This chapter feels all over the place lmao

CWs/TWs: mention of starvation, talk about sex, and implication of sex (it doesn't go into explicit detail, and both characters are 18, but there's a bit of making out so be warned if you don't like that). Stay safe and enjoy!

.•°*°•.

"Mum, please-"

"No, I don't want to hear it, you brat!" she screamed at Mumbo, making him pull the phone away from his ear. "You're too flabby at the stomach and you need to lose some weight. A hundred and fifty pounds is unacceptable for a kid your age."

Mumbo groaned. "I know, but I'm starving," he whined. "I don't think fasting means starving myself."

His mum sighed. "You said you want some control in your life, right?" she asked, and Mumbo hesitantly agreed. "This is that control. Keep this up, and you'll be feeling better than ever, alright? I' just lookin' out for ya'."

"You locked all the food away so I can't get to it," Mumbo murmured.

"Because I care," she said bitter-sweetly down the line. "You don't want to be fat and unhealthy, do you?"

"...No."

"Right. And so this will keep you skinny. You trust your mum, don't you?"

Mumbo pursed his lips, then forced himself to smile. "Of course."

"Good. I'll even reward you with a small snack when you get home."

He closed his eyes to stop himself from crying. Eating sounded like heaven and hell at the same time, but he wasn't planning on going back any time soon. "I, uh... was actually planning to stay with my friend," he said nervously.

She scoffed. "Mumbo, I told you to stop going out to get drugs," she whined.

"I'm... not?"

"Whatever. Have fun getting drunk, bitch boy," she spat, then hung up on him.

.•°*°•.

"It's okay, Grian," Scar said to the door of the bathroom, where Grian was hiding to cry. "We'll always love you, with or without hair."

"Scar," Joel said tiredly, putting a hand on Scar's arm. "Let him be for a minute. It's a really big deal to him."

"Okay..." Scar was hesitant to walk away, chewing on his lip as he sauntered into the living room.

Mumbo came out of the office grumbling to himself as he typed on his phone, rolling his eyes. "'Have fun getting drunk, bitch boy,'" he murmured mockingly, pocketing his phone. "Hope you have fun getting railed by men you don't know, whore." He sighed and walked into the living room, smiling a bit when he saw Scar. The boy was just wearing his binder since it was so hot and the air conditioning broke. "Wow, I'm finally seeing you in that crop top," Mumbo joked, to which Scar laughed.

"I'm finally getting comfortable," the brunette said, leaning into Mumbo as the ravenette sat next to him on the sofa. "Joel talked to me about it. Apparently, he knew the whole time. But he said the way my body looks doesn't matter as long as I was comfortable with who I am as a person..." He smiled. "And I think I'm getting there."

Mumbo kissed Scar's head. "I'm so glad," he said with a fond smile. "How's Grian?"

Scar sighed. "He's in the bathroom having a meltdown about his hair," he mumbled. "He said he finally felt pretty and now he's ugly, but he's always been pretty so I don't get it."

Mumbo chuckled. "Yeah, but he has really bad self-esteem," he reminded his boyfriend. "And he sees himself differently than we do."

"I know, I just..." Scar groaned and shoved his face into Mumbo's shoulder. "I wish he could see himself the way we do."

Mumbo paused, feeling a sudden dizzy spell. "Me too, Scar," he said once the dizzy spell went away.

Weird.

.•°*°•.

"I promise, nobody will think of you differently," Joel said to Grian, who was sitting, half asleep from crying, in the corner of the bathroom.

Grian sniffled. "Don't wanna shave my head."

Joel sighed. "What if I did it with you?"

Grian's eyes widened. "What?"

"Yeah, I'll shave my hair off, too," the brunette said again. "Then we can go buy crazy cool wigs and have those instead."

Grian smiled a bit. "You don't have to."

"I want to." Joel reached over to rest a hand on the younger's shoulder. "I want you to not be alone."

Grian's eyes began to water again and he sobbed, reaching out for a hug that Joel gave without hesitation. "I'm sorry," he cried, confusing Joel.

"Sorry for what?" Joel asked.

Grian hiccuped. "F-for saying I hate you," he babbled into Joel's shoulder. "I don't hate you, I promise."

Joel huffed out a small laugh. "I know, buddy. I know." He rubbed Grian's back and waited for him to calm down (which took a bit longer than he thought it would) before helping Grian to his feet and getting the clippers out.

"Are you ready?" Joel asked, turning the clippers on.

Grian stared nervously at the clippers, nodding slightly. "Yeah..."

"You wanna go first?"

"Why not?"

.•°*°•.

"Hey, Jimmy," Scott said as they stared distractedly down at his phone.

"Yeah, babe?" Jimmy looked up from his own phone as he lifted his water bottle to his lips to drink from it.

Scott yawned. "Do you want to have sex with me?"

Jimmy struggled to not spit out his water at the question. He coughed, hitting his chest with his fist and trying not to choke. "Pardon me?"

Scott shrugged. "I was just wondering," he murmured. "I mean, I'm definitely not ready to have sex, but if I wanted to, would you want to?"

"I mean..." Jimmy, face quickly turning red, looked away. "I'm not opposed to the idea," he said, then snuck a glance back at his partner, who's cheeks were pink. "If you wanted to, of course. I don't want you to have a panic attack or anything because I made a move on you."

Scott smiled a bit. "I don't deserve you," he whispered, then crawled across to Jimmy's side of the bed to kiss him.

