(u know i’ve been too deep in kier’s head lately when i write doe and instantly burst into tears at how sad and soft my boy is. i’m crying real tears at 12am. im so proud of him. my everything)

“Hywel,” Doe breathed, and his voice was so soft, so sad for him. Standing, he slipped off the pew and limped over to meet him in the shaft of dusty, buttery sunlight. Sitting down in front of him, he gave him a small, soft, sad little smile, so tired and warm and quietly, numbly resigned to how it had ended up like this. He had no energy left to break his own heart with. This was Doefreckle, honest as the incense in the air. “I know what I said.” His voice was no louder than the air currents drifting between the pillars. “I was afraid. Not many toms have been kind to me in my life and to have one that is… As beautiful as you are, I just keep waiting for the shoe to drop, for the moment when you’d show your true colours and it would all fall into that familiar pattern, the one where I go ‘oh, yes, there it is.’ I can’t be happy without it feeling like fear. And the—the fact that that moment never came, that just scared me more. Because what do I do, who am I meant to be, if I’m not afraid?” He looked up at him so earnestly, eyes round and gentle and honest. He’d never been this honest with anyone other than Shaded. Usually, he felt too embarrassed to speak like this, to bring it all out into the open; but since his exile, everything he’d always been so afraid of — it didn’t seem to matter as much. Or maybe he was just so fogged by exhaustion that he was floating on air, all his fear harmless as light and laid bare for the world to see.

He dared to draw himself closer to Hywel, craning his head back further to look between his eyes with that same earnest stare. “All I’ve ever wanted was a mate. But somewhere along the way, I started to feel like I didn’t deserve one — not… me, not someone like me.” He opened his mouth to say the word, eyes drifting down to the stone floor, but for a long few moments nothing came out. He could never say it. But, finally, he forced it out. “Gay...” Heart fizzing and hammering with a mixture of familiar terror, disgust, self-hatred, and unfamiliar freedom, pride, weightlessness, Doefreckle looked back up to Hywel. A small smile flickered across his face. “It’s taken me a long time to even get to this point, Hywel — to go on dates, to still be there in the morning, to do all the… all the innocent, gentle things that come with being close to someone. And the way I’ve treated you, it hasn’t been right, I know that. But I…” For a long moment, he just stared up at him, his mouth dry.

Finally, with all his bravery, he said it. “But I’m falling in love with you. I have been for a long time. And even if you don’t want to pursue me anymore, I want to pursue you.” He frowned a little, still gazing up at him with such pleading softness. “If you’ll let me.”

He’d only told two other toms he loved them. One of them, though still in his heart, had faded to a past memory. The other, he still loved. Would never stop loving. Loved in a way unknowable to onlookers. A soulmate of old, of a whole past life before the tom standing before him had even been born and a present one. But Hywel… Hywel was the tom he wanted to be the mate of. Hywel was the tom he wanted to belong to. Gazing up at him, he offered a small, nervous smile. This was the most honest he had ever been in his life. Now that it was out, a bit of his sheepishness came back and he shifted his weight back and forth, cheeks blushing as he chewed on the inside of his mouth. He’d never asked someone to let him court them before. He almost laughed, soft and breathy and embarrassed and self-conscious. It was silly, wasn’t it? But he loved him. He wanted to woo him.

Doe was hurt, but he had been expecting it. Well, no, that wasn’t true. He had been hoping for something else, but he had known this was a possibility, even if it wasn’t the dream he always had in his head. So, he just smiled, thin and resigned and so sadly kind, and gave a little nod. “Well,” he replied at last, quiet and tender. “Until you do, I can love us enough for the both of us.”

