Permanently Blue For You
Title: Permanently Blue For You
Author: wishof_wings
Betas: Becky & Therese
Rating: R (for language)
Pairing: CrissColfer
Word Count: 5000
Summary: “Hey there, sexy,” Darren purrs, and he runs the paint roller down his body and-shit, that fucking tickles. Chris is covering his mouth but Darren is pretty sure he’s smiling by the way his eyes are crinkling. “I heard you needed someone with experience, and I assure you that I can fill in all your nooks and crannies.”
Warnings: RPF. Really awful innuendos and a shirtless Darren Criss.
Author's Notes: So what feels like forever ago, I hit a follower milestone on tumblr and said I would write something to celebrate - and this was born! I had so, so much fun with it and will probably write a sequel (or multiple) sometime down the line. There are vague underlines of sexual tension, but it's a goofy friendship fic all the way through so. Don't be afraid. Title from "Bruises" by Chairlift.
There is nothing that says that Chris Colfer is a neat freak. At least, it’s not written anywhere to Darren’s knowledge. Still, it’s something he’s come to expect from Chris.
Sure, he’s seen a laundry basket that’s been a bit too long neglected and one time there was a cup in the sink, but otherwise Chris’s house is unfailingly spotless whenever he happens to be there.
So he figures today is just a fluke. That, or Chris was robbed.
“Chris?” He asks hesitantly as the door falls shut behind him. Maybe that should be the first alarming thing. Sure, Chris had asked him to come over (well, more like told him to) but he usually still expected Darren to knock and shit. Especially after the first few times when Darren had tried to just walk through the door and Chris had thought a stalker was trying to break in.
At least Chris never used the bat.
But if the unlocked door isn’t strange, the fact that all of Chris’s furniture has migrated to the middle of the room is. Chris has some sort of pride in furniture placement that Darren never really understood. After all, he’s happy enough just to own a couch and doesn’t really care how big or small it makes a room look.
Then again, Chris actually picks out his furniture. Darren is still in the mentality that everything he owns needs to be picked up from garage sales or Craigslist.
There’s also the fact that all of Chris’s electronics are very obviously missing. It’s hard not to notice, especially the flat screen that’s usually mounted on the wall (Darren has watched a lot of movies on that flat screen).
Chris was definitely robbed. Is that why he asked (told) Darren to come over? The text hadn’t seemed very urgent. Had the robbing happened while Darren was on his way over? Shit. Now he felt really fucking bad for stopping to get a cheeseburger.
“Chris?” He tries again, hesitantly. What if the burglar is still here? Fuck fuck fuck. Where did Chris keep that bat? Darren would feel a lot better if he was holding a bat.
“Finally.”
Darren might have screamed. Maybe. He knows he certainly flew back into the wall when Chris suddenly popped into view around a corner. He also knows that Chris is laughing.
“Oh my god.” He’s wheezing now between his laughter, bent over and letting the wall support his weight and Darren wonders if he looks as mortified as he feels. “Your face.”
“Fuck you, Colfer,” Darren grumbles as his pulse slowly returns to its resting place. “Your face. I thought you were a monster or something.”
“I didn’t even know your screams could get that high pitched.”
“I hate you.” But even Darren can’t help from grinning now, because Chris is still laughing and his laughter is sort of contagious (or maybe Darren just really likes laughing).
When Chris calms down and the only sound that fills the silence is his slightly labored breathing, he wipes at his eyes and looks up at Darren with a cocked eyebrow.
“Do you want to tell me what that was about? Or are these jeans really that bad?”
Looking at what Chris is wearing is normally not something Darren does, but this time he does look and, yeah, those jeans are pretty old and worn but they aren’t scream worthy.
In fact Darren is looking at Chris’s plain, on-the-small-side black shirt a little skeptically, too.
“Why the clothes?” He asks, and Chris raises his eyebrow again as he makes his way towards Darren.
“If that’s a ploy to get me naked, it’s not going to work,” Chris responds in a deadpan and Darren reels back a bit, mouth working wordlessly for a few moments.
“That’s, shut up, you know that’s not what I meant. Jerk.” Darren runs a hand through his curls and Chris walks past him and into the living room and-“Dude you were robbed!” Darren nearly shouts suddenly, shooting back to attention. Fuck, maybe Chris doesn’t even know yet.
The random declaration certainly stops Chris in his tracks. He doesn’t even turn all the way around, but looks at Darren like he’s speaking in tongues.
“I’ve been what?”
“Robbed. All… Your stuff is all moved and, dude, your TV is gone. That’s why I freaked out. I thought you were like. A burglar or something.”
“So your reaction to burglars is to… Scream and flatten against a wall?”
“But you’re not a burglar!”
“You thought I was, though.” Chris’s grin is on the mocking side, the way it is whenever he knows he’s backed Darren into a corner. So Darren just lets out a huff of breath instead of a retort and Chris finishes with an amused, “I thought so.”
“So…” Darren doesn’t say anything else, just gestures vaguely at the expanse of the living room and Chris sighs.
“You really have the worst memory.”
“I do not. I remember a lot of things.”
Chris just gives Darren a look, a look that clearly says you forget your own lyrics. Before Darren can continue his argument, though, Chris holds up his hand.
“Remember how I asked you to help me paint my living room?”
Darren tries to remember. He really tries.
“Yes?” His own uncertainty is enough to turn it into a question and cause Chris to give him a pointed look. “Okay, no, but I mean-that must have been awhile ago.”
“It was two weeks, Darren.” Okay, woah, Chris is really not amused.
“Two weeks could… Constitute as a while, right? In,” Darren pauses, his head working frantically to come up with something. “Dog years?” He finishes pathetically, but it makes Chris crack a smile. Which is good. Because Chris can be really scary when he wants to be.
So rather than lash out at Darren, Chris grabs him by the wrist and pulls him the rest of the way into the living room. Now it makes sense why there are sheets on the ground and, hey, there are paint cans. He had definitely not seen those before.
“Well it’s good to know that you respond well to commands. Seeing as you forgot your promise to help me, you really did get here fast,” Chris says over his shoulder, catching Darren’s confused look back. “My text? You didn’t think I sounded off?”
Darren pulls his phone from his back pocket, frowning in concentration. “Where are you? Come over now,” he reads out loud and then shrugs. “I just thought you were being bossy-hey!”
Chris shoves him playfully, and Darren rubs at the spot on his arm as if he’s been gravely injured.
“Foul play was not called for, Christopher.” But Chris is already crouching down, pouring a light shade of blue paint into the tins and no longer paying attention to Darren.
“So,” Darren says conversationally, because he prefers it when Chris pays attention to him and not to the paint. “Got tired of the taupe?”
