Z (Jealousy) + Klapollo (bonus points if it’s Klavier that’s the jealous one)
i took a couple swings at this until i came up with something that could be short & sweet. thanks for the prompt & ur patience!!
Z. Make up your own prompt—jealousy
It had been a long trial—what else was new? They were all long trials. Even the ones that were technically shorter felt like they had lasted eons by the time the judge brought down the gavel. This had been a full three days in court, though, and by the time Apollo was descending the courthouse steps with another triumphant ‘not guilty’ verdict under his belt, he felt a little dazed from the potent mixture of adrenaline and sleep deprivation.
Which meant, of course, it was the perfect time to bother him. He recognized the brisk footsteps approaching from behind and glanced backwards. As usual, Klavier looked entirely too satisfied for a prosecutor who had just lost his case.
“Another job well done, Herr Forehead.”
“Thanks,” Apollo said. It was getting… a little easier to take some of Klavier’s compliments genuinely. “You too.”
“I meant to catch you in the defense lobby, but Fräulein Magician informed me you hadn’t even stuck around for celebratory ramen. Are you off somewhere in a hurry?”
“I’ve got shit to do tonight,” Apollo said, ruefully. He sort of wanted to cancel on his plans to go pass out at home, but Clay had already threatened to come pick him up by his scruff if he tried to skip out. Apparently the post-stress exhaustion of having someone’s life and freedom in his hands wasn’t a good enough excuse to get out of outreach he’d agreed to weeks before he ever knew he’d have this case. Ugh. Apollo was going to come up with all kinds of obnoxious shit to drag Clay along on for the day after he got back down from the moon, see how he liked it. “They’re not so urgent I don’t have a minute to talk, though, if you needed something?”
“Ach, I won’t keep you too long. I just wanted to schedule our usual debrief about the case.”
“Oh, yeah,” Apollo said, shaking himself out of his slight daze. Meeting up with Klavier to go over the details and make sure they both understood everything inside-out and backwards. Right. He did appreciate Klavier indulging him on that habit. “Uh—I mean, you know my schedule’s usually pretty open. When were you thinking, tomorrow? Later in the week?”
“Tomorrow would work best with my schedule.”
“Okay, then tomorrow.”
“It’s a date,” Klavier confirmed, brightly. Apollo rolled his eyes. Damn flirt. With a slightly sly undertone, leaning in close enough for Apollo’s heart to give a confused lurch, Klavier added, “I was thinking lunch—?”
Abruptly, a car horn blared, startling Klavier and jolting Apollo into jumping badly enough that he almost slammed his forehead into Klavier’s chin. They both turned to look at the offending car. Over at the curb, a familiar idiot leaned out of the rolled-down driver’s side window of a familiar car, grinning wildly.
“Hey, handsome! You come here often?”
“Oh my God, Clay,” Apollo groaned, face warming. Did he really have to do this routine in front of Klavier?! “I’m at work!”
Clay waved a hand dismissively. “You already left the courthouse, you’re basically off the clock.”
Apollo decided that didn’t dignify a response. “What are you even here for? I told you to pick me up at my apartment. I’ve got my bike here, dude, I can’t just leave it.”
“Toss it in the back. Jeep’s got plenty of room. It’s not like I don’t have plenty of your spare clothes you've forgotten at my dorm for you to change into.”
“Is this a friend of yours, Herr Forehead?” Klavier asked, warily. Apollo glanced up at him. Clay’s car was bad enough that even Apollo realized it was a bad car. It deserved a dubious look or two. Apollo wasn’t sure it deserved quite the tight-lipped, judgmental study Klavier was giving it, though.
“Something like that,” Apollo muttered.
“‘Something like that’?” Clay echoed, grin spreading even wider. “Wow, AJ. Where’s the love? At least introduce me to your rival.”
“We’re not rivals!” Apollo huffed. “Prosecutor Gavin, this is Clay. As much as I’d love to say I’ve never met this man before in my life, I do actually know him, and he’s not just some weirdo trying to pick me up off the street.”
“Ach, what a relief,” Klavier said, with strangely forced levity, summoning up a smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes. “A pleasure to meet you, I’m sure.”
