Logs:Command Me To Be Well (Annotated Edition)

Command Me To Be Well (Annotated Edition)
cn: explicit sex, depictions of rape
Dramatis Personae Flicker, Steve
In Absentia	2019-09-16 (Steve and Flicker's Monday Night, this time with telepath meta included.)
Location <PRV> Tessier Residence - Greenwich Village
Understated opulence claims this spacious and well-kept townhome, the decor throughout the whole of it of the highest quality and carefully chosen. The front door opens onto the entrance hall, a closet close at hand to receive coats and shoes -- the pale hardwood floors gleam underfoot, unsullied by tracked-in mess from outside. The living room beyond the entrance is all dark woods and pale earth tones, comfortable couches and armchairs and a thick soft rug laid down beneath. Two large and painstakingly aquascaped aquariums flank the entrance to the dining room, with several brightly coloured species of fish within. Most of the rest of the wall space, notably, is taken up with shelves -- shelves crammed with books of every subject and genre. A study branching off of the main hall is cozy, small, done in pale blues and lined with books as well around the large computer desk and smaller futon, though these rarer books are cased behind glass. Another securely locked door leads to the basement, and another to the full bathroom downstairs. The kitchen connects to the living room; in contrast, it is sleek and modern and well-appointed, stocked by someone who takes their cooking seriously. And takes their alcohol equally seriously -- to one side of the kitchen there is a fully-stocked bar. The back door to the kitchen looks out on a small well-kept garden.  In the dining room, a quiet rattle has joined the soft burble of the twinned aquariums' filters. There are numerous tiny pastel eggs sitting nestled in the cagelike grip of Flicker's mechanical hand; they clatter and click against the hard plastic fingers as he shakes them lightly. A number of small colorful wooden tokens -- shaped like cherries, little grubs, fish, mice, small stalks of grain -- already sit in a plastic holder; the eggs are supposed to be joining a host of similar pieces in a little round birds nest. The rattling is, apparently, too satisfying to set them down just yet; it's a pleasant distraction from the whirl of preoccupied thoughts clattering together in their head. Maybe he ought to go home -- what if Steve doesn't like the game -- what if he has already annoyed his hosts too much -- he's such a mess do they REALLY want to play this with him or are they just being polite. "Those cards need shuffling." He is nodding to the slick new deck. "Have you -- played a lot of..." He trails off with a slight flush. "I promise it's not as complicated as it looks." Steve is staring down with firmly unexpressed dismay at the nest full of pastel eggs, the myriad wooden tokens, the colorful graphic dice, the (large!) player mats, the three rulebooks. "I believe you but ah...I have to admit I was expecting something more like Monopoly. With birds." << This just looks like five games piled into one box. >> But he picks up the stack of cards as instructed and begins shuffling them, the motion practiced. "I've played a lot of card games -- though generally there were only fifty-two cards. Not so many board games, other than chess and checkers." He cuts the deck and performs a textbook riffle, the motion automatically conjuring a melange of countless long nights huddled around a campfire or a single dim lamp in Resistance hideouts with the Commandos. "I'm guessing I've probably got entirely the wrong idea about game night, then?" Flicker's eyes shift to Steve's hands as he shuffles, one thread of his tangled worries unspooling to bounce off in a different direction as he takes in the practiced ease of the motion. << ...limited options for fun at war. >> "Oh -- I don't think we've ever had Monopoly anywhere near Game Night." He ducks his head, tips his hand over to drop the eggs back into their nest. "We play a lot of different types -- they're not all as complicated as this. We try to mix it up enough to have something for a range of tastes. It's been a while since I've -- I used to do it every week, but." << Haven't exactly been much fun lately. >> His head shakes as he starts shuffling a different set of tiles together. "At first I was just busy but I guess with all the chaos it just felt hard to --" << constantly stress out my friends >> "-- want to jump back into life, you know? I feel like it might be about time to try, though." "Good. I've only played it twice and it was equally terrible