everything farthing of the cost (soundtrack: on our way).
title: every farthing of the cost.
author: conditionelle
pairing: Kris/Adam.
rating: PG-13, let's say. There are some implications.
summary: That's why people had histories, after all. The past is a neat ledger-book and a chronicle; if you felt shame you would have/could have burnt it, doused it with the inscrutable black ink that still colours you around your edges, that bleeds past your half of the room and into his (the dark circles under his eyes, the five o'clock shadow of a long day).
notes: I've been listening a lot to Brand New Shoes - more specifically, to On Our Way, which soundtracks rather well to the present situation as it stands. Second-person narrative again.
It's nothing illicit, what you're doing. You're just lying on your bed with your laptop on your stomach and your headphones on, listening to a song that can have nothing to do with you, a song that precedes you and paints a portrait of life as it was, Before Idol. He could do the same to you with a few effortless keystrokes, find out exactly who you were (or something like it).
You wouldn't mind.
That's why people had histories, after all. The past is a neat ledger-book and a chronicle; if you felt shame you would have/could have burnt it, doused it with the inscrutable black ink that still colours you around your edges, that bleeds past your half of the room and into his (the dark circles under his eyes, the five o'clock shadow of a long day).
Nonetheless, it feels voyeuristic. He's not sharing this explicitly and you feel, you always feel that you need his express permission for the distance between you to shrink down one more iota of an inch. (Obviously, though, he's given that express permission more often than not, because now you almost disappear into each other's skin. Still.) And you don't think you have permission to listen in on his confessional, to know any of this, to sing along to the words and a melody that cannot/will not be rearranged. They're too inexpressibly his.
(This is what you're thinking when) you hear vaguely a hesitant triad of staccato knocks on your door. You untangle yourself from your refuge amongst the sea of hotel-room pillows and go to the door, take a peek before you reach for the ready-to-be-turned handle.
He's standing there in a t-shirt that's four sizes too big (yours), rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet; the countdown in his head is almost visible - three more seconds and he'll turn and go. (Shrug sheepishly to the security personnel lined down your hallway, this is a public space after all, what will people think.)
You open the door.
This wasn't the way it was supposed to go and you don't know whether it's your fault or his or if you've aided and abetted one another in finally crossing the line, the fine line you've been dancing down for weeks. It was just one more joke amongst the many that have already accumulated; it seems as if you speak to each other now in your own language for two:
You take his hand to look at his nail while he sits cross-legged in the center of your bed and you're sprawled out at its foot.
You just wanted to see if the polish has been chipped already, if you should repaint it or if he even wants you to (you told him, you told him - don't chew your nail, polish tastes awful - but he doesn't listen so what can you do?) and the world could not have prepared you for the slight lingering pressure of callused fingertips on your cheek, crystallized disbelief in his tentative touch.
What does he think he's doing?
Your eyes widen as he somehow rearranges his limbs so that he's kneeling almost over you and his lips are on yours, chapped and warm, more the impression of contact than the actual thing. You realize that he's probably not thinking at all, you certainly weren't for the longest fraction of a second of your life, and even now that you are - you're thinking about the shape of his smile - you still can't fathom how this came to be.
He makes a sound in the back of his throat (the sound of revelation) and only your hand on the back of his head, working with gravity to pull him down to you, only that keeps you both anchored. You think, as you surge up and push (him down) and pull (at the collar of his - your - shirt), you need to stop thinking; there is no other case of could have been, and this is what you have.
So you sing into the valley and crest of his body, hot breath erratic-then-slow against curve of his hipbones. Sweetheart (so the words go, and you like the sound of it on your own tongue) you're on your way. He laughs, ghosts his fingertip down the length of your nose to come to rest at your lips as you continue the whisper-song, you're on your way to make it all make sense.
You're stealing my song, he says as the corner of his mouth tugs up into a smile, the one that you know (and love) best. You laugh too, shake your head. The angle at which your lips meet again is a new melody altogether, electricity amplified thousand-fold through both your veins as he arches against you, taut as a viola string, eyes clear and certain as a pure note. The tension in his shoulders tells you that he's scared out of his mind, but he's not backing off and that's permission enough. And so, on you go.
Hours later, you're staring up at the ceiling and surprised that he's not yet asleep - the rhythm of his breathing is too steady; you know, you spend many nights tracing in the dark the cadence of his on-the-down-beat inhale/exhale. You sleep better when you can hear him. (You've not slept well for weeks, sometimes sit in the bathroom you share and lean your head against his door. You suspect that he knows.)
Finally through with pretending as the sky begins to lighten once more, he traces letters on your back through the fabric of your shirt.
I don't want this to end.
When Ryan is one second away on Wednesday night from saying one of your names, he reaches for your hand as if he's forgotten all about the cameras, the millions of pairs of eyes, his wife in the audience. It's what you've never dared to do all along, a final affirmation of what was, what is, what will (not) be. You've been too afraid of scrutinizing eyes, of untempered backlash, of what you think you know is going to come. (You've been too afraid of the prospect of goodbye.)
