1-15
hi! is anyone even left around here? I’m sorry for being horrible. I know I say that all the time, but I really am. also, I don’t write silly stories about bands anymore. NOPE. now, apparently, I write silly stories about freaking DREAM THIEVES, because THAT’S mature!
and here’s the thing, I really didn’t mean to get back into fandom. I was feeling so high and mighty with my fancy degree and my job and my apartment and I took a look at myself and said “no more porn on the internets for you, honey, you’re a REAL GIRL NOW” but I’m not and the REASON is because the Inception fandom is already so fucking great. it seriously is. plus, I saw the movie once and was like “cool, that’s alright” and then I saw it again and I was like “WHOA, HOLD ON A MINUTE THERE, HOW DID I MISS TOM HARDY FLIRTING FOR EVERY SECOND OF HIS SCREENTIME?” because I did somehow miss that the first time around. and from there it was a quick fall.
the other reason for this is that I was hanging out with your__design as per usual and, again as per usual, we wound up inventing a stupid new drink that got me into trouble. for you see, as the name of this journal suggests, I write embarrassing shit when I’m drunk. WHATEVER. I also write faster when I’m drunk, I discovered this. so it was experiment! for science! and not at all embarrassing!
anyway, I hadn’t written anything just fast and dirty and pointless for awhile so I thought, “oh, let’s do that old meme that was flying around awhile ago, and, hey, if I wind up writing something about Inception, so be it!” only then it got really involved and horrible and now I don’t know what to DO. I haven’t really written anything for any fandom for - what, has it been a year? something like that? and I haven’t written anything for any fandom on PURPOSE in TWO years, so, IT’S BEEN AWHILE, basically. I have to relearn how to block out shame!! so I’m easing myself back into it, meaning, writing a bunch of little stories while I pretend I’m not writing one or two already too-long and just-obnoxiously-and-persistently-getting-ever-longer stories as well.
1. Pick a character, pairing, or fandom you like.
2. Turn on your music player and put it on random/shuffle.
3. Write a drabble related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it’s over. No lingering afterwards!
4. Do ten* of these, then post them.
*seriously, I got freaking INVOLVED, okay, and wound up doing THIRTY, ARGH. THE POST IS TOO BIG, THAT'S HOW BAD THIS IS. but, I mean, is anyone really surprised? I couldn’t even INTRODUCE this without getting obnoxiously verbose! anyway, I blame Tom Hardy, because I’ve been blaming EVERYTHING on him lately and I’m just going to keep right on doing it until he stops being so damn saucy. (meaning: I’m not going to stop. not EVER.)
I should also mention that this collection of songs makes it look like I only ever listen to The National, Blur, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen and The Smiths. I want to state for the record that that is only mostly true.
anyway, here’s fucking thirty fucking stupid fucking stories about fucking Arthur and fucking Eames, goddamnit.
1. hollywood babylon - the misfits
Eames likes nothing more than a good car chase. He prefers them in reality, actually, that extra little zip of adrenaline from the knowledge that it all matters, but driving an old Mustang through the narrow streets of what looks like a combination of San Francisco and Brooklyn makes for a pretty good day’s work, in his opinion, especially with Arthur in the passenger seat, lips thinned out in charming disapproval as he fires shots out the window.
As he loads another clip he turns to Eames and says, “You couldn’t have put us in something a little more modern?”
Eames laughs and says, “Can’t compete with the classics.”
Arthur doesn’t roll his eyes, but Eames suspects it’s only because he knows it makes him look even younger than he already does. He’s like the Bonnie to Eames’s Clyde, there’s no denying it, but when he tells Arthur so he can tell that Arthur only barely restrains himself from firing off a shot into Eames’s shoulder.
“I need that arm to shift gears, darling,” he says amiably and Arthur grumbles and takes out his aggression on the projections, pretends he isn’t totally charmed by Eames’s every thought.
Of course, Eames knows better.
2. mother make me golden - dear in the headlights
After Mal dies, Arthur sticks closer to Cobb than ever.
Cobb needs someone there, someone reliable, someone who can ground him in reality more firmly than Mal’s old totem can. Arthur disapproves of Cobb using the silver top; it only makes him worse, more unsure. But he understands why Cobb needs it and he keeps quiet. Eames, for all his infuriatingly indisputable charm, never was as good as Arthur when it came to tactful silences. At least he doesn’t take his complaints to Cobb, preferring to unload them on Arthur instead.
“We can’t work like this,” he says, over and over again on a dozen different jobs. Arthur knows what Eames means: he can’t work like this.
But he stays with them and Arthur finds himself relying on the forger’s quips and endearments, using them like a totem when he feels Cobb’s quiet madness pulling him down. Arthur grows used to Eames, more than anything, even comes to enjoy his unprofessionalism since it at least offers a break from Cobb’s constant, frantic depression.
They spend a lot of time together, pretending they don’t know that Cobb is pushing himself deeper and deeper into dream states, chasing his projection of a ghost, haunting himself so thoroughly in his dreams that it starts to bleed through into his waking life, painting dark semi-circles under his eyes, lining darker shadows into his face. Even Eames starts to look a little ragged, though not so much that a stranger would know. It happens somewhere in his eyes, in the way they’re growing wilder and duller, both at once.
Arthur thinks he can hold them together though, he thinks he can get Cobb out of this, with enough time.
But then one morning, just after a job, Eames is gone without a word, leaving nothing but a red loaded die in the middle of Arthur’s workspace, and Arthur panics, thrown mostly by the degree to which Eames’s loss throws him. He starts keeping Eames’s old totem in his pocket, runs his fingers over it, even tosses it a few times, but this is always reality.
Is this how Cobb feels? he wonders once and then actually, physically, has to shake himself, like he’s initiating his own kick, because he and Eames are not Cobb and Mal and Eames has never been reliable. Arthur knows he shouldn’t use Eames’s totem, but he understood when it was Cobb and he understands now too; in this respect they are at least a little bit similar.
Except there’s always the off-chance that Eames, at least, might come back.
3. desire - ryan adams
Eames has always thought Arthur looked like the type who went in for romance, but in a closeted kind of way, layered over by manners and chivalry. He tries to hide it but in reality, Eames decides, what Arthur wants is moonlit picnics on the beach and strolls through the park at sunset, holding hands and staring deeply into each others’ eyes.
Later, he learns that he was all wrong about this. Arthur hates the beach, hates sand. Arthur has allergies that make any park a less than romantic setting.
The only romantic thing about Arthur, Eames eventually discovers, is that he likes to be kissed slowly and patiently, not kisses designed to start anything, but soft, lingering kisses, kisses that ground them where they are. He likes it when Eames presses his hand to Arthur’s lower back and holds him in close, he likes to lay in bed for hours, just memorizing Eames’s mouth. It’s less rushed than Eames would have expected, from all of Arthur’s clean lines and brusque steps, from how capable and quick he is on the job.
It’s probably his favorite thing about Arthur.
It’s also something that he knows Arthur would strangle him for, if he ever thought of mentioning it to anyone else, especially the rest of the team, but that’s not why Eames keeps the secret.
He keeps it because it’s a little piece of Arthur that’s just for him, a slowed-down, dreamy Arthur, open and loosened and warm and Eames has never liked to share.
4. fool - blur
The morning after is less awkward than Arthur expects. Eames has already disappeared, leaving nothing but one of Arthur’s post-it notes slapped to Arthur’s forehead, a sloppy “xo” scrawled on it in, inexplicably, thick pink sharpie. Arthur does not have pink markers, he knows he doesn’t. Maybe Eames used one of Ariadne’s. Or his own, Arthur wouldn’t be surprised.
At least sleeping at the warehouse allows him some extra time to work, no Cobb or Ariadne or Eames requiring a watchful eye. He should be able to get a lot done before everyone else turns up. Unfortunately, Arthur can’t focus.
He refuses to think it’s because of Eames until Eames himself saunters in with coffee, clothes rumpled from the night before, hideous shirt halfway undone because Arthur ripped the buttons off last night.
“Morning,” Eames says, shrugging off his jacket. “You owe me a new shirt.”
Arthur allows himself to gape at Eames, but just for a moment before he looks down and shuffles his papers. “I hope you don’t plan on picking it out yourself,” he says.
“Of course I do,” Eames says, and his voice sounds closer than before, though Arthur is pointedly not looking at him. “And it’s going to be truly revolting,” he says gleefully.
Arthur rolls his eyes, still looking down so Eames can’t see.
“Since, apparently,” Eames continues, stepping in close, chin resting on Arthur’s shoulder, breath hot in his ear and smelling faintly bitter from the coffee - Arthur recognizes it, belatedly; it’s from his favorite café - and he lowers his voice and says, cheerfully, “the more hideous my clothes are the more you want to rip them off me.” He kisses Arthur’s cheek once and leaves a coffee cup on his desk, resting on a napkin so it won’t leave a ring on Arthur’s papers.
And if Arthur finds it a lot easier to concentrate on work after that it’s because of the coffee and nothing else.
