This little pre-slash cecilos drabble was too tempting not to write.
--
Carlos observes the waveforms on the monitors. They're like nothing he's ever seen. Almost like a cursive version of the usual waveforms. More elegant, more flowery, yet so much harder to make sense of. Carlos catalogs them, charts them, takes detailed notes. These are important. They need to be studied. Understood. They are one of Night Vale's most scientifically fascinating oddities and Carlos is there to unravel it. Carlos the Scientist. Not how he's used to being addressed, but he likes it. It's simple. It's him.
“And here he goes again,” one of his fellow scientists, Nicole the Geologist, says.
Carlos lifts his head to see what this is about. His coworkers are looking at the radio, some shaking their head, some smiling, some snickering. Carlos focuses on Cecil's voice rather than letting it wash over him in a soothing murmur that is so good at blocking out the buzzing and beeping of machinery and the various other small noises that make concentrating on his work impossible. Cecil, unsurprisingly, is talking about his hair. More specifically, he's updating the community on the state of its regrowth.
“He really seems to like you a lot,” Zachary the Paleobiologist says. “Maybe you should try to get to know him better.”
"He's obsessed, Zachary. I don't have time to deal with that. There's science to be done."
He returns to his analysis of Cecil's previous broadcasts. His screen displays a particularly intricate series of waves. A little annotation tells him this is Cecil saying his name. It's quite beautiful. Carlos wonders how it would look like as a tattoo.
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I wrote this because Cecil really needs some friends right now. So have a fanfic with Cecil, Old Woman Josie, and some angels.
--
Cecil stayed late at the station not because of the work to do, but because the thought of going back to his empty home made him a little sick. It was the home Carlos and him had made together, but now Carlos wasn't there waiting for him and wouldn't join him there even if Cecil waited for him. He didn't want to be alone in their home, so he stayed here. Sometime he forgot to return home at all and ended up falling asleep on the couch in the break room, where he would be woken up before his show by an intern.
He wished he still had his small apartment. It would be lonely there too, but that was a familiar kind of loneliness. He had spent an unknowable number of years—and he tried not to think too hard about how literally unknowable it was—alone there, with no company but the semi-sentient dust bunnies and the Faceless Old Women he could never quite see. He wondered if she was waiting for him to come home right now. It was a mildly comforting thought.
But he didn't have that familiar, lonely apartment to return to, only a house too big for one, and his studio at the station. So he stayed here and reviewed tomorrow's horoscopes and made sure they didn't say anything too nice about Scorpios. He added a few “vile” and “despised” for good measure. It made him feel a little better about life in general.
When he reached his own horoscope, he swallowed past a lump in his throat. “Aquarius: you should smile more.” And, scribbled in yellow with what appeared to be a toothpick dipped in mustard, the station's oracle had added: “So go out and talk to people, Palmer.”
He stared down at those words. He knew he had become a bit of a recluse since Carlos had gotten stranded in the desert world. If he was quite honest with himself, he knew he had been a bit of a recluse before Carlos as well. He hadn't met up with his old bowling league since long before the miniature city under lane five.
Cecil let the page fall down and pushed himself to his feet. He could do this. He wasn't going to spend one more moment hiding in here. He threw on his orange poncho, stopped by the bathroom to say goodbye to Khoshekh, and strode out of the station with new-found confidence.
That confidence lasted only until he started the car. He still didn't want to go back home, not yet, but he had no idea where he should be going. He started driving, pondering that. Big Rico's? The Moonlite, All-Nite Diner, for a slice of invisible pie? The White Sand Ice Cream Shop? The Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex? He missed bowling, but there was something very sad about bowling alone.
It was probably that thought that brought him, not at the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex, but near the edge of town, to an old house surrounded by a halo of light by The Car Lot. He put the car in park and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, not sure what to do. It was late and he hadn't even called. He squinted to see if any lights were on, but it was hard to tell, since the entire house was glowing.
“You should go inside,” a familiar voice next to him said. “Or whatever.”
Cecil looked at the previously empty passenger seat, where a tall being with golden wings—that he could at least call an angel in the relative privacy of his own thoughts—slouched, wearing an expansive hand-tailored suit coat and nothing else. They appeared to be checking the stock markets on their cell phone, but they were keeping an eye on Cecil. Only one; the others were trained on the screen.
