[ his nose wrinkles at the first statement. he's going to be a brat about it - unfortunately, you don't get any control over how I feel - but he stops himself, because that's not helpful. he's diplomatic sometimes. therion gets to keep having his tail in his lap as punishment.
but he does listen, and he doesn't let up, because it's time for some of this to come out. his eyes stay down on the the crescents therion dug into his palm, cleaning them with a sterile packet of wipes he found in his pocket. ]
And that ended poorly, I assume.
[ because people who part ways on good terms don't have conversations like the one in the pharmacy. ]
[ that's an understatement. his fingers curl and flex, but otherwise, he holds perfectly still, staring down at his tail and trying not to think about it too much. there's no sense in holding grudges, and he doesn't hold one - but that doesn't mean he ever, ever wanted to see darius again.
his voice stays even, but that sardonic tone stays in the words. self deprecating, mean. bitter - saying nothing, but saying a lot, all at once. ]
[ because there's a lot here, but jiaoqiu can't do anything if he doesn't know, and - well, therion knows about him. he knows what wrecked jiaoqiu to the point of being unable to function. it might be nice for the scales to be a little balanced. ]
[ let's just start with ripping that bandaid off - it'll give jiaoqiu something to chew on, and that one's much easier than any of the emotional hurt that came from it. that was worse than the fall itself. ]
jiaoqiu doesn't react with his face, but his ears always betray him - immediately they pin back against his skull. almost in an angry fashion. a beat, as he wrestles control of the words he wants to say and swallows them back, bitter. his tail curls and flutters in therion's lap. ]
[ it - it makes him laugh? just a short, harsh noise, kind of humorless but less than you'd expect. he can't look at jiaoqiu right now, so he doesn't. ]
Yeah. Real Nobel Peace Prize kinda guy.
[ so he jokes back - as dry as the desert, and stares down at his glass. like it means nothing, like it doesn't matter.
he wants it not to matter. he so, so badly wants it not to matter. but it matters sometimes on rainy days, when the places where his bones shattered ache and hurt and he hides it. it matters in ways he doesn't really articulate, in ways that he doesn't trust anyone, that he guards his every single vulnerability, that he runs from closeness, attachment, and this - this, right here, is the closest he's ever come to it.
silence passes.
You were so easily manipulated by cheap words. You're nothing but a stepping stone to me. ]
No one does anything for no reason. [ he says, and downs the rest of the drink and lets it burn. it's gone, now, just dregs, but he keeps the glass in his hand, rolls it across his palm. ] A crime family we robbed offered him a high position if he got rid of me. Simple as that.
[ he cleans the cuts. he wipes them down, no matter how small, and then carefully wraps a little bit of gauze around them and tapes it. a little overkill, maybe. or maybe not.
silence, for a moment, as he absorbs it. months ago, therion had heard jiaoqiu's story, and the pieces clicked into place. it's the same now - therion can be as flippant about it as he wants, but jiaoqiu can see the timeline. someone he cared about, someone who he was likely with for a long time when he was younger, threw him off a cliff for power. it makes a lot of things make sense. the way he shifts a little more gingerly on rainy days, the way getting him to stay the night was like pulling teeth, the way he took the long way to get to a ramshackle apartment, the way he comes through windows and the way he nearly bit jiaoqiu's hand off when jiaoqiu tried to bandage him that first night they met. the way he treated sex like a business transaction, until they got a little too carried away and started to give a shit.
jiaoqiu links their fingers together. holds his hand. ]
I'm sure that you know it isn't your fault that he betrayed you.
[ he says, and the response is so quick, because - well, he believes that a hundred percent. that's not the crux of the issue, though, maybe it kind of is? but not in the way you might think. he continues, acerbic and sharp: ]
Or, if it was, it was because I was too good at it. That's the whole fucking reason. That's the thing about thieves: we don't travel well in packs. You put a couple of egos together in a room for too long, and fur starts flying.
