The Cape Rouge, Port of Fandom, Wednesday morning

[betterthanaplan]

Waking up next to Lucifer was beginning to become a habit. Or maybe Duke just wanted it to become one. He missed waking up next to someone who wasn't a raccoon and/or probably pissed at him.

The fact that literally all they'd done was fall asleep in the same bed didn't even feel all that weird. Just . . . kind of nice. Like they'd skipped past all the messy, intense stuff and went right to the "comfortable in each other's presence with nothing to prove" part of a relationship.

Well, that was how it was for Duke anyway. Though Lucifer had said that waking up on the Rouge with Duke and Octavia had made him feel safe and comfortable, after the nightmare shit this summer.

Either way, Duke was bustling about his galley, cooking up some eggs and bacon and, of course, waffles. Theoretically this was normally when he'd be getting ready for morning yoga with Rey, but after last week. . . . Well. This was a lot more comfortable than morning yoga with Rey promised to be, right now.

[for the one]

Comments

[my_own_advocate]

It was weird. Lucifer had definitely been entirely too far on a roll last night to spend any time making internal faces at how weird it was (even though it was nice and didn't leave him with the terrible sense of loneliness that waking up alone or with Seivarden or even sometimes with Eve had struck him with over the past... whenever and anyway, he was getting off track), and now he was awake and realized that he had, so to speak, missed the 'making internal faces at how weird this is' window and was now stuck coming to terms with the fact that it was nice.

Anyway.

He was awake enough to find his trousers and his shirt and to go chasing the smell of food into the galley.

"Aren't you supposed to be off stretching ridiculously on the beach? Not that I'm complaining."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke sighed. "The last two weeks have both ended in one or the other of us storming off in a huff. I'm thinking Rey and I could use a week off."

[my_own_advocate]

"I see she's still the angry type," Lucifer said, both because his two experiences with Rey had been unpleasant and, on his side, trollish because she was unpleasant, and because Duke hadn't seemed particularly combative to him personally lately. "Ah, well. I'm hardly going to convince you to abandon breakfast."

[betterthanaplan]

"I can do some ridiculous stretching after, if you like," Duke said, setting down the first plate of waffles, along with some syrup and a dish of freshly whipped cream. "Just because I'm mad doesn't mean I have to let myself stiffen up."

[my_own_advocate]

Lucifer pulled up a chair and sat down on it, looking amused like a fifteen-year-old. "Yes, can't have that," he said, "though sometimes it does help work off your anger issues productively."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke snorted. "I don't have anger issues."

He absolutely had anger issues.

[my_own_advocate]

"You just said you were mad," said Lucifer, who didn't believe Duke had any genuine long-term anger issues, largely because, again, for whatever reason he had never really run into them.

[betterthanaplan]

"I'm allowed to be mad sometimes without it being an 'anger issue'," Duke pointed out. "Frankly, there's a lot out there for me to be mad about."

[my_own_advocate]

"Duke," Lucifer said, thinking perhaps of last night, or maybe just wanting to make this point, "Sometimes a dirty joke is just a dirty joke."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke set down a plate of bacon maybe slightly harder than necessary. "Sorry," he grumbled. "Maybe I'm a little bit defensive."

A little bit. Sure.

[my_own_advocate]

Lucifer sighed. "What is this fight even about, then?" he said, "Since you're now assaulting your own table."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke slumped into the bench across from Lucifer. "She basically told me it's my own fault shitty things keep happening to me. And then got mad at me for getting mad at her for saying it."

[my_own_advocate]

"Well, I am something of an expert in the field of making terrible things happen to myself," Lucifer mused, cutting into a waffle, "so I can see where that's a feasible idea. On the other hand, you were born in a place that seems to actively want to destroy your life, that probably has something to do with it."

Thank you, Luce.

[betterthanaplan]

"Yes, thank you," Duke said. "I mean, all I did was say that the most recent shit luck was perfectly in keeping with my usual shit luck and she was all 'well, you know that's on you, right?' And then got confused when I pointed out that was kind of a shitty thing to say. And a week later, she's poking at me to confess all my feelings to her or whatever and when I actually let myself be angry about it, suddenly I 'can't talk to her that way'."

[my_own_advocate]

"Sounds like something she'd say. Now there's someone with anger issues."

Your audience was pretty biased from the start here, Duke.

"And rude, apparently."

[betterthanaplan]

Duke snorted. "You've run into the Great Wall of Rey too, huh? Last time we fought she basically refused to talk to me until I gave in and agreed with her. Apparently I was a dick for 'blaming' her for me not finding her attractive."

He leaned back in his seat with a long sigh. "I'm just -- sick of people telling me what I'm supposed to do. Or feel. Especially when I'm not asking them to."

Claire, at least, he was paying to do exactly that. Not that she was answering her phone right now.

[my_own_advocate]

"I spoke to her twice, and both times she was extremely irritable and rude." Which was an approach to getting Lucifer to leave you alone kind of on par with trying to chase off a bear by making eye contact with it. "About sex pollen. Maybe she just has some bizarre hang-up about relationships. Whatever it is, I can't be bothered to deal with it."

He took a bite of his waffle.

"... Wait, now we're on people, plural?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Danny keeps trying to be my defacto therapist," Duke said. "He gets extra cranky when you try to turn that psychobabble back on him."

[my_own_advocate]

"Think he might have empty nest syndrome or something?" Lucifer posited.

[betterthanaplan]

"How could he? He basically lives with a toddler in the body of a ninja." Duke shook his head. "I think he's just another compulsive fixer. Just no one harasses him about it."

[my_own_advocate]

"Well, maybe if he got the ninja-toddler to sleep with him he'd finally work off some of that energy on something useful," Lucifer said, and chewed on some more waffle.

[betterthanaplan]

"Right? He gets pretty pissy when I try to bring up that, too. But Steve's so deep in his closet, I finally just backed off on that one."

[my_own_advocate]

"It's a shame, really, especially with those army types," Lucifer sighed, reaching for some bacon. "I mean, someone should be getting laid around here, since it's not going to be either of us."

You know, independently of each other.

[betterthanaplan]

"I mean, you could," Duke pointed out. "You haven't promised Chloe you're going to wait for her or anything, right?"

[my_own_advocate]

"No, she was actually rather clear on that point," Lucifer said. "I just... can't seem to find the right mood."

Well, not anywhere appropriate, anyway.