Chapter Text
“Why are you calling me?”
Julien scoffs. “Is that any way to talk to your boyfriend?”
“You're only my boyfriend for five more weeks,” Occtis says.
“God, not like you're counting,” Julien says. “I have bad news.”
“You should've opened with that,” Occtis says. His voice is muffled and Julien knows there's probably a ballpoint pen between his lips. So he's studying. Again. Like he always is. Alogar needs to get him out of Thaisha's place more.
“Apparently we're going on vacation.”
“No,” is all Occtis says.
Julien sighs, looking at his phone. “No?”
“No,” Occtis repeats.
Julien sighs again. “Listen, my dad is thrilled that I'm ‘dating’ a doctor. He planned this whole thing around your study break.”
The other line goes so quiet that Julien has to look at his phone again to make sure Occtis didn't hang up on him. That's usually how he ends phonecalls, but Julien can see that the line is still active.
“What?”
“Yeah, like,” Julien starts, “he heard you got some kind of study break thing and wanted to take us to the beach house to celebrate that and our six month anniversary.”
“Why would we celebrate either of those things?”
“Oh my God, what the fuck is your deal?” Julien groans. “Just pack all your books and your swimsuit and we can pretend we're in love for three weeks.”
“Three weeks?!”
“Yeah, I told him that's, like, barely any time for–”
Occtis hung up on him.
Great.
“How'd he take it?” Aranessa asks, looking at Julien over her coffee cup.
“He hung up on me.”
“So the usual,” she says with a heavy sigh. “You know Raimond is going to put you both in the same room.”
“I know,” Julien groans, rubbing his eyes.
“With one bed.”
“Stop!”
“Shared bathroom…”
“Are you enjoying this?”
Aranessa snickers. “No,” she lies. “Absolutely not.”
“I don't even know why I told you about this,” Julien says.
“You didn't,” Aranessa corrects. “Thjazi told me.”
“I thought you two were divorced,” Julien says.
“Well Julien,” Aranessa says, just a hint of sarcasm in her gentle voice, “when you are in a relationship for more than three weeks, you learn that maybe it's easy to fall in love with someone all over again.”
“Does Thimble know?” Julien asks. “I'd ask if she threatened to kick your ass, but I don't think her little legs can reach.”
Aranessa sets her cup down and rolls her eyes when Julien immediately grabs it. “Thimble is very happy for us.”
“She hates me,” Julien says, grimacing at how sweet Aranessa's coffee is.
“Gee, I wonder why,” Aranessa says flatly. “You all but sang and danced when that all happened.”
“When your maybe ex-husband goes to jail for a few years,” Julien says pointedly, “maybe some of us are happy that he's out of the picture.”
Aranessa's dark eyes harden. “Don't you talk about things you don't understand.”
“I understand that–”
“Your fake boyfriend is coming on vacation with us?”
“You're coming too?” Julien asks.
Aranessa nods. “Everyone is. I think Hal and Thaisha are letting the kids use their place.”
“Occtis can stay with them,” Julien says.
“No,” Aranessa says. “Your dad thinks this is a big celebration for your 6 month anniversary. You can't sleep in separate houses for your anniversary.”
“You and Thjazi don't even live together,” Julien sneers.
“And I'm not pretending to like him so my Daddy gets off my case,” Aranessa says, taking her coffee cup back.
“It's not like that,” Julien scoffs.
“Six months of a ‘committed’ relationship?” Aranessa says, folding her arms. “So you can stage a big breakup? And then Raimond never gives you shit about being a freeloader?”
“I have a job.”
“You take slutty photos at the gym and shill protein powder on social media,” Aranessa says. “When you're not being a ‘personal trainer’.”
“Yeah,” Julien says, like it's obvious. “And it pays. Very well!”
“Not as well as being a doctor would.”
Their relationship, if it can even be called that, is a twofold dynamic. Raimond Davinos swore he'd never make another comment about his almost-thirty-year-old son living in his guest house, going through partners like underwear, and being a slut on social media if, and only if, Julien managed to be in a relationship with the same person for six months. For Occtis Tachonis, eighth son of a man with notoriously suspicious dealings, he gets the satisfaction of knowing that his father has to reconcile that his least favorite son is entangled with a family that Primus Tachonis would like to personally see eradicated.
They both don't mention that Julien spent a very passionate five days “dating” Parisa Tachonis two and a half years ago. For Julien, he was coming off of, at least, two different substances for those five days. For Occtis, he was a med school prodigy this side of 18 who was waiting until the first disbursement of his trust fund hit and he could start moving away from the rest of his family.
Occtis won't ask why she did it, especially for him, but he will always be grateful for the afternoon where Murray Mag’Nesson popped her brightly colored bridge back in her mouth, took Primus Tachonis off hold, and went yeah, nah– student confidentiality, sir; I can't say a damn word about your son bein’ in the dorms or not. And she smiled at him, rainbow teeth on one side of her mouth, and told him to get his ass back down to Bolaire's office and remind him that they were gettin’ dinner after work. Occtis told her that she'd saved his life. Murray looked satisfied, winked at him, and went and don't you forget it before shooing him out of her office.
Julien lives in Raimond’s guest house. Occtis pays rent to live in the apartment above Thaisha Lloy’s garage. Twice a week, they pretend to hang out. Julien takes up too much space in Occtis' bed and scrolls through his phone while Occtis studies. Occtis sits at Julien’s kitchen table to study while Julien does whatever upstairs. Despite being on the sixth month of pretending to like each other, they've rarely spent any time together. Two months into the arrangement, Julien offered to order pizza and watch a movie. They sat on opposite ends of Julien's couch, most of an uneaten pizza on the coffee table in front of them, and Occtis spent the entire movie correcting the anatomical errors of the zombies in the film.
Julien couldn't say goodnight fast enough.
“Cute photo,” Aranessa says when Julien’s phone lights up.
“Ugh,” Julien groans. “Don't remind me.”
The Lloy family is still kind of a big deal, almost as much as the Davinos family and the Tachonis family. It's a photo that Shadia had taken at a gala, one that she and Alogar dragged Occtis to. They're cropped out of the photo, Shadia radiant in a cream colored beaded dress and Alogar charming in a dark green suit, but Shadia’s elbow is still in frame. In the photo, Occtis wears black and it makes him look even paler than he already is. He's turned, probably to speak to Shadia on his left, and the top two buttons on his black button-down are unfastened. His dark hair curls against his collar, and there's a mostly empty wine glass cradled in his long fingers.
It's been Julien's lock screen for the last four months. He can see Occtis’ painted nails and the two silver hoops through the cartilage on the shell of his ear. He needed a haircut when the photo was taken, and his dark hair frames his face as he's half smiling at Shadia out of frame.
God, it'll be a great day when Julien can swap this photo out for literally anything else.
“He's bringing his dog,” Julien says, eyes on the screen.
Aranessa beams. “I can't wait to meet him!”
“It's a dog,” Julien says.
“A very cute dog,” Aranessa says.
“Missing a leg.”
“Cutely,” Aranessa offers. “I imagine he'll sleep in the bedroom with you.”
“You can take him,” Julien rolls his eyes.
“Oh yeah,” now Aranessa rolls hers, “let me take the boy's medical alert dog so you don't have to wake up to puppy breath.”
“Maybe I should break up with him now.”
“You wouldn't dare.”