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tirednotflirting · 1 year

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this could be heaven (if heaven was an actual place)

hello there! it’s time for the 2022 5SOS Song Fic Fest ( @5sos-fic-fest )! it’s here! we did it!

firstly! many many thanks to @allsassnoclass for organizing this event! this was so fun and i’m very very appreciative for your support and for keeping all of us organized lol.

this fic is inspired by the song Mona Lisa, Mona Lisa by FINNEAS. (it’s a good one! go listen!)

special thanks go out to @reveriesofawriter for reading like three different versions of this silly little story and also convincing me at least a few times that i was indeed capable or writing this. meghna ilysm, idk how i got so lucky to know you. also many thanks to @kaleidoscopeminds <3 somehow the moment i was questioning whether or not i should participate in this event, meg showed up in my dms to encourage me to sign up. she’s got super powers i stg. meg ily your support in all things means more than i could ever express. also - shout out to my roommate who let me read bits of this out loud to her to check for flow. she’ll never read this but bless her.

here this is on ao3 if that’s more your jam

happy reading :)

Michael is still getting used to not waking up alone.

Before, when he was off tour, he’d wake around 9. Though all of the health Tiktoks he’d get on his For You page (and his mother) would advise against it, he typically would immediately pick up his phone and scroll through the notifications that had gathered while he slept. Usually dumb things on Twitter and Instagram, late night DMs of dog videos from Calum, emails also from Calum related to something the PR team needs Michael to do. Eventually, he would climb out of bed and shuffle into the kitchen to wake up his coffee maker.

While the coffee brewed, he would feed the dogs and turn on a podcast likely suggested to him by Ashton (he was big on podcasts for a while). He would let the dogs out to the backyard before sitting at the island with his coffee to continue listening to the podcast. His second cup would be accompanied by a scroll through his news app to check up on what was going on in the world. After he felt caught up, he would retreat back to his room, get dressed, and text Calum or whoever he was writing with or his manager, all depending on what was to be done that day. He didn’t spend all that much time with his mornings; there was always something to be done and he didn’t want to get behind on things.

But still, it was a mindless routine. His mother or Ashton would shake up the routine every once in awhile by sharing some tip they had heard or read somewhere that would have Michael adding in a glass of lemon water before the coffee or a gummy multivitamin that he kept on his nightstand to make sure he didn’t forget to take them. But ultimately the routine stuck to the same general pattern until Michael went on tour and would have to relearn the whole thing upon returning to LA so many months later.

That all changed after Luke became a part of Michael’s world.

It depended on the day of the week. He taught early morning labs on some weekdays and it made more sense for him to stay at his place closer to campus to get to those since sweetheart, I love you but rockstars live too far from the campus. This particular morning was a Tuesday, which meant Luke wasn’t due on campus until a meeting with his advisor at 3PM. That meant they could sleep in. That was the first change to Michael’s routine: rising a bit later in the morning. But the purple painted below Luke’s baby blue eyes worried him more than he would ever let him know, so they slept in a bit.

The ridiculous sleep schedule was one of the first things Michael learned about Luke. Though it had taken a week for him to respond to Michael’s first messages to him after being set up by Calum and Ashton (It’s not my fault they decided to set me up with their hot musician friend the week before my qualifying exams, okay?), Luke’s initial suggestion that they meet for dinner at 10PM was the first of an endless number of times he would make Michael laugh. It was the lack of predictability of their schedules that made their amateur match-making friends first think that they might make a good pair. Six months since their first date at the diner across the street from campus and everyday Michael thanks his lucky stars that his best friends love getting in the middle of his business.

On this Tuesday, something stirs Michael closer to around 9:30. They’ve managed to remember to close the curtains for once so the room isn’t too bright and Michael is grateful to not wake up to the blinding mid-morning sun. He hears a scratch at the door (the dogs are still getting used to routines a bit later than they like). Michael turns his gaze to Luke, worried that the sudden noise will wake him.

