the night starts here (7a/?), will/skandar/anna, nc-17
Title: the night starts here (7a/?)
Author: likecharity
Pairing: Will/Skandar/Anna
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Real person slash and het
Summary: Skandar knows he should want to bond with Will P., and Michael, and all the new people he's going to be working with. He shouldn't want to just abandon this party, but there's really only two people he cares about giving a proper goodbye to.
A/N: GUESS WHAT. This fic wasn't entirely forgotten about!! Also, I have absolutely no idea what's going on with its timeline anymore, can we just pretend it makes sense? I also just want to thank everybody who's stuck with this story all this time, despite my obvious issues with updating on any kind of regular basis. ♥ It really means a lot to me.
[ Part 1. ¦ Part 2. ¦ Part 3. ¦ Part 4. ¦ Part 5. ¦ Part 6. ¦ Part 7a & Part 7b. ¦ Part 8a & Part 8b. ¦ TBC]
Skandar stands awkwardly at the side of the room, nodding along to the conversation around him without really paying attention to it. He taps his foot against the floor agitatedly, eyes fixed on the door. It's not fair-he hasn't seen Will and Anna for almost a whole month, and now he has to wait even longer because apparently, they're incapable of arriving to a party on time.
"Oh my god, stop it," a voice hisses in his ear suddenly, breaking his concentration.
"What?"
Georgie, standing beside him with her arms crossed, stomps on his foot.
"Ow! What was that for?" he cries, but then realises, as his foot almost instantly starts tapping against the floor again.
Georgie looks at him pointedly. "It's so annoying."
"Wait a minute, is that-" Ben says, leaning in from Skandar's other side. Skandar's eyes instinctively dart towards the door again, but nobody's there, and he looks sheepishly back at Ben, who is tilting his head down towards the floor and frowning in concentration. "Is that 'Another One Bites the Dust'?"
"...What?" Skandar says helplessly, but his voice is drowned out by Georgie.
"It is!" she cries, laughing, and adopts Ben's bizarre stance, head on one side, bending over just a little.
And then-
"Dum, dum, dum," Ben says, in time with Skandar's tapping foot.
"Another one bites the dust," Georgie chimes in.
Skandar stares at his foot, which has apparently decided to tap out the beat of old Queen songs to keep itself occupied while he impatiently watches doors.
"Dum, dum, dum," Ben and Georgie sing, "another one bites the dust! And another one gone, and another one gone, another one bites the dust-"
They seem not to notice or care that Skandar has forcibly restrained his foot, now, and he wonders how exactly he's going to survive spending six months filming with these two. Ben and Georgie, that is, not his feet, although if they're going to develop a habit of drumming out '80s hits, that could be an irritation as well.
"Hey," says Georgie, as Ben continues singing, mostly to himself, "is that Anna?"
"What?" Skandar looks around wildly. "Where?"
"Over there, talking to Will," says Georgie, pointing in the opposite direction.
"What?" Skandar almost gives himself whiplash. "When did Will arrive?"
"When we were singing," says Georgie nonchalantly. "HEY, ANNA! WILL!"
"Damn you and your singing," Skandar mutters, as he spots the two of them, looking startled on the other side of the room.
"Damn you and your musical foot," Georgie retorts, waving manically at Anna and Will to come over.
Skandar feels his heart start beating a little faster-ridiculously-as the two of them approach, Anna looking beautiful in a lacy black dress and Will in one of his typically weird outfits but looking good anyway. He doesn't like that he's missed them as much as he has, because it's only been a month and he has to cope without them for much longer than that. And he used to be able to, too, but it seems like the more time he spends with them lately the harder it is to be alone.
It's not helped by the knowledge that this is a leaving party. This is likely the last time he sees them before he goes. Suddenly, he regrets that they never really talked about this, because if they had, they maybe could have had a decent send-off of their own. But instead they just had their first serious couple talk (threesome talk?) and then Anna realised she had a bunch of Uni work to do, and hurried off back to Oxford. Shortly after, Skandar received a phone call from his Mum wondering whether she was actually going to get to spend any time with him at all before he disappeared for six months, and he was guilted into going back home. They didn't think about the fact that that might have been the last time they'd all be alone together before Skandar left.
They reach the group and suddenly the air is filled with greetings. "Hi!"
"Hi!" everybody echoes.
"Hi, I was watching the door but I didn't see either of you arrive!" Skandar says hurriedly, almost feeling guilty for not being the first to notice them.
"We saw you," says Anna, looking a little puzzled, "you weren't watching the door, you were standing on one leg."
"Oh, that," says Ben. "His foot was being a jukebox."
She looks at him for a moment, then says fondly, "I missed you, Ben," and pulls him into a hug.
Georgie attaches herself onto the hug, and Will and Skandar grin at each other over the huddle.
"This'll probably save time," Will says, and wraps his arms around one side of the group.
Skandar shrugs, and does the same, hiding a smile in Anna's shoulder as one of Will's hands closes around his and gives it a gentle squeeze.
"Okay," says Anna after a moment, her voice muffled against Ben's chest, "I'm beginning to have difficulty breathing. Also, shouldn't you guys be bonding with the new cast and crew?"
"Are you trying to get rid of us already?" Ben asks, mock-offended and squeezing her tighter.
"We did try," Skandar adds, "but I'm not sure we're coming across that well."
"Ah, what with the hopping around on one foot and public group hugs?" Will asks.
"Yes, that." Skandar cranes his neck to grin at him over Georgie's head.
In truth, it went all right, but it was just kind of awkward, and he'd really rather be joking around with this lot than getting to know new people. He never really felt like that when Ben joined the cast, but maybe that was because they were all still together, and this time they've been split into two and it's like he has to choose where his loyalties lie.
He knows it's not particularly fair to shut the new people out-Will Poulter in particular, who is over in a corner right now looking intimidated by Tilda-but he can't help it; right now it seems so much more important to be saying a decent goodbye than a decent hello.
It takes quite a while for them to get a chance to talk on their own. Skandar spots Will heading to the toilets and goes after him, and after, they sit down around the corner together.
"I'm gonna miss you," Will says quietly.
"I know," Skandar replies, a little stiffly. "Me too."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Will says. "It's just-we haven't, you know."
Skandar sighs exasperatedly. "What is there to talk about?" He leans back, hard, against the wall. "I'm leaving. You're staying."
"Yeah-but-" Will says, then stops, hesitating. "It's just. It doesn't seem like you've really accepted it."
Skandar wants to say, I'm leaving, you're staying, again, until Will gets it, but he knows what Will means.
Will's sort of fidgeting like he's not sure how much he should say, whether he'll offend Skandar, and Skandar wishes he'd stop worrying about his feelings and just go ahead.
Eventually, he does. "I mean, you're sitting here with me instead of getting to know Michael. Or Will." He tilts his head in the direction of the party. "And you know...you should make an effort, you're going to be working with them."
Skandar crumples, falters, gives in. He can't stand it anymore. "I don't want to work with that Will," he says, his voice sort of breaking a little as he places a hand on Will's chest, feeling the gentle thud of his heart against his palm. "I want to work with this one."
Will pulls him into a hug, apparently without a second thought, and Skandar holds onto him tightly, savouring the warmth and the closeness. He shuts his eyes and buries his face into Will's neck, inhales, smelling soap and sweat and cologne and that Will smell he knows so well. He likes the shiny-soft feel of Will's blazer against his cheek. He doesn't want to open his eyes and see if anyone's noticed them, but he can't help his paranoia and when he senses someone coming closer he opens one eye carefully.
It's only Anna.
He and Will stay right where they are.
Skandar's reminded of the Prince Caspian premiere after-party in New York, reminded of Anna coming around the corner to see him pushing Will against the wall and kissing him. He wishes it were that simple now, that they could just steal a bottle of something and sneak off to a hotel and get off. He knows he's simplifying, knows it was anything but easy back then, but still. He wants that.
Anna looks tired, drained, somehow. She was probably flashing smiles at everybody else, dancing with Andrew and Georgie, politely asking Will and Michael about their other projects. But now the smile she gives them is sort of forced and tight and she slumps down next to Skandar on the bench and drags her hand back through her hair.
