[Closed] [Mature] Our Young Faces

[Tom Cooke]

Charlie’s Flat, Cantile

Bad Decision Hours on the 27th of Ophus, 2719

T
here was some kind of thrumming inside his skull. He laughed; he was laughing, he realized, at the sound of Charlie’s voice drifting in from the other room. But the glint of lamplight on the metal edge of the tub felt sharp as the edge of a knife. He found himself looking down at the drain, at something like rust encrusted round its edge. He licked his lips; his mouth was dry and tasted of smoke and whisky and blood.

He‘d been about to get up. “Ah,” he said, at the muffled sound of shifting and creaking from the couch. He heard a pair of feet padding across the floorboards, then stood on his aching knees and poked his head back in.

Charlie was over past the counter. He caught his eye and made a dismissive gesture with one long white hand.

The boiler’d kicked on behind him; all the same, he took a deep breath, oddly relieved to put it off a little longer. He caught a whiff of himself as he picked his way back over to the bed and wrinkled his nose, but he was happy enough to sink back down against it. Charlie was shuffling about in the cabinets, and he could hear the gurgle of liquid into cups. The other man was a languid, narrow shape against the lamplight; he watched him get a third cup down through half-lidded eyes, then shut his eyes.

He opened them again at the brush of Charlie’s field, moving past him round the workbench to – the bird cage in the corner, he realized, raising his brows. Tippy’s cage, he amended. He blinked, squinting: he watched the little white shape inside hop closer to the door as Charlie took the food dish.

He stayed still, watching, for a moment oddly mesmerized. There was a funny sort of smile spreading itself out on Charlie’s face, lopsided, with just a hint of his crooked teeth. The bird’s eyes were peering back at him. A strand of dark hair had fallen over his cheek; there were a few warm little lines round his clear blue eyes.

The smile vanished in an instant, and so did his.

He grunted, shifting up off the bed. As Charlie bent to get the food, more hair fraying out of his wet-and-drying mess of a ponytail, he padded to get the drink Charlie’d left him. There were two of them; he’d poured him a glass of water. He sucked at a tooth, looking down at it uncertainly.

He shook off the funny feeling, whatever the hell it was. He took a long drink of water, then took up the battered tin mug and took a long drink of – whatever that was. It might’ve been Low Tide; it was heavy on the liquor, and went down about as smooth as sandpaper. He looked uncertainly at the bottle, cloudy-dark and unlabeled, and poured a tiny bit more.

“Thank you,” he said matter-of-factly, looking at one cup and then the other, and then over his shoulder. He took a deep breath, setting the mug down on the table, and disappeared into the washroom again. Best not waste time, he kept thinking. Just don’t think about a damn thing.

He went quick. The water wasn’t quite warm; it got warmer. He hesitated once before taking off his shirt, then took it off, and peeled his trousers and underthings off for good measure and set them in a neat pile to the side.

He didn’t look down as he washed, and nor’d he bother to let the old tub fill up or soak. He washed thoroughly and quickly, and he might’ve scraped his skin ragged. He made the mistake, once, of looking down at it – at all of it – and felt a surge of anger. It turned to something else in the buzz of what Charlie’d poured him; he shut his eyes then, and he scrubbed harder.

When he finally shut off the tap, he sat waiting for the water to drain. He was breathing hard, his eyes still shut. When he opened them, he looked down at his hands on his lap in the low light.

He shut his eyes and smiled bitterly.

He found an old robe. It was short in the arms and in the waist, and a little too narrow in the shoulders; he hesitated, tying it up double at the waist, then stepped out, shivering. His hair dripped a little on his shoulders.

“I, uh…” He reached up and scratched the back of his neck, feeling pinched and raw. “I’m out,” he grunted. “Whenever you, uh.”

[Charlie Ewing]

Ophus 27, 2720 - Bad Decision Hours
Charlie's Flat, Cantile

Tippy was happy at least, to be fed. Whice didn't need much feeding, which was good because Charlie didn't always come home. Didn't come home as many nights as he could manage, honestly. Or he hadn't; of late, staying at home with Tippy had seemed the better option. Charlie tried not to think about that.

He left the door to the cage open while he refilled Tippy's food dish from a linen sack he kept in one of the lower cabinets. It was one of the only things in the kitchen that didn't look terribly suspicious; Charlie had never kept a particularly stocked pantry. He usually ate elsewhere, or not at all. Depending on his mood. Tippy stayed obediently inside her cage, though she hopped over to perch on the edge of the door and nibbled on his fingers when he set the food back inside. He looked at the cage a moment, frowned, and then walked back into his kitchen. When he returned to the cage, he was holding a spray of millet—she had mostly finished the one that was in there already.

