Work Text:
February
Burnout wasn’t the sudden full-stop Astarion always thought it would be. It began so slowly that he did not recognize it for what it was; invisible chemicals leaching into the dirt around his personal wellspring, undetectable until the groundwater was contaminated beyond repair. Until the well ran dry. Until his entire body and brain refused to just go.
The brain fog—as he would later know to call it—crept in slowly. One mundane October Monday, Astarion missed a court call at nine in the morning for no discernible reason other than he just forgot that it existed. He was at the office, at his desk, reviewing obscure statutes for another case entirely when Wyll stopped by after his own hearing and asked how his morning docket went.
He had never missed a court date in all of his fourteen years of practice. It was in the firm’s docket management software which auto-updated in Outlook, and he had—according to the edit logs he checked multiple times in disbelief—had been the one to enter it. Several weeks ago. He had no one to blame but himself, not sure how it happened at all.
He also began to miss scheduled client calls, or find himself in a file room with his fingers hovering over an index folder without the faintest inkling as to why. He slept both constantly and not well at all. The holidays passed in a lumpy blur. In gray January, protein bars and meal replacement shakes began to colonize his barren pantry, until he forgot to even repurchase those.
Then, the breaking point: a reply brief in an appeal for a fussy client who was never, ever satisfied. It was due the next evening at midnight Eastern. He had not even started, like his brain had glossed over the ten careful reminders he’d set. Except he knew it wasn’t that. It was the fact that he’d sat down every night for the last week in his home office to a blank shell document he’d had his legal assistant draft weeks ago, well in advance of the looming deadline, staring at the blinking cursor on his screen for hours until sleep finally overtook his racing thoughts.
He had just enough energy left to call Jen and ask her to step in on his behalf. Jen knew he never preferred to delegate if at all possible. Neither of them did; their shared devotion to their careers was one of the key reasons why they first became acquainted, how over time Jenevelle shortened to Jen, Astarion (usually, lovingly) to Asshat.
She took his weak, half-reasoned request with a grave seriousness, asked precious few questions, and appeared at his doorstep the next evening with a bottle of expensive wine and an overnight bag. An excellent friend. Efficient as always. The final brief was honestly better than if he would have written it himself under the best version of his mental faculties.
Astarion made the necessary arrangements over the weekend with Jen’s quiet support. He was on a fresh leave of absence the subsequent Monday.
The sun was particularly bright that cold February morning. Astarion winced at the change in light when he got out of the passenger seat of Jen’s black Roadster. A friend of a friend had recommended this particular medical office through personal experience, Jen coordinating the anonymous ask-arounds to preserve the active status of Astarion’s law license. It was an unfortunate reality of their field. They were very familiar with lawyers, well-practiced at the art of the discrete pharmacological quick-fix, and tucked away in a leafy and unassuming suburban office park. Conscious of a paper trail, even under duress, Astarion asked the front desk receptionist to make sure medical billing only coded the most general diagnoses to his employer’s private insurance.
There were a myriad of causes for burnout, the kindly psychiatrist explained. She peered at him over her horn-rimmed glasses; almost through him, like she had seen a hundred Astarions before and knew exactly what ailed them all from the ghost of a single fifteen-minute conversation.
Astarion was quite new to the experience of being pinned and taxidermied lepidoptery. He did not enjoy the distinct lack of autonomy he felt as the dotted rubber soles of his driving loafers squeaked against the tile floor, even as he was assured that it would be preserved by all means possible.
Unless, as it was so nonchalantly explained to him—
(Yes, he knew about mandatory reporting laws. He was a lawyer, for fuck’s sake.
No, he did not need to talk to a counselor regarding potential substance abuse concerns. No allergies. No surgeries. No other chronic health concerns.
Just a Juris Doctorate.)
The piles of outpatient intake paperwork bled together in front of his weary eyes. He had forgotten to put in his contacts before leaving his condo that morning.
He began an intensive outpatient therapy program the next afternoon. He was gently told the entire area was on monitored closed-circuit television, twenty-four hours a day, weekends and holidays. Only six hours were germane to him, requiring his active presence, five times a week. As long as he checked in twice a day on Saturdays and Sundays, he was free to do whatever he wished on weekends. As long as he was back at nine sharp on Monday mornings.
He was the only one in the earth-toned lounge with starched and monogrammed shirt cuffs. There was something comforting in the ritual of donning corporate defensive armor when faced with new and uncertain terrain. The whole exercise was far more banal than he thought it would be, a soundtrack of easy listening radio to accompany a landscape of waxed clementines and chewy granola bars on pepto-pink plastic trays. Fake plastic greenery, because it was inedible. There was even a small zen sand garden, although its soft foam rakes were useless for any real task.
It turned out that what Astarion considered the natural state of practicing law was actually a severe and paralyzing anxiety disorder with several bonus, co-occurring conditions.
