come_sailaway | [Closed] Can you forgive me for trying again?

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[Closed] Can you forgive me for trying again?

Who: Rich, César, Johnny, and Watson
What: Rich gets a very strange regain, and doesn't realize it's meant to make him question everything his poorly constructed support network hinges on. Embarrassment ensues.
When: June 19th
Where: Cabin 102
Warnings: Likely mentions of alcohol addiction and child abuse.

[The day after the excursion team returns back to the ship is... peaceful, somehow. After the mess that was his conversation with Johnny, Rich had been expecting to wake up with a guilty migraine and the miserable nausea that comes after a good cry, but surprisingly, he wakes without much complaint, and after sneaking some more chocolate from César's drawer, he's feeling well enough to get out of bed, and is actually considering going to the buffet for something substantial to eat when he opens the door and is face to not-face with Friday.

There's envelopes in his hands moments later. He reads the top one, for César, and tries to protest these clearly aren't for him, but she's already off again. She's really bad at answering questions, huh? Granted, that's probably because she's too busy to stick around and have an existential chat.

Well, Rich doesn't mind being the mailman. He's pretty sure his roommate spent the night canoodling with his boyfriends, and now that he's checked the other envelopes, it looks like the other two are addressed to those men. He can get this done quickly before breakfast, surely. It just means he'll end up having to enjoy a good brunch instead.

He knocks on the door to the cabin before checking to see if there's a slipper propping the door open.]

Hey! Are you all decent in there? I don't wanna see a lick of PDA before I come in, alright?

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"Yeah, right? Tried to ask her about it, but she was gone before I could..."

He trails off as he sees their distressed faces, his curious smile fading into a look of concern. "What? What is it?" He didn't deliver a bomb, did he?

No, he sees the paper Johnny's holding, with the smudged handprint on it. He remembers a craft like that in kindergarten, where everyone had to put their handprint on a piece of paper to show how fast they were growing. He can barely remember, but it was typical for a lot of classes to do something like that on... a special day...

He goes pale as he looks at the other cards and starts putting the pieces together. "Huh? You all got cards...? Weird, ahah, I mean, what's the occasion?"

He knows what the occasion is. He had just forgotten until now... he hasn't celebrated it for a decade, after all.

Johnny holds up the card so Rich can read his child-self's handwriting. "César, remember when you asked me if I wanted to have kids? I think my answer's changed somewhat."

Considering that answer had been 'what the fuck, César?', that's not really saying too much, but like. Yeah, this is their boy, and they are fathers.

"Not entirely, but somewhat."

César lets out a bit of a snort at the glitter, completely out of character for the situation, and then looks up to Johnny as he speaks. He glances at Rich, who's gone pale, and then idly flips his card open to see the Dad Dad Dad Dad Dad repeated all over. That card also gets lifted to show Rich.

"I'd say this is fast, but we three were desperately together in a month's time right after I asked that question." A wibbly smile. "And certainly a far simpler solution than an external apparatus and minor medical procedures I was thinking of."

Then, to John, about the apparatus. "I'll explain later." And to the room at large, a solemn sort of happiness. "The occasion is Father's Day in Mexico, Argentina, the United States, the United Kingdom, and throughout Europe."

"Well, I've never heard of the holiday, but the name is self-explanatory."

He sounds hoarse. Watson claps a hand over his mouth -- there is definitely glitter in his moustache now, it will probably be there forever -- in an attempt to hold back some of the reaction that's running through him. Are they being made fun of, perhaps? Is this a cruelty aimed at Rich, at all of them? The gifts in general are so inscrutable, and it's hard to assign a motive.

He'd also somewhat come to terms with the idea that he would never have children of his own.

Words are failing him. He moves forward, taking hold of Rich by the arm. Watson's expression is nothing short of terrified, and there's a gleam in his eyes of emotion threatening to spill over. "Rich."

Johnny holds up the card, and there's no more pretending these are just familiar anymore. They're his old cards. It's clear in every crease in the paper. He's pretty sure he's shaking, in disbelief, in anger, in utter terror. He wants to disappear, but there's nowhere to run to.

"I..." he stammers and sputters, practically hearing his mind creaking as it attempts to justify what's happening before him. His face heats up with shame. "It's not fast because it doesn't mean anything, okay? It's a sick joke!"

