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officialdiegorodriguez · 11 months ago

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Diego knew that, if she were there, he’d be on the receiving end of a glare from Marley for the words about to leave his mouth – but given the circumstances, he didn’t give a flying fuck.

“Harper, doesn’t it ever get fucking tired being such an insufferable little cunt? Don’t get you bored? Do you ever stop and think that maybe, just fucking maybe, it might be nice to not spend your every waking minute acting like an intolerable, soul-sucking, migraine-inducing little asshole? You make Maggie fucking Chance look like Florence fucking Nightingale, you dumb fuck!”

His tirade had been met with a loud gasp from Poppy, who he’d momentarily spared a sympathetic glance for, his chest aching as he’d noted the tears that had welled in her eyes. He knew those tears weren’t for Harper – even Poppy’s empathy only went so far – but he hadn't had it in him to comfort his best friend. He was in no fit state to look after himself, never mind anyone else. His gaze had wandered, as it always did, to Henry in the corner. Sweet, loyal Henry who always came to his defence or, at the very least, played mediator. The man he’d poured his heart out to, confessed his feelings to in a fit of vulnerability, who’d shut him down and spent the entire day avoiding him.

Yeah, that fucking Henry. The same Henry who’d kept his head low, eyes on his keyboard, as Harper had branded Diego a dirty little ponce, with Michael following her lead with cries of snowflake and limp-wrist; the two of them giggling deviously as Poppy had interjected, raising her voice in a way that he’d never seen her do before. She’d waved her arms frantically, desperately trying to garner Henry’s attention, insisting that Harper was being mean, and that Diego should take a breather, remove himself from the situation. She’d looked so small, standing there, trying to stand her ground, but it had all been white noise to Diego. His ears ringing, Harper’s retort on repeat in the back of his mind.

“Maybe if he wasn’t behaving like such a pathetic little queer, he wouldn’t be out here ruining the band’s fuckin’ rep.”

Everything after that had been such a blur. Diego could barely even remember what he’d said, only that he’d needed to get the fuck out of there. Poppy had followed suit, gasping as he’d shouldered his way through a gaggle of roadies on their break, bumping Noah on the shoulder a little harsher than he’d probably intended. He’d ignored the man’s snappy jibe, waved off Poppy’s cries of concerns, and simply kissed the girl on the forehead and told her he was going him.

“I need to get out of here. I know where I’m not wanted,” he’d told her, before turning on the spot and hailing a taxi before she could try and convince him to stay.

He hadn’t taken anything with him. He had his wallet, his credit card, and his phone that he’d promptly switched off the second he’d gotten on the road. Now, he was tucked into the relative safety of his and Poppy’s New York apartment and was curled up on the sofa feeling sorry for himself.

His chest ached as he replayed the events of the last few days. His head was spinning, and all he’d wanted to do was cry. It was pathetic, he knew it was, but he felt like the whole world was crashing down around him and he’d never be able to breathe again.

Henry had told him he liked him back. He’d said that, had offered Diego some semblance of hope, and then snatched it all away like it was just some sick joke.

I just think we should slow down. Pause for a bit.

The words replayed in Diego’s mind, a broken record caught in an endless loop on his least favourite song. He could barely make sense of it – the way Henry had avoided looking at him all day, providing no input during rehearsals, not so much as a friendly smile when Diego had entered the room. He had no idea what had shifted between them, what had caused Henry’s change of heart, but it stung harsher than any rejection he’d ever faced from Poppy, or anyone. The two had shared late night fumbles, stolen kisses in the back of the tour bus, and even just talked mindlessly into the early hours while the rest of the band had slept through long flights. Diego had no idea how he felt about his sexuality, had no real grasp on how he wanted to label himself or identify – hell, he wasn’t even sure he was ready to come out publicly – but his feelings for Henry had grown clearer with each passing day. The other man made him feel brave in ways he’d never felt before.

But all of that was gone now.

As he lounged on his sofa, a bowl of ramen warming his stomach, he glanced over at where he’d abandoned his phone on the table. The temptation to switch it back on was real, but he knew he couldn’t give in. If he did, he figured all he’d find would be texts from Poppy, maybe even Marley if the young bassist had filled her in on his tantrum, and that would only hurt him further. The only person he wanted to hear from was Henry, but he knew he was fighting a losing battle, a one-man army marching towards a future sure to crumble at his feet.

