c. cogsworth

It was strange, hearing Claude call himself a gossip and apologizing to Michael instead of the other way around. Of all the possibly hobbies he could have guessed for his boss to have, indulging in some silly workplace secrets and rumors certainly wasn’t one of them. He would have thought the man to be more of a bird watcher or something along those lines, finding gossip and potential scandals to be below him. But maybe he just didn’t know the older man as well as he thought he did - at least not on any sort of personal level. Perhaps what Michael and the rest of the employees saw wasn’t all there was to the man.

Dear god, he thought, just how scared had he made this poor boy? Michael never had to defend himself against his job, or himself as a person, but here he was, nearly scared straight before Claude like he’d done something wrong. Perhaps it was a sign to loosen up a bit—not all the way, never; that would be against the standards he’d set for himself and the restaurant way back when Adam had given him this position. And he certainly didn’t want to be seen as a friend to his subordinates. But, he supposed, there could be a time and place for things becoming a bit more personal than he had previously allowed.

Watching as his boss counted out the bills and slid them over his way, it took all of Michael’s self control to not immediately look at how much he had made tonight. While technically there wouldn’t have been anything wrong with being curious about how well he’d been tipped, it felt rude to do so right in front of Claude - especially when they were in the middle of a conversation. So instead he simply slid the cash into his pocket and made a mental note to count it out himself as soon as he made it to the break room. “That’d be awesome. I think he’ll like that,” he repeats the words from earlier, not wanting to say much more and seem too eager to see the pianist again.

Perhaps the kid took him too seriously, or Claude had done something to make him afraid to loosen up a bit at his job. For how long Michael had been here, he'd proven himself as someone reliable enough that he was hardly worried about ignoring his tables or making one of his fellow employees uncomfortable. Perhaps it was a sign Claude needed to loosen up a bit, whether explicitly or subtly communicating it was perfectly acceptable to have a more personal relationship, if Michael wanted one.

Like most nights, Michael found himself being one of the last of the servers to head over to their manager for their final tips of the evening. Though this time instead of it being because he had actually taken the time and effort to properly do his side work instead of rushing through it to get home like everyone else, it was thanks to the extra time he’d spent talking with Berlioz. It wasn’t something that he had expected anyone to pick up on or notice, but apparently that hadn’t been the case. The question of whether his tables liked the music was expected, but Claude taking note and mentioning the fact that he’d spent so much extra time with the pianist certainly was not.

Though Michael hadn’t explicitly come out to Claude, he had an inkling from a long time ago that the younger boy was also gay. Perhaps it was a strange sort of sixth sense that he had, or just the amount of himself he’d seen in Michael, but there were certain instances that all but proved him right: tonight being one of them. The amount of time he’d spent near the piano hadn’t gone unnoticed, and it hadn’t terribly affected his tips or gotten him any complaints, so Claude could hardly complain himself. He might’ve just found himself his permanent new pianist, thanks to his small desire to play matchmaker in his own subtle way.

Saying he liked theatre was a bit of a stretch, not that Michael disliked it by any means - but really he had only joined the club because his parents had pushed him to be more involved on campus. And drama seemed like the easiest of organizations to participate in - building sets and running lines was far more enjoyable than joining any business or science group. And all of the fraternities had been ruled out immediately, despite his father’s hope that at least one of his kids would join greek life. “Yeah, I guess you could say I enjoy it. The shows are always pretty cool and it’s fun to help bring them to life, but I’m not like a theater kid or anything,” he answers, realizing only a second after it’s left his mouth that maybe he shouldn’t have said it with such judgment, in case Claude himself used to be one of those theater nerds. “Not that it’s bad, you know, loving theatre. I just don’t have as wide of a knowledge as most of the others in the club.”