[ that was, after all, why. it was what darius said. he was the better thief between the two of them. the better lockpick. better at staying silent. better at not making clumsy mistakes, finding seamless entrance routes. it made darius crazy, and it took therion too fucking long to realize it. it's what he deserved for trusting him. and in a way this phrasing is his version of self deprecation - he makes himself look just as bad, like it was mutual, when in reality, he didn't actually do anything wrong and the betrayal hit him harder than the cliffside.
his hand feels hot. he looks down at it, at the gauze and the tape, and the fact that jiaoqiu is holding his hand, and the ugly molten fire in his chest wants to bubble over and explode, splattering out his emotions like blood at a crime scene, and it's so much that he forces himself to look away from it, and that he can't, can't hold his hand back. can't squeeze or hold on. ]
He gave me this nice little parting gift [ a jerk of his shoulder towards his eye, covered by his bangs ] and chucked me off the side of the cliff. No wonder seeing me was such a surprise - he thought he finished the job.
You have never, in the time I have known you, had an ego. You are capable of exactly what you say you're capable of. I don't believe that this was anything that you predicted would happen. In fact, to me, it sounds like jealousy.
[ first of all. it's fine that he doesn't hold his hand back - he doesn't expect him to, because that'd be like reaching to grab out for someone to save him from falling, and he can't do that, because the fear of nobody reaching back is far more painful than hitting the ground. he understands it, now. but he is reaching. as much as the sludge allows him to lift his hand, he is trying. his tail flicks in therion's lap. ]
I only spoke with him for a few moments, and I could tell his confidence is not earned. He is all posture.
[ oh, that's generous. he definitely has an ego. however, he listens to this, and it's - it throws therion off guard, a little to hear jiaoqiu defend him so... intensely? he's defending him, seeing right through therion's story, the careful construction of himself as a little beast.
he finally turns his head to look at him, his visible eye just a little wide, before he composes himself, and - he is all posture gets another little sort of laugh, this one bubbling out of his mouth unbidden, and he looks away again because he has to, because its his turn to feel a pilot light. flick, flick, flick.
eventually, he tucks his face into the collar of his scarf. hiding from it, from that sudden, burst of something positive in the midst of telling tiny slivers of the awful fucking story of what happened to him the last time he trusted someone, has to swallow thick and sticky around something too warm. ]
... Doubt it. [ in his usual low voice, but - he's not sure if he really believes it. ] Unless we're after the same shit, there's no reason to.
[ sometimes you gotta tell a little lie in order to counteract someone's self esteem.
the laugh eases something in jiaoqiu's lungs. he breathes out slow, and presses his shoulder against therion's. keeps holding his hand, staring across the way at the wall. the whole place rumbles, as another train passes by, and his expression gets pinched because his poor ears are sensitive and it's loud. but again, he doesn't complain. ]
Is there anything I can do to convince you to stay at my apartment with me until he leaves town?
[ kind of... resigned. like he thinks therion is going to say no. ]
[ on the other hand, therion doesn't even flinch at the sound. no, the way he leans against him startles him more than the train does. slowly. slowly, his fingers curl. it's reflexive. subconscious. ]
Couldn't leave, if I did. Better if I didn't.
[ which probably doesn't sound that bad? but it's kind of a warning. it makes him kind of twitchy, the idea of being Trapped. that, and he's paranoid, so paranoid, that something could happen. not to himself. he doesn't really care about that, for all that confidence. ]
surprisingly, despite everything - this stupid little interaction, these stupid little interactions, the burn of the drink - it's been enough to bring him down to almost calm. he's gone from high strung and paranoid to quietly safe, sitting here. safe enough to, for the first time, talk about darius, even if it was tiptoe and roundabout, he spat out the words, and jiaoqiu's first response was to stay.
despite his shitty life. his shitty background. his fucking awful safehouse. the idea flickers across his head - we could just go, and the feeling of the word we in his own subconscious startles the hell out of him. reflexively, his hand curls again, and it's a hold. ]
This is my normal.
[ and it's obvious in four words, he's not just talking about the apartment, here. ]
[ but it doesn't have to be, is obvious in his four words.
he knows it's not fair and not right to trap a wild and free animal in a cage. therion would be unhappy to be stuck in one place forever, stagnant and rotting. but he supposes that he isn't even really thinking past today. it's hard to do that. the future is not a real thing to him, half the time. it's only because therion is here next to him, holding his hand, that he can even hear the train rattling past them.
he tilts his head back, looking up at the ceiling. therion has calmed down, and it puts him at ease, too. it makes him want to find them a kitchen, find them a meal, a blanket, a pillow and a warm place. to nap. ease down into the void together. sometimes, he thinks that he's a little more like moss than a person, growing slowly along the bark of something and threatening to rot the both of them.
he shakes his head a bit. feels therion's hand finally gripping back. breathes in, and then out. ]
I don't want you to be alone.
