A Heart to Hold You [Broken Toy verse]

[whiskyrunner]

Title: A Heart to Hold You
Pairing: Arthur/Eames
Words: ~6500
Rating: R
Summary: How Arthur learned to love (and was just a little too late).
WARNINGS: References to child sexual abuse, noncon, prostitution.
Author's Note: Don't read this. It's sad. This is the coda, prequel, and final part of the Broken Toy verse. I recommend you read at least Broken Toy, if not its monstrous sequel, before starting this one.
That's if you read this one. Which you shouldn't. It's sad. Go away. :c


I.
Arthur drummed his fingers slowly on the surface of the lacquered table, contemplating. He sat there a long time. Until the light coming in through the curtains was orange, casting long shadows across the room.

He picked up his phone and entered a number. The dialtone purred in his ear. After eleven seconds, someone answered.

“Bonsoir,” Arthur said. “I heard you have need of an extractor.”

+His contact in France got him in touch with a contact in Germany. Before the week was out, Arthur was on a plane to Berlin.

Herr Reimer was waiting to meet him at the coordinates Arthur had been texted. He was smiling, offering Arthur a slightly sweaty palm on the threshold of the building. Arthur shook it.

“Good to meet you,” Reimer said in German. “Mister ...?”

“Just 'Arthur' is fine,” Arthur replied.

“Wonderful. Come in.”

It's a brothel, was Arthur's first thought. It looked like a brothel. It looked like somebody's very old house, really, with the stairs right next to the door, but there was a bar at the back and three stories above them. Reimer led him up the first flight of stairs, continuing to converse in German.

“You understand our business, of course?”

“I believe so,” said Arthur. “If it's prostitution, yes.”

Reimer laughed delightedly. “You are very sharp. Yes -- the world's oldest profession -- simply made more modern. There's no risk this way, you see. And it's more glamorous. Business is booming. I've had to turn away people looking to work here!”

“So you come here,” said Arthur, “and then, what--”

“Find a girl you like ... or a boy, whatever your tastes ... and you pay for a room, come upstairs here, and dream together.” Reimer paused on the second floor, and nodded at a burly man who was standing outside one of the closed doors like a security guard, presumably to watch that nobody tried to do anything with the unconscious bodies or maybe steal the PASIV equipment. Arthur noted the slight bulk of a gun under his coat. The man stepped aside and Reimer opened the door to reveal another man, lying comfortably on a cot alongside a curvy young woman. A PASIV wheezed softly between them. “Not quite as messy as the real thing, you see,” Reimer said, closing the door quietly.

“It's very neat,” Arthur agreed. “Your employees come and go, then?”

There was a dark flicker of intelligence in Reimer's jovial, smiling face. “All our employees work for us of their own free will, of course.”

“I'm going to need you to be more open than that if you want me to help you,” Arthur said quietly.

Reimer's smile faded. With a glance at the security guard, he began to ascend the stairs. Arthur followed him up, past more closed doors and more security personnel, to the fourth floor. It was dark up here and there were no security guards. All the doors were ajar, revealing empty rooms, except for two, side by side. Reimer walked to the nearer one and took out a key. Only one of the doors had a lock. He opened it and led Arthur inside.

“All our employees work for us of their own free will,” said Reimer again. “Some ... some have been trafficked, yes, but they're treated well and they are far happier here than they were in their homelands.” Then he hesitated. “But this one is a special case.”

There was a lightbulb dangling from the ceiling in the middle of the room. It was the only thing in the room apart from the dirty mattress on the floor, upon which Eames lay, attached in multiple places to a tangle of wires. His eyes were closed and his chest rose and fell calmly. The PASIV hissed and wheezed next to him. A second line trailed out of it and vanished into the wall.

Arthur knelt next to him and checked his pulse, cradling the wrist not attached to a cuff. It was steady and strong, but slow. He lifted one of Eames' eyelids.

“He's deep,” he observed.

“Yes.” Reimer had his hands folded behind his back. He rocked back and forth on his heels slightly. He seemed somewhat uncomfortable, as though he didn't like to be near Eames. “He's on a special compound. Round-the-clock sedation.”

