too many hats, too few heads

By contrast to all the amazing canon parallels, I am fascinated by the roles that @thickenmyblood has Kastor and Nikandros are playing in HIUH.

I mean, in canon, the two characters are very straightforward. Damen loves Kastor and Kastor is completely disloyal and prepared to kill Damen to get what he thinks he deserves. Damen loves Nikandros and Nikandros is completely loyal and would lay down his life for his true king.

But again, these are roles best suited to a pseudo-historical world of kingdoms. In each canon relationship, Damen, as the Crown Prince, holds a particular power (for Nikandros to cede to and for Kastor to resent and seek to destroy).

The absence of these royal dynamics in HIUH allows Damen’s relationships to Kastor and Nikandros to be delightfully more complex. And the two relationships/characters parallel and contrast with each other in interesting ways.

In terms of their relationships with Damen:

They each have the closest perspectives on Damen’s depression since all Damen does in the months after the breakup is go to work and sit around Nikandros’ place.

They have known Damen the longest of anyone left in his life.

They each present relationships that Damen must work through in his process of introspection (though Damen does not know this about Nikandros initially).

They can each, for their own reasons, be incredibly dismissive of Damen’s feelings.

Interestingly, in terms of their characters, the other thing they have in common is that the source of some of their most problematic behavior is their resentment of a child.

Kastor resents Damen for having been favored by their father and not only chooses to blame Damen along with their father, but also assumes that, as a much younger child, Damen would have been able to perceive and understand their father’s favoritism.

Damen ignores him. “Dad didn’t force anyone to stay at the house. They worked for him, and he paid them for their work. Not everyone takes the holidays off. It doesn’t mean dad was exploiting them.” “I never said he was. I said he was paying them to play house with you.” “What?” “He was too busy with work,” Kastor says, “and you were a half orphan. Do you actually think Hera, Chryses, and Brios wanted to be there? They had families too. They stayed because dad paid them, because he didn’t want you to grow up unbalanced.” A snort. “Not that it worked out too well, in the end.” Damen’s legs have gone numb. He thinks of standing, of walking out, but can’t muster up the strength to do it.  Kastor goes on talking as if nothing’s happened. To him, it hasn’t. “You know, after we had lunch the other day I kept thinking about Hera and all your nannies. Every time I went over to dad’s house, you had something new. A toy, a bed, a fucking babysitter. It used to make me furious. But now?” He pours what’s left of the wine. “Now I just feel sad for you.” Kastor is drunk. Has been for a while now. He looks less like their dad like this, which Damen is glad for. It’s always made him feel strange, the way Kastor can transform into someone older, with more authority, with just a gesture.  The polite thing to do would be to leave, quietly, and pretend this has never happened. Never bring it up again. Deny it, even, if necessary. Damen knows this. Damen has done this once before, for Laurent. He never brought up what happened at the company function all those years back. He should do the same now, for Kastor. “Why did it make you furious?” Damen says. “You were too old for toys, and you had a—you didn’t need a babysitter. Your bed was bigger than mine.” “It’s not about the fucking bed, Damianos.” “What is it about then?” Kastor’s hand goes pale around his glass, then back to normal. If he squeezes that hard again, the glass will break. “I can’t do this,” he says, as he pushes himself away from the table. “It’s—I’m not fucking doing this.” Damen stands as well. He feels like someone stuck on the wrong side of a mirror, his choice narrowed down entirely to another person’s. “Do what? We’re just talking.” “It’s never just talking when it’s you.” The table between them seems to wobble, unsure of whether to shrink or stretch. Damen thinks this might be the closest he’s ever been to Kastor.  “There’s nothing sad about having people work for you,” Damen says. He thinks that might be what Kastor was getting at earlier. Some internalized class shame. “They spent the holidays with us because they were paid to, yes, but that’s the way the world works. Would you go to work if you didn’t get paid to do it? Dad firing nannies because he was indecisive or something isn’t inherently—” “Indecisive. Dad, indecisive ? You’ve officially lost your mind.” They’re almost shouting again. This time, Damen doesn’t care. “If you would just explain what you mean instead of having me guess your fucking riddles like we’re ten years old, then maybe I wouldn’t sound like I’ve lost it.” “You’re insane,” Kastor says, even louder than before. “You’re just rewriting things to make them suit your craziness. Dad wasn’t indecisive about your stupid nannies, Damianos. He kept firing them because you called them all mom and wanted them to practically live with you. It freaked him the fuck out. And honestly? I don’t blame him. You freak me —” “Daddy?” Kastor steps away from the table. All of the sudden, he is like a man changed, reformed. Even his voice comes out different. “Did we wake you up, sweetheart? Uncle Damen was just leaving.”

(Also, intriguing little snippet re: Laurent just snuck into that passage.)

But anyway, it is wholly unreasonable for Kastor to expect Damen at the age of having nannies to have recognized how his behavior based in the absence of an involved parent had been interpreted by adults and influenced their actions. And it’s very dismissive of Damen’s experiences growing up (which, to be fair, Damen dismissed in himself for a long time before Neo).

Kastor definitely stopped therapy too soon!

Nikandros, meanwhile, has lumped Nicaise (who came into Damen’s life at the age of eleven!!) in with Laurent as a toxic and manipulative force in Damen’s life.

It’s obvious now to Damen that Laurent had been wrong at the coffee shop, wrong to assume Nicaise was on a crusade to spend more time with Damen. Nicaise has been inviting Damen places—Berenger’s houses, Laurent’s own apartment—because he knows Laurent will be there. Because he wants Damen and Laurent to be together again. Damen ignores the prickling sensation in his chest. It doesn’t exist, he tells himself, because why would he be upset to find out that a teenager doesn’t actually want to spend time with him? Nothing about what they’ve been doing has been normal. Nicaise isn’t normal.  Nikandros’ words, years old, come back to him now. That kid doesn’t care. He’s not going to call you in five years on Father’s Day. Like a parent’s scolding, the memory has come far too late to be useful.

Nikandros is doing the mouth thing, that soured-up expression he can’t hide when he wants to say something but knows he shouldn’t. Aktis calls it his bitch face. Damen breathes in. “Just say it.” “Do you talk about Laurent?” He does, sometimes. But it’s not a thing, it’s not often. It’s always in passing. Still, saying no outright feels like cheating. “I mostly talk about Nicaise.” The mouth thing worsens. Nikandros gets up. “I’m gonna get you more water.” “Don’t bother. I’m not thirsty.” “I am,” Nikandros says, and disappears into the kitchen. The sound of rushing water travels from the kitchen to Damen’s ears, but it’s not loud enough to drown out Nikandros’ voice. Damen doesn’t know what he’s muttering about, the words low and cut off, and he doesn’t care enough to ask. It’s not hard to picture Nikandros, standing in front of the sink, glass of water in hand, saying—well, what he’s always said. That kid doesn’t care. That kid’s fucking trouble.

“You just—you fucking love it.” Nikandros is walking again, half a circle, then back, then half a circle again. “You fucking love being his dog. He calls, you answer. He asks, and you drop every single fucking thing for him.” The thread stretches, wobbles. “I do.” “And for what? Are you that desperate to play daddy?” Damen doesn’t reply. Nikandros scrubs his face with both hands. “Damen. Damen . I’m—do you think he’s changed? Is that it? He hasn’t. People like him don’t change.” People like him. “Why don’t you like Nicaise?” “What?” “Nicaise,” Damen says, calmly, slowly, numbly. “You’ve never liked him. Why?” “Are you being serious right now?” Damen tips his head to the side, waits. His hands are not tingling anymore. “What is there to like? That kid’s a fucking brat,” Nikandros says. “You can’t even take him to a family dinner without him making a scene, and he’s, what? Eighteen? Come on.” “Did you tell him that? Did you call him a brat?” Nikandros’s mouth thins. He looks like Kastor. “Damen.” “Did you?” “Answer me this. Have they been asking you for money again?” “What?” Damen says. And then, as the thoughts trickle down: “ Again ? What the fuck does that mean?”

