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The girl smiles too much, Viktor thinks, as she sways back and forth on her feet in the only corner of the cramped living room that isn’t covered with schematics and half-finished inventions.
Her name is Drusilla, and there’s a gap between her teeth, though it doesn’t make her any less beautiful. Jayce brought her home and then left her there in that barren little cranny while he went into his room to haphazardly throw all of his dirty clothes under the bed. Victor knows this because Drusilla is the third girl this month.
It shouldn’t be surprising, Viktor notes as he tries to ignore the elephant in the room. They’ve been particularly productive recently, with the date for the reveal of the first ever Hexgate being decided on by the council tomorrow. Either Jayce is feeling nervous, or likes to celebrate prematurely. Viktor likes to think he doesn’t have a preference for either theory.
With minimal eye contact with Drusilla, Viktor finally reaches his destination, the sole reason he isn't locked in his room on such a night. He flicks on the kitchen light, and then jams his cane up at the blue fluorescents to stop them from flickering, for even Piltover has its faulty wiring moments. He then reaches up for a glass, and then down below to find the stash of sleeping pills Jayce doesn’t know about. He’s got a terrible headache, and he isn’t trying to make it worse by letting himself eavesdrop on Jayce and this week’s late night visitor.
The tablet has just slid down Viktor’s throat when Jayce’s door flings open, and the man of the hour appears. Viktor thinks the pulsing behind his eyes has worsened.
Jayce is drunk, unsurprisingly, and there is a telltale lurch to his gait that means he’ll likely fall asleep before Drusilla’s taken his pants off, with a slightly smaller chance of him puking all over himself in the process. For Viktor is a scientist, and Heimerdinger’s former assistant to boot, and has experienced this particular night too many times to not know what comes next.
Jayce leads Drusilla by the arm into his room, lazily jerking her this way and that to avoid her stabbing her stiletto heels through a stray blueprint. They share secret smiles and giggles on their way, and Viktor knows, five minutes after that door closes, Drusilla will come rushing out, disgusted (but more importantly, disappointed), and he’ll be the one to clean up the mess.
Which is why, seven minutes later, he’s prodding Jayce’s prone body with his cane, holding a glass of water in his free hand. “Wake up, you brute,” he mutters under his breath.
Luckily, Jayce did not vomit over himself this time. Unluckily, Drusilla had been mostly successful in her mission of undressing the man, leaving Viktor to have to pointedly stare at his own shoes while waiting for Jayce to wake up.
Finally, Jayce stirs, and Viktor shoves the glass at him as soon as his eyes open. Their hands touch for just a moment, but Viktor’s fingers burn all the same.
“Ah, Viktor,” Jayce groans out, “my savior, as always.”
Viktor doesn’t reply, because Jayce is looking at him straight in the eyes, drunk but not entirely unconscious, sober but not quite lucid, dressed only in his pants, and all he wants to do is hide in his room and let the sleeping pills take over.
“Really,” Jayce continues, propping himself up on a pillow to take a drink from the glass. “Back then, now, it’s all the same. I’d be lost without you.”
And Viktor can’t help but flinch at that. “Are you done?” he says dryly in an attempt to recover, but the damage is done. He slipped, even if Jayce was too out of it to notice.
“Why do you help me when I’m like this?” Jayce asks suddenly. “You don’t have to; I know you hate it when I’m drunk.”
No, Viktor wants to say, I hate it when you bring girls over. But he doesn’t feel like ruining his life today, so instead he replies, “Because that’s what partners do?”
Jayce nods slowly, and for a moment Viktor thinks he doesn’t buy it until he repeats, “Because that’s what partners do.”
And Viktor thinks he’s in the clear, because Jayce has thrown an arm over his eyes now, and the door is just over there and he can leave and sleep this all away when:
“Is it the girls? Is that what bothers you?”
Followed by: “I can take you to this salon I go to. Introduce you to a girl you’ll like, someone smart. In fact, I think I already have someone in-“
Viktor’s cane is going to break under his grip. It’s going to snap and then he’ll snap because he can’t say it out loud, that he’s doing all of this under the delusion that maybe, just maybe, Jayce will one day choose him over the girls of Piltover’s finest salons, and shove dirty laundry under the bed for him, and smile that secret smile just for him.
“It’s,” he grits out instead, “it’s not the girls. It’s not anything.” He lies through his teeth, “Really, there’s nothing wrong. I’m your partner, and this is what partners do, alright?”
Jayce lifts his arm, just enough to stare at him, but Viktor is already turning away.
He leaves, trying to ignore the eyes on his back and the voice in his skull taunting him. He leaves, even with the acceptance of the fact that he’ll be back here in Jayce’s room to indulge a doomed love a week, month, years from now.
In his dream, Jayce will climb into his bed, kiss the moles on his face, name the one under his eye Polaris, and whisper thank you, thank you, I love you, over and over again in his ear like a prayer.
And in his dream, Viktor will wrap his arms around Jayce’s neck, and taste the whiskey on his lips, and wish that he would never wake up.