When They Knew - Reece Shearsmith/Steve Pemberton
Title: When They Knew
Pairings: Reece/Steve
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2286
Summary: The first times they all knew that Steve and Reece were in love
AN: Hello! It’s that time again, sorry. Here’s some more slash for you, and this one’s a bit more self explanatory in terms of when it’s set, so at least that’s something. If you’d like to read the other’s we’ve written you can find them here or here on lj if you’re that way inclined. Enjoy, darlings.
When They Knew
By Jess and Jodie
For Steve, it happened immediately. In his first month at Bretton Hall, after being pushed about by the people he didn’t really like but lived in halls with, he’d finally managed to click with a group of students in one of his seminars. He’d just quit smoking and was making a terrible job of it seen as most eighteen-year-old drama students were smokers. Although he did try at first, because of this he’d find himself pulling out a crisp pack of Benson & Hedges between classes without realising because everyone around him had. Even when he’d managed to cut down the odd drag a few times a week, he still stuck around with everyone who’d form a circle outside the building, sheltering from the wind as they smoked.
It was there he first noticed the only person who never had a cigarette between two fingers: an awkward and ridiculously young looking lad with piercing blue eyes who someone had told Steve was called Reece. Steve had seem him a few times before actually speaking to him, because he was constantly at the side of a tall man with strawberry blonde hair who Steve found somewhat intimidating. It was quite a long time before Steve got the chance to speak to Reece properly without Mark hovering over him, even though Steve thought all along that the man was brilliant. One lesson, Mark didn’t show up and Steve saw Reece standing in the corner looking painfully lost and he couldn’t help but smile at how out of place he was. That was the first time Reece made him laugh so hard that everyone else in the class looked over at the two of them as though they were both completely crazy. That’s when he knew.
*****
Jeremy met Reece and Steve through the intimidating man with the strawberry blonde hair. He and Mark had known each other a little while, hated each other for an even littler while and had spent the longest while drunk in each other’s company. He first saw Steve and Reece at a party, he and Mark on the other side of the room half cut and lost in their own conversation as always. Jeremy had watched in mild fascination at the two of them from across the crowded space, absolutely and obviously so rapt with each other. Mark had glanced at Jeremy staring and leant down to him, mumbling into his ear over the noise. “That’s the friend I was telling you about; Reece. We’re in the same halls. That’s his-”
“Boyfriend?” Jeremy cut him off; still staring at them and something in his voice said he had them both utterly worked out before he’d even heard them speak. Mark had nudged him with his elbow and stood up straight then, speaking in clear outrage.
“What? No! They’re just mates.”
“If you say so.” Jeremy took a sip of his drink and smirked at Mark’s confusion.
“I do say so. They’ve not even known each other that long. He doesn’t even know him. Reece doesn’t, he wouldn’t, they’re not…shut up.”
Jeremy successfully hid his pleasure at knocking Mark off guard and continued as though he knew so much more than him, which he evidently did. “What’s the other guys name?”
“Steve. Listen, Jeremy there’s nothing between them alright? They’ve only known each other a couple of months. Me and Reece, we’re-”
“Doesn’t matter how long it’s been. It’s there, look at them.” He nodded over at the pair of them and Mark risked a look too, seeing Steve and Reece with a new perspective for the first time. He sighed then, putting his drink down on the table in a huff.
“I don’t care, you’re wrong. There is absolutely nothing going on between those two.” As Mark wandered across the room to meet them, Jeremy finished off his drink in silence with a satisfied grin. That’s when he knew.
*****
Mark very rarely lets his guard down. In fact, he thinks the only time he really does is when he’s more than a bit inebriated. Other than that though, he’s confident that his best attribute is never showing his hand. With Reece however, it’s a totally different story. Usually, Mark hates everyone he meets at first until they give him a reason to think otherwise, but not Reece.
They were in the same halls right from the start of University, their rooms down the corridor from one another’s and because of that they were forced into each other’s company. Reece was this terribly nervous and quiet person and Mark can remember the first time they spoke, towering over him with hair in his eyes and when he smiled Reece smiled back and he didn’t even have to say anything for Mark to know he wouldn’t hate him. They were inseparable for a little while after that; because Reece felt a little bit lost without him, and Mark was so infatuated he could hardly stand to let Reece out of his sight.
