Arthur sighed deeply as he stared at the phone in his hands, struggling to decide whether to call him or not. If he didn't make a decision soon, the time wasted just sitting at his desk and staring at his phone would cut into his work schedule, and there was no way he could let that happen. Even now, this was just a brief interlude from his work, a treat that he didn't always give himself.
He took steady breaths as he contacted Alfred F. Jones, his boyfriend, and waited for the rings to dissolve into the obnoxious American's voice. However, Alfred never picked up. Instead, there was a click, and then Alfred's voice stating very confidently: "Hey dude! I'm probably busy doing something right now, so leave a message after the beep! If this is Matthew, your hockey sticks are in the closet."
Feeling as though a weight had been semi-lifted from his chest, Arthur waited for the beep and then said, "Hello, this is Arthur. I regret to inform you but I am unable to make it to our engagement tomorrow. Perhaps we could reschedule? No, I mean..." He felt his cheeks heat and sighed. "Call me." He then very decidedly tapped the END button.
Arthur didn't understand what it was about the concept of dating that made him so flustered and he honestly didn't want to think about it. It was easier to focus on his work, something that was predictable and didn't require any emotions to deal with. Arthur placed his phone on his desk and thus returned to the monitor seated in front of him, a screen brimming with numbers and words: predictable information.
Just as Arthur began typing, however, the phone at his elbow began to vibrate, sending a jolt through him. He swept his arm against the table, accidentally pushing his phone off its surface. Thus, it ended up on the floor with Arthur leaning down to peer at the caller. Bold letters spelled out Alfred's name; below that was a picture of him, his sapphire eyes glimmering behind the frame of his glasses, his fingers formed into a peace sign beside his face.
Arthur almost didn't answer it, he really didn't, but he succumbed to that face full of mirth and managed to push beside his cowardice enough to lift his phone off the floor and answer the boisterous man's call.
"Hello?" Arthur inquired as he leaned back in his seat, slightly perplexed as to how Alfred so quickly received his voicemail. When he said 'call me,' he hadn't expected a response so quickly.
"Hey Arthur! I sent you to voicemail by mistake," Alfred explained, very quickly answering Arthur's inquiry, "and I wanted to ask you if you really couldn't come tomorrow."
"Yes, it turns out that I have a lot of paperwork I need to finish tonight, so much that I might still be working on it tomorrow and thus won't have the time to make it to our date. I wouldn't want to let you down, so it made sense to me that I cancel our date altogether instead of keeping your hopes up for nothing."
"Dude, that's really generous of you and everything, but you shouldn't cancel unless you're super sure that you can't make it!" Alfred exclaimed, his voice ringing joyously in Arthur's ears. Really? He wasn't disappointed at all? "Our date isn't 'til tomorrow, so let's wait until then to see if you can come or not." He sounded so determined, exultant, and full of faith that it was almost sickening.
In all actuality, Arthur could probably finish his paperwork in an hour or two, and he still had all evening to complete it before tomorrow. Even if he hadn't somehow finished the paperwork, Arthur would have the rest of the weekend to work on it, although Alfred (thank God) didn't know that. If that was so, then what was the problem, one might ask? The answer was that, by the time Arthur and Alfred had gone on their first date, Alfred had already planned their second and Arthur was in too good a mood to turn him down, no matter which event Alfred had planned. Unfortunately for Arthur, he had foolhardily agreed when Alfred suggested that they go skating, despite his severe lack of athleticism and even worse ability to do things that required partnership.
Arthur really didn't want to go skating but now he was second-guessing himself. He didn't want to deceive Alfred and end up regretting it when he heard the disappointed lilt in his voice, but he also didn't want to break his leg skating for what would easily be the second or third time in his life. This was a lose-lose situation that he wished-no, begged-to be freed from.
"...I'll see if I can make it," Arthur relented, already hearing Alfred's pacified sigh. "What was the address for the rink again?" He queried and briskly scribbled it down when Alfred repeated it to him.
