If You Were My Boyfriend... But You Ain't My Boyfriend
The next few days were all about Gem and Opal. Scar was glad they got along so well, but the similarities between Opal and LF were so glaring that he struggled to call Opal by her name and not Pearl. Scar often found himself wondering if Gem even remembered that what used to be her girlfriend turned into... something else over the course of a day. But if finding people who looked weirdly similar to her ex helped Gem cope, then Scar was all in.
Scar was standing next to a sleepy, uncaffeinated Grian while shoveling two pieces of toasted white bread down his throat when Gem suddenly gets this really funny look on her face, and being the good friend he is, Scar asks her about it.
"Well, Opal just asked me out." Gem says, a hum of excitement in her voice. Judging by the way she facepalms when seeing Grian suddenly choke on his coffee and Scar's shocked expression, the two had interpreted that wrong. "I meant as a friend, as a friend."
Grian yawns, leaning on the countertop before sleepily countering Gem. "Mm... Whatever makes you feel better at night.."
"Where are you two meeting?" Scar asks through mouthfuls of bread. Grian offers Scar a napkin which he takes graciously while Gem judges him from the couch.
"At a botanical garden," she shrugs, smiling slightly. "Apparently working at a restaurant makes you more money than your average nine-to-five. I might give it a try."
"I heard you get free food if you work at a restaurant."
Grian shakes his head. "You don't. Sometimes you get discounts but that's it."
"You worked at a restaurant? That's cool." He turns to his left in an attempt to make eye contact with Grian. How has he done practically everything?!
Grian's eyes widen slightly, before nodding quickly. "Yep, only for a brief moment though -- I may or may not have been fired." he leans on the laminate countertops, grinning at Scar almost nervously before shrugging to himself and going back to staring at the dark vortex of decaf coffee. Scar wonders how one could drink such a bitter mixture; he could barely get one sip down without gagging.
Gem raises her eyebrows at the two, before checking her phone and hastily getting up from the couch. "Well, nice chatting, I gotta get out of here in about thirty minutes." She quickly walks into her room, saluting before closing the door.
"Do you think those two like each other?" Grian asks, a smile playing on his lips.
"Totally."
˚⊹ ‧✩⋆⁺₊𓆩✦𓆪⋆⁺₊✩‧ ⊹˚
"Alright, I'm leaving! Please don't burn this place down, Scar, I'm talking to you." Gem says, emphasizing the 'don't burn this place down' part.
"You're not my mom!" Scar jokes, laughing when Gem rolls her eyes and speed-walks out the door, slamming it behind her.
As soon as Scar finishes laughing, Grian gets up, grabs Scar's arm, and drags him over to the couch. He takes it as a hint to sit down so he takes one side of the couch while Grian sits down in the other. Grian is still holding his espresso even though it is 100% cold by now and most likely gross.
Grian takes a long sip, wrinkling his nose and flicking his stinger slightly at the taste of the hour-old coffee. He glances at Scar, an awake-but-kinda-tiredish look on his face as he squints at Scar before finally speaking; "Random question but do... Er, do you think you're a good person?"
Scar's heart could have stopped that second. Did he think he was a good person? Morally, the answer would probably be yes. But by actions?...
"Depends on your definition of a good person." Scar falters, voice still happy-go-lucky as always.
"You said you do all this vigilante stuff because you want to protect people, yet when we do just that, you never seem very happy," murmured Grian, staring blankly at the wall in front of him. "You're always so- serious about all of this. It's almost like you're a different person."
"Even when you saved that girl's life -- and mine, all while fighting the other day, you didn't seem like yourself. What I mean is that you just seemed kinda disappointed in yourself, I guess."
