catphishing | IC Contact [ryslig]

[Mere moments after Lucius finishes his 'conversation' with Soeki, or possibly while he's still in the middle of it even, Oliver is going to get a surprise visitor. A very special surprise visitor as no matter where he is a bird is going to fly up to him and offer him a handwritten note in an envelope sealed with wax.

The bird will not leave him alone until he takes it.]

I DO HOPE THAT YOU'RE SATISFIED. IT WOULD MAKE PRECISELY ONE OF US.

TO THINK I WAS ABOUT NEARLY CONVINCED AFTER YOUR INTEREST AND PROMISES TOWARDS MY SON'S WELL BEING THAT I HAD NO REASON TO BE CONCERNED SOMEONE I HAD QUARRELED WITH BEFORE WAS INVOLVED WITH SOMEBODY I HAD BEGUN CONSIDERING A DEAR FRIEND. IT SEEMS IN ADDITION TO WHATEVER OTHER DIFFERENCES EXIST BETWEEN YOUR SOCIETY AND MINE THE IDEA OF CIVIL INDIFFERENCE AND HOLDING ONE'S TONGUE TO MUTUAL BENEFIT HAS ALSO GONE BY THE WAYSIDE.

I TRIED TO INVITE YOU ALONG IN A WAY THAT WOULD NOT BE AWKWARD FOR EITHER OF US. I WANTED TO BE ABLE TO BOTH PLAN AN EVENT WITH SOMEONE WHO UNDERSTOOD MY REVERENCE FOR IT WHILE ALSO ALLOWING HIM TO CELEBRATE IT PROPERLY, WITH THE COMPANY OF THOSE HE CARED FOR. MY EFFORTS WERE OBVIOUSLY IN VAIN WITH HOW I WAS REWARDED.

NOW I SUPPOSE SOEKI HAS WHAT HE WANTS AND I WILL HAVE WHAT I WANT BUT THE TWO NEVER HAD TO BE MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE. I WILL CONTENT MYSELF WITH SEPARATE HAPPINESS BUT IT DID NOT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY. YOU HAVE MUCH TO BE PROUD FOR IN YOUR SUCCESSES. SO GO ALONG AND GLOAT BUT YOU HAD BEST KEEP IT FAR AWAY FROM ME.

AS THEY DO NOT MANUFACTURE HOWLERS IN THIS THRICE ACCURSED BACKWATER DIMENSION FEEL FREE TO ENVISION THIS NOTE SCREAMING THE PRECEDING AT YOU IN MY VOICE SO LOUDLY IT MAKES YOUR EARS RING. THIS IS HOW WE HANDLE THINGS WHERE I COME FROM AS I AM CERTAIN YOU ARE SO SO VERY CURIOUS.

[The entire note is written in the odd scrawl of a man who has well practiced penmanship but is also writing in a hurry and a great deal of unruly emotion.

...Also the bird was supposed to leave immediately after delivering the note, but if Oliver has any food nearby it might well stay to happily peck at it instead.]

[Well. This is new. He does, in fact, have a cake he was in the middle of that the strange looking bird helps itself to. He guesses it's not too different from a messenger pigeon.

It's fairly clear even at a glance who the note is from, so he shuts the window in case the bird gets restless before he's finished and starts to pen a reply.

He puts the finished letter into the bird's mouth before he frees him, assuming that must be why the break is so large.]

I'm not happy. No one is happy about this.

I know I could have handled things better, so I won't show this letter to Soeki. I hope you know you were wrong too.

I'm guessing you've talked to him if you're sending me this, and you should know anything he says now is all him. If he's mad that's not because I'm telling him to be. I know what Halloween means to him and I've told him he should make up with you.

Please don't be mean to him. He's stubborn and upset, but you did hurt his feelings. He also knows some of the things you said to me now and they're things that are hurtful to him as well as me. If you really consider him your friend try and understand why. If you can't then I can't justify trying to get him to fix things with you.

Sincerely,
Oliver

PS- Your owl swallowed half a muffin at once and I don't know if it's supposed to. I'm really sorry if that gets it sick. My private channel is 142.58.303.67 if it does.

[The response comes several hours later, after Lucius has finished alternating between fussing over and scolding his owl.

