Logs:Ask For Me By Name

Ask For Me By Name
Dramatis Personae Matt, Ryan
In Absentia Elie, Lucien	2024-02-13 "You are not the only messy fucking bitch freezing his ass off out here." (shortly followed by second thoughts.)
Location <NYC> Tessier Residence - Backyard - Greenwich Village
Living in the heart of Manhattan means space is precious, and as such, the yard behind this house is small. It is as exquisitely well-kept as the rest of the place, though; all available space has been meticulously cultivated and transformed into a lush retreat from the concrete and asphalt of the city. The borders of the garden are lined in a wealth of flowers, the selection chosen to provide a panoply of color in all seasons save winter. A grassy rock-bordered pathway separates these from the raised-bed vegetable garden that dominates its center. The far left corner of the garden plays host to a tiny rock-lined pond, goldfish and a pair of turtles living in its burbling water. To one side of the pond is a garden table and set of chairs and presiding over the pond, a large oak tree with a hammock underneath, its branches spreading out over the tall brick wall that screens the entire area off from the city outside. Inside, the stereo system is on shuffle, currently playing "Keep Your Family Closer". Inside, the post-game analysis is still running on the Habs' humiliating shutout of the Ducks. Inside, there are board games and beverages and desserts in various shades of hearts. The birthday boy, however, is not inside. Outside, it's snowing. Matt is perched on the picnic table in a black hoodie featuring a stick figure jumping into an orange portal on one side of the zipper and out of a blue one on the other side, soft blue jeans fraying at the cuffs, one sock-and-sandalled foot braced on the edge of a chair and the other swinging lazily beneath him as he stares out over the fence at the crescent moon sinking down, framed just so by the alleyway. There is beside him on the table an intricately carved rosewood tarot box, a whimsical green-and-silver glass pipe, and a lowball glass half full of something that probably should have been a little less vodka and more a little more cranberry. It isn't long after the song has started that Ryan is fleeing the light and warmth and stereo for the relative peace of the garden. He's hesitating in the doorway as soon as it's open, and it's hard to say whether his brief and wavering assessment is directed more at Matt or the snow -- either way there's a definite deliberation before he ventures further from the house. The wide-gauge black sweater he wears certainly accentuates the tight gold metallic tank underneath to good effect but maybe is not the best protection against the cold; at least the wide-leg jeans he has on are sturdy material. He doesn't have any kind of intoxicants with him, and probably this is because of the twinned forearm crutches occupying both his hands. His steps are wobbly and uncertain on the wet ground, one leg dragging more than his PT would probably approve of. He glares kind of balefully at a chair once he's reached the table, but slumps heavily down into it despite it evidently offending him. "What they don't warn you, this shit's bi erasure. If someone told me before how many chairs I'd have to sit in like a goddamn heterosexual I woulda strongly reconsidered." He's tapping one of his crutches lightly against the table next to where Matt is sitting. "Keep it in mind if anyone ever offers to drop a fucking building on you. Just say no." Matt's smile is softened by intoxication but strangely edged with the sickly light the city casts up through the snow at the clouds. "I will resist the temptation, when it comes calling," he promises, his words touched with pain that casts its own static snow through his bright joy at Ryan's presence. "But pray don't sell yourself short, my dear. You are so queer you suck the hetero right out of any position you happen to be sitting in." He leans back on one arm, his head lolling onto one shoulder where he's studying Ryan sidelong. "Are you sheltering from something inside, or did you just feel like sitting...bi my side?" Probably, he didn't need to visually flag that with the ridiculous pun dog face for this particular audience. "I have sucked the hetero right outta a lotta --" Ryan is cheerfully interjecting, but finishes this with only a groan at Matt's pun dog face, lifting a hand to swat lightly at the other man's leg. "What, I can't just enjoy freezing out here with you?" "Mm, I do so love to indulge an enthusiastic masochist," Matt admits, his mild and philosophical tone in the mundane register, juxtaposed with the heavy prurient interest audible in Ryan's empathic wavelength. "I'm not sure about this particular brand of temperature play, though." He's shucking his hoodie to drape over Ryan's shoulders in a gentlemanly fashion. Underneath he's wearing a fine-waled gray corduroy shirt over a red tee with an abstract graphic of a serpent twined around a black heart. "I am both grateful of and honored by your company, and