He shrugs. "What's left in there to work on? You've hit bedrock, my friend, and the only thing left there is suffering. So you can either bury yourself in it, or let someone help you try and make the pit a little less overwhelming."
He thinks of Thalarion, maybe the closest he's ever truly come to death, the mad thing he became there, the raw nerve, the wordless cacophany, the crawling equations, the contents of his mind inverted and splayed out like an axolotl's gill fringes, fractal and red with blood, utterly and deliberately exposed along an infinite ragged edge. He hadn't been himself anymore, in Thalarion. It had hurt every moment, but sometimes he misses it.
"There's two problems," he says slowly. "On the basic level. There's the problem of how much I hate myself, and how - I get stuck on it, how I go back to it. How I was maybe programmed to feel that way. Or maybe it's just natural talent."
Bone dry.
"And there's the much smaller but more pertinent problem of not liking Sokie and not -" His voice cracks a little, wavers. "And being selfish about it. And then there's the third, higher-order problem that I can't seem to deal with the second problem without getting completely fucking sidetracked by the first one. It's not wholly intractable but it's been the work of my whole fucking life so far, I'm not going to fix it in time to reassure John. So if I want to deal with the actual - situation - I can't be indulging that."
He hums softly. Thoughtfully, even if he's trying to wrangle his brain in from making this more problem-solving.
"Luckily, how much you hate yourself has no bearing on how much John loves you," he comments. "It just changes how he expresses it to make sure you feel it. And he's not going to be upset with you or reject you if you don't like Sokie - I imagine he'll be a little confused as to how when you haven't spoken to her much, but I promise that you're having an entirely human reaction."
"She's spoken in public enough for an impression."
If not an impression of who exactly she is, then certainly an impression of how she deflects from revealing who she is. And he's seen how she speaks to Justine privately, thanks to snooping on Justine's private filters, which he won't be admitting to anyone, but rubbed him the wrong way a time or two.
"And what reaction is that?" He isn't sure Arthur even knows what his reaction is; he's not sure he has it all the way figured out.
"I suppose I can't rightly whether you wanted to marry John or not yourself, but being upset and jealous because you were the one who didn't get picked - especially over someone you don't have a positive impression of - Christ, half of the entire romantic genre on Earth is made of it."
"Well I'm not from Earth," Jedao huffs. "And of course I never had more than idle daydreams of John marrying us, because he was already basically married to you. I know, I know-" he waves away the protests he's sure are coming.
"Your partnership isn't romantic, but it damn well is domestic. Your future is his future, your plan is his plan, your family is his family."
He can't quite sustain the exasperated tone all the way through it; his voice wobbles into hurt.
"I'm not coming with you," Jedao answers, aching and frustrated. He throws out a wide arm. "I'm not coming here, I'm not - maybe it's selfish but I am not doing that."
He's not locking himself down on one planet where no one who wasn't on the barge will understand him, not for John, not for Hakkai and Gojyo, not even for Edwin. He can feel the gravity of the pit reaching for him, how easy it would be be to careen right back into the ditch of hating himself about it. But that's stupid and childish in itself: he made this choice, and he gets to live with it.
"You can't just say you're family because you love someone. You build your lives around each other or you don't. That's why it's so - stupid and greedy of me, I already made that choice, I already gave it up. Only -"
He can't help the way he's smiling, now, some relief at what a simple problem the core of it all turned out to be.
"Look, family always expands, that's the beauty of it. People marry in, or get adopted, a-and they're not always stuck in one place - usually they're spread out across all sorts of cities, even countries. It's actually rare that people keep in touch with more than their immediate family, siblings and parents and children, often cousins or grandparents, but- still."
He squeezes Jedao, rubbing his shoulders with both hands. "Family can absolutely just be because you love someone. Because you want being with them to be the place you can call home. Fuck, d'you know how many people just call themselves brothers and everyone treats it the same, even on Earth?"
He shivers, feeling strange and off-balance and cold, hollow, flimsy.
