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“Hey Jaune, you alright?” Pyrrha asked as she nudged his arm, “you seem to have even more trouble focusing on the textbook than usual.”
“Ah, it’s just… with Vytal Festival coming up, I don’t really feel like thinking about the history of Remnant,” he mumbled, “I’d rather do some sparring. I don’t want to be in the way when we have to fight”
“You’ve improved so much recently and that essay is due tomorrow. Ren agreed to help you write it, if you do the reading first.”
And that was the problem. Jaunes feelings were all over the place for several weeks, but now he felt like he was getting close to figuring out what was happening, and he didn’t quite like where it was going. However, he was still very confused about his and Pyrrha’s relationship because their interactions had changed after he showed up at prom in a dress . Was this just how it felt to get closer to girls who aren’t your sister? Jaune was pretty sure he had a crush on Pyrrha, but recently it didn’t feel as much like that anymore. Was it normal to stop crushing on people when you get closer? He sighted and laid his head on the book.
“Can’t we just tell Ren I did the reading and you give me a summary of what I need to know? I won’t remember half of the things in that text anyways”
“You’re giving yourself too little credit”, Pyrrha said, but she could see how discouraged Jaune was and caved in, knowing that he would remember pretty much everything she told him. His memory wasn’t as bad as he made it out to be. She noticed something off with Jaune for quite a while now, but she knew that he would shut himself away from her completely if she asked directly. He didn’t want anyone to see his flaws and burdens, and Pyrrha respected that. Still, she felt weird seeing him slump off towards their dorm where he was supposed to meet up with Ren to write the essay.
Jaune took a deep breath to settle himself and remember all the things Pyrrha told him about the essay topic. Don’t disappoint Ren, he’s trusting you to have read your stuff. Remember what you’ve been told. He stepped in, ready to try his best to complete the essay without asking for much help. Not that he didn’t appreciate Ren and Pyrrha working together to help him keep his grades on an acceptable level, he just felt like he was burdening them.
“Ready to power through this essay?”, Ren asked with a slight smirk. Oh this wonderful smirk… Why did it look so good on him?
“Yeah”, Jaune nodded and sat down at his desk as Ren made himself comfortable on Jaunes bed, ready to give him a hand whenever needed. For some reason, this time it made him nervous. They did a few homework assignments like this before, but for some reason, Ren sitting on Jaune’s bed with a book was giving him emotions he couldn’t quite place. Ren was his best friend, he trusted him a lot, so why did this feel so different? Since they returned from their first training mission, everything felt different and unusual. He just couldn’t pin down why, which drove him crazy.
He stared down at his half-finished homework and furrowed his brows, trying to think of any answer for his confusion. It wasn’t like he didn’t have an idea what this was all about, he just really didn’t like it. He was straight, he was very sure he was straight—all his crushes had been girls, his first and only kiss had been a girl from his village too, he liked girls! A lot! And Ren wasn’t a girl. Ren was a very handsome man with a very handsome smile and a very handsome voice and- “Stuck?”
Jaune flinched when he heard Ren’s voice right next to him, then blushed when he realized that Ren stood close behind him, looking at his paper. “Ah, no, I just- I drifted off I think”
“Hey, you’re more than halfway through the thing already”, Ren noted, “Do you need a break?”
“Might as well finish it then, right?” Jaune stretched a bit in his chair, then picked his pen back up, “Which parts am I missing?”
Ren leaned over and skimmed Jaunes homework and their shoulders brushed together, which made Jaune much more nervous than he’d like. He shook his head. Concentrate. You’re straight, maybe you just crave body contact. Yeah, that must be it.
Jaune spent the next thirty minutes writing the end of his essay as fast as he possibly could, before jumping up, thanking Ren, and disappearing out of the dorm. This was bad. This was not right. Also, as far as he knew, Ren and Nora were an item. So even if he were into guys, Ren would be totally off limits. He’s got a girlfriend. He’s probably straight too. Just as Jaune himself, well, minus the girlfriend.
Instinctively Jaune knocked on RWBYs door, hoping their leader would be home. Ruby might be young, but she was great at giving advice, and a hot chocolate in the kitchens would be nice after his stressfull day. Thankfully, Ruby opened the door, and smiled up at him “Jaune! What’s up!”
“I- uh, I need some advice I think? Are you free for some hot chocolate or something?”
