FIC: 'Parallel Motion' - Part 3b
Oct. 8th, 2011 01:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
thalialunacy2Old habits die hard, of course, and he’s anxious. More anxious than he’s been since he was fourteen and hadn’t yet developed the strength to escape the sway of the lunar cycle. He kind of understands how his mom must’ve felt at that point. Only, she didn’t know firsthand exactly how much pain her son would be going through.
Chris knows.
Chris knows and so he coddles Karl all day. Well, as much as Karl will let him. Which is about to the extent of Karl picking what they watch on tv, hence the rugby. Karl is stubborn in his denial. It pulls at Chris, makes him want to protect him even more. It’s a vicious cycle.
At about five-thirty Karl yawns, and stretches, and makes a face as his bones pop and re-settle anxiously. Ominously, to Chris. “Let’s go out,” he suggests, as distraction. Mostly distraction for himself.
“Where?”
“Somewhere not here. Just... a burger and a walk. Maybe the pier.”
Karl has an eyebrow raised. “But--they’ll find us--”
Chris shrugs. “I’ll wear my hat. You can wear one of my sweaters, the kind you’d never wear of your own volition.” He grins. “And if they come at us, we’ll growl and they’ll run away.”
Karl fights it but ends up laughing anyways. “Or you’ll flip them off and then we’ll run away.”
“Or that.”
---
They don’t, by some miracle, end up getting chased home by the paps. They have a burger from a stand-- “Just, don’t ask to see the health grade, ok?” --and wander down the beach a ways. The sky is gorgeous and the sun is just about to set. Which means the moon is just about to rise, has probably already started. But Chris is trying not to think about it, letting himself get distracted by the greasy food and the foamy water and the gorgeous man next to him.
“I’ll have you know, it’s taking a supreme effort on my part to not hold your hand right now.”
Karl smirks, but his eyes are soft. “Thank you. Seeing as you still have hamburger juice all over yo--”
Chris barely has time to comprehend it before Karl’s doubled over.
“Holy shit,” he hears Karl gasp. “What the fuck--”
Chris glances at the horizon. The moon has started its dance with the sun.
Shit is about to get real.
---
He gets Karl home as fast as he can, speeding like the LA native he is--and good god if he’s this strung out just by Karl’s change, what the fuck are they going to do when Karl’s full term? Live in the hospital? Sounds good to Chris-- but it kills him, to have to listen to the cursing and pained sounds coming from the passenger seat.
“It’ll be okay, I promise--” He tries to be soothing but he can’t quite take a full breath. “We just need to get you home, then I can--” --can make it better, he wants to say, but he can’t. He can’t make it better. And that makes the ache in his chest expand into panic.
---
Panic is great fuel for action.
As soon as he’s got the car parked, he’s around the other side and hauling Karl to the door, Karl’s arm slung over his shoulder so his weight is mostly on Chris. When Chris realizes the keys are in Karl’s pocket, he comes thisclose to just kicking the door in, but Karl’s not that far gone yet; he seems to sense Chris’s dramatic inclinations and pulls the keys out just in time, with a grunted, “Don’t even think about it.”
Chris supposes fleetingly, as he’s helping Karl lower himself to the couch, that it would be rather awkward to explain in the morning.
“I’m never letting you buy me food ever again,” Karl mutters, and Chris can’t help but find the stubborn naivete rather endearing.
Then Karl lets out a strongly pained gasp, that almost sounds like he’s choking, and panic fills up all the spaces in Chris’s brain again. His lips linger against Karl’s sweaty temple. He tries to think. He thinks of his mom, and what she would do. And then he moves.
---
He’s never understood the whole ‘wailing and gnashing of teeth’ thing. He’s seen pictures, videos, of people laid out over coffins, faces stretched and scrunched by grief, making noises unhuman and haunting, but he’s never really understood. And he’s known people that died. Grandparents. Family friends. But he didn’t feel anywhere near that level of emotion for them. Hasn’t for anything, really.
He fucking gets it now.
Watching Karl writhe and whimper, alternately curling into himself with pain and spreading out all his limbs as if he can reach relief if he just stretches far enough, is fucking killing Chris. His chest feels like it’s splitting in two as he sits in a chair beside the towel-covered bed, watching his proud, strong mate shiver in the stink of his own waste.