Charlie had just about finished feeding the bird when Anatole came over to where he'd set the cups. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the other man look at the water like it was a trick. Well, they weren't exactly in Uptown; he supposed there was reason enough to think twice about the water that came out of the tap here. Charlie usually did, but it had proven to be fine. At least, it hadn't made him sick yet, and it tasted like water should.

The liquor was more suspect by far; that Anatole knocked back with much less apparent unease. That came after. It was sort of vile stuff, but he couldn't say no to free alcohol. Especially not a whole bottle of it. The vileness accounted for the free-ness, Charlie thought. Still. Did the trick, didn't it? Took the edge off, at least. Not that there was an edge here, but if there was, it would have been sanded clean off by the time he'd gotten to the bottom of his cup.

"Think nothing of it," Charlie said with a grin and a voice that only wheezed a little. Fucking Lady, that shit burned on the way down. He'd forgotten. Time had not improved this particular bottle, and it had been in his flat for a solid week. A record, surely. Nevermind that there had been three at the start. Anatole vanished into the washroom again, looking a little like a man about to go to his own funeral.

Charlie stared at the door a moment, letting himself frown. The water hadn't been running long enough to fill the tub—well, whatever. He hadn't thought Cherry's father such a fucking oddball, but then again she was very strange herself. She had to get it from somewhere. While Anatole was in the washroom, he rummaged through his wardrobe. He had some workwear that he thought might fit; it was too big for him (hence the being workwear) and Anatole wasn't that much larger than Charlie was.

He'd thought, for a second, that it might be funny if he didn't find anything at all. Some line about—fuck, he didn't know. Goals and ideas, or blasphemy, or whatever stupid shit he'd been saying all night. "Might as well not", or something like that. It would have been funny, and it would have been charming, because he was always both. But he thought it also sound a little bit like backing someone into a corner, and the idea made his stomach turn over. He tossed it all into a pile on the bed, for whenever Anatole finished hiding in there, and then started digging through for a pair of short drawers for himself.

It actually didn't take that long; Charlie had expected longer. Charlie had forgotten there was a robe in there at all, but there must have been, because there it was. It didn't fit, but it didn't not fit either. Charlie grinned; he made absolutely no pretense at not looking. "So I see," he said, raising his eyebrows. He had been mostly through unbuttoning his own shirt, so as not to waste his time.

For a breath, he hesitated. Fuck. He didn't even know why. "Well, uh. Make yourself comfortable then, or something. There's..." He trailed off, making vague gestures to clothes, the bottle on the kitchen counter. Next to—ah, shit. Next to several months of unopened letters from home. Well. He couldn't do anything about that now. They were just letters. It was fine.

Charlie stared a moment longer, then he found his grin again; he hadn't known it wasn't on his face until he had to put it back. "Try not to miss me too terribly much while I'm gone." Then it was his turn to hide—no, fuck, shit. He wasn't hiding. This was his fucking flat. He knew how to—fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

[Tom Cooke]

Charlie’s Flat, Cantile

Bad Decision Hours on the 27th of Ophus, 2719

W
hat the fuck, he thought to ask, are you looking at?

No, he thought – he was buzzed, but he wasn’t fair drunk, not drunk enough to be having thoughts like this – what is it that you see?

He didn’t know what it was he himself saw; he only knew that he’d seen it just moments ago, all of it, without a scrap of grey cloth to cover it up, and he hadn’t much liked it. He saw it in snippets, like the pieces of a broken mirror: freckles here; hair there; the line of a ribcage, the line of an arm, long thin fingers and long, fine-boned feet. Each of it was a piece, and he had never known how to fit them in and make a full picture. None of them seemed like they belonged to the same man, least of all him.

And now, he couldn’t see them, but he could feel Charlie Ewing’s eyes on him. And the worst thing was he wanted to like it, like he had once. He sure as hell liked the expression on his face, all narrow, coy blue eyes with their fringe of lashes; the set of his lips, and those two freckles he kept glancing down at, because he couldn’t seem to look away, and all the things he kept imagining.

He wanted so very badly to like it. But now, he couldn’t even see them, so he had only the prickling in his skin to tell him what he looked like. That was a separate image, a separate reflection. It didn’t even fit with the way Charlie’d said sir earlier, all tsuter-sultry. No, he felt like a plucked chicken in a bathrobe, and a handsome man was looking at him like he was a man, too.

Charlie’s long white fingers were working at the buttons of his shirt, mostly-undone; he could see a line of collarbone, a flat white plane of chest above his undershirt, delicately contoured with the suggestion of muscle. It was familiar, too, like something out of a dream, and he liked it very much, though his eyes lingered only a few moments. They flicked back up to his face, to the two dark eyebrows delicately raised.