“Is that safe?”

“It's been done before,” Reimer said, not looking at either Eames or Arthur, still crouched on the floor next to the mattress. “Mainly by gamers ... you know of the gaming field, in Japan? We borrowed one or two ideas from their more innovative minds. The compound used by clients, for instance. It's quite light. We guarantee a ninety-eight percent chance of being able to recall the dream completely. There wouldn't be much point otherwise, would there?” He chuckled uncomfortably, then, looking at Arthur's face, cleared his throat and inclined his chin towards Eames' prone form. “We have a registered nurse on staff who makes checks on him regularly.”

Arthur stood up slowly. “How does this work?”

“It's more complex than our other services. Clients must book appointments. They normally have someone specific in mind. We relay the information down there so that the forger knows who he's to be forging at what time. Nobody ever sees him up here, so as to preserve the fantasy aspect ... I don't think half the clients understand that he is a real person.” Reimer cleared his throat again. “We've tried several other forgers. There's no doubt that Eames is the best. He's the only one who can forge all manner of both genders with complete accuracy in ... in all areas.”

Arthur could imagine them stripping him bare, forcing him into different male and female identities to check clinically that everything was in working order.

“So you need an extractor,” he said. “Why?”

“There's something he's hiding,” Reimer said. “And we haven't been able to find it yet. We think it must be a room -- some place he's disappearing to when he's not supposed to be. Once it's located, and we have access, we can put a stop to it. We've had extractors in his mind before, but none of them can find it. We need it located before it starts to affect his -- his efficiency.”

“Mm,” said Arthur, thoughtful.

On the mattress, Eames made the tiniest sound in his throat. It was so soft that Arthur had no way of distinguishing it, whether it was pain or pleasure or protest. They both looked at him for a moment.

“Is somebody under with him now?” Arthur broke the silence.

“Yes. One of his regular clients.” Reimer looked at Arthur suddenly, fully. “I do my homework, Arthur. I know you have worked with Eames in the past.”

“Then you know he has sold out my partner and I on one occasion in Toronto,” said Arthur calmly. “A job is just a job to me, Herr Reimer. I'm not here for revenge on him or anything else. I'm here for the money.”

Reimer looked calmed by that. “The reward would be considerable,” he said. “He brings in a lot of business. We may steal all the Western clientele from the Thai prostitution trade.” Then he laughed. “Imagine spending not an hour with a whore, but a week, for the same price. Tempting, is it not?”

Arthur shrugged, since he had no particular feelings either way about whores. Arthur had never felt sexual attraction to people he didn't know. Romantic attraction was something he was recently familiar with; but to him, the thought of having sex with a stranger was somewhat equivalent to the thought of having sex with a couch. This made it worse, somehow, to think of all those strangers fucking Eames.

“Anyway,” Reimer said at last. “Our resources are at your disposal. You can go under whenever you're ready.”

He was interrupted by the buzzing of a cell phone. Pulling it out of his pocket, he examined it.

“Excuse me,” he said. “I have to take this.”

Arthur nodded and he strode out of the room, leaving the door open a crack. Arthur could hear his low voice out on the landing.

A more emotional person would have ripped all the wires out of Eames right there. That person might have pulled a gun and shot Reimer, and dragged Eames down all four flights of stairs, past all the security, somehow. They'd have damned the consequences, because at least Eames would be awake, not in a dream with whoever was on the other side of that wall.

But Arthur was not emotional and not given to whims, no matter how powerful. He was a point man who was doing just that, running point -- collecting all the information he could so as to formulate a working plan. He would need more weapons, he would need to clear the building somehow, he would need a getaway car and a safehouse to take Eames to, and he had none of those things right now.

If nothing else, Arthur was a professional.

He dropped to his knees on the old mattress and pressed a hand to Eames' chest firmly.

“I swear I'll get you out, Eames,” he said softly, under his breath. “I swear to you. Just hold on and I promise you I'll come back for you.”

And it killed him, to slide his hand away and leave Eames' side. But he did it. It was the only thing he possibly could do.

