Chapter Text
Brimming with youth, yet somehow, many students seemed incapable of carrying the heaviest books back to the return slot.
Six thick texts laid, stacked and abandoned, at the end of one of the lobby’s angular, red benches. Standing over them, Viktor sighed. Late afternoon light filtered through the glass-paned roof four stories above, soothing when he looked up through the open floors and forced a deep breath to tuck away his animosity.
For all its aggressive lines and sterile palette, the library was a beautiful place. From the outside, it rose over the Seine as a Brutalist form of raw concrete and glass. Modern in design and age, its innards were honest in their utilitarian purpose to provide space and light in which an unending flow of scholars could bloom, mind and spirit. Structure to facilitate progress.
The scattering of lobby seating was perhaps the least popular choice for studying coeds; not only was it a disconnected trek down from the stacks, but it was subject to the noise and commotion of the crowd in transition. Still, the tables at the center served as a common meeting place for large groups or for those who didn’t intend to get much done — patrons more likely to leave a mess for the librarians to pick up.
Balancing his cane against the bench, Viktor bent to heft the pile of texts into his arms. He shifted them into a precarious, single-armed grip before taking hold of his cane and turning for the circulation desk.
The books fell out of his arms more than he made the choice to place them on the cart to be shelved.
“Putain,” he muttered, shaking the collateral-damage pain out of his jammed pinky until a presence at his back slowly pulled him from his ire. Whoever it was felt large, quietly in need, and when he turned around, Viktor verified that and much more. 1
He was clearly a student, eyes bright and searching, but he was nothing like the type of mousy boy that usually came asking for help before the term had officially started. This boy was a man – a handsome man, tan with a swath of dark hair and a well-cut jaw. Worry marred his statuesque features.
“Bonjour,” he said. 2
"Bonjour.” Viktor stepped up to the desk. “Comment puis-je vous aider?" 3
“Je cherche un livre…” The words fell unnaturally from the man’s lips, not nearly nasal enough. His natural accent jumped out in full force as he changed into his mother tongue. “Principles of Optics, Born and Wolf.” 4
“Optics- Avez-vous regardé dans les cinq cent trente?” 5
The man glanced down at a small piece of paper in his hand, as if he was reading the lagging translation of Viktor’s speech.
“Oui,” he said slowly. Viktor could hear the friction in his mind’s gears. “Mais je…uh…” 6
“Would you rather speak English?”
Relief washed over the man like a wave. It swiped away the wrinkle in his brow and made him all the more devastatingly handsome.
“Yes, thank you.”
“It will be on the second floor. The five hundred and…thirties, I would presume.”
The man sheepishly held up the piece of paper with a scribbled-down call number on it. “I was just there, but I couldn’t find it for some reason.”
Viktor pushed his glasses up from the end of his nose, then accepted the paper scrap.
“It is possible that someone has tried to start the term before you,” Viktor offered, peering over his wire-frame readers. “I can come search for it myself.”
Before waiting for an answer, Viktor made for the elevator. Regret radiated from the man as they walked along opposite sides of the long desk. “I’m sorry- I didn’t mean to make you come upstairs, I could go look again if you-“ But Viktor waved him off, rounding the endcap and passing him by to catch the closing doors of the emptying car with the tip of his cane.
Without the barrier of the desk, it was easier to spot him as the foreigner he was. His clothes were modern and colorful, tight fit to his body. He had an approachable air that most French people wouldn’t dream of carrying, boy-next-door charm only found in imported, far-off media. It was almost off-putting to see in real life.
“You don’t sound like you’re from around here either?” the man asked after they were in motion. This elevator was notably slow, unfortunately enough to pressure those who couldn’t handle a bit of silence into chitchat. Viktor was not the typical topic of choice, though.
“Mmm, yes, though I have lived here for 25 years now, nearly as long as I had in Česko-” he searched his brain for the English word, “Czechoslovakia.”
Two minutes had been long enough to deduce that every thought and emotion was projected onto the man’s face, even simple age arithmetic. It was a kind of naïve honesty that Viktor wasn’t sure he’d ever possessed.
“Very cool.” Ding. “I’m American.”
“Yes, that is clear,” Viktor said. A blush snuck over the man’s cheeks as Viktor led them through the opening door. In a few of the man’s oversized steps, he was back at Viktor’s side.
“Well, your English really is good.”
“Thank you. I do not use it often, though I have had quite some time to practice.”
The wonderment of the second floor stole away the man’s attention before Viktor could finish, not that Viktor could blame him.
