I'm not sure what you want me to say, Hawk. What we do is our business, but since you felt obligated to watch? We are enjoying one another. I care about his wellbeing.
If that's difficult for you, then you should reflect on what went wrong two years ago. That wasn't up to me.
Oh, so it is a romance? Looks an awful lot like something else. Different than your expectations from before - unless they've lowered? Suppose the President has a lot of pull for himself.
Hawk, what is wrong with me wanting to be wanted? With wanting someone to care about my feelings, my goals, my desires, regardless of my expectations? Sure, there are plenty of closed doors we have to hide behind. That's the nature of everything we do here, but I fail to see why wanting to be seen by someone means I've lowered my expectations.
[does tim really think he didn't want him? that he's not doing this because he can't sleep when there's visions of him on his knees for someone else plaguing his waking hours and his nightmares?]
That didn't earn you any favors with the General. You don't have to put yourself on the line like that next time.
[ why did he think being honest and genuine with hawkins fuller now would make any difference? he reads the messages and while he can see the burning jealousy for what it is, it makes tim feel strangely dirty. how can he say kind things, question his happiness, worry about his reputation - and then - that? ]
I hid everything for you and it wasn't enough. I don't think anything I did would ever have been enough for you. You made that very clear.
[ just like he's hiding his still fractured heart, held together with scotch tape and desperation. ]
Everyone says I'm sweet like it's some mortal sin. I refuse to change who I am. I refuse to believe that I have no purpose or meaning here, no matter what you, the General, anyone thinks.
[ no, ash doesn't fuck him as good as hawk used to. but then again, tim doesn't crave to be wanted and owned and utterly consumed by ash colchester, either. it was never just the fucking that made it so good in the first place. ]
Put the bottle down and go to sleep, Hawk.
You slammed that door shut in my face years ago. I'm not the one that's locked himself in.
[it wasn't just about hiding, was it? no, hawk made it about every possible barrier, hawk made it about as one-sided as it could possibly be. it wasn't fair to tim - to tell him about all the expectations he had, watch him jump, and then pull the rug out from him anyway. maybe that's why it's not really about president colchester. it's not about someone else fucking him, even if he's jealous as all hell at the thought of someone else with his skippy, calling good boy, watching the precise ways he falls apart like a goddamn work of art in his pleasure.
ash is a better man than him. of course tim would be drawn to it. tim will probably learn to love him too, and receive that love in return.]
You didn't need to change. That was the whole point - you're fine just the way you are, you hear me?
But you're right. Good thing another one was there to swing open for you.
[he's still jealous. but he does mean that somewhat sincerely, even if it sounds passive aggressive in text. his thumb hovers over the dial button, wanting to hear tim's voice even for just a few minutes. hell, he'd even accept scolding over his drinking still.]
[ any other person might look at these messages and leave the sender on read. they might just turn their phone off and ignore the furious drunken waves and go to sleep. but two years ago hawkins fuller carved up a hole in his heart, and even when he turned heel and left, the tissue and muscle never grew back. ]
I didn’t need to change. Not for you.
Anyways, I’m reading. A book from my childhood.
[ they had locked eyes across a busy congress floor and something between them had never been the same. they fit, and even now the hawkins fuller shaped hole in his heart flutters, uncomfortable and achy. hawk isn’t calling him because he’s raging and stubborn, no.
tim knows the language of this man better than he knows the sound of his own name. and even if he wants to turn the phone off, wants to dismiss the conversation?
well.
his thumb swipes. there’s a tap, a few rings and if he answers? he’ll speak. if not? a voicemail, if much of the same.
the fluttering if the pages of the book he’s reading: ]
“He tried to remember Moon Child's eyes, but was no longer able to. He was sure of only one thing: that her glance had passed through his eyes and down into his heart.
He could still feel the burning trail it had left behind. That glance, he felt, was embedded in his heart, and there it glittered like a mysterious jewel. And in a strange and wonderful way it hurt. Even if Bastian had wanted to, he couldn't have defended himself against this thing that had happened to him. However, he didn't want to. Oh no, not for anything in the world would he have parted with that jewel. All he wanted was to go on reading, to see Moon Child again, to be with her.
