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Sometimes, I swear, the Devil *does* make me do it. I am *powerless* against him. He makes me read porn, he makes me dream dirty wrong dreams, and he made me write *this*.
For
nerodi, whose uncontrollable squeeing helped convert me to the Leto-lust; for Patroklos_Ghost, to whom I owe email (it’s coming, I promise, I just want to make it a good’un); for everyone who loves both Alexander *and* Lex. And, y’know, Hephaistion and Clark too...
So... Lex and Clark went to see Alexander...
When Worlds Collide
In hindsight, Clark was just glad they made it out of the theatre before Lex exploded. A man less invulnerable would have been maimed for life by the near constant impact of his lover’s elbow with his stomach, ribs, and once, presumably accidentally, groin, not to mention the thousand small puncture wounds left by fingernails on sensitive wrists and forearms. They hadn’t actually broken his skin, of course, but Lex had managed to destroy a fifty dollar manicure, and left smears of his own blood on Clark’s shirt sleeve.
“Fortune favours the bold?” he shouted, as Clark bundled him into the Porsche, thankfully parked in the owners’ spot right in front of the Talon. “Never mind it’s four hundred years out of period, they put the god damn credit in for Virgil. It was Homer Alexander loved, Homer. Virgil was a second rate plagiarist hack!”
“Calm down Lex, maybe nothing from Homer seemed appropriate.”
“If you believe *that*,” Lex sneered, angrily grinding gears and making the brakes scream as he pulled out, “then you haven’t listened to a word I’ve said in four years, and you’re sleeping on the couch.”
“Lex, of course I listen, I’m just prepared to make allowances. It’s only a film.”
“Only a film?” Lex looked like Clark had just declined to follow him across the Hindu Kush to the Encircling Ocean. “This is all that an entire generation too lazy to crack a book is ever going to know about Alexander.”
“Lex...”
“His men followed him for twelve thousand miles, Clark, across the known, and into the unknown, world.”
Oh god. That Hindu Kush idea had been closer to the mark than he’d realised.
“I wouldn’t follow *that* man across the street!”
Lex looked dangerously close to tears, and as his bottom lip quivered, Clark couldn’t help thinking he looked like Colin Farrell in some of his best scenes. Well not *like* him, exactly, but reminiscent of him. And damn if that wasn’t a line straight out of Mary Renault, and damn it, he *did* listen to Lex, every word.
“I admit, he wasn’t quite the way I’ve always imagined him from hearing you talk,” he said gently. “But I know why you’re upset. He’s your hero, and you think I’ll think he’s nothing special. Think less of *you* for thinking he *is*.”
Lex looked anguished.
“They didn’t show the things that made people *love* him! Like pouring out the water in Gedrosia, because there wasn’t enough for everyone. And taking his medicine even when they said the doctor was trying to poison him. And...”
Clark sighed.
“I know, Lex. I was looking forward to seeing those things too, but it could have been worse.”
“Worse?”
The crazed look in Lex’s eye again reminded Clark of Mr Farrell, though he knew his life wouldn’t be worth living if he mentioned it.
“They conflated the Granikos, Issos and Gaugamela into one battle, they conquered Persia in half an hour, they had Alexander *lose* the battle of the Hydaspes, and they *killed Bucephalos*. Oh, and Roxane had pneumatic breasts! How could it *possibly* have been worse?”
Clark shrugged helplessly. “Hephaistion could have been Alexander’s cousin? They could have invented some ugly, fictitious, entirely non-homoerotic guy to be his right hand man?”
Lex fishtailed the Porsche right across the driveway, barely braking before they collided with the front steps.
“They never kissed *once* Clark,” he spat, in a voice of pure menace. “Not once. And the breasted one got a whole sex scene. With hissing and teeth-baring.”
“Well sure, but Alexander and Hephaistion were the *couple*. The whole film was about them, even when it wasn’t.”
“Really?” Lex looked suspicious.
“Truly. And honestly, a hug can speak volumes. I mean...” Clark smiled. “I seem to recall you hugging me more than a few times over the years, before we got together, and it was obvious what you were trying to say.”
Somewhat mollified, Lex got out of the car, reaching for Clark’s hand as he punched in the security codes.
“It *was* nice seeing them together,” he said dreamily, “even if it was mostly soulful looks and longing gazes.”
