(Untitled)

[golden_lyre]

[OOM: Out of his sleep, from time to time,
From between half open lips,
Escaped the bewildered words which try to tell
The tale of his bright night
And his wing-shadowed day
The soaring flights of thought beneath the sun
Above the islands of the seas
And all the deserts, all the pastures, all the plains
Of the distracting foreign land.]Orpheus'

Comments

[alsoagreengrass]

Orpheus is quiet. Too quiet for Scorpius as he knows him. And the drinking -

Well.

Scorpius sets aside his butterbeer with a frown.

"All right?"

[golden_lyre]

Orpheus turns to him with bleary eyes and a hazy smile.

"Who me? Fine, sure."

[alsoagreengrass]

"If you say so."

Scorpius thinks Orpheus looks like he could use a hug.

He scoots a seat closer.

"Do you want something to eat with that?"

[golden_lyre]

He's smiling, see? He can't be doing that badly if he's smiling, can he?

(And if he were to get a hug, he'd likely no be able to keep smiling like that.)

"Hm, no. Not hungry."

Slurring his words just a bit but not hungry.

[alsoagreengrass]

He can be downright miserable and still smile.

Which Scorpius would not want to be the case. He'd prefer to be mistaken in thinking Orpheus needs a hug than the bloke really needing one.

"Okay. Am I interrupting your thoughts? Do you, er - Want to be left alone to finish the bottle?"

[golden_lyre]

He contemplates both questions as he pours himself another glass.

"No thoughts to interrupt." This is, of course, a complete and total lie.

"Stay. Have a drink!"

[alsoagreengrass]

Scorpius drags his butterbeer over to his new spot. He'll stick with that. For now.

"Not even a small thought about, uhm - I don't know. Accidentally having worn a different sock on each foot?"

[golden_lyre]

Orpheus tilts his head curiously, leaning over to peer at Scorpius' socks. "That's what you spend your days thinking about?"

[alsoagreengrass]

Though hidden by his shoes, Scorpius wiggles his sock-clad toes at Orpheus.

"Not all day, but I might, er - Spare a thought for it once and awhile?"

[golden_lyre]

Orpheus nods, half-seriously.

"It's a problem? Wearing different socks?"

[alsoagreengrass]

"It can cause feelings of imbalance. And then your whole day would be, uhm - Well. It'd be off."

He's not serious. At all.

[golden_lyre]

He takes another drink and refills his glass.

"Balance is...important."

He frowns thoughtfully, scrutinizing Scorpius. Possibly because Scorpius seems to insist on being two of himself just now. It's really not fair.

"Things are important. You think they're...people think they're...trivial. But they're not. They have impact. They last. Things last. Important things. And they keep having impact. It's not a trick, not a sideshow act. It's real."

[alsoagreengrass]

Scorpius blinks, then eyes the bottle of ouzo like he might need a sip to follow along.

"What sort of important things are we talking about now?"

[golden_lyre]

It might help him think Orpheus were making sense, at least.

"Important things."

He waves the bottle, loosely gripped between his fingers, then asks, seemingly out of nowhere. "Do you love him?"

[alsoagreengrass]

"Uhm. I like him. A lot," Scorpius says carefully as he takes the bottle from Orpheus and sets it down on the counter.

[golden_lyre]

"It's important," Orpheus says, like the connection to his earlier statement should be obvious. "It's not trivial. Not now."