If We Sleep Together (Will You Be My Friend Forever) - R - (1/2)
Title: If We Sleep Together (Will You Be My Friend Forever)
Rating: Light R, but probably R nonetheless
Pairing: Bradley/Colin
Warnings: None, unless the mental anguish of Bradley James counts.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. If Colin or Bradley would like to negotiate being owned by me, though, we can work something out.
Summary: According to Wikipedia, and I quote, a bromance or "man-crush" is a close but non-sexual relationship between two men. Bradley James does not read Wikipedia.
Notes: Because some people needed a version of this that isn't community locked. The original is here, with thank yous and music links. Prequel to Love Made Visible.
- - -
Bradley doesn't mean to end up vacationing with Colin. It's an accident, really. Colin's just mentioning how he's off to see Neil for a few days, and Bradley casually mentions that he's never been to America, but always sort of wanted to.
"So come along," Colin suggests. It's obviously one of those nice things that people like Colin say to be polite, not like something you should actually take them up on, but only a week later Colin's handing him a plane ticket and going "you can pay me back later". Bradley wasn't raised to be ungrateful.
Neil's a fun guy. He's much more... bloke-y than Colin. Not that Colin's particularly a girl, he just isn't a bloke. A bloke's more someone you'd go down to the pub with and watch a football match. Blokes eat red meat and don't read anything except maybe Harry Potter or a Dan Brown novel. Blokes don't try and wake you up at arse-o'clock to go to the Prudential Center and Quincy Market when you're jetlagged out of your mind, because blokes understand you need your sleep, thank you very much. And most of all, blokes don't pout when you refuse to tag along.
"The two of you are a right pair," Neil chuckles when Colin's telling Bradley about all the great sights he missed (like crowds are better in America, or something) and Bradley's telling Colin that he was sleeping, thank you very much, maybe you've heard of it, Colin. "You're like an old married couple."
"I - we are not!" Colin yelps, turning pink.
"I'd never marry Colin," Bradley says. "Even though he's got everything I'd want in a woman. Besides the bits that make him a woman."
"See, that," Neil gestures between them. "They've got a word for that in America. Bromance, I think."
"Wouldn't that be between you and me?" Colin asks. "I mean, you're the one who's my brother."
"No, Colin, like how the Americans use brother," Neil explains. "A bro, you know?"
"No," Colin says, and that's the end of that for the time being.
- - -
Bradley's in New York City in a ridiculously swanky hotel when he gets the call that he's MTV's "Humpday Hottie", which Colin gives him no end of shit about. Even Katie and Angel are taking the piss out of him via text message and e-mail, and there's a huge fucking ocean that's supposed to protect Bradley from such vicious assaults.
"Oi, don't sit on that couch," Colin will say, "you'll burn it, you know, from being such a hottie."
"Your humor is growing subpar," Bradley informs him. "I don't know why I stand to be around you."
"Me either," Colin says sadly, "especially now that you're one of the beautiful people."
Bradley's opening his mouth to tell Colin where, exactly, he can shove that last comment, when his phone rings, saying he's got a call from MTV.
"Shit, I forgot the interview," he mutters, flipping the phone open. "Hello?"
"Good luck, gorgeous!" Colin calls after him, mouth full of cereal and milk from room service. Bradley flips him the bird and goes to the other room so he can give his standard interview answers in peace. He's pretty much going by rote until the woman asks him about his dream girl.
"Uh..." he says. It's hard to think about the perfect woman when Colin's noisily eating some terrible children's cereal and watching Spongebob in the next room over, his big toe wiggling through the hole in his sock. It kills Bradley's mood. "I would say confidence, a sense of humor is a knock out for me," he says, finally. Colin laughs loudly. "I always find myself in trouble."
"Anything else? The reporter prompts. Colin catches him watching from the other room and smiles at him, big and cereal-free, in that way where his entire face crinkles up and the blue of his eyes looks extra bright.
"Eyes," he says. "I'm quite into eyes... in the sense of girls having nice eyes."
The inflection in his voice is weird, but the reporter seems completely unphased. They exchange a few more standard questions before she thanks him and hangs up.
"So?" Colin asks when Bradley collapses back on the couch.
"She asked about girls," Bradley moans and thumps his head against the back of the couch repeatedly.
"And what did you say?" Colin's grinning again. "Tell her about our bromance?"
"I told her the truth, that any girl who thought I was hot was completely mental."
"Like that will stop them," Colin snorts. "Humpday Hottie, my arse."
Bradley turns up the volume on Spongebob pointedly and chooses to ignore Colin's extremely ridiculous existence.
- - -
Bradley thinks everything's pretty normal when they get back to England. Sure, there's the requisite teasing from the girls, pointing out everyone who has nice eyes, including Marge, the woman who runs catering and is old enough to be his grandmother.
"I'm just saying she could be the one, Bradley," Angel teases. "How do you know she isn't? She's very confident with ladling out that soup."
"I'm very confident you're off your tit, Angel," Bradley says, sitting down with her and Colin, who's got his nose buried in some book again. He at least closes it when they join him, which Bradley chooses to take as a sign of character growth on Colin's part.
"Angel's off her tit?" He asks, sipping his soup.
"My soulmate is Marge from catering," Bradley informs him. "She has a confident air and kindly eyes."
"Ah," Colin nods with an excellent imitation of woe and gravitas. "Well, I guess that's the end of us, Bradley. You know how I feel about you checking out other women."
Angel chokes on her soup and looks between them with too-interested eyes.
"Colin and I had a bromance," Bradley tells Angel."We learned about it in America."
"I see," Angel says in that tone that suggests she doesn't really see at all, but she will be telling Katie about it, and then the entire set and, quite possibly, universe, will know within a matter of hours.
- - -
Colin is an excellent actor, but he's absolutely rubbish at all the stuff that comes with acting. He's awkward in interviews - he gets this demented smile fixed to his face that Bradley supposes he thinks makes him look friendly, but it really makes him look slightly deranged. He has to be prodded directly into saying something, if he says anything at all that isn't a scripted answer. Sometimes, if they've got an interview, he'll hear Colin rehearsing to himself in his hotel room, going over in his bathroom mirror how he's going to tell the story about the time the horse gave out or what it's like working with Richard. It's quite endearing, actually.
Before he'd met Colin, Bradley had always figured to be an actor you had to be a little bit of an egomaniac. After all, it was sort of in the job description, wasn't it? Except attention makes Colin nervous, edgy with panicked energy. He positively wilts under bright lights when he's playing himself. Bradley's never seen anything like it. It's like a bizarre sociological experiment. He feels like he's got to make up for Colin, give all the reporters visiting set something a little new every time they come. This reporter gets his rhapsodizing about Tony, that reporter gets the after-hours hide-and-seek. Paul English gets the bromance angle. It's just how it works.
Except Colin gets really angry about it.
"Why'd you go and tell everyone?" He yells. Colin never yells.
"Because it's fun!" Bradley says."It's funny. It's not like I'm lying, now is it?"
"The world doesn't need to know everything about us!" Colin paces back and forth. "I mean, we get enough shit as it is."
"What shit?" Bradley crosses his arms.
