Raef: Alcohol and Orcs

Rum swirled in dark, lazy circles as the cup was turned, unaware of the man that stared at it.  *It* had no cares in the world. *It* couldn’t hear the roar of laughter or the tinkling of breaking glass. *It* didn’t notice that it was stared at.  *It* didn’t notice as the mug was tilted and it was swallowed down bythe elf that had been staring into it.

Raef’s nose wrinkled at the burn of the alcohol as it slid down his throat and tickled the back of his nose.  This was his third mug of the night after a long, fruitless day of wandering the streets of the grime filled city.  He had been on the search for a job, but nothing had presented itself   He was beginning to wonder if he should move on to another city or even move back to where he had come from.  He squashed this thought down before signaling for the waitress to bring him another mug.

“Fuck…" he sighed and lounged back, grey eyes flickering over the other patrons of the seedy bar.  For all of its lack of finesse, the bar at least had entertainment. Near the windows a group of dwarves were drunkenly playing dice andfurther along was a boisterous group of orcs, shouting and laughing as they swung their mugs about.   Down closer to the serving bar was a smattering of humans that were not quite as inebriated the orcs, but more gone than the dwarves.

“Here you go, sweetie.”

“Thanks.” Raef chugged down half of the cool drink before he thought to look at it, gaze wandering back to the orcs.   They were having more fun than anyone else in the bar, not caring if their drink landed on the dirty floor or on each other. There was only one lounging back –

The elf tore his gaze away and looked back at his half-empty mug.  He had been staring and the damned orc had glanced up.  He scowled into his mug yet he looked upwards once more.  Their eyes met briefly and he swore he saw a smile dance across the toothy face before their eyes parted ways.  Raef let out a puff of air in frustration, or irritation, and resumed drowning his day away in alcohol

As the night wore on, the bar grew less and less crowded.  The dwarves left to continue their party elsewhere, the humans either passed out at the bar or crawled to a corner to curl up, and the orcs departed to wherever it was they wanted.  Eventually it was Raef, the remaining waitress dozing at the counter, the barkeep, and the orc that had *smiled*.  Throughout the night, Raef had continued to sneak peeks at the other, but he had failed to do anything further.

Now, however, that he was past the point of tipsiness and heading into a drunken stupor, he swallowed the last of his alcohol and dragged himself up to his feet.  He held out an arm to steady of himself, feeling much like he was walking a tight rope, then he took a deep breath and walked over to the still-lounging orc.

Raef dropped a hand on the table when he reached it and smiled, “Hey.”

“Hey.” The orc hadn’t moved an inch when Raef’s arrival, only his eyes moving as he watched the drunken stagger.

“You were…you were…”

“I was what?”

“You were…” Raef was going to say something that would have been coherent and thoughtful, maybe even *smooth*, but what came out was every ounce of alcohol he had consumed in the last four hours.