It’s like dying. Chris remembers only too clearly.
He knows, somewhere in the part of his brain that can manage rational thought, that it’s almost over. Karl’s body is nearly to the point where the wolf will take over and the change will be complete.
Then they just have to survive the night. And the reversal that morning will bring.
Chris’s heart hurts.
---
Then, suddenly in comparison with the torture of the last few hours, Karl lets out one final pained shout as convulsions curl him into the mattress.
When he lifts his head again, it’s that of a wolf.
Chris’s breath catches on a choked sob. He barely feels the snaps and crackles as he changes himself, ignoring the stretch of muscles as he leaps up onto the bed.
He approaches Karl cautiously, not sure if his presence will be welcome. Karl sniffs once, twice, then whimpers, and lays his head down between his paws, his still-large eyes on Chris.
Chris crawls forward, licks a comforting stripe along Karl’s jaw, and settles in for the night.
---
He doesn’t sleep.
Karl does, at least a little, in that way dogs have of being half-asleep half the time. But his body is too fucked up for real sleep. Which means Chris has little chance of finding any himself.
He considers getting up and changing the sheets, but as soon as he lifts his head, Karl curls into him with a sleepy whine and his heart fucking shatters all over again.
The hours claw at him.
---
When he can feel the moon beginning to wane, he starts counting breaths. In, out, Karl’s still alive. In, out.
In. Out.
---
The change back is quicker than Chris expected. Anomaly, he has to remind himself, as Karl goes from grunting to keening to full convulsions in under an hour.
Chris stays beside him in bed as long as physically possible. And feels it like a literal tear in his gut when he’s forced to move back to his chair beside the bed.
He folds his hands together, knuckles white, and waits.
---
Karl opening his eyes--human eyes--is the best thing Chris has seen all year. And when he focuses a bleary gaze on Chris, and exhales as if the sight brings him relief, Chris feels eighteen tons coming off his shoulders.
“Hey,” he whispers, his throat raw. “Welcome back.”
Karl licks his lips and reaches out a shaking hand, and Chris’s eyes burn. “Don’t try to move yet. You’re done. You’re done and you did awesome.”
Karl nods a little, then lets his hand fall, relaxing back into the pillow. He doesn’t close his eyes, though. His gaze is glassy, droopy, and Chris knows it’s the endorphins, and he’s thankful for them. Karl probably doesn’t remember much of anything at the moment, just the bare facts. Which would be enough to send most people a bit catatonic, anyways.
Chris murmurs inconsequential things as he removes the towels and changes the bedclothes, maneuvering Karl around when necessary. Karl’s watching him, he knows, and occasionally makes a noise in response, but they’re not bad noises, just heavy, tired ones, so Chris goes along his way, and when he gets the last corner of the clean sheet tucked, he makes a small triumphant noise.
He really, really needs to send a thank-you card to his mother. And flowers. And possibly a small island in the Bahamas.
---
He can tell Karl’s getting restless, getting ready to try to sit up, so he gathers the things he had on the nightstand and comes to scoot the chair closer to the bed. But before he can settle, Karl’s gripping his wrist, slack with exhaustion but still enough to make Chris’s brow furrow. Karl’s eyes are so, so big. And confused.
“Karl? Are you--” He stops himself before he says the ‘okay,’ because what a stupid fucking question. Karl’s not okay, and he won’t be for at least another couple days.
“Chris,” Karl says, his voice gravel, barely there. He swallows a couple of times, then tries again. “Chris, I--”
Chris hushes him. “There’s water-- Here, let me--” And Karl does, he lets Chris put the straw to his lips until he’s had a few mouthfulls. But he doesn’t let go of Chris’s hand.
“You knew,” he says instead, bewilderingly.
Chris’s brows draw together. “Of course I knew. I tried to tell you. I--”
“No.”
And Chris has no idea what’s going on until Karl drags his hand over and down. Until it’s resting lightly against Karl’s belly.
Chris feels the air knock clean out of his lungs.
“You knew,” Karl repeats.
“Oh, god,” Chris whispers. “How...did you--do you--” Oh, God.
Karl shrugs a little. “You know what it’s like. To be... in... the other form. You feel things. You feel your body in ways you never feel as a--” He stumbles over the words. “Human.”