~time skip to when berli is working at the restaurant playing his little tunes~

At the easy encouragement that he was offered, Michael breathed a bit easier, his smile growing as he nodded his head and was ready to make a promise to bring in his resume on his next shift - but the finger held up to indicate one moment stopped him before he had a chance to say anything. It’s not a surprise when the older man has a copy of his old application and resume tucked away for such easy access, Claude always seeming like a very organized manager and just a person in general. “No, sir,” he agrees with a nod. “Just my classes. And technically I’m in the university’s drama club, but I really only just help with the sets sometimes or help the real actors run their lines. It probably doesn’t really count for much or mean anything, though.” How that would show himself as a worthy candidate for a serving position, he wasn’t sure - but it was something that he had officially added to his resume, and he wanted his boss to have the most up to date information possible right now.

"Of course it means something," Claude countered, pulling out a pen to jot down the updated information the boy had given him. "You like the theatre? See, that's something I didn't know about you that I just learned from an update to your resume." Though he was more of a symphony man himself, that didn't mean that Claude didn't appreciate the theatre, or see the value it had in younger people who needed an outlet to express themselves. He hadn't gotten to hear an awful amount about of Michael's personal hobbies or interests in the past few years, but at least this was something he could bring up to try and make conversation every now and again.

Despite being quite literally just told that he wasn’t in trouble, Michael couldn’t help the way his heart picked up a bit in nerves as his boss motioned for him to follow into the office. It was just too similar to being called into his father’s office every time he’d done something wrong or disappointed his parents, his go to response was simply to worry. Thankfully though, Claude hadn’t changed his mind within the span of mere minutes and had instead handed him a water and instructed him to sit, which he eagerly did, opening the bottle to start taking a few small sips in a row - just like Wendy had always told him to do whenever he felt a bit nauseous, so as not to overwhelm the stomach with too much at once.

It was endearing, how nervous the younger boy seemed to be to ask about the position he was vying for, when Michael was the most qualified candidate Claude could think of for the role. He'd been working at the restaurant for years now, had never had any major slip-ups; including this morning, if he hadn't caught Michael a bit flustered for another reason entirely. Claude could see no reason not to give him the job, especially if he'd gotten the courage to ask himself, and, if money was the primary reason he'd been seeking more hours, this would certainly help.

At the mention of the full moon being the trigger for the curse, Eda’s head tilts to the side ever so much and she lets out a soft hum as she considers what that would mean for altering her elixir to help this Adam fellow. It was certainly different than her own curse, which was impacted by her stress levels primarily, but she figured with a bit of influence from werewolf magic - she should be able to get some kind of remedy easily enough. Her mind was busy running through all the potential options she could try testing when Claude speaks up again, pulling her focus back to the task at hand. “Of course it would help,” she answers with a bit of a snicker, not meaning to be rude but feeling like that should have been kind of obvious. “Finding the person who cast the spell means they could tell you what they did - what magics they used, how wide their cast was, whether they combined spells or built a really, really complicated one all of their own accord. Hell, they may even be able to completely revoke it.” It’s only when she realizes just how desperate this man seems to be that Eda realizes she needs to make the potential severity of this all a bit clearer for them all. Sighing softly, she sets her glass down onto the desk and leans forward in her chair, a small frown forming on her lips as she prepares to potentially ruin his day. “Claude, I gotta warn ya though… There’s a chance even finding the witch who did this might not change anything. Curses… are complicated. And some are for life, no matter how much the caster may regret it or try to take it back.”

At the very least, he now had another direction in which to point his search: not on someone who could help him, exactly, but on the person who had placed the curse to begin with. It would be difficult to find the enchantress who had been disrespected by Adam all those years ago, but Claude was hardly in a position to give up hope now. If anything, being pointed toward another source was the exact kind of help he'd been hoping for. "I can do that. I mean, I hope I'm able to--if I can ask Adam if he remembers anything about the woman who had done it, all those years ago. But, to be fair, she did set the curse because he was being rude to her, so, he may not be the best of help," he reasoned aloud. It made Claude want to kick his friend practically daily, knowing that the reason they were in this position was because he had been an asshole. Eda's demeanor shifted to a much more serious one, and though he heard exactly what she was saying, Claude simply couldn't afford to think like that. "No," he replied simply, shaking his head, "this has to work. I cannot live the rest of my life like this, and neither can my friends. I will do anything, everything, to fix this. And, I know what you're going to say: it doesn't matter how much I want it to happen. But, until we've searched every possible avenue, tried every solution, I have to at least try."

