Silent Night
I wrote something. =) It makes me unbelievably happy.
Title: Silent Night
Author: Bo
Pairing(s): At first, I didn’t know.
Rating: PG
Word count: About 760
Disclaimer(s): Don’t own.
Warning(s): Unbeta'd
Summary: Two men and a phone. And they talk. Really.
Notes: I’m beginning to think I have a fixation with phones. This one is short and simple; didn’t know where it was going until it actually went there. A little play on what our newscaster said on an episode of Shukudai-kun. Hope you like it!
It is near 3 o’clock in the morning. The room hums with the kind of velvety darkness unique to that time of night. The air conditioner purrs; his feet scratch against the bed sheets as he shuffles away from the laptop and stretches like a cat. The laptop screen splashes a pool of bluish-white light onto his knees, illuminating the cell phone half tucked under the covers. He flips the phone open and begins to text, doesn’t hesitate and doesn’t hover over the choice of words like he does during the day.
Half a minute after the text is sent, when the laptop screen has blacked out and he’s closing it, the phone vibrates. He smiles and pushes the computer against the wall, and then lies back and snuggles into the pillow with the phone.
They begin, as they always do, at the middle of the conversation. He marvels at the way the lack of a beginning doesn’t count as long as there is a middle that they can jump into, like the welcoming, familiar taste of a cup of coffee that has been forgotten on the table. Beginnings aren’t important. Not between them.
He can feel his body relax into the mattress, unwinding along with the conversation. The other man’s voice is pressed low against the phone, as if he’s afraid to disturb his side of the quietness. They take a minute to admonish each other for staying up so late, though this is the typical bedtime for people in their business, though they talk at this time almost every night.
Just finished the movie that was on TV, you know, the one with Pierce Brosnan and that pretty blonde lady in it. Did I remember to put the leftovers from dinner in the fridge? The moon is a huge smile outside; can you see? I’ll have to check that later. You know, I just noticed, I have two different colored socks on. Yes. Yes. No. Really?
There is a loose string in the hem of his shirt and he twines it around and around his finger, lets it loose, and then winds it around again like their conversation, which is a bunch of loose ends all thrown together with no beginnings and no ends, more onomatopoeias than is actually in the language and very little sense, verbs and pronouns that don’t agree. It feels criminally good, to completely neglect the rules of grammar and logic and every day life, to not pay attention to the choice of words and their impact. The actual topics of the conversation matter very little; they revel in the strange freedom that floods them with a feral sense of triumph as their emotions spiral out into the air conditioned night.
Finally the phone has become so warm against his ear and his eyes are so heavy that he can’t stand it anymore. Good night, he says. It does not matter that he says this smack dab in the middle of his own sentence, because what follows becomes another part of the conversation, the goodbye part, the part they drag out for fifteen minutes, half an hour if they can, savoring it like the last lingering lick of a piece of chocolate.
And then he says it, just like that, without any sort of appropriate preamble, love you. An exodus of emotions tumbles into those two little words, and the words themselves seem so meek that for a second he doubts the other man can feel it at all. It’s just obvious enough to be ignored.
Love you, the other man says, no preamble, no hesitation. Love you too.
They never talk about their nocturnal conversations during the day. Like curses that lift with the midnight bell, their spell breaks at dawn with the honking of their manager’s cars waiting outside. During the day they have to mind their words and talk with purpose or without, hi-how-are-yous and what-was-your-question-agains. There are formats to answering questions, methods to avoid unnecessary misunderstanding. He tries his utmost to be sincere about everything he says out of respect for everyone who is listening, and what truth he cannot reveal he tucks away to save for the night. At night his words are never misunderstood, his opinions are never judged. All of his heart is in every pause and every giggle. But that is only at night.
Sometimes, though, Sho slips (he thinks he slips; he really can’t tell during the day), and he says without preamble or a moment’s hesitation: ”Me? I called Aiba-chan last night.”
Title: Silent Night
Author: Bo
Pairing(s): At first, I didn’t know.
Rating: PG
Word count: About 760
Disclaimer(s): Don’t own.
Warning(s): Unbeta'd
Summary: Two men and a phone. And they talk. Really.
Notes: I’m beginning to think I have a fixation with phones. This one is short and simple; didn’t know where it was going until it actually went there. A little play on what our newscaster said on an episode of Shukudai-kun. Hope you like it!
It is near 3 o’clock in the morning. The room hums with the kind of velvety darkness unique to that time of night. The air conditioner purrs; his feet scratch against the bed sheets as he shuffles away from the laptop and stretches like a cat. The laptop screen splashes a pool of bluish-white light onto his knees, illuminating the cell phone half tucked under the covers. He flips the phone open and begins to text, doesn’t hesitate and doesn’t hover over the choice of words like he does during the day.
Half a minute after the text is sent, when the laptop screen has blacked out and he’s closing it, the phone vibrates. He smiles and pushes the computer against the wall, and then lies back and snuggles into the pillow with the phone.
They begin, as they always do, at the middle of the conversation. He marvels at the way the lack of a beginning doesn’t count as long as there is a middle that they can jump into, like the welcoming, familiar taste of a cup of coffee that has been forgotten on the table. Beginnings aren’t important. Not between them.
He can feel his body relax into the mattress, unwinding along with the conversation. The other man’s voice is pressed low against the phone, as if he’s afraid to disturb his side of the quietness. They take a minute to admonish each other for staying up so late, though this is the typical bedtime for people in their business, though they talk at this time almost every night.
Just finished the movie that was on TV, you know, the one with Pierce Brosnan and that pretty blonde lady in it. Did I remember to put the leftovers from dinner in the fridge? The moon is a huge smile outside; can you see? I’ll have to check that later. You know, I just noticed, I have two different colored socks on. Yes. Yes. No. Really?
There is a loose string in the hem of his shirt and he twines it around and around his finger, lets it loose, and then winds it around again like their conversation, which is a bunch of loose ends all thrown together with no beginnings and no ends, more onomatopoeias than is actually in the language and very little sense, verbs and pronouns that don’t agree. It feels criminally good, to completely neglect the rules of grammar and logic and every day life, to not pay attention to the choice of words and their impact. The actual topics of the conversation matter very little; they revel in the strange freedom that floods them with a feral sense of triumph as their emotions spiral out into the air conditioned night.
Finally the phone has become so warm against his ear and his eyes are so heavy that he can’t stand it anymore. Good night, he says. It does not matter that he says this smack dab in the middle of his own sentence, because what follows becomes another part of the conversation, the goodbye part, the part they drag out for fifteen minutes, half an hour if they can, savoring it like the last lingering lick of a piece of chocolate.
And then he says it, just like that, without any sort of appropriate preamble, love you. An exodus of emotions tumbles into those two little words, and the words themselves seem so meek that for a second he doubts the other man can feel it at all. It’s just obvious enough to be ignored.
Love you, the other man says, no preamble, no hesitation. Love you too.
They never talk about their nocturnal conversations during the day. Like curses that lift with the midnight bell, their spell breaks at dawn with the honking of their manager’s cars waiting outside. During the day they have to mind their words and talk with purpose or without, hi-how-are-yous and what-was-your-question-agains. There are formats to answering questions, methods to avoid unnecessary misunderstanding. He tries his utmost to be sincere about everything he says out of respect for everyone who is listening, and what truth he cannot reveal he tucks away to save for the night. At night his words are never misunderstood, his opinions are never judged. All of his heart is in every pause and every giggle. But that is only at night.
Sometimes, though, Sho slips (he thinks he slips; he really can’t tell during the day), and he says without preamble or a moment’s hesitation: ”Me? I called Aiba-chan last night.”