5. heart with no companion - leonard cohen
A lot of what draws Ariadne to team is that they all seem so lonely. Cobb, torn from his wife and children and set adrift in a reality he can’t stop questioning; Arthur, with his cold suits in cold colors and how he’s always wrapped up in his work. Saito is solitary like a king, almost, head heavy with necessary dignity and full of worries that even his mysterious phone calls can’t solve. Yusuf buries himself in his chemicals and keeps his distance from all of them, in small ways. Even Eames is practically homeless and if she ever asks about his life he laughs and makes a joke about keeping up the mystery and leaves as soon as he can.
She wants to fix them, to build them up in logical and sturdy shapes, like buildings. She doesn’t know if it’s some maternal instinct or just human compassion, but she wants it badly.
When Arthur kisses her in the dream she thinks for a minute that that might be the way to solve at least one of them, but later, when they’re going down to the third level, she glances over at him as he kneels over Eames.
Eames says something to him, quietly so the rest can’t hear. He looks worried, more worried than Ariadne has ever seen him when anything other than his own skin has been on the line. Arthur smiles and says something that makes Eames smile back, and she sees it then, the soft, warm way that they look at each other, and she realizes that it’s not the first time she’s seen that look. She’s seen it from one or both of them every time they tease each other; she’s seen that same warmth between them every time they’re in the same room.
She has a little moment of personal disappointment (Arthur is really quite beautiful, she thinks, and at least Eames has better taste than his clothing suggests) but as she slips into the dream she’s pleased that there’s at least two less broken men for her to clean up, and if they can just finish this job and keep Saito alive, she’ll be down a third as well.
6. cardinal song - the national (I cheated on this one, I don’t give a fuck. I wanted to know how it was going to end.)
Eames isn’t dishonest, but he’s not honest either. Every time Arthur tries to catch him in a lie, to prove, at least to himself, that he’s right to be uneasy about this latest addition to their team, he can never do it. Eames always leaves himself some kind of loophole or technicality. Arthur grudgingly has to give him credit for it, but he also blames Eames for making Arthur so obsessed with figuring him out. He’s like the Penrose stairs in that way, offering Arthur a constantly changing perspective on where he stands with the man. It shouldn’t matter. Professionally, they work well together. Eames, whatever else he is, is very, very good at what he does.
Arthur knows that, and he knows that Eames likes hideous shirts, and that Eames is often the best indicator of whether a new team member can be trusted; if Eames gets along with someone, he’s always reliable. (Arthur doesn’t know what it says about him, the way that Eames can never just let them be in the same space without needling Arthur in little ways, making him squirm and glare. It’s not that Eames doesn’t trust him, that’s about all he knows for sure; he wouldn’t keep working with Arthur if he didn’t. Arthur has a few guesses about it, though most of them boil down to Eames being an asshole.) Arthur knows that Eames does not like coffee, doesn’t even like the smell of it, but is defensive, almost embarrassed about his preference for tea. Arthur knows that Eames is charming when he has to be and usually even when he doesn’t, probably just for fun.
He especially likes to flirt with shy young women and he does so in an almost sexless way but he never talks about anything long-term, or anything about his life outside the job in general, with the exception of a few pieces of information he lets slip sometimes, so randomly that Arthur would say they were accidental if he believed Eames capable of anything uncalculated. Eames has an apartment in Paris, but it’s not where he feels most at home. The longest he’s spent anywhere since he was seventeen was a year he spent in Algiers. He had a cat once, but he moves around too much to keep pets for very long. He never takes a suitcase anywhere, only steals or charms or gambles his way to what he needs, but he always springs for a hotel room, and a nice one, because he doesn’t like the idea of a cheap motel that skimps on the housekeeping.
Arthur knows there’s a lot he doesn’t know about Eames, and that’s really the most solid fact he has about the man. He should have tried harder, he thinks now; he should have dug deeper, even though he already thought he was digging too far.
He had assumed that Eames carried a gun, in the real world. He was so capable with them, even fond of them in dreams, Arthur just assumed Eames had one. He wouldn’t have sent Eames around the back of the building by himself if he’d known the idiot was unarmed.
He had assumed that Eames’s careful observation, so necessary to his job as a forger, would have carried over into a situation like this where their lives - their real, waking lives - were on the line, but it doesn’t and Eames gets himself shot. Was it out of nervousness or cockiness or just sheer stupidity? Arthur wonders as he takes off his jacket and uses it to apply pressure to the wound.
He hadn’t assumed that Eames would know anything about field medicine, but he grunts out, “Bullet’s still in there. You’ve got to-” and then he bites down hard and doesn’t finish.
“A hospital-” Arthur starts to say but Eames jerks his head and Arthur knows he’s right. Gunshot wounds attract too much attention at hospitals and there’s no time to find someone more discrete, not now.
Arthur doesn’t have a knife and when he asks Eames, Eames just shakes his head again and closes his eyes tighter.
“Alright,” Arthur says, keeping his voice steady, “Hands then.” He removes his jacket from Eames’s shoulder, unbuttons his cuffs, rolls up his sleeves and rips the seams of Eames’s hideous Hawaiian shirt, tearing his way to bare, bloody skin. When the wound is exposed he takes a breath and reaches in. Eames lets out a noise that’s not quite a yell or a groan or a hiss but somehow combines all three.
“I have to confess,” Eames says, his eyes open again (Arthur wonders if he’s talking to get himself through the pain, if he’s talking just to see if he can, if he even knows he’s talking at all.), “this is not the way I wanted to get your fingers in me, darling.”
Arthur doesn’t even understand for a minute, he’s so focused on trying not to cause Eames any undue pain, on trying to find the bullet. He wouldn’t have, normally, but he’s so scattered, so off balance right now. He understands and he pictures it, all in one breath, and then he blushes. Eames laughs, sounding both pleased and pained. Arthur looks away from Eames’s shoulder to his face, and is surprised by how fondly Eames is looking at him. This is not the way you look at someone who’s causing as much pain as Arthur is right now.
“Shut up, Mr. Eames,” Arthur says, his fingers closing on the bullet. Eames hisses as Arthur’s fingers move, clenching the bullet between thumb and forefinger. Though Eames is grimacing, clenching his jaw, he’s biting down on that same warm smile and Arthur suddenly figures out one of the forger’s secrets, pulls it out of him as painfully and quickly as the bullet itself. Eames sucks a breath through his teeth and closes his eyes again, his head falling back to the bloody pavement. Arthur covers the wound with his jacket again, the bullet still wrapped in a sheen of Eames’s blood and the tight grip of Arthur’s fist.
“Your bedside manner…” Eames pants, then shuts his mouth again, breathing deep and hard through his nose. Arthur can piece together the joke from there.
He should reply in trade, should make a comment about Eames being a baby about a little shoulder wound, should try to goad Eames into being alright, but it spills out before he can think better of it and he says, “You should have said something, you idiot,” and at that point he might as well, so he kisses Eames’s mouth, too quickly to taste anything much more than blood and salt.
Eames doesn’t miss a beat: “I thought I had, darling.”
7. cosmic love - florence and the machine
“Darling!” Eames says brightly. “I’ve missed you.” And he has, so he puts his hands all over him, puts his mouth everywhere he can reach, tastes heartbeats with his tongue. Arthur twitches in his grip, almost as if he’s ticklish, but doesn’t pull away.
“You’re drooling on me, I hate you.”
But he doesn’t, he never has and Eames knows it because Arthur’s smiling at him.
*
After Eames has had six months or so to himself, Ariadne convinces Cobb to go after him. You know what it’s like, she said, you can talk to him. Cobb argued that Eames isn’t the type to talk about feelings, but he tracked him down anyway, call it a favor, and he was surprised to find that Eames is in Mombasa. Cobb thought he would have hidden himself better than that, but Eames, it turns out, wasn’t exactly hiding. Not exactly.
*
“It’s nice here.”
“That was the idea.”
“How long will you stay?”
“As long as you need me to.”
“Eames, you know it isn’t like that,” Arthur says and gives him a long look, tired and stiff but beneath that warm and worried and confused and so many other things that it’s hard to decide which to focus on. Eames decides to focus on the fondness and leave the rest for later.
“It’s like I built it, pet, it’s exactly like that.” He wishes he hadn’t said it, but it looks like Arthur didn’t hear. Everything is still nice.
*
Cobb lands in Mombasa and tracks down Yusuf first, figuring the chemist would be likely to have an idea where Eames might be. Yusuf has a little more than an idea.
“You’re not going to like it, Cobb,” he says, and Cobb wonders if Yusuf has always looked this tired.
“I should have said no,” Yusuf says and he leads Cobb down into the basement.
*
“You have a job to do, Mr. Eames. We can’t stay here forever.”
“Of course we can. Another job will come along. We still have plenty of money to keep you in suits.”
“It’s not the money I’m worried about. You can’t stay here like this. You’ll have to wake up eventually.”
Eames doesn’t say anything. If he ignores this, Arthur will drop it.
