Chapter Text
Damon walks into the bathroom to find Liam spitting blood into the sink.
"Uh. Hi?" Damon says. The Mancunian throws him a dirty look. There’s dried blood running down Liam’s nose, all over his mouth and neck.
"Albarn." Liam grunts, voice wrecked.
"What happened to you?" Damon slurs, and his voice sounds too loud. He’d been doing shots with Graham all night, and it was now his fifth trip to the toilets. Somehow Graham hadn’t needed to go once, still seated at the bar now.
"None of your fucking business, you twat." Liam yanks some paper out from the metal box and holds it to his bleeding nose, tilting his head back.
"You shouldn’t do that…" Damon steps closer. "It’s just gonna make the blood—" He gestures helplessly at Liam’s neck, searching for his words. "—Down your throat. Just… hold your head straight."
Liam frowns at him, but he does as advised. He wrinkles his nose, sniffing aggressively as if checking to check if his nose is still working. He crumbles up the bloody paper and throws it at Damon.
Damon tries to catch it but it hits him in the face. He grimaces and bends down to pick it up. Only then does he realises how drunk he is. A sudden rush to his head, and he almost sees spots for a second. Recovering quickly, he finds a bin to toss the paper in. When he turns around, Liam is fiddling with a bag of coke.
"Jesus. Give it a minute, will you?"
"Fuck off." Liam replies without looking at him, but his hands are shaking slightly and he’s leaving traces of blood on the plastic from his messy fingers.
Before he realises what he’s doing, Damon grabs the tiny bag from him. Liam stares at his empty hand for a second, stunned, and then he’s yanking Damon back by the arm.
"Don’t fucking—" Liam halts his movement as the bathroom door whips open. Damon quickly shoves the bag in his pocket, smiling at the man who walks in. Liam ducks his head and faces the mirror again, no doubt trying to avoid getting recognised in the state he’s in.
The guy drunkenly makes his way to a urinal. Damon glances at Liam, who is braced against the bathroom sink, head hanging, and realises then that he must be high. However strong that punch must have been to make him bleed so much, it somehow still wasn’t enough to sober him up.
The guy’s pissing sound fills the room. Damon takes advantage of Liam’s quietness to grab some paper and clean the bag of coke, staying out of the stranger’s view.
After what feels like forever, the guy leaves.
A hard yank on his arm and Damon stumbles backwards, falling into Liam. God, he’s really drunk. Liam continues dragging him roughly and pushes him inside a bathroom stall.
"Move." Liam grits out when Damon just stands in front of him, catching his balance. Damon steps aside to let Liam kneels on the ground, and pulls down the lid of the toilet.
Damon has a brief, fleeting thought about the way Liam looks right now, bloody lips and messy hair and on his knees, looking up at him. It doesn’t matter how rude, disrespectful or downright insufferable Liam usually is with him, Damon has always had a soft for pretty people.
"The coke, you cunt." says Liam, reaching out his hand.
Right. Damon reluctantly hands Liam the bag of coke. Even in his drunken state, he worries how Liam is gonna get a line up his nose that was bleeding just a minute ago. Watching the man prepares a line on the lid of the toilet, Damon wonders why Liam brought him here to do coke with him. He’d thought the Mancunian would have just hurled insults at him, and maybe hit him until he’d given him back the coke. But here Liam is, gesturing towards the other thick line on the toilet. Snorting his own must have stung a bit, Damon figures from the way Liam scrunches up his nose in discomfort. Damon thinks about saying no; he was doing coke earlier and right now he’s completely drunk and the walls are moving a bit, but somehow rejecting Liam Gallagher when he offers you a line of coke seems rude.
Damon does the line and looks up to Liam, who is staring at him intensely. Heavy-lidded eyes bore into him, and Damon can’t break the eye contact. This feels weirdly intimate.
A dark, shiny drop of blood slowly runs down Liam’s nose. Without thinking, Damon reaches out and gently wipes it away with his thumb before it catches onto Liam’s lips. Liam seems to come back to himself then, swatting Damon’s hand away.
"Cunt." He mutters, rubbing under his nose with the back of his hand. "You had your line, you can fuck off now."
Liam says ‘your line’ like Damon begged him for one, but Damon can’t think straight long enough to argue against Liam’s choice of words. As Liam begins cutting another line, Damon suddenly remembers what he initially came into the bathroom for.
"I need to piss." He says dumbly.
"Go take a fucking piss, then." Liam replies without looking at him, leaning down to snort the line.
