[ She's saying it, and he's hearing it; but it's water crashing on a rocky shore. Maybe he's too unbendable. Too resolute. Rock's can't soak up water, but they are prey to erosion. He hears it, shifts, scrabbles for how he feels, how he doesn't know how to put it to words.
He wants that too—thinks it snuck in the day he realized he wasn't going anywhere, that she wasn't either, that he loved her, that they could live here, if they never left here. Together. What that might look like, years from now. ]
No that's— [ Insane. Intense. ] Yeah. Me too.
[ He tries to bend. Erode faster. ] You have... them. Your Petre too if he's out there. [ There's a crease between his brows. It feels like there is always is. ] What the fuck am I gonna offer you that they can't?
[The quiet little oh that sparks inside of her is instantaneous; it's an ugly, relieved feeling, to know that he feels the same way. That he has the same insecurities, that they're both just sitting here passing the same fear back and forth.
They're the same. They're the same, every way that counts. She's looking into a mirror, isn't she? This is her. She's him.
And she still loves him, even though most of the time, she can't love herself. ] What do I offer you that you can't get anywhere else? From anywhere else? I think that all the time.
[She's not like Murphy. She's not pretty like Lottie. She's not safe like Jim. She's a mountain of problems, of issues, a mess that masquerades in human skin. ] You make me feel safe. You make me feel like it's okay to be me. You make me feel like it's okay to be seen. You make me want to imagine a future that isn't some - fucked up dystopia, moving from one place to the next. You make me want to be happy with you. You make me want to try. I had to - [she chokes a little, because this is hard to say. Perhaps the hardest thing of all to admit. ] I had to travel across two universes to feel like that - like I wanted to be happy, to settle with someone and just be. You make me feel like I deserve that. I've never - no one. Ever made me feel like I deserved to be happy, before, except - except Kieren.
[ They're different in this— Billy only traveled the universe once, and somehow he found Jem. It's inconceivable. Doesn't feel real. Doesn't feel like something that gets to be put pen to paper, be written into reality. He wants it carved on his ribs, secreted away.
It's hard to believe it, to feel it quantified when— Billy's difficult. He knows this. It's hard for him to open up, to express how he feels. When he gets angry, it blooms up so violently. He's obstinate, he's quick to anger. He doesn't take anything seriously. He takes everything seriously.
His thumb retraces Jem's cheekbone. ] I do want that. I want you to be... happy. [ He does. Terribly. ] I don't think you get it, what you do for me. I don't think I could be here without you. I don't think I could be here, [ he stresses the word, struggles. ] Jem, I didn't now how to do this before you. Loving someone.
[This comes out much smaller than she means it to. She sounds so fragile. She feels so fragile. She doesn't want to fall apart again. She doesn't want to sit here and cry, because all she does is cry. ]
What - what do you want, Billy?
[Maybe it feels like a loaded question. She has to know, though. She has to understand. ]
[ He doesn't think there's a version where he survives this without her. Even if it hurts.
He's staring at her, really staring. It's complicated. And after a moment he says lowly, really carefully: ] What do you think I want? If I could... I'd take you and run.
[ But he can't do that, can't seem to convince her of anything. ]
[Into the void, maybe. Maybe they'd come out in another dream life, with only memories of each other. A beach in California; a place that is just theirs. Rent, bills, two jobs that are mostly just tolerable but keeps them together. Happy.
There's no escape here, though. ] I'd go with you. But where would we go?
[ It's a nice thought. A pretty promise. If they were still in the void he wonders what it would have felt like, leaving Hawkins with Jem in the passenger seat, fucking with the radio, the trunk filled with a mix of their things. He wants it, desperately, the two of them pointed west. But, north, south, east, west, all directions point to the yawing void. Inside, he doubts they'll find California, that they'd be so lucky twice over. ]
One of these days.
[ He kisses her forehead, breathes in the soft scent of her shampoo, her sweat. ]
[ He's got a hand on her side, thumb rubbing against the curve of her ribcage. ]
Don't say that. [ It won't be forever, he doesn't think. He doesn't know, but he doesn't think... ]
Listen. If it were me. [ He thinks about it for a moment. If it were him, a bug in his brain, or something, touched and used. Excuses, even reality, wouldn't matter, not against the wash of hurt, of the bodies he would've caused. He thinks about Hawkins, the people he hurt there, how he would have felt with a name and face to blame. ] I wouldn't listen to anyone.
