Archive of Our Own

The building Kimi and Ollie live in is old.

It is a narrow four-story brick structure that looks as though it was squeezed into its plot of land as an afterthought. The staircases are steep and narrow. The windows rattle with the slightest gust of wind, and the water pressure in the shower is entirely dependent on the mood of the plumbing on any given day.

Despite everything, Kimi loves their floor.

The building is divided into two flats per floor, and for the past eleven months, the unit directly across from theirs, 3B, has been peacefully vacant. The faceless corporation that is the building management, had stubbornly refused to fix a terrible draft in the living room. Nobody wanted to rent it.

For Kimi, this negligence was the greatest gift the universe have bestowed upon him (second, after Ollie).

The vacancy was in favor of Kimi and Ollie’s domestic bliss. The walls in the building were paper thin, the kind where you could hear a neighbor sneeze and feel obligated to say bless you. Having no neighbors meant no awkward polite coexisting when trying to squeeze past a stranger on the narrow stairwell.

It was a perfect little utopia.

Until today.

Kimi is currently navigating the creaking ascent to the third floor. Both of his arms are weighed down by heavy canvas tote bags. He had just run to the grocery store to pick up some oat milk, a specific brand of organic pasta, and two massive trays of chicken breasts because his boyfriend has the daily caloric requirements of a horse.

Kimi is tired, shirt is clinging slightly to his back in the humid afternoon air, and he is mentally mapping out how he is going to arrange the fridge.

But as he rounds the landing of the second floor, his internal monologue is interrupted by the sound of voices.

Loud voices.

"Bro, I literally told you to put them in the zipper pocket! The zipper pocket is specifically designed for important small items, bro!"

"Mate, I didn't have the zipper pocket! I was carrying the lamp! You said you had them, mate!"

"No I didn't! Why would I have it when my hands were full, mate?"

Kimi freezes on the stairs. He blinks, his dark eyes wide, his grip tightening on the handles of his tote bags.

He swears to God, he has just heard the words bro and mate no less than five times in the span of a single breath. The voices are echoing down the narrow stairwell, shattering the peace of Kimi’s third floor haven.

With a deep sigh that pulls all the way from his chest, Kimi trudges up the final few steps, bracing himself for the inevitable contact.

He steps onto the landing.

Standing directly in front of the door to 3B, are two guys.

Kimi takes them in with a judgmental gaze. They look to be roughly his age, maybe a year or two older or younger, you can never tell these days. 

They are both wearing jeans that are so aggressively baggy that they’re sweeping against the dirty hallway floor.

The first guy, the one currently gesturing wildly with his hands, has a head of messy, sandy hair  streaked with aggressive blonde highlights. He is wearing a backward baseball cap and an oversized graphic tee. But the highlight, Kimi’s eyes narrow in disbelief, is a heavy metal carabiner clipped to his front belt loop, weighed down with an absurd assortment of clinking keychains, bottle openers (yes, plural), a bottle of hand sanitizer, and what looks like a tiny plastic skateboard.

The second guy is leaning against the wall, looking both defensive and exhausted. He has dark olive skin and a thick, chaotic head of dark curls cut into a mullet. He is currently glaring at his friend through a set of eyelashes so unfairly long and thick that Kimi feels a fleeting irrational spike of jealousy.

Between the two of them, the hallway is cluttered with a chaotic barricade of cardboard boxes, a haphazardly wrapped floor lamp, and a suspiciously lumpy beanbag chair.

Kimi remains perfectly still on the top step. He wants to simply slip past them, put his oat milk in the fridge, and pretend this isn't happening. But then, his eyes drift down to the open cardboard box resting at the blonde guy's feet.

The flaps of the box are folded back, revealing the contents packed within a terrifyingly inadequate layer of bubble wrap.

Glass bongs.

Not just one. Not just a small subtle pipe. An entire, multi-colored, intricate collection of massive glass bongs, some of them featuring complicated chambers that look like they require a certain level of experience to operate.

Kimi’s brain immediately shifts into overdrive.

Weed, Kimi thinks, a cold spike of horror dropping into his stomach. They are going to smoke weed. In a building with the structural integrity of a wet paper towel and the ventilation system of ye olden coal mine.

The draft is going to blow it directly under our door. Ollie is an athlete, his lungs are a temple. I am going to fail semester because I will be subjected to secondhand contact highs.

"Bro, I swear to God, if we have to sleep in the hallway on night one-" the blonde guy continues to rant, turning his head.

He cuts off abruptly as he finally registers Kimi standing on the edge of the landing, staring at them with wide eyes and bags of groceries.

The two guys freeze. They stare at Kimi. Kimi stares back, clutching his eco-friendly bags like a shield.

The blonde guy’s face immediately brightens. The frustration vanishes from his features, replaced by a wide, incredibly enthusiastic, golden-retriever-esque grin that instantly reminds Kimi of Ollie, albeit a much more… stoned.

"Oh, hey!" the blonde guy says, stepping over the box of bongs. "Hello! Are you from the management?"

Kimi blinks, taking a very slight, defensive step back. He looks down at his vintage AC Milan jersey, his shorts, and the tote bag clearly displaying a bundle of organic celery sticking out of the top. In what universe does he look like a  property manager?

"Uh, no?" Kimi says. He nods his chin toward the door directly opposite theirs. "I live there."

"Oh!" The blonde guy’s grin somehow gets even wider. He claps his hands together, the carabiner on his belt loop rattling loudly. "A neighbor then! Sick! We’re moving in here, actually. Obviously. I mean, look at the boxes. I’m Liam."

Liam extends a hand. Kimi, shifting his groceries to balance on one hip, politely reaches out and shakes it.

He is currently running Liam’s accent through the extensive database of his brain, trying to categorize it.

Huh, Kimi thinks, furrowing his brow slightly as Liam continues to talk. Australian? A hillbilly version of british? Cowboy british?

"Arvid," the second guy says, finally peeling himself away from the wall.

Arvid offers a lazy two-finger salute instead of a handshake. Oh. Now this one is just British.

Arvid’s voice is a low, gravelly tone, entirely devoid of the chaotic, bouncing energy that Liam is currently radiating.

"Nice to meet you," Kimi says slowly, feeling incredibly out of his depth. He tightens his grip on his groceries. "I am Kimi."

"Kimi. Sick name, bro," Liam says, nodding enthusiastically. His eyes drop down, landing squarely on Kimi’s chest.

"Mate! AC Milan!" Liam points a finger at Kimi’s chest, his eyes lighting up with genuine excitement.

Kimi feels a sudden spike of camaraderie. Perhaps he has misjudged them. Perhaps beneath the baggy jeans, the bongs, and the chaotic accents, Liam is a man of culture. A football purist. Someone who appreciates the beauty of the early nineties Serie A.

"Yes," Kimi says, a proud smile finally touching the corners of his mouth. "Are you a fan of the Rossoneri?"

Liam stares at him blankly for a fraction of a second. Then, he laughs, a loud, booming sound that echoes down the stairwell.

"Oh, nah, mate! I don't watch football at all," Liam says cheerfully, completely oblivious to the way Kimi’s proud smile instantly shatters into a look of  betrayal. "Literally couldn't name a single player. But the colors are sick! Red and black is a killer combo. Very retro. Cool, cool anyway."

Kimi simply stares at him.

He feels his Italian soul leave his body, float up to the ceiling, and disintegrate into dust. Sick. The man just called the legacy of Paolo Maldini sick because the colors are a killer combo.

Kimi takes a slow, deep breath, channeling every ounce of patience he has absorbed from his boyfriend over the past year. 

"Right," Kimi says, his voice flat, devoid of all previous warmth. "Well. Welcome to the building. I have groceries to put away-"

"Wait, wait, actually, bro, since you live here-" Liam steps forward, blocking Kimi’s path to his own door. "Do you happen to have the number for the building management? Like, a direct line?”

Kimi frowns, looking between Liam’s bright, desperate face and Arvid’s exhausted posture leaning against the wall.

"I do have it, yes," Kimi says cautiously. "Why? Is there a problem with the flat?" He hopes it’s the draft. He hopes the draft is so severe they decide to pack up their bongs and baggy jeans and leave immediately.

Arvid groans, dropping his head into his hands, his dark curls falling over his fingers. "Don't tell him, Liam. I'll die. I'll literally throw myself down the stairs."

"Mate, we have to tell him, he has the number!" Liam turns back to Kimi, offering a wincing apologetic smile. "So... funny story. We picked up the keys from the office this morning. Brought the first load of boxes up. And then... we went out for coffee."

Kimi stares at him. He can see exactly where this is going, and the incompetence of it is almost awe-inspiring.

"And?" Kimi prompts, his tone completely deadpan.

"And," Liam sighs, scratching the back of his neck. "We lost our keys. We lost the keys to the flat, Kimi. We have been officially moving in for exactly two hours, and we are currently locked out of our own apartment."

