2019-10-05 - Strength (VIII)

August showed up at Eleanor's and took matters into his own hands, which mostly involved feeding her and doing some cleaning. There was also a bit of working, on his tablet and via text with Cy. Alexander would probably not be pleased with him, but oh well.

He's lying in bed next to her, keeping an eye on her while she sleeps. It's fitful; nightmares are plaguing her. He worries that the dreams which could pull her Over There will come next, and he's determined to get dragged in with her. He's not going to let her go into one alone.

But for now, she's asleep, so he lets her hold one of his hands, lies back and stares up at the ceiling. His eyes drift half-closed, and he lets his mind wander down the roads of Gray Harbor to the hospital. Instinctively he flinches from it; steadfastly, he pushes past that, will the unease in the pit of his stomach to settle.

I am not there. I did not die.

But Itzhak isn't there either, so perhaps he's well enough now to have been sent home. To Elm, then; much closer. He seeks out the violin--probably a little out of tune with the illness, though hopefully not with the mental beating August's own subconscious just dished out. The forest is a little different: the river's clearer, and there are aspen suckers popping up all over. And maybe that distant volcano looks less distant, less unspecific, more recognizable, to Itzhak just now.

<<Hey.>>

The violin of Itzhak's thoughts is strong, singing high and sweet as August homes in on him. The reason why is clear once he makes contact: Itzhak's playing his violin. He's tired still, from the physical ordeal of the flu and then the hospital, equally arduous in its way, but he's playing. 'Practicing' is maybe the better word. He's got a certain exhausted focus as he plays the same passage, fine-tuning it as he goes. It's 'Ave Maria'.

His bow skips when August calls to him. Blinking, he looks up. (Why is 'up' the right direction for telepathy? he doesn't know, it just is.)

"Hey," he murmurs, then clears his throat. <<Hey. How's by you.>>

August listens to the music for a second, regrets that his greeting ends it. <<I'm okay.>> 'Okay' might be stretching it. Eleanor is having nightmares, Itzhak was in the hospital, They made use of August's subconscious to try and mutilate a few people, he's probably lost a good ten pounds or more on this flu, Alexander was hiding out in the cabin due to Gohl's influence, and August probably can't get back in a tree for another few days.

But no one's died. No one's been maimed. Not yet.

<<How about you?>> It's such a stupid question, he doesn't wait for an answer. <<How's Isolde?>>

Itzhak's thinner himself, the usual vital sense of him a little ragged around the edges. But only a little. The doctors did their work, and he was smart enough to submit to them doing it. Unlike certain Alexanders. Of course, now he's here working himself too hard trying to nail 'Ave Maria'. If he's not courting a relapse, he's at least drunk-texting one.

<<Alexander said she's in the hospital. Gonna go see her. Just gotta get this down a bit more.>> Itzhak doesn't make August wait for more violin; he gets right back into it, correcting his position and then drawing his bow (his normal one) across the strings. Aaaaaaaaa-ve Maaaaaariiiiiiiiii-aaaaa... <<Fucking Gohl. Fuck him.>>

<<It's beautiful.>> If there's a part Itzhak doesn't have down, August isn't entirely aware of it. But he wouldn't be; he's only familiar with orchestral and chamber music, he doesn't live and breathe it the way Itzhak does. In the same way a small variance in a leaf shape would be seen as 'leaves are just like that' by other people, but to August tell an entire story, so he knows Itzhak is hearing something in his own playing August can't.

(Itzhak could play it 90% wrong and Isolde would still love it. But August doesn't bring that up either.)

In August Gohl's anger is less present. Here, it's a howling wind that seeks to ramp up all of his insecurities into a need to survive and strike out. It's shaking the forest even now, but he's doing his best to let it pass through him. <<Yeah.>> And still they'd be sacrificing more, to make this stop.

