Chapter 15
How was Adam sure that he loved Ronan Lynch?
It could have been the way that Ronan always seemed to fit next to him. How their hands naturally intertwined. How there was always an arm around a waist, always a leg tangled with another, always warmth between them. It was not that.
It could have been how Ronan was a romantic. He cooked Adam dinner, he bought (or dreamed) Adam flowers and mix-tapes and hand lotion. He called Adam ridiculously sugar-sweet pet names like “my star” and “my angel”, he kept Adam’s transformer polished on a desk in the barns right next to a small toy car that played music when the wheels spun. He gave and gave and gave and gave and gave but expected nothing in return. How, when Adam tried to refuse, tried to call it pity and turn it away, Ronan was just as stubborn as he was, and would not let him. How even after all this, he still looked at Adam like he had hung the moon. It was not that
It could have been the way that Ronan knew how to make him smile and laugh. How Ronan knew exactly how to elicit the reaction he wanted, how Ronan knew him, and how that was the best gift Ronan could ever have given Adam, unknowable Adam. It was not that.
These things were clues, they were insights into why he loved Ronan, how he loved Ronan. But how did Adam know? How did Adam feel in his bones every time he looked at Ronan, that that thud in his heart, that flush in his cheeks, the smile in his heart was love?
It was that Ronan could make Adam angry in a way that no one else could. Adam tried not to attach too many expectations to anyone, so that when they inevitably let him down, they never upset him too much. But Adam admired Ronan so deeply, so wholly and completely that when Ronan failed to meet his usual glory, it was upsetting. Not to say that Adam was completely without blame, he had just forgotten that Ronan was human, that he wasn’t perfect.
It was that Adam, Adam who had every reason to be angry at the world, didn’t think he knew what it was to be truly upset until he saw Ronan again. Eye swollen, cheeks red, hands no longer caked with blood, but knuckles bruised.
It was that the thing that sent a roll of flame over Adam’s stomach was the brightness in Ronan’s eyes. It was a kind of happiness that Adam recognized, a kind of beer-and-fast-cars kind of happiness that Adam did not realize had disappeared, it was Ronan-before-Blue, no, it was Ronan-during-Kavinsky.
It was that when Ronan looked in his eyes, sheepish and ashamed, Adam felt the overwhelming desire to forgive him.
The silence in the room had been so pointed that Adam had forgotten there were others in the room, they seemed determined to keep it that way, they filed out of the room with hushed whispers until only Ronan, Adam, and Henry remained, and Henry only because he couldn’t leave.
“Henry, could you do me a favor and pretend like you don’t hear us?” Adam found himself saying, his accent unintentionally spilling from his lips.
“Man, I’m already two steps ahead of you,” Henry answered, halfway through plugging in a pair of headphones and turning his phone volume much higher than recommended. “You couldn’t get me to step in the middle of this if you tripled my inheritance,”
There were a few moments of a strange silence with Ronan and Adam looking at a closed-eyed Henry.
Ronan broke the silence “Yeah this is still too fucking weird, can we go to the dorm?”. Adam nodded and walked out, ignoring the rest of the foxes in the hallway, he felt Ronan following, not far behind.
Then they were in the dorm and they couldn’t use location to stall anymore.
So this left Adam and Ronan, staring at each other, neither saying a word. They looked into each other’s eyes waiting to see who would break first, Adam with his bounds of anger and sadness and Ronan with his guilt and reluctance.
Ronan did not break, he looked at Adam with every ounce of remorse in his body and willed Adam to accept it. Adam was harshly reminded that he was a catholic. He was used to confession.
“I’m sorry,” Ronan said, he sounded so reluctant Adam almost believed him.
“You’re not,” Adam said, and he knew it wasn’t true. Ronan didn’t lie, and he didn’t make a habit of apologizing.
“I am, Adam, I-,” Ronan’s voice fell. “I’m not sorry for hitting him, and I’m not sorry that he hit back, but I am sorry for how it made you feel, and- no, fuck that sounds condescending, shit, look, I made a mistake, I made a mistake and I’m asking you to forgive me,”
“What exactly were you thinking?” Adam asked, face ashen.