Scott had to admit, he did lie about not being ready. He wasn't quite past the trauma, but he was safer with Jimmy than he was with even Pearl. They knew there'd be no problems having sex with Jimmy, but they were content to cherish the somewhat (if at all) innocent relationship they had with him already. And, granted, it was a random and explicit thought, but he was curious if Jimmy would actually be up for it. And they were slightly surprised (though, not entirely) that he was.

"What if I asked to have sex right now?"

Jimmy's face got even redder, which was a shock considering the shade it already was, and Scott could practically see steam coming off of his head. "R-right now?" Jimmy stammered. "Like- right now, right now?" Scott nodded. "I thought you said you weren't- Ohh, you are very close..." Jimmy took a deep breath as Scott clambered into his lap and pushed him back against the pillows. "Wait, Scott, are you sure?"

"You said you'd be up for it," Scott said, then leaned down to kiss him sweetly, moving his hips against Jimmy's. They panted a bit when they pulled away from the kiss for air. "And I'm not against it."

Jimmy stared at them, still not looking fully convinced. "Are you sure?" he asked again.

"Positive."

"A hundred percent?"

"A million percent."

Jimmy nodded, wetting his lips, and shifted a bit to be sitting slightly upright. "Then what are you doing with your clothes still on?"

.•°*°•.

"I'm bald," Grian sobbed dramatically before blowing his nose obnoxiously loud into a tissue, laying sprawled out on the sofa.

Lizzie leaned over the counter to whisper to Joel, "What do you think his next mood swing will be?"

Joel nudged her with his elbow. "Liz, don't poke fun," he scolded, though he was smiling a bit.

Since Grian and Joel shaved their hair off, Grian started having extreme ups and downs where he would go from being ecstatic about the promise of silly wigs to way over dramatic about losing all of his hair. At the moment, he was doing the latter.

Scar and Mumbo gave up on comforting him a long time ago since he clearly didn't want it (he threw a fit over Scar trying to soothe him by playing with his hair and nearly punched Mumbo for trying to kiss him). He just wanted to be left alone to sulk.

"We need to go on a date," Scar said with a yawn. He stretched his arms out wide and arched his back as he did so, not missing how Mumbo stared at him. He winked and Mumbo blushed, turning his face away.

"Y-yeah," the ravenette agreed, clearing his throat. "A date. Doing stuff." He hummed to himself. "What kind of stuff would we do, actually?"

Scar shrugged. "Eat food?" he offered. "My friend Cub works at this café down the road from my place. They have cats there."

"A cat café?" Grian asked, wiping away the tears on his cheeks. "With real cats?"

Scar nodded. "Yep, and really yummy pastries," he said. "Cub also makes really good coffee but Nana says I can't have any until I'm twenty because caffeine 'makes me too hyper'." He said the last bit with air quotes.

Mumbo chuckled nervously. "Maybe we can go somewhere else?" he asked. "I don't think I'd be able to eat anything if we went."

Grian frowned. "What? Why?"

"Uh... my mum and I are fasting." Mumbo tried to smile, but it just looked sort of awkward. "It's this... It's this, uh..." He blinked slowly, suddenly feeling really dizzy.

"Are you okay?" Scar asked, moving closer to Mumbo on the sofa.

Mumbo rubbed at his eyes. "Yeah, I... I'm all sudden it feeling out of really," he mumbled, leaving his boyfriends confused.

"You're huh?" Grian blanked.

Mumbo blinked. "Hm?"

"Are you sure you're okay?" Scar asked a second time, and Mumbo nodded.

"'M fine."

"...Alright, if you say so." Scar backed off, but still stay close, and started talking to Grian about what they were doing in his architecture class.

Mumbo tried to listen, but suddenly found it way too difficult to concentrate and instead began to dissociate. He felt really tired, and his brain felt foggy.

"-mbo? Mumbooo? Babe!"

Mumbo blinked and looked up at Scar and Grian, who both looked panicked.

"Jeez, we thought you were dead for a second!" Grian said, lightly slapping Mumbo's arm, confusing him.

"Dead?" he echoed. "I'm not dead."

"Joel said dinner was ready and you just sat there and started blinking all funny," Grian said. "Are you okay?"

"I feel fine," Mumbo said, which was entirely true. There was no more fogginess or sleepiness, he was wide awake and alert. Weird. "But I can't eat, I'm fasting."

Joel seemed to materlialise in the peripheral of Mumbo's vision, startling him a bit. "When does your fasting end for the day?" he asked as Grian and Scar went into the kitchen to get their food. "I can save you some food for when you can eat again."

Mumbo blinked. "Huh?"

"When can you eat tonight?"

"I can't."

Joel narrowed his eyes at Mumbo. "Do you know how fasting works?" he asked suspiciously.

"Yes?"

"Explain it to me, then."

Mumbo chewed on the inside of his lip. "Uh, you... don't eat for a certain amount of time," he answered simply, and Joel nodded.

"Right, so when is that certain amount of time over for you?" the brunette asked. "Or are you on a strict schedule?"

Schedule?! Bloody hell does he mean, schedule?! "Um, yes," Mumbo said, then he wanted to slap himself. That was an either-or question, not a yes-or-no question!

Joel blinked. "You confuse me," he said with a sigh. "I'll just leave some in the fridge for you to eat later, I guess."

Mumbo let out a long breath of relief as Joel walked out of the living room.

I'll just feed the food to Duncan.

.•°*°•.

Angst, fluff, everything in between. What a varied chapter /lh

I did just finish this at 12:30 A.M., so uh... sorry if the end is obvious that it's written by a very sleep-deprived Vinnie lmaoo

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter, and have a wonderful rest of your day, or evening, wherever you are! Love y'all <33 /gen/p