Who ? O and Aries Where ? Aries' room When ? Wednesday dinner time What ? O gives Aries his Christmas gifts
It had been a long time since O had gone to see Aries, a fact that definitely wasn't an accident. The best remedy for a break up, he decided, was time. When Aries sent him Christmas gifts, however, it seemed like a pretty good sign that maybe he was doing better. He'd asked Aries to come and see him but the Australian hadn't showed up. O wasn't sure why, if maybe Aries had just given him those things to get them off his hands. Either way he wanted to give Aries his gifts and not just because they were cluttering his room. After work, he made his way to Aries' room and even though he still had a key, he knocked lightly.
After a short moment, Aries opened the door. Other than O, he never had many visitors from any of the other Stargate members. He had been hanging out with Uriah lately, but other than that, Aries had returned to his life, basically alone. He looked at O for a moment, almost curious as to why he was there. He simply shrugged and backed away from the door, leaving it open for O to come in if he wanted.
Aries strolled back into his room to the table where his humble dinner was, and picked up his beer and took a drink. He appeared normal anyway, bandana around his head, tattered jeans, and an open vest over his bare chest which allowed only a small glimpse of the tattooed lightning bolts that ran up the Australian's shoulder blade. "Yeah?"
O smiled even though Aries looked less than pleased to see him. He wondered idly if maybe it was a mistake for him to be there or not but the door hadn't been shut in his face so he stepped in, closing the door behind him. "Hello," He said with a small smile, holding the gifts he had for him in a box. "I just came to see you. I didn't realize you were eating, I'm sorry to interrupt."
Aries shrugged, sitting back down at his table. He didn't bother to offer O a seat, he didn't exactly want the little traitor to stay too long in his room. He shrugged a little, taking another drink. "Whatever, mate."
He sat back in his chair, tilting it back on two legs and folding his arms over his chest, feet keeping him at a careful balance. "Wha's in the box?" He nodded curtly at the box in O's arms.
O didn't sit down since he hadn't been asked to but he put the box down on the other end of the table, folding his arms over the front of it. "Your Christmas presents. If you don't want them, I understand, but I hope you'll keep them. It would mean a lot to me."
Aries quirked his eyebrows upward, looking at the box then at O. He was almost confused. He shrugged a little, wrinkling his nose. "Er, why did you get me Christmas presents?" He seemed almost confused by this idea. Why would O want anything to do with him anymore? He certainly hadn't shown that he wanted to, and at the moment Aries certainly didn't want anything to do with O either.
O looked uncomfortably down at his hands that rested on top of the box he brought in. "I bought them a long time ago...in November. I didn't give them to you earlier because I didn't think you'd want to see me but when you gave me things I thought...maybe you didn't hate me anymore so I came by to see you."
Aries looked at O for a while. He remained quiet for a bit before turning to look away from O. "I bought those a while ago too. Shipping was late, and I forgot about em." He would not have gotten O a single thing for Christmas if he knew what was going to happen between the two of them. Oh well, no harm done he supposed. He shrugged before looking back at O.
O sighed, biting his lower lip before he looked up again once it was safe and Aries had looked away. He pushed his nails into the soft cardboard beneath them and tried to smile again. "How are you?"
"Fine." His answer was prompt and short. He lifted a hand to scratch his head under his bandanna and took a breath. He supposed he may as well talk if O was going to be here like this. He waited a moment before asking, "How are you?" He knew how O was. He knew perfectly well O was perfectly fine.
O smiled at the question and left the box on the other end of the table, walking around to sit closer to Aries, He pulled a chair out and lowered himself into it. "You look okay," he said sounding encouraging. "Of course you would be. I'm alright, I guess, a little busy for this time of year. You were amazing on your mission, what was it like in Times Square on New Year's eve?"
Aries didn't respond to that. He never really cared what he looked like, which probably explained the messy hair, odd clothes, and slight goatee he kept, but all the same...he supposed it was nice to hear. "Yeah the mission was banger. Smooth sailing. Uriah and I got a good deal of folks a right zap. Heavy that was, yeah? Too sodding crowded through."
"I don't think I would ever go there myself unless I had to." He agreed. "There are so many people and apparently all everyone does is stand around and waiting for the ball to drop? That seems a little silly." O tried to keep the conversation as innocuous as possible for both their sakes.
