Kristin
I type in a second, just getting painting stuff set up <33

Late nights bled into early mornings without changing their shape, hours melted away into the soft blanket fibres, forgotten kernels of popcorn, and long, even breaths taken in Owen's room. The machinations of the swiftly turning planet were all the same to the boy sprawled out on the dark sheets, arm slung over his dearest friend beneath all the cold twinkling stars, warm and softly dozing.

Outside the window, cracked open just a couple of centimetres, the sun was rising late; it reached languid golden fingertips through the mist between the trees to touch every star, sending them off into the morning. Beneath a layer or four of heavy blankets, another set of warm fingertips drummed against the side of a silvery figure much closer to the earth.

"Hey."

A whisper, barely-there, husky from a stretch of deep sleep. Owen's crooked smile stretched across his face before he groggily wiped the sand from his eyes, heavy head dropping back to the pillow just a breath away from Uriel's.

Legs tentatively brushed somewhere out of sight, and a knot mewled in Owen's stomach— he had something for them. He needed them to open their silvery eyes, and respond to the gentle squeeze at their arm.

*"Hey!"*

Wide, gold-flecked doe eyes peered almost unblinkingly up at their face.

*"Uri!"*
Rebecca
A dignified awakening might have been what one would have expected from the dream-weaver; instead, at the insistent noise, Uriel let out a small whine from the back of their throat.

Images of their mother having a tea party with them in a forest clearing, talking about how they've grown up to be a fine young person and, oh, you're almost twenty, how old you've grown since you were a child who would make sure all of your stuffed animals had equal cuddle time— those images faded away from their mind, a dark room and a sunny face looking down at them. 

"Mmmm," Uri sighed, grabbing the arm draped across their chest and pulling it higher up, like one would a blanket. Their eyes blink open, not dissimilar from a newborn kitten opening it's eyes for the first time, and Uriel turns to face Owen. 

"Mmmphm?" They repeat themselves, wiggling around a bit to shake off the sleep from their joints and satisfy the primal urge to be covered by copious amounts of blanket. "Mmmpgmh." They follow up. 

One. Two. Just when it seems as if they fell right back asleep... 

"Owen? What.. Time is it?" Their eyes are fully open now, and they're close— scooting to be pressed against his chest, blinking up at him with a confused expression.
Kristin
"MmnnnhhhIdon'tknow," He mumbled back, blinking slowly as a groggy wave of heat crawled to his face. Though there were still cobwebs aplenty in his brain, the redhead's heart picked up the pace under theirs. For a moment, he felt bad he woke them up on their birthday, but their sleepy eyes blinking at him so perplexed and cuddly, and their soft pressure on his chest just— it summoned the urge to crush their ribs.

He pulled his other arm, still tingling and half-asleep, out from wherever it had been before and pulled them yet closer to his warm trunk, pressing their faces together. Owen couldn't give an explanation for what he did next, beyond the inexplicable fact that it needed to be done.

Owen kissed the soft part of their cheek once, twice, three times. His nose poked their cheekbone, soft puffs of air dusting their downy curls. He had had *Something* To say, surely, but it was of little importance under pressing a proper 'good morning' into their sweet, discombobulated face. Invisible hints of stubble grazed the rumpled sheet-pattern pressed into their skin, and a pleased hum rumbled from his throat.

"Goodmorn... Hellobirth-day..."

Whoops. That was supposed to be.. Only one of those things at once drowsily murmured into their ear, but the boy's brain floated in molasses and so, it seemed, did his tongue. Anyone else would find it difficult for a punctuating grunt to be bashful somehow, but Uriel might not find it so hard.

The world was late pink sunlight and mist and groggy affection, all tangled together with the nibbling excitement in his stomach. His hold around them tightened.
Rebecca
In the morning haze and thick air, Uriel felt something they had never felt before. 

