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It was a good day.
Ever since he finally resigned from his temporary position as the Acting Grand Sage, Alhaitham found himself actually going to work with a spring in his step. Okay, maybe not that much - but at least he wasn’t walking to the Akademiya as if he were going to attend his own execution.
Returning to the simple duties of a Scribe was almost a blessing after all the mess he had to deal with before. Today, for example, he finished his work early and allowed himself to relax with a book in his office until it was time for him to clock out.
He ate a tasty shawarma for lunch. In Sumeru City, it was sunny, warm, and not too humid. Overall, Alhaitham was in a good mood.
As always, he passed through the bazaar on his way home. He didn’t have any groceries to buy with plenty of food in the icebox, but he enjoyed looking around the colorful stalls, his headphones thankfully blocking out all of the loud, annoying sounds that would hurt his ears.
Something caught his attention.
A small stall attended by an even smaller elderly man, seemingly selling antiques. Most of the items on display were weird, mismatched things - right up Alhaitham’s alley. He stepped a bit closer to examine the trinkets.
“Good afternoon, Acting Grand Sage,” the vendor greeted him with a pleasant smile.
Alhaitham sighed but didn’t take it to heart. With his resignation not even two weeks behind him, some people could be a little slow on the uptake.
“Just the Scribe now, mister. Good afternoon. May I take a look at some of these?”
“Of course!”
Contrary to popular (or rather, Kaveh’s) belief, Alhaitham wasn’t an impulsive buyer. Each and every purchase he made was thought out, even if it was an objectively ugly wooden carving of an Aranara. He had his reasons for it.
Most of the knick-knacks seemed far too ordinary for him to take home, but his eyes were instantly drawn to a pair of mugs sitting in the corner of the stall. They were very similar in shape, but different in color and details. The first one had a golden sheen to it and was decorated with tiny red gemstones around the rim and the handle, as well as an intricate carving of a sun. Similar to it, the other one was silver, with teal stones and a moon.
Alhaitham chuckled. It… reminded him of someone. And, well, himself.
The owner noticed his interest and smiled. “These are leftovers from two sets that almost sold out, hence there’s a discount. Would you like to purchase them?”
Ever since Kaveh moved in with him, everything in Alhaitham’s house came in pairs. Two cups of coffee in the morning. Two bottles of shampoo in the shower - Kaveh had ‘sensitive hair that required extra care to stay as soft as it was’. Two piles of dishes in the sink. Two dutars. Two bedrooms.
He figured that buying two coffee mugs, similar yet very different, was only appropriate.
Alhaitham could already picture drinking out of them while lounging on the divan with a certain roommate of his.
“Hmm, how much are they?” He asked with a tap of his finger against his chin, pretending to think even though his mind was already made.
“Ten thousand mora for each of them, or eighteen thousand for both,” the vendor supplied sweetly. “For a small extra, I could engrave whatever you want on them as well. I have a really nice machine for it, imported from Liyue.”
Well, the price wasn’t that bad.
“I’ll take both, then.”
With one exchange of a pouch of mora later, Alhaitham made his way home with a brand new mismatched yet matched set of coffee mugs in his arms - one with a ‘K’ and one with an ‘A’.
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Alhaitham was a simple man with a simple routine.
Every day, he woke up at 7 a.m. sharp. He worked out for an hour and then took a shower before heading to the kitchen. He greeted Kaveh, still groggy and grumpy from pulling another all-nighter. He brewed both of them coffee and ate breakfast - usually leftovers from the day before, as he was too lazy to cook.
He clocked in at work at 9 a.m., ate lunch at noon and left at 5 p.m., never staying even a minute longer than he was required to.
Usually, he passed through the bazaar to purchase groceries and an... interesting piece of furniture to tease Kaveh with. He was always at home before 6 p.m.
In the kitchen, he received a warm plate of food made by Kaveh and plenty of nagging - also from Kaveh. Together, they debated random topics of the day over dinner then retired to the living room, where they sat on the divan, each of them doing their own thing. Kaveh - fussing over his commissions, Alhaitham - reading. When it was time for bed, they wished each other goodnight and went their separate ways to their rooms.
Alhaitham really liked his routine. It was easy to follow and predictable. Everything was always in the right place, where it should be.
When he returned home today, he expected the usual dinner with a side of playful banter.
He didn't expect this.
Kaveh was standing in the living room, surrounded by suitcases and boxes. He was filling one of them with what little books he had, taking them one by one off of their shared bookshelf.
Alhaitham felt like someone had poured a bucket of ice cold water over him.
He changed his mind. Today was a bad day.
"What are you doing?" He asked, once he found his voice functional again.
