Chapter Text
It wasn’t important.
Fingers tapping absentmindedly on the lacquered wood of his desk, Vox snuck a glance at the man sitting in the armchair across the room, posed as delicately as ever. The question tumbled around his head once more at the sight of him doing nothing in particular besides lounging and staring absently out of his office window.
It really wasn’t important, and that was why Vox hadn’t asked. His business…acquaintance? Whatever they were was an enigma to him, another question he dared not ask, because Alastor was not a man who appreciated most of Vox’s questions.
But day after day, the more Vox realized that in his entire time of knowing him, Alastor was really only doing one of two things, the question nagged in the back of his mind until it was sometimes the only thing he could think about during their rambling conversations.
Besides killing people and hosting his radio broadcasts, what did Alastor even do?
Once the thought had popped into his head a few weeks ago, he’d unconsciously paid more and more attention to it. Alastor hosted a radio show. A news report about the Radio Demon claiming the life of yet another pseudo-overlord. And then he saw him for a chat on Tuesday about ideas for his shows. And…then another news report, and another radio show, and another chat…and nothing really else.
Though of course Alastor was not exactly prone to sharing details about his personal life, he didn’t have a reputation for being reclusive, per se, which left Vox even more curious and baffled. Surely the man had some other hobbies or business, but Vox couldn’t really see him being into anything besides, well, torturing people and radio shows.
“You know,” came the always-muffled tone of Alastor’s voice, “it’s quite rude to stare.”
Unable to suppress the habit of pulling nervously at his antennae, Vox quickly looked back down at his desk and the papers scattered across it.
“Sorry, sorry. I just got lost in thought,” he said honestly.
Admittedly, Vox had a lot of habits, and one of them did happen to be looking a little too long in his acquaintance’s direction. Alastor only called him on it about half the time, so Vox figured that he didn’t mind all that much. Even so, when he did bring it up, it always left him feeling disoriented in a weirdly pleasant way.
“...Mmm,” was all Vox got in response, but even so, he could feel Alastor’s gaze boring into the plastic of his head. It would probably be best to ignore it. If he could even manage that. With great effort, Vox picked up his pen and signed the paper he’d been ignoring for the past ten minutes or so.
It was another ten minutes of getting increasingly more anxious and exhilarated by Alastor returning the favor of staring for way too long before he heard the clacking of his heels against the floor. Finally giving in, Vox looked away from the work to meet his gaze.
The look on Alastor’s face was not unlike the face he’d seen on the man when he was about to describe his next victim as “a good fit for supper”. Vox unfortunately found this a great deal more enticing than foreboding.
“Alright, out with it, Vox. You’ve been dancing around something for days now,” he said, folding his arms decisively in front of him. “You only do that when it’s something either particularly stupid or-” Alastor’s smile sharpened, “-particularly interesting.”
Great. Just great. Vox wondered how annoyed Alastor was about to be with him.
“What do you even do besides your takeover and your radio show? Not that those aren’t interesting by themselves,” Vox hastily tacked on, “but I’ve just realized that I have no idea if you do anything for leisure in your free time.”
A full seventy-two seconds of silence followed that. (He counted.) At long last, Alastor blinked at him very slowly.
“What I do in my free time,” he repeated blankly, as if the very thought of someone wondering about that was a mystery to him.
Vox shifted in his chair uncomfortably.
“I just meant, like…” Floundering for words, he waved his hands aimlessly in the air. “Like, do you have a hobby or a group of friends you hang out with, or something? I-I mean, I like to tinker with electronics,” he said, slipping into familiar rambling territory. “And I read a lot, mainly about marine biology. Stuff like that. I was just curious because I’ve really only interacted with you in a work setting.”
After another scrutinizing pause, Alastor sighed and shrugged.
“I suppose cooking could be considered a hobby of mine. If you mean what do I do when I go out, I go drinking and dancing, like any cultured fellow does,” he said, still sounding undeniably confused as to why Vox even cared.
Truthfully, Vox hadn’t expected any sort of real answer from Alastor in the first place. At best, he assumed he would scoff and give some noncommittal snark about having more of a social life than Vox anyway, and that would be that. Now that he’d actually answered the question, Vox wasn’t sure what to do next. He hadn’t planned on getting this far.
“Oh,” he managed lamely. “I…don’t think I’ve ever been dancing?”
