Work Text:
“Oh, this one is just darling.”
“What about this one? Does it make me look more sexy, or more badass?”
“Mm… I think it makes you look both.”
Shopping is one of the rare instances where Velvette and Valentino get along like a house on fire. Where they can put aside their bickering and dedicate themselves fully to making every other shopper’s experience, as well as the day of every clerk or shop keep they lay their eyes on, absolutely fucking miserable.
As a concept, Vox finds it endearing. Even when they decide to send him the bill for it— if that many zeroes is what it takes to get a little peace and quiet in his life for once, then it honestly seems like a small price to pay.
The reality of it, when he’s caught in the middle?
Less so.
He doesn’t even know how many stores they’ve been in at this point. It feels like they’ve covered the whole shopping centre twice, and yet Vel and Val keep finding new stores to screech over and run into while Vox traipses along behind, wishing the two of them hadn’t forced him into this shopping trip because he needed to ‘relax’ for once.
As if there’s anything relaxing about this!
Especially when he’s the one who’s stuck carrying the fucking bags!
Don’t they have employees for this?!
They probably do, but Velvette and Valentino would prefer to shove all of their shopping in his direction and let him waddle after them, arms absolutely dripping with shopping bags, boxes precariously balanced in his arms, and knees shaking with the effort of carrying so much stuff without dropping all of it.
“Vox, does this make my ass look big?” Val asks, and maybe an hour ago Vox would have given him an ‘honest’ answer (which is to say, whatever answer Valentino is looking for, because he doesn’t feel like cleaning up the mess he would make in the midst of his tantrum), but instead he says,
“Val, I can’t see your ass through all of the fucking shopping I’m carrying! Are you two done yet?!”
“Ugh, really, Vox?” He can’t see Velvette but he knows the bitch is rolling her eyes at him. “I know you haven’t updated your wardrobe since the last time I forced you too, but aren’t we all about image? I’m a fucking fashion designer, I can’t be seen walking around in last month’s rags.”
“Voxie, baby, you need to work on that anger of yours,” Valentino says with a click of his tongue which he knows is just meant to rile him up, because hearing that from Val of all people makes him angrier than he could possibly imagine. The fact that Valentino starts laughing a moment later just proves it. “If you’re that pissy, just go find a bench to sit on somewhere. We’ll find you when we’re done.”
Which could be fucking hours from now, Vox thinks, but he doesn’t say anything out loud, because knowing his fellow Vees just the suggestion of that will make them do it out of pure spite.
He’s definitely considered the bench angle. All of these fancy high-end clothing stores have to have a husband chair or something for him. But the thing is—
He really needs to piss.
Normally that wouldn’t present a problem, but this is Hell. He knows Vel and Val are too wrapped up in their little private fashion show to watch their own stuff, and without someone else around to do it, some idiot who doesn’t know who they’re stealing from (or who does know and just has a death wish) would be all too happy to swipe it and take off while they have their backs turned. He doesn’t think he’s going to be able to carry everything to the bathroom, either— not to mention the shit the two of them would give him for dropping their precious designer shopping bags on a piss-soaked bathroom floor.
This is why Vox does all of his shopping online.
He doesn’t even know how long he’s been holding it now, but the answer is too long. The cramping in his bladder is insistent and painful, and that’s certainly not doing anything good for that temper Val pointed out, even if he was taking the piss (bad choice of phrasing) when he said it.
He just wants them to finish this stupid shopping trip so they can load their shit in the car and he can find the nearest bathroom.
“You know, I just don’t think blue is my colour…”
“Oh, fuck off, Val. You look hot in anything you wear.”
“You think so?”
Vox grits his teeth. He can’t help but think that the two of them are conspiring against him, that they’re doing this on purpose just to torment him. That’s the other reason he refuses to just drop everything and go.
It would feel like admitting defeat.
Instead, he’s just going to stand there and suffer like the jackass he is, listening to the two of them go back and forth about the same five outfits as though they’re not just going to buy all of it end up throwing half of it out without wearing it in spite of that massive price tag.
“Do you think the platforms are tacky? I don’t want anyone thinking I’m trying to be taller just because you two chumps are massive.”
“All the better to step on everyone with, Vel.”
The worst part is, Vox can feel the exact moment when he’s losing the fight. The precise moment when squeezing his thighs together and cursing Velvette and Valentino in his mind using the kinds of words he wouldn’t dare use out loud even in Hell is no longer enough to stem the tide.
He really shouldn’t have slammed that energy drink before they’d started this day (and then several cups of coffee, and then that way too expensive smoothie Velvette had forced him to try and also pay for), but how was he supposed to know they were going to shop for an entire fucking day?!
(You know, besides his experience with them shopping for an entire fucking day every other time they’ve ever gone shopping.)
Vox holds onto it as long as he possibly can, but he’s fighting a losing battle, and the moment that battle is lost something almost seems to snap.