Kimi stands there in the narrow hallway. He looks at the cardboard box full of glass bongs. He looks at Liam’s backward cap. He looks at Arvid, who is about to melt into the peeling wallpaper out of embarrassment.

Kimi closes his eyes. He takes another long, deep breath.

"Hold my oat milk," Kimi says, extending his left arm toward Liam.

Liam blinks, before quickly taking the heavy tote bag. "Uh, sure, bro."

Kimi fishes his phone out of his sweatpants pocket with his free hand. He unlocks it, scrolling past his ten missed texts from Ollie, and navigates to his contacts. He finds the contact labeled Evil Landlord - DO NOT TEXT UNLESS DYING and pulls up the number.

He holds the screen out toward Arvid, ignoring Liam entirely.

"Take a picture of the screen," Kimi instructs, his voice dripping with tired resignation. "Tell him you are the new tenants of 3B. He is an awful angry little man. Do not yell back, or he will charge you a call-out fee."

Arvid scrambles to pull his own phone out. He quickly snaps a photo of Kimi’s screen.

"Mate, you are an absolute legend," Liam beams, handing Kimi his tote bag back. "A lifesaver. Seriously. Once we get the keys and get unpacked, you and your flatmate should totally come over! We’ll pack a bowl, order some pizzas, it'll be sick!"

Kimi feels a shudder run down his spine at the phrase pack a bowl.

"I live with my boyfriend," Kimi corrects automatically, adjusting his grip on the bags. "And we are very busy students. But... thank you for the invitation."

He steps around Liam, carefully maneuvering his way past the barricade of boxes and the wrapped floor lamp. He reaches his own door, slotting his key into the lock with a swift, practiced motion.

"A boyfriend! Cool, cool," Liam calls out, entirely undeterred by Kimi’s prickly demeanor. "Tell him we say hi! We'll be quiet, I promise! Good neighbors!"

I highly doubt that, Kimi thinks.

Kimi offers a tight smile, and firmly shuts the door behind him. He locks the deadbolt, sliding the chain into place for good measure.

He drops his tote bags onto the kitchen counter and groans into the empty kitchen.

The moment Kimi finishes shoving the oat milk into the refrigerator, he pulls out his phone. His thumbs fly across the screen with unprecedented speed, drafting a message to Ollie.

Emergency. 3B is occupied. They are highly suspicious individuals with suspicious baggy jeans. They lost their keys within two hours of existing here. Do NOT make eye contact if you see them. 

He hits send, tosses his phone onto the counter, and begins realigning the spice rack to self-soothe.

Twenty minutes later, the heavy thud of familiar footsteps echoes on the stairs, followed by the rattle of a key in the lock. The door swings open, and Ollie fills the frame. He is fresh from the campus gym, a faded grey hoodie pulled over his massive chest.

But it isn't the sight of his massive boyfriend that makes Kimi’s stomach drop. It is what Ollie is holding in his hands.

It is a small, pale pink cardboard box tied with a white bow. The logo of the artisanal bakery three streets down is stamped on the top.

"Ollie," Kimi says, his voice flat, his dark eyes narrowing into dangerous slits. "What is that?"

Ollie closes the door with his foot and beams. It is a blinding sunny smile that usually makes Kimi’s knees weak, but right now, it only fills him with a sense of dread.

"Pastries!" Ollie announces cheerfully, setting his gym bag down. "I saw your text, Bambi. I thought, brilliant, new neighbors! We have to be good neighbors, don't we? So I stopped and got some of those lemon tarts you like, and a few croissants to take over. Love thy neighbor, right?"

Kimi stares at him. He stares at the pink box. 

"You are an atheist," Kimi points out, his voice calm.

"I'm sampling religions," Ollie counters without missing a beat, unlacing his trainers. "The Christians have some very solid community values, Kimi. You can't fault the hospitality aspect. Plus, you said they lost their keys? Poor blokes are probably stressed out. A bit of sugar will sort them right out."

Kimi closes his eyes. He takes a deep breath. He crosses the kitchen, stopping inches from Ollie’s chest. He grabs the drawstrings of Ollie’s hoodie, pulling the larger man down slightly so he can speak directly into his ear.

"Ollie," Kimi whispers, his tone carrying the gravity of a national security threat. "I saw bongs."

He pulls back, waiting for the horror to set in and for him to recoil in disgust.

Instead, Ollie simply blinks. His expression doesn't change.

"Oh," Ollie says mildly. "Well. Everyone has a hobby, darling. Don't be judgmental."

"Judgmental?!" Kimi hisses, dropping the drawstrings as if they burned him. "I am not being judgmental! I am being logical! The walls in this building are made of compressed dust! The draft from their living room is going to funnel directly under our front door! We are going to fail our drug tests just by inhaling the hallway oxygen!"

"I'm sure they'll open a window," Ollie says reasonably, picking up the pink pastry box. "Come on, let's just go say hello-”

Before Ollie can take a single step toward the door, a sound shatters the quiet of the third floor.

RRRAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT

It is incredibly loud. It is rhythmic and terrifyingly mechanical. It sounds exactly as if someone has just opened fire with an automatic machine gun directly on the other side of the plaster. The force of the noise makes the floorboards vibrate beneath Kimi’s socks.

RRRAT-TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT

Kimi lets out an undignified yelp. He scrambles backward, putting Ollie’s massive frame between himself and the wall.

"What the fuck is that?" Ollie mutters, his voice dropping into a whispering wonder.

"I told you!" Kimi whispers frantically, his fingers digging into the fabric of Ollie’s hoodie at his lower back. "They are a cartel, Ollie! Call the police!"

RRRAT-TAT-TAT-TAT

Ollie strides toward their front door all the while Kimi clings to the back of Ollie’s hoodie and shuffles right behind him like a Labubu with attachment issues.

"We are not going out there!" Kimi hisses against Ollie’s shoulder blades. "Ollie, absolutely not! We are locking the deadbolt and hiding in the bathtub!"

"I'm just looking," Ollie says, turning the handle and cracking their door open.

Kimi peeks out from under Ollie’s bicep.

The door to Flat 3B is propped wide open, held in place by a heavy, paint-splattered combat boot. The hallway is flooded with the suffocating heat of the afternoon.

Ollie pushes their door open wider, stepping out onto the landing. Kimi follows, entirely against his own survival instincts. They peer into the open doorway of 3B.

The living room is a chaotic disaster zone. Cardboard boxes are everywhere. But in the center of the room stands Arvid.

He is completely shirtless, revealing a lean, olive-skinned torso glistening with sweat in the humid, un-airconditioned flat. He is wearing a pair of noise-canceling stickered-up headphones over his dark, curly mullet, and he is wielding a heavy, terrifying-looking mechanical device with a needle the size of a ballpoint pen. He is aggressively, violently driving the machine into a massive canvas stretched tight over a wooden frame.

He is tufting. He is making a fucking rug.

"Bro, the blue! We need more of the cerulean blue!"

Liam emerges from the kitchen, holding two massive cones of yarn. He, too, is completely shirtless, hair tied back into a messy, pathetic excuse for a topknot. His baggy jeans are sitting dangerously low on his hips, the carabiner still jingling violently with every step.

Ollie stops dead in the doorway. The tension bleeds out of his broad shoulders so fast Kimi can practically hear the deflation.

"Oh," Ollie says, his voice echoing in the doorway. "They're doing arts and crafts."

Liam spins around, nearly dropping the cerulean yarn. His face breaks into that same, terrifyingly bright smile Kimi had witnessed earlier.

"Yo!" Liam shouts over the heavy bass of the synthesizer and the rat-tat-tat of the tufting gun. He strides over to the door, unfazed by the fact that he is half-naked and sweating profusely. "Kimster! And you must be the boyfriend!"

Liam looks Ollie up and down, his eyes widening slightly as he takes in Ollie’s sheer width and the thick muscles of his arms straining against his hoodie.

"Holy shit, bro, you're huge," Liam says with genuine awe. "Do you lift? You look like you could punt a fridge over a house."

Kimi waits for Ollie to be weirded out by the lack of boundaries. Ollie would stammer and look at him. He always does that.

Instead, Ollie’s face breaks into a delighted, sunshine-bright grin.

"Cheers, mate," Ollie says, puffing his chest out just a fraction. "Yeah, I play rugby. Sports Science major. I'm Ollie."

"Sick! I'm Liam. That's Arvid," Liam points a thumb over his shoulder at his friend, who is still violently shooting yarn into a canvas that currently looks like a deranged acid trip. "Sorry about the noise, bro. We're trying to get the commission done before the sun goes down because we forgot to buy a bulb for the living room."