“You know this isn’t real, don’t you?” Arthur keeps asking, but he sounds less urgent every time he does. He’ll stop eventually, and it’ll be alright.
*
Eames looks thin, more than thin, emaciated. He looks like he hasn’t slept, though that’s all he’s been doing. “He’s been under for the better part of a few months,” Yusuf says.
“Can you wake him up?”
Yusuf hesitates, but he nods and disconnects Eames from the PASIV device. It takes a long time for the forger to open his eyes, longer still for him to focus on Cobb.
Eames blinks at him once, seems to recognize him. He blinks again and sits up a bit, eyes widening to take in the dim light, and then he focuses just behind Cobb’s right shoulder, where Arthur should be. Cobb flinches in spite of himself.
Eames sighs and lies back. “You’re here, then,” he says, voice thick and dry, breaking from lack of use. “I thought I might have been dreaming.”
8. tall saint - the national
I.
“If this happens,” Arthur said, the first time, “it happens once and once only. And we do not cuddle. And we do not talk about it ever again.”
Eames considered this. It was not what he wanted, not by a long shot, but it was a foot in the door. He could work with that. He beamed at Arthur. “My room or yours?”
II.
The second time, he got Arthur drunk. He’s not proud of it, but there you go.
“It wasn’t all bad, was it, darling?” he asked against Arthur’s thigh.
“Shut up, just shut up,” Arthur said and flipped them over.
III.
The third time it was Arthur’s idea, if grumbling “oh fuck it” and jumping Eames in an elevator counts as an idea. Eames will take it, either way.
IV. and V.
The fourth time was actually the fourth and fifth time and Eames even managed to get a cuddle out of him in between, sort of.
(“What are you doing to my arm?”
“… Nothing?”)
XV.
“This is absurd, Arthur,” Eames panted. “Just admit-”
“This counts as talking about it,” Arthur said and gave Eames something else to do with his mouth. It was sneakier than Eames would have given him credit for, before he knew Arthur was kind of a bastard when you got him in the sack.
LXII.
He woke up with his face in Arthur’s neck, hand over his hip and he tried so hard not to move but Arthur shifted in his sleep and his hair tickled Eames’s nose and Eames sucked in a breath, just a quick one, and before he could exhale, Arthur was up and out of the bed.
MORE ROMAN NUMERALS THAN EAMES KNOWS OR REMEMBERS
When Arthur builds dreams he builds them out of Masterpiece Theater and glues them together with caviar. It’s always stuffy and high class and ridiculous. Eames thinks it’s adorable.
He finds Arthur blending in with the projections, sipping from a flute of champagne, wearing a suit that probably costs more than a gently used car. Eames doesn’t say anything about it though, just plucks the glass from Arthur’s fingers and puts a hand on Arthur’s back, steering him to the dance floor.
“I’m not asking to talk about it, I’m not asking for a cuddle, I’m just asking for a dance,” Eames says when Arthur opens his mouth to argue.
Arthur looks at him, head cocked and wary, like Eames is a strange dog that he thinks might bite him. Eames huffs out a breath that isn’t quite a laugh; if he wasn’t so besotted with this idiot he would have hit him in the face by now. “Alright,” Arthur says finally. “For cover.”
“Yes, of course,” Eames agrees and buries his smile into Arthur’s perfectly slicked back hair.
9. a little drop of poison - tom waits
It’s rare that the whole team gets drunk together. After the Inception would have been the perfect time, but Cobb had wanted to be with his kids and they were all so marveled and shaken that they needed a few days to themselves, reassuring themselves of reality and coming to terms with what they’d done. The first few jobs they pulled after were smaller, so it hadn’t warranted anything special, but when they get back into the real business of it they pull off some jobs so stunning that even Eames seems surprised by his own cunning.
“This is ridiculous,” Ariadne says after a particularly beautiful job well done. “We need to drink to this, we just do.”
No one argues.
It’s the first time any of them (except Cobb) has seen Arthur drunk. Ariadne thinks it’s the most adorable thing, the way he gets all flushed and unbuttons, unties. Yusuf isn’t sure he likes the way Arthur becomes suddenly… friendly, and rather, well handsy.
When Arthur puts his hand on Cobb’s knee and tells him what a great friend he thinks Cobb is and how proud he is of Cobb, even calling Cobb a “brave little toaster,” Eames declares it the best night of his life. He sticks close to Arthur afterwards, and Arthur doesn’t seem to mind, even lets the forger pull him bodily from potentially dangerous or awkward encounters with strangers. Perhaps in payment for the delight of seeing Arthur so unwound, Eames takes it upon himself to take Arthur home. It’s a testament to how drunk the rest of them are that this idea doesn’t worry them in the least.
The next morning, when they meet to clear out the warehouse, Eames has hickeys all over his neck and a self-satisfied smirk on his face. Arthur is walking a little stiffly, but other than that he still seems slightly softer somehow, as if a trace of his behavior from last night has lingered, making the Windsor knot of his tie look just a little bit less tight.
If the rest of the team notices, they don’t say anything. It’s nice to see Arthur relaxed, they decide, and they don’t want to ruin it. Eames is especially in favor of this course of action, which the others graciously do not mention either.
10. swamp song - blur
Arthur is not surprised that Eames is a biter. He wouldn’t have guessed it, necessarily (if he had let himself think about this before they somehow found themselves tumbling into bed together), but he’s not surprised by it.
What’s surprising is how much Arthur likes it. He’s not expecting to at all. No one’s ever bitten him before; he’s never really understood the appeal.
But then Eames has one of Arthur’s hands up in front of his mouth and he just nips, so quick and sharp and Arthur just jerks towards him, full body, like he’s been tugged.
Eames raises an eyebrow at that and Arthur shudders, as much from embarrassment as anything else. He can feel how wide his own eyes are in his face.
“Well isn’t this interesting?” Eames smiles, and does it again. It feels even better this time, because now Arthur gets a sweet dark moment of anticipation before Eames bites and he knows that Eames is doing this because Arthur likes it, he’s doing this for Arthur. Arthur makes a noise that he didn’t realize could come out of his own throat, or any other human throat, for that matter. He’ll deny it tomorrow, but right now it’s not as important as the heat unspooling rapidly in his belly, not nearly as important as Eames’s eyes raking all over him, looking for the next target. There’s a thrilled look in his eye, like Eames is excited just to explore, just to study, just to learn how to make Arthur come apart.
It’s like, Arthur thinks, Eames is memorizing all of Arthur’s body. For later, he realizes, for next time, and he repeats that horrible/thrilling noise as Eames’s teeth graze his bared throat.
11. wasp nest - the national
Eames starts out bothering Arthur purely because the man so clearly needs to be bothered. He’s like a little store mannequin running about like a real boy, Eames thinks, and it’s creepy, frankly. And he’s so quick to prickle when Eames nudges a bit, it’s fun to make him squirm.
But then Eames starts to notice things, like the softness of Arthur’s hair when he’s been working so hard that he’s ruffled it smooth with his fingers, the way it wisps up just at the temples. He starts to wonder what Arthur’s hair looks like fresh from the shower. And from there it’s a short leap to wondering what the rest of Arthur looks like straight from the shower, all of him compact and thrumming with energy, and how would that body feel underneath his?
Eames is a betting man, and he’s willing to bet the answer is “pretty fucking great.”
And here’s where the problem arises, because now that he’s spent so long flirting with Arthur to rile him up he can’t seem to convey that he’s now flirting to, well, rile him up.
He starts to lose the subtlety, starting with an onslaught of “darlings” and “pets” and “loves” and anything else he can think of. Arthur remains unmoved.
One day Eames just blurts out, “Your ass is fantastic, darling,” and Arthur just shrugs, so it only gets worse from there. It gets so bad that he accidently teaches Ariadne a lot more about the mechanics of gay sex than she ever wanted to know and Yusuf starts actively avoiding being with the two of them at the same time.
So really, Eames has no choice but to molest him, late at night after everyone’s gone, and force his thigh between Arthur’s, force his mouth to Arthur’s skinny, beautiful, collared throat and just, just taste him and Arthur is still for far too long before he suddenly says, “OH!” and Eames says, “Exactly what part of ‘I’m going to bend you over your desk tonight’ didn’t you understand?” around a mouthful of Arthur’s skin. Arthur just laughs and pulls Eames up to kiss his mouth.
12. I hope that I don’t fall in love with you - tom waits
The first time Arthur sees Eames he knows that it’s going to be trouble. Eames is relaxed and charming, handsome even, if you ignore the shirt, and when he sees Arthur for the first time he beams at him and doesn’t look away when he says, “Mr. Cobb, I think we need to reevaluate the terms of my contract. I didn’t realize you were holding out on me.”
“My point man is not for sale,” Cobb says, smiling warmly. Arthur kind of wants to shoot them both in the head.