“I'm not the extractor you need,” he said, when Reimer returned. “But I know who is. My partner is the best in the business. If anyone can find the information you want, it's him.”

Reimer's smile was back in place. “Wonderful,” he said. “Just give me a time and I'll have him ready for you.”

They left the room. Arthur glanced back at Eames once before closing the door. As he watched, Eames' fingers twitched slightly against the mattress and his lips parted, as if in a silent plea.

Arthur shut the door on him and heard the lock click behind him.

II.
When Arthur was ten, he learned that he wasn't very good at school. It came as a dull surprise.

“Are you calling my son retarded or something?” his mother demanded.

“The school counsellor does think there is a chance that Arthur might be developmentally delayed,” his teacher replied diplomatically. “But nobody's saying he's retarded. I think Arthur is a bright young boy.”

“Why fail him, then? How do you even fail the fourth grade?”

Ms. Burns glanced at Arthur like she thought this wasn't a conversation they should be having in front of him, but Arthur was staring at the floor, absently swinging his legs back and forth.

“Arthur is a good student,” she said. “He's reading at a ninth-grade level. He gets all his homework done and hands all his assignments in on time. I'm just worried that he doesn't have a very good grasp on the course material. He gets a lot of answers wrong. His test scores are very low and he seldom, if ever, participates in class activities or discussions.” She paused. “He's not ... developing as quickly as the other kids. Emotionally.”

“How can his test scores be low?” his mother snapped. “He never misses school.”

Ms. Burns adjusted her glasses cautiously, threaded her fingers together on her desk and looked down at Arthur again.

“Arthur doesn't seem to take in much of what I'm teaching,” she said. “I think he's often in his own little world. It's ... very difficult to reach him when he's distracted.”

“So he's ADD.”

“I think repeating the fourth grade will give him a chance to catch up, emotionally and mentally,” said Ms. Burns, gently. “The alternative is to consider a school like Applewood--”

“And put him in a class with a bunch of special-ed kids,” said his mother. “Jesus Christ.”

“--The student to teacher ratio is very low, it would give him a chance to get some one-on-one attention and equip him with the skills he needs to--”

“So now I don't give my kid any attention.”

“Please,” said Ms. Burns, starting to get a little flustered. “I'm only trying to consider what's best for Arthur.”

“Well, I'm his mother. And I'm not putting him in a school for retards.” She stood up with an air of finality, taking Arthur by the hand. “Come on.”

Ultimately Arthur wouldn't drop out of school until after his first year of high school; but that was approximately when he decided that he and school didn't get along. It was easier at home, where he didn't have to pretend that his dad hadn't fucked him.

+He was eleven when this exchange came about:

“I made your favourite,” his mom said, scooping pancakes onto his plate from a platter. “Chocolate chip pancakes.”

She always made his favourite. After. He didn't tell her that chocolate chip pancakes made him sick. Once a week, once a month; didn't matter. They always made him sick.

He ate, quietly.

When he was done he retreated back into his room to get ready for school. He tucked his homework into his bag carefully. He'd made sure to get all the answers right. He knew now that wrong answers made him stand out and if there was one thing Arthur couldn't take, it was standing out.

He shouldered his bag and was ready to duck out the door when his mother's voice stopped him:

“You're not even going to give me a hug goodbye?”

He stopped. Face pinched with confusion, he turned around. He and his mother never hugged. Sometimes, after she'd been drinking, she would paw at him, pull him into an uncomfortably tight embrace that smelled of booze, but that didn't count.

“Oh, fine,” she snapped, seeing the wary hunch of his shoulders. “Just go, if I'm so fucking unpleasant to be around.”

Now he felt slightly bad. It wasn't her fault she was a bad parent. She bought him presents, a lot of the time. Usually treats, sometimes books, which he'd carefully hide away in his closet whenever he wasn't reading them; sometimes stuffed animals, which he always mysteriously lost. Sometimes he heard Him fighting with his mother at night, and he thought about how she didn't have anyone to make her favourite, the next morning.

He hovered uncertainly, wondering if it really meant that much to her. Finally he turned to leave. Her voice was choked and bitter and ugly, stopping him once more before he could make his escape:

“It wasn't like this, until you came along.”

