Gabriel Taylor is so very himself that it’s obvious without ever having really met him in person, just through the constant dance with his trainer and choreographers (plural!) and consultants and the director for the next video and his personal assistant and...so on. The star himself has always been scarce.

This time, he’s the first one through the door, with his entourage trailing in behind him.

He moves like he’s been choreographed, looks around the room like he’s being posed. He is draped in an off-the-shoulder cutoff shirt that probably cost half Sasha’s salary and the thigh-length hair flowing in a ponytail behind him probably takes hours to manage and he is flawlessly, perfectly thin.

He approaches Sasha’s current project, first, without looking at him.

He is excruciatingly aware of what Gabriel Taylor looks like, but the moving like it's choreographed is distinctly more impressive when Sasha doesn't know that it actually has been. He hasn't actually interacted with the guy but from what everyone says about him he's not surprised that he's ignoring Sasha entirely. 

His current project is drapey and silver with a slightly ridiculous amount of sequins. 

He walks around the piece, examining how it drapes, nodding occasionally. The director for the video approaches to inspect it as well.

After a minute he looks up at Sasha.

“When will this be—“

...he frowns.

“...ready to try on?”

...yeah, okay, fair enough. 

"It should be by the of the day." He controls himself and does not put a question mark at the end. 

"You're wasting your face."

He could try to decode that. 

He could also just say, "I don't know what you mean by that," and keep working on his project. They're not paying him for social skills. 

"–look at me," he says, irritably.

He does. 

"...perfect cheekbones," he says, with a hint of what almost sounds like resentment. "Perfect face. You could be modeling, and you're doing this."

He gestures, vaguely, to Sasha's clothes – oversized hoodie over more sweatshirts, baggy pants, so much fabric you can barely tell he has a body.

Ahahaha he could not in a million years do modeling. 

"Thank you," he says instead of that, "but I'd rather make interesting clothes than wear them." 

"There are steps between interesting and this."

Some of Taylor's entourage are looking distinctly alarmed.

"My job is to make sure people are looking at you." 

"You're going to be working with me, now. When people look at me, they're going to see you, too. Do you think this is what they should be seeing?"

One of the flock breaks off and murmurs something in his ear, starts pointing the screen of a tablet. He's ushered away without further fanfare.

"You just looked over all of me," he doesn't say. 

"You're completely, one hundred percent right," he doesn't say. 

He gets back to work, face wiped blank. And as soon as he reaches a natural stopping point he finds a bathroom and — do you think this is what they should be seeing — puts two fingers down his throat and throws up. 

Gabriel Taylor arranges recording sessions and takes an hour with a vocal coach and two with the choreographers and practices new steps until he nearly passes out and then deigns to eat half of what they bring him.

He asks the makeup artist if they can fix his cheekbones.

That night, he appears with the director and the makeup artist and a few other auxiliary human beings on the set of his latest video, to wait for the new costume.

It is in fact done by then and where it needs to be, and Sasha's drawing up vague sketches of other projects with notes in the margins about colors and materials and level of sparkliness. 

Well, there's no point in hiding behind something, is there? Everyone here knows what he looks like.

He approaches the mannequin and starts to undress on the spot. The elbow-length gloves are the first thing to go – once he's dropped those neatly on a table, everything but his underwear ends up on the floor.

He's gorgeous in a way that makes Sasha want to touch him and also want to be him, and also makes him want to throw up again.

Not that Sasha's watching. 

He always knows who's watching him. It's one of his skills.

So when he picks up the top part of the garment and finds that it's hooked in a few places that are difficult to reach by oneself...

"Your name's Sasha, isn't it?"

There's a warm, somewhat coquettish tone to his voice, one that wasn't there before in the slightest.

Do you think this is what they should be seeing.

What the hell's he playing at. 

"Yes." 

He really is pretty. Hopefully everything's not ruined by what happened earlier.

"Help me with this, won't you?"

He turns around, inclines his head at the open hooks exposing the skin of his back.

"...sure." 

He closes the clasps, isn't as mechanical about it as he'd like to be but doesn't linger either. 

“I’m so sorry about earlier,” he says, quietly enough that there’s less danger of someone listening in. “You just don’t see a face like yours every day.”

The pants are significantly easier. He turns to one of the mirrors scattered around the set.

“—oh.”

Gorgeous.

He lifts an arm slowly, watches the fabric ripple and shift.

