Chapter Text
August 28. Tempest. Noon.
A month has passed since I had that nightmare with Amelie, and while my relationship with my dear friend is not quite the way it was before, it has significantly improved since that Incident occurred. We spend more nights together than we do apart, and the frequent nightmares I suffer are soothed by the warmth of my dear friend’s tenderness with relative ease. He claims that my presence is as much of a balm to his soul as his is to mine, which is absolutely preposterous considering he knows I don’t have one. But beyond that, I know with utmost certainty that my dear friend is incorrect because there is no conceivable way that I could match the way he graced me with the freedom to live on that fateful night, nor the way his soft embrace pushes back the wraiths that threaten to enclose me every night since.
I would be desolate without his kindness in this agency where he is my only, my very dear friend. Yet even now, I feel a deep sense of isolation that his words can only calm to a degree. Rimbaud doesn’t truly know what it is to be alone in this world, so alone that not a single person in existence is able to share in your experience and truly know what it is that you have endured. He is unable to understand my pain despite his best efforts, and though I cannot fault him for that, I fear that the rift between us is doomed to crumble the ground surrounding it and grow ever larger. How I wish that nagging fear had been wrong, but I have unwillingly and unfortunately become an expert in predicting my own suffering.
I now find myself in a meeting with Rimbaud and our superior, Glass, in a soundproofed room with no windows and little lighting. The air is heavy with tension and the person has not even begun to speak, and to make matters worse they keep glancing at me with an expression somewhere between pity and disdain.
“You two cannot tell anyone about this mission. This must be resolved with the utmost secrecy unless it is successful,” Glass cleared their throat and then locked eyes with me, and their expression filled me with a sudden unease. “It is regrettable that you must be the one on this mission but your team is the only one with even a minuscule chance of success.”
I bristle in my seat, the alarms going off in my head, and Rimbaud must have taken note of it because he subtly interlocks his pinkie finger with mine beneath the table. My dear friend is so attuned to the most perceptible changes in my body language, and I am forever grateful for that. I am forever grateful that he took time to write his own instruction manual for dealing with something as broken and unknown to him as I.
“There is another being like Verlaine,” Glass says cautiously, their eyes flickering but not dropping from my gaze. I do my best to school my expression into something neutral but for the first time ever, a single flame of hope sparks in my chest, hope that I’m not entirely unloved by God and that there really is another comet in the empty space that has been my life. “We need you both to extract it from a scientific research facility in Japan. It is a new model of skill weapon that happens to have the appearance of a young boy.”
“It?” That one choice of descriptor is enough to splash water on the singular, weak flame of hope. In its place is the all too familiar tempest of my rage, always twisting and churning just below the surface of the water in this godforsaken place. I slam my hands down on the table and push myself into a standing position. “This is a child you’re talking about, not a pistol or a blade.”
Glass’ expression does not change but their hand slides to their side, the side where they have a holstered gun. All this time and they still fear that I may snap and kill them one day. This is the one and only time I’m mildly considering it. “It is a weapon. Thinking of it as a child will only make the extraction more complicated and therefore will jeopardize the already slim chances of success. Watch your emotions, agent, or you definitely won’t be making it home from this mission.”
I look back to where Rimbaud remains seated and silent, with what I can only recognize as pity shining in his eyes. Not pity, not again. I hate being looked at like some kind of wounded animal that can’t fend for itself in the wild anymore. I can’t stay in this meeting room anymore or the situation may deteriorate even further, so I turn on my heel and storm out of the meeting. I don’t stop until I get out of the building and back to the relative safety of my apartment, and I finally allow myself to think when I get there and collapse onto the bed.
“I understand why you are upset,” I hear Rimbaud’s voice roll in from the doorway, followed by the gentle click of the door closing behind him. “There is someone out there like you, and he is being treated horribly. It’s upsetting.”
“Go away if you’re going to pretend to understand,” I force my voice to soften but some bite still remains in it. “That’s a small part of why I’m upset, and you surely won’t be able to understand the rest. You aren’t like me, you couldn’t hope to know what that was like for me to hear.”
