Chapter Text
This was a mistake.
The karaoke bar is packed, nevermind the ungodly time of night - early morning, really - and Irwin casts his gaze around, searching for a familiar figure.
Julian is easy to recognise, his bright pink hair distinct in the dim lights of the establishment, and Irwin carefully picks his way over to his booth, avoiding the other patrons navigating the aisles with their own drinks, and realises he doesn’t recognise the other people Julian is drinking with. Probably his coursemates, or maybe colleagues from internships - but no matter, he’s only here to pick up Julian. The idiot’s so lucky he’s pretty, Irwin thinks meanly, and almost steps into a puddle of unidentified liquid. Instant karma, and still he curses out Julian in his mind, considering he’s the very reason he’s in a bar at a time that he’d very much rather be in bed.
He finally makes his way to their booth, a rather large one for their relatively small party of four, and very nearly blanches at the number of empty bottles and cocktail glasses piled high on their table. Irwin looks around at the drunk idiots sprawled all over the sofas - one of them, slightly less drunk than his friends, lifts a hand in greeting, and Irwin returns a polite smile - and sighs.
Julian is going to be having a hell of a hangover tomorrow. Dear God, but Irwin hopes he doesn't have to deal with that.
“Julian,” he pokes him. “ Julian. Let’s go.”
Julian cracks an eye open reluctantly, gorgeous and clear and blue and hazed over with alcohol, and mumbles something that Irwin chooses to interpret as recognition. He untangles Julian from the mess of sleepy and hammered college students, and slings his limp, drunk arm around his shoulder. “Bye-e,” he calls back at his friends, slurring a little, and tries to take a step but immediately loses his balance, and nearly drags Irwin down with him as he stumbles and struggles to get his feet back under him.
Irwin grabs the edge of a neighbouring table to steady himself, and gives Julian a tug in his direction to thwart his drunken attempt to hug the floor.
Julian tips toward him instead, and wraps his arms around his shoulder. And then he slips again, and he pulls at the nearest object to balance himself - and unfortunately for Irwin, Julian’s hand slips and grabs at his neck instead of his arm. And physical contact from pretty boys, especially this one, is not unwelcome, but Julian is pulling at his throat and effectively cutting off his oxygen intake, and maybe Irwin would be welcome to experimenting with a bit of choking, but he’s only willing to do so in a bed , not possibly pass out in a bar by the hands of a drunk idiot that for some reason he calls his friend - though to be fair, he’d be open to trying that somewhere else and nope, nope, think of something else, cute puppies, cute puppies, the puppy in his clinic right now that needs adopting, that was cruelly abandoned by her owner whose novelty of being a pet owner wore off way too quick, and yeah okay that solves that issue , but Julian’s fingers are still digging into his throat and Irwin is maybe fifteen seconds from his Adam’s apple embedding itself into his trachea.
Irwin shoves his forearm at Julian’s chest, pushing him backwards from himself, and with his other hand carefully pries Julian’s hands from his neck and, as Julian falls backwards away from him, yanks him back again, and leans him against himself and half-drags him towards the exit.
It’s not very dignified, but it’s not like Julian is that conscious, and with the sheer number of bottles at his booth, Irwin doesn’t think he’ll be anything less than utterly hungover tomorrow morning and hence still won’t remember this mortification. But Irwin isn’t drunk and is extremely aware of the half-pitying half-amused looks the other patrons are giving him - not that any of them are offering assistance, thanks a lot, bar customers - and he will recall this embarrassment in perfect 4K clarity. He regrets that he didn’t think to carry Julian in a fireman’s lift when he could have arranged him so on the booth’s sofas - still embarrassing, but more so for Julian than himself, and that’s what matters, and maybe he’ll have another blackmail photo over Julian other than the frog one, which is an appealing thought, but unfortunately not realistic since he isn’t slinging Julian over his shoulder like a heavy bag of flour, and hence he’s still the only one suffering the awkwardness of being perceived, with Julian mumbling slurred nothings into the back of his neck.
It’s a miracle he manages to lug a drunk and heavy all the way of the door into the cool and crisp night air - early morning air, really, if he was being technical about it - and Irwin abruptly realises he isn’t very sure where to take him.
He nudges the drunken heap of Julian wrapped around his torso. “Do I take you home?” he murmurs, and realises he phrased his question entirely inappropriately, and immediately wants to throw himself off of a bridge. Ah, it’s not like Julian is sober enough to remember it in the morning.
Julian shakes his head. “Joni,” he mumbles, “’s late. Can’t.”
