Drabble #4.5
Er, this is a drabble-point-five, as I think I'll end it here unless you guys are kinda clamoring for more. I am becoming increasingly leery of this drabble because it could very easily turn into a story and nobody wants that.
Okay, an alien visits a human gay bar, written for rorarin.
Earth Guys Are Easy
The loud, throbbing music was already beginning to hurt Zed’s ears, and he had only been inside the human club for approximately twenty-three Earth minutes. This was not an auspicious start to the evening.
He made his way across the slick dance floor to the bar. Flashing lights turned his face into a rainbow whorl of color and he squinted his violet eyes against the glare. The bar was a long chrome strip with faux dials and switches embedded under a thick, shiny sheet of plexiglass. Behind the bar, electric blue lights illuminated racks of bottles on chrome shelves. It made Zed feel like he was back inside his spaceship. Except inside his spaceship scantily clad humans wearing black mesh tops did not serve him drinks.
“Hello,” Zed said to the nearest bartender as he squeezed his way through the crush of sweaty, glittering bodies to the counter. “I wish to purchase a beverage like a normal human.”
The bartender pushed a drink out into the sea of grabbing hands and turned to Zed as he wiped his fingers on a neon blue towel. This particular human subject appeared shorter than him by several grummels - he calculated mentally - or approximately five Earth inches and had dark brown hair and green-hued eyes.
Through the black mesh, he could see the glint of metal hoops adorning the human’s chest. Zed had yet to understand the significance behind the ceremonial jewelry, but he had seen several other Earth homosexuals wearing similar adornments so he suspected it was a way of pledging allegiance to a certain tribe.
“Oh yeah? What’ll it be, smart guy?” the bartender asked.
Zed looked down at himself and then back at the bartender. “My intellectual aptitude is apparent from my manner of dress?”
“Riiiight,” the bartender said. “Hit a couple of spots before you came here, huh? Just don’t get crazy or the bouncers’ll throw your ass out. And the second I see you wobble a drink, it’s water all the way.”
They will throw out my ass? Zed thought, aghast. He tried to imagine how the bouncers were going to separate his ass from his body. A new form of nano-dissecting technology? Had the humans advanced that far? He would need to investigate the bartender’s claims later if he was to make a full report.
“Do not worry for my safety,” Zed said. “I will not cause an altercation.”
The bartender stared at him and shook his head. “Man, the really good-looking ones are always crazy,” he mumbled. Normally, it would have been lost to the blaring music and the shouts and laughter, but Zed’s excellent hearing picked up the bartender’s words.
“I assure you, I am perfectly sane,” Zed replied.
“Hoookay,” the bartender said. Zed wondered if this was a particular sort of human speech pattern. Perhaps it was regional? Or it could be familial. “Let’s get you that drink. What’s your poison?”
Zed blinked and nearly took a step back. Did this human know about Saloran defense mechanisms? Surely not. Their poison glands were a secret weapon of which not even the Galactic Squad was fully aware. Zed inspected the human more keenly: he might be one of the rumored telepathic hominids Zed’s predecessor had reported about.
“What poison?” Zed asked. “I have no poison. I only wish to purchase a beverage and cavort on the dance floor with the other humans - I mean, people.”
The bartender laughed. “There might be something to the weird guy act. It’s charming in a bizarre, Quasimodo sorta way. What can I get you to drink?”
Zed paused. In the excitement of dressing and practicing human speech for his night out, he had forgotten to read through the drink manual before he left the ship. “I am not certain. What would you recommend?”
“I like Sex on the Beach,” the bartender said, shrugging. “It’s a classic. But around here Cocksucking Cowboys and Blowjobs are pretty popular.”
“I see,” Zed said. “Thank you. I appreciate your frankness, beverage merchant. But for now I would merely like something to drink.”
The bartender rolled his eyes. “Try a slutty redhead. You look like a peach schnapps kinda guy.”
“Yes,” Zed decided. “I will drink whatever you serve me.”
“At that stage of the night already, huh?” the bartender asked sympathetically as he went to make the drink.
An elbow jostled Zed’s side, and a stunning human with bright red hair and blue eyes slid up to the bar in front of him. Ah, this must be the redheaded slut the bartender had mentioned.
“Hey, gorgeous,” said the redheaded man, pushing sweaty hair off his forehead. He had on a tight neon yellow shirt that was thin enough for Zed to discern his partially erect nipples. “Love the hair, very funky, very moon-man. I’m Adam. Do you dance or just sit there and look good?”
