Work Text:
“Last question, I promise. Grian, you’ve been in this business a long time.”
Grian chuckles. “Yes, a very long time.”
The interviewer shuffles her notepad in her lap as she speaks. Scar glances between the two. Grian seems calmer than him, hands folded on top of his calf. Scar purses his lips and refocuses.
“Your family is very prominent in the industry; your father owns the production company in charge of your show, your mother–”
“I’m sorry, is this going somewhere?” Scar speaks before he could think. He was prone to that.
“Scar, it’s fine.” Grian’s touch is feather-light on his arm, but not good enough to quiet the heat simmering inside him.
“No, no, I just want to know what your parents have to do with our season finale?”
They both turn back to the interviewer at the same time. Her eyes have gone wide; she taps her pen against her notepad and bites her lip.
“W-Well, as I was saying, Grian, I just wanted to know how you’ve been dealing with the online feedback you’ve been receiving.”
Grian doesn’t say anything. Scar doesn’t want to stop looking at the interviewer – his death glare was getting really good, he’d have to thank Cleo for the pointers later – but he turns to study his co-star anyways. Grian just blinks slowly behind his glasses, tilts his head to the right slightly.
The interviewer cleared her throat. “In terms of, you know, your character on the show. I don’t know if you’re aware, but there’s been a good deal of negative feedback regarding, uhm, some of the writing decisions and–”
“This was the last question, right?” Scar cuts in again. It was getting painful watching her flounder; that’s what he told himself anyways. His outburst had nothing to do with the questions she asked or the ghost of fingers still on his forearm.
“I’m sorry?”
Grian clears his throat too, presses his fingers a little harder into Scar’s flesh. “Scar, it’s okay, really.”
Scar leans back in his chair, not docile but tame, and crosses his arms. Grian’s hand slips off Scar’s and re-joins its twin. The extended sounds of conversation filtered in one ear and out the other. Both of them were kind enough – or too scared, maybe – to not re-engage Scar. He listens to the tenor of Grian’s voice explain something about online interactions and finding his peace in a digital world; it scratches a part of his brain nothing else can, enough to get him to let go of whatever anger he still had leftover.
It wasn’t her fault , he thinks, his logic finally catching up to his emotions. She was doing her job. Reading pre-determined questions off cue cards in her lap. They’d all been having fun before that: Scar and Grian ribbing one another for the camera, the interviewer laughing and egging them on. She was quite witty, had a nice voice, was charming. And the way she’d gone red at his outburst – no, he couldn’t blame her at all.
He needs someone to blame though. Scar taps his fingers against his upper arm, itching to pull out his phone. It would be rude and unprofessional, but the urge is biting at the space behind his ears.
It wasn’t Grian’s fault either. None of it was – not the writing, not his connections. He was a good actor despite it all. He played his parts well. Scar gnaws at his lip, glances at the camera pointed over the interviewer's shoulder, and sets himself right again.
When he was a kid, he idolized Grian. He used to beg his parents to take him to the Blockbuster every Friday night and scour the kids shelves for Grian’s face on the cover of movies. He was a cute kid attached to a big last name that included record labels, F1 drivers, and maybe even a small off-shoot of the English royal family.
Scar had asked Grian about that once. He’d just winked and gone ahead with his line read.
He could always rely on a movie Grian was in to have at least one good aspect. And, hey, if he had a bit of a crush on the boyish charm during his teen years, who could judge him?
It was sheer luck they’d started working together. A shot in the dark audition, a dreamlike acceptance, a pilot season played with the seriousness of a seasoned thespian. Grian had been the last actor to join the Life Series – that was what they called it on set – and his presence was a total surprise to everyone involved. This was a tiny show, slotted for a Friday night showing, full of unknown actors all clamoring for a place among the lineup. No-one expected it to go very far; not the cast, not the crew, not even the director.
But Scar had put his heart and soul into his role on Third Life anyways, and Grian had bloomed opposite him.
