maskormenacelogs | semi-open.

[ ooc ; continuation from october tdm. ]

I always liked the hunt, [she answers, a reasonably tactful way of half-agreeing, half-disagreeing. What he means is-- would vampires enjoy eating people so much if the people didn't struggle and cry and wish not to die?] But it's only sustenance, Louis. [And the people she'd chewed through in the decades that passed are alike to each other in her mind. Not quite interchangeable, but forgettable, night to night. There will always be another.]

And chocolate wouldn't taste better if it tried to run away, or told me it has children.

[Her smile is cheeky. More playful, more childish than she lets herself be when she looks like an actual child. She's only being a little terrible, but she then dips neatly into smoothing his ruffles after. After all, he's doing such a fine job tidying up her appearance.] Do you think you miss it? I will eat more candy for your sake, mon chéri.

[ He might prefer to think of the hunt that way, of only sustenance, if he hadn't made up his mind a long time ago to suffer through being unable to forget them. These are torments he'd shared more explicitly with Lestat, and had spared her most of agonising, save for how he wore it plainly.

So he allows his feathers to ruffle, and then become smooth, and thinks about her question. ]

Do I think I miss it, [ he repeats. ] I don't know. No. But I think I wasted it away.

[ She knows something of his life, before, but Lestat is the only one to have seen it. Louis is not so proud of his beginnings as to miss that human experience, but human experience itself. ]

Because I didn't know anything else. To become human after being a vampire is like reclaiming a lost youth.

Will you want to try it, if the opportunity arises?

[She tugs him absent-mindedly and without intent, toward the front of a store that sells paintings. All of them in the contemporary style. None of it to her taste, not really. But they're oil paintings, with textures built up with knives and brushes, coarse and choppy in some places then smooth and rutted deeply by fibers in others, and that's interesting to her, even as a human with taste that rusted out decades ago.] I've read about it on the networks. The exchanging of powers, or suppression of them.

[But she knows he'll like it. It'll say something different to his vampire eyes, taste irrespective. It'll be richer for him to look at. Maybe she'll come back later, four feet tall, curly and undead, and see for herself.

How flat and ordinary things look, when you are flat and ordinary!]

[ ooc ; continuation from december tdm. ]

[ Lestat's question takes Louis longer to answer than he should. He's wondered this before, back when the idea of Claudia was a figment, a ghost, but nevertheless present enough that he might be able to say something. He imagined himself on his knees, asking her forgiveness, asking her what she would have of him to make things right. Where understanding is simply the measure of his deep regret.

But it is harder to ask that of a vampire who has, for all intents and purposes, been rescued from the hideous death she experienced. Who is living her second chance. ]

Perhaps how we love her, [ he says, finally. ] Perhaps love would not feel so burdensome, then.

Burdensome, [ he repeats, in the exasperated tone of a weary parent; he tips his head back, sighing toward the ceiling.

It's a difficult thing to hear, made more difficult because he understands some of it — or thinks he does, at least. Resentment, unresolved, made worse by the fact that she still cares. Lestat adds it to the list of disquieting things he doesn't know how to address: the way he can't hate her, doesn't want to hate her, it's only that he can't trust her, and then again why should he deserve that if he hasn't been able to be honest with her yet?

Burdensome, yes, that's the right word after all.

He looks back toward Louis; seized suddenly with some nameless worry, Lestat seeks out his hand. ]

Help me, then. I know this needs a gentler touch than mine.

[ Louis permits his hand to be taken, fingers curling gently to grasp back. ]

I will, [ is a simple promise, easily given. A promise to help, not to solve. He wants to say more, like how he is afraid that Claudia will never absolve him, but even that thought circles back in on itself, shamefully.

He runs his thumb across Lestat's knuckles, and for once, sheds a little lightness on the conversation. ]

She said you take to the spotlight, here, [ he says. ] When we are so otherwise used to shadows and secrets. Is that true?

