@kkobweek day 6: Uchiha clan! With some implied narusasu again hehe. They are supportive, in their own way! Kakashi-kun, you're basically already one of us!
Fuck I made another one. Here’s a second part of Simon being a prick and working at a plant store (based on this post here)
(Also here’s the first part)
(Idk if I’ll make more)
————
Simon saw a lot of Colt for the first few weeks after meeting him initially. He came by a lot, telling him about his girlfriend (“We just made it official! I know, it’s a bit fast, but—” “I don’t care.”) and how everything was going. He would usually buy one flower now; a sunflower. Sometimes he’ll go for a smaller bouquet, but not as big as the first date one. He would call the store in the early morning when Simon wasn’t working to place an order, and then always pick it up when he arrived.
And he was a talker. Simon knew too much about this man’s relationship.
He sighs through his nose as he walks up to the shop now, having just dealt with a too long bus drive. He was lucky he always took the early bus to work. If he didn’t, he knew Elli would have his head for being late.
Colt was already there waiting for him.
He perks up from where he was leaning against the shop’s window. He smiles at him. “Hey, man! Wondering where you were.”
“You don’t need to wait for me,” Simon grunts as he walks past the man to open the door. “Elli is always working when I’m not.”
“Yeah, but she’s kinda scary.”
He scoffs. Understandable. He barely ever sees her outside of the two second window between his shift and hers, everything else is just a malicious, omnipresent email. He swears she’s always watching through the cameras to catch him slacking.
Even as soon as he enters the store, all he sees is the tail end of an arm and a leg before Elli books it out the back of the building to clock out and leave. Not even a hello, or at least a goodbye.
“Yeah, nice to see you too, El.” Simon grumbles as he heads to the back to shed off his jacket and throw on his work apron.
Colt is yammering away as he gets ready. “It’s going to be my one month soon with Jody! Can you believe that? I kept her interested for a whole month now! So I was thinking, ‘shit, I should get her something really special’! Then I thought about that movie, uh. Y’know…”
He’s waving his arm in the air with wide, circular motions when Simon walks back out, like he was scooping up something. He’s leaning heavily against the counter too. He wants to shoo him off of his space, but with what little he knew about the guy, one thing he did know was that he was always leaning against something. He said something about his knees always hurting and being too forgetful about putting on the braces.
Colt stops waving suddenly, palm open and arm stretched out to him. He’s looking at him with those tired blue eyes, brows raised expectedly.
Simon shrugs. “I don’t know movies.”
The man sags against the counter. “Ugh! You know it. If you’re alive and living in this century, you know what I’m talking about. The whole ‘lying naked in a bed of rose petals’ thing. I think she would find it funny and charming. Y’know, all the things I am.”
Simon wrinkles his nose in disgust. He knows too much about this couple.
“I don’t wanna hear about you guys having sex, man.”
Colt stands up straight now, clearing his throat. “Right, yeah. Too buddy-buddy. This is a strictly transactional relationship. I get that.”
He holds up his hands vertically and parallel with the sides of his head, chopping them forward in another odd gesture. He made a lot of odd gestures. He smiles after and crosses his arms over the counter, leaning forward on it again.
Simon sighs and goes to get his order. It’s roses, to his horror.
Colt takes the bundle of roses happily, paying for them quickly and going merrily on his way. He said a quick, “Thanks for your service, man, as always,” before he was out the door.
Simon didn’t know it at the time, but that was the last time he would see Colt for a while.
It’s weird. Even if Colt doesn’t come by every day for flowers, he comes by often enough, and stays around to talk while Simon gets his order ready. Maybe he would peruse the other options, some of the flora on the racks. He would always linger longer than needed when he came by, just to talk to Simon. He never asked questions about him, happy to just chat about his relationship and his job to a captive audience.
When a week went by without him coming in, Simon didn’t question it. He went about business as usual.
When two weeks went by, Simon started to wonder. Fleeting thoughts about if they broke up. He guessed the rose petal thing was a bit much. He didn’t really know. He’s not much of a relationship guy himself.
A month went by and Colt was still nowhere in sight.
Simon didn’t want to complain. Colt was always a bit of a bother to him. He talked too much about himself. Not really in an egocentric way, but just in a way that made it obvious he was trying to make conversation. He overshared a lot, mostly. Simon could never get him out fast enough.
Still, the shop was pretty slow. They didn’t get a lot of traffic in the evenings when he usually worked. The rare occasion he’d get someone, they wouldn’t make conversation. The most he would get is a small question or two before the customer would ultimately leave, either with or without a plant in hand. The rest of the time it was just a quick in and out from people coming in for their online pickups.
It could be a bit lonely, just him and the plants. Colt was bothersome, but at least he was captivating enough to drive away some of the boredom. He kind of missed having the noisy regular bothering him on days that just felt like they never would end.
It’s three months before he sees Colt again, and he’s…off.
Simon doesn’t look towards the door as the bells ring. He’s been busy propagating for a bit. The only thing that brings him out of it is when the customer passes by him in his peripheral.
He does a double take at what he sees.
Colt stands there, staring up at a hanging fern. He looks almost like a completely different person. The wavy bleached hair was cut just a bit shorter, fluffier and more of a natural dirty blonde. The leather jackets and baggy worn-in pants were replaced with a chunky knit sweater and cleaner skinny jeans. It looked like he had lost some weight, the large shoulders and clear muscle in his legs were slimmed down. And, most shocking of all, his nose was without a scar, left straighter—still a bit hooked—and glasses he had never seen before perked on the bridge instead.
