I wrote a short little thing about Beatrice and Benedick from Nothing Much To Do (which, by the way, is my new obsession). This is a little bit of it. Click here to read the whole thing on AO3.
In which "dickface" is a term of endearment and "You're an ass" means "I love you".
Benedick Hobbes was sulking. He didn’t like it. He had hoped that if he tried to make a video, he might be able to work out his thoughts into something resembling coherency but he had been proven utterly wrong. As he lay sprawled on his bed, so many different things fought for attention in his head that he couldn’t even begin to name them all. He was angry with Claudio for humiliating Hero—a genuinely kind human being. But he may have been even angrier at Pedro for making him choose sides. A surge of nausea reminded him how helpless he felt. He had told Beatrice that everything would work out, that this would all be over and they’d be fine. But how could he promise such a thing?
And Beatrice. Interwoven with all these things was Beatrice. Thinking her name even gave him a small shiver down his spine. He hated himself for feeling glad that this whole situation had given them reason to talk without their usual venom. He shifted and felt movement in his bed—his phone was ringing. He glanced at the screen and answered.
“Beatrice.”
“Hey,” she answered with none of her usual lively spirit. She hardly sounded like herself. “Could I come over?”
“Sure,” he said, but she kept talking.
“It’s just that if I spend another moment in this hospital I’m going to go insane. And I don’t want to go home because no one’s there and...I don’t know where else to go.” Her voice trailed away into silence and they were both quiet for a few moments.
“I’ll make some tea,” he said. He thought he heard a half-smile over the phone.