The only brothers I ever had disappeared into the dark with my murderous ship without ever seeing my face, he thinks, the old ache of never even speaking to the other human-shaped moths. And then he remembers it's not true with a little jolt, as he thinks of Jetaan, his chubby fists and Jedao's promise to bring him ice cream someday: the brothers Shuos Jedao and Fives and Quentin have held out to him.
The first person he ever called his brother, of course, was Nathaniel.
"No," he says shakily. "No, I don't know." The only family he started with was Kujen.
He swallows as the gravity of that hits him again.
"Sorry. It's just..." He lifts a hand to rub his jaw down, trying to find newer, better words.
"...look, labels only have the power that we give them. And John is... he understands that, a-and he respects it, so he's not going to give anyone labels if he can help it. So the way he decides which ones he wants to use is... by letting people come to him with them. So he can understand how they want to define it."
"He said he wanted this one. He isn't just - indulging her. He told me he had the rings before she asked."
That's not just loving people as they come to you. That's culture, that's ceremony, that's - planning, for how much he wants her, which he has every right in the world to do.
"He's allowed to hope," he says gently. "But he wouldn't have done anything with them until she asked, I didn't even know about the rings. He just... he likes visible marks, of that relationship."
He rests his head on Jedao's. "I know how much it might feel like... crawling back and begging for scraps, to go back and tell John that you want something like that too, just- a name for what you two are. But I promise that's not how he's going to see it."
He'd been happy, proud, honored, to be John's lover. He hadn't thought John wanted anything more official, more labeled than that, not from people who weren't his Partner, anyway.
"It's the...being hoped-for. You can both swear no one comes first until John and Sokie and I are three-wheeling it in the heat death of the universe, but that means something. And that's fucking fine. He's - he's allowed to love her more and want something special with her when I'm not fucking available to move in, but it makes me absolutely insane that no one will admit it."
Fox and hound, he's a proper wreck, he thinks, with a part of his mind that's drifted off to the side a little. Pathetic.
And his jaw clacks shut, rather than let the defensive frustration out, and he lets a long, slow breath out through his nose. He's frustrated at going in circles, not at Jedao.
"You know, perhaps you might get along with Sokie after all," he muses instead. "She's about as deep in her own pit as you are."
It feels like Arthur is frustrated with him; Jedao forces himself to put the greater weight on what Arthur is choosing, his breath, his tone. Still -
"We're similar in all sorts of ways," Jedao says coolly. "We're also both dreadfully arrogant and incorrigible flirts. That doesn't mean we've got any chance of getting along now."
"As far as I'm aware, I'm the only person John's told about your talk. He wouldn't tell people and make this more complicated than it already is."
Except him, obviously. The exception to every rule.
"John wanted the label because Sokie offered it." His tone shifts, a little acerbic. "Because God forbid she do anything without going to extremes about it."
"He had the rings before she asked." Jedao repeats. John wanted the cultural symbol of marriage, whatever it means to him, for himself. "That's what he told me."
He knows intellectually that Arthur generally has much better insight into John than he does. But he trusts John. He can't believe that was a lie, and he doesn't understand how it could mean anything else.
Jedao blows out a long, slow breath.
"Not because she'd hold it against me. Just...because I've backed myself into a corner, haven't I?" Extremely poor strategy; he should have befriended Sokie as soon as she moved into John's rooms, instead of giving them space and wallowing a little. But now -
"John wouldn't love her if she was an idiot. So either I've got to put quite a lot of effort into deceiving her, which is no ground to build real friendship on, or I've got to approach with some level of honesty about being a jealous mess of resentments trying to connect with her, not for her own sake, but to selfishly make me feel better about my relationship with John. Do you think she'll be inclined to let down her walls for that?"
He runs a hand through his hair, fluffing it against its losing battle to the pomade. "I agree that lying is the completely wrong course of action, of course. Attempting to manipulate her will certainly backfire, especially with being in Justine and Iago's ears. I don't know that she'd be jealous or threatened by yourself, to be quite honest - as evidenced by the multiple other people he's marked, she recognises that his love and priorities are related, but- largely distinct matters."
