Monsters in the night

5

His whole body was in pain. Physically and mentally he was hurting, the pain overtaking him, shaking him, making tears burn in his eyes. His gasps and pleads for help had stopped a long time ago. He wasn't able to tell how much time had passed when he suddenly felt himself get slammed against something hard. A voice said something. His vision got blurry. Darkness.

-------

"Again. Come on, boys, what's wrong with you?" The producer of Saturday Night Takeaway sounded rather annoyed. For the third time today, Dec had missed the cue for his text. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. Let's do it again, okay?"

Filming the short trailer they wanted to show on TV before the show would start its new episode was usually something funny and mainly quickly done. But today, nothing seemed to go to plan. Three days had passed after the desaster of a meeting-day and Ant's and Ali's phone call.

To Ant's dismay, Dec's behaviour hadn't changed much. He stayed really distant and mindless, snappy for no reason, then again he seemed incredibly fragile as if he would break at the slightes critic. To say Ant was worried was an understatement. His tries to get Dec to talk had gotten less and less over the past days of working, as Dec had always reacted snappy and not spoken a word to him afterwards. To be precise, the boys hadn't really spoken ever since their small argument and it was slowly but surely driving Ant crazy. He felt almost sick and the insecurity started to get on his mood.

"Okay, one more time", the producer announced. The cameras started rolling and Dec said his text perfectly timed this time. "... and I can't bloody wait! Can you, Ant?"

The silence grew and rose above them, the tension bursting into disappointment. "Ant!", Dec hissed and Ant snapped out of his thoughts. "What? God, I'm sorry, I was in thoughts..." He could see how everyone around him let the shoulders slump down and exhaled in resignation. He felt the embarrassment paint a faint blush to his cheeks. "Sorry, guys, really. I think we need a break", he added with a side-glance to Dec, who nibbled his lip.

The producer sighed and nodded. "Okay. Ten minutes break but after that I want to have it done perfectly!" Ant nodded and assured that a break would surely do them good, then he quickly walked down the corridor to the dressing room.

Slumping down on the couch, he buried his face in his hands and sighed deeply. Ant rubbed his eyes and shook his head slightly. What on earth was going on these days?

The door swung open and Dec entered. Ant forced his glance up and looked at Dec. "Dec?" His voice was quiet, almost shy. It felt wrong to feel that insecure talking to his best mate. Like he didn't remember how talking to Dec even worked. He was scared to say something wrong and that fact scared him even more. Because usually, there was nothing wrong between them.

Dec didn't react, so Ant repeated, a bit louder this time: "Dec." Dec's head turned around, Ant could see how he closed his eyes for a second, collection himself. "What?" Ant inhaled deeply. "We don't have much time", he started, "but I think there's something we should talk about."

Dec, still standing in the middle of the room, bit his lip anxiously. "You think?", he asked, stepping back and forth, nervousness crawling up in his stomach. Ant nodded and slipped aside to offer Dec a place to sit. "Please", he added and patted on the empty space on the couch. Dec sighed barely audible but made his way over to the sofa to sit down. Ant didn't miss how Dec sat as far away from him as possible, but he tried to ignore the painful needle that this realization stabbed into his stomach.

"What do you want to talk about? If it's about today, I think I am concentrated now." But Ant shook his head. "No, it's not about today. Well, partly. It's about us. What happened to us, Dec? Why are we so distant suddenly?" Dec tightened up, raised his shoulders in a defensive way, ready to deny any and every thing Ant wanted to say to him.