gift fic: "untouched"
Look at me, I've finally written something! It's a miracle. :D
Title: Untouched
Fandom: Narnia RPS
Pairings/Characters: Skandar/Will
Rating: PG-13 for language and mentions of sexual situations.
Disclaimer: Not mine. At all.
Summary: Ben apparently leads a secret life of sock-filled debauchery.
Notes: This is for the lovely
likecharity, for the community
tapsandvietnam, because I love and admire her. I hope that you like this, sweetie. (ignore the fact that I haven't written any of the porn I said I would write like, a week ago, okay? :O) Thanks to
thisissiriuswho is great at encouraging squee-ing. :)
Untouched
I feel so untouched right now
Need you so much somehow
I can't forget you
I've gone crazy from the moment I met you
[the veronicas]
*
"This is horrifying,” Skandar announces.
It is the day of the London premiere and they were supposed to have met with the others in the lobby several minutes ago, but are unavoidably late due to some, ah, technical difficulties. First, Will had spent about eight minutes on the subject of Skandar’s shirt, which Skandar had defended vehemently, while silently cursing Soumaya’s prankster streak. Second, they’d fought over the remote because no, Will, we can’t bloody watch the cooking channel.
Then about three minutes ago, Skandar had realized that he hadn’t packed any ties, and they’d went rooting through Ben’s luggage for a spare, Will commenting that it would be totally appropriate if Ben had one with picnic foods on it.
"Haha," Skandar said dryly, “I know where you sleep, Moseley.”
Then they found the socks.
Atrocious, inhuman socks.
There must’ve been over twenty pairs, none resembling normalcy. They’re in all sorts of colors with odd patterns-one pair might possibly have the Coach logo embossed on it; they’re afraid to check.
"I am blind,” Skandar says, distraught as he fumbles through the suitcase for one measly tie amongst the socks, which are all neatly folded and apparently arranged in rainbow order.
"You should wear these,” Will says in his Serious Voice, holding out a pair of checkered ones. “They match your shirt.” Skandar shoots him a glare, and Will places them back in whatever horrifying corner he’d found them, not bothering to stifle his laughter.
"They were silk, I think,” he adds, and Skandar punches him in the collarbone, ignoring the little leap of his heart when Will laughs in response.
“Hurry up; we’re late.” Skandar grins despite his grumbling, grabbing a simple black tie that looks like it is screaming to be saved from death by argyle.
*
There is a party after the premiere, and Skandar has too much to drink.
He’s had too much to drink at most of the premiere parties so far, and it never ceased to amaze him how everyone seemed to turn a blind eye to the underage drinking of celebrities. Skandar caught Georgie with a neon-colored margarita in the corner of his eye, and managed to wonder at the crumbling state of their society for a quick moment before he was distracted by Will’s arse.
It wasn’t his fault, really. It was just that Will was very drunk as well, and when he was drunk he got all crazy and did things like participate in a dance-off with Ben (who was also drunk; everyone was drunk), which, in their incoherent states, resulted in an amusing sort of flail-off instead.
Skandar pretends to watch them, but really is just watching the way Will’s suit moves.
Like a fucking second skin, Skandar thinks, even his thoughts slurring.
A minute later, Ben is distracted by a girl in a tube top and goes swaying after her, leaving Will to proclaim himself the winner. He bows over-dramatically to the small audience that’d gathered and makes his way towards Skandar’s place at the bar.
"Congratulations,” Skandar drawls, trying to shift his eyes away from Will’s crotch and failing, “That was quite the come-from-behind victory.”
Will plops himself onto a stool, flushed and alive with energy. He motions to the barkeep for a drink, any kind, and takes a mouthful. Skandar watches him, swallowing the lump in his throat as Will swallows the liquor in his.
"It was not a come-from-behind victory,” Will scoffs, scrubbing at his mouth with his forearm like a bad cowboy movie, “It was an owning. I don’t know if you saw, but I did the splits. There’s no coming back from that.” His smirk is ragged at the edges, due to alcohol and some post-dance adrenaline that Skandar doesn’t understand because he can’t dance to save his life even while sober.
Will shifts his eyes up, just a fraction, and Skandar swallows even though his drink is empty.
The look he gives Skandar is intense, pinning him on the spot, and Skandar shifts in his seat, suddenly much too hot. He signals to the barkeep in a way that he hopes is somewhat graceful.