"You're telling me it never gets old," Colin scoffs. "The Merlin and Arthur questions. The gay icon thing. It never bothers you. You, the straightest man alive, don't get bothered by it."
Bradley shrugs. "Not really."
"I don't believe it," Colin mutters, rubbing his forehead. Bradley almost does a Richard impression back at him ("I don't believe it!") but he has a sort of gut feeling that it won't be well-received.
"Why would I have a problem with it?" Bradley asks. "The fans love it. Besides, so what if we're gay icons? Someone's got to be one. It's not as if there are loads of others running about."
That stops Colin mid-pace, makes him stare at Bradley like he's never seen him before. Then his shoulders drop and the fight goes out of him so fast Bradley expects to hear a woosh. "You're right," Colin says, collapsing on his favorite chair opposite Bradley."You're right, of course you're right."
"I - I am right." Bradley agrees, and then, "... I'm right?"
"Yeah, it shocked me too," Colin says dryly. "Don't let it go to your head."
"Well, thank you, Colin," Bradley grins. "That's so kind of you, Colin. You're so thoughtful, Colin."
"Just because I'm being an arse doesn't give you free reign," Colin says, but there's a ghost of a smile on his face. "God, I'm sorry, though. I'm being a right idiot."
"You really are," Bradley says, leaning forward and patting Colin on the knee. Colin stiffens immediately, which makes Bradley realize that maybe touching isn't the best idea at the current moment. "What's got you really upset?"
"I..." Colin sighs and goes silent. "I don't... Look, can you maybe give me a day? Just a day to, to think. To think this out. I just need a day to put some things behind me."
In general, Bradley doesn't believe in letting things lie or putting them in a neat little box in your past. In his experience, that leads to festering, but it's Colin. Colin makes all of his experience immaterial just by virtue of being Colin.
"Yeah," Bradley tells him. "Take all the time you need."
- - -
Bradley knows that Colin is not homophobic for two reasons.
The first reason is that he's quite fond of Torchwood. Which in itself, isn't proof, as such, because everyone likes Torchwood. Bradley likes Torchwood. Not that he's homophobic either but the point is - it's not definitive.
The reason Bradley knows is because after the whole Children of Earth debacle Angel and Stu the gaffer and Colin would gather around and have angry, frighteningly pretentious conversations with each other about the fallacy of killing off Ianto, about the emotional resonance of his character and the importance of his relationship with Jack and so on and so forth. Bradley stays out of these conversations because he's never particularly cared about that aspect of the show as much as the shooting things and saving the world part, and also because he's pretty sure he's too stupid to keep up with what anyone is saying. But the point is, it's pretty good proof that no one involved in that conversation gives two shits about men shagging. In fact, they all seem to be pretty violently in favor of it.
The second reason comes when he, Colin, Katie, and Angel are teaching Tony to play Never Have I Ever with some bottles of excellent red wine he'd been keeping to himself. Tony dithers for a few moments and then goes, "Never have I ever snogged another bloke."
"That's not how the game works!" Katie exclaims with more vehemence than she ever would have had she been completely sober. "You have to say things you've never done, not try to get other people drunk faster. Plus, Angel and I have both had boyfriends, so that's not fair play."
"Boooo," Colin says, giving Anthony a double thumbs down. "Boooooooo."
"Fine," Anthony huffs, like he's extremely put-upon and too old for this exercise, which was bullshit, since he invited them all over and asked them to teach him a fun drinking game in the first place. Besides, Anthony owns a DS and has an earring and does lots of other not-old-person things, so Bradley thinks him trying to be mature is always a bit stupid. "Never have I ever kissed a member of the same sex because I wanted to."
Everyone takes a drink except Angel.
"Really?" Anthony looks absolutely delighted.
"Uni," Katie shrugs, "everyone does it."
"I went to uni!" Angel says defensively. "But unlike some of you, I actually studied instead of...of... of being a hussy."
"Boooo," Colin says, giving Angel a thumbs-down. Colin plays Never Have I Ever with what he calls a "boo clause", where if he thinks you're saying something stupid he tries to get you to drink out of shame. It never works, but no one tells him off because he's Colin, which makes it automatically kind of hilarious.
"Now I want stories," Katie settles back against the foot of the bed. "Bradley, who was the lucky fellow?"
"Footie mate," Bradley says. "After we won a big match, we made out a bit at the party. Just for a laugh, really, but he was fit enough."
"At a pub," Katie goes next. "With my friend Sheila to get free drinks. But she was a very good kisser, so we kept on a bit." Bradley approves of this visual. He's met Sheila at a party in London, once, and he'd snog her even if there weren't free drinks at stake. Proof that she and Katie had snogged each other is like a highly illicit Christmas or birthday present wrapped in a slightly seedy bow.
"Catherine Tate Show," Colin hiccups. "First it was acting and then..." his eyes are very twinkly, possibly because he's been drinking. "Wasn't acting so much."
"Wait, I've seen that clip," Angel tries to point steadily at Colin, which doesn't work so well. "There wasn't any snogging."
"Ah, but you didn't see under the covers, now did you?" Colin says. Angel turns bright pink and Colin winks at Bradley, like it's some sort of secret between just them.
For some reason this makes Bradley feel far warmer and more squirmy than the image of Katie and her friend kissing at a pub for tequila. But then again, he's pretty damn tipsy.
- - -
If Bradley had to choose the number one person he wanted to shag on-set, it would be Olivia from makeup. This is not exactly an original choice, since everyone wants to shag Olivia from makeup. Even Angel and Katie had agreed one pub night that if Olivia from makeup asked and they had a little liquor in them, they would not say no. That visual had kept Bradley satisfied for days.
But the point is, Olivia is easily the best-looking person on set. She's got long, honey-blonde hair that's always is in perfect waves that dangle teasingly in his face when she bends over to apply bronzer. She has perfect skin and teeth (a proper Brit with perfect teeth - honestly), hooded, hazel eyes that look like 100% pure sex, legs that go on for miles, and the most perfect bum on the planet. She smells of sweet pea and honey and musk, and Bradley would very much like to bend her over a table and have his wicked way with her, if she was not engaged to a very sweet surgeon back in London who could probably crush Bradley with his pinky finger.
The number one thing that Bradley finds delightful about Olivia is Colin's giant, ridiculous crush on her. Bradley usually engineers it so Colin ends up in her chair every morning. "You've been in the sun again," she'll scold, powdering Colin over and over, "you're bright pink. Don't you ever bring an umbrella?"
"Er," Colin will say, and sometimes, if Olivia's shirt is low-cut enough, he'll start rubbing his hands on the legs of his pants nervously, probably, Bradley thinks with an edge of poorly-contained hysteria, because they've started sweating.
"You're a terrible person," Colin tells him, overly-powdered and pointing dramatically at Bradley, who has since fled makeup and is hiding in their trailer, reading his edits for the day over tea. "You do that on purpose."
"I'm sure I have no idea what you're talking about," Bradley says innocently.
"It's not funny, you know," Colin says, which is completely untrue. Colin is, Bradley figures, at least 90% a eunuch, and anything that makes him act like a thirteen-year-old boy getting asked to slow dance for the first time is hilarious. "She's engaged and completely off-limits."