[ whatever it is, wherever they end up, that's unfathomable to him. the future is his nebulous work schedule. there isn't really anything else. but he is certain of this much. ]
[ almost reflexively, immediately: ] I'm fine by myself.
[ i don't want you to be alone.
it's just -
that's the thing. therion is and always has been, since darius, alone, and that's how he prefers it. he likes his silence. he likes his quiet. he likes that he's attachment free. he likes that he splits no scores, he leaves when he wants, he comes back when he wants. he does whatever his whimsy tells him to.
that's how it's supposed to be. and yet, he keeps finding himself coming back here. he thinks of, terrifyingly, phrases in 'we' instead of in 'I'. he can convince himself of it all he wants, but he is lonely, and it's spending time with jiaoqiu that has eased that, that has reminded him in all the good ways and the bad that he is lonely, and that having companionship has yet to end in... well, in the edge of a cliff. not yet. will jiaoqiu betray him, too? he doesn't know. what's scary is he doubts that he will with each month that goes by - and still, he was with darius for years, so the trust that could be built there is always limited by the word 'but'.
he looks down at his own hand, lightly bandaged, set lightly here. held, but not trapped.
therion's silent for a while after the initial statement, long enough for another train to rattle the walls of the apartment. his expression is stormy. hard to read, but if jiaoqiu is patient, he picks the thread up again. ]
...Don't really want him to dictate my life. [ therion says, after a long moment. darius' presence - it'd be much easier just to skip town. but why should he? it hurts his pride to have to skitter away from him. it feels like a loss. but the problem is that he doesn't want him to see what therion's 'manors' are, and in a way, it's too late for that. what's scary is that therion doesn't consider anything in this world "his", but this might just be the closest thing to it. ]
I doubt he'll stick around long. [ after all, therion's never run into him until now. just a stroke of bad luck. this feels like a non sequitur, but it's not, not really. ] Just need to lay low for a few days.
[ or. he's quiet for a second longer, then snorts. dry: ] You got any vacation days saved up?
[ this is a joke. (mostly.) it's not quite a joke, though, because what it is is an admittance - despite his initial response, the very, very tentatively built whatever this is is on steady enough ground that he extends a wounded paw out to be taken. ]
[ i'm fine by myself kind of... hurts? not as much as it could, because jiaoqiu does know that therion is trying to slam down the stone wall as much as he can out of instinct, that he's protecting himself. it makes sense, especially in the light of what he just told him. darius did some serious damage, and jiaoqiu doesn't exactly take it personally.
still. maybe it's just that he wonders, sometimes. jiaoqiu's world is less covered in fog, when therion is around. if it's the same both ways, or if it's more one-sided than that. he thinks it isn't. he's pretty sure therion cares in return, and just can't bring himself to say so, but phrases like that always make that uncertainty in his mind rise up. it doesn't really matter either way, he supposes, because he's happy to be used, genuinely happy to have some sort of purpose. if he can be a healing stepping stone for therion trusting people again, that might be nice. something to live for.
(it's stupid to think that therion would be so hurt by darius and then turn around and use someone in the same way, but his brain doesn't go in that direction - his lack of self worth doesn't quite get him there.)
he doesn't let go of therion's hand. he strokes the side of it it with his thumb. he's patient, letting therion work through whatever he's working through. doesn't wince, when the train comes through, though his ears do press down against his skull again.
the uncertainty lingers, but therion asks him if he has vacation days in a sort of joking way, and jiaoqiu glances at him with a little smile. ]
An alarming amount, yes. Or so says Sushang.
[ he is holding out his wounded paw for jiaoqiu to take, to bandage. he sees it. and instead of shying away, like before, he leans into it. ]
I can take a few days. I suppose it is my turn to do something new.
