Daniel James Molloy

Ground Zero | Closed Starter | @mirroredxmusings

From the outside it was as he remembered it; the windows, the trees, thought now they were larger, the sound of the ocean gently lapping the shore in the backyard that extended all the way to the water's edge.

How the house looked from where he stood now in front of it was one of the very few memories Daniel had retained of this place. A snapshot, and one he, regrettably, was almost certain was the sight of it as he'd been leaving, a quick glance over his shoulder as he'd told himself, "I just need air, I'll go for a walk..."

The lights from the busier parts of Night Island lit up the smattering of clouds overhead, brightening the night even as the moon was partially obscured, made everything, especially the house seem to almost glow.

He tightened his hold on Jory's hand and glanced at him. In the other hand he carried the small box he'd stowed the fortune cookie in that Jory had given him a few nights prior, kept safe and close.

At first, he waited, believing Daniel would return shortly. Hours trickled by, and as the night wore on, a gnawing worry began to take root in his gut. The silence stretched around him, amplifying his anxiety, and with every passing moment, the sense of unease grew heavier.

When dawn broke, he found himself unable to shake the fear that had settled deep within him. He had tried to stay awake, longing for Daniel's presence, but exhaustion eventually pulled him into the death-like sleep that every vampire knows too well.

Daniel scanned the entryway and living room and did his best to remain calm and focused, pushing down the trepidation that was trilling persistent and low inside. The furniture were like ghosts, shapes softened and distorted by drop cloth.

He paused and closed his eyes, silently willing his mind to empty of everything but a single thought.

Remember.

He opened his eyes and looked around the space again.

"... It's hard to tell sometimes," he finally murmured, turning to look at Jory, "If it's memory or not, or what I wish or hoped happened." Daniel paused again and tilted his head, the words catching hesitant before he asked, "... Have we danced together in the living room here? Not like at the club but.. slow. To a record an-"

A different memory intersected the first.

"... The bathroom has tile." Daniel turned but didn't go there yet, merely looked in the direction of the house he guessed - no, knew that the bathroom and bedroom were in. "... It definitely has tile."

He meant to look back at Jory again but his gaze snapped to the living room window opposite and out into the backyard down to the beach.

The beach had been so bright with all of the candlelight, the little lanterns.

"... That was the first thing I really remembered when I woke up," Daniel breathed, still staring out at the water's edge. "Your name, and standing with you out there."

"That's what matters," he managed, voice soft but strained at the edges. "How you felt."

He turned his face to press a kiss to Daniel's palm, using the moment to breathe, slow, careful, fighting the tightness in his chest. When he pulled back to meet Daniel's eyes, his smile was gentle, practiced. Real enough. Broken underneath.

"We did dance here," Jory said quietly, the memory both precious and excruciating. "To old records. You wanted to make this place ours."

His thumb stroked Daniel's knuckles, grounding himself in the contact even as it hurt, this tenderness from someone who didn't remember promising forever, who didn't remember the vows Jory still carried like prayers.

Then Jory followed Daniel's gaze toward the window, out to the beach beyond.

He could see it so clearly, the way the sand had glowed amber and gold that night, hundreds of candles flickering in glass lanterns they'd placed together that evening. The ocean had been calm, whispering against the shore like a benediction. They both wore white linen, barefoot in the sand.

I promise to love you in this life and whatever comes after.

Daniel's voice, steady and sure. The vows he'd written himself, spoken with his hands holding Jory's, eyes never wavering.

I promise you'll never be alone.

Jory's throat constricted. He remembered every word. Every promise. The way Daniel had kissed him, the way they'd danced on that beach until the candles burned low, the way they had made love like it was something sacred.

And now Daniel stood beside him, remembering the feeling but not the words. Not the promises that had shattered eight years ago when he'd left.

Jory's jaw tightened. His free hand curled into a fist at his side, nails biting into his palm to keep himself anchored, to keep from breaking apart right here.

"I'm glad we came back," he whispered, and meant it. Even if it was killing him. Even if every corner of this house, every grain of sand on that beach, was a ghost of what they'd been.

