Act II
Welcome to the second prompt post!
The same rules/ guidelines apply as for the first prompt post.
Important:
If you fill a prompt from the first prompt post, please post the fill there!
Likewise with all comments for a fic at the first prompt post.
Otherwise it will get very chaotic.
- If you have a fandom related question of any sort you can go ( Read more... )
The same rules/ guidelines apply as for the first prompt post.
Important:
If you fill a prompt from the first prompt post, please post the fill there!
Likewise with all comments for a fic at the first prompt post.
Otherwise it will get very chaotic.
- If you have a fandom related question of any sort you can go ( Read more... )
Luckily, it wasn’t one of those single rope swings. God that had been painful...
Andy cringed at the very thought of those photos on the swings, but Ed doggedly refused to be in any way embarrassed. Andy had already distanced himself from them, although Ed hoped that was only media strategy to make him seem more serious and leaderlike. Hard to be taken very seriously when everyone’s examining photos of you with your plumbs being bisected. Playground planners must really hate young kids..
Andy glanced around the playground at the flats, examining which windows were open, which still had lights on. He leant against the swing frame, attempting to ward off a slight feeling of nausea. Sensing trouble, Ed slowed the swing, a note of caution in the look he threw Andy.
Ed was rarely patient at the best of times, but all that beer was aggravating his already short attention span. Either Andy should throw up like any normal drunk, or he should devote some attention to his friend and colleague, Ed thought, with his typical self-less attitude.
“C’m’ere,” He slurred. Andy sighed, and approached. Ed looked up at him from his lowly stature on the swing, but, as always, avoided the impression that he was submitting control. Ed had never been passive in his life. He seemed to have a pathological fear that was both endearing and absolutely bloody maddening. Ed curled his fingers around Andy’s belt, not pulling, just keeping a firm hold. An odd habit of his which was almost as comforting as a hug.
The pair had no problem with personal space, but sometimes all that touching and fondling just wasn’t practical, especially when cooking, trying to listen to the radio, or fending off phonecalls from irate colleagues or hyperactive spin-doctors with ‘the perfect photo op for you two in a school with a-’.
Andy clambered over Ed, lifting his chin and kissing him deeply, but Ed was already a step ahead, and, in between biting Andy’s lip, began unbuttoning his colleague’s shirt.
“Ed.” Andy protested half-heartedly, grasping Ed’s fingers. “Not here.” Andy peered about nervously. Unlike Ed, who’s stubbornness strayed into arrogance and false sense of security and untouchability, Andy was always a little paranoid.
Ed ignored him, sucking Andy’s throat, thumbs hooked into Andy’s waistband to stop him moving away. “D’s’n’t matter. No one about anyway, it’s three in the morning. We’ve only gotta watch out for doggers, and they wouldn’t object anyway.” Ed mumbled into Andy's jaw.
“It’s only midnight.” Andy twisted his neck out of Ed’s reach, and held Ed’s shoulders. “Ed. Come on. I’ve got some grass at home. Let’s get slaughtered. I’ll let you play my guitar.” He lied. Ed was and never would be trusted with Andy’s precious acoustic.
Ed reluctantly untangled his arms from around Andy’s waist and under his shirt.
They slung arms over each other’s shoulders drunkenly and walked the perimeter of the playground, trying in vain to find the gate. Their drunken gait had just managed to reach a precarious equilibrium which just about kept them both on their feet when suddenly Ed bolted over the fence, like a puppy leaping after a wasp.
In the neighbouring football field, a lone, deflating football sat in the middle of the goal.
“Penalty shootout!” Ed shouted, overjoyed.
“Christ, doesn’t that man know anything about volume control?” Andy muttered, sure that the whole bloody estate would hear and peer out of their windows.
He imagined the prospective headlines. 2 until-recently cabinet ministers, in wine-stained shirts and jackets, muddy knees, open collars, playing football on an estate which had enough problems of its own and didn’t need politicians dicking about, thank you very much. Oh, and a cryptic message which bore both of their names in yellow spray paint not a million miles away...