He had seen Will’s splits, and, while being disturbing on several levels, it also instilled some fairly lewd images in his mind that were popping up very incessantly.
It’s not the only thing that’s popping up! Skandar’s brain yells, clearly insane, and he wants to punch himself in the skull.
Skandar snorts, trying to compose himself, and sipping what must be his fifth drink, avoiding eye-contact. “You tried to do the splits and we almost had to call the ambulance,” he corrects, “I was watching.”
Will laughs under his breath, sort of distractedly, and they fall into a silence that is on the brink of uncomfortable. A minute passes, and then two, and Skandar finally dares a glance over. “Will-”
"Let’s have sex,” Will says, and he is smoldering.
Skandar’s train of thought derails and explodes in a fiery mountain of flame and ash.
Will is looking at him like he wants to devour him.
All he can think to say is, “Yes.”
*
Only afterwards does Skandar let himself think about what’s just happened.
They’re tangled together in the stark white hotel sheets like old lovers, and the thought makes Skandar sigh happily. He takes a moment to silently thank whatever deity that he doesn’t believe in, that Ben has apparently decided to follow the Tube Top Girl and disappear for the night. It’s 3:34 AM, the alarm clock tells him in neon lettering, and Will is soundly asleep.
Skandar is still mildly buzzed on alcohol, so maybe that’s where the soppiness is coming from when he arches closer and softly traces Will’s jaw with his nose, planting a trail of kisses on his neck and chest. He reaches up and smoothes Will’s hair, committing the texture to memory. There is such a burst of giddy happiness in his chest, warm and vaguely embarrassing, and he places his lips on Will’s, hot and soft. Skandar feels Will’s smile against his and he smiles back because he now knows what it’s like, smiling into a kiss, and it’s one of the most exhilarating things he’s ever felt.
"Hey,” Skandar whispers when they part, feeling every place their skin is touching.
Will opens his eyes slowly, and they are blue, blue, blue.
"Hi,” Will whispers back sleepily, and Skandar decides that’s enough talking, and kisses him again.
*
Skandar wakes up in the morning with a jolt of wrongness. It’s cold. The heavy curtains are closed, and Skandar blinks at the sunlight that sweeps in from around the edges of tacky fabric.
Will isn’t in bed, and Skandar hears his hushed fumbling in the corner. In the dim lighting, he can see that Will is dressing, while quickly and hastily throwing clothes and his toothbrush into his traveler. Skandar pushes himself into a sitting position, feeling panic pulling in his chest.
"Will?” he asks, even though he’s afraid to.
Will freezes, his breathing very loud in the hushed morning. Skandar glances at the alarm clock, which tells him that it’s barely seven-thirty.
Skandar’s heart is beating, fast, then faster, and he says, “Will,” meaning for it to be a question, but it isn’t, it’s less than that, it’s like a plea.
He wants to kick himself.
"You’re sixteen, Skandar,” Will says finally, still staring at the crumpled pile of his clothing. Skandar bristles at that.
"So?” he demands, looking around for his clothes because this really isn’t an argument he wants to be having naked.
"So,” Will turns to Skandar with a pained expression, “We-I shouldn’t have-taken advantage. I was-we were drunk, and not, not thinking straight.” Will’s words are stumbling, and he’s swaying-like he wants to get closer but is afraid of what’ll happen if he does.
Skandar finds a pair of boxers that might’ve been his or might’ve been Will’s (they might’ve even been Ben’s, but he doesn’t have the space in his head to review that horrific thought at the moment), pulls them on and climbs out of bed.
"It’s not, it’s not that I didn’t-” Will continues, watching Skandar move like a frightened mouse, wincing when Skandar stands. Skandar feels his shoulders slump. Will swallows dryly, “I mean, it just wasn’t…”
"It wasn’t a good idea,” Skandar says for him, feeling numbness sort of like when the Novocain is just settling in.
It’s an unexpected hurt because he’d honestly thought that it would be okay. The rejection stings and throbs, like falling off his bicycle when he was eleven and scraping his knee open, wobbling back up the sidewalk towards home, just before his mum told him to hold still, sweetie, it needs to be cleaned or it’ll get infected.
"...Yeah.” Will looks pained, and Skandar wants to hit him, because he has no right to look so vulnerable when he feels like Will has just shattered something precious, mangled something to an irreparable state.
