(no subject)
It had been a long time since they last spoke to each other. Lionel had handed Megha off into the care of someone else about a week ago, and of course the transaction was overseen by Deep. Meanwhile, Oscar, six hours ahead in a different location, had stopped his fashion designer job in exchange for textile design and runway modeling. However, in a few days he would drop the former because he simply couldn't take the distraction anymore.
Something just kept messing him up. It was up to Lionel to diagnose the problem for the nth time and to reword his advice, otherwise Oscar just might stop calling for help. "It's not as if you would be unfaithful to anyone. If you're drawn to him I don't see why you shouldn't try to know him better. Isn't that how attraction works? Correct me if I'm wrong." He rubbed his brow and looked over at Peyton, the young homeless man he had taken in for care. Peyton used to be a glassblower.
"Okay yes, you're not wrong but I don't want to be drawn to Krysia. I don't want to know him better because I still plan on coming back and I have to know if--"
"I'll listen to you, Oscar, but I won't take your blather. I'm not telling you not to come back but you can stop clutching until you do. From what I understand, the break-up was official and there's no reason that you should have to dutifully wait in the wings just because you both may still have feelings for each other. You can cross that bridge when you come to it."
Oscar scratched the back of his head and trailed his nails down his neck, raking them down hard an attempt to dispel some of his frustration with pain. "You have a point but this still doesn't feel right to me. Living with Krysia.. Working with him, and Mimi having to be the third wheel.. It would be so awkward. I don't want to mess up in anymore relationships, Leo."
"Believe me when I tell you that I can understand that same exact feeling, but in your case, I just have to wonder, what is it that makes you think you 'messed up' in the first place? Your fallout with Adrian was simple. If I recall correctly, neither party was to blame; it was just the effect of external circumstances--"
"I messed up because he was the first one to say 'I love you' and I allowed myself to trust it completely.." Oscar blurted this out and articulated it so candidly that he didn't feel what he said until he paused. Tears came down quickly as he blinked and a dull tingling feeling rose up from his chest to his throat, and his nose suddenly became stuffed up. He sniffled and began to mumble. "I..don't know, I just messed up. I don't know."
Lionel's quick pause made it seem as if he was surprised at how quickly it took Oscar to cry. "He meant what he said and you reciprocated the feeling. It's nothing like 'messing up'; you're just still not over your grief." Pause. "I know it certainly doesn't feel this way but it is not a bad thing. All you need to do is give yourself some time."
"I've been here for--what is it?--over four months, Leo." Oscar sniffled again and rubbed hard at his eyes underneath his glasses. "I don't feel any better than I did when he hung up after our last phone call." He shut his eyes but tears still streamed down his face. That single memory hurt the most because it was merely a phone call. There was no lingering vision or touch, no real sensation other than just listening to a few seconds of audio that went by so quickly, he couldn't even remember the words in the exact order. He was cooking at the time of the phone call and had to stop afterwards because he lost his appetite. Things flooded back to him.
(The apartment was small but suited him just fine and the walls were white as they always had been. The place was a constant mess but the kitchen, in contrast, was always clean. He twisted the dial on the stove so that nothing drastic would happen to the pasta or boiling water as he went to fetch the phone. After a second of not recognizing the caller ID, he pressed the large circular button and put the device up to his ear, lips pulling taut into a smile and his tone perky as soon as he heard who was on the other line. He returned to the pot to continue stirring. And then that brief line that went by so quickly and hit him so hard that, dazed, he asked, "What's wrong?" but because he was so dazed, he wasn't sure if Adrian had heard because he hung up so quickly. No chance to speak. He lost the will to continue cooking and sank to the floor, leaning against the cupboards where a handle was pressed painfully against his lower back. He dropped the phone. It clattered loudly but never interrupted the zooming thoughts that went, How could you break up with me if you're the one who said it first?)
"You two dated for eight months. I wouldn't expect you to get over it in half that time. It's not what I meant, anyway. Come back and give yourself time here. Leaving the country won't help you in this situation because you still anticipate returning."