The second time Arthur sees him it’s even worse. He’d only clinically noted Eames’s more appealing characteristics last time around before he’d encountered the less attractive aspects of Eames’s personality (sloppy, insufferable, unprofessional, and no concept of personal space) so it hadn’t been too bad, but the second job they work together, Eames takes it personally.
There’s a little girl missing and the father’s got the money to pay for an extractor. He’s got someone he thinks has information and they need a forger to get it out of him, to make him sorry for what he’s done, guilty enough to give them all the information they need and still be willing to give them more. It’s not a fun job and, from what he’d seen of Eames last time around, Arthur didn’t expect him to be on board so quickly but he’s there from day one, early every morning and late every night, and he barely cracks a smile until the job is done.
“He has a thing about kids,” Cobb says when Arthur breaks down and asks and then Arthur has to spend the rest of the job telling himself firmly not to get all swoony about it, everyone likes kids.
The third time he sees him it’s Cobb and Mal’s wedding and Eames comes up to him, smelling like champagne and lilac, takes one look at Arthur’s face and says, “You’re a secret romantic, aren’t you, darling?” It’s the first time he calls Arthur “darling” and Arthur fumbles when he tries to put on the proper expression. At that point, it’s all over; Eames’s smile turns devious when he sees how flustered Arthur is. For the next dozen jobs, he can’t say three words to Arthur without throwing in a pet name among them.
He doesn’t call him “darling” at Mal’s funeral, doesn’t say anything to him at all, just stands next to Arthur as Arthur stands next to Cobb, close enough that Arthur can feel the heat beneath his suit. Arthur has often imagined getting Eames into a good, well-tailored suit, and a part of him wants to see what the end result is, but he can’t make himself let go of Cobb’s shoulder, can’t make himself look away from Mal’s grave until they fill it all the way up again. Eames stays by his side the whole time.
When they come together again for the Fischer job, Arthur can’t remember now how many times they’ve worked together or have seen each other casually (because they run in the same less-than-legal circles, after all), but it’s been at least six months since they’ve even been in the same country.
Eames is there when Arthur comes in first thing in the morning, early like he was for the kidnapping job. Arthur stops when he catches sight of Eames, but it feels like all of his organs have kept moving forward without him or something: his heart stutters just a bit and he forgets to exhale. It’s all very embarrassing.
Eames smiles at him - he’s gotten tan, Arthur notices, but, well, Africa, so that’s not surprising, but he’s also done something deeply stupid with his hair and Arthur still finds it horribly, unavoidably attractive - and he’s holding a cup of coffee, just one.
“Hello again,” he says brightly. “I thought you’d be in early. Care to show me what you’ve got whipped up for a job that can’t be done?”
And it’s the challenge that Eames wants, of course, the challenge is the reason he’s here, Arthur tells himself. He tells himself he’s not disappointed.
“Welcome back, Mr. Eames,” he says and Eames hands him the coffee cup. It’s not warm, Arthur realizes as he takes it. Eames has been here for awhile.
Eames smiles at him, like he’s reading Arthur’s mind and says, “You’ve kept me waiting, darling,” and brushes a hand along Arthur’s back as he makes his way to Arthur’s desk.
Goddamnit Eames, Arthur thinks, but he should really be thinking goddamnit Arthur and he knows it. He had a feeling this was going to happen. He knew from day one that he was going to fall in love with Eames.
13. tear the place up - skunk anansie
Honestly, it’s always kind of given Eames a stiffy to see Arthur go berserk on someone. It’s a quirk at best and something to discuss with his non-existent therapist at worst, but it’s the truth. It’s something about how capable and precise and focused Arthur gets. He tries to imagine Arthur turning that look on him sometimes, though in a decidedly more sexy way, and it’s just an instant boner, every time. So Eames never misses an opportunity to see Arthur go wild all over some projections. It still kills him a little bit inside that he missed Arthur’s zero gravity fight during the Fischer job; Arthur tried to downplay it but in Eames’s mind it’s blisteringly hot.
The moral of the story is, Eames is no longer taking chances when it comes to opportunities to see Arthur in action, which is why he maybe kind of fakes his own death just a little bit on a job. He really shouldn’t, he knows it’s unprofessional, but it’s hardly the most unprofessional thing Eames has ever done in his life. He takes a bullet to the ribs which hurts a lot, yes, probably even enough for Arthur to go all gentleman-assassin on him and put him out of his misery, but that would also put him out of the action, so Eames does what he does best: he fakes it. He writhes around for a bit and even forges some extra blood (he’s very proud of that) and he’s ‘dead’ by the time Arthur gets there.
Arthur actually looks a little concerned for Eames, which is unexpected and also not strictly logical, since Eames would be fine, even if he had just bled out, but then Arthur brushes back Eames’s hair, almost tenderly, before he grabs Eames gun and just starts unloading on the projections, two whole clips without a single miss and then he pistol whips another and - alright, Jesus, that’s unfairly hot.
Eames is just settling in for what promises to be a very sexually exciting thirty seconds of Arthur strangling a projection with its own necktie when he realizes Arthur is looking straight at him, shocked.
Eames waves cheerfully. “Did you miss me?”
“I’m going to kill you, you asshole,” Arthur growls at him and Eames likes the sound of that, likes it a lot, though the death threat is a little overdramatic.
“Did you know you’re incredibly sexy when you’re homicidal?” Eames asks him.
Arthur dreams up a new gun and shoots Eames in the head, but it’s worth it.
14.the proposition - lou reed
“You’re gorgeous, I’m gorgeous,” Eames says. “We owe it to the human race.”
“To do what?” Arthur says, not looking up from his papers. Eames can’t have that. He sits square on Arthur’s desk.
“To hump each other’s brains out, of course.”
“And how does the human race benefit from that?”
“Free show?” Eames suggests.
“Of course you’re an exhibitionist, why am I not surprised,” Arthur mutters, somehow working around the fact that Eames’s ass is smack in the center of his workspace. He only glares once when he has to pull a file directly out from under Eames’s left cheek. As a reward, Eames rocks over to make it easier and, well, also to lean a bit more into Arthur’s personal space.
“And you’re not, of course,” Eames sighs. “How about: opposites attract?”
“What, like magnets? Very sexy, Mr. Eames.” Arthur rolls his eyes.
“Fine. What about we just owe it to ourselves?”
“You’re presupposing that I find you attractive at all,” Arthur says. Eames can see that he’s a step away from a smile; his eyebrows are raised in that half-surprised half-smug look that he always gets when he smiles. All Eames needs is for Arthur’s mouth to cooperate. Eames is close.
“What about we owe it to the team?” Eames tries. “All of this sexual tension…”
“Again, you’re presupposing-”
“Come on, darling, don’t be coy,” Eames says. “We both know you’re not as subtle as you think.”
That actually gets a little blush out of Arthur, there and gone quicker than Eames has ever seen any human being change colors before. Eames wants to perform tests on Arthur’s skin, that’s how fascinating he finds it.
“I’m working, Mr. Eames.”
“So am I,” Eames protests, “and you’re not making my job any easier, mind.”
Arthur gives him a withering look, but beneath it Eames can see a flare of heat, impatience and want and fondness and mostly the want which is precisely the emotion Eames is trying to tap into here. Eames just needs to -
“What about this,” he says suddenly. “We’re not that different after all?”
Arthur looks surprised at that, so surprised that he doesn’t stop himself from smiling. It’s a victory, if a small one. Eames pushes the advantage, of course, and Arthur even kisses him back for just a moment before he gently pushes Eames back and says, “Get back to work, Mr. Eames.”
15. I won’t share you - the smiths
If Arthur had known that fucking Eames would have professional repercussions he wouldn’t have done it. Almost certainly not. Probably not. Well, he would have felt guiltier about it.
The thing is that Eames’s role as their forger tends to require a bit of flirting (sometimes more than flirting) and it’s… surprisingly hard to ignore.
Arthur doesn’t always punch people over it, though. Just the first time.
It was ridiculous, he knew that even before Eames said, “really, Arthur, this is ridiculous,” but he couldn’t help himself. Eames didn’t even look like Eames, but he was wearing Eames’s smile on some beautiful blonde woman’s face and he was smiling it seductively at this forty-something, balding CEO (“not even my type,” Eames pointed out later) and Arthur wasn’t even aware of feeling jealous before suddenly the mark was lying on the floor holding his bloody nose and Arthur was standing over him, looking at his own hand and feeling utterly appalled at himself.
He only ever shot someone once. It wasn’t even that big a deal, actually. It was a projection, some mark’s more homosexually inclined bit of subconscious, Arthur supposes, but all Arthur registered was someone else’s hand on Eames’s ass before he grabbed his gun and pulled the trigger.
The look Cobb gave him was unfairly patronizing, Arthur thought, especially considering how many times Cobb’s relationship quirks have literally shot Arthur in the knee cap. Eames just looked at him, a little amused and mostly exasperated and said, “oh, darling, not again,” like Arthur was shooting people for groping him all the time.