Doe sat down, drawing his tail around his paws. All the lines of his body were soft. “When you were probably no more than a kit, I loved a tom. I still love him, very much. But I was too afraid. And when I finally admitted to myself how I’d felt all along, it was too late. The moment — the moment that might have been perfect — it was gone. And I’m never going to get that back, no matter how many times we— come back to life.” He smiled to himself at that, mirthless and soft and so bitterly sad, like an old enemy he’d long since grown used to, and let out a little breath of a laugh through his nose, looking down. A few moments later, he looked up again, the smile gone from his face. “I don’t want that to happen with you, Hywel. I want to love you because I’m tired, so tired, of wondering what it might be like to want something and do something more than torture myself over it. I want to love you because it will be the kindest thing I’ve ever done for myself. And I’m not— I’m making this sound like it’s all about me.” He gave a frustrated, smiling little shake of his head, glancing up at the ceiling. “I’m good at that, I know. But what I mean, Hywel, is—“ He reached out a paw and gently, tentatively, laid it over the silver tom’s, brown eyes wide and earnest. Not pleading. Just asking. Truly, quietly asking. “I want to love you because I think we can be happy. All the times I’ve thought of you — they haven’t just been the obvious thoughts,” even in the height of his emotion, he still blushed slightly and looked down, a sheepish little grin crossing his face; a moment later, he continued on. “They’ve been about… dumb little things.” He flicked his eyes up, mouth slightly open like he was so close to not continuing, embarrassed by his own vulnerability. Glancing down, Doe brushed his good forepaw back and forth along the dusty flagstone, voice soft and grudging — and wasn’t that the greatest testament, that he forced himself past his own silence. “Watching sunrises with you. Sunsets. Eating breakfast. Waking up next to you. Introducing you to my daughters.” He shook his bowed head, overwhelmed by his own truth for a moment, swallowed up by it, trying so hard to fight the familiar shame.

He looked up now, and there was urgency in his gaze. The desperate need to be understood, to have the immensity of what he was saying, what he was confessing to, comprehended. “I don’t want to grow old. It’s something I’ve been petrified of since I was young. But with you… if it’s by your side, I would grow old a thousand times over. And I know it will take time — a long time — for you to trust me again. For you to believe I’m not going to get tired of you and leave.” He brushed his paw across Hywel’s paw, eyes never leaving his. “But all I’m asking for is a chance. A chance to let me love you. A chance to be… more than the same selfish, cruel Doefreckle I’ve always been. A chance to be the one I’ve always wanted to be. Not the one who ruins lives, who breaks hearts while pretending he’s still so horribly kind — I’m so tired of that one. I want to be the me that deserves you. That deserves all the love I’ve been afraid to let myself have. That’s all I want, Hywel. A chance.” His eyes widened, pleading. “Let me prove myself to you. Let me win you back.”

Doe dared a smile, brows drawn together in such soft, earnest hope, eyes swimming with worry, with deep, deep fear.

As Hywel moved closer, Doe just smiled up at him, brows pushing together with helpless hope; and when he laid his chin atop his head, the smile turned into an outburst of laughter, one, giddy sound that was half a sob, his grin shaky. The grin didn't fade, hidden there from Hywel's sight, and it was filled with enough joy, enough relief, to break your heart. Finally, he tilted his head up to nuzzle his nose into Hywel's thick neck fur. "We'll try?" he asked, and there were tears at the edge of it. "You'll let me try?"

MY BOY MY BOY MY BOY MY BOY MY BOY

Doe smiled, beaming as Hywel brushed his forehead. It faded into a stretched, strained smile at the mention of promises they didn't mean, self-conscious guilt making his cheeks prickle with hot, blooming pinpoints. It had always been a habit of his, promising the world and then backing out in a panic when it came close to fruition, and only Shaded had ever come close to calling him out on it; coming face to face with his destructive traits was going to be a humiliating and painful exercise in healing, in getting better. But if it meant having what he'd always wanted, then he'd do it. Drawing back slightly, he looked up at Hywel with a gentler smile, brows pushed together. "Hi," he replied softly.

---

Days passed — weeks — and Doe grew more at home in the League, at being a part of Hywel's life, and he grew comfortable enough in the cathedral to stay there by himself most nights, alone in the echoing quiet. And that itself was a huge step, a silent sign of growth, of how hard he was trying: he hated to be alone so much that half the toms he'd spent the night with had just been so he would have someone to share his nest with. He was happiest when he was social, when he was part of something, when he was someone's thing — he needed warmth, needed comfort, needed companionship, however empty it was. His heart ached for it. So to be able to settle in a routine where the only sound he fell asleep to was the traffic beyond the heavy stone walls, the sirens and horns and engines; where he had his little night-time habits, like sitting by himself at the top of the bell tower to watch the warm orange sunset or taking a wander around the empty knaves, smiling to himself; to be comfortable in his own company — it was healing like he'd never known it before. And he was conscious of it; he felt it. When he sat and groomed his fur in the quiet, with no one but himself in that great, vast cathedral, he felt it.

And with that growth came a determined optimism: he was going to win Hywel back. He was going to win back a place in SummerClan. He was going to return to Shaded, to their life, happier and healthier than he'd ever been. He had a plan. He had a direction. Everything was alright. He had hope. And that was all he'd ever needed.