An exhale, defeated. “I don’t want to fight with you. That’s not why I called.” “Maybe I do,” Damen says. “You told me you’d stop. Time and time again. You said you’d stop bringing him up, bringing Nicaise up. But you won’t. You can’t.” “You bring them up,” Nikandros says, “all the fucking time. What am I supposed to do? Smile and nod along, like it doesn’t make me fucking sick? Like the way they take advantage of you isn’t wrong?” “We’re not even together. We’re not together. Do you hear the shit you’re saying? How is he taking advantage—” “Is the kid there?” Damen holds onto the counter. “It’s none of your business if he is.” “So, yeah, he fucking is. It’s Friday night, and you’re stuck home babysitting that deranged little shit when he’s not your responsibility anymore. What? Is money tight? Can’t he pay for a fucking nanny? It’s Friday night, and he dumps his kid on you, and then he gets to go out and have fun, which is what you should be doing. What’s next, huh? Is he going to make you pay for his college tuition? Make you buy him an apartment when he drops out? Damen, if you let him, he’s going to fucking milk you—”

Nikandros’ reaction to Nicaise makes me very angry! That’s why there are so many excerpts!

Okay, so we know now why Nikandros hates Laurent—and he wasn’t entirely wrong (though he wasn’t that right either)—but Laurent and Nicaise are not one undifferentiated person. And the difference between the responsibility Laurent and Nicaise bear for their behavior based on their ages is HUGE.

Nikandros has chosen a completely unreasonable interpretation of Nicaise’s trauma-induced behaviors. If a kid is struggling that much at that age, it’s not because they’re inherently unkind, uncaring or manipulative – it’s because of something they’ve experienced that they have not been able to process!

Nikandros has also (perhaps to be protective) minimized and belittled Damen’s desire to parent Nicaise. I think we can see Nikandros’ influence at the beginning of the story and in the time just before the beginning of the story after the breakup. At that time, Damen does not believe he is allowed to still parent Nicaise and has preemptively protected himself by not pursuing contact with Niciase post break-up. What Laurent and Nicaise have sometimes interpreted as Damen’s lack of care is actually, I believe, Damen in denial because he thinks he cares too much and that he is no longer able to give or express that care.

I think all this also gives us reason to reinterpret something else. In Chapter 19, I believe not for the first time, Laurent points out that Damen kept Nicaise compartmentalized from other parts of his life. Laurent takes this to mean Damen is embarrassed by Nicaise and doesn’t want Nicaise for the long haul. But if we think back to Damen’s initial description of why he didn’t want Nicaise to wear feminine-coded things, we see that it is a well-meaning but highly problematic effort to protect Nicaise from harm.

“Okay, then what was the problem? What made the things Nicaise wore girly?” “They were covered in glitter and sequins. He had this pair of shorts he loved, and they had this… pink patch sewn into one of the pockets.” Damen rubs his hands on his thighs again, not liking how damp they are, how tight his skin feels. “To school, he wore normal clothes, but only because I insisted. On the weekends, he’d just play dress-up. At fourteen.” “Let’s go back for a second,” Neo says. “You keep mentioning school, Damen. Was that your main concern? The fact that Nicaise would be teased by his classmates for wearing certain things?” “Yes.” Neo nods. “So you thought you were helping Nicaise prevent bullying of some sort.” Bullying. Damen tries not to roll his eyes. “Yes,” he says again, because it’s true. “Then what was the issue with Nicaise wearing those types of clothes at home during the weekend? No one was going to bully him there.” “Are you honestly going to tell me that’s normal?”  An awkward silence settles over them. Damen thinks he shouldn’t have used that word. Laurent had practically banned him from saying it at home, wouldn’t even hear Damen out if ‘normal’ was part of the argument, but this isn’t home. This is Neo’s office, and so Damen should get to say whatever he wants.  “What do you think would have been the normal thing to do?” Neo says. The confusion Damen is feeling must show on his face, because Neo adds, “What I mean is… What sorts of clothes should Nicaise have been wearing at fourteen?” “I don’t know.” “You can’t think of anything?” “Er,” Damen says. “Jeans?” “Good, jeans. What else?” “I don’t know what kids wear these days. A t-shirt? Sneakers?” “Okay. Now, what did you wear as a kid?” That was over a decade ago, Damen wants to say. What does that matter? Why can’t they talk about what’s actually important here, which is Laurent dating a fucking stranger?  “I guess the same things. Jeans, t-shirts. Gym shorts.” “Could it be that maybe what you think is normal for a fourteen-year-old to wear is just what you used to wear at fourteen?” Damen blinks at him. “I have nieces,” Neo says, “and they dress horribly, in my opinion. Fashion is very fast-paced. Most of the time it doesn’t survive the passage from one generation to the next.” “This isn’t about fashion.” “What is it about then?” “Nicaise is confused,” Damen says. “He needs stability. Rules. A schedule. Playing dress-up is fine when you’re six and a girl, but not when you’re… At fourteen, shouldn’t his main concern be finding a girl he can ask out on a date?” Neo picks his coffee up again. Three short sips this time. “You used the word ‘confused’. What do you think Nicaise is confused about?” “What he wants.” They’re running out of time to reach a conclusion. Damen feels wrung out, like something that’s been squeezed far too tightly and then left alone to decompress.  “What should he want then?” Neo says. The question hangs heavy between them, not accusatory but prodding. It feels like there are fingers scratching at Damen for answers, trying to slip under his skin and examine there too. All Damen has ever wanted is for Nicaise— “To be happy,” Damen says. “It’s like he keeps picking misery over being okay. He should just… make the easy choice, you know. Being a teenager is hard enough, why make things even more complicated by trying to stand out like that?” “Maybe that’s what makes him happy.” Damen snorts. “Right. Because being picked on at school is awesome.”

So now we think about Damen’s friends and what he implicitly (if not consciously) knows about them. He knows they will judge Nicaise, so he keeps Nicaise away from that judgment – less to protect himself than to protect Nicaise. But now, through therapy, he has learned both that his actions were hurting Niciase and that he genuinely desires (and maybe deserves) to parent Nicaise and to parent him well.

Which circles us back to Nikandros. Previously, Damen ignored Nikandros’ comments about Nicaise to keep the peace, and mostly kept the two apart. He also allowed his own desire to parent Nicaise to be belittled. Now that is no longer good enough. He needs to actively defend Nicaise and his feelings for Nicaise, and he does this by ending his friendship with Nikandros.

(Granted, he could have tried to articulate this more clearly and directly to Nikandros to at leave give Nikandros a chance to rethink his stance…) But breaking with Nikandros is Damen breaking with his old behavior and affirming his commitment to Nicaise.

Nikandros also serves as an unhappy mirror on Damen’s old dismissiveness around Laurent’s mental health. When Nikandros speaks, Damen is sometimes hearing Nikandros’ judgment, but he is also hearing his old self.

“Let’s drop it then. Never talk about him again.” “Fine.” “Good.” “Perfect,” Damen says. And then, “He’s not mentally unstable. Just because he has to see a therapist, it doesn’t mean—” “We said we were going to drop it,” Nikandros says. “You can’t just make things up and expect me not to correct you.” “Damen, you were the one that kept going on and on about his medication and fucking shrink appointments last year. Not me, you . So can you just be honest with yourself for once?” Damen thinks about leaving. He sees himself standing up and making his way downstairs, exiting the pub and getting into his car, then driving away. He sees himself ignoring Nikandros’ texts tomorrow. He sees them not speaking for another month or so. But then Damen also thinks about what Nikandros has said, about how it’s true. He should come to the gym with me, Damen had said last year, instead of just chugging down three pills a day. It can’t be healthy . And, Yoga could help. You know, the stuff Jokaste and her friends do. And, I wish he’d stop shit-talking me to his shrink. He’s so fucking crazy sometimes I — “You’re right,” Damen says. “We should just drop it.”

