Chapter Text
Tyler pushes his pillow against his head trying to drown out the constant banging from his roommate, Josh, all he does is plays drums or something for his dumb ass garage band Tyler thinks to himself, but that doesn’t matter to Tyler all he cares about is that he has a basketball game tomorrow and he’s not going to get any sleep with all of his stupid banging.
When Josh and Tyler moved in together they had an agreement that they didn’t really want to interact with each other unless they really needed to and Tyler definitely didn’t want to be seen with Josh his teammates would definitely make fun of him for hanging out with some weird emo music dude and Tyler doubted Josh wanted to be seen with some jock.
And the more time he’s lived with him the more he can’t stand him not only is his drum playing annoying, but he constantly dyes his hair a new color staining the sink and the shower in their bathroom, he hates that he doesn’t know how to wear a shirt ever especially when he’s drumming, its weirdly distracting and he puts his clothes in with Tyler’s laundry, shrinking his jerseys multiple times which always ends him up with a lecture from his coach.
Tyler breaks from thought when he hears the drumming stop he sighs a sigh of relief, he pulls the pillow from the side of his head stuffing it back under his head, when he hears shuffling outside of his door, it travels back down the hall and a second later the drumming starts again.
Tylers body’s heats with anger deciding he’s done hearing banging, lifting himself out of bed he storms down the hallway to Josh’s room, he pushes the door open, but stops for a moment looking around Josh’s room, he scans the room littered with posters and random music items, his eyes lead him to Josh of corse shirtless still beating the snare drum. Tylers eyes travel down Josh’s back watching his back muscles flex with every hit. As much as Tyler’s hates hearing it watching him hit the drums angrily is slightly entertaining.
Tyler literally shakes his head snapping him out of his distant thought and back to what he was here for. He walks up to the back of Josh, reaching out his hand he gives Josh’s shoulder a shove causing him to almost fall forward into his drums. Josh turns his head with a confused and angry look on his face. Tylers voice is loud cutting through the now silent room.
“Hey! Man can you shut this shit down for the night? It’s really fucking annoying.”
Josh stares at Tyler wondering if he’s being serious, after a second of stare battling each other Josh scoffs before speaking “No I have a show tomorrow.” Josh goes to turn back around, but Tyler grabs his shoulder stopping him feeling Josh’s slightly perspiring skin from playing the drums.
“I’m being serious man i have a game tomorrow.” Josh shoves his hand off his shoulder turning back around
“You think i fucking care about your stupid basketball game.” He gets up from his drum kit shoving Tyler back “and don’t fucking touch me.”
Tyler steps back feeling his body heat with anger, but it feels different. He shakes it off by yelling louder at Josh “well no one cares about your lame garage band, at least I’m doing something with my life.” Tyler takes a couple of steps forward by the end of his yelling
Tyler can tell that doesn’t help the situation at all when Josh gets in Tyler’s face almost chest to chest “fuck you dude, you don’t know what you’re talking about, just get the fuck out of my room.” Josh shoves him into the door “go get your beauty sleep for your little basketball game tomorrow and stay out of my business.”
Tyler feels his face redden from the comment, Josh sees it and smirks at him, he turns around sitting down on his bed leaning back on his elbows
Tyler lingers in the door way thinking of what to say, he watches Josh’s chest rise and fall still glistening with sweat.
“Whatever man just cut the shit for the night.” Josh gives his head a nod with a small smirk still on his lips, Tyler hurries out of his room shutting the door behind him, he stomps down the hallway back to his room also shutting the door
He leans his back against the door trying to figure out what is wrong with him, usually he would have picked a bigger fight with him, but he didn’t know what to say to him, Tyler walks to his bed slumping into it
By the time he shuts his eyes he chalks up the situation to just him being mad, but trying to be civil with the person he lives with, but every time he try’s to fall asleep all he sees is Josh leaning back in his bed shirtless with that smug fucking look on his face like he’s better than him.
Tyler turns over in bed pulling his covers close to is face pushing all thoughts of Josh out of his head
⌖ ☠︎︎ ⌖
The sun beams through Josh’s window warming the side of his face, he groans sitting up in bed he pulls the curtains shut falling back into bed, and before he can fall back asleep his phone starts buzzing on the nightstand beside him, he grabs his phone hitting answer not even looking who it is, he licks his lips feeling the cold metal between the two “hello” he says in a groggy voice
His band mates voice cuts through the phone loud enough for Josh to pull the phone away from his ear “dude you’re not going to fucking believe this shit!”
“What? What are you talking about?” Josh sits up in bed so he can focus on the conversation
“We booked it. We got a fucking spot at firefly.”
