Hi everyone! This is a piece that's been brewing in my head for a while and I finally decided to write it down last week. With the help of my lovely temporary beta, MsKelseyLove, here is Part of Your World.
Bonus points (in the form of virtual hugs and ice cream flavor of your choice) for anyone who reviews. No really, review are so much appreciated! Reviews are really so much more gratifying than just alerts, so if you liked this story or just want to give some constructive criticism, please leave a review. Special Bonus points (you get a virtual cookie too!) for anyone who can spot a Lion King reference!
Warning: the fic is rated T for swearing later and descriptions of depressive behavior.
CHAPTER 1 – "GETTING HURT"
Dianna walks with purpose to her costar's trailer on the Paramount lot on a Friday afternoon. She's just overheard a conversation and the topic needed to be addressed pronto. She knocks a few times, and a moment later, the trailer's occupant opens the door.
Darren's hair is messy and he looks tired, his eyes momentarily light up and sparkle until he realizes who it is.
"Hey Di. Can I help you?" he asks.
"No need to be so welcoming, Dare," she replies. "Can I come in?"
The curly-headed glee star simply moves aside so she can walk up the few steps into the trailer.
Darren dumps himself onto the couch and Dianna sits down gently next to him.
"What's wrong, Darren?" she asks without any pretense.
"Nothing's wrong," he replies, looking at her knees rather than her face.
"Don't give me that, Dare. You're a great actor, but you can't hide this anymore. I can see how unhappy you are. We're friends, Darren. Right?" He nods so she continues. "Friends are supposed to trust each other. So trust me, and tell me what's wrong," she explains gently. "Please?"
"There's nothing to tell. I'm fine."
"I see the way you look at him, ya know, when you think no one's looking. You don't have to hide it, Darren," Dianna says, tired of waiting for an answer.
His brow creases in worry for a moment, before relaxing slightly into a sullen expression as he looks down at the floor, and continues to avoid her eyes..
"Why won't you just tell him, Dare?" Dianna asks, resting a hand on his knee.
"I don't know how. And even if I did, it wouldn't matter because he doesn't feel the same way."
"You don't know that, though," the blond answers. "You don't see how he looks at you, Darren. He looks at you the exact same way."
"He'd never want to be with me. I'm just the weird goofball that everyone tolerates but doesn't really like."
"Who said that, Darren? Whoever it is is about to get a stern talking to from me. You are not tolerated, Darren. You are loved. So what if you're a goofball? That's never stopped Chris from loving you before. You guys are best friends. There's no reason why he wouldn't like you as more than that. And you'll never know until you try, right?"
"I guess," Darren replies dejectedly, shrugging.
"If I tell you something, would you keep it a secret?" Dianna suddenly asks, switching gears slightly.
"Of course," Darren says instantly, sitting up straighter.
"I think I like Lea. It's a problem though, because she's with Cory, and because I'm a girl," Dianna explains rapidly, grimacing to herself. "What do I do?"
Darren purses his lips and thinks for a moment. Then, putting his hand on Dianna's shoulder, he forces a smile.
"How about this: if I tell Chris, you'll tell Lea. Take your own advice, right? Worse comes to worse, we get shot down. If that happens, we'll meet up together and cry and eat greasy, delicious food and have a movie marathon. Deal?"
He flashes his charming goofball smile and holds out his pinky finger to her.
Dianna smiles and links her pinky with his.
The next day, Darren meets Dianna in her trailer to hear about Dianna's conversation with Lea earlier that day.
Sitting down on the couch, Dianna begins her story.
"Well, I think that I sort of freaked her out. I was being really quiet around her and I think she thought there was something like, seriously wrong with me or something until I explained myself. Anyway, I told her that we're good friends already but that I'd been developing more serious feelings for her and didn't want to scare her away but that I felt like I had to tell her since Glee's almost over," Dianna explained, nervously. "She gave me a hug and thanked me for telling her. She said that at the moment, obviously, she's with Cory, but if the chance were ever to arise, she would definitely let me know. Obviously she said it much more articulately than I just did, but you get the point."
