AI8 fic: Colliding with Reality, Part 3: Swimming with a Raincoat
Series Title: Colliding with Reality
Title: Swimming with a Raincoat
Author: dark_orion
Pairing: Kradam
Rating: PG (Yeah, movin' up in the world!)
Summary: After the judges comments during the Top 3 performance night, Kris finally loses it, and Adam has to pull him back in. Oh, yeah, and also: Either they need to find somewhere else private to talk or Danny needs to find other closets to lurk around, because if this keeps up, they’re going to scar the poor man for life.
Author's Notes: So, yeah, as you guys can see, rating jump! Got to say, though, since I'm a depraved perv myself, I probably would still call it G; however, if I'm going by, say MPAA guidelines, I'm probably safer with what I got. Anyhoo, this story's been sort of eating my soul--I mean, I willingly write it by hand so that I can take it to work and and futz with it there, then come home and painstakingly type it into my computer. If that's not love... What I wouldn't do for you guys :)
ETA: Before I forget (again), I didn't rewatch the Top 3 Performance Night ep again before writing this, so expect variation.
Previous Parts:
Colliding with Reality, Part 1
Colliding with Reality, Part 2: How Could You Be So...
Colliding with Reality, Part 3:
Swimming with a Raincoat
dark_orion
Top 3 performance night, Kris watches Adam from the wing of the stage. He’s gotten in the way of at least two pages and a half-dozen stagehands, and Debbie the stage manager suggests that Kris go watch on one of the probably hundred different monitors set up backstage, couching it in terms of benefit to Kris-the cameras have a better angle than that from the wing, so he’d get to see more than the back of Adam’s carefully coiffed head, and the sound would be such that he wouldn’t have to strain quite so hard to hear Adam over Bandzilla-but Kris knows that if Debbie’s been sicced on him, someone’s trying to send him the not so subtle message that he may be short, but that doesn’t mean he’s not big enough to take up way too much space in what is technically a thoroughfare for the Idol crew.
On any other day, within any other context, Kris might sympathize. However, Kris is feeling riled enough from the spectacularly shitty day he’s had so far that he’s not terribly inclined to be accommodating to anyone associated with Idol right now, and though he knows it’s not very fair to take his frustration out on the stagehands and the PAs when it’s the judges and the producers who seem so determined to throw him under the bus at every opportunity, he’s finding it very difficult to care about that at the moment.
In fact, the only thing that’s keeping him from snapping at the moment is the man out there on the stage.
After Kris’ first performance, into which he’d put every fiber of himself, because he never could not put all of his being into his music, after the judges had criticized it and torn it down to the point where even Kris couldn’t give them the benefit of the doubt, even being his own worst critic, after the they had made sure that what would be remembered was not his performance, whether good or bad, but was instead the utter petulance and childishness of the judges themselves, Kris stormed backstage, the controls he’d placed on his anger while on air slipping from his grasp like ice become water, and he just wanted to tear into something, someone.
However, before his mind could settle on a target, he felt a hand grab his wrist, and before Kris could blink, he’d been dragged into a small utility closet just off the hair and makeup area behind the main stage.
It was a testament to how anger-clouded Kris’ brain was that it took seeing the familiar silhouette just before the door closed and blanketed them in darkness to realize that it was Adam that had pulled him in there. And it was only when Adam took him by the shoulders and shook him that Kris realized he was a hairsbreadth away from hyperventilating.
“Hey, hey,” Adam said urgently, hand going to Kris’ chest, the extra weight making it so now Kris could really feel how fast he was breathing, how hard. “Calm down,” and Kris could hardly believe he was hearing that-because didn’t Adam see? What they said, what they were doing to him-but Adam persisted, “C’mon, Kris, deep breaths,” hand pushing harder against Kris’ chest, pressing him into the arm Adam had slipped around his back, Adam’s own deliberately slow, steady breathing transferred to Kris through everywhere they were touching, surrounding him, almost as if Adam was trying to breathe for him rather than with him.
Slowly Kris let his breathing come back under control, more for Adam’s sake than his own, because he hated that he’d put that worried tenor in Adam’s voice, which Kris was sure would match the worry on Adam’s face, though the ambient light creeping in from around the closet’s door was not enough to know for certain.
As Kris’ breathing slowed, he found his voice spilling out to fill the silence. “How could…how could they say that? Kara… I mean, she didn’t even… Said I should have done more, but she couldn’t… Simon-Simon, of all people, he had to-and he came to see you, to talk about the song he… But Kara-God, and Randy-couldn’t be bothered, and then they say I didn’t-”
While he expected the anger, the hurt he heard in his own words made him flinch away from Adam’s hold on him, stride the half-step towards the door, splaying his hands against the wood to keep from pounding his fists into it.
“Like I’ve-like any of us-have the time to sit down and rewrite both songs from scratch this week, when I can’t even get enough sleep every night to make sure I can function during the day, and then to get here and find out they buried me in the middle of the show…” As if they hadn’t already buried him enough-the producers had been digging his grave for him since the semifinals.
“I’m sorry.” Adam’s voice sounded so small, and it startled Kris because he’d almost forgotten he wasn’t alone. “I tried to tell them it wasn’t fair for me to…that it was your turn, but they-”
“No,” Kris interjected, sounding angrier than he intended, so he said again, “no,” quieter, more…tired than anything. He’d thought that he wanted an apology, for someone to feel some kind of remorse for the position Kris had been put in. He’d thought it would make him feel better-and it might have, coming from anyone other than Adam. Adam…who’d fucking carried him half the way there.
Kris dropped his forehead to rest against the door between his bracing hands, suddenly wanting nothing more than for it all to be over.
Kris felt Adam behind him, not touching, but his presence sheltering Kris all the same. He felt Adam’s hand hover over his shoulder, wanting to touch, to comfort, but unsure of his welcome. “I’m sorry,” he said again simply, hand finally falling to settle on Kris’ shoulder at the base of his neck.
Kris leaned into Adam’s touch, sighing, anger sucked out of him and resignation rushing in to fill the vacuum its absence left. “Not your fault. You never asked for any of this, any more than I did.” Kris rocked his head against the door, as if he could push his building headache out through his temple and into the wood. “It just feels like…more and more, like anything I do, it’s not good enough, like…they’ve already decided how all of this is going to go, and no matter what I do, it’s never… And it makes me think sometimes that maybe I should just…I don’t know, let it happen.”
