A PEEK INSIDE     :     jon's most recent contacts

❝ what's your favorite color and why? ❞

❝ can i come with you? ❞

❝ you have a nice smile, has anyone ever told you that before? ❞

❝ how do you take your coffee? ❞

❝ sorry, what was your name again? ❞

❝ it just occurred to me i never asked you what your last name is. ❞

❝ actually we've met before. ❞

❝ i've heard a few things about you. ❞

❝ care to join me? ❞

❝ i'm not really sure why i trust you. ❞

❝ i don't usually talk this much, it just feels easy to say stuff when you're listening. ❞

❝ i know we don't know each other that well but if you wanna talk about it... ❞

❝ could you help me with something? ❞

❝ do you like it here? ❞

❝ are you new around here? ❞

❝ you can ask me anything you want. i promise i'll answer truthfully except the things i feel like lying about. ❞

❝ i don't mean to be too forward, you just seem like you could use a friend right now. ❞

❝ you can come with me. i mean if you don't have anyone waiting for you. ❞

❝ we're friends now. you can ask me for help. ❞

❝ do you like this music? i can change it. ❞

❝ what are your favorite snacks? ❞

❝ really? i wouldn't have guessed that about you. ❞

❝ do you mind if i ask about it? ❞

ACTIONS:

VISIT: for sender to go to receiver's home for the first time

VISITED: for receiver to go to sender's home for the first time

CRYING: for sender to see receiver cry for the first time

CRIED: for receiver to see sender cry for the first time

BEGIN: sender and receiver are on their first date together

TRIP: our muses go on a group trip but end up stuck together, away from the rest of their friends.

SITUATION: our muses are acquainted because one of them is their friend's roommate. muse a shows up when their friend isn't there and ends up hanging out with muse b one on one.

GO: our muses go to a zoo or theme park together and get lost.

INVITE: sender cooks for receiver for the first time

INVITED: receiver cooks for sender for the first time

TOGETHER: our muses spend the night for the first time

TRY: our muses hooked up and are hanging out the next day

COMFORT: sender is going through a break up and receiver offers to cheer them up

COMFORTED: receiver is going through a break up and sender offers to cheer them up

OFFER: sender gives receiver a ride to the airport/picks them up

OFERED: receiver gives sender a ride to the airport/picks them up

AID: sender helps receiver redecorate

his terrors make him stir , a long repressed need that he can't help in the dead of the night , not when breezes feel cooler along the slope of his spine , when he knows exactly why . with an intuition , he shudders with fear as he rouses from his deep slumber . a jump to conclusions as empty space offers him no warmth , nothing except the remnants of what came and went . his scent , practically as good as a trail of footprints . in his disoriented daze , he nearly doesn't spot him in the corner there , but moonlight glows moving images like they're made of reflective light and , for a second , curls of smoke seem as sharp as the hooks of his irises once they meet his . only then does his head rise from the pillow and , only when he blinks again , does he remember he's looking at his best friend . no one else . nothing else .

reassurances beg to soothe the frayed edges of his calm , especially when it's spoken in the honey - like hush of lloyd's voice . in that , jon wants nothing more than to listen . uses his voice like a force , a gravitational pull that guides his head back to the pillow . but he's learned his lesson to not be so easily persuaded this time , and it's the same thing that prolongs his stubborn stare , unblinking , bleeding with an undertone of desperation , influenced by the horrible gut feeling that desires to plead to lloyd without actually pleading to him . in his eyes , it's something like , come back to bed . just lay down right back next to me . just come back to bed .

in silence , he swears he won't close them again until daybreak , but his eyes naturally begin to feel heavy only minutes later , and he knows he needs to say something if it means he can spare them peace for just one more night .

crickets pause their night song abruptly , disturb the rhythm of moonlit resonance . solitude forged itself against the plight of lloyd's slumber , pulled him away from the lived-in softness of jon's back as it pressed against his chest , granting an ancient quiet to his best friend's breathing , the slow of his heartbeat like a warm mercy against his own , before the cold threatened this sheltered lull . a phantom chill incessant in the static of nocturne , wherein the monster's den lie abandoned inside his head . the hum of bloodlust old , but faithful still in broken hunger , chewing at the rounded edges of lloyd's sleep . legs swung over , feet met carpet , palms rubbed up and down , smoothed out the wrinkles of wanton sleep . not even a yawn . balanced his weight against the bed , so as not to wake him . reached for his jeans thrown over the chair , dug in his back-pocket for a night-cap , turned towards the silvery blur where blond hair met the shadowed slope of his neck . tattoos peaked beneath the sheet , exposed something familiar in the curve of his shoulder , the quiet rise and fall of safety . an untouched capture of what never was before , but calmed him as if it could have been .

the burn of his cigarette like a dying fire-fly , lloyd's lips pucker around the tip one last time before burying its body in the ash of the others . leaves it there as jon's head falls back against the pillow . fingers pinch the fringes of the curtain . moonlight seeps through as his focus snaps toward the eerie linger of nothingness outside . he could hear it --- the buzz of the woods . every creak , every whip of the wind through the pines a personal taunt , as if the trees murmured his crimes back to him . a language of restlessness like some nightmare brought to life by the light of jon's forgiveness . how easy it was to lose , the thought frightening enough to draw lloyd back in the sleepy low of jon's voice . pushes him up and away from the window .

❝ naw , naw , none a'that now . ❞ he says , a little too quickly in habit , damning up the river of deceit before it looms to flood . he shuffles along the short gap from chair to bed , seats himself next to his best friend , the heaviness ripe within jon's plea planting an ache inside lloyd's chest , reminiscent of a certain stubbornness jon always owned , even inside the gnawed marrow of memory ; perhaps chewed upon still .

❝ can't sleep , s'all . ❞ a ploy to convince even himself , lloyd lifts the heft of his palm to the top of jon's crown , smoothes it against his hair , down the nape of his neck . repeats , slower . tender . stops at the base , let's his thumb absently brush the skin there . pays no mind to the soft shake of his own hand as it ventures further along jon's shoulder blade . relishes in the witness of the dark and its gentle hold . blue eyes catch jon , steady , unblinking . a kind of love that refused to ignore the beauty of a simple motel room , dust and all . a roof that made everything equal : fear , love , guilt . all folded in the same slight lift of his lips as lloyd looked at him , tricked into thinking he might never see the outline of his face again after tonight , or last night , and so on . a faint shine in his eyes as he bends down , roots a kiss to the top of jon's head , his forehead falling against jon's own . flesh to flesh . jon's assumptions tamped .