Simon was staring. He knew he was. He just could not believe that it was Colt standing in front of him. It had to be some fucking clone, a phantom or something. Maybe he was seeing things again and needed to up his dose.
The Not-Colt notices his staring and glances over at him. He gave a smile, one that was so similar and familiar, but still not him.
“Hey,” he greets. Same voice, but not. Less of a growl to it. “Uh, sorry. I’m just looking. I won’t bug you, you can keep, uh, doing whatever you’re doing. Propagating.”
Simon keeps staring.
Not-Colt swallows and moves on from the ferns, turning away and heading to the shelves of cacti on the far wall.
Simon returns his tools to his apron, still keeping an eye on the eerie stranger. He heads over to the flower stand.
“Did you want your sunflowers?” He mumbles, more to himself than anything else, but still directed to Colt. Not-Colt.
The copy looks back at him. “What?”
Simon tries to stop staring, but he can’t. He feels his skin crawl a little at how different this was. It felt wrong.
“Sunflowers,” he repeats evenly enough for how freaked out he was inside. “For your girlfriend.”
All at once, Not-Colt stiffens and turns completely red. He laughs, strangled and awkward. “Oh, no, no. That’s not why I came in. I, um, I don’t have a girlfriend. Or anyone. I was actually just—I was just looking, y’know? Like, just…”
He makes a circular motion with his wrist and hand, just like he was scooping up something.
“Plants? I guess?” He ends off lamely.
Simon stares at him.
“Are you good, man?” He blurts out.
“What—um,” Not-Colt stutters. The blinks a couple times. “I mean…yeah? I don’t—I don’t know why you ask? Am I being weird?”
“Yes.” Simon answers bluntly. “You’re being fucking weird.”
“Oh…” Not-Colt shifts on his feet. Then, he clears his throat and throws a thumb over his shoulder—at the racks and wall behind him. “Okay, well, I think I caught you at a bad time so…I’ll just go, I guess. Sorry.”
Simon watches as the man distinctively not Colt at all practically trips over his feet getting out of the store. The door slams with a loud ringing of the bells as he leaves.
It wasn’t until later that night as he locks the doors, did Simon remember that fucking twins existed. He was a fucking moron.
Actor Simon who came back from a long break and injury in set where he lost his arm having to work on this movie project where he meets Ryland Grace. He’s there to visit his brother Colt who is a friend of Simon’s and reached out after he got injured because “I know what it’s like to get an injury and I isolated myself for the longest time and I don’t want you to do the same.”
Tom Ryder, who’s Simon’s co-star, keeps flirting with Grace who’s on set but Grace is polite about it. (I’m also thinking Simon was a child actor and Grace was a fan of his and he was his childhood crush.) Colt introducing Grace to Simon and they get on well. Grace still has a massive crush on Simon and he tries really hard not to make a fool of himself but it’s Grace.
Rocky and Adrian also work on set too. Rocky is a set designer and Adrian is a manager for Simon.
I'm still thinking of how damn funny it would be if you make a bloodymary au where Simon is just, occasionally in the background of all of Grace's logs that he sent back to Earth.
The teams are watching these, and at first they don't think much about another human and assume it's one of the other two. Except Simon talks in one and that definitely isn't either person that got sent up. In fact, Grace definitely sent back that the other two passed on the voyage, so who the hell is that?
Cue chaos as Earth tries to figure out where a whole new human turned up from. Rocky is comparatively normal; that's obviously an alien. Why the hell was there a human out in Tau Ceti? Why didn't Grace send anything back about this?
I am an absolute sucker for yearning Simon in any AU I make.
Let Simon be the one who wants to put Ryland Grace under a microscope and study him.
Let Simon stare at him and feel endeared by the way whenever Grace is looking in his microscope at something, he slightly sticks his tongue out.
Let Simon look like he’s stoic on the outside but has red cheeks whenever Grace clumsily flirts with him.
Let Simon want to reach out and touch Grace but he thinks because of his mutations and his past that he isn’t allowed to but when he finally lets himself reach out to Grace, he gets slightly addicted.
Let Simon be caring towards Grace because Simon has had to deal with not having anyone do it to him since his mother passed so he wants to make sure Grace knows he’s cared about. Even if he shows it in different ways and let Grace do the same for Simon once Simon opens up more and they start trusting each other.
Also! LET SIMON BE HAPPY AND LET HIM TRY NEW THINGS FOR HIMSELF TOO! LET HIM FIGURE OUT WHO HE IS AS HE PROBABLY HAS NEVER HAD THE CHANCE TO!!
I am in deep in bloodymary hell. My favorite flavour of it is Simon is rescued and Rocky hates him because he is hoarding Grace. In contrast, Adrian and he become besties and he keeps calling Grace Angel. Also! I am a big fan of the Make Adrian super big agenda! Let Rocky have a big mate 💜
I am still scared the youtuber will see my art, but I’ve been told he’s cool with that.
Simon’s appearance here is heavily based on a fic called Mary on a (Mary on a Cross) by orderly on ao3! (there’s some differences but the gills and photophores were pulled directly from the fic)
theartofmadeline
ellievsbear
gummygunk
origamiaround
kaledo-art
vaporwave