He listens to the music a bit more. <<Thank you. For getting me out of there.>>

That makes Itzhak smile. A little grimly, but a smile nonetheless. <<Thanks. It's not THAT hard, just, I never play like this.>> Slow and drawn-out and high and weepy. It's not his usual style. <<Keep wanting to speed up, cut off the phrasing, crisp it up. It ain't like that. But if the mamzer wants a proper funeral, I'll give him a proper fucking funeral with a proper fuckin' solo. It might not be good, but it'll be there. Goyische music, feh!>>

Well he's in a splendid mood this morning. Gohl's infection is less physical than the flu but no less dangerous. Itzhak's suppressed fury lashes through his inner music.

At that, though...at that he sighs and lowers his bow, lets his violin dangle from his hand. <<So, nu, of course I was going to get you out of there. You pulled us in because you needed help. Don't thank me for that. What else was I going to do?>>

Dry humor lurks in the wings. <<Is this where I tell you that Ave Maria was prohibited by the Catholic Church for a while, because it was actually a secular song?>> Or maybe that makes it more appropriate, because part of him wants to give Gohl a proper funeral, and still be a dick about it in little ways. But maybe Gohl wasn't Catholic, so that won't matter. <<Most churches ignore that rule.>> Okay, he's feeling 'roll with it', he won't lie.

<<I was thinking I'd recite a poem.>> For the things they were sacrificing, not for Gohl. Because fuck Gohl. <<Not sure I will. We'll see.>> He will. If Itzhak's reaction to the infection is to be one hundred times as reactive, August's is to get petty. Really...really, petty.

Something inside August shudders when Itzhak says that. <<I pulled you in because I was out of my mind, and They wanted something to feed to what was tearing around inside me.>> It's as close to 'I'd have never subjected anyone to that if I could have avoided it' as he's likely to come, since he's well aware of how Itzhak would respond to that. (A brief, harrowing image of Isabella with her back flayed open, a monstrous thing with a great shiv of a weapon bearing down on her, there and gone in an eyeblink.) <<And I'm sorry for that. But you got me out of there when I was about at the end of my rope, so. You're getting thanked, get comfortable with it.>>

A little pop of pleasure is Itzhak's response to the bit of musical trivia. <<Really? Well...good.>> Being a dick in large ways and small is very appealing to him at the moment. Possibly at all times, but definitely at the moment. <<Still goyische.>> Then he groans, sets the bow on the music stand and his violin in its open case. <<God! Fine, thank me if you must, but don't apologize for needing help!>> He storms to the kitchenette--a very tiny storming, but he sure can get a lot of drama out of it--to pour himself coffee. <<I hate that! You do it all the time!>>

That's...more of an emotional statement than a factual one, but Itzhak certainly feels it's true right now. He goes still midpour as the image of Isabella with her back sliced open flits across his mind's eye. Then mutters a curse and finishes what he was doing. <<Yeah, well, I'm sorry for setting your brain on fire. So there.>>

While August likes to think he left a lot of things behind in his 20s, dick moves being chief among them, he knows it's not true. Thus he agrees whole heartedly with that sentiment.

The other one has him wincing. I do not. It hovers, not fully expressed as he falls back on a learned habit: before you react, look at it.

Eventually, <<Yeah. I do.>> He's quiet a bit more, then, <<It's hard to ask, when you're already going through as much as you are.>> He means the generic you (FinchIgnacioItzhakEleanorAlexander) but he also means Itzhak.

Confusion winds between them. <<Setting my brain on fire?>> August doesn't seem to know what that means.

Itzhak leans on the counter with one narrow hip, closing his eyes. His temper is out of control and he knows it, and he doesn't want to care. He wants to get louder and angrier until something gives.

Speaking of roads he's been down before, however. He forces himself to start counting by prime numbers. Two. Three. Five. Seven. Eleven. Thirteen. The echoing strains of 'Ave Maria' blend in, until he's singing the count to himself in his mind.

<<Had a dream about not asking for help.>> The thought surfaces with the image of himself rolling a boulder uphill, only for the boulder to slip free and crash to the bottom of the hill. <<Funny, right?>> It wasn't funny. <<You know what else is funny?>> Which isn't funny either. <<My Song was different in your dream. I couldn't move stuff. Instead I was like Fincheleh. So was de la Vega. That's how we were able to spray Round-Up on your psychic weeds. But it hurt switching over, like my spine was a Rubic's cube. So I kinda lost it some and...>>

He shows August the image of the fire both he and Ruiz had unleashed.