The hand on Kris’ shoulder spasmed, tightening almost to pain before loosening abruptly and spinning him around. Kris’ breath left him as he was all but slammed back into the door, Adam’s hands coming to pin him against it by a hard grip on his shoulders, fingernails biting in until Kris could almost feel them through his jacket. With eyes now accustomed to the darkness, Kris could see Adam towering over him, see the way his eyes glinted, and Kris realized with a start that Adam was angry.
“Don’t even say that.” Adam’s voice decrescendoed quickly from shout to whisper within the space of the sentence, blaze burning brighter in his eyes as if to compensate for the volume he had to force from his voice. “I don’t give a fuck what the judges say.”
Kris’ eyes widened because he could count on one hand the number of times Adam had sworn in anger. Getting Adam to lose his cool like that was no mean feat, and Kris was abruptly reminded that Adam was a big guy, gym-fit underneath the hair and the makeup and the nail polish, and he could do some serious damage if so inclined. But the fear that could have found a foothold then could not stand in the face of Kris’ sure knowledge that Adam, despite his ability to do so in ways more devastating than physical, would never knowingly hurt him.
As if in confirmation, Adam’s grip on his shoulders loosened, hands sliding inward to the base of Kris’ neck as Adam leaned into him slightly. He let out a breath that ghosted over Kris’ cheek. “Everybody-this whole country…they love you. And those are the people who vote, not the judges. It…it doesn’t matter what they say because anyone with ears can tell you’re brilliant. I mean, your voice…”
Adam trailed off, and Kris could feel Adam’s thumb trace along his collarbone, up along his throat, skipping along tendons and vocal cords as if by doing so he could touch Kris’ voice.
Kris couldn’t speak, didn’t want to, afraid the vibration would make Adam remove his hand, and in that moment, more than the competition, more than recognition for his work, he wanted Adam not to stop touching him.
Adam’s voice, when he spoke again, was quiet, almost pleading. “You can’t just give up, not after…after everything. You’ve worked so hard to get here… You can’t let them stop you now. Not when we’re so close.”
And there was something that hadn’t occurred to Kris before.
Ever since the Top 13, when they’d become roommates, forcing their focus more towards each other than towards their other friendships, when the assumption of the other’s presence had started being taken for granted, they’d talked about making it to the final two together, discussion that had started more as conjecture, but had turned into a goal of sorts.
A part of Kris had always assumed that the suppositions and mutually decided upon goals were for his benefit, because to him, Adam’s place in the finale had been assured long before they were roommates, that Adam’s faith in his own ability would see him through and all this talk about making it together was to hearten Kris, to show him that Adam was there to support him, and Kris had felt guilty for always leaning on Adam.
It had never occurred to Kris that Adam might need him just as much as he needed Adam.
Kris brought up his hands from where they’d been hovering uncertainly around his own waist, in his pockets, in fists at his sides, flattened against the door, to grasp Adam’s forearms, hanging, letting their weight and gravity ground both of them. “I won’t give up. I promise,” he said, and it sounded like a vow.
Adam sagged against him briefly, and Kris was again reminded that Adam was a big guy-but rather than anger directing the thought, this time it was that Adam surrounded him, supporting even while supported. Adam’s big hands slid up to rest on Kris’ neck, and Adam’s forehead dropped to rest against his own, warm skin more balm to the headache than the rough wood of the door had been.
“Good.” The whisper, when it came, was quiet and relieved.
Adam pulled back, smile lost in the dark felt in the hand he left on Kris’ shoulder. “Good,” Adam said again, glint back in his eye, but this time distinctly not from anger, “because if you leave, that means I have to do the Top 2 media rounds with Gokey after the show’s over, and I might have to hate you for that.”
Kris was laughing as he and Adam tumbled out of the closet, but he put a plug in it quickly, because speak of the devil…
“Uh, hey, guys,” Danny said after a brief, awkward pause, eyes wide behind his glasses as they darted back and forth between Kris and Adam, and Kris knew he himself was making strange sounds as his laughter almost couldn’t be held back, because it only occurred to him just then what his and Adam’s conversation might have sounded like as transferred through the door: muffled words and long pauses, scuffling and thuds against the door-and God, it was a closet. Priceless.
Danny seemed to come back to himself after a few seconds, clearing his throat before saying, “Uh, Adam, Debbie’s looking for you. She’s freaking out, man. You’re supposed to be on in, like, less than a minute.”
Adam’s eyes went wide, and he took off towards the stage, dodging crew members and PAs, executing a spin around a slow-moving stagehand lugging an amp that allowed him both a quick glance at himself in the mirror and a hasty half-salute and smile back at Kris before he disappeared into the short hallway that would take him to the stage.
Kris watched him till he was out of sight, admiring and slightly envious of Adam’s grace, before turning back to Danny, who, Kris was amused to note, was staring into the darkness of the still open closet like it was the mouth of hell itself, and when Danny asked, “So…what were you guys, uh…doing in there?” Kris just couldn’t help himself.
“Well,” he said, trying to mold his expression into one of frustration, but fearing he was foiled by the way the corners of his lips were curling up, “I kept trying to give it up, but Adam wouldn’t let me.”
When Kris tells Adam later that Danny’s eyes went wider than softballs and he started sputtering like a speedboat low on fuel, it’s an exaggeration-but not by much.
~~~~
When Kris goes out to perform “Heartless,” Adam’s voice echoes through his mind and resonates in his soul, “doesn’t matter what they think, doesn’t matter what they say,” and before Kris is through with the introductory chorus, the song that he had chosen in a moment of now dispersed anger towards Katy has transformed into his own personal “fuck you” to the judges, and it’s so much word for word what he’s been wanting to say to them for the past couple of weeks that he thinks that this had to have been buried somewhere in his subconscious when he chose the song originally.
What’s truly funny about the whole situation is that the judges love it, really love it, and Kris can’t stop smiling, because on the bus or under it, he really doesn’t care anymore because it’s not for them, and it never will be. It’s for the audience, the 500 in the studio, the 25 million at home, and the one man standing in the stage right wing, grin beaming so brightly Kris is sure it must read on the monitors.
~~~~
Kris heads backstage, and this time he’s the one to snag Adam by the wrist and pull him back into the closet.
Adam doesn’t blink at the change in location, all attention focused on Kris. “Oh, my God… Kris! That was fantastic! That a cappella part at the beginning? Genius. Oh, and did you see the look on Kara’s face when y-”
It is the mention of the judges that does it, because Kris doesn’t even want to think about them right now, not when he owes Adam so much, needs so much to thank him, to show him how much he means to Kris.