And of course these assholes would play into it. It's so easy. Rich makes himself such a good target. They can give him platitudes and of course he'll believe them, so desperate for attention that he'll cry in their laps...

He feels a hand on his shoulder and nearly flinches away. He finds himself about to snap again, but Watson's expression cows his anger... if only slightly.

"Don't... don't look at me like that, okay? It's... it's just cruel." The cards or the hope hearing his name gives him? It's unclear.

"Cruel?" Johnny falls silent for a second after he repeats that word aloud, tilting his head slightly to one side. "I don't understand. Why do you think it's cruel?"

It's gentle, prodding at the bruise to understand its shape better, trying to gently get under Rich's skin instead of taking a blunt instrument to it and making things worse.

This metaphor was a mistake.

César goes quiet, looking down at the card in his hands again as his expression falls. Watson has glitter in his moustache now, probably. This is all too sudden. Rich isn't ready for this. César isn't ready for this.

He can't deal with the anger or the potential upcoming rejection. Watson grabbing Rich's arm makes him reach up to touch where Rex had grabbed his. César holds the card in one hand now, the envelope on his lap.

These three cards could push Rich away from them before they can even reach a natural point to wonder if this was the path they chose. César furrows his brows in clear distress. Is he being forced to fail another kid by external forces?

Better to have the others speak, at least for the moment.

"If it's a joke, it's a very poor one," Watson agrees. "Rich... come sit down. It's true that it doesn't have to mean anything more than we want it to. Please don't run off."

Because Rich looks like he might.

"Sit down before you faint."

Rich sighs quietly, and though he's still agitated, he follows instructions, moving over to the couch and sitting down. He tries to take up as little space as possible, face still bright red and knuckles white where they rest in his lap.

"...I don't know why you guys got those. I... I was probably 3 or so when I made them. I mean, I wasn't even Rich back then. I was just my mom's weird little tomboy. So bringing them back now and shoving them in my face just seems tasteless."

That's clearly not every reason they bother him, and not even the main reason, but Rich is horrified of admitting to why these men would have received cards once meant for someone else.

"Look, I can already tell you we're all refusing to acknowledge the other name on these, that's just part of not being a heel." Not like the wrestling term, but kinda like the wrestling term. A little bit. If you squint.

"That's not the point, though. Rich, do you want these cards back, or are we allowed to keep them?"

Breathing is a thing César remembers to do when the catastrophizing going on in his head doesn't come to pass. He closes the card again and just looks at the outside of it. This is just a terrible taunting with bonus deadnaming of Rich to boot.

This is about Rich, but César can't help but focus on how he'll never be signing a Father's Day card for his own father ever again. Rafael Salazar had decades left to live. Decades. But not anymore.

"We'd never deadname you, Rich." César says quietly, the only thing he can think to add that's of any use.

He nods along to Johnny's question. Otherwise, he's entirely silent. There's not much he can do right now besides keep his emotions in check.

Edited (oops forgot icon) 2022-06-20 19:38 (UTC)

Reassured that Rich is at least sitting and there's going to be some effort at talking through this, Watson perches on the arm of the couch. His expression is serious; the initial shock has worn off and he's prepared to focus entirely on... not him, anything but himself.

"It is a little tasteless," he agrees, "in several ways, but I doubt that you had anything to do with that. I don't think any of us are angry about it."

"N-No, I know you wouldn't be mad," Rich mumbles, still a bit hunched in on himself. He can't seem to bring himself to look at any of them. He feels like any slight reaction he could see would only make his feelings all the more complicated.

If he just... sits here, facing forward, he can pretend that they hate him. Or that they forgive him. Or whichever reaction he feels he'd prefer in this particular moment, with the way his emotions are churning in a confusing mess.

He finally seems to register Johnny's question, and he blinks, gaze fixed on him for a moment before quickly darting away.

"Why... I mean, why would you want to keep them? They're just... old memories."

"I just think it's sweet. I don't really have a family, back home. I have friends, I suppose, but. It's not quite the same, and I don't know how much they see me for me. You know, beyond Mimley's lover. Theresa and Marguerite's landlord. I guess I wanted the opportunity to...bask in someone else's old memories. I made my father cards when I was little, too. Not for...'Father's Day', that wasn't a thing in Gallery, at least not in my time."

