foolishmortals

[Any subtle attempts at communication, as per usual, go straight over Ford's head and out the window. He laughs.]

Excellent call, excellent. Your face is much better without it.

[Ford Pines is about ten notches above where he ought to be at all times, and now is definitely no exception.

Fiddleford is so nice. Look at him. Look at his nice face. And his nose. Ford really, really loves that nose. Without really thinking about it, he reaches out and grabs Fiddleford's tie, tugging him a little closer. This is fine, right? Friendly. Just. Friendly.]

We should dance. Nobody's dancing, we should be dancing.

We--

[A compliment maybe he could take. Ford is drunk, and some people are remarkably determined to see beauty in everything when they're drunk. That's fine. It's when Ford grabs his tie that he starts feeling maybe a little alarmed. His voice jumps about an octave.]

Excuse me?

Dancing, Fiddleford. [Sweet Mothman, look at him, he's adorable. Why does nobody else see how adorable his is?] I know you know what it is, I've seen you disco.

[None of that alarm seems to register, to probably nobody's surprise. He adjusts his grip so one hand is on Fiddleford's waist—wraps damn hear halfway around it, in fact—and the other has his hand.]

Do you know how to wwwaltz?

[Oh sweet Jesus take the wheel and drive him somewhere else, he can't deal with this. He looks at Ford very much like a rabbit might look at an oncoming truck.]

I know how, sure, but isn't there --

[He almost says 'isn't there someone else' before he realizes... not really? The last thing Elsa probably wants to do is dance. He has a feeling Sylvia would kick Ford through a window if he so much as looked like he was thinking about asking her. Wander, maybe, but Wander comes up to Ford's hip at best. There just aren't a lot of eligible dance partners in this room, huh?]

I mean, you... you're drunk. [He says it in a kind of stage whisper, like there's any possibility the entire room hasn't already noticed.] You don't want to make a fool of yourself, do you?

No, there isn't!

[He doesn't even know what the question was, but there's pretty much no way Fiddleford is getting out of this, unless he's suddenly a whole lot stronger than Ford.]

I am. Only a little. And I don't think anyone here will begrudge an old man a dance with his very best friend, do you? After all, someone's got to lighten the mood. May as well be us!

[Hope he's ready, because Ford is absolutely going to turn with surprising smoothness and lower him into a dip.]

Wh-- hey!

[Ford comes very, very close to getting kneed in the crotch right there. He escapes it by a hair. A hair, which is about how thin the rope connecting Fiddleford to his sanity feels. It's just that a waltz is a little intimate for a best friend kind of dance, isn't it?

But Ford is his best friend and if he's going to start treating Ford like that again then he supposes he's once again taken over the duty of babysitting him. He shakes his head, attempting to knock his glasses back onto his nose (they've gone crazily skewed thanks to the angle).]

... Just one. If you're goin' to insist.

[Ford doesn't notice the close call Fiddleford's knee makes with his balls; he's too busy batting his eyelashes down at Fiddleford in a completely heterosexual way. Yes, look at them, just a pair of best friends dancing a friendly friend dance.]

You know I am.

[He pulls Fiddleford back upright and segues surprisingly effortlessly into a box step, despite the fact that the song currently playing is in the completely wrong time signature. He's going to make it work, damnit.]

[... Okay, well, there's one change that needs to be made right off the bat here. Fiddleford reaches back to grab hold of the hand Ford has placed on his waist and firmly dislodge it. They have to do some minor adjustments.]

I don't follow.

[This, too, is very heterosexual.]

[Ford pauses, raising his eyebrows down at Fiddleford and allowing him to rearrange his hands as he will without complaint.]

That's right. I ffforgot. You like to lead.

[Remember, Fiddleford? Remember that one time in college? Ford remembers. Pepperidge Farm remembers.]

[He is going to burn Pepperidge Farms to the ground. His box step is perhaps just a little more brisk than it needs to be.]

Don't you make this into... Into a thing. We are in public.

[Ford maybe straightens up a little, no pun intended, but he's drunk enough that he does lean over to speak near Fiddleford's ear:]

Would you rather we do this in private?

[Fiddleford is fairly certain that, were it possible, he would spontaneously burst into flames. His ears are red enough that they probably look like they're catching.

He'd forgotten that being Ford Pines' best friend involves an awful lot of wanting to fling himself into the sun. Now, right now, is when Ford wants to do this? In public, at a party that's in awfully poor taste to begin with, with five people dead. Right now is when Ford wants to come on to him and drag up feelings he's dutifully left buried since college and would have been perfectly happy to leave buried for the rest of his life.

Ugh.

The worst part of it is the little voice in the back of his head that's saying hey, well, you're unattached. Newly-divorced. Might be dead next week. You could live a little if you wanted.]

Stanford. Come on. Not now.

[If Fiddleford was under the illusion that Ford Pines was possessed of any sort of tact, he was woefully wrong. But Ford can tell when his friend is unhappy with him, or at least he thinks he can, and even drunk he can force himself to pull back and give Fiddleford what can only be described as puppy-dog eyes.

Right. Fiddleford thinks he's straight. He misses his ex-wife. He'd better keep that in mind, probably,]

I'm done, I'm done.

