featherduster | ( limelight ) overflow

[he takes it from Aloe’s hands with great gentleness.]

[ The hallway is dark and cold. You're splitting along every pressure point, the inky rot of who you are spilling out, threatening to poison everything.

Your neck hurts with a phantom pain, and no matter what you try to focus on, your brain keeps supplying the sound of your own vertebrae being severed again and again. Even the sound of your own skin tearing from your arm just sounds like a guillotine falling.

It doesn't make controlling the roiling emotions any easier.

You stare at Frost and shake with some combination of adrenaline and anger, but if you're being completely honest with yourself -- hurt. This man, who saved your life at his own expense (why? why? why? what does it mean?), then goaded and threatened you with it, holding everything you love over a precipice (is that why? is that all it was?); this man who sent Acidia to the gallows in that performance and feels no remorse, refuses to even be effected by it at all; this man who doesn't seem to give a shit about you one way or another, as long as he can twist your strings for his own sick amusement. Acting so fucking above it all-- exactly like the men who broke your fingers over and over and over again.

It's so different from that vision, suffused with warmth and trust. It's so different from that brief moment where Frost turned away, choosing to protect you; that moment where your heart caught in disbelief, and you thought -- has it been wrong, this whole time? Could it have been different?

So you goad him, while panic rings in the back of your head (he saw it too? no. he can't. he'll just use that to hurt you too--). You want him to show you something real, one way or another. (why did you save me? why? why? it can't really be because--)

You kiss him; if he's going to do this to you, it should matter, you should matter, it should be more than just some sick game at your expense. You try not to think about another world, where love was possible. ]

[he’s gone very pale, in the wake of the memory, eyes wide and suspiciously wet.

he doesn’t let that spill over, though; just swallows hard against the ache in his throat, closing his hand over the paper]

I appreciate it.

[ A little regretfully ]

Did it tell you what you wanted to know?

I think so.

[he had not really known what he wanted to know, but he had known there was something. better this than a torturous conversation to work out what.]

I am sorry.

[ He reaches for Frost's hand ]

Don't.

[he lets Aloe take it, but presses both their hands to his own face to a moment, Aloe’s knuckles against his brow. his breath is the slightest bit unsteady.]

[ Low ]

It's alright.

Wish I could fix it.

[that’s true of a lot of things.

he steadies after a little of that, though; the pressure of Aloe’s hand in his, his breaths deep and deliberately even]

I think... we did, didn't we?

At least-- we both know we were wrapped up in misunderstandings back then. It would've been different, if we'd just understood each other.

I thought…

[a tiny laugh, not precisely happy]

You were always so…good, with other people. It drove me nuts that I couldn’t figure out how to make you look at me like that.

I think, if I look back on all of it... I hated that you didn't like me. I didn't know how to deal with not being liked in my "fake, normal" life, since that was the only place I could have that kind of thing. It was easier to double down on grudges and anger, and decide the problem was all you. You were wrong for not liking me, a guy treating you in a very unlikable way.

[ Softly, chagrined ]

... I'm not quite that stupid anymore.

When I tried to invite you to my bar opening, ages ago, I wanted you to see…that people liked me too. That there was something worth liking.

It’s a little funny. All that effort, and we both had no idea we were that little distance away from each other in our underground lives, too.

Edited 2025-05-20 02:01 (UTC)

I'm alright with that part, at least. I... wouldn't want you to have known me like that.

…

It hasn’t bothered me particularly. Even if I mostly didn’t get my own hands dirty, I still stood in the same mess.

Still...

[ He looks away, the next part hesitant. Like he's not sure if he should give voice to it. ]

I've wondered a few times-- whether Charon would be disgusted by 'Aloe,' compared to the man he knows. He was... better.

[he gives it the visible thought Aloe seems to think it deserves, even though he knows the answer]

The truth is that “Charon” was much worse than “Aloe,” in many ways. Don’t—tell me I’m being too hard on him this time. He knew exactly what he was and he wanted to be what he was.

[ He doesn't argue the point, since he doesn't actually disagree ]

Maybe, but... he fell in love with someone very unlike himself. That couldn't be an accident.

[ He shrugs, a little lopsided since Frost still has his hand ]

It doesn't matter now. It's just- something I think about, sometimes.

You’re not as different from “Minuet” as you think, either. And “Charon” is as greedy as I am.

Rather than being disgusted, he’d just want both.

[ That startles a laugh out of him ]

That's comforting, actually.

I guess it might be.

He’s a lot less of a coward than me, about wanting things like that.

[ A small smile ]

I think you've been pretty brave, in-between a couple fits of cowardice.

Trying to unlearn bad habits.

[a tiny quirk of his mouth]

Now you don’t have to worry about Charon’s opinion, at least.

Edited 2025-05-20 02:48 (UTC)

Mm. Only yours.

I want them both, too.

As much as I can have, I want it.

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