Irwin can’t help the spike of fond exasperation. Oh, Julian knows it’s late, does he? Too late for his little sister to see him stumble into his own house, but not too late to ring him, sloshed to the gills, and ask for a ride home, except he isn’t going home, so where exactly is Irwin supposed to take him now?
“Come home with me?” he asks, softly, and that’s exactly the wrong way to phrase the mostly innocent suggestion, and Irwin is vaguely relieved that firstly, Julian is way too inebriated to remember his words, and secondly, it’s way too unholy a time for there to be passers-by on the streets, because his wording is that of a pervert taking advantage of a piss-drunk university student.
At any rate, Julian thinks it over - what little thinking he manages to do, anyway, in this drunken state - and nods, and Irwin is so relieved he hadn’t made a fuss about it that he almost, almost, doesn’t mind having to book a car to send them home, because, again, ungodly hour, the buses aren’t running, and Irwin isn’t particularly inclined to literally dragging Julian by foot to his apartment, which honestly isn’t that far away, he’d walked here, but still enough of a distance from this bar that he’d rather spend the extra money on a cab than deal with the hassle of getting there on foot while wrangling a drunken idiot there with him.
Except Julian has plastered himself to his back, and why, why, why, did he put his phone in his back pocket?
It’s a struggle to get his phone out without shoving Julian onto the ground, but Irwin manages to force his arm between them to get some distance from him and retrieve his phone to call a taxi.
Thankfully, Julian enters the car without protest, and doesn’t latch onto him - maybe because he’d sprawled across the backseat and napped while Irwin let himself into the front passenger seat to give the driver his address and make payment.
Still, the moment he drags him from the car, Julian wraps his arms around his body from behind again, and clearly Irwin never learns, because even though he’s moved his phone to his front pockets his keys are in his back pocket, and for some godforsaken reason he hadn’t thought to take them out in the car or move them to a different pocket on his body.
He’s standing in front of his door, so close to the soft comfort of his bed and sleep, and he cannot reach his keys.
“Julian,” he tries. “Let go.”
“Hmm,” Julian replies, very coherently, and tightens his hold instead. Irwin’s arms are pinned to his sides, and he’s fairly sure he can dislodge the drunk body on him, but he’s not sure he can do it without Julian somehow injuring himself, his already limited mental capacities dulled further by alcohol - he’s joking, of course he’s joking, but really, Julian is so stupid sometimes, really, he could have had just about anyone else, but no, it had to be Julian.
The heart works in mysterious ways, Irwin supposes, but he does wish it’d work in a way that would allow him to fish his keys from his pocket and unlock his damned door.
His glasses are slipping off his nose. He really needs Julian to let him go, just for a moment.
Irwin turns his head, squints at the mess of pink hair in his blurry field of view, and says again, “ Julian.”
Julian nuzzles his face into the back of Irwin’s rapidly stiffening neck, and mumbles something that sounds like a negative.
“I need my keys,” Irwin says, and yes, he’s trying to reason with a drunkard, this is what his whole life has led to, this is the culmination of all his choices, this is the exact moment he peaks in life. “Can you let-”
Julian looks up and huffs, warm breath ghosting over Irwin’s cheek, and he shuts up real quick, and puppies, puppies, the poor thing in his clinic waiting on a new owner.
He still needs his keys though, and his glasses have slipped all the way to the tip of his nose, and he tilts his head back to peer glumly through his glasses at the unfocused brown blob his door has been reduced to. He really has to invest in digital locks, maybe something that can be unlocked with fingerprints or face ID. It’d certainly save him key troubles in the future, that’s for sure. Irwin takes a deep breath, and clears his throat carefully.
“Let go of me for a minute, okay?” he says, coaxing. It’s a voice he’d devised specifically to influence, to persuade him into bad decisions and brave experiences, like touching a frog when they were eleven, and that one time he princess carried Julian but Julian failed to carry him, an incident that he has pictures of and Julian still gets pissy about, but really, it’s quite funny, and serves as great blackmail material.
He used to use the coaxing voice on his brother, too, to convince him to eat his vegetables, and he doesn’t think Julian would appreciate the comparison. Still, really funny.
“Just a minute,” Irwin repeats, still cajoling, and Julian hums into his neck, as if considering. “I really need my keys.”
Finally, Julian nods, and releases him. “One minute,” he warns, and levels a glare at Irwin. “No cheating.”