It never occurred to him that he was getting into the most unusual and perhaps the most dangerous of adventures. But even if he had known this, he wouldn't have dreamed of shutting the book…”
[of course he answers. it's the call he wasn't expecting, assuming tim would have the good sense to ignore him after this drunken outreach. hawk's usually more careful with the cards against his chest, but something about seeing tim in bliss at the hands of someone else so openly managed to break something loose in his chest, to feel the fullness of the ache that he's kept at bay since his decision to walk away. two years feels simultaneously like yesterday and the longest of his life, even moreso when tim walked into president colchester's office and his heart skipped a beat upon introduction of his new aide.
sometimes he wonders - if he'd known it would end up like this, would have have pushed tim away?
probably. maybe. christ, he has no idea. not when his head is spinning and he's abandoned the empty glass of scotch on his coffee table, stumbled into bed and rolled onto his back to stare miserably at the ceiling and try to take a stab at sleep again.
but it's so much easier to close his eyes and pretend tim is lying next to him, reading gently to soothe and lull him to sleep. to get lost enough in the words that the larger meaning doesn't fully sink in, hawk instead offering a rumbling, teasing:]
[ of course hawk doesn't truly listen. it's no surprise the meaning is lost on him, either, and something about that makes his heart ache. he stares down at the page, the end of the chapter waiting there - a few lingering sentences and the endless blank, yellowed paper indicating he should indeed shut the book and turn out his light.
It never occurred to him that he was getting into the most unusual and perhaps the most dangerous of adventures. But even if he had known this, he wouldn't have dreamed of shutting the book…
With a trembling forefinger he found his place and went on reading.
The clock in the Belfry struck ten.
he's tired, and it shows in the sigh of his words: ]
No, no. I'm sure I could find a copy and read it for you one day, though.
[ what does he look like, sprawled out in bed, drunk and flushed, tousled and unkempt in a way that shows he's gotten messy around the edges. tim always liked it best when he saw the delicate seams start to fray behind closed doors.
he sits for a moment, listening to the man breathe, to the silence on the other line. he feels so far away. ]
[he'd like it if tim were here for him to touch, to hold. is he laying down too? or is he at his desk, no doubt working himself to the bone with late night arrangements and proposals and burning the midnight oil. hawk probably interrupted him - just another tally on a long list of shitty things he's done to this boy.
if tim listens, he'll hear hawk roll over and tug at the switch, turning it off because he would have forgotten. how funny the things they remember about one another - details burned into their souls that they'll never be able to let go, accumulated like little pearls of intimate knowledge twinkling at inopportune times and tugging on their heart strings.
hawk is quiet for a few moments, and then in a low, almost surrender -]
I'll have to see if I can find a copy in all of my free time.
[ though he means to sound a little put off by it, there's no doubt that hawk could hear the smile in his voice if he's listening closely enough. tim should be mad - should chastise hawk and rail against him and count the many hurts he's felt at the other man's hand and words.
the text had been a cry for something, of course. for all the ways he was never able to understand hawk, he can also see right through him. tim isn't made of the stuff to be cruel, even when some deserve it.
(he's not sure hawk will ever fully deserve it, which is another thing to revisit altogether).
he hears the click of the lamp and tim closes his book on his chest. he'll stay put on the couch, and he reaches to turn his own lamp off. this way, if he closes his eyes, he can imagine the scene of them together for a moment. ]
Mm. In a way. She sends someone on a quest to find him. She's the ruler of a great, magical land that's under threat. She's too weak to fight off the evil - she needs to be renamed by a child to regain her power - so he goes on the quest to help her. He can do whatever he wishes, but with every wish, he loses a memory. In the end, he's the one that renames her and saves the land - saves her. But he loses himself, when he does it.
[ he huffs a little, shaking his head. ]
So she sends him back - but only with his ability to love. And with that, he saves himself. He goes back to the land many times after that to give the girl a new name - to save her every time.
