I apologize in advance for this short little runt of a chapter.
His old English teacher (ye olde English teacher, Alfred would gripe when he felt particularly mean) would have probably keeled over in disappointment to hear it, the poor woman, but right now he felt...sucky. Like the anime character in the corner with the little flames –they probably had a name, it just wasn't coming to mind- and gloomy aura, but less intense. Even if Arthur had turned him down today, he still had donuts to heat up in the microwave. And a cat.
Living in an anime world would have been pretty freaking great though. And well, he at least got to drive Arthur home, even if they just kind of sat there quietly and didn't speak over the radio, still playing on –god forbid- a pop radio station. Sue him.
Asking to exchange numbers turned out to be a brilliant idea, because Arthur had gone and searched for a pen instead of just reciting his number to give to Alfred, and then they were holding hands (kinda) and gosh, Alfred hadn't been so excitedly nervous about holding hands since his third-grade girlfriend –and that was at a time when he was just beginning to warm up to the idea that maybe girls didn't have cooties or bite or whatever young boys feared.
So yeah, the little tingles that seemed to spread from their point of contact were pretty great, and Alfred could only hope Arthur felt as silly as he did.
Their hands stayed together longer than they really needed to, just like they hadn't really to exchange phone numbers like that. As with any happy infatuation –one of the biggest words Alfred would use outside of math and science, probably- Alfred liked it. Liked Arthur. A lot.
And well, numbers were usually a good thing. Alfred still felt a little disappointed by his lack of a date, but some things just took more time than others. He could be patient. Sometimes. For special people, and didn't Alfred want Arthur to be special to him?
Hero greeted him enthusiastically at the door, winding between his legs and almost tripping him as he rubbed his face against Alfred's leg to reassert his claim. "Hey there, buddy!" Alfred accepted the eager welcome from his favorite fur ball and scooped the cat up in his arms, carrying Hero to the couch the cat had apparently claimed as base of operations. The Maine coon seemed content laying there for the moment, giving Alfred time to slip away and shower.
And of course, Hero took the open door (oops) as an invitation to climb into the shower with him. If Alfred's phone were waterproof he definitely would have filmed it, as Hero looked perfectly content to sit under the faucet and let water trickle on his head while looking criminally adorable.
Five minutes later, Alfred had towelled off both himself and his cat and relocated to the sofa, which meant that Hero would stay glued to his lap until Alfred had to get up and do other things. Phone though. Phone seemed like a good thing to pay attention to, so Alfred wouldn't be moving any time soon. He had promised a sneak peak at his new music video, and heroes never broke their promise.
(Maybe he was a little brainwashed by his father's old comic book collection and Saturday cartoons and maybe his parents had taken advantage of it; Alfred really didn't mind. It made him a better person, right?)
And yeah, the videos were kind of low-quality, but that was expected from a smart phone camera. Anybody could still tell that the dancers did their parts amazingly –Alfred knew that Marie and Thuy-vi had come into the studio on the first day without any previous dance experience- and the beat was totally a developing ear worm. Between recording the songs, hearing them occasionally on the radio, and now the video, Alfred had his own songs on what seemed to be an endless repeat –unless there was another song stuck in his head. Disney always seemed to sneak in uninvited.
He took the time to appreciate how hot Arthur looked, because it was perfectly acceptable to focus all of his attention on the video. Okay, anybody could agree that Arthur had nice legs, and anybody could appreciate the fact that he made certain moves look effortless, while Alfred swore that his thighs ached just watching the moves being performed.
Well then again, Ludwig had been pushing everyone particularly hard for this video...
And in the second video, the microphone caught a huffed sigh, a quiet mumbled "is this how it works?" (so Arthur didn't have this model of phone, or he was just really bad with modern technology) in what was definitely Arthur's voice, and although the phone wobbled once or twice it remained more or less steady-
–and wait, did Arthur's breath hitch?