“Shut up,” Arthur says, every time, “don’t say a single word,” and Eames just smiles at Arthur, a warm smile that uncurls slowly and Arthur would shoot a thousand projections just to keep that smile all to himself.
part 2
and here’s the thing, I really didn’t mean to get back into fandom. I was feeling so high and mighty with my fancy degree and my job and my apartment and I took a look at myself and said “no more porn on the internets for you, honey, you’re a REAL GIRL NOW” but I’m not and the REASON is because the Inception fandom is already so fucking great. it seriously is. plus, I saw the movie once and was like “cool, that’s alright” and then I saw it again and I was like “WHOA, HOLD ON A MINUTE THERE, HOW DID I MISS TOM HARDY FLIRTING FOR EVERY SECOND OF HIS SCREENTIME?” because I did somehow miss that the first time around. and from there it was a quick fall.
the other reason for this is that I was hanging out with your__design as per usual and, again as per usual, we wound up inventing a stupid new drink that got me into trouble. for you see, as the name of this journal suggests, I write embarrassing shit when I’m drunk. WHATEVER. I also write faster when I’m drunk, I discovered this. so it was experiment! for science! and not at all embarrassing!
anyway, I hadn’t written anything just fast and dirty and pointless for awhile so I thought, “oh, let’s do that old meme that was flying around awhile ago, and, hey, if I wind up writing something about Inception, so be it!” only then it got really involved and horrible and now I don’t know what to DO. I haven’t really written anything for any fandom for - what, has it been a year? something like that? and I haven’t written anything for any fandom on PURPOSE in TWO years, so, IT’S BEEN AWHILE, basically. I have to relearn how to block out shame!! so I’m easing myself back into it, meaning, writing a bunch of little stories while I pretend I’m not writing one or two already too-long and just-obnoxiously-and-persistently-getting-ever-longer stories as well.
1. Pick a character, pairing, or fandom you like.
2. Turn on your music player and put it on random/shuffle.
3. Write a drabble related to each song that plays. You only have the time frame of the song to finish the drabble; you start when the song starts, and stop when it’s over. No lingering afterwards!
4. Do ten* of these, then post them.
*seriously, I got freaking INVOLVED, okay, and wound up doing THIRTY, ARGH. THE POST IS TOO BIG, THAT'S HOW BAD THIS IS. but, I mean, is anyone really surprised? I couldn’t even INTRODUCE this without getting obnoxiously verbose! anyway, I blame Tom Hardy, because I’ve been blaming EVERYTHING on him lately and I’m just going to keep right on doing it until he stops being so damn saucy. (meaning: I’m not going to stop. not EVER.)
I should also mention that this collection of songs makes it look like I only ever listen to The National, Blur, Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen and The Smiths. I want to state for the record that that is only mostly true.
anyway, here’s fucking thirty fucking stupid fucking stories about fucking Arthur and fucking Eames, goddamnit.
1. hollywood babylon - the misfits
Eames likes nothing more than a good car chase. He prefers them in reality, actually, that extra little zip of adrenaline from the knowledge that it all matters, but driving an old Mustang through the narrow streets of what looks like a combination of San Francisco and Brooklyn makes for a pretty good day’s work, in his opinion, especially with Arthur in the passenger seat, lips thinned out in charming disapproval as he fires shots out the window.
As he loads another clip he turns to Eames and says, “You couldn’t have put us in something a little more modern?”
Eames laughs and says, “Can’t compete with the classics.”
Arthur doesn’t roll his eyes, but Eames suspects it’s only because he knows it makes him look even younger than he already does. He’s like the Bonnie to Eames’s Clyde, there’s no denying it, but when he tells Arthur so he can tell that Arthur only barely restrains himself from firing off a shot into Eames’s shoulder.
“I need that arm to shift gears, darling,” he says amiably and Arthur grumbles and takes out his aggression on the projections, pretends he isn’t totally charmed by Eames’s every thought.
Of course, Eames knows better.
2. mother make me golden - dear in the headlights
After Mal dies, Arthur sticks closer to Cobb than ever.
Cobb needs someone there, someone reliable, someone who can ground him in reality more firmly than Mal’s old totem can. Arthur disapproves of Cobb using the silver top; it only makes him worse, more unsure. But he understands why Cobb needs it and he keeps quiet. Eames, for all his infuriatingly indisputable charm, never was as good as Arthur when it came to tactful silences. At least he doesn’t take his complaints to Cobb, preferring to unload them on Arthur instead.
“We can’t work like this,” he says, over and over again on a dozen different jobs. Arthur knows what Eames means: he can’t work like this.
But he stays with them and Arthur finds himself relying on the forger’s quips and endearments, using them like a totem when he feels Cobb’s quiet madness pulling him down. Arthur grows used to Eames, more than anything, even comes to enjoy his unprofessionalism since it at least offers a break from Cobb’s constant, frantic depression.
They spend a lot of time together, pretending they don’t know that Cobb is pushing himself deeper and deeper into dream states, chasing his projection of a ghost, haunting himself so thoroughly in his dreams that it starts to bleed through into his waking life, painting dark semi-circles under his eyes, lining darker shadows into his face. Even Eames starts to look a little ragged, though not so much that a stranger would know. It happens somewhere in his eyes, in the way they’re growing wilder and duller, both at once.
Arthur thinks he can hold them together though, he thinks he can get Cobb out of this, with enough time.
But then one morning, just after a job, Eames is gone without a word, leaving nothing but a red loaded die in the middle of Arthur’s workspace, and Arthur panics, thrown mostly by the degree to which Eames’s loss throws him. He starts keeping Eames’s old totem in his pocket, runs his fingers over it, even tosses it a few times, but this is always reality.
Is this how Cobb feels? he wonders once and then actually, physically, has to shake himself, like he’s initiating his own kick, because he and Eames are not Cobb and Mal and Eames has never been reliable. Arthur knows he shouldn’t use Eames’s totem, but he understood when it was Cobb and he understands now too; in this respect they are at least a little bit similar.
Except there’s always the off-chance that Eames, at least, might come back.
3. desire - ryan adams
Eames has always thought Arthur looked like the type who went in for romance, but in a closeted kind of way, layered over by manners and chivalry. He tries to hide it but in reality, Eames decides, what Arthur wants is moonlit picnics on the beach and strolls through the park at sunset, holding hands and staring deeply into each others’ eyes.
Later, he learns that he was all wrong about this. Arthur hates the beach, hates sand. Arthur has allergies that make any park a less than romantic setting.
The only romantic thing about Arthur, Eames eventually discovers, is that he likes to be kissed slowly and patiently, not kisses designed to start anything, but soft, lingering kisses, kisses that ground them where they are. He likes it when Eames presses his hand to Arthur’s lower back and holds him in close, he likes to lay in bed for hours, just memorizing Eames’s mouth. It’s less rushed than Eames would have expected, from all of Arthur’s clean lines and brusque steps, from how capable and quick he is on the job.
It’s probably his favorite thing about Arthur.
It’s also something that he knows Arthur would strangle him for, if he ever thought of mentioning it to anyone else, especially the rest of the team, but that’s not why Eames keeps the secret.
He keeps it because it’s a little piece of Arthur that’s just for him, a slowed-down, dreamy Arthur, open and loosened and warm and Eames has never liked to share.
4. fool - blur
The morning after is less awkward than Arthur expects. Eames has already disappeared, leaving nothing but one of Arthur’s post-it notes slapped to Arthur’s forehead, a sloppy “xo” scrawled on it in, inexplicably, thick pink sharpie. Arthur does not have pink markers, he knows he doesn’t. Maybe Eames used one of Ariadne’s. Or his own, Arthur wouldn’t be surprised.
At least sleeping at the warehouse allows him some extra time to work, no Cobb or Ariadne or Eames requiring a watchful eye. He should be able to get a lot done before everyone else turns up. Unfortunately, Arthur can’t focus.
He refuses to think it’s because of Eames until Eames himself saunters in with coffee, clothes rumpled from the night before, hideous shirt halfway undone because Arthur ripped the buttons off last night.
“Morning,” Eames says, shrugging off his jacket. “You owe me a new shirt.”
Arthur allows himself to gape at Eames, but just for a moment before he looks down and shuffles his papers. “I hope you don’t plan on picking it out yourself,” he says.
“Of course I do,” Eames says, and his voice sounds closer than before, though Arthur is pointedly not looking at him. “And it’s going to be truly revolting,” he says gleefully.
Arthur rolls his eyes, still looking down so Eames can’t see.
“Since, apparently,” Eames continues, stepping in close, chin resting on Arthur’s shoulder, breath hot in his ear and smelling faintly bitter from the coffee - Arthur recognizes it, belatedly; it’s from his favorite café - and he lowers his voice and says, cheerfully, “the more hideous my clothes are the more you want to rip them off me.” He kisses Arthur’s cheek once and leaves a coffee cup on his desk, resting on a napkin so it won’t leave a ring on Arthur’s papers.
And if Arthur finds it a lot easier to concentrate on work after that it’s because of the coffee and nothing else.
