Archive of Our Own

The whole thing starts when Rick actually goes into college - which proves, really, that making an effort causes nothing but trouble.

Rick has an essay due, and his parents have been on the phone saying things like academic achievement and applying yourself and disappointment. He'd missed half of it, just caught the odd buzz words floating amongst the Tory drivel, on account of the fact that Vyvyan and Neil spent the whole call hanging off his arms and making horrible comedy sex noises like the children they are.

So Rick had gone to the library for a few hours. He'd done a lot of doodling, glared at the stack of books he'd gathered, and written something that vaguely resembled an introduction - or rather, a handful of words lost in a thicket of scribbles. Education is such a fascist, bourgeois concept anyway, he thinks. Who decided that essays were the way to prove intellectual merit? Rick is beyond all of this, he knows he is. He's a poet, after all, not some fusty academic.

He's throwing his stuff into his bag, ready to give up and go home, when a girl approaches him. This isn't entirely unheard of, because girls aren't completely immune to him, no matter what Vyvyan might say. This girl's from a few of his classes and has been working a few tables over. They've spent the afternoon companionably rolling their eyes at each other in passing, tutting and offering commiserations about their stupid course and this stupid essay.

When she approaches, she smells of outdoors and cigarette smoke, and Rick wants a fag suddenly more than anything else, his fingers twitching.

"Your mate's outside," She says. "I think he's waiting for you. He asked if you were in here. Well, he called you Prick."

"Vyvyan," Rick says, sighing the word like he's unbelievably fed up.

Secretly it sends a thrill through him, the thought of Vyvyan being there - of Vyvyan lurking outside, having a fag and looking as surly as ever, waiting for him.

"Vyvyan," The girl says, thoughtfully. "Does he have a girlfriend?"

Rick is so taken aback by this that he nearly drops the books he's holding.

"Sorry?"

"Your friend. I've seen him around before - well, with you, mostly, and that hippy and the small one." She smiles. "He's, you know."

"No," Rick says, somewhat icily. "What is he? A complete and utter bastard?"

The girl laughs.

"You can't say that, he's your friend."

"No, he's not my friend. He's my flatmate, actually, and I hate him."

"Oh," The girl says, frowning a little. Then, if proof were needed that women truly are a mystery to all and sundry - or at least to Rick - she adds, "So does he have a girlfriend then?"

Rick splutters, barely able to believe the direction this conversation is going in.

"No, he doesn't have a girlfriend," He says. "There's no girl in the world stupid enough to bother."

That ought to be enough, really, to extinguish the spark in this girl's eyes. Only she must be completely insane, because she doesn't seem deterred in the slightest.

"But he seems-"

"He seems what?" Rick asks, scathingly. "He's - he's loud and horrible and his socks smell dreadful and - and he's mad, you know, completely barmy, only not in a fun way, in the way that's scary and illegal. But not illegal in a cool anarchic way, alright, in a way that's deeply fascist and totalitarian."

"Well-"

"You'd have to be completely off your head to be interested in Vyvyan, I mean, seriously. Never mind a screw loose, you'd need a whole trip to B&Q. In fact, I don't-" The girl's eyes are wide, looking at something over his shoulder, and Rick knows before he turns around that he's really messed things up this time.

Vyvyan's standing there a few tables away, looking murderous. For one mad second, Rick wonders if they're going to get into a fight in the middle of the library, and if he'll end up having to use books as missiles. But it's worse than that, because Vyvyan just turns and leaves without saying anything.

The girl's speaking, saying something about how awkward the situation is, something stupid, Rick doesn't care. He dumps the books he's holding on the table, grabs his bag and rushes out after Vyvyan.

He isn't fast enough. As he's leaving the library he can hear the squeal of brakes of Vyv's stupid car and watches him mount the pavement in his haste to drive away.

-

It takes Rick too long to get home. He considers calling from a payphone but he doesn't think he can go through with listening to Neil droning on and on, not in a time of crisis.

When he gets back and sees the house, exactly the same as when he left it that morning, he thinks that perhaps everything will be alright. Maybe this whole thing is a huge misunderstanding, and Vyvyan didn't overhear him after all.

It's only when he gets closer that he realises his bed is on the pavement outside. Worse than that, there are some people sitting on it.

"It's alright, I suppose," One says.

"I dunno. Smells a bit, doesn't it?" says the other.

"I washed those sheets last month, I'll have you know," Rick says indignantly, storming over there and snatching one of his teddy bears off them. "Who are you people? Actually, I don't want to know. Get off my property right now or I'll be forced to call the police."

Mike opens the front door then, ambling down the path towards them.

"So, what are you thinking?" He says, joining them on the pavement.

"Well," Rick starts, but one of the strangers talks over him.

"We're not sure if it's right for us…"

"Come on," Mike says. "It's well situated, great transport links-"

"Michael," Rick says, feeling like he might be losing it once and for all. "Can I talk to you in private for a minute, please?"

"Sure," Mike says, giving the two strangers on Rick's bed his biggest and most winning smile. "Won't be a moment."

"What the ruddy heck is going on?" Rick demands, once they're huddled by the front door. "That's my bed."

"Listen, it's all the rage right now," Mike says, with the deeply infuriating air of someone trying to placate a small child. "Al fresco living."

"They're going to live in it?"

"For a fee, obviously."

"But it's my bed."

Mike sucks his teeth at that.

"Ah, see, Rick, bit of a grey area. It was your bed when it was in your room…"

"Yes…"

"But then Vyvyan put it out here and it's no longer within the boundaries of the property, you see?"

"But it's still my bed."

"I see your perspective, Rick, I really do," Mike says. "Tell you what, let it never be said that I'm lacking in generosity and joie de vivre - I'll cut you in. Nought point one percent of the profits, how about that?"

