(no subject)
title: equilibrium (1/2)
author:
chimneypot
a/n: college au part ii
for
slowascent
Mass romantic fool
Separated by sheets when the curtain calls you
Speaking on the themes of stolen virtue
Missing from the radio
Now this romantic duel is into the streets
Bon appetit
You’ve eaten me alive, you realise
The New Pornographers, Mass Romantic
*
It’s awkward afterwards, obviously, but not as awkward as it could have been. All things being equal - not likely - it could have been a lot worse. Daniel was the first to leave, silently, without making the bed or checking his reflection in the mirror. Carlos watched him go, took a shower, and tried to ignore the conflicting emotions flickering inside him like the lights of an empty house. Daniel called him three days later; when Carlos congratulated him on waiting the requisite three days he found himself talking to the dial tone.
They run into each other on the street and Carlos invites Daniel to go for coffee. Instead of their normal haunt they stumble into a small place down an alley, buttery walls and frothy upholstery but it’s the nearest place and neither of them really care. Carlos can’t help but think that Daniel is oddly suited to the fluted, ornate chandeliers and soft lighting careful as a mother’s kiss. He, on the other hand, wants to throw a party here and wreck the place with paint and puke. Careful prettiness has always bored him so much.
“So,” he says to Daniel, who is rubbing his hands together between his closed knees. “How’re the kids?”
“Fine, thank you. Little Jimmy’s kicked the smack,” but Daniel’s smile is strained and uncertain, quavering like the fading note of a flute.
“Well, that’s great. Who’ll I get my gear from now,” Carlos replies, and then they’re both silent. He watches the waitress walk away. She matches the décor, all faded lace and quiet grace, wheat-coloured hair tied back with pearls that he bets she got cheap in some mass-production chainstore. When he turns back, Daniel is holding the gilt-edged china cup and watching Carlos watch the girl.
“She’s probably about sixteen, Carlos. Assuming that ages mean something to you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Carlos says. “Are you getting pissy because I’m looking at other girls?”
“Other girls?” Daniel says. “I’m not fucking - Jesus, Carlos, don’t start by being such a prick, okay.”
Carlos wants to argue, but he just ends up saying, “Okay,” and watches Daniel drink his coffee. He holds the cup with both hands, giving him a childish air, as though he has to concentrate on not spilling anything.
“Have you decided,” Daniel says finally.
“Decided what?”
“You know. Um. Us,” accompanied by an awkward gesture encompassing their table. “I mean. What you want to do with this whole thing.”
“Ah, Christ, Dan,” Carlos sighs. “We fucked. Once.”
It’s the sadistic streak in him that enjoys Daniel’s almost-hidden wince, the red shimmering on his cheekbones like the fading butterfly-stripes of a car’s tail lights.
“Yes, but. Look, I know that your life is just a whirlwind of screwing fashion models and the occasional tranny or whatever but I’m not like you. If I sleep with someone I want it to mean something - foreign as the concept may be to you.”
Carlos can tell Daniel’s working up to something, so he decides to beat him to it. “You’re saying you want me to do you more than once.”
“Can’t you just be normal and call it a relationship?”
“There’s no fun in that.”
“But there’s fun in avoiding the issue, right?”
Carlos is surprised by that - he doesn’t know why he keeps forgetting how sharp Daniel is. Despite being a smart, savvy kind of a guy, he’s always been one to be taken in by appearances, by the romantic gauze cast by alcoholic writers on the poison of their choice, by the one-night-stand cocaine glitter in a girl’s eye that promises more than it can ever deliver. He forgets that Daniel, despite looking so mild, can tear him down instantly. He doesn’t like being reminded - it makes him feel out of his depth, out of control of the situation. But he knows one way he can control Daniel; and Carlos has always been oh-so-good at twisting other people’s feelings to suit him.
“Dan, darling, I would be absolutely delighted to make an engagement with you for another time.”
*
He hears Daniel and Paul speaking to each other in French, softly. Walking to the subway from the only practise they’ve been able to get in this month, Carlos says, “I didn’t know you spoke French.”
“You know I lived in France. It’s a pretty obvious assumption.”
