Chapter Text
“Oh,” Lorenzo said, staring down at something he’d just gotten in the mail. “Huh.”
Francesco could tell he was trying to get him to ask him what was up, so he determinedly kept his eyes on his laptop and pretended not to be listening.
“So crazy.”
Francesco loudly clicked around and typed a long string of nonsense letters so Lorenzo would think he was busy.
“I never would’ve imagined this.”
Francesco sighed and grudgingly said, “What’s up?” because there was only so much he could take.
“You remember Clarice Orsini and Lucrezia Donati? My exes?”
“I remember you telling me about them after the fact, but you dated both of them during the Dark Times so I never met either of them.”
Francesco and Lorenzo had been best friends as children but had been driven apart by Francesco’s uncle when they were ten, after his parents’ deaths, and they hadn’t reconnected until Jacopo’s death and their siblings’ wedding five years ago. Lorenzo always solemnly referred to their period of enmity as “the Dark Times,” which Francesco found melodramatic and ridiculous, but he’d gotten in the habit of doing the same thing because it was just quicker than saying “the fifteen years we weren’t speaking.”
“Oh, right,” Lorenzo said. “Well, they’re getting married.”
“To who?”
“Each other.”
Francesco stared at him for a second, and then he started snickering. “Oh my God.”
“Come on, it’s not funny,” Lorenzo complained.
“It damn well is. It’s not every day that two of your exes dump you and run off with each other.”
“Okay, that is so not what happened. I dumped Lucrezia because I was tired of being her side hoe—”
“Since when do you ever get tired of being anyone’s hoe, side or otherwise?” Francesco asked. “You’re just mad because Lucrezia likes Clarice enough to make her her main hoe when she wouldn’t do that for you. Not just her main hoe, but her only hoe. Hopefully.”
“All right, well—”
“Also, Clarice did dump you.”
Lorenzo sniffed. “We mutually decided that we wanted different things in life and weren’t right for each other long-term.”
“So she dumped you.”
“…Yeah.”
“And ran off with one of your exes. Then again, that shouldn’t be a surprise, most of Italy must be your ex by now. Someone would have a harder time finding someone to date who isn’t your ex.”
“Why has this conversation descended into slutshaming me?” Lorenzo said crossly. “The point is, two of my exes are marrying each other and they invited me to the wedding, but I’m not seeing anyone right now—”
“For once.”
“Shut up! I’m not seeing anyone right now, so I don’t have anyone to take as a plus-one,” Lorenzo fretted. “But I can’t show up alone.”
“Why not?” Francesco said.
“Because it would be embarrassing! Showing up to my exes’ wedding alone!”
Francesco rolled his eyes. “Don’t go, then.”
“Don’t go? Don’t go?! That would be even worse!” Lorenzo said. “They’d think I wasn’t over one or both of them and was too depressed to come to their wedding.”
“Or that you’re just busy that day,” Francesco said. “You’re way overthinking this.”
But Lorenzo wasn’t listening to him (did he ever?). “No, the only option is to go to the wedding with a date, preferably a gorgeous one, and preferably one I’m in a serious relationship with,” he said; Francesco wondered if he was even still talking to him or just thinking out loud. “That would show that I too have moved on and met someone I love.”
“Have you really moved on if you’re this hung up about their wedding?” Francesco said.
“Of course I have. I am happy for them, honestly,” Lorenzo said. “But for the sake of my pride, I would really prefer to attend the wedding with a significant other of my own.”
“So go out this weekend and meet someone, and then take them to the wedding,” said Francesco, who was extremely done with this conversation. “Not that hard, especially for someone who looks like you.”
He regretted that last bit the second it left his mouth. Lorenzo was objectively good-looking, yes, but Francesco really shouldn’t inflate his ego any further. Though a desire to avoid inflating Lorenzo’s ego didn’t exactly explain why he felt himself blushing as Lorenzo turned to look at him.
Lorenzo stared at him for so long that Francesco was about to say something dumb like just kidding, I think you’re ugly, but then at last Lorenzo spoke. “I have an idea,” he said slowly. “What if I take you? To the wedding?”
“Me?” Francesco repeated incredulously. “No way.”
