House Party [AU][M]

This was probably one of the worst house parties he had ever been to. He knew no one. He hadn’t realised it was bring your own drinks, and the music was questionable- no. Terrible

He always preferred house parties of the quieter variety. A few friends getting drunk and almost falling off the couch from laughing so loud. Music that he can play whenever he wanted to annoy his friends with. Not having to worry about running out of wine because it was clear whether it was bring your own or not.

There was one silver lining to this. In the midst of looking for his only friend, the one accountable of dragging him here, he found someone in the crowd that was... approachable. Or rather, someone that was just his type, standing in the corner.

He was sure Sacha will find him if he needed him. It wasn't like he was the awkward one who may as well needed their hand being held at a social gathering.

”This is a shit party, huh?”

He slid up next to the man, swinging on the bottle of cider he stole in an attempt to play up the cool persona and to hide his blush.

”There's no wine, everyone is off in their cliques, and what even is this music? If I didn't know any better, I would have thought it was a group teenagers first time getting passed out drunk.”

"The worst," Fleck agreed, grinning down at the guy that approached him.

This was, sort of, his party. Leo had claimed it was a joint celebration. He was back for a few months, and Fleck's birthday had just passed. The perfect opportunity to throw a massive party, obviously.

Fleck wanted to be in his studio, painting something, not sat here pretending to be social with people he either didn't know or didn't particularly like.

The only person he was actually friends with that had turned up was Sacha, who was quick to fuck off and scope out the party life.

Which left him sat here with a couple fingers of brandy, and very little to do.

Until a cute blond approached him, bitching about the party that he was, in his head, also bitching about.

"Honestly, sometimes Leo acts like a teenager getting drunk for the first time." It was something that Fleck could very rarely escape from. Leo was definitely the more childish of their not-twin-twin set up.

"You know whose party it is then?"

He regretted asking that as soon as he said it. Not everyone was a tag-along. Besides, it was fairly fucking obvious he knew whose party it was. And well, judging how familiar he talked about him.

"Oh yeah, I know Leo."

He didn't sound overly thrilled about knowing him, but there was an easy grin on his face.

It was clearly a bit of a love-hate relationship at times, but they were close. That was obvious.

He took a sip of his brandy.

Dick squinted, trying to interpret how he knew Leo. It didn't seem loving enough to be a boyfriend - assuming this guy even liked men. So he stuck with his original assumption; a close friend. 

"I'm Dick, by the way. And yes, I know, it's hilarious," he said dully, hand outstretched to shake Fleck's.

"I'm a friend of Sacha's"

"Well, hilarious Dick, I'm Fleck."

He took Dck's hand and shook it, dropping the guy a wink as he did so.

"I'm a friend of Sacha's, too."

Sacha had mentioned his friend Dick quite a few times, always threatening to try and hook the two of them up if Fleck was going to carry on being antisocial. He wondered if Sacha threatened Dick with the same thing.

Oh. Ohohoh. 


He's Fleck.

When he saw Sacha he planned to kill him, oh so very, very slowly, for not carrying out his threat of hooking them up sooner.

"He's the only person I know here and fuck know's where he is now. Literally, hear a minute and he's gone."

"Knowing Sacha? He's searching for the hottest bi guy to play with."

That was usually his thing at parties. Or bars. Or anywhere there were people. Sacha was just a slut.

"Hey, c'mon. Follow me."

Fleck pushed away from the wall he was leaned against, and gestured for Dick to follow him as he made his way to the kitchen.

Dick snorted. True.

With a raised eyebrow, he followed Fleck to the kitchen. The cider bottle between his hands was rolled side to side.

"God, I really can't get over how shit this music is."

"I know. Try to block it out. I do."

When he got to the kitchen, he opened up the pantry door and began shuffling through various bottles of alcohol, occasionally pulling one off the shelf to read the label.

"Hard to when it is practically booming."

Dick leaned against the counter as he watched Fleck look through various alcohols.

"How do you know Leo then? You must know him pretty well to go to parties like this for him."

"I know. He plays it all the time. I usually just crank up my own shit."

He came up victorious, holding a bottle of red to Dick.

"We're brothers," he answered with a grin.

"Right, right, you're brothers."

Great first impression: Slagging off Fleck's brother's party. On the most part, he hadn't seemed to mind and still held out a bottle of red. Which he was both surprised and very grateful for. At least he couldn't tell which he was blushing about.

"Thanks," he lifted his cider, "let me finish this first."

He took a large swig to drain it. With his head still tipped back the fizz of the drink crawled up his nose and stung his eyes. He coughed and sputtered.

