Opening up can open some wounds

Hi beautiful people!
This is a Wesper oneshot I've been working on for a while now. I finally had the time (and inspiration) to finish and publish it.

Hope you like it :)
(English isn't my first language, so I apologise for mistakes and if words don't always sound natural! I don't have a beta reader, so there might be a few typos here and there.)

Jesper heard the first, muffled notes of the piano at the foot of the steps leading to the front door of the mansion. With his hands tucked deep in the pockets of his winter coat, he quickly climbed up the steps, risking twice to slip on the thin layer of ice that had formed on them, and haltered before the front door. He stamped his feet repeatedly to remove as much snow trapped under his boots as he could, his warm breath forming white clouds in the freezing air, then opened the front door and slid inside. He felt his cheeks sting as the sudden heat of the house collided with his face. A shiver of pleasure ran through his body. It was late in the evening, dark and cold outside, and he was finally home, welcomed by a warm house and Wylan's music resonating through the ground floor.

He took off his coat and the scarf Wylan had insisted he wore, and went straight for the kitchen. He would take advantage of the time needed for Wylan to finish the piece he was playing – Jesper never liked to interrupt him – to make chamomile for both of them. In all fairness, he didn't even like chamomile that much. He'd rarely had it before living with Wylan, maybe he had taken a sip once or twice from her mum's cup as a child, but that was all. He never felt the need to drink something that would relax him anyway. Restlessness had always felt like an intrinsic part of his life. But left aside his indifference for the taste, Jesper had grown fond of the implications chamomile carried, namely spending quality time with Wylan at the end of the day. They'd usually sit or lie close, warm cups in their hands, talking about the events of the day, cuddling in silence or squabbling over trivial stuff. It was a small tradition they established almost unconsciously and it grew on them, though neither of the two had ever confessed it to the other. Perhaps they didn't even need to, it was an underlying, reciprocal understanding.

He found the kettle on one of the upper shelves of the kitchen, filled it with water and put it on the stove. With his elbows on the counter, he stared at the kettle absentmindedly, waiting for the water to boil. Soon enough, his mind started to rummage through the events of the evening.

After eating dinner early with Wylan, he had gone to the Crow Club to check on Kaz, as promised to Inej the day before her departure. It was Jesper, Wylan and Inej's secret deal, but Jesper started to suspect it had very little secrecy left.

Last time he went to visit Kaz, claiming he was "casually strolling nearby and thought of paying a visit to my lovely friend", Kaz had stopped scribbling down on one of his damned papers, placed the pen to its side and slowly lifted his head, staring silently at Jesper with his perpetual unimpressed look. After what seemed like ages of scrutinizing Jesper's face, he had only said, with an undeniably skeptical tone in his voice, "Right."

Jesper wasn't surprised, he even suspected Kaz had guessed everything from the very beginning but never said a word or complained about it because it was evidence of Inej's care for him, or part of the legacy she left behind whenever she parted from Ketterdam, from Kaz.
Or, less poetically, Kaz had realised it after repeatedly hearing Jesper's absurd excuses. He had never learnt how to lie, especially to Kaz's face.

On his way back home after said above visit, ruminating on Kaz's cold reply to Jesper's reason for stopping by, the Zemeni boy got slightly upset thinking how the Bastard of the Barrel had so easily dismissed the possibility that Jesper went to visit him because, as his friend, genuinely cared about his wellbeing. As soon as he got home, he complained about it to Wylan in his usual, exaggerated ways.
"No offence Jes, but are you really trying to tell me you'd have gone visiting Kaz every two days if Inej's hadn't asked you to?" Wylan had said in response while arranging the shirts in his wardrobe. When no answer came, the boy had turned to face Jesper, who was squinting at him, apparently offended by his words. At that, the red-headed boy had straightened his back and turned his full attention to the matter, trying to make his point clearer.