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http://www.daylife.com/photo/06WUeaH6vU3JQ
Ed's all pretending to be a lion and Andy's... doing some sort of interpretive dance? IDEK...
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I am just in a state of omg
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“Come on, Andy.” Ed wheedled. “Tell you what, we’ll have a shootout for who tops.” He grinned broadly. “I lose and you can fuck me. Or come on my face or whatever your filthy little heart desires.” Ed belted the ball towards Andy.
“You’ll lose and want to fuck me anyway. Either that or punch me. You’re a shit loser.”
Andy was inherently suspicious of any such offerings from Ed Balls, the sorest loser in British politics (thinking back it was a bloody blessing Morley and Outwood had elected him, otherwise they’d probably still be hosing bits of dismembered counting officers off the walls).
Ed put the ball on the penalty spot, and, with the theatrical run up of a rugby player scored in the empty goal, with a delighted cry of “One nil!”.
He didn’t throw his shirt over his head, but he radiated the inferiority complexes and hormones of the violent, adolescent centre-forward he still felt himself to be at the tender age of 43. His achievement was no lessened by the lack of keeper standing in goal: He was bloody world cup material. Fuck Beckham, Walcott, all of them, Ed Balls was the real deal.
He skidded on his knees, lifting his imaginary trophy in the air. He bit his finalists’ medal, wrapped a St George’s flag around his shoulders, all the while making his own crowd noises of hero-worship, elation and good old fashioned hooliganism. Somewhere in the upper tier, someone started a fight; someone sang ‘God save the Queen’; someone won a bet and was allowed a whole precious 5 seconds in between their mate’s girlfriend’s breasts..
Andy, tired of watching his mate prat around in cloud cuckoo land, relented with an exasperated ‘for fuck’s sake’, and trounced Ed 5-2 (although, predictably the score was disputed heavily).
Ed’s look of dismay always made Andy a little giddy, and he savoured it as the ball sailed past Ed’s outstretched fingers into the back of the net.
Andy had always been more focused on playing the actual game, rather than all the distractions Ed took so seriously, like crowd pleasing, sliding tackles, head butting, and howling at the referee. All of which meant Ed had the worst red-card record in the history of the Thames Valley League, and Andy took a first class penalty.
Ed slumped to the floor, where he sat looking like a morose Winnie the Pooh. Andy rolled his eyes.
“Cheer up, y’old bastard. I’ll be a gracious winner.” Andy towered over Ed, holding out a hand to help Ed up. Predictably, Ed mobilised his weight advantage to tug Andy on top of him.
“Replay?” He prompted, hopefully, attempting a different tactic to his usual shouting and bullying. Neither ever really worked on Andy, and Ed would be forever infuriated and enamoured by that fact.
“I won, Ed. Face it. You’re shit at football.” He grinned, victorious, and scuffed up Ed’s hair just to rub it in.
“Not shit. Just drunk.” Ed protested, weakly. “I’ve had about twice what you have, you lightweight.” Ed said, distractedly, attempting to find his way into Andy’s trousers. Which wasn’t easy when Andy was squirming, determined to frustrate him.
Ed saw Andy’s distaste for overtly public acts of gratification as a personal insult and/or challenge. One day, one day, he thought, predatorily.
Andy didn’t argue the point. He indulged Ed’s self-deluding ego because he was drunk and Ed’s ego was one of the reasons Andy was so happy to let him bed him so regularly - the bloody mindedness and pigheaded conviction that was rife in career politics was captivating.
Ed palmed him through his boxers, but Andy remained resolute.
“We’re not fucking on a football pitch.” Andy removed Ed’s hand.
“What about for my birthday next month?” He leered.
“Maybe. If you promise to call me ‘Leader of the Opposition’,” Andy grinned. He gave Ed a quick kiss on his cheekbone, and used the momentary advantage of surprise to nip out of his grasp. “Come on. Home.”