Wyll called it all his “Anxiety DLC” on one of their brief, friendly calls. Astarion did not understand much of what Wyll casually referenced, so he called Wyll far too young and pleasant for a continued legal career at Baldur & Gates LLP in return. It was true.
There Astarion was, stuck feeling his feelings. Making time for himself. He would be more annoyed if the firm weren’t footing almost all of the bill, underwritten by his own blood, sweat, and tears. His sole saving grace was that it was much more arduous a task to divest from an equity partnership than a non-equity one, especially one greased by the squeaky wheel of nepotism.
At the beginning of his second week AWOL, Astarion removed his work account from his phone. It was simply a proactive choice, as he was not allowed to use it during most of his time at Sad Adult Daycare. Jen helped parcel out the more exigent demands of his practice into relatively competent hands. Firm leadership spun up carefully bland explanations to his clients and colleagues about his continued and uncharacteristic absence.
Astarion Ancunín will return full-time as soon as he is able. (In for four.) Please route all correspondence to Mr. Ancunín care of Managing Partner Cazador Szarr. (Hold for seven.) Yes, we’ll certainly pass along your well wishes. Although he may not be able to respond to each message individually, he’ll certainly be glad to receive them. (Exhale for eight.)
Two weeks turned into three weeks; then into one month, then two. He stopped asking Jen for office updates, content to lounge next to her in silence on the couch in sweatpants with the plastic tray of his meal delivery plan she dutifully foisted upon his lap each evening. Jen tapped away at her tablet, her soft but stern features awash in electronic blue light. The dulcet tones of Love Island serenaded them in the background. She would stay over until he was done eating. It was sort of like late nights in the office.
The weather warmed; the days grew longer and more distinct. Astarion fucked with his serotonin and norepinephrine levels in waxing and waning prescription cycles until his care team thought it safe to settle on a fifth and final chemical cocktail. They were satisfied with his apparent progress. He removed his dinners from their plastic trays before eating them with Jen nowadays. He even scheduled a haircut with his old barber.
He thought it would be markedly different, once on the mythical, magic dose; the right one would cure him of his afflictions, allowing him to return back to such cherished pastimes like sending passive-aggressive emails late at night to idiot associates who didn’t know their own asses from an oxford comma. That–Astarion glumly learned—was something called a coping mechanism. He apparently had a cornucopia of coping mechanisms, the majority of which were both maladaptive and pernicious.
There was no magical cure for his ills. Astarion would have to employ the use of another indeterminably long and horrifying series of processes called lifestyle changes.
May
A curious phenomenon befell Astarion; the thought of returning to Baldur & Gates filled him with a deep, existential dread.
At first, any progress made was so he could rejoin the land of the law firm living-undead, post-haste. February Astarion simply thought he needed an emotional tune up. May Astarion, unfortunately, knew better. He disconnected from his biweekly telehealth therapy appointment and stared out the double-paned window of his home office down into the busy city streets below. There was always something.
Enough unpacking and reshuffling and de-compartmentalizing had been done for him to realize that this was bad. He would be lying if he said he did not find the dread an old, familiar friend. It felt odd to sit with it, feeling for the sake of feeling, experiencing instead of using it to get more client-chargeable hours into their pre-billing software.
There was a circular logic to anxiety as a motivator. Anxiety meant he needed to work. Why? Because he was anxious. It was a poorly reasoned argument from any standpoint. Until he was able to replace that drive with something better reasoned (and healthier), he would have to postpone his return to the office.
It was nice to not be chained to his Outlook inbox at the beck and call of fundamentally unreasonable clients. He was sleeping better than he had in years.
He didn’t want to stay in his apartment and rot, though. To him, doing nothing was far worse than doing something at all hours of the day, even if it was unhealthy. Perhaps he just needed a change of scenery away from the city with his job and all of the people not-so-silently wondering when he’d return to it. That almost certainly contributed to any mounting anxieties. Technically it wasn’t running from his problems if he’d spent the past few months delving into them.
June
He was a moron. That much was certain.
His shitty broadband internet wasn’t loading the YouTube video he needed about pilot lights. He had only just figured out what a pilot light was. There was a reason why civilized individuals lived in cities and had things like condominium maintenance fees.
Astarion took a deep breath and held it, releasing on a counted exhale. He would go into town and find someone who actually had handyman skills. Money could be exchanged for both goods and services.
He lost his cool when the front door jam refused to budge, the old wood swollen in the relentless seaside humidity.
It was a sign. He was trapped here forever because he fell prey to idyllic internet inspiration content at two in the morning with an addled mind and poor sense of self. He was far too old to fall for real estate descriptions that included the words “cozy” and “charming,” yet here he was. Maybe the terrifying attic would have a vintage schoolhouse Dunce cap he could borrow.
He sat down at the wobbly kitchen table, cradling his head in his hands, sweaty at the temples. Even floors were apparently not a consideration of seventeenth-century home builders. Neither were finished basements. There was dirt in his cellar. Dirt!
