RUDOLPH "ROCK" LINDEMAN has been spotted in town. They have been living here for HIS WHOLE LIFE inΒ OLD MILL DISTRICT. They are HONORABLE and CALLOUS, as far as newcomers should be concerned when approaching them at SINNERS where they work as a BOUNCER.Β
GENERAL INFORMATION
name: rudolph lindeman
nickname: rock
type: local
birthday: january 12, 1993 (33)
zodiac: capricorn
gender: cismale (he/him)
PERSONAL INFORMATION
occupation: bouncer at saint's cellar. professional light heavyweight MMA fighter.
orientation: he says he's straight
relationship status: dating
residency:Β apartment in the old mill district
habits: cigarettes
allergies: n/a
spoken languages: english, american sign language
PHYSICAL INFORMATION
eye color: brown
hair color: black
height: 6'0"
dominant hand: right
piercings: none.
tattoos: none.
distinguishing marks: left pinky finger has a missing nail and is always bent
scent: jo malone - cypress & grapevine
faceclaim: woo do hwan
PSYCHOLOGIC INFORMATION
MBTI:
temperament:Β choleric
tropes:Β the diligent connard, lost soul, the paradox, contrarian
mental health:
FAMILY INFORMATION
parents: karl & grace lindeman
sibling: clay lindeman
pet(s): n/a
PERSONALITY
He follows his life in a strict and regulated regime, not wanting to allow mistakes in himself. A perfectionist and an overachiever, he refuses to accept less than perfect in his daily life along with in the ring. He trains hard and follows a meticulous meal plan. Now that he must also care for his brother, he feels additional pressure on himself and how he has to live his life, feeling that he needs to do enough for the both of them by letting his brother live vicariously through himself. But because of this, he feels like he can't be entirely honest with himself and what he wants. He has a strong protective nature to those close to him and often rubs people he's not close to the wrong way.
KNOWN INFORMATION
was adopted as a baby alongside his older brother by karl and grace lindeman. karl is of german-american descent and grace is chinese-american.
he excelled in sports where his brother excelled in academics. his brother was the first one in their family to graduate from university and they were all very proud.
it seemed like his brother would be the golden child of the family, ascending to great heights until a car accident turned the tides.
for just over a year now, his brother, clay, has been in a vegetative state after that car accident put him in a coma. rock has moved clay into his apartment and acts as his caretaker.
he competes as a professional light heavy weight MMA fighter and when he's not competing, works as a bouncer at sinners.
he's a native to ennora and no longer lives with his parents but visits when he can.
he has a tendency to go non-verbal and communicates in a series of grunts or gestures and half hearted ASL when he's bored or stops caring about a conversation or gets overstimulated
WANTED CONNECTIONS
childhood friends
you've gotten yourself kicked out of sinners one too many times, there's no hard feelings between you two though, it's just business and you guys get a laugh out of it sometimes
"romantic" interest - rock is in the closet and in denial of his sexuality and so has a woman that he dates publically (taken)
personal trainer
clay's best friend - you are actually friends with his brother more but now that clay is in a vegetative state, you've befriended rock to remain close (taken)
clay's girlfriend - you were dating rock's brother and are the mother of his child (up to you age and gender, they'd be rock's niece or nephew) and stay in touch
Maya shook her head, "It's not that." She let Hiro take her hand, knowing that the physical contact brought him some comfort. "I mean, I didn't love that," she added. It was strange, maybe, that physical pain didn't frighten her as much as emotional pain did. Broken bones and cuts healed with time. The heart, in her experience, was a much trickier wound to close.
"It's, well," there wasn't really a good way to word it, "It's Iggy." Hiro had claimed they were just friends, but she and Hiro were just friends. It didn't seem the same to her. "He's," she continued, "volatile in a way that makes me worry for you." She had practiced this conversation maybe one hundred times and never quite found a way to say it that she thought was perfect. She didn't want to bring up her spat with Iggy. It wasn't about that, really, it was more that it had clarified things in a way that made her feel she had to say something. "And I think, growing up like we did, we're so used to putting our feelings aside that we need people who don't ask us to do that, who won't let that happen." Sitting between the words was the implication that she didn't think Iggy would be that kind of person for Hiro.