"Okay,” Skandar says forcefully, holding back his anger when he really doesn’t want to and feeling an acrid bitterness sliding up his spine, up his throat.
Will looks hesitant, and says after a moment, “Skandar, are we okay?”
No you idiot, you stupid, stupid idiot
"...Yeah,” Skandar forces his face to smile. “Yeah, we’re fine.”
*
A Page from the Diary Journal of William Moseley
June 20th, 2008
The London premiere went well; the screen was massive and intimidating. I think I’m starting to get sick of watching the movie over and over. Skandar’s shirt was atrocious. Ben apparently leads a secret life of sock-filled debauchery, which is several levels of really, really disturbing on top of being really, really hilarious.
The party afterwards was fun, we all got really drunk and Ben and I had a dance-off. I definitely won, no matter what Ben says.
Skandar and I
fuck
fuck
fuck
*
They don’t speak of what happened for months after. It’s uneasy and awkward and terrible, flashing false smiles at each other and conversing over fuck-knows-what, sports or movies or how Caspian’s accent should be changed to Russian (for Ben’s sake), or even the goddamn weather, while Skandar does everything he can not to think about adjectives that describe Will, ranging from amazing to sexy to caring to stupid, stupid bastard, which admittedly is not an adjective but he just doesn’t care, and grammar was always Will’s thing anyway.
It isn’t until Dawn Treader is right around the corner that Skandar cracks a little and tries to bring it up, afraid that he’ll leave and then they’ll never talk to each other again.
Afterwards Skandar can’t even remember what’s been said, just the horrible, horrible feeling like he’d been stabbed when Will’s expression snapped shut and he rushed away from the conversation like he’d been burned, like he’d been fucking repulsed by it.
Skandar sleeps on the plane to Mexico, his face turned towards the window.
*
A Photograph in the Possession of William Moseley
It is stuffed into the bottom of Will’s traveler. Old, slightly faded, the edges worn and fraying. It is wrinkled, like someone crumpled it and smoothed it back out again.
*
Mexico is beautiful.
Skandar’s first glimpse of the ocean is blue, blue, blue.
He closes his eyes.
*
Skandar spends his days on location scowling at the wall of his trailer when he isn’t filming. He should feel bad for ignoring Ben and Georgie, and he hasn’t even bothered to try to get to know Will P. beyond their first compulsory meeting, where Will P. introduced himself nervously and Skandar avoided calling him by his name.
He should feel bad, and he does.
But not for any of those reasons.
*
Almost a month and a half into shooting, Skandar breaks down.
In retrospect, he kind of wishes that it hadn’t been on set, with dozens of eyes and cameras trained on him, in the middle of a scene with Lucy and Caspian and Eustace and that stupid tennis ball that’s supposed to be Reepicheep flanking him like prison bars.
It creeps up on him without warning, reminding Skandar stupidly of when he and Soumaya used to play hide-and-seek when they were little and Soumaya would always jump out of a corner, breaking all of the rules just to make him scream, even after promising time after time that she wouldn’t do it again.
Mid-line, Edmund falls to the wayside (it shouldn’t be that easy to lose him, Skandar thinks frantically, and it feels like something vitally important has disappeared in that moment but can’t even muster the strength-the motivation-to figure out what), and Skandar has broken to the surface, wondering what the hell he’s doing on this fake ship, surrounded by yards and yards of garish green screen fabric and talking about routes to the end of the world when his heart is roaring in his ears. Doesn’t anyone else hear that, it’s like the apocalypse, like the fucking end of the world is right here.
*
It turns out that Skandar is stressed, not eating or sleeping enough (but how can he when there are those dreams waiting for him?), with a slight fever.
This is the doctor’s diagnoses, after Michael and Georgie flip out over his minor panic attack on set-this is also one of the doctor’s phrases, and Skandar wants to kick the man in the sternum, over and over-and insist on medical attention.
None of this matters though.
Skandar doesn’t know who tattled-he suspects Ben, the wanker, because if he collects socks that look like that, what isn’t he capable of?-but about thirty hours after the fact, his Mrs. Keynes is on set. She greets him with something akin to a flying tackle, pressing his head into her chest with alarming motherly force and spewing a stream of questions-What happened? Are you okay, darling? You haven’t been taking your vitamins, have you? Skandar, you poor, poor, fragile baby!
It’s just a slight fever, Skandar parrots the doctor’s words, you didn’t have to come.
