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Timmy is asleep when it happens, meaning he’s probably the last person on earth to hear about it, and he’s never been more happy for the fact that he turns his phone off when he goes to sleep, or he’d probably not get any sleep at all.
And he really fucking needed it.
He’d had a very demanding photoshoot that day, which ended up lasting about 5 hours more than anticipated, because the photographer was an asshole who was never fucking happy with anything. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, the designers couldn’t agree on which pieces of clothing they wanted to highlight the most, so he had to take every photo three times, with different clothes on, so that they could decide which one they liked the best later.
If he’d known that this is what being a model would be like, he’d never have shown up for that first meeting. He loves his life, he really does, and he’s super grateful for all the people he’s met, the friends he’s made, not to mention the money he’s earned. But, on days like today, where everything just goes wrong, and what was supposed to be a ‘quick’ 3 hour shoot, turns into an 8 hour nightmare, he can’t help but wonder what his life might have looked like if he’d stayed in school. Maybe he’d be in law school right now, panicking about an upcoming exam.
Or maybe, if he’d had the guts, he’d have made a real go at his dream of being an actor.
He does enjoy modeling though, and he doesn’t necessarily regret the choices he’s made. But then he has these bad days, where he feels more like a mannequin than anything else, and he’d gladly trade away all the designer clothing, the glitz and the glam of fashion week, and even all of his money, to just… Be normal.
His love life was basically non existent, not for lack of offers, but no one ever really wanted to date him. They just wanted to date his name, and his reputation. And he was definitely not into that.
More than anything, he just wanted someone who saw him, Timmy – the nerdy dork who was embarrassingly into hip hop music, and not Timothée – the face of Louis Vuitton. Literally, all he wanted was to be treated as a person, and not an object.
Safe to say he chose the wrong fucking career for that.
So yes, when it happens, he’s asleep. And he only finds out about it much later when Saoirse and Kiernan come crashing into his bedroom, waking him up by excitedly jumping onto his bed, talking over each other, so he doesn’t understand a word. Saoirse shoves her phone into his face the second she sees he’s awake, and he has to close his eyes immediately or run the risk of being blinded – who the fuck has the brightness on their phone turned all the way up this early?
“Fuck, Sersh, what the fuck?” He groans, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.
“You haven’t seen it?!” She shrieks, and Kiernan lets out a surprised gasp as they both start talking. At the same time. And once again, he understands exactly nothing, literally all he hears is excited mumbling.
“Guys, guys, please. One at a time, I… It’s too early for this.”
“He tweeted about you!” Kiernan practically screams, and Saoirse nods, grinning wider than Timmy has ever seen before.
He has no idea why they’re so excited, because, not to brag or anything, but people tweet about him all the time. Though clearly it had to be someone special this time, or they never would have reacted like this. “Uh, what? Who tweeted about me?”
“Armie Hammer!” Saoirse shouts, shoving her phone in his face again. “Look!”
He takes Saoirse’s phone and immediately turns the brightness down, and then when he finally sees what it is she’s talking about, his heart practically stops. She has the twitter app open on Armie’s page, and right there, at the top, is a tweet with pictures of him.
“Uhm. What the fuck?” Timmy looks up at Saoirse, then at Kiernan, and then back at the tweet. Out of all the people who could have made that tweet, he’d never in a million years expect it to be Armie Hammer.
Mostly because Timmy had nurtured a pretty epic crush on the guy since, well, basically forever. The day Armie came out Timmy might have actually cried a little. It was a really moving interview, okay? It had nothing to do with his chances of dating Armie going from -100% to maybe -50%. It didn’t really matter, because he knew he’d never meet the guy, which is why Timmy let himself crush on him; it was safe.
Or at least it used to be.
Apparently Armie knew who he was now, or at least he knew his face, and he liked it enough to ask about him on Twitter. It probably should have made him feel better than it did. Sure, the fact that Armie found him attractive made his stomach flutter. But. He knew nothing about him, he didn’t even know his name.
“Right?!” Saoirse laughs, clapping her hands together excitedly, but when Timmy, instead of joining her and Kiernan in flailing, just frowns down at the phone, she stops and pokes him in the arm. “Why aren’t you happy?”
“He doesn’t like me, Sersh. Not really, he just likes my face.” Timmy shrugs, handing the phone back to her. Just as he’s about to get out of bed and start preparing for the day, having decided to leave his phone off a little longer, someone’s hand slaps the back of his head. He can see Saoirse staring wide eyed over at Kiernan, her phone still in her hands, so clearly it wasn’t her.