Come to think of it, Arthur probably knew more about Alfred than Alfred knew about Arthur, considering he had an advantage in Alfred's Wikipedia entry, website, and his pick of social media accounts, which meant that Arthur had access to what amounted to a scarily accurate, scarily detailed life story. Well, assuming that Arthur even bothered checking. Still. Alfred would prefer to tell his life story personally –Wikipedia had yet to become a mind-reader, and stories were always best straight from the source.
But in return? Really, all Alfred knew about Arthur was his job, the neighborhood he lived in (ish, did Arthur live in Los Angeles? Wait, he didn't, the area code of his number didn't match...), that he made a damn great critic, liked folktales, and if his accent was anything to go by, that he was British.
Alfred wanted to know mundane things too, things like bedtimes and ways to waste time and as a child did he have a monster under the bed or in the closet? Both? In the toilet, maybe? They could get kicked out of a movie theater for complaining too loudly, or for maybe doing other...things.
Even if he did have a few extra hours, lazing around on the couch with his cat felt morally wrong, somehow, and so Alfred reluctantly got up to go do productive things like writing 500 different lines for 400 something songs he'd never finish. Hero, loyal sidekick that he was, immediately hopped off the couch and followed Alfred to the room that could only be very, very loosely called a study.
Hero sat by the doorframe, looking back at Alfred every now and then with large, sad blue eyes. And really, Alfred wanted to drop everything and coo nonsense at his cat, but the blinking cursor and half-finished chorus seemed a personal challenge that he couldn't back down from. As with the natural order of things, Hero padded back to Alfred's chair and began to make his parrot noise of distress, circling around Alfred's feet.
"Twenty more minutes, silly," Alfred mumbled, in the same manner one might telling their mother "five more minutes" when otherwise busy.
Like any good parent, Hero refused to stand for any disobedience of any kind. Like any good cat, he recognized that Alfred would probably do anything he wanted, as long as it was within reason. And cats were always in the right. Proceeding with the natural order of life, cat and human finally left the room when Hero began to act as if he would die without food, climbing up and down Alfred's chair, table, computer, leg, and anything the large cat could reach, still making parrot noises.
Between his cat, the fact that the still largely unfinished song made him want to burst into snotty tears, and the regretful awareness that his hand seriously hurt to the point where it would probably fall off and declare itself independent, Alfred led the way out of the little study and into the kitchen, Hero following in a manner that could only be considered victorious.
"I fed you twenty minutes earlier than normal, you little shit," Alfred said good-naturedly even as he gave Hero a little extra kibble and a slice of liver for saving him from the nasty writer's block dragon. (It was kind of strange sometimes, forgetting that typically in the professional environment such terms weren't words of endearment.) Hero replied with his customary chirp and then watched as Alfred scrounged for his own meal, in what Alfred would consider encouragement.
It was an informal household. Hero took up half the dinner table as a place to lay down and watch Alfred, so Alfred felt perfectly justified in pulling out his phone to mess with it while eating.
He had a well thought out system, see. Friend contacts went below the business stuff, and even though Alfred kept the whole thing unsorted (who did things by alphabet anyways?) he still knew were everything went. A quick scroll down brought him to his newest contact, still without a contact photo.
Did he have the right number? Alfred had checked three times just to make sure, and everything seemed in place. He checked his hand again, even though the ink looked smudged. Was that a one or a seven? A five or an eight? Arthur's handwriting looked nice, sure, but it made Alfred doubt himself in more ways than one.
Well, hopefully he had the right number. He hesitated for a while over the right first message to send, and eventually settled on a sad little "Hey Arthur? This is Alfred! If this is the wrong number, sorry!"
Alfred didn't expect an instant reply, but an hour and a half later at ten-thirty he accepted that Arthur probably wouldn't respond that day. "You don't think he actually sleeps at nine, do you?" he asked Hero as they curled up in bed. "That's kind of weird."
