Capital R (lonely_perverse) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2017-06-24 22:48:00 |
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Entry tags: | grantaire, tamaki suoh |
Who: Grantaire and Tamaki
What: Visiting a cousin
When: Recent
Where: Grantaire's room
Rating/Warnings: Low // R's depression
Status: Complete
Tamaki was worried about his cousin (and yeah a little bored with no schoolwork now that he’d graduated) which was why he’d gotten his maman to loan him the money to pick up some of the paints he knew his cousin liked best (claiming that it was a favor he’d forgotten that he’d promised to do since his cousin’s work schedule kept him from making it to the art supply store). He’d also kept his promise not to tell her that R was no longer working at the sex shop. There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do to help his favorite cousin and it had the added benefit of not giving her something else to worry about.
He knew where the spare key was at his cousin’s and used it to let himself in, not caring about whether R’s roommate would be okay with him there or not. Family mattered more than anything after all. “R? Mon cousin? Are you dressed?” He called, heading back towards his bedroom.
***
The answer was ‘yes but not properly’ - R was wearing the same clothes he’d been wearing for the last few days (possibly a week, he wasn’t sure), so he smelled like stale sweat and depression. He lifted his head a little at the call, grumbling to himself. He just wanted to sleep. His little outing with Esmeralda had worn him out, and he of course hadn’t done any of the things he’d mused on doing. He hadn’t contacted anyone, hadn’t looked into turning his little bullet souvenir into something more constructive. He’d just laid in bed and pretended that he was doing something so that no one would come looking for him.
He should have known that Tama wouldn’t be fooled. Or wouldn’t care. Either way, it looked like he had a visitor.
Grantaire mumbled something to the affirmative and rolled over so the light from the hall wouldn’t hurt his eyes, pulling the blanket over his head to dampen the onslaught of Tamaki he was about to endure.
***
Tamaki had dealt with R enough to know that as much as he wanted to open the curtains in the older man’s room it was best to leave them closed. As his maman put it they were opposite sides of the same coin when it came to their personalities. Both bipolar but where Tamaki stayed at an almost constant high, his cousin tended to be more on the depressed end of things. But he loved him anyway. He opened the door as quietly as he could, shutting it softly behind him to minimize the hall light coming in before bounding over to the bed and flopping down beside him.
“You realize your entire room smells like Antoinette when she is wet oui? That...what’s the word I’m looking for...DANK!” he said, proud of himself for remembering the word in English.
***
”I don’t think that’s how the kids use that word right now,” R mumbled into his pillow, switching to French just because he didn’t give a shit anymore about keeping up with the English. It was tiring and hard and he was the exact opposite of wanting to do tiring, hard things. ”And that is what I smell like, cousin. I’d be insulted but I think that’s better than what I’ve smelled like in the past.”
R finally managed to turn his head to the side to look at Tamaki. ”What are you doing here? You should be spending time with your friends.”
***
Tamaki tried not to laugh at that mumbled comment but he couldn’t quite keep it inside. The best he could do was not laugh too loudly in respect for his cousin’s headache. “I will ask Haruhi when I talk to her next time.” He responded, switching over to French easily. His English was getting better but he was starting to realize he’d always be more comfortable in French. ”Your room smells like it too. I noticed it from the door. Why do you smell like Antoinette after it rains?” He asked, turning his head to look at his cousin.
“I wanted to spend time with you.” It was mostly the truth, he wasn’t going to tell him that things were still very odd between him and Haruhi at the moment. He didn’t know what to make of her voicemail or their text conversation so rather than worry about it he’d worry about his cousin.
***
R managed something resembling a smile - he liked making those he was close to laugh, even if it was at the expense of his own misery. It cheered him to know that even in this state, Tama could find him amusing. ”She seems to know everything, doesn’t she?” he said in agreement. At the very least, the girl knew more about American culture than either R or Tama did. But R knew why he smelled, at least. ”I haven’t showered, cousin. That would be why. You’re welcome to leave if it’s too unpleasant for you.”
It was difficult to believe that anyone would want to spend time with him, especially like this (though his nigh-endless stream of visitors seemed to disprove that theory, somehow). He didn’t laugh but did make a sound vaguely of amusement. ”I can think of much more pleasant ways for you to spend your day, Tama. Go spend your time doing those, rather than with me.”