Nice. Real smooth. Great follow up.
Vox resisted the urge to zap himself into the nearest device and be done with this whole conversation. This whole day, even. He’d never said something so inane and so indicative of his friendlessness.
“Never?”
In the couple of years they’d gotten to know each other, Vox had never heard the man sound so utterly thrown for a loop. In hindsight, he supposed it was a bit odd, having been alive for the eras of both swing and rock and roll, but Vox had always been a lot more focused on attending swanky dinner parties to climb the corporate ladder than screwing around at the local sock hop for any other reason than learning what the current trends were. Going dancing was something one did with friends, not your boss whom you were planning to murder.
In lieu of words, Vox gave a slight shake of his head, which only caused Alastor’s eyebrows to shoot up even higher than before.
“Well! That just won’t do!”
The sudden shift in tone felt like a rug violently pulled from under his feet. Fluffy ears pricked up with anticipation as Alastor delivered a sharp but amicable kick to his ankle.
“Up, up! I can’t be hanging about with a man who doesn’t even know the Charleston.”
Quickly, Vox got to his feet, torn between embarrassment at his apparent lack of culture and a dizzying thrill at the prospect of Alastor taking him dancing.
“I- Okay, well, I do at least know what that is, give me some credit, Al,” he shot back, jumping to a trot to catch up.
Alastor seemed to be wasting no time, already halfway out the door and heading, presumably, to one of his favorite spots. Vox, now that he’d finally started to process the shift in Alastor’s frankly incomprehensible emotions, was hot on his heels.
“Charleston, Charleston, hmm-hmm-hm-hm-hm-hm,” Vox hummed as proof, punctuating the end of the phrase with a little spin.
Despite rolling his eyes, Alastor offered his arm to Vox as they matched pace.
“Yes, yes, I’m very impressed by the fact you know one of the biggest songs of the style,” he said dryly. “So well that you prefer the tune over the rest of the lyrics.”
“Oh whatever,” Vox muttered good-naturedly. “Where are you…”
The phrase on the tip of his tongue gave him pause, a shiver fizzing up all the way through his antennae. Alastor, taking him somewhere. He’d only been dreaming of this for, oh, several dozen months.
At first Vox had brushed off the excitement of seeing Alastor and the oddly fawning nature of his opinion of the man as nothing more than genuinely looking up to someone for once. But at some point, it became a little too hard to convince himself that blushing at Alastor’s voice and stammering when Alastor complimented him and thinking of Alastor as he fell asleep was a bit more than mere admiration.
And now…well, nowadays, all of Vox’s goals had become rather embarrassingly Alastor-centric. He wanted to expand his TV empire to impress “Al”, he wanted to catch a drink with the man whenever possible, not just for business; hell, even his tinkering habit had shifted almost exclusively to the age of radio.
“A speakeasy, naturally. One of the few good ones down here.” Alastor answered his unfinished question without comment. “I’m not spending the evening with you in some dingy club.”
Spending the evening with him. Oh lord, he and Alastor were spending the evening together. The two remaining braincells behind Vox’s curved screen were in serious danger of short-circuiting.
“Right,” Vox breathed, letting a soft, awed laugh follow the word. If he’d known this would be the result of him asking the world’s dullest question, he would have asked it ages ago. “Of course not.”
The rest of their walk fell into an easy silence. In what seemed like an eternity and also no time at all, Alastor was leading him down a tight, winding staircase into a dimly lit bar.
Classy was the only word that Vox could really use to describe the place. Bedecked in golds and reds and blacks, it felt like Alastor had been a part of the venue’s design that popped out and started singing jazz. There were a decent amount of patrons for it being earlier in the evening; Alastor nudged him towards a table near the band before briskly turning on his heel and making straight for the bar.
Taking that as a cue to sit down, Vox’s gaze unabashedly remained trained on the stripes of Alastor’s red coat as he ordered. Though this wasn’t the first time they’d gone to a bar together - Alastor was actually rather fond of it as a habit, so it quickly became a “thing” to discuss things over a drink or two - it was most certainly the first time the pretense was explicitly not professional.
And despite the familiarity of the action itself, when Alastor returned with their usual whiskeys, Vox couldn’t help the tiny fragment of hope that lodged itself in his mind that maybe this meant they really were more than just colleagues. If going dancing was something to be done with friends, then that must mean…?
