Chapter Text
@xxriftmakerxx - 2h: omg ezkayn confirmed??? [image attached]
@ezREAL <3 - 2h: me when im delulu
“You, are incredibly lucky that Yone is home or I would’ve killed you by now.”
Ezreal has never laughed so hard in his life.
There are tears coming out of his eyes as he holds the wall for support, Kayn’s left eye is twitching, and he may just thank whichever lucky fan managed to catch this photo of them for keeping his Sunday morning interesting.
It’s the morning after their big post-premiere bar hopping adventure, and they hadn’t exactly come out of without stories to tell. There always was, of course, it was Heartsteel. He’d be remiss to expect anything else.
But Ezreal certainly hadn’t expected one of the trending tags on his Twitter to be his name mushed (shipped) together with Kayn’s of all people upon waking at an ungodly hour of the morning (9am), and yet here he was, watching as the engagement creeped up somewhere toward absolutely insane.
Ezreal was not a stranger to Twitter, no. He himself rarely frequented his own account when he was under his previous label and when he was far younger, no that was left to his PR manager, but he did routinely stalk the tags he was relevant to. He always wanted to know a little (a lot) about what people thought of him. Now that he did have full control over his image online, he took advantage of it plenty. And people flocked to the ex-pop star. That didn’t surprise him that so many people were interested in him.
It was the photo that landed the pair of them on everybody’s radar that surprised him.
Mostly because he doesn’t remember it very well.
Just a little too close, a lingered touch around his waist as Ezreal had leaned into Kayn. He remembers briefly they’d been arguing about something and he’d almost slipped over his own feet in the darkness of the club. The other man had wrapped an arm around him, holding him until he’d stabilized himself. His own memory is struggling to remember anything outside of that moment, but it certainly is seared into his brain now how his dual colored eyes had drank him in for a moment from above, the verdant green and striking red pinning him down before they’d returned to shouting about something he can’t even remember now.
It flickers like an after image in his mind’s eye, after he’d stared at the grainy image for a solid fifteen minutes in his bed, trying to process how’d they’d gotten here.
But he didn’t have to worry, the internet had already processed it for him.
The way that Twitter users would often take otherwise innocuous interactions and put them together like Barbie dolls and write their own stories, even if they were so far incongruent with reality they bordered on delusion has his head pounding and bandmate fuming in front of him. A great start to his otherwise projected shitty morning, so he’s not really in a position to complain.
Delusion, that’s exactly what this was, he thinks as he continues scrolling down his feed. There are enough comments in the thread underneath the original post that he’d be reading for ages, just to entertain himself. He was already past being embarrassed getting caught in such a vulnerable position by some lucky photographer (he knew better than this), and had shot out the other side of being incredibly amused. The ‘theories’ of their secret relationship underneath the post, with a heavy helping of what he’d call “red string” theories about their tender interactions were nothing short of impressive. Even he wouldn’t have noted his apparent great amount of time spent with Kayn in their music video, but some fan out there definitely did. And they felt strongly enough about it to put the fact they were rooting for Ezkayn out on their very public profile.
Full government name huh? That was brave.
It was way too early to be dealing with it when there’s a hangover threatening to end him then and there in the hallway, but he knew what his priorities were and that most definitely included bearing witness to Kayn’s absolute meltdown over this.
So when he’d discovered he’d been tagged in half a dozen tweets and mentioned in twenty more upon waking that morning with his eyes strained past where he thought possible, he knew exactly what he needed to do and dragged himself out of bed, down the hall and had knocked on the other man’s door until Kayn came out.
“Can you not laugh in the face of our respective reputations going down the drain?” Kayn demands, shoving the door of his bedroom back behind him. He’s barely dressed himself, a loose tshirt tossed on likely as soon as the door opened, if his sweatpants and slightly raised hem of his tshirt are anything to go by. Ezreal stifles a laugh, he hadn’t washed the gel out of his hair the night prior, as the magenta colored strands stick up in three odd angles in the back, “I am not spending the next few months having to deal with this every time I log onto Twitter!”
