So having a baby is intense. And working full time is also intense while having said baby. Who would have thought*?
(*Answer: Everyone.)
Disclaimer: I don't own Soul Eater or it's characters, friends. But I figure you know that.
He was staring again, but he was too exhausted to stop himself.
Sweat dripped from a pale hair strand, course prematurely white hair he would add, but the journalists saw how thick it was and assumed someone in their 20s must surely spend that hard earned rock money on expensive dye jobs. It was easier to nod and roll his eyes, and Maka to her credit never once giggled in the background. At least she didn't giggle while anyone was there to listen. She would never say it was a giggle that escaped her lips, however, that would be too feminine.
And heaven forbid Soul accuse Maka Albarn of femininity. Despite the long sleek ponytail of ash blond hair and the miles of legs in a tight black skirt, her black leather jackets and ever present sunglasses told every man they better stand down lest they get a studded leather boot in their genitals. It shouldn't have made Soul hot under the collar to picture her slamming her steel toe up into some pick up artist, but he'd seen her do it and he already knew it poured lava into his veins.
"Evans," Kid snapped fingers in front of Soul's face, making him flinch. Caught spacing out again. Thank everything Maka seemed too absorbed in whatever information was coming through her ear piece as she placed two fingers gently against it, or else she might have noticed him staring at her like a creeper. "Are you ready to leave yet? Tsubaki reported that Blake made it to his limo."
That meant the screaming masses were surrounding Black Star and it was the best chance the rest of them had for escaping the venue with a minimum of molestation. The dull roar coming from outside told him that there would still be a crush of people. The usual anxiety started to winch the vice against his chest and he reflexively looked up at Maka, deep in conversation with Harvar.
"And for gods sake put a shirt on," Kid, no less sweaty from the effort of their performance, was in everything but the jacket of his artfully distressed three-piece suit and had to be dying. Soul, on the other side of tired and starting to get that fuzzy feeling that told him he needed his antidepressant about an hour ago, had pulled off his black t-shirt and tossed it carelessly on his guitar. Maka would scold him later about how an artist needed to care for their tools, and he perversely looked forward to her displeasure.
"You don't crawl up Jackie's ass, or Blake's, why am I the lucky one?" Soul already knew the answer, but he had to get surly at someone.
"Jackie is a professional, and Blake—against all reason and probability—manages to be the same when it comes to his job." All Black Star had to do was scream lyrics into a microphone periodically to a beat, but he loved being the center of attention so he actually applied himself to it well enough.
"I'll remind him you said that next time he shows up late to the studio." Soul laughed into his bottled water as he took a swing of it and poured the rest on his head just to make a mess and scare Kid away. It worked as the drummer made a sound of disgust and wandered towards the door. Kid was just prissy because he was tired and he didn't like dealing with crowds of fans any more than Soul did. By tomorrow in the tour bus they'd be on good terms again like always.
Jackie was packing her bass into its case, polished and well loved. She was no less ready to leave so she could call her pop princess girlfriend Kim Diehl, probably silently counting the minutes until she could hear her voice. Outwardly stoic, Jackie's tell was how she fiddled with her hair and stared into space. Maka wandered over to pat her on the shoulder and reassure her that they would start out soon.
"Nygus says the cars are pulling around as we speak," Jackie brightened at Maka's words. Bless their kind manager for giving the good word. "But Black Star is taking his sweet time tonight so there's still a crowd out back."
Soul snorted. He'd told Maka over and over that she didn't need to use Blake's stage name but she said he had told her he preferred to be addressed as Black Star so she'd respect that. He'd immediately retorted that she should call him 'Mr. Evans' then, and damn it all if she did for all of a week before he'd cracked first. Soul was made of sharp edges but he hated putting distance between his favorite security team member and himself. Every time he thought maybe the moment had come to let her know how he felt somehow it just ended in him popping a Xanax and shelving the topic for another day.
"Soul!"
"Shit! Maka, gods, you scared me." Soul clutched a hand to his chest, realizing he was still shirtless when his palm slid across his clammy skin.
