warren and jay: happy birthday

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It's Warren's birthday, and he has Jay over to dinner for the occasion. All seems to go well, until Jay gives Warren his present.

It was possibly overly cheesy, but when Warren had decided he'd wanted to have dinner with Jay for his birthday, he'd gone all out. Going out somewhere was out of the question, so instead he'd brought the fine dining experience into his own home. One of the finest chefs in New York had cooked for them, and now they had been left to their own devices over a raspberry cheesecake dessert. Someone would be through later to clean up, so they didn't have to worry about that.

Most of the apartment was lit by candlelight, and it was no different in the living room where Warren had drawn Jay into for them to eat while the waiter cleared the table. He had a piece of the cheesecake on the end of a fork, and was offering it to Jay with a mischievous smile.

"Ah know you ain't tryin' to bait me with cheesecake," Jay said in a warning tone. He leaned forward only to have the cheesecake pulled away playfully and then leaned over completely until his mouth was around the end of the fork. A grin pulled at his features and he dropped back down in his seat. "Shouldn't this be me doin' this to you?" he asked, reaching for the fork. Jay had wanted to do something different for Warren but he couldn't do much since Warren had planned it all on his own.

"Well, if you insist," Warren said with a laugh, relinquishing the fork and relaxing back against the couch. "I'm certainly not going to complain if a hot guy wants to feed me cheesecake." He paused for a second. "Or anything else for that matter."

"And what else is there besides Cheesecake and pie?" Picking up the plate, Jay pushed up off the couch and settled himself into Warren's lap, straddled over his thighs and comfortable. They were a striking contrast, all of Jay's prime colours to Warren's blond, blue and white that for a second, Jay just looked at him, reflecting.

"Without havin' you say 'Ah know', Ah'm about to tell you yer one hell of a beautiful man. This is the part where you just keep yer trapper shut and act all modest."

"Cake. Ice cream. Creme brûlée. Chocolate mousse... The list goes on, really." Warren settled back further once Jay was straddling him, one hand absently running over the other man's leg.

He cocked an eyebrow at the 'being modest' comment, flashing Jay a cocky smirk for a brief second. He then leant in, quickly kissing him and replying softly.

"Thank you."

"Mmm, Thank you," he grinned and dug the fork into the cheesecake, allowing Warren to have another bite. "Yanno, you ruined mah plans fer yer birthday. Totally took control of that," he said as he eased the fork from Warren's mouth and licked the backing, watching Warren intently.

Warren's gaze didn't leave Jay as he accepted the mouthful of cake, and it was after a couple of moments of chewing and swallowing that he answered.

"Did I?" For some reason, it hadn't occured to him that Jay would want to do something for him. "What had you had in mind?"

"Well Ah ain't gonna tell you now," Jay said, setting the plate and fork aside behind him. "Now you just gotta wait til later. But--" he paused, reaching into his back pocket and pulled out a small, flatly wrapped package, placing it in Warren's hand.

"Tease," he replied with a laugh, before he took the package. "Jay, you didn't have to do this." Just spending the evening with Jay was enough for him.

Jay shifted on his lap, grinning. "You gonna open it or what?"

"I'm not going to get anything opened with you on my lap like that," he said with a smirk. "Except maybe your pants..." He winked playfully before turning his attention to the gift. He made short work of the wrapping, carefully pulling up the tape as he did so. He cocked an eyebrow at the jewellery box before flipping it open.

"And here I thought we weren't getting too serious yet," he continued with a teasing note in his voice, taking the ring out of the box so he could take a closer look. Wide and silver, it was adorned only with engravings, no jewels in sight.

"Don't get on about mah pants Mr. eager or we're gonna have 'nother session with mah killer massage," he teased, holding up his fingers in mock threat before subsiding and watching the unwrapping. It was exciting and even though he couldn't afford much, he thought he scored a real gem at the antique shop that screamed Warren's name.

"Well it ain't that kinda ring," he confessed. "Ah got it from thisguy, old language, don't know what, maybe hebrew, looks like - Ah'm just guessin' here. But he said it was a bindin' ring. There's actually two," Jay's hand snaked into his own front shirt and produced a ring of the exact same fashion. "They come in pairs..."

