The three of them rest long after the January sun glimmers low over the city outside, slotted perfectly together like puzzle pieces, illuminated by the soft glow of morning. Japan stirs beneath them while their room sits frozen in time.
reward for @fervidusships for it’s a leap of faith, their fill for rare steven week
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Pairing: Adam/Andrew/Steven
Rating: Gen
Summary: Adam and Andrew are doing a Tasty shoot in Korea. They discover Steven is only one country away at the time and make some drunk decisions about it. (Basically Lost In Japan by Shawn Mendes, except Adam and Andrew are the ones that are a couple hundred miles from Japan and Steven will Not stop vacationing in east Asia.)
The coastal city of Busan is quiet and cold in the middle of this January evening, a couple of hours after the sun’s gone down. To keep warm, Andrew, Adam, and their film crew of two are tucked into the corner booth at a cozy little bar. They’re celebrating having finally wrapped the last lingering shoot of 2018 by indulging themselves in drinks and good company. It’s a welcome relief after cramming three different videos into the last two and a half days.
Now that the footage can be passed off to their editors, Adam has decided to relax and drink to his heart’s content, which in this case is clearly a lot. Andrew’s more than happy to keep a sober eye on him while he does. He never minds restricting himself to the pleasant space between buzzed and relaxed, savoring high-quality spirits in smaller quantities to a bunch of cheaper drinks. Besides, it’s enough to live vicariously through Adam, who is now well into his fifth fruity cocktail, laughing boisterously enough for the both of them and racking up enough of a tab that Andrew feels okay keeping it conservative. All that sugar and liquor means he doesn’t envy the mean hangover that’s gonna hit Adam come tomorrow morning.
Besides—sometimes, when it comes to sweet drinks, Andrew thinks he prefers the look and the idea of them to their actual taste. He thinks it now, watching Adam suck greedily through a straw while Andrew just purses his lips over the rim of a whiskey glass. Bourbon doesn’t need to sugarcoat itself; it burns the same way down his throat every time, until he starts to acclimate to the sting and let it warm his body pleasantly all the way through.
Synopsis: So this is Steven’s life for the better part of two months. Gym, lunch, thesis, Andrew at the library, Adam at the café. The thing is, he likes them both.
Words: 1546
Steven is a guy who likes his routine. Same breakfast every morning, gym at the same time every day. But lately, in the last few months, he’s developed a routine that really thrills him. Every day after lunch, he spends the whole afternoon at the library to work on his thesis. After a couple weeks, he gets to know the librarians pretty well, and though he likes Niki and Annie very much, he gets a thrill whenever he knows he’s gonna see Andrew.
Summary: Steven’s days lately are a series of reminders, mental notes taken of every blessing he’s been given. If he could bind them together in a scrapbook for his younger self, a promise of better days, he would.
The house is quiet, but not quite sleepy, when Steven slips in through the front door and nudges it shut until it clicks softly. His heart clenches fondly as he looks around the sunlit living room to see Rie asleep on the couch by the window, head pillowed in Annie’s lap and breathing deeply. A somewhat lighter sleeper, Annie had stirred when he’d come in, and she’s smiling sleepily at Steven now, agreeing with him via a glimmer in her eyes: Isn’t she perfect?
Steven beams. Yeah, she really is.
Annie looks down at Rie, hopelessly smitten, and when she looks back at Steven, her eyes catch on the fresh collection of love bites covering his neck. Her expression turns wicked, and that’s Steven’s cue to leave. He clears his throat reflexively and shuffles out of the room, grateful that he has a bedroom to escape to. She huffs as he leaves, and he knows he’s only postponed the teasing, but he can’t find it in himself to care when he walks into his room to find his boyfriends already wide awake and tangled up together under the sheets.
Come join us in celebrating Steven rare ships, from February 11 to 15, 2019!
Create something (fic, fanart, graphics, etc.) for any Steven ship (except for standrew, of course, this is all about rarepair visibility). Tag @rarebuzzships in it and use the #rarestevenweek, which i’ll be tracking. You can also add Ao3 works to our Ao3 collection.
All creations will be reblogged during the week and added to a round-up post.
Reward:
Everyone who joins will earn a custom moodboard based on one of their fills
Posting schedule:
Monday, February 11: slash ships - any m/m ship with Steven (styan, stadam, colim, etc.)
Tuesday, February 12 het ships - any m/f ship with Steven (stinga, stelorm, etc.)
Wednesday, February 13: poly ships - any ship with more than 2 people, regardless of gender, with Steven (stadamdrew, shyandrewven, etc.)
Thursday, February 14: anything goes! - you can post here if you were too late for the themed days!