August's agreement about the boulder dream being 'funny' is palpable. <<They gave you an impossible task so they could watch you fail to finish it.>> And didn't that sound familiar?

Itzhak's succinct explanation clarifies things for August significantly. He'd been wondering how they'd been able to cleanse the tree, how Ruiz had been able to help. Perhaps the blight hadn't been able to hold his own Gifts after draining them and had poured them out into the others. Nothing taken without something given in turn. It had simply given to someone else. Or maybe his own abilities, excused from him, had latched onto them, simply because they were there. Who could say. <<So that's what was going on.>>

And since this is a serious conversation about serious things, and it's definitely not funny that the warping of their Gifts was painful, August is determined to not laugh, but the sight of Itzhak and Ruiz simultaneously reacting to being given the life energy Gift by setting themselves and everything around them on fire tests his resolve. The undergrowth trembles with his determination to squelch that reaction. No, he's not going to laugh about it.

He opts to comment on something else, to keep the laughter at bay, or at least justify it. <<No wonder you're into him.>> It's teasing, amusing, but undeniable.

This is a very serious conversation, so Itzhak proceeds to show August that he'd burnt the hated hospital gown to flakes of char. And how then a goat headbutted him right where it counted most. And then how a very nice boar person of indeterminate gender gave him pants. <<Never a dull moment.>>

...And how Ruiz gave him his GHPD hoodie, and Itzhak hadn't given it back, and how it'd smelled really good. This segues nicely into being indignant that August noticed Itzhak is into Ruiz.

<<I--no, what? How dare you.>> But he's snickering dolefully into the coffee mug. <<Ugh. Don't call me out like this.>>

Well, at least all three of them hadn't been naked? August is sure Itzhak wouldn't have minded, except then there might have been something of an issue with his interests being vastly more obvious. But then the tusked person gave him clothes, so it worked out in the over all.

A wince for the goat's love-tap, yet August can't help but think, <<Oh, look at her, isn't she lovely? A great big nanny goat.>>

Ah yes. Back to that topic. <<You're allowed to be into him.>> It comes out less like 'he's hot, I get it' and more like, 'you're allowed to make your own (possibly colossal) mistakes'.

Itzhak laughs out loud. <<After she planted her horns in my crotch, I wasn't thinking about how lovely she was. Your goats didn't try that on me!>>

A flash of selfconsciousness goes through him. Here he is, standing alone in his kitchen, laughing at nothing. He looks like a lunatic. That's what this town does to you, makes you have conversations in your head.

He raises his eyebrows then, projecting the feeling of skepticism at August, and has a drink. <<Allowed, huh? You don't sound real happy.>>

<<She didn't mean it like that,>> August says, almost defensively. He can't know that, of course, and anyways, she was a Dream goat. Maybe she did mean it like that. But he feels confident in defending her honor, much like Itzhak defended JJ's when she attempted to take off his entire leg. (Though that had been his leg and not his balls.)

And here August is, lying next to Eleanor as she sleeps by fits and starts, speaking with someone in another house while he watches over her. Well, so this was their lives. Maybe not the ones they'd ever have expected, but still the ones they had.

A small grunt of acknowledgment in the form of the river splashing. The wind tries to pick up the pace, and August pushes it back, gentle and relentless. There are a lot of ways to approach this, but he goes for the simplest one. <<You know anything between you two is going to be a total disaster waiting to happen, right?>> Despite the wording, there's no judgment; instead, a visual or two of August's similar relationships from a decade ago. Oh the fighting. And the volcanic make up sex. And the subsequent shouting matches, at 3am, for God and everyone to hear.

