Work Text:
He wasn't sure why he'd decided to stay late in the office, but he was starting to finally regret his decision as he cut ten seconds of unnecessary film from their latest bulk recording. He'd always found editing enjoyable, that was the reason he had decided to study a course that entailed a lot of editing at university, but that had been a more reasonable decision on his part, and not one made out of sheer boredom. He would much rather hang around in the office he shared with his two best friends, than go home to his empty, silent flat, which he did not share with his friends; at least, not anymore. It was too quiet in his flat, too lonely, lacking the usual noise and excitement and life that his two friends had once brought to the flat. He furrowed his brows as he edited in the correct picture in the corner of the video, the smudgy image of a man wearing a ridiculously curly wig and headband that would tell their viewers that they were watching Smith's point of view.
His phone buzzed on the table, just shy of his hand, and he glanced towards it, seeing the screen was lit up. Somebody was trying to call him, and upon closer inspection, he recognised Smith's caller ID on the screen. Why would his friend be calling him? He knew he was in the office, and generally hesitated to bother him when he was busy. They were so behind on editing, and with the December livestreams in full swing, he couldn't afford to let his work load build up any higher on the proverbial desk.
He swiped up his phone and answered the call with one hand as he continued to edit with the other, tucking the phone between his ear and his shoulder as he spoke into the receiver.
"Smith, mate, what's up? I'm still in the office." He frowned, dragging in the correct portion of Trott's gameplay recording into the edit. He would have to worry about matching up audio later.
"Are...are you busy?" Smith sounded hesitant, and when he listened really closely, Ross detected a slur in his voice, and the sound of loud voices in the background. He had a feeling that Smith had gone off to another bar, having had nothing much else to do. Ross pulled a face. Maybe the guy could try taking a turn of editing for once! He resisted the urge to bite Smith's ear off about pulling his weight where it was needed, and instead found himself sighing.
"Kind of? Trying to get some of this editing finished off. Mate, are you all right?" Smith sounded off. His voice was quieter than it usually was, which was especially odd considering his voice was slurred as though he'd been drinking, and alcohol generally made the man much louder. He could just imagine being face-to-face with the taller man, and grimaced at the thought of the smell of whiskey on his breath, his dark blue eyes hooded and his cheeks flushed red, as they always were when he'd drunk more than a little too much. He wondered if Trott was with him, and if, in that case, he would be okay. Considering he was calling Ross, of all people, for a conversation, the seated man assumed that Trott was not with Smith.
"Yeah, man, I'm... I'm fine. Just, I don't know. I was wondering if I could ask you a favour." Ross could just imagine his friend frowning, maybe rubbing a hand across his unshaven jaw as he spoke, a picture of concern. Was he okay?
"This isn't some sort of booty call is it, mate?" Ross grinned. "Dirty bugger!"
"What? No, no..." Ross half-expected Smith to snap back with some humorous, quick-paced and rather salty response, as always, but instead, he just sighed. God, was something actually wrong? "I was just wondering, I don't know. It's a bit weird here, and I don't have enough money to get home. Could you come get me?" A bit weird? Where exactly was he?
"Uh, sure. I mean, right now? Did something happen? Where are you?" He slumped his shoulders in defeat as he took the phone back in his hand, saving what little he'd managed to edit from their latest recording and closing the video editor with a sigh. He would have been pissed, if only Smith didn't sound so unlike himself.
"I...I'm fine. I think. I don't know. Can you just... Can you just come and get me, please?" He sounded almost desperate, pleading, which was also unlike Smith. God, how much had he had to drink? "I just... I don't know. I just want some company, I guess."
"I thought Trott would've been with you, or something?" Ross swapped the phone between his hands as he pulled his coat on over his hoodie, untucking the hood from under the thick black material, and grabbed his backpack from under his desk, leaning over to shut down his computer as Smith spoke.
