Work Text:
Baz could have found a different way to get to work. He could have taken a left and looped around the block, cut through the alleyway, or taken the back entrance into his office building. It might have been easier, just marginally, but he never did. Of all of his tireless complaining about the imbecile on the corner, he was thankful that no one ever asked him why he didn’t just try harder to ignore him.
It was a good bit of early morning entertainment, Baz told himself. Why would he want to pass that up? He worked until after dark, and it was nice to spend a few extra minutes outside, sneering derisively at someone he didn’t sit across from in the office.
Some days, the man had already found a victim, and his pure, undivided attention was on someone else. But that was rare. Usually, he was standing in the middle of the street with his friend (coworker? cameraman?), accosting innocent passerby. And usually, if Baz timed it poorly enough, he was one of the innocent passersby who got accosted.
“What song are you listening to?”
Baz wasn’t listening to music. He was trying to listen to some strung-out salesman tell the man he was a stupid fuck, but it was like he had a preternatural sense for when Baz was coming and made himself available. Maybe he’d memorized his schedule. It wasn’t like it would be hard. He passed this spot, the same piece of gum on the sidewalk every morning at 8:47 AM. He pretended he hadn’t heard.
Sometimes he pretended he was on a phone call or listening to music, sometimes he just gave the man the nastiest look he could muster and breezed past him, and sometimes (once a week, just often enough that the show consistency) he told him to fuck off.
***
The next day, Baz didn’t let him finish his sentence. “For twenty pounds would you-”
“No. Fuck off.” He used to think that the man was doing an experiment with rejection therapy, and then he briefly entertained the idea that he might have some sort of humiliation fetish. He was certainly humiliated, more often than not. Telling him to fuck off was satisfying enough in itself. Maybe Baz had some sort of degradation fetish. Maybe they’d be perfect for each other, and the man would ask him how good the lay was with his tiny fuzzy microphone after they’d fucked. Baz knew that was unlikely.
The man was hot, obviously, but it didn’t make up for how annoying he was. He had curly golden hair, cropped close on the sides and long on the top, and more freckles than Baz thought he could ever count in a lifetime. Maybe he could have counted them if he had a chance to sit him down and scan every inch, but he didn’t foresee an opportunity like that coming up any time soon.
***
“If your sister answers your phone call-” Baz was running late, but he wouldn’t have stopped to talk to him even if he wasn’t. Did Baz seem the type to have a sister? Was there something sisterly about him? Or did this guy bother every single person who walked by? The latter seemed the most likely.
His cameraman seemed slightly hassled every time he sprinted down the sidewalk to chase after Baz. Maybe he was socially inept, and his cameraman was the one with an inkling that he wanted to be left alone.
Baz preferred people watching to being watched, and he certainly didn’t want to be filmed.
These kinds of guys would post unflattering videos of people online who were rude to them, but Baz didn’t think that he was one of them. He had been plenty rude to him before, and he’d seen old women on multiple occasions stop to curse him out, and he never found any of them online.
***
“What’s something you’ve never told anyone before?”
“Hey, Mum, I was thinking we could pick up those sandwiches you like for dinner.” Baz didn’t have a mum. Well, he did, but she’d been dead for years. He pressed his phone to his ear and really committed to the fake conversation. The man did what he always did, and huffed and turned on his heel like he had expected Baz to stop and make conversation with him and his stupid microphone.
He asked him something different almost every single day, but that was probably the nature of an interview. If you just asked the same questions over and over, no one would want to stop to talk to you.
Part of Baz was envious. He wished that he could stand on a street corner every day and irritate the shit out of strangers for fun, no job to worry about.
***
“Would you take what’s in this bag or would you double it and give it to the next person?”
“I’m on my way to work, mate.” A forty-something-year-old shook his head and pushed the microphone out of his face.
“No worries.” This was one of the worst things about him. He was always so polite, even when Baz told him to fuck off and die, even when strangers shoulder checked him and slapped his hands away from him. His cameraman was the same way. He always smiled at Baz sympathetically; he had the self-awareness to know that his friend was essentially a sexy parasite leeching off corporate London’s most depressed.
***
“How tall are you?”
“Taller than you.” Baz deigned him a response for the first time, maybe ever. His friend barked out a laugh.
“I doubt it.”
“Come on, Simon.” The man’s name was Simon, and his friend was American, which made sense because street interviews felt like a very American thing to do.
“How tall is taller than me?”
“Six foot one.”
