Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Vyvyan knew Rick was going out today. He’d been going on about it all week, striding around the house reading his poncy poetry out loud, dropping hints. He was going to some kind of recital, and he wouldn’t stop going on about how his ‘radical ideas’ were bound to ”really shake ’em up.” Vyvyan hadn’t asked who, what, or why. He knew all he needed to, Rick was going to be out for the afternoon. 

This was it, his opportunity. He knew Rick had taken his favourite t-shirt as revenge for him strapping dynamite to the bottom of Rick’s desk last week. He’d bet anything, he’d even bet his second favourite t-shirt that it was somewhere in Rick’s room. 

Vyvyan stomped his way up the stairs, down the hall to Rick’s room. The door was locked, as if that was going to stop him. 

He put his boot straight to the lock, and the door swung open. 

Right, where would he put it? Vyvyan thought. 

The wardrobe was the most obvious place, a bit too obvious if anything, but still worth a go. 

Vyvyan rooted around, through the tatty blazers and crumpled shirts. He found the headache-inducing yellow dungarees Rick was so fond of, but no sign of his t-shirt. 

He sat down on the floor, channeling all of his willpower to try and think (a real challenge after his morning sniffing Ajax for breakfast). 

Just as he was thinking of giving up and waiting until Rick got back to settle this the easy way - by holding Rick up to the wall with one hand and wielding a bread knife in the other until Rick inevitably squealed and gave up the hiding place - he caught sight of something under the bed. 

A small suitcase, locked, with what looked like a bit of fabric sticking out near the zipper. 

Jackpot. 

Again, the lock didn’t stand much chance against Vyvyan. It was only a cheap thing and he made fairly quick work of it. 

He opened up the suitcase. He moved several issues of cosmo out the way and felt a surge of hope when he saw the black fabric underneath. 

He pulled it out. 

It…wasn’t his t-shirt. 

He held it up in front of him, gave it a thorough look over, half expecting that if he looked at it enough he’d realise he’d been mistaken. But no, it was exactly what he thought. 

In his hands was a skirt. Black, long-ish. Weird, it looked like the sort of thing you’d see someone’s mum in. Why on earth would Rick have that? 

He picked up the next thing. The horrible gingham dress he’d seen Neil wearing the night they had their run in with Harry the Bastard. 

Underneath, another skirt, bright red and a decent bit shorter. 

He got the odd sense that he shouldn’t be looking through this. But he was so sure his t-shirt was here. There were so many other clothes hidden here, it had to be. 

As he rifled through, he finally caught hold of something promising. Could it be? 

Yes, his t-shirt! 

Right, job done. As much as he usually liked barging around with flagrant disregard for others’ personal property, something about this just felt wrong. He’d got the t-shirt. Time to get out. 

He stuffed everything back in the suitcase, tried his best to jam the lock back on, although it wasn’t exactly in working order anymore. He pushed the suitcase back under the bed and dashed out into the hallway and down to his room. 

The t-shirt was now back in his possession, just in time for him to change into it before dinner.

Chapter Text

It was a pretty bright morning for Rick, he’d had his cornflakes, he’d gotten all nice and ready for the day. He’d even taken the time to re-do his little braids (and he quite liked how long they’d gotten actually).

He’d gone out, wonderfully bright and early at 3 o’clock, and headed to his recital. He’d been preparing all week for it. 

And he’d had a blast actually. Maybe the audience wasn’t quite enlightened enough yet to be on board with all of his material…

But, their loss. Probably all fascists anyway, that’d be why they didn’t get it. 

Things were looking bloody nice for him that day, until he came across Vyvyan in the hallway. 

Just the sight of Vyvyan could be enough to ruin his day at times, but this wasn’t just his usual, everyday pneumatic-drill-to-the-brain kind of irritation Vyvyan usually provoked. When he caught sight of Vyvyan that afternoon before dinner, he was paralysed with pure terror. 