He hums, tilting his head a little. "Honestly, the most likely option is that she'll attempt to pull back from John in some way, under the misapprehension she's usurping some sort of claim from you."
Jedao does an extremely good impression of shocked pikachu face. Yes, he's sort of doing the same thing, but only temporarily because he's being a bad sport and bad company at the moment; and also he hasn't just made a lifelong promise not to do that, so it's different. How dare she.
"I'll fight her," he says, absurdly, because he doesn't know what else to do with the spluttering hissing teakettle outrage shrilling between his ribs. "I'll duel her for his honor about it. I win she stays, she wins I'll go. She's from Earth history, she probably knows swords. Does she know swords?"
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Re: self harm imagery
Re: self harm imagery
Re: self harm imagery
"There's two problems," he says slowly. "On the basic level. There's the problem of how much I hate myself, and how - I get stuck on it, how I go back to it. How I was maybe programmed to feel that way. Or maybe it's just natural talent."
Bone dry.
"And there's the much smaller but more pertinent problem of not liking Sokie and not -" His voice cracks a little, wavers. "And being selfish about it. And then there's the third, higher-order problem that I can't seem to deal with the second problem without getting completely fucking sidetracked by the first one. It's not wholly intractable but it's been the work of my whole fucking life so far, I'm not going to fix it in time to reassure John. So if I want to deal with the actual - situation - I can't be indulging that."
Re: self harm imagery
"Luckily, how much you hate yourself has no bearing on how much John loves you," he comments. "It just changes how he expresses it to make sure you feel it. And he's not going to be upset with you or reject you if you don't like Sokie - I imagine he'll be a little confused as to how when you haven't spoken to her much, but I promise that you're having an entirely human reaction."
Re: self harm imagery
If not an impression of who exactly she is, then certainly an impression of how she deflects from revealing who she is. And he's seen how she speaks to Justine privately, thanks to snooping on Justine's private filters, which he won't be admitting to anyone, but rubbed him the wrong way a time or two.
"And what reaction is that?" He isn't sure Arthur even knows what his reaction is; he's not sure he has it all the way figured out.
Re: self harm imagery
Re: self harm imagery
"Your partnership isn't romantic, but it damn well is domestic. Your future is his future, your plan is his plan, your family is his family."
He can't quite sustain the exasperated tone all the way through it; his voice wobbles into hurt.
Re: self harm imagery
"Is- that's what marriage means to you? Drawing someone into your family?"
Re: self harm imagery
Nothing about John's feelings has changed; he already had the rings when she asked.
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Sorry Jedao he kind of just sounds baffled now.
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He's not locking himself down on one planet where no one who wasn't on the barge will understand him, not for John, not for Hakkai and Gojyo, not even for Edwin. He can feel the gravity of the pit reaching for him, how easy it would be be to careen right back into the ditch of hating himself about it. But that's stupid and childish in itself: he made this choice, and he gets to live with it.
"You can't just say you're family because you love someone. You build your lives around each other or you don't. That's why it's so - stupid and greedy of me, I already made that choice, I already gave it up. Only -"
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He can't help the way he's smiling, now, some relief at what a simple problem the core of it all turned out to be.
"Look, family always expands, that's the beauty of it. People marry in, or get adopted, a-and they're not always stuck in one place - usually they're spread out across all sorts of cities, even countries. It's actually rare that people keep in touch with more than their immediate family, siblings and parents and children, often cousins or grandparents, but- still."
He squeezes Jedao, rubbing his shoulders with both hands. "Family can absolutely just be because you love someone. Because you want being with them to be the place you can call home. Fuck, d'you know how many people just call themselves brothers and everyone treats it the same, even on Earth?"
