to the divine,

ABOUT BLUE || Did the twin flame bruise paint you blue?

TO THE DIVINE : ALL HALLOW’S EVE COSTUME

He knew Blue wouldn’t tell him the truth, not after the four years they had together. Not after what the two men had gone through. “It’s okay,” he mumbled, closing the space between them. His hand slipped easily into his hair, a comfort to him, “I understand,” he pressed his forehead against Blue’s, letting a calm wash over him. Fionn felt a deep void within his chest that grew quickly as the days passed.. Even if he had been dead for two centuries, he truly felt dead now.

The two of them had been good. Blue had been good in a world that Fionn knew brought death and destruction, “I know,” he nodded, “I’ll burn it,” he looked at his open palm, the shitty necklace gleaming in the fluorescent lighting. “I’m sorry I ruined you,” he looked away, not wanting him to see him like this. Two hundred years and now he no longer saw the point of continuing this immortal life he was given as a sick joke. Anything that had ever been his was ruined once he touched it and Blue wasn’t an exception.

Blue was still denying it. With the tub's edge between them, he leaned over it to meet Fionn's head with his. The tip of his nose ran up and down his until it found its place against his. The curve started and ended with both of them, but he broke the space between. It was a way to silence them, and a way to pretend. His lips brushed against him to swallow those words, no matter how bad they sounded let alone tasted. It was different now, though. Every kiss and everything after felt like muscle memory instead of euphoric. Everything after that night felt the same way. All he could ever endure was Fionn staying close, but no more than a statue. He wanted to play a knight in armor or a guardian angel, he would be no more than a figurehead for it. Blue had stripped him of ever taking action again, something he instilled by adopting a silence that even his hands didn't speak out to interrupt.

Blue's hands found his body again, this time the tugs holding a different motive. Fionn could tune him out better, and he resented the thought that maybe he could tune out more than just Blue when their arguing reached the ceiling from raised voices to flailing hands. He didn't want to think about that night or that damn necklace. His hand wrapped around Fionn's, tipping it so the chain would fall from his grasp. He wiped his hand with his, fingers laced together, as though to clean him of it. There was no washing of it, though. That water Blue laid in had turned dark when Fionn joined him, in more ways than one. No matter how many times he tried to forget that piercing scream in his ears, that ringing silence that followed, the warm splash of blood on skin that was turning cold under someone's knee... He'd seen nothing but disaster, and somehow, Blue had come out untouched by it as though he’d never been there at all.

"We'll fix it." He'd said it enough times now that it was probably his first lie since they'd been together. The first one that mattered, that went beyond missing leftovers or when the dog had been taken out. Blue would rather have the devil he knew than be stuck with the demons he didn't have the courage to even glance upon. "We'll fix us."

He shut off all emotions, refusing to feel in that moment with Blue. The nightmares were an ever present being hanging over him, like a demon waiting to take him to hell. The two were in purgatory: still in the relationship, even though he knew Blue was no longer Blue. All Fionn wished he did differently that night was tear those other vamps to fucking shreds. “it’s nothing, I promise,” his hands found his cheeks. He wondered if the real Blue was somewhere deep inside, begging to be let out.

Blue tried to grab on to what was in his hand, but he refused, protecting Blue,for as long as he could, “I took it on a whim,” he finally told him, “I wanted to toss it and then I didn’t.” He looked away from him, not wanting his brown eyes to bear into his soul. “I keep it to remind myself of what happened to you,” he mumbled.

His hands dropped from his chest, the words pouring out of his mouth like a dark and foul bile that made him lose his grip on him. Blue had never said aloud that he fought with the memory of that night, that his motivations twisted and turned in its fading hues. His silence must have spoken enough that Fionn needed to hold on to it.

"That's not... That's not it."

They had grown apart, there was denying it and Blue hadn't, but he wasn't quite sure to voice an agreement aloud just yet. There was a change that neither one of them could address. That night, the bits of them that were flaking away from what they had endured in life had been pulled back farther than they anticipated. Whatever emptiness they managed to fill for each other was now far most vast than it was before.

"You shouldn't have kept it, Fi," Blue said, voice soft but only with the fear of someone else hearing. "Someone can find it, and it can come back on us."

“Emory Starling, I work over at All in One so I tend to see a lot of people. But aside from that first night, I haven’t really seen you around.” Which was curious on a number of levels, he had no idea what spirits generally did when they weren’t actively hanging around a certain place. For as much time he spent learning about them as a kid, there was so much that he’d had to unlearn as an adult. Without his father’s influence, there was so much he didn’t know about them. William Hart would never sit down with one of them, whether he knew they were malicious or not, he’d have just found a way to banish it and then he’d be on his way. “It’s about that, actually. The time thing.” His eyes go towards the other man and he gives a slight nod before flagging down the bartender. “I don’t usually see any of you hanging around like this.”