“Where did you study, again...?”

He’s entranced by his own reflection.

"You weren't wrong, earlier. I studied at NYU." 

"You have an eye."

After a minute, he manages to tear himself away from his own reflection.

"Are we keeping you on for the rest of the costume work? For the next video?"

"I certainly hope so," he says, which is true. 

"If the next outfit is anything like this one, I'm going to make it happen."

His eyes flick over him, briefly. It's hard not to like someone who makes him look this good. Shame about his clothes.

"–Roger, are we going to try the choreography? Are the cameras all set up?"

When he gets an affirmative, he saunters towards the center of the stage.

Wonderful! Job security! And someone who looks at him like that, which is kind of uncomfortable but whatever, he knew what he was signing up for when he decided to work for Gabriel Taylor. 

They run him through the part of the video he needed the outfit for.

His movements are gorgeous and precise and the arrangement of sequins on the fabric is dazzling when it ripples.

I don't mean to do you wrong, I'm not trying to hurt you, baby

I'm just addicted to pleading on my knees lately

I don't mean to be cruel, lighting up that short fuse

I can, I can – I can make it up to you

(It's not an uncontroversial song.)

He almost categorizes the feeling in his chest as wanting, before he recognizes pride. The song isn't his favorite of Gabriel's, but the glow of having created something beautiful — he'll wind up watching the video a lot, probably. 

He approaches a man at a laptop, when he's done, watches the recording over his shoulder, confers with the makeup artist and the producer.

After a short conversation, he picks up his discarded clothing and disappears behind a curtain.

He comes back out dressed and fixed up, carrying the silvery garments from before like they're made of spider silk and could blow away with a breath of wind. When he hands them off to an assistant, he does so very carefully.

His gloves are back on with the rest of the outfit.

"...I'm looking forward to the rest."

....weird. Not like Sasha knows anything about performers, but. Weird. 

"Me too," he says, soft but earnest. 

He smiles, faintly, before he disappears.

It's only later that he realizes what happened.

Just for a moment – just there, at the end, just a fleeting glimpse of –

Hoping for it is dangerous. Dreaming about it is dangerous.

But what if.

A startling amount of research into Sasha Michaels' portfolio later, he's getting a contract delivered to him by an assistant to work on the next three videos.

That gets the brightest and most genuine smile anyone working there will have seen from him. 

The next few days pile on the assignments.

There's another costume they need for this video – fitted, this time, more angular and dramatic, and then there's the backup dancers in this particular scene, they'll be getting eight identical outfits made off his template, and they'd really like to talk over the video for Breakdown with him while they're still in the planning stages –

He talks to choreographers, producers, figures out what the lighting's going to look like, how he wants the fabric to move; he watches Gabriel whenever he's in eyeshot, studies the way he moves and the way he holds himself and the angles of his face when he's performing as opposed to when he's backstage. He watches previous music videos, watches the types of lighting Gabriel tends to go for, studies the way other costumes have looked on him. He draws, and sews, and adds details where appropriate. It's a lot of work, but it's fun work. 

Gabriel, it turns out, is very different performing and backstage.

While he's working he's curt, moves deliberately, always seems to be doing three things at once. He doesn't touch anyone, if he can avoid it, and even then he's always wearing gloves. He holds himself upright and walks with purpose, but his body language is much more closed off.

When he's been performing...

He's fluid and slinky and open, palms out and hips swaying. He's smiling, often as opposed to almost never. He touches people freely, ungloved, sometimes with much more intent than there perhaps should be. At least once he disappears offstage with a cameraman for half an hour. (He's flawless for the rest of the filming, that day, though.) From what Sasha's able to hear, even his speech is different.

......weird. 

He can tell the difference pretty much immediately, once he's paying attention to it. His designs start featuring less silver and more red, more motion and less structure, fewer cool colors and more bright warm ones; turquoise blue and not ice, orchid purple and not violet. (Still no gold. It just doesn't look that good on Gabriel except maybe if there was only a little of it and everything else was neutral — he shelves that idea.)

When Sasha comes to show the team his designs, one day, Gabriel comes with them.

He leafs through the pages of illustrations, expression tight. The more open lines and jewel colors he sees the more he looks like he's about to cry.

And then he looks up and he beams.

"I feel like you're designing for me," he says, as if this is unusual. "–the person I really am."