"I don't like this," she admits.
There's a long pause.
"It doesn't feel right," she adds. "We've barely said goodbye, and now everyone is, and-" she's looking at him, now, and Skandar peers up at her from over Will's shoulder, "I just want to get out of here."
"We can't just go, Anna," says Will's voice, a low rumble in Skandar's ear.
Neither of them are letting go, yet, and Skandar wonders if maybe it could stay that way forever, if Will could just be his limpet or his conjoined twin and he could bring him with him for filming.
"No, but-" Anna sighs. "Can't we?"
The thing is, Skandar thinks he probably shouldn't want that as much as he does. He knows he should want to bond with Will P., and Michael, and all the new people he's going to be working with. He shouldn't want to just abandon this party, but there's really only two people he cares about giving a proper goodbye to.
He sighs into Will's shoulder. He doesn't want to deal with this. Getting to know these people makes it real.
Skandar catches a glimpse of movement and he glances up, seeing Tilda heading towards them. He knows she knows and everything but he's still suddenly embarrassed, blushing furiously and disentangling himself from Will's arms.
"I'm sorry," Tilda says, standing over them like an absolute giant in her high heels. She crosses her arms, and then brings her fingers to her lips, glancing behind her back at the rest of the party. "I didn't mean to interrupt."
Skandar tries desperately to stop blushing.
"I just thought it seemed like you weren't really enjoying yourselves," she says, and Skandar looks up at her with her tight-fitting black suit and her piercing green eyes and her cropped red hair and wonders how, how she can be so perceptive and understanding and nice and cool all at once.
"No, this is great," Skandar lies, not really knowing why. "It's really-a great chance to say goodbye, to everyone, and everything."
Tilda smiles, then looks slightly pained, then smiles again. She sinks down, crouching, and the three of them look at her in puzzlement. She reaches for Skandar's hands and Skandar feels himself going even redder, especially when he thinks about how they're not really that concealed over here and this whole thing would just look fucking weird if anyone saw.
"You don't want to say goodbye to these people," says Tilda quietly, calmly. "You want to say goodbye to Will, and to Anna, and that's okay."
Skandar looks down at his lap because her eyes are too intense, and he looks at her long pale hands holding his. They slip away and he watches as she gently strokes Anna's cheek, then Will's, and he watches them smile embarrassedly and colour a little.
"If you want to go, I'll cover for you."
Skandar's heart sort of swells and he feels stupid.
"We can't just ditch everyone," says Will, and Skandar hears the way he hesitates on the 'everyone', clearly only really thinking of Georgie.
It's always the four of them, even with Ben now it's always been okay for them to break off from him because he's older and newer. But Georgie-well, they can't just leave her, all three of them vanishing with no explanation.
Tilda smiles again. She tilts her head. "If you're worried about the little one, I think she'll be okay," she says.
They all crane their necks to peer around the corner, and, through the crowd, they can see Georgie sitting at the side. For a moment it looks like she's alone but then they see Will Poulter standing up, offering her his hand as a song starts up-one Skandar knows Georgie loves. He watches as Georgie bursts out laughing and gets to her feet, taking his hand, and he spins her around as they make their way into the middle of the crowd.
"They've been attached at the hip for at least the past half hour," Tilda says with a wicked grin, and then gestures down the corridor. Skandar assumes that down there, they'll find a door they can sneak out through.
"Thank you," he says, and then suddenly, on instinct, leans forward and presses a clumsy kiss to her cheek.
His face feels hot when he pulls back and he can instantly sense the strong desire Will and Anna both have to tease him. But Tilda smiles and squeezes his hand and says something that sounds like it might be a quote, probably from some book he studied in school. And okay, he's not really sure what it means, but he assumes the gist of it is that she's wishing him luck for the next movie. And also maybe something about talent, which makes him blush even more.
Tilda leans back, peering around the corner back at the party, and then gets hurriedly to her feet, gesturing at them to do the same.
"Andrew's heading this way," she says, voice urgently hushed even though she's still smiling.
She nudges Anna's shoulder and the three of them race off down the hall, Anna's heels skittering against the tile as they round the corner. Will and Skandar grab one of her hands each to prevent her from falling, and she can't help but let out a giggle as they race down another corridor towards the back door of the venue. The soles of their shoes all clatter towards it and they can hear Andrew's voice fading into the background.
Skandar feels a sudden pang of guilt as he starts to hear Tilda's indiscernible response, remembering that behind him, there's a room full of people gathered to give him a send-off and he's abandoning them.
But then the rest of Tilda's lie is drowned out by the sound of Anna's heels skittering to a halt, and her laughter as she squeezes his hand. On his other side, Will lets his hand go, in order to grasp the doorknob in front of them, his grip strong and certain. The door opens onto a street and they step out, breathing in the cool fresh air.
"We're in the clear," Anna says breathlessly, her face flushed. She pulls him into a hug, and he buries his face in her shoulder, brushes his lips against soft skin and inhales the sweet smell of her.
She spins him round to Will, passes him over, and Will pulls him close, big hand on the back of Skandar's head, fingers combing through his hair. Will chuckles in his ear and then lets him go, grabs Anna instead, lifts her right up in the air and makes her shriek.
Skandar knows they're hardly going to be chased after, but the security of their hands was nice and so when Will puts Anna down, he links his fingers through theirs again and drags them off down the street before they have a chance to catch their breath. He knows he shouldn't, but he feels like he just hopped into a getaway car after robbing a bank.
"I know a place," Anna pants, as they eventually slow to a stop further down the street. "There's a club, maybe ten minutes' walk from here."
"But Skandar-" Will starts.
"It's fine," Anna interrupts him briskly, tugging Skandar's hand and pulling the two boys in the opposite direction, presumably towards the aforementioned club. "Lulu goes there all the time because they never ID. He'll be fine."
"Sounds like a classy place," Will snorts, and Anna wrinkles her nose.
"Maybe I'm not in the mood for classy," she says. The dress she's wearing begs to differ, Skandar thinks, but he's too intrigued by the meaning behind her words to argue. "I think we should send Skandar off with a night he'll remember."
"What kind of club is this?" Will laughs, and Anna lets go of Skandar's hand to reach round and prod Will in the ribs.
***
It is, indeed, not a classy place. Its main clientele are under-18s out on school nights getting pissed on Smirnoff Ice. As they're heading inside, a boy who looks no older than fourteen stumbles past them and throws up in the gutter. The first thing they see upon entering is a girl slumped against the wall crying her eyes out, her friends drunkenly comforting her. It's a pretty big change from the laidback, grown-up atmosphere of Skandar's official leaving party, but somehow it feels like a necessary one. After all, he needs to remember that what he's leaving this place for is several months of work. Maybe what he needs is one last wild night, one last chance to be an irresponsible teenager.
But Will and Anna are faltering, hanging back. It's really not Will's scene at all, and Anna looks a little taken aback at the discovery of what her little sister's scene apparently is. But everyone here's too drunk to know who the three of them are, or too drunk to care, so Skandar takes their hands again, a shudder of confidence sparking through him like electricity as he strides forward into the club, into the mass of dancing bodies, pulling Will and Anna along with him. The music is loud, growing more deafening the deeper they go into the crowd, but it feels like it's embracing them, the heavy bass pounding right through their bones.
As they head towards the bar, the pounding bass starts to organise itself in Skandar's mind into a hip-hop song he's heard before, something chavs at school play on their mobile phones to annoy his Maths teacher. They reach the bar and drop hands. There doesn't seem to be any sort of queue and so Will steps forward, almost shouting out their orders. Skandar can't hear him, so it's a wonder the barman manages to. All he can hear is the song.
It's one of those ones that features a rapper calling girls bitches and telling them to 'drop it low', and he gives Anna a sidelong glance, expecting her to make a grossed-out face, but instead he gets a smirk. She raises her hands in the air, the movements appearing jerky in the strobe lighting that suddenly flashes throughout the room. Her hips sway, bump against his, and then she throws back her head and laughs suddenly, quite possibly at his expression. He's not actually sure what it is, but it's probably worth laughing at. It's just-well, he's not into these girls, any of the girls they're surrounded by, caked-on make-up and dresses that leave nothing to the imagination, grinding up against guys they've just met. They don't do anything for him. They used to catch his eye, sure, but since Anna, they just seem trashy.