There was a moment of silence, then a surprised “what?”
“I want to know what you were thinking, what did he say? Why did it make you so angry?”
This threw Ronan off, he brought a hand up to awkwardly rub the back of his scalp. Adam was too angry to be endeared. It was a quiet anger, so unlike the explosive feeling he was so used to.
“I don’t know,”
“What”
“I don’t know, I’m not sure he even said anything, the little shit, but I was just angry. I was angry at Gansey and Wymack and Kevin and the fucking court, and there the stick-dick was, looking just the right amount of stupid and cocky and offensive, so I just hit him, and then he hit back and then I hit him for that and well...” he gestured to himself in a sort of well-look-at-me motion.
His words had come out in a strange, unorganized jumble of speech that Adam recognized as the way he spoke when he felt guilty. He didn’t know if knowing that Ronan regretted making him feel this way made it any better.
So, how did Adam Parrish know that he was in love with Ronan Lynch? It was because of shouting at him, Adam told him “come here”. It was because, instead of storming out of the room, he opened his arms and beckoned Ronan closer. It was because instead of being two boys on two opposite sides of a wall, they were two boys curled up on a bed, forgetting the world for a bit.
“It’s still not okay,” Ronan whispered to him.
“No, it’s not,” Adam agreed “but it will be,”
////////////
Scarlet smiled, entering the house, feeling the charms tingling on her skin. The Gray Man and Maura were nowhere to be found. The house was beautiful and strangely roomy, strange splotches of paint were slapped messily onto the wall. Feathers and beads and bottles hung from the ceiling. A beautiful stained glass light hanging over a dining table projected colorful geometric shapes around the living room.
“All right,” said Calla, closing the door behind her “now, what do you really want.”
“I came for two things, one requires Maura Sargent, and she is currently incapacitated, and likely will be till morning. Is there anyone in this house who would volunteer to help me with an extremely dangerous ritua-,”
“Stop,” Calla interrupted.
Scarlet was a little disgruntled, she was sure that whatever Calla was used to, Scarlet thought that being very the-fate-of-all-magic-depends-on-this would warrant a little bit of respect for the words coming out of her mouth.
Calla strode into a small door and after a few minutes in which Scarlet very sneakily examined the room for listening devices or hidden cameras, she strode right back out with a vodka martini and a mojito. She gave Scarlet the mojito.
“Drink, then continue,” Calla’s voice held no room for an interjection. Scarlet had a drink.
“Right, um would anyone in this house want to- woah! There’s the tequila! Jesus Christ!”
“I’m afraid he isn’t here right now, you’ll have to deal with me,” Calla commented dryly, sipping on her martini and looking every bit like a disney villain.
Scarlet was a little disoriented. “Right, um. Dangerous ritual. Fate of all magic at stake. Anyone want to help?” Scarlet punctuated her jumbled statement with a sip of her mojito.
Calla rolled her head and shoulders in a few fluid, cat-like movements “It’s a little too late for a ritual, and I’m sure you know none of us are proper witches, not like you,” Calla grinned at her with a dagger-sharp smile.
“You don’t need a lot of ‘proper’ witches,” Scarlet replied confidently “You just need me,”
Calla snorted into her martini. “I’m sorry, but you can’t expect me to believe that you’re that good,”
Scarlet tried to keep the hurt tone out of her voice, but somewhat failed on that end “I’d be that good with a few psychics and a mirror on my side, and I believe this is the place where I can enlist the help of a few psychics and a mirror, am I right?”
“I suppose you’re right,” Calla said. “By the way, you might need this back,” Calla held up a sharp, thin blade. Scarlet’s favorite knife, she reached into her boot, where it was kept, and instead picked up a tarot card, the fool, she would be angry, except she had already had a bit of tequila, and she couldn’t hold her liquor. She laughed instead, and Calla laughed too
Calla’s smile had softened when she said “I’ll help with your little ritual, finish your drink,”