Rick Martinez // Allan A Dale (anotheroutlaw) wrote in ourtrueselves, @ 2010-05-13 00:00:00 |
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Entry tags: | rick martinez |
Who: Rick Martinez
What: Buying a Ring
When: Wednesday
Where: Los Angeles
It was bad luck. Probably. Or good luck? It wasn't a part of town Rick spent much time in, but the art dealer next door was also, creatively, a coke dealer. Not a bad cover really, but the arrogant bastard still got caught. And Rick had walked past the jewelers next door and seen the ring in the window, and a week after the bust, he'd gone back.
He'd never really bought Dallas jewelry, other than that necklace at Christmas. That just wasn't how they worked. How they worked had changed though, because, well, it just had. They'd admitted that they were dating, and that meant they'd been dating for almost two years. Then there was Allan and Will. That should have made things harder, weirder, but once they got past that, it was just one more connection between them, one more way they were perfectly matched.
Besides, something about this ring had just stuck in his mind. It was just too different, and unique, and bizarrely perfect. Kind of like her, really. The white-gold band had a subtle pattern on it, like wood grain. In the center was a single, striking scarlet ruby. It was like an inside joke, a perfect ring made for a Scarlet Sherwood outlaw. It was also, other than his car and his house, the most expensive thing he'd ever considered purchasing.
"It's not buying it that's the hard part," said another man in the shop, shaking Rick out of his wandering thoughts. "It's figuring out how to ask her."
"What are we asking?" Rick replied, realizing the moment he said it just how stupid he sounded. It was a ring that he was buying for the woman he'd fallen in love with. There was, generally speaking, a question attached to that. One that he'd have to ask and she'd have to answer.
"Hard to say really, isn't it?" The other man laughed. He was just slightly older than Rick and gave the impression both of someone who was quite nervous, and of a man who was not at all accustomed to nervousness. That made two of them, now that Rick had figured out what the hell he was thinking of doing, because it didn't sound like such a bad idea. It sounded like a perfectly logical next step, even if all the steps they'd taken up until now had been anything but logical.
"Yeah. Hard to say."
The clerk came back to the counter, handing the other man a small bag. As they chatted, Rick looked around the shop, trying (and failing) to look casual. He was way more okay with this than he should have been. There should have been some doubt instead of a steadily increasing feeling of certainty and determination, tinged with just a little mischief. She was going to be shocked beyond belief.
"Good luck," the stranger said, passing Rick as he left the store.
"Yeah," he replied, more to himself than the departing man, "it was good luck." It must have been, everything just falling into place.
The clerk looked at him expectantly.
"Right. Um, I want to buy the ring in the window. The one with the ruby..."