Fic: Riddles and Wine (Top Chef RPS)
May. 11th, 2006 01:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
apocalypsosThe best part of this is that while I was writing this, my friends from work text-messaged me with, "Bitch, what did you skip out on work for?" And I texted back, "I'm writing smut, you hags, leave me alone." Heh. (Even though it's not really smut, but whatever.)
Title: Riddles and Wine
Author: Troll Princess
Fandom: Top Chef RPS
Rating: R
Word Count: 1,633 words
Spoilers: The reunion episode
Pairing: Harold/Stephen
Warnings: Slashy references
Disclaimer: I don't own these people, I just like playing with them. And they're not sleeping together in real life, just in that part of my brain that Bravo's warped beyond all recognition.
Summary: It all starts with a bottle of wine.
Author's note: Apparently, for winning that last Quickfire challenge with the junk food, Harold won a bottle of that fancy wine. I'm not sure what happened to it, but I like to think there was smut involved, because this is what Bravo's reality shows do to me. (For the record, I know nothing about wine.)
*****
Riddles and Wine
*****
It all starts with a bottle of wine.
Okay, wait a second.
That sounds like a stupid beginning on the face of it, because when it comes to Stephen, what doesn't start with a bottle of wine? Hell, what doesn't start and end with wine, and include an inordinate amount of the stuff on the way between both points? That's just Stephen. Stephen would probably have an IV drip of French Sauternes going at all times if he could find a preppy enough brand of tubing.
After they filmed the truffle and wine challenge, Harold spent two weeks trying to figure out how to break the news to Stephen before calling him at two in the morning on a Saturday and blurting out, "Dude, Shafer."
Stephen may have cried, but Harold's pretty sure he'll never get him to admit it.
So, yeah, the whole thing starts with a bottle of wine.
Too bad they never bother to open the damn thing. You know, considering.
*****
"That's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life."
Stephen sways a little as he bends down to look at the bottle, standing back like he's afraid to touch it, and just looking at the dazed expression on his face is enough to send Harold into quiet hysterics. Just ... just Stephen, man. Staring at that wine like he's meeting the most gorgeous supermodel on the planet and she's naked. It's fucking hilarious, is what it is.
Harold leans forward on the hotel room couch, rests his elbows on his knees and rubs his hand over his smile like it'll wipe it away. His toes dig into the soft carpeting, his flipflops long gone. "Dude, if that's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen in your life, your priorities are definitely more out of whack than I thought."
Stephen gives him this weird, wily grin all hazy around the edges, and there's something about it that just ... well, hell, Harold knew Stephen was drunk at the studio, but seriously.
"I can't believe you didn't drink it," Stephen says.
"Who the hell am I going to drink it with?"
There's this shrug, this easy roll of Stephen's shoulders that looks a little weird coming from a guy who spent all those weeks looking like he had a steel pole rammed up his ass. This Stephen's wearing this stupid T-shirt and artfully faded jeans and is a hell of a lot more relaxed than Harold's ever seen him. Harold wouldn't be surprised if there's a pod in the bathtub of Stephen's hotel room. It would explain a lot, honestly.
Stephen sways again, and he steps backwards on purpose like he's desperately afraid he'll fall forward and impale himself on the bottle. Probably more afraid of breaking it than breaking himself, Harold thinks, and in his head he starts laughing and can't stop.
"You couldn't have thrown a decent dinner party for that?"
He gestures in the general direction of the bottle with this odd glaze in his eyes. Harold imagines he hears Barry White in the background and wonders with this fucked-up part of his brain if he should probably leave Stephen and the bottle alone.
"Nah, I just ..." Harold's voice trails off, and he does this "I just couldn't, is all" wave of his hand.
Stephen looks at him like he might be a little crazy.
Harold gives him the same look right back.
Because really, Harold thinks, let's be honest. If that were Stephen's bottle of wine, he'd probably have it in its own special room at his house. There'd be track lighting and a laser-beam security system and classical music playing to encourage the mood. There might even be pet names involved.
If Stephen knew where he was keeping the wine when it wasn't hiding out in a hotel room, he'd probably smother Harold in his sleep on mere principle.
"Do you want to crack it open now?" Harold asks.
It's almost worth it to see Stephen nearly fall to his knees with this ridiculous choking sound.
And okay, that's mostly the booze right there. There was drinking before the reunion and drinking during the filming and drinking afterwards when they all wandered off to this trendy bar with a decent wine list and awful techno music. Harold vaguely remembers passing an empty bottle off to Lee Anne before hauling Stephen from the bar and tossing him into a cab.
