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 Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:17 pm
It was only a couple days after the Negaverse’s attack on the subway, and only a couple days after Lovely was let out of the hospital. Thankfully, because of General Cinnabar’s quick response to their distress, they were able to get to the hospital without losing too much blood. Especially in Lovely’s case. While he was told it wasn’t life threatening, Ilian knew just how close Lovely had come to possibly dying. Had it not been for the starseeds Cinnabar gave them, he thought they would probably be much worse off.
Unable to sleep, Ilian rode his bike to Lovely’s house in the middle of the night. He winced as the flood light lit up the backyard and he hoped it wouldn’t wake up anyone else. He gathered a few pebbles from the flower bed and hurled them up at Lovely’s window to get his attention.
Lovely had almost died trying to protect him. But why? Why would he do something so stupid as to try and keep him from getting hurt, when it was his own fault for getting into that trouble, anyway? Ilian didn’t want his friends hurt, but he knew he couldn’t just stop what he was doing, himself.
“Come on…” he hissed to himself, throwing another pebble at the glass as rain started to fall. He knew it had been overcast all day, but he didn’t think about the rain when he rode over.
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Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:27 pm
Tap... tap... tap...
The sound of pebbles striking his window slowly roused Lovely from sleep. For a few moments he thought the tapping to be little more than rain and had every intention of rolling over (gingerly) in an effort to go back to sleep, but the longer he lied there listening, the more he realized the tapping sounded much too solid to be rain drops.
Confused (and a little annoyed by the disruption), Lovely climbed from his bed and padded over to the window over his desk, pushing the curtains aside to look out into the backyard. There was Ilian, throwing rocks at his window like an idiot, getting drenched in the rain that quickly strengthened.
“What do you think you're doing?” Lovely asked once he'd unlocked his window and pushed it open. He raised his voice loud enough to be heard from the second story. “What do you have against using the front door and the doorbell?”
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Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:32 pm
Oh, thank goodness Lovely heard him. Ilian was beginning to worry that it was a wasted effort and that he would just get soaked and have to ride home.
“I didn’t want to wake anyone else!” he said in distress as the rain started getting heavier. He was still covered in bandages under his clothing as well, so he didn’t want to have to redress everything if he could help it. “Let me in! I wanted to talk to you!” he explained, continuing to stand out in the open until he was certain that Lovely would actually come down and let him in.
“Are you mad at me for what happened?” he asked nervously, feeling guilty for it and wishing he would have been better prepared for the Princess’s attack. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know what would happen. Please let me in,” he practically begged, especially as thunder sounded in the distance.
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Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:39 pm
“Of course I'm not mad,” Lovely said as if this should be a well known fact. “I didn't know what would happen either.”
He'd never been up against a Princess before, had never even so much as met the one that attacked them. He wasn't sure what her sphere was, nor had he been aware of what her magic would do when he'd jumped in front of Ilian. He'd only known that whatever it was, it was likely to do a lot of damage. Why he'd jumped in front of Ilian at all was still a mystery to him, except that he hadn't wanted his friend to get hurt. It had been instinctual; he'd acted before thinking things through.
With a sigh, Lovely rolled his eyes. “Wait there,” he said, and shut the window so the rain wouldn't get into his room.
He padded quietly out into the hall and down the stairs, wary that his brother Dorian was still awake. He didn't want his brother getting suspicious and asking any more questions. Lovely made his way through the kitchen and to the back door, which he opened soon after unlocking it.
“Get in, you idiot,” he said. “You're going to get soaked. I have a phone, you know. You didn't have to come all the way here just to check on me.”
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Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:47 pm
Ilian was more than grateful to be let into the house. He quickly ducked in and out of the rain, shaking his hair out and pulling off the button down shirt he wore over top of a normal tee-shirt. At least that had kept him from getting too wet.
“Sorry, the payphone was out of order,” he tried, not wanting Lovely to think he was just running around in the rain for fun. He didn’t exactly have his own phone. Couldn’t really afford it.
Once he was inside, he looked his friend over, reaching out to pull at his shirt to try and see the bandages underneath that were on his side, covering where he had stitches from the knife wound. “How bad is it?” he asked, frowning in concern. “I didn’t mean for you to get hurt. This isn’t the first time, either,” he pointed out with a frown.