“I do both,” Zed answered, reaching up to touch his silver hair. It was just like every other Saloran’s hair. “I have also ordered a drink, but I would be happy to purchase one for you as well.”
The redhead gave him an incredulous look. “Oh yeah? Must be my lucky night.”
“It is the customary initiation for the courting ritual, is it not? Humans - I mean we - purchase each other’s affection.”
“Wow,” said Adam. “You’ve been hitting them pretty hard, haven’t you, handsome?”
“I do not believe in unwarranted violence,” Zed replied. “And I have not attacked anyone today.”
Adam’s brow furrowed, and he fanned his face with one hand. He had bright green glitter smeared across his cheeks and sweat had streaked the black warrior paint around his eyes. “Okay. Buy me a drink.”
Two other young men joined them, the one with dark hair draping himself over Adam’s shoulder. “Hey, who’s the hottie, Adam?” he asked.
“Found a sugar daddy already?” asked the other.
“I dunno, didn’t catch his name yet,” Adam replied, smiling at Zed.
“I am Zed,” Zed replied, pleased that he was finally making progress in a human romantic encounter.
Zed’s bartender came back then with reddish colored liquid in a short glass. He caught sight of Adam and his face twisted into a tiny frown before smoothing back out. “Here you go,” he said, slapping the drink down onto the counter. “That’s eight bucks.”
Zed pulled out a piece of green paper with a large one-zero-zero inscribed at the corners. “Please may I also have one for my new friend?”
“And his new friend’s friends!” chimed in the dark-haired friend of Adam.
“Yes,” Zed agreed, after a moment’s hesitation. He hoped that all three humans did not expect to bed him in one night. He was not a tentacled Snorkax, after all. “And I wish for you to keep the rest to thank you for your advice.”
The bartender stared at him, looked at the piece of human money, and then shrugged. “Your funeral,” he said, taking the green paper.
“Let us make small talk,” Zed said. “I am on business from out of town. What do you do daily to sustain yourself?”
Adam and his friends exchanged glances. “We all work at an office together. It’s boring, but it pays the bills. And gives us time to party on the weekends!” he finished with a little yell. His friends echoed his noise and raised their fists toward the ceiling.
“I hope that your job is still otherwise fulfilling,” Zed said. Adam’s bright yellow shirt, though enticingly contoured over his torso, was beginning to hurt Zed’s eyes.
“It’s a soulless corporate hellhole,” Adam said, “but there’s always free coffee. Geez, what planet are you from?”
“Saloran Five,” Zed replied promptly, and immediately cursed himself.
“Really?” Adam asked. “How far away is that in, like, light years or whatever?”
“Two-point-five,” Zed answered cautiously.
Adam and his friends laughed. “Is this guy for serious?” whispered the dark-haired one into Adam’s ear.
The bartender arrived with three drinks and, after giving Zed a critical stare, left them on the counter and went to the other end of the bar to take his next order.
“Well, weird as this has been, thanks for the drinks,” Adam said. He and his friends started to move away.
Zed blinked in shock. “You accepted my offer of a beverage. Doesn’t that mean you are interested in pursuing a romantic relationship?”
“Not in a million light years, honey,” Adam said over his shoulder with a laugh. It was not a friendly laugh, if Zed was any judge. “But send me a postcard from your home world.” He and his two friends left laughing together.
Zed sighed.
A strange song that required participants to spell words and simultaneously wave their hands began to play loudly over the speakers, and the crowd at the bar thinned as humans rushed the dance floor.
Zed’s bartender was watching the dancing with a wistful smile, but he did not appear occupied with drink preparations so Zed made his way back to him.
“The slutty redhead did not work,” Zed said as he reached the bartender, raising his voice to be heard over the din.
The bartender looked at him, startled. “What?”
“The slutty redhead, Adam, was not interested. His yellow shirt may actually be an indicator to warn potential suitors that he is not in a mating mood. I am not certain - I still do not completely understand hum - the dress code. I fear you may have made a miscalculation in recommending him to me.”
The bartender’s gaze swiveled back to the dancefloor and honed in on Adam and his bright yellow, form-fitting shirt as he danced away with a group of friends. “What are you talking about?”
“You told me to try a slutty redhead.”
The bartender blinked at him. “Pal, you’re drinking one.”