A squeamish feeling— one that made their knees feel like jelly, a feeling that tightened around their chest like a noose. It brought a needless heat to their cheeks that was *Certainly* Visible thanks to their albino complexion, and their breath came out in shaky, uneven exhales. It made their chest rattle, and Uriel only grew more red at the very visible effect that suddenly encased them.

His lips were chapped, and his stubble felt a bit sandpapery.*Ticklish*, they thought, and wished he could do this forever. *Him*, they continued, their every senses focused on Owen's puffs of breath against their skin, and the flutter of eyelashes on their cheek. 

He was strong, too— he squeezed them as if he never wanted to let go, as if they were **Important to him.** *Don't you see?* A little voice in their head piped up. *That's all I've ever wanted to be.*

At the little noise he made, a new and foreign thought bubbled to the top of their mind. It was *Want*— for someone who had sworn themselves to a duty far grander than they could ever hope to achieve, Uriel had long since removed any sense of deserving anything they desired. But there the thought was, basking in the open in the morning fog. Whatever logic and rules they had bound themselves and their thoughts to were unable to function at such early hours. 

And so Uriel wanted, without remorse. 

Their paper-white hands rose from their side, cupping his cheeks. He's already so, so close, and they'd hate to pull him away— not when they could see the flecks of gold and green in his sleepy, half-lidded eyes. A sweet sigh, a gentle tilt of their head... 

...And their lips kiss the tip of his nose.
Kristin
Owen's wide-eyed, mildly dazed expression lagged a minute behind the rush of heat that pushed from behind it; faint trails of gold twisted in the deep bloom of red behind his suddenly giddy smile, a wave of heat like a bonfire emanating from his skin and the strong hands on their back.

*Oh!*

The hum in his throat seemed to reverberate through his whole body beneath them, as though a much greater creature were soaking up the feeling of their eyes on him, their hands cupping his fever-hot jaw, their weight on his chest. 

It was a happy sound.

 They conjured it up like it was nothing at all; a lure pulled from a pond of distant noise, heavy with the tips of his every nerve, and the two black pools trained solely on *Them* And their eyelashes like powdered snow and their cheeks that were as pink as sunrises and the gravity around them that made his head blissfully heavy as sweet dreams beneath a rainstorm.

The gesture made his heart flutter a little, was all.

Owen considered saying something cheeky like *"Is that all, then?"* Or *"Your birthday,* You *Get the kisses,"* But all that fit was a simple

"C'mere, *You*..."

Four, five, six, and seven peppered their face across the splash of pink under their skin, the soft hollows beneath their cheekbones, the tip of their nose that turned up like a last little flourish a sculptor would place on a masterpiece. How lucky he was, to be holding them like he was, playfully rolling them both onto their sides, cupping their jaw and pressing the side of their head deeper still into his barrage of pecks and little puffs of laughter. The boy who hardly even noticed the dark strands of copper in his eyes boiled over with wordless adoration, and Uriel made giving in to such a feeling so easy.

"If you- stop- being- so- bloody- lovable- for- *Five-* Minutes- andthirty-threeseconds on your *Birthday*," He managed between exaggerated pecks, "I might have something for you."
_ _

And with that he pressed his wide, nervous smile into them one more time before pulling away to face them, *Appropriately* Sheepish about such a brazen display.
Rebecca
*Bloody loveable*? Kisses on the face? 

Something inside of Uriel stopped functioning in that moment. 

"You have something for me..?" Their face flushes. "I— I didn't expect..." 

The words die inside of Uriel's throat. They swallow, and they still can't find their train of thought, instead opting to look at Owen with round, shining eyes. 

"I..." They try to find words, but instead a whine escapes from their throat.

This was too much. Surely, there was a threshold to these kinds of things— they were getting too excited, too happy, the foreign feeling in their stomach too bubbly to make sense of.

Owen pulled away bashfully, and Uriel did the same, face beet red with blood rushing to places it shouldn't. 

Instead, Uriel collapsed into Owen's chest, murmuring something soft into his skin. 

