bless the young and rich

i fell in love with a war

Thorn says he knows a guy that does it better and Casimir levels that flat, unimpressed stare that tells him flattery will not save him if that butt goes back on the smooth wood of the bar, letting the compliment roll off his back like he does all the others. All flattery, even if true (even he could admit he made a solid drink), was just a means to some sort of end. Even with his continuous studying of the man behind the bar, his grin wide and satisfied, and of all his rather extensive knowledge of him, he still couldn't quite place what, exactly, Thorn wanted from him. Other than... Companionship? Still, even now in the dimly lit and familiar space of the slightly-idealized bad, Casimir couldn't quite buy it. 

It was easy to forget, though, when Thorn gave him that simple order to eat. There's that traitorous part of himself again that reaches for Thorn against all the survival instincts, tearing apart his armor from the inside all for the sake of holding out a hand. Every move Casimir has made to fulfill that desire this evening, though, has served only to maim. Even that shove off the table, though it brought a smile to Thorn's face, was still a hard shove towards a hardwood floor. His request to have Casimir just be there was too nebulous and foreign for Casimir to do, so what was left? How could he make him happy? And he does, he's realizing, he does want to make him happy. He wants to hear that full laugh burst from his throat, head thrown back as his shoulders shake. It wasn't something he wanted before tonight but as soon as he realizes it it burrows into his desire, suppressing even the loudest of his screaming survival instincts. 

He cannot regale Thorn with lovely tales of adventure and daring, or tease him with jokes until he's hunched over. But this -- simple orders, actions attached, his eyes trained on the grinning courtesan to gauge his reaction -- he could do.

His body complies with the order. Fingers work open the lid of the takeout container and the smell of the meat-pasta-thing fills his nose, and though it is more room temperature than it was at the restaurant, he finds it much easier to anticipate the rich flavors on his tongue here than in that booth. It's better than anything he's made in his years of living here, and his eyes flicker from his food to Thorn in a look of approval. Without even thinking, he holds out his food to Thorn in a silent question, offering to share.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

Oh but it is so, so tempting to perch back up on the counter of the bar. He doesn’t, because that leveled stare at him wards him away just enough to decide to be a dick only after their food is devoured. He’d rather not let it get cold if he wants Casimir to have the full experience. So he behaves, but only just, as he preps their takeout boxes and plucks the fork up from the counter to dive back into his meal.

There’s plenty of time later for all kinds of shenanigans, but for now, Thorn is surprised when Cas actually listens for once — though he doesn’t let the look flash across his face. If anything, it’s a quiet satisfaction that he doesn’t need to say much more before the bartender is digging in and revealing his quiet approval.

It’s only then that Thorn looks away, focused on the pesto meal he’s got, taking enough bites to sate his stomach that has gone through a variety of flips and electric shocks. He looks up upon swallowing down the last bite to see Casimir extend the fork out with his meal on it, something Thorn hadn’t tried despite his numerous trips to the restaurant in the past.

Seafoam eyes glitter in appreciation, and he pierces a gnocchi to offer out in exchange before he’s leaning forward across the bar to take the bite straight from Cas’ fork rather than politely taking the utensil itself, and withdraws with a hum that’s almost heavenly. “Oo, I’ll have t’get that next time.” He says once he’s done with the bite of Casimir’s food, and pays extra attention to see how the bartender likes the potato pasta and the green savory sauce.

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

Thorn's mouth closes around Casimir's fork and he really should have foreseen that outcome coming, as well that the intense groan that flows from his mouth. It's on par with his typical theatrics, and as he always does, Casimir rewards the effort with a look of total disinterest. Of all the revelations from that night, all the strange and bizarre and unfathomable things that have come from Thorn, this reaction is almost familiar and comforting even in its ostentatiousness. 

He eyes the proffered green pasta with so much cold suspicion that one would think it was a piece of poison offered. The bite is an innocuous green lump on the fork, simple and unassuming and probably just as tasty as his own dish. Reaching across the bar for it, though, seems like yet another crossing of these already blurred and largely-destroyed lines between the two of them, and his arm moves slow to pluck the instrument from Thorn's sparkling fingers. At the point of the threshold, the halfway point between the two of them, it hesitates just for a moment. Then, like a finger passing over a candle flame to see if it'll burn, he takes the fork and pulls it back towards himself. 

