hypnoidize‌:
( & WHAT I AM TO YOU? )
( dust, corner-curled things we don’t unfold anymore. you wanted a dream just to wake from it. )
touches skim skin, water ripple shiverings. he doesn’t need to turn to see august pulling away, doesn’t need to look to know that he’s staring, words forming.
a dance, almost. nothing leaves lips that’s worth staying and still, he finds himself in his home, in his clothes, in the company he knows will leave him when he wakes from him again. he thinks himself a fool, but the sweater is soft after a night in scratching lace and thinks he can fool himself a touch longer, maybe. a dream’s dream, this moment suspended.
but he asks, sharp eyes watching august from across the room. is too much of his mother’s son when he steps close to the familiarity, knives under tongue. rosebuds bleeding when he stands on the tips of his toes, breath brushing ears, leaning too close.
“take a guess, sweetheart.” how eyes find a way to glimmer even in the low lights, ever-charming. make a game out of it, fingers trailing buttoned collars, patterns that used to grace skin. nimble hands undo buttons, loosen ties, tugs him gently back to the couch again. reminiscent or fantasy?
he perches himself along the arm of the couch, crosses ankles and looks up at august, almost sweet. “who are you afraid of it being? is any answer right enough for you?” soft, lean in close to catch the words. “want to know how much my dear mister paid me to be half as close as you and I, once upon a time?”
( he is his mother’s son, knife to heart, knife for a tongue. boy bleeds just to wound. )
“did you wish it was you? i almost wished it was. how fate would have it that I ended up here again.” Â
he doesn’t know when things began to change for him, somewhere between meeting cleo for the first time ( and he does recall being intimidated, seeing someone too sharp and too fragile all at once ) and deciding he couldn’t let himself get used to seeing him under his covers. he’s not naive enough to not understand what it means, how his heart reacts first whenever he sees the other, but they are two different people, and the last thing he wants to do is weigh him down.Â
he stays still as cleo walks towards him, ignores the way heat crawls up his neck at the familiar touch, knows he should put an end to this but also knows he won’t. so he follows him to the couch, complacent, and one hand finds its way to cleo’s waist, holds him there.Â
“i never want it to be anybody,” august says, pressing his thumb into cleo’s ribs underneath his sweater, feels the ridges. “do you hate me for it? i wouldn’t blame you even if you did.”Â
and he would be lying if he said he hasn’t thought about it before - if he’d been someone powerful enough, if he’d had enough money - would that have changed things for them? would he have taken cleo away from this horrid place like he used to dream about?Â
his jaw tenses for a moment, almost angry.Â
“you know it can’t be me,” he mutters a beat later, pulling at his tie until it slides off and letting it fall to the ground. “it was never going to be me.” a sigh leaves him as he closes his eyes for a moment, vaguely thinks that maybe when he opens them again, they’ll have moved back in time.Â









