terriblymisguided | (no subject)

"Yes, this time of year is just littered with holidays," Klaus says with an amused laugh that turns into a pleased smile at Obi's eager acceptance of his invitation, without even knowing what it is. It makes Klaus feel a little flushed, but this time it isn't from worry or fear.

He's just happy.

"It's exactly what it sounds like. Celebrating the start of a new calendar year," Klaus explains, taking another sip from his glass. "Mostly it's an excuse for a party. You dress up and drink and the tradition is that there's a countdown at midnight."

Klaus empties his glass and sets it on an empty table so that he can turn and put his hands on Obi-Wan's hips. "And then at midnight you're supposed to cheer and make a lot of noise, sometimes there's fireworks, but most importantly, you kiss who you're with at midnight, and it brings you good luck."

He's never bought into that before. Oh, he's kissed people at midnight, but he never thought it would bring him luck. But if it's Obi-Wan that he's kissing, Obi-Wan who chooses to be with him, then, well. He's already pretty lucky, isn't he?

"On Coruscant the transition to a new year on the Galactic calendar is celebrated be a Fete Week," Obi-Wan tells Klaus. "Jedi never participated in the celebrations, as they were usually quite uninhibited, but we were often present as peace keepers, making sure no one was hurt during the festivities."

It's interesting, he thinks, how the world Darrow is in and the galaxy he's from have some similarities. But in the end, no matter how similar they may be in some ways, Obi-Wan has never participated in any of the holidays. It simply wasn't something the Jedi ever did and now he finds he doesn't really know where to begin.

Perhaps the party is the best place.

He takes another sip from his glass as Klaus turns toward him, then grins against the rim of it. "Does it work?" he asks, once he's swallowed the wine. "Have you had very lucky years when you've kissed someone at midnight?"

"Well, this year one Jedi will," Klaus assures him, sliding his hands around to the small of Obi's back and giving him a warm smile. He can imagine Obi-Wan standing along the edges of a wild crowd in his robes, straight-backed and confident. Unattainably handsome.

But he also knows what Obi-Wan looks like when he laughs, when he's loose from liquor and arousal. Klaus knows that being a Jedi is something of infinite importance to Obi-Wan, and he respects that. But he also knows that Obi-Wan deserves to let loose and have some fun. He can do both of these things.

"Mm, I don't know about that," Klaus says with a laugh, kissing the tip of Obi-Wan's nose, and then the corner of his mouth. "Maybe I just haven't kissed the right person at midnight yet."

"Someone who is naturally lucky themselves?" he asks with an innocent expression. That isn't what Klaus means, not remotely, but Obi-Wan can't help himself. It's in his nature to tease, usually in a manner he knows it at least mostly kind, unless it's Anakin, at which point he thinks he can hardly be blamed for going a little bit further.

"Can luck be passed on like that?" he continues. "Through a kiss? I would think such a thing wasn't possible. We'll have to find you someone especially lucky this year and experiment a little with it."

Obi-Wan is teasing him, and Klaus rolls his eyes fondly, because he loves it. Life is too short to be serious all the time, and while he knows that Obi-Wan is more than capable of sincerity when the need arises, he likes that he knows how to be silly when the need arises for that, too.

"Mm, I dunno. Maybe I'll have to kiss a lot of people," he says easily, stroking his fingers along Obi's jaw, just under the line of his beard. "How do we tell if they're lucky?"

There, peeking just above the collar of Obi's dark shirt, is a fading bruise from Klaus's mouth. There always seems to be one there, in various states of healing, and Klaus slides his fingers down to it, pressing lightly against the bruise as he walks Obi-Wan back towards the dance floor. "You do know how much I like to experiment."

"Hmm," he says thoughtfully, as if they might be able to tell the level of someone's luck just by looking at them. A little shiver works through him when Klaus presses on his throat and he wonders if there's another bruise there, left behind from Klaus's mouth. It makes him smile and he finishes his drink, then reaches up to cover Klaus's fingers with his own.

"You know, I'm not sure there is a way to tell," he decides, realizing they're on the dance floor now. "But I suppose I must be lucky if you're wanting to dance with me."

He has a feeling dancing, as it were, must be the same even across galaxies. There's only so much that can be done. He's been taught how to dance, he assumes Klaus has, too, even if their worlds are a little different.

"If that's the case, I suppose that I'll just have to kiss you, then," Klaus says happily, putting one hand on Obi's hip and lifting his other hand into the air next to them. "Another thing our father made us learn was ballroom dancing, in case it was ever useful on mission."