“Vox,” Alastor said, tapping lightly on the side of his screen. “Quit drifting off when you’re in company.”
“Sorry,” Vox apologized for the second time that day. “It’s just…”
He took a steadying breath. This wasn’t a business meeting, so there was no reason for him to hold his tongue and stick to episode pitches and soundtrack debates.
“It’s just that this is the first time we’ve really hung out together.” Vox shot the man across from him a tiny smile. “I guess I’m just a little nervous.”
Alastor hummed gently at this, taking a long sip of his drink. His smile seemed more genuine than it usually was, as though he was allowing himself to slip a little outside of his ever-present showmanship. The thought softened Vox’s own smile. His shoulders slacked, and he scooted closer to the table to prop an elbow on the surface.
“But, well, I guess this is pretty much what we usually do anyways,” he said, the quick switch-up in his demeanor causing Alastor’s eyebrows to raise ever so slightly.
“Quite so,” Alastor simply replied, setting his glass down with a gentle clink.
After another moment or two of them indulging in their drinks while watching the other patrons of the bar, Vox leaned forward, eyes wide with curiosity.
“So…dancing. I know you like jazz music and all, it’s what you’re always broadcasting, but what’s fun for you about dancing?” The sharp plastic of his fingertips made a dull clacking as he drummed them against the table. “Honestly, I thought it was something you’d hate - you’re kinda prickly when it comes to things like hugs.”
Vox was pretty touchy with most people, but Alastor seemed to draw a line in the sand when it came to heavier contact. He wasn’t too responsive to the little taps on his shoulder or taking his hand to lead him somewhere, but Vox remembered the time a drunk at a bar had tried to sling an arm around his shoulders and…well, Alastor responded quite a bit more violently to that. There were other times, too, and Vox had quickly gotten the unspoken boundary that if he got too close, he’d probably get his head bitten off, figuratively and literally.
That didn’t stop him from pushing the limits at times, but either Alastor was more patient with him, or he didn’t mind it if it was Vox. (He was very hopeful it was the latter.) So the prospect of Alastor enjoying partnered dancing was a bit of a shock.
But even as he voiced the thought, the more he mulled it over, the more loopholes he came up with. Alastor had never said he liked partnered dancing specifically. Maybe he just liked to move around on the floor by himself - Vox had seen the man step along to his tunes and, much like Vox himself, he was quite prone to little dance-like flourishes in his gestures. Even if it was partnered dancing, there were plenty of styles where the dancers simply did the steps next to each other without any contact.
His comment drew a little laugh out of Alastor, picking up his drink and swishing it absently in the glass. “I suppose I am, hm? Really though, you don’t have to be chest-to-chest in a tango to dance with a partner,” he continued, confirming what Vox had just realized.
“Yeah, I just thought of that,” Vox said, sheepishly tucking the corner of his screen further into the palm it was resting on.
“Although…I must admit, the more entertaining styles do require a fair bit more contact than I usually allow. I hope you don’t mind…?”
Vox felt his antennae point taller and his shoulders bunch right back up. Though he couldn’t really feel it in any true sense of the word, he knew his screen must be displaying a blush if the teasing lilt to Alastor’s grin was any indication.
“No!!” Vox coughed immediately, trying to rein in his horribly obvious excitement. “I, uh, I mean no, of course I don’t mind, Al, as long as you don’t mind, then I don’t mind - that is to say, I’m totally fine with it.” And then he shut himself up by taking a much-too big sip of his drink, wincing as his throat burned from the sensation.
Alastor only giggled more heartily, muttering something about being “easy” under his breath, and Vox shook his head bashfully, taking another swig of the drink. Obviously Alastor knew he wouldn’t mind the contact - he’d only asked to see Vox flounder over it. Still, the fact that his friend (his friend!) was comfortable enough to properly dance with him was enough to make the momentary embarrassment more than worth it.
After quieting down, Alastor gestured loosely, waving his hand through the air. “To answer your actual question, dancing was one of the few things in life where everyone was on the same page. No one cared about anything besides matching the tempo and pulling off the moves.” He paused to drink, and his expression flickered into something more contemplative. “I love my freedom, and that was part of how I got it when I was alive. Of course,” he said, grin returning to its catty sharpness, “it helps that it was full of the music I loved and plenty of unassuming victims.”
