fic: The Last True Romantic (Mark/Eduardo, Prompt 99)
Title: The Last True Romantic
Recipient: pasdexcuses
Prompt Number: 99
Characters/Pairings: Mark/Eduardo
Rating/Warnings: R, with some light sexual content and suggestions of possessive sex.
Word Count: ~9,000
Disclaimer: This fanwork is based on fictional representations of the characters in The Social Network; I make no claims of ownership of the characters or concepts.
Summary: For the prompt: Valentine's Day! Their first Valentine's Day together, maybe? I'd prefer if they weren't in a relationship at all and the whole day just brings them together. Like, if it's after movie events, then maybe Eduardo flies in from Singapore. And Sean is being all ridiculous and giving Mark advice. GOD, just whatever, Valentine's Day fic. This is established relationship, but other than that it's pretty much just Valentine's Day fic, as requested!
Notes: Enjoy Valentine's Day in April! Thanks to S for the stellar beta. :D
The Last True Romantic
“See-and I mean this is in the nicest way possible-sometimes, you can be a bit of an idiot about these things,” Sean says. He doesn’t even flinch under Mark’s responding glare, just relaxes back into his seat on the other side of Mark’s desk and helps himself to more Doritos.
“Sean, get out,” Mark says, relaxing back into his own chair by swiveling it to face his computer. Sean, true to form, ignores him and kicks his feet up onto Mark’s desk, pouring the Dorito crumbs into his mouth.
“It’s true, man. And it’s not really your fault; you don’t know any better. You don’t mean to be clueless, you were just kinda-born this way.” Sean screws his face up in thought, absentmindedly wiping his mouth of cheese dust with the paper napkins that came with their sandwiches. “I’m not sure that’s what Lady Gaga had in mind, but-”
“Okay, no, when you start talking about Lady Gaga, I check out,” Mark says loudly, pulling his keyboard in front of him with a hopefully dismissive clatter. “Go away, I’m done talking about this with you.”
“I’m just trying to help,” Sean says, which is basically like his douchebag credence. “Seriously, Mark, when you answer simple, completely innocent questions about Valentine’s Day with that ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about and that bothers me’ glare-that one, there you go!-you need help. I worry about you.”
“I worry about you, too,” Mark tells him. “I worry about your safety the longer you stay in my office.”
“Aww, Mark,” Sean says, ducking his head and grinning. “Love you too, buddy.”
“That is a legitimate threat, and I do not appreciate-”
“Don’t you like it when Eduardo takes you out and buys you things?” Sean asks. Mark blinks at him, trying to come up with an answer that is firmer and more rational than ‘not really’, which is the truth. And it’s not that he actively dislikes those things-Eduardo tends to really enjoy being romantic, though he doesn’t seem to mind that Mark’s idea of romance involves not complaining (too much) about cuddling on the couch. He just prefers, well, not complaining too much about cuddling on the couch. That’s Mark kind of romance, and it doesn’t involve him having to pick out a tie (or Eduardo’s mournful face when the tie doesn’t match).
Sean must see this answer plain on Mark’s face, because he sighs hopelessly and slumps in his seat. “Okay, wrong question. Does Eduardo like to take you out and buy you things?”
“Well, yeah,” Mark says reluctantly, already seeing where this line of thinking is going and sort of disgruntled about it.
“So doesn’t it stand to reason that Eduardo would like it in reverse?” Sean’s grin turns predictably lecherous. “I mean, I’m sure you guys are pretty, ah, versatile, you like to switch things up-”
“Yeah, we do. Sometimes, I even tell Eduardo all about the interest you have in our sex life,” Mark says crisply. Sean falters finally, shoulders slumping, and Mark has to bite down on a smirk. Sean might not be afraid of Mark anymore (enough drunken nights of cleaning up vomit and listening to non-stop babbling about love and tragedies and dilutions really sort of took care of that), but he’s hilariously meek around Eduardo.
“My point is still valid, and you being purposely evasive tells me you know it’s true,” Sean says, recovering his perpetual bravado. Mark avoids his eyes, realizing too late that he’s continuing to be obvious. “Come on, it’s one day a year. One day where people who otherwise wouldn’t get to be cheesy and make grand gestures and treat someone special get to declare everything fair game.”
“I’m not opposed to Valentine’s Day as a concept,” Mark says, which is only stretching the truth a little. He had done the Valentine’s Day thing back in the day, buying a box of chocolate for Erica or any other miscellaneous girlfriend he’d had, once even buying a gag gift of little cloud magnets for Eduardo one year. It just seems juvenile now, pleasant but kind of trivial compared to what he and Eduardo have been through, and the fairly strong relationship they’ve managed to build up out of the wreck. “I just don’t think Eduardo’s expecting that kind of thing from me.”
“Exactly,” Sean says, leaning forward, eyes sparking in triumph. “He’s not expecting it, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be a good move on your part. A strategic move, even.”
“My relationship with Eduardo is not a chess game, and it is also not any of your business,” Mark tells him. He knows it’s fairly hopeless, though; Sean’s been on a kick about “improving” his own life (which mostly means switching from cocaine to pot and cutting down 10 girls a week to three or four) and seems to think he owes Mark for pushing him into the kick (which he did completely by accident, by the way. Who knew one of those death threats would finally stick? Mark didn’t).
The only way to really get Sean out of this would, in fact, be to involve Eduardo, let him in on Sean’s nosiness. Mark knows that that could be disastrous, though; any combination of Sean and Eduardo in any kind of proximity tends to be disastrous. This is probably why his stomach turns to lead as his phone’s display lights up with Eduardo’s picture.
“Get out,” Mark says, much more seriously, but Sean just grins widely and leans over his desk, waggling his eyebrows.
“Ooh, there’s lover-boy now. Answer it, Mark, come on. Don’t be a dick.”
Mark totally resents that comment; he has never, and probably will never, ignored one of Eduardo’s calls, at least not in recent years. It’s something that exasperates most of the board, if Eduardo’s ever traveling and not cognizant of the time differences and interrupts a meeting. The only thing giving him qualms about it now is Sean’s presence, and how Eduardo has some kind of Sean sensor that lets him know when he’s being a nuisance and/or making Mark’s life more difficult.
But his hand is already twitching towards the phone, practically a reflex by now. Since getting together with Eduardo, the desire to talk to him and always be around him hasn’t ever faded, even after nearly six months. The feeling of being lucky, fortunate that they can even be together after everything that had happened, really makes every single instance seem more important to him. He only has to think back to the awful times of the depositions and immediately after to know that he doesn’t want to waste any single moment.
With a heavy, defeated sigh, coupled with his fiercest glare to Sean, Mark answers his phone. “Hey.”
“Hey, Mark!” Eduardo says; he sounds happy and just the tiniest bit distracted. Mark glances at the clock and knows he’s probably sitting in traffic on the way home from Oakland, where he’d had a late lunch meeting. Mark can picture him keeping his eyes steadfastly on the road even if he’s not moving, his tie loosened and the top buttons of his collar undone, and presses his lips together to keep any visual reactions to the image from playing over his face. Sean smirks anyway, and Mark mentally promises him a swift and painful death if he makes so much as a peep. “Just checking in, wanted your opinion on dinner.”
“Anything is fine,” Mark says truthfully, not meaning to be an indecisive pain and cringing slightly when Eduardo sighs in frustration. “I just ate, you know I hate planning meals when I’m full,” he clarifies, and Eduardo makes an understanding sound and, predictably, asks what he had eaten.
As Mark dutifully recounts his lunch (and he knows this isn’t Eduardo simply mother-henning, not completely; Eduardo likes food and likes to tell Mark about the dishes he’s tried traveling or even just at random restaurants around the Bay Area, and likes to hear about Mark’s meals in turn. Most of their dates, especially in the early days, involved tasting as many new things as possible, or trying to cook together), Sean plants his hand over his mouth, not at all hiding his wide, mocking grin and his twinkling eyes. Mark flips him off while reassuring Eduardo that he had had a whole wheat roll instead of white.
Sean releases a muffled snort into his hand and Mark raises his voice. “And pine nut pesto, you know, the garlicky kind-”
“That sounds so good,” Eduardo says wistfully. “Jacobs and I went to a sushi bar, but my tuna was practically purple, it was not a good time.”
“I’m sorry,” Mark says, and he actually does mean it; Eduardo loves sushi. Subpar sushi is like a personal affront to him.
Eduardo’s chuckle says he knows that Mark means it, and Sean’s ridiculous, smirking face agrees. Mark contemplates banging his head against his desk.
“We have to have something awesome tonight to make up for it,” Eduardo says, and Mark can picture the thoughtful tapping of his long fingers against the steering wheel, can practically hear him mentally flipping through his internal recipe and takeout directory. When he speaks again, his voice is lit up and warm, and now Mark is the one with a hand to his face to hide his smile. Sean practically doubles over. “Ooh, what about that veggie lasagna recipe your mom sent me? You liked it, I think, and I wanted to try it with feta instead of mozzarella, so-”
“That sounds great,” Mark says, taking his hand away and purposely avoiding Sean’s sparkling eyes. “Um, do you need me to pick anything up? I should be home around regular time, so-”
“Nah, I’ve got it, I’ve got a free afternoon,” Eduardo tells him, sounding even perkier now that he has a dinner to plan. Even so, just the fact that Mark apparently offered has Sean shaking with more silent laughter, and when Mark glares, Sean mouths you are so cute at him. Mark flips him off again. “Are you really busy?”
“Not that busy. People won’t stop bugging me, though.” He keeps glaring at Sean, as Eduardo chuckles fondly.
“Well, I don’t want to steal you away from them,” Eduardo says teasingly, and Mark looks up at the ceiling with his eyebrows raised in dismay, because if only he knew. “I’ll let you go.” But he doesn’t hang up, which isn’t uncommon with him; he does this weird thing all the time where he tells Mark, usually with no small amount of laughter in his voice, to hang up first. It’s bewildering, and makes Mark wonder if it’s some kind of strange Brazilian phone custom.
“Okay,” Mark says, but he waits, because Eduardo is still on the line.
“You hang up first,” Eduardo says, his voice light and cresting on a chuckle.
Sean is chuckling too, softly, obviously able to hear, and Mark frowns deeply at him, because while Sean making fun of him is pretty much just mildly annoying, Sean making fun of Eduardo is really not cool. “Okay, bye.” He hangs up, and Sean pretty much explodes with laughter.
“Oh my God, what?” Mark snaps, scowling. Sean is doubled over again, face in his hands, and when he looks up there are actual tears in the corners of his eyes. “What is the matter with you?”
“You hung up,” Sean chokes it, chest rolling with suppressed peals of laughter.
“Yeah. He told me to.”
Sean loses it again. “Oh my God, no, no! You are the best, Mark, I swear. My life was so boring and incomplete without your adorable cluelessness in it.”
“Okay, I threaten to call security on you a lot, but this time I really mean it,” Mark says hotly, picking up his office phone. Sean holds his hands up, muffling his laughter into his collar. He gasps a bit and then shakes his head, swallowing hard.
“Mark, you’re not supposed to hang up when he says that. You’re supposed to say ‘no, you hang up first’ and then he says it back, and you say it again, and so on and so forth. It’s a cute couple thing. It’s like-it means that neither of you wants to get off the phone ever. It’s sweet.”
Mark thinks about this. It sounds like the stupidest thing he’s ever heard of-what a waste of call time-but he’s wondering now if Eduardo thinks he doesn’t like talking to him, is eager to get off the phone with him. “Oh. But-should I call him back?”
Sean coos. “Oh God. No, you don’t have to call him back, but-you see what I’m saying about the cluelessness, right?”