Blue hadn’t clung to a place–– but rather, a person. He’d slowly come to realize that whenever he found himself stuck in some aimless routine, he came back to the places that resonated with the memories of whose tragedy he was born from. A bar counter, the home of that smell of antiseptic at the pharmacy’s clinic, the forrest and its damp ground, and his apartment were all reminiscing places of who he was. Even now, the drink in hand was some attempt at recollection. 

“Yes,” she tells him slowly. “It gets you drink faster because it’s an unholy atrocity that should be banned. Also, your tolerance is measured differently depending on the drink so this will only tell you how much of a lightweight you are.”

The comments keep falling from her mouth, what little restrain she has gone after the drinks she had at the beginning of the night plus the warmth brought forth by the two shots she had just taken. Still, she reaches forward and serves herself another three shots, which she downs in an almost professional manner before looking at Blue with a raised brow.

“Yeah, that would feel rather horrible,” she sighs out, trying desperately to come up with any words to reassure him. It’s difficult though, because in a way, she understands. Nothing has been the same since she died, so sometimes she doesn’t want to even try to be okay. It happens less frequently now than it did at the beginning, but it’s a thought that still lingers on the bad days. “I can’t say that you are wrong, because in a way, you are not. Hell, I even understand how you are feelings. There are days when I can’t believe I am the same person that died over a hundred years ago, days where I feel like the spirit I am. Still, I rather stick to believing that there is a part of her on me that she would approve of, because if I don’t… Well, I don’t ever want to go down that path, you know? That is a slippery slope.”

“I didn’t use to be a lightweight, but we’ll see how it goes now,” Blue shrugged. What he’d come to know what was what he had left of the body he manifested was that some aspects were controlled by his own expectation. He wasn’t warm to the touch, and his heart didn’t race like he used to be able to will it to do. Blue had yet to do anything with former pleasures since his human form collapsed, and he’d ruin himself testing his limits if he had to. After all, he had an eternity to put himself back together. 

He knows he had trouble with fixation, but Blue can’t chalk it out to some ghost behavior or the way he’d always been. He remembered being calm more often than not which had gotten him in Fionn’s circles to begin with. Still, he always came back to that single thought that he always needed reassurance for. 

          “Liquor with a price tag,” they scowled in clarification, merely teasing on the matter. A sliver of a grin was mustered up as Blue pointed out who was genuinely responsible for the tab, rolling his eyes roguishly. “Hm,” they half-grunted in understanding, fingers slipping around the other shot glass which was handed to him, “Just no fighting, don’t want to kick you out when you’re trying to have some sense of a good time,” a wicked grin formed on their lips, taking the shot without hesitation, grateful for the burn that consumed them.

          Blue’s current mental state seemed parallel to Eric and he so desperately understood the nauseating battle of trying to escape from the iniquitous thoughts and past horrors that dared haunt you. They wondered if it was the masquerade which gnawed at Blue, but didn’t dare pry, nudging the other playfully, “So, should I leave you and your admirer alone? Or would you rather I stick around?”

          Inquiry was a gentle push, though deep down Eric wasn’t sure if it would be the most responsible choice to leave someone who was clearing drowning beneath a heap of destructive emotions. “I’m game to play,” he clarified further, hoisting up his empty shot glass to reference that he genuinely had nowhere else to be currently.

“You don’t have to worry about me fighting, Eric, c’mon,” He scoffed, though there was a small sting at the idea. Blue’s gaze flickered across the counter where patrons with the reputation Eric seemed weary of leaned too close, spoke too loud, and moved too fast. It’s a kind of sting that’s pain has a small invitation and its pins him to the moment in a way he doesn’t fight. He was never one for a fight, but he can’t help but find himself thinking the worst of how their night would end. His chest feels heavy despite the sigh he forces out where a part of him taunts at the idea of playing god and finding a reason to let out that scream.

No.

Blue stands upright, finishing his drink and burning the thought away. He had no reason to give into the scream, so why would he seek it out now under the peace he felt?

“I see,” she says, despite the fact that she does not quite follow the logic of his choices. Something must have happened to change his mind, as his perspective seemed radically different from their last meeting, but she has no means to learning what exactly changed. And she doesn’t exactly believe she would be able to convince him otherwise, or change his mind in any way. Isabella knows Blue well enough already, and frankly, trying to change his mind might be more counterproductive than anything else. “I understand that you have made your choice already, and while I won’t try to change your mind, I do want you to know that my door is always open in case you want to talk. My number too, in case you want to text. And remember, even if you make mistakes, there are people who care about you, never forget that.”

