Oceana Aftermath {open}

[Aras|Ofelia]

Aurelia had probably seen his reaction to finding Jo's phone number in his pocket, explaining her hesitation in giving him hers. Aras dispelled her misgivings with a nod. She had no need for reservations in this case--it wasn't as if she were half-smashed, hitting on him and telling him to dump Ofelia or something of the sort. (Really, he would have been more flattered had it not been obvious that the woman at the bar was just a few drinks shy of reaching Ofelia's level of inebriation.)

Although he had expected nothing less, he gave a defeated shake of his head when at Aurelia's advice. He doubted he was creative enough to heed her words--whatever Reyes had put in that oven, Aras knew there was no way in nine hells he was going to be prepared for that.

The scent that wafted over from the kitchen only substantiated that thought. It was safe to say he had never encountered anything of the sort before. Some sort of morbid curiosity compelled him to ask just what sort of unearthly substance would emit that saccharine, oily smell (and whether or not it was edible), but his sense of self-preservation prevented him from doing so. Aurelia looked as if she were about to reassure him that his imminent doom was not, in fact, at hand, but she never got the chance.

Reyes had entered the living room and, without further ado, set the platter of... whatever it was... onto the table. In all honestly, they didn't look that bad; if it weren't for the smell and the fact that Reyes had made them, they looked almost like dark chocolate cookies. They did look a bit charred, but neither of them had caught the telltale smell of burnt flour.

As Aras examined the cookies suspiciously, Reyes strode over to him and said casually, “Don’t spill the tea.”

Aras immediately set the cup down.

At least he'd gotten a warning. In a whirl, he suddenly found himself picked up and seated on the other man's lap. He scrambled off, uncomfortably aware that Reyes was still in an apron and nothing but an apron--

--and landed instead on Aurelia's lap.

[DesperateDark]

When Aras gave her the okay nod, she quickly finished writing down her number and handed the scrap of paper to him. In her head, she was debating whether to actually expect him to call any time soon. Once he knew that she knew Reyes, she wouldn’t blame him if he wanted to deny knowing them completely and move to the next town over. Aurelia’s talisman even gave a nod of his head, agreeing with her. Well, there goes that option anyways, at least she tried to be nice.

While she was inspecting the (supposed) cookie, wondering why it was completely black and smelled of oil, Reyes had wandered around to Aras’ side of the couch, picked him up and plopped him down straight on his lap. Of course, being of hopefully sound mind, Aras quickly reacted to the fact that there was only an apron between his butt and… Well, you get the idea. Either way, he scrambled off Reyes and in his haste, accidently landed on Aurelia’s lap instead.

She was caught completely off guard, gave a startled yelp and without realizing it, she slapped him in the face. Hard. Backhand. Ouch. Her talisman was busy laughing his reptilian ass off as she scrambled from under Aras, repeating a rather long string of ‘sorry’ and landing on the floor before regaining some of her composure. Aurelia decided that at this point, she might as well stay on the floor and let Aras have her seat. Now she owed him for bringing him to Reyes’ house and slapping him; she was racking up quite a debt to his man and she’d known him for the majority of two hours, at most.

Reyes, on the other hand, was looking on with a curious, why-are-you-doing-that expression. He obviously didn’t get the awkwardness of the situation, or the discomfort of the smaller man. Sometimes Aurelia actually wondered if Reyes was being weird for the sake of being weird, or that he was mildly retarded. He was actually pretty smart in most aspects, as proven by his love of all things Shakespeare and knowledge of flora; it’s just that he didn’t show it often.

“Hey, what’s wrong with Aras? He seems really jumpy.” Reyes said rather innocently, that smile coming back onto his face once again. A slight pause as he looked back and forth between Aurelia on the floor and Aras sitting/laying next to him on the couch. “You know, I think you both should stay over tonight. Aurelia’s gonna freeze out there, and Aras should stay because he’s here anyways… And he can see Angela and Flo too.”

Count on Reyes to be random at odd times.

[Aras|Ofelia]

Before Aras had the chance to apologize, Aurelia had delivered a stinging slap. It wasn't even a regular slap; she had viciously backhanded him across the face. His head snapped the side, and he saw stars for several seconds.