"Seeing someone." Shit, yeah, he's seeing someone. He's seeing Stephen stumble around his hotel room like an idiot, for Christ's sake.
Something about Stephen wasted and the complete opposite of smug in something that's not an expensive suit is throwing Harold right the hell off.
He really can't decide which one of them is worse off, at this point.
"Nonono," Stephen says, and somehow he's made it over to the couch without Harold noticing. All right, maybe Harold's a little more drunk than he thought. "No, we can't."
Stephen sounds almost reasonable, and Harold's struck by the fact that he can totally hear Stephen's argument for why they shouldn't in those three simple words. Behind it is this long-winded speech about cleansing their palates and picking the appropriate meat for the meal and balancing the flavors, and Harold knows every fucking word of it.
It's entirely possible a handful of days sharing the same house with the guy were one too many.
"You're right, we can't." Harold's head tilts to look over at Stephen and the entire room spins. "If we're going to do something we regret when we're drunk, that shouldn't be it."
Stephen nods, then shakes his head, then just gets this giddy goofy grin on his face. "Any suggestions?"
Unable to resist, Harold starts humming the porn music from that goddamn makeout montage.
And that's when Stephen just loses his shit, when he slumps to the side laughing hysterically like he had during the Fat-Ass Challenge. His smile's wide and ridiculous, his stomach pulling inward and making him curl up like he does when he's just gone.
He tips towards Harold, his entire body off-balance, and the two of them laugh like two mental patients with Stephen's forehead suddenly resting against Harold's shoulder.
So, yeah, Harold blames the wine. One minute, they're giggling like fucking idiots, and the next, their lips are right there, right next to each other. Stephen's laughter dies off and Harold suddenly realizes that he's not wearing that expensive cologne he wore for the entire time he was in the house. He doesn't even know where the hell that reasoning comes from, right before --
Uh-huh. That's the one.
Kissing Stephen shouldn't feel like this, all heat and teasing, hands where there weren't any pressing against him a minute ago and this warm comfortable yes of a silence. One of Harold's hands goes right where it always goes when he hugs someone, slipping up and cupping Stephen's head out of habit more than anything else. Stephen lets out this soft moan, just weird because it's Stephen, for God's sake, but way hotter than it should be just the same.
Harold decides to blame the wine.
The wine they've already had or the wine they've sworn not to drink, he's not so sure.
Suddenly Stephen pulls back, his hair sticking up all over. Granted, it's always sticking up -- that's the point of Stephen's hair, really -- but the short hair in the back's all funny-looking and Harold thinks, I did that, in this far-too-delicious daze.
He has this really absurd urge to protest Stephen backing away, because the kiss was totally unexpected and wrong but if they don't keep it up Harold's not sure he can keep his head straight. But then Stephen's gaze clears, a moment of clarity.
"Wait right here," he says.
He darts away more steady than he's been for the past few hours, and Harold watches as Stephen grabs onto the Shafer with gentle hands and puts it away with a deep respect that makes a smile tug at Harold's lips. He shifts on the couch and flinches when he realizes where he is, sprawled out where he was sitting up only a minute ago, legs stretched out on the cushions, pants tighter than they were before in all the right places.
Harold doesn't remember how he got this way, when he ended up like this.
That's probably a good thing.
Stephen reppears in his line of vision all of a sudden, only giving him a quick warning look before practically crawling on top of him. It isn't graceful or gentle, that's for damn sure -- Stephen must have saved all of that for the wine -- but Harold can't bring himself to care when Stephen presses up against him again.
Yeah, he doesn't get it, either.
"I'm going to plan out the perfect meal to go with that if it kills me," Stephen says, his head lowering as he speaks. "It may take months."
"The hell you will," Harold says, but the next thing he knows, they're kissing again and it doesn't really matter anymore.
*****
Title: Riddles and Wine
Author: Troll Princess
Fandom: Top Chef RPS
Rating: R
Word Count: 1,633 words
Spoilers: The reunion episode
Pairing: Harold/Stephen
Warnings: Slashy references
Disclaimer: I don't own these people, I just like playing with them. And they're not sleeping together in real life, just in that part of my brain that Bravo's warped beyond all recognition.
Summary: It all starts with a bottle of wine.
Author's note: Apparently, for winning that last Quickfire challenge with the junk food, Harold won a bottle of that fancy wine. I'm not sure what happened to it, but I like to think there was smut involved, because this is what Bravo's reality shows do to me. (For the record, I know nothing about wine.)
Riddles and Wine
*****
It all starts with a bottle of wine.
Okay, wait a second.