Luke faces toward Michael, his chest pressed against the mattress and the blanket and sheets pushed down to the dip of his lower back. Michael’s eyes catch the constellation of freckles dotted along his back and shoulders that’s grown from summer afternoons at the beach with the dogs. If Luke were awake, Michael would probably trace a fingertip between them but again, his brilliant boy needs the rest. Blonde curls are splayed out on the pillow and half covering Luke’s face in a way that should look messy but somehow still looks like a piece of art. How Luke manages to look so angelic while unconscious is a mystery Michael thinks he could spend the rest of his life trying to solve and still come up with nothing.

Chapped lips puff against the pillow at a slow tempo and Michael figures there’s no way Luke is close to waking. He gently slides off the mattress to keep the beat steady and shuffles across the carpet to the door. He hears a quiet whine behind him and turns. Luke has lifted his head just slightly from the pillow. His eyes are hidden behind the hair that’s fallen in his eyes and his bottom lip is pouted in Michael’s direction. Michael laughs quietly and walks back toward the bed.

“Sleep for a few more minutes,” he mumbles through a kiss pressed to the top of Luke’s head and the tip of his scrunched up nose. “I’ll have coffee waiting on the patio.” Luke hums something that sounds like agreement to the plan (he rarely gets any argument from Luke when the promise of coffee has been made) and drops his head back to the pillow. Michael waits in the doorway for a moment, smiling at the scene of this boy he’s fallen so hard for even after just six months tangled up in his sheets. He pulls his eyes away and gently closes the door behind him, only just barely fighting against the temptation to crawl back into bed and let the whole day slip away from them under the cover of bright white blankets and sheets.

Michael shuffles down the hall and through a morning-sun soaked living room. The kitchen is lit up from the big windows over the sink, the light bouncing off of a flower vase sitting in the window sill painting the countertops with a pink glow. Michael starts brewing a pot of coffee, the dogs’ nails clicking against the kitchen floor behind him. Moose spends the whole thirty seconds it takes for him to dump a cup of food in her bowl whining and looking up at him with pleading eyes. He laughs quietly to himself and pets the top of her head before he returns to the coffee pot. Michael has taken a pause on the morning podcasts; he’s found that starting his days with quiet is more effective in lifting his mood. He likes not having to pause something when Luke eventually comes out to join him.

He is comforted by the sound of the dogs eating their breakfast and the coffee dripping into the carafe. He remembers the first time he felt that, how he got so worried that he was settling into some kind of domesticity too young. When he raised the concern with his mom, she only laughed, saying she had felt the same thing at his age. He thinks about how his parents have spent their mornings for the last thirty years.

He reaches into the cabinet above the coffee machine for a couple mugs (his, from a radio station in Cleveland, and Luke’s, bright red and reads Trust me! I’m an engineer.). He pours them each a mug (adding a couple spoonfuls of sugar to his own) before heading out the sliding glass door onto the patio. He’s found that the fresh air wakes him up probably even more than the coffee, if he’s being honest. It’s late September and living in LA means the tile under his feet is still warm despite autumn arriving a few days before. The dogs run around his feet before chasing each other into the grass and around the pool. Michael smiles, squinting against the light and takes a seat on the couch after setting the mugs safely on the coffee table.

As he drinks his coffee, he finds himself trying to somehow savor the moment more than he normally does (he’s gotten a lot better at being present just in general, his therapist would be proud of him). He leaves for a short tour in a couple days and as much as he loves being on the road, he finds he misses the mornings most when on a bus for weeks at a time.

When he was away in June and July for a summer tour, he was reminded for the first time in a while of why he had spent so long guarding his heart from something like what he had with Luke. It was a tour with six bands Michael had spent the end of his teen years traveling across the country with during Warped Tour. It was like traveling with family, and yet Michael found himself missing someone other than his mom on tour for the first time pretty much ever. When he talked to Calum and Ashton about it one night in the parking lot before bus call and asked if they thought he was too into Luke and I don’t know guys, maybe this isn’t good for me, maybe we need to take a break. Calum had only rolled his eyes but Ashton smiled kindly and patted him on the back to tell him it was the exact way he had felt about Calum out on his first tour and then handed Michael his phone already dialing Luke.