“Of course not,” Irwin replies smoothly, replacing his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. “When have I ever,” he adds, fully aware he has cheated multiple times when it comes to games with Julian, and will probably continue to do so for as long as they remain friends. With no regret, and possibly Sean will give him judgemental and unreadable looks as he pranks Julian, but hey, Julian’s basically free entertainment, the way he reacts - it’s hilarious, and super fun to get a rise out of him.
He unlocks his door and pulls Julian into his unlit house, only for him to latch onto him like an octopus onto a can again.
Julian props his chin onto Irwin’s shoulder, and whispers into his ear, “One minute.”
Irwin doesn’t quite stop the shiver that runs through his spine.
“Fair enough,” he replies, except now he can’t put his keys back into his pocket, or keep them in a bag. He takes careful aim, and tosses the keys onto his kitchen table. He can deal with them in the morning, he thinks, as he walks Julian into his bedroom. Dear God, but he’s eager to sleep.
Irwin just about falls onto his bed, and drags Julian down with him, and he’s almost ready to fall asleep right there and then, but Julian makes an unhappy noise into his ear, and he should probably get Julian something, right - water, maybe? Might help to reduce his hangover when he wakes up.
Irwin sighs.
“I’m going to get you some water, okay?” he taps Julian’s arm. “Do you need anything?”
Julian takes a moment to think, and mumbles something that sounds like “crow”, that Irwin can’t actually catch for him, so never mind that, Julian is so incredibly drunk he’d probably forget that in a second, but the off chance he doesn’t…
“Get one yourself, yeah?” Irwin says, trying to stifle a yawn. “I’ll just go get you some water.”
Julian nods obediently, and Irwin forces himself out of the comfort of his bed to fetch his water.
He grabs a random cup on his counter, and fills it halfway with water. He walks back into his room and very nearly drops the cup on his foot.
Julian is naked in his bed.
He’s still wearing his boxers, so technically, he’s still clothed - barely - and in the process of unsuccessfully tugging a T-shirt - Irwin’s shirt - over his head.
Irwin’s mouth is very, very dry. He hadn’t thought he had enough energy to be… excited, but apparently his exhausted mind and his titillated body have very different priorities.
Cute puppies, he thinks, desperately. Cute, dead puppies that are horribly treated and are very, very dead.
“What are you doing,” he says, a little blankly, and sets his cup on his table.
Julian pulls his head through the shirt, and blinks at him. “Clo,” he says, slurring, “Crows.”
Clothes. Right.
“Okay,” Irwin says, and he’s tired, but not so tired to ignore the sight of Irwin in his clothes. It fits him fairly well, if slightly oversized - they’re almost the same height, but Irwin is a little more built and just a smidge taller - and he absolutely holds that over Julian’s head. Hah.
He wants a photo.
Julian looks so pretty in his shirt, on his bed, and Irwin wants nothing more than to sleep. He’s so tired, and it’s - he glances at his digital alarm - it’s past five, and if he doesn’t sleep soon the sun is going to rise, and then he really won’t be sleeping.
“Drink the water,” he says, and picks up the cup again, and Julian downs it like a shot, and his practicedness doesn’t bode well for his wellness when he wakes, but at least he’s drank the water, and Irwin will take the win, however miniscule it is.
He puts the cup back down on his table - he can deal with it in the morning - and makes to leave. He has a couch, after all.
Julian grabs at him.
“Stay,” he whispers, clear blue eyes wide and guileless, and Irwin is a weak, weak man.
“Sleep,” he says, and lets himself collapse onto his bed next to Julian.
===
Irwin wakes unwillingly and hoping for more sleep.
There’s an unfamiliar dip in the bed beside him, and Irwin turns to look, his eyes barely open, and is assaulted by an eyeful of bright pink hair.
Right. Julian.
Last night - earlier today, really - is feeling more and more like a fever dream.
Next to him, Julian groans and stirs awake, and Irwin carefully rolls a little further from him. Two guys in the same bed, five feet apart ‘cause they’re not gay, and all that.
Well, he personally is about as straight as twirled spaghetti, but whatever. Damn, he's hungry.
“Holy shit,” Julian breathes, “Holy fucking shit.”
And that’s the hangover hitting him, Irwin thinks. “Do you want painkillers?” he asks aloud.
Julian winces, and reaches over to smack him on his arm. “Stop shouting,” he whispers. “Gimme.”
His bed is warm and comfortable, but Julian is awake and hungover and unhappy. Irwin rolls reluctantly out of bed to search for Advil.
From his bed, Julian makes a tired, drowsy noise, long and drawn-out, and Irwin quickens his steps out of his room. He’s had quite enough imagining dead puppies in his mind.
He should probably get some breakfast for himself, too. Does he still have pasta?