"No worries at all!" Ollie says cheerfully. He literally reaches back into their own apartment, hand patting blindly at the counter until he grabs the pink bakery box. "Actually, we just came over to say hi. Brought some lemon tarts. Welcome to the building.

Kimi stares. He is experiencing a complete out-of-body phenomenon.

He watches, completely paralyzed, as Liam's eyes light up like it's Christmas morning.

"Lemon tarts? Bro, you are literally an angel sent from the heavens. Arvid! Turn the gun off, this massive legend just brought us pastries!"

Arvid finally stops the machine. He pulls his headphones down around his neck, wiping a line of sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist. He looks at Ollie, looks at the pink box, and lets out a long, exhausted sigh of relief.

"Thank Christ," Arvid mutters, "I am starving. Cheers, mate. Come in, seriously, ignore the boxes."

And Oliver Bearman, the supposed love of Kimi’s life, the man who is supposed to protect Kimi from the horrors of the world, literally happily steps over the threshold into the enemy territory.

"Don't mind if I do," Ollie singsongs. He walks right into the living room, dodging a stray box of bongs, and gestures toward the massive, fuzzy canvas. "That looks brilliant, by the way. What's with that gun? Looks heavy."

"Bro, it's so heavy," Liam groans, immediately gravitating toward Ollie, ripping the pastry box open. "Absolutely destroys your forearms. You want to hold it?"

"I'd love to," Ollie says earnestly.

Kimi is left standing alone on the threshold of his own open doorway.

He looks at his boyfriend, currently accepting a contraption from a half-naked, carabiner-wearing Southern Hemisphere cryptic, nodding thoughtfully as a sweaty Brit explains the mechanics of rug-tufting.

Ollie is dangerously sociable. Ollie is the kind of person who knows the life story of the postman and frequently stops to have full blown conversations with random people on the street. Kimi swears that Ollie could befriend a limp piece of lettuce if he stared at it long enough.

But this is an absolute betrayal. 

"Kimi, come look at this!" Ollie calls out over his shoulder, his mouth full of pastry, gesturing enthusiastically at the rug. "It's fascinating!"

Kimi does not move. He glares at the three of them, his dark eyes flashing with pure, unadulterated spite.

"I am going to check on the oat milk," Kimi announces loudly.

He turns on his heel, steps back into their flat, and slams the door shut.

He stands in the quiet hallway of his apartment, the faint sound of Tame Impala and Ollie’s booming laughter vibrating through the floorboards. His sanctuary is gone. His peace is ruined. And worst of all, his boyfriend is officially fraternizing with the enemy.

—----

Kimi is a supportive boyfriend.

He is normal (highly debatable). He is well-adjusted. He is not possessive (a blatant, easily disprovable lie). He is a modern, progressive individual who actively encourages his partner to pursue individual journeys and foster independent social circles.

And truthfully, Ollie needs it.

Aside from his coursework and the grueling hours spent at the university gym, Ollie spends almost ninety-nine percent of his free time with Kimi. Ollie is a deeply domestic creature. He likes being in their flat. He likes laying his massive, heavy head on Kimi’s lap while Kimi reads.

Ollie's actual friends from his hometown, Luke and Dino are attending different universities and work part-time jobs. When Ollie actually manages to coordinate a pint with them, it happens once in a blue moon, usually requiring a WhatsApp poll three weeks in advance.

So, logically, Kimi wants Ollie to have a group of mates he can do aggressively masculine, heteronormative things with.

But why. Why did it have to be the two absolute menaces across the hall?

It has been exactly three weeks since the stoners moved into Flat 3B, and Kimi’s ecosystem is in ruins.

Ollie practically lives over there now. Which is fine. It is totally, completely 100% fine. Kimi is thrilled for him.

But because Ollie is a gentle giant with a heart of gold and zero street smarts, Kimi feels morally obligated to brief him before every single visit.

"Oliver, look at me," Kimi had said just last Thursday, grabbing Ollie by the drawstrings of his hoodie before letting him cross the hallway. "If Liam hands you a glass apparatus, you put it down and you walk away. Peer pressure is a psychological trap. Marijuana is a gateway drug to lethargy and bad choices."

Ollie had just laughed, kissed Kimi’s forehead, and said, "Babe, we’re just playing Mario Kart."

It started with Mario Kart. Then, it escalated.

Now, Ollie and Liam go jogging together. In the dead of the morning. At 5:30 AM, Kimi will be rudely awakened by the sound of Liam’s cheerful, cowboy-British voice echoing in the stairwell, yelling, "Let's get these gains, bro!"

Ollie will actually roll out of their warm comfortable bed, lace up his trainers, and go run five miles in the freezing dawn with a man who wears a carabiner on his running shorts.

Then, there is Arvid. Ollie goes over to 3B to tinker. Kimi doesn't even know what that means. Ollie helps Arvid stretch heavy canvases over wooden frames. Ollie comes back to their flat covered in tiny, neon-colored fuzz, smelling faintly of incense and pizza boxes.

Ugh.

Ughhhhh.

Kimi is currently lying upside down on their thrifted couch, staring at the ceiling, actively stewing in his own misery. He misses his boyfriend. He misses the heavy weight of Ollie hovering over him. He misses having Ollie's undivided obsessive attention.

To make matters worse, Kimi is now forcefully subjected to the ongoing confusing lore of their neighbors. He absorbs it entirely against his will.

For instance: Arvid.

"Did you know Arvid is a Biochemistry major?" Ollie had casually dropped over dinner two nights ago, spooning a massive portion of pasta onto his plate.

Kimi had choked on his sparkling water. "Biochemistry? The sweaty guy with the mullet who makes fuzzy rugs to Tame Impala?"

"Yeah!" Ollie had beamed, entirely unbothered by the paradox. "He’s brilliant at it, apparently. Top of his cohort. He was explaining cellular respiration to me yesterday while we were fixing his Xbox controller. Really fascinating stuff."

Kimi had stared at his plate, feeling his worldview actively fracture. Arvid, the guy who Kimi had mentally categorized as a permanent resident of the couch, was studying the molecular mechanisms of life. It made no sense. 

And then, there was Liam.

"What does Liam study?" Kimi had asked cautiously, bracing himself for another academic shock.

"Oh, Liam's not in uni," Ollie had said, tearing off a piece of sourdough. "He just does this and that."

Kimi had frozen. "This and that?"

"Yeah, you know. A bit of freelance. Some creative consulting. He said he trades a bit of crypto, flips some vintage clothes, manages a mate's band. This and that."

"Oliver," Kimi had whispered, horrified. "He is unemployed. He is an unemployed drifter. He is going to borrow our blender and pawn it."

"He's an entrepreneur, Kimi. Be nice."

Kimi groans loudly to the empty apartment, letting his head loll back off the edge of the couch cushion.

The muffled, chaotic sounds of a FIFA match are currently vibrating through the wall. Kimi can hear Liam shouting something about a penalty, followed by Ollie’s booming, unmistakable laugh.

The front door clicks open, interrupting Kimi’s downward spiral.

Ollie steps into their flat, shutting the door quietly behind him. He looks incredibly relaxed, his shoulders loose, a faint, lingering smell of Doritos and patchouli incense clinging to his grey hoodie. He spots Kimi lying upside down on the couch, staring blankly at the ceiling, and a soft, knowing smile spreads across his face.

Ollie walks over, leaning over the back of the couch so his face is upside down in Kimi’s field of vision.

"You know," Ollie says gently, reaching out to brush a stray, gravity-defying strand of hair out of Kimi’s eyes. "You are more than welcome to join us."

"I would rather staple my tongue to the coffee table," Kimi replies flatly, not blinking.

Ollie chuckles, the sound warm and vibrating. He walks around the couch and sits down on the edge of the cushions, right next to Kimi’s ribs. He rests a heavy, comforting hand on Kimi’s stomach.

"They aren't that bad, babe. They're actually really funny," Ollie says, his thumb stroking lazy circles against the cotton of Kimi’s shirt. "In fact, they always ask about you. Liam wanted to know if you liked Thai food because they were thinking of ordering takeaway."

Kimi entirely abandons his upside-down sulk. He scrambles upright so fast he nearly headbutts Ollie in the jaw. He crosses his legs, pulling his knees to his chest, and stares at Ollie with wide, intensely suspicious eyes.

"You talk about our relationship to them?" Kimi demands.

Ollie blinks, clearly taken aback by the sudden interrogation. "Well, yeah. Of course I did. You're my boyfriend. I live with you. You come up in conversation."

He knows Liam knew the "boyfriend" label on day one, but casually shouting it across a hallway is very different from sitting in a room, behind closed doors, actually discussing their domestic dynamic with two aggressively masculine, backward cap-wearing bros. Kimi knows how groups of guys can be. He knows how the locker-room mentality operates.

"Are they pricks about it?" Kimi asks, his voice dropping into a low, defensive register. He narrows his eyes, actively searching Ollie’s face for any sign of hidden distress. "What do they say?"