“Some good old Ruby Rose advice?” She grinned, “I don’t think Blake will miss me if I disappear for a while, what about hot chocolate in the yard though? The weathers nice.”
“Sounds good.”
They both grabbed the biggest mugs they could find and sat down in the yard, close to where they first met. It was a pretty serene spot on the buzzing campus, and the sun shone onto the bench they sat on. Jaune didn’t quite know where he should start explaining, so he just took a very slow, very long sip from his hot chocolate. Ruby didn’t nag him either, she could probably feel that it was a tricky topic for him.
“I’m straight,” he started, resulting in Ruby giving him a puzzled look.
“I guess?” she said “I don’t really think I can give you advice on being straight though.”
Jaune rubbed the back of his head “I mean, I think I am. Eh, like. Okay wait let me start over.”
Ruby just nodded while Jaune collected his thoughts. “So let’s say, you have a crush on someone, yes? And then you get closer, and in theory that should be exciting and cool and your crush would get stronger, right?”
“Yeah, that’s how it usually goes.”
“So what if things change and you get closer but somehow? You don’t really feel the crush any more? Is that normal?”
“I mean, crushes don’t last forever,” Ruby shrugged, “You might’ve realized that you just have a very attractive friend?”
“Mhm,” Jaune nodded. He didn’t know how to explain the big mush of emotions inside him any better, so he took another sip of the hot chocolate and sat besides Ruby in silence. They stayed like this for a good hour, before Jaune spoke again, “Is it gay if I crush on a guy?”
Ruby started laughing so hard, some milk spilled back out of her nose, “Do you even listen to yourself sometimes?” She couldn’t stop giggling. Jaune just watched her as she rolled on her side and tried to breathe properly. He must have looked pretty irritated, because once Ruby stopped laughing, she looked at him, took a few deep breaths and asked, “Wait, are you actually serious?”
Jaune could feel himself blush. Of course this was a stupid question, but he was having a crisis. “Yeah. Well, no. I mean I think I am straight? But then again there is this guy and. I don’t know. When he’s close to me it feels like there’s butterflies in my stomach and I can’t concentrate on anything that isn’t his eyes or lips and when we end up touching it gives me like? Warm tingles all over my skin. That is not how it’s supposed to be! I like girls, I am straight, I really am and. Ruby, what am I supposed to do about this?” He rested his head in his hands. This was silly, and he knew it was, but it gave him great distress to think about. And whenever he thought about Ren, he ended up wanting to kiss him and that was not how he should be thinking about his bro. He didn’t even know how to kiss a boy? Was it like kissing a girl? The last time he kissed a girl was so long ago, he didn’t even clearly remember how that went down.
“You know that there isn’t just gay and straight, right?” She slowly responded, having recovered from her laughing fit earlier.
“Yeah, I know. Dunno, it just doesn’t feel right to feel like this about a guy, you know?”
“I think you should just see how things go. Maybe he likes you back! And I know that our teams are good people who won’t judge you for liking a guy. And if anyone will, we’ll break their legs!”
“Can you break my legs then?” Jaune felt miserable. He knew there was nothing wrong with a guy liking another guy, but he couldn’t quite accept that he might like a guy. This was giving him a total identity crisis. By the age of eighteen, you should have figured out if you are straight or not. He should have figured it out.
“There’s nothing wrong with exploring your sexuality, Jaune.”
“I know… I guess it’s just? I don’t know. I don’t know how to handle this. I never felt about anyone like this, not even Pyrrha.”
“You’re in deep, aren’t you?”
“This isn’t funny!” Jaune softly punched Rubys shoulder. Her joking around made him feel more relaxed, which he was quite grateful for. They sat together and talked about school stuff and new battle strategies they wanted to practice for the Vytal Festival. Ruby told him about how they decided to give their team combos special names and Jaune explained to her how they started using his shield as a ramp to launch Nora in the air. Their lighthearted bantering distracted him from his worries and calmed him down quite a lot.
The Vytal Festival was just a little over a week away and all the teams at Beacon were busy with practice. Theoretical classes were cut down so everyone had more time to prepare for the festival, much to Jaunes liking. He preferred sparring to studies any time. After a pretty good session of practicing their couple attacks – and him trying to come up with good names for them – Jaune sat at the side of the training field and watched some upperclassmen. It fascinated him how different their strategies were from his own team.
Ren let himself fall down next to him, a bottle of water in his hand. “The partner attacks are a pretty good idea”
“Ruby came up with it, RWBY have been practicing them too.”