"It's not..." Oscar trailed off and leaned his forehead against his palm. It wasn't like that. Ever since that day where it was revealed to him that Yousei was a bad man--bad as in guns and aliases and "It's not safe for you to know me"s--suddenly it was as if everyone turned out to be participants in such things as well. Like Lincoln the painter and Adrian the ex-boyfriend. And apparently the breakup happened after some incident occurred involving the latter man; an incident where Oscar left the country to stay safe and out of the way. He wondered if he should tell Lionel about this, and then wondered if Lionel was involved too but he decided not to do either. He didn't want to know if his counselor was a part of it nor did he want to let something slip. He kept his silence and sniffled again.
"If you don't want to come back just yet, then go ahead and stay there and wait but don't hold yourself back from entering another relationship because perhaps Krysia has potential to be good for you as well." Lionel let out a sigh and checked his nails. "Find a way to pass your time so you don't feel so miserable. I've said it before: I'm not trying to get you to act against your own will but if you're attracted to someone, you may as well do something different. Especially if you've already broken away from the person in your last relationship, might I add."
Oscar sobbed and buried his face into his hand. "Your advice isn't helping me and I don't think it will--"
Lionel interrupted with another sigh. "I'm trying to put some ideas into your head so that you aren't utterly crushed by grief. My personal recommendations may not help you, but then what will? Are you going to waste by yourself and push away the things that try to be good to you?" He rubbed his forehead lightly and paused. "Please do not think that I am trying to hurt you with those questions. You clearly haven't though in depth about these things and I only think that you should."
"I," Oscar squeaked as he sobbed again. "I'm sorry. You're right. You're right." Long pause. "I'll think about it..."
"And then what will you do?"
"I'll--" Oscar choked on nothing. "I'll have to call you back about that."
"Alright. That sounds fine." A mug of tea suddenly appeared on the desk in front of Lionel, and he looked up at Peyton to nod thanks. Peyton smiled helplessly for some reason and apprehensively placed an employment application on the desk as well, however not directly in front of Lionel since he wasn't sure if its presence would be distracting Lionel from his phone conversation. Lionel scanned it quickly and made two gestures: one meant 'thank you' and the other meant 'I'll look at it when I'm done'. Peyton smiled a little more confidently and then moved into another part of the apartment to do some push-ups, since Lionel had recommended that he try to redevelop muscle mass.
Oscar sighed and squeezed his eyes shut. "Okay. I'm going to go now. Bye-bye." Lionel returned the farewell and they both hung up. Oscar dropped his cell phone onto the bed and watched it bounce before looking at Krysia, who was napping on his side of the room. Should he? Should he not? He didn't want to due to the anxiety of becoming attached but if the fear was there, perhaps it meant Lionel was right. Then again, most of the hesitation came out of the possible feeling that Krysia would just be an inadequate substitute. And when one was already hurt, one often did not feel the desire to hurt someone else.
Oscar spent over half an hour thinking intensely about his choices: go back to the States, be with Krysia (for a while?), find someone totally different, or avoid relationships. Between thoughts, there were large spaces in which he contemplated nothing because it was complicated to explore them all at once. The back of his mind told him 'whatever happens, happens' and out of desperation, it struck him as something profound. The option to follow intuition was easy and sometimes led him to the right things; not quite like mutable impulse.
Krysia stirred and eventually sat up, as if he felt the intent thoughtfulness that Oscar was emanating in his sleep and was too bothered by it to stay rested. He looked at Mimi's side of the bed and noticed she wasn't there, panicking briefly with confusion before remembering that she was out on a small trip to do make-up for commercial girls in a different region of the country. He rubbed his eye with his fist and covered his mouth to yawn. "Oscar? Are you okay?" He glanced sleepily at the clock and tried to focus his eyes on the time. "Have you gotten any rest?"
Oscar's heart thumped in his chest. Biting his lip, he went to sit beside Krysia and looked at him in the dim light from the lamp and asked, "What would you do if I told you that I'm upset about something, but that I don't want to really discuss it?" He took off his glasses and held onto them limply, ashamed.
Krysia frowned and hugged him tightly. "I would try to make you feel better but if you don't want me to, I'll give you your space. Do you want anything, coffee maybe? I think I have some cigarettes left. Do you smoke?"
Oscar forcefully numbed the anxious feeling and ignored the skipped heartbeat as he leaned in and touched Krysia's lips with his own. The deep nervousness subsided as he lingered but a pang pulsed through him and he thought, Maybe I'm just tired right now. After a moment, Krysia pressed closer and although Oscar didn't expect that response, he wasn't surprised by it either. After he pulled away, they stared at each other and kissed again. And then one more time, but deeply. Oscar laid his head down over Krysia's shoulder and Krysia rubbed his back gently. Krysia asked him, "Was any of that supposed to help make you feel better?"
the response he got was an apology.
