abraxaslogs | Smart men are always looking for loopholes.

Nocwich weekend means one thing above all else: seeing friends from other factions. Not that Wilhelm has a whole lot of those lying around. Most fit comfortably into the category of acquaintance or, having a solid decade on him, occupy some other hard-to-define role. That puts Jesper easily on the top of his list, and not just because kissing is so much nicer in real life than in the Horizon. Though, he definitely considers that when they set plans for the weekend.

This evening, Jesper's talent for coaxing Wilhelm out of his comfort zone brings them to the hot springs. Luckily, the springs aren't too crowded at this hour, and they can find a nook to themselves.

"Shit, that feels good," he sighs as he lowers himself into the water. Contentment lights his expression.

Jesper likes hookups in the Horizon for a few reasons, the most obvious being how much easier it all is and how many positions and how creative it can get, but when it comes to spending quality time with someone, he does like to whisk his other faction friends to Nocwich. Wille is a chief example and Jesper loves the baths, so he settles into it with him.

"You have no idea, you lot have nice baths, we have the desert. Lots and lots of sand. You get out of a bath and need another one." Jesper likes Cadens in many ways and he prefers it to the other options, but he would happily get away from sand if he could. The thing is too that Ketterdam was a port city, he's used to water, he's used to a different kind of grime.

He reaches over to run his wet fingers through Wilhelm's hair. "How are things with you, my sweet Wille?"

His head tilts into the touch, force of habit and force of gravity. The effect Jesper has on him hasn't dimmed after a year of hook-ups that defy proper categorization, casual but not careless, loving but not romantic. If anything, the familiarity of it makes it easier to fall into.

"Fine," Wilhelm answers with a shrug and a grin. He's never known how to answer that question honestly. "I mean, I get to have a nice, hot bath every night."

If it wasn't obvious that he's just saying this to be a little shit, he pokes his tongue out at Jesper.

"Brat," Jesper says on a laugh. He follows that impudent tongue and gives him a kiss because he can before settling back into the water comfortably.

"I thought maybe you'd have more to share now that you're on the fancy Conclave. All official like." Of course Jesper heard. He hears everything. He knows everything! Jesper is the best information gatherer probably in this whole group, he just hides it behind his smiles and careless attitude.

He would never try to be on the Conclave nor should he. Knowing Jesper, he'd do things just as a lark and make trouble. He wouldn't be able to help himself. He can't be trusted to take anything seriously.

Wilhelm laughs into the kiss and resists the old urge to glance around, check if anybody saw. He hadn't told Jesper about his appointment to the Conclave, because he didn't want to make a big deal of it, but he's not surprised that Jesper knows anyway. He has plenty of connections in Thorne.

"It's not that exciting." Idly, he plays with a strand of hair. "We've met with some castle officials, like, once. I never even know what to say."

"You've got a good head on your shoulders, you should speak up. You have as much a right as anyone." Jesper is more confident in Wilhelm than Wilhelm probably is, but that's nothing new. Jesper is always the cheerleader for his friends, believing them capable of anything and everything. He lends his confidence wherever possible.

"Claude and Sam just went for another go, they're the responsible ones so it makes sense. I might nominate someone next time just to see their face. Someone who would be good at it, obviously." But simply not think about it themselves. Jesper likes surprising people to get them to live a little. Even if that living is in politics.

His lips pull into a quiet smile. Somehow, he's got a whole collection of people who are more confident in him than Wilhelm is in himself. He wonders what they see, and how he keeps missing whatever it is. Or, when he's feeling less charitable toward himself, he wonders how he tricked anyone into believing he might do something more than screw everything up.

"I don't really know why I put my name in. It's the kind of thing I would have done everything to avoid back home."

He puts an arm around Wilhelm, apparently deciding that snuggling close to him in the bath is perfectly reasonable, and it is in his opinion. He likes being near him. Jesper has a tendency to believe the best in his loved ones. He thinks Wilhelm's more than capable of doing anything he wants.

"Well it doesn't last that long, you can just not do it next time. Or! You may find it wasn't as bad as you expected, and you want to continue." Jesper kisses his cheek sweetly. He doesn't think too deeply about these things, one of the many reasons it's good he's never bothered with this.

"You're a smart guy with a good heart, who wouldn't want that in a representative?"

He slants into Jesper, a little pink in the face for the sudden burst of affection. Not that it catches him completely by surprise — this is just how Jesper is. How they are. Under the water, he rests light fingers on Jesper's knee.