Adam keeps trying to talk for a second after Kris kisses him, still not fully aware of what’s happened, and Kris takes full advantage of Adam’s open mouth, halting the words with the thrust of his tongue, quickly reacquainting himself with Adam’s taste, which he’d only gotten to experience so briefly before.
Adam’s surprise shows itself in a moment of stillness before Kris finds his kiss returned wholeheartedly, hands moving to Kris’ waist, fingertips just brushing bare skin under the hem of Kris’ shirt as Adam pulls Kris against him, falling back against the door, and rather than using his height to press an advantage and take charge of the kiss, he ducks in to Kris’ level, letting Kris set the pace.
Kris’ fingers, of their own volition it seems, bury themselves in Adam’s dark hair, and Kris uses the grip to tilt Adam’s head to take the kiss deeper, like if Kris could only find the right angle, he could just crawl inside Adam and curl up next to his heart for a while.
Kris pulls back slowly with a last, soft pressing of lips, finding Adam’s eyes despite the darkness of the closet, holding his gaze as he says, brief, heartfelt, “Thank you,” and Kris wonders if that sounded as much like “I love you” to Adam as it did inside his own head.
Adam’s tongue darts out to moisten his lips, and Kris has to stifle a fleeting urge to do it for him. Adam straightens from his sag against the door. “You’re, uh…welcome?” and the slight interrogative rise at the end makes Kris lean in to kiss him again, though this time he has to rise up on the balls of his feet to do it.
Drawing back, hands coming to rest on Adam’s chest, Kris confirms, “Yeah. Kind of a lot,” referring both to his degree of gratitude and to the extent to which Adam has always made him feel welcome.
He gives Adam’s shirt a little tug. “We better get out of here before Debbie sends out the search party again.”
Their tumble from the closet is no more dignified this time than last-probably is less so-and really, either they need to find somewhere else private to talk or Danny needs to find other closets to lurk around, because if this keeps up, they’re going to scar the poor man for life.
~~~~
On their return to the mansion that night, Danny high-tails it up the stairs to his room, giving the coat closet in the foyer wide berth, which Kris finds rather hysterically funny, though he’s too tired to summon forth a laugh.
He hears Adam’s snort from behind him as the other man secures the front door. “Does he think we’ve christened every closet from here to the studio? Or is he just phobic of all closets now?”
“Dunno,” says Kris around a yawn, “either case, he’s out of luck the next time he needs a jacket.”
The two make a beeline for the kitchen, where they raid the refrigerator, ravenous after their standard day of breakfast but no lunch-Adam because he doesn’t want anything to trigger one of his slight food allergies and clog his throat, Kris because he still can’t be certain he won’t throw it back up before going on stage and he doesn’t want to tempt fate-helping themselves to the food Chef Markus had left for them to reheat, as it is rare these days, with so few of them left, that the contestants make it back to the mansion before he leaves for the day.
They pile their plates high, because once Danny mans up enough to brave the kitchen to find his own dinner, there won’t be anything left by the time he gets through.
They carry their plates into the main living area, where they settle on one of the couches in front of the huge widescreen TV, a behemoth unmatched save for the movie screen in the theater in the back of the mansion. They argue good-naturedly about what they’re going to watch, Adam winning by virtue of being the one willing to get up off the very comfortable sofa to deal with the DVD. He chooses a movie from his own personal collection, most of which had migrated here from his room downstairs, an anime, for which pretty much everyone, except maybe Allison and Lil, because “he who is without sin” and all that, had teased him solidly, the “hey, aren’t you a little old for cartoons?” variety, until they’d all been sucked in, too, much to Adam’s smug satisfaction.
As the film starts, Kris can’t help joking, “Is this the one with the guy you stole your hairstyle from?”
Returning to the couch, Adam sits down hard, jostling Kris and threatening the plate balanced on his knees. As Kris glares at him, Adam innocently picks his own plate back up from where he’d left it on the coffee table and settles back into the sofa. “No comment.”
It is indeed “that movie,” though, and it’s a good thing the TV’s as big as it is, because Adam is a complete subtitle snob. Of course, Kris does have to admit, the Japanese voice actors do do a much better job than their American counterparts.
Kris is hungry enough that he’s finished with his dinner before the movie’s a quarter done. With nothing else to keep himself occupied, Kris finds that he’s fading fast, and before he realizes it and can correct it, he slumps into Adam’s shoulder. Adam, who’s thankfully also finished with his dinner, so no panicked run for paper towels, offers to turn off the movie.
Kris quickly declines. He might be tired, might even be unable to keep his eyes open, but he’s not ready to go to sleep yet, mind too active and body too unwilling to give up such close proximity to Adam’s, because Kris might be making progress, if tonight’s kiss is anything to go by, but he doesn’t think he’s brave enough to ask Adam to sleep with him yet, even if it really is sleep and not…anything else.
Adam looks at him skeptically, as if he’s a bomb waiting to go off, or rather, in this case, an exhausted idiot waiting for his face to make painful contact with the coffee table when he inevitably eventually falls from the couch. Obviously coming to a decision, Adam resettles himself farther down the couch, but before Kris can become too disappointed at the increased distance, Adam pulls Kris down towards him, encouraging Kris to stretch out on the couch. Kris gratefully curls into its depths, appropriating Adam’s thigh for a pillow.
Kris feels Adam’s hand rest not quite tentatively on his side, fingers sliding softly into the spaces between Kris’ ribs as if they were laces on a football, though Kris doubts Adam would appreciate the metaphor. He closes his eyes, smiling when Adam takes him at his word that he’s not ready to go to sleep yet and begins reading the subtitles to him, progressing quickly from simple recitation to fully acting out each line, creating voices for each character, though Kris doesn’t hesitate to tell him that his “girl” voice is completely ridiculous.
Adam jogs his leg just enough to force Kris to lift his head for a second and mock-huff about uncooperative pillows. “Hey, quiet down there,” Adam admonishes, hand tightening on Kris’ side only a little, but enough that it implies a threat to Kris’ highly ticklish ribcage. “I’m doing you a service, here.”
Kris laughs, but only briefly, because yeah, Adam really is, in more ways than Adam could know.
~~~~
For the second time this week, Kris wakes in his own bed with no recollection of how he got there, which means that, God, Adam had carried him there again. This is starting a rather embarrassing trend, and Kris can only be glad now that Danny had been lured downstairs by the promise of food, despite probable risk to his delicate sensibilities, sooner rather than later, because while it was pretty darn hilarious watching Danny beat a hasty retreat back upstairs after, coming to investigate what they were watching, he found Adam and him in their relatively innocent position on the couch, contemplating Danny’s reaction to seeing Adam whisking Kris away downstairs, while still funny, is flavored with a little too much red-faced embarrassment for Kris’ taste.
