his brown eyes ➵ thomgelica

x.

When she's twenty, the first time he tells her he loves her is accidentally over the phone.

It isn't like how Laurens ended every talk with his parents with an automatic I love you that was programmed into him for years (which is good, all things considered) and passed onto nearly every conversation he had on the phone ever. She remembers being thirteen and hearing him tell her the good news that he'd just been transferred to South Carolina, "Alright, love you, bye," before he cursed at himself. First he was telling the pizza guy that he loved them when he called to order, then he was telling her, then he was telling Peter who very dramatically responded with a love you, too, son that made Jane hope it was Thomas on the phone.

Hah.

Hahaha.

That's really not very funny.

But before even the pizza guy, it was Thomas, and she honest to God remembers hearing him profess his love to someone on the other side of the phone and worrying it was a girlfriend.

But he just.. blurted it out. Like he meant it, not like it was an automatic habit he couldn't shake off like his smoking (though he cut back to only when he's nervous now which makes him even more obvious) or something thoughtlessly added just because. He wasn't even talking to her, it was a message since she'd forgotten to charge her phone again, and that -- dear God, it's been three hours and seventeen -- eighteen -- minutes since then.

She's standing there in a blue towel in her old room in her parents' house, toothbrush forgotten in her mouth, her hair already starting to dry without being combed, and she's grinning at nothing, makes his deep voice play again on her phone.

"So I'm running late 'cause Hamilton is being an ass. I'm sorry, I know, I'll be late for our dinner reservations but I'll still order the white chocolate cake so you can have some even if you decide to order three slices of chocolate cake while you're waiting for me. But remember you don't like white wine since you never do when they decide not to card you. I'll try not to be too late. I'm sorry in case I probably forget to tell you again later. I love you, y'know? I --"

And that's where he pauses at the twenty-three second line and doesn't speak again for seven. He sounds so flustered, and she can just see him tearing his hand through his hair, falling back against the wall.

"I wasn't gonna tell you like that. I'm an idiot. But I love you, probably have for years, and you should probably move in with me legally instead of like all my closet space and free use of my hair products, so --"

And then it beeps because he's run out of time for his message, and she can see in her mind how horrified and angry at his phone he probably looked, and she plays the message again, curls up to squeal into her pillow like she's a girl again.