“Why not?”
“Well, per your own requirements, you need someone ‘gorgeous.’”
“Yes, and?” Lorenzo said, not looking like he had an objection on that count.
Francesco, hating himself, blushed even harder. “And someone you’re in a serious relationship with,” he managed. “So.”
“So…I’ll tell them you’re my boyfriend—no, fiancé!” Lorenzo said, grinning at his own ingenuity.
Francesco gaped at him. “No!”
“It’s perfect! I’ll show up with you on my arm and introduce you to them as my fiancé, and that way I save my pride, Clarice and Lucrezia are reassured I’m not upset about them getting married, and you get some free food out of it.”
“No way in hell,” Francesco said, unable to believe that talking Lorenzo out of pretending to be engaged to him was a real thing he had to do. “First of all, I’m sure that at their own wedding they’ll have much better things to concern themselves with than if you’re upset about it. And second of all, if you’re not capable of finding a real significant other within the next six weeks, get one of your other friends to do it, they’re way more willing to put up with your—your shenanigans than I am.”
“This is not a shenanigan, Francesco, this is serious.”
“This is the definition of a shenanigan.”
“Well, regardless, Clarice and Lucrezia both know all my other friends, whereas, as you just said, neither of them ever met you,” Lorenzo pointed out, and Francesco cursed his own slip of the tongue. “So they’d be more likely to believe I fell in love with you than with Sandro or Poliziano or whoever else.”
“No one would believe that anyone would fall in love with Sandro or Poliziano,” Francesco said, wrinkling his nose. “You’re right, I am by far the best catch of all your friends, so I would be the fake fiancé that would make you look the best…”
“That’s not really what I meant—”
“I mean, showing up engaged to a pathetic excuse for a painter or a pathetic excuse for a writer would be just as bad as showing up alone, if not worse, but showing up engaged to the president of the most successful bank in Florence? Now that’s prestige.”
“Second most successful,” Lorenzo grumbled; it was a point they playfully argued all the time, though any real rivalry between the Medici and Pazzi banks had died with Jacopo. “And I just need a fiancé, not a sugar daddy. If anything, I’d prefer you to be the trophy fiancé in this scenario.”
Francesco scoffed. “You’re obviously the trophy fiancé.”
“Okay, okay, I’ll be the trophy fiancé if you agree to the plan. Please?” Lorenzo wheedled. “Like you said, Clarice and Lucrezia are obviously going to be pretty busy, so you’ll only have to pretend to be in love with me for, like, thirty seconds when we’re congratulating them at the reception, and the rest of the time it’ll be just like any other wedding.”
“I hate weddings,” Francesco muttered.
“Pleeeaase?”
Now Lorenzo was giving him his best pleading expression, his blue eyes wide and sad and his mouth in a little pout, and it was ridiculous because Francesco knew how calculated that expression was and how long Lorenzo had spent perfecting it for maximum impact, but it was working on him anyway.
“Ugh. Fine,” he grumbled. “But you owe me big time.”
“Yay! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Lorenzo threw his arms around him and hugged him tight, and Francesco wasn’t sure why his stomach was doing backflips because Lorenzo had always been annoyingly touchy-feely and had hugged him a million times before.
Suddenly flustered, Francesco awkwardly extracted himself from the embrace, and fortunately Lorenzo didn’t seem to find it strange (Francesco was notoriously not touchy-feely). “Yeah, whatever,” Francesco said. “But like I said, you owe me. This is a deal, not a favor.”
“Okay,” Lorenzo said. “What do you want? I’ll do anything. Within reason. And it has to be a favor of equal magnitude as what you’re doing for me.”
Francesco considered it a minute. He couldn’t think of anything he especially needed from Lorenzo off the top of his head. Cover the entire rent for a month? No, Francesco could easily afford his half of the rent, that would be a waste of a favor. Do all the chores around the apartment? Chores were never really an issue for them, as they were both pretty neat, and besides, Francesco liked spending the occasional Sunday cleaning, it relaxed him.
“You’ll owe me a favor I can cash in anytime in the future,” he settled on. “Either one big favor or multiple smaller favors.”