This is probably for the better as it gives him time to calm down enough to go from "wrathful" to "self-important sulk".]

I never asked for you try and fix things! Where are you getting that from?

Also you really aren't supposed to feed a carrier owl that much at once. Did he beg or you did you offer it to him?

You didn't have to ask.
That's what I've been doing.

He was looking at it.
I don't know if he was begging.
I didn't know his beak was so big so I thought at worst he'd peck and that wouldn't be so bad.
He ate it so fast though.
Is he OK?

He's fine. They eat bits of bread and pasties now and again. I think people have been giving him too many treats though, now he thinks he's getting food every time he delivers a letter. I'll have to keep an eye on him for the rest of the day to be sure he hasn't got an upset stomach.

Why are you trying to fix things? You're the one who didn't want us talking in the first place.

I'm sorry. :(
I'm glad he's fine.

That's not true.
I wanted you to have changed your mind.
But you couldn't even deal with me offering to bring him pie.
Soeki didn't have a clue why I was upset and it got to me you apparently only feel like you need to talk down on being gay when it's me who turns out not to be straight.
I wanted him to be mad at you, but I didn't want this.

[Ugh why is there so much to unpack in there? He'd rather remain angry and standoffish, but it's strangely hard to do to someone who is "frown face"ing over overfeeding his carrier owl on a muffin.

He takes more time with this response maybe because he keeps reminding himself to breathe evenly.]

If you need terribly to know what was over the line for me it was the little remarks about "possessing" one another. Pie had nothing to do with it.

And no, I do not care that that is how you choose to speak to one another to the point where I would tell you to stop. But it is not how couples do where I come from, it gives the impression one is too frivolous and lacks restraint. You're both grown men after all, so I imagine after a few more months of courtship there'll be a proposal and then your year of engagement. It's hard to take either of you seriously if you're carrying on like over-bothered schoolchildren.

As with the nature of your relationship in general I am aware such things are done differently elsewhere but I am wholly unused to seeing or dealing with them. My emphasis here would be on "unused to". I am unused to people who don't have magic. I am unused to using a computer device. I am unused to being painfully turned into a bloody hobgoblin. I am attempting to "deal". Evidently my telling you outright I had no prior social experience with homosexual relationships was too honest. I blame the wine for that, in part. Though it would not have made what I said a lie I imagine sober I'd have managed to say it differently.

[Oh.

Shit.]

I really didn't think anyone would pick up on that being intimate.
You're right. That was too far.

We aren't anywhere near the point where we'd get engaged though.
Maybe we won't ever get that far at all.
I get relationships are taken a lot more seriously where you're from, but most people where I'm from wouldn't get engaged for years.

I want to make it very clear to you that it's not your lack of experience with openly gay/bi people I have a problem with.
It's the way you talk about us.
Just taking things from our last argument you called it part of my lifestyle.
That's something people say when they think being gay is something people choose.
You said you live with a couple of a similar nature.
To me that implies you're not exactly comfortable with their sexuality while you were also trying to pull the "I have gay friends" card.
You said to me before you were alarmed that they're engaged.
On top of skating around actually inviting me it really feels like you have a problem with it.
Especially when it comes to me.
You all but outright said you looked down on me for other things.

[...People date for years where Oliver comes from without ever seeing a ring??

Muggles are so weird.

All right fine, that isn't the point right now.]

I could parse hairs about what I actually do think about those of your inclination, but you've neither asked me nor seemed to care overmuch.

If it need be said then no, I don't particularly think highly of you. Especially now after this. I simply do not like your company as much as I do Soeki's. He and I get along far better. I don't see how that's a crime. I've also only known him, what, four or five months? That's hardly a relationship worth burning bridges for. What he wants to do with you is his own business.

That said until what happened I did not despise you on sight as you seem otherwise convinced of. You've been a decent conversational partner and you've shown me enough charity that I cannot ignore. I was fine thinking of you as an acquaintance if one tolerated perhaps in part for Soeki's state. I assumed you thought of me as about the same.

So you don't care about coming across as a bigot.
Good to know.

That's not a crime.
You guys have a lot more in common than we do.
What I don't like is that you act like you think you're better than I am.
Even before this.

