What Sen has said and every resonance it carries. How the air within Null Set altered, turned supernal and rare, flickering their lungs with tickled chill, with speechless knowing. How they - Rin Renault, 47 and proprietor of a flourishing nightclub, life-long thief and former scam artist, well-traveled and self-taught and deft with survival - clung to this counter for dear life, or for understanding, or for the sake of retaining some nearness to this impossible man.
This man who sets his forehead against theirs; a port of respite and an anchor. A promise, perhaps. (Of what?) (Toward what longing?) (They can suppose. Or could suppose, if thoughts would stick to knowing; if thoughts didn’t form themselves only to disperse without a trace.) (Later. Later, all of this will circle back around.) This man whose touch draws gratitude from Rin, drawing appreciation through their stagger of expression.
There is - luckily, luckily - something they can follow in words. A point requiring response, impelling enough to drag their words from humming numbness. And their forefinger brushes Sen’s hand, gently, briefly. (It feels not brief at all. Feels like an era of its own, the soothing rough of that skin, the map of bone and veins beneath, the potential in that hand to hold, to reach, to gesture with such wild grace.) ]
Of course I remember.
I have—
[ They blink; they swallow. Perception flickers; they lose the thought, though the impulse remains. They seek certainty in Sen’s eyes. ]
When light first dawned in the form of a man. When a person presented himself as invitation. As welcome. Of course I took your hand. To find that you were real. To—
[ A slight tilt of their head; a slight, distracted smirk. ]
To reach the instrument capable of such absurd gesticulation.
To find what you were; improbable man.
Your name. Your hand. Your spontaneity in speaking; your proficiency with what can be put to voice. You have ever held my notice, Sen. The fullness of my attention.
[ What attention they possessed. What attentiveness they knew to give.
Which didn’t account for or perceive the fullness of Sen. Which missed much, because.
Because there were signs Rin knew to look for, and then there were signs Rin never let themself consider. Signs that - they thought, they felt certain - couldn’t amount. Signs toward ends that held no place with them. Signs spelling long-term relationships wanted, or sought, or wishing.
How often has Rin said, and felt, and known that they held no intention of seeking partnership, or commitment, or anything beyond a one-night fuck or two?
Nothing else would have been sustainable. And, they’d thought, nothing else could ever be sustained. Not with their existence; not among the pieces they were chasing.
But.
And.
But. Sen has always been there. Present and expected. His place never questioned; his place never, by Rin, put to any particular term. Sen has ever been instinctive and compulsory, harmonious and accustomed. And Rin had never ventured much beyond that understanding.
But Sen said, ’Whatever we have been to one another.’
But Sen speaks of friendship, of companions, and so conjures other words, potentials, relations.
And what if. What if.
(‘What if,’ a long-unthought question. A realm of suppositions Rin never gave themself the luxury to consider. What use in looking back, in regretting or revising what couldn’t be changed, when there was so much to be done, and managed, and effected?
‘What if,’ a question that arose only once Sen was taken, a question rising in pervasive and recurrent forms: ’What if Sen had never confessed,’ and ’What if Sen were here now,’ and ’What if the court hadn’t believed Sen, what if he’d been tossed out without retalation?’ And. ’What if the gun was never fired. What if all of this had been avoided.’
Queries that vanished with Sen’s return. Because what need could Rin have now for ‘what if,’ when Sen is here, and will remain? What more could they possibly ask?)
Sen moves the world with every word, with every breath.
And known facts can be altered with a single fall of words. And known facts can shine brilliant, variant, with a burning light shone sudden.
Sen is compulsory. And. And.
What else, in what words?
Hard to say. Impossible to tell just now. Thinking—
Or. No. Speaking, not precisely intended. ]
I would like to see your hidden heart.
[ It’s true they know Sen’s heart better than any other; nearly as well as their own. It’s true Rin understands their heart and Sen’s as sharing resonance, beating in consonant existence. But it occurs to Rin that sharing isn’t knowing, that there are realms of Sen haven’t glimpsed.
Rin thinks… Yes. Yes, hey would like to glimpse, to venture toward, to know and tend that unguessed heart.
If they could speak their meaning. If they could know their meaning. If they could do more than hold desperate to this moment.
What they can manage for now is another press of Sen’s hand, and a breath. And, voice hushed but steady— ]
no subject
It will linger.
All of this.