He squeezed Daniel's hand gently, holding himself together through sheer will.

"I'm here. However long it takes."

Each of those minute details underscored the way that distinct place in Daniel's chest ached, the bond pervasive as ever between them but quivering under the gravity of the moment, under the weight of numberless regrets and loss.

He looked around the living room again, took a moment to set the boxed fortune cookie on the sideboard and paused as he did, more memory slowly rising and surfacing.

"Old records," he echoed, and took a step toward the center of the room, then another. "Presley... The Ronettes... The Righteous Brothers..."

Daniel hesitated, then closed his eyes, head tilting as he focused on what came and called for him; the music soft but distinct in his mind.

"... Take my hand, take my whole life too," he whispered the lyrics soft and low, remembering the way the lamplight had warmed the room, the overhead lights off, the way Jory had smiled at him as they swayed in time to the songs. "For I can't help falling in love with you.."

He remembered so many times Jory had sung soft and low to him.

He remembered the way Jory had looked at him as they'd danced together in that room. How tenderly he'd held him, as if Daniel were something precious.

Like something he didn't want to lose.

Daniel turned back to look at Jory again, struggled to form words against the tightness that formed and lodged in his throat.

How swiftly he'd destroyed the delicate thing they'd made.

That he'd never meant to somehow felt worse.

That he'd let his fear and instability eclipse his love for this man crushed him from the inside out.

The senselessness of it was maddening.

Daniel finally closed the distance between them again, caught hold of Jory's hand once more, anchoring himself in the now, refused to let the past sweep him up into another cycle that could send him spiraling.

"Even when it's hard," he breathed, reaffirming what he'd promised to Jory the same night they'd reunited again, even if the words were unsteady when they came out.

He squeezed Daniel's hand once before letting go, then crossed to the antique curio cabinet in the corner. His hand trembled as he reached for the brass handle. He steadied it and pulled.

There, on the second shelf, sat the small velvet box. Beside it, in a silver frame, was the photograph. The selfie Jory had taken while driving, Daniel caught mid-turn toward the camera, mouth open in laughter, one hand reaching out as if to steal Jory's phone.

Jory lifted the velvet box first, navy blue and worn soft at the corners. He opened it with a soft click.

Two bands gleamed against ivory satin, black as midnight but alive with color. Jory's ring shimmering with deep purple undertones like twilight, Daniel's catching the light in warm amber gold, like sunset trapped in obsidian.

Not one. Two.

Daniel's ring, where Jory had placed it the weeks after Daniel left. And beside it, Jory's own ring. The one he'd worn faithfully for a year, waiting. The one he'd finally removed when he'd accepted the truth: Daniel wasn't coming back.

Forever begins tonight, the engraving read on the inside of each band.

Forever had lasted exactly one year.

He took the photograph too and turned back toward Daniel. His hands were steadier now, though his eyes betrayed everything.

"Here," he whispered, setting the photo on the sideboard before holding out the open box. "Our rings."

He tilted it so the rings caught the light, purple twilight and amber gold gleaming against black. "I wore mine for a year after you left. Every night. Waiting." His jaw tightened. "And then I couldn't anymore. I put it back in the box. Left the island."

His gaze lifted to meet Daniel's, raw and unguarded.

"I stopped waiting for someone who was never coming back."

He remembered the look in Jory's eyes, that look the one that had come with the memory of his name.

It almost broke Daniel when he looked up and saw the pain where that hope had been in Jory's eyes now. He didn't need to remember the exact words he'd vowed to know the devastation left in his wake.

He felt that pain echoed through the tightness in his chest, felt it in the way the bond ached and strained.

Daniel reached out again and took hold of the box, his fingers resting against Jory's as he did, his own gaze open and holding nothing back.

"I still want this with you," he whispered, the words unsteady not from a lack of certainty, but from the deep tremor of feeling that demanded they be spoken. "Even without the words, I- I know what I had to have said. Had to have promised you - because how I felt at just the thought you..."