He’s sort of starting to. He’s sort of always known about it, known that he’s always going to be a little off-center in relationships, especially in a relationship with Eduardo. But it had never occurred to him that Eduardo might want more than Mark’s weird, awkward brand of love. He certainly deserves more, and the thought makes his stomach sink.
“So you’re saying that if I-if I make Valentine’s Day special, that will help?”
“Yes,” Sean says brightly, perking up in his seat. “Exactly.”
“But-” And Mark is frowning again, because he knows that adulthood Valentine’s Day has to be a more complicated equation than teenager Valentine’s Day. Someone like Eduardo deserves a more complicated equation. The problem is that Mark doesn’t even know the basic formulas. He absolutely hates saying the next word, and tucks his chin into his chest as he does. “How?”
Sean grins, and Mark feels such a deep sense of foreboding, it’s as if someone walked over his grave. “I’m here to help, buddy.”
That’s an incredibly terrifying concept, but the idea of Eduardo not getting what he deserves out of his relationship with Mark (and an awesome Valentine’s Day, their first in official togetherness, is probably the least of what he deserves) is even more so. So he sighs and slumps over his desk.
“Okay. What do I need to do?”
To Sean’s credit, he breaks it down easy for Mark; he takes things that Mark is already comfortable with and just twists them into romance, or at least, his version of romance. Mark has no idea what is romantic and what isn’t. He doesn’t quite understand why making Eduardo breakfast in bed is so much more romantic than their normal routine of whoever happens to be up first is the one to make breakfast (and it’s about equal times Mark; him cooking for Eduardo is not this crazy situation).
But it’s relatively easy, so he types it into the list he’s created for this purpose, ignoring Sean’s continued cooing. The gift thing is easy enough, too; Mark kind of likes buying interesting things for Eduardo, things that Eduardo wouldn’t necessarily buy for himself. The only things Eduardo really indulges himself with are clothes and food (and random shit for Mark), so Mark likes to fill in the gaps. Sean has a bunch of suggestions for suitable gifts, from fancy electronics that Mark vetoes to even fancier fashion items, diamond cufflinks that Mark can’t be sure Eduardo hasn’t gotten for himself, or silk pocket squares that he pretty much considers a total waste of money. Instead, he puts pick out awesome gift on the list and hides a smile about it.
“Okay, now, flowers,” Sean says bossily, clearly enjoying this. “Now, some people like to skimp out on this part, but my motto is go big or go home, pretty much, so-”
“I don’t even know if Eduardo likes flowers,” Mark says, trying to think of an instance in which Eduardo had reacted favorably towards or shown any particular affinity for flowers. Sean shrugs, like this is completely inconsequential, and continues talking, pacing like he’s an overworked professor in front of a lecture class.
“Doesn’t matter; he’ll like flowers from you. Oh, and the attention thing-he’ll like to be made a spectacle of, so this should happen at his office. It’ll be a bigger deal.”
“‘Made a spectacle of’” Mark echoes skeptically, sure there’s an insult in there and glaring on principle. “Eduardo’s not like that, okay, he’s really private, and-”
“And he’ll like for people to know that his boyfriend loves him,” Sean finishes, waving his hands at Mark impatiently. “Anyone would like that. God, you really don’t know anything, do you?”
“This wasn’t meant to give you free reign at taking shots at me,” Mark says peevishly, and Sean makes a face, waving again.
“Oh come on, why else would I do it?”
“Why are you doing this?” Mark asks, suddenly realizing he doesn’t know the exact answer.
Sean answers without missing a beat. “Because kicked puppy Mark is no fun to mess with.” When Mark just blinks at him incomprehensibly, he sighs and slows in his pacing, putting his hand over his heart in a gesture that tells Mark that this conversation is going to be completely useless. “Because Eduardo makes you happy.” Mark continues to stare, and Sean rolls his eyes and then points between. “You friend. Me friend. Me like friends happy. Is that simple enough?”
“I don’t really see how sending 300 roses to Eduardo’s office is really going to make me happy,” Mark says, but he sighs and adds it to the list, as Sean resumes his pacing.
The actual date is another thing that Mark can handle pretty easily; he’s fairly awesome at picking out new restaurants for he and Eduardo to try. Sean’s only stipulation is that it’s a place where they have to dress up, and again, Mark thinks that’s fair enough. The only problem is the gleam in Sean’s eye that follows such an agreement.
It takes Mark a few seconds to catch up. “No. No way.”
Sean sighs big. “Mark, come on. We both know you have questionable taste in fashion. I know you don’t care, but I can guarantee that Eduardo does.”
“I have plenty of suitable clothes, clothes that Eduardo picked out for me,” Mark says insistently. “I am not going shopping with you, end of story.”
“But how can I be sure that you don’t pick the ugliest of those Eduardo outfits, just to spite me? I’m still banned from your house after the incident with your birthday and all the lap dances. I can’t trust you, man, I’m sorry. Not with matters like these.”
“No. Shopping.”
It takes a long while, with plenty of whining and belittling of Mark’s character on Sean’s part, plus plenty of threats on Mark’s part, to reach a compromise: no shopping, but Mark will borrow Sean’s clothes.
“Nothing that’s identifiably yours, though,” Mark says for the tenth time, imagining Eduardo knowing about this and somehow banning Sean from the state of California in response. Sean crosses his heart and gives his most charming smile, which makes Mark immediately suspicious, but part of him is just so relieved not to be shopping that he decides to concede this one point.
Sean adds little things to the list: cologne, basic grooming habits that don’t amuse Mark at all (he brushes his teeth and uses mouthwash regularly, okay, his father is a dentist). “And sex, of course,” Sean says, and this is the part where Mark starts shutting down the conversation. “I’m sure there’s some weird thing Eduardo’s always wanted to do to you; let him!”
“And we’re done,” Mark says, paging security just in case. Sean keeps going, mentioning horrific things like chocolate sauce (which shows he little he actually knows Eduardo, because Eduardo would hate to get the sheets all sticky like that) and special underwear and referring him to helpful websites, and he doesn’t seem particularly surprised when security shows up. He shrugs and goes with them, flinging an arm around one of the guards and calling back, “Think about it, Mark! So Mike, buddy, how’s it hanging? Got any plans with the wife on Tuesday night?”
Mark sits in his office and glares at his computer for a while, until he can stop thinking about what weird things Eduardo can possibly want to do to him.
Sean mostly leaves him alone for the rest of the day, is probably hanging out with the security office and trying to improve their lives, somehow. Mark is grateful for this because his day picks up, and he finds himself hurrying from meeting to meeting with various members of the upper Facebook echelon, his assistant usually yelling at him from behind to go faster, Facebook’s COO usually ushering him in from where she’s beaten him to every meeting (Shannon is pretty good at outworking him, something he’s grown to respect instead of resent her for).
He finds himself in this situation when Eduardo calls him, and he only answers to tell him that he’ll have to call him back later. But then he thinks about Sean’s advice, the cute couple thing, and gives Shannon an apologetic grimace, ignoring her wide eyes.
“Hey, Wardo. How are you?”
Eduardo tells Mark about the majority of his day, complaining about the third in a line of incompetent secretaries who are somehow worse at dealing with computers than Eduardo is. Mark listens, standing outside of a conference room that holds two members of the board and Shannon, checking her watch in the doorway and mouthing seriously, now? at him.
Mark makes a face at her, this time less apologetic, and keeps listening, interjecting every once in a while but mostly letting Eduardo vent. When Eduardo pauses to ask him about his day, Mark answers honestly but, rolling his eyes at Shannon’s increasingly impatient gestures, says, “I’m actually about to head into a meeting, but-”
“Oh God, I’m sorry,” Eduardo says. “Go ahead, you can hang up.”
And it’s on the tip of his tongue to say, “Okay, bye,” but again, Sean’s voice in his head stops him. Biting his lower lip, cursing how utterly stupid he sounds and the blush he can feel spreading over his cheeks, Mark says, “Um, no, you hang up first.”
Eduardo is quiet for a second, and then there’s small chuckle in his voice when he says, “What?”
“You know,” Mark says, scowling at the floor, swiveling around so that he can’t see Shannon with her wide, mocking eyes. “I don’t want to, uh, get off the phone, so you should hang up first.”
“But-you just said…”
“Oh my God,” Shannon says, suddenly right by his ear, and she ignores his surprised squawk and grabs the phone away from him. “Hi Eduardo, sorry about this, but Mark loves you and he’ll call you later. Bye.” She hangs up and thrusts the phone back at him, staring at him like he’s grown three very amusing heads. “Are you kidding? Now is the time you decide to turn into a teenage schoolboy with a crush?”
“Ugh, no, I know it’s stupid, but-” Mark breaks off, realizing that there is no explanation that doesn’t sound absolutely ridiculous. “And it’s not a crush, okay, Eduardo and I are in a serious relationship.”
“That would be adorable at any other time but right now; let’s go, Zuckerberg,” Shannon says, and she drags him into the conference room.
Mercifully, Eduardo doesn’t mention it that night at home, though Mark catches him smiling curiously at him at few times. Mark doesn’t know if he’s embarrassed or relieved or both, but he ignores the subject stubbornly and quietly appreciates that Eduardo does the same.
“Valentine’s Day,” Mark announces over Thai takeout, and Eduardo nods at him with a mouthful of noodles.
“St. Patrick’s Day,” Eduardo answers, grinning. “Are we naming them in chronological order?”
“No,” Mark says, grumbling into his basil chicken, but he looks up again with quirked lips. “And anyway, if we’re going in chronological order, you missed a bunch of days, like Presidents Day-that’s a bank holiday, Wardo, come on-and Fat Tuesday, and-”
“What about Valentine’s Day, Mark?” Eduardo asks, laughing a little. Mark smiles at him, shaking his head, and looks down at his food once more.
“Um, it’s a thing. Okay? We’re doing it. Valentine’s Day, I mean.” He bites his lip, because that’s even more incomprehensible than it sounded in his head, and stumbles on. “Like-we should do something, I can plan it-and I won’t plan anything awful, okay, I promise, so-just FYI, I guess-”
“Okay,” Eduardo says, still laughing at him, but smiling back at him, too. “That sounds great, Mark. I had already made reservations at that new Greek place, though. Do you want me to cancel them?”
“What? No, of course not,” Mark says, thrown a bit. Eduardo had been talking about the Greek place for a while, and Mark had completely forgotten about it, making reservations instead at an Indian restaurant that Eduardo had also been talking about. He squints at him, suddenly realizing that it’s more than possible that Eduardo might be making other plans for Valentine’s Day without Mark knowing, and that they could interfere with Mark’s plans. “Yeah, whatever, we can just go there, if you already made the reservations, but-do you, um, is there anything else that you have planned?”
Eduardo’s responding smile is positively impish, which absolutely should not be so hot, damn it. Pretty much anything Eduardo’s mouth does is hot to Mark, though, and it makes it much more difficult to peer at him sternly over the table.
“Nope,” Eduardo tells him, with a casual and entirely suspicious sip of red wine. Mark continues to eye him as he very obviously changes the subject; he allows the change but continues to dwell on the idea that Eduardo has Valentine’s Day shenanigans in the works, too.
That’s fine, Mark eventually decides. He’ll just have to make sure that his own Valentine’s Day shenanigans are even more romantic than Eduardo’s. This is also difficult, though, because Eduardo simply has to breathe in Mark’s direction, and Mark is pretty much done for, but Mark has the element of surprise on his side.
Suddenly, all of Sean’s ridiculous and embarrassing advice seems much, much more useful.