"Show me, then." They whispered, hands clinging to the skin on his hips, head in the crook of his neck.
Kristin
Owen breathed deep, composure slipping like his heavy head back into his pillow. The request seemed almost a million miles away, despite its importance barely a minute ago. He was wound instead around strong hands riding up the hem of his shirt and *Gripping* Him where it would normally be unthinkable, the tickle of a sigh against his collarbone; the curve of them against him, over his chest, enveloping him in their scent of lavender and sleep.

He exhaled and the thing in his chest hummed under his weak sigh, his heart and its formless passenger thumping miserably against thick cages of bone, muscle, flesh. If he stayed for another breath, his eyes might flutter closed, not to open again, and he would go weak all over— he would surely perish, he thought, leaning helplessly into what he feared was surefire disaster, into what he knew deep down to be bliss.

The edge of an old conversation bubbled up to brush against his lips, before flying away again; he only knew what to say in hindsight. *I'll be devoted to you too. I already am, if this is how it feels— anything, to stay like this forever.*

A warm, callused hand stopped tracing circles in the downy curls at the back of their neck beneath their fluffy cascade of bedhead (when had it moved there?), hovering for a moment.

"Shove over for a second, and I will" Was a betrayal, just barely deemed necessary to quell the sickly hot feeling squeezing his insides. His face was redder than his hair as he sat up just a little to feel around for his phone, and his headphones, and that same audio file he had been obsessing over in one form or another for months.

"I, I um," He stammered, any line he had rehearsed for this reveal flying straight out into the mist. He fiddled with his headphones.
_ _

"W-when you were in my dream. Or, ah, when I woke up, I.. I couldn't forget the stars. I could still f-*Feel* You, when I started writing this, um..." Owen took a swig of water, and felt the cold splash down into his stomach. "I got Ares and Fin to help, but. This is, I wanted it to be for you. F-felt right."

His doe eyes were wide and darting madly from place to place, but his uneven smile stayed put, digging giddily into his burning cheek.
Rebecca
*One, two.* Slow down, pause your thinking. It was a tactic Uriel often employed when they felt too much— the waves of something bubbling in their chest were strange and terrifying, but they needed the conduit of Uriel's hands to do anything. So long as their body remained frozen, the swarm of unknown filling their chest could hurt no one besides themselves. 

Being deprived of Owen was a comfort they quickly realized they were ill-suited to live without— his hands in their hair, the rise and fall of his rapidly-increasing breathing against their cheek. He spoke, and Uriel saw stars. 

He *Felt them*. He couldn't forget their vision, the shared dream they so intimately enjoyed together forever ago. Uriel saw his mind bloom under them, and he was elated at their incessant eyes watching. 

Long ago, they would have wondered if he would feel the same about them— if their patch-work quilt of a psyche riddled with stains and holes and moths chewing the edges would scare off the man with downy fluff as a heroic cape. 

They didn't worry about that anymore.

Uriel's heart hammered in their chest, gingerly taking the headphones from Owen's hands and placing them over their ears. Their already messy bedhead was made worse by the guest sitting around their head— strands of fluffy white hair curled down their face and tangled in the headphones, and they eagerly awaited for the dulcet tones of Owen's playing to reach their ears.

"I'm ready when you are", they whispered, clasping his hands in their own.
Kristin
"O-okay."

Owen swallowed hard, and willed his thumb to press *Play*. If they weren't so comfortably draped over him, his leg would be bouncing madly, but the only outlets for his last few months of madness were the speakers in his headphones, resting securely over Uriel's head.

He could still feel the odd melody rumbling in his chest, digging into his fingers through all those late nights holed up in the music room, perfecting the layered collage of strange, lilting chords, sour notes bringing out the sweet, his fingers inevitably tripping over themselves in every take.

The song, as was his memory of the unfathomable sprawl of nebulas and the gravity of the universe shifting around him, was more full of energy than one might expect— it wasn't incredibly long, but it was a firestorm melting into mist, the mad world whirling back into the place their hands met in the centre of everything over the dreamily waving grass. There were no words— that would have been impossible. An odd distortion coloured the familiar low current of his Rickenbacker, blurred and organic. Almost a heartbeat, layered overtop.

