Day nine: letters
The little AU: advent calendar: letters: day nine
slashfairy
G
Sometime in the night the basket had come unbalanced, fallen off the little table, and landed on the floor, spreading mail across the tiled entryway and under the chair just inside the door. Out the night before at some event, having a good enough time in spite of the ice in his heart, Orli sleeps through the noise, waking after 10 (late, for him, these days) to a week's worth of incoming laid out literally at his feet.
"Bother," he says, leaving it there. His back's stiff this morning, his head aches. He's still a lightweight: a couple of good shots, a glass of wine, and he's done for. Not like Karl, not like Vig, who can drink him under the table and out the other side of it, get him dancing on top of it, and never slur a word. The sense of them brushes across his shoulders like wings just before the shower's warm water hits him; he shivers: the water's colder than the sensation just before it despite the steam that fills the bathroom, obscuring mirror, fogging windows, soothing his eyes. He stands there enveloped, not moving, as though the hot water cascading down his back will melt the aching cold inside him.
On the floor in the entryway, late morning sun slides across the stream of mail, so that when he finally comes out towel-wrapped and picks it up, some of the letters are warm in his hand. He's surprised by that; puts the rest down, and looks more closely at the ones that caught his attention.
The letters from England he smiles at, and lays in his lap. A card, it feels like, from Seb- he'll bet anything there's an invite in it to some do or another. Well, he'll go, he supposes- it's the holidays, ain't it. Supposed to be cheery and all, ain't he?
A brown-paper wrapped parcel with a familiar return address finds its way into his hand, him sitting, still, as he weighs it, as though that will tell him something about the density of feeling put into it by the sender. He lays it in his lap, too, along with a pair of postcards, then drops his head back over the curve of the overstuffed chair, and starts to cry, and starts to smile, and starts to feel alive today. Every day lately it's been an effort: today? Today it may be worth it.
Day ten
slashfairy
G
Sometime in the night the basket had come unbalanced, fallen off the little table, and landed on the floor, spreading mail across the tiled entryway and under the chair just inside the door. Out the night before at some event, having a good enough time in spite of the ice in his heart, Orli sleeps through the noise, waking after 10 (late, for him, these days) to a week's worth of incoming laid out literally at his feet.
"Bother," he says, leaving it there. His back's stiff this morning, his head aches. He's still a lightweight: a couple of good shots, a glass of wine, and he's done for. Not like Karl, not like Vig, who can drink him under the table and out the other side of it, get him dancing on top of it, and never slur a word. The sense of them brushes across his shoulders like wings just before the shower's warm water hits him; he shivers: the water's colder than the sensation just before it despite the steam that fills the bathroom, obscuring mirror, fogging windows, soothing his eyes. He stands there enveloped, not moving, as though the hot water cascading down his back will melt the aching cold inside him.
On the floor in the entryway, late morning sun slides across the stream of mail, so that when he finally comes out towel-wrapped and picks it up, some of the letters are warm in his hand. He's surprised by that; puts the rest down, and looks more closely at the ones that caught his attention.
The letters from England he smiles at, and lays in his lap. A card, it feels like, from Seb- he'll bet anything there's an invite in it to some do or another. Well, he'll go, he supposes- it's the holidays, ain't it. Supposed to be cheery and all, ain't he?
A brown-paper wrapped parcel with a familiar return address finds its way into his hand, him sitting, still, as he weighs it, as though that will tell him something about the density of feeling put into it by the sender. He lays it in his lap, too, along with a pair of postcards, then drops his head back over the curve of the overstuffed chair, and starts to cry, and starts to smile, and starts to feel alive today. Every day lately it's been an effort: today? Today it may be worth it.
Day ten