Michael could practically feel how red his face was getting as soon as Claude let out a laugh and then went on to explain how he wasn’t in trouble at all. So his whole little speech and almost admission to being a hungover wreck hadn’t been necessary at all, if he had just waited and let his boss speak first, he would have saved himself a whole world of embarrassment. But oh well, there was no going back now and it’s not as if he wasn’t used to this feeling by now. It just very rarely happened at work anymore, especially not around the man he had started to really look up to and respect. “Right, oh uhm, yeah. A water break probably would be smart,” he admits with a nod, again not clarifying on why he was in the need of extra hydration today.

It was with a nudge of his head that Claude silently instructed the younger boy to follow him to his office, where perhaps he might've felt better after taking a seat for a moment. "Come, sit," he offered, slipping behind his desk to take a bottle of water from the small fridge underneath. Someone had just come back from their break, and it was a quieter weeknight, leaving Claude unbothered by Michael's absence at the main host stand. He passed him the water bottle, while Claude still had half a cup of tea from before he'd sought out Michael waiting on his desk. It certainly wasn't as good now as it had been a few minutes ago, when it'd reached the perfect temperature, but it would do, for now.

closed starter for @ccogsworth location: batb restauraunt - idr the french name

One of the restaurant's most recent hires had been working there for years, which was simply a reflection, Claude liked to think, of how much people liked being an employee. It was something he took great pride in, even if it was simply because most of the staff had family who had previously worked there, or they were simply longtime employees of the Betes who never left. He'd expected Michael to leave once he'd gotten to college, but he'd stuck around the past few years, a rather dependable young man despite what Claude held as stereotype for people his age. He'd taken it upon himself to look after him, seeing quite a lot of a version of himself in the younger boy.

Trusting others, even those that he held in the highest of regards and kept close to his heart, had never been Adam’s strong suit. A fact that Claude knew oh so well, which was why it felt like a slap to the face having him insist they need to just blindly agree and hand over all of their cards to the order without any hesitation. “And when that backfires? When they use what you tell them against us - how will you explain that to the others?” he shoots off the questions that had kept him from giving away any of their information in the first place. “You must at least ensure they are okay with what you’re about to do. Their secrets are not ours to give away.” Perhaps he was overthinking things and none of their friends would really care all that much, but Adam simply refused to take that chance. Not after everything he’d already done to them.

"Fine, then, I'll tell them," Claude easily agreed. If that was what it took to get Adam to his side of giving the Order everything they had, then, it had to be done. There was not a worry in his mind whether the information would be used against them--they already knew everything about Adam they could possibly find out, and the rest of them weren't inherently magical themselves. The worst that could happen, in Claude's view, was that their curses simply got worse--even then, he wasn't sure if that was possible. "I don't think a single one of them doesn't want to have our lives back to normal, though."

The instructions to close the door, with the obvious excitement in Claude’s tone as he said it was answer enough to the questions she hadn’t been able to ask aloud. He knew exactly who the owl lady was and she would bet her entire life savings right now that they had been discussing the curse. It was selfish, the fact that Zara didn’t want to find any type of cure or countercurse to help them, but she had to preserve her own safety and well being. Lifting the spell that affected them all would put her right back into forced obedience with Mr. Bete and there wasn’t anything she wasn’t willing to do to keep that from happening. Closing the door as she was told, her smile remains ever the same as she moves further into the room and sits down in the chair the older woman had just occupied.