[ the miscommunication trope rises once again but the lore makes it slightly (?) less bad
it's funny how telling people why you are the way you are, at least a little bit, can help smooth the way in interactions where you're vulnerable. he's exactly right, that it is protective, putting up iron walls and barbed wire to keep himself from being hurt again.
when jiaoqiu glances at him, he'll find therion looking back. his expression is inscrutable, though he's taking in those flattened ears. he's taking in the thumb that strokes the side of his hand. how scary that is, how cutting and running would be so much easier - maybe not today, but in the long run - and how selfish it would be, or how much pain it might save jiaoqiu, in the future.
there's another quiet pause as he looks back outwards at the blank, paint-peeling wall. the joke wasn't really a joke, just another shield up for what is an increasingly vulnerable question. his mouth feels dry, and it's somewhere near that panic point again, in an entirely different direction - his pulse jumps, and he keeps it off his face. casual. nonchalant. ]
... Stay here, or go somewhere else?
[ it's an offer. another tentative one. does he want to stay in the city? or leave it. ]
[ how much pain it might save jiaoqiu in the future is a very funny phrase, considering therion knows that jiaoqiu annually goes to sit in a graveyard all day and disassociate. he does really well with people cutting and running. definitely does not torture himself for years afterwards because of someone leaving.
anyway, he tilts his head a bit. ]
I don't have a preference. Though it may feel a bit more like a vacation if we went somewhere else.
[ we, he says. us. he knows that's scary, but he needs it for himself. he needs to do something to reassure himself that this means something. he's casual, though. he understands how vulnerable this is, but he's going to treat it like it's something normal, because he imagines that therion would hate kid-gloves. jiaoqiu would too. his brain is broken, he's not five. ]
he's quiet again, and the word we is not lost on him, either. his pulse jumps again, and - well, jiaoqiu's got it right, this is about the only way to handle this. treat it like it's normal. pretend there's nothing massive happening, pretending the implications of this moment are not a heel turn into - into dangerous territory, but hasn't he been in dangerous territory for months, now?
what does he want. does he want to leave? he thinks about running as far away as he can, as far from everything, and he's not - sure that he's ready to pack up and run with jiaoqiu yet. that feels like a huge step, because that's what he did with darius, after all. place to place to place.
behind his scarf, he swallows, tucking his face into it a little further. like it's a shield, and then feels around in his pockets for his burner phone. it's not the fanciest thing in the world, but it has wifi, and he scrolls on it for a few minutes until he opens up whatever the equivalent of expedia is, types in the name of the city jiaoqiu lives in, sets the rating of the hotel to five stars, and passes the phone to him. ]
Pick one.
[ the dissonance of this garbage apartment and the prices of the places on this list is not small ]
[ it's okay jiaoqiu is also a fucking moron so they were made for each other
he watches therion scrunch down into his scarf with a slightly amused look, but waits. and when therion hands him the phone, he... raises his eyebrows. oh! okay. well. ]
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no subject
but he does listen, and he doesn't let up, because it's time for some of this to come out. his eyes stay down on the the crescents therion dug into his palm, cleaning them with a sterile packet of wipes he found in his pocket. ]
And that ended poorly, I assume.
[ because people who part ways on good terms don't have conversations like the one in the pharmacy. ]
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Yeah, you could say that.
[ that's an understatement. his fingers curl and flex, but otherwise, he holds perfectly still, staring down at his tail and trying not to think about it too much. there's no sense in holding grudges, and he doesn't hold one - but that doesn't mean he ever, ever wanted to see darius again.
his voice stays even, but that sardonic tone stays in the words. self deprecating, mean. bitter - saying nothing, but saying a lot, all at once. ]
Taught me a lesson or two.
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Will you tell me what happened? Please.
[ because there's a lot here, but jiaoqiu can't do anything if he doesn't know, and - well, therion knows about him. he knows what wrecked jiaoqiu to the point of being unable to function. it might be nice for the scales to be a little balanced. ]
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He pushed me off a cliff.
[ let's just start with ripping that bandaid off - it'll give jiaoqiu something to chew on, and that one's much easier than any of the emotional hurt that came from it. that was worse than the fall itself. ]
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jiaoqiu doesn't react with his face, but his ears always betray him - immediately they pin back against his skull. almost in an angry fashion. a beat, as he wrestles control of the words he wants to say and swallows them back, bitter. his tail curls and flutters in therion's lap. ]
That's not very nice.
[ dryly. ]
For no reason?
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Yeah. Real Nobel Peace Prize kinda guy.