He leads Obi-Wan into a slow, simple waltz that's vaguely in time with the music, more preoccupied with staring at him than keeping with the beat. Dancing seems like something the Jedi would have learned, perhaps for similar reasons, and he doesn't even think that Obi-Wan would mind being led by a man in a very nice skirt.

"This is more fun that standing off to the side, isn't it?" Klaus asks, giving Obi's hip a squeeze and then lifting their joined hands to turn him in a playful twirl, laughing as he pulls him back in close. "You're no wallflower, Obi-Wan Kenobi. Even if you are a Jedi."

The sort of gender roles Obi-Wan has often seen at play in Darrow don't exist in most parts of the galaxy where he's from, especially not on Coruscant, where the population is made up of men, women, and every walk of life imaginable and beyond. For him to be led by Klaus in the dance doesn't even register as something someone might mind and he follows the dance with ease, the two of them moving gracefully together to the music playing.

"A wallflower," he muses, then smiles. "No, I don't suppose I am. Most of the people I knew before coming to Darrow wouldn't have expected it of me, but I was a very rebellious young Padawan. To the point where I almost wasn't chosen by a Jedi Master to complete my training. Most Masters thought I would be impossible to properly train, they thought I asked too many questions and challenged too many of the old rules."

He still would have been a Jedi, but never a Knight. Never a Master. And certainly never a General in the Grand Army of the Republic.

As Obi-Wan describes a younger, more rebellious version of himself, Klaus can easily imagine it. The thought makes him smile, and he watches Obi-Wan's face as they dance together. Klaus was also rebellious, also challenged too many of the rules, but Obi-Wan did would Klaus never could. He made it work.

"At the academy, I always felt like a square peg that my father was determined to make fit in a very square hole," Klaus muses, smiling a little ruefully at the idea. He never felt like he was meant to be there, like he was fulfilling some grand purpose.

"But you chose to be a Jedi, right?" Klaus asks, suddenly distressed that Obi-Wan's choices were taken from him, just like Klaus's were. "You wanted to be?"

"I didn't choose to be Force sensitive," Obi-Wan says as they dance, their movements becoming a little slower, a little more muted as their conversation turns in a more serious direction. "We're born with this sensitivity, this... ability to access the Force. Most Force sensitives were tracked down by the order when we were only babies and our parents were given the choice to let us go with the Jedi to the temple on Coruscant or to keep us at home."

Obi-Wan knows it wasn't much of a choice. There are few people who would go against the Jedi, even if the Jedi were to say it was always a choice.

"I grew up in the temple on Coruscant from the time I was only two standard years old. As I grew up, I could have left. I actually did for a short time, unable to turn my back on a planet in the midst of a civil war. The Jedi won't take sides in planetary disputes, but I couldn't in good conscience leave them to their fate." He smiles slightly. "So I left. In the end I went back. It was where I was meant to be."

A bewildered laugh escapes him as the song ends, and Klaus holds up a hand in apology before pulling him back towards the edge of the dancefloor, over to the wall. He swallows hard and shakes his head, giving Obi-Wan a rueful smile as he reaches out to touch his bicep.

"Sorry, it's just-- it's surprising how much we have in common," he admits, looking down at his hand as it travels along Obi-Wan's arm. "We didn't choose our powers, either. Reginald tracked us down as babies and, well, everyone has a price, I guess. My parents sold me off. I never even knew who they were."

It's too heavy of a topic for such a wonderful night, but he likes that he can tell Obi-Wan these things. He's the only one that Klaus has ever been able to talk so freely about his fucked up past with, other than his siblings. And even then, they didn't discuss it much.

"I don't think that I was meant to be a superhero," Klaus admits, rolling his lips into his mouth and shrugging helplessly. "And things at the Academy were just too-- too everything, so I left as soon as I didn't think that Reginald could legally drag me back."

He reaches up to put his hand on Obi-Wan's shoulder, thumbing at the line of his jaw. "It must be hard for you to be away from where you belong. I'm not sure that I've ever had a place like that."

"It is and it isn't," Obi-Wan answers. "I hadn't spent much time at the temple in a long time anyway, so home wasn't so much a place as it was the people."

And even across the entire galaxy, he had still felt connected to the other Jedi. To Anakin and Ahsoka. They had been part of one another in a way that's difficult to comprehend unless someone has experienced it for themselves. He misses the others, but that's more than simply not being in the same galaxy. They're gone.

"You should have been given a choice," he says. "And I'm sorry you weren't. The man who raised you... well. I'm not always prone to anger, but I hope he never deigns to arrive here. Let's say it won't go well for him."

