Chapter Text
“I’m sorry?”
He’s absolutely drenched, sopping red hair falling into his face, baggy white shirt thin and pasty, that heavy jacket he had crowded around his shoulders dark with rain.
“The bus,” he jerks his thumb back at the street, “it broke down. They’re calling maintenance, but like, the driver just kind of up and left and I live three miles from here- told the bastard I’d walk but well-“
He holds his arms out just as the thunder rolls in. This kid, he’s the same asshat that plays games in his biology class. Had he known he’d lived here, or had the bastard just been that lucky?
“Yeah, yeah I guess, just, y’know, tap your shoes against the doorframe before you come in.”
The kid grins and so there he is, dripping onto his wood-paneled entryway, fingers running through his hair.
Law digs through his towels for something clean, hoping desperately his parent don’t come back anytime soon to find some vagrant college kid in their living room.
“So you live alone,” Kid calls from the entryway. Law snorts.
“You think I can afford a house on my own at my age, one with sprinklers and instant coffee? My parents own this place. Not everyone lives on campus, y’know.”
He throws a nice dark one at him, just in case Eustass had been in one of those fights he’s known for- just in case there’s any fresh cuts that might still be weeping.
“Cool, thanks.”
“You want something warm?”
And then Eustass is stripping, scrubbing at his hair with that towel as he peels off his pants, kicking his muddy shoes off towards the wall.
“I’m sorry,” Law finds himself repeating, a strong twitch in his jaw, “but what are you doing?”
Eustass glances up at him in his briefs and has the gall to smile. “Dude I was soaked. No way I can sit down anywhere without leaving an ass-print.”
Law tries to think of something clever but abandons his mind for something simpler. “Alright then, something warm?”
Eustass leaves his pants there by the door in a wet pile, accepting another towel for his waist as he follows him into the kitchen.
Law has a gaudy yellow kettle on the burner, already chewing on conversation topics. Eustass was obviously only in biology to fill his general courses. Law, however, had special interest in dissection and germs.
What did Eustass usually do?
“So you like games.”
Eustass looks up from the island, the stool a bit small for him. The smaller towel's draped around his neck, and he uses the corner of it to wipe his face dry. He smiles a little.
“You been watching me, eh?”
“How’d you know I lived here?”
Eustass shrugs, chin in palm now. “You rode the bus once, and sometimes when I jog I see you out there gardening. You’re terrible at it. Everything keeps dying, that’s why you bought flowers, right, to cover up the rotting corpses of those poor tulips?”
Law chokes on the bagel he’d culled from the pantry.
“They were carnations.”
He realizes his mistake now. He shouldn’t have said anything, now this idiot thinks that he’s been watching him like he’s actually interested or something. But then again, Eustass had done practically the same thing, so at least they’re being awkwardly creepy together.
“You’re really into biology, right,” Eustass points out, “you’re like, the only person that actually takes notes. Why’s that?”
The kettle shrieks and Law removes it with warm ears. So he really has been watching him.
“People are amazing,” is all Law says, not meaning to sound as cryptic as he does.
“People, huh,” Eustass murmurs, “and just what do you know about people?”
Law picks through the tea boxes, some empty, others fostering mismatched packages. “Earl or citrus?”
“Citrus,” Eustass suddenly says from behind him, and Law tenses up. When had he gotten so close?
“What do you know about people,” Eustass repeats.
He smells like rain, but he’s also warm at this distance. He tears at the citrus packet slowly, wondering if he should just spout the eight most disgusting digestive track infections he can think of. His mouth betrays him.
“Admittedly not as much as I could.”
What game was Law trying to play here? He turns around with two cups in hand, realizing now that Eustass is rather tall and still rather close. So he hands him the mug and stares at that wet shirt while sipping.
“You’re fun.”
Not really. He’s the opposite of fun. His idea of fun is playing scrabble with Bepo. Sometimes Penguin gardens with him, but that’s just so he can bury his drugs under the flower bed. Shachi likes to fuck up his toilets so they won’t flush.
“You’re going to be a doctor, right? That’s why you carry around such big books?”
Law can only hum, torn between a hard shot at the crotch or a gentle press.
“Then why don’t you teach me a little about the body?”
That’s the second time he chokes that day, except he’s laughing now, gasping, and Eustass is just smiling and he says something cheesy about liking Law’s laugh so Law drags him back to his room and lets him take off his clothes.
Eustass, in all actuality, appears to know a lot about the body. He knows where to press with his fingers, and just how deep to go before rubbing. He knows where to put those big hands of his, and where to skim those calloused fingers. He likes to have Law sitting in his lap, grinning up at him with hazy eyes as he thumbs at the softer parts.
He knows that the slower he licks behind the ear the more Law’s leg twitches, and the rougher he talks the more his dick jumps. It's something he takes great pleasure in abusing. After all, Law excuses, the mind was an erogenous zone.
His tongue knows how to distract him from the pain, curling around his teeth and lips.
He also knows how to effectively jump out of a window discretely just as the front door opens, slipping into Law’s too tight jeans and thanking the high heavens the storm has cleared.
But better than all that, he knows how to be a gentleman and leave his number on Law’s midterm essay with a sloppy star.
(later he’ll call and Eustass will insist they’re dating and Law can only agree because it seems like Eustass knows everything)