I had felt hope for the first time in my entire existence, the hope that God did love me enough to put someone on this Earth who exists in the same meaningless way that I do. I had felt hope that I was no longer alone in this world, that there was someone who truly could understand me in the way that my dear friend always pretends to. Hope that the burden of what I endured all these years could be shared with another, so that it might be lighter on the both of us. But that hope was shattered almost instantaneously when that utterance of “it” left Glass’ lips in reference to that boy, and shattered beyond repair when they referred to him as a weapon. It was naive of me to allow myself to feel that way; knowing how beings such as myself are treated in this organization, in this world, there is no possibility that seeing another enduring what I have would be a hopeful or healing experience.
“Then tell me,” Rimbaud’s voice cuts through my thoughts as usual, but unusually it is unwelcome this time. I don’t need his empty comfort. “Explain to me what it is about you that I don’t understand. Explain to me why else you’re upset when you’re close to not being alone anymore. You’re going to have a brother in this place, another person who can understand you and keep you company.”
My breath hitches and I lazily roll my head to the side to look at Rimbaud. “What did you say? Repeat that last part.”
Rimbaud pauses for a moment and his brows scrunch together adorably in confusion before real understanding smooths those creases. “You’re going to have a brother in this place. His name is Chuuya, by the way. You left before getting a look at the files.”
Hearing him say that word in reference to the boy we’re assigned to bring back to this god awful place causes a thought to cross my mind with such force that I could have sworn I felt a physical click as it slid into place. He’s going to be my brother… I have family now in a way that I never have before. “Chuuya… A little brother, eh? That would make you his brother-in-law.”
A flicker of affection softens my gaze as I stare into my dear friend’s eyes until I realize the implication of what I had just said. Panic threatens to sear my mind until he removes his shoes and lays in the bed next to me, propped up on his elbow and looking at me with a light that I had never seen before. Or rather, it was a light in his eyes that I had never noticed before. “I suppose it does, Paul. How exciting, to think that I’ll have family again, here of all places.”
My dear friend’s words cause the truth of the situation to sink in again, they cause the tentative smile to fade from my visage. To have a brother, in this place that has treated me with such barely concealed hostility and alienation… It is unthinkable. “Rimbaud, I don’t want him here. Not in a place like this. This is no place for a child to grow up, Chuuya won’t be loved here.”
Rimbaud swallows hard and reaches a hand out to grasp my own where it lays on my chest in an attempt at comfort. It fails. “He’ll be loved by us. I understand your concerns but he’ll be treated just fine here. At the very least he’ll have us, and won’t that be enough? We can make that enough.”
I laugh bitterly and move my hand away from his, still gazing up at him. “You clearly don’t get it. You think this is enough for me? You really think being here has been worth all of the fear and distrust and loneliness that I have been subjected to? It was made clear to me in that meeting that the people here don’t consider me human, save for you, and he will be thought of the same. You really think that I would allow my own brother to experience the same pain that I awaken to every single morning?”
“This isn’t enough for you,” Rimbaud clears his throat and suddenly appears uncomfortable. “I’m sorry, I thought I was making it enough for you. My mistake.”
“For the love of… This has nothing to do with you,” I shake my head and roll off of the bed back into a standing position, leaning against the wall furthest from Rimbaud. I can feel it, the cracking as the rift between us grows, and it burns me more than I could have imagined. “Please leave, my dear friend. I need time alone to think for myself about the situation without worrying about your feelings.” I realize with regret how harsh that sounds and open my mouth to offer an apology but my dear friend is already moving to leave. He lingers momentarily in the doorway as he pulls it open.