Lovely had hurt his ankle as well… obviously the knife was a lot worse. “What did your brother say? Did he believe you?” he asked as he continued to fuss over him, wanting to make sure he’d gotten the proper attention he’d needed.
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Posted: Mon Sep 07, 2015 6:58 pm
Lovely frowned at Ilian and slapped his hand away when Ilian reached for his pajama shirt.
“Don't do that,” he said.
It wasn't that he was overly concerned for his injury. It was better now than it had been when he'd first received it, though it would be another week at least before he felt comfortable leaving the bandaging off. He simply thought it was strange that Ilian always felt the need to try and take his clothes off when he was injured.
Lovely turned to leave the kitchen, motioning for Ilian to fool him out and up the stairs to the second floor. He lowered his voice while they were on their way, still cautious about alerting Dorian to the fact that they had a late night visitor as he led the way to his bedroom.
“Of course he didn't believe me,” he whispered. “Would you? He's worried and suspicious, but what else am I supposed to tell him? No offense, but sometimes you're lucky you're on your own. You don't have to worry about answering to anyone when stuff like this happens.”
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 3:59 am
"No offense?" Ilian repeated staring after Lovely as though he's grown another head. Since when had Lovely cared about offending him or not? If anything, it seemed as though the other went out of his way to try to offend him sometimes.
Still, Ilian didn't push the subject, just continued to stare in confusion as he followed Lovely up the stairs to his room. "If you don't count that damn social worker who insists on prying into my lift. I have to see if what she's doing is illegal or what... I guess they're still paying for Hillworth, but I'd rather just drop out and work," he admitted, and then walked over to the window to look outside at the rain.
"Wow, it's really coming down," he said mostly to himself, glad Lovely actually let him inside instead of sending him home. He stared out for a few moments longer before undoing his belt so he can kick off his wet jeans, leaving him in nothing more than a tee shirt and boxers. He didn't want to drip everywhere. And it was cold.
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 5:29 pm
“So drop out if you want to drop out,” Lovely said, leading Ilian into his room.
Lovely's bedroom was at the back of the house above the kitchen, across from one of the guest rooms and down the hall from his older brother's office, so he kept his voice low until the door was closed behind them. The room was decorated in creams and blues, with beige walls and its own en suite. Otherwise it was minimally decorated, with only a few Parisian cityscapes on the walls for character.
Once they entered and the door was firmly closed, Lovely returned to his bed and sat along the edge of it. He purposefully avoided looking at Ilian as Ilian discared his jeans. Instead, he stared down at the bedspread, picking at an invisible piece of lint for something to do.
“You never told me what you're doing here,” he said. “If it's just to apologize, you're wasting your breath. It was my fault for jumping in the way like an idiot. If you're here to check on me, you shouldn't have bothered. I'm fine. It just hurts a little is all.”
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 5:49 pm
Ilian froze in place when Lovely prompted him to explain his reasoning to be there. He opened his mouth to say how he wanted to apologize, and when that was shot down, he began to try and express his concern for Lovely's well being, but it seemed as though the other already had those subjects covered.
"Because..." he mumbled, shifting in place as he tried to fold his jeans as neatly as possible so he could lay them over the edge of Lovely's desk chair. "You're my friend..."
It was just as bad as saying he was worried about him or that he wanted to apologize, he knew, but it was the truth. Other than Jericho, Lovely was the closest person he had to family. Sure there were some in the Negaverse who tried to make him comfortable, but they didn't really know him.
They didn't know that he liked mixing modern and classical pieces and would fuss at him for it. They didn't let him into their houses in the middle of the night. And they definitely hadn't jumped between him and a princess to protect him.
"And I was lonely..." u
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 5:58 pm
Lovely snorted at Ilian's response.
It wasn't that he didn't consider Ilian a friend. He did, though it had taken him a while to do so. Lovely wasn't of the opinion that he needed friends, and anyway he had such a hard time making them. Ilian was a fluke. A part of Lovely figured Ilian was his friend less because he wanted to be and more because he needed to be. After all, Lovely was able to provide him with the things he wasn't able to get on his own.