Clark nudged his hip with his own.
“Don’t knock eye contact, Lex. Especially if it’s a seven second stare.”
Lex sighed, defeated. It had, after all, worked for him.
*****
Super speeding up the stairs, Clark manhandled Lex across the bedroom, tossing him onto the bed and stepping back to kick off his shoes and shuck his t-shirt. Lex looked up in bemused surprise and arched an eyebrow.
Clark shrugged, a faint smirk crossing his face.
“I’ve read Arrian. And Plutarch. And that other guy, the Roman one, I forget. They all say Hephaistion was bigger than Alexander.”
Lex grinned back. “And more handsome, too.”
Clark blushed. Some things didn’t change, even after four years.
“Well I don’t know about that. But I guess they were both pretty good looking.”
Lex sprawled back invitingly against the pillows, legs falling open.
“So what are you going to do with me, great one?”
“Well I was thinking... We could fill in some of the missing scenes. I figure you know pretty much what would have happened. And I can imagine.”
Lex’s eyes lit up, and he quickly toed off his own shoes and socks. “Where are we then?”
“Babylon. In the big bedroom. And let me say, that bed gave new meaning to the term King Size.”
Clark stalked up the bed like a giant cat, straddling Lex’s waist and helping unbutton his shirt.
“So you’re on the bed, and Hephaistion comes in, and he’s wearing that awesome robe, with the blue and the gold and the, you know, open at the front and cut low at the back, and...”
“And the pants!” Lex sat up suddenly, barely noticing as the top of his head impacted Clark’s chin, mouth quivering with fury. “Pants!”
Clark looked at his own pants uncertainly. They were pretty tight in the crotch just now, but that was Lex’s fault, not his, and Lex was the one that had insisted on buying them.
“What’s wrong with pants?”
“Greeks don’t wear pants! Ever! It’s anathema!” Lex’s hard won good cheer evaporated as though it had never existed. “Or even long sleeves! It’s emblematic of the barbarian, and being ashamed of your body, and having to hide.”
Well Clark could understand *that*, what with the layers of plaid and all, but it wasn’t like Lex walked around unclothed, either. This was still Smallville, even if they were openly dating now.
“He was picking up Persian customs. You know, with the joining of cultures and the living there permanently, and...”
“No! No pants! He started wearing Persian coats, sure, but no pants! It’s just wrong. Those pants represent everything that was wrong with this film!”
“Jeez Lex, I think you might have focused a bit harder on how the pants looked rather than what they represent.”
“What?”
“They were hot! God they both looked good in that scene. And standing on the balcony after, and the bit about Alexander’s eyes...”
“‘You strike me still?’”
“Yeah. I *loved* that line. Now for god’s sake, stop talking. We can discuss this in the morning.”
Clark shoved Lex back down with a hand on his chest, and grabbed the waistband of Lex’s own pants, which truth to tell were offending *him* now, ripping them off in one long pull. His own followed them to the far corner of the room, and leaning forward he nuzzled gently at the creamy smooth skin of Lex’s stomach, tickling feather light kisses all the way down to his cock. Lex squirmed under him, hand clenching on his shoulder as Clark licked a broad stripe from the tip of his cock right down to his balls.
"Clark.”
Clark smiled, breathed deep, and sucked the head of Lex's cock into his mouth.
“Clark!”
Lex pushed weakly at Clark’s shoulder. Clark raised his head enough to look up the line of Lex’s body. The frown on his face was highly disconcerting.
“Mmmm?” he hummed around the shaft in his mouth.
“Did you notice the ring?”
Clark sat up in stunned disbelief, Lex’s cock slipping from his mouth with an audible pop.
“What *about* the ring?”
“Well it’s been bothering me. When Alexander drops the ring, in that whole weird Citizen Kane homage, was it meant to be the ring Hephaistion gave him? Or was it the Macedonian royal seal?”
Clark bit his tongue in an effort not to scream. He’d known going to this film could not possibly end well. He should have stuck to his guns and insisted they come straight home after dinner. Staged his own little mutiny at Opis, and thank god Lex hadn’t latched on to that one yet.
“Christ, I don’t know,” he moaned, grinding his own mutinous cock against the bedclothes.
“Because if it was the seal it should have been Zeus Enthroned, not a lump of amber.”
