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George is already half drunk by the time midnight rolls around, he downed a double vodka white as soon as he got to the drinks table, downed another two after and remembers the shots he took with Chris before they left for “liquid courage”.
He’s stood on the balcony of Will’s flat, he’s throwing a ‘small” get together which means half of UK YouTube are here, which means Arthur is here and George chances a glance down onto the London streets below and wonders if the jump would be worth it.
He’s joking of course, his fear of heights would stop him immediately and by how devastated the fan girls would be.
He sighs and pulls out the blue razz vape he bought in the corner shop 10 minutes before the party, he’s not a vaper, he’s never seen the rave of spending £8 on flavoured air but he’s stressed and annoyed and it’s easier to use this than explain his feelings.
He told Chris he had to buy lemonade mixer, that Will asked him because Chris would flip his shit if he knew George bought a vape, he’d have to sit through a 2 hour lecture on how bad it is for his health and George values his mental health so he hides it.
Although Chris shoots him a look as soon as they get to the drinks table and there’s already four bottles of lemonade sitting idle, George shrugs and pours his vodka, enough to remind him of the house party’s he went to at 17 and thought his double was barely a shot at all.
He needs to be that drunk tonight so he can face Arthur. But George has never been a light weight, not like the rest of his friends so he’s basically fine unlike Chris who last time he checked, had more less glued himself to Arthur Hill, raving to anyone who would listen about “their Finchy” (George should feel bad but a drunk Chris is the last thing he needs right now).
He exhales a puff of smoke and watches as it disappears into the night sky, he kinda wishes he could do that, just disappear and not matter. And yeah it’s a good thing that he matters, he matters to his family, to Chris, to Issac, to Max and his other friends.
But to Arthur?? George doesn’t know if he ever mattered.
He hears a shriek of laughter from below and chances another look down, longer this time and he sees a group of teenagers running about the street celebrating, he kind of makes out the words whiskey and Marbalo gold and lets out a soft laugh, he mentally wishes them luck before letting his eyes dance across the skyline.
London’s beautiful this high up in the night time is the conclusion he comes to. The lights and the noise feel like a weird person enveloping him a hug that will last years.
He could use a hug.
He hits his vape again, he’s watching the smoke disappear when he hears hesitant footsteps behind him. He sends a quick prayer to the God he doesn’t believe in that it’s anyone but Arthur.
But that’s the thing about not believing in god, the prayers to above never work.
“Not like you to be vaping,” Arthur says and George winces like he’s been shot, he imagines the pain from a bullet would hurt less but he’ll hopefully never have to find out.
“Bit stressed just,” he replies turning to face the older man who haunts his thoughts. Arthur looks sheepish, he’s holding a cup of what george presumes to be Southern comfort to his chest (if he could only kiss him he’d know).
“I can’t help but think that might be my fault,” Arthur whispers looking into George’s eyes and George has to look away before he falls into the spell Arthur unknowingly put upon him.
“And why would you think that?” George asks dryly, he’s contemplating that jump again.
“Look George I just want to talk to you!” Arthur replies putting his cup down on the table. George has two options here, listen or run.
George has never been the bravest so he pushes himself off of the balcony railing and starts walking but Arthur grabs his wrist, George stops in his tracks like he’s been burnt.
Arthur’s hand is warm against his skin, familiar in a way George has been trying desperately to forget. Arthur had touched every inch of his skin, burning brighter each time. But George is sick of the scars he left behind.
He turns his head slightly, enough so Arthur can see the side of his jaw is clenched “let go” he grits out and Arthur has the audacity to look like he’s the one that’s been burnt.
He lets go but doesn’t step back, instead he takes a deep breath and looks into George’s eyes “I just want to talk to you,” he says it so softly, like he thinks this volume will make it easier, that George might be more forgiving at this level.
George runs the hand Arthur dropped through the mess of curls on his head and huffs out of a humourless laugh. “You usually never want to talk, what’s changed?”.
Arthur doesn’t answer right away, he looks like he’s trying to think of the words, slow like he usually is, slow to speak, slow at running his hands over George’s body all of those nights, slow at kissing him like it meant something, slow to say he “had plans” the morning George asked if they could have breakfast together.
Too slow when George had drunkingly confessed he was in love with him via a voice note at 3am that still haunts him.
