[It's hard to breathe suddenly, but he knows it must be far worse for Peter, who seems moments away from sobbing. Isaac can't even begin to imagine what he must feel like, right now- he still remembers watching him play with the baby, holding her and trying to text, he remembers seeing the kid and thinking that she's so lucky to have people who care about her like that.
Isaac closes the door behind him.
Shut in the room with Peter and his breakdown, Isaac moves forward without another word, his fingers reaching out to touch Peter's shoulder as soon as he can reach, and he folds himself onto the bed, immediately wrapping his arms around him and trying to ease him into a hug.]
[peter hears the door shut at the same time as he feels isaac's hand on his shoulder, but he's already on the bed and his arms are around peter before he parses it.
isaac shut the door. isaac closed himself into a cramped little room with peter and this ugly, raw pain that feels like it's tearing his chest apart trying to keep it in, like it will tear the rest of him apart if he lets it out.
pack.
that's what snaps the last thread on peter's control, in the end. he turns into isaac, wrapping his arms childishly around the other boy's middle, hands fisted in his shirt, and pushing his face against isaac's shoulder. there is nothing even remotely pretty about peter crying, all red-faced hot tears and shaking, but at least it's quiet beyond the uneven sob of his breath.]
[Isaac doesn't know what to do. People don't generally cry on him- don't generally break down in front of him. And when they do, all he knows to do is to just wrap them up tight and hold them until they've shaken it out. That's not necessarily what he wants when he's upset, but he understands the sentiment and the reasoning behind it, so it's what he does.
Gently, he presses a hand up over Peter's head, letting him cry. Isaac doesn't say anything, he doesn't do anything, he just sits there, letting Peter use him as his anchor while he sinks under the depth of his loss.
He can't help this. He wouldn't know the first thing about fixing it, and this is all he can do. Isaac is starting to feel a different sort of suffocated, but he pushes it down in favor of holding tighter to Peter, fingers threading softly through his hair.]
[it might not be what isaac wants, but it does seem to be what peter needs. it takes a few minutes, but the more isaac touches him, holds him close and pets his hair, the more peter seems to relax. because at the heart of it, what peter wants right now is his mother. isaac is nothing like lynda, but he's there and he's holding on to peter when peter is pretty sure that he'd rather be doing anything else than this.
nobody has ever done anything even remotely like this for peter before. which makes him cry more, but less helplessly. there's something good, right in front of him, one small, infinite mercy in the face of cruelty and horror that's so vast he can't fit it all into his head. because it's not just about one little girl ceasing to exist, although that is what hurts most directly. it's the untold number of others who disappeared too, who nobody even knew to mourn. it's how they're responsible, and about how many times they might already have been responsible, about how many more times they're going to be responsible.
and there's one tiny light against it. i'll be here whenever you need. helpless, half-clumsy teenaged boy fingers threading through the tangles of his hair.
that's what he's got. and it's more than he's ever really had before, so it's going to have to be enough. he unclenches his hands, releases isaac's shirt, smoothes it down and just keeps mindlessly rubbing isaac's back. he's still crying, and his voice comes out quiet and cracked, wet and snotty, but the hysteria has passed.]
[Isaac just holds him through it, not saying anything- he wouldn't know how to even start. He can't make it better. There's nothing optimistic he can say because Peace is gone. Her and all the others that have simply been erased from existence, and there's no hope in getting her back. It sucks- it sucks a lot, and as much as he wants to say it'll be okay, Isaac really doesn't think it will be.
Besides which, Peter will be smart enough to call him out on his bullshit if he even tries, so he doesn't. He holds him, lifts his head up when Peter starts to pull back, when Peter apologizes, and Isaac shakes his head slowly, his eyes lowered toward the ground.]
Don't be. It's fine. [His voice cracks, and Isaac just lets out a sigh, shaking his head again.] I mean- this, it's not okay. It's so messed up. But it's- I don't know what to do about it.
Nothing's fine. Just about everything is completely fucked.
[he turns his head slightly, into isaac's neck, so he's not talking into his shirt anymore. he can't quite bring himself to pull away, to hold himself up, to be looked at like this.]
There's nothing I want you to do, because there's nothing to do. She's gone, they're all gone. This is why we're here, it's what we're for. They're the price to 'save the world'. It's so goddamn ugly.
[one of his hands slides up isaac's back, hooks around his shoulder in a quintessential don't leave me gesture.]
[Isaac is okay with holding him for as long as it takes, letting Peter cling to him- even clinging back, in his own way. He nods slowly into Peter's shoulder and lets out a heavy breath, squeezing him tightly.]
I'll stay here, though. For as long as you need, I'm here.
