whynot | [...boys and boys, however...]

It's Grint's fault.

Casual Chic
HP RPS. Rupert Grint/Tom Felton. PG. Written for

contrelamontre's hidden/orange/stain challenge.
A method to the madness.

"Just put some on your fingers and rake them through your hair," said the stylist, who told everyone to call him Chase. "It's a simple style, one that suits you. A 'do and go'. A 'hit and run', if you will. None of that 'don't try this at home or you'll end up looking like Cher' business because you know what I say, Rupert."

"I don't know what you say," said Rupert, raking his fingers through his hair.

"Neither do I. I said it just last week when I was doing Emma's hair and now I can't for the life of me remember what it was. It was something short but rather great and wise, rather like a fortune cookie."

"Oh."

"Something about style and looking good and being natural," said Chase. "Something along those lines. You know what I'm talking about?"

"Sure."

"Tell me if I'm rambling."

"Okay."

"Casual!" Chase cried out, and for a second Rupert wondered whether this was some new slang that meant 'great!' or 'fucking right!' or something, until he realized that Chase had merely changed the subject. The stylist crossed his arms, put his weight on one foot, and looked at Rupert's hair with a critical expression. It was nice hair, Rupert supposed. His mum wouldn't like it but his mum wasn't his stylist, was she? And all the celebrities he saw on television and in the magazines had these stylishly messy haircuts anyway, so he wasn't really pulling a fashion faux pas or anything. He was just looking good. "Casual," Chase repeated, "shall be your modus operandi, Mr. Grint."

"You think so?"

Chase whipped out a comb and hairspray and began teasing individual locks of Rupert's hair. "Sure. But there is a method to the madness. Stand still."

And Rupert did. A movement in the mirror caught his eye and he looked up. Tom was standing in the hall, partially hidden by the door. Caught red-handed, Tom grinned and cocked his eyebrow defiantly. Rupert smirked and returned the gesture. Tom reciprocated by displaying his freak ability to raise each of his eyebrows to a height of like four meters alternately. Rupert tried to copy this and Chase said, "What are you doing, dear? You'll give yourself premature wrinkles. Stop that right now."

And when Rupert looked back at the doorway, Tom was gone.

+

Rupert didn't like it when people said he had orange hair. Ginger hair wasn't much better. Sure it wasn't red like blood or apples, but it was as red as hair could get, so really, people should just deal with it.

"You've also got these gorgeous green eyes," said Emma. The three of them were sitting together off to the side of the set, in costume and at the ready while Daniel and David filmed their Expecto Patronum scene. "If we took your eyes," said Emma, "and Daniel's hair, you'd have the perfect Harry Potter."

"I think with my eyes and my hair, I make the perfect Ron Weasley," said Rupert. "What do you think?"

Emma laughed, but quietly so as not to disturb the shooting, and Tom smirked. She said, "You're full of it, Rupert, aren't you?"

"Oh, I think you make the perfect Emma," said Rupert. "I mean Hermione. I think you make the perfect Hermione. Doesn't she, Tom?"

Tom leaned back and pretended to appraise her critically. "Grint, I reckon you're right. If she were smart, she would indeed be Hermione Granger incarnate."

"You're not filming, Tom," said Emma. "Snap out of character already."

Tom stared at her, then pulled her into a headlock and she shrieked. Rupert, not to be outdone, plowed bodily into the both of them and knocked them all down to the floor, where they were one big giggly, writhing tangle for which Alfonso had to stop the shoot, march over, and ask what the hell was going on. Tom was quick to cap his laughter, and Emma was not as fast but she kept her face lowered and her gaze on the floor as if this would be successful in making anyone think that she was doing anything other than grinning her head off. When Alfonso asked Rupert, "What's come over you, Grint?" Rupert giggled, stopped, giggled again, blushed, and finally came to a sputtering halt, trying not to think about how he felt when he touched Tom's skin.

+

Hanging out in Tom's trailer one afternoon, Rupert discovered Tom dipped his crisps in mustard before he ate them, which Rupert personally thought was disgusting.

"Don't be so close-minded," said Tom. He dangled a crisp in front of Rupert's mouth. "Go on, it's good."

"Maybe next time, eh?"

Tom popped the crisp in his mouth. "What's the weirdest thing you've ever eaten?"

"Me?" Rupert shrugged. "I don't know. Ostrich?"

"Like the bird ostrich?"

"Yeah, the bird ostrich. After the first movie was done, my family took me out to this really posh restaurant and I ordered the ostrich steak."

"Why?"

"'Cos I never had ostrich before." Rupert grinned. "I'm not close-minded, see. I just know what crisps taste like, and I know what mustard tastes like, and can figure that they'd taste like shit together."

Tom raised his eyebrow. "Then why do I eat them together and think they're delicious?"

"Because you're demented."

Tom dipped another crisp in mustard. "Was the ostrich any good?"

"I guess so. It was like... soft beef."

"Hmm."

Tom went on to talking about the time he was in southeast Asia shooting Anna and the King and ate snake for the first time ("Maybe some cliches are cliches because they're true, because it really did taste like chicken."), and Rupert listened and smiled and stared at a mustard stain at the corner of Tom's mouth, resisting the urge to urge to reach over and wipe it off with his fingers. If it was Emma, he wouldn't have hesitated at all, even though he and Emma were just friends. He would have wiped it off and called her a pig, and they would engage in the mild flirtation that came so easily to them. But girls and boys were supposed to do that sort of thing anyway.

Boys and boys, however.

Rupert and Tom, however.

Rupert found himself wishing he did know what it was that Chase the stylist had said, especially about the 'being natural' thing. What felt natural right now was wiping the mustard off Tom's face, and Rupert wasn't afraid but he wasn't stupid either. Rupert remained leaning against the kitchenette counter, arms crossed, listening to Tom as he told his anecdote. There may be things happening that Rupert was not ready to deal with, but what he could deal with right now was Tom telling him a stupid story. This was the method to the madness. In return Rupert would tell him another stupid story, like the one involving rice pilaf and plastic spoons from back on the Thunderpants set. He and Tom would smile, would laugh, and the sun would set with everyone happy.

"If you ever go to Thailand, you ought to try it," said Tom. "Ostrich is nothing." Rupert opened his mouth and Tom said, "And if you make Slytherin cannibalism jokes, I'll push this bottle of mustard up your nose."

Rupert closed his mouth. Tom rolled his eyes.

He checked his watch. "Hey, I think Alfonso'll be wanting us." He looked up at Rupert. "Wanna go?"

"Duty calls," said Rupert, grabbing his robe from where he draped it over a nearby chair. "By the way, you've got a..." He pointed to the corner of his own mouth. "Mustard." Tom stuck out his tongue and tried to get it, and Rupert said, "No, other side."

"Is it gone?"

"No."

Lick. "What about now?"

"...Yeah. You got it."

"Cool." Tom grabbed his things. "Come on."

They ran out of the trailer and were gone.

[end.]

[...boys and boys, however...]

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