Something just kept messing him up. It was up to Lionel to diagnose the problem for the nth time and to reword his advice, otherwise Oscar just might stop calling for help. "It's not as if you would be unfaithful to anyone. If you're drawn to him I don't see why you shouldn't try to know him better. Isn't that how attraction works? Correct me if I'm wrong." He rubbed his brow and looked over at Peyton, the young homeless man he had taken in for care. Peyton used to be a glassblower.
"Okay yes, you're not wrong but I don't want to be drawn to Krysia. I don't want to know him better because I still plan on coming back and I have to know if--"
"I'll listen to you, Oscar, but I won't take your blather. I'm not telling you not to come back but you can stop clutching until you do. From what I understand, the break-up was official and there's no reason that you should have to dutifully wait in the wings just because you both may still have feelings for each other. You can cross that bridge when you come to it."
Oscar scratched the back of his head and trailed his nails down his neck, raking them down hard an attempt to dispel some of his frustration with pain. "You have a point but this still doesn't feel right to me. Living with Krysia.. Working with him, and Mimi having to be the third wheel.. It would be so awkward. I don't want to mess up in anymore relationships, Leo."
"Believe me when I tell you that I can understand that same exact feeling, but in your case, I just have to wonder, what is it that makes you think you 'messed up' in the first place? Your fallout with Adrian was simple. If I recall correctly, neither party was to blame; it was just the effect of external circumstances--"
"I messed up because he was the first one to say 'I love you' and I allowed myself to trust it completely.." Oscar blurted this out and articulated it so candidly that he didn't feel what he said until he paused. Tears came down quickly as he blinked and a dull tingling feeling rose up from his chest to his throat, and his nose suddenly became stuffed up. He sniffled and began to mumble. "I..don't know, I just messed up. I don't know."
Lionel's quick pause made it seem as if he was surprised at how quickly it took Oscar to cry. "He meant what he said and you reciprocated the feeling. It's nothing like 'messing up'; you're just still not over your grief." Pause. "I know it certainly doesn't feel this way but it is not a bad thing. All you need to do is give yourself some time."
"I've been here for--what is it?--over four months, Leo." Oscar sniffled again and rubbed hard at his eyes underneath his glasses. "I don't feel any better than I did when he hung up after our last phone call." He shut his eyes but tears still streamed down his face. That single memory hurt the most because it was merely a phone call. There was no lingering vision or touch, no real sensation other than just listening to a few seconds of audio that went by so quickly, he couldn't even remember the words in the exact order. He was cooking at the time of the phone call and had to stop afterwards because he lost his appetite. Things flooded back to him.
(The apartment was small but suited him just fine and the walls were white as they always had been. The place was a constant mess but the kitchen, in contrast, was always clean. He twisted the dial on the stove so that nothing drastic would happen to the pasta or boiling water as he went to fetch the phone. After a second of not recognizing the caller ID, he pressed the large circular button and put the device up to his ear, lips pulling taut into a smile and his tone perky as soon as he heard who was on the other line. He returned to the pot to continue stirring. And then that brief line that went by so quickly and hit him so hard that, dazed, he asked, "What's wrong?" but because he was so dazed, he wasn't sure if Adrian had heard because he hung up so quickly. No chance to speak. He lost the will to continue cooking and sank to the floor, leaning against the cupboards where a handle was pressed painfully against his lower back. He dropped the phone. It clattered loudly but never interrupted the zooming thoughts that went, How could you break up with me if you're the one who said it first?)
"You two dated for eight months. I wouldn't expect you to get over it in half that time. It's not what I meant, anyway. Come back and give yourself time here. Leaving the country won't help you in this situation because you still anticipate returning."
"It's not..." Oscar trailed off and leaned his forehead against his palm. It wasn't like that. Ever since that day where it was revealed to him that Yousei was a bad man--bad as in guns and aliases and "It's not safe for you to know me"s--suddenly it was as if everyone turned out to be participants in such things as well. Like Lincoln the painter and Adrian the ex-boyfriend. And apparently the breakup happened after some incident occurred involving the latter man; an incident where Oscar left the country to stay safe and out of the way. He wondered if he should tell Lionel about this, and then wondered if Lionel was involved too but he decided not to do either. He didn't want to know if his counselor was a part of it nor did he want to let something slip. He kept his silence and sniffled again.