Thorn is looking at him expectantly, and if the man had not just demolished the majority of his plate, Casimir would liken the look to one of a master alchemist studying to see if their new poison would be effective. He sighs slightly and pulls the pasta off the fork with his teeth, mindful not to let his lips touch the metal where Thorn's had rested. 

The man's attentiveness is rewarded by a very specific lack of reaction, and Casimir chews and swallows the pasta without a flicker of opinion showing on his face. It is good, rich and flavorful and somehow green-tasting, but he couldn't let Thorn know that. Obviously. He returns the fork to Thorn's plate and levels another look at him, expectant. What now? It asks.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

Yes, Cas, you should have anticipated the outcome that is offering food to the courtesan. Each and every dramatic air is exclusively for the bartender, even if the bite was just as lovely as he’d hoped it would be. It should be enough that Casimir might want to go back one day and try the rest of the options they had available.

But then, Thorn is offering his own fork out – anticipation glittering in the amused seafoam of his eyes. He doesn’t expect him to take it as Thorn had, so when he reaches up to snag the fork from his ringed fingers, Thorn’s lips quirk in a slightly softer smile. It’s given up, though his gaze doesn’t waver from watching his face to see just what his reaction might be.

And really, Thorn should know better at this rate. That any time he expects and wants a reaction from the bartender is the most likely time he’ll not receive it. And despite how much he hopes he sees a glimmer of appreciation or a nod to suggest he does like the outcome, Thorn finds nothing but the lack of a reaction or opinion.

The fork is returned to his plate and Thorn snorts, drawing back up slightly so he can grab his fork and nudge around the gnocchi a little more, feeling Cas’ expectant gaze on him. “Keep eatin’.” He hums, realizing that in the past few moments that the bartender might like to be told what to do. And that is something Thorn can do. He can be decisive and tell rather than ask, and maybe that made it easier for Cas to stand the annoying thorn in his side that was the courtesan.

It doesn’t take Thorn long before he’s finished his gnocchi, and he closes the box of food to set back in the bag to be tossed later, turning his attention back to Casimir as he picks up the old fashioned and takes a healthy sip, relishing in the sweet, cold burn. “Now, is it your first time in the rooms?” He asks, raising a dark brow toward the bartender, folding his arms across the bar as he leans forward, almost bowed entirely halfway as he gets a bit closer to Casimir. His sheer shirt pools on the bar counter beneath him, but from this position it has Thorn’s kohl-lined eyes forced to look up at the taller man even despite him sitting on the stool.

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

At the straightforward request, Casimir begins to mechanically move the food from the plate to the fork to his mouth, enjoying the simplicity of the action and the request. The more Thorn told him exactly what he wanted -- waved that fork around like a wand and bid him do something specific to make him happy -- the easier it seemed for the bartender to settle into comfort in this strange new waltz they were dancing together. The meal goes quickly, Casimir never one to savor his food and instead eating it for utility rather than enjoyment, and soon enough his own fork settles on the counter next to Thorn's. 

The courtesan unfolds himself like a cat on the counter, stretched and languid, and Casimir settles himself on his stool for what is undoubtedly about to be some shenanigans. He crosses his arms against his chest in a mirrored imitation of Thorn and curves his back stiltedly so he, too, rests on the counter. It feels unnatural, like his body isn't meant to move in such fluidity, but it's worth it to meet Thorn's gaze at a level directness so he can adequately express his non-answer to the question. His eyes, as always, are flat and unimpressed, and he thinks Thorn can extrapolate an answer based on the way he looks at him with cold heat and half-lidded unimpressed eyes. Under the lights of the room, Thorn's sea-green eyes look darker and murkier, like churning water before a storm, and his lashes are thick from the kohl. 