I think this offers us one possible answer to a question that Neo poses about the difference between the two relationships which interests me:

“How did you decide to set those boundaries with Nikandros? What made you do it?” Damen rolls his left ankle. It sends a rush of blood to his heel, his toes. “I don’t know. It just… happened. We started disagreeing on things.” “Would it be fair to say you identified some things that bothered you and that was what prompted you to take the measures that you took?” “Yes?” Neo nods and nods. Not a good sign. “Have you not felt that way about other people? Like they were crossing a line, like they were aggravating you…” “Er,” Damen says. “Kastor? We’ve been doing pretty well recently. He doesn’t boss me around; I do more stuff for the firm.” “So, what exactly is the difference between Kastor and, let’s say, your uncle?” “My uncle called me a faggot.” “Kastor has shown a tendency to call you things, too.” “I’m,” Damen says. “Why are you comparing them?” Neo’s pen lifts from the paper. “I’m trying to understand your thought process. What makes someone worthy of a second chance or, sometimes, several chances. What doesn’t.”

Why does Damen seemingly give up completely on Nikandros, while he and Kastor start to make forward progress? I have a few theories:

First, as I just said, I think Nikandros reminds Damen of his own failings, which makes him harsher on Nikandros because he is very angry at himself for hurting Nicaise. Kastor may feel Damen has many failings, but they’re not very fair assessments and Damen hasn’t taken on responsibility for being a clueless kid (nor should he).

Kastor doesn’t hate Laurent or Nicaise (he actually communicates with them when Damen isn’t) and actually seems to recognize Damen’s parenting role before Damen fully does.

“Do you still talk to Laurent?” Kastor does not look surprised. If anything, he seems relieved. “Ah,” he says, because Kastor’s always been one to gloat. “Yes. Sometimes.” Sometimes. Damen hasn’t talked to Laurent in weeks, not since Nicaise staged their little reunion, and before that months had gone by without a single text or call or voicemail. But Kastor and Laurent talk sometimes. That’s good to know. “Why?”  “We’re not friends,” Kastor says, which only makes Damen feel more out of place. Does he think Damen doesn’t want them to be friends? Does Damen not want them to be friends? “Or anything, really. We text once in a while, mostly about Galen.” Damen frowns. “Galen?” “Nicaise asks for pictures of him. He refuses to accept my mom’s friendship request on Facebook, so I send Laurent photos of Galen that he can show Nicaise. On occasion. It’s not a thing.” “Why not text Nicaise directly?” Kastor snorts. When he runs a hand through his hair, messing it up, he looks too much like their father. Damen ends up looking away. “I’ve blocked his number. The little shit kept spamming me with that photoshopped picture of—” “The rabid beaver,” Damen says, smiling despite it all. A bitter hurt starts to spread in his chest, suddenly unleashed. “That’s nice of you.” “You sound surprised.” I am, Damen thinks. Instead, he says, “I need to ask you something.”

Kastor pushes himself away from the door. “We’re going then. Next weekend, or the one after that.” “Just us two?” “No. Galen’s coming too.” Damen frowns. “Isn’t he a little young to go fishing?” Kastor frowns back. “What? Why?” “How’s he supposed to hold the rod?” “I’ll buy him one for kids,” Kastor says. Then, already halfway out of Damen’s office, “Do you.” “Do I…?” “Do you want to bring someone.” Iris? Kyra? What is Kastor talking about? “Like who?” Damen says. “Is Jo going too?” Kastor’s eyes roll and roll and roll. “It’s a boys' trip.” “I’m not,” Damen gets out, awkward and confused, “seeing anyone right now.” “For fuck’s sake, I’m talking about Nicaise. ”

3. Also, Damen and Kastor have ways of improving their relationship that don’t require head-on confrontation of their issues. Once Kastor actually tells Damen how much he’s working, for example, Damen is able to agree to take on a larger share of the work. This isn’t the deep source of Kastor’s resentment, but establishing greater equality in their working relationship serves as a proxy solution.

By contrast, there is no temporary way forward for Damen and Nikandros without Damen both admitting the ways in which Nikandros had a point about how Laurent treated him AND confronting Nikandros about his judgment of Nicaise.

4. I think that throughout this fic Damen has been struggling with the idea of family. He starts the fic with a strong sense that being biological family is a bond that has to be respected in some way. They shouldn’t speak ill of their father. They should honor their father’s relationship to Makedon. Kastor is his brother and so he can treat Damen however and Damen will just take it.

This extends to a sense that family cannot be chosen. Damen doesn’t get to parent Nicaise if he’s not with Nicaise’s guardian. Damen cannot try to fill the whole left in his life by his biological mother (and his father’s distance) by cultivating a relationship with someone else’s (Nikandros’s) mother.  

And I feel like that may be related to Damen not trusting that people not biologically related to him won’t just leave because they have no formal obligation to him. So I think for Damen, Kastor will always be in his life. But if it comes down to Nikandros or Nicaise, he’s decided to choose Nicaise. (Though again, I hope he will rethink that and approach Nikandros with more honesty. And that he can flourish with a better understanding of chosen family and of what he deserves from the people he cares about.)

Bright side of his rigid family ideas: He gets to cut off Makedon once Kastor points out (if rudely) that he isn’t actually biological family.

Kastor puts his chopsticks down. “I don’t know what you’re so upset about. Makedon has always hated Vere. He was the one that threw the biggest fucking fit when he found out dad wanted to move to Delfeur, and back then it was still Delpha. There’s no way you didn’t know that.” “I knew, but he—” “And anyway, why do you care what some old fart thinks of you?” Damen closes his mouth, opens it. “He’s our uncle.” “He was our father’s best friend,” Kastor says, managing to make even the simplest statement sound like a lecture. At least he’s used the right pronoun this time. “We’re not related by blood, and even if we were I’d still think he’s an idiot. Maybe even more, actually.” They only have fifteen minutes left of their lunch break. Any moment now, Marianne will knock on the door and ask him or Kastor or both to sign some papers, to send an email, to make a call. Damen wishes she’d come in right now, before he says something he’ll regret. “You sound so,” Damen starts, and stops. He’s so tired of feeling stupid; he’s so tired of not knowing what to say. “I didn’t know that’s how you saw things.”  “What is that supposed to mean?” Dad’s words sneak out of him: “Family is family.” “According to whom?” Kastor says. He doesn’t sound playful anymore, or sarcastic. He hasn’t moved, and yet Damen feels as though Kastor has gone away, replaced by a stranger that looks like him. “Daddy dearest? Was being nice to Uncle Mak on the will? I must have missed it.” Damen clenches his jaw so hard his molars ache. “Don’t.”

Anyway, I don’t have a great wrap up to this post, but I really appreciate the complexity of HIUH Kastor and Nikandros and the depth it adds to the characterization of Damen as he navigates his complicated relationships with each of them and the meaning of family.

First things first. Let me be clear about the following:

The question of whether or not Laurent is abusive in this piece of fanfiction has no bearing whatsoever on whether any person you know in real life is abusive.

Similarly, any arguments that Laurent can change or that Laurent deserves a second chance have no bearing whatsoever on whether any person you know in real life can change or deserves a second chance.

Neither HIUH nor any fic should be taken as a life advice manual. Just because there are therapists in this fic does not mean that @thickenmyblood is a mental health professional or your therapist.

I am also not a therapist, nor am I trying to give you life advice when I speak of my enjoyment of HIUH.

But if I were to give you life advice, it would be this: If a piece of fanfiction makes you so angry that you feel the need to send abusive anonymous comments to the author and/or ask that author to pass on your comment “correcting” the opinion of a reader writing about that story, you should probably stop reading that fic. It is clearly not good for you. Metaphorically speaking, you are in an abusive relationship with that fic and you should end it. Write the story off and move on.