"I guess so." Wilhelm shrugs, clumsy at the receiving end of compliments. A pause for contemplation, before he circles back: "I guess I did it because nobody was making me. If that makes...any sense."

"Sure it does. Who likes to be told what to do? That's a surefire way to make anyone do the opposite, not only us youngsters." Jesper gets annoyed when people point out how young he is because the Saints know he's lived through so much in his short life, in the past few years alone, that he is hardly a normal teenager. That being said, he knows teenagers, himself included, have a tendency to get rebellious.

He doesn't know that Wilhelm used to be ordered to do this and that, although he suspects, in terms of being a rich boy. Wylan's experience being a rich boy with a psychotic father is unique, but the being expected to do many things is expected.

He runs his wet fingers through Wilhelm's hair, getting it a little damp. "I like to do everything because I wanted to do it, no other reason."

"It's the best reason to do anything," Wilhelm agrees. He loves when Jesper plays with his hair, and he encourages him with a brush of his pinky across the inner hinge of Jesper's knee. "I didn't always have the option, though."

In his old life, the one that, more than a year deep in this world, has begun to feel very far away. Its grip on him is loosening.

"That's what makes you so cool, Jes." He taps playfully on his thigh, but his tone is undeniably sincere. "You just...do what you want, and you don't care what anybody thinks."

Wilhelm has always admired in others what he finds sorely lacking in himself. Although he's had more practice in doing what he wants, he still struggles to figure out what exactly that encompasses. Because it's more than just freedom from the responsibilities and restrictions that used to suffocate him; it's the freedom to build his life from scratch.

"Yeah I know you rich boys get a lot of pressure. You should talk to Wylan some time. Although I think he wins the bad dad award, since he tried to kill him a few times." Jan Van Eck is an actual monster so no one should be compared to him, and he assumes Wilhelm didn't try to get murdered by his parents. He feels like that would have come up by now. The merchants are as vicious as the criminals in Ketterdam, even more so with their power and money.

"It's true, I don't care what anybody thinks, and I am cool." Jesper's confidence coming in full force but he grins and kisses Wilhelm's cheek before briefly going into the water to get his hair wet. Dipping under and coming back out. He playfully shakes out his head so some of the droplets might hit Wilhelm.

"It's not entirely true though. I care about some people's opinions. I care about yours."

He's not surprised that Jesper has guessed the general idea of his family background without ever being told outright. Jesper is perceptive, and Wilhelm has probably dropped plenty of clues here and there. He is stunned by the news that Wylan's dad apparently tried to have his own kid offed. His parents weren't always what he needed them to be, but they at least, you know, endeavored to keep him alive.

When Jesper emerges from the water, Wilhelm throws a hand up to try to shield himself from the barrage of droplets. Leaning into his space again, he combs his fingers through Jesper's tight curls.

"Well, I think you're cool as fuck," he repeats. "And hot. And..." He drags out the syllable, thinking. "Funny. Loyal to your friends. You make everyone feel included and comfortable."

It would do Wylan good to make other friends, something Jesper has encouraged him to do, and he thinks the two of them would get along well. Wilhelm reminded him a lot of Wylan in the start, before he became his Wille and no one else, and he might have to set them up on a friend date. Wylan struggles because he can't partake in any of the network conversations due to his dyslexia, so that connection through inboxes is impossible (for now).

Jesper lets him play with his hair, leaning his head toward him so he can do exactly that. It's nice and they only get so many chances to be like this. He hadn't actually said that looking for compliments but he'll take them. Jesper smiles at him, soft, and cups his cheek.

"My sweet," a little kiss, "sweet," another kiss, "Wille." He adores him. He wants to pull this boy into his arms and take care of him, always. "And you have such a kind and loving heart, but you also have this spicy anger and inner strength I find terribly appealing." He likes when Wille gets a little fierce. "I am so proud to be your friend, darling."

He grins playfully and leans in to whisper at Wilhelm's ear. "Also happy to get thoroughly fucked by you every chance we get."

Wilhelm melts into those kisses, the warmth of Jesper's words. He doubts his own strength on days when he goes around feeling like broken glass and nights when everything crowded inside his head keeps him awake. But he's trying. And maybe that in itself is an act of courage.

The rush of heat against his ear translates into a prickling at the back of his neck and a flush in his cheeks. He's more aware than ever of their nakedness under the steaming water. Breaking the moment, he shoves at Jesper's chest.