“Hello, Erika,” he greeted them. “I wouldn't want to bother Josie at this late hour.”
“She's watching The Walking Dead and yelling at the TV. We'd all appreciate the distraction. Or whatever.”
Erika opened the car door and stepped outside, unfolding their inhumanly tall body that really shouldn't have fitted in Cecil's car. The angel stretched, placed their phone in a pocket of their suit and strolled back toward the house. Cecil sighed and followed.
“I bet no one working on that show have even been through a real zombie invasion,” was the first thing he heard when he entered Old Woman Josie's house. He left his shoes by the door, hung his poncho on a hook next to Josie's and followed Erika into the living room.
“I brought your friend inside,” Erika said before dropping into a floral armchair and throwing one leg over the armrest carelessly. They took out their phone again and stopped paying attention to anyone else. Josie was sitting on a matching sofa in a cream nightgown, shaking her fist at the TV screen, before she lifted her eyes to look his way.
“Cecil! What brings you here?”
“I...” was lonely, could not stand to go back to my empty house, need human contact, need someone to look at me and not just hear me, missed you, miss having friends, don't want to be alone with my thoughts anymore. He couldn't bring himself to finish that sentence.
“Well don't just stand there! Sit down. I made corn muffins.”
She gestured at a plate on the coffee table, next to a sitting angel. The tall being in a white polka dot dress nibbled on a corn muffin, their many eyes glued to the TV screen and their wings twitching at every scream. Another angel sat in an armchair, knitting what appeared to be a very long sock. Cecil grabbed a corn muffin and joined Josie on the sofa.
She must have salt again, because it tasted like he remembered the from the times they came to Josie's house to celebrate after bowling. He let himself find comfort in the familiarity of the recent past. The more distant past was terrifying, and so was the future, but the recent past was a welcome escape from the present.
“Thank you.”
“Will you take some tea? Of course you'll take tea. I'll get you some.”
She rose and disappeared in the kitchen, leaving him alone with the three angels. Cecil looked around the living room. It hadn't changed much, otherworldly beings aside. The same ancient-looking furniture and lacy curtains, the same tall bookcase with shelves filled with mementos, including one familiar bowling trophy. Cecil smirked. His eyes dropped to the bottom shelf, the one filled with photo albums.
They had photos of that tournament they won, he remembered. He recognized the album Josie kept them in and stood to retrieve it. The knitting angel looked at him with interest, but didn't stop him from taking the thick blue album and bringing it back to the sofa. Cecil opened it and started flipping through it.
He flipped past some photos of Josie's house, her lawn, a bake sale, an interesting looking butterfly, and that one time a giant purple monkey went on a rampage in Mission Grove Park, before he found them. There he was, with a big smile on his face, and there was Josie, celebrating a strike, and John Peters, you know, the farmer, raising a plastic cup as a toast.
And there was Maria Fernandez, holding a bowling ball above her head and howling. She had been a good friend. He missed her. He remembered reporting her death with a strange detachment, as if she was a stranger. “Maria Fernandez, of the Night Vale Tourism Board, was swallowed by the glowing chasm that opened in the Vacant Lot Out Back of the Ralphs.” When had he grown so distant?
“You know, Strex invested to have the Desert Flower Bowling Alley and Arcade Fun Complex renovated.” Josie said when she returned and saw what he was looking at. Cecil fought a wince at that name. He didn't need to worry about StrexCorp anymore. The angels bought it. It was safe now. He accepted the teacup from Josie and took a slow sip to calm his nerves. “They even had lane five covered. We shouldn't have to worry about that tiny civilization anymore.”
“I know,” Cecil answered, with a thankful nod at Erika, who only gave a non-committal grunt without lifting their eyes from their cell phone.
“We could start bowling again. I know John has been looking forward to it.”
“That would be... nice.” His gaze still wandered over the photos and he felt a pang of regret for isolating himself for so long. He hadn't really noticed until he let someone in his life again and then found himself abruptly alone once more. He gulped down his tea wishing it was something stronger. He could feel Josie watching him.
