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 Posted: Mon Jul 07, 2014 7:35 pm
It had taken every single bit of self control Rep had (and he didn't have much) to stop himself from immediately spilling the beans to Harrison when he got back from buying the rings. Instead he'd managed to keep it to himself and had been forced to hide them neatly somewhere he knew the other man wouldn't actually look while tidying or looking for other things. And then he'd had to wait, and that had been ******** hard too, waiting for a moment when both of them were guaranteed to be apart long enough to do anything. Considering they spent every ******** waking hour of every day practically joined at the hip, this had also been a lot harder than it needed to be. Eventually he'd wrangled a day where Harrison had been scheduled for a duty for most of the morning and had used it to set up.
He left him a message saying to meet at the bar and when the Moon hunter got there he'd find the whole place tidied up with a trail of rose petals - because he could be romantic, he ******** well could - and because he'd had some money left over on his trip to get the rings, some pink and blue bunting as well. Rep was nowhere to be found and on the bar counter was a neatly folder letter addressed to "Ya Bam" inside of which was a small postcard he'd picked up in Vegas way back when for shits and giggles. On the back was writing in Rep's usual graffiti scrawl.
Your mission, if you choose to accept it is to go back to where it started.
My birthday a few years ago if you need a ******** hint.
And below that was an approximate doodle of the opening to many of the James Bond movies.
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Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 8:56 pm
Harrison set down a box of scrap wood. He'd come ready to work, like he'd done during his off time on all the previous days. The bar was coming together, and folks were already asking about their stock, and it was shaping up into...well, a place he was kind of proud of.
Owning their own business. Proper-like.
That one night near New Years, there'd been a different island. And the only thing different was more hunters. Bigger numbers, not wiped out by s**t all the time, and the town hadn't been a dangerous, titan-plagued ghost town. There had been businesses, and families. And he was starting to think like, they had the time to get those numbers again.
The work also kept his mind off the other s**t- Jordan. Being angry. Being sorry. Rep trying to kill himself. Dakota's warnings, hell, everyone's warnings. That was an old story. Rep was a problem. Somebody ought to solve it, one way or another.
The lifetime he'd spent as something that wasn't human at all, and how petty and small and meaty he felt now.
So working was fine. But when he unlocked the door, there weren't the usual scuffling or banging noises. The lighting was soft, and the bar- still rough around the edges, was done up. Flower petals were all over the floor.
"Rep?" he asked.
He followed the trail, and picked up the letter. Some part of him was always on edge when s**t was off, in spite of the decorations. If it was some sort of set up. Horsemen. Alternate universe. O. Somebody on the island ******** with him. Somebody who might have hurt Rep- but those feelings eased once he read the card.
He flipped it over a few times. He knew where Rep meant, of course. Rep had left him about a hundred hints. His mouth quirked in a small smile, and when he looked back over the decorations and the cleaning, he got kind of tender and melty. It was a big deal, Rep doing s**t like this.
Ooooooh, a fetchquest.
Harrison pocketed the letter, and stopped by a mirror, checking over his shirt and face for grime. He smoothed his hair, then headed out.
He'd been down this way more than a fair share of times by now, but he always preferred picking over the rocks with Rep beside him. The smell of the ocean was strong, the cool breeze nice in the island heat, the sun low in the sky.
When he got to the cave, the rock was to the side, a soft light shining from the interior. He ducked in, not sure if he was going to have to hunt for more letters.
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Posted: Wed Jul 09, 2014 9:54 pm
Inside the hoard was tidy, honestly tidy, devoid of the usual trail of scattered junk which had fallen off of the many and varied things that Rep hauled into the caverns daily. Apparently he'd taken a brush and god forbid even a mop to the stone floor and had swept clean sand in place of the brown and crusty blood soaked stuff which normally lined the floor. The lanterns were relatively new, Rep didn't need lighting with his artifact and its associated ability to see in the dark, but he hadn't forgotten Harrison needed the binoculars for that particular skill.