Over the waist-high railing to their right laid the atrium, open to the top floor, and a table-laden study area beyond. Each floor held an identical study area on the south side with small, quiet rooms lining the east and west, and the most coveted seating floated in the open air: an egg-shaped conversation pit that protruded into the atrium off of each of the upper three floors to hang above the circulation desk below.
But on their left was Viktor’s favorite feature: the solarium.
From the exterior, it was the exception in the draconian facade of concrete and narrow windows. It sat atop the main entrance, light and airy, a glass room projected out from the building’s surface to keep watch over the river walk below. To stand inside it, even on the coldest winter day, was to be filled with warmth.
“I’ve only been in the country for, like, a week, I’m a physics grad student,” the man said, snapping back out of his solarium daze as they continued toward the east stacks. Silence clearly made him uncomfortable. “I’m working on my French – je ne suis pas un idiot, I promise,” he added. 7
Viktor rounded the railing’s corner and turned down one of the first aisles. “That will be a helpful phrase,” he said, scanning the eye-level row suggested by the call number before starting on the several below. Sometimes students purposefully misshelved the reference texts that couldn’t be checked out in hopes of finding them available upon their return, which, if he was forced to guess, is why he found it near his knees.
“Here it is,” he said, leaning his weight into his cane with a groan to bend and heft the book from the shelf. As he struggled to right himself encumbered, large hands rushed to pull it from his grip.
“Wow, if it was a snake, it would’ve bit me.”
Viktor blinked. “I… suppose so.” A little of that bashful blush returned to the man’s cheeks. Viktor averted his eyes. “Is that all you need?”
“Uh, yeah! Thanks!”
Viktor gave a solemn nod. “Bonne chance avec ton français.” 8
The next day, Viktor looked up from the logs at his fingertips to find, first, a copy of Problems in General Physics sliding toward him across the counter, and then, a proud patron standing at the other side.
“Bonjour! J'ai trouvé ce livre por moi-même.” 9
Viktor looked over his glasses at the man from yesterday. His memory hadn’t sufficiently captured just how handsome he was nor how horrific his accent was, perhaps both influenced by the endearing gap between his front teeth that Viktor found difficult to look away from.
“Par toi-même. Very close.” 10
“Right.” The man’s face fell. “Damn.”
“Library card?” Viktor opened the book and pulled the card from inside the cover.
“Oh, yeah.” The bag slung over the man’s shoulder fell to the crook of his arm, and he rifled through it. It was odd, synthetic fabric suited more for outdoor leisure than higher education, and a far cry from anything a native student would carry around. From it, he produced a library card.
“I’m Jayce, by the way.” He placed the card on the circulation desk and pointed down at the chicken scratch Nom.: Jayce Talis at the top. “I don’t think I introduced myself the other day.”
“You had no need to,” Viktor said, as he copied down Jayce’s card number. When he tried to turn his attention to his stamp and ink pad, it was instead pulled to where Jayce gazed expectantly at him. He had to look away, anywhere else, lest he embarrass himself by staring back.
“I am Viktor,” he said, loading the stamp and pressing 16 SEPT 1976 onto the due date section of the card and the book’s inner cover alike.
“Nice to meet you, Viktor.” His name sounded so clear in that American twang. Jayce’s kilowatt smile was nearly blinding, a screaming thank you for a gift Viktor didn’t understand how he’d given.
“You as well.” Viktor closed the book and slid it back across the desk. “Due in two weeks.”
From where he’d been reshelving in the stacks, Viktor had watched for several minutes as Jayce repeatedly reached into his bag and snuck something small into his mouth, eyes still focused down on his work, instead of doing anything about it.
Normally, he would have relished the opportunity to enforce the rule of the land, but today, he just couldn’t bring himself to look away from the way the tips of Jayce’s fingers sank into the plush of his lips let alone stop it from happening.
Shelving the last book had snapped him from his spell. Mid-stride, Viktor tapped on the table as he walked by.
"There is no food in the library, s'il vous plaît.” 11
Even a low whisper startled Jayce in the quiet. Guilt dripped from his face as he looked up with the suddenly stilled jaw of a dog who’d been caught with its owner’s favorite shoe hanging from its mouth.
“Sorry,” Jayce said, the sound snack-mumbled.
Viktor looked ahead and kept walking, a smile creeping onto his face.
Not again.
A prankster had made a habit of stapling his personal dating ad to the third floor Community Events board. Each time Viktor ripped it down, it reappeared within a day's time. This time, he’d placed it at the very top, out of an old man’s reach, and Viktor had a mind to call the number for this apparent giant himself to give him a firm talking to.