He was not cut out for this life. Unfortunately, he had signed a lease agreement with a hefty buyout, funded with his own money. It wasn’t like he couldn’t afford it, but It was the principle of the thing. He had to save face.
He could do this. He could see it through. He was hungry, actually, desperately so, and was freshly out of cheese and crackers. It was a half-hour drive one way to the nearest grocery store. Nevermind DoorDash or UberEats.
Astarion sadly shuffled over to his grimy kitchen window. It was on a frayed rope pulley, which required a balancing act to keep open at the right angle. He had commandeered a stick from the yard with a nice v-shape to keep it open. He angrily shoved a handful of mixed nuts into his mouth. He would have to figure out this pilot light situation if he wanted a complete dinner.
He called Jen later at night from the next town over, fresh off a subpar grocery run. She laughed at him until he could hear the tears of mirth in her breathless voice. He supposed it was deserved; knew it was good-natured.
“I can’t wait until you grow a beard and retreat into the forest permanently,” said Jen. She audibly snorted at her own joke.
“Facial hair?” Astarion involuntarily shuddered. “Not in a million years.”
He was still proud of himself for figuring out the blasted pilot light. Maybe dinner was buttered noodles, but pasta had more protein in it than one would expect, and his stomach was full from his own efforts. It was like he was regaining some autonomy, in a way. He wouldn’t be pivoting to a new career as a handyman any time soon, but now he could sew a button and almost singe his eyebrows off with his custom-engraved, fourteen-karat gold lighter. He was a man of many talents.
Astarion pursed his lips in thought. “What do people do normally? You know, when they live in a backwater town with nothing going on.”
“You don’t quite have the upper body strength for cow-tipping. You could always loiter in a parking lot. I bet you’d meet lots of locals that way.”
“How dare you.” Astarion snorted. “Everyone I’ve met has been lovely, by the way.”
“Well then go out with your new friends. Why are you asking me what to do? Ugh, hold on.”
Astarion waited patiently as Jen barked directions at some poor associate. There was some shuffling of paper, an office door shutting, then Jen muttering under her breath about idiots. Astarion missed her more than he would ever admit.
“Okay. Sorry. Didn’t you just fix the stove? Bake something. I don’t know.”
“You’re so helpful and well-spoken, Jenevelle. Let me just put on my frilly apron and whip up a batch of fresh cookies for the littles.”
“I’m just saying. You could have a healthier mental association when you hear the word ‘torts.’”
“Those are two different spellings.”
“Key word there is ‘hear.’ Which you seem to have a notably difficult time doing.”
“I miss you.”
It slipped out before he could stop it. He felt his teeth clack together with the sudden force at which he shut his mouth. Gods, it was horrible.
“I miss you too,” Jen replied, notable for the lack of appended insult.
The line was eerily silent as Astarion chewed at his bottom lip.
“Seriously. Figure out your homesteading era and come back to us, alright?”
“Yeah.” It was all Astarion could say, feeling too small, too seen. Even after months of outside inspection. Something inside of him could not promise a full return to the way things were.
“And I’m not letting your frilly apron crack go. Pretty much every fucking Michelin-starred chef is a man. You’re a lesser one for not knowing how to fucking boil water.”
“You’re right,” Astarion replied.
“Of course I am,” Jen fired back. “Now go drive yourself home to your little house on the prairie.”
Astarion did, spirits oddly light on the lonesome drive back to his temporary home.
Some Weekday in Late June
(Precisely Pinpointed Later Upon a Nauseatingly Sentimental Request as June 22, around 1:15 PM, by Means of Historic AMEX Gold Statements)
Astarion was sure that sugar cookies were not supposed to be this complicated. He picked them as his first recipe because they were literally just sugar, flour, eggs, and butter, skimming a few recipes until he got the general gist. How hard could it be?
Except he had forgotten the eggs, and measured his vanilla over the bowl so a fair amount of excess vanilla crept in, and who knew there was such a thing as too much vanilla extract, and also there were little lumps of salted butter he couldn’t seem to integrate into the dough as a whole, pale yellow specks of torment in his frustrated tunnel vision. And it was kind of oily, too. And the more he kept fucking with the dough, the more he felt like he should set fire to the entire kitchen, so he let them be, hoping they’d soften out in the stove.
“Just golden at the edges” did not mean dark brown, Astarion soon learned.
He realized he was at the store in a flour-covered apron when he stared bewildered at the white powder dusting his seat before connecting its cause and effect. It wouldn’t be the first time; just a slightly different substance.
Pure fury propelled him out of his car and into the small independent grocery. He would be good at this. It was a matter of brute force. He had bent far more disagreeable and important things to his will than the application of heat to ingredients that formed chemical reactions. The heels of his dress shoes clicked against the linoleum as he prowled the miniature aisles, looking for baking supplies.