Mark is very well-prepared as Valentine’s Day approaches. He has his gift for Eduardo wrapped and ready, and is incredibly satisfied with it. Sean has an outfit waiting for him to change into at the office for the date that night, and cologne he’d allowed Mark to approve of before agreeing to wear it. He has the flower order ready to be delivered to Eduardo’s office, ridiculous number of roses and all, and all the ingredients to make Eduardo breakfast in bed hidden in the mini-fridge in the garage.
He even has a mental promise to allow Eduardo to do whatever weird things he wants to him the night of, even if the thought makes him blush and get inexplicably excited at the same time. Mark is set.
The night before, he contemplates the logistics of the breakfast in bed thing; Eduardo is not guaranteed to sleep later than Mark is, and tends to wake up when he leaves the bed anyway. Mark mulls over the sleeping pills he’d been prescribed (from a doctor who had insisted that his tendency to go days without sleeping was some kind of stress-related insomnia, ignoring his argument that sleep was not necessary when you could be working. He hadn’t needed them since getting back together with Eduardo, so the argument became moot, anyway) last year and wonders if he should crush one up into Eduardo’s evening cup of tea.
Do not drug your Valentine, Mark a voice that is much too sensible and moral to sound like Sean Parker tells him in his head. Mark sighs and concedes the point, deciding he will have to be extra stealthy the next morning.
He uses his vibrating phone alarm directly below his pillow to rouse himself an hour earlier than normal, and does a rather smooth slithering roll out from under Eduardo’s octopus hold. Eduardo snuffles in a way that makes Mark deeply regret being anywhere except for directly in that warmth, wonderful hold, but he makes himself focus and get his head in the game; he barely falters in his step when he looks back to see Eduardo wrapped around Mark’s pillow.
Cooking breakfast quietly is not something he’s used to (Mark constantly forgets where things are in the kitchen and is always banging around in there, even though Eduardo keeps the cabinets and counters meticulously organized), but he manages anyway, casting watchful glances and a careful ear up to the bedroom. He methodically makes his way through mixing pancake batter with farm fresh blueberries, winces at every loud crackle of frying turkey bacon, and juices oranges as quietly as possible, which is a feat considering how finicky their juicer is.
Even so, it isn’t long before Mark hears the lazy thump of Eduardo’s footsteps coming down the stairs, the gentle echo of his yawns, and Mark swears quietly and panics for a second. He eyes the tray on the counter, ready to be loaded with food and brought up to the bedroom, and realizes he can salvage this as long as he can get Eduardo back up in bed and hide the tray until then. Making breakfast isn’t a big deal, it’s normal, but the breakfast in bed thing is the special part, and Mark isn’t ready to fail this early in the day.
He stuffs the tray in the oven and shuts it just as Eduardo comes into the kitchen, eyes heavy-lidded but pleased. “Good morning, Valentine,” Eduardo says, reaching to pull Mark into a kiss, and Mark kisses back readily and thinks I should have drugged him.
“Morning,” Mark says, wrapping his arms around Eduardo’s lean body and pressing his fingers under his shirt into sleep-warm, soft skin. He indulges himself for a bit, can’t help it, leaning up into the kiss, before pulling back, smiling softly at Eduardo’s narrow-eyed look of protest. “You should try and catch some more sleep, it’s still early.”
Eduardo’s face morphs into a crinkly-eyed smile, leaning close enough to drop his forehead to Mark’s. “But you made breakfast.”
“It’s not ready yet,” Mark lies, perhaps stupidly hoping Eduardo is not awake enough yet to notice the clearly cooked stacks of pancakes and piles of bacon sitting on steaming plates behind him. Eduardo clearly does notice, though, looking between Mark and the food and tilting his head to the side questioningly, and Mark sighs and takes a different track. “Okay, fine, but-if you don’t want to sleep more, can you at least run up and grab me a hoodie? I’m kind of cold.”
Eduardo still looks a bit confused, but he also looks amused and, as always, immediately concerned for Mark’s well-being. “Sure, babe. I’ll be right back.” He kisses Mark again, lingering and sweet, the kind of kiss that immediately makes Mark hate the idea of him anywhere but attached to Mark’s mouth. But he remembers his objective and lets Eduardo go, watching him climb the stairs still grinning lazily at Mark.
As soon as his socked feet disappear up the stairs, Mark flies into action, grabbing up the warmed maple syrup, the blueberry pancakes, and the plate of bacon and placing it all carefully but quickly onto the tray. He adds the pitcher of juice and squeezes on another plate and cutlery, and, mentally chanting don’t drop it, don’t drop it, don’t you dare drop it, heads up the stairs as quickly as he dares.
Breakfast in the bedroom is pretty much the same thing as breakfast in bed, Mark reasons. Plus, once in there, he can probably convince Eduardo to get back into bed. This will work.
Except, then, of course, just as Mark makes it to the bedroom and is starting to feel triumphant about this again, Eduardo walks out of the doorway clutching one of Mark’s hoodies and collides with the tray. Both of them are immediately covered in juice and syrup, staring at each other and the food on their hallway carpeting with wide eyes for different reasons, and Mark’s shoulders slump.
“Oh my God,” Eduardo says, looking around some more, then zeroing in on Mark’s face. “I’m so, so sorry, oh my-”
“Don’t be ridiculous, it was an accident,” Mark tells him, wincing down at their shared, sticky clothes and the mess all over the floor. “Um, sorry, it was supposed to be a surprise-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says, but Mark’s not looking at him, contemplating just cleaning up the mess and somehow suppressing the heat in his face, the inexplicable disappointment thrumming through him. Romance is stupid, he’s been saying that all along, but he had thought he could get this right. He’s about to make another comment to this effect when he’s cut off by a sticky-clothed body suddenly pushing into his, pinning him against the wall and making his head snap up to meet Eduardo’s hungry eyes. “You were making me breakfast in bed?”
Mark frowns, because he thinks that’s rather obvious, but nods jerkily anyway. “Yes. I was.”
“Mark,” Eduardo says again, eyes all shiny and soft, and okay, maybe Mark doesn’t know Eduardo as well as he thought, because he doesn’t really understand what that means until Eduardo leans in closer and kisses him, teeth clicking at first against Mark’s unprepared, confused mouth.
This is something that Mark has learned to never actually question; if Eduardo wants to kiss him, for whatever reason, he’s just going to go with it. Soon his head is spinning with it, combined lack of oxygen and dizzy love, lust pooling in his stomach and making his syrup-covered pajama pants tent against the thigh Eduardo has shoved between his legs. Eduardo releases his mouth just for him to pant, his head thrown back against the wall, and Eduardo doesn’t miss a beat, just kisses his throat apparently because it’s there.
“Oh, God,” Mark says when Eduardo gives him a speculative sort of look and then drops to his knees in one smooth, graceful movement. “What are you-but I dropped it.”
“Irrelevant,” Eduardo says, waving dismissively in a way that he definitely picked up from Mark. The wide-eyed grin he gives him, though, is all Wardo, as is the mischievous way he nuzzles at Mark’s crotch.
“Jesus Christ,” Mark whimpers, and Eduardo just keeps grinning and tugs his pants down.
Mark’s thighs are already sticky, sweet-smelling from the orange juice and trembling with his rising arousal. His cock throbs under Eduardo’s breath, pulses under his tongue, and when Eduardo takes it in his mouth, his knees actually threaten to buckle. He’s a little frustrated with himself, but he’s barely even thinking about the ruined breakfast anymore; he’s mostly considering the way he’s almost ready to come just from kissing when Eduardo’s barely started, like he really is that teenager with a crush again that Shannon accused him of being.
It’s not a bad feeling (Mark’s not sure he could ever feel anything bad with Eduardo’s wonderful mouth around his dick, licking him up and down and gently stroking his fingers over his balls); it’s just-kind of embarrassing. But it doesn’t stop him from coming so hard he sees stars, whimpering at the way Eduardo swallows with practiced ease and then smiles up at him with slick lips.
“You’re insane,” Mark breathes out, and his legs give away under him. He got maple syrup stickiness in Eduardo’s hair from clutching at it, and he tells him this with real regret, but Eduardo just pushes him onto his back on the floor and straddles him, leaning down for yet another kiss.
“S’okay,” Eduardo mumbles. He pushes Mark’s t-shirt up and pulls his own underwear down, taking himself in hand and grinning once again. “We’re both going to need a shower after this anyway.”
Then he jerks himself off until he comes on Mark’s stomach. There is nothing for Mark to do except watch and feel, and consider this first round of Valentine’s Day plans a rousing success.
“It’s 9 am on Valentine’s Day, and you’ve already gotten laid,” Sean says with an impossibly smug grin. “I am a genius.”
Mark doesn’t ask how Sean knows; he’s pretty sure everyone knows, considering the amount of uncontrollable manic smiling he’s been doing since he came in. That smile had increased tenfold when he’d walked into his office and spotted the large but simple arrangement of roses left on his desk, with a note in very familiar loopy handwriting.
You’re going to make fun of me for this, but I don’t care, Eduardo wrote, and Mark’s smile widens, despite the various employees watching this and clearly mocking him with their faces. Happy Valentine’s Day! He had also drawn a tiny heart, which shouldn’t make Mark feel like hugging fluffy bunnies and puppies, but it sort of does. Whatever.
It doesn’t take long at all for people to come by and comment on the flowers, but for once Mark doesn’t care. Not when Sean comes in to congratulate himself some more, or when Dustin comes in and practically shrieks, “Aww! Chris! Look at his dimples!” Or even when Chris comes in to look at said dimples, to grin at him knowingly. He doesn’t even care enough to contort his face until there are no more dimples, which is what he usually does (he still has a residual fear of people pinching his cheeks stemming from when he was small, because that was common practice for dimpled children back then. The doctor with the sleeping pills doesn’t buy this as childhood trauma, or as an excuse not to smile that much, despite Mark’s very logical reasoning).
After the attention dies down, Mark is left in his office to grin to himself and to wait for when Eduardo gets to his own office; Eduardo rarely ever goes in to the office first thing, but Mark knows he’ll get a call when he does. Mark had already texted his thanks for the flowers, not trusting himself to actually call without sounding like the demented, lovesick idiot he feels like right now, and had received even more textual hearts in response.
Eduardo doesn’t care about sounding like a demented, lovesick idiot, Mark knows, so he’s not surprised about the call he gets a little while later. “Hey, Mark,” Eduardo says, voice a little choked, and Mark swears and hopes he didn’t make him cry or something.
“Hey, Wardo. Happy Valentine’s Day, I just-”
“This was really sweet,” Eduardo says, but he doesn’t sound, like, I’m going to give you a blowjob and then jerk off all over your stomach excited. Mark frowns. “But-”
“Do you not like roses?” Mark asks. “Oh, wait, did they not send roses? Were they-”
“They were beautiful, Mark,” Eduardo cuts in hurriedly, correctly predicting a stream of annoyed babbling. “But, like. Did you have to send 300 of them?”
“Go big or go home,” Mark says in a small voice, and he can hear Eduardo stifle what is either a laugh or a cough or both.
“Yeah, but-okay, my office is not very big, and three of the secretaries are so allergic that they can’t work-we had to get one a shot of Benadryl, and now she’s crying about how no one sent her flowers but I got 300, and why are all the good ones gay-”
“I’m one of the good ones?” Mark blurts out skeptically, without really meaning to. Eduardo is quiet for a minute, long enough for Mark to start cringing, seriously regretting ever listening to Sean in the first place. The breakfast thing had definitely been a fluke-obviously, maple syrup was a newly discovered turn-on for Eduardo, and Mark had just gotten lucky-but clearly this whole thing had been doomed to fail from the start.
