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The ceiling was blurry. Maybe it was his eyes. Grief blinked. A bit better. God, what time was it? Damn Andrey and his vendetta against clocks. What person didn’t keep at least a watch in their room?
His pocket watch was in his coat which was discarded somewhere on the ground by the closet if his memory wasn’t failing him. He should get up. Whatever time it was it definitely was far too late judging from the fact that the place beside him was empty. How long had he slept? He ran his hand through the sheets. And cold. How long ago had the other woken up?
His brain couldn’t process that many things at once, so fuck it. It had to happen at some point. He got up.
Mistake. Huge mistake. The room spun around and he leaned on the wall trying not to fall. He was never going to drink again. It’s all Andrey’s fault. Fucking Stamatin.
He grabbed his clothes and made a beeline for the bathroom, throwing some water on his face. Yeah, he looked like shit. The image awaiting him in the mirror was that of a man... not at his peak. To put it politely. Grief was too tired to care. Andrey had seen worse. This was his fault after all.
Coffee would help. Or tea at least, even if it was one of the weird ones the other man had, whose names he couldn’t even begin to attempt pronouncing.
He made his way through the labyrinthine corridors reaching the living room. As soon as he entered he noticed Andrey sprawled on the couch, a pile of papers on the table in front of him. The man was sitting, if it could be called that, as if he had fainted. The room was dark. The blinds were shut tightly letting but a sliver of light through and with the lights turned off as well Grief couldn’t see the man very well. Something was off. He turned the light on.
“Andrey?” he asked “What are you doing?”
The other looked at him. His gaze was calm and a bit intense, pouring at him. Examining him. Yeah no, either Grief's brain was playing tricks on him or that was not Andrey.
“You’re not Andrey?” The stranger continued looking at him. The twin brother then. The similarity was uncanny. “You’re his brother…” he couldn’t remember the name, even if almost everyone in town was gossiping about the brothers.
“Peter.” Grief mouthed its syllables. Interesting name. “And you are?”
“Grief”
Peter looked at him as if he answered in the most bizarre way imaginable. Studying him with a commitment matching that of his brother’s, pointedly avoiding his eyes. Yep, they were definitely related, even if Peter looked substantially more calm.
“Where is my brother?” He asked frowning.
“Couldn’t tell you. He was supposed to be here” Andrey was always there when he woke up. This was a first.
“Hhm”
The other looked lost in thought. Perplexed, his gaze falling to the floor. It gave Grief the chance to repay some of the studying back. Peter, at first glance, looked like a carbon copy of his brother but the more he looked the more inconsistencies he noted. Peter’s hair was slightly longer and he was a bit slimmer and lankier. Of course, the most obvious difference was the lack of scars. All of the man’s exposed skin looked flawless.
He carried himself in an entirely different way as well. Where Andrey’s movements felt compulsive, his felt deliberate, they had a predetermined feel to them as if he was exactly where he had to be. He generally looked... well, softer. While Andrey’s whole appearance put you on edge Peter’s lulled you making you feel safe, but Grief wasn’t buying it. The man was unnerving.
Yeah, he was Andrey’s twin, alright.
Grace did seem like a family trait though. As was beauty. The man in front of him was striking, his presence commanding. He was ethereal. Untouchable. But he had waxed poetically more than enough for one brother and he wasn’t about to do it for the other too.
Wait, was that blood?
“You have some…” he pointed at Peter’s neck.
“Oh, it's paint.” He said absent-mindedly, not even checking. He got up, suddenly. “I am making breakfast.”
That was weird. The man was weird. He made his way to the kitchen and Grief couldn’t help but follow. What was he going to do? Stand around in the middle of the living room?
He hesitated at the doorway. Peter had already made himself busy, getting materials out on the counter. “I, um, well, can I help?” That was going smoothly.
“Chop these” He gave him some fruit without even sparring a glance. Grief got the feeling that they’d gotten off on the wrong foot. He didn’t know what he had done to offend the other but he obviously hadn’t made the best impression. “You eat pancakes?”
What? Oh right, they were cooking. “Yes”
He began chopping the fruit. The silence that filled the room was making him want to crawl out of his skin. Lara was right he truly didn’t thrive on silence. She would have loved the pancakes. They used to make them together when they were younger. Somehow Rubin always ended up being covered in flour from head to toe. They always laughed it off. That was back when they still laughed. When they still spend time together.
“How do you know my brother?” Thank god.
How do you explain how they met? It wasn’t really breakfast conversation appropriate, and he didn’t want Peter to think of him based on that story. It didn’t paint him in the best of lights.
“It’s a long story”
“They tend to be with him” Peter sounded vaguely amused. He counted that as a win.