Aries shrugged. "Makes them easy targets. Not exactly a hard mission." He shrugged. He had been in charge of surveying the crowd and terrorizing and sending out the message. "Stupid ball caused too much sodding rubbish. Would have been easier to just attack from the crowd."
"I think Finn would agree with you on that." He remembered reading something about it in the journals, anyway. Keeping his hands in his lap and his smile on his face O persisted. "Do you like your team mates?"
Aries shrugged. He didn't know Lex or the others much, and he had only recently become sort of....'friends' with Uriah. Well, they talked and spent some time together, but they were both equally odd when it came to being social. "Uriah. Don't know 'bout the other blighters. Seemed a bit too into themselves anyway."
"Well I'm sure over time you'll learn to work well with each other. Mr. Smith and Mr. Travers put a great deal of thought into constructing those teams, I think." His smile grew a little bit. "At least you didn't have matching clothes like the Blue team."
Aries rolled his eyes. The blue team. He lifted his beer and took a drink. "Girl-scout wannabe sods." He muttered before taking a swig. He smacked his lips and set the bottle down, rolling his eyes again and thinking of the blue team. He took a breath before remembering O wasn't on any team, he was in special reserve. He shrugged. "Missions are fun. Missing out, mate." He took another drink, then went back to cutting his chicken dinner.
"I would love to go on a mission." He answered with a smile and folded his arms over the table, leaning towards him. "I guess that won't be happening, though. Mr. Smith needs me here...and I'm probably on a few wanted posters since the kids escaped back to school."
Aries didn't exactly make eye contact. While they were having pleasant conversation, Aries was still quite upset with O and just treated him like anyone else now, so basically, he practically ignored him as he carved his chicken. "Bugger that shit. Smith can wash his own damn ties." He then stopped, lifted his fork to his mouth then looked at O and raised an eyebrow. "People still use wanted posters?"
"I'm sure somewhere, maybe on the Internet." He shrugged his shoulders a little bit. "I guess Adam could look." He watched Aries eat, smiling at him when the man looked his way again. "I do more for Mr. Smith than wash ties. I think he'd be lost without me.Did you know his two sons are here?"
Aries nearly spit out his food. He choked a little before swallowing with the help of his bear. He coughed and patted his hand on his chest before looking at O. "Sweet sodding Marry and the saints, he's got kids? It can have children? Bloody hell." He murmured again as he took a drink. Aries didn't care if he insulting Smith to O's face. Aries was never quite fond of Smith, basically because Smith probably wasn't fond of Aries.
O laughed at his reaction "Don't choke, is it really that amazing? Those two brothers that Finn brought here, they're Mr. Smith's children. They're monsters, Aries, both of them. They run me completely ragged."
Aries looked almost disgusted. To think that man could father spawn with god-knows who else. He rolled his eyes and continued to eat, sighing. "That's fucking insane." He continued to eat, although he practically lost his appetite now. It also made Aries curious because he KNEW some of the tasks Smith had for O certainly didn't result in children, but it was close to the same process all the same. He took a swig of his beer. "So long as those hell spawn don't come near me I'll be right fit."
"Maybe they'd treat you differently than they do me." O said, trying to be optimistic about everything like always. "I think they see me as like...hired staff?"
Aries waved his hand carelessly. "What would make me any different. I hate kids anyway." He took a drink again, finishing off the bottle. He gave it a toss, letting it smash to bits in his wastebasket. He pushed himself out of his seat to go get another from his fridge.
"I thought you liked kids." O said with a sassy little smirk on his face. "You liked me well enough and I was just seventeen back then."
Aries rolled his eyes, tugging his fridge open which had of course been freshly stocked with practically nothing but bottles of alcohol. "You re still bloody seventeen." He knew O was a year older, but not far enough into the year for Aries to consider him older. He made no further comment on it and pulled out a second beer, and closing the fridge. As he walked back to the table he simply hit the bottle over the side of the countertop, denting the cap before using a swift tug of his arm to use the counter to pop the cap off the bottle. He knew over 1001 ways to open a bottle of beer without using an opener.
"That doesn't change the point." He answered, watching him as he opened the beer bottle and then afterwards he clapped because really...that was amazing. "Where did you learn to do that?"