Okay, that said, the question of whether Laurent is abusive in HIUH is probably more of a series of questions:

Has HIUH Laurent engaged in abusive behaviors?

If so, do those abusive behaviors necessarily indicate that he is and will always be an abuser?

If not, what evidence do we have that HIUH Laurent can and will stop engaging in abusive behaviors?

If HIUH Laurent stops engaging in abusive behaviors, what reasons, if any, does HIUH Damen have to return to the relationship despite past abuse?

BONUS:

A. Is an HIUH Laurent who harms Damen through abusive behavior mischaracterized relative to the canon source material?

B. Is an HIUH Damen who chooses to be with Laurent despite past abuse mischaracterized relative to the canon source material?

1. Has Laurent engaged in abusive behaviors?

Yes. Although we are limited by a potentially unreliable narrator (Damen), who does not believe Laurent is abusive, we are clearly and intentionally both told and shown in the text that Laurent has engaged in abusive behavior. We are told when Neo explains as much to a skeptical Damen:

“Then you must know I’m only trying to get a feeling on how educated you are on the subject of abuse between romantic partners.” “But why ? I just told you Laurent and I never—” “Do you know what emotional abuse looks like, Damen?” “Yes.” “Give me a definition.” It’s hot in the room, all of the sudden. “It’s… making someone. Feel bad.” “It’s consistent and repeated humiliation,” Neo says. “Gaslighting. Manipulation. Verbal abuse can sometimes overlap with this. Have you ever experienced this while in your relationship with Laurent?” “We weren’t abusive.” “Did you insult each other?” “No,” Damen says. It was so long ago, it was a lifetime back. He can’t remember. “It’s—not like that. Humiliation? We never—” “You’ve said that sometimes Laurent made you feel as though the things you were feeling were inadequate.” You’re being a fucking idiot, Laurent had said about the pink sweatshirt. “What if he was right?”  “It’s never right to invalidate your partner’s feelings.” “We weren’t abusive.” “Damen,” Neo says, the soft caress before a blow. “What if we think about it from—” “There’s nothing to think about. I’m telling you, it wasn’t like that. How the fuck did you get to that conclusion? Because I complained about us arguing?” Neo ruffles his notes. “Contempt. Shame. Hurt. That’s what abusers thrive on. There’s quite a lot of those things in here.” “Laurent’s not an abuser,” Damen snaps. “Maybe not, but he grew up with one, didn’t he? These are learned traits.” Damen folds forward as though to vomit. That’s—He’s made a mistake. They argued, they yelled, they said things they didn’t mean, but they never hit each other or threw cutlery at each other’s heads. They went to bed angry, and Damen slept on the couch, and there would be rolling eyes and huffs and annoyance in the following days, but that’s not—Laurent is not— You’re sweet, Damen had said, hand to Laurent’s cheek. A sweetheart. He remembers meaning it, remembers Laurent not liking it. He also remembers Laurent’s sweetness, scarcer in the end and cloying in the beginning. Breakfast in bed, letting Damen pick what show to watch, giving up half his trail mix bag because he knew Damen liked the dried fruit pieces most. You’ll do great, you always do great. A protein shake prepped and ready to go, peace and quiet the nights before important court days. But also bigger things, biggest things. There was—and sharing a bed, and curling up under Damen to read, and letting Damen carry Nicaise up the stairs, and holding his hand under the table as firm functions, and kissing just to kiss, just because, just— He’s explained Laurent wrong.

And we are shown in the moments when Damen and Laurent talk and Damen expects a belittling response from Laurent:

“There are,” Laurent starts, stops. Starts again, “I didn’t.” He has both elbows on the table, which he used to despise. Tables are for cutlery and food, not limbs. Something about the way he rubs at the skin under his eyes makes Damen’s stomach cower as if expecting a blow. “Agnes recommended it months before you—came back. It wasn’t my idea.”

“I met him?” For once, Laurent doesn’t mock him for his question. “It was at that school play I couldn’t go to. The one Nicaise got that huge part in.”

“I want to know when the twenty-four hours are up,” Damen says, loudly, too loudly, “so we can go to the police station and report him missing. For fuck’s sake, Laurent, will you stop ? He could be seriously hurt, and you’re sitting here, berating me about the way I phrased a question. Do you even give a shit about him? Do you even—” He cuts himself off when he sees Laurent’s expression. Like he did last time with Nicaise, Damen braces himself for what’s to come, goes over the list of things Laurent can hurl at him, tries to minimize the inevitable damage. The comment will be about Nikandros, about his soft childhood in Ios, about the time he tried to discipline Nicaise by himself and ended up covered in vomit.   Nothing happens. There’s only Laurent, turning his face to the side so Damen can’t stare at it any longer. In the silence of the car, Laurent’s breathing shakes.

“Is his name really Dog?” Laurent says, sitting down next to Damen. Between them, the two cups of coffee and the small pile of croissants both steam. “I didn’t believe Nicaise when he told me.” “I,” Damen starts, lie ready on his tongue, and stops. It’s very meta. “I’m not good with names.” Laurent picks up his coffee instead of agreeing with Damen. Instead of mocking. The space between their bodies is comfortable enough—they’re not touching, not even their knees or thighs. They’re not looking at each other either, not with the entire park stretching green and busy in front of them.

2. If so, do those abusive behaviors necessarily indicate that he is and will always be an abuser?

I take this to be one of the major points of contention on the part of the angry readers. As you can probably guess, I don’t think the text suggests that Laurent in inherently abusive. Besides the stuff coming in my answer to question 3, we have several reasons to believe that Laurent’s abusive behavior is the product of particular circumstances rather than a generalized personality dysfunction.

We know, and Neo just reminded us above, that abusive behaviors are learned behaviors. We know Laurent was abused in multiple ways before he was able to leave his uncle’s house. We know that he is still very young and that it has not been that long since his uncle’s trial. We know he has not been comfortable talking to Damen about his abuse, which gives us reason to believe he still experiences a great deal of shame. That shame is hinted at here:

“He respects you,” Laurent says before Damen has made up his mind about the yelling. “He looks at you and sees a standard to meet. Normalcy. It’s hard to disappoint people you respect. Especially people like you.” “Like me.” “You do things your way. Everyone else does them wrong.” “That’s,” Damen starts. The absolute inaccuracy of the phrase leaves him hanging. “What the fuck?” Laurent ignores him. “He doesn’t respect me, and he also knows I have no room to judge. It’s different. We’re—it’s just different.”

We also know that Laurent is specifically and intentionally not abusive toward Nicaise. We have seen that he has been absorbing a ton of anger, vilification, derision, denigration from Nicaise almost entirely without complaint and without lashing out at Nicaise in return. In fact, after the breaking of the paperweight, when Laurent feels that he might not be able to avoid reacting in a way he will regret, he calls Damen to safely remove Nicaise from the situation. Having taken the lock off Nicaise’s door for reasons many parents would no doubt consider justified, he realizes it was a mistake:

Damen doesn’t look down at the twisted little bolts on the floor. “Actually, you should watch this part in case you ever want to dismantle it again.” “I won’t.” Damen rubs his sleeve over a weird spot on the knob. “You’re betting a lot on Nicaise’s hypothetical good behavior.” “It was dumb, taking the lock away as punishment. I…” Laurent’s thumb glides over the edge of the glass. It traces a full circle before stopping and going white, digging in. His jaw twitches like he’s munching on something. “Privacy shouldn’t be a reward.” “Wasn’t this about safety? He locked himself in, wouldn’t come out or reply when you called…” Laurent’s reply is slow to come. After a while, Damen stops expecting it to come at all. He goes back to testing the lock—twice, waiting for that click sound—opens the door, closes it, and rattles the knob a bit. Just to be sure. “My uncle made it about safety too,” Laurent says. “Locks on doors were for adults. Not children.” The lonely ice cube in his glass floats around aimlessly, not quite touching its confines. “The first to go were the bedroom locks. What if there’s a fire and you can’t get out? What if someone breaks in through the window and—well.” Laurent smiles, small and ugly. “That kind of thing. You know.”