“Lex, you think *way* too much. Why do you have to bring politics into it? Can’t you just accept that he bought his boyfriend a ring? I mean, it was like the One Ring or something. It was gorgeous.”
Lex snorted. “The One Ring? Clark, you are *such* a geek.”
Clark leaned over him to yank open the drawer of the bedside table.
“I’m not the one who interrupted a *blowjob* to nitpick a film.”
“I know, I’m sorry, priorities.” Lex laughed, and exasperating or not, it was still the sweetest sound Clark had ever heard. “But you love me anyway, right?”
“Of course I do. ‘*My* Alexander.’”
Clark dropped his head again, sucking harder, slipping one hand under and behind Lex's balls, stroking firmly over the silky, tender skin. Lex’s breath caught in his throat and he moaned softly, gasping for breath, as Clark swallowed hard around him.
“Le-ex,” Clark whispered, pulling off but continuing to stroke with his other hand.
“U-huh,” Lex groaned, pressing down on Clark’s questing fingers. “What?”
“What do you think the Macedonians used for lube?”
Lex sat up, entirely too lucid for this stage of the proceedings.
“I hate to disappoint you, Clark, but the preferred method of intercourse was intercrural.”
Well Clark had brought that one on himself, there was no denying it. The King of the Geeks had found his heir. And it was typical. Lex finally shut up, and Clark’s own curiosity kicked in.
“Penetration would imply something about the passive partner,” Lex continued, for all the world as though lecturing in an auditorium, and not sprawled across a bed with Clark’s slicked fingers thrusting in and out of his ass.
“Oh, come *on*.” Clark jabbed a third finger in somewhat harder than he would have usually. “They were together twenty years. Don’t you think they fooled around, *experimented* a little?”
“It’s a *cultural* norm, Clark.” Lex gasped, and at last he seemed to be losing his composure. “That’s not... fuck... how it works.”
“Really?” Clark snorted, letting go of Lex’s cock to slick his own. “It’s a North American cultural norm too, at least according to a sizeable majority of the populace, and the laws of Kansas. That’s never stopped *you*.”
“Well I’ve – yeah, that’s – Jesus – that’s it – never believed that the vox populi is the vox dei.”
“Right. Exactly.” Clark yanked on Lex’s legs, ducking to hook them over his shoulders, and lined himself up. “And I can’t imagine Alexander did either. I know I wouldn’t, if I was Hephaistion.”
“Were.”
“What?”
“‘If I *were* Hephaistion.’ It’s a – fuck – subjunctive.”
“For an unfulfilled condition?” Clark smirked. He’d known speed reading that grammar primer would come in handy one day.
“Precisely. Just because it’s – God – falling out of English usage is no...”
Lex shrieked undignifiedly as Clark entered him in one swift stroke.
“Now it’s fulfilled.”
“That’s not... Jesus. That’s... God Clark, harder”
*Oh*, yeah. Talk about history *now* Lex, I dare you, Clark thought. And just as quickly bit his tongue, offering a silent prayer that the gods would let *that* bit of hubris pass.
For once, fortune favoured the sorely frustrated, and they did.
Lex’s body arched, hard, pulling Clark in, hands tangling in his hair, dragging him up for a soul searing kiss, biting at his lips and licking his jaw.
“I love you,” he gasped against Clark’s ear.
“I know.”
“No, I *really* love you. More than my empire. More than my life.”
Clark pulled back just far enough to see Lex’s face clearly. He looked oddly vulnerable, even a little frightened.
“Not more than rhetoric and strange declarations though, right?” he asked, giving Lex an out if he needed it.
Lex wrapped his arms tighter around Clark’s neck.
“More.”
Clark didn’t know what to say, so settled for kissing Lex again, tongue thrusting into his mouth in violent counterpoint to the cock in his ass. Lex clenched around him, body whipcord tight, heels digging into his back, and came, hot wet flooding between them, bones melting in Clark’s embrace. Clark rode it out as long as he could, managing another three, four ragged thrusts before he too was coming, gasping and shaking and groaning Lex’s name against his bruised lips.
*****
“Clark.”
“Mmm?”
“Thanks for going to the movie with me.”
“Sure.”
“Clark.”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for putting up with that whole outburst.”
