Work Text:
“Hello, lovely LAMP fans!” Roman chipped into the camera. He was standing behind a pristine granite countertop, grandly gesturing to the kitchen around him. “And welcome, to our first ever baking vlog! Featuring me, your favorite prince, and…” Roman frowned, glancing around. Where was he…
“MO! MO WHERE ARE YOU?” Roman called. From behind the camera, Logan leaned in from the living room, a book clutched in his hands.
“Who on ea- ah,” Logan noted the camera and rolled his eyes. “You’re still doing that ‘code name’ thing then?”
“Yes, it’s cool,” Roman deadpanned, “have you seen Mora-AAAAAA.” Roman’s question was cut off as a grey blur pounced on him from the left. He sputtered, regaining his balance and the camera focused on where he stood, a very excited Patton clinging to his arm.
“Mo, are you really wearing your cat onesie right now?” Roman asked, exasperated.
“Yup! It’s purr-fect for baking,” Patton giggled. Logan’s groan could be heard from off-camera. Patton separated himself from Roman, who brushed himself off, and faced the camera again.
“Right, so today I thought we could make chocolate chip cookies, since I, erm, haven’t really baked since I was five and my moms wanted to have some bonding time,” Roman rubbed the back of his head and Patton gasped, grabbing Roman’s arms and meeting him dead in the eyes. Roman’s heartbeat increased slightly, and he became hyper aware of the warm spots where Patton’s hands were. He felt like he was melting under his friend’s chocolate gaze, and would probably do anything the other asked. That was...odd.
“I. Love. Cookies,” Patton said, voice serious. Roman laughed, though if it sounded like it was about five octaves higher than normal, Patton didn’t comment on it.
“Y-you sure do Padre,” he managed to regain control, and beamed at the camera again, “so, what ingredients do we need then, my lovely Morality?”
“Aw, shucks! Well, you will need-” Patton began to list the ingredients, and Roman set them out on the counter. He’d probably spend all night editing the video so it was more interesting. Maybe he’d stop-animate the ingredients into the frame. Maybe Logan would come into his room and force him to go to sleep, ranting about having a more consistent sleep schedule, despite the fact he’d sit on the edge of Roman’s bed and read as he made sure Roman finally slept.
Roman shook his head to himself. His thoughts were really wandering today! Patton grinned at the ingredients, then at Roman.
“Egg-celent!” Patton cheered, holding up one of the eggs Roman had gotten out. It slipped from his fingers and splattered against the floor. Roman groaned and Patton shrugged sheepishly.
“We’ll clean it up later, it’s fine,” Roman said. Patton giggled and nodded.
“Alright! So our first step is to preheat the oven to 375º F, that’s uh, something else in celsius for all our non-american friends. Sorry, I don’t know how to calculate that. I’m not a nerd,” Roman said, waving his hand.
Off-camera, though he was pretending not to pay attention, they heard Logan yell “IT’S 190.5º C.”
“Ah. Well, you heard the ABSOLUTE LOSER NERD!”
“SCREW YOU, PREP!”
“Now, now, play nice boys,” Patton chidded, putting his hands on his hips. Roman turned to retort, but the look on Patton’s face made the insult die on his tongue. His brown eyes were on fire, with such passion and the underlying hint of affection it made Roman’s knees weak. Wait...shit. He couldn’t have a crush on Patton! Everyone knew Patton liked Logan! Roman decided to shove this new revelation into the back of his brain. He’d deal with it when he wasn’t on camera.
“Anyway, our next step will be to mix together the sugars, vanilla, butter, and egg in a large bowl!” Patton gathered the ingredients he listed and plopped them next to a glass bowl Roman had gotten out.
“Good thing we had more than one egg out, since you broke the other one,” Roman said, cracking it into the bowl.
“Oops, yeah, that’s me! I’m just a clumsy guy, your highness,” Patton giggled. Roman flushed at the nickname, pouring the brown sugar into the bowl as he watched Patton’s eyes crinkle with amusement. He frowned suddenly, turning to Roman.
“Uh, kiddo, did you mean to pour the sugar onto the counter?” Roman spluttered and looked down, where only half of the contents he had been pouring had reached the bowl.