"Not that sort of ring," he said teasingly, looking back up at Jay and then to the ring on the chain around his neck. "But it's a binding ring, and you have a matching one." He kept up the teasing tone, though he was feeling a little uneasy about it. Not that it wasn't a nice ring, because it really was, but...

"War--" The ring was tucked away and Jay got up off the couch, collecting the plates as was his good southern manners. "Ah thought ti was cool, reminded me of us and the guy said it was an antique. So--" it was the thought that counted?

"It's a gorgeous ring," he said sincerely, pushing himself up off the couch and moving to follow Jay, sliding an arm around him and tugging him in close. "Thank you," he said with a smile, lowering his head to kiss Jay. Even if Warren was a little uneasy about it, he did appreciate the thought, and that was the important part, right?

Forced to stop, Jay conceded to the kiss. He warmed to Warren's hold and even with the plate and fork in hand, Jay could have easily dropped them and given completely into Warren but he drew away, a queer look adoring his expresison. "Ah feel like there's a but attached to the end of that."

"No!" Warren protested, frowning a little. "It's a beautiful present, honestly." But okay, yes, there was a but. "You don't think it's a little... early for us to have matching rings?" It had only been a few days since they'd agreed to give the whole relationship a shot, after all.

Jay frowned and slipped from Warren's hold, heading into the kitchen where he could drop the plate off into the dishwasher. There was two people in there, cleaning up and Jay thought it was a little weird or rather felt it was a little off but brushed it away at the dampening of the gift. He returned a moment later through the doors and stopped after careful consideration of what he would say to Warren. "If we was just friends and Ah gave you that, would you say the same thing?" he asked, hand on hip.

Warren had his arms crossed by the time Jay had returned, the ring snugly on one of his fingers even as he frowned a little at Jay. "Maybe not the same thing, but something similiar." He looked away, then shrugged. "Jewellery's sort of a big deal, you know?"
"No, you wouldn'ta said anything War, that's the difference. Jewellery don't mean the same to everyone," Jay reasoned, unmoved in his posture.

"No, maybe it doesn't. But whatever the circumstances, one person giving another person a matching ring is a big thing, you know? Not that I don't like the ring, because I do." Warren just sighed, putting on a puppy dog expression. "Do we have to keep talking about this?"

Jay rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Well, Ah reckon it's important if yer thinkin' Ah'm gonna bend a knee." It was hard to keep the grin from his face.

"... oh, I didn't assume that. But it's usually... well, there's at least some implication of a pretty serious committment involved." And yes, Warren was taking their relationship seriously, but really.

"--to you," Jay said. "War, Ah bought it cause it reminded me of you, of us, not cause -- oh hey, this screams yer mine forever. Like gez, Ah was the one that wanted to take it slow.Ah can take mine back if it'll make you feel better, but they were sold as a pair."

"No, it's fine." Warren let his arms dropped, pouting again. "Can we go back to the part where you were on my lap and I was talking about taking your pants off? Because really, that sounds like a lot more fun."

"Well..." he trailed off, sauntering slowly towards Warren, one hand reaching out to hook a finger in the hem of Warren's pants, sliding around his front.

"That's better," he said with a lazy smile, his arms sliding around Jay's neck to tug him in close. "You don't even really have to be in my lap if you don't want to. Just as long as there is pantslessness involved."
Jay shimmied up to Warren, fingers slinking up to unbutton Warrens shirt as he started walking him backwards towards the bedroom. "Now we're talkin'. Youthink our audience will be gone soon?"

"Yes, I do." And you know why he knew? This was how he knew. "You can leave the rest until tomorrow," he called out to the pair in the kitchen, then grinning over to Jay as he kept walking towards the bedroom. Warren didn't even bother to check to see if they'd listened, he just assumed they would. He similarly started to tug on the back collar of Jay's t-shirt, pulling it over his head and tossing it to one side as they moved through the doorway to Warren's room.