Collab: Coed

Ed started to feel a little anxious - Colin had been gone just long enough to worry him. The band had been practicing for the upcoming tour, trying figure out how exactly they were going to turn the In Rainbows studio songs into concert songs. Some of the songs were easy to figure - Jigsaw had only taken minimal work, for instance, but some songs just weren't clicking. They'd been working on Reckoner for the better part of the afternoon. Colin had characteristically picked up a tambourine, but Thom had put his foot down and said that Colin was not playing the tambourine. Jonny had been playing with his laptop and Phil hadn't gotten involved, signaling that this was a petty argument and not worth his time to figure out. That had left Ed and Ed had sort of agreed with Thom. Ed hadn't thought it was that big of a deal, but Colin had left the room a short time after. Ed looked at his watch again and knew that Colin had had enough time to smoke two cigarettes and raid the vending machine, so he didn't know what could be keeping Colin away, unless he really was angry about the whole tambourine.

Ed was about to go and look for Colin, when he suddenly bounded back into the room, grinning from ear to ear, plastic bottle in hand.

What if he could enable Colin to do what he loved to do - shaking along to the music - and still do as Thom had told him to? Keeping that in mind, he went around the studio, trying to find something to put inside the empty bottle. It could be stones, marbles, anything. He even asked an absent-minded Phil who was reading in the newspaper whether he knew of something he could put inside the bottle.
"Just take the pebbles over there."
"Where?"
"There, in the small bowl."
"Whose are they?"
"I dunno..."
Phil knew that they actually were stones Jonny had collected earlier, but he wanted to get rid of the all-too eager Ed who wanted to help his friend. Who knew what Jonny had wanted to do with those anyway.
"Thanks very much, mate."
Phil frowned at being called "mate" because Ed never called him that, but waved him away anyway. So now all Ed had to do was finding Colin and showing him what he had prepared.

As he hurriedly made his way back to the practice room he almost ran into Thom.

"Edward! What did I say? No running in the studio!" he said, trying to look serious.

"Wha- piss off, you run all the time -where's Colin?"

"I'm allowed to run. I'm small and agile. You're tall and fat and clumsy and you'd break something. What d'you need Colin for? What's that?" Thom added, registering the bottle in Ed's hands. "You stole Jonny's pebbles! And you put them in a plastic bottle! I'm this close kicking you out of the band."

"Haha. Now, you didn't let Colin play the tambourine on Reckoner, and it seems it upset him. It's my fault, I should leave the tambourine to him, why won't you let him..."

"Edward, Edward, Edward..." said Thom smoothly "please calm down. I'm sure Colin doesn't give a flying fuck about that tambourine."

"Oh. Then what's with him?"

Thom rolled his eyes and smiled and Ed hated this smug face Thom was pulling so much he would have strangled him.

"He just doesn't know how to behave around you anymore, it's quite funny to watch."
Ed was at a loss, so Thom went on.

"I figured that ages ago. I may have a wonky eye but I see things, Eddie." he said, comically lifting his eyebrow. "I watched a lot of footage of our live performances and I watch you in the studio and it didn't last long before I put two and two together."

Ed feared to understand what Thom was implying. His brain tried to object, Thom certainly was taking the piss. Colin was gay, that was a fact, but still. And what about Ed himself? Though he had already fooled around with boys back in his school days, he was straight... Surely.

"You must be wrong, I would have noticed, he can't..."

Jonny chose this moment to walk in the corridor. Thom casually grabbed his hand as he passed.

"Hey, Jon-Jon, wait a sec; I was just telling Edward that your brother wanted to fuck him, am I right or am I right?"

"Wha-? Oh. Yeah, you're right. He does." Jonny answered matter-of-factly.

"See, Ed?" Thom smiled triumphantly, highly amused by Ed's horror-struck face. "Now, if someone's looking for me, I'll be in the garden hugging the trees."

"I'll go with you." Jonny said hurriedly.

When they both were out of earshot, Jonny whispered "Since when does Colin want to sleep with Ed?"

"He doesn't." Thom replied with an evil grin. "Oh by the way, thanks for playing along with me."

"Well, you used our agree-with-me-no-matter-what-I-say code, I didn't have a choice, did I? Had I known you were just doing it for fun..."

"Oh, come on, it's going to be fun to watch Ed struggling with his own sexuality and dropping hints Colin won't understand."

Jonny laughed. "Thomas Edward Yorke, you're an evil manipulative bastard. I think I love you."