Me: *Listens to skinny love by Bon iver while writing this* It'S pOetIC CInEma

Tw: Eating disorder (Ana, mentions of BED)

Patton let out a yawn as his alarm rang. He felt with his hand until he got his phone and turned it off. The numbers on the screen were blurry without his glasses but he could make out something looking like 6 am. It was Monday so he had to be at the kindergarden he worked at at 7:30 am.

He thought he could have another 5 minutes of sleep, as a treat. He turned back and cuddled down under the warm covers once more. His leg bumped into another person's leg. He squinted at the figure laying next to him, shirtless just like him. It had to be Lev.

Lev seemed to still be sleeping so Patton gently pulled his boyfriend close and moved to press a kiss to his forhead. It wasn't until right before his lips touched the other man's corpse white skin his eyes could see enough to realize it was Logan.

One of Logan's eyes opened to glance at him for a moment before closing again. He cuddled up close to Patton's chest and went back to sleep. He was shuddering even though he was laying under a blanket.

Patton was afraid to move and wake him. He laid there unmoving like a dead fish. After a while he felt Logan shift around, sleepily rub his cheek against his chest and making grabby hands for him. He let out a yawn before rolling over to the edge of the bed. He took on his glasses and tucked in his friend, who he thought was sleeping, before leaving the room while rubbing his tired eyes.

There came sounds from the kitchen. Cabinets quietly opening, sneaking steps and plates clanging against each other. Before it got quiet again. A door opened. Patton let out a sigh. He put on his glasses and his usual blue shirt before getting up. It was 06:14.

There was a bowl half filled with cereal standing on the stove as he walked past the kitchen. Probably supposed to convince him that his love had eaten. The bathroom door was open. He slowly peeked inside. Logan had somehow found the scale Patton had hidden under the bathtub. He was just about to drop his pyjama pants to get ready to weigh himself.

Patton went up to him "Nope" He said before grabbing onto Logan's waist and yanking him up from the ground.

He carried the now very grumpy man out into the kitchen. Pat put him down by the stove and patted his head while smiling at him.

"No weighing yourself. Bad Logie, very bad Logie" He took the bowl of cereal and shoved it against his chest "Breakfast"

He looked down at the bowl before dropping it on the floor so all of the cereal spilled out "I'm fasting"

"Sta-"

Before Patton even had time to correct him Logan had picked up his phone and held it up to his face. It was an app for weight loss. Aside from a calorie counter at the bottom there was a big timer. It said 43 hours. There was a goal that said 52 hours. That was how long he was planning to fast.

He grabbed his phone "Why do you even have this app? It's not even healthy for me to fast and I actually need to lose weight" Patton exclaimed while going into his dad mode (tm).

"You don't need to lose weight. You look wonderful" Logan assured.

"I know but I'd like to not get diabetes or cardiac arrest and also stop having back pain from holding up my own weight. You don't even know how many pants I have to buy because of my thighs rubbing together and destroying them super fast"

(Even though Anorexia is known as the mental illness that causes the most death binge eating disorder leads to a lot of death because of high obesity rate)

"You don't know how ridicoulously hard it is for me to find pants that fit me-" Logan stopped when he realized that a lightly obese person probably very much had trouble finding clothes "....I can..eat tomorrow....maybe"

"The moment 52 hours has gone you're eating, please" Patton pouted. He wanted to delete the app but he had a suspicion that would only make his crush panic and starve more because of loss of control.

He huffed before turning to make himself 2 cheese sandwiches. Out of the corner of his eyes he could see Logan clean up the cereal on the floor. He would get flustered over his crush not wearing a shirt but seeing Lo's bare chest only made him worried. Logan with messy bedhair on the other hand. He'd seen it before but wow love really made it look better. The way his dyed blue hair fell down in front of his eyes and sat so perfectly even though he hadn't combed it made Patton want to play and comb his hair and cuddle him for hours.

Suddenly Logan wrapped his arms around Patton's waist and leaned his head on his shoulder. "You're warm" He muttered out while pressing his chest close to the other man's back.

His hands roamed up and down Patton's chubby tummy. Lightly touching and holding. Logan nuzzled his cheek against the croak between his shoulder and neck "I like how soft you are.....you're so.... Good"

Now Patton got flustered. He stared straight ahead as he ate his sandwiches so that Logan wouldn't see his blushing red cheeks. He tried to keep his thoughts straight too. Even though all he wanted was to sit his crush down on the kitchen counter and grab his hair and his thigh and kiss him until he was dizzy and-

"I SHOULD LEAVE FOR WORK!" He yelled out before he could get an extreme case of gay panic.

