tampered | (no subject)

WHO: YOU.
WHEN: Valentine’s Day, sundown – 4 a.m.
WHERE:

caughtthebullet estate, the Palace.

And what is a City overrun by Venice flair without its masque?

Come sundown, the overly-lit Palace, suffering under a sea of orchids and a white-and-gold palette, will be welcoming the ladies and gentlemen of our fair City as its guests to this year’s Valentine’s Day ball. Have no fear, the Palace staff has been given notice to help newcomers dock their gondolas!

Should they lack their own, ladies will be served a dance card, white cape and masque upon arrival. Gentlemen without can also be helped find a suitablemask.

Guests will not be introduced by name, but by their choice of pseudonym; instead, they can play the guessing game until masks are formally removed at midnight, giving their time, and maybe their hearts to some hopeful stranger.

jesusing_clown and a cohort of waiters will produce the evening’s treats;

taravata will be attending on any task that calls for strong arms and keen balance;

risetwice’s patisserie will be providing breads, cakes, and the evening’s tort; and

eagleofautozam has promised sweets and candied souvenirs.

The ball’s sponsor and delightful host,

caughtthebullet passes his compliments, and the

sparkling_by puts himself at your service.

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Please, be welcome.

[ooc: up very early, but you know what to do! Thread, threadjack, take advantage of the masks for cute shenanigans, and most of all, have fun! ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Guess who completely doesn't belong in this picture? Why, yes, it's Rudy Miller in sweater and jeans (http://www.cpps90.com/images/ab2/ab232a.jpg), who has been pointedly abstaining from the festivities going on in the ballroom of his current place of residence, but decided to walk down anyway for the sake of snitching some of the desserts while the guests occupy themselves with frivolity.

Will he go unnoticed? Probably not.

(But it's worth a shot anyway.)

Of course he wouldn't go unnoticed, not if Merry was on the prowl. Having taken a break from dancing, the girl was headed to the tables where the desserts were, hoping to snack on some more goodies when she spotted him. It wasn't that hard, considering he stuck out like a sore thumb.

"Rudy? Is that you?"

"No, I'm Jorgen von Liebowitz," he answers blandly, because it's not exactly hard to tell precisely who he is; he's wearing his usual street clothes and has no mask, so there's really no concealing his identity. If anything is working for him, though, it's sheer audacity; he's acting like he knows exactly what he's doing, so people are treating him as such. "...the Third."

That was a little bit of a silly question (and Rudy would have to forgive her for it, since she was a little sugar high on punch and the chocolate truffles a certain Mister Eagle Vision was handing out), so Merry decided to make it up to him by playing along.

"Then, Mister Jorgen von Liebowitz the Third--" she intoned as she started picking and choosing sweets to put onto her plate, "have you come to dance?"

"I live here," Rudy pointed out, beginning to accumulate a small stack of his own. Free food was free food, and more importantly, there were no parents around with the authority to restrict him to only one of anything. "I am entitled to compensation in exchange for this infringement upon my privacy."

Oh, the free food. That was understandable. She understood that perfectly. Merry thus starts a new plate, heaping desserts onto them before handing the plate to him.

"Please accept this gift in compensation."

Not seeing anyone around, she carefully pushes up her mask a little to reveal her face. She looks at him inquiringly.

"So no dancing, then?"

He raises his eyebrows slightly, accepting the plate with a brief glance toward her own. "Your tribute is duly noted."

But at the question, the curiosity fades as he settles back into his usual deadpan demeanor. "I don't dance."

"I'm glad you like it, Mister von Lebowitz the Third."

She smiled a little ruefully to herself when his expression returned to how it usually was, pushing her mask back down and going back to picking desserts onto her plate.

"I thought so. I just thought I'd check to make sure." Merry leaned against the wall, letting out a little huff of breath before she started eating. "Will you at least stay to people watch with me for a while?"

He pauses, considering again. This was generally the part where the insistent girl dragged him out onto the floor for a dance, regardless of his protests to the contrary. The fact that it isn't occurring this time...hm. Interesting.

"I have no pressing engagements," he allows at last. Though he's not changing his clothes or donning a mask. He will maintain his protest at least that far.

Merry remembered a curse that had happened not so long ago-- where he'd vehemently said those exact same words "I don't dance", even though he'd clearly shown that he possessed the ability to do so, and wonderfully at that. She was beginning to see that it was a classic example of "I can" versus "I will", and having been subjected to everything from etiquette to-- ugh-- piano lessons, she could at least relate in that way. She'd just wanted to make sure that he hadn't changed his mind.

So she nodded, thoughtfully sucking on her fork after a bite of food (a bad habit of hers) as she glanced out over the swirl of dancers.

"It's a little strange," she chirps after a moment, not particularly worried if he wanted to listen or not. "At home I was never looking forward to becoming a debutante, but now when I'm here and watching everyone, it almost makes me wish I could."