Saying it out loud? It's a little stupid.
[ except he finds it utterly charming, of course. and he also assumes hawk has most likely fallen asleep. who wouldn't? ]
So they love each other at the expense of themselves.
[the words are a little slurred - half sleepiness and half all the scotch he's put away tonight while chasing off thoughts of this very topic. but just like the boy he can't seem to stay too far, and while he'd told tim once that he should have never gotten close - should have left him alone, he knows if he had the chance he'd go back and do it all over again.
(so why can't he...now? no.)
he remembers tim scolding him once for looking at things so bleakly, interpreting hawk's own protective idea of freedom as an exclusion to keep him out. part of it had been to keep him from getting hurt back then - but it happened anyway, and that's the part he'll take to his grave. even if for now it's easy to pretend that tim is on a jet somewhere, or in a hotel, and he can't sleep because of jet lag or work and hawk is waiting for him to come back and crawl into bed so they can curl around each other like two halves of the same whole and drift off.]
It's not stupid. Seems a little deep for a kid's book, frankly.
[hawk shifts onto his back again, breath evening out as he closes his eyes and listens for every inflection of tim's voice, every inhale he takes in response like he might manifest the sensation of it next to him. enough time has passed that he thinks maybe tim has drifted off too, instead laying himself bare in a murmur that's barely above a whisper.]
[ the book itself isn't about love, it's about adventure and loss and discovering self, but who is tim laughlin now without hawkins fuller? he'd thrown himself to the army to try and find out, to see if he could smudge the imprint of the man from his heart.
it failed. he can see that very clearly now.
tim's eyes remain close as they sit on the phone and he tries to imagine what it would be like were his head on hawk's chest again. if he could feel his heart or meter his breathing. he knows where every dip and turn is, knows how far to reach to find the splintered skin of his scar on his back.
it's a love that picks and nags at his heart with warmth in the same way it hurts. he's just never felt it beat so close to his own heart that his throat swells slightly, his eyes burn, his breath clinging to his ribs. no one but the man on the other side of the phone can slot himself into the hole in his heart and mend it.
he thinks of ash, sadly. ash understands with his sad eyes and warm smile, all good and kind and rough edges. ash, who knows that something as great and all-encompassing like this is a gift, never a curse. no matter the hurt. the wound in is chest doesn't bleed for him - he wasn't the one who made it. ]
I know. [ soft, a near whisper into the phone because he's sure hawk is drifting off. ]
Call me, next time. When you want to drink. I'll read to you. Goodnight Moon, maybe. Or Icarus and Apollo.
[hawk remembers what it was like to be the sole focus of tim's attention, the center of this boy's everything. every bit of thoughtfulness, of sweetness and the surprising fire burning inside him needing release from someone with a firm hand. he remembers that chance meeting too - falling into bed and knowing he was fucked from the get-go, not just another one-off at a hotel or some chance grindr hookup. christ, he'd known it the second he'd locked eyes with tim across a crowd of washington's elite in bright spotlights and a busy bar packed with bodies, stunned and unable to look away like a bolt to the heart. not the kind of thing that happens every day, not the kind of thing hawkins fuller thought he'd even be susceptible to after so long buttoned up.
the part that's not a secret is that there's a tim-shaped hole in his heart too. only his vices are liquid, not nearly enough to even come close to filling the space instead of seeping right on through and dragging him down near drowning in it on nights like this.
he's fighting drifting off, if only because it means morning comes and he's back to the polished, bulletproof aide to the vice president who passes tim laughlin with hardly a hello or more than a passing nod of acknowledgment. the longer he's awake, the longer he can stay in this purgatory of tim's sweet voice in his ear, breathing a phantom whisper against his skin.]
Yeah? You gonna pick it up from the Library of Congress just for me?
[there's a fondness in his voice, the hint of a smile tugging at his lips even in its drowsiness if tim listens closely. the same kind that told him once about beachfront villas and italy and sailing in their future.]
No promises about the drinking. Will you still answer?