“Paul,” he lets out a shuddering breath that pierces what Rimbaud would call my heart, but I know mine is nothing but an empty organ. The knowledge doesn’t make this moment hurt any less . “You are human, and that boy Chuuya is human too, I know it in my soul. I thought if I believed that and reminded you of that faithfully enough, that you would start to believe it too. If that is not enough for you, if my love of you and the humanity you possess is not enough to make this existence bearable, then I don’t know what will be. That frightens me on your behalf. ”
I close my eyes and let the tears crest and fall like waves, and when the door clicks shut behind Rimbaud the expected loneliness envelops me as I slump to the ground. I regret hurting my dear friend but if I apologize then the man would surely stay to comfort me, and after what I said to him I simply don’t deserve it. Yet Rimbaud’s words keep replaying in my head: would anything be enough for me to be at peace with myself? I turn the question over and over but cannot come up with a single suitable answer. There is nothing, absolutely nothing in this wretched world that could help me feel less unbearably alone. The thought is a raging curse but solidifies my idea of what needs to be done, and a protective feeling mounts inside my chest. Chuuya will never know what he is, he will never know that he is like me. He’ll grow up believing that he is human and I will never tell nor treat him otherwise. I’ll give him the normal life that I was never once allowed to experience myself.
I’ll be so terribly lonely, I know, if he doesn’t understand that we are the same kind of being. I’ll be denied the medicinal herb of having even one other being in this world that I can share my background with, but that’s alright. For the sake of my little brother, I will shoulder that burden in silence, and I will do it with a smile on my face. Betraying my country during that extraction mission may forever sever my ties with Rimbaud, but for the sake of Chuuya’s happiness, I will happily shoulder that pain as well.
March 30. Apparently My Birthday? Morning.
I’m back there again, back in the cellar that I spent so much of my life imprisoned in. I stand in front of Pan, attempting to protect him despite my vehement hatred for him because that’s what I was ordered to do. The sounds of breaking walls and the stench of violence fill the space as the intruder draws closer to our location, and then I finally get a glimpse of the cause of the cacophony. The most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen in my life steps into the poorly-lit space, and for just a moment, before I remember that God would never lower themself enough to send me a savior, I think that he must be an angel here to deliver me. The next moments are unclear, full with bright flashes of light and bursts of pain as I fight alongside Pan against this person whom I can only refer to as an angel from the light exploding from his hands and the curtain of raven hair that floats majestically around him with every near-choreographic movement of his body.
Rimbaud manages to get close to the machine that produces the metallic powder Pan has always used to keep me mindlessly under his control, and I dare to feel something for the first time in a long time. I feel a deep yearning for my freedom that I had long written off as pointless, and then he does it, he destroys the machine and grants me my freedom on a silver platter. I don’t waste a single second pondering my next move or the possible repercussions, I simply ball up my fist and direct my ability towards Pan. Half of his body disappears and the rest crumples to the floor in a pool of his own disgusting blood.
I turn to face the angel who has delivered me from the waking nightmare that has been my life under Pan, and suddenly I am tackling him to the floor with my hands around his neck. I don’t remember this part, this never happened. Why am I harming my dear friend? Why are my hands choking him so tightly? Why are my legs pinning his arms to the floor at his sides, using my ability to make them heavier so he cannot so much as pull at the hands upon his throat? There is such an eternity of despair in his eyes, yet when he opens his lips to speak to me, there is only affection in the words he strains to push past his lips. “I love you, dear Paul.”
“You’ll regret that,” My voice comes out pained, as I am fighting back tears. “I am not something that is loved and you will see that.” I continue to press down until his nose bleeds and his eyes fall closed, until I am sure that he is unconscious, and only then do I find the will within me to pull away. I frown at the blood on his face and take his red scarf from where it lays on the ground beside us. I am just now realizing, as the blood runs down his cheek, what a terrible color red is on my dear angel. I gently press the scarf to his face and wipe away the blood I have forced from him, regret searing through me.
“Goodbye, dear friend,” I check his pulse to ensure that the angel still lives, and then I finally stand up from where I sit on his chest. I turn to leave him lying there, eager to forsake him along with the place that I have always regarded as a shackle. “Goodbye, and thank you.”