Familiar again is the sound of sleep-quiet breathing coming from elsewhere in the room, but when Kris looks to the armchair, Adam is nowhere to be seen. Confused, Kris rolls over to take in the other side of the room, startling back a bit when he finds Adam asleep next to him. He’s stretched out on top of the sheets, still fully clothed save for his bare feet, but the intimacy of the moment strikes Kris just the same, and he finds that he likes it, even wishes that Adam hadn’t felt it necessary to maintain the few boundaries he had.
As Kris watches Adam sleep, Adam’s face half hidden in shadow because it’s not even dawn yet and the only illumination comes from the floodlights outside, bright enough that they penetrate the blinds to streak the room with strips of faintly glowing blue-white, noting that he doesn’t look younger or more innocent or any of the clichés, just maybe more…himself, if such a thing’s possible, something else draws Kris’ attention, a faint odor that he thinks he should recognize.
Seeing the bottle of nail polish remover on the nightstand, it clicks, and Kris almost fumbles himself right off the bed jerking his arm out from under his body, because if Adam’s removed the polish from his thumb…
Kris had been fiercely protecting the chipped remains of last Wednesday’s blue-black all week, determined to hang on as long as possible to the piece of himself Adam had imparted to him as symbolized by the paint, and to think that Adam might have taken it away, without warning…
Kris gets his right hand to eye level, angling to see it in the dim light, and yes, the chips are gone-but in their place is a fresh coat of polish, the shine of it letting Kris know that the careful multi-coat procedure had been followed. Kris folds his right hand to run his index finger over the nail and doesn’t bother to suppress the warm shiver that runs through him at feeling its slickness.
When he looks back over at Adam, the other man’s eyes are open and watching him. Feeling a little caught out at having Adam witness his reaction to the new polish, he deflects by displaying the thumb to Adam and raising an eyebrow.
Adam shrugs into the mattress, eyes an intriguing blend of sleepy and sly. “Not my fault you can sleep through anything. Besides, looked like you needed a touch-up.”
Kris relaxes from where his alarm had pulled him up into an almost sitting position, settling back down into the bed, propping his head up on his left fist to regard Adam. “Point,” he concedes. Nodding to the remover on the nightstand, he continues, “But what about…?” trailing off leadingly.
“Oh.” Adams gaze skitters away from Kris’ for a second, and now Kris is really curious. Adam’s eyes come back Kris’ way and end up focusing in the general direction of Kris’ left ear, and Adam’s expression is tinged with slight uncertainty and maybe even a little embarrassment. He raises up his own right hand, and Kris sees that though all his other fingers have their customary paint job, Adam’s right thumbnail is bare.
Kris can feel his heart thudding in his chest even before Adam says, “I just thought, if you could carry a piece of me,” nodding at the hand Kris has tucked protectively between the mattress and his chest, “I could carry a piece of you, too.”
Kris reaches out to Adam, consciously trying to keep his hand from shaking and mostly succeeding, running his own painted thumb over Adam’s bare one, noting the contrast-point/counterpoint, theme/variation-and is proud when he is able to say, “Looks good on you,” while keeping his voice completely steady.
Adam smiles, lacing his fingers with Kris’. “I thought so.”
They stay that way for a few minutes before Kris shakes himself back to reality. “I guess we should get back to sleep, huh?”
Adam slowly disentangles his hand from Kris’. “Yeah. Kind of a big day tomorrow.” He rises to sit on the edge of the bed. “I guess I should-”
Kris grabs a hold of Adam’s arm before he can get too far, though he’s not quite able to meet Adam’s eyes when he offers, “You know, you could just… I mean, it’s not like I’m hurting for room, here.”
Adam remains sitting on the bed, though he does settle back away from the edge a bit-invitation not yet accepted, but not refused either. “You’re sure?”
Kris brings his gaze to meet Adam’s, needing to convince him that, yes, he’s sure. He needs this. “Positive.”
Adam shifts so that he can pull the sheets down and slide under them, stretching out along what is now his side of the bed, smile genuine, but with a touch of wariness behind it. “I should warn you, whenever I’ve…shared a bed with anyone, even if we go to sleep on opposite sides and even if the bed is huge, I tend to wake up on top of them. I guess I’m what you would call a, uh, a cuddler.” He laughs self-deprecatingly. “And that sounds just oh, so manly.”
Kris laughs to hide the fact that the prospect of waking up wrapped in Adam Lambert is one he finds quite pleasurable. “Well,” he says, not even trying to sound unaffected, because acting’s Adam’s thing, not his, “I guess we better start off close-so it’s not such a shock later.” He flips quickly onto his side, away from Adam, because he’s flustered himself a little with how bald an invitation that was.
Adam doesn’t respond for a moment, but then Kris feels the bed dip, and Adam’s hand drops to rest on his hip as the rest of him tucks in behind Kris, the heat of his long, broad body blazing into Kris from shoulder to toe.
“Is this alright?” Adam murmurs, breath a warm current over Kris’ ear.
Kris shifts back slightly into Adam, and Adam’s hand slips farther around him, splayed against his stomach, sending a flurry of butterflies winging from there along his nerves, but also oddly soothing and the same time. “Yeah, very.”
Adam ducks his face into the nape of Kris’ neck, his softly whispered, “Goodnight,” not so much heard as felt.
Kris manages a clumsy, “Goodnight,” of his own, and though he’s certain he’ll never be able to fall asleep, not with Adam draped over him like a living blanket, sending excited waves of energy through him, eventually his own weariness gets the better of him, and he drifts off into welcoming darkness.
Next Part
~
Alright, so I know that Debbie was in the hospital for Top 3. Sue me. I forgot about the accident while writing, and I didn't feel like making up a character to take her place. And yeah, maybe all the action couldn't fit into the commercial breaks during the show. Look at it this way: closet = tiny TARDIS, so time is relative. At least, that's my story. :D
Oh, in case anyone was wondering, the movie the guys are watching is, at least in my mind, Naruto Shippuuden 2: Bonds, although I'm pretty sure it's not out on DVD yet. It's a little bit of an inside joke with, uh, myself, because the first time I saw Adam, my first thought was, "That guy has Sasuke hair!"
Picture of Sasuke:
See, his hair's even drawn with blue highlights!
And oh, yeah, chapter title from "I Want You" by Savage Garden. Seemed appropriate. :)
Okay, so you know the drill: you guys = awesome. Comments = love. Me = tired.
