ArchivedLogs:Pizza and a Nap

Pizza and a Nap
Dramatis Personae Arturo, Eric
In Absentia	2014-06-05 Arturo and Eric meet. A dog follows Eric home. These are related.
Location <NYC> Chinatown
One of New York's oldest neighborhoods and the oldest Chinese enclave outside of Asia, Chinatown is a vibrant ethnic community, which draws throngs of tourists annually as well. This neighborhood is packed with Chinese-owned businesses, from restaurants to groceries to theaters to fashion. If Arturo activated his ability here, he'd likely appear to be a middle aged Chinese man or woman. But as it stands, he's himself - threadbare clothing, nasty scratch on his cheek, stubble and all. He's waiting his turn to buy potstickers from a street vendor. There's a bag looped over his wrist with Cantonese writing on it. He seems in no particular hurry. Eric is looking almost just as ragged as Arturo. The smell of beer hangs thickly in the air around him, though he looks completely untouched despite the distillery smell as he steps down the sidewalk. A passing tourist causes him to pull up to a stop just to one side of Arturo, waiting for the herd to pass with a drumming of his fingers at the belt of his jeans. The ex-officer glances at the line of people and at the potstickers and purses his lips. Pat, pat, his hands brush down his pants to pull out his wallet and glance inside. Rather than continue along the sidewalk, Eric gets in line with Arturo, fingers scratching at the stubble on his face. Arturo glances back behind him as he's joined in line by Eric. He nods absently, then steps up to order. "Can I have a half dozen potstickers. Three uh, three pork and three veg." The man at the cart obliges, dropping the dumplings into a paper boat. "You must be hungry," Eric says, voice light and laughter in his voice. "Or are you getting it to bring home to some friends? One... mmm, maybe two?" Despite his not dressing or acting much like a tourist - no fanny pack here! - his accent is quite Southern, a warm Georgia drawl. "One a' each, please," he asks, taking the bills out of his pocket and passing them over the counter to the vendor. "I haven't eaten in awhile. And I don't get down here often." Arturo's lip curls upwards a bit, though he keeps his lips oddly closed. "And this stand makes the best dumplings in the city. Thanks," this to the clerk as he hands over payment. "Must have been quite a while," Eric says, chuckling as he accepts his smaller order from the street vendor. "If I ate like that, it'd be a while before I was feelin' well enough to eat again, anyway." He grabs a few napkins from the counter and takes a squeeze of Siracha onto the side of the little paper boat. "Now you're going to make me feel guilty about eating them all. Thanks for that." Arturo's smile is less cautious. His pointed canines make an appearance as he pops one of the potstickers into his mouth. He chews and dabs a little bit of filling off his lip. Eric's eyes certainly notice the canines, but he doesn't comment on them as he takes a step to the side to allow the next patrons to get close to the counter. "Well, if ya can eat them all, more power to ya. I love these things." Eric is slower to eat his, taking two bites, the second coming with a scoop of the spicy sauce. For all Arturo looks like the world ran him over with a truck (and scratched him up) the potstickers bring a smile to his face. He chews on another with no regrets. "Mhmm..." he begins, his mouth half full. "...better without the sauce. Normally I'm all over Rooster Sauce but these don't need it. It's like putting ketcup on gourmet food." "Eh, I dunno. Needs to get amped up, in my opinion." Eric says with a little shrug of his shoulders. "Can't just leave it. Ain't spicy enough for me." He chuckles and dabs at his lips with the napkin. Arturo shrugs and bites into another. "Well, to each their own." He chews in an almost animalistic way, though (mostly) with his mouth closed. He starts to walk down the street, but not fast enough to indicate he's trying to ditch Eric. Eric watches the other man for several moments as he strides down the sidewalk, before he comes to some sort of decision and steps after him, closing the gap between them with quick strides. "Name's Eric. What's yours?" The curly-haired man gives Eric a bit more attention now that he's introducing himself. For a moment, he looks like he's deciding whether or not to answer. When he does, it's with a little smile. "Arturo." "Good ta meet ya." Eric says, walking alongside him and bumping past a tourist without even a hesitation, shoulder shoving into shoulder and moving the other person bodily out of the way. "What brings ya to Chinatown today?" he asks, glancing over his shoulder for a second - a quick, suspicious glance - and then back to Arturo. "Chinese medicine shop. Some of it's snake oil, but some of it is very effective." There's two potstickers left. Perhaps Arturo's eyes were bigger than his stomach. "You?" He looks a bit suspicious about Eric's sudden interest, but he's not suspicious enough to be rude. Eric pops the second potsticker into his mouth and crumples the paper boat in one hand, leaving it in his hand for the moment. "Oh, I'm down 'bout here a lot these days. Got the time to kill, and it's good havin' some shit to do." Eric says, vaguely, with a wave of his hand. "Like...eating potstickers and introducing yourself to random strangers on the street?" Arturo says this like it's a bit of whimsy on Eric's part rather than an accusation. The little smile is meant to soften the statement. "Exactly!" Eric says, laughing and grinning at Arturo. "Now you're getting it," he says brightly, tossing the garbage into a can with a smooth, basketball like toss. "I said somethin' to do, not somethin' useful to do." "Well, you and I need to find that Boulevard of Broken Dreams cafe. Or is that in LA? Or is it even a real place?" Arturo snorts and runs his tongue over a canine to free bits of potsticker. He offers his paper boat out to Eric. Two left. "I ain't heard of it, but new places pop open all the time. Perhaps we should take a look at what's in the Green Day directory. Maybe that'll have it." Eric says, brightly, a teasing smile playing about his lips. "Nah, I'm good, thanks." "Just as well. That kind of cafe probably involves a lot of heavy drinking." Arturo shifts, like he's trying to make room in his stomach. Then he picks up another potsticker and bites into it. Gotta admire the dedication. "That's not the worst thing you can be doin'." Eric says, shrugging his shoulders. He glances over his shoulder once more, and he relaxes visibly as he turns towards the other man. "I gotta say, heavy drinkin' sounds not so bad a lot a' days." "Heavy drinking is expensive," says Arturo with his mouth full. He takes a moment to swallow - although with some effort. "And bad on the liver. I've also taken care of more than my fair share of alcohol poisoning patients. Sort of sours you on the whole idea." "Expensive is more'a my concern than my liver, I gotta admit," Eric says, with a little laugh in his voice. "Double expensive for me." He glances at Arturo with a curious look. "You some kind of doctor or something?" "Some kind of one, yeah," says Arturo. He looks at the last pot sticker, nearly reaches for it, then thinks the better of it. He tosses it into the next trash can they pass. Probably a good call. "Some kind'a one? What kinda answer is that?" Eric says, bemusedly, as he swerves around a little old lady with her cane, nimbly dancing into the street and then back onto the sidewalk. "A nurse? Med-tech? Vet? Guy who hangs out in dark alleys?" "Organs, organs for sale," says Arturo as he does a bad Russian accent and opens up one side of his coat. "Two kidneys for price of one!" He lifts a hand up to his mouth and stifles a burp. "I studied genetics. But then I moved into diagnostic medicine. Then I burned some bridges, and now I work as a floater between clinics." Eric's laughter is bright and hearty, eyes glinting with amusement as he raises a hand to clap Arturo on the back - a heavy, though not attacking, gesture. "Burning bridges is certainly somethin' I'm familiar with." He shakes his head, the amusement on his face fading at the edges. "Moonlightin' ain't the worst. You get to see the most unusual parts of the city, for better or worse. I always kind a' liked night shifts." "Mhmm. But the whole reason I studied diagnostic medicine is to get myself out of a lab. I like to build a relationship with my patients. There's no way to do it when I'm rarely back at the same clinic more than once or twice a month. And to be honest, I think a few of 'em have specifically requested to not put me in rotation." Arturo sucks air between sharp teeth. "They say I mnake the patients nervous." "I can certainly see why. A lot'a people say doctors are bloodsuckers, but I think it might be more'a risk with you than with some." Eric says, a teasing tone threading through his words. "Have ya given any thought ta going over to that mutant clinic in the Lower East Side?" Because there's one anywhere else. "I doubt they'd have any problems with your teeth." Arturo laughs a bit awkwardly. "Y'know, no one's ever called me a /vampire/ before. Would you believe that's actually original?" There's a glimmer in his eyes. "I put in my resume there once, but I never heard back. I'm not surprised. I sort of come with some baggage. I broke a couple of contracts. Got sued. Still paying it