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Rohan flicked the character sheet down so harshly it made a swishing sound, his glare like a papercut to Josuke. “No, your character cannot be a human male barbarian with a pompadour.”
“Eh?” Josuke exclaimed, snatching at his sheet. It slightly tore as Rohan's grip tightened momentarily, like he was considering holding onto it just to spite Josuke, but he gave up and let it slide across the Trattoria Trussardi table. Josuke frowned at the torn edge. Whatever, Crazy Diamond could fix it. “Why not?”
“If you really don't know why, you're stupider than I thought.” Rohan punctuated his aggravating words with an aggravating sip from his espresso tonic.
“It's my character. Can't I do what I want?”
“As if you ever do anything else,” Rohan scoffed. “Be more creative. I don't need a second version of you to deal with, Higashikata.”
Josuke looked away and scowled. So what if his character wasn't super imaginative? He wasn't some big shot storyteller artist like Rohan. He wasn’t familiar with weird manga characters like Koichi. He didn't know how to act like somebody else, so what was so wrong with being himself?
All of this started because Koichi heard about these “tabletop role-playing games,” got Okuyasu and Yukako on board with trying one out, and then had the idea of getting Rohan to be the “game master” or whatever. Josuke thought there was no way Rohan would agree, but he had the misfortune of being wrong. Rohan probably had the usual goal of experiencing new things for artistic inspiration. All of this led to their current meeting at Tonio's to discuss Josuke's character sheet. Which, admittedly, he threw together thirty minutes before coming. He’d had a week of procrastination.
“Do you have to be such an asshole?” Josuke asked.
Rohan arched one of his prissy little eyebrows. “You knew what you were signing up for.” His chair legs screeched against the floor as he pushed back from the table. “I’m the dungeon master here. If you don't like it, don't come.”
“Maybe I won't,” Josuke bit back heatedly. He watched as Rohan tossed down enough cash to cover his own meal and tip, but probably not Josuke’s. Stingy jerk.
“Fine by me.” Rohan shouldered his satchel and turned to leave, offering a nod in Tonio’s direction before facing the door. The heels of his white ankle boots clicked on the floor.
Elbow on the table and cheek against his fist, Josuke glared at his swaying hips and the small of his back, bare skin visible below the hem of his cropped shirt.
“Don't show up to our first meeting without a better character!” Rohan called over his shoulder.
Josuke turned his face away. The door thudded behind Rohan as he left. Good riddance.
He could just dip, but… his friends were meeting up once a week to do something fun. Was he going to let Rohan ruin his chance to be a part of that? No way!
Josuke’s fist slightly crumpled his character sheet in his grip. A fiery determination came over him. He'd show Rohan “creative”. He'd make a character so creative it would blow his fucking socks off. He snorted quietly and zoned out, getting lost in fantasies of Rohan being so impressed with his creativity, he'd be forced to bow down and give up the “master” or whatever title to Josuke. And Rohan would have to call him that. Master Josuke.
Unbeknownst to Josuke, he was beginning to scare off Tonio's other customers due to his frightening expression and sinister chuckling.