He smiled faintly, his face prickling. The smile flickered, shy. The pale fingers hesitated on the buttons, then flickered away. He followed them to the bed, raising his own brows; he hadn’t actually expected –

He blinked back at the counter, past the pile of unopened envelopes, to the cup and the bottle he’d left there. When he looked at the lad, he wasn’t smiling anymore. The grin sprang back to Charlie's face like it’d never dropped, but he thought there was some urgency in it, like he was about to charge back onto the stage.

Only, he was charging into the washroom, with not much less urgency than he himself’d done not fifteen minutes ago. “It’ll be a trial,” he shot back after him, “but I’ll do my damnedest,” and then the door shut, and he looked at it, a little furrow working its way into his brow.

He heard the squeak of the knob again, and the chug of the water.

It was quiet otherwise. He went to the bed first, taking up the clothes. They were work clothes, sturdy, heavy cotton; he spread out the shirt and found it roughly his size, if not a pina bigger. He glanced at the washroom door, one brow raised sharply, but found himself smiling again.

He’d shed the robe to put them on without so much trouble. He went to the counter to pour himself a little more of whatever the hell it was, and he found it no less smooth than it’d been. He thought of Charlie’s almost-wheeze and found himself grinning again, well pleased by the burn; then his eyes wandered over the unopened envelopes, and his expression tilted.

He set the cup down; he took a deep breath, glancing away.

It didn’t make any sense.

It wasn’t his business, he told himself staunchly, setting the tin mug down on the counter. He stood up, casting about, and the name pinged round inside his skull like a marble. All-Ewing, he remembered saying once, playfully.

Wasn’t his flooding business, he told himself.

The cage, he realized, was still open. He eased himself up and picked his way across the flat, not sure why. Ought he shut it? He wasn’t sure if birds and suchlike were supposed to roam about. It looked happy enough in there, a little white shape on its perch. As he got closer, it tilted its head in that funny way that’d always struck him eerie about birds. He laid a hand on the door of the cage, then hesitated. He remembered that funny smile that’d spilled out on Charlie’s face, and he found himself smiling, a little.

“Tippy, huh?” he grunted. He wasn’t sure why he was talking to a bird, either.

“Fuck me running,” said a tiny voice.

He near jumped out of his skin. Then – he laughed, and laughed hard, all the while the bird tilted its head this way and that. Godsdamn. He’d heard tell of such, but he’d never…

“Ah, gods,” he murmured, easing himself onto the edge of the work table and sighing, “what the fuck is going on?”

There was another chittery noise, like a hiccup, and then another hiccup that sounded a bit like the Lady’s name. He raised his brows. “Alioe’s hairy teats,” the tiny voice said matter of factly, and then the little beak gave a whistle.

By the time the washroom door opened again, he was singing it a chanty almost tenderly, to a handful of tweets and strange chipper mumbles. “... put ‘im in the bed with the captain’s daughter...” His voice fizzled and frayed; he cleared his throat, straightening a little, though he couldn’t quite bring himself to turn.

He ran a hand through his hair, mostly dry by now and a tousled cloud. “Uh,” he grunted, but he was still grinning, all those strange, crowding thoughts almost forgot. “Tippy has an impressive vocabulary.”

[Charlie Ewing]

Ophus 27, 2720 - Bad Decision Hours
Charlie's Flat, Cantile

Charlie wasn't hiding, that wasn't why he was standing there in his own washroom watching the tub fill with hot water. He was just. Giving his guest some privacy, or some shit. Like a good host. That's what you did, right? Shit. Charlie didn't know; he didn't have guests. And he didn't much pay attention when he was one, either, if he ever even counted as such a thing. Was he a guess when he came in for one purpose and then slithered away before the sun could even rise?

Nah. He was pretty sure that didn't count.

Charlie had turned the water on, and he was going to wait for the tub to fill. He didn't think Anatole had; that just hadn't taken long enough. But Charlie wasn't in a rush. He should have been, but he wasn't. It was all just so weird. Shit. Maybe he'd feel better—no, wrong, he was doing great—differently when he didn't smell like dog piss and feel coated in three inches of grime. It certainly couldn't hurt.

The bath filled before too long. Charlie shut the water off with a squeak and took his shirt off, his undershirt—the whole fucking thing. He left it in a heap on the washroom floor. Anatole, he noticed with a quirk of a smile, had neatly folded his things and set them to the side. Charlie hissed in appreciation, sliding into all that hot, clean water. The bath wasn't large, but neither was he. If he bent his knees, he could slide his whole face under the surface. He undid the tie on his hair and slipped down, letting the heat scald off the outer layer of grime.

