Sage & Jasper (early in the party)
Jasper had only been to one other wedding he could remember, and he’d been a pretty young kid at the time. Some cousin or something. He only recalled it being boring as hell. The ceremony for this one was a little cheesy to him, but he didn’t think he’d ever seen his uncle grin so hard for so long. Mila looked happy too as they walked back up the aisle, so he guessed that was what mattered. It was kind of nice to be there with Jules, she looked cute and she hadn’t cried like some girls did at weddings, so they were having a nice time. Which was good, because they needed nice times.
A particular presence in the back of the audience had caught Jasper’s attention, that familiar tug in his brain surprising him a little. He’d snuck a peek to see who from the fog world it was back there, and he’d caught a glimpse of bright hair that told him it was Sage. It made Jasper’s stomach churn in a weird way, but he didn’t approach the guy until they’d all moved into the reception hall to start partying. Sage seemed to be there with someone, so Jasper waited until the good looking dark haired guy had gone away before he walked up.
“Uh ... hey,” he greeted, slightly lifting the cup of punch in his hand.
Sage didn’t need his weird other-worldly super power to know that Jasper was there. He’d known that might be the case when Marsh had asked him to be his plus one. That itself was still a shocker for him. It was one thing to go on a double date with his friends and another to attend an event together, one where you didn’t typically bring a friend. If Marsh hadn’t been completely out before, he was now, though Sage attempted to keep a low profile around the Lucas family and friends. Or as much as he could with brightly colored hair. In no world was Sage a wallflower. If his punk-ass was asked to a wedding, he’d dress his punk-ass up for a wedding… but he was still himself, just with less holes in his pants and less wrinkles in his shirt.
The weirdest part of seeing Jasper again wasn’t just seeing Jasper in a happy, sunny situation. It was seeing him with Jules. In the months since Sage had returned from the other place, he’d done his best to avoid the people that put him there. He didn’t entirely blame them, since he’d have probably killed everyone he cared about if they hadn’t sent him away, but he didn’t trust them either. So while he couldn’t really imagine Jasper approaching him with Jules at his side, he was glad she wasn’t there when he did. “Hey,” he smiled, raising his drink in kind. “How’s it going?”
The possible issues from Sage being in the same room as Jules probably should have been on the front of Jasper’s mind, but it wasn’t. He’d forgiven her so in his mind everyone else had too. Or they ought to, anyway. Jules hadn’t acted alone, and what those people had all done had probably saved a lot of their loved ones. In any case, he was more thinking about sucking Sage off and how weird it felt to have so many people he’d fooled around with in the same room. “Oh, y’know ... it’s going,” Jasper said with a twitch of a smile. He pulled a metal flask out of his jacket pocket to make his drink a little more interesting, and cocked a brow at Sage. “You need some?” he asked. “It’s weird being around this many people.” Or maybe it was just weird for him and everybody else was nice and adjusted to social life again.
“I’ll take some of that,” Sage said with a little laugh, holding out his drink. That a minor was spiking his drink for him wasn’t lost on him, but he firmly believed that anyone who went through Point Pleasant trauma deserved to drink whenever they felt like it. He just couldn’t apply that feeling at work. “I don’t mind the people, so long as there’s light. I’d like to think it’s getting better, but…” He shrugged rather than go into the details of how he coped with darkness. Of all the bullshit he’d dealt with in the past week, it was one of the easier to manage. “This town doesn’t stop, you know? But this is fun. Distractions help,” he added with a small smirk. Jasper had been a distraction once, which he was sure he knew.