“We could go right now,” she said suddenly.
“Right now? But it's so late.”
“Nonsense. The night is still young and the angels have been wanting to go, right?”
They agreed with varying degree of enthusiasm.
“Bowling seems like an interesting activity,” said Erika.
“Yes! Yes! Yes!” agreed Erika.
“Sure, whatever,” mumbled Erika.
“I... would love to go, then,” Cecil said.
“Good. That's settled. You drove here, right? You four go wait in your car while I get dressed.”
And that was how Cecil found himself sitting in his car, moments later, with three angels crammed on the backseat trying to make themselves comfortable.
“Ow!”
“Your wing is in my face.”
“Whatever.”
Josie opened the passenger door and dropped into the seat next to him. She had thrown on her orange poncho over her green “night in town” dress.
More short cecilos fanfics from me! In which Carlos isn't the only one who sometime gets distracted by his work and passion and forget to come home to his boyfriend.
--
It wasn't unusual for Cecil to stay at the station after his show. There was a lot more to his job than the broadcast itself and, while he could do the rest from home, the station had a comfortable working space that was well furnished in papers and things that weren't technically writing implements, and it was free of his neighbours loud chanting and the terrible noise of the floor of the apartment above his when it got hungry and swallowed yet another tenant. Not that he still had to deal with that, since he moved, but old habits died hard and usually not without the help of a sturdy machete.
With some of the most recent events written down for tomorrow's news, he went back over them with a black sharpie, which he had special permission to use for this purpose, to remove anything that would not be safe or legal to say on air. In the few places where he felt the dangerous information needed to stay, he added little notices like “but they are, of course, not real” and such to allow his listeners to know that they could not officially know or acknowledge this.
He was startled out of his painstaking editing by the sound of his cell phone's ring tone. He smiled when he saw who was calling. “Carlos!”
“Hey Cecil. I'm calling from home. You know, our home. The one we moved in together.”
Carlos sounded playful, fond and loving and it made a warm, fuzzy feeling spread trough Cecil and nestle somewhere in his chest, in the vicinity of his liver. He barely managed to keep an embarrassing giggle in.
“I do think I know the one,” he answered. “I didn't expect you back home so soon. Is the lab full of toxic fumes again?”
“I... no. It's... it's not really early.”
Cecil checked his watch, the One True Timepiece in all of Night Vale, and he realized that Carlos was right. He had gotten so wrapped up in preparing tomorrow's show that he didn't notice how late it was. That wasn't rare, but previously no one had been waiting for him.
“Oh my. I'm so sorry, Carlos. I lost track of time.”
“It's alright. Time isn't real anyway. I was going to bed. I just called to let you know that I cooked some ravioli and there's leftovers in the fridge, if you're hungry when you come home.”
“Thank you, dear Carlos, for calling, and for thoughtfully leaving food for me. I'll just finish this and I'll come home.”
“Alright. And could you... could do me a favor?”
“Anything,” Cecil answered, and he meant it.
“I missed the end of your show earlier so could you... wish me good night?”
Cecil's lips curled up at the request and the warm, fuzzy thing nestled in his chest purred in contentment. “Good night, Carlos, good night.”
Once he ended the call, Cecil gathered his papers, stuffed them in his bag and decided to call it a day. Maybe, from now on, he could find a place at home where he could do this. His and Carlos's home. Their home. The home where his boyfriend was now sleeping alone in their bed because Cecil forgot that he now shared a home with a cute scientist who he would have liked to kiss when he came back from the lab. It was too late for that, but not too late to go cuddle with his sleeping boyfriend after eating those no doubt delicious ravioli.
I bring you cecilos fluff as an apology for the cecilos angst last time. Cecil attempts to bring Carlos breakfast in bed, but pancakes aren't as easy to make as he thought. (A.K.A, Cecil fails at cooking)
--
Cecil glared down at the wheat-free pancake. The batter still looked liquid, but smoke rising from underneath told him it was burning. The cooking wasn't progressing the way the YouTube tutorial demonstrated. He tried to flip it, but it just broke in two and splattered down on the pan, only a small section remaining on his spatula. Cecil took in a slow, steadying breath.