Ahahaha what. 

"You're going to be wearing them while you're performing," he says instead of trying to articulate the differences, it's not like Gabriel isn't aware he has a stage self, "not while you're backstage." 

"I'm never myself backstage."

He runs his thumb over one of the papers.

"...well. Almost never."

what does that mean what does that mean 

"...Yes. It's — not hard to tell the difference, if you're paying attention to it," he says, instead of asking what the fuck that means. 

"I'm glad someone is."

He's so cute. And he pays attention, and then follows through. Not that nobody knows him as himself, but...

"...I like this one. In the red."

He is fully capable of ignoring the sentence that doesn't make sense, focusing on the one that does, and talking about the fabrics and detail work that didn't make it into the sketch for that one in the red! 

Gabriel Taylor is, apparently, attentive and thoughtful when people are talking about fashion!

His posture changes, a little, as they talk, but he's still nodding along and giving opinions and offering qualified suggestions, deferring to Sasha's expertise.

He notices the posture change and —there's something about the syntax, something about the word choice, he can't put his finger on it but it's definitely there— adjusts his own word choice and tone of voice accordingly. (He's enthusiastic about his field, and he's keeping it professional but the enthusiasm comes through anyway.)

"...I'd like to keep some of the silver," he says, eventually. "And the powder blue. If you don't think it's...unflattering."

"It's not unflattering, but it's......better suited to the way you are now than to the way you are onstage," he says, very carefully. 

"...you're not wrong about that."

That sure is a miserable person right there. 

"I can keep it." 

"If it makes the performance worse it doesn't help anyone."

"If it would make the performance worse, it'll never leave the sketchbook. I'll keep the silver." He'd been pleased with the first thing Sasha designed and that was silver, it can't be impossible — it's easier than keeping the blue, even, silver lends itself better to sparkle — he'll make it work. 

“...thank you.”

He doesn’t smile, it seems — uncomfortable for him, somehow, to say it, but it’s deeply sincere.

“The new direction is...good. As long as that’s not all there is.”

He nods and twirls a pencil around his fingers. "Alright. I'll get back to you?" 

He nods, says his goodbyes and departs for more dance.

He has a furious argument with himself in the hallway. What else is new.

The sketches go...slowly. 

At first he tries to split the difference, put silver and ice-blue with flowy, open lines and sheer fabric and put pomegranate red and sunshine-gold and orchid purple with structure, but that just gets him a half dozen thumbnails that don't look like they fit either of the ways that Gabriel can be. Then he tries playing up the distinction, which leaves him with caricatures. Maybe if he leans into the ice theme? —but no, everything he tries to draw on that theme looks like a genderbent Elsa from Frozen, which is a fine thing to design but it's not Gabriel. 

Okay. New plan. How does one go about watching Gabriel run through choreography? 

One talks to the assistant in charge of his schedule, who talks to his choreographers and his trainer, who relay back the information about where he's practicing today and stress to ask before staying and watching because he sometimes has a very intense preference about practicing unobserved by anyone not directly involved in the process. He should be running through a few routines now, or they can set it up as an appointment.

How about he doesn't interrupt Gabriel while he's working and instead sets up an appointment. 

He's penciled in to watch him practice the next day.

On the next day, about an hour beforehand, he's informed that unfortunately it's not going to be possible that day, and he's given a new time for the next day and urged not to arrive early.

....yeah, it's Gabriel, he's not surprised, but this is a bottleneck on his job so he is kind of annoyed about it. Not enough to mention or indeed to show, though; showing it to Gabriel would be deeply unproductive and it's not the assistant's fault.

He shows up in the correct hallway two minutes early and doesn't open the door until exactly the time he was told. 

Gabriel is already warmed up and moving.

Right now, when he dances, he's precise. On stage, he gives the impression of high drama, movements that are perfect because he just happened to fling his arms out in exactly the right way or take the right pivoting step – right now he's clearly controlled. Every so often he makes a mistake, sometimes obvious and sometimes invisible to anyone but him, and he stops the whole thing cold, gets the music turned off or rewound, drills the same movement over and over until it's perfect.

It's fascinating to watch and study the differences, watch how the control he sees all the time translates into Gabriel's movements. (He wonders absently if he'll practice it the dramatic way too once he's gotten the motions perfect.) 