Somehow, though, Anna acting like one of them-even for only about seven seconds-is really hot. It's made even better by her dorky laughter afterwards, and the awkwardness of her movements because she's not used to it. Or, in her own words (the only ones he hears in the sentence she yells in his ear, anyway), "NOT DRUNK ENOUGH!"
Will remedies this quickly, sliding a tray of shots down the bar. He pays the barman as Skandar and Anna take a glass each. Skandar can feel Anna's eyes on him as he brings the glass up to his mouth and downs whatever's in it-possibly vodka-and he's not sure it's because she's being protective, or looking for reassurance. Because she waits 'til he's coughed a little and flashed her a grin before she downs her own. Anna's more of a chardonnay girl than a vodka shots girl, but then, it's not like he has much experience himself with this sort of thing.
He laughs suddenly, the alcohol hitting his bloodstream. They're not exactly in their element here, but it seems more entertaining than embarrassing, more amusing than awkward. He watches Will gingerly pluck one of the shots from the tray, and then gulp it down.
"WHAT IS IT?" Skandar yells in his general direction.
"I DON'T KNOW," Will yells back. "HE SAID THEY HAD SOME SORT OF DEAL ON."
Skandar laughs again, takes another one of the shots on impulse and watches as the other two copy him. He throws his head back, staring at the ceiling as it flashes and pulses with coloured light. His throat stings but his chest, his heart-they feel good. One more shot each, and then Anna's pulling the two of them onto the dance floor just as the DJ switches to another song. This one sounds more playful, electronic beeps pulsing beneath the sound of a woman's rhythmic breaths.
Anna lets go of their hands once they find a part of floor that's not crowded by trainers and stilettos, and she flings her arms up again, up to the ceiling, her fingertips pushing through a layer of light that slices through the room. Beneath it everything is movement in clouds of smoke (the smoking ban is apparently paid no mind here), and Anna's body sways, her hips rocking. But she doesn't quite match the beat, and she laughs and then loses her confidence, arms slung down by her sides once again, her gaze awkwardly flitting all over the club.
Skandar feels her insecurity, getting pushed from both sides as the dancing crowd ebbs and flows. Some girl gets her handbag caught on Anna's dress, and Skandar watches as the two of them try to disentangle it. But the girl eventually just pulls hard and the bag comes free, tearing the delicate lace of Anna's dress in the process. Anna is too shocked to react, just looking down at the frayed fabric, ripped from hip to hem. Skandar knows what Will's about to do before he does it, and grabs his hand without thinking-a combination of the alcohol and the pattern of the evening, he guesses. He's trying to stop Will, but he does it at the same time as Will grabs the girl by her shoulder, yelling something at her.
Suddenly the boys are knocked forwards by the movement of the crowd, and their linked hands jerk upwards instinctively. The girl-fake tan, hair scraped back against her scalp-sees the entwined fingers and simply laughs, still dancing, shouting something in her friend's ear. Will blushes hotly, speechless, and Skandar feels about a hundred things-disbelief, fury, and mortification, to name a few-and shakes Will's hand off, pushing through the crowd alone, back the way they came.
He slumps against the bar, his breathing heavy. For a few moments it seems like all he can hear is his heart pounding in his ears, and he's a little ashamed to realise he's more of a lightweight than he thought. (Then again, none of them know what was in those shots.) He's surprised that his embarrassment isn't so much due to the fact that he was seen holding hands with another guy, but more that they didn't know how to react to it. They haven't had any experience with this before, haven't learnt how to deal with that sort of thing.
And some part of him, some shameful part, wanted to prove to that girl-that stranger-that he's not gay, wanted to explain the situation to her, explain that yeah, he's had sex with a boy, but he's had sex with a girl too, and doesn't that count for something? He doesn't consider himself gay, not in the slightest, even-Will's the only guy he's ever felt this way for, and sex with him isn't gay sex, it's just sex with Will. And holding hands with Will is just holding hands with Will, and he wishes there was some way for everyone to understand that.
"You gonna order, or what?" someone barks in his ear suddenly, and he jerks upright to see a guy with spiky, gelled hair peering at him, pointing at the impatient barman.
"Oh, right, sorry," Skandar mumbles, which is pointless, seeing as anything quieter than a yell is totally inaudible in this place. "Um, a beer please." His mouth seems to work before his mind, possibly in a psychic sort of way, because only seconds after he shouts "THREE, three beers please," Will and Anna appear on either side of him, sweaty and uncomfortable.
Will leans in to say something-Skandar feels lips brush against his ear-and then changes his mind, pulling back. Anna does it instead, and Skandar feels confident that what she says is just a more coherent version of what Will was going to say.
"We're not really used to this, are we," she says. Her voice isn't raised, but her lips are pressed so closely to his ear that the words seem to travel directly to his brain like she's a voice inside his head.
He shakes his head, laughing hopelessly, as the barman cracks open the bottles, one after another after another. He pushes the beers towards them, Skandar pays, they drink, and conversation is still entirely futile.
"DO YOU WANT TO TRY FIND SOMEWHERE THAT'S MAYBE A LITTLE QUIETER," Will bellows.
***
They manage to find the toilets, and lean awkwardly against the wall. On one side of them, boys laugh raucously, trading condoms and stories that even gross Skandar out. On the other side, girls are holding hands as they wait in line for the loos. (Distantly, he wonders why the divide is so clear, why he can't reach down and slip his fingers through Will's right now without being judged, but he pushes the thought out of his mind, embarrassed for even having it.)
In the middle, boys press girls against the tiled walls, mouths against mouths and hands between legs. Will, Skandar, and Anna sip their beers from the bottle, twitchy and uneasy. Everybody here is probably younger than them; immature, aimless partying youths with no future, and yet it feels like they're so much more mature. Skandar knows he's done more than these kids could ever hope to, but he feels so small amongst them.
"Does anyone else feel awkward?" Will says, then, his voice hoarse from shouting, sounding strange in the quieter environment-almost too loud.
Anna takes a long swig of her beer and then just laughs. Then, suddenly, she hands the beer to Skandar, and fumbles around with her dress for a bit like it's bothering her. It takes Skandar quite a while to actually process the fact that she's taking it off, because it seems so ridiculous, but that's definitely what she's doing. She's wearing a slip beneath it, he realises. Tight, silky, black, low-cut. Exactly the kind of thing she'd wear under her clothes, but not-well, not as an actual dress, which is what she seems to be going for now.
She shrugs at them, which has the effect of pushing her boobs together in a rather distracting way, and Skandar and Will only vaguely hear what she says. (Which Skandar thinks is, "Just trying to blend in.")
She sticks out her hand to take her beer back from Skandar, and he gives her his as well, shrugging off his jacket and letting it drop to the dirty floor. She grins widely, kissing him on the lips impulsively before handing his beer back to him. They take a swig in unison, both looking towards Will expectantly. He's wearing something that is pretty much a suit-as in, you'd have to look at him quite closely to realise that the shirt he's wearing is some kind of strange t-shirt with buttons, and the trousers are actually black skinny jeans.
Skandar and Anna consider him for a moment, trying to work out how to casual-ise such an outfit. And then Anna reaches forwards and takes Will's beer, handing both bottles to Skandar, leaving him to clutch the three of them to his chest, cold and sweating ice through his t-shirt. Anna pushes Will's blazer off his shoulders, tossing it over her shoulder, and then begins unbuttoning his shirt. They're receiving a few strange looks by now, understandably. Skandar's sure, though, that stories of seeing Susan Pevensie undressing her brother in the bathroom of a seedy London club are more likely to be on drunken Facebook status updates than legitimate gossip blogs.
Anyway, Will's wearing a vest under his shirt. Skandar looks him up and down uncertainly. It's a sort of pale grey and clingy vest, and teamed with the skinny jeans and slightly pointed black dress shoes, it looks a little odd. But also good, somehow. He's not sure how Will does that.