But that was two weeks ago and Arthur still hadn’t replied, no “I don’t feel the same way” no “I’m sorry” God not even a no just radio silence and a distance that felt like George was alone on the moon, miles away.
The silence and distance was what broke George’s heart in the end.
“You left me on read for two weeks after I told you I loved you,” George whispers turning to face Arthur fully now. “You didn’t even say you don’t feel the same. You just ignored it and ignored me. Like it was nothing, like I was nothing”.
Arthur’s face crumples with guilt, his eyes are so wide and brown that George has to look away, back out to the skyline. He takes a deep breath, he has to make sure Arthur knows it’s not some stupid little mistake he made.
He looks back down, Arthur is still watching him with sorrow in his eyes.
“And then tonight when you saw me you acted like everything was fine. You smiled and asked how I was, like we’re just mates, like I haven’t seen every part of you, like I didn’t just spend two weeks hating myself for thinking there was a chance you loved, no liked me back even because I would’ve taken anything you gave me”.
“I didn’t know what to say,” Arthur whispers like it’s a secret between them. George snorts and shakes his head slowly.
“You didn’t have to say anything life changing, you could have asked me to talk, even sent me a thumbs down and I would’ve understood but you chose silence. You made it really fucking clear”.
They’re quiet for a minute, the music from inside thumps distantly from behind the glass doors, distorted and distant like a memory from a better time. He can hear the starting notes of “Pursuit of Happiness” and George officials decides he wants to launch himself off of the balcony.
Instead he closes his eyes and takes another deep breath in and out.
“I didn’t know how to handle it,” Arthur says, George opens his eyes and looks at him. “You didn’t have to handle it, you just had to treat me like a person, like I was worth replying to”.
Arthur looks down at his shoes and George wants to laugh at the sight, he looks like a scolded school boy but it’s not funny. It hurts, in a dull, deep, irremovable kind of way that George will never be able to put into words.
“I did like you,” Arthur says suddenly, like he just remembered how to speak and wants to say everything, “I just, I just… panicked and I was scared”, he reaches out but George takes a step back.
“Scared of what?” George asks. “Of me? Of what your friends would think? Of your fans? Of ruining your channel? Or just of being honest?”
Arthur opens his mouth, closes it and opens it again “Of everything”.
George lets out a breath, “You think I wasn’t? That I wasn’t terrified of loving you? Of what my friends would think of me? Of how my fans would perceive me? But fuck me Arthur my love for you over rode anything fear I felt”.
The streetlights below flicker, or maybe that’s just George’s eyes stinging from more than just the winter air. The air’s too cold and too warm at once. His body feels pulled in two directions—toward the door, toward Arthur. Toward comfort, toward heartbreak.
“I’m really fucking sorry George,” Arthur says. “I was stupid, I should’ve said something”.
George shakes his head again for what feels like the millionth time. “It doesn’t matter anymore”.
It’s a lie.
Of course it matters. It’s mattered everyday for the past six months, every time george woke up alone in bed smelling like Arthur. When he watched Arthur kiss girls in the low lights of clubs. When he kissed boys and pretended they were Arthur. When Chris and Hill comforted him as he cried over a boy that would never love him back. When Will begged him to come to party, when he agreed even though Arthur would be here. It always fucking mattered.
“That’s not true,” Arthur says eyes as wide as they’ve ever been, he looks like George has just slapped him across the face.
And the cruel part of George that’s nestled deep beneath his bones feels satisfied, he wants Arthur to be upset, to realise that he’s lost something good.
But the rest of George wants to cry, he wants to tell Arthur it’s ok, that all can be forgiven and they can start again.
“Do you still love me?” Arthur asks him so quietly George has to strain to hear him.
He stands for a long second, letting both parts of his soul fight for what they want. The cruel part is screaming at him to turn around, to go inside and find a random boy and kiss him, to go home with a stranger but the other part is begging him to kiss Arthur, to go home with the person he loves.
He doesn’t walk away this time. Not yet. He looks back out at the skyline, where London glitters like a city trying to promise something better.
“What do you think?”.
Arthur doesn’t reply and George takes it as his sign that no matter how much he tries, that cruel part will win this fight.
He turns and starts walking towards the door, he has nothing left to say. He told Arthur the truth and if that wasn’t enough then nothing would ever be.
