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When Dex’s time comes to take up a class, just because he might enjoy it his senior year, he can’t help, but think of the adorable story of Jack’s final photography project that resurfaces every now and again to chirp Jack and Bitty both (they’re comfortably out to their friends at this point). He can’t deny that there’s been something simmering, something building with Nursey. Or within himself for Nursey. So he asks Jack if he can borrow his camera for a semester and Jack’s like “Sure, Dex, which one?” and sends him a picture of twelve high end cameras, because whenever a camera catches his eye or something new happens, Jack buys it apparently. It’s what he splurges on a bit for himself. Dex panics a little and just answers “Something that won’t cost more than my scholarship if Nurse accidentally breaks it,” and Jack’s quiet for quite some time and then he sends him a picture of just one camera “This is the one I used for my final project. Great for portraits.” And Dex doesn’t know if Jack’s chirping him or if he’d be wearing his sincere, I-need-you-to-know-I’m-your-friend face if he were, but he takes it.
They live in the attic now, so when Dex comes home one day with Jack’s frankly expensive camera gingerly held in his hand, Nursey picks up on it as soon as he picks up on Dex entering the room. Which would have been sooner if he hadn’t been reading.
“Oh, hey, Dex, didn’t see you..” He offers distractedly, a small smile, when he does spot him. He trails off, brows furrowing. “Is that Jack’s camera?” Great, Dex thinks, this the boy’s gonna be quick about.
Dex looks down at the beautiful black tool in his hands. Because looking at Nursey when the clouds drifts from his eyes and are replaced by this intense focus he has when talking to somebody he cares about, isn’t something Dex can handle at the best of times. And he’s afraid his motives for taking this class will be clear as day in his eyes.
“Yeah, I thought about picking up photography as an elective and he offered it to me to borrow, so yeah,” He does this weird half shrug that must look as awkward as it feels. He expects chirping, but when he looks up, Nursey’s not smirking. Instead there’s something akin to hurt in his eyes, like it wounds him that Dex chose to tell Jack and not him. Which is dumb. Because Dex has been signed up for the class only a day, told Jack, like, three days ago he wanted to, nobody since and here he is, telling Nursey.
“Have you ever actually taken photos before, Poindexter?” A flash of something, a slow smirk, but a hollowness to it that sits uneasy in Dex’s chest.
Defiant he can do. “Who do you take me for?” He spits back.
“Somebody who’s holding a camera, like it’s a baby?” Nursey says, amused. He looks around for a bit. Dex knows it’s because he’s looking for a book mark. He pulls one of the pieces of paper out, that are in his pocket at all times for moments like this, and shoves it at him.
Nursey looks a little surprised (he always does and it’s been nearly a month, you’d think a guy would catch on- take after his good example and start carrying them around himself or stop looking like a fish on dry land every time it happens). But he takes it with a small smile, folds it in half just to be contrary and puts the book on his pillow.
“Looks like there’s a lot I can teach you then,” He says, hands outstretched, asking for the camera after he’s stood up.
Dex eyes the hand skeptically, cradling the camera closer to his chest. Like a baby. Okay, yes. Like a baby. A very expensive baby. A very expensive baby that he’s not just going to hand over to Derek “Walking disaster” Nurse.
Nursey keeps his hand outstretched though, wiggling his fingers a little when Dex glares.
“I hope you realize Jack gave me his cheapest one, because he knows I live with you,” He snaps. Liar, the voice in the back of his head that sounds like a mix of his mother and Bitty, scolds him.
“Nah, he didn’t, talked to him about photography enough his senior year for him to know I won’t go around wrecking it. I care about cameras, dude,” He says, exasperatedly and pries the camera out of Dex’s hands.
Nursey stands close enough for Dex to feel the warmth coming of off him from head to toe and it feels more intimate than if they had been touching and the death grip he has on the camera goes slack at the realisation and Nursey grins victoriously and something bright burns inside of him.
Of fucking course Derek Malik Nurse is a creative gift in multiple areas. He keeps muttering self deprecatingly whenever Dex says something about it, saying that he’s a words man, that he can’t express himself as much as he feels the need to through picture. But Dex has known him for long enough to detect blushes. And he revels in being the one to cause them.
