#but i wrote the kiss scene waaayyyy back

[roger1na]

careful ch6 - john deacon x reader

summary: you are a ballet student at the royal ballet academy. To pay for your tuition, you work part-time at the celebrity gossip magazine, Seven. One fateful day you’re sent to interview a band on the rise, Queen, post-concert and fall in love with the sweetest man on the planet.

word count: 2.8k+

warnings: swearing

author's note: it's over 16k now, i'm legally allowed to call it a slowburn :,). aa i've had so much fun with all of this writing and this series wow thank u for all the sweet comments<3. also i know -15% about swan lake so it's probably hideous to read about that. (i tagged some people who didn't ask, so if u want to be untagged just shoot me a message).

[ch1] [ch2] [ch3] [ch4] [ch5] [ch6] [ch7] [ch8]

chapter six

The alarm pierced the silence of friday morning at 5am. You snoozed it groggily and buried your face into your pillow. You hadn’t slept properly at all. With the nerves of the show and the nerves of the promise you’d made to John.

“You didn’t pick up on the subtext that I’m definitely kissing you the next time I see you?”

You hadn’t kissed anybody in years. And back then, it was probably totally different. Maybe nowadays they wanted only tongue. Sometimes you slipped a glance at whatever your co-workers were righting. Kissing and sex were at the top of the list of celebrity scandals and sometimes they terrified you. What the hell was the world doing?

A piercing call made you jump. It wasn’t your alarm, but your phone ringing in the living room. The floorboards were cold as you raced barefooted to answer it.

“Y/N!” Rose shrieked in your ear as soon as you. You winced and held the phone further from yourself.

“Rose, what the fuck.” You groaned annoyed.

“She broke her leg!”

Your mind was struggling to connect the dots. Everything was hazy in the morning and you just really wanted some coffee.

“She broke it. It snapped in half like a fucking twig.”

“You’ve lost me.”

“Frances! The prima!”

Slowly, the pieces were beginning to fit together. “What happened to her?”

“Freak accident! She was hit while driving. Or being driven around like the spoi-”

“Rose! She’s injured!”

“Oh yeah! You know what that means don’t you?”

“Rose you’re going to have to stop with the guessing games, I just woke up,” you mumbled and rubbed your forehead.

Rose shrieked on the other end impatiently. “Y/N you don’t get it. You’re the understudy.”

The phone slipped out of your hand as your arms went numb. Holy shit, you thought. If the original prima was unavailable, you’d be the one dancing. You were going to dance as Odette. That was your moment. It took a few seconds and then you screamed.

“Rose! I’m going to be dancing as a prima!” You were jumping around in hysterics. Then you paused for a moment and picked up the phone. “You didn’t have anything to do with the accident, did you?”

Rose giggled. “Of course not.”

“How come you’re the one calling me, not the studio or the teachers?”

“You never gave your number to the studio. I think half your documents are missing, you really need to get your shit in order. You’re going to be prima.”

“I’m going to be a prima!”

“Yes! Now get ready you dumbass, you’ve got a crowd to win over!”

You hopped around in excitement a bit more until you rushed to shower and get dressed. The sun was slowly peeking from the horizon and you grinned at your reflection in the mirror. Adrenaline coursed through your veins. It’d all been worth it. All of it.

London was only rising when you stepped into the musty tube carriage. Drunks coming home from nights slept away from their own beds and people in similar situations like yours, where work and life just started early. You flipped through a stranded newspaper, relieved that you didn’t find your own name among the pages.

You thought about John and how proud he’d be when he’d see you. He didn’t know about the news. Would he recognize you with heavy show make up and an tight bun? Would he wear a t-shirt and jeans combination? What did he know about ballet? Nerves coiled in your stomach, but you let them be. It was your day.

Across the city in a tiny student flat, John Deacon lay awake. He had tossed and turned all night thinking of you, your dance and your promise. He followed the cracks in the paint on the ceiling with his eyes, eyes tired but mind not letting him sleep.

The fact was, John Deacon had fallen in love. With your absent-minded gaze and with your babbling. With the way you stared off at him when you thought he couldn’t see. With the perfect way your palm fit into his. With the way your voice made him want to write a thousand embarrassing and poor quality love songs. And as he breathed and lay awake and pondered the great mysteries of the universe, he was brought back to the first night you had met.

Your eyes had glinted in the multicoloured lights of the show and you had been so mesmerised by the act on stage. And when you knocked on their dressing room door with confidence, John had almost felt apprehensive towards you. Like every interviewer, you were going to spin your own story without listening to them. But then you talked and listened and laughed at his jokes and suddenly the light caught your hair in a new glow and John came to love the confident interviewer in you. Not stuck up, not cruel and not fake. Just confident.

He loved how you let life take you but didn’t stand for its bullshit. How you were so vocal about issues in the workplace and misogyny in dancing and the issues in falling in love with an art and a person at the same time.