He flipped the part he had managed to lift around and hastily rearranged the other piece of his pancake to try and merge both together before the batter solidified. The mound formed by the broken-off piece of pancake was sticking to the pan and refused to be flattened and repositioned. He added more oil, but it didn't improve the situation. Cecil angrily scrapped it off and dumped it onto the pile of his previous failures that filled the plate next to the oven.
His boyfriend was a scientist, which made him kind of a scientist too, and pancakes were basically science. You mix together the ingredients, apply heat and wait for the proper reactions to transform batter into breakfast. It was simple and should have allowed Cecil to bring Carlos breakfast in bed for the scientist's first morning waking up here, at his boyfriend's apartment. Cecil had spent the night at Carlos's place several times, but this time Cecil had dared invite Carlos home for the night and he had agreed. Cecil wanted to make this special.
Time for plan B. He had a box of waffles in the freezer. He just needed to put them in the toaster and Carlos never needed to know about his failed attempt at pancakes. He would keep that between him, the Faceless Old Women, and the Sheriff's Secret Police. He just needed to get rid of the evidence.
“Cecil?” a voice thick with sleep asked from behind him. “Is everything okay? I smelled something burning.”
Cecil froze, plate of shapeless, burned yet half-cooked pancakes in hands, as Carlos walked into the kitchen while sleepily rubbing his eyes. He could probably have dumped the pancakes into the trash can before Carlos slipped on the glasses he was holding in his hand, but he got distracted by staring at how absolutely lovely Carlos looked this morning, with his perfect hair artfully mussed and one eye open only a crack, showing just a peek of the exquisite dark eye still clouded with the veil of sleep.
“Uh huh?” he answered, rather uselessly.
“Are you cooking?” Carlos asked once his glasses put the world back into focus.
“I...” Cecil's shoulders slumped and it takes significant effort to keep the rest of his body from following, flesh and bones sinking down until he was merely a puddle on the floor. “I wanted to bring you breakfast in bed.”
“Oh. That's really nice, Cecil. I'm sorry I'm not in bed anymore, but it's not too late for the breakfast part.”
“I'm sorry, Carlos,” he said, looking down at the shapeless mass in the plate he was still holding. “I'm afraid I wasn't successful. I'm a failure of a scientist's boyfriend. I could not even produce a satisfactory breakfast.”
“Cecil,” Carlos, perfect Carlos, said gently. He walked across the kitchen to rest his hand on Cecil's cheek. “You went through the trouble of preparing breakfast for me. That, itself, makes it more than satisfactory.”
“Oh, Carlos. Perfect Carlos. Let me just get rid of this and I'll make you waffles.”
“No, no, this is fine!” Carlos took the plate of would-be pancakes from his hands, brought it to the kitchen table and settled down.
“You don't have to do that! Improperly cooked pancakes might be hazardous.”
“I'll take that chance,” Carlos says with the brilliant, perfect smile that had made him fall in love instantly over a year ago.
Cecil sighed, picked a fork and some maple-flavored imaginary corn syrup and joined his scientist boyfriend at the table. He sat down to stare despondently at the plate. Carlos smiled at him, poured syrup over the mess and dug his fork into it. To his credit, he only hesitated a moment before shoving some some of the Pancake Failure into his mouth. His face was carefully blank as he chewed for a long time and swallowed with difficulty.
Cecil fetched him a glass of carrot juice, the closest thing he found to orange juice. It was orange, and it was juice, which made it orange juice and so suitable to accompany his breakfast now that citrus couldn't be trusted anymore. Carlos took a long sip to wash down the pancake mush, then smiled at Cecil again.
“Thank you for getting up early to make me breakfast. I appreciate it.”
Cecil felt the heat rise to his cheeks and he was, once more, at a loss for words, so he beamed at his perfect Carlos instead. It took a lot more syrup and a few glasses of orange carrot juice, but the scientist cleaned the plate.
I wrote the story no one actually wanted. Based on this post. Warnings for character death.
--
“You're still on air.” The thought occupied Cecil's thoughts completely. He was still on air. He had to say something. He couldn't keep broadcasting silence. That was unprofessional.
