Disclaimer - I own nothing you recognise.

Challenges at the bottom.

Word Count - 356

Who Needs A Brain Anyway?

"Well, she's clearly an idiot," Oliver said, patting Percy on the arm. "Anyone would be lucky to have you."

Percy sighed. "Sure thing, Oli."

He didn't sound convinced. Oliver ran a hand over his face. Rejection was never fun, but Percy always took it even more personally than most. It was hard to see his best friend so down, especially over a woman when Oliver—nope, not going there.

"Come on, you said you wanted to go to that museum in the morning, so the last thing you wanna do tonight is get drunk."

"Actually, I'm pretty sure that's the first thing I wanna do," Percy muttered. "I'm not going to the museum, there's no point going by myself, is there?"

"Uh. I'll go with you," Oliver offered, inwardly cursing himself even as the words left his lips. Museums were not his idea of a fun time, and Percy tended to get excited about the obscure artefacts and lingered over them forever and— But now Percy was smiling at him and maybe it was worth it.

"Really? You hate museums."

"We can make a day of it? Museum in the morning, lunch, maybe do a bit of shopping or something in the afternoon. Or a movie?"

"You don't have to do this," Percy murmured. "I'll be fine."

"Hey, what are friends for, right?" Oliver replied.

…

He was regretting every life choice that led him here. His brain had melted out of his ear about two hours ago, and Percy was still bouncing from one artifact to the next, lapping up the useless information about them and spewing them back out to Oliver.

Like he cared about a staff used by some Egyptian wizarding dude from the 1500's.

Eventually, Percy was done with his enthusiastic learning, and he allowed Oliver to pull him to the closest restaurant.

"I, uh. Thank you, for today," he said softly, blushing over the menu that covered half of his face from view.

Oliver softened, because no matter his opinions on Percy's obliviousness to what was right in front of him, they were best friends before anything else, and if his brain melting made Percy happy… well, he didn't need his brain that much anyway, right?

Right.

"Anytime, Perce."

Written for:

Auction - Gaston from Beauty and the Beast (cheering someone up after a rejection)

365 - 96. Obscure