"What?" Ollie frowns, his thick eyebrows pulling together in confusion. "Like what?"

"You know what I mean, Oliver," Kimi insists, his hands gripping his own knees tightly. He leans forward, lowering his voice even further, as if the walls might actually be listening. "Do they make jokes? Because if they say anything, if they make you feel weird, or if they act strange about you being with a guy, I swear to God I will go over there and verbally ruin their self-esteem."

Ollie stares at Kimi. The confusion melts off Ollie’s face entirely, replaced by an expression of such fondness that Kimi immediately feels his face start to burn.

"Oh, Bambi," Ollie sighs, a breathy, devastatingly affectionate sound. He reaches over, wrapping his massive hands around Kimi’s waist, and pulls Kimi sideways until Kimi is entirely sprawled across Ollie’s lap.

"Let go of me, I am being a serious." Kimi grumbles, though he immediately goes boneless, resting his cheek against the warm expanse of Ollie’s chest.

"I know you are. You're very intimidating," Ollie humms, wrapping his arms securely around Kimi, resting his chin on top of Kimi’s head. "But you don't need to do anything. They're very chill."

"Chill," Kimi repeats dubiously, his finger pausing its absentminded tracing along the heavy, worn seam of Ollie’s hoodie. He presses his cheek flatter against Ollie’s chest, listening to the steady thump of his boyfriend's heart. "Straight men in groups are rarely 'chill' when discussing homosexuality, Ollie. It threatens their fragile pack hierarchy."

Ollie shifts underneath him, a slow, rumbling chuckle vibrating through his ribs. He brings a heavy hand up to cup the back of Kimi's neck, his thumb resting a warm weight against Kimi's pulse point.

"Well, first of all," Ollie says, his tone taking on that patient cadence he usually reserves for calming Kimi down from a spiral, "it's generally considered bad form to just assume someone's sexuality, Bambi."

Kimi scoffs, a sharp, purely Italian sound of dismissal. He tilts his head back, resting his chin on Ollie’s sternum so he can look up into Ollie’s dark, perpetually kind eyes.

"They are straight," Kimi states. It isn't a theory. It is a proven fact in Kimi’s mind. "Liam uses the word bro as a comma. Arvid fixes gaming consoles with his bare hands. They own a communal bong collection. They exude the scent of performative heterosexuality."

"We don't know that!" Ollie protests, his eyebrows knitting together in genuine defense of his new friends. "You can't just assign them a sexuality based on their vocabulary and their... their tools."

"Yes, I can," Kimi insists stubbornly. "Because if they were not straight, they would have made it known. Gays announce their gayness, Oliver. Especially to a fellow gay. There is a mutual recognition of shared trauma. I would have sensed it in the hallway on day one."

Ollie lets out a long sigh. He drops his head back against the couch cushions, staring up at the water-stained ceiling of their flat, as if asking the universe for the strength to deal with Kimi.

"That is not even how the real world works, Kimi," Ollie says, his voice muffled by exasperation. "People don't just hand over a certified identity card the moment you meet them. Not everyone treats their sexuality like a... a theatrical debut."

Kimi pushes himself up slightly, propping his elbows on Ollie’s chest, entirely ignoring the soft grunt from the larger man. His dark eyes are wide and accusatory.

"You spend hours with them!" Kimi points out, his voice rising in sheer disbelief. "You go running in the dark with Liam! You sit on their floor while Arvid shoots yarn out of a gun! You are close with them! And you mean to tell me you never just ask?"

"Ask?" Ollie repeats, looking genuinely bewildered by the suggestion. "Ask what? 'Hey mate, great pass on FIFA, by the way, do you fancy blokes?' No, Kimi, I don't ask.”

"Why not?!"

"Because it's not something that comes up naturally in a conversation?" Ollie defends himself, his massive hands coming up to hold Kimi’s hips, keeping him steady as Kimi  vibrates with indignation. "We talk about sports. We talk about rug commissions. We talk about the fact that Liam thinks he can successfully trade cryptocurrency despite not knowing basic mathematics. Their sexual preferences have zero impact on whether or not they are good at Mario Kart. Why would I interrogate them about it?"

Kimi stares at him. He searches Ollie’s open, honest, uncomplicated face for any sign of irony, and finds absolutely none. Ollie simply takes people as they are. He doesn't analyze. He doesn't look for hidden subtext.

It is one of the things Kimi loves most about him. It is also, occasionally, completely infuriating.

Kimi presses his lips into a thin line, lowering himself back down against Ollie’s chest. He wraps his arms tightly around Ollie’s torso, clinging to him like a koala.

"They are straight," Kimi repeats, his voice muffled against the cotton of the hoodie, final and absolute.

Ollie doesn't argue this time. He simply adjusts his grip, wrapping his arms fully around Kimi’s shoulders, cocooning him in warmth and the faint, lingering scent of his post-gym body wash mixed with whatever chaotic incense the neighbors burn.

"Okay," Ollie says softly, his voice dropping into a soothing register. "Okay, let's say they are. Let's say they are one hundred percent straight."

He presses a slow, deliberate kiss to the crown of Kimi’s head, lingering there for a second.

"They are straight, and they are kind," Ollie murmurs into Kimi’s hair. "They know I have a boyfriend. They know his name is Kimi. They know he is highly neurotic and thinks the hallway draft is going to give him contact high. And they still invite him over for dinner, and they still buy him pad thai."

Kimi goes very still.

The defensive tension that has been coiling in his spine for the past three weeks slowly begins to unravel. He hates the concept of straight male pack dynamics because he has spent his entire life feeling like he doesn't fit into them.

He had assumed Liam and Arvid were a threat because they looked like the kind of guys who made Kimi feel small in high school.

"He really bought the pad thai?" Kimi whispers, his voice betraying a tiny, reluctant crack of vulnerability. "I thought you bought those."

"Liam bought them," Ollie corrects gently, his hand resuming its slow, steady stroke along Kimi’s spine. "He saw me carrying my gym bag and asked what my boyfriend liked for a takeout. He bought them with his own mysterious crypto-money."

Kimi closes his eyes. He takes a deep, shaky breath, letting the steady thump of Ollie’s heart completely drown out the distant, muffled sound of Tame Impala vibrating through the wall.

"Fine," Kimi mumbles into the hoodie. "If he offers treats again... tell him I prefer the green curry without cilantro.”

Ollie’s chest rumbles with a silent, victorious laugh. "I will pass along your demands, love. I promise."

—-

Okay, fine. Kimi is man enough to admit when he has made a slight, microscopic error in judgment.

After a month of forced proximity, Kimi is forced to reluctantly acknowledge that they are... not that bad.

They are actually functioning members of society.

The heavy scent of weed that Kimi had so violently feared never actually materializes in the hallway. It turns out, Arvid is a deeply paranoid and understands the molecular structure of odorants, and therefore always put down a damp rolled-up towel under their front door and blowing all questionable smoke out the window through a paper towel tube stuffed with dryer sheets. It is incredibly responsible. Kimi respects it immensely.

Liam, despite his carabiner, consistently brings Ollie’s packages inside when the postman leaves them on the ground floor. He also keeps his word about the Thai food, remembering Kimi’s cilantro preferences with meticulous accuracy.

So, Kimi begins to coexist.

It starts with polite nods in the stairwell. Then, it graduates to brief conversations while Kimi waits for Ollie to finish his post-run stretching. And eventually, Kimi finds himself actually crossing the threshold into Flat 3B on a Friday night.

The living room of 3B is exactly what Kimi expected: a chaotic sensory overload. There is a massive, incredibly fuzzy neon rug on the wall of a Mona Lisa rendition by someone on acid. The infamous bongs are lined up neatly on a high shelf, looking less like drug paraphernalia and more like a collection of vases. Ollie and Liam are currently sitting on the floor in front of the TV, screaming at a FIFA match, their shoulders bumping as they aggressively jostle for control of the ball.

Kimi, valuing his personal space opts to sit on the lumpy corduroy beanbag chair in the corner.

Sitting on the other half of the oversized beanbag is Arvid.

Arvid is currently wearing an impossibly oversized, heavily distressed knitted sweater that swallows his hands. His dark, curly mullet is a mess, his absurdly long eyelashes casting shadows over his cheekbones in the dim lighting. He is holding a lukewarm can of cheap beer, resting it against his chest, staring blankly at the TV screen.

Kimi watches him for a moment.

Arvid is... fascinating. Kimi hates to acknowledge it, m but Arvid is so effortlessly cool.

Arvid possesses a very specific aesthetic: he is perpetually unimpressed.

When Liam shouts that he just scored a legendary goal, Arvid doesn't yell. He just takes a slow sip of his beer and blinks. When Ollie nearly knocks over a floor lamp in his excitement, Arvid doesn't flinch, he just reaches out a single, lazy hand and catches the lampshade without breaking eye contact with the television.