They don’t talk on the subway ride back, aside from that. Two steps into Carlos’ apartment and he grabs Daniel’s face, holds it between his spider-leg fingers, and kisses him harshly. He pushes Daniel back against the wall and nudges a knee inbetween his thighs, and he’s the one who leads Daniel to the bedroom this time around. Maybe it’s the familiar surroundings, the removal of the seedy hotel-encounter vibe, or maybe Daniel is just more prepared this time around but when it’s over he doesn’t seem quite as uneasy, quite as ready to bolt as he was before.
After, Daniel lies on his back and stares at the ceiling while Carlos wanders about his room, mindlessly picking things up and putting them back down, staring out the dirty window at the shitty view of the parking lot. They exchange meaningless words, as though they’re strangers in a doctor’s waiting room; Carlos stares at Daniel out of the corner of his eye, but looks away whenever he glances in his direction. Daniel has a preoccupied frown on his face and every so often his lips move silently, which means that he’s thinking deeply about something.
“What are you thinking about?” Carlos says, lying down on the bed next to him. “If you say the band, so help me God, I will cut you.”
Daniel smiles. “I was, actually. I didn’t think you’d guess.”
“Hi, I’m Carlos. I believe we’ve met before.”
“Oh, shut up.”
Daniel stretches and turns to face the window, away from Carlos. His neck is cream and coral, curving softly to meet his shoulders like the winding inside of a shell, hiding a deep secret core.
“Dan, Dan,” Carlos says, and reaches out to touch his shoulderblades with his fingertips. Where Daniel would have wings, if he ever grew them. Carlos used to fantasise about that as a child - being able to fly so high that everyone would be as small as ants swarming on the ground.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
*
They meet in college a few days later, because apparently calling each other isn’t really their thing. Daniel in a soft sky-blue tshirt and black jeans, Carlos in his customary all-black outfit with his steel-toed boots.
“You look like you just fell out of a tree,” Carlos says blandly.
“You look like Robert Smith just puked all over you.”
“Come here.” Carlos tries to pat some of Daniel’s hair back into place (because seriously, he couldn’t have actually been going for the startled chipmunk look) but he ducks away, scowling.
“Go ’way, Carlos,” but he’s smiling even as he runs a hand through his hair, ruffling it further.
“You really need a haircut, Dan.”
“I’m fine the way I am. I like it like this.”
“That can’t possibly be true,” Carlos says, but he gives up anyway. “Let’s go and get something to eat, I’m starved. No roommates means no food to steal.”
“You shouldn’t be doing that anyway,” Daniel says, but he grins. They walk across the campus together and Carlos casually leans a hand on the small of Daniel’s back. He’s always liked that about being with someone, the casual appropriation of their body. He likes that he can touch them, can signal possession to the world with a small gesture; Carlos has always liked other people to know what he has. Daniel, though, shrugs him off; and when Carlos replaces his hand ten minutes later, he removes it firmly.
“Not here,” he says quietly.
“What?” Carlos says, and maybe it came out a little snappier than he intended but he’s more offended than he’d normally be at something like this.
“It’s just… I don’t like it. You know.”
“No, I don’t. You don’t like what? Me touching you? You seemed pretty keen on it before.”
Daniel colours suddenly. “That’s not called for. I don’t like, you know, public affection. It creeps me out, like there are all these people being led around by someone else or something. I can walk perfectly well.”
“I wasn’t implying that. I wasn’t implying you were crippled or anything, except maybe by your fashion sense.”
“Coming from the guy who dresses like a gay Hitler, that really stings. Oh, my wounded heart.”
“Fuck off, you look like a walking advertisement for the Disney Channel.”
“If I’m not cool enough to be seen with you then why are you suddenly all over me?” Daniel snaps. Carlos thought that they were just joking about till now, but okay, if this is how Daniel wants to play it then he’ll bite.
“I wasn’t all over you! I was putting my fucking hand on your fucking back and if you’re so fucking prudish about that then I won’t, I’ll just post a fucking invitation instead and wait for your permission.”
“Look, I wasn’t - hang on,” Daniel says. A tense moment, until a smile breaks over his face suddenly, like a warm breeze. “You’re mad because you’re being possessive, aren’t you?”
“No,” Carlos says sulkily.
“You are!” Daniel says, grinning. “Are you going to beat up anyone who looks at me now?”