Chris stands, wiping his hands on the knees of his jeans and, when he turns, Darren can make out vague thumb shapes. “I don’t think people don’t get tired of taupe. It’s taupe, Darren. Even the word itself is boring.”
“I dunno, I kind of like the way it makes my mouth move. Taupe.” Darren pops his ‘p’ and is greeted by another judgmental eyebrow raise.
“Well, we can paint your apartment taupe,” Chris pops his ‘p,’ imitating Darren, “one day. But for right now we’re going to paint my living room blue and-” He stops suddenly, and Darren waits a few beats (maybe he lost his train of thought, or saw a spider, or realized he left the oven on) before waving his hand in front of Chris’s face.
“Earth to Chris. Anybody home?” His hand is already forming a fist and when his knuckles are hardly an inch from the side of Chris’s head, Chris jerks away.
“You were going to knock on my head,” he says, accusingly, and Darren becomes all big eyes and innocent smiles. He shrugs in a ‘who, me?’ sort of way but Chris stopped falling for that a long time ago. “That doesn’t work on me anymore, Dare. Use it all you want on the rest of the crew, but I’ve grown immune to your boyish charms.”
Darren is halfway through thinking up his rebuttal-he does not charm the rest of the cast-but pauses. “You think I have boyish charm?”
“Not the point,” Chris hisses, but there’s a bit of color to his cheeks and Darren counts it as a (very small, practically miniscule, but existent) victory. “The point is that you forgot we were painting today and so you didn’t exactly adhere to the dress code.”
That much is unfortunately true. Darren fingers the band t-shirt he’s wearing. It’s old but that’s the best part about it. It takes years to make t-shirts as comfortable as the one he’s wearing is.
“I probably have something you can borrow, I just need to-”
“No, hey, don’t worry about it. I got this.” There’s a question on Chris’s lips, Darren can practically see it, but before he has a chance to ask, Darren is pulling the shirt off of his arms and throwing it on the mass of furniture. “Paint just adds to the character of my jeans, right? They’ll be my artsy jeans.”
“You just took your shirt off!” The way Chris says it, it’s almost as if Darren just donned a puppy coat (fuck, that’s just sad and demented).
“Well, yeah. Paint comes off skin.” Darren shrugs, but Chris is still looking a bit on the crazy side. It lasts for a few more seconds before it seems to deflate, and then he’s running hands over his face and making exasperated noises.
“Oh god, this is like the beginning of a really bad porn or something,” he groans, and Darren wonders if Chris realizes he said it out loud.
While Chris has his mini break down, Darren picks up one of the rollers and hikes it over his shoulder. It’s not exactly easy, because it’s one of those hand rollers and he has to bend his arm kind of awkwardly, but he does it. He struts over to Chris and strikes a pose, clearing his throat.
“Oh my god,” Chris is groaning again as Darren sports a sultry smile and cocks an eyebrow.
“Hey there, sexy,” Darren purrs, and he runs the paint roller down his body and-shit, that fucking tickles. Chris is covering his mouth but Darren is pretty sure he’s smiling by the way his eyes are crinkling. “I heard you needed someone with experience, and I assure you that I can fill in all your nooks and crannies.”
Chris loses it then, for the second time that afternoon, his laughter silent but his shoulders heaving. But Darren is laughing, too, reaching to clutch at Chris’s shoulder before either of them goes toppling.
“Nooks and crannies? I think the word cranny is like, on the opposite end of the sexy spectrum.”
“I’m sorry, but painting sexual innuendos aren’t exactly easy to make up off the top of my head.”
“That’s your roller now, I am not touching that. I can’t believe you molested yourself with it.”
This results in Darren brandishing the roller as a weapon, holding it out towards Chris who gives him a very severe warning look that Darren proceeds to ignore. Chris is running, bare feet slipping on the plastic and spare bedding that covers the floor and Darren is sliding along behind him.
“Come on, Chris. I just want to run my moist roller all over your body!”
“What was that about sexual innuendos not being easy?”
“Let me dip my brush into your can!”
“Darren!”
“I want to tape your baseboards!”
“That doesn’t even make sense!”
They end up on the sofa after running circles around the furniture, panting for breath and still giggling on occasion. Darren runs the roller down Chris’s face, resulting in an affronted, “ew, Darren, gross,” and Darren being pushed from the couch and onto the floor.
When they finally settle enough, they sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes, both of them staring at the ceiling.
“You are the worst painting assistant ever,” Chris declares and Darren makes a noise in the back of his throat, offended.
“We haven’t even painted anything yet,” he argues, and Chris nudges at Darren’s shoulder with his knee.
“Exactly. You’ve been here for almost an hour already. So come on, Tarzan, and let’s get started.” Chris heaves himself from the cushions, offering Darren a hand and pulling him to his feet.
“Tarzan?”
“You’re not wearing a shirt. I reserve the right to make any shirtless jokes I desire as penance.”
Darren touches his hand to his heart, pouting.
“Does my bare chest offend you, Christopher?”
“You offend me. Now put your porny roller to use.” He bumps his hip against Darren’s as he makes his way back towards the supplies, and Darren follows. He’s always found painting sort of fun and knows that as long as he stays away from the edges, Chris probably won’t kill him.
“Darren like painting,” he grunts in his best imitation of a caveman, and he sticks his hand in the paint without thinking. Chris just looks at him, an amused what now? grin playing on his lips. So Darren proudly slaps a brilliant blue handprint over his heart and grins back.
“Happy?” Chris drawls, and Darren shakes his head. As quickly as he possibly can, he reaches towards Chris and draws a blue line with his index finger down the slope of Chris’s nose.
“Now I’m happy,” he singsongs as Chris gapes at him.
“You did not just-”
“Oh, but I did.”
This, of course, means war.
The thing about Chris is that he’s full of surprises. Darren has known this almost from the moment they met and Chris started gushing at him about his musical. Which had been weird and totally cool, but certainly unexpected. The longer they’d known each other, though, the more Darren had come to expect the surprises. He had tried, time and time again, to guess how exactly Chris might respond to this or that. Sometimes he’s been half right. But most of the time he’s wrong.
If Darren quoted Blaine more than he already did, he would tell Chris that he zigs whenever Darren thinks he’s going to zag. But the last time Darren had gone all Blaine on Chris, Chris had smacked him in the side of the head with his script.
So when Chris stills, his eyes crossing as he tries to stare at his nose, Darren is unsure what to expect. Maybe he thinks Chris will fling a bucket of paint at him, or maybe Chris will laugh it off.
But being full of surprises generally means being unpredictable.
Chris just stares at Darren for a few moments, before turning back to the wall.