She wanted to be wrong, of course. She wanted to be wrong that Hiro had learned like she did to put her own feelings aside for the comfort of others. She wanted to be wrong about all of it. It was if she wasn't that scared her. Swallowing, she glanced over at Hiro, knowing that this was the moment she would find out how it went over. She just had to hope that Hiro would understand where she was coming from and listen to what she had to say. Even if he was angry with her.
When she says, 'It's Iggy,' the first thing that happens is something in his chest flips and then tightens, thinking something happened to Iggy. Hiro clings to the next words she says so that by the time she's finished speaking, he almost doesn't understand what she said because he'd been expecting something entirely different. His head tilts like he's trying to hear her better or make sense of what she's saying. Confusion wrinkles his brow.
The rest of her words convey her concern with a practiced amount of subtly. It's easy enough to see that she grew up having to mince herself carefully to convey her thoughts, if she was allowed to convey them at all. Hiro grew up in a similar environment except he didn't mince his words, he just stopped talking.
Hiro reads between the lines of all the unspoken things and nods slowly. "Okay, I get it."
He squeezes her hand, still holding her fingers within his to hopefully ease some of her concern. He can understand where she's coming from. "Listen.." he starts to say and then stops because what is he supposed to say. Hiro didn't know how to mince his words carefully. He was all sharp edges and blunt vowels. Words became weapons in his mouth more often than he liked to admit because he struggles on how to handle them in a way to make them hurt less. "It's.. I know he's.. difficult sometimes but he.." he wets his lips and takes a breath, trying to find the words to make it make sense to someone outside of himself, "..he never did anything.. he's never made me feel like.. like I need to.." he presses his lips together, head shaking softly as he struggles to verbalize his thoughts and feelings, "..like I need to make myself.. small. He doesn't do that. Make me put my feelings aside. He's actually really good at.. like he wants me to say the things I'm.. trying to say. He listens. He.. makes room for me.. and then doesn't let me.. back away." Which is equally as important to Hiro. Because someone like him who has been running away his entire life, needs someone who will ask him to come back, who asks him to keep talking.
Maya wondered if it was possible for her heart to beat out of her chest. It certainly felt that way. Aside from her heart, she had gone incredibly still, almost like if she didn't move she wouldn't be noticed. Of course, considering she and Hiro were the only two people in the room, that wasn't practically likely. But she had to be brave. She would never forgive herself if her worst imaginings happened without her saying something.
"Yeah, no problem," she said. It was easy to get Jasmine out from under the bed. Getting the charging cord out of her mouth was a little more difficult, but Maya managed it. She set the kitten on the bed between them.
She sighed. Just coming out with it would be better. Then at least Maya would know if she had lost a friend. "Look, um," she swallowed, "I know you haven't asked for my advice and you probably don't want it. And that it probably has more to do with me than reality." She did not mention that she worried he would be mad at her too. It wasn't fair to ask him to not feel something for her sake. She continued, "I'm just worried. And I love you, I know i don't say it, but I do and I don't want you to get hurt."
Hiro picks up a toy and dangles it in front of Jasmine to redirect some of her boundless kitten energy. When Maya starts to speak again, he looks over at her and catches a note of unease about her posture. It's the way she's holding herself like she's bracing for impact. It's a posture he recognizes.
"Hey, it was just an accident," he sets aside the toy to free his hand so he can reach out for hers. Hiro has always been a physical sort of person and he needs some point of contact once a conversation turns serious. Jasmine immediately pounces on the toy. "Bike accidents happen all the time. I had my gear on and I'm alright. Bit banged up but it could have been a lot worse."