Carlos glares at him for a second, but beyond the teasing, he thinks he can see something real in Daniel’s eyes, genuine happiness. And for a second - only a second - he wants to say something really cruel, to crush that puppyish delight, just to show that he can, that he can control Daniel however he wants. To show Daniel that he’s not really impervious to Carlos. But he also feels a rush of power at having inspired that look in someone else’s face, sweet and strong. It’s intoxicating to know that he can make someone this pleased with a small gesture, so he settles for saying, “Only the girls,” and squeezing Daniel’s wrist, secretly, when nobody else can see.
*
“You never want to stand out,” Carlos says, all wrapped up in Daniel’s sheets. He’d shown up about an hour ago, at three a.m., just as Daniel was getting back from a night out with his friends. He’d been sort of hurt that Daniel hadn’t even invited him out, that he hadn’t known - but then Daniel had kissed him with the lack of inhibition he only had when he couldn’t stand straight, and Carlos had stopped complaining.
“Some people are made to, that’s all.”
“And you’re not?”
“No.”
“Bullshit.”
“It’s not, Carlos. I’m not like you. People don’t just pay attention to me, okay,” Daniel says, and he probably wouldn’t be saying this at all if it hadn’t been for the whiskey.
“You don’t make them. You have to make them.” Carlos, for once, is sober.
“I don’t know how. And I don’t really want to, either.”
“But it must get so… Lonely.” Carlos is watching his face now, Daniel who’s staring at the ceiling, vulnerable and drunk, avoiding his eyes.
“It’s not really. I’m not an exhibitionist. I don’t crave attention.”
“You do more than that. You deflect it.”
“It’s just,” Daniel says, and then he’s silent for a moment. “It’s like this. Some people are lights, right? Big bright lights who everyone crowds around and they warm everyone up. Some people light up the room and people like light so they stay there. And some people don’t.”
Carlos is silent. Daniel sighs and turns away from him - always away from him.
“And some people are mirrors,” Daniel says, so quietly Carlos almost can’t hear him. “They just reflect the lights. But still. It’s not such a tragedy. The room ends up brighter.”
Carlos doesn’t say anything.
In the morning, neither of them mention this exchange. Carlos wonders whether he should have argued with Dan - but then, he does sort of agree with him, if he’s honest.
*
And really, there’s something to be said for doing things Daniel’s way, the subtle way. Sometimes. Of course, Carlos still finds it boring as fuck most of the time, and he likes to screw with Daniel, groping him on the subway, kissing him messily that one time in front of the lecturer that Daniel had a fucking hard-on for or something by the way he kept going on. He’d gotten mad then, stormed away from Carlos and called him a string of expletives that seemed all wrong coming out of Daniel’s mouth.
Carlos likes to think that his insults are as light and meaningless as feathers, but they always feel more like thorns. Trouble is, Daniel’s such a perceptive person. Carlos is, too, but in a different way. He can size people up in a second and figure how they can benefit him; don’t delay call now and find out how you can make it work for you. Daniel, though. He sees the potential in people in all different ways. He thinks about them and works out why they act and talk and dream the way they do, and he won’t hesitate to use it against them if he has to. Carlos cuts people down by building himself up until he uses all the oxygen and blocks out all the sky, withering their attacks away to nothing. But Daniel is needle-precise and he always knows exactly where to prick.
Carlos isn’t used to being bested. Especially not by Daniel.
*
It’s closing in on May, so everyone’s having their last hurrah before they have to start studying; as a consequence Carlos has been high for about six nights in a row. Tonight’s lucky number seven and he finally managed to convince Daniel to come out with him; even the idea of Daniel sitting in his room with yet another box set of shitty French films was starting to set his teeth on edge. But Daniel had been surprisingly compliant and had agreed to come out with him, only balked a little when Carlos suggested they hit a club on his usual scene.
And honestly, it’s probably the industrial quantities of E by now (because Carlos has gotten to the stage where he’s got to keep throwing the pills back into his body to cheat the comedown he can feel hanging over him, like a tidal wave) but he’s been doubled over laughing for at least twenty minutes by the sight of Daniel talking to Simon, looking perfectly placid and only mildly drunk but with the tell-tale tics of uneasiness that Carlos has come to know. His smile flickers and fades like cheap lighting in a cheap apartment block. Carlos saunters over, casting Daniel in shadow, and hooks his arm around his shoulders. Daniel, automatically, shrugs him off.
“You’ve seriously never even tried eyeliner?” Simon’s asking him, in that voice Carlos knows is specifically designed to make people feel bad.
