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[damnedest]

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lestat de lioncourt, 265

i don't remember you

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voice

[ragedagainst]

[ Ren does not waste time on polite mental greetings. ]

D'you prefer kennel father or dog daddy?

[ Out of context Ren O'Neill. ]

I'm gettin' nameplates made.

[damnedest]

[ The array of things vampiric existence can prepare you for: intrusive thoughts belonging to other people. Greatly amused; ]

Nameplates have two sides, don't they?

[ragedagainst]

Aye, they do, but I don't know I'm ready to be accused of favouritism so soon into being everyone's boss.

[madaboutit]

[The day after this.]

Just wanted ta say I appreciate yer words. Pretty sure I was the cunt first, whate'er I did, but it still means a lot ta me.

[It seems to be increasingly an issue for him, in general.]

You know what's settin' her off, so I can try ta stay off the landmines?

[damnedest]

[ Oh. That's nice. An unusual feeling to be praised in this way, and, he decides, not unwelcome. ]

You were fine, in my estimation. She has been careless about speaking of her own life lately, like it has little value. If she didn't want others to give a shit for the things she says, she shouldn't make friends.

[ A verbal kind of shrug, in his tone. ]

It has been a strange month. We barely get through a day without some argument.

[madaboutit]

[Yeah...Sweeney's definitely noticed the lack of self-worth, which is saying something, given his own issues with that sort of thing. He's quiet for a moment, reflecting on the comment.]

But it weren't like that before?

[For all he knows, the pair of them often spat. Not that it means it isn't noticeably worse, but there's no knowing without asking.]

after the curse-marks begin calming down.

[hedoniste]

The stairs to the attic creak under the weight of uneasy footsteps.

Slow — halting, even. Not a consistent, confident step. Hesitations and pauses; listening for the sound of movement up here, maybe in case sometime between them both retiring for the night he’d snuck someone in and this is about to be even worse than it already was going to be. Maybe it’s going to be fine. Maybe nothing is ever going to be fine again, ever, for the rest of her natural or unnatural life.

She’s not died, yet. It’s still natural until after that.

—anyway. She doesn’t announce herself, though if Lestat is awake it’s unlikely he somehow missed her coming, light on her feet but hardly catfooted, moving with unease and stilted impatience. She doesn’t say anything, but lifts the corner of his blanket and edges underneath it, the soft fabric of a robe (not a nightdress, a thing which she doesn’t own) bunching as it snags against the bedding, a hand finding his shoulder. And then her face,

which is wet.

[damnedest]

He had spent some of that same evening laying on his side, candlelight flooding the angular attic room with warm gold, and had studied the cursemark on his wrist. It has been bleeding on and off all month from no discernible wound, no pain, no difference save for a slightly raised quality, like scarring more than a tattoo.

And it had stopped, and he let his fingers feel around the edges of it. It had been the place he'd offered Louis, dying and thirsty, to sink his teeth in, take from him. The same place Claudia had latched with teeth that grew from blunt to sharp with each swallow of thick blood.

Candles blown out. Resigning himself to another night of poor sleep.

So he is somewhere half-conscious when his ears prick after the sound of some approach, feet on the ladder, the floor on the other side of a privacy screen, and then around. Sleepiness keeps him still and sedated, not truly pretending at anything as he feels the mattress dip, the sheets shift, a warm body joining him and he is not confused about how it is. He is dressed as he usually is, a loose nightshirt that by now has been slept in enough to be soft and worn to the touch.

He might slip back into his drifting trance until she touches his shoulder. Gwenaëlle will hear a long breath out in the same moment he turns towards her, sleep-slow. It is an intimacy he appears to understand perfectly well, despite the way they have never shared it, putting an arm around her.

Tired, heartsore, lonely. There are no psychic glitches to carry these sentiments from one brain to the other.

[hedoniste]

Some things don’t require a telepath.

The lingering tension, taut in her shoulders and the fitful grip of her hands, relaxes against him with a quiet, mirroring sigh; a hitching sound, snagged on tired tears. Her head feels full of cotton wool and her limbs heavy, and she knows it’s all in her head—

but she’s in there, too. Stuck there, the same as ever. Everywhere she goes, there she fucking is.

“I’m sorry,” she says, quiet into the darkness, a tactile thing at the closeness of her warm breath. “I don’t know why I was like that.”

voice;

[audentis]

You're still alive, right?

[ And not one of the people who are going around being cryptic and weird and ghostly. ]

Can I ask you something?

[ That's his second question already, but this is a strange situation. After Lestat's punishment there hadn't exactly been an abundance of time to chat about what that all meant, and then they'd been thrown into the dream, and then....

And then it had ended, and that's what he's here to ask about. ]

voice;

[divorcing]

[ Picking up almost mid-sentence, as if they are once again in New Orleans, as if they are again sharing space, Louis moving from room to room, venting out opinions to Lestat— ]

And the people here, they keep saying it's just until the weather breaks, but in the meantime they been piling up on my floor for me to find every night when I make my way out. You believe it? No one here believe in locked doors?

