Not So Good As Fame (But Better Still)
Wensleydale thinks he might be a little in love with Adam, but it's okay because they all are, kinda. Adam pulls them into his orbit the way a star might, or a black hole. They can't help but love him, and for Wensleydale this love is something bright and pure, far too scary to touch. Adam is scary, sometimes, but it's a special scary. Adam holds the universe in the cup of his palm.
It's Pepper who comes up with the phrase a little in love, which is a surprisingly delicate phrase considering Pepper is the one who authored it. Wensleydale is a little in awe of Pepper, who has grown up to be startlingly pretty despite her best efforts to the contrary. Pepper is the strongest of the Them, stronger than Adam in some ways. Wensleydale, bookish and lanky, prefers to change the world through words, Brian, with his open nature and easy grin, simply lets conflict flow around him like water.
As for Adam, well, Adam might be the former Antichrist, but Pepper is Pepper. Adam can bend the world with nothing more than an unconscious thought, but Pepper takes the world head-on and forces it to bend. Wensleydale loves her for this, and were any of Them to fall for Adam entirely, he thinks Pepper might be the only one who could handle it with ease.
He tells this to Brian one day, as they wait around for Pepper in the Pit. Adam is grounded again, for something involving two-dozen eggs and a small cage of white mice. They plan to get the whole story when they liberate him, which is the whole purpose of meeting in the first place.
As usual, Pepper is running extraordinarily late. Pepper has no concept of time, Wensleydale thinks as he and Brian lounge around on the crates, but then again, perhaps he has too much of one. Brian is idly scooping up pebbles and tossing them across the Pit, and after a few minutes of affable silence, Wensley decides to share his Theory of Pepper with him. Brian only blinks at him and grins his usual crooked grin.
"Of course that's the way it will go," Brian says, and he sounds so confident that Wensleydale can't help but take the bait and ask how he knows.
"Because," Brian says. He's leaning back on his elbows, his ratty t- shirt rucked up slightly to show the barest hint of his stomach. "That's the way it's supposed to go. It'll be Adam and Pepper, and you an' me."
Wensleydale knows he's the smart one. Adam always comes up with the ideas, but Wensleydale is the one who can figure things out. He's the top of his class, best marks in the school for years, and despite all this it still takes him several moments to piece together what Brian just said.
"What?!"
When Brian grins, his eyes crinkle up ever so slightly; his smile is a little lopsided, always has been, and Wensleydale wonders when he first noticed this. Brian grins at him now, and he looks so damn cheerful in the face of Wensleydale's incomprehension that Wensley wants to be furious with him.
Not that he can manage it, of course. Brian is entirely too unrufflable to get ruffled at.
"You heard me, you big dork," Brian says. He sits up, leans forward a little bit so that he and Wensleydale are looking eye to eye. Brown eyes, Wensleydale thinks. It's not fair that he gets the prettiest eyes.
"You're a little in love with Adam," Brian continues, "but you're a lot in love with me." That smile, quirking at the edge of his lips and lighting in his eyes. "And I love you too. So it all works out."
And before Wensleydale can think of a single thing to say, Brian kisses him.
It's far from the ideal kiss -- Brian's nose bumps against his, and his glasses are being twisted in a way that's incredibly uncomfortable, and the rough wood of the crate is pushing splinters into the soft skin of his palm. Brian tastes like potato crisps, which is weird but not unpleasant, and like something that can only be Brian, which is also weird but in a nice way.
It's utterly, utterly perfect, and when Brian pulls away Wensleydale can't keep himself from grinning.
Wensleydale knows he's the smart one. But Brian is the one with it all figured out, and when they kiss again Wensley thinks that yeah, he's a lot in love with Brian after all.