Zed stared at the drink in his hand and took a tentative sip. It was sweet and a little tangy. “That is a very strange name for a beverage.”
“Drink about six more of ‘em and it doesn’t seem so strange.”
“Perhaps after I have had more and Adam has had more I should approach him again?”
The bartender shook his head. “Trust me, you don’t wanna get messed up with that guy. My old roommate dated him for a while. Don’t bother hitting on him, he’s a douche.”
Zed flicked through his mental catalogue of the human vocabulary and found a definition for the bartender’s last word in the French human language. “He is a - shower?” Zed asked hesitantly. That was a peculiar insult.
The bartender laughed, flashing white teeth. “I knew it - you were so weird, you had to be European. They always give us grief about that. Yeah, that guy -” the bartender said, pointing out Adam’s writhing form on the dance floor, “ - is a total showerbag. Broke my roommate’s heart. He’s in here all the time and he gets around a lot. I’m not saying he has anything catching, y’know, but I wouldn’t touch him without a full body condom.”
“Ah,” Zed said. “That would not be a pleasurable experience. And most impractical, I would imagine.”
“Yeah, definitely,” the bartender agreed with a chuckle. He stuck his hand across the counter. “I’m Gray,” he said.
Zed shook his hand and studied him. “You do not look grey. You appear peach in complexion.”
“Har har,” the bartender said. “You’re the first person to ever make that joke about my name, let me tell ya.”
Realization dawned on Zed. He was thankful that Saloran blood was clear or he would have embarrassed himself with a blush. “My apologies. I am Zed.”
“Nice to meet ya, Zed,” Gray said, flashing another grin. He had what the humans called a “dimple” in one cheek. It made his face rather asymmetrical.
“I am likewise in enjoyment of our meeting.”
Gray tilted his head curiously. “Don’t get offended, but you seem kinda new at this. Most guys I see trying to get back in the swing are coming off a bad breakup, but you don’t seem too upset.”
“Oh,” Zed said. “I did not realize my inexperience was so apparent. I took great pains to appear normal tonight.”
“Normal, with silver hair and crazy purple contacts and an Armani outfit? Nice try.”
Zed felt another hidden flush creep up his neck. His plan of blending in may have indeed been flawed. “You are correct in your assumptions, however. I am ‘new at this,’ as you say.”
“Yeah?” Gray asked. “Well, what type do you usually go for? I’ve been working bars long enough, I can usually spot the worthwhile ones.”
“I do not know,” Zed confessed, surprised at his own honesty. “I have never dated a human before.”
Gray laughed. “I get it. They were all showerbags, huh? No worries. You probably want a real sweetheart guy, then. Somebody you can take home to meet mom and dad.”
Zed thought about the stern, imposing figure of High Commander Teflyt and his wife Grand Lady Muzqaz. “I would not take anyone I was fond of home to meet my parents.”
“Ouch,” Gray winced. “That bad? Mine are pretty cool about everything.”
“That is fortunate.”
A sweaty young man who seemed to have lost his shirt on the dancefloor staggered up to the bar. “Graaaaay baby,” he panted. “Give me some looooove.”
Gray shook his head, reached under the bar, and pulled out a small bottle. He opened the top with an expert flip of his wrist and handed the bottle to the young man, who downed the contents in one long swallow.
“I owe ya,” the young man grinned tipsily before disappearing back into the crowd.
Gray smiled apologetically. “My roommate. He’s still, uh, getting over Adam.”
“It is good that you are a nurturing person,” Zed said.
Gray raised an eyebrow in question.
“He looks to be heavily inebriated and will likely require assistance getting home and functioning tomorrow morning.”
Gray’s smile was wistful again. “Trust me, Mike is not coming home tonight.” He nodded at the dance floor where his roommate was engaged in a passionate - and very wet - display of affection with another dancer.
“Oh,” Zed said. “Then I am sorry you will be alone tonight.”
“Yeah,” Gray replied. He looked hard at Zed and seemed to come to some decision. “Hey,” he said suddenly. “My shift is over in a few minutes. Do you wanna go out and grab a cup of coffee?”
Gray was a very attractive for a human. Perhaps Zed’s reconnaissance had been wrong - he hadn’t bought Gray a drink and now Gray was offering to buy him one. “Yes,” Zed said decisively. “I would like that.”
Gray smiled. “Meet me at the door in fifteen.”