Scar blinked a few times, barely processing what Grian had said. First of all, when did Grian pay this much attention to him anyway? Second of all, he was really hoping Grian wouldn't question why his personality switched around so often but here he was. He laughs humorlessly, a small smile slipping onto his lips despite not feeling very enthusiastic at the moment. "This is a little awkward, uh -- You can't let the bad guys know you're scared. Pretending like you're not scared at all is also an amazing tactic to stay anonymous... So." Scar says, so softly that Scar couldn't tell if he'd actually spoken.
Apparently, he was loud enough as Grian makes a little 'oh' noise before he just stopped making any noise completely. He drinks the rest of the coffee before putting it down on the table and picking at his nails. After a minute or two, he finally pipes up again, ungluing his eyes from the wall and looking at Scar.
"You don't need to force yourself to do all of this, y'know? Like, last time I asked you didn't owe anyone anything."
Scar shrugs, reaching over and yanking out a feather absent-mindedly. "You don't get it. I-"
He bites his tongue, shutting up suddenly. Does he really need to tell Grian he won? That he'd killed his friends dozens of times for a piece of leathery paper rolled up into a wooden tube? How would Grian think of him when he'd have to explain how he had to be dragged out of Trader Scars, held at gunpoint? How he had felt responsible for hundreds of citizen's deaths, how he could of prevented the forever bloodthirsty versions of his peers from killing everyone and everything if he'd just accepted his fate and let himself be mauled to death by a zombie. Would Grian think he's lying because he's not corrupted and all freaky like the others, no, the question he should be asking himself is how would he be able to explain why he's still normal, unlike the others? Could he have even stopped the other Corrupteds from killing, or would he end up just like them?
Scar shakes himself out of his thoughts; a glassful of unanswerable questions didn't sound fun at the moment. "I did a whole lot of bad things when playing the games. It's not like we were playing a video game, Grian. I was killing my friends and they could feel every little ounce of pain I inflicted on them. Being stabbed or exploded or burnt to death like three times over isn't exactly enticing."
Grian shakes his head, now staring into Scar's eyes, "But you died and were revived about, seven, fourteen, twenty-eight times, yeah? What makes you so much more guilty than other Reborns?"
"Long story short, I could have saved a whole lot of people, but didn't 'cause I chickened out. Just repaying my debts." clears up Scar, biting the inside of his cheek. Don't ask more questions, don't ask more questions, don't-
"Scar, I think you're fantastic." Grian blurts, facial expression contorting like he was shocked at his own words. Whatever he meant to say, Scar bets that definitely wasn't it.
"What?"
Grian sighs, leaning back and accepting the path that he'd paved for himself, "I think you're fantastic. You're funny, weirdly good at aiming, and pretty- Pretty cool. Whatever you think of yourself, I'd like to tell you that you should tell your brain to shut up 'cause you're pretty fuckin' amazing." He blinks and laughs a little; a sound that Scar could theoretically get addicted to, "Excuse my language."
"You mean it? Like no 'Haha, Scar I pranked you?'"
Grian smiles, a faint tint of blush dusting his face, "Yeah, I mean it. 100%."
Scar could kiss Grian cry of joy right this second because that was maybe, no, definitely the best compliment he's gotten in his life. A soft, fuzzy feeling was starting to seep into his chest and Scar found himself wanting to feel like this till the end of time.
He grins, bright and ecstatic as he leans over and gives Grian a big hug. Grian stiffens up for a second before melting into Scar's touch. He was weirdly cold; like he'd been standing in a snowy tundra for a few hours but the cold felt unreasonably welcoming.
"Thanks, that means a lot to me." breathed Scar, pulling Grian impossibly closer for a moment before letting him go and patting him on the head.
Grian smiles as well, quickly combing his hands through his hair to fix the mess Scar had just created, "Just telling the truth." He says, moving a little closer to Scar on the couch.
Scar's heart is pounding out of his chest, drumming in his ears as he packs the last few moments into his memory to keep forever. A set of words starts looping endlessly through his head, one he really hopes isn't true because it may end up being a weird conversation to have with himself tomorrow.
I'm in love with my best friend.