"Not in your mind, she isn't," Bradley says, waggling his eyebrows."I bet in your mind, she tosses aside her mascara and you two have your wicked way with each other. Perhaps the mascara wand is even involved in your goings-on I don't judge."
The tips of Colin's ears start to burn, but he seems incapable of speech.
"It's all very natural," Bradley assures him with a manly, companionable sort of pat on the shoulder. "Crushes are good for you, yeah? Get you through the day."
"I don't have a crush on her!" Colin finally manages to exclaim.
"Of course you don't," Bradley soothes. "Just like you don't imagine her pinning you down in her makeup chair and taking off her shirt - "
"That is not what I fantasize about!" Colin yelps.
"You're right," Bradley agrees. "How could I forget? First she takes of your shirt..."
"I don't fantasize about Olivia!"
There's silence for a few moments.
"But that's not physically possible," Bradley says, dejected. "Everyone fantasizes about Olivia. It's what you do, Colin. Even Richard admitted he thought she was quite pretty! Richard!"
"Sorry," Colin shrugs. "Never have."
"So what do you fantasize about?" Bradley asks. It's got to be pretty good, if it keeps Colin from Olivia. It's got to be bloody fucking brilliant.
If Bradley thought Colin blushed around Olivia, it's nothing compared to how tomato-red he turns now. "None of your business," he mutters.
"Aw, Colin," Bradley throws his arm around Colin companionably. "Poor, sweet Colin. You're rubbish at fancying someone, aren't you? Turn bright red and give away the game. Can't even talk about your little illicit thoughts that comfort you at night."
"Yeah," Colin says. He's smiling, like it's a normal joke they're having, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "That's me, rubbish at all things."
- - -
"I think Colin fancies someone," he tells Katie. They're all sitting at the big table in the great hall, where they're supposed to be filming a scene in which Merlin rushes into a dance/feast/something-or-other and yells a lot of things he shouldn't be yelling. They're not, though, because about five different lightbulbs have blown at once, and none of them are the same sort of lightbulb. Every time one gets replaced, suddenly all the other lights have to be re-calibrated, and Bradley is not allowed to move so they can light him properly. It's all exceedingly boring and Bradley's feeling resentful of Colin, who doesn't have to be lit at all, since he's the one bursting in. Colin gets to sit in a director's chair and play DS. Bradley has to stand still for a half an hour straight. Katie makes a disinterested humming noise and ignores him.
"I'm serious," he presses on. "Aren't you curious? I bet you're curious, Katie. I bet you're absolutely fascinated."
"Riveted," Katie says flatly. "Hanging on your every word."
"No, listen, I was taking the piss about him blushing around Olivia, and he got all upset when I suggested he had a crush on her. And you know why?"
"Because he doesn't have a crush on her?" Katie suggests.
"Well, obviously," Bradley snorts. "But he also obviously has a crush on someone else. You have to help me figure out who it is."
"How about you leave that poor boy alone?" Katie says.
"What's Bradley bothering Colin about now?" Anthony pipes up from Katie's other side with vague interest.
"He thinks - "
"I know for a fact -"
"- that Colin fancies someone, because he doesn't fancy Olivia."
Anthony thinks for a moment. "Olivia from makeup?" He says finally.
"Yes," Bradley nods. "He doesn't even have a proper wank thinking about her. It's unnatural." Katie makes a face at him that suggests that he is the human equivalent of something she'd find stuck to her shoe.
"It is a bit odd," Anthony says. "After all, she has a fantastic bum on her."
Bradley's still laughing so hard that he can't stop even once the lights are back on, and ruins the first two takes.
- - -
In Bradley's dream, Anthony is driving him to a party in the caves with the red-eyed duck. Bowser and Yoshi are in the backseat. They arrive and everyone's there, drinking and laughing and milling around. They start playing party games. Mordred pins the tail on the donkey and Princess Peach breaks open the pinata. Then, Katie claps her hands and goes, "Everybody, start kissing!"
"Why?" Bradley asks her. Dream-Katie gives him a pitying look.
"Because everyone here is supposed to be kissing someone," she says. "Everyone here loves someone else at the party."
Because it's a dream, Bradley goes around kissing lots of other people without complaint, but he doesn't know who he's meant to be kissing. It's all very confusing. "How do I know who I'm supposed to be kissing?" he asks Dream-Angel, who is somehow both Angel and a dragon at the same time.
"Keep going!" Dragon-Angel tells him. She pops up constantly, going "not that one!" and "try again!" every time he kisses someone new. Finally, he gets to the back of the cave, where Colin is sitting in a director's chair. He's dressed like Colin, not Merlin, and he doesn't have shoes on.
"Your feet are going to get cold," Bradley tells Dream-Colin, who does not seem overly worried. Dream-Colin is very relaxed, sipping from a water bottle.
"They took my shoes. I'm not allowed to leave until I find you," Dream-Colin tells him.
"You weren't looking very hard," Bradley replies.
"I knew you'd find me," Dream-Colin says. "You always do."
"I have to kiss someone," Bradley informs Dream-Colin. "Do you know anything about that?"
Dream-Colin's standing now, smiling down at Bradley. His hair is longer, like they're on filming break, and sticking up a little funny. "You're supposed to kiss me," he says simply, and then he leans down and presses his lips against Bradley's. His lips are warm and his hand is gentle against the side of Bradley's face. It's not even a dirty kiss with tongues, just Colin's lips against his, body strong and familiar. He smells like Colin, like generic shampoo and new books and a little like curry. "Bradley," he keeps whispering in between kisses. "It's you. Bradley, Bradley..." And then he's kissing him and kissing him and it's the best kiss of Bradley's life and he never, ever wants it to end, and...
...and his alarm goes off.
- - -
If you have a catastrophe that you need advice on, but don't want anyone to know about it, you go to Richard (if you're Colin) or Anthony (if you're anyone else). If your catastrophe is of a romantic nature, you're fucked, because it's seriously awkward to talk to Anthony (and probably worse to talk to Richard) about romantic stuff. Bradley's tried.
When the dream's still bothering him after a week and he may or may not have wanked to it a few times, he decides he needs to hedge his bets. He needs to do it fast, too, because he keeps staring at Colin's mouth and forgetting lines at inopportune moments, like when he's supposed to be delivering them.
It ends up being between Angel and Katie, of course, because who else would it be between? Both are equally rubbish at keeping secrets, but he feels like while both of them are going to make horrible fun of him, Angel might actually give him advice afterward.
Angel laughs for about five hours straight.
"I'm glad this is so amusing to you," Bradley says sourly when Angel calms down enough to speak again.
"I just thought... I thought if this was going to have happened it would have ages ago," she gasps. "You're together all the time! What took you so long?"
"Yes, that's the real issue here," Bradley says. "Not the fact that I had a dream about Colin, the fact that I didn't have it on your time schedule."
"Yes, you're right, sorry," Angel says, taking deep, gasping breaths. "So what do you want to do about it?"
"I don't know," Bradley says slowly, "that's why I'm talking to you."
"Well," Angel says calmly, as if Bradley is being stupid on purpose, "Do you fancy him?"
"I, what?" Bradley asks, scandalized. "No!"