Kimi wants to be that kind of person. He has spent his entire nineteen years of life desperately trying to cultivate an aura of mysterious European stoicism. He wears vintage clothes! He studies film theory! He drinks black espresso! He should be the enigmatic cool guy in the corner!

But the tragic truth of Kimi is that he is a chronic oversharer.

When silence stretches for more than four seconds, Kimi’s brain interprets it as a social emergency and begins word-vomiting to fill the void. He cannot be mysterious because he literally cannot keep his internal monologue inside his own head.

Right now, sitting next to the silent, stoic Arvid, the quiet is driving Kimi insane.

"You know," Kimi blurts out suddenly, his voice entirely too loud over the sound of the video game commentary.

Arvid slowly turns his head. His dark eyes fix on Kimi. He doesn't say what? or huh? He simply waits, wielding silence like a master.

Kimi’s brain panics. Say something normal. Say something casual about football.

"I have been tracking Liam’s running routes on Ollie’s Strava app," Kimi says.

Abort. Abort. That is not normal.

But Kimi’s mouth is already moving, a runaway train of neuroses. "Because, well, Liam takes him down past the canal. And the canal is poorly lit. And Ollie, you know, Ollie is huge. But he is also incredibly trusting. He has the spatial awareness of a golden retriever chasing a tennis ball. If a mugger approached them, Ollie would probably try to give the mugger his watch. And Liam is... well, Liam wears a carabiner. It jingles. It announces their location to predators. I am very stressed about it. So I just stay awake until 6:30 AM every Tuesday and Thursday until I hear the door unlock, which is ruining my sleep quality and skin."

Kimi snaps his mouth shut. He bites down hard on his lower lip, absolutely mortified.

He just trauma-dumped his unhinged relationship anxiety onto a guy he barely knows, wrapping it up with a complaint about his skin condition. He has ruined his mystery. He is a walking disaster.

Arvid simply stares at him for three seconds. The neon light from the TV reflects in his dark eyes. Then, Arvid slowly raises his can of beer, takes a sip, and swallows.

"Mate," Arvid says, his low, gravelly and entirely flat and devoid of judgment. "Buy him some pepper spray. Problem solved."

Kimi blinks.

He stares at Arvid. He expects a follow-up. But Arvid has already turned his head back to the television, face a perfect mask of being unbothered and entirely unfazed by Kimi’s manic ramble. He absorbed the chaos, processed it, offered a practical solution, and instantly returned to his baseline of chilling.

Kimi’s mouth falls open slightly.

Oh my god, Kimi thinks, a wave of awe washing over him. He is the coolest person I have ever met.

"Pepper spray," Kimi repeats softly, the genius of it settling into his brain. "That is... highly tactical."

"Mm," Arvid hums in agreement, not looking away from the screen. "Got Liam one in pink. He loves it."

Kimi has decided that, they are not too bad.

—--

Until Tuesday night.

It is past midnight. Kimi and Ollie have just returned from a mixer. They are both riding the warm, fuzzy wave of being just a little bit tipsy. Not drunk. Just tipsy enough that the mundane act of walking up a flight of stairs feels like a hilarious hurdle.

"I can't," Ollie groans, draping his body weight over Kimi’s shoulders as they finally reach their landing. His breath is warm against Kimi’s neck, smelling faintly of cheap white wine and mint. "My legs. They no longer function. You’re going to have to carry me over the threshold."

Kimi giggles, trying to unlock their front door with one hand while struggling to keep Ollie upright with the other. "If I try to carry you, my spine will snap like a breadstick. Stand up."

"I am a delicate flower," Ollie mumbles, pressing a sloppy, affectionate kiss to Kimi’s cheek.

Kimi smiles, finally getting the key into the lock. He turns the metal, ready to drag his giant, melodramatic boyfriend into the safety of their flat, when he hears it.

Thud.

Kimi freezes.

Thud. Thud.

It is muffled, but distinct. The sound is echoing through the thin plaster of the hallway, vibrating from the other side of the landing. 

Ollie immediately goes rigid against Kimi’s side. The tipsy, giggly haze evaporates from the air in an instant, replaced by a sudden, heavy tension. Ollie slowly lifts his head, his dark eyes wide.

Thud. Thud. Thud-thud-thud.

It is an intense, rhythmic, entirely unmistakable battering against the shared wall. And then, cutting through the low hum of the refrigerator humming down the hall, comes a sound that makes Kimi’s entire soul leave his body.

A moan.

A loud, breathy, undeniably explicit moan.

Ollie and Kimi stare at each other. They do not move. They are communicating entirely through panicked, wide-eyed telepathy.

Someone is having sex, Kimi’s eyes scream.

Yes, Ollie’s eyes scream back. Please unlock the door, please get us inside right now.

Ollie’s massive hand reaches out, desperately grabbing for the door handle. He wants to retreat. Ollie is a good, pure soul who deeply respects the privacy of others and wants absolutely nothing to do with the carnal activities of their neighbors.

But Kimi is curious.

Instead of turning the handle, Kimi removes the key. He holds up a single, silencing finger to Ollie’s chest. He narrows his eyes, turning his head slowly, deliberately, toward the door of Flat 3B.

"Kimi, no," Ollie whispers, a frantic, terrified breath. "What are you doing?"

"Shhh," Kimi hisses, slapping a hand over Ollie’s mouth.

Kimi takes one quiet, stealthy step away from their door. He tiptoes across the narrow hallway. He presses his ear flat against the wall directly adjacent to 3B’s living room.

Ollie makes a muffled sound of distress into Kimi’s palm, clearly dying of secondhand embarrassment, but he doesn't stop him.

The thudding is furious now. It sounds like a piece of heavy furniture, perhaps the couch, perhaps the wall itself, is being systematically destroyed.

"Ah- fuck-"

Kimi’s eyes widen. It’s Liam. 

"Fuck, mate-"

Kimi gasps silently, pulling his head back an inch to process this monumental piece of lore. 

Scandalous! Liam has brought someone home. On a Tuesday! Who brings a hookup home on a Tuesday night? Arvid must be pulling an all-nighter at the biochemistry lab. Poor, stoic Arvid, trying to cure diseases while his unemployed roommate shatters the sound barrier in their shared living room.

Kimi leans his ear back against the wall, utterly captivated by the drama of it all, ready to piece together the entire narrative of Liam's mysterious midnight rendezvous.

Then, the second voice speaks.

It is low. It is gravelly. It is entirely devoid of its usual sleepy indifference, replaced by a dark, demanding, razor-sharp authority that sends a shiver straight down Kimi’s spine.

"Shut up."

Kimi stops breathing.

"Take it. Just like that, good boy."

Kimi’s brain flatlines.

The low, rumbling timbre of that voice is unmistakable. It is the voice of the man who sits on a corduroy beanbag staring blankly at FIFA. It is the voice of the man who suggested pepper spray to cure Kimi’s anxiety.

It is Arvid.

The thudding picks up speed, accompanied by another loud, desperate whine from Liam, followed immediately by the sound of skin slapping against skin.

Kimi slowly pulls his ear away from the wall.

He turns to look at Ollie. Ollie is still standing by their door, his hand still frozen in mid-air, looking like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck.

Arvid. Arvid and Liam.

Liam, the energetic, hyperactive golden retriever of a man. And Arvid, the sleepy, unimpressed, supposedly asexual entity of the couch. And Arvid is... Arvid is the one giving orders.

Kimi stares blankly at his boyfriend.

"What the fuck," Kimi whispers.

Kimi manages to unlock their door, grab the collar of Ollie’s hoodie, and haul his paralyzed boyfriend over the threshold.

He slams the door shut, throws the deadbolt with a sharp clack, and leans against the wood, breathing heavily. The thudding from across the hall is instantly muted, reduced to a faint, rhythmic vibration that Kimi can choose to actively ignore.

In the safety of their own dark entryway, Kimi takes a moment to process the newly acquired data.

Scandalous? Absolutely.

They are not just bros. They never were just bros. The bongs, the pink pepper spray all makes perfect sense now. Arvid is not a sleepy asexual entity. He is a man who issues quiet commands in the dark. And Liam, the chaotic crypto-bro who jogs at dawn, is apparently the one enthusiastically following them.

It is a monumental shift in lore, sure.

For Oliver Bearman, however, the world has just violently ended.

Kimi turns around to find Ollie standing in the middle of their living room, looking pale as sheet. His broad shoulders are slumped, his arms hang limply at his sides, and his dark eyes are wide and entirely glassy. The tipsy, giggly warmth from the mixer has completely evaporated, replaced by an aura of  devastation.

Ollie doesn't move. He just stares blankly at their coffee table.

