maskormenacelogs | I Learn to Cry For Someone Else

Entry tags:

† maxwell trevelyan | inquisitor

I Learn to Cry For Someone Else

WHO: Dorian Pavus and Maxwell Trevelyan
WHERE: Maxwell's new place
WHEN: Late March 15th, early March 16th, after Lucifer's show
WHAT: They're Going To TALK. No. Really.
WARNINGS: Lots of feelings? Adjusted as needed.

The situation with Maxwell was hardly ideal. It was frustratingly as far from ideal as Dorian could realistically imagine. But at the same time he hadn't been sure what to do about it. Should he give Maxwell space, make a move? He'd been caught and unsure and so he had done the easiest thing: drink and nothing.

But that had been before that damned concert, and so that was how he'd ended up going back to Nonah the same night as the concert, full of a buzzing need to actually do something about this whole damned thing. He wasn't even sure how late it was, not so much that the sun was coming up, but later than he normally would have been out. Part of him wanted to wait while another, louder part, reminded him that waiting was what had gotten him here in the first place.

And so he knocked on Maxwell's door at what could only be termed an obscene hour, shivering a bit since it was a good bit colder in North Carolina than it was in Miami and while he'd been wearing a suit (now mussed and wrinkled, his tie pulled loose) he hadn't thought to grab a jacket between the concert and the Porter.

But that wasn't going to deter him, and he reassured himself that it was sure to be warm inside Max's apartment. They needed to have this talk, and as scared as he was that this might end badly, at least they could have it all out and stop just... circling like this.

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There was a soft light on, golden at the windows, at the edge of the door. There was music - a far cry from the sort Dorian had just left - gentle and low, muffled. And it was only a few moments before there were footsteps.

Clearly, Maxwell hadn't been kidding about Dorian visiting whatever time he pleased.

Despite his fatigue, and an honest attempt at sleep, Maxwell was awake. He opened the door, dressed casually and comfortably in a simple grey t-shirt and dark jeans that were, currently, splattered with flecks of paint in a speckled rainbow.

"Dorian."

Also clearly, despite having meant it, he hadn't actually been expecting the man.

He blinked in surprise and unconsciously stood straighter, instinct and breeding blending together.

"I thought you were--" His brow furrowed, a thought hitting him as he took in the man's determined face. "Is everything alright? Are you okay?"

He'd had a good three and a half hours to try and figure out precisely what he was going to say,and Dorian even had a rather good idea of what he wanted to say to Max. And all of it promptly flew out of his head when Max opened the door. He hadn't even been sure he would answer when he saw what time it was. He certainly wouldn't have blamed him if he'd just ignored him, or told him to go away.

He straightened up a bit too, just in response, and he smiled as he realized that him showing up in the middle of the night looking like what for him was quite a frightful mess, might be a bit alarming.

"No, no I'm fine. I'm sorry Maxwell..." he almost excused himself, but no damn it, he was no coward, and he wasn't just going to apologize and leave. "You did tell me that I could show up no matter the hour." He pulled his jacket straight, and the tie too, trying to resettle himself. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything, I was hoping to talk to you. If you're not busy." He really should have changed clothes, or straightened his out some more before knocking, but that urgency had been pushing him on, and it still was not being denied.

His eyes were moving over Dorian, looking for injuries, everything else falling to the side in the face of his concern, but then Dorian stopped him up short.

"Oh." He studied Dorian's face a moment, recalling that he'd mentioned wanting to talk when they'd spoken earlier. What could be to drive Dorian to his door at this hour? Something twisted in his gut. "Oh, of course."

Stepping back, he gestured for Dorian to step inside.

The apartment was sparse in the way of things, with barely any furniture outside of his bedroom. But it was neat and warm, and there were touches of Maxwell throughout: a tea kettle sitting on the stove, the tea box left out nearby; a small stack of books on the counter; and there, by the largest of his windows, a series of paint cans open and waiting on a stretched tarp, explaining the dried flecks on his clothes and hands. The window itself was mid-project, painter's tape blocking out the edges of the window so it looked stained glass, a watery moonlight shining through the thin paint.

