Chapter Text
The process of Viktor beginning to feel at home in Jayce's apartment took up the rest of the winter, but when he referred to the flat as "their home" instead of "Jayce's home" for the first time in April, Jayce was overjoyed. He'd done whatever he could to make Viktor comfortable, which included installing a wall-mounted handle in the shower for him to hold onto and reorganizing the entire living room so it was easier to move around with a cane. Viktor had referred to this as overkill, but Jayce didn't see it like that.
The physical wellbeing of Viktor was only one aspect that took time to get in check when it came to their living situation. Jayce had lived alone for a few years at that point, and unless Mel was staying over for the night he always expected the flat to be empty and all to himself. The same was the case for Viktor, who was a bit of a recluse and enjoyed his alone time.
Jayce had almost gotten a heart attack the morning after they'd finished moving in when he'd woken up to noises coming from the kitchen. He'd rushed in with nothing but a morning gown and startled Viktor who had dropped the freshly brewed coffee on the ground and received burns to his feet from the hot liquid as well as breaking the coffee pot. A similar instance had occurred when Jayce had been working on something at his desk, wearing headphones, and Viktor had grabbed his shoulder out of nowhere to get his attention. Jayce had accidentally elbowed him in the face and spilled his soda right over his keyboard.
Things had gotten better as time went on, though. They no longer walked in on the other half-naked in the bathroom after forgetting to knock or lock the door, and they'd subconsciously split household chores between one another; while Jayce did most of the grocery shopping and cleaning, Viktor took care of cooking and laundry. It was a working partnership.
Alongside the housework, the professional side of their relationship had also skyrocketed in productivity and functionality. It was so easy to stream, film, edit and post from the same house that Jayce almost didn't know how he'd managed before Viktor moved in. Viktor had also offered to become a moderator for his livestreams on those nights he had nothing else to get done, and Jayce couldn't be more grateful. His platform had entered the stage that auto-moderation on Twitch no longer cut it, and Viktor was an incredibly efficient, professional and likeable moderator.
One thing VIktor had refused to do so far, though, was showing himself on camera. He occasionally shouted something from the doorway of Jayce's room and his viewers could hear his voice, but that was the extent of how much they knew about Jayce's mysterious new roommate-employee. Jayce couldn't blame Viktor; it was a big decision putting yourself out there online, especially on such a large platform as his. He knew Viktor was rather self-conscious about a lot of things, so the thought of being streamed to thousands of people didn't appeal to him in the slightest.
The topic resurfaced on one May evening when Jayce had just finished with a stream and joined Viktor on the living room sofa. He was curled up into a blanket with a laptop, lazily scrolling through flagged comments on Jayce's newest YouTube upload.
"Sounds like you had fun," Viktor said and glanced at him with a soft grin. Jayce had been screaming for the better part of two hours thanks to a particularly thrilling horror game.
"Hopefully I wasn't too obnoxious," Jayce chuckled and turned on the TV for some light background noise. "I need to soundproof my room."
"You say that after every stream." Viktor turned back to his laptop screen and switched from YouTube to Twitter to see the aftermath of the evening. It was pretty much what he'd expected — people live-tweeting about Jayce's reactions and stuff he'd said, as well as posting an obscene amount of blurry or shaken up screenshots of his face with captions like ' omg my poor little meow meow is scared' . What the hell.
"I don't understand 'stan Twitter'," Viktor declared, making heavy air quotes with his fingers.
"Yeah. They can get weird sometimes," Jayce said, glancing over at Viktor's screen with a smirk.
Viktor's slight smile vanished as he started reading more of the replies. "Why are so many people talking about me? What did you say?" he asked in a suspicious tone. It wasn't uncommon for him to be tagged a few times during a night of streaming, but this seemed… excessive. His name was all over the hashtag.
"Well…" Jayce rubbed his forehead and laughed nervously. "I might've mentioned you a few more times than average, is all. And they saw a glimpse of your arm when you popped in at one point."
"An arm," Viktor repeated. "People are desperate nowadays, huh."
"Yeah, but that made everyone ask when you would stream with me and, I don't know, I said that 'at some point'. So now everyone assumes it's like next week."
"You're joking."
"Am not," Jayce frowned. "I know you don't like the idea of it but I feel like it could be fun!"
Viktor put his laptop away and pulled his knees up to his chest, hugging them firmly. "Not interested."
Jayce leaned on him and wrapped an arm around the smaller man's shoulder. "Man, just for a couple minutes would be fine!" he insisted. "You're a big part of this community and deserve the recognition."
"Why do I need to show my stupid face for that?" Viktor snapped at him, turning away from Jayce's pleading eyes.
"First of all, your face is not stupid. Second, I…" Jayce tried very hard to come up with a reason. "Okay you have no need for that but I think people would even appreciate you hanging out without a camera!"
"I'm not good at talking to people," Viktor muttered. Jayce could sense he was becoming more convinced by the second, but was also slightly afraid that he would get mad at the pestering.
"I'm not gonna force you to do anythin' you don't want," Jayce let go of Viktor and turned back to the television. "But just think about it."
— — —
"I'll do it."
Jayce pulled a confused face as he watched his roommate sit down at the small dinner table and begin slurping his sweet milk. Jayce rushed to gulp down the cereal he'd just filled his own mouth with before Viktor had come out of his room. "Do what?" he finally replied and poured himself more orange juice.