“Deal,” Lorenzo said, and then he got down on one knee and grinned up at Francesco. “Francesco Pazzi, light of my life, it would make me the happiest man in the world if you would do me the honor of—”
“Don’t push it.”
As luck would have it, Lorenzo and Francesco ran into Clarice at the grocery store a few days later. “Clarice, hi!” Lorenzo said, smiling. “It’s so good to see you!”
Clarice smiled back and gave him a quick hug. “You too, it’s been ages! I hope you’re well?”
“Very well, thanks.” Realizing this was the perfect opportunity to get the ball rolling on the ruse, he gestured to Francesco and said, “This is Francesco Pazzi, my fiancé.”
He heard Francesco heave a sigh, but luckily Clarice didn’t seem to notice. “Clarice Orsini. It’s nice to meet you, Francesco,” she said. “And congratulations! I didn’t know you were engaged, Lorenzo.”
“Thanks. It…happened just the other day, actually, we haven’t told that many people yet,” Lorenzo said, thinking quickly to explain why no one knew about this alleged engagement yet. After all, while Clarice had spent most of her life in Rome, Lucrezia was from Florence and had several mutual friends with Lorenzo, not to mention a sharp ear for gossip, and would surely have heard about his engagement by now if it was common knowledge.
“Well, then, extra congratulations,” Clarice said, smiling at them both.
“Thanks,” said Francesco, who sounded more bored and less lovesick than Lorenzo would have hoped. Even so, Lorenzo couldn’t help a fond little smile as he glanced over at the impatient and vaguely grumpy expression Francesco was wearing. Francesco’s grumpy face was much less intimidating than he probably thought it was; in fact, it had always put Lorenzo in mind of a sulking kitten. Not that he would ever say so to Francesco.
“…glad things have worked out so well between you,” Clarice was saying, and Lorenzo quickly looked back over at her and refocused on what she was saying. “I remember you always saying how much you missed him, Lorenzo.”
“Did he?” Francesco said. Out of the corner of his eye, Lorenzo saw him looking more interested in the conversation.
“Oh yes, he told me all about how you two were best friends, but then you had that fight and stopped speaking,” Clarice said. “And when Bianca and Guglielmo got engaged, he was excited about the prospect of seeing you at the wedding and being able to mend fences. Is that what happened?” She and Lorenzo had broken up a few months before the wedding.
“Uh-huh,” Lorenzo said. “I sat him down for a chat during the reception—”
“Cornered me, more like,” Francesco said. “And in such a way that I couldn’t have escaped without making a scene.”
“—and we reconnected and spent the whole evening talking, and then we met up for lunch the following weekend, and the rest is history,” Lorenzo finished, smiling at Francesco, who was looking back at him with a markedly softer expression that made Lorenzo’s stomach do a funny little flip.
For some reason, he felt obliged to return his attention to Clarice and change the subject. “But that’s enough about us, you’re the one who’s actually getting married soon,” Lorenzo said. “Congratulations.”
“Thank you.”
“I just got the invitation in the mail the other day, it was so thoughtful of you to invite me.”
“Well, when both the brides have dated you…” Clarice said with a grin, and Lorenzo laughed, weirdly relieved to hear her address that elephant in the room so casually.
“I didn’t expect to see you in Florence. Are you and Lucrezia living here now?” he said next, and now Francesco was back to sighing and fidgeting and making a show of checking the grocery list.
“Yes, we just bought this cute house a little outside the main city…”
They chatted for another minute or two before going their separate ways. “Thanks for playing along,” Lorenzo said once Clarice was out of earshot.
“Not like I had a choice,” Francesco replied grouchily. “Do you think we can make it through the rest of our errands without running into any more of your extremely numerous exes? Because I had things I wanted to do today.”
“I love how supportive you are, darling.”
“Fuck off.”
Lorenzo thought no more of the encounter until the following weekend. Saturday evening dinners at Lucrezia de’ Medici’s house had become a staple in the years since all three children had moved out. Lorenzo usually dragged Francesco with him too, insisting he was part of the family now that Guglielmo and Bianca were married, and Francesco always complained but Lorenzo knew he secretly enjoyed feeling like he belonged to a real family again.