"So what do you call it?" Angel is watching him a bit too keenly, as if she can see into his brain and is sorely disappointed by what she's finding there.
"Bromance?" Bradley tries.
Angel's eyebrows raise nearly into her hairline. "And bromance in this situation means..."
"Being only friends but maybe snogging on the side?" Bradley says cautiously. "Maybe sex. But as friends. No feelings."
Angel sighs in exasperation. "I don't think that's what a bromance is, Bradley."
"So what would you call that?"
"I call that being a prick," Angel says.
- - -
Contrary to what Angel, Katie and the costume department will have you believe, Bradley is not a massive prick.
Then again, he told that gay website he and Colin had a bromance after he knew how much it pissed Colin off the first time.
Bradley doesn't really know what he is anymore.
- - -
Angel has a vise-like grip on Bradley's arm as she drags him to the girls' trailer. "Start talking," she says, jabbing him in the chest. "Start talking right now. That word. Why did you use it?"
"It was a gay site?" Bradley tries. "They were interested. They were asking about - ow!" Angel smacks his arm again, probably for good measure.
"Colin rang this morning and he's furious," she says in a low, angry voice. "You're lucky he's filming in Wales right now, that's all I've got to say to you."
"Well why can't he say that to me?" Bradley whines, rubbing his arm where Angel's been hitting it. It's gone all numb and tingly.
"You are the stupidest man alive," Angel declares, and flounces away righteously.
- - -
"I'm a prick," Bradley says the second Colin picks up the phone that night. "It was a gay website and they were interrogating me, but I shouldn't have said anything. I'm a massive, bloody, fucking prick."
"Hello, Bradley," Colin says with poorly-faked cheer. "My day's been brilliant, how are you?"
"I'm sorry," Bradley whispers, as honest as he's ever been in his life. "I'm so, so sorry."
Colin sighs over the line and Bradley suddenly wishes Colin were here, just a room away, so he could see what Colin probably looks like right now, tired and barefoot with dripping hair and sweatpants on. There's something about seeing Colin face-to-face that's soothing in its familiarity "It's not really your fault," he says finally. "I've been questioned by the gay mafia before - formidable opponents, they are. Got excellent interrogation techniques." Bradley feels unaccountably emotional and privileged that Colin is joking with him again.
"Felt a little like I was in Guantanamo," he says, "except if it was in person, I'd probably be in a better decorated room, yeah?"
"Very fashionable curtains in their headquarters," Colin agrees.
- - -
Bradley's birthday party is not really his birthday party. It is in the sense that that's the official reason everyone's around in the rented-out pub in Wales, but it's not in that Bradley's had no say in how the night's gone, and no one seems to care that it's his birthday beyond a few hearty claps on the shoulder. To be honest, he doesn't mind. Birthdays aren't terribly special. He spent last weekend in Devon celebrating with his family, anyways, so the fact that today's the actual day of his birth doesn't really matter to him.
Because of this, he feels justified leaving the party a little early to go outside and sit on the curb. He isn't ready to go back to his hotel room yet, but he can't quite muster up the energy to finish his beer inside. Besides, it's a nice night, crisp and clear. If he squints upwards, he can see a star or two, even through the neon lights.
"The birthday boy is sitting on a curb to drink?" Colin asks from behind him. Bradley didn't know he was being followed outside. "Doesn't seem quite right to me."
"Mustering up the energy to call it an early night," Bradley says, toasting Colin with his half-finished bottle. "Just trying to finish this off first."
"Very resourceful," Colin nods sagely, sitting down next to Bradley. He's strangely graceful, for someone who's made entirely of angles. "How many have you had?"
"Only on my second," Bradley admits. "Didn't feel like a hangover in the morning. Does that make me old?"
"I've mostly had club soda tonight, so you tell me," Colin shrugs. "Let's call it mature."
"God," Bradley sighs. "We're the most boring telly stars in the world, I think."
"Not true," Colin says. "We could be Amish."
"We wouldn't be on the telly if we were Amish," Bradley points out.
"Well, yes," Colin agrees, "but think of how boring we'd be."
Bradley snorts and looks at Colin, who's giving him that wide grin that makes his face crumple entirely into good humor lines. The pub lights are clipping his dark hair and making one ear stand out, the curve a neon yellow line. He's missed Colin, he thinks distantly. He's missed his face, his laughter, having him around all the time. The Colin he wanks to occasionally is great, but mostly only in bed. He'd give that Colin up for real Colin any day, who's pretty much great in every other way that matters. He sighs and rests his forehead on one of Colin's uncomfortably poky shoulders.
"You're usually drunker when you do that," Colin says mildly. He smells nice, Bradley thinks sleepily. Smoky, but still like that new books and cheap store-brand soap and curry combination that's somehow home, no matter where they are.
"It's my birthday," he says. "I get to do what I want on my birthday."
"This would never happen if we were Amish," Colin mumbles, probably mostly to himself. Bradley chokes back his laughter.
"Shut up, Colin," he says.
- - -
"Ah, shit," Colin says, checking his watch. "I've got to catch the flight out."
"Yeah?" Bradley pauses the screener for the next episode that they'd been watching together.
"Yeah" Colin sounds regretful. "They've already postponed filming to accommodate me, don't want to miss my plane as well."
"It wouldn't be so horrible," Bradley wheedles. Colin laughs, fond-sounding.
"Think you can survive without me for ten whole days, yeah?" He smiles at Bradley. "Won't come back to find you locked in your flat and eating mustard to survive? Missing several fingers? Hear you burnt down the entire block?"
"Fuck off," Bradley grumbles.
"I'm sure you've got someone else who can stand to spend time with you," Colin says, patting Bradley on the shoulder. "I know it's hard, with that face."
"You have a plane to catch," Bradley reminds him, testily.
"Right, right." Colin stands up, and the loss feels to large for Bradley to handle already, so he rises too and pulls Colin in for a hug. It's not the first time they've hugged, but it is the first time Bradley's initiated it over such a short absence.
"Be good," he says into one of Colin's massive, ridiculous ears. He likes the feel of Colin laughing against his body.
"I will, Mum," he murmurs, squeezing Bradley tight as a silent you need to let go now.
Bradley's not sure who botches letting go of the other, but both of them are too reluctant, pulling away slowly, and then they freeze, faces inches apart, looking bewildered into each other's eyes. He does know it's him that leans forward, out of instinct or borne of too many re-visited fantasies, to press a quick kiss against Colin's lips, just a peck, really the barest brush, and it's Colin who exhales like a sigh, his hand rising to rest against Bradley's face so his fingers can curl into his hair.
It's so much like his dream he aches, because it's Colin. Good old Colin, familiar Colin, difficult and charming and lovely, the best mate he's ever had, and it's really him, not something Bradley's made up in his head.
"Colin - " he whispers. Colin sighs and pulls back enough to rest his forehead against Bradley's. He doesn't untangle his fingers from Bradley's hair.
"Plane," Colin says regretfully.
"Yeah," Bradley sighs. "Are we -"
"We'll talk," Colin assures him. "I'll ring when I can."
"Okay," Bradley says. It isn't until he's standing in his empty flat ten minutes later that he realizes that his mouth may have just promised Colin something that the rest of him isn't ready to give.