"Why'd you... would you think I'd bring Trott out with me?" Smith sighed. His words tumbled over one another a little, another symptom of his obvious inebriation. "He's too busy with Katie, remember? New flat, living with his bird, ooh, what a fucking great time he must be having, eh?" Ross frowned at that as he clicked off the computer monitor atop his cluttered desk, before tugging his backpack higher onto his shoulder. Smith really was drunk, especially if he was talking like this. Ross knew he'd been a little funny since they'd all moved into flats of their own, closer to the office, just like he knew Smith well enough to know that he wasn't taking the loneliness of living in his own flat with nothing but his geckos to keep him company very well. At least, he wasn't taking it nearly as well as Ross had hoped he would.
"You know that's not fair, Smith." Ross said carefully. "That was bound to happen; we'd been talking him into asking her to move in with him for months, remember? And you instigated it, if I remember correctly." He imagined Smith pulling a lah-dee-dah face, and a smile crept onto his face. Smith was a salty bastard when he was drunk - more so than when he was sober, in fact - and luckily, Ross knew how to tread carefully, what to say and what not to say, to keep his friend happy.
He cast his mind back many months, to the memory of stacked boxes, bare walls, empty rooms, and games of "what the fuck is this in the back of my cupboard?", and reminded himself that the reason his friend had been so down recently was not because he and Trott had moved out into their own flats, but because he was simply lonely. He'd always been a better person when with company, and so to be by himself could only result in him being...well, like he was now, mumbling drunkenly down the phone to Ross as he left his shared office and stepped out into the corridor.
"I don't know, man, the whiskey here is... It's terrible. I don't know. I haven't drunk that much, I think? One or two. Or..." Smith went quiet for a moment. "Seven or eight. Maybe. I-I'm not sure, mate." Ross furrowed his brows. Smith had always been a heavy drinker, and the dark-haired man had a feeling his friend had had more than seven or eight.
"Where exactly are you, mate? I'm on my way just now?" He ducked his head into the livestream room at the other end of the corridor, the door squeaking obnoxiously loud as he glanced in to see Turps talking loudly into his microphone and furiously clicking the mouse clamped to the desk under his right hand. The bearded man glanced to the side as he ducked his head in, and grinned.
"Ross! Why are you still in so late? Thought you'd have been at home by now, mate." Ross cast a glance up at the screen on the wall, where he saw that Turps was livestreaming an odd little game about space; he had heard Teutron, Lewis and Simon leaving down the corridor and past his office a half hour earlier, and assumed that Turps was filling in for the trio whilst they took a break. He pulled a face upon realising that he had interrupted a livestream, and then muttered almost incoherently into his phone for Smith to hold on a second, before pulling the phone back from his ear.
"Editing, mate. Snowed under. What you playing, then?" He forced a smile onto his face as he leaned against the doorframe, watching the screen upon the wall as Turps struggled to manouevre a wildly-spinning spaceship towards a slightly larger, more stable craft.
"Heat Signature, man. Got an early access exclusive, so I thought I'd give it a whirl, try it out. Tried it yourself yet?" He glanced towards the camera which was settled atop his side of the livestream set-up, raising his eyebrows. "Ross Hornby's in the house, yo! Show him some love, chat."
"I can't stick around, but, er..." Ross stepped towards Turps hesitantly, ducking down and looking at the camera. He gave a quick smile and a wave, before stepping out of shot again, casting his eyes back to the screen.
"Can't stick around? What weighing responsibilities have you got then, eh? Probably picking Smiffy up from some bar, according to chat. 'Ey, you lot at home, you could write some more fanfiction about that, right?"
Ross's cheeks flushed pink at the thought. God, he'd heard enough about the fanfiction people wrote about he and his friends, never mind having read any of it; the mere mention of it had him flustered into silence for a moment, before he smiled again, looking down at Turps.
"We're on the stream tomorrow. You'll be able to see us then!"
"Ah, yeah, 'course. Musical Jam, right? Playing dem strings, writing dem songs - it's a behind-the-scenes exclusive, guys! You won't see that shit anywhere else. Apart from on the channel, but shh." He raised a finger to his lips, winking at the camera, and then turned to Ross again, grinning. "I'll see you later then, mate. Have a good one!"