The time had finally come. Arthur had spent all morning trying to prepare himself for it and then most of noon trying to avoid it. In the end, however, Arthur still retained the same dejected visage, evocative of a child finally relenting when he is taken to the dentist to have a tooth torn out. Arthur could only hope that this experience was less painful and that he would heal more quickly after it was over.
He donned a black pea coat over the green turtleneck he was already wearing and double checked to make sure that he had his phone with him in case Alfred cancelled. Then, Arthur drove to the rink, trying to avoid imagining the future scenarios of what would happen once he got there.
It turned out that Arthur was early and that there were many people already filling the rink, so he waited in the café just feet away from the ice. Alfred had chosen the Rockefeller Center as the spot for their skating, although Arthur would have preferred to be viewed by a smaller crowd. At least they had agreed to skate at a later time, suggesting that perhaps the crowds would thin as the night drew on, although they were living in a city that essentially didn't sleep...
Arthur shook his head, hoping that the friction might dislodge some of his tension. He shouldn't be spending his time thinking about the people or the reputation of the rink he was skating at. He was here to have a good time and have fun, despite whatever he had been telling himself.
"Yo, Arthur!" Alfred's voice called for him as he entered the café, heads turning to watch him as he approached Arthur, Arthur's heart freezing when the eyes transferred to him. Alfred didn't have his skates on yet but carried a bag in his hand, presumably with the skates inside. With any chance, he only brought one pair.
"God Alfred, no need to yell," Arthur mumbled to him as he joined him at his seat, placing his bag directly on the table and pulling out two brand new pairs of skates. The tags were on them and everything. If Alfred hadn't owned a pair before this, then maybe that meant that he also didn't have any former skating experience. Maybe Arthur was saved—although from what, he didn't know.
"Good thing I got here early," Alfred mused, "otherwise you might have been really disappointed when I got here late, right?"
"On time is fine too," Arthur retorted, his eyes dancing between the skates Alfred had brought and the American himself. He was bewildered beyond belief by the prospect of gifting him a pair of skates that he may or may not fit into, let alone use. Alfred must have used quite a bit of guesswork when he was purchasing these. "Are one of these pairs for me?" He queried.
Alfred nodded his head as he handed Arthur his pair, a pleasant black pair that Arthur was more than content with. "Yeah, I bought you a pair. I hope that's okay. I didn't really know if you already owned a pair or not or anything like that, but I took the gamble anyways and bought them for you, since I wanted to make sure that you could skate with me today."
Arthur wished that he hadn't said such sweet words now that he knew what Alfred was expecting of him. "You know they have rental skates here, right?" He queried with a squinted glance.
Alfred lightly laughed and awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. "Well..."
"I still value the sentiment," Arthur told him.
"Thanks Arthur," Alfred acknowledged and then rose to his feet. "Let's get ready to skate!" He then bellowed, and led Arthur out to the rink.
At the beginning, everything had started out fine. Surprisingly, Arthur's skates had fit nicely, as did Alfred's. Alfred, a surprisingly forward thinker, had purchased tickets for them so that they could skate no matter how full the rink got. Alfred had handed Arthur his ticket and told him that it came with free chocolate, although Arthur didn't entirely believe him, and then he had left to go skating.
Now, he was watching Alfred skate on the ice by himself, his bomber jacket unzipped (despite the outrageous cold) and his gloved hands outstretched as though he were flying through air. He breezed past all the other people skating on the ice, thus defeating Arthur's notion that he would, at some point, fall. If Arthur were honest, (which he was all the time,) he would have admitted that Alfred's skating was superb, not decent; he had avoided at least two head-on collisions with strangers with the simple twist of his ankles and had done one figure eight without batting an eyelash.
I could never do that, Arthur thought, and turned his eyes away, trying to feign indifference. At least he was comforted by the slim odds that he would be left alone and not forced to skate, the only thing barring him from complete desolation.
