#molloyed

❝ no babysitter tonight? ❞ bianca replies instead, watching with disinterest as the elder man sat himself before her. the tour bus is empty in preparation for tonight's show, one neither of them have any enthusiasm to attend. long limbs spread themselves along the upper floor's couch, and she knows she's sitting where daniel tends to when he's got lestat in the hot seat. ❝ didn't know they let you out on your own. ❞ there's an ambiguity to her words, one she knows will set the journalist on edge. quite a few people have their turn tugging his leash, it seems. bianca cannot exactly throw any stones, however. both she and daniel have two mutual employers, even if neither of them really have any loyalty to the fucking talamasca.

@molloyed // meme

Nicolas felt the city before he understood it.San Francisco in the seventies thrummed—neon, exhaust, incense, sweat, the ocean’s cold breath rolling in from the bay. It was nothing like Paris, nothing like the centuries of stone and shadow he remembered. This place was alive in a way that made his fingers itch for the violin he had stollen alongside the violinist's hands to replace his own...and Daniel Molloy—this strange, sharp‑eyed mortal with ink‑stained hands and a laugh that cracked like a match—had led him up here, to a rooftop terrace above a bar that smelled of spilled beer and patchouli.

The night was warm.

Daniel sat on the low concrete ledge, one knee drawn up, a joint burning between his fingers. The ember pulsed each time he inhaled, painting his cheekbones in brief, molten orange. Smoke curled around him like a lazy ghost.Nicolas had led down on the dirty roof letting the wind toy with the ends of his shoulder length hair. Resurrection had left him raw, half‑formed in ways he didn’t dare name. But this—this moment—felt almost like a beginning. He lead there with Daniel's recorder on his chest, it wasn't turned on nor was there tape in it, he simply liked the click of the buttons and had spent fifteen minutes simply pressing them to hear the click, click, click of the buttons mesmerised.

He glanced sideways at Daniel.Nicolas watched the smoke drift upward, dissolving into the night. He envied it a little—its ease, its freedom. His own body still felt borrowed, stitched together by forces he didn’t understand.

"You know I never thought this would be the meaning of stillness.A rooftop. A journalist. The scent of… what do you call it? Weed?"

Nicolas took the offered joint, studying the glowing tip with the same reverence he once gave to a violin string.Nicolas took a slow drag—more out of curiosity than desire—and let the smoke sit on his tongue before releasing it into the wind. It didn’t affect him, not really, but the ritual of it… that he understood.

The clock on the wall ticked like a metronome pacing their conversation. Three-hundred-and-forty seconds had passed since Nicolas last spoke. Daniel only bothered to prompt the conversation when it became clear (around the two-hundred-and-fifty second mark) that his line of questioning was being shut down. 

Nicolas had found that silence in his purest form was impossible to achieve; the closest he had ever come being at the point of burning when the heat of the flames ruptured his eardrums, though, even then the crackle of flesh and wails of his coven had echoed (even memory makes a noise). The constant movement of the world caused a disruption in his psyche that clawed at his mind’s walls. Silence was merely chaos disguised. Did Daniel understand this? Did he even care? Wandering eyes trail along the room's back wall, following the streaks of painted over wall paper until the road trailed off entirely. 

Four-hundred-and-three seconds had passed and Nicolas could sense patience and irritation mingling like two old friends. Two stubborn bulls sat across, an unstoppable force meeting an immovable object. Could they sit here until the time turned them to dust? Would Daniel pursue to the point of mutual destruction? He smiles at the thought. (What a waste that would be).

“You put words in my mouth. Ask me again and I might grant you a “yes”.”

@molloyed asked : sender worships receiver's ankle's/feet with touch kisses, and praise.

memory comes like a reverberation in the water where his mind floats, the lapping of tender moments and the ambiguously sweet distillation of these echoes now something that armand can come to welcome; this is not the first time daniel has been at his feet. not the first time that these fingers have come to shape themselves against his arches, his lips, too, have been here before. every caress, the pink fingers that clutch around the sole where it is thinnest and armand feels himself come undone with just how tender it all is - how delicate daniel has become in his wizened age, lips curved to fit against the jutted bone of his ankle. ❝ you're beautiful like this, daniel. ❞ amidst the devotion comes a vague ribbon of pleasure that he isn't quite sure is daniel's, armand's head tilting back against the chair, giving his hips a lift forward. ❝ servitude has always suited you. if my memory serves me right, ❞ a nasty little seedling of cruelty glints in armand's eye for a moment, the kind of malicious pleasure that's been simmering for quite some time now. ❝ the last time i had you in this position you were begging for something. ❞ daintily, a foot is lifted from one of daniel's hands and placed against his jaw, the satiny-soft dorsal flesh ran up under his ear and then pulled back. armand lifts daniel's chin with a toe.

