Drabble: Untitled.
Random thing of 301 words written in eight minutes between an essay on gender comparison in religion and another on race relations in Australia from White Settlement to present day.
Patrick/Pete.
“What do you want from me?”
The question hovers like storm clouds, like dust, like tentative peace and Pete wishes he could touch it, clench it in his fist, hold it in the palm of his hand. Patrick’s sprawled to the side of the bunk, jersey catching across his arms, waist, ribs, and he doesn’t look right, doesn’t look animate, alive, functioning and Pete wants to shake him, wants this, wants this moment to mean something.
“I don’t want anything,” Pete murmurs, and he lets his fingers graze the wall, clench against the curtain. “Not really.”
Patrick sighs, clenches his eyelids too tight over light bulb eyes and Pete can’t reply, can’t say anything more, can’t move.
“No,” Patrick says, and he turns just enough to press his forehead against the wall. “You want too much, you want it all.”
“No,” Pete says, apart from the days when it’s yes, apart from the days were Pete, when he wakes up and thinks in forevers, when he thinks in milestones and anniversaries, in picket fences and wedding rings and children and growing up, growing old.
When Pete says no, he means it every second until he’d be able to stop holding on to whatever this is and let go. Until he can hold on to something that isn’t fleeting glances and touches that don’t quite linger, until he can hold on to something real.
Pete, he breathes into the moment, kisses Patrick like he’s drowning, clings like this is forever and says nothing like its natural. Pete, he dances around love like he’s never felt it, feels it like he’s never been hurt and hurts like he always has.
If this is love then he doesn’t want it. If this is being in love then maybe he’ll feel better in the morning.