Friday, February 15: anything goes! - you can post here if you were too late for the themed days!
Take a look at our Ship List for ships you’ve never considered before (and also to know how to tag your rarepairs)
Take a look at our Prompt Tag for inspiration
what if i can’t join?
please, please, help spreading the rarepair love by boosting this post, and also supporting our creators! reblog, like, and comment on their creations!
next challenges
keep an eye out - we’ll be holding character-based challenges like this every three weeks, and i’ll publish a schedule of the next challenges soon so you can start thinking of your fills in advance!
Alright, drabble request.... Inga Lam x Steven. Like a slow burn kinda thing, them realizing they have the same taste in music (they've actually gone to concerts together) and the same love for Food, in common.
ok this doesn’t really fit the prompt but i hope you like it still
fill for @rarebuzzships Rare Steven Week
Steven isn’t often around. Inga had been delighted when he moved to New York – she thought they could spend more time together, maybe see where this tension between them would lead.
But Steven’s a traveller. The fact is, she doesn’t see much more of him now that he lives in New York than before he left LA.
So she takes whatever she can get. Dinners here and there, concerts once in a while. She tries to convince herself that she’s not on the hook – he’s just a friend, they’re just having fun – but the fact is that she always tries to free up her calendar whenever Steven’s in town.
Which is a totally normal thing to do for a friend you don’t often get to see, right?
All these questions, all these doubts, however, fly straight out of her head whenever they’re together. Steven lights up like there’s no one he’d rather be with, and they stay up until dawn, just talking. Inga suspects this is a side of Steven few people ever get to see. Raw, unfiltered, honest.
It’s the Steven she falls in love with.
He texts her dinner Thursday? and she agrees before she can even realize.
Thursday is Valentine’s Day.
It probably doesn’t mean anything. His text only said Thursday, nothing about the special occasion, or a date, and anyway, he’s probably gonna invite other friends along too, like JP – JP always comes with.
Thursday finds Inga in the Tasty kitchen, stress baking. She can’t make valentine’s treats, because the last VDay videos were wrapped weeks ago so she tries her hand at making gourmet marshmallow peeps – it’s about time to start Easter themed videos anyway.
The first ones look more like boobs than chicks and she laughs so hard she forgets her nervousness for a while. It comes back in full force when Steven texts her can’t wait for tonight 😊 and she starts spiraling again. She ends up using the rest of the marshmallow mix to make a small heart, which she carefully wraps in a box and shoves at the bottom of her purse.
It’s not like she’s hoping for a reason to give someone a valentine’s gift or anything…
It’s just… there. Just in case.
JP’s not there when she meets Steven at the restaurant. Neither are any of Steven’s numerous friends. It’s just him, leaning against a brick wall near the entrance, hands shoved deep into his pockets, collar raised against the cold wind. He beams when he sees Inga, holds out a hand to guide her inside.
They’re led to a small table towards the back, very intimate even though the place is crowded with couples. Inga tries not to feel self conscious, acutely aware of the marshmallow heart in her purse, struggling to remember why she shouldn’t get her hopes up.
But Steven helps her out of her coat and pulls out her chair and her hopes skyrocket up. She’s speechless for a bit, trying to hide it by looking at the menu but after a while she can’t help it. Her knees are shaking with anticipation and she feels almost light-headed. She needs to know.
“Um, Steven?”
He looks up from the menu with a grin. “What’s up?”
“Um.” This is stupid. She should keep her mouth shut. Protect their friendship. “Is this a date?”
Steven blinks. “You-you didn’t know?” He facepalms just a bit, chuckling at himself. “I thought it was obvious, since…” He gestures around them at the fancy restaurant, the valentines themed menu, the roses in a vase on the table.
“Oh! I don’t, um. I’m not good at reading between the lines.”
Steven scrunches up his nose. “Sorry about that… if you want we could go to some place low key, grab some pizza, just as friends.”
“No! I mean, um. I’m okay with this being a date.”
“Just okay?” Steven pouts, but amusement gleams in his eye.
“I got something for you,” she blurts out before she can think of backing out. She pulls the small box out of her bag and hands it to him.
He unwraps it gently. “Is that a — ”
“A matcha and gold leaf marshmallow peep — well, this one is a heart, not a peep, but, um. It made me think of you.”
Inga hides behind a curtain of her hair — one of her nervous habits when she gets shy.
“I love it,” he says, taking her hand on the table.
“Yeah?”
“I wish I could bake like you,” he says, rubbing circles inside her wrist. “Maybe you could teach me?”
Inga doesn’t know where this bravery came from but she jumps on it, blunter than ever before. “Free tomorrow morning?”