~
Title: Swimming with a Raincoat
Author: dark_orion
Pairing: Kradam
Rating: PG (Yeah, movin' up in the world!)
Summary: After the judges comments during the Top 3 performance night, Kris finally loses it, and Adam has to pull him back in. Oh, yeah, and also: Either they need to find somewhere else private to talk or Danny needs to find other closets to lurk around, because if this keeps up, they’re going to scar the poor man for life.
Author's Notes: So, yeah, as you guys can see, rating jump! Got to say, though, since I'm a depraved perv myself, I probably would still call it G; however, if I'm going by, say MPAA guidelines, I'm probably safer with what I got. Anyhoo, this story's been sort of eating my soul--I mean, I willingly write it by hand so that I can take it to work and and futz with it there, then come home and painstakingly type it into my computer. If that's not love... What I wouldn't do for you guys :)
ETA: Before I forget (again), I didn't rewatch the Top 3 Performance Night ep again before writing this, so expect variation.
Previous Parts:
Colliding with Reality, Part 1
Colliding with Reality, Part 2: How Could You Be So...
Colliding with Reality, Part 3:
Swimming with a Raincoat
dark_orion
Top 3 performance night, Kris watches Adam from the wing of the stage. He’s gotten in the way of at least two pages and a half-dozen stagehands, and Debbie the stage manager suggests that Kris go watch on one of the probably hundred different monitors set up backstage, couching it in terms of benefit to Kris-the cameras have a better angle than that from the wing, so he’d get to see more than the back of Adam’s carefully coiffed head, and the sound would be such that he wouldn’t have to strain quite so hard to hear Adam over Bandzilla-but Kris knows that if Debbie’s been sicced on him, someone’s trying to send him the not so subtle message that he may be short, but that doesn’t mean he’s not big enough to take up way too much space in what is technically a thoroughfare for the Idol crew.
On any other day, within any other context, Kris might sympathize. However, Kris is feeling riled enough from the spectacularly shitty day he’s had so far that he’s not terribly inclined to be accommodating to anyone associated with Idol right now, and though he knows it’s not very fair to take his frustration out on the stagehands and the PAs when it’s the judges and the producers who seem so determined to throw him under the bus at every opportunity, he’s finding it very difficult to care about that at the moment.
In fact, the only thing that’s keeping him from snapping at the moment is the man out there on the stage.
After Kris’ first performance, into which he’d put every fiber of himself, because he never could not put all of his being into his music, after the judges had criticized it and torn it down to the point where even Kris couldn’t give them the benefit of the doubt, even being his own worst critic, after the they had made sure that what would be remembered was not his performance, whether good or bad, but was instead the utter petulance and childishness of the judges themselves, Kris stormed backstage, the controls he’d placed on his anger while on air slipping from his grasp like ice become water, and he just wanted to tear into something, someone.
However, before his mind could settle on a target, he felt a hand grab his wrist, and before Kris could blink, he’d been dragged into a small utility closet just off the hair and makeup area behind the main stage.
It was a testament to how anger-clouded Kris’ brain was that it took seeing the familiar silhouette just before the door closed and blanketed them in darkness to realize that it was Adam that had pulled him in there. And it was only when Adam took him by the shoulders and shook him that Kris realized he was a hairsbreadth away from hyperventilating.
“Hey, hey,” Adam said urgently, hand going to Kris’ chest, the extra weight making it so now Kris could really feel how fast he was breathing, how hard. “Calm down,” and Kris could hardly believe he was hearing that-because didn’t Adam see? What they said, what they were doing to him-but Adam persisted, “C’mon, Kris, deep breaths,” hand pushing harder against Kris’ chest, pressing him into the arm Adam had slipped around his back, Adam’s own deliberately slow, steady breathing transferred to Kris through everywhere they were touching, surrounding him, almost as if Adam was trying to breathe for him rather than with him.
Slowly Kris let his breathing come back under control, more for Adam’s sake than his own, because he hated that he’d put that worried tenor in Adam’s voice, which Kris was sure would match the worry on Adam’s face, though the ambient light creeping in from around the closet’s door was not enough to know for certain.
As Kris’ breathing slowed, he found his voice spilling out to fill the silence. “How could…how could they say that? Kara… I mean, she didn’t even… Said I should have done more, but she couldn’t… Simon-Simon, of all people, he had to-and he came to see you, to talk about the song he… But Kara-God, and Randy-couldn’t be bothered, and then they say I didn’t-”
While he expected the anger, the hurt he heard in his own words made him flinch away from Adam’s hold on him, stride the half-step towards the door, splaying his hands against the wood to keep from pounding his fists into it.
“Like I’ve-like any of us-have the time to sit down and rewrite both songs from scratch this week, when I can’t even get enough sleep every night to make sure I can function during the day, and then to get here and find out they buried me in the middle of the show…” As if they hadn’t already buried him enough-the producers had been digging his grave for him since the semifinals.
“I’m sorry.” Adam’s voice sounded so small, and it startled Kris because he’d almost forgotten he wasn’t alone. “I tried to tell them it wasn’t fair for me to…that it was your turn, but they-”
“No,” Kris interjected, sounding angrier than he intended, so he said again, “no,” quieter, more…tired than anything. He’d thought that he wanted an apology, for someone to feel some kind of remorse for the position Kris had been put in. He’d thought it would make him feel better-and it might have, coming from anyone other than Adam. Adam…who’d fucking carried him half the way there.
Kris dropped his forehead to rest against the door between his bracing hands, suddenly wanting nothing more than for it all to be over.
Kris felt Adam behind him, not touching, but his presence sheltering Kris all the same. He felt Adam’s hand hover over his shoulder, wanting to touch, to comfort, but unsure of his welcome. “I’m sorry,” he said again simply, hand finally falling to settle on Kris’ shoulder at the base of his neck.
Kris leaned into Adam’s touch, sighing, anger sucked out of him and resignation rushing in to fill the vacuum its absence left. “Not your fault. You never asked for any of this, any more than I did.” Kris rocked his head against the door, as if he could push his building headache out through his temple and into the wood. “It just feels like…more and more, like anything I do, it’s not good enough, like…they’ve already decided how all of this is going to go, and no matter what I do, it’s never… And it makes me think sometimes that maybe I should just…I don’t know, let it happen.”