He ensures that Nicaise sees a therapist, meets with that therapist regularly, and follows professional advice about putting Nicaise on medication.

Laurent also maintains a strong friendship with Ancel, whose judgment the text has taught us to trust, through Damen’s evolving relationship with him. Laurent is capable of non-abusive, non-superficial relationships.

3. If not, what evidence do we have that HIUH Laurent can and will stop engaging in abusive behaviors?

From the moment we see Laurent interact with Damen in the present of this story, he is trying to treat Damen better. Not because he thinks he can get back together with Damen, but because he realizes he needs to make a relationship with Damen possible for Nicaise. We have already seen above that most of the time when Damen expects Laurent’s ridicule in this story, he does not actually receive it. In very stressful conversations, when Laurent does lash out, he now tends to pull back or even to acknowledge and apologize:

Coffee. Damen takes two long sips, trying to rinse the bad taste out of his mouth. They’ve had arguments in public before, probably louder than this one. For some reason, the thought isn’t as comforting as Damen would have once found it. They broke up to be better than they were together, didn’t they? They should be better. Except this doesn’t feel better. Or different. Laurent says, “That was out of line.” Now, cooled off, Damen feels clammy. Wobbly. He knows Laurent is right, and yet the thought of sitting through a reprimand makes him want to melt away. “It was.” “I—apologize.” Damen looks up from his coffee to Laurent’s profile. He’s facing the wrong way, Damen thinks stupidly, because the window is to their left. “You apologize.” Half a question. “Go ahead,” Laurent says. “Rub it in.” Damen doesn’t want to. Nausea is curling around him, closing in. “I was out of line too, so.”

And we know now that Laurent has thought through some of his past behaviors toward Damen:

“I was angry at you,” Laurent says, “all the time. Sometimes it was justified, but when it wasn’t I just—I found ways to justify it. That wasn’t fair. Of me.” Damen’s palm is numb around the glass. “Why were you angry?” “Nicaise.” “Justified,” Damen says. “And the rest of it?” Laurent is facing him again. “Paschal says I have a tendency to expect the worst from everyone. Especially you. You’d make comments, and I’d think you were being cruel instead of…” “Instead of what? Ignorant?” Laurent doesn’t reply. “That makes no sense,” Damen says. “We never argued about me being fucking sadistic. We argued about you acting like some things were obvious and I was simply too much of an idiot to get them.” “I never thought you were an idiot.” “You said it often enough.” “I’m—sorry,” Laurent says. “It doesn’t change anything, but—even if you had been the biggest idiot in the world, you didn’t deserve…” A blinking spree follows. “I’m sorry.”

We know that Laurent is still in therapy, and we know that he has been talking about his relationship with Damen there because Paschal has suggested couples counseling for them. And Laurent has invited Damen to do that couples counseling, showing that he wants them to build a better foundation for their relationship  going forward.

4. If HIUH Laurent stops engaging in abusive behaviors, what reasons, if any, does HIUH Damen have to return to the relationship despite past abuse?

Damen is deeply in love with Laurent. At the beginning of the story, he is in denial about this fact, but the uncontrollable flow of his thoughts still shows us how much he feels the loss of their relationship. Once he and Laurent are speaking again, seeing improvements in their communication, and experiencing moments of comfort and fun in their interactions – and once Laurent has broken up with Maxime – Damen admits to himself that he wants to be back together. Neo, as usual, prompts the self-recognition:

“I’m asking you to think about what life might look like in two years,” Neo says, “for you and Laurent. Time does not only pass for you, Damen.” A smile, crinkling the corners of Neo’s eyes. “That’d be ideal, wouldn’t it?”  Two years. Damen sits with the question for a while, looking at it, prodding it. In two years, Nicaise will have gone away to college. Maybe Laurent will move, relocate, start over somewhere closer to Vask. He’ll post about his new life on Instagram, or details of it will make it to Damen as second-hand gossip. They could still be friends, over text or the phone or fucking letters, Damen thinks, yet there’s something bitter in the back of his throat, filling up his mouth like vomit. Maybe Laurent will date again. Probably. Most likely. And Damen— When he looks up from the armrest, Neo is looking straight back.  Damen can’t say it. Earlier today, as he typed his last email of the day at the office, he kept drafting a plan for today’s session. He’d explain his argument with Laurent, then the party at Ancel’s, then the way he keeps looking at Laurent in all the wrong lights, in all the wrong ways, and still finds himself wanting to kiss him. Neo would make a disapproving face, maybe, but it would be easy to brush off; anyone that doesn’t know Laurent would find it hard to understand how easy it is to want to kiss him. Except that isn’t all Damen wants. What Damen wants isn’t a settling of the score, a cleaning of the slate. He doesn’t want to do it once for old times’ sake, or twice out of gluttony. He doesn’t want to make any long-distance phone calls, write any letters, see any pictures on Instagram of Laurent and someone that isn’t him. He doesn’t want things to stay like this, in this careful antiseptic stage. He doesn’t want them to be friends. “It’s not what I want,” Damen says, at last. Neo leans back into his chair. He rolls his wrist once. “You think it’s what I should want, right? Letting go and all.” “I wouldn’t say that,” Neo says. “Should and shouldn’t are very loaded words. It also doesn’t matter what I think you should or shouldn’t do, in general. What is it that you want, since we’ve already established what it is that you don’t?” Don’t make me say it out loud. “I want,” Damen starts, and stops. The words look so stupid, jumbled inside his head. I want him back, like Laurent is a toy someone took away and won’t return. Like Damen is a child, begging. Don’t make me say it.   Seconds trickle by, piling into a minute. Then two. “Do you want to be in a relationship with Laurent again?” “I thought I already was,” Damen says. “A friendship is a kind of relationship. You said that.” Neo closes his eyes, keeps them like that for a while. “I did, yes. Let me rephrase that—do you want to be in a romantic relationship with Laurent? Again?” There is no loophole this time, no two-meaning word Damen can latch onto. The truth sits heavy in him, not on his chest but somewhere deeper, inside a little crevice between some (probably important) organs. Saying no would be lying, saying yes would be diminishing.  “I want things to be good,” Damen says. “That’s all.”

And in chapter 19, Damen is brutally honest with himself about how, even after everything, he still wants Laurent:

“You meet new people,” Neo says. “You go on dates, make new friends, find new interests. Despite what you might think right now, Laurent isn’t your only option. Dare I say, Laurent might not even be your best option.” The room is dark, darker than it was when the phone call started, but Damen’s eyes hurt like he’s been staring at a ball of light for too long. Everything hurts in a strange, modest way. A throb here, faint. An ache there, heatless.  “I don’t want other options,” Damen says. “Well.” “How fucked up is that?” “Pretty fucked up,” Neo says. It makes Damen stop blinking. “Luckily, you’re already doing therapy. It’s only bound to get less complicated from here on. Or more, depending on how you look at it.” “I don’t even wanna look at it, to be honest.” “Then don’t. Take time off, let things cool down, think about what’s been said… No one is asking you to choose right this second.” It’s not that anyone is asking. It’s that it feels like he’s already made his choice. 