Hero purred in response and tucked his furry tail around himself, which Alfred took as a demand to hurry up and fall asleep already. He pushed his nose into the pillow and nuzzled it once or twice, sighing happily. Within minutes, he had slipped off into dreamland.
It wasn't desperate in any way to have rolled over and checked his phone the moment he woke up; Arthur had friends in other time zones and Chelles seemed to never sleep. The motion was an ingrained response.
Either way, he had a new message from both Guilherme and Kiku regarding plans should he have spare time (likely not, as Chelles seemed determined to wring from him every hour of work he had put her through in high school and more). An invitation to tea and a museum exhibit coming to town seemed like the kind of relaxing, rewarding activity Arthur would need after Chelles had her way, so he sent a message in the affirmative immediately.
The message from Alfred came as a pleasant surprise, although Arthur couldn't help smiling slightly at the hesitant tone of the text. Alfred certainly seemed the kind to apologise profusely should he accidentally bother someone with a wrong call.
Hello Alfred. This is the right number, don't worry.
Almost immediately, a new message popped up. Arthur frowned in confusion and checked the time; it was eight thirty on a Saturday morning, but he had expected Alfred to be busier than the average person, considering his profession.
Hey! Good, hahaha. That'd be really embarrassing if it wasn't. I promise I didn't fail kindergarten!
Kindergarten. Kindergarden. Close enough.
Kindergarten is such a weird word to spell, pfft.
The messages popped up in such quick succession that Arthur had barely begun responding to the first message when a second popped up. And then a third. How fast exactly could Alfred type? How did he respond? Arthur waited apprehensively for a beat or two before he felt it was safe to reply.
I'm sure you didn't fail kindergarten, and I suppose that autocorrect makes for a rather useful friend.
Arthur settled himself more comfortably in the mess of blankets and pillows and waited for the response.
He wasn't disappointed. Haha, yeah autocorrect is your friend up until it's 3 in the morning and you're kinda drunk and really sleepy. Don't ever text your brother when you're drunk, ever.
Well, that was certainly advice to follow, not that Arthur even had any of his brothers' numbers saved on his phone. Sound advice. Are you even old enough to drink?
Heck yeah I am! Arthur liked to imagine that Alfred would have pouted or at least grumbled indignantly if they had talked face-to-face. Turned 21 this July. Didn't you check the fan page?
Even knowing that Alfred meant it teasingly, Arthur would have crawled into bed from embarrassment had he already not been tucked firmly beneath the covers. It was a precautionary to do his research, nothing more and nothing less; Arthur had learnt his lesson after being forced to go on tour with a certain insufferable French star for months years back. And so yes, he knew Alfred's birthday (July 4, something the American seemed to take an incredible amount of pride in), but actually looking for his age with the date he was given seemed strange and-
and he had a conversation to uphold.
I'm sorry, was this mandatory reading?
I feel betrayed, Artie. I didn't peg you as the minimum requirements guy.
Arthur rolled his eyes, feeling less embarrassed for himself now than Alfred.
I'll try to be more meticulous next time.
Well, enough was enough. He couldn't spend the rest of the day in bed, no matter how delightful the conversation. Arthur stretched, sat up, and set about making the bed, the phone perched on the table within easy reach.
Lucky for you, you have the top expert right here if you need any help!
The joke about student-teacher roleplay which sprang to mind seemed highly inappropriate for the conversation. Arthur blamed Francis. With a slight huff, he smoothed the comforter out to lie more or less even on the bed before replying.
I'll make sure to come and ask any questions that may pop up.
After making sure that he looked presentable, Arthur slunk into the kitchen feeling distinctly embarrassed, as for all intents and appearances it seemed as if he had woken up rather late that morning. He stopped in front of the door to the pantry, the space between the door and the wall too small to pass through without further embarrassment or without disrupting the person currently blocking the way.
Yao stood in the doorway of the pantry, seemingly lost in thought as he stared at the various food items stored inside. "Porridge or bing?"