Slowly, as if his legs truly have lost all function, Ollie sinks down onto the edge of the couch. He braces his elbows on his knees and buries his face in his massive hands, letting out a breath that sounds dangerously close to a sob.

"I thought we were bros," Ollie whispers into his palms.

Kimi pauses halfway through taking off his jacket. He blinks, entirely thrown off by the reaction. He had expected Ollie to be embarrassed. He had expected him to be awkwardly flustered about overhearing their neighbors' sexual activity. He had not expected a full blown existential crisis.

"Ollie?" Kimi asks tentatively, walking over and standing in front of him.

Ollie lifts his head. His eyes are genuinely shining with unshed tears. He looks up at Kimi with the expression of a dog who has just watched his favorite tennis ball roll down a storm drain.

"How could they lie to me?" Ollie asks, his voice thick with genuine wounded grief. "We talk about everything, Kimi. I told Liam about my knee surgery. I let Arvid use my good protein powder. I thought we had an open honest dialogue."

"Oliver," Kimi says, "They didn't lie to you. They just didn't announce their bedroom itinerary. It is a very normal boundary to have."

"It's not about the bedroom!" Ollie protests, throwing his arms out wide in despair. "It’s about the secrecy! This is- this is exactly like if my two childhood best friends got on behind my back! It’s a complete betrayal!"

Kimi stares at him. He watches Ollie drag a distressed hand through his curls, entirely consumed by the perceived shattering of a sacred brotherhood.

"I am so sad, Kimi," Ollie groans, leaning forward until his forehead rests against Kimi’s stomach, wrapping his arms securely around Kimi’s waist. He buries his face in Kimi’s shirt, sounding genuinely miserable. "I am nothing to them. I'm just the guy next door. I thought I was part of the inner circle."

Kimi looks down at the massive, pouting man clinging to his torso. He reaches a hand up, gently threading his fingers through Ollie’s messy brown curls, offering the physical comfort Ollie so desperately requires while simultaneously trying to inject some much-needed reality into the situation.

"Ollie," Kimi says slowly, his tone flat and heavily enunciated. "You have known them for three weeks."

Ollie stiffens. He turns his head just enough to look up at Kimi with one deeply offended, betrayal-filled eye.

"Time is a mere concept," Ollie mumbles defensively against Kimi’s cotton shirt. "We went on a night run together. We built a TV stand using only one key and willpower. We are soul brothers."

Ollie lets out another tragic, heavy sigh, tightening his grip around Kimi’s waist as if Kimi is the only stable thing left in a world built on lies.

"Were, apparently," Ollie corrects himself, his voice muffled and thick with tragedy. "Were soul brothers. Now I don't even know who they are."

Kimi rolls his eyes toward the ceiling, praying for the patience required to date a man with zero emotional barriers. He continues to stroke Ollie’s hair, resigning himself to the fact that his night will now be spent gently coaxing a man through the grieving process of a three-week friendship.

He pulls his face away from Kimi’s stomach, looking up with wide eyes that are brimming with agony. The tipsy flush on his cheeks has been completely replaced by the pale, stricken look of a man who believes he has committed a social atrocity.

"Have I said anything?" Ollie asks, his voice dropping into a frantic, hushed whisper. He grabs Kimi’s hands, holding them hostage against his own chest. "Think, Kimi, think. Have I ever said anything that indicate I might be judgmental? Have I projected an aura of intolerance?"

"Oliver, you own four different floral-print aprons and you cry during dog food commercials," Kimi deadpans. "No one has ever looked at you and thought intolerant."

"But I’m huge!" Ollie protests, entirely missing the point. "And I do sports! Maybe I give off a threatening, locker-room energy. Oh my god, Kimi. When Liam bought that overpriced barista-blend oat milk last week, I made a joke about milking almonds. Did that sound homophobic?  Did I violate the safe space?!"

"You are losing your mind," Kimi whispers.

"Do I seem judgmental?" Ollie presses on, his hands tightening around Kimi’s. "Is it my face? I have a very strong brow bone, Kimi, you’ve said so yourself. Sometimes when I’m concentrating on Mario Kart, my brow furrows. Maybe Arvid thought I was furrowing my brow at his lifestyle!"

"Arvid does not care about your brow bone."

"Is it my cadence?!" Ollie gasps, his eyes blowing impossibly wider as he hits upon a new theory. "My voice is very deep. Maybe it lacks the necessary warmth to invite vulnerable disclosures! Kimi, listen to me." Ollie clears his throat, abruptly shifting his posture on the couch. He softens his eyes and pitches his voice into a bizarre, breathy, overly gentle register. "Hello, Liam. Hello, Arvid. I value your authentic selves."

Ollie looks up at Kimi, desperate for a peer review. "How was that? Too aggressive? Should I soften my vowels? Help me practice my cadence, Kimi, so I don't come off as judgmental when I see them tomorrow."

Kimi stares down at the man currently sitting on their couch, practicing a breathy customer-service voice so his neighbors won't think he's a bigot.

Kimi closes his eyes. He takes a long, agonizingly slow breath through his nose.

He pulls his hands out of Ollie’s grip, steps forward, and grabs two fistfuls of the fabric of Ollie’s hoodie. "Ollie. Stop."

"But my vowels-"

"If you say the word cadence one more time, I am going to pack a bag and go sleep in the hallway," Kimi threatens, his tone flat and utterly devoid of mercy. He tugs hard on the hoodie, utilizing his entire body weight to force Ollie to stand up. "You are not homophobic. You do not have a threatening brow bone. Your soul brothers did not betray you, they just wanted to have a loud aggressive sex on a Tuesday without having to file the paperwork with you first. Stand up."

Ollie whines, a high, pathetic sound in the back of his throat, but he obediently lets Kimi drag him up from the couch.

"They could have just told me," Ollie mumbles mournfully as Kimi physically steers him toward their bedroom, pushing him by the broad expanse of his back. "I would have baked them a cake. To celebrate."

"I am sure they will be thrilled to receive your apologetic, non-judgmental baked goods in the morning," Kimi mutters, flicking off the hallway light and plunging them into darkness. "But right now, Oliver, you are going to get into bed and you are going to close your eyes."

Ollie shuffles into the bedroom, his shoulders still slumped in profound tragedy. "Can I be the little spoon?" he asks pitifully.

Kimi sighs, "Yes. You can be the little spoon."

—--

For a man who possesses the physical dimensions of a Greek deity and the athletic prowess of a professional gladiator, Oliver Bearman is incapable of acting normal.

He does not have a poker face. When Ollie is upset, his entire being comes a walking, breathing monument to human suffering. And for the past three days, following the traumatic, world-shattering auditory experience of Tuesday night, Ollie has been embodying the spirit of an orphan.

The ecosystem of their flat has devolved into a nightmare.

It started on Wednesday morning. Liam had sent Ollie a perfectly standard text message, entirely ignorant of the fact that Ollie now knew what Liam sounded like when he was being brutally dismantled against a piece of IKEA furniture. The text simply read: Morning mate, hitting the track at 7. You in?

In the past, Ollie would have responded with three bicep emojis and bounded out the door like an over-excited puppy.

On Wednesday, however, Ollie had stared at his phone screen as if Liam had sent him a digital virus. He had let out a long, shuddering breath, his lower lip protruding in a tragic pout, and typed back: No thank you. I wouldn't want to intrude on your busy schedule.

"Intrude on his schedule?" Kimi had asked from the kitchen island, pausing with his espresso cup halfway to his mouth. "Oliver, what does that even mean? He invited you."

"It means," Ollie had said darkly, dropping his phone face-down on the table, "that I know my place, Kimi. I am clearly an outer-circle acquaintance. I will not force myself upon them."

Kimi had closed his eyes, counted to three, and prayed for strength.

By Thursday, the situation had deteriorated further. Arvid had knocked on their door to return a roll of packing tape he had borrowed. Ollie had answered the door standing perfectly rigid, his arms pinned to his sides, speaking in a flat, robotic voice that he apparently believed conveyed 'polite, non-judgmental detachment'. When Arvid casually asked if they wanted to come over for beers later, Ollie had physically recoiled.

“Perhaps,” Ollie had said, his voice dripping with passive-aggression, “some people think they are important to the pack dynamic, but apparently not. Have a pleasant evening, Arvid. Give my best to your... roommate.”

He had then shut the door softly in Arvid’s utterly blank, uncomprehending face.

Kimi has had enough.

He does not have the bandwidth to manage his boyfriend’s one-sided feud with the men next door. He wants to go back to ignoring his neighbors entirely, or at least coexisting with them in a state of quiet, polite tolerance.

It all comes to a boiling point on Friday evening.

Kimi is sitting on the couch, attempting to read. Ollie is lying on the floor. He has been lying on the floor for forty-five minutes, staring at the ceiling, periodically letting out heavy, tragic sighs that flutter the pages of Kimi’s book.

