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There was one thing Sebastian was famous (or, someone could object, infamous) for: he had a song for every circumstance. He couldn't help himself, and he was also a tad proud of it. His catalogue was quite extensive, and it included many oldies and obscure gems.
At the moment, he could hear Freddie Mercury gracefully singing to his inner self a couple of lines from It's A Hard Life, a song featured in Queen's album The Works, 1984.
This is a tricky situation, I've only got myself to blame ...
Indeed , Sebastian pondered, looking down to the sink; its marbled surface was covered in a shower of turquoise, shimmery powder, like his fingers – but luckily enough, not his white t-shirt.
It came from the palette he had delicately put on the side of the sink, after having accidentally knocked it down to the floor with the loudest bang – Sebastian had held his breath for a moment, even though it was nearly impossible for Lewis to hear anything from the living room.
He hoped Nicole wasn't the vengeful type, but if she had been... Well, it would have been a well-deserved punishment for his other “perk”, the one he wasn't especially proud of: being the clumsiest idiot, even more so when he was as tipsy as he currently was.
Sebastian sighed; he cleaned the palette and the sink the best he could, and prepared to apologise to his host.
Waiting for him in the living room, there were Lewis and Manhattan's skyline, one lounging on the black leather sofa dominating the room and the latter glittering outside the penthouse's large windows.
It was a breathtaking view but at the same time it felt overwhelming, to Sebastian. Too close and vast, the skyscrapers intimidating like sleeping alien giants.
Lewis put down his phone, smiling.
“Are you alright, man? It took you a while...”
His eyes then fell to the palette Sebastian was holding in his hand, the smile fading off his face.
Sebastian cleared his throat, and explained: “So, huh... I accidentally made this thingy fall and one of the thingies inside is... Pulverised, basically. But I will refund Nicole, of course, or I'll buy a new thingy. I am very sorry.”
It didn't look like Lewis was listening. He had his lips pursed, while Sebastian showed the damage to the palette – the empty pod which had previously housed the turquoise eyeshadow; he finally shook his head, and shrugged.
“It's alright...”
He hesitated, before adding: “… I don't think she cares for that anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“She left. I think this time it might be for good.”
Sebastian raised his eyebrows. “You didn't tell me.”
Once again Lewis shrugged, running his hand along the edge of the sofa. “Well, we broke up so many times, I need to be sure that this is going to be the last one.”
Well, some big news coming from Mr Hamilton. Sebastian had noticed something being off in his demeanor at dinner, but he had chalked it up to one of Lewis' gloomy moments. There were some days in which he was not entirely there. Completely functioning, but a touch more withdrawn than usual. Not even Lewis could come up with an explanation for those moments. They just happened, and he had learned to live with them, with the unexplicable melancholy they brought to him.
Sebastian inquired: “When did it happen?”
“Seven weeks ago. The longer we managed to resist before getting back together is two months, so time is ticking.”
“You don't seem very positive.”
“ I'm positive we're done,” Lewis chuckled, avoiding Sebastian's gaze.
“Why?”
“We didn't fight. We didn't cry. She packed up and left. This is not our style, you know?”
“But she left this here,” Sebastian waved the palette. “Like an excuse to come back.”
He didn't want to feed Lewis' hopes, but at the same time he looked too bummed not to try and cheer him up.
Lewis grimaced, and replied: “She doesn't work like that.”
He then turned his back to Sebastian and moved closer to the window, hands in his pockets as he stared outside.
Sebastian stood there, examining the palette; it was a round, pearly, pale blue affair, with a brand name he didn't know carved in silver letters on top of it.
“It looks fancy,” he commented, just to break the awkward silence in the room.
Lewis scoffed. “Of course it does.”
Sebastian plopped on the sofa with a loud groan, Lewis turning to him in response. He watched his guest as he opened the palette, and studied the pods inside; then, Sebastian pressed a fingertip against the one sporting a bright cerulean shade, smudging the eyeshadow on the back of his hand.
“Sparkly,” he commented, grinning down at the shimmery blue stripe on his skin.
Lewis said: “You seem very interested.”
“I like sparkly things,” Sebastian mumbled, smudging the eyeshadow some more on his hand, the powder silky under his fingers.