"Sure it does." Aries shrugged. He knew very well that it didn't change the point but...he liked to be difficult and teasing when the opportunity came along. He looked at the bottle, as if wondering if that's what O meant when he asked. "That? Oz a'course." He shrugged, sitting back down and taking a swig of his beer. "I've never needed an opener."
"Are you one of those people who can open bottles with their teeth?" He asked curiously and then leaned towards him a little bit, hopefully. "Will you teach me how?"
Aries looked at O and quirked an eyebrow. "Sure I can do that. Sort of hurts though." He shrugged before putting the bottle down then walking back to the fridge to get another one. He paused, holding up the bottle before putting the cap between his teeth. After only a couple seconds, Aries had the bottle opened and spat the bent cap towards the wastebasket and put the beer in front of O.
"That looks horrible!" O admitted, horrified and intrigued all at once. "Your poor teeth, I don't know how they can take it." He took the bottle, turning it around in circles in front of him before he lifted it to take a drink. "I think a dentist would crucify you for doing that."
Aries shrugged, sitting back down. "Yeah, s'why I don't do it much. Fucked up your teeth and cuts your gums if you don't do it just right." He shrugged and took another swig of his drink. "Don't matter though," he pointed to his front right and second to the right tooth on top. "Those are fake anyway."
"Opening bottles or a fight?" He asked curiously, wrinkling his nose at the horrible taste of the beer but he drank it down anyway.
Aries pointed to one tooth. "Fight." He pointed to the other. "Hunting. I tripped while running and snapped that tooth out on a rock or some shit like that."
O grimaced visibly trying to picture it in his head and finding it made him squeamish on the inside. "You must have had a very good dentist, though, you can't tell at all."
Aries shrugged again, taking a swig of his beer then putting it down. "Yeah, got a good one back home I guess. Opening bottles probably ain't helping them though." He looked at O, then the beer, he had noticed O's face at the first sip. "Don't have to drink it if you don't want."
"I want to." He reassured him, otherwise he wouldn't be doing it. "In Japan beer comes in big bottles. Tall, almost line wine but bigger." Of course it also came in smaller containers like America but that wasn't as interesting.
Aries laughed and pounded the table. "You're talking to an Aussie, mate. We're the bloody fucking kings of big beers." He took a drink from his own and ran his fingers over the rim of the bottle before going back to eating.
"I think it's different, though. In Japan that big bottle is supposed to last you for a long time, not to drink all at once." O curled one hand around the bottle of beer, the other he rested his chin in as he watched him. O had been nervous when he first came to Aries room but now he felt okay. It was almost a completely normal conversation.
Aries ate and shook his head."Nope, bottle a big as you say are for a casual thirst, down-under, mate." He shrugged his shoulders. "We're the best." He took a big bite of his chicken dinner, scarfing it down. Why waist formality on table manners?
"I'm not sure that's something to brag about." He tipped the bottle back again, ignoring the bitter taste of it. "Do they have weird things in beer flavor? Like ice cream? Jelly beans?"
Aries nodded. "Sure. Candy, Irish creme rum. Loads of stuff." He shrugged, thinking back actually to a soup he had back home which he was told was actually cooked with alcohol. It was times like this he really wanted to give up Stargate and move back home
"Why did you decide to come to the United States?" He asked, scraping his nail along the label from his beer bottle before he began peeling it off slowly so as not to tear it.
"Had to get away from there for a while." He shrugged. "Never really went back after I found out about Stargate." he shrugged, taking a swig from his beer then looked at O. He was about to ask O why he would ever leave Japan but remembered, O was just property.
"Do you want to go back?" He asked curiously and with one more drink from his beer he finished the bottle. "Are you ever home sick?"
Aries shrugged. "Sure, I wanna go back. Can't exactly do that right now, but yeah." Frankly Aries really did want to go back. He wanted to be away from O, and certainly away from Braylen, but even Australia didn't offer as much fun as Stargate did sometimes.
"Maybe you could take a trip, like a vacation, get some time off?" Of course if Aries went to Australia and didn't come back he could definitely be in some trouble with Mr. Smith which was something O definitely didn't want.
It was almost as if Aries read his mind. He just laughed. "If I'm going there, I aint coming back here." He shrugged. He figured Smith would hunt him down or kill him somehow anyway. Finally Aries stood up, reached across the table and tugged the box O had brought over to him. "Right, lets see what we have here then." He was hoping the box would be empty.
