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“Jamie,” Jesse said, pulling Jamie back out of his thoughts and taking hold of his hands, looking into his eyes with an earnest, yearning gaze.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to explain myself, and I’m even more sorry that you thought it was because I was ashamed to be seen with you.

When I said we had to keep it a secret, I was afraid, but it wasn’t because I was embarrassed to be seen with a man.

It’s because I feel that need to protect you, and make sure nothing bad happens to you.

And if we’re together, openly, bad things might happen to us.

The rules say I have to fall in love with a woman, but I can’t.

And that’s something that nobody but Austin knows about me.

” He swallowed. “But… in the end it doesn’t even matter what people think I ‘should’ do or what I’m ‘supposed’ to do.

Because I want… I want to be with you .”

Jamie’s heart had begun to soar at Jesse’s words.

Everything he was saying matched his explanation of love. The desire to protect him, the pain of being apart from him, it all lined up. And he truly did look at Jamie the way Eric looked at Ariel in that kid’s movie, the way Jamie so desperately yearned to be looked at.

So that was it, then, right?

Or was Jamie still getting something mixed up?

“Jesse,” Jamie asked, reluctantly pulling his hands away to look Jesse squarely in the eye, to make sure there was no lie in his expression. “Does that mean you love me?”

Jesse let out a deep breath. His cheeks grew red, and he ran a hand down his face as if he was nervous, like he was trying to work up the nerve to speak.

At first, Jamie felt his heart start to sink, wondering if Jesse’s hesitation meant the answer would be ‘no.’ But then Jesse finally nodded, his mouth breaking into a smile like he couldn’t bite it back.

“Yes,” he admitted. “I love you, Jamie.”

* * *

Jesse

‘Congratulations, you’re officially a fish now.’

Jesse hadn’t been able to resist sending the text the next morning. He just had to tease Austin about Jamie comparing him to Flounder. A little revenge was fair game, after all, and the comment was still funny even now, a day later.

And it wasn’t the only thing contributing to Jesse’s good mood, either.

He had actually told Jamie that he loved him—and more than that, Jamie loved him back.

He hadn’t been able to stop smiling all day, and he hadn’t paid a lick of attention to his classes at the college, no matter how hard he’d tried.

Now, as he finally got home, he hurried to change into something more casual, and then went back into the living room to wait for Jamie to get back from his dance practice.

He sat down on the couch, glancing at the time on his phone.

He’d barely made it back in time; Jamie should come walking through the door in just a few minutes.

Jesse could literally feel the butterflies in his stomach, that’s how much he was looking forward to it. Thinking back, denying his feelings had only ever been a fruitless attempt to fool himself. He had known it all along, so why hadn’t he just said it?

Well, because he had thought that Jamie wouldn’t understand, but now Jesse began to wonder if maybe he’d underestimated him. It was easy to do, to be fair. Austin had also mentioned it earlier.

‘I get the feeling Jamie is changing,’ Austin had texted him (after plenty of complaining about being a fish, of course.) ‘He’s improving incredibly fast.’

That was true enough.

It wasn’t just the phone which Jamie could already use effortlessly, or the fact that he managed to take the bus to the dance studio and back to Jesse’s apartment entirely on his own .

No, Jamie had adapted to a lot of things—even though his memories had not returned yet; and it remained unpredictable which topics or concepts were confusing to him, and which were not.

Still, yesterday’s conversation had shown that Jamie did understand more complex concepts than Jesse had thought.

His lack of knowledge made him inexperienced (and very, very adorable), but it obviously hadn’t turned him into some kind of child.

As good as that was, it also made Jamie’s questions more challenging.

And not only that, it also made it more difficult to find ‘the right time’ to tell him that his hair and eyes changed color whenever he was sleeping.

Jesse sighed, once again thinking back to his chat with Austin, and absently pulling the conversation up on his phone to read the old messages all over again.

‘Sometimes I really miss those times when he didn’t know about anything,’ he had admitted; only realizing afterwards how wrong that sounded.

‘I mean, I’m glad he’s learning, really,’ he had corrected at once.

‘I guess I’m just afraid he’ll lose that wide-eyed sense of innocence at some point. ’

He had thought that sounded better, but of course Austin would always find ways to tease him, no matter what he said.

