Work Text:
He didn’t see David Cook again until tour rehearsals, and the hotel where all ten of them were staying was like a time warp back to their days on the show.
Except this time, everyone got their own rooms. David had an adjoining room next to Cook, and he had no idea how that happened, but he wasn’t about to complain.
The first day was a blur, and after dinner that evening with the other nine and the bigwigs in charge of the tour, David was ready to hit the shower and soak for a little under the most scalding water he could manage. He was about to get up from his comfortable sprawl on the bed when there was a knock on his door. He sighed; it had better not be Brooke – she would talk his ear off, and he’d been longing for that shower to happen sometime tonight.
He was a little baffled when there was no one there. More knocking, and David thought for a split second he was going insane before he remembered the other door, the one connecting their rooms together.
“Cook,” he said as he pulled the side door open. He wasn’t the least bit surprised, but Cook looked like he hadn’t expected David to answer.
“Hey,” he said and after a pause, a blinding smile broke out on his face. David had forgotten how infectious that smile was. He couldn’t help but return it, his cheeks dimpling.
“Just one thing – ” David said before Cook could step foot inside his room, and donned a serious expression. “I’m taking a nice, hot shower right now, so you’ll just have to wait.”
When Cook’s lips curled into a slow grin, it was kind of hot. David had to fight to keep his hands to himself, a little.
“Okay,” Cook said and walked past him. He dropped onto David’s bed with a small bounce and the mattress creaked. “I promise not to peek.” Creak, creak.
David turned to his duffel bag on the floor next to the bed and pulled out a pair of clean boxers and a white undershirt. He dug around until he found his baby shampoo. Cook saw it and snatched it out his hands, lightning fast. David swore silently.
“Oh my god, Archuleta!” Cook’s laughs were merely giggles, but David knew if he didn’t get that bottle away from him now, they were about to turn into loud, obnoxious cackles.
“Give that back.” He would have pouted, if he thought it would make a difference. Cook was reading the label and mouthing the words, his eyes bright and so very amused. He looked up at him and finally, finally, handed it back, without so much as another word. The smile on his face was still bright and almost cute, if David were in the mood to call Cook cute. But he wasn’t – he just wanted to shower and curl up in bed.
“Don’t touch anything.” David said as he took his clothes and the shampoo with him to the bathroom. He was standing in front of the sink and pulling his shirt off when warm arms snaked around him from behind. Cook clasped his hands against David’s warm belly, rubbing a little with the heel of his palms. David looked at their reflection in the mirror and couldn’t find a single thing wrong with the picture.
“Hmm,” Cook turned his head until his nose bumped against the tip of David’s ear. “So I lied – maybe just a little peek?”
David rolled his eyes and leaned back so he could push Cook’s head away with a playful shove of his hand. “Absolutely not.”
He tried to step away but strong hands palmed his waist and pulled him back against a solid chest. He was suddenly hit with the smell of Cook’s cologne, faint after a full day of running around, and the smell of clean sweat was something David never thought he’d find attractive, but it was on Cook. Completely masculine, a little earthy maybe, like he’d been rolling around in the grass all day. And David went from slightly turned on to at full-attention in no time.
“I don’t even get a kiss?” Cook asked against his hair and David shook his head a little, laughing.
“Okay, fine. One kiss.” He smiled and turned around, careful not to bump against him.
It was like a breath of fresh air. David kissed him softly but Cook turned it into something a little harder, his lips sealing against David’s like he was holding back. Cook squeezed David’s waist, David’s hands on his arms, when he let the kiss end.
“Go,” Cook said and twirled him in a sloppy circle before pushing him further into the bathroom. “Or I’ll kiss you again.”
David’s hands were already starting to unbutton his jeans on autopilot, and inadvertently giving the other man a show.
“Oops!” He darted out to the sink again and reached around Cook to grab his clothes and shampoo, stumbling a little as his jeans started sliding off his waist. He made it back to the inner shower room and bumped the door closed with his shoulder on Cook’s surprised face, before the other could get grabby. Against the door, leaning with his head on the thin wood, David’s smile was huge and his heart was maybe, sort of, fluttering.
* * *
“What’s this one?” David asked and pointed to it with the eraser end of his pencil. He was sitting in bed, slouching with his back against Cook’s chest. Cook hummed and David could feel it through his shirt; it made him wriggle slightly in the circle of Cook’s arms. David looked up and watched him eyeing six-across. He hazarded a guess. “Uh, amorous?”
Cook shook his head and plucked the pencil out of David’s loose fingers. “Noo….I think it’s smitten.” He wrote it in all caps into the small boxes and clucked his tongue. “Baby, we need to move, my crotch is falling asleep.”
“You are such a jerk,” David said and huffed as he scooted out of Cook’s lap and Cook pushed him a little indignantly so that he ended up on his stomach, arm folded under him at an awkward angle.
“Jerk!” David repeated and crawled toward him until he could straddle his waist, kneeling above a very warm David Cook.
To his credit, Cook was trying to hide behind an innocent expression, but it was ruined by the grin that kept turning up one corner of his mouth. David wanted to lick it.