He didn't think he could get back into his chair to finish his show. He didn't think he could get very far from his current position on the ground. With difficulty, he lifted his head to assess the task at hand. He spotted the wire of his microphone dangling from the edge of his desk. If he could just grab it, he could tug the microphone off the desk and broadcast from his current location. That was a reasonable goal. Far more reasonable than trying to stand.
He raised his hand, stretched his fingers as far as they would go, but the wire was just a little out of reach. He refused to admit defeat. He'd just have to crawl across the floor to pull himself closer target. The ground was wet and slick beneath him and his hand slipped when he tried to drag his weight a few inches forward, but he managed to move just enough that his fingers caught the wire on his next swipe of his hand. He pulled and smiled in triumph when he heard the microphone clatter to down to the ground. He tugged it a little closer and set it up straight on its base.
“Listeners,” he said, or tried to. It came out as more of a wet gurgle. He cleared his throat, spit a glob of blood to the side and tried again. “Listeners. It seemed the danger has receded and calm has returned once more. Everything in Night Vale is quiet except for the wailing of those who survived not quite intact. I hope you, all of you, have been more lucky than us at the Night Vale Community Radio, where our losses today were... higher than usual. To the family and loved ones of intern Navjot, Danilo from sales, Janine the sound technician and... whoever else we lost today, our thoughts are with you. They will be missed.”
Cecil took a shaky breath in and rolled over to lie on his back in an attempt to find a position where he wouldn't feel like he was dying. That would be easier if he wasn't dying. Everything was getting blurry and he wasn't sure how long he had left. While he still could, he might as well...
“To the family and loved ones of Cecil Palmer, those who are still in this world at least, I have the regret to announce that—“
A sound interrupted him. Cecil blinked and tried to understand what was happening. His thoughts were getting foggy. His cell phone. That sound was his cell phone. He fumbled with his pocket to pull it out, but it fell from his numb, blood-slick fingers. He blindly put it on speaker, something he had grown used to do lately as Carlos occasionally called at hours at which opening his eyes and holding the phone to his ear was simply too hard.
“Hello?”
“Cecil!” Carlos' enthusiastic voice came to him and he smiled despite the pain. “I have just made the most fascinating scientific discovery since getting trapped in this strange otherworldly desert.”
Carlos sounded so happy. He could hang on to that thought. Carlos was happy. Excited about Science. It had been frustrating him, lately, how Carlos got excited about Science when Cecil just wanted him to look for a way back home, but he remembered now that his enthusiasm was why he had fallen in love with him in the first place. Right now he wanted nothing more than to listen to Carlos being happy and gushing about Science. Cecil closed his eyes. The world was spinning too much to see anyway.
“Tell me all about it.”
“Alright, so I was exploring an area with Doug, and Alicia, and their dog, and some of the other masked warrior, and...”
Cecil let Carlos' voice wash over him even after he stopped being able to make out the words. It brought him some warmth in a world that was getting colder by the second. He hoped Carlos would forgive him for not saying goodbye.
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I wrote another little cecilos fic. Set early in their relationship. Carlos invites Cecil to spend the evening home with him. This fanfic is certified smut-free (because science)
--
Carlos stared down at the complex equations and graphs filling the notebook in his lap and wondered where he went wrong. He had invited Cecil to come watch a movie with him, the first time he brought him here instead of taking him out for a date, and he had hoped that the evening would progress along the path his research material—a collection of steamy romance novel his team lent him—suggested.
It had started well, the two of them cuddling on the couch under a blanket and paying more attention to each other than whatever cheesy science-fiction movie had been playing. But when the movie was over, there was this fascinating documentary that related to some of his current research and now several hours had passed and he had a notebook full of notes and new theories and Cecil had long since fallen asleep, slumped against his shoulder.
Carlos sighed, put down the advanced piece of technology he used to take notes—which was not a pen and which he didn't give a name to in the hope that it would complicate things for the city council should they wish to make it illegal—and looked down at Cecil. He slept with his face pressed into Carlos' shoulder, his purple-framed glasses pushed up on his forehead. His watermelon hair clip was slipping off and long strands of hair fell over his eyes. Carlos gently brushed them off. Cecil's hair was one of the things intriguing him lately. As far as he could tell, it hadn't been cut since they met, even though all available data pointed to Cecil having kept it short before. Carlos wondered if that was some sort of Night Vale courtship thing. More research was needed before he could come to a conclusion.