Another customer interrupted anything else he might say, and Zed left the bar and made his way to the door, his three hearts hammering inside his chest.
Okay, an alien visits a human gay bar, written for rorarin.
Earth Guys Are Easy
The loud, throbbing music was already beginning to hurt Zed’s ears, and he had only been inside the human club for approximately twenty-three Earth minutes. This was not an auspicious start to the evening.
He made his way across the slick dance floor to the bar. Flashing lights turned his face into a rainbow whorl of color and he squinted his violet eyes against the glare. The bar was a long chrome strip with faux dials and switches embedded under a thick, shiny sheet of plexiglass. Behind the bar, electric blue lights illuminated racks of bottles on chrome shelves. It made Zed feel like he was back inside his spaceship. Except inside his spaceship scantily clad humans wearing black mesh tops did not serve him drinks.
“Hello,” Zed said to the nearest bartender as he squeezed his way through the crush of sweaty, glittering bodies to the counter. “I wish to purchase a beverage like a normal human.”
The bartender pushed a drink out into the sea of grabbing hands and turned to Zed as he wiped his fingers on a neon blue towel. This particular human subject appeared shorter than him by several grummels - he calculated mentally - or approximately five Earth inches and had dark brown hair and green-hued eyes.
Through the black mesh, he could see the glint of metal hoops adorning the human’s chest. Zed had yet to understand the significance behind the ceremonial jewelry, but he had seen several other Earth homosexuals wearing similar adornments so he suspected it was a way of pledging allegiance to a certain tribe.
“Oh yeah? What’ll it be, smart guy?” the bartender asked.
Zed looked down at himself and then back at the bartender. “My intellectual aptitude is apparent from my manner of dress?”
“Riiiight,” the bartender said. “Hit a couple of spots before you came here, huh? Just don’t get crazy or the bouncers’ll throw your ass out. And the second I see you wobble a drink, it’s water all the way.”
They will throw out my ass? Zed thought, aghast. He tried to imagine how the bouncers were going to separate his ass from his body. A new form of nano-dissecting technology? Had the humans advanced that far? He would need to investigate the bartender’s claims later if he was to make a full report.
“Do not worry for my safety,” Zed said. “I will not cause an altercation.”
The bartender stared at him and shook his head. “Man, the really good-looking ones are always crazy,” he mumbled. Normally, it would have been lost to the blaring music and the shouts and laughter, but Zed’s excellent hearing picked up the bartender’s words.
“I assure you, I am perfectly sane,” Zed replied.
“Hoookay,” the bartender said. Zed wondered if this was a particular sort of human speech pattern. Perhaps it was regional? Or it could be familial. “Let’s get you that drink. What’s your poison?”
Zed blinked and nearly took a step back. Did this human know about Saloran defense mechanisms? Surely not. Their poison glands were a secret weapon of which not even the Galactic Squad was fully aware. Zed inspected the human more keenly: he might be one of the rumored telepathic hominids Zed’s predecessor had reported about.
“What poison?” Zed asked. “I have no poison. I only wish to purchase a beverage and cavort on the dance floor with the other humans - I mean, people.”
The bartender laughed. “There might be something to the weird guy act. It’s charming in a bizarre, Quasimodo sorta way. What can I get you to drink?”
Zed paused. In the excitement of dressing and practicing human speech for his night out, he had forgotten to read through the drink manual before he left the ship. “I am not certain. What would you recommend?”
“I like Sex on the Beach,” the bartender said, shrugging. “It’s a classic. But around here Cocksucking Cowboys and Blowjobs are pretty popular.”
“I see,” Zed said. “Thank you. I appreciate your frankness, beverage merchant. But for now I would merely like something to drink.”
The bartender rolled his eyes. “Try a slutty redhead. You look like a peach schnapps kinda guy.”
“Yes,” Zed decided. “I will drink whatever you serve me.”
“At that stage of the night already, huh?” the bartender asked sympathetically as he went to make the drink.
An elbow jostled Zed’s side, and a stunning human with bright red hair and blue eyes slid up to the bar in front of him. Ah, this must be the redheaded slut the bartender had mentioned.
“Hey, gorgeous,” said the redheaded man, pushing sweaty hair off his forehead. He had on a tight neon yellow shirt that was thin enough for Zed to discern his partially erect nipples. “Love the hair, very funky, very moon-man. I’m Adam. Do you dance or just sit there and look good?”
