Chapter Text
People have a horrible way of making others' weddings about themselves. Presently, her date, rich, blonde, perfect, is networking with the couple seated next to them—also lawyers, personal injury. The kind that, when asked to join a newish firm, the associates know it's time to start hunting for a job. (Thea is a special sort of bastard for her ability to specialize in mergers and acqs, but her wins bring in the money, and she's told this counts for something, keeping her far above these bottom feeders in the hierarchy of the most hated profession in the world.)
The only thing of import to the stranger sat across her—the couple is made up of an unassuming man with a receding hairline and his affable (effable too, if Alistair's lean-in to laugh at everything she has to say offers any indication) girlfriend wearing possibly the most perfect shade of red lipstick for her—is the bowl of warm olives at their table. It was staged on the grazing table (an excuse to skip serving hors d'oeuvres, works well with this barnyard theme people still haven't moved past) when they first sat down, has since moved so he doesn't have to reach every two seconds. Thea cannot tear her eyes away from the fleck of black olive stuck to his left incisor everytime he bares his teeth to strip the flesh stuck to the olive's core. He's, of course, blissfully unaware of her study, in search of his next victim, fingers hovering over green or black or green. He interrupts the woman beside him for the upteenth time within the hour.
Alistair has her attention the moment his hand rests on her thigh—lower, close to where her knee begins—but he's still talking to the man (the woman has given up, she’s on her phone now) about the firm widening their breadth of services. Casual, that touch. Unfitting for people who've never went out for dinner. People who usually make out in utility closets or boardrooms after everyone has left for the evening. Then, what does she know about the typical sequence of affairs in nascent entanglements.
Alistair has her attention so she catches the last of his speech: "…we work for the same firm. Actually, hot off the presses, as of April, I'm partner."
"Wait, what?" comes out before she can swallow it.
The awful man with his briny finger (Thea has decided against learning his name) has seized his chewing and is watching her as well. Chatter continues at other tables around them, loud enough that Alistair's response almost drowns out. "They said they would talk to you."
Alistair's worst trait is his unwavering sincerity. One might wonder how he can succeed in his, or any really, line of work without the ability to mask his immediate reactions. She smiles, "Emily was busy all afternoon."
"Listen, Jerry will retire anyday now and—"
"It's fine! Honestly. They couldn't have picked someone more, hm, fitting for their brand."
Their table mates are failing at hiding the amusement from their features. Thea cannot help the images of them surrounded by a room full of short, wrinkled men and their no-older-than-thirty wives laughing as these two retell the story.
Her internal clock, all of a sudden, marks every two beats per passing second. "Might be a good time to take that sabbatical."
Turning to the pair, she explains, "I found out my biological father croaked. Turns out, he's loaded. Or—was. Turns out, I'm loaded."
There's a look in the woman's eyes—pity or understanding and because Thea has decided she doesn't want this woman sympathy (they're not the same), she stands. Alistair's hand falls from her leg as his eyes (like a golden retriever begging for its afternoon shit-walk) query. She reaches for her purse. She smiles. Feels it tight on her face. Figures Alistair won't dwell on the meaning behind it for too long. "Excuse me. I need to run to the bathroom." Rushes off before the beautiful woman with the strawberry blonde hair can offer to join.
Two people she has spoken to no more than twice in her life attempt to cut her path as she's weaving through the tables arranged far too close together; answers a mock call to skirt past them. The bathrooms are outside the hall, doors on the direction opposite to where she's headed, but Thea has spotted the bar. The young man tending it, wiping the countertop, marks her approach and attempts to mouth that they're closed.
She stops to say: "Two shots of the best vodka you have, then a beer. Anything light is fine."
He watches her for a long moment while he decides. Thea stares back. She's unsure what he has read on her face, doesn't ask, texting Morrigan the latest when he moves to pour. She won't respond for the next while—unplugged hours with Kieran or something. But Thea has finished her crossword of the day and deleted all the farming sims from her phone, so she has no other distractions to offer her thumbs. Luckily, the bartender—Ezra, if his name tag can be relied upon—places the shots in front of her to put her shaky hands out of their misery.
"You alright?"
She shoots both before answering. "Great. Excellent. Weddings. You go to a lot?"
Mid beer is always an awful chase for vodka, but Thea has never taken to dark liquors and the thought of shooting tequila alone makes even her sad.
Ezra dips his head as she slips a ten in the tip jar. "Served at enough to know when someone's having a bad time."
She turns to lean against the bar top. To her left, Lel and Josie are clinking their glasses to get everyone's attention. Thea says, "People have a habit of making others' weddings about themselves." A man who appears in his 50s (the bride's uncle or father or maybe much older brother) shushes the room when the crystal singing against the mic doesn't work. "I happen to also be people."
The newly wedded couple is invited to the dance floor. (Not before Lel and Josie make a wisecrack on the pair lost in one another and what this might mean for the rest of their lives.) The person who thought to serve shareable marinated olives before a three course dinner must've also planned the layout of the room; the bar is on the dance floor. Thea, now front and centre, has the best view in the house of the couple's first dance as husband and wife. People crowd around her eventually to watch as well and Thea catches a woman, the bride's great aunt, tell a story about the pair taking her to a Paul Simon concert on the first anniversary of her wife's death. Hating it. Promising the woman anyway that they would dance to Still Crazy After All These Years at their wedding just for her.
Her face stings as the song plays. Thea's chest tightens as it does when she's fighting sentiment from bubbling up past her chest, and because fate exists and because she's an asshole (fate, not her, well, both), her eyes land on lavender eyes she has successfully avoided for a decade. (They're as element to her. But, to date, couldn't describe them to save the world.) He isn't taken aback by her presence as she is his, and Thea wonders when he first saw her this evening. (He wasn't at the ceremony. Lel and Josie said he'd cancelled last minute. Maryden was angrier than Cole, apparently. A missing groomsman skewed the wedding party to odd.)
She should look away. The song has changed to something better, the bride and the groom are dancing with parents (or uncles or much older brothers) now. Josie and Leliana have joined them on the dance floor. The longer she watches, the more these details disappear to her periphery. Solas smiles at her and her heart sinks and her face heats. His lips part to say something. She curses her instincts for robbing her of agency, finds herself straightening her dress, moving to set her drink aside, to walk over to him.
But a tall woman with bright purple hair and small hoops pierced into the pointed parts of her ears takes his hand and leads him to the dance floor. The spell breaks, and despite the static in her chest, Thea's glad for it.
They were horrible together.
She turns to Ezra, drops 200 into the jar and tells him to keep them coming as she chugs the rest of her beer. She should just go home. She stays, likely for the same reason she came at all tonight.