[peter makes a sound that's probably meant to be a laugh and buries his face more into isaac's neck as the tears well up again. don't make promises like that, he wants to say, because nobody ever has and how the hell is he supposed to deal with that, with someone promising to stay, to stay for him? the pads of his fingers dig into isaac's shoulder, not hard enough to hurt but hard enough to make his fingers ache, grounding him in the reality of what's happening here.
peter is not usually the one being grounded by someone else. hell, he's usually the one grounding isaac. but not right now. and if he can just make himself stay here, make this the thing that feels the most real...maybe it will be enough.
usually, peter is running away from something, running as fast and as hard as he can. right now, he curls into isaac, as close as he dares, and doesn't move.]
[Isaac has no such desire to run- even if staying here is making things raw, uncomfortable because they've never communicated in emotion so much as the mocking disregard of it. To have Peter here now, crying, broken on him- it's a lot. He holds on because he knows he has to, but it's a lot.]
Yeah. Yeah, it's okay. I've got you.
[He thinks, anyway. Maybe. Because Peter is maybe a year older than him, but he seems an eternity deeper sometimes, and Isaac doesn't know if he has it in him to be an anchor for someone who might as well be an ocean himself.]
[the way he says it, that obviously means a lot, means something shaky and deep and it scares peter, but what doesn't scare peter lately?
not fucking much.
luckily for isaac, peter doesn't need an anchor so much as he needs a buoy, a little light out in the sea of himself to guide him back. he takes slow breaths, until the hitch in them gets more even, mostly disappears, but he doesn't move.]
Nobody's ever said that. Besides Lynda, and she doesn't count.
[Isaac doesn't know what to say to that, so he just rubs at Peter's back warmly, in slow, even circles. It makes sense, he supposes, why Peter wants to go things alone. Why he's been so resistant, fighting himself, twisting himself up into knots just over the simple idea of being friends with Isaac. Allies with him.
Packmates.]
Well- screw everyone else. [Quietly, and Isaac presses his cheek against the crown of Peter's head.] You've got me now.
[not that peter's even stopped crying entirely, but he's not going to start bawling again, he's not, so for a moment after isaac's words soak in he holds his breath, lets it out slowly, blinks hot tears against isaac's neck, shifting just enough that isaac's head can rest comfortably against his head. like he knows.]
Perfect. Screw everyone else is practically my motto.
[it's a bad joke, too true on one hand and a terribly obvious lie on the other.]
[He knows Peter isn't usually like this- that's part of what makes it such a big deal that he's breaking down now. It's not like it's unwarranted at all, losing Peace is probably the immense tipping point that brings everything else crashing back on him. He gets it. Isaac knows what something like that feels like, and he wants to help Peter through it, like Peter helped him through losing Scott.]
You're fine. Do you want me to get you a towel or something?
[peter means to say yes. he means to pull back, to stop this, to quit being an enormous crybaby. he means to clean off his face and pack up his emotions and lock everything down tight and pretend this didn't happen. he means to pretend he can live with this.
instead his fingers tighten on isaac's shoulder and he lets out a shaky breath.]
[Isaac doesn't care that Peter puts it off- it's fine if he wants to hang around a bit longer, and honestly, it's not like they have any pressing matters they need to get to at the moment. So he nods and rests his chin over Peter's head with a little sigh, still rubbing warm circles into his shoulders.]
That's fine.
[And then, there's a beat of silence, before he sighs.]
[that's fine, isaac says, and peter just relaxes, lets his head rest on isaac's shoulder and all the tension go out of his arms. trusting, as though this isn't all an act of purest naive trust. when isaac sighs, peter rubs his back, up and down one side of his spine instead of circles between his shoulders. ]
You and me both, rikonoro. Something's gonna have to give.
[It makes him laugh softly, but the sound is dry, without much humor in it at all. He appreciates the attention though, and just lets Peter stay there, pressed up close against him for as long as he needs.]
Why do I get the feeling that the 'something giving' is going to mean more stress and upset all around?
Mm. I seem to be handing out nicknames lately, that's yours. More complimentary than Tempest's.
[he's going to be there awhile, honestly. it's been too long since anybody has been affectionate with him in a way that was entirely comfortable. since he came to exsi, really, and as much as he'd hate to admit it, he'd gotten used to letha as well as his mother, to having someone constantly there, touching and being touched. he hasn't let himself really feel safe with anyone since he arrived, and now that he has it it's hard to let go, especially in the face of everything that's going on.]
Because you're a smart cookie. We're not through the river of shit yet, not by a lot.
If it's more complimentary, why does it sound like something out of a foreign soap opera? [His name is shorter anyway! But hey, to each their own, maybe.