Overall, he just loved you. And sometimes it felt so stupid, so foolish to lie awake and dream of your peachy lips and rose scent but today of all days, the butterflies felt good. They felt promising.

The day wore on. With little sleep he walked to the studio, enjoying the fresh air and trying to ignore the growing fog in his mind. The boys couldn’t stop yelling today. He just sat in the corner, pouring over his notes for the song that you suggested he write.

It was called Misfire and it was exactly what it sounded like. He laughed when he thought about how you’d react to the lyrics. How you’d have a hesitant smirk at first, and then you’d be bouncing to the music, like the little ball of joy u were. Along the margins, he’d scrawled notes for another song he wasn’t quite ready to pull together. Words like sunshine, and my best friend jumped out from the messy handwriting, but otherwise it was almost illegible.

“He’s got her show today,” Freddie whispered over coffee. Brian and Roger were giving each other the silent treatment over Dear Friends and John was silent in the corner, scribbling his notes down. “Do you think he’s writing her a love song?” He continued.

“What, Deaky?” Brian looked up from his cup. “He doesn’t seem the type. His first song for Queen being a love song.”

“Bri’s right. He’ll write something silly. He’s like that.” Roger added. The argument diffused as fast as it had started. “You forget he’s only twenty two.”

“Twenty three in two weeks, right?”

“Yeah.”

They all looked at him simultaneously. John felt their stares and looked up, flashing a gap-toothed smile. “What?”

“Nothing,” they all replied in unison.

“You excited about seeing Y/N today? Do you need a suit?”

“Freddie,” John rolled his eyes and snapped his notebook shut. “I have a suit. The funky checkered and white one.”

“Aw,” Brian leaned on his hands. “Will Y/N like it?”

“Shut up, you all,” John walked over and took his coffee, black with one sugar, and took a sip. “I’m perfectly capable of going to see a ballet on my own. No need to be babied.”

“But you’re so small!” Roger grinned but John gave him a death glare.

“Bring her roses,” Freddie advised him. “You always give roses to a ballerina after a performance.”

“Gee, Freddie, you seem to know so much, why don’t you go instead? Kiss her for me as well.” John stuck his tongue out.

“You’re going to kiss her? John that’s first base!” Brian teased.

“I hate you all.” John groaned.

“We love you too,” they replied in unison once more.

“And she’s going to love you too,” Freddie grinned.

After an exhausting day of teasing for John and training for you, evening was drawing nearer. The girls were all in one room, putting glitter and makeup on each other’s faces and brushing up hair into tight buns.

“Y/N’s man is coming over today,” Rose told a girl who was dancing next to her, a she was applying mascara.

“Rose,” you warned her slightly.

“Ooh, who is it?” The girl, Pamela, blinked fast, adjusting to the mascara.

“This guy, he’s called John.” You mumbled, incredibly flustered suddenly.

“John Deacon.”

“Who the hell is that?” Beverly, the girl who danced as Odile asked.

“Only the bassist of Queen.” Rose bragged.

“Rose! Shut up, we’re barely dating.”

Rose mouthed, it’s because she’s a prude behind your back and the rest of the girls giggled.

“Well, Y/N, I hope your man can behave at a ballet show, if he’s from a rock band.” Pamela pumped her brows up a bit.

“He’s great! Calm, sweet, but so energetic.” You told them.

“Fantastic.” Beverly clapped her hands together. “I hope he’ll enjoy our show.”

“And what comes after it,” Rose teased. You frowned at her but didn’t reply. The bustling of the crowd outside was finally heard through the walls of the dressing room. Some children, younger siblings and all that, parents, boyfriends, girlfriends, dedicated friends all walking into the auditorium with an excited buzz.

Among them was John, fiddling nervously with a bouquet he’d bought for you. Red roses, almost blooming. He hoped they’d last through the show. Some people did a double take when they saw him, perplexed not only by his imposing height but also his long hair. A young girl came up and asked for an autograph, scribbled on the program they were handed at the entrance.

The auditorium was huge. Seats for maybe thousands. He elbowed his way to the front rows, hoping to have the best view of your dance. You’d told him you were dancing in the background with your friends Rose and Pamela and that when you wore identical makeup, it was almost impossible to separate you, except by Rose’s red locks. He had promised you he’d be able to recognize you among clones and you had playfully shoved him on the shoulder, although you were very happy.

The lights dimmed and the show started, delicate beginning notes being played on the piano. And then the main character he was told was called Odette danced on stage.

His breath stilled. It was you. You with your tight stage bun and glimmering makeup, so strong you were almost unrecognizable. But it definitely was you. You danced with a sorrow in your step. He was told that the story was really quite sad, and he saw it in your mourning movements.

