deuceoftears | TLV IC Inbox

"Alright, so. What did you want, then? No wrong answers."

"You can say no wrong answers with your facehole, but that doesn't make it true," Jedao says dourly.

"And if you want John to fuck you, you can just ask him and he'll oblige," he says, primly snide. "That's not going to change when he's married."

Jedao rolls his eyes. "I know that. Obviously he wasn't dumping me."

Jedao blinks.

"Wait, did you not know we've been fucking since the day he got a body?"

His cheeks turn a delicate shade of pink.

"I-I didn't know it was that long, no, but- look, based on your conversation, John seemed under the impression that you thought he was off-limits somehow, now that he's getting married."

"I was figuring out ways to do it before then, but you got it for him before I had worked out how to pitch him the idea," Jedao adds. It's a weird, pointless point of pride, and also easier than talking about the real - thing.

"It's not that. If he wanted us to stop he'd have said that. I just...I really was just surprised. It's not a word I expected him to want. Which was stupid, in retrospect, and if I'm hurt it's only because I'm mad at myself for being selfish. It's not his fault and the only way to convince him it's not his fault is to explain my own failures and hypocrisies in excruciating, disproportionate detail, and I'm just - I'm just not up to that right now."

His voice ends up heavy and small at the same time.

He wraps his arm around Jedao's shoulders and gives him a little squeeze.

"Can I ask what you think the word does mean to him? Y-you don't have to, I just- I had to have that conversation with him as well, about what everyone else is going to hear when he says it. It's not something that... that ever really came up much between us, previously."

Jedao just sort of...tilts gently into him.

"I don't know," he admits, sounding just a little raw. "But I know it means something, something significant and personal and private, and it's something he wants. And he's not marrying me, so doesn't owe me an explanation. It's on me to be a good friend and be happy for him and I will."

And Jedao gets a chaste little kiss pressed into his hair.

"Jedao. John didn't even know that it means exclusive."

Not that their own marriages are at all typical, but even assuming that conventional marriage was what John was drawing from would explain a lot of the confusion.

"Only on your barbarian planet," Jedao grumbles, staying tucked right in against Arthur's side.

That gets a little chuckle as he rests his head on Jedao.

"...Sokie needs an anchor," he says, after a few moments of silence. "Someone she feels like she's always able to come back to, no matter how long, and still... be able to see that person as home. Safety. Humans aren't meant to get as old as she is, and John's going to live forever, so the pair of them are outliers, even in their own worlds."

He gives a soft hum, mulling over his words. "John recognises how important that is. To have something to ground you. In- in the present, in reality, in love. He loves Sokie, and he wants to be there for her. For as long as she'll have him. He sees it as a vow, to spend their lives together and promise to look after each other. That's all."

Oh, is that all. Jedao supposes he does deserve to have his nose ground in it.

"Great. Well, now that's all cleared up."

Without thinking he donks their heads together a little, a playful reprimand. "And that doesn't mean he loves you one inch less, you melodramatic butterfly. His promises and how he loves are different for everyone, but he still loves you with his entire fucking chest."

Butterfly feels weirdly, meanly pointed. Jedao knows Arthur doesn't mean it that way at all, is probably just riffing on the moth thing; he certainly doesn't know that Cho can mean butterfly with a different tone, that butterflies were on his wedding invitations for a reason besides decoration, if Arthur remembers them at all.

But Jedao can't help thinking of it, and it feels like a slap. How dare he feel anything messy or selfish or ugly about John's marriage, when he has his own?

He can't even be a bitch about it, because of course Arthur will be reporting back to John.

Jedao breaths out, a soft-gentle huff, a completely false relief of real tension.

"You're right, of course."

He feels the tension lessen, but there's probably some irony in that making him worry more. Jedao's being agreeable at him, which means he's definitely fucked that up somehow.

He doesn't release, because he's not sure if pulling away will make Jedao lock up harder, but he doesn't tighten it in case that makes him feel trapped, so he's sort of just awkwardly frozen for a moment.

"Jedao-?"

Jedao only isn't cheerfully leaving because he knows that him pulling away would be a dead give-away, so Arthur does at least keep him there by maintaining the contact.

Jedao's voice comes, warm and wry. If he can just - tie this off and act like an adult about it, and deal with his own shit like he said he would. That would be great.

"He thinks he's hurt me, but the truth is, I kind of just walked into a wall while he was in the room? Emotionally speaking. It's wonderful that he thinks I'd never be such an idiot, except for the part where he's worried now. Would you tell him that? That he didn't hurt me, I was just a bit dumb, and I'll be fine? This time should be about their happiness."

Somehow he's a little bit surprised that he was actually right about Jedao already being upset when the conversation opened with John, but moreso to have it confirmed when he's already upset him.

"Jedao..." And that gets another squeeze - gentler this time, rubbing his hand up Jedao's arm in a gentle assurance that he hopes gets interpreted that way. "Are you... I-I know we haven't caught up much recently, but is- is everything alright?"

It was a metaphor, but of course Arthur would have to go and be perceptive. He can't just bluster his way out of this.

Really, he'd wanted to talk to someone about Gojyo - had even thought about probably John or Arthur or Sheehan - but now it's all tangled up, and Jedao knows he isn't doing right by John, who's their family first -

He takes a slow, shaky breath, letting some of the pent-up misery rattle his ribs, shudder down the sigh.

"...like I said, I've been better," he echoes, but heavier than the first time.

Maybe it's just knowing Jedao, but that sigh immediately feels a dozen times more honest, and he relaxes a little himself, shifting his hand to grip around Jedao's ribs in a more complete side hug.

"You were already upset about something else. Right?"

Maybe it's just because of their own messy complexities, but Jedao hadn't ever struck him as caring about labels before - besides the utter joy with which he'd introduced himself as Cho Jedao at his wedding - as long as the willing and the commitment was there. That John had been accused of not understanding what that meant, when he's not sure that definitions had ever been an unresolvable problem between them before didn't speak to it being about the term, as much as... the loss, perhaps.

Of losing John to someone Arthur wasn't sure Jedao had ever even spoken to before.

"Or... someone?"

Jedao swallows.

"A lot of things are..." Well. No, they're not complicated.

"I've lived on the barge over half my life, now," he starts again. "I miss a lot of people." He misses Godric so bad he feels the ache of it in his ribs, in his fingerbones. He'd even take Fives right now, as a Dad-shaped person he could cry on.

There's a lot he could say to that. Something to assuage, to push, to coax anything more out of him.

Instead he shifts so he can wrap the other arm around Jedao's shoulders and pull his young friend into a full embrace, his own back to the railing of the bridge so Jedao can still see the sky and the languidly flowing river.

Jedao clings to him, hard, and hides his face against Arthur's shoulder so that all his thoughtfulness about the view is wasted. Jedao doesn't really need to see it, though; he can feel the water there, pouring down.

"And it's just been a lot," he mutters after a long pause, full of slow breaths, less about letting his feelings out than still trying to wrestle control over them.

"It can be hard knowing who you can talk to, too," he hums. Which he's not certain is the problem but at least gives him something to murmur reassuringly. "Given how volatile everyone is in this place sometimes."

After a few more long, clinging seconds, he lets go, and then starts moving toward the river.

"Do you know Sha Gojyo at all?"

"Only in passing. I don't think we've ever really spoken." He falls in step with Jedao easily, hands idly back in his pockets. He's certainly seen the man around, but he couldn't say if they've spoken much. "He's from Hakkai's world, right?"

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement

Re: A few days after John's announcement