“No problem, Lex. Go to sleep.”
“Clark.”
“Lex please, don’t ruin the afterglow with any more movie reviews, okay?”
“Okay. But if I acquired some liquid eyeliner from somewhere, would you wear it for me?”
For
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So... Lex and Clark went to see Alexander...
When Worlds Collide
In hindsight, Clark was just glad they made it out of the theatre before Lex exploded. A man less invulnerable would have been maimed for life by the near constant impact of his lover’s elbow with his stomach, ribs, and once, presumably accidentally, groin, not to mention the thousand small puncture wounds left by fingernails on sensitive wrists and forearms. They hadn’t actually broken his skin, of course, but Lex had managed to destroy a fifty dollar manicure, and left smears of his own blood on Clark’s shirt sleeve.
“Fortune favours the bold?” he shouted, as Clark bundled him into the Porsche, thankfully parked in the owners’ spot right in front of the Talon. “Never mind it’s four hundred years out of period, they put the god damn credit in for Virgil. It was Homer Alexander loved, Homer. Virgil was a second rate plagiarist hack!”
“Calm down Lex, maybe nothing from Homer seemed appropriate.”
“If you believe *that*,” Lex sneered, angrily grinding gears and making the brakes scream as he pulled out, “then you haven’t listened to a word I’ve said in four years, and you’re sleeping on the couch.”
“Lex, of course I listen, I’m just prepared to make allowances. It’s only a film.”
“Only a film?” Lex looked like Clark had just declined to follow him across the Hindu Kush to the Encircling Ocean. “This is all that an entire generation too lazy to crack a book is ever going to know about Alexander.”
“Lex...”
“His men followed him for twelve thousand miles, Clark, across the known, and into the unknown, world.”
Oh god. That Hindu Kush idea had been closer to the mark than he’d realised.
“I wouldn’t follow *that* man across the street!”
Lex looked dangerously close to tears, and as his bottom lip quivered, Clark couldn’t help thinking he looked like Colin Farrell in some of his best scenes. Well not *like* him, exactly, but reminiscent of him. And damn if that wasn’t a line straight out of Mary Renault, and damn it, he *did* listen to Lex, every word.
“I admit, he wasn’t quite the way I’ve always imagined him from hearing you talk,” he said gently. “But I know why you’re upset. He’s your hero, and you think I’ll think he’s nothing special. Think less of *you* for thinking he *is*.”
Lex looked anguished.
“They didn’t show the things that made people *love* him! Like pouring out the water in Gedrosia, because there wasn’t enough for everyone. And taking his medicine even when they said the doctor was trying to poison him. And...”
Clark sighed.
“I know, Lex. I was looking forward to seeing those things too, but it could have been worse.”
“Worse?”
The crazed look in Lex’s eye again reminded Clark of Mr Farrell, though he knew his life wouldn’t be worth living if he mentioned it.
“They conflated the Granikos, Issos and Gaugamela into one battle, they conquered Persia in half an hour, they had Alexander *lose* the battle of the Hydaspes, and they *killed Bucephalos*. Oh, and Roxane had pneumatic breasts! How could it *possibly* have been worse?”
Clark shrugged helplessly. “Hephaistion could have been Alexander’s cousin? They could have invented some ugly, fictitious, entirely non-homoerotic guy to be his right hand man?”
Lex fishtailed the Porsche right across the driveway, barely braking before they collided with the front steps.
“They never kissed *once* Clark,” he spat, in a voice of pure menace. “Not once. And the breasted one got a whole sex scene. With hissing and teeth-baring.”
“Well sure, but Alexander and Hephaistion were the *couple*. The whole film was about them, even when it wasn’t.”
“Really?” Lex looked suspicious.
“Truly. And honestly, a hug can speak volumes. I mean...” Clark smiled. “I seem to recall you hugging me more than a few times over the years, before we got together, and it was obvious what you were trying to say.”
Somewhat mollified, Lex got out of the car, reaching for Clark’s hand as he punched in the security codes.
“It *was* nice seeing them together,” he said dreamily, “even if it was mostly soulful looks and longing gazes.”
Clark nudged his hip with his own.
“Don’t knock eye contact, Lex. Especially if it’s a seven second stare.”
Lex sighed, defeated. It had, after all, worked for him.
