(Untitled)
[It's early. Or, maybe it's late. With vampires, it's hard to tell these things. Either way, they've been here for a while, sprawled out in a tangle of limbs in a nest of sheets, quilts, and comforters in the Old Bedroom with the painted windows and the four-poster bed
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It isn't as though any of them - Lavi, Allen, or Lavi's brother - would know how things are really supposed to be with their kind. Although Allen does think it might be something close to this. It always felt so natural to curl up like this and literally snooze the day away.
Though Allen isn't sure if he'd want a life like that, either.
Still.
Another hum, a lighter note this time. Allen cracks a little smile at that, and tilts his head to brush his nose against Lavi's thumb, before he drops himself up on his right elbow.]
Hard to sleep if we end up talking all day... [Though it's true. He tries to avoid sleep where he can, even if the ring on a chain around his neck (that he never, ever takes off) prevents him from having any nightmares. He doesn't want to find out if he can have dreams. But he frowns. It's hard to tell if Aiden is looking at his blind eye, or something else.] ...what're you looking for?
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No, s'not like that.
[He's looking between them, really. Not focused on one moreso than the other.]
Y'don't sleep at all.
[It's... strangely somber.]
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Allen blinks in a tired sort of way, though... curious. Perhaps even surprised. He pushes himself up more - with just the slightest wobble of someone that has difficulty staying awake during the day because it's true, they really don't sleep, and they really should - and leans in. A hand comes up to cup Lavi's jaw lightly, and Allen touches his forehead to Lavi's temple, nose to his cheek.]
...It's not that big a deal.. [But... you actually sound worried about him.
And okay. He's a bit more... touchy-feely when he's tired. Those instincts have to come out somewhere.]
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He allows the contact for a moment -- only a moment; just long enough -- before drawing back a little to center Allen in the middle of his vision again. But he does tilt his head toward the palm cupping his cheek. It's his silent way of saying, "Not going far."]
... yer not denyin' it.
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Allen watches Aiden as he pulls away, humming a few notes of a song - who knows which one, because it certainly isn't one that Aiden would know. Probably one Allen wrote. He brushes his thumb over Aiden's cheek idly, and he doesn't seem intent on pulling his hand away just yet.]
...not much point denying it, is there?
I don't like it.
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He'd never had much control to begin with. Not with being taken into the clan at 6, and turned into a vampire at 16. Not with the records, and the aliases, and the lies, and the rules. Not with being brought to the dressing room, and taken out again, only to be brought back.
There are some things he can control, though, even if they are negligible compared to everything else. And he'll hold onto that control with an iron fist.
What goes up, must come down, after all.]
We all gotta do things we don't like, yeah? [His eye swivels to the ceiling, as if he's measuring his words.] I know our bodies don't really need sleep.
... but we do.
[And perhaps that doesn't make sense. Or, it makes sense only in Lavi's mind.
Really, it's one of the only few human things we have left.
But that part will go unsaid.]
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Lavi was an exception. So was Aiden. But no one else was, and everyone left. And sometimes - not always, but sometimes - even the dreams hurt, because he'd never get to have those things back. Never flick a Noah in the forehead for being a moron. Never press his ear to someone's stomach, only to hear a tiny little heart fluttering away inside.
He still dreamed about Lavi, too. Things he really shouldn't dream about, doesn't want to dream about, but does anyway.
Sometimes he dreamed of Aiden, too.
But then again, Allen has always hid from his mind, the things it showed him. Without the pills he can't do that, and so... this.]
...I sleep sometimes. Hard to get around if you don't... It's just not all the time.
["Sometimes" being when he was too tired to actually do more than curl up and have long hours of dreamless void. He liked those times best.]
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Who knows how long our lives will be.
He leans in again, touching his nose to Allen's.]
Don't sleep like y'should, you won't eat like y'should. [His gaze softens; quiets.
What he isn't saying: I don't like the way it sounds.]
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A small frown tugs at Allen's lips, pulling them slightly downward as his brow furrows.
He doesn't need to say it, really. Allen can hear it. The notes of disapproval, the slight flutter that could almost be called worry... the quietness with which Aiden has listened to Allen's busted body.
Allen closes his eyes, and leans so that their foreheads bump together as well.]
I've been eating more lately, you know. [But he barely ate at all when Lavi disappeared, and he showed up on Aiden's doorstep in the middle of the day with a migraine big enough to kill small children and in desperate need of rest, and mutters of not going home, can't; all with the unspoken reason that Lavi wasn't there.
Even if that had probably led to punches being thrown for showing up in the middle of the day.]
I'm not that bad.
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[It's funny. If Allen were to ask him, Lavi would say no. It isn't a life; rather, just existence. But, unprovoked, he'd call it a life. Maybe he doesn't think Allen's paying attention; maybe he isn't paying attention enough.
And he's still listening; listening to the way that the ribs creak and ache, the way the arm pops and protests. The sleepy fog that muddles everything else.
Exhaustion... it always sounds so disheartening, even if you don't have, (aren't supposed to have) a heart.
He noses at Allen in a way that is... unusually soft. Gentle, almost.]