"Good evening to you too, Haitham," the blonde replied in a sharp tone, not even bothering to look at the Scribe. He bent down, placing another book in the box. It looked like he was almost done. "What does it look like I'm doing?"
Alhaitham swallowed heavily before responding. "You're packing."
"I'm moving out."
Just like that, Alhaitham the Scribe of the Sumeru Akademiya, a man who knew twenty languages, was speechless.
For a few seconds he just stood there with his lips parted slightly, trying to curl around words that just couldn't come. In his hand, he was still holding the box with the matching mugs that he bought for Kaveh and himself. For them.
Kaveh finally turned to face him. He was done with the books. His gaze was cold, sharp. Like a stranger's.
"Don't pretend like you don't want to jump in joy at the news, Alhaitham."
His full name. Ouch.
"You're moving out," Alhaitham repeated dumbly, because the words had yet to sink in fully, his voice croaky from the tightness in his throat. "Why?"
Alhaitham's first unconscious reaction was panic. It paralyzed him, sending shivers down his spine and making his arms tingle. Kaveh. Moving out. Kaveh. Moving out? But... this house was meant for two of them. Not for one person. Not for Alhaitham. For them.
He wanted to reach out to Kaveh, to grab that thin arm of his and shake him. He wanted to ask, to beg him not to go. But he was frozen in place.
He couldn't just ask Kaveh not to move out. It wouldn't be fair towards the architect. If there was one thing Alhaitham cared about the most other than his peaceful life, it was Kaveh's wellbeing. No, scratch that. Kaveh's wellbeing was crucial to Alhaitham's peaceful life.
Which was exactly why he couldn't force the blonde to stay. If Kaveh wanted to go, Alhaitham would have to let him. If Kaveh wanted to go, he would, leaving Alhaitham with an empty house that was way too big for one. A house that once was a home.
Unaware of Alhaitham's inner turmoil, Kaveh released a deep sigh as he answered.
"Well... I just finished a big commission for a wealthy man from Fontaine. He was very satisfied with my work, mind you," Kaveh huffed, turning his nose up in that adorable expression of pride. "So satisfied, in fact, that he included a large bonus. The money is enough to ensure I'm able to pay my debt off with regular monthly payments over the next year - in addition to my usual earnings, of course - with some left over to rent a small apartment on the outskirts of the city."
Alhaitham raised his brows. That must have been quite a lot of money. No wonder Kaveh had spent the last three months hunched over his desk and pulling multiple all-nighters.
He listened intently, desperate to commit the pleasant lilt of Kaveh’s voice to memory.
Then, Kaveh's tone grew a bit quiet. He looked away, avoiding Alhaitham's eyes.
"So don't you worry, I will be out of your hair in no time. I'll get my stuff to Tighnari's before I sign the lease tomorrow and– Wait, what are you holding there?"
Ah, Kaveh had finally noticed the box.
Alhaitham shifted his weight on his feet awkwardly, fingers tightening over the cardboard. “I bought it today at the bazaar.”
“What, another godawful decoration to be an eyesore?” Kaveh cocked his eyebrow.
Despite the uncomfortable feelings boiling at the pit of his stomach, Alhaitham had to bite the inside of his cheek to suppress a small smile.
“Mm, no. Not this time.”
With only slightly shaking hands, he placed the offending box on the coffee table, encouraging Kaveh to take a look for himself.
Both of them sat on the divan as the blonde slowly opened it, revealing two mugs inside.
Kaveh blinked, staring at the gold-and-red with the sun and the silver-and-teal with the moon. “Oh. You bought new coffee mugs. You know, they don’t actually look that bad. Not even that kitschy. They must have been a little expensive, though, no?”
“For us.”
The architect looked at him, confused. “What?”
“For us,” Alhaitham repeated, slow and steady. His throat felt unbearably tight again. “I bought them for us.”
Kaveh was silent. He sat there, finally reaching out to take the golden mug in his hand, turning it over and examining every little gemstone, every little detail.
Alhaitham was silent as well.
“Oh. They have our initials on them.” Kaveh’s voice came in a low whisper. “You bought us matching coffee mugs with our initials and I’m fucking moving out.”
And just like that, Alhaitham started crying.
It came as a shock to him as well, honestly. He didn’t remember when was the last time he had cried. Probably at the funeral of his Grandmother, all those years ago. Since then, barely anything. Alhaitham was not a man who cried.
And yet there he was, tears pouring down his cheeks, sniffling softly, hands shaking as he bore his gaze into the floorboards.
“Why would you waste money on… Gods, Haitham, are you crying?” Kaveh sounded almost panicked. Alhaitham couldn’t raise his eyes, couldn’t meet the blonde’s carmine gaze. “Haiyi?”
