loki laufeyson (toberuled) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2012-08-09 23:38:00 |
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Entry tags: | arthur, loki |
Who: Louis and Arthur
What: Louis and Arthur discuss Evan's treatment plan, IE, locking Evan in his apartment until further notice.
Where: Evan's apartment
When: After leaving Passages.
Warnings/Rating: None!
By the time Evan was packed off to bed in his highrise apartment, Cory and Arthur had come to a kind of symbiotic accord. Arthur was forbidden to shoot anyone unless it was life or death, and even then he was expected to try to maim rather than murder anybody, something he should be perfectly able to do with his skill. Cory would be informed of any decision concerning Evan, even if Arthur had to “wake” him to do it. In return, Arthur had full use of Cory’s body on this side of the door, as long as he didn’t do any naked admiring or anything vaguely sex-related. Ever. (As if Arthur would be interested in doing anything as Cory, anyway. It would be like visiting Paris in a parka.) United in their mutual need to turn Evan into a fully functional human being, the two did a mental shake of hands and decided to pool their respective skills and knowledge. For Arthur, that was being in control, and for Cory, that was dealing with a drunk.
Neither had a clue what to do with Louis, though. After Evan was in bed and Arthur checked the windows, the latter chose a kitchen chair and sat rather gingerly. Cory was observing the change in the apartment since he had last been there and mulling it over while Arthur watched Louis. The result was a slow roving gaze that always ended with a cool glance in the man’s direction.
Louis was in the kitchen, making coffee to be doing something. Anything. Right now it was a waiting game. Who knew how Evan would be when he woke up, or how hard this was going to be without Eames’ help. Louis only knew that he was tired and afraid. Eames notwithstanding, he’d barely been walking. Evan needed to see a doctor. Louis had already considered rehab, but there was no guarantee it would help, or that he wouldn’t just walk out the doors and vanish. He would call someone in a few hours, someone willing to make house calls and give an honest assessment of Evan’s health or lack thereof. Drying him out the wrong way might hurt him, or kill him, and that wasn’t going to happen. How he was going to do it, to get him through it and keep him on the straight and narrow, that was the real question. He’d already confronted the fact that it would probably make Evan hate him, depending on how cruel to him it was necessary to be to keep him from dying, but he thought he could make that trade, Evan’s life for his love, though it made his heart drop into his stomach. He was still angry, and afraid, and anxious, and trying not to think about the things he’d seen. Because he needed to be here, to be present and able to help.
What he did not need was Arthur, the last person in the world he wanted to talk to right now, but somehow he was going to have to find it in himself to be civil. At least he was offering to help keep an eye on him, unlike Eames, but it was a bitter pill to swallow. Louis glanced his way, caught him looking, and looked back, perhaps a little more sharply than necessary, before pressing down his reflexive reaction to finding himself watched. “Coffee?”
Cory was uncomfortable, but it would take a lot more than a stray look to bother Arthur. He’d just rode through a cab in Vegas wearing a windbreaker and an illegal gun, and the faint, natural sheen of sweat on his forehead was totally gone. He looked cool, but a very patient kind of cool, like a touch would not give like flesh but resist like stone. It was an illusion, though, a very cultivated illusion, and it had its cracks, especially when he spoke. There was enough of the brash youth and the ill-advised earnestness spilling through, the characteristics that Cory wore on his sleeve. “Yeah. Thanks.” And he actually meant it, too. Arthur continued to be impressed that, to all appearances, Louis was still in control, and the longer that situation remained, the more impressed Arthur was. Cory was less forgiving, but Cory wasn’t in enough control to emote physically.
Louis poured out two mugs of coffee, and reached into the refrigerator for the cream.”I’m going to call a doctor this afternoon,” he said. He might as well make his intentions known, if they were both going to be forced to dance around each other until Evan woke up. Every move was careful, focused. One foot in front of the other, one action after the next. That was all he needed to do.
The cream was nearly spoiled, but had another day still before the sell by, so he brought it to the table along with the mug, setting both down within Arthur’s reach. He went back for the sugar, and excuse to turn away again, really, to keep his eyes moving. “We’ll see if he needs to be hospitalized, or if it would be possible to hire someone to monitor him here while he dries out.” He set the sugar on the table without touching it himself, picking up the cream instead. He still stood at the edge, not sitting down, not yet. He glanced into the hall to be sure Evan’s door was still closed. “Rehab would only be a chance for him to flee, and it would remove him from the city, which I’m sure wouldn’t be amenable to you.” Somehow, he managed to keep the bitterness out of his voice. Whatever his feelings, it was a fact, and whether Arthur cared a whit for Evan, he did seem to want Eames around. And yet, still, he didn’t meet his eyes - not once.