So, one warm evening, Doe found Hywel outside the Mansion, more comfortable wandering around there than he'd ever thought possible, and greeted him with a cheerful, boyish smile. "Hi." He dropped a little bundle of flowers at Hywel's paws and sat down in front of him, still smiling that smile that felt so much more easy, so much more at peace, than it ever had before. He was smiling because he wanted to be smiling, not because he thought it made him look pretty. "It is my greatest and dearest wish, good sir, that you might accompany me on this fine evening to a rendezvous," he adopted a French accent just for that one word, rolling the r, "of my own arrangement." He leaned in closer and dropped his voice to a whisper. "That means date." He leaned back and grinned, that soft, proud rabbit one that made his cheeks dimple.

"Somewhere," Doe replied cryptically. After a moment's feigned thought, he quirked his brows, tilted his head and added, "nowhere..." He tilted his head the other way. "Everywhere... No, not everywhere. No, no, c'mon, I hate secrets, I hate keeping them — c'mon, the quicker we get there, the quicker I can be like," he let out a melodramatic exhale of breath and slumped in relief, "and you can be like," he perked up and widened his eyes at something imaginary and tall, beaming an open-mouthed smile, "and I can be like," he adopted a shy, sheepish expression, pressing his cheek against his shoulder and batting his lashes towards the ground.

"Enough." Hitting Hywel softly on the foreleg, he limp-bounded forward excitedly. But it disturbed the flower behind his ear and there followed a few, frantic seconds in which it began to slip from his fur, Doe stopped and let out a few sounds of protest, blindly patting at the back of his ear to try and feel for the flower before it fell — but still it fell. "Nooo," Doe exclaimed quietly, crouching quickly to pick up the flower, blow on it, and tuck it back into his fur. "Don't look!" he suddenly blurted out to Hywel, whipping around and pointing his good paw at him, his stance set out wide like he'd just suddenly seen an enemy. "This is my secret powder room routine — and worse, these are sacred SummerClan practices! It's like seeing someone get ready in the morning, suddenly you'll be like 'oh, that's how they do it' and the magic's lost. Y'know? You gotta..." He turned and padded on as he continued, as care-free and babbly as he had been in weeks. "You gotta retain the mystery, y'know? It's like, oh wow, how is Doefreckle always so cute and put together? It's because I'm not!" He spun around again and pointed at Hywel, stopped still as the other tom continued to pad towards him. "I mean, I am," he laughed, lifting that same paw and pretending to push at the bottom of an imaginary bob of hair. "But you've still never really seen me in the mornings."

Doe continued on in this vein, seemingly completely unaware that he was carrying out a conversation with himself with little intervention from the other tom on the date. He led the way with cheerful, unusually bouncy limping steps, confident in the direction he was heading in.

As Hywel mussed his fur, Doe just grinned back at him, lopsided and just this side of offended; if it had been anyone else, he would have been annoyed at having his manicured image undone. But now, he just stared like he couldn’t believe the gall. “Of course I am,” he replied, smoothing the now-damp fur between his ears with one paw and still giving Hywel that grinning, slightly glaring look. More than anything, he was just happy — relieved beyond anything — to have this easiness from Hywel back; for now, for this moment, the coldness had lifted. But as pleased as he always was to have compliments about his looks, they never quite fed the ache in his heart; he wanted to be called something more than cute, something more than beautiful — he wanted to be called smart, funny, interesting. He had always settled for not getting them before, had always sought physical compliments and nothing more. But now, lately, for the first time ever, he wanted to be seen as something more. He’d spent so long hiding away behind his mask of being stupid, of being a pretty face with no thoughts of his own, no ideas, no brain, that now, in the confusing depths of this healing, he yearned tentatively, sorrowfully, doubtfully — guiltily — for comments about something that wasn’t at face-level. He wanted to be called clever. He wanted to be called… sprawling. With this whole new world of possibilities open to him, he was both terrified and dizzyingly intoxicated. There was more to life than being what other toms wanted him to be. There was more to life than submission.

At his guesses, Doe just grinned, continuing on ahead. “Neither,” he replied self-importantly, inordinately cocky he hadn’t guessed. Limping out of the trees, he led the way across an expanse of open, bleak ground — so devoid of SummerClan’s colour, though he tried not to think about it, to compare the two; he was here now, in the League, and it was enough — towards a tall, tall brick building. Slipping through a heavy metal door left slightly ajar, Doe limped lightly up the steps —

And out onto the stage.