He looks over his mother’s shoulder and sees Anna and Will and says, desperately:
"You really shouldn’t have come.”
*
It is so, so awkward.
Michael has rearranged the shooting schedule so that Skandar has a few days to recuperate. Mrs. Keynes has refused to leave her son’s trailer except to sleep in Georgie’s, where she and Anna are staying, and request more blankets.
Skandar is sharing his trailer with Will.
This is an ironic hilarity in the most painful of ways, and it is a huge relief that Skandar is sleeping fifteen hours a day, because otherwise he’d have to actually talk to Will for more than three minutes, which would surely cause some floodgate of emotion to be opened.
Unfortunately, Skandar’s fever is waning, and on the fourth night, after dinner, he finds himself stuck inside his trailer with Will, neither of them able to leave-Skandar because his mum has strictly forbid it, and Will because it’s pouring rain the size of gumballs.
It would unsettle his scarves, Skandar finds himself thinking in comforting humor.
"What?” Will asks, smiling tentatively, and Skandar realizes that he’d actually laughed out loud.
"Er, tassels,” Skandar responds without thinking, and then, “Did you ever figure out how to crochet them? On your scarves,” he clarifies.
The air shifts into something familiar then, and Skandar doesn’t know if he likes it or not, but he’s relieved at least, when the awkwardness falls away.
Will’s smile literally falls off his face, and it’s replaced with defiance. “We agreed that it would be That Of Which We Do Not Speak,” he intoned seriously, with an amusement in his eyes that caused some trip-wire reaction in Skandar’s chest.
Skandar thinks, No, That Of Which We Do Not Speak is something else entirely, but grins in return.
"Have you moved on to tea cozies yet?” Skandar wheedles, and Will tackles him, and it’s like Skandar is twelve again, wrestling with his big brother Peter on the set of Wardrobe.
They land on the bed, Will on top of him, and Skandar realizes with a jolt, I’m not twelve anymore, and it definitely is not his big brother Peter on top of him, heavy and warm. Skandar feels the urge to arch his body up, to get closer-
Skandar almost causes serious injury to both parties when he struggles out from under Will, heedless of everything except for the need to get away, immediately, the memory of his old bicycle wound an oppressive reminder of what pain feels like.
*
Skandar, of course, forgets about the gumball-sized rain until he’s sprinted out of his trailer and down the street to the place where they are filming on location: the long, beautiful strip of white-sanded beach.
The rain is, of course, counter-productive to his fever, and Skandar knows that when his mum finds out about this he’ll likely be executed, but he can’t go back, can never go back again, he’ll have to become a Mexican pickpocket and live off of tacos, which are the only Mexican food of any variety that he can stomach.
They’ll have to recast Edmund, which is probably the worst part of all. Skandar knows how rabid his fans are, the internet is a scary place, and thinks that they’ll probably rip Michael limb-from-limb. It’ll be a tragedy, Skandar thinks wildly, like Shakespeare.
Will is following him, of course. Skandar knows because Will is too good; he would never let a fever-crippled maniac run amok on the beach in a rainstorm. Will commands order, he categorizes his teapots for fuck’s sake-this situation is basically William Moseley’s worst nightmare come to life, something that he must endeavor to fix immediately because he’ll feel responsible.
Also, Skandar’s mum would eat him alive.
Skandar keeps running until he trips on a pocket of sand-it‘s all the same color, the same ugly tannish-gray under the shadow of storm clouds-and falls, rolling as far as his momentum will take him before sprawling right at the water’s edge, breathing hard and soaking wet.
It takes Will a surprisingly long time to reach him, although Skandar’s perception of time at this point is horribly skewed by fever and heartache, and a bit of a headache as well.
"Skandar!” comes Will’s hoarse cry, and Skandar opens his eyes despite the rain, which is like huge, fat bullets hitting him, ruining the jumper which he’s pretty sure he’s been wearing for the last two and a half days because his mum likes the color on him, it brings out his eyes.
Will is still several meters down the beach from Skandar, and he hauls himself up onto his feet so at least it doesn’t look like he’s been hit by a bus, or mauled by some beach-going vagrant. No need to involve the police.
"Skandar!” Will says again when he reaches him, panting and out of breath while trying to check Skandar over for injury. “What the fuck was that?” He demands indignantly, “Have you gone utterly insane, it’s storming like hell out here!”