Logan pressed a kiss to his cheek "Good luck"

"Y-you too"

He let out an awkard chuckle before very quickly heading for the door. He made big turn around when he realized he wasn't wearing day pants. He got himself ready as fast as possible while trying to avoid his crush as much as possible. He wished Logan would have turned very aromantic very suddenly when he got home so he wouldn't have to deal with this.

--

When Patton came home from kids screaming and jumping on him Logan hadn't turned aromantic. Sadly. But he wasn't anywhere in the kitchen, living room or bedroom. He went to the fridge and took out an popcicle. They were pretty low cal so he could eat them and not feel guilty.

He sucked on it while looking around for his crush. The lights were on in the bathroom and steam was coming out from under the door. Patton did an extra spin before lightly kicking the door open.

"Ta-da!!" Patton jumped into the room while doing jazz hands "I'm home!!! And not dead!"

"Because I can definetly not see that you're alive" Logan replied druly.

He was sitting in the bathtub which was filled with steaming hot water. Sometimes when his body temperature dropped too much the only way he could get some form of warmth was scaldingly hot baths (or exercising like crazy). Yes he was naked but they'd been best friends for 12 years, they'd seen each others...everything before.

While Patton dragged off his clothes to get in he noticed that there was a quite disgusting stench in the air and there were what looked like jogging pants and a sport shirt on the floor. He sucked on the ice cream suspiciously while getting into the bathtub.

"You've been excersising haven't you?" He asked while pointing the ice cream accusingly at him.

"I went out on a walk. Nothing more" He held up his hands to look innocent.

The stench came from him purging. After Patton had left he'd drank a ridicolous amount of water to take the hunger away. He drank water until it stopped tasting like water. He hated it. Hated the taste. But it had 0 cal and that was the only important part.

Afted he'd gotten back from his 4 hour long walk he'd wanted to weigh himself but realized all the water would add water weight. In a panic he purged it up. He was down to 43,6 kg. He was 188 cm.

Nobody ever tells you how unbelivable boring having an eating disorder is. Peope always talk about the weight loss. Never about the countless hours spent walking or pacing to burn calories. Times doing situps and squats until his entire body aches. Not about the days and days of him just wanting to eat but desperatly distracting himself.

87% of the time Logan was thinking bout food. About what he wanted to eat but couldn't (daydreaming about how it would taste). Planning how to eat as little as possible today, tomorrow, until he died. Counting and recounting calories. Checking his bmi every day, every hour.

He was a rabid dog with a piece of meat dangling in front of him but with a muzzle keeping his mouth shut.

He was all mouth but a forcibly stitched together one. And the unstopable want and Need and hunger was boring. It was pain. But it was so usual it was a boring pain.

Patton leaned his arms on the edge of the tub and let out a content sigh "I always feel like a dumpling when I take a bath. With the warm water and with me being round y'know" He chuckled out.

Logan moved his head back and let out a groan "Don't mention dumplings when I'm fasting. Now I'm gonna dream about it and wake up feeling guilty for eating it in my dream"

"Wh...what????"

"Should I stop you from eating that ice cream?" Logan asked to change the topic.

"Nah. Not only did I take a walk during my break but I also went out walking for 30 minutes after my shift had ended" Patton replied with a proud smile.

"I can take you out on a really long walk some day. I know some good paths"

Patton took a deep breathe before looking over at him while squinting "You seriously think I would go out walking with you?? Mr. should sit down and not exserscise" He shone up into a big grin "THAT! Reminds me"

He scrambled over to the edge of the bathtub. He reached into his bag and fished up a soda can. He held it out to Logan while letting out a tada!

"While I was out walking I found a store selling this" Pat explained.

It was a soda with the flavor of crofters. AND it was zero cal. Logan stared at it with wide eyes. He carefully took it and held it as if it was a precious treasure. He moved his arm around Patton's shoulder.

"Where would I even be without you" Dead actually, but Logan was asking sarcastically out of immense love for crofters.

"Aww Looogggiiiieeeee!! It's the least I can do for my fav person" Patton remembered the word Remus and Remy had assured him was a word of affection "...UwU"

Logan ignored his breaking of the english language. He snuggled closer against his friend's side because it was so warm. He opened the crofters soda and sipped on it. Patton glanced over at him before staring down into the water.