When his vision cleared--and the ringing in his ears stopped--he saw that Aurelia had somehow ended up on the floor, muttering repeated apologies. She looked positively mortified and had opted to stay on the floor instead of rejoining them on the couch. Not, as Reyes had so deftly proved, that there was any room left.

Realizing he was still awkwardly half-sprawled on the couch, Aras quickly got to his feet. "I'll get another chair," he said abruptly, and motioned for Aurelia to take the couch. Spying one in the corner next to the music stand, brought it over and sank into it, not bothering to look at all composed. It was too late, he was too tired, and this was entirely too weird. On top of that, his throbbing jaw would undoubtedly sport a lovely bruise by morning.

He gave Reyes a disbelieving look at the comment about him being unusually twitchy, but otherwise ignored him. That is, until the other man proposed that they both stay for the night. In the back of his mind, Aras sincerely hoped that Angela and Flo were pets, not a couple of unfortunate souls Reyes kept imprisoned here, but he was more concerned about his own tenuous grasp on sanity at the moment.

"Ah... thank you, but I can't. I should really go home soon." He looked from Aurelia to the so-called cookies to Reyes. Something--most likely Reyes' expression--told Aras that he would not be permitted to leave until he'd at least tried a cookie. I can digest days-old roadkill. I don't see why you can't stomach a cookie, his talisman snickered. He sighed.

Tearing his caution to tiny bits and tossing them into the aforementioned bubbling pool of insanity, Aras snatched up the nearest cookie and popped it into his mouth.

[DesperateDark]

Aras quickly got up to his feet, though Aurelia could still see the slight, dizzy tilt in his stance, and told them that he would go and fetch a chair before motioning her to take his seat on the couch. She nodded silently and sat down next to Reyes as Aras fetched a spare chair from next to the music stand in the corner. As Aras slumped down into the chair, Aurelia could clearly see the red blossom on his jaw that signaled a nasty bruise tomorrow morning, and she felt a twinge of guilt.

“Ah... thank you, but I can't. I should really go home soon." Aras said while looking from Reyes, to the dish of unidentified imminent doom, to Aurelia. Reyes looked visibly upset for a moment, the smile gone and replaced by either a slight pout or a frown, she couldn’t tell. Then, in a bold and crazy move probably brought on by the sanity in his head snapping, Aras took a cookie and popped it in his mouth, seemingly without a second thought.

Reyes was overjoyed by the fact that Aras would have done that on his own free will, and couldn’t suppress a gleeful “Yay!” as he gave the shorter man another soul-crushing hug that would’ve killed a small child. While Reyes was babbling and bubbling random, happy thoughts and suffocating Aras, Aurelia simply sat there and stared in wonder. She ticked off the last minutes until face-bursting destruction, but that never came and Aras seemed to still be alive… Sorta.

Well, Aras was beginning to turn a little pale in the face, so she figured it was her time to intervene before Reyes accidently killed the guy. The very last thing she needed to do at about three in the morning was eat Aras’ corpse while Reyes wondered what went wrong; the cookies or the hugging. “Hey Reyes, when was the last time you fed Angela and Flo?”

A slight pause as Reyes tried to remember, Aras’ face shoved into the crook of the taller man’s neck and held there by a hand with little or no oxygen to be had. Reyes could get too affectionate sometimes, and he brought a literal meaning to ‘love can kill’. Thank god the only pets the Japanese man was interested in were marine animals, namely a blacktip reef shark (Angela) and a purple-striped jellyfish (Flo) he kept in a huge tank in his basement. He was even thinking about importing a Caribbean reef squid and naming it Irene.

“I fed them this morning,” he finally, finally, finally answered, which probably took a bit too much time for Aras and his lungs. “I should feed them again, wanna see?” Reyes questioned joyfully, almost like a kid and, without waiting for an answer, took Aras by the arm and dragged him down the stairs to the basement. Aurelia could only follow behind the two men to make sure Aras didn’t get fed to the animals by accident.

God help Aras.

[Aras|Ofelia]

Aras tried not to think about what Reyes could have possibly put in what looked like Oreo cookies--though the overpowering stench of garlic was difficult to ignore, and something tasted suspiciously of grease and bacon--and swallowed the entire bite before he could change his mind. Aurelia simply stared in a combination of disbelief and amazement. Even his talisman looked positively dumbfounded. In fact, almost everyone seemed to think he had finally gone off the deep end, and Aras was quite tempted to agree.

