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“Don’t worry,” the man said, “it wont hurt a bit.”
#
Quentin didn't notice the guy right away. In fact it took him about a week before his brain registered “tall and well dressed” presence. He was on meds, new ones, and they were making him kind of dozy - vaguely nauseous at times to the point where he just wanted to stay in bed forever because what was the point anyway? He probably would have to mention that and hope for a switch of meds next time he was going to a check-in with a doc. Everything felt as if he was in a fog, and the past weeks were a blurry mess he couldn’t remember properly. “Experimental medication trial” he had been told, “strong secondary effect on some people”. Quentin had to agree with them on that if this was the result he got for trying it. He was so out of it he had no idea how he had actually managed to get into that Yale graduate program.
He sure as Hell couldn't really remember interviewing for it in the first place.
James told him, mildly annoyed and a bit worried, that Julia was with him that day. But Julia didn't answer his texts - or his calls. Maybe Quentin had fucked up. James tried to be reassuring, telling Quentin he hardly saw her too but… James also mentioned that Quentin hadn't seemed that worried at her birthday party, which left Quentin feeling shitty and uneasy. He couldn't bring himself to tell James he didn't recall that birthday party in the slightest. Only vague impressions, glimpses too fickle to be caught and a nasty headache that made him want to not think about it at all.
The point was that this guy had been in the periphery of Quentin’s space for a while. He was tall, and really well dressed – even someone as dispassionate about clothes as Quentin could tell that much – and he seemed to be in a lot of places where Quentin went. Coffee shops, bars, libraries, and the list went on. Of course the guy had the right to be in those places, it wasn’t like Quentin thought he was a stalker –he was probably another post-graduate student. But once Quentin noticed him, it became hard for him not to notice him all the time. He wasn’t always alone, a beautiful dark haired girl came with him once or twice but she never stayed long. He couldn’t explain why he felt this strange hyperawareness around the guy – he wasn’t sure if it was because oh the guy’s presence or if it was just him being weird. Mostly he tried to ignore it. He thought about mentioning it to someone but he was reluctant to ask if everyone else saw him too. He didn’t want to deal with the way people would look at him if he asked.
In the end, thankfully, he didn’t have to.
While Quentin was trying to get through a text he was supposed read weeks ago – almost bored to the point of giving up – then he saw, from the corner of his eye, one of the waitresses of the coffee shop asking the guy if he needed a refill. “No thanks– unless you have an Irish coffee version of that one?” he heard the guy say. He had a nice voice. The waitress laughed and told him that no, they didn’t have any alcoholic version of the coffee and the guy sighed dramatically, “Oh well, I tried.”
For some reasons, it made Quentin smile.
#
He kept losing things. Random things, not things he needed on a daily basis like keys, or cards, but pens, mugs, clothes kept disappearing.
Quentin had never been the most organized person but it was getting weirdly out of control. It made him feel on edge, like something was off fundamentally wrong but he kept missing the point. He would work on an assignment, get up to get a drink and the pen would be gone when he came back – not just on the floor, or under some furniture but plain gone.
Things appeared too. Cards seemed to move from places to places, books he didn’t think he owned appeared in his apartment, random papers and notes with a writing that wasn’t his, something that looked like a clock but didn’t seem to show time. Most of the books were about magic, and Quentin didn’t know if someone was playing an elaborated trick on him or if he was really losing it for good this time.
He never allowed himself to read them.
#
Tall and well dressed stood-off in a discreet sort of way, if such a thing was possible.
There was something about him that seemed to both attract the eyes and make Quentin's mind dismiss him. He was fit, stylish and attractive, hardly a rare combination here in New York yet Quentin noticed him. What was stranger was how he felt like this man was looking at him. He knew it was just in his head, but still had the sensation of a gaze on him, before even noticing the guy’s presence sometimes. This was likely his imagination going overboard - why would that guy look at him and not talk to him? He certainly didn’t look shy. “It’s just your imagination,” he told himself over and over again when he felt eyes on him, until he could ignore it and move on. Still, Quentin couldn’t fully shake the impression that he was being watched.
#
He couldn't remember his dreams anymore.
It was new; he had always been able to recall his dreams before, with an uncanny accuracy even which was probably why he was so bothered by it now. It seemed important somehow. Then again, Quentin brain was wired particularly wrong recently. He took his meds, but they barely help – and not with the unrest those dreams he couldn’t remember left behind. Feeling semi functional and restless was becoming his daily routine.
Some days he would woke with a low fear in the back of his mind that he couldn’t explain. Other days he woke wanting to punch someone in the face - except it had to be a very specific someone and he couldn’t quite remember who.
#
“I can’t believe you are willingly paying for this crap. Well no, actually I can, but there is no way I’m letting you drink that any longer.”
“Excuse me?” Quentin stuttered, with his usual grace as tall and well dressed sat down in front of him at the table he was more or less squatting, pretending to work on his assignment while sipping at his beer hoping for inspiration - or a miracle at this point considering this paper was due tomorrow.
“I’ll excuse you alright, yes. This is clearly a much needed intervention Q.”
Quentin distantly thought maybe he should be worried that tall and well dressed was suddenly talking to him – was he hallucinating? - but for some reasons he felt calmer than he had in a while. Confused, but not in a bad way.
“I don’t think there is anything wrong with it?” he tried instead, looking down at his drink.
“Of course you don’t.” the guy said rolling his eyes, and it should have felt condescending – it would have from anyone else, but it made Quentin want to smile.
“Then… what should I drink? You know - if I was to ask for recommendations?”
Tall and well dressed smiled. It wasn’t the prettiest smile in the world, crooked and toothy but Quentin felt something in him flip nonetheless.
“Oh, I’ll do better than recommendations!” the man said, his smile turning into a smirk, a quiet kind of eagerness in his voice, “I’m going to order it for us – consider it a new required part of your education.”
Quentin mentally said goodbye to his assignment. He would have to bullshit his way out of it one way or another tomorrow. Or not. Either way he had a feeling that unless he felt like writing drunk, he wouldn’t be in any state to finish that essay once they would be done.
The next morning, with a terrible hangover that made him regret pretty much all his life choices, Quentin realized that he couldn’t remember telling Eliot his name before Eliot started to call him Q.
#
“I’m Eliot.” Tall and well dressed said at some point during the night and Quentin swallowed the “I know” that almost passed his lips, unable to figure out why he felt like he knew that already. He was so drunk, and so was Eliot. “Quentin.” He said instead and Eliot nodded and got them another pretty cocktail. He thought he heard Eliot saying something, but it got lost in the noise of the bar.
#
Eliot appeared at random times after that night easing himself in Quentin’s life so smoothly it left Quentin a little breathless. He wondered why someone like Eliot would go out of his way to hang with someone like him.
“I bond fast.” Said Eliot with a shrug, as if it explained everything.
Quentin gave him a skeptic look, but he felt like smiling.
“Time is an illusion and all that?” he replied jokingly, without thinking.
He had expected Eliot to laugh, but Eliot looked surprised. There was and expression on his face that Quentin wasn’t sure he knew what to call, but it was gone too fast and he couldn’t be sure he had really seen it. Eliot said something witty, bringing their easy banter back but Quentin couldn't help feeling like something had happened.
#
“Are you singing Tailor Swift in your head?” someone complained loudly behind him. Quentin gave them the finger without looking back, because he was dreaming and he would sing whatever he wanted in his head if he felt like it.
#
It was a constant source of thrill that Eliot seemed to genuinely like him. It didn’t make sense to Quentin, but he accepted it like another mystery of life. This mystery at least, was kind of cool. It felt right, and it was one of the few things in his life that felt that way right now - if not the only one. Eliot was amazingly easy to be around, in a way that reminded Quentin of Julia and yet they were nothing alike. It wasn’t right to compare them – the only thing Eliot had truly in common with Julia was that he seemed to find Quentin worthy of his time.
