Cutie Pies

The Bet (bromance)

No pairing, fair amount of fluff

Watching them from afar, sitting on one of the spare chairs near the make up tables, Stephen was lost in his own pre-show state where he was putting everything in his head in order to go to his presenter headspace.

There was nothing much to do so he busied himself watching the boys rehearsing and making their director fed up.

If anyone asked Stephen how he would describe them the first thing that would come to his mind would be naturally in-sync.

Bored and lost in thought, he barely recognized a voice calling his name, the third time he jumped a little looking in the voice owner's direction and smiled sheepishly in embaressment. He was needed in the make up area.

All these years, after rough patches and challenges of this industry, Stephen found himself proud of keeping a strong and close friendship with almost all of his colleagues.
His patience had paid off and he knew he wouldn't take any of this for granted.
Least of all the abnormal sadistic but brotherly bond he managed to share with these two.

In the early years where he was working his ass off on anything to maitain his career, the boys were nothing but supportive and welcome, but never shying away from poking fun at his dumb choices here and there. And he appreciated the productive jabs, after all they were big names and if they could stay on top for that amount of time, there had been something more than luck and connection on their side; something called being professional.

They made sure to boost his confidence up when there was no camera around, 'no one should make your head bigger on camera', Dec had claimed once. 'Your on-screen self needs a slap not a compliment', had added Ant.
And he agreed with them.

He was barely in control of his on camera character, he had a mind of his own. Sometimes he got surprised by that person's bluntness.
In more than one occasion he had found himself apologizing to people when the filming was over. And seeing them laughing it off.

Why was he thinking about all this in the first place? He wondered.
Ah! The bet.

It was a bet, and the problem was neither he nor the boys ever turned down a challenge. Especially if it was stupid.

"No interactions, not even texting for the whole week."
That was the challenge.

Tim, their producer, suggested yesterday evening when they annoyed him to the point of taking a break from them and leaving the room so he wouldn't say something he would regret. They were a little behind and their clowining around wasn't helping the filming.

For three grown men, they could act as a bunch of chaotic teenagers on their worst behaviour days, funny to some degrees but none the less annoying.

So the bet was set, 500£ each, for them three to shut up and never exchange a word for a whole week.

That was an obvious joke at first. Tim laughed, them three laughed, the crew laughed but...

Dec smiled mockingly at the frustrated producer, "you think that's hard?"

"Did you actually dared us?" Ant added with a smirk.

After a moment, Stephen made a mock serious face, "You know what? I can do it for a month"

Ant looked him up and down with an offended face, "Yeah? I can even avoid looking in your direction for two."

Their silly conversation got disturbed with Tim almost shouting frustrated, "Starting from now!"

And the game was on.
Childish? Yeah, had it ever stopped them from doing anything before? Nope.

So here they were not talking, not looking at eachother, not acknowledging eachother, not even looking as if they knew eachother.