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Three notable things happen this week. Or, rather, three Ted related things.
No, that’s too vague as well. Isn’t everything that happens somehow intertwined with Ted?
Right, so three, non-football, Ted Lasso things happen this week. To Trent Crimm, naturally. Who else?
The first is something that’s happened before, right? It has to be, except that surely Trent would remember, if Ted had touched him before. Surely he would recall the heat, the weight of Ted’s hand, the painfully platonic and yet so unbearably romantic feeling of it all.
It shouldn’t make him sink deeper. It shouldn’t—no, and yet it does. With one simple touch, a hand on his shoulder, and Trent is falling, pulled into the black hole that is Ted Lasso, with no way out, no tether back to reality, nothing.
Or perhaps, something? We come to the second thing now. “A straight white male from Middle America”.
That should be it, shouldn’t it? The tether, the pinch to wake him up from the dream, the stark reminder that that’s exactly what Ted is. A straight white man.
Trent knew this. Of course he did, just look at Ted (Trent has done this quite often). Hearing it, though, out of Ted's mouth. It’s disappointing, and yet Trent finds himself yearning for the pain, some masochistic need to fall further, deeper, to let himself become obsessed.
It should make it easier, Ted being straight. After all, the only thing more difficult than falling for a straight man is falling for a gay one. Trent has learned this lesson many times over, but Ted. Ted seems different.
Which, of course, brings us to the third—unfortunately embarrassing—thing. Trent’s stupid little outburst, the fanaticism in his voice as he practically gushed to Ted about his tactics, his strategy, but not about that at all.
No, it was painfully obvious to anyone watching that this was purely about Ted.
And god, the way Ted smiled at him as he said it. Trent overthinks it, later. Of course he does, he’s an anxious middle aged gay man—overthinking is one of his strengths.
So later, yes, that smile is patronizing, it’s fake, it’s too wide.
But in the moment. Fuck, in the moment it felt like they were the only two people in the world, as if Beard and Roy simply vanished, leaving only Trent and the black hole that is Ted Lasso.
A fourth thing happens, as it is wont to do. This comes later, after the game, when Trent sits in his office, still smiling to himself, caught up in the giddiness that is The Lasso Way.
The fourth thing is that Ted walks in, a slight hesitancy in his step.
The fourth thing is that everyone else is gone, at that point. That they’re the only ones on the floor, and yet Ted still shuts the door behind him.
The fourth thing is what Ted says next.
“I suppose I may have lied out there.”
Trent raises an eyebrow, and his heart beats faster for no apparent reason. “Is that so?”
“It is,” Ted nods, the motion jerky. “Or maybe it wasn’t a lie per se, but it wasn’t exactly true.”
“Do tell,” Trent offers calmly.
Ted draws his lips into a thin line. “Trent, can I switch up the roles here and ask you a question for a change?”
He inclines his head in assent.
“Y—now, I don’t ask this lightly, mind you.”
Trent would very much like it if Ted would just spit it out already.
“You’re gay, yes?”
Of all the things that Trent could have expected him to say… well that certainly wasn’t one of them, and it must show on his face.
“That—no, you don’t have to answer th—I shouldn’t have asked, Trent, I apologize.”
“No, no,” Trent shakes his head, because anything to stop Ted from leaving. “Yes. I am.”
Ted nods rapidly. “Right, and I—“
“And you?” Trent’s heart is beating so goddamn fast, he’s half convinced it’ll pop out of his chest, pulled into Ted’s orbit in some gory resemblance of a moon.
“And I said that I was a straight man, back there,” Ted swallows, his throat bobbing. “But that’s—that’s not true. And I guess I—it’s not—I wanted you to know that, I think it’s important that you—yeah.”
And if Trent thought it hurt when Ted said he was straight? Then there’s no word for what he feels now, some cruel concoction of hope and fear, joy and grief, love and hate.
“You—“ he starts, his voice so awfully transparent.
“I don’t know,” Ted says softly. “I said that because—well, it was true, then, in the era I was talking about. But it’s been some time, and, well, bisexuality is criminally underrated. Crimm-inally, get it?” His lips curl upwards enticingly on those last words, pulling, pulling, and Trent can’t resist it.
“But why—why are you telling me?” he asks, ever so softly, the sound swallowed in the vast space between them.
“Well that’s the question, ain’t it?” Ted grins, ever so casually, as if he hasn’t just—just said what he did.
“Yes,” is all Trent can get out in between the traitorously loud beats of his heart.
The fourth thing is that Ted steps forward.
The fourth thing is that Trent stands to meet him.
It’s that they cross the event horizon, the point of no return.
Ted reaches a shaky hand towards Trent’s hair, and then seems to think better of it, his fist clenching at his side.
“Ted, what—“
“I don’t know,” Ted says, and this time when his hand comes up it stops, his fingers resting at the side of Trent’s neck, intertwining with his hair.
Time stops—or at least it feels that way, Ted looking into his eyes with a look of pure sincerity.
And then he leans in.
The fourth thing is that Ted kisses him.
The fourth thing is that Trent kisses him back.