He’s about to open the sliding door when he hears it, sharp and sudden like he had made the decision then and there.
“I’m in love with you too”.
George stops, his hand is hovering over the handle and his breath catches in his throat.
Arthur’s voice cracks when he speaks again.
“I know I don’t deserve to say that, that I don’t deserve you but it’s the truth. I’ve been in love with you far longer than we’ve been hooking up. I took that night you kissed me as a chance to have at least one night with you, that we’d wake up and you’d laugh it off but you didn’t. You kept showing up and I was selfish, far too selfish because I wanted you but I didn’t know how to deal with it”.
George turns slowly, heart pounding in his chest, not trusting himself to believe that these words are coming out of Arthur’s mouth.
But they are, he’s stood where George had left him, tears falling down his beautiful face and he’s like a vision of a God with the city lights shining behind him. If it wasn’t so emotional George would take a photo and frame it above his bed, he would fall to his knees every night and pray to it.
“I didn’t ignore you because I don’t feel the same way,” Arthur says. “I ignored you because I was scared, I was scared of what admitting I loved you would do. It’s selfish and stupid and I hate myself for acting the way I did. But it’s the truth”.
“Do you think saying you love me will fix everything,” George asks, voice low and stripped of any emotion.
“God no, if anything I’ve probably fucked it up but I couldn’t let you walk away without saying it, I couldn’t let you live thinking it was all for nothing, that it didn’t matter because it did. It matters too much and it scares me but I want to be scared, I want to be scared with you and have you help me learn to be brave”.
It’s honest, it’s so unbelievably honest and George wants to scream so loudly all of London would hear him, he wants to cry and beg Chris to take him home, he wants to kiss Arthur so hard that the last few months erase themselves from his mind.
Instead he walks back over slowly, stopping just in front of Arthur. Close enough to feel the heat between them, like history, like fate.
“You have to try to be brave by yourself Arthur, saying you love me won’t just magically erase the fear you feel, you need to embrace it,” George says softly, he wants to reach out and wipe the tears from his face.
Arthur looks at him, brown boring into blue, he looks like he’s torn between something. He looks vulnerable, terrified, real.
Arthur leans in then.
It’s hesitant, like he’s giving George time to stop it. But George doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe. Doesn’t blink. Because this is what he’s wanted, isn’t it? Through every lingering touch, every morning he woke up and Arthur was actually still there, every night he stayed up wondering what could have happened if either of them had been braver.
Now, Arthur is being brave.
So George closes the distance.
The kiss is soft, slow, the kind that feels like an apology and a promise rolled into one. George suddenly feels like he might have been harsh when he called Arthur too slow at everything.
He tastes faintly of Southern Comfort (which George knew that’s what was in the cup) and something sweeter—maybe the Coke he mixed it with, maybe something else. Maybe the part of him that’s finally ready to love without fear.
George pulls back first and lets out a shaky breath and rests his forehead against Arthur’s. Arthur has his arms around George’s neck, holding tight, savouring the moment like it might be the last time he gets to hold him like this.
George knows it won’t.
“I knew you were drinking southern comfort,” he mummers lips curling, which makes Arthur let out a startled laugh.
“And I didn’t even have to kiss you to know you’d be on vodka whites,” Arthur grins back.
George huffs out a soft laugh and lifts his hand to trace the tear stains on Arthur’s cheeks. Arthur blushes scarlet, like this is George’s first time touching him.
But George won’t say anything about it because Arthur loves him, he loves him and George loves him back.
They stand there for another while, just looking at each other like they’ve struck pure gold, sharing the same breath, thinking “God I love you” in their heads.
The hum of the party behind them is like a distant heartbeat, the London skyline stretches out in front of them, glittering and indifferent and vast. Full of promise.
George leans down and kisses Arthur again. Arthur kisses him back with so much force that George feels like he can hear what he’s trying to say.
“I’m brave, I’m brave and I want to be brave with you”.
George smiles into the kiss and thinks he’ll throw away his vape as soon as they’re finished, he’ll down his vodka white and hold Arthur’s hand tight in his, they’ll walk through the party, say goodbye to their friends and go back to his, when he wakes up in the morning Arthur’s arm will be draped across his stomach and when he asks if they should get breakfast Arthur will say yes this time.
They’ll be brave together.