Some of the Beautiful Fools Have Gathered

[Verhalten]

Author: Verhalten
Rating: R
Summary: This is a study on a character I have been rolling around in my head for the better part of a decade. It's a work in progress. The title comes from a Billy Collins poem called "Nightclub." I'm also toying with literary convention here, but not in any earth-shattering ways. I would appreciate any feedback you might have, positive or negative.
Warnings: Mild sexual content (m/m in this installment, but not always).


(Kentas)

When he opens his eyes, it ranks among the top five biggest mistakes of his life. Screws them tightly shut again, wonders what time it is and can only come up with 1992. Tries in vain to remember that other thing. His mind clambers ineffectually for a long moment, possibly minutes, and he remembers. Hours.

What was the hour? Sometime late in the morning, if not already past, judging by the blinding light illuminating the room. No idea where it's coming from, except the vague notion that the sun is involved. He hears the slide of string and the clink of wood (Blinds?) and then the translucence of his eyelids is no longer glowing ominously. He cracks his eyelids apart, just a little, and it's darker. (Yes, blinds.) Lifts his head, registers a room he's never seen before. Registers a man he's never seen before, standing over him, frowning. He struggles to sit up.

That top five list just shifted again, because that is a worse idea. Hurts in places that he didn't know existed, places that make no sense, until he realizes he's naked under the thin sheet. Suddenly, at least some of the places make sense, if he's honest, but he's never been honest a day in his life and now doesn't even remotely seem like a good time to start.

"You need to leave." Stern tone, British accent.

Kentas nods, swings his feet over the side of the bed, dragging the sheet with him. The floor is cold. "Uh, my clothes?"

The man smirks and suddenly looks familiar, but only briefly and it's gone. "In the foyer."

A flash of something then. Hard mouth on his, clumsy struggle to get out of his jeans, panic just an insignificant backdrop to the overwhelming urgency of the moment. He touches the pads of his fingers to his lips, presses. They're tender and raw. This is somehow more alarming than the incriminating aches littering the rest of his body. He stands, hisses, walks through the house to his discarded clothes without any help, denial slipping further and further out of his grasp. He dresses quickly, glances over his shoulder and the man is there, doing up his tie like he's got to get to work. Kentas looks at those hands and remembers something, blushes clear up to his hairline. He wonders just how old this man is, guesses at early twenties but figures it must be older if he's in the habit of casually referring to his foyer. Reeks of success or trust fund or both.

"Any particular reason you're still here?"

"Well." Kentas doesn't know what exactly he wants to say but knows something's got to be said. If only for his own sanity, there has to be some exchange here to which he can anchor all the rest. "What's your name?"

"Really?"

Cants his head to one side, confused. Thinks hard, but he's coming up empty. He doesn't know what that's supposed to mean, 'Really?' Doesn't know if he should already know the answer or if it's a stupid question in the first place. Doesn't know much of anything. "Really."

"Mark."

"Do you--"

"I don't."

Kentas nods and leaves. The neighborhood is known to him and he makes it home on foot. It takes less than twenty minutes. He passes his sister on her way out the door, no doubt running off to enjoy the weather, which is lovely. He doesn't look at her, just goes up the stairs and sheds his clothes, steps directly into the shower and stays there until he's wrinkled. Turns this new information over in his head again and again, trying to make sense of it. Jerks off to the thought of breasts, just to make sure, not that he believes it really proves anything. But he's successful and he'll take it over whatever he was afraid would happen. He isn't sure what that is.

As he eats his breakfast, he resolves never to think of it again. As soon as he's over the shock of it, that is. As soon as the information is old and there are better things to think of, he'll put it out of his head for good. Spends the entire morning congratulating himself on how maturely he's handling all this.

It's a good plan, in theory, but the practical application is tricky. He finds small victory in the fact that he can focus on the little details, the safe ones. After a time, he remembers that they got from the party in Mark's car, which had leather seats and some horrible pop music playing on the speakers, but he wasn't allowed to change it. He'd even reached for the dial, but his hand was slapped. That pissed him off. He asked Mark to stop the car, but he wouldn't, just kept driving. He got over his anger, tried to think of why he was in the car in the first place. He'd asked and had received a flat, unsmiling look.

