thegeekgene (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thegeekgene) wrote2009-05-09 09:37 pm
thegeekgene) wrote2009-05-09 09:37 pm
Entry tags:
Scoptophobia
Title: Scoptophobia
Fandom: Punditslash
Pairing: Anderson Cooper/Keith Olbermann
Rating: PG13ish
Word Count: 1068
Summary: Anderson is perfectly justified in feeling he is being watched.
Notes: From 2008. Precursor to much later fic.
Anderson gets the feeling he's being watched. This is, perhaps, logical, as he is being watched – by producers, by camera operators, and by everyone else who works to put him on the air. He's also going out live, now, and is, hopefully, being watched by hundreds of thousands of anonymous strangers. Perhaps by more anonymous strangers then anything else currently being broadcast. (That would be nice. Unlikely, of course, but it's still a nice thought.) But that's not what he's feeling. He's used to all that and doesn't get that creepy 'right, being watched, now' feeling from it, anymore. He's realized that it's not really him they're watching – it's whatever he happens to be doing, or the on-air, or someone else who is entirely of their own invention. (Which is a good thing, really – the broadcast has nothing to do with him.)
No, what he's feeling now is that there's someone or something there, watching, who's not paying attention to the news or making sure he's doing the news right. There's someone watching him. Him, him. As in, him personally. Looking through the story and the newsman and past the too-expensive suit and straight in at whatever might be left when all that's been stripped away. It's an unsettling sensation, not least because he's not sure what there is left for his observer (if an observer there is and this isn't a figment of his sometimes paranoid imagination) to see.
The feeling persists for an hour or so, steady and stubborn, unchanging and unnerving. He looks around during breaks, trying to figure out the source of his discomfort, but no one's ever there – no one who's not supposed to be, at least, no one with eyes like razor blades slicing into a nerveless core that he sometimes suspects might be empty.
Reaching for an explanation, he recalls that there's some fairly common radiation (or was it a gas?) that can cause this sensation, trick the mind into thinking some ghostly apparition is observing them where no one's there at all. He makes a mental note to look into it and tries not to get too distracted.
He succeeds, for the most part and, eventually, between one breath and the next, the feeling goes away. Another break and he wonders whether he would prefer the whole thing to have been an illusion or that his observer had decided there was nothing worth seeing and left. This latter was a depressing thought, maybe even more then the idea he might be going really crazy, and he found deliberating the possibilities even more distracting then the theoretical phantom stalker had been.
Anderson is still turning the experience over and over in his mind as he makes his way back home, far later then he would have liked. He thinks that he really doesn't want this to turn into some kind of thing then wonders what the hell he means by that.
Keith is there, when he gets back, and he wonders when it became socially acceptable to enter the home of your sort-of boyfriend (not they're actually using that word – they haven't been using any words since they started their relationship, or association, or whatever, but especially in recent weeks if Keith's not around Anderson, Anderson's around Keith so it's not nothing, it's just undefined) without permission while he's not around and, apparently, help yourself to the contents of his refrigerator. He has to wonder about how fresh the food is, even as he reminds himself that Keith is an adult and would most likely not have reached his current age if he didn't have the sense to not eat anything with visible mold.
“Hi,” he says, and Keith responds by informing him on no uncertain terms that the abysmal state of entertainment television is probably a sign that the downfall of civilization is nigh. Or something.
“Hold that thought,” Anderson replies. “I'll be right back.”
He squeezes Keith's shoulder as he passes him on the way back to his bedroom and changes into pajama pants and a t-shirt as quickly as he can manage without doing harm to his daytime clothes. Once he manages that, he's feeling just a little bit closer to human and it's also about then that he notices the sensation that someone is watching him has returned. Huh, he thinks, and things don't so much click into place as waver into being.
“I thought you were set on compiling a definitive list of everything late night television does wrong,” he says.
The floorboards don't creek and bare feet make no sound but he can still hear Keith moving. He's leaning into his embrace almost before it happens.
“You're much more interesting,” Keith says. He kisses his neck.
Anderson smiles and reaches back, threading his fingers through Keith's hair, the contact doing a hundred times more then a change of clothes ever could for getting his synapses firing right.
“Were you at the studio, tonight?” he asks, mildly.
Keith stills and is quiet for a moment. The pause is either thoughtful or guilty, or it might be both. His silences sound kind of the same, sometimes, or maybe Anderson just hasn't heard enough of them to differentiate. He has this abstract hope that someday he'll be able to.
“I might have been.” He makes it sound like an answer and Anderson decides to let it be.
“All right,” he says. He starts to turn but Keith stops him with a push toward the bed – not hard, but pointed, and Anderson is entirely capable of taking a hint, when he wants to. He drops onto the bed and turns onto his back, looking up at Keith. His eyes are like lasers and Anderson wonders just what it is he's seeing. When he asks, Keith tilts his head to the side and shrugs, his gaze never wavering.
“Enough,” he says, in the same tone as before.
Anderson wonders at this for a moment, but only for a moment because then Keith's hands are on him, sliding under the shirt that hasn't even warmed to his body yet, and he realizes that maybe that is his answer, and not an evasion. There's an honesty in his touch that Anderson can't find it within himself to doubt so he figures he can accept it, even if he doesn't understand it.