He found his target shelf in thirty seconds. There was one bag of flour left. A pleasingly heavyset man with olive skin in a jewel-toned violet shirt stood in front of it, deep in thought, as if he were contemplating his myriad options. Astarion cleared his throat.
“Excuse me,” Astarion said. “I need that.”
The man turned around with a pretty furrow to his thick brows. There were streaks of gray at his temples, his shoulder-length brown hair pulled up into a half-knot.
“Need what?”
Astarion crossed his arms. “The bag of flour you’re observing like a museum piece.”
“Ah,” said his new acquaintance, his flour-coated competition. “It seems we have a tad bit of an issue facing us, as I am also in need of this sack of flour.”
A tad bit of an issue. Who even spoke like that in real life? This entire surreal venture felt like a forced trip back in time. Perhaps if he came to the grocery store in a dandy bowler hat and houndstooth front-pleat trousers he could have engendered more goodwill with the local folk.
If this were the Whole Foods by the subway back home Astarion would not think twice about taking the bag and running. This was, however, not. It was a small town that ran slowly, with a tiny grocery store. Who knew what influence this man held over the owners. Could one be banned from a grocery store? Astarion took one of his stupid fucking deep breaths.
“Do you have Venmo?”
The man blinked. “Pardon?”
“Venmo. Paypal. Cashapp. Whatever.” Astarion angled his head toward the shelf impatiently. “Doesn’t matter which. We can split it. I’m kind of in a hurry.”
“It depends.”
Astarion narrowed his eyes. “It depends?”
The man smiled, eyes crinkling. Kind of like how the surface of his doomed sugar cookies were supposed to look. Definitely not how the amorphous lump of them currently in his trashcan turned out. “Well, what are you using this flour for?”
“Why do you need to know?” Then, against Astarion’s best judgment to not indulge this odd man’s curiosity, “Sugar cookies.”
Sugar cookies. Fucking mortifying. He was standing around idly chatting like a house husband.
“Ah!” One pointer finger held in his direction, like a schoolteacher. Astarion should have hated it on principle. Strangely nice hands. “Well, then, you won’t want this bag of flour for your specific purposes. This is high-protein content flour, about twelve and a half percent by volume actually. Not the brand I usually prefer, but apparently King Arthur’s price differential is a deterrent around these parts.” Gale looked at him conspiratorally, raising a hand to cup his mouth, sotto-voce. “No accounting for taste.”
Astarion stared blankly in the man’s direction, and he interpreted this as a sign to continue.
“High-protein flour is also referred to as bread flour because the higher protein content promotes the formation of gluten. What you want to use for soft sugar cookies is going to be All-Purpose flour, which has a lower protein content, around nine to eleven percent typically. Although, if you really wanted to make something luxurious, you could use cake flour. Swans Down makes a good one, but you have to special order at the front office from Halsin ahead of time. The nice thing is that if you buy a case, he’ll sell it to you at the wholesale price. I have some at home if you are in dire need, as you seem to be from your general demeanor and clothing, but I don’t know where you live or if that’s terribly convenient for you. Oh, my sincere apologies!” The man smacked himself playfully on the forehead. “I didn’t even introduce myself before talking your ear off about flour. I’m Gale.”
Astarion kept his arms crossed. He would, evidently, not be getting his bag of flour. “Astarion.”
“I’m afraid this won’t be useful for you, although my offer still stands. You can pick it up outside my house if you’re in a hurry. I’m just a few minutes down the road.”
Astarion blinked. “You don’t know me at all. And you’re inviting me to your house.”
“Well, it’s not my house, it’s the residency house, but same principle. And I wouldn’t count on backstock here if you’re in need. They run a tight ship.”
Gale gave him an obvious once-over. Astarion looked down, realizing his left shoelaces were untied. They were also dusted with flour.
“You also don’t quite seem all that dangerous. If you hand me your phone, I’ll input my contact information.”
“So you took him up on the offer, right?” Jen was on speaker as Astarion braved through searing a pallid chicken thigh. “Right, Astarion?”
Astarion let the pan’s sizzle do his talking for him.
“Astarion. Gods help me, I will drive down there myself and grab you by your weirdly pointy ears and frog-march you to his front door.”
“It’s not his front door.” Astarion fought the urge to poke the chicken with his kitchen tongs. Apparently it, too, required undisturbed rest to reach its full potential. “It’s the writer's residence's property. Also, you’re too busy to take a day off of work.”
“Have you even texted him yet?”
Astarion sighed. The thing about having trial attorneys as close friends was that they were extremely good at following a devoted line of questioning against the subject of said questioning’s best wishes.
“No. I did Google him, though.”
“It’s okay,” Jen said placatingly, “If it helps, I also ran his info through Lexis public records search.”
“Find anything juicy?” Astarion checked the timer. One minute left of searing. “Actually, no. I don’t want to know unless he’s some sort of violent felon.”
