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changedmyminditsnicehere · 10 months ago

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So here it is! Only many months after my last fic, I am delighted to present, Hob and Dream make bad choices in a back office, the fic. I really hope this will mark the start of me coming back to writing a bit more after a slump! I've got ideas for keeping up this AU if people like, so please do let me know!

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Hob didn't normally attend these sorts of events. Scratch that. Hob had never attended one of these events before. It wouldn't even have crossed his mind if Genny hadn't suggested it at the Humanities start-of-term drinks. So what if Genny was a broke history of art student and Hob was a professor? Professor shmessor. As far as his salary was concerned, he certainly wasn't going to turn down the chance at a free glass of wine on a Thursday evening. That said wine had to be drunk in front of some incomprehensible contemporary art while surrounded by the sort of person who was very determined that they alone could comprehend it was a minor issue. Hob drank with Joyce professors, a few neo-expressionists were nothing to him.

With his spirits fortified by that thought, Hob had taken the plunge, looked up the nearest and soonest private art gallery opening in Mayfair, put on a slightly nicer suit than he normally wore and got on the tube. On arrival, Hob had realised the suit was completely unnecessary. Certainly, some of the (older) attendees were decked out in what was clearly thousands of pounds of suit, but the majority of the young crowd looked like they had taken a wrong turn through the zombie apocalypse on their way from whatever trendy bit of North London they emanated from. Ah, youth.

Still, Hob was unlikely to have fit in even if he had attempted to squeeze himself into some drainpipe leather trousers. He wasn't going to complain about seeing them on someone else. As he carefully lifted a glass of wine from the tray of a nearby waiter, nodding gratefully, Hob looked around the white-walled room, eyes passing over canvases and the crowd alike, then stopping. No, he certainly wasn't going to complain about leather trousers on anyone, especially not if some of the attendees could fill them out so well.

The figure had his back to Hob. One ebony hand gestured at a large canvas of swirling lines of black and near black and hips cocked at an angle that was doing, just, everything, for said trousers, the figure was clearly mid-sermon on the meaning of the mess to the young woman next to him. She was half to leather-trousers, half to the work, though the amusement twirling around her lips told Hob she was taking neither very seriously. If it was an art nerd's attempt at seduction, it wasn't going well. Hob snorted to himself and raised his glass, taking a sip of commiseration for all those poor undergrads who had ever tried to chat up a woman via metaphysics.

The movement must have caught the woman’s eye. Her gaze flicked in his direction and Hob wasn’t fast enough in raising his eyes from the work of art in leather in front of him to the artworks around him. Brown eyes caught Hob’s and the woman’s amusement sparkled into an outright wicked smirk. Utterly careless that her companion was still mid-homily, the young woman reached out, grabbed him by the arm and dragged them both towards Hob. The crowd, previously stifling, seemed to flow apart like the Red Sea in her path. Hob found himself rooted to the spot as she held eye contact, unable to mingle off into the crowd as he had hoped.

By comparison, her companion had clearly not caught up with their new direction yet. Barely facing the right way, they were following with all the grace and hangdog expressions of a particularly put-upon wolfhound. Yet Hob was hardly going to complain about the opportunity to see said expression. If the view from the back had been good, then oh boy, the front was something else. Pale pale skin, with high cheekbones, wild dark hair and a nose meant for looking down on people, the man was a vision in black and anger. Somehow, Hob knew he was the artist behind the baffling canvases on show tonight. He also knew he really wanted to know what the artist looked like after Hob had licked away the anger currently curling those rose-bud lips.

Unfortunately, imagining licking this beautiful vampire of a man, on his face or elsewhere, was hardly conducive to making the best first impression. As the woman pulled up directly in front of him, smirking delightedly up, Hob floundered desperately for an opening statement that wasn’t going to leave him wearing his drink.

"Hello?" There. That was a good start.