As if it was his fault his father was more attracted to young boys than to his own wife.

All the same, the words chased Arthur as he clattered down the fifteen flights of stairs, out of the apartment building. They chased him till he was sick and threw up the pancakes in a drainage ditch next to the road. He missed his bus, even though some of the kids saw him. He could see them laughing through the windows when he climbed out of the ditch, wiping his mouth feebly.

He shouldered his backpack. That was just fine. Arthur got on better on his own, anyway. He started the long walk.

+The elevator was small and cramped and it creaked a lot.

“Great game tonight,” his dad said. He smelled like aftershave and beer. He rested a hand on Arthur's shoulder, slid it down to the small of his back.

Arthur took a deep breath and prayed and prayed the elevator wouldn't jam, because if they made it home to the apartment, it would seem like so much less of a crime. In the apartment he could sometimes be distracted by Arthur's mother, or the TV; something, anything long enough for Arthur to slip away, hide in the bathroom and lock the door.

The elevator jammed.

Arthur was nine years old when he stopped believing in prayer because that was when he learned that nobody up there was listening.

+He was nineteen and Cobb was nudging him. Arthur pulled off his headphones and paused his music.

“Yes?”

Cobb cleared his throat. “I ... wanted to talk.”

“What about?” said Arthur, sitting up on the couch. Cobb hesitated, then sat down in the chair opposite.

“About ... about what you showed me yesterday.”

“Oh,” said Arthur. “Yes.”

He waited attentively for Cobb to go on, but Cobb didn't seem inclined to do so. He seemed to be waiting for Arthur to speak first. Arthur raised an eyebrow.

“I mean ... Christ, Arthur.” Cobb was starting to look faintly helpless. He spread his hands. “Don't you want to talk?”

“I wouldn't know what to say,” said Arthur. “There's nothing really to talk about.”

“Are you kidding me?” said Cobb weakly. “Those memories--”

“It's not as bad as it looked,” said Arthur. “Honestly. I'm over it.”

“Well, obviously not, if you're asking me to extract those memories from you!”

“I just don't want anything to adversely affect my performance in the dreamscape,” said Arthur calmly. “I've been reading up on it and I know how one's subconscious and memories can influence their dreambuilding. I don't want to be taken by surprise, that's all. I appreciate your efforts, and I can see now that I'll just have to keep a tight handle on my subconscious control.”

“Jesus, Arthur.” Cobb was shaking his head slowly. “Is this really you? Is it really so easy for you to bundle up everything inside you like that?”

“Dom,” said Arthur patiently. “I don't have panic attacks. I'm not afraid of men. I have no physical scars. I don't wake up screaming in the middle of the night. If I hadn't shown you those memories, you wouldn't be treating me like something is wrong with me, because nothing is. I'm okay. I promise.”

“Have you at least talked to a therapist about all this?” Cobb asked.

“Why would I?” said Arthur, bemused. “What would I say?”

“Jesus,” Cobb muttered again. He dragged a hand through his hair. Then he got up and walked away.

He always looked at Arthur a little guardedly from then on, like he was afraid Arthur might suddenly snap. But Arthur never did. Arthur always had everything under control. He was a fucking professional.

He'd learned long ago, but the lesson was driven home one last time: Never tell anybody. They would never understand.

III.
Once, Mal had purred, teasingly, “I know what your secret is.”

Smiling, indulging her, Arthur had said, “What's my secret, Mal?”

She placed a hand on his chest, covering his heart, and answered quietly, “This is not nearly as cold as you think it is.”

+Arthur didn't feel.

That was a lie. He felt some things. He felt pain, especially in dreams. In reality, he was just indifferent. At school kids used to attack him because he was different. He was bad at fighting, then. But he never flinched, never cried, never backed away; just kept getting up no matter how badly he was hurt, and that made them all the more afraid of him.

He wasn't insensitive. Just indifferent.

He'd had relationships with two women and sex with a few more. It was okay. Not great. Just okay. Half the time he didn't come. He thought this was normal, until he learned it wasn't; then he'd pretend, pull out quickly and tie off the condom before she could realize he'd been faking.