It was a theatre after-dark, empty and yawning. Fairy lights were hung over the stage for a performance the next day, disappearing into the heavy, velvet black of the wings. Someone had left music playing in the auditorium over the stalls, gentle classical. The wings, the vast, old wooden stage — everything smelled of dust, of faint hairspray, of perfume and wood and the burn of stage lights, long since switched off. Doe turned to Hywel with a wide, beaming smile. “They do always call me a drama queen,” he joked around a little lopsided grin, his earlier utter confidence fading slightly to a hum of faint insecurity, faint self-consciousness — he’d only arranged a date once before in his life, a thousand flowers in a copse of birches, and that hadn’t… Well, it had been beautiful. But it had been long, long ago. And Chim had been as different to Hywel as it was possible to be. Still smiling, slightly shyly now, his shoulders hunching up a little, he looked at him for a moment longer before suddenly turning and limp-bounding over to a treacherous metal staircase. With seemingly no fear, he limped quickly up it, coming out on the rafters above the stage, looking out over the stage, the open red curtain, the seats, the dusty black wings below.

Sitting on the metal behind the railing, he smiled out at the view, pleased and proud and, after a moment of gazing, softly dreamy. He fell into the magic of the atmosphere, forgetting for a second that Hywel was there at all. The fairylights reflected in his brown eyes as he gazed out at them with that warm, soft smile, as innocent in that moment as an apprentice untouched by the violence of the world. His whole life ahead of him and no pain to blemish it.


i have had this date planned since NOVEMBER, the relief of finally being able to use stuff oh my lord <3

Doe grinned, soft and happy and relieved; he let out a laughing breath and glanced back at him, not having fully realised himself how anxious he was to know whether Hywel would like it or not. “I’d say something totally cliché like, yes it is, but I’d be looking at you while I said it and so any onlooker would be like ‘oh my gosh, he’s talking about Hywel, not the lights’ and it would be all yearn-y and romantic and sad — but I won’t. Except I just did. But…” While he was speaking, he turned and made his way slowly back to the other tom, finally slipping down to brush his forehead under his chin and settle beneath it, the last word coming out as a low, quiet murmur. At any other time, in any other place, it would have been sensual, would have been leading up to foreplay, would have been his special brand of melting cheerfulness into sudden flirtation, like he’d just been using the babbling as a guise to get close, like a circling shark — but, for the first time ever in his life, Doe was resigned to living like a monk if it meant winning Hywel back. It was hell, but he was stubbornly determined. So, instead, he just sat there under his chin, tipping his head back to give him an upside down smile — like he was saying ’see, look how good and well-behaved I am. Look how much I’m trying. It might have seemed disingenuous if it were anyone else, might have seemed like he was trying too hard, that such obvious actions meant he’d lose interest and fall back into bad habits the second they were acknowledged — but with Doefreckle, over the top shows of affection, of trying, were the most genuine signs of putting his full heart into something. He was turning over a new leaf; he was committed to it. From a little narcissist like him, all flamboyant parades of love were utterly genuine.

“So,” he continued, his voice happy and close but still soft enough to not disturb the gentle, hushed ambience of the theatre. His head was still tipped back to smile up at Hywel. “How’s my first month of redemption going so far? Am I mate material yet?” His perseverance was another sign of his true commitment: he’d had stubborn tasks before, things he’d done just to show he could — he could be loyal, he could go without (that one not so much; he’d lasted three days). Doe was nothing if not competitive, nothing if not self-absorbed — and, even with this, a fair bit still traced itself back to himself. But it also just showed that he wasn’t giving up: Hywel could say he still wasn’t enough, could say he wasn’t ready, could say Doe hadn’t proved himself, and he would wait. He would keep trying. His mama had raised a messed up boy, but she hadn’t raised a quitter. And that determination that he would be Hywel’s mate was both cocky and sweetly devoted. He’d jump through every hoop the other tom set for him. He’d perform every trick, read every line, sign on every dotted line.