“Well,” Daniel says, leaning in closely, as though revealing a secret, “I just don’t like it. I think men look better without makeup, the way people look better with their natural eyebrows.” He’s drunker than Carlos thought, but he looks so good, dishevelled and sweaty as a whorehouse bed.
“Bitchy bitchy!” Simon exclaims, ostensibly mocking, but he doesn’t hide his anger very well.
“Not really. That’s your territory, isn’t it?” Daniel says, tilting the neck of his bottle towards him in an ironic salute.
Simon walks off. Carlos grins and presses his face into Daniel’s neck, full of artificial love for the world. Daniel scrunches his face up uncomfortably but submits to the embrace, and when Carlos looks at him again he’s smiling too, drunk and content. The club is full of glittering girls and guys and everything inbetween, with too much makeup and fake everything.
“Eyeliner isn’t just for girls,” Carlos says.
“As far as I’m concerned it is,” Daniel says. “I don’t care about being progressive or genderfuck or whatever people say now.”
“But it’s interesting to fuck with boundaries, don’t you think?” Carlos says. “Don’t you think though? I mean to take something out of its context - eyeliner is a traditional symbol of femininity, but taken out of its ideological context it’s reduced to a mere object, to an ornamentation, and once you’re free of its symbolic use you can subvert it for your own purpose. You can strip it of its purpose and use preconceived notions against the people bound up in them. It’s a form of rebellion against the traditional perception of masculinity.”
“It’s makeup,” Daniel says flatly. “You’re totally wired right now, aren’t you?”
“Yes!” Carlos says, his smile so wide and shiny and utterly untrue. “It’s fantastic. Come on. Let me introduce you,” and he grabs Daniel, pulling him by his arm through the room. They weave through the crowds, the voices heavy and ugly as chords on a ruined piano, makeup smeared everywhere and blood caked on fingers. Carlos smiles at Daniel, who doesn’t smile back, just looks around him nervously.
“Hey, hey,” Carlos says, tapping his friend Gala on the shoulder. Gala took her name from Salvador Dali’s wife, even though she looks more like one of his creations: her arms are tattooed with wide, staring eyes, their pupils picked out in various jewel tones, anthemyst and jade and sapphire. Carlos gets the feeling that he could spend hours decorating each one individually, brushing on a rainbow of eyeshadow carefully, lining each eye with such love and precision. He loves being this high; he loves everything. He’s in the nooks and crannies of the wonderful, glimmering universe, he’s fucking cosmic, he’s all the bright turquoise summer skies and all the jet jewelled nights. He’s counting out his heartbeat with the stars, and tracing Daniel’s face in the moon.
“Gala, this is Dan, Dan this is Gala.” He doesn’t ever want to leave Dan’s side again, doesn’t want to let go of Daniel’s arm, so alive and solid, his veins throbbing with crushed rubies and garnets. The rest of their conversation goes over his head; Daniel making some small talk, Gala arching an eyebrow, cocking a hip, running a thumb down Daniel’s face. He starts back, and Gala leans in again; when she falls into Daniel, Carlos realises just how smashed she is. He laughs, again, as Daniel staggers under her weight.
“Carlos, fucking help me!” he says, hauling her to her feet, and the two of them drag her away from the crowd of gawkers who do nothing but watch. Her boyfriend is over by the bar and thankfully he’s sober enough to take her home. Daniel sits down on his vacated barstool and sighs heavily.
“She’s not exactly thin, is she,” Carlos whispers, and Daniel begins to laugh silently, which he does when he finds something really funny. His shoulder shake and he makes no noise at all; if Carlos didn’t know better, he’d swear Daniel was having a seizure. After a beat, Carlos joins in, and the two of them sit next to each other, leaning on each other’s shoulders, shaking with laughter. If Carlos could reach out and kiss the world right now, he would, but instead he kisses Daniel. He’s so high that he doesn’t even care when Daniel pushes him away and looks embarrassed.
*
He can see the struggle, sometimes, when Daniel can’t decide whether he hates him or not. It’s not a love-hate relationship because while he’s pretty sure Daniel somethings him he’s equally sure it’s not love. On good days he thinks it’s the way smaller objects orbit a larger one, in space. On bad days, he thinks it’s the way things get sucked into black holes, or quicksand.
