okteiviakom | Lucifer's Mansion, Friday Evening

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Lucifer's Mansion, Friday Evening

A lot could happen in a week. Like Octavia doing a 180 on what she considered an appropriate venue for her and Duke's inaugural date night. Not that they hadn't had date nights before (although ones Octavia had probably refused to call that, with her own internal rules about language), but there were date nights, and there were date nights.

There were random events, and there were the beginnings of traditions.

(Hopeful ones, anyway.)

So there Octavia was, already at the house. She'd thought about cooking something herself, maybe paella like Lucifer had taught her to make once, but had ultimately decided against it. This all felt new enough as it was, without adding the unknown factor of her cooking into it.

The trusty Thai she'd ordered had arrived a moment or two ago, and was now sitting on the coffee table in the living room.

Now all she needed was her date.

[ooc: For that guy. No, not that one, the other one.]

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Specifically about things that were very important to her and that he'd previously (and memorably) flinched away from? No. But skills could be re-learned.

Especially if Octavia could talk herself into helping him out, which... she didn't immediately seem to be able to do. But she was buying herself time by grabbing a fork and digging into whatever the mostly cold thing in the container was.

Trying to think.

That would definitely help. Especially if she managed it before Duke spiraled too deep into his mental recriminations.

He picked up his own cold food carton and started picking away at it.

Whether any of the words Octavia landed on would actually help... remained to be seen. Her voice had gone a little flat, by the time she spoke again. "You've processed things," she said, slowly. "And that's great for you."

She meant it, despite the mildness.

She speared some food with the fork. Kept her eyes on it. "But it doesn't change the fact that you turned away from that part of me, years ago. And now you come back and you're talking about tying you up, or playfighting you into submission, and... you don't know who you're talking to, anymore."

You messed up once and ruined it forever.

Duke shoved that voice aside hard. He was rebuilding with Lucifer. This didn't have to be ruined forever.

"We've both been through a lot," he said softly. "I'm not the same guy I was then, either."

He was learning to let go and it meant so much to him. He wanted so badly to share that with her, too.

"No," Octavia agreed. "Now you want things."

She was... wording things as she processed them. It wasn't all going to be the best.

"And it's okay to want things." That much, she knew, needed to be clear. "But now you're coming to me with scenarios where you get them."

So he was allowed to want them, but not allowed to get them.

No. Knock that off.

"We don't have to do anything you don't want to do," Duke said firmly. "I mean it. I just -- if you don't want to because you're worried about how I'll react. . . . That feels like something we can work on. But if you don't want to because -- because you just don't want to. We can do other things."

Octavia shook her head, with one of those tiny movements. "You're not hearing me." Less of an accusation, more a warning that she was about to say... what she hoped might clarify something.

For both of them.

"You're talking about getting things done to you," she continued, mild and quiet. "And I'm glad you've found stuff that works for you, and I know you don't mean it like this, but I'm... really struggling to hear you being interested in what I might want. Just what you want, and what I don't have to do if I don't want to."

Which wasn't nothing, but, well.

"You already have Lucifer, happy to provide whatever you could possibly think to want, no questions asked. That's not me."

That . . . still hurt. But he couldn't exactly argue with it.

She doesn't trust you.

Yeah, little voice. No shit.

"Okay," he said after a moment. "What do you want to do?"

But it wasn't really about trust. It was about not feeling like something that had previously seemed monstrous about her was now okay because it could be used to fulfill something in him.

Whatever trust issues there also happened to be... were separate.

"Right now? Nothing."

Duke picked at his food, not looking at her.

"Do you want me to leave?"

Octavia wasn't looking at him either.

"No," she said. She moved her food around in the container. Her voice was quiet and even. "But I do want you to think about what I said, and if you really think you said all you wanted to say in response."

Duke glanced up at her, out of the corner of his eye.

From too many people in his life, that kind of statement would be a test. Or a trap.

He didn't like how much he felt like that was what it was from her, too.

(He wished he could figure out how to let go with her, too.)

He took a long breath. "I'm . . . figuring something out. About myself. That I was excited to share with you. And didn't think enough about how it sounded when I said it."

He speared a chunk of pineapple in his cold fried rice. He held it for a moment, then offered it to her.

"I'm sorry."

If you asked Octavia, it had been the opposite of a trap. And the closest she'd been comfortable getting to outright asking him to actually acknowledge what she'd said.

To reassure her that she'd been heard.

"Better," she said, softer. "Mochof."

For what he'd said. She only took the pineapple chunk after.

The apology was more important.

(If it was a test, he really hoped he'd passed.)

He flicked her a tiny smile. "De nada."

Octavia didn't smile, but there was a little more life in her expression again. A softness. Even some trace of vulnerability, maybe, opening up.

She ate the bit of pineapple. Then set her stuff aside.

Offered him her hand.

(It hadn't been a test. He'd still passed.)

Someday . . . maybe he’d learn to trust that.

He took her hand. Gave it a little squeeze.

Told the little doubting voice is his head to shove it. Again.

Octavia squeezed his hand back, and finally looked at him properly again.

"Do you want to tell me more about it?" she asked, softly. "About what you've been figuring out?"

“Oh. Yeah.” Duke huffed a little laugh. “You’ll, uh, poke me if I start being stupid again?”

"I'm asking you to talk about what's been happening and how you've been feeling about it," Octavia pointed out, managing to find something gently wry (and hopefully reassuring) in her tone. "I think you'll be fine."

A pause.

"But yes."

“Thank you.” Duke shook himself a little. “Okay. Talking about it.” He closed his eyes, trying to picture where to start.

“There’s something . . . freeing. I guess I’ve always been on edge. Waiting for the moment someone decides I’m . . . wrong. Pushing it, even, to try to get it over with.” He bit his lip and opened his eyes again. “When Lucifer ties me up . . . I stop having to do that. I don’t have to try to stop, I just stop. Because he’s got me.”

A flicker of a wry lip twist.

“Plus, you know, I physically can’t do a lot. That helps too.”

While he was talking, Octavia pulled their joined hands over to rest against her leg. Another point of contact, connection.

She gave one of her tiny nods. "Nowhere left to go," she murmured. "And the choice is just... gone."

Duke nodded. "I'm just. Helpless. I can't do anything but let go."

"Could struggle," Octavia said, quietly, after a beat where she wondered if she wanted to say it - although less about that, more about what she said next. (A private thing, and he hadn't asked. She was trying to offer anyway.) "Sometimes I do, even knowing it's futile." And another small pause. "To know it's futile."

And a tiny shrug. She was rubbing her fingertips faintly against his hand.

"But then again I don't really do ropes."

"Does it feel good?" Duke asked. "Sruggling?"

"Sometimes," Octavia said. Quietly, watching their hands again. "Really knowing where... the boundaries are, I guess."

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