hera & strange
When Hera had approached him, Stephen had been holding his beverage up to the light. It looked like he was admiring the color of his Old Fashioned, but the truth was that he was using the liquid in the glass to measure his hands' steadiness. It had become something of a habit of his, checking the tremor in his wrists. His work with the mystic arts had taken his life in a different direction, and certainly, one that he was content with, but that didn’t mean he didn’t occasionally feel a pang of loss when he was left alone long enough to think back to his former glory.
Once he was addressed, he set the glass he was holding down on the bar's corner beside where he stood and surveyed Hera with some genuine curiosity. He wasn’t here to look for a date, not really. But he supposed if he thought about it, this atmosphere might have been why he’d been distracted by his hands. Parties and disposable sex partners used to make up a great deal of his limited free time when he was a surgeon. He liked what the money, prestige, and skill brought him, once upon a time. But that - that part of himself - that he did not miss.
“Hm.” He considered her question, absently pressing his thumb against the knuckle on the back of each finger of his left hand to stretch them slightly as he weighed his options. He had to answer her inquiry, but he wasn’t sure how to weave a path between disrespectful and dishonest. Strange was captivated by the mechanics of a place like this and interested in the people that this place managed to swallow up, but it wasn’t particularly looking for the kind of evening that was this place’s bread and butter. He might have wanted that a few years ago, but this life that he had now was far removed from one peppered with simple pleasures. “Innocent curiosity, I suppose. I’m not exactly the most forthcoming when it comes to making new acquaintances, so I thought - if someone was offering - I might as well take them up on it. I can only imagine what kinds of innocent people this place has swallowed whole.”