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“Aaaand here we go again,” Arthur sighed into the microphone attached to the collar of his shirt. The square office he had been shoved into with his partner was humid and lacked any decent air conditioning, and when said partner was Francis Bonnefoy, well, things were bound to get out of hand at one point or another. Arthur wasn’t looking forward to it. “We’re back with the live coverage of the European athletics championships — just in time for some more sprints. Oh, joy.”
“Your bias is showing, my dear,” Francis commented from Arthur’s side, and Arthur’s brows twitched at how close Francis’s voice came. Personal space hadn’t been taken into consideration when these commentator’s booths had been built, had it?
“I, for one,” Francis continued, “am looking forward to the men’s 100 meters. Qualification rounds or not, it’s bound to be, ah, heated.”
“Did you just make a pun, Bonnefoy,” Arthur deadpanned, the words heats and heated pushed to the forefront of his mind. “Oh, wait, you’re not witty enough for that. You were just being lecherous as usual.”
“Pay attention to the track, mon cher. Otherwise the audience might think we’re here to flirt rather than commentate.” Francis could say that all he wanted, but Arthur could feel his gaze and definitely felt the way Francis’s fingers curled around his under the desk. Sap.
“In any case,” Arthur cleared his throat, his neck burning even as he kept his gaze on the two screens before them, one being that of the televised broadcast of the champs and the second showing starting lists and current standings out in the outer fields. Short put qualifications were going on there, and then there was the triple jump. Arthur could only hope Francis would spare him, and the listeners, from the puns. I’ll triple jump into your trousers, really? That had been so bad it almost killed Arthur from the ensuing laughter. In a live broadcast, even, and even despite that the director, Elizaveta, had simply told them to 'keep it up'.
“As you can see, the 200 meter hurdles are coming up first — some young lads are making their first appearance at adults’ level, so good luck to them. Especially the British,” Arthur continued evenly, gaze flicking down the starting list to the first heat.
“And the French,” Francis piped in, fingers squeezing Arthur’s. Reluctantly, Arthur threw a glance at the face of his commentator partner.
“And the frogs,” Arthur agreed after a short pause.
“Truly romantic,” Francis said wryly, pressing his free hand’s fingers over Arthur’s lips. It was certainly a good thing the telly viewers couldn’t see them — even plain listening might be a rather hazardous experience, Arthur concluded as he narrowed his eyes at Francis, whose lips parted again. “Ah, bienvenue from moi, as well, viewers. There are a few exciting things happening tonight, like my inelegant partner just said—”
“I’ll show you elegance, you arse— oh, pardon my language—”
Who had been the genius to pair them up to commentate the athletics events, one might wonder. Again, the answer would be Elizaveta with the surname Arthur couldn’t, for the life of him, either pronounce or write. It had been a strenuous partnership at first, and Arthur still hadn’t got the foggiest idea how Francis had wormed into his heart. (”I do it best,” Francis would say, winking like the extravagant git he was.)
After the rocky start, the channel had started receiving mail, both physical and electronic, about those two sexually frustrated commentators. As usual, some was positive (despairingly so) and some rather negative — and Francis had laughed at least half an hour the moment he had read the first letter with all the are you guys together?! questions.
Arthur had been far, far less amused, and incredibly restrained in the next gigs following the mail incident. Francis, in return, had been even more flamboyant and a nuisance. And somehow the broadcast ratings had skyrocketed. Arthur was almost 100% sure it wasn’t because of sudden interest in every athletics event possible.
And, well. The inevitable had happened after one of their gigs; long story short, after one intense session of commenting on the events unfolding at a marathon (London marathon, in fact), Francis had asked him out for a dinner, and after some (a lot) soul-searching Arthur had agreed with a roll of his eyes and invisible nervousness that he made sure the other wouldn’t detect. The condition being that Francis cut out the incessant sports puns he had (probably) stolen from one the North American commentators in the booth next to theirs.
The rest was bloody history, as they said.
“We’re not having bloody sex in the booth,” Arthur hissed at Francis, hand covering the microphone so that his voice wouldn’t be broadcasted. “You’re as mad as the Hatter if you think I’m going to say yes to that—”
“Only madly in love, mon cher.”
“Shut up and get back to pole vaulting. I need a drink.”
“There’s coffee in the back, so bring me some while you’re at it, hm?”
“…You still like it with disgusting amount of sugar in it, right?”
“You remembered! How touching — and here I thought you had started to suffer from old age, Arthur.” The glimmer in Francis’s eyes would have made Arthur blush if he wasn’t busy taking off the microphone from his collar and switching it off. Which he should have done first, according to hindsight.
“I’ll be right back, love,” Arthur said quietly, not noticing that Francis had turned his microphone on just for the last bit. Later, Francis would claim it was an accident, but that excuse didn’t stop Arthur from pushing him off the bed that night.
The love affair CONFIRMED, the newspapers declared the following day. Elizaveta was happy; thus, everyone involved was, officially, content. Except Arthur, of course, what with the excessive pressure from the press that suddenly followed Francis and his every movement.
“The world is our stage,” Francis had said to reassure Arthur, hand on Arthur’s cheek, “let’s make it as beautiful as possible, oui?”
And the rest was unwritten history.