Casimir had, of course, never been to the rooms before. Patrons had told him about them at length and so that the courtesans there, each encouraging him to at the very least go up and take a look at the magical, shifting areas. The bartender had refused to break from his routine from working the bar, taking his diverting walk home, and then settling in his little room in the back, and tonight with Thorn is the first time Casimir has found himself in one of these. He's sure Thorn knows that, though, and clearly wants to bait whatever hook he has before sinking it in front of Casimir for shenanigans.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

The quiet of their meal is only interrupted by the occasional crack of a piece of wood in the fireplace, echoing around the room in its empty, perfectly mirrored version of the bar down below. Only the two faces here are the two currently facing each other, and while Thorn moves everything aside to curl across the bar like he does, he watches in quiet amusement as Casimir mirrors the action. He meets the bartender’s gaze, spying the unimpressed and half-lidded gaze that only has the courtesan’s lips quirking slightly in amusement.

“Uh huh.” Thorn hums, putting the pieces together, remaining in that lockstep of how they peer at each other. He feels bared in a way that would usually frighten him, but the boon of the liquor back in his gut has his mind a little swimmier than normal and his body a perfect replication of being relaxed. “Y’get to make it whatever you want.” He starts to explain, fully prepared for the shenanigans to start as he tears his gaze away from Casimir to look up at the ceiling.

The wooden beams of where the ceiling would usually sit vanish in an instant, replaced by a warm Longheat night sky, littered with stars and constellations and a moon that tries to fight the light of the oil lamps nearby. He looks back down when he’s pleased with the shift, scanning Casimir’s face to try and see what kind of reaction he gets. “Whattya think?” He's fully anticipating the handsome unimpressed looks.

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

The room once again does that strange, slippery slide into bleary, washed-out watercolor and the familiar scenery shifts into a peaceful night. It's that pleasant kind of warm where the wind is enough to warm anyone out there, but not enough to drive thick drops of sweat down their bodies to ruin the peace. There's no hint of the Flowerbirth cold that slams against the doors to the real world, or intrusive blood-sucking bugs, or cloying humidity, or anything that would make it all less than perfect. 

It all feels so real, a perfect moment frozen in time for them to share, and Casimir moves his head up to study the constellations. As far as he can tell, they're all accurate, but he's never been much of an expert on anything other than inflicting pain and messing up his life, so he couldn't say for certain. There's a part of him that's a touch surprise the ostentatious man in front of him chose such a subtle, straightforward scene; he had expended something like a lavish beach with several chairs under the sun for lounging, or some sort of architecture marvel he'd either concocted or wished to see. Still, alongside the surprise is something closer to fondness. For all his swagger and bravado and bluster, there was something subtle and shining and real to all of Thorn's show. 

Under the light of the moon, Thorn's face glows just a little and he looks like he's waiting for something. The same thing he always wants from Casimir. And the bartender is filled so strongly with a fondness, here in the Longheat night under the stars and moon, when he could have put them anywhere else, that a short approving hum vibrates from his throat. It seems to float in front of him in the pleasant air, whisping towards the courtesan and landing in front of him like an offering. The moon grows just a little brighter, and in the sky, the constellations shift into something closer to the stars that hang over Torchline.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

As he watches the transformation takes place, he can see Casimir’s head tilt up, taking in the view as Thorn wills it through the room. The warm, sweet air reaches him, satisfied and content like a honeyed addition to the otherwise warm and charming bar that they still sit at. He wants to keep some familiarity for the bartender, or else he’s sure it’ll send him running again.

But this? This combination of the two where the stars and moon shine down on them and the warm breeze whips its way through the beams of the bar, ruffling his tamed back hair somewhat. A loose curl of his own breaks from the rest, curling around his forehead as he lowers his gaze to the other man, taking in the way the moonlight and stars play with a face that’s been such a lovely challenge to read.

His question is aired with a quiet studiousness that is greeted with very little change in the handsome face of the bartender, but that short approving hum that pours from his throat and floats toward him has the courtesan softening in the sharp lines of his face, the way he shifts to sit up a little more from draping so much across the bar, curving his back like a cat might stretch as the shift of stars changes overhead.

It captures his attention and he finds himself staring up at it, all rogue and catlike smiles shifting to something more innocent, a boyish lilt as he takes it in. “Torchline..?” He asks softly, and before realizing it, the question continues to slip from his lips. “Did ya live there before? I did.. for a few years.” It wasn’t exactly like it was something Thorn kept quiet, but he rarely talked about his own Torchline experiences apart from where he worked.

