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“Does meddling run in your bloodline?”
Marc squeaked as he threw himself away from the window and turned to face the person that had snuck up on him. His terror quickly changed to exasperation when he took in the calmly smiling face of his boyfriend. The other boy was crouched to Marc's right, his satchel was flat on the ground while his chin rested on his crossed arms. Nathaniel’s smile only grew when Marc huffed at him.
“Nathaniel!” He hissed. “What do you think you're doing?”
“I could ask you the same thing.” Nathaniel retorted. He ignored Marc's affronted glare as he continued. “Besides, I asked you a question first.”
Marc stared at Nathaniel, completely unimpressed by his attempt to change topics. “One, you know that's literally impossible.” He magnanimously ignored the eye roll that he saw Nathaniel give him at that statement. They’d had the ‘Nature vs Nurture’ discussion several times already in relation to Marc, his parents and, especially his and Marinette’s behaviour. The results weren’t stacking too well in Marc’s favour. He was also ignoring that; Nathaniel was smug enough to inflate an air balloon, he didn’t need any more ego boosting.
“Two,” Marc said as he turned back to watching over –not spying on, thank you very much– Aurore. “If you absolutely must know, I’m offering silent support and supervision to a friend.”
Ever since lycée, heck, even as far back as collège, their friends have been trying to help Aurore and Mireille confess to Zoé. Yet, here they were, five years later and Marc was convinced that it was a miracle that those two had gotten together at all. He was, however, a loyal friend and so he would help them. Life would be so much easier if they all talked about their feelings but everytime he tried to hint at that, all three women would go full Marinette™ on him. It was endearing and infuriating in equal measure. And his wonderful, caring, boyfriend had lent him a shoulder to groan and complain upon, only to seal his fate by stating that it was a ‘Canon Event’ and they couldn’t interrupt it. Afterall, Marinette had found her way to love, and Mireille and Aurore had found each other. Marc immediately relegated Nathaniel’s laughing butt to the couch and resolved to sulk in peace.
Of course Nathaniel would say that. He wasn’t the one that had had to listen to his cousin whine into the early hours of the day about muscle definition, athletic skills, kind dispositions, wise intellects and hidden depths. Enough was enough. Marc was determined to not endure another year of that just because time had a course to run. He was expediting it.
Unfortunately, all attempts thus far had been…lacking. A few of the other students in his and Aurore’s Composition and Literature class had jumped at the chance to help out. So as the semester neared to an end they decided to set their plan in motion. Everyday, either Aurore or Mireille would try to gauge Zoé's interest in them and if she was open to a poly relationship. It had been obvious that she was at least into girls, but that definitely didn’t guarantee that she would be into them. Every attempt at subtle questioning, however, had only led to more confusion or no answers at all.
As Marc watched Aurore awkwardly flop at questioning Zoé again, he could tell that this would be another failure. He knocked his head into the window sill and took a few blissful seconds to question his life choices.
‘I could have been working on my own date night plans by now.’ I thought mournfully. Sheepishly he tilted his head to find that Nathaniel was already watching him with that familiar fond look in his eyes. The same one he got when he thought that Marc was perhaps being a little silly and the situation didn’t require half as much stress as Marc “liked” to do, but he loved him too much to stop his thinking process. It was his “my boyfriend is a silly goose and he’s my silly goose and I love him” look and really what was Marc supposed to do? Not kiss him? Preposterous.
He’d just decided to put all thoughts of his friends’ romantic woes aside in favour of pursuing his own romantic interest, –if only for a moment, they were still in a classroom after all– when he felt someone shove him aside. He almost shot out of his skin in fright. If it weren’t for the fact that he would have likely taken Nathaniel’s poor tongue with him, he might have truly jumped. As it were, the push only caused minimal injury in the form of one bitten tongue, and one choking fit..
Despite his bitten and slightly swollen tongue, Nathaniel still somehow managed a casual and almost chipper, “Hey, Alya!” to the person who had shoved them aside.
“Hey, guys!” She responded in no small amount of glee. “Don’t let us stop you. Just wanted a better view and there was no way I was staying out there.” She huffed.
Once Marc had his breathing under control he turned his other side only to almost fall over as he saw the entire Literature class plus several of Nathaniel’s classmates there. Including his cousin.
“Bells. I’m putting bells on all of you.” He whispered sharply. Alya waved him off as she continued to take in the scene in the courtyard, which was very quickly becoming an artform of awkwardness. Mireille smiled sheepishly at him but Marc could forgive her more than the others. That was her girlfriend and hopefully-soon-to-be girlfriend out there. The others however, he could not so easily forgive.
“Why are you all here? Didn’t all of your classes finish already?
“Yup!” Rose piped up from where she’d snuggled into Juleka’s side.
“We wanted to see if today was the day they finally asked Zoé out.” Juleka continued where Rose left off.
Marc stared at Juleka in disbelief. “You don't even go to this campus, and I know for a fact that you had classes this afternoon. How'd you get here so quickly?”
