The Hermit's Retreat

Chapter 6

Scar sat in his room, nervously drumming his fingers on his knee. He'd just sent Cub a Discord message, even though he could've called out to him just as easily. He didn't exactly want the whole house hearing him with what he was planning to do. He'd also messaged Grian, saying simply 'I'm going to do it.' Grian hadn't needed to ask what 'it' was. A few minutes passed, then Cub walked through the door and sat down on the edge of Scar's bed.

"Hey." He greeted.

"Hi." Said Scar.

"What did you need?" Cub asked.

"I just wanted to talk, since we haven't really seen each other in a while."

"Oh. About anything specific?"

"Yeah, actually. L- listen, if I say something crazy, you won't be mad, right?"

"I've got something crazy to say too."

This was it. This was where he was going to tell Scar that he knew, and it was obvious, and that he didn't feel that way. And then they'd always be just friends, but it would be awkward because Cub would pity him. He decided it was better to go ahead and get it over with.

"You go first. I think our crazies might be related." Scar said, bracing himself.

"So, I know that you know that you're like, one of my best friends. And I've had this thing, for a little while now, and I figured that if we're going to be staying in a house together for a month, I should probably tell you this now. Um... I- I like you a lot. Maybe even love you."

Scar was too shocked to respond. Of all the things, that wasn't what he expected to hear. It had thrown him off so badly he forgot he was supposed to respond until Cub started talking again.

"I get it." He said, "you just want to be friends and I ruined everything and-"

Scar cut him off. "No! That's not- I just mean... Why me? I eat through a hole in my stomach, I can't walk, I can't really even breathe. I don't even count as a whole functioning person, so why?"

"Because you're a good person. The fact that you have your own challenges and you still live and don't let it control you just makes you stronger."

"You're serious about this."

"It'd make me a pretty massive jerk if I wasn't."

Scar snorted.

"So what do we do now?"

"I don't know. Do we want to try... this?"

"At this point I'm not sure what else we would do. I think we can both agree that we can't just pretend this conversation didn't happen"

"Yeah," Scar laughed.

"Well alright." Cub said.

"Alright."

Scar felt a weight leave his shoulders.

A/N: I know this one was really short without a lot of buildup to  it, but I felt like it didn't really make sense to add in a bunch of fillers just to get to this point. Also, I've been INSANELY motivated to write more, which is why I've been publishing multiple on the same day. I actually cranked this out in about an hour and a half, which has to be a record for me. Sorry for the long author's note, I'll go now. Peace.