He looks down at the card again. "But I'm sure mine were discarded, too, if not when I was little, definitely when I detached myself from my name."

While the others talk, César clothes his eyes and breathes, finally recentering himself. It still feels weird to lift and shift his emotions so strongly, as relieving as it is to be able to do so.

"None of us have families back home, Rich." It shouldn't roll off the tip of his tongue, yet it does, and César finally looks to Rich, eyes quiet and sad. "At least, not emotionally."

He gently nudges Rich with his shoulder and quietly hands over the letter. "We should keep this one in our room... it has your mother's handwriting on it, as tasteless as this might have been." César's voice drops quieter. "Mementos like these are important. ... although we might have to do something to contain the glitter of the one, else we end up like John's moustache."

A joke to lighten the room, he hopes, as true as it is.

"Do I have -- oh, bloody hell." Watson rubs ineffectually at his moustache. The glitter is still there. "But that's very true, Rich. My family is all either dead or pretending to be dead. I admit the card was rather a shock to me because of that. I think... I think that's something we all have in common, the sense of feeling alone."

"Bask in..." Rich stammers at Johnny's words, at the implications, once again feeling his face heat up, but he tries to listen. He feels like he should try... as scary as it is.

It seems they're all a little scared. He inhales a bit sharply when César explains that none of them are connected to their families anymore. Of course, he shouldn't have assumed he was the only one, and he knows César mentioned his parents that first day they met...

It's still a lot to take in, but it makes him more understanding of why they care so much about this. They... don't want him to miss out. They don't want him to let go of family.

"...I know I really did feel alone when I got here. I think that might've been part of why I hid, for so long? I... you get used to just having people see surface level and you're afraid of anyone getting close enough to dig any deeper." He scoffs. "Or, you know, getting your old childhood cards delivered to them because you've been thinking too much about why three weird old guys have been looking after you for three weeks."

When Rich comments about being used to people seeing surface level, Johnny's eyes flicker to César for the tiniest moment, because he has heard that before on this ship. But his attention soon returns.

"...weird? Old? Ouch. I get it, you're uncomfortable and feeling vulnerable. But the insults aren't necessary."

A bit of a giggle at Watson, even as he talks about how they're all mostly or entirely alone back home. The glitter's still there. César is going to be finding it in his mouth later, probably.

But he refocuses on the conversation. Rich's words echo in him, and César doesn't miss the glance from Johnny. He even smiles softly to him.

Another chuckle. "I'm weird, though, Johnny. And old in the eyes of a teenager. They're just facts for me, so I don't mind. Also, I'm afraid we're just like this, Rich. We fuss and care about people in an instant."

He looks to Rich, leaning back against the couch and resting an arm along the back of it. "I get how scary this is. People only see me surface level as a crazy scientist back home. No one sees me at depth."

"And I expected that was going to be my lot for the rest of my life, which I was using to my advantage with my current employers." César sweeps a gesture to both of the other two men. "... until these two men immediately and terrifyingly saw me for who I was after eight months of no one noticing my true self. And I do mean terrifying, because I actually worried they were spies for Providence for about five seconds with how well they saw me. So I get your reaction, I really do... and if you'll permit me a moment to prattle on about these two...."

Leaning over towards Watson, César touches his forearm. "I was stupid due to lack of sleep from when I was taken and had walked around briskly for several hours as I memorized the layout of the ship. Dehydrated myself and forgot to eat. John here—" He has to take Watson's hand now, actually. "—found me sitting, trying to recover my senses. Most people would stay away from a man dazed like that, worried he might be high or crazy. But John didn't."

"I was too out of it to hide my eccentricities. Back home in the present, I'd get weird or disapproving looks, but John found them charming and familiar. He stepped right in to help me get a bottled of water and some mixed nuts. Kept my focus on consuming them since I couldn't myself." He squeezes Watson's hand, a hint of sadness as he smiles fondly up to Watson. "It was the longest non-work conversation I had in eight months. We talked about so many things. Medical advances, my ADHD without naming it, our mutual grief, my broken relationship with my brother... so many things. Never once did you find me too strange to be anything other than a person, John. Not even when I described how my brain processed things differently from others."