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

The question should have been an anticipated one, but Casimir hadn't expected it anyway and his body twitches as something like a flinch passes through him. The stars above have drifted fully into different constellations without him commanding him to; just a response to the ghost of a memory, filling in what Casimir would have expected to see when he casts his eyes upward. As Thorn asks the question, gentle like he's trying not to spook an already half-crazed horse. the stars whirl back to where they had been. 

The bartender's eyes fix on the lone jailbroken curl dancing on Thorn's forehead and tells himself its eye contact. That he's not avoiding anything. It's a strange feeling of deja vu to have, Thorn asking him such a personal question at the same bar they had known each other at, but in such a strange and bizarre configuration of sitting and place. Unlike his usual inquisitions, though, this one is soft. It's not prying, not built to bust something in Casimir open and examine it under a bright light, and though it's curious, it's not teasing. 

Thorn looks young under the soft glow of the twinkling stars and Casimir remembers that he's even younger than this beautiful boy with the gentle smile on his face. He feels old. 

Questions about his past get thrown aside with more disdain than any others, but Thorn's eyes are so open and imploring, his voice so gentle, and the curl dances on his forehead in a hypnotizing pattern. Any word about himself hurts like a dagger getting wrested out of a wound but Casimir owes something to Thorn for tonight; he's treated Casimir like a person instead of the corpse he knows he is, told him what to do to make him happy and then let him do it. He doesn't quite want to answer Thorn's question, not yet, but-- 

He will. 

His head jerks, a single slight nod that's almost violent in its brief certainty before returning to its normal place. Unfolding his body away from where it had leaned so casually on the counter, he sets his shoulders back into their normal defensive knot and casts his eyes upward to once again study the stars. He's not avoiding looking at Thorn. He isn't.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

Thorn studies Casimir’s face, seeing the brief twitch cross his face as the stars begin to shift and change back to those easily seen from King’s End. It’s another point where he thinks that he might have gone a little too far, but his question is from a place of innocent curiosity – something that seems to suggest there’d be little judgement in it if Casimir told him what he did back then. Thorn wouldn’t keep his a secret – most of it, at least – because he’d worked at the brothel there, too, a courtesan for the Halenani where he’d started this adventure of shifting his careers.

But he draws silent, doesn’t fill the space with assumptions and questions when Cas hasn’t answered anything yet. And if he retreats into himself, Thorn would let him. He’d gotten him this far, it’s a win either way, but anything else that the handsome bartender can offer would just be a cherry on top. So he settles there, open and curious, allowing himself to be studied too in the way that only Casimir seemed to study him.

And then, he watches as Casimir nods – single and sharp but an answer in and of itself. Even as he straightens up and his shoulders grow tense again, Thorn’s seafoam gaze dances across his face and really looks when he changes his attention toward the sky as if to make sure it had changed. “I miss it sometimes. The heat, the rum, the sailors.” He shrugs lightly, remaining relaxed as he fills the air with his side of the story of Torchline, trying to take a little bit of a charge to convince Casimir to open up easier.

“Though I think if I have t’hear one more story ‘bout the fuckin’ Arclight an’ the ghost whales, I might actually die.” His face pinches in a look of distaste, like if he tied hard enough he could force his face to shift to a shade of green. But he shakes out of it, shooting a softer smile toward Casimir before he turns his attention up toward the sky again. “But I missed the snow, too. The… Harshness of it. I grew up in Halo so maybe I’m jus’ a glutton for punishment.” He snorts, shaking his head slightly before he sighs. “Or maybe I jus’ miss the danger. Like.. In a snowstorm. The way your heart races ‘n your stomach gets all light.”

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

Thorn's voice had drifted into a softness, a recollection, that Casimir had never heard from him before. He dares not turn his gaze back to the other man, afraid to see whatever softness or hints of memory linger there. If there was even a hint of sympathetic kindness written in those sparkling eyes -- and he knows there would be, because for all his mocking and teasing Thorn is kind, Thorn is good -- Casimir thinks he would flee the House of Midnight and take his chances with a new continent. 

