Into the Woods 7a

[manipulant]

Seven

To say that Spencer is pissed is kind of an understatement. He's completely calm on the outside, collected and together and very very Zen. Inside, though, he's planning the best ways to completely destroy a book of fairy tales - and, depending on time constraints, the bookstore where he got it.

He's pretty much decided on shredding each individual page separately and then setting the shredded pages on fire, when the world comes entirely back into focus. The store...he'll have to do some research when he gets back home, it's been ages since he's made a Molotov cocktail (that afternoon with Andy had been...informative and strangely exhilarating). He just needs to remember to use one of Pete's work computers instead of his own. He doesn't need Homeland Security all up in his shit.

...Seriously, he'd been so close. So fucking close, and Brendon wasn't horrified, he seemed into it, he'd closed his eyes and everything. Fuck, Spencer thinks, for probably the twentieth time in ten seconds, as he closes his eyes and remembers the way Brendon went still and kind of expectant, there in bed. Fuck fuck fuck.

Whatever. Spencer isn't going to waste any more time when Brendon shows up, that's for damn sure. He scowls, and slides off of the lumpy mattress of his bed and goes to take a quick look in the mirror - the scars and scratches are gone, thank fuck, but so is his beard. Spencer grimaces, his shoulders deflating a little before he looks down and...yep. Wearing a dress.

Well, a nightgown, but there's lace on it, so he's comfortable making a few assumptions about his role in the new story. He grumbles a little and rubs a hand through his hair, til its standing up in peaks at the back, and makes a series of faces at himself in the mirror until he's feeling up to trying to find some decent clothes and trying to figure out who the hell he's supposed to be, this time.

There's a bowl and pitcher next to the dresser with cold but clean-looking water, so Spencer pours out a bit into the bowl and cups his hands, drinking til the back of his throat doesn't feel like paper anymore. Then he splashes his face, sucking in a breath as his skin registers the coldness, blinking water out of his eyelashes as he immediately starts to grope for a towel.

After a few seconds he finds one and rubs his face quickly, shivering once before he blinks his eyes open and wets one corner of the towel, wringing it out and scrubbing it quickly over his neck and ears. While he's doing that, he glances around, taking in his little ramshackle room. The bed with the lumpy mattress is pressing up against the far wall, underneath a tiny port window. There's a dresser missing one drawer, and the tiny mirror, and the pitcher, and over at the other end of the room is an ancient and rickety-looking wardrobe, but that's it as far as furniture and decoration goes. Spencer's pretty sure this room is about as big as his bed was, in Rapunzel.

Spence sighs and sets the scrap of towel down, reaching to grab the bowl and pour it...out the window, or something, whatever, but then he lets out an embarrassingly girly shriek and hops away a good five feet, startled half to death by the teeny little bird just hanging out, all oh hey sup, on the table just inches from his fingers.

Spencer stares at it nervously, as the bird - seriously, it's fucking looking right at him, what the shit - tilts its head and chirps, once.

"Um," he manages, before he just bites his lip and gives up. He takes a step forward and reaches his fingertips gingerly forward until he can just snatch the towel off the table, and then he spreads it out in both hands, stepping forward carefully.

The bird doesn't even react, just watches him coming with a curious, disturbingly intelligent look in its black eyes. Spencer winces, and finds himself muttering "Sorry" - which, seriously? - just before he tosses the towel over the bird and scoops it up quickly, hopping over to the window with a frantic, hissed shitshitshitshitshit before he thrusts the towel outside and opens it, bouncing the squawking bird out of his hand and into the open air.

Spencer watches, horror-stricken, as for the first couple of seconds the bird doesn't even open its wings, but then it seems to catch on and it flaps away, still gravelling angrily about its treatment. "Sorry," he says again, before he can catch himself, and then a little brass bell over his doorway begins to ring.

Spencer does a pretty good job of ignoring the first one, but within thirty seconds, three bells have all begun to ring, jangling incessantly until it looks like they should just come off their hooks. He watches them curiously for a while, tilting his head, and then he shrugs and heads over to the wardrobe, sorting through the various patched-up, shabby dresses until he comes across an old pair of trousers and a linen shirt tucked carefully away in a corner. They kind of have "sentimental value" written all over them, but when Spencer shakes the pants out, they look to be about the same size as he is, and he shucks the nightgown off and gets dressed in record time.

