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Your name is Dirk Strider, and you're seven years old. There's a new family at the orphanage today, and you're sad for them--all three look terrified, but especially the boy. He keeps glancing at his sisters, little chest heaving as though he's about to have a panic attack.
You've been there and it's not fun, so you intervene.
"You look kind of scared," you murmur as you offer him your hand, "I've been here for a while, so I know the ropes. I can help you, if you'd like?"
He nods and looks up at you like you're his new favorite person, clinging to your hand tightly. You guide him and his sisters through the orphanage, ignoring the looks you get as you pass--you tend to keep to yourself, but dammit if this kid doesn't look just like your big brother.
Thankfully, the orphanage is good about getting kids to good families quickly when they can, so you're not overly packed or anything. You learn the names of the kids--Roxy, Rose, and Dave--and try to get a lock on each of them. Roxy's energetic but sweet as can be, Rose is just--quiet, and Dave... Well, Dave's just terrified. He's very obviously thankful for your presence, but it doesn't change the fact that he's still tense and doing his best to make himself small.
The three Lalondes sit with you at supper, and you chat amiably enough, you suppose. You don't want to push any of them out a window, so that's an excellent sign. You've gone over the dorm issue once before, but when everyone's leaving the room, you pull Roxy aside and promise her all over again that you'll look out for Dave and make sure he's okay.
Your teeth have been brushed so hard your mouth kind of aches, peppermint cooling your throat every time you breathe as you roll onto your side in your bed, and your shades are tucked safely under the bed. You've just gotten nice and cozy--nowhere near sleepy, but comfortable--when you hear a quiet, wet sound.
You wait, listen another moment to make sure you're right, and then roll out of bed. Dave's obviously embarrassed when you gently grip his shoulder. You don't say anything, just slide under the covers next to him and hold him tight. He hugs back impossibly tighter, and slowly falls asleep.
He still has an iron grip on you when the nuns come around in the morning, and even though you've only gotten a few hours of sleep, you're content.
Time goes on.
You get to know Dave, and you find yourself absolutely basking in the obvious admiration he has for you. People try to pick on him for it--for following you around and doing what you do and seeking your approval, but you pay them no mind. They're just jealous they don't have a kickass friend like him to teach things to.
You learn he's nothing like your brother, and you're actually relieved about it. You never down him for things--you only encourage and give helpful advice, and he all but worships the ground you walk on.
You've never wanted to keep someone safe so badly in your whole life.
-
Eight isn't a spectacular year, really. Roxy is your only friend in your grade, and barely that. Dave holds your hand to and from school, though, and it makes your heart feel light. You hang out with him on the playground, during the twenty minutes you're both out there, and his smile sets the sun to shame.
You don't know anything's wrong until you come out to see him being pushed around, hit, laughed at. You're seeing red, and you walk to a space between two of his tormentors to catch him the next time they shove.
He's shaking when he looks up at you, scared of whatever reason someone had wrapped their arms around him, and you have to bite back a snarl.
"You're never going to do this again," you hiss at his classmates, clutching him protectively to your chest.
"Who's going to stop us?" the ringleader sneers.
"I'll cut ten minutes off my lunch if I have to, just to make sure," you snap back, and stare the boy down until he looks away, grumbling and motioning for the others to follow him.
You sit Dave down and clean his tears away with your sleeve, his blood with the hem of your shirt. You hold it over his nose and make him keep his head tilted down until it stops bleeding.
On the way home you hold his hand tightly, as if someone is trying to pull him away, but he squeezes back just as hard.
You present him with your old shades when bedtime rolls around, and his eyes go wide. "My big brother gave these to me," you murmur, setting them on his round little face and making tiny adjustments so they're comfortable for him. "He found out that there were people at school who thought my eyes were weird, and said these would help. They're dark enough to hide the color of your eyes, and sharp enough to deter people from trying to hit you. I outgrew them, so you can use them until I find another pair for you."
