“So it’s true then, that you really did fall head over Wooloo heels in love with me from the day we met for the very first time,” he smirked as he allowed his better half to navigate through the crowd of bar patrons out for a good time.

…for some reason his mindset had reverted back to his old bartender days again, the moment he caught sight of the long counter within the area proper.

“Boy do I have a story to tell, then,” he cackled as they made their way through the crowd of merry, rowdy bar-crawlers before following the manlet boyfriend and taking the seat next to his.

“You remember what I said about Trashy Rascal’s, right?”

[attr="class","samjermain"]“It’s very true,” he assured, as the server comes over to take their orders; they’re wearing black skinny jeans and too much eyeliner. “You had me at hello. Or, you know, you had me at here are pictures of my gay Wooloo.”

He couldn’t quite place what had originally draw him to Alex… or, rather, so many things had done so, together, like planets aligning, an overwhelming gravitational force, that it was difficult to name them all. He was tall and attractive; he was very kind; he was adorable.

But sitting at that little table, rustling the cheap pink crepe cloth with his thighs, and pretending to be too cool to be speed dating, Memo had fallen head over heels for a different reason:

Alex made him feel safe. Safe to be himself. Safe to be gay. For the first time in… forever.

He would forever be grateful to that speed dating event, forever grateful he swallowed his pride and went.

“I still can’t believe it was actually called Trashy Rascals,” he snickers, after placing his order-- an old fashioned, because it sounded like it would do the job and also actually taste okay-- “that is, like, the worst name ever.”

[attr="class","samjerpoke"]

“Look, when I got there the bar was already named as it was, I couldn’t do a thing about it!” he exclaimed as he sank into the table, unable to control his laughter because holy shit the way his boyfriend reacted at the name ‘Trashy Rascal’s’ would forever send him into a fit of the giggles.

Noting that the old fashioned was a good place to start as any (at least when his boyfriend was concerned when it came to drinking) he made the same order as well, to humor him.

“Their nightlife scene was way wilder than this. On a daily basis,” he pointed out as they then proceeded to wait for the drinks to be doled out.

Oh, it was reminiscing evening now, huh? Well, to be fair…

“D’you wanna know what I’m grateful for, for this year?” he asked his boyfriend quietly.

Even though they both already knew the answer to that. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to humor the other man a little bit.

[attr="class","samjermain"]“Definitely the most horrible name,” he confirmed again, fighting down the giggles so as not to continue to be derailed. Alex was telling a story, after all. He enjoys Alex’s stories-- the fleeting vignette glimpses into his boyfriend’s past life, his pre-Memo life. Even though some were terrifying (like an alternate-universe version of him getting eaten alive by a Guzzlord) and gave him nightmares.

“Wilder than the Ritual?” It didn’t seem possible, but then, Memo thought about it: the Ritual wasn’t polished, exactly, and it had its fair share of drama and barfights. But the feet of stained tile and old mahogany mostly catered to a known crowd, one that was frequented often by the dangerous.

Trashy Rascals-- he covered his mouth to hide the snicker-- may have been wild, but the Ritual was wild, too. A different sort-- a dark ferality that smelled of whisky and cigarettes and low bruise-purple lighting instead of neon and MDMA.

“Yeah, I do,” he answered earnestly, as the server brought them their drinks and said they’d be back to grab food orders, if they wanted any. Memo tried his old fashioned and held his breath, waiting for the pungent afterkick of alcohol to sting up his nose.

It wasn’t bad. He still made a face.

[attr="class","samjerpoke"]

He knew he was going to be applying the fucking sap all over the next few words, so he mentally braced himself by taking a deep breath and falling silent.

Once the peanut gallery had calmed down a little, he then turned to face his better half.

“I’m grateful for making that decision. The best one I ever made, hands-down.”

Need he spell it out to his boyfriend what that was?

[attr="class","samjermain"]He was taking another drink when Alex spoke and so he tried to bite back the post-alcohol-ingestion exhalation that wanted to burst out of him in an effort to clear his palette.

“Me too,” he said, only slightly out of breath, reaching out to squeeze Alex’s hand across the table, “me too.”

Then he grins, already feeling the booze swimming in his veins.

“If you hadn’t, though, I’d still be chasing you.”

[attr="class","samjerpoke"]

“It was, really just one choice would change everything.”

Remember that time when they went diving? Yeah. That was pretty much it.

“Sorry if I kept you waiting,” he apologized again as he turned red under the affectionate touch. “I just really needed to be absolutely sure. And I’m pretty sure that I did make the right decision.”

After a few moments of silence, he took another sip of his drink.

“Thank you.”

[attr="class","samjermain"]He could sit here and live in this moment, he thinks, buoyed by warmth and light and love. He grins over his glass, already feeling tipsy (he’s a lightweight, for a number of reasons, including but not limited to: his size, the price of alcohol, and his detest of the taste).

One eyebrow goes up as he twists his hand, meshes their palms together, fingers lacing.

“Only pretty sure?”

[attr="class","samjerpoke"]

“You know what I mean,” he teased back, squeezing his boyfriend’s hands in response to the gentle pressure.

“More than pretty sure. I’m positively, absolutely sure. That this. This, us, is the best decision I’ve ever made. And I’m eternally thankful for it.”

He then finished the rest of the sentence in his head, And I’m sorry if I made you wait, because that part was better left unsaid.

[attr="class","samjermain"]Every word was a little shock of happy electricity through him, and it was only the swirling of the room and Alex’s anchoring hold on him that prevented him from getting up and doing a little happy dance.

He grinned like an idiot.

“I love you.”

[attr="class","samjerpoke"]

“No, I love you more.”

Were they going to out-cheese each other now here at the bar?

Their drinks sat on the table, forgotten (for now).

“Aren’t we going to go to the next bar, or something after this?” he continued a few minutes later after they pretty much stared into each other’s eyes like the blithering, blushing, bumbling lovestruck fools that they were.