both times." Steve's smile is quick and sharp, belying the painful memory of a scruffy dark-haired boy bent over a Monopoly board, glibly explaining the rules. "Would have turned me off to the whole Capitalism business if being poor hadn't done the job already." He squares the deck and casts around for a place to set it down. "Matt's always crowing about this event of yours, so early on I figured there must be a lot of chess. I've since come to realize he's a man of somewhat more complicated tastes." He blushes suddenly, Matt's dry correction coming to his mind unbidden. << "...I actually prefer to top. >> "I didn't mean like --" He laughs, shaking his head. Just settles the cards next to the dice tray. "Well. I can't promise I'll be any good at this game, or the other kinds you play, but I sure wouldn't mind dropping by Game Night. If you'd have me." "There's sometimes chess." Flicker plucks some of the tiles out of the pile and sets the rest aside. His eyes widen slightly, eyes fixing steadily on the new goal tiles he is just laying out. << have me >> echoes over (over) (over), an abruptly distracting klaxon in his mind that he deliberately shoves aside. "Yeah. If you'd want -- I mean, I'd like that. I guess you'll have to see if you want --" His wood-grained fingers uncurl stiffly, gesturing toward the game laid out on the table. << Nerd stuff. >> "If it's your speed. But even for people not that into games there's always good food and company and --" He shrugs a shoulder. "Maybe you'd have fun anyway. Just hanging out with people outside of work or Chimaera or. I don't actually know if you have a lot of other." His cheeks darken a shade further. << Friends >> is a deceptively simple end to this thought; it overlays mental images of Steve in his uniform, impeccably patriotic, cameras flashing and kids with small plastic Captain America shields waiting excitedly for autographs. The feeling beneath this beats much stronger: << (your friends) >> turns up Steve in jeans and a paint-flecked tee shirt helping set up a stage at Chimaera, Steve with a glass of lemonade and Flèche leaning up against his knee as he laughs around a garden table, Steve in black-on-black barista stock clothing sitting on a gnarl of driftwood and pointing towards a throng of distant shorebirds. "Community. Yet." "I do like good food and company." Steve braces both hands on the table and leans forward, studying the goal tiles, little though it gives him any insight into the game. "I suppose I could find that a lot of places, but I just -- haven't." His broad shoulders hitch up, and do not relax quite all the way back down. He reconsiders his words, his memory sifting through images of Montagues, Chimaera, the VA. "Well, no, I've found plenty, here and there. Just been hard..." << ...ought to try harder. >> He frowns. Shakes his head. "Hard to get close to folks, I suppose." Flicker has started to reach for the deck, but he stops here, letting his hand fall back to the table. His eyes lift to Steve's face. Here there's just a jumble; mental images of soldiers at war, scattered headlines announcing Steve's miraculous return from the dead. A swift mental calculation of how many years had passed -- how old the rapidly dwindling number of WW2 vets he's aware of are getting. "I -- could imagine a lot of reasons for that, with your -- um, everything, but --" His other hand turns up. "Is it something in particular that's been making it harder?"  Steve keeps his gaze on the game, uncomprehending though it may be. "Probably the shell -- uh, PTSD?" << He doesn't need all this right now. >> He swallows. "And...maybe this is a part of it, but. Well." << Button it, Rogers... >> But still the answer is welling up anyway. He sucks in a deep breath. His voice comes out quavery. "Lot of folks I was close to are dead now. Most not in the war, thank God, but for me it was -- awful sudden." "I'm sorry. That's --" Flicker starts to reach out when Steve's voice wavers, but drops his hand back to the table. << How often does he cry? >> << Would he be upset we noticed? >> << Would he be upset I'm touching him? >> << probably uncomfortable >> "Losing people you love isn't ever easy. I can't imagine dealing with that when it's -- kind of your whole world, too. Not just losing them but -- having nobody who knew them to talk about it with." He hesitates, fingers tracing against the grains of wood in the table. "Does it help? To talk about it?" "It wasn't the best of worlds," Steve admits with a short, harsh laugh. "Neither is this." << Howard was so excited for the future. I wonder if he saw enough