[ Lestat is immensely grateful for the distraction. Grateful, too, for the gentle brush of Louis' fingers against his, giving his heart a far more pleasant reason to tighten in his chest. He's easy like that. ]

Our daughter speaks the truth. [ A little grin, sharp and teasing. ] Not like back home, nothing that grand, don't you worry — but I haven't made any attempt to hide what I am.

[ Oh, right: ]

And now and then, I do still sing.

No attempt?

[ He's too genuinely curious for this to be a whiplash attempt back into heavier material. His first few moments in this world had been frightening, conjuring up his former paranoia about what might happen to them all in a world who understood what they were.

They gave him a dossier and sent him on his way.

So he is curious, and pondering, more philosophical than anxious about imminent danger or unwelcome as he posits; ]

You must embellish. Even this utopia shouldn't be able to abide by ones like us.

Well, what I do for dinner is personal—

[ He'd taken care of a burgeoning serial killer in Tampa recently, that had been fun. But then, he's sure that Louis doesn't want to hear him brag about the gory details. He never does, when they're fun.

And then, because he's thinking about feeding, and maybe because he hopes it will ruffle him, he draws Louis' hand near, kissing his knuckles. ]

But the rest of it is more or less an open book, so to speak. So far I haven't had to deal with any torch-wielding mobs; I'd say that's a good sign, wouldn't you?

[ Louis' mouth forms a line even as he allows the motion, and draws his hand back once it's done, as if in rebuke of mingling topics of dinner and death and danger with flirtation.

That this is a part of how they operate is innately something like flirtation is neither here nor there. ]

Then they are the liars. To themselves, if nothing else.

[ They have spoken to him of synthetic bloods, already. He's not had a chance to try it for himself, and there's no oversight at all for his feeding habits. It feels like a strange delusion, under which they all labour. ]

[ Lestat's hand hovers between them for a moment, hurt feelings plain on his face. Too quickly covered up with anger in the past, instead, the unhappy look in his grey eyes lingers this time. ]

Then let them lie. What does it matter if they choose to look the other way?

[ But the spell, such as it is, has been broken. It does matter, and he knows it, and he hates that Louis is right, and he hates that he had to say it to him, and he hates how pale and monstrous his hand suddenly appears to himself. Long nails curl against his palm; Lestat draws his hand to his chest, finally.

He's certain that Louis is stronger than him, in at least one way: Louis can bear to be alone. ]

I thought I would never see you again.

[ It's the last thing he wants to admit, and all he can think to say. ]

[ This flippancy seems to irritate him, as it always does, Louis letting his gaze wander away from that flicker of unhappiness in Lestat's expression, pensively considering the opulent decor. It matters, his manner seems to say.

Then that, with enough reluctance that it does not sound like a ploy to ease the conversation somewhere else. ]

I'm glad you're here, [ he offers, great feeling ever muted.

He hadn't had time to miss anyone, and he is rather certain that if he'd come here alone, he would not wish this place on any of those he loves, but what's done is done. ]

Not a night has passed that I haven't thought of you.

[ It's the truth, even if it sounds like flattery. Perhaps too honest, more sentimental than is wise after that rebuke — but the sight of Louis seated amongst his things like he belongs there destroys Lestat's resistance utterly. He can't help himself. ]

That's why I had to do it, [ he continues intently, circling back to the issue. ] Being alone in this place was bad enough! I couldn't stand the thought of going back into hiding on top of that.

[ And if he can look for some kind of understanding from throngs of mortal strangers, he should at least try to explain himself to Louis. ]

I don't begrudge you that, [ is kindly, and probably true, at least to some extent. ] I'm suspicious of this world, and that is all. A world that promises to us that we can exist as openly as we desire.

[ A smile, then, slight and sedate. ]

I don't intend to hide in the belfries, if you were wondering. Unless it appeals to your authorial sensibility.

[ He'll accept the conversational truce for the moment, conceding with his silence, if nothing else, that Louis's suspicions are reasonable enough. Lestat intends to continue ignoring them until they become an un-ignorable problem, of course, but that isn't part of the compromise.

