[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 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?"

[cozen]

This earns a look up, Bastien's eyes glinting with a little mischief in the firelight for a moment of obvious consideration. Calling Byerly a hysteric might be fun. But when that look slides to Benedict, the good humor fades, and he's quick to look down at the paper again.

"He came to tell me he was sorry for how things went when you all had forgotten us," he says, "and I gave him a hard time for about ten seconds, and he had a tantrum about it."

Because he's weak! Your protege is weak, Byerly!

[altusimperius]

“I said you were being an arsehole,” Benedict snaps, quick as a viper, his poise breaking, “because you were. And you are.”

[cozen]

"You said I was an arsehole," Bastien replies before Byerly might have a chance to intervene, "and you said Rat Red loves you more than me," with such unbothered serenity (and such a firm hold on the puppy) that a clever ear may detect that this was why he did not laugh and call Benedict back into the workroom to make amends on the spot, "and you stormed out like a child because I pretended very politely not to recognize you — "

He flips the paper in his hand to resume reading below the fold.

" — which was funny."

[bouchonne]

Byerly turns towards Bastien, his eyes narrowed. He caught that saintly serenity. He knows what it means. But he is also not about to elucidate that meaning front of Benedict, because as fond as he is of the lad, By isn't about to reveal Bastien's tender heart for common viewing.

"That is funny." Objective facts are objective facts. "And quite arseholish, too. That does not answer the question of why it is persisting."

[altusimperius]

“She does,” Benedict answers primly, looking back to the mirror as he begins to dab color onto his lips, “but I wouldn’t have said it if you weren’t being so nasty. I was sincerely apologetic and you threw it in my face.”

[cozen]

Bastien narrows his eyes back at Byerly — what combined with don't you dare — before giving them a slight roll in response to Benedict, who cannot hurt him with repetition and also has not even begun to experience what it would be like if he was nasty and throwing things in anyone's face.

"I am going to get ready," he says, restrained and dignified and dismissive, rising from his seat and tossing the paper onto a pile of others.

He does not toss Rat Red anywhere. She's coming upstairs with him.

[bouchonne]

Once Bastien has ascended the stairs, Byerly casts an unimpressed look at Benedict.

"You know, dear lad," he says, "in Ferelden, you'd be cut down where you stood if you implied a man's dog wasn't loyal to him above all others."

This is not a joke.

[altusimperius]

“Good thing we’re not in Ferelden, then,” Benedict grumbles, continuing his primping, though he pauses after a time to meet Byerly’s gaze.

“It’s all my fault, I suppose? Because I didn’t correctly interpret cruelty as what was clearly just a joke at my expense?”

[bouchonne]

"It's somewhat your fault." Which is perhaps the most frustrating response - it neither absolves nor martyrs.

"What happened the other month was miserable for him. Specifically for him." By plays with his eyeshadow palette a moment, then decides to be a bit reckless. "How much has Bastien told you of himself? Who he truly is?"

[altusimperius]

"It was miserable for a lot of people," Benedict retorts, though with less venom than before, "Clarisse managed not to mock me when I remembered her. Which wasn't our fault, by the way. The forgetting."

He turns back to the mirror, and begins to line one of his eyes with kohl, a slow and painstaking motion. "I know his name. And I know he picked this one when he was a child."

[bouchonne]

"Any notion why he picked a different name in the first place?" By purses his lips, watching Benedict.

[altusimperius]

"There's no reason I would have one," Benedict says quietly, slowly, as he traces the line around his eye, "but I imagine to get away from someone."

[bouchonne]

"Mm." It's a good guess. "No. It was a bit of...Well, seeking a new identity for himself, I suspect, after what happened. His family just left without him, you see, when he was a child. Let him come home to an empty house."

It's matter-of-fact and simple. No specific highlighting of why that loss of memory might make Bastien particularly prickly; he trusts that Benedict will see it at once.

[altusimperius]

Benedict does see it, but it fails to weaken his resolve: "imagine, your family not loving you," he says dully, distantly.

[bouchonne]

That earns a bit of sarcasm. "Oh, aye. Do extend a bit of grace, dear Benedict; we can't all be like you, and utterly resist developing any neuroses or hang-ups or obsessions as a result of that coldness."