simplestgift: (Just a little idle talk of this and that)
Archie Kennedy ([personal profile] simplestgift) wrote in [community profile] lucetilogs2011-11-30 10:14 pm

Comfort and Joy

Who: Come one, come all! ...In formal attire.
What: A Christmas ball, old world style.
When: December 1st, beginning around five in the afternoon and ending when the last person leaves.
Where: The rec center.
Summary: Earth's eighteenth-century peeps are throwing one hell of a party.
Rating: Well, considering no one is serving water? Probably PG-13 for alcohol consumption and the results thereof (there's coffee and hot chocolate!).

The recreation center has been utterly transformed.

The doors open to a host of candles and a warm, old-world smell and feel. The scent of food and spices hangs in the air—mulled wine, wassail, evergreen boughs, fresh bread and roast meat. Cream brocades, simple but elegant, are draped over the walls. Traditional red rugs have been thrown over the floor. Gone are the billiard tables, ping-pong, and foosball. It looks like a different place entirely, every table impeccably dressed with light linen cloths and set with fine china and crystal. At least one-half of the room is cleared and ready for dancers.

The tables are lit with candles, and five chandeliers have been temporarily added to the room for more light, giving the room a golden glow instead of the sterile luminescence of fluorescent lighting. On the tables, boughs of evergreen and holly surround the candles, and mistletoe has been hung discreetly here and there. In one corner of the dancing area, by a large and beautifully decorated fir tree (Buffy’s insistence), the musicians are set up to play, unobtrusive to the diners but essential to the dancers. Leading them is Frederic Chopin himself, and few here can say they have had anyone better play for their pleasure.

Things will begin with a grand dinner late in the afternoon, with a light supper (mostly consisting of cold meats, bread, and other lighter fare) at around nine o’clock. The selection of food on the tables is enormous. Most of it is meat-based and some of it is simply meat. Roast beef with mushrooms, goose in giblet gravy, herbed chicken, baked salmon, and a whole pig are among the choices. There is some hope for vegetarians, though, with spinach mixed with bread crumbs and cheese on small toasts, turnips (or rutabagas if you speak American), onions, carrots, parsnips, mashed potatoes, asparagus in breadcrumbs, and savory onion and wild mushroom pies. There is hot fresh bread and rolls with butter and heaps upon heaps of small mince pies filled with fruit, molasses, and yes, a little minced lamb. Moreover, there are fresh winter fruits like oranges and mikans and many different desserts, such as Christmas pudding, a rum chocolate dessert, and spotted dog with custard. Sit and help yourself. For a complete list of the food offered, take a look here.

Among the drinks throughout the evening are wassail, tea, hot chocolate (less sweet and much more intense than most modern characters would be used to, made with cinnamon, vanilla, and a hint of cayenne pepper), coffee, brandy, wine both mulled and plain, port, sherry, and gallons of rum punch. Even though the food is fantastic, overseen by Jack Aubrey, the conversation is the point of the game, and who knows who they will wind up sitting beside. At the center of each table is placed a pineapple as a sign of welcome and wishes of prosperity.

There is dancing light as the music itself, with Archie Kennedy and Elizabeth Swann teaching the steps of each dance before striking up the music and letting everyone go to town with it. They are poised and elegant but relaxed and seeming to glide as they demonstrate the motions with an effortlessness that comes with years of practice. They were both raised on these dances and this sort of social function and seem completely at home here. The dancing begins after dinner with the minuets and continues after a light supper with some informal English country dances. Anyone unused to dancing like this may find that it’s harder than it looks, but when one gets used to it, it feels very graceful, beautiful, and…fun! The activity will only end when there are too few dancers left to continue, and will continue all night if possible. As dancers pass each other or move hand-in-hand, eye contact can be made, quiet words exchanged, subtle (or not) messages passed as they spin through the room, or perhaps the room spins while they remain still.

It might depend on how much they’ve had to drink.

Those who do not wish to dance have other activities to participate in. In one corner, card tables are set up with multiple decks of cards stacked up, and there is even a box or two of dominoes and a handful of dice. The tables themselves are round and made of polished rosewood or mahogany. This area is well-lit and on the opposite end of the room from the musicians and dancers, probably as a mercy to the tone-deaf Horatio Hornblower who loves cards but can’t abide music. Here, discreet (or indiscreet) gambling is inevitable. There may be no money here, but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing to wager.