When he surfaced, he thought he could hear Tippy. No, he knew he heard Tippy. The walls here were thin, and she had a very distinctive voice. Charlie hadn't let himself really think about what Anatole would be doing in his flat while he bathed. If you'd asked him, he would not in a million years have said "strike up conversation with my fucking bird". He couldn't make out what was being said, really, which didn't matter—Tippy's vocabulary was very specific. They were not likely discussing fine literature.

He grinned to himself when he heard a laugh; she must have picked a good one. He didn't know what drove her to pick what she did. Sometimes she just chirped, but if you addressed her directly and sincerely enough—well. Charlie had trained her to say all sorts of things, and she'd picked up a few more besides. Listening to him work, he supposed.

Charlie was choking on his own laughter by the time he was stepping out of the bath, clean-scrubbed and warmer than he had been. Some of that was the godawful booze; some of it was the bath. The rest he was ignoring. Singing came floating in through door. Not good singing, but that fucking absurd sailor shit. Sea shanties. Anatole Vauquelin was sitting in his room, singing sea shanties to his goddamn pet whice. If that wasn't the weirdest fucking shit to happen yet tonight... There was room for more, he thought optimistically.

"Don't stop on my account," he said cheerfully. He was, he had to admit, a little disappointed that the robe had be swapped out for the clothes he'd left out. Charlie had a towel draped over his shoulders, his drawers on, and absolutely nothing else at all. This was his flat, after all. Why did he have to be shy in it? He didn't, simple as that. And he wasn't. So there. Besides, he knew what he looked like. Maybe it would help. It wasn't just his face that was pretty.

Charlie couldn't stop himself from laughing again, wandering over. "She's a very clever girl; I didn't teach her all of it." Charlie had a funny sort of smile on his face, talking about his stupid bird now. It wasn't the sort of smile he usually had at all. He thought to wipe it of his face, but it was, again, his flat. So who fucking cared? He was allowed to... to smile at his bird. In his own home. Right? Yeah.

"I'm glad you found someone to keep you company in my absence, at least." The stupid smile wouldn't leave. He didn't think it was just for Tippy, but it had to be. Wasn't the right sort for anything else. "Although I'd hope we can all agree I'm prettier company, at least."

[Tom Cooke]

Charlie’s Flat, Cantile

Bad Decision Hours on the 27th of Ophus, 2719

C
harlton Lawrence – Almond, he kept thinking, like a low buzz at the back of his skull. Like the last piece of a puzzle that made even less sense. I’ve seen you once in my life, three years ago, he thought, once, and barely that – of all things taking you to Ipadi’s flooding kint and then sucking your cock, and that I can barely remember – and then one year ago I got a card from your mother wishing me well after my stroke. It was utterly surreal.

Anatole's 'stroke'. You won’t know about that, either, will you? he kept thinking. All those unopened letters.

If they’d even’ve mentioned it. He didn’t know how close the families were. They were just neighbors, after all; it wasn’t as if he knew shit about them after a year and a half of living next to them, except that they had two bochi they talked like they were proud of. He’d met the lass once, he thought, during some break, before Diana’d whisked him away. He’d met them only a few times, for how Diana’d always whisked him away, hiding the monster away from the guests…

No, he thought, no, no, no. And he didn’t think about it anymore. It felt a hundred miles away from this, anyway. He felt a hundred leagues under where he ought to be, and just sinking deeper, into a much, much stranger place than he had three years ago.

He laughed anyway, helpless again. He didn’t turn, though he caught the vague brush of a field still held apart, and the faint smell of soap. Tippy gave a little whistle and chirped, “Fuck me running,” inching her little claws about the perch.

“I, uh, well.” He was still grinning, though he reached up and scratched the back of his neck. He hadn’t expected to have an audience for the last of it, or – being honest – any of it; he’d known Anatole’s voice carried well enough, but he hadn’t thought much of it.

Charlie must’ve thought him mad, singing to his bird. If he did, he didn’t seem to mind it. He supposed, he thought wryly, the ship had already sailed on that.

For a brief flicker of a moment, he entertained the thought of picking up the thread and going right on singing; he was only the fourth or fifth verse through, and he knew verses carried in from the sea that would’ve curled the toes. Somehow, the thought of singing in front of Charlie now, opening himself up to whatever he might have to snark about it – he shrank from it, though it shouldn’t’ve mattered a whit.

Charlie went on in the same drawl, spilling out around a surprisingly genuine, clear laugh. It made him laugh again, too. He half-turned to look and trailed off.