"You too, man, enjoy the stream!" Ross smiled, before stepping back out of the livestream room, frowning. He had almost forgotten that he and his two friends were to stream the following evening, and grimaced at the thought as he raised his phone to his ear again. If Smith had drunk this much already, how was he going to make it through a livestream the next night, let alone a livestream where they would play music for six hours straight? Ross highly doubted he would make it through the whole session, and grimaced as he listened to the other end of the line, surprised to find that Smith was mumbling to himself, as though he hadn't realised Ross had ever taken the phone away from his ear.
"You still in one place, Smith?" He asked over the drunken man's mindless rambling.
"Wha-? Yeah, yeah..." He heard rustling, like Smith was shifting his phone from one ear to the other. "Y-You know that pub? The one with the really fit guy behind the bar." Smith laughed, and Ross blinked in surprise, unsure if his friend was joking or not. He'd never been too clued-up about his friends preferences, and preferred to leave it that way. His feet moved quickly down the stairs as he listened to his friend ramble on. "I went there, but like, they won't serve me now? What the fuck. Like, I've not...not had that much to drink, right?"
"It sounds like you've had more than enough, mate. Is it that place just down the road from the old flat?" Smith had enjoyed frequenting some old, grey-stone monolith of a bar when they had all lived together in their old flat, the place being at the end of the street they had lived on. It wasn't too far from Ross's new flat, but far enough from the office that Ross audibly groaned as Smith confirmed with a quick "uh-huh" that it was indeed the bar he'd thought of. "I'll be there soon, mate, all right? Just meet me outside, or whatever." He proceeded to hang up, but Smith spoke quickly, louder than before.
"Mate, wait!"
"What is it now, Smith?" Ross sighed in defeat as he stepped out into the chilly December air, digging in his coat pocket for his car keys as he cut around the back of the building and towards the car park.
"Can you... Can you stay on the...the thing? You know, the...whatsitcalled." He sounded confused, and Ross could just imagine his friend furrowing his brows, his deep blue eyes narrowed in unnecessary concentration. It was a sight he'd seen a lot - Smith's mind worked a lot slower when he was drunk - and it made him smile.
"It's a phone, Smith. And I can't, I have to drive - it's against the law." He imagined Smith biting his lip, and sighed. He was such a child when he was drinking. "Okay, look. I promise, I'll be there, ten minutes. Okay? Outside. I'll park the car, come get you. I need to hang up, but I promise, I'll be there soon. All right?" He unlocked his car, a sleek black BMW that he dared to say he loved almost as much as he loved his dogs, and slid into the driver's seat, dumping his bag into the passenger seat.
"Oh...kay. Sure. I'll just...just wait. All righty-o."
"See you soon." Ross hung up, sighing, fastening his seatbelt and dumping his phone next to his bag. A deep, worried frown found itself settling onto his pale features the entire time as he drove through dark Bristol streets, illuminated only by the obnoxious orange of streetlamps over the pavements, and his own blindingly white headlights on the front of his car.
It wasn't hard to spot Smith at the front of the dreary grey building; a tall figure, wobbling a little on his feet even as he leaned back against the wall for support, a grey beanie pulled over his auburn hair, biting his lip and glancing about him almost uneasily, blue eyes darting back and forth, back and forth. He pulled up to the kerb easily, winding down his window and leaning across the passenger seat to call out the window.
"Smith, mate, over here!" Smith didn't seem to notice, and Ross rolled his eyes, closing the window and killing the engine. It wasn't as though his friend had particularly bad hearing, he was just straight-up drunk, and when he was drunk, he was an ignorant, salty prick at best, and unconscious at worst. He just hoped he wouldn't be at his worst until after Ross got him home and safely into his own bed. With that thought, he shifted his bag and phone off the passenger seat, ducking out of the car and closing the door behind him, locking it for good measure. He didn't trust people in this part of town.
