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Roman did not think he was doing anything unusual. This would later be identified by historians—or at least by Logan—as his first and most catastrophic mistake of the day.
His second mistake happened approximately twenty minutes after they arrived at the annual campus spring fair. The plaza was a chaotic swarm of student booths, loud music, and the overpowering scent of fried funnel cakes. It was a sensory nightmare, which meant only one thing.
Virgil had disappeared.
Roman noticed the exact millisecond the purple plaid hoodie vanished from his peripheral vision. He stopped in his tracks, turning a full circle.
"Where’s Virgil?" Roman asked, interrupting whatever story Patton was currently telling.
Patton paused, looking up from a table of handmade university keychains. "Oh! Um, bathroom maybe? Or maybe he went to find some shade?"
Roman nodded sharply, his internal compass already recalibrating. "Cool. I’ll go track our resident cryptid down before he melts."
He turned on his heel and walked away, scanning the crowd with laser-focused intensity. Behind him, a heavy, knowing silence fell over Patton and Logan. Roman ignored it completely. People on this campus were simply weird today. It was not his problem.
He found Virgil exactly where he expected him to be: completely bypassing the crowded pavilion, tucked away on a weathered stone bench beneath the massive willow tree near the edge of the quad. He was clutching his phone, his posture rigid, his expression hovering somewhere between profoundly annoyed and utterly exhausted.
Without a single word or invitation, Roman slid onto the bench beside him. Naturally. Automatically. Like it was a fundamental law of physics that his body belonged in whatever space Virgil occupied.
"You okay?" Roman asked, leaning in close enough that their shoulders brushed.
Virgil looked over, his knuckles white around his phone. But the moment his dark eyes met Roman’s, his sharp shoulders dropped by a fraction of an inch, a soft, familiar relief washing over his features. Roman completely missed it, of course. His brain completely bypassed the romantic filters.
"Yeah," Virgil muttered, shoving his hands into his pockets.
"Liar," Roman countered smoothly.
"Rude."
"Correct, but a monarch must speak the truth." Roman extended his hand, casually presenting a plastic cup of iced lemonade. "Here. Drink this before you pass out from heatstroke."
Virgil accepted it automatically. He didn't say thank you. He didn't ask how Roman knew he wanted lemonade, or how Roman had found him in a crowd of five hundred people in under five minutes. He just took the cup, took a sip, and relaxed completely against Roman’s side.
It was a perfectly seamless, subconscious routine. It was also, apparently, incredibly damning.
"Oh, hey guys!"
Roman looked up. Chloe, a girl from his advanced theater history lecture who also happened to be a friend of Janus, was walking by holding a basket of raffle tickets. She stopped when she saw them, a bright, knowing smile on her face.
"Hey, Chloe," Roman greeted warmly. "Enjoying the festivities?"
"Trying to!" She laughed, gesturing between the two of them. "Hey, quick question. Maya and I are running the couples' trivia booth over by the student union later. Are you two finally going to sign up, or are you going to keep gatekeeping your status?"
Absolute, suffocating silence fell over the bench.
Virgil stopped mid-sip, the straw freezing between his lips.
Roman blinked once. Twice. "What?"
Chloe frowned, her eyes darting to Roman's arm, which was currently slung casually across the back of the bench right behind Virgil's neck. "The couples' trivia? You guys are entering, right?"
"We are... not a couple?" Roman offered, his voice cracking slightly into a register he would later deny.
Chloe looked genuinely surprised, her smile faltering into a look of sheer bewilderment. "Wait. Seriously? You guys aren't dating?"
"No?" Roman repeated.
Beside him, Virgil died. He didn't just get embarrassed; his entire soul visibly left his body, his face rapidly turning a spectacular shade of crimson that rivaled a freshly painted fire engine. Roman watched it happen in real-time. It was both deeply impressive and highly concerning.
"Please stop talking," Virgil muffled into his lemonade cup, his voice a strained squeak directed at the universe at large. "Please just let a sinkhole consume me."
Chloe looked between them, completely baffled. "But... you guys have major couple energy? Like, I see you around campus all the time. Roman, you literally noticed he was gone from the main pavilion, tracked him down here in under five minutes, and brought him his exact favorite drink."