Some things about Eliot were strange, but Quentin always chose to overlook them. It didn’t mean he did not notice. Eliot once or twice mentioned a Margo and looked like he had let something slip he shouldn’t have had when Quentin asked him who she was.
#
“Of course it would have to be you, because fuck me that’s why.”
Quentin knew he was dreaming again so it was not as surprising as it should have been. Though he didn’t know why some annoyingly good looking guy - brown skin and dressed like a hipster - would be ranting at him in his dream. Or why he suddenly had the strong urge to punch this dude in the face. His subconscious was getting weirder by the minute.
“I’m sorry?” he said instead because he was going to try being polite about it – you know, before actually punching him in the face. Why not? it was a dream after all, Quentin was pretty sure punching random people was allowed there.
“Not as much as I am.” Annoying guy said, and his face was looking more punchable by the second.
The guy looked vaguely insulted, and Quentin wondered if he had said that out loud. Then he remembered that he was dreaming.
“I can’t believe it has come to this.” Annoying guy said, sulking.
“Ok?” Quentin started, already hoping for a change of scenery – maybe he could make himself dream of something else.
“You’re not going anywhere!” annoying guy cut in. He took a step in Quentin’s direction and Quentin immediately stepped back. The guy sighed and took a paper out of his pocket. “Here goes nothing.” He extended his hand holding the paper toward Quentin. “Do you have any idea what this is?”
Quentin hesitated. He didn’t feel like helping but at the same time he was curious. He looked at the paper.
“Uh, this is a weird dream.” He said airily.
“What? Look asshole…”
This guy was officially the most annoying dream person Quentin could remember and he couldn’t wait to wake up.
“This is the emblem of Ember.” He said.
“The what now?”
Quentin sighed.
“It’s from Fillory. Look I don’t know what kind of point this dream is trying to make with that and to be honest I really I don’t care I just wish you could disappear... now.”
“Are you fucking with me me right now? I’ve seen this in a dungeon where a monster was interrogating a missing girl and I need to know where she is because I can’t stop hearing her crying for help in my mind! So if you could stop bullshiting about your nerd books I would…”
“Why would I lie? This makes absolutely no sense! Look, I don’t know what you want me to tell you! I don’t see why anyone would go that far into making a place look like Fillory just to torture people in it! And the only other explanation would be that you went to Fillory which should be impossible because it’s a story and I don’t really care about what it could mean because this is a dream and I’m going to wake up and forget all about it.” Said Quentin closing his eyes and hoping for this whole thing stop.
“Like hell you…”
Quentin woke up.
He spent his entire morning wondering what he had been dreaming about because he felt oddly bothered, and like he really should have punched someone in the face.
#
“Are you ok?” Eliot asked, looking truly concerned.
Quentin hadn’t felt ok at all and tried texting Eliot to cancel their plans, which was how he ended up with Eliot at his doorstep. Not that Quentin was complaining.
“I’m just having weird dreams recently.” He said, shaking his head. The migraine was getting worst.
It wasn’t the first time he woke with a migraine in the last weeks, but this one was vicious.
“Oh… What about?” Eliot asked, and there was something in his tone, but Quentin really couldn’t focus on that right now.
“I don’t know – that’s the point I guess. I just… I could always remember my dreams before. Now I’m just left with the feeling that I missed something.”
“Maybe you did.” Eliot said, his voice careful, before distracting Quentin with a glass of water and some painkillers.
#
Quentin knew Eliot was gay. It wasn’t like it was a big secret - or especially obvious either - it just was something Quentin knew.
Eliot hadn’t said a word about it and Quentin hadn’t asked. But he knew the same way he knew Eliot had a pretty difficult childhood and would likely not want to talk about it. It was slightly freaky, because Quentin was shit at reading people and he was pretty sure he was shit at reading Eliot too yet he somehow knew that much about him without being able to explain why. Like most thing regarding his now two months old friendship with Eliot, he avoided thinking about it too much. He didn’t want to ruin this.
Despite knowing though, it came as a surprise when one night they were spending at Quentin’s apartment he realized that this all felt sort of like a date. It was after probably too many bottles of really good wines Eliot had brought with him, both of them were artfully slumped on the couch. Eliot was looking at him with something in his eyes that made Quentin feel both tingly and inadequate. It suddenly felt as if maybe Eliot was about to kiss him. Quentin distantly told himself he would without a doubt freak out about it later, but certainly wasn’t going to stop it from happening as Eliot leaned toward him and... Stopped halfway.
“I think”, Eliot said, carefully pulling himself back in his own space, “that we’re a bit more drunk that I anticipated Q.”
His voice was low and rough, he avoided Quentin’s gaze.
“Uh.” Quentin eloquently said.
#
They both ignored it in the morning.
Eliot said something about having to go back, work to do and such, and Quentin pretended to listen - mostly nodding blindly. He felt too awake, keyed-up about that almost kiss that had not happen. Maybe it wasn’t even really what had been about to happened.
He did freak out about it as soon as Eliot was gone, then again Eliot hadn’t looked so cool with it either, so that was something. “Something like both of you being idiots yeah” a voice said in his mind. Quentin had never think about a voice as “punchable” before, but this one fitted the brief.
“Shut up...” he muttered out loud, hoping for his hangover to go away with the voice.
#
The next time they met, it was in a coffee shop.
Quentin told himself that it was for the best – less awkward than his apartment, neutral territory – but the idea that Eliot had thought about this too before suggesting the place didn’t sit well with him. He was aware that it was ridiculous to feel so angsty about something that hadn’t happen but being conscious about it did not help him to stop feeling that way. They had both been drunk, those things happened – or at least that’s what Quentin had heard. But what actually left Quentin feeling shifty and on edge was not being able to figure out why we felt some anger toward Eliot. He had no reasons to be angry with Eliot – Eliot had been right to stop - they were both drunk and Quentin wasn’t even gay, he couldn’t be what Eliot needed. Hell if Eliot was to ask Quentin would probably bolt, so he couldn’t be mad at Eliot for not asking.
Knowing it made no sense however, didn’t stop him from being cranky and kind of an asshole for the rest of the week.
#
What Quentin hadn’t expected, was for Julia to come to him.
His memories were still confusing, but he believed she had some good reasons for not calling him back. Sure, he couldn’t remember precisely that almost month, but he did feel an odd mix of old resentment and guilt when he thought about her. He was trying to be honest lately, at least with himself, and admitted that he wasn’t past being a jerk. He had been angry with her, for a while. Feeling like she was leaving him behind – that was the only way Quentin knew to put it. It wasn’t fair to her – to either of them in fact – but of course it hadn’t stop the feeling and maybe he had slipped and been an utter asshole about it.
So, he left messages, but never expected much out of it.
She hadn’t answer and he realized now that he didn’t expect her to. Which probably explained why he was left speechless, wondering if he was dreaming when he opened the door of his place at some ungodly hour in the night - or morning, who cared? - to find her waiting behind it.
“Can I come in?” she asked.
She sounded drained and Quentin felt his heart sink a little.
“Fuck, you look like shit Jules.” He said, because of course he would put his foot in his mouth and be his usual charming self about it. He grimaced, already regretting his words but Julia didn’t seem to care and pushed past him into his apartment.
He was going to need coffee for this.
#
“You don’t remember? How can you not remember?” Julia cried out.
She was agitated - her hands were shaking and she was too pale. Quentin couldn’t remember ever seeing her falling apart like this. He felt morbidly fascinated by it, unable to stop watching yet not saying anything. He didn’t know what to say - too used to be the one spiraling out of control to be of any help to her. He still felt out of control, just numb and abnormally at peace with it.