On this Saturday in particular, they’d hardly shut the front door behind them when several people started exclaiming “Congratulations!” and Lorenzo and Francesco were abruptly engulfed in a very tight hug.
“Oof,” Lorenzo said, but the hugger, whom he’d realized was his mother, just hugged them tighter.
“Oh, I’m so happy for both of you!” she gushed. “I do wish I’d heard it from you directly, but I know it just happened, so I’m sure you were planning to tell us all soon, maybe even tonight—”
“What are you talking about?” Lorenzo said.
Lucrezia let go of them at last and beamed at them. “Your engagement, of course!”
Lorenzo’s eyes widened, and he glanced over at Francesco and saw that he looked equally stunned. “Our engagement?” Francesco said.
“Yes, you see, Maddalena Orsini was in Florence yesterday visiting Clarice and seeing the new house, and you know she’s an old friend of mine, so we met up for coffee downtown before she went home, and she told me that Clarice told her she ran into you last week, Lorenzo, and you mentioned to her that you and Francesco are engaged!”
Panicked, Lorenzo looked around the room and took in the full scene in front of him. It wasn’t just their family there, but also Sandro, Poliziano, the Cavalcanti brothers, and several of Lorenzo’s other friends, as well as Luca and Bastiano Soderini and other coworkers from the Medici bank, and a few family friends. Clearly, Lucrezia had thrown together some sort of impromptu engagement party.
How could he look all these people in the eye and admit that the alleged engagement was just a ruse to protect his sorry pride at his exes’ wedding? No, he couldn’t do it, it would be utterly humiliating.
So when Francesco started to say, “Well, actually, the thing is—” Lorenzo quickly interrupted him.
“You’re right, we were planning to tell you all tonight,” he said, putting on his best sheepish smile. “But I guess the cat’s out of the bag, so…”
And everyone started exclaiming again and hugging them both, despite the fact that Francesco was glaring daggers at Lorenzo and giving off clear do-not-hug vibes. Lorenzo gave him a please-just-play-along look and got a fine-but-you-owe-me-even-more one in reply.
Since when had he and Francesco been the sort of people who didn’t need words to communicate with each other?
But Lorenzo put it out of his mind as Lucrezia ushered everyone to sit down in the living room and plied them with wine (Francesco downed his in one gulp and poured himself some more, looking suspiciously annoyed for a supposedly newly engaged man).
“Wait a minute, none of you seem that surprised,” Lorenzo realized. “Considering we, uh, never even told anyone that we were dating.”
“Oh, we all just kind of assumed it ages ago,” Bianca said. “I mean, you’ve been ‘roommates’ for so long…” She put airquotes around the word.
“Yeah, why else would two rich and allegedly single thirty-year-olds voluntarily choose to share an apartment, just the two of them?” Giuliano said. “We’re not stupid, you know.”
Now that Lorenzo was thinking about it...why had he and Francesco voluntarily chosen to share an apartment? At first it was because Francesco was moving back from Rome and Lorenzo had offered him his spare bedroom while he was getting settled, but why were they still living together? Why hadn’t Francesco moved into his own apartment years ago? Why hadn’t Lorenzo kicked him out? Why hadn’t he even noticed that Francesco had stayed so far past the time he’d expected him to move out?
“Not to mention that you always had such a crush on him when you were in school, Lorenzo,” Lucrezia said fondly. “So once you became friends again, I for one was sure it would only be a matter of time before something else developed.”
“I did not have a crush on him,” Lorenzo spluttered, mortified.
“Like hell you didn’t,” Sandro said. “You wrote poems about him. Poems.”
Francesco’s expression immediately went from murderous to smug, which Lorenzo supposed was less harmful to their ruse, though it was infinitely more harmful to his pride. “Oh really?” Francesco said, raising an eyebrow at him.
Lorenzo’s face was on fire. “It was one poem,” he grumbled. “And it was a—a literary exercise, not anything that reflected my actual feelings.”
“Sure,” Sandro said, grinning.
“Don’t feel bad, Lorenzo, it’s not like Francesco’s feelings were a secret either,” Guglielmo said.
“Really? Because I was pretty sure he’d never had a feeling in his life,” Giuliano snarked.