The bells are still going as Spencer's doing up the last button on the shirt, and really, that fucking bell noise is getting on his last nerve. He glares at them, and then stomps over to the door and unhooks the tiny clapper inside each one, rendering them silent.

"Good," he says, storing the pieces of brass in his pocket, watching with satisfaction as the bells jump and shake noiselessly. He turns back around, and starts - there, on the windowsill, are two birds this time.

They both appear to be carbon-copies of the one Spencer already took care of, which is fucking weird enough, but they also appear to be watching him. Glaring at him, more like. The back of his neck starts to prickle unpleasantly, and Spencer stares at them, frowning suspiciously, as he backs up to the door and opens it, letting himself out.

Once he's on the landing, Spencer closes the door carefully behind himself, and tries not to think about claws and sharp beaks and Alfred Hitchcock movies.

He has to hold on tight to the handrail to navigate the rickety stairs - apparently his room is in a tower or an attic or something - and once he actually manages to get to the rest of the house, he steps into chaos.

"Where have you been?" Jackie shouts at him, scowling fiercely as she waves a couple of scraps of fabric between them. "Ohmygod, of all the days for you to decide to sleep in," she huffs, pushing the scraps into his hands, giving him a supremely unimpressed look that Spencer knows all too well.

"Morning to you too," he drawls, despite his inability to keep from grinning - it's Jackie, it's the first member of his family he's seen in weeks, and he's not going to be able to put her as squarely in her place as he normally would. He's too fucking happy to see her. "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?" he asks, looking dubiously down at the fabric in his hands.

He looks up, and is...actually a little startled at the flat-out loathing he can suddenly see in Jackie's eyes. "God," she sneers. "You mend them, dumbass. You take them and you find the holes and you sew them up!" She pauses, and then gives him a hateful little smile. "Is that too much? Should I write it down for you?" She pauses, and tilts her head, her eyes narrowing. "Can you even read?"

Spencer stares at her, his mouth hanging open stupidly. Both of them are distracted, though, by a voice screeching from further down the hallway. "JACKIE, WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY FUCKING GLOVES?" Spencer hears, recognizing Crystal's voice, and then Jackie's rolling her eyes and flouncing off.

"Language, dears," his mother's voice wafts up from downstairs somewhere, and Spencer's knees nearly buckle from the sudden weight of homesickness and stomach-twisting happiness he feels at hearing it. He almost drops the stuff Jackie gave him, and starts towards the stairway, towards finding his Mom and giving her the biggest fucking hug he can manage.

"And when your sister deigns to come down from her room, someone tell me," she continues. "She didn't do half her chores last night and I think we all deserve an explanation."

Spencer stops, on the top of the stairs, frozen. He's...never actually heard his mom sound like that before, lazy and annoyed and - fuck, and mean. Spencer's stomach quickly turns to lead, and he feels a weird little shiver of fear, an ache spreading through him as he remembers the look in Jackie's eyes. Something in the back of his throat tastes bitter, almost like metal, and Spencer looks down at the pile of stockings in his hands.

One of the stockings slithers between his fingers and falls to the floor, and Spencer just stares at it for a second, sort of frozen where he is. Then - he should freak out, he knows - a mouse pokes its nose out of a crack between the floorboards and the wall, and then its ears appear.

Spencer watches, dumbstruck, as the mouse twitches its ears and then its head, and then scurries out into the open. It moves towards him, getting closer to his foot, but Spencer just stays stock still and doesn't even breathe, and watches as the mouse stops at the stocking and...picks it up, holding up a section in its teeth. Then it pushes itself up on its hind legs and wobbles for a couple of seconds, before it grabs the stocking and fucking holds it up.

Spencer blinks. Oh, he thinks to himself, finally realizing which story it is just before he bends over and takes the stocking carefully from out of the mouse's paws. "Thanks," he mutters, before he moves silently down the stairs and in the opposite direction of his mom, not stopping until he finds a door that will take him outside.

