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He knew it was a bloody stupid idea the moment he agreed to it, but at the time he had been high on New Zealand sunshine, good food and even better company and so he had said ‘yes’.
Of course it didn’t help that James could be as stubborn as a dog with a bone when he had a bee in his proverbial bonnet. And so when Aidan had tried to undo this whole mess with his most charming smile and an ‘I was just joking’, James had shaken his head with that infuriating grin on his face and had said, “Don’t tell me you’re scared. I thought you Dubliners were a lot more ballsy than that.”
Aidan had scoffed at that – after all he did have his honour to defend – and with a dark frown he had delivered a performance worthy of an Academy Award.
“Of course I’m not scared!”
But that was the whole point, wasn’t it? He was absolutely petrified by the whole idea of jumping out of a fucking plane with nothing but a flimsy piece of fabric and some bloke strapped to his back. It wasn’t natural. Oh, Aidan did well enough on planes. He didn’t really like to sit next to the window, but as long as he could play music on his iPod and people left him alone he was perfectly fine. But this? This was insane.
Dean had been as useful as a chocolate teapot when Aidan had told him about his predicament.
“Then don’t do it,” Dean had shrugged as he had raided the fridge in Aidan’s trailer for something to snack on.
Aidan had groaned at that statement, lazily watching the smoke of his cigarette swirl up to the ceiling. “It’s about honour. Don’t you understand anythin’?”
“Understand you? Definitely not. You’re a weird one, Aid.” And Dean had winked at him over the top of the refrigerator door.
Aidan had ignored both the wink and the insult and had instead continued with, “James won’t ever let me live it down if I back out now. I’ll be the ‘Coward of Durin’ or ‘Kíli the Fainthearted’ or something equally embarrassing and then he will tell some journo and the whole world will know that I’m an utter wuss in real life and that I can’t be taken seriously with my bloody bow and sword.”
He had been interrupted by a snort coming from the general direction of the fridge. Dean had popped up then, sandwich in hand and a huge smile on his face.
“Kíli the Fainthearted? What does that make me?”
“Fíli the Food thief,” Aidan had replied without hesitation and Dean had laughed even harder. He had joined Aidan on the sofa then, leg touching Aidan’s as he had continued to stuff his face whilst trying not to swallow Fíli’s moustache in the process. Aidan had watched him out of the corner of his eye, wondering why Dean always came to his trailer to plunder his food supply, but at the same time in some twisted part of his mind he actually quite liked it. And so he had pushed his knee against Dean’s and had stared some more at the clouds of smoke twirling above his head like Aladdin’s genie escaped from the lamp.
“You’re really scared, aren’t you?” Dean had asked after a moment and Aidan had simply shrugged and dragged vigorously on his cigarette. Who in their right mind would throw themselves out of a plane to drop to an almost certain death?
“I could come with you, you know.”
Aidan had raised an eyebrow in surprise at that, but he hadn’t wanted to appear too eager at the prospect of his best on-set mate being there, and so he had opted for humour instead. “And watch me die?”
Dean had rolled his eyes as he had devoured his last bite of bread. “You won’t die. Anyway, I could take pictures of you so you can show everyone back home it’s Kíli the Courageous, and afterwards we can go out for drinks.”
Aidan had spent another long moment thinking about the offer. If he agreed he had two people he couldn’t disappoint if he did decide to drop this entire ridiculous idea. Then again, having Dean there with his ever-present smile and positive vibes would probably help him through it all if he did get on that plane.
“Alright then,” Aidan had finally said and he had sounded a lot more casual about it than he had actually felt. ”Thanks.”
“That’s what friends are for,” Dean had simply stated with a shrug and a smile before he had gotten up to return to the sound stage. “I’ll pick you up at nine, yeah?”
That had been two weeks ago now. Two weeks during which the idea of jumping out of an airplane had been put on a backburner in lieu of script learning, archery training, dialect coaching and every so often a couple of hours of sleep.
But now Doomsday had finally arrived and with it Aidan’s fears. Still, Aidan was a man of his word and so he dragged himself out of bed that faithful morning after a night consisting of equal parts worrying and nightmares about parachutes that wouldn’t open.
Time seemed to drag by before Dean finally arrived, but when he did it was with a grin slightly too big for his face and his blond hair sticking up every which way. Aidan tried to act as bubbly as usual, even though his legs felt like they were made of lead and his hands felt wet and sticky.
“So you’re going through with it then?” Dean asked once they had left downtown Wellington.
“Yeah. Yeah, sure. Of course I am. Why wouldn’t I be? It’s not like going to the guillotine, is it? It’s just a parachute jump.”
He was rambling and he knew it and Aidan closed his mouth with a snap. Dean merely raised an eyebrow in his direction, that secretive smirk that always seemed to linger right beneath the surface of his dimpled cheeks making an appearance, but he didn’t say anything. The rest of the journey continued in silence, except for the sound of the radio playing and Dean’s ever so slightly off key singing. Aidan in the mean time fiddled with his sunglasses and considered whether it would be less painful to jump out of the driving car than it would be to jump out of a plane.