off with garnished wages." "Really? That's almost as surprisin' as the teeth themselves," Eric says, lips rising in a smile. "Well, I ain't much in the way of advice for ya. I've not had more'n two jobs in my life, and I lost my last one a couple weeks back. You've probably got more experience n' me. Certainly got better skills," Eric says, chuckling. There is a little pause as his eyes flick over the other man. "So where are we walkin'?" Arturo checks to make sure no one's paying them any attention. Then he pulls back his mop of dark curls to reveal tapered, canine-like ears. As he does that, he also draws attention to his hands and the dark, slightly curved nails. Almost as quickly as he reveals it, he covers it back up with a toss of his head and the quick movement of his fingers. "Dunno. I might walk all the way home. It might take an hour and a half, but I don't have another shift for a few days." Eric's eyes take the other man in with a broadening smile on his face as he looks him over. "Where's your place?" Eric asks, curiously. "I'm up in Hell's Kitchen. Ain't that far, and you can take the subway right up to the next door. If ya want to save yourself the walk." "I'm not far from there myself," says Arturo. He rests his hands in the pockets of his jacket as he strolls along. "I suppose...I'm not in much of a hurry to get home. Which sounds a bit pathetic." He smiles in spite of the darkness of that statement. "Oh, I ain't in much of a hurry neither. My apartment ain't exactly much'a place to be. It's a shithole, but it's a cheap shithole." Eric laughs at his own joke, shaking his head with bemusement. "'Sides, I've always found home much more'a a good thing to go to when ya have good company, you know?" Eric says, with that teasing tone in his voice once more. "I've actually seriously been considering finding a roommate. Then I could afford more...food. And maybe a new shirt now and again. But the trick is, finding someone who wouldn't disturb me when I have to work all night and sleep all day. And vice versa." Arturo rubs the side of his neck around a long scratch. It's healing, so it's starting to itch, but the doctor knows better than to scratch. "It's not that hard'ta find, if you know where ta look. There's plenty a' people who work nights in this city. Probably harder to find someone who'd be alright with the teeth than someone who'd be alright with nights, but..." Eric trails off, shrugging his shoulders. "So, we goin' to your place, or to mine?" The younger man's lips curl into a grin. "Hhhngh. You might have a point. And that's harder to advertise than 'works nights.'" Arturo idly scuffs the ground and glances sidelong at Eric. "Got anything to drink? Cause there's a long way between a few to make the world fuzz a little and alcohol poisoning." "That's 'bout all I have, though I've got the phone number for a good pizza place up on the fridge." Eric offers, smile spreading wider on his face as he lets his hand come up to rest on Arturo's shoulder, a light weight of suggestion. Arturo stops, half-turns, then looks at the hand on his shoulder. He looks suddenly a bit perplexed. His lips purse together and his brow furrows. "I...uh..." And that's about all he has to say. Eric gives the other man a look, stopping as well in the middle of the sidewalk. He tilts his head slightly to one side, taking a step back to let a pedestrian through between the two of them. "Too forward?" His smile is still in place - if anything, it widens a little bit. "If I've misread, I'm sorry." He spreads his hands apart in supplication. "The offer for beer and pizza still stands one way or'nother." "Was I...flirting? Damn. Apparently I can only do it when I don't mean to." Arturo grins a little and rubs at his nose. He shuffles back a step, but he's not bolting. "As a guy who has dog ears and claws, my radar's kind of busted." He's not quiiite blushing, but there's one just below the surface. "I don't know, but I certainly was," Eric says, grinning at the other man. "Don't ya worry - I'm sure ya would have cottoned on eventually eventually. It's a long walk, after all," The ex-cop winks and starts off walking once more, though slower, eyes on the other man to see if he follows. "As I said, either way, you're welcome." Maybe it's because he's revealed himself, or maybe it's because he's been caught off-guard, but Arturo's canine nature seems to surface. He hangs back a bit like an unsure dog, then starts to take a few steps after Eric, moving slowly until they're walking at the same pace again. "I admire your confidence," he says finally. "Oh, it's easy to be confident when you can't get hurt," Eric says, a shrug of his shoulders indicating the casualness. "Or at least, not in the ways