Author's Note: Okay so I know it's been months. But I had exams, then a major bout of writers block and then when inspiration finally struck I was away from home for a month without my laptop. But I got back yesterday, and so here's a new chapter. Enjoy :)
Matt and Finn arrange to go out for a meal together the next night and Finn drags Matt to a new burger joint that's opened a ten minute walk away from him.
"So..." Matt says.
Neither of them expected it to be this awkward but it definitely is. There's something about a gap of two years that appears impossible to overcome. Finn can't even really remember why they fell out of touch, but he does remember why he and Matt were such good friends. There may be some awkward tension between them but it fades a little bit more as every second passes and hints of their friendship starts to appear again.
Ten minutes in and Finn's got Matt snorting lemonade out of his nose as he laughs. Twelve minutes in and Matt has Finn blushing about a drunken hook-up back at a party when they were teens. Fifteen minutes in and the pair are smiling like nothing ever changed.
"So what have I missed over the past two years?" Finn questions.
Matthew tells him all about his time at university, about his girlfriends and his brief experimental phase and his lecturers. Filling Finn in on every little detail he's missed. Then it's Finn's turn to talk about friends and parties and drunken hook-ups. They swap stories of class pranks and drunken dares. But Matthew can't help but notice that Finn seems to be avoiding talking about an important detail. He may not have been in Finn's life for most of the past two years but he certainly seems to be important now.
"So..." Matt says again, but this time he's apparently unsure of how to approach a certain subject.
"So?" Apparently Finn is confused and so Matt might actually have to bite the bullet and ask.
"You and Charlie?"
"What about the two of us?" Finn asks, feigning nonchalance.
"Are you what? Boyfriends, hook-up buddies?"
"We're just friends."
"Don't even try that on me," Matt warns, "Charlie already told me that and you're only marginally a better liar than him. I know my little brother and I know something's going on between the two of you. I'm not bothered, do what you want you're both grownups. I'd just like to know what that something is so I don't accidentally say something stupid."
"Fine," Finn concedes, "we're something... but I don't know the specifics of it."
Matt pauses and looks thoughtful, Finn takes the opportunity to take a large bite of his burger in the hope that Matt will stop asking questions if he thinks Finn's mouth it too full to reply. He appears to have no such luck as Matt looks at him purposefully when he finally appears to have figured out what he's going to say.
"You should probably figure that out."
"Probably."
"Just don't break his heart Finn," Matthew tells him.
The switch to protective big brother mode is obvious and Finn lets out a slow sigh. He's not used to this as he never usually gets to this stage of meeting the family, but he's heard about it and he kind of hoped he'd never have to suffer through it.
"It's not my heart to break," he replies simple.
"Oh come on, we both know that's not true."
"Charlie's not given me his heart, we're not that serious."
