Title: Bad Boys
Pairing: Handsome Bob/One Two
Note: Another RocknRolla fic, because it's a good one. Still not mine. Italic is Handsome Bob, regular font is One Two. A little bit of a twist on the original plot.
He pulls up to her house, humming along with the radio. As he throws the car in park, he grabs the flowers from the passenger seat and steps out of the car, still humming. Stepping through the dirty slush on the street, he makes his way up her steps, onto her porch. He knocks softly on the door, waits a few moments, and then lets himself into her house with his key.
She's just coming down the stairs as he closes the door behind him. "Oh Bobby, are those for me?" He looks at the dainty woman before him, her body frail with sickness. He gives her a bright smile, "Acourse ma, you like 'em?" She giggles, pressing close in a tight hug before pulling away, taking the flowers from him, and heading toward the kitchen. He follows her, slipping the heavy jacket from his shoulders. He drops it in a chair as he gets the kettle out to make her some tea.
"Have you heard from him?" His smile is more of a grimace as she asks about One Two, but he turns around to face her, take her brittle hands in his. "No, but he wouldn't want me coming up. And honestly, I don't wanna go anywhere near that place. I've spent enough time in a jail." They laugh together as she slumps in a chair, and he fixes her a cup of tea.
As he sits down in the chair next to her, she pats his hand softly. "You're a good boy Bobby, always one of my favorites." He gives her a bright, charming smile. "Aw well thanks ma." Slowly, he gets to his feet and opens the refrigerator door, paws through the food there. He gets out some things to make her soup. He fills two pots with water, puts chicken in one to boil, noodles in the other.
She starts coughing harshly while he's chopping carrots. Dropping the knife on the counter, he's by her side as quickly as he can be. He smoothes her hair back, helps her lift her cup, holds her still as the coughs rack her body. She waves him on, "I'm alright Bobby, promise." He nods and goes back to making her homemade chicken noodle soup.
After the chicken cooks, he chops it into chunks, adding it to the pot of carrots and noodles. Slowly, he stirs the soup, tastes it, adds some salt. He helps her to her feet and leads her into the living room. He situates her on the couch, piles blankets up around her. "That good?" She smiles up at him, holds his hand briefly.
When she nods off, he goes into the bathroom and checks her prescriptions. When he comes back, she's awake again. "You need anything ma? Or you good?" She gives him a soft, sad smile. "Did he tell you to take care of me?" Once again, the mere mention of One Two makes his heart cringe. "Actually, he doesn't know anything about this. I just wanted to make sure you were alright. Any doctors' appointments this week?"
She shakes her head and reaches for his hand, holding his hand tightly while staring at the TV set. He's content to just sit, to give this woman all the comfort he can.
"When you gonna tell him?" He looks over at her, but she keeps her gaze on the TV. "Tell 'im what?" She looks over at him, an eyebrow cocked up and a smile toying at her lips. "Well you know…that you love him." He freezes, and she pats his hand comfortingly. "It's alright Bobby. You're the prettiest, nicest boy I know, and it's a shame that you have to be alone." He gives her a soft grimace. "I don't think it'd be a good idea to tell him, ma. He'd flip." She nods and lets it go, and they settle back into the mundane routine.
But when he gets ready to leave, she holds his hands and looks up at him. "You ever wonder why his relationships don't work out? Why he has these perfect, pretty, posh birds who fall madly in love with him, but he remains unattainable? Maybe it's because his heart is already someone else's. Maybe he'd surprise you Bobby." He nods, "Yeah…maybe ma. I'll see you tomorrow."
And they never speak of it again, just go on like it never happened. He keeps her fed, her utilities on, her meds filled, her clothes clean. He takes care of her like she's the mother he never had, because in a way she is. And when the time comes, he's the one who plans the funeral, who pays for everything out of pocket, who picks through her belongings while bawling his eyes out and trying to determine what is worth keeping and what isn't.
And when One Two gets out of prison, he's the person at the gate, smiling a bittersweet grin. He's the first person to be touched by the rugged older man in two years. He's the one who tells One Two the terrible news about his mother dying, the one who offers his support, who never gets anything in return. But that's alright, he tells himself, because love is selfless.
