date night
It was crowded, like it always was. Friday night, and an endless array of posters lined the wall of the cinema, enticing movie-goers with their magic like a hall of mirrors. They offered guns, knives, women, romance, cartoons, space adventures, a Tyrannosaurus, and the opportunity to get busy with something. Angel wasn't sure what that one was offering.
Revue night was his favorite time to go to the movies. He and Connor had a standing engagement on the first Friday of every month at the multiplex down the road. It surprised him that Connor was interested in old movies. Surprised him even more that he'd want to see them with his old man, who always told boring stories about where he'd been when the movie first came out a hundred years ago. But Connor was taking a film studies course. He said he liked the sweep of the screen, the big battle scenes, the saturated colors of restored Panavision. He'd talked about Lawrence of Arabia for days.
They always met by the popcorn stand, where Angel would buy Connor an obscenely sized pail of popcorn and a bucket of soda. But this time, Angel stood at the concession stand by himself, debating whether he should see the movie or head on home. Connor had just called. He couldn't make it. Something about a test and a paper and a girl, and Angel suspected it had more to do with the last one than either of the first two.
"If you're looking for blood on the menu, the closest they have is Frutopia."
Angel sighed and turned around. Spike was standing behind him, chewing obscenely on a piece of red licorice. Angel half-expected him to tie it into a knot with his tongue like a cherry stem.
It wasn't the worst sight he'd seen all day.
Spike grinned around his cigarette-substitute. "Wouldn't have expected to see you here. You suddenly develop a thing for pointy ears?"
Angel blinked. Spike rolled his eyes. "Star Trek, you git. Opening night. S'why this place is swarming. Lemme guess, you're here to see The Soloist or some froofy piece of redemptionist crap?"
Angel shoved his hands in his pockets. "Actually, Connor was supposed to meet me here but he can't make it. We were gonna go to the Paul Newman tribute."
"Newman tribute? S'not Cool Hand Luke, is it?"
Angel shook his head. "Butch and Sundance."
Spike's lingual dance with the licorice went from acrobatic to thoughtful. "Not the best of his, but it's alright. Wouldn't mind seeing it again." He shoved his way into the popcorn line-up. "Keep you from sitting in the dark brooding by yourself, at any rate. Know how you hate that." He rolled his eyes again.
"What about Star Trek?"
Spike waved him off. "Be here for ages. Got plenty of time to see it some other night."
Twenty minutes later, he was sitting in the dark with Spike, who was juggling a pail of popcorn, a bucket of soda, a bag of M&Ms and the licorice with superhuman agility. Every once in a while, Angel would glance over to watch Spike lick butter off his fingers.
"Never a big fan of Redford," Spike muttered. "Bit wooden if you ask me. Kinda like you, only without the dark and glowery thing."
"What? He doesn't look anything like me." It was hard to sound indignant when you were whispering in a theater. "He's all blond and tanned and California boy."
"Got the chiseled jaw, though," Spike said, and there was a hint of admiration in his voice.
Angel smirked in the dark.
"Can see why you like Newman, though," Spike continued to natter. "Brilliant blue eyes. Pouty lips. Great cheekbones. S'obvious, really."
"Shhhhhh," came a loud hiss from behind them. It saved Angel from having to argue that Spike was delusional. Instead, Angel reached for the popcorn, and if his fingers happened to touch Spike's in the pail, he didn't much mind.
*
"Ever jump off a cliff?" Spike lit up a cigarette as soon as they were out on the sidewalk. Inhaled it with as much relish as he'd inhaled the popcorn."Once," Angel said. "This mob of villagers was chasing me with torches and pitchforks. Jumped about three hundred feet down. Broke both legs in the fall." They started down the street, heading in the direction of Angel's apartment. "You?"
Spike shook his head. "Followed you into that alley. Close enough, I'd say."
Angel nodded. Smiled to himself.
"Hey, you hear that Butch and Sundance were voted the number one movie bromance of all time?"
Angel blinked. This was why he avoided conversation with Spike. He never knew what the fuck he was talking about. "What's a bromance?"
Spike squinted at him, a look that Connor might have given him. The one that said, You really need to learn how to use the Internet. "Like a romance, only it's betwen two blokes. Platonic-like. Two friends who'd follow each other off a cliff." Spike took another puff on his cigarette. "Kirk and Spock came in second."
Angel started to laugh. Spike raised his chin, indignant. "What?"
"A hundred years and you're still a poet." Spike's teeth tightened around his cigarette, molars grinding together. It only made Angel smile wider. "You want me to admit we have a bromance?"
"Said platonic," Spike growled. "Doesn't count if you're shagging."
"Oh, so this is a real romance, then." He sidled up to Spike, until Spike took a step back. Then another. Till his back was nearly touching the wall. "If you wanted to take me out on a date, you could have just asked. Instead of following me to the movies."
"I didn't follow you!" Spike burst out. "Just 'cause we fuck around doesn't mean I wanna be seen in public with you!"
"I ever tell you that you look like Paul Newman?"
"Fuck off, Angelus."
"Make me."
There were a couple of bricks missing in the alley wall by the time they were finished. They even managed to kill something together on the way home. All in all, a perfectly bromantic evening.