The hand on Kris’ shoulder spasmed, tightening almost to pain before loosening abruptly and spinning him around. Kris’ breath left him as he was all but slammed back into the door, Adam’s hands coming to pin him against it by a hard grip on his shoulders, fingernails biting in until Kris could almost feel them through his jacket. With eyes now accustomed to the darkness, Kris could see Adam towering over him, see the way his eyes glinted, and Kris realized with a start that Adam was angry.
“Don’t even say that.” Adam’s voice decrescendoed quickly from shout to whisper within the space of the sentence, blaze burning brighter in his eyes as if to compensate for the volume he had to force from his voice. “I don’t give a fuck what the judges say.”
Kris’ eyes widened because he could count on one hand the number of times Adam had sworn in anger. Getting Adam to lose his cool like that was no mean feat, and Kris was abruptly reminded that Adam was a big guy, gym-fit underneath the hair and the makeup and the nail polish, and he could do some serious damage if so inclined. But the fear that could have found a foothold then could not stand in the face of Kris’ sure knowledge that Adam, despite his ability to do so in ways more devastating than physical, would never knowingly hurt him.
As if in confirmation, Adam’s grip on his shoulders loosened, hands sliding inward to the base of Kris’ neck as Adam leaned into him slightly. He let out a breath that ghosted over Kris’ cheek. “Everybody-this whole country…they love you. And those are the people who vote, not the judges. It…it doesn’t matter what they say because anyone with ears can tell you’re brilliant. I mean, your voice…”
Adam trailed off, and Kris could feel Adam’s thumb trace along his collarbone, up along his throat, skipping along tendons and vocal cords as if by doing so he could touch Kris’ voice.
Kris couldn’t speak, didn’t want to, afraid the vibration would make Adam remove his hand, and in that moment, more than the competition, more than recognition for his work, he wanted Adam not to stop touching him.
Adam’s voice, when he spoke again, was quiet, almost pleading. “You can’t just give up, not after…after everything. You’ve worked so hard to get here… You can’t let them stop you now. Not when we’re so close.”
And there was something that hadn’t occurred to Kris before.
Ever since the Top 13, when they’d become roommates, forcing their focus more towards each other than towards their other friendships, when the assumption of the other’s presence had started being taken for granted, they’d talked about making it to the final two together, discussion that had started more as conjecture, but had turned into a goal of sorts.
A part of Kris had always assumed that the suppositions and mutually decided upon goals were for his benefit, because to him, Adam’s place in the finale had been assured long before they were roommates, that Adam’s faith in his own ability would see him through and all this talk about making it together was to hearten Kris, to show him that Adam was there to support him, and Kris had felt guilty for always leaning on Adam.
It had never occurred to Kris that Adam might need him just as much as he needed Adam.
Kris brought up his hands from where they’d been hovering uncertainly around his own waist, in his pockets, in fists at his sides, flattened against the door, to grasp Adam’s forearms, hanging, letting their weight and gravity ground both of them. “I won’t give up. I promise,” he said, and it sounded like a vow.
Adam sagged against him briefly, and Kris was again reminded that Adam was a big guy-but rather than anger directing the thought, this time it was that Adam surrounded him, supporting even while supported. Adam’s big hands slid up to rest on Kris’ neck, and Adam’s forehead dropped to rest against his own, warm skin more balm to the headache than the rough wood of the door had been.
“Good.” The whisper, when it came, was quiet and relieved.
Adam pulled back, smile lost in the dark felt in the hand he left on Kris’ shoulder. “Good,” Adam said again, glint back in his eye, but this time distinctly not from anger, “because if you leave, that means I have to do the Top 2 media rounds with Gokey after the show’s over, and I might have to hate you for that.”
Kris was laughing as he and Adam tumbled out of the closet, but he put a plug in it quickly, because speak of the devil…
“Uh, hey, guys,” Danny said after a brief, awkward pause, eyes wide behind his glasses as they darted back and forth between Kris and Adam, and Kris knew he himself was making strange sounds as his laughter almost couldn’t be held back, because it only occurred to him just then what his and Adam’s conversation might have sounded like as transferred through the door: muffled words and long pauses, scuffling and thuds against the door-and God, it was a closet. Priceless.
Danny seemed to come back to himself after a few seconds, clearing his throat before saying, “Uh, Adam, Debbie’s looking for you. She’s freaking out, man. You’re supposed to be on in, like, less than a minute.”
Adam’s eyes went wide, and he took off towards the stage, dodging crew members and PAs, executing a spin around a slow-moving stagehand lugging an amp that allowed him both a quick glance at himself in the mirror and a hasty half-salute and smile back at Kris before he disappeared into the short hallway that would take him to the stage.
Kris watched him till he was out of sight, admiring and slightly envious of Adam’s grace, before turning back to Danny, who, Kris was amused to note, was staring into the darkness of the still open closet like it was the mouth of hell itself, and when Danny asked, “So…what were you guys, uh…doing in there?” Kris just couldn’t help himself.
“Well,” he said, trying to mold his expression into one of frustration, but fearing he was foiled by the way the corners of his lips were curling up, “I kept trying to give it up, but Adam wouldn’t let me.”
When Kris tells Adam later that Danny’s eyes went wider than softballs and he started sputtering like a speedboat low on fuel, it’s an exaggeration-but not by much.
~~~~
When Kris goes out to perform “Heartless,” Adam’s voice echoes through his mind and resonates in his soul, “doesn’t matter what they think, doesn’t matter what they say,” and before Kris is through with the introductory chorus, the song that he had chosen in a moment of now dispersed anger towards Katy has transformed into his own personal “fuck you” to the judges, and it’s so much word for word what he’s been wanting to say to them for the past couple of weeks that he thinks that this had to have been buried somewhere in his subconscious when he chose the song originally.
What’s truly funny about the whole situation is that the judges love it, really love it, and Kris can’t stop smiling, because on the bus or under it, he really doesn’t care anymore because it’s not for them, and it never will be. It’s for the audience, the 500 in the studio, the 25 million at home, and the one man standing in the stage right wing, grin beaming so brightly Kris is sure it must read on the monitors.
~~~~
Kris heads backstage, and this time he’s the one to snag Adam by the wrist and pull him back into the closet.
Adam doesn’t blink at the change in location, all attention focused on Kris. “Oh, my God… Kris! That was fantastic! That a cappella part at the beginning? Genius. Oh, and did you see the look on Kara’s face when y-”
It is the mention of the judges that does it, because Kris doesn’t even want to think about them right now, not when he owes Adam so much, needs so much to thank him, to show him how much he means to Kris.