Rick blinks.

"But Mike- !"

"I knew you'd understand," Mike says. "I'll need to cover my overheads, and I've had to cut Balowski in as well - he sourced the bed to begin with - and then there's my processing fee. I'll have an agreement drawn up ASAP, alright? My people will be in touch."

"Your people? What people? Mike!"

Before Rick can protest further, Mike hurries him through the front door and shuts it behind him.

Rick stands there for a moment in the quiet.

"Vyvyan," He calls, nervously. "Vyvyan, are you in?"

There's nothing. No response, just that strangely eerie silence. There's no sign of Neil, either. He's usually lurking in the kitchen somewhere, complaining about the little men in the cupboard under the sink or talking total boring crap about lentils.

Rick feels sick to his stomach. It's not that he doesn't hate Vyvyan, because he absolutely does. Vyvyan is violent and insane and rude and generally unpleasant. Rick would gladly tell him so (and has told him so) probably millions of times at this point.

It's ridiculous, really. Trust Vyvyan to be so stupid and take it personally when Rick was just doing what they usually do.

He can't get the look on Vyv's face out of his head. There'd been something particularly horrible about his eyes, something tender and fragile and exposed.

If it had been anyone else other than Vyvyan, Rick would've said he looked hurt.

And then there'd been that girl, who's pretty and has nice hair and lovely clear skin, and is basically everything that Rick isn't.

Isn't Vyvyan always saying how much he can't stand Rick? Isn't he always sneering at him and shoving him and trying to bite his fingers off?

Doesn't he sometimes pause before he leans in to kiss Rick, a quiet golden moment that neither of them ever talk about, and really look at him, his hands momentarily soft and gentle? Doesn't he drive Rick completely potty with wanting him, until he thinks he might explode into an unsightly splat of guts and skin and hair?

If that girl had gone to Vyvyan and been all girlish, had done all the things Rick would never do, simpering and fluttering her eyelashes and having breasts, Vyvyan would've had his tongue down her throat faster than you could say Thatcher's Britain. Rick wouldn't blame him, either.

Sighing, he sets his teddy bear down on the sofa. It's really strange, the house being so quiet.

Feeling aimless, he wanders over to have a look in the fridge.

"Hi, Rick," Neil says.

"Neil," He yells, just about jumping out of his skin. Somehow, Neil is crammed into the fridge, holding a bottle of milk and looking more wretched than usual. "What the bloody hell are you doing in there, hippy? I could've died of shock. Is that what you're doing? Is this an assassination attempt?"

"Things are bad," Neil says. "Heavy. I think I just put my elbow in a broken egg."

"That better not have been my broken egg, you bastard," Rick hisses. "Get out of there right now."

As if on cue, there's an ear-splitting bang from upstairs. Neil shoves the milk between his legs for safekeeping and tries to pull the fridge closed. Rick grabs hold of the door to stop him.

"Find your own place to hide, Rick," Neil says, not letting go.

"Hide from what?" Rick demands. "You've really lost it this time, haven't you? I suppose you think hallucinogenic substances are pretty groovy, don't you?"

"Yeah, actually," Neil says.

"Oh," Rick says. "Well, they're not."

"It's Vyv, man," Neil says. "I dunno if something happened at college but he's angry, alright, seriously angry. I wonder if he had a row with that girl Mike saw him with the other day."

Rick slams the fridge door shut on him, panicking.

"Oh, that's really nice, Rick," Neil says, his voice muffled. "You were the one who disturbed me, you know."

"Shut up," Rick yells, giving the fridge a kick for good measure.

He stands for a moment, feeling like there's static in his brain, dimly aware of Neil prattling on about spilt milk. Then he rushes off up the stairs.

"Vyvyan!" He shouts. "Vyvyan, I want you to go outside and bring my bed back in right now! And you'll do it quickly, if you know what's good for you!"

The door nearest to Rick is thrown open with a crash.

"Piss off," Vyvyan says, glowering at him.

"Vyvyan-"

"I said piss off," Vyvyan snarls, his eyes blazing. "Are you deaf as well as thick?"

"Vyvyan," Rick says, his heart hammering. "I don't know what you heard-"

"You wanna know what I heard?" Vyvyan says, advancing upon him. Rick backs up against the wall, hands half raised in surrender. "I heard blah blah blah, my name's Rick and I'm a boring ugly spotty virgin. That's what I heard."

"I know what it sounded like," Rick says, his voice coming out all weedy and thin. "But if you just let me explain-"

"You know," Vyvyan says, loudly, ignoring him. "I only ever snogged you 'cause I felt sorry for you. I thought, bloody hell, nobody's ever gonna go near this bastard. I was being nice."

"Vyvyan-"

"Well, now you can get bent, you pansy. Or more bent than you already are, if you can manage that."

"You're blowing this completely out of proportion, you know," Rick says, knowing it's the wrong thing to say before he's even finished speaking. "We - we say stuff like that about each other all the time, it doesn't mean-"

"Doesn't mean, doesn't mean," Vyvyan squawks, in a horrendous parody of Rick's own voice. "D'you think I give a shit what you do or don't mean? D'you think I give a shit about you at all, ever?"

"Probably not, no," Rick says, weakly.

"Well, good," Vyvyan says. "At least you're self aware."

It's the madness of the whole situation, of needing Vyvyan to listen to him, that makes Rick reach out for him. He just touches his arm, but Vyvyan slaps his hand away. After that he shoves him for good measure, Rick's head hitting the wall with a thunk.

He's reeling, eyes smarting in pain, when Vyv gets in really close. For one mad second Rick thinks he might kiss him.

"You touch me again, alright, ever again, and I'll chop your hands off and bury them in the garden," Vyvyan hisses. "I mean it."

And with that, he's gone.