She shrugged sadly and Darren gave her one-armed hug and then rubbed her back.
"Have you talked to Chris, yet?"
Darren shook his head slightly, looking down at the floor.
"Well, you know where to find me if you wanna talk when you do. Okay?"
The curly-headed actor nodded once to show he understood but said nothing, still looking at the floor.
The following day, Darren stands outside of Chris's trailer, trying to calm himself down.
'Relax. You can do this. Di said he looks at you the same way you look at him so your chances are good, right? But don't go in expecting anything either or else you'll get your hopes up.' He takes a deep breath. 'You can do this.'
He knocks on the door, waits for Chris to answer, and then gets invited inside by his friend.
"Hey, Darren. What's up?" Chris asks brightly.
"Oh, uh, not much," Darren replies, suddenly nervous again.
He hopes Chris won't notice how on-edge he is, but no such luck.
"What wrong, Dare?" Chris asks, worried for his friend.
"Oh, um, I- I wanted to talk to you about something, actually," Darren forces out.
"Oh, okay. Shoot," the other man replies, seeming less worried.
Darren tries to steady his breathing. He feels like he's going to pass out if he doesn't get some air into his lungs now. After what feels like both a year and an instant, he opens his mouth to speak.
"Ilikeyou."
"Hmm?" Chris looks confused, thinking maybe he heard his friend wrong.
Darren slows his breathing enough to repeat himself.
"I like you."
Chris looks confused still so Darren continues.
"I have feelings for you. Romantic, more-than-just-friends feelings. I know you probably don't return them but it's been eating me up inside not telling you, so I'm telling you now: I like you," Darren explains in one long breath.
There's silence, so he opens his mouth to repeat himself again, afraid that maybe he somehow wasn't understood, but Chris raises a hand to stop him.
"I can't be with you, Darren, I'm sorry."
"So you don't return my feelings," Darren says, trying to keep breathing regularly. "That's alright. I'm not offended or anything. I didn't really expect you to feel the same way, honestly, I just needed to tell you before I exploded."
He's rambling. He knows that he's rambling but Chris isn't saying anything and for some reason it feels like someone should be saying something so he's taking it upon himself to speak even if he's not quite sure what he's even saying anymore- hopefully nothing stupid.
"I'm sorry, Darren, I just can't be with you," Chris repeats.
"But you do have feelings for me? I mean, you didn't say you didn't so…" Darren asks, trying to figure out what's going on. God, if only he could read minds, this would be so much easier right now! He notices that Chris hasn't answered his question. "You do have feelings for me. Just like Di…" he trails off. "But if you feel the same way, what's the problem?"
Darren feels really naïve asking this, as if he's missed some crucial point that everyone else besides him knows.
"You wouldn't understand," Chris answers quickly, stalking to the couch.
"What wouldn't I understand?" Darren asks, following him but not sitting.
"It doesn't matter. I just can't be with you. That's that."
"No. That's not fair, Chris. At least tell me why." Darren's trying to keep calm. He's starting to feel slightly light headed and hopes he can get through this without passing out, vomiting, or breaking down completely.
"I don't want anyone to get hurt, Darren. That's why."
"I would never hurt you, Chris. You know me. Even if we broke up at some point, we would always be friends," Darren explains.
"Ugh, Darren! You don't know that!" the younger man spits out, standing back up.
"You mean… you think I'll hurt you," the older replies. "Why would you think that?"
Darren's not angry, just hurt. He wants to understand why Chris would ever think something like that about him.
"You're not out, Darren. And you've never been with another guy before," his costar explains.
"But I know I have feelings for you. I've thought about this, a lot, and I know that I'm bi. I always have been, I just never took my feelings seriously. I always assumed it was just a phase or a fluke or something- And I know that's seriously hypocritical and rude and awful, I know, but I understand now. I do," Darren explains. He knows that he's starting to edge toward 'desperate' but he doesn't care; he has to get this out. "Please, Chris. Please be with me. I- I love you. And I'll come out to the whole world first if that'll make you want to be with me. I swear I will."
