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fellowshippers2006-04-07 01:07 am
geniusartist.livejournal.com) wrote in fellowshippers2006-04-07 01:07 am
So Shall the Shadow
Title: So Shall the Shadow
Pairing: EW/DM, DM/BB
Rating: NC-17
Notes: This fic was inspired by and written as a response to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
feelforfaith’s Traveler. It can be read alone, but would be better understood in the context of her story.
Thank youfeelforfaith for your story, which moved me enough to write this.
New York, New York
Home
Elijah isn’t impulsive. He likes to weigh every ounce of a decision, frames each maybe or how about and what if in layers on top of, against, under, and in between each other. He’s not always entirely certain when he finally decides, but when he does, he is committed. He’s not one to argue, after all, when people say, those who make their bed…
When he gets the call from Dom, he doesn’t have to feign enthusiasm at the news that he and Billy are visiting New York. He is gracious in defeat, a skill learned and cultivated through years of being a child actor. Now, as an adult, he is a consummate professional. When Elijah understood… accepted… that always after Dom there would trail Billy, like a shadow…and likewise…he resigned himself contentedly to the role as sidekick-participant-observer to their happily ever after.
When the body bends, so shall the shadow.
Elijah is like their half beat response, thunder that follows lightning.
It takes him a fraction of that time to whisper, “Okay…”, in answer to Dom's hesitant, partly stuttered proposal. He remembers afterwards that he forgot he isn’t impulsive. As an afterthought, he takes the could and perhaps that he neglected to consider, links them together like cut-out paper dolls and tries to tamper down the aching swell in his chest. He tries not to imagine himself as Dom’s shirt collar, imprinted stark gray against concrete pavement.
***
Billy snaps a sharp and low, “No.” His response to Elijah’s suggestion that they return to his apartment.
They rent a room at the W, the swanky “it” hotel of the minute, and since it is New York, no one even blinks at “Information” when Elijah presents his credit card. Dom and Billy, to his right, are engaged in one of their famous comedy routines. He giggles for emphasis.
On the 31st floor, they can see the Empire State building from the window. Tonight, it is draped in red, white, and blue, a standard combination when there are no looming holidays.
When Elijah is stripped down only to his boxers and is sitting at the corner edge of the king-sized bed, he proposes to himself a scenario. Even in the whisky-induced fog, he is weighing, framing, layering, contextualizing.
What if…body…I am…maybe…half beat…stutter…shadow…need…could he…Dom…
Elijah jumps when he feels a hard, bare shoulder press against his. Warm, he thinks. From the beer. The whisky. Perhaps… He stops thinking of pieces framed together, allows the image he’s constructed to grow blurry when he feels Dom’s face rubbing against his left cheek. He sinks to the bed on his back, let’s himself be impulsive and hooks a leg behind Dom’s thighs. Elijah’s grip is possessive and he doesn’t pretend otherwise. Dom lengthens himself on top of him, and Elijah arches and releases with every touch, a mountain peak of yearning for what if, a valley of desperation for someday.
Billy’s face is a dark shape of indefinite features under the dimmed lights. He sits naked against the headboard, a moon’s distance away, stroking himself.
Elijah’s lids flutter close and he bites his lip when Dom enters him, slow and certain. Dom rocks, a methodical ebb and flow. Billy strokes in rhythm.
When the body bends, so shall the shadow.
Dom rocks/Billy strokes…A half beat pause, and Elijah comes keening, burning…
Dom leans into him, cups his face with both hands and kisses him tenderly. He nuzzles his nose against Elijah’s and mutters, “Thank you.” When Dom rises, Elijah rubs at his eyes, forces a yawn, and pretends not to see Dom kneel before Billy. He shuts his eyes almost closed and convinces himself he only imagined Dom gently wiping at Billy’s stomach with a corner of bedsheet. When Elijah sees Dom take both of Billy’s hands and kiss each uncurled palm in turn, Elijah decides it’s time to go home.
***
The next several months bring sporadic phone calls, each with an awkward, “Hey…” It takes an additional several months more, or more, for Elijah to re-resign himself to his former role.
He’s still not impulsive, still weighs every proposition against every imagined circumstance, divides each by all their possibilities and multiplies them for consequences. In fact, these days, he is near scientific in his approach.
He’ll never admit regret.
But these days he is almost stagnantly careful with his choices.
And when he constructs paper dolls in his mind, he imagines they’re cut from the heaviest and thickest card stock. And he ignores the play of light against objects, imprints against walls, floors, a table, and tries not to remember that he once wished himself as inseparable from another.
