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Flash #3 - Ja!pov, daydreams (Ja/R)

The car is the most beautiful thing James has ever seen, gleaming red and black in the sunshine. The long, smooth bonnet, curves accented with chrome and - he shakes his head. That's nothing but a daydream.

Dreaming of the lean body, spread out across a just as beautiful bonnet, those chocolate brown eyes half-lidded with pleasure - that's not something to do during daylight, those thoughts ought to be saved for night and bed. James' breath hitches, nonetheless, when Richard walks up to the car, dragging his hand over the bonnet. That is the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Flash #2 - Je!pov, Introspection

He's not sure what does it, if it's the clink of the bottle toppling or if it's the hiss when he pushes the cigarette into a smudge of spilled wine. Something that night makes him stop, makes him take a long, hard look at his life. He doesn't like what he sees. Alcohol, cigarettes, an ever-trembling rage, what else does he have?

At this point in time, Jeremy's managed to ruin the one good thing he still had. He'll likely never return to telly, but when faced with never again counting Richard and James as friends, telly seems - inconsequential.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Flash #1 - R!pov, J/J

If it weren't such a cliche, Richard would probably be finding this quite amusing. Maybe. Well, no, he wouldn't, but that's just because his heart was (maybe audibly) breaking. There should be a cautionary tale about this, he felt; never introduce your love and your friend, because in the end you'll lose them both.

It's not that Richard is exaggerating, because he can plainly see that Jeremy's not only delighted with James' dry sense of humour, he's entirely besotted with the man. Richard doesn't have a claim, to either of them, but. It still hurts to see himself left behind.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

ya know what y'all getting tonight?

y'all getting flashfiction! because i'm bored!! and at work!!

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Christmas Traditions

Tonight, Jeremy admires a fashion disaster, Richard rummages in an attic, and The Stig wears a Santa hat. 

Jeremy Clarkson/Richard Hammond

6 am, Christmas Eve, and his phone blares it's time to wake up; it's with a grumble he does so, shutting the alarm off and sitting up in one smooth motion. He swings his legs out of the bed, shuddering when his feet hit the floor. Sometime during the night it began to snow, and an ever-thickening blanket of the stuff covers the world outside their window. Jeremy, for once deeply asleep and seemingly set to stay that way, burrows deeper under the covers behind his back. Richard gets to his feet, deeply regretting his choice to keep fit in that moment, and enters the en-suite. Softly closing the door behind him, carefully making sure he doesn't wake his husband up,   he does what he needs to before pulling on warm clothes over the boxers he slept in.

He throws an envious glance at the bundle of duvets and blankets that is Jeremy, making his way through the bedroom and finally out the door. Outside it's lighter than he'd expected, the snow doing a lot to decrease the dark of night; there's enough snow that Richard doesn't feel like running, instead going for a walk that gets him warmer than a run usually does. He stops when he comes to the thick copse of firs on the edge of the property; the light there is odd, streaming through the heavy snowfall and turning reddish, somehow. He stands there and looks for a while, before he starts making his way back to the house.

Kicking his shoes off inside the door, he cants his head and listens carefully for any hints of movement within the house; all is quiet, nothing stirring - indeed, not even a mouse. Chuckling silently at his own thoughts, Richard makes his way upstairs again, taking the steps two at a time and dropping an article of clothing every second step, until he's stood at the foot of their bed, once again clad in only the boxers he went to sleep in.

It takes a little doing and some careful manoeuvring, but soon enough he's managed to lift the covers enough that he can get under them - and close to Jeremy. He carefully gets into bed, halfway crawling until he's close enough to Jeremy that he can lie down almost on him, which he promptly does.

Jeremy wakes up with a satisfying shriek.

"Hi," Richard says, smiling smugly at him.

“Was that really necessary?” Jeremy grumbles, but wraps an arm around Richard nonetheless, pulling him down. Richard pretends to think for a second before shrugging.

“It really, really was.” Relaxing into the body beneath him, Richard took a moment to just breathe and enjoy the moment; Jeremy was slowly stroking his hand up and down Richard’s back, and Richard felt as if he any moment could fall asleep.