Mark had asked his age and he'd lied. He said nineteen, he thinks. Mark said, "Oh, please." Wasn't fooled for even a moment, which Kentas took in stride, he thinks. He admitted the truth and the car swerved a little. Hands tightened on the steering wheel. Apparently, it was a bad thing, but he couldn't quite understand why. Or wouldn't. He asked if he was being brought home and was met with a tight, "If you like." He reasoned that he was too pissed to make it up the front steps at his house.

He made it up Mark's front steps just fine. At the door, they stopped, looked at one another. He noticed that Mark was really interesting looking. Dark hair, dark eyes, skin paler than Kentas'. Red lips, like they'd been bitten. Mark made some comment about prison that made absolutely no sense and then leaned in.

But Kentas isn't going to think about that. He's going to skip over all the awkward kissing, the grinding of their hips, the surprised noises he made, the other noises he made. He's going to forget about how easy it was, just handing over all the control and allowing himself to be undressed and pinned and positioned and bitten and sucked. He spends the entire afternoon not thinking about it, not getting hard, not pinching himself to distract from the memory, not dressing or heading outside, not taking a fifteen minute stroll that ends as the sun disappears over the horizon.

Only he does think about it and he pushes the doorbell with a sigh.

Mark appears at the door, not looking amused. He's in t-shirt and jeans again. "Did you forget something?"

"No."

Silence drags out between them and then the door opens a little wider. "Very well."

He tries to subdue his own grin as he steps into the house and pushes the door shut behind him.

It's just past ten when he returns home on tired, shaky legs, hoping against the odds that he'll make it up to bed before he's noticed. A light's on in the sitting room and when he's halfway to the stairs he looks, knowing already that he'll regret it. His father sits there, rigid in a high backed chair, swirling the contents of his glass. Kentas knows it's Irish whiskey the same way he knows spring follows winter.

"Kentas." Spoken like a declaration, but he knows what's expected of him and he drags his feet into the room, stopping several paces away from that hard, glittering stare. He stands straight, hands at his sides, chin lifted parellel with the floor. Angry eyes inspect him and Kentas wonders if there's any evidence to be found, though he showered and dried and checked and re-checked himself in the mirror before leaving Mark's. He knows he was careful enough, but that sternly disapproving look can have him questioning his own name.

"School in the morning." Punctuated by a slow sip. Simple, innocuous statement bogged down with layers and layers of unspoken censure. He is a master at this and Kentas has no shield, no tool of defense, because nothing has been said, everything implied. He's not clever enough for this game, has no way of explaining why without words. Couldn't convey the multitude of reasons with the entire Oxford Dictionary at his disposal. Scarcely knows what it is he's supposed to be excusing, only that there is dissatisfaction thick in the air and he is the source of it. Wishes his father would scream or yell, give him something substantial to fight.

"Yes, sir."

"Good night, son."

In his room, he strips out of his clothes and reclines on his bed without turning down the sheets. His father melts away from his consciousness with practiced ease, replaced by a muted sense of significance, like a blank page preceding the start of a new chapter. Feels like he's shifted down to his core, but nothing at all has changed. He falls asleep like this, naked and defenseless. He doesn't dream and when he wakes on the following morning he is tangled in the sheets.

(Mrs. Buchanan)

She watches the students' faces as the seconds wind down to the final bell. It's Monday and they are almost violent in their desperation to be anywhere else, separate units all animated by the same current of electricity. Except one, who seems to have broken away from the circuit. Pillar of stillness amongst the chaos, chin in his hand, watching the window with a jolting intensity. Kentas Miles, usually found right in the thick of it. Mischief like an inexorable compulsion for the boy, she could set her watch to his episodes of cheerful disregard for anything resembling structure. Now he's hunched in on himself, distant, unnvervingly calm.

The bell sounds and the volume of chatter swells. He stands with the rest of them, swept along in the mad scramble for freedom, distinctly separate from it. She catches his arm before she realizes she's going to try. He gives a start and looks at her, expression of confusion passing over his face before it's replaced by guilt. Maybe instinctive, though she's more than ready to believe he's got something to hide.

The rest of the students are gone before she speaks. "Is everything all right with you?"

She is answered with a blinding smile, shockingly convincing. Warmth makes it all the way up into his eyes, so gray and dull just seconds ago. Like he can turn joy on and off with a switch. Makes her question what she knows of him, which is admittedly little, but teenagers shouldn't be such proficient actors. Leaves her feeling more than a little useless in her capacity as a mentor. Intimidated, even, by that smile.

