First Reply Out of Place

[Aiden Porte]

​

The cantina was dimly lit, its air thick with the mingled scents of engine grease, spice smoke, and the faint tang of ozone from a blaster discharged too recently. Nar Shaddaa's constant neon glow seeped through the grime-streaked windows, painting the tables in uneven stripes of pink and blue. It was the kind of place where no one looked twice at a stranger, which was precisely why Aiden had chosen it.

He moved with quiet confidence through the crowd, his dark cloak blending easily with the layers of streetwear and smugglers' leathers. The hum of conversation and low thrum of electro-jazz masked the subtle rhythm of his boots as he reached the bar. For a moment, he scanned the room in the mirror behind the counter. A Rodian dealer. A pair of Nikto guards nursing Corellian ale. A hooded figure in the back who hadn't touched his drink.

He signaled the bartender, a droid with one photoreceptor flickering in and out and spoke in a tone casual enough to pass as weary traveler.

"Something local." he said. "Nothing that glows."

The droid gave a static-laden grunt and poured him a measure of pale amber liquid that smelled faintly of citrus and rust. Aiden accepted it, turning slightly so his back rested against the bar. The drink's warmth spread slow and steady through him as he listened, not with his ears, but with that deeper current beneath them. The Force hummed faintly, threads of tension and intent brushing against his awareness. Somewhere in this cantina, someone was waiting for a contact. Someone tied to the information he'd been sent to uncover.

He took another sip, his expression calm, posture relaxed but behind the quiet surface, his mind was tracing every movement, every flicker of emotion that rippled through the crowded space. Nar Shaddaa's underbelly was a dangerous place for a Jedi, but sometimes the shadows were where truth chose to hide.

A voice at his side broke the rhythm.

"You don't look like you belong here." it said, smooth, curious, edged.

Aiden's gaze shifted, one brow lifting slightly over the rim of his glass.

"No one ever does." he murmured. "That's why they come."

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes

Maybe the track shifted or the definition of ‘electro-jazz’ music did the next instant. Sitting at a bar on Nar Shaddaa, it was all one patron could do in a cantina of misfits and dipshits to listen to the beats, think nothing of the feminine lyrics and sip her drink. Tequila. Neat. Glowing blue.

It wasn’t a time to think though. Eyes to the viewscreen which depicted an Ithorian with a state of the art translator collar in some advert. He hollered words at his audience that was anything but Galactic Basic Standard. However, here was one woman who understood a number of languages, and sometimes speech was silent like death in the eyes.

Others on the stools beside her. Fools, most likely, but she wasn’t exactly one to judge. Sure, she sat alone though wasn’t lonely, liked her privacy and then some, but if she wanted her own company at the moment then she would not not have come to a bar and restaurant.

Dressed in a black leather trench coat, hood lowered, turning her glass of vibrant cyan liquid in her hand on the bartop for no other reason than to turn it, she looked to her side. There was an Ithorian whose gaze was fixated on the viewscreen. Another sucker for commercials. Yet credits were universal and served her purpose.

She looked to her other side. Some guy in leathers and a dark cloak. Not so local and not so glowing. Might be he was trying to pass for a Sith or an assassin, his fellow patron figured, but what did she know? Humored, however, enough for mildly diverting conversation to serve as entertainment, she opened her lips to him.

“You don’t look like you belong here.” She spoke with a smile, taking in his visage.

“No one ever does," he murmured. “That’s why they come.”

“True enough,” she replied, iced eyes wide open, colored like oceans. “Or just because it’s something local to get drunk in even though nothing glows.” She sipped her liquor, licked her lips, gaze unwavering from his face.

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden let her words linger in the air between them, carried by the static hum of the cantina's electro-jazz. He didn't move right away, didn't rush to fill the silence. His eyes shifted just enough to meet hers, studying the glint of amusement in those ocean-colored irises. The drink in his hand was still warm from the swallow he'd taken, bitter and metallic on his tongue, but his mind was elsewhere, mapping the currents beneath the surface.