Roman opened his mouth to deliver a stellar defense.
He stopped.
"And," Chloe continued, raising an eyebrow at Virgil, "he just took it from you without even asking, and you sat practically in his lap without a second thought. Janus always rolls his eyes when you guys leave the room, so I just assumed..." She shook her head. "Wow. Okay. Wild. My bad! See you in class, Roman!"
She walked away, leaving a radioactive blast radius of pure awkwardness behind.
Roman stared after her, his brain entirely short-circuiting. Virgil kept his hands clamped firmly over his face. "Please kill me. A rogue meteor. Anything."
"Virgil," Roman said, his voice dropping its theatrical volume.
"No."
"Virgil, look at me."
"No."
"VIRGIL."
Virgil let out a long, suffering sigh, peeking through his fingers. "What, Roman?"
Roman’s brow furrowed in genuine, dizzying confusion. "You... you really did take the drink without asking."
Virgil went entirely still.
"And I knew exactly where you were," Roman continued, his voice dropping an octave as the puzzle pieces began to violently smash themselves together in his head. "And I noticed you were gone the exact second you left. I didn't even think about it."
Virgil abruptly stood up from the bench, his notebook rustling. Danger. Pure flight-or-fight response. He began walking rapidly back toward the campus dorms.
Roman stood up too, trailing right behind him. Instinct. Pure, unadulterated habit.
Virgil stopped dead in his tracks and whipped around. "You followed me!"
Roman stopped just inches from him, blinking. Oh. He had. He hadn't even processed his feet moving; he had just automatically pursued.
Interesting. Terrible. Catalytically interesting.
Roman spent the next hour in a state of absolute existential crisis. Not visibly, of course—he was a theater professional, a master of the stage. He could hide his internal screaming behind a perfectly manicured smile while they walked back to the house.
But the moment they crossed the threshold, Roman marched straight into the kitchen, looking utterly haunted. Patton was standing at the counter, organizing some fair brochures.
"What happened, kiddo?" Patton asked, his eyes instantly widening. "You look like you've seen a ghost. Or a bad review."
"Chloe asked if Virgil and I were entering the couples' trivia booth," Roman said flatly.
Patton froze, a brochure hovering in mid-air. A slow, incredibly heavy pause filled the kitchen. Then, Patton winced. "Oh."
Roman narrowed his eyes dangerously. "OH? What does 'oh' mean, Patton? Why is everyone in this house speaking in riddles today?"
Patton smiled nervously, backing away toward the fridge. "No reason! No reason at all!"
"PATTON, CEASE." Roman stepped forward, pointing a dramatic finger. "You know something. Everyone knows something! I am living in a psychological thriller!"
Patton sighed, letting his shoulders slump. He looked at Roman with a soft, incredibly patient expression. Less chaos now. More gentle, maternal fondness. "Roman."
"Yes?"
"When Virgil gets a good grade, or finds a weird new song he likes... who does he text first?"
Roman blinked, his dramatic defenses faltering. "...Me."
"When he has a terrible day and his brain is soup, who does he call?"
Roman’s brow furrowed. "...Me."
"When he panics in public?"
Roman opened his mouth to argue, but the words died in his throat. He closed it. His heart did a strange, frantic little dance against his ribs. Patton smiled softly, delivering the final, crushing blow.
"When he just needs somewhere safe to go, Roman... where does he go?"
Roman stared at him. A massive, overwhelming dam broke in his mind, and years of memories came rushing through the crack like a tidal wave.
2:13 AM. His phone vibrating. Virgil: 'You awake?' Roman: 'Unfortunately. Capes.' Virgil: 'Can I come over?' His bedroom door opening fifteen minutes later, a blanket already waiting on the floor.
Competition day. Roman holding his phone in a crowded lobby, typing frantically: 'Guess who won the lead?' Virgil replying in three seconds: 'Proud of you, Princey. Knew you would.'
Outside the lecture hall. Virgil shaking, completely overwhelmed by the crowd. Roman dropping onto the concrete right beside him, handing over a bag of snacks, and just staying in absolute silence for twenty minutes.