Part Two
Rating: Light R, but probably R nonetheless
Pairing: Bradley/Colin
Warnings: None, unless the mental anguish of Bradley James counts.
Disclaimer: I own nothing. If Colin or Bradley would like to negotiate being owned by me, though, we can work something out.
Summary: According to Wikipedia, and I quote, a bromance or "man-crush" is a close but non-sexual relationship between two men. Bradley James does not read Wikipedia.
Notes: Because some people needed a version of this that isn't community locked. The original is here, with thank yous and music links. Prequel to Love Made Visible.
- - -
Bradley doesn't mean to end up vacationing with Colin. It's an accident, really. Colin's just mentioning how he's off to see Neil for a few days, and Bradley casually mentions that he's never been to America, but always sort of wanted to.
"So come along," Colin suggests. It's obviously one of those nice things that people like Colin say to be polite, not like something you should actually take them up on, but only a week later Colin's handing him a plane ticket and going "you can pay me back later". Bradley wasn't raised to be ungrateful.
Neil's a fun guy. He's much more... bloke-y than Colin. Not that Colin's particularly a girl, he just isn't a bloke. A bloke's more someone you'd go down to the pub with and watch a football match. Blokes eat red meat and don't read anything except maybe Harry Potter or a Dan Brown novel. Blokes don't try and wake you up at arse-o'clock to go to the Prudential Center and Quincy Market when you're jetlagged out of your mind, because blokes understand you need your sleep, thank you very much. And most of all, blokes don't pout when you refuse to tag along.
"The two of you are a right pair," Neil chuckles when Colin's telling Bradley about all the great sights he missed (like crowds are better in America, or something) and Bradley's telling Colin that he was sleeping, thank you very much, maybe you've heard of it, Colin. "You're like an old married couple."
"I - we are not!" Colin yelps, turning pink.
"I'd never marry Colin," Bradley says. "Even though he's got everything I'd want in a woman. Besides the bits that make him a woman."
"See, that," Neil gestures between them. "They've got a word for that in America. Bromance, I think."
"Wouldn't that be between you and me?" Colin asks. "I mean, you're the one who's my brother."
"No, Colin, like how the Americans use brother," Neil explains. "A bro, you know?"
"No," Colin says, and that's the end of that for the time being.
- - -
Bradley's in New York City in a ridiculously swanky hotel when he gets the call that he's MTV's "Humpday Hottie", which Colin gives him no end of shit about. Even Katie and Angel are taking the piss out of him via text message and e-mail, and there's a huge fucking ocean that's supposed to protect Bradley from such vicious assaults.
"Oi, don't sit on that couch," Colin will say, "you'll burn it, you know, from being such a hottie."
"Your humor is growing subpar," Bradley informs him. "I don't know why I stand to be around you."
"Me either," Colin says sadly, "especially now that you're one of the beautiful people."
Bradley's opening his mouth to tell Colin where, exactly, he can shove that last comment, when his phone rings, saying he's got a call from MTV.
"Shit, I forgot the interview," he mutters, flipping the phone open. "Hello?"
"Good luck, gorgeous!" Colin calls after him, mouth full of cereal and milk from room service. Bradley flips him the bird and goes to the other room so he can give his standard interview answers in peace. He's pretty much going by rote until the woman asks him about his dream girl.
"Uh..." he says. It's hard to think about the perfect woman when Colin's noisily eating some terrible children's cereal and watching Spongebob in the next room over, his big toe wiggling through the hole in his sock. It kills Bradley's mood. "I would say confidence, a sense of humor is a knock out for me," he says, finally. Colin laughs loudly. "I always find myself in trouble."
"Anything else? The reporter prompts. Colin catches him watching from the other room and smiles at him, big and cereal-free, in that way where his entire face crinkles up and the blue of his eyes looks extra bright.
"Eyes," he says. "I'm quite into eyes... in the sense of girls having nice eyes."
The inflection in his voice is weird, but the reporter seems completely unphased. They exchange a few more standard questions before she thanks him and hangs up.
"So?" Colin asks when Bradley collapses back on the couch.
"She asked about girls," Bradley moans and thumps his head against the back of the couch repeatedly.
"And what did you say?" Colin's grinning again. "Tell her about our bromance?"
"I told her the truth, that any girl who thought I was hot was completely mental."
"Like that will stop them," Colin snorts. "Humpday Hottie, my arse."
Bradley turns up the volume on Spongebob pointedly and chooses to ignore Colin's extremely ridiculous existence.
- - -
Bradley thinks everything's pretty normal when they get back to England. Sure, there's the requisite teasing from the girls, pointing out everyone who has nice eyes, including Marge, the woman who runs catering and is old enough to be his grandmother.
"I'm just saying she could be the one, Bradley," Angel teases. "How do you know she isn't? She's very confident with ladling out that soup."
"I'm very confident you're off your tit, Angel," Bradley says, sitting down with her and Colin, who's got his nose buried in some book again. He at least closes it when they join him, which Bradley chooses to take as a sign of character growth on Colin's part.
"Angel's off her tit?" He asks, sipping his soup.
"My soulmate is Marge from catering," Bradley informs him. "She has a confident air and kindly eyes."
"Ah," Colin nods with an excellent imitation of woe and gravitas. "Well, I guess that's the end of us, Bradley. You know how I feel about you checking out other women."
Angel chokes on her soup and looks between them with too-interested eyes.
"Colin and I had a bromance," Bradley tells Angel."We learned about it in America."
"I see," Angel says in that tone that suggests she doesn't really see at all, but she will be telling Katie about it, and then the entire set and, quite possibly, universe, will know within a matter of hours.
- - -
Colin is an excellent actor, but he's absolutely rubbish at all the stuff that comes with acting. He's awkward in interviews - he gets this demented smile fixed to his face that Bradley supposes he thinks makes him look friendly, but it really makes him look slightly deranged. He has to be prodded directly into saying something, if he says anything at all that isn't a scripted answer. Sometimes, if they've got an interview, he'll hear Colin rehearsing to himself in his hotel room, going over in his bathroom mirror how he's going to tell the story about the time the horse gave out or what it's like working with Richard. It's quite endearing, actually.
Before he'd met Colin, Bradley had always figured to be an actor you had to be a little bit of an egomaniac. After all, it was sort of in the job description, wasn't it? Except attention makes Colin nervous, edgy with panicked energy. He positively wilts under bright lights when he's playing himself. Bradley's never seen anything like it. It's like a bizarre sociological experiment. He feels like he's got to make up for Colin, give all the reporters visiting set something a little new every time they come. This reporter gets his rhapsodizing about Tony, that reporter gets the after-hours hide-and-seek. Paul English gets the bromance angle. It's just how it works.
Except Colin gets really angry about it.
"Why'd you go and tell everyone?" He yells. Colin never yells.
"Because it's fun!" Bradley says."It's funny. It's not like I'm lying, now is it?"
"The world doesn't need to know everything about us!" Colin paces back and forth. "I mean, we get enough shit as it is."
"What shit?" Bradley crosses his arms.
"You're telling me it never gets old," Colin scoffs. "The Merlin and Arthur questions. The gay icon thing. It never bothers you. You, the straightest man alive, don't get bothered by it."
