![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
[The amount of relief he feels the moment he catches the expression on Josh's face is a little ridiculous. They had long since established that they had much in common, but there was also the fact that technically speaking? They had not been with each other for all that long.
Still. Why did he seem to regard Joshua LaRue in the same way that he used to look at Kaien Yamazaki, or Feranen?
Ridiculous, really, this thing people called 'attachment'. When he smiles, it's more for himself than it is for Josh, but that's probably going to be difficult to tell.]
I suppose you're going to be stuck with me while I figure it all out.
Still. Why did he seem to regard Joshua LaRue in the same way that he used to look at Kaien Yamazaki, or Feranen?
Ridiculous, really, this thing people called 'attachment'. When he smiles, it's more for himself than it is for Josh, but that's probably going to be difficult to tell.]
I suppose you're going to be stuck with me while I figure it all out.
[ For whatever reason that the former-Sin-Eater-now-Geist is smiling, Josh is just glad that he is. Honestly, he likes the guy. Makoto has, surprisingly enough, been such a grounding presence in various respects. ]
I got nothing but time, man.
[ He's offering you his pack again. The first stick is good for grounding, the second, you should be able to enjoy just for what it is. ]
I got nothing but time, man.
[ He's offering you his pack again. The first stick is good for grounding, the second, you should be able to enjoy just for what it is. ]
[Thank you, good sir.]
Time, and an awareness of how to use it.
[That is a compliment, done in the typical Makoto Kuzunoha style.
Yeah, he is getting better.]
Time, and an awareness of how to use it.
[That is a compliment, done in the typical Makoto Kuzunoha style.
Yeah, he is getting better.]
Edited 2014-03-05 15:00 (UTC)
You really should sleep.
[He's not going to force you if you don't want to, but... yeah. As things stand, he's better.]
[He's not going to force you if you don't want to, but... yeah. As things stand, he's better.]
[A wry look, and then a careless shrug.]
As long as I get to smoke another one too, then.
As long as I get to smoke another one too, then.
[ Josh doesn't touch the bed. It's strange. He was excited about this, was grateful for Stanley going back in a second time to clearly make a piece of furniture permanent for his room in the Tower, but now, he's sitting in his mostly bare room, staring at that bed and finds that he's not entirely sure if he can bring himself to sleep in it.
He can't remember Stanley's exact words; only that "emotions" and "shelved" and "he is mature enough" was part of that whole spiel and these keep coming back to him. There's an awful feeling in the pit of his stomach that he doesn't know what to do with or how to define because... just because.
How the night went from awkward to okay to better to good to suddenly this, he really isn't sure.
So he's just sitting there with his head in his hands waiting for Makoto to show up -- if ever the geist does. ]
He can't remember Stanley's exact words; only that "emotions" and "shelved" and "he is mature enough" was part of that whole spiel and these keep coming back to him. There's an awful feeling in the pit of his stomach that he doesn't know what to do with or how to define because... just because.
How the night went from awkward to okay to better to good to suddenly this, he really isn't sure.
So he's just sitting there with his head in his hands waiting for Makoto to show up -- if ever the geist does. ]
[He is manifesting promptly enough, rounding off to recover four packs of the usual, and quietly sitting down right beside you. He draws his knees up, drapes his arms on them, and peers, angling his head towards your face.
No words. He knows that YOU know that he's out.]
No words. He knows that YOU know that he's out.]
[ It takes him a full minute. No, two -- before he shudders.
He can't think. He'd only really meant to ask Stanley what it had been like for Sabina and him to be friends before they became something else -- and now he can barely remember why he'd wanted to ask in the first place.
No. Wait. He did. Sort of. ] I think... Jessiah Vice was right. I should just stick to smoking when I go out.
[ He sounds -- in a word -- wrecked. ]
He can't think. He'd only really meant to ask Stanley what it had been like for Sabina and him to be friends before they became something else -- and now he can barely remember why he'd wanted to ask in the first place.
No. Wait. He did. Sort of. ] I think... Jessiah Vice was right. I should just stick to smoking when I go out.
[ He sounds -- in a word -- wrecked. ]
Probably. Some things, though, are better dealt with when you're drunk as shit.
[Speaking of cigarettes. He's lighting up, and then holding the pack out in your direction.
He'll light up for you when you take it. Do not try to stop him.
Yes: that is written all over his face.]
[Speaking of cigarettes. He's lighting up, and then holding the pack out in your direction.
He'll light up for you when you take it. Do not try to stop him.
Yes: that is written all over his face.]
[ He's straightening up now, taking that pack, but oddly enough not lighting up. ]
Go ahead, man.
[ About that cigarette. Looking down at it now, wondering if he should. Quiet, still; because he's decided he doesn't know what to say to the first half of that exchange just yet. ]
Go ahead, man.
