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Dramatis Personae Fury, Lucien
In Absentia	2021-07-20 "{-- what is it you need?}"
Location <DC> AKA White House - Downtown and <DC> AKA White House - Lucien's Suite
Not to be confused with the other White House a few blocks away, this is a chic extended-stay hotel popular with those whose business keeps them in the nation's capital -- and keeps them in luxury. The entryway and lobby are not large, though elegant and comfortable with copious plush seating arranged to encourage dawdling and conversation.The lounge beyond is quite expansive, the decoration slick and modern with a gleaming horseshoe-shaped bar as a centerpiece. The suites above range from one-room affairs to sweeping penthouses, all tastefully appointed with plush furniture, state-of-the-art appliances, thoughtfully stocked kitchens and bathrooms, and private balconies. A capacious gym, theater, business center and rooftop terrace are also available, along with dining and other residential services for those without the time, ability, or inclination to manage their temporary homes. It may not be late by night life standards, but Downtown is hardly the destination of choice for partying in this city on any night, much less a Tuesday. It is late enough, though, for the killing heat of the day to mellow out to a pleasant mid 70s. Foot and vehicle traffic are both light -- mostly young professionals scurrying to or from their Ubers. The only people lingering on this block are the two cops in an MPD squad car idling in an illegal spot and the man leaning casually against the non-presidential White House across the street. Given the man is Nick Fury, maybe the lean isn't quite as casual as it looks. He's holding a cigarette, cool minty smoke curling up from its tip to disperse in the still dark air, though to the very observant he isn't actually smoking all that much. He's dressed a sight more formal than is his usual habit, but the color scheme at least is as expected -- black broadcloth shirt and black satin vest, a black satin tie to match, black slacks and black oxfords, a black jacket draped casually over one arm. He's not looking at the cops, but not making a point of not looking at them, either. Just a grizzled old man at his ease, taking a leisurely smoke break to enjoy the balmy night. Among the trickle of Ubers and Lyfts it is getting rarer for an actual taxicab to pull up but one is stopping now, just outside the White House. The young man it dispenses is dressed nicely as well, an understated black tuxedo in classic lines that somewhat downplay his newly bulky physique with blue grosgrain lapels, vest, and necktie to bring out the striking pale blue of his eyes, black patent leather shoes polished to a subtle gleam. The boutonniere on his left lapel is a single edelweiss, small and white and unpretentious, not likely to draw remark from any but the keenest theatre-minded observers. Lucien exchanges a few words with the cab driver as he's slipping out, hands the man a number of bills, adjusts the abundant number of flowers that are tucked into the crook of one arm before shutting the cab door; it's only then that the energy that has carried him through the night seems to evaporate, his carriage wilting and his polished expression its luster. There's a considerable extra drag to his steps as he turns away from the curb, starting toward the hotel door -- when his eyes land on Fury he hitches to a stop, his brows sweeping upward. For a fraction of a second he's straightening, shoulders back, weary expression displaced by a pleasant neutrality -- but then he scrubs a hand over his face, wiping this away to just bemusement. "Well." His eyes flick down and back up over Fury. "I'm having a drink. Would you care for one?" Fury's eye follows the cab as it pulls up, then darts to the cops and away again. He's patient, though, and does not call attention to himself until Lucien has recognized him and had time to put his leading man hat back on and then take it off again. "I sure would." He pushes off of the wall and disposes of his cigarette in the hotel's thoughtfully provided receptacle. "Am I allowed to say good things about the show now? I read up on opening night superstitions and Ionno how y'all keep it straight." Lucien huffs out a soft laugh, his head shaking once as they head inside. "If we will be sunk by accolades tonight we are already doomed." He pauses for a moment to greet the youth at the front desk -- bright once more -- and though he's considerably more subdued when they head to the elevators he is no less warm. "Please. Do. Lavish me with praise. My brother forbade me years ago from reading my reviews, he said nothing of soliciting them." Fury is just a quiet presence at Lucien's side until the elevator doors close. "Well." His tone is very serious. "I done told you I don't like musical theatre, but you just had to go and prove me wrong. I admire that kind of gumption and I ain't ashamed to say I loved the show, even if I never hear the end of it from Barton." Something about his lopsided smile suggests he'd been holding it in all this time. "The whole cast was amazing, but you especially. Somehow you made alla Steve's golly-gee awkwardness and damn fool stubbornness and mountains of trauma look endearing. If I had a hat and was wearing it indoors for some reason, I'd be taking it off to you." It's only after they've entered the suite that he adds, not too casually, "Didn't see your brother there." Lucien has sunk back against one wall of the elevator for the duration of the ride, eyes half-lidded and a ghost of a smile