He was done with the chopping, so he let his eyes wander to the man. He was standing by the stove his back turned to him. His choice of clothes was bizarre but at least not as much as his brother’s. His coat did look very comfortable. Did all people from the capital dress like that?
“You’re an architect, are the papers you brought designs?” He was curious. He couldn’t help it.
“Yes. I need Andrey’s opinion on something”
Everyone was talking about the twins. Opinions varied. They were either demons spawned by Nina’s will or the greatest artists the town had known. He had heard a lot of whispering around about them. Hushed voices in the street.
Andrey’s behavior was certainly not helping to earn others’ goodwill but it had definitely earned their fear. No one gossiped about them anywhere he might have heard. All knew how protective he was of his brother. One wrong word about him and Andrey would pounce.
“You made the staircases, no?”
There were three of them around town. It had been about two months since they had been constructed. They were accepted into town the same way everything new was. With distrust but a moment later with acceptance. Now it was as if they had always been there. A part of the Town. Children seemed to love them and had taken to playing on them. A bizarre game. Something about a beach, Grief wasn’t sure. It was a wonder no one had gotten injured.
“We did, yes. Failed experiments” The contempt colouring Peter’s voice was thick.
“They are beautiful” He wasn’t just flattering the other man. He didn’t seem like someone who would fall for it either way. They truly were beautiful.
“Putain!”
The pan fell on the floor, clinking and jumping around, settling at last by Peter’s feet. The man was holding his hand. Oh, he’d been burned.
“Here let me.”
Grief took the hand that Peter extended and ran some water over it. He examined it. Not that bad. He grabbed an olive-based ointment that he knew Andrey kept in the cabinet above the counter.
Peter’s hands were covered with calluses, an artist's hand, but after closer inspection they also bared some more burn marks. This probably wasn’t the first time. Weird. The other didn’t seem like the clumsy type.
Peter retreated his hand. He tried to look at Grief but quickly flinched, raising his hand to his head almost involuntarily.
Grief guessed the other had a headache. Andrey had them often and the other certainly acted like it. Peter had quickly gotten back to cooking, so Grief opened one of the lamps on the table. It was probably strong enough. He turned the main light off. He hoped it would help a bit.
“Thank you” Peter whispered. He wasn’t sure if it was for the light or the ointment but he smiled at him.
He felt weird just standing around so he went ahead and cleaned up, beginning at the table and moving to wash the dishes.
Peter started humming a tune. His voice was a bit deeper and lower than his brother’s, not as thunderous, but it was certainly the same song that Andrey loved to hum. It almost sounded like a lullaby in Peter’s mouth. They settled into a rhythm, the tense feeling that he didn’t even know he had accumulated rolling off of him.
Grief heard the keys before the voice. Andrey was here. “I’m back!” Footsteps got closer and closer but stilled by the doorway. “Peter, what are you doing here?”
“I made breakfast” he answered still concentrated on the pan in front of him flipping a pancake.
“I can see that” Andrey looked a bit surprised. He stared at Peter until the other did so too. They looked at each other for a while. Grief felt as if he was missing something.
“There are some blueprints I need you to check”
Andrey accepted that and walked over to the counter by Grief's side. He dipped his finger in the batter trying some.
“Hmm, tastes good”
“Andrey” Peter looked at him disappointed, but Andrey just smiled brightly, feigning innocence.
“You’ll have to forgive me. Look at what I brought you” He raised the bag he had been carrying. Grief had been so taken with the twins interacting that he hadn’t even noticed it.
Peter grabbed it. They were berries? Grief couldn’t quite tell. They were a blackish-blue colour.
Peter was staring at them. “I didn’t think they reached the Town” Andrey smiled softly at that.
“I placed an order with the last train. Got there first thing in the morning, I hope you like them”
“Thank you, brother, they’ll go well with the pancakes”
“Let me take over with that” And Andrey did just that.
Peter, on the other hand, grabbed him softly by the arm and led him to the table, sitting down and waiting for Andrey to finish with the pancakes. There wasn’t a lot of work left so a pile of pancakes was quickly placed in front of all of them. Andrey dropped the chopped fruit on all of their plates along with some honey, opening the box with the berries he had brought and placing them on top of Peter’s. He finally sat down on the chair across from Grief.
“Do you like blueberries?” Peter asked him.
So they were blueberries. “Never tried them”
“Here” Peter took one from his plate and placed it on Grief's lips.
“Oh,” They were good. Peter smiled at him and transferred some from his plate to Grief’s.
“Thank you” They both turned back to their own plates and started to eat.
Grief felt someone staring at him fiercely. He looked up at Andrey who was looking at him as if he had never seen him before. Weird. “What?”
He continued to frown for a second, but then relaxed back on his chair. “Nothing”
Very weird.