“We’re almost snowed in, by the way”, he eventually murmurs drowsily, words muffled further by being spoken into Jeremy’s neck. “If we want to get out today we’ll have to take the Landy, I’m guessing…” When a minute passed without comment, Richard raises his head slightly from Jeremy’s neck, snorting when he sees the older man deeply asleep again. Poor knackered old man, he thinks silently to himself, before settling down into a state of warm drowsiness, almost but not quite sleep.

At 8, or thereabouts, he rouses himself, just as careful now as earlier to not wake his husband; Jeremy, still deeply asleep, snuffles a bit before pulling the duvet further over himself. Richard snorts, shaking his head fondly, before going about getting dressed. He closes the door behind himself when he leaves the room, thankful he’d remembered to oil the squeaky hinges the week before.

It felt reminiscent of his childhood’s Christmases, tiptoeing out of his room, sneaking downstairs with his brothers in tow, doing what they could not to wake their parents; it’s the same sense of anticipation in the air, something that would in a story be called Christmas magic.

Richard pads, silently on bare feet, down the stairs and into the kitchen, getting the kettle going; this time of day, Jeremy was likely to wake up when it registered he was alone in bed again, but it wasn’t much use getting breakfast ready before he was up and about.

He leaves the lights off when he enters the living room, crossing it carefully to avoid the coffee table that has it out for his toes, and comes to a stop right by the big windows overlooking the garden. Warming his hands on the tea mug, he curls his toes and slightly regrets not wearing socks; the house is old and draughty, something he should be used to by now but never quite manages to remember.

When Jeremy suddenly rests his chin on Richard’s head Richard barely manages to avoid startling bad enough to drop the mug. For such a big man, Jeremy certainly manages to move quietly enough when he wants to.

“Merry Christmas,” comes the gravelly greeting from above his head. Jeremy wraps an arm around his husband, the other holding the mug of tea he’d made himself after blearily stumbling downstairs. The first thing he’d seen after turning away from the kettle had been Richard, outlined against the big living room windows, and he’d once again felt a thrill at how much he loved the younger man, and a fair amount of glee at being loved back. “Whose stupid idea was it to leave getting a tree to Christmas Eve?”

“Merry Christmas, Jez.” Richard stretches, careful to not spill either his nor Jeremy’s tea, and snorts. “I do believe it was yours, actually; I think you blamed it on tradition.”

“Can’t have been my idea. I only have good ideas.” Jeremy shakes his head, chin ruffling Richard’s hair, before leaning back slightly to drain the last of his tea. “It shouldn’t be a problem getting out if we take the Land Rover, hm?”

“No, it should be fine,” Richard replies, rolling his eyes.

“I can hear you rolling your eyes at me. What’d I do now?”

“Nothing,” Richard gets out between chuckles, fondly shaking his head. “Let’s get dressed and going; otherwise we might not get back in if it continues snowing like this…”

They do get dressed and get out, the Land Rover easily conquering the growing snow drifts. Richard lets Jeremy drive, taking the task of looking for the perfect tree upon himself – mostly because the one time he let Jeremy pick the tree, it had half the amount of branches it needed on twice the amount of tree.

“What about that one?” Richard points to a tree, half buried in the snow, that at least from a distance looks evenly spaced and decently dense. Jeremy brings the Land Rover to a halt, studying the tree intently before slowly looking at Richard.

“Do you mean the snow drift, or the pile of snow next to it?” Nevertheless, Jeremy gets out of the car, grabbing the chainsaw he’d had the foresight to bring. Richard, having in the meantime both gotten out of the car and plodded through the snow to the tree, stares at his husband in disbelief.

“Must you insist on using chainsaws? I’m still not sure why someone let you have one in the first place…”

Jeremy just laughs before starting the chainsaw. Next it’s Richard’s turn to laugh when Jeremy sets the saw to the trunk of the tree Richard had picked, and proceeds to get buried in all the snow that had, seconds earlier, been on it.

“Are you – oh god, are you okay?” he manages to say between chortles, laughing even harder when the only reply he gets is Jeremy spitting a mouthful of snow out.

Without the snow the tree is still perfect, if maybe a slight bit bigger than Richard had first thought; nonetheless, it’s the tree he’s decided on. Managing to cut it down, without further mishap, is something Jeremy credits to a Christmas miracle. He changes his mind when he realises they have to bring it home, somehow.

