Dinner and Discussion

The past few weeks had not been kind to Nils, but that was only to be expected. Nils' detox had taken much longer than he'd hoped, and even after that he'd been having a hell of a time trying to get back into the swing of things and avoid temptation.
On the bright side, he was totally caught up on his commission work. On the down side, he'd had a lot of time to thing. One of the primary things he'd been thinking about(mainly because it was unpleasant enough to dwell on without being actively traumatic) was how things had gone with Chad. He hadn't heard much from his lover, but admittedly between dealing with the Indigo thing and his trip with the frat, he wasn't particularly surprised. It could mean absolutely nothing. It probably had nothing to do with how much of an ass he'd made of himself.
Even so, he still wanted to clear the air, and he'd be glad for Chad's company. After some indecision, he arranged a date, and all that was left was to meet his lover at the designated restaraunt. He showed up early, mostly due to nerves, and took a long look at the drink selection before taking a deep breath and ordering a tea. He did not want to do anything that would screw this up.

Chad walked into the restaurant and told the hostess he was meeting a tall,lanky redheaded man, and she led him to Nihls' table.
"Hey" he said, before giving his drink order to the waitress. "What's up?"

Nils smiled brightly at Chad. He took it as a good sign how much the other man's presence lightened his mood. The feelings he'd drunkenly professed were definitely real then. Well, that's no surprise. Whatever some of the others might think, he could see how wonderful Chad was.
Also a good sign was Chad's apparent mood. He didn't seem particularly concerned about anything, and that was a relief. He couldn't recall ever being more thankful for Chad's tendancy to not let anything get to him.
"Hey Chad." He replied, trying his best to be nonchalant and not at all like he wanted to kiss him. "How was your trip?"

Chad sipped his beer before replying. "It was good. Mostly hung out with Trent on the beach and watched him go after Tracy look alikes. How were things here?"

Nils winced at the smell of alcohol. He didn't even like beer, but the smell of it was a painful reminder. He gripped his tea so hard his knuckles turned white, resisting the impulse to call their waitress over and order something stronger. In the end, only the thought of what it would do to the date was enough to allow him to relax and focus on Chad.
"Sounds fun." He said, with a bit of false cheer. "I couldn't really tell you. I spent most of the time at Aimee and Connie's. They've been helping me detox." He smiled perhaps a bit stiffly. "I'm sober now, which is new."
He took a shaky sip of his tea. "And Esperanza's doing a lot better. She's out of her room and apparently working for Simon now."

Chad assessed Nils quickly. "That's good. Glad Ronnie's feeling better, but don't tell her I said so. Are you going to be staying at Aimee and Connie's until you get used to being sober, or do you plan to go back to your place soon?"

Nils smiled wryly. "I'll make sure not to." He promised. This right here was a perfect example of why Nils thought so highly of Chad. He was really a great guy, even if he didn't really show it. And lets face it, his false douchebaggery was hilarious. All of those jokes about Thompson eating hoboes were hilarious, even if they were a bit in bad taste.
"I'm already back to my own place." He replied, "They searched my apartment for booze before I moved back in, but it's really a lot better this way. Watson was not happy living in Aimee's studio, and I much prefer sleeping in my own bed at night."

"That's fair. Where is that damned bird anyways?"

Nils laughed. "Oh, he's at home, in his room." he replied. "He was so excited to be going home I had to hold onto him to keep him from cutting and flying over there. In his state at the time" namely that he was refusing to go back to pretending to be a macaw, "that would have been a very bad idea."
He took a sip of his tea. "How's Thompson doing?"

"Weaned off of hobo meat. Not happy about it though."

Nils laughed. Perhaps foolishly, he was convinced that the whole hobo thing was merely an elaborate prank. If there were really hoboes dying, someone would have noticed. He ignored the nasty voice that said that perhaps it just hadn't made headlines and steered clear of the local news. If he was wrong, he did not want to know about it. "Well, that's probably a good thing. We'll just have to find him something equally delicious to eat."

"Yeah. He's been picking off some of the University's livestock. I think Trent might be noticing that something is off about Thompson though. He left the bottom half of a calf's leg in front of my door yesterday. That was hard to explain."

That was starting to sound a little less like a joke. Nils' laughter was now perhaps a touch strained. "I can imagine." He answered, "What DID you tell him?"

"That he probably just found it and dragged it home."

Nils nodded. "That works."
He was interrupted then by the waitress coming to take their order, and afterward he was silent for a few moments, unsure what to say. He finally decided to just get to the point.
"So, I wanted to apologize for generally being a drunken ass. Particularly that one night, after Halo."

Chad assessed the redhead for a moment. "It's fine. I'm not a very monogamous person. You know that. I just think the drinking has gotten a bit out of hand, so I'm glad that's ending."

Nils winced. "Yeah... I don't want to hurt anyone else I care about."
He sighed and took a sip of his tea. "I just want you to know, that drunken antics aside, what I said about my feelings is true. I don't expect anything to change, I don't expect you to change, that wouldn't be fair to you." He bit his lip. It would be so much easier if Chad were out, because he was really nervous and physical contact would really help right about now. "I just felt like you deserved to know."

Chad took a swig and nodded before giving the best answer he could. "Thanks for that."

Nils nodded, unsure as to what else he could say. He took a sip of his tea, reaching nonchalantly under the table in an attempt to snag Chad's hand while looking innocuous. "So, we're alright then?"

Chad laughed. Nils was not subtle. "Yeah we're fine."

The relief hit him all at once, his muscles visibly relaxing. Losing Chad had become one of his primary worries, and it was endlessly good to hear that it was not like to happen because of his stupid mistakes he'd made.
"Well, that's good to hear."

Chad felt awkward and didn't know where to go from there, so he just nodded and said, "So what's up?"

"Oh, just enjoying freedom, mostly." He replied with a wide smile. "I'm living on my own again, moving more or less freely through life, I'm self employed..." He realized as he spoke he hadn't told Chad yet. "Oh, yeah. I lost my TA gig-got fired due to the craziness of my detox. I'm living entirely off of my commission work now. I should have done it years ago, now that I've cut my spending in half by eliminating the wine budget, I still have more than enough."

"That's good. Are you working on expanding?"

Nils nodded. "Yeah, I have the free time now, so I figured, why not. I went ahead and bought myself a much nicer sewing machine, so I can get things done faster. Plus, I'm not really sleeping now. I'm working my way through my wait list. I think I may also expand into making garb for Ren Faires, see if I can get a booth at TRF."