And then Eduardo lets out a deep breath and starts laughing.
“Oh God, Mark,” Eduardo wheezes, and Mark is, as always, pretty lost. “Yes, you are one of the good ones. I love you so much.”
“I love you too,” Mark says, grumbling a little. “But-”
“But 300 roses is insane,” Eduardo says, still laughing. “I mean-we can’t even walk around, Jesus.”
“I’m sorry,” Mark tells him, but the way Eduardo is still laughing, the way he’s muttering “Go big or go home, oh man,” under his breath, tells Mark that it’s okay, even before Eduardo tells him.
“Are there any more big surprises?” Eduardo asks, and Mark thinks about it. Unless he counts the any weird things Eduardo wants to do to him freedom, he doesn’t think so. Just dinner, dressed up a bit more than normal.
“No more surprises,” Mark says. “I promise.”
“Okay, then let me get going,” Eduardo says. “I have to make a path somehow so that people can get to their desks.”
“Okay,” Mark says, and then he considers something. “Um. You hang up first.”
Eduardo is quiet again, and then his voice is low and mirthful when he says, “No, you hang up first.”
Mark grins. He feels ridiculous, young, and utterly stupid, but for once can’t actually care. “No, you hang up-”
“Oh my GOD,” comes a shriek from his office doorway, and Mark whips around and swears as he spots Dustin, back to mock him some more. “Mark! This is even cuter than I thought! CHRIS! You have got to hear this!”
“No, no, no,” Mark says, and he quickly blurts out, “Bye, Wardo, love you,” and then cringes as Dustin shrieks some more.
The day passes slowly, but Mark is inexplicably nervous when Sean shows up with a garment bag, an hour before he’s meant to meet Eduardo. Even as Sean lets him carefully examine the clothes (“No tie?” “No tie, I promise. And you’ll look like a million bucks anyway. No, a billion bucks!”), as he finds them more than acceptable (he actually sort of looks pretty cool in the open-collared dark blue dress shirt and deeper navy jacket, instead of awkward, the way he normally looks in clothes that aren’t jeans and hoodies), his palms stay sweaty. His fingers shake as he does up the buttons, to the point where Sean’s knocking his hands away, scowling, and buttoning the shirt himself.
“Eduardo would chop my hands clean off if he saw this,” Sean remarks with a raised eyebrow. That makes Mark smile a little, mostly because of how true it is.
He’s not sure why he’s nervous, though. The date that follows really doesn’t have any surprises, not really. Eduardo is pleased but kind of wary about the clothes Mark shows up in, enough to make Mark immediately self-conscious, but then they’re ordering way too much food just to try everything, like they always do. They talk the way they always do, fast and easy, laughing because they can do that, now, they can understand each other enough to laugh together all the time. It’s great. Pretty much anything is worth this.
“Here,” Mark says, pulling out the wrapped gift he’d stashed under his seat and passing it over the table at Eduardo. Eduardo narrows his eyes at him, looking at the gift for a second like it’s a bomb.
“I thought you said no more surprises.”
“Just shut up and open it,” Mark sighs, and Eduardo shrugs and does it, ripping up the stupid, sparkly paper neatly but quickly. He stares at the leather-bound book he uncovers and runs his hands over it, lips turning down into a frown.
“It’s a recipe book,” Mark tells him when he doesn’t say anything, and Eduardo jerks his head up. “I mean, you write your own recipes in there. I know you have a folder with like, a thousand digital copies of them on your laptop, but I also know that you like to do things the old-fashioned way, too, and this could be something we can both write in and, um, keep, to show-you know. Like, my mom has one that’s been in her family forever, and I guess-”
“It’s amazing,” Eduardo breathes out, and he’s gone all crinkly-eyed and happy, which is all that Mark had wanted. “My present is nothing compared to this.” He pulls an envelope from inside his jacket and hands it to Mark, still looking reverently down at his recipe book. “Remember how you wanted to go sky-diving, and I said ‘over my dead body’?” Eduardo says as Mark opens the envelope, letting him know exactly what the gift is. He does this with most of the gifts he gives Mark, telling him what they are before he opens them; Mark finds it too endearing to complain.
Eduardo clears his throat and looks up, his eyes suspiciously shiny but determined, too. “I rethought it a little, and decided you’re only allowed to go if I go with you. And since I’ll probably die of a heart attack during it-”
“Oh man, yes,” Mark says triumphantly, grinning down at the tickets. “You’re the best, Wardo.”
“You totally win at the gifts thing, though,” Eduardo says, running his fingers over his book. “You-I can’t believe you did this.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Mark says, rolling his eyes, but he’s really pleased. He is awesome at giving Eduardo gifts, and he loves doing it. This is the one thing he didn’t need Sean’s help for, and he’s definitely proud of it.
Eduardo’s happiness and Mark’s apparent success definitely chase away most of the nervousness. By the time they’re home again and kissing languidly up the stairs to the bedroom, Mark is feeling pretty good about all this Valentine’s Day stuff. It really wasn’t too hard, and he gets a weird little thrill at the thought of doing this again next year, finding ways to make Eduardo even happier than he is right now.
He is told to wait while Eduardo lights a bunch of candles in the bedroom; Mark is slightly disappointed that he hadn’t thought of that, or rather, that Sean hadn’t thought of it. He decides he’ll just have to up the game with them next year, though. Maybe 300 candles.
“Okay,” Eduardo says when he’s done, turning back to Mark and grinning. “That’s it, I’m done being cheesy and ridiculous, and you can mock me if you’d like, but I’m going to remind you of the 300 roses-I’m probably going to remind you of them for the rest of our lives-”
“I’m not going to mock you, it’s Valentine’s Day,” Mark says, and he joins Eduardo by the bed, drawn there by an unnamable force. Eduardo is made for candlelight, looks golden and warm and perfect for touching. Mark cups his face in his hands and kisses him gently, leaning into him easily.
“You can mock me a little, I know you don’t mean it,” Eduardo whispers into the kiss, and somehow, that’s romantic. That’s what makes Mark flush with love, smiling dopily up at Eduardo until those stupid dimples show up again.
He doesn’t even mind when Eduardo kisses the dimples; he thinks that’s the best therapy out there for his childhood trauma.
It isn’t long before Eduardo starts fumbling to slowly undress Mark, and Mark hastens to return the favor, he tries to get his lust-fogged brain moving fast enough to get out his promise.
“Uh, yeah, so if there’s anything-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says softly, kissing his cheek and pulling his jacket down. Mark swallows hard and keeps going, afraid of not getting it out.
“I mean, anything you want to try-not that I’m ever opposed-”
“Mark, you-” Now the shirt is coming off, and it’s hard to think, talk, breathe, with Eduardo’s hands on his bare skin, rubbing over his goose-pimpled shoulders.
“Anything you want me to, um, do, or anything you want to do to me, I’m down for-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says, and Mark freezes at the sudden sharpness in his voice. He forces himself to focus and notes that Eduardo isn’t looking at him but at-at the shirt he’d just pulled half off Mark’s body. More specifically, at the label of the shirt he’d just pulled from Mark’s body.
Where, squinting in the dim candlelight, Mark can clearly make out the words Hugo Boss for Sean Parker.
Mark closes his eyes.
“Why,” Eduardo starts icily, pausing to swallow hard. “Why does your shirt have Sean Parker stitched into the label?”
“I hate you,” Mark seethes into his phone. He had given up on knocking on the locked bathroom door, trying to get Eduardo to come out and just listen to his explanation, and is now pacing in the hallway with his phone pressed to his ear, plotting 300 different ways to murder Sean Parker. “No, really. You are dead to me.”
“Mark, man, it’s not really a good time right now,” Sean says, but there is definite laughter in his voice, laughter that makes Mark want to set things on fire.
“Fuck you, if it were actually a bad time, you wouldn’t have answered. Tell me, though, was this the plan all along, or just a super fun coincidence? I don’t know which is sadder, really.”
Sean is quiet for a second, but then there’s definite, definite laughter, choked back but audible. “Eduardo’s been telling people at parties and conferences that I’m a pedophile,” Sean says. “I guess he’s still not over that stupid thing with your birthday and all the lap dances.”
“Well, congratulations!” Mark practically shouts. “Now you’re a dead pedophile.”
“I did actually want you to have a good night, Mark,” Sean tells him, trying to fake earnestness. “I just wanted Eduardo to have a bad one.”
Mark hangs up then. He thinks he hears Sean sneering, “You hang up first!” as he disconnects, but he’s too angry to be sure.
He hangs up right on time, though, because he hears the click of the bathroom door opening, and though he hurls himself back towards the bedroom, Eduardo bursts out again, once more slamming him back into the wall of their hallway. This time, though, his eyes are on fire, and mouth is set in a firm, angry line.
Mark says, “Wardo-” and Eduardo cuts right in.
“Take them off.” When Mark just blinks at him, Eduardo actually growls and leans closer. “Take. The clothes. Off.”
Without a second’s hesitation, Mark scrambles to do as he’s told, stripping hastily. Eduardo watches him heatedly, and Mark still doesn’t know if he’s in trouble or if this is a sex thing or both, and he’s sort of hoping for both because the idea is a major turn-on, somehow. Even so, he falters at his boxers, mostly out of uncertainty but maybe a little bit to hear Eduardo growl again.
“Those too.”
“These aren’t-” Mark says, but the look on Eduardo’s face has him scrambling to obey again, until he’s standing naked against the wall with Eduardo staring at him like he wants to eat him up.
“I just want to say,” Mark stutters out, and he grows confident when Eduardo seems to listen. “You are allowed to do whatever weird things you want to do to me tonight. And, I mean, any night, but especially tonight. Go nuts.”
To his real surprise, Eduardo breaks into a small, almost relieved smile. “Good,” he says, and then he pulls Mark into his arms and kisses him hard.
As it turns out, the weird things that Eduardo has in mind are really just fucking Mark harder than he ever has before, hard enough to make their usually sturdy bed frame creak under their weight. Mark definitely doesn’t complain, if the fact that he comes twice in almost painfully quick succession is any indication. He doesn’t even mind the wicked hickey Eduardo bites and sucks into his neck, well above his collar.
“You don’t even understand,” Eduardo pants into Mark’s ear as he takes him a second time, finding absolutely no protest. “I want to-fuck-tattoo my name on you or something now, it’s ridiculous, you make me crazy.”
Mark is pretty much beyond words by now, but he does manage to whimper out, “You can.” And even though the words are a surprise, it’s not so much a surprise when Eduardo comes from them, considering their situation right now.
“Christ,” Eduardo sighs, burying his face in Mark’s neck and wrapping his arms around him. “I cannot believe you.”
“Sorry,” Mark says drowsily, not feeling very sorry at all. Eduardo squeezes him, probably sensing this.
“Can you wear something of mine to work tomorrow?” Eduardo asks, and Mark can’t believe he’s actually asking, like he even needs to.
“I told you, whatever weird stuff you want,” Mark mumbles, kissing him blindly and breathing into his hair. “Tattoos, your clothes, whatever. Not even that weird.”
“No, especially since, apparently, you’ll wear anyone’s clothes,” Eduardo says, and Mark can hear the pout in his voice.
“Only yours and mine, now,” he answers obligingly, and when Eduardo kisses him again, there’s finally a smile on his lips, and that’s really all Mark ever wants.
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Eduardo settles down then, not relinquishing his steadfast hold but relaxing about it, at least, starting to drift off. Mark follows him lazily into sleep, wondering if he can consider this last Valentine’s Day surprise a success.
He’s happy, warm, and incredibly sated, right where he belongs. Mark thinks he probably can.
