Work Text:
Dr Ratio’s shopping list at Holiday Supplies:
3x Lowell’s 12 ft plastic skeleton
16x pumpkin lamps
5x orange LED light strings
1x bag of eco-friendly fake spider web fiber
3x Hershell’s brand chocolates, bulk-pack
—
“Come on… Look at this, doesn’t it just look so good?” The satin was cool and soft under his fingers, pitch-black and rippling like oil in water. Aventurine had never been into monotones- he’s more of a colors guy- but he could make an exception for this. He ran his finger up his leg, shin to thigh, his satisfied grin highlighted by the theater makeup. “Wouldn’t I look so good?”
Corporate halloween parties never let him go this far in provocativity, and the rowdy, drunk, actual-party halloween parties never let him keep his outfit on in one piece by the time the sun rises. In truth, he never went to these parties because they actually cared about Halloween. Nobody did. It was just one holiday amongst the hundreds that he needed to track; though by no means unique to Veritas Prime, its celebration was mostly confined to the local star sector. Like most events of this nature, however, planetary religious festivals tend to devolve into fun, almost stereotyped versions of themselves. Gone were the days of warding off spirits. Now everyone just dressed up and decorated their lawns and got piss-drunk.
He wished he could get piss drunk, right about now.
“We aren’t going anywhere tonight,” Veritas reminded him. Most would find the look he gave scathing. Aventurine could tell otherwise.
“So? Can’t I dress up for myself? Can’t I get a little festive? It’s… it’s like that one thing you said about that tree falling in some forest that nobody heard. Just because nobody sees me doesn’t mean I don’t look hot, and I like being hot.”
“You look ridiculous-” Aventurine gasps, mock-scandalized- “And cold. It’s the end of October. And there’s going to be kids.”
“Oh,” he shrugged. “I thought we could just put a bowl out front?”
Veritas raised a single, immaculately penciled (by Aventurine!) eyebrow.
“Alright, fine.”
So, change of plans. No weird mad scientist roleplay. No downing ten of the red vodka jello shots he SPECIFICALLY bought for halloween. It'll be just him and Veritas, sitting on the couch, watching some terribly avant-garde horror movie while answering the doorbell once every few minutes.
It's not that he was nervous about it, by any means, but children were… unpredictable. He wasn’t sure what they were supposed to be like. He wasn’t a normal child. He never had the chance.
What would it be like, he wondered, if he was born here? Would he still have Her blessing, Her eyes upon him? (Would that be for better, or worse?)
Someone rang the doorbell.
“You get that,” Ratio instructed. “I’m almost done grading this essay.” It's true, he hasn't actually watched the movie for the past half an hour at all. To be fair, it was a mediocre movie.
Aventurine ignored him in favor of rummaging through the closet. He’s not going to let some little kid see him in fishnets. That sight is reserved for his boyfriend only.
—
She was a teen, or maybe a twentysomething years old, and dressed in a low effort, sexy version of… peanut butter? She wobbled a bit in her heels, maybe from the cold, or maybe just the lack of balance. The little boy behind her could've been her son, or he could've been her brother. His robot costume, somewhat culturally insensitive to intellitrons, clanked as he walked.
“Jules,” she coaxed, slightly slurring her speech. “What do we say after we knock on the door?”
“Shrick-o-shreat!”
He made a performative gesture of going “hmmm” and raising his brows. “Close enough,” Aventurine concluded, reaching behind him for the plastic, pumpkin-shaped bowl. Sticking out of the candy was a paper sign, reading “ONLY 2 PIECES,” in Dr. Veritas Ratio’s handwriting. He plucked it out and crumbled it to the ground before holding the bowl over. “Now, now, don’t be nervous. Take what you want!”
The boy grabbed a small handful of chocolate bars. The girl, when she thought he wasn’t looking, also snatched one.
When she caught his gaze, she must’ve read something into his eyes, like people often did, because her face twisted. “Yeah, yeah, I’m too old for that,” she muttered, defensive. “Gimme a break. I just broke up with my boyfriend. It’s so… ugh. He was jelly.”
“Like, jealous…?”
“No.” She pointed to her peanut butter jar costume. “I just didn’t have time to get a new costume.”
Curiosity won over social propriety when he asked, “So, why did you break up. then?”
“Because he stole my credit card to go to the casino, and then I found out and smashed his car windows with a baseball bat.”
“I’m sorry that happened.”
“It’s not your fault,” She shrugged. It technically was, because he was the one who approved of the ICP building that casino, but he held his tongue. “Now, what do you say, Jules?”
“Shwank you!”
“You’re welcome, friends,” he smiled.
—
“Not bad, wasn’t it?” Grading presumably finished, Veritas had, presumably, found his partner far preferable to look at than the teen girl being chased down by a slasher on the TV screen.
“Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that I dislike the idea of doing this. It’s just… There’s so much else we could be doing instead. Together.”
“We’ll be handing out candy together.”
“It’ll do you good to experience something new like this,” Veritas noted. Must’ve caught him thinking for a second too long about how to turn this into some snarky joke about having kids. “You don’t interact much with youngsters, don’t you?”
“Judging by your complaints, I think I’d rather keep it that way.”
“Trust me, toddlers are preferable to grad schoolers any day.”
“You’re not trying to teach toddlers discrete maths.”
Veritas opened his mouth, and the sound of a doorbell came out. The two practically scrambled to open the door.
The man in the firefighter outfit that rang the doorbell had a hoard of children surrounding him like a flock to a sheepdog. There were at least fifteen of them, some barely out of toddlerhood, others tall enough to reach his shoulders (not that Aventurine was a tall man, mind you,) and all of them dressed in cheap, ill-fitting costumes. Each of them said Trick-or-Treat in their own pace and accent, which made the words get all tangled up like indecipherable gibberish. Ratio reached for the bowl, and frowned at it. “Hold on a second.” He closed the door slightly, and then turned to Aventurine with his brows furrowed.
“Did you take the sign out?”
“Come, now, Veritas. We’ve got plenty more.”
“That’s not the point-”
“What are you talking about, Mister?”
Ratio gave him a signature we-will-talk-about-this-later look, and then opened the door again. “Nothing of importance. Now, you can each take two pieces.”
—
They did not end up talking about it later. Instead, Aventurine announced that he was going to re-apply his makeup, and Ratio simply put another sign in and answered the next visitor.
“Oh my gosh,” said the girl of about seven or eight in a wubbaboo costume. “It’s you!” Ratio blinked, taken back- most little children are not in the habit of recognizing business magnates nor academics. Most parents, he had also hoped, were not in the habit of randomly asking him invasive questions when they are accompanying their children for halloween, which was why he didn’t bother having a costume that obscured his face. A decision he was now beginning to regret.
“I thought you’d, like, live in a big science lab or something!”
“I have a healthy work-life balance.”
“Ohhh, so-” and her mother kind of apologetically tapped her shoulder at that point- “OK OK OK I got it, erm, yeah. I know I shouldn’t bother you, I just got too excited, haha. Can I have candy now, please?”
“It’s no matter,” Ratio smiled. “Here, take your pick.”
—
The boy in the reaper outfit stared back at him, unaffected by his ringed gaze. His cloak was raggedy, but in an artificial way, like someone attacked it with scissors. His manacles clinked like plastic, not metal. Next to him, an older girl, about twelve or so, fidgeted with the sleeves of her hoodie jacket, out-of-costume and a little bit cold.
Aventurine thought they looked much too young to be alone.
“Hey, kids,” he said. “Do you have your parents with you?”
The boy thoughtfully chewed on his lips. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Uh,” the girl started, at the same time that the boy just muttered “They’re dead.”
Oh. He wished Ratio wasn't taking a leak right now, so that he didn’t have to deal with the awkwardness alone.
“I’m sorry,” Aventurine said, and then winced. It’s the worst thing to say. I’m sorry that happened to you, or I’m sorry that you were so young when it happened, or I’m sorry that things turned out like this for you. I’m sorry that they couldn’t be there when you needed it. I’m sorry that the world can be so cruel. I’m sorry that you were just a kid. I’m sorry that you’re going to miss them for the rest of your life. No, he hated it when people said they were sorry. What did they do to help? What could they have done?
“Do you… do you have another adult?”
“I’m twelve,” the boy said. “I’m old enough to go outside on my own. Look, if you really feel sorry for me, you’d let me take an extra piece.”
“Jira,” the girl hissed, and yanked his ear. “Look, sir,” she smiled politely. “I’m really sorry about my brother. He’s just going through one of those phases. We have an auntie taking care of us, and she dropped us off here. It’s OK.” Aventurine thought that this was very much not OK, in fact being orphaned was one of the most not-OK things he could think of that can happen to a child, but he acquiesced. There’s no way to win an argument against the boy, and he looked like the type where every conversation was just an argument in disguise. Instead, he probed a little deeper.
“Why did she drop you off here? Shouldn’t she be with you?”
“We live in- no, Ji, shut up. We live in, erm, Monts. Y’know, there,” she pointed to somewhere behind him. “You can’t properly trick-o-treat in the city, so she drove us here!” She batted her lashes a little, and for a moment her eyes almost looked her age. “And it’s a lot safer here. You know, for two kids to go out while their Auntie works.”
“I see.” Like recognizes like- the girl was lying. It wasn't exactly the same kind of lying he liked to do, the sort where he pretended to be fine so people could stop pitying him. But it was close enough that he knew that she knew that he knew she was fibbing. “Well, be careful, then. Here, have some more,” he smiled, holding out another fistful of sweets. It didn’t reach his eyes.
