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The Devil's Nest, Tuesday Evening

Lucifer was doing fine. Just fine. That date night had completely worked everything out of his system. Everything.

"I hate these curtains," he growled to the small cadre of interior designers following him around the club. "This shade of red is far too burgundy for my tastes. Can we have something less burgundy? But still burgundy?"

... at least he was keeping himself occupied?

Tiny just watched and sighed.

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Duke was, by necessity, mostly focused inward these days. Trying to anticipate when the pain of the troubles inside him would get to be too much and head it off by letting one out -- and then trying to work out what that trouble was and how to manage it and keep it to a dull roar once he did.

That didn't mean he didn't notice the strain it was all putting on his partners, though. They just got even more stressed if he tried to keep them from having to deal with it at all, which left him swallowing his frustration along with . . . so many other emotions to try and keep the chaos to a minimum.

Tonight, though. He was feeling . . . okay. His emotions were even, he felt, and while he was definitely hurting, he was pretty sure he had a day or two before he had to let anything else out. So he went for a walk. And found his way to the bar. Where he quietly ordered a drink for Lucifer and tonic water for himself and went to find a seat and watch his boyfriend putter.

"Maybe you should try for a maroon instead," he offered. "Or chartreuse." He wrinkled his nose and tilted his head. "Wait, that's a green, isn't it. It always sounds red to me."

"Not only is it green, it's a liquor," Lucifer said, pausing mid-putter (and raising a hand to stop one of the designers from pitching in his opinion). "Actually, we should have some tonight, shouldn't we?"

... he'd take any kind of liquor. He hadn't noticed the drink Duke had ordered yet.

"I should've thought of that a minute ago," Duke said, then held out the -- not at all chartreuse -- drink. "Hope you'll settle for your best scotch first. I have soda too, but that's for me."

He was on the wagon again, albeit very unofficially. Alcohol tended to make him more emotional, not less, so he'd taken to unwinding a different way.

"I brought some gummies too, if you want one. Sour watermelon indica."

"Ooh, yes."

Lucifer took the drink first. And knocked almost half of it back in one go. "Do share."

"Happily. Especially if you come sit with me while we enjoy 'em." He patted the seat next to him. (The walk had felt good, but that didn't mean he was up to puttering speed at the moment.) "And help me figure out what shade of red I was thinking of. Maybe . . . puce? That sounds like it should be green. . . ."

Lucifer turned towards his gaggle of designers. "You may go, for now."

They chittered among themselves, then dispersed in a puff of relief. Lucifer ignored all that, and slipped into the seat Duke had offered him, drink in hand. "Love," he added, "You do know I will never listen to you about anything related to interior design?"

"Of course not. You're weirdly prejudiced against nets." Duke gave him a fond smile. "That doesn't mean I have to stop joking about weird color names, does it?"

Lucifer sipped his drink. "No," he said, "It merely means I will ignore any actual opinion you voice about the Nest's signature colors."

"Which are . . . magenta and turquoise, right?" Duke teased. "Or, ooo. That bright green color that you get when you mix blue curacao and orange juice."

"I believe you promised me a gummy," Lucifer told him, "In return I will not hold you upside down until you respect our interiors."

“You say that like I don’t enjoy being upside down,” Duke said. But produced the gummies anyway.

“So. Did Eric piss you off again, or are you just taking your restlessness out on the curtains?”

"I just thought they could use a bit of a freshening up," Lucifer said, taking a gummy greedily. "Don't you?" Beat. "Wait, never mind, asking you about interior design is, again, a useless endeavour."

“I mean. If you want them fresh, by all means. Make ‘em fresh,” Duke said, sipping his tonic. “You deserve to treat yourself.”

Lucifer snorted. "I would categorize this more as a 'necessary time-investment'. If I were treating myself, I'd be somewhere warm and you and Octavia would be there in your swimwear."

He swallowed the gummy.

"Can't argue with that," Duke said. He'd spent a fair amount of the summer in the water, and was feeling a little extra lost now that it was too cold to swim regularly again. "Well. Whatever the reason. We all know this place will look swanky as fuck when you're done with it."

He popped a gummy of his own into his mouth and dropped his head onto Lucifer's shoulder while he chewed.

Lucifer slid an arm around his shoulders, almost automatically. "I do have excellent taste," he agreed, distractedly. "How has your day been?"

Good day or bad day?

"Good," Duke said, just managing to sound casual about it. "I mean, check it out: I even left the port."

That . . . hadn't happened in a little while.

"You did," Lucifer agreed. "Getting some of your steps in, are we?"

He pressed a kiss to Duke's temple.

Ah, the joys of getting a day where he wouldn't have to quietly worry quite as much.

"And some fresh air." Pacing in the galley wasn't quite the same effect. He rubbed his hand against Lucifer's thigh. "Gonna try to do this more. The internet is pretty sure it'll be good for my mental health."

"Well, I don't know about 'good for your mental health', but I do know that trapping yourself in the boat all week is a grand way to develop agoraphobia," Lucifer offered. "So this is better. Or if at some point you don't feel like leaving, we could try taking the Rouge herself out again."

"The OceaNyx," Duke said. "Or the Samsara, if Octavia's into it. The Rouge. . . ." He sighed. "She's showing her age."

And for all his poking and fidgeting, he wasn't convinced he'd been maintaining his ship properly.

"Well," Lucifer said, though he didn't sound so certain, "You are the expert."

"On boats, if not on interior design," Duke agreed. He let out a soft sigh and shifted against Lucifer again. He could feel the faint buzz of the gummy through his scalp, and was relaxing into it a bit. "It could be fun, though. Maybe we should do a picnic, sometime, when the weather clears up. Sail around to the preserve, so you don't have to hike."

They'd had a number of rainy days over the last couple of weeks, which wasn't helping Duke's mood much.

"Perhaps," Lucifer said. Was it terrible of him that he wondered if Duke would ever even have the energy? He certainly felt guilty. "You can work your people at the diner for it. I imagine they'd scramble to pack us a free lunch."

Well, someone should probably remember that Duke's current good day was not a permanent change. Duke had trouble with that sometimes. Remembering that how he felt at any given moment wasn't forever.

". . . Yeah, probably. Assuming they haven't turned the place into a co-op while I've been, uh. Out."

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