My bloodshot eyes fly open in a panic, and I move to jump out of the bed, only to find Rimbaud wrapped around me. Ah, only a nightmare then. I wrap my arms tighter around his waist, tucking my head back into the crook of his neck where I fit almost too perfectly. I inhale his grounding scent and ghost a kiss over his skin, hoping it is light enough that he will not be disturbed by it. I loathe the thought that this is one of my final opportunities to relish in his presence this way. The nightmare itself doesn’t surprise me one bit, as it is the anniversary of when my dear friend liberated me from the darkness and carried my unconscious body out into the light.
What does leave me disturbed is that in two days that dream may come to pass, that I may be pushed to force the breath from my dear friend’s lungs. I feel shaken simply from having done that in my dream, will I truly have the resolve to do so in the waking world? Can I harm, and possibly kill, the very man who returned my life to me? The question sends a shiver down my spine because I am unable to answer one way or the other. I stay safely in the ravenette’s embrace until I have calmed sufficiently and then I carefully extract myself from his arms and head to my hideout.
Rimbaud understands that I need this day mostly to myself, to remember and feel and forget in a typhoon of spiraling emotions. I spend much of it thumbing through the journals that I secretly kept from N, forcefully reopening the wounds that those memories split open and making them heal over again. So many of the entries are moments I had entirely forgotten, repressed by the one part of my brain that cared about me enough to try to protect me from them. Burying Amelie, the first time I was thrown into the isolation room as punishment, disposing of those who I held dear when Pan deemed them no longer of enough use to justify their existence.
I am unable to determine whether these or the memories I was allowed to cling to are more disturbing to me. There was waking for that initial time, naked and screaming from the electric currents being pushed into my veins, the way my body kept trying to fail me and being forced back awake by the scientists who showed nothing besides indifference to my pain. Oftentimes I fantasize about what bliss it would have been had my body succeeded in failing on that day. There was the only time Pan hurt his prized weapon, when he discovered a small book of sketches which I had carelessly hidden within my pillowcase. He had been so angry with me, breaking my fingers one by one while coldly lecturing me on the sin it was for an Artificial like me to partake in art, repeating countless times that it was a beauty reserved for God’s treasured.
These are memories I can never admit to my dear friend, though believe me when I say I have ached to on several occasions. He already worries for me so deeply, and I fear that care will forever be marred into pity if he were to discover the full scope of what I endured at that man’s mercy. So instead of confiding in anyone, once the spiral has tired me out sufficiently, I sketch these scars in charcoal as black as the soul of the man who gave them to me. I take the wounds of the past and create beauty with them in defiance of he who sought to purge all love and passion from my existence. My hands brush the pages and I take a deep breath, steadying myself as I sketch my hands broken and bruised, gently cupped around a bird with an injured wing. I work in a feverish state, and the dull age-old ache that strikes my fingers when I move them a certain way reminds me of the very reason I need to create. That man took so much from me, morphed me into this being that cannot love Rimbaud, broke me in ways no human would have survived, but I will be truly damned if I let him keep me from the beauty of creation.
By the time I complete it and close the sketchbook, I am thirsty and hungry and the sun has already abandoned the sky for the night. Suddenly I hear those footsteps coming down the ladder, the soft and nonthreatening steps of my dear friend. I knew he would come find me at the end of today, he always has. What surprises me is that he has a tote bag on his arm, and when I stand and come closer to greet him, he quickly moves the bag behind himself so I cannot see its contents. The smile on Rimbaud’s face is nervous as he gestures for me to sit at the table, and I oblige despite not knowing what it is he seems so secretive about. Rimbaud brings two wine glasses from the kitchenette before returning to sit next to me at the table, taking care to set the bag on his side furthest from me.
“We both know what today is,” Rimbaud takes a deep breath as he pulls a bottle of wine out of the bag and begins to pour it ever so gracefully. “It is the day that you took your life back, the day you freed yourself from that dreadful man. It was the day your life as a free man began, and some might even say that makes it more your birthday than the date of your initial birth. So… happy birthday, dearest Paul.”