“Not a violent felon, confirmed.”
“So he won’t murder me. Great.”
Jen laughed, crystal-bright. “I mean, he hasn’t spent extended time with you yet in an enclosed space. Don’t rule it out.”
The oven’s timer dinged and Astarion flipped his chicken thigh. Apparently leaving it be had worked, and the oven was almost done heating, too. Everything was coming up edible.
So far. He had emergency noodles just in case.
Astarion huffed dramatically into the receiver. “Isn’t this supposed to be a pep talk?”
“I’m pragmatic because I care.”
“I know,” Astarion said. He set to work cutting uneven slices of red onion. “I know.”
July
With Gale’s patient and doting help, Astarion managed to produce things by himself that looked and even tasted like sugar cookies. Successful after far too many tries for victory to feel like anything other than sweet relief, they moved on to classic chocolate chip cookies, then onto different butter and flour ratios to produce shortbread.
Guilty for once in his life about food waste, he donated the approximate cost of all the ingredients he’d burned or mangled beyond a crisp to a local food bank. They were even able to take leftover baking products to Gale’s neighbors. Astarion also learned that Gale secured his best deals on baking ingredients by means of Halsin’s sweet tooth. He thought Gale’s local racketeering scheme was mildly endearing.
Astarion found himself at Gale’s house more nights than his own. Something odd was happening to him. Something odd enough to have him stand around and listen to Gale over-explicate about sourdough proof ratios and hydration percentages. It might as well have been tax law for all he cared. Maybe he himself suffered from a lack of proper hydration. Perhaps he was quite thirsty.
Seeing Gale happy and in his element unlocked something new and terrifying in Astarion’s chest.
Gale piped rosettes onto miniature strawberry shortcakes, humming. It was the perfect time to ruin a pleasant moment.
“I looked you up,” Astarion said. Gale’s face fell slightly in a way one would only perceive if they were attuned to his minute expressions. “Why are you hiding out here in a writer’s residency for up-and-coming authors?”
He left the rest unsaid. Gale capped the icing bag and wiped his hands on the front of his own apron, affixing him with a knowing look.
“You’re helping me knead the dinner-roll dough by hand if you want this story,” Gale said. He passed the cloth-covered metal bowl toward Astarion. Astarion gladly complied.
A flash of brown and black fur darted past him, taking its place above the fridge.
“I feel like your cat is watching me,” Astarion said, punching the dough down before separating the dough into halves.
“She is.” Gale took the other half. “She’s making sure I don’t divulge the most sordid details.”
Astarion grinned, sharklike. “You don’t trust me, Gale?”
Gale rolled his eyes, then began to knead. Astarion tried not to follow the pleasant ripples of the aggressive movement across Gale’s broad torso.
“I feel like it would lower your personal estimation of me if I told you that I did.”
“Absolutely.” Astarion dawdled on starting his half, artistically sprinkling flour over his side of the white marble slab. “Good job.”
“You have a funny way of getting into people’s good graces. Okay. Picture me, young, naive, raw talent. Emphasis on naive. An incredibly well-known and well-connected literary agent finds my internet blog.”
“Of course you had a blog.”
Gale arched one bushy eyebrow, then gestured sharply with his right hand towards Astarion’s still-unkneaded dough half. “What does that mean, exactly?”
“Nothing, darling.” Astarion picked up his neglected half, beginning to knead. Gale’s expression softened. “My apologies. Please continue.”
“She emailed me. Of course, I was star-struck. I had been trying to get a manuscript into any publishing house that would listen, and here was a famous literary agent contacting me first about my work. She said she would connect me with a good editor who could match my style free of charge. I had potential, you know. This could be an incredible fantasy series. She’d only get paid when I got paid. She’d even cut her usual fee to ten percent.”
Astarion leaned forward, over the counter, on the balls of his feet. “And?”
“Gods, you’re nosy.” Gale paused and smacked his shoulder with a kitchen towel. “Get back to work.”
“Yes, Mr. Dekarios.” His wrists hurt. He would persevere in the face of acute adversity.
“Obviously I took the deal. It was everything I had ever wanted, and she had chosen me, of all people. It was unbelievable, and she was right. She got me in at Tor Books in a month, which is like the father of all science fiction and fantasy publishing houses. I had a terrifyingly large advance in my bank account the next week.”
“So you spent it all, then?”
“You are positively incorrigible. Absolutely not. I was at least smart enough to invest the majority of it and live off of a small pittance until the manuscript was done. I didn’t trust myself. It didn’t feel like real life. It felt like some parallel magic plane.”
“Mhm,” Astarion encouraged. His wrists really, really hurt. “So what then?”
Gale focused his gaze downward on his dough, kneading with aggressive vigor. “Remember how I said I was remarkably naive? That naiveté also came with a generous helping of hubris. I trusted her intentions, assumed them to be good faith. I followed her advice blindly as if I were commanded to do so.”