His hold on Chris’s hand tightens. “And I could feel it. Inside me.” A muscle in his jaw tics. “Foreign.”
Chris wants to shrink back into himself, to run away from all of this. “I’m sorry,” he finally manages instead. “I’m so sorry, Karl. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen, I took every precaution I could, I--” His words evaporate, unhelped by the vague desperate gestures he’s making.
“Then how?” Karl’s voice is quiet. Calm. Too calm. Chris’s skin feels itchy.
“Zach thinks it’s fate,” he tries to joke. It fails. “But it’s something that happens amongst--us. Werewolves. Only certain... kinds, and not very often.”
“What kinds?”
“I don’t--” Chris can’t do this. He just can’t. “This isn’t the best time, you’re exhausted and--” He tries another tack. “And how are you not either freaking out or in incredible denial?”
Karl snorts, but is clearly not amused. “That’ll come round later. But for now, you should treat me like a grown-up, and get it over with.”
Chris sighs and rubs his cheek with his hand. They’re both fucking exhausted, and he does not feel like going over Werewolf 101. How do you tell the person you’re shit-crazy for that you’ve fucked up his life?
You just do, he can hear his mother saying. Man the fuck up, he can hear Zach saying.
He takes a deep breath and starts in.
“Since ancient times, as far back as we know, we’ve had three types -- They’ve gone by different names, or whatever, but for the past couple hundred years it’s been Omegas, the ones that can...” He can feel himself blushing. “...breed... Alphas, the ones that... do the breeding... And betas... which is everyone else. Alphas and omegas are about one in fifty.”
He can’t look bring himself to meet Karl’s eyes. Holy fuck does he want a cigarette. A shot of tequila. A morphine drip. Something.
“You’re... in about eight months you’re going to basically pass out--” From pain, he refrains from saying; it’s pretty much understood, right? “--for two days while your body makes itself a nice--” He makes a vague shape with his hands. “--exit route, sort of near your... liver.” He really needs to read up on that part, Jesus. “And then we’ll be... you know. Parents. Well. You’ll be a parent again. And this one will be pretty much the same as Hunter and Indy,” he for some reason feels the need to explain. “Not necessarily a were. Maybe, but probably not. Just... a baby. You know. Of... us.”
And that’s it, Chris is going to die of awkward.
Then he hears Karl laugh.
It starts out a chuckle, then it kind of expands, until Karl is clutching his sides and positively howling--ha--with it, so much it has got to hurt, and Chris’s eyebrows come together with both confusion and innate concern. “What?”
Karl just keeps laughing.
“What the fuck?”
Karl tries to stop, and manages to wheeze out some words. “Listen to yourself--I mean--”
Chris is slightly affronted.
Karl sees the look on his face and laughs some more, but reaches out a hand and pulls at Chris until he’s sitting with Karl curled around him. “It’s just--” Karl continues, wiping his eyes. “--what you’re saying, it’s so ridiculous, and yet I know it’s true because I just went through it--” He grins up at Chris. “But you have to admit it, it’s ridiculous. It sounds like one of the graphic novel movies I do that everyone hates.”
Chris cannot resist that grin. Or the truth of it, for that matter. “Yeah, fuck, all right, you’ve got a point.”
Then suddenly he’s laughing, too, and they’re clutching at each other, adrenaline-crash taking over, all other things forgotten.
You have to laugh at yourself, Chris thinks, drinking in Karl’s sounds, smell, presence. You’d cry your eyes out if you didn’t.
---
They sleep the rest of the morning, by necessity. Chris rolls over once at about eleven to text Zach and his mother, oh and his PA, he recalls at the last minute, then rolls back over and tucks himself back against Karl, purposefully not thinking of anything at all.
---
An hour later, he wakes up and the bed is empty.
He panics for a moment, then simultaneously hears the shower and remembers that he’s at Karl’s place. So Karl hasn’t left. Probably.
Twenty minutes later, there hasn’t been a change in the sound of the shower, and Chris’s curiosity--paranoia--gets the better of him.
He knocks on the bathroom door once. There’s no answer. Twice, and there’s an answer that time but it’s short and he can’t quite make it out. “Karl?” He tries the handle; it’s unlocked. “I’m coming in, okay--”
The room is chock full of steam, and Chris has to blink and make his way in to see what’s happening. When he does, his stomach tightens.