Iggy's head falls back and he sighs. He wants to keep kissing Hiro, keep looking at him, but his eyes fall shut anyway because the room is moving in his vision. His good hand is still holding on tightly to the other, holding him close, but he doesn't kiss him again, not yet. It's too much, too intimate, and his body stiffens as he suddenly remembers who was kissing him last. Before the hospital, before his cousin and Hiro had found him in the motel room. He'd kissed someone else, someone he didn't really want to kiss but what did it matter if it was just a kiss, right? (It was never just a kiss.) A kiss that got him what he really wanted. Attention, and an escape that came in the shape of death this time.
His grip tightened even further on Hiro, but he shook his head. "We can't," he said quietly. "I can't. I can't, is that okay?" And he hoped it was okay, because he didn't want Hiro to leave yet. He'd understand if the other wanted to, because Iggy figured he wasn't good for company either so if he couldn't at least give the other what they wanted physically then what good was he? "Please don't go," he said before Hiro could answer, still holding him tightly, keeping his eyes open to look at him despite the way it made him feel a little nauseous.
"It's okay. I was only joking," he says it swiftly, leaning in close not to kiss him again but just to press the slope of his nose against Iggy's cheek. "I won't go.. I promise." He'll stay in this hospital room the entire time if Iggy would let him and if the nurses didn't kick him out. He'd unfortunately already made quite a fuss with them when Iggy was first admitted that they're not entirely fond of him now but he can try to butter them back up again. He just wants to be near him. He needs to be near him. Even now every touch of his skin feels like a blessing. He was so close to never being able to hear his voice again that he clings to every word and every breath that leaves his lips. "I'll be here for as long as you want me."
Their vision, lost to an unseen distance, gets filled up with a personβs face gradually drawing closer. Closer and closer until it was the only thing Minho saw and it startled them out of their reverie into a deer in the headlights moment. Even as their vision unfocused due to the proximity, they feel a soft touch of lips landing on theirs and for the longest second they are unsure why this touch was placed there of all places. Then it hit them. The touch was called a kiss and it was given and done in specific situations and although Minho had not read this situation as one deserving a kiss, apparently it was one!
Their lips part in surprise but instead of expressing it, they end up catching Hiroβs bottom lip in a soft hold that hints they do not want this surprise to end even if they still donβt know it themself. Their lashes flutter before their eyes close at the feeling of scarred roughness of fingertips on their knuckles. There were callouses on Minhoβs palms as well, from gripping bars for balance in dancing studios during ballet and jazz lessons but they were always quickly taken care of, nothing about their hands revealing any sort of hard work done. It was like silk over rough stone, the meeting of their hands and when that touch moved to Minhoβs cheek that was when they woke up, leaning away with a soft gasp before the kiss truly began.Β
They search Hiroβs face, eyes shifting between lips and his own pair of dark gems. To say that theyβve sought out Hiroβs company just because they once met on the road a long while ago outside of Ennora and therefore were already acquaintances reuniting in the town would be a lie. There was a wild handsomeness to Hiro theyβve always noticed and appreciated but werenβt sure was appropriate to admire considering the age difference between them and the unknown state of interest on the other part. Yet there it was, interest plainly revealed, much to Minhoβs surprise.
βAre you teasing me, Hiro?β They whisper, not creating further distance between them so their breath is a soft puff of cooling warmth against the wetness left on Hiroβs lips.
"Do I look like I'm laughing?" His own voice whispers back, close enough in proximity that his breath warms Minho's own lips as well. There's nothing about the line of Hiro's brow that gives way to laughter, nor amusement, nor even a taunting tease. The thing about Hiro is how dark his eyes are. They're not brown, there's no hint of warmth in the depthless ink pool that makes up his eyes. They're two black holes that swallow the light and everything around them. Hiro was born hungry. He was born empty. He was born crying and desperate to fill that black hole inside of himself. As he got older, he stopped crying but he has never stopped trying to fill that hole.