He stared up at it in defeat. There was a step stool downstairs, but the idea of dragging it all the way up here made his blood boil. Standing on a chair wasn’t a good idea, but maybe he was frustrated enough to throw caution to the wind. When he turned around to locate one, he encountered an easier method already looking back at him.
Jayce trotted over with a beckoning wave, and without a second thought.
“Would you please remove that for me?”
“Totally.” With a single hop, Jayce ripped the paper from the cork. Turning to face Viktor, he gazed at the ad, a stumped child reading their first book sans pictures.
“Interested?” Viktor asked – couldn’t help himself. Not only was it overly friendly, but a bit stupid; many men would not take kindly to his suggestion.
He barely had time to regret it before Jayce gave him a smug smile.
“It says he wants… une femme blonde aux… well, I don’t know the next word but it doesn’t matter, I’ve already failed.” He handed the crinkled paper to Viktor. “I don’t think he’ll like me.” 12
Énormes nichons, it said. Viktor tried not to look at Jayce’s énormes nichons, ill disguised behind a striped rugby shirt. 13
“No, I suppose not.”
People did not attach themselves to Viktor, a fact true largely by design. Living alone and keeping solitary hobbies were choices he was happy with. He was friendly with the rest of the staff, but he wouldn’t call any of them his friends, and a student had certainly never attempted to strike up a friendship with him, but that… seemed to be what was happening.
Jayce felt ever-present within the library's walls (sometimes as much as Viktor himself), but friendship is not simply made of being in the same place at the same time. It was the sum of each small interaction.
Crossing Viktor’s path with a smile turned to stopping at the circulation desk for a short greeting before he continued upstairs to work. He rarely left without saying goodbye. The more Viktor heard of it, the more he realized just how atrocious Jayce’s French was – good looks could only get you so far — but he occasionally tried nonetheless, and Viktor did his best to steer him straight as if he had a stake.
By a few weeks into the semester, Jayce rarely made it upstairs at all, less ending his greeting and more lengthening their tether to reach one of the tables scattered around Viktor’s lobby domain.
From his post, Viktor had a perfect view of him, ever studious and ever handsome, so young. Anyone with eyes and an interest in men would find Jayce interesting to watch across the room, he often told himself. Viktor was no stranger to attraction, but his proclivity for alone time had relegated him to a few trysts over the years, largely physical, never lasting. Just enough to scratch the itch.
Watching Jayce was scratching an itch.
Catching his eye across the room and smiling like they had a secret was scratching an itch.
But Viktor wasn’t delusional. With all of Paris at Jayce’s fingertips, it would be ill-advised and unthinkable for him to settle for a banged-up, old librarian.
Still, he found himself shifting his posture and worrying at the wrinkles in his admittedly-drab wardrobe. Lingering on the unruly grays at his temple that refused to stay kempt in his ponytail and tucking them behind his ear before returning to the circulation desk. He learned Jayce’s schedule by sheer accident and could predict his visits with some accuracy, which is why it surprised him to hear Jayce’s voice on a new morning.
“For being someone who works in a library, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you ever actually open somethin’ to read it.”
Said somethin’ nearly fell to the floor. Wide-eyed, Viktor found Jayce leaning over the desk, peering down at the book settled over his crossed knee. He needed to get his ears checked, and maybe his heart too, now beating twice as fast as it was mere seconds before when Jayce’s eyes slid up to meet his own.
“Yes, well, Saturday mornings are peaceful here. Not much to do but wait for the students to wake.”
Jayce gestured to himself, here I am, as if Viktor possibly could have looked through him, then cocked his head at the book again.
“Whatcha reading?”
“Oh, ehm, it is something I picked up recently.” Thumb in the page, Viktor closed his book to show the cover, DARKROOM TECHNIQUES printed in big block letters.
“Darkroom techniques, oh for photography? Are you trying to learn?”
“Learn, no, I am quite experienced. But…” Viktor searched for the right words, “one can always learn something, new ideas.”
“Of course, yeah.” Jayce shifted his weight and leaned in further, planting his elbow on the desk and his cleft chin in his palm. If Viktor sat a little taller, he’d have had a perfect view down the open few top buttons of his shirt. “I’ve always found photography interesting as an optics guy but I just don’t have a creative bone in my body.”
An uncertain noise left Viktor’s throat.
“That does not necessarily preclude you from taking a good photograph.”
“I dunno about that-”
“No, really!” Even conversational excitement felt too big for the open, silent space. Viktor drew in on himself at the sight of Jayce’s wide eyes. “Really,” he said, softer. “It is not always about creativity. More, a good photo captures what a person finds interesting. Certainly there are things you find interesting.”
“Well, sure,” Jayce said, boyish grin plastered over his face. “Though I’m not sure all of them are easy to photograph.”