Still holding Watson's hand, he turns his head to smile at Johnny. "Johnny... I met at the first party. We could only escape if we answered 10 questions about ourselves. We started simple, with bits about the times and Earths we were from. Eventually, I mentioned losing my parents and a family friend. There were times he even guided the conversation when I stumbled. But then he asked about my pastimes, and..."

A little laugh. "... Read me like a book, saw the pressure on my shoulders from back home. I was seen, and it was terrifying. A stranger could read me easily, and that meant everything might fall apart back home, if others could, too. So I started to have a panic attack, and—"

He shakes his head, amused, looking to Rich for a moment. "—and he stuck my hand in champagne, stopping it cold by short-circuiting my thought process. While he helped me dry my hand, we spoke about the pressures of masculinity. About people important to us back home."

César looks back to Johnny, almost in wonderment. "And then, without even trying, you got me to open up. About how no one could see I was a person with emotions because I was strange, so much that no one expected me to grieve over losing my parents despite knowing they had died only hours ago by my clock. You were so angry and supportive on my behalf."

Another shake of his head, glancing to Rich again. "I was in such a messed up state I needed a hug but couldn't ask for it like a normal person." He shrugs, glancing to Johnny. "But you gave me what I needed, then took me by the hand. While we spoke about sappy things regarding John after we found out we both knew him and made plans to meet again."

He laughs briefly, rolling his eyes at himself as he looks to Rich again. "And in that meeting, I figured out he was into me when he put his hand on my knee. But, honestly, that's an aside. What I'm saying is that we just... see people and care for them, fast and furious. For who they are, terrifyingly so, because we know how to pay attention. It's just who we are. I'm sure these two can tell you stories about me."

Edited (mentioning why Johnny and César talked about John specifically) 2022-06-22 14:51 (UTC)

"I think you make too much of that," Watson says, a little self-consciously. "I am a physician, and I am used to eccentric people. If you had been insane or under the influence of some substance, I still would have involved myself." But he squeezes César's hand all the same. "It is true that I have ever attached myself to people quickly. I proposed to Mary, rest her soul, after a matter of days."

There's a whole novel about that, actually. He can lend it to you.

"Perhaps I am odd, though I refuse to dignify 'old' with any sort of response, but I have also always been quick to care. This," he waves the card, inadvertently scattering more glitter, "seems a rather double-edged gift, but also... yes, we have been attempting to look out for you. You... seemed to need it. I just hope that hasn't been unwelcome."

"Oh, come on-" He protests at Johnny's words for a moment, trying to insist he was just making a joke, but César seems to accept it all easily enough, and it relieves him enough to let his guard down... only, of course, for César to take advantage of that and strike with frightening precision at just what has Rich so scared.

Hearing that someone else went through something similar to what he had, feeling unknown and unlovable in every sense, only to come here and have people truly get him in just an instant... it helps. It makes this all the more painful, because it isn't just Rich having a dumb freak-out and reading too much into the casual kindness shown by pitying adults, but it does help. So much of what César went through, though obviously slightly different due to the nature of the relationship between the three men, rings true for the few weeks Rich has been on the ship. Watson treating him with kindness, despite the strange behaviour Rich was taking part in. Discussing how your brain works differently from the people around you, and yet not being shunned for it. Johnny discussing masculinity so candidly and knowing better than Rich ever did how badly he needed a hug.

Things are clicking into place. These men are... a little strange, sure, but like Rich hasn't been called the same. Like he hasn't been turned away before for coming on too strong, coming off as desperate, rambling too excitedly about something he cared about. They were all weird in much the same way, and maybe seeing those similarities in each other had made them all a little more attached a little bit quicker. Rich sighs, scrubbing a hand over his eyes.

"It wasn't unwelcome, what you all did. I really, really needed it. I just didn't know how badly I did." He looks at them all with the softest, most hesitant smile.

"I'm used to people wanting nothing to do with me when they find out what I'm really like. I was expecting the same from you guys... so when you didn't, I got, you know. Really excited, but really scared at the same time?" He looks at Johnny and bites his lip. "I wanted so badly to just let you take care of me. I thought, maybe if I just didn't make a big deal of it, maybe I could just keep pretending I had a family who actually got me." He looks down again, at where some glitter has floated down onto his shorts (of course, it's probably all over the room by this point).

"I just couldn't acknowledge it. If I did, I felt like it'd all disappear."

