[OPEN]

[justscribing]

WHO: (justscribing) & you!

WHAT: October Catch-All (open + closed)

WHERE: Poison garden, University, Around

WHEN: all through October

WARNINGS: TBA + marked in threads as necessary




OPEN PROMPT LINKS [UPDATED AS ADDED]

Poison Garden

University

Feel free to reach me by PM or plurk (monochromic) if you want to plot for something specific!

Comments

[fussiest]

[ which then, kaveh thinks, leads to the question that's been unasked all along. its sits nestled in the silence, blank lines between words. alhaitham sits. kaveh leans back to give him room. his knees, kaveh thinks, are sore from kneeling. scraped, from having poured over the seed packets time and time again.

kaveh draws breath. ]

... we couldn't get you to swallow, Alhaitham.

[justscribing]

... So you were going to force them down with your tongue?

[That's not even remotely what it was. Alhaitham knows that's not what it was. Kaveh knows that Alhaitham knows that's not what it was, an on goes the spiral of silent understanding.

But, see, he had kissed Kaveh. And Kaveh had responded. The surge in could not be reasoned away as for the sake of a curse that had already just been broken.]

[fussiest]

[ kaveh starts: ]

No! [ the reaction comes before the understanding: that alhaitham knows it couldn't be what it was, that kaveh knows alhaitham knows that it couldn't be what it was, that the hierarchy of understanding has yet to collapse. but kaveh can't quite parse the thought. alhaitham's mouth had moved beneath his. kaveh shakes his head. ] No, it's nothing like that. Alhaitham, you weren't swallowing, so the solution was - Midnight said -

[ kaveh's breath shudders, ] it was a kiss. It was to wake you up. I'm. [ sorry, alhaitham. but the words die. they always do. ]

[justscribing]

[Ah, so they are admitting to it. Even if Kaveh looks admonished at the thought.

Alhaitham's free hand cups his chin.] That's different than the other teas.

[And yet, the fantastical nature of the tea party makes it not out of place, doesn't it? He was unconscious and couldn't swallow. Mondstadt fairy tales tell the story of a sleeping beauty woken only by true love's kiss.

...

Alhaitham's fingers brush over his lower lip.]

[fussiest]

[ it's impossible not to. predators are attracted to motion. kaveh looks. kaveh observes the slide of alhaitham's fingers as they line the lower jut of his lips.

he looks away. ]

It is. It's, um. It's the ginger tea.

[justscribing]

I know. That was the only thing I tasted. [He'll record it later. For now--Kaveh looks away, so Alhaitham looks at Kaveh. Fixes him with his considerable attention to study every line of reaction. Because they had just kissed, even if only out of compromise.

They have never kissed. This is not the well worn habits from the days in which they were an operant of one. This is not Kaveh and Alhaitham as they know it. This is a leap over a chasm they haven't actually filled.

Alhaitham stares, silent. He wonders if Kaveh will meet him at the halfway point, or if his feet will remain firmly rooted on the opposing ground.

Or maybe Kaveh has nowhere to leap at all. Maybe it is only a compromise.]

[fussiest]

[ on the other side of the precipice, kaveh looks. the awning chasm between them is murk. the silence fills it. the silence buries it. but you couldn't bury a chasm without filling it. and mere rocks into the well will only reveal to you the sound of water far, far below. kaveh looks, and looks, and waits, for the sound of water.

they say the desert is beautiful because it hides a well. kaveh is no well. kaveh is the desert. there is no water. ]

We should leave, then. [ kaveh says, in a voice so small, the bare breeze carries it far. ] I want to leave, Alhaitham.

[justscribing]

[Kaveh does not apologize. He does not acknowledge. He does not move. The stillness has always been a poor fit for Kaveh. It is the turn inward, the burying of himself that makes it so uncanny. Kaveh should never be so still.]

That's fine. [Alhaitham's gaze flickers away. He reaches for the red hairclip that has scattered.] I don't care to be here any longer either.

[The clip, then, is slid back into Kaveh's hair in the same place it had fallen out. The gap was visible as he'd turned away. The gap was present.

The gap is always present.

With just as little fanfare, Alhaitham moves to stand. He looks towards Cyno.] I see you're back to yourself.