“Stay away from the corners,” he threatens. But, duh, Darren already knows that.
Their silences are generally easy. Chris is kind of a quiet person when he’s concentrated on things, and Darren buzzes with so much energy that he’s surprised he doesn’t make any noise.
Still, Darren doesn’t like being silent for long. Even Chris’s comfortable silences press on his ears after a few minutes, and he begins to hum.
“Really?” Chris looks over him, but there’s a hint of amusement tugging at the corner of his lips. “What are you even humming?” He’s kneeling down on the ground, pouring more paint into the tub.
“You can just hum music, Christopher. My humming is not bound by your sometimes logical reasoning.” He paints over the wall, down to where Chris has started on the corners but staying carefully away from the crown molding. He wiggles slightly, dancing to the sound of his own humming, and he hears Chris chuckle behind him.
“I’m painting Chris’s walls, because he wants them to be blue.” Darren sings along to his own made-up melody, grinning at his rather respectable strips of paint. There’s like no steaks or anything. “I’m not wearing a shirt, that way it won’t be-Shit!”
Darren jerks forward, almost slamming his chest into the painted wall as he feels something cold and thick dribble down his spinal column. He snaps around, eyes wide, to Chris standing there and smirking rather triumphantly.
“Did you just…” Darren motions erratically behind him as if that will convey his point, and Chris’s smile is so sinister it reminds Darren eerily of Kurt.
“Pour paint down your back?”
Fucker.
“Of course not, Darren. That would be juvenile of me.”
Darren knew this wouldn’t end without some sort of fight. And he certainly has no intention of being the loser.
Chris is kneeling beside him now, working on the corners, and Darren aims his soaked paint roller before flicking it and sending paint splattering Chris’s right cheek, ear, and quite a bit of hair. They’re both still for a moment and Chris slowly swivels his head and stares at Darren. After a few very long, tense moments, Darren waves awkwardly.
Without so much as a change in expression, Chris unfolds himself until he’s standing, twirling his roller in his fingers before he chucks it at Darren. They aren’t standing very far apart, so he hardly has time to turn before it whacks against his shoulder and then falls onto the plastic under their feet.
“That was uncalled for,” Darren says as he turns, but there’s a hand dripping with blue paint inches from his face that quickly rakes through his curls. It’s shockingly cold and Darren jerks away, nearly falling over as he moves away from Chris. “Fuck.” Darren grabs at his hair, can feel the way the paint congealing in his curls and makes a face. “You just put paint in my hair.”
“Yep.”
Darren just nods for a minute, lips pursed together, before he kneels down and picks up Chris’s discarded roller. With one in each hand, he looks at them with vague interest. He debates twirling them in his fingers, but he knows his likelihood of dropping them is kind of high. Instead, he brandishes them, turning to look at Chris only to see that he’s holding the open paint bucket.
“You wouldn’t.” Darren’s eyes are wide, flicking back between the deadly set of Chris’s and the teasing peak of blue in the paint can.
“Oh, wouldn’t I?” Chris’s eyes narrow, challenging Darren to try him. Darren really has two choices at this point in time. He could charge Chris and see what happens, or he could admit defeat.
He yells like a crazy person as he runs at Chris who, judging by the way his eyes widen, was not expecting Darren to come at him head first. Darren has him around the middle and is tackling him to the floor before Chris can even think to throw the paint, although Darren is pretty sure that it was just a bluff.
The paint can swings and clatters to the side, dousing Chris’s face and the top of Darren’s head in blue paint.
Darren’s breathing is rapid and loud as he lies on top of Chris, waiting. He sees movement out of the side of his eye and peeks up to watch Chris wipe the paint from his eye and mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.
“Chris?”
His eyes snap open and lock instantly with Darren’s in a look that is thoroughly unamused. Which would matter more if Chris’s eyebrow and half his face wasn’t blue.
Darren starts laughing, clutching at Chris’s arm as if it will somehow keep him from losing it completely. “Dude, you look like you just walked out of Braveheart.” His body is shaking from laughing so hard. “Freedom!” He pumps his arm in the air, still laughing, when Chris promptly pushes him off and onto his back.
“I hate you,” Chris hisses, but Darren just keeps laughing, every so often looking over at Chris as if the displeased look and paint are just what he needs to renew his laughing vigor.
“You are the worst friend. Ever.” Darren continues to laugh, eyes screwed shut and hardly any sound coming out of him. His stomach hurts from laughing so hard.
And then his stomach is cold, cold, why is it so cold? Darren shrieks slightly, his body jolting and arching off the floor as his eyes open to see Chris sliding both rollers up his chest.
“I’m priming while I paint,” he singsongs, pulling away when Darren’s chest is streaked blue.
“You ruined my handprint,” he pouts, looking up at Chris.
“You ruined my face,” Chris deadpans.
“Actually, you ruined your face. You were the one holding the open can of paint.” Darren sits up, running a finger through the wet paint on his chest and testing its tackiness with his fingers.
“You were the idiot who tackled me,” Chris bit back, exasperated. He sinks fully onto his knees beside Darren, rubbing at the still-wet paint on his own face.
“Darren Criss doesn’t back down from a challenge.” Darren grins cheekily, and Chris dips his hand into the large puddle of paint on the floor before dragging it down Darren’s face.
“There. You can have my handprint.”
“Was that really necessary?”
“Yep.”
They sit still for a moment, knee to knee, and Darren instinctively touches his hair, wincing as he feels how crunchy the paint has made it.
“If I wash this out and my hair is suddenly blond, I’m going to kill you.” But Darren’s lips are dropped in a pout rather than a sneer, his eyes big as he pets at his hair pathetically.
“Gasp. Darren Criss, homicidal maniac. I didn’t see that one coming.” Chris is wiping at his face with the bottom of his shirt now, but some of it has dried and is leaving Chris’s face tinged blue.
“It’s because I’m so charming and friendly. No one can resist this smile.” He beams at Chris, who pushes at his cheek until he’s turned away and has, as a result, smeared more paint onto Darren’s face. “They never suspect it.” He shifts to his knees, dipping his chin slightly and looking up at Chris through his eyelashes.
Chris reels back slightly, catching himself with one hand thrown behind him and staring at Darren unsurely. The clean half of Chris’s face is slightly flushed.
“They never know when I’m about to strike.” He’s leaning over Chris, hands pressed to the floor on either side of him, giving him nowhere to run. The air between them is heavy for a moment. Then another one. Darren feels like his heart is beating in his ears, or maybe that’s Chris’s heart, fast as a hummingbird’s.
Slowly, he raises one hand, newly wet with paint, and dresses it to Chris’s chest, right over his sternum. Chris’s eyes shift rapidly from the touch to Darren’s face, before Darren gives a shove and Chris is falling backwards.