“You didn’t tell me,” Damen says before he can think not to. “Tell you what?” “How bad it was.” Laurent’s thumb traces the t in team. It’s a bit crooked, even from Damen’s perspective. “It was pretty bad,” he says, slowly, “before you came back. Things were better once he started seeing you again.” “You call that better?” “Yes,” Laurent says.  I would have come back, Damen thinks, if you’d told me. Except it’s not true; he would have come back for much less. He’s here now, sitting across from Laurent in this mediocre coffee shop, talking things out, making an effort, thinking of reaching out to finally, finally, hold Laurent’s hand.  It’s strange, looking at Laurent and knowing he’s the only other person on earth that feels the same way he does. Where else would Damen go? Who else would he talk to? No one will ever get it, not the way Laurent does. And Laurent knows it. He must, or else he would not be sitting here either. There is only this, Damen thinks. At least for him, there will only ever be this.

So there is that. Damen is hopelessly devoted to Laurent. But that doesn’t make getting back together with him a good decision. Love would not be a good reason to return to an abusive relationship.

Another NOT good reason would be Damen believing the fact that he made mistakes cancels out Laurent’s harmful behavior. The text makes that explicitly clear through Neo:

Neo’s pen hops; a period appears at the end of a sentence. “Apologies can be hard to navigate. It’s sort of like… You’ve wronged me, and you know that you’ve wronged me, and now you’re apologizing for it while expecting me to forgive you. It’s quite a lot to put on a person.” “There are degrees to wrong,” Damen says. His chair feels smaller, like it’s locking him in instead of holding him up. The armrests keep getting in the way of his elbows. “And it’s not like I didn’t have stuff I had to apologize for too. I don’t get why you’re trying to make this seem like a bad thing.” “I’m not.” “Then why—” “Do you think you deserved an apology from Laurent?” Damen leans back and back and back, until his shoulder blades find something solid. Did he deserve…? He’d wanted one, once. In Nikandros’s guest room, with only beige and white and terracotta everything around him, he’d had staring matches with his own phone. He’d thought Laurent might call, at the very beginning. Apologizing. Begging. But Laurent never did. “Yeah,” Damen says.  Neo’s head begins to tilt. “You don’t sound too sure about that.” “I am sure.” “All right,” Neo says. “Why do you deserve an apology?” “I told you already. He treated me like I was an idiot.” “How?” “How—what?” “How exactly did he treat you like you were an idiot? What were his actions towards you?” “I,” Damen starts, but something in Neo’s face makes him pause. “He’d say things when we argued.” “Such as?” “That I was an asshole.” Neo nods. “And how did you feel when you heard him say that? Did you feel like it was fair?” “I felt like he was an asshole,” Damen says. “Sometimes.” “Whereas now you feel like he was right?” He was right about Nicaise. And maybe about Ancel, too. “I don’t know what you want me to say.” “I don’t want you to say anything,” Neo says. “I’m just trying to get you to think about things from a different perspective. Laurent apologized, which is an important—not to say crucial—step in rebuilding any kind of relationship. But it seems to me that you’re holding onto this newly found belief that because you acted a certain way, because you made mistakes, you somehow deserved the way he treated you throughout the last stages of your relationship.” “That’s not what I think,” Damen says.  “All right. Then you think you deserved the apology because the way he treated you was wrong.” “Yes. But…” “But…?” Damen’s face feels hot, the heat lodged right over his molars. “Doesn’t it kind of cancel out? Like, we both fucked up.” “Those are two different issues,” Neo says. “So no, they don’t cancel out. What he did to you and what you did to him are obviously connected, but someone doing something wrong or bad is not an excuse to do the wrong or bad thing back to them.” Neo gives his pen a tap. “Or it does, I suppose. It depends on your belief system. But you don’t strike me as an ‘eye for an eye’ fan.” I don’t want any eyes, Damen thinks. 

I interpret the failed second try (or second strike) of Damen and Laurent’s relationship to have been somewhat based on the “cancel out” reasoning from above. The “cancel out” and move past approach  did not work because they failed to address the many insecurities, communication failures, and problematic patterns that plagued the first time around. A discussion with Neo (again) makes this clear. Damen hasn’t yet learned to listen to what Laurent is saying without letting his insecurities and anger get in the way:

But Damen isn’t in Laurent’s position. You’ll never get it, Laurent had said about Nicaise. Maybe it’s true. “I get why he did it. I’ve been thinking, and it’s not—I get it. Nicaise being embarrassed, wanting Laurent in the room because he was the least angry of—” “I don’t think that’s why,” Neo says. “Or at least, that’s not what you’ve just told me Laurent said about the whole thing.” “What?” “Laurent talked extensively about roles. Did you notice that?” “No.” “He presents himself as the scapegoat for Nicaise’s anger, while you’re the one Nicaise admires and wants to impress.” Tap, tap, tap. Damen imagines Neo’s fingers flying across the keyboard. “It seems to me Nicaise wasn’t concerned about the different intensity levels of your—as in, yours and Laurent’s—anger. He knew you were both angry.” “Laurent was better at handling it.” “Was he?” “I couldn’t stop thinking about the guy,” Damen says. Guys, his brain supplies, helpful as ever. “I still can’t. Even now, I know it’s not—that’s not important. I was yelling at Nicaise. I wasn’t listening.” “And that’s why Nicaise didn’t want you to go with him to the clinic?” Damen closes his eyes. He needs to repaint his ceiling, do something about the lack of texture there.  “Laurent said something about abandonment,” Neo tries. A nudge. “You’ve mentioned Nicaise doesn’t do well with change, that he’s got a tendency to latch onto routines and people. Do you think it might be possible that he was trying to preserve the relationship he has with you?” “By keeping me out of a medical examination room.” “Yes.” “That’s what Laurent said.” “Well,” Neo says. “It sounds plausible.”

Damen wanted magically for them to be over their past:

“Right,” Damen says. “You don’t do should and shouldn’t. I forgot.” “Are you upset?” Are you angry with me? “I don’t know,” Damen says. “We were supposed to be past this, and now it’s out there and I can’t—we can’t—” “How were you supposed to be past this, if this had never been discussed before today?” “You said it’s impossible to discuss everything.”

So, I don’t think it’s a strong interpretation of the text to say that @thickenmyblood is trying to present Damen in an unfairly negative light in order to excuse Laurent’s much worse behavior and thereby make it okay for them to get back together. Cancelling out isn’t what the HEA of the story is set up to be about.

That said – and given the fact that Damen is still in love with Laurent – what GOOD reasons might Damen have to try the relationship again?

For one, he is beginning to understand better what the fights with Laurent about Nicaise were about. Moreover, they have now explicitly acknowledged that they are co-parenting Nicaise and Laurent has expressed a clear commitment to them parenting Nicaise as a team.

For another, Damen has a much improved understanding of the role of therapy and the complexities of mental health. He has a long ways to go on this front, but I don’t think we’ll see him dismissing or belittling Laurent’s mental health needs. Moreover, Damen has ways of addressing his own mental health needs and talking things through with a person who doesn’t share his triggers and emotional investments around Laurent.

For a third, he has made a commitment to working through their issues in therapy and has concluded that he trusts Laurent to try just as hard as he will to repair and strengthen their relationship.

Crucially, Damen has also learned to stand up for himself when he feels Laurent is implying that he is incapable of understanding things. This means he can point it out and Laurent can recognize when he is retreating into a defensive, harmful pattern. This also allows Damen to indicate that something isn’t obvious to him and to ask Laurent to explain it kindly and clearly. I think that is the only way they can reconcile their very different life histories and relationships to social normativity.

ONCE AGAIN, believing this about HIUH Damen relative to HIUH Laurent does not mean that I believe this is something all (or even very many) real life people who were previously in unhealthy relationships should aim for or could achieve.  

Which brings us to our bonus questions:

A. Is an HIUH Laurent who harms Damen through abusive behavior mischaracterized relative to the canon source material?

No, in fact, this is not a mischaracterization. Laurent abused Damen in canon. He took him as a slave. He sought Damen’s public humiliation. He had Damen whipped to an extent that would have killed most other people. He placed Damen in a situation that (for almost any other person) would have resulted in a violent public rape. He also forced Damen to engage in public and non-consensual oral sex. Later, when he understood Damen more emotionally and was feeling insecure or threatened, he lied about his feelings and motivations out of shame and self-hatred and with the aim of hurting Damen enough to drive him away.

