ArchivedLogs:Comfortable

Comfortable
Dramatis Personae Jackson, Sebastian, Shane
In Absentia	2014-04-23 '
Location <XS> Art Room - FL2
Smells of paints and chalks and turpentine mingle freely in this room, well-used, well-stocked. Natural light flows in, plentiful through the large windows. The long counter-like tables are speckled with spots of color, and half finished projects often stand on easels or propped in corners. The many cupboards lining the walls are crammed full of art supplies. It is late, by the time rounds of hospital visiting are done with and everyone has returned to school; just in time to get Spencer bundled off to bed, really. Jax retreats to the art room, somewhat -- quiet, after seeing Dusk. He's changed out of the bright clothes he's been in all day, dressed now for painting in plain jeans, a Cooper Union tee. The painting he sets on his easel right now /is/ Dusk, in-progress, perched on the edge of the wall of the Lofts roof with laptop on his lap in what would probably be a precarious perch for most people though his enormous wings draped to either side of the wall keep him balanced. Jax doesn't get his paints out immediately, leaning back against a table as the painting shifts and changes, more details added, colours and shading altering as he focuses on it thoughtfully. His fingers drum against the surface of the counter, tongue poking into his cheek. The art room door opens, shuts again quietly, admitting a twin pair of small blue sharks into the art room. Shane is in pinstripes, vest and slacks and a dress shirt and a neat bowtie. Sebastian contrastingly is vibrant-colorful, a studded purple top paired with black and purple-plaid pleated miniskirt, black fishnets layered over solid silver tights, chunky ankly boots. Thick rainbow-studded cuffs on his wrists. Shane wanders in, leaning up against the table beside Jax, black eyes scanning the painting -- narrowing slightly as they do. Flicking up to Jax afterwards. Sebastian is slower to approach, hanging back behind Shane. His arms curl against his chest, brows pulling deeply together. He looks from the painting to Jax. From the painting to Jax. Eventually he creeps over to his father's other side, pulling up a stool to climb up onto. He leans forward, resting elbows on his knees and propping his chin in his hands. The shifting of painting stills, fading away to just leave the perhaps mostly-done painting behind. Jax's head turns, just slightly to glance at one twin and then a lot more to take in the other on his blind side. He straightens, curling his arms outward to wrap around each of the twins' shoulders, tucking them in against his sides. "You okay with this?" Shane jerks his chin towards the painting. "With him." From his stool, Sebastian leans in against Jax, eyes narrowing on the picture of Dusk. "Or all of this." Shane turns his head away from the painting, nestling his face in against Jax's side. Jax exhales quickly, tipping his cheek against the top of Shane's spiky head. "How okay can you be with any of this?" He squeezes gently against their shoulders, the painting blanking out white as /he/ settles down onto a stool. "Y'all had time t'take care'a your homework tonight? S'been a lotta runnin' about." "/Psh/." That's Shane's only answer to this, in quick-dismissive snort. "I finished mine," Sebastian assures Jax, "except for, um -- wait, /yours/ wasn't due tomorrow was it?" Suddenly his eyes are wide, flicking around the art room with an abrupt sense of guilt. "Can't you get a note from the teacher?" Shane grimaces. "He was at the hospital /with/ you." "No, he can't -- mnh. I don't -- think --" Sebastian's gills flutter for a brief moment, nose wrinkling up. "I can finish it before bed anyway." "I'm not sure," Shane finally decides, "you can really be okay with much of this." He gestures towards the now-blank canvas without looking at it, leaning in further against Jax. "I'm pretty solidly on the not-okay side of all this, fuck the -- world." "Hm? You don't got nothin' due t'morrow for /my/ class do you?" Jax sounds suddenly uncertain. "Ohgosh, yeah, you do." Now /his/ nose wrinkles, head shaking slightly. The painting on his canvas shivers back into existence. "Prob'ly not, no. Jus' kinda -- deal with it how y'can." His arms drop, hands resting lightly in his lap. "Y'know we're here for --" His eye drops to his lap, then lifts back to -- well, he can't manage both the kids. He pulls his stool a little ways away from the table so that he can turn around on it to face them