It's the reason he surrounds himself with people. It's the reason he doesn't like quiet nights alone. It's the reason he's always trying to find another body, another something or someone to soothe the ache of being born empty. And he has a gift, he thinks. He has the uncanny ability to see lonely people, aching from their own emptiness maybe if two lonely people come together, maybe at least for a little while, they can feel a little less empty. He hadn't planned on kissing Minho. He hadn't come over with that intention but when he saw that look in their eyes, he simply felt right.
"Can I kiss you again?" He asks this time. Now that the shock of the first kiss has passed. Now that the reality of the world comes shifting in.
location: outside of maisie's house
with: @littlesugarnspice ( daphne & hiro )
It's been a few days since his discharge from the hospital and one of the things the doctors told him was that total bed rest was actually detrimental to his recovery process. They made sure to remind him before he left to try and resume as much of his daily activities as he possibly could with adjustments to reduce pain and excess strain. He couldn't work out and he couldn't go for a run like he usually did but he could go for a slow walk around the neighborhood and so that's what he was doing right now, finishing up a walk before Daphne came over. He's making his way down the street when he looks up to where his van is parked and notices her there.
"Hey," he can't raise his arm to wave because that would also hurt so he just gives her a nod as he approaches. His left arm is held in a brace and his sprained ankle is pretty much fine by now and thanks to his gear he didn't get much by way of road burn except for across his left and right forearms which are covered up anyway right now. The bruise on his forehead is also healed up. Except for his arm, he looks generally fine even if he doesn't feel it. "Have you even seen the inside of my van before?" He tilts his head to the side where it's parked. He's not been staying in there, mostly because he has to stoop in order not to hit his head and bending over hurts, but he has all of his things in there except for a few changes of clothes which he's been keeping in Maisie's house.
It's fascinating. Iggy doesn't know where to even start, as he looks around. He wants to take it all in, touch everything, and he isn't able to stop himself from running his fingers along the edge of a table as he walks slowly by it. Not touching the art, not wanting to ruin anything accidentally, but feeling the edge of the flat surface everything sits on as he inspects the materials on top.
He takes his time sitting on the couch, a hand resting on his hip as he bends, to ease himself into it as electricity shoots up his back from the joint. When he's down, he stares at a nearby wall, barely registering that Elio is speaking again. "Bellissimo," he repeats, feeling the word on his tongue, not knowing what it means but having several guesses.
Iggy doesn't hesitate to pull his shirt off over his head, tossing it aside. He takes a little more time with his shoes and socks, though they end up tossed aside, as well, perhaps getting lost in the fray. He doesn't care so much. "It's fine," he said, shrugging. "Maybe a little bit chilly, but I don't mind."
Elio comes over after he finishes taping up the light and immediately crouches down in front of where Iggy sits. He doesn't touch him but he looks, appraising the way the light falls across his frame, the way it warms already warm skin. Every stroke of his eyes feels deliberate. "Bene. I will give you a blanket." Then he stands up and steps backward, still looking at Iggy though now taking in more of him than before and the background as well.
"How would you lay if you just came home? Lounge," it comes out equally as a question and request. He takes a second to locate a blanket. It is an older building so it doesn't have one of those fancier centralized heating systems and even if it did he wouldn't use it. Not that it doesn't get hot enough but because he thinks it does something to the art and considering a lot of what he does involves forging art from a time before heaters, he thinks this means something. Forging art isn't just about matching colors and brushstrokes, it's about matching the intention of the artist and the environment. It's about recreating how the dust particles lay across the surface after years of poor storage or sitting on display on a wall beside a window so half of it fades faster than the other.
Elio returns with the blanket, richly purple and heavy, vibrant against the muted yellow of the couch and the warm of Iggy's skin. "May I touch? I want to move you."
It was weirdly soothing, the feeling of clay under his fingers. Iggy was fixated on the wheel and the work in front of him, his brow furrowed, tongue just barely poking out of the corner of his mouth as he leaned into the work. Occasionally he'd glance up, looking over at Hiro's clay, and open his mouth to say something...but he never actually said anything, eyes dropping back to what he was doing instead. It was the quietest he'd been in a long, long time.
