by Aidan Wayne
“No, it’s alright, I—I know you wanted me to come.”
Dovid raked a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I did. But not if it freaks you out. I don’t want that to be how we meet for the first time. Besides, I’ll be hanging out with you after anyway, right?”
“R-right.”
“There you go. How about this: you know how we made plans to go back to where I’m staying together, for dinner?”
“Yes. Yes, of course.”
“How about I just give you the address direct, and you can meet me there when I’m done? You can bring dinner, just pick whatever you want. Deal?”
“Alright,” Sam said sounding, at last, much calmer. “Deal. But I’m still so sorry.”
“I know, and it’s okay.” It was worth it, for Sam to feel at ease. “I’ll get to see you soon anyway.”
“Yes. Right.” And then, adamantly, “I love you. I’ll see you soon.”
Just like that, Dovid was pumped again. “Love you too.”
* * *
“Hey, guys! This is Don’t Look Now with Dovid and Rachel! I’m Dovid, Rachel is right here next to me, and welcome to our Ireland meetup!”
The crowd roared, and Dovid basked in it, grinning his head off as he encouraged them to make some more noise.
In the back of his mind, he was relieved Sam hadn’t come. People in general made Sam nervous, but he’d mentioned a few times how he was “slightly bothered” by crowds especially, particularly noisy ones. He’d said it in the same offhand way Sam used to downplay all the things that made him unhappy or caused him distress, which meant it was worth paying attention to. This would probably have terrified him.
And anyway, this way Dovid was going to meet him in person while also getting to have him all to himself.
Chapter Nine
Dovid was unaccountably nervous when his hosts dropped him off at the place where they were staying.
Rachel walked him inside and gave him a hug. “It’ll be great,” she told him. “You love him to death already, and it’s obvious he’s just as crazy about you.”
“Right.” Dovid ran his fingers through his hair. “It’ll be fine.”
“It’ll be way more than fine. Now stop fussing with your hair. And promise me you won’t change, like, twelve times after I leave.”
“I won’t change twelve times.”
“You are allowed to change one time.”
“I am allowed to change one time,” Dovid repeated. “Oh my god, I’m going to meet him, Rachel. I’m going to meet him.”
“You are going to meet him, and it’ll be great.”
Dovid clutched at his face.
Rachel patted him on the shoulder. “Go change and then do something productive until he gets here, okay? Now, I’ve got to go. I’ll be back late. If he’s still here when I come back, I expect to be able to meet him, unless you two are already asleep.”
Asleep. Asleep together with Sam. Dovid couldn’t handle this. “Right. Of course.”
“And then I’ll meet him tomorrow.”
“Right. Yeah.”
She hugged him one more time. “Have a great night,” she said into his ear. Then she turned and walked away, the door closing and locking behind her.
Dovid stood in the quiet living room and tried not to freak out.
Changing. He was going to change out of the clothes he’d worn for the meetup (one of his Don’t Look Now T-shirts) and into something nicer (a soft, red henley that Rachel insisted he looked great in).
He breathed out. Sam had already texted him to say that he was on his way and bringing dinner. Dovid wasn’t hungry; he was too nervous. But he had to pass the time somehow.
He set the table, because Sam was bringing dinner and Dovid didn’t want to have to fumble with putting out dishes and cutlery while Sam was there. But then he had nothing left to do.
In the end he got his laptop set up in the living room, plugged in an earbud, and did some social media work. Or tried to. His thoughts kept drifting over to Sam, to the point that Dovid went to check his Twitter. Mostly it was about Sam talking about his Tuesday video upload, reminding his fans that there wouldn’t be one on Friday this week, and a few tweets here and there about how excited he was to have his friends visiting him. Those made Dovid smile.
And then someone knocked on the door.
Dovid shot to his feet and went over to it. “Who is it?” he asked, surprising himself with how calm he sounded.