5. heart with no companion - leonard cohen
A lot of what draws Ariadne to team is that they all seem so lonely. Cobb, torn from his wife and children and set adrift in a reality he can’t stop questioning; Arthur, with his cold suits in cold colors and how he’s always wrapped up in his work. Saito is solitary like a king, almost, head heavy with necessary dignity and full of worries that even his mysterious phone calls can’t solve. Yusuf buries himself in his chemicals and keeps his distance from all of them, in small ways. Even Eames is practically homeless and if she ever asks about his life he laughs and makes a joke about keeping up the mystery and leaves as soon as he can.
She wants to fix them, to build them up in logical and sturdy shapes, like buildings. She doesn’t know if it’s some maternal instinct or just human compassion, but she wants it badly.
When Arthur kisses her in the dream she thinks for a minute that that might be the way to solve at least one of them, but later, when they’re going down to the third level, she glances over at him as he kneels over Eames.
Eames says something to him, quietly so the rest can’t hear. He looks worried, more worried than Ariadne has ever seen him when anything other than his own skin has been on the line. Arthur smiles and says something that makes Eames smile back, and she sees it then, the soft, warm way that they look at each other, and she realizes that it’s not the first time she’s seen that look. She’s seen it from one or both of them every time they tease each other; she’s seen that same warmth between them every time they’re in the same room.
She has a little moment of personal disappointment (Arthur is really quite beautiful, she thinks, and at least Eames has better taste than his clothing suggests) but as she slips into the dream she’s pleased that there’s at least two less broken men for her to clean up, and if they can just finish this job and keep Saito alive, she’ll be down a third as well.
6. cardinal song - the national (I cheated on this one, I don’t give a fuck. I wanted to know how it was going to end.)
Eames isn’t dishonest, but he’s not honest either. Every time Arthur tries to catch him in a lie, to prove, at least to himself, that he’s right to be uneasy about this latest addition to their team, he can never do it. Eames always leaves himself some kind of loophole or technicality. Arthur grudgingly has to give him credit for it, but he also blames Eames for making Arthur so obsessed with figuring him out. He’s like the Penrose stairs in that way, offering Arthur a constantly changing perspective on where he stands with the man. It shouldn’t matter. Professionally, they work well together. Eames, whatever else he is, is very, very good at what he does.
Arthur knows that, and he knows that Eames likes hideous shirts, and that Eames is often the best indicator of whether a new team member can be trusted; if Eames gets along with someone, he’s always reliable. (Arthur doesn’t know what it says about him, the way that Eames can never just let them be in the same space without needling Arthur in little ways, making him squirm and glare. It’s not that Eames doesn’t trust him, that’s about all he knows for sure; he wouldn’t keep working with Arthur if he didn’t. Arthur has a few guesses about it, though most of them boil down to Eames being an asshole.) Arthur knows that Eames does not like coffee, doesn’t even like the smell of it, but is defensive, almost embarrassed about his preference for tea. Arthur knows that Eames is charming when he has to be and usually even when he doesn’t, probably just for fun.
He especially likes to flirt with shy young women and he does so in an almost sexless way but he never talks about anything long-term, or anything about his life outside the job in general, with the exception of a few pieces of information he lets slip sometimes, so randomly that Arthur would say they were accidental if he believed Eames capable of anything uncalculated. Eames has an apartment in Paris, but it’s not where he feels most at home. The longest he’s spent anywhere since he was seventeen was a year he spent in Algiers. He had a cat once, but he moves around too much to keep pets for very long. He never takes a suitcase anywhere, only steals or charms or gambles his way to what he needs, but he always springs for a hotel room, and a nice one, because he doesn’t like the idea of a cheap motel that skimps on the housekeeping.
Arthur knows there’s a lot he doesn’t know about Eames, and that’s really the most solid fact he has about the man. He should have tried harder, he thinks now; he should have dug deeper, even though he already thought he was digging too far.
He had assumed that Eames carried a gun, in the real world. He was so capable with them, even fond of them in dreams, Arthur just assumed Eames had one. He wouldn’t have sent Eames around the back of the building by himself if he’d known the idiot was unarmed.
He had assumed that Eames’s careful observation, so necessary to his job as a forger, would have carried over into a situation like this where their lives - their real, waking lives - were on the line, but it doesn’t and Eames gets himself shot. Was it out of nervousness or cockiness or just sheer stupidity? Arthur wonders as he takes off his jacket and uses it to apply pressure to the wound.
He hadn’t assumed that Eames would know anything about field medicine, but he grunts out, “Bullet’s still in there. You’ve got to-” and then he bites down hard and doesn’t finish.
“A hospital-” Arthur starts to say but Eames jerks his head and Arthur knows he’s right. Gunshot wounds attract too much attention at hospitals and there’s no time to find someone more discrete, not now.
Arthur doesn’t have a knife and when he asks Eames, Eames just shakes his head again and closes his eyes tighter.
“Alright,” Arthur says, keeping his voice steady, “Hands then.” He removes his jacket from Eames’s shoulder, unbuttons his cuffs, rolls up his sleeves and rips the seams of Eames’s hideous Hawaiian shirt, tearing his way to bare, bloody skin. When the wound is exposed he takes a breath and reaches in. Eames lets out a noise that’s not quite a yell or a groan or a hiss but somehow combines all three.
“I have to confess,” Eames says, his eyes open again (Arthur wonders if he’s talking to get himself through the pain, if he’s talking just to see if he can, if he even knows he’s talking at all.), “this is not the way I wanted to get your fingers in me, darling.”
Arthur doesn’t even understand for a minute, he’s so focused on trying not to cause Eames any undue pain, on trying to find the bullet. He wouldn’t have, normally, but he’s so scattered, so off balance right now. He understands and he pictures it, all in one breath, and then he blushes. Eames laughs, sounding both pleased and pained. Arthur looks away from Eames’s shoulder to his face, and is surprised by how fondly Eames is looking at him. This is not the way you look at someone who’s causing as much pain as Arthur is right now.
“Shut up, Mr. Eames,” Arthur says, his fingers closing on the bullet. Eames hisses as Arthur’s fingers move, clenching the bullet between thumb and forefinger. Though Eames is grimacing, clenching his jaw, he’s biting down on that same warm smile and Arthur suddenly figures out one of the forger’s secrets, pulls it out of him as painfully and quickly as the bullet itself. Eames sucks a breath through his teeth and closes his eyes again, his head falling back to the bloody pavement. Arthur covers the wound with his jacket again, the bullet still wrapped in a sheen of Eames’s blood and the tight grip of Arthur’s fist.
“Your bedside manner…” Eames pants, then shuts his mouth again, breathing deep and hard through his nose. Arthur can piece together the joke from there.
He should reply in trade, should make a comment about Eames being a baby about a little shoulder wound, should try to goad Eames into being alright, but it spills out before he can think better of it and he says, “You should have said something, you idiot,” and at that point he might as well, so he kisses Eames’s mouth, too quickly to taste anything much more than blood and salt.
Eames doesn’t miss a beat: “I thought I had, darling.”
7. cosmic love - florence and the machine
“Darling!” Eames says brightly. “I’ve missed you.” And he has, so he puts his hands all over him, puts his mouth everywhere he can reach, tastes heartbeats with his tongue. Arthur twitches in his grip, almost as if he’s ticklish, but doesn’t pull away.
“You’re drooling on me, I hate you.”
But he doesn’t, he never has and Eames knows it because Arthur’s smiling at him.
*
After Eames has had six months or so to himself, Ariadne convinces Cobb to go after him. You know what it’s like, she said, you can talk to him. Cobb argued that Eames isn’t the type to talk about feelings, but he tracked him down anyway, call it a favor, and he was surprised to find that Eames is in Mombasa. Cobb thought he would have hidden himself better than that, but Eames, it turns out, wasn’t exactly hiding. Not exactly.
*
“It’s nice here.”
“That was the idea.”
“How long will you stay?”
“As long as you need me to.”
“Eames, you know it isn’t like that,” Arthur says and gives him a long look, tired and stiff but beneath that warm and worried and confused and so many other things that it’s hard to decide which to focus on. Eames decides to focus on the fondness and leave the rest for later.
“It’s like I built it, pet, it’s exactly like that.” He wishes he hadn’t said it, but it looks like Arthur didn’t hear. Everything is still nice.
*
Cobb lands in Mombasa and tracks down Yusuf first, figuring the chemist would be likely to have an idea where Eames might be. Yusuf has a little more than an idea.
“You’re not going to like it, Cobb,” he says, and Cobb wonders if Yusuf has always looked this tired.
“I should have said no,” Yusuf says and he leads Cobb down into the basement.
*
“You have a job to do, Mr. Eames. We can’t stay here forever.”
“Of course we can. Another job will come along. We still have plenty of money to keep you in suits.”
“It’s not the money I’m worried about. You can’t stay here like this. You’ll have to wake up eventually.”
Eames doesn’t say anything. If he ignores this, Arthur will drop it.