Daniel paused, his eyes closing for a moment as he let the memory of waking and remembering rise, and with it, the surge of feeling.

The sudden tidal wave of emotion that had crashed over him and brought with it Jory's name and a tangle of memory with it. It had overwhelmed him, the depth of that love and he'd torn up out of the ground and surfaced, gasping and at it's mercy.

"Sure?" The word came out rough, almost broken. "Daniel, I wore this ring every single night for a year. I waited for you on that beach until the sun came up more times than I can count.

"I..."His voice cracked. He steadied himself, jaw tight.

"Taking it off nearly killed me. It meant accepting you were gone. That you'd chosen to stay gone." His eyes burned but he didn't look away. "And I did it anyway. I survived it. I left the island because staying meant drowning in waiting for someone who wasn't coming back."

He shook his head and a sigh deeply.

"So am I sure?" His free hand came up to cup Daniel's face, thumb brushing his cheekbone with devastating gentleness. "I've been sure since the moment I saw you again. Since before you remembered my name. The question isn't whether I want this..or want you."

His voice dropped to barely a whisper, raw and undefended.

"The question is whether you're sure. Whether you can choose this, choose me, every night, even when the memories are hard. Even when you remember why you left." His thumb traced Daniel's jaw. "Because I can't survive losing you twice, Daniel. I won't."

The words hung between them, tender and terrified and absolutely true.

Instead he lifted his own hand and mirrored it, pressed his palm to Jory's cheek in return as he took a deliberate pause to feel the weight of the moment and commit it to memory, hoping to sear it in himself so it couldn't become lost like so many other memories had.

"I'm sure." The words were soft but steady.

Certain.

He stroked his fingertips along the curve of Jory's jaw. "I want this. I choose this, I choose you."

He let his hand fall but only to reach into the box, to take out the black and purple band. "No matter how hard or painful. Nothing is as painful as the absence of you was... and I'm sorry I made you know what that was like too. That I hurt you. If.. if I could change just one thing in my life, that would be it."

He took Jory's hand and carefully slipped the ring onto his finger, only then looking away to do so before glancing back up, his eyes shining with the welling of sudden but unshed tears, the bond thrumming stronger now. Resolute.

Daniel's hand pressed against his chest, and Jory's heart quickened beneath that touch like it recognized home. The bond between them thrummed stronger, wrapping around his ribs until he thought he might break from the intensity.

I want you. No matter what.

Something in Jory's chest cracked open, not breaking, but unfurling. He looked up and saw the blood tears shining in Daniel's eyes. Saw the remorse and love and absolute certainty. This wasn't the Daniel who had left him. This was the Daniel who had chosen to come back.

Jory moved, pulled Daniel into his arms with desperate violence. Buried his face against Daniel's neck.

"I waited for you," he whispered, raw and broken. "Every night I waited."

His fingers curled into Daniel's shirt, holding on like Daniel might disappear. "I love you so much it terrifies me. Because losing you once nearly destroyed me, and I..."

The silence between them settled soft and sacred. Jory's breathing had steadied, his forehead still against Daniel's, when his gaze caught on something small and golden on the nearby table.

The fortune cookie box.

He pulled back slowly, hand trembling, not from fear, but from the overwhelming enormity of loving someone this much. Of needing them this desperately.

"Will you open it?" The words came out broken, barely a whisper. "Please?" He held it out to Daniel like he was offering his heart, raw and undefended, asking to be held gently.

His eyes burned as he searched Daniel's face. This was trust. Devotion. Him saying I'm choosing to believe in us even though the terror of losing Daniel again lived in his bones. "I need something good," his voice cracked. "Something that says we get to keep this. That the universe isn't going to take you away from me again."

He wrapped his own arms around Jory, hand not still clutching the ring box sliding up to cradle Jory's head when he buried his face against his neck, tenderness and fierce protectiveness welling up in equal measure within himself as he did, the words Jory had sent him over text that first night he's reached out rising up in his mind.

You unmade me.

The evidence of it laid bare within his own arms, in the broken admission Jory had spoken now.