His other co-stars had been phenomenal in their own right: Ren and Martyn with their medieval dynamic and silly accents they somehow pulled off, Bdubs and Cleo’s quiet alliance that crumbled under little pressure. But Grian and Scar had played off each other like he’d never experienced. Grian brought nuance to an admittedly flat relationship. Neither of them were main characters – that wasn’t how the show was written, not at first – but they acted like they were, like every scene together was their last.
Scar had called it intense in post-season interviews. That was what really started the buzz online. Enough for the producers to move their time-slot to something more central, enough for more funding, enough for a bigger writers team, who all decided that the third season of their show should be based around soulmates.
Grian and Scar had spent season two mostly separated, playing the parts of traumatized lover and amnesiac ball of sunshine respectively. Their viewership had tanked that season too. Producers were desperate, the writers were facing job insecurity again. No, Scar couldn’t blame any of them either for pairing the duo up again.
He just wishes they wouldn’t have so blatantly called them soulmates and then made them the worst couple on the show.
Scar stares at his black pool of coffee. It burns his hand through the thin styrofoam, but the steam feels nice on his cheeks, so he suffers along.
“You don’t have to do that.”
Grian’s voice startles him. Scar turns his head and watches Grian hover his hand over the buffet spread out for them – fruits, bagels, cartons of coffee with varying levels of strength. Scar had gone for the blonde roast.
“Do what?”
“Defend me like that. To interviewers, or online, or whatever.” Grian picks up a grape and pops it in his mouth. He doesn’t look at Scar, just shifts his eyes back and forth across the table, looking for something appealing. “I can take it.”
Scar purses his lips and looks down at his coffee again. He’d seen the interview leave the set fairly quickly afterwards. He couldn’t tell if she’d been crying or not. “It’s not fair, is all. You didn’t write the show. How can they blame you for what you do on it?”
“I know. Believe me, I know. But it’s just how people watch stuff these days.” Grian shrugs and reaches across Scar for the stack of cups.
“I guess.” Scar watches Grian pour the darkest roast at the furthest end of the table. The liquid came almost to the brim; his eyes trail its movement up to Grian’s mouth before peeling away. “I’m sorry. Was I being harsh?”
“No, no.” Grian pauses his sip and glances up at Scar. “Maybe a little. I just…” Scar watches him set down his cup, manicured nails interlocked with each other around the white plastic. The back of Scar’s neck tingles. Once, in their first year of knowing each other, before they’d even really been close friends, Grian had spent almost an hour on set just scratching along Scar’s skin. It’d felt so nice he’d fallen asleep in Grian’s lap, like a big cat, and of course someone had come by and taken a picture. He doesn’t know who exactly posted it, but the image of him open-mouthed snoring in his childhood crushes lap haunts him everyday.
“I don’t want you to worry about it, is all.” Grian finishes his sentence, and Scar is pulled back to the land of the living. He looks down at his own cup again to avoid Grian’s eye.
“You’re my friend. It pisses me off,” is all he has to say.
Grian chuckles – God, it’s a nice chuckle. Scar shoos the thought away – and turns his back on the table. “I know. But all press is good press, though, right?” He pats his hand against Scar’s shoulder and lets it slide off his arm slowly as he walks away. It’s supposed to be a comfort, but Scar just feels the stifling heat radiating out from where Grian’s hand had been.
***
If Scar reads one more headline, he thinks he might explode.
The threat of death doesn’t stop him from doomscrolling anyways. The interview had generally positive reception: people geeking over their little touches throughout (same), others commenting on their hints to the finale. It hadn’t aired yet, wouldn’t for another few days, which gave Twitter enough time to create its own hype and theories about how it was all going to go.
Unfortunately for Scar, he’d read one negative comment on Grian, and now he was laying half upside down off his bed, phone in the air, just reading critique after critique of his friend.
The phone screen was starting to burn his eyes in the dark room. He hadn’t even bothered to change out of his day clothes before flopping onto the hotel mattress.