*****
Super speeding up the stairs, Clark manhandled Lex across the bedroom, tossing him onto the bed and stepping back to kick off his shoes and shuck his t-shirt. Lex looked up in bemused surprise and arched an eyebrow.
Clark shrugged, a faint smirk crossing his face.
“I’ve read Arrian. And Plutarch. And that other guy, the Roman one, I forget. They all say Hephaistion was bigger than Alexander.”
Lex grinned back. “And more handsome, too.”
Clark blushed. Some things didn’t change, even after four years.
“Well I don’t know about that. But I guess they were both pretty good looking.”
Lex sprawled back invitingly against the pillows, legs falling open.
“So what are you going to do with me, great one?”
“Well I was thinking... We could fill in some of the missing scenes. I figure you know pretty much what would have happened. And I can imagine.”
Lex’s eyes lit up, and he quickly toed off his own shoes and socks. “Where are we then?”
“Babylon. In the big bedroom. And let me say, that bed gave new meaning to the term King Size.”
Clark stalked up the bed like a giant cat, straddling Lex’s waist and helping unbutton his shirt.
“So you’re on the bed, and Hephaistion comes in, and he’s wearing that awesome robe, with the blue and the gold and the, you know, open at the front and cut low at the back, and...”
“And the pants!” Lex sat up suddenly, barely noticing as the top of his head impacted Clark’s chin, mouth quivering with fury. “Pants!”
Clark looked at his own pants uncertainly. They were pretty tight in the crotch just now, but that was Lex’s fault, not his, and Lex was the one that had insisted on buying them.
“What’s wrong with pants?”
“Greeks don’t wear pants! Ever! It’s anathema!” Lex’s hard won good cheer evaporated as though it had never existed. “Or even long sleeves! It’s emblematic of the barbarian, and being ashamed of your body, and having to hide.”
Well Clark could understand *that*, what with the layers of plaid and all, but it wasn’t like Lex walked around unclothed, either. This was still Smallville, even if they were openly dating now.
“He was picking up Persian customs. You know, with the joining of cultures and the living there permanently, and...”
“No! No pants! He started wearing Persian coats, sure, but no pants! It’s just wrong. Those pants represent everything that was wrong with this film!”
“Jeez Lex, I think you might have focused a bit harder on how the pants looked rather than what they represent.”
“What?”
“They were hot! God they both looked good in that scene. And standing on the balcony after, and the bit about Alexander’s eyes...”
“‘You strike me still?’”
“Yeah. I *loved* that line. Now for god’s sake, stop talking. We can discuss this in the morning.”
Clark shoved Lex back down with a hand on his chest, and grabbed the waistband of Lex’s own pants, which truth to tell were offending *him* now, ripping them off in one long pull. His own followed them to the far corner of the room, and leaning forward he nuzzled gently at the creamy smooth skin of Lex’s stomach, tickling feather light kisses all the way down to his cock. Lex squirmed under him, hand clenching on his shoulder as Clark licked a broad stripe from the tip of his cock right down to his balls.
"Clark.”
Clark smiled, breathed deep, and sucked the head of Lex's cock into his mouth.
“Clark!”
Lex pushed weakly at Clark’s shoulder. Clark raised his head enough to look up the line of Lex’s body. The frown on his face was highly disconcerting.
“Mmmm?” he hummed around the shaft in his mouth.
“Did you notice the ring?”
Clark sat up in stunned disbelief, Lex’s cock slipping from his mouth with an audible pop.
“What *about* the ring?”
“Well it’s been bothering me. When Alexander drops the ring, in that whole weird Citizen Kane homage, was it meant to be the ring Hephaistion gave him? Or was it the Macedonian royal seal?”
Clark bit his tongue in an effort not to scream. He’d known going to this film could not possibly end well. He should have stuck to his guns and insisted they come straight home after dinner. Staged his own little mutiny at Opis, and thank god Lex hadn’t latched on to that one yet.
“Christ, I don’t know,” he moaned, grinding his own mutinous cock against the bedclothes.
“Because if it was the seal it should have been Zeus Enthroned, not a lump of amber.”
“Lex, you think *way* too much. Why do you have to bring politics into it? Can’t you just accept that he bought his boyfriend a ring? I mean, it was like the One Ring or something. It was gorgeous.”