“More importantly,” he leaned back against him, his voice dropping to its seductive low tone, though his eyes were still (mostly) teasing, “does any of this get me a little…” He straightened, as much as Doefreckle could straighten. “Kidding!” he added cheerfully, and it was said like someone would have laughed with a bullet wound to their chest bleeding out and said ’haha, I’m fine! No complaints here!’ “I’m doing very well,” he went on, looking down and smoothing his good forepaw over his soft chest fur, still sitting beneath Hywel’s chin. “Getting the full… Well, I was going to way ‘getting the full medicine cat experience’ but that got me here in the first place. But!” He held up his paw and looked up. “In that same vein, that got me here. And I’m very happy to be here.” He smiled, his cheek dimpling. Like a complete dork. “Back to my question, though — scale of one to ten. Anything less than five and I’ll cry, but be honest. How am I doing?”

There was a time when Doe would have wept to hear it, when he would have been so consumed by the belief that he didn't deserve it that he would have deflected and bared his teeth in some nasty insult designed to force the other tom to give him up, just as he had with Hywel all those moons ago. But first had come Shaded, who had lain with him night after night, who had spent such meaningless, nothing time with him that meant the world, and all that peace, all the gentle, unselfish love that asked for nothing in return, had broken down the first of Doe's walls. Had taught him to stop hurting himself. And now had come Hywel. Anyone else but those two, any of the other toms he had known, wouldn't have given a single thought to consideration, to him — they would have numbered him, and that was precisely what had led to his question in the first place: because as natural as it was, as unthinking and flippant as it was, it was how he'd been taught to think of himself. On a sliding scale — nothing on this end, desirable on the other. A two to wound him, to keep him desperate, to keep him bound and trying; a ten to watch him preen and simper. But now, to have not one but two who loved him — who he hoped loved him; who cared for him not because they wanted something, but because they wanted him to be alright. They wanted him to eat. They wanted him to sleep... If someone had told the Doe he once was that there would come a day where he was given that deference by two separate souls, he would have burst into tears.

But rating this on a scale of one to ten doesn't seem to do this any justice either. He smiled, and even though shy wasn't ever the right word to describe him — he was shameless — he looked it: half because he knew it looked cute on him and that was difficult to shake; half because he was overcome. He looked down, played absently with the thick fur of Hywel's foreleg. "Yeah..." he conceded softly, sheepishly, like he was embarrassed in the most wonderful way by Hywel's earnestness, and the smile was in his eyes.

I might not be able to give you a sliding scale number, but I love hanging out with you. Doe smiled, wide and close-lipped; all his life he'd curated expressions that made him look young and boyish, that made him look stupid because no one liked them clever, and even if everything about him healed and changed, that never would. To be told someone liked hanging out with him, platonically and without expectations of what he would give them; it meant more than there were words for. Give me a little bit more time for my heart to decide what it wants? He nodded, still smiling. "Yeah," he agreed again in a soft, breathy voice, half a whisper. He brushed his broken paw against Hywel's chest, looking down for a moment. When he looked back up, the smile was still just as deceptively innocent, but there was an impishness to it now. "But it'll be me. It's always me." Half of it was teasing cockiness borne just as much of shame and pain as arrogance — toms always wanted him. If there was one thing they wanted, it was always him — not his brain, not his wit, not his heart, wherever that was; but at least they wanted him. It's always me sounded just as tired as it did satisfied. But the other half was genuine hope, genuine gentleness; he wanted it to be him. He was going to make sure it was. Doe wasn't overly respectful, wasn't overly patient, not when you stripped away the softness and dug down to the real marrow — Hywel knew that. He wasn't going to deferentially say take all the time you need, because even if he did, even if he breathed it so sorrowfully, it would be so clear to Hywel that it was a lie; he was going to call himself Hywel's mate until he actually was, and that love, however stubborn, however irritating, however mean-girl, was just his own.

He didn't say it now, but he couldn't imagine a life where he was happy in the League; he knew, whatever it took, he would find his way back to SummerClan. All he hoped was that when he did, Hywel would love him from across boundaries. That maybe, someday, if Doe couldn't move his heart to the League, Hywel could move his to SummerClan. "So," he said again, and now he eased Hywel down to the wooden floorboards of the rafters with all the silent insistence that said he'd done it plenty of times before. He settled atop him, looking down at him, enveloped in his thick fur. He really did have a thing for long-furred toms. Doe smiled down at him, the look in his eyes showing all the temptress awareness his silence on the physicality of them otherwise denied; his glossing over the topic made him seen unaware of the indecency of the position, Hywel on his back and him resting between his legs, his eyes said otherwise. He tapped his good paw on his chest as he spoke, cheery and teasing and pointedly oblivious. The gentle lights of the theatre played across the both of them; they shared a shadow. "Since we're completely on a break, are there any other toms in the League that have caught your eye now? Y'know, now that you're totally on the market." He gave a puckish, dimpled little grin. It was subtle, like most times Doe addressed a particularly painful or confronting memory — sometimes he delved to the heart of the matter and babbled his brains out in desperate earnestness; but otherwise, he just alluded to certain situations in their shared past. The particular situation he was referring to now was their earth-shattering fight in the city that had stemmed of Doe's jealousy and Hywel's venomous hurt; he couldn't say he was going through the ten steps and laying everything to rest in the pursuit of healing and peace, so he just had to show that he was very much not jealous now. Even though the jokeyness of it was clearly, harmlessly jealous — Hywel was on the market; he was very clearly not on the market, not if Doefreckle had a say in it. His psyche was a complicated thing. It was what made loving him such a business contract.