Realizing his heart didn’t belong entirely to himself anymore was an adjustment but after six weeks of almost nightly phone calls (sometimes Facetimes when Michael found himself missing Luke’s too big smile and California skies and eyes to match it) and the trip Luke made to the Chicago stop (Michael, I want to visit the Bean), he thinks he knows how to go about things this time around. (It’s another thing his therapist would probably be proud of him for.)

It’s the Chicago trip that Michael is thinking about when he hears the back door slide open and a moment later, a pair of lips pressing against the bedhead he’s yet to bother taming. Luke joins him on the couch, immediately moving to fold his long legs up under him and settle under the arm Michael holds out. His hair is tied back in a tiny bun and he’s wearing one of Michael’s old stretched out t-shirts that’s threatening to fall from his shoulder. Luke looks so good in the mornings, it should be criminal. He takes a sip of his coffee and hums to himself, delighted at the taste.

“Good morning,” Luke says in a voice still gravelly from sleep, a lazy smile pulling at his lips. He presses another kiss against Michael’s jaw and drops his head against his shoulder. Michael lets his fingers tangle into the curls at the back of Luke’s neck while taking another sip of his coffee.

“Sleep alright?” Michael asks with a laugh when he hears Luke yawn. Out in the yard, South settles in for a nap in the sun. Moose continues to run in circles around the smaller dog.

Luke leans forward to set his mug on the coffee table. “Like a baby,” he replies, and leans back into the couch. “I’m going to come over here and steal all your fancy pillows while you’re out on the road. Costco pillows are like bricks to me now.”

Michael laughs. “You could just stay here while I’m gone, you know? Calum is going to be here to watch the dogs but I don’t think he’d mind the company.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Luke says with a wave of his hand. “We’ve already planned slumber parties so we can gossip about you and Ashton while you’re on the other side of the country.”

“As long as Moose gets her special treats, the place is all yours.”

“Thank you, honey.”

They sit in the silence for a while, the jingle of the dogs’ collar tags and the windchime around on the front porch a delicate soundtrack as they finish their coffee. Luke moves to stretch out along the couch when Michael gets up to leave their mugs in the sink and grab his journal.

The remainder of their morning routine continues from there. Michael does some journaling, scribbling down some lyrics in the margins until he finishes up the prompt he had been working on. After a few minutes, Luke stands and wanders into the yard. He stretches and runs around with the dogs for a while (his bright laughter when the dogs run between his feet the music to go along with Michael’s doodled lyrics). Eventually, he returns to the patio and drops back onto the couch, his head dropping to the pillow on the opposite end of the couch from Michael.

Michael pauses in his writing and turns to look at Luke. He’s lost the hair elastic that had been holding the bun at some point and his hair looks something like a tiny lion’s mane the way it fans out against the pillow he’s resting on. His fingers are pulling at the bottom hem of the t-shirt he’s wearing in a way that just after they met earlier in the year, Michael has always interpreted as a nervous habit. He remembers being worried he was making Luke nervous somehow only to find out it’s just what Luke did when he was working through some puzzle or idea in his mind. Michael studies his face now, the way his nose will scrunch up just the slightest bit, the small lines forming between his eyebrows. Luke’s eyes don’t stray from their gaze up at the ceiling as he reaches a hand up to scratch at the pale stubble on his jaw. It’s like he’s tracing out invisible constellations on the ceiling of Michael’s back patio.

Michael lifts a hand and gently pats at Luke’s ankle, a silent back in a minute with more coffee. As he heads for the door, he can’t be certain if the quiet buzzing he hears in between the windchime is the hummingbird visiting the feeder outside the kitchen window or the racing of Luke’s mind. He settles on the possibility of both and opens the sliding door.