Dex has however severely underestimated the thought that goes into taking pictures. There's composition and light exposure and saturation and more and it makes him a little dizzy. Especially because Nursey keeps turning little knobs on the camera expertly and smooth. It makes Dex thank the hockey gods for gloves, because if Nursey's hands are this attractive when he’s all steadfastly and competently doing something, he's glad he doesn't have to see them whenever they play. Though Dex loves watching him write, too. Loves the slow, unsure strokes and the harsh, feverish scratches. Loves the ink splotches, even when some end up on him or his belongings. He likes carrying Nursey around like that.
The shutter click snaps him out of his reveries. Dex blinks out of it to see the camera pointed at him. Grumbling, he takes it from Nursey. This is why he can't day dream around him. The stuff this dude gets up to without supervision is truly incredible.
"Like I said, good lightning. And you're a lot prettier when you stop frowning and glaring," Nursey says by way of explanation. "You looked pretty peaceful actually," He tacks on, quieter, as if he isn't sure whether he wants anyone to hear. Whether he wants Dex to hear. Dex knows his blush is undeniable and probably spotted by the guy on the bench further up.
"So, photography?" He prompts, because he did not have a clue of this skill of Nursey's and every time something like this happens it makes him wonder how much there is to him that he hasn't seen yet. Makes him ache, because he doesn't have enough time to knock Nursey's walls down or pile the information up. He doesn't know which way it is anymore.
"It was a thing to do," Nursey shrugs, but Dex can tell it’s the fake chill. A shrug that isn't to say he doesn't care, but that he cares more than he's comfortable expressing.
Nursey sighs, looks at the camera to avoid his eyes the way Dex had earlier. Fiddles with it in a way that’s a lot more distracting than Dex's desperate clutching must have been.
"I.. You know.." And they're on even footing again. Dex lost and Nursey lost for words. It's how they share. It's how the barriers crumble and the pile of information grows.
He puts a hand on Nursey's shoulder and feels them sag, squeezes a little.
"I spent a lot time with my parents until they sent me off to a private boarding school, you know? It wasn't always like this. And we don't have any pictures from that time. And I sat there, the first weekend all my new friends were picked up by their parents and mine never showed. And I looked at the bright, happy pictures stuck on their walls and how they could gaze at them lovingly for hours. And I cried. Dex, I.. I cried, like, the entire weekend, until one of the guys who tended the grounds found me and asked me what was wrong. And I told him just that. That I wanted things I could hold onto, things I could look back on. The next day, he came in with his camera and whenever everybody's parents came, he'd come, too, after his hours and he'd teach me everything. It was a thing to do.. To cope, I guess," Nursey wraps it up, voice uncharacteristically soft.
"Jack likes the structure of it, likes the process as much as the result. I've always been more of a results guy. Was always too impatient for these bad boys," He chuckles, raising the camera. "But I bought Mr Danvers one. I bought him one when I graduated and put a post it with my e-mail address on it and he cried, like it was the best thing he'd ever gotten," Nursey smiles at Dex, as if he is supposed to find that incredible, too.
Dex is still stuck on the image of little Derek, stuck in a boarding school away from his parents and the home he loved, crying because he realised maybe that home wasn't there anymore and he didn't have anything to remember it by. It makes him wish he could build a fort around the two of them with the pile they've been unearthing.
-
It becomes a thing they do. They go to places, on and off campus, together and try to take pictures, both insisting on not being pictured themselves. Taking pictures of each other anyway. Dex thinks he's making progress. He's never been happier to have the top bunk than now, when he can scroll through pictures late at night, coming back time and again to pictures where Nursey's taken unaware.
As the class progresses, his professor assigns him task after task and Dex waltzes through them. Well, Nursey guides him through waltzing through them. Because when Dex comes home with a new one, Nursey’s eyes spark and he's on his feet, having taken the camera out of his hands and talking fast. Dex loves it. Jack laughs at him a lot. He's glad to be a source of enjoyment for a stressed NHL player. But he's got it covered, he does.
It's probably ridiculous how much time they both invest in Dex's assignments, but Dex keeps a cautious eye on his own grades and Nursey's by extension. Because he knows how hard Nursey tries, but fails to keep track of everything. The best thing about it, Dex decides during dinner one day, is that this seems to be a thing he loves and he's passionate about that brings Nursey out instead of makes him withdraw, like his writing tends to do.
