Title: The face of love

Author: Adalisa

Feedback: I love it. It's inspiring... and let's face it, it's the only real reason to keep writing.

Distribution: My site. Anyone else, just ask. I won't say no.

Summary: Champ Terrace thinks about his friend and roommate, Trevor Hale and his weirdness.

Rating: G

Disclaimer: Everyone here is property

Spoilers: Ep 1, 2 and 3 of Cupid. (Unfortunately, I do not have episodes name's yet)

Notes: I fell in love with this series, Cupid, since the first episode. Even when Jeremy Piven (Trevor) is not classically handsome, he has something that caught my eye. He his half balding, black hair, green dark eyes. You know the type. Then there's the fact that all the story happens in Chicago... <g> And after seeing this week's episode... well, this almost wrote itself. It can be seen as a little slashy, but I'm not sure if that's the path this story will take. The only female important character in the story is really nasty, and Champ hits me as a way too supportive friend. A little like Ray Vecchio in Due South. Oh, the basic plot of the series is this: Trevor Hale says he is Cupid, god of love, who is being punished by the gods and has to unite 100 couples to return to Mt. Olympus. His landlord/roommate Champ Terrace, a black half- unemployed actor, usually gets dragged into helping him, while his psychiatrist Claudia Allen is bent on proving that he is not Cupid.

By Adalisa.

That's what I see every time I see my roommate and coworker, Trevor Hale.

Sure, I didn't noticed until this week... Before that, I just thought he had a great smile and that he really had to be insane, to be perpetually cheerful, even after one of his biggest mistakes.

I have only know him for a month, and I feel like if I have know him forever.

Trevor does that to you. Unless you're Claire Allen, his psychiatrist. Of course, perhaps I don't think he is crazy because I have gone insane. Sure, I know I'm not nuts. As sure as I know that he is not insane, even if he goes around telling people that he is Cupid, the god of love.

_That's_ what got him in the loony bin in the first place and into the hands of the worst psychiatrist in Chicago, no matter what all newspaper's say... And into my life. So I guess that's not all bad.

When I meet him, skipping the line to the bar where I worked, and where he is now the best barman I've ever seen, I thought Dr. Allen was right. He had to be insane. You cannot be cheerful 24 hours a day, completely convinced that true love at first sight exists, without being a little crazy.

But then I saw him giving advice to all the depressed people in the bar... And next thing I know, I'm in a bear suit giving chocolates to a florist, just to make her see that the man of her dreams is getting a divorce so they can be together. And why? Because he gives everything he has to make people fall in love. So I thought, well, he might not be a god, but at least he has a propose in life. At least he is not shooting arrows at people.

And no matter what, Trevor is always cheerful. Not even when I tried to threw him out from our shared apartment just over the fact that he found out my real name and made me miss an audition because he writes in roman numerals. I thought that nothing could ever depress him.

Until last night, that is.

I should have known that something was wrong with him when he arrived to the bar. When instead of his usual greeting, a mix of teasing and joy that always helped to make the mood in the dance room better, he barely nodded at me. I hadn't seen him all day, after Angela Benett cancelled her dance class.

It wasn't until I saw him in the bar, serving straight tequila and announcing it as 'house pays'... all in hopes that if everyone got drunk, some one would fall in love. Totally unlike him. His usual careful planning just shoot to hell.

I went to him, hoping to talk him out of it... shocked at his actions.

He was rude with me, almost yelling at me over it.

Because he was scared of dying.

When he faced me with his fears, with his terrors... and asked me to tell him that he was not going to die... that he was never going to die.... I hated his shrink.

In that split second before he left the bar, I saw the face that I had come to identify with... well... with love become pale, afraid... I saw his joy in life broke. And my heart broke.

I wanted to hug him, to tell him that everything was going to be fine. But I couldn't. He left, saying that he was going to take a sick day. And in the moment he crossed past the doors of the bar, everything felt colder.

I swear I'm going to kill Dr. Allen if I see her now. Because somehow, this has to be her fault. She must have done something stupid trying to convince him that he was not Cupid, depressing him somehow.

So I finished our turns, and went home. Our home. I was renting it to him, to ease my expenses. But as the time passed, I ended up thinking of _my_ apartment as ours.

And now, _our_ apartment felt empty without him. He didn't come home in all night, and the morning came without a sign for him. I was terrified, wondering what could happen to him, in his depressed state. What if he had an accident, what if he got even more lost? I even thought that his madness could go to the deep end.

Until I saw the bead string.

It was the first thing he put on when he moved, the first thing over which we argued. A bead string, numbered to 100, like the ones that are used in pool clubs. He said that it was for marking the number of couples he reunited, his way of knowing how his mission was going. I always suspected that he moved the beads himself, when I was not looking.

It accounted 5 happy couples, in the space of a month. And then I saw a bead shake... and move by itself until there were six beads in the 'accomplished' side of the room.

That's when I knew that Trevor is not insane. Because somehow I knew that that sixth bead marked the Bennett's. Dancing and joy had helped them.

Seeing the beads that mark Trevor's hard work, I know what I will do. I will tell him that I believe him, that I'll be right behind him, ready to help.

Maybe... Maybe that's all it would take to make him smile again, to make him forget his new found fear.

And when he smiles again, I know what I will see.

His face.

The face of love.

The End.

--

Adalisa

-Obi Wan and Darth Maul Rule!

(WhiteKnight's own Dama de los AU)