And then: a nearly silent huff of a laugh, and he relaxes a bit toward Louis, draping an arm over the back of the couch. ]

You would do that just for my authorial sensibility? How unbearably kind of you... but it's hardly the most appealing scenario I can envision for us.

And what would that be?

[ It's an unnecessary question; Louis knows, all too well. This place is already indicative enough of how Lestat prefers to live even if he didn't.

Still, for the sake of indulgence-- ]

Is this all you, or did she have a hand in this?

[ A glance aside to indicate the room. ]

My canvas, with her touches here and there since she arrived.

[ Lestat considers mentioning his strange and inconvenient new power, or that the lavish decor is, in many places, only surface-level... ah, but it doesn't matter, really, as long as it all looks right. ]

If you don't like it, we can redecorate.

You'd let me redecorate?

[ That isn't in the tone of someone who really wants to redecorate so much as someone who is genuinely disbelieving. Louis' sense of taste is...

...modest, to say the least. ]

Non. Even when it was only Claudia and I, it was she who cared for such things. They did also give me my own quarters, you know, furnished with a coffin and sunlight cancelling curtains.

I said we, not you.

[ He loves you, Louis, but not that much. ]

I assumed they would have given you somewhere to stay, but surely you don't intend on living there, all alone, slowly becoming a recluse, with no one to look after you...

[ —says Lestat, dismissively, as he pretends that he isn't intensely worried about (almost) exactly that. ]

Ahh.

[ Yes, that must be it. But then, Louis cannot completely mount a protest, save that there is nothing wrong with being a recluse, except when Lestat does it. ]

Perhaps you should tell me more of your life here, before I consider joining it properly.

... I see.

[ And Lestat smiles, his voice dropping into his most beguiling purr. ]

You're hoping I'll entice you.

You entice me, Lestat.

[ A little blunt, even in flattery, no charm in it except the kind that is purely accident. Lestat is enticing, hardly doing anything at all. Sometimes even more so, when doing hardly anything at all. ]

But I wish to know.

[ The bluntness of it is more disarming than anything else might have been, and Lestat is left blinking in surprise as the honest compliment slides between his ribs and settles down warm in his chest. ]

All right, [ he says, recovering less smoothly than he would prefer. ] I arrived at the beginning of September, so I don't know if I would call it a life yet, but what it is is yours to know.

[ Maybe there's a glimmer of satisfaction to be had from Lestat being disarmed, even if it wasn't his aim. His eyes hood, as he considers: what does he want to know? Where to start? ]

You arrived in September, [ he says, situating focus there ] and what did you do, finding yourself in this place?

[ Always at the beginning. ]

[ It's as good a place as any to start, and Lestat is, as always, perfectly happy to talk about himself. His grin widens as he draws closer, his voice low and confessional and teasing: ]

Well, the staff in the Porter room referred to it as "making a scene."

[ As usual. ]

[ There's a soft sound at that, and for once, it's not disapproval. Empathetic, perhaps. ]

An inauspicious beginning.

Well, it was an undignified way to arrive.

[ But thank you, Louis. He'll bask in the possibility of empathy. ]

But you'll be pleased to know I behaved myself, which is to say that there were no casualties, [ he adds, as though it doesn't matter in the least, despite his deliberate decision to point it out. ]

[ A tolerant blink for the flippancy, now settled more comfortably into his corner of the furniture. He very ever rarely seems well fed, but he's taken care to see to himself before coming here -- perhaps, if only, so that Lestat isn't moved to point it out.

Staying here, and talking, is just fine. ]

And how was your mercy repaid?

Not as well as I deserved.

[ Oh, but he doesn't like the way that feels almost inappropriate to joke about. Is that something like guilt? He hates it. ]

It's strange how systematic it all was, don't you think? Even I got swept up in the bureaucracy of it! I hardly had any time to complain before I was handed my documents and sent on my way. [ Lestat still sounds a little indignant, recounting it. ] Well, you aren't alone in your suspicion, Louis, I can tell you that much — I was sure they'd made a terrible error before I looked over the paperwork and saw that they knew exactly who I was.

