Welcome to Gaia! ::

He had lost the bet and when handed the form for the Valentine's Day blind date he filled it out with little more then a sigh. He had known the consequences for being off even one point in the Super Bowl firehouse pool. Atleast he hadn't been far off on his guess because the guy who had made the worse bet would be wearing a dress for a week.

When the day of the date arrived Pat was prepared for a evening of small talk and flavorless finger food. He had glanced at the letter, noted the time and location and his date’s name before his attention was drawn to the note at the bottom where he was informed that they did not have an animation exhibit which was unfortunate as far as Pat was concerned.

Before he even realized it was time to head out for his date. He scooped up his keys and shrugged into his coat, pausing just once to check his appearance in a mirror before heading out. His black dress shoes were scuffed but still presentable, the jeans were clean and showed very little wear as the color was still a deep blue, his nice buttoned down shirt was politely tucked in but he had refused to put on a tie or even button the last, strangulation inducting buttons. His simple black jacket finished off his look, if you could even call it that. He was presentable if not highbrow but his only suit was old and no longer fit so it was as good as it was going to get.

It didn't take him long to get to the muse and even less time to find the right location. He was right on time, according to his watch at least. The redhead fished out his invitation as he approached the entrance of the Egyptian exhibit, he scanned the description he was given before glancing around. It didn’t take long for him to spot a female in a cream dress and ‘cozy’ knit sweater. He approached her and stopped at a polite distance before coughing softly to get her attention. “Fiona?”

Pat smiled down at her before nodding his head in greeting. “Guilty as charged. It's the purple eyes right? They give me away every time. I'm sure it's got nothing to do with my fire hair or my height.” His smile was crooked and full of amusement as he took her hand and mischiefly sketched a bow over it and placed a chaste kiss on her knuckles before letting her go

The EMT shrugged sheepishly, slipping his hands into his jacket pocket to fiddle with his keys quietly. “Honestly? I lost a bet. Every year the guys do a Super Bowl bet, depending on how off you were depended on how embarrassing your pay up is. I wasn't too far so I was signed up for this thing.” He shifted his weight slightly, “and you? Why did you toss your hat into the ring?” She didn't seem like someone who needed a blind date to get a date but what did Pat know about females? With a mental shrug he extracted one hand from his pocket and gestured to the exhibit, “shall we? We can talk on the way.”

Pat chuckled, she had a point. It was kind of hard to miss someone with red hair and unique eyes. “Fiery hair means fiery personality.” Pat actually thought he was pretty laid back for his self understanding but he knew his cousin wouldn't take s**t from nobody so maybe the old idiom had at least a base in truth.

The tall redhead smiled and nodded in agreement, “It really could have been worse. The guy who lost the worse is even now wearing a old dress running errands for the rest of the guys in the firehouse.” Everyone had known that this was the possible punishment they would get if they lost and yet they all still placed their bets. Some had done some serious research to avoid it, others not so much. This time the poor guy who failed so miserably was one of the later and not being much of a football fan he hadn’t even tried to do well. Pat personally didn’t care for the sport either but he also didn’t want to be the house’s gopher for the next week either.

“Thats a shame really. Understandable but a shame.” He offered her his arm, his mother taught him manners, and continued his thought process. “So technically this is a day off for you, and here you are stuck with me. That is a serious bummer. Well I hope I don’t ruin your first date in a while.”

“I think your right. I definitely got the best deal out of everyone.” He smiled at Fiona before escorting her towards the first display. “Well I’ll do my best to make the date worth it. Can’t have your first date in forever to be a dud.” The glass case in front of them were a dozen pieces of Egyption jewelry, each one intricate and glittering under the bright spotlights that illuminated them. The small white placards described where the jewelry was found, what it was made of, its age, and its likely owners and usage.

“This city is full of some strange a** people who like cosplay but a troll? I don’t think so. As for the attractive part...“ Pat shrugged. He knew that he wasn’t ugly, but he also wasn’t use to the attention or adoration of the opposite sex. Not really at least. He really hated being the center of attention so he tried to shift the conversation slightly. “I think you have me beat by quite a few points in the beauty department. If I was one of these items I likely would be that one,” he pointed to the simple battered gold bracelet, “where as you're probably more around that one,” this time Pat indicated the large multicolored, intricate, collar type necklace that was the center of the display.

Pat actually hadn't seen just how strange the city was even though he had recently been inducted to the shadowy world of the city’s night. He spend most of the last month adjusting to his new ‘reality’ and learning everything he could from his cousins but he knew better then even hinting about that. “I've seen some pretty messed up things but all of them were done by man.” His smile tried to make light of the meaning behind his statement, it didn't do a very good job. He forced his mind back to the beautiful young woman at his side, the darkness that lurked in the city was something best forgotten. They were on a date after all.

“I think your eyes are only part of what makes you stand out.” Maybe he was putting on too much charm but she was cute and it never hurt to be galiant when it came to the fairer sex. Pat wisely kept his mouth shut when it came to her comment on his looks. It didn’t really matter what he thought, only what she did. Besides it wasn’t like he really cared all that much one way or another.

The tall redhead chuckled at her challenge, “Oh I can handle it, just lead the way.” He bowed slightly and offered his arm once more, a wide smile on his face. He had seen many things worse than mummies including live bodies wrapped in so much gause they looked like mummies so a few petrified bodies wouldn’t make him balk. He really didn’t do so badly in the betting pool. With some luck maybe he could get a second date out of tonight as well.