Partners In Crime (lietpol/Poliet)

Chapter 16

Toris could honestly admit that he was quite surprised when he spotted Antonio trying to sneak into his homeroom class. Hell, 'stupefied' was probably a better word to describe his shock.

What in the world was Antonio trying to do? The Spaniard had been kind earlier, Toris recalled, but giving the picture to Lovino even after Felik's video? Now that was just plain low.

"Psst, Toris."

Toris took a quick glance in Antonio's direction before looking away. Should he talk to Toni?

Sighing, Toris gestured Antonio to sit at the empty desk next to him. Felik's old desk.

Antonio crept over and took a seat, clearly attempting to act natural so the teacher wouldn't notice his presence. He cleared his throat. "I broke the deal?" He asked simply. Antonio asked it as if it were more of a confirmation than a question, but he sounded polite enough.

Toris clenched his teeth. He was pissed off with Antonio. "Yeah," responded, a rude tone creeping into his voice, which was quite unusual for the Lithuanian. "Feliks made a video that hit 1,000,000 views way before yours did."

Antonio looked genuinely shocked. "He did?" He asked softly.

Toris narrowed his eyes. Was Antonio bluffing his shock? Nearly the entire school had seen Felik's video. It had been the biggest talk for the past couple of weeks. Some people even took suspicious glances at Toris or Ivan when they walked by because they suspected that either might be the special 'partner in crime' Feliks mentioned in the video.

Surely a popular guy like Antonio had gotten in on the latest scoop. Still, there was no evidence that the Spaniard was lying, so Toris has no choice but to believe him.

Toris took a deep breath. "Yeah," he finally responded. "On the channel FabuLiet. But unlike you, we don't have Gilbert and his magic phone number superpower so we couldn't contact you about it."

Antonio looked down at the carpet with a guilty expression. "I'm sorry," he murmured. The Spaniard placed a developed photo facedown on Toris's desk. "I took it back from Lovi. You can have it if what you're saying is true."

Toris swallowed hard. "Thank you."

"I'm really sorry for the mistake. Gilbert and Francis never mentioned seeing a video from Feliks so I just assumed there was none." Antonio scratched it head. "I'm just wondering, but where is Feliks, anyway? I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks."

"He moved." It wasn't a lie, but not the entire truth either.

Antonio seemed a little upset by Toris's answer. "Oh," he said sadly. "I never got a chance to know him."

...

**Time skips brought to you by Chinatown. Woah, since when was there a Chinatown there!?**

...

Toris glanced at the picture in his hands. He had gotten home from school a few minutes ago, and couldn't seem to pry his eyes away from it.

The Feliks in the picture had his eyes closed. The Toris in the picture had his eyes widened. Feliks had both his hands resting on Toris's soldier. It was pretty obvious from the photo that the kiss was one-sided.

Toris didn't know how long he stared at the picture. An excessively long time to say the least. Toris was just busy taking in Felik's facial features. From his delicate nose, to his pointed chin and tiny ears. The physiognomy that Toris had grown so familiar with in such a short amount of time, yet never really took the time to study closely.

The Lithuanian bit his lip. He had a nagging urge to do something crazy, stupid even.

He submitted to that urge.

Toris grabbed a sharpie from the counter. He flipped the photo over and started writing. Then, a slight hesitance behind his movements, Toris pinned the written side of the photo to the fridge with magnets.

It read in Toris's neat blocky handwriting:

Hey mom, hey dad. I'm writing this down because I'm not exactly sure I'd be able to say all of this out loud.

First of all, I'm sorry for making you worry out me for the past two years. I think my condition has been getting better. I never could've made it through such a rough time in my life without such amazing parents.

Now the second thing I want to say is a little harder for me to write. I'll just cut to the chase I guess.

I've fallen in love with Feliks Łukasiewicz. Or at least I'm pretty sure I have. I'm falling in love with him to say the very least.

I'm not exactly sure what I consider myself sexuality-wise yet but I just thought both of you should know.

It's kind of stupid getting nervous over telling both of you this. You're both the best parents ever and I love you so much. I'm sure you'll understand.

Toris read the message three times over. Satisfied, he went up to his room and waited for his parents to come home. His heart was pounded and bubbles of nerves were dancing around in his gut, but somehow, everything just felt a little more right than before.