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Kaisar does not dance. He hasn’t since he was young, and he’s not about to start up again now. No, not even to the jauntiest of melodies piercing through the heavy air of the bar. And especially not with the redheaded scoundrel before him, stomping his boots on the floor and whooping in time with the music.
It’s not that Kaisar can’t dance – he was taught well all those years ago, after all. He simply refuses. It’s undignified, or at least this kind of dancing is, anyway, getting drunk and losing oneself to the sound of a lute in a matter of minutes.
Favaro pauses suddenly at the end of the song, ignoring the groans of other dancers who slam into him. Favaro wavers on his feet as one nearly knocks him over, but he stands firm, holding a hand out to Kaisar.
The next song begins.
“May I have this dance, Hammerhead?”
Kaisar glares at him, daring him to try. “No.”
Favaro, never one to back down from a challenge, grabs Kaisar by the wrist, dragging him out of his seat roughly. He meets Kaisar’s gaze evenly and bares his teeth in a winning smile. “Dance with me, stupid.”
Kaisar growls warningly, but he has no choice but to follow along for now. His eyes narrow pointedly.
Favaro laughs, tries to push him into moving his feet at least a little, but Kaisar seems to be made of stone. He shrugs – after all, if Plan A fails, he’s already working on B, C, D, through Z – and laces the fingers of his right hand with Kaisar’s, bringing their clasped hands up by their faces. “See, Kaisar? Ain’t this romantic?” he prompts with a little sway of his hips to the music.
Kaisar looks away, suddenly feeling very stiff. He pretends for a moment his cheeks aren’t hot with embarrassment (they’re standing together so brazenly like this in public…!) and Favaro grins, finally catching him off guard enough to uproot him from his spot. Suddenly, Kaisar’s feet are stumbling across the stone floor to keep up with Favaro’s, which skip along the ground nimbly in perfect time.
Kaisar tries to hate it, he really tries, but Favaro is beaming and pulling Kaisar through little twirls around the room, and he can’t bring himself to. Not with the giddy look in Favaro’s eyes and how simple and natural this all seems to him.
Favaro’s smile is as infectious as disease, and Kaisar thinks maybe that’s why he suddenly feels faint, like he might be ill – or perhaps it’s because Favaro just had the audacity to spin him and Kaisar hardly had time to even notice before he’d settled safely back in Favaro’s arms.
It’s hard to say.
He wants to scold Favaro, wants to spit some retort that’ll wipe that grin right off his face, but maybe that grin really is an infectious disease because Kaisar swears he’s caught it with the way his stomach is at once full of butterflies. His head still spinning with the wonder of it all, Kaisar imagines the butterflies are green, a dark, familiar, brilliant green he can’t help but get lost in right now.
Favaro smiles wickedly but grants Kaisar a moment to catch his footing once more before pulling him in close. They fill each other’s vision, fill the room, fill the world, and all at once it’s over for Kaisar, who can’t help but let a smirk crack his hardened mask.
Favaro’s eyebrows shoot up at that, and if Kaisar didn’t know any better, he’d think Favaro had lost his composure in his surprise. But of course, it’s Favaro, and he never loses his composure, merely misplaces it, and it’s all too quickly found again as he leads Kaisar in an even more breakneck rhythm than before.
Kaisar is tripping over his feet and Favaro is cackling and the music feels loud and distant at the same time, and the chatter of the pub is so far away they can barely make out a sound because all Kaisar can hear is Favaro’s laughter, punctuated by little breathless gasps for air he tries to hide.
It’s a kind of bliss Kaisar’s never known, and he wonders how it can feel so good to break into a sweat amid a mob of people, how anyone’s smile can pierce so deeply into his chest, how anyone’s eyes could even begin to capture his the way Favaro’s do.
And all at once, Favaro swings Kaisar to his side and the bastard has dipped him now, bent low on one knee and grinning down at him with all the smugness in the world. Kaisar freezes, sure he’s about to hit the floor hard any moment, but Favaro, ever prepared, always ten steps ahead in five different directions, scoops Kaisar back up at the first tremble of his arm and kisses the tension out of Kaisar’s lips, and Kaisar really begins to wish he’d had something to drink before all this so he could at least try and blame it on the booze when he kisses him back.
Instead, he simply pulls away after a few moments and laughs at the calculating look in Favaro’s eyes when he does.
“What?” Favaro blurts, indignant.
“It’s nothing,” Kaisar assures him, letting his arms come to rest on Favaro’s shoulders, hands meeting loosely behind his neck. “Just dance with me, stupid.”