Anna balls up the shirt and tosses it over Will's shoulder in the general direction of a bin, missing by about two metres. Will immediately looks concerned.
"I'll buy you a new one," she promises, looking him up and down and grinning.
Skandar does the same (for the second time), feeling a little more drunk as he appreciates the sight of Will's biceps and the way the vest clings to his chest.
"Do we blend a little better now?" Will asks, rolling his eyes, oblivious to the way they're both eyeing him.
Skandar looks from side to side, and is greeted on both left and right by couples with their tongues down each other's throats.
"Uh," he says.
Anna laughs, and then takes Will by the hips, clutching him tight and pulling him close. His vest pulls up a little against the thin silky fabric of her slip, and her breasts push together as they press against his chest. She grins against his lips before they kiss, soft and then harder. Skandar's watching, but he starts to feel a little conspicuous for doing so, so he fumbles in his pocket for his phone as Will nudges Anna against the wall with his hips. Anna drapes her arms over Will's shoulders as the kiss deepens, and Skandar finds that he doesn't feel jealous, not even a little bit.
Suddenly, the guy Skandar met earlier at the bar stumbles out of the toilets and bumps into him.
"Shit, sorry mate," he says, running fingers back through his gel-coated hair.
Will and Anna are oblivious, wrapped up in each other, Anna's back arched so that her hips press forward into his. The guy follows Skandar's gaze and his expression turns suddenly sympathetic.
Just then, another boy comes through the door and a short blonde girl queuing up for the girls' toilets turns around, eyes lighting up. She embraces him, and the guy with the gelled hair watches them for a moment. He and Skandar stand awkwardly between the two kissing pairs.
"Third wheel, eh?"
Skandar can't help but grin, as he stands there with three beers clutched awkwardly in his hands, waiting. "Something like that," he replies.
"I know how you feel," the boy says, shaking his head in understanding.
Skandar laughs uneasily, shrugging as he looks back over at Will and Anna, who are listening in, smiling against each other's lips. He looks back over to his left, to the other couple, feeling like a voyeur as he watches their heated kiss. The guy's hand snakes down between their bodies and under the girl's short skirt, and Gel Boy groans.
"Jesus, get a fuckin' room," he yells, jostling them apart.
They stumble off back through to the club and Skandar returns Gel Boy's perfunctory wave. The moment they've disappeared around the corner, the three of them crack up, and Anna reaches out to Skandar for her beer, pulling him in towards them in the process. Their hips bump and their bottles clink, and Skandar desperately wants to kiss them both on their flushed, wet mouths. Anna's forehead rests against his, and he can feel her breath on his face, and Will's arm sneaking around his waist. The tension is unbearable, but they're already attracting a few odd looks, and attention is really the last thing they want.
A crowd bustles past them suddenly and they all separate, the moment gone as quickly as it arrived. They cough, run their fingers back through their hair, finishing their beers and trying to look normal. As they head back to the dance floor, Skandar realises how drunk he's starting to feel. He kind of likes it.
"Hey," Will shouts, slinging his arms around their shoulders as they fight their way back through the club, "I think we should get completely plastered."
Skandar laughs and Anna looks doubtful.
"To send Skandar off?" Will adds, and then shoots a glare at a group of guys who check Anna out as they pass.
Anna shrugs obliviously. "I thought we wanted it to be a night he'd remember," she yells back above the noise.
They've reached the bar now, and Will is frowning at Anna. He lets his arm drop from her shoulders and turns to Skandar instead.
"Hey," he shouts, "I think we should get Anna completely plastered."
Anna folds her arms, pouting at them, but they can tell she's not genuinely annoyed.
***
Roughly ten minutes later, they're sitting at a booth all in complete hysterics after witnessing the ridiculous, soap-opera-esque break-up of a girl and her boyfriend. Normally, Skandar might feel kind of bad about being so entertained by others' tragedy, but in these circumstances, the ex-couple are entirely unaware of their comedy genius, and anyway, Skandar's too drunk to care all that much.
Anna can't stop laughing and even does a hilarious impression of the girl, which causes Will to literally do a spit-take. He then goes and buys them all another round, to make up for the beer he lost as a result.
Or something.
Currently, Will and Anna are currently sitting across from him, laughing and swaying into each other, shouting sentence fragments in each other's ears.
"DO THEY HAVE," it sounds like Anna is yelling, "ANY MORE. OF THE STUFF?"
"THE WHAT?" Will yells back.
"THE STUUUUFF." Anna collapses into giggles.
"ALCOHOL?"
Anna gives him a Look. "YES, I'M ASKING IF THE BAR HAS RUN OUT OF ALCOHOL." She somehow manages to make her voice sound scathing, even at such a volume.
Will, clearly too drunk to bother coming up with an actual response, just sticks his tongue out.
Skandar leans across the table, getting his arms rather grossly sticky in the process, and presses his lips to Anna's ear. "I thought you wanted this to be a night I'd remember," he mimics, teasing, and she gently headbutts him away, laughing.
It doesn't take much longer for them to relax enough to actually get up from their safe little booth. A song comes on that Anna, apparently, secretly likes, and now that she has a decent amount of alcohol in her system, she's willing to get up and dance to it. She slides out of the booth and places her hands flat on the table, leaning forward with a frown. Skandar attempts to look at her face instead of her cleavage, but interestingly, alcohol interferes with such a task.
"I'm not going to dance on my own," Anna says, pouting at them. "Come on."
Skandar shakes his head. He's really not a dancer.
"Come on," she pleads, swaying her hips to the beat like she's trying to tempt them.
It's a wonder, really, that no drunken underage boy appears at that moment and takes the opportunity to start grinding against her, because Skandar's not sure which boyfriend is supposed to defend a girl who has two. Then he realises that Anna can probably stand up for herself, anyway. And then he realises that he'd rather like it if he were the drunken underage boy grinding up against her, but Will gets there first, wriggling gracelessly out of the booth.
She's looking at him suspiciously as he ducks behind her and curves his hands around her hips. He leans down over her, in a way that's dangerously close to being obscene, even here. But Anna's arms stay straight and her back only arches a little under Will, and then, fuck, he really presses in against her and she resists, presses back, her hips moving in a tiny, slow circle. He presses his lips to the back of her neck, and flashes Skandar a look which makes him squirm in his seat.
They straighten up, Anna reaching up behind her to cup Will's face and turn it down towards her. She smiles, and they seem to be lost in their own little world for a moment until the crowd surges and knocks them sideways. Skandar leaps up to keep from losing them, and feels his surroundings spin a little as he pushes past people. He finds Will and Anna not far away, holding each other close and sort of swaying to the music, almost like they're at a fancy ball or something-although Will's hands are a little low on Anna's hips for that.
Anna takes Will's hand and lifts it high, twirls herself under it to face Skandar.
"Hiii," she sing-songs, and reaches for him, pulls him in.
"I don't dance," he says into her ear, grinning.
"Oh, like we do?" she snorts.
And then she takes him by the hips and it's as easy as that all of a sudden, just moving with her. The next hour or so seems to go by in a blur-the three of them tangled with each other, pressed together and dancing in a way that feels almost as satisfying as sex, the closeness and the way they respond to each other's bodies. They fall into it easily where others might struggle, because they're used to being a trio, they know how to make space and avoid exclusion. Anna is in the middle for the most part, the boys just touching where they can, but a few times Skandar does end up against Will or with Will against him, and those brief moments make him buzz with anticipation.
But it's as frustrating as it is satisfying, as there's only so far you can go in public and after a certain amount of time Skandar starts to feel like this is the longest foreplay ever. At various times through the night, he's been half-hard against Anna's thigh, against her crotch, against Will's arse, against what he's pretty sure was Will's equally-growing erection. He's not sure it's particularly healthy for his body, either, to keep having an erection flipped on and off like a light switch, and eventually he just can't take it anymore.
"I think we need to get a taxi," he says, lips to Anna's ear, and he tightens his grip on Will's hands, which are clutching her hips.
Once again, the three of them hold hands, forming a line with Skandar at the front as they snake their way through to the club's exit.