"Hey Arthur, are you all right?" Alfred asked him, gliding to a stop by the railing where Arthur stood, shattering another frail ray of hope. Arthur rose his eyes and glanced at Alfred, acknowledging that his hair was a mess, some of the tresses fuzzed out in a wayward fashion. The disheveled hairdo looked nice on him.
"Why do you ask? I'm fine," Arthur replied solidly, quickly breaking eye contact. His peripheral vision caught Alfred leaning over in an attempt to reappear in his line of vision.
"I ask because, frankly, you look cold and miserable," he replied unabashedly, Arthur's eyes returning to his. "Come on! Skate with me! You can hold my hand if you want," he urged, although the only response Arthur allowed him was an uncontrolled reddening of the cheeks and a firm "no thank you."
He saw that Alfred's face took a brief, downward turn before he smiled again, this time more encouragingly. "This is supposed to be a date, Arthur," he replied with a huff, "but it can't be if we're not spending time together. I didn't bring you here to see you sit on the sidelines the whole time. Won't you please go out and have fun with me?"
Alfred had a point and Arthur felt that it was his duty not to let the other down too much. If he had wanted to disappoint Alfred, he could have stayed at home like he had planned to do. It would defeat the purpose of Arthur's coming here if he just wasted it making Alfred disappointed in him anyways. Suddenly, he didn't want to see a frown on Alfred's lips. He didn't come here to make Alfred waste his time giving him a pep speech he shouldn't have had to give.
With a deep, resolute sigh, Arthur conceded. "Fine, I will go," he informed, "but if you leave my side I will not talk to you for a week." It only seemed fair since, if he was going to fall, he didn't want to be deserted and forced to get up on his own (and he was going to fall).
Alfred's eyes lit up almost as brightly as the large Christmas tree glimmering behind him. "I won't, I promise," Alfred stated, then skated to reach around the railing and pull Arthur onto the ice with him.
"Alfred-" Arthur had warned before Alfred grabbed his hand, but then lost his voice the second he was standing in the foreign landscape of strangers and ice. Suddenly, Arthur lost the will to speak. He felt as though his heart was skipping several beats as his feet immediately lost traction, legs going limp like jelly. He scrambled to clutch at Alfred (only as a means of support, mind you) as his feet slid against the ice and made Arthur do an awkward form of the splits.
He was so horrified by the thought of being caught falling, of perhaps being bumped into or pushed to the ice or even bruising himself in the aftermath of falling that he didn't immediately register that Alfred was laughing at him.
There were so many unexpected things to like about Alfred, like his beautiful eyes, smooth voice, his kindness, and even his lack of observational skills. Now, Arthur could also add his laugh to that list. It sounded so bubbly and sweet, even breathless, nothing like the faked laughs or the malice-filled ones Arthur had heard before. He was impressed by how light the atmosphere became just by the sound of it, but more importantly how light he felt because of it. Sure Arthur hadn't known the American very long and he was accustomed to disliking loud, obliviously obnoxious people, but he had a feeling that he liked Alfred, even though he did have his bad traits.
"Oh my God, Arthur! You should have told me that you couldn't skate!" Alfred chuckled, his hands gliding against Arthur's waist.
Arthur, who had wrapped his arms around Alfred's midsection to prevent himself from falling, felt his face heat at the contact. "Help me up, won't you?" he stated, reaching down for the hands wrapped around his waist, immediately regretting it when he lost the weight that was preventing him from slipping entirely.
Warm hands found Arthur's cold ones and held on tightly as Alfred pulled him back onto his own feet. Arthur remained as still as a rock through the whole thing, thinking that moving his legs might make him stumble again.
"Jeez, your hands are really cold," Alfred observed, releasing a hand at a time so that he could pull his gloves off and hand them to Arthur. "I guess I was more right than I thought when I said that you were cold and miserable."
Arthur accepted his gloves and slid them on, sending Alfred a soft, slightly copy smile as a means of thank you.