That sounds like a stupid beginning on the face of it, because when it comes to Stephen, what doesn't start with a bottle of wine? Hell, what doesn't start and end with wine, and include an inordinate amount of the stuff on the way between both points? That's just Stephen. Stephen would probably have an IV drip of French Sauternes going at all times if he could find a preppy enough brand of tubing.
After they filmed the truffle and wine challenge, Harold spent two weeks trying to figure out how to break the news to Stephen before calling him at two in the morning on a Saturday and blurting out, "Dude, Shafer."
Stephen may have cried, but Harold's pretty sure he'll never get him to admit it.
So, yeah, the whole thing starts with a bottle of wine.
Too bad they never bother to open the damn thing. You know, considering.
"That's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life."
Stephen sways a little as he bends down to look at the bottle, standing back like he's afraid to touch it, and just looking at the dazed expression on his face is enough to send Harold into quiet hysterics. Just ... just Stephen, man. Staring at that wine like he's meeting the most gorgeous supermodel on the planet and she's naked. It's fucking hilarious, is what it is.
Harold leans forward on the hotel room couch, rests his elbows on his knees and rubs his hand over his smile like it'll wipe it away. His toes dig into the soft carpeting, his flipflops long gone. "Dude, if that's the most beautiful thing you've ever seen in your life, your priorities are definitely more out of whack than I thought."
Stephen gives him this weird, wily grin all hazy around the edges, and there's something about it that just ... well, hell, Harold knew Stephen was drunk at the studio, but seriously.
"I can't believe you didn't drink it," Stephen says.
"Who the hell am I going to drink it with?"
There's this shrug, this easy roll of Stephen's shoulders that looks a little weird coming from a guy who spent all those weeks looking like he had a steel pole rammed up his ass. This Stephen's wearing this stupid T-shirt and artfully faded jeans and is a hell of a lot more relaxed than Harold's ever seen him. Harold wouldn't be surprised if there's a pod in the bathtub of Stephen's hotel room. It would explain a lot, honestly.
Stephen sways again, and he steps backwards on purpose like he's desperately afraid he'll fall forward and impale himself on the bottle. Probably more afraid of breaking it than breaking himself, Harold thinks, and in his head he starts laughing and can't stop.
"You couldn't have thrown a decent dinner party for that?"
He gestures in the general direction of the bottle with this odd glaze in his eyes. Harold imagines he hears Barry White in the background and wonders with this fucked-up part of his brain if he should probably leave Stephen and the bottle alone.
"Nah, I just ..." Harold's voice trails off, and he does this "I just couldn't, is all" wave of his hand.
Stephen looks at him like he might be a little crazy.
Harold gives him the same look right back.
Because really, Harold thinks, let's be honest. If that were Stephen's bottle of wine, he'd probably have it in its own special room at his house. There'd be track lighting and a laser-beam security system and classical music playing to encourage the mood. There might even be pet names involved.
If Stephen knew where he was keeping the wine when it wasn't hiding out in a hotel room, he'd probably smother Harold in his sleep on mere principle.
"Do you want to crack it open now?" Harold asks.
It's almost worth it to see Stephen nearly fall to his knees with this ridiculous choking sound.
And okay, that's mostly the booze right there. There was drinking before the reunion and drinking during the filming and drinking afterwards when they all wandered off to this trendy bar with a decent wine list and awful techno music. Harold vaguely remembers passing an empty bottle off to Lee Anne before hauling Stephen from the bar and tossing him into a cab.
"Seeing someone." Shit, yeah, he's seeing someone. He's seeing Stephen stumble around his hotel room like an idiot, for Christ's sake.
Something about Stephen wasted and the complete opposite of smug in something that's not an expensive suit is throwing Harold right the hell off.
He really can't decide which one of them is worse off, at this point.
"Nonono," Stephen says, and somehow he's made it over to the couch without Harold noticing. All right, maybe Harold's a little more drunk than he thought. "No, we can't."
Stephen sounds almost reasonable, and Harold's struck by the fact that he can totally hear Stephen's argument for why they shouldn't in those three simple words. Behind it is this long-winded speech about cleansing their palates and picking the appropriate meat for the meal and balancing the flavors, and Harold knows every fucking word of it.
It's entirely possible a handful of days sharing the same house with the guy were one too many.
"You're right, we can't." Harold's head tilts to look over at Stephen and the entire room spins. "If we're going to do something we regret when we're drunk, that shouldn't be it."
Stephen nods, then shakes his head, then just gets this giddy goofy grin on his face. "Any suggestions?"
Unable to resist, Harold starts humming the porn music from that goddamn makeout montage.