He was all slim lines and pale skin, shoulder and collarbones oddly fine and delicate underneath the towel draped over his shoulders. His dark hair was a slick, wet tangle, a little longer than he’d thought let down. His eyes wandered down. He shifted in his seat, crossing his legs delicately and scratching the back of his neck again, then glanced back up.

Funny enough, the thing his eyes lingered on was the smile. It was messy and open, with those crooked teeth just peeping out. Charlie was looking at the bird; he looked at Tippy, too, and found himself grinning, peering closer at the beady-eyed little bird in the cage.

“Prettier,” he murmured, sucking at a tooth as if in deep thought and shaking his head, “I don’t know. Tippy’s a fine plumage.” Well taken care of, he thought, feeling an odd twist of gentleness. “But you’re more eloquent company by far, and much funnier. Sorry, Tippy, dove.”

Tippy was silent.

“I didn’t know you could teach whice to talk, much less that they’d, uh – pick shit up. Gods know what I’ve taught her already.” He laughed again, surprisingly easy, then grinned wryly back up at Charlie. He tried to ignore the prickling in his cheeks. “I got halfway through the Drunken Sailor. Much longer and I’d’ve got to the Bastian verses, and woe betide.”

[Charlie Ewing]

Ophus 27, 2719 - Bad Decision Hours
Charlie's Flat, Cantile

Tippy seemed to have been enjoying the song at least. She chirped a little obscenity in her bright, high voice, and Charlie grinned. It always made him smile, even though he'd taught her to say most of them. Not that one, he thought fondly; that one she'd just picked up by being around him. Encouraged it, but hadn't taught it to her on purpose. That was the kind of high-class conversation she'd been exposed to, he supposed.

Anatole had to turn around eventually, Charlie thought. Or he should, because Charlie was standing here in a state of near undress, and that was very worth turning around for in his own humble, restrained opinion. He must not have thought Charlie would hear, although he wasn't sure why. That was a voice that carried; Charlie had thought so before, in his more delicate years. Certainly it did when crooning bawdy sailors' songs to a bird in a flat the size of a cracker with walls that may as well be made out of paper.

It had taken Charlie a moment to process that Anatole's laughter had trailed off when he turned, just a bit, to look at him. There, see? Worth turning around for. Charlie's laughter veered into a smile that was extremely aware he was being looked at. Charlie always knew he was being looked at, to be fair, but he was also standing right the fuck there in his knickers, which was a bit different. He raised his eyebrows.

"Tippy is a very pretty bird," Charlie allowed, because it was true. Not as colorful as most whice, but her snowy plumage had its own appeal in its purity of color. She'd been gawkier as a hatchling, a strange shade of mottled gray. Well, that was normal. Charlie had been gawky too, when he was younger—they'd both turned out prettier than anyone might have expected, looking at them at that age.

He was too sober to be so pleased by being told he was funny. He was funny, of course, and eloquent, and handsome besides. Charlie had a great many fine qualities, some of which he would be perfectly happy to demonstrate. Too sober, but he was pleased.

"I think you've wounded her dignity," he said, with a twist of a smile. She didn't have much dignity to wound, honestly, being a bird as she was. She didn't say anything, anyway. Not so much as a peep. Charlie's grin was easy and only slightly filthy; that was weird, and he felt weird about it. He brushed past, deliberately close, to reach into Tippy's cage and pet the feathers on her head.

"No? They're famous for it. Not usually quite that kind of vocabulary, I admit," Charlie said looking over his shoulder with a flash of his teeth. His hair dripped a little over his cheek and he could feel a drop somehow making its way down the ridge of his spine. "I supposed I'll find out of she starts singing sea shanties."

Charlie shut the cage door and fastened the latch. As much as he loved his bird, he thought, he did have other goals in mind. He still felt unstable and strange; he tried not to think about the pile of mail on the counter, or how the bottle next to it was definitely less full than it had been. Which meant—meant nothing, he told himself. Other than that now Anatole had learned his great secret of being bad at correspondence. Just with his mother and sister, mostly.

He didn't get a lot of letters.

There were a few steps between the workbench and the bird cage. Charlie crossed them, leaning forward. "I don't know if I know the Bastian verses," he offered, setting his arm down to one side. He was, basically, doing his best to loom over Anatole now. But like, in an attractive way. That was the only way he did anything, but especially looming. Was it still looming then? Ah, fuck, he was too sober for this. But he was too drunk to think twice, too.

"You know," he murmured all quiet as he leaned in closer still, "I am going to kiss you if you don't tell me not to." He didn't think that would happen, but this was a weird night and weirder things had happened.