The moment he finds out that Handsome Bob is gay, his world crashes down around him. He remembers all the…unmentionable times Bob had been around. For Christ's sake, he had shared showers with the man, seen the guy's dick. He tries to quell the remembrances of the chiseled planes of Bob's chest and stomach, the way his easy smile makes his stomach churn and flutter.
He suddenly takes offense to even breathing the same air as Handsome Bob, his Bobby boy, and everyone picks up on it. When Mumbles tell him they all know about Bob being a poof, he's shocked and a little angry. He's chalk full of street smarts, and he wonders how he managed to miss Handsome Bob being a bloody faggot. He loses himself in thought for just a moment, wondering if there's a reason his mind never connected the dots, when Mumbles tells him there's more.
"What, there's more?" He's shocked, and really doesn't want to hear anymore. Finding out one of his best mates is gay is close to more than he can really handle.
"Who do you think looked after your mum before she died, whilst you were doing a two stretch?" Mumbles takes a drink, and he has an idea where this is going. His heart twists in his chest. "Cos it wasn't fuckin' me and I am your best pal! No, it was Bob around there six times a week without fail making sure she was looked after. You tore your mum's heart out when you went away, and Bob did his best to put it back. I tell you something One Two, if I could be half the human that Bob is and the price was being a poof, I'd think about it. Not for too long, but I'd have to think about it."
He swallows hard, "He looked after my mum, how come he never told me?"
Mumbles shrugs, "Cos that's Handsome Bob, and he's class." His heart churns and twists hard in his chest, and he gets up from the table, leaves the bar, and gets in his car. He drives around aimlessly for the better part of an hour before winding up at Handsome Bob's place. He had known where he was headed the moment he got in the car, but he knows he couldn't put it off forever.
Slowly, he pulls over to the side of the road, puts the car in park, and gets out. He walks up the stairs, stalling for time he doesn't have. And before he knows it, he's on the porch of Bob's townhouse, and he rings the bell. It takes a moment, but then the door is being pulled open and his breath seems to catch on something in his throat.
All on its own, his gaze takes in all of his friend, his dark hair wet from the shower and the smell of Bob's soap, his clean skin. He's all too aware of how tight Bob's shirt is, the way the boxers gape just barely in front of him, and he shakes his head to be rid of it. Glancing back up, he watches as Handsome Bob leans against the doorframe, his head resting against the white paint. "What're you doing here One Two." He gives Bobby a sheepish smile, a crooked grin that makes girlies fall in love. "Well…I," he rubs the back of his neck, stares at the ground. "Well what? You spend the week avoiding me, and now you come around here. Aren't you worried you'll catch some disease, that I'll turn you queer by breathing my air?" Handsome Bob bites the words out, and he feels them as they bury in his heart.
He rubs his hair. "I…I've been a bad friend. Ah…uhm Mumbles told me it was you who looked after mum. She loved you, ya know." He watches as Bob nods slowly, his gaze catching on the subtle flex of the younger man's throat muscles as he swallows. "Why'd you never tell me?"
Handsome Bob just shrugs, "It wasn't a big deal. I didn't figure you'd want her to be alone, so…I went." The smile that curls Bob's mouth is nothing short of sultry, a look that screams sex. He feels it in his stomach, the cradle of his hips. "You know," Bob laughs, rubs his hair slowly, "she was the one who told me to tell you how I felt. Said you might surprise me. Well, you didn't."
His stomach lurches, curls. "She told you that?" His ma always had known more than he. He steps up on the porch, within touching distance of Bobby, and looks anywhere but those deep blue eyes. "Well…ah…let's go inside and have a drink, yeah?"
Bobby steps back, letting him in, and he follows, shutting the door definitively behind him. The apartment hasn't changed, it's still the bachelor's pad from before. A big leather sectional couch and matching armchair gather round a widescreen TV. He touches the afghan strewn across the back of the couch and remembers when his ma made it for Bobby.
The kitchen's a bit dirty, a day's worth of dishes in the sink. He watches Handsome Bob stretch to a top shelf and pull down two tumblers. The clink of ice cubes in the glasses is almost melodic. He watches Bob twist open a brand new bottle of bourbon, and the deep amber liquor drains slowly into both glasses.