"It's not going to disappear, Rich. We're not going to disappear. We've managed not to do that to one another yet, and we're not going to do it to you."

Johnny quietly tucks the card he received into the breast pocket of his shirt, close to his heart. "We all know what it is to be heart-wounded and abandoned." That last word is quieter than the rest. He's thinking about his family there, but also the fugitive Mimley Bastrop leaving the city and coming back married.

He left his family, so can he even really count that as them abandoning him? Probably not. Maybe. He's truly not sure. And Mimley didn't choose to leave, not really. And he did come back. Maybe none of it counted. Except the ache in his heart said otherwise.

César would argue that, yes, that would count as abandonment. When you have to choose between survival or family, they've abandoned you emotionally. He may also be biased, considering how great he thinks Johnny is.

Watson's words get a smile and yes, another squeeze of his hand. John would've taken care of him regardless, certainly. But regardless, he saw the younger man before him as a person.

"You might not have known how much you needed it, but we did. We tried incredibly hard to make sure you got the care you needed while giving you the breathing room you needed, too. Something, something, responsible adults, sí?"

He's looking to Rich as he talks again, looping his arm with the hand holding his card gently over Rich's shoulders.

"As an example myself: I didn't know how much I needed these two until we found each other... and I experienced the same fears you've been worried about. My own baby brother, Rex—you two have a few similarities in your kindness and enthusiasm—he..."

César shakes his head, his smile saddening as he looks to Johnny, needing the support in those almost golden eyes. He understands how Rich feels in incredible detail. And thus, he's the one that will give the corroborating evidence to show Rich he really isn't alone.

"... can't conceptualize me as a person. Him and his found family couldn't accept me, not really. I was always an outsider. After he involuntarily disappeared and things began to get bad, they packed up his things without giving me a single memento, then left. Leaving me to save tens of thousands of lives by myself while I was grappling with losing my entire family, not that any of them cared to realize that. To be honest, I irrationally feared you might decide to hate me like he did for a bit. You didn't, but I still worried."

He glances back to Rich, pulling the young man closer to him. "... So Johnny's right about me being heart-wounded and abandoned. I was afraid that they, or later, you, would abandon me once seeing who I was. But neither of them did, and there's no way any of us would do that to you. We've all felt alone and unloved, each for different reasons."

César shrugs, smiling for real now. "So matter what kind of friendship or family or relationship we settle into... Whatever we end up being to each other, if we even never want to someday define it at all... I'm happy to let happen naturally, including working through any ups or downs that might occur."

A laugh. "Including me being perhaps unnecessarily wordy. Hmm. Perhaps I should have warned you about that, first?"

Edited (Added tiny more bit of Rich to Rex comparison and then modified based on brainstorming) 2022-06-24 03:01 (UTC)

Watson casts a glance over at Johnny; unfortunately, he's in the wrong place to offer any sort of physical reassurance at that soft "abandoned," but his expression is faintly worried.

"Rich, lad, we all need someone to lean on sometimes. You're more than welcome to lean on us, if that's something you need. The point is... you shouldn't be alone. All four of us have been, but that doesn't mean we must continue to be."

"...I wish you all didn't know what that was like," Rich offers quietly. He knows for sure that none of them have done anything so wrong it warrants being left behind and forgotten. He wishes so badly they didn't understand him in this regard like they do with so many of Rich's other eccentricities.

He leans in a bit when César wraps an arm around him, his fears of being too close momentarily put to the side. He feels like... they all need a little closeness right now.

He's surprised to hear about his roommate's brother, wonders what they have in common. Would they have connected too, or would they have hated each other? César says he's kind, but... a kind person would have gone back for someone who needed it. It seems so much like César needed the help. He finds himself slightly angry, his words coming out with more force than necessary.

"I wouldn't hate you guys. Any of you. I already told you all... you were the ones that were supposed to hate me. I've messed up plenty. Already messed up more than once with people here. You aren't supposed to let me keep coming back and..." He sniffles and has to press knuckles against his eyes to stop himself from getting overly emotional.

"Keep trying to be a family." He exhales then, and laughs wetly. "I can't believe I fucking said it. I was so afraid of telling you how I saw you."

[Closed] Can you forgive me for trying again?

VIVA LA REVOLUTION

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