FIC: 8 Ways to Get Your Man, or, Not That Zach Reads Cosmo or Anything

Sep 28, 2010 21:28

Title: 8 Ways to Get Your Man, or, Not That Zach Reads Cosmo or Anything
Author: likeaglass
Pairing: Zach/Chris
Rating: errr, PG-13?
Summary: Zach tries to seduce Chris. It doesn't go exactly as planned.

1. Make eye contact.

Staring into Chris's eyes was never exactly a hardship -- Zach doesn't think he's ever seen a blue that's actually made him feel like he was drowning, before -- but staring into his eyes with purpose...that was nervewracking. And unexpectedly hard to accomplish with any sort of suaveness. Still, if you stared soulfully into a guy's eyes long enough, he was bound to notice eventually.

Just, maybe not in the way you would hope.

"Dude, why are you looking at me like that?" Chris said, eyes wide. "You look like a serial killer."

Zach sighed and looked away.

2. Show you're interested in what he likes

"So, since when are you into running?" Chris finished lacing up his sneakers and stood up, only to bend over and touch his toes, the firm roundness of his ass outlined obscenely in his flimsy running shorts. If Zach didn't know any better, he would say Chris was deliberately tempting him; but of course he did know better, which was the whole point of this ridiculous show of macho, sweaty bonding. "I thought you were more into that downward-facing dog stuff," Chris said, straightening up -- and then kept on straightening, raising his arms above his head, his shirt lifting to show a tantalizing slice of stomach, a trail of hair bifurcating his taut, golden abs and leading down into...

Zach quickly looked away, taking a steadying gulp of water from his bottle. "I am." He peeked over at Chris, who was thankfully done stretching and fully covered once more. "I mean, I'm into that too, but it's always good to...expand one's horizons," he said, meaningfully.

Chris smiled and slapped him on the back. "I know, dude. Why do you think I went to that yoga class with you?" He picked up his keys and headed to the front door. "Come on, last one to the park buys the booze tonight!"

"Great," Zach muttered under his breath, trying not to grimace too noticeably as he followed Chris out into the bright LA morning.

An hour later, dripping with sweat and about to be much poorer, Zach dropped onto his couch gracelessly and wondered if all this was really worth it. Then he saw Chris out of the corner of his eye, lifting up his shirt to wipe his sweaty brow, and decided, very emphatically, yes. It was totally worth it.

3. Play up your assets

One thing Zach knew about himself, without any doubt or self-consciousness, was that he was smart. He read Faulkner and Tennyson and Joyce for fun, he knew more polysyllabic words than probably all of his college English professors combined, and he had been told since the age of seven that he had a natural eloquence when he spoke.

One thing he knew about Chris was, he liked intelligence.

He was not above using this knowledge to get what he wanted.

Chris opened the door at his knock, costume half off and smiling nervously. He raised an eyebrow. "Well? What'd you think?" He gestured for Zach to sit down and went back to the mirror, swiping at the rest of his stage makeup with a cloth.

"Well," Zach began, and took a deep breath.

The words flowed off his tongue, slow and deliberate, trying to convey how much he wanted him, how much effort he was putting into this relationship with every syllable, every word of thoughtful criticism and praise. He wasn't just some brainless twink or some airheaded fangirl, this speech said: he was smart, and thoughtful, and knew Chris, knew what he wanted and his insecurities, how he wanted approval and honest thoughtful commentary in equal parts.

Still, though, Zach had never been above a little good-natured teasing. "Also," he tilted his head as if to think about a deep and intellectual point, "it was interesting when you took off your pants."

Chris choked on his tongue, staring at Zach incredulously in the mirror. "Interesting," he said, eyeing Zach, "when I...took off my pants."

"Well," Zach said, a cheeky grin on his face, "it certainly added to my enjoyment of the play."

Chris threw the cloth at him.

So much for intellectualism.

4. Compliment him

It was pretty much a given that, no matter what Chris chose to wear, he would be eminently fuckable. Christ, somehow the man made clogs and sweatpants look...well, not good, exactly, more like oh god I don't care that you have no taste in clothes fuckmenowplease. Zach was pretty sure it wasn't just him, either; he'd clicked through enough posts on Oh No They Didn't in which approximately five thousand fangirls lusted obscenely after Chris's bubble butt to be relatively sure it wasn't just him, anyway.

Still, when Chris chose to dress up, his crisp, freshly pressed suit tailored exquisitely to all the long, lean lines of his body, the line of his jaw freshly shaven and smooth...

