"...that makes sense but I'm not sure I can imagine not liking you for being too sensitive." 

"...You like me?"

He sounds earnest and a little surprised.

"Maybe we can figure out what our roots are together. Personally, I am leaning towards a lurid tale of parental abuse, because fuck my parents."

"Course I do." He is slightly uncomfortably aware of just how much he likes Lev.

"I'm not sure I trust them not to tell my parents if I go that route, and I do need to deal with them, I'm seventeen." 

"Is peer rejection plausible?"

"People don't usually like me."

Lev is smiling directly at Marlo and it lights up his whole face.

"I have no idea why." 

Lev has the most lovely smile. 

"I think I might go for lack of appropriate same-gender role models, I could sell peer rejection but I like Natalie too much to throw her under the bus like that." 

"That's not gonna get you shit from your parents? --Were they divorced, I bet you could sell divorce."

"Is that sarcasm?"

Marlo is making a face at him and it feels like warm liquid is filling his entire body.

"It isn't! I like talking to you, and you're really good at teaching." And you're small enough to hold and I want to make sure nothing ever makes you sad again, he doesn't say, because that would be weirdly intense and probably would freak Lev out. 

"They are not divorced, more's the pity, it's easier to hide things from people who aren't talking to each other, but when I was a kid all the men I idolized were, like, David Bowie." 

"David Bowie turned you gay? He'll be so proud."

"Thank you. I like you too. You're patient and kind and you try really hard and you want to be a good person." And you have the kind of abs that until now I thought were made up by Hollywood as an unrealistic beauty standard, he does not say, because he is trying really hard not to be gay.

"David Bowie, Interview with the Vampire, there's a handful." 

"Thank you!" 

He's glowing. 

The warm liquid feeling has gotten stronger and turned into a sort of electricity dancing on his skin. 

"Want to sit together today?"

"Oh, if you're modeling yourself after Interview with a Vampire, do I have to be worried you're going to drink my blood?"

"Of course not, I'm not Lestat I'm Louis. Clearly." 

"Sure!" 

He should maybe not sit with Marlo because Marlo makes him think extremely homosexual thoughts. 

But on the other hand Marlo is progressing really far in his recovery from homosexuality and is not going to kiss him, and Marlo likes him. 

Does Marlo want to hear about Brandon Sanderson.

"I might be disappointed!"

Marlo would love to hear about Brandon Sanderson! 

He is.... conflicted about how much he wants to listen to whatever Lev has to say, when Lev isn't right there, but when Lev is right there that seems much less salient. 

"Well. Not like Louis never bit anyone." He would love to punctuate that sentence by kissing Asher, but.