Prompt
The New Year is nearly upon you; all around town, people are buzzing with excitement. Sales are aplenty and among some of the better deals is a popular new brand of champagne. The drink’s been getting a lot of attention and very good reviews; it boasts a guarantee for a magical evening. It’s a promise that holds true—sort of. Anyone who imbibes the champagne will be extremely in tune to their more romantic feelings. They may feel more open, more daring, or more flirtatious towards the object of their affections. Or, maybe a glass of it is enough to make them realize they have feelings for someone…Either way, after ingesting the champagne, romance is all you can think about. The effects last for only a few hours, so you’d better use that time well. The bottles are out of stock quickly, so you are lucky to have gotten your hands on one. Lucky, unless you made a fool of yourself in your romantic haze…
(WC: 1093)
He'd heard about the champagne on the news - some new fancy label had come out with some new fancy bubbly drink that most of the housewives seemed to be going apeshit over. Maybe it was sweet, supposedly it had some aphrodisiac to it, who the ******** really knew what conned all these people into it but he'd rolled his eyes and flipped the channel when he'd caught a glimpse of the featured discussion over it shortly after Christmas.
It wasn't until he was doing a quick run to the grocery store that he actually saw the champagne on display. What a wonderful thing, alcohol being sold on shelves anywhere these days but from the look of things, the shelves had been cleared out completely. The billboard advertising the fancy-smancy wine was still there and visible but the three shelves that used to hold the rows of bottles were empty from back to ********, these housewives were clearly serious about this wine s**t.
He preferred harder alcohol for his personal taste but Paul had to admit that the concept was intriguing. Not that it mattered, the s**t was sold out across the city - let the women get drunk new year's with their husbands, why did he give a....
The burly man froze as he made it halfway down the pasta and boxed dinner aisle, violet eyes focused on the long neck bottle of something hiding behind a row of angel hair and lasagna noodle boxes. It looked suspiciously out of place and when he nudged the large boxes aside, eyebrows furrowed together as he read the label on the misplaced bottle of champagne.
Well holy ******** snatched it up without thinking. In it went with the other groceries, the large man feeling rather proud of himself for his find. Sure, he didn't normally drink bubbly s**t but ******** - if it was a popular trend, maybe he'd impress even his own spouse when he came home with a bottle. Yeah - Noah enjoyed this s**t, right? Maybe he'd dig whatever the hell this stuff was.
So dinner was focused around the champagne, or at least the ingredients were. He'd taken down the list from Noah's texts, purchasing all the necessary items for the normal, meat and three veggies meal he was making for tonight's course. Paul didn't mind fetching the food, if Noah didn't mind making it.
Once home with all of the grub, though, and Paul was already eyeing the bottle. It probably wouldn't hurt if he had a taste to see what all the fuss was about, right? Save most of it for when Noah got home, take a little bit off the top in the meantime...
Shrugging to himself, he decided what the hell and uncorked the bottle after putting up the rest of the groceries. The s**t fizzed and bubbled like regular champagne did and the pink s**t looked girly as ******** as he poured it into a plain glass, not bothering with getting fancy about it. Taking it like a shot proved just as useless as he'd expected it to be - it was so horrifically sweet that he almost gagged, choking down the liquid until the burn carried its way down his throat.
s**t - how was he expected to drink this stuff?
Setting the now empty cup down, he shook his head and returned the remainder of the bottle to the fridge, in hopes of keeping it chill after screwing a cap across the top. It was s**t champagne, no wonder all the women in the city were after it. Bullshit, really, if they wanted sugar there were plenty of cheaper drinks out there to provide a sweet buzz with, but hey, he'd apparently found himself a sucker to the twenty dollar bottle too so he didn't have any room to talk.
As he glanced over the kitchen table, he swallowed again for good measure to try to stomach down the burning sensation still lingering in his throat. The room was still growing warm - girly crap shouldn't give him a buzz, he knew that much. Most things had to have a strong proof to even touch him these days, yet he couldn't explain how he got the sudden urge to unbutton the first two buttons of his shirt after having essentially a goddamn shot of girly drink.
Christ, he was losing his s**t.
Though the more he stared at the empty dining room table, the more it made sense that he should probably try to make dinner himself. That would be the nice thing to do for his husband, right? Long day at work, probably no energy - yeah, dinner would be a nice gesture, would probably earn him more than a few brownie points.
As he started pulling out all of the ingredients he'd just gone out to get for Noah to make the dinner with, he started up the oven and shot a borderline gag-worthy text to his working spouse. Probably gonna get called a pansy over it. Probably not going to give two shits about it.
A series of texts continued to make their way towards the ginger while he worked on the food. The meat earned a nice sear (more like burn) while the vegetables earned their own fates of being over-salted, over diluted, over-everything.
But it was okay. Noah would see that effort was made and be proud of him for it. Yeah, he'd be proud and he'd get at least a few kisses out of it, if not some praising and... well, other things.
Candles were found for the table, though none of them matched. One refused to light, another had been lit too much and the other two flickered on their own accord. He set the table as proper as he could, placing out the good china for the occasion, along with the bottle of champagne - pre-pouring it, of course, so Noah wouldn't be aware that he'd already taken a sip for himself.
The table looked sad once the food was placed on it but Paul was nevertheless proud of his attempts. Noah had been sent approximately fourteen separate texts, messages that ranged from his appreciation for him to practically demanding for him to come home soon - almost whining, telling him how much he needed him.
When the front door finally opened and a muffled what the ********> echoed through the hallway, a hopeful, wide eyed Paul Jones rose from his seat in the kitchen and happily made his way into the foyer to greet his beloved husband, just in time for dinner.