He leans against the island as the coffee maker whirs back to life and looks back out to the patio. Luke has sat up in preparation for more coffee and even from the far side of the kitchen, Michael just catches Luke’s dimple as he lets the dogs climb all over him on the couch.

He thinks back to his parents again, about one particular picture that’s hanging in the dining room back home in Sydney. It’s the two of them, probably about the same age Michael is now, Michael’s dad laughing at something and his mom smiling fondly behind her mug. Growing up, his mom had always told him that that’s what love should be; someone who never stops bringing you joy, who never stops making you laugh. Michael spent a very long time thinking that it would be okay if he never found that romantically, that it wasn’t something he needed.

He thinks about the lockscreen image on his phone, a picture Calum had taken when the four of them had gone out for brunch in Chicago before Luke and Calum had needed to head for the airport. In the picture, Michael is wearing one of Luke’s hoodies and has an arm around the back of Luke’s chair. Luke’s eyes are closed in laughter and Michael is smiling as he reaches for his coffee with his free hand.

Michael never intended to share his heart with someone else. But as he fills the coffee mugs again to head back outside, he finds himself making a mental note to print some pictures for the frames in his dining room.

+++

It’s their last night in Paris.

They had started the day ambitious, intent on trying the fancy place a couple blocks from the hotel for dinner but after a day of sight-seeing, they both knew that they were lacking the patience and energy required to get changed and be in public any longer. Michael had been trying to think of a way to make the suggestion to stay in to Luke in the back of their Uber when Luke lifted his head from Michael’s shoulder to shyly suggest that they chill that bottle of sparkling wine they had picked up the day before and order room service instead. Over three years together and it still sometimes surprises Michael how in sync they often are.

They pass a couple of the guys from Michael’s band and crew in the lobby (Ashton and Calum missing because there was something Ashton had needed to ask Calum at the bistro where they had their first date on Michael’s 2016 European tour). Michael waves to them while Luke asks for the ice machine location at the front desk. As they wait for the elevator, Michael intertwines his fingers with Luke’s, smiling at the way Luke never fails to squeeze their palms together every single time Michael holds his hand. It gives him butterflies that he was certain had all flown away when he was still a dumb teenager traveling across the country in cramped vans and kissing boys in the alleys behind shitty bars that had barely even let a teenage punk take the stage. He lifts their joined hands up to his lips as the elevator chimes its arrival.

Their room is golden from the light pouring in through the open curtains as the sun starts its fall toward the horizon in between the buildings they can see from their balcony. They tend to be messy travelers (it makes Ashton anxious whenever he has to stop by for an allergy pill or Michael's Switch charger) and this trip is no exception, their clothes all mixed together between two open suitcases in front of the bed. It's not often they're allowed so much time in one spot but between some additional promo for the new single and actual begging with his booking agent, the band and crew (and partners with airline miles burning a hole in their pockets) got four whole days in Paris. Michael's been highly reflective for a number of reasons on this trip and thinking about how far he's come in his career, to be able to have that flexibility in his touring schedule, isn't lost on him.

Luke doesn't wait for Michael to follow him before continuing through the entryway and launching himself onto the bed. Michael leans against the wall, a smile pulling at his lips at the sight of Luke wiggling out of a cardigan Michael is pretty sure was pulled from his own suitcase. He's been grateful to have Luke out on the road, though he's especially happy it was this week he was able to make it out rather than a week of back to back dates. As much as he loves being able to see his boyfriend standing side stage night after night, he felt that Luke needed the rest. It's been a long semester for him, finally nearing the end of his studies. Michael knows Luke loves the work (he has a habit of reminding him even in his sleep on his most restless nights) but he sent his advisor a last, final draft of his dissertation for edits a couple hours before boarding the flight to France and the weight off his shoulders is almost physically obvious.