Vox couldn’t help the snort he let out. “Of course it all comes down to that. I should have known,” he teased, rolling his eyes with a smile.
Alastor raised his glass in a mock toast and Vox snorted again, tapping his own to it before finishing the drink. Something about Alastor’s answer struck him as being almost personal in nature, and he felt his screen brighten in response to the fuzzy glow that spread through his chest. It really was the little things when it came to Alastor, a man who’d sooner kill than give away what he was really feeling.
“I’ve never had to teach anyone to dance before,” Alastor said. “I hope you’re a quick study, because I don’t consider myself a patient teacher.”
Vox quirked an eyebrow. “Don’t you love watching people fail at things? You’re always smirking at people making a fool of themselves when you pick a victim.”
“I’ve changed my mind!” His ears were pricking again, smile a little too wide. “I think you’ll find I’m a wonderfully patient teacher!”
“That would be reassuring if I didn’t know you were planning to laugh yourself half to death giving me vague instructions and watching me trip over my shoes,” Vox replied, letting his tone turn to a slight pout.
“Oh, I’m sure I’ll tire of that eventually. I fully intend on teaching you properly, Vox. As I said, I would be remiss to be caught dancing with someone who can’t keep up with me!”
“Like that’ll be hard, old man,” Vox said with a huff of laughter, narrowing his eyes with a slight challenge.
“Oh really?” Alastor narrowed his eyes right back, and the sudden uptick in volume of the static in his voice made Vox wonder if perhaps he had just made a mistake. “Well, no time to waste, then!”
Vox grunted as Alastor aimed a kick at his heels for the second time that evening, but took the hint and got up to follow him to the open space to the side of the seating area. A little tremble in his hands betrayed the sheer glee that was threatening to spill over his face, but Vox managed to keep himself relatively composed as Alastor gently showed him where to stand.
“Right. I suppose the basics are where a lesson ought to start,” said Alastor, who looked as if it had only just occurred to him that for once he would have to do a majority of the talking.
“Makes sense to me,” Vox said, bouncing lightly on his heels.
“The style of dance I tend to stick to is known as Lindy Hop,” Alastor explained, Vox nodding along attentively. “And the three types of steps it primarily uses are normal steps, triple steps, and rock-steps - why don’t you give those a go?”
Naturally, Vox had seen people dance before. Pop culture was rather obsessed with dancing during the time he was alive; he’d watched fancier footwork than he could ever had conceived of on his own. On the other hand, Vox had no idea what the hell a triple step or a rock step were. It didn’t seem like Alastor was about to explain, with the way he was watching expectantly without another word.
Hesitantly, Vox stepped forward with his left foot, turning over his shoulder a little to keep Alastor’s face in view. He gave nothing away with his expression, so Vox assumed he must have guessed correctly that a normal step was, in fact, literally just a normal step.
Following that logic, Vox shuffled forward three steps in a row. Alastor’s ear twitched a little, but he just continued smiling at him, so Vox turned away and tried to think of what a rock-step could be. His first thought was that it had something to do with a rock, but that seemed rather unlike the frantic style of swing dancing that he remembered seeing, so probably not. Maybe rock as in rock and roll? What would a rock-and-roll step be, though?
Feeling the heavy silence as Alastor continued to wait for him to do something else, Vox swallowed and timidly tried shifting his weight from foot to foot, “rocking” to the other side. Heat creeping up his neck, he turned to look back at Alastor for some sort of confirmation.
To his credit, Alastor hadn’t lost his composure yet, but it was painfully obvious that the sinner was doing his very best to stifle a laugh, grin wobbling at the corners and standing up a little too straight.
“...Why not try putting those together?”
Vox grimaced, but obliged, walking back to where he had started. Then, in an awkward rhythm, he stepped forward four times and mimicked the rock-step that he’d come up with before turning fully to face Alastor and flashing a weak set of jazz hands, which seemed to be the final straw for his instructor.
Alastor doubled over, summoning and using his staff as a crutch as he laughed so hard that Vox saw tears glint at the corners of his eyes. The cooling fans in his system kicked into overdrive as Vox stood there, watching Alastor gasp for air between peals of laughter. He supposed he deserved it after the “old man” jab, but his stomach still squirmed uncomfortably. Impressing his friend was usually his number one goal, so completely humiliating himself instead left a sour taste in his mouth.
