At first Autharyx feels like he has made his point well, but when Viltez turns his focus on his food without talking, doubt starts to creep in. His host’s face is red again, which is an indication of shame, right? Was he not clear enough that he wanted to stay? Or did he say things that were ‘inappropriate’? Viltez had seemed worried about his reaction, so he’d tried to make it clear that he thought it was a good idea and that he was only thinking about his host’s comfort, but perhaps he should have pretended to be more conflicted about the idea?

With every passing moment of silence he is more and more certain he’s said something wrong, but when Viltez finally answers it sounds positive enough. Autharyx looks up with an expression of slight surprise, but turns it into a smile now that everything seems to be okay. The rest of the meal occurs in silence, but to Autharyx’ inexperienced ear it seems to be a companionable one rather than an awkward one. 

When Viltez stands up to put the plates away, the tail slips from his arm and he is free to stand up and do his own share of helping. Viltez seems busy in the kitchen, so Autharyx uses the time to tidy up the living room further. From the corner of his eye he can see his host’s tail wring and twist itself, and he once again wonders whether he’s said something wrong after all. 

When the man turns to him with a question, though, there is a smile on his face even though he stumbles over his words again. Autharyx’ eyes dart to the tail that was still moving in a far more restless way than usually, but perhaps that doesn’t mean anything?

“Um, yeah, bed is fine,” he says, cursing himself for the hesitation in his voice. If Viltez is smiling, surely he didn’t want Autharyx to act like something is wrong. If anything, he is probably covering for something Autharyx said earlier, right? Best to just go along with the cues his host was giving. 

Mind made up, he feigns a casual air as he walks to the bedroom, in the meantime still trying to go over what he might have said wrong. It must have been the eagerness, right? Apparently humans had a thing against sharing beds and he didn’t show that clearly enough. Should he try to do it after all? Or would any more talking only make things worse?

He is already in his (Viltez’) sleeping pants with his (Viltez’) sleeping shirt in his hands, when he decides the uncertainty of maybe having done something wrong does not sit well with him. He already told Viltez he was from a different culture, right? So he might as well figure out if or where he’d gone wrong.

“Viltez,” he says, looking at the other man with just a hint of a frown. “Is there something I did… wrong?” The word feels distasteful in his mouth as a means of referring to himself, but ‘rude’ would imply that he’d done it on purpose and that would be worse.

“I assure you, I did not mean to offend, and if I did it was an accident…”