Zach shifted in his seat, his own suit pants uncomfortably tight, and told himself to hang on just for the next few minutes, and then they would be out of this interview and on to the afterparty, which would no doubt have booze.

"Hey," Chris said, slapping him on the back as they shuffled out of the interview room, "that went well, huh?" He started to undo his tie, and before Zach really thought about it or could stop himself he was reaching over, stilling Chris's fingers on the silk. Chris looked at him, eyes shining in the low light of the backstage area. "What's up?" he asked, voice soft, his fingers unmoving beneath Zach's.

Zach took a breath and let it out, slowly moving his hand away from Chris. "Nothing, man," he said, and then cleared his throat; his voice had come out too scratchy and hoarse. "Just, the suit looks good on you, and we've still got the afterparty." He shrugged, aiming for nonchalant but probably missing by miles.

"Oh," Chris said, "right." His eyes were impossibly blue, Zach noticed, and the skin around them crinkled adorably when he smiled -- and yes, Zach realized how gay using the word "adorably" in any context made him, but he was trying to get into Chris's (incredibly tight, form-fitting) pants, so. "We'll be the two most suave motherfuckers in the room, then," Chris said, gesturing to Zach's own dove gray suit. "You're looking pretty fierce yourself there, Miss Zachary."

Zach shook his head, but couldn't help smiling as he pushed Chris's chest, sending Chris stumbling away from him, laughing like a drunken donkey. "Whatever, Princess," he said, still smiling, "let's get out of here."

5. Lean in close

The bass in the club was heavy and insistent, pounding though Zach's body like a heartbeat, quickening his pulse and making it impossible to hear anything anyone said, even if they were right next to you. It was exactly what he had been picturing when he asked Chris if he wanted to go to this concert with him. It was perfect.

"WHAT?" Zach asked, placing a steadying hand on the small of Chris's back, leaning in so he could -- ostensibly -- hear what Chris was saying. He was so close he could smell Chris, a mix of soap and clean sweat and an underlying hint of something delicious, something that was all Chris.

Chris turned to look at him, the blue of his eyes sparkling with humor and the beer he'd drunk. "I said," Chris began, smiling, "it's kind of loud in here, isn't it?" He leaned closer as he talked, the entire right side of his body pressed up against the entire left side of Zach's. The heat of his bare arm was scorching against Zach's, like a brand against his skin.

Zach grinned back and opened his mouth to reply, only to let out an undignified yelp when some drunken twink flailed into him with what Zach supposed could be called dancing, if he were being generous. But since he was pushed into Chris and -- of course, of course -- into Chris's beer, which spilled all over both of them, he wasn't particularly inclined to be.

Chris started laughing, gripping Zach's arm with his sopping hand, and Zach shook his head and joined him. "I should have known this would happen," he said, conversationally. Chris didn't hear over the sound of his laughter.

6. Draw attention to your mouth

"Got a light?" Zach asked as he slouched against the bricks next to Chris, an unlit cigarette dangling artfully from his lips. The lip balm he had borrowed from Zoe left a slick sheen on his mouth, and Zoe, after she had stopped laughing at him, had promised him that he looked as pretty as a princess. Zach had glared at her until she pushed him out of the booth and towards the back of the bar, telling him to hurry up and get his man, already.

Chris looked over at Zach and smiled around the cigarette in his own mouth. "Sure," he said, taking out his lighter and leaning close, his hands cupped around the flame as he lit Zach's cigarette.

"Thanks." Zach smiled at Chris and inhaled, then drew the cigarette out of his mouth, slowly, and exhaled, letting the smoke drift lazily from his lips. He closed his eyes, as if this cigarette were better than sex and he wanted to savor every second of it, before putting it back to his lips and taking another drag, hollowing his cheeks like he was sucking cock and loving it.

"Wow, Zach. I never noticed before, but your mouth..." Chris said, breaking the silence around them. He sounded speculative, and Zach thought, this is it here it comes. "Dude, do you wear lipgloss?"

Zach's eyes popped open and he scowled, managing to mumble something that sounded enough like, "fuck you, it's lip balm" around his cigarette to make Chris laugh.

He seemed to be laughing at Zach a lot, lately.

7. Make him jealous

Zach had really, really not wanted to do this, but desperate measures and all that.

