Day 56: Hearth and Home Handcrafted Furniture (late afternoon)
Their wanderings had led them across town, moving back over places Albedo had already been. A brother's slight shivering had the older of the pair steering them towards a close building, moving into the warmth the heated building offered. Such a demanding little thing, for being such a quiet individual. Albedo himself didn't mind the chill
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Technically, with a give and take, nothing had happened, now had it? The largest transgression was that Albedo had touched the man, but he had not harmed Klavier, now had he? No, and it wasn't as if he was plotting to set the other up either. That was a bit beneath him by this point, after all. The cretin was a fool, and Klavier's downfall would be his own. However... If Albedo killed him out of rage, there was no class to it whatsoever. The point of this, then... Was to perhaps get the man to never speak that again.
His eyes lost the light-hearted manner they had been in, and Albedo's expression tightened. "I would have killed him, I think," he said quietly. "Except I hated him too much to do so." The man was filthy, disgusting, and that he drew Albedo's ire was unwanted. Klavier did not deserve his hate. "That he...." He chose his words carefully, calm despite things. "He refuses to allow logic other than his own," he finally said, a repeat of another time. "He insists that I betrayed you, wronged you, abandoned you, and that I should be kept from you."
The boy opened his mouth to add opinion to fact, but bile rose up in his throat, and he snapped his mouth shut, muscles in his jaw working. The sentence just said... Was very, very wrong. Adverse to nature, in fact, and against all wants.
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This vaguely reminded Nigredo of the twins and their occasional petty arguments. Only, petty was more damaging, and someone was bound to get bludgeoned to death while the other would remain affected. Where would they be, then? These things could never be reversed. Not to mention, Nigredo himself probably sparked some of the misconceptions on the man's end.
If Albedo indeed was trying to clear up what they were, then...
The younger watched in silence for a moment longer, the unknown countenance sliding to contemplation. He finally released a breath and nodded to show confirmation. Yes, the boy understood the gravity of what had been conveyed. "I'll talk to him," Nigredo said. A statement, not a suggestion. It would be done regardless of the middle variant's response.
"But Albedo," he began quietly, "his views do not affect anything about us. You should know this. Also, we..." Here, Nigredo trailed, uncertain of the actual content. It could be taken in any way. "We didn't exactly give evidence to the contrary when in his presence." Basement, for a large part. Individual dealings, for another. Model siblings they were not, the boy would be the first to admit.
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...He would kill him. Albedo would sincerely kill Klavier one day.
"Good," the boy said shortly. "Fine. That's nothing..." Close to correct. He looked up at his brother. "I told him you'd agree with me." A question disguised as a statement. "That abandonment is worse than anything we've done to each other."
A delicate subject, no doubt, but something that had to be fortified or doubt would creep in unawares. Albedo glanced away abruptly, then back, something like understanding slipping in before being wiped aside by irritation. "Like it matters. He's completely worthless." Agreeing with his brother even as he argued. "He should believe what we say compared to how we've acted."
The time in the basement flashed in Albedo's mind, pulling Nigredo up by his collar to hit him, and regret washed through him before he could halt it--he swallowed roughly, wondering.
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Shouldn't this overwhelm? Bring all train of thought to an abrupt end? Still, Nigredo moved on to address what affected Albedo, to watch quietly as his brother's anger circled to a conclusion. He agreed for Nigredo to intervene while quietly wanting Klavier's death. What does the one who promised to protect the man do in this case? The child had several possibilities.
Before he had a chance to set the logic in motion, however, two things pulled at his attention. First, what they had said to Klavier. In this, the man had mentioned something interesting less than two weeks prior. "We had a talk," he had said. About a potential murder and its subsequent approval. "He seems to think any assault is justified." Was that not it? The reaction to the memory was fierce, the expression plain. Nigredo knew it was simply an echo, but rejection was hardly an easy facet to push aside. And there was nothing now to draw the boy away from its tightness. Memories of grass and faraway hope regained, only to fade.
His lips moved on their own accord. "He shouldn't believe what we've said either," he uttered, barely audible in the tones. "Even I thought you..." Would rather have the youngest dead than deal with his faults. A part of why he wanted the same himself. He could not form the concluding thought.
Second, there was regret in his brother, free and flowing. Nigredo's eyes widened in something close to shock; regret and guilt were not attributes associated with this one. What could the boy do, then, but watch Albedo for a clarification, on what the middle child would feel regret over.