-
Dex should have known it wouldn't last. He gets the assignment "Say it with flowers" which he knows should make him run home, because who better to say it with flowers than a poet? Instead it makes him run in the opposite direction. He goes to the library to brainstorm with a flower language dictionary on his lap. Because this is the moment he's been waiting for. This is the clue he needed, to bridge the last remaining gap between how they are and how they could be. He wears himself out, trying to put together the message he needs to send.
It's only when he arrives home that he realises he didn't think of a game plan as to avoid Nursey's usual help. He stands by the front door for a good ten minutes, ducks out of view of the kitchen window to escape Bitty's prying eyes before he comes to the conclusion that being casual about it would be the best course of action.
He shrugs and tells him there is none when Nursey asks him what the new assignment is. He can almost hear the wheels turning, whirring, clicking in Nursey's head and he hates that the corners of his mouth sag and the light in his eyes dims, because of whatever conclusion he's come to. He gathers what's strewn around him, tucks a pen in a pocket and says, jaw clenched, that he's stuck on a poem and needs some inspiration, so he's heading to the library.
Which is.. Fine. They don't need to spend all their time together, but it's almost dinner time and they usually eat dinner together, searching for scraps in the kitchen, ordering something or going to the dining hall. It's a comfortable routine and it sets him off balance. He blames that and not the fact that he might enjoy Nursey's company in and of itself, had begun to rely on it for a sense of peace now sorely lacking, for the fact that he barely gets any work done other than outlining his dumb photography assignment. The mother hen voice in his head also reminds him of the fact that he knows Nursey has a poem due tomorrow, so it's not that far of a stretch that Nursey knows the assignment program for his photography class. He buries his face in his hands and then himself in readings and tries not to think about it. It doesn't work very well.
When he invites Nursey to come shoot with him in this new little park he'd found, a little off campus, Nursey cocks his head and tells him, his usual faux arrogance back in place "I thought you didn't have a new assignment, Poindexter, so why would we really?," and stands up. The crack in his voice and the way his hand trembled for a second when he pushed his chair back were like anchors that Dex clung to, to tell himself it’d be okay. He hadn't fucked up completely. It would be fine. Inhale, hold, exhale. Soon enough you'll have the project planned. It takes Dex's shocked brain a couple minutes to catch up with the fact that Nurse had just left his barely touched breakfast to get out of talking to him. Huh.
And Dex isn't a people person. Can't read them as easily as others can. Thought he'd managed to learn to read Nursey well enough, but he was wrong there, too apparently. Dex doesn't understand how, but it's like Nursey pulled the walls back up overnight. The lazy, superior smile is back and his answers have become vague and unsaying again. And it's a physical ache. It's a physical ache that makes him curl in on himself, while he listens to Nursey's breathing at night and tries not to think of how he can tell from his breathing pattern that he's not sleeping, too. Tries not to wonder why.
-
It's a couple of days of their tentative less-good-but-still-friends balance later that Dex works up the courage to ask Nursey to model for him for his new assignment. It doesn't go over well, but thankfully Chowder is there to mediate.
They're sitting in the dining hall and Dex's eyes can't help, but latch onto parts of Nursey. The dark circles under his eyes, which are a copy of those under his own. The muscles in his forearms as he scoops spoonful after spoonful of cereal into his mouth. His strong jaw as he chews. Anywhere, but his lips and eyes.
He scrapes his throat. Doesn't lift his eyes to meet Nurse's, but feels his gaze on him nonetheless. Burning into him. This is why you're doing this. Get a grip, Poindexter. He tucks his hands under his thighs when he notices the slight tremor in them. Damn his body for betraying him like that.
"I.. I have this weirdly specific assignment for my photography class.. And.. I was wondering," Stop beating around the bush, he scolds himself mentally "if you would want to model for me." He definitely didn’t have enough oxygen for all those words or paused enough between them to make them clear, but when he finally lifts his eyes, Nursey seems to have understood perfectly.
"You didn't have another lecture. And you said he didn't give any assignments." Nursey snaps. He doesn’t avoid his gaze though, as Dex himself would have done. He looks Dex dead in the eye, the hurt plain to see and Dex's stomach does something horrible and he averts his eyes anyway.
"He.. E-mailed it?" He tries, but feels his face burn. Thanks, blush. Thanks for ratting me the fuck out, you traitor.
"So you could show me the e-mail if I asked you right now?" Nursey asks, reclining in his seat, seemingly chill, but Dex can detect the earnest annoyance in his voice and the tension in the way he holds his body.
