Prompt 9: finally home

Warnings: slight mentions of unsupportive families and homophobia, but like theyre happy!! theyre soft!!

Idk how old they are, theyve finished college at least i guess maybe theyre 20?? Idk whatever u think feels right

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Virgil fumbled with his keys, repeating to himself that, yes, he was currently trying to unlock the door to the right apartment and, no, today was not just a fever dream.

Finally he got the door open, immediately spotting his boyfriends shoes and jackets and several cardboard boxes with labels such as 'kitchen', 'books (astronomy)', Roman's clothes do not touch', and 'art supplies'.

Yes, this was definitely the right apartment.

Virgil kicked his shoes off, landing them in the pile of other shoes. He dropped his bag to the floor and dug for his phone charger before continuing towards the living room. He was slightly offended that none of his boyfriends had met him immediately, but they were probably busy.

The living room was empty, but the others had been productive during the day. They had rolled a soft and fluffy carpet out over the floor and managed to assemble a coffee table that was already covered with all the Disney movies they owned and at least two cups of (probably cold) coffee.

There was a couch that Virgil had no idea how they had managed to get up the stairs and into the apartment standing on the carpet too. The shelf right below the window was already crowded by small plants. Someone had begun to assemble a bookshelf but seemed to have given up in the middle, some tools and pieces of the shelves laying around on the floor. There were also at least fifteen more boxes stacked together, covering almost an entire wall.

Virgil stuck his head into the kitchen, finally finding one of his boyfriends. Logan was standing by the window, carefully placing more plants along the window shelf. At least ten more potted plants were covering the kitchen table. Logan turned around to face Virgil, likely having heard him approach. He smiled at the sight of him, something that always made Virgil feel all warm inside.

"Greetings, V, welcome home." He said, already striding over to where Virgil was standing in the doorway to press a chaste kiss to his lips. His words filled Virgil with giddiness. Home.

"Hi, where's the others?" He asked, letting his arms sneak around Logan, not letting him escape him so quick.

"In the bedroom I assume. They're trying to assemble the bed before nightfall." Logan said, pulling a face that made Virgil guess he did not have much faith in their progress.

"IKEA being difficult?" Virgil said with a grin, remembering the half finished bookshelf.

"Quite. After putting all the lights up I decided to make sure the plants got some sunlight, instead." Logan said, gesturing to all of them that he had been placing by the kitchen window.

"And you didn't shock yourself?" Virgil asked. He'd been mildly worried about that all day at work after Logan had texted him that he would make sure all their ceiling lights and etcetera was put up before he got home.

"I did not electrocute myself, as promised." Logan said, amusement tugging at his lips.

"Good. I would have kicked your ass." Virgil said. He finally let go on Logan, who immediately returned to his beloved plants. Virgil explored the kitchen, opening all the drawers and cupboards to see which were still empty and which had their stuff in them, trying to memorize where the cups and plates and bowls and everything was so far.

Of course Virgil already knew what the apartment looked like, they had all visited it and looked at pictures and everything, but now it was theirs. And his boyfriends, who had been able to take the day off, had been slowly filling it with their stuff and marking it as their home the entire day.

It was a little dizzying, yesterday he had sent all his stuff away and only this morning he had left his parents house and gone to work, and now he was going home to an entirely different place. They had all talked about it for so long, saved up money, dreamed about it, searched for apartments and houses and researched everything that someone might need to know, even way before they were dating. And now they were really making it reality.

He explored the rest of the apartment, peeking into closets and boxes and testing the lights, lastly finding himself in the doorway to the bedroom. His other two boyfriends were sitting on the floor by a partly finished bedframe of a gigantic bed.

They'd made sure to find one they could all fit in, all agreeing that they wanted to share. It had been... expensive, but it didn't matter if it meant Virgil was really going to get to wake up cuddled to his lovers for the rest of his life.

Roman was staring quizzically at an instruction manual that he was holding in one hand, muttering to himself. In his other hand three different kinds of screws were lying in his palm. Patton was lying down next to him on the floor, holding what Virgil thought were two tools of some kind. They both looked incredibly lost with the task at hand.

Then Patton noticed him and gasped, letting the tools clatter onto the floor as he sat up.

"Virgie!" Patton's expression shifted from confused to delighted instantly, and he reached out towards him, making grabby hands. Virgil chuckled, walking towards Patton and letting himself be pulled into the others lap, not complaining in the least when Patton peppered his face with kisses.

"I've missed you." He mumbled before burying his face into Virgil's hoodie, arms holding onto him tightly. Virgil kissed the top of his head, grinning widely.

"Missed you too, Pat. You two having fun with the bed?" He asked, Patton only groaning tiredly in response.

"This is the least fun I've ever had with a bed." Roman huffed, throwing the instructions at the big mattress that was leaning against one of the walls and putting the screws down by three small plastic bags with other screws in them.

Virgil pressed another kiss to Patton's hair before he slid down from his lap and crawled over to Roman, giving him an encouraging kiss.

