Work Text:
“And stay out!”
When the bouncer pushes Stan and Ford out this time, he isn’t as gentle as he was before. Stan stumbles in a foggy, drunken haze, almost tripping on his own feet from how hard he was shoved.
“This is…not an appropriate way to treat your patrons!” he hears Ford yell out from behind him, the words slurred together as he hiccups a few times in between. “We…we will report you and leave our bad experience on…Holler!”
Stan laughs a little as he tries to balance himself on the dirt beneath him, too loud and far too fond for his own tastes. “It’s called Yelp, Poindexter.”
“Yes,” Ford turns to him, pointing and grinning at him like Stan just solved all the answers to the universe. “That! We will Yelp as loudly as we possibly can! To ensure that no other patron will be mistreated and…and…thrown aside! You will not silence us! You will hear us yelp!”
“Alright, alright,” Stan chuckles, pulling Ford away from the doors. There’s a warmth in his chest and gut that isn’t just from the alcohol. “Easy there, Tiger. Don’t need to get so worked up on my account.”
Ford puffs his cheeks at him slightly, putting his hands on his hips. He looks adorable.
They start walking away from the bar, swaying with each step as they begin to make their way back to the boat.
“It’s the principle of it all, Stanley!”
Stan waves a hand. “Eh, who needs ‘em? I’m the one who threw the first punch.” A beat. “And the second. And the third. And all the other ones after that.”
And Ford—Ford, honest to god, beams at that. “That man was being quite rude—I do think he deserved some of it. You still punch quite well after all this time.” He says, making Stan sense a whiff of pride that he thinks he could get high on.
Ford’s expression turns a bit softer—the moonlight shining on him in a way that’s making Stan’s imagination go wild. Ford reaches out to put a hand on his shoulder, his touch a brand in and of itself. “You’re still my protector after all these years.”
Stan feels his face grow even hotter beyond the alcohol. “It—it was nothin’,” he says gruffly, shrugging it off even though he knows for a fact he’s gonna replay that in his head in the shower tonight. “The guy—he called us both faggots.”
Ford hums. “True. Funny how he was only fifty percent correct—he incorrectly assumed you shared a love for the same sex as well.”
Stan trips.
“Stanley!” Ford exclaims, catching Stan right before he would’ve come crashing to the ground. “Are you alright?”
“Uh.” Stan rises back to his feet, feeling like his world just got tilted on itself. They’ve stopped walking now, only a little further to the boat.“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. It’s just, you—I—Could we get back to the whole—” he gestures to all of Ford before giving up on subtlety. “Ya like guys?”
Ford frowns before his brows crease together. “Hmm. I thought I’d mentioned it to you before. Silly me.” He chuckles.
Stan stares at him.
Ford’s smile starts to fade. “Is…is that an issue?”
“What? No, of course not,” Stan shakes his head, kicking himself mentally for letting his mind go crazy with this new information and letting Ford get the wrong idea. “I just—uh.” He rubs the back of his neck. “Well…”
Ford raises a brow, crossing his arms. He still probably thinks Stan has an issue with it if he’s getting all defensive. “Spit it out, Stanley.”
“He wasn’t—he wasn’t wrong. The guy,” Stan blurts out. “He clocked both of us, I guess.”
It’s like he can see Ford processing it in real time, the way his eyebrows raise and his mouth goes slack.
“You…” Ford starts in a quiet tone, a glimmer in his eyes that looks mostly full with surprise but with…something else, too. Something Stan can’t quite place. “Really?”
“I mean, hey, don’t get it twisted now,” Stan says, defensively raising his hands as they start to walk again. “I still enjoy babes—”
“Unsure if they would return that sentiment.”
“—but I’ve been…” he ignores Ford and wobbles his head a bit, like he’s trying to choose his words carefully. “…known to dabble.”
Stan risks a glance at Ford, seeing him raise an eyebrow. “Dabble,” he repeats slowly, a twitch to his lips.
“OH LOOK WE’RE HERE,” Stan says way too loudly. He makes his way to set foot on the boat, walking ahead of Ford.
Anything to escape that conversation.
“How much dabbling did you do, exactly?”
It’s been a bit since they’ve gotten back to the boat—they decided to grab a few beers of their own and enjoy the moonlight and waves on the deck.
Stan thought it would be a good way to unwind after everything that happened. Of course, leave it to Ford to press on subjects that Stan would rather not be pressed.
“What are ya, a cop?” Stan grunts out, taking a sip of his beer and refusing to look at Ford directly.
“Merely curious,” Ford replies, a tilt of…something to his tone. Stan’s too drunk to figure out what it is.