"Well, you should have responded the first time. Your car is here, ready to run out?" Soul gave Maka a look that spoke volumes about how ready he was, and it was accompanied by an epic eye roll. "Don't get smart with me, I know you hate this but it's the only way—until you spontaneously grow wings—to get yourself to the hotel."
Soul slumped into his chair more, letting a humorless smirk play on his lips.
"Or you could walk. It's a nice night." From her even tone Soul couldn't imagine if she was serious or not. Knowing Maka she would probably encourage the walk become a run and she might very well enjoy it, but Soul was predictably not thrilled by the prospect of being chased down by fans for miles.
"Ok ok, hold on." Straightening his spine, Soul snatched up his cold, damp t-shirt and pulled it on while baring his fearsome teeth. He had heard Maka mention to Kid in passing while reading one of their interviews in a magazine that the article mentioned some fans dyed their hair to match their favorite band member, and some of them even got veneers to look like Soul's teeth or contacts to match Kid's yellow eyes. Super fans scared the life out of him sometimes. All they did was play some catchy music, it wasn't like they wanted people to make the band's fashion choices a lifestyle.
"There, happy now?" Soul stood upright enough so that Maka had to tilt her head to meet his eyes. Black sunglasses met crimson contacts and Soul as always blinked first, or so he assumed. "Time to get mauled I guess."
"Kid went second last two shows, so it's only fair you take some turns." Some lady managed to pop a button off Kid's suit last time and he had a meltdown in the middle of the alley. Soul and Blake had a good laugh at the pictures in the tabloids last week, and every guffaw had been well worth the welts Maka had given him on the back of his head for the insensitivity.
"Couldn't we just let Blake run laps around the theater while they scream and snatch his clothes off? Maybe then they would be too tired to bug the rest of us."
Jackie snorted in the corner at Soul's suggestion.
Maka pressed her lips together and started to drag Soul towards the exit since she realized he was stalling. "While I'm sure Black Star would love to do just that, I don't think Tsubaki deserves that kind of torment. She'd have to not only pace him but fight off all those fangirls, and in case you didn't notice Black Star's fans are just as nuts as yours."
"At least he doesn't get creepy goth love letters like me and Kid…"
"Cheer up, I'm opening the door." Maka pushed hard on the bar and the exit swung open with a rusty creaking that was drowned out by the sudden excited screams. Soul felt the blood drain from his face.
"I don't do cheery, Maka."
"That's the spirit!" The way Maka shoved him out first into the throng, he would have sworn she was enjoying his torment more than usual. His fingers brushed where her hands had wrapped around his wrist just moments ago and he tried not to smile. Soul had a bad boy image to maintain after all, and smiling like a dope wasn't part of it.
"Soul," the knocks on his door were getting louder, and felt like they were coming from the inside of his skull. "Soul, if you don't let me in I swear I will send Black Star in with your meds instead." Maka's muffled voice cut through the haze of exhaustion and Soul found himself springing up from the couch in the fancy suite he had had booked.
Maka, sans sunglasses, met him with a sunny smile. It was too late (early?) for sunny anything, and Soul told her so.
"All the same you need food and it's time for your antidepressant. Then you can sleep."
"Who died and made you my boss…"
"Kid was the one who told me you never took your meds on time and how it made you an impossible monster, so in a way I think it was Kid who made me boss of your meds. Now eat this pudding and swallow this pill like a good rock star." She said it to make him feel ridiculous, and dammit if it didn't work every time.
"When do I need to be up?" Soul said through a mouthful of chocolate pudding.
"In about 5 hours. Kid was asleep in the car and Patti had to practically carry him to his room again. Black Star is hopped up on caffeine pills and bouncing off the walls."
"I assume he drank a bunch to counteract it."
Maka nodded. "If I were Tsubaki I would have tossed him out a window ages ago."
"He'll jump on his own. Just dare him. The pool story isn't a fairy tale, it's a cautionary one."