For once, his brain seemed to go quiet. And Iggy was sort of enjoying that. When Hiro asked him what he was making, he looked up, finally breaking out of his own head. Eyes wide, he looked at Hiro, then looked down at his clay, and frowned. "Oh, um...a ball," he said, gesturing to the almost perfectly round sphere he'd been smoothing his hands over this entire time. He grinned, proud of what he'd accomplished, even if it was actually nothing. "What are you making?"
Hiro appraises the ball, dark eyes dancing with amusement before flicking back down to his. The walls of his almost bowl have now slumped onto the wheel in a folded puddle, succumbing to the pressures of gravity and instability. "Mm.." He tilts his head to the side one way and then tilts over to the other, "Abstract art. It's called... Flaccid Pottery." He chuckles and is about to slap his hand over it to mold it back together when he pauses again, hand hovering over. He tilts his head again and then pinches the edges here and pinches the edges there. "Ashtray," he waves a proud clay covered hand over his creation, having turned what would have been a fail into something else.
Maya was not known for dressing appropriately for the weather. Spencer had harassed her enough times about getting a proper winter jacket that she probably ought to do it. Before leaving her apartment, she had at least pulled on her trusty leather jacket. Underneath her jacket though was a black crop top that she had paired with tight jeans. Her blonde hair had been pulled back into a high ponytail. As she walked up to The Rusty Dog, she checked her phone, but found no new notifications.
Her attention was pulled away by a girl standing outside the bar in a completely pink outfit. It took a second for Maya to process the question. Once she did though, she pulled a lighter from her jacket pocket. "Here," she said, tossing it over. Maya didn't smoke herself, but she had partied enough that she had just started carrying a light. It was a good way to get the occasional free drink. "Just give it back inside," she said, nodding towards the bar's warm light behind the door, "I'd like to keep my tits on, after all."
Shy catches the lighter with one hand, "Safe, fam," as a quick thanks before she ignites the end of her joint. It's a good toke and she exhales slowly as it begins its work in her body, warming and loosening her up. After being so strung up at the hospital for the last three days it's desperately needed. If she didn't have these little moments to fully release the tension in her body then she would definitely lose her head.
After a few hits, she heads back into the bar to look for the woman who had so kindly let her borrow the light. The bar itself isn't overly packed with the usual crowd filling it around this time and no game on. In fact what is showing on the TV is actually a black and white re-run of a classic American TV comedy that Shy learned is called I Love Lucy, which she thought was strange to show at a bar but why the hell not. The tall lanky goth bartender seems to enjoy it and Shy finds it actually hilarious. Especially now that she's high. She almost forgets what she was doing until she spots the woman she was looking for and then resumes her walk over.
"Nice one for the light, babes, and your tits are sitting right proper, still," dropping the lighter onto the table for her to pick back up, "Drinking on your lonesome, or can a girl step in?"
Calder had been halfway through a cigarette when she found him, standing just outside the back door with his jacket hanging off one shoulder and a beer in hand. The show had gone well, but he was glad that the month was ending and his promise to Diego to play in all the performances was fulfilled. He hadn't done such a long stretch of frequent performances since his early twenties, and honestly, he could use the break, even if he did enjoy the thrill of fucking someone backstage and risking getting caught as much as the performances.
He glanced over as Shy appeared, restless as usual. He had grown to like her company in the past month, knowing he'd enjoy her being around when they gathered to play something in someone's garage or a busk somewhere. "Depends," he said, taking another drag. "Are we stepping out for drinks in the bar or the club?" A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth as he flicked ash onto the pavement. "Because if it's either one, then yeah, I'm in."
"Can't pick the spot, babes?" Which is fair enough since not even she is sure which one she wants right now and both sound appealing. Pink hair flicks over her shoulder and then in a spin in the air as she whirls it up behind her head into a swift and messy updo with many a straggling strand framing her face. It helps cool her down, body still feeling excessively warm after the show.