Most of the time he thinks it might just be bad luck.
author:
chimneypot
a/n: college au part ii
for
slowascent
Mass romantic fool
Separated by sheets when the curtain calls you
Speaking on the themes of stolen virtue
Missing from the radio
Now this romantic duel is into the streets
Bon appetit
You’ve eaten me alive, you realise
The New Pornographers, Mass Romantic
*
It’s awkward afterwards, obviously, but not as awkward as it could have been. All things being equal - not likely - it could have been a lot worse. Daniel was the first to leave, silently, without making the bed or checking his reflection in the mirror. Carlos watched him go, took a shower, and tried to ignore the conflicting emotions flickering inside him like the lights of an empty house. Daniel called him three days later; when Carlos congratulated him on waiting the requisite three days he found himself talking to the dial tone.
They run into each other on the street and Carlos invites Daniel to go for coffee. Instead of their normal haunt they stumble into a small place down an alley, buttery walls and frothy upholstery but it’s the nearest place and neither of them really care. Carlos can’t help but think that Daniel is oddly suited to the fluted, ornate chandeliers and soft lighting careful as a mother’s kiss. He, on the other hand, wants to throw a party here and wreck the place with paint and puke. Careful prettiness has always bored him so much.
“So,” he says to Daniel, who is rubbing his hands together between his closed knees. “How’re the kids?”
“Fine, thank you. Little Jimmy’s kicked the smack,” but Daniel’s smile is strained and uncertain, quavering like the fading note of a flute.
“Well, that’s great. Who’ll I get my gear from now,” Carlos replies, and then they’re both silent. He watches the waitress walk away. She matches the décor, all faded lace and quiet grace, wheat-coloured hair tied back with pearls that he bets she got cheap in some mass-production chainstore. When he turns back, Daniel is holding the gilt-edged china cup and watching Carlos watch the girl.
“She’s probably about sixteen, Carlos. Assuming that ages mean something to you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Carlos says. “Are you getting pissy because I’m looking at other girls?”
“Other girls?” Daniel says. “I’m not fucking - Jesus, Carlos, don’t start by being such a prick, okay.”
Carlos wants to argue, but he just ends up saying, “Okay,” and watches Daniel drink his coffee. He holds the cup with both hands, giving him a childish air, as though he has to concentrate on not spilling anything.
“Have you decided,” Daniel says finally.
“Decided what?”
“You know. Um. Us,” accompanied by an awkward gesture encompassing their table. “I mean. What you want to do with this whole thing.”
“Ah, Christ, Dan,” Carlos sighs. “We fucked. Once.”
It’s the sadistic streak in him that enjoys Daniel’s almost-hidden wince, the red shimmering on his cheekbones like the fading butterfly-stripes of a car’s tail lights.
“Yes, but. Look, I know that your life is just a whirlwind of screwing fashion models and the occasional tranny or whatever but I’m not like you. If I sleep with someone I want it to mean something - foreign as the concept may be to you.”
Carlos can tell Daniel’s working up to something, so he decides to beat him to it. “You’re saying you want me to do you more than once.”
“Can’t you just be normal and call it a relationship?”
“There’s no fun in that.”
“But there’s fun in avoiding the issue, right?”
Carlos is surprised by that - he doesn’t know why he keeps forgetting how sharp Daniel is. Despite being a smart, savvy kind of a guy, he’s always been one to be taken in by appearances, by the romantic gauze cast by alcoholic writers on the poison of their choice, by the one-night-stand cocaine glitter in a girl’s eye that promises more than it can ever deliver. He forgets that Daniel, despite looking so mild, can tear him down instantly. He doesn’t like being reminded - it makes him feel out of his depth, out of control of the situation. But he knows one way he can control Daniel; and Carlos has always been oh-so-good at twisting other people’s feelings to suit him.
“Dan, darling, I would be absolutely delighted to make an engagement with you for another time.”
*
He hears Daniel and Paul speaking to each other in French, softly. Walking to the subway from the only practise they’ve been able to get in this month, Carlos says, “I didn’t know you spoke French.”
“You know I lived in France. It’s a pretty obvious assumption.”