“Looks like I’m not the only clumsy one here!” Patton giggled, helping scrape the sugar into his hands so they could put it back into the bowl.
“Y-yeah,” Roman laughed, knowing his face was bright red. He’d play it off as embarrassment later. This was fine. Everything was fine. Patton began to mix the ingredients together, chatting excitedly.
“So yesterday I was doing some solo practice on my drums and one of my drumsticks snapped clean in two! Guess I forgot my own strength,” he giggled. Roman totally didn’t start staring at Patton’s arms, which were now exposed after Patton had rolled up his onesie sleeves, after he said that. Damn, they were muscular. No, bad Roman. Focus on baking. Patton decided to save him from his own spiralling thoughts by tasking him with adding the flour, baking soda, and salt, as he stirred. Roman did so, snickering at the salt.
“Look, it’s Anxiety!” he joked, holding up the salt. Patton leveled him with a look and Roman’s snickering stopped.
“I HEARD THAT!” came a call from off-camera. Roman’s smirk returned a bit.
“Did either of you two want to join us, since you keep butting in?” Roman called back. Patton finished stirring and showed the end result to the camera.
“IN YOUR DREAMS PRINCEY,” Virgil yelled again. Roman heard Logan snickering and rolled his eyes. He turned to Patton, who was giggling and froze.
“Uhh, you got some...flour...on ya there, Mo,” Roman said, noting the white powder dusting his face and hair.
“Oh, so I do,” he said, looking at his hands. He wiped them on his pants and left white streaks across his khakis. Roman averted his gaze and swept up a bag of chocolate chips, cutting them open and pouring them into the dough. Patton gasped suddenly.
“Can I lick the spoon? PLEASE?” Patton begged and, well, how could he say no? Roman handed Patton the wooden spoon they had used to stir the dough. Only to regret his entire life and how it led up to this point, as Patton stuck the entire spoon into his mouth with a small groan. Wow, how could Roman’s life get any better and/or worse from this exact second.
“Want a lick?” Patton pulled the spoon from his mouth, a thin trail of saliva clinging to it, and presented it to Roman.
Ah, that was how.
“Uh n-no thanks, just put it in the sink when you’re done,” Roman said, hardly stuttering at all. Man, he was good at this whole ‘What? I’m not dying internally what are you talking about?’ thing. Patton shrugged and shoved the spoon back into his mouth. Roman decided it was time to start scooping the dough into balls to put on the tray before he lost his goddamn mind. Patton finally threw the wooden spoon into the sink and helped assist Roman, spacing the dough further apart and re-rolling some of the more lopsided dough balls for Roman.
They chatted throughout the process, laughing at each other as their hands got sticky and covered in cookie dough. Roman looked up and noticed Logan and Virgil leaning against the wall. Virgil had his head ducked and was smiling through his bangs, while Logan looked fond. Roman stuck his tongue at them and Virgil flipped him off. Patton kept laughing as he picked the trays and turned to put them in the oven. He didn’t notice the three pairs of eyes burning into his back as he leaned over to push them in.
Suddenly, Roman heard his own voice blasting through the kitchen, and he laughed as he saw Logan set his phone on the table.
“Dude, you can’t play our own music in our videos!” Virgil said, trying to hide his smile. Logan scoffed.
“Why not? We play our music in videos all the time. Besides, it lowers the risk of getting a copyright strike,” Logan said.
Virgil muttered something, and Logan raised an eyebrow. “What was that?”
“I just don’t like hearing my own voice...still,” he admitted. Roman felt his heart twist slightly.
“Relax, you emo nightmare. This is an old one, only I sing in it,” Roman reassured him. Patton suddenly took his hands and Roman’s heart went into rapid-fire beating again.
“Baking intermission dance!” he cheered, guiding Roman into a spin. A laugh escaped the taller man as they twirled. Patton began to sing along to Roman’s song.
“Careful,” Virgil’s voice warned from the side, worrying. Roman hardly heard him past the pounding in his ears. The look of pure bliss on Patton’s face was all his brain could focus on. He wanted to see that look every day, he wanted to see it when he laid down to sleep at night and when he woke up every morning, wanted to see it when they sang together, wanted to see it when they were filming or when they were alone. He wanted Patton. Yet, something else was burning in his lungs. He wanted more than that. In his perfect future, he was picturing himself with Patton, but it was like the picture was still mushy, blurred. Something was missing.