Recipient: pasdexcuses
Prompt Number: 99
Characters/Pairings: Mark/Eduardo
Rating/Warnings: R, with some light sexual content and suggestions of possessive sex.
Word Count: ~9,000
Disclaimer: This fanwork is based on fictional representations of the characters in The Social Network; I make no claims of ownership of the characters or concepts.
Summary: For the prompt: Valentine's Day! Their first Valentine's Day together, maybe? I'd prefer if they weren't in a relationship at all and the whole day just brings them together. Like, if it's after movie events, then maybe Eduardo flies in from Singapore. And Sean is being all ridiculous and giving Mark advice. GOD, just whatever, Valentine's Day fic. This is established relationship, but other than that it's pretty much just Valentine's Day fic, as requested!
Notes: Enjoy Valentine's Day in April! Thanks to S for the stellar beta. :D
The Last True Romantic
“See-and I mean this is in the nicest way possible-sometimes, you can be a bit of an idiot about these things,” Sean says. He doesn’t even flinch under Mark’s responding glare, just relaxes back into his seat on the other side of Mark’s desk and helps himself to more Doritos.
“Sean, get out,” Mark says, relaxing back into his own chair by swiveling it to face his computer. Sean, true to form, ignores him and kicks his feet up onto Mark’s desk, pouring the Dorito crumbs into his mouth.
“It’s true, man. And it’s not really your fault; you don’t know any better. You don’t mean to be clueless, you were just kinda-born this way.” Sean screws his face up in thought, absentmindedly wiping his mouth of cheese dust with the paper napkins that came with their sandwiches. “I’m not sure that’s what Lady Gaga had in mind, but-”
“Okay, no, when you start talking about Lady Gaga, I check out,” Mark says loudly, pulling his keyboard in front of him with a hopefully dismissive clatter. “Go away, I’m done talking about this with you.”
“I’m just trying to help,” Sean says, which is basically like his douchebag credence. “Seriously, Mark, when you answer simple, completely innocent questions about Valentine’s Day with that ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about and that bothers me’ glare-that one, there you go!-you need help. I worry about you.”
“I worry about you, too,” Mark tells him. “I worry about your safety the longer you stay in my office.”
“Aww, Mark,” Sean says, ducking his head and grinning. “Love you too, buddy.”
“That is a legitimate threat, and I do not appreciate-”
“Don’t you like it when Eduardo takes you out and buys you things?” Sean asks. Mark blinks at him, trying to come up with an answer that is firmer and more rational than ‘not really’, which is the truth. And it’s not that he actively dislikes those things-Eduardo tends to really enjoy being romantic, though he doesn’t seem to mind that Mark’s idea of romance involves not complaining (too much) about cuddling on the couch. He just prefers, well, not complaining too much about cuddling on the couch. That’s Mark kind of romance, and it doesn’t involve him having to pick out a tie (or Eduardo’s mournful face when the tie doesn’t match).
Sean must see this answer plain on Mark’s face, because he sighs hopelessly and slumps in his seat. “Okay, wrong question. Does Eduardo like to take you out and buy you things?”
“Well, yeah,” Mark says reluctantly, already seeing where this line of thinking is going and sort of disgruntled about it.
“So doesn’t it stand to reason that Eduardo would like it in reverse?” Sean’s grin turns predictably lecherous. “I mean, I’m sure you guys are pretty, ah, versatile, you like to switch things up-”
“Yeah, we do. Sometimes, I even tell Eduardo all about the interest you have in our sex life,” Mark says crisply. Sean falters finally, shoulders slumping, and Mark has to bite down on a smirk. Sean might not be afraid of Mark anymore (enough drunken nights of cleaning up vomit and listening to non-stop babbling about love and tragedies and dilutions really sort of took care of that), but he’s hilariously meek around Eduardo.
“My point is still valid, and you being purposely evasive tells me you know it’s true,” Sean says, recovering his perpetual bravado. Mark avoids his eyes, realizing too late that he’s continuing to be obvious. “Come on, it’s one day a year. One day where people who otherwise wouldn’t get to be cheesy and make grand gestures and treat someone special get to declare everything fair game.”
“I’m not opposed to Valentine’s Day as a concept,” Mark says, which is only stretching the truth a little. He had done the Valentine’s Day thing back in the day, buying a box of chocolate for Erica or any other miscellaneous girlfriend he’d had, once even buying a gag gift of little cloud magnets for Eduardo one year. It just seems juvenile now, pleasant but kind of trivial compared to what he and Eduardo have been through, and the fairly strong relationship they’ve managed to build up out of the wreck. “I just don’t think Eduardo’s expecting that kind of thing from me.”
“Exactly,” Sean says, leaning forward, eyes sparking in triumph. “He’s not expecting it, but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be a good move on your part. A strategic move, even.”
“My relationship with Eduardo is not a chess game, and it is also not any of your business,” Mark tells him. He knows it’s fairly hopeless, though; Sean’s been on a kick about “improving” his own life (which mostly means switching from cocaine to pot and cutting down 10 girls a week to three or four) and seems to think he owes Mark for pushing him into the kick (which he did completely by accident, by the way. Who knew one of those death threats would finally stick? Mark didn’t).
The only way to really get Sean out of this would, in fact, be to involve Eduardo, let him in on Sean’s nosiness. Mark knows that that could be disastrous, though; any combination of Sean and Eduardo in any kind of proximity tends to be disastrous. This is probably why his stomach turns to lead as his phone’s display lights up with Eduardo’s picture.
“Get out,” Mark says, much more seriously, but Sean just grins widely and leans over his desk, waggling his eyebrows.
“Ooh, there’s lover-boy now. Answer it, Mark, come on. Don’t be a dick.”
Mark totally resents that comment; he has never, and probably will never, ignored one of Eduardo’s calls, at least not in recent years. It’s something that exasperates most of the board, if Eduardo’s ever traveling and not cognizant of the time differences and interrupts a meeting. The only thing giving him qualms about it now is Sean’s presence, and how Eduardo has some kind of Sean sensor that lets him know when he’s being a nuisance and/or making Mark’s life more difficult.
But his hand is already twitching towards the phone, practically a reflex by now. Since getting together with Eduardo, the desire to talk to him and always be around him hasn’t ever faded, even after nearly six months. The feeling of being lucky, fortunate that they can even be together after everything that had happened, really makes every single instance seem more important to him. He only has to think back to the awful times of the depositions and immediately after to know that he doesn’t want to waste any single moment.
With a heavy, defeated sigh, coupled with his fiercest glare to Sean, Mark answers his phone. “Hey.”
“Hey, Mark!” Eduardo says; he sounds happy and just the tiniest bit distracted. Mark glances at the clock and knows he’s probably sitting in traffic on the way home from Oakland, where he’d had a late lunch meeting. Mark can picture him keeping his eyes steadfastly on the road even if he’s not moving, his tie loosened and the top buttons of his collar undone, and presses his lips together to keep any visual reactions to the image from playing over his face. Sean smirks anyway, and Mark mentally promises him a swift and painful death if he makes so much as a peep. “Just checking in, wanted your opinion on dinner.”
“Anything is fine,” Mark says truthfully, not meaning to be an indecisive pain and cringing slightly when Eduardo sighs in frustration. “I just ate, you know I hate planning meals when I’m full,” he clarifies, and Eduardo makes an understanding sound and, predictably, asks what he had eaten.
As Mark dutifully recounts his lunch (and he knows this isn’t Eduardo simply mother-henning, not completely; Eduardo likes food and likes to tell Mark about the dishes he’s tried traveling or even just at random restaurants around the Bay Area, and likes to hear about Mark’s meals in turn. Most of their dates, especially in the early days, involved tasting as many new things as possible, or trying to cook together), Sean plants his hand over his mouth, not at all hiding his wide, mocking grin and his twinkling eyes. Mark flips him off while reassuring Eduardo that he had had a whole wheat roll instead of white.
Sean releases a muffled snort into his hand and Mark raises his voice. “And pine nut pesto, you know, the garlicky kind-”
“That sounds so good,” Eduardo says wistfully. “Jacobs and I went to a sushi bar, but my tuna was practically purple, it was not a good time.”
“I’m sorry,” Mark says, and he actually does mean it; Eduardo loves sushi. Subpar sushi is like a personal affront to him.
Eduardo’s chuckle says he knows that Mark means it, and Sean’s ridiculous, smirking face agrees. Mark contemplates banging his head against his desk.
“We have to have something awesome tonight to make up for it,” Eduardo says, and Mark can picture the thoughtful tapping of his long fingers against the steering wheel, can practically hear him mentally flipping through his internal recipe and takeout directory. When he speaks again, his voice is lit up and warm, and now Mark is the one with a hand to his face to hide his smile. Sean practically doubles over. “Ooh, what about that veggie lasagna recipe your mom sent me? You liked it, I think, and I wanted to try it with feta instead of mozzarella, so-”
“That sounds great,” Mark says, taking his hand away and purposely avoiding Sean’s sparkling eyes. “Um, do you need me to pick anything up? I should be home around regular time, so-”
“Nah, I’ve got it, I’ve got a free afternoon,” Eduardo tells him, sounding even perkier now that he has a dinner to plan. Even so, just the fact that Mark apparently offered has Sean shaking with more silent laughter, and when Mark glares, Sean mouths you are so cute at him. Mark flips him off again. “Are you really busy?”
“Not that busy. People won’t stop bugging me, though.” He keeps glaring at Sean, as Eduardo chuckles fondly.
“Well, I don’t want to steal you away from them,” Eduardo says teasingly, and Mark looks up at the ceiling with his eyebrows raised in dismay, because if only he knew. “I’ll let you go.” But he doesn’t hang up, which isn’t uncommon with him; he does this weird thing all the time where he tells Mark, usually with no small amount of laughter in his voice, to hang up first. It’s bewildering, and makes Mark wonder if it’s some kind of strange Brazilian phone custom.
“Okay,” Mark says, but he waits, because Eduardo is still on the line.
“You hang up first,” Eduardo says, his voice light and cresting on a chuckle.
Sean is chuckling too, softly, obviously able to hear, and Mark frowns deeply at him, because while Sean making fun of him is pretty much just mildly annoying, Sean making fun of Eduardo is really not cool. “Okay, bye.” He hangs up, and Sean pretty much explodes with laughter.
“Oh my God, what?” Mark snaps, scowling. Sean is doubled over again, face in his hands, and when he looks up there are actual tears in the corners of his eyes. “What is the matter with you?”
“You hung up,” Sean chokes it, chest rolling with suppressed peals of laughter.
“Yeah. He told me to.”
Sean loses it again. “Oh my God, no, no! You are the best, Mark, I swear. My life was so boring and incomplete without your adorable cluelessness in it.”
“Okay, I threaten to call security on you a lot, but this time I really mean it,” Mark says hotly, picking up his office phone. Sean holds his hands up, muffling his laughter into his collar. He gasps a bit and then shakes his head, swallowing hard.
“Mark, you’re not supposed to hang up when he says that. You’re supposed to say ‘no, you hang up first’ and then he says it back, and you say it again, and so on and so forth. It’s a cute couple thing. It’s like-it means that neither of you wants to get off the phone ever. It’s sweet.”
Mark thinks about this. It sounds like the stupidest thing he’s ever heard of-what a waste of call time-but he’s wondering now if Eduardo thinks he doesn’t like talking to him, is eager to get off the phone with him. “Oh. But-should I call him back?”
Sean coos. “Oh God. No, you don’t have to call him back, but-you see what I’m saying about the cluelessness, right?”