He raises his glass and lifts it towards me, and though I still feel somewhat dazed I clink my glass against his own. He brings out a small pudding, I can tell it’s from our favorite pâtissier. He wordlessly brings out two spoons and hands one to me with such an expression of bliss on his face that it makes my heart stutter momentarily. As we eat, I think he can tell the confusion written all over my expression and clears his throat.
“You seem puzzled,” Rimbaud reaches his free hand out to cover mine on the table in a soothing manner. “I think birthdays are absolutely essential. Though they are nothing more than a celebration of your birth, that is precisely what makes them a vital occasion to celebrate. Paul, the simple fact of your existence is something worth rejoicing in, something that I personally am grateful for every day that I have you as my partner. No matter what anyone else ignorantly says, you deserve to exist in this world and you deserve to be loved.”
Despite the conviction behind what my dear friend says, I cannot bear to hear it. It fills me with neither happiness nor relief, it only reminds me of the weight of the guilt I feel to be planning to leave this man behind along with the rest of this life. How can I look him in the eyes and accept his beautiful words when in two days time I will have shredded all that exists between us? My resolve to keep Chuuya from suffering the same fate as I has not wavered in the past several months and surely will not waver now, no matter how deeply I long to rest in my dear friend’s love and kindness. How can I bear the softness in his gaze when I am unable to return any of it, when I may resort to shedding his blood when the accursed time is upon me to diverge from the assigned mission?
“And,” a mischievous smile crosses Rimbaud’s face as he turns back away from me to reach into the bag that I had assumed was now empty. “No birthday is complete without a present.”
All my instincts are screaming for me to stop him, to reject the present that I so clearly am undeserving of. But I stay silent as he pulls out a beautiful black bowler hat and places it onto the table after moving the pudding out of his way. “This isn’t just any hat either, it is a special one utilizing something I… well, that I may have stolen from Pan’s lab on this night all those years ago. The sweat absorbent lining of the hat utilizes a special metal that allows the wearer to resist any external command sequences that may try to tamper with their control over their own body. To put it into simpler words, so long as you wear this hat, no one will be able to manipulate you in the vile way you once were.”
I swallow hard and try not to flinch as he suggestively pushes the hat in my direction, instead taking it into my hands and turning it over to look at it from different angles. Of course my dear friend would get me something so thoughtful and personal, something that would serve to bring me closer to the bodily autonomy and free will that humans are born possessing. I am completely at a loss for how to respond after receiving such a perfect gift from the man I am about to betray. I cannot possibly thank him, I feel too undeserving of overwhelming kindness such as this. “Sure, I’ll take it.”
His face falls slightly but he recovers his cheery expression with relative ease and pours more wine into both of our glasses. I put the hat on (it fits almost too perfectly) and take the glass from him, noting that his expression relaxes upon seeing that I am at least wearing the gift. We drink the wine in silence until the bottle is completely emptied, tension and discomfort in the air while I wish he had never given a birthday to a wretch like me. He is blissfully unaware but he is simply creating more memories that will have to be ripped from my body and buried two days from now. He eventually gathers up his things and bids me goodnight, brushing my hair aside and kissing my cheek gently before ascending the ladder and leaving me alone again. I somehow manage to force words from my lips before he is gone completely. “Goodnight, dear friend.”
The moment I hear the latch at the top of the ladder close, I am running to the bathroom mirror. “That bastard,” I whisper at my reflection as a smile creeps defiantly onto my face. “It’s stunning on me.”
March 31. Our Last Day. Twilight.
My dear friend and I rise early this morning, though we are both reluctant to untangle our limbs from one another. Neither of us wants to waste what could likely (in my mind: certainly) be our last day together, as the higher ups themselves expect us to not survive this mission. Little do they know, regardless of how well the mission goes according to plan tomorrow, neither I nor the boy will be returning to this hellhole.
“Is it alright if I accompany you to feed the ducks today?” I brush the thoughts away as quickly as I can, lest they taint the final moments where I am loved by my dear friend. Rimbaud’s head turns towards me so fast that he has to put a hand against the wall to steady himself afterward.