"Oh!" The box of gifts. He had forgotten about it already and he stood up quickly, putting his hands on top of it. "Do you have to open it while I'm here? I'll be embarrassed." In case Aries didn't like them. He was sure he would be able to tell if he didn't.
Aries looked at O and paused, hands on the box. He quirked his eyebrow a little and waited. Nope. He simply shrugged and tugged the box open anyway. He frankly didn't care if O wanted him to wait, because O didn't care about what Aries wanted. Aries was a jerk like that sometimes. He opened the box and peered inside before reaching into to grab a hold of, well, whatever was inside.
O took his hands away as Aries lifted off the lid of the box and turned a little wide eyed, unable to turn away as Aries discovered the gifts inside. There were several boxes colored coral and green with a picture of a cat on them that looked like they held food, a white yukata robe with blue dragons crawling all over it, three overly round sumo wrestler figurines and a little toy that looked like a hammer with a red ball attached to a string resting on the top. "I wanted..." O tried to explain, "I wanted to give you things from where I was from. Japanese things..."
Aries drew out the objects one by one. He was confused a little by the food, the robe was nice he supposed, then he noticed the pattern. All Japanese things. He pulled them out setting them on the table before looking them off, looking at the small hammer-ball toy, turning it over in his hand. "Oh." He shrugged a little, nodding, dropping the ball and letting it swing. He supposed it was a more complex version of that ball-in-a-cup game from Mexico. "Thanks."
O looked unsure, glancing at him to his fingers again before he stood up. "You don't like them," He said gently. "Just because they came from me or...am I bad at giving gifts?" He felt stupid now, especially with Aries standing there holding the toy in his hand. It had been his favorite when he was little though.
Aries was quiet for a moment. He wasn't quite sure what to say. "No." He put the small town down, softly as if he was scared he would break it, beside the small overly plumb summer wrestlers and quickly took a drink from his beer. "No...they're good gifts. I like em." he nodded. He did like them. He was just not expecting something so...he was uncomfortable now.
O smiled a new again and he lifted up the toy, flipping the ball up and trying to catch the hole in the projectile on the spike at the top of the hammer. He missed and tried again, missed, tried again. "I used to be really good at this!"
Aries watched him play with the toy. He understood now. He took another drink from his bottle before sitting down, still watching O. He looked away. He looked over the rest of the gifts, looking at the foreign food in the boxes, wondering how they would taste. He would be getting very drunk tonight, he could already tell.
O felt some of his gifts needed explanation and when he couldn't get the ball on the hammer, he put the toy down again and held up the boxes. "My favorite candy," He told him. "When you open them, each piece comes in a red and clear wrapper and then, inside that, another wrapper that you eat, it's made out of rice. Do you remember when I told you about it?"
Aries watched O show-and-tell his gifts. He probably should pay attention to the explanation. He nodded, "Yeah I remember." He continued to watch O for the rest of the debriefing.
"And this..." He took out the robe, it was finely crafted silk, the inside a dark blue satin. "You should put this on." He smiled up at him hopefully. "I think you'd look really good and I'll show you how to tie the belt." Although he wasn't sure Aries would run around wearing that...at all.
O was correct about one thing, Aries would only wear that robe in the confines of his room...chances are probably more than he planned to, but he would never let anyone see him in it, and he certainly didn't want O to see...but this one time he could. He sighed and stood up, tugging off his vest and tossing it on his chair before standing in front of O. "There's a special way to tie a belt?"
"There is." O assured him, lifting the belt out of the box next. It was just one long solid blue piece of fabric. Tossing it over his shoulder he moved around behind Aries, pulling a chair up so he could stand on it, offering one of the sleeves of the robe to him. "But you can do it by yourself if you practice."
Aries stood there, letting O scurry around behind him. It was funny how O needed a chair. Aries forgot how much larger he was. He shrugged and rolled his eyes a little, but not at O, but because now he'd have to hunt down a bandanna that would match the robe. He slipped one arm back into the silk and at once was glad O got him the robe. It felt like heaven was woven into fabric.
O helped him in to the other arm and then hopped off the chair, moving around in front of him. "You overlap it like a regular robe," he explained "but it's important you do it properly." He looked up at him with a grin as he showed him. "The right side goes under, the left side goes on top. If you do it the other way around it's like...you're dead. It goes the other way when you're dressing a corpse." He tucked the right side under and pulled the left side on top. "Uhm..." He looked down and then up at him again. "It will work better if you aren't wearing pants so...you know." When he was alone since he probably didn't want to take his pants off in front of him.
