The Academy of S.I.D.E.

No. 30: A Christmas Waltz

Before Virgil knew it, winter break rolled around. Suddenly, the crush of students that usually populated the halls was down to almost half its size, he could wake up at whatever time he wanted (well, at least until Roman forced him out of bed with errant singing), and the teachers who stayed behind were a lot more relaxed, or at least not worried about what students thought of them. Logan had apparently gone up to Emile's office to ask him about something, only to walk in on Remy fiddling with the headmaster's tie while murmuring stuff in French to him.

According to the others, this kind of thing happened a lot to Logan. Not that exact thing, but the walking-in-on-couples-flirting-and-or-making-out was a common occurrence for the forever-flustered genius. Virgil actually kind of felt a little bit sorry for him.

That feeling was soon taken over by the sheer glee at picturing his face.

And speaking of couples, Virgil was currently on the verge (no pun intended) of a nervous breakdown.

It was the night of the Winter Ball, and Roman was already dressed and waiting in the ballroom with Patton. Virgil had told him that he needed a little more time to get ready, which, in Virgilesque, meant "I am about to have a mild freak-out because I genuinely like you and I don't want to fuck this up."

At this point, he was seriously considering just spending the entire night holed up in the bathroom.

"Do keep up with the pacing, Virgil," Janus called from the doorway. "I'm sure the maintenance staff would adore it if you wore a hole through the floor."

"Jan, I really do not have the patience for your judgement right now," Virgil growled, not looking up from the floor. "Go bother someone else."

"One of my close friends is in clear emotional distress, and I certainly can't abandon him now, can I? Besides, there's really nothing to be nervous about."

"What do you mean, 'nothing to be nervous about?!'" Virgil exclaimed, spinning around towards him. "I'm about to go to a formal dance with a guy who I have legit feelings for and I'm risking making a total fool out of myself, and---and why the everloving fuck are you wearing a goddamned monocle?"

"Oh, this old thing?" Janus adjusted it. "I got it for my Alastor costume back in October, and I found it in my dresser drawer this morning. I thought it only fitting for this event."

Virgil inhaled deeply. "You---you are the most---"

"Stylish man at the ball? Why, thank you." He smoothed down his outfit. "Really, now, Virgil, this is Roman we're talking about. Worst-case scenario here is that he'll embarrass himself, not you. I mean, look at you!" Janus patted him on the shoulders, beaming. "You're dashing and daring and perfectly elegant. He won't be able to take his eyes off of you, I can promise you that."

Virgil begrudgingly admitted to himself that Janus had done an amazing job in picking out his suit---it was simple and black with a purple dress shirt, plus a tie that had a pattern fairly similar to the patches on his hoodie. He'd actually picked the tie out himself, though Janus had protested a little at first.

His shorter friend's outfit was a lot more elaborate---a mostly-black three-piece with a yellow dress shirt, matching gloves, a pocketwatch on its own chain, and even a top hat. Honestly, if you took that into consideration, Virgil shouldn't have even been surprised by the monocle.

"Look, just promise me that if anything goes wrong, you cover for me," Virgil said, pointing at him. "Got it?"

"No, no, I understand." Janus smirked. "Really, though, it's a relief that you're not even at half the level of nervous that Logan is."