Getting that glint in her eyes that Soul knew preceded saying something pedantic, Maka took that book on tape tone he hated. "Actually, fairy tales were always meant to be cautionary tales. They were meant to teach children moral values like humility, and how you should be kind to strangers."
"…Or how you can't trust them."
"Always the optimist." Soul was pacing around, waiting for the pill to kick in, while Maka was sprawled against the couch, legs crossed at the ankle and stretched out in front of her. "Did you even shower yet? You look like hell, Soul."
In fact he hadn't. Soul had been possessed with a strand of inspiration and had scrawled some notes down for a new tune he'd play out for Kid on the way to the next venue. With any luck Kid would be inspired to make some lyrics and it would go on the next album, not that hardly anyone cared about the artistic integrity of albums these days. A few hits people would download were enough, along with a cool music video that would bring their channel a bunch of ad revenue. Merch, sponcon, private parties… it all seemed kind of sordid compared to the dreams he had had originally of artistic integrity and some obscure releases that would get recognized as brilliant and innovative when he died young and insane. Churning out commercially viable alt rock with his college buddies hadn't been the plan. He might as well get a 'sell out' tattoo, but everyone would probably assume he was being ironic.
"Tonight's set sounded really good."
Maka's praise drew him out of the darkness.
She yawned and stretched, shrugging out of her jacket and leaving Soul with a clear view of lean arms in a white tank top. He knew for a fact that every fiber of muscle in those arms was toned from years of training in more martial arts than he thought legitimately existed before Maka had been brought into the security team by Sid as a favor to an old friend of his. "Still can't really dance to it though."
Soul groaned at her. "Not every song needs to be danceable. Go bleed out your ears in a club if that's what you want."
"Touchy tonight!" Maka laughed, never taking his words to heart. It was nice that at least one person on this planet understood him. "I'll be next door if you need me, just text."
She began to stand up and Soul felt his body tense from head to toe. He didn't want her to go but didn't know any reason why he would ask her to stay that didn't make him sound like a perv. Maka had told him enough stories of her FBI agent father sleeping his way across the country with every major case he'd worked that Soul knew every human of the male persuasion was suspect. But in the end his mouth moved before his brain could stop it.
"Can you hang out a little longer?" He knew he was blushing, but he fought through it. "Just until I fall asleep. And to make sure I don't pass out in the shower or something lame like that."
"Oh." Maka looked at him with concern at the unusual request. "Do you feel sick or…?"
"Yeah, something like that…"
"I'll be right here then." She sat back down on the couch and pulled her hair out of the ponytail with a slight sigh. It was just as long a day for her as it had been for him. And he hadn't been the one bodily forcing back teens from storming the VIP sections backstage. As Maka relaxed by cracking her knuckles and neck, Soul turned towards the bathroom and smiled to himself.
He used eye drops before removing his contacts, looking into the face of his brother in the mirror as soon as the distinctive Evans grey was exposed. He hated this part of the day, when he was just a scrawny body held together by chemicals and dubious musical talent. Soul Eater was a badass. Saul Evans was a dweeb.
The hot water felt good once he was under it, and Soul probably spent too long zoning out in the heat because as soon as he exited in a hotel robe while rubbing his thick wet hair with a towel he was greeted with the sight of Maka completely asleep on the couch. She was snoring lightly, head propped at an awkward angle on the armrest.
Unrequited love was unfair and it could fuck right off.
Soul sighed and pulled the blanket off the bed to drape it over Maka's legs and torso. Her skirt had ridden up exposing the most ridiculous pair of days of the week underwear—something that no adult should be caught dead in—and the blanket saved her modesty as well as her pride. Rather than crawl into bed, Soul sat down next to the couch and crossed his hands over his chest. He wasn't sure why he needed to play monster guarding the maiden, especially when he was plenty tired enough to fall asleep on the bed with or without a blanket, but it seemed like the thing to do. Maka spent all her time guarding him, turning it around gave him a sense a balance and his buzzing mind quieted down.
It was a stolen moment, but he could get used to this feeling.
"Hell's angels!"
