Chapter Nine
Jack, I didn’t realize when the routines started to soften, when repetition turned into something like intimacy, but I hear you now in the small things: the bell over the door, the way I square the sleeves after closing.
Even when you’re not here, you’re folded into the record store with me, living in the quiet habits we built together.
Still here, Clyde
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Ellis learned quickly that routines only worked if he let them change, even slightly.
He’d spent most of his life before Issaky constructing systems so tight they left no room for surprise.
Every habit had been a brace, every repetition a guardrail meant to keep him upright.
But Issaky had a way of stepping into a pattern and messing it up without causing Ellis's life to crumble around him.
He treated routine less like a rule and more like a rhythm—something you could follow, break, and return to without consequence.
They didn’t announce when–whatever this was–started. There was no conversation, no agreement spoken aloud. One Thursday, they went out to dinner. The next Thursday, they did it again. By the third, it felt foolish not to.
Thursdays became dinner nights.
Not dates. Ellis never called them that outloud, not even in his head.
Dates implied expectation, implication, a direction with an ending he didn’t know if he wanted.
Dinner was neutral. Dinner was sustenance.
Dinner was something he could leave halfway through if his chest tightened or his thoughts started stacking too fast.
Except he never wanted to leave.
They rotated places. Sometimes it was the Thai place with the chipped blue plates and the owner who always tried to upsell dessert.
Sometimes it was a quieter spot with laminated menus and a television behind the bar that stayed permanently tuned to whatever sports season they were in.
One time the menus were sticky and Ellis was completely disgusted, refusing to touch anything ‘icky and sticky’ as he called it.
Issaky stood with a laugh and took the menus to the older man, requesting clean ones.
He had done it without being asked, and better yet, he didn't even seem to mind Ellis's quirks.
Most weeks after that Issaky let him choose where they were eating. When he couldn’t, Issaky picked without making it feel like a decision Ellis had failed to make. And that’s what scared Ellis the most. Someone willing to do things and make decisions for him when his brain couldn't.
Saturdays were for movies.
That happened even more gently. One offhand comment about something playing late on cable. Issaky said he hadn’t seen it either. A shrug. A pause long enough to be an invitation but short enough that it didn’t feel like pressure.
They watched movies every Saturday after that.
Always at Issaky’s place. Ellis noticed that detail only after the fourth week.
Issaky never pointed it out, never asked to switch locations, never suggested Ellis's apartment instead. Ellis suspected he had asked Clyde about his home situation. About his mother who took up their couch with beer bottles and smokes. Ellis was irritated at first, but then he began to know the dips in Issaky’s cushions.
He knew how far he could lean back before the lamp behind him cast a shadow too sharp against the wall.
Issaky’s apartment was more than nice. It was boujee, just as Ellis had expected.
The floors were a light washed wood and the walls were all painted off white with framed art, hard rock posters and pictures that looked like they were taken from an iphone.
It was an open concept with a large kitchen, featuring a bar and a spacious living room.
Ellis had never been in his room, but he would be lying if he said he hadn't thought about it.
Issaky would guide him into his apartment every Saturday at seven-thirty.
Never earlier. Never later than ten minutes past. Issaky would pull out his keys with the small penguin keychain he had gotten from the Woodland Park Zoo, and unlock the door.
Ellis liked that he could anticipate the sound of the metal penguin hitting the wood as Issaky unlocked it.
He thrived on it, though that word made him uncomfortable when he noticed himself thinking about it.
Thriving implied growth, motion, forward momentum.
It implied change. He wasn’t sure he believed in that, not for himself.
But he was better in those weeks. That was undeniable.
His sleep regulated. His appetite followed a predictable arc.
The buzzing under his skin—the low-level static that never quite shut off—quieted in the spaces between their routines.
He stopped bracing himself for things to end before they started. He stopped cataloging exits.
He didn’t call it love; he labeled it safe and exciting. Those words felt manageable. Those words didn’t ask anything of him in return.
Saturday December 12th, everything shifted.
They had been seeing each other for three months.