-

To say it's the start of a difficult few days in the house would be something of an understatement.

Vyvyan, Rick guiltily notes, has gone totally nuclear. He hacks at Neil's bedroom door with an axe and stuffs whole rolls of paper down the toilet. The ensuing flood makes the landing unpleasantly swampy, and Mike toys with the idea of marketing the rush of water on the stairs as a log flume.

Except then, unsatisfied with the new river in the middle of the house, Vyvyan yanks a load of the pipes out of the bathroom wall and sets about trying to rip the bath out, to do Cliff knows what with it. Neil tries to intervene and gets clobbered with the toilet brush for his trouble. It's only when Mike steps in as mediator that Vyvyan leaves the bath alone and goes to cause mayhem elsewhere.

Rick had never fully appreciated how calm Vyv normally is, even when he's breaking things and blowing things up and chasing Rick with an axe.

It doesn't help that he feels horribly guilty about it all. He ends up taking it out on Neil, unbearable hippy skidmark that he is. Neil has started hiding in the fridge practically all the time, even going so far as to keep a woolly hat and scarf nearby so he can put them on before he gets in.

Mike doesn't seem too bothered about the chaos, but Rick suspects that if Mike woke up in the middle of an active volcano he'd start selling magma to the locals.

"It's you he seems really angry with, Rick," Neil points out, during a secret house meeting. They're huddled at the back door, smoking, while Vyv crashes and bangs around upstairs.

"It's nothing to do with me," Rick says, hurriedly. "Anyway, it was your head he just flushed down the toilet."

"I know," Neil says, pushing his wet hair behind his ears. "But he always does that. I've started putting shampoo in the cistern."

"All of this crashing and bashing is really bad for business," Mike says, shaking his head. "My tenants have been complaining about the noise."

"Oh, are those your tenants who are living in my bed out in the street?"

"The very same," Mike says. "They're paying good money, Rick."

"So am I," Rick says. "To sleep in a bed I don't actually have."

"I don't think you all realise how difficult this is for me, actually," Neil says. "That fridge is, like, really cold, and the food smells really bad."

"Probably because you keep putting your bottom on it," Rick says.

"It's the only safe place in the house," Neil says. "Vyv won't do anything to mess up his samples."

"It's piss, Neil!" Rick shouts, giving Neil a shove. "It's bottles of piss and you're sitting in the fridge with it like a bloody overgrown stretched out loony!"

Neil shoves him right back.

"Maybe if you hadn't upset Vyvyan, right, he wouldn't be losing it and I wouldn't have to be in the fridge in the first place."

"I didn't upset Vyvyan!" Rick squawks, indignantly. "I haven't! This is nothing to do with me."

"I've got a stonemason who owes me a favour," Mike says, thoughtfully, clearly not listening to either of them.

"Oh," Neil says. "Will he be able to fix the bathroom wall?"

"No, but he can do me a gravestone on the cheap," Mike says. To Rick, he adds, "Do you prefer Rick or Richard?"

Rick scoffs, rolling his eyes.

"I don't need a gravestone because I'm not going to die," He says. "Vyvyan isn't going to kill me."

"Actually, he probably will," Neil says. He has the nerve to sound quite cheerful about it.

"Vyv won't murder me," Mike says. "We've got an understanding. Code of conduct between comrades and all that."

"Yeah," Neil says. "Normally I wouldn't fancy my chances but it's you he seems really angry with, Rick." He pauses. "We could have a really New Age funeral, right, with, like, flowers, and -"

"Chicks," Mike suggests.

"Chicks, yeah!" Neil agrees, brightly. It takes all of Rick's willpower not to throttle him - that and the fact that his head's only just recently been down the lav.

"You seem to be forgetting that if Vyvyan kills me the rent will go up," He reminds the pair of them, pompously.

"Oh no," Neil says. "He's right."

"We need to resolve this, and fast," Mike says.

"We could have the funeral anyway, though," Neil says. "It might be nice. And my grave's just going to waste out here. It'd be cool to get some use out of it."

Rick slaps his arm.

"We are not having a funeral because I'm not dead and Vyvyan is not going to kill me!"

"Oh, so you're gonna go and speak to him, then?"

"Yes," Rick says, with as much dignity as he can muster. "Of course I am."

There's a brief silence in which Mike and Neil watch him, expectantly.

"Now?" Neil prompts.

"Oh just shut up, Neil," Rick hisses. "Just shut up. I suppose you'd love it if Vyvyan killed me, wouldn't you?"

"No," Neil says. "Because it'd be me who'd have to clean up the mess." He pauses. "If you do start, like, haemmorhaging blood, could you try and concentrate it in one area? That way we could put a rug over it."

"Good thinking, Neil," Mike says.

There's the sound of glass smashing, and something flies out of an upstairs window and lands in the grass a few feet away.

"My incense burner," Neil says, sadly.

Rick sighs. He straightens his lapels, and tries to seem as tall and manly as he possibly can.

"If he does kill me," He says. "I'm gonna haunt you to death, hippy."

-

The thing is that his and Vyv's -

Their -

He and Vyvyan are built on a foundation of mockery and name-calling and gratuitous violence.

Rick makes a show of hating it. He complains at full volume, he lashes out and dodges and winds up with more nosebleeds than is probably advisable for one person to have over the course of a single academic year.

But the thing is that Rick didn't realise how much he didn't hate it until he'd broken an unwritten rule. Rick can say what he wants about Vyvyan - and he does, frequently - but there's something different to the pair of them sniping at each other at home and him involving some random girl in the whole thing.

It's all such a mess. He's pretty sure Vyvyan wouldn't have cared either way before that first snog and all of the subsequent ones, stolen moments in Vyv's car and the broom cupboard and on the sofa with the snowy backdrop of TV static.

