For solcita: JC/Lance. "You'll remember me like a melody / Yeah, I'll haunt the world inside you."

You remember watching him when you were both young and stupid, with bad hair and awful clothes, when you could see the lines of it under his skin waiting to get out. You promised yourself then that you wouldn't let yourself think about what it might mean for you someday, if he ever grew into it, if he ever realized what it was and what was waiting for him.

And then you woke up one day and he had and he did and you wanted to laugh yourself crazy, because it was everything you'd known it was going to be. He didn't get it immediately, and it took him a few months before he even knew what it was that he was seeing, what it was that you'd been seeing all along, but suddenly, it wasn't outside of the realm of possibility anymore, and you felt giddy and speechless just watching him staring at himself in the mirror the same way you used to stare at him when he wasn't looking, squinting as though if the light were just right he'd be able to see the outline of who he'd be when he closed his eyes.

One night you're leaning against the frame of the bathroom door and waiting for him to finish getting dressed to go out. In the mirror, he catches sight of you looking at him, and he looks back at you, and for a minute the same gaze gets passed around a few times until it somehow winds up with the conversational ball in your court. "Ten bucks says that Justin spends the whole night talking about Brit," you settle on, for lack of anything better to say.

He laughs, that deep and wicked laugh. "No bet. My momma didn't raise no idiots."

You watch as he does the buttons on the cuffs of his shirt by himself, quick deft flicks of each thumb. You've always admired that trick; you can't pick it up yourself, and Joey always winds up dressing you and making snide comments about it when he does. You've both got girlfriends waiting for you downstairs, and you're both hyper-aware of precisely whom you owe and what you owe them, and you know every inch of the definition of "bad idea". "Come on," you say, and take a step backwards. "If we're not the first ones there, we'll never hear the end of it."

"Jayce," he says, as he steps by you, and you stop and tilt your head and think that it sounds like an apology. "I just, you know. I know it's there. You. And, you know. Maybe."

You woke up one day and he'd grown into it and he suddenly knew what he wanted and you'd realized that maybe wanting was better than having, because you'd been wanting so long that you didn't know what the having would bring. "Shh," you say, and you press your fingers against his mouth. The insides of your knuckles fit right into the crease between his lips. "Not yet. We're not ready yet."

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