Rose giggled before quickly covering her hands. When that didn't stop the sounds she turned and buried her face in Juleka's arm.
“Trade secret.” The goth replied unabashedly.
Marc huffed and was about to call her out on host when Alya gasped excitedly, bringing their collective attention back to the reason they were all hiding and spying on their friends.
They all looked out at once, breaths held as Aurore moved closer to Zoé . Marc was distantly aware of Nathaniel grabbing his hand as they both leaned into the window. Logically, Marc knew that they wouldn't hear any better by doing so, but it didn't stop him from trying. He began repeatedly mumbling encouraging words and prayers, when he saw Aurore hold Zoé ’s hand.
He didn’t know how he got there, but Marc was basically smooshed to the window pane and saw the exact moment when Aurore finally, finally, confessed to Zoé that she wanted to be in a relationship with her. Zoé ’s eyes began to water as she raised her free hand to her mouth and nodded enthusiastically.
Marc jumped and cheered with the others when Aurore pulled Zoé into a tight embrace. He distantly registered the bright light of a camera flash as two women startled apart at the sudden noise. They frantically looked around and bent double with laughter when they noticed the group waving excitedly from the classroom. Zoé rushed them both over, threw open the classroom doors and announced to the room, “I said yes to them both!”
The cheering after that was more akin to stadium when the home team was winning, than a small group of university students. Marc felt his ears pop lightly but the look of joy on two of his best friends’ faces was worth anything.
The noise only increased when Alya called for a proper photo to commemorate the moment. Zoé eagerly pulled a laughing Aurore into her arms and signalled for Mireille to join them just as the camera went off, forever immortalising the moment of them gazing into each other’s eyes with large grins.
One of these days, Marc would learn to not make declarations lightly. He would never take back saying that his friends’ happiness was worth anything, he would stand by that fully. However, he would like to make a slight addendum. His time with his boyfriend was very precious and missing more of it was a punishment of epic proportions. There were few things worth missing more time with Nathaniel. As he ascended the stairs to Aurore’s dorm, he asked himself when helping her through a breakdown over polka dots and stripes began to rank above time with his boyfriend.
“Ok, I’m here. I’ll call you a little later, babe.” Marc said as he knocked lightly on the dorm door.
“Ok, Angel. Don’t sound so upset over it. We’ll still see each other Saturday, and–” Nathaniel cut in just as Marc opened his mouth, “we can call over dinner tonight and get lunch tomorrow.”
Marc huffed, keeping one ear intently focused on the increasingly concerning amount of crashing noises coming from Aurore’s dorm. He knocked lightly once more when the noises stopped. “Aurore?”
“Coming! I’ll be right there!” It was muffled by the door, and whatever she might have found herself under but she sounded alive and unharmed so Marc turned his attention back to his phone call.
“On Saturday,” he huffed, “we’ll be hanging out with everyone else, and tonight and tomorrow we won’t have as much time to ourselves as we would have had today.”
“I know, Angel, I know. But we’ll have more chances. Besides, Toussaint is coming up. We can hang out then.”
“Yeah…” Marc sulked, “but that’s only ten days.”
“It’s ten more than today, my love.” Marc felt his posture loosen with the use of the term of endearment, and he slumped against the doorframe to support his rapidly weakening knees.
“That’s foul play and you know it.” Marc could feel Nathaniel’s smug satisfaction over the phone. He didn’t need to see Nathaniel to know that he was making a smug face. He did it every time he managed to shut Marc's brain down.
Whatever reply Nathaniel had was lost to Marc as Aurore's door opened, depositing him –bag, phone and all– onto Aurore’s carpeted entryway. The two of them blinked owlishly at each other. After an indeterminable amount of time, Aurore’s eyebrows furrowed as she glanced between the open doorway and Marc on the floor. “Why are you on the ground?” She asked confusedly.
“I’m testing the carpet.” Marc deadpanned before he could catch himself. He flushed as soon as the words were out. The sound of Nathaniel’s tinny laughter filtering out of Marc’s phone drew his attention back to his call. He hurriedly apologised to Aurore, who simply huffed and helped him up off of the carpet. When Marc brought the phone back to his ear the previously tinny laughter became clearer, if still a bit distorted.
“Haha. Are you done?” Marc asked, “I’ve gotta go help Aurore and I’d be lost to despair if you choked on all of that laughter in my absence.”
“Hardy ha, Snarky McSnarkster.” Nathaniel replied as he calmed down. “Go help Aurore. We’ll talk later. Bye, babe. Love you.”
Marc finished saying his goodbyes, complete with over the phone kisses, before hanging up and taking in the dorm room. More accurately, he gaped in increasing horror at the natural disaster that had run through the room. There were clothes strewn on every available surface. Out of the corner of his eyes Marc noticed a set of umbrellas hung in a row along the top of a door. That was the only orderly thing in the entire room. Seemingly every square inch of the room, from the window, to the floor was covered in clothes or makeup.