“Let’s hear more about Francesco’s feelings,” Lorenzo said eagerly.
“Let’s not,” Francesco said, but Guglielmo had already started talking again.
“Not so much when we were younger, but these past few years I definitely started noticing it,” he said. “Just the way he looks at Lorenzo—”
“Oooh, yes, his eyes go all soft,” Bianca said.
“They do no such thing!” Francesco protested, but Lorenzo could picture the exact soft expression so easily, he realized in astonishment that Bianca and Guglielmo were right. Strange…
“I’ve known him since the day he was born and I’ve never seen him look at anyone else that way,” Guglielmo said. Lorenzo was pleased to see that now Francesco was the one blushing. Served him right.
“So you see, we all had our suspicions,” Lucrezia concluded. “Of course, we would have appreciated you confirming them to us before getting engaged…”
“Yeah, sorry about that,” Lorenzo said, trying to think of a plausible explanation. “But…well, you know Francesco, he prefers keeping his personal life very private, so he wanted our relationship to stay between us. Until now, obviously.”
“Oh, yes, of course it’s my fault,” Francesco said, but everyone else was nodding as if this made perfect sense.
“How’d you convince him to marry you, then?” Giuliano said. “Seeing as he’d rather die than admit to people that he has experienced an emotion for somebody.”
“Believe it or not, Francesco has a much bigger and more tender heart than you might think,” Lorenzo said, earning him an irritated huff from Francesco and an eyeroll from Giuliano. “And there was no convincing needed. I just told him the truth. That he’s my favorite person in the world and I love him and I can’t imagine a future without him by my side.”
Unconsciously, Lorenzo had turned to look at Francesco beside him, and as he spoke, Francesco looked up and met his eyes. And Lorenzo realized that in a way, everything he’d just said was true. Francesco was his favorite person in the world, and Lorenzo did love him. As his best friend rather than his fiancé, sure, but still, he loved him so much that sometimes there were moments when Lorenzo would look at him and just feel amazed that this incredible, brilliant, fascinating person actually liked spending time with him.
He really couldn’t imagine a future without Francesco. He’d had that for fifteen years and those fifteen years were the Dark Times of his life. Lorenzo never wanted that experience again.
For a moment, as he and Francesco looked at each other, the rest of the room fell away and Lorenzo could feel…something between them, something charged with emotions he couldn’t name. But then Francesco was dropping his eyes and taking another sip of wine, and Lorenzo hastily turned his attention back to the conversation.
“So how long have you actually been together?” Bianca was asking.
Lorenzo frantically racked his memory to determine how long it had been since he’d last mentioned seeing someone who wasn’t Francesco to any of the people present and settled on, “About a year.” The past year for him had been limited to one-night stands or first dates with people from dating apps, during which he’d always immediately decided he wasn’t interested in a second date. Certainly nothing worth telling his family or friends about; the only person who was aware of these one-night stands was Francesco, who always loaded Lorenzo up with noise complaints the next morning.
“Really? Because I seem to remember some nights out within the past year when you definitely acted like a single man,” Giuliano said, raising his eyebrows.
Oops. “Oh, well, we had an open relationship for a while,” Lorenzo improvised. “Totally monogamous now, though.”
Impulsively, he put his arm around Francesco’s shoulders and pulled him into his side, which made Francesco tense up, but at least he didn’t throw his arm off. “A monogamous Lorenzo?” Giuliano said. “I never thought I’d see the day.”
“Neither did I,” Francesco said, which made everyone laugh though Lorenzo was sure he’d meant it as an insult.
Lorenzo enjoyed himself more than he probably should’ve fabricating relationship details like who made the first move (Lorenzo), where they went on their first date (the Uffizi Gallery), who said “I love you” first (also Lorenzo). Francesco remained in a sullen silence unless directly asked a question. Lorenzo hoped everyone would think he was just shy about discussing so many details of his personal life in front of all these people.
The grilling continued after Lucrezia had ushered everyone into the dining room and throughout most of the meal too. At one point Lorenzo excused himself to use the bathroom, and when he came out he started in surprise as he opened the door to reveal Francesco standing right on the other side glaring at him.
“Uh, hey,” Lorenzo said. “What’s up?”