Reyes, on the other hand, gave a gleeful yelp and enveloped him in yet another rib-crushing embrace that would have put boa constrictor to shame. Aras barely had time to shoot Aurelia an expression that clearly said 'help!' before he had no choice but to focus all his energies on getting enough oxygen so he wouldn't pass out. Reyes was babbling incoherently as if he were on a sugar high, even though he hadn't had a cookie yet (though no-one would put it past him to sneak several spoonfuls of batter), but Aras found that he didn't particularly care what was being said to--or, more accurately, at--him at the moment.

The enthusiastic hugging and chattering were brought to a sudden halt as Aurelia brought up Angela and Flo again. Unfortunately, that didn't mean Aras got any relief from his oxygen deprivation. After a lull that lasted way too long for a simple question (and for his lungs), he was released.

He barely had time to gasp noisily for air before Reyes had him by the arm and was dragging him off to God-knows-where. Aurelia trailed behind them. Aras mouthed a quick 'thank you' for saving him from death by asphyxiation, all the while giving her a helpless look that asked what his chances of survival were this time.

At least it didn't look like he was going to be force-fed any more cookies. For the moment. Now, if only he could keep down the one he'd eaten. Hopefully, the fates would be kind to him (hah) and he would never find out what went into those so-called cookies.

[DesperateDark]

By the time Aurelia made her way to the basement, Reyes had already placed Aras on the large antique couch in front of the huge shark tank that covered the other three walls. On the one wall that wasn't covered where the stairs, another door leading to the cold room and shelves upon shelves of old tombs of books and creepy, glassy-eyed porcelain dolls that he had gotten as gifts from Japan. The whole scene was made all the more creepy by the lights. They weren't normal white lights, but blue lights that made everything look shades of blue or black. The other three walls were covered by the huge shark tank to house Reyes' pets; and they were pampered, for sure. The setup made it look like a real coral reef, and it took up a lot of space.

Reyes then told Aurelia to keep him here while he went to fetch the meat from the cold room to feed to the animals. He skipped off behind the door and closed it behind him, leaving Aurelia and Aras alone once again, but this time in his creepy, blue-lit basement. She slowly sat down next to Aras, waiting on the tense silence before she decided to throw caution to the wind and speak anyways. This was getting weird enough already.

"That's Angela," she pointed to the blacktip reef shark swimming in circles near the top of the tank, knowing that it was feeding time. "And that's Flo." Aurelia then pointed to the purple-striped jellyfish bobbing along lazily in the artificial current. "They're supposed to be named after... Eh... Minor gods of some sort, but you'll have to ask Reyes if you want to know."

Somehow, she had the feeling that Aras wouldn't ask.

Silence for another moment, which was when, out of nowhere, the chunk of bloody meat came flying through the air and landed straight in Aras' lap. Reyes was smiling from the door, having thrown given the meat to Aras and was now looking at him expectantly. "Go on, Angela doesn't bite."

[Aras|Ofelia]

Unlike the living room, which had been homey in a unique sort of way, Reyes’ basement was just plain creepy. It was cold, too—not as cold as the wintry bite outdoors, but cold enough that Aras crossed his arms in an effort to conserve heat. The odd-eyed porcelain dolls and distorted figurines would have been enough, but the blue lighting added another level of eeriness to the already-weird atmosphere. Strangely enough, it reminded Aras of the underground temple beneath the Shaman Ruins—except the lighting was artificial rather than ethereal. Nor were there long-unheard voices whispering ancient words and forgotten secrets.

And, of course, there was the gigantic shark tank here.

Aras would have gaped if he hadn’t been too tired to. As it was, he just sat still on the worn couch on which Reyes had left him and stared at the shark swimming in lazy circles near the surface. A jellyfish bobbed somewhere nearby, its tentacles undulating in the current. The man had apparently done his best to spoil his pets; the tank was an impressive replica of a Caribbean coral reef. As far as Aras could tell, Angela and Flo (as introduced by Aurelia) were content, even if they did have to live in the basement belonging to a man of questionable sanity.