“Clay, you don’t get to be introduced to Prosecutor Gavin because I know damn well you won’t behave.”
“Me?” Clay put a mock-affronted hand over his heart. “Not behave? I have no idea why you’re slandering me like this. I’m always a perfect angel.”
“Anyway, I’m getting a ride now, I guess,” Apollo said, shifting back towards Klavier. “What were you saying about our meeting tomorrow? Something about lunch?”
Klavier opened his mouth, then paused, eyes flicking over to Clay before meeting Apollo’s again. “I was going to suggest we go over the files after picking up something to eat, but I’ve just remembered a meeting I have with Herr Cravat just after lunch. I wouldn’t want us to be short on time. Could you do earlier in the day?”
“Yeah, I can do earlier than lunch.”
“How does ten sound?”
“Ten sounds good,” Apollo said. “Ten AM at your office, then?”
“Ja.” Klavier nodded, first to Apollo and then to Clay. “I’ll leave you gentlemen to it, then. Enjoy your evening—and congratulations again for your win, Herr Forehead.”
“Thanks?” Apollo said, confusion turning the statement into a question when Klavier turned and walked off, just like that. He usually spent longer needling Apollo before he left well enough alone after a trial. Was it because Apollo had someone waiting on him? It wasn’t like the presence of Trucy or clients had ever dissuaded him before, though. Apollo shook himself out of his bewilderment, hustling over to the bike rack to unlock his bike. Clay climbed out of the car to help him load it into the back before they both got in, buckled up, and set off.
“Man,” Apollo said, after a minute, when Clay had had a chance to navigate the courthouse parking lot and rejoin traffic without distractions. “He really fucking hated your car. I knew it was a piece of shit, but I didn’t realize it was that bad.”
Clay’s eyebrows shot up. “Sorry, what?”
“Gavin? He was glaring at your car that whole time.”
“My car?” Clay echoed, starting to grin again. “You think he was glaring at my car?”
“Yeah, I—what do you mean, ‘you think’? He was glaring at your car!”
Inexplicably, Clay started laughing. A quiet snicker at first—then he chanced a glance away from the road, over at Apollo, and almost immediately devolved into full, chest-deep laughter. Apollo’s sound of outrage only encouraged him to further cackling.
“Clay—Clay! Hey, asshole, come on, you’re driving!”
“God I love you so much,” Clay wheezed, wiping tears away from his eyes as they pulled into the queue at an intersection. “Oh, man, AJ. Yeah, my car’s a real piece of shit. That’s gotta be it.”
“What the hell is so funny?!”
“He was glaring at me, not the car. I’m like eighty percent sure he thinks I’m your boyfriend and a hundred percent sure he’s jealous, dude.”
“Excuse me?!” Apollo’s face flushed red-hot. Clay getting mistaken for his boyfriend wasn’t new, and Apollo grudgingly understood the confusion whenever it happened. The idea of Klavier being jealous about it, though, that was— “You’re making shit up for the fun of drama.”
“I’m not! I’m not. He wasn’t glaring until after I basically cat-called you and you rolled with it, and it got worse after you said I was quote-unquote ‘something like’ a friend. He looked like he was sucking on a lemon.” Clay smirked at the road. “Glaring at my car. Pfft. Come on, man. You’re supposed to be the perceptive one.”
“I am the perceptive one,” Apollo snapped. “I didn’t perceive anything because you’re wrong.”
“I’ve never been more right about anything in my life.”
“You say that literally every time I disagree with you.”
“Yeah,” Clay said, “Because every time I’m even more right.”
“You’re so stupid. I can’t believe they trust you with a spaceship.”
“They don’t,” Clay scoffed. “They trust Sol with the spaceship, and they trust me to keep Sol from imploding out of anxiety. And I just want you to know, that was the world’s most obvious deflection, and I’m only letting you get away with it out of the kindness of my heart.”
How magnanimous of him. Apollo rolled his eyes, turning his glare back out the passenger side window as Clay kept the chatter going. He did his best not to notice the splotchy blush across his cheeks in his own reflection.
Clay really was an idiot trying to find drama where there was none. Klavier, jealous of him? Please. As if.