Together, they manage to pull it out to the road and heave it onto the car – Jeremy’s second Christmas miracle of the day is that he doesn’t throw his back out; Richard’s first Christmas miracle of the day is that his husband lugs the tree around with minimal complaining.

Getting home is a slight bit more difficult than getting out, the snow having piled ever deeper even in the short time they’d been away; they’d long since decided to spend Christmas on their own, but it looks like they wouldn’t have much choice.

While Jeremy unloads the tree and lugs it inside, Richard goes ahead to get a fire started and decorations for the tree down from the attic.

“Rich? Where’s the tree stand?” Jeremy yells from somewhere downstairs, and Richard pauses in his rummaging amongst the cardboard boxes in their attic to think.

“Check the garage! Or the wood shed?” The box of tree ornaments is much bigger than Richard remembers it being, but he makes it downstairs with it – taking the stairs blindly, and hoping he wouldn’t fall seems to be a working strategy. Not seeing anything because of the box makes the moment when he straightens up from putting it down all that much better, though, because the tree? The tree is enormous. They’ve got good headroom in the house – Jeremy standing straight and putting his arms straight up barely brushes the ceiling – but the tree still manages to be an inch too tall, the top of it bending to accommodate the ceiling. Richard looks at the box of ornaments, a box big enough for him to sit in, easily, and then back to the tree. “We… won’t have enough ornaments. I think.”

“And you complained about the tree I picked? At least that tree fit in the house!” Jeremy puts an arm around Richard, looking admiringly at the tree. It’s much too big, but really quite a nice tree. Richard, in turn, shrugs sheepishly. Jeremy chuckles, stooping slightly to kiss Richard’s temple. “It’s a very pretty tree.”

“I… didn’t think it was quite that big, actually.” Richard leans into Jeremy, enjoying his warmth after both getting the tree and rifling through the cold attic. “Want to help me decorate?”

“I’m going to have to, aren’t I? You picked a too-tall tree. You won’t reach.” Richard feels very magnanimous, ignoring the digs at his height, even if it in this case might be well-deserved.

Unpacking the decorations always brings Jeremy back to childhood, him and his sister bugging their mother to let them help; many of the decorations are from Jeremy’s childhood home, too, making decorating the tree a bittersweet moment.

Decorating falls mostly to Jeremy, with Richard standing back and calling directions around a candy cane, starting with the lights and ending with the tinsel, managing to end up with a tree that can’t quite be called fashionable, but it is a tree that truly fits them – tiny Stig with a tiny Santa hat included.

While Jeremy admires their fashion disaster of a tree, Richard goes to make hot cocoa; one of the few things he truly feels comfortable cooking, if it can be called that. Juvenile it may be, but hot cocoa after decorating the tree is a Hammond tradition, in keeping with what they did during his childhood.

Soon, the whole house smells of chocolate, accompanied by the crackling of the open fire.

When Richard turns around, trying to glimpse the tree from the stove, Jeremy is standing in the doorway to the kitchen, leaning against the jamb, watching Richard with a small, fond smile. If he hadn’t already been warmed up before, he would’ve been now, a warm flush of joy spreading through his body.

After pouring the chocolate into their two biggest mugs, Richard carefully makes his way over to Jeremy, and goes to hand him one before noticing that he’s engrossed in looking like he’s not the slightest bit interested in the ceiling. Glancing up, it’s obvious what Jeremy’s patently not looking at.

“That’s new,” Richard says, indicating the mistletoe with a nod of his head. Putting the mugs down on the nearest flat surface (in this case, the top of the microwave oven), he lays a hand on Jeremy’s shoulder. “But let’s not ignore it, even if you’re an old sop.”

Kissing is slightly difficult when they’re both grinning like loons, but they make it work. They keep it soft, but Jeremy can’t resist deepening the kiss and licking the taste of peppermint out of Richard’s mouth, one hand in his hair and one on his hip. Breaking the kiss, Richard remains pressed against him, looking slightly dazed.

“The chocolate is getting cold,” he eventually murmurs, but makes no motion of moving away from Jeremy, rather kissing him again instead. Before too long he does, however, grabbing the mugs of chocolate and following behind Jeremy into the living room.

They sit down on the sofa, offering a prime view of both the Christmas tree, lit with twinkling lights, as well as the heavy snowfall outside.