It was the whole lonely bit that caused Lovely to snort. He didn't think he was much in the way of company. Certainly Ilian would have gotten more sympathy from Jericho—or any other Negaverse officer—than he could expect to get from Lovely. Lovely wasn't the type to offer sympathy.
He told himself it was because he didn't care enough, but the truth of the matter was he just didn't know how to offer comfort and companionship.
“You woke me up,” he complained instead of saying anything about it. Gingerly he lied down, pressing a hand to his side as he did so. He got back under the covers like he had every intention of ignoring Ilian's presence and going back to sleep.
“You could have come to see me in the morning,” Lovely told him.
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 6:08 pm
He knew not to expect sympathy from Lovely. There had already been plenty of occasions that could have warranted sympathy, but not Lovely. If anything, the other boy seemed cold and distant, and it wasn't that Ilian thought he was good enough to try and break through whatever barrier Lovely had placed around himself, but because the more trouble they got into, the more Lovely placed himself in danger in Ilian's stead.
"I was lonely now... And the cats are horrible where I live. I swear a whole family lives outside my window," he explained, making his way over to the bed to pull back the covers and climb in himself.
As much as he was sure Lovely would probably prefer him to sleep in the guest room across the hall, Ilian just didn't want to. If he was kicked out of the bed he would just sleep on the floor in Lovely's room.
He just really didn't want to be alone at the moment. u
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 6:14 pm
A small part of Lovely thought Ilian would give up and go to the guest room across the hall once he realized that Lovely was more interested in sleeping away his pain than he was in assuaging Ilian's loneliness. But a much larger part of him had almost expected that Ilian would join him in the bed. Lovely made room for Ilian despite himself, shifting over on the mattress to leave one side of the bed open for Ilian.
“What are we, five?” he said.
He felt a bit like a child having a sleepover, but beyond his initial comment he said nothing else about it. If this is what it took for Ilian to feel better about the situation, Lovely figured allowing it wasn't too much of a hassle. The bed was big enough for the both of them, in any case.
“If you kick me in your sleep, I'm kicking you out of the house,” Lovely warned him.
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 6:24 pm
When Lovely didn't try to kick him out immediately, Ilian let himself feel a small sense of relief. The best thing about being on your own was also the worst part of it. He really was all alone, and while he tried to busy himself with work and now school, the loneliness crept up on him much quicker than it used to when Sorin was still alive.
"What happens if you kick me?" he asked with a small snort, keeping his voice low now that they were both trying to settle down and go to sleep. "I won't... I'm used to sleeping in small beds anyway," he offered, shifting down to get comfortable under the covers.
Curiously, he reached up his hand to gingerly place it over the bandage on Lovely's side. "You know I probably would have died had it not been for you. I didn't even think about teleporting away until you jumped in front of me."
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 6:33 pm
Lovely felt awkward about the touching for reasons not yet ascertained. He chalked it up to not being a very touchy-feely person. He was used to having quite a large amount of personal space. Having Ilian invade that space made him feel quite out of sorts.
He didn't really understand what it was about Ilian that made him constantly need to touch areas of injury. This wasn't the first time he'd done so and it likely wouldn't be the last. Lovely pushed his hand aside and shifted a few inches further away from him.
“You wouldn't have died,” he insisted. “I didn't die, did I? So what makes you think you would have? You're just being dramatic.”
Which was something, coming from Lovely, given how dramatic he usually was himself.
“Go to sleep,” Lovely said. “If you insist on staying here, the least you could do is let me rest.”
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Posted: Tue Sep 08, 2015 6:42 pm
Ilian frowned when Lovely pushed his hand away, but made no comment about it. Maybe he just felt the need to touch? He couldn't say he was touchy-feely per say, but he wasn't against physical contact.
He wanted to argue that he wasn't being over dramatic. Had Lovely not been there, who knows what would have happened. He was used to Jericho being his protector, but now that Lovely had done so much to keep him out of harms way too, his sense of loyalty couldn't help but extend to the other.
"Fine," he said as he released a yawn. The rain was still coming down, creating a soft white noise. That, and the warmth of another person seemed to calm his nerves enough to finally feel as though he was ready to go to sleep.
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