[Tom Cooke]

Charlie’s Flat, Cantile

Bad Decision Hours on the 27th of Ophus, 2719

H
e sat fair still when the lad leaned past him, conscious of a brush of warm skin through the rough fabric of his shirt. He sat with his legs crossed and his hands clasped together in his lap. Eyebrows slightly raised, he watched: he’d wondered if whice liked being pet. Tippy didn’t seem to object. He glanced up at Charlie’s face once, though at this angle all he could see was the curling edge of his smile and a lock of wet hair on his cheek.

He snorted. “Nobody’s perfect, Tippy, I’m afraid to say,” he said. If the bird heard, he didn’t know; her tiny eyes were squinting and her head was tilted, as if pleased by the petting. In the corner of his eye, he could see the light flickering over Charlie’s back, the faint suggestion of his ribs, with the path of a droplet of water still gleaming against the skin.

Could she? Start singing sea shanties, that was – he caught the edge of Charlie’s grin over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow sharply. He looked back at Tippy as Charlie drew back, all bright blinking eyes and soft white feathers, all perch and straw dotted with droppings, water and food dish clean and well-stocked.

He smiled a little; there was a funny twist to this one. “I’m not too familiar with whice,” he offered. “I’ve met other birds with such keen tongues, colorful ones from the isles.” He thought of packed cages full of squawking, clipped wings and matted feathers; he swallowed, watching Tippy inch her lovely little claws about the perch, and smiled a little more.

“Who knows?” he said even more quietly. “If you can teach a man like me to sing opera and waltz, a bird can sing a shanty.” For a moment, he was utterly – wholly and completely – absorbed in watching Tippy: so much so that the smile almost melted away, replaced by a softer, stranger expression.

Charlie closed the cage door. He was almost to asking if he might pet her, like a man putting off the gallows. Now, one long white arm poured itself into his space. He followed it up slowly with his eyes, as if he didn’t know what was at the top: followed the collarbones as they sloped out from under the towel, the pale column of his neck, the curve of his jaw.

“They’re, uh – positively filthy,” he murmured, eyes lingering on the smooth plane of his chest. His hand twitched in his lap. “The creativity of men at sea. Mostly about the captain’s daughter, but some about the… captain...”

He met Charlie’s clear blue eyes, sparking in the lamplight. He was close enough he couldn’t see much of the flat round him, and nor’d he want to; the counter with its liquor and pile of envelopes he could just glimpse over one shoulder.

Oh, no, he wanted to purr, I’m not going to stop you. No, he wanted to do it himself. He raised a hand and brushed the backs of his knuckles over Charlie’s cheek; his finger lingered there, then coiled gently round a strand of wet hair, guiding it back behind his ear. His hand came back, this time underneath his chin. No, I’m not going to stop you.

“Why on Vita,“ came out of his mouth instead, “would you want to do that?” His hand dropped to his side, curling against the work table. Something like a little laugh crawled up out of him; he shut his eyes. “Hoping I’ll turn into a prince?”

Another laugh. What the fuck was wrong with him? I don’t get any prettier than this, lad, he wanted to bite off, bitter; on the contrary – he swallowed it, choking down another laugh. More to drink, he thought, that’s what I need, isn’t it?

[Charlie Ewing]

Ophus 27, 2719 - Bad Decision Hours
Charlie's Flat, Cantile

I can leave you and the bird alone together, if that's what you want, Charlie almost said. He was a little annoyed, a little impatient, and—shit—a little uncertain. Not that he didn't love and adore Tippy, and perhaps under different circumstances he would have liked to talk more about her. Under very different circumstances, he would have left the cage door open and given her free reign to move around the whole flat; those circumstances were "he was alone and working on something that didn't pose much danger to her". They were not "he had taken leave of his senses deliberately and by accident and invited someone into his flat".

Shit. He should have suggested they go to the hotel, except the idea hadn't occurred to him until just now and it was far, far too late for that. The problem with being really fucked up and making decisions, at least in Charlie's rich and varied experience, was that you don't always remember all of your options in one go.

Charlie almost turned right back around and opened up the cage again, the other man seemed so keen on her. He'd had the weirdest soft kind of look on his face, one that Charlie didn't even think he'd ever seen directed at either of the Vauquelin daughters. Granted, he was usually with Cherry—she didn't really inspire that kind of look. Maybe the little one did, whatever. He couldn't have said where the impulse came from, and it made him a little itchy. Time to put an end to that, honestly.

"Oh yeah?" At the word "filthy", Charlie's grin became distinctly more of a leer. He had to admit he liked this leaning-over-someone thing; he didn't often get much chance to do it, given his general stature. He didn't mind any configuration, really, but this was a bit novel. Novelty was getting increasingly rare. It gave him a good vantage point to look from, to appreciate the sharp aristocratic lines and the freckles spread over them. Charlie had always liked freckles, he had to admit.