Arthur blinked in confusion. "What?"
"For breakfast." Yao began pulling out ingredients from the shelves; containers filled with beans of different colours, flour, what looked like a jar full of rose buds... "Are you hungry?"
Usually, breakfast was only this complicated when Arthur attempted to eat out. "Not particularly," he said at last. He stepped in and plucked a container of small red beans the small and the jar of rose buds from the pile growing in Yao's arms and placed it on the kitchen island.
"It's probably too late for porridge," Yao conceded as he began placing ingredients back on the shelves. "Bing is rather like naan, if you've had that before. And there's always cereal."
The manner in which Yao talked left Arthur with the feeling that his input was less for the sake of carrying out a conversation and more for providing some sort of verbal feedback for the other man's thoughts, so he trailed after Yao as the man began to set ingredients on the island counter. It felt...strange, certainly, to feel so uneasy in a kitchen.
"Can you get the green onions from the fridge and dice them? They should already be washed." Yao said from his position near the sink, watching the water fill the bowl he had procured carefully. Arthur found himself obeying without so much of a word in protest, more glad for the opportunity to do something resembling normal.
After he finished dicing the onions, Yao called him over to help roll out the shape of their breakfast –the name's pronunciation firmly out of his grasp- before evidentially finding fault in Arthur's work and dismissing him from the kitchen, which probably stung more than it should.
The sound of something sizzling merrily in a pan and the scent of salt in the air was apparently enough to convince his stomach that yes, it did indeed have an appetite, and it let out a happy little rumble when Yao set down a plate stacked with what looked like thicker pancakes with a smattering of green onions throughout. His host smiled and looked pleased with what he saw in Arthur's expression. "There's tea on the stove," he said.
Well, some slights could be forgiven. It wouldn't do to hold a grudge.
"McDonalds should totally deliver," Alfred groaned as he spun around in his rolling chair. He didn't sign up for all of this crap when he decided on his career; singing was supposed to be fun, not this ridiculous management stuff and responding to email, blah blah blah...
Hero purred and swished his tail lazily across Alfred's abandoned keyboard; the traitor had stopped caring sometime around the third time Alfred broke down un-heroically in the face of adult life.
"Wait, do they?" And normally Alfred knew not to trust the tricky little voice urging him to just abandon real life, give up his firstborn child and spend the rest of his days on YouTube or Tumblr, but this was for research. And his grumbling stomach.
It turned out that no, McDonalds didn't deliver. Plus, looking at all those pictures of burgers and stuff made him hungrier. Alfred slumped down further in his ergonomic chair (not that it would help him and his terrible posture now) and blew a puff of air at that one strand of hair, which bobbed cheerfully. Well, at least the pizza places around wouldn't let him down.
Somehow, Hollywood had led him to believe it would all be...more glamorous. And well, sometimes his stylist would bully him into a nice suit for like promotions and stuff. Or music videos, but at least those were fun.
Alfred could have sworn there was a point to this...anyways, ordering a large pizza and some breadsticks seemed awfully lonely for just himself and Hero. And while he had the feeling that part of it had to do with the empty spot on his kitchen table he saved for desert, Alfred also knew that he was a people pleaser and would shrivel up and die if left alone for too long.
Do you ever wonder what chocolate covered ants taste like? Texting became a lot harder when he had pizza to deal with, huh.
What? Alfred snorted at that. Man, if only he could see Artie's face...
I'm looking at reviews for this cool candy store. I've never had chocolate covered ants and I kinda want to try some. Plus they have a station where you can build your own candy bar!
That's an invitation out, in case you missed it. ;P
Apparently, pizza had confidence-granting powers. Did the winking face work as a kind of "jk" thing? But "jk" was never an acceptable excuse...
That sounds lovely, Alfred. What time?
If anyone asked, good luck totally tasted like the meat lover's pizza from the little place down the street.
Please don't be angry with me, haha