The Force brushed against him, subtle as a draft through a sealed room. A flicker of intent, a knot of tension woven somewhere deeper in the crowd. He traced it without revealing that he did, letting his posture remain relaxed, the easy silhouette of a drifter nursing a forgettable glass.

"Places like this sell a certain kind of anonymity." he said finally, his tone quiet, steady. "But anonymity doesn't last long when people start looking too closely." His gaze flicked to the mirror behind the bar, catching the reflection of the hooded figure still posted in the back. The same one who hadn't moved since he'd walked in. Could be something, probably not though.

He turned back to her, expression unreadable save for the faintest tug at the corner of his mouth. "So tell me, are you here to drink, or to watch?"

Behind the calm of his words, he was already bracing. In Nar Shaddaa's shadows, conversations were rarely just conversations.

 

[Oshin Jantu]

He sipped his drink like any average patron in an establishment like this. He spoke steady, plain as day with his straight face yet, if there was any hidden intent, it was cryptic like his tone. Wasn’t her own, though? With her eyes into his, every direction they shifted in was glimpsed, but whatever Oshin witnessed in her peripheral vision was as ephemeral as his; hidden like whatever was in a mirror image.

It was only fitting, then, that the next words that escaped his lips as his face turned to hers was on the very same topic. She kept her gaze in his even as she spied all kinds of things in the corners of her eyes; like the bartender’s photoreceptors, the guys with their unbridled laughter on the other side, or a door toward the back of the bar that opened just then for a Devaronian, or the subtle hint of a grin from the man sitting before this woman, and either could be trouble.

“Oh…” Oshin sighed through her nose, lips too busy grinning with no faint hint as she craned her glass of tequila away from her face; like she was as much interested in taking another sip as she was in him. “Both?” She spoke it as a question, but maybe she meant it as a statement, if not an invitation.

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden's eyes flicked up from the rim of his glass, the faint reflection of blue light rippling across the surface of his drink as Oshin's words hung between them. Both? The single syllable landed like a subtle test casual enough to blend with the hum of the bar, but deliberate enough that he caught the weight behind it.

He didn't answer right away. He let the silence do some of the talking, the kind that stretched just long enough for the music to thread its way through a low synth rhythm that echoed against the metal fixtures and the laughter from the back corner. His thumb traced the condensation on the side of the glass, mind quietly turning over the possibilities she'd offered, or perhaps, dared him to choose between.

When he finally spoke, his tone carried that same evenness he was known for calm, measured, with a hint of warmth that only appeared when he wanted it to.

"Both..." he said simply. The corner of his mouth curved faintly, not quite a smile, but close enough to suggest he'd caught her meaning and wasn't opposed to it.

He leaned back in his seat, posture easy, though his gaze was anything but lax. "Trouble has a habit of showing up when the drinks are good." he added, nodding slightly toward her glass. "Question is, are you the kind that finds it… or the kind that walks right through it without blinking?"

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes

Both. She might have said it again. Heck, she would have had the right of it even in this instance. Might it have satisfied this guy as another answer if repeated? Would he have accepted her words as much as he did his challenge, whatever it was?

Here to drink. Here to watch. Here to talk, more or less, in addition. Instead of the repetition, though, Oshin turned in her seat to face him a bit more, giving her drink less attention, propping an elbow on the tabletop, letting the glass sit for a minute.

“I guess that depends whether I’m on my own or with someone.” She spoke like somebody who hadn’t given his question much thought. Was that lack of uncertainty what he read in her eyes, though? “Then again…sometimes trouble finds you whether you’re looking for it or not.”

