2020-04-24 05:37![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
threedimensions
threedimensionsDimensions: [1-2]
Timeline: Late February 2017
Title: Distance
Summary: Brandon and Mark finally talk a little about the situation, but it's strained and there is too much unsaid and unsettled.
~2.5k
The new City Center venue was huge, sprawling, wonderfully maze-like. Mark had always been attracted to winding paths, to finding his way though, and the irony was not lost on him as he settled himself down just off the end of a dead-end hall with an outside exit. He'd tried his pass on the eye lock and it beeped and opened; he'd considered going outside, but he could hear traffic and didn't want to be seen by anyone, even passing vehicles. Instead, he'd propped the door open and looked up for a smoke detector, not seeing one. That was good. A fairly strong breeze drifted in from the door: even better.
The short L off the main part of the hallway stopped in front of what looked like a custodian closet, and with the show coming up in less than three hours, he was pretty sure that the cleaning staff would be off until later, only security roaming the halls. That was fine; he had several fifties in his pocket in case any of them happened upon him, and it always worked like a charm before.
He sat against one wall in the narrow hall and leaned back, stretching out his legs and listening to the quiet for a few minutes. No rush. He had hours, and no one ever bothered to find him any more, which was actually just fine—when he wasn't getting stupid ass comments and questions, he was getting looks, all of which he could do without. If he had nothing anymore other than that, he would take the nothing and exist in his silent vacuum.
He was halfway through the first of the joints he'd brought along when he heard footsteps; he nodded to himself and reached into his pocket for his bribe cash, hoping that it was just one guard instead of two, and that, if they wouldn't take the money, they'd just direct him back to his lounge instead of throwing a conniption about the pot. Oh well. Let him be arrested, then, what the fuck. Could anyone actually blame him for wanting a goddamn joint at this point? Was this even one of the legal states? He couldn't remember where they were and didn't particularly care.
It wasn't a guard. He reached up and took the joint out of his mouth, exhaling slowly and shifting his eyes to the wall opposite. He studied the bumps and grooves in each painted cement brick that made the pattern as Brandon came closer, seemed to hesitate, and then slowly lowered himself down to sit against the other wall. The hall was narrow and he didn't sit directly across from him, but a little to one side, not speaking, just looking at him.
Fuck, Mark thought mildly.
Neither of them moved or said anything for too long of a time. As if he didn't know why he was here? Mark studied the end of the joint that was burning merrily away, the edges of the paper charring and then falling off. It had been weeks since he'd tried, and he wasn't sure he fully wanted to, but he tried now, to reach out. To feel out for Brandon, to feel anything from him. Nothing, he thought after a moment, and didn't that just figure. He didn't look at him but held the joint out, offering.
Brandon didn't move at first, but then he shifted, leaning forward to take it. That was something. What it was exactly, Mark didn't know, but he didn't have to be a psychic genius to figure out why he was here, why now. He hoped they could get it over with quickly.
Brandon leaned out to pass it back, and Mark looked in his direction just enough to make sure he wouldn't burn his hand as he accepted it, then he raised his eyes to the ceiling and leaned his head back as he inhaled deeply, held his breath, let the smoke mist out from his nose. It definitely was a fuck of a lot better than the alcohol, but he was still in a state of 'if it works, it works', and although he'd promised several people after that fuckup that landed him in the ER that he would lay off, he hadn't as much as he should have. He'd laid off enough to hide it better—no use in bringing everyone else further down with him. He'd done enough of that already.
Like with Brandon. Here he was, sitting there silently, clearly trying to figure out how to say something. He was going to say something about It, probably about that interview, only, he couldn't figure out how to start. He'd never been out of words before, had almost never seemed so unsure of himself. Mark did not want to talk about it—that was why he'd gone off by himself, to get away from the stares and the whispers and the chance that, eventually, probably, they were going to be right here, everything changed between them with no chance of ever going back.
He wanted to forget it, but here they were. He would rather have endured another verbal bitchslap like that PR manager (the one that Brandon had fired) who had humiliated him in front of so many people. He would rather have endured another thousand times of him just managing to look at Brandon again only to see him turn away. But now he was here, and eventually, he would find a way to come to it. Mark thought, as he took another huge pull from the joint and offered it back out again, that he should help him out. He owed him that much at least. To just...get it rolling and get it over with.
He exhaled slowly, trying to keep steady, realizing that at some point soon he might get shaky, but that he should hold on to himself as much as he could until then. Brandon had hit from the joint again and was looking at it contemplatively as he held his breath, and while he was looking down at it, Mark took a long look at his face. How tired and drawn he looked, too. His eyes flickered up and they looked at each other for a long moment, the longest in weeks. Months, maybe.