“You’re fucking joking, we didn’t even have all of the requirements to even play there.”
“Yea i know we just got lucky.”
“Holy shit dude did you tell the rest of the band?”
“Nah not yet, but i will” Josh threads his fingers through his hair still in disbelief “i figured we could tell them at practice tonight.”
“Yea that sounds good i’ll bring beer to celebrate.”
“Alright I’ll talk to you later man.”
“See ya.”
Josh hangs up the phone throwing it back onto his nightstand, he rubs his face now fully awake for the day
Making his way to the kitchen finding Tyler sitting at the kitchens island spooning cereal into his mouth, Josh watches the milk drip down his chin before he whips it with the back of his hand, then looks down at what he’s wearing
A very tight basketball jersey and too short of shorts, Josh pulls his eyes away walking to the fridge opening it feeling the cool air flow out onto his exposed skin “what are they making you wear? People are going to start going to your games not to just watch basketball with that outfit.”
Josh hears Tyler scoff loudly “you’re the one who shrunk them in the damn wash.” Tyler feels his face heat at Josh’s comment trying to deflect it, Josh pulls a water out of the fridge downing some of it before turning to look at Tyler
“Don’t blame me you’re the one who leaves clothes in the washer, you’ll just have to get new ones.”
Tyler stands putting his bowl in the sink “I already have, twice, and if it happens again I’ll get you back one way or another.” Tyler feeling Josh’s presence closer than before, turning around Josh is right behind him almost running into him
“Yea? Is that so?
Tyler gives Josh a hard shove, Josh steps back, but catches his wrist squeezing it hard enough to leave a mark, it hurts, but Tyler wont let Josh know that. “Don’t start shit you can’t finish Tyler.”
Tyler pulls his wrist out of his grasp holding it with his other hand to dull the pain “what the fuck is wrong with you man?” Tyler steps back
“Aww did I hurt your wrist. I hope i didn’t mess up your ability to shoot.” Josh says it with a small smirk on his face
“You’re weird man.”
Josh tilts his head “yea go have fun playing with balls in your cheerleader outfit.”
Tyler quickly steps towards him giving him an even harder shove regretting it immediately hurting his wrist even more but the shove still makes him step back a couple times “fuck you don’t say that shit to me when you don’t even ever wear clothes and when you do its those tiny cropped shirts, its weird.”
Josh looks angry enough to hit Tyler, but he sees his face change and flatten into a small smile “weird? Huh” Josh looks like he’s thinking, but then just makes and exit from the kitchen
Tyler wants to make a rebuttal, but can’t think of one because of how weird Josh was just acting, he runs his hand through his hair letting out a long breath
Feeling his phone vibrate in his pocket he sees his coach texting him that he’s late to the buses ‘shit’ Tyler say under his breath grabbing his duffel bag and hurrying out the door
⌖ ☠︎︎ ⌖
Tyler sits in the cold locker room of another school looking down at his wrist he starts to see the marks of were Josh’s fingers gripped him almost making a perfect outline of five fingers, he runs his fingers over them with his other hand, pressing down feeling the dull pain of the bruises, he flexes his wrist sucking in a breath from the jolt of pain
He gets snapped out of thought when he feels someone’s hand on his shoulder “hey Tyler you good?”
Tyler looks up seeing his teammate Noah, he’s their star player right beside Tyler, they grew up together and have always played on the same team, Tyler would even go out to say they’re best friends
Things got weird with them a couple of months ago during the summer, Tyler was visiting Noah and his family, they were catching a ball in the pool like they always do, talking about life, girls, school, basketball, its what they always did this it wasn’t like today was any different.
They therapy ball throwing session ended and they swam around each other then it turned into racing each other from each end of the pool, they would wrestle each other to get ahead, every touch from Noah felt different and he couldn’t figure it out, in reality Tyler was scared of what he was feeling
When Noah kissed him that day in the pool it changed what he thought about himself and what he thought about has best friend
After it happened Tyler didn’t say anything he just got out of the pool and ran home five miles trying to figure out what was going on in his mind
They didn’t talk the rest of the summer, Tyler only reached out when the basketball season was going to start, he knew how awkward it would have been if they didn’t at least talk about. They talked it out or more Noah talked at Tyler basically saying it was a mistake and he’s not gay, Tyler just nodded the whole conversation
Now Noah has a new girlfriend, Jenna, she’s resident cheerleader, but she’s actually nice and easy to talk to which Tyler appreciates.
