Freak (Troyler AU)

Chapter Twenty-Five

*Troye's POV*

Tyler was surprisingly silent as I led the way outside, turning down a familiar stone path that led to our backyard. He had his hands stuffed in his pockets and a determined expression etched on his face, likely lost in thought somewhere. I couldn't blame him, my family had definitely given him a lot to process. I really wished they could just be normal sometimes, even a little bit. I mean, I get that they're excited, but they didn't have to scare the poor guy.

I paused, lifting my hand to unlock the gate surrounding the backyard. I walked inside carelessly afterward, Tyler close on my heels. I walked past the pool and through the overwhelming flowery scented garden, coming to a stop at the gazebo at the end. I actually hadn't been out here in weeks, but it seemed like the most logical place to take Tyler to evade my family's weirdness. I walked onto it and sat down on the wooden swing, wondering if Tyler would follow my lead or not. He did, though he also kept a reasonable distance between us on it. I decided to distract myself from the tension, looking around at the slowly dying garden. It pained me to think that fall was already upon us, meaning the much less desirable season of winter was just around the corner.

"What were you going to say up in your room before your family got home?" Tyler asked suddenly, his tone completely serious for once. My nervous mood from earlier was back and I tried to laugh it off, my chuckle coming out blatantly strained and obvious. He didn't let it go though, his big blue eyes blinking at me expectantly behind their frames. I raised a hand and ran it through my hair, extremely annoyed with the flat quiff I'd decided to go with today. Well, I hadn't so much decided as had no time to style it before Tyler arrived.

"I'm pretty sure it was some sappy thing, you probably don't want to hear it anyway-"

"Oh no, I want to hear it." He interrupted, reassuring me of what I already knew. I sighed loudly, knowing I wasn't going to get out of this without some sort of sappy compliment for him, it might as well be the one I'd already planned on saying.

"I, uh, I was just going to say that there's a lot more to you than you let on, too." I mumbled awkwardly, refusing to meet his gaze despite knowing he was staring at the side of my head. I tensed a moment later, feeling his head lay on my shoulder. I tried to ignore the way my heart sped up in reaction, cautiously glancing in his direction while staying perfectly still. I couldn't see his face, only the mass of hair right next to my eyes, but I had a feeling I knew what his expression was anyway. Before I realized what I was doing I was slowly leaning back against the chair, my arm coming up to wrap around his shoulders so he wouldn't back out of the embrace. He didn't, moving with me so we both had the back of the swing to support us.

"Am I allowed to reply with something equally, if not more, sappy?"

"I don't see why not." I replied, biting my lip at I waited to see what kind of mush he was about to give.

"I'm really glad I was stupid enough to skip class on the first day of school, and that you have never-ending shirt mishaps." I felt my lips quirk up into a huge smile, suddenly thankful we couldn't see each other's faces in this position. 

"Oh god, Tilly, you didn't warn me it was going to be that sappy." I teased, tightening my grip around him.

"So, it stuck then, huh?"

"What?"

"The nickname." He answered, turning slightly to look up at me. I knew I should probably be replying to that, but all coherent thought seemed to leave my head when I realized how close our lips were. I felt weird, for lack of a better description. I couldn't even really write it off as butterflies, because that made it out to be some bubbly light feeling. This was so much more than that, my tongue heavy in my mouth as I tried desperately to make it work enough to utter even a short response. I never did, but Tyler didn't seem too phased, just giving a small intimate smile before turning his head and nestling into the same position as before. I felt like the weight had been lifted off my chest then, but I wasn't even sure if that was a good thing.