AN: Sorry not sorry, I love you all, and I'm trash! Enjoy :)
Art by robinfangirl100 on deviantart!
Michael Jones doesn't text anymore. Michael owns the latest iPhone, but he absolutely refuses to text.
Michael Jones doesn't drive anymore. His Ford Mustang sits in his garage, gathering dust, and he refuses to drive.
When you get his number, don't text him. You'd have a death wish.
Don't ask him why. He would never tell you.
Michael wakes up slowly on this particular Monday morning, before his alarm for once. Yawning, he stretches in bed before rolling over to face the person occupying the other side of the bed.
He studies the other, taking in messy, sandy hair and a scruffy face. Shallow, sleepy breaths expel from slightly parted lips, the smallest amount of saliva gathering in the corner.
Michael reaches over, running his hand through the soft locks of hair and he leans forward, pressing his lips against the other's in a chaste kiss.
He slowly stirs, squeezing his eyes and stretching much like a cat would before blinking up at Michael.
The curly haired man smiles at the other, looking into his beautiful, bright green eyes. He smiles right back, his voice gruff with sleep when he speaks. Michael only smiles more at the cheeky accent.
"Mornin' Michael."
Michael used to hate the way his name was pronounced by the other, but now it just makes his heart feel warm.
"Good morning, Gavin."
They share another kiss before the alarm interrupts them, making them jump and Gavin squeal.
"You ready for your big day?" Michael asks the Brit, linking their fingers together. They're adorned with shiny new gold bands, which is why today is a big day. Gavin was to take a plane to travel home today so he could announce his new engagement to Michael to his family in person. Michael would join him, however he had work to do at the office, and Gavin needed to film some more 'SlowMoGuys' videos with Dan, anyways.
"What time does my flight leave at, again?" Gavin asks, earning a light whack on the head from his fiancé.
"1 o' clock, numbnuts. We need to get up."
Gaivn whines, but is eventually persuaded out of bed by the idea of homemade waffles.
Their morning routine goes by quickly, the two brimming with excitement over their news.
"I wish I could be there, to see the looks on their faces," Michael sighs yet again.
"I'll videotape it. Rather, I'll make Dan videotape it," Gavin chuckles, and Michael laughs with him.
"I'll miss you."
"I know, Michael, I'll miss you too. Quite a lot, actually."
Michael rests his forehead against Gavin's, simply hugging him. "I'll make sure to record it when I tell everyone at work," Michael grins, and Gavin snickers.
"You're gonna get teased loads, you know that?"
"So will you, when you get back. Imagine how the fans are gonna react!"
"Oh lord," Gavin's eyes widen. "They're gonna make so many GIFs!"
"You know it, boi," Michael grins. "This is gonna surprise the shit outta them, considering we've been keeping our relationship from them."
"For good reason," Gavin says. "With all the hints everyone else drops, though, I'd bet they already know," He shrugs as he pulls away from Michael, looking at his watch. "We'd better go, love."
"They've got a Mavin-radar, Gav, they knew before we knew," Michael chuckles as he pulls on his shoes, grabbing his keys and one of Gavin's suitcases, leaving the other one for the Brit to carry.
It's all too soon that they arrive at the airport, and they have to part ways.
"I'll see you in a week, Gavvers," Michael smiles before giving Gavin a lingering kiss goodbye.
Once they part, Gavin whispers, "See you, my boi. I'll text you when I arrive."
"You'd better!"
They share one last hug and a small kiss before parting ways. Gavin to his flight, and Michael to the RoosterTeeth office.
"Hey, this is Geoff, and you're watching AHWU!" Michael hears as he enters the office. Everyone's head turns to look at Michael, who immediately gets into the camera's view, waving excitedly with his left hand as Geoff exclaims,
"Michael's here!" There's a chuckle at his signature voice crack.
"I'm here!" Michael confirms before Geoff playfully pushes him away.
"But where's Gavin?" the older man asks dramatically, shrugging his shoulders. They all know that he's traveling to England for the SlowMoGuys, though they play it up for the camera. However, only Michael knows the other reason. For now.