"If you don't want to come back just yet, then go ahead and stay there and wait but don't hold yourself back from entering another relationship because perhaps Krysia has potential to be good for you as well." Lionel let out a sigh and checked his nails. "Find a way to pass your time so you don't feel so miserable. I've said it before: I'm not trying to get you to act against your own will but if you're attracted to someone, you may as well do something different. Especially if you've already broken away from the person in your last relationship, might I add."
Oscar sobbed and buried his face into his hand. "Your advice isn't helping me and I don't think it will--"
Lionel interrupted with another sigh. "I'm trying to put some ideas into your head so that you aren't utterly crushed by grief. My personal recommendations may not help you, but then what will? Are you going to waste by yourself and push away the things that try to be good to you?" He rubbed his forehead lightly and paused. "Please do not think that I am trying to hurt you with those questions. You clearly haven't though in depth about these things and I only think that you should."
"I," Oscar squeaked as he sobbed again. "I'm sorry. You're right. You're right." Long pause. "I'll think about it..."
"And then what will you do?"
"I'll--" Oscar choked on nothing. "I'll have to call you back about that."
"Alright. That sounds fine." A mug of tea suddenly appeared on the desk in front of Lionel, and he looked up at Peyton to nod thanks. Peyton smiled helplessly for some reason and apprehensively placed an employment application on the desk as well, however not directly in front of Lionel since he wasn't sure if its presence would be distracting Lionel from his phone conversation. Lionel scanned it quickly and made two gestures: one meant 'thank you' and the other meant 'I'll look at it when I'm done'. Peyton smiled a little more confidently and then moved into another part of the apartment to do some push-ups, since Lionel had recommended that he try to redevelop muscle mass.
Oscar sighed and squeezed his eyes shut. "Okay. I'm going to go now. Bye-bye." Lionel returned the farewell and they both hung up. Oscar dropped his cell phone onto the bed and watched it bounce before looking at Krysia, who was napping on his side of the room. Should he? Should he not? He didn't want to due to the anxiety of becoming attached but if the fear was there, perhaps it meant Lionel was right. Then again, most of the hesitation came out of the possible feeling that Krysia would just be an inadequate substitute. And when one was already hurt, one often did not feel the desire to hurt someone else.
Oscar spent over half an hour thinking intensely about his choices: go back to the States, be with Krysia (for a while?), find someone totally different, or avoid relationships. Between thoughts, there were large spaces in which he contemplated nothing because it was complicated to explore them all at once. The back of his mind told him 'whatever happens, happens' and out of desperation, it struck him as something profound. The option to follow intuition was easy and sometimes led him to the right things; not quite like mutable impulse.
Krysia stirred and eventually sat up, as if he felt the intent thoughtfulness that Oscar was emanating in his sleep and was too bothered by it to stay rested. He looked at Mimi's side of the bed and noticed she wasn't there, panicking briefly with confusion before remembering that she was out on a small trip to do make-up for commercial girls in a different region of the country. He rubbed his eye with his fist and covered his mouth to yawn. "Oscar? Are you okay?" He glanced sleepily at the clock and tried to focus his eyes on the time. "Have you gotten any rest?"
Oscar's heart thumped in his chest. Biting his lip, he went to sit beside Krysia and looked at him in the dim light from the lamp and asked, "What would you do if I told you that I'm upset about something, but that I don't want to really discuss it?" He took off his glasses and held onto them limply, ashamed.
Krysia frowned and hugged him tightly. "I would try to make you feel better but if you don't want me to, I'll give you your space. Do you want anything, coffee maybe? I think I have some cigarettes left. Do you smoke?"
Oscar forcefully numbed the anxious feeling and ignored the skipped heartbeat as he leaned in and touched Krysia's lips with his own. The deep nervousness subsided as he lingered but a pang pulsed through him and he thought, Maybe I'm just tired right now. After a moment, Krysia pressed closer and although Oscar didn't expect that response, he wasn't surprised by it either. After he pulled away, they stared at each other and kissed again. And then one more time, but deeply. Oscar laid his head down over Krysia's shoulder and Krysia rubbed his back gently. Krysia asked him, "Was any of that supposed to help make you feel better?"
the response he got was an apology.