Work Text:
Someone inside doesn’t want their hair cut.
Marc had been forced to admit (by Steven, obviously, irritatingly) that there was a third. Steven had noticed, caught on fairly quickly, knew it faster than Marc ever had, and badgered him insistently.
We should talk about it.
Who was that, then, Marc?
You don’t really believe I took care of that.
Who was the third sarcophagus for, Marc?
Can we please talk about it?
Yeah, well. Marc doesn’t talk. That’s not his thing. He also, unlike Steven, doesn’t go around digging into memories that would rather be left forgotten, whose only remnants leave his hands stained red.
Right now, though, whoever it is in there, they’re being a straight-up nuisance. This is the third time he’s walked into a barber shop, blacked out, and found himself miles away, hours later, not a hair sheared on his head.
“This is bloody ridiculous,” Steven complains. “We look ridiculous.” Marc sighs and tilts his head. He watches Steven in the mirror blow a rush of air through his pursed lips. It successfully moves a strand of unruly curls out of his eyes, only for another to take its place. Steven pouts. Marc grins.
“I don’t know,” he says, “I think you look nice like that.”
“I look like a prat,” Steven insists.
Marc laughs and rolls his eyes, but the fleeting warmth of it fades and suddenly Steven’s looking contemplative.
“Maybe they’re a woman,” Steven suggests, catching Marc so off guard it takes a second to gather his thoughts.
“What?”
“You know. The other one.” Our third.
“Yeah, I know what you—” He sighs. “Just because they’re growing our hair, it doesn’t mean they’re a woman, Steven,” he says, trying and failing to keep his tone light. He sounds like he’s giving a lecture.
“Well, no, obviously,” Steven huffs. The curls are falling in front of his face. Something achey and jealous clenches in Marc’s chest as he watches Steven twist the strands around his fingers, tightening the curls into a ringlet, attempting to tuck it behind his ear.
He wants— Marc wants to—
“I’m just saying. Clearly it’s important enough to them that they’re stopping us. Or maybe– maybe this is their way of opening up?” Marc’s incredulity must show immediately on his face, or maybe Steven can feel it, because he’s quickly waving his hands to elaborate.
“I-I just mean that, well, considering… the other times we’ve noticed them—” He skirts around the violence, the adrenaline, the last bits of sheer thrill that are leftover when Marc comes back and the muscle’s memory of pleasure he still hasn’t told Steven about— “it’s usually during, um, dire situations. Maybe they’re trying to show us something personal about them. In their own way.”
Marc watches Steven twirl another few strands of hair around his finger, nervous, fidgeting. It’s getting long enough in the back they could probably tie it into a small ponytail. The curls up top don’t bother Marc too much, laying mostly flat against his head when he combs it all back. It bothers Steven, though, which in turn bothers Marc. It’s distracting, watching Steven fiddle with his hair all the time. It makes something unspool in him. It fills his head with all sorts of half-desires, ones he tucks away, saves for when Steven’s sleeping, saves to play over in his head while he lies awake in bed at night. He wants to reach for him, and it doesn’t make sense because it’s his own face in the mirror, but Marc doesn’t think he ever looked this doe-eyed and beautiful. He doesn’t think he’s ever let so much of his emotions stream from his eyes, figuratively and literally, too, because Steven cries, and Steven is so pretty when he cries, and Marc is sure he has never in his life been pretty when he cries, all ugly and choking and sputtering and nothing like Steven, never anything like Steven—
“Marc?”
There’s a hand on his chest. Gentle pressure. Tiny circles. It’s his hand, but he didn’t put it there. He lifts his eyes back to the mirror, realizes he’d drifted a bit.
“Sorry,” he mumbles, unsure what for.
Steven’s lips are quirked unhappily, distressed at Marc’s distress. Marc wants to kiss him. He wonders if Steven can feel that, too.
“No worries, mate.” His heart thuds against his hand. Steven’s hand. Their hand.
“Maybe you’re right,” Marc says, and if he says it with enough confidence there’s a chance he might even believe it himself. Steven hums when Marc doesn’t go any further.
“For what it’s worth,” he says softly, offering Marc a warm smile. “I think you look like a proper bev.”
That thing in his chest unfurls, loosens its claws, warms into something easy and fluffy and makes him reach out to touch the mirror in front of him. “You just said we looked ridiculous.”
Steven's shoulders fall into a dramatic slump, but the pout on his face is playful, and the smile stays in his voice. “Yeah, well, I was trying to make myself feel better. You look bloody great. I’m jealous.”
Marc grins. Steven beams back at him. Sweet, perfect Steven, with curls that won’t fall away from his face and boyishly fuzzy sideburns.
“Don’t be,” Marc says, and he means it.