"I.. Deleted it?"
"Just stop lying, Dex. Please." Nursey says, pushing himself upright again. His voice shakes a little, but he looks pleased for a fraction of a second that it didn't break. This idiot.
"You'd never delete an assignment," Chowder adds. Both of them turn to him, surprised and very much too caught up in each other to remember their friend's presence.
Dex raises his hands in surrender.
"Yes, okay, I wouldn't," He concedes to Chowder, before turning back to Nurse.
"But I wasn't lying about the assignment existing. I'm sorry I lied about it before, but he did give us one last lecture. It was a specific one. I'd like it if you'd model for it."
He tenses up as he waits for an answer, watches Nursey search his face, read his body language. Dex is anticipating something cutting, something with which Nursey would make sure he kept the upper hand.
Instead, Chowder reaches out to grip Nursey's biceps.
"I think you should do it, Nursey," He says, kind, but firm.
"He lied, but he apologised. And I know it's not an excuse, but it wasn't a life changing lie, now was it?"
Nursey glares at Chowder, but there’s not a lot of heat behind it. If there’s somebody who can make Nursey do something, it’s Chowder, Dex tells himself.
"C'mon, you'd help me if you were the only one who could get me a good grade. And I know you'd do it for Dex, too," Chowder’s smiling now, in that way with which he tells you that you’re okay, that he’s your friend and that he loves you. Dex spares a moment to think of how much both he and Nursey have already needed and received that smile in their years of friendship. Good to know there’s somebody with more than the bare minimum of common sense in their group of friends.
The whole exchange did puzzle him a little though. And made him curious. Something hidden in the depths of Derek Nurse he hadn't yet unearthed. He tries to put any rising anger towards Chowder, because he did know, aside, because he’s helping Nursey cooperate.
Nursey sighs and squeezes Chowder's hand on his arm.
"Thanks, C," and he smiles a little hesitantly at Chowder, before turning to him.
He exhales, stretches his shoulders and nods.
"I'll do it. But.. Like.. If you don't want to talk about something or don't want to say something, just say that, please? Lying really fucking sucks," and the fake chill expresses itself through a hollow chuckle Dex really would have rather not heard. He knows there's more to the story, but Nursey's face makes it clear that it's for another place, another time.
-
Twenty four hours later, Dex is pacing in a small, white room in the art building with beautiful natural light for which Lardo had magiced reservations for when he’d asked for her help from her connections still at Samwell. She’d be ashamed of your complete lack of fucking chill, Poindexter, he tells himself sternly and he takes a deep breath and wipes his hands on his jeans and at that exact moment, the door opens.
“Dex?” Nursey pokes his head around the door and he smirks his dumb “cool” smile at him when he spots him and comes inside. Dex hasn’t itched to sock him in the jaw in a good while now, but he does now.
He sees him survey the room, a small smile when he sees the lightning and a frown when he sees what Dex has stalled out on a little table. Two single orchids, two single dark pink roses, a bunch of lavender and a bunch of daisies. Dex doubts he’s about to connect all the dots in those couple seconds, but he knows the nerd knows what the flowers mean. Nursey makes eye contact with him then and it’s only been a couple days since Dex saw those eyes unguarded, but it knocks the breath out of him all the same.
“Okay, you wanted me, now you got me,” Nursey tries to shrug casually “Where do you want me?” And Dex feels heady with power. He has this absolutely gorgeous man that inexplicably dislikes to be photographed and is angry at him for reasons he doesn’t really know and whom he’s in love with and he’s offering to do whatever Dex wants, is telling Dex that “he’s got him now”. Dex tries to keep his breathing calm enough for Nursey not to notice.
“Shirtless, in front of that wall,” He says and moves to the table and starts plucking daisies off it. When Nursey’s where he wants him, looking very displeased with the situation, he turns to him, a hand full.
Dex doesn’t let his gaze drop, but the body heat radiating of Nursey is even stronger than usual when he stands close and he wants to touch so badly.
Instead, he clenches his jaw, before bending even closer to Nursey and threading the daisies in his eyebrows. He’s hyperaware of everything around him: the low hum of the lights of the hallway, the creaking of the staircase to the left of the room, the wind outside the window. But also Nursey and how he can’t smell or see anything other than him.