Rick wishes none of it had ever happened. He wishes he could still just hate Vyvyan the normal way and have Vyvyan hate him back without feeling so weighed down, like his shoes are made of lead.

He bangs on Vyvyan's door with his fist.

"Vyvyan," He bellows. "You'd better open this door right now."

For a moment, he doesn't think Vyvyan will reply. But then there's the sound of Vyv's nightstand getting a hefty kick - Rick can tell because of the way all of the glasses and cups rattle.

"You'd better stop knocking or I'll smash your face in."

"You'd have to open the door to do that, wouldn't you?" Rick taunts, then quickly takes a step back, not trusting that Vyvyan couldn't lamp him one through solid wood. "Vyvyan, we need to talk."

"That's just about the ponciest thing you could've said, you know that?"

"I can think of poncier," Rick says. "I wrote a poem for you. I can read it if you like." When the door stays firmly closed, he clears his throat ostentatiously, fishing his notebook out of his pocket. "Oh Vyv," He recites. "What I wouldn't give-"

The door bursts open and Vyvyan rushes out to slap him around the back of the head.

"Shut up, alright, I told you to shut up."

Rick slaps him right back, furious.

"This has gone too far, Vyvyan! Mike and that stupid hippy are arranging my funeral down there, do you know that?"

"Good," Vyvyan says. "You won't mind if I don't turn up, will you, only I absolutely couldn't give less of a shit."

He goes to slam the door shut again but Rick throws himself into the gap, planting his feet firmly and grabbing hold of the doorframe for good measure.

"You're being such a seeping gangrenous knife wound, Vyvyan," He hisses. "You just want to smash things up, you won't even listen to what I've got to say!"

"All any of us ever do is listen to what you've got to say!" Vyvyan yells. "On and on and bloody on, driving me insane! I've heard enough from you to last me a lifetime."

"Well, tough tits," Rick says. "Because I'm not going anywhere, so you'll have to hear plenty more."

"Not if I kill you," Vyvyan says.

"Oh, whatever. Whatever, Vyvyan! At this point, I really don't care. Neil's living in the fridge putting his bottom all over the food and Mike's renting out my bed and you've ruddy well lost it once and for all, so if you're gonna kill me then do it. It won't even be the most annoying thing to happen this week."

"Get out of the way, shit face," Vyvyan says, giving him a shove. Rick braces himself and holds on tight.

"Not until you listen to me."

"I don't want to hear a bloody poem."

"It's not a poem, it's just the truth!" Rick shouts. "I know I was saying all that stuff to that girl but it wasn't true! I panicked and I didn't mean any of it!"

"You didn't mean that you hate me?"

"Well, no," Rick says. "I do hate you. I meant that part. But the rest - I was - it was-"

"Get out of the way."

"Make me," Rick says.

It's definitely the wrong thing to say. Vyvyan knees him in the balls, then pushes him when he's doubled over, groaning.

He slams his bedroom door shut and rushes off down the stairs without so much as a backward glance, whacking the banisters as he goes. Rick is just about aware of the distant sound of Neil opening the fridge door, but Vyvyan isn't staying. The front door slams behind him, making the whole house shudder.

"So that went well, then," Mike says, when Rick rejoins him and Neil downstairs.

"At least he's gone out," Neil says. "D'you think we could fortify the house while he's gone? Has anyone got any titanium?"

"Oh, shut up, Neil," Rick spits. It feels hollow without Vyvyan there to say it with him.

-

Vyvyan doesn't come back all day.

He isn't home for tea. Rick can hardly blame him for that, though. Neil won't let go of the lentil bake he'd made days ago, and it hadn't exactly been palatable the first time around. It's congealed so much it needs to be carved like a joint of meat. Rick sits and prods at his slice, feeling sick.

It's only when Neil starts on the washing up, Rick and Mike trailing into the living room, that Rick finally tries to get some advice.

"Mike," He says, quietly, perching on the arm of the sofa. "Can I ask you something?"

"If it's about the birds and the bees, Rick, may I please refer you to a top shelf magazine?" Mike says, not bothering to look up from the TV. "I think Vyv has a couple under his mattress."

"No! No," Rick sighs out a breath, wondering how best to phrase it. "It's - when you've upset a - girl, how do you fix it?"

"What's that, Rick?" Neil asks, interestedly, suddenly looming over the back of the sofa.

"Piss off, hippy," Rick says.

Mike takes his sunglasses off, thoughtfully.

"What are you saying, Rick? You're having problems with a bit of skirt?"

"A girl?" Neil asks, eyes wide. "A real one?"

Rick gets to his feet then.

"Oh, I knew this would be a waste of time-!"

"No, no," Mike says. "Sit down and lay it on me, Rick. A problem shared is worth two in the bush."

"So there's this girl," Rick says, feeling hot and stupid. "And I. You know, she's alright. But she heard me talking about her. Saying horrible things."

"What?" Neil asks. "Why?"

"I wouldn't expect you to understand, Neil."

"You're right, I don't understand," Neil says. "Even I know that if you say, like, really uncool things about a chick she'll get upset."

"He's right, Rick," Mike says. "There's treat 'em mean keep 'em keen and then there's taking the piss."

"No," Rick says, loudly. "Because there was this guy, right, and he fancied her, and I thought if I said how completely awful she is then he wouldn't fancy her anymore."

Mike nods.

"I see what you were trying to do," He says.

"I don't," Neil says, frowning. "If you're into this chick, why would you say bad things about her?"

"So that sh- the other bloke wouldn't try and ask her out!"

"And she heard you?"

"Yes, she heard me," Rick says, rolling his eyes.

"Well, that was pretty stupid of you, wasn't it?"

