Disney+ Rivals : Bas Baddingham x Female Character (undescribed - read as reader insert if you wish!)
Drabble written based on this idea I had and couldn’t let go off! Thank you enablers! 😂
He wasn’t really sure when it happened, this plummet into affections that he tried not to give name to no matter how far down in its depths he was. Bas knew what he was; a rake, a cheat, a serial lover with no fixed destination in sight, a playboy. He was proud of it. It was this dynamic that had kept him and Rupe friends for so long after all! Well, that and the shared trauma of a secondary school. Though the lad was getting sickeningly close to “normalcy” more and more since Taggie had come into his life. Still, despite this divergence from audacious antics that his nearest friend had taken, he at least had remained dedicated to his wanton ways. Till now. Till her.
Bas wasn’t sure what it was that drew him to her, not really. The first night they met, it was obvious, she was drop dead gorgeous. Dressed in a tight fitting number and heels that could spike an eye and a heart alike, she was a wonder - far too well dressed for even his fine dining establishment. He later learned it was all too common for London fashion but in that moment the only thing that occurred to him was the curve of her hips and the swell of her corset that drew attention to two of his favourite things. A rake, as ever. Drinks and idle flirting turned into something all too familiar; the entanglement of hot bodies churning in passion in back room of Bar Sinister - one usually reserved for private parties and situations just like this - and dear god it was incredible. But then the most baffling phenomenon occurred.
He couldn’t stop thinking about her.
Every patron who entered the bar, he found himself hoping to be her. He looked around every room in the hope of catching a glimpse, a whisper of her voice, the smell of her perfume. He felt sick to his stomach each time he couldn’t find her, and worse still felt his chest flutter every time he did. He could feel his heart pounding in his throat when he spoke to her, and the slightest shake in his hands which he quickly rubbed against the sides of his trousers to disguise the embarrassing tremor. He couldn’t stop smiling too, for goodness sake, it’s like his face was on autopilot and he had no control behind the wheel. At this rate, Bas thought, he might need to invest in those damn facial masks women use to reduce wrinkles from the involuntary constant grinning. Awfully vain of him, really.
Be it his dickhead brothers garden parties, or the curry night karaoke, a trip to the stables to check on his dear horses or a Venturer prep meeting, he found himself each and every time unable to stop himself slipping a hand around her waist and whispering in her ear till his pants were too tight and they found themselves pushed into a closet, a back room, a toilet or even just out in the open with hay under his arse. Every sound she made, every move against him, it felt like a drug seeping into his skin that left a confounding ache the moment they were apart again. Was he going mad? Was this insanity?
It must be, because suddenly he found himself unable to make it all the way with another bodacious beauty. Bas thought distracting himself with another woman might help, that it was evidently this woman’s incredible bedroom ability that had him coming back for more until.. Well, he could barely get ‘not so little Bas’ even interested. That had never happened before. Despite the friction of bodies over his clothes and frankly great tits in front of him, he just.. Felt nothing. Not really. It was mortifying. And it happened again, and again, and again, till he stopped asking others for it at all. Only when she was there, when she and he were all sneaked touches and cheeky winks did ‘not so little Bas’ wake up once more.
The signs were becoming undeniable. Even by his standards.
So he let this insanity grip him by the short and curlys and bloody rolled with it. If he was going to be a hooked, desperately obsessed, passion struck man then so be it. He couldn’t forget the look on her face when he approached and invited her to dinner, instead of another closet rendezvous. Unexpected was an understatement, given her slack jaw and wide eyes (a sight that he knew too well but for a wholly different reason) but in the second that it took his heart to plummet to his shoes and gut roiling feeling to puke half the bottle of whiskey he had stomached for the courage of this alone, it took only another for him to soar again when she blushed a beautiful tinge on her cheeks and said yes.
One dinner became two, became three, became five and ten until he had escorted her to a Venturer party with her arm in his, raising more than a few eyebrows to say the least. Especially her family’s. Though if any negativity was thought it was kept firmly under wraps for once. Another party, another night out to dinner and a film at the Cotchester Royal that she had mentioned wanting to see (the surprise that he had remembered her saying so was written in that beautifully adoring gaze of hers that had him feeling giddy), bringing her to Archie’s birthday party despite any protests from Tony - but family was family, as dear Monica reminded him. The spat Bas and his douche canoe of a half brother nearly ruined his nephews birthday till she stepped in, poor lad, but that didn’t hit him near as hard as seeing the disappointment in her eyes. He felt that pain twist in his chest worse than any fall off his horse.
He resolved never again, and sent a bouquet of roses to her door the next morning with a handwritten card of apology for the embarrassment - something Bas couldn’t remember having ever done before, save for the yearly Mother’s Day cards till his dear mother passed. He didn’t have long to feel awful however, because barely hours later she was on his doorstep and back in his arms and that was that. But he rather liked the feeling, he realised, seeing that touched visage on her. So he sent another round of flowers a week later when she successfully passed her interview with Venturer, and another when it was their six month anniversary. If you counted the first dalliance as day one, supposedly.
Now here he was. Utterly fucked.
Sat at the counter of his own Bar Sinister, watching her and Taggie discuss the potential of a cooking show - the two had stricken up such a fast friendship it had given most whiplash to be in view of it, which at surface level may have seemed like an odd duo but in fairness, how could they not have been? The redheaded chef was a sweetheart after all and his girl was a ray of sunshine to every one she met. Bas found himself admiring how she curled her hair behind her ear as she listened to Taggie’s ideas with interest, and how she adjusted her posture after the soreness of the night before (and morning) began to dig at her, how she shot him a side glance and a soft smile that he knew was meant only ever for him.
As he turned on the stool to grab for his whiskey glass, he noted the striking figure of his best friend barely a meter away staring in the same direction as Bas had been just seconds ago. Unable to resist the chuckle rising him, he wasn’t surprised when Rupert glanced his way in first confusion - then amusement.
“What a fucking pair we make, hm?” Rupert uttered casually as he slid over to the stool beside the Argentinian with his own glass in hand.
“Pair? You’re the one staring at Taggie as if she was the fucking sun with your balls in her vice.” Bas quipped back without a blink, earning another chuckle between them.
Rupert swung an arm back casually onto the bar, leaning against the wooden surface as he replied: “Seen yourself in the mirror lately, Bas? You’re not so bloody different yourself, even if you pretend otherwise.”
“Don’t know what you mean Rupe.” Bas sighed between sips of whiskey, toying with the glass between his hands. His gaze drifting between friend and her at regular intervals, one he hoped wasn’t obvious (and definitely was).
Rupert evidently saw it, and could only laugh good naturedly as he patted his friend on the back lightly. “You know I might be gawping like some lovestruck teenager, but at least I admit it. You’re in love, my friend, might as well come to terms with it. I dare say I finally have.”
The revelation hit Bas like a tonne of bricks being dropped off a roof and colliding with him like rainfall. No, no, that couldn’t… That isn’t what… All excuses, all diversions died in his mouth before he could even give them syllables till all that came out was a blunt, soft sounding: “Fuck.”
