The Making Of A Primary Color
Chapter Two: "Pretty Boys"
Sherlock forced himself to get ready for whatever Molly had planned for tonight. Maybe he would tell her at the end, just so all her money wouldn't be wasted. Normally he wouldn't care if he canceled at the last minute, but this was Molly. Hurting her feelings may as well be the same as spitting on a puppy. She'd had a crush on him for years, but after finding out he was gay, she let up, although he felt as if it still lingered beyond her control.
Even so, Molly remained a very close friend who would listen to Sherlock, and even if she ran out of words of comfort, she would sit with him and rub his back or something. Usually Sherlock wasn't one for physical contact, but right about now he embarrassingly longed for a hug from someone. He couldn't even remember the last time he'd had a hug. Probably some family member at a holiday get-together who he hadn't seen for an entire year, sometimes more.
It must have been his attitude. It was known to put people off, in the worst ways possible. But he'd really tried to not be himself for the interview and audition. Perhaps that was it, then. They saw through his little gimmick and saw him as even worse than he already was, saw a fake.
There were other universities, Sherlock knew. But rejection was taking its toll on him and trying its best to remind him that he can't do anything, that he's not good enough for any university at all. Sherlock attempted to remain positive and logical by telling himself louder than the other voice in his head that he could get into Oxford if he wanted to; that's where his brother went. Except he didn't want to be some Oxford graduate rich man. He just wanted to do what he loved. But he'd always had a feeling that the harsh reality of the world would forbid him from doing so, forcing him into some day-to-day job that he hated and would never be remembered for.
After a few hours of moping in his room, there came a soft rapping at his door before his mother opened it and poked her head in, stepping into the room and finding Sherlock. Pity flooded her face as she saw her son's tear-streaked cheeks and puffy eyes, her bottom lip even jutting out slightly. She didn't ask what happened, instead sauntering over and nudging one of Sherlock's long, skinny legs to tell him to sit up so she could sit on the edge of the bed with him.
Sherlock sat up, sitting cross-legged in the center of the bed as his mother took her place on the edge as intended. She talked for a while, Sherlock mechanically responding when it was absolutely necessary. Not much of what she said registered with Sherlock, even though he knew that her words held weight and that she knew what she was talking about, being a well-educated and intelligent woman herself, but he couldn't endure a pep talk right now. When she was done, she kissed his cheek and offered to make him some tea, but he refused./p
He went about the rest of his day like a zombie, meandering about just to stay out of his room because his parents didn't want him to go back there. They scolded him only lightly when he didn't eat dinner, but honestly, he felt sick, and he had felt sick since that stupid phone call.
He also tried to listen to the band he would be seeing tonight, but his mind drifted elsewhere, and he knew that by tonight he would know no songs at all, which was perfectly fine with him, just as long as the deafeningly loud music and fans could take his thoughts away from the state they were in now.
Molly arrived at 6:30 with a bright, and freshly applied, red-lipped smile, her light brown hair pulled into side braid, swinging away happily as she bounced up his driveway and cheerily knocked on the door.
Sherlock failed to dress as presentable as she was, not changing his usual style at all, which consisted of thin, dark colored button-ups, dirty Converse, and black jeans with a few dress pants here and there. He ran his fingers through his curls and fluffed them a bit, shaking them down when he was done and deciding that was the end of it.
Molly chirped a "Hi!" when Sherlock came out, taking in his appearance and accepting it. Sherlock could wear a potato sack and she'd think he looked great, though.
Sherlock forced a tiny smile and wrapped his blue scarf around his neck loosely. "Let's go," he said, sounding as happy as he possibly could.
xxx
"Guess what," Greg said upon entering the tour bus and putting his toes on the siderail of the bunk below John's so he could rest his elbows on John's mattress.
"What?" John asked, not bothering to guess.
"Management's been talking, and you might be dating one of the singers of Dawn Aligned soon."
John groaned, burying his face in his pillow. It wasn't the first time they'd tried this, but it never stopped being annoying. The girl Greg was talking about, Sammie or something, John had never even met, and she probably felt the same way. He understood what management was doing: a girl from a pop girl band and a bass player from pop-punk band; it got a new set of fans for each band. Still, when John said he was lonely, he didn't mean a fake relationship. In fact, a fake relationship actually ruined his chances even further.
"If you're unhappy about it, take it up with Marshall," Greg said. This was a bit of an inside joke within the band. Marshall Hampton was their manager, and he never listened to a damn thing any of them ever said. To him, they were puppets. Puppets who earned him a lot of money, so of course these particular puppets couldn't have a very loose leash. They'd ruin everything, supposedly, if they did their own thing.