Mark turned his face away first, focusing again on the lines and grooves on the wall. "So," he said, quietly, his voice as dull as it was any time he spoke anymore, all of the emotion stripped out and replaced with emptiness and exhaustion. "I guess...I love you."
Brandon exhaled hard, but he didn't say anything. Maybe he couldn't. Mark couldn't look at him, so he continued to look at the painted lines, the bumps, remembering that cement was porous; it absorbed much of what touched it. It had to do with the ratio of water in it. The air got in, and it absorbed, and it crumbled the foundation. Everything fell apart.
Mark made himself look back at Brandon and almost flinched at what he saw: confusion, hurt, sorrow, guilt. He didn't deserve that, not any of this shit. Everything that had happened was Mark's own fault, and no matter what he tried, he just...kept...fucking everything up. He sighed and let his head fall back so that it hit the wall as he looked back up.
"You don't have to say anything," he said. "I know."
"You know what?" Brandon said, his voice hushed. His voice was tight, too, strained.
Nothing and everything, Mark thought. He shrugged. "It's fine," he said.
"Here."
Mark glanced over again and saw that he was holding out the joint. He took it, reaching out slowly and taking it carefully, so that their fingers didn't touch. Brandon held his hand very still, knowing what he was doing, moving his thumb at the exact right moment so that Mark could put his where it'd been. God, they had been so in sync; in a lifetime far, far away, here was the one person whose rhythm was always on the same beat as his own, the one who had known his mind so often without them having to speak. Now they were strangers who could hardly bear to look at each other, a huge empty space of air and silence building on their crumbling foundation. Mark hit the joint again, hard, as much as he could, staring up at the tiles on the ceiling and hating himself.
"So..." Brandon said, and Mark closed his eyes instead of trying to look at him. "What do we do now?" he asked.
Mark shrugged without opening his eyes. "Nothing." He let his head fall back down level again and opened his eyes at the wall. He'd gotten in a lot of wall-staring over the past couple of months and was pretty good at it. "I don't think there's anything to do, do you?"
"I don't know."
There was another long pause, neither of them saying or doing anything. The joint was too small to try to pass without touching him, so Mark put it out and got another instead of trying. He lit it, inhaled even though it wasn't his turn, and held it out without looking.
Brandon took it, but he didn't bring it to his mouth. "Mark," he said, and it stung. How long had it been since he'd heard him say his name, at all? To be fair, Mark hadn't been able to make himself say his name either. They were, apparently, each other's goddamn Voldemort. If he'd had any feeling left, he might have snorted at that, but all he felt was tired and stoned. At least it wasn't tired and—and that other thing that made him feel like he was being crushed to death. The rolled-up end of an almost-out toothpaste tube.
"Yeah," he said.
"Are you going to be okay?"
Well, now. That was surely a goddamn question for the ages, wasn't it, the sixty-four thousand dollar prize winner. Who fucking knew? He'd thought so at first. He'd thought a lot of things at first, though, fairy tales like This will blow over and Just give it time and we'll be back to normal and even the most laughable one, the one that had got him into this terrible corner with no exit: How could I be in love with someone and not fucking know it? It's ridiculous. I don't love him. I don't—
"Yeah," he told the wall. "I think so. Hopefully. Y'know—" He gestured with one hand. "When we're done with this and get to go home, peace and quiet."
"Yeah," Brandon said eagerly, sitting up a little more. "Absolutely. This shit is so fucking old. We're all exhausted, and not only because we've been touring far longer than ever before. All of this bullshit—we all just need some time away. A break. A long one. To clear our heads."
Mark nodded and took back the joint after he hit it and held it out. They smoked it down to the point where it was too small to pass without touching again, and Mark pulled another rabbit out of the hat, why not. He'd been planning on demolishing all three before going back to the green room before the show anyway. Miracle upon miracles, he was actually feeling a little better, although he wasn't for sure if it was just smoking down that fast, since they were basically playing speed chess with it. Normally—oh, never mind, that was gone—before, when they'd smoked together a lot, they'd be talking too, or playing their guitars or a video game. Not sitting three feet away from each other but being miles apart, not talking because there wasn't anything to say. He lit the new one and passed it, and Brandon took it, and they continued to sit in silence and smoke it down, but maybe...maybe, for the first time in months, it wasn't such a bad silence.
"Mark?"