Arthur was really more of an espresso guy, too much time in Paris to really appreciate horrific American drip coffee, but since it was dark and fresh, he poured in some cream and spooned in some sugar. He didn’t sniff the cream in an obvious trust that the supplies would be in as good a shape as any restaurant, indicative of the fact that he simply didn’t visit people who kept spoiled cream in their refrigerators. Stirring, he nodded. “A doctor is a great idea. Get him or her in here, and then we can decide if we need a nurse or if Cory and I can manage it.” He looked up, as if remembering, and added, generously, “And you.” Arthur didn’t do anything by mistake, and the omission had been absolutely intentional, designed to draw Louis out past the bitter stings of passive aggressive commentary. Even though Louis didn’t want to look at him, Arthur was looking at him, almost expectantly.
Louis did look at him then, when Arthur offered to manage it between him and Cory, and he did not disguise his alarm and anger at potentially being shut out well. He recovered as quickly as possible under the circumstances, sitting down perhaps a little heavily in the chair across the table from Arthur. "Yes," he said, trying to collect his thoughts. "Well." He stirred his coffee. "More help would be good. At the very least, I wouldn't want him to leave the apartment because I couldn't physically restrain him on my own." He was frail enough that it wasn't likely he wouldn't be able to handle Evan on his own, but it sounded like a good reason for Arthur to be there, anyway. And it would be easier, not being there on his own with him. He was trying, he really was, to just be normal. It shouldn't hurt this much, none of it. He needed to do what was best for Evan, and it was better for him to have more people around who cared about him, not less. He glanced up, found Arthur still looking at him, and looked down again.
Louis tapped his spoon on the edge of his mug and set it aside on a napkin with the deliberation of someone raised in a pin neat house. "Is Eames usually so..." 'Cruel' stuck in his throat. "Blunt?" 'Unkind' was more the word he was looking for, but Arthur wouldn't like that much. And he knew the answer to the question. It wasn't as if he hadn't spoken to Eames before. But Eames had been kinder to him in the past, even when Louis had been vindictive and rude, reactionary and angry. Really, it was just a chance to divert the subject. He wanted to be the consummate adult, to approach this situation with open honesty and an ease with the truth, but he couldn't. He was in no state to. He was just holding himself together anyway, just.
Arthur was pleased that Louis was in the right place, that his omission had pulled a reaction like that at the hotel, and there was nothing of Loki there in his eyes. Satisfied, Arthur sat back in the chair and lifted his cup as if they were both sitting on the long sidewalk of some curving rue de Paris. Was Eames blunt? Arthur smiled. “Yes.” It was a very simple answer, and though it was unlikely that ‘unkind’ or ‘cruel’ would have drawn the smile, Arthur would still have answered, and he’d already showed that he was better able to keep his temper than any of the other men involved in this, from Eames to Cory to Loki. “But more so when he isn’t feeling good,” he added, not really defending but just informing. “And he’s always critical.” The frank brown eyes looked Louis over behind the rim of the wide cup. Arthur decided to add, “I think Evan will react better to Cory than me, so you’ll probably see more of him until we don’t have a choice.” There was always the possibility they wouldn’t need Arthur’s physicality, but it wasn’t fucking likely. (In Cory’s words.)
Louis accepted Arthur's response. Perhaps he was right. Perhaps he simply hadn't been feeling well, though he found that hard to believe. Critical, however, rang definitively true. "So it seems," he murmured, and took a sip of his coffee.
Louis looked up, finally meeting Arthur's gaze for more than a few seconds. "You're...sure about that?" he said, finally a betrayal of one of the things he was really afraid of. Would Evan really want Cory there more than Arthur? That surprised him if it was true. Cory was tied to the accident and Arthur was...whatever he was, to Evan. Louis really had no idea, and that was where the fear lay.