>studcavatelli: he’s literally only in that show because his parents own the whole thing
>hawkeyeluvr05: I think he’s a good actor!
>tree.barktruther: he is so chopiana grande.
>studcavatelli: OMFG chopiana is frying meeee
>hawkeyeluvr05: Literally what’s yalls' problem, he’s so unproblematic.
That opened the floodgates. Scar watched in real time as his notifications started to flood with responses. He should’ve known better than to stoke the fire, but it was so hard to resist. He’d never been good with temptation.
>tree.barktruther: he’s literally a nepo baby??
>studcavatelli: he’s such an asshole
>tree.barktruther: and he's not even a good actor sorry T-T just because you’re in a bunch of movies doesn’t make you good, it makes you rich
>hawkeyeluvr05: what do his parents have to do with this? He still had to audition and stuff
>tree.barktruther: are you genuinely brain damaged ofc he’s gonna get on the show his dad owns please be serious
Scar finally drops his phone on his chest and groans into his hands. Twitter beef usually pissed him off, but this was different. He feels hot again, stiflingly hot, like someone had kicked on the heater to his room. Scar rolls over onto his stomach and maneuvers himself ungracefully off the mattress. His phone clatters to the floor; in the dark, he doesn’t care to go looking for it.
His feet shuffle against the packed carpeted floor towards the flowy, thin curtains that separate him from the outside world. It wasn’t a grand hotel by any means – though the show certainly could afford the expense – but it was comfortable. A good bed that doesn’t make his back ache, a window that opens fully, a mini-fridge he doesn’t have to worry about the cost of. The cast was only in town for a few more days anyways. He could manage.
Scar almost doesn’t hear the knock on his door over the metal rings sliding along the curtain rod. The city lights filter in from below, glowy and casting his whole room in a blue tint. He breaths against the glass, draws a smiley face in the condensation, and fixes his hair while he pads across the room. He doesn’t think at all about who could be on the other side; he likes to keep little surprises in his life.
This surprise is, as always, a welcome one. Grian stands a few feet away from his door, looking down the empty hallway, a bottle in his hand.
“Hi,” Scar breathes. He’s deeply aware that he’s still wearing clothes that Grian had most certainly seen him in hours ago. Grian whips his head forward again and gives Scar a once over. His eyebrows flick together, like he wants to ask, before sitting right again.
“Hey,” he holds up the bottle, half-empty, an indiscernible liquid sliding around inside its confines. “This was donated to me.”
“By who?” Scar’s hand trails down to the doorknob and fiddles with the brass plating.
Grian narrows his eyes, a smile quirking at the edge of his mouth. “Does it matter?”
Scar shrugs. “What if it’s poisoned?”
“Oh, do you want some or not?”
“...so, the intended watch order of the movies goes four, five, six, one, two, three. But, myfavorite,” Scar pauses and finishes off his drink. “my favorite watch order is–it’s called the Machete Order, okay?”
Grian nods along. He almost looks like he’s listening.
“So you watch episodes four and five, and then, listen, and then you jump over to one and two – now, I like to throw three in there, even though you’re not supposed to, but who can pass up that Duel on Mustafar, right?”
“Right,” Grian takes a last sip and knits his eyebrows together, “so then at what point do you watch the new ones?”
“You don’t.”
“Right.” Grian twists to his right and lets the cup slip from his fingers onto the bedside table. It wobbles for a bit before toppling over onto the hotel bible left out. Scar does the same on the opposite table, though his cup sits nicely under the lamp and next to the phone.
Grian readjusts himself on the bed. Scar just watches him nestle deeper among the thick comforter and pillows. He looks totally at home in his sweats and t-shirt, like this is his room and not Scar’s.
“Are you aware your phone has been going off for the last ten minutes?” Grian punches the pillow behind him a few times as he says it. Scar’s heart drops.
“Seriously?” Idly he knows he dropped it off Grian’s side of the bed earlier. Instead of getting off and walking around, he cuts out the middle man, rises to his feet, and clambers across the bed, careful to avoid the outline of Grian’s curled-up legs under the blanket. He jumps off – the shock in his ankles reminds him why he shouldn’t be doing that – and spies the edge of his phone peeking out from under the bed. He curses himself for leaving his ringer on.
