Re: The Capital: Holly W & Noah N
Noah felt really guilty about everything. He hadn't actually done anything in this most recent landmine detonation. He hadn't placed it. He hadn't stepped on it. He was kind of innocent of all charges. But, he still felt guilty about it, because it had to do with him and it had to do with insidious insecurities creeping in, and he knew he'd made those first cracks. There was no way not to. With the first "betrayal" in the motel. What else could he do? Should he have just come clean immediately? Maybe. Probably. But, he hadn't, and he'd done the next best thing he could think of. Obviously, it was still a betrayal. And he hadn't wanted whatever the fuck happened on Halloween. So, I mean, even though some of it was his fault, it all felt out of his control and like all he could do was try to minimize damage. But, dude, he was running out of ways to do that and Holly's words about slowing things down were on repeat in his head. And maybe he was right.
He did use, like, a crazy amount of feeling words. Noah. He was... what was the word? Like, effusive? He felt a lot of things, not just from other people, but in himself, and there was a lot of bleed-over. But, Holly didn't reciprocate that way. He hadn't, really, not since the days they were texting. Probably if Noah couldn't feel that the dude actually liked him, actually this or that, he wouldn't be able to deal with the lack of expression. It would feel like rejection. Even now, spewing all this stuff, Holly was just sitting there, then, he stood and left. And Noah was just left sitting there. If he was anyone else, he would've just looked at the finger that instructed him wait and then he would've been left to wondering. Because he was himself though, at least he knew Holly was nervous and needed to breathe (Noah felt bad about that, about overloading him), etc., etc.
Holly came back, without looking at Noah, and he put on the record. Queen, the dust jacket said. Noah watched his back, having slid into the corner Holly left to let him out, and he leaned against the wall. Holly said he'd mentioned cock sucking to Adrian, which just made him sigh, but he didn't say anything about it. He listened and when Holly turned, folding his arms over his chest, Noah mirrored him because it was what his brain made him do, sleeves still pulled down. He really tried not to listen to the lyrics or put meaning to them, dude. "Thanks," he said about the sweater, half a smile playing on his lips. He looked up at Holly, the dude was like one foot away, but it felt pretty far. "It's okay." It was a response to Dietre and to sucking at trust, to going without saying. I mean, Noah had said a lot, and Holly's response was pretty minimal. He didn't want to overwhelm the dude a second time, so he had to leave and change the record, so he chewed on his bottom lip a little. "I'm sorry. I didn't think about telling you about Dietre. I mean, it's not like that, so it just didn't occur to me, but it should have. I didn't—If I could go back and, like, never cottage, dude, I would. I don't know. Sorry."