“Ouch, the fuck you do that for?!” He practically shrieks, rubbing the back of his head.
“Because you’re a dumbass, that’s why.” Kiernan mutters, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Of course he fucking only likes your face, because newsflash! He hasn’t fucking met you yet! For fuckssake, Timmy, you always do this. Give the man a chance, for once in your fucking life.”
Timmy doesn’t think he’s ever heard her curse this much in such a short amount of time, and all he can do is blink dumbly back at her, trying to process everything.
“She’s right, you know.” Saoirse says quietly, as she reaches out and gives Timmy’s shoulder a light squeeze. “I know this is a sore spot for you, but, babe, you’ll never fall in love if you keep rejecting everyone before you even meet them.”
Technically, he knows they’re right, but the idea of reaching out, putting his heart on the line, he doesn’t know if he’s ready for that. And especially not now, with Armie, where he’s built his own version of the man in his head, and he’s literally perfect. He’s scared that he’s going to meet him and… Be disappointed. Which isn’t fair to Armie at all, because it’s not his fault that Timmy has been carrying around a mental!Armie for the last few years. But he’s also scared that he’s going to meet Armie and have him be just as perfect in real life as he is inside Timmy’s head, and then have him not actually like Timmy after all.
He honestly doesn’t think he’d be able to handle that.
“I…” He sighs, rubbing his eyes. “It’s just – It’s scary, you know? I don’t want to disappoint him.” Kiernan slaps him upside the head again. “Motherfucker, what?!” He shouts, rubbing the back of his head, again, for someone so small, there was definitely nothing wrong with her arm strength.
“How can you disappoint him if you don’t even meet the guy, Timmy? Come on. Everyone worries about rejection, everyone.”
“Clearly Armie doesn’t.” Timmy mutters, looking down at his hands. “Or he wouldn’t have tweeted that for everyone to see.”
“Seriously?” Saoirse shakes her head at him, raising an eyebrow. “He tweeted it, for everyone to see, on the off chance that you’re gay, single and willing to hit him up. He took a huge risk, if you reject him now, everyone will know it. And you don’t think he’s worried?!”
“I…” Truth to be told Timmy hadn’t thought about it like that, he hadn’t considered the fact that maybe Armie actually meant what he wrote, that maybe he actually did want to get to know him and find out how he preferred his eggs in the morning.
“Exactly.” Saoirse said with a nod, smiling over at Kiernan before turning her gaze back on Timmy. “So, come on, Sweet Tea. DM Armie on Twitter. Or better yet, have your people call his people. I mean, isn’t that the entire point of having people?”
Turns out that getting Armie’s number wasn’t nearly as hard as Timmy thought it would be, and in a way, he wished it would be. Simply because, well, he’s just not prepared yet, he thought he’d have more time. But Armie is awaiting his call now. He’d taken Saoirse’s advice and had his agent reach out to Armie’s agent, and when they found out he was the guy from Armie’s tweet, the reply with Armie’s phone number as well as a scheduled time to call came back within less than 10 minutes.
He’d thought that Armie would be busy enough that scheduling that phone call would take ages, that maybe their schedules wouldn’t align for at least a few weeks. But no, Armie was ready for him to call that same day.
So here he was, fiddling with his phone, trying to work up the courage to actually make the phone call. Once the email with Armie’s number had come through, Saoirse and Kiernan had left him alone so that he could have some semblance of privacy while making the call, but he knew they’d demand a full play by play when he was done.
And if he tried to back out of it, Kiernan had promised she’d eat an entire bag of Funyuns and sit on him, breathing her disgusting onion breath on him, until he, as she said, womanned up to make the call.
His thumb hovers over Armie’s number, and he sucks in a deep breath before pressing down and bringing the phone to his ear. Timmy doesn’t think his heart has ever beat as fast as it’s doing right now as he waits for Armie to pick up the phone. He hopes he picks up on the first try, because he honestly doesn’t know if he’d be able to try again.
Luckily he doesn’t have to find out.
“It’s Armie.” A deep voice comes through the receiver, and Timmy sucks in a quick breath, willing his heart to slow down a little before he got a fucking heart attack and died.
“Uhm, hi, it’s Timmy. I… Uh… You were looking for me?”