Vyvyan was wearing his Motörhead t-shirt…

The t-shirt Rick had hidden in the padlocked suitcase under his bed.

Shit. 

Rick dashed back to his room. 

He saw the state of the door, the lock booted off. 

He shut himself, as well as he could manage. 

Almost immediately, he could feel himself spiralling, his mind absolutely racing, firing off a billion questions at once. 

How had Vyvyan gotten it back? He had to have opened the suitcase. But it was locked. How much had he seen? How much did he know? And what about the others, how much did they know? 

Rick tried to pause and take some deep breaths. 

Maybe Vyvyan had more than one of that t-shirt. He did wear it all the time, was it possible he’d have a spare and he hadn’t actually been in Rick’s things at all? 

But Rick knew that it wasn’t likely. That just didn’t sound like Vyvyan at all. 

There was only one way to know for sure. He had to look in the suitcase. 

He wedged a chair against the door, since locks don’t seem to mean anything in this house, he thought to himself. 

As he slid the suitcase out from under his bed, he could feel his heart hammering away. He usually waited until everyone else was asleep before he did this. But he just couldn’t stand to wait that long, he needed to know now. 

The lock was broken, already a bad sign. He opened it up, squinting. He almost didn’t want to look. 

It was a mess, not neatly folded as he’d left it. The clothes were all balled up and jumbled around, the t-shirt was gone. Definitely Vyvyan’s doing.

Shit. Shit, shit, shit. 

Well, Rick thought as he pushed the suitcase back under the bed, that’s it for me, I’m doomed.  

He sat on his bed, flooded with the overwhelming urge to cry. 

It was completely over for him. Vyvyan was bound to find this hilarious, tell everyone in the house what a big freaky girlie Rick was. Everyone was going to find out and when they did…

He was going to have to leave. He needed to come up with a plan to get away, soon as anyone mentioned it, he’d be gone. It was the only way. 

So that’s what he did. It was all he thought about all day, all through dinner and all night. He couldn’t sleep, he couldn’t even think about sleeping with his utter ruin on the horizon. 

He avoided Vyvyan like the plague, just trying to delay the inevitable. 

Maybe Vyvyan would notice, it hardly mattered to him. He just couldn’t bear to hear Vyvyan taunting him, his mind was already working through the string of insults Vyvyan was bound to have come up with, he didn’t need to hear them out loud. 

What would they do at the anarchist’s society without The People’s Poet? He didn’t know, but they’d just have to cope without him. 

As he went to bed, prepared to spend another night lying awake contemplating his great escape, there was a knock at his door. 

It was hard, unnecessarily loud. There was only one person that could be. 

Fuck. 

Vyvyan. 

Chapter Text

Rick was being weird. 

And not just regular Rick weird, Vyvyan knew what that looked like better than anyone. 

No, he could tell this was different. 

For one, he’d barely seen Rick since the other day. Usually Rick was always somewhere, eagerly waiting to piss Vyvyan off with his ugly little face. 

And another thing, Rick was strangely withdrawn. Like he was always halfway out of the room. Hell, Vyvyan had even called him a complete and utter bastard yesterday over dinner and didn’t get so much as a heckle of “fascist” back. Not even a kick in the shins. 

He’d tried tripping Rick up as he was going up the stairs, but even that hadn’t gotten anything. Rick would usually be furious about something like that, but he didn’t even seem annoyed. He just sloped off, depressed. 

It was like living with two Neils. 

And Vyvyan was bored . 

He had so much excess energy he could barely sleep that night. He just spent the night thrashing around, hoping eventually he’d knock himself out. 

It was so backwards.

If you’d asked him, he’d have said he’d do anything to be rid of Rick, but now that he was… 

It was just so quiet with no one shouting at him. 

He spent the next day stomping around his room. He really knuckled down, concentrated, and started thinking. 