He lands, hair and back drenched in the puddle of paint, and stares up for a few moments.
“Fuck you,” he groans, wincing as he rubs at his head, and Darren feels a little bad. He decides he’ll make it up to Chris later. But for now. He moves, slamming down on Chris’s stomach so that they’re perpendicular, the paint on his chest smearing across Chris’s t-shirt.
“Darren!” Chris’s legs flail as he tries to get Darren off, but Darren lets his dead weight hold him down and he grins at Chris. “You are the biggest, asshole, jerk, stupid face-”
“Stupid face? Really?”
“Get off me!”
“I’m sorry, I appear to have lost all control of my motor skills. Any attempts at movement will result in octopus-like tendencies.” He looks at Chris very seriously. “We can’t have that.”
“You are playing a dangerous game, Criss!” He thrashes some more but only manages to splash paint up onto his arms.
Darren grins.
“The most dangerous game.”
There’s a pause, and then Chris is laughing and Darren can feel sweet, sweet victory coursing through his veins.
“Will you get off now?” Chris asks, still laughing but obviously still wanting Darren off of him.
“Nope.”
“Come on, we’ve had our fun, get off.” The laughter is dying out of his voice, and he looks at Darren with not so much patience as amused insistence. Darren grins, eyes glinting mischievously.
“Make me.”
Chris slumps against the ground, glaring at him.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, Darren, but I could totally kick your ass.”
Darren scoffs and rolls his eyes. “You might be taller, Christopher, but I think I have home field advantage.”
“This is my house!” Chris splutters, staring at Darren as if he’s completely lost it (then again, Chris stares at him like that a lot).
“Not what I meant. I meant-” Darren shifts and Chris’s arm works free and begins insistently shoving at him. Darren doesn’t budge. “-home field advantage to wrestling. Obviously.”
Chris smacks Darren’s bare arm, resulting in a hiss of pain.
“Dick.”
“I’m not wrestling with you, so get off of me.” Chris raises his hand to hit Darren again, but Darren shifts quickly, grabbing Chris’s hand with his own and grinning in triumph.
“What was that about not wrestling?” Darren challenges as they struggle for dominance.
“That I’m not doing it!” Chris is beginning to win, though. His position certainly affords him better leverage and, well, Darren just can’t allow that. So he releases Chris’s hand, evoking a “Ha!” Chris even grins as Darren starts shifting again, as if Darren letting go of his hand equates to Chris winning. He’s obviously new at this.
Darren swings his leg around just as Chris starts to try and get up, effectively straddling Chris’s waist and pinning him to the ground. Chris stares up at him in disbelief.
“That wasn’t a good position.”
Chris groans.
“Oh god, this is a nightmare. I’m stuck in a weird nightmare with you. A nightmare that resembles some really freaky porno or something.” Chris thrashes his legs again, but Darren sits contently, his weight resting on his knees.
“Don’t pornos require significantly less clothing?”
Chris raises his arms to shove Darren off of him, but Darren quickly catches his hands and pins Chris down, looming over him.
“You’re already halfway there,” Chris points out, his voice laced with irritation.
“Shirtless wrestling is not porn, Colfer. And if it is, I need to hook you up with better porn.”
“If you weren’t straddling my waist, I’d knee you in the balls.”
Darren chuckles.
“So are you going to just let me win? That’s no fun.” He pouts playfully down at Chris, batting his eyelashes.
“Pinning me to the paint covered ground isn’t a game, Dare. Ugh, it’s seeping through my shirt.”
“It’s just a little paint,” Darren teases, rocking Chris’s body back and forth with his knees.
“Darren. We’re both covered in so much paint, I’m surprised I haven’t made more Smurf jokes.”
Darren looks down at himself and, yeah, he’s pretty fucking blue. It looks like he got in a fight with a paint bucket and lost which, actually, is sort of what happened. He starts bobbing his head from side to side, humming the Smurfs theme.
He really should have known that the Smurfs was just a convenient distraction.
Darren forgets how strong Chris is until Chris does something to prove it. He’s kind of like a superhero like that. Like the Hulk, except he doesn’t turn really green and isn’t triggered by anger.
His back slams into the ground and, fuck, the paint is really fucking cold and how does he keep forgetting that? Chris glares down at him for a moment, holding Darren’s wrists now and looking expectant.
“You are no fun.”
“Rolling around in paint isn’t anyone’s definition of fun, Darren.”
Darren is sure he could find like, ten people who would say otherwise.
“I will tickle you,” Chris threatens, and Darren can’t help but laugh. The idea of thrashing around in paint, though, probably isn’t as awesome as it sounds. Sort of like how mud wrestling is actually pretty gross.
“Fine. Fine. You win.”
Chris’s glare splits into a grin and he releases Darren, rolling off and back onto the floor. Chris’s back is in paint again, his head resting inches from Darren’s shoulder as his body angles out on a diagonal. Darren turns his head to raise an eyebrow, amused.
“Shut up, I’m tired. You’re exhausting.” Darren folds his lips together to keep from laughing, his barely contained grin straining at his cheeks. Chris must see the slight shake in his shoulders, because he turns his head slightly to level Darren with an unamused gaze.
“Really?”
Darren holds his hands up in surrender.
“You’re the one who said it.”
“And you’re apparently a preteen boy.” But Darren can see Chris roll his eyes fondly, so he drops it. Besides, he sort of is half the time.
They lay in silence for a few moments, staring at the ceiling, before Chris lets out a sigh. Darren turns his head and hums in acknowledgement, waiting for Chris to let off whatever’s on his mind.
“A whole bucket of paint, and we got about… A foot of the wall done.” Darren leans up and, yeah, Chris might even be generous by saying a foot.
“At… Least your floor is nice and blue?” Darren grins at him optimistically, and Chris huffs out a laugh.
“Just what I’ve always wanted.”
“It’s perfectly right?” Darren raises his eyebrows and sees Chris fighting a smile.
“Remind me to never ask you to help paint again. Ever.”
Darren lays back down, nudging Chris’s shin with his foot.
“You had fun, come on. I know you did.”
“Darren. I’m blue.”
“It’s a lovely shade on you,” Darren drawls in a snooty tone, and that’s enough to make Chris laugh and curl into Darren, shaking his head repeatedly. Darren grins, turning and smacking a kiss against Chris’s less-paint-covered cheek.
“Ew, gross, Dare.” Chris makes a show of rubbing at the nonexistent saliva on his cheek and Darren rolls his eyes, albeit with a hint of affection. They’re silent again, and then Chris groans, falling onto his back again.
“Help me clean up?”
“But of course.”