❝ do you remember what you were begging for? ❞

They ran until cobbled streets of Saint Denis turned soft with grass. Finally collapsing onto the ground with heaving chests. Bellies too warm with liquor and pockets too heavy with coin to care about the circumstance.

He allows his curly haired friend a few moments rest before opting for shared misery- why should he be the only one to suffer a splitting hangover.

"Oui, mon ami." A sharper, less polite nudge follows. "Wake before I leave you for the Raiders."

humiliation was a powerful elixir to the prideful mind, a booze of sorts that he and daniel pass back and forth. some nights, most nights, the humiliation was a burden for only daniel to bear. it framed his pretty face with morbid splotches of his pleasure, a creeping blush that often made it past his naval and then some; armand is not so keen on the humiliation. he's grown stoney in his old age, cemented in a mind-set that he has yet to outgrow, so careful with his pride that these rituals often do not touch it at all. was it love to loosen the folds of his binds? could it be the simple act of loving daniel that he might get on his knees and give in to the boy's baser needs or was it something other? was it his repugnance that welcomed more of it? and to bear that burden, did he not take pleasure in that sacrifice? in all sacrifices? still. a shade of vulnerability on the face tonight. the fishnets had stuck on his toes when he'd first tried to pull them up his thighs, had torn at the knee and ankle.

the dress, however, felt as if he were slipping into water. sure, at first, that something so delicate could never fit over his shoulders. certain that his hips were not meant for the effortless drape that now cascades down his body. armand's never known his body to be without it's sharp edges, but the purple velvet hides the ridges of his hips easily enough, even the sharp dips at his clavicle are softened under the collar. it still feels wrong - when he looks upon himself in the mirror, his feet weighed down with heavy, scuffed boots that daniel insist he wear, armand feels every bit the whore he once was. but even amadeo was spared this humiliation. this was new territory, new flesh, lips that drip like ripe plums and eyes with a shuddering darkness. each lashline made heavier, kohl and powder and a blurring powder to each lid. it should embarrass him, it does, but there is a boon to be found here. the creature that looks back at him is not armand. he's not anybody. these arms, as he clutches them, are not his. too smooth, this skin, too soft. and the legs - armand can't remember a time when his legs have ever looked this long. he lets a hand drop to the hem of the purple dress, caressing the fabric between a thumb and forefinger. daniel finds him like this, his heavy footfall crashing down the hallway - calling out for him. his mind turning already, impatience and giddy anticipation, the kind of pleasure-seeking vibration that crosses from daniel to armand the moment their eyes meet. a silence becomes lodged in his throat. gooseflesh crawls across his body, exposed and cold inside. a death blush just behind the face and before he can say anything at all, daniel rushes out the way he came.

❝ wait … ! hold still, i want to take a picture. ❞

❝ what could you possibly know about loyalty? ❞ it's meant to burn. the initial puncture is returned with one of his own, sharp and crooked, a twisting of the knife that only armand can quite get in far enough without bleeding daniel out fully - it's meant to curve to his body like silk, created for the sole purpose of shutting this conversation down like he shuts down all others when it comes to matters such as these; love, reluctance, an untidy connection that will not be severed by hand or blade. the spider web of their connection vibrates with each pluck. each end is struck, each end a morsel. trapped together, even through the horror of what very might well be their last moments together. he's considered it. by the light of addiction, the skin over the jutting bones, the desperation that leads daniel to sleep on benches, in the street, on the beach. how awful it must be, armand considers nightly, that his lover would choose these unforgiving tombs over his arms. ❝ if louis walked through that door and offered you his blood, daniel, i would never see you again. you'd take any chance at all to get what you want. ❞