Even when Reece and Steve moved into his flat after Uni, sharing a room where he could hear them talking late into the night Mark still didn’t think about what it all meant. Looking back on it, he curses himself for not noticing anything sooner because he knows that it would have stopped him from making a fool out of himself on more than one occasion. Jeremy eventually got bored of winding him up about it, and so Mark assumed he’d proved himself wrong and given up.
That was, until the night the boiler broke. The three of them had only been living there a few weeks, although Jeremy stayed a few nights a week when he was too drunk to find his way home. Reece had said all along that the landlord made him feel uneasy, and of course he wouldn’t let it lie when one morning he heard Mark screech from the bathroom because he’d stepped into a bath filled with ice cold water. A few hours later, after a totally exasperated conversation with the landlord in which Mark got so frustrated that Steve had to take over, they still had no heat.
The four of them had taken to setting up camp in the living room, the gas fire on full and the TV bursting light from the corner of the room until Jeremy fell asleep and Mark’s eyes were heavy and he was forced to close them despite not wanting to. He was lying in the chair, his head resting on one arm and his long legs hanging over the edge of the other. He wished then he’d insisted on going on the sofa because only half of him was covered by his blanket but Reece and Steve were already sat on it when he came in, Reece flicking through the channels frantically with the remote.
He could still hear the television, although it sounded far away and muffled over the soft humming and crackling of the gas heater. Closer though, behind him on the sofa he could hear Reece and Steve mumbling stupid things to each other, laughing quietly at whatever was on screen. Steve in the purple fleece blanket Mark found when they moved in and Reece in his huge parka with the hood up and the two of them murmuring at each other through pure exhaustion and an unwillingness to sleep.
“Reece, are you gonna turn the telly off?”
“Why?”
“Cause it’s wasting ‘leccy.”
“I’m watching it.”
“Your eyes are closed.”
“They’re watching it.”
“They’re asleep.”
“Well you’re watching it.”
“I’m not. I want to go to sleep.”
Mark smiled slightly at their tired conversation, his face completely out of the view because of the way the chair was positioned and the darkness that was shrouding his features. After a little while longer of redundant banter, Mark could hear the TV click off and the static on the screen crack before it was silent again. They shuffled on the sofa, presumably getting comfortable although Mark was certain it must have been difficult with the two of them on that tiny thing, one arm each to lean on. It wasn’t any worse than having to make do on an armchair with legs as long as his, he supposed though. After a little while longer, just as he was dropping off, he heard Reece’s voice again quiet and small into the dark.
“I’m cold.”
“I know.” Steve answered, his tone just as hushed and laced with fatigue.
“Let me share your blanket.”
“Come here then.”
More rustling then, mainly the sound of Reece’s coat against the back of the sofa and then it was quiet again for what felt like long, stretching minutes. Mark tried hard to sleep, but found he was too uncomfortable. He was planning on laying out some pillows in front of the fire and just lying on the floor when he heard Reece’s voice one more time, this time shaking a little and very faint.
“Steve?”
“Mmm?”
“Kiss me.”
Mark froze then, unable to even breathe as steady as he would have liked. He let out a shaking breath as quietly as he could manage as though it was then more important than ever to not give himself away. He didn’t realise until minutes later, after he’d heard the familiar sound of soft skin on skin and the steady breathing of sleep that he’d had his fingers digging into his palm. That’s when he knew.
*****
It rained terribly during their last week in Edinburgh. They found themselves running from the theatre late at night, bombing down the high street to their hotel before they got too soaked. Reece had been hiding the ever-growing symptoms of an oncoming cold for days, although part of him knew that his voice was becoming noticeably scratchy. Steve had told him he’d woken up coughing the night before but Reece had no memory of it, as if the entire thing was a blurred fever dream.
They’d said goodnight to Mark and Jeremy in the lobby, because he and Steve had been lumbered with the sixth floor room after Mark saw the lift was broken when they arrived and snatched the room key for the ground floor room before Reece could even blink. For the first few nights he and Steve took to calling their room on the hotel phone and hanging up as soon as Mark answered as some kind of revenge, but the lady on reception told them to stop it on their way out one morning.
