Chapter Text
Ivan wakes up. The alarm clock beeps unpleasantly next to his ear. Sunlight breaks through the thick dark gray curtains. Ivan wakes up, but does not open his eyes right away. Today is Monday, the twenty-eighth, seven in the morning. The first lesson at college will be literature. The voices of the first morning passers-by can be heard outside the window. Again..
Ivan opens his eyes. The sunlight casts golden streaks on the light sheets, and the voices outside are still noisy. He feels the familiar sharp pain somewhere around his heart and absentmindedly rubs his chest with his hand, as if this will help him rub off the phantom sensations. There is a salty taste of blood in his mouth, a cacophony of ghostly sounds of rain and the roar of gunshots in his ears. Ivan sits up on the bed and runs his hands through his hair, squeezing the tangled strands in his fists, trying to collect his thoughts.
He hears silence and the silence transforms into a terrifying roar of residual memories of a past that did not exist in this world. His head is splitting from sounds, voices and images that did not give him peace. His hands are shaking, his nails are scratching his scalp, trying, habitually, with pain to return a sense of reality to his confused consciousness.
And then the distant sound of a keyhole opening and keys is heard in the hallway. He hears footsteps, firm but quiet, as if their owner is deliberately trying not to make unnecessary sounds. When the door to the room opens, Ivan hears a voice.
“Rise and Sing!” the voice is deliberately loud, but the intonation, though rough, as always, trembles slightly nervously at the edges. The roar in the ears disappears.
The sun still breaks through the curtains in golden stripes and now casts light on his face, reflecting in golden sparkles in his large, bright green eyes. Ivan often sees these eyes in his dreams, but here, in reality, unlike in his dark and distorted dreams, they reflect the light and, directed straight at his face, seem especially beautiful.
Ivan smiles, his cheeks aching. He disentangles himself from the sheets and looks at this face through his bangs, which he himself has just ruffled even more, that have fallen over his eyes.
"Till," he says, his voice hoarse from sleep and something else happy and sweet that is constricting his throat. Till sighs, throwing his backpack on the chair and leaning his shoulder against the door frame, crossing his arms over his chest. His eyebrows are furrowed, but they twitch in a strangely sweet way, uncertain and awkward.
"Are you still asleep?" he grumbles, pushing off the wall and heading towards the kitchen. Ivan follows him, a silent shadow shining with happiness.
The clatter of dishes is heard, the noise of water fills the kitchen for a couple of seconds, after which the filled kettle whistles quietly on the stove, while Till continues to fiddle with the glasses. Ivan watches as Till's hands, thin, with long fingers, callused at the tips, try to fish a glass out of the shelf. His movements are constrained.
“It’s not working?” Ivan asks, but because of the smile on his face, the initially intended friendly phrase sounds almost malicious when it comes out. Till jumps like a frightened cat, and the glass he’s been trying to get this whole time falls with a crash from his shaking hands into the sink standing nearby.
“What are you scaring me about?” Till pounces on him right away, putting the ill-fated cup on the table and plopping down on a chair. His cheeks are a soft pink. Ivan wants to touch them. Which he does a second later. His fingers squeeze the soft skin and Till screams, waving and trying to fight off Ivan’s hands, which are patting his face.
“What the hell?!” he is indignant, rubbing his face with his hands fiercely and turning away slightly. Ivan smiles even wider, completely unaffected by such a sharp reaction. The skin under his fingers was hot a second ago. From this it seems to him that his eternally cold hands have also warmed up. It becomes strangely warm. Till only sighs at this, unconsciously running his fingertips over his cheeks, where Ivan’s fingers had dusted a second ago, with a much softer movement.
The kettle is boiling. Ivan pours the tea himself.
Till drinks his tea, sipping the hot liquid with a familiar, awkwardly loud slurp. Then he jumps up from his seat, as if remembering something, and rushes to the backpack left on the chair, without saying a word. Before Ivan can follow, Till immediately returns with a container in his hands.
“My mom!..” he exclaims intermittently, then, clearing his throat awkwardly, rubs the back of his head and puts the container on the table, “my mom sent you some pancakes. She said that we have to eat them together before going to college.” Ivan is silent, blinking his eyes in bewilderment. Till sighs, adding: “You can refuse if you don’t want to. I’ll eat it myself.” Ivan immediately pulls one out of the container and stuffs it into his mouth. Till snorts.
Ivan chews his breakfast carefully, this time unexpectedly distinguishing the tastes on his tongue well. Sweet. The taste of blood on his tongue disappears without a trace. His heart tingles, giving off a kind of shudder inside. It becomes even warmer. The warmth suddenly begins to sting his eyes. Ivan is not sure how to express this, and then finds Till looking at him with his usually serious eyes.
“Don’t you like it?” he asks and is already reaching for Ivan’s unfinished piece to take it away, “I told you that you don’t have to eat if you don’t want to,” he grumbles embarrassedly, his voice trembling again. Ivan moves the plate closer to himself.
”I do.”
“You suddenly stopped smiling,” says Till. His voice sounds almost accusatory. Ivan touches his lips with his fingers and finds that this is true. And then he smiles again, shaking his head, “It’s nothing.”
“It's not "nothing". What is it?” Till suddenly asks, this time more insistently. Ivan freezes, looking away.
“I don’t know,” he says quietly, digging into his portion with his fork, “it’s just… warm. I like it.”
Till looks at him piercingly for a moment, and then smiles slightly, relieved. His green eyes soften at the corners. Ivan likes that, too. He moves his chair so that he’s shoulder to shoulder with Till, and bumps shoulders with him slightly. Till doesn’t pull away, just wordlessly moves the container of pancakes closer.