Karl’s sitting under the spray, his tall form folded up into itself. The water’s beating down on him, on his chest and knees, and he’s just letting it.
He doesn’t look at Chris. “I’m sorry, I’ll be out in a minute.”
Chris swallows. Only Karl would be polite in a situation like this. “No worries, man. It’s fine.”
Karl laughs, a barking laugh that contains no humor. “What part of this is fine in any way?”
“Karl...” And Chris can’t stand it, so he goes with his instinct and reaches into the shower, holding a hand out for Karl. “Come on. Let’s get you back to bed. Or maybe some food?”
Karl, though, does not take what he’s offering. Instead, he stands--grunting a little with what can only be pain, and Chris winces--shuts off the tap, and reaches past Chris for a towel.
“Jesus Christ, Chris, leave it.”
“I’m just--”
“Quit mother hen-ing me.”
Chris grits his jaw--he remembers what a prick he’d been after his first change, too--and reaches out for another towel, stepping towards Karl with it. “I’m just trying to help, you don’t have to be a douche about it--”
As soon as the towel Chris is holding touches Karl’s skin, he feels a hand shoot out and grab his wrist in a vice grip.
“Don’t.”
Chris sucks in a breath and stares at Karl. The fingers are so tight around Chris’s arm--Karl’s not resisting that part of his...evolution, apparently--that Chris feels his heart thud in his ears as the adrenaline starts up. Karl is so close, and wet, and strong, and--
And fucking pissed.
“Don’t you dare try and take care of me,” he says, his voice low and rough. “You’re no one’s nursemaid, and while I appreciate you sticking around last night, I don’t need anyone looking after me.”
“I’m just--”
“In fact, you should probably leave now.”
But his words are betrayed by his lack of motion: He doesn’t let go of Chris’s wrist. They stand there, staring at each other. Breathing hard.
And Chris is suddenly incredibly pissed as well. “Why are you being such an idiot?”
Karl scoffs. “Me? You’re the one--” He waves towards Chris, and the towel Chris is still holding. “The one that’s--”
Chris steps even closer. “I’m the one that’s doing the right thing, is what you mean.”
Apparently those are the wrong words, though. Karl’s eyes go even darker, and he yanks the towel out of Chris’s hand, then bends down the pick up his clothes. “Fuck you,” he growls at Chris once he straightens, his breath hot on Chris’s face. “I am not your obligation.” Then he’s through the door and moving down the hallway, shoving clothes onto his still-damp body as he goes.
Chris stand there, stunned, for a minute. Then he’s following Karl like a shot, catching him round the back and pinning his wrists together between them. Karl might have were strength, but he’s weak from the change, and Chris is, in a sense, far older.
And a shitload more desperate.
“Wait,” Chris says into Karl’s neck, voice low, rough, and steady, despite the fear curling in his gut. “Wait a God damned mother fucking minute.”
Karl growls and pushes against the hold.
“Fucking stubborn Kiwi bastard-- Don’t you see?” He lets his lips linger against Karl’s skin softly--wanting instead to bite down, to leave a mark, make a fucking claim--and wills his heart to stop racing. Wills his brain to work.
His instinct is telling him to take, seize, conquer -- but he’s fought against that instinct this whole relationship, and for damn good reasons. Karl deserves his fucking respect, deserves to be treated like an equal, deserves to have a choice.
Chris takes a deep breath, brushes one last kiss on Karl’s neck, and lets go.
Karl stills for a moment. Then his hands fall to his side, fists uncurling slowly. He doesn’t turn, but he doesn’t leave, either. “See what?”
Chris almost laughs, but it’s a sad sound. He doesn’t really know what to say first, what’s going to be the most convincing, important thing to say.
So he just starts talking.
“That it’s the right thing not because I feel some sort of shotgun against my temple, or because the fates conspired and wove the tapestry this way, or because biology dictates, or any other bullshit. It’s the right thing because it feels right, because it feels like exactly where I want to be, and it has since the beginning, and only has more as it’s gone along. Pardoning the construction of that sentence.” He twitches a little. He can feel the warmth from Karl, the tension bleeding into the room. “It’s simple, in a way. It’s just because I fucking love you, and am in love with you, and want nothing more than to continue on with my ridiculous life as long as you’re in it-- As long as you’re my--”
He falters. Karl hasn’t moved. The fear is getting more insidious, taking over his guts, and he doesn’t want to show any more cards. Doesn’t want to give any more away, just to have it rejected.