The rest of the filming of AHWU goes as normal (chaotic), and is soon uploaded. They always film AHWUs the day of, editing going quickly and being uploaded only a couple hours after filming. In the meantime, they begin filming a GTA V Let's Play for a future Monday, with Lindsay sitting in for Gavin. Technical difficulties arise an hour into filming, however, so they decide to take a short break while Geoff tries to fix his capture.
Michael leans back in his chair, linking his fingers behind his head and stretching. The relaxation doesn't last for long though, as Ray's voice startles him when he shouts,
"Holy shit!"
"What?" A few voices ask, including Michael's.
Ray turns to the Jersey man though, ignoring the others in favor of yanking Michael's left hand towards himself. "Holy shit, it's true!"
Michael draws his hand back sheepishly as Jack asks,
"What's true?"
"Check out the comments section of AHWU!" Is all Ray offers, and Michael tries not to blush as he reads the comments over the bearded man's shoulder.
'omg is that a ring on michaels hand?'
'GUYS when did Michael get engaged? That is an engagement ring right?'
'liking the jewelry, jones!'
'holy shit who's the lucky lady?'
'I wish that was me! :( :( :( '
'Wait, Michael was dating someone? How come he didn't say anything?'
An arsenal of other comments are on the rise, and Jack turns to Michael, smiling.
"Congratulations, Michael. Both you and Gavin."
Geoff catches on to what's going on after reading a few comments himself, and he laughs. "You guys finally did it, huh? Who asked?"
Michael looks down, his face red. "Me."
"You guys are so gay oh my god," Ray comments, but it's all in good nature.
That's when Ryan walks back in with Lindsay, both having gone to get a snack.
"What's all the excitement in here?" The redheaded girl asks.
"Gavin and Michael got engaged!" Jack informs them, feeling truly happy for the two.
"It's canon! Mavin is canon!" Ray adds, having a grand time with the situation.
"Engaged? Shit's serious now, isn't it? When's the wedding?" Ryan jokes, grinning.
Michael shrugs, "Not anytime soon. We need time to plan and save money and stuff."
The rest of the day goes like that, with various employees finding out and questioning Michael about it. It's overall happiness all around the office, everyone is truly happy for the two men.
Michael is ecstatic when he receives news of Gavin's safe arrival in England.
Later, Michael is on the live podcast with Burnie, Gus, and Lindsay. Of course, the conversation is steered towards Michael's engagement to Gavin not even 20 minutes into the podcast, and the Jersey boy can tell that Burnie wanted to bring it up way earlier.
"So, the internet fucking exploded today. What happened Michael?"
Michael is more confident about the topic now, but it won't last for long. Not when the internet is about to find he got engaged to Gavin of all people. For all they know, he could've gotten engaged to Lindsay, considering they dated at one point. Except for the fact that she doesn't have a ring like he does.
"I wore a ring to work today," Michael tells Burnie, and Gus is giving him a mischievous grin.
"What kind of ring is it, Michael?" Lindsay butts it, nudging him with her foot.
"It's an engagement ring," he answers simply.
"Hey internet, Michael Jones, the Michael Jones got engaged! But to whom?" Gus asks 'the audience' dramatically. And of course, Burnie is sitting there on his laptop, ready to keep the group informed of the exploding tweets from sponsors. He reads aloud various guesses, much to Michael's contempt.
'Lindsay'
Said person interrupts, showing off her empty left hand.
"Sorry guys! As much as I'd love to marry Michael, he's not mine," she jokes. Their relationship had ended on good terms, with both of them deciding they were better as friends.
'Barbara'
'Arryn'
"That's pretty far out," Gus comments.
"Yeah, it's like everyone is assuming you're straight," Burnie laughs, and Michael turns red in the face, he's totally giving it away.
Burnie reads new guesses as the fans stumble over the latest comment on Michael's questionable sexuality.
'Ray'
'Gavin'
'His right hand'
Michael can't help but laugh at the latest guess.
"Yep, guys I'm marrying my left hand and my right hand together, to my dick, it's a polyamorous relationship, I just couldn't afford two other rings."
"I'm so happy for you," someone says, but Michael isn't paying attention because all he sees is one of the screens in front of him, showing the screen of Burnie's laptop, and he sees the latest tweet.