“You know this isn’t real, don’t you?” Arthur keeps asking, but he sounds less urgent every time he does. He’ll stop eventually, and it’ll be alright.
*
Eames looks thin, more than thin, emaciated. He looks like he hasn’t slept, though that’s all he’s been doing. “He’s been under for the better part of a few months,” Yusuf says.
“Can you wake him up?”
Yusuf hesitates, but he nods and disconnects Eames from the PASIV device. It takes a long time for the forger to open his eyes, longer still for him to focus on Cobb.
Eames blinks at him once, seems to recognize him. He blinks again and sits up a bit, eyes widening to take in the dim light, and then he focuses just behind Cobb’s right shoulder, where Arthur should be. Cobb flinches in spite of himself.
Eames sighs and lies back. “You’re here, then,” he says, voice thick and dry, breaking from lack of use. “I thought I might have been dreaming.”
8. tall saint - the national
I.
“If this happens,” Arthur said, the first time, “it happens once and once only. And we do not cuddle. And we do not talk about it ever again.”
Eames considered this. It was not what he wanted, not by a long shot, but it was a foot in the door. He could work with that. He beamed at Arthur. “My room or yours?”
II.
The second time, he got Arthur drunk. He’s not proud of it, but there you go.
“It wasn’t all bad, was it, darling?” he asked against Arthur’s thigh.
“Shut up, just shut up,” Arthur said and flipped them over.
III.
The third time it was Arthur’s idea, if grumbling “oh fuck it” and jumping Eames in an elevator counts as an idea. Eames will take it, either way.
IV. and V.
The fourth time was actually the fourth and fifth time and Eames even managed to get a cuddle out of him in between, sort of.
(“What are you doing to my arm?”
“… Nothing?”)
XV.
“This is absurd, Arthur,” Eames panted. “Just admit-”
“This counts as talking about it,” Arthur said and gave Eames something else to do with his mouth. It was sneakier than Eames would have given him credit for, before he knew Arthur was kind of a bastard when you got him in the sack.
LXII.
He woke up with his face in Arthur’s neck, hand over his hip and he tried so hard not to move but Arthur shifted in his sleep and his hair tickled Eames’s nose and Eames sucked in a breath, just a quick one, and before he could exhale, Arthur was up and out of the bed.
MORE ROMAN NUMERALS THAN EAMES KNOWS OR REMEMBERS
When Arthur builds dreams he builds them out of Masterpiece Theater and glues them together with caviar. It’s always stuffy and high class and ridiculous. Eames thinks it’s adorable.
He finds Arthur blending in with the projections, sipping from a flute of champagne, wearing a suit that probably costs more than a gently used car. Eames doesn’t say anything about it though, just plucks the glass from Arthur’s fingers and puts a hand on Arthur’s back, steering him to the dance floor.
“I’m not asking to talk about it, I’m not asking for a cuddle, I’m just asking for a dance,” Eames says when Arthur opens his mouth to argue.
Arthur looks at him, head cocked and wary, like Eames is a strange dog that he thinks might bite him. Eames huffs out a breath that isn’t quite a laugh; if he wasn’t so besotted with this idiot he would have hit him in the face by now. “Alright,” Arthur says finally. “For cover.”
“Yes, of course,” Eames agrees and buries his smile into Arthur’s perfectly slicked back hair.
9. a little drop of poison - tom waits
It’s rare that the whole team gets drunk together. After the Inception would have been the perfect time, but Cobb had wanted to be with his kids and they were all so marveled and shaken that they needed a few days to themselves, reassuring themselves of reality and coming to terms with what they’d done. The first few jobs they pulled after were smaller, so it hadn’t warranted anything special, but when they get back into the real business of it they pull off some jobs so stunning that even Eames seems surprised by his own cunning.
“This is ridiculous,” Ariadne says after a particularly beautiful job well done. “We need to drink to this, we just do.”
No one argues.
It’s the first time any of them (except Cobb) has seen Arthur drunk. Ariadne thinks it’s the most adorable thing, the way he gets all flushed and unbuttons, unties. Yusuf isn’t sure he likes the way Arthur becomes suddenly… friendly, and rather, well handsy.
When Arthur puts his hand on Cobb’s knee and tells him what a great friend he thinks Cobb is and how proud he is of Cobb, even calling Cobb a “brave little toaster,” Eames declares it the best night of his life. He sticks close to Arthur afterwards, and Arthur doesn’t seem to mind, even lets the forger pull him bodily from potentially dangerous or awkward encounters with strangers. Perhaps in payment for the delight of seeing Arthur so unwound, Eames takes it upon himself to take Arthur home. It’s a testament to how drunk the rest of them are that this idea doesn’t worry them in the least.
The next morning, when they meet to clear out the warehouse, Eames has hickeys all over his neck and a self-satisfied smirk on his face. Arthur is walking a little stiffly, but other than that he still seems slightly softer somehow, as if a trace of his behavior from last night has lingered, making the Windsor knot of his tie look just a little bit less tight.
If the rest of the team notices, they don’t say anything. It’s nice to see Arthur relaxed, they decide, and they don’t want to ruin it. Eames is especially in favor of this course of action, which the others graciously do not mention either.
10. swamp song - blur
Arthur is not surprised that Eames is a biter. He wouldn’t have guessed it, necessarily (if he had let himself think about this before they somehow found themselves tumbling into bed together), but he’s not surprised by it.
What’s surprising is how much Arthur likes it. He’s not expecting to at all. No one’s ever bitten him before; he’s never really understood the appeal.
But then Eames has one of Arthur’s hands up in front of his mouth and he just nips, so quick and sharp and Arthur just jerks towards him, full body, like he’s been tugged.
Eames raises an eyebrow at that and Arthur shudders, as much from embarrassment as anything else. He can feel how wide his own eyes are in his face.
“Well isn’t this interesting?” Eames smiles, and does it again. It feels even better this time, because now Arthur gets a sweet dark moment of anticipation before Eames bites and he knows that Eames is doing this because Arthur likes it, he’s doing this for Arthur. Arthur makes a noise that he didn’t realize could come out of his own throat, or any other human throat, for that matter. He’ll deny it tomorrow, but right now it’s not as important as the heat unspooling rapidly in his belly, not nearly as important as Eames’s eyes raking all over him, looking for the next target. There’s a thrilled look in his eye, like Eames is excited just to explore, just to study, just to learn how to make Arthur come apart.
It’s like, Arthur thinks, Eames is memorizing all of Arthur’s body. For later, he realizes, for next time, and he repeats that horrible/thrilling noise as Eames’s teeth graze his bared throat.
11. wasp nest - the national
Eames starts out bothering Arthur purely because the man so clearly needs to be bothered. He’s like a little store mannequin running about like a real boy, Eames thinks, and it’s creepy, frankly. And he’s so quick to prickle when Eames nudges a bit, it’s fun to make him squirm.
But then Eames starts to notice things, like the softness of Arthur’s hair when he’s been working so hard that he’s ruffled it smooth with his fingers, the way it wisps up just at the temples. He starts to wonder what Arthur’s hair looks like fresh from the shower. And from there it’s a short leap to wondering what the rest of Arthur looks like straight from the shower, all of him compact and thrumming with energy, and how would that body feel underneath his?
Eames is a betting man, and he’s willing to bet the answer is “pretty fucking great.”
And here’s where the problem arises, because now that he’s spent so long flirting with Arthur to rile him up he can’t seem to convey that he’s now flirting to, well, rile him up.
He starts to lose the subtlety, starting with an onslaught of “darlings” and “pets” and “loves” and anything else he can think of. Arthur remains unmoved.
One day Eames just blurts out, “Your ass is fantastic, darling,” and Arthur just shrugs, so it only gets worse from there. It gets so bad that he accidently teaches Ariadne a lot more about the mechanics of gay sex than she ever wanted to know and Yusuf starts actively avoiding being with the two of them at the same time.
So really, Eames has no choice but to molest him, late at night after everyone’s gone, and force his thigh between Arthur’s, force his mouth to Arthur’s skinny, beautiful, collared throat and just, just taste him and Arthur is still for far too long before he suddenly says, “OH!” and Eames says, “Exactly what part of ‘I’m going to bend you over your desk tonight’ didn’t you understand?” around a mouthful of Arthur’s skin. Arthur just laughs and pulls Eames up to kiss his mouth.
12. I hope that I don’t fall in love with you - tom waits
The first time Arthur sees Eames he knows that it’s going to be trouble. Eames is relaxed and charming, handsome even, if you ignore the shirt, and when he sees Arthur for the first time he beams at him and doesn’t look away when he says, “Mr. Cobb, I think we need to reevaluate the terms of my contract. I didn’t realize you were holding out on me.”
“My point man is not for sale,” Cobb says, smiling warmly. Arthur kind of wants to shoot them both in the head.
The second time Arthur sees him it’s even worse. He’d only clinically noted Eames’s more appealing characteristics last time around before he’d encountered the less attractive aspects of Eames’s personality (sloppy, insufferable, unprofessional, and no concept of personal space) so it hadn’t been too bad, but the second job they work together, Eames takes it personally.
