Aidan M. Chambers (aidans) wrote in veritaserum_rp, @ 2008-09-11 22:21:00 |
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Entry tags: | aidan chambers, tracey davis |
Who: Tracey Davis & Aidan Chambers.
Where: Some smoky, intimate little pub in the magical part of London.
When: About an hour after Terry takes Tracey dancing.
What: Aidan tries the whole 'no strings attached' concept and finds out that it works. Only very differently from what he expected.
Rating/Warnings: R for Swearing (the "f-word"). A lot of that. And one instance of violence, though not against each other.
One would think that a few days of living in the real world and dealing with real problems would do wonders for Aidan's state of mind and easily help him forget the whole Tracey-episode. One would think wrong.
The moment he was alone, the Ravenclaw tended to drop his cheerful facade and become uncharacteristically moody and withdrawn. Terry had returned a few days previously – as Aidan had been forced to learn as he stumbled in on his best friend and Miss 'No Strings' – the very reason why he was so depressed. Aidan frowned, trying to keep his mind from imagining Tracey in Terry's arms – reacting to him the same way as she had done when it had been his arms that held her and almost immediately Aidan shuddered with indignation.
The painful truth was that he missed his best friend and Merlin knew, he also missed this troublesome woman who had turned his whole life upside down in a matter of a few weeks. However, Aidan – being his usual stubborn self – refused to acknowledge this simple fact and instead opted for his usual routine: doing something stupid.
That was why, on this late evening, Aidan entered 'the Smoky Cauldron' with the intention to find distraction. Of a very female and a very loose kind. Barely five minutes had passed when a busty blonde sidled up to him and five minutes later they had shared their first pints. Aidan wasn't quite sure about her name but tonight he couldn't care less. She was nice. She was friendly - very friendly, judging from the way she practically undressed him with her eyes – and she surely wouldn't push him away like that. Five more minutes passed and they moved from the bar to a quiet corner where Miss Needy pressed herself up against Aidan in a most scandalous way and they engaged in a public display of affection that was bound to get them thrown out if they kept it up at this level of intensity.
Aidan was rather pleased. He seemed to be good at this 'no strings attached'-thing. Now if only he could stop imagining that he was kissing Tracey instead.
Dancing with Terry had been fun. Teasing him knowing that he wasn't going to be able to do anything about it had been even more fun. But in the end, they'd gone their separate ways and Tracey had decided she wanted a drink. Actually, she wanted more attention and a drink, so she wandered to a nearby pub with the intention of doing just that.
Her plans were abruptly foiled five steps into the pub, when she happened to glance at a shadowed corner and saw Aidan Chambers locking lips with a woman whose blond hair was obviously not even natural. Sudden rage, hot and fierce, coursed through her. That bloody hypocrite! To tell her over and over that he wanted more than just a casual affair and then go and pick up some slag in a dingy bar like this! To call her a liar when he'd been the one lying about his intentions all alone! And that woman! What the hell was she doing, plastering herself all over her Ravenclaw like that?
Tracey didn't stop to think. She simply marched over, grabbed the slag by her potion-dyed hair, and yanked.
They were in mid-snog when the blonde was suddenly gone. With a yell of the kind to alert the rest of humanity about this fact, of course. Aidan blinked in confusion, then he saw Tracey and his eyes narrowed angrily.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing, Slytherin?" He yelled at her, grabbed her hand and pressed a pressure point to make Tracey let go of his...blonde distraction.
"Go," he addressed the woman who now started screeching at both of them.
The pain of it made Tracey gasp and recoil, but it also infuriated her even more -- which was why the other blonde decided to swallow her indignation and go find someone without any psychotic women in their lives to take home.
Meanwhile, Tracey was left glaring at Aidan furiously. "You filthy hypocrite!" she shrieked, picking up one of the empty glasses at the table and hurling it at him. "You tell me you want more than just no strings and then you go and hook up with...that?"
Aidan barely had time to duck out of the way, momentarily too furious to respond. He glared fiercely at Tracey and - lest she wanted to throw something again - grabbed her wrist once more.
"How dare ye?" He shouted, drawing even more attention than they already had as a small crowd assembled around them. "How dare you call me a hypocrite! When I saw ye out with me best friend just an hour ago! Of all the men ye could 'ave picked - why the hell did it have ter be my best friend?" Aidan shook his head, at a loss of words. "I knew ye'd been lyin' ter me but makin' Terry lie, too - how could ye do that?"