both rather than keeping one of them on his blind side. "-- for anything. That helps. Deal with all this." "Rewind time?" Sebastian suggests hopefully. "Heal /anything/," Shane decides. "Clone yourself might help too if you can't add more hours to the day," Sebastian adds next, tucking his toes onto the rung of his stool. "Stop the planet," Shane tips his head back towards the ceiling to look upwards with this answer, "let us all off." "... nuke /everyone/ who keeps trying to hurt all of you." This is softer but harder, Bastian's teeth slightly clenched. Jax winces at these answers, lifting a hand to scrub it against his cheek. "Think you're gonna hafta talk with your Ba about all time-related shenanigans. An' I don't know as nukin' nobody's gonna solve a whole lotta -- an' Dusk's gettin' worked on. Best as can be managed, anyhow." He sinks his teeth down against his lower lip, fingers curling in against his knees with a soft scritch of nails against denim. "Wouldn't say no t'jus' spendin' a quiet weekend'a break time with y'all though." Shane slips forward just a little away from the table so that he can bonk his head up against Jax's chest. "I don't think we'd /ever/ say no to more time with you." "Ba always insists he can't control time." Sebastian sounds /intensely/ skeptical. "He's just holding out on you, you know." Shane doesn't look up from where his head is bonked against Jax. His arm lifts to curl around the other man. "OK, but even if we can't grow extra time we could maybe," Sebastian suggests more pensively, "/manage/ it a little better. Because a lot of the stress is --" "-- just not knowing," Shane finishes for him. "When we'll have you an when we /won't/. When all this stuff keeps coming up and then you should be here and you /aren't/ and --" "That's worse. Being surprised? Expecting one thing? I don't know." Sebastian frowns uncertainly. "And hugs are good don't get me wrong I want," Shane says firmly, "/all/ the hugs ever but. Kinda also want shit to get better." Jax wraps his arm back around Shane, curled upward against the boy's shoulder so that his fingers can trace down against Shane's gills. "Hugs I got plenty of. The rest'a it -- okay." His heels thump back against the rung of his stool, now, before he rests his toes against it as well. "Somethin' a little more concrete than hugs p'raps. But the problems is if it's all the /unexpected/ stuff that --" His tone at first is starting to edge just slightly towards defensive, but this breaks off with a quick breath. Instead: "What'd be helpful for y'all?" Instead of answering this, Shane snuggles happily into the hug, eyes squeezing closed as his gills press flat against the sides of his neck. "/Having/ regular -- time? That we know is ours?" Sebastian volunteers this timidly, like he's not entirely sure of the validity of this answer. "Okayso," Shane speaks up abruptly, rising up slightly onto his toes, "I totally read this post on Pa's blog like seventeen million years ago? -- The sex blog," he clarifies with a note of cheer, "not the art blog. And maybe it's relevant now?" Jax drops his hand, eye widening with a very /sudden/ flush darkening his cheeks. "You -- wh -? I mean, how is -- my -- blog," his hands are lifting to cover his extremely crimson face, "relevant to -- you. /Here/." "Why do you read Pa's sex blog." Sebastian wrinkles up his nose, shoulders shuddering. "Because it's awesome?" Shane spreads his hands, stepping back as Jax lets him go. "And most of it is relevant to a /lot/ of things. But there was a post about poly relationships and handling time management and how did anyone survive before Google Calendar." "{Thank God.}" Sebastian looks very abruptly relieved. "I was afraid fisting was going to come into this somehow." Jax just -- keeps his face buried in his hands. Shane grins, shaking his head and moving over to lean up against Sebastian's side, one arm curled loosely around his twin's waist and the other elbow propped behin him on the counter. "No. I just mean maybe something solid like that would be good. There's a lot to keep track of." "Huh." Sebastian leans slightly to one side on his stool, propped against Shane. "And even if something comes up suddenly it doesn't take hardly any time to add a new -- entry. So people can see you're just at dinner or the hospital or /whatever/ and not. Dead." "Or whatever," Shane agrees lightly. "And having it all there'd make it easier. To /find/ time. That works for everyone. That we can all just -- do a thing? Even if it's not a