Chapter Text
There were very few things Husk hated more than waking up in the morning with a hangover. On that shortlist was waking up in the morning with a hangover to the sound of someone rummaging around in his kitchen. It took Husk’s foggy brain a good ten seconds to decide whether that noise was real or just his hangover staging an immersive experience. Then came the unmistakable clatter of a spoon against a mug. Definitely real.
He cracked an eye open, the room spinning like it had somewhere better to be, and tried to make sense of the sounds. For one disoriented heartbeat he pictured a burglar making instant coffee before stealing his TV — except Husk didn’t even have a TV.
His first instinct was to reach under his pillow for a gun - a dying twitch of an old habit from a time and place that felt more like someone else’s life now. His fingers met nothing but cool sheets. He groaned, rolled over, and fought the nausea that punched through the hangover haze. His head throbbed like it was trying to escape his skull. He debated whether it would really be that bad if someone decided to steal his kitchen appliances. It wasn’t like he had much use for them anyway.
“I’m going to take those sounds of despair to mean that you have awoken,” a voice said from the kitchen, and Husk’s brief struggle halted as recognition hit. Then he groaned again, and rolled on his front, hiding his face into the pillow and considered suffocating himself with it. It would probably be less painful than facing the reality of this morning. He heard footsteps approaching the bed, and he ignored it to the best of his abilities, until an insistent finger prodded at his shoulder, urging him to move. Husk tilted his face so that he could meet Alastor’s gaze, smiling beatifically. Despite it being Sunday morning, he was fully suited up, though he had seemed to have taken off the jacket as he was invading Husk’s space. Husk sneered at the sight of him.
“Turn that frown upside down, my good man,” Alastor said, bent at the waist so his face was uncomfortably close to Husk’s, “I brought beignets.”
Husk smelled the expensive cologne Alastor preferred, the weird one from some independent brand which both managed to smell like cold steel and church pews, and he grumbled in displeasure.
“You aren’t supposed to be here,” he muttered, voice rough with sleep and the remains of the whisky in his throat, “how the fuck did you get in?”
“Don’t insult your intelligence by asking questions you already know the answer to,” Alastor said cheerfully, and he prodded Husk’s shoulder again, “perhaps a shower, whilst I make us coffee.”
Husk wasn’t obtuse enough to think it was a suggestion. So he didn’t justify that with any other response than to toss the sheets off, and to get to his feet. Alastor stepped to the side, allowing Husk to stomp off towards his bathroom, and perhaps it was childish to slam the door simply because it would irritate the other man, but the satisfaction of knowing that it did almost was worth the way the sound reverberated in his mind.
The shower helped, but only barely.
Husk was more than familiar with the symptoms of his hangovers, and he knew that aside from picking up the bottle again, the best thing he could do was to stand under the cold water until the headache lessened and the nausea was replaced by shivers, then switched to scalding heat to numb the rest. Two dry-swallowed ibuprofen later, he felt slightly less like a corpse, though the mirror told a different story. He averted his eyes.
He considered brushing his teeth, but the call for coffee was greater, and so he simply toweled himself down and got dressed in the first clothes he grabbed on the drying rack on the back of the door. The shirt and shorts were worn and mismatched, but Husk didn’t have it in him to appeal to Alastor’s sensibilities today; especially not since he had intended to spend the entire day lying on his couch feeling sorry for himself.
Alastor’s presence was always bad news - Alastor who came bearing gifts was even worse. Husk feared to hear what the man was looking for. Nothing good ever came covered in powdered sugar.
Indeed, the vision of him at Husk’s small dining table didn’t bring Husk anything but a pit of anxiety in the stomach, a fact he tried his very best to not show on his face as he joined the man. Alastor had cracked open the window, and Husk could hear the early morning traffic filtering through.
Alastor pushed a mug of coffee towards him, and Husk accepted it, took a deep whiff of the black liquid gold, and then halted. The scent from the brew was rich, a warm earthy smell with a fruity undertone that Husk knew even before sipping his drink would leave a silky feel behind. It was most definitely not the bottom-shelf white label ground coffee Husk had been using recently.
“Did you bring a different coffee?”
“There’s a lovely little roasters just two blocks down,” Alastor said, sniffing his own cup and letting out a pleased hum at the fragrance, “sweetest girl behind the counter. Teeth so delicate they’d be a wonderful necklace. I’ve left you a few bags in your kitchen. Of the coffee, that is, not her teeth.”
Husk clutched his cup, burning porcelain against his skin. “I don’t need your charity,”
“Oh, this is far from charity,” Alastor said, took a sip of his coffee, “if you insist on calling it anything but a Sunday kindness from a friend, I’d suggest to call it bribery.”
Husk raised an eyebrow. “You’re bribing me?”
“I’ve actually always thought bribery is such a harsh word,” Alastor mused, eyes drifting away from Husk towards his flat. Husk was painfully aware of the pile of clothes in the corner, the trash he really should have taken out three days ago, the fact he still hadn’t gotten a bed frame. The boxes in the corner. “I’d consider it more of offering an opportunity.”
“An opportunity I can’t refuse, I’m sure,”
Alastor’s gaze returned to him, that same smile returning to his face as he pushed up his glasses. “I’m so glad we are on the same page, Husker.”
Husk didn’t have the energy for these games today. “What do you want, Al?”
Alastor took another sip of coffee, took his damn time savoring it and swirling it around in his mouth. Husk watched in barely concealed impatience as he swallowed, smacked his lips once, and then said, tone factual, “You’re a pianist,”
Of all the things Husk had expected, that hadn’t been it. He frowned.