The relief his body feels at finally letting go as he pisses himself right then and there, standing in the middle of an expensive fashion boutique that Val and Vel seem intent on cleaning out down to the rack, is met in equal measure by the dawning horror and humiliation he feels at the fact that he just pissed himself in an expensive fashion boutique.
Is still pissing himself, actually! He’s been holding on so long that it just keeps coming, soaking all the way through his underwear and pants and making a big wet stain— and then running down his leg all the way to the floor below.
Vox is frozen in place, too terrified of anyone realizing what he’s just done to be able to even think a way out of this mess. If there even is a way out of this mess that doesn’t involve killing himself right then and there.
Maybe if he doesn’t move at all, no one will notice and he can get away with it, getting out of there before anyone is the wiser—
He doesn’t see Valentino, not through the mountain of packages he’s still managing to hold in spite of how hard he’s shaking in his combination of desperation and embarrassment, but he hears him dramatically sniffing the air like he’s some kind of bloodhound instead of a fucking moth.
“Do you smell that?” His voice is dripping with disgust, as though this is the worst thing he’s smelled in his life, in spite of the fact that Vox has watched enough of his pornos to know that he’s around way worse smells all day.
“Ugh,” Velvette makes a matching noise of disgust. “Why does it smell like someone just—”
Even though he can’t see them, Vox can feel their eyes on him.
It takes a lot to make Vox feel self-conscious. There’s a reason he plasters his face on every screen in Hell, after all. But having the two of them looking at him like they’re burning a hole right through their pile of purchased packages makes him wish a hole would open up in the floor and swallow him right now.
He would almost rather deal with Alastor right now, at this moment of humiliating defeat. At least then he wouldn’t have to worry about what the other person thought of him.
The warmth of his own piss suffusing his pants and running all the way down his leg is nothing compared to the heat in his face. He thinks he’s going to overheat and fry himself in the process, and he’s sure his screen is entirely pink by now. Fuck, why couldn’t he have just dumped all of their stupid purchases on the fucking floor and told them it was their fault if anyone stole them? Sure, he’d have to deal with them bitching if it did happen, but—
“We need the car to the doors. Now. No, I don’t know what doors— isn’t that your job? Figure it the fuck out!”
Vox is so wrapped up in his own head that it takes him a second to realize Velvette is talking to someone on the phone, and a second later, she pops out of nowhere around the pile of packages and grabs him by the back of his suit jacket, literally dragging him out of the store.
She might be small, but size isn’t everything.
“V-Vel, wait—” There are packages falling out of his arms as she drags him towards the doors, which thankfully aren’t far away. It’s only when one tumbles out of the carefully constructed front wall of the package fort he’s built in his own arms that he’s able to see past the pile and can see that Val is dutifully following behind, picking up all of the dropped packages— seemingly not caring about the trail of yellow left behind as Vel drags Vox away.
Considering Valentino hasn’t done anything ‘dutifully’ in his entire life, as far as Vox knows, it’s kind of a weird thing for Vox to witness. It’s almost enough of a surprise to snap him out of the humiliating situation he finds himself in.
Not quite enough, though, because a moment later he’s being promptly shoved into the back of the limo— apparently, their drives managed to figure out the right exit— and all of the rest of the packages go tumbling to the floor.
Velvette clambers in after him, and Valentino does as well, folding himself up the way he always needs to any time he gets in a car.
“Wh-wh-where to, Miss—”
“Just take us the fuck home, Charles!”
Velvette immediately slams shut the window separating them from the driver, likely so that they can’t be seen or heard— and probably also because she just doesn’t want to deal with Charles.
Vox has no idea what to say. His mouth flaps uselessly, and he doesn’t know whether he’s supposed to be grateful or ashamed. He also has questions.
“Did you two—”
“Shut up, Vox. What the Hell was that back there?”
“I had no idea you were into that sort of thing, Voxie…” Valentino’s smile is wide and intimidating as he reaches over to pinch Vox’s cheeks, accompanied by the usual squeaking sound of his fingers on Vox’s screen.
It would be annoying if he weren’t so caught up being confused instead, and if he weren’t still sitting in his own piss, probably making a complete mess of the limo’s upholstery.
“I just— it snuck up on me, okay?!” Vox’s shame starts to turn to anger, wanting to lash out at the other Vees because they’re the only ones around to witness his humiliation, not to mention the only ones whose opinion of him mean anything beyond their stock projections for the next quarter. “If you two hadn’t dragged me around the mall all goddamn day—”
“And you couldn’t have just, I dunno— dropped the fucking shopping and gone to the bathroom?!”
“If I did that and someone came along and swiped your shit while you two were too busy drooling over yourselves and each other in the mirror, who would you have blamed for it?!”