“Tyler” Noah says again with a more concerned look this time
“Yea…uh I’m fine i was just thinking about an exam i have coming up” Tyler scrunch’s over to tie his shoes trying to distract
“Well don’t think about that right now we have some Christian school ass to kick.” Tyler lets out a small laugh trying to relax into the conversation
“I’ll try.” Tyler looks up at Noah with a nod, Noah nod back moving on to talk to other teammates
Tyler lets out a heavy breath not realizing he was holding it.
⌖ ☠︎︎ ⌖
Once the game starts Tyler get their team ahead scoring a couple of three pointers, but as the game goes on his wrist aches more making him miss two jump shots, he gives Noah a look basically telling him to take over for a little.
The opposing team pushes back scoring points now only two points behind them
When the buzzer sounds out at the end of the game Tyler’s team wins, but he doesn’t feel the satisfaction he usually does, he can’t stop thinking about his wrist or more that Josh was the one who did it.
Tylers teammates lift him in the air and for the first time all day he breaks into a genuine smile, not thinking about Noah or Josh or that his tight uniform is starting to get uncomfortable.
Every time Tyler’s team wins they all go to Noah’s frat house to share a couple blunts
Noah offers Tyler a ride back to his place and Tyler accepts not wanting to say no and make their situation weird all Tyler wants is for their friendship to go back to the way it was.
The ride was quiet soft music plays through the speakers, Tyler watches out the window watching the trees and street lights pass, Tyler hears the music being turned down so he looks over at nosh who’s already looking at him
“So what’s going on with you man? I feel like we don’t talk as much as we used to.”
Tyler feels his stomach tighten “idk I’ve just been focused on school more than usual.”
Noah lets out a laugh “i don’t think I’ve ever heard you say you’re focused on school.”
Tyler shrugs looking back out the window, i just want to get this night over with Tyler thinks to himself
⌖ ☠︎︎ ⌖
Josh hits his drums with a new attitude one because his band booked their first festival and two his roommates not home so he can be as loud as he wants, every time Josh hits the drums he feels the vibrations travel through the sticks and into his arms
Josh always loved the drums for that reason it made him feel like he was the instrument which gave him the adrenaline rush he lived for
He gets lost playing the drums for a couple of hours until he hears a loud banging at his bedroom door, Josh sets his drum sticks down turning around to look at the door deciding if he wants to answer it.
Lifting himself off the drums stool he walks across his room opening the door finding Tyler leaning against the door frame looking down at his feet, but when he hears Josh he looks up with heavy hooded red eyes
“Tyler? You good?” Tyler pushes himself off the door frame standing up straight he nods running his hand through his hair
Josh crosses his arms backing up one step into his room “what then? Did you come to tell me to shut up?”
Tyler just nods again stepping into Josh’s room “yeah and to tell you that you fucked up my wrist, we almost lost because of you.” Tyler knew that wasn’t true, but he wanted the fight, he holds his wrist up to Josh showing the almost perfect outlines of his fingers, Josh sees the marks and smirks slightly satisfied with his doing and that it was bothering Tyler that much.
Josh scoffs “well you obviously didn’t so i think you can get over it.” Tylers face gets angrier, he steps over to Josh’s drum set grabbing his sticks he breaks them and then throwing them at Josh’s chest.
Josh drops his mouth open slightly feeling anger wash over him “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!!!” Josh grips the front of Tylers jersey pulling him closer to get in his face “stop doing shit that makes me want to end your season, because i will don’t test me Joseph.”
Josh watches Tyler’s eyes search his face with a surprised look like he couldn’t believe Josh was confronting him, Josh smells the weed still lingering on Tyler’s breath
Josh lets go of Tylers jersey pushing him back when he sees a smile forming on his face “you think this is funny?”
Tylers lets out a small laugh nodding “yeah i think getting you mad at me is one of my favorite things to do lately.”
Josh looks at Tyler confused that this very honest yet high version of Tyler
Tyler travels closer to Josh, he looks at Tyler closely for the first time noticing how long his eyelashes are that are shielding his deep brown eyes, the curved slope of his nose, plump lips that are chapped and red in some spots from being bitten “what are you talking about Tyler?”
“I like to watch you take your anger out on your drums some times I wish it was me.” Josh can barely hear that last part of what Tyler says.
Josh’s mouth goes dry, but still manages to get out a single word “what?”
Tylers face gets shake his head backing up from Josh “nothing…I mean never mind forget i said anything.” Tyler steps towards the door
“Wait.” Josh steps towards him trying to stop him, but slams the door shut hearing him run to his room and slamming that door too.
Josh lets out a stressed breath running his hand through his hair he looks around his room as if he could get answers from a bystander, he sees the broken sticks on the ground, picking them up he tosses them across his room in the general direction of his trash can
Falling into bed he stares at the ceiling knowing it going to be a long night.