Tracker Website
Author: wishof_wings
Betas: Becky & Therese
Rating: R (for language)
Pairing: CrissColfer
Word Count: 5000
Summary: “Hey there, sexy,” Darren purrs, and he runs the paint roller down his body and-shit, that fucking tickles. Chris is covering his mouth but Darren is pretty sure he’s smiling by the way his eyes are crinkling. “I heard you needed someone with experience, and I assure you that I can fill in all your nooks and crannies.”
Warnings: RPF. Really awful innuendos and a shirtless Darren Criss.
Author's Notes: So what feels like forever ago, I hit a follower milestone on tumblr and said I would write something to celebrate - and this was born! I had so, so much fun with it and will probably write a sequel (or multiple) sometime down the line. There are vague underlines of sexual tension, but it's a goofy friendship fic all the way through so. Don't be afraid. Title from "Bruises" by Chairlift.
There is nothing that says that Chris Colfer is a neat freak. At least, it’s not written anywhere to Darren’s knowledge. Still, it’s something he’s come to expect from Chris.
Sure, he’s seen a laundry basket that’s been a bit too long neglected and one time there was a cup in the sink, but otherwise Chris’s house is unfailingly spotless whenever he happens to be there.
So he figures today is just a fluke. That, or Chris was robbed.
“Chris?” He asks hesitantly as the door falls shut behind him. Maybe that should be the first alarming thing. Sure, Chris had asked him to come over (well, more like told him to) but he usually still expected Darren to knock and shit. Especially after the first few times when Darren had tried to just walk through the door and Chris had thought a stalker was trying to break in.
At least Chris never used the bat.
But if the unlocked door isn’t strange, the fact that all of Chris’s furniture has migrated to the middle of the room is. Chris has some sort of pride in furniture placement that Darren never really understood. After all, he’s happy enough just to own a couch and doesn’t really care how big or small it makes a room look.
Then again, Chris actually picks out his furniture. Darren is still in the mentality that everything he owns needs to be picked up from garage sales or Craigslist.
There’s also the fact that all of Chris’s electronics are very obviously missing. It’s hard not to notice, especially the flat screen that’s usually mounted on the wall (Darren has watched a lot of movies on that flat screen).
Chris was definitely robbed. Is that why he asked (told) Darren to come over? The text hadn’t seemed very urgent. Had the robbing happened while Darren was on his way over? Shit. Now he felt really fucking bad for stopping to get a cheeseburger.
“Chris?” He tries again, hesitantly. What if the burglar is still here? Fuck fuck fuck. Where did Chris keep that bat? Darren would feel a lot better if he was holding a bat.
“Finally.”
Darren might have screamed. Maybe. He knows he certainly flew back into the wall when Chris suddenly popped into view around a corner. He also knows that Chris is laughing.
“Oh my god.” He’s wheezing now between his laughter, bent over and letting the wall support his weight and Darren wonders if he looks as mortified as he feels. “Your face.”
“Fuck you, Colfer,” Darren grumbles as his pulse slowly returns to its resting place. “Your face. I thought you were a monster or something.”
“I didn’t even know your screams could get that high pitched.”
“I hate you.” But even Darren can’t help from grinning now, because Chris is still laughing and his laughter is sort of contagious (or maybe Darren just really likes laughing).
When Chris calms down and the only sound that fills the silence is his slightly labored breathing, he wipes at his eyes and looks up at Darren with a cocked eyebrow.
“Do you want to tell me what that was about? Or are these jeans really that bad?”
Looking at what Chris is wearing is normally not something Darren does, but this time he does look and, yeah, those jeans are pretty old and worn but they aren’t scream worthy.
In fact Darren is looking at Chris’s plain, on-the-small-side black shirt a little skeptically, too.
“Why the clothes?” He asks, and Chris raises his eyebrow again as he makes his way towards Darren.
“If that’s a ploy to get me naked, it’s not going to work,” Chris responds in a deadpan and Darren reels back a bit, mouth working wordlessly for a few moments.
“That’s, shut up, you know that’s not what I meant. Jerk.” Darren runs a hand through his curls and Chris walks past him and into the living room and-“Dude you were robbed!” Darren nearly shouts suddenly, shooting back to attention. Fuck, maybe Chris doesn’t even know yet.
The random declaration certainly stops Chris in his tracks. He doesn’t even turn all the way around, but looks at Darren like he’s speaking in tongues.
“I’ve been what?”
“Robbed. All… Your stuff is all moved and, dude, your TV is gone. That’s why I freaked out. I thought you were like. A burglar or something.”
“So your reaction to burglars is to… Scream and flatten against a wall?”
“But you’re not a burglar!”
“You thought I was, though.” Chris’s grin is on the mocking side, the way it is whenever he knows he’s backed Darren into a corner. So Darren just lets out a huff of breath instead of a retort and Chris finishes with an amused, “I thought so.”
“So…” Darren doesn’t say anything else, just gestures vaguely at the expanse of the living room and Chris sighs.
“You really have the worst memory.”
“I do not. I remember a lot of things.”
Chris just gives Darren a look, a look that clearly says you forget your own lyrics. Before Darren can continue his argument, though, Chris holds up his hand.
“Remember how I asked you to help me paint my living room?”
Darren tries to remember. He really tries.
“Yes?” His own uncertainty is enough to turn it into a question and cause Chris to give him a pointed look. “Okay, no, but I mean-that must have been awhile ago.”
“It was two weeks, Darren.” Okay, woah, Chris is really not amused.
“Two weeks could… Constitute as a while, right? In,” Darren pauses, his head working frantically to come up with something. “Dog years?” He finishes pathetically, but it makes Chris crack a smile. Which is good. Because Chris can be really scary when he wants to be.
So rather than lash out at Darren, Chris grabs him by the wrist and pulls him the rest of the way into the living room. Now it makes sense why there are sheets on the ground and, hey, there are paint cans. He had definitely not seen those before.
“Well it’s good to know that you respond well to commands. Seeing as you forgot your promise to help me, you really did get here fast,” Chris says over his shoulder, catching Darren’s confused look back. “My text? You didn’t think I sounded off?”
Darren pulls his phone from his back pocket, frowning in concentration. “Where are you? Come over now,” he reads out loud and then shrugs. “I just thought you were being bossy-hey!”
Chris shoves him playfully, and Darren rubs at the spot on his arm as if he’s been gravely injured.
“Foul play was not called for, Christopher.” But Chris is already crouching down, pouring a light shade of blue paint into the tins and no longer paying attention to Darren.
“So,” Darren says conversationally, because he prefers it when Chris pays attention to him and not to the paint. “Got tired of the taupe?”