“You want to feed the ducks with me?” His eyebrow quirks up in a disbelieving expression, to which I can only respond with an eye roll. His hands go up in a defensive gesture and then he goes to his wardrobe to busy himself with picking out his winter wear for the trip. This kind of exchange is something I will miss so heavily, the communication between us that transcends a need for words. This bond has been the only worthwhile one of my life, the only one where I have been trusted and cared for, and I never imagined myself being so foolish as to let it slip away from me.
I find myself being the one carrying the bag of rolled oats while my dear friend grasps my free arm with his own hands, insisting that it is the only possible way for him to endure such cold. We both know that Rimbaud faithfully does this on his own every morning, and thus has survived the outdoors just fine without leeching the heat from my body. Still, I feel such affection for the man that I cannot find the will to deny him these indulgences. The sky is painted in loving pastels and the lake shimmers with a light so beautiful that it could almost compare to that in Rimbaud’s gaze. Almost. Once we get to the tree he normally stops at, we lean heavily against its sturdy trunk and begin to scatter the oats in front of the ducks gathered nearby. They don’t shy away from me the way that most living beings do, they don’t look at me with the same hostility. A part of me regrets not having accompanied Rimbaud here before today, and a part of me is glad because it’s one less thing which pains me to let go of.
We walk back once the ducks seem to have had their fill, and I whistle while he softly hums along, the words to some song we haven’t heard in ages yet feels fitting for today.
I love you till the day I die
(So don’t die today
Please don’t die today)
Everything but you is an ugly lie
(That’s not how you pray
That’s not what you say)
If I’m here when you’re gone, I’ll fall apart
(Stop your crying now
Stop your crying now)
What’s the point of life without my heart?
You’re not dying now
You’ll survive somehow
Of course I love him. My love for him grew freely within me as flowers grow even on the lawns of houses that have been condemned, and much like those flowers, that love cannot save my house from annihilation. It pains me to admit that, even to myself, and I could not bear to tell him; it will only result in his heart being shattered into more and sharper fragments tomorrow.
Our next activity for the day is something we have done on many of our mutual days off, we bask in the warm light and heat of his fireplace as well as our companionship. He is knitting matching gloves for us with small pink lotuses on them, black ones for him and forest green ones for me. Meanwhile I open my sketchbook, the one that I allow him access to. The record player drones out soft instrumental music in the background while my hands start to shape the lines and softness of my dear friend’s likeness intertwined with mine. His head is laid on my shoulder, his hair cascading down my arm as he rests in my presence while I gaze lovingly down at him. I doubt my dear friend recalls this simple moment which has always been ever so dear to me, the moment when I felt trusted for the very first time in all of my life. I mean to gift it to him when it is complete, though I wonder in the back of my mind whether he will end up tearing it to pieces.
“Why exactly are you knitting those?” My real question is left unsaid for fear of sounding harsh and ruining the peace between us. Why are you knitting those when we will likely die tomorrow?
“What do you mean, why?” My dear friend smiles softly and continues his work without so much as sparing me a glance. “It is still spring, there will be some cold days yet. I’ll make a pair for Chuuya as well, once I complete these. Do you think he’ll be alright with the color red?”
“I see,” I force my voice out evenly, though my mind feels anything but peaceful. He does not know how it pains me to hear him speak as though our lives together will continue after tomorrow. I’m certain that Rimbaud thinks hearing him speak so confidently of the future is a comfort to me, and if I was not planning to rupture our bond then they would be. “Hmm I suppose you could wait until we have a chance to speak with him personally to make his? It seems unfair for us to get to pick the colors we want for ourselves while he simply takes what he is given.”
Rimbaud’s eyes snap up to meet mine and he nods several times in understanding. “How thoughtful you are, Paul. After so long of being pushed around by those scientists, it will make him feel warm to have a choice, even one as small as this. I want him to know that we are safe people for him, people that see his humanity and respect his autonomy. That, I think, will be a good way to start showing the boy that truth.”