This one, he thought, he didn't want to hear. This one was tentative and anxious. But he had never been able to refuse him anything. He'd never wanted to. "Yeah," he said again.
"Why?"
He didn't need to ask why what?. He stared down at the joint in his hand, this new one almost gone already, and he couldn't speak. Jesus, he thought. I'm supposed to count the fucking ways? Because you're you, and I'm me, and it's always been us, and you're part of me. You're the biggest part of my goddamn heart. You're the best person I know and I want to know you and be with you and be a part of you and you a part of me forever. You don't make my day, you make my fucking life, you're all I really care about and always have been. Because being near you is like breathing and I am drowning. Because. Because I...just...love you.
He couldn't say any of that, and what would be the point? Why was he even asking? Mark did what he always did lately; he kept his mouth shut and his eyes down. Eventually, Brandon sighed, no longer waiting for an answer he realized he wasn't going to get.
Mark wanted to be alone again now. He crushed the end of the joint that was in his hand and dropped it in his shirt pocket, pulling out his pack of cigarettes and shaking one out. Brandon hated cigarettes, hated the way they smelled and what they did to people. Mark had had originally started when he was fifteen, but he'd made a huge effort to quit at sixteen, just because this kid he barely knew disapproved. God, he'd been so fucking stupid.
He stuck the end of one in his mouth and lit it up, taking a long drag and exhaling the smoke up toward the ceiling, wondering if it would make Brandon leave—it had worked before.
Not quite so easy this time, it seemed. "It'll be better when the tour's over," Brandon said suddenly, and his voice seemed far too loud, too sure. It was like a proclamation, though a forced one, an untrue one, which was probably why it rang out but fell flat. "We just...we all just need some space. We're constantly just, like, stuck together. Too close to the—the situation for anyone to ever catch a break." He paused, and then, finally, slowly got to his feet. "There's only two weeks left," he said vaguely. "Some distance might help. Right? Just...to take two steps back and breathe. Then it'll be okay. It's going to be okay."
Mark didn't say anything to that, and Brandon just stood there while the seconds spun out and the distance between them grew. That was the goddamn problem, right there—not a lack of distance, but a whole, empty life of it.
"Mark?" Brandon said, his voice gentle. "All right?"
"Yeah," he said.
Brandon hesitated for another few seconds, and then he left. Mark listened to his footfalls as he went back down the hall, smoking his cigarette and thinking about distance.
Timeline: Late February 2017
Title: Distance
Summary: Brandon and Mark finally talk a little about the situation, but it's strained and there is too much unsaid and unsettled.
~2.5k
The new City Center venue was huge, sprawling, wonderfully maze-like. Mark had always been attracted to winding paths, to finding his way though, and the irony was not lost on him as he settled himself down just off the end of a dead-end hall with an outside exit. He'd tried his pass on the eye lock and it beeped and opened; he'd considered going outside, but he could hear traffic and didn't want to be seen by anyone, even passing vehicles. Instead, he'd propped the door open and looked up for a smoke detector, not seeing one. That was good. A fairly strong breeze drifted in from the door: even better.
The short L off the main part of the hallway stopped in front of what looked like a custodian closet, and with the show coming up in less than three hours, he was pretty sure that the cleaning staff would be off until later, only security roaming the halls. That was fine; he had several fifties in his pocket in case any of them happened upon him, and it always worked like a charm before.
He sat against one wall in the narrow hall and leaned back, stretching out his legs and listening to the quiet for a few minutes. No rush. He had hours, and no one ever bothered to find him any more, which was actually just fine—when he wasn't getting stupid ass comments and questions, he was getting looks, all of which he could do without. If he had nothing anymore other than that, he would take the nothing and exist in his silent vacuum.
He was halfway through the first of the joints he'd brought along when he heard footsteps; he nodded to himself and reached into his pocket for his bribe cash, hoping that it was just one guard instead of two, and that, if they wouldn't take the money, they'd just direct him back to his lounge instead of throwing a conniption about the pot. Oh well. Let him be arrested, then, what the fuck. Could anyone actually blame him for wanting a goddamn joint at this point? Was this even one of the legal states? He couldn't remember where they were and didn't particularly care.
It wasn't a guard. He reached up and took the joint out of his mouth, exhaling slowly and shifting his eyes to the wall opposite. He studied the bumps and grooves in each painted cement brick that made the pattern as Brandon came closer, seemed to hesitate, and then slowly lowered himself down to sit against the other wall. The hall was narrow and he didn't sit directly across from him, but a little to one side, not speaking, just looking at him.
Fuck, Mark thought mildly.