"I don't recall asking for your opinion, Neil! What was the last thing you did with a girl, put her in a bong and smoke her? Try and light her like a joss stick?"

"Whatever I did it can't be as stupid as what you've done."

Rick gets up again, making a show of rolling up his sleeves.

"Do you want a fight?" He demands, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet. "Because I'm just in the mood for a fight."

"Gentlemen, gentlemen," Mike says. "Rick, sit down. Neil, let him talk."

Rick sits, glaring at Neil, who's glaring right back at him.

"Now, Rick," Mike says, with the air of a high court judge. "To recap. You've been getting hot and heavy with this bird…"

"I didn't say that," Rick says, feeling himself flush. "But, er, yes."

"And then you try and ward off some other guy by talking badly about the aforementioned bird. And she heard you?"

"Yes," Rick says, exasperatedly.

"And I take it the lady in question wasn't too pleased about this?"

"No," Rick says. "She hates me, she won't talk to me, she - look, I just need to know if there's any way to fix it."

Mike rubs his chin, thoughtfully.

"Have you tried saying sorry?" Neil asks.

"If you can't say anything helpful, hippy, I'd rather you didn't say anything at all," Rick snarls.

"Rick," Mike says, slowly. "This chick of yours. She's not about your height, ginger, with a love of hamsters and bouts of psychopathic violence, is she?"

Rick feels like he missed a step going downstairs.

"What on earth are you implying?"

"He's implying that the chick is actually Vyvyan, Rick," Neil says, helpfully.

"Yuck! That's disgusting! Me and Vyvyan?" Rick says, then remembers that saying that sort of thing is what got him in this mess in the first place. "I'm not gay, you know. Not that there's anything wrong with being gay, alright? But I'm not."

"You owe me a fiver, Neil," Mike says.

"What's that?" Rick demands. "You were betting? On my sexuality?"

"No," Neil says. "We were betting that you've been snogging Vyvyan, actually."

"And I suppose you'd hate that, wouldn't you, Neil? You tiny-minded despicable little homophobe."

"No," Neil says, mildly. "Well, actually, if this whole situation is part of some, like, enormously messed up and heavy lover's tiff, and if the two of you are likely to do this every time you fall out, then yes, I do hate it. But apart from that I don't mind at all."

"I second that, Rick," Mike says. "Snogging blokes isn't Mike Thecoolperson's bag of sprouts by a long chalk, but live and let live, is what I always say."

"Except when Vyvyan goes crazy and I have to hide in the fridge," Neil says.

"Except then," Mike agrees.

"Well, you're wrong," Rick says. "Both of you. There is a girl, a real one, and it isn't Vyvyan."

"Pretty weird coincidence though, isn't it?" Neil points out. "You've upset some chick, right, and at the same time Vyvyan's, like, really mad at you..."

"You really are just so stupid, aren't you, Neil?" Rick says. "Why don't you just get back in the fridge and I'll put a padlock on it! Do us all a favour!"

He storms off to his bedroom at that, and doesn't come back downstairs until he hears the others going to bed.

-

Vyvyan doesn't come back until past midnight. By that time Rick's been sat at the kitchen table with his notebook for an hour, caught between poetry and that stupid bloody essay. He didn't even have the heart to kick Neil out of his own bed so he could sleep there instead.

When it gets to about half one, Rick thinks maybe Vyvyan isn't going to come back at all. But then there's the noise of footsteps outside, of a key scraping in the lock - and scraping a bit more, and a few kicks and thuds for good measure. The front door bursts open and Vyvyan spills onto the doormat with a thud.

"Where's the walls?" He slurs, rolling around on the floor like a bizarre worm.

"Vyvyan," Rick says, going over to him.

"Oh no," Vyvyan groans. "It's you."

"Yes, it's me. Get up, come on."

"Piss off, bum breath."

"Your grasp of the English language is truly amazing, Vyvyan," Rick says. "Oscar Wilde had nothing on you, did he?"

"Nah," Vyvyan says. "'Cause he was a poof. And I'm not."

"No, not poofy at all," Rick says, dryly. "I can attest to that. It wasn't even a little bit poofy, the way you snogged my face off all those times."

"Oh, shut up," Vyvyan sneers. Rick stoops, trying to help him up, and Vyvyan squirms away from him like a recalcitrant child. "Get off. Don't need your help. Don't want anything from you."

"Right," Rick says. "So you'd rather choke on your own vomit down here, is that it?"

"Don't mind," Vyvyan says, with a vague horizontal shrug.

"Yes, well," Rick says. "I do mind, as it happens. If you die then not only will the rent go up but Neil will prattle on about it for ages, and he and Mike will hold some stupid funeral, and-"

"You'd read some poncey poem."

Rick swallows, hard, reaching up to nervously touch one of his own pigtails.

"Probably not, actually," He says, snootily. "Since you've been even more vile than usual lately."

"That's because I hate you," Vyvyan says, needlessly. "You're a total arsehole and your poems are shit. Wouldn't want one at my funeral anyway."

Rick is just opening his mouth to defend the quality of his verse when someone clears their throat. It's one of the people renting Rick's bed, standing in the open doorway in a fluffy dressing gown.

"Excuse me," He says. "Do you know what time it is? It's not on, making this sort of racket in the middle of the night. I could contact the council, you know."

"Oh, piss off," Rick and Vyvyan say.

"That's my bloody bed, you know, you fascist," Rick hisses. "If anyone has grounds to contact the council it's me on account of squatting and theft of private property."

He slams the front door shut and locks it. Vyvyan has curled onto his side like a woodlouse, eyes closed and mouth open, looking completely gormless.

"God, my head," He groans, when Rick prods him with his foot. "Why did it have to be you? Why couldn't it be anyone else?"

Despite everything, that stings, somehow.