Ed groaned like a sulking child, hauling himself to his feet, which was when his really quite unhelpful brain decided it was a good idea to start singing ‘You’ll never walk alone’.
captcha: lovable lout. i kid you not.
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“Okay, okay, okay.” He repeated the triad like a broken record, conceding defeat as Andy squeezed. “No, okay. Okay. Andy!” His voice cracked, squeaking the last syllable at the frequency only dogs and superheroes could ever hope to hear.
Andy raised one eyebrow, examining Ed’s expression for genuine regret at his actions and at any offence caused by it. It was only when Ed caved entirely and yelped ‘OW’ that Andy was satisfied and removed his fingernails from his fleshy undercarriage.
Andy, very pleased with himself, snaked an arm around Ed’s waist and bit his ear as they walked. When he’d bored of this, the taller man spent the rest of the journey singing into Ed’s hair. All the songs he could think of with ‘Ed’ in the title (Edward Bear, Poor Edward), before moving on to Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2 (refrain of ‘We don’t need no Education’ - this was apt as it both included his name and mocked his job. Clever. Very clever), and, when he struggled at finding anything else, a mangled performance of Cribbin’s ‘Right Said Fred’ until Ed begged him to stop (“Christ, Andy. Did you learn that just to torture me?”. A pause. “Yes”.)
The rest of the way back to Andy’s passed uneventfully. Andy bottled the dare to jump the ticket barrier at the tube station as the security guard glared at them from his little booth; Ed chickened out of causing a bomb scare; and they both happily ignored the law against drinking on the tube (Andy felt sick at even the memory of Trashed on the Tube. “You girl!” Ed snorted as Andy recalled the horrific moment when he’d thrown up into Ed’s collar. “I was clinically dead for a week.”. “If only. You were bloody sick in my sink three times. You still owe me for fumigation and bleach.”. “You mean you didn’t put it on expenses?”. “I will fucking end you.”).
Andy let them in, successfully fending off an assault on the stairwell (Christ, was Ed actually a sex-starved 16 year old?), and put the kettle on with a bark of ‘don’t touch my guitar or I’ll kill you’.
Tea, scotch and talking drivel. An ideal end to the evening. Along with the brownies Ed made yesterday, and a fuck on the floor.
Ed flicked through the newspaper, idly throwing insults whenever faced with a mention of the coalition, drawing a Hitler moustache on George Osborne and a penis on Cameron’s head.
“Fucking child.” Andy sighed. “No wonder your campaign is such a shambles, the level your brain operates at. You going to stand at the hustings and pull faces at us all? Flick bogeys and make wanking gestures?”
“Never know. If Gordon had done that, we might have won those leader’s debates.” Ed said, not unreasonably. “Would have made Cameron a lot more uncomfortable if Brown’d called him on his obvious blatant lust for his chancellor. And Clegg. Manwhore.” Ed said, drawing a banana on the photo of David Miliband. “How come it’s the Milibands who’ve got the reputation of being youthful? We’re the one who do all the swings and football and shit. David was only right back, not even a bloody goalscorer. We’re way more fun than they are.” Ed mumbled into his teacup.
“Ed lisps. That makes him endearing.” Andy shrugged, strumming idly on his guitar.
“No one ever found me endearing. I only ever got beaten up for my funny ‘r’.” Ed grumbled.
“And it hasn’t made you bitter, has it?” Andy grinned at Ed. “I mean, it’s not like you pick a fight with anyone over absolutely anything.”
“Having a name like ‘Balls’ makes you defensive.” Ed shrugged. “Come on then. I know you’re dying to play me something. Probably something shit. Let me guess: You’ve found another song with the name ‘Ed’ in it?”
Andy smirked. “Did you hear the news about Edward? On the back of his head he had another face..”
Ed threw his shoe at him.
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♥
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Ed paused, mid way through a brownies and frowned, thoughtfully.
“We need some more members first, Andy. Just you and me isn’t much of a band.” He said with his mouth full.