Neither of them moved or said anything for too long of a time. As if he didn't know why he was here? Mark studied the end of the joint that was burning merrily away, the edges of the paper charring and then falling off. It had been weeks since he'd tried, and he wasn't sure he fully wanted to, but he tried now, to reach out. To feel out for Brandon, to feel anything from him. Nothing, he thought after a moment, and didn't that just figure. He didn't look at him but held the joint out, offering.
Brandon didn't move at first, but then he shifted, leaning forward to take it. That was something. What it was exactly, Mark didn't know, but he didn't have to be a psychic genius to figure out why he was here, why now. He hoped they could get it over with quickly.
Brandon leaned out to pass it back, and Mark looked in his direction just enough to make sure he wouldn't burn his hand as he accepted it, then he raised his eyes to the ceiling and leaned his head back as he inhaled deeply, held his breath, let the smoke mist out from his nose. It definitely was a fuck of a lot better than the alcohol, but he was still in a state of 'if it works, it works', and although he'd promised several people after that fuckup that landed him in the ER that he would lay off, he hadn't as much as he should have. He'd laid off enough to hide it better—no use in bringing everyone else further down with him. He'd done enough of that already.
Like with Brandon. Here he was, sitting there silently, clearly trying to figure out how to say something. He was going to say something about It, probably about that interview, only, he couldn't figure out how to start. He'd never been out of words before, had almost never seemed so unsure of himself. Mark did not want to talk about it—that was why he'd gone off by himself, to get away from the stares and the whispers and the chance that, eventually, probably, they were going to be right here, everything changed between them with no chance of ever going back.
He wanted to forget it, but here they were. He would rather have endured another verbal bitchslap like that PR manager (the one that Brandon had fired) who had humiliated him in front of so many people. He would rather have endured another thousand times of him just managing to look at Brandon again only to see him turn away. But now he was here, and eventually, he would find a way to come to it. Mark thought, as he took another huge pull from the joint and offered it back out again, that he should help him out. He owed him that much at least. To just...get it rolling and get it over with.
He exhaled slowly, trying to keep steady, realizing that at some point soon he might get shaky, but that he should hold on to himself as much as he could until then. Brandon had hit from the joint again and was looking at it contemplatively as he held his breath, and while he was looking down at it, Mark took a long look at his face. How tired and drawn he looked, too. His eyes flickered up and they looked at each other for a long moment, the longest in weeks. Months, maybe.
Mark turned his face away first, focusing again on the lines and grooves on the wall. "So," he said, quietly, his voice as dull as it was any time he spoke anymore, all of the emotion stripped out and replaced with emptiness and exhaustion. "I guess...I love you."
Brandon exhaled hard, but he didn't say anything. Maybe he couldn't. Mark couldn't look at him, so he continued to look at the painted lines, the bumps, remembering that cement was porous; it absorbed much of what touched it. It had to do with the ratio of water in it. The air got in, and it absorbed, and it crumbled the foundation. Everything fell apart.
Mark made himself look back at Brandon and almost flinched at what he saw: confusion, hurt, sorrow, guilt. He didn't deserve that, not any of this shit. Everything that had happened was Mark's own fault, and no matter what he tried, he just...kept...fucking everything up. He sighed and let his head fall back so that it hit the wall as he looked back up.
"You don't have to say anything," he said. "I know."
"You know what?" Brandon said, his voice hushed. His voice was tight, too, strained.
Nothing and everything, Mark thought. He shrugged. "It's fine," he said.
"Here."
Mark glanced over again and saw that he was holding out the joint. He took it, reaching out slowly and taking it carefully, so that their fingers didn't touch. Brandon held his hand very still, knowing what he was doing, moving his thumb at the exact right moment so that Mark could put his where it'd been. God, they had been so in sync; in a lifetime far, far away, here was the one person whose rhythm was always on the same beat as his own, the one who had known his mind so often without them having to speak. Now they were strangers who could hardly bear to look at each other, a huge empty space of air and silence building on their crumbling foundation. Mark hit the joint again, hard, as much as he could, staring up at the tiles on the ceiling and hating himself.
"So..." Brandon said, and Mark closed his eyes instead of trying to look at him. "What do we do now?" he asked.
Mark shrugged without opening his eyes. "Nothing." He let his head fall back down level again and opened his eyes at the wall. He'd gotten in a lot of wall-staring over the past couple of months and was pretty good at it. "I don't think there's anything to do, do you?"
"I don't know."
There was another long pause, neither of them saying or doing anything. The joint was too small to try to pass without touching him, so Mark put it out and got another instead of trying. He lit it, inhaled even though it wasn't his turn, and held it out without looking.