It's also beautiful, beautiful in a completely different way from how his performances are beautiful — if he had to pick a metaphor he'd say it was the difference between a sunrise and the Fibonacci sequence; there's a reason he's not a writer. 

He watches. He takes notes. He tries a few thumbnails with the poses he sees in front of him, but Gabriel will wear this when he's performing, not when he's practicing, knowing how tightly controlled his posture is right now does help but not that directly. He watches closer. 

He keeps going. He takes the occasional extremely reluctant break, which is mostly him lying on the ground and interrogating the trainer about his own posture.

And then, more than an hour in–

They run the whole routine, for the second time in a row, and it's different.

It's easier to see the skeleton behind Gabriel's seemingly effortless movements onstage, now, the countless hours of practice that must be involved.

He watches himself lovingly in the mirrored wall, rather than with a critical eye, flirts with his own reflection.

It's gorgeous. It's always gorgeous, but it's even more so when Sasha can look at it and see the effort behind each step. 

Better yet, he thinks he has an idea.

If he needs to talk to Gabriel about it, it might have to wait a little while.

He practices for another hour at least, flickering back and forth between the meticulous drilling of his movements and the runs of the whole thing with his performance face. Occasionally one of the staff steps in to correct something for him.

At some point, abruptly, he misses a step and stumbles. And that’s the end. He picks himself back up, with clearly shaking legs, and slumps in a chair — someone covers his shoulders with a blanket and hands him water.

He doesn't need to talk to Gabriel about it — he will at some point but not right now, and Gabriel probably doesn't want to talk to him at the moment — but as soon as there's nothing that someone might think he was recording, he pulls out his phone and starts researching various companies' costume designs for Swan Lake. 

Gabriel isn't actually a ballerina, Sasha can't put him in Odette's dress — well, he could, technically, but it wouldn't go over well and he's not going to — but if he takes the torso detailing from this production and takes the skirt detailing from that production and moves it so it wraps around the legs, it looks right.

Gabriel remains in the corner, being extremely picky about the food he’s being offered.

After a minute, he looks up at Sasha. Not a “come here” look, just...observing, warily.

He glances up at Gabriel, then goes back to drawing. He's pretty sure that's embroidery on Odette but if he could get a closer look at it it probably has beading — whatever, he can draw up the detail work himself, that's the fun part, it's the general shapes he's looking at — he can't remember Gabriel ever putting feathers on anything and it's a little on-the-nose but it could work — he doesn't change his behavior when Gabriel's looking at him but no matter how much he focuses on his work he can't quite ignore the fact that Gabriel is looking at him. 

Something needs to be done about his new designer wearing four layers. He has never been in such agreement with himself. They don't even match properly.

For now, though, he's just going to recover himself enough that he can move on to a writing session.

Sasha keeps drawing, fills a page with plans for detail work and notes on fabric. 

...the thing about basing your design on ballet costumes is that if he's going to make this work he's going to need measurements more recent than the ones he has. 

Gabriel’s people will, when contacted, be happy to arrange an appointment to take very detailed measurements, wherever Sasha happens to do most of his work. They promise that this one won’t be cancelled unless something is on fire.

He's not sure how much he believes that but alright. Most of his work gets done in this department over here, there's a fitting room they can use if Gabriel wants to but (Sasha remembers the run-through for the first video he'd designed for) he might not want to. 

According to his people, Gabriel very much wants to.

When he arrives, he’s very much ‘off stage’, and dressed in oddly loose-fitting clothing — it’s still fashionable, but outside of his forearms you can’t see much of his shape, and those are gloved, again.

Huh. Okay. 

"I'm going to need you to take the shirt off, sorry," he says once they're in the fitting room with the door shut. 

“You don’t have to apologize for that,” he says, in the process of removing it. “I know you need measurements everywhere.”

"I can still be polite about it." Out comes the measuring tape. He does his best not to touch Gabriel except through the tape but it's not actually possible to manage that perfectly. 

He twitches a little, occasionally, when Sasha’s fingers brush him.

The longer it goes on, though, the more he seems to relax.

(It probably doesn’t need to be mentioned that he still has a weirdly flawless upper body. A little ribcage showing, but weirdly flawless all the same.)

It sure doesn't. Sasha very quietly redirects power from the part of his brain that keeps pointing this out. 

He works quietly and carefully; having Gabriel relaxed puts him less on edge. 