Reece had just brushed his teeth and clicked the bathroom light out when he made his way back into the room, just as Steve was pulling the window shut. Reece knew he’d only done it because it had blown open, and when Reece tried to reach the handle a few minutes before he couldn’t quite reach. Steve gave him a knowing look when he started coughing a few minutes later because it sounded less like that of a 28 year old non-smoker and more like the cough you’d hear from an elderly gentlemen after 60 years of 40 Silk Cut a day. Reece just snapped that he was fine and closed his eyes and he was asleep within five minutes, although he was certain he could hear Steve get up off his bed at some point.
When he woke up, it was light out but only just. He could see Steve on the next bed, one arm hanging over the edge but Reece didn’t realise until he’d rubbed at his eyes that Steve was on top of the covers and still fully dressed.
He sat up in his bed, rubbing at the side of his face and immediately feeling the ache in his throat and the throbbing need for caffeine. He could hear Steve breathing rhythmically, but as he looked over at him he could tell he was absolutely knackered. They’d had a tough run with the show but for whatever reason Steve had taken to collapsing on the bed without getting changed. Reece wasn’t sure what the story was, until he looked over at the side cabinet across the room and saw the pack of Bourbon creams, the box of lemon Strepsils and the plastic bag from Spar half hanging out of the waste bin.
Reece looked over at Steve again then, and it was as if it just clicked. Steve’s coat was on the bed next to him, crumpled and obviously soaking wet, his jeans damp at the bottom and his shoes on the floor by the bed drenched where he’d stepped in a puddle. He’d waited until Reece was asleep to go because he knew Reece would tell him to stop making a fuss, that he was fine and didn’t need anything for his cough and would do without a biscuit with his morning tea, but Steve knew he would wake up and grumble because Steve knows everything about him.
Steve had gone out for him, risked catching pneumonia himself for the sake of some biscuits and a pack of cough sweets he could have gotten in the newsagents when it opened in the morning. Reece felt a smile pull at his mouth as he glanced over at the bloody idiot on the next bed. That’s when he knew.
Pairings: Reece/Steve
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2286
Summary: The first times they all knew that Steve and Reece were in love
AN: Hello! It’s that time again, sorry. Here’s some more slash for you, and this one’s a bit more self explanatory in terms of when it’s set, so at least that’s something. If you’d like to read the other’s we’ve written you can find them here or here on lj if you’re that way inclined. Enjoy, darlings.
When They Knew
By Jess and Jodie
For Steve, it happened immediately. In his first month at Bretton Hall, after being pushed about by the people he didn’t really like but lived in halls with, he’d finally managed to click with a group of students in one of his seminars. He’d just quit smoking and was making a terrible job of it seen as most eighteen-year-old drama students were smokers. Although he did try at first, because of this he’d find himself pulling out a crisp pack of Benson & Hedges between classes without realising because everyone around him had. Even when he’d managed to cut down the odd drag a few times a week, he still stuck around with everyone who’d form a circle outside the building, sheltering from the wind as they smoked.
It was there he first noticed the only person who never had a cigarette between two fingers: an awkward and ridiculously young looking lad with piercing blue eyes who someone had told Steve was called Reece. Steve had seem him a few times before actually speaking to him, because he was constantly at the side of a tall man with strawberry blonde hair who Steve found somewhat intimidating. It was quite a long time before Steve got the chance to speak to Reece properly without Mark hovering over him, even though Steve thought all along that the man was brilliant. One lesson, Mark didn’t show up and Steve saw Reece standing in the corner looking painfully lost and he couldn’t help but smile at how out of place he was. That was the first time Reece made him laugh so hard that everyone else in the class looked over at the two of them as though they were both completely crazy. That’s when he knew.