There’s a little girl missing and the father’s got the money to pay for an extractor. He’s got someone he thinks has information and they need a forger to get it out of him, to make him sorry for what he’s done, guilty enough to give them all the information they need and still be willing to give them more. It’s not a fun job and, from what he’d seen of Eames last time around, Arthur didn’t expect him to be on board so quickly but he’s there from day one, early every morning and late every night, and he barely cracks a smile until the job is done.
“He has a thing about kids,” Cobb says when Arthur breaks down and asks and then Arthur has to spend the rest of the job telling himself firmly not to get all swoony about it, everyone likes kids.
The third time he sees him it’s Cobb and Mal’s wedding and Eames comes up to him, smelling like champagne and lilac, takes one look at Arthur’s face and says, “You’re a secret romantic, aren’t you, darling?” It’s the first time he calls Arthur “darling” and Arthur fumbles when he tries to put on the proper expression. At that point, it’s all over; Eames’s smile turns devious when he sees how flustered Arthur is. For the next dozen jobs, he can’t say three words to Arthur without throwing in a pet name among them.
He doesn’t call him “darling” at Mal’s funeral, doesn’t say anything to him at all, just stands next to Arthur as Arthur stands next to Cobb, close enough that Arthur can feel the heat beneath his suit. Arthur has often imagined getting Eames into a good, well-tailored suit, and a part of him wants to see what the end result is, but he can’t make himself let go of Cobb’s shoulder, can’t make himself look away from Mal’s grave until they fill it all the way up again. Eames stays by his side the whole time.
When they come together again for the Fischer job, Arthur can’t remember now how many times they’ve worked together or have seen each other casually (because they run in the same less-than-legal circles, after all), but it’s been at least six months since they’ve even been in the same country.
Eames is there when Arthur comes in first thing in the morning, early like he was for the kidnapping job. Arthur stops when he catches sight of Eames, but it feels like all of his organs have kept moving forward without him or something: his heart stutters just a bit and he forgets to exhale. It’s all very embarrassing.
Eames smiles at him - he’s gotten tan, Arthur notices, but, well, Africa, so that’s not surprising, but he’s also done something deeply stupid with his hair and Arthur still finds it horribly, unavoidably attractive - and he’s holding a cup of coffee, just one.
“Hello again,” he says brightly. “I thought you’d be in early. Care to show me what you’ve got whipped up for a job that can’t be done?”
And it’s the challenge that Eames wants, of course, the challenge is the reason he’s here, Arthur tells himself. He tells himself he’s not disappointed.
“Welcome back, Mr. Eames,” he says and Eames hands him the coffee cup. It’s not warm, Arthur realizes as he takes it. Eames has been here for awhile.
Eames smiles at him, like he’s reading Arthur’s mind and says, “You’ve kept me waiting, darling,” and brushes a hand along Arthur’s back as he makes his way to Arthur’s desk.
Goddamnit Eames, Arthur thinks, but he should really be thinking goddamnit Arthur and he knows it. He had a feeling this was going to happen. He knew from day one that he was going to fall in love with Eames.
13. tear the place up - skunk anansie
Honestly, it’s always kind of given Eames a stiffy to see Arthur go berserk on someone. It’s a quirk at best and something to discuss with his non-existent therapist at worst, but it’s the truth. It’s something about how capable and precise and focused Arthur gets. He tries to imagine Arthur turning that look on him sometimes, though in a decidedly more sexy way, and it’s just an instant boner, every time. So Eames never misses an opportunity to see Arthur go wild all over some projections. It still kills him a little bit inside that he missed Arthur’s zero gravity fight during the Fischer job; Arthur tried to downplay it but in Eames’s mind it’s blisteringly hot.
The moral of the story is, Eames is no longer taking chances when it comes to opportunities to see Arthur in action, which is why he maybe kind of fakes his own death just a little bit on a job. He really shouldn’t, he knows it’s unprofessional, but it’s hardly the most unprofessional thing Eames has ever done in his life. He takes a bullet to the ribs which hurts a lot, yes, probably even enough for Arthur to go all gentleman-assassin on him and put him out of his misery, but that would also put him out of the action, so Eames does what he does best: he fakes it. He writhes around for a bit and even forges some extra blood (he’s very proud of that) and he’s ‘dead’ by the time Arthur gets there.
Arthur actually looks a little concerned for Eames, which is unexpected and also not strictly logical, since Eames would be fine, even if he had just bled out, but then Arthur brushes back Eames’s hair, almost tenderly, before he grabs Eames gun and just starts unloading on the projections, two whole clips without a single miss and then he pistol whips another and - alright, Jesus, that’s unfairly hot.
Eames is just settling in for what promises to be a very sexually exciting thirty seconds of Arthur strangling a projection with its own necktie when he realizes Arthur is looking straight at him, shocked.
Eames waves cheerfully. “Did you miss me?”
“I’m going to kill you, you asshole,” Arthur growls at him and Eames likes the sound of that, likes it a lot, though the death threat is a little overdramatic.
“Did you know you’re incredibly sexy when you’re homicidal?” Eames asks him.
Arthur dreams up a new gun and shoots Eames in the head, but it’s worth it.
14.the proposition - lou reed
“You’re gorgeous, I’m gorgeous,” Eames says. “We owe it to the human race.”
“To do what?” Arthur says, not looking up from his papers. Eames can’t have that. He sits square on Arthur’s desk.
“To hump each other’s brains out, of course.”
“And how does the human race benefit from that?”
“Free show?” Eames suggests.
“Of course you’re an exhibitionist, why am I not surprised,” Arthur mutters, somehow working around the fact that Eames’s ass is smack in the center of his workspace. He only glares once when he has to pull a file directly out from under Eames’s left cheek. As a reward, Eames rocks over to make it easier and, well, also to lean a bit more into Arthur’s personal space.
“And you’re not, of course,” Eames sighs. “How about: opposites attract?”
“What, like magnets? Very sexy, Mr. Eames.” Arthur rolls his eyes.
“Fine. What about we just owe it to ourselves?”
“You’re presupposing that I find you attractive at all,” Arthur says. Eames can see that he’s a step away from a smile; his eyebrows are raised in that half-surprised half-smug look that he always gets when he smiles. All Eames needs is for Arthur’s mouth to cooperate. Eames is close.
“What about we owe it to the team?” Eames tries. “All of this sexual tension…”
“Again, you’re presupposing-”
“Come on, darling, don’t be coy,” Eames says. “We both know you’re not as subtle as you think.”
That actually gets a little blush out of Arthur, there and gone quicker than Eames has ever seen any human being change colors before. Eames wants to perform tests on Arthur’s skin, that’s how fascinating he finds it.
“I’m working, Mr. Eames.”
“So am I,” Eames protests, “and you’re not making my job any easier, mind.”
Arthur gives him a withering look, but beneath it Eames can see a flare of heat, impatience and want and fondness and mostly the want which is precisely the emotion Eames is trying to tap into here. Eames just needs to -
“What about this,” he says suddenly. “We’re not that different after all?”
Arthur looks surprised at that, so surprised that he doesn’t stop himself from smiling. It’s a victory, if a small one. Eames pushes the advantage, of course, and Arthur even kisses him back for just a moment before he gently pushes Eames back and says, “Get back to work, Mr. Eames.”
15. I won’t share you - the smiths
If Arthur had known that fucking Eames would have professional repercussions he wouldn’t have done it. Almost certainly not. Probably not. Well, he would have felt guiltier about it.
The thing is that Eames’s role as their forger tends to require a bit of flirting (sometimes more than flirting) and it’s… surprisingly hard to ignore.
Arthur doesn’t always punch people over it, though. Just the first time.
It was ridiculous, he knew that even before Eames said, “really, Arthur, this is ridiculous,” but he couldn’t help himself. Eames didn’t even look like Eames, but he was wearing Eames’s smile on some beautiful blonde woman’s face and he was smiling it seductively at this forty-something, balding CEO (“not even my type,” Eames pointed out later) and Arthur wasn’t even aware of feeling jealous before suddenly the mark was lying on the floor holding his bloody nose and Arthur was standing over him, looking at his own hand and feeling utterly appalled at himself.
He only ever shot someone once. It wasn’t even that big a deal, actually. It was a projection, some mark’s more homosexually inclined bit of subconscious, Arthur supposes, but all Arthur registered was someone else’s hand on Eames’s ass before he grabbed his gun and pulled the trigger.
The look Cobb gave him was unfairly patronizing, Arthur thought, especially considering how many times Cobb’s relationship quirks have literally shot Arthur in the knee cap. Eames just looked at him, a little amused and mostly exasperated and said, “oh, darling, not again,” like Arthur was shooting people for groping him all the time.
“Shut up,” Arthur says, every time, “don’t say a single word,” and Eames just smiles at Arthur, a warm smile that uncurls slowly and Arthur would shoot a thousand projections just to keep that smile all to himself.
part 2