"Say less. Girl's gonna flip a coin for it, innit. Heads, the raves. Tails, the local spot." This is how Shy ends up deciding on a lot of things in her life. She'd picked up a lucky penny one night and was very convinced it was truly a lucky penny as immediately as she knelt down to pick it up, she'd avoided getting hit in the head by a plastic bag carried by a strong gust of wind. Not exactly a terribly threatening experience but she believes in the magical in the mundane and so reads into many experiences.
Sofia's shoulders stiffened as Elio continued to call her by her childhood nickname. Luckily, it was easily explainable given its other meanings. The fact they are both speaking Italian and clearly already know each other will be the harder part to explain should she need to. She nodded even as she glanced up towards where his apartment was. They should get off the street. "Va bene," she agreed.
She let him lead the way, thinking the entire time about if anyone from the Family ever spoke about visiting Elio here in Ennora. She couldn't think of an example, but it also wasn't something that would likely to be mentioned. If anyone came here, it would be game over for her. She would be taken back to New York and dragged to the altar. As they entered the apartment, she looked around. It was warmer than her own, more lived in. "Does Romeo live here too?" she asked. She stayed in Italian. It felt natural. Back in New York, Italian and English mixed easily in the Family homes. Even though she hadn't spoken it with someone else since leaving New York, it slipped off her tongue easy as honey.
The apartment is full, that is to say it is rather cluttered. Neither Elio nor Leo his roommate are on the clean side and so things sort of end up where they end up. Dishes have a dirty pile, a semi-dirty pile and a clean pile in the kitchen but they are also scattered around the apartment. Mugs with dried scum of coffee left on the coffee table in the living room on the side table by the front door like it was left there in a hurry while someone took their one last sip before leaving and then simply forgot about it. Likely it was him who had left it there but he doesn't recall it. There's a half completed art project on the floor that he steps around as he guides her inside. Pants draped across the back of a chair because someone took them off unexpectedly, a stain across the front that is reddish and smells acidic like tomato sauce.
"Yes, Romeo lives here now," and there's evidence of this too with text books in a neglected pile, a laptop open but the screen is blank and the cable that gives it power is unplugged but strewn across the ground. Perhaps it's supposed to be plugged in. Elio isn't sure and he so he leaves it like that because Romeo is also temperamental when it comes to his things being touched and moved. "You will not see him, he is in school."
Elio moves into the kitchen and sniffs the moka pot when he opens it. He'd already made espresso this morning for himself and Leo and hadn't cleaned it out yet. He does so now so he can brew a fresh pot. "You can sit where you can find place. Move that one thing and the chair is open." Referring to any random thing that might be on any of the given chairs around the kitchen table.
Ivy wishes to never look away from them. He wants his eyes to stay with theirs for as long as their hearts keep beating, but the further River takes him, the harder it gets for his eyelids not to flutter closed. His entire body contracts altogether as his hand moves from their shoulders to the back of their neck to hold him in place. "Fuck, you're unbelievable," he whispers shakily with the faintest hint of a voice as it becomes a moan the moment it passes through his throat, and he has to remind himself to be gentle and not to pull River's head towards him right away. His fingers close around the longer strands of hair at the back of their head as he takes a short breath before it leaves his lips right away in the form of their name.
"Did you like that? Did you like me calling you a good boy?" His voice is low, but coated in a sweetness that feels foreign in his tongue, something he wasn't even sure he had reserved, let alone that it would be for River's ears only. "Or is it that you just like having me in your mouth that much?" He asks, slowly pulling his hips back until just his tip stayed in their mouth, then just as slowly pushing back into it, letting nothing but the overwhelming heat around his cock guide his movements. Ivy bites his lip and moves his hand back to their cheek, thumb gently soothing the spot on their jaw to coax them to open up a bit more. "Yesβ that's beautifulβ is it okay? Are you okay?" It's not like he's expecting River to speak in that very moment, but Ivy simply wants to make sure, as if he needed any sort of reminder, that this is happeningβ that River, his life-long best friend, whom he's fantasized about more than a few times all along, wants this just as much as he does.
