Notes: 4.01 Episode add-on. REBETA'D FROM TUMBLRPOST.
Written out of adoration for three particular FAYAZI Dresses. Visit RedWineonaVanillaSkye Tumblr for the post...
The Angel and the Fool - By Atheniandream
Schmoozing was most probably Harvey Specter's least favourite part of being a Managing Partner.
His eyes flicked to Jessica, who was stood, very demure in a electric blue gown that slid across her petite curves with ease and a collar that teamed with her sharp bun made her look like a beautiful villain from a disney movie. He examined her, poised and effortlessly charming, her dark lips parting to smile graciously at the man stood opposite, a hedge fund guy in need of a proper representation.
He was grateful for her; for their well made match. He was the killer and she was the quiet snake in the grass with a poisonous bite, able to strong arm anyone without so much as flick of her wrist.
He was a Lion, but in this arena, she was ten times more useful than he was. Sure, he was good at swanning around in a tux and maintaining their impressive reputation, But if he was honest with himself, the Met Gala was an excuse to look at some beautiful women dressed either rather peculiarly or very particularly.
He was single. It wasn't a crime. And he knew he had the moves. Unlike Louis.
He had watched that guy strike out more times than he himself had succeeded, and judging his own reputation around town that was a…large number, to say the least. These days he was rather proud of the fact. Bachelors and all that..
His eyes landed on Rachel, looking unsure of herself and strangely ethereal in a gold number, sheer and backless, from what he could tell, with Mike's hand pressed proudly up against it. He looked up to see Mike give him a curt nod.
Their relationship was strained at the moment - to say that least - but that didn't mean they weren't still friends. He hoped anyway. Playing hardball wasn't quite as fun with a person who used to play for your own team when he was now heading his own. So much more to lose on both sides… He nodded back, the strained feeling in his gut easing when Mike's eyes cooly left his.
Looking back to Rachel, it reminded him that she was a strangely over-analysing girl; something delicate about her like she would eventually crack under all the pressure but still try to assure you she wasn't going to long after the whistle ha been blown. After 3 months he still couldn't put a finger on what he didn't like about her professionally. Personally, she was nice enough, and a good friend of Donna's, so something had to be said for that, but.
Something was off about the girl no matter how much Donna tried to assure him there wasn't.
Which brought him to her… Donna.
Someone whom he hadn't glimpsed all evening. No doubt she had still been pissed about getting caught up in he and Mike's recent shit fight, and how he'd inevitably snapped at her for once again preaching the moral ethics of law to him when he hadn't asked for it. He couldn't put a finger on the agitation that enveloped recently, every time she started to lecture him on whatever it was that he was doing wrong that day. Even if she was right, in the end, it crawled up his ass whenever she lorded her supposed 'omniscience' over him.
He sipped his Champagne, finishing the glass before popping it onto the tray held by a very pretty girl, who glanced towards him as he smirked briefly back, then thought better of the challenge. His attention caught immediately, double taking at the end of the busy hallway, a mass of red and orange sashaying vaguely in his direction.
He snapped his mouth shut after the fifth second...
Sometimes it was hard to believe this woman was an assistant to a Lawyer, he thought to himself.
Right now she looked like…a model. Which for her age was beguiling, to say the least.
She looked taller somehow, with her violent crimson dress peeling off of one shoulder and very skin tight like she'd been poured into it, as it dripped down her thighs and fell into ripples onto the floor around her. Her hair was enormous, like something out of a sixties science fiction novel, large and slightly 'poofy' at the edges, with large watery gold earrings on either side of her face highlighting her her sharply kohl-rimmed eyes and dress-matching lips. He took in a short breath, his chest puffing out, a questioning look falling onto his face as her eyes countered his. He straightened when he noticed the obvious and yet completely missed tall, darker skinned man who's arm she was draped over, proudly escorting her through the crowd in a similar tux to him.
When he expected her to stop just in front of him, she paused about ten foot away, the man saying something indecipherable to her and then kissing her lavishly on the cheek and squeezing her arm before passing her to wander in another direction. The look she shot him was rather calculated, again, annoying him slightly as she closed the rest of the distance with a quicker pace.
"Who's the date?" He asks her, his jaw twitching as his cheekbones sharpened.
"That's really the first thing you have to say to me?" She replies, predatorily leaning in to close the large gap between them. She smelled like coconut and orange.
"Who's the date?" He presses, rolling his eyes tiredly.
"The designer of…" She pointed to the dress, "This." She says, with a sharp hazel coloured glint in her eye.
"Moved on from Investment bankers and Doctors now, have we?" He remarks, his hands stuffing themselves into his pockets.
"What I do or don't move on or off of is none of your concern, thank you." She smiles, a shit eating grin that puffes her chest out and her collarbones to poke slightly through her translucent skin. When she looks away from him she looks like a swan painted red. Dangerous. Graceful. Long-necked. Volatile. "And for your information - not that you'd be at all interested - but he's responsible for Rachel and Jessica's dresses too."
"What is he, the firm's designer?" He says, rather pig-headedly scoffing at her. He can't help it. It's reactive with her.
"No. Just a good and talented old friend." She huffs matter-of-factly, before gliding past him.
He isn't sure how the impulse strikes, and why now of all of the places it does, but as he grabs for her hand, yanking her back to him, the look she fires at him, bird-like and startled has his mouth falling out into self satisfied grin, the previous tension partly abated just by the feeling she encourages in him.
"What are you-" She scrambles for the words, taken aback at his action as he cuts her off.
"You look stunning, by the way." He says, purposefully ogling her, much to her dissatisfaction.
"That's not an apology." She points out, dead-panned.
"I'm not apologising." He admits, smirking at her almost outrage.
"Then we have nothing to talk about." She says, yanking her hand back with a dissatisfied huff.
"Are you…naked underneath that?" He asks boldly, unnaturally as his libido takes over for a briefly allowed moment.
"Hitting on me…also not an apology." She remarks roughly, gathering her dress, to swish past him; that raw, annoyed look on her beautiful face.
He's certain then.
There's something disjointed about them lately.
And he has no idea why…but it makes him want to rip all of her clothes off and write his name over very inch of skin with just his tongue...
He isn't stupid.
He knows he can't.
And the knowledge of that is more deafening than the sharp sound of her heels on the marble floor as her rather pert derriere glides expertly away from his dumb ass.
But he smiles to himself anyway, and grabs at a glass of passing champagne to dull the fact.
'She found herself in a world full of men
Watching them slowly destroy all her plans
'Cause all the love she won't allow
Herself to even dream about
Well both of us are older now, and it won't be long
The early morning siren
Is growing louder now
'Cause waking up is hard enough when there's no one else around' - 'The Angel and the Fool' By Broken Bells.