"Smith? Mate, it's me, Ross." Ross approached him slowly, carefully, studying him with worried icy-blue eyes, a frown across his features. Smith glanced up, and instead of looking as lost as he had seconds before, a crooked grin now spread across his features, and he raised a hand to wave, wobbling a little on his feet.
"Ross, maaate. Took your time! Been out here for...for-"
"For five minutes, Smith. I made sure not to take too long." Ross arched an eyebrow at his friend, and then cocked his head to the side. "Ready to go?"
"Go? Where?" Smith narrowed his eyes, furrowing his brows. "I'm kinda...kinda happy here."
"You need to go home, Smith. That's where."
"Oh. Home. Sure." Smith frowned, then, and cast his eyes down to the floor for a moment. "Do I need to?"
"Of course you do!" Ross sighed in exasperation. "You're pissed, Smith. I'll get you home, get you some water, and then we'll get you into bed, that sound all right?" Ross reached out to loop Smith's arm around his shoulders, and Smith grinned sideways down at his friend, winking.
"Get me into bed? Randy fucker. Don't you know it's...it's hiiiighly unethical to try take advantage of a...a poor, defenseless man like me when I'm under the influence." He raised his auburn brows as he said the last word, nodding.
"I'm not- I'm not trying to get you into bed, Smith, don't be ridiculous. I mean, you need to sleep. We've got that livestream tomorrow, and right now, you're legless." Smith stumbled as Ross walked him over to the car parked at the kerb, as if to back up Ross's point, and with his free hand, Ross unlocked the car, pulling open the door and all-but pushing the taller man inside, shoving down his head roughly so that he wouldn't hit it on the top of the car. Was it wrong that right now, he was more concerned about his car not taking a beating, than the drunken man sprawling out in the passenger seat, struggling to fasten his seatbelt? Maybe so. He dodged around the front of the car, slipping into his own seat and fastening his seatbelt.
"You know, you're a bloody idiot, Smith. Getting drunk, by yourself? And what if I hadn't been able to pick you up? What if something serious had happened? What if- Oh, for fuck's sake, let me get it." He stopped mid-rant to lean over, nudging Smith's clumsy hands out of the way and fastening his seatbelt for him. As he moved to lean back into his own seat, still scowling, Smith met his gaze for a moment, and then one of his larger, more tanned hands rested atop Ross's, stopping his movements in an instant.
"I'm sorry, I..." Smith leaned back against the chair, his eyes wide and sad for just a moment. He looked lonely. Lonely and helpless, and extremely drunk, and something in Ross's gut jerked at the sight. He didn't like seeing his friend sad, didn't like seeing him like this. Smith was the funny one, the salty, dirty-minded one, the handsome one, the one that made everyone laugh and cringe and fawn; he wasn't meant to be the sad one, or the lonely one, or the apologetic, quiet one. "I wasn't thinking, okay? I-I..." His eyes rolled back to look at the car's low roof, and his eyelids drooped shut for just a moment.
Ross realised after a moment that his friend's hand was still resting on his own, and slowly moved to pull it away, eyes still locked on his friend's bearded face, on the frown stretching downwards where a grin should have been placed.
As Ross withdrew his hand, Smith's eyes flickered open, and he looked at the dark-haired man again. "Just f-for a minute. Please, mate." Ross bit the inside of his cheek anxiously, glancing down at his friend's hand again, before slipping his hand back into place, back underneath Smith's own. It was cold, freezing cold, against Ross's much warmer hand, and he moved his other hand to settle on top of Smith's. He was just warming up his hands, he told himself. Nothing else.
"I worry about you, you idiot." Ross forced a smile onto his face. His voice was much quieter, much softer, than it had been before. "You shouldn't go out by yourself like that, not if you don't have any definite way of getting home again. What do you think Trott and I'd have done if we'd shown up to the office tomorrow, and thought you'd just skipped the stream? We wouldn't have known you got lost, drunk, in the middle of Bristol." He met Smith's eyes again. "You're such an idiot, Smith."