Kristen was out of the question, even though she knew about his -- well, not crush, exactly; more like adolescent infatuation with a side of completely obsessed with Chris's mouth. Chris would never believe he was dating a girl, anyway, even one as objectively hot as Kristen was, which was one of the downsides of knowing each other so well. Besides, when they were drunk and bored after filming one evening Chris had confessed to marathoning all ten episodes of So NoTORIous before turning to Zach and saying, "I didn't realize you could get a job playing yourself" and descending into drunken laughter. So pretending to be bi was out of the question.

Luckily, Tyler Shields appeared in Zach's life just when he was starting to despair of ever putting his Operation: Make Chris Jealous into action. He was everything Zach needed in a supposed paramour -- Gorgeous? Check. Gay? Check. Willing to spend ridiculous amounts of time with Zach while doing vaguely homoerotic things together? Check and check.

Unfortunately, Chris was not cooperating with the plan. His only response to the whole incredibly, incredibly gay milk debacle (which was so obviously a metaphor for bucketloads of come spraying on Zach's face that it was really kind of embarrassing) was to call him up and laugh hysterically at him while seemingly choking on words of mockery, and then proceed to text him every half hour with nothing but facial jokes. Not the response he was going for, but okay, fine; he could work with that. Zach replied to Chris's texts with vaguely suggestive remarks about how fascinating and amazing and not to mention big Tyler was. Huge, even. The texts stopped, but Chris didn't come frantically knocking on his door, desperate to put his own come on Zach's face.

So, fine, stage two: spend ridiculous amounts of time with Tyler, alone in the desert, while ignoring Chris for a while. Absence supposedly made the heart grow fonder, and all that; maybe Zach's absence would pain Chris so deeply that he would let Zach fuck him in the ass. Zach was ever hopeful.

Zach realized his plan was inherently flawed when he flipped his phone closed for the fifth time in an hour; did he really call Chris so often? Jesus, he had it bad. And Chris apparently didn't even realize Zach wasn't texting him or talking to him, because there were no missed messages, no mixed texts from Chris's phone. Was he really the only one who called the other? He couldn't remember.

When he finally got back to LA, a week later and in the depths of some serious Chris-withdrawal, he decided he couldn't stand it anymore and pressed speed dial one.

Chris's voice answered, breathless and dick-hardening, after the first ring. "Hello?"

"Hey," Zach said, trying to be cool, be collected, when really he just wanted to hunt Chris down and stick his tongue down his throat for hours to make up for all the lost time of the last few endless days. "Did you try to call me? I turned my phone off all weekend when I was with Tyler."

There was a long, endless pause before Chris answered. "I...no, I didn't try to call. I was with Olivia this weekend."

Well, fuck. Gorgeous, talented, female Olivia Thirlby. Chris had apparently been doing in reality what Zach had only been pretending to be doing, spending a secretive weekend away, fucking for two days straight. Except it seemed there actually had been fucking on Chris's part, and Zach's supposed weekend of hot, filthy gay sex had gone completely unnoticed. Zach felt his stomach sink despondently. "Oh," he said, hoping he didn't sound as crushed as he felt. "I was just checking, man. I...I have to go."

He barely heard Chris's answering goodbye as he flipped the phone shut, careful not to slam the thing closed.

8. Be Yourself

If Zach weren't so damn stubborn, and if he weren't so --alright, fine, he was a grown man, he could say it-- in love with Chris, he would surely have given up by now. All his best tactics had been worthless against the relentlessness of Chris's heterosexuality, which was...well, disappointing, and annoying, and disheartening, and tragic were all applicable descriptors in this situation.

But still, the fact remained the he was in love with Chris, and Zach had never given up on anything he wanted. And he really, really wanted Chris.

Which was how he found himself here, sitting crosslegged across from Chris, with Chris looking earnestly into his eyes. "What's up, man?" Chris asked, face tense with worry. "What'd you want to discuss?" For once he didn't make a joke, for which Zach was sincerely grateful even though the air was so thick with anticipation it felt like a fog had descended in the midst of his living room.

"Well," Zach cleared his throat, a nervous attempt to buy more time before maybe ruining the greatest friendship he had ever known. But no, even if Chris didn't feel the same, they could get over this, they could stay friends. They had to, right? Zach cleared his throat again. "The thing is," he began, and then stalled out, eyes flicking away from Chris as he gathered his thoughts.

"Hey, hey, shh," Chris said, sliding closer to Zach on the couch, "it's okay, Zach. Whatever you have to say, it's gonna be okay, you know?" He took Zach's hand in his own and twined their fingers together, warm smooth palm infusing Zach with new courage and new nerves.