It’s...sort of nice. If he ignores the occasional prickling feeling from someone touching him on his bare skin.

He makes it all the way through the measurements of his torso without incident. Shocking.

"Thank you," he says when he's done. "You can put your shirt back on for the leg measurements, if you want." 

“...it’ll be fine,” he says, and reluctantly removes his pants.

Apparently, Gabriel Taylor is almost always tucking onstage, because if he hadn’t been it would definitely be noticeable.

Oh, good, so he doesn't have to account for that at all, there's just no way to make that particular measurement non-awkward. Not that any of this is non-awkward, but. 

(He shuts down the thoughts about why a performer might tuck onstage. He is so not prepared to have that conversation.) 

Stupid ugly thing ruining his body line.

He’s a little tenser, through these, especially the ones at the tops of his thighs.

He goes a little slower for these ones; he's being more careful not to make contact. 

When he's done he stands up and hands Gabriel his clothes back, still careful not to touch Gabriel. 

He steals a glance at his own measurements as he dresses himself.

Evidently, he's satisfied with what he sees, because he relaxes significantly as he pulls his shirt on.

...He kind of wishes that was a surprise. "Thank you," he says again. 

It takes him a moment before he speaks again.

"...why the layers?"

"...I get cold easily." 

It isn't, technically, a lie. 

"You know how to dress someone for that without..."

...he stops.

"Would 'as a costume designer I'm passionate about clothing and always wear lots of it' be a better answer? After that I have to start making up something about having enough pockets and you've seen me not put things in my pockets so that won't work." 

–was that a laugh?

"I've never used that one."

.....?

"People ask you why you're covering up so much a lot?" There's no judgement in his tone. 

"They used to."

He nods. 

"...glad you don't have to make excuses anymore." 

Asking what worked won't produce anything Sasha can use. 

"Only to tabloids, on bad days."

He has no answer for that that wouldn't make things more awkward instead of less. 

"I have the sketches if you want to see them, you'd know better than I would how well it — fits." 

"–yes, please."

"Ignore the genderbent Elsa from Frozen page, I was trying something and it didn't work — here." 

A sketch of the rough shape of the design on Gabriel in backstage mode; another with Gabriel in performance mode. A sketch of the detailing, with notes on which parts are embroidery and which parts are beaded. Another sketch of the detail work, on a different piece of the costume. One of the Odette reference pictures is taped to the opposite page from the first two sketches. 

He looks at it for a long time.

"...this is beautiful."

"Thank you.

And thank you for letting me watch you practice, I — would never have thought of it otherwise." 

"...I'm glad I did."

They're not just talking about the costume anymore. 

"It's beautiful. Watching it come together, I mean, I'd only really seen you move when —" when you have your stage face on sounds like he means that the way Gabriel gets when he's performing isn't real, and that's definitely not something he wants to take a stance on — "when you're in performance mode, it's — you hold yourself completely differently and I'm not sure how I was expecting that to translate into how you practice but it was beautiful." 

For a second, he looks startled, even confused, like he's expecting Sasha to be talking to someone else in the empty room.

"It's–just the unfinished product, I should spend more time on practicing like I mean to perform–"

Look at that smile.

It's a gorgeous smile. 

"I watch a lot of speedpaints too, the process is just as — interesting to watch, beautiful, they're both true — as the product." 

"It is, isn't it."

"...you don't need to make an appointment, next time. If you think it would help in the future."

He's glowing — he knows Gabriel well enough by now to know how much that means. 

"Thank you" isn't anywhere near enough, but the text-to-subtext balance is delicate as it is.

A bright synthesizer tone from his pocket. He picks up his phone and checks.

"...ugh. Hopefully the next time I see you I won't have a benefit appearance crashing down around my ears."

"Hopefully. I'd say good luck but you won't need it." 

"...no. I make my own."

He's still smiling when he leaves.

He's smiling for the rest of the day. 

He finishes the sewing on the red costume and starts on the Odette costume; the work gets done over the course of the week. His hands and eyes ache by the end of the detailing; it's unquestionably worth it to have seen the look on Gabriel's face. 

He meets Gabriel to show him the finished piece on Thursday. 

When he walks into the dressing room — apparently the first pass won’t be on set, this time — Gabriel is leaned in close to a mirror, scrutinizing something about his own features, hair brushed back from his face.

When he hears the door open he spins in his chair. For once he’s looking up at Sasha.