“What am I supposed to remember?” he asked.
She paused, and looked at him – really looked - like she was looking for something inside of him.
“Do you remember the manuscript – Fillory book sixth – it was given to you when we went for that Yale interview of yours.”
“There is no sixth book, you know that Jules.” Quentin said, frowning. Because why would Julia invent something like this? She was the one who had been so annoyed with Quentin’s attachment to those books, to Fillory, she wouldn’t go for something like this, even if she was angry, even to be cruel, he knew that much about her still. Hopefully.
“Yeah”, she laughed bitterly, “that what I said back then. But I think it was already a test Q – gosh, those assholes do love their tests. Maybe one just for you, or for both of us I don’t know. She gave it to you. That woman gave it to you.”
Julia wasn’t lying. Quentin knew it with the same type of guts deep conviction he had about Eliot. He could almost taste it, the feeling he had reading the first lines, the excitation. His head hurt. She wouldn’t lie about that, about Fillory, he thought. He didn’t know what to do with the remnant of anger inside him.
The mug of coffee on his left exploded.
“Shit!” he blurted out, more surprised than scared. This wasn’t the first time it happened.
Pieces of the mugs had flung everywhere in the living room, all around Julia and him.
“Are you ok?” he asked, “Don’t move, I’m going to clean it up.”
Julia was looking at him with something akin to wonder. None of the sharp fragments had touched either of them and she wasn’t wounded.
“I don’t know what it is with these things recently,” he told her while cleaning up, because her silence made him feel anxious, “it’s been happening a few times already– don’t know what is wrong with this place but I keep losing tableware.”
“You’re doing that.”
“What?”
“This. The making things explode. It’s you Q, you’re the one doing that.”
“Very funny Jules. I’m on new meds but they’re not that good.”
She frowned.
“Shit.” She muttered. “Those assholes.”
“You know, I’m starting to think James was right to worry about you. Which is saying a lot because I generally don’t agree with James all that much.”
Julia laughed but it sounded like an angry sob.
“They fucking wiped you. Gosh this is like the best kind of irony! What did you do? You had to do something for them to do that, because you passed the tests and you’re… I can still feel it around you so that’s not what’s lacking. Didn’t work on me and it worked on you – what a fucking joke. What am I even going to do now...”
“Jules…”
“I’m… I’m not ok Q. Not really in troubles, at least I don’t think so as long as I don’t step on Marina’s territory again but… Someone died Q. She died and I… This hedge witch things, it’s not working anymore, it’s starting to feels so fucking wrong and I don’t want magic to be like that but I can’t give it all up either. I knew from James that you were back and now he doesn’t even know who I am and I just, I don’t know… I just came here.
“Jules what the hell happened to you?” Quentin asked.
Julia gaze went back on him and then moved onto the fragments of the mug he had carefully gathered. She moved her hands, muttering things Quentin couldn’t hear. The fragments started to move, slowly rearranging themselves until the mug was back in one piece. It barely looked like it had been broken in the first place anymore. Quentin pinched himself, multiples time, but nothing disappeared and he didn’t wake up. He didn’t know what he looked like right know, he couldn’t think about anything past “what the fuck”.
“Magic happened to me Q. Magic happened to both of us.”
“Oh. Ok. Right.” Quentin mumbled absently before passing-out.
#
“I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore.” Julia admitted.
Quentin wanted to tell something comforting but couldn’t think of anything.
“Well, I guess that make two of us then.” He settled on instead.
#
Thank to Julia, Quentin had multiplied his “things to freak out about” list. Because yes, magic being real, having been kicked out of the college version of Hogwarts then his memory wiped before getting sent back to his sorry life seemed like a worthy reason for a major freak out - maybe more than “I’m freaking out about almost kissing my guy friend and being low-key pissed off at him for not actually kissing me”.
He had unfortunately said that out loud, with Julia in the vicinity, and she had laughed her ass off for at least fifteen minutes before calming down enough to ask him
“Wait? Is Eliot the tall and overdressed guy that came with you for my birthday party? The Brakebills student?” Which brought the whole new issue of Eliot being a magician. While it was not a surprise all in all, it didn’t help Quentin to deal with, well, everything really. At least it sort of relaxed things between Julia and him a bit - they were still careful around each other, but "the Eliot affair" made things less awkward.
Eliot however, had obviously worked things out one way or another in the meanwhile because he came directly to Quentin’s place the next weekend.
He brought one bottle of white wine with a name that Quentin couldn’t pronounce right even before drinking it. The wine tasted so sweet that it made Quentin’s toes curl in his socks. This time Eliot didn’t stop himself when he leaned towards Quentin, he just went for it, putting his hand on the back of Quentin’s neck, fingers tangling in Quentin’s hair, holding him in place as if Quentin wasn’t already paralyzed with how much he wanted. Quentin felt so electrified he forgot to feel mortified about not having the slightest idea what he was doing, not quite sure where to put his hands.
“You have no idea how long I wanted to do that.” Eliot murmured between kisses and Quentin whimpered, grabbing Eliot’s face to pull him back in. Eliot laughed throatily, in a way that was both incredibly hot and kind of frustrating until Quentin bit Eliot’s mouth strongly enough for it to be painful. He felt ridiculously proud when instead of hating it it made Eliot moan loudly, his entire body shuddering and ok, getting hard was so not going to be a problem. Which seemed to please Eliot making him grow urgent, almost feverish. His hands rushed to Quentin’s jeans, impatiently working them open, kisses growing hungrier, distracting Quentin until Eliot’s hand was inside his pants and Quentin’s brain short-circuited.
He would deny making the noise he was making if Julia was ever to ask but Eliot didn’t seem to mind it at all – quite the contrary in fact – so Quentin decided to count it as a win.
#
“I’m not gay.”
“I never thought you were.” Julia said looking more amused than she had any right to be.
They were both getting better at being friends again, things between them mending slowly but surely. Right now, they were making progress with a new spell Julia had found in one of Quentin’s book. She was very excited about the books. Sadly she was also having way too much fun with Quentin current situation.
“I’m straight.” He insisted.
“Well, I wouldn’t say that either.”
Quentin needed a better best friend.
#
(“I can’t believe you didn’t even open them” she said, awe and excitation in her voice when she found the books.
“I wasn’t sure they were real.” He told her, eyes firmly on the ground because he couldn’t bring himself to watch the expression on her face.
“How did you get them?” she asked. She didn’t really care that much about the how though; Quentin knew she wouldn’t push if he didn’t answer. He shrugged.
“I have no idea. They just sort of appeared. They keep moving too.”
One of the books probably decided to illustrate his point by appearing on the table in front of them.
“Well,” Julia said, a small smile in his direction, “guess at least we know where to start?”)
#
“I’m really not gay.” Q muttered to himself.
He was dreaming - somewhere forest like and with a path of stone he was carefully not following.
“Yeah right.” Said someone behind him.
Quentin jumped, only to find himself face to face with the annoying guy again. Annoying guy that he now remembered. Somewhat. Weird.
“I know you.” Quentin said.
Annoying guy looked vaguely guilty. Quentin wasn’t sure it was possible to be an asshole about being guilty that guy was giving it a good try.
“About that… Kady said I probably should… apologize. Sorta.”
“Sorta?” Quentin scoffed.
The man gave him an exasperated look and Quentin finally went for it and punched him. Hard. In the face. The guy tumbled into a bush swearing loudly. It surprisingly felt just as satisfactory as Quentin had imagined. “Annoying guy whose name he still couldn’t remember” got back to his feet and gave Quentin what was probably his best “I wish I could afford to punch you back right now” look.
“Who’s Kady?” Quentin asked, a bit late.