B. Is an HIUH Damen who chooses to be with Laurent despite past abuse mischaracterized relative to the canon source material?

Damen fell in love with Laurent after all that abuse because he came to understand its source and because he saw other sides of Laurent that were caring and honorable and expressed a commitment to achieving justice, even if not by fully honest means. He came to understand Laurent as a survivor, even before he became aware of what exactly Laurent had survived. He stuck with Laurent through all of Laurent’s attempts to push him away and fought for what should have been an impossible relationship. And throughout this process, he learned about his own naivete and to question key elements of his upbringing, like the quest for war glory and the belief that “perfect treatment” justified slavery.

Captive Prince is a seductive and enthralling trilogy. And we willingly suspend any disbelief about whether Laurent’s trauma can truly be overcome simply by Damen’s noble nature and magical healing cock.

Why not do the same for HIUH? (Or, you know, just stop reading it.)

So here’s how I picture it:

[PASCHAL is in a chair. DAMEN and LAURENT are sitting next to each other on a couch, but stiff and not touching.]

PASCHAL [leaning forward]: You both want to try again.

[DAMEN and LAURENT nod.]

PASCHAL: So, let’s talk about why things didn’t work out the first time.

[DAMEN and LAURENT stare straight ahead.]

PASCHAL: Damen, why don’t you start? Address Laurent.

[DAMEN turns to look at Laurent as the opening bars of “All You Had to Do Was Stay” by Taylor Swift play. Suddenly, singing…]

DAMEN: People like you always want back the love they gave away.

LAURENT [turning to face DAMEN]: And people like me wanna believe you when you say you've changed.

DAMEN: The more I think about it now, the less I know.

BOTH: All I know is that you drove us off the road.

LAURENT [standing up and looking back at Damen on the couch]: Hey, all you had to do was stay. Had me in the palm of your hand…

DAMEN [standing too]: Then why'd you have to go and lock me out when I let you in?

LAURENT: Hey, now you say you want it back. Now that it's just too late. Well, it could've been easy. All you had to do was stay.

BOTH [each looking at PASCHAL as if pleading their case]: All you had to do was stay.

All you had to do was stay.

All you had to do was stay.

All you had to do was stay.

DAMEN [looking at LAURENT again]: Here you are now, calling me up, but I don't know what to say.

LAURENT [looking back at DAMEN]: I've been picking up the pieces of the mess you made.

DAMEN: People like you always want back the love they pushed aside.

LAURENT: But people like me are gone forever when you say goodbye.

BOTH: Hey, all you had to do was stay. Had me in the palm of your hand.

DAMEN: Then why'd you have to go and lock me out when I let you in?

LAURENT: Hey, now you say you want it back. Now that it's just too late.

DAMEN: Well, it could've been easy. All you had to do was stay.

BOTH [looking at PASCHAL again]: All you had to do was stay.

All you had to do was stay.

All you had to do was stay.

DAMEN [looking at LAURENT]: Let me remind you, this was what you wanted. You ended it.

BOTH: You were all I wanted. But not like this.

LAURENT [sinking down to the couch]: Not like this.

DAMEN [sinking down next to him]: Not like this.

[Music fades.]

[PASCHAL takes over and fixes everything.]

HIUH is both an easy and a hard read. On the one hand, the writing style makes is go down smooth. On the other hand, the plight of the characters burns (in all the best ways). And sometimes you just want to shake some sense into them!

I am obsessed with HIUH to a borderline unhealthy degree. I love the style and subtly of the writing (but that’s a whole topic for a different post). I love how frustrating and heartbreaking and hilarious (I’m looking at you, Ancel) it can be. I’m obsessed with how much it makes me feel.

Typically, when a chapter is posted, I read it once, then go back and read the previous chapter and the new chapter again, then reread my favorite little sections again and again. Sometimes, I start at the beginning of the story and read all the way through. It’s never not worth my time.

So, anyway, perhaps this obsession explains how very defensive I feel when I read people commenting on how unlikeable Laurent (or Damen) is, or how they can’t imagine feeling good about them getting back together. I mean, it’s fair for them to feel however they feel as readers, but also…

Of course they have to get back together, because they are MEANT TO BE!

Which brings me to the question of canon parallels.

Because we, as a fandom, know that they are MEANT TO BE because of Pacat’s trilogy, and more specifically, because they had SO MUCH to overcome. Only a couple that is MEANT TO BE still comes to be despite the fact that one killed the other’s brother and the other took the one as a slave had him nearly whipped to death. I mean, that’s a lot to get past.

And herein lies the genius of HIUH. Because Pacat was able to set up this drama by setting her story in a pseudo-historical world of kingdoms and old-fashioned, army-clashing warfare. It was neither farfetched nor unreasonable that Damen killed Auguste. And it was believable (to everyone but Damen) that Damen’s brother tried to have him killed in a coup. And it was fair enough that Laurent swore vengeance, which, combined with the trauma he had experienced, ultimately allows us to forgive his cruelty. Also, Damen may not have whipped slaves, but he owned them, so he ultimately lacks moral purity (despite a common desire to grant it to him in fanfic, which I totally understand, because he has honor! It’s hot!). And they all live in a world before therapy, so they’re just gonna have to kind of suck up their trauma and go on ruling.

But how do you plausibly transfer this meant-to-be-despite-all-odds to a modern-day setting?

You can make them both modern royalty (which is always fun), but you can’t make Damen own people or have Laurent be casually sadistic and still have us root for them. Laurent’s trauma can be the same (unfortunately, because shitty adults still get away with abuse), but he can’t take it out on Damen in the same way. And Damen can’t be a catalyst for the trauma to the same degree either, because it’s hard in modern setting to imagine him having justifiably killed August and then Laurent being able to move on.

So how can two people hurt each other so much and still come together in modern times? By being exes, it turns out! Who knew?

@thickenmyblood knew!

And from that amazing canon adaptation of the overall conceit, @thickenmyblood goes on to create so many other canon parallels. I’ll number them (in order to assure you this post isn’t actually endless), but I’m sure it’s not an exhaustive list:

1. Damen’s quest begins when his privileged world, which he has never examined very closely, gets turned upside down. His unquestioned acceptance of slavery becomes an unquestioned acceptance of toxic masculinity, which also parallels with Damen’s unquestioned pursuit of war glory (the Original Toxic Masculinity™). His complete inability to recognize what every single reader can see – that Laurent was abused by his uncle – becomes an unwillingness to hear about Laurent’s traumatic experiences or accept their mental health consequences. His quest to regain his throne becomes a quest to regain his sense of self, which leads him to therapy, which leads to a realignment of his priorities that ultimately puts a connection to Laurent high on his list (as in the books).

2. Which makes sense, I think, of why Damen still cares so much for Laurent in HIUH despite his recognition of Laurent’s behavior. As in the books, he, like a few of the people closest to Laurent, sees beneath the judgmental exterior to Laurent’s resilience, deep care for people like Nicaise, and well-hidden playfulness. Lest we forget, the running over the rooftops was a key moment for Lamen – the banter and wordplay they can still find in HIUH post-breakup gestures to that playful connection/reconnection.

3. Meanwhile, Laurent remains a survivor in both worlds, and alternates between dedicating almost everything he has to simply persisting despite his uncle and trying to carve about a more purposeful and livable existence, which he at the same time does not fully believe he deserves. He is willing to protect and fight for Nicaise in ways he isn’t always able to fight for himself.

4. Nicaise, as in canon, sometimes desperately appreciates that, sometimes need to push, push, push until Laurent gives up on him the way he can’t stop fearing Laurent will.

