Chapter Text
At 6:00am in Paris, France, Sami’s phone alarm started to chime. He hit the snooze button, and then hit it again 10 minutes later. After a third time, a loud groan came from the occupant in the other bed.
“ZAYN, WOULD YOU TURN THAT THING OFF ALREADY?” Dean barked, and Sami’s eyes shot open, then struggled to silence his phone. Through bleary eyes he stared at the screen, and tried to comprehend the barrage of Twitter updates that he had been alerted to; normally it was just fans tweeting at him, but this time they were alerts from what looked like almost all of his co-workers, none of which were directed at him. Did someone die? Curiosity got the better of him, so Sami unlocked his phone and pressed on the Twitter app.
“Hey. You alright over there?” Dean asked after a few minutes of silence. Normally Sami would have been up by now, turning the lights on and getting ready to greet the day or whatever, but Sami hadn’t moved, his eyes glued to the screen. “Sami?”
“Finn...Finn lost. He lost the title,” Sami looked over at Dean who, with the exception of his face, was completely cocooned in his comforter. “He’s not the NXT champion anymore, Joe is.”
“Shit, that sucks. Joe’s tough as fuck.” Dean yawned, then went to pull the blanket over his face to complete his metamorphosis, but stopped when he saw how distressed Sami appeared. “Dude, c’mon. Like...this doesn’t impact you personally, right? Huh? Sami?”
“Dean, what’s the timezone difference between here and the East Coast?” Sami’s voice edged on frantic, and Dean cocked an eyebrow.
“How should I know? You’re holding a phone, why don’t you look it up?”
Sami stared back down at his phone, thumbs desperately slipping across the screen, and Dean finally sat up to turn the lamp on that sat on the shared nightstand. In the midst of everything, Sami had started talking to himself, mostly just softly repeating “no” over and over again.
“Did ya find it?” Dean asked, still very confused, but whatever was going on in Sami’s head seemed enough to warrant concern.
“Yeah, it’s a 6 hour difference. I don’t think it’s too late. I…” Sami had started to trip over his words, looking helplessly over at Dean and simultaneously wishing that he was alone right now. “I don’t know if he’d be at his hotel room yet trying to sleep. Maybe he’s showering? I don’t know if I should call yet.”
“Why would you need to call over something like this? Just wish him well over Twitter or whatever it is that you guys normally do and move on. Don’t you have places to be?”
“This is more important.” Sami continued to stare at his phone, still contemplative over his next move.
“Whatever you say.” Dean rolled over to face the wall, but something felt off. They hadn’t been hanging out for too long just yet, but even a blind person could see that Sami never neglected his duties, and by now he would have been up and out the door to attend whatever he needed to before the asscrack of dawn. “You uh...want me to leave? For a bit?”
“Huh?” Sami looked up. “No, it’s OK. That wouldn’t be fair to ask you to do. I’m sorry for bothering you.”
“Nah, you’re good.” Dean stuck a hand out and waved it dismissively in Sami’s general direction. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence. “So you gonna call him, or…”
“I-” Sami sighed and pursed his mouth. “I don’t want to bug him. I don’t want him to be alone, but what if he needs the time alone to decompress? What if I just stress him out? I don’t want to bother him.”
“He’s a grown-ass man, he can handle himself. Sounds like you’re more upset than he probably is.” Dean retorted, and Sami snorted.
“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Sami said softly, and Dean grunted back at him.
“Y’know, if the worst part of your day is some other guy losing a title, that guy not being you, your day’s not so bad.” Dean was a little annoyed now, always amazed at how the ease and grace that Sami got stuff done in the ring, but when it came to personal matters he was so fumbly and self-conscious.
“Yeah, maybe when you’re not-” Sami cut himself off and quickly laid back down, then exhaled loudly.
“Not what?” Dean quickly asked, then regretted it, wary that this may delve into personal territory. More silence greeted him, which was equally as maddening. “Zayn?”
“When you’re not Finn.” Sami weakly responded, not sure how to word it any other way. He rubbed his hands over his face, and partially wished that he had taken Dean up on that earlier offer.
“Oh.” It was Dean’s turn to be silent. “You should definitely call him.”
“Yeah?”
“He might like that, y’know.”
“Are you-”
“Sami Zayn, are you about to ask if I’m sure about something?”
“Well it’s just-”
“Like to clarify, you’re doing each other, right?”
“Holy shit, Dean.” Sami laughed.
“Is that who you text like all the fucking time? Then you giggle? And you get all red in the face like the fucking dork you are? Because you’re bangin’ our NXT champion?”
“Former.”
“Right.” It’s quiet again. “Call him. Right now. I’ll tell whoever that you need to report to that you’re late ‘cause of me. Call your sexy boy toy.”
“He’s not-” Sami sighed. “It’s not exactly like that.”
“Whatever.” Dean rolled onto his back while Sami fumbled with his phone again. A text was sent to Finn, inquiring if it was OK to call, and instead of getting a text back the FaceTime function on Sami’s phone alerted him that Finn was calling him.
“Hey,” Sami said softly and examined Finn’s face, his eyes red and looking utterly exhausted. “How’re you?”
“Surprised you’re up,” Finn responded as he tried to smile, and Sami’s chest hurt.
“I have stuff to do in a bit, I just wanted to check in with you.”
“Well, I didn’t have to take a trip to the hospital, like you did when you lost it.” Finn laughed lightly and Sami made a face.
“Very funny. I’m glad you didn’t have to take that trip, though. I can’t even think about you being in a hospital and me being across an entire ocean.”
“HEY FINN!” a certain gravelly voice called out from off-screen, and Finn’s eyes opened wide as Sami hushedly started directing expletives towards said voice, with the occasional “no, don’t you dare! Dean!”, until Dean’s face popped into view of the camera.
“Dean? Hi.” Finn didn’t know how to react to the surprise appearance, so he nervously giggled.
“Finn, buddy. Look, I was asleep until your boyfriend woke me up, but I heard about what happened and I’m sorry.” Dean expressed his sympathy while Finn mouthed “boyfriend” and tried to get a look at Sami’s face, which Dean was not allowing for at that moment as he had taken control of the phone. “But hey, you’re still fucking awesome. Don’t forget that. And I’m taking care of Sami until he gets back to you, I won’t Kevin touch a single hair on his pretty little head.”
“Thanks, Dean. I appreciate that. All of it.” Finn was able to genuinely smile that time, and Sami got control of his phone again as he pushed Dean away and off of his bed.
“Sorry about that.” Sami apologized as he shot a glare over at Dean, but when he looked back at Finn and saw the radiant smile beaming back at him, he couldn’t stay mad. “Aw, Finn. You look a little better now.”
“Feeling a bit better. Glad you’re in good hands out there.”
“I can handle myself, thank you very much.” Sami huffed.
“I know you can, but the extra bit of insurance will help me sleep better at night.”
“Oh.” Sami sighed. “I should let you go, huh? You probably need sleep.”
“I do, but thank you for talking to me. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“HOLY SHIT!” Dean yelled off camera. “Thought you two were just banging, not-”
“Gotta go!” Sami quickly spat out as he shut down his phone, then turned his attention to his roommate. “What the fuck, man?”
“You didn’t say anything about love an’ shit!” Dean exclaimed.
“Look, I gotta run. I’m so late. I’ll catch you later.” Sami hurriedly grabbed articles of clothing from his suitcase and rushed into the bathroom to pull everything on.
“Fuck, you two would have good looking kids if that was a thing that could happen in the wild.”
“Thanks?” Sami laughed as he pat himself down to make certain that he had all of the necessities, and ran out the door.