Chris stands, wiping his hands on the knees of his jeans and, when he turns, Darren can make out vague thumb shapes. “I don’t think people don’t get tired of taupe. It’s taupe, Darren. Even the word itself is boring.”
“I dunno, I kind of like the way it makes my mouth move. Taupe.” Darren pops his ‘p’ and is greeted by another judgmental eyebrow raise.
“Well, we can paint your apartment taupe,” Chris pops his ‘p,’ imitating Darren, “one day. But for right now we’re going to paint my living room blue and-” He stops suddenly, and Darren waits a few beats (maybe he lost his train of thought, or saw a spider, or realized he left the oven on) before waving his hand in front of Chris’s face.
“Earth to Chris. Anybody home?” His hand is already forming a fist and when his knuckles are hardly an inch from the side of Chris’s head, Chris jerks away.
“You were going to knock on my head,” he says, accusingly, and Darren becomes all big eyes and innocent smiles. He shrugs in a ‘who, me?’ sort of way but Chris stopped falling for that a long time ago. “That doesn’t work on me anymore, Dare. Use it all you want on the rest of the crew, but I’ve grown immune to your boyish charms.”
Darren is halfway through thinking up his rebuttal-he does not charm the rest of the cast-but pauses. “You think I have boyish charm?”
“Not the point,” Chris hisses, but there’s a bit of color to his cheeks and Darren counts it as a (very small, practically miniscule, but existent) victory. “The point is that you forgot we were painting today and so you didn’t exactly adhere to the dress code.”
That much is unfortunately true. Darren fingers the band t-shirt he’s wearing. It’s old but that’s the best part about it. It takes years to make t-shirts as comfortable as the one he’s wearing is.
“I probably have something you can borrow, I just need to-”
“No, hey, don’t worry about it. I got this.” There’s a question on Chris’s lips, Darren can practically see it, but before he has a chance to ask, Darren is pulling the shirt off of his arms and throwing it on the mass of furniture. “Paint just adds to the character of my jeans, right? They’ll be my artsy jeans.”
“You just took your shirt off!” The way Chris says it, it’s almost as if Darren just donned a puppy coat (fuck, that’s just sad and demented).
“Well, yeah. Paint comes off skin.” Darren shrugs, but Chris is still looking a bit on the crazy side. It lasts for a few more seconds before it seems to deflate, and then he’s running hands over his face and making exasperated noises.
“Oh god, this is like the beginning of a really bad porn or something,” he groans, and Darren wonders if Chris realizes he said it out loud.
While Chris has his mini break down, Darren picks up one of the rollers and hikes it over his shoulder. It’s not exactly easy, because it’s one of those hand rollers and he has to bend his arm kind of awkwardly, but he does it. He struts over to Chris and strikes a pose, clearing his throat.
“Oh my god,” Chris is groaning again as Darren sports a sultry smile and cocks an eyebrow.
“Hey there, sexy,” Darren purrs, and he runs the paint roller down his body and-shit, that fucking tickles. Chris is covering his mouth but Darren is pretty sure he’s smiling by the way his eyes are crinkling. “I heard you needed someone with experience, and I assure you that I can fill in all your nooks and crannies.”
Chris loses it then, for the second time that afternoon, his laughter silent but his shoulders heaving. But Darren is laughing, too, reaching to clutch at Chris’s shoulder before either of them goes toppling.
“Nooks and crannies? I think the word cranny is like, on the opposite end of the sexy spectrum.”
“I’m sorry, but painting sexual innuendos aren’t exactly easy to make up off the top of my head.”
“That’s your roller now, I am not touching that. I can’t believe you molested yourself with it.”
This results in Darren brandishing the roller as a weapon, holding it out towards Chris who gives him a very severe warning look that Darren proceeds to ignore. Chris is running, bare feet slipping on the plastic and spare bedding that covers the floor and Darren is sliding along behind him.
“Come on, Chris. I just want to run my moist roller all over your body!”
“What was that about sexual innuendos not being easy?”
“Let me dip my brush into your can!”
“Darren!”
“I want to tape your baseboards!”
“That doesn’t even make sense!”
They end up on the sofa after running circles around the furniture, panting for breath and still giggling on occasion. Darren runs the roller down Chris’s face, resulting in an affronted, “ew, Darren, gross,” and Darren being pushed from the couch and onto the floor.
When they finally settle enough, they sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes, both of them staring at the ceiling.
“You are the worst painting assistant ever,” Chris declares and Darren makes a noise in the back of his throat, offended.
“We haven’t even painted anything yet,” he argues, and Chris nudges at Darren’s shoulder with his knee.
“Exactly. You’ve been here for almost an hour already. So come on, Tarzan, and let’s get started.” Chris heaves himself from the cushions, offering Darren a hand and pulling him to his feet.
“Tarzan?”
“You’re not wearing a shirt. I reserve the right to make any shirtless jokes I desire as penance.”
Darren touches his hand to his heart, pouting.
“Does my bare chest offend you, Christopher?”
“You offend me. Now put your porny roller to use.” He bumps his hip against Darren’s as he makes his way back towards the supplies, and Darren follows. He’s always found painting sort of fun and knows that as long as he stays away from the edges, Chris probably won’t kill him.
“Darren like painting,” he grunts in his best imitation of a caveman, and he sticks his hand in the paint without thinking. Chris just looks at him, an amused what now? grin playing on his lips. So Darren proudly slaps a brilliant blue handprint over his heart and grins back.
“Happy?” Chris drawls, and Darren shakes his head. As quickly as he possibly can, he reaches towards Chris and draws a blue line with his index finger down the slope of Chris’s nose.
“Now I’m happy,” he singsongs as Chris gapes at him.
“You did not just-”
“Oh, but I did.”
This, of course, means war.
The thing about Chris is that he’s full of surprises. Darren has known this almost from the moment they met and Chris started gushing at him about his musical. Which had been weird and totally cool, but certainly unexpected. The longer they’d known each other, though, the more Darren had come to expect the surprises. He had tried, time and time again, to guess how exactly Chris might respond to this or that. Sometimes he’s been half right. But most of the time he’s wrong.
If Darren quoted Blaine more than he already did, he would tell Chris that he zigs whenever Darren thinks he’s going to zag. But the last time Darren had gone all Blaine on Chris, Chris had smacked him in the side of the head with his script.
So when Chris stills, his eyes crossing as he tries to stare at his nose, Darren is unsure what to expect. Maybe he thinks Chris will fling a bucket of paint at him, or maybe Chris will laugh it off.
But being full of surprises generally means being unpredictable.
Chris just stares at Darren for a few moments, before turning back to the wall.
“Stay away from the corners,” he threatens. But, duh, Darren already knows that.