Michael tosses his hoodie toward the couch and grabs the room service menu before taking a spot beside Luke, Michael’s head dropping to rest against his shoulder. As the sun continues its daily descent, the sky painting their room in shades of orange and pink and purple as it goes, they call out anything that catches their eye to each other until Michael grabs the phone from the nightstand and dials for the room service line. Luke shuffles around and settles his head against Michael's lap and whispers last minute additions to their order as Michael smiles in between items to the person on the other end of the line. Luke doesn't move once Michael hangs up so he spends a few minutes running his fingers through Luke's hair fluffing up the curls that spent most of the day squashed by a beanie. He senses that the action is likely putting Luke to sleep so he asks him to lift his head back to the pillow, announcing that he needs to shower before food shows up.

Luke sits up for a moment and presses a kiss against Michael's jaw before dropping his head back to the pillow. He mumbles a promise to not sleep through the food being delivered as he reaches for his phone to set an alarm. Michael laughs but by the time he reaches the other side of the room and turns back toward the bed, Luke is already asleep again. He leans against the wall beside the bathroom again and smiles at the scene before him. Their somehow lived-in hotel room is bathed in indigo as the last moments of the day fade from the Parisian sky with Luke nestled into the center of it. The whole scene is a combination of so many things that Michael loves: music, touring, this gorgeous city, the person he so head over heels for that he gets to share all of it with.

He sometimes wonders if he should be worried, doing the long distance thing for as long as they have. Maybe he shouldn't be as comforted as he is by how well they work with Michael on the road and Luke as busy as he is with school but somehow it works for them. It's not something he's ever experienced with any other relationship in his life that exists outside of others in the industry. Up against everything that should make it all fall apart, they stand steady. He's never been religious, barely even spiritual if he's being honest with himself. But something about the view his eyes are taking in right now, Luke and their life and the skyline just beyond the balcony, feels like Heaven. Or whatever Heaven is meant to be.

A few hours later, Luke is twisting off the wire cage from the bottle of wine they had picked up. They're out on the balcony and the air is just on the cool side of a late summer night, perfectly comfortable with a hoodie tossed on. Michael doesn't bother closing the door when he comes back to join Luke with a couple of flutes he found hiding beside the mini-fridge. He smiles at the concentration shown on Luke's face when he carefully drops the cage on the table between them and starts twisting the cork. Michael places the flutes on the table a safe distance from where Luke is sitting right as the cork pops! into a potted plant next to Michael. Luke's laughter fills the air around them and he reaches for one of the glasses.

Michael watches Luke gently filling the glasses and finds his chest filled with an emotion he's been feeling every few hours since he woke up that morning. He's still doing a pretty good job at being present but he can't help the way he allows his heart to start longing for the boy across from him even before he's left to get back to the lab and the hallways of the university building Luke pretty much lives in when he's not with Michael. It's like there's a weight of something dropped onto his chest the moment Luke steps onto another flight away from him. It's a feeling Michael has had described to him from just about every person he's met on a tour who has a partner back home they’re waiting to get back to. It's a feeling Michael was hesitant to believe he'd ever experience himself. Now he's filled two albums just trying to describe it.

Luke leans across the table and sets a glass in front of Michael. He sits up for a moment himself and presses his lips to the corner of Luke’s mouth in thanks. As he settles back in his chair, his mind is pulled back to where they are right now: together, on a balcony in one of his favorite places in the world, in love, drinking horribly expensive bubbles. Beneath the table, Michael taps a slow beat against Luke's ankle with his foot. He feels floaty, like he's drunk on the moment before he's even sipped from the glass in front of him.

They talk about their plans for the week in the same kind of way that they would while making Sunday dinner back in LA. (In their kitchen, a title the space received about six months ago once Michael finally got the guts to ask Luke to move in. At that point, Luke had taken over a third of Michael’s closet, his entire bathroom counter, and was on a first name basis with every mail person that stopped by the house. Luke found the formality cute though and made a big show of changing his address in the university records when his lease ended the following month.) Michael and the band are headed onwards to Germany the following evening. Ashton had preemptively conspired some sort of reason to convince Calum to continue on with them to the Berlin show so they can be disgustingly in love and engaged for a solid 36 hours before Calum follows Luke home to LA. Luke has some meetings at the end of the week and needs to schedule a conference room for his defense at the end of October. Michael reminds him that the dogs have their checkup at the vet Friday afternoon and Luke runs inside for a moment for his phone to add that to his calendar because he had in fact forgotten. He returns with a quilt from bed and the slice of chocolate cake they had ordered earlier.