“Cecil,” Carlos called and shook the sleeping man's shoulder. “Wake up.”
Cecil mumbled something against his arm, shifted, tried to lift his head, let it fall back against Carlos' shoulder, tried again and slowly, reluctantly, pried his eyes open. He assessed his surroundings, his position slumped against Carlos' side and the notes in the scientist's lap, opened his mouth to say something, yawned instead pressed his face back into Carlos' shoulder, the plastic frame of his glasses digging somewhat painfully into his flesh.
“How was science?”
“Very scientific. I'm sorry, Cecil. I invited you here to have a good time and instead I got distracted by this documentary and now it's so late.”
Cecil raised his head again to look up at him.“Oh, Carlos, perfect, beautiful Carlos. There's nothing to apologize for. I had a wonderful time.”
Cecil smiled like he meant it and maybe he did. He was certainly more willing to put up with Carlos than anyone he had ever dated or tried to date in the past. The scientist kissed the top of his head as an apology the other man claimed wasn't needed. Maybe it wasn't too late to salvage this.
“Still, I'd feel bad letting you go home so late. Maybe you could... if you want, that is, maybe you could stay the night.”
Cecil's whole face lit up. “Stay?” he squeaked. The radio host blushed at the sound of his own voice and he cleared his throat. “If you offer me a place on your couch to spend the night, dear Carlos, I will happily accept.”
“Ah, yes. But, previous experiments have shown that the couch is a terrible place to spend the night. It is too small and the stuffing his terribly insufficient. But, according to my calculation, based on its surface area and our body sizes, I have come to the conclusion that, scientifically speaking, there is more than enough space for both of us on the bed. Although bed isn't really the proper scientific word for it. It's a mattress on the floor. But it's still more comfortable than the couch.”
“But Carlos, I wouldn't want to impose...”
“No, no it's... fine. It's fine.”
--
Carlos wasn't so good at communicating clearly what he wanted. This was probably why, even though he invited Cecil here with the intend of finishing the night with both of them in bed tangled together, it ended up instead with him lying on one side of the mattress, with Cecil, his back to him, staying as far as he could without falling off the mattress for fear of intruding upon his personal space. Carlos very much wanted him into his personal space, but he didn't really get that point across very well. He sighed.
“Cecil.”
“Yes?”
“I've been thinking...”
“It's what scientists do,” Cecil finished for him, sounding a little proud that he had remembered. Carlos smiled despite the embarrassment. This hadn't been his proudest moment. He was supposed to be smart, but it wasn't so easy whenever Cecil looked at him like he meant the world to him.
“I've been thinking about space, and how...” Don't ramble, he admonished himself. “And how there a lot of it between us right now.”
“Oh? Would you say... that it's too much space?”
“I would say it's an excessive amount of space.”
“I would agree.”
Cecil shifted on his side of the bed, scooting away from the edge and toward Carlos. When he came near enough, the scientist reached for him and pulled him the rest of the way until Cecil's back was pressed against his chest. The other man melted in his arms with a sigh of contentment. Carlos smile, threaded his fingers through Cecil's hair to comb it away from his neck so he could bury his nose there. He kept carding his hair, enjoying the feel of it between his fingers. Cecil seemed to enjoy it too, from the way he tilted his head to allow him better access.
“Are you trying to grow your hair?” Carlos asked into the silence, his curiosity now demanding to be satiated. Cecil tensed and Carlos pressed a kiss onto his neck, not sure if he had said something wrong.
“I don't trust barbers anymore.”
Carlos snorted noisily and pressed his mouth into the crook of Cecil's neck, more in an attempt to stifle his laughter than anything else. He should have guessed that was what it was about. Cecil huffed at his reaction.
“I can't say I sympathize. I haven't been able to get a haircut in a year because everyone is too terrified to cut it.”