Reyes tossed something on his lap that landed with a rather unpleasant squishing noise. Aras wondered if Reyes meant for him to eat that, too, before he realized that it was in fact the shark’s dinner with which he had been so unceremoniously presented. He didn’t even bother to look surprised.

"Go on, Angela doesn’t bite."

Past experience and sheer common sense told Aras to take that statement with a grain of salt, not because this was a shark they were talking about, but because it was Reyes who had said it. Looking mutely from Aurelia, to Reyes, to the shark, and to the shark’s dinner (he seemed to be doing this unusually often tonight), Aras heaved a defeated sigh. Shushing the vulture, who had perked up at the sight of raw meat, he walked to the tank and tossed the meat into the water.

Angela looked happy enough. The same couldn’t really be said of himself. Whatever he looked like right now, it was probably a conglomeration of disbelief and ‘I-want-to-go-home,’ both somewhat muted by exhaustion.

[DesperateDark]

Aurelia caught that despairing look on Aras' face and decided that it was high time she got him the heck out of the crazy funhouse before his head exploded. "Oi, Reyes? I think it's about time we leave now." she took a glance over her shoulder and realized that Reyes had disappeared. Quickly checking the cold room and realizing he wasn't there, she shot a look at Aras that clearly said 'uh... what?' She took him by the wrist and bolted upstairs, fully expecting to find Reyes.

Yeah, she found him. As soon as she arrived in the living room once again, Reyes was already holding out two brown paper bags, one to Aras and one to herself. They were probably filled with at least ten of those weird cookies in each bag, and she shot Aras another look that said 'just take them' before she took her own bag.

"Okay guys, be safe," Reyes leaned down and gave Aurelia a rather motherly kiss on the cheek as he brought them to the door. "Aurelia, don't freeze out there, got it? It's still cold, but spring's coming soon."

He then turned to Aras and gave him a kiss on the lips. "And you, get home, it's late." Reyes sounded like an over-protective mother, which was one of his personalities on the side.

Aurelia answered with a simple nod before she stepped out into the cold air, immediately beginning to shiver. Where would she reside tonight that wouldn't turn her into a popsicle by the morning?

[Aras|Ofelia]

Aras looked ready to kiss Aurelia out of sheer gratitude. Fortunately, he restrained himself--the woman had one mean backhand--and turned around, expecting to have to politely refuse Reyes' insistence that they stay.

Except Reyes was no longer there. With the exception of Angela and Flo, Aras and Aurelia were alone in the basement. Shooting him a confused glance, Aurelia grabbed him by the wrist and led him upstairs. She was none too gentle, but at least he wasn't being dragged bodily along to somewhere he didn't want to go. In any case, he was more than glad to leave the blue-lit, creepy-eyed porcelain dolls behind. Too bad he still smelled of meat, but that could be ignored, even if the vulture was somewhat wistfully watching the shark feed. After that cookie, he wasn't going to be thinking about food for several hours yet.

Reyes was in the living room to bid them farewell, shoving a brown paper bag in each of their faces. It almost definitely contained the so-called cookies. He caught a whiff of garlic. Definitely. Seeing Aurelia's look, Aras took it with a "thank you" that, he was proud to note, didn't sound too forced.

Aurelia was sent off with a surprisingly tender kiss on the cheek. Aras was sent off with a no less surprising, but rather more unwelcome one on the lips. He was going to have to learn to dodge those, because apparently Reyes had not gotten the message. Maybe he could get Aurelia to beat said message into the man, but he somehow doubted it would work.

He gave a halfhearted wave as he stepped out onto the porch. Curiously enough, Aurelia, looking miserable once more, had come with him. "Aren't you staying here?" he asked, puzzled.

[DesperateDark]

"Aren't you staying here?"

"I was, but I'm not staying if he's baking anything," Aurelia said once Reyes stopped waving at them from the front door and retreated into his house. She was going to stay overnight at his house, but after all that and how she narrowly got out without tasting a piece of her death, she decided otherwise. She must've looked miserable, like somebody had just kicked a puppy.

"Christ it's cold," Aurelia murmured to herself as she moved her already-stiffening fingers. She didn't know if she was thinking it, or her talisman was thinking it, but she was quite tempted to just go back into Reyes' house and hole up until tomorrow morning. But then she remembered the last time she stayed overnight; Reyes kept her up until 6 in the morning talking about how he wanted some thirty-odd kids.