It diverted the guy’s attention from punching Quentin back but he ignored Quentin’s question nonetheless.
“Turns out you were right.”
Quentin must have looked lost because the guy rolled his eyes. Rude. And maybe Quentin should ask for a name by now.
“Fillory. It’s real.”
“No it’s not.” Quentin retorted. “It’s a storybook, asshole.”
“Yeah well that “not real” place is currently occupied by a Beast busy kidnapping magicians right now, and I’m traveling there without meaning to so as far as I’m concerned it feels pretty real.”
Quentin scowled. “There is no Beast in the books.”
“Lucky me. Because we got one, it's seriously homicidal and I’m pretty sure I made it on the to do list.”
“Sucks to be you I guess” Said Quentin.
There was something familiar about this guy since the first time Quentin had seen him in his dreams. Now that he knew about magic again it was easy to guess why, but what he felt now was different from what he felt when he was around Eliot. It was like a humming in his head, a persistent buzzing in the back of his mind, stirring something. It felt louder now than it had ever been before, yet the guy didn’t seem to hear it. He was usually the first to complain about Quentin’s mind being too loud.
“It knows your name too dumbass.”
Quentin laughed meanl, the buzzing in his head painful now, making his teeth hurt. He felt angry, and off-centered.
“Why the fuck would a monster from Fillory know my name?”
“How the Hell should I know? Look it’s been talking in my head for years and I don’t have any more answers than you do except that it's a problem and somehow you’re a part of it too! That dumb ritual that you and – that we did... it made thing worse!”
“Maybe you should have thought about that before getting me kicked out then!” Quentin snarled.
The buzzing in his head stopped.
Quentin froze, startled, and looked at the equal measure of astonishment on Penny’s face before he woke up.
#
“I don’t know what got into you, but I really, really like it.” Eliot said as Quentin pushed him onto the bed.
“Let’s just stop talking,” Quentin ordered, straddling Eliot, “right now.”
#
He did not tell Eliot he was starting to remember. It felt like lying more often that not. He wondered if that’s how it felt for Eliot too.
Julia kept telling him to talk to Eliot, to tell him already. She brought it up every time she came by.
“I’m pretty sure he is from Brakebills Q.” she said. Which was absolutely right, Eliot was from Brakebills, but Quentin had never officially confirmed it to her because then she would want to talk about it more and he would have to deal with other things too. Like the fact that he liked kissing Eliot apparently. “We should probably ask him stuff. He came with you and a pretty girl on my birthday. Remember?”
Quentin must have made a face because Julia sighed “I mean if he came to see you even after they kicked you out he clearly cares about you. You know, cares more than just because he wanted in your pants. That or he is highly motivated and possibly desperate but he doesn’t look like the type.”
Quentin grimaced. “Thanks Jules.” Julia hit him in the ribs with her elbow.
“Hey, no pity party. Pretty sure he has a lot of other options, yet he went for you. That’s saying something.”
“That there is clearly something wrong with him?” Quentin tried, half serious.
Julia hit him harder.
“Didn’t I just said no pity party?”
Quentin signed, slouched even more on the couch. He didn’t even know what he was doing – with Eliot as well as on a more general level. Penny hadn’t been back in his head for some time – and he wasn’t remembering anything new about that asshole since he’d remember Kady. Julia and him were steadily getting better with magic but they were also kinda stuck with spells requiring more than two people. After her experience with some of the New Yorkers hedge witches, Julia was careful about bringing someone new in. She didn’t talk much about how bad things had gotten, and he didn’t push. They could make it work, just the two of them for now.
Quentin knew Eliot was from Brakebills - it explained a lot, why it felt so easy to be around him, why he had been so aware of Eliot in the first place – but he wasn’t sure he wanted to know more. Not talking about it at all was the coward’s way out and Quentin felt pretty okay with being a coward right now.
#
“You are such a fucking coward.” Penny said.
Quentin almost wished he could forget him all over again but that probably wouldn’t shut him up.
“Yeah, Yeah, because you’re clearly captain courage here.” He said, ignoring the warning look Penny sent him. Their “what about Kady” talk had been uncomfortable and neither of them wanted a repeat performance.
“Why do you gotta make an issue out of everything man?”
“Everything is an issue for me.”
#
“Q? Who the fuck is that?” Eliot asked looking at Julia with what was almost a sneer on his lips, and a full on glare and Quentin wished he had a spell to let the ground swallow him. Though he had a feeling Julia had meant for this to happen, so maybe he should just let them fight it out and be done with it.
Eliot was looking down at her like she was a resistant stain on his favorite vest. Which was not a flattering way to look at someone and in fact quite insulting, but Julia just smiled back at him. In Julia’s book that pretty much meant she was ready to bite someone’s head off. Those two were likely going to jump at each others throats. Quentin really didn’t deserve that. He wasn’t the best person in the world but still, there had to be people more deserving of this mess than him. Karma and all that.
“Julia, this is Eliot. Eliot, this is Julia. Please don’t kill each other, I wouldn’t know how I would get rid of the bodies.”
“Very funny Q.” Julia said without taking her gaze of Eliot.
“I try.”
Eliot eyes had yet to move from Julia to Quentin.
“Q, any reason there is a hedge witch in your apartment?”
“Uh…”
“Maybe because we both have magic and it would be a waste not to do anything with it even if your pedantic school kicked him out?” Julia said.
Eliot looked ready to hiss at her. Which was kind of hot in a very unexpected way.
“Please,” he said, condescendence dripping from his tone, “hedge witches know as much about magic as Q knows about cocktail mixology.”
Quentin opened his mouth to protest, before realizing he did know absolutely nothing about mixology. Julia gave him a pointed look, expecting him to protest but he shrugged with an open handed “what can I say?” gesture because really, he had nothing.
Eliot pinched the bridge of his nose, inhaling deeply, getting himself back under control, his face a mask of neutrality.
“Sit down. Both of you. I think we all have some explaining to do.”
#
“So….” Eliot said later, both of them sitting on the couch while Julia had moved temporarily elsewhere in the apartment, “you know about magic.”
Eliot’s voice was neutral enough to make Quentin nervous. He had barely looked at Quentin since they sat down.
“Sort of? I mean not since the beginning but yeah, Julia kinda broke the M word to me.”
“And you know… about me.”
“Not really?” Quentin shrugged, unsure how to explain yet hoping Eliot would understand. “Like, I knew that I knew you but not really how and why? It’s still like glimpses, fragments mostly. I think remember Penny the most.”
“The first year psychic? The one who got you expelled? Oh well, isn’t that’s just great!” Eliot said, his tone slipping from carefully neutral to something a little more bitter.
“That’s because he’s been hijacking my dreams! Like, not because he is like more important or something. He is an asshole, mostly. I would know, I’m good at the ‘being an asshole’ thing recently.”
Eliot laughed faintly and swore, passing a hand over his face. He was still not looking at Quentin, and that felt strange. Quentin was usually the one avoiding eye contact, but Eliot looked – a lot.
“Yeah. I noticed. I kind of like that about you.”
“You like that I'm an asshole?” Quentin blurted out, his voice more strangled than he would have liked. Not that he had any hope left about being cool - he was sadly pretty sure he hadn’t been cool about any of this since day one. Even before magic entered the equation he hadn’t been cool about anything.
They both heard Julia cracking up in the bathroom – where she had been pretending to give them some privacy. Quentin let his head fell into his hands. He knew she was never ever going to let him live this down.
“I could get rid of her.” Eliot said, falsely nonchalant.
“She is kind of my best friend.” Quentin responded without moving, his voice muted by his palms.
Eliot sighed and moved slightly closer, his weight shifting on the couch. His arm cautiously going around Quentin’s waist.
