Smosh Fic: A little bit closer so it doesn't matter anymore
Title: A little bit closer so it doesn't matter anymore
Rating: PG-13
Pairings: Ian/Anthony, Anthony/OC
Genre/Warnings: Angst (but not my usual depressing crap - it's happy...ish. I tried, alright?)
Summary: Maybe he’s fucked up before - a thousand times - and maybe this is another fuck up but maybe it’s not.
A/N: I must love the theme of making Anthony choose between two people (I think 90% of my fics are like this). I'm very ashamed of myself because I've heard several authors say that, as a writer, you can write a million things but somehow, they all will always come back to your "true passion". I guess my true passion is making Anthony suffer. LOL!
Anthony thinks he’s made a mistake. He thinks he’s fucked up but he keeps going, letting his head fall back and his fingers reach up to slide along Ian’s hot damp skin. He watches the swollen pink lips, open mouthed and wet. A slow simmering but intense warmth settles within every place they’re touching, the untouched places feeling empty.
“We’re drunk, we're just drunk,” Ian says over and over again, trying to convince them both, but Anthony knows. He covers his mouth over Anthony’s. The taste of alcohol just tastes like what Anthony always thought Ian would - rough and salty but sweet for some unknown reason. And Anthony’s mind is completely clear as he sucks hard on Ian’s bottom lip, feeling the stubble with his own tongue. Ian smells, like new laundry and old sweat all at the same time and he feels hot and soft laid over Anthony. His leg cramps under the weight and his spine pops; Ian’s overgrown beard scratches his neck. They move together with too much effort until they’re both breathing too hard and Anthony’s bare ass is probably suffering from rug burns and Ian’s head from bruises as he hits the dinner table’s leg over and over again.
But it feels good, painful in his chest and painful everywhere else - it’s overwhelming, but good.
There’s still beer in the fridge the next day and no empty cans to throw away. Just a t-shirt to adjust and pants to put back on before the sun comes up.
*
“Stop looking at me like that.”
“Like what?” Ian smirks and crosses his arms across his chest. He props his legs up on the table, dangerously close to Anthony’s arm. “Almost finished?”
“No, not even close,” Anthony snaps and falls back into his chair with a huff. He’d like to just throw the mouse up against Ian’s face but he resists. He only glares at Ian. “You gonna just sit there with your dumb face or help me out, you ass?”
Ian doesn’t say a word though, only gets incredibly close or as close as their two chairs allow them to be. Anthony’s knee presses against the inside of Ian’s thighs and the anger instantly slips from his face. He forgets to breathe, and he realizes they need to finish this thing before dinner or his drive home would be dark and spent coming up with apologies and make-ups. But Ian is so close, until Anthony can feel his breath on his chin and dripping down the front of his neck. He’s mesmerized, by Ian, by his closeness, by the little upward quirk of those lips and the way Ian just radiates heat like a magnet, making everything cold until you have no choice but to gravitate towards him. And Anthony feels himself messing up again, and will probably mess up a thousands times and more.
“Guess you need some help, huh?” Ian’s still smiling and the corners of his eyes crinkle as he dips his head and then, he presses his lips to the corner of Anthony’s mouth.
Anthony’s completely still, holding his breath as his eyelids flutter and fingers clench tight around the armrest. His heart beats fast and he’s hyperaware of the shared touch of their legs, moving his away just a fraction. Then he notices Ian’s expression sobering, the flash of fear that distresses the blue in his eyes and the sharpness of ice when Ian puts two hands on his arm rests and pushes him away so he can have a go at the computer.
Maybe he has scared Ian, Anthony thinks, as his chair rolls across the room and hits the wall with a dull thud. He watches the back of Ian’s neck for a moment, notes the freckles beneath the hairline and the tense curve of his shoulder blades.
There he goes messing things up again.
“You’re a fucking idiot, Anthony,” Ian mutters and after a long minute, “You forgot to convert all the files. Who’s the dumbass now?”
