Work Text:
A man is standing at the gate of the Lumièran école maternelle. And he is drawing in all the eyes around him.
Parents are picking up their small children as per usual at this time of the day. But nobody has seen him waiting at the gates before. They would have recognized him instantly.
He’s a memorable figure with his dark grey suit with golden lines acting like lighting is running up his arms and back. His hair was clearly once black, but with his age it now it is mostly white and grey, his locks immaculately styled and wavy, at a shoulder length that compliments his gentlemanly appearance.
But what Gustave draws in the most is not his dashing outfit or hair, nor his well trimmed black and grey beard or the faint wrinkles he sees at this distance, telling Gustave of a longer life than his own, well lived.
No, what draws him in most are his icy grey eyes that are piercing him since he has stepped out of the children’s tutor room, completely disregarding his dirtied up workers outfit as a périscolaire and looking straight into his soul. Gustave knows he’s been rudely staring back for the last couple minutes, but he just can’t look away.
“Papa!”
Gustave watches a girl with raven hair run towards the man. He knows her - only because of a single sentence though, a piece of children’s wisdom of the most devastating kind she’d whispered to him during their playtime after lunch.
‘You look lonely like papa.’
The man picks what he presumes is his daughter up with a brilliant smile, one of the likes that could end world wars if push comes to shove. He must’ve been waiting for her, Gustave only now noticing the sleek black car behind him that he now gently helps his daughter into. Wait, is that - did he really just completely ignore the fucking Ferrari parking there this whole time, too captivated by the older gentleman to notice that shiny hunk of metal?
With both prosthetic and flesh arm, Gustave rubs his eyes and sighs loudly, frustrated with himself and his sudden newfound obsession. Let that way too sexily dressed, rich ass father leave with his daughter, go back to your workstation, forget about his stare that felt like he was eating you up at a distance and — wait, why is he approaching…?!
“I can’t help but notice you staring at me, did you need something?” The most sexy deep baritone voice that has ever graced Gustave’s ears now tells him, only at an arms length distance.
“I- I - uh—-” Very intelligent. “S-sorry monsieur, I was just-”
“Verso.”
“Pardon?”
The man sends him an illegally handsome smirk. “That is my name, monsieur-” blue eyes flick down to the other’s uniform “… Gustave.”
By the lights, Gustave can barely hide the shiver running down his frame at that whisper of his name, as if tasting and savouring it like the finest wine. He’s sure he’s more like… apple juice. But judging by the stranger’s continuous stare, he might disagree.
“Uh, yeah. Verso… I didn’t want to be rude, I just… uh, never seen you here?”
Fuck. That could be read like a pickup line, couldn’t it?
The smirk framing that beautiful man’s face certainly just got wider at that.
“Mhm. I think so. I certainly would have remembered a cute man like you.” His eyes darken as he purrs out the you, not hiding the second meaning at all.
“Cute—?” His heart races and Gustave feels like fainting. He lowers his gaze, now looking at a dress shirt that seems much too tight for the pecs it must hide. But Gustave can’t stare into those blues any longer, or he’d lose his sanity.
Lonely, the girl said. And Gustave tries to desperately discern what that means while not losing his goddamn mind.
“Mhm. Cute. A shame we can’t talk for longer - I’m supposed to bring her to her mother’s place…”
A mother. Gustave sobers up. Of course, there must be one. “O-oh, yes. Of course.” He nods, still avoiding eye contact and is at loss for more words. Fully expecting the man to turn and leave now. But… he doesn’t.
Instead his heart picks up a new speed record as large, firm hands suddenly wrap around his. Beckoning him to look back up into brilliant grey-blues that stun him with their intensity - and rob his breath when they ever so briefly flick down to his lips.
“When getting her into the car, she briefly told me you looked lonely today, Gustave.” He huffs and Gustave blinks back, only slowly realizing that he talks about his daughter. “I know that feeling very well, after the breakup with her mother, shortly after her birth…”
He can feel his breath ghosting against his face now. A tinge of peppermint and sandalwood caresses his nose. Gustave is caught. And with a sudden surge of bravery created by the admission he just got told, he turns his hands in the hold to caress Verso’s instead. The sharp intake of breath he hears from the other at his action is emboldening him even further.
“What do you want from me, monsieur Verso?”
“I want you to come over tomorrow, whenever you finish work.” Verso breaks their contact, but his eyes lose none of their intensity. Out of his breast pocket, he procures a card and gives it to Gustave.
An address. Sixth arrondissement. Dessendre… THE Dessendre manor?!
Gustave stares at the card in his hand in shock as Verso slowly but surely turns away to return to his duty. But not before adding one last, devastating whisper:
“Let my darling daughter meet her new parent, yes?”