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The only brothers I ever had disappeared into the dark with my murderous ship without ever seeing my face, he thinks, the old ache of never even speaking to the other human-shaped moths. And then he remembers it's not true with a little jolt, as he thinks of Jetaan, his chubby fists and Jedao's promise to bring him ice cream someday: the brothers Shuos Jedao and Fives and Quentin have held out to him.
The first person he ever called his brother, of course, was Nathaniel.
"No," he says shakily. "No, I don't know." The only family he started with was Kujen.
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He swallows as the gravity of that hits him again.
"Sorry. It's just..." He lifts a hand to rub his jaw down, trying to find newer, better words.
"...look, labels only have the power that we give them. And John is... he understands that, a-and he respects it, so he's not going to give anyone labels if he can help it. So the way he decides which ones he wants to use is... by letting people come to him with them. So he can understand how they want to define it."
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That's not just loving people as they come to you. That's culture, that's ceremony, that's - planning, for how much he wants her, which he has every right in the world to do.
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He rests his head on Jedao's. "I know how much it might feel like... crawling back and begging for scraps, to go back and tell John that you want something like that too, just- a name for what you two are. But I promise that's not how he's going to see it."
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He'd been happy, proud, honored, to be John's lover. He hadn't thought John wanted anything more official, more labeled than that, not from people who weren't his Partner, anyway.
"It's the...being hoped-for. You can both swear no one comes first until John and Sokie and I are three-wheeling it in the heat death of the universe, but that means something. And that's fucking fine. He's - he's allowed to love her more and want something special with her when I'm not fucking available to move in, but it makes me absolutely insane that no one will admit it."
Fox and hound, he's a proper wreck, he thinks, with a part of his mind that's drifted off to the side a little. Pathetic.
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And his jaw clacks shut, rather than let the defensive frustration out, and he lets a long, slow breath out through his nose. He's frustrated at going in circles, not at Jedao.
"You know, perhaps you might get along with Sokie after all," he muses instead. "She's about as deep in her own pit as you are."
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"We're similar in all sorts of ways," Jedao says coolly. "We're also both dreadfully arrogant and incorrigible flirts. That doesn't mean we've got any chance of getting along now."
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Except him, obviously. The exception to every rule.
"John wanted the label because Sokie offered it." His tone shifts, a little acerbic. "Because God forbid she do anything without going to extremes about it."
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He knows intellectually that Arthur generally has much better insight into John than he does. But he trusts John. He can't believe that was a lie, and he doesn't understand how it could mean anything else.
Jedao blows out a long, slow breath.
"Not because she'd hold it against me. Just...because I've backed myself into a corner, haven't I?" Extremely poor strategy; he should have befriended Sokie as soon as she moved into John's rooms, instead of giving them space and wallowing a little. But now -
"John wouldn't love her if she was an idiot. So either I've got to put quite a lot of effort into deceiving her, which is no ground to build real friendship on, or I've got to approach with some level of honesty about being a jealous mess of resentments trying to connect with her, not for her own sake, but to selfishly make me feel better about my relationship with John. Do you think she'll be inclined to let down her walls for that?"
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And he tilts his head in thought.
"Well, I think she'd appreciate your candour."
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He's heard her all but brag to Justine about every she's pushed away.
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He runs a hand through his hair, fluffing it against its losing battle to the pomade. "I agree that lying is the completely wrong course of action, of course. Attempting to manipulate her will certainly backfire, especially with being in Justine and Iago's ears. I don't know that she'd be jealous or threatened by yourself, to be quite honest - as evidenced by the multiple other people he's marked, she recognises that his love and priorities are related, but- largely distinct matters."
He hums, tilting his head a little. "Honestly, the most likely option is that she'll attempt to pull back from John in some way, under the misapprehension she's usurping some sort of claim from you."
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"I'll fight her," he says, absurdly, because he doesn't know what else to do with the spluttering hissing teakettle outrage shrilling between his ribs. "I'll duel her for his honor about it. I win she stays, she wins I'll go. She's from Earth history, she probably knows swords. Does she know swords?"
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