"They went to bed ages ago," Rick says. "And I don't have a bed to go to on account of you putting it outside and Mike renting it to those delinquents."

"You deserved it," Vyvyan says. He huffs out a breath, and for a moment Rick thinks he might have nodded off, but then he scrambles into a sitting position, fumbling around in his pockets. He pulls out a bashed packet of cigarettes eventually, and Rick watches him put one in his mouth first the wrong way round, then realising his mistake, then struggling with the lighter.

"Yes, thank you, Vyvyan, I'd love a smoke, you selfish bastard," He says, taking the lighter off him. Vyvyan lets him, slumped against the closed front door, eyes glinting in the dim light. Rick lights the fag for him and ends up joining him on the floor.

"You're not having one," Vyvyan says, hoarsely.

"Oh no," Rick says. "Whatever will I do?"

"Poof."

There's silence for a moment. Rick is suddenly so tired, deep in his bones tired. He's tired of this whole situation, tired of Vyvyan hating him - and just tired in general.

"It really wasn't how it sounded, you know," He says, quietly.

Vyvyan doesn't say anything for a long while, the orange glow of the cigarette bright in his periphery.

"Sounded like you were talking a load of shit about me," He says, eventually.

Rick blinks.

"Alright, yes, I suppose it was how it sounded. But I didn't mean it."

Vyvyan scoffs at that.

"You just go round saying stuff you don't mean?"

"Everyone does that, Vyvyan."

"Not me."

"Well, bully for you, then."

There's silence for a little bit. It's strangely companionable, despite everything. Rick feels very aware of Vyvyan, of the sound of his breathing and the clink of the chain around his neck when he moves.

When Rick looks over, it's to find Vyvyan looking right back at him, all sleepy-eyed.

"Do say things I don't mean sometimes," He admits. "Said I hate your stupid dungarees. And don't get me wrong, they are ginormously and collosally stupid, but I don't hate you in them."

Rick swallows, hard.

"That was almost a compliment."

"Yeah, well, I'm pissed, aren't I?" Vyvyan says. "There was some bird, alright-"

"I don't want to know."

"I nearly snogged her. Nearly. I thought, that'll show him. And she smelt great and everything, and all I could think was that she wasn't you."

"Vyv-"

"And that's bloody pathetic, if I can't - can't even look at girls anymore. And I hate you, alright, I really bloody hate you, so it doesn't matter anyway."

"It matters to me," Rick says.

"Oh, shut up, poofy pants," Vyvyan says. "We hate each other, alright, that's what we do."

"Yeah but I liked the way it was before. I liked hating you before." Rick pauses. "I really didn't mean it, you know."

"Why say it, then? Do you just go round to all of the girlies on your course telling them how shit I am? Is that your idea of a chat up line?"

"She was interested in you, alright?" Rick says, feeling like the words have been ripped out of him. "Oh, does Vyvyan have a girlfriend, whatever. And - and I hated that she was saying it and I hated knowing that you'd run off and snog her given half the chance, so I said all of that stuff to put her off. And I bet it didn't even work anyway, you bastard, so you should honestly ring her or something, I can get her number for you."

Vyvyan is quiet.

"I'm too pissed for this," He says.

"That's probably the most intelligent thing you've ever said."

Vyvyan agrees to go upstairs and is strangely docile after that. Rick has no idea how much of what he said has penetrated the fug of Babycham and spirits, but he lets Rick guide him upstairs without protest, accepting a hand when he stumbles and trips.

Vyvyan's skin is hot and he smells sweetly sweaty, and sort of like spilled drinks. When they reach the bathroom, he stumbles through the door and promptly throws up in the toilet.

Rick lingers in the doorway awkwardly for a moment, then leaves to slip into Vyvyan's room. He hasn't been in here in over a week, and things are definitely looking worse for wear. SPG's cage is overturned, sawdust and hay strewn about the floor. Rick knows SPG sleeps in Vyv's knicker drawer in times of crisis - and sure enough he's sat in there when Rick checks, happily nibbling away at an ear of corn.

Feeling like he's intruding, Rick kicks a clear path to the bed from the door. He scoops up fag butts and crisp packets and dog eared comics off the mattress, dumping them in a corner, then shakes out the stained duvet into some semblance of order.

Vyvyan appears in the doorway with a thump and a groan, wiping his mouth on the neck of his t-shirt.

"If you think you're getting in my pants you've got another thing coming, alright?"

Rick pulls a face.

"Yeah, well, as irresistible as you are when you can barely stand up and you stink of vomit, I'll somehow contain myself."

"Prick," Vyvyan says, and throws off his vest and t-shirt. Rick looks down at his hands, at the stained wall, at the chest of drawers, at literally anything other than the pale lines of Vyv's shoulders and the play of muscles under his skin.

"You should get some sleep," Rick says, hurriedly, making his way to the door. He should expect Vyvyan to grab his arm on the way past, really.

"We can snog, y'know," Vyvyan says, quietly, suddenly very close indeed. There must be something deeply wrong with Rick, because even when Vyv's breath has the sour reek of puke he still feels that pull of wanting, deep in the pit of his stomach. "But I don't want you to get the wrong idea, because I still hate you and wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire."

"No, Vyv," Rick says, sadly. "You're drunk."

"So? I thought you liked it when we snogged."

"I do like it. I really do, alright? But not like this."

"You big frilly prissy girl," is the last thing Vyvyan says before Rick gets out of there, shutting the door behind him.

-

Rick is woken in the morning by a cacophony of bashing and crashing.

It'd taken him ages to get to sleep. He'd made a makeshift nest out of the dirty washing pile, head pillowed on a balled-up shirt that he thinks was last clean during fresher's week. Between the general lumpiness of it all and the smell of unwashed socks, it hasn't been the best night's sleep he's ever had.

