Reality And Us

Chapter Thirteen

When Zane was younger, he and his siblings used to dress up so prettily and go around in their neighborhood as a competition to see who got the most candy on Halloween.

They'd put a lot of effort into it, but they didn't only put said effort into their costumes - they used to spend their whole day, till late afternoon, to make tasty sweets, they'd bake scary cupcakes or make marshmallow-ghosts, they'd cook chocolate and put it into Halloween-y forms.

Not only they used to dress up, but their house as well, it was by far the coolest one in the whole neighborhood. They'd make scary puppets and put fake cobwebs everywhere, they'd put funny traps all around the house and garden, fake cadavers of mice or other animals were things you could easily spot in their house.

Zane and his siblings always made sure to be home when most of the kids came, especially once they weren't little children themselves anymore, to scare and entertain them. It always made his heart so warm to see their faces lighting up whenever he gave them their self-made sweets, it was so special.

Or the way their looked surprised and horrified and anxious or even started to scream when you jumped out of nowhere to frighten them, or just when they stepped forward and suddenly were surrounded by all the scary things in their garden.

And after most of the kids were gone, already at home, he and his siblings would go around, that most of the sweets were already given out to other children didn't matter that much. They were always hyped to go, just to show off their beautiful costumes.

Halloween was one of Zane's favorite days of the year, he always waited in anticipation, he loved it.

Now, eighteen years of age, he was sitting in his bed on the morning of the thirty-first of October and dwelt in the memory of his childhood days, wishing to do that just once again. He could, maybe, but now he was an adult and his boyfriend and him had to find their own traditions for Halloween.

Lee might not be as excited to find those traditions, yet, but that was okay. Zane didn't need to have a big Halloween party, he liked those, but it wasn't necessary.

He looked over at his boyfriend, who was still sleeping silently. They had fought the day before, it had been the same as always. The same reason, the same way, the same behavior of both of them, everything was the same as always.

One could say that the way it was the same as always was sad, because those kinds of interactions shouldn't be how relationships should work, but Zane just closed his eyes and kept on pretending.

Pretending they were alright.

Lee opened his eyes, still sleepy, and shuffled over to Zane, laying his head on his boyfriend's lap. "Good morning.", he mumbled closing his eyes once again, enjoying how comfortable it was to have his lover's hand massaging his head.

And they stayed in this position, Zane liked it. He liked the good moments in their relationship, they might be rare, but they made his heart feel fuzzy and light, it made him happier than most other things out there.

Those moments were so lovely, they were what kept him in the relationship, what made him want to stay, take care of what they had, made him love what they had.

He loved the boy in his lap, he really did, and the way he could hear him mutter "I love you." so quietly, it made him smile so incredibly widely, made him rest his head against the wall, eyes closed. He knew Lee loved him, but hearing him say it just made him so, so happy.

"I love you, too.", he whispered back at his boyfriend, just because it felt so right to do it. He felt lucky, lucky to have this boy so close.

Of course they had bad moments. Moments Zane didn't know what do to with himself, because he always caused problems within their relationship. He wasn't attentive enough, too clingy, stressed Lee when he was already so stressed, and Zane felt sorry for it.

He sometimes didn't listen to his boyfriend even though what he said was reasonable, he simply wasn't good enough sometimes. He did wonder why his boyfriend still stayed with him regardless of his flaws, he had already thought of leaving him just because he didn't want to bother Lee anymore, but for some reason his love was returned, it made him feel happy and guilty.

"Let's get up.", Lee whispered, and Zane nodded.

"If you get your head off my lap."

Lee stood up, his hair messy, looking like sleepy chaos. Zane thought him to be beautiful.

They both got off the bed, and went outside of the room, into their living room. Their cute apartment was tidy as always, and Lee let himself fall onto their couch. It was already eleven am, they had slept in, but that wasn't bad. Sleep was good for you.

Zane went towards their kitchen, and Lee looked up.

"You're getting something to drink?", he asked, but it wasn't that much of a question.

The other boy nodded, it wasn't what he wanted to do originally, but it had became it the second his boyfriend had asked - it was better to accept what Lee said as his own truth.

So he went into the kitchen and got a bottle of water and two glasses, he was hungry since he hadn't eaten anything since Friday lunch, but that was okay. He was only there in the kitchen to get water after all, what other reason could there possibly be for him to go there?

He gave a glass of water to his boyfriend, who smiled at him in return.

Then he sat down and shuffled over Lee, who lent his head against Zane's shoulder. It might be Halloween, but he knew that they wouldn't be spending their day in a Halloween-y manner, how most people usually did.

They would just sit there, maybe talk, watch something together, do the laundry, go outside, usual stuff. It was just another day in their relationship, like every single other day.

They hadn't even bought any candy for possible kids or other people passing by, his boyfriend hated sweets. And Zane was okay with that, he told himself. And he believed it.

He started to wonder, Lee hadn't said anything about their fight the day before. Sometimes he didn't address it when Zane had somehow driven his boyfriend to the edge again with his behavior, he knew that. But sometimes he did, reminding him that there was no need for Zane to apologize.

"About yesterday. . .", the blonde-haired boy began, trailing off. He wanted to make sure things were okay between them, was ready to apologize for what he did the day before.

"Yesterday? What do you mean, 'yesterday'?", the other boy answered through a question.

Zane blinked. Didn't they fight yesterday? He thought they did. Or maybe he just imagined it, he had quite vivid dreams.

It happened sometimes, he thought that there were things that took place the day before, just to realize after a conversation with his boyfriend that in reality, his dreams were what made up what he had thought to be a memory.

"We barely saw each other yesterday because you were out with Zoe? What's there to talk about?", Lee asked, his eyebrows furrowing in confusion. Not real one, though.

Zane sighed. He had thought his dreams to be reality again, apparently, he hated it, but didn't think further about it. He said, "Nothing, I must've imagined it."

He was always quite quick to accept what his boyfriend said in order to dodge possible conflict, even subconsciously.

"It's okay, don't stress yourself.", Lee answered, and Zane was swooning. How did he get so lucky with his boyfriend?

Yeah, Zane, lucky.

A/N

This chapter has 1337 words it literally hurts to write this note, . . . I destroyed perfection.