“I do both,” Zed answered, reaching up to touch his silver hair. It was just like every other Saloran’s hair. “I have also ordered a drink, but I would be happy to purchase one for you as well.”
The redhead gave him an incredulous look. “Oh yeah? Must be my lucky night.”
“It is the customary initiation for the courting ritual, is it not? Humans - I mean we - purchase each other’s affection.”
“Wow,” said Adam. “You’ve been hitting them pretty hard, haven’t you, handsome?”
“I do not believe in unwarranted violence,” Zed replied. “And I have not attacked anyone today.”
Adam’s brow furrowed, and he fanned his face with one hand. He had bright green glitter smeared across his cheeks and sweat had streaked the black warrior paint around his eyes. “Okay. Buy me a drink.”
Two other young men joined them, the one with dark hair draping himself over Adam’s shoulder. “Hey, who’s the hottie, Adam?” he asked.
“Found a sugar daddy already?” asked the other.
“I dunno, didn’t catch his name yet,” Adam replied, smiling at Zed.
“I am Zed,” Zed replied, pleased that he was finally making progress in a human romantic encounter.
Zed’s bartender came back then with reddish colored liquid in a short glass. He caught sight of Adam and his face twisted into a tiny frown before smoothing back out. “Here you go,” he said, slapping the drink down onto the counter. “That’s eight bucks.”
Zed pulled out a piece of green paper with a large one-zero-zero inscribed at the corners. “Please may I also have one for my new friend?”
“And his new friend’s friends!” chimed in the dark-haired friend of Adam.
“Yes,” Zed agreed, after a moment’s hesitation. He hoped that all three humans did not expect to bed him in one night. He was not a tentacled Snorkax, after all. “And I wish for you to keep the rest to thank you for your advice.”
The bartender stared at him, looked at the piece of human money, and then shrugged. “Your funeral,” he said, taking the green paper.
“Let us make small talk,” Zed said. “I am on business from out of town. What do you do daily to sustain yourself?”
Adam and his friends exchanged glances. “We all work at an office together. It’s boring, but it pays the bills. And gives us time to party on the weekends!” he finished with a little yell. His friends echoed his noise and raised their fists toward the ceiling.
“I hope that your job is still otherwise fulfilling,” Zed said. Adam’s bright yellow shirt, though enticingly contoured over his torso, was beginning to hurt Zed’s eyes.
“It’s a soulless corporate hellhole,” Adam said, “but there’s always free coffee. Geez, what planet are you from?”
“Saloran Five,” Zed replied promptly, and immediately cursed himself.
“Really?” Adam asked. “How far away is that in, like, light years or whatever?”
“Two-point-five,” Zed answered cautiously.
Adam and his friends laughed. “Is this guy for serious?” whispered the dark-haired one into Adam’s ear.
The bartender arrived with three drinks and, after giving Zed a critical stare, left them on the counter and went to the other end of the bar to take his next order.
“Well, weird as this has been, thanks for the drinks,” Adam said. He and his friends started to move away.
Zed blinked in shock. “You accepted my offer of a beverage. Doesn’t that mean you are interested in pursuing a romantic relationship?”
“Not in a million light years, honey,” Adam said over his shoulder with a laugh. It was not a friendly laugh, if Zed was any judge. “But send me a postcard from your home world.” He and his two friends left laughing together.
Zed sighed.
A strange song that required participants to spell words and simultaneously wave their hands began to play loudly over the speakers, and the crowd at the bar thinned as humans rushed the dance floor.
Zed’s bartender was watching the dancing with a wistful smile, but he did not appear occupied with drink preparations so Zed made his way back to him.
“The slutty redhead did not work,” Zed said as he reached the bartender, raising his voice to be heard over the din.
The bartender looked at him, startled. “What?”
“The slutty redhead, Adam, was not interested. His yellow shirt may actually be an indicator to warn potential suitors that he is not in a mating mood. I am not certain - I still do not completely understand hum - the dress code. I fear you may have made a miscalculation in recommending him to me.”
The bartender’s gaze swiveled back to the dancefloor and honed in on Adam and his bright yellow, form-fitting shirt as he danced away with a group of friends. “What are you talking about?”
“You told me to try a slutty redhead.”
The bartender blinked at him. “Pal, you’re drinking one.”
Zed stared at the drink in his hand and took a tentative sip. It was sweet and a little tangy. “That is a very strange name for a beverage.”