of it to be let down. >> He looks up at Flicker, eyes brimming. Looks down again. "Don't know. Haven't done a lot of talking about it. If I do..." Shakes his head, still trying to push back the tide of memories wearing the faces of family and friends, too many to make any sense out of. "Not sure I'm strong enough," comes out quiet, his mind numb beneath it with the enormity of his loss. For a moment it seems like he might leave it at that, but then his shoulders tighten, his decision made in a wordless rush. "Howard Stark. Was my lover." Flicker's breath catches for a quick second when Steve looks up. For a brief instant the familiar jangle of "Turn it Off" sounds in their heads. Is quashed just as quick with a swift, << -- oh heck. >> In the next instant he's across the table, pulling a chair up closer to Steve so that he can drop into it. Rest his hand on the other man's back, rub slowly, an acute awareness in his mind of the inadequacy of any comfort he can give but a fierce determination to provide some support to a friend in distress. He doesn't reply at first, and when he does it's quiet. "That has to be a lot you've been carrying, too. I don't think there's a timetable for this kind of thing. But also you don't -- have to. Be strong -- all on your own. Sometimes when it's too much you're allowed to fall apart some. Let your friends give you some of our strong." The guilty twinge here at how he's applied this -- or failed to -- to his own life passes quickly, his attention largely too focused on Steve to dwell on this. Steve does not flinch this time when Flicker blinks across the room, though a kind of relief spreads through the numbness. "God, he was an ass, but I loved him so. At the time, I believed he loved me, too, however flippant he was about it." His hands grip the edge of the table hard, but relax visibly at Flicker's touch. << Please. >> Something unfurls within him, vast and aching, bending towards the warmth Flicker offers with all the life-seeking instinct of a flower opening its face towards the sun. "After, I tried to tell myself it was just a fling that happened to hold his attention for a while. That it wouldn't have outlasted the war by long anyway. That he didn't suffer decades of this, never speaking of it for fear of tarnishing my legacy. That he could remember me with fondness instead of agony." One tear slides down his cheek. Then another. And another. An old, old fear surfaces -- taught by a long succession of bullies -- but there's no blinking them back this time, no willing them away. He produces a plain white handkerchief from his back pocket to dry them. "Wish I could believe it." There's a sudden tension beneath Flicker's hand, a choked-back sob pushed out of him by the boundless misery bubbling up out of his past, and he leans toward the other man, shaking visibly. "I've known some people to hide a lot of love under some very --" Flicker can't help a fleeting glance toward the closed kitchen door, the sounds of clinking dishes and running water coming from behind it; the mental image that surfaces is their own apartment, Lucien's hand resting over Hive's on their dining table, Hive's expression sullen and disinterested but the mug of tea at Lucien's elbow carefully brewed to their guest's exacting tastes, "-- cavalier exteriors." He curls his arm more securely around Steve, drawing the other man nearer when he starts to lean toward him. Just holding Steve close, squeezing at his shoulder. "Things are kind of different now. Really -- really far from perfect but. I don't know what he might have gone through after losing you. Worrying about what people might think. But it... doesn't have to be the same for you, probably."  Steve's laughter seems to startle him, though the tears keep coming. There's a flush of warmth at the at the thought of Lucien. << If you'd told me the night I met him this was a cavalier sort of man, I'd have called it slander. Howard, though... >> "I take your point, but as far as I could tell, he was nothing like Luci. Sometimes I wonder..." He mops his face again, leaning into Flicker's embrace. There's a twinge of a more physical longing in the pit of his stomach that he pushes aside without much thought. "...if I might have grown to loathe him, had he not offered comfort I so desperately needed, in the face of such unspeakable horrors, or if we had ever gotten more than just...frantic stolen moments between missions." The shaking eases, but his breathing does not even out with it. The longing only grows and grows into a yawning void, a distinct sense that he's been hollowed out. "But that's