“Oh please,” Ezreal rolls his eyes, saving another thread before pocketing his phone into his own sleep shorts. He’s thinking of sending these to Kayn every time he annoys him if this is the reaction he gets out of him, “You’re making a bigger deal of it than it needs to be, I think it’s hilarious. They’ll forget it about it in a couple weeks.”
“A few—” Kayn pinches the bridge of nose, clearly becoming frustrated. A low growl escapes him before responds, “Try a few months. And Gods forbid we ever interact in front of camera again lest we get even more traction online, so thanks for that, by the way.”
“If we’re being honest, this is your fault anyway!” Ezreal exclaims, wincing a second later because the sound pings around in his skull like a wrecking ball. He lowers his voice, propping his hands up on his hips, “You get so damn handsy when you’re drunk. What was I supposed to do?”
“You almost ate shit,” His red eye flickers for a moment, and Kayn groans at the action, blinking as his pale face flushes. He refocuses on Ezreal a moment later, “Believe it or not, your actions reflect pretty heavily on the rest of us. We would’ve had a completely different problem on our hands if I let you fall, but maybe I should’ve at this point.”
“Don’t even start! I would’ve caught myself,” Ezreal rolls his eyes. He likely wouldn’t have, and if Kayn hadn’t caught him, probably would’ve taken them both down, but that’s irrelevant right now, “I wasn’t some damsel in distress.”
“Amazing you can’t even say thank you, but I couldn’t get you off of me for the rest of the night,” Kayn quirks an eyebrow, “You lose the definition of personal space as soon as you get more than three shots in you.”
“Hey!” Ezreal is only slightly actually offended, even though he gasps like he is.
Kayn’s not incorrect about that, he tends not to drink as much as he used to, and the effects are rearing their ugly head whenever he goes out with their new band. Everything slips into being way funnier than it should be, and he just can’t help propping his weight on any of his friends nearby who’ll support him.
With his old band, he’s pretty sure they found it mostly endearing (does he really know?), and it seems like his habits are carrying over when he loses his finer control over his actions. Kayn was not his first victim, just his most annoying and most recent. He doesn’t actually recall all that much about the night prior, and he’s unfortunately erring on the side of caution and assuming Kayn may be right.
But that doesn’t mean he likes that Kayn’s right, and will tell him just as much, “I can handle my alcohol fine. I mean, you were barely coherent enough for us to get you home last night! I think you were significantly more of a problem than I was.”
“If you weren’t trying to touch every single person who even gave you a look, we certainly wouldn’t be in this situation, Ezreal,” Kayn shoves a finger into his chest, making his point. His dyed hair flutters in front of his face, and Ezreal fixates on his one green eye, “You could barely keep your hands off of anyone, like your damn feed is so quick to point out.”
“If you hated it so much, you could’ve made me stop. But you didn’t,” Kayn’s face colors, eyebrows furrowing in anger as Ezreal shoves himself forward enough to get him to back off, staring him down. Ezreal remembers that at least in his hazy recount of the night prior. Kayn’s cooler hands finding purchase in any of article of clothing he could manage to get his hands on to keep him upright, the fabric getting caught and his fingers grazing his bare torso just enough for it to shock him out of his clouded state for a few minutes of unfortunate clarity.
How close they’d been. Kayn was the exact opposite to him — he didn’t choose to be close to others unless strictly necessary. Yet as soon as Ezreal realized he was slipping, he’d grabbed him first. A strong arm, a head taller than him solidifying him in the dark ocean of the club around them. His hand had just grazed the strip of skin he’d left free underneath his own crop top, and yet it feels like it’s stained him just above his hip.
Ezreal is entirely unsure of what to make of these actions in context and chooses not to otherwise acknowledge the heat that follows creeping up his own face. He leans closer to Kayn, smirking, “Admit it, I’m irresistible.”
“In your dreams!” Kayn bites back, shoving him back out of of the doorway of his room. Ezreal stumbles over the slick surface of the hardwood, catching himself on the wall, the world spinning for a moment before he’s able to right himself back up. He considers re-donning his sunglasses, considering how bright the sun is spilling out into the hall and how it sears into his hungover senses, “You are the last person I’d ever consider.”