Alfred grinned at the slight smile and squeezed Arthur's then-gloved hands. "Hey, do you want to hear something really corny?" He asked, to which Arthur hesitantly nodded his head. He brought Arthur towards the rails as he inquired, "How much does a polar bear weigh?"
Arthur pondered the question. They had to be pretty big, bigger than at least four people... "Two hundred kilograms?" He pondered, watching Alfred expectantly for the proper answer.
"...Enough to break the ice!" Alfred smirked defiantly, as though he were saying something witty, but Arthur couldn't find the hilarity in the joke. His eyebrows curled upwards in bewilderment and he cast Alfred an inquiring look that he hoped told the other how badly he needed a proper explanation.
"You don't get it?" Alfred queried, frowning at Arthur's confused expression. "It makes perfect sense! Break the ice? Get it?"
Apparently, he was still expecting the punch line to make sense but Arthur was already losing interest. If it didn't make total sense the first time then Arthur would rather not waste his time trying to decipher the joke. "I don't get it Alfred," he informed, feeling the smallest offense when Alfred looked at him like he was crazy. "Why don't you explain it, you git, because I obviously don't understand," Arthur grumbled impatiently.
"Fine, even though you should have known it," Alfred retorted in the same grumbling tone. "'Break the ice' is a term you use when you're, like, meeting someone for the first time. If it's really awkward between you and someone else, you might talk about the weather to break the ice."
Ugh! The explanation had been so simple and Alfred had been right—he had known what it meant! The meaning having slipped his mind, Arthur felt the embarrassment creep up on him by the time Alfred's explanation was finished.
"You're such a dork," Arthur mumbled, although it didn't prevent his face from still feeling hot. There was no better way to stave off the cold than constantly embarrassing yourself.
"Thanks," Alfred replied lightly, squeezing Arthur's hand and sending out another heatwave. He had to stop doing that. "You don't know how to skate, right? Do you mind if I teach you?"
"Well... this is a date, right? I have nothing else better to do," Arthur replied, without much forethought. Alfred's cheery demeanor had calmed him down enough that he trusted Alfred to, at least, not let go of him if his legs failed him.
PAGE BREAK
"Mmmm!" Alfred hummed beside Arthur as he drank his fresh hot chocolate. Arthur could feel his legs swinging underneath the table, as though the American were a child (and he knew deep down that he really was).
Arthur took a sip of his own chocolate, watching Alfred from across the table, as he considered how much fun he had had tonight, against everything he had told himself. Alfred had taught him how to skate, and although it had taken enormous patience not to yell at the git sometimes, in the end he was able to skate better than he had started, and that was all he needed to consider this date worth it (if not for Alfred's smiling face as well). Surprisingly, Arthur had only fallen once or twice—and that was when Alfred had fallen with him. As Alfred had said, he kept to his promise and stayed by Arthur's side, doing all he could to keep Arthur on his feet until he lost his balance and was pushed to the ground with him. Arthur was grateful that Alfred had taken the falls so good-naturedly or surely he would have given up skating in less than ten minutes.
He caught himself briefly remembering the warm sensation of Alfred's hand curled around his waist when he directed Arthur on how to move his feet when he skated. Alfred's voice had been surprisingly stern and serious, Arthur finding himself respecting the younger for that.
"Did you have a fun time tonight?" Alfred asked him, lowering his mug and leaving a trail of chocolate above his lip: a milk mustache.
"Surprisingly, I did," Arthur replied, and then reached over to wipe the milk away with a napkin, earning him an unexpected look of embarrassment from Alfred, whose cheeks had become a soft, rosy color. Served him right since Arthur's had been practically all night.
"What do you mean 'surprisingly?'" Alfred responded as Arthur leaned away, his hands raised to rub away any smidgen of hot chocolate left on his face, even though Arthur had already done a thorough job of cleaning it.
"Well..." Arthur glanced to the window overlooking the skating rink and considered his words carefully. He didn't want to hurt Alfred's feelings or offend him, but he also wanted to be honest, perhaps even if it hurt to hear the truth. The best he could do was tell Alfred and then apologize and explain to him that his mind had changed. "I didn't actually want to come tonight because I was afraid that I would fall," he explained feebly.