Inside, rather than the usual wall of smell of rotting meat and whatever else Rep was working on there was only the warm and only slightly sour smell of tanned hides. He'd tidied up the main room at least insofar as it was possible to do so at all, the mountain of items was not easy to organise into any semblance of order. It didn't ultimately matter though, there were a few other lanterns marking out a path through the un-lit room and into one of the newer side storage areas that Rep had the other man help him hollow out of the stone. It had been empty a few days ago but he'd quietly taken the time to clear it out, hang the walls with pelts to muffle the hollow echo of the stone and to even line the floor with scraps of carpets and rugs salvaged from his various leave trips. From the wreckage of the bunk room in the bunkers he'd rigged together a few bedframes and lined them with thick clean furs into something between a raised fur lined patio and a bed. The overall look of the place was that of a labour of care and effort and off to one side, where natural erosion had provided a chimney of sorts was a small fire to heat the place and presently burning cheerfully.
Rep himself looked almost startlingly tidy, without Harrison's help he'd taken a shower and combed and tied back his hair. He'd considered doing this whole thing in nothing but a thong, a statement that he would offer himself body and soul to the other man, but after donning said clothing he'd found himself feeling oddly vulnerable and had decided instead to dress the way he had for the dinner with Clarice - it was after all the only neat clothes he had - and was so neat he almost didn't look like himself at all.
He'd been waiting there a while, not sure if Harrison would get the clues he'd left for him or if he'd be too suspicious to show up at all, and he'd tolerated the boredom because this was worth it. For anyone else he wouldn't have tolerated being alone in the quiet with his thoughts given how dire and miserable they'd been since even before Rin's death. His dreams had been a tableau of awful, from strange horseman rampages where he was one of them to memories of teeth and red for ever.
And while waiting he'd planned. He'd planned out all ******** day what he'd say, how he'd smile, how he'd exude easy confidence and how it'd be cake because Harrison was the guy he spent his every waking hour with, the guy he did everything with no matter how small. But of course nothing ever went that ******** easy and it was precisely because Harrison was the guy he did everything with that this was so huge, so unfathomably difficult that he'd needed all the run up, all the romantic nonsense just to keep his mind off of it. And even with the rings stashed somewhere accessible he didn't know what to expect or even if he'd get turned down. After all it had been him who had mangled everything and self destructed the relationship, driven Jordan off and left Harrison ultimately with less, the way he always did. He chipped away at the other man's possessions, his friends and even his significant other now, he'd taken so ******** much and here he was about to ask for even more.
And the longer he thought about it the more daunting it seemed, the more hopeless and pathetic it all felt. Nothing was as perfect as he wanted it to be, he wanted none of the pain that had come their way to have ever happened, to be able to do this in a rich comfortable setting where both of them didn't have any threats of death hanging over their head and where he could be confident and make an impression.
But things were what they were and he'd done what he could with what little he had, his only real skill was his fur and his taxidermy and he'd put on a magnificent show of the former, every expensive thing he'd ever killed laid out there, from polar bears to exotic and endangered creatures worth thousands and thousands of pounds apiece. He didn't expect Harrison to understand the value or the effort that went into scraping, stretching and tanning every single one of them, but they were there and it was a statement.
"I'm in here." he said whenever Harrison arrived, and it wasn't like his rehearsals, his voice uncertain and kind of feeble, because things never went to plan, and when you got right down to it, it was probably ok.
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Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2014 6:24 pm
Harrison was relieved to hear Rep's voice. As much fun as hunting all over the island for him would have been, there was always a part of him on edge about it.
"Rep," he said, and the relaxation was clear there too.
The way to the back room was well-lit and likewise covered in flowers. Furs, what must have been Rep's whole fur collection, was laid out. It was like something out of a movie, and gestures like this made Harrison's heart swell up in a stupid way. He'd been grieving about Jordan, but Rep... everything about him was lighter, like he was finally able to do the big gestures. Trips, sex, general fun, and part of it was cast in reflection of the relationship before. How easy Rep got scared, or insecure, or jealous. There'd always been s**t they'd had to work at, balancing acts, and the good s**t had been great, but- between Rep and Jordan, it was always a tightrope. Jordan always wanting control, for there to be less trouble. Rep always testing that control, seeing how far it went and what he could get away with.
Rep did seem nervous now, and dressed up- Harrison almost never saw him out of tshirts. Harrison was dressed to work, unfancy, and along with his chest getting tight his face was hot too.
"Is...this for us?" he asked.