Now, sitting across from one another, there's really no place he can look but in those dark blue eyes. Of course, Bobby won't say anything but he can still see the wounds in the other's gaze. He had bailed. He had promised his best mate a dance and then bailed. He'd gotten scared. He gulps at the bourbon, feels it burn its way down his throat and into his stomach.
"I…ah…I'm sorry Bob." Handsome Bob sips near daintily at the bourbon, his full lips parting around the rim like a kiss, and the bourbon accepts that kiss. He runs a hand through his hair, sighing deeply through his nose, prying his gaze away from that mouth. "Nothing to be sorry 'bout One Two." He knows that Bob is willing to act like it didn't happen, to ignore the hurt and press on through. Mumbles is right; Handsome Bob doesn't just have class, he is class.
"Don't say that. There is. There's plenty to be sorry about. But mostly, I'm sorry that I bailed. I promised ya a dance an' I shoulda followed through. And…I'm sorry." He throws back the rest of his bourbon and gets to his feet, striding back through the kitchen and into the living room. He fiddles with Bob's sound system for a bit, looking for the perfect song. Finally, he thinks he's found it.
The slow, easy melody of The Lengths rolling through the house is his music for striding back into the kitchen. His fingers curl around the back of Bobby's chair, spinning him around sharply at the guitar's first lonesome wails. He tugs Handsome Bob up, slinging his arms around that tight waist. Instinctively, he leans into the embrace, letting Bobby twine his arms about his neck. The song is slow, and it speaks of losing love and maybe finding it.
He can feel Bob's face buried in tight against his neck, and he can feel the tears squeezing out from under those eyes screwed shut tight. He rests his head against Bob's skull, slowly leading them in an easy, swaying motion about the kitchen. He inhales deeply, smelling the masculine scent of Bob's soap, clean and fresh and musky spice. His fingers curl tightly against Bobby's lower back, clutching at the shirt there.
Five minutes. Five long, but somehow not long enough, minutes. When the music drops off, he pulls back, his fingers spreading over Bob's cheeks, destroying the tears there. "Bob. Bobby, why're you crying?" He brushes frantically at the tears that seem to keep falling, slipping gracefully off the damp spikes of the younger's eyelashes
He waits for those dark blue eyes to open, prepares to see them darker than he's ever seen them before, like looking into the bruised blue of Bobby's heart, but it doesn't happen. Instead, Bob brings his lips crashing against his, banging them back against the cabinets. He can feel Bob's fingers curling against the back of his skull, cupping his head.
And the kiss. While it's messy and rough and nothing like any of the kisses he's had since finishing school, he can taste the hunger there. And the love. And something in him clicks. He grasps at Bob's back, pulling him tighter, pressing deeper into that kiss.
When finally Handsome Bob pulls away, that warm soft mouth sliding from his, he is reluctant to let go. For a brief moment, his fingers curl tighter against Bob's back, before relaxing. The younger slips away, those dark eyes opening slowly. Just like he had thought, it's like looking into Bob's heart. But amid the tear-bruised colors, he can see a spark of love, and it's catching. "Thanks One Two, you didn't have to do that." The smile curls his lips sullenly as he swallows down the words that fill his mouth.
For a moment, he's struck by the desire to tell Bobby that he'd wanted to. For maybe longer than he's willing to admit. He runs a hand through his hair before grinning, "Oh you're welcome Bobby boy. It was my pleasure." And he means that. His lips are still tingling from the pressure, the hunger of Bob's kiss. And he can feel it in his stomach, coiling and twisting.
He wants more, more than he can ever have. As he watches Bob move around the kitchen, refilling their drinks and cleaning up a bit, it becomes apparent to him that Handsome Bob is happy with just that kiss. But not him. That kiss…it woke something up in him, something that his mother had hinted at to Bob in those last few months of her life. And when Bobby glances over that broad shoulder at him, gives him that easy, crooked grin, he can feel his heart quiver. His hands itch to grab at Bob, and his lips part with the idea of kissing the younger.
And he wonders if things will ever be the same.