Dave nods, and mimics your motions when you put your shades under the bed before going to sleep. You've gotten so used to falling asleep beside him that you don't even hesitate when he holds onto you--you just nose against the top of his head and wrap your arms around him.
You sit by the window during lunch every day from then on, and no one dares to touch him again. You're glad, because you'd hate for Dave to have to watch you lose your temper.
(He gives you a picture of you that he'd drawn, a few days later. It's actually pretty fucking good, and you're in a ridiculous pair of poofy pants. Apparently, you're a superhero. You never lose that picture--it stays folded carefully in your pillowcase.)
-
On your thirteenth birthday (and Dave's eleventh), Jake English comes into your life. He and Roxy both listen to you almost as aptly as Dave does--but oh, how you prefer Jake.
He's sweet and goofy as hell and doesn't give a solitary fuck what anyone thinks of him, and you've got the worst crush on him from the moment you see him.
You spend tons of time with him, Dave tagging along, but you barely even notice. Months pass in a blur, and you're happier than you've been in a long, long time.
You comfort Jake the same way you did Dave, but he actually speaks. You pass the late hours of the night mumbling back and forth, and you find yourself smiling when he stops midsentence because he's fallen asleep.
-
You're fifteen, your name is Dirk Strider, and you're pretty fucking stoked because Jake said yes when you asked him out. You're on cloud nine for ages, and you don't even care that the nun would scalp you of they found out.
You're not hanging out as often anymore, but you stay up to date on what's happening with Dave (thanks, Roxy.) He's making friends--hell, made friends with Jake's cousin--and doing his own thing, and you're confused when that makes you both proud as hell and a little sad.
-
Your name is Dirk Strider and HAPPY FUCKING BIRTHDAY TO YOU. What do you want for your birthday, Dirk? How about your heart being handed back to you, beat to hell?
You crawl in with Dave because you just--you need to have him close, you need to apologize, you need to have him comfort you the way you've always comforted him. He does so gladly, letting you wet his shoulder with tears and warm your feet on the back of his calves.
You catch his hashing out a plan to defend your honor by beating the snot out of Jake, and it's only Jade telling him she'll gun him down if he touches her cousin that stops him. It still warms you, still helps patch you up inside, and you start to smile a little more for him every day. He smiles right back and usually hugs you for good measure.
-
The nuns catch you holding Caliburn's hand when you're seventeen, and they treat you like a demon of hell. They preach and rant and fling holy water at you, excoriate you like it'll do something other than piss you off, the works.
You only get mad about it when they try to accuse you of molesting Dave.
Like, what the fuck? No. No, no, no--sure, Dave grew up pretty, but you're definitely not about cheating on your partners or doing shit non-consensually.
And then they start trying to separate the two of you.
The two of you protest by making a huge pallet out of all of your blankets and sleeping tangled up closer than ever.
They stop trying to stop you. Rose and Roxy are adopted by this rad as hell lady who not only doesn't change their last name but changes HER last name to match theirs. Dave spends the night with John, you spend the night with Rose and Rox. (Mostly Rox, but come on, she's your best friend. You miss seeing her all the time.) Tenth grade rage on for you, and you ace your classes with flying colors.
-
"I'll be out of here soon," you're telling Dave, arms crossed as you look at him."I don't want you to be alone. Take Egbert's offer, alright? I'll be okay--I move into the apartments soon, remember?"
You're a few months away from eighteen, and Dave has been asked if he'll let John's dad adopt him.
He has the gall to try and convince you that he should stay, and you put your foot down. Between you and John, it goes down, and you spend yours and Dave's birthday over there with John looking on in disgust as you and Dave consume your own weight in cake.
You're pretty sure they're screwing around. You get angry at yourself for not liking that thought.
-
Dave's getting lovelier and lovelier every time you see him. You swear you weren't anywhere near as cute as he is when you were seventeen. He is the dancing queen, it's him.
You've got a job now, and an actual apartment that's yours and not the orphanage's. You have to work your ass off all the time to make rent, but it makes you happy that you can make rent and buy groceries and take Dave on little not-dates-okay-you-want-them-to-be-dates. Shhh, you're wooing him. This is a long courtship on the road to (hopefully) a relationship, and he deserves all the wooing in the world because he's precious.