“Merry Christmas, Jeremy,” Richard says, leaning against Jeremy’s side, mug of hot chocolate held between his hands.

“Merry Christmas, Richard,” Jeremy says, kissing Richard’s temple, his mug of chocolate balanced onehandedly on the arm of the sofa. With his other hand, he pulls another spring of mistletoe out of his pocket.

Looking up, Richard laughs silently at his ridiculous husband, but kisses him anyway, silently thinking to himself that this is what love and Christmas should feel like.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

hi lovelies!!

so! i’m a good bit into that sick!fic, and it should be up before easter - i’m in the middle of switching jobs atm so i don’t quite have the spoons to write, sorry dearies.

another fic i’m a bit into is the ABO fic someone requested quite a while ago, and it is Sin™. if you know you requested it, i wouldn’t mind if you hmu so i know you’re still out there!

to tide y’all over for a while, i’ll be posting 2016′s christmas fic because i never got around to that, sorry. enjoy it, two weeks before easter...

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

remember everyone: my personal is @grand-tourers (HERE) (idk if i've updated the info since my myriad of changes)

i welcome everyone into my inbox and or dms: hate, porn and bots are deleted and blocked with prejudice

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

sit rep: i'm ~500 words into the asked-for sick fic, anon! just so u know it's happening

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

okay so to both (maybe ur the same person? idk) anons in my inbox: if i find u, i will propose and marry u on the spot

i am going to write SO MUCH fic and i love u

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

if you're still taking requests i have about 8 million so im hella fingers crossed that you are

hit me THE FUCK up

no but seriously i’ll gladly (at the very least) take a look at ‘em! keep in mind: i’m unlikely to write ocs though

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Yuletide Treasure

Based on two prompts: ("Oh Little Town of..." They're on the road for Christmas, somewhere, and things are a bit different. First time maybe) and ("Deck the Halls" Decorating something for Christmas, whether it's the studio, a house, each other...Fluff and chaos greatly encouraged.)

OT3 - Jeremy Clarkson/Richard Hammond/James May, James POV

The airport is a riot of bustling activity, but two things stick out the most; Andy, hissing over his phone at someone, trying to find somewhere for the crew to sleep the coming night, and Jeremy, comforting one of the junior sound crew. The girl’s purple hair stands out in vivid contrast to Jeremy’s soft grey pullover, her shoulder’s shaking with barely supressed tears.

“Her gran’s sick, apparently,” Richard says as he sits down, gesturing to the girl with one mug, handing another to James. It’s full of something that barely passes for tea, but it’s better than nothing. They drink their subpar tea in tense silence, a small island of calm in a chaotic sea of stressed, disappointed travellers.

It was something of a Christmas miracle that they’d managed to find lodgings for the entire crew, even if it would be a bit cramped, with as short notice as they’d had, but James was still disappointed. Not that he’d be forced to share with Jeremy and Richard, forced of course being a misgiving word, but that they wouldn’t be home for Christmas.

He had really been looking forward to celebrating together. They had celebrated Christmas together before, but this would have been their first in a home they shared.

Disappointment curling into lead-heavy ball in his stomach, James begs off drinks in the hotel bar in favour of going to bed early. Since it was Andy, one of the few in the know about the trio’s relationship, who had booked the rooms, it doesn’t come as a surprise to see that the only bed in the room is an overly large double.

He doesn’t bother unpacking, instead gets ready for bed in a meandering way, and when he’s done – bedecked in a fresh, white tee-shirt and clean(ish) boxers – he curls up under the covers, as far from the door as he can, back towards it to lessen the risks of getting woken up unnecessarily even more. He’ll certainly get quite a few hours of uninterrupted sleep, the two other louts not likely to join him in bed before they’ve had their fill of drinks and social interaction.

When James next wakes, it’s to the unmistakeable sound of Jeremy and Richard trying to be quiet as they enter the dimly lit room, all light coming from the hallway outside. They both smell of stale beer and staler smoke, but there’s something else, something more than that, that makes James wake up properly.

Outside the window it’s still snowing, now more gently than the wild storm that had caused their flight to be cancelled. James had a feeling that the picturesque little town they were apparently staying in over Christmas was starting to look like something out of a postcard.