I love you so much it terrifies me.

The unshed tears in his eyes fell when Jory moved to take up the box with the fortune cookie and held it out, the desperate plea for him to open it and his haunted expression when he said it catching at something deep inside both Daniel's chest and mind and tearing wide.

The bond surged and he was flooded with a sudden wave of emotion, caught in the riptide of it.

He knew this feeling, intimately; of fragile hope coupled with a bracing for impending despair.

Knew the crushing weight having that hope shattered.

How many times had he held his own heart out in a similar way and had it dashed into pieces again and again and again?

Daniel set the ring box down on the table and reached out for the one in Jory's hands now, nodding as his fingers brushed his fledgling's as he did so, the touch gentle - gentle in the way he'd always wanted and needed in the wake of so much ruin.

"Yes," he whispered, I'll open it."

He lifted the lid, then lifted out the cookie; feather-light, as fragile as the look in Jory's eyes.

Daniel set the box beside the one for the rings and looked up again, held Jory's gaze with his own, words spoken with hushed reverence.

"No matter what it says, though, I mean it. I want you and I want us. I choose you. Not anything or anyone else. You."

He took Jory's hands and guided them to help cup the cookie, and Daniel smiled up at him, utterly unmindful of the bloody tears sliding down his own face, eyes full of unwavering love and fathomless certainty.

"Let's open it together."

Marry me...again

Three words in Jory's own careful handwriting. Three words he'd folded into that cookie himself, hands trembling as he'd sealed it back up, as he'd placed it in the box and waited for this exact moment.

A smile curved across Jory's lips, not broken, not desperate, but radiant with certainty. With intention. He'd orchestrated every second of this, and now Daniel was reading the words Jory had written for him.

"I put them there," Jory said softly, his voice steady despite the blood tears tracking down his own face now. "I wrote them for you."

His fingers tightened around Daniel's, the broken cookie and its message pressed between their palms like a vow.

"You came back." The words emerged tender and fierce all at once. "After eight years, you came back for me. You could have stayed away. You could have let the distance win. But you didn't."

Jory brought their joined hands up between them, the slip of paper visible in the space where their fingers intertwined.

"Eight years ago, you chose me. You made me yours." His smile widened, absolute and unwavering. "You came back, and now I'm choosing you. I'm asking you."

He held Daniel's gaze, unflinching, unafraid.

"Marry me again, Daniel. Not because fate says so. Not because some fortune cookie tells us to." His voice dropped to a whisper, intimate and certain. "Because you came back for me, and I want you. Because I choose you. Because I'm done waiting for the universe to decide if we get to keep this."

Jory's thumb brushed across Daniel's knuckles, gentle and deliberate.

"You returned to me after all this time. Now let me return to you completely."

He leaned in, forehead touching Daniel's, their breath mingling in the space between.

Then his mouth split in a bright and unrestrained smile, even as the blood tears continued to slip down his face, as he shook the cookie crumbs from a hand before lifting it to brush at one streak of red also coursing down Jory's cheeks.

"- Yes."

Daniel bridged that minute gap between them, pressed an ardent kiss to Jory's lips, the rest of the words that followed tumbling out half whispered and urgent between more kisses that he pepper over Jory's face; his temple, the bridge of his nose, his chin, his lips again - everywhere he could reach.

"Yes... I'll marry you - every night if you wanted it, again, and again -"

He threw both arms around him, the fortune still tightly clasped in a hand, and buried his face into Jory's shoulder, holding tight as he said it again, the word muffled but still distinct and said with deeply felt and unshakable certainty, the intense and overwhelming swell of love and devotion he felt so strong it seemed it might break him wide open.

"Yes."

Daniel continued to embrace onto Jory tightly, unwilling to let go for a long, long moment; and when he finally drew back it was only enough to kiss him again and lean forehead to forehead, violet eyes locked on amber ones once more as the gravity of the moment and the steady hum of their connection held them there.

When they finally broke apart, Jory was trembling. Not from fear or uncertainty, but from the sheer weight of joy, of having Daniel here, saying yes, meaning it with every fiber of his being.