***
”Yes. And she’s easy to talk to most of the time.” Tamaki told him, giving a half shrug as he looked around the room, in an attempt to avoid the confession that had just slipped out of him that things with Haruhi were getting more complicated. Or at least they were for him. ”It’s just taking some time to get used to,” he didn’t want to leave. If he went home, Maman would ask questions. Haruhi was either at an interview or at work. Tasslehoff had moved. The only person that he felt comfortable relaxing around and letting his brain unwind was R. He could say anything and know that his cousin wouldn’t judge him for it.
”I want to spend time with you R.”
***
”Only most of the time? She doesn’t seem difficult to talk to ever, I’d think. Very straightforward,” R said. But then, he didn’t truly know, did he? But he wasn’t going to press. Tamaki suddenly seemed uncomfortable and R was very glad that he was one of the few people who Tama was entirely open with. He wasn’t going to ruin that for the sake of curiousity. Tama had a habit of just letting what he was thinking fall out of his mouth, whatever was bothering him would come out eventually.
R scoffed, because again, it was hard to believe. ”I’m not nearly exciting enough, especially right now. I don’t want to go out or eat or anything but lie right here. I might watch a movie. I don’t know. But I’m not getting up to do it.” And it was true; he’d had a day where he thought he was doing better and he’d rearranged the room a little, managing to drag his desk close enough to the bed where he could operate his laptop from it. But even that little bit of activity had worn him out and he’d been tired since. He hadn’t been able to do anything but hit play on the same DVD for the past three days, so he’d been getting a lot of wear out of something called Rent that seemed to be terribly depressing but involved a girl stripping and thus was right up his alley. He’d have to change it if Tama wanted to watching something with him, though. Shit. ”If you insist on staying, go find something else for us to watch, I’ve seen this already. And not Chicago, I’ve seen it ten times already.”
***
”She normally is. Right now...Things are complicated.” Tamaki said softly, chewing on his lower lip. ”She...called and got my voicemail and left a message singing about having a crush on me. But then she texted me and said she didn’t know why she’d done that.” The words were coming out of him in spurts as he finally started talking about what had been on his mind lately.
”It’s not about wanting excitement cousin. It’s about...wanting to be with family. With someone who understands me.” Someone he didn’t have to put on an act for or pretend around. ”What is it?” He asked, curiosity awakened.
***
...shit. R needed a drink for this. He didn’t know how to respond to other people’s emotions at his best and he wasn’t at his best. ”The singing was a pain in the ass, but it seemed to be sincere, if that’s any consolation?”. He tried to chuckle. ”Be happy you weren’t here for my singing, cousin.”
”You are a teenager, you aren’t supposed to care about your family. We’re supposed to be uncool and tell you not to do fun things, like…” Well, everything that normal teenagers did was so far outside the realm of things that Tamaki did that it was almost laughable to think of him doing them. He dropped the thought. ”You are welcome to stay. But I’m not going to be fun to be around. I’ll probably fall asleep.”
R made a questioning noise. ”Chicago? It’s one of Kurt’s movies. It’s about women who killed people, there’s lots of singing.”
***
“I asked her about it. She did not mean to tell me she was starting to think she might like me as more than a friend.” Tamaki said, his voice coming out small as he looked at the ceiling, anything to avoid looking at his cousin. “I tried to avoid everyone’s singing. Although Antoinette did try to sing along with some of the people we ran into on our walks. I am sure her voice is better than mine cousin.”
”You are terribly uncool,” he teased. ”But I care about you anyway. But then I am not very cool either it would seem.” He thought for a moment. ”I won’t disturb you if you do. I did bring you some paints though. As an explanation to Maman for coming over instead of asking you to come by the house to hang out. Or asking you to join us for something. I have not told her what happened with Haruhi.”
”I have had enough singing lately. Maybe there will be something on Netflix I’d like to watch. With no singing.”
***
”It is better than mine as well, I am sure.” R didn’t know what to say to the first comment. He’d never had to deal with that, keeping his romantic trysts at an arm’s length for this exact purpose. He barely knew how to deal with his own feelings, much less anyone else’s.
”I’m the most uncool. I can only buy you beer for parties to impress your friends. That’s not cool at all.” For Tamaki’s friends, it probably wasn’t, actually. His heart warmed at the mention of the paints, though he wasn’t in any particular mood for art at the moment. ”Thank you for not telling her. I won’t tell her about Haruhi either. We’ll keep quiet on as many things as we can.”
R snorted. He’d had quite enough too. ”Find yourself something, I’ll probably take another nap.” Though he felt energized by Tamaki’s visit. He’d found he’d had more energy lately, felt more like doing things; perhaps he was getting better and moving on.