[damnedest]

[ He can almost sense the pacing energy, Louis moving from hearth to window while Lestat stays in infuriating stillness, comfortable in an armchair or posted up on shared bed. ]

Is your sense of southern hospitality being tested, mon cher?

[divorcing]

[ A beat, testing the quality of this response, the tone in which it is delivered. Feeling out the extent to which it fuels Louis' own frustration. ]

You ain't sick of being six to a bed?

[ tfw you pose a question and immediately know the answer. ]

post duchess.

[divorcing]

The door is ajar.

The room has been cleaned up. Some evidence of the fight remains. Louis has hung a few lovely cloth drapes up to cover up broken boards. The debris is swept up. Furniture all resettled.

Louis still wishes he had a better place. Wants to find one, make a home where they have privacy. Where there is a hearth, a bed. A place filled with their things, mingled together. But this is what he has to offer.

He is sitting, waiting. So attuned to Lestat, he hears his heartbeat before he hears his footsteps.

[damnedest]

He has seen fit to stop crying by the time he makes his way back into town. There is just so much to weep about!, with the added benefit that it does make him feel better having done so.

So Lestat is fairly certain he appears Fine, Now, as he ascends the stairs, but more than likely has a kind of spare fragility to his countenance, tender flesh and brittle manners. He is also, unhelpfully, not quite his most human self. No wings plague him, but his skin is pale, his eyes bright, and a too-lean cut to his shape that might summon notions of some longterm ailment.

But he is here, and hurries his steps a little more when his sense of Louis heightens, and when he sees the door open, waiting for him. Moves at a rush when he enters, a breath of relief leaving him.

[divorcing]

And Louis blurs into motion.

Closes the door. Catches up Lestat's hands. Tightens his grasp, lacing their fingers together.

Studying Lestat, taking in the small signs of the monster. Not the worst it's been, but not absent. That, and the more familiar signs of emotional turmoil. Louis gives him a little tug, using their linked hands to draw Lestat into the room fully.

"Hey."

Quiet. His thumb runs along Lestat's knuckles.

"You been having some interesting conversations.

voice;

[hislittleflower]

Would you kindly collect your housecat from Ianthe's home? I would consider it a personal favour.

[ Someone is not happy about Gwen taking refuge there. ]

[damnedest]

[ Hm. After giving 1.2 seconds of thought about what this metaphor could possibly allude to, ]

Are you asking me to stop fucking Ianthe?

[hislittleflower]

No.

[ Although, very much noted. ]

Your girl has taken up residence there and I want her gone.

let me here

[divorcing]

Half the blankets that typically adorn Lestat's bed have been kicked away, wound up either puddled on the floor or bunched up at around the footboard.

Louis is keeping Lestat draped acros his chest, fingers sliding up and down his back. They're sweaty, and sated, and Lestat is human; he can't go again just yet even if Louis can. Sprawled together, Louis' fingers trailing along Lestat's skin, he thinks maybe—

"Les," he murmurs. "You with me?"

Trying to gauge whether or not this is the right moment. Whether they should try to talk now about offers and promises and things Louis wants that'll change everything for them both.

[damnedest]

It can be frustrating that he can't just go and go. But it is also blissful to feel that warm blanketing fatigue, to lay limply and held and petted. Just give him a minute, mon cher, he does not say out loud but thinks lazily, finding himself in no real rush. The sun isn't soon. Louis' hands are making pleasant patterns on his back.

A summoning, then. Lestat turns his head, answers first with the graze of his blunt human teeth against Louis' shoulder.

Resettles. "Yes," in other words. "Despite your best efforts."

[divorcing]

"I'll have to work harder next time," sounds teasing, might be serious.

But it's not for right now.

Louis lifts shoulders from the mattress, leans to catch Lestat's mouth as he turns towards Louis. The scrape of teeth stirs up interest, impossible not to, but Louis doesn't do anything with it. Touches Lestat's face.

"I wanna tell you something," he says softly. This had all felt like the best approach, to talk when both of them are spent and tangled up and Louis' spent some time devoting himself to making Lestat come apart a few times. But he isn't sure now, that it won't turn out he's misjudged. "And you gotta tell me how you hear it, and what you think about it. Okay?"

A big ask, maybe, given the topic. Given the track record they're tiptoeing past these days.

text.

[poleaxed]

hi my name is joan and a french (i assume) lady told me u know how dogs work
do u train individual dogs
ps this is a paying gig

[damnedest]

Hello Joan
You mean, dogs from outside the lodge? I can

What kind of training and what kind of payment

[poleaxed]

the dog was being trained by a guy i was living with
its really his but hes gone now
i dont want 2 fuck it up
he was training it 2 hunt & follow commands
its a huge hunting dog one of the skinny ones with the long faces
basically a horse
i wasnt here for like a year so the first thing i need is 2 kno if the people it was living with fucked it up

payment depends on what u need
i used to be a mechanic and i was fucking good at it but no cars here
i can mix drinks
i can clean and i can fight
i can teach u how to box
i can also paint nails?