It's bloody typical that Vyvyan would start his next attack the second he actually manages to get comfortable.

When Rick's bedroom door is unceremoniously thrown open, he curls into a ball, eyes squeezed shut. There are noises of exertion that can only be Vyvyan, and Rick wonders what horrible thing he's dumping in here now. Probably a cowpat or a cadaver or something.

"Vyvyan," He groans, hoarsely, not bothering to open his eyes. "Can the assault wait until I'm actually awake? I'll call the pigs, I mean it this time."

There's an almighty thump and a scraping noise, and then his bedroom door slams shut. Rick sighs, about to drift off again, until someone grabs his arm and pulls.

"Get up, come on."

"Vyvyan, no-!"

"Get up right now or I'll kick your teeth in," Vyvyan says. After the week they've had, Rick thinks he's best off taking him at his word. He scrambles to his feet unsteadily, rubbing his eyes.

It takes him a moment to realise what he's looking at. There's Vyvyan, of course, his hair sleep-flattened, scowling, and Rick's own bed, back in its usual place like it had never been gone.

"What-?"

"Just get in," Vyvyan says. Rick is too tired and confused not to do as he's told, gratefully crawling under the covers. "And bloody budge up, you poof."

"What?" Rick protests. "What are you doing?"

"Shut up," Vyvyan says.

Of course, Rick's wide awake then. The bed dips as Vyv clambers in after him. Rick experiences snapshots of sensation - the brush of their bare legs, hair against Rick's skin, Vyv's cold nose brushing the nape of his neck and making him shudder.

Vyvyan shifts a little, bedsprings creaking, huffing out little irritated breaths, before he throws his arm over Rick's side. His hand's all limp against Rick's stomach, hanging there like a dead thing, like it doesn't matter at all.

It's a lot to be so close to Vyv after the past few days, to go from nothing at all to this with no apparent bridge in between. Rick lies there and thinks about touching Vyvyan's hand, about pulling his arm closer like it's a blanket. He thinks about squirming around in his arms to give him a proper snog.

"Stop thinking so loud, you nancy," Vyvyan says, shuffling in even closer and fisting his hand in Rick's pyjama shirt. "Go to sleep."

Against all the odds, Rick does.

-

When he wakes up, his head's resting against Vyvyan's leg. Vyv's sat up, smoking. Rick had been dreaming about someone stroking his hair, and it had been pretty bloody lovely.

It takes him a moment to adjust to the golden afternoon light on the wall, the line of Vyv's wrist as he ashes into Rick's favourite mug, the warmth of him.

"Don't smoke in my bed," Rick grumbles.

"Shut up, you girl. You've done worse in here, I bet. And not washed the sheets after."

"I washed them last month!" Rick says. "And you can hardly complain, you didn't have to get in with me."

"Seemed like a good idea at the time," Vyvyan says.

Rick squirms and flails into a sitting position, leaning heavily against Vyvyan's shoulder. They've never done this before, never gone beyond stolen kisses before retreating to their separate rooms. Sitting in bed together in companionable silence is new.

"The people who were renting your bed left in a hurry," Vyvyan says.

"Oh?"

"After I ran out there waving the axe at them they didn't seem too keen on staying."

Rick swallows.

"And why did you-?"

"Oh, piss off, you git," Vyvyan says, elbowing him and ashing everywhere in the process.

"Does this mean you've stopped, you know. Everything?"

"Nothing much else to break, really."

"So it's a truce?"

Vyvyan shrugs.

"Neil was going on, before. I've got this splitting headache, right, and I only went downstairs to get some peas for SPG, and he starts going on and on. It was like someone drilling in my head. I had to whack him just to get him to shut up." He pauses. "Anyway, before I threw a plate at him he said you'd upset some girl you fancied. Something about thinking she'd go off with another bloke."

"Traitorous bastard," Rick mutters. "I'll kill him."

"You've not been near any girls, have you? No girl would touch you with a bloody bargepole."

"Says you!" Rick says, pinching him. "They're not exactly queuing down the street for a look at your undercarriage, are they?"

"No," Vyvyan says. "Never said they were." He pauses. "Neil asked if the girl was me. Have you been pretending I'm a bird to seem less queer?"

Rick splutters at that, feeling himself flush. Vyvyan just watches him, the picture of nonchalance, puffing away on his cigarette. God, Rick hates him.

"I asked Mike for advice."

"And you told him I was a girl?" Vyvyan frowns.

"Well, I was hardly gonna tell him the truth, was I?" Rick says. "What would I have said? Yes, Vyvyan's a suppurating sore on the backside of mankind but I still really want him to touch my knob?"



"You'd have to pay me to touch your manky knob, you ponce. Buy me a biohazard suit."

"You really are a professional comedian, aren't you?" Rick sneers. "Have you thought about doing stand up?" He pauses, watching Vyvyan smoke and pick at a loose thread on his duvet cover.

There's something mesmerising about his eyelashes, the line of his mouth and jaw, the way he purses his lips around the cigarette filter, thoughtful and unselfconscious. It's weirdly beautiful. He's weirdly beautiful.

No sooner has he thought it that Rick knows that this is something he'll keep to himself.

"She fancied you, you know," Rick says, softly, his mouth dry. "The girl in the library. And she had, you know." He cups his hands at his chest.

"Hands?" Vyvyan suggests. "Fingers?"

"Breasts, you cretin."

"Nice ones?" Vyvyan asks.

Rick elbows him in the ribs.

"I was trying to put her off," He says. "I knew given half the chance you'd much rather snog her than me. And - and that's not fair, really. On you, I mean. If you wanna snog her then you should."

"You don't half talk bollocks," Vyvyan says. When Rick gives him a deeply unimpressed look, Vyv offers him his half-smoked fag. "Shows how much you know, doesn't it? The only bird I wanna snog is you."

