[ The longer his hand remains where it is (stroke of a thumb, another fuse lit, another combustion in waiting that he has to tamp down quickly) (a slow, unacknowledged and unpointed brush of his own thumb) (the minor skate of his index and middle fingertips along a pulse point) the more it feels as though he's known this touch his whole life. As though there has always been the specter of this hand holding his, the heel of his palm meeting the heel of Treavor's, and where his lifeline ends, Treavor's begins.
Unspeakably right. Natural, and unbearable because it will in ten minutes or an hour or three hours be gone. (And he comprehends extinction now. He comprehends the destruction of rain forests. He understands why people fear the deaths of bee colonies. He understands the loss of condors, of megafauna, of rare plants, of the ice caps. He understands supernovas and the heat death of the universe, and why all these things are tragic.
Why dying is tragic.
What is gone, and can never occur again.)
There's something vaguely amusing, and vaguely melancholy about what their conversation has become: each of them trying to convince the other of their worth, while rejecting their own. It strikes Alice that he really doesn't know much about Treavor, and Treavor doesn't know much at all about him; what he has are impressions, and a belief about the neutrality of people. (And Treavor, smiling. Treavor, excited, reaching for Hope, and calling her perfect. Hope's refusal to leave the man's side all through the morning, and her apparent approval of him.) (A glimpse last night at the wounded self, the loneliness, the soft and gentle person wanting connection, wanting starlight and fish stories and contact in a desolate city.)
Treavor says he likes to help people, and Alice pulls a face that speaks eh, a sort of shrug of an expression. Alice doesn't like people. He likes his routine, his apartment, his own company and his cat. (He likes the hand in his hand, Christ, he likes that so much.) It's not untrue that his morality is strict, that he feels strongly on the lines of giving aid when he can.
But what he likes.
He likes. Helping Treavor.
Which is a very different thing from 'people'.
(What. Really. Does Treavor see in him that makes him think Alice is 'good'? Has he seen something else? Has he watched at all over the past month, or only crafted in his mind an adversary at the Other Desk, someone to torment (why?) and annoy?)
He watches the other man for a moment, silent, truly looking at him: his eyes, his nose, the perfect curve of his mouth (another wistful brush of his fingertips in an arc across the softness of a wrist, wishing, and wishing, and wanting), the mess of him begging for someone to clean him up and set him right again ((please, yes, and he tries to ignore the feeling, that melting pleasure, but it's so tantalizing and it's so available, isn't it?)) ]
Self-deprecation could turn into a competition between us if we keep on. I'll acknowledge I - like to help you. 'People' is a very broad category.
[ His voice softens, and his gaze drifts slightly right. ]
But I like to help you. I'm not certain it makes me good. But it makes you think I am, and that amounts to the same.
[ To Alice, it amounts to the same.
Really. What other opinion matters, aside from the one attached to the hand in his, and the eyes that won't let him flee this conversation?
A little cant of his head, and he presses on, returning his eyes to his locus, his lodestone (a star, if not northern, if not guiding, at least it's his.) ]
And you can compromise, as well. Acknowledge you have worth to me, no matter how flawed or nonsensical my logic might seem.
[ He pauses, opens his mouth to say more. Looks away uncomfortably - and oddly, his hold tightens just a little, as though seeking affirmation. Confirmation. Or simply comfort, before he draws a breath and adds carefully: ]
You know. I've known rabid assholes. People worse than you, even on our lousiest encounters. I don't think you've got it in you to rise to that occasion, Treavor.
no subject
Unspeakably right. Natural, and unbearable because it will in ten minutes or an hour or three hours be gone. (And he comprehends extinction now. He comprehends the destruction of rain forests. He understands why people fear the deaths of bee colonies. He understands the loss of condors, of megafauna, of rare plants, of the ice caps. He understands supernovas and the heat death of the universe, and why all these things are tragic.
Why dying is tragic.
What is gone, and can never occur again.)
There's something vaguely amusing, and vaguely melancholy about what their conversation has become: each of them trying to convince the other of their worth, while rejecting their own. It strikes Alice that he really doesn't know much about Treavor, and Treavor doesn't know much at all about him; what he has are impressions, and a belief about the neutrality of people. (And Treavor, smiling. Treavor, excited, reaching for Hope, and calling her perfect. Hope's refusal to leave the man's side all through the morning, and her apparent approval of him.) (A glimpse last night at the wounded self, the loneliness, the soft and gentle person wanting connection, wanting starlight and fish stories and contact in a desolate city.)
Treavor says he likes to help people, and Alice pulls a face that speaks eh, a sort of shrug of an expression. Alice doesn't like people. He likes his routine, his apartment, his own company and his cat. (He likes the hand in his hand, Christ, he likes that so much.) It's not untrue that his morality is strict, that he feels strongly on the lines of giving aid when he can.
But what he likes.
He likes. Helping Treavor.
Which is a very different thing from 'people'.
(What. Really. Does Treavor see in him that makes him think Alice is 'good'? Has he seen something else? Has he watched at all over the past month, or only crafted in his mind an adversary at the Other Desk, someone to torment (why?) and annoy?)
He watches the other man for a moment, silent, truly looking at him: his eyes, his nose, the perfect curve of his mouth (another wistful brush of his fingertips in an arc across the softness of a wrist, wishing, and wishing, and wanting), the mess of him begging for someone to clean him up and set him right again ((please, yes, and he tries to ignore the feeling, that melting pleasure, but it's so tantalizing and it's so available, isn't it?)) ]
Self-deprecation could turn into a competition between us if we keep on. I'll acknowledge I - like to help you. 'People' is a very broad category.
[ His voice softens, and his gaze drifts slightly right. ]
But I like to help you. I'm not certain it makes me good. But it makes you think I am, and that amounts to the same.
[ To Alice, it amounts to the same.
Really. What other opinion matters, aside from the one attached to the hand in his, and the eyes that won't let him flee this conversation?
A little cant of his head, and he presses on, returning his eyes to his locus, his lodestone (a star, if not northern, if not guiding, at least it's his.) ]
And you can compromise, as well. Acknowledge you have worth to me, no matter how flawed or nonsensical my logic might seem.
[ He pauses, opens his mouth to say more. Looks away uncomfortably - and oddly, his hold tightens just a little, as though seeking affirmation. Confirmation. Or simply comfort, before he draws a breath and adds carefully: ]
You know. I've known rabid assholes. People worse than you, even on our lousiest encounters. I don't think you've got it in you to rise to that occasion, Treavor.