We aren't the first of our kind to come through their gates.

[ Louis' nails idle against the coverings of the couch. ]

They've even taken pains to see to our appetites.

Ah, of course.

[ A smile spreads across his face, knowing, teasing. Fond. His eyes flick to Louis' long, elegant fingers on the rich upholstery for a moment, and he moves his hand nearer, resting on the sofa's back. An offer, or Lestat badly resisting temptation. ]

I thought of you the second I heard of it.

[ He doesn't move; neither accepting any imagined offer nor pulling away. Louis' smile is familiar also, in that it is subtle and strangely melancholy. ]

And disliked it immediately.

I liked the idea that it might please you, [ he says, which is true and (he thinks, he hopes) also diplomatic. How carefully can he navigate this? Tact, after all, is not one of his virtues. ] I'll admit, it's a marvel, if a horribly unappetizing one.

[ If Louis squints, he can see the effort going into Lestat's answer. It would be rude not to appreciate it, and he wonders if he truly does yearn for a companion who shared in every sentiment and moral dilemma as he did, and does. ]

It is to the hunt what microwave dinners are to shooting wild deer, [ he says, as if inching himself somewhere halfway. ] But most humans don't wield muskets anymore either. Perhaps we should move with the times.

[ --assured in the knowledge that Lestat will do no such thing. Perhaps he's teasing. ]

[ It's true: hardly a night passes that Lestat doesn't give at least a fleeting thought to what it would be like to have a companion who mirrors him in all the ways that his fledgling doesn't. But what he wants more than that — more than anything, really — is Louis. And there's the trouble.

But it doesn't feel like trouble right now, he's too relieved for that, and maybe it's partly that relief that has him laughing out loud at Louis' impossible suggestion. ]

Are you accusing me of being outdated?

[ Teasing right back, then. ]

[ A smile, from Louis, thin and gentle. His attention ticks from Lestat's face to implicate their luxurious surroundings. ]

They favoured minimalism by the turn of the century, [ he says, languid, aloof. ] You should have seen the way the artists changed galleries. From every detail painted true to life in gilded frames, to abstract form, finding the construction and physics of their subjects in brush stroke and empty space. Pollock's messes and Mondrian's squares. They tore down everything we thought beautiful and then put what was left in glass cases and in brochures.

But I imagine that synthetic blood in microwaveable bags would be considered postmodern. Genre savvy. It is a gesture that invites us into their world, to live within its parameters. Pastiche and parody.

[ It's almost embarrassing, Lestat thinks, how utterly charmed he is. He feels a little like he suspects one of Louis' mortal victims must feel, captivated as if against his will, and as Louis gazes elsewhere, Lestat sees only him.

He does think about kissing him to shut him up, but that goes without saying. ]

I hadn't thought of it that way, [ he concedes at last, his tongue coming to rest against the point of one fang as he turns the idea over in his head. It doesn't wholly lack appeal, viewed in a certain light. ]

I'd been considering it in terms of pure function alone. The lack of sensation, a bit of ethical eye rolling, but not the artistic angle.

Mm. The modern vampire.

[ He will try it. He owes it to himself to attempt such an existence, and while it is far too late for his own immortal soul, perhaps he can spare other souls. It would, of course, be an easier thing if he weren't the only one. ]

I am sure the ones who produced such a product haven't either.

It's a good thing you're here, then, to pontificate on these things at length.

[ A small joke that isn't really a joke at all. ]

I suppose it might not be so bad to try it, once. Just to see, I mean, just to say that I've done it...

[ He leans in conspiratorially; it brings him conveniently closer to Louis, which is exactly what he'd wanted all along anyway. Low and playful, expecting nothing out of it except his own amusement, he adds: ]

I'll let you try to convince me.

[ Louis is still, and his gaze darts downwards, close as a grown adult monster can come to demure without intending it. More aware of Lestat's nearness than he'd prefer to let on, he thinks on this proposition, such as it is, for a moment.

