"Why would I act like you're broken? You're perfect."

"...I mean I also have kind of a lot of rape in my backstory." 

Hugs. "I-- want you to be safe but. I don't actually think that makes you less perfect."

"Is there a reason it would make you any less perfect?" 

"I question the idea that I'm perfect! I have massive anxiety issues and I'm afraid that everyone hates me and I have imposter syndrome and when people are wrong I tend to yell at them about it and I'm a workaholic and also I'm bad at everything."

Yep. More hugs. "You know I'm not perfect either, right? And if it's that obvious that I'm not broken I don't know why you'd be broken." 

Wow. A lot of people are staring at them in this doughnut store. 

"--Maybe we should save this conversation for when we're in private."

"— yeah. Good plan." He glares at one of the people staring particularly obnoxiously until they stop. 

It's like no one in Heaven has seen traumatized queer kids before. 

"I wonder what there is to do in Heaven."

"No idea. I should probably go back to your house and put real clothes on." 

"Yeah, we can check if Asher has burned down the place."

Asher has not burned down the place. He is eating a bagel, perhaps on the principle that it is impossible to burn bagels. 

"Hi, Lev. Who's that?"

It is definitely possible to burn a bagel. "I'm Sasha." 

"Nice to meet you. Were you here this morning? I was kind of distracted by almost setting the house on fire."

Asher is charming. He looks at Sasha like Sasha is one of the most important people in the world and he's fascinated by everything Sasha has to say. His smile is broad and joyous and makes you want to give him what he wants so that you might see it again. You can see why he was a politician. 

Sasha, as a rule, does not trust immediately charming men, impulses to give people whatever they want, or politicians' smiles. "I was." 

"Were you planning to talk to me about this at some point?"

"...No, not really."

"I am your soulmate, I think that really ought to mean that you at least talk to me before you fork someone else. --What. Why can't I say fork?"

"It censors swear words. We did not in fact have sex, although the position my soulmate took on the matter was that we had met yesterday and she had no particular claim on my time and I'm inclined to agree with her." 

"I don't want to be your soulmate because you are a dictator who imprisoned your political opponents!"

"I did what I had to do to make sure my country was stable and developing. I had a plan for transitioning my country to a liberal democracy before I was assassinated." Classical music starts playing; his mouth moves but no words come out. "God forking dime it!"

Okay, he's smiling a little bit. "That's not generally the axis on which people decide whether they want to be in a relationship with someone," he observes. 

"I don't know how I'm supposed to convince you I'm not evil if every time I explain why I did the things I did it turns my words into classical music."

He puts his head on Lev's shoulder and holds Lev's hand, which seems much more productive than trying to respond to Asher. 

"I think 'I don't want to date evil people' is a reasonable boundary."