His phone buzzes on the coffee table. Ollie reaches a languid, depressed hand up, checks the screen, and lets out the loudest, most pathetic sigh yet.

"Let me guess," Kimi says, not looking up from his book. "They texted you."

"It's a trap, Kimi," Ollie groans, rolling onto his side and pulling his knees to his chest. "It’s a guilt offering. They know I know they’re keeping secrets. But I’m not going to give them the satisfaction."

Kimi stops reading.

He stares at the page for three seconds. He absorbs the absurdity of the sentence that has just left his boyfriend’s mouth.

Then, Kimi snaps the book shut. The sound echoes like a gunshot in the quiet living room.

Ollie flinches on the floor.

"Get up," Kimi orders, his voice dropping into a register of cold, terrifying authority.

"Kimi-"

"I said get up, Oliver." Kimi stands, dropping the book onto the cushion. He marches around the coffee table, grabs Ollie by the fabric of his athletic shirt, and hauls with all of his might. It is like trying to lift a dead weight but the blinding annoyance gives Kimi superhuman strength. "You are an adult. You are going to act like an adult who understands normal social boundaries and casual sex. We are going next door."

"No!" Ollie gasps, his eyes going wide with genuine terror as Kimi drags him toward the front door. "Kimi, please! I am not emotionally prepared! My cadence isn't right! I haven't practiced my face!"

"Your face looks like you are trying to pass a kidney stone," Kimi snaps, forcing Ollie’s giant, heavily treaded sneakers into his hands. "Put your shoes on. Now."

Two minutes later, Kimi is dragging a physically resisting grown ass man down the narrow, drafty hallway of the fourth floor. Ollie looks like he is walking to his own execution. His shoulders are hunched up to his ears, his hands are wringing together in front of his chest, and he is muttering a frantic stream of progressive buzzwords under his breath as if trying to memorize a script.

Kimi ignores him. Kimi stops in front of the door to Flat 3B. He raises his knuckles and knocks three times. Sharp. Decisive. Inescapable.

"Kimi, what are you going to say?" Ollie hisses, panic making his voice crack. "Don't bring up the noises! Please don't bring up the noises!"

The door swings open.

Liam stands in the threshold. He is wearing a pair of violently yellow athletic shorts, a faded tank top, and his signature carabiner clipped to his waistband. His messy, sun-bleached hair is sticking up in every direction, and he is holding a half-eaten slice of toast. He looks entirely relaxed, painfully bright, and completely devoid of any dark, hidden secrets.

Behind him, in the dim recesses of the chaotic living room, Arvid is sitting on his corduroy beanbag, hunched over his phone, looking as perpetually exhausted and unimpressed as ever.

"Oh, hey mates!" Liam beams, his Australian-adjacent accent warm and cheerful. "Just in time. I was just about to hit Deliveroo. You guys want the green curry, yeah?"

Kimi does not return the smile. Kimi squares his shoulders, lifting his chin to look Liam dead in the eye. He channels every ounce of his European stoicism, refusing to let the chaos of this flat dictate the terms of this interaction.

"Hello, Liam," Kimi says. His voice is perfectly level, devoid of emotion. "We need to clear the air. Tuesday night. Past midnight. You were very loud. You might want to keep it down in the future. The walls are thin, you know."

Behind Kimi, Ollie lets out a sound that can only be described as a dying whimpering noise. He physically folds in on himself, bringing a hand up to literally clutch at his collarbone in an aggressive display of pearl-clutching mortification. He looks away, his eyes squeezed tightly shut, waiting for the sky to fall.

Liam blinks.

He stops chewing his toast. He looks at Kimi. Then he looks down the hall, as if mentally measuring the distance between their two doors.

Then, a massive, unbothered grin breaks across Liam’s face.

"Oh, shit!" Liam laughs, a bright, booming sound that completely shatters the tension in the hallway. He reaches up to scratch the back of his neck, not looking even remotely embarrassed. "Y'all heard that? Christ, apologies, mate! The headboard in Arv’s room is completely fucked. Kept banging against the plaster. We'll throw a pillow back there next time, or move it to the rug. Good looking out."

They are very casual. They are entirely, terrifyingly unabashed.

Kimi stares at Liam, slightly thrown off balance by the absolute lack of shame. He had prepared for a confrontation. He had prepared for apologies, or perhaps defensive anger. He had not prepared for Liam to review his bedroom logistics so casually.

"Right," Kimi says slowly, processing the data. He decides to push through, eager to wrap this up and get his spiraling boyfriend back to safety. "Well. Thank you. And, for the record, congratulations, by the way. I did not know you were together like that. Ollie was slightly... surprised."

Kimi gestures vaguely toward Ollie, who is still violently clutching his imaginary pearls, currently looking as though he might pass out from secondhand exposure to the concept of intercourse.

Liam lowers his toast. His brow furrows in genuine, innocent confusion. "Together?"

"Yes," Kimi says, speaking slowly, as if explaining a very basic concept to a child. "Together. Romantically. Sexually. As a couple."

Liam looks from Kimi to Ollie, and then bursts into a fresh, booming fit of laughter. He slaps his thigh, shaking his head. "What? No, no, mate! We're not together. God, no. We just live together."

Kimi frowns, his sociological framework experiencing a sudden, unexpected glitch. "But... Tuesday night."

"Yeah, Tuesday night was brilliant," Liam agrees cheerfully, taking another bite of his toast. "But we're not dating. I'm straight, mate."

The hallway plunges into a profound, suffocating silence.

Kimi’s brain short-circuits.

He stands perfectly still, staring at Liam’s violently yellow shorts. His mind desperately tries to parse the sentence he has just heard. He rewinds the tape of Tuesday night. He remembers the furious thudding. He remembers the breathless, frantic moaning. He remembers the explicit, unmistakable sound of Liam getting absolutely destroyed.

None of this aligns with the word straight.

"What," Kimi says flatly.

"Yeah, mate. Straight as an arrow," Liam says brightly, entirely serious. "Love the ladies. Always have."

Kimi continues to stare. He can feel his left eye developing a slight, uncontrollable twitch. "What."

From the shadows of the living room, a low, gravelly voice cuts through the tension.

"We're just open, you know," Arvid calls out slowly, not looking up from his phone screen. His tone is lethargic, completely unbothered by the psychological warfare they are inflicting upon their neighbors. "I don't label myself. Liam likes to experiment. It's just a release of kinetic energy. No need to put it in a box."

Kimi’s mouth opens slightly. He feels dizzy.

Kimi cannot process it. It is too much lore. It is a terrifying, lawless frontier of human sexuality that Kimi’s highly structured, neurotic brain is fundamentally incapable of comprehending.

"Okay," Kimi breathes out, holding up a single hand to pinch the bridge of his nose. "Hold on. I need a minute."

Beside him, Ollie has completely stopped functioning.

Oliver is clutching his imaginary pearls so tightly his knuckles are probably turning white. His jaw is slack, his dark eyes darting wildly between Liam’s cheerful, smiling face and the dark void of the living room where Arvid resides. He looks like a man who has just been told that gravity is actually just a government conspiracy.

"Any issues, guys?" Liam asks, his smile faltering slightly as he notices the  state of devastation painted across Ollie’s face. He shifts his weight, the carabiner jingling against his hip. "I mean, we're cool, right? No bad vibes?"

"No, no," Kimi says quickly, desperate to maintain the fragile peace. He drops his hand, forcing a tight, incredibly strained smile. "I just- we are just-”

"Okay, I thought we were all progressive here," Arvid drawls, his low voice suddenly carrying a sharp, dangerous edge.

Kimi freezes.

Slowly, Arvid rises from the corduroy beanbag. He shuffles toward the door, his oversized knitted sweater swallowing his hands. He comes to stand beside Liam, leaning his shoulder casually against the doorframe. He crosses his arms over his chest, his dark, heavy-lidded eyes fixing directly onto Ollie.

Arvid possesses the terrifying ability to see straight through a person’s soul while looking like he just woke up from a four-day nap.

"We are!" Ollie shrieks. It is an undignified, panicked sound that echoes down the stairwell. He drops his hands from his chest, waving them frantically in the air in an entirely uncoordinated display of allyship. "We are! I am! Extremely progressive! I value all authentic selves!"

Arvid does not blink. He just stares at Ollie, his expression an impenetrable mask of stoic judgment. "Oliver doesn't seem like it."

"I am!" Ollie insists, his voice climbing an octave higher. Sweat is actively forming on his brow bone. He looks at Liam, then at Arvid, his eyes practically begging for mercy. "I think boxes are terrible! I don't care if you're straight, Liam! You are the straightest man I know! I fully support your... your experimentation!"

