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twobirdsonesongTitle: Five Dreams and Something Else
Pairing: Chris/Darren
Length/Rating: 500 / G
Summary: Read the title
Some nights Chris dreams.
“I have a girlfriend,” he says.
And it all makes sense. Every awkward pause. Every aborted touch. Every almost kiss. Chris blinks and the last three months shake apart like a dry sandcastle, held together with a whisper and trembling hands.
He tries to rewind the tape; replays the days and nights searching for all the things he must have missed, and comes up with a list that adds up to nothing. A pause can be a breath. An almost touch nervous hesitance of something new. A withdrawn kiss a sign of respect towards boundaries that cannot be uncrossed.
Or not. It is the unasked question answered.
“Oh,” Chris says, and carries on like he didn’t just realize he’d been building the castle alone.
***
“I’m straight,” he says.
And Chris laughs. And then he sobers. Stares. He feels like the punch line to a joke he did not know was being told. He wishes – sharply, keenly – that he had never even met him at all. There are better hands he could have left his heart in, if he’d known.
“Well,” he says. “I’m not.”
***
“You’re a good friend,” he says.
And the missing word is the loudest. Just. You’re just a good friend. Nothing less, surely, but nothing more, precisely. It’s the missing word that explains the sentence, explains the times when he invited others along to what Chris assumed was a date. Just them. It’s the missing word that completes the space between their hands when they walk just close enough.
He’s been a friend before, but it’s never felt like a retreat.
“Yeah,” Chris says, and swallows down his cold and useless pride. “You too.”
It’s a lie.
***
“I just can’t,” he says.
And that’s a lie too.
It’s cold and it’s cruel and it’s not at all what it is. Chris leaves and doesn’t come back. He has a phone, but it does not ring, and he has a house, but there is no one on his doorstep.
He has nothing else to say.
***
Sometimes Chris doesn’t dream at all. He gets into bed, he closes his eyes, and he opens them again. That’s it. That’s the end. What was true at night is true again in the morning. He cannot dream a wish into being and he cannot live a dream. He gets up, he gets dressed, and he does not think about the lonely dreams that might yet come to pass.
***
“I’m sorry,” he says.
And it’s not enough. It wouldn’t have been enough at the start and it’s not enough now. He is too far gone and there is too much said and unsaid to be unbound by two words.
“No,” Chris says, and maybe it’s what he should have said all along.
***
“I’m sorry,” he says.
And it’s a start. Try as he might; want as he might, Chris has never quite stopped rebuilding the sandcastle. Grain by grain. Night by night. Dreams do not so easily collapse.
“Okay.”
Pairing: Chris/Darren
Length/Rating: 500 / G
Summary: Read the title
Some nights Chris dreams.
“I have a girlfriend,” he says.
And it all makes sense. Every awkward pause. Every aborted touch. Every almost kiss. Chris blinks and the last three months shake apart like a dry sandcastle, held together with a whisper and trembling hands.
He tries to rewind the tape; replays the days and nights searching for all the things he must have missed, and comes up with a list that adds up to nothing. A pause can be a breath. An almost touch nervous hesitance of something new. A withdrawn kiss a sign of respect towards boundaries that cannot be uncrossed.
Or not. It is the unasked question answered.
“Oh,” Chris says, and carries on like he didn’t just realize he’d been building the castle alone.
***
“I’m straight,” he says.
And Chris laughs. And then he sobers. Stares. He feels like the punch line to a joke he did not know was being told. He wishes – sharply, keenly – that he had never even met him at all. There are better hands he could have left his heart in, if he’d known.
“Well,” he says. “I’m not.”
***
“You’re a good friend,” he says.
And the missing word is the loudest. Just. You’re just a good friend. Nothing less, surely, but nothing more, precisely. It’s the missing word that explains the sentence, explains the times when he invited others along to what Chris assumed was a date. Just them. It’s the missing word that completes the space between their hands when they walk just close enough.
He’s been a friend before, but it’s never felt like a retreat.
“Yeah,” Chris says, and swallows down his cold and useless pride. “You too.”
It’s a lie.
***
“I just can’t,” he says.
And that’s a lie too.
It’s cold and it’s cruel and it’s not at all what it is. Chris leaves and doesn’t come back. He has a phone, but it does not ring, and he has a house, but there is no one on his doorstep.
He has nothing else to say.
***
Sometimes Chris doesn’t dream at all. He gets into bed, he closes his eyes, and he opens them again. That’s it. That’s the end. What was true at night is true again in the morning. He cannot dream a wish into being and he cannot live a dream. He gets up, he gets dressed, and he does not think about the lonely dreams that might yet come to pass.
***
“I’m sorry,” he says.
And it’s not enough. It wouldn’t have been enough at the start and it’s not enough now. He is too far gone and there is too much said and unsaid to be unbound by two words.
“No,” Chris says, and maybe it’s what he should have said all along.
***
“I’m sorry,” he says.
And it’s a start. Try as he might; want as he might, Chris has never quite stopped rebuilding the sandcastle. Grain by grain. Night by night. Dreams do not so easily collapse.
“Okay.”
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