He slowly turned to face Aurore, who stood sheepishly in the middle of the room. She had a mismatched pair of shoes on, along with a lace bolero and capri pants.
“So. You were definitely not kidding about that SOS.” Marc said as he stared at the fuzzy headband hanging on for dear to a strand of Aurore’s hair.
“Nope.”
With a huff Marc shifted some clothes off of a chair and set his bag down. He pulled out his notebook and unlocked his phone. He snapped a quick series of pictures before opening his messaging app and sending a hasty SOS to the ZoRoReille Guardians Chat.
“Alright. Let’s do this.” With a quick crack to his knuckles Marc proceeded to direct Aurore to change while he sorted her disaster into orderly piles.
While they got to work Marc’s phone buzzed three times on the dresser. Three confirmations to his request. Plan “get Aurore settled and prepped for her date” was officially in action. They’d be damned if they let all of their years of hard work fail now.
Marc sighed as he flopped down onto the lounge chair next to Nathaniel. He passed Nathaniel his requested monstrosity masquerading as an acceptable drink, happily accepted the payment of kisses in return and proceeded to attempt to merge himself and Nathaniel into one being. He knew that he wouldn’t actually be able to –curse these corporeal forms– but he was determined to get as close as comfortably and humanly possible. Finally, after weeks of trying to get quality time with his boyfriend, Marc felt the world settle in equilibrium as Nathaniel threw his arm around Marc’s shoulders and pulled him closer. Giving him an extra tight hug and squeeze for good measure.
Marc sighed, “I have waited all year for this–”
“We literally hung out just last week.” Nathaniel chuckled as he cut off Marc’s dramatic monologue, and earned himself a smack.
“As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted by a man that drinks abominations–”
“Excuse you, Mr. ‘Three shots of vodka goes great with a mug of banana soda and whipped cream’!” Nathaniel laughed in disbelief. Marc shushed him with a finger sternly pressed to his traitorous mouth. The nerve, from his own boyfriend no less.
“Ah. We said we’d never speak about that! At least I can admit when my experiments fail. You still drink cola with clementine juice and vodka!” Marc huffed and turned away in feigned annoyance. He had just enough time to admire the way Zoé dipped Mireille during their performance before his attention was once again captured by Nathaniel.
The other man had grabbed him by his hips with one hand, leaned over and grabbed his far leg with the other, before yanking and pulling Marc firmly into his lap. The momentum of the movement startled a hysterical laugh out of Marc as he spun around, almost knocking his drink from his hand.
“Now then,” Nathaniel huffed as he firmly grabbed Marc’s waist and pulled him in those last few inches until they were chest to chest, “what was my amazingly talented, drop dead gorgeous boyfriend trying to say?”
This close, Marc could see every tiny fleck of colour in Nath’s eyes as he just looked at Marc. The points where the greens and blues mixed with vibrant intensity, bolstered by the sparks of devotion and love as Nathaniel’s gaze softened. Marc had no chance of withstanding it. He really did miss being this close and intimate with Nathaniel.
Marc groaned as the combination of sweet words and besotted looks hit him at once. He didn’t stand a chance. He leaned down and tucked his face into the space between Nathaniel’s neck and shoulder. “Why can’t I stay mad at you?” He pouted.
Nathaniel chuckled in response before pressing a kiss to Marc’s hair, or at least as much of it as he could reach with Marc attempting to burrow into his neck. “I missed you too” Nathaniel whispered as the main lights came back on. Marc, feeling well and truly warmed by the admission, pushed himself back just far enough to see Nathaniel’s eyes again. He gently cupped his free hand under Nathaniel’s chin and brought the other man’s face closer and closer until he was able to press a chaste kiss to his lips. Just as he was about to deepen the kiss, his dear, beloved cousin’s voice broke his reverie.
“There’ll be plenty of time to try to eat your boyfriend later, Marc, we want– Mireille!” Marinette’s voice changed from teasing to joyfully aghast and Marc whipped around to look at the booth to the right of the stage just in time to see Zoé surfacing for air from the dip and kiss Mireille had held her in.
“We didn’t get to do it on stage.” Mireille laughed. She pecked Zoé once more, chastely this time before pulling the other woman to sit with her and Aurore.
“As I was trying to say, we’re going to start the big group song so I hope you all put your suggestions in.” The group of gathered university students erupted in loud cheers with a few good natured jeers. Everyone knew that the majority of them had suggested songs based on what would be the most obnoxious to perform and they were all excited to see what would be picked.
Looking around from his seat on Nathaniel’s lap, Marc felt completely at peace. He pulled his phone from his pocket and snapped two quick pictures; a panorama of the karaoke room and one selfie of just him and Nathaniel.
Later he would print out the pictures and frame them on his desk. He would look at them in moments when he missed his friends and family and Nathaniel. Those snapshots of beloved memories would remind him that living in the moment was just as worthwhile as capturing it.