[ the tiniest little roots of hope begin to snake their way back round his heart, threatening to seep into the hole left by one hawkins fuller. it's better if he ignores it - if he swallows down anything from this moment and stores it away for safety where it can't be touched.
where it can't hurt him. ]
The Library of Congress might laugh me to the curb. But I'll think of something.
[ just for you, he might have echoed in another time, another life, really. it's been two years and still tim knows he is under this man's wicked spell. what would it be like to be loved and held and wanted and cherished again the way hawk had for him?
he'll never know.
but the fondness in hawk's voice, drowned out by the listless fatigue, starts the very beginning of the fissure in his chest. a splinter, waiting for pressure. damn him. ]
No promises. I guess you'll have to take a shot and see.
[ what does he look like now, stretched out in bed, exhausted and sleepy, eyes heavy and smile slow and lazy. a great love, of course. isn't that what ash had alluded to once? is that what hawk is to him? ]
Goodnight, Hawk. Get some rest. [ a small pause, and then, tentative: ] I'll see you tomorrow.
[ damn those little roots - the little taste of hope, to dare him to try and feel something real and true and painful all over again. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
It would be the right thing to do, considering you serve his Vice President.
It would be advantageous for your career.
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When are you both going public?
I know that's important to you.
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I'm not sure what you want me to say, Hawk. What we do is our business, but since you felt obligated to watch? We are enjoying one another. I care about his wellbeing.
If that's difficult for you, then you should reflect on what went wrong two years ago. That wasn't up to me.
[ with us - he almost says. ]
no subject
So is it just sex? Are you intentionally keeping it under wraps? Who broached that topic?
I'm just trying to keep it all straight, here. For reference.
no subject
I always hated it when you drank like this.
1/2
Just a nightcap.
no subject
1/2
no subject
You're drinking too much. I could smell it on you last week in the defense meeting. It's why I pretended to accidentally burn the coffee.
[ the smell of coffee lingers and covers even the strongest of smells. burnt coffee? even moreso. ]
1/2
[does tim really think he didn't want him? that he's not doing this because he can't sleep when there's visions of him on his knees for someone else plaguing his waking hours and his nightmares?]
That didn't earn you any favors with the General. You don't have to put yourself on the line like that next time.
But you would. And you did, because you're good.
Sweet.
no subject
1/2
I hid everything for you and it wasn't enough.
I don't think anything I did would ever have been enough for you.
You made that very clear.
[ just like he's hiding his still fractured heart, held together with scotch tape and desperation. ]
Everyone says I'm sweet like it's some mortal sin. I refuse to change who I am. I refuse to believe that I have no purpose or meaning here, no matter what you, the General, anyone thinks.
no subject
Put the bottle down and go to sleep, Hawk.
You slammed that door shut in my face years ago. I'm not the one that's locked himself in.
no subject
ash is a better man than him. of course tim would be drawn to it. tim will probably learn to love him too, and receive that love in return.]
You didn't need to change. That was the whole point - you're fine just the way you are, you hear me?
But you're right. Good thing another one was there to swing open for you.
[he's still jealous. but he does mean that somewhat sincerely, even if it sounds passive aggressive in text. his thumb hovers over the dial button, wanting to hear tim's voice even for just a few minutes. hell, he'd even accept scolding over his drinking still.]
Can't sleep. Why aren't you in bed?
no subject
I didn’t need to change.
Not for you.
Anyways, I’m reading.
A book from my childhood.
[ they had locked eyes across a busy congress floor and something between them had never been the same. they fit, and even now the hawkins fuller shaped hole in his heart flutters, uncomfortable and achy. hawk isn’t calling him because he’s raging and stubborn, no.
tim knows the language of this man better than he knows the sound of his own name. and even if he wants to turn the phone off, wants to dismiss the conversation?
well.
his thumb swipes. there’s a tap, a few rings and if he answers? he’ll speak. if not? a voicemail, if much of the same.
the fluttering if the pages of the book he’s reading: ]
“He tried to remember Moon Child's eyes, but was no longer able to. He was sure of only one thing: that her glance had passed through his eyes and down into his heart.