"And?" Alfred was listening attentively, as though he were still waiting for a proper explanation.
"That's it," Arthur replied, his eyebrows knitting together in confusion. He didn't understand. Wasn't Alfred supposed to be upset that he hadn't been able to defeat such a small fear?
Alfred reached for Arthur's hands and he willingly complied, his thin fingers still covered with Alfred's surprisingly warm gloves. Somehow, however, Alfred's hands were still warm without them. "I'm a little surprised that you'd be willing to cancel our date just because you couldn't skate," he mused, "because we could have changed plans or you could have told me yesterday."
"But I didn't want to tell you!" Arthur rebuked. "What would you have said if I had told you that I couldn't ice skate? You would have been disappointed when you realized that I didn't have any interest, and might have even treated me as a burden..."
Alfred scoffed, Arthur feeling himself prickle at the sound. "Did I?" He inquired. "I had a lot of fun teaching you, Arthur!"
"Even though I stumbled all over the place and people stared at us the whole time?" Arthur felt his heart throb against his ribcage, on-edge. He was letting his walls down for once and didn't want to be judged for it, didn't want Alfred to take notice and strike at him when he was in such an exposed state. He was almost expecting Alfred to say something, beginning to suspect that maybe next time Alfred scoffed it wouldn't be to say something nice.
"Arthur, that was the funnest part," Alfred argued. "I haven't had that much fun since Matthew and I were leaning to skate. Matthew is my brother, and he's also a great hockey player, but he had to start out just as clumsily as you had to get as good as he is now. I'm honestly super grateful that you let me teach you, because I don't think I would have had as much fun if you already knew what you were doing."
Arthur felt him squeeze as his hand as he replied. ""Thank you so much for saying that. It means a lot to me."
He saw that other people were casting glances at them but didn't let it bother him this time, although it would probably be best to refrain from making too many people uncomfortable. Arthur did want to be alone with Alfred anyways, so this was his chance to escape.
"Would you mind walking me to my car?" He inquired, to which Alfred shook his head as he stood.
"Nah, I don't have anywhere to be right now," he replied.
Arthur rose with him, keeping his hand cradled in Alfred's as they left the café and took a short trek to his car.
"The tree looks really beautiful, huh?" Alfred acknowledged as they walked away from it, his head turned for a moment to glance back at its lights.
"Mhm. Christmas trees are nice, but I prefer ones that are basic," he explained.
He heard Alfred's gentle chuckle and smiled at it, his heart warming to the sound. He could get used to hearing it. "That sounds like something you'd say," Alfred noted. "But me? Well, I love the really bright Christmas trees the most, with the different ornaments and candy canes on the branches," he stated. "If Matthew would let me, I'd decorate my tree to be really patriotic," he informed, "with only red, white, and blue."
It was Arthur's turn to laugh. "And that sounds like something you'd say," he rebutted, soaking in Alfred's priceless, stunned expression.
He stopped on the sidewalk, motioning to his car. "Thank you for giving me a fun time," he stated, "I actually really enjoyed it."
Alfred exhaled deeply, then rubbed the back of his head. "Yeah..." there was a pause and a downward glance to his feet.
Arthur couldn't believe that he was being bashful now, after everything they'd discussed. How could he have nothing else to say? Arthur could have imagined him saying something encouraging or sweet, but saying nothing at all was a big surprise for him. Was he okay?
"Alfred, are you-" just as he was about to ask, Arthur's voice was torn away when he felt a curled finger of Alfred's underneath his chin, lifting it to bring Arthur's lips closer to his.
