"I don't see why I have to be the one to stay late again."
Moss wants to slam his cup down on the desk, but it's full of hot Ribena and it would spill if he did. So he doesn't. But he does think about doing it, and allows himself a smile at the thought of the noise it would make.
The mess is all Jen's fault anyway. Pressing buttons like she knows what she's doing just to impress Darren from fifth, and now Moss is stuck working late again to restore the data she's lost.
"Oh God, did I lose another eight hours?" Richmond's standing in his doorway, looking confused and slightly scared, eyes flicking back and forth between Moss and the clock on the wall. "Is it morning already?"
Moss sighs and shakes his head. "No. Just muggins here working late again to fix another of Ms Barber's little messes." He rolls his eyes to show how utterly cheesed off he is.
"Oh." Richmond seems surprised. "She asked you and not Roy? That's strange." He wanders over to Roy's desk and picks up Roy's magazine with one finger and thumb, like it might be contaminated. Then he drops it and starts rifling through the lid-less biros stored in a chipped Dilbert mug.
"Strange?" Moss turns away from his monitor, giving Richmond his best puzzled face. "How so?"
But Richmond doesn't seem terribly concerned - he just carries on noseying through the things on Roy's desk.
"Just that Jen and Roy have got that whole sexual tension thing going on. You know."
"Do I?" Moss slides his chair to the right, a little closer to Richmond. "Wait, what sexual tension? Are you saying that Jen and Roy – " He makes a complicated gesture with both hands.
"What, shagging? Probably." Richmond's accent makes 'shagging' sound strange. Somehow less vulgar than if Roy or Jen had said it. Which makes the thought of the two of them…doing that all the more weird.
"No! You think? No! Really? No!" Moss flaps one hand in a 'don't be silly' motion. Then he inclines his head like a confused puppy. "How can you tell?"
Richmond turns to examine one of the posters on the wall behind Roy's desk. When he speaks, his voice sounds distant and sort of dreamy.
"It's just something in the air. A glance, a careless word. It's all rather embarrassing, really. I don't know how you can stand to be around the two of them."
Moss is flabbergasted. He leans back in his chair, his mouth gaping open as he tries to take in this sudden shocking news.
"I had no idea!" He casts his mind back over the past few working days, trying to work out if there have been any signs or signals he could have missed. "And I'm usually good at reading people, too."
Richmond moves around to the front of Roy's desk, leaning against it. By now he's got one of Roy's hardback comic anthologies in his hands, and he's leafing through the pages (backwards, Moss notices, and decides that Richmond has never seen manga before). He glances up briefly at Moss before he speaks.
"I'm surprised you hadn't noticed. It's almost painful to watch them." He gives a noticeable shudder, then goes back to looking at the comic. "Then again, I'm more concerned about the sexual tension here right now." He clearly does not look at Moss when he says this.
"What?"
"The air's thick with it. Any day now, it's going to burst out and we'll either end up having a blazing row or else tearing each other's clothes off on the couch over there." He puts the comic back on Roy's desk and wanders over to read something pinned to Jen's office door.
Moss takes a moment to contemplate this.
"Are you sure?"
"Positive. Couldn't you tell how much I was blushing when I walked into the room?"
Moss wonders how it's possible to tell when Richmond blushes, given the amount of white foundation he wears.
"Sexual tension."
"Yes."
"Between you and me."
"Yes."
"Oh." Moss shifts uncomfortably in his chair. "Is that likely to be a problem?"
"We could always just shag now, and get it out of the way."
Richmond turns back to face him; well, his body does, but his gaze is fixed on the pointy toes of his boots. Still in his chair, Moss fidgets with the PC mouse.
"Do you think that's the best course of action?"
"Probably best to clear the air."
Moss nods. Then realises he ought to do something else. He gets to his feet and shuffles out from behind his desk. Richmond shuffles too, until eventually they meet in the middle of the room. There, they do their best to avoid eye-contact. Moss focuses on the weird churning in his tummy, and decides that's probably the sexual tension right there. He wonders why he's never noticed it before.
Richmond is tugging at the oversized cuff of his satin shirt, and Moss realises that he's probably going to have to take the lead here. He leans in and carefully presses his lips to Richmond's cheek. It's surprisingly soft; he must moisturise before putting all that make-up on, Moss decides.
When he pulls back, Richmond is almost smiling, his eyes darting everywhere but in Moss's direction. Then he takes a deep breath before tipping his head and planting a kiss on Moss's lips. It lasts maybe a second before he pulls away, and this time Moss realises that they're both almost smiling. Richmond was right – this probably was the best thing to do, under the circumstances.
So he places both hands on Richmond's arms and goes for it.
Some time later, he's sprawled on the couch in a most undignified manner, with Richmond tangled up around him. They're both trying to catch their breath. Moss spends a few seconds contemplating some sort of device for carrying his inhaler when he's undressed, then decides this probably isn't the best time for those sort of thoughts.
"Well, I'm glad we got that out of the way," Richmond says once he's got his breath back. He extricates himself from Moss's arms and sits up, looking around for his shirt.
"I do have to say," Moss returns, "that I feel considerably less tense."
For a moment, Richmond looks back over his shoulder at Moss, and there's an actual smile there. Then he turns away to find his boots.
"Now we can get back to sharing a workspace without all that awkwardness." Richmond pulls on his left boot and stands up. Moss decides that maybe he ought to move too, as soon as he can find the energy.
"So we don't need to do that again, then?" He manages to stretch out an arm and retrieve his shirt from where it's gotten stuffed between the couch cushions.
"No."
Richmond's gone back to doing that weird shifty eye thing again. Evidently out of things to say, he gives Moss a friendly nod before going back to his door and disappearing behind it.
When Moss has dressed and finally pulled himself up from the couch, he realises that the churning in his stomach is still there. Maybe it's just wind, he decides.