GavinFree: RTPodcast Me
Michael breaks out into a grin, feeling warm inside because Gavin is watching the podcast and he's watching him and it's Gavin and that tweet is the best thing. Michael immediately whips out his phone, favoriting Gavin's tweet and replying.
AH_Micheal: GavinFree #LessThanThree
"Well, I think we've kept the fans waiting for long enough, don't you, Michael?" Burnie asks the Jersey boy, who shrugs.
"I guess."
"Who's the lucky person?" Gus asks, backed by Lindsay, who's grinning like mad.
Michael smiles softly, looking directly into the cameras after a few moments of hesitation.
"Gavin Free."
The fanbase explodes.
People wouldn't stop talking about it. At first, they thought it was a joke, but now they know it's serious. Over the course of the week, certain videos were released. Short ones, mostly, ones with small, sweet moments between Gavin and Michael that'd been cut from other videos, or just hadn't been released altogether. Knowing that Gavin was in England, the fans knew these weren't recent. However, more recent ones were released as well, one just from Friday where Kerry had caught the two kissing in the hallway.
Of course, Michael and Gavin had previously consented to the release of these videos, they just needed to wait to release them until the public knew of their relationship.
It was hard, sometimes, to censor themselves in videos and in life itself. They would never know when a fan would recognize them in public, see them holding hands and sneak a picture. And they couldn't be like other couples at the company, tweeting hearts to each other and uploading silly pictures and saying "I love you" over and over again because it would never cease to be true. They needed to wait for the right moment.
The perfect moment. Every moment for Michael is a perfect moment, though. Every video, every shared look and every nudge of the shoulder and every time they held hands, every time they kissed. It's all perfect in Michael's eye because Gavin is perfect and Gavin is beautiful they always say you should marry your best friend.
Gavin is his best friend.
If you look hard enough, no, if you aren't blind, you can see it in every last video, because if there was ever a dead giveaway it's every single thing the two say to each other, anyone who knows can tell. And if you don't know? You can tell. The fans don't have a Mavin-radar, they just have common sense.
The videos are always Michael's favorite because they catch the perfect moments, and you can relive it again and again. When he's 70 years old and his memory starts to fail him, Michael wants to watch these videos and look back on when he was young and know that his love never died, it's only grown.
The videos catch every last detail that is lost because he's too busy living in the moment.
One beautiful video even caught the very beginning of it. It was a Behind The Scenes video of a Surgeon Simulator Play Pals, the exact moment when Gavin had said,
"I give you my heart, Michael."
In the video, Michael just looks over at Gavin, looks him right in the eyes and smiles warmly as he retorts, and Gavin's smile is so big and dorky and it makes Michael tingle every time he watches it because that was the moment he realized he was in love with Gavin Free, and he wanted to be with him forever.
Too bad he didn't get a forever.
Gavin had been walking back from a restaurant with Dan, both chatting animatedly about all the recent news. The engagement, their new videos, new stuff they wanted to try for TheSlowMoGuys, and of course the fans' reactions to everything.
Gavin hadn't given a second thought to the car approaching the stop sign of the street they were crossing.
It's common sense that the car would stop, right?
It should've been.
"Gav-"
It was too late. Dan's voice was drowned out by the loud thunk, the screeching of tires, the broken asphalt underneath the British boy.
Most notably, the crunching of bones.
It was Friday afternoon when Michael received the call. They were in the middle of recording a Let's Play, so the Jersey boy ignored his ringtone.
When it rang a second time, though, it caught his attention.
"You'd better get that," Ryan said absentmindedly.
Michael frowned at the number, not recognizing it, and he stepped out to take the call.
He didn't come back in.
Don't ask Michael Jones why he doesn't text. Don't ask Michael Jones why he doesn't drive, either.
Don't ask him any of those things, because that will bring up a rage long died out, a rage that was too exhausting to continue to have over pointless videogames when it could be used on the important things.
Like the unyielding urge to strangle the teenager that had been texting and driving, the stupid stupid stupid fucking teenager that thought his text was more important than the life of Gavin David Free, more important than the love of Michael's life. More important than the wonderful ray of sunshine that had brought so much happiness into everyone's lives, the handsome man that was actually intelligent, despite his often idiotic questions.
A stupid text that was more important than life itself.
Don't ask.
He will never tell.