–
The trio of (or so he assumed, anyways) college students dressed up as some kind of… furry scientist, maybe, looked at each other, no doubt hiding grins under their vulpine masks.
“Guess what we are!”
He had no idea what this was supposed to be about, but he does know the gold-and-navy Veritas Prime University patch on their lab coats, where they had taped giant “P” signs on to. Some kind of nerdy, esoteric pun, no doubt. Thankfully, he has the nerdiest of them all right behind him.
“Oh,” said the shortest of the three, being the first to notice. “Uh, hello, Professor Ratio.”
“Is there truly nothing better for you to do tonight than to dress up as the FOXP3 regulatory gene?
“Nope,’’ said the boy popping his P. “Got kicked out of a party. By the way, prof, is that your husband?”
“Yes,” Aventurine said, at the same time that his fiancee said “No.”
“Not yet, anyhow,” the cornerstone smiled.
“Ohh…”
“Are you done poking into my private life, or do you still want to harass my partner?” Aventurine preened a bit at the title, wrapping one arm around Ratio’s torso.
“That’s a rhetorical question, but…”
“Rocky Horror,” the boy of the trio called out.
“What?”
“Rocky Horror. You’re Brad,” he pointed at his professor. “And your boyfriend’s Frank. I thought you did some weird vampire thing with the cloak at first!”
“Ratio watches Rocky Horror?”
“Well,” piped the taller of the two girls in the group, “He is gay.”
“That’s a homophobic stereotype,” Aventurine pointed out.
“I’m literally engaged to the girl next to me. Also you’re an evil mega-capitalist.”
“It’s awfully risky of you all to make fun of your professor, knowing that you-” he pointed at the short girl- “Are one bad lab report away from failing the class. He’s complained about you, you know, Antonia.”
“Oh, the betrayal! Professor, how could you?
Vertias, with his head in his hands, just sighed. “You were eating chips while dealing with PCR. With your bare hands.”
The girl had no response.
“Are you going to take some candy? Beer?” Aventurine jerked a thumb towards the direction of the fridge. “We have beer.”
“We’re not giving my students beer.”
“Come on, don’t they deserve a little reward? For trying so hard to spread the word of the, uh, Fox-3 gene?”
—
Three cans of beers and a few anecdotes later, they were finally interrupted by another hoard of kids.
—
Aventurine decided to go to bed at 10, when all the trick-or-treaters should be in bed already, and if they weren’t, well, they really should be for the sake of their own health. Alright, fine, the truth was, Aventurine didn’t decide that, Ratio did, and when he said the word “bed” Aventurine had realized that he’d earnestly forgotten the whole mad scientist roleplay thing and then immediately re-organized his priorities that night to accommodate it. Anyways, they had a good time and very pointedly ignored any more doorbell-ringing, obviously because they cared a lot about the sleep schedules of children and not because they were too busy fucking each other’s brains out.
It was genuinely one of the best holidays he’s ever had. He wasn’t sure if that fact was particularly depressing or not, honestly. A lot of people, Ratio included, the first time they talked, had assumed that it would’ve been one of the times he celebrated Kakava in his homeland. It was so easy to fake that he always smiled and nodded and faux-congratulated them for figuring out something so braindead easy, like, haha yeah, you guessed it!
In actuality, it was the Feast of Sara-la-Kali; he and Matuja always dressed up the statue with their shiniest scarves, pilfered from mom's closet- or maybe Ederlezi, where he the dancers held him up like playing airplane, raising the blessed child for everyone to admire. He never liked his namesake, never enjoyed joining in on the chanting for Kakava. Too much noise, too many hands touching him. Please, Kakavasha, can you bless us? Wave your little fingers and tell us it’s all going to be alright? Dear golden child, please, hear our prayers. It’s all on you now. There was joy to be had, but Kakavasha was tired, so tired, of all the noise and bodies and people. He would give anything to have that back, though. He would give anything to have his people back, in the flesh. What does he have now? So little left, but so much more, too, thousands of planets, thousands of holidays.
Pier Point, where commercialization has turned centuries-old festivals into corporate retreats and savings deals. Lymanika's bloody rituals, where men bear their bruises with pride and smiles. Each world had their own ways of celebration, and each world celebrated different things; saints, miracles, and the such.
He was a bit of both, back home. A saint, a miracle-birth, and now, all that remains. Home doesn't exist anymore.
Home was a colorful tent and home was a concrete floor and home was a cell block and home was a chain of lavish hotels each higher than the last and home is 4506 25th Montague St, Veritas Prime. Home is between the arms of his lover, firm muscle beneath a cable-knit yarn sweater, smelling like bubble baths and chalk-dust. He’ll never be home again, but he could make new homes, starting here.