“Ahh…oh dear, oh dear…” Alastor giggled his way out of the fit, wiping gently at his eyes as he stood up once more. “I’m sorry, Vox,” he said, sounding not very sorry at all. “I did really think you had to know what those meant, even if you’d never done them before.”
Vox felt his antennae droop. Great - not only had he humiliated himself, he’d also been overestimated. He opened his mouth to say something in his defense, but quickly shut it as he realized that there wasn’t much he could say.
Lucky for him, it seemed like Alastor had gotten his fill for the time being of laughing at someone else’s suffering. The demon approached with a gentle tap on the shoulder, standing next to him as they had been before.
“I suppose you weren’t actually that far off anyways,” he offered kindly, demonstrating the actual canter-like rhythm of the triple step. Waving him on, he watched as Vox clumsily repeated the motion. It turned out that a rock-step was back-to-front rather than side-to-side; neither step was really all that difficult, leaving Vox feeling more at ease.
Alastor gave a pleased hum, motioning for Vox to come back to his side. “Let me show you the positioning, then, and we can try the steps together.”
As Alastor reached for his shoulder, Vox felt his mechanical heart kick into overdrive. Delicately, the gloved palm of his hand slipped across the top of his back, landing on the shoulder nearest to Alastor, as if he was simply getting the man’s attention. Vox swallowed, feeling the tremor from earlier return to his hands.
Seeming to take Vox’s nervous silence as a cue, Alastor reached over to pull Vox’s right arm behind his back and set it just above the curve of his hip, right where his red-striped coat met the hem of his pants. They were properly “hugging” now, sides pressed lightly against each other. Somewhere in the back of his mind, behind all of the muddled soup of affectionate babbling, Vox realized that Alastor was having him lead the dance.
Alastor stepped slightly away from him, the distance loosing some of the pressure inside Vox’s chest.
“There we go,” he said in a chipper voice, as if the presence of his hand on Vox’s shoulder wasn’t about five seconds away from making his systems crash. “Let’s do those together, then.”
As Vox slowly led Alastor through the same three steps, he tried desperately to force his thoughts to return to a normal speed. The brushes of Alastor’s legs against his when Vox misstepped and the light but firm grip of his hand on Vox’s shoulder really were not helping. They ran the moves another few times, enough for Vox to finally get somewhat used to the sensation of being so unbelievably close to a man who constantly refused his touch.
“Good,” Alastor said at last. “Now, the move that truly defined the Lindy Hop is called the swingout,” he said as he separated from the hold, moving back towards their chosen table.
Vox followed, a little grateful for the break. Leaning over the back of his chair, he listened intently as Alastor shed his coat and folded it neatly while describing the move aloud. While he appreciated it, Vox was pretty sure the move wouldn’t make a lot of sense to him until he tried it out. That didn’t change the fact that he drank in every word - he always savored the precious few moments where Alastor indulged in talking about his own interests to Vox. He’d always politely sat through Vox’s little tirades about shark facts, so it was the least he could do to hear about the specifics of Lindy Hop footwork; but of course, Vox would have listened to Alastor talk about his tax returns if it meant getting the man’s full attention and seeing the way his ears pointed higher when he was genuinely excited.
Having finished both the explanation and with removing his coat, Alastor offered Vox his hand. “Shall we try it, then?”
“Of course,” he replied, taking his hand and accompanying him back to the floor.
Wordlessly, they resumed the dancing position Alastor had taught, and Vox waited for further instruction. This time, Alastor seemed keen to give it, though it could well have been in the interest of keeping his toes un-squashed.
“We’re going to start the pattern with the rock-step,” Alastor said, nodding as Vox slipped into the move.
Vox tried to keep the flush off of his face when Alastor used the momentum from the step to move around him until they were suddenly face-to-face rather than side-by-side. In a position that felt much more like slow dancing, Vox felt the fans in his system kick up a notch.
If Alastor noticed the sudden tension of his dancing partner, he paid it no mind.
“Now, you will pull me towards you. Gently, Vox,” he said, stressing the word with a sharp stare.
Hands shaking softly, Vox complied, using the hand on Alastor’s back to gently guide the man forward until his shoulder was pressed firmly up against Vox’s chest.
