December 2021
Now that vaccinations were happening and restrictions were easing up, the hospital in Terre Haute where Sören and Yeyette worked was having a holiday party. Neither Yeyette nor Sören were extroverts and the idea of a festive gathering with a bunch of near-strangers sounded about as fun as a root canal, but they knew they were in for a lot of guilt tripping and weird looks and potential gossip if they didn't go.
Because of social distancing, as well as not wanting to advertise they were each in poly relationships in a very conservative part of the country, they each decided to only bring one partner. Victor, Dara and DeKalb drew straws for attending with Yeyette, and Victor won. Both Nicholas and Maglor were averse to parties so it defaulted to Anthony to go as Sören's plus-one.
The party encouraged dressing in "Christmas-themed costumes", which Sören found mildly annoying because it assumed everyone going to the party celebrated Christmas, but then Sören had learned from two and a half years of living in Indiana that most people were assumed to be Christian unless they had some sort of outward marker very obviously declaring otherwise, like a Muslim hijabi. Sören had become especially bitter about the fundamentalist Christian conservatism of Indiana within the last year, and so he decided he would, in fact, wear a Christmas-themed costume... going as the Grinch.
Sören had presented Anthony with the idea of dressing up as the Grinch's dog, complete with a single antler on his head, but Anthony had other ideas.
"You about ready?" Sören called up the stairs, looking at the clock, then the stairwell, the clock, then the stairwell, as if that would make Anthony come down faster.
"Just a sec."
Sören began humming the Jeopardy! theme.
A few minutes later, Anthony loped down the stairs. He wasn't wearing a dog costume with a single antler tied to his head. He was dressed up like Tony the Tiger. Wearing a Santa hat.
Sören's laughter rang out - confused and delighted. One of his pet names for Anthony was "Tony the Tiger" - nobody got away with calling Anthony "Tony", except Sören - and here, Anthony had rolled with it rather than protesting.
"Frosted, snow," Anthony explained, doffing his Santa cap then putting it back on. "Come on, Misterrr Grrrinch."
_
The party was less bad than Sören had been expecting, if only because he couldn't stop laughing at the absurdity of Anthony in a Tony the Tiger costume, and the other partygoers being completely baffled by it. Sören and Anthony drew even more attention to themselves with deliberately bad dancing, especially during "Macarena".
The showstopper was "U Can't Touch This" by MC Hammer, where they attempted to re-enact Hammer's dancing... in their costumes... and mostly failed at it, but still got short of breath enough to require a break after the song. Anthony led Sören over to the punch bowl and they leaned against the wall, gulping down punch.
Then Anthony looked up, and back at Sören, tapped Sören's shoulder, and pointed at the ceiling. They were standing under the mistletoe.
Sören grinned, threw his arms around Anthony's waist, and pulled him close. Anthony hugged Sören's neck and moved closer. Their lips met, and what was meant to be a quick, chaste kiss in public soon deepened, heated, their tongues playing together. Sören's hands slid down to grope Anthony's ass - and he opened his eyes wide when he felt the plush and remembered Anthony was still in costume.
Anthony's cheeks were pink as the kiss broke, and they busted out laughing, aware they'd given each other a horny kiss dressed up as they were.
"Does this make us furries now?" Sören teased, stroking his beard.
"Gettin' Jiggy With It" by Will Smith started playing and Anthony's tiger paws grabbed Sören's hands and pulled him back onto the dance floor. "Let's get yiffy with it," Anthony teased back.