They don’t talk on the subway ride back, aside from that. Two steps into Carlos’ apartment and he grabs Daniel’s face, holds it between his spider-leg fingers, and kisses him harshly. He pushes Daniel back against the wall and nudges a knee inbetween his thighs, and he’s the one who leads Daniel to the bedroom this time around. Maybe it’s the familiar surroundings, the removal of the seedy hotel-encounter vibe, or maybe Daniel is just more prepared this time around but when it’s over he doesn’t seem quite as uneasy, quite as ready to bolt as he was before.
After, Daniel lies on his back and stares at the ceiling while Carlos wanders about his room, mindlessly picking things up and putting them back down, staring out the dirty window at the shitty view of the parking lot. They exchange meaningless words, as though they’re strangers in a doctor’s waiting room; Carlos stares at Daniel out of the corner of his eye, but looks away whenever he glances in his direction. Daniel has a preoccupied frown on his face and every so often his lips move silently, which means that he’s thinking deeply about something.
“What are you thinking about?” Carlos says, lying down on the bed next to him. “If you say the band, so help me God, I will cut you.”
Daniel smiles. “I was, actually. I didn’t think you’d guess.”
“Hi, I’m Carlos. I believe we’ve met before.”
“Oh, shut up.”
Daniel stretches and turns to face the window, away from Carlos. His neck is cream and coral, curving softly to meet his shoulders like the winding inside of a shell, hiding a deep secret core.
“Dan, Dan,” Carlos says, and reaches out to touch his shoulderblades with his fingertips. Where Daniel would have wings, if he ever grew them. Carlos used to fantasise about that as a child - being able to fly so high that everyone would be as small as ants swarming on the ground.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
*
They meet in college a few days later, because apparently calling each other isn’t really their thing. Daniel in a soft sky-blue tshirt and black jeans, Carlos in his customary all-black outfit with his steel-toed boots.
“You look like you just fell out of a tree,” Carlos says blandly.
“You look like Robert Smith just puked all over you.”
“Come here.” Carlos tries to pat some of Daniel’s hair back into place (because seriously, he couldn’t have actually been going for the startled chipmunk look) but he ducks away, scowling.
“Go ’way, Carlos,” but he’s smiling even as he runs a hand through his hair, ruffling it further.
“You really need a haircut, Dan.”
“I’m fine the way I am. I like it like this.”
“That can’t possibly be true,” Carlos says, but he gives up anyway. “Let’s go and get something to eat, I’m starved. No roommates means no food to steal.”
“You shouldn’t be doing that anyway,” Daniel says, but he grins. They walk across the campus together and Carlos casually leans a hand on the small of Daniel’s back. He’s always liked that about being with someone, the casual appropriation of their body. He likes that he can touch them, can signal possession to the world with a small gesture; Carlos has always liked other people to know what he has. Daniel, though, shrugs him off; and when Carlos replaces his hand ten minutes later, he removes it firmly.
“Not here,” he says quietly.
“What?” Carlos says, and maybe it came out a little snappier than he intended but he’s more offended than he’d normally be at something like this.
“It’s just… I don’t like it. You know.”
“No, I don’t. You don’t like what? Me touching you? You seemed pretty keen on it before.”
Daniel colours suddenly. “That’s not called for. I don’t like, you know, public affection. It creeps me out, like there are all these people being led around by someone else or something. I can walk perfectly well.”
“I wasn’t implying that. I wasn’t implying you were crippled or anything, except maybe by your fashion sense.”
“Coming from the guy who dresses like a gay Hitler, that really stings. Oh, my wounded heart.”
“Fuck off, you look like a walking advertisement for the Disney Channel.”
“If I’m not cool enough to be seen with you then why are you suddenly all over me?” Daniel snaps. Carlos thought that they were just joking about till now, but okay, if this is how Daniel wants to play it then he’ll bite.
“I wasn’t all over you! I was putting my fucking hand on your fucking back and if you’re so fucking prudish about that then I won’t, I’ll just post a fucking invitation instead and wait for your permission.”
“Look, I wasn’t - hang on,” Daniel says. A tense moment, until a smile breaks over his face suddenly, like a warm breeze. “You’re mad because you’re being possessive, aren’t you?”
“No,” Carlos says sulkily.
“You are!” Daniel says, grinning. “Are you going to beat up anyone who looks at me now?”
