Notes To Myself (a Joshler story)

Day 802, noon

Tyler followed Josh back inside as Josh held his hand. They closed the door behind him and Josh lead Tyler to the kitchen.

"You can sit down, let me make you some tea. Uh... do you like tea?" Josh asked as they reached the kitchen table. Tyler nodded as he sat down. "Yeah, I love tea, thanks bunny", Tyler said. "...sorry", he trailed softly.

"Don't be, you can call me that", Josh smiled softly at the boy as he ran his hand through Tyler's hair. "Are you sure?" Tyler asked. Josh nodded. "One hundred percent", he smiled softly. He turned around and walked to the counter. He grabbed the electric kettle and filled it with water, then turned it on.

He opened one of the cabinets to look for mugs, but they weren't there. "Second on the right", Tyler said. Josh looked behind him at Tyler, softly smiled, before opening the second cabinet on the right. Several mugs were on the shelves. He grabbed two mugs that had bunnies on them. He put them down on the counter.

"What about the tea?" He asked. "Behind that long door, you can pull the handle to pull it out", Tyler said. Josh did as he was told and found plenty of boxes of different types of teas.

"What's your fave, Ty?" Josh asked as he looked at Tyler. "Vanilla", Tyler replied. "And mine?" He asked. Tyler smiled softly. "Vanilla", he repeated. Josh smiled. He looked for the box of vanilla tea and got it out. He waited for the water to boil before he poured it in the mugs, then added the teabags, and later he added a little bit of cold water to make it more drinkable.

"D'you want honey or sugar?" Josh asked. "Sugar, so do you", Tyler said. Josh smiled. "Similar tea taste", he said. Tyler softly laughed. "Yeah", he replied.

"I'm not used to talking about tea with you", Tyler said. "Oh?" Josh wondered as he grabbed the mugs and made his way to the kitchen table. He put the mugs down and sat down opposite of Tyler.

"Well, usually I'm not at your place this early. Actually, I never am", Tyler shrugged weakly. "So we don't drink tea together. There's too little time for that, we only have a few hours of each day together so..." Tyler trailed.

"What time are you usually at my place? Are you here every day?" Josh asked. Tyler nodded. "Almost every day, yeah, unless you have something important planned. Other than that, I'm always here for a few hours", Tyler said.

"Usually around 5 or 6 PM. I then usually leave around 10, or 10:30. At most we have like 5,5 hours together usually", Tyler softly said.

"But now we have at least ten more together right?" Josh asked, and he sounded hopeful. Tyler smiled softly. "Of course, if you want to. I won't leave before that unless you want me to", Tyler said. Josh reached over to Tyler's hands who were both wrapped around his mug. He gently prodded Tyler's fingers with his fingertips so one of Tyler's hands let go of the mug. Josh laced his fingers through Tyler's and gently squeezed.

Tyler inhaled shakily, closing his eyes as he tightened his grip a bit. He opened his eyes and looked at Josh as he bit his lip hard.

"Just... let me know if you don't want this okay?" Josh said. "There's nothing that I want more than this", Tyler softly said. "Which is why it's so difficult. Even if I tell you that you're not supposed to do something or you should stop doing something... please don't", Tyler softly said. "Please don't let me go", his voice cracked as his eyes got watery again.

Josh wrapped his other hand around Tyler's hand too, so he was holding it with both hands.

"I won't", he promised.

~~

Mehhhhhh what did you think of this? Wanted to write more but I'm in the train and I don't wanna cry in public so I gotta wait 'til I'm back home to write more haha. Love u all, thank you for loving this story so far ♥️