You were so graceful, he couldn’t help but be in awe that he was so lucky to have you. Occasionally, when the music turned to a minor key and the dance turned into sadness and pain, he felt tears brimming in his eyes. When Freddie gushed about ballet, he had been skeptical at whether it was truly possible to convey such intense emotions through dance, but when he saw you in action, all his doubts dissipated.

You received a standing ovation. Well, from John. Everybody was clapping heartily, having enjoyed the show. Some people had stood up with John, others were wiping their eyes. Some children had already began an excited gabble to their parents about the show.

John beat the crowd outside, managed to get to the front of the buzzing people. He couldn’t stop his grin. He heard the girls chattering to themselves on the other side. Somebody screamed in joy and everybody laughed.

You were only separated by a pair of sturdy oak doors and a dimly lit hallway where at the end every dancer was cursing their sore legs and undoing tight hairdos. Rose helped to take out all your pins and you did the same for her whilst gushing in excitement.

“That went really well, don’t you think?” You smiled at her as she tried to to remove some of the glitter plastered on your face, with little success.

“I think so, yes,” she paused for a moment, tilting your head back to get some of the stuff off your neck. “Did you see him?”

You looked at her and smiled. “Well, uh no, not really, I got so caught in the stage and the motion and the music. But I felt him, y’know? Like, his dopey grin just shone to me.”

“Aw, Y/N’s been turned into a sap,” Beverly joked, pulling on a sweater and trousers.  

“Excuse me, you would too, if you were around him.”

“I wish I had someone,” Pamela wiped off her lipstick and grimaced.

Rose looked at her quickly, flushed a bright red only you noticed and then turned back to you, smiling sheepishly, saying nothing. You studied her face and caught her eye but didn’t say anything.

“You ready?” She whispered as you glanced in the mirror one more time before nodding and leaving the dressing room.

The chatter was becoming more obvious the more you neared the exit. Pushing the heavy doors open, a pang of hot air hit your face and then you were out and you heard the excitement and the little children and your eyes were searching the crowd.

When you saw him, with his lopsided bowtie and gorgeous red roses he was holding, your heart stopped. He was grinning, ear to ear, flushed with pride. John thought you were so beautiful, breathtaking, with your hair just taken down from a tight stage bun, show make up still glimmering slightly on your face.

Cupid twisted the arrow he’d embedded into your heart and common sense was thrown out of the window. The feeling of being in love embraced you and left your heart soaring. Nothing could stop you as you ran up to him and before he could open his mouth to congratulate you, you took his face in your hands and on tiptoes you kissed him, slightly missing the center of his lips but hitting the mark all the same.

He kissed back, almost dropping the roses. It wasn’t ferocious or possessive, it was sweet. He tasted of cigarettes and red wine and the smell of his cologne flooded your nose. It was like a dance, synchronised, almost practiced. It was perfect, passionate and soft.

When you pulled away, slightly out of breath, he was starstruck, eyes shining. “Wow, I-” he blinked and laughed. “If I got a kiss everytime I went to your shows, I would’ve come sooner.” You giggled and took the roses.

“Thank you.” People were staring, but you didn’t care. “Really, it means a lot.” He was still grinning like an idiot and you were sure the same grin graced your face, eyes squinting, nose wrinkly, all in the glory of being in love.

He giggled then he leaned down and pressed his forehead against yours. “You were so amazing dancing, I kept thinking I know her. You’re my favourite celebrity.”

"Oh, I'm hardly a celebrity," you laughed, blushing.

He handed you the roses after one more kiss and you marveled at how good they smelled. He had held them so close to him that part of his cologne had gotten stuck to it as well, and you revelled in the scent.

More people came up and congratulated you, a bit intimidated by John’s presence but happy for you all the same. A small child ran into you for a hug and gushed about you being their favourite princess. He was pulled away from you by embarrassed parents.

After the crowd had cleared a bit, John laced his fingers with yours. “Can I take you out to dinner?”

“Of course,” you smiled at him softly and on your tiptoes, kissed his cheek. You felt like you were in the best place. Warm and comfortable with his hand in yours, his hair tickling your face as he leaned down and whispered more compliments to you about the performance to you.

He lead you out, where the evening had darkened to night, making jokes and acting like the happiest man on earth.

“John?”

“Yes love?”

“Thank you,” you grinned as his eyes found yours and sparkled.

“What for?”

“For the roses. And the kiss. You’re a great kisser.”

“Oh?”

You nodded with a serious expression.

“Well, I’m not actually really sure how I think of you as a kisser, can I kiss you again? Just to be sure?”

You giggled and let him softly cup your face with his hands and lean down to kiss you gently. He pulled away fast and had a mockingly thoughtful expression on his face and he smacked his lips. “Hm, I’m not quite sure yet,” he teased before leaning down again. You giggled into the kiss, arms wrapping around him.

Your heart fluttered, but not from nervousness or confusing feelings which had been far too present for the past three weeks. Your heart was fluttering because you were in love and you were happy and okay with it. You were more than okay with it. You loved it.

***

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