He could still feel the burning trail it had left behind. That glance, he felt, was embedded in his heart, and there it glittered like a mysterious jewel. And in a strange and wonderful way it hurt.
Even if Bastian had wanted to, he couldn't have defended himself against this thing that had happened to him. However, he didn't want to. Oh no, not for anything in the world would he have parted with that jewel. All he wanted was to go on reading, to see Moon Child again, to be with her.
It never occurred to him that he was getting into the most unusual and perhaps the most dangerous of adventures. But even if he had known this, he wouldn't have dreamed of shutting the book…”
no subject
sometimes he wonders - if he'd known it would end up like this, would have have pushed tim away?
probably. maybe. christ, he has no idea. not when his head is spinning and he's abandoned the empty glass of scotch on his coffee table, stumbled into bed and rolled onto his back to stare miserably at the ceiling and try to take a stab at sleep again.
but it's so much easier to close his eyes and pretend tim is lying next to him, reading gently to soothe and lull him to sleep. to get lost enough in the words that the larger meaning doesn't fully sink in, hawk instead offering a rumbling, teasing:]
Is this the grown up version of Goodnight Moon?
no subject
It never occurred to him that he was getting into the most unusual and perhaps the most dangerous of adventures. But even if he had known this, he wouldn't have dreamed of shutting the book…
With a trembling forefinger he found his place and went on reading.
The clock in the Belfry struck ten.
he's tired, and it shows in the sigh of his words: ]
No, no. I'm sure I could find a copy and read it for you one day, though.
[ what does he look like, sprawled out in bed, drunk and flushed, tousled and unkempt in a way that shows he's gotten messy around the edges. tim always liked it best when he saw the delicate seams start to fray behind closed doors.
he sits for a moment, listening to the man breathe, to the silence on the other line. he feels so far away. ]
Turn your light out, Hawk. You always forget.
no subject
[he'd like it if tim were here for him to touch, to hold. is he laying down too? or is he at his desk, no doubt working himself to the bone with late night arrangements and proposals and burning the midnight oil. hawk probably interrupted him - just another tally on a long list of shitty things he's done to this boy.
if tim listens, he'll hear hawk roll over and tug at the switch, turning it off because he would have forgotten. how funny the things they remember about one another - details burned into their souls that they'll never be able to let go, accumulated like little pearls of intimate knowledge twinkling at inopportune times and tugging on their heart strings.
hawk is quiet for a few moments, and then in a low, almost surrender -]
Does he get to see her again?
[moon child. he was listening.]
no subject
[ though he means to sound a little put off by it, there's no doubt that hawk could hear the smile in his voice if he's listening closely enough. tim should be mad - should chastise hawk and rail against him and count the many hurts he's felt at the other man's hand and words.
the text had been a cry for something, of course. for all the ways he was never able to understand hawk, he can also see right through him. tim isn't made of the stuff to be cruel, even when some deserve it.
(he's not sure hawk will ever fully deserve it, which is another thing to revisit altogether).
he hears the click of the lamp and tim closes his book on his chest. he'll stay put on the couch, and he reaches to turn his own lamp off. this way, if he closes his eyes, he can imagine the scene of them together for a moment. ]
Mm. In a way. She sends someone on a quest to find him. She's the ruler of a great, magical land that's under threat. She's too weak to fight off the evil - she needs to be renamed by a child to regain her power - so he goes on the quest to help her. He can do whatever he wishes, but with every wish, he loses a memory. In the end, he's the one that renames her and saves the land - saves her. But he loses himself, when he does it.
[ he huffs a little, shaking his head. ]
So she sends him back - but only with his ability to love. And with that, he saves himself. He goes back to the land many times after that to give the girl a new name - to save her every time.
Saying it out loud? It's a little stupid.
[ except he finds it utterly charming, of course. and he also assumes hawk has most likely fallen asleep. who wouldn't? ]
no subject
[the words are a little slurred - half sleepiness and half all the scotch he's put away tonight while chasing off thoughts of this very topic. but just like the boy he can't seem to stay too far, and while he'd told tim once that he should have never gotten close - should have left him alone, he knows if he had the chance he'd go back and do it all over again.