‘As long as you don’t TAKE his innocence he should be fine. XP’

That’s what friends were for, he supposed.

Besides, Austin was a writer. He could never resist a chance at some witty wordplay, could he?

Jesse scoffed, shaking his head as he closed down the conversation and put his phone back in his pocket.

Saying that he loved Jamie was one thing; it didn’t mean he could suddenly throw all his concerns to the wind now.

Footsteps sounded on the stoop outside, and Jesse immediately felt a surge of happiness and anticipation as he turned to the door. God, he had fallen hard into the honeymoon phase. He couldn’t tell Austin about this; the guy would tease him harder than ever.

Jesse heard the click of Jamie’s key in the lock—and the mere fact that Jamie had his own key now was exciting in and of itself.

Once Jamie had decided not to leave, it meant he had officially decided to stay.

He wasn’t just here anymore because he had nowhere else to go.

Now he was here because he wanted to be.

Jamie had officially moved in with him. As his boyfriend.

Jesse practically jumped off the couch to hurry over to the door, a wide grin spreading across his face once again.

“Jesse!” Jamie’s warm voice greeted him. In that moment, Jesse couldn’t imagine a more beautiful sound. No sooner had the door been pushed open than Jamie leaped up into his arms, planting his lips against Jesse’s in an excited kiss.

These kisses honestly never got old. Joy flooded Jesse’s heart as he spun him around and kissed him back, though he was smiling too much to hold the kiss in place. He pulled his head away after a moment, warmth rising to his face as he looked into Jamie’s pretty brown eyes. “Hello.”

“Hello,” Jamie replied, smiling widely himself. “I have a surprise for you!”

“A surprise?” Jesse repeated, curiosity filling him as he gently set Jamie back down and then closed the front door.

“Yes, I’m—” Jamie didn’t get any further, interrupted by a loud growl from his stomach.

“…Hungry?” Jesse chuckled as he finished the sentence for him.

“M-maybe?” Jamie admitted, shrugging his shoulders with a sheepish giggle as a blush came to his face.

God, he looked so cute like that.

“Maybe quite a bit,” Jesse said. “Come on, let’s get you something to eat, and then you can tell me about your surprise.”

They went into the kitchen together, Jamie still beaming as if he couldn’t wait to tell Jesse what he had planned.

Admittedly, Jesse was beginning to feel a little apprehensive about what that ‘surprise’ might be—but he also couldn’t help but catch Jamie’s enthusiasm.

He was so endearing when he got excited like this.

The good mood faded just a little when Jesse opened the fridge, which was unfortunately far too empty again.

He sneaked a quick glance at Jamie. He was so lean, where on earth did he put all the food he ate!

? Burned it all away with the exercise he got from his dancing, no doubt, and Jesse wasn’t about to complain about that, since it gave Jamie that perfectly, gracefully toned body—

He was getting distracted from the task at hand.

Forcing his focus back to the fridge, Jesse took stock of what few ingredients they had and tried to think of something to cook with it all.

He was honestly getting pretty sick of cheap packaged ramen with eggs.

What he wouldn’t give for some nice, homecooked bossam like his mother had used to make…

“We are… boyfriends now, aren’t we?” Jamie suddenly asked behind him.

Jesse turned to him, forgetting all about food as he blinked in surprise. “Er, yeah?” he replied. What kind of question was that now? Hadn’t they already settled that?

“And… boyfriends can…” Jamie hesitated, fidgeting with his hands and watching Jesse as if to see how he would react. “…Sleep in the same bed,” he finished. “Right?”

A jolt of inexplicable panic shot through Jesse, and he instinctively shut the fridge door as he whirled around to face Jamie—a lot harder than he had actually intended to.

Jamie winced a bit at the slam, tensing up and biting his lip, as if he thought Jesse was angry at him.

“I’m sorry,” Jesse said at once. “I didn’t mean to—I just—but… we already discussed that topic!”

“Yes, we did,” Jamie said, squaring his shoulders and lifting his chin challengingly, clearly not willing to back off. “But that was before we were boyfriends. And that’s why you said you didn’t want to, isn’t it?”

“W-well, yeah but—”