And maybe he was, because now he’s wondering what he got himself into.
*
They don’t touch for the longest time. Not even when they’re side by side, playing video games and filming. There’s an inch and more between them at all times and smiles that are too wide, too loud and too strained. Anthony thinks, at this point, he would do anything just to be able to have a silent, true moment with Ian again.
Eventually things settle and unfamiliarity becomes normalcy.
*
It’s one morning at eleven when Ian texts him with something other than work and it’s simultaneously the same morning after the last big fight with his girlfriend.
Lunch today? it reads.
He texts back, slips his phone in his pocket and grabs his keys.
“That’s it?” Her voice stops him. It’s shaky and tired, broken with long ago dried tears. He doesn’t want to turn around to know what she looks like; only opens the door, straddling the edge of it. One foot is on the threshold and his whole body sways between the two differing airs of inside with her and outside where he'll put on his shoes and Ian's a twenty minute drive away. He looks down at the ground and sighs. The floor’s made of hardwood and it’s cold underneath his bare feet. He spreads his toes apart and sighs again. He always wished they could’ve kept the carpet.
“I’ve got to go,” he mutters and walks out.
*
“Anthony, I’m sorry, man -“
“Don’t, just - fuck, I don’t want to talk about it anymore.” His grabs Ian’s waist a little too roughly but he doesn’t complain, doesn’t move, just lets Anthony tug at his shirt and pull at his jeans. He swears at the zipper when it catches and sticks, making Ian laugh at his expense. Anthony kisses him hard on the mouth as punishment. He fists Ian’s hair and pulls hard, feeling the strong heat radiating off of Ian’s sweaty scalp wrapping around his wrist.
“Damnit, ouch! What the frick, Anthony?” Ian digs his nails into the side of Anthony’s cheek in retaliation and it feels good, like a fresh slap of water after a long hot suffocating day. He breathes a little harder and pushes at Ian until they’re up against the wall and somehow, their clothes are off and they’re both naked in the evening pink light. The window lets in a chill that circles the room and the blinds are open just a sliver. A lone car zooms by, stretching the shadows and scattering the dusty summer light all around them.
Anthony pulls back to look at Ian. His face is red and his freckles look aggressively dark on top of flushed skin. His mouth is open and ready, glistening with wet saliva at the corners. And Ian’s eyes shine so very blue against the backdrop of muted crimson of dusk. He lets his fingers trace Ian’s jaw, scratching at the recently shaved skin, liking how the rugged stubble drags along the smoothness of his own thumb.
The moment between them becomes too still, too fragile and Anthony feels like he’ll break soon. A painful lump in his chest stops his breath, pushes at his insides and tries violently to get out. He drops his gaze and swallows. Unease rattles his body and he’s afraid he’s fucked up again, left a part of his life that he’s been so invested in, spent so much time dreaming and hoping but he’s alarmed at the relief of having it spread all behind. It’s gone now, and Anthony had thought his life and the world was going to crumble all around him.
But somehow, Ian’s in front of him, holding him and saying to him, “So… you know, I actually wasn’t drunk that time. Sorry.” He looks sheepish but not at all sorry, grinning like a little shit. Anthony scoffs at him and wraps his arms around Ian until they’re pressed together as close as can be. The smell of Ian surrounds him and he feels his own body mould into Ian just a little bit more, until it feels like no amount of distance can nudge its way between them now.
“You’re a fucking idiot,” Anthony says, laughing and buries his face in Ian’s neck with a grin.
Maybe he’s fucked up before - a thousand times - and maybe this is another fuck up but maybe it’s not. Because when Ian’s right here, in front of him, smiling and laughing, and kissing him until he’s wanting more and out of breath - all the other times before, the times that he’s messed up, screwed things over, fucked and broken things that shouldn’t have been broken… it all doesn’t matter anymore. Nothing matters anymore.
And the painful good feeling is back again, but a little less pain and a little more good.