“Is that a no?” he asked, letting his chin rest on top of Quentin’s head, carefully adjusting himself around the smaller man.
“Yes Eliot”, Quentin whined, “that’s a no.”
“I would love to see him try anyway!” Julia scoffed from the bathroom.
Quentin groaned, but he could feel Eliot’s smile as he chuckled “Bring it on hedge bitch”.
#
“Finally you’re back!” said the girl. “You’re so late!”
“You're Jane Chatwin.” Quentin sighed.
Hearing himself say it out loud didn’t make it sound any less bizarre. Still, it made things more real. As real as a weird forest-like dream space could feel. The place was probably Fillory or at least some representation of it - and no Penny in sight - Quentin wondered if he was ok.
She smiled and he realized her smile had never looked like a little girl smile.
“Better late than never?” he tried.
“I guess you will see about that.”
#
He remembered Margo the moment their eyes met, when she started talking. She came by his place one day with Eliot, and everything came back at once, his memory going from zero to one hundred in a matter of seconds. It was nothing like the slow shift in his memories it had been with Eliot, or like the buzzing noise building itself into a sudden blinding clarity the way it had been with Penny. She gave him a once over again, and he rolled his eyes as she turned to Eliot with a dramatic sigh.
“What is it with you and your first year boys” she said with a “tsk tsk” of false disapproval.
“Not sure I fit that profile anymore” Quentin said, and Margo smiled at him coyly.
“Well, I guess it’s good for you then – the first years generally barely last a month.”
Quentin was quite positive he was getting some version of the shovel talk later.
#
“It was only fair Q,” said Eliot, his hand playing with Quentin’s hair. It was kind of awesome and Quentin felt dazed in the best way. Eliot was right - good orgasms really did help. But cuddling was apparently a thing with them now and Quentin wasn’t complaining.
“Huh?”
Eliot laughed softly. He was so close Quentin could feel the vibration on his skin.
“Julia gave me the shovel talk first. So it was only fair for me to bring Margo.” He explained.
“Uhuh…” Quentin tried, still too comfortable to care about his poor elocution skills, “Still not fair.”
Eliot gave him a questioning look.
“Margo is way scarier than Jules.” Quentin grumbled.
#
“I cannot believe they did this!” muttered the woman who appeared in his apartment through what had to be a magical portal. “They’re messing things up!”
Jules and Quentin had been working on making one of those – a magical portal - and they thought they were pretty close to getting it to work. Eliot hadn’t been of any help at all because he and Julia were still being little shits about each other. It made Julia more hell-bent on proving they could get there without his “condescending shit of a boyfriend” – she was competitive like that. And they weren’t – boyfriends, that is – they never said they were, which was good because then Quentin would have to freak about that too and he was still not done freaking over his heterosexuality. He wasn’t sure Eliot even did the whole boyfriend thing - and he wasn’t about to ask.
“How did I only hear about it now? They have no idea what they did!” she kept on ranting while pacing his apartment.
Quentin, alarmed by the entrance, fell off the couch that he was busy desacralizing with Eliot, somehow still managing to magically bring a plaid with him, covering himself a bit. He was still gaping at the now closed portal on his wall, his brains scattered still. Eliot mostly looked pissed off by the intrusion and uncaring about his nearly naked state - his usual reaction when getting cock-blocked, Quentin had recently learned – so they probably weren’t in danger. There was a clear and quite vicious bite mark on Eliot’s collarbone that made Quentin blush all over despite having been the one to put it here. Looking at it didn’t help Quentin to calm down - at all.
“Hi?” he squealed.
The woman looked at them briefly and swore. She didn’t look like she cared - nor was shocked by their state – mostly she looked inconvenienced.
“They would never have if Henry had been in a better state, but of course they would fuck things up while he was out of it and wiped you. This is the last thing we needed right now, not when he started to make moves already!”
“You’re… you’re the one that gave the manuscript. Fillory book six.” Quentin said, finally remembering why she looked familiar in the first place.
“Eliza, yes, glad you’re less of a useless mess than I first feared and broke the memory wipe already.”
“More like halfway there I’d say?”
“Well, you spared me the “You’re a wizard Harry!” – which was pretty much the plan so thank you for helping me avoid that scene.”
“Great?”
“You’re certainly coming along better than I expected.”
“More like we were about to get to come before being rudely interrupted.” Eliot muttered. He threw his shirt back on, carefully watching in Eliza’s direction. He also managed to find Quentin’s t-shirt somewhere before holding it out to him. Quentin took it with an apologizing look in Eliot’s direction and put it on promptly, doing the same with the boxers Eliot had also managed to retrieve because he was magical that way. Quentin may have been a little smitten.
#
Eliza’s relative approval of Quentin, unsurprisingly, didn’t last five minutes.
#
“What do you mean, “you lost it”? How could you just lose it?”
Quentin refrained from rolling his eyes at Eliza, but only because he was still slightly scared of her. But he was starting to be quite done with people talking cryptically and then complaining about him not getting things right.
“It means I cannot find it? I left it in my room back in Brakebills and it was gone right after I had a talk with the Dean.” And I’m pretty sure Penny stole it even if he still swears he didn’t, Quentin didn’t say.
“You were supposed to read it! It was supposed to help!”
“Maybe you could have told me that! Rather than being enigmatic about it all!”
“The goal was for you to figure things out by yourself! I can’t hold your hand Quentin, not for this!”
“Well letting him figure it out by himself certainly turned out great.” Said Eliot, still on the couch and watching Eliza with a fake uninterested look. Eliza didn’t even look at him.
“I didn’t even get to read it so here goes nothing I guess?”
“Lost things can be found Quentin. I would have expected you to be more of a magician and know that already by now.”
“I didn’t get to become much of a Magician at all,” Quentin retorted bitterly.
Surprisingly, for a second, she looked saddened.
“You’re going to have to be.” She said grimly.
#
Alice apologized awkwardly for an uncomfortable amount of time for the ritual when she finally came to see him with Margo and Eliot. Quentin, equally awkwardly, tried to tell her he wasn’t angry with her. He remembered her by waves, bits of admiration and the hint of a crush. It was a lot of awkwardness going all around. At least that’s what Margo complained about when she ‘accidentally’ interrupted them and Quentin didn’t disagree.
He asked her about how she was doing, and she looked shifty enough for him to know that she wasn’t done with her quest for answers. It seemed even more ridiculous now that he was out that she couldn’t just ask the Dean or a teacher but then again, Quentin was well acquainted now with how Brakebills dealt with its problems. Covering the problems up or wiping them were clearly the favorite options, before going on like it hadn’t happened at all.
#
His father left him a voicemail. Quentin went to see him for the first time in what felt like years.
“Brain cancer”, he said casually, like it was no big deal and Quentin had never resented their inability to communicate as much as he did now, words echoing meaninglessly in the house. He looked for something, anything in magic that could solve this, that could make it go away.
“It doesn’t work like that Q.” Eliot told him as gently as he could, but Quentin couldn’t let it go.
He felt powerless, angry but he hadn’t realized how much. One weekend, Eliot, Margo and Alice came by while Quentin and Julia were working on their magic, up until Quentin’s spell turned into a full storm in the middle of the room. They had been lucky Alice was there and managed to get his spell under control before anyone had been hurt.
#
Quentin went back to his father and settled for fixing the old broken model plane, not knowing what else to do, or what to say to convey what he felt. The genuine marvel on his father’s face almost felt like a blessing.
#
“She said she’s going to make them take me back. That Henry – the Dean I mean – was working things out.” Quentin said looking intensely at his mug of coffee as if it could hold the answer to the universe inside it. Or any answer, at this point Quentin wasn’t going to be demanding – he’d take anything.
