Prompt Post No. 13
Welcome to Round 13 of the Inception Kink Meme. This post will be closed to new prompts once it reaches five thousand comments.
New Prompting System
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Which is just the icing on the cake, isn’t it. “Eames. Eames, please. Please tell me you’ve held a baby before.”
“Not all of our mothers had six children, Arthur! I’m an only child, there were never any babies to hold!”
“But you want to keep her!” Arthur laughs, because it’s funny. It is. It’s fucking hysterical how Eames, the most capable person Arthur knows, wants to blunder on into this new situation with his eyes shut tight and his hands tied behind his back. “You’ve never held a fucking baby, and you’re pleading with me to let you keep one?”
“I do not plead, Arthu--”
“Didn’t you ever ask for a dog when you were a kid? And then your parents had to tell you what a big responsibility it was, how you had to feed it, and clean up after it, and train it? Sound familiar?”
“No,” Eames says, chin set defiantly. He throws himself down onto Arthur’s couch and crosses his arms over his chest. “Mum and dad said a dog was not suitable for their lifestyle.” He turns his eyes on Arthur then, and though he doesn’t say it, it’s written all over his face: That was just before they decided the same about their son.
“Okay,” Arthur says, his composure regained. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. You’re going to take Magdalena. Just stay on the couch, you won’t drop her. And if you do, don’t worry too much; babies are built to be dropped. I’m going to warm up her formula, okay? And then we’re going to talk about this logically.”
“Arthur, I really don’t think--” Eames is saying, but he shuts right up when Arthur deposits Magdalena into his arms. “Oh,” he says, and at first it’s concession but then, then it’s reverent. The look on his face changes, and he goes from unsure to awe-struck, cradling her in his arms. He sits there, stock-still, like he’s terrified to move, should she suddenly decide to throw herself out of his arms, an impossible stunt for a six-month-old though Eames is convinced otherwise. “She’s… wow.” And he’s looking down at her with something akin to devotion, like he’s been delivered, like he’s had a sudden epiphany and everything now fits together. Arthur’s stomach knots.
There were times back when they were younger, before Mal died, and then more times, after, when getting with Eames made so much fucking sense that reason practically bent back in on itself and it seemed, somehow, illogical. Eames wasn’t everything Arthur wanted, but he was undoubtedly the most he’d ever get, and there were moments, insane in their direness, where Arthur wanted nothing more than for Eames to be happy. And it was soul-shaking, how ready he was to give up everything to see to that. Falling in love with Eames made sense, and it would have been easy, and that’s exactly why Arthur chose not to. He stayed just on the brink of love, and Eames flitted in and out of his life as smoothly as he flitted in and out of personas, and they never had their great love story, but Arthur’s always been pretty sure that he wasn’t made for one of those, not the way some people are, so he tried not to let it bother him. And nine times out of ten, he succeeded.
This is one of those failures. Those terrifying, heart-rendering, full body shutdowns where he’s ready to pour his heart out, all over the floor, just with the slightest hope that Eames will mop it all up. It’s the wrong kind of feeling to be having, in this moment. Or ever, really. But one time out of ten, Arthur’s always feeling a little lovesick.
He makes his getaway, and prepares Magdalena’s formula.
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Um, and also baby and nice worldbuilding with the Advil thing, and other praiseworthy, story-relevant things. :)
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