would enjoy you better unfrozen." This, at least, is flush with affectionate concern aloud and beneath alike, if characteristically stiff and muted on the latter. He plucks up the pipe and waggles it in offer. "Are you sufficiently elevated?" "Boy you see that shit falling from the damn sky?" It's slightly incredulous when Matt sheds the hoodie, disapproving click of tongue at odds with the empathic flutter of grateful warmth that accompanies it. For all the tsking Ryan is southern and it is snowing and he is not rejecting it, pulling the sweatshirt a little more snug about himself. "Honored, hell, I'm out here with the man of the evening all to myself. You hiding from your own party or just --" He swiping the pipe readily. "Highing." Matt arches his lightly snow-dusted eyebrows high. "See it? Goodness, I'm spiritually attuned to it, carcinogens and all." As if to prove his devotion he tips his head back to catch some (probably only homeopathically carcinogenic) snowflakes on his tongue. "Hence coming out here to thank the gods on high for that very satisfying victory. And take a break from the birthday hijinks. And get high...er--speaking of which, there's a lighter in that pocket." He tips his hand at the right side of the hoodie he's lent. "Tis a multipurpose hieing." His giddy delight at the string of puns is mellowing into something more muddled, more unsteady, more...anxious? "I was about to hie to you, actually, and might well have saved you a bit of fuss if I hadn't dithered so long." It's not an apology, but it doesn't feel too far from one. Ryan pats at the pocket and fishes the lighter out, flicking it a few times testingly. His hesitation after Matt speaks is somewhat papered over by lifting the pipe and taking a first slow puff, but not quite enough to disguise the very brief tension that goes through him, shoulders tightening and then deliberately slouching back into casual. Also excessively casual is his light, "Shit, yeah, what ya been needing? -- I swear whatever Perez fucking Hilton's been saying I have been a perfect gentleman with your ma -- I can totally see now where Luci gets it, that woman can charm her way through any red tape." "I only hope she's been a lady with you. Mother can be...a lot." Matt looks down and breathes a not entirely humorless laugh, touched conflicted love and a distant unreal loathing. "Which is presumably where I get it from. It's really hard for me to feel sincere, so I may not sound sincere--especially not to you, but I swear to you it's the truth." This qualification comes with little empathic subtext, just a low background hum of amorphous distress. He braces his hands on the edge of the table, draws a deep breath, lets it out wordless and draws another. When he finally does manage to speak again the words come at once quiet and tight to bursting with terror and relief, hope and desire: "I'm in love with you." "I don't even know what sincere is. Most people sound like a confusing mess." Even so, the look Ryan is giving Matt as the other man prepares to speak looks sincere enough, focused and attentive while his friend finds words. They are, clearly, not even slightly the words Ryan was expecting. He sits up straighter, fast enough and startled enough to jar his chair slightly backwards, toppling his crutches from where they've been leaning to fall into the grass. His expression has fallen rapidly, attentive to hurt in no seconds flat. It doesn't stay there; he pulls a sharp u-turn on this tumble of emotion and settles on an amused quirk of smile, rubbing at the back of his neck as he slouches back into his chair. His tone is light, if not quite as much as before, and carefully augmented by a light empathic flutter of levity to balance out where his demeanor is falling just a little flatter than it should. "Me? Tcha, sure. 'Tis the season, after all." He's taking a bigger puff on the pipe before handing it back. "You wanna be my Valentine? Some other heart attack gonna distract Luci from his current embarrassment?" Matt doesn't seem entirely surprised by the reaction, and doesn't evince much of one himself beyond a gentle, rueful smile. "Darling, I would love to be your Valentine, but you should know this isn't some passing whim." His lips compress, his voice flat beneath his usual lilting speech. "I ought've told you before Lassiter, but at first I did think it was a passing whim, and I didn't want to be a distraction." He takes a hit on the pipe and stares up at the oddly bright flurries against an oddly bright sky. "It always seemed like a bad time, but eventually I realized there can always be a worse one." He passes the pipe and lighter back to Ryan, his smile skewing to one side in a way that does not at all match the muffled queasy fear in his words. "I'm not saying you have to go all in just to go on a date with me, but I'm wary that I might drag you in too deep. You don't owe me a date because it's my birthday, and if you have reservations I want to know." His teeth grind quietly as he struggles to push down something a lot more rapacious