Fixing Nico [boyxboy / yaoi]

Ch 8 - How everything went Right... then Wrong again

'Okay, okay,' I chucked, resting him down until his toes touched the gravelly cement. The instant he felt the ground underneath him, he leaped a metre away and glared at me, arms crossed, as he tried to conceal the obvious blush that tinted his cheeks.

'Why were you carrying me? Where are we going?' he asked sullenly, now refusing to meet my gaze.

I sighed. 'You fell asleep in my arms. I was taking you home.'

'You were planning to carry me all the way home?' he gasped. 'Wasn't I too heavy for you?'

'No! Are you kidding me? You weigh, like, nothing!'

Nico frowned. 'Gee... I didn't think I was that skinny,' he muttered, almost to himself.

'You're beautiful,' I assured him, then felt my own face heating up in a blush.

'What?' he looked stunned.

'I... I said... you're beautiful, Nico. You're so beautiful, I...' I coughed awkwardly. 'I'm really sorry. You know that, right?'

Nico didn't say anything for a while - the seconds ticked past agonisingly as Nico glared down at his feet, wrapping his arms around himself like he was cold, despite the overwhelming heat of the Australian summer - even at night. Just when I was sure he was going to ignore me, he piped up finally: 'I know... I think.'

'I love you, Nico!' I yelled desperately - probably louder that I should've, because Nico blinked and flinched back slightly. 'Sorry - but, seriously, I love you. And I'm not just saying it. I mean it.'

I stared at Nico intensely - every fibre of my being willing him to whisper back the words I badly wanted to hear as I riveted my gaze on him. He look... unsure. Afraid. 

'Nico,' I pressed, stressing very syllable as I tried winning him over. 'I love you. I -'

'How?'

'What?'

'How?' Nico repeated, his voice just a hollow, bitter whisper. 'How could you possibly love me? It's been three days.'

'Love at first sight?' I suggested.

'I don't believe in that.'

'Why not?' I demanded.

'It's a ridiculous notion based on physical attraction and lust. I'm not sure what love is, but it's not that.'

I blinked, crossing my arms over my chest. 'What about Romeo and Juliet?'

'What about them?'

'It was love at first sight for them. They married within three days of meeting. They gave their lives for their love for each other! You don't think that's beautiful? You don't think things like that could ever happen?' I raised an eyebrow, challenging Nico as he continued to glare sullenly down at him feet.

'Firstly, Romeo and Juliet is fiction,' Nico muttered.

'But... it's based on a true story...'

'A highly exaggerated true story,' Nico corrected meticulously. 'And, secondly, their deaths were just pointless. They both could have survived if they hadn't been so melodramatic and killed themselves at each other's dead bodies - or supposedly-dead, in Romeo's case.' This kid is way too pessimistic for his own good, I thought to myself gloomily. 'Okay, so many that wasn't the best comparison... but come on, Nico. You really don't believe that I love you?'

'I...' Nico gulped, his expression suddenly changing: his eyebrows furrowed and his eyes started brimming - he looked on the verge of tears, and not only that, but like he was actually in physical pain. He hugged himself, shivering under his baggy clothes. 'I want to. I wish I could believe that someone like you would love someone like me. But... Listen, Christian, even if you do l-love me... you shouldn't. You'd be better off with someone else... it was selfish of me to think t-that we could b-be together,' Nico finished, stuttering as his words became thick and wet. He suddenly whipped around, turning to face away from me, but not before I saw the teardrops leak from his eyes and stream down his cheeks.