He’s always known Nursey smells good, knew how to appreciate it even when he wanted to tear his hair out and give him a black eye every time he opened his mouth, but he doesn’t think he’s ever been so free to smell.
The pine and wood and simply Nurse smell mixes intoxicatingly with the sweet daisies and Dex contributes years of handling tools and the tiniest of machinery for covering Nurse’s entire eyebrow with them and his lifetime of suppressing emotions for not doing anything stupid.
Nursey’s gaze is just as addicting though. Dex feels it like a physical weight on his face, unblinking, unmoving. It makes him want to squirm and touch, touch, touch.
He doesn’t. He strokes the flower dotted eyebrow once, before moving back. He hides his face behind the camera as soon as he can and Nursey’s intense gaze turns into a glare. Clenched jaw, face half turned to the light and everything about his face is so beautiful Dex doubts a picture will capture it. He takes a few anyway, the shutter sounds obtrusive and loud.
“You can, uhm, you can take them out, if you’d like,” He says, when he’s checked to see if he’s pleased.
“Thank God, they’re itchy as fuck,” Nursey exhales and he just, starts rubbing his eyebrow back and forth until all the leaves have fallen to the ground. Then he licks his thumb, ridiculously, slowly, and glues his eyebrow back in place. Dex doesn’t know whether to be disgusted at the spit in Nursey’s eyebrow, the fact that he’d just thrown all of that on the floor while there’s a trash can in the corner or the fact that he’s into the entire thing.
The latter probably.
He looks at Nursey, allows himself to drink him in the way he normally would never. The way the light highlights his gorgeously defined face, shoulders and chest. The curve of his mouth. The colour of his eyes.
“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Nursey interrupts his internal monologue, cocky smirk in place and a challenge in his eyes.
Dex could do challenges. He takes one of the orchids, trying to will the red of his skin back to normal. Without much success. He gently slides the orchid in Nursey’s hair by his left temple, so it obscures a good quarter of his face. Yet again, there’s the smell and warmth of him that throws Dex off, both a push and pull, his heart and head warring between pushing him on and pulling him back. He pushes the orchid further into Nurse’s hair, combing through it with his fingers. He feels the softness of it on his fingers still when he faces Nursey again. The annoyance is back in Nursey’s eye that Dex can still see, only a hint of teasing left in his face in the slight upturn of one of the corners of his mouth.
“Why two? Don’t wanna see me at all?” He whispers, his breath hitting Dex’s cheek, where he is still dangerously close. Too close, he decides abruptly and steps back, narrowly avoiding collision with the table.
“N-no, mostly to have back up in case you decided to wreck one,” Dex sputters, his voice a lot lower and hoarser than it should be in this situation. He pushes Nursey a little, so there’s not a bland white wall behind him, but a wall of light. Nursey seems disoriented for a fraction of a second, before he relaxes and goes straight back to posing.
“Go on then,” Nursey grumbles, gesturing to the camera on the table. Dex splutters something before relenting. Nursey doesn’t glare at him this time, which Dex counts as significant progress. Instead, he just looks at him intensely. Him, not the camera. He can feel his eyes burn into his forehead. It’s the intense focus which had always had the power to stop Dex’s heart beat in its tracks, but having it directed at him here and now, after days of not seeing it, makes him hold his breath, too. Too scared to break whatever moment there is.
“Got your picture? It’s pretty damn annoying, not being able to see with an eye,” Nursey pipes up after a few clicks and the tone of his voice is almost too much. It’s as if he’s watching the ice thaw in front of his eyes, as if he’s seeing Nursey, his best friend, come back to him right in front of his eyes.
“Yes, cry baby,” He chuckles and Nursey takes the flower and puts it back on the table, before crouching and gathering the daisies and throwing them in the trash. Huh.
“Figured you could give the ones I’ve very much kept intact,” A pointed glance “to C to give to Farmer of to Lardo for some art project,” He shrugs and questioningly points at the wall. Dex manages a nod and Nursey steps back in position.
A Nursey that doesn’t care kills him. A Nursey that does might, too, Dex thinks grudgingly, before gathering some lavender in his hand. He dreads having to return to his place scarily close to Nursey, but he has to put them in his hair. Damn him and his elaborate plans honestly. He knows he’s bright red before the first lavender is placed, because Nursey’s staring at his face. He feels as much as sees his gaze travel from his eyebrows to his eyes, to his lips and.. Stay there. He gives up embarrassingly quick, the few lavenders he’s managed to chuck into Nurse’s hair not placed all that well, but he needs the distance.