<<Nothing is GOING to happen.>> Itzhak pushes back, sharp ascending scale. This sounds fake even to himself, though, and he scowls at the mug in his hand. <<...What do you want me to say, Roen?>> Pine sap/thick glazed stoneware/the gray of a PNW sky. Roen. <<Yes I think he's hot. So? That doesn't mean anything. I think everyone is hot.>>

<<You don't have to say anything. I just know what it looks like when people are circling each other. I've done a lot of it myself.>> Brief glimpses of this too. It's probably no coincidence that some of these men are plainly rich guys. Well, August did go to grad school in Seattle during the tech boom, after all. <<And...>>

This is the hard part. There are things he's discussed with Alexander he's not going to bring up. That's not his place. But his own experiences--would that be fair? Seems like it would.

<<I want to show you something. And you tell me what you think it means.>>

It's a memory. A recent one, from just before their respective illnesses. August is in the forest, hunting. It wasn't a good day. And Ruiz is there as well. And Ruiz comes into view...with a gun pointing at August's head.

Even in the memory, August's reaction is a sort of tired boredom, with an edge of realization that came later.

Ruiz simply puts the gun away. (He also has a high powered rifle, with a scope. What did he have that for? Does he hunt? August doesn't know, can't be sure, but his suspicions don't involve game hunting.)

The memory ends there. No revelation as to what they talked about. Just a question. <<What do you think of a guy who rolls up on someone like that?>>

Itzhak mutters in Yiddish. His protective instincts rise up to snarl at the memory of Ruiz pointing a gun at August, but Ruiz pointed a gun at him, too.

He hadn't told August on purpose. Now he just goes ahead and admits it.

<<I think he's the kind of guy who's a cop and ex-military.>> His reply is sour. <<Uses guns to solve all his problems. Likes to rough people up and scare 'em.>>

Oops. The memory of Ruiz arm-locking him surfaces, too. Itzhak swears, knocks back the rest of the coffee, and sets the mug in the sink. <<If your point is that he's a violent shithead, believe me, I'm way ahead of you.>>

The wind in the forest kicks up a notch at the sight of Ruiz arm-locking Itzhak, and August struggles to get it under control. He doesn't respond to any of that until he's sure he can do it without getting nasty. So Itzhak's not the only one with protective instincts.

<<He is, but, that's not really my point. You can take care of yourself, I know that.>> Though the part where Ruiz is a cop and like this hits home, because August is entirely aware of how 'cop and ex-con' plays into this. (He's been very studiuously not thinking about it. Very, very studiously. He's Not Thinking About It right now.) <<My real concern is, anyone but me, wouldn't have taken that lightly. And with abilities like mine, it's six to one and pickin' 'em if he survives that sort of stunt. And I think we can agree he's not a stupid man, so that means it wasn't a case of him not thinking it through. He either didn't know what I can do, or, he didn't care.>> August doesn't bother pointing out that it actually doesn't matter which of those it was, because they amount to the same thing.

Gentler now, <<You've been through a lot. So has he. And you're both still dealing with it. So anything involving the two of you, it's going to be rough on you.>> There's another sense of 'you' mostly meaning Itzhak, but it also means Ruiz too. August might not be particularly invested in Ruiz's well being, but he's not uninvested in it, per se. Bennie had been half-right; it wasn't 'once an Army man, always an Army man' in August's case, it was, 'once a guy running himself ragged trying to save strangers from disaster, always a guy running himself ragged trying to save strangers from disaster'. Bosnia truly is the gift that keeps on giving.

Itzhak listens, arms folded, frowning. His gaze drifts over to his music stand. While he listens, his mind throws off a fractal branch dedicated to thinking about 'Ave Maria' and where he needs to work on it. He's not drawing it out long enough, hauntingly enough. It needs to soar without getting sloppy. More bow. Always more bow.

He grunts when August is done, shoves off from the counter hips-first, opens the fridge. <<He's as smart as you. I guess I can't argue with that. Bein' smart don't mean you can't act stupid, though. Ask me how I know.>>

Stephanie had made him something she called a breakfast casserole, eggs with sausage, hash browns, and cheese. It was really nice of her to cook for him after she had to call 911 when he was unconscious in the bathroom. (That whole story gets across to August. Itzhak, after throwing up for several hours and spiking a fever that just wouldn't come down, had started the shower. Then black stars had bloomed in his vision. When he came to it was to Stephanie shaking him. He hadn't been able to talk to her, but he'd been able to kythe. He'd never been that sick in his life, never even close.)