Their silences are generally easy. Chris is kind of a quiet person when he’s concentrated on things, and Darren buzzes with so much energy that he’s surprised he doesn’t make any noise.
Still, Darren doesn’t like being silent for long. Even Chris’s comfortable silences press on his ears after a few minutes, and he begins to hum.
“Really?” Chris looks over him, but there’s a hint of amusement tugging at the corner of his lips. “What are you even humming?” He’s kneeling down on the ground, pouring more paint into the tub.
“You can just hum music, Christopher. My humming is not bound by your sometimes logical reasoning.” He paints over the wall, down to where Chris has started on the corners but staying carefully away from the crown molding. He wiggles slightly, dancing to the sound of his own humming, and he hears Chris chuckle behind him.
“I’m painting Chris’s walls, because he wants them to be blue.” Darren sings along to his own made-up melody, grinning at his rather respectable strips of paint. There’s like no steaks or anything. “I’m not wearing a shirt, that way it won’t be-Shit!”
Darren jerks forward, almost slamming his chest into the painted wall as he feels something cold and thick dribble down his spinal column. He snaps around, eyes wide, to Chris standing there and smirking rather triumphantly.
“Did you just…” Darren motions erratically behind him as if that will convey his point, and Chris’s smile is so sinister it reminds Darren eerily of Kurt.
“Pour paint down your back?”
Fucker.
“Of course not, Darren. That would be juvenile of me.”
Darren knew this wouldn’t end without some sort of fight. And he certainly has no intention of being the loser.
Chris is kneeling beside him now, working on the corners, and Darren aims his soaked paint roller before flicking it and sending paint splattering Chris’s right cheek, ear, and quite a bit of hair. They’re both still for a moment and Chris slowly swivels his head and stares at Darren. After a few very long, tense moments, Darren waves awkwardly.
Without so much as a change in expression, Chris unfolds himself until he’s standing, twirling his roller in his fingers before he chucks it at Darren. They aren’t standing very far apart, so he hardly has time to turn before it whacks against his shoulder and then falls onto the plastic under their feet.
“That was uncalled for,” Darren says as he turns, but there’s a hand dripping with blue paint inches from his face that quickly rakes through his curls. It’s shockingly cold and Darren jerks away, nearly falling over as he moves away from Chris. “Fuck.” Darren grabs at his hair, can feel the way the paint congealing in his curls and makes a face. “You just put paint in my hair.”
“Yep.”
Darren just nods for a minute, lips pursed together, before he kneels down and picks up Chris’s discarded roller. With one in each hand, he looks at them with vague interest. He debates twirling them in his fingers, but he knows his likelihood of dropping them is kind of high. Instead, he brandishes them, turning to look at Chris only to see that he’s holding the open paint bucket.
“You wouldn’t.” Darren’s eyes are wide, flicking back between the deadly set of Chris’s and the teasing peak of blue in the paint can.
“Oh, wouldn’t I?” Chris’s eyes narrow, challenging Darren to try him. Darren really has two choices at this point in time. He could charge Chris and see what happens, or he could admit defeat.
He yells like a crazy person as he runs at Chris who, judging by the way his eyes widen, was not expecting Darren to come at him head first. Darren has him around the middle and is tackling him to the floor before Chris can even think to throw the paint, although Darren is pretty sure that it was just a bluff.
The paint can swings and clatters to the side, dousing Chris’s face and the top of Darren’s head in blue paint.
Darren’s breathing is rapid and loud as he lies on top of Chris, waiting. He sees movement out of the side of his eye and peeks up to watch Chris wipe the paint from his eye and mouth with the sleeve of his shirt.
“Chris?”
His eyes snap open and lock instantly with Darren’s in a look that is thoroughly unamused. Which would matter more if Chris’s eyebrow and half his face wasn’t blue.
Darren starts laughing, clutching at Chris’s arm as if it will somehow keep him from losing it completely. “Dude, you look like you just walked out of Braveheart.” His body is shaking from laughing so hard. “Freedom!” He pumps his arm in the air, still laughing, when Chris promptly pushes him off and onto his back.
“I hate you,” Chris hisses, but Darren just keeps laughing, every so often looking over at Chris as if the displeased look and paint are just what he needs to renew his laughing vigor.
“You are the worst friend. Ever.” Darren continues to laugh, eyes screwed shut and hardly any sound coming out of him. His stomach hurts from laughing so hard.
And then his stomach is cold, cold, why is it so cold? Darren shrieks slightly, his body jolting and arching off the floor as his eyes open to see Chris sliding both rollers up his chest.
“I’m priming while I paint,” he singsongs, pulling away when Darren’s chest is streaked blue.
“You ruined my handprint,” he pouts, looking up at Chris.
“You ruined my face,” Chris deadpans.
“Actually, you ruined your face. You were the one holding the open can of paint.” Darren sits up, running a finger through the wet paint on his chest and testing its tackiness with his fingers.
“You were the idiot who tackled me,” Chris bit back, exasperated. He sinks fully onto his knees beside Darren, rubbing at the still-wet paint on his own face.
“Darren Criss doesn’t back down from a challenge.” Darren grins cheekily, and Chris dips his hand into the large puddle of paint on the floor before dragging it down Darren’s face.
“There. You can have my handprint.”
“Was that really necessary?”
“Yep.”
They sit still for a moment, knee to knee, and Darren instinctively touches his hair, wincing as he feels how crunchy the paint has made it.
“If I wash this out and my hair is suddenly blond, I’m going to kill you.” But Darren’s lips are dropped in a pout rather than a sneer, his eyes big as he pets at his hair pathetically.
“Gasp. Darren Criss, homicidal maniac. I didn’t see that one coming.” Chris is wiping at his face with the bottom of his shirt now, but some of it has dried and is leaving Chris’s face tinged blue.
“It’s because I’m so charming and friendly. No one can resist this smile.” He beams at Chris, who pushes at his cheek until he’s turned away and has, as a result, smeared more paint onto Darren’s face. “They never suspect it.” He shifts to his knees, dipping his chin slightly and looking up at Chris through his eyelashes.
Chris reels back slightly, catching himself with one hand thrown behind him and staring at Darren unsurely. The clean half of Chris’s face is slightly flushed.
“They never know when I’m about to strike.” He’s leaning over Chris, hands pressed to the floor on either side of him, giving him nowhere to run. The air between them is heavy for a moment. Then another one. Darren feels like his heart is beating in his ears, or maybe that’s Chris’s heart, fast as a hummingbird’s.
Slowly, he raises one hand, newly wet with paint, and dresses it to Chris’s chest, right over his sternum. Chris’s eyes shift rapidly from the touch to Darren’s face, before Darren gives a shove and Chris is falling backwards.