And then his head lands quietly on Ivan’s shoulder. Ivan freezes. His hands are shaking, clutching his fork.
“Don’t leave me,” Till’s voice is hoarse, barely perceptible in the hum of the kitchen lamps and the beating of his heart. Ivan swallows hard, something painful twists in his chest, blocking his breath.
“Of course. We haven’t finished eating yet,” is all he can say. His carefree voice trembles at the ends of his sentences. He curses himself for never being able to speak properly.
Till raises his hand and squeezes the fabric of Ivan’s sweater in his fist, hard, until his knuckles turn white.
“Don’t leave me,” he repeats again, “Don’t leave me again.”
Ivan is silent. The sound of a fork falling from his weakened fingers onto the table is deafening in the silence.
Till loves him, his heart says. His consciousness refuses to acknowledge it.
“Why?” he whispers quietly.
Till is silent. Then the crash of a chair is heard, turning over and falling to the floor. Till hugs him tightly, almost to the point of crunching his ribs. Ivan cannot breathe, and does not know if it is from the force of the hug or from the fact that he seems ready to spit out his heart, beating madly somewhere in his throat.
“Forgive me,” Till mutters frantically, tightening his grip even more, “I will be more attentive. I will try to say everything I think out loud. We can make up for everything we missed last time. Let me be with you for real this time.”
Till hugged him. Again. This had happened more than once in this world, but Ivan still didn’t know how to react to it. So, again, as before, he just hugged him back, awkwardly, stiffly.
“No, I should be the one apologizing,” he muttered hoarsely, “I know I’m not fit for such things. You don’t have to…”
I know that I will never be worthy of your love. You don’t have to stay with me. That’s what he’s trying to say.
“Shut up,” Till interrupts him, but the voice Ivan heard didn’t sound cruel, quite the opposite. Ivan laughs, quietly, almost happily.
“You’re such a crybaby,” he says, hugging him back and lightly patting his hand on the back, “cheer up.”
“Shut up,” comes the answer again, “I don’t want to hear anything from someone who cries like an idiot.”
Ivan runs his hand over his face, leaving smeared drops of water on his palm. He is silent. There is suddenly more water on his cheeks.
Till pulls away, looks at Ivan’s face and smiles crookedly, sniffling, strangely similar to himself from childhood. And then he smiles broadly, furiously wiping his face with his sleeve. “Damn,” he mutters, pulling his sleeve over his palm and wiping Ivan’s face now. He obeys, closing his eyes, practically trembling from the touch, “I don’t know what you were thinking that day, but I’m so glad you’re here,” he grumbles, his sleeve scratching Ivan’s skin, causing the white skin of his cheeks to slowly turn red, either from the friction or from the warm feeling spreading in his chest again. Ivan hum in agreement, and, opening one eye, looks at Till, who seemed to have set himself the goal of reshaping Ivan’s face with his own sleeve (he wouldn’t be against it, really).
Till’s cheeks are shining from the moisture that hasn’t been completely wiped off, and his green eyes reflect the light, not like they used to, when Ivan could only see his face occasionally and from the side. Till looked at Ivan.
This made something in his head turn over once again.
The friction of the sleeve against the skin became even more intense, Till sniffled again, but said nothing. Ivan raised his hands and grabbed Till’s tense wrists with his palms, stopping him.
“You know,” Ivan muttered, his cold fingers touching the thin strip of skin on Till’s wrist that was peeking out from under the sleeve of his sweatshirt, “that thing… the lip touching. In the books of this world, they call it a “kiss,” I read.” His speech was quiet, but somehow almost impulsive. A kiss. That last painful memory that they had not discussed. A touch that tasted of rain, blood and death. Not what he wanted, not what he thought. So the words burst out on their own, for the first time, probably, in his entire life. Till’s hands tense a little more. Green eyes widen. Ivan immediately regrets bringing this up and smiles awkwardly, "I know you promised me this for my birthday. Don't pay attention, I'm just saying stuff. I just read that it has meanings, so..."
"Sorry about that," he wanted to say, but stopped because he felt a warm breath burn his lips, just for a second.
And then - a soft, gentle, barely perceptible touch of something warm on his cold lips, from which Ivan shuddered, as if frightened, and then, following some uncontrollable loud thought, reached out to touch in response. Their noses collided, their teeth clicked against each other. Ivan does not close his eyes, on the contrary, with his eyelids wide open, he looks at Till's closed eyes straight ahead, forgetting even to breathe.
Intermittent breathing. The soft touch of skin on skin. This time he does not feel any pain, nor the taste of ghostly blood on his tongue, nor the insipid raindrops flowing down his face, like that day.
Warm. Soft. It smells of pancakes, sweet tea and safety.
An amazing feeling that struck Ivan with its correctness.
Till pulls back, awkwardly rubbing his previously bruised nose and looks away, breathing heavily, his face even redder than his backpack, which was still lying on the chair.
"I promised you this for your birthday," he says awkwardly, running his hands through his hair and hiding his face behind his forearms, "but I didn't have time, you know, last time," he trails off, his shoulders slumping and his shoulders hunched in embarrassment in his seat, still not revealing his face, "and I also… know about the meanings. I read about it here and everything," he adds, completely unintelligibly.
Ivan gasps, covering the lower half of his flushed face with his palm and digging his fingers into his cheeks as if trying to hold back some unworthy sound that was ready to burst out of him.
Somewhere on the nightstand, a telephone rings. Probably one of their classmates was asking where they both disappeared to. Ivan doesn't look, doesn't check the time.
Today is Monday, the twenty-eighth, eight o'clock in the morning.
Three and a half months in a world he sincerely wanted to live in again.