Fandom: Punditslash
Pairing: Anderson Cooper/Keith Olbermann
Rating: PG13ish
Word Count: 1068
Summary: Anderson is perfectly justified in feeling he is being watched.
Notes: From 2008. Precursor to much later fic.
Anderson gets the feeling he's being watched. This is, perhaps, logical, as he is being watched – by producers, by camera operators, and by everyone else who works to put him on the air. He's also going out live, now, and is, hopefully, being watched by hundreds of thousands of anonymous strangers. Perhaps by more anonymous strangers then anything else currently being broadcast. (That would be nice. Unlikely, of course, but it's still a nice thought.) But that's not what he's feeling. He's used to all that and doesn't get that creepy 'right, being watched, now' feeling from it, anymore. He's realized that it's not really him they're watching – it's whatever he happens to be doing, or the on-air, or someone else who is entirely of their own invention. (Which is a good thing, really – the broadcast has nothing to do with him.)
No, what he's feeling now is that there's someone or something there, watching, who's not paying attention to the news or making sure he's doing the news right. There's someone watching him. Him, him. As in, him personally. Looking through the story and the newsman and past the too-expensive suit and straight in at whatever might be left when all that's been stripped away. It's an unsettling sensation, not least because he's not sure what there is left for his observer (if an observer there is and this isn't a figment of his sometimes paranoid imagination) to see.
The feeling persists for an hour or so, steady and stubborn, unchanging and unnerving. He looks around during breaks, trying to figure out the source of his discomfort, but no one's ever there – no one who's not supposed to be, at least, no one with eyes like razor blades slicing into a nerveless core that he sometimes suspects might be empty.
Reaching for an explanation, he recalls that there's some fairly common radiation (or was it a gas?) that can cause this sensation, trick the mind into thinking some ghostly apparition is observing them where no one's there at all. He makes a mental note to look into it and tries not to get too distracted.
He succeeds, for the most part and, eventually, between one breath and the next, the feeling goes away. Another break and he wonders whether he would prefer the whole thing to have been an illusion or that his observer had decided there was nothing worth seeing and left. This latter was a depressing thought, maybe even more then the idea he might be going really crazy, and he found deliberating the possibilities even more distracting then the theoretical phantom stalker had been.
Anderson is still turning the experience over and over in his mind as he makes his way back home, far later then he would have liked. He thinks that he really doesn't want this to turn into some kind of thing then wonders what the hell he means by that.
Keith is there, when he gets back, and he wonders when it became socially acceptable to enter the home of your sort-of boyfriend (not they're actually using that word – they haven't been using any words since they started their relationship, or association, or whatever, but especially in recent weeks if Keith's not around Anderson, Anderson's around Keith so it's not nothing, it's just undefined) without permission while he's not around and, apparently, help yourself to the contents of his refrigerator. He has to wonder about how fresh the food is, even as he reminds himself that Keith is an adult and would most likely not have reached his current age if he didn't have the sense to not eat anything with visible mold.
“Hi,” he says, and Keith responds by informing him on no uncertain terms that the abysmal state of entertainment television is probably a sign that the downfall of civilization is nigh. Or something.
“Hold that thought,” Anderson replies. “I'll be right back.”
He squeezes Keith's shoulder as he passes him on the way back to his bedroom and changes into pajama pants and a t-shirt as quickly as he can manage without doing harm to his daytime clothes. Once he manages that, he's feeling just a little bit closer to human and it's also about then that he notices the sensation that someone is watching him has returned. Huh, he thinks, and things don't so much click into place as waver into being.
“I thought you were set on compiling a definitive list of everything late night television does wrong,” he says.
The floorboards don't creek and bare feet make no sound but he can still hear Keith moving. He's leaning into his embrace almost before it happens.
“You're much more interesting,” Keith says. He kisses his neck.
Anderson smiles and reaches back, threading his fingers through Keith's hair, the contact doing a hundred times more then a change of clothes ever could for getting his synapses firing right.
“Were you at the studio, tonight?” he asks, mildly.
Keith stills and is quiet for a moment. The pause is either thoughtful or guilty, or it might be both. His silences sound kind of the same, sometimes, or maybe Anderson just hasn't heard enough of them to differentiate. He has this abstract hope that someday he'll be able to.
“I might have been.” He makes it sound like an answer and Anderson decides to let it be.
“All right,” he says. He starts to turn but Keith stops him with a push toward the bed – not hard, but pointed, and Anderson is entirely capable of taking a hint, when he wants to. He drops onto the bed and turns onto his back, looking up at Keith. His eyes are like lasers and Anderson wonders just what it is he's seeing. When he asks, Keith tilts his head to the side and shrugs, his gaze never wavering.
“Enough,” he says, in the same tone as before.
Anderson wonders at this for a moment, but only for a moment because then Keith's hands are on him, sliding under the shirt that hasn't even warmed to his body yet, and he realizes that maybe that is his answer, and not an evasion. There's an honesty in his touch that Anderson can't find it within himself to doubt so he figures he can accept it, even if he doesn't understand it.