"Is that right?" Arvid asks slowly, tilting his head a fraction of an inch. A faint, sadistic gleam appears in his dark eyes. He has smelled blood in the water. He knows exactly how fragile Ollie’s mentality is, and he is going to meticulously dissect it for his own amusement.

"Yes!" Ollie squeaks.

Arvid fixes Ollie with a deadpan stare.

"How many genders are there in this world, Ollie?"

Kimi’s eyes widen. He whips his head to look at Arvid, genuinely horrified by the unadulterated evil of the interrogation tactic. It is a trap. It is a sociological landmine designed to completely obliterate Oliver Bearman’s remaining sanity.

Ollie freezes.

You can practically hear the gears grinding in his head. His mouth opens, but no sound comes out. His eyes dart back and forth, mentally flipping through every infographic, every TikTok video, and every sensitivity training module he has ever consumed in his life.

He knows there is a number. He knows there is a spectrum. But the terrifying pressure of Arvid’s gaze has completely wiped his hard drive clean. If he says two, he is a bigot. If he says a hundred, he is patronizing. If he says infinity, he sounds like a hipster.

"I-" Ollie stammers, his face flushing a deep, violently embarrassed shade of crimson. He looks at Kimi, his dark eyes huge and pleading, silently begging for a lifeline. Help me. Save me from the gender quiz. "I- well, scientifically speaking, but also sociologically, you have to account for the- the spectrum of-"

"Guys!" Kimi shouts, loudly clapping his hands together to shatter the tension.

He cannot take it anymore. He wants to read his book. He wants to eat dinner. He refuses to spend his Friday night watching his massive, golden retriever boyfriend have an aneurysm over gender theory in a drafty hallway with a man who thinks he is straight despite the evidence to the contrary.

"Enough," Kimi says, grabbing Ollie by the bicep and violently yanking him back a step. He looks at Liam, then at Arvid, projecting a level of exhausted authority that warrants no argument. "Liam, order the Deliveroo. Extra peanuts for Oliver, none for me. Arvid, stop terrorizing my boyfriend. Oliver, close your mouth before you swallow a fly."

Liam bursts out laughing again, the tension instantly dissipating. "Right you are, mate! Curry it is. Come over in twenty."

Arvid just shrugs, uncrossing his arms. "Just making sure the vibe is good," he murmurs cryptically, a ghost of a smirk playing on his lips before he turns and shuffles back into the chaotic depths of their flat.

Kimi forcefully drags a hyperventilating Ollie back toward their own door. The ecosystem has not been restored. The ecosystem is in ruins, and the lore is entirely broken. But as Kimi pushes his shell-shocked boyfriend over the threshold, he decides that as long as they get free Thai food out of the ordeal, he can live with it.

The deadbolt slid into place with a definitive clack, effectively sealing them off from the lawless terrifying wasteland of Flat 3B.

Kimi leaned his back against the cool wood of their front door, closed his eyes, and exhaled a long, measured breath. He could practically feel the cortisol draining from his system, replaced by the deep, resonant ache of exhaustion that only came from interacting with Arvid.

When Kimi opened his eyes, he realized the crisis was far from over.

Oliver had not made it past the entryway mat. He was standing completely still, staring blankly at the coat rack. His shoulders were rigid, his hands were still hovering defensively near his chest, and his dark eyes were wide and unblinking.

If Ollie were a computer, there would be a spinning, rainbow wheel of death hovering directly over his forehead.

"Ollie," Kimi said cautiously.

Ollie did not blink. A soft, high-pitched dial-up modem sound seemed to be vibrating in the back of his throat.

"He said he was straight," Ollie whispered, his voice hollow and completely detached from reality. He addressed the coat rack, unable to meet Kimi's eyes. "He said he loved the ladies. But, Kimi... the headboard. The headboard is broken."

"Oliver-"

"And the genders," Ollie continued, his breathing beginning to pick up speed, shallow and panicked. His hands flew up to grip his curls, tugging at the dark strands as his brain short-circuited entirely. "How many are there? Scientifically, sex is bimodal, but gender is a social construct, so the limit does not exist, but if I say infinity to Arvid, he'll look at me with those cold dead eyes and I will pass away right there in the hallway. I don't know the answer, Kimi. I failed the test. I am a bad soul brother."

He was fully spiraling. The fragile motherboard of Oliver Bearman's psyche had overheated, caught fire, and completely crashed under the weight of Liam's fluid reality and Arvid's psychological warfare.

Kimi sighed. He pushed off the door, abandoned his shoes, and walked over to his massive, paralyzed boyfriend.

It was time for a manual reset.

"Come here," Kimi commanded softly, grabbing Ollie by the wrists and physically pulling his hands away from his hair.

Ollie offered no resistance. He allowed Kimi to lead him out of the hallway and into the living room. Kimi guided him toward the couch, pushing firmly against Ollie’s chest until the larger man completely collapsed backward onto the cushions with a heavy, defeated thump.

Ollie slumped there, staring up at the ceiling, looking like a discarded ragdoll.

Kimi did not sit beside him. Instead, he stepped between Ollie’s spread knees, took a second to balance himself, and then smoothly straddled Ollie’s lap, settling his weight directly over Ollie’s thighs.

Ollie blinked, his eyes finally shifting from the ceiling to focus on Kimi.

"Bambi?" Ollie murmured, his voice thick with confusion and residual trauma.

"Do not speak," Kimi instructed.

Kimi reached up and firmly planted both of his hands on either side of Ollie’s face. He pressed his palms flat against Ollie’s jawline, letting his long fingers tangle into the hair at the nape of Ollie’s neck. Then, with deliberate, unyielding pressure, Kimi squished Ollie’s cheeks together.

Ollie’s lips immediately puckered outward into a ridiculous, fish-like pout. His dark, distressed eyes widened further, staring cross-eyed at Kimi’s nose.

"Listen to me very carefully," Kimi said, his voice slow, rhythmic, and incredibly grounded. He maintained the pressure on Ollie's cheeks, effectively cutting off the oxygen supply to the panic attack. "Your brain is broken right now. We are going to restart it. I am going to give you facts, and you are going to accept them. Do you understand?"

Ollie tried to nod, but with his face firmly compressed between Kimi’s hands, it translated to a pathetic, jerky wiggle. He let out a muffled "Mhmph."

"Good," Kimi said, leaning in closer so he occupied Ollie's entire field of vision. "Fact number one. You are Oliver Bearman. You are a golden retriever in human form, and everyone likes you."

Ollie’s shoulders dropped a fraction of an inch.

"Fact number two," Kimi continued, his thumbs gently smoothing over Ollie’s cheekbones while maintaining the squish. "Liam is an idiot. He wears a carabiner on athletic shorts. He bottoms on Tuesdays. If he wants to call himself straight, that is between him, God, and Arvid's broken headboard. It is none of our business, and it defies all logic. You do not need to understand it."

Ollie let out a long, shaky exhale through his nose. The frantic tension in his thighs beneath Kimi began to loosen.

"Fact number three," Kimi whispered, "Arvid is sadist. He feeds on fear. He saw you panicking and decided to poke you with a stick for his own amusement. There was no correct answer to the gender question, Ollie. He just wanted to watch you squirm. The test was a trap."

Kimi released the pressure on Ollie’s cheeks, sliding his hands down to rest on Ollie’s broad, sweater-clad shoulders.

"And fact number four," Kimi concluded, tracing the seam of Ollie's collar. "We are going to go over there in fifteen minutes, we are going to eat free curry, and you are not going to say the words kinetic energy, spectrum, or cadence for the rest of the evening. Are we clear?"

Ollie stared at him. The glassy, terrified sheen had faded from his dark eyes. The rainbow wheel of death had vanished. The system was successfully rebooting.

Slowly, Ollie’s massive arms came up. He wrapped them securely around Kimi’s waist, burying his face directly into Kimi’s stomach with a heavy, dramatic sigh of total surrender.

"I love you," Ollie mumbled against Kimi's sweater, his voice muffled but undeniably grounded. "You are my anchor in this lawless universe, my love."

"I know," Kimi said smoothly, threading his fingers back into Ollie’s soft curls, gently scratching at his scalp. He felt Ollie completely melt against him, a two-hundred-pound puddle of relief and devotion. "I am very brave for putting up with you."

Ollie nuzzled deeper into the embrace, pulling Kimi flush against his chest. "I’m never talking to them about anything other than the weather ever again."

"An excellent policy," Kimi agreed, closing his eyes and leaning his weight fully against Ollie's sturdy frame. "Now, stay here and finish rebooting."

Ollie let out a soft, genuine huff of laughter, his massive hands splaying wide across Kimi’s back finally, finally, acting completely normal. "Okay, Kimi. Okay. Just... give me five minutes of physical affection first."

"Fine," Kimi sighed, though the  quiet smile on his lips betrayed his annoyance. "Five minutes. And then we are getting our free meal."