“—is this it? Is it done?”

There’s a little edge of urgency in his voice, not even just eagerness.

"It's done." He holds out the clothes, folded carefully. 

He takes them quickly and turns away to shed his own clothes methodically.

The gloves go last, and reluctantly.

He looks away for several reasons. 

The clothes are silvery white; under blue lights they'll look like snow at night. He didn't wind up going with the feathers but there's embroidery down Gabriel's chest and up his arms and around his waist and across his legs, beading that'll catch the light. 

When he’s dressed again, he stops in front of the mirror, looks himself over.

He looks a little in awe.

“...I can’t believe this is really me.”

…that's a tone of voice he hasn't heard before. 

Sasha turns and looks at the way he's standing, the way he's looking at his reflection. "In a good way, I hope," he says, keeps his voice soft.

“Yeah. I think so.”

He reaches out and touches the mirror. He’s leaned in, a little, relaxed like there’s no one watching him.

“Do you ever look at your own life and wonder how you got here?”

"All the time," he says carefully. 

“Sometimes I feel like this is all a dream.”

His smile is a little empty, a little sad.

“...thank you. It’s really beautiful. I think it’s the best thing we’ve ever worn.”

A dozen things click into place. 

"Thank you. I love my job, and you're the reason I can do it and do it well." He means every word. "Is there… a way I could help? A way anyone could?" 

He could ask ‘help with what”? It would be pretending not to know.

“...it’s hard to make friends like this.”

He pushes a little hair behind his ear, almost self-consciously.

“I don’t expect you to be my friend—but—”

"I'd like to be." 

— He wasn't intending to say that but he's completely sincere. 

"Are you going to be alright onstage?" 

He nods.

”It caught me off guard this time. But it’ll be fine, I think.”

He glances back at the mirror.

Gabriel looks lovely; Sasha had known he would, but it's still warm to see. He can't tell whether the warmth is affection or pride in his work. It doesn't really matter.

He raises an arm, slowly, the opening movement of the latest routine–

and then he stops in his tracks, frozen.

Fuck. 

"…are you alright?" he says, in a different tone this time. 

“I think—”

“I think I’m going to need just a minute alone.”

His voice is unsteady.

"Okay. I can step outside." 

He does, and tries not to worry too much, and fails. 

When he opens the door again his formerly immaculate eye makeup is running down his cheeks. He's changed out of the costume and he has it folded in his arms.

"...is there anything that needs to be touched up? Can this stay here?"

"It can stay here. 

…but seriously, are you alright?" 

He almost reaches up to wipe his eyes, but jerks his hand away. He'll smear it more.

"–it's not your job to worry about me."

It could be a brushoff.

It's not.

"I know it isn't. That's not what I asked." 

"Something – happened just now that hasn't happened in...a long time."

He nods. 

"Do you want to talk about it, do you want to be distracted from it, do you just want it quiet…" 

“I don’t know,” he says, a little miserably—

“...do you have anywhere to be?”

"I don't," a little uncertain. 

“...Wellspring Roasters has amazing coffee. It’s just down the street.”

…what the fuck. 

"Okay," still uncertain. 

He looks like he’s about to speak,

and then he bites his tongue for a moment, and disappears behind the door for just a second.

He comes back with his hair loosely up with a pair of sunglasses folded in his hand.

“It’s easier to get out of this place with someone else.”

Okay, still what the fuck, but in a different way. 

"Makes sense," he says, and pretends he means the entire situation and not Gabriel's statement in particular. 

He flips the sunglasses neatly open and slides them on.

It takes a few conversations with assistants and other hangers-on before they actually get out of the building. Apparently Sasha is going to be discussing design particulars with him.

He does and says nothing to contradict this and mostly does and says nothing at all. 

The cold hits him hard when they step out the door. He stops and shivers.

“...I’m still not used to dressing for New York.”

"I know what you think of layering, but," and he's not sure what was going to come after the but. "Are we actually going to a coffee place or are we going somewhere else?" 

“Layering is fine—is there somewhere you’d rather be? I just need to walk.”

And I wanted to go somewhere with you where someone won’t walk in at any moment. Not that they won’t be seen, anywhere they go.

"Coffee place is fine, I'm just surprised you'd want to be seen with me in public." He matches Gabriel's pace. 

“Wh—”

Oh.

Right. That.