[ so he jokes back - as dry as the desert, and stares down at his glass. like it means nothing, like it doesn't matter.
he wants it not to matter. he so, so badly wants it not to matter. but it matters sometimes on rainy days, when the places where his bones shattered ache and hurt and he hides it. it matters in ways he doesn't really articulate, in ways that he doesn't trust anyone, that he guards his every single vulnerability, that he runs from closeness, attachment, and this - this, right here, is the closest he's ever come to it.
silence passes.
You were so easily manipulated by cheap words. You're nothing but a stepping stone to me. ]
No one does anything for no reason. [ he says, and downs the rest of the drink and lets it burn. it's gone, now, just dregs, but he keeps the glass in his hand, rolls it across his palm. ] A crime family we robbed offered him a high position if he got rid of me. Simple as that.
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silence, for a moment, as he absorbs it. months ago, therion had heard jiaoqiu's story, and the pieces clicked into place. it's the same now - therion can be as flippant about it as he wants, but jiaoqiu can see the timeline. someone he cared about, someone who he was likely with for a long time when he was younger, threw him off a cliff for power. it makes a lot of things make sense. the way he shifts a little more gingerly on rainy days, the way getting him to stay the night was like pulling teeth, the way he took the long way to get to a ramshackle apartment, the way he comes through windows and the way he nearly bit jiaoqiu's hand off when jiaoqiu tried to bandage him that first night they met. the way he treated sex like a business transaction, until they got a little too carried away and started to give a shit.
jiaoqiu links their fingers together. holds his hand. ]
I'm sure that you know it isn't your fault that he betrayed you.
[ people die. not your fault. ]
no subject
[ he says, and the response is so quick, because - well, he believes that a hundred percent. that's not the crux of the issue, though, maybe it kind of is? but not in the way you might think. he continues, acerbic and sharp: ]
Or, if it was, it was because I was too good at it. That's the whole fucking reason. That's the thing about thieves: we don't travel well in packs. You put a couple of egos together in a room for too long, and fur starts flying.
[ that was, after all, why. it was what darius said. he was the better thief between the two of them. the better lockpick. better at staying silent. better at not making clumsy mistakes, finding seamless entrance routes. it made darius crazy, and it took therion too fucking long to realize it. it's what he deserved for trusting him. and in a way this phrasing is his version of self deprecation - he makes himself look just as bad, like it was mutual, when in reality, he didn't actually do anything wrong and the betrayal hit him harder than the cliffside.
his hand feels hot. he looks down at it, at the gauze and the tape, and the fact that jiaoqiu is holding his hand, and the ugly molten fire in his chest wants to bubble over and explode, splattering out his emotions like blood at a crime scene, and it's so much that he forces himself to look away from it, and that he can't, can't hold his hand back. can't squeeze or hold on. ]
He gave me this nice little parting gift [ a jerk of his shoulder towards his eye, covered by his bangs ] and chucked me off the side of the cliff. No wonder seeing me was such a surprise - he thought he finished the job.
no subject
You have never, in the time I have known you, had an ego. You are capable of exactly what you say you're capable of. I don't believe that this was anything that you predicted would happen. In fact, to me, it sounds like jealousy.
[ first of all. it's fine that he doesn't hold his hand back - he doesn't expect him to, because that'd be like reaching to grab out for someone to save him from falling, and he can't do that, because the fear of nobody reaching back is far more painful than hitting the ground. he understands it, now. but he is reaching. as much as the sludge allows him to lift his hand, he is trying. his tail flicks in therion's lap. ]
I only spoke with him for a few moments, and I could tell his confidence is not earned. He is all posture.
[ jiaoqiu said darius has a small dick ]
... Is he going to come after you?
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he finally turns his head to look at him, his visible eye just a little wide, before he composes himself, and - he is all posture gets another little sort of laugh, this one bubbling out of his mouth unbidden, and he looks away again because he has to, because its his turn to feel a pilot light. flick, flick, flick.
eventually, he tucks his face into the collar of his scarf. hiding from it, from that sudden, burst of something positive in the midst of telling tiny slivers of the awful fucking story of what happened to him the last time he trusted someone, has to swallow thick and sticky around something too warm. ]
... Doubt it. [ in his usual low voice, but - he's not sure if he really believes it. ] Unless we're after the same shit, there's no reason to.