Before Roman could figure it out, the timer beeped and Patton twirled away from him. Roman watched him as he opened the oven, put on oven mitts, and pulled the cookies out. He set the tray on the counter and Roman helped him transfer them onto wire cooling racks, slapping on his cool and nonchalant facade once more.
Logan and Virgil had left the room, and Roman felt himself quietly missing their side comments. Virgil’s voice sang through Logan’s phone, which he had left on the table with their playlist of songs on shuffle. Patton beamed as he hummed along, a soft and fond look on his face. Patton was the one closest to Virgil, and had been the main reason Virgil had even decided to join their band in the first place. Now, Roman couldn’t imagine the group without him. He was the caution they so often desperately needed, because even with Logan as their realist, they often threw caution to the wind. Virgil was there to yank on the metaphorical leash and say things like: ‘No, Roman, we aren’t putting our address online we have a bunch of rabid fangirls who’ll stalk us. We’ll get a P.O. box instead.’
“I think they’re cool enough to eat now!” Patton said, shoving a cookie into his mouth before Roman could stop him. He yelped, spitting it onto the floor and waving his hands in front of his mouth frantically.
“NOPE STILL TOO HOT!” he said, hurrying over to the sink to get some water. Roman laughed and muttered under his breath, quiet enough so the camera couldn’t pick up, “they aren’t the only thing.”
They ended up enjoying the cookies about five minutes later, with Roman trying them first to assure they weren’t still too hot. Patton complained about how he couldn’t taste them properly due to his tongue being burned, and Roman told him it was his own fault, which caused Logan to snicker from where he’d come in to grab his phone. The vlog ended with Patton leaping onto Roman’s back and Roman screeching bloody murder.
~~~~~
It was about a week after the baking vlog went up and Roman was screaming into his pillow. Unfortunately for him, his audience wasn’t nearly as oblivious as Patton was, and they were pointing out all the times Roman’s very obvious crush was showing. Along with that, a majority of the comments seemed to have to do with shipping, and while that didn’t really bother Roman on most days, he was getting a little sick of how much they were hitting the nail on the head.
He suddenly felt a soothing hand on his back and heard the soft, soothing hum of Virgil’s voice.
“Hey Prince underarm stink, what’s the problem?” Virgil asked. Roman said nothing. He didn’t want to talk about his crush on Patton, especially since Virgil and Patton pretty much told each other everything. However, Virgil wasn’t the type to tell the others’ secrets. He was too kind, too understanding. Surely it’d be alright. Roman rolled over from where he was lying on his stomach and pushed himself up on his elbows, about to admit everything when he froze. Virgil’s hair was falling in his eyes, and he blew his bangs away to reveal warm grey eyes, looking attentive and eager. Their eyes met and the words died. Roman’s heart rate increased. Oh. Oh no.
Virgil suddenly looked alarmed, face turning pink, as he turned away. Ah, yes, Virgil hated eye contact. Roman was about to apologize, but Virgil was already standing.
“I...have to go do a- a thing! Yeah, so, talk to you later, cool? Cool,” Virgil threw him some finger guns before backpedaling from the room and shutting the door. That was...odd? Roman shrugged to himself, slight relief filling him at the fact he didn’t have to share his revelation from a week ago about his Patton crush. However, that relief fell away as he realized what it was. The thing he was missing from his fantasy he’d had during the video.
He didn’t just want Patton’s smile, he wanted Virgil’s snark as well. He wanted Logan’s smirk and eye rolls. He wanted all three of his friends curled up around him as they watched Disney movies. He wanted to wake up in the morning and pepper them in kisses. He wanted them as more than just his friends.
Roman rolled over and screamed into his pillow again, because this was somehow ten times worse than just liking Patton. This was extra chances at rejection, this was the pain of having no one to rant to about his crush because his crush was all three of them. Still, despite his new suffering, Roman couldn’t help but feel that giddiness that came with every new crush. Couldn’t help the pleasant images of a possible future where his bandmates were also his boyfriends. Roman rolled back onto his back and closed his eyes, and as he drifted to sleep his dreams were full of warm smiles, sarcastic comments, and endless laughter.