“It wasn’t you,” he says, despite this getting across very few of his feelings on the matter.

"Still. Not what they should be seeing."

"I've met designers who just didn't care how they looked. It's – different."

He's pretty sure Gabriel knows what his deal is, which is sort of nice — it means he won't have to explain, if nothing else — but deeply uncomfortable to think about. 

"...I guess." 

He holds the door to the coffee shop for Gabriel. 

He sweeps in like he's used to it – pauses – reaches behind him to keep it open until Sasha's inside as well.

"...it's frustrating when beautiful people don't see it."

Sasha could dispute being beautiful. Apparently, though, that's frustrating. He finds them a table with two empty chairs.

"...We were going to talk about something?" 

He's suddenly incapable of looking Sasha in the eye.

"...you met...Apollo," he manages, and his voice doesn't break even once.

He nods carefully. 

"That makes — a number of things make more sense. 

How many people's names have I been getting wrong?" 

He takes off his sunglasses, folds them with one flick of is hand and sets them on the table.

“...you seem fine with this,” he says, a little suspiciously.

"I don't know what there is to not be fine with, other people's mental architecture is really not my business." 

He bristles a little instinctively, looks around the shop  — he’s glad it’s mostly empty at this time of day.

“Some people,” he says, very quietly, “would think it was their business that Gabriel Taylor is insane.”

"Other people would notice they've been thinking of you as 'both of them' for a month now," he says, just as quiet. "How many names." 

“I’m — we’re Gabriel Taylor. We always will be.”

But.

Deep breath.

“Mercury. The flashy one is Eros. And the—”

He struggles for a moment with descriptors.

“...the real one is Apollo.”

There are any number of things he could say about mythological significance; every last one of them sounds unbearably pretentious. 

"They're beautiful names," he says instead. 

He just barely smiles.

"What's the point of choosing your own name if you don't make it beautiful?"

Does he know? 

Yeah, Sasha's fairly sure he knows. 

"I — kept mine. I considered other things but it's mine. 

Are you named after the god, the metal, both?" 

He looks very briefly surprised, then nods.

"Mostly the metal. The god doesn't quite fit, even if it's more on-theme."

He nods. 

— glances around the coffee shop. "I have — kind of a lot of casual assumptions I need to reevaluate. Do we want to have this conversation in private?" 

He nods, a little tense,

and then takes a deep breath, twirls his sunglasses between his fingers, and stands.

"Do you actually want any coffee? I'll buy."

"I don't really drink coffee except when I need it for work, but if they have tea —" 

He nods and plucks a copy of the tea list off the counter. It's extensive.

He's more than half aware of what he picks but less than two thirds. 

He leans over the counter a little as he orders, gestures loosely and often, flirts lightly with the cashier but not in a way that signals any threatening interest.

Black coffee for him, tea for Sasha. He holds his while they wait, doesn't seem interested in drinking it.

Sasha keeps careful track of Eros's facial expression, keeps quiet, makes a mental list of questions he wants to ask once they aren't here anymore; he drinks his tea once it comes and doesn't ask why Eros isn't drinking the coffee, there's enough intrusive questions he has in mind and he suspects he doesn't want to know anyway. 

There’s a change as they walk out the door.

He sips his coffee as they head back, glances at Sasha every so often.

Aha. 

"Having completely different taste from one another can't be fun," he says, as quietly as he can while still making sure Mercury can hear him. 

“It’s not,” he says, making a face. “There’s overlap, but agreeing on créme brulée doesn’t help anything.”

"Fights over what movie to watch must be legendary." He's maybe halfway serious. 

"They would be, if we ever had enough time to watch a whole movie."

He opens his mouth and then closes it again. 

"I was going to suggest doing what I do but songwriting while watching a movie with a soundtrack sounds like a terrible idea actually. Do you usually switch off this fast and I just haven't noticed before?" 

"...we don't usually have a reason to."

"…I'm kind of flattered." He could be joking. He isn't. 

"It's."

"No one else has ever known."

"Then I'm proud to be someone you trust that much." 

He opens his mouth, closes it again – they're just about back to the studio.

When they reach the dressing room, he shuts the door and locks it carefully behind them.

He does his best to take up as little space as possible. 

"...do you want to sit down?"

He gestures vaguely to a couch at one end of the room.

— right. Yes. Other people are not generally averse to the concept of taking up space or having people look at them. He sits down.