that'll kill ya. It bleeds into your life, one way or 'nother." His musing tone is replaced a moment later by a much more playful one, adding, "Though bleeding isn't generally a problem I have, gotta admit." "Everyone gets hurt. It's part of being...." Arturo hesitates on the word, then changes, "...alive. You have to have the risk, otherwise what's the reward worth? I remember playing Super Mario 3 as a kid with that...gold thing you hooked in..." he mimes, "...that gave you infinite lives. You got the story, but not the thrill. And I mean, if that little cluster of pixels got hurt, you didn't. But your effort was expended and wasted, then you had to repeat and get better. And uh...and I'm babbling. I don't...normally babble." The red starts to creep into his cheeks. "You should. It's adorable," Eric says, raising his hand once more to press down on the other man's shoulder. "Maybe everyone does, but I don't. I mean, I do. But it ain't stick. Just in here," he says, tapping the side of his body. "It doesn't show on the outside, ya know?" He grins. "Besides, anyone who says you gotta get hurt ain't never been in a meth lab explosion. You ain't want to go through that one twice, believe you me." Red cheeks get redder at the comment. He clears his throat. "Are we talking emotional hurt here or...physical?" There's a glimmer in Arturo's eyes. Scientific curiosity. He's suddenly looking at Eric with a more considering, bolder eye. "Physical. I'm not a robot," Eric says, a chuckle. "I can get hurt, but it don't last very long. I heal... fast. Very fast. Scratches heal almost as fast as you can make 'em. I don't get sick." He pauses and grins. "Good thing I like the taste'a beer, since it takes a half a keg to get me buzzed." "That's...that's /amazing,/" says Arturo. "But what if you get stuck with shrapnel? Do you heal around it? What about head injuries? Projectiles? Dismemberment?" He really shouldn't be saying a word like 'dismemberment' with such enthusiasm. Oh, nerds. It's Eric's turn to look a little bit hesitant at the other man's excitement. "I don't suppose the reason you're hesitant to go home is you've gotta scrape the blood off'a the floor or somethin'," he says, a trace of wariness in his voice, despite the smile. "It hurts like hell is what happens. But, nah, it grows out eventually." He shudders. "I only had to grow a limb a couple'a times. Ain't somethin' I want to repeat." Arturo looks rather horrified at the suggestion. "Ah, no. No, nothing like that. I just...I'm sure it's highly unpleasant. I've just studied mutants and how to heal them for years. I wasn't happy with where my research might end up, which is why I broke my contracts." He digs his hands a bit further down into his pockets. "It takes quite a bit to hurt me. I don't heal faster, though." Eric nods and gives the other man a smile. "Well, I'd rather not get hurt that badly in the first place, ya know? Healin' hurts like a motherfucker, 'least when you got a lot to heal." Arturo unconsciously rubs the skin around the scratch on his neck. "Mhmmm. I bet in the last few seconds of healing, everything itches like a motherfucker." He smiles the widest he has so far, no longer worried about showing off his inhuman teeth. Eric shudders. "Try doing it when you're regrowing most of your skin from a burn. I sat in an oatmeal bath for hours, trying not to scratch. And it /itched/ so much, fuck. I tore myself open a couple of times when I just couldn't help myself." Arturo winces. "Yeah...that's...I think that's one of those abilities that sound better on paper." He looks at his shoes as they're walking, then looks up in time to deke around a gaggle of schoolkids. "Still. I would be lying if I said it didn't interest the scientist in me. But I also completely understand the aversion to being studied. Too many people would be interested in taking advantage of us." "And do." Eric says, grimly. He goes silent, for once, gaze fixing straight ahead as he chews on the inside of his lip, making it pucker and bend as he gnaws. "I don't know about you," Eric says, suddenly. "But I could use a beer right about now. You still up for beer and pizza?" He gives the other man an innocent look. "Or whatever?" "Yeah, sure," says Arturo. He doesn't specify which of those he's referring to. "There's no beer at my place, though. I can chip in for pizza, though I think the potstickers are going to tide me over for awhile." "My place it is." Eric says, eyes lighting up as he glances over the other man once more. "Oh, we got time. Neither of us has any place to be and fuck all to do, I think." He glances towards a subway stop across the street. "Come on. My MTA pass is still on the City, until they remember to cancel it." "You're a