Claude doesn't answer, not in words anyway. When he closes the door behind Vincent, it's with a final view of his (once more) Inverness-clad backside and a slight smile clinging to just the very corner of his own mouth. A warm curve around his lips. No doubt, it would taste sweet, were he to lick it. He won't, though. Midnight has come and gone, in theory the day is over and he's balancing on the edge of tomorrow already, not quite ready to let go of either the past or the present. 1891 isn't further away than an uninvited reminder. Sometimes, all he truly needs is to shut his eyes...
The years since have been barren in certain areas. His career, certainly, has been an uphill struggle, treading quicksand and getting nowhere fast. Most notably, this endless row of men he's slept with, though few of them made it all the way to his bed and those who did left in the morning, soundlessly and without a trace. All of it physical. All of it mostly meaningless, beyond the need for relief. Desires of the flesh that don't necessarily satisfy the desires of the soul. Souls he does believe in.
Sighing, he turns off the lamp on the writing desk. The one in the sill of the west-facing window. The bluish-tinted one on the kitchen counter, next to his abandoned roses. If he hangs them to dry, they'll fill the entire room with their smell for a good while to come. While he prepares for closing night.
So Claude strings the bouquet together and hangs it on one of the dozen nails sticking out of the walls here and there in an unregulated pattern. Incidentally, it happens to be right above his bed. In the soft light of the remaining lamp on the floor, he sheds his trousers and crawls for cover. Certain things you are allowed to hide from. Such as the cold. And unneeded attraction, if it proves equally insistent.
no subject
Claude doesn't answer, not in words anyway. When he closes the door behind Vincent, it's with a final view of his (once more) Inverness-clad backside and a slight smile clinging to just the very corner of his own mouth. A warm curve around his lips. No doubt, it would taste sweet, were he to lick it. He won't, though. Midnight has come and gone, in theory the day is over and he's balancing on the edge of tomorrow already, not quite ready to let go of either the past or the present. 1891 isn't further away than an uninvited reminder. Sometimes, all he truly needs is to shut his eyes...
The years since have been barren in certain areas. His career, certainly, has been an uphill struggle, treading quicksand and getting nowhere fast. Most notably, this endless row of men he's slept with, though few of them made it all the way to his bed and those who did left in the morning, soundlessly and without a trace. All of it physical. All of it mostly meaningless, beyond the need for relief. Desires of the flesh that don't necessarily satisfy the desires of the soul. Souls he does believe in.
Sighing, he turns off the lamp on the writing desk. The one in the sill of the west-facing window. The bluish-tinted one on the kitchen counter, next to his abandoned roses. If he hangs them to dry, they'll fill the entire room with their smell for a good while to come. While he prepares for closing night.
So Claude strings the bouquet together and hangs it on one of the dozen nails sticking out of the walls here and there in an unregulated pattern. Incidentally, it happens to be right above his bed. In the soft light of the remaining lamp on the floor, he sheds his trousers and crawls for cover. Certain things you are allowed to hide from. Such as the cold. And unneeded attraction, if it proves equally insistent.