"Right," Zach breathed, psyching himself up. He could totally do this. "I sort of really like you," he said, and he could feel himself blush. Oh god, he was in fifth grade. Why didn't he just write a note: Do you like me? Check yes or no.

Chris huffed a laugh and ran the fingers not entwined with Zach's over the back of his hand. "I sort of really like you, too," he said, all smiles and misunderstanding.

"No, I mean," Zach looked up into Chris's eyes, the most mesmerizing blue he'd ever seen, and took a deep breath. "I mean, I want you. I've been trying...well," he laughed a little, self-deprecatingly, "I've been trying to seduce you, actually, though it hasn't really been working out the way I planned." He looked at Chris and waited for his reaction, ready, he thought, for anything.

Chris started laughing.

Well, Zach thought, trying in vain to disentangle their fingers, maybe not quite anything. He hadn't thought Chris would laugh at him, even if he had expected his rejection, expected just how much it would hurt. It was like a gaping wound in his chest, bleeding out, and Chris was making it harder and harder to breathe through the pain the more he laughed, the tighter he squeezed Zach's hand.

He was crying with laughter now, trying to say something through his mirth as Zach started to stand and Chris held him down, pulling with their clasped hands so Zach fell against him, forcing Chris down on the couch. Chris tugged him closer, wrapping his free arm around Zach and holding him against his shaking chest, his laughter ruffling Zach's hair. He struggled to get free but Chris trapped him against the back of the couch, chuckles gradually trailing off into soft exhalations against the side of his face, and Zach squeezed his eyes shut against how close Chris was, against the pain in his chest.

"Shhh, Zach, shh, I'm not," he laughed a little, "I swear I'm not laughing at you." He kissed the side of Zach's face, lips lingering at his temple for a moment. "It's okay, I promise. I'm laughing at us."

"I don't understand," Zach said, though it came out sounding more like "idnwat inderstrat", muffled as he was in the flannel of Chris's shirt.

"I know, baby." His words buzzed against Zach's skin, ticklish and confusing. "It's just that, I've been doing the same thing." His voice shook a little with suppressed amusement. "I've been trying to seduce you, too."

Zach's mind went blank, his jaw falling open in what he was sure was an unattractive manner, but he honestly couldn't help it. "You..." He levered himself off of Chris's chest, palm pressing Chris down into the cushions. "You've been what?" Zach asked, voice too high and really very unmanly, but he didn't, couldn't, care.

"I thought you weren't interested, or you weren't sure of my gayness for you, or, I dunno, something." Chris squeezed the hand he was still holding. "But I guess I was just too subtle, huh? I guess we both were." The corner of his mouth quirked up, drawing Zach's eyes. He could kiss those lips now, he realized. Chris had said so or, well, implied it anyway. Zach leaned forward, and finally got his man.

BONUS OUTTAKES:

Originally part of 7, before I realized that would make this one part like, ten times longer than any other and settled on the Tyler Shields angle:

The problem was, what gay male of his acquaintance would be willing to pretend to be fucking him, without actually getting laid in return?

Luckily, Zach's dilemma was solved for him when Milo called, obviously trying to hold back laughter, and said, "Kristen called me."

"Oh did she?" Zach said, listening to the stifled giggles on the other end of the line. "And what did she say?" he asked, even though he could pretty well guess.

"Well," Milo said, and then, showing he actually was an actor and not just a pretty face, he swallowed his laughter and continued in an impressively calm voice. "I hear you need someone to pretend to be your booooyyyyfriend," he said, making the last word into a singsong, "so you can hook your fabulously gay claws into that Captain Kirk of yours."

Zach thought about strangling Kristen, and then he thought about hanging up on Milo, and then he thought about strangling Kristen some more. He ended up sighing in his most put-upon manner -- one that clearly said, I don't know why I put up with you; oh wait, it's because they pay me a lot, before replying, "I suppose you'll do." And then, because he really was a catty queen at heart he added, "Not that you're really my type. I like them with a little more meat."

Milo was still spluttering when Zach hung up on him.

There was originally going to be ten parts, one of which was going to be "show a little skin," but I got blocked after the first paragraph. Still, I slaved over the first paragraph (NOT REALLY), so here it is:

Zach's next move required some delicate planning. If he were a girl, he could just wear a low cut blouse, a miniskirt, and some fuck me heels and be done with it. He could still do that, of course, but it might raise Chris's eyebrow more than his cock, which was not part of the plan.

my fic

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