Under Control

3. Photos

Author's Note: Guys, my inability to count my own chapters is a recurring problem. This story has nine chapters. Not ten. My bad. (I have a master's degree, I swear I can count to ten 😩)

3. Photos

Two weeks later, he scrolled through Instagram as he waited for Mark to finish showering.

He had already taken his shower after their workout together. Mark continued to ask why they didn't simply shower together. But Scott still really wasn't in the mood to be seen all... fat and soggy.

Sure, in the past two weeks, Scott had already lost seven pounds. Not bad. In fact, most would say that the weight had come off unhealthily fast. But he had a long way to go.

He found himself scrolling through Mark's Instagram. He wasn't sure how he had gotten here, but suddenly, he was filled with curiosity.

He began with Mark's most recent post. It was a photo of the two of them. A typical post for Mark, where he was deliciously tanned, slightly sweaty, and of course, shirtless. And behind him was Scott, clad in a t-shirt and snap-back hat, his body nearly completely blocked by Mark's.

The caption caught his attention: "My sunshine".

He tried to ignore the comments, all commending Mark on his body and completely ignoring the fact that he was in the photo at all. He had an investigation to finish, after all, and didn't have time to be sidetracked with people drooling over his future husband.

He continued to scroll backwards. He stopped at a birthday post from a year ago. Mark wrote a paragraph as the caption, calling Scott handsome. And back then, Scott was, he supposed.

He kept going backwards.

Man of my dreams.

...(obviously) most overwhelmingly handsome person I've ever known...

I'm the luckiest.

Look at this dreamboat 😏

More like GuadelouBABE

Scott became even more curious, and went into his own posts. He located Mark's comments on each of his photos from the past few months.

Love you so much, baby.

My talented babe.

He scrolled backwards to a year ago.

Mostly emojis. Fire, drooling face, et cetera et cetera.

It was settled upon. Mark used to be attracted to him, physically. The comments made it clear. Now, he wasn't.

Oh, God. Had Mark become some sort of trophy partner? With the somewhat-successful ugly dude that everyone wondered how the hell it even happened?

He zoned out as he thought about it.

"Ugh. How dare you distract me with my favorite thirst trap right as I need to go and be productive?" Mark asked, taking the phone from Scott and looking at the photo on the screen. He handed it back after a moment, and Scott realized which photo he had meant.

It was a photo from their trip to Greece. Scott's shirt was open and he had sunglasses on. 71,000 likes.

He absently scrolled up to one of his more recent photos. 20,000 likes.

Ouch.

"You're contradicting yourself, Marky," Scott said, trying to keep his tone teasing.

"Hmm?" Mark asked.

"You said you like when I'm fat. This isn't fat."

Mark raised an eyebrow. "Can you stop saying that I said I like you when you're fat? I never said that."