The only thing he could focus on was the other man's skin pressed against his. His cheeks went rosy pink at how close they were sitting. If he could he would rerange the world for Logan. He would bring the stars closer and make it so that nothing could ever hurt the love of his life again. Not even Logan himself.

--

It'd been almost 2 weeks. It was a Saturday. There were birds singing outside, with the warm sun shining down on them.

Somehow no matter how many different places Patton hid his scale Logan always managed to find it again. One time he'd locked it in a cabinet. When he came back from work his roomate had picked the lock. Even worse was when he came home to his love sitting in the bathtub long after he'd stopped showering naked, cold and crying because he was so exhausted and malnourished he was physically unable to stand up without help.

Having his roomate there at least helped with his BED. When he got the urge to binge Logan held him and comforted him with facts about food until the urges were gone. He went with him to the store to stop him from buying any of his trigger foods that would definetly lead to binging. When Patton had dropped a pound or gone out walking for a long while his love was there to congratulate him and assure him he was doing amazing.

But today none of that was happening. Today it was somewhere between lunch time and dinner time but Patton had been busy watching cute cartoons so he was eating lunch now. Microwave noodles and a sandwich. He was sitting by his kitchen table with Logan on the opposite.

He was slowly peeling an clementine. Once the peel was gone he picked all of the clemetine slices apart and carefully laid them out in a pattern on his plate. He continued to pick at the peeling while staring at the food. Eventually the peeling was pretty much nonexistant. He picked up a slice and forced it to the back of his mouth so he wouldn't be able to spit it out easily.

Patton watched on. He wished he could take his love and give it to Logan to eat. If it was like that he would never go hungry again. His heart was filled with love for him. It was in the air around him. It was filling the room.

His crush took another slice and frowned while forcing it in. Patton wished he could do more. He didn't know what to do for a person who didn't want to get better except for to be there. Logan's skin had become leather like from lack of nutrients and short hairs were growing on him to keep him warm while starving. How could Patton undo all of that, all of these years simply by loving him. He wanted to cry because he couldn't.

He stood up and slammed his hands down onto the table so suddenly Logan dropped his slice "Want to go out for dinner?"

"Me?...Dinner?" He looked like he was about to take out a powerpoint where he listed all the reasons that was stupid.

"Yes! Dumplings! You don't have to eat just sit with me!" He held out his hand "Come on Logie, you can still have fun y'know. Live a little"

Logan glanced down at the slices on his plate. He let out a sigh before taking Patton's hand.

They quickly took on nicer clothes and got themself ready. Which in Logan terms meant putting on 2 more layers of clothing while in Patton terms it meant putting on his cat hoodie which didn't have any stains on it.

The bubbly man ranted about cute animal facts while they walked to the resturant. The nerd shot in with some more statistical animal facts every now and then.

The resturant was a quite small one. There were a few families and couples eating but not too many. They sat themself by a table for two near a corner. Logan read through the meny and counted in his head the amount of calories each of the dishes had. It took some time but Patton didn't say anything, he knew his love would get anxious if he didn't do his routines.

"The salmon salad should be the dish with the least calories" He finally concluded.

Patton leaned his elbows onto the table and moved forward with a smile "But what do you actually want?"

".......Dumplings...But-"

"You can chew and spit. You deserve to eat something because you like it and not because of calories for once hunbun"

He waved for a waiter. Logan kept fiddling with the sleeves of his hoodie out of nervousness as Patton ordered vegetarian dumplings, apple juice for himself and coca cola zero for his friend.

"Want to talk about space to calm down?"

Logan nodded very quickly. Even though he was telling space facts his voice was shaky and his hands even more so. Patton reached out and laid his hand on top of his. He squeezed lightly.

Before either of them had time to say anything more. A plate filled with delicious dumplings was sat between them. The smell made Logan's mouth water but he didn't make an attempt to take any of them.

Patton rambled about some creepy but very well animated movie Virgil had shown him and cookie recipes he'd tried out between bites of dumplings. Logan nodded along while taking sips of his cola. He was only half listening. His foot was quickly tapping into the floor.

With an unsure hand he put a dumpling on his plate. He carefully broke of a part of it's dough and ate it. Eating was euphoric, like a thousand fireworks of pleasure going off inside of him. Very quickly followed by guilt for eating. He cut up the dumpling and put some of the vegetable filling in his mouth.