He’s sort of starting to. He’s sort of always known about it, known that he’s always going to be a little off-center in relationships, especially in a relationship with Eduardo. But it had never occurred to him that Eduardo might want more than Mark’s weird, awkward brand of love. He certainly deserves more, and the thought makes his stomach sink.
“So you’re saying that if I-if I make Valentine’s Day special, that will help?”
“Yes,” Sean says brightly, perking up in his seat. “Exactly.”
“But-” And Mark is frowning again, because he knows that adulthood Valentine’s Day has to be a more complicated equation than teenager Valentine’s Day. Someone like Eduardo deserves a more complicated equation. The problem is that Mark doesn’t even know the basic formulas. He absolutely hates saying the next word, and tucks his chin into his chest as he does. “How?”
Sean grins, and Mark feels such a deep sense of foreboding, it’s as if someone walked over his grave. “I’m here to help, buddy.”
That’s an incredibly terrifying concept, but the idea of Eduardo not getting what he deserves out of his relationship with Mark (and an awesome Valentine’s Day, their first in official togetherness, is probably the least of what he deserves) is even more so. So he sighs and slumps over his desk.
“Okay. What do I need to do?”
To Sean’s credit, he breaks it down easy for Mark; he takes things that Mark is already comfortable with and just twists them into romance, or at least, his version of romance. Mark has no idea what is romantic and what isn’t. He doesn’t quite understand why making Eduardo breakfast in bed is so much more romantic than their normal routine of whoever happens to be up first is the one to make breakfast (and it’s about equal times Mark; him cooking for Eduardo is not this crazy situation).
But it’s relatively easy, so he types it into the list he’s created for this purpose, ignoring Sean’s continued cooing. The gift thing is easy enough, too; Mark kind of likes buying interesting things for Eduardo, things that Eduardo wouldn’t necessarily buy for himself. The only things Eduardo really indulges himself with are clothes and food (and random shit for Mark), so Mark likes to fill in the gaps. Sean has a bunch of suggestions for suitable gifts, from fancy electronics that Mark vetoes to even fancier fashion items, diamond cufflinks that Mark can’t be sure Eduardo hasn’t gotten for himself, or silk pocket squares that he pretty much considers a total waste of money. Instead, he puts pick out awesome gift on the list and hides a smile about it.
“Okay, now, flowers,” Sean says bossily, clearly enjoying this. “Now, some people like to skimp out on this part, but my motto is go big or go home, pretty much, so-”
“I don’t even know if Eduardo likes flowers,” Mark says, trying to think of an instance in which Eduardo had reacted favorably towards or shown any particular affinity for flowers. Sean shrugs, like this is completely inconsequential, and continues talking, pacing like he’s an overworked professor in front of a lecture class.
“Doesn’t matter; he’ll like flowers from you. Oh, and the attention thing-he’ll like to be made a spectacle of, so this should happen at his office. It’ll be a bigger deal.”
“‘Made a spectacle of’” Mark echoes skeptically, sure there’s an insult in there and glaring on principle. “Eduardo’s not like that, okay, he’s really private, and-”
“And he’ll like for people to know that his boyfriend loves him,” Sean finishes, waving his hands at Mark impatiently. “Anyone would like that. God, you really don’t know anything, do you?”
“This wasn’t meant to give you free reign at taking shots at me,” Mark says peevishly, and Sean makes a face, waving again.
“Oh come on, why else would I do it?”
“Why are you doing this?” Mark asks, suddenly realizing he doesn’t know the exact answer.
Sean answers without missing a beat. “Because kicked puppy Mark is no fun to mess with.” When Mark just blinks at him incomprehensibly, he sighs and slows in his pacing, putting his hand over his heart in a gesture that tells Mark that this conversation is going to be completely useless. “Because Eduardo makes you happy.” Mark continues to stare, and Sean rolls his eyes and then points between. “You friend. Me friend. Me like friends happy. Is that simple enough?”
“I don’t really see how sending 300 roses to Eduardo’s office is really going to make me happy,” Mark says, but he sighs and adds it to the list, as Sean resumes his pacing.
The actual date is another thing that Mark can handle pretty easily; he’s fairly awesome at picking out new restaurants for he and Eduardo to try. Sean’s only stipulation is that it’s a place where they have to dress up, and again, Mark thinks that’s fair enough. The only problem is the gleam in Sean’s eye that follows such an agreement.
It takes Mark a few seconds to catch up. “No. No way.”
Sean sighs big. “Mark, come on. We both know you have questionable taste in fashion. I know you don’t care, but I can guarantee that Eduardo does.”
“I have plenty of suitable clothes, clothes that Eduardo picked out for me,” Mark says insistently. “I am not going shopping with you, end of story.”
“But how can I be sure that you don’t pick the ugliest of those Eduardo outfits, just to spite me? I’m still banned from your house after the incident with your birthday and all the lap dances. I can’t trust you, man, I’m sorry. Not with matters like these.”
“No. Shopping.”
It takes a long while, with plenty of whining and belittling of Mark’s character on Sean’s part, plus plenty of threats on Mark’s part, to reach a compromise: no shopping, but Mark will borrow Sean’s clothes.
“Nothing that’s identifiably yours, though,” Mark says for the tenth time, imagining Eduardo knowing about this and somehow banning Sean from the state of California in response. Sean crosses his heart and gives his most charming smile, which makes Mark immediately suspicious, but part of him is just so relieved not to be shopping that he decides to concede this one point.
Sean adds little things to the list: cologne, basic grooming habits that don’t amuse Mark at all (he brushes his teeth and uses mouthwash regularly, okay, his father is a dentist). “And sex, of course,” Sean says, and this is the part where Mark starts shutting down the conversation. “I’m sure there’s some weird thing Eduardo’s always wanted to do to you; let him!”
“And we’re done,” Mark says, paging security just in case. Sean keeps going, mentioning horrific things like chocolate sauce (which shows he little he actually knows Eduardo, because Eduardo would hate to get the sheets all sticky like that) and special underwear and referring him to helpful websites, and he doesn’t seem particularly surprised when security shows up. He shrugs and goes with them, flinging an arm around one of the guards and calling back, “Think about it, Mark! So Mike, buddy, how’s it hanging? Got any plans with the wife on Tuesday night?”
Mark sits in his office and glares at his computer for a while, until he can stop thinking about what weird things Eduardo can possibly want to do to him.
Sean mostly leaves him alone for the rest of the day, is probably hanging out with the security office and trying to improve their lives, somehow. Mark is grateful for this because his day picks up, and he finds himself hurrying from meeting to meeting with various members of the upper Facebook echelon, his assistant usually yelling at him from behind to go faster, Facebook’s COO usually ushering him in from where she’s beaten him to every meeting (Shannon is pretty good at outworking him, something he’s grown to respect instead of resent her for).
He finds himself in this situation when Eduardo calls him, and he only answers to tell him that he’ll have to call him back later. But then he thinks about Sean’s advice, the cute couple thing, and gives Shannon an apologetic grimace, ignoring her wide eyes.
“Hey, Wardo. How are you?”
Eduardo tells Mark about the majority of his day, complaining about the third in a line of incompetent secretaries who are somehow worse at dealing with computers than Eduardo is. Mark listens, standing outside of a conference room that holds two members of the board and Shannon, checking her watch in the doorway and mouthing seriously, now? at him.
Mark makes a face at her, this time less apologetic, and keeps listening, interjecting every once in a while but mostly letting Eduardo vent. When Eduardo pauses to ask him about his day, Mark answers honestly but, rolling his eyes at Shannon’s increasingly impatient gestures, says, “I’m actually about to head into a meeting, but-”
“Oh God, I’m sorry,” Eduardo says. “Go ahead, you can hang up.”
And it’s on the tip of his tongue to say, “Okay, bye,” but again, Sean’s voice in his head stops him. Biting his lower lip, cursing how utterly stupid he sounds and the blush he can feel spreading over his cheeks, Mark says, “Um, no, you hang up first.”
Eduardo is quiet for a second, and then there’s small chuckle in his voice when he says, “What?”
“You know,” Mark says, scowling at the floor, swiveling around so that he can’t see Shannon with her wide, mocking eyes. “I don’t want to, uh, get off the phone, so you should hang up first.”
“But-you just said…”
“Oh my God,” Shannon says, suddenly right by his ear, and she ignores his surprised squawk and grabs the phone away from him. “Hi Eduardo, sorry about this, but Mark loves you and he’ll call you later. Bye.” She hangs up and thrusts the phone back at him, staring at him like he’s grown three very amusing heads. “Are you kidding? Now is the time you decide to turn into a teenage schoolboy with a crush?”
“Ugh, no, I know it’s stupid, but-” Mark breaks off, realizing that there is no explanation that doesn’t sound absolutely ridiculous. “And it’s not a crush, okay, Eduardo and I are in a serious relationship.”
“That would be adorable at any other time but right now; let’s go, Zuckerberg,” Shannon says, and she drags him into the conference room.
Mercifully, Eduardo doesn’t mention it that night at home, though Mark catches him smiling curiously at him at few times. Mark doesn’t know if he’s embarrassed or relieved or both, but he ignores the subject stubbornly and quietly appreciates that Eduardo does the same.
“Valentine’s Day,” Mark announces over Thai takeout, and Eduardo nods at him with a mouthful of noodles.
“St. Patrick’s Day,” Eduardo answers, grinning. “Are we naming them in chronological order?”
“No,” Mark says, grumbling into his basil chicken, but he looks up again with quirked lips. “And anyway, if we’re going in chronological order, you missed a bunch of days, like Presidents Day-that’s a bank holiday, Wardo, come on-and Fat Tuesday, and-”
“What about Valentine’s Day, Mark?” Eduardo asks, laughing a little. Mark smiles at him, shaking his head, and looks down at his food once more.
“Um, it’s a thing. Okay? We’re doing it. Valentine’s Day, I mean.” He bites his lip, because that’s even more incomprehensible than it sounded in his head, and stumbles on. “Like-we should do something, I can plan it-and I won’t plan anything awful, okay, I promise, so-just FYI, I guess-”
“Okay,” Eduardo says, still laughing at him, but smiling back at him, too. “That sounds great, Mark. I had already made reservations at that new Greek place, though. Do you want me to cancel them?”
“What? No, of course not,” Mark says, thrown a bit. Eduardo had been talking about the Greek place for a while, and Mark had completely forgotten about it, making reservations instead at an Indian restaurant that Eduardo had also been talking about. He squints at him, suddenly realizing that it’s more than possible that Eduardo might be making other plans for Valentine’s Day without Mark knowing, and that they could interfere with Mark’s plans. “Yeah, whatever, we can just go there, if you already made the reservations, but-do you, um, is there anything else that you have planned?”
Eduardo’s responding smile is positively impish, which absolutely should not be so hot, damn it. Pretty much anything Eduardo’s mouth does is hot to Mark, though, and it makes it much more difficult to peer at him sternly over the table.
“Nope,” Eduardo tells him, with a casual and entirely suspicious sip of red wine. Mark continues to eye him as he very obviously changes the subject; he allows the change but continues to dwell on the idea that Eduardo has Valentine’s Day shenanigans in the works, too.
That’s fine, Mark eventually decides. He’ll just have to make sure that his own Valentine’s Day shenanigans are even more romantic than Eduardo’s. This is also difficult, though, because Eduardo simply has to breathe in Mark’s direction, and Mark is pretty much done for, but Mark has the element of surprise on his side.
Suddenly, all of Sean’s ridiculous and embarrassing advice seems much, much more useful.