You don't hear the final verdict. You don't care about the confetti.
You already know.
author: conditionelle
pairing: Kris/Adam.
rating: PG-13, let's say. There are some implications.
summary: That's why people had histories, after all. The past is a neat ledger-book and a chronicle; if you felt shame you would have/could have burnt it, doused it with the inscrutable black ink that still colours you around your edges, that bleeds past your half of the room and into his (the dark circles under his eyes, the five o'clock shadow of a long day).
notes: I've been listening a lot to Brand New Shoes - more specifically, to On Our Way, which soundtracks rather well to the present situation as it stands. Second-person narrative again.
It's nothing illicit, what you're doing. You're just lying on your bed with your laptop on your stomach and your headphones on, listening to a song that can have nothing to do with you, a song that precedes you and paints a portrait of life as it was, Before Idol. He could do the same to you with a few effortless keystrokes, find out exactly who you were (or something like it).
You wouldn't mind.
That's why people had histories, after all. The past is a neat ledger-book and a chronicle; if you felt shame you would have/could have burnt it, doused it with the inscrutable black ink that still colours you around your edges, that bleeds past your half of the room and into his (the dark circles under his eyes, the five o'clock shadow of a long day).
Nonetheless, it feels voyeuristic. He's not sharing this explicitly and you feel, you always feel that you need his express permission for the distance between you to shrink down one more iota of an inch. (Obviously, though, he's given that express permission more often than not, because now you almost disappear into each other's skin. Still.) And you don't think you have permission to listen in on his confessional, to know any of this, to sing along to the words and a melody that cannot/will not be rearranged. They're too inexpressibly his.
(This is what you're thinking when) you hear vaguely a hesitant triad of staccato knocks on your door. You untangle yourself from your refuge amongst the sea of hotel-room pillows and go to the door, take a peek before you reach for the ready-to-be-turned handle.
He's standing there in a t-shirt that's four sizes too big (yours), rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet; the countdown in his head is almost visible - three more seconds and he'll turn and go. (Shrug sheepishly to the security personnel lined down your hallway, this is a public space after all, what will people think.)
You open the door.
This wasn't the way it was supposed to go and you don't know whether it's your fault or his or if you've aided and abetted one another in finally crossing the line, the fine line you've been dancing down for weeks. It was just one more joke amongst the many that have already accumulated; it seems as if you speak to each other now in your own language for two:
You take his hand to look at his nail while he sits cross-legged in the center of your bed and you're sprawled out at its foot.
You just wanted to see if the polish has been chipped already, if you should repaint it or if he even wants you to (you told him, you told him - don't chew your nail, polish tastes awful - but he doesn't listen so what can you do?) and the world could not have prepared you for the slight lingering pressure of callused fingertips on your cheek, crystallized disbelief in his tentative touch.
What does he think he's doing?
Your eyes widen as he somehow rearranges his limbs so that he's kneeling almost over you and his lips are on yours, chapped and warm, more the impression of contact than the actual thing. You realize that he's probably not thinking at all, you certainly weren't for the longest fraction of a second of your life, and even now that you are - you're thinking about the shape of his smile - you still can't fathom how this came to be.
He makes a sound in the back of his throat (the sound of revelation) and only your hand on the back of his head, working with gravity to pull him down to you, only that keeps you both anchored. You think, as you surge up and push (him down) and pull (at the collar of his - your - shirt), you need to stop thinking; there is no other case of could have been, and this is what you have.
So you sing into the valley and crest of his body, hot breath erratic-then-slow against curve of his hipbones. Sweetheart (so the words go, and you like the sound of it on your own tongue) you're on your way. He laughs, ghosts his fingertip down the length of your nose to come to rest at your lips as you continue the whisper-song, you're on your way to make it all make sense.
You're stealing my song, he says as the corner of his mouth tugs up into a smile, the one that you know (and love) best. You laugh too, shake your head. The angle at which your lips meet again is a new melody altogether, electricity amplified thousand-fold through both your veins as he arches against you, taut as a viola string, eyes clear and certain as a pure note. The tension in his shoulders tells you that he's scared out of his mind, but he's not backing off and that's permission enough. And so, on you go.
Hours later, you're staring up at the ceiling and surprised that he's not yet asleep - the rhythm of his breathing is too steady; you know, you spend many nights tracing in the dark the cadence of his on-the-down-beat inhale/exhale. You sleep better when you can hear him. (You've not slept well for weeks, sometimes sit in the bathroom you share and lean your head against his door. You suspect that he knows.)
Finally through with pretending as the sky begins to lighten once more, he traces letters on your back through the fabric of your shirt.
I don't want this to end.
When Ryan is one second away on Wednesday night from saying one of your names, he reaches for your hand as if he's forgotten all about the cameras, the millions of pairs of eyes, his wife in the audience. It's what you've never dared to do all along, a final affirmation of what was, what is, what will (not) be. You've been too afraid of scrutinizing eyes, of untempered backlash, of what you think you know is going to come. (You've been too afraid of the prospect of goodbye.)
You don't hear the final verdict. You don't care about the confetti.
You already know.