They inspired all of it, every ripple in the strange dream-flowers, every corresponding flare of a guitar, every drop of sweat in his sea of madness that was *Worth it*. Their sweet face rested close enough to his heartbeat to practically taste it, the heatwaves pressed into their snow-framed cheek through his shirt. Even with no lyrics, there was little he could hide from them here. 

At least, that was what he hoped. It was what he tried to make it. All the gods he had cussed out while shaping it certainly knew he had heard it too many times to say for certain anymore.

In the silence of the morning, the boy with all those clusters of stars still burning away beneath his skin sank back down to his pillow and busied himself with their hands, woven into his. 
_ _

He was fascinated by them, even when he wasn't looking for a distraction from time moving so very slowly; they were strong, and cool, and they felt good to press between his own. He gently pulled on their fingertips, traced their tendons, rubbed circles in their palms where he knew somewhere in the back of his mind that muscles tended to ache. His warm, callused fingertips marvelled at the difference between them. *Soft...*

The copper-haired composer once again fell into the orbit of their hands in his, and a strange smile reached his glittering earth-and-turmeric eyes.

Time passed, or it didn't— maybe the file had looped, maybe it was longer than he remembered, maybe the turning of the planet happened slower when he stared.
Rebecca
Waves of notes crashed over Uriel's ears; a beautiful tapestry of sound, noise emblazed with a single sentiment, one they had never heard before. Uriel barely remembers closing their eyes— their head was too busy reeling from crashing of musical tide against their ears, the silent sound of their heart melting and solidifying just to melt again.

The song was beautiful. It was a musical blanket that covered the two lost souls laying in the Swedish dawn. To the dream-weaver, nothing else existed save for the rapidly-heating fabric beneath their palm and the steady, freckled hands idly playing with their own. 

It was just Uriel, Owen, and the music. The music and that *Sentiment*, the one that carried itself in every twang of the bass that ricocheted between their ears. 

The sentiment that he loved them. 
He really, really did.

It made sense, then, what they did next— the barest breath escaped from their lips as Uriel's chin tilted up towards his in a silent plea, headphones still askew on their head.

The song looped. Uriel didn't notice.
Kristin
The strong hands tangled in Uriel's fingers and in their hair weakened so when they looked at Owen like that, like he was strong and captivating and everything he ever wanted to be. He felt their breath on his face, so *Close*, and in that moment he wanted nothing more than to breathe them in, for them to fill his shuddering chest.

His strong arms had no purpose now other than to loop under theirs, around their back, one hand curling down over their waist and the other tenderly spreading over the back of their neck.

One heartbeat passed, the smallest scrap of a breath hitching in his throat. He glanced at their lips and nearly saw stars.

And then he realized that it was *Uriel* Who was looking at him like this, Uriel who he loved as easily as as smiling at the sun after a long winter, his dearest friend.

It just barely counted as a kiss when he closed his eyes, tightened his hold on them and pressed them into their goal. He was rusty, lightheaded, and his nose poked their cheek at just a slightly awkward angle, but he was determined. 

Their lips were a little dry from sleep, and their eyelashes brushed against his cheek like butterfly wings, and they were soft and solid and warm in his arms where he silently begged them to remain until life was sweeter than even dreams. 

*If only that accursed grin they drew out of him would relax a little, so that he could do this properly...*

They pulled apart, but barely by a hair's breadth. Not even that. His warm, glinting-firelight eyes opened halfway, blinking slow.
Rebecca
Ah. So this was what it was like to be kissed.

It was barely anything, really— if they were distracted for even a moment, they would have missed it. But how could they be distracted, when Owen looked at them as if they deserved every ounce of love he poured into them? 

It didn't matter how it felt, physically. Uriel melted all the same, a small noise escaping from their lips as Owen's contacted their own. They couldn't decide what the kiss was trying to convey; was it a *Thank you for loving me* Kiss? Or perhaps a confirmation of a fact Uriel had always known, deep down, that they adored him in every possible way.