At last they made it to a tiny airport, its white hangar standing in sharp relief to the dark tarmac of the runway. James, as expected, was already there to await them.
“Ah, young masters dwarf!” James yelled across the car park from the spot where he was lounging against the hood of his own car. He looked far too fucking casual, as if the entire world was well and made of cupcakes and rainbows, and for a moment Aidan hated him for it.
“Hey mate,” Dean greeted, equally chipper, and Aidan wanted to punch the little bugger in the face. Bloody traitor.
“Et tu?” he mumbled under his breath, making Dean look up sharply.
“What was that?”
Aidan held up his hands and shook his head. “Nothing, nothing.”
“Had to drag him here, did you?” James joked, making Dean laugh that boyish, devil-may-care laugh that always made Aidan grin right along with him, but not this time. Bloody, fucking traitor. Aidan knew he was being unduly moody but it was hard to be anything else when he felt as if he was about to face the Spanish Inquisition’s trial by fire. So instead of snapping he took a deep breath, dug deep into Gaiety college resources and beamed at James with the bouncy enthusiasm of the utterly terrified.
“Morning Jimmy. Are you ready for this?”
“I’ve been ready since before you were born, lad,” James replied, swinging an arm around Aidan’s shoulders, which to him felt more like a vice than a friendly gesture.“You coming along too, Deano?”
“No,” Dean smiled as he held up his camera. “I’m here for professional purposes.”
“Ah, action shots. Very wise. Remind me to wax my eyebrows before we go.” And with that he steered Aidan in the direction of the hangar which looked little bigger than a large shed.
The next hour was taken up by preparations, safety checks and the fitting of proper gear. When Aidan finally came back outside, wearing some stupid overall that was two sizes too big, Dean was already waiting for him.
“Prepped and ready?” he asked, all innocence and dimples.
“Prepped, yes. Ready, no.” Aidan watched as Dean fiddled with the buttons on his camera. “At least you get to take a proper action shot for my obituary.”
Dean simply smiled and shook his head. “You’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
“Aidan! Move your arse!” James yelled across the field, helmet and goggles already into place as he made his way over to the plane that would take them up for their suicide mission.
“Guess that’s my cue.” Aidan muttered with a wince, making Dean chuckle. He grabbed Dean’s shoulder for a moment, momentarily weighing the option of crawling against the shorter man and hiding his face against his chest, but then he straightened and smiled. “It was good knowing you.”
“Same here,” Dean replied, smile widening into something that made Aidan’s heart beat even faster. Or maybe that were the nerves. “Now, off you go.”
“Turner!”
James again. Aidan rolled his eyes, muttered a ‘right’ under his breath and let go of Dean’s shoulder to join his impatient and far too enthusiastic colleague, Dean’s voice wishing him good luck almost too soft to hear over the tremulous beating of his heart.
They took off alright – nothing new to experience there – before the two instructors started to strap both him and James in, with James chipperly joking about personal space and not making a habit of having strange guys in such close proximity, except maybe on alternating Saturdays and Ash Wednesday. Aidan tried to smile, he really did, but he knew it looked more like he was actually sucking a lemon. As they reached higher altitude he was convinced he would probably die of a heart attack before they had even begun their jump. He felt sick and lightheaded. James didn’t make matters any easier by giving him an all too knowing smile and elbowing him in the ribs.
“You’re not going to faint, are you lad?”
Aidan grunted and muttered something obscene under his breath. He was an actor, for God’s sake. He could at least pretend he wasn’t the least bit bothered by what was to happen next, but that thought was wiped from his mind the moment that one of the professional jumpers opened the door. He watched with morbid fascination as James grinned at him, then marched forward with his friendly instructor attached to his back and jumped outside at the count of three.
“Oh Jesus Christ,” Aidan breathed.
The moment he had been dreading came both sooner than expected and not soon enough. He wanted to turn his head and tell his instructor ‘thanks, but no, I’ll pass’, but all that came out was a tiny squeak that was indistinguishable over the roaring of engines and wind. He was left to the instructor’s mercy, who brazenly walked them towards the door, yelled something over the ruckus – possibly his own count from one to three – and then there was nothing but holymarymotherofgodandjosephtoo height and wind.
Everything that happened after that would always remain a blur to Aidan. A terrible, insane, fucking horrifying blur. A blur in which he alternated between screaming his lungs out of his chest in a totally undignified manner and hyperventilating until he was sure he really was going to die. A tiny part of his brain knew he was having a full blown panic attack but he couldn’t stop it. He watched terrified as they plummeted through the air, the earth rushing up to meet them with an ever-increasing pace.
He hardly registered the jerk upwards when the parachute finally opened; he was too busy shouting himself hoarse. And then there was ground within reach and they landed in an inelegant sprawl right in the centre of the small meadow right next to the landing strip.
Aidan couldn’t breathe. He also couldn’t see a damn thing for he had his eyes pinched shut in an expression of torture.
