An unexpected love || Ant x Stephen

Talking - Chapter Eighteen

Stephen spent the last 3 hours trying to build up the courage to call Ant. He sat on his sofa with his phone on the coffee table just staring at it, eventually he picked it up turned it on and scrolled to Ants number in his phone, he clicked on it and hovered his phone over the call button. He couldn't do it, he turned his phone off, put it in his pocket. He got up from the sofa and walked over to his front door, he put his shoes on and went for a walk. He didn't know where he's going, he's just going to walk and see where it takes him.

Eventually he stopped, when he saw where his walk had taken him. It had taken him to Ants street, to Ants house. it was 5 o'clock in the evening, and Stephen didn't know what to do, all he knew was he missed Ant...so much! He wants to fix things. He didn't know what was going through his head at the time, all he knew was that he was standing outside Ant's house debating whether he should go and knock on the door. He stood there for a moment, took a deep breath and next thing he knew he was walking up to Ant's front door, and knocking. He stood there for a moment waiting for someone to open the door, when he heard the pitter patter of paws running to the door, barking and you hear Ant saying "calm down Hurley" he laughed as he opened the door, but froze when he saw Stephen.

"Stephen.." Ant said surprised to see him, the other man didn't say anything he just nodded faintly to Ant, when Ant gestured for him to come in, as Stephen stepped into the older mans house, he felt strangely calm but also nervous at the same time, he had no idea how this was going to go, or whether or not they could fix this, all he did know is he wanted to fix it, and that he wasn't going to give up on this. "uh you want a drink?" Ant asked Stephen as he sat down "um no i'm okay thanks" Stephen said with a faint smile "ant..." he started of nervously "i um-" he started before he was interrupted by Ant "no. No you don't have to...you don't have to say it Stevie" hearing Ant call him 'Stevie' again made him smile, he hasn't heard him call him that in a while "i do...i do have to say it." he corrected Ant "i'm sorry" he paused for a moment "i shouldn't have said that..." he trailed off. "It's fine Stevie...i understand" Ant said "no...no you don't! Because it's not our relationship that's making me anxious. Our relationship is the only thing keeping me...sane" when Stephen said that Ant couldn't help but smile "so...what did you mean 'these last few months' then?" he asked "i mean...i realised more recently that we're- we are going to have to come out to the public and then we'll have to deal with the homophobia, which will be inevitable, its just...telling people has always made me anxious, i mean even people I've known for ever, so telling people i don't know...i don't know how they'll react, i at least have a small- inkling how the people i know will react" he said staring at the floor, with his hands in fist. Ant grabbed the younger mans hands knowing he was digging his nails into the palm of his hands, so he grabbed them to stop him doing it.

"Stevie...why didn't you tell me?" Ant asked calmly and relieved that Stephen didn't want to break up "you know i would've understood and tried to help the best i can" Stephen sighed "I- i tried to but i couldn't think what to say....i thought after that conversation i had- well screwed this up and i thought maybe if you wanted to talk to me you would've called and you never did so i thought you wanted nothing to do with me and so i thought i'd screwed this up and that we were...." he paused again took a deep breath "over. I thought maybe we were over" Ant looked at Stephen with a look on his face which could only be described at guilt "Stevie..." he started as the younger man looked up at Ant and saw the guilty look on his face "don't..don't feel guilty this isn't your fault. It's mine, i need to work on opening up to you better." Ant didn't know what to say to Stephen, he felt kind of bad he never called, but he was happy that Stephen was here.

Ant gave Stephen a smile, that's all he could think to do, and when Stephen smiled back, Ant grabbed Stephen and pulled him into a long hug, and when he pulled away he said "i love you so much Stevie." which made Stephen blush and he smiled and replied "i love you so much too Ant" Stephen just looked into Ants eyes as he smiled and pulled him into a kiss, as they were kissing, Dec came strolling in, slightly surprised to see Stephen but also glad they had worked things out. "awwww" he said mockingly which made both men jump out of their skin and start laughing.