Grian ignores his haste, but Scar knows he has to be buzzing with curiosity. “You’re pretty popular.”
“I guess so.” Scar shuts off the sound, ignores the comments and replies still filtering into his hotbar, and tosses the phone off the bed. He can see Grian staring him dead-on now from the corner of his eye. Scar purses his lips and turns his face away.
“Did you get into a fight on Twitter agai-”
“No!” Grian laughs, loud and echoing in the tiny hotel room. Scar flops face first into his bed to hide his red face.
“I’m going to tell your publicist about that alt of yours.”
Scar whips his head towards Grian, deadly serious and propping himself up on his hands. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“I will if you keep starting fights!” Grian laughs again and scrunches up further into himself. “Leave those poor people and their opinions alone.”
“But Grian, their opinions are wrong.” Scar pouts and brings his knees up onto the bed. He’d given up a long time ago on trying to convince Grian to join him in sowing online chaos, but Scar still loves telling Grian all about it anyways. He thinks it might fulfill some latent wish inside the other; never once has Grian seriously discouraged or shamed him.
Scar crawls over to the right side of the bed again and settles himself back into place, significantly more horizontal than before. Grian shuffles further down too until they’re both lying side by side: Grian, in his cozy pajamas and under the blankets, and Scar in his crumpled button down, propped up with one hand under his head. He’s struck again with the feeling that this is Grian’s world and he’s just living in it.
“You just care so much,” Grian mutters. Scar almost can’t hear him behind the blanket covering his mouth. “About what other people are saying, I mean.”
Scar scoffs. “So do you.”
Grian shrugs, the movement barely noticeable if Scar wasn’t watching him so closely. “Everyone’s always got something to say.”
Scar shrugs too. He’s not out of things to say – about how it’s not fair, about they should be allowed to defend themselves, about how Grian is better than all of them – but his mouth has gone dry. He’s become aware of how close they are now. Grian’s eyes flick across Scar’s face, big and dark, pretty doe eyes framed by blonde lashes. In the sun, when Scar’s looking from the right angle, they seem translucent. Now, the ends are tinged darker than the stems, reflecting orange where they pick up the gentle lamplight behind Scar’s head.
There’s the vague whisper of a bad idea in the back of his mind. Grian’s hand shifts a little lower and reveals the top peaks of his cupid's bow, inviting and taunting all the same. Bad idea. Terrible idea.
“You never finished your Star Wars viewing.” Grian’s voice is a little stronger now that the blanket has moved. His eyes flick down Scar’s face. This does not help Scar’s horrible, no good, very bad idea.
“Right, uh,” he licks his lips. Grian follows the movement. Scar is feeling bold, God help him, the mystery liquid warming him from the inside out. Scar’s arm is starting to ache; he slides both his hands under the pillow, his fingernails scratch against the pillowcase, and tucks his head against his palm through the soft down. His mind is blank now save for the visions of follow-through, the little whisper in his mind getting louder while Grian just waits for him to keep talking.
Grian shifts in his spot, turns to lay on his stomach and brings his arms underneath him. The opportunity is lost, but Scar doesn’t feel any colder for it.
“I care about what people say too,” Grian says into his hands. Scar watches him pick at the cuticle around his thumb. There’s already various layers of skin there radiating out from the edge: tough skin, healing skin, raw skin. Grian picks at the reddest part and Scar hears him suck in a breath as blood starts to bead along his nail. “But I’ve just been caring for so long, y’know? So what if people don’t like me. Maybe I don’t like them either.”
Scar wishes he had the luxury of not caring what people thought of him.
He turns over onto his back. Already he is letting go of the Bad Idea – not fully, but he bats it away for now, puts it in his back pocket – while he stares at the ceiling and folds his hands over his chest.
