[closed] let's go girls

[altusimperius]

WHO: Bastien, Benedict, Byerly (the Better Business Bureau)
WHAT: DRAG NIGHT
WHEN: sometime in [mumbles] winter
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: will add if necessary, I don't think anyone who's offended by any of this would last very long in this game

Fausta was an amalgamation of things: undergarments and cosmetics and shoes from Byerly, a wig and hair decorations and a fine Minrathousian gown from the Scouting closet, all mishmashed together in a convincing approximation of a wealthy lady in Tevinter's high society. It had done the job, and Benedict enjoyed the effort, but has since summarily refused to participate in Kirkwall's scene until he's gotten all the details just right.

And finally, he has: it's the night of an event in one of Lowtown's more curious establishments, and, having born witness to it before but in plainclothes, Benedict is ready for Fausta to make her society debut.
Or, at least, he will be when they're finished getting ready-- having arrived at Byerly and Bastien's house with all his things and a fancy cheese tray, the preparations have begun.

Comments

[bouchonne]

Byerly will not allow Fausta to look anything but fantastic. He looks over Benedict, now, with a critical eye, rubbing at his mustache as he considers his stock of rouges.

"This shade doesn't flatter right now, but I think it'll look right under stagelights. What do you think?"

He calls back to Bastien for another expert opinion, holding the little round of powder up to Benedict's face.

[altusimperius]

"I'm-- it's all right, I'm not performing," Benedict insists, balking from the powder; "you know I haven't prepared anything, the first powder's fine." The very concept seems to inject him with dread, and he casts a familiar wide-eyed look at Byerly that hearkens back to his early secretarial days.

[cozen]

Bastien looks over the top of the newspaper he's reading by firelight from the hearth — news imported from Minrathous, work never ends — to consider the powder and the exchange both with mild to middling interest.

"He's not performing," Bastien says, with a tip of his head that means you heard him, and his attention goes back to the page.

[bouchonne]

Byerly frowns at Bastien, who normally is far more helpful in these sorts of matters. Certainly, perhaps he's in the midst of work, but he usually proves eminently distractable from such things.

Well - "There's no chance at all?" By purses his lips. "It would be a dreadful shame to go through all this effort to then not end up the center of attention."

[altusimperius]

“I don’t sing,” Benedict explains, amiably enough, though his expression cools in a glance toward Bastien when the latter offers his remark. That’s right.

“And I don’t need to make a spectacle of myself to get attention,” he adds with a little smirk, watching his own reflection as he holds up one earring and then another to compare them.

[cozen]

Bastien is impervious to Byerly's frowning, thank you very much, but at Benedict's remark he cuts another look over across the top of the paper. That's a rich thing coming from anyone dressing so richly, in his street urchin opinion, and an uncharitable description of the sorts of things Byerly does besides, at least to the ear of someone disinclined to take anything Benedict says right now as friendly teasing.

But aside from a rather pointed-sounding rattle of the paper as he smooths out a fold, he stays quiet.

[bouchonne]

By, however, doesn't seem to take any offense to this. Offense, after all, would require him having any feeling that making a spectacle of oneself is a bad thing. Instead he clicks his tongue and says, "Just as long as you aren't under the impression that anyone will be looking at you when I'm on stage. I don't want you to be heartbroken."

And he looks coquettishly at Bastien, expecting his beloved to be nodding in support.

[cozen]

Not quite, no. But Bastien does catch the turn of his head in his peripheral vision in time to look up from the newspaper again, and he winks the wink of a man who has no quarrel with Byerly whatsoever and will not be looking at anyone else, on or off any stages, for as much of the evening as is plausibly polite.

Rat Red, arising from a short-lived nap against Whiskey's warm side, trots closer. She's headed for her favorite, certainly, but Bastien intercepts her with a one-handed scoop and holds her to his chest.

[altusimperius]

"I would never," Benedict insists serenely, taking the powder from Byerly and beginning to apply it, though he opens his eyes just in time to narrow them at Rat Red's unwitting betrayal.

"Being in the presence of glory is enough for me." It's spoken wryly, but with at least a modicum of sincerity: he truly doesn't have any desire to be onstage, does in fact respect Byerly's craft in doing so, and also, most importantly, wants Bastien to see him treating Byerly warmly.

[bouchonne]

What is surprising about this whole thing is that it’s Bastien who’s so dreadfully unsubtle. Benedict has no ability whatsoever to lie, whereas Bastien is a master of the form. And yet it’s Bastien who’s making the tension between these two impossible to ignore.

The kidnapping of Rat Red, and Benedict’s silent disapproval, together constitute the last straw. Byerly finally sighs and turns away from the cosmetics.

“All right. What’s going on between you two?”

[cozen]

"Oh, you know," Bastien drawls without looking up from his paper, cool calm somewhat undermined by bouncing Rat Red in the crook of his arm like a baby and letting her try to fight his fingers to the death. "The usual."

