Chapter Text
Harry’s day had gone as expected. He had bid the Hart household goodbye. He had received the key to his new home in Oxford. He packed his car with a handful of personal possessions and an almost comical amount of clothing before finally embarking on his appallingly dull two hour drive.
Harry idly wondered if this was a sign of how truly boring his university years were going to be.
He slotted the key into the keyhole and pushed the door to his new home open, immediately spotting a worn duffel bag at the side of the door. Harry frowned, crouching down to inspect the bag closer for a luggage tag.
“Eggsy Unwin,” he read aloud. He tilted his head, confused. “Who on Earth is that-?”
“Jesus fucking Christ, what the fuck!”
Harry nearly dropped to the ground in shock.
A man stood atop his staircase.
Soaking wet.
And near-naked if not for a strategically placed towel.
Harry didn’t know whether to avert his eyes or throw the nearby lamp and claim self-defence. He did neither. “I don’t suppose you’re here to rob me?” he tried tentatively.
It was apparently the wrong thing to say judging by the angry shade of red the stranger’s chest, neck and face had turned. Not that Harry was deliberately staring, of course.
“Get fucked!” the man replied with what was probably meant to be vehemence, but was significantly less intimidating given his state of undress. “I live here.”
Harry blinked. “What,” he bleated helplessly.
“I live here, you rich prat,” the man spat as he re-adjusted his towel. “And Christ, if you’re going to fucking case the joint, at least close the fucking door!”
He shut the door a little too obediently for his liking while he attempted to scrape two brain cells together. “But I live here,” he tried, picking himself from up the floor, house keys deliberately jingling in hand. “I’m not ‘casing the joint’, I have a key.”
The stranger seemed to consider that. “They didn’t tell me I had roommate in the rental agreement.”
“They didn't tell me I had a roommate when I bought the house.”
The other man was carefully blank for the moment. “Well, fuck.”
---
Harry wasn’t sure how long he was staring at his so-called half-naked ‘roommate’, until his British sensibilities kicked in. “Could… Could you please put on some clothes?”
The man glanced downwards as if finally remembering that he was, in fact, nearly naked. “Oh, right.”
Harry awkwardly stared at his shoes and at the carpet and tried not to fidget. “We’ve established that neither of us is here to rob the other, after all.”
He sighed. “Well, this is a first.”
Harry was even more confused, which he didn’t think was possible at this point. “First time you’ve thought someone was robbing you, but wasn’t?”
“Nah,” he muttered with a flippant wave and the towel dropped a little further down. “First time anyone’s ever asked me to put clothes on, I think.”
Harry felt his face burn, but he could hear the other man pad over to the bathroom and shut the door. He let out the breath he wasn’t aware he was holding and scrambled for his bag for the deed to what he hoped was still his house.
---
They were both sat at the dining table with two very different contracts before them.
Harry watched as yet another distracting drop of water drop from the other man’s hair and onto the rental agreement he was trying to read for the third time. He wiped the pesky drop away and continued to read. “I’m Harry, by the way.” He glanced at the name printed at foot of the rental agreement. “So, Gary Unwin, right?”
“Call me Eggsy,” the other man corrected, his forearms crossed and pressed comfortably against the table.
“Eggsy,” he repeated.
Harry couldn’t help but observe that Eggsy had hastily put his clothing on over his wet skin and that his t-shirt now clung onto him for dear life.
Harry read over the documents again.
“So, did we both get scammed or what?” asked Eggsy.
Harry sighed. “No, but I would say that our real estate agent made a mistake.” He tapped his finger against the dates of both documents. “I had bought the house first, but you signed on as a tenant just the day after.”
Good lord, he must work out every day to look like that. Harry had no idea of why his brain was leading him astray.
Eggsy frowned. “Which means what?”
It means that you’re appallingly fit, thought Harry.
Harry needed his brain to shut up.
“I suppose it would mean that I’m-” He stopped, realising.
I’m your landlord, his mind finished.
Harry winced internally. He had an odd feeling that Eggsy would be defensive if he claimed that so soon after inadvertently implying he was a robbing his new home. He rephrased. “I suppose it means you’re my first tenant?”
“Making you my landlord.”
And he sounds defensive anyway. So much for that.
“Only if you’re amenable,” he added. “You don’t know me, after all. I could have committed terrible atrocities in a church for all you know.” Harry was experiencing his first and only case of word vomit to date. He had a terrible feeling that this was going to happen often all of a sudden. “But I haven’t. Really, I haven’t.”
Eggsy looked more unimpressed than alarmed. “Atrocities in a church. Bit much, innit?
”
Harry shrugged, feigning indifference.
“You don’t get out much, do you?”
“What gave it away?”
To Harry’s surprise, Eggsy laughed and stood up. “Well, I guess that settles that then.”
“What does?”
Eggsy dragged his rental agreement from off the table. “I’ll be outta your hair tomorrow morning. D’you mind if I stay the night though?”
Harry frowned. “Wait-“
“Just work out how much a day’s rent is and I’ll pay you for that.” The rental agreement was skimmed off the table as Eggsy made a move to just walk out of Harry’s life undoubtedly forever –
Harry took hold of the rental agreement and Eggsy stopped walking.
“I’m not kicking you out,” Harry suddenly blurted, far louder than he had intended to.
Eggsy turned around, mildly startled. “I know, I said I’d stay the night-“
“You can stay as long as you want.” Harry really hoped he sounded flippant. Flippant was surely better than sounding like a complete and total idiot.
Eggsy appeared more annoyed than appropriately creeped out. Harry was unsure of which was worse.
“I’m not some charity case.”
“It’s not charity if you’re paying rent.” Harry gestured to the crinkled document in Eggsy’s hand. “Just pay whatever you originally agreed to. We’ll split bills.”
Eggsy was silent for the moment, casting a wary look over at Harry as if weighing his options. “You don’t know nothing about me either. For all you know, I could’ve also committed terrible atrocities.”
“In a church?”
“Secret underground bunker.”
“Well, we’re fine then.”
Eggsy snorted. “You’re mental.”
“Probably.” Harry flickered his eyes over the agreement they both clutched from opposite ends. “Deal, then?”
Eggsy didn’t say anything at first and Harry willed his heart to stop beating so embarrassingly loud. He almost took the insane idea back when –
“Deal,” replied Eggsy.