Work Text:
Dan presented their tickets to the usher at the door.
Dressed in an unflattering uniform, complete with a red sequinned scarf and reindeer antlers, the usher inspected their tickets. Her uncanny customer-service smile seemed permanently fixed in place as she tore the edge of their tickets and directed them toward their seats in the upper circle.
Herbert had to be half-dragged through the doors, Dan’s grip on his bicep guiding him forward until they had situated themselves in the plush theater seats. This was a well-practised routine, acted out every year as Herbert pretended to be entirely uninterested in whatever performance that Dan had selected for the two of them.
He would sit in an angry silence, arms crossed and glaring at the crowds of people shuffling into their seats. Then the lights would dim and the curtains would open, and Herbert would drop the act.
Even in the darkened hall, Dan would see how his eyes would shine with excitement, his hand swaying in time to the music.
They had started this tradition during their first Christmas together. The reality of Meg’s loss hadn’t yet sunk in, and Dan had unthinkingly bought two tickets to a concert of Brahms' German Requiem. Dan preferred something with a bit more bounce, but Meg had liked classical music. As it happened, so did Herbert.
He had forced Herbert out of their basement for the evening and driven them to a concert hall in Boston. Herbert had hissed and spat out his objections the entire way, and Dan had almost turned the car around and given up. But he’d paid good money for those tickets, and Herbert’s goddamn serum was the reason why he couldn’t take Meg instead.
And then he’d seen the way that Herbert melted into his seat, eyed half-lidded and lips upturned in a gentle, secret smile. When the orchestra finished their concert and the conductor bowed to the audience, Dan was convinced that Herbert had clapped louder than anyone else in the whole damn auditorium.
From then, it had become a tradition. Every year at Christmas, Dan would buy them tickets for the orchestra. They’d mixed it up a couple times; going to see a musical or play, and one disastrous year they’d gone to a carol service. Dan really should’ve known better than to bring Herbert’s god complex face-to-face with carollers singing earnestly about the birth of Christ. Herbert had scoffed and muttered under his breath during the entire concert, and had locked himself in their lab the moment they returned home.
To make up for it, that year Dan had bought them last minute tickets for a New Year’s concert.
“Two concerts this year? You really must enjoy torturing me, Dan,” Herbert had complained.
Dan very politely pretended not to notice when Herbert started crying during the fourth movement.
This year, Dan had taken them to the ballet. It was a bit out of their budget; they’d had to relocate again after Herbert was caught stealing parts from the morgue.
They’d only just established themselves in their new home and their new identities, and had very little cash to throw around, but tradition was tradition.
Besides, lately Herbert had seemed in need of a pick-me-up. In their last town, he had been convinced that they were closer than ever to successful re-animation, but all of their progress had been put on hold because of one damn security guard who spotted Herbert stuffing a severed hand into his lab-coat pocket.
They’d barely been able to synthesize the serum since the move, and certainly hadn’t been conducting any tests on deceased subjects. The situation resulted in a mopey, irate Herbert, who listed aimlessly around the house.
Dan turned away from the dancers to look at his companion.
Herbert was transfixed by the performance on stage, leaning forward in his seat and staring with a wide-eyed, attentive gaze.
The only time Dan had ever seen Herbert so open was when they were in private, discussing The Work or admiring one of his creations.
Dan reached over and took Herbert’s hand in his own, squeezing gently. Unwilling to look away from the performance for a single second, Herbert blindly squeezed back.
Herbert would no doubt retreat back into his hardened shell during the intermission, but whilst the music played and the dancers pirouetted around the stage, he was about as vulnerable as Dan had ever seen him.
The ballet concluded to thunderous applause, and the concert hall emptied out onto the street, everyone wandering home in a daze.
Dan and Herbert walked through the icy streets in silence as they made their way back to where the car was parked.
Herbert had his hands buried in his coat pockets and a thick scarf wound around his neck. Every exhale was visible, a puff of white in the frigid winter air.
His face was blank once more, all his vulnerability extinguished the moment that the curtains closed. But if he listened closely, Dan swore he could hear Herbert humming under his breath.
It wasn’t the first time that Dan had seen Herbert soften the way he had during the performance tonight; he’d had years of seeing Herbert’s gentleness emerge in the privacy of a darkened theater. And it certainly wasn’t the first time that Dan had felt a certain fondness for Herbert.
Tonight though, the feeling lingered in his chest and bloomed into something more.
“Herbert?”
Herbert glanced at him. “Yes, Danny?”
Dan held his hand out in offering, wiggling his fingers.
Herbert eyed the hand, a bemused look on his face. All the same, he extracted one hand from his pocket and laced their fingers together.
They held hands all the way to the parking lot, and when they reached the car Dan opened the passenger door with a flourish. Herbert ducked inside and rolled his eyes at Dan’s antics.
Dan switched the radio to a classical station on the ride home, and Herbert hummed along to the music the entire way.