“Not that close,” Alastor chided, taking a step back to create space for himself. The flush could not be held back this time, Vox stuttering a quiet apology as he looked anywhere except his friend’s face.
As a result, the poke of Alastor’s finger on the edge of his screen made him jump. “Not that close because I need room to move past you, picture-box.”
Right. While it made him feel a little less flustered, it didn’t make him feel any less warm at the mistake. When Alastor was in a relaxed mood, he tended to dip into his really quite expansive reservoir of nicknames; Vox had gotten used to being called “picture-box” and “TV-head” and “pal” fairly often. One time, Alastor had called him “darling” and it took him a full ten minutes to be able to look the man in the eye again.
“I’m going to step past you now, like I said. As I do,” Alastor continued, once again ignoring Vox’s internal panic, “you will turn outwards, like you would for a spin.”
Without waiting for any acknowledgment, he moved forward, and Vox did his best to follow the instructions, stepping back and around until his arm was extended and Alastor had paused himself.
“Good,” Alastor said again, and Vox smiled, heart jumping as his dance partner returned the gesture.
“Finally, I’m going to step back to you - mind your footwork so that we are in sync - and we will end up where we started.”
It was easy enough to follow, and so they did just that, each neatly returning to the other’s side.
“That wasn’t so bad,” Vox said, the first coherent thing he’d said in a good few minutes.
“Of course not! It was far slower than anyone would actually perform the move, though,” Alastor pointed out.
Vox conceded, and they practiced the move until it felt much more natural to him. He was starting to get a little warm now, and understood why Alastor had ditched the coat. If there was a next time to this endeavor, he’d probably switch to a thinner vest.
“You’re coming along well, Vox,” said Alastor, sounding pleasantly surprised, and he unconsciously stood a little taller. “Another aspect of this dance style is improvisation. You’re still a ways from doing that yourself, but I may throw in some things from time to time as you get more acquainted with the moves.”
Nodding, Vox was curious about what kinds of things he was talking about. To Vox, all dances looked like they had to have been planned - wouldn’t the dancers all trip over each other and miscommunicate otherwise? Maybe there was some secret language dancers shared that allowed them to talk about what they’d do next.
Picking up on Vox’s confusion, Alastor readied himself again. “Here, do the swingout again and I’ll show you what I mean.”
He began the move once more, but this time it was like dancing with a whole different person. Alastor had been a little stiff and deliberately slow before to teach him, but now his movements were snappy. The wide smile on his face matched the sudden bounce to his steps, finally clueing Vox in to the “hop” part of the style’s name. The energy was contagious, and he tried to mimic it in his own movements. As Alastor pushed past him, he used his arm as a flourish; Vox copied that, too, doing a sort of one-armed jazz hand as the other performed the swingout.
Instead of turning back to Vox like he had before, Alastor stayed put. With a cheeky grin, he shuffled his feet to the beat of their invisible rhythm, smoothly snapping his hips back and forth in a little twist that made Vox’s jaw drop. They stepped in place like that another couple of times before Alastor completed the second half of the move, laughing at the captivated expression on Vox’s screen.
“You should do that every time,” he managed to squeak out after a beat, prompting another laugh from Alastor.
“If that’s your reaction to one of the most basic moves, I admit I am quite curious to see how you’d react to what I can really do!”
The prospect of Vox getting to witness Alastor truly in his element was almost too good to be true. At the same time, something protective crept up his throat. All of a sudden, now that Alastor had allowed him as a dance partner, the thought of some other demon with a hand on his waist and on the receiving end of his smug grin as he spun made him feel the same violent urge he had experienced with his superiors when he was alive.
“Hmm,” Vox muttered at length, tone sharper than he’d intended it to be. Alastor’s face reflected his confusion at this response.
“Excuse me?”
“Nothing,” he replied, filled with the immediate desire to sink into the floor.
“You know,” Alastor said, the quizzical squint still present, “I thought you’d jump at the chance to see more.”
Subconsciously, Vox’s grip on Alastor’s back tightened. “I…” Cyan spilled over his screen as he got embarrassed by his little lapse in decorum.
“It’s not that I don’t want to watch, I’m just enjoying learning from you. You seem to be enjoying teaching me,” he ventured cautiously, meeting Alastor’s gaze. “You…you are having fun with me, right…?” Vox winced at the way his voice trailed off pleadingly.
