louis de pointe du lac

the feeling is short-lived. louis’ words slap him sideways across his cheek and he nearly spins in his seat trying to find the bartender, who seems to have disappeared into the backroom much to his dismay. it leaves him with no other choice than to redirect his attention back to louis. he shrugs his shoulders then, indicating that it doesn’t interest him or that he doesn’t care if they are looking. lestat already extents so much of himself to people, he’ll allow himself to have this one thing to himself. “it is a difficult transition. going from years in solitude to having no privacy at all.”

the laughter followed by that strange question go unanswered. louis can see something desperate flash behind the rockstar's eyes --- he still knows lestat well enough to know when he needs to be left alone. the fledgeling sighs and sits up straighter, averting his gaze to allow his maker a moment of privacy, so that lestat could compose himself. coming to find you isn't exactly hurting myself, is it? louis bit the inside of his cheek. i'm not sure. he thought.

when lestat speaks again, he has put on his brave face again. the bravado of insisting on a question which had been dropped causes the american to scoff, amused by the ease with which his ex-lover shifts between moods. he's fighting to stay afloat. he doesn't want to dive into his feelings --- that's fine. they could be cordial. they could be uncomplicated. louis arched an eyebrow at the other vampire.

he leans back and inhales another lungful of smoke. "i'm having fun with whoever the hell i wanna have fun with." and not thinking about him while he did. "which i reckon is more than you can say. anyway," he exhales, smoke curling from his nostrils, "what's the point in eternity if we don't have fun?" orange eases back to blue as he throws an arm over the back of the chair, eyeing louis.

"i've heard your story, a bit of ar- his, and now even lestat's. claudia's, too. all four of you are mopey. fucking. bastards." he holds a hand up placatingly. "said with affection. some. i'm just saying, i think i said it back in san fran, you don't realise the gift you were given. me?" he gestures lazily to himself. "i feel fucking fan. tast. ic. right? i wake up in the morning- evening and i feel like a million bucks. i could snort a bucket of coke right now and be right as rain by sunset tomorrow. no hangover. i feel like i'm twenty again," even if he didn't look it. "so why are you lot all so dead - hah, no pun intended, dead set on being miserable?"

just like he was actively trying not to get involved with daniel.

the journalist continued berating louis and every other vampire that had ever come in contact with him. it caused the eldest vampire to roll his eyes and turn his face away, shaking his head, making sure that daniel knew he did not agree with any of his observations. "you're too young to understand what has happened to you." he was. daniel molloy thought he could relive his twenties without any of the consequences, but the ecstasy of gaining time would wear out. one day his daughters would begin to grey and shrivel while he remained the same --- and the day they passed and daniel molloy realised that there was no do-over, that that had been it ... then what?

his shoulders had become too sitff. louis had to sit up straighter in order to shake the inevitability of his friend's suffering off of him. he focused on something else. "and i do not understand why it is so imperative that i join you in," the hand holding the cigarette gestured towards daniel's general direction. "whatever you've got going on." despite his furrowed brow after daniel's small nudge, louis sounded like he was having fun. "i am not miserable, daniel. at least, not anymore," he gave the journalist a pointed look. "thanks to you." louis became very still then. his jade eyes staring deeply into ( once again ) familiar blue ones. he did not know how to show the overwhelming affection he had for that boy in a healthy manner. not without hurting him.

but he can sense the proverbial tipping point, the pendulum swinging from a suggestion to an order. he’s well-aware of what it means. what it will lead to. what he must accept. “ugh.” it’s less of an actual complaint and more of a monosyllabic whine. “dude... seriously?” 

relying on the kindness of strangers is an indispensable component of a junkie’s toolkit. jesse uses it often. he’s gotten gas money and hastily scrawled phone numbers. stinging sinuses and carpet burns. except this type of kindness is costly. irremediably ruinous. this type of kindness is gonna erode him from the inside, molecule by molecule, and replace his entrails with molten silver.  with a blistering clarity.

and the manner in which the boy slowly comes to accept this truth, it tugs at the strings of louis' undead heart. those pale digits tighten around his flesh and he can feel jesse's desperate whispers brush against his open wound, like prayers against the velvety curtains of a confession booth. and then his mouth connects to his hand and louis can feel it, the hunger which guides that lost boy to wonder, to cheat, to steal, to surrender to the will of the fates which do not hold his best interest in mind...even though the head which ducks to drink from his blood is covered in bright yellow hair, louis thinks he sees too much of himself in jesse.

he hurries to move on, lest the hearts in his eyes grow to cartoonish proportions.

