Chapter Text
“Take your shirt off.”
“Won’t that... not help my case?”
“What, like you’ve got a beer gut or something?” Dahlia scathed. “You’ll be fine, straight women have really low standards. Now take your shirt off.”
Kristoph cringed as he grabbed the hem of his shirt, pulling it up only an inch or two.
“... Would you mind looking away maybe?” He tried to sound exasperated but the blush creeping onto his face betrayed him.
Dahlia’s jaw dropped. “Oh my god. You’re body shy.”
“Shocked it took you this long-”
“I have watched you shoot a man between the eyes, at point blank range, without so much as a flinch,” she leaned forward, emphasizing every word. “And you’re telling me you’re scared to take your shirt off in front of people?”
Kristoph struggled for words for a moment and came up short.
“Yes, I have an easier time killing people than being... grossly exposed in public. I don’t know what to tell you.”
“You’re not ‘grossly exposed,’ it’s just your chest,” Dahlia cackled. “And this isn’t even in public, I’m the only one here.”
He glared at her. “And you’re going to make unwanted comments.”
“You really think I’m gonna insult you or something?”
“Does one have to be ugly to get unwanted comments?”
Dahlia took a second to put it together, and her heart dropped to her stomach. It was gross; she felt gross. Guy or not, she just tried to pressure someone into taking off their shirt, even when they told her they were uncomfortable.
“Shit. I- I’m sorry Kris... I wasn’t thinking about... that.”
“You don’t have to be sorry. If it bothered me too much, I would have said so,” Kristoph said with averted eyes. At least he didn’t sound upset, Dahlia thought.
“But you’re right. I have to be used to it if this is going to work.” He took a deep breath and tried again, pulling his shirt over his head and off of him entirely. His long hair trailed behind and fell over his now bare chest.
Dahlia gave him a cursory glance before turning away. Yep, that was about what she figured it would be.
“You’ll be fine. More than fine.”
Kristoph rolled his eyes and smiled. “Dahlia, I promise it’s fine. Do you really think I would ever lie for anyone else’s benefit?”
She considered the question for a moment and looked back toward him. “Just trying not to make any unwanted comments.”
“Wasn’t that the point of this whole exercise?”
Dahlia pouted and let her eyes fall downward again. She could tell how small his waist was with a shirt on but seeing it in its entirety was something else; the width of his shoulders to his waist was practically a 2:1 ratio. The man was all smooth lean muscle, his height and slim figure just looked... pretty. There was really no other way to put it. He had a deep collarbone and taut arms, and his hip bones formed a deep V over his waistband.
She gestured vaguely toward him. “... Gorgeous, 10/10. Absolutely swoon worthy. You’re gonna have no trouble drawing eyes, even from men.”
Kristoph didn’t say anything but the blush returned to his face, and he couldn’t seem to keep his eyes on one thing for more than a second.
“I can see where the unwanted comments were coming from. If you walked up to me like this and told me to jump off a bridge I’d probably do it.”
“Alright that’s plenty,” he murmured with a hoarse voice and dark pink cheeks. That brought Dahlia’s spirits back around.
She smirked. “Distractingly beautiful.” Teasing him always had been great fun, since he was often so unflappable. And about the most innocent of things, she mused.
“That’s the ticket, isn’t it? Being distracting.” Kristoph fidgeted with the shirt in his hands.
Dahlia hopped off the hood of the car. “Mhm! And that’s why you,” she poked Kristoph’s chest right over his heart, “need an attitude change.”
He cocked an eyebrow at her.
“You can have the face and body of Adonis but if you act like Hades then no lady’s gonna chase you,” she wagged a finger at him.
Kristoph hummed and looked down at her. “Would that make you my Persephone?”
Petal pink lips curved upward in a playful smile and his dark eyelashes fluttered like butterfly’s wings. His features were truly stunning— high cheekbones and ice-like eyes gave him a haughty and untouchable aura, and his fair unblemished skin looked almost ethereal in the soft gray light of an overcast day.