Part 7b.
Author: likecharity
Pairing: Will/Skandar/Anna
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Real person slash and het
Summary: Skandar knows he should want to bond with Will P., and Michael, and all the new people he's going to be working with. He shouldn't want to just abandon this party, but there's really only two people he cares about giving a proper goodbye to.
A/N: GUESS WHAT. This fic wasn't entirely forgotten about!! Also, I have absolutely no idea what's going on with its timeline anymore, can we just pretend it makes sense? I also just want to thank everybody who's stuck with this story all this time, despite my obvious issues with updating on any kind of regular basis. ♥ It really means a lot to me.
[ Part 1. ¦ Part 2. ¦ Part 3. ¦ Part 4. ¦ Part 5. ¦ Part 6. ¦ Part 7a & Part 7b. ¦ Part 8a & Part 8b. ¦ TBC]
Skandar stands awkwardly at the side of the room, nodding along to the conversation around him without really paying attention to it. He taps his foot against the floor agitatedly, eyes fixed on the door. It's not fair-he hasn't seen Will and Anna for almost a whole month, and now he has to wait even longer because apparently, they're incapable of arriving to a party on time.
"Oh my god, stop it," a voice hisses in his ear suddenly, breaking his concentration.
"What?"
Georgie, standing beside him with her arms crossed, stomps on his foot.
"Ow! What was that for?" he cries, but then realises, as his foot almost instantly starts tapping against the floor again.
Georgie looks at him pointedly. "It's so annoying."
"Wait a minute, is that-" Ben says, leaning in from Skandar's other side. Skandar's eyes instinctively dart towards the door again, but nobody's there, and he looks sheepishly back at Ben, who is tilting his head down towards the floor and frowning in concentration. "Is that 'Another One Bites the Dust'?"
"...What?" Skandar says helplessly, but his voice is drowned out by Georgie.
"It is!" she cries, laughing, and adopts Ben's bizarre stance, head on one side, bending over just a little.
And then-
"Dum, dum, dum," Ben says, in time with Skandar's tapping foot.
"Another one bites the dust," Georgie chimes in.
Skandar stares at his foot, which has apparently decided to tap out the beat of old Queen songs to keep itself occupied while he impatiently watches doors.
"Dum, dum, dum," Ben and Georgie sing, "another one bites the dust! And another one gone, and another one gone, another one bites the dust-"
They seem not to notice or care that Skandar has forcibly restrained his foot, now, and he wonders how exactly he's going to survive spending six months filming with these two. Ben and Georgie, that is, not his feet, although if they're going to develop a habit of drumming out '80s hits, that could be an irritation as well.
"Hey," says Georgie, as Ben continues singing, mostly to himself, "is that Anna?"
"What?" Skandar looks around wildly. "Where?"
"Over there, talking to Will," says Georgie, pointing in the opposite direction.
"What?" Skandar almost gives himself whiplash. "When did Will arrive?"
"When we were singing," says Georgie nonchalantly. "HEY, ANNA! WILL!"
"Damn you and your singing," Skandar mutters, as he spots the two of them, looking startled on the other side of the room.
"Damn you and your musical foot," Georgie retorts, waving manically at Anna and Will to come over.
Skandar feels his heart start beating a little faster-ridiculously-as the two of them approach, Anna looking beautiful in a lacy black dress and Will in one of his typically weird outfits but looking good anyway. He doesn't like that he's missed them as much as he has, because it's only been a month and he has to cope without them for much longer than that. And he used to be able to, too, but it seems like the more time he spends with them lately the harder it is to be alone.
It's not helped by the knowledge that this is a leaving party. This is likely the last time he sees them before he goes. Suddenly, he regrets that they never really talked about this, because if they had, they maybe could have had a decent send-off of their own. But instead they just had their first serious couple talk (threesome talk?) and then Anna realised she had a bunch of Uni work to do, and hurried off back to Oxford. Shortly after, Skandar received a phone call from his Mum wondering whether she was actually going to get to spend any time with him at all before he disappeared for six months, and he was guilted into going back home. They didn't think about the fact that that might have been the last time they'd all be alone together before Skandar left.
They reach the group and suddenly the air is filled with greetings. "Hi!"
"Hi!" everybody echoes.
"Hi, I was watching the door but I didn't see either of you arrive!" Skandar says hurriedly, almost feeling guilty for not being the first to notice them.
"We saw you," says Anna, looking a little puzzled, "you weren't watching the door, you were standing on one leg."
"Oh, that," says Ben. "His foot was being a jukebox."
She looks at him for a moment, then says fondly, "I missed you, Ben," and pulls him into a hug.
Georgie attaches herself onto the hug, and Will and Skandar grin at each other over the huddle.
"This'll probably save time," Will says, and wraps his arms around one side of the group.
Skandar shrugs, and does the same, hiding a smile in Anna's shoulder as one of Will's hands closes around his and gives it a gentle squeeze.
"Okay," says Anna after a moment, her voice muffled against Ben's chest, "I'm beginning to have difficulty breathing. Also, shouldn't you guys be bonding with the new cast and crew?"
"Are you trying to get rid of us already?" Ben asks, mock-offended and squeezing her tighter.
"We did try," Skandar adds, "but I'm not sure we're coming across that well."
"Ah, what with the hopping around on one foot and public group hugs?" Will asks.
"Yes, that." Skandar cranes his neck to grin at him over Georgie's head.
In truth, it went all right, but it was just kind of awkward, and he'd really rather be joking around with this lot than getting to know new people. He never really felt like that when Ben joined the cast, but maybe that was because they were all still together, and this time they've been split into two and it's like he has to choose where his loyalties lie.
He knows it's not particularly fair to shut the new people out-Will Poulter in particular, who is over in a corner right now looking intimidated by Tilda-but he can't help it; right now it seems so much more important to be saying a decent goodbye than a decent hello.
It takes quite a while for them to get a chance to talk on their own. Skandar spots Will heading to the toilets and goes after him, and after, they sit down around the corner together.
"I'm gonna miss you," Will says quietly.
"I know," Skandar replies, a little stiffly. "Me too."
"Do you want to talk about it?" Will says. "It's just-we haven't, you know."
Skandar sighs exasperatedly. "What is there to talk about?" He leans back, hard, against the wall. "I'm leaving. You're staying."
"Yeah-but-" Will says, then stops, hesitating. "It's just. It doesn't seem like you've really accepted it."
Skandar wants to say, I'm leaving, you're staying, again, until Will gets it, but he knows what Will means.
Will's sort of fidgeting like he's not sure how much he should say, whether he'll offend Skandar, and Skandar wishes he'd stop worrying about his feelings and just go ahead.
Eventually, he does. "I mean, you're sitting here with me instead of getting to know Michael. Or Will." He tilts his head in the direction of the party. "And you know...you should make an effort, you're going to be working with them."
Skandar crumples, falters, gives in. He can't stand it anymore. "I don't want to work with that Will," he says, his voice sort of breaking a little as he places a hand on Will's chest, feeling the gentle thud of his heart against his palm. "I want to work with this one."
Will pulls him into a hug, apparently without a second thought, and Skandar holds onto him tightly, savouring the warmth and the closeness. He shuts his eyes and buries his face into Will's neck, inhales, smelling soap and sweat and cologne and that Will smell he knows so well. He likes the shiny-soft feel of Will's blazer against his cheek. He doesn't want to open his eyes and see if anyone's noticed them, but he can't help his paranoia and when he senses someone coming closer he opens one eye carefully.
It's only Anna.
He and Will stay right where they are.
Skandar's reminded of the Prince Caspian premiere after-party in New York, reminded of Anna coming around the corner to see him pushing Will against the wall and kissing him. He wishes it were that simple now, that they could just steal a bottle of something and sneak off to a hotel and get off. He knows he's simplifying, knows it was anything but easy back then, but still. He wants that.
Anna looks tired, drained, somehow. She was probably flashing smiles at everybody else, dancing with Andrew and Georgie, politely asking Will and Michael about their other projects. But now the smile she gives them is sort of forced and tight and she slumps down next to Skandar on the bench and drags her hand back through her hair.