Dave doesn't correct the girl at the ice rink who tells you you're a cute couple. You don't either, and your heart leaps in your chest at the thought that maybe, just maybe, he likes you a little too.
Neither you not Dave have ever built a snow fort before, but it's awesome. John can't convince the two of you to be separated, so he has Jade over and the four of you pelt each other with snowballs until you're sopping. You, Dave, and John spend the next few days sick as dogs, but it's so worth it.
You end up calling in sick, and calling Mr. Egbert 'Dad'. He insists on both.
You and Dave go in even on the Egberts' gifts, but you've been tucking back pennies for-fucking-ever to get Dave's gift for him. He sets the headphones down gently and then tackles you, and you promptly flip your shit over the sewing kit he and the Egberts got you.
He wears the headphones all the fucking time, and as silly as it is, it sets you at ease to see him adoring something you gave him.
You're in for the shock of your life on your graduation day--one minute, you're waiting for the inevitable nearly-toppling force of Dave's body weight against yours, but no. No, he curls his hands in your hair and tugs you down into a kiss, and you're powerless to do anything but give as good as you're getting. You lock your arms around his waist and kiss him until your classmates are wolf-whistling and John's coughing awkwardly beside the two of you.
He laughs at the two of you and Dad bakes you a cake and Dave--that wonderful, beautiful, perfect little shit--smashes his piece of cake against your face like you just said 'I do' and got all fucking matrimonial.
Naturally, you do the same.
-
You put Dave on your phone plan and get him an iPhone with a ridiculous amount of space on it, and the first thing he sends you on snapchat is a video of he and John snickering like morons over a condom they've drawn on. You do the most genuine thing, because it's Dave, and have to hurry to respond with your breathless laughter.
He takes at least three snapshots of it, and you don't even care. You catch John calling him a sap for making one of them his home screen.
You're shocked and admittedly aroused at the thought of Dave packing what you find in the very bottom of his bag while he's spending a few weeks at your house during the summer. You bring him his clothes, but once he sees what you've got in your other hand, he doesn't wind up putting them on.
Precious darling that he is, he's never tried penetrating himself. You remedy that quickly enough, give him a nice hands-on lesson, and he makes you see stars.
The two of you get tested even though you have at least enough condoms to supply his entire grade for a month, and you wind up getting rid of them anyway. You're clean and most definitely exclusive--you don't really need them.
(The lube, however, definitely stays.)
-
You're twenty-one years old and definitely have a lock on your hormones at this point, but that doesn't mean you and Dave don't fuck like rabbits.
It's almost a problem--or, would be if that was all that ever happened. It's not that you're only ever physical--it's that you see each other so frequently that you practically live together, so. Why not, you suppose.
Actually, Dave kinda does live with you on the weekends. You have a standing date and movie night on Fridays at this point, whether you stay in or go out. The two of you always wind up crashing on the couch on Fridays, curled close in front of the T.V.
For a long while now, you've been carefully testing the waters in things either or both of you want to try, and however slowly, you tiptoe into the role of master and he into the role of pet. You collar him on your shared birthday, and John coos at his anklet and padlock for all the wrong reasons.
Dave gets you a replica of Toshiro Hitsugaya's zanpakto, and you kiss him until neither of you can breathe.
(And then you take him home and completely ravish him in thanks. Your stomach still flips weeks later when you think about the reverent way he slides his fingers over your bitemarks, how content his little sighs are as he settles in your arms in the afterglow.)
You pull Dave close and dip him low at his graduation, kissing him every bit as solidly as he kissed you upon your graduation. Rose gets proposed to by her longtime girlfriend at the Egbert-Lalonde hosted bash afterwards, and all of you cheer until your ears are ringing when she says yes.