Arthur only smiled slightly. As far as he was concerned, Louis could sit there and hate Eames to his heart’s content. Arthur had no impulse to defend Eames or his methods, and never had. Usually he was the first in line to criticize them. Eames had his strengths, though, and one of them was working with people--if he cared to exercise that strength. In this case he didn’t, and Arthur figured it was a tactic that worked, so he left it alone.
Sipping his coffee, Arthur obediently reflected on what he had said, and finally nodded. “Yes. He doesn’t react all that well to people ordering him what to do, and I am not who you come to for therapy. Cory is better because he cares where it shows.”
Louis found Arthur's eternal calm almost unsettling, but, then again, maybe he only found it so because he was, himself, unsettled, uneasy, and turbulent. Arthur's cool waters therefore felt strange, though they shouldn't have. "I have no idea how you aren't uncomfortable," he said, honesty, finally. His fingers tapped against the side of the mug, nervous energy finding an outlet. "I certainly am, but you don't care. Is it because Evan doesn't matter, or because I don't?" The former would be a relief as much as a sting, to know it really had meant that little to the both of them. The latter wouldn't matter so much, since he didn't deeply care what Arthur thought of him, but it might bode badly if Arthur didn't care what he thought for a reason - for instance, because he was so dead set on Evan that nothing could sway him. But that possibility seemed as far off as it was terrifying, and he was tense, nervous, and paranoid at the moment. No, more likely it was the former. Arthur seemed interested in Eames - undoubtedly, his encounter with Evan simply didn't bother him, whatever it made Louis feel.
Arthur was actually rarely totally calm. He was better at hiding it, and also in a disgustingly good mood despite the general disorder around him. He was totally confident that he could force Evan to be physically healthy--one way or another--and that was what he wanted. A physically healthy Evan was a healthy Eames, and a healthy Eames was interested in him. A lot. So yeah, Arthur could sit there and sip his coffee, because he wasn’t sitting there to make friends. “Well, it’s not exactly fun, but it’s the first time that Eames and I, and Cory and I, have ever really agreed on anything. So everybody wants that asshole in there to get it back together, and all of a sudden all the fighting stopped.” Arthur said asshole more affectionately than insultingly, and sipped his coffee again. “So... I guess it’s because everybody matters.”
Louis felt suddenly even more tired than before, as if he'd been worked up for nothing, all along. It occurred to him that he ought to call his sisters, and talk to Neil, though he had a vague impression Loki had checked up on everyone to be sure they hadn't inconveniently died. Yes, there was a great deal to be done, and no time to be heavy, or sit down and rest and think. Thinking was only going to make it worse. "Well, I'm glad they want him better," he said, trying to sound glad about being glad. He was, of course - this would hardly work if the lot of them didn't want him well, since they could throw a wrench into it in a number of ways. "I only wish Eames would help, if that is truly what he wants."
Arthur thought maybe Eames was helping, in his way. “I think he’s like me. Evan doesn’t react well to people telling him what to do, and Eames probably isn’t any better at talking to him than I am. Cory isn’t a great speaker and maybe it’s just that he really cares that way, I have no idea. But even he can’t wave a magic wand and make this happen. Evan might take it bad the first day and try to throw him out.” Arthur’s sudden frown revealed that this, unlike everything else so far did bother him. He didn’t want to deal with another depression.
"He'd be trying to throw me out along with him," Louis reminded, "I assure you. But I'm not going to let that happen." He stared into his coffee mug. "I'll keep him here. Whatever it takes to do it. Whatever the cost. There is no magic wand, no quick fix, but this isn't going to happen again."
Louis tapped one finger on the mug again, lost in thought. It wasn't going to be easy, that was assured. "I worry that he might go the other way," he said, quietly. "That, denied his balm, he'll simply become more and more depressed. Or worse." After how much better Evan had been, it was hard to believe that he had ended up this low. But now it seemed that it had been a cheat all along, with Eames buoying him up. Of course. Louis bit his tongue, for a moment, thinking of all Eames had said - that all of this, all of it, was essentially his fault.
Louis got up from the table, picking up the cream and carrying it to the refrigerator. Really, it didn't matter what he said to Arthur. Arthur didn't care, not really. He cared about Eames and whether he lived or died, not Evan's mental state, or what the cost of bettering him might be. He poured out the coffee he'd barely touched absently, rinsing the mug. "If Eames was where Evan is, what would you do?" he asked. He set the mug beside the sink to dry, and turned around, leaning against the counter, light eyes looking across, not darting this way and that. "What would you be willing to trade to see him well?"