“What exactly is your plan here?” Francesco asked.
“Plan?”
“Telling all these people we’re engaged, including our entire family! What are you trying to accomplish? This was not part of the deal.”
“I know, I’m sorry,” Lorenzo said. “But they ambushed us like this all thinking we were actually engaged, so I panicked and went along with it.”
“Hmph.”
“Can you please just go with it for now? Please?”
“I obviously have to since we’re already in it this far,” Francesco said. “But the wedding’s not for weeks and I’m sure your family will want to spend an absurd amount of time with us in the meantime, I can’t pretend to be in love with you for that long.”
“It won’t be that bad, just act like you always act around me,” Lorenzo said. “They know you’re not into PDA, it’s not like they’re going to expect you to make out with me in front of them. Besides, all of them apparently thought that the way we act as friends meant that we were in love, so…”
“Hmph,” Francesco said again. Lorenzo could’ve sworn he was blushing. “Fine. But you’ll owe me twice as many favors.”
“Okay.”
“And how are we going to put an end to it? If we say we broke off our engagement, no matter how amicably we claim it happened, our family’s going to be all weird about it and we’ll never be able to have a nice Christmas or anything again because they’ll think we broke each other’s hearts.”
Lorenzo bit his lip; he hadn’t thought that far ahead. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” he said. “It’ll be fine, don’t worry about it.”
“Well, I am worried,” Francesco said, scowling at him. Lorenzo suddenly became conscious of how close together they were standing in the doorway, nearly touching. “You’re fucking up my whole life just because you have a fragile ego.”
“I do not, and that’s not what this is about.”
“No? Why else are you so desperate to pretend that somebody loves you?”
“Plenty of people love me! If anything, I’m doing you a favor by pretending someone loves you,” Lorenzo shot back, then immediately felt guilty as his brain caught up with his mouth.
But Francesco didn’t look hurt, just even more angry. “Oh, excuse me, I forgot, you’re Lorenzo de’ Medici, the most perfect human being to ever walk the earth, the one a million people would kill to be with, and I should be grateful that you’ve chosen me to bestow the great honor of your attention upon.”
“I’m sorry, Francesco, I didn’t mean it like that—”
“How did you mean it, then? What other possible interpretation of ‘no one loves you, be grateful I’m pretending to’ is there?”
“I’m not pretending anything.” Lorenzo leaned forward to put his face even closer to Francesco’s, forcing him to maintain eye contact. “I do love you, Francesco, you’re my best friend. You’re my favorite person in the world.”
This close, he could visibly see the fight leave Francesco’s eyes, fading away and being replaced by uncertainty and a hint of that softness Bianca had talked about. Lorenzo gave him a small smile, and Francesco didn’t smile back, but his eyes grew a little warmer. Lorenzo could get lost in those eyes, the beautiful deep brown fascinating him and sucking him in, the only window to the heart Francesco kept so many walls around, the only visible indication of how deeply he felt.
“Is the bathroom free or are you two about to fuck in it?”
Lorenzo and Francesco both jumped and turned to see Giuliano standing in front of them. Lorenzo was still slightly dazed, but Francesco recovered quickly. “God, no,” he said, scrunching his face up in distaste, and he stepped away from Lorenzo and strode back towards the dining room, making sure to bump into Giuliano as he went.
Giuliano scowled and rubbed his shoulder. “A real charmer you’ve got there.”
Lorenzo sighed in agreement and followed Francesco.
The rest of the evening passed relatively free of incident. Francesco became a little more sociable and agreeable (well, to everyone except Giuliano), so Lorenzo supposed something he’d said must have gotten through to him.
“I am really sorry I’ve roped you into this,” Lorenzo said as they finally left the house together after a dozen attempts to escape Lucrezia’s excited discussion of wedding plans. “But I appreciate that you’re playing along to help me out. Truly. Thank you.”
Francesco just shrugged. “It’s not a big deal, I don’t mind,” he said with an unusual gentleness. But before Lorenzo could fully process it, that familiar smirk was back in place. “So, circling back to that poem you wrote about me when we were teenagers—”
Lorenzo shoved him into Lucrezia’s prized rosebush.