"Well, we didn't get very far--it was just a first meeting. But, I think there's a chance, maybe, that she might be able to help." Claude didn't want to get his hopes too high, but this was the closest he'd felt to having any answers in a long time. All of the questions she had for him were valid ones, especially as he hadn't told her the meeting was even coming, but Claude was far too busy basking in the potential for results that he hadn't even stopped to consider whether he should be putting all his faith into the woman the Order had appointed. "I think she studies them, breaks them, probably sets them on people, hopefully not on myself," he joked, feeling lighthearted. "I believe she's a witch, which, I know to be careful, but she can't be one out to hurt us, if she was appointed by Arthur and the Order to help us. The how part, I'm not entirely sure." Claude wasn't even sure he wanted to know how Eda was going to go about absolving them of their curse--he would rather not be involved in the details of magic he would have nothing to do with. "Either way, it's all very exciting, I think. I know how desperately everyone affected wants to be rid of this, though, as much as I'd like to celebrate, I'm trying not to get my hopes up too high, as nothing's happened yet, but I'm so glad you're here. Adam would be telling me I sound ridiculous."

“You can’t live your life like this?” he spits back, standing up from his seat in a rush of anger. Not once has Adam ever wanted to compare his own curse to that of his friends, knowing perfectly well that they all caused great struggle amongst the group and that it was all his fault. He was the one to blame for their suffering over all these years, and he was acutely aware of that fact. However, right now, as Claude stands there and tries to act as if he isn’t doing enough - that he doesn’t want to undo the curse that haunted them all, something inside of him snapped. “I am a monster. I turned into a beast. The love of my life doesn’t remember anything about our relationship. I do nothing but hurt every person that comes into my life. If you think that I of all people do not want this curse lifted, you are highly mistaken. Living with fucked up clocks and a misconstrued sense of time seems quite simple in comparison to being a monster.”

Claude's jaw agape, he scoffed at the comparison he and Adam had wordlessly sworn they'd never make. For how much worse Adam's curse was, he wanted to make the point that the only reason any of them were cursed because of him, but Claude held his tongue. Spitting back at his friend would only make things worse, despite the temptation. Still, what bothered him more was the feeling that Adam wasn't trying as hard as Claude knew he could to cooperate with the Order. "Then, I'm going to go ahead and tell the Order everything we know. If you really want this fixed as much as you say you do, you'll allow it. If we're supposed to trust them, then that's what we have to do, wholeheartedly," Claude insisted.

Her smirk turned into a bit more of a genuine smile, though a bit surprised, as he responds so normally to her mention of apple blood. Normally humans, or honestly anyone from this dimension even if they’re magical, all got at least some level of flustered or confused at her mention of the drink from the boiling isles. It was why Eda always brought it up - not because she ever expected anyone to have any, but she simply liked making others squirm. But then again, considering he mentioned talking to a bartender he likely simply thought it was some kind of cocktail or mixed drink. Which was less fun, but she supposed they weren’t here for jokes and tricks anyway. Taking the offered whiskey, Eda downed a good portion of it before nodding her head and taking in the new information. “Well like I said, the beast I know what to do. I can’t cure him completely, but I can make it more manageable. How often does he change? Is it triggered by anything specifically?” she asks, her mind already running on just what she’ll need to do to modify her current elixir recipe for her own curse to fit for this situation instead. “As for the rest of you… I’m not entirely sure. I could work on remedies as well, but I’ve never dealt with anything like this before. It sounds simple, all of your conditions, but the fact that it’s from just one curse and not multiple complicates things greatly.” It wasn’t what he likely wanted to hear, but it was unfortunately the truth of the matter.

It was at least comforting to know that she might be able to do something, but it almost felt a bit unfair that the only one she could think she could cure was Adam. Though Claude tried not to think of it this way, and he certainly never mentioned it, he was the reason they'd gotten into this mess in the first place. "It's the full moon--that's what makes him turn. On the night before, the night of the full moon, and the night after: that's when it happens for him," Claude explained. If this was who the ?Order had recommended look into their curse, he trusted their judgement, but surely there was someone out there who would know what to do, if not Eda. That kind of thinking was the only way Claude could seem to cope with the grim diagnosis. "Well, would it help if we tried to find the source of the curse itself? Would finding whoever cursed us be of any sort of help in fixing it?" Not that Claude had a single clue who that could be, but perhaps one of his friends, namely Adam, would know more about the woman from years ago. "I don't mean to be dramatic, but I will do anything to help, sincerely. I understand Adam can be reluctant to give any information, but I will do whatever I can to cooperate."