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He was silent for a moment, and only stared.
"Even I thought you..." Would have rathered him dead. That was far too simple, and wholly untrue, despite the facts presented to the contrary. Albedo's jaw clenched, and he glanced down suddenly, wondering how much to give away. It couldn't continue, though. Nigredo could not think that he....
"It was an excuse," he said quietly. "Saying I hated you, that I wanted to kill you. It was something fake for me to focus on, something that would have become real in time if I kept telling myself it. I don't think I could have actually killed you if I tried." There was something like loss in his voice. "...You're my brother. How could I...?
"And I thought... That you restricted my abilities. It was easier to use that, and you--" He looked up, something veiled in his eyes. "I think I always... recognized us as similar. I didn't want to...." Admit it. Allow it. "And by saying you had no right to Rubedo, I was saying...."
He looked down, giving something too far from a smile to be entirely accurate. "I was saying... That I shouldn't be around him."
He was silent. "...Haven't you ever paid attention? Even that first night, when you asked me..." In the visitor's room, white and black. {"Do you want to kill me that badly?"} "Did I ever answer you, Nigredo? Did I ever tell you... That that was what I wanted? The time we were here, after I came after you, I said even then--" {"You can't die."} "...'I don't want to be left all alone.'"
Of regret? Was there anything to speak or explain? Wasn't it so perfectly simple? "You... I hadn't wanted... I had wanted to support you. And instead I moved to hurt. Instead that man was the one who...." Pulled him back. Even as Albedo had been becoming horrified with his own actions. "I wanted you to... be glad that I was there." His throat closed at that--it was too close to a weakness--a want spoken was never something Albedo was fond of. In any point in his life, he would rather skirt the subject than declare want.
"I don't want to move against you," he whispered, fingers pinching fabric between them. {You are something altogether wanted.} Something both emotionally longed for and logically sought after. The night of over a week past had made that utterly clear. This was given, in bits and pieces. {You are precious,} he sent, form shaking. He finally looked back up, helpless. {How could I...?} Want to hurt him. Not regret that reaction when the opposite was needed. Move other than how he was.
The sentence went unfinished. Albedo finally fell silent.
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In the end, it was only an instance, and Nigredo remembered it was Albedo, not Rubedo, whom he held promises to. Focus returned to the spoken topic with the boy allowing himself a moment for comprehension. So Nigredo was an excuse. The emotions involved were nothing personal. Yes, he had paid attention to their exchanges, but those parts had never occurred to him. The reason for this was simple.
"I think I paid attention to the wrong things," he admitted. Executioner had a way of muddling that. He smiled, the image bittersweet. Nothing of the expression could be deemed false; it was as Nigredo felt, even as he wished for stoicism. "We're passed that, though. Right now, I know what you really meant." What was genuine and wanted.
He swallowed with effort, and the smile crumbled in its entirety. Albedo spoke the reasons for regret, and Nigredo remembered the effects the night after. As much as all of this was believed now, it was never touched upon then. And for every ounce of remorse the elder had, he returned it in full, albeit in a different light.
"I'm glad." Glad for the words and the truth behind them, for the change in direction between the pair. This was no lie. Nigredo suddenly shuddered. His brother's touch seared despite the cloth in-between, but the child continued unaware, face paler than what was normal. "I just...wish you had told me...before..."
Everything. {Everything broke down.} And left him with a want to die.
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Albedo partially winced. "You were supposed to pay attention to those things," he said, tone touching on apologetic. It was Albedo. In antagonism, what was said but what most had the tendency to hurt, and affect. And distract, in certain cases. From things that he himself had been denying.
And yet, here. Nigredo had given something without knowing. He allowed that he had been affected, and Albedo wondering, knowing as he did now. If Nigredo had been hurt by those words, then, and showed nothing. What else had affected his little brother without him knowing? He poured backwards, looking for instances, wondering what else had happened, never to be spoke on. What had--
He remembered the morning, suddenly. When Nigredo had came to him as Albedo had never before recalled, to touch him and hold him as Albedo had wanted from a different source. And yet... Those hands only wished to tear apart, destroy in their entirety, and Albedo knew this. While this one had only... Been there, without wavering. Had not left or walked away. Had been precisely what Albedo wanted. Needed. And he knew this. Knew this entirely. Had known it for over a week's time. Nigredo could love him... As Albedo desired most.