Lex snorted. “The One Ring? Clark, you are *such* a geek.”
Clark leaned over him to yank open the drawer of the bedside table.
“I’m not the one who interrupted a *blowjob* to nitpick a film.”
“I know, I’m sorry, priorities.” Lex laughed, and exasperating or not, it was still the sweetest sound Clark had ever heard. “But you love me anyway, right?”
“Of course I do. ‘*My* Alexander.’”
Clark dropped his head again, sucking harder, slipping one hand under and behind Lex's balls, stroking firmly over the silky, tender skin. Lex’s breath caught in his throat and he moaned softly, gasping for breath, as Clark swallowed hard around him.
“Le-ex,” Clark whispered, pulling off but continuing to stroke with his other hand.
“U-huh,” Lex groaned, pressing down on Clark’s questing fingers. “What?”
“What do you think the Macedonians used for lube?”
Lex sat up, entirely too lucid for this stage of the proceedings.
“I hate to disappoint you, Clark, but the preferred method of intercourse was intercrural.”
Well Clark had brought that one on himself, there was no denying it. The King of the Geeks had found his heir. And it was typical. Lex finally shut up, and Clark’s own curiosity kicked in.
“Penetration would imply something about the passive partner,” Lex continued, for all the world as though lecturing in an auditorium, and not sprawled across a bed with Clark’s slicked fingers thrusting in and out of his ass.
“Oh, come *on*.” Clark jabbed a third finger in somewhat harder than he would have usually. “They were together twenty years. Don’t you think they fooled around, *experimented* a little?”
“It’s a *cultural* norm, Clark.” Lex gasped, and at last he seemed to be losing his composure. “That’s not... fuck... how it works.”
“Really?” Clark snorted, letting go of Lex’s cock to slick his own. “It’s a North American cultural norm too, at least according to a sizeable majority of the populace, and the laws of Kansas. That’s never stopped *you*.”
“Well I’ve – yeah, that’s – Jesus – that’s it – never believed that the vox populi is the vox dei.”
“Right. Exactly.” Clark yanked on Lex’s legs, ducking to hook them over his shoulders, and lined himself up. “And I can’t imagine Alexander did either. I know I wouldn’t, if I was Hephaistion.”
“Were.”
“What?”
“‘If I *were* Hephaistion.’ It’s a – fuck – subjunctive.”
“For an unfulfilled condition?” Clark smirked. He’d known speed reading that grammar primer would come in handy one day.
“Precisely. Just because it’s – God – falling out of English usage is no...”
Lex shrieked undignifiedly as Clark entered him in one swift stroke.
“Now it’s fulfilled.”
“That’s not... Jesus. That’s... God Clark, harder”
*Oh*, yeah. Talk about history *now* Lex, I dare you, Clark thought. And just as quickly bit his tongue, offering a silent prayer that the gods would let *that* bit of hubris pass.
For once, fortune favoured the sorely frustrated, and they did.
Lex’s body arched, hard, pulling Clark in, hands tangling in his hair, dragging him up for a soul searing kiss, biting at his lips and licking his jaw.
“I love you,” he gasped against Clark’s ear.
“I know.”
“No, I *really* love you. More than my empire. More than my life.”
Clark pulled back just far enough to see Lex’s face clearly. He looked oddly vulnerable, even a little frightened.
“Not more than rhetoric and strange declarations though, right?” he asked, giving Lex an out if he needed it.
Lex wrapped his arms tighter around Clark’s neck.
“More.”
Clark didn’t know what to say, so settled for kissing Lex again, tongue thrusting into his mouth in violent counterpoint to the cock in his ass. Lex clenched around him, body whipcord tight, heels digging into his back, and came, hot wet flooding between them, bones melting in Clark’s embrace. Clark rode it out as long as he could, managing another three, four ragged thrusts before he too was coming, gasping and shaking and groaning Lex’s name against his bruised lips.
*****
“Clark.”
“Mmm?”
“Thanks for going to the movie with me.”
“Sure.”
“Clark.”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for putting up with that whole outburst.”
“No problem, Lex. Go to sleep.”
“Clark.”
“Lex please, don’t ruin the afterglow with any more movie reviews, okay?”
“Okay. But if I acquired some liquid eyeliner from somewhere, would you wear it for me?”