Skandar is about to open his mouth to respond-with what, he has no idea, possibly to say yes, he thinks he actually is insane, but then:
He stills, seeing, with a blinding clarity, Will’s blue eyes set against the blue ocean.
They’re the exact same fucking color, a voice is yelling in his head; and it’s his voice, Skandar’s voice, screaming every angry thought he’d had in the past five months, feeling like a wild animal being baited by something that he can’t have and he just doesn’t understand why.
It’s like a wave (which is appropriate, being on the beach and all, haha, oh god), the feeling that hits him; it is anger and hurt and some sort of panicked hilarity that rushes through Skandar like a lightning bolt, leaving him both boneless and energized at once.
Without thinking, or maybe just ignoring all of the rational thoughts that he’s sure he had once possessed, Skandar punches Will in the face.
It’s actually not that great of a punch: it hits Will’s jaw a bit crookedly and Skandar thinks he may have broken his thumb on Will’s face, but the force is there, and it knocks Will back stumbling. He rights himself pretty quickly-damn the boxing training in New York, damn all of New York, Skandar seethes-and looks at him incredulously.
Skandar thinks Will would very much like to yell what the hell, you madman, except he’s already done something like that and it wouldn’t properly express what Skandar assumes is the same mindless shock that they’re both feeling.
"You are a complete bastard,” Skandar informs him, trudging onward like an idiot through wet sand, which is basically what he is. His voice is shaking-hell, all of him is shaking, and he surprises himself with the intensity of the words, sharp like he’d just shot them from a pistol instead of spoken them with his lips.
Then he surprises himself again by grabbing the front of Will’s shirt and crashing their lips together.
*
Kissing Will is like fireworks.
It sparks, it burns, it’s impossibly bright.
It hurts, too, stings in a way, because Skandar knows that this won’t last, in the next second Will will push him away and try to deny that it had ever happened. Skandar feels, as hard as he can, trying to memorize this moment before he has to pull away and keep on running, once again crazily entertaining the pickpocket idea.
Then Will winds his arms around him, one finding the small of his back, the other twining into the short hairs at the base of Skandar’s neck, and kisses him back.
Skandar bides his time and waits for Will to smile before he allows himself to smile back, and it’s still true: smiling into a kiss is unbelievably exhilarating, probably Skandar’s favorite thing ever.
*
It takes them almost three hours to trek the two and a half kilometers back to Skandar’s trailer. Granted, they’d spent the first two hours doing unmentionable things to each other, probably scaring any passersby that had been unfortunate (for fortunate, depending on your take on that sort of thing) to wander out onto the beach in the rain.
Sex on the beach is terribly overrated, Skandar thinks. He has scratches and bruises, and most of all, sand in many unimaginable and uncomfortable places.
As they burst into the trailer, stealing touches and kisses every few feet, Skandar distantly thinks how lucky it is that Will P. is sharing a trailer with Ben (he briefly envisions Will P. being smothered by socks and mourns for him) and that his mother has apparently gone to bed already (the images otherwise are on the brink of traumatizing).
They make their way towards Skandar’s cramped bed.
Will’s mouth is hot and soft, kissing Skandar all over as they fumble to shed clothes not for the first time that night.
"Fuck,” Skandar thinks, perhaps out loud, and then stops thinking altogether.
*
When Skandar wakes up, it is cold. Panic and adrenaline jolt him to wakefulness when he realizes that he is alone in his tiny bed.
"William Moseley, I swear,” Skandar says, feeling the throb of his heartbeat pounding in his chest, “if you’re not in this trailer, I will end you.”
"Skandar? Are you up?”
It’s almost pathetic, Skandar thinks, how relieved he is to hear Will’s voice-his happy, warm voice-and see Will emerge from the tiny kitchen area, a pot of steaming tea in his hands.
Skandar stares at him for a moment, tracing Will’s contours with hungry eyes.
"...Come here,” Skandar says, shocking himself with the husk that emerges from his throat.
Will’s expression darkens and he sets the tea down in a flippant manner that he will surely regret later. He’ll probably buy it a new tea cozy as an apology. Skandar watches as he stalks forward and grins when Will envelopes him in his arms, pressing his face into the space between Skandar’s neck and shoulder.
Skandar looks into his eyes, and they are blue, blue, blue.
He leans into Will’s body, and thinks that he could get used to this.
"You should crochet socks," Skandar says.
*