"Let...go of me!" Tracey snarled, struggling wildly to free herself from his grasp so that she could throw more things at him. "What are you, stalking me now?" The more he talked, the angrier he got. How dared he pin this back on her and accuse her of lying when she'd been nothing but honest (if cruelly so) to him?
"Did I give ye that impression a moment ago?" Aidan snapped back and looked like he was about to ad something else but the bartender stepped in and roughly pulled Aidan's hand from Tracey's, completely convinced that Aidan had gone insane. Unfortunately, however, the Ravenclaw was far too angry to think clearly and in a fluent movement he didn't even start consciously Aidan turned around, freed his one hand with flick of his wrist while bringing the elbow of his other arm to connect with the other man's nose, sending.
And then he froze, in shock. "Oh fuck." Aidan breathed, suddenly going pale. "I'm sorry, I didn't...I'm a Healer - almost a Healer, in a few weeks, anyway - perhaps I can...I can fix this an'..."
"OUD!" The barkeeper yelled, holding his broken nose and Aidan retreated immediately, his face burning with shame.
"Please, let me help. I'm so sor..."
"OUD! Or I'll call de Audors!"
Nodding, Aidan retreated, brushing Tracey as he did so. Hell, this was just the impression he wanted to give her, the Irishman thought sarcastically. An insane, uncontrolled madman.
There was something satisfying in seeing Aidan being kicked out of the bar. Tracey felt vindicated, because obviously the bartender agreed with her that Aidan was a menace, which meant that she was right all along.
Her smugness lasted right up to the point when the bartender turned to her, glowering. "You doo! OUD!"
"But I didn't do anything!" Tracey protested, conveniently forgetting that she'd just assaulted one of the customers here.
The bartender hadn't, however, and he just pointed vehemently to the door. "OUD!"
So, with a haughty sniff, Tracey stomped out.
"Well, I hope you're happy," she snapped, once she got outside.
"Elated." Aidan said dryly and fought the insane urge to start laughing. This was the very first time in his life he had ever chatted up a woman and it was the very first time in his life he had ever been thrown out of a pub - and for beating up the barkeeper, too!. And it was all Tracey's fault.
He rubbed his elbow thoughtfully (the man had a rather solid jaw, after all) and gave Tracey a furious look. "See what ye did?" Aidan snapped, blaming her rather irrationally before closing his eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose against an impending headache.
"What are ye doin' 'ere anyway? Shouldn't ye be off sleeping with Terry?" Aidan gave Tracey a hurt look and then it hit him. Why wasn't she with Terry? Could it be...was there the remotest possibility that she said the truth? The Irishman's heart sped up at the hopeful thought.
She could have told him that it'd been just a dance and that neither of them had planned on anything more, but Tracey was annoyed enough that she wasn't going to make it easy for him.
"Oh please," she said with a roll of her eyes. "As if you two are the only men on earth I can sleep with. How'd you find out about us anyway if you weren't stalking me?"
Aidan opened his mouth to argue but then recalled that his temper had caused enough chaos for one night. Perhaps it was time to use his upstairs brain around Tracey for a change.
"I was just gettin' some last minute groceries shoppin' done an' passed by the window. I..." He hesitated and averted his eyes and for a moment it was very plain to see that Aidan was hurt. "Ye looked like ye had a lot of fun an'...I was...I don't know." He ran a hand through his curls and fixed some spot in the distance. "I thought Terry was away. He told me he was leavin' for work an' now it turns out he lied ter me."
Aidan turned to Tracey. "Honestly now, why are you here? Weren't ye planning ter...ye know, havin' a no strings thing with Terry behind me back?"
Tracey rolled her eyes and absently rubbed her wrist, which he'd grabbed onto earlier. She wondered if it'd bruise. "Ravenclaw, if I wanted to have a no strings thing with Terry, it wouldn't be behind your back. I have nothing to hide."
"So ye just met him like that? For fun? Discovered yer fondness of platonic friendships?" Belatedly he realized that it sounded a bit more snappy than he intended to and pressed his lips together in regret before his eyes followed the movement of her hand.