Bradley shrugs. "Not really."
"I don't believe it," Colin mutters, rubbing his forehead. Bradley almost does a Richard impression back at him ("I don't believe it!") but he has a sort of gut feeling that it won't be well-received.
"Why would I have a problem with it?" Bradley asks. "The fans love it. Besides, so what if we're gay icons? Someone's got to be one. It's not as if there are loads of others running about."
That stops Colin mid-pace, makes him stare at Bradley like he's never seen him before. Then his shoulders drop and the fight goes out of him so fast Bradley expects to hear a woosh. "You're right," Colin says, collapsing on his favorite chair opposite Bradley."You're right, of course you're right."
"I - I am right." Bradley agrees, and then, "... I'm right?"
"Yeah, it shocked me too," Colin says dryly. "Don't let it go to your head."
"Well, thank you, Colin," Bradley grins. "That's so kind of you, Colin. You're so thoughtful, Colin."
"Just because I'm being an arse doesn't give you free reign," Colin says, but there's a ghost of a smile on his face. "God, I'm sorry, though. I'm being a right idiot."
"You really are," Bradley says, leaning forward and patting Colin on the knee. Colin stiffens immediately, which makes Bradley realize that maybe touching isn't the best idea at the current moment. "What's got you really upset?"
"I..." Colin sighs and goes silent. "I don't... Look, can you maybe give me a day? Just a day to, to think. To think this out. I just need a day to put some things behind me."
In general, Bradley doesn't believe in letting things lie or putting them in a neat little box in your past. In his experience, that leads to festering, but it's Colin. Colin makes all of his experience immaterial just by virtue of being Colin.
"Yeah," Bradley tells him. "Take all the time you need."
- - -
Bradley knows that Colin is not homophobic for two reasons.
The first reason is that he's quite fond of Torchwood. Which in itself, isn't proof, as such, because everyone likes Torchwood. Bradley likes Torchwood. Not that he's homophobic either but the point is - it's not definitive.
The reason Bradley knows is because after the whole Children of Earth debacle Angel and Stu the gaffer and Colin would gather around and have angry, frighteningly pretentious conversations with each other about the fallacy of killing off Ianto, about the emotional resonance of his character and the importance of his relationship with Jack and so on and so forth. Bradley stays out of these conversations because he's never particularly cared about that aspect of the show as much as the shooting things and saving the world part, and also because he's pretty sure he's too stupid to keep up with what anyone is saying. But the point is, it's pretty good proof that no one involved in that conversation gives two shits about men shagging. In fact, they all seem to be pretty violently in favor of it.
The second reason comes when he, Colin, Katie, and Angel are teaching Tony to play Never Have I Ever with some bottles of excellent red wine he'd been keeping to himself. Tony dithers for a few moments and then goes, "Never have I ever snogged another bloke."
"That's not how the game works!" Katie exclaims with more vehemence than she ever would have had she been completely sober. "You have to say things you've never done, not try to get other people drunk faster. Plus, Angel and I have both had boyfriends, so that's not fair play."
"Boooo," Colin says, giving Anthony a double thumbs down. "Boooooooo."
"Fine," Anthony huffs, like he's extremely put-upon and too old for this exercise, which was bullshit, since he invited them all over and asked them to teach him a fun drinking game in the first place. Besides, Anthony owns a DS and has an earring and does lots of other not-old-person things, so Bradley thinks him trying to be mature is always a bit stupid. "Never have I ever kissed a member of the same sex because I wanted to."
Everyone takes a drink except Angel.
"Really?" Anthony looks absolutely delighted.
"Uni," Katie shrugs, "everyone does it."
"I went to uni!" Angel says defensively. "But unlike some of you, I actually studied instead of...of... of being a hussy."
"Boooo," Colin says, giving Angel a thumbs-down. Colin plays Never Have I Ever with what he calls a "boo clause", where if he thinks you're saying something stupid he tries to get you to drink out of shame. It never works, but no one tells him off because he's Colin, which makes it automatically kind of hilarious.
"Now I want stories," Katie settles back against the foot of the bed. "Bradley, who was the lucky fellow?"
"Footie mate," Bradley says. "After we won a big match, we made out a bit at the party. Just for a laugh, really, but he was fit enough."
"At a pub," Katie goes next. "With my friend Sheila to get free drinks. But she was a very good kisser, so we kept on a bit." Bradley approves of this visual. He's met Sheila at a party in London, once, and he'd snog her even if there weren't free drinks at stake. Proof that she and Katie had snogged each other is like a highly illicit Christmas or birthday present wrapped in a slightly seedy bow.
"Catherine Tate Show," Colin hiccups. "First it was acting and then..." his eyes are very twinkly, possibly because he's been drinking. "Wasn't acting so much."
"Wait, I've seen that clip," Angel tries to point steadily at Colin, which doesn't work so well. "There wasn't any snogging."
"Ah, but you didn't see under the covers, now did you?" Colin says. Angel turns bright pink and Colin winks at Bradley, like it's some sort of secret between just them.
For some reason this makes Bradley feel far warmer and more squirmy than the image of Katie and her friend kissing at a pub for tequila. But then again, he's pretty damn tipsy.
- - -
If Bradley had to choose the number one person he wanted to shag on-set, it would be Olivia from makeup. This is not exactly an original choice, since everyone wants to shag Olivia from makeup. Even Angel and Katie had agreed one pub night that if Olivia from makeup asked and they had a little liquor in them, they would not say no. That visual had kept Bradley satisfied for days.
But the point is, Olivia is easily the best-looking person on set. She's got long, honey-blonde hair that's always is in perfect waves that dangle teasingly in his face when she bends over to apply bronzer. She has perfect skin and teeth (a proper Brit with perfect teeth - honestly), hooded, hazel eyes that look like 100% pure sex, legs that go on for miles, and the most perfect bum on the planet. She smells of sweet pea and honey and musk, and Bradley would very much like to bend her over a table and have his wicked way with her, if she was not engaged to a very sweet surgeon back in London who could probably crush Bradley with his pinky finger.
The number one thing that Bradley finds delightful about Olivia is Colin's giant, ridiculous crush on her. Bradley usually engineers it so Colin ends up in her chair every morning. "You've been in the sun again," she'll scold, powdering Colin over and over, "you're bright pink. Don't you ever bring an umbrella?"
"Er," Colin will say, and sometimes, if Olivia's shirt is low-cut enough, he'll start rubbing his hands on the legs of his pants nervously, probably, Bradley thinks with an edge of poorly-contained hysteria, because they've started sweating.
"You're a terrible person," Colin tells him, overly-powdered and pointing dramatically at Bradley, who has since fled makeup and is hiding in their trailer, reading his edits for the day over tea. "You do that on purpose."
"I'm sure I have no idea what you're talking about," Bradley says innocently.
"It's not funny, you know," Colin says, which is completely untrue. Colin is, Bradley figures, at least 90% a eunuch, and anything that makes him act like a thirteen-year-old boy getting asked to slow dance for the first time is hilarious. "She's engaged and completely off-limits."