Rick swallows, hard, his mouth dry. It occurs to him, taking a drag, that sharing a cigarette is the closest they've been to kissing in days and days - and now they're crammed in bed together, all elbows and legs and shoulders. Vyv's warm and close and perhaps everything is gonna be alright after all.

"Oh," He says, on an exhale.

"Piss off," Vyvyan says. "Oh." He affects a truly grotesque face for that last bit, presumably in some heinous impression of Rick himself.

"So you still…you still…?"

"Rick, you really are as stupid as you look," Vyvyan says. He plucks the cigarette right out of Rick's hand and takes a fortifying drag before stubbing it out on the wall. "C'mere, will you?"

Rick doesn't know which one of them moves first. He doesn't care. Vyv licks into his mouth like he's starving, like he's dying of thirst, yanking Rick close in a tangle of bare limbs.



"Bastard," Vyvyan mutters when they break apart for a moment, fingers at the buttons of Rick's shirt. "You're such a bastard."



Rick really means to say something, something cutting and witty and dripping in sarcasm, but then Vyvyan bites him, right on the hinge of his jaw, and it doesn't seem to matter much after that.



Nothing matters beyond this - beyond Vyvyan kissing him, beyond the awful noises that keep slipping out of Rick, the way he's clinging to Vyv like a limpet, desperate to be touching him as much as possible.



Vyvyan pulls back, wild-eyed, just looking at him for a moment. He presses down on the spot he just bit, digging in with his thumb. Rick's breath catches in his throat.

"That's gonna bruise," He says.

"Wouldn't be the first time," Rick says. "Fascist." And he hauls Vyv back in again by his hair.

-

"Not this again," Rick says, later, when Neil brings the loaf of lentil bake back to the table at tea time. "Neil, I demand a refund. We've been eating this for days. By my count you owe me fifty pence, and I will be charging interest."

"Food waste is seriously heavy, Rick," Neil says.

"This is seriously ruddy heavy, Neil," Rick says, picking up the loaf and dropping it back in the dish with a thud. "It's like a rock. I'm not eating it."

"You know, it's not easy doing all of the shopping and cooking and cleaning. It's a really tough job. I'd love to just sit and complain, right, that'd be really easy, but I don't."

"You don't complain?" Rick says. "Ha! What alternate universe is this and can I go and live there?"

"There are people dying in other countries, man!"

"Oh, have they been eating lentil bake as well?" Rick asks. "Or have you been going over there and boring them all to death?"

"Halt the presses," Mike says, choosing then to burst in through the front door. "This is Mike Thecoolperson bringing chips for all, courtesy of Jerzei Balowski."

"Why is Jerzei buying us chips?" Neil asks, watching Mike passing out paper wrapped trays.

"Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies," Mike says, cryptically. "Is Vyv in?"

"Yep," Vyvyan says, rounding the corner. "Alright, Michael? Neil? Shit for brains?"

He throws himself into the seat opposite Rick. Rick finds himself struggling not to look at him, so aware of his presence that he feels like all of his hair's standing on end. He looks down at his own hands, not trusting himself.

That is, until Vyvyan starts helping himself to his chips.

"Those are mine, Vyvyan," He points out.

"I know," Vyvyan says, reaching over for more. Rick slaps his hand away and Vyvyan flicks his forehead.

"Vyvyan-!"

"Here," Mike says, pushing some chips across the table to Vyv.

There's blissful silence for a moment while they all eat.

"Nice love bite, Rick," Mike says. Rick chokes, his hand flying up to his jaw. "Did you fix things up with that bird of yours? Or did SPG mistake you for a hamster pellet?"

Rick stammers for a moment, the words all tangled up on his tongue.

"Neither," Vyv says with his mouth full, spraying bits of potato everywhere. "It was me."

"I knew it! Didn't I say so?" Neil says. "That's five quid you owe me, Mike."

"Never let it be said I don't settle my debts," Mike says, digging a fiver out of his pocket and handing it over.

"Bastards," Vyvyan says, but there's no heat behind the word. He looks up and catches Rick's eye across the table. "You're not gonna be weird about it, then? Not that I care, but we're not above shagging in your bed, Neil."

"Oh no," Neil says. "That'd be really uncool, Vyv."

"Yeah, well," Rick says. "Maybe you'll think twice before being a big square homophobic Tory."

"I'm not!" Neil says. "Anyway, Rick, I thought you said you weren't gay?"

"That's just typical fascism, isn't it? Erasing the identities of others? Disgusting."

"It's looking more and more like we might have to shag in your bed, Neil," Vyvyan says.

Neil gets to his feet.

"If you guys do anything in my bed, right, I'll go on strike. I mean it."

"Nobody's doing anything in anybody else's bed," Mike says. "We can add it to the charter."

"Fascist," Rick says.

Underneath the table, Vyvyan hooks his foot around Rick's ankle. Rick touches the sore spot on his jaw, poking 'til it hurts. Neil's going on about his horrible lentil bake again and Mike's saying - something, Rick doesn't care, because Vyvyan's looking at him across the table.

It's ridiculous, and Rick's not gay, but he still moves his foot to rub at Vyv's calf. In moments like this it feels like he and Vyvyan are on the same wavelength - even if he's a humongous bastard who Rick hates most of the time.

Vyv's still looking at him. Rick feels all girly and tongue tied and stupid, right up until Vyvyan lets his mouth fall open, showing off a load of half-chewed chips.

Rick kicks him, then.

"That's vile, Vyvyan. I'll be sick, I mean it."

"Oh piss off," Vyvyan says, and grins at him.

He really is the worst and most horrible used tissue of a person Rick will ever meet.

That doesn't stop him smiling back, though.