It felt like some of the story was missing here. This is where Astarion knew to be silent. He kept up his work, mouth shut. It was the same in the court room and in depositions. Nervous people, faced with uncertain silence, would eventually talk.
Gale kept at his half of dough. He sighed. “We also may have started a romantic relationship. And I also may have moved in with her, to her nice apartment in Manhattan. Anyway.”
Astarion hummed noncommittally, echoing Gale. “Anyway.”
“So I write on paper, usually, when I work on first drafts. It just feels more natural to me and allows me to filter out other digital distractions. This, of course, also means that there’s no lock or encryption on my work. I had started a more personal project. I wasn’t quite sure about it, but she was. She took the first draft of it without my consent to option it off for film rights. I was very adamant with her that I didn’t want any part of any movie deals. The loss of creative control over my work would bother me until the end of my days. I knew something was up when she came home with a very expensive bottle of wine and a shit-eating grin.”
Gale’s hands slowed, voice unsteady. “I was furious. I said no. In said hubris, I told her that I would go to any news outlet that would listen if she didn’t respect my wishes. So of course, she backed off. I thought I had won. I came home the next week from a pre-planned trip to find all of the locks changed and my stuff outside in cardboard boxes. I figured, okay, so this didn’t work out. I’ll just get another agent.”
Gale laughed, sharp and harsh and discordant. “I was blacklisted. On both coasts. Even from some international imprints. They’re all connected.”
“Oh,” Astarion said. He was not sure what else to add. His hands had slowed, too. He felt a familiar corkscrew tightening in his chest.
“I consider myself to be an intelligent man. Unfortunately, wisdom is a separate skill.”
“Fuck that,” Astarion said sharply.
He felt anger rise up his throat. He knew what it was like to be trapped by golden handcuffs, even if he was able to get some extra mileage out of his own. He could never leave Baldur & Gates and expect to practice law at the same caliber again. Not while Szarr was still alive.
“It’s not your fault someone took advantage of you. Of your care and hard work and passion. Fuck that.” He picked up the dough for something to do. Gale had mentioned something to him about a Windowpane Test. He stretched the dough to see if it ran transparent, with a bit too much force, ripping it in half.
Gale’s smile didn’t reach his eyes. “I thought you’d find me rather stupid after this.”
“Well then you are quite stupid.” Astarion shoved his half of the dough across the cool marble. “Here you go.”
That evening, Astarion spent the night at Gale’s. The strawberry shortcakes were delicious at three am on the back porch, half-naked; better the next morning with Gale’s exacting moka-pot espresso.
Late July
Lae’zel had called him.
Astarion knew this not because he had her personal phone number, but because she left a stilted voicemail after he let his phone ring out. It was an unknown number at the time, and he had far more important, pressing business to attend to. Like Gale’s thighs.
He put Lae’zel’s voicemail on speaker for Gale’s entertainment as Gale fried up their morning eggs. Today’s eggs would be over easy. Gale was diligently working to turn Astarion away from the scrambled rubber of his childhood to greener pastures, ones filled with organic free-range hens, oozing orange yolks.
“Astarion,” Lae’zel began. “If you are listening to this message and you are not Astarion Ancunín, delete this voicemail immediately.”
There was a notable pause, no doubt for any non-Astarions to comply with Lae’zel’s explicit order.
“I hope this is still your personal number. Please forgive my breach of firm protocol. Szarr has not provided us with sufficient updates as to your health. Are you well? Please call me back at once to confirm receipt.”
The message ended there.
“She seems lovely,” Gale said, behind him.
Gale wrapped his arms around Astarion as he placed their plates on the table. His soft belly shook with laughter against Astarion’s back. Gale would have to move before Astarion became too distracted to eat breakfast. He peeled Gale’s arms away from his body with deep regret.
“She is. She means well.” Astarion cut into his egg yolk, dipping a hunk of soft French bread into the well. “She’s a good person to have in your corner. An absolute fucking warrior of a trial attorney. Ruthless. Deeply admirable.”
“Good to know. Will you call her back?”
Gale had a very distracting dot of egg yolk on his chest. Astarion wanted to lean over the table and lick it off. He would be severely chastized for his lack of table manners. He briefly weighed the pros and cons of this action before resuming his breakfast. There would be other opportunities.
“I have to,” Astarion said. “Otherwise she’ll keep calling until I respond.”
Gale had enticed him outside for a nature hike with the promise of Gale in a tank top and shorts. Gale knew his power. Under the patchy cover of heath across the cliffs by the sea, Astarion diligently coated himself in another layer of SPF 50. He was not so genetically blessed as Gale in this arena, whose skin had bronzed and freckled over the last month in response to the summer sun. Astarion had tried his best to keep apprised of each new one.