[altusimperius]

Benedict might have been about to come clean, but Bastien’s reply railroads him into further pettiness: he gives a prissy little scoff and then echoes, in a whiny sing-song, “the usual.”

[bouchonne]

Byerly crosses his arms. "I think you can reasonably assume that, since I'm asking about it, it strikes me as being somewhat unusual. So either there's something to comment on, or you both are calling me a hysteric. Which one is it?"

[bouchonne]

At some point that evening, when Benedict has been carried away to be fussed over and plucked at and admired, and Byerly has managed to set himself up with a cigarette in a long cigarette holder and a divan where he can tuck himself into the crook of Bastien's arm, Byerly says to his beloved -

"My dearest love, light of my life — you're being a real dick."

[cozen]

This accusation does nothing to shift Bastien’s comfortable lean or stop the fingertip idly circling on Byerly’s arm, but it does make him raise his eyebrows and slide a look over.

It isn’t a look that pretends at innocence. He knows what Byerly is talking about.

“I thought you liked it when I didn’t try to please everyone.”

[bouchonne]

“I do.” He moves his head to cast a coquettish look upwards, then wrinkles his nose and reaches his hand up to adjust the dangling earring that he’d gotten snagged on Bastien’s shoulder.

“But what has the boy done to earn it?”

[cozen]

"I told you," Bastien says, which is both true and evasive, holding his shoulder still to help with the earring.

Called him an arsehole. Stormed out of his own apology because Bastien did not promptly supply his desired response. Said (correctly, which makes it much much worse) that Rat Red loves him more.

"Scolding me like this — " Has he mentioned how he feels about corsets? The first five mentions don't count. " — is cheating. You know I'll do anything you ask."

He's teasing. He is a little stronger willed than that.

[bouchonne]

“Of course you will. My pretty little plaything.” It’s saucy and teasing and sexy. And deeply unfair.

But. “You told me how the boy offended you - not how he earned this. I’ve seen you forgive a man who actually tried to kill you in less time than this.”

[cozen]

Deeply unfair. Bastien's sigh is yearning, not exasperated.

"Junien? That was not personal," he says. "That was business."

Someone stumbles past them, drunk, and jostles the divan. Aside from raising his arm to make sure the empty tankard she's swinging around on the way doesn't come anywhere near hitting Byerly in the head, Bastien continues unperturbed.

"He's not a boy, you know. He has to be thirty by now."

He does not have to be thirty by now. But close enough to feel the fire, surely.

[bouchonne]

It’s a fair point. And also depressing to contemplate. Maker, but Byerly feels old.

But - “The first twenty years don’t count for him, given where he came from. He’s effectively lived in the real world for less than a decade.” And, something that’s part peace offering and part real, “And also he’s a bit of an idiot.”

[cozen]

The offering of it makes Bastien smile; the reality of it makes him say, “You know, I don’t think he is.”

If Bastien thought Benedict were a child or a fool, let alone both, he wouldn’t enjoy it any more — he never wanted children, and he never signed up to mentor anyone — but he would be more tolerant.

“But I cannot overstate how little it took. He said he was sorry. I said who are you. He said you’re not serious, and I said sorry like I still didn’t know him. That was it,” Bastien says, “and he stormed off talking about Rat Red,” and perhaps the crux of the issue is that he doesn’t see this as a sensitive child having his feelings hurt, but as a young nobleman unwilling to have his apology accepted with anything but immediate gracious absolution without feeling disrespected.

[bouchonne]

The fact that Byerly sees it otherwise is made clear by his immediate response. "You're not making a strong case for him not being an idiot." Though he does add - "In certain parts of Ferelden, he would be killed for that comment about Rat Red. Which, I know, sounds like some dreadful rumor they spread about us in the North, but it's actually true - There was a case where a Blackhaller determined that a man had been excessively provoked by another man insulting his dog, and the murder was considered justified."

[cozen]

"I can't wait," Bastien says, which is always true — the dream of heading off with Byerly to Ferelden (and anywhere else they feel like) after the war is what keeps him here even when things are so unpleasant he would never stick around otherwise — but moreso if there's a chance he can wind up in court over his dog's honor. That sounds fun.

However,

"He would not insult her. He loves her."

[bouchonne]

That earns Bastien a pleased squirm. What a rare delight it is, to hear praise for his deranged homeland in a perfect Royan accent.

"Yes, there's no doubt of that. But in this case, you are the insulted, and could put a knife in his heart for daring to claim your dog's loyalty. It's like implying that a man's wife is unfaithful, but obviously much worse."

[cozen]

A contemplative hum.

"That makes sense," he says, and reaches his free hand around to skritch affectionately at Byerly's goatee. "I would not have been nearly as bothered if he told me you loved him more."

— is not true. Or it is true, but only because Bastien would have found it too ridiculous to dignify with his offense.