“Do you want to take it?”
“My girlfriend isn't into sparkly make-up.”
“You seem to be into it, though.”
“Ah-ah,” Sebastian replied.
He looked at his own reflection in the palette's mirror, and gently rubbed his fingertip back onto the cerulean pod; a moment of hesitation, due to his dexterity being slightly impaired by the alcohol in his system and the thought that wow, am I really going to do it? , and then he spread the eyeshadow on his eyelid, covering it all up to its crease. He did the same to the other eyelid.
The result was overall crude, edges a bit irregular and one eye being different from the other, but it was his first time so it didn't really count.
In the meantime, Lewis had sat on the sofa next to him, looking puzzled and intrigued at the same time; Sebastian beamed at him, asking: “Not bad, huh?”
Lewis frowned in concentration, as he scrutinized his guest's job.
“Try a darker shade, this one is too similar to your eye colour,” he finally sentenced, relaxing against the cushions behind his back, one leg bent across the other.
“Oooh, you're an expert,” Sebastian replied, and that granted him a playful slap on his shoulder.
He chose an indigo shade – it was matte, but the shimmery cerulean layer underneath should have brought some spark.
Lewis was right: the blue in his eyes jumped out in contrast to the darker eyeshadow, which Sebastian also used to underline his lower eyelids.
“Very glam rock,” he said.
For the first time since he had put his hands on it, Sebastian noticed what looked like a drawer at the bottom of the palette. As there was no visible way to open it, he pressed his thumb on its edge. The drawer sprung open, showing a set of three additional pods and a tiny brush. They were in three different shades of pink, the surface of the palest one slightly scraped in the middle.
So, Nicole did use it, after all.
It was like she had suddenly materialised into the apartment, sitting on the sofa with them.
Sebastian didn't know much about her, besides the fact that she was in a band, she was very attractive, and she had been in a complicated relationship with Lewis for quite a while. His friend wasn't interested in discussing the details of his own love life with him nor with anyone else, apparently, and he had never even introduced her to him.
She must have been as head-strong as he was. Maybe not willing to put up with his childish side (because Lewis could definitely be childish, from time to time). Trapped in a situation that provided her both with torment and pleasure, and she finally managed to break free.
None of his business, at the end of the day.
“I think this is for the lips,” Sebastian said, dipping his middle finger into one of the untouched pods, the hot pink one. The content was sticky and thick.
He spread it on his lips, pressing them together and checking the result on the mirror.
Very subtle... He was bracing for something bolder.
“You look stunning, my dear,” Lewis startled him, his voice closer than expected.
He definitely seemed more amused than before.
“You know, this is very appropriate,” Sebastian said, struck by a sudden thought.
“What do you mean?”
“We're in New York, and I look like Lou Reed.”
“You don't look like Lou Reed. You look like Sebastian Vettel with a painted face.”
“I mean, in the spirit.”
“That's still a reach, man.”
“You're such a party pooper.”
Sebastian poked Lewis, and said: “Speaking of parties... I think we're still in time to go to some club.”
“A club? Really?”
“Yes.”
“No, man, sorry.”
“Oh, come on.”
“I'm not in the mood.”
Sebastian wasn't going to give up that easily.
“Ok, let's play a game...”
He brought the palette right under Lewis' nose, and continued: “… I am going to paint your face.”
“That sounds so wrong, mate.”
“And if you like the result... We'll go out.”
Lewis shook his head. “You seriously can't hold red wine.”
“Yeah, whatever,” Sebastian said, bouncing off the sofa.
He towered over his still sitting friend, drawling: “… let's paint this handsome face.”
Lewis opened his mouth in fake shock, his arms sprawling across the sofa's edge.
“Did you just say 'handsome'?”
“Well, I'm not blind,” Sebastian replied, scanning him head to toe and wiggling his eyebrows in a suggestive way; at that, Lewis let out his first genuine laugh of the night.
“Ok, you can paint my handsome face. Do whatever you want.”
Sebastian sat back on the sofa, crouching by Lewis' side, and lifted up the palette's lid.
What would have been the best option, mhm...
Something bright. Like that turquoise he had destroyed in the bathroom, or the cerulean he had put on himself...
