Who: Miguel + Tulio (The D’Clines. Giggle) What: unpacking, teasing When: Mid-May Where: Their house! Rating: Low, mostly just adorable. you’re welcome. Status: Complete
Moving was hard. Obviously. There was the act of moving, which no one liked, because it involved packing and labeling and stacking boxes and then taking all those boxes from one place to another wholly different place, and that sucked, because when it was all said and done, you were just stuck with all the same stacks of boxes and no idea where to put all that shit you were sure you wanted to keep.
It'd been a few weeks now, and while Miguel had unpacked most of their important stuff, there were still boxes basically everywhere. Were they breeding? They must have been breeding. Like tribbles. Or rabbits. Unless those were the same things -- he'd never been very sure on that one.
"Make it stop. I can't do it anymore. I don't even need a waffle iron. If there's a waffle iron packed in those boxes. Do we have a waffle iron?" His urge for dramatics had been terribly ruined by a further urge for talking nonstop. Still, he was trying to stay on point here as he flopped onto the couch. Maybe possibly directly on top of Tulio. "Should we have waffles for dinner?"
Tulio had to concur with Miguel -- moving was the absolute worst. Why had they wanted to leave Texas, again? They’d been happy in Texas. They had a nice house and a nice life and they hadn’t ever had to move anything in Texas. Clearly Texas was superior to California in every way and they should go back.
He barely even reacted when Miguel flopped on top of him, letting his husband ramble on until he came to what seemed to be a conclusion -- and as soon as Tulio opened his mouth Miguel asked one last question. Rolling his eyes fondly, Tulio began to run his fingers through Miguel’s hair absent-mindedly. “We could have waffles, I guess. If you wanted to look through the boxes in the kitchen for the waffle iron that we may or may not have.”
Going back meant packing again. No. They were never leaving this place, not even for the siren call of Texas.
Ooh. Headpettings. Yesss. Miguel did a little thing that was probably like purring, except for humans. He wiggled until he was in a position that was very comfortable, but probably just looked silly with one leg dangling off the couch and arms flopped lazily to his sides. “That seems like a lot of effort. All those boxes. Maybe no waffle iron. I swear we have one though. How could we not? I mean -- those are like the things people give out for wedding presents. We probably have three of them.”
It was indeed a very silly position, but Tulio had long ago learned to just ignore when Miguel was being silly. Or, well, he tried to ignore it. Most times he couldn’t help but notice and then he was kind of hit over the head with a wave of stupid affection. Hence trying to just ignore it. He got the stupidest fond expressions on his face otherwise.
“Well, we didn’t exactly have a proper wedding, did we? So it’s possible that we never got any waffle irons at all. But if you’re really set on waffles we could look. There are only three more kitchen boxes to go through. We could get the rest of the kitchen unpacking done tonight! Oooooor we could just order Chinese and leave that for tomorrow.”
Oh yeah, they hadn’t had a proper one, had they? Sometimes he forgot. Miguel liked to make up a lot of things for that week that had been a bit of a blackout and a blur. Sometimes the things he made up involved trips to Narnia. Others were a bit more lazily invented, and apparently involved waffle irons. Clearly, vodka was to blame. Or maybe tequila. Possibly both.
“You know how I feel about procrastination,” he said, raising his eyebrows and staring up at Tulio. “...So. I’m really thinking General Tso’s.” Procrastination? Fucking awesome. (Obviously. Or else there wouldn’t be boxes multiplying in their home as they spoke.) Also, little beat out the prospect of Chinese.
In their case it was probably both vodka and tequila. Rum was probably also involved. If Tulio was honest, there were some days that he was actually a bit upset that he couldn’t remember that week in New York. Not that he really needed to, the actual “being married” thing was more important than remembering the “getting married” part, but... still. It would be nice to have an actual memory of the event.
“Mmmm, you’re so sexy when you put things off til tomorrow,” he quipped, pressing a kiss to Miguel’s forehead before he moved out from under him to go get his cell phone. “What do you want, darling? Orange chicken, fried rice, lo mein? All of the above?”
The best part about being so used to someone - sharing a surname and a house and a pet horse and whatever the hell -- was that it was so easy to delight in the little things. Like stealing up all of the space on the couch when Tulio moved to get his phone. Yes, said Miguel’s overly-smug expression. This is my space now. “Just wait and see what I can put off tomorrow from today. It’s like double hot. I know. Irresistible. How can you can keep your hands off me ever--” well. Eyebrow wiggling because he was putting off finishing that sentence. It was like a whole new form of procrastination. Miguel was clearly going for the gold tonight.
“Oh. Surprise me.” Funny how he could talk all day until he actually had to offer his opinion on something.