Who is this recollection for, Casimir wonders, as they linger under the illusions of stars that rest somewhere between Torchline's and King's End's constellations? He hopes it's not for him. Every murmured gentle memory sends a spike of pain shooting through the bartender and his hands clench almost unwillingly into fists where they rest on the counter. But, as Thorn talks, he wants to ask Thorn if it hurts him to be an open book, letting his past spill out to anyone. Through his delusion of Thorn talking to get something off his chest, he can read that Thorn chatters in hopes his murmured memories talk him off whatever cliff he was so clearly veering towards. 

The room starts to drift closer towards Torchline on a Longheat night, the air growing damper and warmer and the sky lightening just a little as if they were closer to the dregs of a glowing sunset than the dark of night. The grass starts to rot, turning from that lush, perfect green to a dry and brittle brown. Even as the heat builds upon Casimir's skin he runs from the memory, shutting his eyes for a second and pushing something down. 

He turns his gaze back on Thorn and regrets it almost instantly. The smile resting there is soft and wistful and sympathetic and looks to Casimir like he has something to contribute instead of run away from. Under the stool where Casimir sits, a puddle of something blood-like grows and stains the dead grass red. Casimir doesn't even see it, too busy staring at Thorn and trying to work up something like a response in his frozen throat.

"I don't," He lies. It's a statement he wants to accompany with his quiet rage, the one that sends people thinking about mischief at the bar running and courtesans whispering about who he was, but it just comes out flat and tired.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

Thorn has been an open book ever since he was young. Always forced by his father to do something, following the family’s footsteps in becoming one of the Mercers that built homes in Halo, that went out of their way to fix things. It’s why he’d gotten into architecture, why he’d wanted to strive for it, until he was finally out on his own where he had to make his own decisions.

And those decisions only proved to him that he liked stories more than he liked building. He wanted to hear the way people’s lives were influenced by a single moment, the real heart of it all rather than design the buildings that those memories were made in. It’s half of the reason he’d become a courtesan – realizing at the end of the day that he could share a part of himself and receive those stories and themes, of how those he spent time with could live without the outside expectations.

It often made people more nostalgic – sometimes in good ways, sometimes in some bad ways. But it was always Thorn’s job to try and make the pain feel better. It was one of the many masks he wore for the sake of getting the story he always wanted. So as he draws quiet from his own nostalgia, his gaze facing the sky and taking the stars and the moon in, he feels the way it starts to change. The air smells saltier, warmer, more humid than King’s End has to offer. But the sky changes too, shifting toward something lighter, a hue of dark blue and purple crowding out the light of the stars, such that only the strongest, biggest ones could be visible.

His gaze drops down to Casimir as he answers – verbally – and his brows pinch together a fraction as he tries to figure out how to respond to that. He doesn’t want to pry, doesn’t want him to have to explain why he doesn’t miss it. Because the answer is spelled out in those two words. Casimir had experienced it. He didn’t want to experience it again. “S’not for everyone.” He agrees with a light hum, straightening up from the bar where he’d laid against it. He catches sight of the blood that begins to pool at the base of Casimir’s seat, but he doesn’t let any tells give away the concern suddenly filtering through the courtesan’s body.

Instead, he subtly shifts the room again, covering up the dark and dead, the ghosts in the closet to completely shift the scene above them and below them into something else. Snow crunches beneath the bar, beneath Casimir’s seat – not cold, but sharp. The way that the chill of snow made every breath noticeable rather than the hug of sticky air. Above them, the stars have vanished completely again, but in their place a vibrant rainbow spreads its fingers, dancing across the sky in the aurora lights that often adorned Halo’s night skies. “I used t’sit in the snow until I couldn’t feel my toes or my fingers jus’ to watch this.”

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same

i fell in love with a war

Casimir exhales low and thankful as the dead grass under him turns to snow and the sky above him and Thorn melts into a symphony of colors like he’s never seen before. His breath billows into a plume where it floats out of his mouth, drifting away like the painful memories float out of his head and off back to wherever they bury themselves. Under him, the blood soaks into the snow, seeping deep into the white until is disappears like a stain getting soaked up by a fresh towel. His broad shoulders loosen, not quite dropping in relief but some of the fight that so often threads through them morphing away.