The room goes abruptly dark when the door swings shut, and Richard utters a vivid curse under his breath.

“Shhh!” Jeremy hushes him, the noise louder than Richard had been. Going by the sudden, silent stillness, Richard tries to convey that via an unseen glare, too. “You’ll wake him up!”

“I’ll wake him up? What about you, you big oaf?” Richard hisses, and James prays they won’t notice the bed shaking as he laughs. He has a feeling they’ll stop whatever they’re doing if he ‘wakes up’, and now he’s curious what they’re up to.

There’s a dull thud, sounding like a cardboard box being put down on the floor, before a dim light fills the room. Going by the angle, James thinks they’ve opened the bathroom door and flicked on the lamp inside, probably in the hopes of not disturbing him while still getting some light. A warm feeling fills him, and he’s pretty certain that this, this is what love feels like.

“Honestly I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Jeremy grumbles, in that way he has of complaining despite not really being bothered. Complaining just for the sake of it, keeping up appearances – Andy claims he’s been like that since childhood, and James isn’t surprised.

“You’re a regular Scrooge, have some cheer!” Richard’s reply is muffled, sounds like it’s coming from closer to the floor than it usually do, accompanied by something rustling. “Here, put this up around the doorways.”

“How, exactly, am I meant to do that.” Jeremy’s voice is without much in the way of inflection, and James almost chokes on his laughter. It’s the tone Jeremy always pulls out when humouring Richard, despite not being sure it’s a good idea go along with whatever it is.

“You’ve got a roll of tape there.” James can almost hear the negligent wave accompanying the words, just like he can visualise the long-suffering look Jeremy’s wearing.

Jeremy and Richard quiet down, the only sounds being something plastic rustling, and James is certain he’s hearing something jingling. In the peaceful quiet following Richard and Jeremy’s discussion, James almost falls asleep again.

“Hey, can you hold this?” Jeremy asks in a whisper, followed by a soft groan from Richard when he stands up.

“I’m too old to be sitting on the floor,” Richard grumbles softly. “Here good? Also, you know what this reminds me of?”

“Yeah, that’ll do. And if you start singing ‘Deck the Halls’ you can sleep in Andy’s room tonight.” James can hear the shit-eating grin in Richard’s voice when he, instead of singing, starts humming it, the ‘Fa la la la la’ underscored in smugness. Cheered up, despite not actually speaking to his lovers, James drifts off to sleep again, not waking even when Jeremy and Richard finally gets around to going to bed, too.

When James wakes up next, it’s to deep, chainsaw-like snores shaking the bed. Reaching out blindly he finds an arm to swat at, but going by the answering groan he gets after doing so, it’s Richard’s arm. Richard, apparently waking up enough to also take offense at the noise coming from Jeremy, does something that results in Jeremy groaning before turning over to continue sleeping. Since the noise stops, James is well pleased.

Chancing a glance at the clock, he’s shocked to see it’s no later than half past six, and yet the room is dimly lit in stark contrast to the pitch dark outside. The thought wakes him up further.

“What in the name…” The only conclusion James can draw is that either Santa or a department store has vomited Christmas all over their hotel room. The dim lighting is from a small Christmas tree, trimmed with red baubles and tiny, twinkling fairy lights, standing on the desk over a couple of wrapped presents. Around the doorways and the window there’s garlands of fake fir-branches hanging, also trimmed with red baubles.

James twitches, startled, when Richard suddenly leans against him.

“Merry Christmas, James,” Richard murmurs, and when James turns, to look at both Richard and Jeremy, they’re wearing smug smiles and undeniably fond looks in their eyes.

Richard is also wearing a Santa hat, adorned with mistletoe and a fake beard.

What else is James to do but pull him in by the shirt he’s wearing (blue, new, with a ridiculous print of a snowman saying ‘ho ho ho’) and kiss him silly? Well, lean over him, smugly noticing his gobsmacked expression, and do the same to Jeremy, of course.

“How… what? When?” James is aware he’s stuttering, but both Richard and Jeremy look at him so very fondly he can’t bring himself to feel self-conscious about it.

“We found this shop, an ICA?” Richard starts explain, with all the excitement of, well, a kid at Christmas. “They have everything, James, I’m not joking. We bought all of this there! We went out last night, after you’d gone to bed, it can’t have been more than a few blocks.”