We're supposed to be reading the same book and yet you're a few chapters ahead of me. Doe looked down at him with a cocky little grin, dancing his head from side to side. “Cuz you’re illiterate,” he replied teasingly. “Too much time out on those country bumpkin moors.” Still grinning faintly, gaze holding that sultry gloom it always got in the dark, he leaned down to touch their noses together.

Is there...is there something you wanted to talk about? Grin slowly fading, Doe gave a little shrug, curling a tuft of Hywel’s fur round and round his claw so he could justify looking down. Hywel never let him deflect with jokes; he always made him be honest. “I suppose getting it all out in the open is, like, step one in clearing the air, isn’t it?” He let out a groan and tipped his head back; then, with the full force of gravity, he dropped his head onto Hywel’s chest, petulant and unenthusiastic. “I haaaate therapy,” he grumbled, cheek against his heart and tufts of Hywel’s fluff in his mouth as he spoke. He flexed his tongue and tried to push them back out, looking like a yucked-out kit. “Okay.” He suddenly pushed himself up, forepaws resting on Hywel’s chest again so he could look down at him. “As soon as we had our big fight, I went and did totally indecent things with a rogue — which you totally can’t blame me for because you were all over that other guy when I found you,” Doe added, brows raised and head turned slightly to the side so he could look at Hywel out of the corner of his eye, like he was stubbornly daring him to argue. This was the horrible part of getting back together, the confessing everything — but the very fact he was doing it inside of running and hiding showed that he wanted this to work, that he cared. “And then after that, I…” He rushed through this part, hanging his head dramatically like he just wanted to get it out, “slept with the enemy when SummerClan was being occupied by NightClan, and he was the brother of the, like, dictator and also he killed my friend’s dad, who was the leader of SummerClan. And he was fine,” he added hastily, suddenly looking up with wide eyes, “he had nine lives. But she was still justifiably pissed, and that’s why I was exiled. But I only did it because I was angry and hurting about us, about you and me, and old Doefreckle totally came out and made me all self-destructive and awful and— it was just a bad vibe.” He shook his head. As flippant as he made it sound, he was utterly genuine. He hung his head again, resting his forehead against his good paw and letting out a sigh with his eyes closed, like the taste in his mouth was horrible but at least he had been unburdened. At least it was out. “You can tell me about all the things you did, too, but I already know they’re all a quarter as good in bed as me, so.” It was half a joke, but the other half really did want to go round to all those toms and show how pretty he was and show how much Hywel was off the market and jhappy — with him. He paused for a moment, eyes still closed where he rested his temple against his paw, and then added so quietly, so stubbornly, like he was just saying it to himself, “not even a quarter.”

Finally, he opened his eyes, shifting his head slightly against his paw so he could look down at Hywel with a softer, calmer smile, looking faintly tired. “Point is. I messed up. Times that by a thousand and that’s how much I messed up. And now all I want to do is show you how much I want to be with you. And I know I know I make this all sound like a big joke to me but… it’s not. It’s just that I care so much that I…” Letting out a breath, he slowly lowered himself back down to rest his cheek beside Hywel’s head, his chest laid out along his and his breath ruffling the other tom’s fur. When he continued, his voice was so quiet, so vulnerable, so genuine and raw. “That I can’t talk about it out loud.” Piece by piece, Doe was peeling himself away — for Hywel. His defences. His fronts. His fears. For him. Because he wanted to be better, and because Hywel wanted him to be, too. And so he’d try.

(after your reply, shall we timeskip to them saying goodbye after the nc-pi raid? and then i can post (DANCES) the proposal thread? <3)