What was different? He was sure it was Rick that was different and not him, which didn’t really help. 

All that’d happened since was Vyvyan finding Rick’s little suitcase and getting his t-shirt back. 

But that wouldn’t be it, right? It’s not like Vyvyan had said anything. He’d put the t-shirt on and worn it at dinner that night, clearly that showed he didn’t care about it. He’d obviously moved on.

He’d only thought about it like a couple of times, just out of curiosity. Nothing weird. Just when he couldn’t sleep last night, he might have considered it a bit, like what Rick might look like wearing that stuff. But that was just because he’d never seen it, it was just hard to imagine. 

Overall, he really didn’t care. 

But, the cogs had finally started to turn now. 

What if wearing the t-shirt looked like something else? What if it looked like gloating? What if Rick had seen it as a threat? 

Bugger. 

Rick was just the type to get into a flap about it as well. 

Vyvyan silently cursed himself for caring at all. 

It wasn’t like him at all, he must be coming down with something. Usually he wouldn’t care, he’d just carry on. Who cares what Rick thought of him?

But still, Vyvyan’s feet started to carry him down the hall to Rick’s room. He felt the frustrating need to make it right. 

Vyvyan knocked on the door. 

“Rick?” 

He knew Rick was awake, he could hear him shuffling around in there and he could see the light from under the door, but he got no response. 

He knocked again. 

“Oi Rick.” Louder this time. 

From the other side of the door he heard a muffled, “I’m…asleep.” 

“What?” Vyvyan went into Rick’s room. 

He saw a very panicked Rick, sitting up in bed, clutching his tatty blankets to him like a fretful granny. 

“Ah, well what I meant is I was about to be asleep, you see?.” Rick stammered his explanation. 

“With the light on?” 

Rick knew he’d been beaten, he didn’t have an answer for that one. 

Now that Vyvyan was actually standing here, he had no idea what to say. He’d hoped that he’d just come up with it when the time came. It’s not like he had to think about anything he usually said beforehand. He didn’t understand why this was different, why couldn’t he just say? 

But say what? Hey I saw your big girlie dress collection and I just want to say I don’t care so you can stop being so weird (and talk to me again). 

He’d never been in silence for this long in his entire life, he was absolutely desperate for Rick to just say something already. 

But they were just staring at each other. 

“What do you want, Vyvyan?” Rick finally asked. 

“What? Why do I have to want anything?” A completely pointless answer. 

This was bothering Vyvyan on so many levels now, what was wrong with him? 

Rick looked like he was rapidly working himself up now, he leapt out of bed and stood across from Vyvyan. 

“Oh, so you’re just having a little stroll then? Skulking around in the dead of night wandering into people’s bedrooms. Pretty pervy if you ask me.” 

“Says you!” Vyvyan shouted, incensed. 

Immediately he saw the change in Rick’s face. He’d completely blown this to smithereens. 

Rick nodded solemnly. “I see. So now we’re getting down to business, are we? Go on then. Do your worst.” 

“What?” Vyvyan could feel he was on the back foot here, this wasn’t going well. 

“Oh don’t be obtuse Vyvyan, I know exactly what you want to say.” 

Vyvyan had no clue how to get out of this particular hole he’d dug for himself. (Which was very unusual considering the amount of very real holes he’d buried himself in and still found a way out). 

In Vyvyan’s silence, it seemed Rick was filling in the blanks for him. He was now pacing around in a frenzy, flitting about like one of those flies that just can’t find it’s way out of an open window. 

As he fretted his hands, he launched into a monologue, “Yes, I’m sure you’re full of very predictable quips about what a horrid girlie I am. I bet you’ve already sent out a memo to everyone you know telling them I’m a perv. I can just picture it “Hey everyone, did you know Rick’s a massive freaky transvestite and he has girls' knickers under his bed.”

Vyvyan thought it seemed like a bad idea to mention he didn’t actually know that yet. 