Adam keeps trying to talk for a second after Kris kisses him, still not fully aware of what’s happened, and Kris takes full advantage of Adam’s open mouth, halting the words with the thrust of his tongue, quickly reacquainting himself with Adam’s taste, which he’d only gotten to experience so briefly before.
Adam’s surprise shows itself in a moment of stillness before Kris finds his kiss returned wholeheartedly, hands moving to Kris’ waist, fingertips just brushing bare skin under the hem of Kris’ shirt as Adam pulls Kris against him, falling back against the door, and rather than using his height to press an advantage and take charge of the kiss, he ducks in to Kris’ level, letting Kris set the pace.
Kris’ fingers, of their own volition it seems, bury themselves in Adam’s dark hair, and Kris uses the grip to tilt Adam’s head to take the kiss deeper, like if Kris could only find the right angle, he could just crawl inside Adam and curl up next to his heart for a while.
Kris pulls back slowly with a last, soft pressing of lips, finding Adam’s eyes despite the darkness of the closet, holding his gaze as he says, brief, heartfelt, “Thank you,” and Kris wonders if that sounded as much like “I love you” to Adam as it did inside his own head.
Adam’s tongue darts out to moisten his lips, and Kris has to stifle a fleeting urge to do it for him. Adam straightens from his sag against the door. “You’re, uh…welcome?” and the slight interrogative rise at the end makes Kris lean in to kiss him again, though this time he has to rise up on the balls of his feet to do it.
Drawing back, hands coming to rest on Adam’s chest, Kris confirms, “Yeah. Kind of a lot,” referring both to his degree of gratitude and to the extent to which Adam has always made him feel welcome.
He gives Adam’s shirt a little tug. “We better get out of here before Debbie sends out the search party again.”
Their tumble from the closet is no more dignified this time than last-probably is less so-and really, either they need to find somewhere else private to talk or Danny needs to find other closets to lurk around, because if this keeps up, they’re going to scar the poor man for life.
~~~~
On their return to the mansion that night, Danny high-tails it up the stairs to his room, giving the coat closet in the foyer wide berth, which Kris finds rather hysterically funny, though he’s too tired to summon forth a laugh.
He hears Adam’s snort from behind him as the other man secures the front door. “Does he think we’ve christened every closet from here to the studio? Or is he just phobic of all closets now?”
“Dunno,” says Kris around a yawn, “either case, he’s out of luck the next time he needs a jacket.”
The two make a beeline for the kitchen, where they raid the refrigerator, ravenous after their standard day of breakfast but no lunch-Adam because he doesn’t want anything to trigger one of his slight food allergies and clog his throat, Kris because he still can’t be certain he won’t throw it back up before going on stage and he doesn’t want to tempt fate-helping themselves to the food Chef Markus had left for them to reheat, as it is rare these days, with so few of them left, that the contestants make it back to the mansion before he leaves for the day.
They pile their plates high, because once Danny mans up enough to brave the kitchen to find his own dinner, there won’t be anything left by the time he gets through.
They carry their plates into the main living area, where they settle on one of the couches in front of the huge widescreen TV, a behemoth unmatched save for the movie screen in the theater in the back of the mansion. They argue good-naturedly about what they’re going to watch, Adam winning by virtue of being the one willing to get up off the very comfortable sofa to deal with the DVD. He chooses a movie from his own personal collection, most of which had migrated here from his room downstairs, an anime, for which pretty much everyone, except maybe Allison and Lil, because “he who is without sin” and all that, had teased him solidly, the “hey, aren’t you a little old for cartoons?” variety, until they’d all been sucked in, too, much to Adam’s smug satisfaction.
As the film starts, Kris can’t help joking, “Is this the one with the guy you stole your hairstyle from?”
Returning to the couch, Adam sits down hard, jostling Kris and threatening the plate balanced on his knees. As Kris glares at him, Adam innocently picks his own plate back up from where he’d left it on the coffee table and settles back into the sofa. “No comment.”
It is indeed “that movie,” though, and it’s a good thing the TV’s as big as it is, because Adam is a complete subtitle snob. Of course, Kris does have to admit, the Japanese voice actors do do a much better job than their American counterparts.
Kris is hungry enough that he’s finished with his dinner before the movie’s a quarter done. With nothing else to keep himself occupied, Kris finds that he’s fading fast, and before he realizes it and can correct it, he slumps into Adam’s shoulder. Adam, who’s thankfully also finished with his dinner, so no panicked run for paper towels, offers to turn off the movie.
Kris quickly declines. He might be tired, might even be unable to keep his eyes open, but he’s not ready to go to sleep yet, mind too active and body too unwilling to give up such close proximity to Adam’s, because Kris might be making progress, if tonight’s kiss is anything to go by, but he doesn’t think he’s brave enough to ask Adam to sleep with him yet, even if it really is sleep and not…anything else.
Adam looks at him skeptically, as if he’s a bomb waiting to go off, or rather, in this case, an exhausted idiot waiting for his face to make painful contact with the coffee table when he inevitably eventually falls from the couch. Obviously coming to a decision, Adam resettles himself farther down the couch, but before Kris can become too disappointed at the increased distance, Adam pulls Kris down towards him, encouraging Kris to stretch out on the couch. Kris gratefully curls into its depths, appropriating Adam’s thigh for a pillow.
Kris feels Adam’s hand rest not quite tentatively on his side, fingers sliding softly into the spaces between Kris’ ribs as if they were laces on a football, though Kris doubts Adam would appreciate the metaphor. He closes his eyes, smiling when Adam takes him at his word that he’s not ready to go to sleep yet and begins reading the subtitles to him, progressing quickly from simple recitation to fully acting out each line, creating voices for each character, though Kris doesn’t hesitate to tell him that his “girl” voice is completely ridiculous.
Adam jogs his leg just enough to force Kris to lift his head for a second and mock-huff about uncooperative pillows. “Hey, quiet down there,” Adam admonishes, hand tightening on Kris’ side only a little, but enough that it implies a threat to Kris’ highly ticklish ribcage. “I’m doing you a service, here.”
Kris laughs, but only briefly, because yeah, Adam really is, in more ways than Adam could know.
~~~~
For the second time this week, Kris wakes in his own bed with no recollection of how he got there, which means that, God, Adam had carried him there again. This is starting a rather embarrassing trend, and Kris can only be glad now that Danny had been lured downstairs by the promise of food, despite probable risk to his delicate sensibilities, sooner rather than later, because while it was pretty darn hilarious watching Danny beat a hasty retreat back upstairs after, coming to investigate what they were watching, he found Adam and him in their relatively innocent position on the couch, contemplating Danny’s reaction to seeing Adam whisking Kris away downstairs, while still funny, is flavored with a little too much red-faced embarrassment for Kris’ taste.