Cecil let out a panicked little noise and tangled his fingers into Carlos' curls as if he worried they would suddenly disappear. The scientist chucked against his neck and pressed a soothing kiss under his jaw. At some point, they would need to have a talk about haircuts and Cecil using his influence to drive people out of town out of irrational anger, but that could wait. So could his original plans for the night. Instead, he buried his nose behind Cecil's ear and played with hair that smelled faintly of bubblegum-scented shampoo until Cecil's breathing slowed and deepened as he fell asleep in Carlos' arms.
Short cecilos fluffy thing. Set after the episode where Carlos comes back, you know, the one that didn't happen yet?
--
Cecil lifted a hand to his neatly combed hair and deliberately mussed it up once he walked through the door. He fought back panic when Carlos wasn’t immediately visible, but the smell of lasagna wafted from the oven and he could hear, faintly, the sound of paper tearing and muffled Spanish cursing coming from the direction of Carlos’ private lab.
"Carlos? I’m home!"
"I’ll be with you in a moment!" Carlos shouted back. There was a frantic edge to his voice that worried Cecil. "I just need to finish something."
"Are you alright? Do you need help?"
"No, no, I’m fine! Don’t come in here! I got everything under control."
Cecil eyed the door to Carlos’ lab suspiciously, but all he heard from inside was the sound of scissors and possibly something being taped. It didn’t sound too sinister or deadly and if Carlos said he had everything under control, Cecil would believe him. But if he got whisked off to some other dimension, Cecil would be very cross with him. And then he would cry. But he was probably fine. Scientists were always fine.
He reluctantly walked away from the lab and into their shared bedroom to change into something more comfortable. He got rid his tie and ‘professional reporter’ attire and slipped into a loose shirt depicting skeletons dancing down a stairway made out of cotton candy, some purple plaid Capri pants, and a green plush cardigan. He shoved his feet into his favorite slippers and shuffled back out of the bedroom.
"Cecil?" Carlos called him from the living room. He was sitting on his usual side of the couch with a colorfully wrapped box on his knees. "Come here a moment?"
Intrigued, Cecil joined Carlos on the couch. The somewhat squished box appears to be a gift and, judging from the many tape-covered tears, he would guess that this was what was keeping the scientist busy earlier. A puffy ball of ribbon hid the worse of the damage. It was perfect in every way, but Cecil couldn’t figure out the occasion.
"What is this?"
"It’s for our anniversary. Since I missed it."
"Oh. Oh! But… Carlos, I didn’t get you anything!"
"It’s alright. It’s not much anyway. Here, take it. And sorry about the wrapping."
The box was rather light for its size. Probably not a municipally approved book or a board game. Cecil reverently unwrapped the gift without tearing the paper, prying off the tape so he could remove the whole thing without damaging Carlos perfect work. Under the wrapping, he found a white cardboard box. Excited to see what his Carlos had gotten him, he removed the lid and pulled out the tissue paper.
"A shirt!" Cecil took his gift out of the box to take a better look. It was a sparkly teal hoodie covered in a beautiful depiction of the galaxy in which the stars had been replaced with a spiral of adorable cat heads that started tiny in the center and grew in size as they neared the edge. "Oh, Carlos! It’s so… it’s so neat!"
"I have compared the clothes available in the store with my database of every outfit I’ve seen you wear to find, using very complicated calculations and a software I created, the best match to complement your wardrobe. According to my scientific understanding of your fashion sense, I came to the conclusion that you would find this shirt ‘neat’.”
"You used Science to find me a gift?"
"I guess I wanted to show you that Science wasn’t only good for keeping me distracted and away from you. I know I tend to cancel dates and… stay overlong in strange desert because of it."
Cecil carefully set the shirt down on the coffee table and half-climbed into Carlos’ lap to wrap his arms around his waist and lay his head on his shoulder. “Oh, Carlos. My beautiful, perfect Carlos. Science already did something wonderful for me.”
"And what was that?"
"It brought you to Night Vale."
Carlos pulled Cecil closer and kissed his hair. “I missed you,” he whispered.
"I missed you to. But there’s one thing I’m wondering."
"What is it?"
"When did you start cataloguing my clothes?"
Carlos coughed in what Cecil recognize as his ‘I’m too embarrassed to speak of this’ way. “I… I think the lasagna is ready.”
