Title: and it always leads to you (in my hometown).
Fandom: Waterparks
Pairing: Awsten Knight/Otto Wood
Rating: G or PG idk
Length: 2086 words
Content notes: warning for real person shipping.
Author notes: This takes place in a small town AU. also hiii i'm back after like three years of absence in this community.
Summary: in which Awsten can't find the right words.

Early summer is as soft as clouds, the light breeze through the foliage isn’t enough to raise goosebumps, and there is still birdsong echoing from somewhere in the trees, just loud enough to be audible, light as air.

It’s fitting for a day of celebration, but there is an unspoken gloom that hangs over everything, casting the vivid colours in shades of grey. It sure doesn’t feel like anybody should be celebrating.

Awsten is sitting on the stretch of roof below his bedroom window while a party carries on without him inside the house. They’ll notice he’s gone soon, but for now the world is quiet. He leans back, supporting himself with his arms, and looks up at the sky, feeling immeasurably small.

There’s a song here, somewhere between the layers of today and the rest of forever, something about regret and indecision and safety, and he’s thinking in metaphors and stringing together phrases, hiding a meaning somewhere underneath flowery words and maybe he’s just a little bit afraid of growing up.

He would be content to sit like this all night, with only the company of the words in his head, but as predicted, someone comes to collect him.

Otto, his best friend, leans his head out of the window, his hands curling around the edge of the sill. “I knew I’d find you out here,” he says, and Awsten just rolls his eyes. “What are you doing?”

Awsten shrugs, fidgeting with the strings of his hoodie. “Nothing, really.” He sits back up, hugging his knees to his chest. “Writing a song. You know, in my head.”

Otto nods casually, as though this were perfectly normal Awsten behaviour. “I know what you’re about to say – something about how I should come inside and enjoy my graduation party with everyone else, right?”

There’s a smile in Otto’s deep, brown eyes, and he says, “actually, I wasn't going to say any of that; I was gonna ask if I could sit with you.”

Awsten blinks. “…oh. Yeah, sure.” Otto sits beside him, his legs dangling over the edge of the rooftop. The art in his head shrivels and dies, words collapsing into jumbled piles of letters and punctuation, because the words he speaks to Otto are different; the words he speaks to Otto really count. He says nothing, eyes fixed on the trees lining the horizon.

“You remember the first time we sat up here?” Otto asks, and of course Awsten does because how could he forget something like that? It had been autumn, wrapped in golds and oranges and deep reds, and just cold enough to raise goosebumps. Awsten had just moved to town, and he’d been sad, missing Houston. It feels like it was decades ago, not just four years.

He remembers seeing Otto for the first time, from across the property line, and how he almost went back inside, the thought of talking to anyone weighing him down. He remembers that by the end of the night, he’d forgotten about being sad. “Yeah. I called you lame for getting so excited about showing me your horses.”

“I should have gotten out while I still could.” Otto grins at him, and there’s a song there, too.

“Everything’s gonna change,” Awsten says then, and it isn’t a question; suddenly it’s all too real. Everything is sharp edges and haphazard lines; the sunlight doesn’t seem so warm anymore. Maybe he’s just afraid of growing up.

“Maybe,” Otto whispers and he sounds as unbothered as Awsten wishes he could be; it almost hurts; a gentle, sweet kind of pain. “Maybe not.” It’s not the answer he’d been looking for, but he has no idea what Otto could have said that would be preferable.

Neither of them speak, and Awsten toys with his kandi bracelets just to fill the silence with something. There’s a song playing from inside; he thinks it might be 3OH3!. Maybe nobody has realised he’s not there after all.

“We’ll be apart,” Awsten says then, and he hates how weak it sounds, how tiny and uncertain. It’s the truth, though, and he does feel unsure of himself, shaky and without balance.

“For now,” Otto replies calmly, and Awsten resents him just a little bit for that flat, even tone. Beyond them, the sun is setting, bathing the world in an ethereal orange glow. The hum of nighttime insects has already begun; they call to each other from the safety of the trees. If only humans had it that easy.

It’s not just the being apart, though; it’s everything — suddenly, there’s so much pressure to find his place in the world, and he doesn’t even know where to start. College sounds logical enough, but Awsten already feels like he doesn’t belong there, like he’s trying to force himself to connect to a piece that doesn’t fit.

As though Otto could read his mind, he speaks again, “college will be fine, you’ll see.” A pause. “Or you could always drop out and start a band.”

Now it’s Awsten’s turn to smile. “Hey, that’s a valid option!” They’d talked about it, like many other things, sitting right here, close enough to the sky that dreams seem attainable. Right now, though, it sounds like a joke, like something said to fill the quiet gaps in the conversation, something meaningless.

They had talked about running away together, but that had been high school Awsten, who could afford to be reckless and over the top. Adult Awsten has to plan things, has to make choices, has to read between the lines. At least fake it until you make it, or something like that.

“Can you share some of it?” Otto asks, and Awsten just stares at him for a second, confused.

“Can I what?” He asks, feeling detached from the moment.

Otto, who is probably used to Awsten getting lost in his own head at this point, says, “you know, the song that you were writing. I’ll tell you if it’s any good, and then we can make a plan for you to drop out and get us rich.”