As for emotions--

Well. Arthur was a professional.

This, he would cite, was the reason he was perpetually numb inside. A healthy, lukewarm nothing. He cared about the people he let get close enough (namely, the Cobbs) and that was about it. He'd never gone home, not to revenge himself against his father nor to liberate his mother, because he just didn't care.

Arthur lived his life in sepia tones, and he could not figure out Eames.

Eames, who wore bright colours and called him darling just to piss him off.

Arthur had never met anybody less professional--

--and yet, so good at their job.

Their job now was in Singapore. It was simple enough, just him and Eames and Cobb. The mark was an American businessman and had subconscious security, but that was nothing they hadn't dealt with before. They were doing a practise run now with Arthur as the subject, since Arthur's projections were the quickest to pick up on intruders and the most vicious when it came to eradicating them. It was a chance for Cobb to make sure the architecture, an old university building, was sound before they allowed the mark to enter. This was before Mal had begun to stalk his dreams, just four months after she'd jumped.

“You're supposed to be on the run from my projections,” Arthur said to the girl with the bookbag, walking past him now. He was leaning against a pillar at the edge of a seemingly abandoned courtyard. The apparition shimmered and grinned.

“It'll be a few minutes before they catch up,” said Eames, himself again now. “I wanted to speak to you alone.”

“You have a question about the job?”

“I have a question,” said Eames. “How are you?”

Arthur glanced down at his crooked cuff, and began to straighten it, even though he didn't really care. “Why don't we stick to business-related matters, Eames.”

“You look as though you haven't been sleeping. Up above, I mean.”

“I only need a few hours a night.”

“Do you miss her?” Eames asked, catching him off guard.

“I -- yes,” said Arthur. “Yes, I miss her. Everyone who knew her misses her.”

“I'm not asking about everyone, Arthur,” said Eames. “I'm asking about you.”

Disgruntled, Arthur let go of his sleeve and looked up. “Then, yes. Are you satisfied?”

“It's just that I've never seen you so upset as you were at her funeral,” Eames said. He waved a vague hand in the vicinity of Arthur's chest. “And now you're all ... you again.”

“Of course I was upset. Cobb was useless, I had a million things to plan, I had to get him out of the country, I had to see to the kids, I had to ... I had to ...”

“Grieve?” Eames suggested softly. There was a knowing spark in his eye. “Didn't pencil in any time for that, did you?”

“I don't have time to grieve,” Arthur said, and unexpectedly, he felt exhausted. “Cobb needs me.”

“Never let yourself relax, do you, pet?”

“I don't have time,” Arthur said bleakly. His shoulders slumped. “I don't... Fuck you, Eames, what do you know?”

“I know somebody who's about to crash and burn when I see it.”

“The projections are coming,” said Arthur abruptly.

Eames glanced away. The clamour of the crowd was approaching fast.

“Quick,” Eames said, turning back to Arthur. “Kiss me.”

“What--”

Arthur looked up, and immediately had to break off because Eames was there, taking him by the tie, crowding him against the pillar and kissing him, the bulk of his body shielding both his face and Arthur entirely.

Arthur froze. He didn't understand how they'd gotten here, the smooth pillar pressing into his back, Eames' lips working gently against his. His mouth slackened, maybe to protest, but Eames tentatively and then, met with no resistance, hungrily invaded Arthur's mouth with his own. Arthur could hear the projections around them and he at once, instinctively, let himself go, opening himself to Eames' ministrations and returning them. Eames' thigh slid between Arthur's legs, pressing in just a little. He made a soft sound into Arthur's mouth, and suddenly this wasn't a game anymore.

For a split second Arthur had never been so terrified of another human being. Not because he was frightened for himself, but because of the violent, colourful burst of emotion in chest. He felt like-- He felt. His senses were hyper-attuned and Eames' soft lips covering his, Eames' hands over his hips, his thigh between Arthur's, the heat of their bodies pressed together-- It awoke something in Arthur he'd never experienced before, an entire orchestra of somethings. Kissing somebody had never felt like this before. He wanted to go limp against the pillar and let Eames do anything, anything to him, because he didn't realize that he'd been craving this for his entire life -- this emotion.

