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[ukan]

This is Lark Tennant, leave a message.

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[ukan]

"Are we still agreed that nothing with a name like 'Elk Tongue' is a good look?" Lark asks, eyeing the walls. One would think he'd love the name and a color that calls to mind a puddle of drying blood, but no.

[kissthatgoodbye]

"We were never agreed on that in the first place, if I recall correctly." Yes they were.

"You also tried to veto Unicorn Cupcake Swirl."

[ukan]

He wags a finger as if to point out the wall he spared from such a nightmare. "I did veto it, and then you agreed when I pointed out that purple glitter swirls would make me vomit up bits of rawhide all over your shoes."

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec rolls over on his stomach, resting his chin on Lark's hip instead, eyebrows raised.

"I still don't believe you. That's not the effect it has when they're in body paint."

[ukan]

He pretends to take this seriously. Pretends there isn't a smirk pulling at his lips. "Well, if you want to get naked paint yourself and stand in front of the wall, that might be a compromise. You'd have to quit your dayjob, though."

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec shrugs, poker faced except to someone who knows very, very well what his real poker face looks like.

"You'd have to quit your day job too, in order to make all that work worth it. I can't just be standing around naked and fabulous without an audience."

[ukan]

He eyes Alec like he can't quite picture him naked at all anymore. It's clearly been years. "We should do a trial run. I don't want to tell Pagan I'm quitting so I can watch you stand naked in front of a wall all day if it isn't worth it."

[kissthatgoodbye]

This only makes Alec, currently bare to the waist, tense and draw in his breath just so to make his muscles that more subtly defined under Lark's gaze. He's fully aware of what he looks like, even if some days he has small panic attacks about how different it is to what he used to be.

"He'll understand. I'm sure he'd even agree that it's worth it. And that it's a fantastic color for anything - including walls."

[ukan]

Lark's fingers trail after, lightly brushing each line of muscle. At least until he stifles a laugh because, "He would agree. Not even just to gang up on me. Obviously we can't tell him."

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec breathes out under the ghosting touch along his skin, relaxing just the slightest bit.

He smirks.

"You're the one who wanted to. In fact you're the one that wanted us to talk. It's your own fault we're BFFs now. I pretty much have to tell him."

[ukan]

"Yeah what do you think of him?" An honest question, while he keeps teasing Alec's skin. It's rare that they have the same affections for people, and he isn't sure if Alec is doing it just for his sake. He hasn't seen them together yet; he can only hope it's more than just appeasing him.

[kissthatgoodbye]

While it's true that in a way, Alec being here at all is appeasing Lark - he certainly wouldn't be here alone - it's also true that if he didn't want to be here, didn't want to do this, he wouldn't. He's put his foot down before. That he can do it again is precious to him.

He shrugs, shifting ever so slightly closer in the bed to keep Lark's hand on him, to give him better reach.

"He likes you. He's always prepared to be insulted, but also to be talked out of it if you're paying attention. I don't know how much tea I can take on the regular -" Which is its own joke; Alec could drink antifreeze daily if he decided it was necessary. "- but there have been worse people on this ship."

[ukan]

He smiles a bit at that 'tea' bit. It's delicious and he knows how Alec really is with tasty things.

"It's important to me that you get along, but if it wasn't genuine I'd rather you two fought. I don't want you to get along just for me, and I know he won't. So he must actually like you."

[kissthatgoodbye]

"Well, I am incredibly charming when I want to be," Alec points out, and it's only half a joke.

"What surprises me more is that you genuinely like him. What caught your eye?"

[ukan]

"His showmanship," Lark smirks, meaning it though. "It reminded me of you. So I knew how to respond to it, and then he responded to me reacting appropriately. It's gone from there. He's not like you underneath--he's more like me. So it worked out in an even way."

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec gives him the flattest, stillest look.

"I am not that fickle. Is that the you part?"

[ukan]

"Oh, you don't have showmanship?" Lark scoffs, leaning down to kiss him. "Who was it that entered a drag show? Who was it who took over on 'pole night' at the Caberet?"

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec accepts the kiss, but gives him the same poker faced look on the other side of it.

"Poppy Cox."

[ukan]

The name never, ever fails to make Lark laugh. Although this time he smothers it against Alec's neck. "Poppy Cox, who loves to blue balls me backstage. She's a bitch."

[kissthatgoodbye]

This is where Alec gives in to his grin, too, and laughs at the summary. He's not wrong.

"You loved it," he accuses in return. "And I'm still not convinced you didn't arrange for the entire thing to happen. It is not a coincidence that we just happened to be in town for the national pole dancing competition."

[ukan]

"I have never given you any reason to believe that," he murmurs, kissing Alec in the slow, self-denying way he had in Vegas. "It was pure coincidence. Why would I look at pole dancing competitions when you had never been on one before then?"

[kissthatgoodbye]

"Because," he returns, punctuating it with another kiss, as slow. "I've -" Another kiss, bringing himself up onto his elbows. "Met -" And another, pushing up higher on the bed again. "You. And I know that either you plan these sorts of things, or you take an opportunity when you see it."

[ukan]

"But have you met you?" Lark smirks, wanting to chase Alec with another kiss and restraining himself the moment before he touches him. "I can't plan anything around you."

[kissthatgoodbye]

Alec has learned the look of Lark testing himself by now. He stays right where he is, stays close, right where he might close the distance himself at any moment but he doesn't, smiling.

"But you love the challenge of trying."

[ukan]

"Because sometimes I'm right," he returns, enjoying this immensely. "Just like I know if I kiss you again, you'll blue balls me as much as you did in Vegas, and I'll take it out on the Barge. Think of the innocent passengers."