[His back is ramrod straight, now, his expression quite serious, or as serious as he can manage as they go through the motions of the dance. He's not sad. Why would he be sad? He just tried to come on to the man he's been in love with for forty years and was rejected, that's fine.]

[Ugh, great. Now he just feels like a jerk. He lets the silence spiral uncomfortably between them as they turn. It probably says a lot that even with how chilly the air's gotten neither of them has missed a step. If he were a little more poetic he'd say that might be a metaphor for their relationship but he isn't and he doesn't.

He knows he hurt Ford just know. He knows Ford well enough to tell. He spends a couple more rotations thinking, until suddenly the music is gone and they've stopped and he doesn't have a good excuse to hold Ford's hand anymore.]

... We can talk about this. Later. Just... not here.

Alright?

[By the time the dances ends and Ford lets his arms drop, he's feeling far more sober than he'd like and there's a lump in his throat that he desperately wants not to acknowledge. He cuts his gaze to the side, to try and hide the hurt in them. He can't even let what Fiddleford says cheer him up, because it'll probably just be him telling Ford that he wants nothing to do with him. Not like that. Not anymore.]

Sure. [His voice is a little thick, but very polite.] Later.

[Much later, after the party and after Fiddleford has had time to get his head on a little straighter and after Ford has had time to (hopefully) sober up a little, Fiddleford knocks on Ford's door. He better be in there, because anywhere more public just isn't going to happen. This is not a conversation he can have with even the slightest possibility of anyone overhearing.]

Stanford?

[Luckily for Fiddleford, Ford has had time enough to sober enough and also feel a little shitty about how over-the-top he was acting at the party. Maybe three weeks of murders and executions are finally getting to him. Either way, it was indiscreet of him, and he's not feeling too great, and his feelings are hurt besides. Which is why he can't even feel hopeful about hearing Fiddleford knock on his door, because it's probably going to be more rejection.

He barely glances up from where he's furiously scribbling in his notebook.]

Mm? Come in.

[It's fine, it's whatever.]

[Well. That's the chilly reception he was expecting. He knows very well how Ford can get petulant when he's feeling hurt, so this isn't surprising. He steps inside the room and closes the door behind him but doesn't walk too much further in.]

I... I'm sorry. About all that.

[Petulant? Who's petulant? Ford is merely sobering up and very tired and nursing a lot of hurt right now, but it's fine. He's an adult, he can handle it. He glances up at his friend standing in the doorway and once more has to swallow down a lump in his throat, looking over the top of his glasses, like a professor looking up from grading papers might.]

No, that's quite alright. I was out of line. Not your fault.

[See? Very civil. Very calm. It's all good. No crushed hopes here!]

[Considering how familiar Fiddleford is with denial it doesn't take much for him to recognize it here.]

You can't... you can't blame me. We were in public. Everyone was watchin'.

[His leg has started bouncing like it always does when he's nervous and has nowhere to direct his energy.]

I don't blame you. Did I say I blamed you?

[He looks back down at his notebook, as if he's got something very very important he's working on that isn't a highly detailed drawing of the Loch Ness Monster that's so heavily inked it's threatening to split the paper open.]

I clearly embarrassed you, and myself. It won't happen again.

[He can see that movement out of the corner of his eye. It's killing him to act like this, but he doesn't know how else he should act that won't tear his pride to shreds.]

[His leg keeps bouncing until it bounces hard enough that he has to slap his knee to stop it. No. Come on. You are an adult man, Fiddleford McGucket, and if you want to keep being friends with this man you have got to have this conversation no matter how it winds up going.

Maybe it's still not too late to spontaneously combust.]

Were you serious about it? I mean, would you have, if you weren't -- if you'd've been sober?

[That actually gets his attention; if he's that nervous, it must not mean he's here to give Ford a dressing down. And then he actually asks if Ford was serious, and Ford has to fight down a laugh, because laughing isn't going to go over well right now. So instead, he sets his notebook aside, his legs crossed, and leans forward, fixing Fiddleford with a curious stare.]

Of course I was. Does that strike you as something I'd joke about? I...

[He looks down at his hands, which are grasping at the hems of his trousers above his bare feet.]

My feelings aren't a laughing matter, Fiddleford.

[Well.

Okay.

He bites the inside of his cheek, mulling over his next words very carefully. He could potentially be making a very big mistake bringing this up at all, but the phrase 'you could be dead next week' keeps repeating behind his eyes. They're going to live, they'll get out, but... but if they don't... what does he really have to lose?

A lot. He has a lot to lose. This relationship he only just got back, that he still can't quite believe is real, that he still expects to go up in flames any moment.]

You know what I got in that envelope the second week we were here?

[Ford raises his eyebrows at Fiddleford's hesitance, wondering exactly what he's about to say, and why it's taking so much thought. He's trying very hard to fight down that little spark of hope that says maybe he feels the same way, maybe the tide is finally turning in your favor. In Ford's experience, it rarely does that.]

I'll bite. What was it?

[He'd assumed it had something to do with the ray. With the Blind Eye.]

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TIME FOR A T-T-T-TIMESKIP

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