He lands, hair and back drenched in the puddle of paint, and stares up for a few moments.
“Fuck you,” he groans, wincing as he rubs at his head, and Darren feels a little bad. He decides he’ll make it up to Chris later. But for now. He moves, slamming down on Chris’s stomach so that they’re perpendicular, the paint on his chest smearing across Chris’s t-shirt.
“Darren!” Chris’s legs flail as he tries to get Darren off, but Darren lets his dead weight hold him down and he grins at Chris. “You are the biggest, asshole, jerk, stupid face-”
“Stupid face? Really?”
“Get off me!”
“I’m sorry, I appear to have lost all control of my motor skills. Any attempts at movement will result in octopus-like tendencies.” He looks at Chris very seriously. “We can’t have that.”
“You are playing a dangerous game, Criss!” He thrashes some more but only manages to splash paint up onto his arms.
Darren grins.
“The most dangerous game.”
There’s a pause, and then Chris is laughing and Darren can feel sweet, sweet victory coursing through his veins.
“Will you get off now?” Chris asks, still laughing but obviously still wanting Darren off of him.
“Nope.”
“Come on, we’ve had our fun, get off.” The laughter is dying out of his voice, and he looks at Darren with not so much patience as amused insistence. Darren grins, eyes glinting mischievously.
“Make me.”
Chris slumps against the ground, glaring at him.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, Darren, but I could totally kick your ass.”
Darren scoffs and rolls his eyes. “You might be taller, Christopher, but I think I have home field advantage.”
“This is my house!” Chris splutters, staring at Darren as if he’s completely lost it (then again, Chris stares at him like that a lot).
“Not what I meant. I meant-” Darren shifts and Chris’s arm works free and begins insistently shoving at him. Darren doesn’t budge. “-home field advantage to wrestling. Obviously.”
Chris smacks Darren’s bare arm, resulting in a hiss of pain.
“Dick.”
“I’m not wrestling with you, so get off of me.” Chris raises his hand to hit Darren again, but Darren shifts quickly, grabbing Chris’s hand with his own and grinning in triumph.
“What was that about not wrestling?” Darren challenges as they struggle for dominance.
“That I’m not doing it!” Chris is beginning to win, though. His position certainly affords him better leverage and, well, Darren just can’t allow that. So he releases Chris’s hand, evoking a “Ha!” Chris even grins as Darren starts shifting again, as if Darren letting go of his hand equates to Chris winning. He’s obviously new at this.
Darren swings his leg around just as Chris starts to try and get up, effectively straddling Chris’s waist and pinning him to the ground. Chris stares up at him in disbelief.
“That wasn’t a good position.”
Chris groans.
“Oh god, this is a nightmare. I’m stuck in a weird nightmare with you. A nightmare that resembles some really freaky porno or something.” Chris thrashes his legs again, but Darren sits contently, his weight resting on his knees.
“Don’t pornos require significantly less clothing?”
Chris raises his arms to shove Darren off of him, but Darren quickly catches his hands and pins Chris down, looming over him.
“You’re already halfway there,” Chris points out, his voice laced with irritation.
“Shirtless wrestling is not porn, Colfer. And if it is, I need to hook you up with better porn.”
“If you weren’t straddling my waist, I’d knee you in the balls.”
Darren chuckles.
“So are you going to just let me win? That’s no fun.” He pouts playfully down at Chris, batting his eyelashes.
“Pinning me to the paint covered ground isn’t a game, Dare. Ugh, it’s seeping through my shirt.”
“It’s just a little paint,” Darren teases, rocking Chris’s body back and forth with his knees.
“Darren. We’re both covered in so much paint, I’m surprised I haven’t made more Smurf jokes.”
Darren looks down at himself and, yeah, he’s pretty fucking blue. It looks like he got in a fight with a paint bucket and lost which, actually, is sort of what happened. He starts bobbing his head from side to side, humming the Smurfs theme.
He really should have known that the Smurfs was just a convenient distraction.
Darren forgets how strong Chris is until Chris does something to prove it. He’s kind of like a superhero like that. Like the Hulk, except he doesn’t turn really green and isn’t triggered by anger.
His back slams into the ground and, fuck, the paint is really fucking cold and how does he keep forgetting that? Chris glares down at him for a moment, holding Darren’s wrists now and looking expectant.
“You are no fun.”
“Rolling around in paint isn’t anyone’s definition of fun, Darren.”
Darren is sure he could find like, ten people who would say otherwise.
“I will tickle you,” Chris threatens, and Darren can’t help but laugh. The idea of thrashing around in paint, though, probably isn’t as awesome as it sounds. Sort of like how mud wrestling is actually pretty gross.
“Fine. Fine. You win.”
Chris’s glare splits into a grin and he releases Darren, rolling off and back onto the floor. Chris’s back is in paint again, his head resting inches from Darren’s shoulder as his body angles out on a diagonal. Darren turns his head to raise an eyebrow, amused.
“Shut up, I’m tired. You’re exhausting.” Darren folds his lips together to keep from laughing, his barely contained grin straining at his cheeks. Chris must see the slight shake in his shoulders, because he turns his head slightly to level Darren with an unamused gaze.
“Really?”
Darren holds his hands up in surrender.
“You’re the one who said it.”
“And you’re apparently a preteen boy.” But Darren can see Chris roll his eyes fondly, so he drops it. Besides, he sort of is half the time.
They lay in silence for a few moments, staring at the ceiling, before Chris lets out a sigh. Darren turns his head and hums in acknowledgement, waiting for Chris to let off whatever’s on his mind.
“A whole bucket of paint, and we got about… A foot of the wall done.” Darren leans up and, yeah, Chris might even be generous by saying a foot.
“At… Least your floor is nice and blue?” Darren grins at him optimistically, and Chris huffs out a laugh.
“Just what I’ve always wanted.”
“It’s perfectly right?” Darren raises his eyebrows and sees Chris fighting a smile.
“Remind me to never ask you to help paint again. Ever.”
Darren lays back down, nudging Chris’s shin with his foot.
“You had fun, come on. I know you did.”
“Darren. I’m blue.”
“It’s a lovely shade on you,” Darren drawls in a snooty tone, and that’s enough to make Chris laugh and curl into Darren, shaking his head repeatedly. Darren grins, turning and smacking a kiss against Chris’s less-paint-covered cheek.
“Ew, gross, Dare.” Chris makes a show of rubbing at the nonexistent saliva on his cheek and Darren rolls his eyes, albeit with a hint of affection. They’re silent again, and then Chris groans, falling onto his back again.
“Help me clean up?”
“But of course.”
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