Maxwell closed the door behind them, and paused uncertainly, both concerned and, now that Dorian was actually there, a little self-conscious. He pulled a small cloth from his backpocket and rubbed at his hands.

"You mentioned earlier, but I didn't realize... I'm sorry. What would you like to discuss?"

It's quite bare, which is understandable since Maxwell has been there less than a month and has only just gotten back. So he's more than willing to forgive the lack of much furniture. But the influence of the music is fading now that he's here, and he's second guessing just how much of a good idea this really was. But no, he'd already come all this way, and leaving now would actually be worse. Or so he tells himself.

"No, it's quite alright. I'm sorry for showing up like this." Late, disheveled, without having called or given even the slightest amount of courtesy warning. What in the void was he even thinking? He was here though, so better to just... actually talk to Maxwell.

"I just... wanted to tell you that I know. That... my self from your world, that you were together. And that they left you, though for what reason I'm not sure." Poe hadn't known either, so he had never been able to find out. "And I suppose that's why you've been so hesitant to so much as talk to me, or why you completely shut everything down when you let yourself flirt back, and I've been trying to give you space to figure things out, to decide whether you wanted to try something with me when another version of me had already broken your heart." He licked his lips, knowing he looked nervous, and he was.

"But I'm tired of waiting for you to make up your mind, Maxwell. And I'm not even sure that's what you were doing. I want to either have a chance at something with you, or I want to know for sure that you want to keep me at arm's length. Which I'll be quite honest I don't think would do you any good, but you are an adult and that's your own decision to make." He wished he had somewhere to sit, now he was just stuck to pacing.

"I don't want to pressure you, Maker knows feel free to tell me to get out." Even as he said it he sent a silent prayer to an absent god that Maxwell wouldn't tell him to do that. "But I did want to actually get it out in the open." He paused then, having run for the most part out of words, hopeful and beyond nervous now that he'd actually said it. He wasn't even sure he felt better yet, just nervous and sick to his stomach.

"It's alright, Dorian, I offered. I'm not in the habit of doing that if I don't--" He started, but came up short as Dorian went on and truth came rushing free.

He stilled, his breath catching, and slowly his mouth closed, Adam's apple lurching as he swallowed. His eyes closed, head ducking slightly - guilt and regret and hurt balling together in his chest - as he struggled to come up with any sort of response to the last thing he expected to say.

"...No," he said finally. His head lifted again, drawing a deep breath as his eyes found Dorian, only steps away - yet somehow miles away. Universes. "You don't have to go. I-- I didn't want to hurt you, that's why I didn't tell you everything. I thought it would be too much. A burden, to have to carry my feelings as well as your own in all this." He paused, a breath shuddering free from him. "But apparently I have anyway. For that, I am truly sorry. That wasn't my intention."

"Hurt me?" Dorian sighed, shaking his head "I appreciate the thought, but you don't have to worry about that." He wondered how much of that was the truth and how much of it was Maxwell wanting to protect himself and telling himself that he was really protecting Dorian. It was probably a combination of the two.

"I should have told you sooner that I knew. I can understand if it's painful for you, seeing his face but having it be effectively a different person. But I would like to at least have a chance with you." And damn it all, he kind of wanted to know if Maxwell was even going to give him that chance or if he was just going to leave him in limbo.

"If it's painful?" Maxwell echoed, his eyebrows twitching, a quick flash of incredulity crossing his face. "If it's painful to be around you and see again all the things, all the reasons, I loved him here in front of me-"

He turned, pacing away few steps, the words slightly easier without Dorian looking at him.

"I knew, almost from the start, how easy it would be for me to fall over again."

"So what would you have me do?" Dorian stayed where he was, feeling restless and trapped.

"What do you want, Maxwell? Would you have me stay away, make polite excuses when you say I may come over whenever I like? Or am I to come over and pretend that I don't find you interesting and charming and bite my own tongue off when the urge to flirt with you presents itself so as not to remind you further of a man who left you for some Maker be damned unfathomable reason? Or do we... actually try this, with both of us knowing what happened. Because I would prefer some sort of choice be made instead of this damned circling in the void that has been happening for the last month." He sagged a bit, maybe it had been a mistake to tell him, but it had felt like a bigger mistake just to let it lie and not say anything to him about it either.

