HEYA FELLA

He is equally excited and devastated, wanting to hear every detail and none of them all at once – WHY ?  Why oh why had he gone and opened his big mouth about setting Pete up – ?  Despite the mental debate he has with himself regularly on the topic, he knows WHY.  He wants Pete to be able to accept and love himself – Orpheus own needs and desires come second to Pete.  Even if the idea of setting him up on date after date does tie Orpheus’s stomach in knots.  He’d find someone, eventually, wouldn’t he – ?  Pete was lovely and intelligent, witty – he was a keeper, for sure.  Someone would snatch him up, see what the world was missing out on eventually.  ( There is a voice, small and insecure, that reminds him he did this because he isn’t GOOD enough for Pete White.  Too afraid of the rejection that would surely come to even try. )

“ Al has the very most experience being true to himself, in my opinion of him – I thought it would be pleasant for you to experience someone safe.  I’m glad you enjoyed the night !  Speaking of TYPE – it would be helpful to know if you had one, so I can keep my eye out. “ He sips his own tea, smiling pleasantly.  “ And as for your latter comment – no, Pete – no one on this earth really knows what they’re doing.  Love and it’s elusive intricacies escape us, often – “

     THAT SMILE. The sight of it is infectious and before he knows it White is smiling too. Orpheus flashes it so carelessly-- he doesn’t know that it is the very weapon that could put Mr. White down for good. Has not a clue that if he were to look in the mirror, he would find the very type they spoke of staring back.

But Pete can’t say all of that-- hell, he can barely articulate it all in his head between all the white noise that is unbearable affection for a man out of his league. So he makes the vaguest noise possible and sets his intricate little cup back on the saucer. “ Eh-- I’ll keep ya updated. I think it’s a li’l early to know for sure, you know- but it isn’t Al, I can tell ya that much. “ Silence falls and in the vacuum an itch to be daring is born. A sudden urge to throw caution into the wind and see what happens. It’s impulsive. It’s reckless. It’s the kind of thing Pete will regret at 3 am if it doesn’t explode in his face the moment it oxidizes- but fuck it, right?

     PETE NEVER EXPECTED this to happen. To be sat on a necromancer's couch, tea clutched in his hands, ready to recap the extremely homosexual date he'd been on no more than 24 hours before. Life really has a way about it, huh? A mere two months ago Pete would have recoiled at the idea of openly discussing gay shit, but now thanks to Orpheus--

" Yeah, I mean- he was cute! Sorta campy, not really my type. But.. cute, yanno? " White shrugged into his tea, gaze wandering around the various books and decor lining the walls (eye contact? No thank you. Not when he was talking about his type).  " You were so right, though. He really was a good starter date. Totally put things into perspective, like- it really isn’t all that intimidating when you sit and realize we are all just as clueless when it comes to this sort of thing. "

@albinae 

Yuletide Celebrations – he cannot count or fathom in truth, the precise number of years spending winter alone, sequestered away with his books and scrolls – lit by synthetic fireglow.  Only aware of a phantom kind of warmth – there is an entirely real warmth present currently.  It’s different to observe the world than to be a part of it – as he has been since Triana was born.  

The party is in full swing – everyone present seems to know one another well.  The two talking away from the rest of the party draw his eye – He thinks perhaps he’s seen them around, sort of distnatly familiar in the way small social circles usually are – but he’s confident they’ve never met.   He’s lovely – a specter of the winter beyond the windows, Orpheus thinks he could picture him wreathed in snow, a wraith of ice.  Cold is perhaps the most silent and elegant of deaths – For someone so WINTRY and white, his smile is remarkably warm.  Radiant like the sun.  Enchanting.  Orpheus, amiable as he is, doesn’t hesitate to make an introduction — in his traditional flare for the dramatic of course.  He smiles at the festive sprig of mistletoe his ghostly winter wears around his head and recites a poem from MEMORY. 

( his voice lulls low and dulcet, as though intimately familiar with every lilt and lull of the words, the way it was meant to be heard. ) 

“ Sitting under the mistletoe (Pale-green, fairy mistletoe), One last candle burning low, All the sleepy dancers gone, Just one candle burning on, Shadows lurking everywhere: Some one came, and kissed me there. Tired I was; my head would go Nodding under the mistletoe (Pale-green, fairy mistletoe), No footsteps came, no voice, but only, Just as I sat there, sleepy, lonely, Stooped in the still and shadowy air Lips unseen—and kissed me there. “ 

He smiles, slipping closer to get a better look.  “ Your hat, I mean.  It’s clever.  I’m Dr. Byron Orpheus, and I don’t believe we’ve met. “  

       IT ISN’T OFTEN Peter White finds himself at a loss for words, but tonight seems to be a night chock-full of firsts. First time a man ever recited poetry to him in the middle of a party, first time he suspected he’d just been hit on in the form of poetry, and the first time he found himself not recoiling at the very prospect of being hit on by a man in such a public setting. It was probably the champagne (definitely the champagne-), but he wasn’t so sure champagne could make his heart feel so light in his chest.

White’s all but slack-jawed, pink in the face. Billy is going to have a fucking field day with this when they get home- but that sounds like a problem for future Pete. “ Dr. Orpheus? “ He echoes in the lieu of a proper response. “ You’re, ah. You’re Rusty’s tenant, right? Yeah! I’ve heard of you. “ He takes just a half a step closer to the man. “ Iiiii’m going to go see what Dr. Venture is up to.” Billy, who’d done little more than sit awkwardly between the two and tap at his glass with his metallic fingers, was now quick to toddle out from between them and amble off in a vague direction. White watches him go, but seems more or less unbothered as he turns his attention back to the good Doctor, mistletoe a-bouncing.