Dahlia stuck her tongue out at him. “Nope. Persephone was sweet and gentle; I’m a bitch.”
Kristoph chuckled, pulling his shirt back on. “I suppose you’d have to be, to deal with such a dour lover like Hades.” He winked at her. Dahlia put her hand over her heart dramatically and laughed.
“Stop that, your flirting style is too... sophisticated. You’re gonna make people feel stupid.”
“That’s my forte. Why, do you feel stupid?”
“Oh my god, shut the fuck up!” She doubled over with laughter, which coincidentally helped to hide the pink on her cheeks. “You’re supposed to be all mysterious and shit, stop being funny.”
Kristoph made a skeptical face, amusement still alight in his eyes. “Mysterious?”
“Yeah,” Dahlia waved her hand at him vaguely. He raised his eyebrows and repeated her gesture. “Wh- How do you not know? You just look mysterious. People here don’t look or talk the way you do.”
“It’s because I’m German?”
“I mean... it helps, ladies love a European accent, but that’s not why. It’s like... how you carry yourself. You look naturally important, like nobody in their right mind would ever fuck with you. That’s the appealing part.”
That gave Kristoph pause and he stared off as he spoke. “Not entirely natural, actually.”
“Huh?”
“I was taught to do that. Look unapproachable, that is. Though I took to it very quickly, so I suppose you could call it natural in that regard.” Kristoph absently played with his bottom lip with a rare look of reminiscence on his face. He broke out his trance a moment later, blinking and looking back at Dahlia. “That’s actually attractive?”
“Unapproachable plus ugly makes a creep; unapproachable plus hot makes an alluring bad boy. People put a ridiculous amount of bias into appearance.” She put her hand under her chin with an enchanting smile. “I would know~!”
Kristoph only smiled back, joining her on the car. Large pine trees lined the horizon and birds swooped above them. If their conversation hadn’t reached a comfortable end, she might have thought the fog that had settled over this trashy part of town was deafening. It felt... vaguely familiar, in a strange way.
“I’ve spent my whole life trying to get away from my family,” Dahlia mused. “And yet this is the farthest I’ve ever been from home.”
“Really? I thought you lived near Hazakura Temple. We’re only about a state away.”
She giggled. “We didn’t travel. The farthest I ever got was Ivy University, and even then she followed me. Like the kind of lap dog that can’t fend for itself, and just whimpers when it’s kicked.”
Kristoph glanced at her. “A good analogy, but if you’ve been going around kicking dogs, you can get the fuck off thi-”
“I don’t kick dogs!” Dahlia howled in outrage, starting to crack up again. “You ass!”
He put his hands up in surrender. “Just checking I haven’t been travelling with an unforgivable monster.”
“No, the only dogs I kick are men,” she said. Kristoph snorted.
Their laughter slowly died out once again and Dahlia’s talk of her past settled over them.
“...I’m closer now than I was in prison. Though I can’t say I would hate being home anymore.” Kristoph looked at the ground, nudging the unsightly weeds with his shoe.
“Well, home is empty for you.”
“Literally, perhaps,” he chuckled. “But their ghosts still remain.”
“You sound like the Telltale Heart guy.”
“Aren’t you well-cultured? First Greek mythology, now Victorian classics?”
“Shut up,” Dahlia shook her head with a smile. “What happened to them anyway? Your parents?”
He paused, biting his lip. “They got a, how to put it... a memorable taste of karmic justice.”
Her eyebrows went up. “Ah.” Silence punctuated the mental image.
“You know, ‘karmic justice’ is usually dished out by like... fate.” She stared down the side of his head as she spoke. “And yet, I get the weird feeling matters were taken into other hands.”
“Who would be more fit to serve an untimely death than Hades?” Kristoph grinned with a dangerous glint. Dahlia rolled her eyes playfully. Body and personable façade be damned, she never found him more beautiful than just like this; the cruel and self-assured smartass he truly was inside.
“Touché.”