Actions

Work Header

Rating:
Archive Warnings:
Category:
Fandom:
Relationship:
Characters:
Additional Tags:
Language:
English
Collections:
Anonymous
Stats:
Published:
2025-12-11
Words:
597
Chapters:
1/1
Comments:
8
Kudos:
34
Bookmarks:
1
Hits:
195

dressing rooms

Anonymous

Summary:

'The soft, sweet hum of the desk fan filled the silent dressing room with an old sort of comfort.'

or, relationships explored from the point of view of an inanimate object- a dressing room.

Work Text:

The soft, sweet hum of the desk fan filled the silent dressing room with an old sort of comfort. 

 

The room was empty, of course. Tom’s jacket was strewn lazily across the sofa, Luke’s one placed on top of it. The laptop AJ had brought sat half open on the desk, with a soft glow crawling out from the open crevice. Sam’s coat was hung on the chair before the desk. 

The fan was left on, the air of summer heavy on stage; a cooling room was something they longed to return to. 

The muffled voices of performers bled through the walls, followed by a lengthy applause. 

Tom’s phone buzzed in his jacket pocket; the empty room responded with nothing but silence. 

 

Steps in the hall preempted the return of the boys, the door swinging open as a chattering group of four entered the small dressing room, filling the space with their words. 

 

The tallest of the group had an arm draped around the (comically shorter) blonde’s shoulder, looking down at him as he spoke with a look that simply resonated with adoration. The other man talked happily, adjusting his position to give Tom a more comfortable shoulder to lean on. The  man in the plaid jacket gathered his belongings, playfully poking fun at the other two, who were holding tightly to each other as they conversed. The final man was quieter, opening his ajar laptop, cursing under his breath as he realised he’d left it on the entire performance. 

 

Tom grabbed his jacket, Luke moving to help the others tidy. The fan was inaudible by now, their continuous chatter and calm talk overpowering the monotonous hum. 

 

They packed up their clothing, AJ sticking his laptop in his bag, on top of his unused charger. Sam donned his jacket as his eyes lingered on the pair in front of him, speaking to one another as if there was nothing else for them to do. He let himself smile; a hand lingered a moment too long on an arm, and a finger jokingly caressed the tip of a nose ( though the flush that appeared afterwards was far from humorous.) 

 

They left pair by pair, the quiet hum of the fan now the only noise that echoed across the (empty) room. 

 

A figure appeared once more in the room, his blonde hair shining in the light from the corridor. He grabbed Tom’s jacket that had been left behind in his eagerness to greet the fans. He chuckled affectionately, jogging behind to hand it to him. Had anyone else been in that room, they may have noticed the hesitant stroke of the poorly sewn name tag, and the slight loiter at the door as Luke gripped to the jacket. They may too have seen the smile that played on his face as Tom’s lock screen lit up, a picture of the two of them momentarily lingering on the screen. 

However, the room remained empty, and therefore, not a single linger, smile nor touch was seen. 

 

The fan hummed painfully, coming to a pause as the door slowly creaked shut, engulfing the room in darkness. 

 

The remnants of a faint, yearning memory distilled across the uncomfortably quiet room, unable to seep through the crack between the door and the floorboards, holding captive the unspoken desires that they’d left behind. 

 

And the rest?

 

(The muffled voices of fans seeped down from above, two male voices echoing ever so slightly above the rest. The words they wanted so desperately to say remained in the stilled, now impenetrable, dressing room.) 

 

The rest was silence.