"Hello there yourself. I saw you standing over here admiring my brother's work and I just had to bring him over to say hello." Her brother clearly didn't agree if the way those dark eyes were currently flinting up at Hob was anything to go by. “I’m Morana, this is Dream.” Morana had a beautiful, chocolatey voice which she was absolutely using to encourage Hob into joining her in her mischief.

“Hob, Hob Gadling. It’s lovely to meet you.” Hob congratulated himself for managing a whole sentence and a completely unawkward tip of his wine glass towards the pair. Dream did not seem like he would appreciate the offer of a handshake, even if Hob’s palms hadn’t already felt sweaty enough he was worried about losing grip on his drink.

"It's just so hard to extract Dream from his studio,” Morana declared, a theatricality which could only be achieved by older siblings very much tinging her words. “I think it is important he talk to people who show an interest in his art whenever we manage it, don't you?" She was in no way even attempting to hide her awareness that Hob’s interests might lie elsewhere than Dream’s art, or her apparent delight in the fact. Dream, by comparison, was clearly trying to pretend that he was not party to their conversation at all. Well, Hob thought, two can play at that game.

"Oh, what can I say?" He smirked right back. "I've always found myself partial to the colour black."

"Perfect! Dream's all about black at the moment."

Dream, beautiful creature that he was, was not, it turned out, very good at tuning out inanities when directed at his work. With a derisive snort, he shifted his gaze from the mysteries of the universe to Hob and Morana.

“As I was just telling you, sister, the whole point of these works is that they are not actually black…”

“They are infinite colours, infinite varieties, I know dear brother. I wrote your catalogue essay. How about you explain it all to Hob here?” Her eyes positively gleamed. “I’m sure he’d love to hear all about your work. In fact, why don’t I leave you two to it? I’m going to go see if anyone here might have something more drinkable than this.” With a wave of a warm white wine glass, Morana disappeared smoothly into the crowd.

Hob turned fully to Dream, ready to commence operation seduce-the-moody-goth-artist, despite having absolutely no idea what to say. Luckily, against all his expectations, Dream, appeared to be willing to talk to a complete stranger, if only about his work.

“It is as my sister says. None of the pigments I used in this series are truly black, or anywhere close. If you look carefully, you can see.” Hob feels as faint as a Victorian maiden when Dream actually takes his wrist, long fingers delicately wrapping around his sleeve to pull him closer to the nearest canvas to demonstrate. “This series, this work, is about exploring the depths that can be found everywhere, if only one takes the slightest moment to actually look for them. It is not my fault that people so rarely take that moment to actually look at anything beyond their immediate impression.”

Dream pauses, apparently socially aware enough to realise that a rant about human failings probably isn’t the best way to talk to someone that, for all he knows, could be a paying customer - not that Hob’s suit, or his shoes, make any promises about his ability to buy these works - the ‘price on request’ written on the exhibit list had confirmed that to him. But Hob was enamoured. Up close he can really see what Dream means, can see where the seemingly black canvas actually reveals itself as the deepest blues, purples, even greens glittering across the surface.

“Beautiful” he breathes. “Practically a playground, isn’t it?” He feels Dream freeze, the fingers still (still) clasping his shirt sleeve suddenly tensing, and he curses himself. What a way to stick his foot in it. Well done Hobsie. There’s negging and then there’s telling a man who works as an artist that his life’s work is just playing around. Bollocks.

But Dream, though stiff, doesn’t drop his wrist. If anything, he grips more tightly, fingers edging up, closer to bare skin. His eyes fly from the canvas to meet Hob’s. If Hob had felt like a Victorian maiden before, the sudden realisation that he could absolutely get off just from looking into Dream’s eyes and a touch to his bare wrist finished him off.

“You.” Add Dream’s breathy, breathless voice to the mix and Hob is off to heaven as well. Shame he absolutely wrecked his chance. “You would be the first person to say such a thing about my work.” Oh. Oh. Not a mouth-meet-foot moment. It may in fact precipitate a mouth-meet-something-quite-different moment Hob realised, staring into Dream’s darkening eyes.

“Really?”