Carlos glares at him for a second, but beyond the teasing, he thinks he can see something real in Daniel’s eyes, genuine happiness. And for a second - only a second - he wants to say something really cruel, to crush that puppyish delight, just to show that he can, that he can control Daniel however he wants. To show Daniel that he’s not really impervious to Carlos. But he also feels a rush of power at having inspired that look in someone else’s face, sweet and strong. It’s intoxicating to know that he can make someone this pleased with a small gesture, so he settles for saying, “Only the girls,” and squeezing Daniel’s wrist, secretly, when nobody else can see.
*
“You never want to stand out,” Carlos says, all wrapped up in Daniel’s sheets. He’d shown up about an hour ago, at three a.m., just as Daniel was getting back from a night out with his friends. He’d been sort of hurt that Daniel hadn’t even invited him out, that he hadn’t known - but then Daniel had kissed him with the lack of inhibition he only had when he couldn’t stand straight, and Carlos had stopped complaining.
“Some people are made to, that’s all.”
“And you’re not?”
“No.”
“Bullshit.”
“It’s not, Carlos. I’m not like you. People don’t just pay attention to me, okay,” Daniel says, and he probably wouldn’t be saying this at all if it hadn’t been for the whiskey.
“You don’t make them. You have to make them.” Carlos, for once, is sober.
“I don’t know how. And I don’t really want to, either.”
“But it must get so… Lonely.” Carlos is watching his face now, Daniel who’s staring at the ceiling, vulnerable and drunk, avoiding his eyes.
“It’s not really. I’m not an exhibitionist. I don’t crave attention.”
“You do more than that. You deflect it.”
“It’s just,” Daniel says, and then he’s silent for a moment. “It’s like this. Some people are lights, right? Big bright lights who everyone crowds around and they warm everyone up. Some people light up the room and people like light so they stay there. And some people don’t.”
Carlos is silent. Daniel sighs and turns away from him - always away from him.
“And some people are mirrors,” Daniel says, so quietly Carlos almost can’t hear him. “They just reflect the lights. But still. It’s not such a tragedy. The room ends up brighter.”
Carlos doesn’t say anything.
In the morning, neither of them mention this exchange. Carlos wonders whether he should have argued with Dan - but then, he does sort of agree with him, if he’s honest.
*
And really, there’s something to be said for doing things Daniel’s way, the subtle way. Sometimes. Of course, Carlos still finds it boring as fuck most of the time, and he likes to screw with Daniel, groping him on the subway, kissing him messily that one time in front of the lecturer that Daniel had a fucking hard-on for or something by the way he kept going on. He’d gotten mad then, stormed away from Carlos and called him a string of expletives that seemed all wrong coming out of Daniel’s mouth.
Carlos likes to think that his insults are as light and meaningless as feathers, but they always feel more like thorns. Trouble is, Daniel’s such a perceptive person. Carlos is, too, but in a different way. He can size people up in a second and figure how they can benefit him; don’t delay call now and find out how you can make it work for you. Daniel, though. He sees the potential in people in all different ways. He thinks about them and works out why they act and talk and dream the way they do, and he won’t hesitate to use it against them if he has to. Carlos cuts people down by building himself up until he uses all the oxygen and blocks out all the sky, withering their attacks away to nothing. But Daniel is needle-precise and he always knows exactly where to prick.
Carlos isn’t used to being bested. Especially not by Daniel.
*
It’s closing in on May, so everyone’s having their last hurrah before they have to start studying; as a consequence Carlos has been high for about six nights in a row. Tonight’s lucky number seven and he finally managed to convince Daniel to come out with him; even the idea of Daniel sitting in his room with yet another box set of shitty French films was starting to set his teeth on edge. But Daniel had been surprisingly compliant and had agreed to come out with him, only balked a little when Carlos suggested they hit a club on his usual scene.
And honestly, it’s probably the industrial quantities of E by now (because Carlos has gotten to the stage where he’s got to keep throwing the pills back into his body to cheat the comedown he can feel hanging over him, like a tidal wave) but he’s been doubled over laughing for at least twenty minutes by the sight of Daniel talking to Simon, looking perfectly placid and only mildly drunk but with the tell-tale tics of uneasiness that Carlos has come to know. His smile flickers and fades like cheap lighting in a cheap apartment block. Carlos saunters over, casting Daniel in shadow, and hooks his arm around his shoulders. Daniel, automatically, shrugs him off.
“You’ve seriously never even tried eyeliner?” Simon’s asking him, in that voice Carlos knows is specifically designed to make people feel bad.