Anyway, he gets the casserole out because he's effin' starving. Once his appetite came back, it started roaring. Itzhak cuts off a square of it while another fractal extrusion pops out of his mind. This one's about August and about how he can't help but need to help people. And how actually, Itzhak admires and likes that about him, but it came from such a bad source.

As a sort of apology, Itzhak thinks about what Alexander had shown him about himself: the sea cave, beauty carved out by relentless adversity.

Stupid and suicidal aren't the same thing. August almost lets that get out. Almost. It hovers between them on the link, a thought he knows he shouldn't share so explicitly.

Instead he opts for, <<Yeah I've done a bit of that myself. I just think this came from somewhere else. Somewhere that will make anything with you two harder. So.>> So, keep it in mind. So, be careful. Please, be careful.

A soft sigh for how hard the flu hit Itzhak, heavy with regret August couldn't be there to help in any way. He was, after all, half-comatose in his cabin, convalescing with Alexander, who was afraid of killing anyone.

He doesn't hide that from Itzhak, lets him see it. The gleaming red rage lurking in Alexander's mind, Gohl's infection worming its way into his every thought and deed. Including--

No. Not that one. Itzhak sees a hint of it. Something about when Ruiz came to bring Alexander to the cabin.

The ugliness creeping in Alexander's mind isn't all that different from the blight of August's forest, come to it, but with August, Gohl was weaponizing him against his friends and loved ones in a whole different way. Still. Regret, that he couldn't come see him in the hospital. That he dragged them all into the middle of what he felt he deserved for sacrificing anything to that bastard.

<<Mmm. He's right, you know.>> August adds his own version of the image: a lava tube, gleaming black and red-veined with obsidian, quartz glinting on stalactites and stalagmites. A similar concept, if sources from fire rather than water. Earth, hewn into new shapes.

Itzhak scratches the back of his head, blushing. The thought of Alexander calling him beautiful is bad enough without August agreeing (and showing him more natural beauty to compare to him). And that's bad enough without August making it clear he expects Itzhak and Ruiz to sleep together sooner or later. Itzhak is not convinced of that at ALL, but Roen apparently is.

The microwave dings, distracting him. Heck yeah! He's so hungry. Itzhak gets his plate out. <<Don't feel bad, okay?>> he sends, while finding a fork, hip-bumping the drawer closed, and digging in. <<You were sick too.>>

The image of Gohl's infection in Alexander's mind gives him pause. <<...Yeah. I talked to him. He's feeling not so good about himself.>> That same infection is in Itzhak, but maybe it's because he's not related to Gohl that he's finding it fairly tolerable. Or maybe because it's pretty natural to him to fly off the handle about anything, anyway.

August laughs, rueful and amused. The view from the recovering forest with its yellowed aspens and red oaks and maples coloring the evergreens is clear enough.

But maybe they won't. It could happen. How many men had August done this little dance with and somehow managed to not fall inot bed with? ...fine, not that many. He was thirty and quite aware of being tolerably decent looking, so sue him. But sometimes, it didn't happen. Sometimes it was just a dance and then nothing else. Sometimes.

This town's too small, though. In Seattle you could lose one another. In Gray Harbor, not so much.

He lets that go. He's said his piece. Plenty else to think on. Like how he should've taken that shiv from the thing hunting him and Isabella before it cut her fucking back open. Like how he should've known he'd not be able to heal that tree by himself, and had maybe instead fed it the power it needed to torment the rest of them.

<<Sorry, this guilt trip is already at ten thousand feet with the fasten seatbelt sign off.>> He makes it clear he appreciates the thought, though, appreciates that Itzhak, at least, doesn't blame him.