He’d become so famous so fast after season one aired. Of course he’d put in his time with short films that premiered at Sundance, but he’d been shoved into the spotlight with barely any time to adjust. Suddenly his days were full of media training and styling and sessions on what to say, what not to say, how to smile, whether or not he should start smoking cigarettes, what brand of alcohol to drink. What to wear, who to talk to, what store to shop at, who to kiss in bars when he was blasted. Every aspect of Scar was carefully curated to fit an industry standard; he’d put so much work into crafting the perfect persona that he wasn’t sure anymore if the old him was still in there.
But people were making TikTok edits of him to Starboy, so it was probably fine.
The Bad Idea is like a disease. Scar ponders encephalitis while he’s getting fitted into his suit.
“Enchephalitis isn’t a disease.” Cub has taken up residence in a plush red armchair directly behind him. Hypothetically it would be for parents to watch their children, or for designers to critique the exact measurements of an actress’ waist. All Cub does is turn the page in his clothing catalogue. He’s flipped through a whole pile of them by now. Scar thinks he must be doing it for the bit at this point; there’s no way he hasn’t found something he might like to wear tonight.
“It’s basically a disease.” Scar would shrug, but his clothes are being held together by literal threads while a seamstress pins fabric in pleats around his legs. He knows he’s hot, but he doesn’t think she or Cub deserve to be subjected to his clothes literally falling off of him.
Cub looks up at him over his glasses. Scar is reminded of Grian for a second; they both give him that same look, with the same indent appearing between their eyebrows, and the same lift of their top lip in general confusion. “Whatever you say.” Cub shrugs for him. “Why are we pondering encephalitis?”
“It’s exactly like my capital b ‘Bad Idea’.”
“Exactly like it?” Cub throws his catalogue to the left, reaches for another on his right, and finds nothing waiting for him.
“Exactly.” Scar nods very solemnly. This is a very serious topic. Cub pulls a magazine from the bottom of his mish-mash pile and starts going through it again. “Makes ya’ crazy.”
“I suppose.”
Scar watches Cub through the full-length mirror in front of him. He’s running a bet with just himself whether or not Cub will find a suit he likes before getting to the end of the pile again. Right now, he’s leaning towards no.
The suit Scar’s in now is nice enough. White satin fabric button down, ankle length gray overcoat, black dress pants. The shirt is meant to be worn half open. The jacket material is thin too, despite its padded look, making it perfect for the roofless venue of the red carpet event he has tonight.
In a perfect world, he would’ve done this fitting ages ago, like Grian, but he is anything but perfect.
He is lucky, though, that this outfit wasn’t sold by the time he found it. Cub, it seems, wasn’t going to be so fortunate; Scar purses his lips as Cub throws the magazine to his right to start a new pile.
“What are you laughing at, Starboy?” Cub asks. Scar rolls his eyes – he can’t laugh, he might get poked by thousands of tiny pins – and sticks his tongue out at Cub through the glass. He’s starting to think that edit might haunt the rest of his career. The seamstress sends him a warning look as she finishes off the hem of his pants.
“All done,” she stands up and swipes imaginary dust from Scar’s shoulder, “We can have it ready by five.”
“That’s fine,” Scar nods and smiles, “Thank you, really. I know this must be a big hassle.”
The woman squints up at him. Her jaw tightens, like she wants to say something but is thinking better of it. Scar glances to his left. They both just stare at each other until she clears her throat and turns away. “Take the clothes off gently. If you drop a pin, it’s fine, but try not to anyway.”
He nods silently. Cub and him exchange a glance and wait for the woman to leave.
“I think she actually wants to kill you.” Cub says as soon as the door closes.
“I seriously think so too.” Scar steps off the platform very slowly. It makes Cub snort, which is always the goal of everything Scar does. “Shirt?”
Cub tosses Scar’s t-shirt to him without looking up from his magazine. “Shirt.”