"Not in your mind, she isn't," Bradley says, waggling his eyebrows."I bet in your mind, she tosses aside her mascara and you two have your wicked way with each other. Perhaps the mascara wand is even involved in your goings-on I don't judge."
The tips of Colin's ears start to burn, but he seems incapable of speech.
"It's all very natural," Bradley assures him with a manly, companionable sort of pat on the shoulder. "Crushes are good for you, yeah? Get you through the day."
"I don't have a crush on her!" Colin finally manages to exclaim.
"Of course you don't," Bradley soothes. "Just like you don't imagine her pinning you down in her makeup chair and taking off her shirt - "
"That is not what I fantasize about!" Colin yelps.
"You're right," Bradley agrees. "How could I forget? First she takes of your shirt..."
"I don't fantasize about Olivia!"
There's silence for a few moments.
"But that's not physically possible," Bradley says, dejected. "Everyone fantasizes about Olivia. It's what you do, Colin. Even Richard admitted he thought she was quite pretty! Richard!"
"Sorry," Colin shrugs. "Never have."
"So what do you fantasize about?" Bradley asks. It's got to be pretty good, if it keeps Colin from Olivia. It's got to be bloody fucking brilliant.
If Bradley thought Colin blushed around Olivia, it's nothing compared to how tomato-red he turns now. "None of your business," he mutters.
"Aw, Colin," Bradley throws his arm around Colin companionably. "Poor, sweet Colin. You're rubbish at fancying someone, aren't you? Turn bright red and give away the game. Can't even talk about your little illicit thoughts that comfort you at night."
"Yeah," Colin says. He's smiling, like it's a normal joke they're having, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. "That's me, rubbish at all things."
- - -
"I think Colin fancies someone," he tells Katie. They're all sitting at the big table in the great hall, where they're supposed to be filming a scene in which Merlin rushes into a dance/feast/something-or-other and yells a lot of things he shouldn't be yelling. They're not, though, because about five different lightbulbs have blown at once, and none of them are the same sort of lightbulb. Every time one gets replaced, suddenly all the other lights have to be re-calibrated, and Bradley is not allowed to move so they can light him properly. It's all exceedingly boring and Bradley's feeling resentful of Colin, who doesn't have to be lit at all, since he's the one bursting in. Colin gets to sit in a director's chair and play DS. Bradley has to stand still for a half an hour straight. Katie makes a disinterested humming noise and ignores him.
"I'm serious," he presses on. "Aren't you curious? I bet you're curious, Katie. I bet you're absolutely fascinated."
"Riveted," Katie says flatly. "Hanging on your every word."
"No, listen, I was taking the piss about him blushing around Olivia, and he got all upset when I suggested he had a crush on her. And you know why?"
"Because he doesn't have a crush on her?" Katie suggests.
"Well, obviously," Bradley snorts. "But he also obviously has a crush on someone else. You have to help me figure out who it is."
"How about you leave that poor boy alone?" Katie says.
"What's Bradley bothering Colin about now?" Anthony pipes up from Katie's other side with vague interest.
"He thinks - "
"I know for a fact -"
"- that Colin fancies someone, because he doesn't fancy Olivia."
Anthony thinks for a moment. "Olivia from makeup?" He says finally.
"Yes," Bradley nods. "He doesn't even have a proper wank thinking about her. It's unnatural." Katie makes a face at him that suggests that he is the human equivalent of something she'd find stuck to her shoe.
"It is a bit odd," Anthony says. "After all, she has a fantastic bum on her."
Bradley's still laughing so hard that he can't stop even once the lights are back on, and ruins the first two takes.
- - -
In Bradley's dream, Anthony is driving him to a party in the caves with the red-eyed duck. Bowser and Yoshi are in the backseat. They arrive and everyone's there, drinking and laughing and milling around. They start playing party games. Mordred pins the tail on the donkey and Princess Peach breaks open the pinata. Then, Katie claps her hands and goes, "Everybody, start kissing!"
"Why?" Bradley asks her. Dream-Katie gives him a pitying look.
"Because everyone here is supposed to be kissing someone," she says. "Everyone here loves someone else at the party."
Because it's a dream, Bradley goes around kissing lots of other people without complaint, but he doesn't know who he's meant to be kissing. It's all very confusing. "How do I know who I'm supposed to be kissing?" he asks Dream-Angel, who is somehow both Angel and a dragon at the same time.
"Keep going!" Dragon-Angel tells him. She pops up constantly, going "not that one!" and "try again!" every time he kisses someone new. Finally, he gets to the back of the cave, where Colin is sitting in a director's chair. He's dressed like Colin, not Merlin, and he doesn't have shoes on.
"Your feet are going to get cold," Bradley tells Dream-Colin, who does not seem overly worried. Dream-Colin is very relaxed, sipping from a water bottle.
"They took my shoes. I'm not allowed to leave until I find you," Dream-Colin tells him.
"You weren't looking very hard," Bradley replies.
"I knew you'd find me," Dream-Colin says. "You always do."
"I have to kiss someone," Bradley informs Dream-Colin. "Do you know anything about that?"
Dream-Colin's standing now, smiling down at Bradley. His hair is longer, like they're on filming break, and sticking up a little funny. "You're supposed to kiss me," he says simply, and then he leans down and presses his lips against Bradley's. His lips are warm and his hand is gentle against the side of Bradley's face. It's not even a dirty kiss with tongues, just Colin's lips against his, body strong and familiar. He smells like Colin, like generic shampoo and new books and a little like curry. "Bradley," he keeps whispering in between kisses. "It's you. Bradley, Bradley..." And then he's kissing him and kissing him and it's the best kiss of Bradley's life and he never, ever wants it to end, and...
...and his alarm goes off.
- - -
If you have a catastrophe that you need advice on, but don't want anyone to know about it, you go to Richard (if you're Colin) or Anthony (if you're anyone else). If your catastrophe is of a romantic nature, you're fucked, because it's seriously awkward to talk to Anthony (and probably worse to talk to Richard) about romantic stuff. Bradley's tried.
When the dream's still bothering him after a week and he may or may not have wanked to it a few times, he decides he needs to hedge his bets. He needs to do it fast, too, because he keeps staring at Colin's mouth and forgetting lines at inopportune moments, like when he's supposed to be delivering them.
It ends up being between Angel and Katie, of course, because who else would it be between? Both are equally rubbish at keeping secrets, but he feels like while both of them are going to make horrible fun of him, Angel might actually give him advice afterward.
Angel laughs for about five hours straight.
"I'm glad this is so amusing to you," Bradley says sourly when Angel calms down enough to speak again.
"I just thought... I thought if this was going to have happened it would have ages ago," she gasps. "You're together all the time! What took you so long?"
"Yes, that's the real issue here," Bradley says. "Not the fact that I had a dream about Colin, the fact that I didn't have it on your time schedule."
"Yes, you're right, sorry," Angel says, taking deep, gasping breaths. "So what do you want to do about it?"
"I don't know," Bradley says slowly, "that's why I'm talking to you."
"Well," Angel says calmly, as if Bradley is being stupid on purpose, "Do you fancy him?"
"I, what?" Bradley asks, scandalized. "No!"
"So what do you call it?" Angel is watching him a bit too keenly, as if she can see into his brain and is sorely disappointed by what she's finding there.