She glanced between his own drink and his eyes. “So tell me.” She drummed a lone finger on her glass to the beat of the music, her gaze unwavering from his face—except to blink. “Is it a good drink?”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden's eyes lifted from his drink, a faint curl of amusement tugging at one corner of his mouth. The cantina light caught in the amber liquid as he rolled it once between his fingers, the muted hum of conversation and the slow rhythm of the band filling the spaces between words.

He studied her for a moment before answering not out of suspicion, but curiosity. The Force didn't whisper any danger here, only the soft tension that came from two people testing the edges of a conversation.

"A fair question." he said at last, voice calm but carrying that trace of quiet humor that came naturally to him. "Depends on what you're asking about. The drink? It's…fine." He tilted the glass, watching the surface catch the light. "Too sweet for my taste, though. I think they try to hide the bitterness that way."


Setting the glass down, he leaned back slightly in his chair, the motion casual but measured. "But if you're asking whether it's a good place to think over one, that's another story." His gaze met hers, steady, green eyes reflecting the dim glow of the room. "Sometimes that's all a person needs a quiet corner and something to hold while the galaxy turns."

"What's your name?"

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Questions. Answers. Dependence. Misdirection. Then again, perhaps all this really was just aimless conversation in a cantina in the end. Whatever it was for him, whatever it was for her, maybe they played the same game, maybe their agendas were different like her tequila and his spirit.

The drink was too sweet, he said. They might try to hide the bitterness. He would find none in her eyes though; only those oceans for irises, serene as the sea, but sweet was for him to decide.

“I’m asking if it’s a good drink.” Her lilt dripped like a droplet upon a lily in a spring pond. Maybe. Words given simply, gaze measured with his, she lifted her glass, taking another sip. “Sometimes all a person needs is that quiet corner,” she agreed, hesitating. “And somebody to hold while the galaxy turns.”

She licked her lips, tasting spice. “Oshin,” she replied, head tilted as if to bow, lips curved like her eyebrows. “And who are you?”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden's lips parted just slightly not from surprise, but from the quiet awareness that her words had shifted the air between them. Her voice lingered in his ears longer than the music did, carrying that undercurrent of something between play and philosophy.

He set his glass aside, the faint clink of it on the table barely audible above the low murmur of the cantina.

"Aiden." he said after a heartbeat, though there was something deliberate in how he spoke it, not the way a man offered his name at a bar, but the way someone might offer truth carefully, gauging how much of it should be seen. "Just Aiden."

The corner of his mouth twitched, a hint of warmth softening the composure that seemed natural to him.

He studied her again the way she'd turned the simple act of sipping into punctuation for her thoughts. "Oshin," he repeated, as if testing how it felt to say aloud. "You don't strike me as the sort who stays still while the galaxy turns. More like someone who keeps it spinning."

Aiden raised his hand lightly motioning to the bartender for another round. "What are you drinking?" He asked as he looked over to her.

His gaze lingered a moment longer, eyes bright against the dim. "So tell me, Oshin... what brings someone like you to the quiet corner of a noisy world?"

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes

Minutes passed, and each music track lasted only two or four minutes at that before it shifted. Then again, time was fluid, like liquid irises; blue into blue, though hers might be more cyan than his. Her hair was darker than his, black over brown; and maybe this separation of hues was just an aimless observation in truth.

However, every gesture mattered in an encounter like this; each direction the eyes shifted; each position of the hand; even the clink of glass on the metallic surface. Aiden. Oshin tasted the name as her lips curved. He only gave his first name like she did. That was standard practice. Just Aiden.

Someone only emphasized a line like that if they were hiding something. Oshin didn’t show her curiosity though. As others drank and chattered under the music, she listened only to him. Hearing her name given back to her the way he did was like trading a frisbee over the beach and she showed it with her grin.

“Tequila,” she answered simply; almost a purr to her word, each of the three syllables inflected with liquid lilt. “Laquita. Diamond. No lime with it.” The oceans that were her eyes danced between the bartender and this guy as if to say please.