Soul was awakened by a knee to the back of his head.
"Ffffff…" Soul clutched his head as much from Maka's inhumanly loud shriek as the stars from the head injury she'd just given him inadvertently as she'd jerked awake.
Lingering warmth on his exposed peck and belly combined with the way Maka was clutching her arm and hand like she was burned led his sleepy mind to conclude they had woken up in some sort of compromising position. The robe had fallen open sometime while he was snoozing upright, and while his head hurt the most his back and ass were telling him he was getting older and shouldn't sleep sitting on the floor like an idiot.
While he had been taking an inventory of aches and pains, Maka had been blabbering about something or other. Soul tried to tune in past his pain and drowsiness.
"…sort of Albarn curse! I'll go, I'm so sorry, I can't believe I… I mean, I'll understand if you want me to hand in my resignation…" Maka, flustered and horrified, was disentangling herself from the blanket and grabbing up her jacket. Her hair was a curtain over her face as she moved, but he could still see she was bright red down to her neck.
By the time Soul had sorted out her words she was already opening the door to run out of the room, and presumably the hotel and his life as well. Panic started up a cold sweat and he rushed out into the hall after her, bare foot suddenly smarting from what he hoped was just a corn chip embedded in his heel, and lunged to grab onto her wrist.
"Let me go, Soul!"
"Don't be an idiot!"
Their drama was playing out at full volume, and true to form Blake's door opened almost immediately. He wouldn't have slept all night, and the dark circles under his eyes were the only indicator because he seemed as loud and energetic as usual as he whistled at the tableau in front of him after taking a swig of his breakfast beer.
"Nice, bro. Finally found your balls, huh? I thought they were in Maka's pocket, but turns out they're right there." Blake pointed at Soul with an eyebrow waggle.
Steaming with rage and embarrassment, Soul was forced to drop Maka's limp arm so he could tie up his robe properly and avert everyone's collective stare. It would be just his luck if some paparazzi had snapped pictures of his junk already somehow. But nude photos were the least of Soul's worries as Maka turned mournful and horrified liquid green eyes back up to his face.
"Blake, you saw nothing, and if I ever hear of this I'm telling Tsubaki about that time I found you with that picture of her—" Soul didn't even need to finish the sentence before Blake had slammed the door on them both in retreat. That threat had been far more effective than he had thought it would be and filed that information in the back of his head to consider later. "Maka, come back and talk to me before anyone else—"
"Obviously I can't be trusted alone with you, Soul." She interrupted tightly.
That's what she had taken from all this?! Ye gods she was hard on herself. "So your hand slipped while you were sleeping, so what, I've been touched more intimately by screaming fans. Last night I swear to you someone touched my ass, and I don't mean above my pants." That at least got a ghost of a smile from her, which she quickly schooled back into a scowl.
"But—" She was about to start throwing logic and self-recriminations at him, he knew, and he panicked.
"If it's you, I don't mind..."
"What?"
The stress sweat was really turning up now, and he could feel actual droplets slide from his armpit down the side of his ribs. His weight shifted back and forth on bare feet still sore from standing for hours earlier in the evening. "You heard me. Now can we please go back into the room?"
He ran a hand through his wild hair and over his no doubt still bloodshot eyes.
"Please." Don't leave, Maka. He couldn't finish the sentence except in his own mind.
Woodenly, Maka moved back in his direction, tugging down at her skirt as if it would suddenly cover more than the top of her thighs. Her face looked wan and determined. Soul felt like the oxygen was returning to the world again, and he followed her in quickly.
They continued to stare at one another.
"So Black Star and Tsubaki…"
Soul snorted, glad she had at least started on a safe topic. "Blake wishes." He had pulled on a long sleeve t-shirt and some pajama pants in the bathroom at Maka's insistence before he had emerged to talk. Maka was stiff backed and sitting in a chair next to the small desk by the window. A light from some advertisement across the street was blinking slowly and backlit Maka's stricken face with oranges and yellows. It would be dawn soon.
