“I’m starting to understand,” Reno said. “I can lie here and say you won’t experience that kind of cruelty with me, but I know my words cannot convince you. I will say the words anyway, as much as you need me to.”
“I don’t think you’d ever hit me.”
Reno fought a flinch and promised,“I wouldn’t.” He ran his hand over Luka’s arm, trying to be reassuring, but found his palms sweaty. “One of my biggest fears is that I would accidentally hurt you like that.”
Luka was quiet for a while, idly playing with the ends of Reno’s hair.
“I don’t think your friends would abandon you if you felt that way, either," Reno said. “If one day, you felt like I’d taken advantage of you, and you didn’t feel comfortable asking me for help returning home to August and your previous life, I’m sure they, and your other friends, would help you.”
“So they’ve said.” Luka sighed, still playing with Reno’s hair. “I’m not seventeen. I have a good support network. I have a family of my own making, outside of the one we’ll try to build. I think I’m just asking for you to be sensitive about it. Let me have my independence still. Let me work, and do things alone, and have my own world away from you too.”
“I love that you do. I admire it about you. I wouldn’t change it.”
“Really?” Luka looked up at him and the openness in his eyes took Reno’s breath away for a second. Luka wanted to trust him so badly; Reno could see it written all over his expression.
“Yes.” Reno kissed his forehead. “Don’t misinterpret my gift, though.”
“Your what now?” Luka blinked, a slow smile growing on his face.
“I got you something special, in case you said yes. Are you saying yes?”
“I am.” Luka nodded. “Will you be my boyfriend?”
“Of course.” Reno laughed, delighted that Luka beat him to asking the question. “I’ve been yours for a while now.”
“I know.” Luka beamed at him and Reno wanted to remember this moment forever. Luka sat up and asked, “So what’d you get me?” He ran a hand through his drying hair, pushing it away from his face. Reno loved how it dried a bit wavy and fluffy before Luka styled it.
“Hold on," Reno said, then rolled out of bed to grab the bag he’d tucked away in the kitchen.
Luka was sitting upright in the bed when he returned, looking expectant and cute in an oversized, worn-down Voltage t-shirt. Reno handed him the bag.
“You don’t have to accept it.”
“Pretty sure as long as it’s not an engagement ring, I’ll be keeping it.” Luka pulled the tissue from the top of the bag to remove the box inside. “Box is too big anyway. Definitely not a ring, thank god. I can’t handle deciding to move across the world, be your boyfriend, and get engaged on the same day.”
“So you’d say yes?”
“Don’t twist my words.” Luka gave him a dirty look and Reno sat on the edge of the bed, effectively humbled. He snapped the box open and looked confused for half a second before turning beet red. “I?—”
“Like I said, you don’t need to?—”
“Shut up.” Luka laughed awkwardly. “You got me a collar.”
Reno pinched his lips together but nodded an affirmation. Luka pulled it out of the box and held it up to look at it more closely. The thin black metal formed a seamless circle, and its sleek surface reflected the bedroom’s light. Luka’s face, other than being a lovely, flushed red, was hard to read.
“How does it open?”
Reno held out his hand and Luka handed it over.
“You can talk again.”
“There’s key for it, two actually. One for me, the pretty one. One for you, small to keep in your wallet in case of emergency.” Reno pulled his key from the box and showed it off. It hung from a black chain that he could wear tucked under his shirt. The key was also black, and the top of it curved into a heart where it hung from the chain.“It is hex key, so if you lose your key, a small Allen wrench will work too. Universal for safety.”
“That’s considerate.” Luka looked slightly more composed than before as he watched Reno use the key to unhinge the collar. “I like that I won’t have to rely on you to remove it.”
“I thought you would," Reno said. “I got you this because I knew you would like it, not because I am ownership over you. The key around my neck holds as much weight as this does.”
“I own you, you own me, you said. Equal exchange.”