Spencer carefully, thoughtfully buries the stockings in a corner of the garden. He's willing to bet that Jackie's room is as messy here as it was when they were growing up back home, so he can just say he did mend them, and put them on her bed, and she'll go crazy looking for them.

A bird lands on his shoulder, and to his credit, Spencer only jumps a little before he just mentally shrugs and finishes tamping the dirt back down. He wipes his eyes quickly, sniffing once, and then he stands up straight and squares his shoulders, taking a couple of deep breaths as he reminds himself that it's a fucking story, it's not real; animals aren't normally so helpful and the Jackie and Crystal and Mom here are not his family.

Spencer marches back into the house and after a few wrong doors, finds his mom's bedroom. He hardens his expression and his heart, but it's still a wrench at first, seeing her sitting on a pouf in front of her dresser, wearing a look of disgust as she regards him in the mirror. "What on earth are you wearing?" she asks.

"Clothes," he says shortly, raising his eyebrows, expectant. "You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, I noticed the sitting room wasn't dusted last night, and couldn't discover why."

"Yeah, I'll be sure to get on that," Spencer drawls, leaning against the doorframe.

"Oh, well, nevermind that today," she sighs, irritated, rooting through a jewelry box. "Just help your sisters before they kill each other, trying to get ready for the ball tonight."

Aha. Spencer tries to keep his poker face, but he's a little worried his not-mom saw him go a little wide-eyed. "Oh, right, the ball," he says, casual. "For Prince..."

"Brendon," not-Mom huffs, turning to give Spencer a disdainful look. "Not that it concerns you. Now, go on, you've certainly got enough to keep you busy."

Spencer rolls his eyes, but shoves off of the doorframe and heads down the hall, sticking his hands in his pockets as he saunters down towards where he can hear the twins screaming at each other about...ribbons, or hairbows, or something.

The next six hours do two things: they make Spencer really miss his real sisters, and they give him a new understanding and respect for the costumers and make-up people and...basically everyone who's ever had to deal with Panic, especially during the NRWC days. Looking back, Spencer's not really sure how he and the rest of his band made it out of that tour alive, and not all stabbed in the neck with an angled eyeshadow brush.

"Hold still," he hisses at Crystal, who gives him a smirk and continues swinging her leg, constantly knocking him in the shin as he hovers over her and tries to make sure her rouge is even. "Fine, it's your fucking fault if you wind up looking like a clown."

"Sort of doubt Mom'll see it that way," Crystal points out cheerfully, smiling up at him beatifically. "So, what're you going to do tonight, while the rest of us are at the palace dancing our heads off?"

"The Prince," Spencer mutters before he can stop himself. He can feel his blush start to rise up his neck, but he presses his lips together tight and grabs Crystal's chin, forcing her to stay still as he sweeps shadow over both her eyelids. For not the first time, Spencer really wishes Ryan were here - he was always a lot better with makeup than the rest of them.

"Where are my stockings?" Jackie scowls, stomping around the room. "Did you finish mending them?"

"Yeah, I put them on your bed," Spencer says calmly, smirking a little when he hears Jackie's muttered fuck. It's only a few seconds before he can hear quiet thumps and bangs of things being thrown off of her bed and hitting the floor. "You've got to do your own liner and mascara," he tells Crystal, sitting back and stretching.

Crystal glances over at herself in the mirror and squints, pursing up her lips. "Not your best work," she eventually pronounces, giving Spencer a frustrated sigh. Spencer rolls his eyes and escapes while he can, wandering around until he finds the entrance to the kitchens. He walks down a short flight of stairs and breathes a little easier at the way the air immediately grows cooler, and starts looking around for something to eat.

There's an orange and some bread, which Spencer supposes will do - fuck, he's just grateful it's Brendon who gets to be in the castle for this one, he was looking kind of gaunt at the end of the last story. Spencer picks at the bread, digging out the white insides and leaving the hard crust, eventually moving for the back door and throwing it outside, for the birds. By the time he's peeled and settled into his orange, eating the segments as slowly as he can, he can hear Jackie and Crystal and now his mother thumping around just above him, shouting at each other as they finish putting on gloves and pins and pearls.

The door to the kitchens opens, and Spencer cringes away, tucking himself as far into his corner as possible. "Spencer," Crystal calls down, sounding irritated, "Mom says you have to come see us off. So hurry up, the carriage is already waiting."