This probably isn't rewarding good behaviour, really, but it's as close as he is bound to get. Rough wool slides on satiny upholstery as he closes the rest of the distance and kisses Lestat's mouth. ]

[ The kiss is a little startling, in the way that truly good things often are. Lestat's heart trips into a staccato rhythm as he loses himself to it, and rather than pulling Louis closer in the possessive snare he'd anticipated from himself, he lifts a hand to the side of that pale throat, some unconscious part of him seeking out a matching pulse beneath his fingertips. He isn't used to it yet, never wants to get used to it; he could surely live another two centuries exactly like this. ]

[ Snare is certainly an evocative description of what Louis, in turn, expects of Lestat as well; as if love and attraction is a trap, cold grasps and warmth mouths. When it doesn't come is when Louis can recognise his own anticipation, wary and bracing, and so he puts his hand over Lestat's hand and presses it there firmer.

By the time the kiss has loosened and gentled, he has almost forgotten as to why he initiated it. ]

[ Lestat, on the other hand, remembers perfectly well and doesn't care; he has what he wants, and to hell with the rest. It'll come up again without his help, knowing them. For now he loses himself to it, the heavy steady thud of Louis' pulse, the insistent press of his cool hand, and finally Lestat's arm slides around his shoulders to keep him...

Well, it takes a moment for Lestat to collect himself, after they part. The hush seems tangible, almost fragile... until finally, he brushes his nose back along the curve of Louis' cheekbone. And there it is — a grin. ]

Welcome home, Louis, [ he says, in a low teasing lilt, the kind that says 'I have your measure.' How foolishly, thrillingly sentimental. ]

[ It's difficult to deny the slightly uncomfortable truth of that, more enamored at the feeling of a toothy smile, the way Lestat's voice takes on a richer register when pleased. Louis is more aware of his own heart beat against Lestat's hand, poised but not tense within the bracket of the other vampire's hold. ]

Then you agree, [ he says, not quite as smoothly -- a little like he had to pause and rifle around in the back of his mind for a response, and remember what pushed him closer.

Shamefully, it's not truly an ultimatum, that to live together they must live in this specific way. His tone treads lightly, and his fingertips idle with a fold of fabric at Lestat's shoulder, and tries not to quest his senses out enough to pick up on his maker's own heart beat. ]

[ Lestat hears what he thinks is implied encouragement in Louis' slight distracted pause, or at the very least, permission. It's a game in its own way, teasing Louis' own desires out from beneath layers of mannerly restraint. Their heartbeats are just out of step, Lestat's as always more shamelessly eager, and it's impossible to keep himself from yearning for the blood he can feel coursing just beneath Louis' skin. ]

To try it once, [ he repeats, acquiescent. It seems a perfectly equitable trade, for that much convincing. Lestat delicately traces the underside of his companion's jawline with the edge of one glassy nail, and follows it with a brush of lips, scarcely more than the suggestion of a kiss, seeking out that anticipation again. ]

But it seems I'm in an agreeable mood tonight. I bet you could push your luck.

[ Louis' eyes slide close as the feather-light brush of Lestat's mouth. Behind lips lie sharp fangs, impossible to forget, and it's almost a shame for him personally that he is so well practiced at prudent denial. He can't remember the last time he tipped his head aside for Lestat's bite, but the low urge to do so has been more present of late.

Not tonight. Maybe not ever again.

Rather than think of Lestat's mouth drifting towards his neck, he pulls back to brush a kiss with his own. ]

It is not a game, [ he chides. It's not very convincing, when these words are murmured scarcely a fraction of an inch away. ]

[ Not convincing at all. Lestat resists the urge to pluck at Louis' rebuttal like it's a loose thread, a task admittedly made easier by the achingly sweet brush of his lips. All right, so he can be good, or at least sort of good... ]

Not even if I let you win?

[ Fingertips tarry on the knot of Louis' tie. It's an admission, or as close as he's going to get to one, that he doesn't really want to bicker about it seriously. Later, almost certainly, but not now. ]

semi-open.

heropa. closed to claudia.

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heropa. closed to lestat.

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