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Dottore frowned at his Spotify Wrapped. Insane Clown Posse again– he couldn't possibly share this. Sighing, he moved to put away his phone. Before he could, however, a text popped up from Columbina.
“I'm at Paris Baguette,” she said. “Do you want to come?”
“No,” he replied, which he knew she knew meant yes. He grabbed his wallet, went outside, and got in his red Fiat 500.
He thinks Paris Baguette had unethical business practices, or something, and so wondered why Columbina was going there. That was the kind of thing Pantalone would like, not her. He didn't really care either way because he was a little bit evil.
The drive was uneventful, and though it took him a minute to find parking, it wasn't all too bad. He walked past the 6 Teslas and 7 Subarus in the parking lot and headed into the restaurant.
He spotted Columbina fairly quickly, but to his support she wasn't alone– Sandrone was there with her, and–
“Nice to see you!” Pantalone said happily. “Here, I got you a strawberry croissant.”
Dottore took a seat next to Pantalone and accepted the offered pastry. It had a cream filling with little strawberries in it, and though he might not have picked it for himself it somehow looked very good in this particular moment.
Columbina smiled coquettishly and said nothing. Sandrone took a suspiciously long sip of her cinnamon sugar churro latte.
“Did you get your Spotify wrapped?” Columbina asked.
“No,” Dottore brazenly lied.
“It's kind of annoying because we share a Spotify account, so it's not personalized,” Sandrone said.
“Wait– you two share a Spotify?” Pantalone asked. Dottore, who had a mouth full of croissant, was unable to speak.
It was a pretty good croissant. Probably better made at home, with better ingredients, but Dottore wasn't about to go through all that effort. Scaramouche might. He seemed to have a weird vendetta against bad cooks.
“Yeah,” Columbina said. “We have a family account because we're dating.”
The croissant nearly fell out of his mouth.
“You're what.”
They all stared blankly at each other for what felt like several minutes.
“... How long?” Pantalone asked.
“The whole time,” Columbina said, nodding sagely.
“Yeah,” Sandrone confirmed. “The whole time. It's really annoying. She's been clogging up my Spotify for years. Who even likes Insane Clown Posse?”
“Uh oh,” Columbina said, “it looks like someone's in a nasty mood.”
“Wait– not in public–”
Columbina leaned over and all of the sudden teasingly kissed Sandrone. Their lips stayed interlocked for like kind of a while given that they were in the middle of a restaurant.
“Damn, I guess that's how Columbina comforts Sandrone when she's in a bad mood,” Pantalone said under his breath.
Dottore stood up abruptly, slamming his hands against the table. Everyone around who was not already looking at them quickly turned to do so.
“You know what– I'm going to Crumbl. See you guys later.”
With that, he spun around and marched out the door. The snickerdoodle sandwich cookie on the menu this week seemed interesting. At the very least, he'd rather be eating that than be sitting here with tempting visions of that which he does not deserve to experience paraded in front of him.
He heard footsteps behind him– Crumbl was just across the street, so he was walking– and turned around. To his surprise, Pantalone was following him. He chuckled a little awkwardly.
“Crazy, huh?”
They reached the crosswalk together, and stood quietly as they waited for the light to turn. It was raining a little, or maybe it was just the kind of foggy mist that seemed to permeate December. In either case, Dottore was left cold and slightly wet. Unpleasant, but so it goes.
“Pantalone?” he asked.
“Yes?”
“Do you think I can be loved? Like, genuinely?”
“... Excuse me?”
“Maybe that's an odd question to ask you of all people. That's probably why I'm asking you. I mean– I've played people before, manipulated them until they loved me, but that wasn't actually love, you know? Everyone who's actually known the real me has rejected me.”
The sign lit up, and they began to cross the street.
“I haven't,” Pantalone said.
“Do you think you know the real me, then?”
“I know that liking you is hard,” he said. “Being in love with you is probably something like getting kicked in the head by a horse, deciding that you actually really like that feeling, and then standing behind the horse every day for the rest of your life hoping you'll get kicked again.”
They entered Crumbl. There was, for some reason, a small redheaded child behind the counter, which Dottore did not have time to think or worry about. He and Pantalone headed off to the side to place their orders.
“You really think so?”
“I can't say for certain. I’m biased on account of the fact that I am in love with you.”
“So you're– standing behind the horse.”
“Every day,” Pantalone confirmed. “I mean, I have tried to give up on you and move on, but it never once worked out.”
Dottore, having completed his order, moved to the other side of the store to wait for his cookie. There wasn't a lot over there, so it was somewhat hard to pretend that he didn't notice how all of the employees, child included, were very obviously listening in to their conversation. Pantalone stared back at them, unblinking, until they got scared off and actually started to work on their orders.
“If we were to start dating, what would that even look like?” Dottore asked. He couldn't really imagine it. He had never been able to imagine his own future, really– every time he tried, the only thing that came to mind was a vague haze of unhappiness, self repression, and scientific research so unethical it would get him expelled from most accredited universities.
“Like this,” Pantalone said. “Except I imagine we'd both be a lot happier.”
Dottore guessed they might be. Perhaps he, like Sandrone, would finally have someone to comfort him when he was in a bad mood. It was a pleasant thought.
“...um, am I interrupting something?” The Crumbl employee asked. She seemed to be a furry, given her grey cat ears, but Dottore didn't have time to worry about that. He grabbed their orders from her and left the store.
Pantalone took the box with his cookie– brownie batter, an excellent choice– and opened it happily on the sidewalk. Dottore did the same with his own cookie, and took a bite.
“Oh– you've got a little cinnamon sugar on your lip,” Pantalone said.
It felt like he did– the rain had made his skin a little sticky, apparently.
“Here, let me just–”
Pantalone reached out his hand and gently swiped a bit of sugar off his face with his thumb. Dottore, hyper aware of the contact, stood there frozen. Pantalone stilled too, with his hand still there resting against the curve of his jaw. Dottore couldn't remember the last time he'd been so close to someone. He felt– electric.
Pantalone leaned in and kissed him. It felt inevitable, beautiful, like it made everything right in the world. Benson Boone, who had been standing in the parking lot the whole time, started applauding.