Roman looked up slowly, his eyes wide, his chest heaving as if he had just run a marathon. "Oh no."
Patton nodded, his smile growing incredibly sweet. "Oh yes."
"Oh, gravity, find me now," Roman whispered, clutching his hair. "I am an absolute, unmitigated blockhead."
"Roman," Patton chirped, patting his arm affectionately. "I think you accidentally became his person a long time ago."
Roman forgot how to breathe.
Ten minutes later, Roman was standing in the doorway of the campus library. His feet had memorized the route years ago, operating on an autopilot that he now realized was fueled entirely by a catastrophic, deeply buried crush.
He walked to the very back corner. There he was. The window seat. Virgil had his headphones around his neck, staring blankly at a textbook.
Roman didn't hesitate. He didn't make a grand entrance. He just walked over and sat down directly across from Virgil in the window seat. Automatically. Hopelessly. Entirely in love.
Virgil looked up, his cheeks still a little pink from the campus fair disaster. But when he saw Roman’s intense, unblinking stare, his brow furrowed. "...You okay, Princey? You're looking at me like I'm a ghost."
Roman pointed a strict, shaking finger directly at Virgil’s chest. "You’re in love with me."
Absolute, dead silence descended on the library corner.
Virgil completely blue-screened. His jaw went slack, his pen slipped out of his hand and clattered loudly against the wood, and his eyes went wide with pure, unadulterated panic. "Excuse me?"
Roman crossed his arms, looking deeply indignant but with a softness bleeding into his eyes. "You like me. As more than a friend. Everyone in the house apparently knew except me."
Virgil choked on his own breath, coughing into his sleeve. "Did—did Patton tell you?! Was it Janus?"
"No," Roman said, leaning over the table. "I had to piece it together myself after Chloe practically called us a married couple. Virgil, I have apparently been participating in a fully committed romantic partnership without even realizing it!"
Virgil stared at him, his mouth opening and closing. Then, a tiny, breathless laugh escaped him. He covered his face with one hand, his shoulders shaking as the laughter bubbled up, rich and bright and completely exhausted.
Roman watched him, his heart melting into a useless puddle. Hopeless. He was entirely, beautifully hopeless.
Virgil finally wiped a tear from his eye, looking up through his bangs with a soft, incredibly warm expression that made Roman's soul feel warm. "You are so ridiculous."
"You love me," Roman repeated, his voice dropping into that stupid, gentle register, entirely devoid of theatricality.
Virgil looked at him, his eyes soft and entirely gone around the edges. "Unfortunately, yes. It's a medical marvel I haven't died of whiplash."
Roman smiled—a small, real, vulnerable thing. He reached across the table, his hand resting flat on the wood, an open invitation. "Well, I think I might be completely, hopelessly in love with you too. I'm still processing the sheer density of my own brain, of course. But I want this. With you."
Virgil blinked, staring at Roman's open hand, then up at his face. A beautiful, genuine smile broke across his features, the tension completely melting out of him.
"Rude that everyone knew except me, though," Roman huffed playfully, leaning back.
Virgil let out a soft, melodic laugh, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He reached out, sliding his hand across the table until his fingers slipped perfectly between Roman's, squeezing tightly.
"About time you realized," Virgil whispered, his smile softening into pure, mic-drop affection. "Been in love with you for four years now."
Roman’s heart immediately resigned from its duties. His eyes went completely wide. "FOUR?!"
"Yep."
"Virgil! Four years?! That’s got to be illegal. The emotional whiplash alone—"
"Not illegal," Virgil grinned, his thumb tracing the back of Roman's hand.
Roman leaned closer across the table, his eyes locked onto Virgil’s lips. "Feels highly illegal."
Virgil laughed again—that bright, unbothered, safe sound. Roman decided right then and there: New life goal. Cause that exact sound repeatedly. For the rest of his life.
Across campus, sitting in the kitchen with a fresh batch of cookies, Patton’s phone buzzed on the counter.
Roman [7:42 PM]: YOU KNEW THIS ENTIRE TIME??? FOR FOUR YEARS???
Patton smiled softly to himself, taking a bite of a warm chocolate chip cookie as he typed back his reply.
Patton [7:43 PM]: Apparently. <3