Soul sat at the end of the still tightly made bed, sans blanket, that he wished he had just slept in instead of stationing himself next to Maka and causing this whole mess. In a couple hours they would be on a tour bus together and they needed to work this out before this stretched into terminal and public awkwardness.
"Do you know how excited I was when Sid called me up last year? It seemed like a great summer job, but then you all were finishing up the tour in fall and I didn't want to leave you short staffed and that's when I figured out I could take the last of my degree requirements online…" Maka wasn't meeting his eyes now and it scared the shit out of Soul, even as it stuck him as silly that she was talking to a desk. "I just wanted you to know I'm not a crazy fangirl. I didn't plan it to be like this."
He had snuck into her graduation this spring—worn a wig and weird clothes and everything so he wouldn't be recognized—and he thought he had been really cool and sneaky except Maka had found him immediately after she had thrown her cap in the air. It was like magic, and all he had been able to do was gape at her. A red-haired man had been running after her crying and calling her name. When she had grabbed Soul's hand and whispered 'just keep up' before pulling them out into the hot desert day, Soul knew he was in love with her for sure.
"I figured you thought I was the crazy one."
It was Maka's turn to snort. "Given all the people we hang around, insanity seems pretty relative."
The silence was suffocating.
"Hey—" Soul and Maka tried to break the awkwardness at the same time only to fall deeper into the well.
"I was waiting for you to quit, you know." Soul said the words tightly, looking at the ceiling where a fan lazily thrummed. He knew Maka was finally searching for his eyes, and all at once he wished he had put his contacts in. He felt too much like Saul and not enough like Soul. "You're too good for this stupid job. Too smart. Too ambitious. Plus you think all the money and the fame is bullshit."
Maka, unlike Soul, couldn't handle being ignored and he had to keep from startling when she plopped next to him to sit on the bed's end.
"The lifestyle doesn't have substance, but you do. I have faith in you." Her hand covered his and Soul felt his palms go instantly clammy.
"You're better than…" Me. "…all this." Soul told the ceiling fan, heart on his sleeve. It would have felt much more significant, even romantic, if his churning stomach wasn't threatening to make an unattractive indigestion-based noise.
He heard her clipped laugh. "If someone had told me a couple years ago I would be sitting in a rock star's hotel room reassuring him he was a cool guy while he was getting all maudlin, I would have laughed them out of the country."
"If someone had told me a couple years ago I'd regress back into emo fuckbo-mmph" Soul's self-deprecating statement couldn't finish because Maka had grabbed his shirt by the collar and pulled him in for a sudden kiss. It was more like her mouth smashing his, done with her definitive and forceful style, but all the same his world tilted. When Maka decided to do something she sure didn't hesitate, and Soul wondered where a person got that much conviction.
In a daze, Soul wondered to himself what it all meant. As if she could read his mind, Maka answered his unspoken question.
"I don't do this job because I like it, I do it because I like you." She stood up and poked him in the forehead before moving towards the door again. This time Soul's legs were clearly made of jelly because standing up to follow her seemed impossible.
As Maka opened the door he heard her sharp intake of breath, and he leaned over to see Kid standing there. Creeper had either been listening at the door or was just about to knock. Either way, it looked like Maka had stopped herself from braining him with an elbow to the face just in time.
"Black Star told me to come see if you wanted breakfast. I think, in retrospect, that was a ploy." Kid's considering tone normally would have bugged him, but Soul was too blissed out to care.
Goddam Blake. Soul groaned and flopped back on the bed. He brushed his fingers against the bump on the side of his head from where Maka had kneed him and felt the answering pain with a vicious self-satisfied smile. The unconvincing way she was stuttering out a reason for being in Soul's room was pretty cute, made even funnier by the fact that the truth was so mundane it wasn't believable. The bus ride to the next gig was going to be hours of bruising back slaps and high fives from Blake and teasing from everyone else. Maka's voice rose in pitch as she repeated over and over that nothing had happened, and why was Kid smiling like that…
Maybe when Maka inevitably left to go do her next big important job she could just take him with her.