He found he was relieved as well as pleased by the touch of Anatole's knuckles against his face. The relief annoyed him; he hadn't actually thought he was reading this situation wrong. It was really hard to misread being stared at without a shirt on, honestly. He ignored that, and focused on what he knew what to do with: that little electric thrill that followed after the trail of those fingers, radiated out from the point where they came to rest. About fucking time, he thought, and he almost leaned forward.

Only to stop again, because—what the fuck was that about? Now Charlie thought he was annoyed properly. Not that the baffling fucking thing that came out of Anatole's mouth, a few inches from his own, was telling him to stop. It just sort of cast a bit of doubt on if he should continue, also.

Charlie didn't back off, but a frown settled over his pretty face. Anatole shut his eyes, like even he knew that was a dumb fucking thing to say. Charlie made an impatient, frustrated noise in the back of his throat. This was stupid, and he was really getting tired of the sheer quantity of mixed signals here.

"I don't know how to make this any more clear," he said with something that could best be described as a "petulant hissing", "but I am, and have been all night, trying to get you into bed with me. If royal status were required for that, I would spend a lot more time alone." He did not spend a lot of time alone, unless he wanted to. He didn't want to at the present moment, but it was looking rapidly more likely, and he distinctly didn't like this idea.

There was only so much pushing he could do before it started to feel less like finding the shape of something, and more like bludgeoning it to fit what he wanted. Like coercion. He wasn't particularly in the habit of wanting to fuck someone unwilling, and if he hadn't gotten so many positive signals he might have stopped way before this point. Just one more push, he thought, and then he was giving the fuck up. However weird that made him feel in his skin, however much he wanted to whine that he wasn't just pretty—he modestly thought he was a good lay, too.

"I don't know what kind of weird shit you think is... Is this supposed to be cute, or what? You don't need the boost." Charlie raised his eyebrows. This was a kind of novelty too, he supposed. He couldn't remember the last time he had to spell this out so clearly. Normally, he thought, being incredibly easy and available did a lot of the talking for him. Charlie took the hand that wasn't holding him braced against the table and slid it very deliberately over the rough-spun work shirt, taking his time to get to the narrow line of Anatole's jaw, the back of his neck.

[Tom Cooke]

Charlie’s Flat, Cantile

Bad Decision Hours on the 27th of Ophus, 2719

T
his was a fair different tone.

He glanced up sharply at the sound of Charlie’s voice. The other man was still close. Too fucking close, he thought, irritatedly; still close enough he could feel the soft tickle of his breath, could smell him, soap and warm skin.

It wasn’t that he’d expected him to – he hadn’t flooding known what he’d expected. There was a small frown on his lips, and he was looking down at him petulantly through his long lashes. The lips were moving, and a voice was coming out, but he wasn’t altogether sure what to make of it.

Only as Charlie went on, the prickling at the back of his neck got worse, and so did the spur of irritation. Why? he wanted to demand, like a boch that didn’t even know why it was upset anymore, except that it was, and damned upset.

Why? Why?

He blinked and blinked again; his eyes widened. He felt his lip curling back. Oh, you’ve made it fair clear, he wanted to shoot back, against all logic. You’ve made it clear since the de la Cours’ ballroom, with all your macha looks and shoulder brushes, with the way you were sprawling all over me under the umbrella. You didn’t do that to me before, he thought, when I was still – when I was still a man, when I still had a body I knew what to flooding do with – oes, we fucked, but you didn’t look at me like this when I was still a thing to behold –

“Cute,” he repeated, more like the wind’d been jerked from him than a question. “The boost?” He breathed in another lungful of the close, warm air between them, and he felt another familiar tug down through him; his eyelids fluttered, and he couldn’t seem to focus for a few moments.

It was long enough he felt Charlie’s hand, his long, warm fingers, gliding up his chest. There was only a layer of roughspun fabric between his skin and the other man’s, and it was too much and too little at once. He swallowed again and opened his mouth, but his throat was too tight to squeeze any words out.

Then: the fingertips were at his throat with their raised mechanic’s calluses, both less and more familiar than he’d expected. He picked his way – very, very slowly – up to the line of his jaw, then walked his fingers to the back of his neck, which was burning almost hotter than his cheeks. Charlie’s fingers were almost cool, now.

He couldn’t remember the first time it’d happened, After. It had been long before Aremu; it’d happened in fits and starts. In the morning, of course, mostly. He hadn’t done anything with it ‘til almost a year, when he hadn’t been able to bear it anymore. Even then, it’d been a strange dream of a thing; it usually was. He had often taken himself back to other places, to other, less strange times, and his hands did their qalqa loyally and without troubling his mind too much about what they were touching.