Feeling. It took his breath away.

He shoved against Eames' chest, hard. Eames chased his lips, just for a second, like he'd gotten too wrapped up in this to remember where they were. Then he saw Arthur's face and stopped.

The ploy, if it had been one, hadn't worked. Arthur took one look at the crowd of projections surrounding them, watching them, and he shot Eames in the head. Then himself.

As soon as he was awake he was tearing the line out of his arm, swinging his legs over the side of his deck chair. Cobb was still under. The dream wouldn't collapse while Cobb, the builder, was still there.

“Arthur, wait.”

Arthur didn't run. He didn't understand what was happening, but he didn't run from it. He strode quickly from the room, loosening his tie even though it was already slightly loose, dragging a hand through his hair dazedly.

“Arthur!”

Eames caught him up just as he left the warehouse, bulling into his path and crowding him back up against the door.

“Wait,” he said again.

“Fuck you, Eames,” Arthur snapped. Eames looked slightly anguished.

“I thought you knew,” he said.

“That you're gay? Or that you're in love with me?”

At once Eames' features sharpened, so that's how we're going to play this, and he responded coolly, “I'm not in love with you.”

“You kissed me.”

“It was a distraction.”

“You certainly got distracted.”

“This doesn't have to be -- we don't have to make this a thing,” said Eames sharply. “It doesn't have to mean anything, but--”

“But what?” Arthur demanded, pouncing angrily on that. “But what, Eames?”

“But--” Eames looked angry, too, and defensive “--but it could. If you wanted it to.”

The warmth still hadn't quite faded from Arthur's chest and that brilliant burst of emotion hadn't subsided. He could feel his heart pounding painfully, and that was new. He was scared of this feeling. Too unfamiliar.

He took a step forward and stabbed a finger into Eames' chest aggressively.

“We get this job done,” he said flatly, his tone brooking no arguments. “And we don't talk about this again.”

And he stormed back into the warehouse, leaving Eames standing there.

That was the last time they worked together before the Fischer job.

+The Fischer job was business as usual -- except that with Cobb so hunted, and Ariadne so green, and Yusuf so absorbed in his formulas, it seemed to be Arthur and Eames planning everything out -- Eames scheming, and Arthur troubleshooting. It was Arthur and Eames who stayed late into the night, looking over Ariadne's mazes and making minor adjustments and shortcuts.

Working with Eames was the same. He hadn't changed. In fact, he was exactly the same -- down to those secret smiles and the endearments he tossed at Arthur, nobody else.

Had Arthur really been so blind, before?

Something inside him was different now. Some tiny voice urged him to move closer to Eames, to touch Eames, see if it could awake the same emotional symphony inside him. At night he lay in bed and thought about kissing Eames and it made his chest warm again.

And how could that be? Arthur wasn't gay. Arthur wasn't anything. He was just barely straight enough not to be asexual. But maybe this wasn't a sexual thing; maybe it was an Eames thing. Arthur trusted him, for all that he was a con man; liked him even. He loved Eames' efficiency and his phenomenal skill. Most of all, he liked that, even more than Cobb, Eames was the only person Arthur could lower his barriers around. There was no point to having barriers around Eames; Eames could see right through him anyway.

So he had to know. He had to know what made Eames different. What had made that kiss different. That they were in the dreamscape, maybe?

Two layers into Fischer's subconscious he watched Eames-the-blonde cross the lobby of the hotel, and wondered.

“Quick,” he said to Ariadne at his side. “Give me a kiss.”

She did. It didn't feel like anything.

It was worth a shot.

When the job was all over and they'd survived, Arthur disappeared, partly to take a break from dreaming, but also to puzzle out this new facet of his identity that he couldn't quite come to terms with. The problem was just ...

The problem with Eames was that he always said one thing and meant another.

It doesn't have to mean anything. But it could. If you wanted it to.