He can relate, then, to Alexander's position right now, at least somewhat. Bitter amusement lends a dusky glow to the river at the notion Itzhak isn't in a position to notice Gohl's influence. <<That could be.>> Silence as he mulls it over. The autumn forest sways in that wind. <<I've been asked before how I didn't go crazy, in Bosnia, with the Gift working. And, well...I didn't know it shouldn't feel like that. All those Vietnam vets came back, told us all it was hell. I get there, and it's hell. Seemed reasonable. So. Maybe you were born in this briar patch, you know?>>

Kything is so awesome. Itzhak can eat and scold August at the same time. <<Hey, listen, you didn't know. You didn't know! We're all new to this. So fine, guilt trip away, but you didn't know and I'm not gonna be convinced of anything else. You lived, she lived, me and Alexander and de la Vega lived. Sure your zombie tree had a lot to say to me about...>> he hesitates, <<about what a loser I am and how my ma and sister are better off without me around anyway, and I should break up with Izeleh and Bex and stop acting like I can be a decent guy, and a bunch of stuff like that. It's nothing I don't already know.>>

Well, he didn't mean to go into quite that much detail. Maybe he's stinging a little bit more than he thought. The merry-go-round of self loathing squeaks on. It's true though. He really is quite familiar with the litany of his personal failures.

<<Maybe,>> he says, then, at the idea that he's just like this so Gohl can't make it that much worse. <<But, Jesus, dude. You were in Bosnia with all ya receiving channels open? God, no wonder.>> His attention shifts to the looming, silent volcano. So that's where that comes from. No wonder.

August winces at all of that; the trees bow a little in the wind, the river's surface froths. <<Yeah, it went on at length with me too.>> Oh how it had. In the darkness, inside that seed; not dying and dead people he couldn't save, just something he'd willingly given up that was more than a little angry about being a sacrifice. A whole different failure. So it went.

<<Yeah. I guess I didn't.>> He admits that grudgingly. He's not used to being so new to something as to make these kinds of mistakes, the ones that feel so elementary and baseline. The kind that got people killed. Then laughs. <<Hey, at least you got to try it out, right? Set some grass on fire. Heal something big.>>

As Itzhak's attention drifts that was, so does August's. The volcano, which has a gleam of water down in it, and an island with a small, new, clean sapling struggling to start over. Correctly, this time. But he's not going to look at it. <<Yeah. But, well--I didn't know. I didn't realize it had to be something else until...>>

Now that Itzhak has some understanding of what the Spirit Gift feels like at a higher level, what comes next makes more sense. Utter, pitch black darkness, and everywhere, pain. Emotional, physical. His own, other people's. Dozens and dozens of other people, flooding down like magma chambers emptying into a caldera that can't take anymore. It happens like a volcanic eruption, too. Not one envisioned by Hollywood, slowed down so the details can sink in. It's like it is in nature. One second, there's a mountain; the next, there's darkness and destruction and agony. It's that fast.

And just like that, August snuffs it out. He hadn't intended to show it, but the link is uncertain to him now, and some part of him can still feel when Itzhak had that power. <<That's when I figured it out.>>

More specifically, set some grass on fire with Ruiz. Itzhak's reddening up again thinking about it. Oh the way Ruiz's fire had been something savage, like the wolf of his soul. <<If only I'da been able to enjoy Alexander tying me down.>> Alexander had tied him down while he was naked, no less. Whew. Itzhak hadn't thought of it until now, but he needs to spend some time very seriously considering when that happened. <<Yeah, I got to try it out. It's way different than what I can do. There's way more of it, for one thing. I'm strong, but I'm only strong in a couple ways. That other power, it covers so much. Jeez.>> And he's a little jealous. Only a little though.

He's finished the chunk of casserole, and it's a good thing too, when August's experience suddenly comes down the link. Itzhak stiffens, eyes widening as if he can somehow open them enough to see through the awful darkness. The plate drops from his hand, smashing on the floor.

August flinches when the plate breaks, almost jerking his hand out of Eleanor's grip. The echo of that half-second careens between them, and he has to take a few breathes to steady himself. The wind howls, the trees bend.

Gradually he calms, reaches out and mends the plate. He broke it, he'll fix it. The pieces shiver on the floor in front of Itzhak, yank themselves back together, one and all, like a small magnet's undoing time.

