Romance is boring

Chapter 7: You! Me! Dancing!

That same evening. At Jude's apartment.

'How do I look?' Zero asked, pressing his palm flat to his scalp and sliding his hand back to smooth down his hair.

'Pretty,' Jude flippantly answered. 'You always look pretty. Why are you consulting me?'

Zero turned to grin at him.

'You're the one who's gonna be looking at me,' he replied. Jude raised an eyebrow.

'I see myself twice a day,' Zero explained patiently. 'When I'm brushing my teeth in the morning and when I brush my teeth in the evening.'

'Like you don't stop in front of every shop window to admire yourself,' Jude scoffed. Zero thought that he sounded hilariously catty. Kind of like how he had sounded at Lionel's wedding when he'd nonchalantly told a girl who was hitting on Zero that the man in question had crabs. It was funny, because it was Jude and he was fucking adorable when attempting to be snide.

'There's much to admire,' Zero agreed, smirking. Jude scowled. It was so easy to wind him up. They made their way downstairs in total silence.

'I don't even know where we're going,' Jude complained in the car, breaking the silence.

'You'll see,' Zero cryptically responded, checking the side mirrors for traffic and checking out Jude in one fell swoop. Jude looked fine. Good enough to eat. His dress shirt gave away tantalizing glimpses of the body underneath every time he moved. It was clear that there was some serious muscle on him.

Jude also looked incredibly nervous. His eyes were bright with anxiety. He couldn't stop fiddling with his seatbelt. Seriously, he was behaving as if he was afraid that the night might end with him dead in a hole in the desert.

'Why are you always so tense?' Zero asked. 'You're going to give yourself a heart attack one of these days.'

Jude didn't respond, except by peering out of the window and trying to guess where they were going. When Zero stopped the car and got out, Jude uncertainly followed. Zero pointed at the entrance of a club.

'A gay club? Are you kidding?' Jude snapped.

'It's for you. Because you're the best agent ever.'

'I'll take a cheque instead, thanks.'

'Relax. It'll be fun,' Zero promised. Unconvinced, Jude nodded. Zero laughed. Jude narrowed his eyes. He looked so much like Lionel in that moment that Zero shivered.

'Is this your warped idea of a date?' Jude inquired. Zero sighed. Was this going to become a regular thing? Was Jude going to pounce on everything he said and did to prove that there was something more between them? Of course, there was, but this was as far as it was going to go. No dating, no relationship, which was non-negotiable. It was also, as the voice in Zero's head kindly informed him, dumb, dumb, dumb. Zero didn't know whether this was a step up or down from abort, abort, but it was still annoying as fuck.

'It's not a date if one of us is trying to get the other one laid,' Zero pointed out.

'What?' Jude protested, outraged. Zero slipped the doorman a fifty and pushed Jude inside. He had been thinking about this for a while. Jude needed some experience and Zero would function as a supervisor of sorts. Just to guide things in the right direction. The right direction being: a series of one-night stands. Definitely nothing serious.

The thumping beat and flickering lights assaulted them immediately. Heads turned. Eyes followed them. It was hot inside the club. Within seconds, Zero was surrounded by a flock of admirers. Jude rolled his eyes and made his way through the crowd to the bar.

Zero kept him in sight at all times, while extracting himself from groping hands and hungry eyes by loudly announcing that he was taken. Jude had ordered two beers and was looking around when Zero sidled up to him.

'See anything you like?' Zero asked, wagging his eyebrows. Jude nearly did a spit take at the question.

'Huh?' was all he managed.

'Pick a guy. Take him home. Live a little,' Zero suggested.

'I don't think so,' Jude disagreed. In response, Zero turned to the nearest guy and turned on the charm.

'Have you met Jude? Jude needs to get laid,' Zero said. Jude stared at him in disbelief for a second before stalking away. Zero apologetically smiled at the confused guy and tailed Jude.

Subtlety when scheming made sense to Zero. Scheming really relied on subtlety. Zero just didn't see the point of subtlety when it came to sex. You want sex, you say what you want; the other person gives it to you or not. Pretty simple. Games took too long and were boring. Like romance. All the uncertainty and the guessing were not Zero's thing.

'Are you deliberately cockblocking me?' Jude accused, not stopping, not looking back, just arguing over his shoulder as he kept walking. As if he knew that I'd follow him, Zero thought.

'I'm not cockblocking you,' Zero objected. 'In fact, some might say that I'm doing the exact opposite of cockblocking you.'

'Do you not get that I don't want you to be my wingman?'

'What's the problem?'

'I don't want to sleep with some random guy...'

'You should. It would be good for you.'

'...especially not one you handpicked for me.'

'Why not? I've got good taste.'

'Well, I'm not going to!' Jude shouted, finally turning around. The 'not with you here' wasn't explicit, but it was definitely implied and Zero knew it. He was fully aware that Jude was not going to go off with some guy right under his nose. He knew that just his presence at the club counted as cockblocking.

'Okay then. Want me to get us another beer?' Zero asked, noticing that they'd almost reached the end of the bar.

'No.'

'At least dance,' Zero insisted. Jude lowered the bottle he was holding and stared at Zero.

'This is us being buddies, right?' Jude inquired.

'Right.'

'That doesn't seem like something buddies do, though.'

Suddenly, Zero realised that Jude thought that he'd meant for them to dance together. This was the point where Zero should have left, but something stopped him. He wasn't going to name it, because – goddamn – he couldn't believe that he was doing this for Jude. He placed his beer on the bar.

'I think we're safe as long as we don't slow dance,' Zero explained, sardonically. 'Come on, dance with me.'

Jude shrugged and gave in. They danced. Jude's dancing was embarrassing. The guy had no moves. No rhythm. No nothing. After a while, Zero couldn't bear it anymore. With Jude's permission, he pushed carefully at Jude's shoulders and waist in an effort to try and make something of it, but Jude remained hopeless. Others snickered as they watched them. Jude flushed, but smiled at Zero and kept right on going. Zero started to suspect that Jude did it on purpose. Probably because he was a huge goofball underneath all that pent up tension.