Michael shifts his chair closer to Luke so they can share both. It doesn’t get much better than this, he thinks, as Luke steals a kiss in between a bite of cake and a sip of wine. But then, he supposes, the city reads his mind somehow and the Eiffel Tower starts sparkling between buildings in the distance just behind Luke.

Yeah, Michael thinks when Luke turns to see what Michael is looking at and gasps, pretty close to Heaven.

+++

They have three hours until Michael needs to be back at the bus and four until Luke needs to be checked in at the airport. But the previous night, drunk on chocolate cake and sparkling wine and each other, they decided they needed to visit the Louvre. Michael had bought the tickets online and texted his tour manager the plan with Luke kissing down his neck and laughing in bed.

They had to be strategic in their plan for this visit, knowing they were limited on time. Luckily for them, it’s gorgeous outside, meaning that the museum is a touch less busy than it might be on a rainier day.

Luke decides they should finish their visit with the Mona Lisa since it’s likely to be one of the busier galleries and because he thinks it’ll be a cinematic way to finish off the trip. His labmates had been insistent that he tell them everything about his trip upon his return home, going so far as to schedule an additional meeting just before their lab meeting that week to catch up. He smiles to himself as he lets Michael lead him to the next gallery on their list, thinking about the chocolates in his suitcase he’s brought to share with Ellie and Jacob in their lab’s tiny break room.

Before he knows it, Luke is looking up and there’s a small crowd gathered around the center of the last room on their self-guided tour. They take a spin around the room first, admiring the other pieces gracing the space. Luke loves a museum day, but even more than that, he loves a museum day with Michael. He loves watching the way Michael will drop Luke’s hand to lift it to rest his chin in, his eyes slowly panning over a piece and then reading the card beside the frame, his fingers adorned with chipped black polish scratching at his beard. Luke loves art but there’s something about watching an artist love art that fills his chest up with a feeling he can’t even describe.

Finally they make their way to the room’s centerpiece, Michael’s eyes wide and maybe a touch watery as they take in the view. He’s been quiet in this room compared to most of the others. He reaches his hand back down for Luke’s, his eyes not leaving the piece in front of him. Luke keeps looking between the painting and Michael looking at the painting. He’s struck speechless, whether from the art or Michael, he’s not sure. He’s looking up at the piece again when Michael squeezes his fingers to get his attention.

“Not to be a dork but can you take a picture?” Michael asks shyly.

Luke smiles. “Of course,” he says, pulling out his phone. “Also you took like 60 of me with the Eiffel Tower, you are not a dork.”

He snaps a couple shots of Michael smiling just to the left of where the piece hangs several feet behind him, his cheeks pink and hair almost falling in his eyes.

Michael plucks the phone from Luke’s fingers as they step away, letting the people behind them take their turn in front of the painting. “How do they look?” Michael asks as he navigates to Luke’s photo app.

“Perfect,” Luke says. He reaches for Michael’s free hand as they head for the hall that will take them back toward the museum lobby. “Though she’s got nothing on you, honestly.”

Michael laughs brightly as they reach the stairs back to the Pyramid. “Now who’s the dork?” he laughs and lifts their joined hands to his lips. “Thank you for coming with me. Love you.”

“Love you too,” Luke echoes, and they step out into the light.

#5sossongficfest2022 #muke fic #5sos fic #michael fic #luke fic #cashton fic #hesitant to put that one but i'm proud of that side cashton alright?#they're fucking cute #songfic #also sorry i've never been to paris i was guessing for that entire section <3

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