[ About that cigarette. Looking down at it now, wondering if he should. Quiet, still; because he's decided he doesn't know what to say to the first half of that exchange just yet. ]
Edited 2014-03-08 18:55 (UTC)
[Watching now. Then fixing his gaze on that pack, canting his head up in a movement that says well, take one already, you idiot (complete with a look, of course), and promptly holding out the lighter, already clicked.
Please to be letting him fuss over you this way. This is the (dead) man who knocked you out when you tried to go for a run, remember?
Of course, not speaking like this and just watching how you move and how you look gives him an opportunity to read you without having to break completely into your brain. Personal space can still be a thing, right?]
Please to be letting him fuss over you this way. This is the (dead) man who knocked you out when you tried to go for a run, remember?
Of course, not speaking like this and just watching how you move and how you look gives him an opportunity to read you without having to break completely into your brain. Personal space can still be a thing, right?]
Edited 2014-03-08 18:58 (UTC)
[All of that is telling enough, as if the vague presence of Josh at the back of his own mind already isn't.
Setting the lighter aside, and taking another drag from his cigarette. When he speaks next, he says it quietly: there's no need to do it any other way, even if some possibilities might be gentler.]
No. It's not.
[He has been silent, in fact, ever since that last breakdown. No "snakes"-worthy moments. No turtling. Nothing.]
Setting the lighter aside, and taking another drag from his cigarette. When he speaks next, he says it quietly: there's no need to do it any other way, even if some possibilities might be gentler.]
No. It's not.
[He has been silent, in fact, ever since that last breakdown. No "snakes"-worthy moments. No turtling. Nothing.]
[ Looking up now, the look in his eyes a little panicked, a little lost -- things he couldn't show while out there in the living room because Stan had caught him by surprise. ]
Could it be leftover? From before? Could it just me be riding on that influencing-- [ he cuts off and there is a quiet, almost desperate "please, Makoto," in the way that he's looking at the geist. His breath is shallow, but oddly loud in the silence of the room. ]
Could it be leftover? From before? Could it just me be riding on that influencing-- [ he cuts off and there is a quiet, almost desperate "please, Makoto," in the way that he's looking at the geist. His breath is shallow, but oddly loud in the silence of the room. ]
Would you like me to lie to you, or not?
[In as much as the look on your face cuts at him, he respects you enough to not sugar coat, not pull his punches, and be very ready to help you pick yourself right back up when you're done.]
[In as much as the look on your face cuts at him, he respects you enough to not sugar coat, not pull his punches, and be very ready to help you pick yourself right back up when you're done.]
[ And you've been joined to his brain for long enough that he knows what that statement means. Which is why he's pressing his head back into his hands -- fingers fisted now as he tries to breathe.
That laugh that escapes him is awash with a mix of emotions: guilt, helplessness, and even a little bit of fear. ]
That laugh that escapes him is awash with a mix of emotions: guilt, helplessness, and even a little bit of fear. ]
[This reminds him, uncomfortably, of the very first night that he manifested more than a month ago. Your roles have been switched around for the moment, but he's caught snippets of the playback in your memories.
Not his best moment, that. And this certainly wasn't yours.]
I'm not going to tell you that it's okay yet. Talk to me first.
[And even with the potential harshness of that first statement, he's reaching out with his free hand and squeezing your shoulder.]
Not his best moment, that. And this certainly wasn't yours.]
I'm not going to tell you that it's okay yet. Talk to me first.
[And even with the potential harshness of that first statement, he's reaching out with his free hand and squeezing your shoulder.]
[ Maybe it's because it's been a very tense, and frighteningly emotional two weeks for him. Maybe it's been because it's just been one realization after another: how much Rhiannon had become home, how highly he'd regarded Jessiah Vice as an individual, that fucking clock above Hikaru Shinta's head, celebrating his birthday, seeing his boys again -- realizing how important and valuable he was to people he actually gave two shits about and being granted all these responsibilities he hadn't realized he'd wanted so badly to have. And then having to deal with the uncomfortable absence of that one friend who just seemed to get him as he was, as he could be and more.
He's trying to logic his way out of it. There was Gabriel. There was the Board of Directors at Rhiannon. There was doing right by his sister and by the blade he now led. There was Cisco Montelibano-Profaci coming to speak with him about that brief encounter during Hikaru Shinta's 28th Life Cycle.
He's shaking a little as he looks up, because he's thinking back to that apology -- that goddamn apology, over and over at the club. To that hurt look on Hikaru's face that he didn't understand right after he'd said: Isn't that what friends are for? on that bench, right outside Balamb. ]
He's trying to logic his way out of it. There was Gabriel. There was the Board of Directors at Rhiannon. There was doing right by his sister and by the blade he now led. There was Cisco Montelibano-Profaci coming to speak with him about that brief encounter during Hikaru Shinta's 28th Life Cycle.