"I don't like this," she admits.
There's a long pause.
"It doesn't feel right," she adds. "We've barely said goodbye, and now everyone is, and-" she's looking at him, now, and Skandar peers up at her from over Will's shoulder, "I just want to get out of here."
"We can't just go, Anna," says Will's voice, a low rumble in Skandar's ear.
Neither of them are letting go, yet, and Skandar wonders if maybe it could stay that way forever, if Will could just be his limpet or his conjoined twin and he could bring him with him for filming.
"No, but-" Anna sighs. "Can't we?"
The thing is, Skandar thinks he probably shouldn't want that as much as he does. He knows he should want to bond with Will P., and Michael, and all the new people he's going to be working with. He shouldn't want to just abandon this party, but there's really only two people he cares about giving a proper goodbye to.
He sighs into Will's shoulder. He doesn't want to deal with this. Getting to know these people makes it real.
Skandar catches a glimpse of movement and he glances up, seeing Tilda heading towards them. He knows she knows and everything but he's still suddenly embarrassed, blushing furiously and disentangling himself from Will's arms.
"I'm sorry," Tilda says, standing over them like an absolute giant in her high heels. She crosses her arms, and then brings her fingers to her lips, glancing behind her back at the rest of the party. "I didn't mean to interrupt."
Skandar tries desperately to stop blushing.
"I just thought it seemed like you weren't really enjoying yourselves," she says, and Skandar looks up at her with her tight-fitting black suit and her piercing green eyes and her cropped red hair and wonders how, how she can be so perceptive and understanding and nice and cool all at once.
"No, this is great," Skandar lies, not really knowing why. "It's really-a great chance to say goodbye, to everyone, and everything."
Tilda smiles, then looks slightly pained, then smiles again. She sinks down, crouching, and the three of them look at her in puzzlement. She reaches for Skandar's hands and Skandar feels himself going even redder, especially when he thinks about how they're not really that concealed over here and this whole thing would just look fucking weird if anyone saw.
"You don't want to say goodbye to these people," says Tilda quietly, calmly. "You want to say goodbye to Will, and to Anna, and that's okay."
Skandar looks down at his lap because her eyes are too intense, and he looks at her long pale hands holding his. They slip away and he watches as she gently strokes Anna's cheek, then Will's, and he watches them smile embarrassedly and colour a little.
"If you want to go, I'll cover for you."
Skandar's heart sort of swells and he feels stupid.
"We can't just ditch everyone," says Will, and Skandar hears the way he hesitates on the 'everyone', clearly only really thinking of Georgie.
It's always the four of them, even with Ben now it's always been okay for them to break off from him because he's older and newer. But Georgie-well, they can't just leave her, all three of them vanishing with no explanation.
Tilda smiles again. She tilts her head. "If you're worried about the little one, I think she'll be okay," she says.
They all crane their necks to peer around the corner, and, through the crowd, they can see Georgie sitting at the side. For a moment it looks like she's alone but then they see Will Poulter standing up, offering her his hand as a song starts up-one Skandar knows Georgie loves. He watches as Georgie bursts out laughing and gets to her feet, taking his hand, and he spins her around as they make their way into the middle of the crowd.
"They've been attached at the hip for at least the past half hour," Tilda says with a wicked grin, and then gestures down the corridor. Skandar assumes that down there, they'll find a door they can sneak out through.
"Thank you," he says, and then suddenly, on instinct, leans forward and presses a clumsy kiss to her cheek.
His face feels hot when he pulls back and he can instantly sense the strong desire Will and Anna both have to tease him. But Tilda smiles and squeezes his hand and says something that sounds like it might be a quote, probably from some book he studied in school. And okay, he's not really sure what it means, but he assumes the gist of it is that she's wishing him luck for the next movie. And also maybe something about talent, which makes him blush even more.
Tilda leans back, peering around the corner back at the party, and then gets hurriedly to her feet, gesturing at them to do the same.
"Andrew's heading this way," she says, voice urgently hushed even though she's still smiling.
She nudges Anna's shoulder and the three of them race off down the hall, Anna's heels skittering against the tile as they round the corner. Will and Skandar grab one of her hands each to prevent her from falling, and she can't help but let out a giggle as they race down another corridor towards the back door of the venue. The soles of their shoes all clatter towards it and they can hear Andrew's voice fading into the background.
Skandar feels a sudden pang of guilt as he starts to hear Tilda's indiscernible response, remembering that behind him, there's a room full of people gathered to give him a send-off and he's abandoning them.
But then the rest of Tilda's lie is drowned out by the sound of Anna's heels skittering to a halt, and her laughter as she squeezes his hand. On his other side, Will lets his hand go, in order to grasp the doorknob in front of them, his grip strong and certain. The door opens onto a street and they step out, breathing in the cool fresh air.
"We're in the clear," Anna says breathlessly, her face flushed. She pulls him into a hug, and he buries his face in her shoulder, brushes his lips against soft skin and inhales the sweet smell of her.
She spins him round to Will, passes him over, and Will pulls him close, big hand on the back of Skandar's head, fingers combing through his hair. Will chuckles in his ear and then lets him go, grabs Anna instead, lifts her right up in the air and makes her shriek.
Skandar knows they're hardly going to be chased after, but the security of their hands was nice and so when Will puts Anna down, he links his fingers through theirs again and drags them off down the street before they have a chance to catch their breath. He knows he shouldn't, but he feels like he just hopped into a getaway car after robbing a bank.
"I know a place," Anna pants, as they eventually slow to a stop further down the street. "There's a club, maybe ten minutes' walk from here."
"But Skandar-" Will starts.
"It's fine," Anna interrupts him briskly, tugging Skandar's hand and pulling the two boys in the opposite direction, presumably towards the aforementioned club. "Lulu goes there all the time because they never ID. He'll be fine."
"Sounds like a classy place," Will snorts, and Anna wrinkles her nose.
"Maybe I'm not in the mood for classy," she says. The dress she's wearing begs to differ, Skandar thinks, but he's too intrigued by the meaning behind her words to argue. "I think we should send Skandar off with a night he'll remember."
"What kind of club is this?" Will laughs, and Anna lets go of Skandar's hand to reach round and prod Will in the ribs.
***
It is, indeed, not a classy place. Its main clientele are under-18s out on school nights getting pissed on Smirnoff Ice. As they're heading inside, a boy who looks no older than fourteen stumbles past them and throws up in the gutter. The first thing they see upon entering is a girl slumped against the wall crying her eyes out, her friends drunkenly comforting her. It's a pretty big change from the laidback, grown-up atmosphere of Skandar's official leaving party, but somehow it feels like a necessary one. After all, he needs to remember that what he's leaving this place for is several months of work. Maybe what he needs is one last wild night, one last chance to be an irresponsible teenager.
But Will and Anna are faltering, hanging back. It's really not Will's scene at all, and Anna looks a little taken aback at the discovery of what her little sister's scene apparently is. But everyone here's too drunk to know who the three of them are, or too drunk to care, so Skandar takes their hands again, a shudder of confidence sparking through him like electricity as he strides forward into the club, into the mass of dancing bodies, pulling Will and Anna along with him. The music is loud, growing more deafening the deeper they go into the crowd, but it feels like it's embracing them, the heavy bass pounding right through their bones.
As they head towards the bar, the pounding bass starts to organise itself in Skandar's mind into a hip-hop song he's heard before, something chavs at school play on their mobile phones to annoy his Maths teacher. They reach the bar and drop hands. There doesn't seem to be any sort of queue and so Will steps forward, almost shouting out their orders. Skandar can't hear him, so it's a wonder the barman manages to. All he can hear is the song.
It's one of those ones that features a rapper calling girls bitches and telling them to 'drop it low', and he gives Anna a sidelong glance, expecting her to make a grossed-out face, but instead he gets a smirk. She raises her hands in the air, the movements appearing jerky in the strobe lighting that suddenly flashes throughout the room. Her hips sway, bump against his, and then she throws back her head and laughs suddenly, quite possibly at his expression. He's not actually sure what it is, but it's probably worth laughing at. It's just-well, he's not into these girls, any of the girls they're surrounded by, caked-on make-up and dresses that leave nothing to the imagination, grinding up against guys they've just met. They don't do anything for him. They used to catch his eye, sure, but since Anna, they just seem trashy.