Pairing: EW/DM, DM/BB
Rating: NC-17
Notes: This fic was inspired by and written as a response to
feelforfaith’s Traveler. It can be read alone, but would be better understood in the context of her story.Thank you
feelforfaith for your story, which moved me enough to write this. New York, New York
Home
Elijah isn’t impulsive. He likes to weigh every ounce of a decision, frames each maybe or how about and what if in layers on top of, against, under, and in between each other. He’s not always entirely certain when he finally decides, but when he does, he is committed. He’s not one to argue, after all, when people say, those who make their bed…
When he gets the call from Dom, he doesn’t have to feign enthusiasm at the news that he and Billy are visiting New York. He is gracious in defeat, a skill learned and cultivated through years of being a child actor. Now, as an adult, he is a consummate professional. When Elijah understood… accepted… that always after Dom there would trail Billy, like a shadow…and likewise…he resigned himself contentedly to the role as sidekick-participant-observer to their happily ever after.
When the body bends, so shall the shadow.
Elijah is like their half beat response, thunder that follows lightning.
It takes him a fraction of that time to whisper, “Okay…”, in answer to Dom's hesitant, partly stuttered proposal. He remembers afterwards that he forgot he isn’t impulsive. As an afterthought, he takes the could and perhaps that he neglected to consider, links them together like cut-out paper dolls and tries to tamper down the aching swell in his chest. He tries not to imagine himself as Dom’s shirt collar, imprinted stark gray against concrete pavement.
***
Billy snaps a sharp and low, “No.” His response to Elijah’s suggestion that they return to his apartment.
They rent a room at the W, the swanky “it” hotel of the minute, and since it is New York, no one even blinks at “Information” when Elijah presents his credit card. Dom and Billy, to his right, are engaged in one of their famous comedy routines. He giggles for emphasis.
On the 31st floor, they can see the Empire State building from the window. Tonight, it is draped in red, white, and blue, a standard combination when there are no looming holidays.
When Elijah is stripped down only to his boxers and is sitting at the corner edge of the king-sized bed, he proposes to himself a scenario. Even in the whisky-induced fog, he is weighing, framing, layering, contextualizing.
What if…body…I am…maybe…half beat…stutter…shadow…need…could he…Dom…
Elijah jumps when he feels a hard, bare shoulder press against his. Warm, he thinks. From the beer. The whisky. Perhaps… He stops thinking of pieces framed together, allows the image he’s constructed to grow blurry when he feels Dom’s face rubbing against his left cheek. He sinks to the bed on his back, let’s himself be impulsive and hooks a leg behind Dom’s thighs. Elijah’s grip is possessive and he doesn’t pretend otherwise. Dom lengthens himself on top of him, and Elijah arches and releases with every touch, a mountain peak of yearning for what if, a valley of desperation for someday.
Billy’s face is a dark shape of indefinite features under the dimmed lights. He sits naked against the headboard, a moon’s distance away, stroking himself.
Elijah’s lids flutter close and he bites his lip when Dom enters him, slow and certain. Dom rocks, a methodical ebb and flow. Billy strokes in rhythm.
When the body bends, so shall the shadow.
Dom rocks/Billy strokes…A half beat pause, and Elijah comes keening, burning…
Dom leans into him, cups his face with both hands and kisses him tenderly. He nuzzles his nose against Elijah’s and mutters, “Thank you.” When Dom rises, Elijah rubs at his eyes, forces a yawn, and pretends not to see Dom kneel before Billy. He shuts his eyes almost closed and convinces himself he only imagined Dom gently wiping at Billy’s stomach with a corner of bedsheet. When Elijah sees Dom take both of Billy’s hands and kiss each uncurled palm in turn, Elijah decides it’s time to go home.
***
The next several months bring sporadic phone calls, each with an awkward, “Hey…” It takes an additional several months more, or more, for Elijah to re-resign himself to his former role.
He’s still not impulsive, still weighs every proposition against every imagined circumstance, divides each by all their possibilities and multiplies them for consequences. In fact, these days, he is near scientific in his approach.
He’ll never admit regret.
But these days he is almost stagnantly careful with his choices.
And when he constructs paper dolls in his mind, he imagines they’re cut from the heaviest and thickest card stock. And he ignores the play of light against objects, imprints against walls, floors, a table, and tries not to remember that he once wished himself as inseparable from another.
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