"He wouldn't stand a chance," Klaus replies with a soft smile. The words stir something in him, because it's nice to know that there's someone who would fight for him. He knows that Obi-Wan isn't a person prone to violence, so it means that he really cares, if he would say such a thing.

Also, on a pettier note, it's something that Klaus would kind of love to see.

"My handsome knight," he says fondly, eyes sparkling with emotion as he leans in to give him a soft kiss on the mouth. The kiss lingers, and Klaus grins as he pulls back to press their foreheads together as his hand slides down Obi's arm to thread their fingers together. "I think we should go try our luck on another round of drinks, huh?"

It's not the Jedi way, raising his lightsaber out of anger or a desire for vengeance, but it would hardly be the first time Obi-Wan had done so. He and Maul have clashed blades more than once with anger and pain and loss simmering in Obi-Wan's heart.

He knows he is far from the perfect Jedi many saw him to be.

Returning the kiss, Obi-Wan smiles when Klaus takes his hand and he nods. "Why not?" he asks. "Now that we know the trick of it, it all does seem to be a bit more fun than it had at first."

"And either way, we'll have fun," Klaus says, turning to give Obi-Wan a wink as he lifts their joined hands to press a kiss to Obi-Wan's knuckles. "And end up back in one of those rooms. Maybe even make it to the bed next time."

They dance their way across the crowd, with Klaus lifting their hands to twirl underneath them until they're on the other side of the dance floor. There's an open spot at the bar and Klaus sidles up to it, keeping Obi's hand in his as he pats the other on the bar.

"Two more of those funny drinks, please," he says happily, and the bartender gives him an odd look.

"I don't know what you're talking about," the guy says, and Klaus turns to quirk a brow at Obi-Wan. "Roll of the dice, I guess." He turns back to the bartender and ponders for a moment, trying to think of something blue. "Two sapphire martinis, then."

"That does seem to be more Magnus's style," Obi-Wan agrees as he turns slightly, leaning sideways against the bar. "It has to be unpredictable, doesn't it, or it may get boring. And if it's too easy for people to control, that eliminates the element of trickery from the entire experience."

And while Obi-Wan sincerely believes Magnus means for the experience to be nothing more than a bit of fun, he also believes he doesn't mean for it to be easy. To be a simple trick would take away what is entertaining about it.

"So what happens if only one of these drinks works?" he asks with a smile. "Does the other one of us keep drinking until we find something of the opposite effect?"

"Wouldn't be the worst thing," Klaus says with a laugh, smiling as the bartender sets down two blue martinis. He takes one and slides the other towards Obi-Wan before looking down at his drink curiously. "Or we find someone else in need of assistance and cuddle them."

He winks, because while that doesn't seem like the worst thing either, he'd prefer that it just be the two of them. This is their first real date, after all, and while Klaus certainly wouldn't be adverse to having a little fun with someone else some other time, he finds that it isn't something he wants tonight.

"Well, here goes nothing," Klaus says, lifting his glass before taking a long sip. He waits for a moment, smacking his lips a bit, but nothing happens. "Bupkis."

"There are certainly plenty of options," Obi-Wan says as he sips his drink and surveys the party around them. People are talking, dancing, having a good time, but he can see others in the crowd who are suffering from the effects of the drink and don't seem to know how to fix it. A part of him thinks they ought to go over and tell them the trick, but at the same time, Obi-Wan thinks half the fun is discovering it for themselves.

"But I don't know that I'm especially interested in cuddling a stranger," he continues thoughtfully. "Perhaps if they were in dire need."

He would see no reason not to help, but as the drinks are hardly a threat to anyone's health or safety, he also doesn't feel a pressing need, like he might in another situation. This isn't like East Hallow, where saving people had been the only priority.

“If they’re in dire need,” Klaus agrees, smiling softly as he watches Obi-Wan survey the party. It’s rare for him to have eyes for only one person, but a lot of the things that he does with Obi-Wan are rare for him.

Neither drink seems to have any effect on them, so he knocks back the rest of his martini and sets the glass down on the bar. The bartender sidles over, and Klaus taps his chin.

“Surprise us,” Klaus says, and the bartender nods before turning away. Then Klaus curls an arm around Obi’s trim waist, unable to keep from touching him for very long. He leans in to press a kiss to his cheek, and for a moment he wants to say to hell with the drinks and drag him upstairs again, but then another round of drinks is set in front of them.

“Cranberry old fashioned,” the man says, and Klaus lets out a delighted noise as he lets go of Obi and claps his hands together.

