Blinded by the Light: the Series

Blinded by the Light Part Four: Lightning Strikes

Brian discretely glanced over at the radio alarm clock on the nightstand at the other side of the room, pleasantly surprised with the fact that it wasn't even ten past ten yet. He had estimated it to be way later than only just past ten; they had gotten home from the studio at half past eight, which meant that their dinner was more than two hours delayed in comparison to their usual habit of eating at six o'clock. When he had gotten Roger to eat at least half of the spaghetti he had hastily prepared in the hope that he could let that pass for dinner, it had already been far past nine, while there still had been so much that yet had to be done. The kitchen had to be cleaned up, the dishes had to be done, the bed covers had to be changed, and most of all, he had to get Roger ready for bed, meaning he had to put him in bath, help him shave, and most of all, talk him into going to the bedroom. It had seemed like an impossible task to do in a matter of an hour, which was why it surprised Brian so much that he had managed to get all of it done so fast.

'We're early tonight. It's not even ten past ten yet,' Brian informed Roger, who was sitting on the edge of the mattress as he closed the last opened buttons of his shirt.

'I'm sure that's because I was being so brilliantly cooperative,' Roger stated, giggling when Brian gave him a tap on the nose. They both knew that the drummer had not exactly been doing his best to quicken the whole process of cleaning around the house and getting ready for bed. In fact, with his preference for taking long baths and his incapability to keep water, soap, shaving foam, and similar liquid products where they belonged instead of on the floor, on the mirror, and in various other unsuitable places, he had done quite the contrary, rather.

'I personally think it's because I was quick to clean the kitchen, because if I hadn't done that in less than five minutes while the rest of the activities would just have taken as long as they did, I still would have been scrubbing toothpaste off the bathroom floor by now,' Brian said.

'I didn't know you put your toothpaste where mine is supposed to be!' Roger defended himself, the first hints of laughter audible in his voice. 'You know that I have to squeeze very hard to get just a little toothpaste out of my tube, so when I thought I had my tube in hands, I did just that...'

'... And squirted half of my new toothpaste all over the floor, thank you very much,' Brian finished the sentence with a sigh. He tried to sound quasi-indignant to express the fact that he was not exactly happy with the waste of perfectly good tube toothpaste, but he couldn't rule out the smile that threatened to form on his face, especially not when Roger started biting down his lip to keep himself from laughing about the unfortunate but secretly highly amusing event. Brian was unwilling to fully admit that it had been funny, since the last thing he wanted was to encourage Roger to waste more of their personal hygiene products, be in intentional or unintentional. However, that smug little smile the unexpected source of amusement had brought onto his lover's face turned out to be contagious.

'Don't laugh about it, will you? That was a brand new tube of toothpaste!' Brian managed in between a few badly oppressed huffs of laughter, of which the sound course did not go unnoticed by Roger.

'I know you're laughing, too,' Roger giggled, which was the last thing Brian needed to see to let his composure go and let his smile shine through.

'Okay, you've got me. Of course I am laughing, you should've seen your own face the moment you realised you messed up!' Brian told him, once again forgetting that Roger would always throw back at him for using the word 'see' in relation to him.

'Sometimes I'm glad I can't see, because I certainly don't want to be confronted with how I must have looked in that particular moment,' Roger chuckled, and Brian flashed him a both relieved yet painful smile. He was never entirely sure what he should do when Roger made comments about his blindness being useful. On one side, he was glad Roger was finally starting to accept his handicap as part of his life and that he was learning to live with it, but on the other side, no single advantage of being blind could ever live up to being able to visually perceive the world around you with proper eyesight. However, by looking at the small smile that lingered on Roger's lips and the lively look in his eyes, Brian could immediately deduce that no such negativity was torturing his boyfriend at the moment. Roger's comment was meant to be taken purely as a witty joke, and not as some kind of bitter, cynical, self-pitying remark so Brian decided to just laugh along with him to encourage him for finally starting to accept his fate.