InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "I love you Sydney"

Dean Thomas (artistdean) wrote in finnigans_rpg,
@ 2015-08-30 22:34:00

Entry tags:

character: dean thomas, character: seamus finnigan, character: susan bones

RP: How awkward can this be?
Who: Dean, Susan, and Seamus

What: Dinner

Where: Monmatre, Paris

When: Sunday 29th August

Rating: SFW probably

At any other time spending the weekend in Paris with his two best friends would have been an absolute birthday dream for Dean. Even given the whole in love with one of them and in one of the supposedly most romantic cities in the world bit. Only now it was like some sort of low-grade torture situation. He and Seamus were barely talking because of the little birthday incident. In fact until he arrived shortly after finishing Battlescars back in London they hadn't really seen each other since the party. Dean had been greeted by his disappearing back when arriving for his pub shift and had been basically hiding out at home otherwise.

Friday and Saturday had been of some minor relief. The Louvre had been absolutely amazing and he'd forgotten about the whole situation for most of the time they were there. Even the discover of two pieces which had similar three-layered finishes like the nightmare piece he had been working on hadn't defeated his mood. Saturday had been good too, there had been some more art-related tourist attractions, he'd even managed to do a couple of sketches (admittedly half-arsed ones, but it was something). The fact Susan kept making him try and speak French was... irritating, especially considering how bad his French was. Thankfully after half of a sentence most people got the idea he was trying but terrible and switched to English.

Then Saturday night had become appallingly awkward when the restaurant they had gone to had assumed the two of them were a couple and given them a secluded table and candlelight. Of course they had been arguing about again it when Seamus arrived the next day. Which was appallingly awkward.

The awkwardness had continued during lunch at a tiny café where Susan had tried to make them sit next to each other. It hadn't worked. In fact they had been taking a lot of care to keep Susan between them at all times. Dean could honestly say it was at least somewhat intentional on his own part. He just didn't know what to say to break the beginnings of a rift that had sprung up between them, or if he even had the right to.

After lunch they had explored Monmatre, dragging themselves up the hill to the Sacré Cœur, and stopping off at various places on the way. Dean had been fascinated by some of the artistic history of the district, but tried to not bore the others, which was easy enough because half the words which came of his mouth felt like dust as soon as he glanced at Seamus and remembered the betrayal he had wrought on their friendship.

And now it was time for dinner and they were picking a restaurant almost at random, a few streets away from the main tourist trail, as they wandered back down the hill. Dean knew from other trips to places that if you stepped away from the tourist traps you could get cheaper food that was probably more authentic and arguably better.

"There?" he suggested, pointing at random. It was France, everywhere had menus outside the door by law, which was good for both assessing food and prices.

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openbottle
2015-09-02 05:05 pm UTC (link)

Seamus had woken on Sunday with a splitting headache and a temper like a flea-infested bear. He'd tried to clean himself up the fastest way possible before stumbling down to Battlescars. He honestly couldn't remember now what they'd talked about, or what they were scheduled to be discussing. He'd let others do the bulk of the talking, distracted by Dean's obvious absence. Logically, he knew it was just because Susan had whisked Dean off to France - but it still felt wrong. On the other hand, the more Seamus thought about it the more natural it seemed. In the dissolution of their friendship it was thoroughly predictable that Dean would get Susan and Seamus would get Battlescars. It felt horribly permanent.

After the meeting crawled to its conclusion Seamus had taken another stab at getting clean - spending long minutes in the shower, scrubbing his skin red. Standing barefoot in the bathroom he downed a bottle of hangover potion before he grabbed his clothes. Fifteen minutes later, he was in France, interrupting an argument about he-didn't-know-what.

The rest of the day had been more of the same. Seamus knew he pissed Susan off a half-dozen times, and when his eyes automatically sought Dean for backup the other wasn't even looking. They'd sat awkwardly on either side of tables, flanked Susan while they walked and generally acted like they didn't even know each other. Seamus wasn't stupid - he could tell that Dean was wishing he weren't there. It was obvious every time Dean faltered over an art term and then abruptly stopped talking.

By the time they were ready to have dinner, Seamus was exhausted and moodier than he'd been when he woke up. "Do they do cocktails?" On any other day, Seamus would have been curious to explore the bars and nightclubs of Monmatre, taste different cocktails and muddle through conversations with any bartender who spoke enough English to put up with him. Now, though, he was just hoping alcohol would prove the saving grace he kept looking for - make him at least able to act normal.

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susanamybones
2015-09-07 09:34 pm UTC (link)

Susan spent much of the day following Seamus' arrival in a state of constant ennui - to borrow a phrase from the French. Technically, ennui described a feeling of metaphysical angst, and thus a more accurate and less enchanting description of her feelings would have been 'royally pissed off' but she chose to overlook that. Ennui sounded nicer. The majority of her problems stemmed from the fact that her fabulous little getaway wasn't going at all to plan, and she was feeling extremely put out with the fact. When she'd first planned the holiday, she'd been anticipating spending a weekend filled with laughter and good cheer with her two best friends, instead of being constantly placed between them like an ugly and imposing buffer to allow the two of them to suffer unnecessarily in the latest episode of their ridiculously convoluted saga of schoolboy homoeroticism.

She tried unsuccessfully throughout the day to draw them both into conversations, but really only managed to converse for any length of time with one or other of them. By the time they were ready for dinner, she was ready to stab herself in the hand with a fork repeatedly, just to see if the shock of the action would make the two little shits put aside their ridiculous misunderstanding for a couple of minutes to gibber at her in unified horror. She looked at the menu on the windows outside almost incuriously. "They do," she told Seamus. "I don't know about you two, but I need a fucking drink, and I need it now. Or possibly just someone to kill," she mused, almost to herself as she led them towards the restaurant. "A bit of casual violence might make me feel less like an aegis betwixt Pausanias and Agathon, wouldn't you say?"

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artistdean
2015-09-08 05:13 pm UTC (link)

That was two of them drinking then, Dean thought with a hint of bitterness. He knew he couldn't, not with needing to take sleeping potion to lull him to nightmare-free sleep in an unfamiliar bed (no matter how stupidly comfortable). Maybe a single glass of beer wouldn't hurt him. He'd never been much of a fan of wine outside of cooking.

Then Susan said something completely incomprehensible about violence and what he assumed were two people. Ancient Greeks or Romans he would have guessed, but his knowledge was lacking in the extreme. His head turned automatically to Seamus to frown at him in confusion, or the faint hope of a translation. The rush of sick feeling came again and his head dropped again as he looked to his feet.

Swallowing down on the feeling he followed Susan over to the restaurant and opened the door. "Voila," he said, holding the door for her and sounding far less enthusiastic about the word than he should have done.

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openbottle
2015-09-14 04:31 pm UTC (link)

As much as he completely agreed with Susan, Seamus didn't say so out loud. Dean would just worry, and blame Seamus's drinking on himself and the awkwardness between them. He was leaning forward to study the cocktail menu when Susan started spouting academic metaphors that Seamus hadn't a hope in hell (or Hades) of following. "Stop talking bollocks and let's get inside," he said, ignoring the way his stomach turned over at the aborted glance from Dean. They would be fine. Booze would make Seamus act more normal and then everything else would follow suit.

He let Susan precede him through the door, then waved at Dean to follow her. The last thing they needed was awkwardly trying to squeeze through the narrow doorway at the same time. They weren't quite that much of a slapstick comedy sketch. Not yet. "You are not allowed to go haring off after Dark anything, no matter who or what you spot in the shadows," Seamus informed Susan, keeping his voice low. "You're off duty. Understand?"

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