No, he begged quietly to himself. No, please, don’t use that old nickname. Not here, not now. Not when you’re about to walk out of my life, again.
Warm, nimble, calloused hands came to rest on his cheeks, and he was forced to look at Kaveh. He hiccuped, a new wave of fat tears rolling down his face. The touch burned.
Kaveh was beautiful. So, so beautiful when he looked at Alhaitham like that, brows scrunched up in worry and confusion. His mesmerizing eyes that resembled the most expensive rubies. His freckled, sunkissed cheeks.
Kaveh was beautiful. And so cruel.
His resolution crumbled to dust as he leaned his face into Kaveh’s touch.
“Don’t go,” He pleaded quietly, voice hoarse from crying and the salty-bitter taste of tears on his tongue making him want to gag. “Please.”
“Haitham…”
The Scribe grunted softly as he was pulled into a tight hug, those thin arms embracing his much bigger form. His brain short-circuited for a second and then he was hugging back, clinging to Kaveh tightly as if the blonde were to disappear if he let go.
He pressed his face into the crook of Kaveh’s neck, the darkened tips of his hair tickling his nose. Closed his eyes and inhaled the scent of padisarahs greedily.
“Please, don’t move out.”
With every repetition, it was starting to sound more and more like a prayer.
“I’ll be a better roommate, I promise,” he mumbled wetly against Kaveh’s skin. The tears were still falling, but slower this time, gentler. “Please.”
Please, don’t leave me alone, he wanted to say, but didn’t. He felt that he had already humiliated himself enough.
Kaveh pushed him away a little bit, just enough to look him in the face. His expression was complicated, almost unreadable.
“But… you don’t want me here,” the blonde argued, and it frustrated Alhaitham to no end.
“Who told you that?” He retorted instantly, but in his tearstained voice it sounded more pathetic than sharp like he had intended.
“Uh, you? Was it not you who said ‘Well, you might as well move out of my house’? With every argument we have, I feel like we would both be better off if I got out of here and gave you the peace and quiet you love so much.”
No, that was obviously so wrong. The only peace and quiet Alhaitham loved was the one he experienced during those peaceful evenings with the rain pouring outside the window, his noise-canceling headphones abandoned on the table and the sound of Kaveh’s pencil scratching the paper right beside him.
Or it was peace that was not quiet at all, the two of them sitting together on the divan, plucking the strings of their dutars and softly humming along.
Alhaitham’s peace and quiet would always have a place for Kaveh in it.
“It was never my intention to make you feel like that,” Alhaitham chose his words carefully. Perhaps it would be better if he just… was honest. So that’s what he did. “I only tease you because I like how it gets a rise out of you and how… animated you are when you argue back. Besides, I prefer to call them academic debates, not arguments. Gods know you are the only one who’s able to keep up in a discussion with me.”
After a moment in which the Scribe held his breath, Kaveh’s confusion gave way to a small, exasperated smile and Alhaitham felt his heart clench. “I suppose you’re right.”
A beat of silence. Kaveh’s hands remained on Alhaitham’s burly arms, steadying him.
Alhaitham raised a hand to wipe the remainder of his tears away, painfully aware that his face most likely looked all red and splotchy right now. He wasn’t one to be embarrassed, but he still felt weird for crying. It wasn’t like him.
But Kaveh always had the ability to bring out the parts of him that he would never show to others.
After a moment, the blonde opened his mouth again.
“So… you want me to stay?” He whispered gently, his eyes searching Alhaitham’s.
The Scribe swallowed heavily and held Kaveh’s gaze.
“No,” he said, watching as those carmine eyes widened in a momentary panic. “I need you to stay.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
Kaveh’s cheeks turned a delightful shade of pink and Alhaitham felt his heart hammering wildly in his own chest.
Then Kaveh asked a question that made that hammering nearly screech to a halt.
“Can I kiss you?”
What?
“What?” He whispered, half-convinced that his faulty hearing was deceiving him.
“Can I kiss you, Haiyi?” Kaveh repeated, and yes, it was definitely his senior’s pretty tenor saying those earth-shattering words. And then the blonde started to babble. “U-unless I read this whole situation completely wrong, in which case can you please pretend that you haven’t heard that and can we move on to the part when I unpack my bags and we never speak of this a–”
Alhaitham shut him up with his lips.
The angle was weird. He wasn’t an experienced kisser - there was hardly any occasion to practice when the only object of his affection was always so unattainable.