civil servant are you? Or uh, past tense?" Arturo says that like a man who realizes that's probably a sensitive topic. He follows Eric down into the subway. He reaches into his pocket to fish for change. "Past tense," Eric says, swiping his card at the turnstile next to the gate. Instead of going through it, though, he reaches out and pulls the gate open. "After you." Eric says, grinning. "You might have read about it in the news, actually. The candidate - now mayor - talkin' about a mutant police division? That's me." "Yeah, I heard about that. I didn't follow it that closely, but..." Arturo steps through and waits for Eric to come through. "So supporting a mutant division got you fired? Or...you got fired because you...revealed yourself?" He drops his voice even though they're in a crowded place. He leans in a bit. "My registration came through. NYPD policy says you ain't allowed to be a mutant and on the force. They suspended me when I propsed the division and told the Chief I was one - since they're gonna find out anyway." Eric shrugs his shoulders, stepping through the gate and closing it behind him. "Processed my termination couple weeks back. I'm officially just a civilian again." "That's bullshit," says Arturo, almost unthinkingly. And he does not give off the impression of a man who swears often. "So you lost your job for complying with the registration law. That's such backwards thinking. How can we trust the police if we're not allowed representatives of the community on the police force?" "Mutant police might be a threat to the communities' trust. We got the right to a jury of our peers, not a police force'a 'em." Eric grins and slaps Arturo on the shoulder, voice rising as a train's horn echoes through the stone walled subway platform. "Come on. We got more pleasant things waitin'." Eric says, as he tugs Arturo towards the opening doors of the subway car, towards beer, and towards pizza. Arturo seems slightly on-edge as they ride in the subway car. He's standing, clasping to one of those gray hanging loops. Something about the tight, confined space raises the heckles of the feral part of him. He's relatively quiet as they speed along to their destination, though he does cast the odd look towards Eric with a close-lipped smile. Eric falls quiet too, on the train. Very soon after he has taken up a position at one of the poles, he pulls out his cell phone and busies himself with it, perhaps obeying the most important rule on the subway: no eye contact. He glances up occasionally only to check what stop they are pulling up to. It's only as they pull up to Hell's Kitchen that Eric looks up and matches his glance with Arturo. "We're here." The police officer steps off of the subway quickly, pushing lightly through the crowd and glancing behind him to make sure that Arturo is following. "It's not too far to my place." Indeed, it's only a few blocks from the subway. His place, it seems, is a dingy building with the kind of grime that must pre-date the zombie apocalypse. "Come up, I'm on the fourth floor." The elevator, of course, is not working. "Watch your step," he adds, navigating around a pile of some kind of brown dropping as he holds the door to the stairs open to Arturo with a smile. If Arturo's put off by any of this, he doesn't show it. He navigates the dirty underbelly of New York like a man who's seen it all before. "This is in better shape than my building," he says, even as he steps over said brown goop. "There's nothing visibly dead in the hallways and most of the apartments have doors," he deadpans. "Most. Jus' don't necessarily want to know what's on the other side." Eric quips, as they head up the stairs. He passes a woman coming down, wearing a short skirt and thick, plastered on makeup. "Be safe out there, Nina," Eric says as he passes, and she snorts. "Be safe in there, Georgia-boy." She drawls, as she passes the two. The hallway of apartments is surprisingly in decent shape - threadbare carpet, a few burned out lights - but all the apartments have doors, and most of them even have apartment numbers hanging on them. Eric pulls out his keys and unlocks his apartment - two dead bolts and a door lock - and opens it for Arturo. "It ain't much, but it's home." Arturo rests his hands casually in his pockets as he waits for Eric to open the door. He steps through and waits for Eric to join him before venturing too far in. "Your neighbours are friendlier, too. Mine just warn me about the ants eating my brain while I sleep or threaten to cut me if I look at him for too long." Eric closes the door behind him - and does up the locks. "Make yourself at home," Eric gestures. There isn't too much to make at home, really. A table, a bedstand, a bed. A laptop lying