"Fuck you," he laughs. Dangling from a smile, it sounds like a term of endearment.

He has to leap to another subject, though, to beat back thoughts of pulling Jesper into his lap. He knows that Jesper wouldn't mind — hell, that's an understatement — but Wilhelm isn't fond of tangling up private lives and public places. Not to mention, it would probably be really fucking unsanitary.

"How are things with Wylan, anyway?"

Jesper usually has a better opinion of people than they do of themselves. He sees the best in those he loves. He can see Wille's strength clear as a bell, but that may be something he has to believe in himself. Jesper will just be here kissing him and reminding him as often as possible until then. How hard to be him!

"Oh I would, but I know one of us doesn't like public sex." Jesper says out loud what Wilhelm's already thinking, but he laughs and kisses his cheek again. He personally wouldn't even hesitate from riding Wilhelm here and now, but he respects boundaries. He hmmms thoughtfully at the question.

"We're good. We finally stopped being stupid. Or well, I stopped being stupid." Wylan was very clear about it being him that's stupid, and Jesper did mostly agree with him about that. "Turns out he's been trying to communicate to me for a while that he's fine with the poly thing, but I was getting in my head about it." And despite being fantastic at communication usually, Wylan's one of his blind spots. He was too afraid of accidentally hurting his merchling to listen to his reassurance. Now they're well past that.

"It's nice to have the real Wylan here, not the one I started to make up in my head as who he was to me."

Wilhelm scrunches up his face in response to the kiss planted on his cheek, but he's just joking around. He likes that Jesper, for all his audacity, respects his boundaries. And he likes that he trusts him with his feelings, the things that weigh on his heart. So many of Wilhelm's friendships back home were built on the flimsy foundation of having fun at any cost and laughing at stupid shit together. Nothing that meant anything.

"That's great."

His smile is soft with encouragement. He's happy for Jesper — genuinely happy, in spite of his own loneliness which he nurses like a wound.

"I guess that means I should definitely meet him, right?" A pause, his expression twisting awkwardly. "Not that I was, like, avoiding him before or anything. It's just that we're in different factions, so..."

"It'd be okay if you were avoiding him. It's an awkward situation, as comfortable as it is between us." To him and Wilhelm he means, who have managed to balance their love affair well without making it a drama. He knows this wasn't normal for Wilhelm until they met and tried this out, but he thinks he's adjusted to it well.

It would be awkward with Wylan because up until now, Wilhelm wouldn't know he was fine with the situation, but Jesper does truly believe he is. Wylan wouldn't lie to him and he gave it several months of consideration. Jesper's very happy about it. He's been in love with that boy so long now.

"You would like him, Wille. He's one of the kindest people I know, with a spine of steel. It's impressive he turned out like that, considering his father is psychotic." Jesper thinks they'd find things in common. While Wille's father wasn't that, he also dealt with some rich boy problems, and pressure from his parental figures, he can tell that. "He also plays the flute and is a science genius. The only thing is you can't message him on the network."

Jesper shrugs, this isn't that big a secret. "He can't read. Kaz is trying to help him and we're still seeing if that patience will win out, but he's unable to. It's hard for him here, to lack that communication option. But if you see a red-haired boy with insane blue eyes, delicate and lithe, that's him."

These are still new waters to navigate, and even casual relationships come with their own complications. All of his stumbling forays into his sexuality over the past year have taught him a few of them. Honestly, he's amazed that Jesper can balance so many relationships, some casual and some not at all, without making a mess of everything. This thing he has with Jesper is the only one he's gotten right so far.

"I'll keep an eye out for him. Next time we're all in the same place."

Anyone who's so important to Jesper has to be worthwhile to know. Now that Jesper has cut through the awkwardness that might have resulted from their meeting — hey, so, sorry that I've been fooling around with your ex-boyfriend — Wilhelm actually looks forward to crossing paths.

It is actually easy for Jesper, that's the thing. Maybe in the start, he wondered how he could balance it all, while he's had many lovers in the past it wasn't so widespread. But it's all about the people involved, and they've made it easy. Sweet. His love for them as genuine as anything he's ever felt.

Wylan piecing in did help a lot though. It was difficult to have that hole when the person was around he wanted to be in it.

"I know you two would be friends. It might be a bit awkward in the start, but just give it a chance." He kisses Wille on the cheek.

Smart men are always looking for loopholes.

baths

YAY hi

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Maybe wrap here! we can do a more recent thing soon :)