citylogs | [OPEN]

Who would? [See? See? This place's true horrors is pulling apart their minds, not their bodies. They should have gone down the path with the screaming.

Alhaitham looks because that one was definitely about Heine. But he doesn't comment on it right now because the flowers just keep talking.

"He acts like he doesn't need anyone but he actually misses it, being loved."

"He had it. He ruined it."]

[ oh, that one's definitely not him. heine glances sharply at alhaitham, but before he even has a chance to say anything—

(although, what would he say? heine had studiously not listened to the conversation between badou and alhaitham at dinner, too busy trying to be a buffer to kaveh's drunken ramblings about combustion engines, but he would have to be more than a fool not to know that something's going on between them that neither of them seem ready to confront. so what do the flowers mean, he had it and he ruined it?)

—another flower chimes in with, "he's ruined every beautiful thing he's ever touched, and now he's too afraid to admit even to himself that he's in l—"

loudly, heine says, ] Fuck this, we're getting out of here.

[ he reaches out on instinct and grabs alhaitham's wrist to haul him back the way they came, toward the exit of the greenhouse. ]

[Alhaitham narrows his eyes on response, judging of Heine's reaction is that of expectation or wariness. The flowers don't stop talking. The follow up causes every muscle in Alhaitham's body to stiffen at once as the implication cuts too close.

(In the minutes later, when he thinks about it, he'll realize it couldn't have been him. Because he knows he is in love. Because he knows Kaveh is inevitable, and denying this truth will not unmake it.)

Heine grabs his wrist and pulls. Alhaitham twists on his feet, fingers curling around in the response interlock.

The flowers hush. The silence is not lost on him.] ... Wait. It's stopped.

[ the rabbit-quick thud of heine's heart in his chest is momentarily loud enough to drown out the whispering, which is why he doesn't immediately notice when the whispers fade away. it's only the curl of alhaitham's fingers into his and the words that take a second to parse that clue him in, and then heine pauses too, focusing with some effort on the sound (or lack thereof) of the greenhouse around them. ]

... [ heine looks up at he flowers, then down at their joined hands. it's literally the only thing that changed, so...

carefully, he withdraws his hand from alhaitham's, and almost immediately one of the flowers whispers, "he could—" before heine grips alhaitham's hand again, more tightly this time. ]

What the fuck.

[Alhaitham allows the release. The whisper starts as if eager. Alhaitham allows the rejoin, staring at Heine with the expression of this may as well happen.

What the fuck, indeed.]

... So we have a greenhouse of giant gossiping flowers that shut up if you're holding hands with somebody.

[ for his part, heine carefully does not make eye contact with alhaitham. listening to each other's secrets being whispered by fucking plants is embarrassing enough, but having to hold hands to get it to stop?

heine's never held hands with anyone but nill. ]

Great. [ that final consonant is bitten off, the way heine's voice gets when he's speaking through gritted teeth. ] Let's walk.

[ he will not ask which secrets were alhaitham's, because doing so would make it obvious which secrets were heine's, and he is not ready to face up to that. ]

I'm guessing the papers in the university didn't say anything about this.

[Heine looks away. Alhaitham, with no reason to linger, follows at the same pace by his side to walk out.] No, most were related to our own worlds and the one that wasn't as about a different experiment that occurred at the university itself.

[And, because he doesn't want to talk about what the plants said, and Heine doesn't want to talk about what the plants said, but he also can't help the question from springing up with Heine's strangely demure reaction:] ... Are you shy?

[Bro can't hold hands with his bro.]

That's disappointing. [ ...but also much more interesting than heine originally knew. documents from their own worlds? he's going to have to pay a visit of his own, see if there's any documentation of the experiments that made him.

he flinches a little at the question, then finally looks over at alhaitham, although it's to shoot him a dirty look. you can't just ask your bro if he's shy, come on. ]

No. [ ...maybe a little. ] Just never done this before.

[ YES, he means hand-holding. especially not with another dude. holding hands with a fourteen-year-old to help her keep her balance as she walks tighrope along the church pews doesn't count. ]

[Alhaitham doesn't make a habit of it himself. But there was his grandmother, cradling his little hand in hers as they crossed a busy Treasures Street for pita. There was Kaveh, too dynamic to remain in his own space and always ending up in Alhaitham's. There's Tsuruno, who moves with a bold certainty that matches Alhaitham's own.

And now there's Heine, who actually grabbed Alhaitham first before having second thoughts as reality sank in.

Heine shoots him a dirty look and denies. Alhaitham is not so fooled.] There's nothing embarrassing about it. It's a solution, nothing else.