“Erm,” came a voice that Dovid recognized, that he’d listened to hours of video footage of and, more recently, had spent hours on the phone with. A voice that, this time, was simply behind the barrier of a door, as opposed to hundreds of miles away. “It’s Sam. Sam Doyle. I brought dinner?”
Dovid wrenched the door open and smiled, knowing it was probably shaky. “Hey there.”
“Hey.” It sounded like Sam was smiling too. Dovid could hear the crinkle of plastic bags. “It’s...it’s good to see you.”
“Come in,” Dovid said, brain scattered as he backed up. “Come in, um, you can put your stuff down over here.” He led Sam to the table, bumping into it with how nervous he was.
“Oh dear, are—are you okay?” Followed by the sound of items being set down.
“Yeah, yeah, I—sorry, I’m just—I’m nervous.”
“Me too.” It sounded like an admission. “Could I—could I hug you?”
“Please,” Dovid breathed, opening his arms.
Sam enveloped him, long arms like Dovid had been told to expect. He smelled like the bottle of cologne Dovid had sitting safely on his nightstand at home, and his shirt was soft and he was so, so warm.
Dovid buried his face in his shirt and hugged back tight. “I can’t believe I’m really here with you,” he said.
“Neither can I. I—I can’t believe it. It’s amazing.”
A million different thoughts blew through Dovid’s mind at what to say to that, and he ended up blurting out, “I like your shirt.”
“My shirt?”
Dovid nodded, stroking his hands down the front of it. “It’s really soft.”
“Oh good,” Sam breathed, sounding relieved. “I went through half my closet trying to find the nicest thing I had to the touch. I know you care about that sort of thing.”
Fuck, Dovid wanted so badly to kiss him.
And now...now he could. If Sam wanted.
He pulled back, tilted his face up. “Could I kiss you?”
“Y-yes,” Sam said. “Yes, please do. How should I—what would you like?”
“Stay still a minute,” Dovid said, moving his hand to Sam’s arm and trailing upward, until he reached his shoulder, his neck, his cheek. He felt Sam swallow, take a shuddering breath. “Here,” Dovid said, brushing a thumb over Sam’s lips. They felt just a bit wet, like Sam had nervously licked them.
Dovid moved to kiss him, slanting their mouths together. He dimly registered Sam’s hands at his back, clutching tightly, like Sam couldn’t do anything but hang on and kiss and be kissed.
He didn’t want to stop. Kissing Sam made his head spin; it was so good, felt so right.
“Fuck,” he ended up panting, letting his head rest against Sam’s chest. “Fuck, can we just do that forever?”
A soft laugh. “I—I might be partial to that. But you should eat. If the video of your last meetup was any indication, you’ve just had a very exciting few hours.”
“Meeting you is what’s exciting,” Dovid said, but he did reach for Sam’s hand and tugged him towards the table. “It all smells really good. What’d you get?”
“Some things from my local pub. Champ, boxty—meat and vegetarian—and some Irish stew for you. I—I can’t vouch for the meat things myself, but I’ve been assured they’re quite good. I, erm, I hope you like it.”
“Well, it smells f
antastic. That’s usually a good sign.”
They both sat, and Dovid loathed to let go of Sam’s hand, but he did what he had to do. Personally, he felt the quicker he ate the quicker he could go back to touching Sam.
“So how was the meetup?” Sam asked, after they’d served themselves.
“It was great,” Dovid said. “A lot of great energy. Rachel and I talked about traveling to and around Ireland, and then we did a ‘Dovid guesses the object’ segment—those are always really popular. Different fans in the crowd brought stuff specifically for it, so we called on people to come on up with their stuff. Some guy brought his pet skunk. The crowd went nuts.”
“Did that...go well?”
“Oh yeah. It was super well-trained. And really soft. He put it straight into my lap—I thought it was a cat at first. It was really cuddly. That was one of my favorite parts. And after that we did a food tasting. Again, people brought stuff and we called them up from the crowd. Rachel and I both had a lot of fun with that; there was a lot of homemade stuff, which is always cool to try.”