"Well, I guess I'll see you around? You got my number, so..." she trailed, seriously doubting he would call, off into silence before she turned towards the woods, dragging her feet because it was so freakin' freezing to an oversized lizard. She'd probably freeze herself to the sidewalk before she got there. Thankfully the spring was just around the corner, and she would be right back to living outside again.

The clopping, scratching noise of her shoes on the pavement was sharp in the cold, silent night air. Of course, the chill often made reptiles sleepy, and that was what she was feeling at the moment; sleepy.

[Aras|Ofelia]

"I was, but I'm not staying if he's baking anything."

Aras couldn't blame her. If these supposed cookies were Reyes' idea of a midnight snack, he didn't want to think about what breakfast would be like. Or lunch, or dinner, or afternoon tea, or second breakfasts, for that matter. As it was, he wasn't sure if he was going to wake up the next morning with food poisoning or something of the sort.

Despite Aurelia's wise decision to stay far away from the possibility of death by Reyes' cooking, she looked completely miserable. The cold's effect on her was palpable; she practically shrank into her coat, leaving only her eyes and a few wisps of hair peeking out from the gap between her hat and scarf. Even with that little of her face showing, she looked as if she'd almost rather brave a night with Reyes than be out in the freezing cold.

As she bid him farewell, Aras wondered if Aurelia had another place in mind where she could stay. That question was quickly answered--yes--when she turned and walked towards the nearby woods, feet dragging with each step but with purpose in her movements.

"Aurelia, wait." He couldn't imagine anyone spending a night outside during winter, and Aurelia seemed to fare even worse than average in the cold. If he found her frozen the next day like one of the statues on Reyes' lawn, he would feel very guilty indeed. "You don't have anywhere else to stay?"

[DesperateDark]

"Aurelia, wait." she paused and took a look over her shoulder and saw Aras was still standing on the sidewalk. Why wouldn't he just go home? "You don't have anywhere else to stay?" Oh, that was probably why. In her mind, that went two ways. One was that he was just being friendly, which was sweet of him to care. Two was that he was a perv, which wasn't so nice.

Her lips pressed into a thin line as she went through the list of people she might consider. Her list came up blank except for Reyes, whom she was absolutely not staying with tonight, and maybe Ofelia, but after the Oceana melee, that wasn't an option.

"No." Was her simple answer to his simple question. No, she didn't have anywhere to stay other then the woods tonight. Aurelia never had a problem with living in the forest, she just had a problem with it when it was really cold out. Though having a reptile as a talisman often included advantages such as stealth and poison, it included disadvantages such as not being able to function in cold weather. And when one lived in a frozen country like Canada... It was sort of irony all in itself.

[Aras|Ofelia]

A succinct "no" was her answer. Though Aras had known that would be her answer, hearing it out loud only seemed to substantiate the problem. He couldn't let her freeze out here tonight, but inviting home a strange girl he'd just met wasn't exactly the brightest idea he'd ever had. And Aurelia was probably none too keen at the thought of staying the night with a man whom she'd just met.

Still, he had to at least offer her the option. "You could stay at my place," he said, trying not to make it sound to weird. He wasn't sure if he succeeded.

There was a long pause. Finally coming to a decision, Aurelia nodded. Good. Now that they'd reached a consensus, maybe they could get out of the cold, to somewhere where they could feel their fingers and toes again.

Aras led the way back to his apartment, pacing his steps so that Aurelia wouldn't have to struggle to keep up. They walked the entire way in silence, both of them too busy detesting the cold to speak. Or perhaps it was that their jaws had frozen shut. It didn't really matter; neither of them were awake enough to hold a decent conversation anyway.

His apartment was closer than Ofelia's, for which they were both grateful. The heated air was a breath of relief. By tacit agreement, they took the elevator--Aras didn't even want to think about stairs at this point--and, taking a moment to search his pockets for his keys, he let Aurelia into his apartment.