on the edge of it. The refrigerator, which Eric opens and rummages through. "You up for pizza? I've got the beer already, assuming you want Sam Adams. Or everclear," he says with a laugh. "But I don't recommend drinking that unless you've been having a really miserable day and decide a hangover sounds like just the thing." "I might be up for pizza by the time it arrives. I've still got too many potstickers sitting on my stomach at the moment." Arturo pats his belly and has a look around. He shrugs out of his jacket and looks for a place to set it down. He's wearing a short sleeved shirt beneath. His arms are rather hairy, but not unusually so. What is more unusual are the directions the hair grows. It doesn't seem to follow the usual pattern. "I never plan on a hangover. But who does, really? Maybe frat boys. Beer's fine. I'm not too fussy." Eric pulls out two bottles of beer and takes a churchkey out of his pocket. He pops the caps off of both of them with practiced ease, approaching the other man and holding one out to him. "Here you go," he says, with a smile. His eyes, however, are not looking directly at the other man - instead, they're skimming over his arms curiously. "I've never had one." Eric looks into Arturo's face at last, giving him a half smile. "Even when I chug everclear by the bottle. I just don't get hangovers. Of course, I don't usually get drunk neither," he says, laughing. "So maybe I'd not make much'a frat boy after all." When Arturo takes the bottle, his nails clink against it. When he's not consciously trying to hide it, all his little feral features become more obvious. The long ebony nails, the hair on his arms, his ears as they peek out beneath his hair. The most unusual thing about the hair on his arms is that there's a little gathering of it around his elbows. "I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Cheers," he lifts up the beer and holds it out towards Eric. "A fair warning. I /can/ get drunk." He chuckles. Eric grins and shrugs his shoulders. "It means I ain't got anythin' to blame on the next mornin' 'cept myself," he teases lightly, a light smirk tugging at the edges of his smile. He reaches out with his bottle, clinking brown glass against brown glass with the other man in a salute. "One beer shouldn't get ya drunk," he says with a chuckle. "Least, I hope not. I ain't want ya to be blamin' that the next mornin' neither." A wink, then a playful grin. It's all the "ain't"s that prompts Arturo's question. "What brings you to New York anyway? I can't say that I've met too many Southerners out this way." He takes a swallow of the beer, then looks around for a place to sit. Eric takes a seat along the edge of the bed, shaking his head once and laughing darkly. "Actually, it's funny, almost. I got fired from my last job as a cop down back home in Georgia. For bein' a mutant. But, my Chief felt bad 'bout it, and got me hooked up with a reference to take a job up here. Didn't thnik it'd last me's long as it did, anyway, but." His smile fades slightly and he takes a sip of his beer. "Still. Maybe now with the election goin' the way it did, I might be on the force soon enough." "The wind has to change," says Arturo as he takes a seat beside Eric. He holds his beer with both hands and rests his elbows on his knees. "What are you going to do in the meantime? I'm sure you could get a job in private security. There's got to be people who would see you being a mutant as a good thing." "Maybe. I'm not sure," Eric shrugs his shoulders once, glancing off to one side. "Yeah, it's gonna change. Here's hopin' it's for the better." Eric takes a long sip of his beer - a chug, really - and then chuckles. "Well, to be honest, I'm tryin' not to think about it. I just keep hopin' that my unemployment won't run out before they come back on bended knee to give me my job back." He laughs, and despite a trace of bitterness in the sound, it is a laugh. "Maybe. There's a club openin' that I might be able to take a job at." "Take it from me, if you haven't experienced it already?" Arturo lifts his beer in a sort of a weak salute, "...unemployment sucks. It's good to feel useful, even if it's not to your full potential. That's why I'm working in clinics bandaging scraped knees and questionable stab wounds instead of doing research." "Yeah, that's true." Eric drums his fingers on his leg with his free hand, lying down on the bed and staring up at the ceiling for a moment. "I should stop complainin' and just move on, but." He shrugs his shoulders and lets out a sigh. "You do the same thing for long enough, I think ya forget how to do the rest." He laughs. "It's all I wanted ta be. The day I put on a badge, I knew I ain't want to take it off. I guess it was naive, to