The kiss was briefer and lighter than Arthur had hoped it to be. He wasn't sure what he was expecting, but he knew it hadn't been that. Where was the passion, the desperation? As a person, Alfred was very outgoing and foolhardy, and Arthur had braced for his kiss to be the same. When Alfred pulled away with a small smile on his face, Arthur felt his heart take a short drop. That was the unease he had been hoping wouldn't plague Alfred, the tentative, almost questionable disappointment he had been trying to avoid producing. How ironic it was that it wouldn't be Arthur who inflicted it.
"Alfred, you need to know that I'm not always going to be as forthcoming with my feelings as I was tonight, and that I'm not always going to want to put aside my pride to admit how I really feel. It's something I have a good deal of trouble doing. For that, I want to give something to you in advance to make future experiences more tolerable for you."
He could see that he had really hooked Alfred's curiosity now, his eyes like windows spread wide open, all the light and curiosity flooding in through that narrow expanse of space.
Arthur took a deep breath. It was true that he was terrible when it came to things like love and that he had trouble expressing his feelings, but he felt at peace with that fact and didn't mind that it was true. Even so, Alfred had done something very important for him, whether he knew it or not: he had broken through Arthur's barriers on the second date, something no one had ever done before, and he deserved a thank you for it.
Arthur leaned forward and lifted himself slightly on his toes so he could reach the proper height to kiss Alfred. His hand tentatively went to Alfred's shoulder and he closed his lips around the taller male's, pivoting Alfred's shoulder so that he was at a slight lean towards him.
When he had initiated the kiss, Arthur had no idea whether Alfred would be welcoming or not. He didn't worry himself with how Alfred felt, only intent on breaking past the walls of Alfred's lips with his tongue, on transferring all his gratitude and happiness into a language that Alfred could feel and respond to.
He hadn't known that he was tense until Alfred's second hand let go of his and both hands joined around his waist. That was when Arthur's shoulders melted and Alfred leaned intimately into Arthur's private space, Arthur's hands then rising to swing around Alfred's neck. At first, they kissed tentatively, the kisses growing fiercer as Arthur adjusted and conveyed more properly, mostly through muffled groans and flicks of his tongue, approximately what he wanted. He was substantially impressed by the skill that Alfred exhibited over him, mostly because he had such good control of satisfying Arthur's desires, having a gesture to rebuttal each one Arthur made.
At some point, Arthur didn't know when, his back was greeted with the cold metal of his car and there were cool fingers thumbing through his hair, the already disheveled tresses becoming a more strangled mess. Arthur felt the heat of Alfred's breath as it drummed past his cheek and down the cold gap between his sweater and skin. He suppressed an ungodly sound rising through his throat- a moan- and pulled away from Alfred's imploring kisses.
"I... thought we... were only skating..." he muttered tiredly, mostly to himself, in wild disbelief that he had instigated this.
"You started it," Alfred replied in a good-natured and taunting tone, consolidating to Arthur that he had.
He pulled his hands away to flatten his hair, feeling the fingers shaky with adrenaline. Alfred was right. He had forgotten that this was his gift to him. "So I did," he stated, somewhat more level-headedly.
Alfred stepped away from the car, giving Arthur the chance to regain his dignity and maybe retain the look that they hadn't just been making out in the middle of the sidewalk. "Thanks again for coming out tonight. It was super fun teaching you how to skate."
Arthur nodded his head, feeling his face finally cool.
"Next I was thinking that we could go together to one of my brother's hockey matches, but I have to warn you: he never loses."
That lilt of determination made a smile resurface on Arthur's lips. He nodded his head again, this time while fishing the keys from his pocket. "I'd love to go," he stated, pulling out his keys, the metal jingling together, "but I have to warn you as well: don't be expecting a kiss like that any time soon."
For the third time that night he heard Alfred laughing. "I won't," he replied. "I seriously don't think I could handle another one like that in the next week," he joked.
Alfred said his goodbyes then left, trudging down the sidewalk a minute later. For a moment, Arthur remained behind to watch him, thinking of how foolish he had been to even consider cancelling their date. The next unimportant paperwork came up, he was definitely going to miss out on it for Alfred, the American who made perfect figure eights and told corny pickup lines.