Sebastian did his best to follow the eyelid outline, not wanting to fuck up what could have easily been a stunning outcome.
… he really was getting invested in it, wasn't he? After all, wasn't he a bit of an artistic soul? And also, he wanted Lewis to be satisfied with the result. And to go out clubbing, and showing off his debauched rock star look. At first the idea was to drag Lewis out of his sad, enormous apartment and get his blood pumping a bit faster through his vein – yeah, he was grieving and processing and accepting pain into his life and so on and so forth... But come on.
At the moment, he also just wanted to have a bit of fun with his friend.
After being done with one eye, Sebastian stopped and examined his work.
“This one is better on your eyes,” he pondered.
Lewis shrugged: “Brown eyes, mate. They go with everything.”
On him the cerulean shade popped in a different way, like his eyelid was carved out of a precious stone – Sebastian also had managed not to screw the borders up, so he was quite proud of his skills.
As he struggled to get the other eye done, Lewis said: “Man, just straddle me.”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course... You're basically on top of me anyway.”
“Is it just an excuse to have me in a compromising position, Mr Hamilton?”
“If that was the case you wouldn't be on top, Herr Vettel.”
Sebastian chuckled, but not at Lewis' joke: his friend's smile had trembled for a moment, his gaze flashing down for a second.
Lewis' sense of humour could occasionally border on the dirty side, but over all it was pretty tame, and he could actually get very easily embarassed at his own adult jokes. Sure, he was no choirboy and something quite... Saucy lurked inside of him. It managed to escape, from time to time, but usually Lewis was fast enough to catch it and put it back where it belonged.
Too bad, because Sebastian's opinion was that the thing belonged outside, instead. Even though seeing him getting all flustered at his own innuendos was still quite funny, and endearing.
Sebastian sat on Lewis’ lap, finishing his job on the other eye and starting with the mouth. The little brush he had found inside the palette was pretty rubbish at the job, but he had to make the best of what he had.
“Man, you've got lips for days,” Sebastian commented.
Under him, Lewis subtly shifted his legs – he must have been numb by then, poor guy; Sebastian raised up for a moment to provide him with some relief, his knees sinking into the cushions and his hand being next to Lewis' head, grabbing the edge of the sofa for extra balance.
He looked down, meeting his friend's eyes.
Damn. Once again, that colour was really fucking good.
“Thank you, I guess?” Lewis said, and Sebastian snapped out of his study.
“What?”
“Were you complimenting my lips?”
Sebastian furrowed his brow.
“They're big,” he said, shrugging.
That wasn't an answer, though; Lewis didn't seem to mind, his half-painted mouth curving into a gentle smile as he lightly complained: “Get on with it, now... I can't feel my legs.”
A few brushstrokes and the job was done, at last. Sebastian hopped off Lewis' lap, turning around to check the result.
“How do I look?”
Sebastian inspected him carefully, his eyes wandering from the cerulean shells of his eyelids to his glistening lips – the lip-gloss giving them a wet-looking finish.
He took a step backward as to take in some more details – Lewis sitting with his hands on his slightly parted thighs, back straight and head high like a king. Hopefully a merciful one, who'd be pleased with his work.
… now, that was a weird thought.
The word was on the tip of his tongue, and for once Sebastian considered the idea of letting it stay there; then, as many other times before, he just went for it.
“Gorgeous.”
Lewis nodded, standing up.
“Let’s check.”
In the bathroom, Lewis stared intently at his own reflection in the mirror.
“Wow... Great job.”
“You're welcome, mate,” Sebastian murmured, leaning against the doorframe.
Lewis scrutinized himself some more, before musing: “You know what... I think I'll keep the palette.”
“You want to experiment a bit?”
Lewis turned to him. The golden light coming from the lightbulbs embedded in the bathroom's mirror creating a soft halo around his features, his smile still somehow brighter than that.
“I'll send you pictures.”
“By all means, do send them,” Sebastian replied, grinning back at him; he then left the bathroom doorstep, heading for Lewis' bedroom.
“Can I borrow your leather jacket? I really want to go for the full Transformer Era Lou Reed look,” he called from the hall.