"Come on, I'll help." He offered, wanting to actually do his part in furnishing and decorating their home. Of course he would have been around to help out if he had been able to take a day off work like the others, but he still felt slightly bad about it. And he almost felt a little left out, he wanted to help with making their apartment theirs.

"Yes please." Roman said, then pulling Virgil in for a more thorough and lingering kiss, that definitely left Virgil breathless and slightly disoriented.

"Right, um, instructions." Virgil said, after catching his breath and remembering what they were supposed to be doing. He reached for the manual that Roman had thrown away and they then spent the next hour figuring out how everything was supposed to go together and wrestling the mattress into place.

Then they all split up to go rummage through all of their moving boxes to find where they had decided to put sheets and pillows and blankets. For some reason the bedsheets had ended up in a box not labelled what it contained, making everything so much more difficult. But finally, their bed was assembled and neatly made, pillows and blankets in place.

Patton immediately ruined it by launching himself at it, laughing as he bounced slightly on the mattress. Roman flopped down next to him, stretching out to cover as much of the surface as possible.

"Yeah, this will be perfect." He said, sighing deeply before rolling over to his side and pulling Patton in for a kiss that quickly turned rather intimate. Virgil rolled his eyes at them, throwing one of the left over pillows at them.

"Guys come on." He said, faking annoyance that likely did a poor job covering up his fondness.

"Right, right, let's help Logan with all the kitchen things." Patton said, worming out of Roman's arms, making the other pout.

"Fiiine." They both crawled off the bed, Patton taking Virgil's hand and pulling him along.

They found Logan still in the kitchen, listening to a podcast on a little speaker that he had connected to his phone and putting cups in one of the cupboards.

"How come we have eleven cups but no glasses?" Was the first thing that Logan asked, showing the empty shelf below the cups.

"Oops?" Patton shrugged, grabbing one of the cups and filling it with water. "Cups are more important than glasses tho."

"I have yet to unpack the cutlery because we also do not have one of those boxes you can sort them into and I really don't want to just mix them in the drawer." Logan said.

"We're going to notice so many things we haven't thought of buying." Virgil stated, grimacing at the thought of all the future shopping trips.

"Bed is done. Are we going to order pizza? I'm not in the mood to cook." Patton said, and everyone agreed. They probably wouldn't find half the things needed for a meal, both when it came to kitchen tools and ingredients. Logan took care of ordering while Virgil went and laid down on the couch in the living room, draping himself across almost the entire thing.

He stared up at the ceiling, at the lamp he and Logan had bought and at the fairy lights that Roman had insisted on hanging on the wall where the tv would go once they bought it and figured out how to put it up. A bunch of blankets were thrown over the back of the couch already and the door to their balcony was ajar to let the warm spring air into the room.

It was still surreal that this was really theirs.

Sure, Virgil had helped collecting things and deciding on furniture, he had packed all his things from his parents house that he wanted to keep and sent them here, he had his own pair of keys and he would be helping to pay the rent.

But still, they had all dreamt of this for so many years that it was hard to believe that this was not just another wistful daydream.

But it wasn't, and this was their very own home where they could all make their own rules and hang their pride flags on the walls and never ever have to deal with disapproving or disappointed looks or downright hurtful comments from family members.

They had all finally gotten away from all that and now had the chance to live their lives exactly how they wanted to. They could live their lives together. Because even if they had all been dating for three years already it was not as if they had spent those past three years doing what straight couples did, like meet the others families and hang out together at each others houses.

Virgil's own family had been fine with him being gay, but polyamory? No, their son having three boyfriends had been too much for them apparently and he had to endure a constant of 'but you can't marry them all' and similar things that only served to hurt and make Virgil's relationship seem bad or doomed to fail.

Logan's family wasn't even happy about him being gay, just as Patton's parents who barely spoke to him since he came out a year ago. Virgil wasn't sure what was worse, parents who almost constantly ignored their kid despite living together, or parents who constantly voiced their disapproval and bigoted opinions.

And Roman's family? Roman wasn't even telling them he had moved until in a few days. They likely wouldn't notice anyway, and when they did he didn't want to be near them. They had no way of finding out where they had moved, and after telling them he had moved away he was going to block their numbers and all the social media accounts he knew they had.

"What are you thinking about?" The voice of one of his boyfriends pulled him out of his thoughts and Virgil stopped biting at his fingernails, instead reaching out for Roman who was leaning over him.

"Nothing, just... things will get so much better now, right? We have our own home, we are our family, no one else." Virgil said. Roman caught his hand, pressing kisses to his fingers.

"Yeah," Roman smiled, "we're finally home."

Patton and Logan then joined them in the living room, and Virgil was forced to sit up so they all could fit on the couch, cuddled together under two blankets while watching The Good Place on Patton's laptop until their pizza arrived.

Yes, Virgil thought to himself as Patton came back into the room carrying their pizzas and four plates, things would definitely get better now, and even if there were a lot of things they were still missing and even if they were going to live out of boxes for a few days or weeks and even if they were all in the process of cutting contact with their families, they had all finally found a real home.

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Written: 18th & 19th May 2021
Published: 26th May 2021
Words: 2195

Im good at forgetting to publish but anyway more is coming soon