Maxwell said nothing for moment. Then, finally, he turned back.

"He left because of what we found in the Temple of Mythal. You said you hadn't gotten there yet, that your Inquisitor was still making the push, but we got there. And we found elves. Elves so ancient they recalled the fall of Arlathan, and how it really happened." He took a step closer, voice softening as he shared the truth, his pain, fully for the first time since it had happened. "It wasn't Tevinter, Dorian. It was the elves themselves, fighting among themselves. By the time your people got there, they were already dying."

He took a breath, deep and steadying.

"That's why he left. After we learned the truth, he came to me and told me he was leaving. He was going to take what we'd learned back to Tevinter and try to convince them of it, try to make them see they could be more than their perceived past and even when I all but begged to go with him--" He shook his head, shoulders falling. "His decision was made. A brave and noble goal. And one I had no place in. Maybe had no right to hope for one."

Edited 2018-03-18 21:15 (UTC)

It sounded like something he would do. It sounded just like the high-minded, noble, completely idiotic sort of thing he would do. "Of course he couldn't let you abandon the Inquisition just for his sake." He was quiet when he said it. "Maker forbid he allow himself to be happy."

His brow furrowed though at Maxwell's words. "Why do you really think he left? Because he had something better waiting for him?" Dorian knew precisely what was waiting for him, loneliness and politics. Excellent wine, yes. Evidently good work. But he rather wanted to get ported over to Maxwell's Thedas so he could knock some sense into himself and damn whatever sort of time travel parallel universe contradictions might arise.

Maxwell pushed out a breath, less a snort than a short sigh. A sad sort of amusement.

"That's very nearly what he said," he replied softly. "The Inquisition needed me..." another short breath, his head tipping. "It needed him - you - too. As did I."

He folded his arms over his chest, trying to consider Dorian's question honestly. From the back of his mind, his conversation with Odin came swimming back - how Odin had said he'd thought Maxwell had looked too much into it. That he'd thought the worst because that's what he expected, not because it was necessarily true.

"I've asked myself that a lot. 'Was it me? Did I not do or say something, or was it maybe too much? Maybe because I'm not a mage, or that I'm not from Tevinter?' But maybe it wasn't me at all. Maybe he'd just realized what I already knew - how amazing, and good a person he was."

Dorian shook his head. He dearly wanted to shake some sense into himself, as improbably unlikely to happen as that was. "As flattered as I am that you think your particular version of me is so wonderful, I highly doubt that would make him want to leave you. If being a mage or not being from Tevinter was a factor I doubt it would have gone past the flirtation for novelty stage. Not that I can say what precisely made him think it would be a good idea to leave..." He sighed "Other than a genuine belief that what he had to do back home was more important than his own happiness."

It wasn't as if Dorian had ever expected that he would find love or anything of the sort. You learned better than to think you were going to get that, that someone like you deserved it. It wasn't as if most of the members of the nobility fell in love, someone like him? Even less likely.

Silence fell along with Maxwell's head. His eyes closed and he took a deep breath. It was as close to answer he was likely to ever get, and it was at once what he'd wanted to hear - Dorian could have been happy, wanted him - and at the same time devastating to think he wouldn't be, despite going to fulfill his dream.

"...Just the pair," he said finally, slightly strained, his throat tight. "Aren't we?"

"Quite." Dorian's smile was wry, he both hated that this was so obviously painful for Maxwell, and was simultaneously relieved that at least it was actually out in the open. At least there was a chance to move forward now, or so he hoped.

"I don't expect an answer or decision right this moment, but my question still stands. What do you want from me, Maxwell? I'm not him, for all that we share any number of similarities. I'm not in love with you, and Maker knows I'm not selfish enough to insist you hurt yourself to give me a chance." He thought he could be, and it wasn't as if he was in the habit of showing up at the home of people he didn't like in the middle of the night. There was something there, but he was hesitant to call it more than it was.

It was so different, and yet so much the same, Maxwell struck by it. They'd had - he and his Dorian - almost this same conversation, hadn't they? That first night together, in his quarters.