Brandon took it, but he didn't bring it to his mouth. "Mark," he said, and it stung. How long had it been since he'd heard him say his name, at all? To be fair, Mark hadn't been able to make himself say his name either. They were, apparently, each other's goddamn Voldemort. If he'd had any feeling left, he might have snorted at that, but all he felt was tired and stoned. At least it wasn't tired and—and that other thing that made him feel like he was being crushed to death. The rolled-up end of an almost-out toothpaste tube.
"Yeah," he said.
"Are you going to be okay?"
Well, now. That was surely a goddamn question for the ages, wasn't it, the sixty-four thousand dollar prize winner. Who fucking knew? He'd thought so at first. He'd thought a lot of things at first, though, fairy tales like This will blow over and Just give it time and we'll be back to normal and even the most laughable one, the one that had got him into this terrible corner with no exit: How could I be in love with someone and not fucking know it? It's ridiculous. I don't love him. I don't—
"Yeah," he told the wall. "I think so. Hopefully. Y'know—" He gestured with one hand. "When we're done with this and get to go home, peace and quiet."
"Yeah," Brandon said eagerly, sitting up a little more. "Absolutely. This shit is so fucking old. We're all exhausted, and not only because we've been touring far longer than ever before. All of this bullshit—we all just need some time away. A break. A long one. To clear our heads."
Mark nodded and took back the joint after he hit it and held it out. They smoked it down to the point where it was too small to pass without touching again, and Mark pulled another rabbit out of the hat, why not. He'd been planning on demolishing all three before going back to the green room before the show anyway. Miracle upon miracles, he was actually feeling a little better, although he wasn't for sure if it was just smoking down that fast, since they were basically playing speed chess with it. Normally—oh, never mind, that was gone—before, when they'd smoked together a lot, they'd be talking too, or playing their guitars or a video game. Not sitting three feet away from each other but being miles apart, not talking because there wasn't anything to say. He lit the new one and passed it, and Brandon took it, and they continued to sit in silence and smoke it down, but maybe...maybe, for the first time in months, it wasn't such a bad silence.
"Mark?"
This one, he thought, he didn't want to hear. This one was tentative and anxious. But he had never been able to refuse him anything. He'd never wanted to. "Yeah," he said again.
"Why?"
He didn't need to ask why what?. He stared down at the joint in his hand, this new one almost gone already, and he couldn't speak. Jesus, he thought. I'm supposed to count the fucking ways? Because you're you, and I'm me, and it's always been us, and you're part of me. You're the biggest part of my goddamn heart. You're the best person I know and I want to know you and be with you and be a part of you and you a part of me forever. You don't make my day, you make my fucking life, you're all I really care about and always have been. Because being near you is like breathing and I am drowning. Because. Because I...just...love you.
He couldn't say any of that, and what would be the point? Why was he even asking? Mark did what he always did lately; he kept his mouth shut and his eyes down. Eventually, Brandon sighed, no longer waiting for an answer he realized he wasn't going to get.
Mark wanted to be alone again now. He crushed the end of the joint that was in his hand and dropped it in his shirt pocket, pulling out his pack of cigarettes and shaking one out. Brandon hated cigarettes, hated the way they smelled and what they did to people. Mark had had originally started when he was fifteen, but he'd made a huge effort to quit at sixteen, just because this kid he barely knew disapproved. God, he'd been so fucking stupid.
He stuck the end of one in his mouth and lit it up, taking a long drag and exhaling the smoke up toward the ceiling, wondering if it would make Brandon leave—it had worked before.
Not quite so easy this time, it seemed. "It'll be better when the tour's over," Brandon said suddenly, and his voice seemed far too loud, too sure. It was like a proclamation, though a forced one, an untrue one, which was probably why it rang out but fell flat. "We just...we all just need some space. We're constantly just, like, stuck together. Too close to the—the situation for anyone to ever catch a break." He paused, and then, finally, slowly got to his feet. "There's only two weeks left," he said vaguely. "Some distance might help. Right? Just...to take two steps back and breathe. Then it'll be okay. It's going to be okay."
Mark didn't say anything to that, and Brandon just stood there while the seconds spun out and the distance between them grew. That was the goddamn problem, right there—not a lack of distance, but a whole, empty life of it.
"Mark?" Brandon said, his voice gentle. "All right?"
"Yeah," he said.
Brandon hesitated for another few seconds, and then he left. Mark listened to his footfalls as he went back down the hall, smoking his cigarette and thinking about distance.