"Wait," Jory whispered against Daniel's mouth, and he reached blindly for the small velvet box on the table beside them. His fingers found it, steady now with purpose.

He drew back just enough to look at Daniel, really look at him, violet eyes shining with blood tears and love and absolute certainty. Jory opened the box to reveal the matching ring: black band, amber inlay catching the soft light like captured fire.

"You gave me one," Jory said, his voice thick with emotion. "Now I'm giving you one."

He took Daniel's left hand and gently uncurled his fingers. Jory slid the ring onto Daniel's fourth finger. It settled there perfectly, a mirror to the one on Jory's own hand.

Two rings. Two choices. Two halves of a circle finally complete.

Jory brought Daniel's hand to his lips, kissed the ring, kissed the skin beneath it.

"I love you too," he breathed. "Endlessly. Completely."

He pulled Daniel close, their foreheads pressed together once more, their connection thrumming between them like a second heartbeat.

"We'll stay tonight," Jory said softly. "Stay here, in this place. Let yourself remember, all of it. The good, the hard, all the nights we built something sacred in these rooms." His fingers traced gentle patterns along Daniel's spine. "We owe it to what we were, to honor it before we leave it behind."

Jory drew back just enough to meet Daniel's eyes, his hand still clasped with his.

"And tomorrow, when the sun sets, we say goodbye to the past. We leave this island, leave the ghosts, leave the eight years of waiting." His voice was steady, certain, forward-looking. "We go home together. We build something new, something that's ours, not haunted by what we lost."

Jory smiled, and it was radiant with hope and purpose.

His gaze softened when Jory took his hand and slipped the wedding band onto his finger, quietly awed at how after so long there was still a familiarity in seeing and feeling it there, but now unaccompanied by the fears and trepidation he'd known those years before.

Daniel only felt a sense of rightness in it, of completion.

The light caught the shimmer of the inlayed band and he had to swallow hard against the rush of emotion that again surged seeing it.

He'd never willingly remove the ring again.

He melted into Jory when he drew him near, felt the way their bond seemed to wrap them both in it's steady warmth and hold, just as sure and strong as Jory's arms around him, and both gave him the courage he needed for what was to come.

"Help me remember?"

He searched Jory's eyes, the amber of them the same as the band on his finger, just as the violet in Jory's ring matched his own, and Daniel's brow furrowed again as he felt a stirring, a whisper of something rising - a memory?

He was never certain and he so wanted to be.

"I want to remember, Jory. I don't want to be caught in up by the past and not knowing, for your sake and mine. I want our fresh start... but I need your help."

He lifted his free hand to stroke his lover's cheek again, kept his gaze locked with Jory's as he tried to follow that thread of something, the fragment of something he couldn't quiet catch hold of.

"Did I ask you something?" Jory repeated softly, his voice gentle with confusion and curiosity. He tilted his head slightly, studying Daniel's face as if he could read the fragments his lover was grasping for. "What are you sensing, Daniel? What's the memory trying to tell you?"

Jory's thumb continued its slow, soothing motion against Daniel's palm grounding him, keeping him tethered to the present moment even as his mind reached backward.

"Tell me what you're feeling," Jory urged, his amber eyes searching violet ones. "Don't force it. Just... what's there? What's the shape of it?"

The question made Daniel try to even harder to catch whatever it was that had come slithering through his mind; again no remembered words came and no solid memory, just fragments. Flashes like still photographs. Quick and sudden trills of remembered emotion.

" -- Confusion. Fear." He looked up at Jory again, his hand closing lightly against his fledgling's and his expression softened for a moment as he focused on the way Jory's thumb stroked his palm.

"... After I turned you, but before I left... did we disagree, or fight about something?"

Daniel paused again, his eyes dropping to focus on their joined hands. "... There's so much I can't remember from when we were together before, and -- I resent my own mind for not being able to hold onto the things I want to remember the most, when I can still remember so much of things I actually wish I could forget."

For ancient and/or immortal muses, here are some questions to build your headcanons!