Heyyy, so I have been gone for a little while, sorry. I've been busy with job hunting. Also, I got my results last week and found that I can't go to med-school because I barely passed my sciences. So now I'm taking both English at college because I'm a fucking legend when it comes to those short stories lol
Anyway, please enjoy this fic, I got the idea of Tumblr post I saw a while ago and I can't find it now so sorry but if I do find it, I'll post a link here.
Disclaimer: I don't own Assassin's Creed or it's characters. If I did, I wouldn't be writing this, I'd be sleeping with Malik. (I am so in love with him, help me)
Altair checked his phone for the third time in the last two minutes. He did this for two reasons; one, to check the time which had slowed down considerably throughout the last hour, and two, to check for a text message, or a Facebook status update, just a single sign of life from Ezio, who had stood him up, yet again.
The waitress drifted over to his table again, as she had done at least eight times since he arrived. He eyed the unopened champagne bottle in the centre of the table, and sighed.
"Are you ready to take your order yet, sir?" asked the perky young blonde on his left. She smiled sympathetically as he told her, again, that he just needed a few more minutes for his date to show up"
He hated her in that moment, as he hated anyone else who would look at him with pity. He looked up to watch the waitress walk away to find at least half the people in the restaurant staring at him with barely concealed pitiful expressions, just as she had worn.
This was easily the most irritating and embarrassing moment of his life and he decided he really couldn't take much more of this. He checked his phone again and decided that five minutes would be enough - if Ezio didn't show up by 20:45, he was leaving.
He waited semi-patiently, only checking the time twelve times before an entire fifteen minutes had passed and still no sign of Ezio.
He sighed and stood up, fishing out a fifty from his jeans and throwing it on the table, reaching to pick up the champagne bottle so he could take it with him. He was just about to walk towards the door when he heard a man's voice speaking, loudly, behind him.
"Hey, sorry, I'm late babe, traffic was a nightmare".
Altair tensed, was this man addressing him?
He turned around to find a tall, handsome man with tanned skin and dark, black hair holding his seat out for him and looking him right in the eye.
"Uhm...?" he began.
The man smiled and whispered to him as he took his seat, "I'm Malik, just go with it okay. Whoever didn't show up is a dick"
Altair shrugged and decided to go with it because the man in front of him was sweet and trying to save him and he looked pretty cute too.
They sat opposite each other and Altair opened the champagne bottle, pouring them both a glass as he introduced himself and Malik told him a little about himself.
He was just a year younger than Altair himself, who was 27, and he was taking an art course at the local college because his dream was to open his own gallery and to fill it with his own work one day.
Altair smiled as he listened to the handsome young man ramble on passionately about his art. He found himself watching the way he couldn't keep his hands still as he spoke, how he kept gesticulating wildly as he moved on to talk of his younger brother or something.
Altair simply hummed along politely until the man stopped and looked expectantly at him.
He flushed as he realised he hadn't listened to a word the man had said these past few minutes.
"Uhm...can you repeat the question?"
Malik smirked and complied "I said, 'enough about me, tell me about yourself'"
"Oh, right." Altair smiled, embarrassed. "Well, my parents are from Syria so if you picked up on an accent, well, that's where it comes from. I'm an only child but I have a cousin, Desmond - he's a bartender, but he wants to buy his own bar one day. And I work for the government"
Malik snorted, "Yeah, don't we all".
Altair smiled, he liked this guy.
They talked a little more about their living arrangements and friends and family before the question he'd been dreading finally came up.
"So, if you don't mind me asking, who were you supposed to be having dinner with? Is he cute?"
Altair was about to reply when he realised something, "Hey, wait, why'd you just assume that it was a guy I was meeting?"
Malik shrugged, "Gaydar?"
They were silent for a moment while Altair glared and Malik just looked passive before they both started laughing.
They ignored the stares they got from the other customers who were still enjoying their meals and Altair realised he still hadn't ordered anything. He looked over to the bar to find the waitress from earlier looking rather bored, chewing some gum and fiddling with her hair while stared at one of her male co-workers.
"Alright, we'll continue this when I get back, and I want a straight answer out of you" he warned.
Malik simply chuckled at the irony of the word 'straight' but nodded his head.
Altair smiled lightly and turned away to walk over to the woman at the bar to tell her that he was finally ready to order.
She forced a smile and followed him back to the table, notepad in hand and took their orders. Altair ordered a large steak while Malik asked for a vegetarian pasta dish.
The woman smiled politely as she nodded her head and asked if that was all. They told her it was and she trotted back over to the bar.
"So, vegetarian, huh?" asked Altair.
"Mmhmm, both my parents were 'militant vegans' so I just kind of grew into the lifestyle."
"What's a 'militant vegan'?"
"It's basically just a hardcore vegan, my parents would have rather died than eat meat or let me or Kadar anywhere near it"
"Kadar..your brother right? Where does he live?"
"Oh, he lives with me, we're flatmates. He keeps telling me he's going to move out and get a real job but so far, he's refusing to quit his job at KFC because he's too lazy to search for a better job"
"Wait, KFC? I thought you just said you and Kadar were vegan?"
"No, I'm only a vegetarian and Kadar doesn't really get on with our parents, I swear he only keeps the job to spite them. But he's always liked meat, he rarely ate at home when he was younger - always at a friends or McDonald's or something."
Altair hummed in acknowledgement as he filed the information away in case it ever became useful.
Their food arrived and they talked for a further hour before they realised the time and Malik had to go, he had work in the morning - selling art supplies at the local craft store.
The continued their conversation as they walked outside and Malik called a taxi. He told Altair that when his uncle Rashid had died, he'd come into a small fortune so he didn't really need a fancy job, just enough to pay his college fee as he was saving the inheritance for an emergency.