“Shouldn’t you be happy about that?” Julia asked cautiously. She read him well enough to know he wasn’t. He knew she wasn’t as calm as she pretended to be either – she was barely sipping her own coffee, and the spoon on the counter was vibrating steadily.
Quentin mumbled something that was close enough to an agreement. He knew how he should feel about it – he remembered more now, almost everything really – he knew how much he had loved Brakebills, how broken he had felt when about to get kicked out. How angry.
Still, everything was different now.
“I don’t want things to go back like they were before. With us.” He settled down, frowning. “I don’t understand why she doesn’t want you there. You’re good at magic.”
He did remember most of it now, how things had been – especially the birthday party - and it was far from his proudest moment. The spoon on the counter stopped vibrating and Julia smiled faintly.
“I don’t want things to go back to how they were either. And they don’t have to, Q.”
Quentin exhaled a breath he hadn’t known he was holding.
“But I also don’t want you to not go back just for me.”
“Jules…”
“We both were in bad places, and you getting kicked out helped us reconnect that’s true, but maybe you should go back. It doesn’t mean we won’t see each other anymore – it will just be different. I won’t go back to dealers hedge witches like Marina just because you go back to Brakebills. It doesn’t mean we won’t do magic together anymore either. It maybe won’t be as often, or as easy, but it doesn’t have to be over. I mean sure I wish they would take me, I feel like they should sometimes, but apparently it’s not happening. I made my peace with that. Sort of.”
Quentin winced.
“And, there is the matter of that Fillory. Which, hello! is apparently real! amazingly enough! And full of monsters if your psychic guy and the lady who gave you the Fillory manuscript are to be trusted? And by the way: I was totally right about it being a test. They love their freaking tests so damn much." she sighed. "Point is, I love you Q but I don’t think you will find any of the things you need around hedge witches - as much as I would like to prove Eliot wrong.”
Quentin snorted. He still didn’t know how to feel about that, the idea that Fillory was real. And the apparent fact that it was nothing like what he had believed it to be. He wondered how Julia felt about it – she had been the one to get him into magic in the first place, Quentin knew how much loved Fillory too. He couldn’t bring himself to ask yet.
“I won’t spin out of control just because you’re at Brakebills again, she continued with some humor, I’ve been talking with some other… well I guess they’re hedge witches too, but nothing like Marina. People who love magic for what it can be. Only met Richard so far – was planning on getting you two to meet when I was sure he wasn’t a weirdo creep.”
Quentin scowled a bit. “And is he a weirdo creep?”
Julia laughed. “Not too much, he is ok. A bit weird sure – he is very into the more spiritual aspect of magic – but no, not bad. Plus your boyfriend and this girl of his would be insufferable if I was the reason you didn’t go back.”
“I knew you were scared of Margo.” Quentin joked.
“I think you’re confusing me with you Q.”
#
“I am quite glad to see you back Quentin.” Henry Fogg said from behind his desk. Quentin would have called it bullshit but he didn’t want to be kicked out again right away.
They were in what was obviously a new office. Quentin tried not to stare – at the glasses, at his hands, at anything really. He hadn’t expected to see so much of the attack still, so much of the Beast. Naively enough, he had thought that magic would heal it all away.
“Thank you? I guess?” he responded.
“I suppose you are aware by now, of certain things that are going on. Things that are a great source of concern for some of us.”
Quentin nodded. “You mean the Beast.”
“Yes, the Beast. And as you probably already know…”
“Fillory is real.” Quentin finished curtly.
“Well at least that cat is out of the bag already. We cannot say why the Beast knows your name, but the fact that it does is frankly not a good for you. It has an interest in Penny too – though that is easier to explain - and obviously, it does not bode well for either of you. But we have to hope that being here, in Brakebills, will help the odds to be a little more in your favor.”
Quentin remembered the attack – the thing in the classroom, how it had touched him, said his name – he remembered it all too well by now. He winced.
“As far as “good luck and let’s hope you don’t die” speeches go, I’m sorry to say this one kind of sucks.”
Dean Fogg’s laugh followed him out of the room.
#
They gave him a bunch of tests before letting him go – Julia had been so right about Brakebills and tests. He must have done ok enough though because they seemed mildly surprised and no one talked about kicking him out. They couldn’t find him an emphasis – and it certainly felt like they had tried everything with how long it had taken to find nothing. It left Quentin feeling a bit depreciated but mostly emotionally drained. They had all looked pretty perplexed too but they chose to put him with the physical kids regardless – more room there or something.
He found Eliot and Margo waiting for him as he exited the classroom, both of them looking as flawlessly casual as ever.
“You’re good?” Eliot asked.
“I guess?” he sighed, which seemed to translate by “fuck no” in their book because they both grabbed him and led him toward the physical kids’ house. He tried to ask but Margo gave him a “do not even try to argue” kind of look and he knew better than trying to go against her.
“You know what we all need?” said Eliot with a smile and Quentin had to roll his eyes. “You’re going to say a drink.”
#
They did get drinks. Then Quentin also got to christen his new room. Said room ended up in a complete mess thank to Eliot going a bit wild with his telekinesis. Not that Quentin complained. Telekinesis was pretty amazing.
#
Quentin tried to help Alice quest for answers about her brother’s death because he did really felt bad for her but in the end, Margo was the one to bring some real information.
It went about as well as expected – which meant badly because Alice wanted to save Charlie from being a niffin and Quentin didn’t trust Alice’s judgment enough to let her try to bring her brother back. That’s why he took the box with him – and as what looked like blue flames stated to appear around her hands, he felt he had to step in. He couldn’t let her lose herself like Charlie. Charlie didn’t have anyone to stop him, but Quentin was there for Alice, he wouldn’t let it happen. So he bound Charlie to the box, and Alice left.
Julia assured him that he had done the right thing – which helped slightly but not as much as he’d hoped it would. He wanted to help, for magic once in his life to make something better. This didn’t feel better. Eliot didn’t say much about it at all, but then again, Eliot hadn’t really been talking to him recently. Oh, he would chat away and talk around things, he was charming and witty and strategically avoiding Quentin at the same time on some subjects. Quentin didn’t quite know what to do about that so he did what he did best – absolutely nothing.
He knew both Margo and Penny were a bit down after Alice had left, but neither of them seemed angry with Quentin either so maybe Julia was right.
#
A few weeks later, Alice came back.
She looked... better - if more withdrawn than before - and she was still careful around Quentin. Quentin had tried to apologize in some rather unfortunate fashion, but Alice was actually the one to take the first step towards making things better between them in the end.
#
Penny, it turned out, was as much of an asshole in the flesh as he had been in Quentin’s head. Not that is came as a surprise - Quentin would have been sort of disappointed if it hadn’t been the case - but it still took some getting used to, seeing him and not be dreaming.
Kady disappearing didn't help Penny’s morale, but Penny and Quentin somehow managed some kind of – well, it would have been a stretch to call it a friendship, but it was hard to hate someone who spent so much time in his head, quite literally speaking. Quentin still thought Penny looked kind of punchable, and Penny still complained about more or less everything about Quentin, but it worked out. Having a monstrous entity from another world aware of both their existences helped, in a weird way. Like, sure Quentin wasn’t Penny’s biggest fan, but did he want him to be brutally killed by a mothman from Fillory? No.
Lucky for him, Penny seemed to feel the same way about Quentin.
“Could you please stop referring to me as “the psychic” with your hedge witch friend? Penny grumbled, barely looking at the book he was supposedly reading while Alice and Quentin were actually getting some research done. “I’m a traveler, not a freaking psychic!”
“Well, to be fair”, Quentin thought as loudly as he could without looking up from the book he was reading, “you’re still a psychic too – just the annoyingly moving kind.”