“My family jewels –” Cook began and grabbed at David’s hand as it suddenly darted out to pinch the crap out of Cook’s nipple. “Hey! Stop that,” Cook easily enveloped his hand in his own, and held onto David’s hip with the other, steadying him while at the same time, pushing him down against his lap. David bit his lip to keep from making a desperate sound. Cook’s eyebrows went up and he tilted his head, and David recognized that playful glint instantly.
“I was saying, the family jewels are extremely important. And besides, there are way better things to do than sit on me.”
“Like sleep?” David said and faked a yawn. He blinked at Cook and smiled sweetly at his sudden scowl.
“Not exactly what I had in mind,” he murmured in that voice that did things to David, made him want to kiss him until there was no air left in his lungs. David squeezed his eyes shut and tried to think clearly before things spun too out of control.
“How about I make you a promise.” He said and slung both arms around Cook’s neck. He leaned in and hesitated at his mouth, deciding instead to press a quick kiss to Cook’s nose. “When I’m, um, legal. We can – do stuff. That is if you still want to.”
Cook laughed, closing his eyes briefly. “You sure know how to ruin a moment,” he joked and rubbed David’s sides with his palms, their warmth seeping through the cotton shirt to his sensitive sides. Cook knew David was extremely ticklish there.
“So? Is that okay?” As soon as the words left his mouth, he was abruptly unsure of himself, of where he and Cook stood in their relationship. He never actively examined what they had or tried to classify it as anything other than a relationship, not what type it was, polygamous or monogamous or boyfriends or not-boyfriends. Getting that deep would be getting in a tad over his head. But his proposed promise was tipping that line. How long it would last, and how long Cook expected – or even wanted – it to last.
How long is long enough? What if that was too long?
He realized he might have made a mistake in assuming they’d be together for any length of time. But it was too late to backpedal now.
The idea was out there, David had voiced it. He could see Cook forming a clever response in his head. David waited and his hands were resting, clammy, along the back of Cook’s neck. It was the longest ten seconds of his life.
“Let’s take it a day at a time, okay?” Cook finally answered, and it wasn’t the response David was hoping for.
It was actually kind of the complete opposite, but it was something, at least. What it was not, a cheesy declaration of undying love, and for that, David was grateful. He might’ve shaken himself apart if something that heavy were laid on him so soon.
But it wasn’t rejection, either.
A happy medium that he could work with. He was okay with that, he thought.
* * *
He was okay with it until Kimberly Caldwell entered the picture, and almost all of the pictures of David Cook at any type of public event. He was okay with it until they’d had a third, fourth, then fifth date. Then he was maybe seeing a little red when his friends would call him and since, they were such big fans, gush about this new article or Cook-this and Cook-that, and David just had to check the magazines and the online sites because he had a mean masochistic streak.
Then he would see Cook with his arm around her waist and all over her shoulders and her bright blond hair stung his eyes.
He hated her probably more than was justifiably reasonable, but so long as Cook didn’t say a peep about it to him personally, he could keep up appearances of wishing Cook the best.
“He’s such a great guy, who deserves a great girl.”
He had never felt more like a liar.
But David Cook had always made him do incredible things he thought he’d never do before. Lying wasn’t even the worst one.
Maybe loving him, yeah. Maybe that one was the worst, since Cook didn’t seem to care if David saw him with her or not.
Touring became less and less enjoyable. Not the actual concerts and the time on stage, the face-to-face time with the fans. But the tour bus was cramped; David hated sleeping in close quarters on a moving vehicle. He got car-sick so many times, it was beyond embarrassing. Cook always brought him cold water bottles and saltine crackers to settle his stomach, and he’d rub his back on occasion. But it wasn’t anything like before.
“You still like me?” David asked one night, 2 a.m. while the bus was halfway to their next destination. He was sitting on the floor in their small entertainment room, the television muted but the colors still bright, flickering across Cook’s face as he rubbed drowsily at his eyes.
“It’s two in the morning, Archie.” He trudged into the room. David turned around to face the screen, his back to him.
“Answer me.” He swallowed the please.
“Would I be out here if I didn’t?” Cook asked, which wasn’t an answer at all. David could hear him sit down heavily on the small couch behind him. Cook’s bare toes pushed up against David’s butt, then wriggled their way under to keep warm.
“You should go back to bed,” David whispered, but a large part of him hoped Cook hadn’t heard. When there was no answer, David turned around to look and found the other man already asleep, his head tilted back and his face smooth.
It was the little moments like these that kept David’s hope buoyant (but not for very long). The tour kept them busy so their relationship was put on hold. Cook had been saying it long enough that David began to believe the tour bus was no place to carry on intimately, so the touching receded to back-patting and high-fives, and if David made eyes at Cook, Cook would only wink and smile and effortlessly move on.
And he still – he still could not say anything about Kimberly Caldwell to Cook’s face, afraid that Cook would want to end whatever was left of what they had if he brought it up.
Not a big surprise, then, that by the end of the tour, they were hardly speaking to each other. Their respective albums were nearing their finishing stages so much of their free time was spent apart in the studios.