Aries' eyebrows quirked up a little as he looked down at O. "Corpse?" He looked a bit confused but shrugged as O did the folding. He didn't even think about it. Aries had already had quite a few beers that day. Without O to look after or to worry about Aries was certainly not afraid of dropping back into alcoholism. So he simply rolled his eyes, as if it were a simple tedious chore, reached under the robe and pushed down his pants, kicking them away from him. "There. Now how do you tie this bloody thing?"
"Don't be so anxious." O explained and folded the yukata more snugly around him. He took one of Aries' hands and pulled it forward to hold the fold in place before looping the belt around his waist from behind. He tied it once in the front. "You can let go now" he explained and then bit his lip before stepping closer. His arms circled Aries' waist almost as if O were trying to embrace him as he tied it again in the back.
Aries held on as O tied it. He lifted his eyebrow again, curious as to how an article of clothing could be so complicated sometimes. With him it was just a bandanna, pants and occasionally a shirt or a vest or something, usually made from an animal. He shrugged as O tied the front. He lifted his arms a little to let O's arms slide around him. This was familiar but Aries didn't let that register. It took a bit of restraint not to slip his own arms around O. No. He didn't want to. Nope. No no no. Not at all. Nope.
"There." O said and lowered his hands back to his sides, releasing the breath he hadn't been aware he was holding. He looked him up and down, taking a step back and smiled at his work. "You look good."
Aries looked down at himself and turned slightly as if trying to look at the back. "Yeah?" He shrugged, and waved his arms a little, liking the silky soft feeling of the fabric against his skin. "Never was much of a robe bloke." He looked down at himself again, avoiding eye contact. "Thanks, mate."
O laughed out loud when Aries flapped his arms, clasping his hands together in front of him. "You just need the proper shoes and you'd be all set. Well, for the summer, anyway." He looked so adorable. O felt proud of himself.
Aries shrugged, looking at O. "If you say so." He was pretty much lost. All the customs and traditions the Japanese had always confused him. Then again all the LACK of tradition and formalities Australians had probably looked barbaric to people like O.
O smiled again with a nod. "I do say so." he told him sternly, "And don't forget it." With another laugh, he went to the table to pick up the now thankfully empty box. " I'm glad you like everything, relieved, really. I should probably go though. I'm sure you have things to do."
"Yup." Nope, the rest of Aries' evening was filled with nothing but drinking and probably watching TV, and maybe, if he could still walk by the end of the night, some drunken practice in the training room. He still shrugged and waved O towards the door. "Pretty sure you know the way out." He turned and went back to his seat, slitting and taking a big drink from his bottle, robe flowing over the edge of the chair and over one of his legs.
O sighed again, watching Aries as he sat down. It certainly was a bundle of mixed signals and he hated it, hated it knowing that in the base Aries disliked him so much. "Have a good night." he said gently, biting his lower lip. "If you want, sometime, I'd like to make you dinner." It would give him an opportunity to get back inside Aries' room.
Aries looked at O and shrugged. "Sure. If you'd like." It would give Aries opportunity to get O back in his room. He acted as if he didn't care, resting an elbow on the table and taking another drink. He didn't hate O. He certainly wanted to, and was trying very hard to, but he couldn't. So he just played the passive aggressive card as often as he could and looked at O again from the table."Show up whenever you want to. I don't make dinner plans anymore."
"I'll be here Monday night." O told him and set the box down by the door. He knew his way around Aries' place well enough. He found a piece of paper and wrote a note across it "Monday, January 12, 6:00 pm, Dinner with O" and attached it to his refrigerator. "Now you have plans." He answered.
Aries watched O and sighed a little as he put the note up."Guess I do." He nodded. "Monday then." He nodded and began counting down the hours in the back of his mind. He took another drink, finishing his second bottle at dinner, and sixth bottle of the day, and tossed it into the wastebasket.
O picked his box up again and then reached behind him to open the door and then took a step back and out. "I'll see you Monday, Aries. Have a good night, okay?"
Aries flipped O a lazy salute with his hand. "Monday then. Night mate." He sat back in his chair and folded his arms behind his head.
"Okay." Aries had called him mate. It made O smile as he closed the door carefully behind him.