“Someone like me?” She repeated the question. "Somebody who keeps this galaxy spinning, you mean?" She took a moment to think as she sipped what was left of her drink. "As much as someone who looks for somebody, something, to hold onto while the galaxy turns, burns?" Her lips rested on the rim, finding an excuse, eyes lingering in his.

“Maybe I’m just visiting the corners of my universe,” she teased, crossing one leg over the other, shifting in her seat to give him her attention. “You know, drifting like a leaf in the breeze from the silence of the void between the stars to the noise of Nar Shaddaa.”

With that last sip, Oshin finished her drink, discarded the empty glass, waited for the pour. It was a high-priced selection but evidently Aiden was a gentleman. “Just…taking in the scenery.” She drummed her fingers, expectant, but never impatient, eyes ever vibrant.

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden watched the rhythm of her movement the rise of her glass, the turn of her wrist, the way her words shaped the air before them. She had a way of speaking that filled the quiet, not by breaking it, but by turning it into something deliberate. The kind of person who knew silence was just another instrument.

He'd met plenty of people in cantinas before, soldiers looking for numbness, merchants for escape, Jedi who shouldn't have been there at all. But Oshin she spoke like someone who didn't need to hide behind distraction. There was intent in her ease, a kind of curiosity that reminded him of himself in younger years, before restraint became habit.

"Tequila, no lime." he repeated with a small nod, half to himself, watching as the bartender caught her glance. "Brave choice."

The new drink came, light shifting along its surface as he looked back to her. "Drifting can be dangerous." he said, tone even, though something almost wry touched it. "Leaves in the breeze don't always choose where they land. Nar Shaddaa isn't kind to wanderers."

He leaned forward slightly, forearms resting on the table, the light catching on the edge of his saber's hilt beneath his cloak not flaunted, but not hidden either. "Still." he added, meeting her gaze fully, "I suppose there's beauty in the drift. Even when it takes you places you shouldn't be."

A faint smile tugged at his lips. "And if this is your corner of the galaxy tonight, Oshin, I'll admit the scenery's improved considerably."

He raised his glass slightly in her direction, that quiet Naboo calm still threaded through the gesture. "To leaves and stars, then. And to not knowing where the wind might take either of us next."

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes (Recurring)

[

Deliberate. Delicate. Take it. Shape it. Rhythm. Give into it. Like this conversation. Concentration given. Unexpected. Heck with it. They were in a cantina and this was the name of the game as much as the nature of their circumstance, wasn’t it? Just chat. Listen. Witness with lips and vision. They weren’t caged birds but free spirits featured in this predicament of wits. Like two contestants in an arena. They didn’t trade blades but they played. They danced, not with swords, but in more than one way.

Tequila. No lime. So specific but he needed to not be reminded of it. Bartender caught onto Diamond Laquita, of course, which was more than enough for her. Brave choice? Maybe. To enter from the stars into the void of Nar Shaddaa meant you had business to begin with. She did anyhow. What about him?

The new drink came. Oshin glued her gaze to it, turning it on the surface; a student to its perfect circumference as if she had never been served this pour before; nectar, but no fruit juice. Fighting to hide her smirk, her lips quivered, turning into a grin; drifting like leaves in a breeze.

"Cute."

She listened, ears curved to every word from her speaker, even if her gaze might betray her attention; like a seasnake hiding in the seaweed, waiting patiently. A lone finger lingered at the liquid level of her drink as bass and treble seized the speakers.

Dangerous. Wasn’t he? This Aiden. Aided her endeavor to simply be here and drink and listen to music, at least. Danger was the name of the game, wasn’t it? Oh, Oshin would know, wouldn’t she? “To leaves and stars,” she repeated at first, caught off guard by his words.

“To beauty in the drift.” She turned to him. “To quiet corners and noisy worlds.” Lifted the rim of her glass to her lips but didn’t sip. “To turning the galaxy and keeping it spinning.” At that, eyes into eyes, she drank. Liquid coated her throat, swallowing all of it, finished.

