Arthur and Merlin watched in disbelief as the actress got a custom suit made for the garden gnome and escorted it to some fancy Italian restaurant. Candles and everything. Their incredulity slid down the edges of their worn seats and they met in a darkened corner of the room where they laughed and pointed at the screen.

Merlin was desperately trying not to laugh. He was putting every iota of self control to the test. He felt like a soda can that had been shaken too long and then left out in the sun. It wouldn't have been so bad if the dozen or so other people in the theatre were laughing at the crazy mess that was happening on-screen, but they were strangely silent. It was almost as if they cared what was going to happen next. Didn't they realize that at any moment the, ahhhm, leading male actor could take a tumble off his fancy chair? Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall...end of movie. The thought made Merlin want to giggle even more.

Merlin glanced at Arthur from the corner of his eyes and noticed, with some satisfaction, that Arthur had his lips pressed together so hard that they were almost colourless. The flashes of light from the screen played along the angles of Arthur's face and made his eyes sparkle with a hungry light. Those eyes widened and Merlin turned his attention back to the screen just in time to see the actress lean forward over the table.

Merlin couldn't quite comprehend what he was seeing.

From beside Merlin, Arthur tried to suck in a breath and exhale at the same time and ended up snorting loudly through the silent theatre. Arthur's hand instinctively flew up to his mouth but the damage was done. Arthur opened the soda can and Merlin howled from laughter. Merlin stuck both hands in front of his face in hopes that it would muffle at least some of the sound. It was incredibly contagious and soon both of them were sliding down in their seats trying to find the equation needed to convert their choking giggles to silent laughter.

Merlin felt Arthur lean his head towards him.

"Shit, Merlin," Arthur said and Merlin felt Arthur's breath bounce off his cheek, still shaky from laughter, "she just made out with something that normal people stick into their backyard."

The woman who sat in front of them turned and glared at both of them and if looks could have killed they would have both been ash on the floor. Clean-up in theatre 3: the one showing a movie with the most moronic plot thus far known to man.

When the woman turned back around Arthur's hand flashed out and grabbed Merlin's forearm. Merlin felt the tiny tremors that ran along Arthur's fingers, tremors that translated into an eyebrow raise. It was probably something along the lines of, 'holy crap, she actually likes this movie!'. Merlin sucked his cheeks in hard and hoped that it would prevent his mouth from opening to let out a sound. Merlin turned his head to look at Arthur and he met Arthur's gaze. The light reflected off the excess moisture in Arthur's eyes and the wetness on his cheek. He took one look at Merlin with his sucked in cheeks and threw his head back in a silent exhalation of air.

"You look like a goldfish," Arthur whispered when his head came back down.

Merlin swallowed down the laugh and his stomach felt full with all the pointy exclamation marks. At the same time, he couldn't help but notice that Arthur's hand was still on his arm. He closed his eyes and the actress, who was now fondling the gnome's beard, disappeared.

In his mind he was a wizard and he used his wand to draw three little words in the air and then with a gust of breath he sent them swimming through the air towards Arthur. He was a Greek god with the power and confidence to slide his arm up until their two hands molded together. He was a warrior who threw his sword tiredly to the ground in favour of reaching his calloused hands to Arthur's face. He was an angel who decided to fall because he'd rather live beside the man he loved than above him.

The feelings stirred inside him and what started off as a small breeze turned into a tornado. It pulled all the feelings that were sitting on the sidelines into the funnel and it jumbled his thoughts. The ratio was off. There were too many feelings like courage and rashness and not enough wariness and anxiousness.

It was a dangerous vortex that blew through his mind and pulled each laminated sentence apart word by word. It flung the unneeded words like 'can't' and 'won't' out through his ears. Words were flying around in circles, orbiting his brain, and they felt strange because they were unattached. The words were free to join friends that they'd barely seen in twelve years, friends they'd only visited at night as their owner dreamed.

The words hugged and joined hands and their owner sat there in the darkened movie theatre in a strange state because he wasn't sure what was going on inside him. He wasn't sure why all of a sudden he felt like impossible things could come true. All he knew was that there was something jumping on his heart and an emotion sitting on his tongue and it tasted strangely like impulsiveness.