[ That sits with her for a long moment. If it were her, she doesn't know if she'd vocalise the want for anyone to pick her. She hasn't yet, has she? She's kept that to herself, knows it's not rational, that isn't fair. But if she were wounded, if she were hurt? Maybe. Maybe she'd be crueller than Murphy about it. She's always been cruel, when she's hurt. She's always gone low; she's always found the weak points of a person and known how to strike at them.
She could hurt Billy right now, she knows. She doesn't. ] But it's not you. [ And it's not black and white. She loves John Gaius. It's different to how she loves Billy, which is more akin to having had her chest opened up to make room for Billy to slip in. Loving Billy feels like her soul's been very lonely for a long time, and then suddenly found its other half. Loving Billy feels like a hundred first loves she could have had if she had lived a normal life, it feels like a billion more possible happily afters waiting for them. Loving Billy feels like hope, like certainty.
But she loves John too. ] It's not you, it's him, and - he didn't do that to anyone else, did he? So I think it's pretty obvious the problem is me, and I know how to take a hint.
[ Billy would, he thinks. He thinks if he were hurt he would have been louder, more cruelly divisive than Murphy, snarled from the rooftops that there were lines in the sand: or more accurately, walls being resolutely built, stone by stone. Good luck breaking them down.
But he wasn't the one hurt. Now he's stuck here in the middle, all of their hurt buffeting up against him. ]
The problem's not you. Murphy's problem is John. And he's gonna need time to decide whether he believes his apology's real.
[That isn’t fair, she thinks. Because he’s still living with Mavis, who has John’s name. It’s not fair, because who has he made such a thing about choice with, except her?
She feels suddenly childish. Like the whole thing is childish. Stupid. ]
I don’t want to talk about this anymore. He can do whatever he likes.
[ Seemingly John's loudest defender. On the flipside, Billy hasn't seen who's pushing back on John, doesn't know what's in his heart because he hasn't been shown it himself. ]
No, I - [A beat. A hesitation; a sigh. ] If I go to bed upset I have - nightmares.
[Historically, anyway. She worries her lip with her teeth. Her hands fidget. She could sleep here, in the greenhouse. Curl up on the sofa that Eddie dragged in, scream and scream all she wants and they wouldn't hear her. ]
No. [ No. None of that. No staying up, awake, while expecting him to drift off smoothly. ] You'd be in good company.
[ They all have nightmares, don't they? She said she doesn't want to talk about it, so he doesn't know what he's supposed to chew over and spit out. Murphy, John, this place, guilt and doubt. He doesn't know what she wants to say about it.
His hand drifts down to encircle her wrist, and then he tugs her along beside him toward the greenhouse's couch. He goes down first, ass settling into the old cushions, and then he tugs her too so she's half laying on top of him. If she wakes up screaming, he doesn't really care. He's not sure he's going to sleep anyway. ]
[He's so gentle with her. She thinks about this a lot; often can't make it fit with the self he sometimes tries to paint for her, when he talks about the past. About home. They're still half-cross with each other, and he's so gentle, he won't leave her, and her eyes feel suddenly raw, a sting of wetness in them when she turns and buries her face into his stomach. No amount of blinking really stops it, but there's no hiccup that follows, and there's no shoulder-shaking sob. She lays there with her head on his lap and her face shoves straight into his shirt and stomach, a hand clutching at the fabric.
She curls in on them both. Knees coiled as tight as the sofa will allow. Eddie's going to come looking for them, eventually, and he'll find them here, half-upset and exhausted.
In the now, she desperately doesn't want to let him go. She inhales him deep, smells everything that is him, that is them - can smell, faintly, what must be Murphy, too. The lingering scent of his home, out there in the woods. She doesn't like what it does to her insides, or how it makes her feel right now. It's cat-like, the urge to puff up, to strip him down and cover every inch of him in her, until that's all there is to see, to smell, to feel. It's - ]
[ It's human isn't it? Sometimes Jem comes back to the shack or the boarding house and Billy can't help but be stiff and irritated and annoyed until he loosens up with every kiss pressed against her skin, tongue dragging over her, and even better, watching flecks of cum mark her body, covering up anyone else who wants to have her.
