Hold My Heart (Scomiche AU)

11: Spaghetti

 It was 3:30 AM on the Tuesday following the anniversary party for Scott's parents, and Mitch was not asleep. Scott knew that Mitch was not asleep because he himself was trying to sleep, and he hadn't been able to hear anything but the sound of Mitch's voice shouting unintelligibly through his wall for the past hour. He groaned for what felt like the millionth time, shoving his pillow over his head in an attempt to block out the noises, but it didn't work. What on earth could Mitch possibly be doing to make so much noise before the break of dawn on a Tuesday morning? With a resigned sigh, Scott threw his pillow to the side and sat up, rubbing his eyes sleepily and grabbing his phone from his nightstand.

Scotty: What are you doing?

Scotty: Go to sleep.

Mitchy: y r u up?

Scott furrowed his eyebrows at Mitch's clear avoidance of his question, but was distracted from his thoughts as Mitch's voice rose once again, louder than Scott had ever heard him speak. He groaned in annoyance. As much as he was infatuated with Mitch, Scott was grumpy, tired, and running dangerously low on the patience required to deal with this sort of situation so early in the morning.

Scotty: Can't sleep because it's 3 in the morning and my neighbor apparently decided this was a good time to be the world's loudest conversationalist.

It took a moment, but the silence rang out abruptly as, Scott assumed, Mitch read his text. He pushed himself to stay awake for a few minutes, awaiting the sassy response or joke that he knew was to come; Mitch may have quieted down at Scott's--okay, sort of shady--request, but he wouldn't let the conversation end on a negative note like that. So when, almost ten full minutes later, it was still silent next door and Scott still hadn't received a response, he was fully awake and fully panicking. Had he been too mean? Sure, he was grumpy and it was the middle of the night, but maybe Mitch had a good excuse for being so loud. Maybe he shouldn't have said it in such a shady way. D*mn it, of course he had been too mean. What was he thinking? He had to fix it, somehow. The relationship was so new, but Scott liked Mitch so much, and he was so determined to make it work. There was no way he could f*ck it up this early on.

Scotty: Sorry, that was mean. I was just grumpy. Forgive me?

Scott sighed pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes in hope of some respite as he anxiously awaited Mitch's response. He was almost asleep again when his phone buzzed on his chest, the vibration tearing through his entire body.

Mitchy: no no no don't apologize i'm so so sorry

Scott waited for a follow-up, for some sort of explanation, but nothing came. With a sigh, he placed his phone back on the nightstand and allowed himself to drift back to sleep, making a mental note to talk to Mitch about it in the morning.

Unfortunately for Scott, the morning turned out to be a whirlwind of hurry up and sh*t I'm late and where the f*ck are my shoes? that left him no opportunity to knock on Mitch's door with a cup of coffee and an apology, as he'd planned. Instead, he was frantically running out the door of the building almost a half hour after class was supposed to begin; it was uncannily similar to the day he'd met Mitch, but today, the brunette was nowhere to be seen.

The rest of his day was equally messy and disaster-filled, beginning with an uncontrollable riot in his 9 AM lecture at the announcement of a pop quiz and ending with a spilled coffee, a stained shirt, and a very angry businessman. By the time Scott was collapsing on his couch, coffee-stained shirt discarded on the ground, it was already past 7 and all Scott wanted was dinner, a movie, and Mitch. Unfortunately, he was completely out of groceries to use for cooking dinner and entirely unwilling to drag himself to a grocery store, and he had so much work to do that if he tried to squeeze in a movie, Scott was sure he'd not only get fired from his post at the university, but also from his position as best man/wedding planner in Kirstie and Jeremy's wedding. The only thing that could possibly make Scott's day better at this point was Mitch.