Damon waits until he’s done before clearing the toilet seat, and opening the lid.
"What the fuck are you doing now—"
Damon ignores Liam, standing up and unbuckling his belt.
"No, go to another toilet, you fucking cunt—"
Damon lets out a moan of relief as he starts peeing.
"Fuck’s sake. You’re such a twat." Liam makes a disgusted face, and pulls himself up. The poor man was just at eye level with Damon’s dick, Damon realises. At the sound of the door lock sliding, however, Damon panics and grasps at Liam’s shirt.
"C’mon, mate." Damon pouts.
Liam raises his bushy eyebrows at him menacingly, but Damon’s too happy peeing to care. A sudden, hard whack on the arm makes Damon yelp, and he almost falls over again, but Liam has the decency to steady him this time, and keep him from spraying everywhere.
"Hurry the fuck up, Albarn." Liam grumbles.
Finished, Damon tucks himself back into his pants with difficulty. He’d thought relieving his bladder would clear his head a little, but he feels even more light-headed and weak now. The coke was a mistake. Starting to sweat profusely, Damon attempts tiny breathing exercises while Liam gets the door open, but it doesn’t help at all and his mouth fills up with saliva. He watches Liam turn around with a frown in slow motion, but Damon doesn’t have time to give any warning before he’s emptying the contents of his stomach all over the Mancunian.
A beat.
Damon’s hands fly to his mouth as he stares at the vomit on the floor and on their feet. Slowly, he dares to look up at Liam, who stands covered in his vomit, shocked and fuming. Damon opens his mouth to say something, but closes it as Liam slams the door shut.
"Take your clothes off." Liam orders, voice tight.
"What?"
"Give me your fucking clothes, you cunt. Fuck’s wrong wit’ you."
"Oh."
Fair enough, Damon figures, and starts undressing. The tabloids would have a field day if they could see them now: Liam Gallagher and Damon Albarn, eternal rivals, stripping to their underwear in a tiny bathroom stall. Liam looks like he’s physically trying not to gag as he peels off his vomit-covered clothes. Damon feels bad, but he does feel much better now that all the alcohol and drugs have left his body.
"I’m so sorry about…" Damon gestures helplessly to the general area on Liam’s body where his sick landed. "Thanks for the coke though."
Liam shoves him against the bathroom wall.
"Better fucking pay me back, ya hear? For all of it, fucking clothes and coke—actually you owe me double the fucking amount now, you fucking twat. Fuckin’ ten times the amount."
I can think of better ways to pay you back, Damon doesn’t say. He manages a nod, distracted by Liam’s shirtless body against him. He tries not to think too hard about Liam’s arm against his bare chest, his elbow digging into his skin and his face inches away from him. Liam suddenly seems to realise how close they are, and lets him go.
As Liam steps back and unbuckles his belt to let his pants fall to his feet, it’s hard to keep his eyes from wandering. Liam leaves so much to the imagination by wearing oversized jackets everywhere he goes; Damon feels almost privileged to be able to see so much. He takes in Liam’s strong thighs, his soft belly, and slightly hairy chest…
Liam snatches the clean clothes from his hands. He sniffs them and grimaces—Damon has sweating all night, but it’s still better than vomit clothes—and begins sliding them on. Despite Liam being shorter than Damon, Damon’s tight shirt looks small on him, the hem stopping right before his pants. The Mancunian makes a face, wiggling around in the fabric.
"Fucking shite taste in clothes, you have." He says.
Liam hands Damon his dirty clothes. They’re dripping in vomit. Damon’s not sure what he’s supposed to do with them but he doesn’t argue.
Liam walks out.
"You gonna try to dry them or you gon’ walk around half naked?"
God, Damon can’t believe Liam is the most practical one out of the two of them right now. He follows Liam out in his underwear and holds Liam’s dirty pants and shirt under the drier, praying that no one walks in and recognises him.
"You can fucking keep them." Liam says, and heads out.
"Wait! How am I supposed to get my clothes back?"
"You care about this—" Liam eyes the clothes on him with disgust, "that much?"
"Graham doesn’t live far. If we can find him, we can go to his and get you a change of clothes that fit you. And clean all that blood. And I’ll get you some coke."
Liam grunts. "I suppose I’m the one that has to find him? With you being off your head and that."
"He’s probably just at the bar."
—
They do, indeed, find Graham at the bar. Even in the darkness of the club and in his drunkenness, Graham’s mouth drops open when he takes in the state they’re in.