big thing. Lunch. Movie night. I don't know. It's hard to do when everyone's all over the place all the time and --" "-- we don't /know/ when people are going to be around." Sebastian's gills flutter for a quick moment. "Plus just having -- time to do things might be better for --" "Actually talking about shit?" Shane's smile is lopsided. "Maybe. Fff. Actually there's /another/ post on his blog about that too." He tips his eyes up towards Sebastian. "About having regularly scheduled check-ins." "Huh," Sebastian says again. Jax has finally dropped his hands from his face, resting them back against his knees; one leg bounces restlessly up and down on the rung of the stool. "Those might be good, actually," he agrees thoughtfully. "Because I feel like there's all this baggage built up around being the first person to say -- 'we need to talk' -- like that's always a bad thing and someone's done something /wrong/. Only but. If you just know there's a space every month for people to get together and talk about how they're doing it's less like that?" "Yeah, kinda takes some of the pressure off," Shane's elbow is poking gently into Sebastian's side with this, "cuz you know he's never going to talk about fucking /anything/ without --" Sebastian fidgets, tensing at Shane's side. "Not he," this interjection comes very abruptly. "Hm?" Shane's brows lift, eyes lifting back to his twin. "{Sorry.}" Sebastian's head shakes. "I interrupted." "You always interrupt s'kinda how we roll." Shane hoists himself up in a lean flex of arms to sit on the counter, now, still frowning slightly at Sebastian. "What's up?" Jax's head tilts slightly to one side, eye flicking between Shane and Sebastian on this exchange. "Y'aright, Bastian? What was you sayin', sweetie?" Bastian's gills flutter rapidly, eyes lowering downwards. "{I'm sorry I --}" It takes a moment. A long deep breath. Eyes lifting slowly back upwards to the other two. "Just that -- I don't. Want to be called 'he'. Any -- more. If. That's. Okay." B's voice gets progressively smaller with each of these phrases. Shane just smiles at this, quick and warm. He slides back /down/ off the counter he just pulled himself onto, curling his arms around Bastian and tipping his head up to press a small kiss to his twin's fluttering gills. "-- Oh." Jax draws in a quick breath, and for a moment a very small smile ghosts across his face, too. "Of course that's alright, honey-honey, whatever you're -- comfortable bein' called that's just fine. Is there somethin' you'd prefer?" Bastian shrugs, gills still fluttering quickly and cheeks flushing deeper blue. "I don't -- I don't /know/. Anything? Anything's better than. I don't know. Am I going to have to move out of my room? Oh gosh." "B, sweetie, it's okay. You ain't going to hafta move outta your room now -- are you comfortable stayin' there? You don't gotta make up your mind on things /overnight/, honey-honey." Jax slides off his stool, too, moving in to kiss Bastian's forehead lightly. "You jus' take things as you're comfortable with." "... I don't know what I'm comfortable with, though," Bastian admits awkwardly, leaning forward to bop forehead down against Jax's chest. "I mean I keep thinking about it and this whole thing is like /augh/ how do I -- /pick/." "/We're/ comfortable with whoever you are," Shane assures Bastian easily, bumping his shoulder up against his twin's. "You don't gotta pick," Jax gives in easy answer. "Not 'less somethin' feels right t'you. An' whatever /do/ feel right t'you we'll be 'round t'help -- deal with the /school/ side'a it. But who you tell an' when, s'up to you." Bastian's nose crinkles up, head nodding slowly. Gills still fluttering, restless, as arms lift to wrap around Jax. "Okay. Okay because right now I have no idea. I just -- /boy/ feels all wrong? I think I'm okay with anything else though. I mean. Pronoun-wise? Ze. She. They. It? I don't know about it. Maybe it." Quick-shrug. "I wouldn't really mind being a robot. Maybe my gender is 'robot'." "Have you met Sage?" Shane asks Bastian, "you definitely wouldn't be the /first/ around --" "/Shane/," Jax cuts in, sharper, "that ain't okay, have some respect." But light and amused, back to Sebastian: "If your gender's /robot/ -- well." His eye tips up towards the ceiling. "We'd prob'ly hafta change somethin' in our forms somewhere. It'd prob'ly be okay." Bastian giggles at this, quick and bright and amused, arms squeezing tighter around Jax. "It'll probably be okay." And for once, she even sounds like she means it.