“Drink about six more of ‘em and it doesn’t seem so strange.”
“Perhaps after I have had more and Adam has had more I should approach him again?”
The bartender shook his head. “Trust me, you don’t wanna get messed up with that guy. My old roommate dated him for a while. Don’t bother hitting on him, he’s a douche.”
Zed flicked through his mental catalogue of the human vocabulary and found a definition for the bartender’s last word in the French human language. “He is a - shower?” Zed asked hesitantly. That was a peculiar insult.
The bartender laughed, flashing white teeth. “I knew it - you were so weird, you had to be European. They always give us grief about that. Yeah, that guy -” the bartender said, pointing out Adam’s writhing form on the dance floor, “ - is a total showerbag. Broke my roommate’s heart. He’s in here all the time and he gets around a lot. I’m not saying he has anything catching, y’know, but I wouldn’t touch him without a full body condom.”
“Ah,” Zed said. “That would not be a pleasurable experience. And most impractical, I would imagine.”
“Yeah, definitely,” the bartender agreed with a chuckle. He stuck his hand across the counter. “I’m Gray,” he said.
Zed shook his hand and studied him. “You do not look grey. You appear peach in complexion.”
“Har har,” the bartender said. “You’re the first person to ever make that joke about my name, let me tell ya.”
Realization dawned on Zed. He was thankful that Saloran blood was clear or he would have embarrassed himself with a blush. “My apologies. I am Zed.”
“Nice to meet ya, Zed,” Gray said, flashing another grin. He had what the humans called a “dimple” in one cheek. It made his face rather asymmetrical.
“I am likewise in enjoyment of our meeting.”
Gray tilted his head curiously. “Don’t get offended, but you seem kinda new at this. Most guys I see trying to get back in the swing are coming off a bad breakup, but you don’t seem too upset.”
“Oh,” Zed said. “I did not realize my inexperience was so apparent. I took great pains to appear normal tonight.”
“Normal, with silver hair and crazy purple contacts and an Armani outfit? Nice try.”
Zed felt another hidden flush creep up his neck. His plan of blending in may have indeed been flawed. “You are correct in your assumptions, however. I am ‘new at this,’ as you say.”
“Yeah?” Gray asked. “Well, what type do you usually go for? I’ve been working bars long enough, I can usually spot the worthwhile ones.”
“I do not know,” Zed confessed, surprised at his own honesty. “I have never dated a human before.”
Gray laughed. “I get it. They were all showerbags, huh? No worries. You probably want a real sweetheart guy, then. Somebody you can take home to meet mom and dad.”
Zed thought about the stern, imposing figure of High Commander Teflyt and his wife Grand Lady Muzqaz. “I would not take anyone I was fond of home to meet my parents.”
“Ouch,” Gray winced. “That bad? Mine are pretty cool about everything.”
“That is fortunate.”
A sweaty young man who seemed to have lost his shirt on the dancefloor staggered up to the bar. “Graaaaay baby,” he panted. “Give me some looooove.”
Gray shook his head, reached under the bar, and pulled out a small bottle. He opened the top with an expert flip of his wrist and handed the bottle to the young man, who downed the contents in one long swallow.
“I owe ya,” the young man grinned tipsily before disappearing back into the crowd.
Gray smiled apologetically. “My roommate. He’s still, uh, getting over Adam.”
“It is good that you are a nurturing person,” Zed said.
Gray raised an eyebrow in question.
“He looks to be heavily inebriated and will likely require assistance getting home and functioning tomorrow morning.”
Gray’s smile was wistful again. “Trust me, Mike is not coming home tonight.” He nodded at the dance floor where his roommate was engaged in a passionate - and very wet - display of affection with another dancer.
“Oh,” Zed said. “Then I am sorry you will be alone tonight.”
“Yeah,” Gray replied. He looked hard at Zed and seemed to come to some decision. “Hey,” he said suddenly. “My shift is over in a few minutes. Do you wanna go out and grab a cup of coffee?”
Gray was a very attractive for a human. Perhaps Zed’s reconnaissance had been wrong - he hadn’t bought Gray a drink and now Gray was offering to buy him one. “Yes,” Zed said decisively. “I would like that.”
Gray smiled. “Meet me at the door in fifteen.”
Another customer interrupted anything else he might say, and Zed left the bar and made his way to the door, his three hearts hammering inside his chest.