“Okay, mate?” the instructor asked as he began to untangle them from their harnesses, his voice elated and bright. Aidan could only nod. Slowly, ever so slowly, he dared to open first one eye, then the other. With trembling hands he took off his goggles and helmet, hands rubbing his face as if trying to convince himself of the fact that he was indeed still in one piece. He had only just managed to scramble to something that vaguely imitated standing up when something short and blond came sprinting in his direction.
“You did it!” Dean crowed as he bounced on his toes, camera held high in triumph as if he and not Aidan had jumped from that plane.
”Never again,” Aidan panted as he clutched at Dean’s shoulders, fingers digging hard into flesh and bone. “Never fucking again.”
Dean took one long look at Aidan’s face, which was undoubtedly as white as a sheet, and asked, “Are you alright?”
“I… need to sit down,” and the words hadn’t even left his mouth before he let himself drop into the grass, head between his knees as if he was trying to keep from vomiting. Dean dropped down next to him, expensive camera momentarily forgotten, and put a comforting hand on Aidan’s shoulder.
“That bad was it?”
Aidan leaned heavily against Dean, still not entirely sure he wouldn’t be sick right then and there, and muttered, “Hell. It was hell.”
Dean chuckled but wrapped his arm tighter around him nonetheless. Aidan let his head fall to the side to rest against Dean’s chest, finally getting his breathing somewhat under control as he listened to the steady ‘thump thump’ of Dean’s heart. He still felt shaky all over and he knew his hands trembled with the release of pent up fear, but adrenaline was starting to surge through his body, too. He had done it despite being scared shitless, he was still alive, and Dean made one hell of a cosy pillow.
And so he rested for a while, only dimly aware of the instructor as he left, the parachute dragging behind him. It was Dean who broke the silence.
“You looked good up there.”
Aidan snorted. “I screamed like a banshee.”
“Screaming and still managing to look fit enough to be on the cover of GQ? That’s quite a feat.”
Aidan looked up at that, not sure whether to give Dean a playful shove or to roll his eyes. In the end he did neither for Dean’s hand left his shoulder to cup his face, fingers warm on Aidan’s wind-chilled skin. That warmth immediately turned to electric heat and travelled down to settle in the pit of Aidan’s stomach. Apparently he had swallowed an entire flock of birds during his jump: he could feel them fluttering nervously in the cavity where his heart usually belonged.
“Dean?” he asked, not quite sure what was happening. If he didn’t know any better he could have sworn that Dean – on-screen brother, best friend, colleague – was about to kiss him.
And then Dean did exactly that.
It was a little awkward; they weren’t properly aligned and Aidan felt the muscles in his neck twitch and pull at the odd angle. Hell, it was awkward because it was Dean who had his lips plastered to his own and if that wasn’t enough to make things slightly weird then what was? And yet…
And yet Aidan couldn’t stop his hand from reaching up to tangle in the short hair at the back of Dean’s head. Dean hummed at the contact, gently deepening the kiss for just the time of a breath before he finally pulled away, leaving Aidan feeling dizzier than he had during his parachute jump.
“What was that?” Aidan asked the moment he had finally regained some form of composure, dark eyes looking everywhere but at Dean’s face. One finger pushed Aidan’s chin up until he was forced to make eye contact and what he saw in his friend’s azure gaze was something entirely different than what was usually there.
“Want to hazard a guess?” And Dean was all smiles and soft eyes. “Or shall we just continue where we left off?”
“Yeah. Yeah, of course,” Aidan replied because whether it was due to having tested the boundaries between life and death or because he had somehow landed on his head, but everything all of a sudden seemed perfectly clear. They leaned in again, lips only an inch apart, when a not-so-gentle cough ripped them out of the spell that they had woven around each other.
The expression on James’s face was lost somewhere between amused and smug as he peered down at them.
“I was going to suggest a visit to the pub for a celebratory pint, but I reckon that’s out of the question.”
Two pairs of eyes regarded him in tandem and James laughed. “I guess that’s a no. Aidan, thanks for tagging along. What a marvellous performance that was. Don’t let anyone ever tell you that you don’t have well trained vocal cords.”
Aidan blushed a deep scarlet at that, but he was laughing and feeling ever so slightly intoxicated. Apparently the combination of adrenaline and Dean O’Gorman were the quickest way to feeling sloshed.
“I’ll leave you lads to it then. See you two around.” James turned, took a step, stopped, and turned back towards them. “Oh, and you can thank me later. A bottle of whisky will do.”
And with that he sauntered off. They watched him leave, hands already finding stubble and hair again, when Aidan wondered, “Thank him? What for?”
Chuckling, Dean shook his head. “I guess he had this whole thing planned from the beginning.”
Recognition dawned of Aidan’s face, his eyebrows lowering dangerously. James had known how Aidan would react and his sneaky mind had already counted on Dean lending moral support. Apparently his all-seeing eyes had not missed any of the signals between them; signals that he and Dean hadn’t even been aware of. “That twat! So I went through all of that for… for, what?”
“For this,” Dean answered and without further ado he pulled Aidan into another kiss.
~Fin~