Mark is very well-prepared as Valentine’s Day approaches. He has his gift for Eduardo wrapped and ready, and is incredibly satisfied with it. Sean has an outfit waiting for him to change into at the office for the date that night, and cologne he’d allowed Mark to approve of before agreeing to wear it. He has the flower order ready to be delivered to Eduardo’s office, ridiculous number of roses and all, and all the ingredients to make Eduardo breakfast in bed hidden in the mini-fridge in the garage.
He even has a mental promise to allow Eduardo to do whatever weird things he wants to him the night of, even if the thought makes him blush and get inexplicably excited at the same time. Mark is set.
The night before, he contemplates the logistics of the breakfast in bed thing; Eduardo is not guaranteed to sleep later than Mark is, and tends to wake up when he leaves the bed anyway. Mark mulls over the sleeping pills he’d been prescribed (from a doctor who had insisted that his tendency to go days without sleeping was some kind of stress-related insomnia, ignoring his argument that sleep was not necessary when you could be working. He hadn’t needed them since getting back together with Eduardo, so the argument became moot, anyway) last year and wonders if he should crush one up into Eduardo’s evening cup of tea.
Do not drug your Valentine, Mark a voice that is much too sensible and moral to sound like Sean Parker tells him in his head. Mark sighs and concedes the point, deciding he will have to be extra stealthy the next morning.
He uses his vibrating phone alarm directly below his pillow to rouse himself an hour earlier than normal, and does a rather smooth slithering roll out from under Eduardo’s octopus hold. Eduardo snuffles in a way that makes Mark deeply regret being anywhere except for directly in that warmth, wonderful hold, but he makes himself focus and get his head in the game; he barely falters in his step when he looks back to see Eduardo wrapped around Mark’s pillow.
Cooking breakfast quietly is not something he’s used to (Mark constantly forgets where things are in the kitchen and is always banging around in there, even though Eduardo keeps the cabinets and counters meticulously organized), but he manages anyway, casting watchful glances and a careful ear up to the bedroom. He methodically makes his way through mixing pancake batter with farm fresh blueberries, winces at every loud crackle of frying turkey bacon, and juices oranges as quietly as possible, which is a feat considering how finicky their juicer is.
Even so, it isn’t long before Mark hears the lazy thump of Eduardo’s footsteps coming down the stairs, the gentle echo of his yawns, and Mark swears quietly and panics for a second. He eyes the tray on the counter, ready to be loaded with food and brought up to the bedroom, and realizes he can salvage this as long as he can get Eduardo back up in bed and hide the tray until then. Making breakfast isn’t a big deal, it’s normal, but the breakfast in bed thing is the special part, and Mark isn’t ready to fail this early in the day.
He stuffs the tray in the oven and shuts it just as Eduardo comes into the kitchen, eyes heavy-lidded but pleased. “Good morning, Valentine,” Eduardo says, reaching to pull Mark into a kiss, and Mark kisses back readily and thinks I should have drugged him.
“Morning,” Mark says, wrapping his arms around Eduardo’s lean body and pressing his fingers under his shirt into sleep-warm, soft skin. He indulges himself for a bit, can’t help it, leaning up into the kiss, before pulling back, smiling softly at Eduardo’s narrow-eyed look of protest. “You should try and catch some more sleep, it’s still early.”
Eduardo’s face morphs into a crinkly-eyed smile, leaning close enough to drop his forehead to Mark’s. “But you made breakfast.”
“It’s not ready yet,” Mark lies, perhaps stupidly hoping Eduardo is not awake enough yet to notice the clearly cooked stacks of pancakes and piles of bacon sitting on steaming plates behind him. Eduardo clearly does notice, though, looking between Mark and the food and tilting his head to the side questioningly, and Mark sighs and takes a different track. “Okay, fine, but-if you don’t want to sleep more, can you at least run up and grab me a hoodie? I’m kind of cold.”
Eduardo still looks a bit confused, but he also looks amused and, as always, immediately concerned for Mark’s well-being. “Sure, babe. I’ll be right back.” He kisses Mark again, lingering and sweet, the kind of kiss that immediately makes Mark hate the idea of him anywhere but attached to Mark’s mouth. But he remembers his objective and lets Eduardo go, watching him climb the stairs still grinning lazily at Mark.
As soon as his socked feet disappear up the stairs, Mark flies into action, grabbing up the warmed maple syrup, the blueberry pancakes, and the plate of bacon and placing it all carefully but quickly onto the tray. He adds the pitcher of juice and squeezes on another plate and cutlery, and, mentally chanting don’t drop it, don’t drop it, don’t you dare drop it, heads up the stairs as quickly as he dares.
Breakfast in the bedroom is pretty much the same thing as breakfast in bed, Mark reasons. Plus, once in there, he can probably convince Eduardo to get back into bed. This will work.
Except, then, of course, just as Mark makes it to the bedroom and is starting to feel triumphant about this again, Eduardo walks out of the doorway clutching one of Mark’s hoodies and collides with the tray. Both of them are immediately covered in juice and syrup, staring at each other and the food on their hallway carpeting with wide eyes for different reasons, and Mark’s shoulders slump.
“Oh my God,” Eduardo says, looking around some more, then zeroing in on Mark’s face. “I’m so, so sorry, oh my-”
“Don’t be ridiculous, it was an accident,” Mark tells him, wincing down at their shared, sticky clothes and the mess all over the floor. “Um, sorry, it was supposed to be a surprise-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says, but Mark’s not looking at him, contemplating just cleaning up the mess and somehow suppressing the heat in his face, the inexplicable disappointment thrumming through him. Romance is stupid, he’s been saying that all along, but he had thought he could get this right. He’s about to make another comment to this effect when he’s cut off by a sticky-clothed body suddenly pushing into his, pinning him against the wall and making his head snap up to meet Eduardo’s hungry eyes. “You were making me breakfast in bed?”
Mark frowns, because he thinks that’s rather obvious, but nods jerkily anyway. “Yes. I was.”
“Mark,” Eduardo says again, eyes all shiny and soft, and okay, maybe Mark doesn’t know Eduardo as well as he thought, because he doesn’t really understand what that means until Eduardo leans in closer and kisses him, teeth clicking at first against Mark’s unprepared, confused mouth.
This is something that Mark has learned to never actually question; if Eduardo wants to kiss him, for whatever reason, he’s just going to go with it. Soon his head is spinning with it, combined lack of oxygen and dizzy love, lust pooling in his stomach and making his syrup-covered pajama pants tent against the thigh Eduardo has shoved between his legs. Eduardo releases his mouth just for him to pant, his head thrown back against the wall, and Eduardo doesn’t miss a beat, just kisses his throat apparently because it’s there.
“Oh, God,” Mark says when Eduardo gives him a speculative sort of look and then drops to his knees in one smooth, graceful movement. “What are you-but I dropped it.”
“Irrelevant,” Eduardo says, waving dismissively in a way that he definitely picked up from Mark. The wide-eyed grin he gives him, though, is all Wardo, as is the mischievous way he nuzzles at Mark’s crotch.
“Jesus Christ,” Mark whimpers, and Eduardo just keeps grinning and tugs his pants down.
Mark’s thighs are already sticky, sweet-smelling from the orange juice and trembling with his rising arousal. His cock throbs under Eduardo’s breath, pulses under his tongue, and when Eduardo takes it in his mouth, his knees actually threaten to buckle. He’s a little frustrated with himself, but he’s barely even thinking about the ruined breakfast anymore; he’s mostly considering the way he’s almost ready to come just from kissing when Eduardo’s barely started, like he really is that teenager with a crush again that Shannon accused him of being.
It’s not a bad feeling (Mark’s not sure he could ever feel anything bad with Eduardo’s wonderful mouth around his dick, licking him up and down and gently stroking his fingers over his balls); it’s just-kind of embarrassing. But it doesn’t stop him from coming so hard he sees stars, whimpering at the way Eduardo swallows with practiced ease and then smiles up at him with slick lips.
“You’re insane,” Mark breathes out, and his legs give away under him. He got maple syrup stickiness in Eduardo’s hair from clutching at it, and he tells him this with real regret, but Eduardo just pushes him onto his back on the floor and straddles him, leaning down for yet another kiss.
“S’okay,” Eduardo mumbles. He pushes Mark’s t-shirt up and pulls his own underwear down, taking himself in hand and grinning once again. “We’re both going to need a shower after this anyway.”
Then he jerks himself off until he comes on Mark’s stomach. There is nothing for Mark to do except watch and feel, and consider this first round of Valentine’s Day plans a rousing success.
“It’s 9 am on Valentine’s Day, and you’ve already gotten laid,” Sean says with an impossibly smug grin. “I am a genius.”
Mark doesn’t ask how Sean knows; he’s pretty sure everyone knows, considering the amount of uncontrollable manic smiling he’s been doing since he came in. That smile had increased tenfold when he’d walked into his office and spotted the large but simple arrangement of roses left on his desk, with a note in very familiar loopy handwriting.
You’re going to make fun of me for this, but I don’t care, Eduardo wrote, and Mark’s smile widens, despite the various employees watching this and clearly mocking him with their faces. Happy Valentine’s Day! He had also drawn a tiny heart, which shouldn’t make Mark feel like hugging fluffy bunnies and puppies, but it sort of does. Whatever.
It doesn’t take long at all for people to come by and comment on the flowers, but for once Mark doesn’t care. Not when Sean comes in to congratulate himself some more, or when Dustin comes in and practically shrieks, “Aww! Chris! Look at his dimples!” Or even when Chris comes in to look at said dimples, to grin at him knowingly. He doesn’t even care enough to contort his face until there are no more dimples, which is what he usually does (he still has a residual fear of people pinching his cheeks stemming from when he was small, because that was common practice for dimpled children back then. The doctor with the sleeping pills doesn’t buy this as childhood trauma, or as an excuse not to smile that much, despite Mark’s very logical reasoning).
After the attention dies down, Mark is left in his office to grin to himself and to wait for when Eduardo gets to his own office; Eduardo rarely ever goes in to the office first thing, but Mark knows he’ll get a call when he does. Mark had already texted his thanks for the flowers, not trusting himself to actually call without sounding like the demented, lovesick idiot he feels like right now, and had received even more textual hearts in response.
Eduardo doesn’t care about sounding like a demented, lovesick idiot, Mark knows, so he’s not surprised about the call he gets a little while later. “Hey, Mark,” Eduardo says, voice a little choked, and Mark swears and hopes he didn’t make him cry or something.
“Hey, Wardo. Happy Valentine’s Day, I just-”
“This was really sweet,” Eduardo says, but he doesn’t sound, like, I’m going to give you a blowjob and then jerk off all over your stomach excited. Mark frowns. “But-”
“Do you not like roses?” Mark asks. “Oh, wait, did they not send roses? Were they-”
“They were beautiful, Mark,” Eduardo cuts in hurriedly, correctly predicting a stream of annoyed babbling. “But, like. Did you have to send 300 of them?”
“Go big or go home,” Mark says in a small voice, and he can hear Eduardo stifle what is either a laugh or a cough or both.
“Yeah, but-okay, my office is not very big, and three of the secretaries are so allergic that they can’t work-we had to get one a shot of Benadryl, and now she’s crying about how no one sent her flowers but I got 300, and why are all the good ones gay-”
“I’m one of the good ones?” Mark blurts out skeptically, without really meaning to. Eduardo is quiet for a minute, long enough for Mark to start cringing, seriously regretting ever listening to Sean in the first place. The breakfast thing had definitely been a fluke-obviously, maple syrup was a newly discovered turn-on for Eduardo, and Mark had just gotten lucky-but clearly this whole thing had been doomed to fail from the start.