"Hey Pat" He said.

"What?"

He took his napkin and moved his tounge to push out the food onto it so it was seen clearly "I've never been hotter"

Patton covered his mouth with his hands to hide his chuckles "You're so gross"

"It's a lifestyle"

"It's grooOOOooOOoOssSs!!!" Patton exclaimed "At least it's better than the time I found you and Remus cutting up a frog"

"That frog was already dead when we found it" He pointed out while dissecting another dumpling "And it had lovely intenstines"

He dropped his fork "Please never mention intenstines while I'm eating"

"Noted...Want me to mention skin tissue instead?" He asked sarcastically.

Patton threw his napkin at Logan while pouting "Meanie"

He took the napkin and redid the chew and spit routine. Patton couldn't believe he was in love with this mess of a person. Still he couldn't help but wonder if Logan could ever like him back. Did he even dare to try and ask him.

Lev hadn't thought he was enough. Maybe Patton was so bad so that no one would ever be able to be together with him for long periods of time without seeing someone else on the side. Most of the people who asked him out only wanted him because they s*zualised his weight. Maybe he really was good for nothing romantic. Maybe he would just be alone forev-

"Pat! Pat! The waiter is here" Logan poked at his cheek forcing him out of his thoughts.

He quickly blinked away a tear and forced on a bright smile. The waiter looked at their table. The majority of the dumplings was in Patton's stomach but there were at least 4 cut up and taken apart dumplings with some parts laid acroos the plate and some parts in the napkins.

"Was the food not as desired?" She asked.

"It was great but I just so happen to be allergic to food. All of it" Logan lied. He put on a fake sad expression "It's hard you see I have to be tubefed every day. I'm so overjoyed I got to share this dinner with my life companion here. You must understand it's hard to scrape up money when I need so much medical help but we can try to pay"

"I can see if you can get a discount" She replied with an unsure tone.

"No! I can pay, it's okay" Patton felt bad for having to hold back laughter.

Eventually it ended with them getting a 50% discount. Logan looked very proud of himself. If Janus had been there he'd been impressed.

"You're very very big meanie Logie I hope you know that" Patton said once they'd left the resturant. He crossed his arms and pouted dramatically.

"I am aware"

He laid his arm around his friend's shoulder and leaned close as they walked. As expected it made Patton soften up and smile. The wind blew making the leaves on the side of the road fly around. They went in shades of yellow and dark green as autum had began to rear it's head in.

It had gotten a bit late. The streetlights were on illuminating the nearly empty road in a warm orange tone. Everything outside of the light was colored blue by the dark night sky. The moon wasn't visible and only a few stars far away could be seen.

Logan squinted up at the sky before pointing up at a specific point of stars "That's Andromeda" It was his favorite.

"No bear? I like the bear constelations. They're cute!" Patton could be a bear if he wanted to.

"Well the bears don't have any interesting mythology behind them and are therefore inferior. Andromeda symbolizes star crossed lovers. It symbolizes how Persesus saved Andromeda no matter what he had to do" Logan looked up at the stars while saying it.

There was a light blush on Patton's cheeks. He wanted to say that the star constelation could symbolise them. That he could be his Perseus. He would do anything to save Logan.

"My hand is cold" Logan said while holding out his hand "Want to perhaps hold it? To warm it up, obviously"

"YES! I....I mean yeah...sure....Sure cool cool cool"

He took his hand and intertwined their fingers. Logan continued to point out different stars as their hands absentmindledly swung between them. Even though he pointed at all of the beautiful stars Patton only looked at him.

"....Hey Lo...I-I think there's something on your lip"

Logan stopped and leaned down slightly so Patton could take it away. He lightly stroked his thumb over his lower lip. It was soft. He looked up and their eyes meet.

Patton moved up on his tippy toes to kiss him.

He kept their hands together but moved his other hand to cup Logan's cheek. Neither of them made an attempt to move away. Even though the night air was cold their lips were warm against each other.

The kiss ended and Patton took a step back. He had a soft smile on his lips. He squeezed his love's hand. Warthm filled his chest. The air was filled with warm love. Everything was perfect.

And then.

"What made you think I am interested in you?" Logan asked with a baffled expression.

Patton's eyes widned. He let go of his hand. A feeling of nausea took over as his thoughts became muddled and panicked. His lip trembled from holding back tears of shame as he for a moment simply stood there unsure of what to do. How could he have destroyed everything like this.

He turned and ran away.