He's shaking a little as he looks up, because he's thinking back to that apology -- that goddamn apology, over and over at the club. To that hurt look on Hikaru's face that he didn't understand right after he'd said: Isn't that what friends are for? on that bench, right outside Balamb. ]
[Because there are no words, he's left to study your expression and - fine. He caves a little, reaches, just so, into your mind. Traces the wires, where they connect, what flares up, what fades.]
Trying to apply logic to this is still going to lead you to the same place.
[Unless you don't want to go there in the first place.
That goes unsaid.]
Trying to apply logic to this is still going to lead you to the same place.
[Unless you don't want to go there in the first place.
That goes unsaid.]
[ Dropping his face back into his hands now because he doesn't know what to say, doesn't know if he actually has the words to coherently express the utter mess of emotions that is crashing down on and all around him.
But he tries. Because that's always been Joshua Lee Brennan's personal philosophy where it concerns living: Trying, even if there doesn't seem like there's a point to anything. The simple act of trying -- because that is something everyone is capable of doing. ]
Why me?
[ The words come out in a half-croak, and he's thinking back to the seven of them seated out there on that couch and how easily the words Don't make it me had left his mouth, with an accompanying reason that Hikaru Goddamn Shinta went ahead to dispute, by systematically pointing out why the others would not work.
Why the hell him? He wasn't a veteran hunter like Yulia with prior experience with a top blade, he didn't have Kaz's family legacy nor the ties that came as a supplement of that. He never spent five hundred years in Arcadia, found himself picked up by Tala Vega, "The Key", a member of Wolf's Choice, nor is he the one mentored by the Kaiser herself. He's not a promethean with a hundred years' worth of experience on the battlefield, nor is he like Stan, who had, by Josh's estimation, only been held back from greatness by the traumatizing possibility of what that greatness could achieve if wielded by the wrong hands.
He's just the kid who wandered around lost for so long. His first mentor ( and he cares for Rethe like a brother ) wasn't quite the right fit and at the beginning, it seemed like the people who could be wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't even wanted to join Netsach in the first place, but then the reasons and the justifications came in the form of his sister and his dad and so had the unexpected news of his mother's connection to TFV, which had led to him want something more than a position as a novice.
He isn't used to wanting things, people, due recognition anymore. He isn't used to it because he'd taught himself for six, long years that wanting got you nowhere but hurt. Because wanting makes you feel so terribly small, especially when you thought you had it handled only to realize that you don't have it handled at all; when you're almost there only to have it snatched out of reach.
He's hugging his knees now, mind moving faster than his own emotions can catch up because working under and around people who challenged him and twigged that he was more than just a jock had felt something like the day he'd walked into the Blue Coffin asking if they would take a kid with some kitchen knowhow who needed the work. He'd meant what he'd said: Rhiannon was now like home, the people there as much family to him than his own blade or his friends in Netsach or even his own flesh and blood. They were like his second chance at being someone more than just the kid who ran, someone named Joshua LaRue, that kid that was good enough to catch Gabriel Marlowe's attention, the Sin-Eater affiliated first with and now leading the War Hounds, trusted enough by two ( maybe three? he wasn't sure ) Malice Kings to be called a friend. ]
Why me? [ He's not twenty-eight years old as he looks at you, Makoto -- he's that twenty-one year old kid who's just figuring out that he'd chosen to let Time stop, metaphorically, because he'd given up growing up every, single year in favor of wandering like a lonely ghost in Vancouver. Because that -- that was easier. That helped him deal with losing what little he'd already had. ]
But he tries. Because that's always been Joshua Lee Brennan's personal philosophy where it concerns living: Trying, even if there doesn't seem like there's a point to anything. The simple act of trying -- because that is something everyone is capable of doing. ]
Why me?
[ The words come out in a half-croak, and he's thinking back to the seven of them seated out there on that couch and how easily the words Don't make it me had left his mouth, with an accompanying reason that Hikaru Goddamn Shinta went ahead to dispute, by systematically pointing out why the others would not work.
Why the hell him? He wasn't a veteran hunter like Yulia with prior experience with a top blade, he didn't have Kaz's family legacy nor the ties that came as a supplement of that. He never spent five hundred years in Arcadia, found himself picked up by Tala Vega, "The Key", a member of Wolf's Choice, nor is he the one mentored by the Kaiser herself. He's not a promethean with a hundred years' worth of experience on the battlefield, nor is he like Stan, who had, by Josh's estimation, only been held back from greatness by the traumatizing possibility of what that greatness could achieve if wielded by the wrong hands.
He's just the kid who wandered around lost for so long. His first mentor ( and he cares for Rethe like a brother ) wasn't quite the right fit and at the beginning, it seemed like the people who could be wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't even wanted to join Netsach in the first place, but then the reasons and the justifications came in the form of his sister and his dad and so had the unexpected news of his mother's connection to TFV, which had led to him want something more than a position as a novice.