"You know these fans, Greg. They'll figure out it's fake. They figure everything out." Which John was grateful for. It wasn't that he liked his entire personal life to be known on the Internet by anyone who cared to find out, but if they didn't buy into this kind of thing, then it didn't really work out.
"They'll only believe it's fake because they want us to date," Greg teased.
"Piss off," John said, lifting his face from the pillow and throwing it at Greg, who caught it and laughed.
"Maybe I'll write my own Johnstrade fan fiction. 'Greg knows that he secretly loves John, but John won't admit his real feelings.' That's the description. It'll start out with us talking for a little bit. Then it'll just be hardcore porn for the rest of it."
John rolled his eyes and climbed down from the bunk, and Greg jumped back down beside him. "Shouldn't you be getting ready, anyway?" John questioned.
He shrugged in response. "No one else is yet."
"But you're the vainest of all of us."
John supposed Greg had a right to be vain, though. He was pretty much the one everyone thought was the hottest. Over the years, he gotten both of his arms completely covered in tattoos and the side of his neck tattooed, and stretched the earrings he'd had since he was twelve big enough so he could put in small tunnels, and he had clear, tan skin and chocolaty eyes and brown hair that was always styled in some way with just the right amount of hair gel.
Meanwhile, John didn't really have any of that. Greg had tried to convince him to get something pierced or tattooed because everyone else did. Sally had her ears and tongue pierced and a small tattoo on the side of her hand near her thumb, and Dimmock had the smallest nose stud he'd been able to get ("Get a 16 gauge if the 14's too big." "18 gauge, then." "20 gauge." "Goddammit, Dimmock, they don't get much smaller than a 22."), even though you couldn't really see the gold hoop until you got up close to him.
But John was still attractive. He had dark ash blonde hair and blue eyes, and for whatever reason, girls found his shortness and compactness cute, where John had never liked it. Actually, he'd spent most of his teen years waiting for one last growth spurt to bless him and make him not have to get on the tips of his toes to do some things. But it never came, much to his dismay, so he remained at 5'6".
As they began to walk off the bus, John brought it up again.
"Why is it only me who gets set up with people?"
"Well, with the amount of kissing pictures of Philip and Sally out there, they can't hide that, and everyone loves Abigail."
"What about you?"
"Every band needs a man-whore," Greg said, and John wondered if this was really the thought process of management. "So that leaves you. Of all the puppets, your strings are the tightest."
xxx
Sherlock was fine. He's fine as can be and would appreciate it if Molly would stop asking. She asked him several times on the way there, once when they got there, and this total stranger in the restroom stopped Sherlock at one point and said, "You all right there, mate?" Yes. Yes, he was. In fact, right now he was surprised his lips didn't start to split at the corners and bleed with how big his smile was that he was trying so hard to pull off, maybe as punishment for having a fake smile and a bad acting job.
The band was okay. The singer obviously had some confidence issues, even at this point in the game of success, and the guitarist seemed too flirty with the adult men in the crowd for his own good, but other than that, they were pretty good. The bassist didn't seem to fit in at first with his blonde hair and tattoo-less skin and piercing-free face, but once Sherlock saw him joke around with the other band members and interact with the crowd without saying a word and still getting them to scream, Sherlock saw that he did fit with the rest.
His eyes remained fixated on him the whole time, he found. Something about the young man's energy reminded Sherlock of what he wanted without making him want to sulk all alone again, like every other piece of music had been doing. He couldn't even look at his violin. He put it in its case and put it in his closest shortly after the call, as if that would make him forget all about it.
Once the show ended, Molly was reunited with Sherlock, and she excused herself by saying that she was going to go to the bathroom really quickly before they left, so Sherlock sat on the curb and waited for her, where about a hundred (very loud) people were also, and Sherlock had to look up to see what the big deal was until he saw that a couple of the band members were outside, conversing with fans and taking pictures with them like they were lifelong friends. Sherlock turned back around and decided he didn't care. Instead, he traced his fingers on the pavement, leaning back.
But that was precisely the moment John became interested by the sight of him.
Flashing lights of cameras clicking and the harsh lighting of the streetlights danced in the reflection of his eyes, but John saw no light of his own in his eyes. Dark brown curls adorned his sculpted face and somehow allowed his neck to look even longer and elegant than it already was. He sat off to the side, and if this were a party, John would see him nursing a drink and staring down into it as if it held some kind of answer out on the roof or something. But he had nothing to stare at now, not even a phone he could fiddle around with and try to look busy.
"Not having a good day?" John asked him, coming up behind him.
The boy (man? Guy? Fan? Angel?) didn't uncross his arms, but he regarded John by looking him up and down, his face unreadable.