“And stop thinking so loud you asshole!”
Alice laughed next to them.
#
Somehow, Alice, Penny and Quentin became friends. On paper they didn’t really make sense. Penny would probably deny they were friends at all until his last breath but still, they were. Alice was determined to help with the whole “Fillory is real and the Beast we accidentally let into the school is kinda trying to kill us” and she was probably the best of them all once she had something to focus on. It was fortunate for all of them because Quentin and Penny weren’t always the best at thinking things through while Margo and Eliot, though more concerned than they pretended to be, were really not the best at researching things.
It was also good for the simple reason that Penny and Quentin had a hard time working on something together without bitching at each other in the following minutes.
#
He had hoped things would go back to being naturally easy with Eliot but wasn’t surprised either when it didn’t happen.
Eliot kept looking at Quentin like he was waiting for him to suddenly wisen up and put a stop to whatever was happening between them – or rather what was not happening now that he was back at Brakebills. As if Quentin not being in Brakebills anymore had been the only reason it ever happened. Quentin wasn’t going to deny he felt the urge sometimes to just run in the other direction, or that he hadn’t ever thought about it, because he had. It would almost be easy. But Quentin was waiting for Eliot to end things himself if that’s what he wanted. But Eliot didn’t end things and they both kept on walking on eggshells around each other. The balance they had found back when Quentin was outside was gone and finding a new one without talking about it wasn’t really a success. Eliot barely touched him, with or without anyone around and Quentin had no idea what to do about it because he had never had to ask for Eliot touching him before, even when they were just friends and not whatever it was that they were now. He knew they had to talk about it at some point.
Penny rolled his eyes at both of them a lot, like they were being absolute idiots. Regrettably, Quentin had to admit that he was most likely right this time.
#
It happened like this: an old student who had allegedly been sniffing around Eliot attacked them - clearly not in his right mind unless glowing blue eyes were a thing - and Penny took a knife aimed at Quentin.He managed to be an asshole about it, because he was gifted like that, but Quentin didn’t really mind it anymore. Eliot and Alice arrived quickly at the hospital and they both hugged him so tightly he wasn’t sure he could still breathe, before Alice asked about Penny, worry clear in her voice. Eliot mostly looked really pale, almost sickly, sipping something that was certainly not water or coffee.
Obviously the blade turned out to be from Fillory, because that was apparently Quentin’s life now. He tried to figure it out and failed. Quentin wanted to call Julia more than ever – she would know what to do - she used to be so much better at this than he was. Eliot kept saying he was fine about it all while clearly not being fine and Quentin didn’t know what to do about that either, which left him feeling pretty useless as Penny’s state kept worsening.
Eliza came by, and threw enough cryptic hints for Alice and him to figure out a working way to save Penny, and for a moment it almost looked like a win. Until Eliza died brutally and no one had any idea what to do anymore – if they ever really had one to start with.
Quentin had no illusion that things were going to be better from there.
He looked at Eliot passed out next to him still holding his hand. Alice was probably making sure Penny was ok and Margo on her way back from wherever she had been. Quentin closed his eyes and tried to relax, focusing on simple things like Eliot’s hand in his. It felt almost ok.
At least, if things were all going to shit, he would be in good company.
#
Unsurprisingly, it went worse from there.
#
Quentin hadn’t expected both Eliot and Alice to want to make a deal with the Beast – he wasn’t sure why, but he had hoped for at least one of them to be on his and Penny’s side. He couldn’t understand how either would think of it as a good alternative – that this thing that had killed Eliza would somehow be ok with just having a button back and getting Penny to kill himself and would then forget all about Quentin! Neither of them really listened when he tried to argue, they thought he only refused that option because he wanted to go to Fillory.
He did want to go to Fillory, but it wasn’t what it was about.
Margo suggested a probability spell, and Quentin convinced Penny to give it a try.
"We both know it's pointless." Penny muttered before the spell was cast.
#
It turned out to be both pointless and traumatic.
“Holy fucking shit!”
“See! That’s what I was talking about!”
“Holy fucking shit! What the actual fuck Penny?!”
“Why did you think I was so worried you guys?!"
“Where the fuck were you even trying to go?!"
“Ugh could you two stop screaming at each other?” Margo moaned, clutching Eliot’s arm tightly - Eliot who was looking worryingly vacant still, “Like we get it! Trying to make a deal with that fucker is an epic fail could we just freak about our recent horrible virtual deaths in peace?”
#
“Is that Kady in your kitchen?” he asked, watching a familiar-looking dark haired girl going through Julia’s things to make herself coffee.
“Maybe?” Julia said with a face that said that it totally was Kady. Penny was going to freak out about that. “But seriously Q, you better have another plan because, so far what you have? Doesn’t sound so good.”
Yeah, Quentin was working on that.
#
“I though you were straight.” Eliot said appearing into Quentin’s room that night, pacing silently for a while before throwing the words out on the open. A clear sign that shit was gonna hit the fan.
“Ok.” Quentin said, because he honestly didn’t know where Eliot was going with this. Hopefully to things not being awkward anymore and some cuddling but Quentin was trying not to get his hopes up.
A few weeks ago, he would have gone in panic mode at that. But now, as they were knee-deep in trouble, between Eliza’s death, Plover’s nightmarish house, getting Penny back from the Neitherlands and travelers starting to kill themselves all around, this talk didn’t seem so scary anymore.
“In fact,” Eliot continued, “I half expected you to just freak out and never talk to me again.”
Quentin scowled a bit.
“I kinda thought I was straight too?” he told Eliot.
Because it was the truth, and he was still not sure what to call himself - he still liked girls – the mild crush he had on Alice being proof enough of that.
He wasn’t sure honesty had been his best move though, because Eliot’s face went from ‘neutrally trying to talk about feelings” to ‘I made a terrible mistake and am clearly not drunk enough for this’ really quickly.
“I wouldn’t have stopped being your friend just for something like this though”, Quentin blurted out, “I’m not that shitty thank you, even if I wasn’t… I mean I would probably be angry, and confused – not that I’m not confused now – and more than likely kind of an asshole about it but. I wouldn’t stop being your friend over you kissing me. Even if I hadn’t kissed back and…”
“Oh for fuck’s sake you guys!” Margo complained, barging in the room because clearly no one cared about private conversations, “Bisexuality is a thing ok? Could you two please talk about your feelings and get over yourselves so we could all move to trying not to get killed in the nearest future?” then stormed out of the room without closing the door.
Quentin wasn’t sure how much Eliot had grieved about their situation to her, but he guessed this was a legitimate reaction. He was about to get up to close the door since Eliot seemed frozen in place when Alice awkwardly peeked trough the still half-opened door.
“Hum, I don’t mean to eavesdrop but if I may?” she blurted out, “pansexuality? For Quentin I mean? It’s a thing? Like, herm, people? I mean… uhme? Like… ok… And I’m just going to… go, away… now.”
She actually closed the door behind her, because Alice was awesome and considerate like that.
“Are things ok with you two?” Eliot asked, his voice only a little accusing and he had do be either really high or at his wits’ ends to finally ask about it plainly instead of carrying on glaring at Alice and Quentin when he thought they wouldn’t notice.
“We kinda made out in some versions of the probability spell.” Quentin blurted out.
“Oh.” Eliot looked almost defeated. “Is that… a thing?”
Quentin sighed. “No… Not outside of the spell.”
“But it could be.” Eliot said.
Quentin shook his head. This was really not how he had hoped this conversation would go.
“I don’t know what you want me to say?”
“I don’t expect you to say anything Q.” Eliot said.
“Yeah, maybe that’s the problem. You not expecting anything.”
Eliot snorted.
“Please Q, you tense every time I touch you now. I think that’s telling me all that I need to know.”