In the moment though, he runs his hand through her long hanks of hair. He's pretty sure she's crying into his shirt, turning it wet against his stomach. Months ago, back home, it probably would have grossed him out. Instead, he kind of wants to cry too, maybe. His hand rolls down, grips against her shoulder, thumb digging into the back of her neck, meant to be soothing, rubbing into sore, fucked up muscles. ]
[She moves enough to give him space, scrubs at her cheeks while he lays down. She settles onto his chest, sprawled out over him. Her tucks against where she can hear the thump of his heart, and it's not the most comfortable, but it's where she wants to be. It's close; it's intimate. To leave her, he'll have to shove her off. He'd have to be explicit about it.
She reaches for one hand, holds it with both her hands and presses her mouth to his knuckles, his palm, and then bows her forehead against it. It says: I love you, and you're mine.
She doesn't sleep. She's too scared to sleep, too scared to slip into a nightmare and have him deal with it. So she lays there, head to chest, heavy, and listens to his heartbeat, his breathing, and soaks and in his warmth. ]
[ Thump, thump, thump. Jem smells like soap and sweat, maybe a little salty, those tears gathered on her cheeks, on his shirt. He doesn't sleep either, not right away, but Jem settles close by and his broad hands play with her long strands of hair, fingers slipping through the strands to scratch against her scalp.
It says: We're here together. I've got you, I've got you, you're mine, I'm yours.
Eventually he falls asleep, head tilted toward hers, nose against her hair and filled with her scent, and he finally, finally sleeps, heavy drawls of breath. ]
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no subject
He wants that too—thinks it snuck in the day he realized he wasn't going anywhere, that she wasn't either, that he loved her, that they could live here, if they never left here. Together. What that might look like, years from now. ]
No that's— [ Insane. Intense. ] Yeah. Me too.
[ He tries to bend. Erode faster. ] You have... them. Your Petre too if he's out there. [ There's a crease between his brows. It feels like there is always is. ] What the fuck am I gonna offer you that they can't?
no subject
They're the same. They're the same, every way that counts. She's looking into a mirror, isn't she? This is her. She's him.
And she still loves him, even though most of the time, she can't love herself. ] What do I offer you that you can't get anywhere else? From anywhere else? I think that all the time.
[She's not like Murphy. She's not pretty like Lottie. She's not safe like Jim. She's a mountain of problems, of issues, a mess that masquerades in human skin. ] You make me feel safe. You make me feel like it's okay to be me. You make me feel like it's okay to be seen. You make me want to imagine a future that isn't some - fucked up dystopia, moving from one place to the next. You make me want to be happy with you. You make me want to try. I had to - [she chokes a little, because this is hard to say. Perhaps the hardest thing of all to admit. ] I had to travel across two universes to feel like that - like I wanted to be happy, to settle with someone and just be. You make me feel like I deserve that. I've never - no one. Ever made me feel like I deserved to be happy, before, except - except Kieren.
no subject
It's hard to believe it, to feel it quantified when— Billy's difficult. He knows this. It's hard for him to open up, to express how he feels. When he gets angry, it blooms up so violently. He's obstinate, he's quick to anger. He doesn't take anything seriously. He takes everything seriously.
His thumb retraces Jem's cheekbone. ] I do want that. I want you to be... happy. [ He does. Terribly. ] I don't think you get it, what you do for me. I don't think I could be here without you. I don't think I could be here, [ he stresses the word, struggles. ] Jem, I didn't now how to do this before you. Loving someone.
no subject
[This comes out much smaller than she means it to. She sounds so fragile. She feels so fragile. She doesn't want to fall apart again. She doesn't want to sit here and cry, because all she does is cry. ]
What - what do you want, Billy?
[Maybe it feels like a loaded question. She has to know, though. She has to understand. ]
no subject
He's staring at her, really staring. It's complicated. And after a moment he says lowly, really carefully: ] What do you think I want? If I could... I'd take you and run.
[ But he can't do that, can't seem to convince her of anything. ]
no subject
[Into the void, maybe. Maybe they'd come out in another dream life, with only memories of each other. A beach in California; a place that is just theirs. Rent, bills, two jobs that are mostly just tolerable but keeps them together. Happy.
There's no escape here, though. ] I'd go with you. But where would we go?
no subject
[ No, there's nowhere to go. There's just festering here. But everything rots, sometimes makes fuel, sometimes something grows. ]
Back to... that place you were. Anywhere you want. A beach somewhere. If I could, I'd throw you in my passenger seat and just drive.
Anywhere.
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[It sounds nice. It sounds like something lovely, something so normal. ]
Just us, your car and - a road. I’d do it.
no subject
One of these days.