“Sounds like it was a lot of fun.”
“It was. After was the meet-and-greet. I got a lot of hugs.”
“Was that nice?”
Dovid smiled. “Yeah. There were a lot of people who were disabled or otherwise special needs. It’s...it’s amazing to hear their stories, and to be told that I’m helping them somehow.”
Suddenly there was a hand on top of his own. “I’m so glad,” Sam said. “That it was so nice for you. I’m... I’m sorry I wasn’t able to make it.”
Dovid turned his hand so he could link his and Sam’s fingers together. “It’s really okay. I mean it. There was a lot of people and noise in a really concentrated area.” Sam had mentioned several times in both his videos and to Dovid personally how even using public transportation sometimes made him nervous. “I wouldn’t have wanted to do that to you.”
“Thank you,” Sam said quietly.
“Of course.”
When they’d finished eating, Dovid gave Sam a quick tour of the apartment, showing him the bedrooms (Rachel had gone on about how cutely they’d been decorated), where the bathroom was, all that stuff. Then they went to sit down on the couch. Dovid was suddenly experiencing butterflies again. He was holding Sam’s hand. He was holding Sam’s hand and he still wasn’t sure if he was really awake or dreaming.
“Hey, Sam?”
“Yes?”
“Remember, uh, that time we were talking on the phone and you—you described how you’d touch me, when we were together?”
“How I’d hold you, you mean?”
Dovid swallowed. “Yeah,” he said quietly. “I’ve... I’ve been thinking about it a lot. Maybe too much, really, but I—”
“Dovid, no, here. Come with me?”
Dovid held out his hand to be led, and Sam took his arm, slowly and carefully guiding him off the couch and—oh, and back to Dovid’s temporary bedroom.
And bed.
“Lie down?”
Practically shaking, Dovid climbed in underneath the covers. A moment later the bed dipped and Sam was sliding in next to him. “Here,” Sam said softly. “Face me?”
Dovid turned towards Sam’s voice, and then two arms were wrapping around him and pulling him in close. Dovid let out a noise that might have been a whimper and clung on.
A kiss was pressed to his hair. Just like—just like Sam had said he would. “Alright?” Sam asked.
“Yeah,” Dovid managed. “Yeah. Perfect.”
They lay together like that for a long time. Not even talking, just resting with each other, listening to one another breathe.
Eventually Sam murmured, “I’ve maybe dreamed about this.”
“Yeah?”
“Mm-hm.”
Dovid let out a soft laugh. “Me too. Ever since you talked me through it that one time. I went to bed a lot just...thinking about just this.”
“Does it live up to expectations?”
“Are you kidding? Way, way better.”
“That’s gratifying to hear,” Sam said, smile in his voice.
“Hey,” Dovid shifted a little, moved up. “Could I kiss you? Like this?”
“I’d like that very much,” Sam said quietly, hand coming up to cup Dovid’s cheek.
Dovid pushed up with one arm, and leaned in, catching the corner of Sam’s mouth before moving lower. He moved to kiss under Sam’s chin and Sam let out a gasp, his other hand clutching at Dovid’s shoulder.
“That okay?” Dovid asked, pulling back just a little bit.
“Y-yes I—it—yes.”
“Could I kiss there again? Is that okay?”
“What—whatever you like.”
Dovid grinned ruefully. “Don’t give me that much power. What would you like?”
Sam stroked Dovid’s cheek. “I’d like to keep kissing you.”
“Okay,” Dovid breathed against Sam’s lips. “I can do that.”
He felt Sam smile against him, and then curl his fingers around Dovid’s back.
* * *
As much as Sam was loath to leave, he did still have work in the morning, which meant waking up early. And he wasn’t going to do that to Dovid, especially since he had a full day of filming and editing ahead of him.
“I don’t mind,” Dovid insisted. “Maybe...maybe tomorrow you could bring, like, an overnight bag? And just leave from here. If you want to, I mean. If it wouldn’t be like, upsetting your whole life.”