“Ya think most people are curious about who their brother is fuckin’?” And it’s a bit too harsh, Stan knows it, but he’s in defensive mode. He doesn’t want the topic to continue—not like this, not when Stan is loose-lipped and seconds away from doing something ultimately stupid if given the chance.
“Ah. Apologies,” Ford says, in that tone where he figured out he screwed up somehow and feels beyond guilty about it. “I didn’t intend to make you uncomfortable.”
The silence lands between them like a lead balloon. Heavy, awkward, and uncertain.
Stan sighs. “Nah, Sixer. Ya didn’t make me uncomfortable. I just—y’know how we grew up,” he shrugs, as if that could fully encapsulate the damage that was done to them. “Kinda hard to talk about this kinda stuff when it was basically a death sentence for a while.” He huffs out a lightly bitter laugh. “Bet Pops would be losin’ his mind right now.”
Ford snorts. “He very much would be.” Ford’s smile turns bittersweet. “It is nice that you understand, however.”
“Yeah,” Stan nods, “Yeah. I like knowin’ I ain’t alone either.” He takes a swig of his beer. "To answer your question, though…I dunno, really. If you’re askin’ if I’ve ever actually been with a guy, yeah, that’s happened plenty of times. Not like I keep a journal of every lay I ever have.”
Ford lets that sink in. He purses his lips and squints a bit. “Is it…considered abnormal to do so?”
Stan laughs. Fuck, he loves him so much.
“Never change, Sixer,” he pats Ford on the shoulder. The touch lingers a bit longer than usual.
Neither of them points it out.
“What about you?” Stan asks, shooting for casual. “Lots of dabblin’ goin’ on in different dimensions?”
“Oh, yes,” Ford perks up. “Quite a bit, actually.”
Stan hums. “Nail any aliens?”
Ford rolls his eyes. “If you’re questioning if I’ve ever been intimate with beings other than humans, the answer would be yes.” He tilts his head. “Although I believe they were the ones doing the nailing, as you would say.”
Stan nearly spits out his drink. He’s barely able to keep it together, clearing his throat and telling himself, do not think about him being nailed by aliens, do not think about him being nailed by aliens, do not think about him being nailed by aliens—
“Do you have a type?” Ford suddenly asks, making Stan grateful for breaking him out of his thoughts.
Stan shrugs. “I dunno. As far as non-human lays go, those half-man, half-cow things were pretty—”
It could be a trick of the light, but it looks like the tips of Ford’s ears darken. “In men, Stanley.”
“Oh.” He clears his throat.
There were a few different ways he could go about this—he could try to tell the truth in small fragments so that he wouldn’t be lying, not really—but Ford’s so smart, of course, he’d figure out something was up.
“Eh,” Stan waves a hand dismissively. “The only type I have is the interested in me type, and you and I both know that’s hard enough to come by,” he forces out a laugh, elbowing Ford in his side.
Ford isn’t laughing.
“What? What’s with the long face?”
“Do you truly believe people are not interested?” Ford asks, his tone getting a bit…firm. Weird.
Stan just shrugs. “Maybe once in a blue moon, if I’m lucky.”
Ford stares at him.
“Oh, c’mon, don’t look at me like that. Look at me, Sixer. Does this body scream sex appeal to you?”
“Yes.”
It comes out so fast, so immediate, that it nearly makes Stan’s eyeballs pop out of his head. “U-uh.” A beat. “What?”
“Your body is quite appealing to certain individuals,” Ford barrels on like he didn’t just give Stan a mini-heart attack. “A rounder, softer body that holds so much hidden strength within? In multiple dimensions, that was the peak form of a man. Not to mention, the amount of hair on your body.”
Stan opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it. ”Good to know,” he chokes out.
And look, don’t blame Stan here. What’s he supposed to do? What’s he supposed to do with that?
It’s one thing to be in love and attracted to your brother and accept that nothing will ever come from that—being happy with that even, because it would be opening a whole other can of worms—and it’s another thing for said brother to say…all of that.
He did say certain individuals, though. Maybe Ford just met a lot of people like that in his travels. Didn’t mean that Ford wanted him like that.
“In fact, you would be quite a good example of what my personal type in men is.”
Never mind.
What the fuck.
“…if we weren’t related, you mean?” Stan asks, strangled.
Ford’s face does a weird little twitch. “Yes.”
Cool. Cool. Cool. Very cool. Very normal. Very non-incestuous of them.
Okay, maybe he shouldn’t be freaking out. Normal families gotta do it too, right?
Hey bro, just saying, the only thing stopping me from fucking you brainless is the fact that we share some DNA. Can you pass me a beer?
…maybe they don’t.
“And you?”
“Whuzzat?”