"Let me see yer wrist." Aidan said quietly. "I can't say how sorry I am about that. Did I...did I hurt ye?" Aidan could honestly say that apart for the Battle of Hogwarts where he fought to defend his life, he had never hurt a living thing. Hardly daring to raise his eyes to hers, Aidan did so nevertheless (albeit very hesitantly). "So ye really wanted me ter stay? Do ye..." His voice dropped, betraying his insecurity. "Do you still want to?"
Tracey quickly pulled her hand away, still rather miffed at the whole episode back at the bar. "No," she said shortly. "Not if you're going to go off with any blond slag that looks your way. So much for wanting more than no strings, huh? You want to talk about lying? How's that for a lie?"
"Oh, wait.You're allowed ter sleep with anyone ye want ter but ye want me ter be faithful?" Aidan frowned. "For what? For ye to come ter me an' tell me that ye just slept with what's-his-name-this-time? Why did ye attack that woman for anyway?"
"Look, you're the one who's wanting some sort of exclusivity thing," Tracey snapped. "I don't care who you sleep with --" which wasn't true, exactly "--but if you're going to pick up just any slag from a bar, at least be honest about it. You're looking for no strings just as much as I am. At least I'm honest about it."
"No." Aidan shook his head, his temper flaring once again. "I'm the one who offered exclusivity. You're the one who pushed me away an' now gets huffy when I try ter forget ye. I am still interested in tryin' this...'us'...Merlin knows, I should know better." He started pacing angrily, quite unsure what to do with his excess energy.
"Listen, Slytherin. I want clear answers from ye now an' then I'll leave - either with ye or on my own." Aidan took a deep breath and looked straight at Tracey. "Do ye want ter be with me? In a strings attached, exclusivity-way? A simple yes or no will suffice. No more evading an' twisting of words here."
Tracey crossed her arms over her chest and looked away. The simple, obvious answer was no. It'd be terribly boring to be exclusive with just one man, even if they did have incredible chemistry, and besides which, it wasn't as if he were anyone important. He was a Halfblood, for Merlin's sake -- not even that. He had much more muggle blood in him than wizard blood, and it'd be embarrassing to show him to her friends. They'd all laugh at her, and she wouldn't be able to stand that. Besides, even if she said no now he'd probably just come back. He always did.
...but what if he were serious this time? He certainly looked determined about it. If he walked away now, she wouldn't be heartbroken at all, but she'd miss out on that blinding chemistry between them. Maybe if she just agreed for a little while...just until it burned out.... She wouldn't have to let any of her friends know if they just kept it to themselves. And then she could get what she wanted from him, and by the time she was done, she could let him walk away with no doubts whatsoever. That might be a plan.
Slanting her gaze back to him, she asked, "What do you mean, strings attached?"
"What is so hard about a 'yes' or 'no'?" Aidan rolled his eyes in annoyance. "Ye know, this whole relationship thing with spendin' time together, talkin', bein' faithful...I can draw ye a bloody diagram."
He swore under his breath and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. "I'm goin' home now. Ye can come or not." With these words Aidan turned around and left, his heart beating far too quickly for the slow pace he was taking.
"Ravenclaw."
Now that he was actually serious about going, Tracey was just a little more sure that she didn't want him to. It was just that what he was asking was rather disconcerting and scary. Men didn't want her for relationships. They wanted her for a quick shag or to show off on their arms. They never wanted to talk to her or just spend time with her.
With a sigh, she uncrossed her arms and promptly crossed them again. "Look. I haven't done this relationship thing before. I don't know how."
"What do ye mean, ye haven't done...?" And then her words registered in his mind and a brilliant smile spread over Aidan's face as he turned back.
"Come home with me an' we'll figure it out."
She really shouldn't. She knew she shouldn't. If she did, she was going to embark down a path that she knew was going to be wildly different from what she'd ever experienced before, and frankly, that scared her.
But when she saw the way he smiled at her and the expectant look in his eyes, all she could do was uncross her arms once more and hold them out to him.
Now that he hadn't expected. At all. Almost hesitantly Aidan approached Tracey, always wary lest she should start laughing at his naïveté and push him away. And yet, as she did no such thing, the Irishman approached steadily until he was once again in front of her, suddenly feeling as nervous as a schoolboy before his first kiss.
Aidan reached out and shyly took Tracey's hand, momentarily stunned that a woman like her - a classy, high-society woman like Tracey - would even consider being with him.
"Ready ter Apparate?" He asked and pulled Tracey into his arms.