Are too. Shoulda been doin' it the whole time, not just lately.
Why?
[Though, a part of him thinks he already might know.]
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Really, who wants to pay attention to all the ways your body refuses to work? So it goes ignored, because it's easier that way.
If it isn't the exhaustion, it's the pills. There's always something there, keeping Allen from thinking, from looking at all the pieces like he should. Sometimes he does anyway, but others... a lot goes over his head if he isn't careful.
Allen lifts his hand from Lavi's cheek, fingers sliding up into his hair. Pulling through it once lightly, before resting against his scalp. He doesn't really know what to do with Aiden being this soft and worried and like-- Like Allen might have actually meant something more than he was supposed to.
He blames it on the daylight.
And because it's the daytime, he doesn't stop himself from answering. Doesn't see the point or feel a reason to.]
...Ehan told me once not to act like you. Because I said the finders were terrified of me... Allen [Aiden's brother, his "uncle", whatever you wanted to call him--] told me that, too. The way that kid would look at me...
[There's more. Just one thing more, one thing that he doesn't say, though. Because Allen probably talks very little of his roommate to Aiden, outside of saying that he's "his Lavi".
It's also probably worth noting that he avoids calling his sire by name as often as possible.]
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What is a human's life, if not a blip in the timeline.
But it's their existence. And even if their existence were a plethora of blips on the timeline -- they still only get one.
Just one. Just one, and it's a hell of a lot longer. A lot longer.
(That alone is a sickening thought.)
There's a soft sound in the back of his throat, something that sounds a bit like a sleepy purr.]
Tellin' you ta not follow instinct.
[Because, at the heart of it, that's what it all is, isn't it? Instincts?]
And?
[You hesitated. He heard it.]
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Only one, and people fade in and out of it so quickly. Sometimes the thought scares Allen - scares him because he thinks about Aiden; how old he is and how old he actually looks, and what he has to look forward to in his life, and Allen wonders, "will that be me some day?"
But he's usually comforted by the thought that he probably won't live that long anyway, if that can be a comfort. Either an impossibly long life, or an impossibly short one.
There are days where he can't decide which is worse.
Allen shrugs his shoulder, the good one, and tilts his head so that his nose ends up against Aiden's cheek.]
It's hard not to follow instinct...
[Or it was, at first. He has pretty good self-control now. Even if it's mostly used to keep him unhealthy.
But Allen pauses at that, hesitates further. And maybe it's less because he doesn't want to say it, and more... he doesn't want to think it. It's such a terrible thought, for something that means so much to him.
Allen closes his eyes.]
...If Lavi were smart, he'd stay away from me. [His voice is soft; and he doesn't clarify, because who else would he be talking about? There's no other Lavi that it could be save for the one he lives with. The one, by the odd way his heart twists in his chest... that Allen loves, in his own weird way.
It's oddly similar to the way his heart twists at times when he thinks of Aiden, isn't it?]
He doesn't like supernaturals.
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[Which is true. There is too much, too much about their natures to keep wrapped up neatly behind some curtain. And hardly any of it can't be ignored.
Don't like your diet? Fine, don't eat -- you won't starve to death, however; you'll simply become an aching, hungry, powerless, listless form. Don't like to dream? Fine, don't sleep -- you won't die from sleep deprivation; you'll simply become too exhausted to hunt. If you can't hunt, you can't eat, if you can't eat...
... your whole state of existence would be worse than if you had just died.
We can't help what we are. And we can't hide it, either.
Everything within Lavi sounds like it's falling still. Quieting himself, so he can hear.]
's normal for people ta fear what they don't understand, yeah? [A pause as his eye flicks between Allen's, regardless of whether they are open or not.] Doesn't give him the right to make you something yer not.
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Wrap it neatly behind a curtain, and don't let anyone see it.
Allen isn't ashamed of what he is, he just doesn't think the people he cares about would understand.
Most people wouldn't pick this life that he has right now over dying, though. Chronic pain (although most of the time he's too disconnected to feel it properly), sneaking around, always hungry, always tired... no. It could be a lot better than it is, than Allen lets it be.
Can't hide it, but he can try.]
He doesn't do that. He'd never make me change. [But something in Allen's chest clenches almost painfully when Aiden says that one little word; fear.] I don't want him to... [If a day ever came where Lavi was genuinely afraid of him, and it was entirely Allen's fault... he wouldn't be able to live with himself. He needed Lavi too much, cares about him too much... what would he do if Lavi ever looked at him with fear in his eyes?
It isn't something that Allen is typically afraid of, not something that crosses his mind. But now that Aiden has made the connection, the thought is almost to terrible for him to stand.]
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For everything that's negative in this life (existence) there's so much more that's positive. So much more that put them above the humans -- why fall on bended knee for them?
And this... this right here... is why he's so skeptical of them.
Because they aren't creatures meant to be kept in cages, behind curtains; and yet that's what they're forced to do.
And if the people that Allen cares about don't understand -- then why should he go on caring about them?
So for all that, his eye narrows, and there's a spike of something -- it almost sounds like rage? -- that rips through him.]
Stop lyin' to yerself.
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