“We noticed you were disappointed we wouldn’t be home for Christmas, so we thought we’d bring Christmas to you, instead.” Jeremy sits up, showing that while he had more restraint than Richard in that at least he didn’t wear a Santa hat to bed, he didn’t have enough restraint as to not buy an ugly Christmas shirt. His features a Santa on a rocking horse – reindeer, James corrects himself, after looking a bit closer.

This, James thinks, this is what love feels like. Bringing Christmas cheer to a hotel room in a country quite a bit away from where they’d hoped to be. Yes, he’s really rather grateful for the two idiots he calls his own.

At least he is, until they throw him an ugly Christmas shirt too. Then he’s mostly exasperated (but very much in love, still).

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Mod update

Hey all, if there’s any of you left!

Mod A is still gone, has entirely removed herself from the fandom as a whole, which I of course - and I’m sure many with me - find very sad.

That leaves this blog to me, then!

I’ve just finished my bachelor’s degrees, and everything should be calming down a lot right about now, so I’m planning to pick this up again. 

I currently have three (3) requests in the inbox, an ABO-verse OT3, a denial/pining/mutual unrequited love Je/R, and a cuddling Je/R Namibia fic: if you feel that you recognise these requests, you’re welcome to contact me again, both if this is still of interest or not. I will likely write all three even if no one contacts me.

That said, I do have some recently posted things, primarily on AO3, that I’ll crosspost here, too. 

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Mod update

Hey all!

Mod E here. 

The lovely mod A has taken an indefinite - and likely everlasting - break from the CHM fandom, and thus I’m the only one left here to keep up the Lord’s work (well, writing fanfiction about three middle-aged men, it can be argued if this is the Lord’s work or not).

Slash requests are open, I’m still holding true to the fact that I won’t write OC, so those are closed.

Thank you!

Mod E out.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

I was the one who requested that fic. It was beautiful and you captured the emotions so well! Thank you! :D

I’m so happy you liked it! :D 

Gosh, it was more difficult to write than I thought, but really fun!

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Breathing the same air

anonymous wondered: Could I request Burma fic? Jeremy worrying over Richard when he falls off of the horse? Thanks! (AN: not quite sure this is what you wanted, but it’s what happened.)

Jeremy Clarkson/Richard Hammond, references to The Accident

Having seen Richard loaded into what passed for an ambulance around here, Jeremy grabbed Tesco’s reins and went off to find diesel for the lorries. The hospital was four hours away, which meant that Richard likely wouldn’t be back until morning… which left Jeremy with about twelve hours of nearly panicking.

Getting the diesel, with help from Tesco, didn’t take very long, but worst of all, it didn’t distract Jeremy from the fact that Richard was in the hospital. He put on an unconcerned face for the cameras, of course, but he was fairly certain that James didn’t buy it – Jeremy didn’t quite manage the same glibness when talking as he usually did.

Having filmed Jeremy’s triumphant return with the jerry cans full of diesel, the cameras were shut off; all of them were more subdued than usual, the only other time it had been anything close to it had been in the Middle East, with James’s concussion.

After emptying the cans into the lorries, Jeremy and James set off to find somewhere to camp for the night, ending up on a grassy area right by the lake. The crew had other accommodations, Jeremy not quite finding it in himself to even fake interest at that moment, and he firmly rebuffed their offers to join them for a drink or two, to no one’s surprise.

Waving the crew off, Jeremy went off to find somewhere quiet, so he could catch himself a few minutes of sleep, and absolutely not to find somewhere a bit removed so he could worry and fret about Richard in peace. He imagined that if he told himself that enough times, he’d maybe start believing it.

It was pure luck, really, that he found the boulder; halfway hidden beneath a large tree, right at the water’s edge, it was invisible from where they’d parked the lorries. It was a nice boulder he thought to himself as he sat down, absentmindedly wondering why that sounded so familiar. Around the boulder were piles of gravel, and as Jeremy sat there he started throwing pieces of gravel into the lake, attempting to skip the few flat ones with little to success. Richard had always been better at skipping rocks than Jeremy, something Richard lorded over him at every possible opportunity.