“That doesn’t matter.” Andy waved that problem away. “We need a really good name, though. Something really... cool...” He frowned at his guitar, his fingers not quite doing what he wanted them to.
Ed tucked into another brownie.
“How about this:” Ed said, as if he'd discovered the cure for aids, “‘Fuck the fucking Tories up the fucking arse and don’t stop til they’re fucking dead and bleeding more than a teenage self-harmer’” Ed chanted, returning to his favourite slogan of his student days.
“Or ‘Michael Gove’s a fucking prick’?” Andy suggested, tentatively. He could never rid himself of the suspicion that Ed and Gove had been fucking for months.
“Or ‘Andy Burnham is a paranoid twat who thinks Ed Balls is so fucking easy he’ll let Gove anywhere near him’.” Ed rolled his eyes. “Stupid sod.”
Andy took offence at being patronised. “Or we could keep it simple and call our band ‘Ed Balls is Gordon’s little bitch and fucking loves it’.” Andy grinned wickedly.
Ed launched himself at him, rolling him to the floor, guitar falling with a loud jarring chord. Ed gripped Andy’s shirt front and attempted to lift and slam him into the floor, but his bloodstream was still approximately 13% proof, and it wasn’t easy. He frowned in concentration, and tried again. Andy just laughed at him.
“No, even better:” Andy said as Ed pulled his hair, “‘Ed Balls was Gordon’s little bitch but doesn’t know what to do now Gordon’s gone back to Scotland’. Maybe ‘Ed Balls is lost without his big Scottish daddy-kink’.” Andy sniggered, as Ed pinned him to the carpet, strewn with brownie crumbs and newspapers.
“How about ‘Andy was a little virgin until Ed took pity on him’.”
“You wish.” Andy grabbed Ed’s collar, smashing their mouths together. Ed said something nasty, but it made no sense through Andy’s determined mouth.
Resistant to letting Andy take the lead, Ed pulled Andy’s shirt open, and then his belt.
“Oi. I won the shootout, remember.” Andy jabbed Ed in the chest. “You get your keks of first.” Andy attempted to be masterful, but Ed just laughed at him.
“You’d make a rubbish Labour leader.”
“Least half the party don’t think I’m a cock.” Andy propped himself up on his elbows as Ed, still straddling him, unbuttoned his own shirt.
“I’ll bake ‘em all a cake in the shape of a dead Tory and the votes’ll pour in. What are you going to do? Play them all a song?”
“Why not? That’s how I charmed you, isn’t it?” Andy said, referring to that night at conference. The practice game, long shower, Andy’s misguided attempts to convert Ed to good music, Ed sinking to his knees in front of him...
“Yeah. I fell in love with you for your soulful music. Nothing at all to do with all those showers after football, or the fact you’ve got eyes the size of Jupiter. You big Jessie.”
Andy’s eyes were usually large and watery anyway, but alcohol, high quality grass and anticipation amplified them about fifty times. He wetted his lips, unsure of how to respond to that.
“Aw, Ed, I never knew you were a romantic.” Andy fluttered his eyelashes at him, and pushed his hair out of his eyes.
Ed rolled his eyes and bent for another deep kiss, holding Andy’s throat with his fingertips. Andy squirmed, ticklish under the touch, and Ed rolled off him, easing his trousers off.
“You’d better be fucking careful, right? Because it’s been a bloody long time since you won a shootout.” Ed hid his apprehension with his default objectionableness.
Andy couldn’t help but smile: that was probably the closest Ed would ever come in his life to asking someone to be gentle with him.
“For fuck’s sake, yes, Ed.” Andy sighed, with a saintly air of patience. If more saints had Andy's accent and long eyelashes, Ed couldn't help thinking, the Christian faith would be much better patronised...
thanks to a certain photo, can't get bottom!Ed out of my head. Argh. Sorry all.
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What photo might this be? I need these for science.
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Also, while I'm here, my review on this fic:
asdfghkxvjdkldk;asgldk ckjk I CAN'T DESCRIBE MY JOY
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