"Bromance?" Bradley tries.
Angel's eyebrows raise nearly into her hairline. "And bromance in this situation means..."
"Being only friends but maybe snogging on the side?" Bradley says cautiously. "Maybe sex. But as friends. No feelings."
Angel sighs in exasperation. "I don't think that's what a bromance is, Bradley."
"So what would you call that?"
"I call that being a prick," Angel says.
- - -
Contrary to what Angel, Katie and the costume department will have you believe, Bradley is not a massive prick.
Then again, he told that gay website he and Colin had a bromance after he knew how much it pissed Colin off the first time.
Bradley doesn't really know what he is anymore.
- - -
Angel has a vise-like grip on Bradley's arm as she drags him to the girls' trailer. "Start talking," she says, jabbing him in the chest. "Start talking right now. That word. Why did you use it?"
"It was a gay site?" Bradley tries. "They were interested. They were asking about - ow!" Angel smacks his arm again, probably for good measure.
"Colin rang this morning and he's furious," she says in a low, angry voice. "You're lucky he's filming in Wales right now, that's all I've got to say to you."
"Well why can't he say that to me?" Bradley whines, rubbing his arm where Angel's been hitting it. It's gone all numb and tingly.
"You are the stupidest man alive," Angel declares, and flounces away righteously.
- - -
"I'm a prick," Bradley says the second Colin picks up the phone that night. "It was a gay website and they were interrogating me, but I shouldn't have said anything. I'm a massive, bloody, fucking prick."
"Hello, Bradley," Colin says with poorly-faked cheer. "My day's been brilliant, how are you?"
"I'm sorry," Bradley whispers, as honest as he's ever been in his life. "I'm so, so sorry."
Colin sighs over the line and Bradley suddenly wishes Colin were here, just a room away, so he could see what Colin probably looks like right now, tired and barefoot with dripping hair and sweatpants on. There's something about seeing Colin face-to-face that's soothing in its familiarity "It's not really your fault," he says finally. "I've been questioned by the gay mafia before - formidable opponents, they are. Got excellent interrogation techniques." Bradley feels unaccountably emotional and privileged that Colin is joking with him again.
"Felt a little like I was in Guantanamo," he says, "except if it was in person, I'd probably be in a better decorated room, yeah?"
"Very fashionable curtains in their headquarters," Colin agrees.
- - -
Bradley's birthday party is not really his birthday party. It is in the sense that that's the official reason everyone's around in the rented-out pub in Wales, but it's not in that Bradley's had no say in how the night's gone, and no one seems to care that it's his birthday beyond a few hearty claps on the shoulder. To be honest, he doesn't mind. Birthdays aren't terribly special. He spent last weekend in Devon celebrating with his family, anyways, so the fact that today's the actual day of his birth doesn't really matter to him.
Because of this, he feels justified leaving the party a little early to go outside and sit on the curb. He isn't ready to go back to his hotel room yet, but he can't quite muster up the energy to finish his beer inside. Besides, it's a nice night, crisp and clear. If he squints upwards, he can see a star or two, even through the neon lights.
"The birthday boy is sitting on a curb to drink?" Colin asks from behind him. Bradley didn't know he was being followed outside. "Doesn't seem quite right to me."
"Mustering up the energy to call it an early night," Bradley says, toasting Colin with his half-finished bottle. "Just trying to finish this off first."
"Very resourceful," Colin nods sagely, sitting down next to Bradley. He's strangely graceful, for someone who's made entirely of angles. "How many have you had?"
"Only on my second," Bradley admits. "Didn't feel like a hangover in the morning. Does that make me old?"
"I've mostly had club soda tonight, so you tell me," Colin shrugs. "Let's call it mature."
"God," Bradley sighs. "We're the most boring telly stars in the world, I think."
"Not true," Colin says. "We could be Amish."
"We wouldn't be on the telly if we were Amish," Bradley points out.
"Well, yes," Colin agrees, "but think of how boring we'd be."
Bradley snorts and looks at Colin, who's giving him that wide grin that makes his face crumple entirely into good humor lines. The pub lights are clipping his dark hair and making one ear stand out, the curve a neon yellow line. He's missed Colin, he thinks distantly. He's missed his face, his laughter, having him around all the time. The Colin he wanks to occasionally is great, but mostly only in bed. He'd give that Colin up for real Colin any day, who's pretty much great in every other way that matters. He sighs and rests his forehead on one of Colin's uncomfortably poky shoulders.
"You're usually drunker when you do that," Colin says mildly. He smells nice, Bradley thinks sleepily. Smoky, but still like that new books and cheap store-brand soap and curry combination that's somehow home, no matter where they are.
"It's my birthday," he says. "I get to do what I want on my birthday."
"This would never happen if we were Amish," Colin mumbles, probably mostly to himself. Bradley chokes back his laughter.
"Shut up, Colin," he says.
- - -
"Ah, shit," Colin says, checking his watch. "I've got to catch the flight out."
"Yeah?" Bradley pauses the screener for the next episode that they'd been watching together.
"Yeah" Colin sounds regretful. "They've already postponed filming to accommodate me, don't want to miss my plane as well."
"It wouldn't be so horrible," Bradley wheedles. Colin laughs, fond-sounding.
"Think you can survive without me for ten whole days, yeah?" He smiles at Bradley. "Won't come back to find you locked in your flat and eating mustard to survive? Missing several fingers? Hear you burnt down the entire block?"
"Fuck off," Bradley grumbles.
"I'm sure you've got someone else who can stand to spend time with you," Colin says, patting Bradley on the shoulder. "I know it's hard, with that face."
"You have a plane to catch," Bradley reminds him, testily.
"Right, right." Colin stands up, and the loss feels to large for Bradley to handle already, so he rises too and pulls Colin in for a hug. It's not the first time they've hugged, but it is the first time Bradley's initiated it over such a short absence.
"Be good," he says into one of Colin's massive, ridiculous ears. He likes the feel of Colin laughing against his body.
"I will, Mum," he murmurs, squeezing Bradley tight as a silent you need to let go now.
Bradley's not sure who botches letting go of the other, but both of them are too reluctant, pulling away slowly, and then they freeze, faces inches apart, looking bewildered into each other's eyes. He does know it's him that leans forward, out of instinct or borne of too many re-visited fantasies, to press a quick kiss against Colin's lips, just a peck, really the barest brush, and it's Colin who exhales like a sigh, his hand rising to rest against Bradley's face so his fingers can curl into his hair.
It's so much like his dream he aches, because it's Colin. Good old Colin, familiar Colin, difficult and charming and lovely, the best mate he's ever had, and it's really him, not something Bradley's made up in his head.
"Colin - " he whispers. Colin sighs and pulls back enough to rest his forehead against Bradley's. He doesn't untangle his fingers from Bradley's hair.
"Plane," Colin says regretfully.
"Yeah," Bradley sighs. "Are we -"
"We'll talk," Colin assures him. "I'll ring when I can."
"Okay," Bradley says. It isn't until he's standing in his empty flat ten minutes later that he realizes that his mouth may have just promised Colin something that the rest of him isn't ready to give.
Part Two