All on me then?

Should it be all on me?

"The offer of time is generous," he replied carefully. "But I'm still not sure it'd be fair even with all the time in the world. It isn't just about me, and what I want, nor should it be. Especially given the circumstances." His arms dropped and he looked at Dorian plainly.
It was just as frightening now, as it had been then to ask, "What are you hoping comes from this, Dorian?"

Edited 2018-03-19 04:44 (UTC)

"What, other than to fall madly in love and live happily ever after like some terrible sappy romance novel?" The tone is flippant, he knows better. There's a pause as Dorian sighs and thinks it over. What exactly does he want? Or... perhaps he should say what does he realistically want? The small part of him that had never stopped pining and day dreaming rather wanted what this other self had thrown away. But he also knew that wasn't fair to Maxwell, to just ask to slip into a role that wasn't really his. So realistic it was.

"I want a chance. For this to be something other than you remembering another me. I quite like you, and I can certainly see why, in another time and place, I might have been exceedingly fond of you." Had this other him ever said Love? He doesn't know, can't know, he can tell that Maxwell loved his Dorian, and he thinks that he could have, but how different was Maxwell's Dorian?

"But, I also don't want to hurt you. If this, if old memories turn out to be too painful... I don't want that. Despite prevailing wisdom back in Skyhold, I am not that selfish." He took a deep breath. "But perhaps I'm hoping that new memories will make the old ones less difficult."

"...You'd likely be better going to Varric for that," Maxwell said lowly. A silly, lame joke because he didn't trust himself to say anything else at first.

He didn't know how much Dorian wanted, couldn't know, but he surely recognized it in himself.

"No, you're not..." And he couldn't be either. "...I can't promise I won't ever slip, that it won't ever be hard, but you're right. You deserve to be you - outside of his shadow. And maybe--" A pause, his breath catching until he forced his shoulders to relax, "--I do too."

Maybe he could let go. Maybe he could move on. Maybe it really wasn't all that he deserved. Maybe.

Slowly, he lifted a hand, reaching half-way across the distance between them.

"...Hello, I'm Maxwell."

A fresh start.

"Dorian Pavus, a pleasure to meet you, Maxwell." Dorian smiled as he took the hand, feeling relief. He hadn't messed everything up, had perhaps done something right.

He chuckled, letting go of Maxwell's hand after a moment "I am still sorry about showing up here in the middle of the night, but at least I didn't wake you." Sleep was a wonderful thing, and he would have actually felt quite bad if he'd woken him. Of course, he was unaware of just how much trouble Max was having with sleep, and thought that perhaps he was the artistic sort that got lost in his work or somesuch.

He gave the hand Dorian released a small wave, his smile easy and handsome.

"I'm used to it. And I said anytime. I try to mean the things I say." He gestured again, at the small kitchen nook behind Dorian, and stepped that way. "Though I understand if you'd like to go now, get some rest... unless you'd like a drink?"

In the kitchen he paused, waiting for direction.

"I have tea, wine, brandy...."

It was a very handsome smile, perhaps a bit sad around the eyes, but that was to be expected and it was a very easy one to smile back to. "Yes well, I'll at least next time do you the courtesy of calling, I'm just not quite used to the idea that I can yet."

He thought about it for a moment and then nodded. "If you aren't too eager to go back to your piece, I would like a glass or two. Ah, where is your bathroom? I'd like to freshen up a bit if you don't mind." He was, now that the adrenaline had fully worn off, keenly aware that he was not at his best right now. Even if this wasn't first impressions, even if this was 4 o' clock in the morning, he wanted to make a good impression, damn it.

"It'll still be there later," he replied mildly, untroubled to be pulled away from the unfinished work.

He pointed, "The door on the right," and turned to a cupboard to fetch a pair of glasses, only to glance at Dorian's back and add, "Ah, sorry for the mess. Mind the dropcloth."

He hadn't had a chance to pick it up, pulled as he'd been mid-work, and so it, along with the open paint cans, remained on the floor in front of the in-progress, mosaic transformation of his window.

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I Learn to Cry For Someone Else

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