"The stream thing," Viktor said, quirking a brow in slight annoyance at the reaction. As if it was Jayce's fault he couldn't read minds.
Jayce took a sip of his juice, face scrunched up in thought. Finally, he remembered the conversation they'd had two days earlier. "Oh!" he exclaimed and splashed a few drops of juice on the table in his haste to put the glass down and lean in closer. "You'll come on camera?"
"...First of all, that sounds wrong," Viktor said, having interrupted his own initial train of thought. "And yes. I suppose I will."
Jayce laughed, ignoring the dirty comment. "Oh, that's great! I was really hoping you'd say yes."
"Well I'd hope you did, since you asked," Viktor rolled his eyes benevolently.
"When do you wanna do it? Tonight?" Jayce asked excitedly.
"Gods, no," Viktor shut him down immediately, looking slightly startled. "Maybe… Maybe this weekend. I don't know. I forgot your schedule for the week."
"Viktor, you made my schedule. Literally last night."
"But it's not my schedule, so I didn't bother memorizing it," Viktor shrugged nonchalantly and downed the rest of his milk.
It was Jayce's time to show exasperation by rubbing his forehead. "Yeah, okay," he gave in. "Weekend's fine, I don't have anything special planned." He watched as Viktor started putting butter on a piece of uncooked toast. "We have a toaster, y'know."
"I know. I prefer it like this." He emphasized his point by taking a big bite out of the bread. "Anyway. What do you want me to do in the stream, anyway?"
"I… didn't think that far," Jayce admitted.
Viktor chuckled, "Never do, do you?"
"Maybe we could invite some people over, too? So you wouldn't feel so nervous."
"Uncomfortable is the word I would use," Viktor said, deflating a bit in his chair. "But I also don't like people, Jayce."
"I know. But you're fine with Vi and Cait, yeah?" Jayce pestered on, just like he always did to Viktor's distaste. "We could all play together, or just hang out? Do a… Q and A?"
Viktor shook his hands in front of Jayce's face to silence him. "I don't know now do I care, really," he said and stuffed his face with bread. "Just decide for me by Saturday, yeah?"
Jayce only had time for a nod before Viktor already grabbed his cane and stood up, piling three more pieces of buttered up bread and a cup of boiling hot coffee on top of a plate. Nodding a goodbye, he retreated back into his room with his breakfast and shut the door behind him. This was Jayce's cue to not bother him; as much as it was nice to idly chat in the living room, breakfast was a sacred time for Viktor had he'd made it very clear from the very beginning that he didn't want anyone to ruin that for him. It took a while for him to wake up in the morning.
Knowing he wouldn't hear from his roommate for the next couple of hours, Jayce decided to spend his breakfast productively by solidifying the weekend's plans right then and there. He propped his phone against the orange juice box and FaceTimed Caitlyn.
It took a minute for her to pick up, and when she finally did, she looked rather annoyed. "What do you want at nine in the morning?" she asked in a hushed tone and further hid herself into the blankets, only visible from the nose up.
"Oh I'm sorry, did I interrupt Ms. Sleeping Beauty over there?" Jayce sneered.
"Some of us like to enjoy our days off," Caitlyn said and flipped on her side, a tuft of pink hair poking out from behind her. So that's why she was being quiet. "Whatever. What do you need?" Jayce found it endearing how thick her accent got in the mornings. It was the same case with Viktor.
"Me and Vik are planning to stream together this weekend. He wants you to join them." He decided to put the words in Viktor's mouth instead of his own since Caitlyn had quickly developed a soft spot for the man after meeting him for the first time. Jayce was happy about them getting along well.
Caitlyn looked like she was in pain. "And this couldn't wait until like… I don't know, noon? It's Wednesday!"
"Sorry," Jayce blushed a bit and scratched his chin. "I feel like I woulda forgotten to ask otherwise."
"Yeah, I can imagine," Caitlyn sighed and switched her phone from one hand to another as she flipped on her stomach. "I guess that could be fun. What did you have in mind?"
"Not sure yet. Maybe some games, or just hanging out," Jayce shrugged.
Caitlyn let her eyes dart over to her girlfriend. She was quiet for a bit, gently smiling at the other woman's sleeping face. "Okay, yeah," she finally looked back at Jayce. "I shall consult this sleepyhead and let you know."
"My formal thanks," Jayce bowed his head with a grin. "And sorry. For waking you up."
Caitlyn stuck out her tongue. "You've given me some free time to adore my gorgeous, beautiful, future wife. So you're forgiven." She gave a cheeky grin, exposing her tooth gap.
"You're so cute," Jayce shook his head. "Alright. Text me when you've gathered your intel, milady."
Caitlyn saluted approvingly and ended the call without further goodbyes. Jayce stared at the ' call ended ' on his screen, losing himself in thought. "Future wife," he muttered with a soft smile. He remembered how rough the start of those two's relationship had been. But he supposed the stereotype of lesbians getting engaged within a year of knowing each other checked off. Personally, he couldn't see himself in a marriage, at least not anytime soon. He felt guilty admitting that out loud, though. It was a staple of a good relationship, was it not? And he liked Mel, liked her a lot. So why couldn't he see them together like that?