His mind convinced his nerves to move his arm but his muscles overpowered them both and his arm went rigid. His nerves may have been easily swayed but his muscles were veterans in the game. His muscles, the last checkpoint, asked his brain if it was sure. The newly reunited words jumped up and down as they hugged each other and the muscles relented.

A moment before, another pair of muscles contracted.

Arthur pulled his hand away just as Merlin pulled his arm up and turned his palm over. The cold weight of truth landed in Merlin's vulnerable, upturned palm. His fingers curled into a fist and he caught some of the truth so next time he could remind himself what unguarded hope felt like.

He opened and closed his fist to brush off the movement. "Muscle cramp," he said when he felt Arthur watching him. He glanced over at Arthur. Tiny bursts of light from the screen illuminated the blue eyes that were trained on him. The expression in Arthur's eyes changed as he looked at Merlin and Merlin whipped his head back to look at the screen. Merlin didn't know which emotion he forgot to wipe off his face before he looked at Arthur.

He never allowed himself to maintain that ribbon of connection. It was easy to look into Arthur's warm and gentle eyes and convince himself of things that weren't there. He didn't want to give his brain tampered with evidence to stockpile; evidence that would foolishly try to convince Merlin that Arthur's glances were more than just a sensory organ sliding through vitreous fluid.

Merlin felt Arthur shift closer. "You win, this movie is definitely worse than the one we went to last time about the detective who was able to solve crimes using a psychic cucumber." Merlin watched the actress slide her foot along the gnome's four inch leg. "Do you want to duck out of here?" Arthur asked after a moment.

Merlin slanted a look at Arthur. Arthur was smiling but there was something off about it, something forced.

"Yeah, okay."

They got up from their seats and crouched down as they walked over to the end of their row. They followed the tiny lights down the steps and out the auditorium.

"Oh you always know the perfect thing to say," Merlin heard the actress croon as the door swung closed behind them. Merlin blinked a little, his eyes unaccustomed to the light, as they slowly walked towards the exit.

"I really hope they paid that actress a lot," Arthur said as he pushed the doors open and they found themselves outside. "Considering all the mortifying crap they made her do."

Merlin sniggered as he silently agreed. "You couldn't pay me enough to have a make out session with a two foot tall, rosy-cheeked, bespectacled garden gnome."

Arthur smiled but there was something missing. "What if he wasn't wearing glasses?" Arthur asked before Merlin could figure out just what was missing.

"Well in that case pucker up Mr. Gnome."

Arthur laughed lightly and Merlin joined in. They were best friends and Merlin told himself that that was enough. He wasn't a wizard, a Greek god, a warrior or a fallen angel; he was just a man named Merlin. Maybe he was being selfish by wanting to turn their friendship into something more, something that both parties weren't in agreement with. Merlin told himself that if he would just stop comparing every boyfriend he ever had to Arthur then maybe one day he would be able to look at Arthur with just friendship on his mind.

They walked through the parking lot toward Merlin's beat up Toyota but Merlin didn't really feel like going home yet. He pulled out his keys and fiddled around with it in his hands. He saw Arthur eye the path across the street that ran next to the river.

"Want to take a walk?" Arthur asked as he nodded towards the path with his head.

Merlin could almost feel the inviting breeze coming off the water. He tucked his keys back into his jean pocket and they headed towards the path. They passed an upturned garbage can in the parking lot and the wind caught on some of the balls of paper and blew them in various directions.

Merlin looked at the little balls of paper and had a thought. Maybe we were all little pieces of crumpled up paper and we were all waiting for that one person who would pick us up and gently smooth out our sharpened corners. But Merlin was scared that Arthur would accidentally cut himself on his corners. Arthur ate light and light shone from his pores while sometimes all Merlin had left in his lunchbox was dark.

Okay, so the story ends here. *cricket, cricket* Just kidding! There's at least one more chapter left (if not two). Next one's from Arthur's pov again.

Thanks again to everyone who's been reading, following, favoriting and leaving lovely reviews. :)