*****
Jeremy met Reece and Steve through the intimidating man with the strawberry blonde hair. He and Mark had known each other a little while, hated each other for an even littler while and had spent the longest while drunk in each other’s company. He first saw Steve and Reece at a party, he and Mark on the other side of the room half cut and lost in their own conversation as always. Jeremy had watched in mild fascination at the two of them from across the crowded space, absolutely and obviously so rapt with each other. Mark had glanced at Jeremy staring and leant down to him, mumbling into his ear over the noise. “That’s the friend I was telling you about; Reece. We’re in the same halls. That’s his-”
“Boyfriend?” Jeremy cut him off; still staring at them and something in his voice said he had them both utterly worked out before he’d even heard them speak. Mark had nudged him with his elbow and stood up straight then, speaking in clear outrage.
“What? No! They’re just mates.”
“If you say so.” Jeremy took a sip of his drink and smirked at Mark’s confusion.
“I do say so. They’ve not even known each other that long. He doesn’t even know him. Reece doesn’t, he wouldn’t, they’re not…shut up.”
Jeremy successfully hid his pleasure at knocking Mark off guard and continued as though he knew so much more than him, which he evidently did. “What’s the other guys name?”
“Steve. Listen, Jeremy there’s nothing between them alright? They’ve only known each other a couple of months. Me and Reece, we’re-”
“Doesn’t matter how long it’s been. It’s there, look at them.” He nodded over at the pair of them and Mark risked a look too, seeing Steve and Reece with a new perspective for the first time. He sighed then, putting his drink down on the table in a huff.
“I don’t care, you’re wrong. There is absolutely nothing going on between those two.” As Mark wandered across the room to meet them, Jeremy finished off his drink in silence with a satisfied grin. That’s when he knew.
*****
Mark very rarely lets his guard down. In fact, he thinks the only time he really does is when he’s more than a bit inebriated. Other than that though, he’s confident that his best attribute is never showing his hand. With Reece however, it’s a totally different story. Usually, Mark hates everyone he meets at first until they give him a reason to think otherwise, but not Reece.
They were in the same halls right from the start of University, their rooms down the corridor from one another’s and because of that they were forced into each other’s company. Reece was this terribly nervous and quiet person and Mark can remember the first time they spoke, towering over him with hair in his eyes and when he smiled Reece smiled back and he didn’t even have to say anything for Mark to know he wouldn’t hate him. They were inseparable for a little while after that; because Reece felt a little bit lost without him, and Mark was so infatuated he could hardly stand to let Reece out of his sight.
Even when Reece and Steve moved into his flat after Uni, sharing a room where he could hear them talking late into the night Mark still didn’t think about what it all meant. Looking back on it, he curses himself for not noticing anything sooner because he knows that it would have stopped him from making a fool out of himself on more than one occasion. Jeremy eventually got bored of winding him up about it, and so Mark assumed he’d proved himself wrong and given up.
That was, until the night the boiler broke. The three of them had only been living there a few weeks, although Jeremy stayed a few nights a week when he was too drunk to find his way home. Reece had said all along that the landlord made him feel uneasy, and of course he wouldn’t let it lie when one morning he heard Mark screech from the bathroom because he’d stepped into a bath filled with ice cold water. A few hours later, after a totally exasperated conversation with the landlord in which Mark got so frustrated that Steve had to take over, they still had no heat.
The four of them had taken to setting up camp in the living room, the gas fire on full and the TV bursting light from the corner of the room until Jeremy fell asleep and Mark’s eyes were heavy and he was forced to close them despite not wanting to. He was lying in the chair, his head resting on one arm and his long legs hanging over the edge of the other. He wished then he’d insisted on going on the sofa because only half of him was covered by his blanket but Reece and Steve were already sat on it when he came in, Reece flicking through the channels frantically with the remote.
He could still hear the television, although it sounded far away and muffled over the soft humming and crackling of the gas heater. Closer though, behind him on the sofa he could hear Reece and Steve mumbling stupid things to each other, laughing quietly at whatever was on screen. Steve in the purple fleece blanket Mark found when they moved in and Reece in his huge parka with the hood up and the two of them murmuring at each other through pure exhaustion and an unwillingness to sleep.
“Reece, are you gonna turn the telly off?”
“Why?”
“Cause it’s wasting ‘leccy.”
“I’m watching it.”
“Your eyes are closed.”
“They’re watching it.”
“They’re asleep.”
“Well you’re watching it.”
“I’m not. I want to go to sleep.”
