Chapter Text
Stu kicked his front door open, carrying an overwhelming amount of beer in each arm, stumbling forward as he struggled to support the bottles. Billy trails behind him, a bag of vhs tapes hung on his arm while carrying an open bottle of beer for himself. Stu had insisted he could carry everything inside when they parked and Billy had no plans to protest, being content watching the taller boy struggle getting dangerously close to dropping the glass bottles every time he took a step. This lasted from the car but after 5 minutes they were barely in the house and Billy was running, taking pity on the boy and grabbing 2 boxes of cans from him. Not that much help, but he didn’t feel that bad for Stu’s self imposed struggle.
“Dude I told you I had this under control” Stu turned his body enough to look at Billy. Despite his snarky tone he visibly was relieved he wasn’t struggling as much.
Billy scoffed, “I’m sure you did.” pushing past him to move to the kitchen.
Stu makes a small huff at him, adjusting himself to carry the rest of the beer. Finally having a better grip on them, he walks much more confidently, setting down everything on the counter as he begins stuffing the fridge.
Billy continued forward leaving all the beer to be dealt with for Stu as crouched in front of the tv, deciding on something to watch. He settles on ‘Evil Dead’, before settling down on the couch. Absently dragging his finger on the rim of his bottle while he waits. It’s not another 2 hours till the party is supposed to start but he was dreading it. He doesn’t get why Stu loves them so much; the noise, the trash, the smells???? He can’t stand it, not to mention he has to deal with a drunk and hungover Stu. Who becomes needy, overly affectionate, and way way too touchy for Billy’s liking. He’s already dealing with Stu’s obvious crush badly enough, he doesn’t need less impulse control from the guy to deal with. It drives him crazy how easily Stu can have affectionate, hell even romantic advances towards Billy when he’s drunk but acts completely oblivious to his prior actions when he’s sober. He probably doesn’t even see what he does to Billy, probably too nervous to see if Billy actually likes him back. But the way Stu gazes into Billy's eyes as if nothing else in the world matters, the way his lingering touches burns billy’s skin, the way his breath on his neck makes Billy shiver while he mutters pet names into the shorter man’s ear, it all just feels so-
His train of thought was (thankfully) broken by Stu falling into the couch, not caring about the personal space between the two as he landed, his legs resting on top of Billy's lap causing the brunette to jolt in surprise and annoyance. Shoving Stu's legs away while he tried to focus on the screen. Oblivious to the turmoil of his friend, Stu simply readjusts how he’s sitting, tilting his head towards Billy to start speaking.
“You know you could’ve helped me put that stuff away,” Stu says as he chuckles. He actually doesn’t mind but he can’t help but tease.
“Thought you had everything under control,” he grins as he glances at Stu
Stu laughs before tilting his head back at the screen, “Oh now you listen to me, you dick.” unable to hide the fondness in his voice. His giant smile never faltered.
Stealing a final glance, Billy lets out a small laugh before refocusing on the movie. The two sit in silence for a moment finally settling down to pay attention to the movie.
—
As the film progresses, Stu would “accidently” scoot closer to Billy every time he commented on something. By the midway point Stu was only a few inches away, acting like he hadn’t moved. When his commentary started feeling more shallow Billy glanced over to see him spacing out, Stu's head is slowly rocking as he takes longer blinks, obviously not focusing on the tv anymore.
“Hey, you all good?” Billy elbows him gently, paying more attention to the tv than Stu.
“Huh?” Stu blinks a few times to reorient himself before responding, “Yeah, uh-yeah man. Just tired. Didn’t sleep well last night, and doing all that-uh driving for beer didn’t help.” he slowly blinks as he tries to focus back on the screen.
“People aren’t gonna be showing up for another hour or so, you could probably go upstairs an-” Billy stops himself, finally turning his head back to Stu he sees the blond is already nodding back off, his head starting to tip forward closer to Billy's chest. He tenses up, just silently watches Stu's head slowly falling gently on his chest, causing him to realize his breath had become far more shaky and shallow. God this is pathetic, unraveling like this for Stu. Fucking Stu. But man did this feel nice, and no one is gonna be around for a while surely he could just indulge himself here. His hand was already drifting towards Stu's head while he was justifying this to himself, resting it down slowly. His hair was surprisingly soft and before Billy realized what he’s doing his fingers were gently petting and playing with his hair.
They stayed like this for a good half hour, every so often Stu adjusted, laying more and more on top of Billy in the process. While Billy ended up placing his other hand on Stu's chest, feeling his gentle heart beat. He could fall asleep like this, cuddling Stu while the tv’s static played, it was peaceful.
The phone ringing made him jolt, quickly moving his hand off Stu’s chest to answer it, praying Stu didn’t wake up from it. He doesn't think he could handle being questioned by Stu, he’s stupid but he’s not dumb enough to brush off this as nothing.
He cleared his voice before speaking, “Hello?”
“Hey S-, oh! Billy, hi!” It’s Sidney, her voice is cheery and warm but Billy can never get himself to be that happy hearing her, “Sorry I was expecting Stu to answer!” she giggled into the receiver.
“Yeah Stu’s out cold, he passed out when we got back with the drinks, thought I might as well get the phone so he can sleep.”
She hummed before turning to mumble something to someone with her “Anyway we wanted to call to let you two know that Tatum and I are on our way with the snacks, we’ll be there soon!”
Stu began to shift, slowly waking up as he tried to get his bearings. Obviously confused because he did not fall asleep like this. Billy begins to panic, trying to sound calm for Sid.
“Well-I’ll go wake him up so we’ll be ready for you guys when you get here.” His voice was slightly shaky as he responded.
“I’ll leave you to it then, see you soon,” he could practically hear her turning to blush before adding on “LoveYouOkBye!!”
“Love you too,” his voice was hollow as he responded, before noticing Sid already hung up. Poor girl was head over heels for the guy.
He hung up the receiver before turning his head back over, seeing Stu was already staring back. He’d slightly lifted himself up barely hovering over Billy and continued to scan his face. As he opens his mouth to speak, Billy cuts him off.
“Come on get up Sid and Tatum are on their way.” Billy said flatly, hoping Stu would just move away already.
Stu lifts himself up more, his arms are stretched out on either side of the shorter boy, but instead of moving away, he just stares at Billy, his grin growing on his face as he seemingly realizes what had happened.
“Come on dude,” Billy glared at him but Stu just chuckled in response.
“Ah, come on man, what's wrong?” his smile was wide and malicious, “someone too embarrassed to admit they wanna cuddle?” he batted his eyelashes mockingly.
Billy’s face gets redder, there’s no answer to that question that isn’t a trap, he starts to clench his fists before hearing Stu make a small whine. Shoot, his hand never left Stu's head. Hell he’d probably been petting Stu when he was on the phone, it just felt so natural. Fuck. Flinging his arm away from Stu's head, he moves to push Stu off of him instead. There’s no real force but he gets the message and rolls back onto the couch trying to stay close to Billy.
“Stop making things weird,” Billy finally mutters before getting up and storming to the front porch. Stu just watches Billy in confusion as he left, sitting still for a moment to process what happened.
‘Why didn't he push me off? How long were we like that? He obviously enjoyed that so why is he being so difficult?’ Damn it why did this stuff have to be hard. It felt like it would be way easier to kill someone than seeing if Billy actually liked him or not. Giving up on his questions, he rewinds the tape, turns off the tv and goes to find Billy. Maybe he can do some damage control. But when he goes outside, Tatum and Sidney are driving up to the house, only able to get a few words out to Billy before they park. Stu’s forced to brush off the encounter, after all a party was about to start he had to be a good host.