Scar is very careful about taking off the button-down, but his definition of careful is closer to poor-man’s-chaos. He counts three pins dropping off each shoulder before he can finally maneuver himself out of the shirt. He’s looking around for where to put the mess of fabric, his normal shirt slung over his shoulder, when Cub speaks again from behind him.
“I think you should do it.”
Scar turns at the waist to look at his friend in his armchair. He’s been stuck on that particular magazine for a while now. Scar is starting to lean more hopeful.
“Really?” He gives up and leaves the satin on a nearby table. A sleeve hangs off the side of the wood; he squints at it and tries to gauge whether or not it’ll slide off. All signs point to no.
“Why not?” Scar can practically hear the shrug that accompanies Cub’s blasé words. As if he’s not suggesting something that could turn Scar’s whole world upside down, that could ruin his career if he’s not careful. “It’s been a long time coming, I feel like.”
Scar slips his shirt over his head and tugs at the fabric before it can suction to his body. Has it? He starts the next arduous process of taking off the dress pants.
Scar thinks it has, but in the way pipe dreams usually materialize into something that’s slightly similar. Scar’s pipe dream was a teenage crush on his favorite actor. His materialization was the opportunity to work with him.
It was luck once again that they got on so well. Luck, that they were both so dedicated to the role. Luck, that Grian, as antisocial as he was, even took to Scar’s brashness. They were so different on paper; Grian stayed home, hated paparazzi, declined fan events. He preferred secluded red carpets if pressed. Scar loved the spotlight more than anything. He loved knowing people loved him.
Cub jammed his finger against the laminate paper. “I got it!”
The second Scar gets out of the car, he knows the show will be on.
He’s not totally ready for it to start, but he doesn’t have much time. Cub is sitting next to him, stiff in the leather seats of the limo; to the surprise of no one, he’d picked a suit that mirrored Scar’s. Black button down, white overcoat, white dress pants. Scar had very artfully decided last minute to throw on a pair of sunglasses.
“For the bit.” He winks at Cub and tries out his flashy grin. Only one side of his mouth perks up, a smirk that says I know something you don’t. Cub sticks the tip of his tongue out at him.
“I can see you sweating, man.” Cub twists the ball of one of his lip piercings and nods his head towards Scar’s temple. He’s not surprised when he touches his face and finds the offensive fluid. “It’s just a red carpet. You love red carpets.”
The car moves forward just slightly while Scar slumps back in his seat, a dramatic hand resting against his forehead. “I do. I really really do.” He looks to his right out the window and sees the mess of people waiting. They all blend together in their various shades of black and white, each person trying to ride the line between standing out and blending in.
Cleo’s car is up just ahead of them; Scar cranes his neck, presses his forehead against the cold glass, and watches them get out of their car. A simple hand is extended by her partner and plus one, and then they’re off. Lights flash around them – paparazzi, mostly, but also hopeful TikTok and Instagram influencers who think Cleo might give in to their calls for a selfie.
They’re stronger than Scar in that regard. He sees the top of their head moving along into the atrium that serves as their venue for the night, and then his car is moving again. It’s slower than before, which means it’s time for the game to start.
He’s not ready. He’s not ready. Everybody will be looking at him, recording him, shouting at him. Sweat prickles on the back of his neck and makes his collar stick to his skin. Scar’s not ready in the slightest, but the car is halting anyways and Cub is rubbing a hand on the small of his back, and then the door is opening for him.
Scar picks up his smile – a full smile this time, all teeth, but not too much. Just like he practiced in his mirror at home. Cub comes around the other side of the car. Scar is hit with a familiar feeling of gratitude as his plus one helps him out of the limo and guides him to the entryway, one hand holding the inside of Scar’s elbow.
They wave and walk, and Cub has to pull him away from a gaggle of twenty-somethings screaming over Scar’s artfully placed single lock of hair on his forehead, and then they’re inside the lobby of the atrium and it’s all over.
That wasn’t so bad, was it?
He says as much to Cub, who just swipes a finger along Scar’s temple and holds up the shiny end accusingly.