[ and yet, he practically ran all the way here. ]
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the laugh eases something in jiaoqiu's lungs. he breathes out slow, and presses his shoulder against therion's. keeps holding his hand, staring across the way at the wall. the whole place rumbles, as another train passes by, and his expression gets pinched because his poor ears are sensitive and it's loud. but again, he doesn't complain. ]
Is there anything I can do to convince you to stay at my apartment with me until he leaves town?
[ kind of... resigned. like he thinks therion is going to say no. ]
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Couldn't leave, if I did. Better if I didn't.
[ which probably doesn't sound that bad? but it's kind of a warning. it makes him kind of twitchy, the idea of being Trapped. that, and he's paranoid, so paranoid, that something could happen. not to himself. he doesn't really care about that, for all that confidence. ]
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Well, then - shall I stay here?
[ he won't trap therion, but he doesn't want to leave him alone, either. ]
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looks at him so flatly ]
You. In this place.
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[ mildly. like, look, this has four walls. that's pretty good. ]
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and watches his reaction ]
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okay listen his nose gets wrinkly at the sound, but the second it's done: ]
I will get used to it.
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surprisingly, despite everything - this stupid little interaction, these stupid little interactions, the burn of the drink - it's been enough to bring him down to almost calm. he's gone from high strung and paranoid to quietly safe, sitting here. safe enough to, for the first time, talk about darius, even if it was tiptoe and roundabout, he spat out the words, and jiaoqiu's first response was to stay.
despite his shitty life. his shitty background. his fucking awful safehouse. the idea flickers across his head - we could just go, and the feeling of the word we in his own subconscious startles the hell out of him. reflexively, his hand curls again, and it's a hold. ]
This is my normal.
[ and it's obvious in four words, he's not just talking about the apartment, here. ]
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[ but it doesn't have to be, is obvious in his four words.
he knows it's not fair and not right to trap a wild and free animal in a cage. therion would be unhappy to be stuck in one place forever, stagnant and rotting. but he supposes that he isn't even really thinking past today. it's hard to do that. the future is not a real thing to him, half the time. it's only because therion is here next to him, holding his hand, that he can even hear the train rattling past them.
he tilts his head back, looking up at the ceiling. therion has calmed down, and it puts him at ease, too. it makes him want to find them a kitchen, find them a meal, a blanket, a pillow and a warm place. to nap. ease down into the void together. sometimes, he thinks that he's a little more like moss than a person, growing slowly along the bark of something and threatening to rot the both of them.
he shakes his head a bit. feels therion's hand finally gripping back. breathes in, and then out. ]
I don't want you to be alone.
[ whatever it is, wherever they end up, that's unfathomable to him. the future is his nebulous work schedule. there isn't really anything else. but he is certain of this much. ]
no subject
[ i don't want you to be alone.
it's just -
that's the thing. therion is and always has been, since darius, alone, and that's how he prefers it. he likes his silence. he likes his quiet. he likes that he's attachment free. he likes that he splits no scores, he leaves when he wants, he comes back when he wants. he does whatever his whimsy tells him to.
that's how it's supposed to be. and yet, he keeps finding himself coming back here. he thinks of, terrifyingly, phrases in 'we' instead of in 'I'. he can convince himself of it all he wants, but he is lonely, and it's spending time with jiaoqiu that has eased that, that has reminded him in all the good ways and the bad that he is lonely, and that having companionship has yet to end in... well, in the edge of a cliff. not yet. will jiaoqiu betray him, too? he doesn't know. what's scary is he doubts that he will with each month that goes by - and still, he was with darius for years, so the trust that could be built there is always limited by the word 'but'.
he looks down at his own hand, lightly bandaged, set lightly here. held, but not trapped.
therion's silent for a while after the initial statement, long enough for another train to rattle the walls of the apartment. his expression is stormy. hard to read, but if jiaoqiu is patient, he picks the thread up again. ]
...Don't really want him to dictate my life. [ therion says, after a long moment. darius' presence - it'd be much easier just to skip town. but why should he? it hurts his pride to have to skitter away from him. it feels like a loss. but the problem is that he doesn't want him to see what therion's 'manors' are, and in a way, it's too late for that. what's scary is that therion doesn't consider anything in this world "his", but this might just be the closest thing to it. ]
I doubt he'll stick around long. [ after all, therion's never run into him until now. just a stroke of bad luck. this feels like a non sequitur, but it's not, not really. ] Just need to lay low for a few days.