His hands slid to Nigredo's back, and Albedo stepped closer, face close as he watched his brother with a mix of calm and desperation. {Nothing's broken.} Words ironic, even to himself. He would say this? Breaking was but a habit, outside and internal. And Albedo would still say this.
If he had spoke--when? When could he have? That night regretted? It wasn't in him to do so, then. He did not understand, then, with clarity. He only was moving on instinct, desire, without the reasons in their complex detail. He understood the next night. More and in part. And yet that was deemed too late.
He refused that. Refused it in all of itself. "I've said it, as much as I was able. I've given you...." What. What Albedo could give. All of himself that he could offer. At the time, Albedo was allowing his brother as much of himself that Albedo could offer without shifting. Shattering. {I love you.} And things had been agreed to move forward. Move past. {I'm not going to go away.}
"So keep walking forward."
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This covered ground, which the variant was not willing to tread. For beyond their individual biases, there existed a third he refused to touch upon. The lips that moved, therefore, were not his. Any response at this point was beyond his control, or that was what he wished to believe. "Isn't an excuse better?" he offered calmly. To regret the phrasing in the next second.
"...No, I'm sorry. Let me reword that." Nigredo took a breath, exhaling on a sigh. As much as the other hated both the calm and the apology, this could not be so readily discussed. His first reaction was incorrect. "If I wasn't an excuse, then what was I?" the boy questioned, voice subdued. If certain actions were to be called excuses, then the target had to be something else. Or nothing else. He did not know.
Albedo moved closer, his sending stepping toward a path unwanted. Nigredo wished this sibling would leave his comments alone sometimes, take the sentiment without the added return. It wasn't like he was begging for assurance or for a result to change. Yet, here it was. A hand reached to the elder's side, opposite of where he had received his injury. He leaned closer to almost touch noses.
"It's fine. You don't have to try and convince me." About love or effort. It was faulty to try right now. {I believe you.}
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But brother dear had asked him a question, and even as he stepped closer, pressed close enough to touch, reassured, Albedo felt it continue. The fact of something wrong. He didn't want to answer. He could do nothing but.
He allowed their breaths to mingle for a moment, something taking comfort in that. "You weren't something that was seen." He blinked up at Nigredo, understanding how it sounded. And that it had been true. But he wouldn't be surprised if Nigredo knew that--for wasn't it that? That Albedo had noticed that night? That even before this place, Nigredo was not something... Focused on. That was a truth, horrible as it was. It was true, and he wouldn't lie about it.
But. Truth that it was and had been.
"But things have changed--" He cut off, tilting his head. How must that sound, to say that after referencing that subject? That things had changed because Rubedo wasn't here? How trite. That... had bearing but wasn't it at all.
"I started thinking about you here. Before... anything changed. Before those nights--" The brainwashing, and his brother dying. "And before... things changed." A sibling missing. As if Albedo could simply say it. A sibling choosing to leave again? As if that one was the correct one. And yet, still, wasn't he here, wounded, because of it? How pathetic. He should at least hold to his own findings.
"From that night that you didn't reject me, despite my actions before it, I started thinking about you more. You've become something wanted and...." He blinked suddenly, shy. "...I depend on you. I don't know what I would do...."
What were the words to be said. The pieces to a puzzle to put meaning into words.
"...You are something I would choose," he said, quietly, calmly. "Not something I'm burdened with or left with. You are something that I would choose."
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Of course, in a way unanticipated and perhaps unwanted, things had changed. And as Albedo denied it, Nigredo held to the reason entertained. As the minute details flowed to a fact and a conclusion, the child's lips stiffened into a thin line. Nothing due to inaccuracy. Albedo was right, and his methods would register as sound in anyone's mind. Doubt, however, had its method of creeping in, clinging to the edge of where honesty appeared less defined.
Still, Albedo would speak of choice and Nigredo, as though false hate was so easily set aside. The latter looked at his feet and the floor past them, noting no details. He finally lifted his eyes to his sibling, the emotion behind them unfathomable. "Alright." A confirmation of their prior topic. The one that led to this. "Klavier won't make the same mistake again. Leave the misconceptions to me."
And back again. "But if I'm something you would choose," he started softly, "you would have to accept what I am. Or what I could do." It wasn't about not caring, as stated before. If it wasn't about not caring, what was Nigredo supposed to believe?