“What?”
Chris looks up at the sound of Karl’s voice, and finds he has turned to Chris, finds him startlingly near, his eyes dark and bright. “As long as I’m your what?”
Chris holds his gaze, somehow. He feels his face heat up. He’d pretty much rather do anything other than answer.
But for Karl, he’ll do any number of things he doesn’t want to do. Even walk out that door.
So. What the hell.
When the words come out, they’re rough, but there. “...my mate.” Then they just start pouring out of their own volition, clumsy and hot. “I know it’s a cheesy-ass term, but it’s not-- It’s just how we are, weres. Once we find somebody, we stick with them, build lives with them... And I’d never really gotten that, before, but then I met you, and I wanted it, for the first time in my fucking life.” He almost laughs at himself. “And I can’t force you into anything, wouldn’t want to, so we can do however much or little of that you’d like, but every fucking cell in my body screams that you’re mine-- that I’m yours-- that that baby is something we should be proud of and that we could have this fucking epic life together if only you’d--”
Karl’s lips stop the flow of words.
Chris grunts in surprise, instinctively reaching up to Karl’s shoulder with one hand and neck with the other, grounding himself as Karl kisses him until his brain is spinning and it’s all he can do to hold on. Karl’s mouth is gentle and warm and wet, and Chris is confused as shit.
“Not...” He licks his lips as the kiss ends. Their foreheads touch. “...that I’m complaining, but...”
Karl chuckles. His breath poofs against Chris’s lips. “But?”
Chris swallows, weighing his options. He could be a complete fucking nag and demand answers, or he could get laid. He’ll go with Door #2. “Nothing. Come here.”
---
Karl doesn’t just let it happen that easily, though. He takes Chris’s mouth over and over again, and Chris more than willingly reciprocates, but just when Karl’s hand has molded around Chris’s length through his boxers and Chris has recovered enough to return the favor, working his hand into Karl’s jeans, Karl starts punctuating the kisses with talking. Short sentences, but ones Chris will never forget.
“I fought it,” he says against Chris’s lips as he works Chris’s cock. “Even when I knew things were going to shit with Nat. All that shit I did, was because I knew. And I was fighting it.” He trails kisses down Chris’s neck. “I’ve never wanted anything so badly.”
He tightens his free arm around Chris’s back, until they’re flush together as can be, and speaks lowly, almost tentatively, into Chris’s ear. “I don’t want to fight it anymore.”
Chris, for the first time since he’d smelled this man of sunshine, feels the world right itself.
Their hands aren’t even really moving, anymore; they’re so tight against each other that the movement of hips and the friction of clothing is all they need, the heat and lust and sense of so fucking right doing the job for them. Chris feels Karl come, feels the grunt against his jaw and the hot wetness against his hand.
Tied up and twisted, and so in love it hurts, Chris places his mouth against Karl’s for one last desperate kiss, and lets go.
---
Afterwards, he snuffles against Karl’s neck. “That was rather anti-climactic.” He straightens and meets Karl’s eyes with a grin. “Pun intended. Sort of.”
“How so?”
“Well,” he says cheekily, “since we both came, it’s kind of ironi--”
Karl gives him a smacking kiss. “Smart ass.”
Chris does a little thrust. “You know it.”
Karl shakes his head. “Tell me what you mean.”
Chris sighs, and tries one of his gesticulations, but they’re so tangled up in each other it kind of fails. He forges on. “It’s just-- After all this, you know, conflict, one would expect...” He tries again. “It’s not a very good end for a story, is it?”
Karl’s smile is soft but genuine. “Feels more like a beginning to me.”
Chris can’t help but smile as well, but he tries to hide it by nuzzling at Karl’s jaw. “Dork.”
“Says the one who just put a story structure over our relationship.”
Chris takes a nip of sweaty skin, liking how Karl tips his head for better access.“You love it.”
“Yeah,” Karl says quietly, but firmly. “I do.”
Master Post
