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Not all nights were kind to Agathon.
He sat by the edge of his bed, covered in the new silk sheets he had purchased at the agora a week ago, doused in a striking Tyrian purple that matched Agathon’s favorite robe. His hands had grown stiff. Joints ached from clutching his stylus, and his wrists creaked from his frequent gestures and accidentally smacking a pole in his frivolity. It had stung, but Agathon didn’t cry, only bit his lip and cradled it to his chest until it seemed like his actors might have been watching. Then he brushed himself off and went on, though he made Pausanias stop by the agora to pick up some fair pigment to cover the newly blossoming bruise, black-and-purple freckles beneath his pale skin.
He kept tidy, which was one aspect of his life which Agathon never let go by the wayside. His hair—pretty dark loose waves, kept a little longer than his chin—stayed pinned up with an amethyst-and-copper hairpiece from Pausanias to keep it out of his eyes. Even his robe remained pristine, fabric bunching only where Agathon had intended and pinned it so it draped around his body, letting the imagination run wild. Svelte, pale skin, never ruined with tan and sun-freckles like every other youth; Agathon oiled himself for hydration and covered with expensive silks and delicate shoes, made custom for him by the tailors and cobblers of the city. Not everyone had the means for such pleasures, but Agathon considered it the price to pay for his beauty.
Pausanias delayed that evening, between the council and Agathon’s home, bound by the pretty stacks of legal work that towered over his desk. Agathon grew cold waiting, and had nearly turned in for the night before Pausanias entered the room. “Agathon,” he called, but Agathon could hear his footsteps and had only waited to turn to achieve the right moment, “Are you alright?”
Pausanias had come to know Agathon’s moods like star alignments. When Agathon pretended to listen to someone else and feign interest, he pursed his lips up into a small smile, nearly indistinguishable from a real one. When he had been scorned, he bit his tongue with his mouth closed, berry-damp lips parted ever-so-slightly. When over-tired, the weary look sat low in his dark, thoughtful eyes, as if to say that he was done but would not capitulate. Agathon swore that no one could tell, and Pausanias knew Agathon was almost right. No one else could tell.
Tonight, Agathon’s lips were still lined with rouge alkanet juice, but bitten, too, in little indentations that made them swollen and bruised, cheeks rouge to match. “The Lenaia is tomorrow,” Agathon reminded him, finally meeting Pausanias’ eyes.
And the poet was at a loss for words. “You’ll win,” Pausanias promised, setting his legal work down to make his way to Agathon’s side, “You always do.”
Agathon’s eyes kept their searching intensity, like the certainty was a box and Agathon needed to know what was inside, if it were hollow or full of promise. “I can’t decide what to wear for it,” Agathon complained, and Pausanias liked that because it sounded like him again.
“You always pick something fitting,” Pausanias tried, reaching one arm around Agathon’s back, “Didn’t we buy you a new himation not long ago? You haven’t worn it out yet, so you won’t risk repeating something you wore to a different dramatic festival.”
It was matters like that which plagued Agathon, and he sighed. “Maybe. But it’s that light meadow green, and we are in one of the colder times of the year.”
“So you’ll be the blossom, then.”
“And maybe it’s too…” Agathon trailed off, his eyes no longer meeting Pausanias’s, “I don’t want to look like the men there.”
“So you have that hairnet you bought without telling me. And jewelry.”
Agathon raised his head slightly, eyeing Pausanias. “Which jewelry?"
“The one you look best in,” Pausanias told him, although it wasn’t a real answer and both of them knew it, “If you’re worried about looking anything less than yourself, you have more than enough pigments and golds and silks to make up for it. We’ve bought most of them together.”
“I still can’t decide,” Agathon said stubbornly, but he let Pausanias guide him to sit on the edge of the bed, turning to rest his head on Pausanias’s shoulder. Pausanias still smelled like slight dust from his walk back to their home and the faint whisper of the scented oils Agathon had been picking out for him for years. Pausanias had first insisted that he didn’t need it, but Agathon was only sixteen then and it was difficult to say no, so he had started to accept them without complaint. Agathon’s breathing slowed as his inhales began to match Pausanias’s, and he shut his eyes. “I have to look perfect.”
“I know,” Pausanias told him, “You will. You do.”
“And… they’ll like my play?”
Pausanias and Agathon had matching little calluses on their hands from writing so much, but Pausanias had wider hands than Agathon ever did, and he reached one to card it through Agathon’s hair. “Of course,” he murmured, pressing a soft kiss to Agathon’s brow.
“Don’t mess my hair up.”
“I won’t,” Pausanias promised, and Agathon always anointed himself sweetly, his skin soft and his breathing now slow. He would wear the green himation, of course, his face done up and his hair in elaborate bunches beneath and around his hair net, not a far cry from the Anacreon who Agathon had so admired in his youth. “Your play is beautiful. You’re beautiful.”
“Say it again,” Agathon whispered, calm now.
“You’re beautiful,” Pausanias smiled against Agathon’s brow, kissing him again, “And I’ve had a long day. We can dine here together by the bed tonight so you can rest early for your day tomorrow. Why don’t you get one of your slaves to bring us something to eat?”
Agathon laughed and pulled him in closer by the fabric at the top of his himation. “They’re preparing dinner already,” he said, and the delight of being by Pausanias brought him this new surge of energy, “I wanted it ready shortly after you get home. We probably have a little time before it’s done, though.”
“How much time?” Pausanias asked softly, pacing himself with the way Agathon’s eyes lit up in devious delight then, but he was already reaching for Agathon’s garments.
“More than enough,” Agathon offered his lips in resplendent reply, and he let himself relax into Pausanias’s arms, “I think you’re right. The green will look nice.”
Pausanias held him, his own sense of luckiness washing over him as Agathon undid his own clasp. “It always does.”