“He will appreciate the gesture,” I clear my throat but there is still a heavy implied quietude in my words. “I am sure that I would have, in his shoes. But try not to worry too much about feeling safe to him, I have no doubt that he will come to trust you. That’s your way; you make people feel loved and at home.”
Again, there is much unsaid in my words. I trust you. You have made me feel loved and at home. I silently plead with him not to fight me when I alter the mission tomorrow, plead with him to help me save myself and Chuuya, plead with him to choose me over the strong sense of duty and responsibility that kept him going when this life forced him to abandon all that was precious to him. I desperately want to salvage our relationship but there is no feasible way I can see unless he, against all odds, chooses insignificant me over the country he loves so dearly and has sacrificed for all these years.
Rimbaud moves from his chair closer to the fire and presses himself against me on the loveseat, a soft sigh leaving his lips which tells me he is blissfully unaware of the dark storm clouds rolling in my head. He hums that song again while resuming his own work beside me.
It's been the night since you've been gone
(Please I have to go
Please, please let me go)
What's the use of writing one more song?
('Cause it's what you know
'Cause it's what you know)
It was you and me, that's what you said
(And it's always true
Aren't I here with you?)
I may look alive but inside I'm dead
(Well, let's make it true
Let's make that true)
“That’s one of my favorite memories of us,” My dear friend’s voice is softer than it has been all day, somehow more at peace. “You hadn’t moved an inch when I reawakened, you were so scared of disturbing me. That was the first time you allowed me to see your kindness.”
My heart pounds in my chest so wildly that I’m certain he must be able to hear it; he not only remembers but that moment is special to him as well. “My kindness? You think I am kind after being stuck with me for four years?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Rimbaud pauses his knitting and rests back against the couch to look closely into my eyes. My own hands pause their work so I can focus on indulging in the beauty of his golden gaze. “It is because I have been your close companion for all this time that I know your kindness. Even when you are behaving erratically or speaking harshly, there is a softness in your voice. You always allow me to cling to you, even when you yourself are cold and I am likely making it worse. You always ensure our opponents, no matter how vile they are, meet their ends quickly and with minimized suffering. I don’t think I’ve touched a tea kettle since we became close because you always make it for me. You are kind, Paul. Anyone paying attention could see that.”
“I wish you would not say things like that,” I take a deep shuddering breath. “You make me want to be the person that I am in your eyes, when I am not even a person to begin with. I want to be what you see and I never can be, not if I tried for fifty years.”
“You can’t know that,” my dear friend has tears pricking at the corners of his eyes, tears that do nothing to strain the hopeful smile he stubbornly graces me with. “My dear Paul, you cannot tell me with any certainty that you will never be the kind of person who I know in the deepest part of my soul that you already are. You said fifty years? Give them to me. I want you to be by my side, trying to believe in your own goodness and kindness, for that length of time and each time that heart inside you fails, I will warm it with my gloved hands and give it life again.”
I do something selfish then, though for once I can honestly say that I don’t regret it. I take his face in my charcoaled hands and slot my lips against his, kissing him more softly than I have done anything in my entire free life. His lips are cold but sweet, tasting of the sugar cookie-flavored lip balm he is so fond of, and beyond the sweetness is a fire blazing so brightly that it burns away all my doubts that he is the love of my life. Our lips part and the loss ripples through my body so suddenly and violently that I immediately try to reconnect them, only to be stalled by his hand against my chest.
“Not now,” Rimbaud sounds breathless and his cheeks are redder than I have ever had the pleasure of seeing them. “Tomorrow. My dearest Paul, kiss me again when we have rescued the boy, when we are home safe again. Please don’t let our first kiss be a goodbye, a kiss between lovers who will never touch again.”
My heart aches but I cannot deny him this sweetest of lies, so I simply nod and drink in the way he breathes out relief and buries his head in my neck. He doesn’t see the single tear that slides down my cheek and buries itself secretly in his hair. “Tomorrow, my dear friend.”