[D8LA] Where the Magic Happens

[Manny Donos]

Manny's new place wasn't in the worst part of town. But it also wasn't in a great part of town. Still, while the building was a bit run-down, it at least seemed to be made up of single units.

His door was easy to find; halfway down the hallway on the third floor. It was simple unassuming wood, and gave no hint as to what lay behind its solid surface.

At the moment, that was Manny. He waited, confetti in hands, for his guest to arrive.

[Leah kuso]

Leah had a good intuition. She trusted her gut with most things. However...she couldn't predict what Mannys apartment would be like. She almost missed having the guy around, he was warm at least. Her apartment was far too small for two people though, so when Manny left it was nice to be able to stretch and the only thing you'd hit was a wall, not a person.

She walked down the hall, stopping outside the door, and knocked.

[Manny Donos]

The door opened.

"Ayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!" Manny said, greeting Leah with all of his usual enthusiasm. Which was a lot. The effect was accentuated by the handfuls of confetti that he cast into the air, scattering down all around them.

He grinned at her. "Hey, c'mon in. Welcome to my new place." It was... well, it was bigger than her place, anyway. There was a whole other room; a 'living' room, one might call it. The main feature of it was a vidscreen on the wall, pretty big, with a sofa facing it. He had put up a few posters of gravball players and magicians on the walls.

Besides that, the apartment was pretty bare, lacking any furniture whatsoever, unless one counted the refrigerator. Tan carpet covered plasticrete floors.

[Leah kuso]

Leah laughed at Mannys enthusiam, smiling at him.

"Someone's pretty happy. Are you saying my apartment wasn't good enough?" she chuckled, walking in and looking around.

"Damn, someone's loaded now. I should move in here, so much space!"

[Manny Donos]

Manny laughed. "Hey, I'm just glad to have my own refresher now. How often could those two bang? And why didn't they just use their own room?"

He paused, looking at her. "... you wanna? I mean, seriously. You let me stay with you for a while. Seems only fair." He chewed his lip a moment. "And hey, I've kinda gotten used to having you around. So, y'know. If you want."

[Leah kuso]

"You serious?" Leah turned to look at Manny "where would I sleep? Do you have a second bedroom or is this an offer to start sleeping together again?" There was a teasing grin at that.

[Manny Donos]

"I am serious." Manny said. "Living alone sucks, anyway."

He coughed. "Well, no... the bed is bigger, though." He smirked at Leah. "Not that it matters. As soon as you're asleep, whoop!" He put a hand to the side of his face, octopus-like. "You'd cuddle up right against me anyway."

[Leah kuso]

"S-shut up!" Leah said, giving Manny a shove "I won't even share the bed with you if you say that! You can sleep on the couch!"

[Manny Donos]

Manny laughed, grinning as she shoved him.

"Well, what do you think? Are you in?" He jerked his head. "Or do you want the tour? I mean, it's not gonna take too long..." Manny shrugged.

[Leah kuso]

"Hmm...I'll take the tour first. Let's see you sell your apartment to me" Leah said with a grin "go on Magic Manny, make this place sound amazing."

[Manny Donos]

"Yeah, okay." Manny said. "Let's check it out."

He lead the way into the middle of the living room. "So, sofa. Vidplayer. This is where we can watch stuff. Or where I can sleep after I tease you too much."

He waved at the walls. "And if you want to put up some posters of your own, that's cool too. But we gotta keep Antilles up. And, uh, that one." Manny cleared his throat, indicating a lady magician wearing a rather revealing costume.

[Leah kuso]

"Hmm..." Leah went to study the magician poster with a curious expression.

"She's pretty hot" she said after a moment, looking back at Manny "who looks better, me or her?"

[Manny Donos]

"Ha ha..." Manny laughed nervously, rubbing the back of his head. "That's... a hard question." He equivocated, looking at the poster, then back to Leah.

His lips curled up. "Think you could get an outfit just like that?"

[Leah kuso]

"Hmm...I could. Not sure where from mind you, you're the magician here. Is there a secret magicians store that sells magician outfits?" Leah turned back to study the picture "it'll be super revealing though. You might struggle to focus on the act."

[Manny Donos]

"Yeah, actually. Only it's not that secret." Manny shrugged. "I'll take you there sometime."

Looking at Leah, Manny took a deep breath. "Yeah, I might." After a moment, he smiled. "But hey, whatever you want to do for the act is cool with me."

He cleared his throat. "You wanna see the rest?"

[Leah kuso]

"Ooh, shopping trip? I'm up for that!" Leah said with a big smile "ok, let's see the rest of your place. I'm hope it'll be as exciting as this."

[Manny Donos]

"Shopping trip sounds great." Manny said, smiling. "But first..."

He lead the way towards the back, waving a hand at the attached kitchen as they passed it. "Kitchen that you don't have to walk through to get to the bedroom." He opened a door revealing a refresher, simple but clean. "Refresher that you don't have to wait for people to finish banging in it to use."

[Leah kuso]

Leah giggled.

"Are you saying you didn't like the appeal of laying in bed and being able to turn the oven on at the same time? It's totally overrated, and I only set the bed on fire once in my years living there."

[Manny Donos]

"Only once?" Manny blinked. "I did it, like, twice in the few weeks I was staying with you. I put it out right away, though." He assured her.

"So, pretty good, huh?" He said, smiling at her.

[Leah kuso]

"You did? That was impressive, I don't think I even noticed! Do you mean small fires? The one time I did it the whole bed went up in flames. Had to quickly get rid of it" Leah said with a chuckle.

"This apartment is nice. It has a lot of space, I feel like I could get lost in here. Are you sure I can stay?"