“I admit,” she licked her lips. “The scenery has improved considerably.” She didn’t wink, and her eye didn’t twitch, but her gaze never wavered from his. “But what’s your corner of the galaxy tonight?” She looked left, looked right. “Besides a bar on Nar Shaddaa that isn’t kind to wanderers wanting to rest their heads?”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden's answering breath left him in a quiet chuckle, the sort that curved his mouth but didn't quite reach his voice. The drink was set down again, still half full, the rim traced absently with a gloved thumb. Her words playful, deliberate hung between them like the faint curl of smoke above the tables.

He didn't speak right away. Maybe he was buying time. Maybe he was just savoring the rhythm of her tone. Either way, when his voice came, it was steady Naboo softness tempered by something older, something practiced.

"My corner." he echoed, as if trying the question on for size. "I suppose it depends on the night. Sometimes it's the cockpit of a starfighter somewhere over the Mid Rim." He tipped his head slightly toward her, a ghost of a grin forming. "Sometimes it's wherever someone else happens to be asking good questions." Aiden chuckled and took a small sip. "I do have, a ship though that is docked in Hangar A. That's where sleep will consume me."

His gaze lingered on her for a moment that calm, appraising kind of look that didn't pry, didn't push, but still managed to read too much. "Nar Shaddaa's a rough place to look for rest." he admitted, "But even the Smuggler's Moon can surprise you. Quiet's a rare commodity here rarer still when it's genuine."

A pause. A slow sip. The band's bassline crawled through the floor like a heartbeat.

He leaned forward slightly, voice lowering to something closer, easier. "What about you, Oshin? Do you prefer the quiet? Or does the drift give you a thrill nothing else can."

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes

Deliberate was good. Considerate, even, given the nature of this conversation. The name of the game yet again. This was the occasion to be concise as much as descriptive; to give eyes as much as lips; deceptive if honest. They were just dancing, in a way, and the fact that they hadn’t even left their seats didn’t matter. They asked questions, gave answers, navigating between each other’s mysteries like hands and feet on a stage.

Taking turns to sip their shared drinks and lick their lips was its own way of pleasure as much as a measure of thought as they talked. He didn’t speak right away after her words, however. Maybe he was buying time. Maybe he was just savoring the rhythm of her tone as much as the way the music flowed like a river with no sway of limbs to give her. No lyrics. Electro-jazz though. After a manner.

Your corner. She thought. Watched. Whatever she intended with her words, there was no right or wrong answer to her question except silence. This wasn’t quite the time for it. Cockpit. Starfighter. Night. Mid Rim. She shifted the rim of her glass to her lips for a sip. It was timed. Her eyes didn’t shift from his as she did. The music track had since shifted. That tended to happen.

Mirror behind the counter. Mirror, mirror, on the wall. It reflected this cantina and the patrons within it. Watch them all fall. “I suppose it depends on the night.” She didn’t lean forward as he did. She didn’t lean backward either as she answered him. “The engines of a ship might roar the loudest even more than this crowded cantina and its music.”

Oshin hesitated to take another sip, turning her glass in her hand, eyes like arrows from a bow into Aiden’s as if to penetrate them straight into his skull, and never mind the blades of daggers or blaster bolts. “Thrill might fill my wings as I fly in the dark between the stars.” She licked her lips. “Sometimes it’s just as quiet in space. I can appreciate that. Naked. Vacant of surprises, of Q&A and Hangar A.”

Her oceanic irises swept over his like a tide. “Only…one thing I know, Aiden…” She leaned forward slightly with a head tilt, competition and confidence dripping from her lilt as much as someone who just wanted to be honest for once on this moon of Nar Shaddaa and between these stars in the dark. “Tonight...I do not want to sleep.”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden's breath caught in his chest not sharply, not like surprise, but the way it did when the air in a room changed texture. Her words didn't strike like a challenge; they unfolded, deliberate, wrapped in rhythm. The kind of rhythm that made a man notice the pulse in his own wrist.