People who care about you. It has a ring to it, one that Blue seems to cling to. While people by default is more than once, he’s convinced its still a small number he could count without using all of the fingers on one hand. Isolation was part of the reason they moved to Rome. Him and Fionn had been trying to avoid whatever curse had been following them and avoid anymore peculiar casualties. Now that they had their answers, it was more of a mess on how to bring them all together and it was a matter far beyond whatever unraveling of self esteem could be solved on a couch. None of the remedies he studied made sense anymore, and in his defeat, Blue stripped them of all integrity.

“That is a rather sad take in nihilism,” they comment idly, boredom crawling closer as the conversation continues. The young spirit proved as a thoughtful distraction, but she has met many a spirit with similar experiences and it gets rather dull after a while. “It seems to me that you have skipped the bargaining bit of the seven stages of grief and mixed the anger and depression stage together, which is a rather big waste. Perhaps your life has drastically changed because of this information, but forgetting to consider the bright side of things will never be helpful.”

This is a lesson that she knows through experience, one she learned on the ashes of her first home, and reinforced as she kept the sentiment at bay as she focused on her Court. If she had fallen prey to depression, she would not have accomplished nearly as much as she had, nearly as quickly. Anger, however, is helpful. It drives you and pushes you further than you believed possible.

“You have a new lease in life, despite it all. You are here. That alone is a gift many cannot say they have.”

The next question sparks back some of her curiosity and amusement, just enough to deign him with an answer, even if she is less enthusiastic about it than before.

“Titania’s domain lays in the Otherworld,” she explains. “It felt different because it’s the realm between worlds, the Courts are located there, yes, but so are many other places that you have only heard in legend. Purgatory, Inferno, Persephone’s Palace. The Otherworld is infinite and contains infinities.”

Everyone he’d crossed paths with told him that the rejection of his new life was one he’d look back on and scoff at. As much as Blue wanted to believe them, he could hardly put what little faith he had in that alone. The very thing he was now was to be of service of the inevitable, but he was born of the worst way it came into play. A tragedy. He was suppose to be the knock before the last breath while his got pushed out of his chest until nothing was left in a scream. He could kick and scream for someone else’s demise, but there was nothing when it came to his–– and that had yet to sit well with him. 

“Stop dwelling on the why, and just figure out the how the hell to do this,” He sighed with a nod, and a tight smile that he used to silence himself rather than their guidance. Blue would only be able to explore his own territory if he simply stopped trying to compare it to the one thing he didn’t have anymore. 

        If looks could kill, she’d assume she asked the wrong question. At the same time, given the turmoil that occurred at the masquerade, it’s fair game to inquire if he, too, is somewhat in an unstable place after all that’s happened. There’s also the point of his desire to consume alcohol at a such a rapid pace which plays a part in her nosiness, however in the end, Èdelie is truly concerned for Blue’s wellbeing. “Did I shoot myself in the foot trying to see if everything’s alright?” If Blue is capable of seeing past her need to please, perhaps it’ll be the start to an engaging friendship. Besides, this beats the restricted environment of his pharmacy where their prior conversation went awry.

         Dolefully, her eyes shot down as a means to think about what to do and say next, absorbing his confession of not being okay — a fine, yet worrisome thing to admit. It’s also unfortunate that Blue has a point about what goes on in Rome; the troubles of many never overshadows the bigger picture at hand, therefore it’ll pass. “We’ll have to fix that, right? It’s weird being at a bar feeling like muck,” she verbalized, dramatically shaking off the feeling to the stress the importance of lifting yourself up. “I suppose alcohol can be a remedy for a lot of things including a time like now, but It’s not usually my choice of comfort.” 

       Her nose briefly brushed past the rim of her drink to inhale the scent of fermented grapes, pleased at the swiftness of the workers there, and still encouraging even the slightest taste out of the dark-haired male. Although she’s not befuddled by the wine yet, Èdelie will make it her duty to drag Blue out of his funk until left unsuccessful. “I doubt a sip will interact with you to the point where you’re lying on your death bed.” 

             Cue the pause, raising a brow. “Can I ask what’s wrong, or no?”

He shakes his head, and there’s a drop of his shoulders as he seems to break away from the fast pace he’s forced upon himself. The room’s not spinning anymore–– Blue is simply wallowing now, and it takes him this long to realize it.

“Alcohol’s not the best cure for normal things, but I don’t think what I have is a normal problem,” Blue admitted. 

He gave into truth too easily around certain people. There was something about their presence that drew him in and once sliver of honesty seemed to make it easier to get close. He’d never been one to lie because he didn’t have anything to hide–– from others, at least. Blue had come to know that anything he buried was for his own sake and no one else’s. 

He’d seen her at the masquerade, but he had yet to give her the credit she deserved in the new world he was trying to maneuver. She didn’t seem like Fionn, or Marisol, or Farenduil. She wasn’t human like Kadir, either. He wasn’t sure why, but Blue had forced himself to stop asking questions now.