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Posted: Fri Jul 11, 2014 8:37 pm
It always amazed Rep that; no matter how worked up he'd gotten over some problem, no matter the depths of his despair and self loathing, that ultimately Harrison would calm him down. The other man didn't even need to do or say a ******** thing, his presence alone was a grounding force. It was just so easy to temporarily hear his voice in his thoughts and to imagine his level headed dismissal of the ridiculous and petty things he always got so tangled up in as if they were nothing but illusions. Harrison's perspective cut the threads of his own internal sabotages and set him free. It was the case that day too, like an exhalation of anxiety, tension and of all the fear and uncertainty that had beset him as he worried that he couldn't go through with this so certain he'd ******** everything up.
But everything was more simple when it came to Harrison and he'd found himself realizing that it always had been, with Jordan there had been a relentless push and pull, a vaguely aggressive dance which happened in every encounter, every argument and discussion, it kept their walls up and put them both under unrelenting stress. And underneath it all was a jealousy so intense it was impossible at times to tolerate watching Jordan touch Harrison, wanting both of them to belong to him but selfishly separate and never together. It hadn't been fair to feel that way and he had known it, but even despite this knowledge he hadn't been able to change his nature and in his failure had spent a great deal of their time together as a threesome torn between jealousy and guilt in a constant destabilizing seesaw of emotions. Without that weight he felt free, liberated to love in a way that was no longer complicated and restrained. Before there had always been a grudging addendum to every fond thing he allowed himself to think about Harrison - an "also Jordan" clause. And vice versa when he had thought of Jordan he had been forced to qualify every single thing in relation to Harrison. It had been tiring and difficult. At the root of everything for Rep, he'd realized was the simple fact that he couldn't do the polyamory thing, that in his heart of hearts he was too jealous a creature, too fractured and broken in too many ways to maintain the fairness and openness required for a healthy multi-person relationship. Pared down to a couple there was - as far as he could see it - only a straight and direct route of love and affection, without the need for clauses, a freedom to love how he loved without modifiers of fairness.
He smiled over at Harrison, the worry seeming to melt away as his features lit up, an unusual genuine sort of confidence creeping in around the edges, just a little bit of pride that here he was, doing what people thought he was too ******** evasive to do. His offerings might have been meager, after all what was he worth in the grand scheme of things? And the furs were not the wealth and freedom from this dangerous life he wanted to give Harrison. But it was what he had in this moment, and what he had belonged to the other man entirely, that had not changed and would not change, even beyond this present lifetime.
"Aye." he said. "For us." And there was as always the swelling desire to apologise, to say he was sorry for how cheesy it all was, how sentimental and vulnerable, that he wished he was stronger and cooler - more manly. But he wouldn't apologise, not for this, not for honesty to the only person he could truly show honesty to, he wasn't ashamed, merely afraid that it wouldn't be enough, that his heart - despite a million examples to the contrary - would be found wanting on the greater scale of worth.
He stood up from where he was sitting on the "bed" in a single motion and opened his arms, not dramatically - he didn't do theatrics - but with the familiar and subtle splay of his palms which requested nearness and hinted at the storm of emotions which raged always unrelenting under the surface, a gesture which even in its differences echoed the hand that had been a lifeline and sought a lifeline on a mission in the Arctic. "Cause I've been thinking a lot." he said, but waited, for then to say the rest, after a long and taxing wait simply wanting to be near him, to recharge that he could go on.
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Posted: Sun Jul 13, 2014 9:07 pm
Harrison nodded. And he hadn't gotten changed, or showered, and Rep was in his nice suit. On top of all the furs, he looked half like a barbarian king. But he bent to kiss him anyhow, and clutch Rep's back.
Love you, missed you.
One of his hands dropped to lace together with the open palm.
"What on?" he asked, and he had one knee on the bed, breaking the kiss but not the distance.
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Posted: Mon Jul 14, 2014 10:44 am
It had only been half a day away spent away from Harrison which, in the grand scheme of things was practically nothing at all, but to Rep it always felt like a million years. Having him in his arms again was almost enough to make him forget about all the things he'd set out to say because lost in the warm feelings, the swell of love and affection and the taste and the smell of the other man, it was very easy to feel like none of his problems mattered. It had never and would never matter to Rep he hadn't showered.
