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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 16:53:36 GMT -5
Dare had been here countless times with Michael, but somehow, despite the company waiting outside, making sure one last time that they wouldn't be seen, it was still a comfort. The furniture was different, but he knew this place, and it knew him. It knew him too well.
His heart ached at the familiar scent of the fire, at the plush rug he stood on, stretching between the fireplace and the couch. The coffee table was pushed aside, as though it knew he'd want to move it anyway, and though the picture frames were empty to spare him tears—or maybe because he'd forgotten which pictures had been in them—the rest was the same. There was the door to the stairwell, and there were the shelves, loaded with books, knick-knacks, and some of his mother's favorite pottery. There was the door to the bathroom, and when he looked away, pulling a hard breath at the thought of it, the door faded and disappeared. He didn't need it, and he didn't want it.
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 17:19:57 GMT -5
Markise counted to thirty, staring absently at that tapestry of those damned ballet trolls, but thinking of something entirely different. Was it right to be here? What did he think might be said that he wouldn't want Ariel to hear? He didn't want to think about any possibilities there might be, and refused to acknowledge them. They were going to talk. He just wanted to know they'd have as much time as they needed.
He walked back and forth, concentrating on Dare so hard that a door didn't even appear, leaving him an open doorway to follow, Three painfully familiar steps down, and he stopped, lips parted as the hole closed behind him, crackling as it covered over with paint. It was the Blackwoods' basement.
Pale blue eyes swept from one end to another, seeing all the details he knew so well, just from visiting. It had been a haven to them, even more than Dare's bedroom. It had been a world of its own for the two of them, and though he hadn't seen it a moment before, there was Dare's guitar, with the faded purple strap, fraying at the edges. It was a lavender-grey from the sun, oh, the California sun, shining down on them in the school courtyard. They'd spent so many days sitting around the fountain, listening to Dare play, watching him draw, or had that only been him? He couldn't remember anymore. It felt like it had just been them at times.
His eyes teared, and he fought the feeling, damning his allergies to hell, along with the feeling that any moment, Mrs. Blackwood might call down the stairs offering them a plate of sandwiches. He pulled a breath, then struck forward into the room. "Couch or floor?" He asked, for all the world as though they still did this every day.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 20:06:15 GMT -5
Dare started, his mind pulled from the details he'd been waiting for, and those he'd forgotten. The smell of damp clay lingered somehow, as if she'd been through here, and it was painful, but he couldn't wish it away. He didn't even look up at Markise, but shifted, kicking off his shoes and bending to sit on the rug before the fire.. God, it felt good, and he wondered suddenly what his father had done with it, if he'd thrown it out of put it with more of his mother's things somewhere.
He leaned back against the front of the couch and stretched his bare feet somewhere into the center of the rug, wondering if he could still lay on his stomach in front of the warm fire, or if he'd grown too long since he'd been here. Or maybe the room knew what he needed, and the rug was longer than it had been. He didn't know, and he couldn't think about it anymore. He looked up at Markise through his hair, waiting expectantly. Some of the panic had left, and he almost felt resigned now.
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 20:09:22 GMT -5
Markise's brows drew together as he looked down at Dare, feeling again like his friend was lost. He didn't acknowledge it, not just yet, and stepped over his legs, moving to sit on the floor to Dare's right, where he'd always sat. He pulled off his own shoes and set them aside, then leaned back, letting his sock-covered feet stretch as far as they could.
He looked absebtly into the fire, low, since the weather was so nice, but comforting all the same. There was nothing to be said just now, and he let himself relax into this familiar place. It had been years since he'd been here, and yet it still felt right. How strange it was that it felt so normal.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 20:11:47 GMT -5
Dare let the silence settle between them. Why, when he'd wanted noise so badly at home, was this different? Was it because Michael wasn't here? Was it because he felt like he didn't have to worry about money, like all he had to do was keep up with homework and keep his room picked up enough to count? Or was it Markise?