think I could simply coast through my life and not have any problems with it." "Idealistic is a kinder word," says Arturo with a soft little laugh. He sets the beer aside and hesitates before leaning back. "This is a strange situation," he says after lying still for a moment. "I mean, you could've been an axe murderer. And I just followed you like..." he hesitates and then lets out a whuff of laughter. "...like a dog." Eric turns his head and looks a little bit surprised as the other man lies down on the bed next to him. "That's true," he says, eyes twinkling playfully as they look into the older man's. "This apartment certainly looks the part." he adds, glancing around at the peeling wallpaper. "But I've always been more'a dog person than a cat person, so maybe it shows." He grins and reaches a hand out to - lightly - scratch behind one of Arturo's ear for a moment. Eric grins at the other man, the playful movement slowing to something more akin to a caress. Arturo's reaction to being touched by his ear is immediate tension. It's a reflex that he does his best to ease off on. After a moment, he manages to relax. He even half-lids his eyes. "How did you know I wouldn't punch you for the...mere suggestion?" Laughing, Eric grins at him. "Instinct." There's a brief pause, and his smile widens. "Also, I get punched a good amount. Ain't fun, but also not the end'a the world. 'Sides, nothin' wagered, nothin' gained, as the sayin' goes." Eric rolls slightly onto one side, his closer hand propping his head up as he looks at the other man. "Why didn't ya punch me?" Arturo laces his fingers together and rests both hands against his chest. He tilts his chin back and works his jaw to the side. "Because not too many people are interested in associating with me once they notice my...oddities." Eric eyes the other man and then laughs again, brightly. "So, desperation wins out?" Despite the words, Eric's tone is still teasing, and a smile still plays on his lips. "Are you even interested in men, or do your tastes run more towards women?" A brief pause, and his eyes twinkle as he adds, "I know there's a thing about dogs and bones, but...." That comment makes Arturo chuckle. It's a deep, warm sound that rocks the bed slightly. "I suppose the actual, technical label for it is...bi-curious? But to be perfectly honest, when you're like me, you don't exactly get many opportunities to express any sort of preference." "Wasn't it cats that the curiosity got in trouble?" Eric seems determined to continue along this path of teasing, even way after the horse has died and been buried. "Well, you certainly got one now," he says, and his voice drops slightly with a darkened color of promise. "I don't see any problem with ya bein' like ya." His eyes flick over the older man's body, and there is a spark of hunger in his eyes to add to his statement. "Maybe. But the only reason dogs don't get in more trouble is that they're rarely left to their own devices. Noses in everything." Arturo taps his own nose. He rolls over onto his side and looks Eric in the eye. "Did I even tell you my name?" His cheeks colour a little bit at the look. "Yeah. Arturo." Eric says, eyes flicking to the other man's nose, and then down his own body with a suggestive grin. "See, we've been introduced all proper and everythin'." His teeth flash in a bright smile, and the hand on the other man's ear splays out, thumb skimming gently along the side of Arturo's face. "As I said before, you're more'n welcome to the pizza, the beer, and a place ta crash, if that's all you're lookin' for. Ain't want to drag you into nothin' you ain't want." "I'm glad I remembered to give my name. I've been known to be rendered speechless." Arturo's tone is deadpan, but with a curl of amusement. He closes his eyes and tilts his head back. His adam's apple bobs as he swallows a sudden lump. "I'd be sitting on the floor if I just wanted pizza," he says. Eric's smile widens and he looks up and down the other man, thumb still skimming along Arturo's cheek. "Well, I ain't gonna lie; I was hopin' that'd be your answer," Eric murmurs, and there is a quiet rustle and dip in the bed as he moves towards Arturo, nose pressing against the older man's exposed neck and lips pressing a light kiss to the side of it. "I want pizza - and the beer, yeah, but I want ya first." Goosebumps prickle Arturo's skin, from the small of his back to the top of his scalp and the tips of his fingers. He flexes his hand against the bed and sucks in a deep breath. "I uh...I've only done this once before. And that was a very long time ago." "Ain't nothin' to be worried about there, Arturo," Eric says, gently. "You got plenty'a time ta practice. And I ain't so easy to hurt - and I ain't