“I play the piano,” he corrected, “Two very different things. There’s a significant gap between banging out some jazzy tunes and being a pianist.”
“You’re a classically trained pianist who prefers jazz,” Alastor continued, as if Husk hadn’t spoken at all, “and you don’t have a job.”
Husk felt his eye twitch. “Thanks, I am aware of that fact.”
“Excellent,” Alastor said, and he put down his cup again, reaching inside the pocket of his waistcoat and procuring a neatly folded piece of paper that he placed on the table, slid towards Husk with a single finger, “Consider that issue resolved.”
He lifted his finger and waved at Husk to pick up the paper, and Husk did. But when he unfolded it and looked at the contents, it didn’t give him much more explanation.
“Did you intend to give me a brochure for the New York Ballet Academy, or are you thinking of a career switch?”
“Such a comedian!” Alastor said, despite no part of his face showing any other emotion than the mild amusement he seemed to wear as a standard mask, “no, I’m afraid my dancing will remain restricted to one swing too many on a Tuesday night, a-ha! However, it has been brought to my attention that the new semester is starting in a week, and they have sadly fallen without a piano accompanist for the upper level. Dreadfully tragic. Mental breakdown. Burnout.”
Husk was pretty sure it was indecent to be talking about someone’s terrible mental health with such cheer. “Right.”
“And as I received this news, I thought to myself, what a wonderful opportunity, and don’t I just have the perfect friend to fill this position? Of course I immediately thought of you, and how it would be so good for you to have a way to spend your time that doesn’t revolve around the… intoxicating qualities of your preferred drinks.”
Husk raised an eyebrow. “Are you calling me a drunkard?”
Alastor met his eyes and tilted his head. “Let’s call a cat a cat, shall we, Husker?”
There was a multitude of things that Husk could want to say in reply to that, but at the end of the day, it wouldn’t really make any difference. So instead of making a scene about it, he reached for the plate of beignets Alastor had placed in the middle of the table. He picked up one of the little rectangles, and bit into it, pleased to find it was both crispy and airy, and most importantly - delicious. It was clearly meant to be a diversion, but Husk assumed there were worse ways to be manipulated.
“So you’re offering me a job.”
“The trial of a job,” Alastor corrected, pushed the plate of beignets closer to Husk, “You still have to prove yourself, of course, I just put in a good word.”
“And what do you want from me?”
“Nothing!” Alastor said, and almost looked offended at the suggestion that his intentions might be anything less than absolutely pure. Though he then quickly amended it by saying, “Well, a chat or two, sometimes, just to hear how you are doing. How life in the academy is. Who is on the list for the fundraiser. That sort of thing.”
His voice was light, tone casual and conversational, but even with his hungover brain it didn’t escape Husk’s attention that Alastor flicked his eyes to the side when talking, that his fingers tapped against the side of his cup with just a little too much intent.
“Who is it?”
“Hmm?” Alastor said, as if he didn’t know what Husk was talking about. His expression was perfectly neutral when he turned it on Husk, but his eyes were cold. Husk didn’t back down.
“Who do you need information about?”
“I don’t need anything, my friend,” Alastor said pleasantly, “but if in between tinkling-tonkling your way through the notes on the sheet music you happen to hear murmur of investments, or perhaps, unexpected donations, I would be much obliged if you would share them with me.”
Husk couldn’t help it. He smirked. “Is this still about the guy who outbid you on the station? What’s his name, Victor? Vincent?”
Alastor’s lip twitched irritably, a fact that brought Husk vindictive joy. “I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about. Have another beignet. You are much too chatty this morning.”
Husk did.
The truth of the matter was that Husk had been looking for a solution to the persistent unemployment that plagued him. There wasn’t much opportunity for a man with his track record. The rise: a lucky strike in Vegas that had made him an overnight millionaire, a flourishing jazz bar, headlines in every second cultural magazine, an interview for Forbes under 30, glitter and glam he could have only dreamed about; and the fall: a drunken streak of hubris, keys on the table, a life that came crashing down, a flash of anger that almost cost him his freedom.
The man opposite him was the sole reason Husk was walking around without an ankle bracelet, but the life he had been given hadn’t much been worth living. It was cowardice more than lust for life which kept Husk walking the earth, and it was weakness which kept him from facing it without his lips around the neck of a bottle or the rim of a glass.
The occasional shifts in one of the neighborhood dives were enough to keep him somewhat occupied, as he slowly drained the one savings account he still had relative access to - with Alastor’s name as the guarantor, keeping Husk from draining it all at once and returning to his old ways. He missed it, every second of every day, an itch under his skin so fierce he wanted to claw it out.
He took another beignet. “What if they won’t hire me?”
“I doubt that’ll be a problem,” Alastor said, and he leaned forward, grabbed one of the beignets himself and gave it a critical look, slowly spun it between his fingers, powdered dust falling to the table, “after all, you aren’t in the habit of letting me down, are you?”
“I thought this whole thing was the kindness of a friend?” Husk shot back, picked up his cup of coffee to flush the beignet.
“Two things can be true at once,” Alastor said, pearly smile just a tad too sharp at the edges as he bit down into the pastry, dusted powder on his nose, soft white on light brown skin. Husk watched as he didn’t wipe it off. “So what do you say, Husker, do we have a deal?”
Perhaps he should’ve said no. He didn’t trust Alastor, not even for a second. But rent was due, his savings were thinning, and there was something heavy in Alastor’s tone that implied it wasn’t really a choice. And maybe, just maybe, the promise of something to do, a reason to stay sober past noon, was enough for now. And despite himself, his fingers twitched on top of the table, playing a chord no one could hear.