I don't actually despise you though.
You're rude and you hold a lot of views I disagree with. After we first met I can safely say I really didn't like you.
But when you talk about your wife and son it's like there's this whole other side to you.
I have a lot of respect for you in how much you care about them and seem to treat them if nothing else.
I underestimated how much the stuff at the BBQ upset me, but if you can be respectful to him I can deal with you being friends with him.
If you apologize for how you treated him.

I don't especially like this concept I am being given "permission" to remain friends with him. I did not pull away from him on your account, I did it because I suspected he was going to start disliking and avoiding me on his own as a result. I was proven correct from the manner he spoke to me when I tried to contact him. Instead of cooling off he at once got in my face.

It's not about me giving you permission.
It's his choice.
I'm just not going to be supportive of someone I know is upsetting him.
I don't know how he's talking to you and I don't care.
I know he can be abrasive, but he's my boyfriend and his feelings are important to me.
I don't even get on with you half the time.
I think it's fairly clear who I'm going to side with.
Apologize to him.
If he accepts it I won't get in the way of your friendship.
If he doesn't then that's not my problem.

What is it precisely that you think he needs me to apologize for?

He feels like you shut him out of planning for Halloween.
That's a really important day for him and there aren't that many people who get that like you do.
It really upset him.

If I shut him out it was because I doubted the joint endeavor would continue to be pleasant for either me or him. I thought he would no longer be interested and it was easier to stop counting on him then and there.

And I didn't want it to come across as if I was still seeking out his help only because I needed it for practical reasons.

I wanted to collaborate with him simply because I thought with us working together it would be more

[There's an eloquent way to say this? Right? Right? No.]

fun.

That's the thing.
He wants you to need him.
Though I'm sure he'd appreciate you thinking it would be more fun too.

But you really need to tell all this to me him. Not me.

You truly think he's become that invested over this? It wouldn't surprise me if by now he's stopped caring about the whole thing.

[...Unlike Lucius himself, who let's be honest, would totally still be steaming over it.

Or maybe it's just easier for him to not feel bad if there's nothing to be done about it anyway.]

Have this conversation with him.
If he's that invested he's perfectly capable of telling you himself.

Perhaps I will and perhaps I won't.

["So there", he doesn't actually add. But he certainly won't give the impression he's trying to make nice because of Oliver.

He almost ends the conversation at that. But. Something comes up in his mind.]

He is here, by the way. My son.

He arrived with the most recent bunch.

Only a few weeks after you and I discussed the possibility. It's almost like a curse.

[He's ready for the conversation to end there. When it doesn't he's not quite sure what makes him tell him this when things are as fraught between them as they are now, but...

His heart still sinks upon reading those words. He feels a twinge of pity for him. For all their disagreements he knows full well Lucius loves his son. He also knows it sucks to have someone that you care for stuck here with you.]

He is?
I'm sorry.
I know this isn't what you wanted for him.

[He isn't sure why he said this, himself. Perhaps because given what they've talked about before it feels somehow relevant. Certainly it's weighing on his mind.

But he isn't about to vent to Oliver about this now after everything that's happened either.]

Certainly it is not.

In any case now you know. If you see an adolescent boy around who bears a strong resemblance to me

Or to myself before the changes began that is

That is my son. His name is Draco. All I would ask is that you leave him alone, or contact me if he seems to be in any trouble.

Oh, I've actually met him.
I feel like I should have guessed that.
He looks just like you.

I'll stay away from him.
You should know I gave him the number for my private channel, but I doubt he'd have any reason to use it.

Yes, the Malfoy family traits have always been strong, particularly on the male side.

He's no fool and knows to be wary of strangers. And who knows what he's made of this city, or its people. Certainly I had no idea when I first arrived myself. He's coming from the same perspective.

But in any case that is all I had to say.

Sometimes strangers are all you have here.
In his case he's lucky enough to have you, so I'm sure he'll be fine.
Good luck.

IC Contact [ryslig]

failowl delivery, oct 10th

no subject

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WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, OLIVER. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 142.58.303.67 * oliver has joined 142.58.303.67 <oliver> So this is my private channel. <oliver>** Talk to me?