All over Fleck's shirt.

He wiped his mouth and nose with the back of his hand, beat red. He blinked quickly in an attempt to make the tears go away. The realisation of what he had done hit him.

"Fuck- shit- I'm so sorry! Um, here."

Flustered, he grabbed a nearby teatowel in an attempt to clear up what he had spat out.

Fleck watched Dick choke on the cider, and laughed as it bubbled up and ended up splattered all over his own shirt.

He was still laughing when Dick began to freak out and scramble for a towel.

"Don't worry about it," he said around chortles, holding his hand out to stop Dick's movements.

He peeled his wet shirt off, tossing it onto the counter, then wiping his first stomach idly with the palm of his hand. Hardly damp.

Dick's face still burned as Fleck stopped his movements.

"Are you sure?" 

He looked between Fleck's shirt and his now bare chest. Was this the silver lining in the situation? ... Nope. Definitely not. He felt the heat rise in his cheeks as he actively avoided checking him out.

"Thanks," he repeated, taking the bottle of red to lift it in a cheers motion. "I'll try not to spit this one out. At least cider won't stain?"

"I don't think much can stain black clothes, anyway," he assured.

He took a step closer to Dick, until he was very nearly touching him he was so close.

Fleck grinned down at the flushed blond, then reached up above Dick's head to open the cupboard and remove a wine glass, stepping back and holding it out innocently.

"You wanna go hole up somewhere away from the ruckus of that god awful party?"

Dick took a step back as Fleck stepped forward, feeling his back press against the counter.

He tilted his head back to look up. It took a long moment to answer as he looked between Fleck and the glass.

He swallowed.

"Sure." He took the glass from Fleck. "And thanks. Again. For the glass."

He let out an awkward laugh and tilted his head to the side.

"Lead the way?"

Fleck was falling in love with the way Dick's cheeks heated up like that.

He really needed to rail Sacha for not introducing him earlier.

Admiring that blush as he was, it took him a second to realise Dick had spoken. That led to his own flustered reaction.

"Yeah, yes."

He took half a step back and picked up his glass, gesturing for Dick to follow him down the hallway to his studio.

He opened the door and gestured with his brandy glass for DIck to step in ahead of him.

Dick looked around the studio, intrigued by each detail.

"I have to admit, I was expecting to head out to the patio." He took particular interest in an everyday pencil. He picked it up and spun it between his fingers. "Or a bedroom."

That deserved a large gulp. This time he managed to keep it down.

"So, whose space is this we're invading?"

He doodled a tiny flower on a scrap bit of paper.

"Patio's gonna be just as packed as everywhere else, and I didn't really want to presume, y'know." He gave an awkward half-shrug.

He kinda wanted to head to his bedroom, really, but he didn't want to look too eager and smarmy. Should he have just said fuck it?

...Maybe.

"Mine. This is where I paint and sculpt."

He gestured for Dick to take a seat on the beaten up old couch in the corner beside the bookcase full of sketchbook and art-related textbooks he owned.

Then he dragged a clay-splattered stool over.

Dick took the seat Fleck offered, perched on the edge of it. The whole place was a little bit dusty. One of the major reasons why he never gelled well with most 3D art; it was always going to have that layer of dust no matter how hard you tried to keep it clean.

His eyes lit up with interest. 

"That's pretty cool. I remember Sacha mentioning something like that. Do you do that full time?"

"Painting is more of a hobby, but sculpting is pretty much full time when I can get the work."

He settled on the stool and took a swig of his brandy, gaze turning over the studio.

He had a few little things on the go but nothing big right now.

"I work with one of the local bronze smiths a lot. Between us we're pretty good at precision casting."

Dick's head bobbed with interest. It was nice that they didn't have to raise their voices to speak to each other. The music and the chatter was now just constant background noise.

"What type of stuff do you make then?"

"Anything people order," he admitted with a sheepish grin.

He wasn't picky when work meant he got to eat.

"I do specialise in animals, though. I make a killing out of rich women wanting sculptures of their pets for gravestones." Lots of rich people asked for statues of their pets after they'd gone. Lots of dogs and cats.

He thought it was incredible what rich people spent their money on, but he wasn't complaining.

Dick couldn't help but snort at that. He tried to hide it behind his hand.

"There's no shame here. I'm trying to start a career painting, but..." He shrugged, trying to brush off the disappointment with casual humour. "The silver lining is that I'm amazing at making lattes from my 'real job.'"

He made little quotation marks with his fingers.