“You’re lying.” Simon scoffed. “If you’re not lying, will you let me measure you to check?”
Baz raised an eyebrow at him. “Absolutely not.” In truth, he wasn’t sure if he was six foot one or six foot two.
“Then you must not be taller than me,” Simon said in a singsongy voice.
“Fuck off.”
“There he is! I thought the world had turned upside down for a second there.” Baz rolled his eyes and brushed past Simon and his cameraman (he felt rude now, only knowing one of their names). “Same time, same place tomorrow?”
***
“Are you single?” Simon held out that tiny microphone, and Baz actually stopped in his tracks, again.
“Yes?” He said suspiciously.
“Let me set you up on a date with a stranger, and I’ll give you fifty pounds.”
Baz scoffed. He took a deep breath, dramatically, before saying, “In your dreams, Simon. You don’t have enough followers for me.” He was taking the piss, obviously. But maybe he was flirting a little bit too. It was almost like falling in love with a television show; it was entertaining, and there was no chance it would love you back.
“How many would it take?” Simon sounded serious, and it was freaking Baz out a little bit.
“More than money could buy.”
***
Simon was wearing a beanie and a scarf, but the rest of his outfit wasn’t nearly warm enough for him to be standing outside for hours. Baz was drinking a holiday drink from a little coffee shop down the street. He had gloves on, a coat, a sweater, and two pairs of socks inside his boots. He felt like the tip of his nose was turning blue.
“Kiss or slap?”
“In general?” Baz was taken aback.
“No, me.”
“God, you’re tireless.” He was staring at Simon’s lips. They were a little chapped from the cold, but they were pink and lovely. His breath was puffing into the air between them, humid and warm.
***
Baz had been thinking. He’d been listening to him harass people for the past six months, and he had never asked anyone else that question. He took a different path, just once, and found that he missed Simon. How fucking strange. How annoying. He didn’t want to miss Simon; he wanted to be glad for his absence. He didn’t want to be excited for his walk to work; he wanted to dread it like every other normal person on the planet.
***
“What’s your haircare routine?”
“I have to go, sorry.” It was the first time he’d apologized for not being able to stop.
“I was worried you’d quit your job to avoid me or something.”
“I’ve thought about it.”
“It’s an honor to have you thinking about me at all.”
“Fuck off.” That would show him not to flirt. Simon just laughed, and it was one of the best sounds that Baz had ever heard.
***
“Kiss or slap?”
“Do you ask all the boys that, or is it just me?” Baz wanted to ask him if he asked all the girls that too, but he was afraid of the answer.
“Just you. I’m trying out some new material.”
“Hm.”
“What do you think?”
“Of your new material?”
“Of the question.” Baz was looking at his lips again. The only con to the whole situation, he thought, was wanting to kiss a street interviewer. Was that really going to be the type of person he was attracted to? Simon smelled like cinnamon buns and soap this close up. It wasn’t sexy, but it didn’t deter Baz as much as it should have.
He kissed him. It was a light kiss on the lips, a brush, a ghost of a whisper. As he was pulling back, Simon’s arm snaked around his waist and tightened like a vise, and kissed him back. It was different than the kiss that Baz had given him; it was burning heat in the cold and his pulse thudding in his ears, and it was over before Baz could remember that they were in the middle of the sidewalk, being filmed by Simon’s friend.
“I won’t. I won’t post that.” Simon said. He was grabbing the ends of Baz’s scarf. He gave them a little shake and then stepped back. “I haven’t posted any videos of you yet.”
“You don’t think I have the face for television?”
“You always tell me to fuck off.” Simon laughed; his smile was one of Baz’s favorite things about him.
“I do. I probably still will.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow.”
***
Simon’s friend had the day off. He was standing off to the side, leaning against the wall of the bank with his head buried in his phone. Baz almost walked by, but since Simon had Baz-Radar, he looked up right as he approached.
“Hey.”
“Hey. Can I ask you a question for once?” Baz was nervous. What was he doing? He had work, he had bills to pay, he couldn’t call out (he never called out anymore; he was too excited to walk down this stupid street).
“Sure?”
“Do you have plans?”
“Right now?” Simon cocked his head.
“Yes, right now.”
“No. Not at all. I’m free.” Baz knew that Simon had answered too quickly, too hopeful for the kiss yesterday to be an experiment.
“Do you fancy a coffee? I’ll buy.” Baz asked, and Simon’s face lit up. His smile might be the only thing better than his laugh.