"Fine," he says, tone easy and light. "Why?"

"You seemed preoccupied today."

He shrugs, hoists his bag a little higher on his shoulder. "Guess so, maybe."

She's starting to feel silly. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Not really, but thanks." So casual and polite. He doesn't take the obvious road, doesn't deny that he was somewhere else entirely throughout most of the class period. He isn't hiding anything at all, but blandly refusing to confide in her. He doesn't care what she knows or doesn't know, doesn't care what she thinks at all and isn't at all ashamed to let it show. At least, that's where all the evidence is leading her and she's torn between being impressed and offended.

"Is there anything else, Miss Buchanan?"

She laughs nervously. "Um, not really, no. Have a good evening."

"You do the same."

(Kentas)

The walk home is a winding one. He detours past Mark's but doesn't ring the bell, simply comforted by knowing the house is still there. Looks ordinary in the light of an overcast Monday afternoon and that's unsettling. Flashes on Mark, bare feet propped on the coffee table, having a Coke, watching the news. Flashes on Mark in shorts and t-shirt, cutting the lawn. Flashes on Mark folding fresh towels. Flashes on Mark, mouth wrapped around him and undoing his soul, dark eyes something like amused. Flashes on the snowy static of a busted television. Doesn't compute. A man like Mark should have people for that. People to do his laundry, cut his grass, take his vitamins. And maybe he does.

At home, he takes his shoes off at the door, hangs his jacket. Goes up the stairs and to his room, keeps the lights low, and puts in his old tape of Apocalypse Now. He watches it as if for the first time, just like every time. He aches when Kilgore crouches among his subordinates and tells them with haunting sadness, "Someday this war's going to end." It never occurs to him that this should be a hopeful declaration, a prayer. Because there is only despair there and Kentas feels it. Aches through the entire movie, somewhere in his chest. This tight, overly full sensation. And it's never any different than this and he wonders if perhaps there's something wrong with this picture, but he watches it a second time, skips dinner, and goes to bed.

He closes his eyes, feels warm and full. Falls asleep smiling into the dark, dreams of Playboy Bunnies and tigers in a dense, blue jungle, Captain Willard's warm breath against his forehead and he says, "I'd wake up and there'd be nothing."

(Mother)

She pauses at his door, fist poised to knock, and reconsiders. She could let him sleep another couple of hours, send him into school with a note. Something about a dentist appointment or a meeting with a tailor. No one would question it. That her priorities have always hung slightly off center is no secret, but carefully cultivated public knowledge. She could do this for her son and maybe when he opened his cloudy blue eyes they would be well rested. He's looked hunted for days now, the way all teenagers do. Maybe he would look different later in the morning. Maybe he'd look at her differently. The way his sister does, trusting and effortlessly accepting and just like a son or a daughter should look at their mother. She'd like to surprise him, contradict his entire definition of his mother, who she is, what she does. Can't even assume that there is such a definition. There's no irrefutable evidence that they're a part of one another, that she's left any kind of lasting impression. Today could be the day.

"That boy still sleeping?" Dean is behind her, sharp burn of his cologne in her nostrils. "What time did he get in?" The air is suddenly pregnant with the potential for disapproval.

"He didn't go out," she tells him.

"He'll be late." Ominous tone, a worse fate than death to not fit exactly inside the paper thin lines of propriety.

"I was about to wake him," she lies and knocks.

[Dio the Awesome]

I. I read the whole thing. Every word. But I don't know what to say.

I was never really good on the commenting thing.I know what's good and what's bad, but I never can give reasons for it. But here I go.

I loved the first two paragraphs. The disjointedness really drew me in. It's what I always feel like after awaking from a drunken haze after a party. The blinding light was probably my favorite part.

The rest of it, somehow made me intrigued, but uncomfortable. I couldn't stop reading, even though I would wince with Kentas at each new memory. I guess what I'm trying to say is, you made your character come to life, whether or not the provokes positive or negative emotions.

Great work.

[Verhalten]

I was about to log off and go to bed, but I saw that someone had read this and I've had one eye on the post since I put it up, reconsidering and hemming and hawing over pulling it down.

I'm glad you liked it. I like to know what particularly you liked or didn't like about it and the lack of technical criticism doesn't bother me at all. I really appreciate you taking the time to have a look and comment.

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