“But you have considered?” Ezreal asks, raising an eyebrow. He grins, “Awh, you flatter me.”
“Like you could handle me, ” Kayn responds, his voice dropping an octave. A shiver runs up his spine. He’s challenging him. It’s not like Kayn is all that much taller than him (less than the almost foot and a half Sett has on him), but he’s still capable of making Ezreal feel smaller than he is.
“I could,” Ezreal answers, growing ever closer again. Does Kayn really think he’ll back down from that challenge? “Not that I’d want to, maybe I like the chase. And you’re already obsessed with me, so…you know.”
“Like I’d give you the satisfaction,” Kayn crosses his arms over his chest, “You think you’re the center of the world, but hell’ll freeze over before I let you be the center of mine.”
“With how much you talk about me, I might as well be.” Ezreal responds, “You know I’m front and center in that head of yours.”
“Yeah, because you’re at the top of half of my Twitter mentions right now,” Kayn deadpans, “I couldn’t get rid of you if I tried.”
“Being seen with me would be an upgrade for you.”
“Would it now?” Kayn’s almost too close for comfort, lidded gaze almost piercing, “You know between the both of us I’m the star of the show. You’d be lucky to call me yours.”
He came in to press all of Kayn’s buttons, but instead he can only feel his own face getting hot at the thought when Kayn turns to return back into his own room, leaving the door open as if he intended to come back. Ezreal rests against the doorframe for a moment, stuttering over a response.
Kayn just had to have the last word, always.
Kayn is just barely getting out of the ‘nuisance’ stage in his mind, frustratingly close to friend if their interactions while they were filming were anything to go by. Ezreal had already taken the liberty to changing his name to just his first name in his contacts, rather than his full one, but he wonders how long it’ll last before they get into another nonsensical argument.
Still, he finds it more funny than outright annoying to be paired with him after their music video drop. It isn’t the first time that Ezreal has had to deal with it in the public eye (his friend Lux had been his first pseudo partner online, back when he was younger and spent a good deal of time with her, and there were even rumors he and Seraphine of all people had something going on — probably the one he still found the funniest to date, considering she was very much not interested in men), just his most recent. Not even two days since the video dropped and they’re already getting publicity. While he stands there in the doorframe, he wonders briefly whether to encourage it for fun, just to entertain himself. In the last few years, he certainly hasn’t be a stranger to the crueler side of what social media had to offer, why not play his hand early and spin it for himself this time?
Kayn would kill him, but Kayn would also threaten it for less. He was here for a good time, not a long time, and that good time included causing a few PR problems for Alune to keep everyone on their toes.
Kayn disappears into his room for a moment before returning with his own phone, tousling his dyed hair with his free hand out of his face. His long fingers get stuck in the chunky hair in the back of his head, and he shakes it out. He closes the door behind himself with more force than necessary, stalking off in the opposite direction, towards one of their workspaces.
“Hey, where are you going?” Ezreal asks after him, shouting down the hall. He thinks about following him, and a moment later chooses to anyway.
“Finding Yone, so he can fix this damn mess.” Kayn responds, not bothering to look back at him.
“Awh,” Ezreal says, quickening his pace to catch up with the other man. He fishes his phone out again, drawling out one of the titles in his saved tab, “You don’t want more posts pointing out how many times ‘Ezreal and Kayn shared more than just a scene’?”
Kayn turns over his shoulder just outside one of their workrooms, narrowing his gaze at the shorter man. He’d call it murderous if they weren’t so close to Yone’s usual workspace, which meant while he likely wouldn’t enact any violence now, he certainly may later, “I can’t think of anything worse in this world than whatever that thread is implying — especially with you.”
“Boo, you don’t mean that,” Ezreal laughs, leaning against the wall opposite to the door, “We could make a fun pair. Even if it’s just for the cameras.”
A conflicted emotion runs through Kayn’s expression, his gaze lingering in a way Ezreal can’t quite describe. As if he even considers it, before he whirls around and raps on the closed door with renewed vigor, “Yone, you had better be able to fix this!”