my_own_advocate | Samsara, Sunday Evening

It wasn't a great idea to keep sticking to old traditions to the letter, Lucifer and Octavia had found last weekend. And so Lucifer had suggested something else for this Sunday night.

Samsara.

It was a place where she felt safe. And it could-- go somewhere else, for a nice change of scenery. "Should we take her to the back of the preserve? Or head further along the coast?" Lucifer asked, as he hopped aboard, basket of food in hand.

[[ for her ]]

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From:

okteiviakom

"You know, when you asked if you could get on this topic or whether it would make me uncomfortable," Octavia told him, raising her eyebrows, "I didn't think you were going to make me uncomfortable."

From:

my_own_advocate

"Sorry," Lucifer said, raising his hands in surrender. "I'll stop talking."

From:

okteiviakom

"Little late for that now."

That was the discomfort talking.

It was there in the way she folded her arms over her chest, too.

"All this time I've been talking about one thing," she continued. "Not all of sex, just one thing. Was that not clear? Because it really feels like you've just jumped straight to thinking you need to prove I have preferences about other sex stuff."

Edited Date: 6 Jun 2022 23:37 (UTC)

From:

my_own_advocate

"It was not clear," Lucifer said.

Because that was the simplest and truest explanation for where this had gone wrong.

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia stared at him.

"How was I supposed to make it clearer than by saying several times it was about 'one thing' and even repeating what the one thing was? Especially when you know about my preferences better than anyone?"

Because he saw a side of them no one else was privy to. (Wasn't supposed to be, anyway.)

From:

my_own_advocate

"Because you're always like this about Duke," Lucifer said slowly. "All-- 'everything is good'. I honestly didn't realize the 'one thing' wasn't 'sex in general' but 'positioning, specifically'."

From:

okteiviakom

"... How do you not realize when I said so?"

From:

my_own_advocate

"I may have been a bit too far up my own argument at that point," Lucifer admitted.

From:

okteiviakom

"The argument that you just -- went straight into without telling me we were suddenly supposed to be talking on a wider level."

Just to be clear.

From:

my_own_advocate

"Because I thought we were already talking on a wider level," Lucifer said. "Look, can we just accept we had some ridiculous miscommunication and I made it worse by steamrolling on ahead?"

From:

okteiviakom

"Well, you probably also shouldn't have said it's because I'm 'always like this about Duke'."

Sorry, that part was only now starting to sink in.

From:

my_own_advocate

Lucifer sighed. He wished he hadn't left his flask at home in some kind of ill-fated gesture. Though at least in his current cowed state, he was able to observe that, "I... may be... a bit insecure about that..."

From:

okteiviakom

"Apparently," Octavia replied, exasperated but not really at him. She sank further back in her seat. "Why?"

From:

my_own_advocate

"Because it makes me feel like I'm not doing this properly," Lucifer admitted. "Like you've-- accomplished some ideal of love I'm not capable of."

Oh, hello, very old insecurity.

From:

okteiviakom

"Lucifer, that's dumb."

... Hold on, she was going to find her way to something a little more reassuring than that.

"For one, why would you ever think I would be the model for how to do any of this shit properly?"

From:

my_own_advocate

"Because you've always been good at loving people," Lucifer said quietly.

From:

okteiviakom

"Yeah, I think we both know that's not true."

(Or maybe she was mixing up loving people with managing to treat them the way they should be treated.)

From:

my_own_advocate

"It is, though," Lucifer said. "You may not know how to handle the day to day of it all, but you don't-- struggle with loving someone and letting yourself be loved the way Duke and I do."

From:

okteiviakom

"Okay, well..." Tiny shrug. "None of that actually relates to anyone's preferences in the sack."

From:

my_own_advocate

Lucifer shot her a Look. "It does when one thinks the other person is saying they don't have preferences because they enjoy anything they can do with their love," he said.

From:

okteiviakom

"Then I guess one needs to learn to listen," Octavia replied mildly. "Or better yet, ask."

From:

my_own_advocate

"I thought I did ask," Lucifer said, sinking into his chair with a sigh. "Octavia, please. I misunderstood you. That was all."

From:

okteiviakom

"You made me feel pressured to pick a favorite out of things I don't have a favorite one of right now," Octavia replied. "Your insecurity made me feel like you thought I was doing something wrong."

From:

my_own_advocate

"And I am sorry," Lucifer said, frowning. "I didn't mean to do that, and I was an arse to you."

From:

okteiviakom

Octavia gave him a (still slightly exasperated) nod, like 'yes, thank you'. Sometimes bruised feelings needed her to go digging for an apology.

"You never asked why, but I'm gonna tell you anyway," she said. "I don't have sexy preferences right now, because they change, they come and go, they're based on -- whatever I feel like at the time, whatever was hottest most recently, that kind of thing. And I don't... That's a distant thing right now. There's nothing anchoring me to any preference, right now."