Arthur was lost in the eventuality that Cory might fall into a depression somehow deeper than the one he’d been fighting for years, if you could call it fighting. It was hard to make plans, hard to consider, when it was hard to relate to that kind of depression. Arthur had been low before, but it had been a horror low, a low when all he had to look forward to the next day was dying in some new way while bright-eyed soldiers became dull and empty in his dreams. It wasn’t the same thing, because his personality gave him things that Cory didn’t have--a will to work, to always be busy, being one of them. It wasn’t a fix, but it helped to have something he was good at. Cory didn’t have that.
Arthur blinked and look up. “It doesn’t work like that. This isn’t something you can do. It’s something you have to help him do, and that’s why it’s harder.”
"I suppose that's true." Louis glanced toward the hall again. There was still no sign that Evan had woken up, which was good. With a little rest, they might be able to actually get through a conversation. He didn't like thinking about how quickly Evan had dismissed him. He didn't know whether he could assume it was simply because he'd been tired, or whether he'd truly ruined everything by not chasing him down when he left him in that cab, not staying present after the memories, not doing enough. Eames was likely right about him.
"There's food in the refrigerator if you - or Cory - get hungry," Louis said. It wasn't much, but there had been some when he checked inside, enough to get them all by until someone could stock up for however long they were going to need to stand guard for. And Louis would keep being civil forever if need be, but there was nothing more for him to say. To Arthur, this was a means to an end, to be sure he could keep seeing Eames and Cory wasn't disappointed. He wasn’t attached to the situation, and no one could predict what happened next. All Louis really wanted to do now was sleep, but that was out of the question. Evan could wake up at any time, and anyway, lying down would only let him think.
“I’ll let Cory handle it,” Arthur said, glancing at the refrigerator distrustfully. Arthur had a liking for spring greens and soft cheeses, and grocery shopping for Cory generally involved choosing which microwave meals were on sale. It was like shopping for a five year old, really, and Arthur preferred not to get into it. Or they might be able to take turns just so Arthur could insist on something green now and again, maybe a vitamin supplement...
Arthur returned his attention to Louis and looked him up and down. “You could go in there. It might be good if he woke up and talked to you then,” Arthur suggested, rather bluntly. “Then you’d know if he woke up, too.” Arthur wanted to hide his weapon. It wouldn’t be a good idea to have it kicking around in an apartment full of desperate suicides waiting to happen.
It was a surprising suggestion, but a fair one. "I will," Louis said. He didn't even consider that Arthur might have some other motive for getting him out of the room - the other man was terribly difficult to read. "I'll call the doctor once I've spoken to him," he said. Right. The business of things. "...Do you mind staying close by, in case he attempts to leave?" Evan was frail, so he wasn't likely to need two pairs of hands, but it would be best not to risk it. Every step of this had to be careful, measured, and covered from every angle. Evan was, after all, an addict. Louis had no idea what that actually meant for him yet, since he'd seen so little of him since he'd begun drinking again, but he knew from experience that denying an addict their fix rarely created a reasonable and thoughtful reaction.
Arthur smiled. “I’m staying here. I’ve watched people like this before, don’t worry.” Arthur had staked out everything that was possible to stake out; schools, businesses, residences, army bases, people, families, even pets. Cory could handle all the hugs and coffee, but Arthur could handle being in one place forever, all patience and watching. “I’ll let you know before I leave, for supplies or whatever. He’s not a prisoner but we want to be awake when he needs us to be. We’ll work it out.” Arthur lifted the cup to his lips and folded one leg over the other. “Go on,” he said, tipping his head toward the door. “Oh, and...You could leave me the doctor’s number, or I could get one if you need it. We should probably do that sooner rather than later.”
Louis nodded. He was trying to feel sure about something, at least. This would work. It had to. "Precisely what I was thinking." It wouldn't do to give him an opportunity to sneak out. "I didn't have a specific physician in mind, so if you can find one I would be much obliged. I assumed I would have time to seek one out later." He didn't even have a doctor in the area yet. The nuances of the American health care system were still a bit misty to him, and he had yet to require any immediate help.
Louis stood for a moment in the hall, briefly awkward and hesitant. "...thank you," he said with a faint, unsure smile. He turned, with a measure of gratitude, toward Evan's door, and slipped inside.