"Sorry about the mess." He flipped a switch, and the incandescent lights revealed a flat somewhat smaller than Ofelia's and not nearly as neatly-kept. By his sister's standards, it would have hardly been considered a mess, but then again, Sonia's idea of 'organization' was to arrange everything into several piles instead of one large pile. A couple of newspapers were scattered here and there, though none were more than a week old. A pair of glasses lay on the wooden coffee table, next to a couple of novels. In fact, the apartment contained a surprising number of books, on shelves and tables and chairs. There was also one on top of the refrigerator, though Aras could not remember putting it there.

"Bedroom's over there," he said, gesturing. Luckily, he'd somewhat cleaned that this morning, so it could be considered presentable, even if the bed was unmade. "I'll take the couch."

[DesperateDark]

When Aras offered up his place for her to stay, her talisman immediately protested with "no no don't do it!". But when she brought up how cold it was, and that she and her talisman was, in fact, a large lizard, he quieted down immediately. There was a pause that hung in the air before she finally nodded a slightly hesitant 'yes'.

His apartment wasn't all that far away; it was a much shorter distance then Ofelia's. His apartment itself, however, was a bit smaller. Or was it just that there was so much clutter that it looked smaller? It was only a second after she had taken note and stepped over a newspaper or two did he apologize about the mess. It wasn't the biggest mess she had ever seen, just take a look at Reyes' house when he hasn't cleaned it in a few weeks. The place also contained a large amount of books, ranging from classics like 20 000 Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne to more modern writings like Stephen King.

"Bedroom's over there," Aras pointed out a door that she hadn't noticed before, or as of yet. "I'll take the couch."

Aurelia considered it for a moment, but then counted up owing him for leading him to Reyes' house, slapping him (he still had a mark on his jaw) and now letting her stay at his house, she decided that three was enough. "Eh, it's okay, really. I can take the... The floor, I guess." Yes, she slept on the floor rather often. It just came along with sleeping on dirt and in trees, and after a while, one got used to it. And anyways, she never really slept in a bed and could probably claw it to pieces before the morning, and she didn't want to repay Aras for that too.

It was only now did she realize she was still holding the bag of 'cookies' that Reyes had given her, so she placed them on the coffee table. Then she realized something else: crap, she didn't have any clothes to change into. Her bag was still in it's usual place in the woods, and that bag contained her clothing, along with her various worldly possessions. It would've been fine if she wasn't wearing a belt and had a her trusty old machete attached to her side. Well, she didn't have it as bad as Aras; at least she didn't smell of meat.

"Hey, Arthur?" Or was it Aras? Dammit, she was too tired to get it right. "You have any clothing I can borrow? I don't think sleeping in this," Aurelia pulled at the collar of her shirt slightly from under her scarf. "Would be all that comfortable." How much would she owe this man by tomorrow morning, anyways?

[Aras|Ofelia]

Aras was about to protest when Aurelia said she'd take the floor, but decided against it. He'd insist on letting her have the bed, she'd insist against it, and they would go back and forth until one of them (most likely him) relented. The only thing it would accomplish would be a waste of energy, and neither of them exactly had a lot of energy to waste at the moment.

He placed the bag of so-called cookies on the kitchen table. He would wait until tomorrow to figure out what to do with them. He didn't want to possibly give some poor, intrepid stray cat stomach cramps by throwing them into the dumpster outside, but, well... he'd think about it tomorrow. And he'd try not to think about the fact that he'd eaten one. And that he smelled of meat and his hands smelled of garlic.

"Hey, Arthur?" Aras didn't bother to correct her. If she was anywhere near as tired as he was--and she certainly looked it--a slip of the tongue was easily forgiven. "You have any clothing I can borrow? I don't think sleeping in this would be all that comfortable." She tugged at her scarf and collar.

The thought hadn't crossed his mind. Sure, he could blame it on the late hour, or the recent brawl, or even the cookie, but that didn't make the situation any less awkward.

"Um... yes, hold on." He crossed over to the bedroom and found a clean pair of pajamas, neatly folded in a drawer. It was a few sizes too large, the sleeves and trousers too long, but it would have to do.

Directing Aurelia to the washroom so she could change, Aras turned back towards the bedroom so he could find something to wear that didn't smell like a shark's dinner. His foot caught on something--trousers, which Aurelia had inadvertently dropped on her way to the washroom.

He picked them up with a sigh and walked back to the washroom. Mind barely functioning, he pushed open the door.