The mirror behind the bar caught her reflection as she leaned forward. He could see her twice, one version haloed in neon light, the other drawn in the cool shadow of its glass. Both were looking at him, and both seemed entirely aware of it.

He didn't move at first. Jedi training taught stillness, patience, awareness. But there was something in her gaze something alive, untamed that tugged against that discipline like gravity on a satellite.

"Not tired, then." he said finally, voice low but calm, the faint trace of a smile curving beneath it. His hand found his glass again, not to drink but to give his fingers somewhere to rest. "Can't say I blame you. Nar Shaddaa doesn't make rest easy, even when you find it."

He tilted his head slightly, studying her, his tone quiet but curious, not presumptive. "So what does someone do with a night they don't want to sleep through? Chase the noise, or find what's hiding beneath it?"

The hum of the music filled the pause that followed soft bass, static, the clatter of glasses from somewhere deeper in the bar. Aiden's eyes stayed on hers, steady but not pressing.

"I'm not much for sleep either." he admitted after a moment. "Too many places to be. Too much that waits in the quiet when I close my eyes."

He lifted his drink in a small, thoughtful salute between them. "Maybe, for tonight, that's reason enough to stay awake."

 

[Die Shize]

oops

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes (Recurring)

Nar Shaddaa. For a heartbeat, her thoughts were lost on this city and moon that never sleeps. Morning to evening, it stayed awake, trapped in time like eyes stabbed by spice. That was the high, wasn’t it? What enticed a guy like him and a woman like her into this cantina to begin with?

He spoke. She listened. Oshin had since given every gesture she could measure, like he did, until all that was left was her glass of tequila half-filled, like his, and this endeavor of words and irises. In the dark of Nar Shaddaa, were they simply misplaced visitors blinded by the light?

She measured her gaze with his. Every word he uttered slipped between her teeth, coating her throat like her liquor, liquid as the music, but she didn’t speak except when his tongue had finished. It was a different instrument amid his rigid lips, that arced mustache above them, the dip of hair on his chin no less elegant, his beard stretching to his ears and the hair on his head. He had the visage of a man, more or less; yet, for this woman, it was certainly more.

Waits in the quiet when I close my eyes. At that line, Oshin closed her eyes for a moment, waited; like wings in a breeze over an ocean as the bird searches for prey, finds it, snatches it into her beak, and flies away. She opened her eyes, and it was all she could do to breathe.

“To staying awake on Nar Shaddaa,” she saluted back with her own glass. “And sleeping between the stars far from this cantina.” She sipped, finishing her drink, and set her glass on the bar. “Chasing the noise, to me, means finding what’s hiding beneath it.” She licked her lips, savoring every taste.

“Let’s say you’re the noise, Aiden,” Oshin played, swapping her legs to cross the other over the other, her boot brushing his leg as she shifted. “What might I find beneath you, I wonder?”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

Aiden didn't flinch when her boot brushed his leg, though the faintest movement, more a breath than a gesture, gave away that he'd noticed. The contact wasn't aggressive; it was deliberate, like every other motion she'd made since she'd sat down. It reminded him of the way she spoke: soft enough to seem effortless, sharp enough to demand an answer.

He let the silence stretch. It was a familiar tool, one he'd used in interrogation rooms and peace talks alike. Here, though, it was different. It wasn't to pry truth from someone it was to let something breathe.

When he finally spoke, his voice had lowered; not in warning, but in weight. "Noise." he repeated, rolling the word between them like a coin. "That's one way to put it." His gaze remained steady, a calm counterpoint to her teasing energy. "Beneath the noise you'd probably find someone who's seen too much of it. Someone who's learned that quiet isn't peace, and sound isn't always chaos."