He clears his throat as he picks up the camera, but Nursey doesn’t move a muscle. Keeps staring at his lips. It’s only with his eye behind the lens that Dex notices how dark Nursey’s eyes have gone, pupils dilated. He swallows audibly and feels Nursey track the movement. What the actual fuck is happening to him.
He only manages to vaguely gesture at his hair to notify Nursey that he can get rid of them, because he doesn’t really trust his voice to cooperate. Now this fucking moron starts rubbing them between his hands above the trashcan before letting them drop in and then he’s just.. Rubbing his hands behinds his ears and on his neck and over his chest and Dex’s brain short circuits, because he can only imagine how the surfaces Nursey’s running his hands over feel like and he wants to know. Itches to replace his hands with his own.
“Sorry about that, couldn’t let that smell go to waste, now could we?” Nursey smiles when he positions himself again. It’s a sweet, goofy smile and Dex’s knees feel like they’re giving out, but he takes one of the roses and rolls it in his hand for a second, before taking a step closer to Nursey.
He’s hit with the smell of the lavender and he closes his eyes to take a steadying breath, deeply in- and exhaling. Which doesn’t help make the smell go away, but Dex will take what he can get in terms of small victories. Any victory made that day is lost when he opens his eyes and Nursey’s irises are fucking gone with how dilated his pupils are and he’s looking at Dex, like Dex is a work of art, like he wants to get his hands on Dex, too.
Dex ducks his head down and takes another breath. Fuck it, he thinks, and he holds the rose in front of Nursey’s mouth, who easily opens his mouth and lets Dex slide the rose in. His hands are shaking and he’s certain all his earlier blushes from today were a light pink compared with the color he’s turned now, but Nursey is still looking at him, like he’s the only thing that matters.
It makes him brave enough to hold onto the rose for a bit, while Nurse starts to play with it a little with his tongue. Gives him the courage to grab onto Nursey’s shoulders next and turn him so his back is no longer to the wall, but to the window and the light falls in around him, framing him like a halo again. Mostly strengthens him so he’s capable of letting go of Nurse’s shoulders, when he’s where he wants him to be. Nursey keeps rolling the rose around in his mouth and he’s undressing Dex with his eyes and Dex finds the room unbearably hot as he frantically takes a couple of photos. When he’s satisfied, he awkwardly clears his throat as he starts gathering the flowers. Nursey hands him the rose silently. Dex doesn’t look up. He keeps his eyes trained on the table while he hears and feels Nursey move around him and pull on his shirt. Hears the door open, feels the silence press in on him.
“Uh.. See you, I guess?” Nursey says and he slips through the door before Dex manages at least a thank you.
The door clicks shut and Dex wants to cry. He does, a little, when he notices that one of the thorns of the roses has cut his index finger. Easy to blame it on that.
When he gets to the Haus, Chowder is in the kitchen doing the coding Dex knows he should be doing, too, so he goes upstairs to grab his laptop (Nursey’s not in) and joins him. There’s a saddeningly short time where they’re quietly working on their own work, before Chowder clears his throat and stops typing. Dex follows suit, because Chowder is his captain, so actually has authority, but also because Nursey probably went to him and Dex needs to know something, anything.
“So.. Nursey was pretty messed up when he came back home earlier. Care to explain?” Chowder says and it’s conversational, but Dex doesn’t miss the quiet force of it. They’re talking about this. This is not a conversation Dex can turn away from.
“Uh, we did my photography project and he.. Just left?” Dex gambles. Gambles wrong, he concludes from the way Chowder’s face falls.
“He came here, visibly upset, stammering about being more honest with you than he’d ever dared to let himself be and that you’d barely spoken to or looked at him. I’ve never seen him so worked up about something, Dex,” Chowder answers and something settles in Dex’s chest, but something else stabs painfully and viciously.
“I just.. More honest? He spoke even less than I did?” Dex asks, searching Chowder’s face for any kind of answer, because he’s at a dead end himself.
“Actions speak louder than words, right? He.. He knows you’re not a word person, so he tried to let his actions speak for him instead,” Chowder said, biting his lip, like he knew he’d already said too much.
“I’m sorry, I wasn’t.. Supposed or allowed to tell you that,” Chowder says quietly, voice laden with regret.