It took a while before he looked aside, seeing changes years in the making that he simply hadn't noticed. They'd been fifteen once, and he'd drawn those fake-black lashes and tried to capture the medley of golds and pinks, violets and blues, on paper. But Markise looked older. It struck him that Markise was twenty already, that he'd had his birthday in February and he hadn't even thought about it. The lines of his face were harsher, just barely, and he wondered how much he'd changed, if his face looked... more grown up? Was that it? Twenty.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there," Dare said at last. He looked forward again, into the fire.
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 20:32:11 GMT -5
Markise blinked, trying to clear away the sensation of being looked at so closely after so long, of trying to figure out what Dare was thinking, or if he was just being evaluated like a painting. He hadn't expected that, hadn't expected those words, and he shook his head slightly, without looking away from the crackling flames.
"You didn't have a choice."
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 20:42:34 GMT -5
Dare sighed softly. I know, he thought. He hadn't had a bit of choice about leaving, but still, he felt like he should have been there. He should have been around to help his best friend, to support him when he came out. He knew how hard that was.
"How bad was it?" he asked.
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 21:01:13 GMT -5
Markise shook his head again. He didn't even know where to start, so he started with Dare leaving. He was blunt about how lonely he'd felt, how abandoned, and how hard even his classes had been without Dare to bounce ideas off of, to talk about secret things in private and laugh at the world for thinking those things taboo. He told Dare how desperately he'd wanted to please Kwami, and how alone he'd still felt, how he'd wanted to make those secret things public so he wouldn't have to hide anymore. He told Dare how hard it had been when he'd finally done it.
Then there was that night, the last he'd spent at TAIM, however little of it he actually remembered. He choked describing the pain, the voices, and the confusion, and how lost he'd been when he'd waken in the hospital. "Brin said they left me by the fountain," he repeated, knowing it hadn't been a coincidence.
He paused before going on, then told Dare how hard those days in the hospital had been, how angry Brindle had been, how scared his mother had been, how his father, jerk that he could be, had still fought the school, though the man had been unable to confront why he was fighting it.
And he'd never written to Dare. Not once. Dare had left him, and it hadn't been until there was a chance of seeing him again that he'd really forgiven him for that.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 21:13:51 GMT -5
Dare was quiet for several minutes after that, staring at the fire, or at the hems of his jeans around his ankles. He picked lightly at the carpet, loosening fluff now and then, and picking it apart in his fingers before dropping the pieces aside. It was a wonder the thing wasn't threadbare.
"I never told you this," he said softly, slowly, as he thought out the words. "I started cutting after Mom... and Silver." He braced himself for a gasp, for the audible reaction he couldn't be surprised by, and reached for his right wristband, working it free as he went on. "You know I blamed myself." They'd been over and over that when he'd had so much trouble with potions a couple years ago; there was no forgetting that Markise knew it all now.
"I hurt and I thought... if I made it real, you know, if I felt it on the outside, it would all go away together." He turned over his arm for Markise to see the faint lines on his forearm that were so easy to miss, and his mangled wrists, criss-crossed by lines he'd made, and the deep burn marks from the ropes Ivy had tied him with. Had he ever told Markise that? Oh yeah, Markise knew, he'd been involved. How had he forgotten that?
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 21:18:18 GMT -5
Markise's eyes teared again as he took Dare's arm, letting his fingers trace those lines. Had he ever noticed them? Had his mind flickered right past them? He suddenly remembered what he'd been doing at the time, when Dare had gone quiet and started to withdraw. He'd been in his first relationship, getting pushed around and begging for more. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm so sorry I wasn't there..."
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 21:29:14 GMT -5
Dare looked aside at Markise, watching the motions of those silky fingertips against his skin. "You didn't know," he returned. "I never told you." Not for years and years after. He cleared his throat. There was more. There was always more.
"I started again when she died," he admitted, watching Markise still. "I was drawing mostly, drawing all the time, and I met Michael, and he was drawing too. His girlfriend had disappeared, and I was so confused, Markise, and so was he, and I don't even know how it happened. I still don't." It had been so long that it didn't matter anymore how hurt Markise had been by it. I needed said. It was coming out.