“Aha,” Alastor finally said after letting Vox’s words hang in the air for an uncomfortably long moment. “Aha,” he repeated, the confusion fully leaving his face, only to be replaced with a rather predatory grin.
Vox panicked. Quickly, he dropped his arms and stepped back, waving them defensively in front of himself.
“That’s not- I just meant-” Giving up, he pressed a hand to his screen. Alastor wasn’t an idiot - Vox had always had a bit of a possessive streak when it came to Alastor, something that was difficult not to notice. It wouldn’t take much for a man as sharp as him to put two and two together.
“Usually you’re focused on being the only one to do business with me,” Alastor continued, folding his hands behind his back. “Which I can respect, though you could stand to be less obvious about it to potential clients. What, worried I’ll find someone better than you are at something?”
Vox winced again at the jab to his narcissistic tendencies. At least his friend thought it was just a matter of needing to be the best at everything and not the temporary fit of jealousy it actually was. Alastor rolled his eyes before lightly shaking his head.
“You have nothing to get worked up over, anyways. You’re the first person I’ve bothered dancing with in decades, so you hardly have any competition,” he said, watching with an amused smile as Vox perked up almost instantly.
“Oh, yes, okay,” he said agreeably, too happy at this new revelation to feel bashful at the quick switch-up. “Can we do that again, then?”
Alastor shook his head again, but went along with it, continuing with the livelier motions until Vox had fallen into the new rhythm of waiting for Alastor to do the twists.
“You can do those with me, you know,” he said as they moved to practice it again.
“I can?” Vox had of course been trying to match the new energy level, but it never occurred to him that he could be improvising the same way Alastor was.
“In theory,” Alastor teased, watching as Vox took the bait and a determined gleam appeared in the CRT’s eyes.
“Like this, right?” Vox attempted the same quick shimmy that he’d been carefully observing, concentration written all over his face.
“That’s not bad,” his friend conceded. Vox puffed up with pride at the praise.
“Though maybe don’t stick your tongue out like that.”
It really was getting warm the more they danced. His cooling fans were working extra hard to keep up with the exercise. Instead of replying, Vox offered his hands to perform the move again, earning a chuckle from Alastor.
This time, as they reached the spot, Vox snapped his hips in sync with Alastor, trying to copy the slight tilt forward and the loose, free way the man shuffled side-to-side. He caught Alastor’s gaze, and the bolt of energy that struck him in the moment left him feeling breathless as they returned to a standstill. Alastor seemed a bit enthralled himself, humming a little tune under his breath and tapping his foot even as they had stopped moving.
Their eyes met again, and the smile that sprang to Alastor’s face felt as natural and genuine as the one on Vox’s own screen.
The evening carried on that way, with Alastor slowly introducing new moves and then practicing them until his little improvisations could be added without throwing Vox off-kilter. By the time a couple of hours had passed, both men were panting and, admittedly, a bit sore in the joints.
“Alright, I think that’s all I got in me, Al,” Vox finally said, feeling an uncomfortable burn in the arches of his feet as he walked towards the table they’d abandoned after a single drink.
“Mmm,” Alastor concurred, following in his footsteps.
As they gathered their things and made their way to the exit, Alastor turned over his shoulder to regard Vox with a smile that, if he hadn’t known better, he would almost have thought was fond.
“I admit, you learned far faster than I anticipated,” he said, sending a flutter through Vox’s chest.
“Well, it was fun, so I guess it was easy to pay attention,” Vox replied, trying not to let the comment go to his head too much.
“It was, wasn’t it?”
Vox had to stop in his tracks outside the venue to stare stupidly at his friend. While he’d inferred earlier that Alastor was enjoying himself, it was a whole other thing completely to hear him say so directly to his face.
“We- we should do it again sometime, then,” he stuttered out after a moment of trying to slow his heart down, desperate not to let the opportunity slip by him.
Alastor made a show of thoughtfully tapping a finger against his chin, humming in contemplation. “I suppose we should. Same time, same place next week?”
Vox nodded so hard it felt like his head was going to pop off, and Alastor merely waved as he headed off to wherever he called home.
Monday, Vox found as he turned to do the same, was suddenly his favorite day of the week.