[Intro/OTA]

[dj_esebel]

Audrey's not entirely sure how she's managed it, but she fell asleep on the beach last night. It was just meant to be a breather, dipping her toes in the frigid water just long enough to wake herself up for the short drive back to her trailer park. Only the water had been extremely fucking cold, so cold she'd rippled up in orange scales and had to warm up the siren way just to get back to the sleeping bag she'd spread out to take a seat.

The plan had been to sit, warm up, wake up.

Which, in a manner of speaking, she's accomplished. After all she's very warm in her deep chill sleeping bag and she's mostly awake with the cold, gray morning light. "The fuck..." Audrey sits up and drags a hand down her face. "Well that sure is the fucking ocean..."

Good thing she's awake before high tide. That would have been more trouble than she'd been prepared to deal with.

Grumbling, she unzips the sleeping bag and carefully wills the orange scales away.

Comments

[lesparker]

He pulls her towards the door with a laugh. "You can get anything on the menu, babe," he says. "I take care of my ladies."

[dj_esebel]

She laughs a little and gives him a brief kiss on the mouth. "How about your hotcakes, hm?"

But first, food.

[lesparker]

He chuckles. "My hotcakes? My sad relationship-ruining hotcakes?" he asks, following after her, wondering if he's even on the menu for his and Audrey's normal thing. He's definitely single. That's never been more obvious. But Corry is also on his mind and she's a whole other level of confusing.

"You really want some of this?" he jokes.

[dj_esebel]

She likes sex and she adores Les, so that's always on the menu, if it's wanted. The hopes for a romp can wait, though, while she worries about him.

"I love you, Les," she promises. It's not an anguished declaration. It just is. They're best friends, closer than close. She just loves him, the end. "And you know I won't ever screw you over."

[lesparker]

Les just smiles back at her declaration because he feels the same for her. She was there for him, many times, and she's really the first person he let into his life after he was done being so empty after his mom died. It took, honestly, years for him to give a fuck about anything again, and Audrey was one of those things. She just happened to stick.

"Really? Never? Not even if Green Day called and said you could be their opening act?" he asks draping an arm around her shoulders in a half-hug.

[dj_esebel]

"If I'm fronting for Green Day, then they can loan me their private jets to make sure I get back to you whenever you need me." She leans into the hug and then slides a hand down to grasp his.

"And honey, I wouldn't be opening. We'd be co-headlining. And I'd get a solo in their encore."

Laughing, Audrey raises their joined hands and kisses his knuckles. "You're never getting rid of me, darlin."

[lesparker]

She is too much like him sometimes, and all he can do his laugh. "I don't want to get rid of you, Ess. I'm your groupie, man," he says, pulling her hand that's gripping his and kissing the back of it. "If you headline with Green Day, I'll be in the front row screaming your name and tossing you my bra."

He nudges her with his elbow, chuckling. "Hell, I may just do that the next time you sing at a wedding."

[dj_esebel]

They're alike in a way that makes it easier to understand one another without judging or letting one of them get away with something they shouldn't.

"Okay but is it actually your bra or one that you stole from one of the hot fangirls in my audience?"

[lesparker]

"Well, I do think I could talk some fangirl into giving me their bra. I'm awfully charming," he says, laughing. As they continue to walk to the cafe, he gets an idea in his head. "You know now that you're back, you should meet Corry. Complete love life mess aside, she's awesome and if you can believe it she and I used to get into more trouble than I think you and I ever did. I know there are plenty of embarrassing stories about me that you two can share."

[dj_esebel]

"What, you and her the OG's of Siren Cove?" she asks, gesturing to the quiet little town. "Terrorizing everyone, having sex up and down the coast? Is she cute?"

[lesparker]

Les shakes his head. "Okay, for one thing, Corry and I were best friends when were eight years old. We were not having sex up and down the coast." When she asks if Corry is cute though, he does his best not to fidget or blush. "But yeah, I guess she's cute." Which is the deflective answer that would've made sense a couple weeks ago...had he not realize he was completely in love with her. It's just hard to turn off that part of his brain that only sees Corry as his best friend. He isn't used to talking about her as someone he's into yet. It's just a little strange and...maybe embarrassing.

[dj_esebel]

"You guess?" she teases, moving to stand in front of him with hands on her hips. The diner is looming in the middle distance but she can put her hunger aside to torment Les.

"You should have decided and swept her off her feet before she got married."

[lesparker]

"I mean. I dunno," he says, sensing that evil tormenting look on her face but he just shrugs. "I like her hair."

He's always had a thing for red heads, and he's actively not thinking about why that's true considering Corry's the first girl in his life 'cos that seems like a chicken or the egg question. "She eloped. It's not like I knew she was going to marry that guy." And it's not like he knew his own feelings enough to care when Corry came back a three months ago married to Will Cabot.

"You asked me if she was cute. I said she was cute," he defends poorly.

[dj_esebel]

"Okay but there's cute and then there's cute." Audrey ruffles his hair. "Like there's my cute and then there's your cute, like I could just eat you up cute."

Elopement sounds...well it sounds like the kind of thing she and Les might do in a fit of drunken pique, so she's not actually in a position to judge, but still.

[lesparker]

He laughs when she ruffles his hair trying to knock her hand away. "Cute. You know, like, I've never thought about making out with you until about two weeks ago cute," he says looking at her. He sighs a little. "Maybe she and I have just been friends too long for all of this. When people get together doesn't it ruin the friendship?"

[dj_esebel]

"...are you really posing this question to me?" Audrey teases. God knows that sums up half of their friendship, hooking up and doing things that would ruin weaker friendships.

"Anyway, I've never really been in love. Except you."

[lesparker]

Les rolls his eyes, but she has a point. But it was different with Audrey. He met her when he was twenty-three...of course he wanted to hook up with her. She's hot and his friend, and sex was fun.

"I just don't want to mess anything up. You know me I'm a disaster," he says.

[dj_esebel]

"And I'm right there with you," she says, reaching up to ruffle his hair once more. "But you're trying, I know that."

[lesparker]

They finally come up to the familiar diner, and he pulls open the door. "Atleast you're a disaster with a band. But...I guess I did find you asleep in the snow this morning, Ess," he says laughing.

[dj_esebel]

"It's a good thing we're...sturdy." Magic. She means magic, but this town has always seemed so cagey about explicitly stating it that it's become a habit for her to go with euphemisms.

[lesparker]

"We are so...sturdy," Les snorts in amusement at her wording. "I get really sturdy down in my basement. You should come check it out."

[dj_esebel]

"Oh I've gotten you sturdy in the basement," she says, switching meanings on herself. "I love it when you're sturdy."

[lesparker]

"You have definitely gotten me sturdy a few times," Les says laughing at her. What was even wrong with them sometimes, he didn't even know. "Of course, you love it when I'm sturdy. I'm the best at being sturdy. That's why."

[dj_esebel]

So many things. There are so many things wrong with them. "Of course I do. You're the only one who treats me right."

She nudges him gently, smiling. "I mean it."

[lesparker]

"And I'm going to treat you to the best breakfast of all time," he says, wrapping his arms around her shoulders and pulling her into a brief hug. "Look at us. We're finally doing alright." As he takes a seat at one of the empty tables at their diner he thinks over his comment then tacks on, "Sort of."