Carlos runs into Cecil while grocery shopping. His off-duty look comes as a bit of a surprise.
--
Half a year after coming to Night Vale, the place still threw Carlos off constantly and even something as simple as grocery shopping had become a harrowing experience. Today, the produce section was mostly empty except for some quivering oblong vegetables that Carlos wasn’t quite desperate enough to try. Supposedly the store was also well-stocked in imaginary corn.
Carlos sighed and wandered into the cracker aisle instead. He found a box of Ritz crackers that seemed fairly normal. He pressed his ear against it and didn’t hear any wailing or skittering or otherwise unlikely noise, so he dropped it into his basket.
"Carlos?"
The scientist froze. He knew that voice. He knew the way it curled around his name. He had heard it on the radio on his very first day in Night Vale, and most days since, and he had to admit that it was a pleasant voice to listen to when he worked, or to fall asleep to, but he was a lot less fond of hearing it in person. Mostly because the man it belonged to, one Cecil Palmer, creeped him out quite a bit.
He had met the radio host a few times, usually during the aftermath of some strange event, as Carlos came to gather data and Cecil showed up to interview survivors, sharply dressed in a lavender shirt, deep purple tie and waistcoat, his silver hair perfectly combed. Even if he was there as a reporter, he always seemed to give Carlos most of his attention, trying to get an interview and complimenting his choice of clothes. Once, he even slipped him his number.
His interest was utterly baffling and Carlos kept his distances, but, after some observing and analyzing, he came to the conclusion that Cecil didn’t mean him any harm. The scientist slowly breathed in, then out, and turned to face his not-at-all-secret admirer. And then he gaped at him in a way that was probably not polite. This was the fist time they met while Cecil was off-duty and Carlos hadn’t been prepared for the sight.
The radio host had always been professionally dressed while on the job, but now he was a fashion disaster. He wore a bright yellow raincoat that wasn’t really appropriate for the sunny weather, an over-sized indigo shirt patterned with sequin silver stars, rainbow suspenders, and tie-dyed shorts worn over obnoxious yellow and pink polka-dotted leggings. Mismatched socks and orange crocs completed the look.
"…Cecil?" he asked, just to be sure it really was him, because that was hard to believe.
"Hi Carlos," the other man greeted with a timid smile. Cecil readjusted his glasses and fiddled with silvery hair that hadn’t seen a comb that day and rocked on the balls of his feet, not looking at him except for quick glances. His other hand clutched at a shopping basket filled with sliced rye bread, a family size jar of peanut butter and some of the quivering vegetables Carlos didn’t recognize. Or maybe they were fruits. He didn’t have enough data to tell. ”I hope you’re not here for fire, because they’re out again.”
"I noticed."
"It’s a shame, I meant to bake cookies." Cecil shifted in place. The hand that had been twirling a lock of hair around a finger lowered to rub his neck nervously. Carlos realized that he was probably waiting for some kind of response, so he gave a noncommittal grunt. Cecil chewed on his lip and rubbed his left foot against his right ankle. "I’ve been meaning to bake you cookies to welcome you to Night Vale, but I don’t really bake, so I had to, like, make several attempts so I could try to make them perfect, but then they banned wheat and wheat by-products and now I have to start over."
"Oh." Carlos wasn’t sure how to react to that. He was never sure how to react to Cecil’s attention. It was a little overwhelming.
"I’m so sorry, you’ve been here for months already and they’re going to be so terribly late."
"You don’t need to bake me cookies."
"Oh." Cecil looked down and his hand left his neck to join the other in holding his basket. He sounded so sad at what he took for a rejection of his late welcome gift that Carlos felt bad.
"I mean, it’s really nice of you." He tentatively reached out and patted Cecil’s arm before making his escape without another word.
Once at the end of the aisle, he dared look back at the peculiar man. Cecil was still standing right where he left him, half turned to stare at him with an expression of wonder and flushed cheeks, his hand pressed to the spot Carlos had touched. The scientist shook his head and walked away. Cecil still left him completely baffled, maybe even more baffled, but… now he seemed a little less creepy and a little more innocent. Something about knowing he had the fashion sense of a toddler made him a lot less threatening.
