Em's eyes were soft and impossibly fond as he leaned forward to kiss Atlas gently. "Yeah, I… I'm starting to get that," he murmured. "I try to stay off the social media stuff, but… it's hard. I wanna know if I can improve, I wanna know what people think of me, I want… all that shit, and I can't hear anyone's opinions if I stay off so I… I keep going back. And I keep feeling like shit, and it's a never-ending cycle"
Atlas frowned slightly and leaned forward for another kiss, his lips lingering for a second longer. "Do you need me to delete your accounts and apps for you? Then you actually couldn't even go back to it." He said with a soft giggle. "The only person who can say if you need to improve or not is yourself. If you wanna change something about yourself, make sure it's something you really want and not something you saw some hater say about you. And if you do see something that makes you feel like shit, find me. I'm always here, for anything and everything."
Em squirmed a little at the laugh, kissing him back to distract from the discomfort. He knew, logically, that Atlas wouldn't laugh at him, but his brain and his heart were split down the middle and he couldn't help but pout a little. "I know, I know, I… I just have to know, okay? It feels better, in a weird way, 'cause I'd rather hear it from someone else than quietly think it about myself, y'know? It's easy to brush off other people most of the time, and… and anyways, I dunno. I'm not gonna change everything about me just because some idiot on the internet was rude, but… I wanna change. I wanna feel good about myself, and I feel like this at least motivates me a little.:
"I can understand that. I think it's good to change sometimes, it's definitely helpful at times. I just really don't want people to get to you so much to where you get depressed and…" Atlas swallowed, "I won't say, I.. I can't think about it…" His frown reappeared and he buried his face in the crook Emrys' neck. "Er… what do you want to change about yourself at the moment?" He asked, redirecting the subject.
Em frowned and pulled Atlas closer. "Hey, hey, I… I might be anxious, and I might've had a couple episodes in the past, but… I'd never…" He bit his lip, kissing the top of Atlas' head as he struggled together himself. "I'd never do that to you, or to Cadmus or Harley. I couldn't bear to. So… I'm gonna be just fine, okay? We don't need to worry about that. And… I'd like to improve my guitar playing, and… maybe be a little less passive during interviews."
Atlas pressed a soft, small kiss to Emrys' neck, a small sigh of relief escaping his lips. "Thank you… um, do you want any help with either of those? Not that I know much about the guitar, but I could still try to help in any way I could." He said softly.
Em nodded, pulling Atlas a little closer to his chest. He'd had issues with his mental health in the past, he was perfectly open about that, but… he hopes Atlas knew that he was in a better place today than he had been in a long time. "Yeah, I… I'd like it if you could help me be better at interviews? I always get so nervous when the camera starts rolling, I look like an idiot."
"I could definitely do that. I would hold your hand or something of the sort, but management would beat me up in the back afterward if I did that. Honestly, I'll probably do it anyway though." Atlas said with a small giggle. He lifted his head to look at Emrys, a soft smile on his lips. "Just pretend the camera isn't there. Just look at the interviewer, the wall or something, and you can always look at me if you need. Anything works."
Em laughed softly, nuzzling the top of Atlas' head. "Maybe we can sit together? And then nobody'll be able to see us holding hands?" He hummed as he considered the other advice. "But I don't think pretending the camera isn't there is gonna work. I mean…" He blushed slightly. "I already look at you all the time during interviews. ANd I'm still nervous."
Atlas' smile grew as he leaned to give Emrys a quick kiss. "If someone sees us close during interviews… it's fine since our fans seemed to have known we liked each other before we even knew it ourselves. If management gets angry, well we're already planning on leaving them sooner or later. So yeah" He saidn, kind of rambling.
Em kissed him back with a soft smile. "Our fans have been talking about us like we were a couple from the first time we met, Atlas. Even if they see us, nobody's going to believe them." He pecked Atlas on the cheek. "And anyway, having you around is… comforting. You always help me calm down, I don't see why we can't hold hands or sit close or anything like that as long as we keep it quiet."