<<Sorry.>> The ruined side of the volcano sits in silent testimony of how that all went. <<Sorry.>>

He hasn't thought about it in so long. Not like that. Certainly hasn't actually shown it to someone.

Fuck you, Gohl.

All of Itzhak's busy tendrils of mental power had recoiled into themselves, like a fern in reverse. He's very still. As August reaches 'through' him like they'd done with Alexander, mending the plate, he stirs and looks down, watching the plate reseal itself together.

<<It's just from Goodwill,>> he murmurs. Slowly his mind unfurls again. He stoops to pick up the plate. <<Bubbeleh, it's okay. You went through it. I just got a little taste. Now...now I understand better.>>

He understands better now why August chooses to live out of town. Why he chose a tiny podunk town to begin with. Why he laid in that seed unable to break free. Why he rushes to help Itzhak or Ignacio or Finch or Alexander or anyone in his orbit.

Itzhak's worried just thinking at August won't be enough to convince him that he's forgiven. He wishes he could hug him.

General reactions coalesce out of August's disappointment in himself. You shouldn't have to have seen that though. No one should have to see that.

He drags himself off that particular ride. It doesn't get anyone anywhere, least of all either of them. <<It's still your plate, or your landlady's, and I still made you break it. Anyways. Last thing you need to be running out of is plates. Then you're eating in bowls when you don't need to be and soon it's anarchy in your damned kitchen.>> Okay, maybe that's just his memories of a shared house with four guys, the rest of whom hadn't been raised to understand the dishes would not, in fact, put themselves into the dishwasher, nor get out and hop into the cabinets once clean.

It's a welcome distraction from that. That all came After. Arguing over whose turn it was to deal with the shredding and recycling. He's able to smile a little at the notion of a hug. <<Next time see one another,>> he assures Itzhak. <<Don't even have to preface it with anything.>>

That leads him to thinking. <<The funeral.>> A frisson of apology for bringing it up. But... <<Do you need something to wear for it, or are you good?>>

Itzhak snorts. Kitchen anarchy. Sounds like something he'd be into, actually.

He sets to washing the plate. Now that it's been resurrected it seems rude to just leave it for later. Snorts at the image of four guys in one house, none of whom can work out how to do the damn dishes. <<Any of them ever tell you they just can't see a mess? Why do guys think anybody believes that?>>

'The funeral' pulls out a long gory string of associations, many of which have to do with Seattle. He'd rented a violin there apparently, and bought a new case. (The case is glossy candy-apple red. It's no Dropkick Murphys sticker, but it'll do.) For something to wear, he remembers standing for the tailor in Bex's apartment, wearing the expensive steel-blue suit that his bestie-with-benefits then gave to him. <<I'm good.>> The suit isn't black, but Gohl will just have to cope. <<...should probably worry about Alexander, though.>>

He remembers how he'd felt seeing himself in the mirror, too. A man with fierce eyes and inked hands, someone who's clearly been around the block a time or three, in an elegant suit that made the most of his height and long limbs and narrow hips. He still doesn't know how to feel about surprising himself with his own reflection. Who was that guy? Not him!

The cleaning of the dish soothes August some, in that way that all simple, physical labor does. It's half of why he went into what he did. The activity eased the other things going on inside him. <<I'm positive I heard that from someone at least once.>> He rolls his eyes, which echos into the link as a quieting of the wind whipped up by Gohl in favor of the sound of the trees themselves. Well, he'd always had clean clothes and sheets; the rest of them, probably not. He shudders to remember it.

He takes in the new case and rented violin with the gentlest touch of acknowledgement. More things Gohl is taking. Take, take, all he does is take.

The suit, though, and especially Itzhak in it, gets a murmur of approval out of him. <<Very nice. She has good taste.>> August can relate to the 'not him' feeling; laughs a little at those memories. <<I was going to show you what I'm wearing but now I might just make you wait and see.>> No, no black for Gohl. They weren't mourners. They were part of the 'funeral party'. It was different.