“I need a drink.” Cub mutters. His hand slips out of Scar’s arm and then he is gone, joining up with the other plus ones loitering around the beverages. The lobby is always reserved for guests of honor – actors, musicians, mildly famous TikTok dancers, Instagram activists. In here, it’s quiet, save for the low rumble of chatter and the roar of people outside both sets of doors. One of them he just came through; he turns to look at the ornate white wooden doors, shut tight now that the last round of people have come in. The others have yet to open. They match the entryway, both in size and grandeur. Scar knows the real party is on the other side: established paparazzi, news interviews, cameras in places cameras shouldn’t be that make the back of his neck prick with the feeling of being watched, endlessly watched. Even when he goes to the bathroom he worries someone might’ve slipped a tiny camera into the stall.
“I hate paparazzi.” Scar startles and turns to his right. Grian’s come up behind him with two shots of amber liquor.
“Is that for me?” He points. Grian holds the glasses to his chest and shakes his head.
“Both mine. Get your own.”
“Gosh, isn’t anyone chivalrous anymore? First Cub, now you?” Scar gestures towards Grian and tries not to focus on how good he looks in his suit. It’s a deep purple, almost black, but Scar knows the color will show in the warm lights of the hall.
“Cub’s here?”
“Of course Cub’s here, and he’s very much not getting me a drink.”
Grian chuckles and circles in place. “I don’t see a Cub anywhere.” He presses the glass to his lips, thinks better of it, lowers it back down to his stomach. Scar’s eyes linger where the cup just was. “Maybe he ditched you.”
“He would never ditch me.” Scar falters. He should have another witty come-up, but he’s starting to feel hot on the back of his neck again. Maybe he should ditch the overcoat.
“You look good.” Grian looks him up and down. Scar tries not to feel weird about that. Fails miserably. “You’ve got a good tailor.”
“So do you,” Scar’s tongue feels heavy in his mouth, and he’s really eyeing that second glass Grian has got now, if only for the courage it might give him. “Look good, I mean. You look good. Nice. Handsome.” He needs to stop talking. Scar closes his eyes and tries to find his cool again. Maybe it’s because he’s nervous about going back out into the lion’s den, or because he’s also lost sight of Cub, his only anchor to normalcy. Or maybe he can’t find his charm because Grian is laughing right next to him and craning his head back to shoot the alcohol and Jesus Christ, having a neck that nice should be illegal.
Scar clears his throat. He has got to get it together.
Scar does not get it together.
The whole night, no matter what, he finds himself scanning the room for Grian’s dirty blonde crown. When Cub talks, he’s only half-listening. Interviews take twice as long with the camera just idling on a wide shot, waiting for Scar to answer a question he didn’t even register.
Scar certainly hasn’t committed himself to the Bad Idea, not fully, but he keeps an eye on Grian anyways. Just in case.
He thinks Grian might be watching him too. Scar keeps catching his eye when he spends too long turned away. Grian isn’t usually a heavy drinker, especially at events like this, but Scar spies him knocking back a few more shots periodically. His friend certainly is no lightweight, but Scar thinks Grian might be getting close to his limit.
Scar scrounges his drinks up too, finally. He’s grateful for the warmth in his limbs, the numbness in his fingers, the blood that rushes to his lips and makes them look pinker than they actually are. Mostly, though, he’s grateful for the way it makes his head feel. He watches everything through a camera lens, moving like a puppet on a string, his head lagging behind. His spine tingles at the nape of his neck all the way up to the top of his skull. That's how he knows he should stop.
Somehow, someway, Grian ends up sidled next to him again. He doesn’t try to think about how it happened; Scar prefers to take his miracles as they come.
Grian is laughing next to him – at Scar’s joke, at his own joke, at something someone said as they passed, he may never know. Scar can’t stop watching the way Grian’s knuckle brushes against his bottom lip as he covers his mouth with the back of his hand to laugh some more.