In truth, giving someone that- comfort? Affection? Is just as new to him as it is for Peter to be receiving it, if not newer. But Isaac doesn't really hate it and he's not particularly inclined to stop any time soon. He's getting a positive reaction out of this... sort of, if you discount all the crying, and so he doesn't particularly mind continuing.]
[there's a hint of peter's normal deadpan in his voice, weak and watered-down, but it doesn't come with even a hint of the distance peter's always been careful to leave between them. he's still leaking the occasional tear against isaac's neck, but mostly it's stopped. possibly peter's been so careful about that distance because he needs this, and needing something means it hurts to lack but it hurts more to lose. not caring is almost always the best defense. but it's failed now, and so he'll take what seems suspiciously like cuddling instead.]
[The sort-of cuddling is a little odd, but Isaac takes it because he doesn't quite know what else to do. it's not like he's in his best mental state either, and if Peter wants to offer him closeness- wants to ask for closeness- then who is Isaac to say no? It's a nice feeling, and he thinks, dangerously, that it might be a nice thing to get used to.
Nope. Gadje is a label, not a nickname. You're Roma or you're gadje, kind of a Jews and Gentiles thing. Most everyone is.
[including, technically, peter himself, but he's in no mood to get into the politics of it. he can feel isaac's pulse faintly through the place where his forehead rests against the other boy's neck, and there's something calming about that. it makes him want to stay there, and peter knows that's bad, that it's dangerous. but this thing that scared the hell out of him yesterday is so lulling now, seems so simple to give into. he never wanted to be alone quite so much as he believed he did, and it's painfully obvious that isaac never wanted to be alone at all.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
freezerburned) wrote2012-08-21 10:00 pm
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[It's hard to breathe suddenly, but he knows it must be far worse for Peter, who seems moments away from sobbing. Isaac can't even begin to imagine what he must feel like, right now- he still remembers watching him play with the baby, holding her and trying to text, he remembers seeing the kid and thinking that she's so lucky to have people who care about her like that.
Isaac closes the door behind him.
Shut in the room with Peter and his breakdown, Isaac moves forward without another word, his fingers reaching out to touch Peter's shoulder as soon as he can reach, and he folds himself onto the bed, immediately wrapping his arms around him and trying to ease him into a hug.]
I'm- I'm sorry.
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isaac shut the door. isaac closed himself into a cramped little room with peter and this ugly, raw pain that feels like it's tearing his chest apart trying to keep it in, like it will tear the rest of him apart if he lets it out.
pack.
that's what snaps the last thread on peter's control, in the end. he turns into isaac, wrapping his arms childishly around the other boy's middle, hands fisted in his shirt, and pushing his face against isaac's shoulder. there is nothing even remotely pretty about peter crying, all red-faced hot tears and shaking, but at least it's quiet beyond the uneven sob of his breath.]
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Gently, he presses a hand up over Peter's head, letting him cry. Isaac doesn't say anything, he doesn't do anything, he just sits there, letting Peter use him as his anchor while he sinks under the depth of his loss.
He can't help this. He wouldn't know the first thing about fixing it, and this is all he can do. Isaac is starting to feel a different sort of suffocated, but he pushes it down in favor of holding tighter to Peter, fingers threading softly through his hair.]
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nobody has ever done anything even remotely like this for peter before. which makes him cry more, but less helplessly. there's something good, right in front of him, one small, infinite mercy in the face of cruelty and horror that's so vast he can't fit it all into his head. because it's not just about one little girl ceasing to exist, although that is what hurts most directly. it's the untold number of others who disappeared too, who nobody even knew to mourn. it's how they're responsible, and about how many times they might already have been responsible, about how many more times they're going to be responsible.
and there's one tiny light against it. i'll be here whenever you need. helpless, half-clumsy teenaged boy fingers threading through the tangles of his hair.
that's what he's got. and it's more than he's ever really had before, so it's going to have to be enough. he unclenches his hands, releases isaac's shirt, smoothes it down and just keeps mindlessly rubbing isaac's back. he's still crying, and his voice comes out quiet and cracked, wet and snotty, but the hysteria has passed.]
Sorry.
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Besides which, Peter will be smart enough to call him out on his bullshit if he even tries, so he doesn't. He holds him, lifts his head up when Peter starts to pull back, when Peter apologizes, and Isaac shakes his head slowly, his eyes lowered toward the ground.]
Don't be. It's fine. [His voice cracks, and Isaac just lets out a sigh, shaking his head again.] I mean- this, it's not okay. It's so messed up. But it's- I don't know what to do about it.
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[he turns his head slightly, into isaac's neck, so he's not talking into his shirt anymore. he can't quite bring himself to pull away, to hold himself up, to be looked at like this.]