"No," he said.
"I'm sorry."
"Why?"
"Well, that's what you usually say to a person when they tell you something like that," John said with a smile, linking his hands together and squeezing them nervously and biting his lip.
The boy-man-guy-fan-angel continued to stare at John, now focusing on his hands and what they were doing, and John couldn't move them because he knew that they were being watched, and now they were starting to get sweaty and sticky.
"You've got fans waiting on you over there, you know," he finally said, tilting his head to the side slightly.
John slid his hands apart and clapped once, then rubbing his hands together, trying not to appear grossed out by the sweat, even though he probably already noticed. "I'm too interested in your bad day. I've got all night to talk to people."
"No, you don't."
"Then we should probably get to it." John sat down in front of his cross-legged with his hands on his knees and looked up at him like a child waiting for a bedtime story. "What's your name?"
"Sherlock Holmes."
John nearly asked him if he was lying, but the glare he received when he smiled and nearly laughed told him all he needed to know. Sherlock was his name, then. Sherlock. Would that even roll off his tongue correctly? He tested it out quietly, almost under his breath. He accustomed himself to the name, got used to it as if he would be saying it often.
"What's yours?" Sherlock asked.
John blinked a few times, having never been asked that at one of his own shows before. Yes, bass players were sometimes overlooked, but he'd gotten lucky and was generally recognized. He cleared his throat and raised one of his eyebrows. "John. John Watson," he answered, and it sounded like a question, like he wasn't sure if that was really his name.
"You assumed I already knew your name," he said.
"Well, you are at my show." He tried a smile, but lost it when it wasn't returned.
"I'd never heard of your band until tonight. A friend of mine bought tickets for both of us. It was supposed to be a celebration."
"And this celebration," said John. "Is it why you're having such a bad day?"
"In a sense. The reason for the celebration was ruined."
"What was the reason?" John questioned.
Sherlock went quiet, and his eyes darkened and narrowed. Obviously, it was the wrong thing to say. Seeing Molly try to push her way through the crowd, Sherlock grabbed the thin bag from beside him, slung it over his shoulder, and stood up, readying himself to walk away.
"I'd rather not talk about it," he said, already about to turn his heel.
"Well, hold on. You don't have to talk about it," John offered, pushing himself up to his feet, dusting off whatever had latched onto him from the ground.
"Learn not to pry, John," Sherlock said, beginning to saunter away, but John gently grabbed his arm, and surprisingly, that was all it took for Sherlock to stop and look at him.
"I'm not prying. Sensitive subject, I assume. I won't bring it up again, promise."
"My friend's right over there," Sherlock protested, pointing to the sea of people.
Then, an idea struck John. "You know, I get a lot of hugs at this time when people leave. No one would think anything of it," he said.
Slowly, Sherlock uncrossed his arms, looking around him at the people who were really paying no attention apart from a few shy fans admiring John from afar and debating whether they should approach him or not, which Sherlock found a bit strange. John was a very approachable person, and he was just a man like every other man.
Against the stronger part of Sherlock's brain, he slid into John's open arms and melted into his embrace, breathing in the scent of a man who'd just gotten off stage after being in a stuffy, cramped backstage area. Sherlock dropped his head onto John's shoulder, which was less awkward than he thought it would have been because of the ridiculous height difference they had going on.
John's arms enveloped him in a warm, comforting hold that Sherlock had desperately needed, and now he actually felt a bit better. Okay, a lot better. But it wasn't like Sherlock expected anything else from John. By tomorrow, he'll be miles away, perhaps listening to another person's bad day and hugging dozens of other fans, ones who were more polite and excited to see him.
John wasn't sure how long he stood there holding Sherlock, but when he started to hear murmurs between two people (the parts he picked up were, "Who's that guy with John Watson? He's beautiful," and "I wonder if that's his boyfriend"), he decided it was probably time to pull away. Sherlock must have heard it, too, because his eyes snapped open—he'd shut them? When?—and he pulled away, clearing his throat, which burned with an odd sensation Sherlock nearly associated with another round of tears threatening to break loose because of all the ranting and comforting, but he pushed the tears as far back as he could.
"Thank you," Sherlock said in a strained voice. "That's what you're supposed to say, right?"
"Yeah," John answered, already wanting to hug the adorable little bastard again.
"Sherlock?" came a small, feminine voice, and Sherlock walked over to the girl, quickly walking away, and she was going after him, whispering things like, "What was that? Was he flirting with you? It looked like flirting. Wow."
John laughed at the sky and then went on to meet more fans.
Walking home, right as Sherlock thought, He won't even remember me, John thought to himself, I'll never forget him.