And that's when Stephen just loses his shit, when he slumps to the side laughing hysterically like he had during the Fat-Ass Challenge. His smile's wide and ridiculous, his stomach pulling inward and making him curl up like he does when he's just gone.
He tips towards Harold, his entire body off-balance, and the two of them laugh like two mental patients with Stephen's forehead suddenly resting against Harold's shoulder.
So, yeah, Harold blames the wine. One minute, they're giggling like fucking idiots, and the next, their lips are right there, right next to each other. Stephen's laughter dies off and Harold suddenly realizes that he's not wearing that expensive cologne he wore for the entire time he was in the house. He doesn't even know where the hell that reasoning comes from, right before --
Uh-huh. That's the one.
Kissing Stephen shouldn't feel like this, all heat and teasing, hands where there weren't any pressing against him a minute ago and this warm comfortable yes of a silence. One of Harold's hands goes right where it always goes when he hugs someone, slipping up and cupping Stephen's head out of habit more than anything else. Stephen lets out this soft moan, just weird because it's Stephen, for God's sake, but way hotter than it should be just the same.
Harold decides to blame the wine.
The wine they've already had or the wine they've sworn not to drink, he's not so sure.
Suddenly Stephen pulls back, his hair sticking up all over. Granted, it's always sticking up -- that's the point of Stephen's hair, really -- but the short hair in the back's all funny-looking and Harold thinks, I did that, in this far-too-delicious daze.
He has this really absurd urge to protest Stephen backing away, because the kiss was totally unexpected and wrong but if they don't keep it up Harold's not sure he can keep his head straight. But then Stephen's gaze clears, a moment of clarity.
"Wait right here," he says.
He darts away more steady than he's been for the past few hours, and Harold watches as Stephen grabs onto the Shafer with gentle hands and puts it away with a deep respect that makes a smile tug at Harold's lips. He shifts on the couch and flinches when he realizes where he is, sprawled out where he was sitting up only a minute ago, legs stretched out on the cushions, pants tighter than they were before in all the right places.
Harold doesn't remember how he got this way, when he ended up like this.
That's probably a good thing.
Stephen reppears in his line of vision all of a sudden, only giving him a quick warning look before practically crawling on top of him. It isn't graceful or gentle, that's for damn sure -- Stephen must have saved all of that for the wine -- but Harold can't bring himself to care when Stephen presses up against him again.
Yeah, he doesn't get it, either.
"I'm going to plan out the perfect meal to go with that if it kills me," Stephen says, his head lowering as he speaks. "It may take months."
"The hell you will," Harold says, but the next thing he knows, they're kissing again and it doesn't really matter anymore.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 05:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 05:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 05:57 am (UTC)Only next time? Could you write a story with the me and Harold making out? Because that would make me happy in my face.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:04 am (UTC)Dude, if I write a story with Harold macking on a girl, ME FIRST. ;P
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:10 am (UTC)Oh, and don't tell QB. He'll get jealous. Not because of me - He loves him some Harold, and in a very slashy manner, I might add. My boyfriend - the gayest straight man alive.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:30 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:39 am (UTC)I really freaking love this. I mean seriously. I LOVE the idea of the wine IV and the room Stephen would have for the Shafer. I could totally see Harold in the little confession room talking about how Stephen needs to be left alone with it for a while.
Oh man this rocks. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:51 am (UTC)And thanks!
no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 07:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 06:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-11 07:35 pm (UTC)More please! Please! Please?
no subject
Date: 2006-05-12 03:05 am (UTC)I cannot even. Stephen and the wine need some alone time.
Drunken sex! That's the whole *point* of Stephen's hair! *flails with joy*
no subject
Date: 2006-05-13 03:49 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-14 02:21 am (UTC)Great story! I kept looking at them during the reunion show, how Stephen said he was surprised how he came across, and Harold being careful not to mention gender when he said he wasn't single, and just wanted to read slash. I am so happy you were inspired.
The story was great. I can just see Stephen putting the wine away before there was a chance it might get damaged in the sexcapades. And who but Stephen would appreciate sharing that wine with Harold? Lovely story.
no subject
Date: 2006-05-16 03:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-19 04:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-05-22 02:56 am (UTC)I seriously didn't think I'd find any Top Chef slash when I searched for it, but I did.
I love all the comments about Stephen and the wine because it is so true. And I definitely think you should write more.
danke
Date: 2006-10-31 05:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-07 08:28 am (UTC)Thanks for writing this!
no subject
Date: 2007-01-07 09:02 am (UTC)<3
no subject
Date: 2007-01-23 06:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-04-19 07:24 am (UTC)Love, love the rhythm and flow of this!