[Untitled]

Leon was on his second shirt when Stephen walked into the room. He put down the needle and thread promptly. Leon was on guard duty for that day, but damned if he was going to spend it contemplating the graffiti on the walls.

The "room" was little more than a damp, musty basement. Somehow, Leon and Charlie were able to convert it into something they could comfortably call home. Fluorescent bulbs in all the right places, pillows and couches everywhere that was dry, a decent dining table at the center, buckets to keep the place from flooding over -- it was a good place. Certainly well-lit enough for sewing.

And Leon was spending his time patching up some of the shirts they had brought in for emergency use. Their makeshift family of four was in an active business, and understandably, their clothes got ripped up a lot. They could always pick new clothes up off just anywhere, of course, but sewing relaxed Leon. Gave him something vaguely surgery-related to do with his hands.

Leon stared at Stephen while Stephen unlaced his rubber shoes. After a while Stephen had to stare back.

"Well...?" Leon said.

"Well, what."

"You're supposed to say 'Honey, I'm home.'"

If there was anything Leon liked doing - besides sewing - it was making people smile. It may have been an old line, it may have been cliche, but something in the way he said it must have been funny enough to make even Stephen smile.

"Not on your life, 'honey.'" Stephen kicked off his shoes and threw himself on the couch. His head landed near where Leon was sitting. Leon almost pricked his finger with the needle he was still holding.

"Hey!" he snapped. "Holding a deadly weapon here."

"Sorry." Stephen covered his eyes with one arm.

Leon continued with his sewing, knowing Stephen wouldn't speak further until 1) he was asked, or 2) there was something everyone else needed to know. Besides Sheila, Stephen was the one who most needed restful silence after a run.

Leon detested silence and would normally talk to himself just to kill it, but when Stephen was there, he tried to keep himself in check. There were heavy rings under Stephen's eyes, which meant he must have had a good run... which, in fact, Stephen hated. Even if the four of them decided long ago that they couldn't do anything about it, none of them liked their runs. And Stephen was the busiest one.

Leon went on sewing, but after a while he found himself watching the steady rise and fall of Stephen's chest. Compared to Leon, Stephen was easier to overlook at a glance: he was your regular wiry, tanned, good-looking, redheaded teenager of average weight and height. If there was anything that would distinguish him, it was the indescribable feeling of motion one got when looking too long at him, the way Leon was looking now.

Any ordinary human would probably not be able to look at Stephen too long. Leon guessed that many had tried, and something inside them had been struck blind. It would probably be a lot like staring at the sun.

In contrast to Stephen, Leon was tall, gawky, white-haired and deathly pale -- he would fit his classical definition more, he had decided. He hated looking at himself in the mirror, but he supposed they all did.

Leon had taken to thinking that being together, supporting each other, had made them blind to each other's physical faults. For one thing, he could no longer find any physical fault in Stephen. In essence he was seductive, even more than little Sheila, though give Sheila a few more years and she would definitely trump this one. Look at him lying close by with his hands folded on his stomach, already-too-long red hair framing his permanently serious face in a dark halo.

If Stephen's eyes were open, he would probably be even more difficult to resist touching.

"Go ahead," Stephen murmured.

"...Excuse me?"

"You wanted to touch me, go right ahead."

It wasn't that Stephen could read minds. The boy was just acutely aware of desire, even while half-asleep. It didn't even have to be an extreme desire -- curiosity was enough.

"Hell no, you'll get warts all over." Leon went back to his sewing. "Or worse. Can't go blaming me if that happens..."

"Stop worrying. You'll never hurt me," Stephen answered without opening his eyes.

And it wasn't an order. Or a threat. Leon wasn't sure what it was. God forbid it was an accusation.

"Fine, friend, your funeral," Leon grumbled. But it still took him a while before he could let go of the shirt he was working on -- one of Stephen's, he idly remembered -- and reach out to tentatively run the tips of his fingers through and across the ends of Stephen's hair.

He figured, if there was anyone he wanted to touch, who could take his need to touch, it was Stephen. But though Stephen could hear his heart, know his desires, he still would not be able to understand.

Leon craved that, some days. Another living being validating his desires. He couldn't seek that from Charlie. Not poor Charlie with the sad eyes. Not paperthin Charlie, as he liked to call her... thin as paper, and just as fragile.

And not Sheila -- she was just too young. All the feeling she could acknowledge would be loss.

Who else was there to feel anything about?

"What's the tally today?" he asked.

"Twenty-one," in monotone.

Leon grunted, shook his head. "There was this thing that went around. I remember it from time to time. You know how that goes, Steph? 'Whoever you are, there are at least three people in the world who would die for you' -- "

"Yeah, I know it."

"Well... I think in your case, you got the whole world to die for you, and just three people who won't."

That wasn't quite true, but it wasn't intended to be. A chuckle escaped Stephen.

"You know sometimes," he said as the laughter faded, "I wish I could hate you for joking around."

Leon shrugged. "Would you rather forget how to laugh?"

It was a valid question. The instant he became free to walk abroad in daylight, he knew this was his purpose in Stephen's life. He knew it as soon as he looked into Stephen's eyes.

It was as sure as Stephen's purpose in Leon's life was to give him the strength to take his first steps outside.

What would I have done... if you hadn't come into my life and messed it up? Leon wanted to say while his long, bony fingers continued threading through Stephen's hair, memorizing the feel of it, careful not to touch the roots or any part of Stephen's skin.

Killed myself, probably...

Stephen shifted in half-sleep. He was aware, at least, of Leon's desire to say something aloud.

[ email Whiskeybird ]