"never said anything about love, louis. and, i mean," he drops back into the chair he'd just spilled from, "no offence but are you really one to be worrying about how healthy your relationships are?" he holds up his free hand, palm out, as if in surrender. "no offence, lou, but c'mon. you're a century and change too late to be thinking about that."

his friend's remarks regarding love, however, brought a line to the space between louis' eyebrows. the man nearly pouted at the suggestion that he was not capable of maintaining healthy relationships. louis gave a couple of steps so that he could lean against the makeup table closest to daniel. this revelation felt like news to him. "at some point, we gotta realise that repeating the same behaviour over and over again isn't a mistake. it's self flagellation." louis glances at the reporter and gives a small shrug. "anyone can change." but not everyone will, he thinks. and with that, louis takes a long drag from his cigarette, seeming somewhat defeated.

he does his best not to look annoyed by daniel's mentions of lestat. god, he tries so hard --- but he cannot help but bite the inside of his cheek and look down at his shoes, trying not to guess in his head the number of people lestat has slept with since this rockstar endeavour first began. and when daniel mentions his own dick, louis' head recoils as if he got smacked across the face, scrunching his nose at the crudeness of it all. jade eyes do, however, take notice of the other vampire's spread knees. they watch as his adam's apple rises and falls as he chuckles, behind his curtain of smoke. louis shakes his head at both daniel and himself.

the sudden earnestness in his voice causes louis to pause. the cigarette burns between his fingers as he looks at his friend, really looks at him. he is taking his words into consideration. but the moment comes and passes. daniel brings lestat into the mix and louis can't help but scoff a bit. he's teasing him. payback for the toppled chair. he flicks some ash into an empty beer bottle. "is that what you want? to have some fun?" louis turns his head to look daniel in the eye again. "or are you trying to make up for the fact that you're not having fun with someone in particular?"

louis looks at him, blanketed by a tenebrous haze, and sees a remnant of possession. a conduit for his creator’s greed. (khaki pants and wire-rimmed glasses. fangs that puncture arteries. scavenge for easy prey. tear through the entirety of new mexico and venture beyond its borders, beyond its basins and pueblos and suburban trappings. help, jesse remembers wheezing, blood-drunk and desperate. mister white, ever the eager parasite, came to his rescue.) and then kept coming. 

that’s the key takeaway, ladies and gents and whoever else might be spying through the motel blinds: if someone solemnly promises to save you, you should ask what they’re saving you from. “eat me.” jesse replies, because the snarky comeback is practically tailor-made for their circumstances. he doesn’t follow it up with his favorite five-letter word, the one mister white would describe as inappropriate, the one that encapsulates what jesse has become to him.  ironic, ain’t it.

louis wondered when was the last time anyone touched him there without hurting.

pinkman scrubbed at them. the older vampire remained still. "too long." he admitted. "i've come across the same crossroads you've tried to avoid. i've chosen the wrong, the right and the fucked up path, over and over again." louis mentioned, watching, within the field of his peripheral vision, the tortured boy's thoughts develop into catastrophe. he had let the sun lick at his flesh --- had prayed for it to take him back home, to where all his loved ones waited, in one bright flame. the pain had been too great to bare ... but he had also learned, no feeling is final.

no evening at the movies, no theatre performance, nothing at all.

louis should know that his showing up is usually a catalyst for chaos. announcing it would be pointless, since it shifts the air all around lestat and he makes damn everyone knows it. if lestat loses his last bit of sanity, well, then that is nobody’s business other than his own. tonight, he has merely pulled a disappearing act, set out, with no warning, to find his love before louis has the chance to find him first. it is easily managed when you are joined by an invisible cord and are drawn to each other like a pair of magnets. lestat can smell him before he sets foot in the establishment, the warm, nostalgic smell of him, like the dusty spine of old book, dragging him through the streets. it is no coincidence in fact that the first thing lestat asks louis is what he smells like to him.

somehow, even though time has passed since their reunion, lestat is still nervous seeing him. even if his flamboyant exterior shows no sign of it, even if he pretends that time has diminished his effect on him, his heart has not yet been told to stop picking up its pace whenever he is there. his heart has everything to do with how he manages to skip all attempts at formality or politeness as he approaches him, and how he ends up merely blurting out the thought at the sight of him. he supposes, with the way he leans against the counter, and flashes his teeth in a smile, it all appears more impudent than shaky.

when he is right beside him he can also smell the day on him. foreign smells that don’t belong to him, but that attract him nevertheless. then there is his face with every detail preserved how he remembers. it pulls an expression that he is familiar with but that he doesn’t know how to interpret. he wonders what is funny, but he doesn’t ask, in case it has to do with him. 

his finger drew slow circles over the rim of his martini glass. it only faltered in its' impeccable rhythm when lestat mentioned he had been looking for him. louis felt himself swallowing dryly before turning his head to look at the blond. he had felt him, out there, sometimes closer, sometimes further away --- they were bound together by an invisible but thick string. nothing appeared to be able to sever it. he sat there in silence, letting his eyes shift across lestat's features and, his first instinct, was to thank him for finding him. but that felt too pathetic; this sort of vulnerability was uncalled for. the vampire lestat had his tour and louis had his own private project to deal with. to hell with sentimentality.

he takes notice of the long finger brushing over his arm and can't help but chuckle bashfully. "maybe." louis replies, a touch of levity made this rendez-vous feel harmless. but the fact of the matter was that louis did not want his endless infatuation with lestat to get in the way of his main goal for the last year or so: revenge. "should you be asking that?" he asked with a quirk of his brow. "everyone's looking for you. i can hear them, creating a search party to spread out through the city, managers and producers alike ---"