“Mmm.” Dream was turned fully to Hob now. Hob realised how close they had become, a private moment in the middle of the ebb and flow of the art crowd in their corner. “People often see what they assume to be true. In me, as well as my art.”

“Too into the tortured artist ideal to see what’s underneath?” Hob quirked an eyebrow.

“Too enamoured of their assumptions to appreciate the potential for… personal enjoyment as well.” Hob had to take a conscious breath and loosen his fingers on his wine glass one by one. He debated just how inappropriate it would be to invite an artist to ditch their own exhibition opening for a shag right now or if he should wait around until the end of the opening, whenever that might be. They always said 9, but Dream’s crowd did not give off the atmosphere of a people who might allow an event to end before 3am.

He was about to open his mouth to make the suggestion anyway when the crowd swelled once more, and Dream stumbled into him. In his loosened grip his wine immediately went everywhere, if everywhere was almost exclusively down his own front. Thank fuck it was white wine. Hob would not have coped with red wine stains on his singular dry-clean only shirt.

“Oh dear.” He was barely surprised at how sorry Dream did not sound. “Let me take you to the office, I am sure there are towels back there. Maybe you can borrow one of my shirts.”

Hob was not convinced that a high end art gallery office space would stock towels, and much less convinced that he would fit into any Dream might wear. He was, however, not going to object as Dream used his grip on his wrist to weave through the crowd, utterly ignoring the various socialites waving tissues in a vain hope to catch the attention of the star artist. Looking past them too, Hob caught sight of Morena. His attempt to convey ‘sorry there’s been an unfortunate accident but I promise I will return your artist shortly and not get up to nefarious things with him in an absolutely not sound-proofed back office’ via eyebrows was swiftly and gleefully undermined by the salute she gave him with, what Hob couldn’t help but notice, was definitely a much nicer glass of wine than any of the other attendees.

He had little time to do much more than salute back before Dream was pushing him through a small door into a surprisingly large office space. As Hob stepped into the space, Dream leant back against the door, pushing it shut. The burble of the crowd through the walls didn’t entirely cover the sound of a lock clicking emphatically into place. “Just in case anyone tries to barge in.” Dream said, looking up at Hob like the picture of innocence through his eyelashes. “You know how people are at these things, always trying to get in places they shouldn’t.” Hob snorted. Dream stepped away from the door, walking towards a kitchenette on the far side of the room.

“And are we somewhere we shouldn’t be? I wouldn’t want to keep you from your adoring public after all.” Dream paused his rummage through the cupboards. From what Hob could see, those things had clearly never stocked anything more than empty coffee mugs and instant powder, and certainly didn’t currently contain anything as useful as a tea towel.

“My sister runs this gallery. She organised this event. She can handle the crowd.” The lack of tea towels was swiftly going down as a problem in Hob’s estimation. The gap between Dream’s shirt and his leather trousers as he reached up into the cupboards however…

“Good to know,” Hob walked to Dream, stopping close enough that he wouldn’t be able to turn without brushing against Hob. “Any luck on the towels?” Dream’s huff is so clearly part amusement, part attraction, Hob can’t help but be flattered. Then Dream turns, carefully sliding his hips against Hob’s crotch and Hob feels his own breath being punched out of his lungs. Dream leans back, head tilted and a challenge clear in his sparkling eyes.

“No luck, tragically. You are going to have to take your shirt off. We can put it on the radiator to dry.”

“And whatever shall I do, while I wait for it to dry? I’m not sure I can pull off the suit jacket without a shirt look. Certainly not as well as you could.” A rosy blush rises to Dream’s cheeks, but his face looks no less hungry.

“Oh, I don’t know, Hob Gadling. I think you could certainly give it a go. You might just become someone’s next muse.”

Hob can’t help it, as he looks at Dream’s smug face, at his beautiful rosy lips twitching like the cat who got the cream. He huffs out a laugh and leans forwards, hands coming to frame Dream’s bony hips and presses his lips to Dream’s.

#dreamling #the sandman #dream of the endless #hob gadling #My Writing #Artist!au

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