Astarion re-adjusted the strap of the wide-brimmed sunhat he borrowed from Gale. He felt ridiculous. Gale waited patiently for him a few paces away. He looked to be in his element, covered in an appealing sheen from exertion. It was truly criminal that once one reached the top of the trailhead, one had to walk the trail back.
“We can rest here for a bit.” Gale spread out the blanket he carried in his daypack. “Unless you’re allergic to the sun. Did they ever let you out of the office?”
Astarion took the other edge of the blanket, pinning the corners down with their water bottles. “Technically, I was free to leave at any time.”
They had baguettes and cold cuts for a late lunch. Gale’s baguettes, that was. Astarion’s attempts at baguettes were more suited for blunt-force weaponry than sandwiches.
Gale looked at home among the sea holly and wild verbena; all vibrant forces of nature. Astarion knew them to be such because Gale had pointed out each new plant on their hike, providing a pleasant soundtrack to accompany the cries of seagulls and dull roar of the ocean waves.
On their walk down Gale cut two small springs of purple verbena from a low-lying bush, wide grin evident under his straw-brimmed sunhat. He tucked one behind Astarion’s ear to match his own, and the thing that had been growing in Astarion’s heart and brain and body finally grew too large to ignore.
Late, Late July
He finally had one edible baguette to his name, borne of his own arduous toil. Astarion promptly drove it over to Gale’s house, buckled into the passenger seat, wrapped in several kitchen towels, afraid that it would vaporize into thin air before he arrived at his destination.
“Baguette,” Astarion said, at the door. He shoved it towards Gale, still bundled, tied with kitchen twine. “Edible baguette.”
“Hello,” Gale said, amused. He leaned over and kissed Astarion on the cheek. “It’s so nice to see you, Gale. How are you, Gale?”
Astarion dragged Gale into the cottage by his shirt collar.
Gale set out sea-salted butter. He put the kettle on. Astarion sat nervously, posture upright, as Gale hack-sawed into his baguette.
“Once you manage to cut it open, it’s actually quite good,” Astarion yelled from the living room towards the kitchen. “I hope?”
The slices were wonky and oblong. It was evident that Gale had cut many, trying to preserve Astarion’s ego by selecting only the best ones for the seaglass green ceramic tray. Gale buttered a slice for Astarion first before taking one of his own.
“That way we both get food poisoning,” Astarion said. “Smart.”
Gale snorted. “It’s cooked all the way through this time, which is a huge improvement.”
Gale took a bite. It took a bit for him to get through the crust, moments filled with dedicated chewing. He swallowed, tilting his head in thought. “It’s good, Astarion. Seriously. The flavor and inside texture are there.”
“Sure,” Astarion replied. He took a very, very chewy bite of his own. It was decent. It definitely was not Gale’s handiwork, but it was passable.
They ate in comfortable silence until Astarion saw fit to broach it.
“It’s so horrible to be bad at something you really want to do well.”
There was more silence, more chewing. Gale didn’t answer. Then, a patch of fur jumped into Astarion’s lap. Tara looked up at him and gave him a slow blink. She started purring.
“Incredible,” Gale said. “You finally passed muster. On several accounts.”
“I guess I did.” Astarion wouldn’t press his luck by assuming he was allowed to also pet Tara. He kept his hands to himself as she closed her eyes, content, splayed pancake-flat across his lap. “I’m trapped now, I think.”
“All part of the plan,” Gale replied cheerily, just a bit too quick to be casual. “More tea?”
August
August was unusually rainy, even for the coast. Jen let him have his due in torrential bursts of exasperation that matched the rain patter on the old windowpanes when he finally came clean about his recent Gale-shaped activities. He couldn’t continue to dodge her calls.
“Fine. You’re an adult and capable of making your own decisions, I guess.”
“Thank you,” Astarion said. “Inspiring addition there, at the end.”
“Look,” Jen said. She sighed, a weary, heavy thing. For a moment the only sound on the line was their shared, slow breaths. “I just don’t want you to get hurt again, so soon. I know you. You’ve always been attracted to shit you can’t actually have. You come back here in September and he goes his own way, back to his own life and career. Then what? You’re both working through serious shit, not going to the same place.”
Astarion swirled a teaspoon around his empty cup. “I don’t know.”
“Well you better figure it out, and fast. Don’t fuck around with him if you don’t mean it. He deserves better.”
“What about me?” Astarion trilled. “I don’t?”
“You’re a rat bastard. He’s far too nice for you.”
“Maybe he’s not,” Astarion said quietly. Jen paused, sensing the mood shift, always acutely tuned to his emotions for better or worse.
“Okay,” Jen said slowly. “Maybe he’s not. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Astarion set down the teaspoon. “I know you’re kidding. I know you care.”
“I do,” Jen echoed. “Which is why you need to figure this out, for the sake of both of you.”
Astarion dreamed of baguettes. They taunted him with their perfectly crusty exteriors dotted with flour, sliced artfully in even, diagonal stripes. Gale had several bread lames, different handle weights and sizes depending on whether he was decorating a batard or a boule. He had brought them along to his residency program, along with the moka pot.