Somehow, though, Anna acting like one of them-even for only about seven seconds-is really hot. It's made even better by her dorky laughter afterwards, and the awkwardness of her movements because she's not used to it. Or, in her own words (the only ones he hears in the sentence she yells in his ear, anyway), "NOT DRUNK ENOUGH!"
Will remedies this quickly, sliding a tray of shots down the bar. He pays the barman as Skandar and Anna take a glass each. Skandar can feel Anna's eyes on him as he brings the glass up to his mouth and downs whatever's in it-possibly vodka-and he's not sure it's because she's being protective, or looking for reassurance. Because she waits 'til he's coughed a little and flashed her a grin before she downs her own. Anna's more of a chardonnay girl than a vodka shots girl, but then, it's not like he has much experience himself with this sort of thing.
He laughs suddenly, the alcohol hitting his bloodstream. They're not exactly in their element here, but it seems more entertaining than embarrassing, more amusing than awkward. He watches Will gingerly pluck one of the shots from the tray, and then gulp it down.
"WHAT IS IT?" Skandar yells in his general direction.
"I DON'T KNOW," Will yells back. "HE SAID THEY HAD SOME SORT OF DEAL ON."
Skandar laughs again, takes another one of the shots on impulse and watches as the other two copy him. He throws his head back, staring at the ceiling as it flashes and pulses with coloured light. His throat stings but his chest, his heart-they feel good. One more shot each, and then Anna's pulling the two of them onto the dance floor just as the DJ switches to another song. This one sounds more playful, electronic beeps pulsing beneath the sound of a woman's rhythmic breaths.
Anna lets go of their hands once they find a part of floor that's not crowded by trainers and stilettos, and she flings her arms up again, up to the ceiling, her fingertips pushing through a layer of light that slices through the room. Beneath it everything is movement in clouds of smoke (the smoking ban is apparently paid no mind here), and Anna's body sways, her hips rocking. But she doesn't quite match the beat, and she laughs and then loses her confidence, arms slung down by her sides once again, her gaze awkwardly flitting all over the club.
Skandar feels her insecurity, getting pushed from both sides as the dancing crowd ebbs and flows. Some girl gets her handbag caught on Anna's dress, and Skandar watches as the two of them try to disentangle it. But the girl eventually just pulls hard and the bag comes free, tearing the delicate lace of Anna's dress in the process. Anna is too shocked to react, just looking down at the frayed fabric, ripped from hip to hem. Skandar knows what Will's about to do before he does it, and grabs his hand without thinking-a combination of the alcohol and the pattern of the evening, he guesses. He's trying to stop Will, but he does it at the same time as Will grabs the girl by her shoulder, yelling something at her.
Suddenly the boys are knocked forwards by the movement of the crowd, and their linked hands jerk upwards instinctively. The girl-fake tan, hair scraped back against her scalp-sees the entwined fingers and simply laughs, still dancing, shouting something in her friend's ear. Will blushes hotly, speechless, and Skandar feels about a hundred things-disbelief, fury, and mortification, to name a few-and shakes Will's hand off, pushing through the crowd alone, back the way they came.
He slumps against the bar, his breathing heavy. For a few moments it seems like all he can hear is his heart pounding in his ears, and he's a little ashamed to realise he's more of a lightweight than he thought. (Then again, none of them know what was in those shots.) He's surprised that his embarrassment isn't so much due to the fact that he was seen holding hands with another guy, but more that they didn't know how to react to it. They haven't had any experience with this before, haven't learnt how to deal with that sort of thing.
And some part of him, some shameful part, wanted to prove to that girl-that stranger-that he's not gay, wanted to explain the situation to her, explain that yeah, he's had sex with a boy, but he's had sex with a girl too, and doesn't that count for something? He doesn't consider himself gay, not in the slightest, even-Will's the only guy he's ever felt this way for, and sex with him isn't gay sex, it's just sex with Will. And holding hands with Will is just holding hands with Will, and he wishes there was some way for everyone to understand that.
"You gonna order, or what?" someone barks in his ear suddenly, and he jerks upright to see a guy with spiky, gelled hair peering at him, pointing at the impatient barman.
"Oh, right, sorry," Skandar mumbles, which is pointless, seeing as anything quieter than a yell is totally inaudible in this place. "Um, a beer please." His mouth seems to work before his mind, possibly in a psychic sort of way, because only seconds after he shouts "THREE, three beers please," Will and Anna appear on either side of him, sweaty and uncomfortable.
Will leans in to say something-Skandar feels lips brush against his ear-and then changes his mind, pulling back. Anna does it instead, and Skandar feels confident that what she says is just a more coherent version of what Will was going to say.
"We're not really used to this, are we," she says. Her voice isn't raised, but her lips are pressed so closely to his ear that the words seem to travel directly to his brain like she's a voice inside his head.
He shakes his head, laughing hopelessly, as the barman cracks open the bottles, one after another after another. He pushes the beers towards them, Skandar pays, they drink, and conversation is still entirely futile.
"DO YOU WANT TO TRY FIND SOMEWHERE THAT'S MAYBE A LITTLE QUIETER," Will bellows.
***
They manage to find the toilets, and lean awkwardly against the wall. On one side of them, boys laugh raucously, trading condoms and stories that even gross Skandar out. On the other side, girls are holding hands as they wait in line for the loos. (Distantly, he wonders why the divide is so clear, why he can't reach down and slip his fingers through Will's right now without being judged, but he pushes the thought out of his mind, embarrassed for even having it.)
In the middle, boys press girls against the tiled walls, mouths against mouths and hands between legs. Will, Skandar, and Anna sip their beers from the bottle, twitchy and uneasy. Everybody here is probably younger than them; immature, aimless partying youths with no future, and yet it feels like they're so much more mature. Skandar knows he's done more than these kids could ever hope to, but he feels so small amongst them.
"Does anyone else feel awkward?" Will says, then, his voice hoarse from shouting, sounding strange in the quieter environment-almost too loud.
Anna takes a long swig of her beer and then just laughs. Then, suddenly, she hands the beer to Skandar, and fumbles around with her dress for a bit like it's bothering her. It takes Skandar quite a while to actually process the fact that she's taking it off, because it seems so ridiculous, but that's definitely what she's doing. She's wearing a slip beneath it, he realises. Tight, silky, black, low-cut. Exactly the kind of thing she'd wear under her clothes, but not-well, not as an actual dress, which is what she seems to be going for now.
She shrugs at them, which has the effect of pushing her boobs together in a rather distracting way, and Skandar and Will only vaguely hear what she says. (Which Skandar thinks is, "Just trying to blend in.")
She sticks out her hand to take her beer back from Skandar, and he gives her his as well, shrugging off his jacket and letting it drop to the dirty floor. She grins widely, kissing him on the lips impulsively before handing his beer back to him. They take a swig in unison, both looking towards Will expectantly. He's wearing something that is pretty much a suit-as in, you'd have to look at him quite closely to realise that the shirt he's wearing is some kind of strange t-shirt with buttons, and the trousers are actually black skinny jeans.
Skandar and Anna consider him for a moment, trying to work out how to casual-ise such an outfit. And then Anna reaches forwards and takes Will's beer, handing both bottles to Skandar, leaving him to clutch the three of them to his chest, cold and sweating ice through his t-shirt. Anna pushes Will's blazer off his shoulders, tossing it over her shoulder, and then begins unbuttoning his shirt. They're receiving a few strange looks by now, understandably. Skandar's sure, though, that stories of seeing Susan Pevensie undressing her brother in the bathroom of a seedy London club are more likely to be on drunken Facebook status updates than legitimate gossip blogs.
Anyway, Will's wearing a vest under his shirt. Skandar looks him up and down uncertainly. It's a sort of pale grey and clingy vest, and teamed with the skinny jeans and slightly pointed black dress shoes, it looks a little odd. But also good, somehow. He's not sure how Will does that.