"Maybe it is a phase," Chris says quietly.
Darren pauses at this, trying to reign in all of his swirling thoughts.
"What?" Darren's chest is starting to hurt- 'Huh. So this is what your heart breaking feels like,' he thinks. "You think that I'd lead you on? You really think I'd do that? Have some huge epiphany or something and then leave you when I realize that you're a guy? Or when I tell people that we're together and they judge me for it or something? Do you really not know me at all, Chris?"
"I don't know what to think, Darren! I'm sorry! You just don't know what being out is like! People look at you differently and treat you differently. It could ruin your career and your relationships and your life. And we've been best friends for practically three years now and I think that maybe I have feelings for you too, but I can't do this with you. I can't get hurt, not by you. You're the first best male friend I've ever had and I can't ruin that, I can't. I… can't," Chris replies, his voice getting louder and then falling so much that the last statement is barely audible.
Darren looks like he could be sick any minute. He's pale and his breathing is shallow and he can't quite find any words with which to respond to what his best friend's just said.
So he nods. He nods and then quickly turns and leaves the trailer. He flees. Like a coward - like the coward Chris said he is - he walks as quickly as possible - moving almost mechanically, to his trailer, climbs the steps, enters, locks the door, and then slumps to the ground, totally spent.
Chris doesn't feel a whole lot better than Darren does. He sits back down on the couch when his friend leaves, dumbstruck. He's not quite sure what just happened or why. He rejected Darren. Why'd he do that? Chris knows on some level that Darren would never hurt him but Chris has never been in a public relationship before and doesn't want to start out by being publicly rejected when the other guy suddenly comes to his senses.
So he cries. He cries for himself, for his wasted opportunity and for Darren because he feels awful for him, but mostly because he thinks that he may have just done what he'd been trying to avoid: ruining one the best relationships he'd ever had. Darren looked absolutely beaten when he'd left. He hadn't even put up a decent fight. He'd just left. Because he knew what Chris's last "I can't" had meant. It'd meant more than just that they couldn't be together romantically; it meant that Chris was totally lost for words. He was lost and didn't have any clue where to go from there.
And that's how he feels now. And worse, Darren probably hates him now. Chris had killed two birds with one stone - but not in the positive way that people usually used the phrase. He'd killed all chances of ever being with the man he was pretty sure he might love and he'd also ruined the friendship he'd forged with that same man. He had literally killed two relationships with that simple "I can't" and now Chris doesn't know what to do to fix either of them.
Darren on the other hand has no coherent thoughts going through his head at the moment. He's sitting numbly on the ground with his knees pulled to his chest and his head in his hands. His chest hurts like there's a 100-pount weight pressing on it, and his head feels clouded like he's just woken up from a really deep sleep, and his eyes are tearing up but he can't find the energy to actually cry, like his body's so shocked that it can't quite remember how.
So he sits there. He sits there for an hour until he realizes that he's sitting on the floor of his trailer in front of the door and get up to go sit on the couch instead.
It's another hour until he falls into a dreamless sleep and another two until he wakes up again to realize that he could've gone home after his conversa- after filming today.
But he doesn't have the energy to get up yet so he just lays there on the couch for a little while, slowly feeling less and less numb and more and more awful. Soon his body's remembered how to produce tears again and he's crying silently into the throw pillow on the couch.
He's not even sure why exactly he's so sad. He knew that there was a chance that Chris would reject him. He just didn't think that it would go down the way it did and feel the way it does now that it's over.
It's close to 10pm (about 5 hours after he'd finished filming) when he finally works up the energy to go home.
He gets back to his apartment and finds its emptiness lonely, not peaceful like he normally does. He makes himself a bowl of cereal because he feels like he should eat something but starts feeling nauseous after two spoon-fulls and throws it out.
Around midnight he falls asleep on the couch to the quiet sounds of a Disney movie playing on the tv screen in front of him.
"Out of the sea… wish I could be… part of your world."