At this point Rick was so frantic he was practically hyperventilating. 

Vyvyan could only watch in wide eyed horror as Rick went on. 

“What do you want? I can leave, you’ll never see me again if that would make you happy?” 

That snapped Vyvyan out of his dazed state, before he’d even had time to consider, he blurted out, “NO.” 

“What is it then? Do you want money? I’ve got £2.50, but that’s all.” Rick dug through his blazer hanging on the wardrobe door, trying to scrabble his coins together. 

Vyvyan really couldn’t have imagined this could go any worse. He cursed himself for not being able to explain himself. Still the only word that came to him was, “No.” 

“Okay fine, I have £2.70. But that really is everything this time. Please, don’t tell anyone.” 

Rick held out his pennies in his cupped hands. 

It was so absolutely pathetic. 

Vyvyan was overwhelmed by the urge to reach out to him, take him in his hands and… 

He took Rick by the shoulders and shook him vigorously. 

“For Christ’s sake will you SHUT UP! ”  

He let go of Rick, who was rather startled but at least he was quiet. 

“I don’t want your money Stupid. And I haven’t told anyone.” 

Rick’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “What, you’re not here to call me a poof or something?” 

Vyvyan was weirdly offended, as if he hadn’t been doing exactly that for as long as he’d known Rick. 

“No. I mean, it’s no fun if it’s true. That’s like saying you have brown hair or something. What can I do with that?” 

He could guess from Rick’s expression that it probably struck him as quite an odd philosophy, but it was the best way he could think to explain that he might be a generally antagonistic and destructive bastard, but he wasn’t a total knobhead. 

Rick sat down on his bed, looking oddly deflated. 

“Oh, okay then. Well… thank you, I suppose.” 

“Eugh, no don’t say thank you. You’re making it weird.” Vyvyan flared his nostrils. 

“Yes, right.” Rick mumbled. 

His head was turned away. Though he was obviously trying to hide it, Vyvyan could tell Rick was starting to cry. 

“Anyway, I’m off to bed. And I don’t want to be woken up tomorrow by you screeching Summer Holiday from the toilet, so will you bloody keep it down.” 

Vyvyan let himself out. 

As he made his way back to his own bedroom, he couldn’t help but notice this horrible sinking feeling, like someone was swinging a cricket bat around in his stomach. 

Bloody Rick, how long was the sad git going to keep bothering him for?

He launched himself onto his bed, face first. 

Talking hadn’t gotten rid of the feeling, he had to try another way. What else could he do?

Chapter Text

Vyvyan went out early the next morning, and although Rick hadn’t been to church since he was a school kid, it didn’t stop him thanking baby Jesus and all the saints that he didn’t have to come across Vyvyan at all that day. 

Their conversation last night had deeply affected him, and while he’d tried his best to hide it, he worried that Vyvyan suspected it anyway. His nerves were higher than they’d ever been, the whole situation just kept playing on his mind. He wasn’t sure he could face Vyvyan just yet…

He just couldn’t wrap his head around what had happened. He was 100% sure that if anyone found out it would be dire, but he thought Vyvyan would be the worst of them all. 

But no, Vyvyan didn’t seem to care at all. He’d even gone out of his way to tell

Rick that. Which, on reflection, seemed a little bit like he did care, just in the opposite direction to what Rick had expected. The more Rick thought about it, the more confusing it seemed to get. 

It all went round and round in his head. And that didn’t help, because he was stuck thinking about Vyvyan , which was wrong in so many ways that Rick couldn’t even begin to count. 

So for the rest of the day, he vowed that he wouldn’t allow Vyvyan to take up any more space in his mind. If Vyvyan was so adamant on acting as if nothing had changed, then what sense was there in resisting it? Actually, it suited Rick a whole lot better that way. 

Except, when day dragged on to night, Neil was serving dinner and there was still no sign of Vyvyan…

Well, alright maybe Rick was a little bit curious. But that wasn't a crime. 