playing on his lips as Fury speaks. "Well. Forget Jesse Green, then, that is all the feedback I need to hear." He has a brighter smile when they return to the suite, reserved for the eager pup who greets them at the door -- and though it does not quite fade at Fury's comment, his head bows, eyes lowering as he sets his armload of flowers aside, trading them for a plain leather lead hung by the door. "Ah," he replies, softly as he turns back, calling Flèche with him, "please, do make yourself comfortable. It's been some hours since her walker came by -- I ought to let her out before I settle in." Fury nods his assent, though he hasn't quite worked his way to sitting down by the time man and dog are out the door. It's honestly hard to tell whether he has, in fact, made himself comfortable by the time Lucien returns, but he has at least settled onto the couch. If he'd busied himself with a mobile device in the meantime, he's tucked it away already. "I thought about bringing you some scotch by way congratulations." This comment is quite casual. "But I wasn't sure I'd see you after or if it'd be bad luck to anticipate how well this went. I trust you're well-stocked, though." <DC> AKA White House - Lucien's Suite This one-room residence suite has more in common with a small luxury apartment than any hotel room. Bright and airy, it is tastefully appointed with a wealth of mirrors, and furnished in understated earth tones. Just inside the entryway, the dining area sports a round table in smokey glass, three chairs, and one long bench against the wall. The kitchen is small but efficiently designed with steel appliances and a full set of cookware, utensils, elegant if utilitarian tableware, and various other thoughtful homey conveniences. A long, gleaming limestone counter separates the kitchen from the living room with its perhaps surprising variety of seating options, from tall stools at the counter to classic armchairs to the soft, comfortable couch facing a widescreen TV across a smoky glass coffee table. A set of french doors in the living room open onto a balcony with a breathtaking view of the cityscape. Opposite that, a short hallway accesses the half bath, linen closet, laundry machines, and the frosted glass sliding doors to the bedroom. This last, while admitted cozy, does not skimp on luxury. A king size bed takes up a good deal of the floor space, a long closet much of one wall, with an integrated chest of drawers, and the adjoining full bath is perhaps startlingly spacious with a generous soaking tub, rainwater shower, and a counter with two sinks. "If we have the good fortune to move to New York, perhaps you can congratulate me then. We shall have to keep this up for -- at least a handful more shows, though. I am trying not to think yet about doing this all again tomorrow." Lucien slips out of his shoes and jacket, folding the latter neatly to drape over the back of a chair before bringing out a bottle of scotch (there is, indeed, a choice selection of good liquor in his cabinet) and pair of squat glasses. "How do you take yours?" He does sink down into a seat once he has poured the drinks, claiming one corner of the couch with a relieved settling of his frame into its soft contours. "It's a deal." Fury reaches down to scratch behind Flèche's nearer, floppier ear. "Until then I'mma keep my mouth shut about how I think y'all will do. I know jack and shit about show business and Jack ain't spoke to me in years." His lackadaisical speech belies his keen appraising glance. "Neat, unless you got good cause to recommend otherwise." He waits until Lucien is comfortably seated before picking up his own glass. "Thank you. What do you say we toast to not worrying about tomorrow just yet?" "I will certainly drink to that." Lucien leans forward to touch his glass to Fury's; he doesn't quite bother to drop all the way back to his corner of the sofa, draped now with arm propped against its back and cheek resting against the loose curl of his fingers. "-- no. I confess. Already my mind has strayed there. I quite envy people who live in the moment but I myself only comfortably reside there with a script and, preferably, director's notes. Only -- Did you have business in Washington again or were you simply enjoying DC for once? Will you have to be back to New York tonight?" Fury takes one sip of his scotch before setting it down to breathe, shifting in his seat to face his host more comfortably. "Living in the moment ain't all it's cracked up to be, but it can be nice when the planets align." He looks out at the gleaming cityscape through the glass doors. "First time I been down here for anything but business since -- a while." The momentary distance in his gaze and voice alike are gone when he turns back to Lucien. "I'm Barton's ride and he'll be carousing with his band of theatre nerds all night, turning every bar they can find and probably a few apartments into makeshift Marie's Crises. So. Here I am." He picks his glass back up, gestures toward Lucien with it rather than actually taking a drink. "I'm probably s'posed to say I'm also worrying about tomorrow or the day after or the next global catastrophe, but truth is I ain't." His eye contact is brief but unblinkingly intense before he very deliberately breaks it. "I'm worrying about you." "My gods, U street won't know what hit it." Amusement blossoms in Lucien's voice at this image. He starts to lift his glass, but his hand freezes halfway to his mouth. It takes a noticeable second before he completes the motion, taking a small sip sand rolling it in his mouth before swallowing. "Me? Were we at the same show? I