Spencer groans and pops the orange segment he'd been nursing into his mouth, pushing away from the wall and trudging towards the stairs and the door. Upstairs, Jackie is tapping her foot and giving him a hideous glare, his mother is still fiddling with her earrings, and Crystal is messing with one curl of hair that won't stay put. "Bye," Spencer says, giving them a little wave and immediately turning to go back downstairs.

"Just a moment," his mother snaps. Spencer cringes, but pastes a smile on his face before he turns back around and raises his eyebrows at her.

"I expect the sitting room to be dusted by the time we return," she says, putting her gloves on carefully, not even looking at him. "The garden needs weeding and the kitchen and pantry need a good scrub. And do something about this foyer, it's filthy."

Spencer just stares at her, folding his arms. She gives him a small, smug smile (which almost makes him feel better - he's never seen his mom look like that), and props her hands on her hips. "Now, wish your sisters luck that the prince will ask them to dance."

"Good luck getting the Prince to ask you to dance and marry him and make a dozen babies," Spencer says flatly, his expression unchanging. He injects more than a little bit of sarcasm into his words, making Jackie scowl even more fiercely. Crystal just snorts and tosses her hair.

"Fuck that, I'm going for the dancing," she says firmly, pretending not to notice the horrified look her mother throws her. "See you, Spence," she says, as her mother and Jackie are bustling out the door and down to the carriage. "I'll steal a piece of cake for you."

"Thanks," Spencer says wryly, leaning against the doorframe as he watches them all stumble and wobble as they try to get inside the carriage. Finally, they're inside and it pulls off, the horses' shoes and the wheels making a racket that slowly fades into the distance.

Spencer takes a breath as soon as the carriage is out of sight, and turns back to the house, slouching back inside and shutting the door behind him.

He just wanders for a little bit, til he's seen every room, and then Spencer thinks about actually cleaning. Two seconds later, he snorts and heads back to the kitchens, grabbing another orange before he strolls out to the garden to take a look around.

He stays outside and watches the sunlight edge past its harsh late afternoon glare and start shooting red and pink rays out into the evening sky, bright against the encroaching dark. Eventually, he finds his way back into the house, and for some reason Spencer gravitates towards his not-mother's bedroom.

There's a small portrait of her and his dad (with an impressive handlebar mustache) on the dresser, and Spencer stares at it for a long time, picking it up to peer at their happy expressions. He wonders what happened to the dad in this story, but only for a few seconds, before he can feel himself starting to tense up and he quickly has to turn his attention to something else.

The cut-glass perfume decanters are catching the light of the sunset, prisming it into different colors onto the surface of the dresser. Spencer picks one up and almost spills it, setting it down quickly and looking around the room for something less breakable.

After another five minutes of looking around, Spencer can't really fool himself anymore. He takes in a deep, shaky breath, and looks once around the room just to make sure there's no one else there (there are a couple of birds hopping on the closed windowsill, and he's pretty sure a couple of mice are watching him, but whatever), and then he slides onto his parents' bed and curls up, his face pressed against Fake Mom's pillow.

It just figures that however different and quasi-evil she might be, she smells exactly the same as his mom, his real mom. Spencer shudders at the familiar combination of roses and jasmine and hunches in on himself a little more, breathing in deep a couple of times before he presses his eyes shut tight. He's never felt anything but love from his family, and feeling the difference is fucking with his head.

After a few minutes of shivering, fighting against the stinging happening behind his eyelids, Spencer takes a couple of breaths and recovers. He thinks hard about his real mom, and his real sisters, and his dad, and how in his family there was always a lot of arguing but there was more laughter.

He thinks about growing up with constant barbecues in the summer, and lazy, cheerful Christmases, and the twins bickering over whether to watch reruns of Family Guy or ANTM, and Ryan having carte blanche to the house at all hours ever since Spencer was twelve, and his parents' concerned-but-supportive faces when he told them about Maryland. Spencer thinks god, I'm really fucking lucky before he drifts, floating off into a light sleep.