Pushing himself up off of the sofa, bowl in hand, he trudged towards his bedroom, figuring he might as well embrace his slob-like tendencies for the night and tuck himself in. He was usually a stickler for bringing food into his bedroom, always rushing around and picking up after Poppy, stealthily watering her plants and tending to their leaves where his scatterbrained friend tended to forget. As it was, he decided that desperate times called for desperate measures.

The minute his body hit the mattress, the universe seemed to send another big fuck you his way as he heard somebody hammering at his front door. He had no idea who would be calling to the apartment at this hour – particularly since everybody he knew thought he was out on tour right now – and so he opted to ignore it. He didn’t know his neighbours, so he figured it was just some asshole who’d gotten the wrong number. The pounding never seemed to cease, serving to build the blinding headache that Diego was suffering from, and he groaned as he set his bowl down on his bedside table, instead tugging his pillow over his face in a bid to drown out the noise. Whoever was outside wasn’t letting up, though, and Diego froze where he lay when a voice called out for him, his own name muffled on the other side.

If he hadn’t known any better, he might have thought that was Henry’s voice – but it couldn’t be, could it? Not when Henry was a few hours away, no doubt cosied up with Poppy as the two of them gossiped about Diego and his unpredictable moods. Curiosity got the better of him as he pushed himself up onto his feet, grabbing his bowl of ramen as he went – hell, just because some asshole had decided to come along and make his night worse, didn’t mean he should let his food go cold.

The minute he opened the front door, his heart tugged in his chest, confusion washing over him as he took in the sight of Henry Bly. For one, startling moment, Diego found his mind running rampant with thoughts, clambering to figure out what date it was, before exhaling slowly and bringing himself back to reality. It was still a few, short days until Poppy’s favourite holiday of the year, and he wasn’t about to fill himself with silly notions that Henry might have been inspired to enact some grand, romantic gesture by following Diego back home.

Diego’s eyes were red rimmed from tears that had spilled over the last 24 hours, his voice hoarse and hair sticking up every which way. He was clad in an old pair of sweats and a hoody that he suspected once belonged to Henry, so he had no doubt in his mind that he looked like fresh hell to the other man. His pride was the worst of his worries right now as he took in the look of horror on Henry’s face, the urge to reach out and pull him overwhelming him; he forced himself to grip his bowl with two hands, ignoring the way the tips of his fingers tingled with want.

“What the hell–” Diego started to say, his words immediately buried under the weight of Henry’s own.

It was a rare thing to have Henry Bly swearing at you, and Diego was sure there’d been countless occasions where he’d actually deserved it. In this instance, however, he had no idea what the fuck he’d done to be on the receiving end of Henry’s temper. Feebly, he set his bowl aside, clumsily discarding it on the shelf of a bookcase by the doorway, and raked his trembling fingers through his hair as he stared back at the man he’d made the mistake of falling for.

“What the hell are you doing here, Hen?” was all he could muster.

There had been a number of times when he’d climbed these stairs for other reasons, fueled by a desire to slip his tongue into a certain lead singer’s mouth. With, you know, other appendages also slipping into other orifices to put it crudely. Those times, he’d flirted with the notion that it was a bad idea, which was a sentiment that, right now, he wished he’d given more attention to. Maybe if he had, they would never have been in this situation, Henry pounding up stairwell after stairwell to Diego Rodriguez’s high rise apartment with no idea what he would find on the other side of the door.

There was a sick feeling weighing heavily in his gut when he realised he could be too late. Not only because the flight here had taken about four hours, but because Diego had definitely got the jump on him and had created about a two hour window separating them both. Two whole hours before Henry had even known he’d gone.

Breathing heavily, as he rounded the corner and began sprinting up yet another flight, he could still picture the way Poppy’s features had twisted in concern as she tilted her head at Henry and gently told him, “He flew back home.”

Poppy hadn’t seen reason to worry, but maybe she hadn’t heard Diego properly. What he’d said to them. She’d been there though, during sound check when Henry and Diego had been awkwardly sitting at opposite ends of the room, Henry sending furtive glances over to the other man then quickly letting his eyes dart away whenever he looked back. That wasn’t like him at all; Henry was usually direct and to the point, never coy. But he was avoiding Diego, or perhaps Diego was avoiding him. The specifics didn't actually matter, because Harper had of course decided to increase the awkwardness by tenfold and make yet another one of her snide remarks. Truthfully, Henry couldn’t even remember exactly what she’d said, but he remembered watching Diego flinch and Poppy tense up and Michael start laughing as if the whole thing was amusing to him. What had followed had been an argument that Henry had tried his best to stay out of, energy reserves drained to the point of him receiving confused looks from Poppy when he refused to step in and play the mediator as usual. He regretted that now, especially with the image of Diego’s hurt face still playing in his mind, as their frontman stared at all of them - not Poppy, never Poppy - and informed them, “Guess you’d all be better off without me then.”