"Hey, you never told me who you came here to meet" stated Malik.
"And you never told me why you assumed I was gay, I mean, it's not like I was prancing around the place calling people 'boo' tonight".
Malik laughed at the visual and Altair smiled.
"Okay, okay," began Malik, "but if I answer your question, you have to answer mine, deal?"
"Deal" agreed Altair.
"Okay, I knew you were meeting a guy because I might have snuck behind you while you were checking your messages from some guy called Ezio."
Altair tried not to look surprised at the fact that a total stranger had been reading his texts to his boyfriend over his shoulder.
But Malik could still tell that he was a little shocked and confused.
He sighed and explained that he had a bet going with his friends about who Altair was waiting for. "I won" he grinned.
Altair flushed, was his sexuality really that obvious?
"Hey, wait a minute then, if you already knew I was meeting with a guy called Ezio, why did you ask me who I was meeting?" asked Altair, confused.
"Oh, no, I meant who is he, you know. Like, what is he like?" explained Malik.
Altair thought for a moment, "You really want to know?" Malik nodded,"Well, he's tall, almost as tall as you. He's got long brown hair which he refuses to cut even though I keep asking him too because it's really annoying when it tickles my neck."
Malik grinned, "So you're a bottom then?"
Altair flushed and chose to ignore him, "He has a weird attraction to colourful clothes, the frillier the better. He has this particular pink apron that he says he wears as a joke but I bought him a set of blue, plain ones for his birthday last year and he still continues to wear this frilly atrocity. I swear, I'm throwing it out next time he's not looking." he laughed.
Malik smiled, "So you've been together a long time?"
"No, not really. It's only been just over a year but it feels longer, you know?"
Malik hummed in agreement.
"Anyway, why did you want to know all this?" he asked.
"Well, actually I didn't. You told me what he looks like but I wanted to know what he acts like, like, what's his personality like?"
Altair blinked, what was with all the questions? "Well, he's pretty rich because his family owns a bank so he's used to the finer things, I guess. And he's always been a bit of a flirt. Scratch that, a lot a of a flirt - sometimes with me, sometimes not but he doesn't mean anything by it, he just can't hep himself. He sees a pretty face and he just has to say 'ciao bella' or something equally stupid.
"He's Italian? Damn, no wonder you fell for this jerk" smirked Malik.
"Hey, he's not a jerk, not all the time. Clearly, he just got tied up and could't make it tonight" Altair replied in his defense, "What's with all the questions anyway", he asked suspiciously.
Malik laughed as he said, "Okay, you caught me, I was gonna lead up to it but the taxi should be here soon so...do you maybe want to do this again sometime?"
Again, Altair blinked, did he just hear that right?
"Uhm, did you not just hear me talking about my boyfriend? Or what?" he questioned.
"Yeah, but honestly, he seems like a douche. I really think you'd be better without him"
Altair snorted, "Excuse me, but we just met and now you expect me to break up with the man I love after one not-date?"
The taxi picked this moment to roll up next to the curb and Malik sighed. "Tell you what, if you ever change your mind or want to go another not-date, or even if you just want to talk, here's my number." He took Altair's phone out of his hand and flicked his thumb over the screen to open it before adding his number to Altair's contacts.
He handed Altair his phone back and stood awkwardly before giving him a small hug. It only lasted a few seconds but Altair hadn't realised how much he had needed that after all he'd been through earlier this night.
Malik stood back and smiled at him before climbing in the back of the taxi and speaking to the driver. A few seconds later he was waving at Altair through the window as he pulled away from the curb.
Altair stood there for a moment, watching the cab disappear from view before he walked over to his car, a black sedan, and drove home.
Once in, he wasted no time in changing into his pajamas and getting into bed. As usual, he propped himself up in bed and scrolled through his social media for a while before sleep and stopped on something that caught his eye.
'Gr8 time with Ezio and the boys tonight at my place. Best b-day ever. Tho probably a good job that Snapchat pictures only last 10 seconds lol' -Leo da awesome.
Altair rolled his eyes at Leonardo's Facebook name but managed to simultaneously growl at Ezio's behavior. He opened his Snapchat and was hardly surprised to find dozens of pictures and videos with proof of a drunken Ezio at the party.
He sighed and wriggled his way down his bed and leant over to turn off his bedside lamp. He was about to put his phone down when it vibrated in his hand. He checked it to find that Ezio had just sent him a text.
Wondering what Ezio could possibly say to this, he opened it to find 'Sory bout date nite,, gt held up at werk :3'.
Seriously, even if he hadn't seen the status or pictures, the text would have been proof enough that Ezio had gotten drunk.
Resisting the urge to throw his phone across the room, he went to put it down again when, again, it vibrated. What now?
He opened the text to find it was from Malik. 'Had great fun with you tonight, hope we can do it again sometime :)'
He smiled at that and found he felt better, maybe he should reply, Malik was easy to talk to. He yawned and decided he would reply tomorrow instead, after he'd confronted Ezio.
He re-read the text and put his phone on charge and down on the bedside table. He stretched and turned onto his side before falling asleep with a smile on his face.
Ooh, look, it's a rare, medium-length chapter (rare for me).
Okay, so if you've checked out my DeviantArt (Vitacazzo) recently then you'll know that I actually already have the first three chapters pretty much done but I'm going to release them regularly instead of all at once so I can stay motivated, okay?
I hope you liked this chapter and the idea for this fic in general. Very little has been revealed in this chapter tbh but the basic plot for the whole fic is witten in the summary so please let me know what you think.
Vale,
Vitacazzo