A pause. A half-smile, there and gone. "If you were hoping for treasure under the surface, I'll disappoint you. It's just a man trying to keep from getting lost in the drift."

He took another sip of his drink, the burn of it grounding him before he met her eyes again. "But if you really want to find what's beneath, Oshin…" His tone carried that faint, dry warmth that often hid the Jedi's deeper edge. "You might have to stop looking at me like a mirror."

He leaned in, just enough that the music's pulse filled the narrow space between them. "Because mirrors don't show what's beneath, do they? They just reflect what's already there."

Then, quieter, the hint of curiosity threading through the calm.

"Tell me, when you look at me, what is it you're really trying to see?"

 

[Oshin Jantu]

Spoiler: Cantina Vibes

When given an establishment like this and its kind of environment, where patrons were tuned to the tunes as much as the food and drink, Oshin Jantu was someone who wasn’t going to forsake the notion. Music moved her movements in more than one way, whether her ass was parked in a seat or her dagger was between her target’s teeth—or her blaster, for that matter.

She let her fellow patron let the silence stretch. Waited. Patient. There was no rush in this occasion, whatever game they played. Neither person was indecisive, however, and that much was evident in their eyes as they traded gazes. Blood flowed beneath their skin. Tongues flicked for lips to sip. He spoke. She listened. She had since finished her drink though.

Her mannerisms were measured, whatever the extent of her manners and, having no tequila at the moment, Oshin’s oceanic irises were glued to Aiden’s face; like he was the figurine on display, and she was the spectator.

He leaned in. She didn’t flinch. That a mirror was at her side and his fingers were inches from gripping her crossed thighs was not lost on her. Bar counter on her side. Bartender. Mirror image reflected patrons just like her and him, making merriment, all manner of intoxicated or getting there, intentions bare as they wanted, naked if not wanton.

She let the silence stretch, taking his eyes into hers as they shifted, one after the other. Just a man trying to keep from getting lost in the drift. Those were his words, but his gaze betrayed his thoughts like faint stars on the horizon. He had a way with words, that was for sure, but words were wind like the lyrics in this music.

“If I want a mirror to glue my gaze to for the rest of this evening then I’ll head to the restroom where you can’t see me.” Her words purred, reflecting his calm curiosity. “I don’t seek my own reflection,” she admitted.

At that, her fingers shifted, sliding across the tabletop inches from his arm, only to grip his glass instead of his hand, lift the rim to her lips, and sip. “On the contrary…” Oshin swallowed, deliberately slow, and spoke as though her fellow patron was the only other person in this establishment, never mind this universe. “...I’m trying to see someone who sees me.”

Aiden Porte

 

[Aiden Porte]

Oshin Jantu
​

The corner of Aiden's mouth tilted not quite a smile, but something that carried the same quiet weight of one. It wasn't mockery. It wasn't invitation. Just acknowledgment. A shared understanding that hung between them like the smoke curling in the air above the bar's warm lights.

Her words lingered longer than her touch had. I'm trying to see someone who sees me.

That wasn't the kind of line a man brushed off, and it wasn't the kind of truth he'd ever pretend not to hear.

He leaned back slowly, breaking their line of sight just enough to let the tension breathe, before returning it measured, deliberate, the way one might hold a blade between two fingers. The music carried a low rhythm through the room, something with too much pulse to ignore. It rolled through his chest and met the slow rise and fall of his breath.

He reached for his glass her handprint still glistening faintly on the rim and took it back without breaking eye contact. The liquor caught the light between them, amber and warm, and for a heartbeat it was the only thing that moved.

"I see you." he added finally, after that same silence had a chance to stretch again. Not rushed. Not heavy-handed. Just steady. "Maybe not all at once, but enough to know I'd rather learn than just look."

The glass touched the bar with a soft click. He didn't lean in this time. He didn't need to. The air between them was already close enough to touch.

"Your turn." Aiden said, voice softening around the words. "What do you see?"