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Little brother ignored U-DO's taint as if it wasn't there. Last night, Albedo had obviously been off, the start more than anything else, and what had Nigredo done but waited for Albedo to regulate? Even in the locked cell, shattered enough to nearly kill his kin, Nigredo had done nothing but allow everything, had not protested or fled, but remained still and patient. Was it a want of death in that?
But brother had protested last night, and Albedo had believed him. Neither would leave the other, not as things stood. So, in that, was it only as Nigredo had once intoned. A forgiveness for murder. Murder not yet wrought, and murder that would not be learned. Rubedo could not allow Albedo to exist as he was--gave into instinct to destroy what was opposite, and Nigredo would claim otherwise? What was that, in the end? Just another point, another branch to add to the pile.
And he should just light it all ablaze.
"...And me?" He asked, quietly, childishly. "Am I something that you can accept?"
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But as claimed prior, the concept did not apply to a tainted brother. As held to previously, the move against him was a straightforward act of denial, a residue of an old prejudice. Albedo was still Albedo, and Nigredo had grown. His view had pivoted the moment he had pulled the trigger against their father; it simply took time to realize how many steps he had strayed from what had been set before him.
At this moment, as it had before, the fact came easily. He smiled, the expression far away and wistful. "You're someone I accept," answered Nigredo, "even if you can't accept me." And he would rather destroy what endangered his siblings' existences than touch them. Taint or otherwise.
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So here laid the issue at hand. Nigredo could destroy what was between him, put aside the anomalies that rose within Albedo, and Albedo what kill what threatened a bond of blood, and he could not pass over what Nigredo existed as.
It came as something faulty, now. A fact that Albedo was not as welcoming and accepting as he himself had believed. But... The fact remained that he was trying. He had thought it to himself a week prior and stated it within the confines of the cell--he had buried what Nigredo was, placed it in a carefully dug grave and patted the earth over it. Couldn't that be enough? Couldn't it just lie there, to be forgotten? Nigredo had said--promised--that he would not use it, had not wanted to use it. It was enough. That was enough.
"I love you," he said, clear as fact. "And we've crossed over this before." He glanced up, eyes watchful. "We were 'moving forward', passing over what was in the past--I told you, I buried that. If it mattered, I would...." He trailed off. "I wouldn't even be near you. I wouldn't touch you, care for you, whatever the circumstances."
In all of this, there existed a solidity to words, a intent watchfulness to expression. "You are not what you were made to be. You're yourself. You're my brother." {And I love you.}
His hands tightened in the fabric of Nigredo's shirt. "I would choose you," he repeated, lacking any of the hesitance he had held before. "Understand this. Because it's the complete truth. I would choose all of you."
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Something existed, however, and it became a pathetic little joke. He was himself, but that could be lost. The past could be passed over, but the present remained, and Nigredo was... He was what endangered his siblings. Every love offered could be retracted at the purpose of his existence, and that knowledge caused pain. Forced death when there should be joy.
"Albedo, I--"
He almost said what he never meant to say: the second clause of his pathetic purpose. The mistake was noted, and instantly, the mind ripped it from consciousness. The child was left without words, not even a return for what was given. Albedo would choose Nigredo, but not all of him was known. Should that be revealed, would the elder still offer the same?
Bile rose. A bad taste lingered inside his mouth.
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He was suddenly extremely, heartbreakingly lonely, in a way he had not been for perhaps weeks. There was pressure in his chest, and his waveform recessed, expression breaking. He couldn't breathe. Didn't want to. It was like rejection and he had thought--
He was stupid, wasn't he? Hadn't he learned? After all of this, shouldn't he know not to expect.... It wasn't something that....
His arms slid downward; he took a step back. His gaze dropped, and he realized he was crying. "I'm sorry," he said quietly.
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{Albedo,} he intoned softly, {I want you to accept me. There is nothing...I want more than to have someone...} Accept him. Acknowledge him. Cement his existence without tearing it apart. This was what partly drew the child to Klavier. To Senna. To Rubedo before the truth came out.
Hurt seemed more familiar than comfort when one gave completion without understanding, however. This was the source of Nigredo's hurt, though it appeared he had failed in communicating that aspect. He dared not entertain the reason, but he could offer the solution that formed without effort. Albedo's movements made that necessary.
{But you can't choose me right now,} came the explanation. {You don't know enough about me, and I don't want you to regret the words later.} Did he understand? That would be worse than any rejection. {So wait...until you do. I'm not going anywhere.} Not until that was wanted.
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