When he wakes up, it's dark outside, and there's a weird glow in the bedroom. Spencer blinks his eyes open fully, and lets out a fucking humiliating shriek as he sees someone hovering at the end of the bed, watching him curiously. "Hey," the figure says, waggling its long fingers.

Spencer rubs his eyes and blinks again. "What the - Gabe?" He sits up, yawning a little, peering at him. "Why the fuck're you glowing?"

"Hey, I think I'll ask the questions," Gabe fucking Saporta tells him, giving him a severe look as he just keeps on hovering over the bed, legs crossed in mid-air. "One," Gabe says, holding up a finger, "how the fuck do you know my name? And two, why are you a dude?" he asks, adding another finger. "And three," he says, tilting forward, giving Spencer a very serious look, "do you have any food?"

"Um," Spencer says, frowning as he considers the questions. "Lucky guess, I was born that way, and I think there are still some oranges in the kitchen?"

Gabe screws up his mouth, watching Spencer suspiciously for a handful of seconds, before he shrugs his shoulders and relaxes, giving him a grin. "Sweet. Okay, be right back. Don't you go anywhere," he says, giving Spencer a mildly upsetting leer, before he pops out of existence and half a second later pops right back, this time with a couple of oranges in his hands. "Okay so," he says to Spence, peeling the orange, flicking pieces of peel onto Fake Mom's bedcovers, "first things first. My name is Gabe - which you already know, because you are psychic - and I am your awesome fairy godfather." He waggles his eyebrows expectantly, and pops an orange segment in his mouth.

"...I'm Spencer," Spence says after a beat, watching Gabe warily. He's not used to one-on-one interactions with Saporta, there's usually a buffer zone involving Pete or Beckett or someone more used to his particular brand of weird. Not that Spencer doesn't like the guy, just -

"Oh, I'll bet you are," Gabe smirks, chomping down on another piece of orange.

- yeah. That. Spencer sighs and shifts on the bed, uncomfortable with the intense way Gabe is watching him.

"Not bad, not bad," Gabe says after a few seriously awkward moments - it's amazing to Spencer how Gabe is seemingly impervious to the awkwardness he creates in those around him. But yeah, Gabe's still staring at him like a creeper, calm and poised as you please, and Spencer can feel his cheeks starting to flush redder and redder. "Ooh." Gabe grins - a wide, thin slice of teeth that reminds Spence of cheshire cats and sharks. "The blush is cute, we'll keep that. And the hips. Hot," he says, reaching out to grab for Spencer's side before Spencer squeaks and smacks his hand away, glowering. "Feisty," Gabe says, still grinning the same worrying grin, even as he sits back on his heels and gives Spencer a foot of space.

"What the fuck, dude," Spencer grumbles, pushing his hair out of his face and sitting up, folding his arms tight across his chest. "No means no."

"You didn't say no," Gabe points out cheerfully, tilting his head and watching Spencer for a couple more seconds.

"You didn't give me a chance to," Spencer snaps.

"Or you just didn't want to take the chance to," Gabe singsongs, gesturing.

"I'm saying no now," Spencer shoots back immediately, still scowling at him.

Gabe tsks, and pouts a little. Which shouldn't be at all effective - he's like, ten feet tall and skinny as a lamppost, and dressed in colors that sort of make Spencer wish he was still blind, but still, Spencer feels himself relenting. "Come on, chill the fuck out," Gabe says, reaching out to twist around one of the bedposts. "Do we need to go over the mission statement, here?"

Spencer gives him an unamused look, and waits. After a few seconds, Gabe huffs and rolls his eyes.

"Mission Statement of Awesome Fairy Godfathers: One, we will get you dolled up. Two, we will get you to the ball. Three, we will get you and the Prince a little...alone time." Gabe pauses and smirks, warming to the subject. "A little seven minutes in heaven, a little - "

"No," Spencer says shortly, holding a hand up to quell the rising tide of dumbfuckery. "What's number four?"

"Four, we will get you home at midnight," Gabe says, looking sort of deflated. He holds both hands up at Spencer's shocked look. "Don't ask me, man, I tried to get it changed to three in the morning, when all the bars close. The folks upstairs weren't very receptive."

Spencer sighs, and rubs a hand over his face. "At least you tried, I guess."