Oh. Right. The words swirl around in his head like a windstorm, and it’s impossible for him to grasp and arrange them. Something about longing and asking too many questions and hiding from the world. Something about warmth and taking a leap of faith and finding patterns that aren’t there, losing the bigger picture. It’s all blurry and muddled now, like bleeding watercolours in his head, and maybe sometime he can make them beautiful again but not right now. Not with Otto causing all of this static in his brain. Putting words to feelings is what Awsten is best at, but with Otto it’s like tangled string, like soft whispers or scribbled notes, almost decipherable but ultimately unanswered.

“I don’t remember it,” he says quietly, a contrast to all of the loudness in his head. “It was probably genius, almost perfect, and you made me forget.” He forces a laugh, and after a second, adds, “maybe we should go inside.” He doesn’t move from where he’s sitting.

His hands are at his sides now, flat against the tiling of the roof, and his limbs feel stiff and awkward.

“It’s okay,” Otto says, laying a hand over one of Awsten’s, “you can blame me when you don’t make it.”

Awsten freezes, his heart ceasing to beat for just a moment. Everything seems insignificant then — the party, the future, his racing thoughts — none of it matters. Otto’s hand is warm (or maybe his own is just cold) and their fingers overlap, closing the gaps between. Awsten feels muted, inanimate, and he can feel the touch down to his bones.

“Thanks,” he says, unsure of what he’s even thankful for, but the silence is heavy and it’s the only word that comes to mind. He’s stuck somewhere between elation and anxiety, and his heart feels stuck in his throat. It’s kind of cruel, he thinks, for Otto to do this when… when he…

Awsten can’t even think it, can’t even admit it to himself, and there aren’t words for it; his head is almost empty. He wishes Otto would say something.

“See?” Otto finally asks, and Awsten barely hears him. “Nothing’s different.” And it isn’t, not right then, in the glow of the setting sun peeking through the tree line, in the almost-silence between the buzzing insects and the hum of barely audible music from inside. He doesn’t want to reply, afraid that the moment will shatter.

“You’re right,” he says anyway, trying to will his hand not to shake beneath Otto’s. Everything feels as though the entire world were holding its breath, waiting.

Otto smiles. “Yeah, as usual,” and Awsten tries to scowl at him but it feels like his face (his entire body, really) is frozen in place.

It would be so easy to just go back inside now, to just climb through that window and pretend to be happy. It would be so easy to forget this entire moment only to revisit it sometime when he can attach the proper words to it and keep it like a secret, the meaning locked up where no one else can unravel it.

The first star twinkles in the sky above them. Clouds are gathering, greying out the remaining blues and threatening to open up and rain until they’re all cried out. Awsten leans in and presses their lips together, and the world exhales.

It lasts less than half a second before he regrets it, pulling away quickly. “I’m sorry—“ he starts, but words don’t come; of course they don’t. He spends all day walking around in a daze, head bursting with words and lines, and yet he can’t come up with a single thing to say when it matters most. When it counts.

There’s a terrifying gap of time wherein he feels like the world might end (or, at the very least, Otto might punch him in the face), and then Otto is kissing him again, for real this time; his hand is in Awsten’s hair, holding him in place. Awsten forgets how to breathe (let alone how to kiss) but he manages somehow; it feels like a whole eternity passes them by and then it’s over, and Awsten is starry-eyed, looking at the roof below him because looking at Otto might actually stop his heart.

A drop of cold rain lands on his bare arm, and it sends a chill up his spine, as though someone were walking across his grave. Three more raindrops hit the roof beside him, but he still doesn’t move, and then Otto is laughing.

“It’s so dramatic isn’t it, that it starts raining literally right now?” A smile twitches at the corner of Awsten’s lips. “It’s like an overly sappy song… but I guess you’re the expert, not me.”

“Be quiet,” he replies, but in reality he’s tired of the quiet, and he’d much rather Otto keep talking. There are so many different things he could say right now, but his brain is too quick for his mouth and what comes out is, “don’t make me kiss you again.”

Otto rolls his eyes. “What an intimidating threat,” he says, and Awsten’s cheeks burn. “C’mon, let’s go inside before it pours on us.”

On autopilot, Awsten crawls over to the window, ducking his head down and climbing back into his bedroom. Otto follows right behind him, and as though it were a purposeful end to the moment, there’s a roll of faraway thunder that echoes from the sky.

“Now what?” He dares to ask, the dim lamp in his room casting their shadows on the wall.

Otto shrugs. “I dunno.” After a moment he says, “I mean, that happened. Maybe you should go back to your party now.”

There has to be at least one person looking for him at this point; he can’t bring himself to really care. “Yeah, I probably should.” The words are coming back now — something about second chances, about long summer days spent inside, about kissing your best friend.

Otto grabs him by the arm and warmth spreads from the touch, extending all the way to his fingertips. “Let’s go, then.”

Awsten takes a step towards the door. “Okay.” Outside, the sky finally opens up, a downpour beginning to hammer against the outside glass of his window.

There is a song out there, but there’s one in here, too.