It’d be just like a stage kiss, wouldn’t it? Scar tries to shoo away this thought, but he’s far too addled to dictate what his brain thinks about. The second floor they’re standing on is barely higher than the first, just enough to create an interesting visual dynamic and nothing more. Grian has set them up just next to the waist-high wall that overlooks everything. His shot glass has been replaced with a fancy crystal cup of water; it sits precariously on the edge of the thick, plaster-white wall. Scar thinks he should move it, but he can’t be bothered.
He wonders if Grian’s ever done a stage kiss. Scar certainly hasn’t. He tries to wrack his brain on Grian’s movie trivia. Did he ever kiss a co-star on screen, even as a kid?
“Of course I have.” Grian answers. Scar’s eyes widen at the thought that he might’ve been talking this whole time.
“What’s it like?” Scar’s words are a little clumsier on his tongue, but he manages. He tries to be cool and lean on his elbow on the wall, but he only serves to make his head spin a little with the sudden movement. Grian just shrugs.
Someone else might be convinced that Grian is clear-headed, but Scar can see the flush creeping up his neck, the unsteady way he sways back and forth just barely, the slow blinks he takes as he scans the room, eyes sweeping back and forth from the railing edge.
The Bad Idea takes hold again, and this time Scar is less inclined to let it go. His hand moves on its own towards Grian’s face. It’s soft – he thought it might be – and relaxes into Scar’s palm as he turns Grian’s head to him. The Bad Idea pushes his feet forward and makes him train all his effort into the precise landing of his lips on Grian’s.
“Scar,” Grian warns, his hand hooking on Scar’s wrist, “We’re in public.”
Scar does pause, for a second, and turns Grian’s words over in his mind. It wasn’t a no.
“Do you not want me to?” Scar swipes his thumb over the faded freckles dotting Grian’s cheek. “Say it and I won’t. But I want to.” When he was a kid, he used to sit with a DVD cover that sported Grian’s face and count the visible specks on his skin, over and over, until he could see the layout on his eyelids. Now he thinks all that studying might’ve been worth it. They’re deeply familiar to him, having barely shifted over the years, and almost blink at him like little stars.
Grian opens his mouth, then shuts it again. His eyes flick to the sides. Scar recognizes the gears turning in Grian’s mind, because he thinks he would recognize every part of Grian forever. He thinks he was made to just recognize Grian.
“Everyone’s watching.” Grian’s voice is unsteady as he looks up at Scar. It’s not much of a height difference, but it’s enough to make him have to look down.
“I want to.” He repeats, because his language is not nearly as precise as his motor function. Grian swipes his tongue over his bottom lip and Scar’s brain quietly reboots. “Maybe I’m tired of caring what people think of me.”
Grian grins at the echo of his words from a few days ago. His hand unhooks itself from Scar’s wrist and moves up higher, towards his shoulder, until his fingers are pressing on the meat of the muscle through his shirt. Scar is a little apprehensive now, a pit of fear forming at the base of his spine, but he knows he’s too close to quit now. Sunk-cost fallacy.
Scar pushes forward and pulls Grian towards him at the same time. He sticks the landing beautifully; their lips meet with just enough force, but not enough to have their teeth knocking against each other. Grian’s mouth is soft – he thought it would be. He’s thought endlessly about this – and moves in time with him. Scar had mostly intended for a gentle kiss at first, but Grian isn’t making any moves backwards. Scar isn’t inclined to be pushing him away either.
He doesn’t listen to the startled sounds people are making around him, or the clicking shutter-lights of cameras going off behind his eyelids. He doesn’t even have the capacity to care, not when Grian is kissing him slowly, deliberately, his hands moving with intent towards Scar’s face and cradling it closer to him. He’s warm; not the burning kind of warmth that Scar is used to from his own body, but a gentler feeling, like the sun on your face after spending all day in an air-conditioned room. It’s all he can care about right now: Grian’s cologne filling his nose, Grian’s hair brushing against his fingertips, Grian’s mouth on his, forever and ever he hopes.
Scar thinks he should delete Twitter. He doesn’t want to know what his fans have to say about this.