"Exactly. But if management insists on asking, then I'll tell them. It's not like they can make us break up, that's not going to be happening anytime soon. But it's not even a big deal, most people won't even notice." Atlas paused, about to say something else, but deciding against it, "And I'm thinking into this way too much. Um yeah. I'll always be there, so you can count on that."
Em smiled and kissed him on the cheek. "They won't insist. They like me, remember? They'll back off if I tell them to, and it's not like they wanna know anyways." He curled closer, getting Atlas flush up against his chest. "And I don't think you're overthinking, I think it's… nice. It's good to know that one of us has a plan."
"Oh yeah, I forget that I'm basically the only one they absolutely despise, but it's a mutual thing so it's fine," Atlas said. He leaned into Emrys completely, letting them fall back onto the bed instead of sitting. "That's good though, they can't touch us now," He giggled as he said that," But yeah I guess we just have a plan for things. And Cadmus and Harley won't tell management as a joke now either since they're together as well. We rigged the system I guess."
Em smiled. "Yeah, we kind of did, though I doubt those two'd ever tattle on us, even if we hadn't gotten them together. They get how hard it is to keep things quiet, there's no way they'd sick management on our asses even if we really did something to piss them off."
"True, true. But hey we're protected from all angles. But speaking of those two, they're probably ready to go or at least close. All we've done it lay and talk on this bed… we should probably get ready to go…" Atlas said with a slight dissapointed tone.
"Ah shit, you're right." Em pecked Atlas on the cheek and then rolled out of bed, hurriedly shoving himself into his thickest sweater before he yanked on his jeans and shoes. "I heard they've got penguins in a special exhibit at the aquarium we're going to, d'you wanna see them too?"
Atlas, not so energetically, also got off of the bed and searched through his luggage. He grabbed a random tee-shirt and jeans. Pulling out his leather jacket, he smiled. He hadn't worn it in a while so he was glad to bring on the tour. He put on his converse as fast as he could, but of course, high tops aren't that easy to put on quickly. "My hair is so bad now, no cleaning the chlorine out and it's so faded… do you have a beanie I can borrow?"
Em peeked behind him and grinned when he caught the leather jacket in the corner of his eye. "I like your hair like this though." He reached over to brush a few bleached-dyed strands of hair off Atlas' forehead, leaning in for a soft kiss. "You look cute as a bleached blonde. And it looks really nice when you've got blue all over the ends of your hair."
Atlas couldn't help but smile into the kiss. True, it wasn't quite as terrible as he had claimed it to be since Atlas is sometimes a bit overdramatic, and if Emrys liked it, he was all for it. "Well, then I guess I'll just have to keep it like this for a bit then, yeah?" He asked. His arms wrapped around Emrys' waist. "But remember Hailey brought me hair dye yesterday or something, so I always have the possibility of dying my hair again."
"Yeah, you're gonna look like a piece of cotton candy." Emrys fluffed up his hair for a little longer, enjoying the feeling of arms around him before he pulled away. "It's gonna be adorable. And speaking of adorable, we need to head out now if we don't wanna miss those penguins."
Atlas leaned up and pecked Emrys' forehead before grabbing Em's hand, the keycard, and his own phone. "Yeah, we should definitely go. They'll definitely be adorable, but not as adorable as you, love." He said with smile.
Em blushed as he towed Atlas out the door and into the elevator. "Hush you flatterer, nothing's gonna be cuter than those sweet little babies." He unlocked his phone, wincing at the sheer number of all caps texts from Cadmus calling him down to the lobby because their uber was almost there. "Ah shit, they beat us down. Cads is gonna be pissed."
"Oh are you sure, I bet you $100 you're cuter than half the babies." He said, giggling. But he quickly stopped giggling, however. "Well… shit… there goes our safety. And he's actually capable of beating us to a complete pulp." Atlas lead Emrys to the stairs instead of the elevator. "They would expect us to go down the elevator so we're going this way."
"He's not actually gonna beat us up, Atlas!" Em hurried down the stairs despite his words, letting Atlas yank him down the stairs untl they emerged out into the lobby where a very ticked off Cadmus was waiting. Harley sipped at an iced coffee, looking amused.
"They're by the food court, sweetie," he suggested, watching as Cadmus turned on heel and charged them.
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