They nod and their eyes and mouth speak for them, answering the question they have no words for. It's okay. It's more than okay. They want this. They want him so much. Desperately. They're so desperate for him. They've been desperate for him for years and years and years and-- they open their mouth more to take him in deeper until they feel that sweet pressure at the back of their throat that's only just a bit uncomfortable. Then they draw back, thick saliva coats his shape as they leave their mouth.
"I want you," finally speaking, finally putting it into tangible words. With their lips feeling raw and swollen pink from kissing. "I want you, Ivy. I need you."
Rick hadn't really thought much about making his account. The reason had been silly, maybe. Looking around and just wondering what else is normal... he'd gotten a job, two even. Making sure he can provide for himself and be independent despite the years of absence and time he has lost. He had a shitty studio apartement that he could hear what everyone around him was doing in their own small shitty apartments. He was supposed to get his license back pretty soon. NA meetings were going well. He was 50 days out and fifty days clean. That had to count for something. And he started a gym membership, going there whenever he could find time between road crew and diner. But... still, he kept feeling like he was missing more things. Like he needed to be doing more. And he'd thought about what other 25-year-olds do? What were those he'd gone to school with doing? They were... living life. And he'd figured out the basics, too, now, but the emptiness was still there. So he had thought he needed to try living among others.
He was surprised at himself and what could be considered boldness in his Tinder chat with Elio, but in reality, he had been hoping that going with the flow and simply asking to do something instead of trying to text would be okay. His main experiences in this had been in school, and then he'd spent so much time with the people he'd dated. He figured this would be easiest? It should be, right?
He'd put on jeans and a T-shirt with a collar - the fanciest things he owned right now. He'd googled what to take on a first date in 2026, and of course, flowers had been the first. But he felt like that was too much. So chocolates it was, a box under his arm as he waited by the entrance of the theatre, tickets for "Much Ado About Nothing" already bought for what appeared to be a comedy. So that ought to be good? He was staring at the people around with so much concentration that it took him a second longer to realise that his date had arrived. "Oy... hey man," he greeted, not super eloquently... He had spent the better part of a decade talking to the same handful of people every day. He was still working on situational language. "Glad you showed up," he added, extending the hand with chocolates in it awkwardly instead of a handshake.
If Elio looks like he just rolled out of bed before arriving that would be somewhat close to accurate but not entirely so. Technically he hadn't been in bed at all and he had been in his studio inside his apartment, half perched on the armrest of the chaise lounge with his thumb pressing his lip against his teeth while he stared at his current project. He'd been staring at the canvas for almost three hours already, contemplating things. This was how things were for Elio. Time simply didn't cooperate with him. He'd only thought he'd just sat down and began to consider the canvas and the paint only for him to glance at the clock and realize hours had passed instead of minutes. When did that happen? He had to leave pretty promptly to avoid being late and even still he arrives a few minutes after their scheduled time.
Despite his hair looking fluffy and unkempt his clothes is relatively neat, which is unique, but precisely only because he'd been entirely stationary for three hours. He wears just a simple shirt and jeans which are indeed paint stained. Almost everything he owns ends up with paint on it somehow.
"Yes, hello. I'm here," he voice is low and warm like an aged oak bottle of whiskey. Deep shadows rest beneath his eyes as permanent installations to his features along with the grey speckled stubble adorning his jaw. He stares at the offered chocolates and then tilts his head as if confused why they're there at all. "Chocolates." He finally takes the box and holds it, also a little awkwardly. Honestly it has been a long time since Elio has been on a date. He'd signed up for Tinder on a whim and had just about to begin regretting it when he'd gotten that notification indicating they'd matched.
"We can eat these during the show," Elio concludes when he accepts the box and tucks it under his arm. "I prefer dark. You can eat the milk."