"I know. I know. I just." He looked out of the front window of the car, down the empty street. "It's quiet. Lonely. Sometimes it's easier to just...I don't know. Go out, find some noise. Find some life, some company. I don't like living by myself, mate."
"I imagine you wouldn't." Ross agreed with a sigh, and squeezed Smith's colder hand between his own. It was beginning to warm up, finally. He studied his friend's faraway expression, seeing how the gingery hairs had started to grow back in on his cheeks and jawline, how his mouth turned down at the corners in a slight frown, how his eyebrows furrowed slightly as he looked out the window. His eyes shifted ever so slightly to the side as Ross squeezed his hand, but then he was looking out the window again, his gaze trained on some faraway object that Ross wasn't entirely sure Smith could even see properly, in his inebriated state.
"I'm really...really s-sorry, Ross. Really. I-I don't know. It's stupid- Why am I getting like this?" He bowed his head, breathing out slowly through lips parted a fraction of an inch, and closed his eyes. Ross lowered his gaze to the hand balled up into a tight fist in his lap, and squeezed Smith's other hand again, more firmly than before, hoping to appear reassuring. "Is it bad that I...I don't want to go home? I don't want to be on my own. That sounds really dumb, doesn't it?"
"No. It doesn't." Ross assured him, forcing the corners of his mouth to turn up slightly when Smith looked at him. His eyes didn't stay in one place for long, searching around his expression for something, anything, and Ross wasn't sure what. What was going on in Smith's head right now, he wondered, to create that expression on his face? His cheeks were lightly flushed a faint pink, and his lips were parted, chapped and red from having been bitten anxiously.
Smith chuckled awkwardly, then, and Ross realised that his gaze had lingered on his friend's lips for a second too long. His eyes darted back up to meet Smith's aquamarine depths, and found his own cheeks burning as he saw that his eyes were centered on his own lips. His tongue darted out to wet his lips anxiously, and Smith's gaze left his mouth, meeting Ross's gaze again.
"Smith? What's wrong?" Ross asked, and cringed slightly as his voice cracked.
"Alcohol makes me feel...feel really fucking gay, Ross. I swear to god- Have your eyes always been that bright? God..." Ross's cheeks burned hotter at his friend's words, and he dropped his eyes down to their hands, embarrassed.
"Don't say shit like that, Smith. It's...it's embarrassing, eugh." He didn't move his eyes from their hands, not until he felt a hand in his hair, fingers carding through the short black spikes of his unkempt hair. He closed his eyes for a minute, sighing and leaning into the contact.
What was he doing? Smith was drunk, and dammit, the guy might have disliked physical contact when he was sober, but drunk Smith really liked it. With Smith's hand in his hair, his own hands still holding onto the drunken man's own, sitting so close that he could feel the man's breath on his face, smelling strongly of the whiskey he had been drinking all evening, he was beginning to wonder who exactly was the idiot here. He would have cringed under any other circumstances, but dammit, Smith's hand in his hair felt so nice, and they were so close, and- Hell, he had to stop this, but he couldn't, he couldn't pull away, couldn't sit back in the driver's seat and put the car into drive and take Smith home, not when he was like this, when they were so close, when his cheeks were burning and he was too embarrassed to ask Smith what the hell was going on.
Was the fluttery, stirring feeling in his gut normal? What about his burning cheeks? The fuzzy feeling in his head? Reluctantly, he opened his eyes again, meeting Smith's burning blue gaze, trained on his eyes.
"Smith? What's... What's going on, here?" His voice was low, shaky, and Smith moved his hand in Ross's hair down to Ross's cheek, where it rested against his unshaven jaw.
"I don't know, mate. I- Have you always been this red?" Ross moved a hand from atop Smith's, wondering whether or not to remove Smith's hand from his face as he placed it atop the taller man's. This was wrong, and Smith was drunk, and dammit, it wouldn't be right to act on this now when Smith didn't have a clue what he was doing. But would he have another chance at this? Would another opportunity ever arise, when Smith would be touching his face like this, or holding his hand and threading his fingers with his, or staring into his eyes like this? It was so casual, so simple, and it had Ross flushing a deeper shade of scarlet as he looked helplessly up at his friend.