What Sen has said and every resonance it carries. How the air within Null Set altered, turned supernal and rare, flickering their lungs with tickled chill, with speechless knowing. How they - Rin Renault, 47 and proprietor of a flourishing nightclub, life-long thief and former scam artist, well-traveled and self-taught and deft with survival - clung to this counter for dear life, or for understanding, or for the sake of retaining some nearness to this impossible man.
This man who sets his forehead against theirs; a port of respite and an anchor. A promise, perhaps. (Of what?) (Toward what longing?) (They can suppose. Or could suppose, if thoughts would stick to knowing; if thoughts didn’t form themselves only to disperse without a trace.) (Later. Later, all of this will circle back around.) This man whose touch draws gratitude from Rin, drawing appreciation through their stagger of expression.
There is - luckily, luckily - something they can follow in words. A point requiring response, impelling enough to drag their words from humming numbness. And their forefinger brushes Sen’s hand, gently, briefly. (It feels not brief at all. Feels like an era of its own, the soothing rough of that skin, the map of bone and veins beneath, the potential in that hand to hold, to reach, to gesture with such wild grace.) ]
Of course I remember.
I have—
[ They blink; they swallow. Perception flickers; they lose the thought, though the impulse remains. They seek certainty in Sen’s eyes. ]
When light first dawned in the form of a man. When a person presented himself as invitation. As welcome. Of course I took your hand. To find that you were real. To—
[ A slight tilt of their head; a slight, distracted smirk. ]
To reach the instrument capable of such absurd gesticulation.
To find what you were; improbable man.
Your name. Your hand. Your spontaneity in speaking; your proficiency with what can be put to voice. You have ever held my notice, Sen. The fullness of my attention.
[ What attention they possessed. What attentiveness they knew to give.
Which didn’t account for or perceive the fullness of Sen. Which missed much, because.
Because there were signs Rin knew to look for, and then there were signs Rin never let themself consider. Signs that - they thought, they felt certain - couldn’t amount. Signs toward ends that held no place with them. Signs spelling long-term relationships wanted, or sought, or wishing.
How often has Rin said, and felt, and known that they held no intention of seeking partnership, or commitment, or anything beyond a one-night fuck or two?
Nothing else would have been sustainable. And, they’d thought, nothing else could ever be sustained. Not with their existence; not among the pieces they were chasing.
But.
And.
But. Sen has always been there. Present and expected. His place never questioned; his place never, by Rin, put to any particular term. Sen has ever been instinctive and compulsory, harmonious and accustomed. And Rin had never ventured much beyond that understanding.
But Sen said, ’Whatever we have been to one another.’
But Sen speaks of friendship, of companions, and so conjures other words, potentials, relations.
And what if. What if.
(‘What if,’ a long-unthought question. A realm of suppositions Rin never gave themself the luxury to consider. What use in looking back, in regretting or revising what couldn’t be changed, when there was so much to be done, and managed, and effected?
‘What if,’ a question that arose only once Sen was taken, a question rising in pervasive and recurrent forms: ’What if Sen had never confessed,’ and ’What if Sen were here now,’ and ’What if the court hadn’t believed Sen, what if he’d been tossed out without retalation?’ And. ’What if the gun was never fired. What if all of this had been avoided.’
Queries that vanished with Sen’s return. Because what need could Rin have now for ‘what if,’ when Sen is here, and will remain? What more could they possibly ask?)
Sen moves the world with every word, with every breath.
And known facts can be altered with a single fall of words. And known facts can shine brilliant, variant, with a burning light shone sudden.
Sen is compulsory. And. And.
What else, in what words?
Hard to say. Impossible to tell just now. Thinking—
Or. No. Speaking, not precisely intended. ]
I would like to see your hidden heart.
[ It’s true they know Sen’s heart better than any other; nearly as well as their own. It’s true Rin understands their heart and Sen’s as sharing resonance, beating in consonant existence. But it occurs to Rin that sharing isn’t knowing, that there are realms of Sen haven’t glimpsed.
Rin thinks… Yes. Yes, hey would like to glimpse, to venture toward, to know and tend that unguessed heart.
If they could speak their meaning. If they could know their meaning. If they could do more than hold desperate to this moment.
What they can manage for now is another press of Sen’s hand, and a breath. And, voice hushed but steady— ]
I have always been reaching toward you.