Is God The Devil Himself?

Childish

Everyone eventually piled into the practice room and helped set up or tuned their instruments. Graves however, stood off to the side and watched. He examined every instrument carefully, and guitar stood out to him. Bass guitar, actually. He liked the deep sound and the fact it was more felt than hear when played. He took a seat near the door as they played, humming along to songs and lightly tapping his claws on his seat in rhythm.

He enjoyed it, the atmosphere the music provided. Dew or Swiss would occasionally fuck with the other band members just for fun or to get a rise out of them. He would get to join them in due time, but for now he just had to watch on the sidelines.

Practice ended as fast as ot began and everyone flooded to the commons room. Graves stayed behind to help Copia, though. He attempted to shoo the ghoul away, telling him that he should enjoy time with his new family. Graves shook his head and insisted he help. Copia eventually caved and let the taller help him get instruments back in their cases and pick up any picks that had been hurled at Aether.

Graves sprinted through the halls, and the sound of laughter and overlapping conversations made him yank his mask off and put his wide smile on full display.

Cirrus was playing Sorry with Dew and Mountain, while the others were either sitting or playing tag. His smile got impossiblely bigger at the sight. He plopped his mask onto the coffee table and called out to Swiss if he could join, to which he was promptly hit in the back of the head by Sunshine who was running away.

They played like children for a while, checking on the ones they hit particularly hard only to be tagged and start again. Cirrus and Dew joined in on the fun after their game ended while Mountain just sat and talked with Aether on the couch. They would've preferred to go back to their rooms, but they needed to ensure no one actually got hurt. Graves tapped out after about half an hour, plopping down next to Aether on the couch and resting his head on his shoulder.

"You wanna go rest? Dinner won't be for another two hours." Aether asked, stroking the smaller ghouls hair. Graves just nodded, to tired to bother responding with words.

Aether scooped him up from the couch and said his goodbyes to the rest if the ghouls, of which only three of them paused to wave goodbye. Aethers room was closer than Graves, being the first room on the left hallway, so he settled on letting him stay with him till dinner. Aether kicked open the door and flipped on the lights. His room was more decorated and personalized, with fairy lights and a large bookshelf filled with fantasy and horror books. Aether set Graves down on his bed and moved to sit next to him against the wall. Graves crawled on top of Aether and rested his head on his chest. The larger ghoul smiled fondly at the man resting on him.

Aether ran his hand up and down Graves' back slowly as an attempt to soothe him, and after a few minutes he dozed off.

Graves slowly opened his eyes and looked up to Aether. The lights had been turned off and the windows were open slightly, letting in a light breeze. Aether was still asleep with a smile on his face, though he was quickly woken up by rapid knocks on the bedroom door.

"Aeth! Aether wake up and come eat dinner!" Dew yelled from the other side of the door.

Graves giggled and moved to dangle his legs off the edge of the bed, smoothing out his clothes. He had forgotten to change out of his uniform which now had wrinkles and tangled fringe. He let out a defeated sigh and opened the door, being greeted by Dew tapping his foot impatiently.

"God you are a child, Dewdrop." Graves laughed, gently hitting Dews head. Aether slipped past Graves and shoved Dew off to the side so he wasn't blocking the hallway and walked off.

"Hey, Dew," Dew turned his attention to the taller of the two. "how 'bout we race?" Graves asked, smiling with his fangs poking out. Dew nodded and suddenly took off. Graves followed after, realization that he was entirely in his uniform still, including his fancy shoes that he was horrified to crease, setting in moments after he began running.

The pair ran past Aether and jumped onto the couch in the commons room. Dew was bragging about how he won whilst Graves was mortified by the fact he had creased his precious uniforms shoes. Swiss listened to Graves practically sob about it for a few minutes before he lost it. He laughed uncontrollably for a moment before apologizing and patting Graves on the back.

"Don't worry! Just shows you actually wear them!" Swiss turned to glare at Mountain before returning his attention to the ghoul beside him. "Papa won't care, he's nice! You're fine."