Mark smiled slightly at their tired conversation, his face completely out of the view because of the way the chair was positioned and the darkness that was shrouding his features. After a little while longer of redundant banter, Mark could hear the TV click off and the static on the screen crack before it was silent again. They shuffled on the sofa, presumably getting comfortable although Mark was certain it must have been difficult with the two of them on that tiny thing, one arm each to lean on. It wasn’t any worse than having to make do on an armchair with legs as long as his, he supposed though. After a little while longer, just as he was dropping off, he heard Reece’s voice again quiet and small into the dark.
“I’m cold.”
“I know.” Steve answered, his tone just as hushed and laced with fatigue.
“Let me share your blanket.”
“Come here then.”
More rustling then, mainly the sound of Reece’s coat against the back of the sofa and then it was quiet again for what felt like long, stretching minutes. Mark tried hard to sleep, but found he was too uncomfortable. He was planning on laying out some pillows in front of the fire and just lying on the floor when he heard Reece’s voice one more time, this time shaking a little and very faint.
“Steve?”
“Mmm?”
“Kiss me.”
Mark froze then, unable to even breathe as steady as he would have liked. He let out a shaking breath as quietly as he could manage as though it was then more important than ever to not give himself away. He didn’t realise until minutes later, after he’d heard the familiar sound of soft skin on skin and the steady breathing of sleep that he’d had his fingers digging into his palm. That’s when he knew.
*****
It rained terribly during their last week in Edinburgh. They found themselves running from the theatre late at night, bombing down the high street to their hotel before they got too soaked. Reece had been hiding the ever-growing symptoms of an oncoming cold for days, although part of him knew that his voice was becoming noticeably scratchy. Steve had told him he’d woken up coughing the night before but Reece had no memory of it, as if the entire thing was a blurred fever dream.
They’d said goodnight to Mark and Jeremy in the lobby, because he and Steve had been lumbered with the sixth floor room after Mark saw the lift was broken when they arrived and snatched the room key for the ground floor room before Reece could even blink. For the first few nights he and Steve took to calling their room on the hotel phone and hanging up as soon as Mark answered as some kind of revenge, but the lady on reception told them to stop it on their way out one morning.
Reece had just brushed his teeth and clicked the bathroom light out when he made his way back into the room, just as Steve was pulling the window shut. Reece knew he’d only done it because it had blown open, and when Reece tried to reach the handle a few minutes before he couldn’t quite reach. Steve gave him a knowing look when he started coughing a few minutes later because it sounded less like that of a 28 year old non-smoker and more like the cough you’d hear from an elderly gentlemen after 60 years of 40 Silk Cut a day. Reece just snapped that he was fine and closed his eyes and he was asleep within five minutes, although he was certain he could hear Steve get up off his bed at some point.
When he woke up, it was light out but only just. He could see Steve on the next bed, one arm hanging over the edge but Reece didn’t realise until he’d rubbed at his eyes that Steve was on top of the covers and still fully dressed.
He sat up in his bed, rubbing at the side of his face and immediately feeling the ache in his throat and the throbbing need for caffeine. He could hear Steve breathing rhythmically, but as he looked over at him he could tell he was absolutely knackered. They’d had a tough run with the show but for whatever reason Steve had taken to collapsing on the bed without getting changed. Reece wasn’t sure what the story was, until he looked over at the side cabinet across the room and saw the pack of Bourbon creams, the box of lemon Strepsils and the plastic bag from Spar half hanging out of the waste bin.
Reece looked over at Steve again then, and it was as if it just clicked. Steve’s coat was on the bed next to him, crumpled and obviously soaking wet, his jeans damp at the bottom and his shoes on the floor by the bed drenched where he’d stepped in a puddle. He’d waited until Reece was asleep to go because he knew Reece would tell him to stop making a fuss, that he was fine and didn’t need anything for his cough and would do without a biscuit with his morning tea, but Steve knew he would wake up and grumble because Steve knows everything about him.
Steve had gone out for him, risked catching pneumonia himself for the sake of some biscuits and a pack of cough sweets he could have gotten in the newsagents when it opened in the morning. Reece felt a smile pull at his mouth as he glanced over at the bloody idiot on the next bed. That’s when he knew.