He isn't used to wanting things, people, due recognition anymore. He isn't used to it because he'd taught himself for six, long years that wanting got you nowhere but hurt. Because wanting makes you feel so terribly small, especially when you thought you had it handled only to realize that you don't have it handled at all; when you're almost there only to have it snatched out of reach.
He's hugging his knees now, mind moving faster than his own emotions can catch up because working under and around people who challenged him and twigged that he was more than just a jock had felt something like the day he'd walked into the Blue Coffin asking if they would take a kid with some kitchen knowhow who needed the work. He'd meant what he'd said: Rhiannon was now like home, the people there as much family to him than his own blade or his friends in Netsach or even his own flesh and blood. They were like his second chance at being someone more than just the kid who ran, someone named Joshua LaRue, that kid that was good enough to catch Gabriel Marlowe's attention, the Sin-Eater affiliated first with and now leading the War Hounds, trusted enough by two ( maybe three? he wasn't sure ) Malice Kings to be called a friend. ]
Why me? [ He's not twenty-eight years old as he looks at you, Makoto -- he's that twenty-one year old kid who's just figuring out that he'd chosen to let Time stop, metaphorically, because he'd given up growing up every, single year in favor of wandering like a lonely ghost in Vancouver. Because that -- that was easier. That helped him deal with losing what little he'd already had. ]
[It takes him a while to respond because he is following the twists and turns of your mind, reliving your moments as if they were his own. He has spoken to Davis about you, and the two of them have commiserated, compared notes, debated, wondered.
The saddest part is, by the time he is done, he knows that there is no "right" or "wrong" way of answering that question. Distance always helps with perspective, but that doesn't mean that it's the cure-all for every situation. As things stood, it was obvious that this was going much, much deeper than just the matter of Hikaru Shinta turning his eyes towards Joshua LaRue/Joshua Lee Brennan in the first place.]
Did he not already tell you? You were always there for him when he needed you. You and him seem to see each other for what you are. Neither of you have to pretend.
[He settles for a reminder, pushing up what Joshua should already know from the surface of his doubts. Those he can try to deal with later.]
The saddest part is, by the time he is done, he knows that there is no "right" or "wrong" way of answering that question. Distance always helps with perspective, but that doesn't mean that it's the cure-all for every situation. As things stood, it was obvious that this was going much, much deeper than just the matter of Hikaru Shinta turning his eyes towards Joshua LaRue/Joshua Lee Brennan in the first place.]
Did he not already tell you? You were always there for him when he needed you. You and him seem to see each other for what you are. Neither of you have to pretend.
[He settles for a reminder, pushing up what Joshua should already know from the surface of his doubts. Those he can try to deal with later.]
[ He's tearing up now, rubbing the back and heel of one hand across both his eyes. Because the reminder hurts as much as it helps. Because earlier that night at Hyve had been a quiet kind of hell, walking into a space he's already since considered theirs ( his and Hikaru's, for all that it had been one night nearly a month before ) to kick back by the bar and repeatedly check his phone.
The people he'd struck conversation with had been distractions, a way to pass the time and keep him from casting looks towards that one particular couch. It had been a way to forget that this was his first time here, all alone, in a crowded room full of strangers looking to have fun, and forget the life they led outside the black-tiled walls where music and mischief of varying sorts was the game that everyone played.
He still remembers the relief that had flooded through him when he'd glanced over to see Hikaru up there, hadn't even cared if he'd excused himself a little too quickly from the girl he'd paused mid-conversation with, because the real reason he'd decided to go out tonight had finally arrived.
Breathing harder now, but keeping his voice down because he doesn't know how thin the walls are in this place and his eyes travel to the one separating his room from the Blade King's. ]
I was so happy to see him laugh. [ Forehead pressed to the palm of that same hand now; eyes screwed shut and tight. ]
The people he'd struck conversation with had been distractions, a way to pass the time and keep him from casting looks towards that one particular couch. It had been a way to forget that this was his first time here, all alone, in a crowded room full of strangers looking to have fun, and forget the life they led outside the black-tiled walls where music and mischief of varying sorts was the game that everyone played.
He still remembers the relief that had flooded through him when he'd glanced over to see Hikaru up there, hadn't even cared if he'd excused himself a little too quickly from the girl he'd paused mid-conversation with, because the real reason he'd decided to go out tonight had finally arrived.
Breathing harder now, but keeping his voice down because he doesn't know how thin the walls are in this place and his eyes travel to the one separating his room from the Blade King's. ]
I was so happy to see him laugh. [ Forehead pressed to the palm of that same hand now; eyes screwed shut and tight. ]
Edited 2014-03-09 04:49 (UTC)
Page 2 of 3