As for other men – there had been only one, since, and he couldn’t’ve borne wondering what he felt or saw. A ghost, he thought, possessing a body; any would’ve done.

Except the ghost and the body maybe weren’t so disconnected after all, and times like this were a sharp and not altogether unpleasant reminder.

He didn’t think about it, because those thin, lovely lips were inches from his, and Charlie Ewing hadn’t in the least done what he’d expected, and he was furious and aroused all at once.

Why? he asked petulantly, his hand sliding right back up along the delicate line of Charlie’s jaw. Why? Why? He braced his own arm against the work table beside Charlie’s and leaned up and kissed him – insistent – teeth lingering on his lips.

He was breathing hard, and he brushed another kiss along the edge of his mouth, finally feeling the brush of those two freckles against his lips. “I don’t need a boost,” he protested, almost a petulant hiss himself. What the fuck am I doing? He thought once of the letters on the table, of - he resolved not to think again.

Then: “I should be wearing less. This doesn't feel very fair, does it?” The twist of his lips had turned to a crooked smile, somewhere in there. He laughed soft and deep in his throat, and ran a hand along Charlie's cheek again, almost tender.

[Charlie Ewing]

Ophus 27, 2719 - Bad Decision Hours
Charlie's Flat, Cantile

Whatever reaction Charlie had expected to his complaints, Anatole looking like he'd been slapped across the face wasn't quite it. Like he'd been slapped, and it didn't hurt much, but the act of it had been annoying. Well, good. Charlie was feeling a little run ragged trying to figure out if—if... If Anatole had fucking eyes or not, Charlie insisted firmly. Eyes and all the rest, he supposed.

That lip had curled back in a little snarl. As if Charlie was the ridiculous one here, and not Mr. Midlife Crisis. That hadn't made Charlie less annoyed; if anything, he was more so. Irritation and desire together, until Charlie couldn't tell which was which, or if one was part of the other. That was familiar ground, at least. He kept talking, then he stopped and used his hand instead. If he had to crawl into his godsdamn lap to make his point, he would.

Charlie had to admit this was more than a little thrilling, not quite enough, gliding his hands up and up. Over his own fucking shirt; he didn't know if he'd be able to wear it again without remembering any part of this. He didn't know, either, if that was a good thing or a bad thing. At least Anatole had stopped talking, stopped asking him stupid questions.

What did he want Charlie to have said, honestly? He didn't think he could have admitted just how much or how long he'd wanted to do this. That seemed too revealing. Telling Cherry was one thing; she'd just punched him in the arm and told him he was disgusting, and that was the way it was between them anyway. Telling the man himself was like—it was just different. And anyway, that didn't matter as much as right now mattered. Idle fantasies from an idiot against a night of activity from the same. Charlie wasn't sure it would have made a difference, anyway.

Maybe it had needed saying, maybe it had needed spelling out. Or not. Charlie had been petulant and irritating, and that seemed to be part of the appeal sometimes. Whatever part of it had been missing, he'd found it and he didn't particularly care which piece it was. That, he thought distantly, was more fucking like it. Charlie didn't have to do shit; those hands (freckled hands, that he'd thought about a nonzero number of times) slid along his jaw, and he finally, finally leaned up to kiss him.

His imagination was lacking in several key arenas, or maybe the situation was just too strange for his mind to have accounted for. Charlie supposed there was no reason he would have imagined any circumstance where kissing Anatole Vauquelin would taste like the cheap swill he had in his kitchen or smell like his own soap, his own laundry. Somehow the teeth, too, were surprising and not at all unwelcome.

"That's what I was saying," he mumbled, not really listening to himself. It had been a long night, honestly. He had held out the whole time. He deserved some kind of medal for it. At least an award. Maybe a parade. The Most Patient Man in the Rose, that's what they should call him. No more of that shit; he wasn't going to be patient one moment longer. He'd tried, and it was awful and he hated it. Someone else could have that crown. It was too heavy for Charlie's head.

Not very fair. Charlie laughed, surprised by that. Just full of godsdamn surprises, right? All night, one right after another. "You're the one who got dressed," he pointed out with a grin and a shrug. "I just thought I'd save some time. But you're right, it's not fair. A fixable problem."

Not on his work bench, though. Charlie was too fucking sober not to know he'd think about this later, and honestly. He did, actually, have work to do sometimes. Work he needed to concentrate on, even. He grabbed a fistful of that rough, too-big shirt and pulled, trying to draw the other man to his feet. Backing up towards his bed, which was for once relatively clean. The main reason to keep the bed at all, he supposed, and not just get rid of it and move to the couch properly. That, and it felt like too much commitment.