“That is sometimes the joy in it – the pursuit.” The book’s spine crinkled as Viktor reopened it. He let his eyes fall to the page as he finished his thought. “You are a smart boy. You would find a way.”
Summer always gave one last attempt at sticking around, clinging to the edges of late September. This was that day, temperatures mirroring those two months prior, though the final hurrah of it weighed heavy in the air.
The lobby’s plants thrived in filtered sunlight from above, startlingly alive in comparison to the drab concrete as long as someone remembered to water them. Viktor seemed to be the only one capable out of the staff, or perhaps was the only one who cared, which is how he found himself giving each one a final deep summer drink.
He was watching the earth at the foot of a particularly large potted ficus darken when the glass doors flew open with a blur of color that stole away every bit of his consciousness.
There was never a time when Viktor found Jayce unattractive but this… this was something else.
The Jayce jogging across the lobby toward Viktor was ripped from a corner of his imagination he hadn’t yet allowed himself to peer into. A statue of an Olympian in motion, entirely foreign and untouchable.
A yellow tank top clung tight to his torso with sweat, thin straps and a deep scooping neckline baring the built muscle of his shoulders and pecs. Trailing downward, the tiniest purple shorts known to man, the thickest thighs and calves, and the dirtiest old tennis shoes.
His typical clothing didn’t do much to hide what was beneath but it’d never been so clear to see: all the beautiful muscle and skin and hair, garnished with a dangerously genuine smile as he zeroed in on Viktor across the room.
“Viktor, hey-” He came to a halt a few steps away. “Oh, watch it-” He drew attention to the watering can in Viktor’s slack hand that had strayed over the edge of the pot with water still flowing freely from the spout.
“Kurva,” Viktor muttered, righting it with a splash, though it had already nearly emptied onto the floor between them. He stared down at the puddle, then attempted to bring his eyes back to Jayce’s face without falling into the chasm where a dusting of coarse hair sat between each swelling pec. 14
“You are,” Viktor paused. Words – appropriate ones, and in the correct language – weren’t coming to mind. Sweaty. Sexy. “In danger?” he said, gesturing at the general rushed state of him.
“Ah, yeah.” Jayce rolled his eyes. “No, I’m just going on a run.”
A disgust in Viktor’s gut boiled over uninhibited. “For fun?”
Jayce chuckled. “Yeah, I guess. Fitness. It’s not as popular here, I noticed."
“No, it’s…” The way Jayce bounced on the balls of his feet made every bare muscle in his legs ripple and flex, enough to make Viktor’s mouth run dry, “frankly, a bit absurd.”
A laugh burst from behind Jayce’s probably perfect six pack.
“Paris had a marathon this past year. We’re infiltrating,” he said, waggling his brow. Viktor gestured dismissively with the watering can. “Anyway, uh, I told you yesterday I was going home to make these, so, I brought you some.”
Viktor had been too preoccupied to think about the cloth wrapped package hanging from Jayce’s hand until he raised it to waist level. Yesterday, he’d been talking about his grandmother’s recipe, wondering where to get the things he needed to make-
“Corned…” Old man memory under harsh conditions never stood a chance.
“Cornbread, yeah! And chili, which is like a stew. You’ve got a fridge back there, right?”
“We do,” Viktor said, trying not to stumble over his words. His hands were full of cane and can. He set the watering can at the edge of the planter, and as he reached for the bag, Jayce was already stepping forward and threading it to hang from his forearm. More than the weight of the bag, Viktor felt the soft brush of fingers on his bare skin.
All of it was foreign, the American good boy kindness and the familiar touch. Worry flooded his chest, fear that he was blushing or drooling or growing visibly hard in his suit trousers. Making a fool of himself.
“Thank you, this is very kind,” Viktor said, looking down at the food for longer than felt socially acceptable. When he looked up, Jayce still looked tickled, though, taking a few slow steps backward.
“Let me know what you think?”
“I will.”
“Gotta run,” Jayce said, not an ounce of shame for his joke. Viktor couldn’t help the smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.
“Thank you again,” he said, maybe too soft to hear.
Shock stood him still until the entrance doors had closed behind the most pert, least covered ass he’d seen in years. Shaking himself from his trance, Viktor became suddenly too aware, turning to find Marguerite, the other librarian on call, watching with a puzzled look in her eye.
His eyes fell to the floor in discomfort. He would need to find a mop.
The promising smell of the cornbread reheating in the oven and chili on the stove paled in comparison to their delicious taste. As Viktor ate them, alone at his kitchen table, he wondered what it would be like to dine with the chef.