It was only when they parted (though not really, he still held tightly to Harrison's hand) that the real world sloshed back in and reminded Rep of its existence. With it came the memory of all the dangers that faced them every single day and that was why it was urgent. They'd managed to get a long time thus far, avoiding death every time it came their way on missions and even at home, but that was no guarantee that they'd get an indefinite amount of time beyond this point to swither on making decisions. The thought of dying without ever just getting off his arse and biting the bullet had been enough to spook him into action.
"On everything." he said softly. "On all the s**t that's gone on since I met you till now. On how I felt about Jordan and about you. On the future and what it could mean for us now it looks like there's just the two of us. You know me, you know that I'm always afraid, always terrified that s**t I do will go wrong or be interpreted wrongly. It takes me a long ******** time to get the balls to do anything - as people really like reminding me. I'm no ******** America, I can't just do s**t and be like "You're welcome." I think too much about s**t and then I just stop." And he knew it was becoming an excuse, becoming an attempt to make this step tolerable for him and his lack of courage. "But I just.. I don't know. I want to do this." He reached over with his free hand to fish out the box with the rings in it, rambling all the while. "And I know its probably still way too soon to do anything like this, and you might not feel the same and I don't expect you to be ok with it but I need to do this before I get afraid and can't do it again. Because its ******** fact, its how I feel right now."
He held opened the box and held it out as if it was a very dangerous explosive, taking a deep breath to steady himself.
"Harrison Alexander Hughes." and his full name was still a sequence of unfamiliar rolled letter rs on Rep's tongue. "I know all sorts of s**t has gone down, but I also know that ******** nothing about how I feel about you has changed one tiny ******** bit. I still intend to go wherever you go, in this life and so ******** help me - beyond it. I keep ******** dodging things because I'm scared but I'm no scared to ask you this because its what I want, no question. Will you marry me?"
And because before it had gotten away from him, he'd been able to fearfully put it off indefinitely, he amended. "And soon."
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Posted: Thu Jul 17, 2014 9:40 pm
Harrison hadn't taken their ring off.
He was the only one who hadn't, and that fact bore down on him all of a sudden. Looks like it's just the two of us. Had they decided that?
The first proposal hadn't been set up anywhere. It was Jordan who bought the rings, one for each of them, and clarified they didn't mean anything more than a solidarity. Just a regular Christmas gift. No commitment, not a proposal.
Rep had asked why not.
So, after some talking it over, Jordan had asked proper. He'd been mostly nervous, because he always got nervous when it came to s**t like this. But they never had got married. Not even after all the s**t, not even after him swearing to himself it'd be at the next opportunity, budget and big show be damned. And now they were broken up, and he didn't know what to think.
He was still nervous, even if it was stupid, the emotions all churning up together. Angry about Jordan. Grieving over Jordan. Happy to be here, relieved to have Rep safe and whole, stirred up. And Rep was shitty at gifts, at putting things together, because he didn't have practice at it and he got scared, but he'd put this together, had found time to get rings, to clean, to make the whole place nice.
"Yes," he said before anything else. "********, I- no matter what. Us, together, it's always been- even if-"
He wiped his face on his wrist. "********, Rep. I wanna be married. I want to be married to you so bad."
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Posted: Fri Jul 18, 2014 9:44 pm
All the fear and anxiety vanished as Harrison spoke, gone as though it had never been there in the first place. He'd been expecting a yes with a complicated conditional clause or worse, a no. He hadn't been sure if the other man would have said that they couldn't do it, that it had to wait or that it was much too soon. But there had been no hesitation, no clauses, only a yes, the word he'd wanted to hear more than anything else. He'd interpreted the question for what it was, one regarding only their relationship and no one else's.
He couldn't help the grin that spread across his face and didn't even try, reaching out to forcefully pull the other man close. It was difficult to keep his composure, the anxiety translating into adrenaline all too quickly, leaving him shaky and weak.
"I am so ******** relieved. So so ******** relieved." he said, burying his face against him and taking a deep breath of his scent. "I spent all ******** day thinking you'd ******** say no, that s**t had changed too much. That it was too soon.. I don't know I just.."
He trailed off, dismissing his yammering, clenching his hands tightly in Harrison's shirt. "I want it too." And unhurried, able to enjoy all the time in the world here in this, his only real island sanctuary, he moved to kiss him earnestly, all gratitude and delight, breaking it only to muse aloud. "And I'm ******** taking your name." There wasn't going to be compromise on that front, his surname meant nothing to him while belonging firmly and undeniably meant everything.
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