Astarion could not believe he knew what all of these things were. It was yet another area of knowledge that Gale benevolently and cheerfully shared with him. A lot of his world had expanded over the last few months.
Astarion was slightly worried he’d exceed his stated utility allowance, but this was worth it. Whatever horrible overage penalty he’d be hit with was nothing compared to his beautiful, final, blessed baguette baby. She was perfect, smooth golden crust flecked with flour. He made a smaller one to test the crumb, once cooled. The inside was dotted with little fermented bubbles, just enough to make a sandwich’s texture interesting without being annoying.
He did it.
Shit.
He was running late.
Gale gave him an odd look when he arrived with a secretive brown paper bag amongst others but said nothing, respecting Astarion’s request for privacy on the matter. It was not to be opened until dinner was ready. The other bags were for Gale’s use, now.
The unusually chilly weather called for a bouillabaisse, according to Gale, and who was Astarion to disagree? Gale had sent him on errands down the coast accompanied by an exacting, hand-written list of requests to be fetched from his favorite fishmonger. He had a ranked tier list of every fishmonger within a two-hour drive. Any more than that, Gale explained, and he’d have to source dry ice to “keep their bounty in optimific condition.” There were side instructions for each type of seafood requested so a novice like Astarion could ensure its quality and freshness. They were done in the style of annotated footnotes. There were B options if A options weren’t available.
He loved the man. Deeply. It was terrifying.
“The way you’re brandishing that bag at me is making me mildly nervous,” Gale said. He set down two steaming bowls, appealingly garnished. “Should I be concerned?”
“Don’t be,” Astarion said. His heart threatened to leap out of his chest as he sat down, unrolling the top of the bag. “Everything’s fine.”
“A phrase people use when everything is truly dandy, yes,” Gale said cheerfully. “What in all the names of the Gods, old and new, pray tell, is in that bag?”
Astarion shoved the bag over towards Gale. Gale took it and shot him a quizzical look before gingerly dipping his left hand into the unrolled, crinkled top.
“It won’t bite.”
“It?” Gale’s hand froze. “An even more reassuring statement than the last one, Astarion.”
“Open the bag, Gale,” Astarion said. “Please?”
Gale narrowed his eyes.
They widened when he pulled out the baguette. He gasped, mouth a perfect circle. Tara chirped expectantly at Astarion’s feet, eerily cognizant of Gale’s distracted state. Astarion slipped his wing-woman a well-earned, clandestine piece of crab.
“It’s beautiful, Astarion.” Gale looked so happy, big brown eyes shining. Astarion wanted to bask in the moment forever. “I don’t even want to cut into it, it’s so gorgeous.”
“You will,” Astarion said, brandishing a bread knife in Gale’s direction. “And you’ll enjoy it.”
Gale visibly paused for a second, white-knuckled grip around his bread. “We need to talk, later, about my, uh, reaction to you brandishing a knife in my direction, I think. It’s dinner time now.”
“I love you,” Astarion said, strong and robust and very, very sure of his decision.
Gale dropped the baguette. One end landed in his bowl, its contents splashing across the nice table linens. It was the first and only time Astarion had ever heard Gale curse. He had a lapful of Gale in a flash, the phrase repeated back to him between desperate, sloppy kisses.
Dinner ended up delayed; the baguette torn open away from the table, good enough to be eaten plain.
October
Either they started making text on the internet smaller, or Astarion was getting older. Perhaps it was both. He squinted through the bottom of his glasses at his laptop screen. The internet was better at Gale’s cottage.
“Gods, this is boring.” Astarion slammed the lid of his laptop shut in exasperation. “Real estate law is a punishment.”
Gale set his old Paris Review down. “Real estate law?”
“Yeah. Got my equity partnership officially bought out last week. Your residency is over before Christmas, right? You can stay at my house.”
“I,” Gale paused. “Okay. Several new pieces of information here for me to digest. You’re purchasing your rental?”
“Only after they pay for new, energy-efficient windows.”
Gale leaned forward, a wild, manic look on his face. “That assumes they’ll accept your offer.”
Astarion grinned. “Of course they will. I’m very charming.”
“I didn’t know charming people was one of the tenets of real estate law.”
“Sometimes,” Astarion placed his palm over Gale’s own. “One must go off-book. I know, heresy to a gentleman such as yourself.”
It worked. It got a bewildered Gale to crack a smile, settling down. Astarion grinned, waiting for the rest of his implied ask to sink into Gale’s oblivious brain. Gale withdrew his hand, huffing goodnaturedly. He leafed through several pages, taking a cup of tea before Astarion saw the realization dawn on Gale’s stupidly handsome face.
“Wait,” Gale said, raising one index finger.
“I’m waiting,” Astarion replied, failing to suppress his giddy grin.