Familiar again is the sound of sleep-quiet breathing coming from elsewhere in the room, but when Kris looks to the armchair, Adam is nowhere to be seen. Confused, Kris rolls over to take in the other side of the room, startling back a bit when he finds Adam asleep next to him. He’s stretched out on top of the sheets, still fully clothed save for his bare feet, but the intimacy of the moment strikes Kris just the same, and he finds that he likes it, even wishes that Adam hadn’t felt it necessary to maintain the few boundaries he had.
As Kris watches Adam sleep, Adam’s face half hidden in shadow because it’s not even dawn yet and the only illumination comes from the floodlights outside, bright enough that they penetrate the blinds to streak the room with strips of faintly glowing blue-white, noting that he doesn’t look younger or more innocent or any of the clichés, just maybe more…himself, if such a thing’s possible, something else draws Kris’ attention, a faint odor that he thinks he should recognize.
Seeing the bottle of nail polish remover on the nightstand, it clicks, and Kris almost fumbles himself right off the bed jerking his arm out from under his body, because if Adam’s removed the polish from his thumb…
Kris had been fiercely protecting the chipped remains of last Wednesday’s blue-black all week, determined to hang on as long as possible to the piece of himself Adam had imparted to him as symbolized by the paint, and to think that Adam might have taken it away, without warning…
Kris gets his right hand to eye level, angling to see it in the dim light, and yes, the chips are gone-but in their place is a fresh coat of polish, the shine of it letting Kris know that the careful multi-coat procedure had been followed. Kris folds his right hand to run his index finger over the nail and doesn’t bother to suppress the warm shiver that runs through him at feeling its slickness.
When he looks back over at Adam, the other man’s eyes are open and watching him. Feeling a little caught out at having Adam witness his reaction to the new polish, he deflects by displaying the thumb to Adam and raising an eyebrow.
Adam shrugs into the mattress, eyes an intriguing blend of sleepy and sly. “Not my fault you can sleep through anything. Besides, looked like you needed a touch-up.”
Kris relaxes from where his alarm had pulled him up into an almost sitting position, settling back down into the bed, propping his head up on his left fist to regard Adam. “Point,” he concedes. Nodding to the remover on the nightstand, he continues, “But what about…?” trailing off leadingly.
“Oh.” Adams gaze skitters away from Kris’ for a second, and now Kris is really curious. Adam’s eyes come back Kris’ way and end up focusing in the general direction of Kris’ left ear, and Adam’s expression is tinged with slight uncertainty and maybe even a little embarrassment. He raises up his own right hand, and Kris sees that though all his other fingers have their customary paint job, Adam’s right thumbnail is bare.
Kris can feel his heart thudding in his chest even before Adam says, “I just thought, if you could carry a piece of me,” nodding at the hand Kris has tucked protectively between the mattress and his chest, “I could carry a piece of you, too.”
Kris reaches out to Adam, consciously trying to keep his hand from shaking and mostly succeeding, running his own painted thumb over Adam’s bare one, noting the contrast-point/counterpoint, theme/variation-and is proud when he is able to say, “Looks good on you,” while keeping his voice completely steady.
Adam smiles, lacing his fingers with Kris’. “I thought so.”
They stay that way for a few minutes before Kris shakes himself back to reality. “I guess we should get back to sleep, huh?”
Adam slowly disentangles his hand from Kris’. “Yeah. Kind of a big day tomorrow.” He rises to sit on the edge of the bed. “I guess I should-”
Kris grabs a hold of Adam’s arm before he can get too far, though he’s not quite able to meet Adam’s eyes when he offers, “You know, you could just… I mean, it’s not like I’m hurting for room, here.”
Adam remains sitting on the bed, though he does settle back away from the edge a bit-invitation not yet accepted, but not refused either. “You’re sure?”
Kris brings his gaze to meet Adam’s, needing to convince him that, yes, he’s sure. He needs this. “Positive.”
Adam shifts so that he can pull the sheets down and slide under them, stretching out along what is now his side of the bed, smile genuine, but with a touch of wariness behind it. “I should warn you, whenever I’ve…shared a bed with anyone, even if we go to sleep on opposite sides and even if the bed is huge, I tend to wake up on top of them. I guess I’m what you would call a, uh, a cuddler.” He laughs self-deprecatingly. “And that sounds just oh, so manly.”
Kris laughs to hide the fact that the prospect of waking up wrapped in Adam Lambert is one he finds quite pleasurable. “Well,” he says, not even trying to sound unaffected, because acting’s Adam’s thing, not his, “I guess we better start off close-so it’s not such a shock later.” He flips quickly onto his side, away from Adam, because he’s flustered himself a little with how bald an invitation that was.
Adam doesn’t respond for a moment, but then Kris feels the bed dip, and Adam’s hand drops to rest on his hip as the rest of him tucks in behind Kris, the heat of his long, broad body blazing into Kris from shoulder to toe.
“Is this alright?” Adam murmurs, breath a warm current over Kris’ ear.
Kris shifts back slightly into Adam, and Adam’s hand slips farther around him, splayed against his stomach, sending a flurry of butterflies winging from there along his nerves, but also oddly soothing and the same time. “Yeah, very.”
Adam ducks his face into the nape of Kris’ neck, his softly whispered, “Goodnight,” not so much heard as felt.
Kris manages a clumsy, “Goodnight,” of his own, and though he’s certain he’ll never be able to fall asleep, not with Adam draped over him like a living blanket, sending excited waves of energy through him, eventually his own weariness gets the better of him, and he drifts off into welcoming darkness.
Next Part
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Alright, so I know that Debbie was in the hospital for Top 3. Sue me. I forgot about the accident while writing, and I didn't feel like making up a character to take her place. And yeah, maybe all the action couldn't fit into the commercial breaks during the show. Look at it this way: closet = tiny TARDIS, so time is relative. At least, that's my story. :D
Oh, in case anyone was wondering, the movie the guys are watching is, at least in my mind, Naruto Shippuuden 2: Bonds, although I'm pretty sure it's not out on DVD yet. It's a little bit of an inside joke with, uh, myself, because the first time I saw Adam, my first thought was, "That guy has Sasuke hair!"
Picture of Sasuke:
See, his hair's even drawn with blue highlights!
And oh, yeah, chapter title from "I Want You" by Savage Garden. Seemed appropriate. :)
Okay, so you know the drill: you guys = awesome. Comments = love. Me = tired.
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