all we had, and now he's gone and I miss him so much. I miss them all so much." "I'm sorry. I can't even imagine." Flicker doesn't let go. His breathing has -- not quite to the same degree -- sped up, grown slightly less steady; it has none of the ragged quality of Steve's but falls nearly in time with it. << (just breathe) >> Less a fully formed thought and more a well-trained instinct, born of years of his own breathing struggles and the panic attacks of too many friends -- modeling calm rather than demanding it, holding Steve just that much closer to let his own steadier rhythms provide a quiet recalibration. He keeps his breathing nearly in time with Steve's for a short while, at least, before his own breaths -- gradually -- ease back into a steadier rhythm. "I don't know what might or might not have happened if -- not for war. But I do know living through that must have been it's own kind of horrific and I'm -- I'm glad. That you had that comfort." Steve turns his face against Flicker's shoulder. The call of the void quiets, just a little. "I'm sorry. I hadn't meant to --" He struggles for a word that doesn't present itself, though the sobbing finally stops and with it his breathing comes easier. The emptiness in him doesn't really recede, but it's not so obtrusive now that he cannot ignore it. << I should have kept my mouth shut. >> "After the horrors you've been through, the last thing I wanted to do was make you worry about me." << God, if I'd lost him, too -- >> He tries to shut that thought down, but too late -- his mind is starting to spin out into every moment since the ice that he's come near losing another friend, and the growing horror that there have certainly been dozens more he never knew. The empty feeling in him swells. << But he's alive, and he's hurting. >> He straightens a little, just enough to raise his bloodshot eyes and meet Flicker's gaze. "You deserve comfort too." Flicker's hand continues to rub at Steve's back. Kneading gently between his shoulders. "It's okay. I can't just live in my head all the time." He sounds a little wry. "I worry about the people I love no matter what's happening. I honestly worry a little less if I can actually -- offer some help. I don't mind if --" His breath catches as Steve looks up, his eyes widening as his hand very slowly drops. << -- is he offering --? >> Then lifts again, halfway toward Steve's face. << What are you thinking the man is in distress you're projecting you told him you liked him if he was interested he would have said -- >> << This isn't why we held him. >> He pulls it back sharply with a sudden flush of red in his cheeks. He's racking his brain, thinking back over his past interactions with Steve -- lining these up against his own grief, guilt, conflict, the stress and time it took him to be open about his feelings -- all the reasons someone might not be in a place to explore any interest. He's thinking, too, of firm strong arms around him; his head against Steve's chest amid the calls of shorebirds and the rustle of saltmarsh grass, of the small currents of peace and safety running quiet but deep through a tumultuous ocean of pain. Of all the reasons someone might choose to explore that interest. Of what kinds of hurt Steve is carrying, the traumas of a war still fresh for him, the loss of love and community. "Steve --" There's a faint tremor in his voice, a surge of longing spiking so acutely it robs him of any shred of calm. In the next moment he's leaning in, completing the motion he'd only just aborted, his hand gentle where he reaches to cup Steve's face but the press of his mouth fierce. Steve watches Flicker's hand, mesmerized. Blinks as he pulls back. Starts to reply almost the same time the other man speaks his name, but if he meant to do more than groan into the abrupt kiss he does not succeed. It feels like freefalling from a great height. It feels like a lifeline. One of his arms winds around Flicker, the other hand rising to trace rough fingertips along his jaw. "Flicker --" he gasps, pulling away for breath but not pulling away entirely, his first and strongest instinct screaming to kiss him again, "-- oh!" << I shouldn't -- I can't do this -- >> But then his recently won calm deserts him to a heady rush of desire, and he pulls the smaller man to him, hands roaming jerkily over his clothes. Flicker draws in a unsteady breath against Steve's mouth. What lingering guilt and doubts remain about choosing this moment, this avenue for comfort given and taken, are flushed wholly away by the intensity of Steve's reciprocation, caution displaced under a surge