“Well,” Daniel says, leaning in closely, as though revealing a secret, “I just don’t like it. I think men look better without makeup, the way people look better with their natural eyebrows.” He’s drunker than Carlos thought, but he looks so good, dishevelled and sweaty as a whorehouse bed.
“Bitchy bitchy!” Simon exclaims, ostensibly mocking, but he doesn’t hide his anger very well.
“Not really. That’s your territory, isn’t it?” Daniel says, tilting the neck of his bottle towards him in an ironic salute.
Simon walks off. Carlos grins and presses his face into Daniel’s neck, full of artificial love for the world. Daniel scrunches his face up uncomfortably but submits to the embrace, and when Carlos looks at him again he’s smiling too, drunk and content. The club is full of glittering girls and guys and everything inbetween, with too much makeup and fake everything.
“Eyeliner isn’t just for girls,” Carlos says.
“As far as I’m concerned it is,” Daniel says. “I don’t care about being progressive or genderfuck or whatever people say now.”
“But it’s interesting to fuck with boundaries, don’t you think?” Carlos says. “Don’t you think though? I mean to take something out of its context - eyeliner is a traditional symbol of femininity, but taken out of its ideological context it’s reduced to a mere object, to an ornamentation, and once you’re free of its symbolic use you can subvert it for your own purpose. You can strip it of its purpose and use preconceived notions against the people bound up in them. It’s a form of rebellion against the traditional perception of masculinity.”
“It’s makeup,” Daniel says flatly. “You’re totally wired right now, aren’t you?”
“Yes!” Carlos says, his smile so wide and shiny and utterly untrue. “It’s fantastic. Come on. Let me introduce you,” and he grabs Daniel, pulling him by his arm through the room. They weave through the crowds, the voices heavy and ugly as chords on a ruined piano, makeup smeared everywhere and blood caked on fingers. Carlos smiles at Daniel, who doesn’t smile back, just looks around him nervously.
“Hey, hey,” Carlos says, tapping his friend Gala on the shoulder. Gala took her name from Salvador Dali’s wife, even though she looks more like one of his creations: her arms are tattooed with wide, staring eyes, their pupils picked out in various jewel tones, anthemyst and jade and sapphire. Carlos gets the feeling that he could spend hours decorating each one individually, brushing on a rainbow of eyeshadow carefully, lining each eye with such love and precision. He loves being this high; he loves everything. He’s in the nooks and crannies of the wonderful, glimmering universe, he’s fucking cosmic, he’s all the bright turquoise summer skies and all the jet jewelled nights. He’s counting out his heartbeat with the stars, and tracing Daniel’s face in the moon.
“Gala, this is Dan, Dan this is Gala.” He doesn’t ever want to leave Dan’s side again, doesn’t want to let go of Daniel’s arm, so alive and solid, his veins throbbing with crushed rubies and garnets. The rest of their conversation goes over his head; Daniel making some small talk, Gala arching an eyebrow, cocking a hip, running a thumb down Daniel’s face. He starts back, and Gala leans in again; when she falls into Daniel, Carlos realises just how smashed she is. He laughs, again, as Daniel staggers under her weight.
“Carlos, fucking help me!” he says, hauling her to her feet, and the two of them drag her away from the crowd of gawkers who do nothing but watch. Her boyfriend is over by the bar and thankfully he’s sober enough to take her home. Daniel sits down on his vacated barstool and sighs heavily.
“She’s not exactly thin, is she,” Carlos whispers, and Daniel begins to laugh silently, which he does when he finds something really funny. His shoulder shake and he makes no noise at all; if Carlos didn’t know better, he’d swear Daniel was having a seizure. After a beat, Carlos joins in, and the two of them sit next to each other, leaning on each other’s shoulders, shaking with laughter. If Carlos could reach out and kiss the world right now, he would, but instead he kisses Daniel. He’s so high that he doesn’t even care when Daniel pushes him away and looks embarrassed.
*
He can see the struggle, sometimes, when Daniel can’t decide whether he hates him or not. It’s not a love-hate relationship because while he’s pretty sure Daniel somethings him he’s equally sure it’s not love. On good days he thinks it’s the way smaller objects orbit a larger one, in space. On bad days, he thinks it’s the way things get sucked into black holes, or quicksand.
Most of the time he thinks it might just be bad luck.