5. Meanwhile, just as in canon, the only means Laurent has found to protect himself is by keeping his deepest self hidden and feigning indifference and superiority when he feels vulnerable or hurt. Did Laurent break up with Damen to protect Nicaise? Yes, absolutely. But, as I argued in the previous post, Laurent also breaks up with Damen because he believes deep down that, in the long term, Damen could not love the real Laurent because the real Laurent is fundamentally unlovable.

6. And he clearly told himself Damen would be better off without him, and without Nicaise, too. Like in canon, he’s willing to sacrifice his own chance at happiness to let Damen have his. He probably figured he was letting Damen go back to his charmed and trauma-free life. Which was less charmed and trauma-free than Damen thought it was, as it turns out (thank you, Neo). Which just takes us right back to Damen’s canon obliviousness and rose-tinted glasses.

7. Consider also that Laurent comes to give Damen his first and second chances because he is so desperate for Damen’s help that he has to push aside his anger, pride, and fear and let Damen in just a little (calling him for that first date, showing up at his house looking for Nicaise + asking him to take Nicaise after the paperweight). This mirrors his decision to take Damen with him to the border. But, just as in canon, whenever he lets Damen in just a little, Damen surprises him and worms his way back into Laurent’s closely-guarded heart.

8. Similarly for Damen in canon and here, Laurent is easy to hate when he’s being icy, superior, and hurtful, but impossible for Damen to hate when he pays close enough attention to see Laurent’s vulnerability. A lot of this comes through in HIUH in Damen’s careful notice of Laurent’s body language. When not clouded by his own insecurities, Damen can still read Laurent like a book.

9. Also worth noting is the way @thickenmyblood translates the differences in how Damen and Laurent think. As in canon, Damen is very literal and practical, thinking in straight lines. He is well suited to the law. Laurent’s thinking is more complicated, theoretical, and more attuned reasoning born of trauma. He is well suited to academia. But since there is no court intrigue in this modern setting, these differences are displayed not only in their communication differences, but through the contemporary complexities of sexual orientation and gender expression. Laurent (and his friend group) navigate these things effortlessly, while Damen (and his friend group) find it needlessly confusing and easy to mock. But like in canon Damen really should have understood court betrayals for his own sake, so too should this Damen understand how his thinking and friend group have prevented him from being fair to those he loves and fair to himself.

10. And if we want to get really metaphorical, we can say that Kastor "kills" their father in this by forcing Damen to realize he wasn't as good a father as Damen cast him in his memory. Although in this case, the metaphorical killing of the father opens the possibility for a more genuine relationship between the brothers, instead of destroying it...

Hand in Unlovable Hand.

At first I was oriented toward the Mountain Goats song (“No Children”), you know how it goes :

I am drowning there is no sign of land you are coming down with me hand in unlovable hand

And throughout the fic's posting, lots of readers have been alternately finding Damen and then Laurent very hard to like (which was an awesome reading experience in and of itself because fanfic doesn’t always tend toward deeply complex characters). So the sort-of-toxic relationship view felt plausible (except I was always going for “appears-toxic-but-is-actually-true-love-and-totally-fixable” because this is make-believe anyway and it’s based on CP, so).

But now I’m thinking, what if the “unlovable” is actually about people who think they are unlovable? And what if that’s not just both Damen and Laurent, but also Nicaise?

So, like, what if what this little family actually has in common – even if Damen appears to have a very different history and Laurent has said they are too different – is their individual fears that no one will ever really love them?

Like Nicaise obviously doesn’t think Damen can actually love the real him and tries to be on his best behavior (even while pushing Damen’s boundaries). And Nicaise seems like he’s doing his level best to drive Laurent away, so that when Laurent eventually abandons him – as he fears - he can pretend that’s what he wanted anyway. 

And Damen has panic attacks about Maxime not because he gives a shit about Maxime but because he’s let Maxime represent the idea that Laurent never really loved Damen, but was just using Damen and moved on quickly and painlessly. And Damen had no mother and had a distant father and a resentful half-brother and he’s only just beginning to believe that chosen family can be real family.

And Laurent completely doesn’t get that Damen has this insecurity because he sees Damen’s life as so normal and charmed.

And, finally, even though our unreliable narrator thinks Laurent has always been in control of everything, including their relationship and entrance into the family formed by Laurent and Nicaise, Laurent’s insecurities (on nearly full display in Chapter 19) have been sprinkled throughout this fic like breadcrumbs.

In the original breakup:

“We’re different. We want different things.” Damen said nothing. The coffee was ashy in his mouth. Dry. “I’ve got Nicaise,” Laurent said, “and I can’t—this is not working. It was never going to work.”

In the overheard conversation with Ancel:

Ancel’s back is all Damen can see. His hair shakes from roots to ends when he tilts his head in Laurent’s direction. “I thought,” he says, slowly, “that you wanted different.” “I did.” “Ugh, Laurent, you’re giving me a headache. What even is the pro—” “I’m not,” Laurent says, louder than before. The shock of sound works like a slap, and Damen wants to move back into the hallway, to scurry to the other bathroom, to leave them alone, but his legs simply won’t take him there. “ I’m not. I’m still—you heard what Nicaise—”

In Laurent's interpretation of the breakup:

“You wanted out,” Laurent says, “so I gave you out.”

But Damen finds Laurent so loveable – and he didn’t ever really talk to Laurent about the effects his abuse – that he can’t understand how unloveable Laurent feels.

So I feel like they three are all so much alike (and so lost in insecurity) that now they’re all talking past each other.

“Like dominating you in bed?”

“I mean, beds haven’t really been involved…yet.”

Nik’s face is doing something complicated. “Have you joined the BDSM scene? Like do you have a Dom or something? Not that I’m judging…”

“No! I mean, I don’t think so. I mean… there’s not a scene, really.”

“Damen,” Nik asks, suddenly serious, “have you consented to this?”

“Yes, of course!” Damen says. “Well, not in so many words, but it’s not like he’s holding a gun to my head.”

“He?”

“They,” Damen says quickly.

“You know that’s not the definition of consent, right?”

“Obviously.”

“Okay,” Nik begins, in a tone that brooks no argument, “I am—unfortunately—going to need more details.”

Damen can see how, from Nik’s perspective, this is a reasonable request. Also, Damen may be secretly dying to share something of all this.

“Okay, so remember last weekend at the bar when I took that guy into the—”

“Yes,” Nik interrupts. “I remember.”

“Okay, well, they, um, told me to do that.”

“They told you?”

“It was a text.”

“They texted you to…” Nik declines to finish the sentence. He frowns, thinking. “Wait a minute. Were they there? At the bar?”

“No.” Damen shakes his head for good measure.

“Dude. You can’t lie for shit. Who was it?”

“I’m really not going to tell you that,” Damen says.

It takes Nik less than thirty seconds to work it out on his own.

“Oh my god. It’s Auguste’s brother, isn’t it? What’s his name…”

“Laurent.”

Nik shakes his head. “I knew he was going to be trouble the moment I saw his face.”

“What?”

“He’s, like, the Platonic form of your type.”

“He’s Auguste’s little brother!” Damen protests.

“Who’s apparently in charge of your sex life!” Nik counters.

Fair point, but... “I haven’t even touched him.”

“You realize that only makes it weirder, right?”

He does… “But it’s so, so good, Nik.”

Nik covers his face with his hands. “I really wish you hadn’t told me this.”

“I tried not to!”

“Did you, though?”

Damen feels like a weight’s been lifted of his chest. “I’m really glad you know, though.”

Nik sighs. “Of course you are.”

Damen knows he must have a stupid look on his face. He feels giddy. He hears Nik take a deep breath and knows what’s coming.

“I know you don’t want to hear this, Damen, but be careful, okay? You haven’t even talked about whatever this is. He could just be toying with you.”

Damen shakes his head. “I don’t know why, but I trust him, Nik.”