of desire. His eyes flutter closed, his hand skimming down to the back of Steve's neck. "Oh -- please --" It's just a soft breath between hungry kisses. Flicker is easily tractable in Steve's hands, a flush of heat tearing through him when Steve pulls him closer that startles him with its intensity; he shifts from his chair half into the other man's lap, body pressing up into the touch. Steve lifts Flicker up easily, settling him more snugly, straddling his lap. There's something calming about having the weight of another on him, but Flicker's eager yielding is more than exciting enough to offset that calm. << What the hell do you think you're doing? >> The demand comes through in Bucky's voice, and brings with it only a sharp, ripping pain and the wrongness of his absence, rather than any sort of restraint. Flicker's soft, breathy plea sweeps it aside. His kisses roam lower, down over his neck, his fingers going to the collar of Flicker's polo shirt, unbuttoning it more deftly than really seems probable given their chaotic fumbling so far. "Yes, I -- what..." << ...what are you asking me? >> He kisses Flicker's chest through the open collar of the shirt. "We don't have to, but -- " << -- why do I want this so badly? >> His cheeks burn hot as he looks up, the game on the table beside them forgotten. "Do you want me to -- oh..." His question dissolves into a quiet moan as his one of his hands slips beneath Flicker's shirt, his mind not really up to processing the sensation of another's naked skin against his. That heat only grows when Steve lifts him, stirring up something sharp and suffocating. The very clear and intense memory of Ansel's rough hands. Slamming him against a wall or crushing his wrist to the floor. Where in other moments these intrusive flashes have occasionally debilitated him, here it only stokes the hunger he is, for once, not trying to quell. The warmth of Steve's strong arm around him -- the solid firm expanse of his muscles -- the ease with which he shifts Flicker's body over his. The soft press of his lips and gentle care of his hands despite the clear signifiers of strength. There's something unexpected here -- the sudden force of sheer need that rises in him is nearly as drowning as the flashbacks had been, but in this case he sinks into it, lets it sink into them. At the 'we don't have to' Flicker's breathing hitches, his hand shifting to Steve's shoulder and the slightest ripple of tension in his posture as he starts to pull back. << -- oh no what did we do is he upset -->> He doesn't get far -- at the very next half-formed question, at the hand that slips against his skin, there's a flood of relief that comes in time with the shiver as he melts back into Steve. << what are we doing >> still jangles in warning alarm somewhere in the back of his mind -- equal parts concerned about overstepping and, too, brightly aware of their surroundings. The game on the dining table, their hosts perhaps still in the next room; the intoxicating rush of feelings that leaves him very much less on the ball than he'd like to be, with his back to the large windows looking out to the garden. A series of kisses dotted with increasing fervor to the other man's neck. "Pleaseyes." Not whispered or breathy this time but immediate, vehement, an unfettered need lending the words a raw edge. His mechanical hand braces itself against the backrest of the chair; his other pushes up at Steve's shirt, palm skimming over the other man's broad chest. "I want you." Steve arches into the touch, which sends a bright, electric thrill of pleasure through him, the kiss he returns for it urgent and deep. His arms wind around Flicker's waist, lifting the smaller man effortlessly as he stands and settling him on the edge of the dining table. The act ruffles more memories, of a different man in his arms, other lips on his, and a fresh wave of grief. There's only the vaguest sense in the back of his mind that this might not be an ideal place, complete with estimations of the room's tactical defensibility. "You have me," is surprisingly gentle, as are the hands tugging at Flicker's shirt, inexpertly attempting to remove it without upsetting the harness for the prosthetic arm beneath it. "I'm here." "Oh!" Flicker's breath quickens when Steve lifts him to the table. The surge of need redoubles and again he lets it, buries himself in the immediacy of this moment. In the brief span here between kisses he tugs further at Steve's t-shirt, at first clumsy with the motion until he gives up and the shirt just vanishes, reappearing a few feet away to fall in a crumpled heap on