Ellis was shocked that Issaky had yet to get tired of his particular schedules and required routines, but he was happy to be spending nearly every day with the man.
They were watching something they’d both already seen.
That mattered, he thought. There was no pressure to follow the plot, no need to track dialogue or anticipate twists.
The movie played like background noise—familiar enough to let his attention drift without snapping back in panic.
Issaky sat beside him, close but not touching. The space between them was intentional, calibrated. They’d been here before. Many times. Their knees aligned. Their shoulders nearly brushed when one of them shifted.
Ellis cataloged how often he was noticing him. The warmth of Issaky’s arm through the thin fabric of his shirt. The way Issaky breathed—steady, deep, unselfconscious. The faint scent of soap and something citrus Ellis couldn’t place.
At some point, Issaky laughed quietly at a line they both knew was coming. The sound startled Ellis, not because it was loud but because it felt intimate—like a secret exchanged between them and no one else.
Ellis turned his head and their eyes met. The moment stretched—not in the crazy, cinematic way Ellis had always assumed these things happened, but gently, uncertainly. Like they were both checking for exits at the same time and finding none they wanted to use.
Issaky didn’t move closer. That was what did it. The absence of urgency. The lack of assumption. Issaky stayed exactly where he was, giving Ellis room to retreat or advance without commentary.
So Ellis leaned in.
The kiss was soft, almost tentative. Their mouths brushed more than they pressed, a question rather than a statement. Ellis felt the answer in the way Issaky responded—not by deepening it immediately, not by taking control, but by staying with him in that fragile middle space.
Issaky’s tongue brushed Ellis's lower lip carefully, forcing Ellis's breath to hitch. Ellis became acutely aware of his own body—the way his hands hovered uselessly at first, unsure where to land.
Issaky solved that problem by placing one of Ellis's hands for him, guiding it to Issaky’s shoulder, then letting go. Permission without instruction. He then rested his own hand on Ellis's hip and suddenly, his jeans felt thinner.
Ellis exhaled in relief while the movie kept playing in the background. He registered flashes of light, fragments of dialogue, but none of it stuck. His focus narrowed to the press of Issaky’s mouth, the warmth of his skin, the way his nerves flared and settled in waves.
They then shifted positions. Issaky turned slightly toward him, forcing Ellis's back to meet the arm of the couch. It felt inevitable rather than abrupt. Every change arrived with enough warning that Ellis's body could follow without panic.
He was aware, distantly, of the line they were crossing, but he didn’t want to stop.
Issaky broke the kiss, now hovering over him. “Are you okay?” he asked gently, eyes drifting to Ellis's mouth like he couldn't help himself.
Was he okay? Ellis had had sex in the past, none of it enjoyable—it had been more about feeling normal back then. Right then, though, his body felt like a live wire, in the best way possible. All the handholds and cheek kisses had led to this, and Ellis realized then that he was—
“More than okay.” Ellis beamed up at him before grabbing Issaky’s face and bringing his lips back to his own.
The moment their lips touched, everything felt right again.
Issaky’s hand met Ellis's waist as Ellis's fingers threaded into Issaky’s hair, surprised by how grounding the texture felt. Issaky’s hand found Ellis's buckle and paused.
Ellis wanted to groan in displeasure, but Issaky spoke before he could.
“Can I?” Issaky asked so politely that it seemed nearly impossible to tell him no, even if Ellis had wanted to. Which he didn’t.
Ellis nodded with half nervousness and half unfiltered excitement before Issaky smiled and placed one last kiss to his lips. Issaky’s head then dropped to look at Ellis's buckle, and Ellis watched in pure fascination as Issaky undid his belt with one hand.
“Do that often?” Ellis asked, without thinking. Issaky looked up with a smirk and went to say something, but Ellis cut him off before he could. “Don’t answer that.”
Issaky released a soft laugh before sitting back and glancing over Ellis's body. “Take your shirt off, El.”
Ellis shivered at the nickname–that no longer seemed to bother him–before pausing, ready to argue. But the dominance in Issaky’s voice made his stomach flutter. So he obeyed.