"Only a matter of time," Gabe tells him, regaining some of his confidence, tilting his chin up. "Got an 'in' with their secretary. She totally wants to join the field agents, and I think she might have some pull, so." He shrugs a shoulder, and grins. "We'll see what happens."

"Cool." A bird flits in through the open doorway and drops down onto Spencer's shoulder, fluffing up its feathers as it starts hunkering down - Spencer doesn't even flinch. It's like the twelfth time it's happened today, after all. Gabe, however, stares. The bird stares back. It tilts his head in response to Gabe tilting his, and lets out a soft chirrup.

It's actually pretty funny, and if Spencer wasn't vaguely homicidal about being fucking Cinderella and his whole family being either dead or complete assholes, he'd probably be laughing. Eventually, Gabe scoffs and looks away.

"Fucking birds," he grumbles, shifting above the bed, giving Spencer a dark look. "And the mice, you've seen the mice, right?" He folds his arms and screw up his mouth again. "Just for the record? Those little fuckers were not my idea. All right?"

"Okay," Spencer says, giving him a dubious look. He rubs his arm, and looks longingly towards the door, and wonders what would happen if he just said fuck it to the whole fairy godparent idea and showed up at Brendon's place in his guy clothes.

Gabe scowls and kicks the bedpost lightly. "People kept on showing up and asking where the talking animals were, right?" he explains, gesturing expansively. Spencer cringes back a little after he almost gets hit by a flailing arm, and nods to let Gabe know he's following along. "Like everybody, is there some talking animal thing where you're from?" Gabe looks at him curiously.

Spencer thinks about the effort it would take to explain the whole Disney phenomenon, and shrugs instead. "Kinda," he says feebly. "It's complicated."

Gabe rolls his eyes, and huffs again. "Yeah," he grumbles. "So anyway, I had to go and make some, and. Dude. I couldn't even - man, Spence, they were so much cooler when they were all snakes, you don't even know, all right?"

Spencer blinks. "The...snakes?'

"Fuckin' sweet little army of cobras, dude. I had them all trained and everything, shit. Management turned them into birds and mice after they kept getting complaints," Gabe mutters, a mutinous expression on his face. "Something is wrong with people, that's all I'm saying."

Spencer stares at Gabe, who's fiddling with the turned-up brim of his hat idly. He watches as Gabe bites down into an orange segment and tries to suck it dry, and thinks for a couple more seconds. "Yes," he agrees finally, very firm.

Gabe gives him a pleased look, and a disconcertingly sweet smile, and offers him a section of orange. Spencer pauses, then takes it, and smiles back encouragingly. "Not everybody hates snakes," he offers, nibbling on the end of the orange piece, sucking one piece of pulp into his mouth at a time. "Keep the faith."

"Oh, don't you worry," Gabe assures him, tucking the other untouched orange into the cavernous recesses of his violently purple hoodie. "I am full of conviction. Now," he says, clapping his hands together, his eyes beginning to gleam unpleasantly, "we gotta stop shooting the proverbial shit because you have a ball to get to, motherfucker."

Spencer winces and shifts on the mattress, jogging one leg incessantly. "Or...you can do magic, right? So just magic the prince here. Less time and effort."

Gabe considers this for a moment, then sighs and shakes his head. "While you make an excellent point, I'm on my last-last-super-last chance from the last girl who wanted to deviate from the plan and if I lose this job, I gotta go join the Henchman's Union with my uncle so my dad doesn't flip. And you're cool and all, Spence, but can you imagine me as some vampire's henchman or some shit?"

Spencer emphatically does not think of the pictures Pete showed them of a very tall Gabe and a very drunk Mikey Way doing some very nasty dancing, and shakes his head. "No," he says, "no, I cannot."

"Of course you can't," Gabe tells him consolingly, reaching a long arm to pat his knee. "So, what colors are we thinking, for the dress?"

Spencer groans, long and miserable. "Dude, a dress? Come on."

"What part of 'last-last-super-last chance' did you not get, man?" Gabe asks him, frowning a little. "This one has to go off pretty much perfectly or I'm up shit creek, okay?" He pauses, and looks Spencer over, considering. "Look, it'll be fine, you're pretty. We can absolutely make this work. And okay, I'm not saying that you have to put out just to, y'know, save my career or anything, but...it would be really selfless and awesome if you could make sure that the prince wants to find you. If that requires some royal dick groping, I mean. I would really owe you one."

