Another quickie

[maculategiraffe]

I drafted a version of this dialogue several months ago in a notebook, and it's been sitting there ever since, but as a result of multiple reader requests, I've just fixed it up for readability, and here it is. Set almost immediately after Bran's homecoming.








"Hey."

Yves, lying on his back on his bed and staring at the ceiling, hands clasped behind his head, lifted his head slightly and looked at Holden without responding to his tentative greeting. Holden stepped inside the door and closed it behind him. "Can we talk?"

"I guess we should," said Yves, without much inflection.

Holden came and straddled Yves' desk chair backward, leaning his arms on its back as he examined Yves' expressionless profile.

"You're not going to sell him, are you?" Yves asked, his eyes on the ceiling again.

Holden swallowed. "No."

"No." Yves studied the ceiling as intently as if he expected to be quizzed on its features later. "Well, if you're going to give me the same talk as you did about Jer, don't forget to skip the part about how long you've known him."

"I wasn't--"

"Actually, skip the whole thing. I remember it like it was yesterday." Yves turned his head and looked Holden in the eye. "Oh, wait. It was yesterday."

Holden held his gaze. "Yves, I'm really sorry. The timing on this is shit. But-- please try to understand. You know I wouldn't do this to you if it weren't really important to me."

"Yeah," said Yves. "I know. I'm just starting to wonder what is important to you, master."

"Yves--"

"Because," Yves continued relentlessly, "I've thought for a long time that it was your family. Your wife, your daughter, and-- if I may make so bold-- me. Then this kid comes along, and he gets a crush on you-- like a million of them have before. And I don't worry, because I've never had to worry."

Holden swallowed the glib answer that sprang to his lips, making himself stay silent.

"And then suddenly there's Jer," Yves continued after a short pause, "and you're dropping everything for him-- and, okay. This is important to you. I get that. I'm okay with that. I am. And you tell me how great I am and how you're so sorry to spring something so huge on me with so little notice--"

Holden looked down, unable to hold Yves' steady blue stare.

"And then Bran goes missing, and you're a wreck all day, Jer's trying to figure out why and what's going on and is it his fault the kid ran for it, and I'm trying to settle him down and keep him out of the way of your, your panic, while I'm wondering myself why the hell you're taking this one so hard. Then the phone rings, and you peel out of here in a cloud of dust, and two hours later you drag him back through the door and disappear for two more hours and now you come in here and--"

Holden looked up swiftly at a catch in Yves' voice and saw tears sliding silently, unobtrusively, from the corners of his eyes and disappearing into the hair at his temples.

"--and." Yves pressed his lips together sharply, either to keep from crying audibly or from saying something else. Holden bit his tongue so hard to keep from speaking, from babbling out meaningless apologies and promises, that he tasted blood.

When Yves spoke again, he said, "Did you already talk to the mistress?"

"Yes," said Holden.

Yves nodded. "What did she say?"

"That she was the one who mortgaged the house to buy fifteen-year-old twins who hated me and then let one of them get knocked up and talked me into signing the birth certificate, so now we're even."

Yves snorted, then fell silent again for a minute before he said, "You know what's funny? How helpless I feel. How scary that is."

"Why is that funny?" Holden asked quietly.

"Because I'm a slave," said Yves without looking at him. "Because of course I'm fucking helpless. This is not news. It just--" He pressed his lips together again before finishing, "Feels like it. Hey. I guess I should thank you for that."

Holden's heart constricted so sharply he very nearly whimpered out loud. He waited until he was fairly sure his voice would be steady before he asked, "Can I-- come over there?"

"Yes, master," said Yves to the ceiling. "You may approach your property."

Holden got up and went to the bed, where he lay down beside Yves, feeling an almost overwhelming desire to cry himself when Yves moved closer, pressing up against Holden without looking at him. They lay in silence for what seemed like hours, but was probably only a few minutes, Yves' body warm and firm against his.

"What's this?" Yves asked suddenly, looking at a mottled purple bruise on Holden's forearm just below his wrist, in the rough shape of a hand.

Holden grimaced. "Bran was a little reluctant to let me come talk to you. He seemed to think you might-- change my mind. About keeping him."

"Oh, gods." Yves touched the bruise, then fitted his own hand over the finger-shaped marks, grasping Holden's arm very gently. "Poor kid. You know, he still slips sometimes and calls me sir."

"I know," said Holden. "And that reminds me-- he's agreed to serve you and Jer, and I quote, 'however you wish.' As one of the terms of his staying here."

"Huh." Yves considered that for a moment. "Does that mean I can fuck him whenever I want?"

"Yeah."

Yves' brows drew together, but he was thinking, not angry-- Holden hoped. "What about Jer?"

"He can, too. Though I have to talk to Jer about not being too rough with the kid."

"No, I mean me and Jer. Can we fuck? Each other? Without you?"

Holden peered at him. "Seriously?"

"Well?" Yves looked back with the faintest hint of a challenge in his eyes, wiping absently at his tear tracks with the back of his hand. "They're both going to be needing a lot of attention for a while, aren't they? From you, I mean. It would be nice to have someone to... be with. When you're busy. Now that I'm one of three, instead of... one."

Holden sighed. "You're trying to guilt-trip me."

"Trying? Is it not working?" The corners of Yves' mouth twitched. "I could cry some more."

"No, no, no, it's working fine," said Holden, and the curve of Yves' mouth grew a little more pronounced. "Gods. Okay, Yves. Yes. You can do as you like."

"Just with Jer and Bran though, right? Because there's the prettiest boy selling apples down at the market on-- No? Too much?"

Yves was actually smiling now, if faintly, and just that fact made it impossible for Holden to scowl at him with any conviction as he agreed, "Too much."

"Yes, master," said Yves demurely. "Just Jer and Bran, then... That could be nice. You know who Jer reminds me of, a little?"

"Cal?"

Yves stared, startled. "How'd you know?"

Holden shrugged. "Just from how you described Cal-- I figured. Tall, toppy, kind of bitter around the mouth."

"You remember the funniest things." Yves was silent for another minute before adding pensively, "Actually, come to think of it, I'd love to bottom for Bran sometime. Can you imagine?"

"Frankly, no," said Holden, smiling a little. "I've got to get around to that myself one of these days. I'm never quite sure how to broach the subject. The first time I went down on him he almost blacked out."

"I bet that was a sight," said Yves. "Maybe you could let me watch that sometime. Since Bran's sticking around." He leaned back, watching Holden. "And, hey. As long as I'm guilt-tripping you."

"Yes?"

"I--" Yves cleared his throat. "Well. Like I said. I know they're both going to need you a lot, for a while. So it's okay if you need to-- neglect me, a little. No, let me finish," he said when Holden tried to speak. "I'm not playing the martyr. I just mean, I don't need you holding my hand every minute. I'm pretty good at filling my own time. But. If I do ever-- Can you promise me that if I come to you and ask, you'll make time for me? No matter what?"

"Yes," said Holden, his overtired heart hammering again; he hoped it would hold out for the talk he still had to have with Jer. Nobody would be particularly happy if he suffered a cardiac arrest tonight. "I can promise that."

"Okay," said Yves. "Thank you. And-- no more, right? New boys, I mean."

"Not for at least a week."

"Not funny," said Yves coldly.

"No more," said Holden, trying not to betray a distinctly unmasterful flinch. "I swear."

"Okay," said Yves again, and then, "Okay. Good." He sighed, then looked up. "You going to talk to Jer now?"

"Only if-- I mean-- are we--"

"Yes." Yves reached out and cupped the nape of his master's neck, pulling him in for a quick kiss on the lips. "We are. Go on."