Nine times out of ten— actually, more like ninety-nine times out of a hundred— Vox is the peacekeeper between the three of them. Velvette and Valentino both have big personalities, and big personalities have a tendency to clash, putting the two of them at odds for usually absolutely no goddamn reason. Val tends to start fights, Vel tends to escalate them, and in the end it’s usually up to Vox to finish them. He’s the diplomat of their little faux family, the one who can slide in and put on his best charming voice and get the two of them to calm the fuck down and remember that the three of them are supposed to be a team, and teammates don’t kill each other!
Valentino is absolutely not a peacekeeper. Not by nature, not by choice. His solutions to problems tend to involve either drugs or violence— or both, in many cases— and while Vox doesn’t doubt his methods when it comes to keeping his whores in line (except for Angel, but really, Vox knew that was a lost cause the moment he laid eyes on him, no matter what Val seemed to think), there’s something downright embarrassing about the fact that it’s Valentino of all people who plants one hand on his shoulder, one on Velvette’s, and makes them both sit back in their own seats and not lean towards each other from across the limo like they’re about to get into the kind of cat fight that will leave a comical dust cloud in its wake.
“Relax,” Valentino hisses, and Velvette and Vox both glare at him, but he’s never been intimidated by them and he doesn’t intend to start now. “Voxieeee… If you needed to go, why didn’t you just tell us?”
The way Valentino is able to make so many things he says sound condescending and sexy at the same time is a genuinely impressive feat just shy of a miracle. Vox blushes, feeling his screen start to heat up, but he doesn’t know whether it’s from embarrassment or just because the way Valentino says it has him wanting to squirm in his seat.
Even more than his piss saturated clothes are already making him want to squirm, that is.
He grumbles a vague answer and doesn’t even really know what he says. Whatever it is, it’s a stupid excuse anyway. Not only because he doesn’t want to admit it was his own inflated sense of pride that stopped him from saying anything, but because…
Well, the whole thing is still so embarrassing he doesn’t want to be reminded it even happened. Never mind that he’s still sitting in the results of it happening; he just wants to go home, change, and drown himself in enough booze that he forgets that today ever happened.
Valentino drapes one of his arms around him and starts drawing patterns idly on his chest with one long finger. It seems like whatever aversion he had to the smell before is gone now, and the eye roll and fake gag Vel gives from across the limo probably has more to do with the way Valentino’s stupidly long tongue lolls out of his mouth and he licks a stripe up the side of Vox’s face, which would normally just earn him an eye roll but now earns him Vox trying to slap him away with flailing hands because he doesn’t want to deal with them right now.
“Oh, c’mon, Vox, stop being such a big baby— I know you’re the piss baby here today, but it’s not that big a deal.” Velvette looks at him flatly from across the car. Vox glares right back at her, daring her to continue that train of thought. “I mean, even though you pissed your pants in public—”
“Right in the middle of the bougiest store we were in all day,” Valentino helpfully adds, which earns him another swat and just makes him cackle even harder, like he’s turning into a wicked witch or something.
“Yes, thank you, Val, now shut the fuck up— Even though you pissed your pants in public, it’s not like anyone saw it happen.”
“Except for us.”
“And maybe that store clerk.”
“We have plenty of ways of making sure people like that stay quiet, though.”
“You know? Surprisingly enough, this isn’t making me feel any better,” Vox grumbles. The piss in his pants is starting to cool down, just leaving him feeling clammy and— awful.
This day really couldn’t have gone any worse, and he’s pretty sure if he keeps blushing like this, he is actually going to overheat and that’s just going to be the cherry on the sundae of his shit day.
“Don’t worry, Vox. You don’t really think we’re going to let you ruin our hard-earned reputation by pissing yourself in public, do you?” Vox wonders if the only reason Velvette even has eyes is so she can roll them.
“We would never,” Valentino drawls. “You know we’re always looking out for you just like you do for us, right?”
He sounds so sincere for a second that Vox actually thinks he’s reaching out for a heart-to-heart. Like maybe Valentino is actually trying to make him feel better, and maybe Velvette is too, and he’s just being an asshole to the two of them in spite of knowing how bad the two of them are at offering anything even remotely resembling comfort to someone because he’s embarrassed and needs to take it out on someone.
But just as he’s about to open his mouth and apologize for snapping at the two of them, Valentino has to open his mouth to say,
“But maybe next time we take you shopping with us, we’ll have to take a few… Extra precautions.” He reaches down and hooks his fingers into Vox’s waistband, making it snap against him, and as soon as the meaning of his words dawns on him Vox feels the heat rising again— until all of a sudden it feels like steam is going to come out of his ears.
This time, it’s very much anger, hot embarrassment, that’s making him heat up.
“Val, if you think I’m going to wear a fucking diaper, you can go fuck yourself!” It’s a good thing they only hire staff that’s good at keeping their mouths shut and letting the Vees pretend they don’t exist, because there’s no way the driver didn’t just hear him scream that. “Next time, go shopping by yourselves, assholes!”
In the end, Vox sulks in his piss-soaked pants all the way back to the tower, while the raucous laughter of Valentino and Velvette practically makes the limo shake, rattle, and roll its way down the street.