"Christ. What happened to you lot?"
Damon squirms uncomfortably in the slightly wet, vomit-stained clothes hanging from his body. Liam looks even worse, dried blood all under his nose.
"Your knobhead of a fucking singer puked on me." Liam supplies helpfully. Damon grimaces.
Graham waits.
"Is that it? Doesn’t explain why you," Graham nods to Liam, "look like you got punched in the face. Damon didn’t punch you, did he—?" He frowns. "Hang on. Is that Damon’s shirt? Did you guys—"
"No, no, no." Damon interjects before Graham says something that might seriously piss off Liam. "We swapped clothes, because… Yeah. Listen, Gra. We need to get back to yours so we can clean up. And give Liam some coke."
Graham just looks more confused. Bless him, though, he doesn’t ask anymore questions, just sighs and leads the way for them.
—
Two hours later, Graham plops down next to Damon on his sofa.
"Right, so. What the fuck." Graham begins.
The shower is running in the background. When they’d arrived at Graham’s house, Graham had immediately handed Liam some clean clothes and shown him to the shower. Damon had been surprised to hear Liam say ‘cheers, mate’ at that. There is something about Graham that makes anyone get along with him.
"I know. I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I’m doing."
"Clearly."
"D’you think he’ll attack me when he comes out of the shower?"
"Perhaps." Graham says unhelpfully.
"He’s so hot, Gra, what do I do? Help me." Graham is always fixing the messes Damon gets himself in. It makes up for the hundreds of times Damon’s had to carry the guitarist home when he got too wasted.
"I think you made a great start, there." Graham smiles.
"Graham." Damon leans his head back against the cushions in frustration. "You’re his friend, c’mon."
"What? We’ve hung out maybe twice, I’m hardly his friend."
"You’ve hung out?" Damon frowns.
"I bumped into him at the pub once or twice, yeah." Graham shrugs. "We were shitfaced."
"And you failed to mention this because?"
"I definitely didn’t. Between you and me, you’re the one that can’t be trusted right now."
"God." Damon groans. He thinks about stealing Graham’s personality for the next time he runs into Liam, just so the Mancunian will be nice to him. "He hates the rest of us. Why does he like you?"
"I don’t think he hates Alex. And I doubt he even knows who Dave is."
"Great. You’re saying he only hates me, then."
"Dames. That’s just how he is, you know? Slagging off everyone, all the time. In the end it doesn’t mean much, does it?"
Damon considers this. The Gallaghers are on the news everyday for slandering a new artist, but the press remained keen on emphasising Oasis’s rivalry with Blur. Truthfully, Damon doesn’t enjoy fueling the feud, but he is nonetheless competitive at heart, and he can’t just sit there without pushing back when his band’s success is being doubted.
The sound of the shower stopping pulls Damon out of his thoughts.
Minutes later, Liam walks into the living room wearing a black tee Damon has never seen on Graham and a pair of blue jeans. And he has wet hair. Damon tries not to stare at the wet strands hanging in front of Liam’s eyes.
Without asking, Liam grabs the pack of cigarettes sitting on the table in front of them and places a cigarette between his lips.
"Uh…" Graham rummages through the empty beer bottles on the table, clearly trying to find a lighter.
Damon spots it on his side of the table. He reaches it out to hand it to Liam, but the Mancunian bends down towards his hand and looks at him expectantly. Damon lights his cigarette, staring back into Liam’s eyes as he sucks it. This is maybe the third of fourth time they’re having a moment of intense eye contact that night, and it’s fucking with Damon’s head.
"Alright, I’m gonna head. Thanks for a huge fucking waste of a night, yeah? Later, tossers."
"I’ll show you out." Damon stands up, ignoring Graham’s look which clearly says the front door is right there.
"Hey." Damon calls when Liam steps outside. "Again, I’m sorry…"
"Yeah, you said already, twat."
"Well, I am."
Liam smirks. "Not good enough. Maybe you should get on yer fucking knees and beg me to forgive you."
That bit is unexpected. Damon’s not sure if they’re flirting, so he goes with a safer route. "I’ll do it if you tell me what’s actually happened to you."
Liam inhales deeply, and blows smoke in his face. "Beat the shit outta some kid who liked your shite band."
"Hilarious."
Liam hums. "You should go back to your boyfriend before you fuckin’ get sick on me again."
"Thank you for the concern." Damon smiles, ignoring the boyfriend comment.
At that, Liam scoffs. He ashes his cigarette on Damon’s shoes and walks away.