"You... You have my first kiss, then." They uttered, fingers tracing their bottom lip as they settled into his chest. 

More room was needed in the ever-expanding shelves in their heart. Rows of good memories since arriving at the Cradle now cluttered the once-barren walls; Watching television with Margo, drinking tea with Haoran in the early morning, and now... 

And now the sensation of lips on theirs, and a smile pressing into their skin. 

"Promise to keep it safe." Uriel whispers, digging their quickly heating face into the crook of his neck. The words aren't meant to be bashful, but it can't be helped— after all, Uriel only had one first kiss to give, and it now laid in the hands of the man in front of them. 

He had a part of them, forever. Something they could never take back... And something they would never want to take back.
Kristin
Wide, shining eyes fixed on a spot on the ceiling above the lovingly tangled pair. Owen's lips remained incredulously parted as his head swam and his hands grasped at Uriel's hair, their (his) shirt, their waist pressed over his own. *Their first kiss*. He was wrapped around his dearest friend and the ghost of their *First kiss* Lingered on the tip of his tongue, buzzing through to the tips of his fingers and toes.

"I promise," He whispered. What else could he say? What cascade of stammered words could say how much he would treasure such a thing, that rendered them a blushing mess just to speak of?

*"Fy anwylyd,"* He murmured into their temple, just barely reachable at his angle. A reassurance, a relief, a truth that made him shiver like the tickle of their heavy breath on his neck:

*My beloved.*

A hiccup in such a warm and perfect moment, though, nibbled at the front of Owen's mind. The rush of red returned to his face tenfold as he grabbed the sides of their face, turning them to face his. *Esgob annwyl, this is silly.*

"Hang on, um..." *Gulp.* "Th-that was. That wasn't my best- I could- could I, may I kiss you properly?"
...
"Please?"

He leaned in, and their noses brushed together; he breathed them in, deep through his lungs, until he was certain they reached every part of him. A strong, softly trembling thumb brushed a coil of silk from the corner of their mouth, and he stopped dancing around it.

The second kiss he gave them was long and sweet, and the deeper it got the more it drove the truly hopeless romantic out of his mind. All the love they'd given him, all the rainbows he saw in their eyes, and all he could do was kiss them silly? It didn't feel like enough. Their teeth clacked together awkwardly, their noses got in the way, his hands clumsily pulled them too close to breathe, the edges of that smile nearly stopped him again before the both of them figured out a rhythm.
_ _

He wanted to do this properly, and he wanted to devour them, and he needed to thank them for loving him like they did, so gentle and tangible and unapologetic.

Familiar floods of humming ether pressed at the insides of the fingers weaving through their bangs, trying to reach their cheeks in his palms, desperate to *Hold them* In every way the boy possibly could. Owen wanted them under his skin, safe and warm, a piece of him curled up under his ribs.

When he finally pulled back again, his hands were curled miserably deep into their fluffy mane of snow and silk, an errant tooth caught on their bottom lip, a weak gasp and a shuddered exhale dissipated into the air between them (what little of it there was).

Fire bloomed in his chest, alive enough to melt the frost on the windowpane.
Rebecca
*Two whole kisses?* Uriel's head swum as hungry lips took their own in embrace. 

Fate, Uriel had realized, had finally rewarded them for their hardships. The lips of their dearest friend were worth it all— every bruise or stab wound they had suffered for the sin of being born was worth it, so long as they were in the arms of someone who loved them. 

And he did. Sweet nothings in a language they couldn't understand left his lips, and Uriel sunk into the kiss. He was eager, breathtakingly so; their brain was still attempting to process the first kiss before he came back once again, and the little braincells they had melted in heat that could rival their bright-red cheeks. 

*He held you so sweetly*, a voice in their head whispered. *And you don't even deser—*. The thought was cut off by his teeth catching on their lip, eliciting a noise they'd seldom admit making to anyone else. 