than the interest that propels his wonted flirtation. "I love you, and I will still love you if this isn't something you want to deal with right now." Ryan doesn't take the pipe back. His expression has fallen again, and he's studying Matt for a very intent moment before his head turns sharply away, his eyes fixed on the snow-rimed grass. "Seriously? How many years have we -- how many times have I -- and months now you been acting like -- hnngh. You really gonna sit there and pretend that suddenly you want me? Now? I don't need --" He's leaning down to try and swipe his fallen crutches from the grass, but nearly loses his balance in the attempt. He only barely manages to catch himself against the table and avoid tipping entirely sideways and after his chair is firmly back on all fours he just slumps back, defeated. His palm rubs slow over his eyes. "Fuck," is softer, and there's a thick snarl of confusion and betrayed hurt bleeding heavily through despite his half-hearted attempt at smile, now. "Can't fucking sit right, can't dramatically storm off. Maybe I do need your damn pity." Matt sets the pipe down and sips on his drink instead while Ryan chews over his reaction. He does not flinch at the outburst when it comes. His eyes do narrow, however, and if it's a sign he's gearing up for an outburst of his own it's entirely derailed when Ryan's chair starts to tip. The spill has already been averted by the time his altered reflexes have put him in any position to help, and he leans back against the edge of the table. "Oh, darling..." The deliberate softness of his tone can't hide his own anger and frustration and hurt roiling beneath it. "Don't you think all those things might have made it a little hard for me to admit--" He breaks off when his voice starts to rise, pressing one hand over his mouth. His hand lowers and he sinks down to one knee. "I'm sorry." He doesn't sound sorry in the least. "You have every cause to doubt me, and I didn't really expect you to believe me, but I don't do pity." His eyes catch the otherworldly light of the snowstorm and almost seem to glow with the intensity of his gaze. "Even if I did, I wouldn't do it to you, not like this, because I get it. But unlike me after three rounds of chemo, you are still obnoxiously fucking hot." This is angry again, but also aroused. "Now, if you still want to storm off dramatically I will do it for you, not out of pity but because I'm pissed off and turned on and you are not the only messy fucking bitch freezing his ass off out here." Ryan is pushing himself a little more upright, a little more stable. His hand drags slowly down his face to fall heavily into his lap, gaze dropping to regard Matt thoughtfully where he kneels. "Mais, gardes des don." His words have gentled, no extra feeling layered in them this time save for the amused warmth of his actual voice. "I didn't know you Canucks could even feel the cold." His hand lifts, cold fingertips touching lightly to Matt's cheek and his eyes meeting the other man's bright ones, just before his chin tips toward the door, the twitch of his mouth telling of barely-restrained laughter. "Get storming." Matt leans just slightly into Ryan's touch, his cheek unreasonably warm by comparison despite his claim of freezing. His impassive expression doesn't change, but his wordless scoff flutters with amusement and relief. He straightens up vehemently and dusts the snow from himself as he stalks off toward the kitchen door and the promise of the party beyond. For a moment Ryan is watching Matt go, breath coming out in a puff of silent laughter. But just a second later his eyes are widening and he's scrambling -- trying to get his crutches situated, trying to get himself situated. "-- wait fuck wait I have got to figure out a new --" He hasn't quite managed it, flustered and on his feet now but only with the heavy assistance of the table he's leaning against. "-- in my head this had much better cinematic timing and I caught you by the damn door and -- uh, crap --" He's shifting his grip on one of the crutches but not quite trusting himself to it just yet. "-- in my head I can fucking walk -- you'll just have to picture it, yeah? Sweeping music, whole nine yards." Matt is slowing before Ryan has even called out, though he takes just a couple more exaggeratedly swishy steps before circling casually back to the table as though he'd only returned to collect the items he left there. "I'm not sure what's actually in your head, but I certainly am picturing...something. Mind you, in my head, you are too disastrously bisexual to do anything straight--sitting, walking, or lying down." The affection and desire and elation singing through his words are as confused a mess, perhaps, as ever, but sharp and bright and intense in a way his positive emotions rarely are. "Out here, though, you have instead drawn me back by the power of your voice--and your cinematic timing." He cups Ryan's cheek with one hand, and leans close in to murmur, inordinately sensual, "I believe you can still manage some sweeping music, no?"