Sam squeezed his hand. “I’d love to. You and Rachel won’t mind?”
“Of course not. And Rachel’s dying to meet you. Since you can’t meet her today, it’ll be great that we’ll be able to introduce you tomorrow once you’re done with work. We could go out to dinner together. If you wanted.”
“I do,” Sam said. “So much. It’ll be something to look forward to tomorrow, amid the exciting world of IT.”
“Okay,” Dovid grinned. “Plan.”
They kissed goodbye for a long time, until Sam regretfully had to pull away. “If I don’t leave now, I won’t at all,” he said.
“Right.” Dovid trailed his hand up Sam’s arm again, until he was cupping his face, and pressed one last kiss to his mouth before stepping back. “Have a good night. Get home safe. Text me, okay?”
“I will. I’ll see you tomorrow.” He squeezed Dovid’s hand. “Love you.”
The last thing he saw before he left Dovid in the apartment was Dovid beaming, his whole expression directed at Sam. “I love you too.”
* * *
Sam Doyle: Home and safe. Have a good night and I’ll see you tomorrow!
Dovid Rosenstein: <3 <3 <3
* * *
“Are you really sure we should take the camera equipment in?”
“If we’re going to do a food montage of Ireland, it only makes sense to film every time we eat out to get as much footage as we can,” Rachel said. “Don’t worry, I’ll keep Sam out of all the shots. I’ll just pretend he’s me.”
“But what if he’s not comfortable with us filming around him at all?”
“Then we won’t, obviously. But it couldn’t hurt to be prepared in case he doesn’t mind.”
“That’s true.”
“Besides, he’s meeting us there. We might as well get shots of you going in and getting seated. This place is kind of famous for the way it looks.”
“I’ll be sure to appreciate that in the video,” Dovid replied dryly.
She nudged him. “Alright, camera’s on. Go ahead and introduce our eatery. This would be why we showed up fifteen minutes before he’s supposed to meet us.”
Dovid went through the motions of introducing the show and where they were eating, trying to be calm for the camera, but inside he was buzzing with excitement. He was going to get to see Sam again. An
d introduce him to Rachel. With each new thing that happened, things got more real.
The host and servers were all great, and the place was easy to navigate on his own while Rachel followed behind with the camera. Since they had reservations, they were seated without issue without having to wait.
“Right,” Rachel said. “Camera’s off. I can’t wait to meet him.”
“I can’t wait for you to meet him either. He’s nervous about meeting you by the way, so don’t be weird.”
“Me, weird? Never.”
Dovid nudged her under the table. “I mean it. Don’t give him a hard time, okay?”
Rachel sighed. “You know I wouldn’t. I like him a lot. Not nearly as much as you do, but he’s cute and endearing and obviously nuts about you. I’m not gonna give him the shovel talk.”
“Good. He’s been getting enough of that on the internet.”
“It hasn’t gotten any better at all?”
Dovid shrugged. “He doesn’t really mention it all that much. I think he doesn’t want me to worry. But I still check his comments once in a while to watch out for that sort of thing. Then again,” he added thoughtfully, “there have been a few—only a few, but still—people who’ve done the same to me.”
“Really?”
“Oh yeah. Meganbeginagain is someone who was a fan of Sam long before me. She left a comment on one of my videos. Promptly got a lot of hate—remember when I did that mini-vid about how I wouldn’t tolerate hate in my comments?”
“I didn’t know it was because of that. Why didn’t you tell me?”
He shrugged again. “What were you going to do?”
“Not sure. Maybe congratulated her. And also said my own piece about personal attacks. She did a good thing.”
“Giving me the shovel talk was a good thing?”
“It’s sort of standard. Hey, does Sam even know what she did?”
Dovid shook his head. “I don’t think so. I haven’t brought it up.”
“Ooh, ooh, can I?”
“What would you possibly even say?”