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 Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:05 pm
Harrison finally had the blood off him.
Not that he minded a little blood. It happened. This blood had seemed more like evidence than a price of battle, though, and he was glad to see it down the drain. He carried the bento box and the bloody clothes bundle. He could do laundry later.
He'd been mostly silent in the shower, but walking back, was nervous again. He stayed close to Jordan.
"You think we oughta text him?" he asked. "Just so he knows where- I mean, I know you told him-"
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:45 pm
Jordan nodded a little. He carried the bundle of his clothes under his arm. He hadn't really realized how much blood had been on him until he'd gone to wash it off; watching the deep red swirl down the drain had utterly silenced him, the patterns in the water almost hypnotic, too beautiful to carry the horror of their origin. He was dangerously close to dissociation, he recognized distantly, but when he stopped holding the emotions at arm's length it would all come crashing in on him, and he refused to let that happen in public.
He let his shoulder bump against Harrison's. "When we get back to the room," he said. "If he's not there." He didn't think Rep was going to be there, but he could hope.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 9:51 pm
Harrison nodded, throat tight.
He didn't say he wasn't in the showers, because they both knew that.
"Back there," he started anxiously, "with the net..."
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 10:02 pm
Jordan shook his head. "Not yet," he said, his voice cracking.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 10:09 pm
"Okay," he said hoarsely, "Sorry. I-" He held his tongue the rest of the walk.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 10:15 pm
They'd left the door unlocked. Jordan opened it, hoping just a little, but the room was empty. He dropped the bundle of bloodied clothes beside the door and went across the the bed, crawling onto it to lean back into the corner. After a moment he got his phone out.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 10:43 pm
Harrison dropped his clothes in the same pile, but put the box on the bedside table with a little more care.
He felt heavy, all of a sudden.
Tomorrow.
He dragged both their pillows over and wrapped his arms around Jordan's waist, resting his head against Jordan's side. He stared at the wall while Jordan sent the text.
He hadn't been in the showers. He wasn't here.
Jordan acted like he was wearing a mask.
It came tumbling out in the silence, even without permission "I wouldn't have left you in that- s**t," Harrison said, and it sounded weak even to him, "I swear, I wouldn't have left you. I was so ******** scared we wouldn't make it back, and we did, but now-" it was getting hard to talk.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 10:45 pm
Jordan dropped the phone and turned to wrap his arms around Harrison, burying his face against Harrison's shoulder. He breathed deeply, and then his shoulders started to shake with massive, silent sobs.
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Posted: Mon Jun 18, 2012 11:03 pm
When you couldn't deal with problems, run away. Ingrained, it was incredibly hard to change.
At the beach he'd focused on getting rid of the gore. He'd found a secluded spot and stripped the bloodied garments off. His important possessions were left on the shore, they were almost all that he owned. The artefacts of an entire life: a set of keys for a room no longer inhabitable, a gold necklace bought with dirty money and a phone.
The water had been painfully cold and even scrubbed raw, he wasn't clean - blood left stubborn stains on his clothing.
When he finally noticed the text, he stared for a long time.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 8:47 am
He shouldn't cry too, it would just make it worse and how was Rep supposed to feel if he came back to two guys sobbing.
He felt the tears start to roll down his cheeks anyhow, as he held on to Jordan and squeezed his eyes shut, feeling desperate for the pair of arms he had and emptier for the pair of arms he didn't. He didn't know if it was an emptiness that would go on forever, like a deep chasm, that tomorrow might mean tonight any way, and he didn't want to be spared anything, he wanted to be there and to ********> fight it.
He was crying from anger, and frustration, and grief now.
For Jordan and himself.
For how nothing could ever go ******** right.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 6:14 pm
The mask was gone now. Jordan clung to Harrison and let himself cry, anger and grief and frustration and worry overwhelming him. He'd had to lock it all down to function while they returned, to be able to step up while everyone else began to fall apart in shock. Detaching himself from the situation had hurt too, but it had been necessary.
Before Rep and Harrison, he'd never let anyone see him cry. It made him feel worse and better all at once.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 6:22 pm
He didn't want to think. He didn't want to feel.
Somehow he'd succeeded this long, but resisting it was like damming up an ocean and the text was a hairline crack in his defences. In the face of those two simple words, he could do nothing but crumble. The world came unbearably back into focus - no longer distant and far away but close and overwhelming.
In the jungle his failings had been laid bare right to the very heart of what he was. He'd shown them all what he was capable of, shown them how deep and black the anger ran.
But they still wanted him to come back.
They were more than he deserved.
He refused to let them think his lapse of judgement meant he loved them both any less. The instincts had been animal, a kneejerk hardwired reaction. The raw and honest emotions were unchanged, nothing could ever change them. Killzone had been right, they were the best of him. It was that better side he wanted them to remember, whatever happened.
Tomorrow was uncertain, tonight was his.
He went home.
Knocking the door was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do, but he was done hesitating.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 7:30 pm
Harrison looked up, and refused to clear his face of the tears, because that would be like admitting he had them in the first place.
His grip on Jordan's shoulder tightened.
"Door," he said, with an edge of hope.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 7:59 pm
Jordan wiped the tears off his face, swallowed hard, and slid off the bed to open the door. It occurred to him to wonder as he turned the knob what he would do if it was somebody else -
- but it wasn't. It was Rep. Jordan smiled shaky and small and reached out to grab Rep's shirt, pull him inside, and close the door.
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Posted: Tue Jun 19, 2012 8:08 pm
Rep had been mentally rehearsing what he would say and do when the door opened.
A hundred different follow-up ideas got discarded as he found himself unexpectedly hauled inside.
He was shivering and still soaked with sea water, and in that strange way that the brain liked to home in on trivial details when the emotions ran too high, he found himself worrying about his clothes dripping on the floor.
He was scared to look up. "I..I got..th..the text."
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