Anna balls up the shirt and tosses it over Will's shoulder in the general direction of a bin, missing by about two metres. Will immediately looks concerned.
"I'll buy you a new one," she promises, looking him up and down and grinning.
Skandar does the same (for the second time), feeling a little more drunk as he appreciates the sight of Will's biceps and the way the vest clings to his chest.
"Do we blend a little better now?" Will asks, rolling his eyes, oblivious to the way they're both eyeing him.
Skandar looks from side to side, and is greeted on both left and right by couples with their tongues down each other's throats.
"Uh," he says.
Anna laughs, and then takes Will by the hips, clutching him tight and pulling him close. His vest pulls up a little against the thin silky fabric of her slip, and her breasts push together as they press against his chest. She grins against his lips before they kiss, soft and then harder. Skandar's watching, but he starts to feel a little conspicuous for doing so, so he fumbles in his pocket for his phone as Will nudges Anna against the wall with his hips. Anna drapes her arms over Will's shoulders as the kiss deepens, and Skandar finds that he doesn't feel jealous, not even a little bit.
Suddenly, the guy Skandar met earlier at the bar stumbles out of the toilets and bumps into him.
"Shit, sorry mate," he says, running fingers back through his gel-coated hair.
Will and Anna are oblivious, wrapped up in each other, Anna's back arched so that her hips press forward into his. The guy follows Skandar's gaze and his expression turns suddenly sympathetic.
Just then, another boy comes through the door and a short blonde girl queuing up for the girls' toilets turns around, eyes lighting up. She embraces him, and the guy with the gelled hair watches them for a moment. He and Skandar stand awkwardly between the two kissing pairs.
"Third wheel, eh?"
Skandar can't help but grin, as he stands there with three beers clutched awkwardly in his hands, waiting. "Something like that," he replies.
"I know how you feel," the boy says, shaking his head in understanding.
Skandar laughs uneasily, shrugging as he looks back over at Will and Anna, who are listening in, smiling against each other's lips. He looks back over to his left, to the other couple, feeling like a voyeur as he watches their heated kiss. The guy's hand snakes down between their bodies and under the girl's short skirt, and Gel Boy groans.
"Jesus, get a fuckin' room," he yells, jostling them apart.
They stumble off back through to the club and Skandar returns Gel Boy's perfunctory wave. The moment they've disappeared around the corner, the three of them crack up, and Anna reaches out to Skandar for her beer, pulling him in towards them in the process. Their hips bump and their bottles clink, and Skandar desperately wants to kiss them both on their flushed, wet mouths. Anna's forehead rests against his, and he can feel her breath on his face, and Will's arm sneaking around his waist. The tension is unbearable, but they're already attracting a few odd looks, and attention is really the last thing they want.
A crowd bustles past them suddenly and they all separate, the moment gone as quickly as it arrived. They cough, run their fingers back through their hair, finishing their beers and trying to look normal. As they head back to the dance floor, Skandar realises how drunk he's starting to feel. He kind of likes it.
"Hey," Will shouts, slinging his arms around their shoulders as they fight their way back through the club, "I think we should get completely plastered."
Skandar laughs and Anna looks doubtful.
"To send Skandar off?" Will adds, and then shoots a glare at a group of guys who check Anna out as they pass.
Anna shrugs obliviously. "I thought we wanted it to be a night he'd remember," she yells back above the noise.
They've reached the bar now, and Will is frowning at Anna. He lets his arm drop from her shoulders and turns to Skandar instead.
"Hey," he shouts, "I think we should get Anna completely plastered."
Anna folds her arms, pouting at them, but they can tell she's not genuinely annoyed.
***
Roughly ten minutes later, they're sitting at a booth all in complete hysterics after witnessing the ridiculous, soap-opera-esque break-up of a girl and her boyfriend. Normally, Skandar might feel kind of bad about being so entertained by others' tragedy, but in these circumstances, the ex-couple are entirely unaware of their comedy genius, and anyway, Skandar's too drunk to care all that much.
Anna can't stop laughing and even does a hilarious impression of the girl, which causes Will to literally do a spit-take. He then goes and buys them all another round, to make up for the beer he lost as a result.
Or something.
Currently, Will and Anna are currently sitting across from him, laughing and swaying into each other, shouting sentence fragments in each other's ears.
"DO THEY HAVE," it sounds like Anna is yelling, "ANY MORE. OF THE STUFF?"
"THE WHAT?" Will yells back.
"THE STUUUUFF." Anna collapses into giggles.
"ALCOHOL?"
Anna gives him a Look. "YES, I'M ASKING IF THE BAR HAS RUN OUT OF ALCOHOL." She somehow manages to make her voice sound scathing, even at such a volume.
Will, clearly too drunk to bother coming up with an actual response, just sticks his tongue out.
Skandar leans across the table, getting his arms rather grossly sticky in the process, and presses his lips to Anna's ear. "I thought you wanted this to be a night I'd remember," he mimics, teasing, and she gently headbutts him away, laughing.
It doesn't take much longer for them to relax enough to actually get up from their safe little booth. A song comes on that Anna, apparently, secretly likes, and now that she has a decent amount of alcohol in her system, she's willing to get up and dance to it. She slides out of the booth and places her hands flat on the table, leaning forward with a frown. Skandar attempts to look at her face instead of her cleavage, but interestingly, alcohol interferes with such a task.
"I'm not going to dance on my own," Anna says, pouting at them. "Come on."
Skandar shakes his head. He's really not a dancer.
"Come on," she pleads, swaying her hips to the beat like she's trying to tempt them.
It's a wonder, really, that no drunken underage boy appears at that moment and takes the opportunity to start grinding against her, because Skandar's not sure which boyfriend is supposed to defend a girl who has two. Then he realises that Anna can probably stand up for herself, anyway. And then he realises that he'd rather like it if he were the drunken underage boy grinding up against her, but Will gets there first, wriggling gracelessly out of the booth.
She's looking at him suspiciously as he ducks behind her and curves his hands around her hips. He leans down over her, in a way that's dangerously close to being obscene, even here. But Anna's arms stay straight and her back only arches a little under Will, and then, fuck, he really presses in against her and she resists, presses back, her hips moving in a tiny, slow circle. He presses his lips to the back of her neck, and flashes Skandar a look which makes him squirm in his seat.
They straighten up, Anna reaching up behind her to cup Will's face and turn it down towards her. She smiles, and they seem to be lost in their own little world for a moment until the crowd surges and knocks them sideways. Skandar leaps up to keep from losing them, and feels his surroundings spin a little as he pushes past people. He finds Will and Anna not far away, holding each other close and sort of swaying to the music, almost like they're at a fancy ball or something-although Will's hands are a little low on Anna's hips for that.
Anna takes Will's hand and lifts it high, twirls herself under it to face Skandar.
"Hiii," she sing-songs, and reaches for him, pulls him in.
"I don't dance," he says into her ear, grinning.
"Oh, like we do?" she snorts.
And then she takes him by the hips and it's as easy as that all of a sudden, just moving with her. The next hour or so seems to go by in a blur-the three of them tangled with each other, pressed together and dancing in a way that feels almost as satisfying as sex, the closeness and the way they respond to each other's bodies. They fall into it easily where others might struggle, because they're used to being a trio, they know how to make space and avoid exclusion. Anna is in the middle for the most part, the boys just touching where they can, but a few times Skandar does end up against Will or with Will against him, and those brief moments make him buzz with anticipation.
But it's as frustrating as it is satisfying, as there's only so far you can go in public and after a certain amount of time Skandar starts to feel like this is the longest foreplay ever. At various times through the night, he's been half-hard against Anna's thigh, against her crotch, against Will's arse, against what he's pretty sure was Will's equally-growing erection. He's not sure it's particularly healthy for his body, either, to keep having an erection flipped on and off like a light switch, and eventually he just can't take it anymore.
"I think we need to get a taxi," he says, lips to Anna's ear, and he tightens his grip on Will's hands, which are clutching her hips.
Once again, the three of them hold hands, forming a line with Skandar at the front as they snake their way through to the club's exit.
Part 7b.