There's nothing I want you to do, because there's nothing to do. She's gone, they're all gone. This is why we're here, it's what we're for. They're the price to 'save the world'. It's so goddamn ugly.
[one of his hands slides up isaac's back, hooks around his shoulder in a quintessential don't leave me gesture.]
I don't want you to do anything.
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I'll stay here, though. For as long as you need, I'm here.
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peter is not usually the one being grounded by someone else. hell, he's usually the one grounding isaac. but not right now. and if he can just make himself stay here, make this the thing that feels the most real...maybe it will be enough.
usually, peter is running away from something, running as fast and as hard as he can. right now, he curls into isaac, as close as he dares, and doesn't move.]
Good. Please.
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Yeah. Yeah, it's okay. I've got you.
[He thinks, anyway. Maybe. Because Peter is maybe a year older than him, but he seems an eternity deeper sometimes, and Isaac doesn't know if he has it in him to be an anchor for someone who might as well be an ocean himself.]
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[the way he says it, that obviously means a lot, means something shaky and deep and it scares peter, but what doesn't scare peter lately?
not fucking much.
luckily for isaac, peter doesn't need an anchor so much as he needs a buoy, a little light out in the sea of himself to guide him back. he takes slow breaths, until the hitch in them gets more even, mostly disappears, but he doesn't move.]
Nobody's ever said that. Besides Lynda, and she doesn't count.
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Packmates.]
Well- screw everyone else. [Quietly, and Isaac presses his cheek against the crown of Peter's head.] You've got me now.
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Perfect. Screw everyone else is practically my motto.
[it's a bad joke, too true on one hand and a terribly obvious lie on the other.]
I don't usually lose it like this.
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[He knows Peter isn't usually like this- that's part of what makes it such a big deal that he's breaking down now. It's not like it's unwarranted at all, losing Peace is probably the immense tipping point that brings everything else crashing back on him. He gets it. Isaac knows what something like that feels like, and he wants to help Peter through it, like Peter helped him through losing Scott.]
You're fine. Do you want me to get you a towel or something?
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instead his fingers tighten on isaac's shoulder and he lets out a shaky breath.]
In a minute.
[don't leave yet, that's what he really means.]
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That's fine.
[And then, there's a beat of silence, before he sighs.]
Everything is so messed up. I hate it.
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You and me both, rikonoro. Something's gonna have to give.
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[It makes him laugh softly, but the sound is dry, without much humor in it at all. He appreciates the attention though, and just lets Peter stay there, pressed up close against him for as long as he needs.]
Why do I get the feeling that the 'something giving' is going to mean more stress and upset all around?
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[he's going to be there awhile, honestly. it's been too long since anybody has been affectionate with him in a way that was entirely comfortable. since he came to exsi, really, and as much as he'd hate to admit it, he'd gotten used to letha as well as his mother, to having someone constantly there, touching and being touched. he hasn't let himself really feel safe with anyone since he arrived, and now that he has it it's hard to let go, especially in the face of everything that's going on.]
Because you're a smart cookie. We're not through the river of shit yet, not by a lot.
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In truth, giving someone that- comfort? Affection? Is just as new to him as it is for Peter to be receiving it, if not newer. But Isaac doesn't really hate it and he's not particularly inclined to stop any time soon. He's getting a positive reaction out of this... sort of, if you discount all the crying, and so he doesn't particularly mind continuing.]
Great. More stuff to look forward to.
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[there's a hint of peter's normal deadpan in his voice, weak and watered-down, but it doesn't come with even a hint of the distance peter's always been careful to leave between them. he's still leaking the occasional tear against isaac's neck, but mostly it's stopped. possibly peter's been so careful about that distance because he needs this, and needing something means it hurts to lack but it hurts more to lose. not caring is almost always the best defense. but it's failed now, and so he'll take what seems suspiciously like cuddling instead.]
This place is just a laugh-a-minute fun ride.
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Except, you know. Without the tears next time.]
Gadje, now? Did I just get demoted?
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[including, technically, peter himself, but he's in no mood to get into the politics of it. he can feel isaac's pulse faintly through the place where his forehead rests against the other boy's neck, and there's something calming about that. it makes him want to stay there, and peter knows that's bad, that it's dangerous. but this thing that scared the hell out of him yesterday is so lulling now, seems so simple to give into. he never wanted to be alone quite so much as he believed he did, and it's painfully obvious that isaac never wanted to be alone at all.]
Still rikonoro.
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I don't even now what that means.
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[there's a little smile in his voice when he says it, the slight curve of his cheek into isaac's shoulder.]
It's not bad, promise. Spent that coin on Tempest. Pricina means annoying.
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[He laughs, trying to force some brevity into the situation.]
What did she say to that?
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