[ or. he's quiet for a second longer, then snorts. dry: ] You got any vacation days saved up?
[ this is a joke. (mostly.) it's not quite a joke, though, because what it is is an admittance - despite his initial response, the very, very tentatively built whatever this is is on steady enough ground that he extends a wounded paw out to be taken. ]
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still. maybe it's just that he wonders, sometimes. jiaoqiu's world is less covered in fog, when therion is around. if it's the same both ways, or if it's more one-sided than that. he thinks it isn't. he's pretty sure therion cares in return, and just can't bring himself to say so, but phrases like that always make that uncertainty in his mind rise up. it doesn't really matter either way, he supposes, because he's happy to be used, genuinely happy to have some sort of purpose. if he can be a healing stepping stone for therion trusting people again, that might be nice. something to live for.
(it's stupid to think that therion would be so hurt by darius and then turn around and use someone in the same way, but his brain doesn't go in that direction - his lack of self worth doesn't quite get him there.)
he doesn't let go of therion's hand. he strokes the side of it it with his thumb. he's patient, letting therion work through whatever he's working through. doesn't wince, when the train comes through, though his ears do press down against his skull again.
the uncertainty lingers, but therion asks him if he has vacation days in a sort of joking way, and jiaoqiu glances at him with a little smile. ]
An alarming amount, yes. Or so says Sushang.
[ he is holding out his wounded paw for jiaoqiu to take, to bandage. he sees it. and instead of shying away, like before, he leans into it. ]
I can take a few days. I suppose it is my turn to do something new.
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it's funny how telling people why you are the way you are, at least a little bit, can help smooth the way in interactions where you're vulnerable. he's exactly right, that it is protective, putting up iron walls and barbed wire to keep himself from being hurt again.
when jiaoqiu glances at him, he'll find therion looking back. his expression is inscrutable, though he's taking in those flattened ears. he's taking in the thumb that strokes the side of his hand. how scary that is, how cutting and running would be so much easier - maybe not today, but in the long run - and how selfish it would be, or how much pain it might save jiaoqiu, in the future.
there's another quiet pause as he looks back outwards at the blank, paint-peeling wall. the joke wasn't really a joke, just another shield up for what is an increasingly vulnerable question. his mouth feels dry, and it's somewhere near that panic point again, in an entirely different direction - his pulse jumps, and he keeps it off his face. casual. nonchalant. ]
... Stay here, or go somewhere else?
[ it's an offer. another tentative one. does he want to stay in the city? or leave it. ]
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anyway, he tilts his head a bit. ]
I don't have a preference. Though it may feel a bit more like a vacation if we went somewhere else.
[ we, he says. us. he knows that's scary, but he needs it for himself. he needs to do something to reassure himself that this means something. he's casual, though. he understands how vulnerable this is, but he's going to treat it like it's something normal, because he imagines that therion would hate kid-gloves. jiaoqiu would too. his brain is broken, he's not five. ]
What do you want?
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he's quiet again, and the word we is not lost on him, either. his pulse jumps again, and - well, jiaoqiu's got it right, this is about the only way to handle this. treat it like it's normal. pretend there's nothing massive happening, pretending the implications of this moment are not a heel turn into - into dangerous territory, but hasn't he been in dangerous territory for months, now?
what does he want. does he want to leave? he thinks about running as far away as he can, as far from everything, and he's not - sure that he's ready to pack up and run with jiaoqiu yet. that feels like a huge step, because that's what he did with darius, after all. place to place to place.
behind his scarf, he swallows, tucking his face into it a little further. like it's a shield, and then feels around in his pockets for his burner phone. it's not the fanciest thing in the world, but it has wifi, and he scrolls on it for a few minutes until he opens up whatever the equivalent of expedia is, types in the name of the city jiaoqiu lives in, sets the rating of the hotel to five stars, and passes the phone to him. ]
Pick one.
[ the dissonance of this garbage apartment and the prices of the places on this list is not small ]
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he watches therion scrunch down into his scarf with a slightly amused look, but waits. and when therion hands him the phone, he... raises his eyebrows. oh! okay. well. ]
I'm not sure how much money you think I make.
[ he says, bemused. ]
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