"I thought I needed him, you know? I wasn't cutting anymore, I had something else to think about. No one else noticed me but him, and when you came, it was still new. I wanted so much to hang out with you like I used to, but I was afraid of losing him, the only person at Hogwarts who'd even cared I was alive the day before, except Silver."
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 21:36:49 GMT -5
Markise shook his head. "I know, Dare, I know! You didn't have to tell me all that, I know, and I knew you needed him, and so I didn't fight it. I tried so hard just to let you go. I didn't have anyone either, but I wanted you to be happy." And he still did, and that was the only reason he was here, the only reason he hadn't told Dare to get the g~damned f~ out of his shop and never come back. He loved Dare, despite himself, and he knew it. It had faded, and it had been powerfully eclipsed by Ariel that summer they'd gotten together for good, but he couldn't fall out of love with Dare after so long.
It struck him how long they'd known each other, and what a large chunk of his life that had been. Dare was part of him, no matter what happened, and no matter how he'd been hurt. "Have you been happy?" he asked softly. What answer was he hoping for?
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 21:48:27 GMT -5
Dare was quiet, giving the question real thought. "Mostly," he replied. "I love Michael... I loved Michael. He did a lot of good for me, and I think I helped him a lot too. Then there was that article, the one that outed us, and we had to stick together. Not that I didn't want to, because I did, but we've both wondered what would have happened if everyone hadn't turned on us."
It was a thought that came back now and then. Would they have simply moved forward slower? Would they have gotten to some small obstacle and stopped? Would the experiment have failed, leaving them both going their own separate ways?
"I did love him," Dare repeated. And he knew from experience that just because he wasn't falling-down in crush with Michael right now, it didn't mean he wouldn't be again in a couple months. It always came back full force in the end. That was real love, wasn't it?
He looked aside at Markise and lowered his voice, then pulled a deep breath. "I love you, too," he whispered.
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Post by Markise Sterling on Jun 2, 2011 21:56:41 GMT -5
Markise's hand stopped, and for some indeterminable time, his head rang with words he'd wished so long to hear and hadn't expected when they'd. Finally come. "No," he whispered, almost inaudibly. "No, you don't, Dare. Don't say it, you don't have to..." He couldn't accept it, and he wouldn't hear it, not when he was with Ariel and Dare was with Michael! He wouldn't let go of Dare, though, and his fingers curled between Dare's, holding onto his hand as an anchor.
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Post by Dare Blackwood-Hardt on Jun 2, 2011 22:33:42 GMT -5
Dare pulled a sharp breath, but went on, still watching Markise. "Maybe it's not the same," he said. "I know it's not the same, it's not, but that doesn't mean I don't. I mean, you've been my friend since I was eleven. I just... I'd never thought of it until you said it, and I wasn't ready to think about it because I was thinking about it all wrong!" The more he said it, the more he believed it, and the less dangerous it felt to do so. He felt freer than he had in so many months, and he felt so much more comfortable with Markise. He didn't need to censor himself. It wasn't the same with the two of them, and it never had been. The problem had never been changing their friendship so Michael would be comfortable with it, it had been knowing where everything lay himself.
All those times you said it, I thought you we're just drunk, you know, I love you, man, and it was like, whatever. Okay. I didn't know what could happen, you know? I'd never been in love, I didn't know. But I have been, and you can't help who you fall for." He'd fallen for Michael. He'd fallen hard for Michael, and he'd loved every bit of it.
"I felt like crap when you came out here, but not because you were messing anything up, you never messed anything up, and I always knew it was me, but I didn't know why. Then you said... at the reception, you said all that, and I think it freaked me out because I knew, I knew and it had never even hit me. I don't know if it would have been different if you'd told me when we were... dating, whatever..." He didn't need to go into what ifs. That way could only be painful for both of them.
"I just know it's been years I've been here, and I haven't found anyone else like you. I love Michael, I do, but it's never gonna be the same as us, and I don't wish it was, but... I don't know, am I making any sense?"
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