"You're really drunk, Smith. This isn't right-"
"It's weird, you can look good even when you're tired. Like- I don't know, mate. You must be pretty...pretty fuckin' sick of me acting like this. You must be tired- Dammit, you look tired. I'm sorry. But- Hell, I love your eyes." His blatant honesty had Ross flustered and embarrassed into a nervous silence. "I can't stop looking at them."
Ross wanted to tell his friend to stop looking at him with that damn look on his face, part-confusion and part-drunken wanting, as if Ross was some admirable, lustworthy thing which had been presented to Smith, like a glass of water presented to a man after days without hydration. But, instead, he found that he couldn't stop looking at Smith, couldn't tear his eyes away, couldn't bring himself to open his mouth and tell his friend to piss off, couldn't pull away and compose himself and drive Smith home like he had initially intended to do. God, this was wrong. This was really wrong.
He wasn't sure what drove him to do it, but his eyes slipped closed, and he threaded his fingers through Smith's where it rested against his cheek.
"This is really wrong, Smith. I shouldn't be- We shouldn't do this. You're drunk and- It's wrong, Smith." His voice was a coarse, uneasy whisper, and he heard Smith chuckle uneasily.
"Sorry, but I don't give a shit, mate." And then, a pair of lips were on his own, and any ounce of sense in his brain was lost as he leaned into the feeling of Smith's mouth on his, moving his hand from his cheek to rest on the back of Smith's head, grasping desperately to remove the beanie from his head to card his fingers through his thick auburn hair. Smith took his hand away from Ross's to cup the shorter man's face with both hands, deepening the kiss as his tongue slipped across Ross's lower lip, requesting entry which Ross granted without delay, falling into familiar motions as they kissed, as though they'd done so a million times before. To say a million was an exaggeration, though, and Ross's cheeks heated up unceremoniously as he was reminded of the kisses they had shared in the past, when both men had been equally as drunk as the other, as senseless and reckless as Smith must have felt in that moment. Ross had tried to block them out, tried to pretend they hadn't happened, but- Dammit, it was becoming increasingly difficult to forget the feeling of Smith's hands on his body, of his lips on his and his tongue in his mouth, as he experienced those feelings all over again, all creating a stirring feeling in his gut that he felt he needed to appease, needed to satiate, before it was too late and Smith came to his senses and realised he was kissing his best friend.
He was pulled from his reverie as Smith groaned into his open mouth, the sound hot and flustered and desperate, and Ross realised with an embarrassed, heady laugh that Smith was a little too excited, considering they had only shared a drunken, sloppy, messy kiss. At least, it had felt drunken and sloppy and messy to Ross, who pulled back after a moment to compose himself, pulling a hand through his dark hair and smiling uneasily at Smith.
The taller man flopped back against his seat, sighing, his breathing heavy and his eyes closed, his hand dropping to meet Ross's in between their seats. His fingers threaded through Ross's and he held the man's hand tightly, squeezing it and smiling drunkenly.
"Call me a fucking idiot, but- Well, your place or mine?"
Ross studied the man's expression, full of bliss and excitement and drunken pleasure, and a part of his brain, the part still harbouring what little common sense he still had left in him, screamed at him to say no, to drive Smith home and not act on his ridiculous feelings and leave it at that. Smith would regret all this in the morning, if he could remember any of it, and Ross didn't want to create any problems - well, any more than their kiss would have already created.
But there was another part of his brain, a much larger, much more excited part, which reminded him of the uneasy feeling in his gut and the need for some sort of pleasure, some sort of feeling, a release from all the work he had done that day, and he smiled crookedly at Smith as he turned the key in the ignition, changing to the right gear as he pulled away from the kerb.
"Fuck it. Mine. Why not?"