He buried his head in his hands, groaning. Logically, Jeremy knew that Richard would be okay. At worst, he’d broken his wrist and so it’d be a pain for him to drive. Emotionally, however, it might just as well have been eight years ago, when the call had just come in that Richard had crashed and it looked bad. The only difference between now and then, he felt, was that now the crew understood why he was so distraught. Back then they’d just barely started putting their feelings into words, into actions, and not even told James.

It had been a pain then, trying to keep his feelings under lock and key, try to not seem as effected as he truly was; keeping the distress at a concerned friend level rather than a distraught lover. The sheer relief of not having to wave off their concern or explain his distress now probably helped him a great deal in keeping it together for the cameras.

Back then, back when no one even knew if Richard would wake again, when they definitely did not know what his mental state would be like – when they didn’t know if he would remember anything – Jeremy’s biggest worry had been whether or not Richard would remember him. He knew he could deal with anything, no matter how big or small, as long as Richard still loved him.

Jeremy shook himself, shaking off the memories in much the same way TGDog shook water out of her fur. Richard would be back in the morning, at the latest, pissy and sleep-deprived as all hell, but ultimately fine.

It was with this in mind that Jeremy slouched back to his lorry, resolving to try and get some sleep.

In hindsight, Jeremy wasn’t sure what he’d expected – desperately hoped would not happen? – but it should have been this. He’d probably slept a few hours, going by how dark it was outside the lorry, but now trying to get back to sleep was an exercise in futility, since someone had kicked a sawmill into action right beside his lorry. That, or James was back, and deeply asleep. The sound was about the same.

Jeremy quickly gave up the idea of getting any more sleep, instead crawling out of his bed and moving over to the garden chair he’d bought – hopefully it’d be more comfortable than tossing and turning in an empty bed.

He did a short piece to-camera, bemoaning James’s horrible snoring, before leaning back in his chair and gazing out over the lake. Even this late at night, it was devastatingly pretty.

Jeremy had probably dozed off for a while, sitting in that chair, because when he next opened his eyes, it was to a very welcome sight. Richard was crouched in front of him, customary smirk on his face, arm wrapped from wrist to elbow in a brace.

“Fuck.” It was a soft exhale, nothing more, filled with relief; Jeremy stood up as quick as he could, none of the usual cares about his back. Richard had just as quickly risen to his feet, and was soon crushed to Jeremy’s chest in a none-too-tender embrace.

“I thought – I knew you were fine but – I thought I’d lost you, dammit, don’t do that.” The words were barely audible, buried in Richard’s hair as they were; Jeremy quieted, breathed him in, the familiar smell now mixed with the musk of horse and the antiseptic smell only hospitals managed to have.

Richard clutched at him just as fervently, and once more Jeremy thought of the accident; of how, when Richard had woken up, it’d been Jeremy he asked for, and it had been Jeremy he’d clung to in the aftermath.

“’m sorry, bloody hell – I wanted you there, too, damn it all.” Jeremy felt the words more than he heard them, but he couldn’t let go, not just yet.

They stood, tightly pressed together, for a good half hour, the camera men either asleep or thankfully decent enough to realise this wasn’t meant for anyone but Jeremy and Richard. When they actually managed to tear themselves away from each other, they still kept within arm’s length, and only long enough to crawl into bed, opting to sleep in Jeremy’s; not just because it was closest, but also because it was the one furthest away – from James’s lorry, that is.

Come morning, they’d get out of bed a bit before anyone else, and when the cameras turned on, they’d be keeping their distance, that of a worried friend and not a frantic lover; in a pre-emptive strike, already hating the knowing glances they’d get, they hung James’s hi-tech tent out over the river.

But that isn’t until morning; now, it’s them, tightly pressed together and breathing the same air, reassuring one another that they’re alive, they’re fine, they’re still there.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

Could I request Burma fic? Jeremy worrying over Richard when he falls off of the horse? Thanks!

Anon, it will be my genuine pleasure to write this.

My genuine, heartbreaking pleasure.

Thank you.

[clarkson-hammond-and-may-fanfics]

hi lift Richard anon here thanx so much it was great i loved it! omg it was so good thanx! off corse if you want to write hardcore nswf i wouldnt mind really.. but only if you want to! same pairing maybe pls

I’m so happy you liked it!

We’ll see about that nsfw, muse might just strike!

Glad you liked it!