His nose bumped against Kaveh’s, and their teeth clashed a little bit. After a moment, the blonde shook out of his stupor and reciprocated, using a gentle hand on Alhaitham’s jaw to guide them into a more comfortable position.
Their mouths slotted together. Kaveh kissed him back slowly, eagerly, meticulously. Just a languid, lazy slide of lips against lips.
Oh, and it was delightful.
The taste and scent of Kaveh. The sound of their lips moving together, the smallest slick of saliva. The gentle touch of a calloused hand on his jaw. The heat emanating from Kaveh’s chest as the blonde pressed a little bit closer. Every single one of his senses was stimulated in the best way possible.
Alhaitham could stay in this moment forever and he would be content.
Eventually, they had to pull away from each other, if only to breathe. Still, Alhaitham’s heart gave a soft pang of regret at the loss of Kaveh’s lips against his, and he let out a deep sigh.
Thankfully, that pang was swiftly soothed by the very pleasant sight of Kaveh before him, with his lips swollen and glistening from the kiss and his cheeks red. Gods, Alhaitham wanted to kiss every little freckle under that rosy hue.
“You don’t have to be a better roommate.” Of all things in the world to say after their first kiss, Kaveh chose this , for whatever reason. “In fact, please don’t. It would feel weird to see you acting… meek and polite towards me. I like the teasing, you know. Sometimes.”
Alhaitham chuckled breathlessly, his mind still swimming with the flurry of conflicting emotions inside him. He felt like being honest. Being honest after years of hiding his yearning for the blonde behind teasing jabs and wordless gestures that Kaveh would always misinterpret.
He felt like the little Alhaitham from the Akademiya again, shy and flustered in front of his senior.
“I like having you here. All of the times,” he whispered. “I like when we drink coffee together in the mornings, which is why I got the mugs. I like when you come out of the bathroom with wet hair and ask me to dry it for you with that gadget from Fontaine. Unbelievably, I like it when I hear you hammering away at your projects, because it reminds me that you’re here with me, just a room away. Unless it keeps me up at night, of course.”
That got a laugh out of Kaveh. A pretty, pretty laugh. More exquisite than any birdsong.
“So please,” Alhaitham continued, begging for the final time. “Stay.”
Kaveh sighed deeply, but there was a warm smile on his lips. His eyes almost sparkled, their red color complimented by the flush on his cheekbones.
“You Haravatats and your pretty words…” The blonde teased, causing Alhaitham to roll his eyes. “As if you haven’t convinced me before. Of course I’ll stay, as long as you’ll have me.”
Alhaitham let out a long breath of relief, feeling as if a huge boulder had been lifted from his chest. His body still buzzed from the adrenaline of almost having Kaveh walk out of their home and never return.
But it was their home. It would always be their home.
“Good.” He paused for a bit and averted his gaze. “...Can we kiss again?”
Kaveh answered him by pushing him back onto the divan and straddling his hips.
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Later, when they were laying entangled with each other on the divan, exhausted from a lot of some pretty thorough kissing, Kaveh let out a soft chuckle.
Alhaitham looked down to where the blonde’s face was pressed against his chest, curious as to what had gotten his senior giddy all of a sudden.
“The mugs are pretty cute.” Kaveh smiled up at him. “Even though the gemstones are a bit much.”
Alhaitham rolled his eyes. Couldn’t do without words of criticism, of course.
“Of course they are cute, I picked them,” he said simply and squeezed his arms a little bit tighter around Kaveh’s waist. “I have great taste.”
“Hm, debatable.”
He leaned down to press another soft, wet kiss to Kaveh’s reddened lips. “Just admit that you like the furniture I buy, ya shamsi.”
Alhaitham watched in delight as the blonde’s eyes flew wide open and his cheeks flushed at the affectionate nickname.
“R-really, Haitham? You insufferable man!” Kaveh complained with his voice pitched up an octave.
“What? I’m only telling the truth. You are that to me, you know.” Alhaitham shrugged, pointing to the golden cup adorned with an engraved sun sitting on the coffee table. “Golden and full of light.”
Kaveh groaned and buried his face in Alhaitham’s chest again. “Gods, is this how it’s going to be now? Petnames and sweet words?”
“I am a scholar of linguistics. Should I stop?”
“Absolutely not.”
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A week later when they walked into Lambad’s hand in hand, they were greeted by equally satisfied and annoyed ‘finally!’ from Cyno and Tighnari. Their friends immediately started assaulting them with a barrage of questions, which Kaveh tried his best to answer and Alhaitham gleefully ignored.
And maybe even later, when the matching coffee mugs were joined by a pair of sun-and-moon coasters, Alhaitham received a sweet kiss from Kaveh and smiled like a cat that got the cream.