(no subject)
one shot, two shots
tom conrad / william beckett, 576 words
originally, their friendship was instantaneous.
william fell in love with the way tom rolled his eyes at things like people chewing loudly or talking during movies. tom appreciated bill's boldness and ability to feign innocence after throwing popcorn at the loud people.
when they went to parties, they would circulate the room and talk to as many friends as it seemed polite to do but they would always end up in a corner, chatting to each other and making some excuse to sneak out and drive to a random spot on the highway, pull over and continue their conversation on the side of the road with a bottle of jack's and smiles on their faces.
mike would tease william about having a crush and the jokes only got worse when he suggested tom join the band and take over little mike's position. it wasn't love, though, as much as it was a mutual admiration for one another and a longing to see the other succeed. when mike pushed william to try harder, to sing better and write more, tom told him that what he did was more than good enough.
it used to make bill smile.
it used to make tom laugh, the way william's face would turn bright red at a compliment and he would avert his eyes or leave the room altogether, mumbling that he forgot something in the van.
now, their friendship is gradual.
it starts with a message left on an answering machine and continues from there.
there is an email in tom's inbox that reads URGENT but is just a collection of jokes william's kid sister told him that he is passing along. tom returns the email with blond jokes and a short anecdote about he and nick's adventures one drunken night. eventually their machine messages get longer, their emails more detailed and finally, tom picks up the phone and dials william's number at a time he knows he'll actually get an answer and says, "knock knock."
"who's there?" william smirks, unable to avoid the conversation.
"tom conrad, calling to say what's up."
"that's not a knock knock joke," william points out and tom shrugs.
"i know, but you enjoyed it anyway."
their phone bills might be getting ridiculous but william secretly doesn't care because he'd pay any amount asked of him to get tom's friendship back.
it wasn't love that compelled them to be friends in the first place, but he thinks it might be love that drives him to continuously dial the same number, night after night. he thinks it might be love that gives him that butterfly feeling in the pit of his stomach whenever his phone rings and he hears tom's voice on the other end.
he thinks it might be love when tom says, "i took a picture of you once, while you were sleeping. i don't know bill-bo, you looked gorgeous."
"tom-bo," he sighs, bites his bottom lip and doesn't even pretend that he isn't grinning from ear to ear. "you and i both know i wasn't sleeping."
--
it has been entirely too long and i apologize. i feel like a celine dion song.
"it's all coming back
it's all coming back to me now"