(so why can't he...now? no.)
he remembers tim scolding him once for looking at things so bleakly, interpreting hawk's own protective idea of freedom as an exclusion to keep him out. part of it had been to keep him from getting hurt back then - but it happened anyway, and that's the part he'll take to his grave. even if for now it's easy to pretend that tim is on a jet somewhere, or in a hotel, and he can't sleep because of jet lag or work and hawk is waiting for him to come back and crawl into bed so they can curl around each other like two halves of the same whole and drift off.]
It's not stupid. Seems a little deep for a kid's book, frankly.
[hawk shifts onto his back again, breath evening out as he closes his eyes and listens for every inflection of tim's voice, every inhale he takes in response like he might manifest the sensation of it next to him. enough time has passed that he thinks maybe tim has drifted off too, instead laying himself bare in a murmur that's barely above a whisper.]
I miss you, Skippy.
no subject
[ the book itself isn't about love, it's about adventure and loss and discovering self, but who is tim laughlin now without hawkins fuller? he'd thrown himself to the army to try and find out, to see if he could smudge the imprint of the man from his heart.
it failed. he can see that very clearly now.
tim's eyes remain close as they sit on the phone and he tries to imagine what it would be like were his head on hawk's chest again. if he could feel his heart or meter his breathing. he knows where every dip and turn is, knows how far to reach to find the splintered skin of his scar on his back.
it's a love that picks and nags at his heart with warmth in the same way it hurts. he's just never felt it beat so close to his own heart that his throat swells slightly, his eyes burn, his breath clinging to his ribs. no one but the man on the other side of the phone can slot himself into the hole in his heart and mend it.
he thinks of ash, sadly. ash understands with his sad eyes and warm smile, all good and kind and rough edges. ash, who knows that something as great and all-encompassing like this is a gift, never a curse. no matter the hurt. the wound in is chest doesn't bleed for him - he wasn't the one who made it. ]
I know. [ soft, a near whisper into the phone because he's sure hawk is drifting off. ]
Call me, next time. When you want to drink. I'll read to you. Goodnight Moon, maybe. Or Icarus and Apollo.
no subject
the part that's not a secret is that there's a tim-shaped hole in his heart too. only his vices are liquid, not nearly enough to even come close to filling the space instead of seeping right on through and dragging him down near drowning in it on nights like this.
he's fighting drifting off, if only because it means morning comes and he's back to the polished, bulletproof aide to the vice president who passes tim laughlin with hardly a hello or more than a passing nod of acknowledgment. the longer he's awake, the longer he can stay in this purgatory of tim's sweet voice in his ear, breathing a phantom whisper against his skin.]
Yeah? You gonna pick it up from the Library of Congress just for me?
[there's a fondness in his voice, the hint of a smile tugging at his lips even in its drowsiness if tim listens closely. the same kind that told him once about beachfront villas and italy and sailing in their future.]
No promises about the drinking. Will you still answer?
no subject
where it can't hurt him. ]
The Library of Congress might laugh me to the curb. But I'll think of something.
[ just for you, he might have echoed in another time, another life, really. it's been two years and still tim knows he is under this man's wicked spell. what would it be like to be loved and held and wanted and cherished again the way hawk had for him?
he'll never know.
but the fondness in hawk's voice, drowned out by the listless fatigue, starts the very beginning of the fissure in his chest. a splinter, waiting for pressure. damn him. ]
No promises. I guess you'll have to take a shot and see.
[ what does he look like now, stretched out in bed, exhausted and sleepy, eyes heavy and smile slow and lazy. a great love, of course. isn't that what ash had alluded to once? is that what hawk is to him? ]
Goodnight, Hawk. Get some rest. [ a small pause, and then, tentative: ] I'll see you tomorrow.
[ damn those little roots - the little taste of hope, to dare him to try and feel something real and true and painful all over again. ]