Ὀρφεύς - Orpheus

Orpheus has been with the Mariposa since Maeve opened it. A fixture, you might say. He can always be found of an evening tickling his keys and keeping an eye out for trouble with the newcomers. Mostly there's none, but sometimes he has to sweep in with a smile and a song or just stand behind Maeve, looking intimidating.

They call him the Lonely Musician, and if you buy him a drink or two, he'll tell you about his great love, long since lost. If you buy him another, he might tell you that you remind him of his love.

He's not one of Maeve's boys, but if a newcomer looks at him right, strikes up the right conversation (buys him the right number of drinks), Orpheus will give them a night they'll never forget.

Orpheus is still grinning as he sets his guitar just inside the door from Milliways and pulls Steve toward him for another kiss, his hands immediately moving back to Steve's waistband.

Orpheus wasn't entirely sure the ring would work as a way for him to get to Steve's world, but he was going to give it a shot. If it didn't work, he'd explain it to Steve the next time they were both in the bar, and they could figure something else out.

His guitar slung across his back, Orpheus turns the ring on his finger and opens the door, pleased to find himself in Steve's apartment when he steps through.

Orpheus is trying very hard not to just drag Steve up the stairs to their room. Despite having been waiting in the bar, he hasn't been spending much time here at all. It made him think far too much of Steve, and the drawings Steve had left for him didn't really help on that score.

He manages to restrain himself, though, as he unlocks the door.

Something is Wrong.

It isn’t the thing in the woods, whatever that was.

It isn’t the look in Steve’s eyes when he can’t do anything to help his friend.

It isn’t even something as simple as the full moon.

It was the beautiful exquisite perfect young woman standing in front of him. The nymph with the lovely braids, flowing robes shimmering in the sunlight, dancer’s feet bare. Sweet Eurydice. Solid enough to touch.

“You seem troubled, my love,” she says, her voice just as soothing as he remembers.

“You aren’t real,” he answers, though every fiber of his being wants to run to her, hold her, ignore the Wrongness of her.

“Reality is not something you’ve held strongly to.”

He huffs out a laugh that is much darker than she has ever heard from him. “True enough.”

“And who is to say what is real and what is not?”

His head inclines, conceding the point.

“Will you stay?” he asks, when he finds his voice again, heart already twisting in anticipation of her answer.

“You know better, husband.”

He does, of course, but he had to ask. Just as he had to follow her so very long ago, though he knew better then as well.

“Why have you come?”

“Because you are troubled,” she says simply, and he finds himself wanting nothing more than to let her take that trouble away, to rest in the shade of an olive tree, head in her lap as her graceful fingers soothe over his furrowed brow and thread through his hair.

But those days are long past.

“And how do you mean to fix that, my love?”

“Like this,” she says, her lips twisting into a smile that is sad and resigned and not much else. Her bare feet pad lightly over to him, and he is entranced by the movement as he has always been. Leaning up on her toes, she presses her lips to the corner of his mouth, and he is held motionless by the scent of her, so familiar and so close to forgotten. He feels her warm breath on his ear (Wrong Wrong Wrong), and his eyes close of their own volition as she whispers, “Open your heart, husband. Love and live and be as happy as you once made me.”

Finally, the spell breaks, but when he lifts his arms to embrace her, he finds nothing but cold air.

Orpheus had dutifully eaten, if not as much as Steve wanted him to, at least enough to be able to say he was taking care of himself.

And after...well, upstairs had seemed like a good idea. Especially good considering this was the first time it was Orpheus who hadn't seen Steve in over a month rather than the other way around. He tugs Steve into the room with a smile, not willing to let go of him even for a second.

The venue is pretty much perfect. The sun has been set long enough that the rooftop is just pleasantly cool with a lovely view of the city. A bar has been set up on the roof for anyone who doesn’t want to venture inside for a refill.

The inside is lovely as well, though, lit with blues and oranges. The bar is open and fully stocked, and waitstaff circulates the room with trays of amazing looking hors d’ouevres. The view’s not bad there either, and couches and low tables are set up around the room to make for comfortable lounging areas.

The upper level is lit from the floor and set up to observe the activity below. Especially the dance floor, which has its own pretty spectacular view through the skylight. Off to one side is a DJ table and to the other is a makeshift stage with a guitar and a full-sized grand piano.

Near the entrance is a table with copies of the album on CD as well as certificates for downloading it from iTunes or Amazon. At Orpheus' insistence, it's also available on vinyl.

It comes on like a wave.

(He's been to psychiatrists before, though not by choice, he knows what they say. He represses his emotions until they overwhelm him.)

Still, it always shocks him, that tidal pull of sadness, like nothing else exists in the world but the memory of loss.

And when it hits him, there is nothing he can do but let it explode out of himself. And the only way he can do that is through song.

That's why he ran.

He ran and he hid in his apartment with his guitar, the window flung open in deference to the Paris summer heat (and to keep the melancholy of his song from drowning him), playing out a song that flooded into the streets, catching everyone in its path, everyone who had ever lost something or someone.

After a few days, his phone began to ring, bringing message after message from his producers wanting to know where he was, when he was going to finish the album. He ignored them all, playing (and drinking) himself into oblivion. For days on end there was nothing but the music.

There were days he wished he could just float away on the memories.

Orpheus is just tipsy enough to be maudlin when they get to his room. He almost wishes he'd brought a bottle of something, but that probably wouldn't be a good idea.

There's a pile of broken pottery on the floor in a puddle of water and crushed flowers, and when he opens the door and sees it, he sets his guitar aside and goes to clean it up. "Sorry about this," he says to Steve. "I forgot..."