the floor. << ... oh. no. Should we -- >> A sudden stab of nervous doubt has returned as he thinks to the network of scars stretching down beneath his shirt, the complicated gear that keeps his arm on, the scar-riddled stump beneath. Tries not to imagine disgust in Steve's eyes -- tries to keep breathing. He's somewhat more hesitant with his own clothing, slow and a little uncertain as he helps Steve peel off the polo shirt together with the undershirt beneath. His eyes have locked, wide and a bit more apprehensive, on Steve's face as the shirts come off to leave the soft cuff and harness criss-crossing his chest and upper back. He releases his clothes to join the other shirt in a growing pile. His mechanical fingers curl against the table, his other hand reaching more tentatively to wrap around Steve's waist. "You're here." << (still here) (please be here) >> Probably this wasn't intended as a question, but something anxious and hopeful in his tone leaves it not wholly definitive.  Steve blinks and looks down, momentarily uncomprehending, when his shirt just. Vanishes. << What -- oh! Right, he -- teleported it. >> His hands follow Flicker's lead, aiding with the removal of the other man's clothing before they stroke down -- still gentle but not at all hesitant -- over his chest, scars and harness and all. His eyes trace the lines on Flicker's skin with curiosity but no hint of revulsion, the feverish intensity in them unabated as his hands slide back around Flicker to pull their bodies together again. << My God, what happened to you? Was this all Prometheus? >> "I am. So are you." He holds Flicker's gaze for a moment more, then falls to kissing him again, hands rubbing slow, firm circles down his back. Flicker exhales shakily, relaxing back into the caresses when Steve pulls him closer again. << Thank God. >> "Thank you. I mean -- this is -- you are --"He slides his hand over the other man's chest, a quiet moan hitched in his throat as his fingertips run hungrily over firm muscle. The relief gives way swiftly to an electrifying warmth, wonderstruck at the desire that is somehow still written on Steve's face, acutely longing to be worthy of that intensity. He offers up a fervent prayer that he can bring Steve even a small measure of the delight that has already claimed him. He lowers his head, trailing kisses against the side of Steve's neck, against his collarbone. Mostly kisses, anyway -- a little less defined as he continues, one spilling into the next spilling into hungry scrapes of teeth, lips closing on skin to suck harder. His hand drops too, his fingers curling into the waistband of the other man's jeans. Kind of tugging, more exploratory than insistent. << (are we going to do this?) >> overlapping with a crushingly intense << (need this) >>. Something sicker and colder churns beneath these -- the memory of another unnaturally strong body bearing down on his -- it comes this time not so much with the usual wrack of terror but with a new sick panic that Steve might not look at him with such desire if he knew, might discard him if he could see the ways he had already been ruined, might feel the same revulsion that grips Flicker himself if he were aware that whatever Flicker wants to lay down here in offering had already been ripped out of this body. It's a panic he tries to snuff out -- with only limited success at first, a slow calm wrapping itself around the edges of that panic, quietly reassuring him that broken or not the pleasure he can share is still real. Steve's smile at Flicker's words is almost shy. "I'm not very experienced, but -- oh!" His head rolls back with a soft sigh of pleasure when the kisses turn aggressive. He was already aroused, and now painfully so, but since intensity of it has displaced, to some extent, the void of his grief, he welcomes it. His grip starts to tighten against Flicker's back, but he catches himself and drops both hands to the other man's belt. Follows it around, fingers playing over the buckle without undoing it. << He's never been with a man, but has he ever been with anyone? >> "Please, let me --" His cheeks flush and his breathing quickens. "-- make you feel good." Flicker's body presses more firmly against Steve's at that tighter grip. He buries his face against Steve's neck with a small whimper and a fiercer nip. His fingers curl hard around the denim, his hips rolling forward against Steve with a sudden urgency. He is already starting to nod before the other man has finished speaking, quick and eager -- though when he does pull back he looks a bit flushed, a bit dazed. << Don't deserve (this