second flame 🔥 January catch-all

[olruggio]

🔥 Who: Olruggio + YOU
🔥 When: Throughout January
🔥 Where: DU + the problem areas around the Dream Sphere
🔥 What: Stuff and things!? He's a Saver, so he's been recruited to thaw everyone's sorry butts.

Comments

[olruggio]

[that gets him to laugh]

Well, what can you expect? Chocolate is a foreign item here in Japan. Frankly, I prefer the sake myself... But I can't admit that when there are minors here, so the next go-to has to be the desserts. Have you seen some of their parfaits?

[unfortunately for Bruno, the wine is stuff that Olruggio makes for himself]

[predecir]

[rip]

Ooooh, yeah! They're kinda pricey, though.

[Bruno actually has money, now, and a good place to stay. He's doing the best he has in a while! Still, you don't just lose those instincts; what if he buys something frivolous, and then it all goes away and he's left with less savings than he might have had?]

[olruggio]

So they are, but I have to admit... The balance of freshness to sweetness to creaminess really is something else. [he laughs] Though I have to be careful to not bring it up in any messages sent back home.

I don't know which one is worse... Being lectured about eating too many sweets or getting told off for enjoying them without any way to send some back home!

[he kind of wants to ask about the chocolate comment. Maybe see if he could get a recipe to try out at home! Then again, he should probably not be spending his money on desserts...]

[predecir]

Heh. Yeah...

[God. What would everyone back home say, if they knew he was here? If he could talk to them about what he's been doing? Bruno hasn't talked openly with anyone for years, not without hiding something or other. It's a lonely thing to think about.]

[olruggio]

[he stops when he hears Bruno trailing off]

... Ah. Sorry, I didn't realize.

[Olruggio rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. He doesn't know the specifics, but it's easy to see that mentioning family might be a sore topic for the other man. Whether it's estrangement or something worse, it's not Olruggio's business to pry into]

If you don't me asking, where are you from? I would say 'somewhere warm, maybe?' but there are people who love the cold because they're home is always hot so... You never know.

[predecir]

Venezuela.

[A lie, but the one he's kept to this entire time. It's close enough to home, and he knows enough about it, that he can fudge details. It helps that he's never met anyone here who's even been to South America. What would they know?]

So pretty far away.

[olruggio]

[there's a pause]

That is pretty far away... And I doubt very many places have chocolates like they do in Venezuela. Imported groceries tend to be massively overpriced.

[the pained complaints of a foodie...]

[predecir]

Ugh, yeah, I don't even look at those.

[complaints of a perpetually-broke guy....]

Whatever, it's fine. Got plenty of good food here too.

[olruggio]

Now that part I absolutely agree with! The quality at the prices they charge feels criminal sometimes. Definitely not something you can easily find elsewhere.

[maybe he'll get himself some ramen tonight...]

[predecir]

Eh, yeah, I guess that's true. I'd never even had most of this stuff before I got here! It was, uh, kinda the middle of nowhere, where I used to live. Not a ton of foreign restaurants, or.....restaurants...........

[olruggio]

Small town, huh? Bet the city was something of a culture shock. [with a sigh, he adds;] Both the glamourous side and the not-so-glamourous parts.

[predecir]

Heh. Yeah...

[It could've been worse, after the way they grew up, but they still never spent all that much time in cities.]

Well, you know, it's - it's a good place to go, if you wanna start fresh. Lots of, uh, other ex-pats. ["Ex-pats"? Is he one of those now? Bruno shelves that away to think about Never.]

[olruggio]

Hmmm... Can't say I ever thought of it like that.

[which is about when it strikes Olly that they've been talking for a while. Not that he disliked it, just that-]

Gah-! So sorry! Look at me chatting your ear off. [please, he doesn't want to face the looming deadlines] I didn't mean to keep you.

[predecir]

Oh! Yeah, yeah, yeah, no problem, I'll just...

[Go somewhere else so this guy doesn't see him again later, still in the building!]