couldn't have prayed for things to go better -- and believe me, I did. This --" He inclines his glass towards Fury, "was just an unexpectedly pleasant nightcap to the evening." "We were at the same show," Fury agrees equably, "and we both know who wasn't. If you was just deflecting, I'd take the hint and let it be." His brows furrow, tugging at the snarl of scars where they disappear beneath his black eye patch. "But I see you hurting, and you ain't the kind of man who shows pain -- no matter how tired you are -- unless you want someone to see it, or you just about to crack." He looks away again, takes a slow sip of his scotch. "Takes one to know one." His voice is quieter when he turns back to Lucien, one eyebrow arching almost imperceptibly. "You gon' look me in the eye and tell me I'm wrong?" Lucien is quiet, after this. His hand rotates slowly, liquor sloshing gently from one side to the other in his glass; his eyes fix on the shifting liquid. "The last time," he begins, soft and not entirely steady, but then corrects himself, "-- the only other time Matthieu has missed an opening of mine, he was in a cage. I --" He blinks, and takes a longer swallow of his Scotch, his voice leveled out when he continues. "It is my fault, regardless. I have been rather distant with him this summer, I ought not expect -- well. I don't really know what I expected." Fury waits, and leans just a fraction closer when Lucien starts to reply. His absence of visible reaction to the words "in a cage" might suggest he has deliberately suppressed a visible reaction. "Guessin' whatever you did or didn't expect, you hoped he would show." His brows furrow again. "Now, I don't know the circumstances, but that ain't unreasonable even if you were the one pushed him away, and I can't see as you'd do that without good cause." These words come out just a little faster than before, but he regains his equanimity in short order. "Family's complicated -- good, bad, or ugly, it's always complicated." He shrugs a fatalistic shrug. "If you want to vent, I'm all ears. If you want advice, I'm...well, I've lived through a lot and I don't mince words. That may not be wisdom, but it ain't nothing, neither." He takes a long sip of his whisky and studies Lucien -- but just for a moment. "And if you just want an unexpectedly pleasant nightcap, that might come easier if you don't got to spend a lot of effort pretending you ain't upset." "Yes." Lucien lowers his glass to his knee. "Family --" His eyes flick up to Fury at the changed cadence of his words, though only briefly before dropping back to his drink. "Complicated, yes. Sometimes I think it would be simpler if the difficulty meant you loved them less. I --" His finger traces a slow circle around its rim, his brows dipping inward. His words are choppier when he speaks again. "-- don't. Know that I had. Good reason. For my anger. He has spent -- so much of life -- ill, or just -- it seems unfair to blame him for needing. More --" He breaks off, a faint flush of pink creeping into his cheeks. He lifts his eyes again slowly; they're a touch brighter, a touch wider when they light on Fury again. "-- oh," seems almost wholly unconnected to what he'd been saying before; just soft now, and wondering. "Ain't nothing wrong with needin' more." Fury sets his glass down with perhaps excessive care. "But that goes for you, too." His breathing remains even, the faint crinkle in his brows still bespeaking friendly concern, but there's a subtle tension now in his shoulders. "You're allowed to want more from him than opening night. At least you still --" He breaks off, too, letting the breath behind his unspoken words out in a slow stream. "Maybe you don't gotta worry about that just yet, neither. You go right on ahead and let yourself be angry, or hurt or..." He hesitates and switches to French, the casual Québécois phrasing oddly rendered in a crisp Parisian accent, "{or just be here, now.}" He reaches out and rests his hand on Lucien's shoulder. Perhaps he'd meant to give a reassuring squeeze, but the curl of his fingers is just firm enough to coax the other man gently toward him. At you're allowed to want more Luci's breath just comes out quick and sharp, his fingers tightening around his glass. He sets the whisky aside (with far less care than Fury had), some of the tension in his own shoulder noticeably bleeding away as he leans into the touch. "{-- what is it you need?}" There is not, admittedly, immediately much time to answer this question, because in the next moment his mouth is pressing soft to Fury's. The wash of his powers here would, standing alone in other contexts, not quite be a subtle thing -- several pains eased, flutters of guilt and worry echoed back just a bit louder than they had been, desire pulled headily higher, a warmth flooding in to fill a kind of greedy yearning below -- but then, this is not other contexts. Fury stills for a instant when their lips meet, but he does not pull away. He does not freeze for long, his surprise rapidly eclipsed by relief not solely at the pain -- emotional and otherwise -- so abruptly allayed, but at the touch he so desperately needed. That relief itself is shortly lost beneath the crush of desire, and the arm he winds around Lucien might suggest an answer to the question he cannot yet spare the words to address. For all the frenetic intensity inside him, he's regained some of his wonted self-assurance for his prowess in what he's doing outside, at least. His confidence is not misplaced. He breaks the kiss for the space of a breath before drawing them back together, just long enough to murmur "more."