Ryden Oneshots

Switch!

Well, no, not exactly. He smells like he's smoked it, though. It and a million of its tobacco'y cousins. Maybe in a landfill. "No."

"Hey," Gerard says, sounding interested for the first time. He tucks his cigarette behind his ear and leans forward. "Let me see your pencil. Mine's too dull, I can't-" he breaks off when Ryan hands over his stunted little pencil, bites his lip at it, and then beams brightly. It's a nice smile, but he has tiny teeth, and they're kind of freaking Ryan out. "Perfect," he says, glee raising his voice like helium. "I can draw. The light is shit but, hey, can you, like, look to the right?"

"What?"

"I'm going to draw you." Ryan looks, and yeah, sure enough, Gerard's already outlined his jaw, the fall of his hair, with a few quick strokes of the pencilet. "I'm shit with names, this is the only way I'll remember."

"Um."

"To the right," Gerard says again, sternly, and Ryan obediently turns his face. It means he has to watch purple-hoodie guy tracing lines on argyle-sweater guy's palm, but argyle-sweater guy is laughing, head tipped back, and while his smile is not exactly dimmer than the sunlight spearing through Ryan's retinas, it's still a nicer sight. 

"So," he says, weakly. "You're an artist?"

"Yeah. Shut up for a minute, I'm trying to do your mouth."

Ryan tries to hold his mouth prettily. Gerard finally says, "Ok, sorry, so, tell me about yourself," and Blue pokes his head in and shouts, "Switch! Round two!"

"Sorry," Gerard repeats, smiling sheepishly. "Nice to meet you, George."

"Ryan," Ryan corrects, but Gerard is already halfway to the next table. He sighs and checks the No next to Gerard's name.

"I'm Bob," round two says, when he sits gingerly in the chair across the table, dwarfing it not all that differently from the way he'd dwarfed his magenta-jeaned monkey earlier.

"Hi, Bob. I'm Ryan."

Bob squints his eyes (impossibly blue, blue like Spencer's, which is a feat heretofore unrivaled in nature). "Your name tag says George."

"I know. You're not going to draw me, are you?"

"What?" Bob kind of licks at his lip ring. It's distracting. Ryan is about mark him as a tentative mental yes, when Bob says, "Oh, God no. I'm not even gay."

Ryan blinks, and revises Spencer's hypothetical death to involve head-shaving. "Ok."

"I'm-" Bob starts, fingers drumming restlessly at the table. "Sorry, I just, I'm here with my friend Gerard? For moral support?" He nods his chin toward where Gerard is, a table over, nudging Spencer's head up, his hand blurring as it moves over his paper. "But, like, that guy?" He nods his chin again, to the left, toward argyle-sweater guy, "Is Gerard's ex? So it's kind of awkward." Bob blanches a little, shifting in his seat. "I'm going to have to go try to hit on him in, like, nine minutes. I can't even."

"Ok," Ryan repeats. He nods, and reaches over the table to put his palms down on Bob's fingers, stilling them. "Have you seen the new Ben Affleck movie?"

Bob has. Bob has also seen the new Jennifer Garner movie, as well as the one Kevin Smith directed, and by the time Blue comes to call round three, they have plans to see a slasher film that neither of them can remember more than the star of, much less the name. It's maybe not the kind of date Spencer wanted him to make, but oh well.

The new guy is little, littler than Ryan, even. He sits and smiles, says, "Hey, George. I'm Brendon."

Ryan says, "Ryan."