A glimpse of honey-colored eyes shifted behind long eyelashes, and Uriel looked away just in time to avoid eye contact. 

It would be disastrous, they reasoned, if they felt the tidal wave of emotions he did. He felt in mountains compared to their molehills— and the buzzing sensation in their ribs was already too much to handle, threatening to spill over with needy noises and grabby hands and long pauses of leaning close and just *Breathing him in*. 

Uriel was certain they would die if they felt what he did. Not only because it was strong, but because it was love *For them.* 

"T-thank you for the gift." They gulp, wiping at the edge of their mouth. "The k-kiss, I mean. I'll treasure it forever."
Kristin
"O-okay," The now-reeling boy murmured after a second, gently rubbing his cheek into theirs before resting his head back against his pillow. He sank deep back into his bed, heavy arms now resting over their back. Closing his eyes once more, Owen's head spun. It was a minute, or an eternity, before he could piece anything else together.

"Happy birthday, love."

He wondered how he should feel about it— *Kissing Uriel*— and came up with nothing but that happy, swirling buzz in his stomach. Should he be worried that he had ruined the unspoken thing they both had built up over the months? Was he truly afraid that they had changed for the worse, that once this high wore off they would shy away from his eyes, brush off his touch?

No. *Maybe?* 
...Nah.

Any worry that might have made sense to a different boy in a different time felt forced, unnecessary. He didn't have a word for what exactly they *Were*, but he wasn't for want of one— it wasn't needed to feel at home in their embrace, to know that they loved him like he loved them, and *What a thing that was*. 

A dreamy hum escaped him, light and blissful.

Here in their cocoon of hazy heat, where the taste of them lingered on his lips, their weight pressed his guts into place, every sound they had made echoed in his skull, turning it to hot lead, Owen closed their fingers that were folded around his heart and kissed their knuckles. 

As though it hadn't already been there for months, cradled in their cool and soothing palms, murmuring to them dreams of stars and cocoa and jagged scars and laughter.

Callused fingertips lazily scratched at the impossibly soft, downy curls at the nape of Uriel's neck. His voice rumbled low and raspy in his chest below them, words meant only for their ears.

"I could stay here forever, like this. With you."
Rebecca
"Staying like this forever... It truly would be a dream come true." Uriel admits. Their sweet sigh spilled out like honey, rolling over his chest and tinting the air sugary. 

...And yet, all dreams came to an end. Morning would come eventually, and Uriel and Owen would both have to wake and face the day ahead of them— a joyous one for the both, but not nearly as enchanting as the moment they had shared in each other's arms. 

Morning would come, and Uriel would think about their sweetest birthday gift of theirs yet. Their eyes would catch his across the table, perhaps— Finley and Ares would be too absorbed in their usual banter to notice how they bashfully looked away at the hint of emotion in his speckled eyes. Margo and Violetta would be holding hands, of course, unable to spot how Uriel's hands lingered on his when he handed them a present just out of their reach. 

And yet— despite being utterly infinitesimal to everyone else in the room, it would be the one thing Uriel's head would keep coming back to. 

Morning would come. But, for now, they decided, snuggling closer into the curve of his abdomen, this was enough.
Kristin
Owen nearly thought the early morning a dream, when he groggily awoke to full sun filtering through the window, illuminating the rest of the world that existed beyond their tangle of limbs and blankets. Only Uriel could have woven a dream so wonderful, their practiced hands picking only the softest threads from his mind. They wove gentle touches out of moonlight, sweet nothings from daydreams, kisses out of sparks leaping from his chest.

The feeling of them curled into his body remained, long after they eventually pried themselves apart; their hands over his sides, their breath on his neck, their smell of clean sheets and taste of sleep. He would close his eyes when they vanished from his sight and feel their heartbeat in his chest next to his own, and silk would spill from between his fingers.

One last bleary look at their pale form melted over his chest, and Owen's sweetly burning eyes went out in the darkness like embers wrapped in a blanket of stars, endless stars.