Ford’s face is neutral, painfully so. Stan can’t get a good read on anything.
It sucks that he’s pretty good at this, even when he’s pretty drunk.
“Your type, Stanley. And don’t go giving me that pathetic excuse you gave as an answer last time.”
Stan huffs. “Look, do we really have to—”
“I shared mine. It’s only fair you share yours.”
He has half a mind to argue you saying I’m your type isn’t exactly describing your type, but he keeps his mouth shut. He sighs, rubbing the back of his neck.
“I dunno. I guess…someone to keep me in line, but unhinged in their own way. Someone I could share a beer and a laugh with. A bit nerdy. A bit of a smart ass. They gotta have a sense of adventure too, a lil bit of whimsy. But all those are just wish list things—the main thing is just…” He takes a moment. “Someone who really sees me, y’know? Who knows me like their back of their hand.”
Ford hums, nodding. It’s silent for a few moments.
“You do realize you essentially described me, yes?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Stan waves his hand repeatedly, powering through his flushed face and enormous amount of embarrassment. “Don’t give yourself a big head now after what you said earlier, Sixer.”
Ford shifts a little closer to him. “Funny, that,” he says, in a tone that is way too observational to be true. “We seem to be each other’s ideal partner.”
“…if we weren’t related,” Stan reminds him.
“Yes,” Ford agrees. “If we weren’t twins.”
“…right.”
“Right.”
The silence returns with a vengeance. Stan is hyper aware of how close they are—arms touching, knees brushing against each other. He feels like he’s about to jump out of his skin.
“Don’t you think—” Stan swallows. “Ain’t that a bit weird?”
“Perhaps,” Ford says after a moment. “But when have we ever been considered normal?" he asks, in a softer tone. In a tone that seems too dangerous for Stan’s heart right now.
Ford’s pinky brushes against his hand.
“You seem a little panicked.”
“Well, yeah, Ford—not every day you find out your brother wants to fuck someone like you,” he snaps, rubbing a hand under his glasses.
Because, again, what is he supposed to do with this? He doesn’t want to dream, he doesn’t want to hope—he wants to believe that it’s just Ford being Ford again, a little odd, a little weird, but what if it’s not?
What if they—what if Ford—what if they both—
“Why don’t we test it out, then?”
Stan freezes. “Test what out?”
Ford stares straight ahead. “We kiss, ensure ourselves that we are not attracted to each other, just those that are similar to us, and we move on with our lives.”
Stan wants to scream. That’s crazy. It’s more than crazy, it’s batshit, and it’s a bad idea.
He’s contained himself, alright? As much as he could. Sure, sometimes his not-so platonic feelings fall between the cracks, but he’s been normal. He’s been handling it.
And he’s not sure what game Ford is playing—whatever the fuck he’s up to right now—but Stan knows if they kiss, if he finally finds out what it feels like to taste Ford on his lips only for it to be some weird kinda experiment, it’s gonna ruin him forever.
He shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t.
“Sure,” Stan says.
FUCK.
Ford positions his body so it’s more angled towards him and leans into his space. He takes one hand—one perfect, beautiful hand—and gently cups Stan’s face. Stan tries not to shiver.
With Ford so close, he can smell the alcohol lingering on his breath—a reminder of how stupid this is, how horrendously bad an idea it is, how they could never go back—
“Relax,” Ford utters out, voice nearly as quiet as a whisper.
And in that moment, it’s just him and Ford. Nobody else in the world, just the two of them—the only ones that matter right now.
“Ford—”
“Shh,” Ford hushes him, his thumb grazing against his bottom lip. “It’s just me, Stanley. I see you.”
I see you.
Stan isn’t sure who moves first, but the next second their lips collide, soft, wild, a little messy, and tasting like cheap beer. It’s perfect.
Ford swipes his tongue on his bottom lip, pressing against him, urging him to open, open up for him—
Stan moans as he deepens the kiss, and he realizes something.
He’s completely and utterly fucked.
Because kissing Ford is addicting—it’s intoxicating, and he knows he’ll never be able to give it up so easily.
They finally part, much to Stan’s dismay. They rest their foreheads against each other and breathe heavily, puffs of air ghosting upon their faces.
“Not sure your plan really worked, Poindexter.”
Ford chuckles. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he says, backing up a bit to look at him softly. “I’d say it worked perfectly.”
Stan starts to laugh. “Fuck,” he shakes his head, a weird hilarity within him, like pure adrenaline in his veins. “We shouldn’t do this,” he says, still laughing. “This is a terrible idea.”
Ford nods. “You’re right.” He smirks, stroking Stan’s face. “Want to do it again?”
“God, yes.”
As far as bad ideas go, this was their best one yet.