Tulio looked over at Miguel from where he was scrolling through the numbers on his phone and very pointedly rolled his eyes. “You are absolutely useless,” he said, though there was no bite in the words. One could make the case that he actually sounded pretty fond, even. Going back to his phone, he pressed the call button and walked back around the couch. He dropped heavily onto Miguel, sitting on his chest and giving him a pointed look -- This is what happens when you try to steal the couch.
“Hello, I’d like to put in an order for delivery.”
Were Miguel a crueler sort of man, he might have made a scene and cried domestic abuse. That was always kind of a fun one while someone was on the phone. Alas, he just didn’t have it in him today. Maybe tomorrow.
“Ergghh,” he said instead, because that’s all he could manage whilst winded. He wiggled and pushed until he was free, giving Tulio a Look (they were more important when they were internally capitalized, you know.) even as he sat up. The transgression of Evil was forgiven not a second later, when he prodded. “Egg rolls,” he said, urgently. “I want those. Get those.” Miguel: managed being both a glutton and a child. Unless that was the same thing. Not so secretly, he just liked those pretending to not be amused faces that Tulio put on for it. You aren’t actually fooling anyone, Tulio.
Not even bothering to look over at Miguel, Tulio reached out and covered his mouth with his hand, holding the phone to his ear with his shoulder. “Yes, I’d like orange chicken, two of the -- the thingie with the -- yes, that, thank you, and a large lo mein.”
As if unsure which expression to go with, Miguel wavered between pouty and then very, very bitey. Which clearly was an expression now. Licking was not an expression, and it was also kind of gross, so he didn’t go there. “Eggs rolls,” he reminded, but did not bother leaning away from Tulio’s hand in order to do it. So really, it was more like “errggrulhhhhs”. But they were married and had a secret language that was lovely and magical so really, he was sure it would be duly understood.
Batting at Miguel’s face, Tulio pushed Miguel away from him, trying not to smile. He’d purposefully left off the egg rolls because he knew it would make Miguel whine, but he didn’t want to give himself away yet. “Yeah, uh huh. And how much will that be?”
If looks could kill, Tulio. If looks could kill. The pouty expression was back, and reinforced with a very dramatic crossing of his arms. “You’re evil,” he muttered, but didn’t really mean it. Because they both knew full well that Miguel could keep this pouty look up all night if he goddamn had to. Or at least for the next three to five minutes. Which was practically a lifetime as far as Miguel was concerned.
Oh, Tulio couldn’t help grinning now, blowing a kiss at his husband. Miguel was so cute when he was pissy. “Alright, that’s great. And I would like some egg rolls as well, please.” See, Miguel? Tulio’s got your back. He may tease, but he’ll always get your egg rolls.
And that, right there? Totally true love, man. Miguel’s pout melted away as suddenly as it had began, and one might say he turned that frown upside down. He gave a look that so clearly said yes, well, I knew you were going to do that. The blonde was just polite enough to wait until the phone call had ended before properly pouncing. He couldn’t help it; he was just affectionate that way.
Tulio laughed as he was pounced upon, wrapping his arms around Miguel and kissing his forehead. “You really thought I wouldn’t get your egg rolls? Really? I’m that good of an actor?” he asked, grinning brightly. He loved when he could rile Miguel up like that -- make him pouty and frowny and then make him smile.
“Mm,” Miguel agreed, doing a thing to Tulio’s neck that was half bitey and half kisses. “Egg rolls today, Shakespeare in the park tomorrow.” He rubbed his nose amusedly against his husbands’ jawline. “Raw talent. Really. I see you going places.”
“I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not...” Tulio murmured, tilting his head to open his neck up further to Miguel’s bitey kisses. “But if you’re being sarcastic, I may just end up completely throwing the egg rolls away. Or giving them to Altivo, I’m sure he’d appreciate them.”
“Well,” Miguel said, because he was no stranger to snark or sarcasm. “If that’s the case, I’m definitely not being sarcastic.” Egg rolls were important. More for him than for Altivo, though. Either way, more nibbles and kisses were deposited in random everywhere spots.
“That’s what I like to hear,” Tulio says, grinning from ear to ear as he drops a kiss right on the tip of Miguel’s nose. “Now, as much as I hate to say it, we probably should do more unpacking while we wait for the food to get here.”
“You just tricked me into a false sense of procrastination,” Miguel said, as if shocked. But then he shrugged in nearly immediate acquiescence. “Fine. But only because I really want find that waffle iron.” If they had a waffle iron. It was a bit like Schrodinger’s Cats’ waffle iron at this point. Miguel could no longer handle the mystery of it.