The words had prompted Henry’s own breath to catch in his throat but all he could do was sit uselessly at his keyboard, frozen, as Poppy sprang into action and chased after Diego. Eventually, he’d had the wherewithal to turn to a cackling Harper and Michael and narrow his eyes at them.

“You guys are assholes,” he’d said, simply, before getting up and leaving. At least that had shut them up for the time being and he could see the shock registering on their faces as he passed them by. Quiet, placid Henry did not call his bandmates assholes.

After two hours of pacing in his hotel room and drafting text after unsent text to Diego, trying as best as he could to not think too hard about the other man’s words, he’d gone to find Poppy.

“How is he?” he’d asked her, expecting her to sweetly reassure him, because he’d managed to convince himself that his worry had been misplaced. That was he was overreacting in an uncharacteristic display of illogical behaviour. All that calm flew out the window when Poppy winced and gently informed Henry that Diego had flown back home.

At once, Henry’s blood ran cold. He could feel the colour draining from his face as he stumbled backwards, knowing it must have alarmed Poppy when he barely reacted after his back slammed into the wall behind him. Heart racing, he allowed Diego’s last words to play over in his memory again.

Guess you’d all be better off without me then.

Diego’s voice shifted a little in his mind.

You’d be better off without me, Hen.

He hadn’t said anything to Poppy after that, had turned away from her in a way he’d never have before. And so transpired the next single most anxiety-inducing four hours of Henry Bly’s life. He’d sat on the flight back to New York, picturing Diego alone in his apartment and thinking of all the things he could be doing right now as a man who thought the rest of the world would be better off without him. As he jiggled his leg on the flight, erratic little twitches coursing through his body and probably alarming the pretty air stewardess who evidently recognised him if the way she batted her lashes at him were anything to go by, all Henry could think was that he might be the one to find him. He’d have to be the one to tell Poppy, wouldn’t he? And Diego’s parents?

He’d thrown up in the airport bathroom as soon as the plane touched down at JFK, which was a five minute affair that ate into his time even more. His taxi driver apparently wanted to talk about their music but Henry bluntly ignored him, instead choosing to let his fingernails dig into the palms of his hands until they broke through the skin in bloody, crescent-shaped marks. Remembering how to breathe seemed like an inane thought at that moment, but he tried to focus on that anyway, whole body trembling as he forced himself to reckon with the idea that he’d caused this. Harper and Michael hadn’t. They’d just been pulling their usual shit, but Henry had been the one to push Diego away after the other man had opened up to him, been vulnerable with him.

Henry had been too wrapped up in not wanting Diego to turn out like Stefan that he’d inadvertently pushed him to, what? Be just that?

Nausea warred with him again. Thankfully, the cab had pulled up outside Diego’s apartment so he didn’t have to fork out extra cash for throwing up over the leather upholstery. Throwing more bills than necessary into the front seat, he climbed out and raced inside, bringing him to the present moment of reaching Diego’s door and hammering frantically on it.

“Diego?” he shouted, voice cracking. When his knocks subsided, he stood back and waited, unable to keep track of what was seconds and what was minutes, only able to acknowledge that Diego was not opening the door.

“No,” he whispered, terror clutching at his chest. He reached into his pocket to pull out his phone, unsure who to call first, an ambulance or his own father, when the door swung open and revealed Diego Rodriguez on the other side of it, bowl of half-eaten ramen in hand.

Distantly, Henry could hear the clattering sound of his phone hitting the ground as it slipped from his fingers. He stared at the other man, blinking rapidly as if to make sense of the fact that he was standing in front of Henry, seemingly okay. Instinctively, his gaze dipped down to Diego’s wrists and there they were, clean and unmarked, albeit adorned with numerous leather and beaded bracelets. But not… cut. Broken.

A wounded noise left Henry as he took a step back, dangerously close to the stairwell.

“You asshole,” he managed, voice hoarse.

#tw: homophobia #tw: homophobic language #tw: q slur #thread: henry3 #ft. henry

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