And Arthur didn't know. He didn't know if Eames was serious or if Eames just wanted casual sex or what, and Arthur could not put his newfound emotions on the line if that were the case. He guarded himself. He spoke on the phone with Eames and exchanged emails now and then but never betrayed himself. He found a woman one night and had sex with her and it didn't feel half as good as kissing Eames had. He didn't know her, didn't trust her like he trusted Eames.

And maybe that was the key.

“I'm between jobs,” Eames said on the phone one night when Arthur answered, not even bothering to say hello. “Join me.”

“Join you? You just said you're between jobs.”

“Yes. It's called a vacation, Arthur. Some people do it together.”

“I don't,” said Arthur.

“Meet me in Stockholm.”

“No.”

“Don't be a pain, Arthur. I know you're not working.”

“I don't want to see you, Eames.”

Silence on the other end of the line.

“That's a lie.”

“No,” Arthur lied again, his hand a tight fist in his lap. He stared down at it.

“Right.” Suddenly Eames became businesslike. “Well. I will be in Stockholm in three days. I hope I see you there.”

“I don't--”

“If not,” said Eames, somewhat gentler, “if you ever change your mind, Arthur. Give me a call, yeah?”

He hung up.

Arthur did not go to Stockholm. Presumably, Eames moved on without him.

+It was a month from that conversation before Arthur decided he couldn't go on like this. He couldn't stand this -- not knowing.

He was biting his lip as he pulled up the number on his phone, shaking his head, almost laughing at his own daring. He didn't know what was going to happen, for once, but he was ready. He wanted to try this with Eames. Even if it got him hurt. He had to try. He was sure now.

The phone rang.

And rang.

It went to voicemail. He hung up.

Did he have the number wrong? Was Eames angry that he hadn't gone to Stockholm--?

No.

So he rang again.

I waited too long.

And again.

Something is wrong.

And again.

And again.

IV.
Eames had made a nest of blankets in his corner, like an animal. He curled into them on the floor, squeezing Ariadne's crotcheted blanket to his chest, rocking and gasping over and over again, “I'll be good. I'll be good. I swear I can be good. Please just fuck me and I swear I'll be good.”

Arthur had tried asking Ariadne just what they'd seen in his dream, but she'd bitten her lip and shaken her head quickly, fresh tears welling in her eyes.

“I didn't see that much, Arthur. It was just like ... a nightmare. The dream started falling apart and went dark and he took over, and what he felt -- God--” her breath hitched “--just scared and panicked and lost. I don't ever want to feel like that again. And he feels like that every second.” She'd brushed at her eye. “Then his projections came in and he shot me.”

Arthur kept talking to him in a soft voice, sitting against the wall next to Eames' nest. He'd been at this for five whole hours now. They went through cycles. Eventually Eames would start to snap out of his stupour, even though he wouldn't stop crying, and then Arthur would lose him again.

“It's okay,” he was saying, just stupid, meaningless stuff meant to sound calm and comforting. “I know you're good, Eames. I know. It's okay.”

And soon, Eames' rocking became less frenetic. He started to take deeper breaths, and he wiped at his nose. The tears were a literal stream. Arthur had never seen anybody cry like that, with their whole body, helpless.

Finally Eames' shudders tapered off. He laid his head in Arthur's lap and breathed deep. The tears kept flowing silently.

“You must ... really think I'm pathetic,” he managed to rasp after a minute, with an attempt at a weak smile, showing a faint flicker of his old self.

“No,” Arthur said. “I don't think that.”

Eames tilted his face into Arthur's thigh firmly. The way he curled his fingers into the fabric of Arthur's pants, bunching it up in his hand, was childlike, a clinging gesture.

“I don't want to go to sleep again,” he whispered.

“I know. We're not going to put you to sleep again.”

“I'm so sorry. I won't be bad to you again. Please don't put me back to sleep.”

“I won't, Eames. I promise. I wasn't trying to punish you.”

Eames relaxed slightly. Arthur could feel wetness on his pant leg where Eames' tears were soaking through. He was uncomfortable with the proximity Eames had to his crotch, lying like that, but didn't dare move him.

“I can be good,” Eames said weakly. “Really.”

