When Stars Collide


"There you are!" Richard pointed the fact out in a hushed yet accusing tones. A passing member of crew turned his head, muting the "ssh" glare to a "quiet please" glance when he saw who it was.

Richard fought the urge to put his tongue out in a distinctly childish manner and ignored him.

He'd finally found James in the hanger-cum-studio, leaning against the side wall with his arms folded. His position gave him a vantage point, through the throng of audience, from which he could watch the stage where Jeremy was interviewing this week's guest 'star in a shite car'.

The cameras had stopped rolling for the moment, resetting something or other, and Jeremy was leaning back, laughing at whatever had been said.

Richard nudged James, already turning away. "Come on, let's get a coffee, I'm freezing."

James stayed put. "He's flirting."

"Who is?"

"Jeremy."

Richard glanced at the third third of their triumvirate. "Who with?"

"Philip."

He almost laughed out loud. "Don't be ridiculous!"

James was insistent. "Look at him!"

Jeremy was leaning forward in his seat now, full attention on the blond man in the chair opposite who was also leaning in.

"You know what it's like up there! You need to get close to hear one another speak over the audience and crew and everything else going on!"

"He hasn't been able to keep his eyes off him all afternoon."

Speaking of eyes, Richard rolled his dramatically. "James, I've worked with Phil before on..."

A hard glare struck him from a foot up. "Oh, it's Phil, is it? Not you too?"

Richard did laugh, as gently as he knew how to, putting on his best 'I love you, but you're being an idiot' face. "...on Petrolheads, and he's a nice guy, a funny guy. That's all."

James didn't look convinced.

Wrapping long fingers around his forearm, Richard tugged. "Come on, I need an Espresso."

~

They walked out to the portacabin in relative silence. Relative to the howling of the wind and the sound of the traffic on the roads surrounding the airfield.

About half-way across, hands shoved in his pockets, shoulders hunched against the biting chill, Richard knocked his arm against James'.

"So... what if Jez was flirting?"

"You said he wasn't." He recognised James' best-loved sulky tone, knew it of old. Knew James of old, now he came to think about it, and Jeremy. Jeremy was a flirt, just that often he didn't realise he was doing it. And Phil Glenister was the perfect foil for that.

He'd seen Neil flirting with him in the pub after they'd filmed that episode of 'Petrolheads', after he'd watched Chris get knocked back. Neil had done it on purpose, getting one up on their co-star. While Richard himself had bided his time in the background and waited.

Chances were Jez wasn't aware he was doing it and Phil was seeing how far he could take it. The thought made Richard smile.

"He isn't, he's just being himself. I asked 'what if'." He glanced up at the man mooching along at his side, braced against the wind. "Why does it bother you?" he asked softly.

James stopped in his tracks, hair billowing in the wind as if being blow-dried by some giant hairdresser. He lifted his eyes from Richard's to look over his head, back at the hanger. "Because we slept together last night."

~

"He's flirting."

James let the smile touch the corner of his mouth. "He's doing more than flirting, Jeremy."

Despite the gentle chilly gale and the soft spots of rain, Richard and Phil were walking slowly around the track, barely a crack of daylight between where Richard's leather-jacketed shoulder brushed against Phil's woollen-clothed arm.

Standing in the window of the portacabin, steaming mugs of tea in their hands, knees pressed against the storage heater in a desperate attempt to claim the pathetic whimper of heat it put out, the two presenters both stared out.

"What do you mean?"

"What you were doing earlier, that was flirting."

James was aware of Jeremy turning to look at him, but he continued to look out on to the blustery scene.

"What was I doing earlier?"

"Flirting, with Philip, when you were recording the interview."

"I was not!"

"You were."

"I wasn't." Jeremy peeled his index finger from around the mug just long enough to point at where Richard and their guest were approaching a tyre wall. "He's flirting."

"He isn't flirting. Flirting implies attempt. He isn't attempting anything. As he would say, he's been there, done that."

Jeremy's mouthful of hot tea was purged against the window pane inches in front of his face. James leaned to one side but not in time to avoid the splash-back.