Damn Derek Nurse for making him work on even tighter deadlines, he thinks, before asking Chowder where he can find him.
“I don’t know, he just said he was going to get some air,” Chowder shrugs, like it wasn’t a bad idea to let an emotionally unstable Nursey loose without any supervision. The boy could very well end up in the lake or hurt somewhere. Or picking fights with people bigger than him, because he has very little sense of self preservation.. Dex sighs.
“Okay, Chow, I’m gonna need you to trust me on this one,” He leads with, before explaining hurriedly how this had stood out to him from the get-go as the ideal assignment to say what he wanted to say without actually having to say it (because damn, Nurse, he really isn’t a words person), how Nursey had acted during the shoot and how he was going to complete the assignment right fucking now, so he could take it to Nursey.
When he’s done, he feels a lot lighter. He stubbornly ignores the persistent voice at the back of his mind that says he’d feel even lighter if he tells Nursey (the voice is now definitely all Bitty, damn him).
Chowder’s staring at him as though he’s never seen him before. His mouth is hanging open, which looks better than when he still had his braces, but still doesn’t look intelligent and Dex is not sure whether Chow’s blinked since he started talking.
“Chow?” He prompts, as gentle as he can, because his brain is going in overdrive, because he needs time to figure this out, time to make this assignment perfect, time to prepare himself for baring his soul like that, but Nursey’s upset, so there goes his time.
Chowder has moved on to disappointedly shaking his head at him.
“I.. I don’t have words for this. I’m going to call in somebody who will, okay?” And Dex doesn’t know where that’s going, but he nods.
Chowder pulls up Skype on his computer and makes a call and minutes later, there’s a very shirtless Adam Birkholtz with shaving cream left on his face filling the screen.
“Yo, Baby Cap!” He greets Chowder, half an eye on his phone and half an eye on the mirror, while he continues shaving.
“Hey, Holster,” Chowder smiles back amicably. Holster raises an eyebrow at him in question, when he doesn’t say anything else.
“Well, uhm, actually Dex really needs some advice with a very very dumb situation he and Nursey have gotten themselves in.. And I thought you were the person to call,” Chowder elaborates haltingly. Holster searches the screen and Chowder pulls Dex into view, earning him a smile from his former captain.
“Ah, Poindexter, trouble in d-men-paradise, huh? Yeah, I can help you with that,” Holster says, his eyes losing focus for a second, as if lost in a lovely memory, before he focuses again.
“Okay. Debrief me. What’s this icky situation Chow speaks of?” Dex doesn’t know if it’s safe for Holster to continue shaving while he recounts the story, but it’s his life and his decisions, so he launches into the story.
He starts from the top. The blossoming, tight friendship with Nursey. The camera and the photography class. Nursey’s enthusiasm and how much closer they’d grown still and how much time they’d spent together. Then his dumb plan to keep the last assignment a secret, what he wanted to tell with it and how Nursey had pulled back. Nursey’s weird behaviour during the shoot.
He’s barely uttered “His pupils were, like, blown fucking wide and he was sort of undressing me with his eyes and he was rubbing lavender all over his naked chest,” before he’s interrupted by a loud bang and a string of curses from Holster’s end.
Chowder pipes up immediately. “Holster, are you okay? Holster??”
They hear a muffled “Yeah, fine, give me a second,” when a drop of blood hits the screen, followed by more curses.
The blood’s wiped away and a couple seconds later, Holster’s on the screen again, bright red and laughing, a cotton wad pressed to a cut on his cheek.
“Well, damn it, Dex, your rom com story made me cut myself. Rans is gonna be supes pissed about that one,” He laughs, before seemingly shaking himself.
“Dex. What do you think Nursey meant with his “weird behaviour”?” He asks, his eyes soft and a smile on his voice, but traces of his captain voice present.
“I.. I don’t know,” Dex sighs. “Maybe he was putting on a show for my assignment?” Holster and Chowder both groan.
“But.. Remember what I said earlier, that he’s actively trying to speak your language: actions rather than words,” Chowder prompts. Dex doesn’t really see how that’s got anything to do with this, so he turns to Holster.
“Oh, my God,” Holster sighs “You really haven’t got a fucking clue, do you?” Dex is a little offended, so he shakes his head, pouting a little.