Above him and Thorn, the lights are truly magnificent. They float through the air, a cacophony of colors, and Casimir doesn’t think he’s seen that much beauty shoved in one vast sky in all his years alive. It takes his breath away in a very literal sense, it hitching in his chest, jaw dropping slightly at the marvel. He wants to turn his face towards Thorn to see the memories playing across his face, but the lights enrapture and ensnare his attention.

Why would anyone ever want to leave a place of such beauty? Casimir thinks of all the wonderful things Thorn adorns himself with; the glittering rings, the tattoos that encircle him, the lush and clinging clothing that draws the eye, and he wonders if he brings the beauty with him to make up for what he’s lost.

He asked Thorn if he was running earlier this evening, a question which feels a million years old and several lifetimes away. Now, staring up at the sky and flickering knowing eyes to the curve of Thorn’s face, he thinks he understands what he’s running from. Or, perhaps more aptly now, what he’s running towards.

The words are thick in his throat like tears would be, and though for once he genuinely wants to ask Thorn something about him (instead of just being told, chattered at endlessly), he finds he can’t. Instead, he nudges Thorn’s hand on the table with his, a slight touch that sends pain and heat racing up his arm, and meets his eyes with open, curious ones. It’s an invitation, he hopes, to share. Casimir will listen. He’s always been a good listener.

Casimir

and nobody told me it ended

on the low, i get vertigo from body overdose

Everything starts to shift, toward where Thorn can recall being young and stupid and only wanting to please his family and wrestling with those thoughts as he remembers laying back in the snow, soaking through his wool coats until he felt more like a pretty popsicle. He didn’t have tattoos back then, nor the many piercings in his ears, nor the fun fashion sense he has now. All he’d had was wild, messy hair, siblings, and a life he thought he could fit himself into as he laid there freezing slowly to death.

It didn’t have the same punch this time around, namely because he wasn’t physically in Halo – taking the occasional trip back home to check on his siblings and his mom, uncaring what happened to his father. But the lights? The aurora was something Thorn would always wait to see. It’s the least he can do to share them now, captivating in their own right. He doesn’t even notice the way Casimir’s gaze flicks toward him, captivated as he is by a sight he’s seen a hundred times.

He’s brought out of it by the gentle brush of Casimir’s hand against his ringed fingers, dragging the courtesan back into reality with a flush that sparks, immediately flooding his cheeks and neck in hues of red and pink. That boyish smile lingers on Thorn’s face as he looks down to their hands and takes a slow and deep breath and shifts his hand enough so that their hands can touch – not quite intertwined, but enough that he can stretch his pinky out to gently stroke along the other man’s skin.

“My family’s the Mercer’s. We made houses ‘n stuff in Halo, so when I was growin’ up and was interested in architecture, they were.. really excited about it. But I was the oldest so I was supposed t’take the family business up so I wanted to go an’ learn about all kinds of ways people built shit.” He pauses, huffing a soft little laugh. “’Til I reached Torchline. Then I kinda enjoyed doin’ this more than the architecture.” His slender shoulders shrug, rippling the sheer shirt with the movement, reflecting a dance of the aurora above that changes the hues of the silver cloth, like he’s wearing the aurora on his shoulders. “Dad didn’t take it well.” His nose wrinkles, eyes focusing on Casimir’s hand before he sucks in a deep breath, letting it roll out of him along with the anger and hurt and frustration of the argument that had ensued. “Still doesn’t. But I go an’ check on my ma and sibling’s every year anyway.” His head tilts slightly, that flush still lingering on his cheeks.

He’s happy to share this part of his story, even if parts of it weren’t good, so when he lifts his head to look toward the handsome bartender’s face, it lingers with that ease of conversation even if the aurora was reflecting all around them and Thorn’s face and neck was still three shades darker than it usually was. “Gotta remind myself sometimes jus’ how long it takes standin’ out in the cold ‘fore ya lose a toe.” A warm and soft laugh leaves him, gentle and wholly at his own expense.

Hawthorn

so tell me your name and tell me your problems, i got the same