“You came up with the ones for us though and that is pretty impressive,” Ren handed him the water bottle, then looked in his eyes. It seemed like he tried to read something in Jaunes expression before he asked, “You’ve been acting odd recently, is everything alright?”
“Are you and Nora still together?” Jaune cursed himself the minute he asked this question, but he just had to know. He wasn’t a person who noticed when people broke up – or got together, on that matter – and he wanted to know if, just if, he had a chance. This whole ‘crushing on your best friend’ thing was still really weird to him, but at this point the urge to kiss Ren had overwhelmed his insecurity about liking a man. When Jaune realized the confused look on Rens face he added “I- I didn’t mean to. I mean, eh, it’s your personal life after all and I- “
“We haven’t been together for quite some time now,” Ren interrupted him, the look on his face now something Jaune couldn’t quite place “We agreed that we work out better as friends. She’s like a sister to me.”
“Ah,” he really was dense. Then again, he hadn’t noticed Ren and Nora were a couple until two months into sharing a dorm with them.
“Is that what’s been on your mind the past weeks?”
“Ah, yeah, I guess I was just wondering. You know how bad I am with noticing this sort of stuff” Jaune laughed nervously, stood up and stretched a bit “I just had an awesome idea for a combo you and Pyrrha could do,” he noted and took off towards Pyrrha and Nora, who were standing further away, watching CFVY fight another team he didn’t recognize. Halfway there, someone grabbed his arm. He turned around to see Ren hold onto him, looking at his face. Jaune could feel some blush creep up his cheeks. Rens eyes made him feel weak. Oh god, was he really that deep in?
Jaune caught himself staring for a solid minute before he found his voice again, “Ah, ehrm, what is it?”
“I want to tell you something. Could we… go on a short walk maybe?” was Ren blushing? Jaune couldn’t figure out what this meant, but he knew that he absolutely loved it. That thought made him blush as well.
“Sure,” he said, very silently. He felt nervous for some reason. What could Ren want to discuss with him? “I’ll go tell Pyrrha and Nora that we’ll be back shortly.”
“I told them already, don’t worry.”
“Ah, uh, okay then,” he couldn’t form any coherent sentence. Ren’s hand still held onto his arm and the butterflies in his stomach were the only thing he concentrated on right now. Oh this was not good, this was not good at all. Ren let go of his arm and wandered off, Jaune followed him.
They had walked to the far ends of the school ground before Ren stopped and turned towards Jaune again. “The reason Nora and I broke up,” He started, then took a deep breath “… is not that we just decided we work better as friends. I mean, we did! But the main reason was, well, is, you” Ren looked Jaune in the eye, waiting for a reply.
“Me?” Jaune pointed at himself as if he had to make his question clearer, “You broke up because of me? But… what did I do?” He was puzzled, trying to figure out how he ended his friends relationship. Had he said something that upset one of them?
“No! No you did nothing! I did… something,” Ren made a gesture with his hands that Jaune could only interpret as helpless waving; “Might as well,” Ren mumbled, then looked into Jaunes face, eyes filled with determination “I broke up with Nora because I fell for someone else. I fell for you. I like you Jaune, and not just in a friend way”
Something in Jaunes brain shut down. Ren just confessed to him. His facial expression was something he’d never before seen on him, and he loved it. His lips were still opened slightly, his eyes still fixed on Jaunes, very faint blush creeping up his cheeks. How does someone reply to this? He forgot how words work. His mind just went fuzzy and blank and all he could think about was how much he wanted to kiss Ren right now – so he did. He stepped close and locked their lips, just briefly, before realizing that he was out in public and just kissed his best friend. He pulled away, blushing furiously. “I- I think I like you too… No homo though”
Ren stood in front of him, eyes wide open while he comprehended what just happened before he started to laugh, “Did you really just say ‘No Homo’ out loud?”
“Did I? I meant to think that,” Jaune nervously rubbed the back of his head, smiling awkwardly, “It’s just very new to me to, ah, like a boy this way?”
“You’re adorable,” Ren still smiled, as did Jaune, even though he still had to process what just happened. And once he did, he just gasped ,“Oh god I totally messed up kissing you”
“That’s easy to make up for,” Ren stepped a bit closer and looked up at Jaunes flustered face, before taking the initiative and locking their lips once more, this time for a soft, long kiss.