Quentin bristled at that because, ok, that was true - not completely because of the reason Eliot thought it was but partly at least, maybe - and it hurt more than he expected.
“You’re the one who putting this weird distance since I’ve been back here! I just – I though it was… I don’t even know what we are supposed to be Eliot! I’m bad at this in general and it’s kind of the first time I do this with a guy in case it wasn’t already painfully obvious.”
Eliot looked like he wanted to say something but Quentin didn’t give him the time.
“I mean, Jules is calling you my shitty boyfriend but to be honest I don’t even know if you are? Or if you’d want to be? And I’m well aware I’m not exactly a prize! I’m not! I mean I wasn’t before and I’m especially not now with that thing apparently hoping to kill all of us putting a target on my back – so to be honest I don’t know what…”
Eliot swore quietly before grabbing Quentin’s chin and pulling him in a kiss. Quentin hadn’t realized how much he’d miss it until he had Eliot’s mouth on his again. He didn’t wait before kissing him back frantically and it was Eliot who pushed him away, only a tiny bit but enough for him to speak. “I can do boyfriends.” He said, a bit breathless, “I can do that Q.”
“Ok.” Quentin whispered because he suddenly felt light and weak-kneed in a way he hadn’t felt in a while now. “Ok good. I think I can try that too. I’m probably not going to be any good at it and mess up but I definitely want to try.”
Eliot laughed and kissed him again.
#
Things went better for about a day to two. Then of course it all went to shit as they decided to go for battle magic with shortcuts, which obviously had a few side effects. Kady hadn’t wanted to tell them about it in the first place, and Julia’s face had pretty much said all her thoughts on the subject too. Truthfully they all knew already that it wasn’t the best idea, it was just that no one had anything better to suggest. Quentin was sure it could have been a lot worse, but the actual feeling of swallowing your own depression back each time they would get their emotions back? It wasn’t only intense: it was brutally painful in a way he hadn’t expected. Henry Fogg had been so full of crap with his “you hopefully won’t need your meds here”. As if half of the school wasn’t self-medicating with magical shit anyway.
It worked – they all got better at battle magic in a ridiculously short amount of time, but each time they bottled up their emotions, getting them back felt worse. Alice was almost sobbing every time, Margo pretended to be fine but always looked a little too broken in the first minutes and Eliot was going for his drinks more and more steadily. Penny somehow seemed to be the one managing the best. While they all had their emotions bottled up, Eliot calmly admitted that he had “sort of” a fling with Mike – before Mike turned out to be possessed and homicidal. It had felt unimportant, only a vague distant annoyance, as long as Quentin’s emotions had been bottled as well. After getting them back though, it had been like being swept under a full shitstorm of feelings he couldn’t handle without dissociating badly enough that Penny had to step in and bring him back as gently as he could. Eliot tried to talk to him but Quentin didn’t let him. “I don’t wanna talk about it.” He said without looking at Eliot at all. “And it really doesn’t matter right now.” He hadn’t meant to sound harsh – or maybe he had – but either way Eliot stopped trying and got himself a drink instead.
Quentin lost count of the number of times they did it, bottling things up, working on battle magic, then swallowing them down, but they were all past being on edge by now and closer to a nuclear reaction. Quentin was outside when Alice found him, checking on him. He hated how they were all worried about him losing it – while still being touched by the concern. He wasn’t sure what they talked about, sharing the bottle of gin Quentin had brought with him until Alice was in his space and kissed him out of nowhere. He kissed her back and forgot about why it wasn’t a good idea.
#
Quentin didn’t know how to feel anything but anger and guilt weighting him down. He wanted to make things better with Eliot – and with Alice – as much as he wanted to just scream until he lost his voice and everything would just stop being so much all at once.
Mostly he wished he would not feel at all. And lucky him, there was a solution for that.
#
They made it to the Neitherlands and it went fine for perhaps half a minute before Quentin was thrown back into the Earth fountain, ending up alone on the floor with a now useless map.
#
Eliza had been Jane all along and Quentin couldn’t even find in him to be surprised. Maybe because he had already found out about it thirty-nine times – not that he remembered, but maybe there were remnants, echoes. Or maybe he was just tired. He wondered if his déjà-vu were only memories of other times, of other lives. How had things gone in other timelines? How different had it been?
He couldn’t figure out how Henry hadn’t lost it yet, remembering other timelines, thirty-nine different timelines yet unable to ever stop it from repeating itself, trapped in someone else’s spell, powerful enough to be aware yet not enough to get out of it. Then again, Quentin couldn’t really bring himself to care. Not caring seemed to make sense, when you couldn’t afford to fall apart.
He didn’t feel angry anymore, just exhausted, terrified, worried sick about the others. Sad about not working things out before it all went down. A growing part of him also felt done with everything.
Death seemed pretty unavoidable at this point, and there was one person he really needed to see.
#
He opened the bottle and choked as everything mercilessly came back.
#
“At this point I’m just glad you didn’t get eaten.” Julia said after hugging him tightly for a long time.
Quentin couldn’t agree more - he was pretty glad about not getting eaten so far. He was sadly pretty pessimistic about his chances of things staying that way – thirty-nine deaths made the odds look pretty hopeless – but he was taking any win he could right now, even the smallest ones. Not that the list of wins was that long considering he had just lost the other in the Neitherlands. In the meanwhile, Julia had apparently successfully summoned a goddess? – funny how things worked. Kady was nowhere to be seen, her absence strangely unnerving yet easy to dismiss.
“Probability spells suck so much,” he murmured from under their table. “Also bottling emotions? Not a good idea Jules.”
“Actually I was more referring to the whole “an evil being squatting in Fillory wants to kill you and Jane Chatwin decided to cast a time loop to fix things but then died which really sucks” but you prioritize how you want Q.”
“That too.” Quentin sighed.
“So – I got into Brakebills in other timelines?”
“Of course you did. Can’t believe I was such a prick - I should have known something was off – well something was off for a while but…”
“Hey, I was going pretty dark on my own too no need to put all the blame on you Q. And to be honest, I’m almost glad she did now because I would never have found her in Brakebills. But if Jane changed things thirty-nine times already and you…”
“Still died miserably every time? Apparently.”
“Well, you did get to drug the Dean with truth serum twenty-seven times – that’s impressive. I wish I had seen that.” Q let out a strangled laugh.
“Everything is going so bad Jules. I really need you.”
“You know, I understand this is a time loop, and that it’s coming to an end and we have no more reboot,” Julia said thoughtfully, “ but I still feel like some things were meant to be this way.”
Quentin sighed. “It feels to me like a terribly random series of events that someone played with until we ended up here Jules.”
Julia shook her head. “I understand, but Q, we are going to Fillory. Together.”
It seemed like such a weirdly fitting goal as they were lying under their table.
“I just hope you have a plan for getting us there.” he told her and her smile was all the answer he needed.
#
Quentin didn’t let go of Julia’s hand as they followed Jane into Fillory, holding their breath. He couldn't help wondering if this was really happening. They looked at each other, barely believing it, as the world around them turned into something else, something they had both dreamed about yet never hoped for. Around them, Fillory seemed to throb, as if it knew they were here.
For a second Quentin forgot about the Beast, about Eliot, Alice, Penny and Margo somewhere – in the Neitherlands or maybe already in Fillory. Then he remembered. They had to make it to Fillory, even without the map, they had to. They were brilliant, and strong and Quentin couldn’t allow himself to think anything else. His fears must have shown on his face because Jules squeezed his hand tighter.
“Hey, Q, look at me. We will find them. We will find them and find a way to make it this time.” She said. “You’re not dying. One way or another, we're gonna fix things.”
Quentin almost believed her.
#
#