Cook was obviously aware of how much press he and Kimberly were getting. It made things painfully awkward towards the end.
David was never so relieved to go home in his life.
* * *
It was a charity event that brought them back together, after four months of not speaking or seeing each other. It was a cold four months. Cook’s album was released mid-November, and David’s in December. It would’ve been a great eighteenth birthday if not for the one thing missing. His friend Jocelyn gave him David Cook’s album as a gag-gift, and he almost cried right there into his red-velvet cake.
But four months allowed him to gain some perspective. It wasn’t the end of the world. He had never fallen so hard and fast and unknowingly in love before, but now he knew what to expect. What the signs were. He wasn’t going to be that vulnerable boy again.
The charity event was on a freezing January evening in New York, and the trees were visibly shaking from the gusts of icy wind sweeping the city, though the sky had been clear all day.
To say it looked ominous was putting it mildly, since David’s stomach had been in knots all throughout the arrival and finally, getting seated at his table in the huge dining hall. The opening address was delivered but David hardly paid any attention. He thought he might’ve caught a cold. His throat itched and his nose was congested. Jeff Archuleta leaned over.
“You okay, David?”
David fidgeted in his seat. He could feel a sneeze coming on. “Be right back,” he whispered, and quietly got up and slipped out of the room, thankful that their table was near the back. He found the men’s room down the hall and was grateful that he’d lucked out, the bathroom empty.
So he could blow his nose to his heart’s content.
“Freaking gross,” David mumbled, finally able to breath again. He looked in the mirror and adjusted his black tie, smoothed down the white shirt. He was flicking lint off his shoulder when the door creaked open and David’s eyes lined up with a familiar shade of green.
Cook was standing just inside the door, one foot in, and his expression was one of relief. David stood still as a deer and could not look away.
“David,” Cook said and walked up to him in a rush, before David flinched back and he stopped short.
“Um. Hi.” David was really going to regret saying anything more than that, because he had a million things he did want to say, and all of this was happening too late. The knots in his stomach had migrated to his chest and he felt like he couldn’t breath again.
“I saw you walk out – I had to talk to you.” Cook explained, but it was unnecessary. David didn’t really need a reason. The fact that he was here overshadowed everything else from the past four months.
David promised himself he wouldn’t start crying or raging. He took a steady breath and said, “You – you have, um,” He glanced at the watch his parents had given him for his birthday. “Ten seconds.” But please, please stay.
Cook gave him a pleading look but David shook his head, “Come on, say something.”
“I just. I wanted to say,” Cook placed a hand on his shoulder and looked at it, not meeting his eyes. “I wanted to say I’m sorry. For how I treated you, for everything. And that I’m done with Kim, though I know that doesn’t change anything now.”
“That’s right,” David said and blinked at his reflection when his voice wobbled. He thought he was over it. He hated feeling like this again.
“I’m so sorry,” Cook said and met David’s stare in the mirror. They were both in their black-tie dinner jackets, matching white shirts, though Cook had little silver guitars for cufflinks and his were just plain. It was like someone took a snap of their history with a disposable camera and it just happened to be their wedding photo. David almost laughed at the absurdity, because he still couldn’t find anything wrong with the picture.
“You know how much it hurt to see you with her? To watch you pull away from me?” The words were out before he could stop them, but now that they’d been said, his heart raced, and he desperately needed to hear the answer.
The way Cook looked down and blinked slowly was familiar, because he’d seen Cook on the verge of tears before, during the Idol finale. It ripped up his heart, all the same.
“I know you’re sorry,” he said in the silence that followed. “I know and I can’t stand it when you’re not with me. I hate it.” The words came out easily, much better than he’d expected. He hadn’t suffered through months of grief only to let his silence stifle them both.
Cook looked up and the first smile David had seen from him in months was a relief, it loosened up the anxiety in his chest, even if the smile was a little forced around the edges. He took a step back until his hip was brushing against the side of Cook’s black jacket. Then he reached up and moved the hand off his shoulder, holding it, until Cook twined their fingers together loosely.
“That was one of the bigger mistakes of my life,” Cook said, a self-deprecating tone in his voice.
“Try, the biggest.” David said and felt the squeeze of his fingers. “You’ve got my number still, right?”
“Of course.” Cook let go slowly and stood with his hands inside his pockets. David saw it as a gesture of peace.
“Good. When this is over, you’ll still be in New York?”
Cook nodded. He waited for Cook to kiss him. Something.
“So call me,” David said as he took a step towards the door, but then he turned back and flung his arms around Cook’s neck in a last ditch effort to hold the moment a while longer, and hugged him so hard he thought his chest would collapse.
“You jerk.”
It wasn’t his strongest hour, but some things would forever remain a weakness in his defenses. One of these things was the feel of Cook’s jaw when he used to rub up against David’s cheek affectionately. It was really doing him in, now, and he had to stand on his tiptoes to feel it.
He pulled back and walked out before he could do anything else. His father looked at him as he sat down at the table and made some comment about missing the first round of donations, but David didn’t hear a word.
David Cook was back in his life. And the one silly thought that had him smiling was that he could finally enjoy his eighteenth properly.