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“Old man…” Leonard began hesitantly, catching the eyes of his reflection before promptly turning away, drumming his fingers along the lip of the sink. And aged grunt sounded in his mind and Leonard’s fingers pressed into the ceramic, steeling himself.
“You’re Mr. Fool’s angel, right? But um, do you believe in his doctrine?”
“Huh?” the voice complained, irritated enough that Leonard could picture a face wrinkled by a deep scowl. “Well, sure? That god of yours has a pretty loose bible though,” Pallez said like a shrug. Leonard chose to ignore the old man’s deferrable word choice, well used to Pallez’s attitude when it came to being roped into a new god’s church. Still, this wasn’t exactly where Leonard was hoping the conversation would be going. He tapped along the sink once more, lips pressing together in consternation.
“Right…” Leonard acknowledged offhandedly before smoothly and innocuously directing the topic elsewhere. “But what about when it comes to marriage? For example, how the Evernight Church is more… open,” Leonard mentioned, trying his best at an impartial tone. Somehow, this didn’t work.
“Ah,” Pallez said, a chuckle in his voice. “This is about those homosexual tendencies of yours, isn’t it boy?”
“Wh-AT!?” Leonard choked, jolting so bad he knocked his hand painfully into the faucet, then the bar of soap which went clattering to the floor. Pallez took this moment to enjoy his schadenfreude, watching the very unsubtle poet freak out.
“Old man, you said you didn’t read my thoughts!” Leonard cried out in a harsh whisper, back to staring down his reflection. Again, that chuckle echoed through his brain.
“Boy, I don’t need to read your thoughts to know!”
Leonard, feeling a bit betrayed and very embarrassed, gripped his hair and let out a dying keen.
Above the gray fog, the unlikely trio of Tarot Club members who knew many of each other’s secrets sat together, drinking tea and chatting about their recent affairs. Audrey, with a smile that she hid behind her porcelain cup, looked on with glee as Mr. Star told Klein all about his work with the church. Following Mr. World’s waking, she’d managed to convince him with surprisingly little effort to join casual meetings like this under his own identity, as recommended by his therapist.
He really was a good patient, but more importantly, Audrey distinctly noticed the exact moment that Leonard recalled something unpleasant, his face souring and his words dying in his throat. Both she and Klein looked at him inquisitively, silently egging on the man to share. A spectator was, at their core, a gossiper after all.
Leonard sighed, pressing his forehead into the side of his hand. “I told the old man something embarrassing, but it turned out he already knew,” he groaned, not meeting the eyes of either of his companions. He feared that if he were to so much as look at Audrey, she would find out, whether or not she tried to grant him privacy. And Klein… well, as much as the Seer liked to put on gentlemanly airs, there was a slightly different reason Leonard didn’t look at him.
Three gentle plops as Klein refilled his tea, sweetening it to his tastes, a nonchalant, “Hm?” The Seer was bearing down on Leonard with his unfathomable aura of a king of angels, Leonard just knew it. Or he wasn’t, and Leonard was deluding himself for his peace of mind. In any case, he very quickly folded.
“I told Pallez that um. Yeah.”
To Leonard’s great shame, Audrey hid her smile behind her hand—only Klein looked confused. Leonard sighed. “That I like to diversify my marriage options.” A Loen-style euphemism.
For some reason, Klein seemed to come to a realization rather quickly this time.
Recomposing herself, Audrey took a sip of her tea and fixed Leonard with a joyful sparkle in her eyes. “What made you realize you like both men and women?” she asked gently, making Leonard feel instantly at ease.
“I’m not really sure. I guess I always sort of knew,” he shrugged, opening his mouth to say more but—
“Wait,” Klein cut in, teacup forgotten midway to his lips, a rare furrow in the knowledgeable Seer’s brow. “You like women?”
Leonard froze, mind short circuiting somewhere as he tried to understand what the fuck this meant and why Klein would be confused about this. Somewhere, he registered Audrey choking on her tea.
“You thought I was gay??” he finally burst out, picking the instinctual response over anything more coherent. Leonard wasn’t sure whether to be offended or not. Probably… he should be, if Klein’s unbearably flat stare, oozing with judgment, was anything to go off of. It was so bad that Leonard did a quick mental check of himself but… he was probably normal? His hair was unbrushed as usual, and everything else about his appearance was a little more casual than society expected, but he’d been putting in more effort since becoming an archbishop!
And he didn’t look gay! If he did, then why were the ladies always swooning over him?! Explain that one, Klein!
Leonard held his composure better than this, however, and so he brushed his hair haughtily over off his shoulder, telling Klein very firmly, “I don’t quite see what you mean.” But uh… did this just backfire? Klein even looked away, pressing his hand over his mouth! His shoulders were shaking!
Instantly losing his composure, Leonard fell into a look of bafflement, leaning forward as if that would make Klein’s behavior any more sensical. He could only give up as Klein’s laughter showed no signs of stopping, drooping dejectedly in his seat.
“How long have you thought that?” he wondered with a sense of crushing despair, mourning his ruined image. What would have ‘tipped’ Klein off? Perhaps he’d only come to this conclusion recently, and Leonard could still rectify Klein’s image of him—
“Ah, it was shortly after I joined the Nighthawks.” What. “I just remember you were all up in my space acting like a romantic poet and you seemed really gay.”
For a while after that, Leonard would staunchly refuse to recite any romance poems.
With several of the Tarot Club members in Bayam due to some matters with the Fool’s church, Alger had suggested a night of companionable drinking, which Leonard, Audrey, and Fors readily accepted. Mr. Sun was, tragically, both too young and out of town. As they were walking down to the tavern, passing the Red Theatre sparked the unfortunate discussion of Fors’ and Leonard’s eternal single status.
“I can introduce you to some nice ladies down there,” Alger generously offered Leonard, indicating to the broader downtown of Bayam.
“Or men,” Audrey kindly informed Alger on Leonard’s behalf. Alger paused for just a moment, squinting imperceptibly at Leonard and then nodding. Leonard, at first startled, blinked his confusion away. Alger was once a follower of the Lord of Storms, he shouldn’t be so accepting of different preferences. Then maybe not accepting, and instead… Expecting?!
No… Leonard sunk into despair, wondering where his social image went so horribly wrong, and why Fors’ gaze suddenly latched onto him like a succulent slice of meat.
When Leonard returned to the Evernight church, he decided to test a certain theory of his, and quickly sought out his close friends in the red gloves.
“Bob, Cindy,” he called, not bothering with greetings. The two lounging Nighthawks turned, alone in the break room. Barely giving them time to make any sort of response, Leonard ploughed ahead. “I’m bisexual.”
The room was silent for a moment and then, “Okay.”
Leonard blinked at them.
They blinked at Leonard.
“…Anything else?” Cindy asked hesitantly, as if unsure what the appropriate reaction here was. More concerningly, she acted as if Leonard had merely mentioned the weather!
Feeling as if he was floating, deeply off kilter, Leonard shook his head. “No, that’s all,” he mumbled, turned, and left.
On that day, to the backdrop of Pallez’s loud cackling, Leonard learned a very important thing about himself. And it wasn’t that he was bisexual.
Everyone thinks I’m gay!