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It’s Deacon’s off-hand comment. A light quip, a jest to fill the silence. He’s talking, endlessly as he does. (Marcus had once suggested he’d start his own radio station. He had considered it for quite a long while. ‘Maybe one of my disguises should be a retired radio host?’ ‘And which station would that be? There aren’t many, people would suspect.’ ‘Easy. I was hosting my show for fifteen years from my place, when I realized my tower was never once transmitting a single thing. Explains the lack of screaming fans, really.’ ) It’s an observation to how he had stopped to help the random group of settlers they had bumped into on the road. Mainly meaning it, but simultaneously just talking.
“You’re just too goddamn good.”
He feels it. The spike of warmth in his lungs rising to prickle his throat. Deacon’s words jog a memory in his cloudy head, jostle the tune he’s heard hundreds of times in hundreds of places. You could rough him awake in the middle of the night, and he could recall it right there. A happy memory, welcome in the dreary, dead land. It’s playing in his head. He was given only two seconds to consider doing it. Could he stop it? Please: When had he ever been able to?
“You’re just too good to be true,”
his quiet voice shifts the mood. He’s staring at Deacon’s black glasses. Deacon’s staring right back at him. Silence. Waiting to see what happens. The song feels good on his tongue.
“Can’t take my eyes off you,”
his voice vibrates tentatively off the ruined road, and he sees Deacon’s brows lowering to furrow behind the lenses. Was this stupid? Most definitely. But being stupid was a trait he had begun to pick off from the master of silliness. This was him returning Deacon’s jokes, right? No, not really. His heart was leaping. His vocal chords begged to be used. A singer’s curse.
“You’d feel like heaven to touch,” his voice carefully picks up courage at Deacon’s raised brow,
“Oh, I wanna hold you so much,
at long last love has arrived,
and I thank god I’m alive,” his lips tug upwards,
“You’re just too good to be true.
Can’t take my eyes off you.”
Deacon was giving him the most curious look. A smirk peeks his teeth. ‘What is this man doing, and I must be dreaming? ’ He also must be remembering that night at Marcus’ place when the artist had belted out the whole soundtrack of Moulin Rouge at the hills. Only this time they weren’t drunk, so he had not that excuse to hide behind.
“Pardon the way that I stare,”
he picks up again before it gets awkward. More awkward than it was, or maybe he’s just making it more awkward now? Deacon’s smirk is threatening to turn into a grin.
“But there’s nothing else to compare.
The sight of you makes me weak,” oh Deacon is definitely grinning now,
“There are no words left to speak,
so if you feel like I feel,
please let me know that it’s real,”
and this has to be some odd analogy to their kind-of-sort-of relationship (like these moments always ended up being). Marcus had taken a step closer to Deacon.
“You’re just too good to be true.
Can’t take my eyes off you.”
Gently he eases the song to a close. Neither of them says a thing. Yeah, here we go, embarrassment guaranteed in the end.
Deacon guffaws. Was that a hint of nervousness Marcus picked up? “Wow, you do live in an endless musical, don’t you? What the hell? So you’re going to break out into a song anytime I say something? That, my favorite pre-war relic, will be very counterproductive to our work; I can’t have you yodeling the national anthem knee deep in Institute synths. Can you yodel? Oh please don’t tell me you can, I don’t think I could live with myself if you yodeled how you can’t take your eyes off me. Which, by the by, is quite unnerving, how can I ever change disguises with your blue eyes constantly glued to my tender white flesh? ‘Oh, gentle sir, cast thine gaze elsewhere’ ...”
He trails off. Marcus is laughing. A gentle, vibrant sound, like a stream of water in sunlight.
‘Oh god, he’s rubbing off on me, here we go,’ Deacon thinks. The crow’s feet in the corners of Marcus’ eyes deepen. He has dimples. He actually has dimples . Marcus brushes back the flop of a black mohawk resting on his nose, and it flops right back in place. Silly, you do that all the time and you’ve never once accomplished getting it out of your face.
He’s laughing, and he’s not even laughing at Deacon from succeeding in taking the spy for a spin. He’s not going fingerguns ‘psyche!', so Deacon can’t elbow him in the ribs and congratulate him on the good jest.
God damnit.
“Yeah, um, that,” Marcus clears his throat and swallows. “That was an old world song that pretty much everyone in the world knew. Just, uh. Just recalled it from what you said.”
“Oh thank god , here I was thinking you had cooked up a song for me on the spot.”