Unless you've come to the realization you want to hold hands.

[ even if he wants to hold hands— ] Not yours.

[ unaware of how much that response implicates him, heine tugs a little harder, leading them back down the winding path towards the entrance. it feels interminable, maybe because he is embarrassed and not inclined to admit it. ]

Just because some of us weren't socialized experiencing normal human interaction— [ grumble grumble grumble. when in doubt, pull out the human experimentation card! it works every time! ]

[Heine tugs. Alhaitham squeezes briefly when he does.]

Even properly socialized people find physical affection embarrassing. [But Alhaitham is a man without shame.

More importantly:] If not my hand, then whose?

[His tone lifts just so at the end. He has a very good guess whose hand.]

Nobody's! No hands.

[ he is not in a place currently where he can think about whose hand he may actually want to hold. he's barely in a place where he can call his friends friends without the words sticking in his throat—the idea of seeking out physical affection would probably give him an anxiety attack.

but also: yes, alhaitham does have a very good guess. it's just that heine will probably drop dead before confirming it 😊 ]

Really? Then you might have said you don't care to hold hands at all. [But ya didn't.] It's fine if you find something comforting in it.

[ it's understandable, in the hurry to get out of this place, that alhaitham doesn't pick up on the way this line of questioning is making heine's hackles raise for real. ]

I said what I said. [ heine's tone comes out sharp. like he means it, not like he's joking. he doesn't look back at alhaitham, because he knows it's not really alhaitham's fault—it's just the combination of things. the flowers, and the secrets, and his nerves, how unused he is to physical touch at all. it's always sort of gotten his back up regardless of who it came from.

but alhaitham isn't to blame for any of that, so heine softens his tone somewhat as he adds, ] Mind the business that pays you.

[Heine bristles more strongly at that, and then seems to momentarily war between the first response and the second as he eases his tone. And Alhaitham had been poking on purpose. It seems to have caused a real offense.]

There's nothing interesting about the business that pays me. [Being a file clerk is easy work, but boring work.

Yes, it's an idiom. Yes, he's going to respond to an idiom literally.]

[ alhaitham is toeing dangerously close to a line, here, and it takes some work for heine not to rise to it. he exhales slowly instead, then looks around—they're close to the entrance by now, he thinks. maybe not quite in the clear to let go of each other, but almost.

also technically there is no business that pays alhaitham in this place, but that's even more reason for him not to mind heine's! ]

Nothing interesting about me either.

I disagree. [Because Alhaitham doesn't suffer boring and tedious people.]

Good for you.

[ finally they're back at the entrance, or at least back where the path had diverged and given them the option to go left or right. heine wishes they'd chosen left, at this point, but if wishes were horses and all that.

he lets go of alhaitham's hand immediately and shoves his hands deep into the pockets of his jeans, shoulders shifting forward. the kind of bad posture he'd been scolded for as a child. ]

I'm just not used to touching anyone. [ it's whatever. with some distance between them and the flowers, heine closes his eyes, takes a breath, and lets it go. ] Sorry for being...

[ he rolls his shoulders in some kind of gesture that vaguely encompasses the whole of his personality. sorry for being how he is, generally. irritable and half-feral and all. ]

[Heine frees his hand easily, and Alhaitham folds his arms in an opposing gesture. He shrugs a shoulder.] There's no need to apologize for your feelings or yourself. You're not obligated act as anyone else. If you feel any shame for it, it should only be because of your own desire to be different.

[Alhaitham took no offense, but even if he did it shouldn't be an influencing factor on Heine's attitude if he doesn't wish to change it. Alhaitham was the one who pressed after all.]

[ unstoppable force meets immovable object in alhaitham's shamelessness vs. heine's self-loathing! not that heine really realizes it as such. to him it's just an objective reckoning of his own existence.

he lifts an eyebrow curiously. ] I should feel shame for my desire to be different?

[ heine has never really considered wanting to be different. what use is there when he can only ever be who he is? ]

[It's okay he's used to that.]

No. I mean there's no reason to feel bad about your reaction unless you actually want to change it.

Ah. [ heine considers that for a second. does he want to change this?

then a shrug, very casual. ]

Probably no point. So I learn how to hold hands—then what? Not like I'm gonna be holding hands with anybody.

[ an increased comfort level with physical comfort would probably only make it more starkly obvious how little of it he gets. no point in setting himself up for that kind of heartbreak. ]

[Alhaitham gestures with a hand.] Then no need to apologize.

[Whatever reasons he has for it for himself. If it's not a trait he wishes to alter, best to just own it.]

[OPEN]

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