But he was certain he wouldn’t waste his energy on taking it any further. If Vyvyan wanted to go out and throw himself directly into the Thames, that wouldn’t be Rick’s problem. Although, he thought it was a little bit rude that Vyvyan still hadn’t come back by the time everyone went to bed. 

Even more so when Vyvyan did come in, somewhere close to midnight, and thundered his way up the stairs in his clumpy boots. 

In fact, Rick was just about considering going out into the hall to complain about the racket when he heard Vyvyan hammering at his bedroom door. 

“Oi Rick. Open up, I’ve got something,” whisper-shouted the voice from the other side of the door. 

“Yes I’m sure you do. Go away Vyvyan I’m sleeping here, come back at a civilised hour.” 

The door crashed open anyway. 

“No you’re bloody not! I can hear you, you’re awake.” Vyvyan said, having entirely given up on trying to be quiet. 

He flicked the light on. 

“What do you want?” Rick asked, incensed. 

“I told you, I’ve got something.” 

A crumpled ball of denim came hurtling towards Rick’s head. 

“Ow, Vyvyan what on earth do you think you’re doing?” Rick shrieked. 

Looking utterly bored of the whole thing already, Vyvyan retorted, “Just look at it, Spotty .” 

Rick unfolded the fabric. It was a denim skirt, light blue. It was a bit on the shorter side. Looked to be about Rick’s size. 

He looked back to Vyvyan, who had his back turned and was giving the skirting board a thorough inspection. 

“Vyvyan, what’s this?” Rick asked, despite the fact that they could both see quite clearly. 

“Oh, just something I nicked while I was in town today. Bloke in the shop was a right bastard so I just took the first thing I saw. Thought it’d be more use to you than me.” Vyvyan murmured while kicking his feet into the wall. 

And Rick might have almost believed him if he hadn’t followed up with a tentative, “So umm… is it the right size?” 

Rick was so utterly dumbfounded by what he was witnessing. Vyvyan being almost…nice? Vyvyan! Nice? It just didn’t go together. It was a bit creepy actually.

Agitated by Rick’s prolonged silence, Vyvyan reached out to grab it back. “Look if you don’t want it I’ll have it back. I could make SPG a jacket or something.”

“Wait.” Rick scrambled out of bed. “Just hold on a second and I’ll try it on.”

Vyvyan nodded. 

Rick slid on the skirt, he felt a little conscious of getting dressed in the same room as Vyvyan. Fortunately, Vyvyan seemed to have decided the ceiling now needed a good look-over and was pointedly turned away from Rick. 

It fit. Remarkably well actually, for something that was supposed to have been grabbed off the nearest rack.

Rick had been so stunned by Vyvyan’s uncharacteristic generosity, he hardly realised what he was doing as he stepped into the middle of the room and told Vyvyan, “You can turn around now.”

He fidgeted nervously as Vyvyan looked him up and down. 

Vyvyan opened his mouth to speak, and a strange, strangled sort of noise came out instead. A look of embarrassment crossed his face, and he cleared his throat before he attempted to speak again. 

“Yeah, umm… looks about right. I’ll be off then, see ya’.” Vyvyan turned to leave.

“Wait,” Rick interjected, “What’s all this about?” 

“I already said, I just grabbed it today.” Vyvyan said, obliviously. 

“No, not that. Why give this to me?” Rick asked with increasing frustration. 

“Well I’m hardly going to wear it, am I? And it’s far too big for SPG.” Vyvyan retorted. 

Rick sighed. He knew he wasn’t going to get a straight answer here. Typical of Vyvyan to be so obtuse. 

“Can I go now?” Vyvyan asked. 

Rick nodded, he couldn’t be bothered to argue this one. 

When Vyvyan was gone, Rick walked over to the mirror. 

He got the feeling he wouldn’t get too much sleep tonight.