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1.
“You’re squinting, aren’t you?”
Sten let out an exasperated sigh and set down his newspaper.
“Yes, Alistair. I am.” He turned his eyes to the younger man. Alistair was staring back at him over his morning coffee, still a little drowsy.
“Why are you, though?” Leliana asked, leaning closer and placing her elbows on the table. “I’ve noticed that too. You do it a lot.”
“Does it bother you?” Sten asked.
“No, no,” Leliana hurried to say. “That’s not-“
“Good,” Sten said, taking the newspaper up again. “Neither does it bother me.”
2.
Sten didn’t like the way the blond elf was staring at him, as if evaluating him in some way.
“What is it?” he finally asked, and Zevran’s face melted into a charming smile.
“I think you would look good in glasses, my stone-faced friend.” To Sten’s distaste, the elf reached out to brush his face with the tips of his fingers, the warning growl barely fazing him. “Square frames, perhaps. Hard edges, like your charming personality.”
“Leave me alone, elf,” Sten growled. “I don’t need glasses.”
“Ah, but Leliana told me that you’ve been squinting at your newspaper for months,” Zevran said, still much too close, moving almost like a snake charmer’s snake, trying to get different angles on the man’s face. “That will not do, my friend, you will scare your morning paper away with that terrifying squint of yours.”
“Me squinting at my paper is none of your business,” Sten said. “Back off.”
3.
“The painted elf tells me you have trouble seeing.”
Sten grunted as he hit the punching bag extra hard.
“You don’t need to be worried, kadan,” he said, glancing at Shale. “He is exaggerating. As usual.”
Shale didn’t set down her weighs, but Sten could see her staring at him out of the corner of his eye as he gave the punching bag a kick and sent it flying.
“You would look good in glasses,” Shale said suddenly, and Sten missed the bag as it flew back towards him.
4.
Wynne made no comment on the injury while holding an ice pack over his nose, but Sten still felt his mood sour as the woman tutted and patted his head.
“Keep that there for a while. You are lucky it isn’t crooked, that would be more painful.” Then she leaned back and fished a magazine out of her bag. “I’ll admit, I hadn’t anticipated this being the circumstance of showing you this, but what can we do? Now, where was it...”
Sten felt a weird feeling of dread settle in the bottom of his stomach as Wynne skimmed over the glossy pages, looking for something. Last time the woman had wanted to show him something, it had been an anti-aging shampoo for graying hair. Sten had had hard time keeping his cool while explaining to her that he had always had white hair, and-
“There!” Wynne said and folded the magazine, handing it to Sten. “Aren’t those frames there just your style?”
“Alistair told you, didn’t he?” Sten asked before even glancing at what Wynne wanted to show him. “I am going to wring his neck.”
“Nonsense, Sten,” Wynne huffed. “Those are nice frames, and there is no need for you to keep squinting at your newspaper. You wouldn’t need to wear them all the time, of course, just keep them with you.”
“Why is everyone suddenly so interested in my eyes?” Sten asked, handed the magazine back to Wynne, and stood up. “Thank you for the ice pack.”
5.
“So, Zevran told me you are going blind,” Oghren said the next time they met.
“What?” Alim yelped and Sten was treated to a faceful of a very worried elf. “He didn’t tell me anything! Are you okay?”
“I am not going blind,” Sten growled, glaring daggers at Oghren. “Alistair and Leliana are merely bothered by how I choose to read my newspaper.”
Oghren let out a roaring laugh.
“So, who would’ve thought? The giant needs goggles.”
Sten didn’t miss a second before grabbing Oghren’s beard and smashing his head into the nearest wall, Alim’s protests be damned.
6.
“They say near-death experiences are healthy for you, you know,” Zevran remarked cheerfully as Oghren chugged down another swing of the whiskey Wynne had given him to dull the pain.
“That’s not funny, Zevran,” Leliana said, going through her seventh magazine. “He could’ve actually died. Sten, do you think you like these more than the yellow ones?”
“This is useless,” Sten said. “I will not agree to get myself reading glasses. You can forget it.”
Leliana set down the magazine with a sigh and gave him an exasperated look.
“You know, you could always get contact lenses. You wouldn’t even need to wear glasses.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice, “But I think Shale would like it if you did wear them.”
Sten forced himself to keep his eyes away from the grin plastered on Zevran’s face, fearing that he might actually kill the elf if he looked.
7.
“So, you agreed, huh?” Alistair greeted him when they met in front of the optical store. Sten gave him a glare, though he suspected it might have fallen a little flat with how tired he was of trying to struggle against the natural force that his friends sometimes were.
“I did not. I agreed to go to an optician to get my eyesight tested.”
“And, while you are confined to the back, having your eyes checked,” Zevran said and patted him on the back, “me and Leliana are going to pick out the best frames for you. Fear not, we are experts on this.”
Alistair shifted his weight from one foot to another.
“So... why am I here?”
“You can help us choose the frames as well,” Leliana said with a smile. “I know that Sten trusts your sense a little more than ours.”
“Oh, good,” Alistair said. “I almost thought I was here just to be a punching bag in case he wanted to relieve his frustration.”
“You would punch back, surely,” Zevran said.
“So did the real punching bag, apparently,” Alistair said.
Sten pushed past them, stepping in.
“We will get this over with before I kill you all.”
8.
“I need reading glasses.”
“Huh?” Leliana looked up from the frames she had been inspecting – horrifying, pink things, and Sten hoped she was not going to suggest them to him. “What did you say?”
“You heard me perfectly well, woman,” Sten said. “I. Need. Glasses.”
“Well, we did know that already,” Alistair said. “Look, we have picked out a couple of frames for you. Zevran wanted them to be angular, but me and Leliana agreed that since you have a square face-“
“Dear Alistair, I still think his face is rather rectangular than square,” Zevran said, but Alistair paid no heed to his words.
“-round glasses might be better for you.”
Leliana set down the pink glasses and instead handed Sten one pair of black frames with rounded edges.
“Alistair got really into this, you know,” she said. “I had no idea he had such a grasp on fashion. But you still do need to try these on.”
Zevran huffed and leaned back against the wall, another pair dangling from his fingers.
“I had no idea that you, Leliana, were capable of making rookie mistakes like this.”
Sten sighed and took the frames. This would take a long time.
9.
It took hours. Sten had no idea whether the glasses that had been picked out for him were round of angular, but eventually he had just gotten frustrated with trying on frames after frames after frames, and after a few threats the three had finally settled on a compromise of a sort.
The next week, when he got a text message that he could go get the glasses, he didn’t even consider phoning any of them. He dialed Shale.
After a minimal amount of persuasion they agreed to meet in front of the store before going to the gym to pick the glasses up. Sten was there too early, which was okay because Shale was just slightly less early, and they stepped into the store without a word other than “hello” exchanged between them.
Only when Sten was handed the glasses and he proceeded to shove them in his pack did Shale speak up.
“Put them on, I want to see.”
Sten forced down a sigh. Only for you, kadan, he thought sourly as he fished them back and unfolded them. He hesitated for the briefest moment before putting them on and turning to look at Shale.
To his astonishment, she did not look like she might laugh if she had a habit of laughing a lot. Instead, her mouth dropped open, just a bit but definitely enough for Sten to notice.
“You look good.”
It wasn’t honorable how fast Sten flushed beet-red. It was only slightly more honorable than the way he could barely stutter a “thanks” to express his gratitude, or how he rushed out of the shop without even remembering to take off the stupid glasses.