You move Dave to your apartment and pack John's stuff in one fell swoop, and Dad cries the whole time, grabbing the closest one of the three of you several times to tell you how proud he is of you. You can't help but smile when he does, and you're polite enough to duck out when Rose and Jade come over for one more sleepover with their little quartet all in one place.
-
You're graduating a month before Rose gets married, and it kind of makes you think, sometimes.
You've had so many jam sessions with Dave by the time your birthdays roll around that you set up a DJ-ing gig for the two of you in Roxy's favorite bar, and you're an instant hit. (You'll admit gladly that the way Dave kisses you when he sees your tag-team name is what hypes you up enough to crank out your half of the frankly phenomenal performance the two of you put on.)
Rufioh is a friend from school, so you're genuinely surprised when he freaks out before a show because he caught the two of you giving each other a good luck kiss. You're about to ask what's wrong when he stammers out that he thinks you're brothers, and you and Dave bust a fucking gut. "My last name is Lalonde," Dave wheezes, folding over on himself a little, face flushed as red as his eyes from the strain. "I'm not a Strider, but it's easier to book us as a unit."
"Well," you hum, a smile curling at your lips, "You're not a a Strider yet."
Then his face flushes because of you, but hey--you're not hearing any protest.
(Ruf manages to slip in that you're both taken, despite the whining of the crowd, and you slide your fingers across Dave's new bracelet on the way to covertly take his hand each time it's mentioned.)
You think a lot about the fact that he didn't seem opposed to the teasing about his last name changing sometime soon. You start looking at rings.
-
Sex on the beach sucks. A lot. Sure, the sound of the waves is romantic, and so is the smell of the ocean air, and the knowledge that the beach is a private one, but it does. It sucks. Too much wind, too much sand.
The shiny new job that allowed it to happen, though, is pretty fucking great. You get to make robots all the time and get paid for it. It's nothing short of fucking fantastic.
So you take Dave on a cruise, because it's getting cold and you have the money to do so.
Again, sex on the beach is never going to be a thing again, even if the two of you had a blast on the trip.
Rufioh's sad that you won't be around as often, but Dave rocks the club to the ground without you and you spend your time in the audience sometimes, when you have a break from your robotics work.
You've never been so nervous in your life as you are the morning of Christmas Day--and then you've never been happier, because you propose and Dave says yes and you're pretty sure no one in the room has kept from tears, least of all the two of you. Roxy congratulates you on your step towards domestic bliss, and you snort.
You're gentle as you can be with Dave for as long as you can keep your self control that night, but he knows exactly how to drive you up a wall and through the ceiling.
(You know that was the plan. You know it was on purpose. You don't mind--he's the one with bruises all over, so if he goes out of his way to get them, you're happy to oblige.)
(He is yours, as he'd whispered over and over. He's always been yours, and it's comforting to think about.)
-
You're twitching, fiddling with your cufflinks until Jake chews you up one side and down the other about it, huffing as he straightens them and gets back in his place. Jane laughs softly at the two of you and squeezes Roxy's hand, offering her a fond smile, and it does a bit to ease your nerves. This is your day to look at Dave like that a hundred-fold, and oh, here he is--
His nerves are just as obvious as yours, and you smile at him to try and help. He all but stumbles, and Dad's sniffling terribly as he leaves Dave at the alter.
You keep from stammering simply because you practiced your vows over and over and over the night before, and when you see tears rolling down his face, you wipe then away. His smile is one you've seen often--he's crying because he's so happy. Because you make him that happy.
It warms you from your toes to your nose.
It's no surprise that his vows linger on the most emotionally based times of your lives together, because well--that's Dave, no matter how often he once tried to pretend otherwise. You cry as well, and he links your fingers as he goes on, voice wobbling.
You almost drop the ring, you think, but he's no better. As soon as you're told you can kiss him, you do, deep and sweet and hard. He's grinning against you and the applause is thunderous, loud whistles and shouts ringing out. When you pull away, his expression softens, as it's then that you realize what a soppy expression you have on.
You just don't even care. You're so fucking happy.
You're Dirk Strider, you're twenty-three, and you're pleased to say you just married your best friend.