[ He kisses her forehead, breathes in the soft scent of her shampoo, her sweat. ]
You want me to talk to him?
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She wants to bury herself inside of his shirt. She wants to dig a hole outside, big enough for two, and drag him into the earth with her. ]
What’s the point? [She says, already defeated. Still stung. ]
no subject
Don't say that. [ It won't be forever, he doesn't think. He doesn't know, but he doesn't think... ]
Listen. If it were me. [ He thinks about it for a moment. If it were him, a bug in his brain, or something, touched and used. Excuses, even reality, wouldn't matter, not against the wash of hurt, of the bodies he would've caused. He thinks about Hawkins, the people he hurt there, how he would have felt with a name and face to blame. ] I wouldn't listen to anyone.
no subject
She could hurt Billy right now, she knows. She doesn't. ] But it's not you. [ And it's not black and white. She loves John Gaius. It's different to how she loves Billy, which is more akin to having had her chest opened up to make room for Billy to slip in. Loving Billy feels like her soul's been very lonely for a long time, and then suddenly found its other half. Loving Billy feels like a hundred first loves she could have had if she had lived a normal life, it feels like a billion more possible happily afters waiting for them. Loving Billy feels like hope, like certainty.
But she loves John too. ] It's not you, it's him, and - he didn't do that to anyone else, did he? So I think it's pretty obvious the problem is me, and I know how to take a hint.
no subject
But he wasn't the one hurt. Now he's stuck here in the middle, all of their hurt buffeting up against him. ]
The problem's not you. Murphy's problem is John. And he's gonna need time to decide whether he believes his apology's real.
no subject
[That isn’t fair, she thinks. Because he’s still living with Mavis, who has John’s name. It’s not fair, because who has he made such a thing about choice with, except her?
She feels suddenly childish. Like the whole thing is childish. Stupid. ]
I don’t want to talk about this anymore. He can do whatever he likes.
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[ Seemingly John's loudest defender. On the flipside, Billy hasn't seen who's pushing back on John, doesn't know what's in his heart because he hasn't been shown it himself. ]
Yeah. Okay. Let's just go to bed.
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[Historically, anyway. She worries her lip with her teeth. Her hands fidget. She could sleep here, in the greenhouse. Curl up on the sofa that Eddie dragged in, scream and scream all she wants and they wouldn't hear her. ]
You - you go to bed. I'll just keep you up.
no subject
[ They all have nightmares, don't they? She said she doesn't want to talk about it, so he doesn't know what he's supposed to chew over and spit out. Murphy, John, this place, guilt and doubt. He doesn't know what she wants to say about it.
His hand drifts down to encircle her wrist, and then he tugs her along beside him toward the greenhouse's couch. He goes down first, ass settling into the old cushions, and then he tugs her too so she's half laying on top of him. If she wakes up screaming, he doesn't really care. He's not sure he's going to sleep anyway. ]
no subject
She curls in on them both. Knees coiled as tight as the sofa will allow. Eddie's going to come looking for them, eventually, and he'll find them here, half-upset and exhausted.
In the now, she desperately doesn't want to let him go. She inhales him deep, smells everything that is him, that is them - can smell, faintly, what must be Murphy, too. The lingering scent of his home, out there in the woods. She doesn't like what it does to her insides, or how it makes her feel right now. It's cat-like, the urge to puff up, to strip him down and cover every inch of him in her, until that's all there is to see, to smell, to feel. It's - ]
Lay down with me, [she says, faintly, tired. ]
no subject
In the moment though, he runs his hand through her long hanks of hair. He's pretty sure she's crying into his shirt, turning it wet against his stomach. Months ago, back home, it probably would have grossed him out. Instead, he kind of wants to cry too, maybe. His hand rolls down, grips against her shoulder, thumb digging into the back of her neck, meant to be soothing, rubbing into sore, fucked up muscles. ]
Yeah. Here, come on.
no subject
She reaches for one hand, holds it with both her hands and presses her mouth to his knuckles, his palm, and then bows her forehead against it. It says: I love you, and you're mine.
She doesn't sleep. She's too scared to sleep, too scared to slip into a nightmare and have him deal with it. So she lays there, head to chest, heavy, and listens to his heartbeat, his breathing, and soaks and in his warmth. ]
no subject
It says: We're here together. I've got you, I've got you, you're mine, I'm yours.
Eventually he falls asleep, head tilted toward hers, nose against her hair and filled with her scent, and he finally, finally sleeps, heavy drawls of breath. ]