Are you lingering at the dining tables, drinking and talking loud and laughing with friends, or will you shyly sit and watch the dancing and games and hope to be invited in? Are you sitting quietly alone and listening to the music as your foot taps on its own, or are you unable to sit still and ready to dance all night if they’ll let you? Are you playing cards with a few new acquaintances, or are you hanging on someone’s arm and helping them cheat?

Whatever you do, have fun.

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-06 08:22 pm (UTC)(link)
"They seem so..."

When they weren't lecturing him, accusing him of perversion and theft he wasn't guilty of, laying traps for him to get caught in like a turkey, or giving him hallucinations of demonic versions of said turkeys.

Lupin smiles at her giggling. He catches her and tilts her backward in a dip, mimicking the dancers he had seen in those old black and white films he sometimes watched with his sassy handful of a lady. "You seem nice too, my dear Grune. I'm still pretty new in town, so maybe you could introduce me around sometime?"

He winked boyishly at that, as if implying that she could introduce him to a few other things...but he was teasing, teasing!
lostinmyway: (Giggle!)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-07 03:51 am (UTC)(link)
The dip surprises another giggle out of her, and she's beaming once Lupin rights her.

"Oh, I'd be happy to help! I'm sure all my friends would love to meet you."

Teasing or not, the implications are entirely lost on Grune, and so it's just as well he wasn't serious.

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-07 04:32 pm (UTC)(link)
Her smile was lovely, but she didn't have a brain in that pretty head at all, did she? He was expecting at least a playful smack for that!

"That would be lovely," he intoned, ever the gentleman. He didn't voice his opinion on the overabundance of lawful-types in Luceti, nor the fact that they likely wouldn't get along.
lostinmyway: (Well....)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-07 06:51 pm (UTC)(link)
"I wonder who you should meet first," she remarks half to herself, her mind running through one very long list.

Should she try Dhaos or Vincent first? They both are a little lonely. Or maybe Pao-lin or Link--or Norma! Hmm, this is a difficult decision.
Edited 2011-12-07 18:52 (UTC)

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-08 02:18 am (UTC)(link)
"Don't think too hard about it," he said, still guiding her along through the dance. The song they entered to ended, and was succeeded by one with a mellower tempo and pace.

"Though, I could suggest someone a little more on the open-minded side for starters, if you don't mind."
lostinmyway: (Hmm I wonder....)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-08 03:13 am (UTC)(link)
Grune easily adjusted to the new pace of the next dance. Figuring out what Lupin was talking about, however, was a little more difficult.

"Open-minded?"

She was sure all her friends fit that definition.... What was that definition?

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-08 06:09 pm (UTC)(link)
"Oh, you know. People who are willing to accept differences in opinion is all."

He smiled easily while willing himself to be patient. He wondered if this was how school teachers or tutors felt around their young charges. Still, this was a woman--not a child. It was best to tread carefully.
lostinmyway: (It's always a sunny day.)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-08 07:06 pm (UTC)(link)
"Oh, all my friends are open-minded, then," she said with confidence. "They're all such nice people."

Unfortunately, while a good deal of her friends really did fit that definition, there were some very notable exceptions.

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-09 01:26 am (UTC)(link)
"All of them are open minded? Really?" He smiles. "That--that's really, really good to know."

Maybe he'd actually avoid a lecture this time. He'd heard enough people harp about the merits of rules and such forth since his arrival. "So then, they wouldn't mind a person who's occupation isn't held in the highest esteem, right?"
lostinmyway: (Hmm I wonder....)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-09 03:22 am (UTC)(link)
"Oh, of course not," she answered, somehow able to keep up with the figures of the dance without so much as noticing the music. "Why would they mind?"

[identity profile] redjacketthief.livejournal.com 2011-12-09 06:25 pm (UTC)(link)
"Maybe we can discuss that some other time, my dear? A man has to have his secrets, you know."

He smiles at her boyishly. "Are you getting thirsty? I'm getting thirsty. Do you want some of that cocoa that has graciously been put out?"
lostinmyway: (Oh my isn't this lovely?)

[personal profile] lostinmyway 2011-12-10 03:39 am (UTC)(link)
She immediately smiles back, her expression free and unrestrained. "Oh, yes, that would be very nice. I bet it's delicious!"