And then Eduardo lets out a deep breath and starts laughing.
“Oh God, Mark,” Eduardo wheezes, and Mark is, as always, pretty lost. “Yes, you are one of the good ones. I love you so much.”
“I love you too,” Mark says, grumbling a little. “But-”
“But 300 roses is insane,” Eduardo says, still laughing. “I mean-we can’t even walk around, Jesus.”
“I’m sorry,” Mark tells him, but the way Eduardo is still laughing, the way he’s muttering “Go big or go home, oh man,” under his breath, tells Mark that it’s okay, even before Eduardo tells him.
“Are there any more big surprises?” Eduardo asks, and Mark thinks about it. Unless he counts the any weird things Eduardo wants to do to him freedom, he doesn’t think so. Just dinner, dressed up a bit more than normal.
“No more surprises,” Mark says. “I promise.”
“Okay, then let me get going,” Eduardo says. “I have to make a path somehow so that people can get to their desks.”
“Okay,” Mark says, and then he considers something. “Um. You hang up first.”
Eduardo is quiet again, and then his voice is low and mirthful when he says, “No, you hang up first.”
Mark grins. He feels ridiculous, young, and utterly stupid, but for once can’t actually care. “No, you hang up-”
“Oh my GOD,” comes a shriek from his office doorway, and Mark whips around and swears as he spots Dustin, back to mock him some more. “Mark! This is even cuter than I thought! CHRIS! You have got to hear this!”
“No, no, no,” Mark says, and he quickly blurts out, “Bye, Wardo, love you,” and then cringes as Dustin shrieks some more.
The day passes slowly, but Mark is inexplicably nervous when Sean shows up with a garment bag, an hour before he’s meant to meet Eduardo. Even as Sean lets him carefully examine the clothes (“No tie?” “No tie, I promise. And you’ll look like a million bucks anyway. No, a billion bucks!”), as he finds them more than acceptable (he actually sort of looks pretty cool in the open-collared dark blue dress shirt and deeper navy jacket, instead of awkward, the way he normally looks in clothes that aren’t jeans and hoodies), his palms stay sweaty. His fingers shake as he does up the buttons, to the point where Sean’s knocking his hands away, scowling, and buttoning the shirt himself.
“Eduardo would chop my hands clean off if he saw this,” Sean remarks with a raised eyebrow. That makes Mark smile a little, mostly because of how true it is.
He’s not sure why he’s nervous, though. The date that follows really doesn’t have any surprises, not really. Eduardo is pleased but kind of wary about the clothes Mark shows up in, enough to make Mark immediately self-conscious, but then they’re ordering way too much food just to try everything, like they always do. They talk the way they always do, fast and easy, laughing because they can do that, now, they can understand each other enough to laugh together all the time. It’s great. Pretty much anything is worth this.
“Here,” Mark says, pulling out the wrapped gift he’d stashed under his seat and passing it over the table at Eduardo. Eduardo narrows his eyes at him, looking at the gift for a second like it’s a bomb.
“I thought you said no more surprises.”
“Just shut up and open it,” Mark sighs, and Eduardo shrugs and does it, ripping up the stupid, sparkly paper neatly but quickly. He stares at the leather-bound book he uncovers and runs his hands over it, lips turning down into a frown.
“It’s a recipe book,” Mark tells him when he doesn’t say anything, and Eduardo jerks his head up. “I mean, you write your own recipes in there. I know you have a folder with like, a thousand digital copies of them on your laptop, but I also know that you like to do things the old-fashioned way, too, and this could be something we can both write in and, um, keep, to show-you know. Like, my mom has one that’s been in her family forever, and I guess-”
“It’s amazing,” Eduardo breathes out, and he’s gone all crinkly-eyed and happy, which is all that Mark had wanted. “My present is nothing compared to this.” He pulls an envelope from inside his jacket and hands it to Mark, still looking reverently down at his recipe book. “Remember how you wanted to go sky-diving, and I said ‘over my dead body’?” Eduardo says as Mark opens the envelope, letting him know exactly what the gift is. He does this with most of the gifts he gives Mark, telling him what they are before he opens them; Mark finds it too endearing to complain.
Eduardo clears his throat and looks up, his eyes suspiciously shiny but determined, too. “I rethought it a little, and decided you’re only allowed to go if I go with you. And since I’ll probably die of a heart attack during it-”
“Oh man, yes,” Mark says triumphantly, grinning down at the tickets. “You’re the best, Wardo.”
“You totally win at the gifts thing, though,” Eduardo says, running his fingers over his book. “You-I can’t believe you did this.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Mark says, rolling his eyes, but he’s really pleased. He is awesome at giving Eduardo gifts, and he loves doing it. This is the one thing he didn’t need Sean’s help for, and he’s definitely proud of it.
Eduardo’s happiness and Mark’s apparent success definitely chase away most of the nervousness. By the time they’re home again and kissing languidly up the stairs to the bedroom, Mark is feeling pretty good about all this Valentine’s Day stuff. It really wasn’t too hard, and he gets a weird little thrill at the thought of doing this again next year, finding ways to make Eduardo even happier than he is right now.
He is told to wait while Eduardo lights a bunch of candles in the bedroom; Mark is slightly disappointed that he hadn’t thought of that, or rather, that Sean hadn’t thought of it. He decides he’ll just have to up the game with them next year, though. Maybe 300 candles.
“Okay,” Eduardo says when he’s done, turning back to Mark and grinning. “That’s it, I’m done being cheesy and ridiculous, and you can mock me if you’d like, but I’m going to remind you of the 300 roses-I’m probably going to remind you of them for the rest of our lives-”
“I’m not going to mock you, it’s Valentine’s Day,” Mark says, and he joins Eduardo by the bed, drawn there by an unnamable force. Eduardo is made for candlelight, looks golden and warm and perfect for touching. Mark cups his face in his hands and kisses him gently, leaning into him easily.
“You can mock me a little, I know you don’t mean it,” Eduardo whispers into the kiss, and somehow, that’s romantic. That’s what makes Mark flush with love, smiling dopily up at Eduardo until those stupid dimples show up again.
He doesn’t even mind when Eduardo kisses the dimples; he thinks that’s the best therapy out there for his childhood trauma.
It isn’t long before Eduardo starts fumbling to slowly undress Mark, and Mark hastens to return the favor, he tries to get his lust-fogged brain moving fast enough to get out his promise.
“Uh, yeah, so if there’s anything-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says softly, kissing his cheek and pulling his jacket down. Mark swallows hard and keeps going, afraid of not getting it out.
“I mean, anything you want to try-not that I’m ever opposed-”
“Mark, you-” Now the shirt is coming off, and it’s hard to think, talk, breathe, with Eduardo’s hands on his bare skin, rubbing over his goose-pimpled shoulders.
“Anything you want me to, um, do, or anything you want to do to me, I’m down for-”
“Mark,” Eduardo says, and Mark freezes at the sudden sharpness in his voice. He forces himself to focus and notes that Eduardo isn’t looking at him but at-at the shirt he’d just pulled half off Mark’s body. More specifically, at the label of the shirt he’d just pulled from Mark’s body.
Where, squinting in the dim candlelight, Mark can clearly make out the words Hugo Boss for Sean Parker.
Mark closes his eyes.
“Why,” Eduardo starts icily, pausing to swallow hard. “Why does your shirt have Sean Parker stitched into the label?”
“I hate you,” Mark seethes into his phone. He had given up on knocking on the locked bathroom door, trying to get Eduardo to come out and just listen to his explanation, and is now pacing in the hallway with his phone pressed to his ear, plotting 300 different ways to murder Sean Parker. “No, really. You are dead to me.”
“Mark, man, it’s not really a good time right now,” Sean says, but there is definite laughter in his voice, laughter that makes Mark want to set things on fire.
“Fuck you, if it were actually a bad time, you wouldn’t have answered. Tell me, though, was this the plan all along, or just a super fun coincidence? I don’t know which is sadder, really.”
Sean is quiet for a second, but then there’s definite, definite laughter, choked back but audible. “Eduardo’s been telling people at parties and conferences that I’m a pedophile,” Sean says. “I guess he’s still not over that stupid thing with your birthday and all the lap dances.”
“Well, congratulations!” Mark practically shouts. “Now you’re a dead pedophile.”
“I did actually want you to have a good night, Mark,” Sean tells him, trying to fake earnestness. “I just wanted Eduardo to have a bad one.”
Mark hangs up then. He thinks he hears Sean sneering, “You hang up first!” as he disconnects, but he’s too angry to be sure.
He hangs up right on time, though, because he hears the click of the bathroom door opening, and though he hurls himself back towards the bedroom, Eduardo bursts out again, once more slamming him back into the wall of their hallway. This time, though, his eyes are on fire, and mouth is set in a firm, angry line.
Mark says, “Wardo-” and Eduardo cuts right in.
“Take them off.” When Mark just blinks at him, Eduardo actually growls and leans closer. “Take. The clothes. Off.”
Without a second’s hesitation, Mark scrambles to do as he’s told, stripping hastily. Eduardo watches him heatedly, and Mark still doesn’t know if he’s in trouble or if this is a sex thing or both, and he’s sort of hoping for both because the idea is a major turn-on, somehow. Even so, he falters at his boxers, mostly out of uncertainty but maybe a little bit to hear Eduardo growl again.
“Those too.”
“These aren’t-” Mark says, but the look on Eduardo’s face has him scrambling to obey again, until he’s standing naked against the wall with Eduardo staring at him like he wants to eat him up.
“I just want to say,” Mark stutters out, and he grows confident when Eduardo seems to listen. “You are allowed to do whatever weird things you want to do to me tonight. And, I mean, any night, but especially tonight. Go nuts.”
To his real surprise, Eduardo breaks into a small, almost relieved smile. “Good,” he says, and then he pulls Mark into his arms and kisses him hard.
As it turns out, the weird things that Eduardo has in mind are really just fucking Mark harder than he ever has before, hard enough to make their usually sturdy bed frame creak under their weight. Mark definitely doesn’t complain, if the fact that he comes twice in almost painfully quick succession is any indication. He doesn’t even mind the wicked hickey Eduardo bites and sucks into his neck, well above his collar.
“You don’t even understand,” Eduardo pants into Mark’s ear as he takes him a second time, finding absolutely no protest. “I want to-fuck-tattoo my name on you or something now, it’s ridiculous, you make me crazy.”
Mark is pretty much beyond words by now, but he does manage to whimper out, “You can.” And even though the words are a surprise, it’s not so much a surprise when Eduardo comes from them, considering their situation right now.
“Christ,” Eduardo sighs, burying his face in Mark’s neck and wrapping his arms around him. “I cannot believe you.”
“Sorry,” Mark says drowsily, not feeling very sorry at all. Eduardo squeezes him, probably sensing this.
“Can you wear something of mine to work tomorrow?” Eduardo asks, and Mark can’t believe he’s actually asking, like he even needs to.
“I told you, whatever weird stuff you want,” Mark mumbles, kissing him blindly and breathing into his hair. “Tattoos, your clothes, whatever. Not even that weird.”
“No, especially since, apparently, you’ll wear anyone’s clothes,” Eduardo says, and Mark can hear the pout in his voice.
“Only yours and mine, now,” he answers obligingly, and when Eduardo kisses him again, there’s finally a smile on his lips, and that’s really all Mark ever wants.
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Eduardo settles down then, not relinquishing his steadfast hold but relaxing about it, at least, starting to drift off. Mark follows him lazily into sleep, wondering if he can consider this last Valentine’s Day surprise a success.
He’s happy, warm, and incredibly sated, right where he belongs. Mark thinks he probably can.