The bit about Alexander gets a wince. <<Fair point. I'll check in with him, make sure he's got something.>> Unfortunately nothing August has will fit him, so a different solution will be in order.

Sensing that it's soothing August, Itzhak washes the other few things too, and dries them, and puts them away. He agrees wryly about August's housemates. Men are disgusting (memories of roommates he'd had himself; he tried to live alone as much as was feasible in New York City).

He agrees about Bex's taste, too, with a little quirk of his mouth. Itzhak's careful to keep too much about her from leaking into the kythe. That way lies a lot of potential embarrassment for both him and August. One thing he lets himself remember: Bex shaving him, cool and professional, wielding a straight razor with skill. She's a woman of unusual skills, Bex. Unusual passions, too. ...Yeah he needs to stop right there.

<<You're gonna make me wait?>> he sends, teasing, grateful August is willing to tease him. That flash of memory, oof. He's glad August didn't pull away from the kythe after that. <<It must be real good.>>

Men really are gross. August can't even recommend dating them, accept a lot of them are also hot. Also, he's one, and he does like dating people. It's an issue.

Well, Alexander does know how to clean, so there's one guy who's not gross. Personal grooming may not be high on his list of priorities, but August's cabin didn't fall into chaos and disaster when the illness really got bad. Alexander was going stir crazy, and had taken it out on every spec of dirt he could locate.

A brief bit of a memory of the two of them in the bathroom, Alexander stitching one hell of a gash on August's shoulder, cleaning a lot of cuts on August's feet. (Those still sting, but they're coming along.)

August considers Bex shaving Itzhak. Smiles at the direction those thoughts go, but lets it be just a teasing smile, and comment free. <<You're good for her, I think. This whole business, this kind of shit--it's good she has someone to help her feel safer.>> Of course he knows, come to it, there might not have actually been much Itzhak could do against Gohl. But that wasn't the point.

<<It's my favorite.>> He wore it to graduation, and Zelda's wedding. A glimpse of it: deep, dark plum purple, though August is younger, his hair and beard still black. The cufflinks are something black and pearly--

It's gone. <<That's all you get.>>

That there is definitely a flash of jealousy, hot and bitter as good coffee. Why didn't Itzhak get to tend to August? Why didn't Itzhak get to live with Alexander? It ISN'T FAIR. Then he's shoving the reaction away, cursing. Fuck you, Gohl.

It's an honest reaction, but Gohl's fuckery makes it both a hundred times worse and strongly suggests lashing out as an excellent plan.

He thinks about Bex instead. <<You think so?>> His violin goes a little yearning; that must be what his eyebrows sound like when he makes that face. <<Well...good.>> Instead of anything more complicated, he settles on that. And hmphs, amused, when August flashes him. <<Purple? Seriously? Can't wait to see that.>>

At least the funeral will give them that. They can see each other looking their best.

August offers a hint of apology; he hadn't expected that kind of reaction, though in hindsight maybe he should have. He thinks better than to tease about it, even though 'next time you can walk over glass so Alexander can clean your feet' is right there, waiting to be said. (It's Itzhak, he'd probably agree to such a deal.)

<<Yes.>> He wants to say more, yet knows he shouldn't. Another car that might swerve off a cliff after driving with the tires half-off it for several miles. Well, they'd burn that bridge when they got it.

<<It was his favorite color.>> The memory is fond; the guy's maybe five years older than August. The sort who nevers settles down, likes to be generous to his lovers while he's with them. Average height, lanky, curly brown hair when he doesn't keep it short, dark eyes, an odd but not unpleasantly shaped face. There and gone in a second, just a brief image of him on the deck of a yacht somewhere, the Seattle skyline in the distance.

<<Doing our best too.>> Because, fuck Gohl, this was for them, for the town, for everyone else. For Rebecca's sister, Hyacinth's father...the list went on and on.

August yawns, glances at his phone. <<Okay. Gonna get a nap here.>> The link starts to fade, though before it does, a final murmur. <<Thanks.>> For getting him out of there. For not being mad at him about it. And so on.