Take my heart

Chapter XI

 "Good."

Not much about the situation is new. Being the reckless idiot to go swimming in autumn, or lend his jackets during winter, Caesar is always the first to catch colds, and he hasn't gotten any better at dealing with them. Still, every other worry Connor had before this is soon forgotten in favor of caring for his friend.

And he's good at it, too. He goes to a grocery store nearby to get supplies, makes tea, some soup, grabs medicine to help the congestion and the headache. Asking what bothers Caesar is unnecessary, Connor can feel the weight of the illness in his own muscles, even if he's not sick himself. He grabs an extra pillow, sets it on the floor of his room and sits next to Caesar's-his bed. The bed where Caesar is sound asleep, anyway.

It's a side not many know about him, but he rather likes taking care of his friends. They don't always make it easy: Adryan is too proud to accept anyone's advice or concern, and Darren rarely ever lets him know what's going on with his life. He still manages, of course, like any good mom friend would do. Even then, Caesar is the one that makes it the easiest and hardest at the same time.

On one hand, it just comes natural, like everything about them. Connor is the one to remember Caesar's appointments and karate lessons, the one to remind him to take his medicine and brush his teeth and eat healthy and drink enough water. And Caesar does the same, in a way, keeps track of Connor's deadlines, watches over his pieces in the oven, gets him early to his expositions.

On the other hand, he's a reckless, brainless idiot, which perfectly explains why he's friends with Adryan. After all, who was there to patch him up after every stupid fight? Before Connor learned to do it himself, he would take the dimwit to his mother, so Caesar's parents wouldn't find out until later. And then he did learn, so they would just take care of everything on their own.

But it's a tricky situation, to hold in his hands the bleeding ones of the person he shares a heart with. It's tricky to hold him still when the world's pressure becomes unbearable and he's this close to cracking underneath it. It's tricky, in the worst way, to clean a boy's tears after some terrible nightmare where they were freezing to death, it's tricky to let Caesar crawl into his warmth to convince himself that they're not in danger, it's tricky to stop him from repeating 'I couldn't save you' over and over until he loses his mind. It's tricky because his helplessness and his grief thunder through Connor's bones and carve a hole in his chest, to the point they share every last bit of pain.

He wouldn't have it any other way, though.

Bringing the teacup to his lips, Connor watches Caesar's sleeping figure mindlessly. It's like he never left, and all this time he's been crashing at his bed, snoring softly and drooling on his pillow. Yet, at the same time, it feels like he's been gone for centuries. Connor's heart swells in his chest and he can't draw his eyes away, instead keeps them there as if in fear that his friend will vanish when he's not paying attention.

He takes a deep, shaky breath, with much of the amazement of someone who thought they were drowning. Yeah, it's not quite easy to think he never left, because these past three weeks have been a growing mess, and a big part of it must be due to the fact that Connor can't function right without his idiot. Hell, he got himself into a relationship he doesn't want, had like three full nights of sleep in the whole time, and overworked himself to insanity to the point falling in love with his best friend sounded sensible.

The worst part is, he still hasn't convinced himself of the contrary.

There's no point in staring at him like this. He carries every bit and detail of Caesar's face around on muscle memory alone. Everything, from the arch of his nose to the curve of his mouth, from the scar near his hairline to the uneven line of his jaw, from the shadow his eyelashes cast on his cheekbones to the space between his brows, everything is carved into his own skin by force of time. He could sculpt Caesar's face in marble and make it unidentifiable from the actual boy.