Before taking the next drink, Obi-Wan closes his eyes for a moment, reaching out into the Force with his mind and focusing it on the metabolizing of the alcohol in his bloodstream. While he knows it's a party and he isn't terribly concerned about becoming inebriated, he still has to consider there might be several more drinks in his future.

And he would very much like to be mostly sober for Klaus.

"Is this a drink you enjoy?" Obi-Wan asks as he lifts his glass, studying it for a moment. What they have in Darrow is similar in some ways to places he's visited, but nothing has quite the same name, sort of wine. "I still find myself learning the new names for familiar things."

And this doesn't apply only to alcohol. Even what Obi-Wan would call a communicator is referred to here as a telephone.

Klaus almost says that he likes all drinks, but that isn't quite true. He's a lush who will drink most anything set in front of him, but he does have preferences. Right now, he't not in a spiral of alcoholism. He drinks a lot, yes, but he would like to think that he has it under control. He's working on it, and that means that he can actually think about his preferences.

"I do, yes. I prefer whiskey or bourbon drinks," Klaus tells him, lifting his drink to take a quick sniff. It smells fruitier than a normal old fashioned, and tastes a little tart. He smacks his lips happily and waits, but he doesn't feel anything with this one, either.

"Do you want to go look at the decorations outside?" Klaus asks, because they might as well enjoy the party. "I hear that Magnus has done something to the temperature out there, too, so I won't even freeze in this outfit.:

Magic always seems like too simple an explanation for the interesting things that are possible in Darrow, even though it's the one most consistently used. Obi-Wan has to believe there's some manner of science involved, even if it's merely science that isn't yet understood.

Whatever the case, he finds it absolutely fascinating.

"Yes, I'd like that very much," he says, offering his arm to Klaus so they might head outside. "I may not know a great deal about this holiday, but the decorations are absolutely beautiful. There's something almost soothing about the lights, the way they twinkle, the golden glow. I'm sure some planet out there in the galaxy celebrates in similar ways, but I've never been there."

"I wonder if I should try to find my shoes," Klaus says distractedly, though he smiles over at Obi-Wan as he offers his arm. It's such a pleasantly old-fashioned thing, but it makes Klaus smile every time. It's probably something that Obi-Wan does without thinking, something that doesn't mean much to him at all, but it always makes Klaus feel like something better than he is.

"He really did go all out," he says as he takes Obi-Wan's elbow and carries his drink with his other hand, looking around at the decorations as they head for one of the tables against the wall. Klaus lifts the tablecloth with his bare toes and peeks beneath, but his shoes aren't there so he heads to the next one.

"We could get some lights for your apartment and string them up. I'll help." He takes another sip from his drink and lifts the cloth of the second table, letting out a triumphant sound when he finds his flats. He pulls them out with his toes and steps into them, and then turns them so that they can head for the doors leading out to the back. "You could leave them up all the time, if you want."

Edited 2020-12-27 20:16 (UTC)

"I've been led to believe Magnus often does," Obi-Wan answers and it doesn't surprise him at all. Though they had met in the park -- and really, Obi-Wan had met Catarina first -- and the entire meeting had been rather casual and relaxed, there's always been a presence about Magnus that makes this entire party seem perfectly in line with what Obi-Wan would have expected.

"They're not meant solely for the holiday?" he asks as they head outside. Klaus had been correct, the temperature is comfortable, even with the falling snow and as they walk out into the yard, the sounds of the party begin to fall away. There are other people outside, they're not entirely alone, but it seems most people prefer to be inside with the music and the drinks.

"The lights, I mean. People leave them up all year?"

"We'll have to go to the next one, too," Klaus says without really thinking of the implications behind it. He can't imagine that he wouldn't want to attend whatever the next shindig is with Obi-Wan, because he can't really imagine a time where he doesn't want to be around Obi-Wan. That in itself is strange enough, but then it occurs to Klaus that the next holiday that might warrant one of these parties is Valentine's Day.

Klaus has been to a fair amount of anti-Valentine's parties, but he's never had a date for the holiday. Except for one, maybe. Dave had snuck him chocolate that he had scrounged up from somewhere over dinner with the rest of the squad, winked at Klaus, and that was that. His first ever Valentine's Day gift. A week later, Dave was dead.

He shoves the thought from his mind and focuses on Obi-Wan's question instead, taking a long sip from his drink before answering. "They don't have to be, no. The white ones, like that," Klaus says, using the hand holding his glass to point to a string of soft white lights draped around a tree. "You could put something like that up in your bedroom, and turn them on whenever you like."

The thought makes him smile, and he turns to give Obi-Wan a suggestive look as the lights reflect off of his eyes. "Mood lighting."