“I know.”

“Please let me.” He tilted his head again, tipping his face closer to Arthur's groin. “Please just ...”

Arthur placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him away an inch or two. “I don't want to.”

Eames ground his teeth audibly, a new habit Arthur suspected he'd picked up while he'd been asleep during those four months. He did it when he was especially anguished, unconsciously, only around Arthur. More tears were streaming down his face and his hand dug so tightly into the fabric of Arthur's pants that his nails clenched the flesh of Arthur's thigh, making him wince.

“You won't let me forge,” Eames spat out. “I can't forge if you won't let me. I can do it, Arthur. I can be somebody you'd want, if you'd only let me.”

It took Arthur a moment to understand this. “Eames, you can't forge because you're in reality.”

“What am I supposed to do, if you want a woman and you won't let me forge?”

“I don't want a woman,” Arthur said, not thinking.

Eames drew a shuddering breath and was quiet for a minute. Then he nuzzled Arthur's thigh, relaxing into him.

He was exhausted, Arthur knew. Arthur couldn't remember the last time in his life he'd ever cried, but he could imagine the kind of toll it would take to be sobbing, panicky, for all those hours. He smoothed Eames' sweat-tousled hair back with one hand and frowned, glancing up at the warehouse before him.

Cobb was in his office with the door closed. This whole situation was making him far too uncomfortable. Ariadne was curled up in a corner somewhere, away from them. Yusuf was the only one nearby, and as he walked past he glanced at the two of them and looked quickly away again.

Arthur had a sudden rush of something not unlike déja vu that made him burn defensively on the inside. What was it--? What--

He was ten years old, he was ten years old and his new teacher was talking to her student teacher, she was calling Arthur a retard, right in front of him like he wasn't there. Oh, that one's Arthur, kind of slow but he's usually harmless, he just doesn't get along with anyone ... a bit retarded really, last year he wet his pants at school, the other kids don't like him...

He hadn't thought about that memory -- or, really, any memory from his childhood -- in years and years. It seemed like somebody else's life, or like a life he lived in a dream. Even Cobb seemed to forget, ninety percent of the time.

Going into this, Arthur had thought he'd be the worst at helping Eames. Thought he would say or do the wrong things at every turn. He already knew one couldn't come through something like that without psychological damage, not even someone as brilliant as Eames; he'd worked in dreaming too long not to know that, and Arthur was already bad at emotions.

It was the way they all looked at Eames, all three of them. Like he was broken. Like he was wrong. Even Cobb, the posterchild for psychological damage courtesy of dreaming, acted like he thought what Eames was doing was embarrassing and uncomfortable.

And it made Arthur angry.

“I'll be good,” Eames mumbled into Arthur's thigh, his eyes closed. A tear rolled down the track on his cheek. Just an individual one, that was good. Arthur hadn't noticed when his tears had slowed.

“I know,” Arthur said patiently, smoothing his hair again. “You are good.”

“I just want to touch you,” Eames whispered.

Arthur shifted him carefully. “Come on.”

He'd been trying to coax Eames out of his nest all night, but only now Eames crept after him, blinking drunkenly. Arthur pulled Eames' deck chair over and spread the duvet out on it. Obediently, Eames crawled onto the chair and collapsed. He reached out blindly and took Arthur's hand, resting on the edge of the chair, and squeezed his fingers.

Arthur climbed up onto the chair with him. It was a wide chair. When Eames rolled onto his side, pulling Arthur's arm over him like a blanket, Arthur could just wedge himself between Eames and the arm of the chair. He could feel Eames giving a little shudder with the occasional exhalation, but it wasn't the frantic sobbing breaths of before.

Maybe Eames was broken. But Arthur didn't care. He didn't care at all. If things happened for a reason, this was his. Eames was his reason.

“I'll take care of you, okay?” he murmured into Eames' ear, and he meant it fiercely, passionately. Eames sighed, already half unconscious.

“Thank you,” he breathed, and he kept saying it, until he fell asleep. “Thank you so much.”

He was so broken. And Arthur loved him anyway. Arthur would love him until the end of the world.