"You disgusting man."

He didn't apologise. He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and smeared spit and tea over the previously clean window with his arm of his dark coat.

"You're trying to imply that Richard and Philip...?"

"I'm not implying anything."

Jeremy shook his head. "Not a chance."

"Couple of months ago, after the recording of Petrolheads."

"How do you know?"

"He told me this morning."

"Why would he just tell you that?"

James stalled. Not particularly wanting to admit to Jeremy that he'd had a green-eyed moment, he wasn't quick enough to make up another explanation.

The realisation lit up Jeremy's face as if the idea had been beamed directly into his brain. "You were jealous! You thought I was flirting and you were jealous."

James ignored him. Outside on the wind-swept track, Philip and Richard had paused in their stroll. Side-on to one another, hands stuffed in jeans pockets, they were saying something to one another over the wind. James watched Philip lean in, rub his chin on the top of Richard's head and pause, before they both moved off again, closer now if that was actually possible.

"Is it serious?" Jeremy asked, quietly, astounded.

Shaking his head, James reassured him, "No, just friends now from what Rich was saying. Still... it changes things, doesn't it?"

"What does?"

"Sleeping together."

Jeremy looked directly at him over his mug raised to his lips. "Are we still talking about them?"

James shrugged. "I don't know. Why does it bother you?"

"What?"

"Them."

Jeremy hesitated just a moment too long, looked back at the pair outside just a moment too soon.

"It's Richard, isn't it?"

"James...."

"It's all right." It was. "I'm not blind."

"No." Jeremy sighed, steaming up the window with the heat of his tea. "But I'm greedy."

~

"They were flirting."

Richard, arms crossed on the roof of the black BMW, turned and smiled, but said nothing. He didn't really want to think about that at the moment. It was Phil's gently commanding presence, his willingness to be himself, that had attracted him in the first place; standing in the pub, next to the bar, watching Neil leave and Phil's approach.

"Two down, one to go?"

That wide smile.

"Third time lucky?"

With a small sigh and a decisive nod of his head, Phil opened the driver's door, but Richard stopped him from getting in with a hand on his arm, fingers curling around the warm black sweater.

Then he hesitated. Maybe it was time to let him drive away, out of the more personal side of his life once and for all. But for some reason, despite this being only the second time they'd met, his opinion meant something. "You don't approve."

"That's not up to me, Richard."

"But you don't."

He could almost see the decision being made, shrewd eyes assessing. "He's a knob. You said it yourself, that night, Jeremy's shaped you, you're his protégé. He has to make way for you."

"He is doing."

"Willingly? Or is it just your agent being wonderfully demanding? Sleeping with him is going to bind yourself to him even tighter."

Richard closed his eyes against the dull daylight. "What about James?"

Philip's tone lightened. "I like James."

Richard cocked one eye open and wiggled his eyebrow, making him laugh. It was one of those sounds that made him happy to be alive.

"Not that much."

Turning away, Philip dropped into the driver's seat and slid the key into the ignition. He looked up at Richard as he moved to stand inside the open door, one hand on the roof, the other on the window frame.

"Thanks for the invite."

"Thanks for accepting."

Richard hesitated, oddly reluctant to let him go.

"If you ever feel like driving a cut-and-shunt Cortina around Manchester, come on up."

Richard's turn to laugh. "Ignore him, he's a knob."

Philip nodded once, smiling. "Bye, Richard."

Stepping back, Richard closed the car door and patted the top and the engine started, radio was tuned, and Philip left the car park, headed for the motorway and the North.


James was on his way in to the hanger when Richard passed him.

"We thought we'd go for a drink after we'd finished, Jeremy and I... we wondered if you wanted to join us?"

Richard smiled to himself. "Isn't three a crowd?"

"Not on this occasion."

"I'd love to."

He watched James' beaming smile light up his face and smiled with him.

"Right now, I need an Espresso."

"Better make it three," James told him as he headed away, "we'll need the stamina."