“Okay.. Dex.. William Poindexter.. Here is a real shocker: what Nursey was trying to tell you during that photo shoot is that he’s in love with you, too. Right, Baby Cap?” He asks and Dex is vaguely aware of Chowder’s affirmative answer, because it’s like all the blood in his body is whooshing to his heart, making him a little light headed. His heart beat pounds in his ears, while he tries to wrap his head around that. Derek, the incredible object of his very own affections, is.. In love with him, too.
He hears Holster laughing and saying “Oooh, I think he's got it now,” but it sounds very far away.
“I need to find him. C, can you please text him to ask where he’s at?” Dex pleads and he pulls out the full puppy dog eyes and pout, because he knows Chowder has never been able to resist.
Holster is still laughing, punctuated by a hissed curse whenever he messes up his cut a little.
Chowder is beaming at him, while he texts and he shoots a distracted smile back.
“He’s at his poetry tree,” Chowder says a few second later and Dex wishes he wasn’t in love with somebody who has a poetry tree, but he is and he really wants to go kiss said person under said tree.
He gives Chowder a quick hug, then turns to Holster.
“All good, my dude. Always here for all you, alright? Though Rans might be a little pissed at you for making me ruin my face for date night,” He shrugs and okay, Dex didn’t know that yet, but he’s damn happy for them. He tells Holster as much and his answering smile is so full of love and happiness Dex itches even more to go find Nursey.
“Go get your partner,” Holster says, reading his mind. He has to wink, when he closes the call, because he’s still Holster, but Dex only chuckles, before he’s up and at the door. He turns again there, but Chowder comes and pushes him through it.
It’s a beautiful spring night. The sun isn’t thinking of setting any time soon and the warm yellow and organ makes the trees glow. Everybody he passes is laughing or smiling or kissing. He can hardly believe the lightness of his steps, the smile on his own face.
Then he gets to Nursey’s poetry tree. It’s an ugly thing, it’s barely grown any leaves in their time at Samwell, but its trunk is flat at the part, facing the pond and Nursey loves sitting against it and thinking about everybody who’s overlooked this tree, because it doesn’t look very pretty, but it’s the perfect place to sit and have a splendid view. Again, Dex can’t really believe he’s in love with someone who has such elaborate opinions about trees, but what’s done is done.
He’s furiously scribbling in a notebook, his fingers streaked with ink already. There are dried tear stains on his face and he couldn’t look any less put together if he tried. It tugs at Dex’s heart and he just wants to take him in his arms.
“Hey,” Dex says, because he doesn’t know how to have this conversation, but he does know how to start it. Nursey’s head shoots up and then he’s furiously wiping at his face. Dex tries not to laugh, but a chuckle escapes him anyway. He makes his way to Nursey and sits next to him, facing him.
“I’m so sorry, Dex. Like, I’m so sorry if I made you uncomfortable, like, holy fuck, dude, just say something? I’m so so sorry, I’ll never do any of it again, I promise,” Nursey starts babbling before Dex has the chance to collect his thoughts. And it suddenly hits Dex that Nurse thought he made him uncomfortable and he can’t have that. Also, he doesn’t really see another way to shut him the fuck up.
He kisses him. It’s short and just a peck, but Nursey’s lips are so soft and the smell of the lavender is less intense now, has mingled with his natural smell and Dex really doesn’t want to pull back. So he only goes back far enough to be able to see Nursey’s face.
Who’s staring at him with his mouth open and an adorable blush. “I.. What..?” Nursey asks.
“You knew the meanings of those flowers, didn’t you?” Dex asks. Nursey nods.
“What do you think they were there for?” And he sees it now, sees that their nearness doesn’t leave Nursey unaffected, too, and he loves this boy.
“You said it was a really specific assignment, asshole. I thought he asked you to you use those,” Nursey grumbled, cheeks darkening.
“No, he didn’t. The assignment was “Say it With Flowers” and because I’m a scared idiot, who’s not good at talking about his feelings and you’re this dumbass who knows too much about flower language, I thought..” He trails off, unsure of how to put his expectations in words, because he didn’t really have any, besides making Nursey aware of his feelings.
“Romantic, Dexey. Get your boyfriend flowers sometime, huh?” Nursey quips and it’s with his cocky smirk, but his eyes are sparkling and he’s leaning in and kissing him again, so Dex can deal with that side of his.. Of his boyfriend.