too bad on the eyes - so I ain't a bad guy to practice with." He brushes another kiss to the edge of Arturo's jawline, a warm chuckle in the back of his throat. "I gotta admit, I'm kinda lookin' forward to it." "No pressure," Arturo murmurs. "You're really not put off by the..." He pokes one of his ears and tucks his hair around it so one's visible. "I have this ability that lets me camoflauge myself. It makes me look normal. Makes me feel normal, too. It's actually the only way I've ever been with anybody." Eric answers with a light nibble at the top of Arturo's pointed ear, a warm and slightly wet nibble between his lips. "Nah," he breathes out, nosing at the edge of the older man's ear and then trailing a line of kisses back to his previous position. "I ain't never really thought much 'bout looks on anyone but myself. People are all interestin' in their own way, and that's what draws me in." He chuckles, softly. "'Sides, you look just right'ta me." Arturo takes a hand and sets it along Eric's cheek. He flexes his fingers, nails digging in a little, but not to the point of discomfort. "You're very kind," he says genuinely. He makes eye contact and ponders something for a moment with a small frown. "I'd just like to know something. Is this one of those things where we go our separate ways after? Because to be perfectly, bluntly, and slightly pathetically honest, I could use a friend more than I could use a fuck." Eric looks a little bit surprised, and his eyes flick briefly away from Arturo to look across the room, before returning back to the doctor's face. "Ain't sleep with anyone who /ain't/ my friend," he says, a little bit puzzled. "Some people want'ta see me again, some don't. Some I see regularly, some only the once, but that's as much'a 'bout what they like, and what they do with me that ain't just a fuck. But they're all friends." "You're better at making friends than I am," says Arturo. A small smile accompanies that. He's not even trying to hide his irregularly shaped teeth and pointed canines. He lifts a hand and runs it up and down Eric's arm. "I'm overthinking things. I do that." "Maybe," Eric says, grinning and kissing a line up Arturo's jaw. "Makin' friends sure is fun." With that, he covers Arturo's lips with his own, soft and smooth. He starts the kiss gently, hand rising to caress the edge of Arturo's ear, as his other trails loosely along his shirt. "I bet you were one of those guys in high school who was friends with all the different cliques. The jocks, the nerds, the goths or whatever the subcultures were at your school." He leans up and returns the kiss with more confidence than his body lanugage and words would suggest. Eric chuckles, a low sound in the back of his throat. He doesn't respond with words as he opens lis lips, tongue darting along the other man's bottom lip for a moment, before murmuring into the kiss. "Yeah, a bit. Though I always was a bit of a jock, too. Football and all that." Eric says, grinning as he rolls slightly over on top of the other man, hand dragging firmer over his chest. There's not a whole lot of talking after that point. Arturo is gentle and attentive, but his inexperience with men does show. In fact, he attempts to linger on the foreplay, perhaps out of anxiety about the main event. But if Eric takes the lead, he relaxes. His mutation is far more obvious once he sheds his shirt. The pattern of hair on his body is very unusual, as it the texture, which is much closer to fur. He is densely muscular in a way that his clothing hides. For an egghead, he has an awful lot of solid muscle. Eric is very attentive, no question, and he does not lack for experience. On the contrary, experience is something he has in spades. He is muscled as well, though this is as much thanks to his exorbitant time at the gym or otherwise exercising, rather than some mutation giving him extra muscle. At least, not any different of a mutation than the human side of the population who builds it easily. Eric guides Arturo when he gets uncomfortable, this not being his first time with someone with little - or no - experience, and has no hesitation about taking the lead, or falling back and encouraging. Afterwards, too, he is tender, holding Arturo in his arms as he nuzzles into his neck, sleepily. "Mmm." he hums, softly. "I don't know about you, but I think I'm up for a nap. And then maybe some pizza." "Hrrngh," murmurs Arturo. It's a sound that's not quite within the human range of vocalizations. He made a few of those over the last little while. Eric's neighbours might have a few questions if they're particularly nosy. "Pizza /and/ a nap? I feel so spoiled." He stretches his toes out towards the end of the bed, then presses a kiss along Eric's jaw.