"Gabe," Spencer says calmly, "you are not my pimp. And you're not putting me in anything with petticoats. Or anything that could be described as 'fluorescent'. Or 'acid-washed'." Spencer pauses and thinks for a second. "Fucking...just put me in something black and don't add heels."

Gabe makes a hideous face. "You'll look like somebody's grandma, dude. Want me to add a string of pearls and a brooch? Maybe a sweater with flowers embroidered on it, for when you feel a draft?"

"If you can make them tasteful, sure," Spencer shoots back, folding his arms and glaring.

"I got this," Gabe frowns, stretching his legs out and actually putting them down so they touch the floor, gesturing for Spencer to slide off the bed and stand as well. He moves in a 180-degree arc around Spence, pursing his lips thoughtfully every few seconds, before he nods and stops. "Okay." And then he raises his hands and the ambient glow around him starts to intensify, brightening and brightening until Spencer has to shut his eyes and squeeze them. He can feel the room growing hotter around him from the light, and he can feel the clothes on his body shifting and stretching and - shit, tightening, goddammit Gabe - into something approaching a dress.

Eventually, the light and the heat die away, and Spencer opens his eyes and immediately looks down.

He looks back up just as quickly, because that is not black. "What the hell, Gabe," he spits. "This isn't - "

"Shut up, you're gorgeous," Gabe tells him firmly, tilting his head and looking...well, almost proud of himself. Spencer glowers at him, and stomps over to the mirror on his mother's dresser, and sucks in a breath at the image it presents him.

He...Spencer feels really weird about this, because he doesn't look bad. It's seriously going to start hurting his head in a second, because - whatever Gabe did, Spencer doesn't look completely ridiculous, which, what. The dress is flat and simple and silver and Spencer looks sort of like he belongs in Bugsy Malone, and his shoes are glass but they're flat, at least, and his eyes are dark and smoky-looking and he's got a feathered headband on his head.

Shit, Spencer thinks to himself. He looks pretty. He turns around, staring at himself, down at the dress and jewelery and shit, and then he notices the shaved legs. And the absence of body hair in general.

He whips around to glare at Gabe, who shifts uncomfortably. "Shut up," Gabe manages finally. "Carriage should be downstairs. It's going to be waiting at the main doors to take you right at midnight, so, y'know. Don't be late."

"Or what, it turns into a pumpkin?" Spencer grumbles, inspecting the material of the dress, and the various little accessories he's starting to find everywhere. Shit, he realizes, Gabe gave him clip-on earrings.

"Fuck that, it's just a taxi," Gabe scoffs, leaning against the bedpost, watching him bemusedly. "Look, don't take this the wrong way, but goddamn I'm good. You're like. My masterpiece."

Spencer rolls his eyes and folds his arms, shivering a little at the feeling of air on his sleeveless arms. He glances around a little self-consciously, and tries not to look down at himself. He must look like he's about to jump out of his skin or something, because Gabe clucks his tongue and comes to give Spencer what should be a comforting pat on the back, except it slides too far down, too close to his ass to really help him relax at all. "You don't fuck around," he finally tells Gabe, rueful.

"Hell no I don't," Gabe agrees, looking Spence over again, sort of entranced by his own brilliance. He grins a little, and fixes Spencer's headband, and then smacks him lightly on the hip. "All right, get the hell out of here before I make a pass at you."

Spencer makes a face and goes, clopping down the stairs a little awkwardly before he gets his bearings in the shoes and walks a little easier. The carriage steps are kinda hard to navigate at first, but he manages, without even tearing the dress or anything. He sits down and exhales the breath he's been holding, and leans out of the carriage window enough to give Gabe an ironic salute, his face tilted up to where he can see the glowing outline hovering in the bedroom window.

The driver must've already been given his destination, because he pulls away without Spencer having to say anything. The horses' hooves dig into the pebbles of the driveway, and Spencer keeps his head out of the window and watches where they're going, keeping track of the turns they make, in his head.

Seven B