Clearly Dev knew a lot about Eternal Solace based on what he’d read, because he was taking this all so seriously. He seemed thoughtful still, even trying to make light of the situation.
“Oh?” Leaf asked, happy to steer the attention away from his childhood.
“Oh yeah.” Dev grinned. “See, I reckoned I had it in the bag.”
“That’s arrogant. Now I want to know more,” Leaf said, grinning, letting him know everything was fine, that he wasn’t upset, really. Dev seemed to be reading him very intently, so careful with the subject.
“Yeah, so, you know how we’re both adopted, right, Angel and I?”
“Yeah, I assumed at least one of you was because I’ve seen your brother and you look nothing like each other.”
“Uh-huh. He speculates he’s ‘triracial’—his word, not mine.” Dev snorted. “Honestly, he doesn’t know much about his origins either, but that’s his story, not mine.” He brushed his hair off his forehead and looked at the dogs, smiling. “You know how you’re literally twice my age?” He turned to look at Leaf suddenly, something in his eyes making the protective instinct in Leaf jump to attention.
“I think we’ve established that,” he replied, attempting at flippant yet gentle, not sure if he actually managed to come across as such.
“Well, I’m twenty-five now. That means that I’m about twice as old as my birth mother was when she had me.” Dev looked away.
“Jesus,” Leaf breathed out the word. “That’s….”
“Horrible. Shocking. Sad as fuck.” Dev snorted bitterly. “I know.”
“Wh—actually, you don’t have to tell me anything more if you don’t want to,” Leaf said quickly, completely unable to hide his dumbfounded body language.
“I don’t really know much. I guess I could find out if I wanted. My parents told me they had some paperwork that had some answers if I wanted them. That was when I turned eighteen. They told me again when I turned twenty-one. There’s not much, apparently. My birth mom was too young, so to protect her as much as me, everything is sealed. She was….” Dev swallowed hard, his gaze jumping from the dogs to the landscape to Leaf and back to the dogs. His body, oddly enough, remained still. “I know she was sold by her mother. Grew up in a drug den, basically. Then got sold to whomever for drugs. There’s no way of knowing who the sperm donor was, you know?”
The question sounded rhetorical, so Leaf just nodded. He got up and rounded the rock to sit next to Dev, then pulled him into his arms.
Dev burrowed in a little, sighing as he seemingly forced himself to relax.
“She was a victim, my birth mom. I don’t know if she was… sane. At the end. By the time I came along. That’s why I don’t want to know more. What if she’s better now and I find a way to contact her and just fuck her up, you know?”
“I like the idea that the papers are still there. Safekept by your parents, right?” Leaf spoke quietly. Dev nodded against his shoulder. “You don’t need to do anything you don’t want to, but if you change your mind about wanting to know later, you can.”
“Exactly what my mom said. My dad… well, he tries to be as neutral as possible. Offers support but stays mostly quiet about this.” They just sat for a moment, and then Dev said, in a thoughtful voice, “I had a lot of therapy as a kid. I stopped going only a couple of years ago. I have anxiety issues, but that’s about it these days.”
Leaf felt like he was supposed to open up now as well, and it made him oddly uneasy. “I have some nightmares. That’s about it. I mean, I should probably get therapy too, at least my sister seems to think so….” He swallowed hard, feeling awkward.
“I think everyone has their own process. It’s not like you have to do anything. But just… it helped me. A lot.” Dev seemed to be done with the discussion.
Leaf cleared his throat. “Did your brother have paperwork like you too?”
“Yeah. He looked up his birth mom a few years back. She’d passed away from an overdose couple of years after he was saved. There’s some more details, but as I said, his story, not mine.”
Leaf made a noise in agreement. “I think it’s amazing what your parents did. Taking in both of you.”
“Apparently there was a spike in the system that year. Lots of little kids coming in, lack of resources. I assume they donated a shitload of the money my mom inherited. I mean, Dad had already started Nemo Gaming by then, but they weren’t huge yet. Anyway, we’re lucky, Angel and I.” Dev relaxed against Leaf finally, almost going boneless as the conversation came to an end.
“Thank you for telling me,” Leaf said softly into Dev’s hair.
Dev pulled away to look at him and smiled. “Same, Leaf. You know that, right?”
“It wasn’t much—”
“No, but it’s not something you can just go telling around, right? So, thank you for trusting me with it.”
Leaf smiled back at him, gaze going from Dev’s eyes to his lips and back. They were so close, the connection suddenly sizzling between them.
It was Dev who closed the distance between their lips and pressed his to Leaf’s carefully. For a moment Leaf lost himself in the kiss. It felt like coming home, like it had felt kissing Seth a decade ago when they’d met for the second time.
