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It was quiet. The air was still, and the silence permeated it like water taking all space to itself. Sometimes it struck, the contrast between this place and their studio; one always had something to do, and the other was the sigh of relief after, followed by a plunge into nothingness.
The stillness rang loud, however. Uncomfortable with it, Ferrus flipped to look at the other side of the bed. Empty. Deciding it was not where he wanted to be right now, he prepared himself emotionally to get up in midst of such a cold.
The bedroom was a gentle compromise — three walls of steel grey and one accent of royal purple. Back when they had barely met each other, his husband whispered delightfully as if speaking of a secret discovered: the story of a world is imprinted in its creations. Each texture of a brushstroke, each descent of the chisel and each badly placed screw had a reason and a rhyme behind it, as mundane or glorious as they could be. He dismissed it back then, jokingly calling it pretentious blabbering, but ever since then, some new channel of appreciation was pried open in his vision – now, the way their room is painted with their favorite colors, his taking the bigger portion, but allowing the one purple to shine and stand out, left him warm in his heart.
It was enough for Ferrus to rise and brush off the cold, making the bed for two and feeling the other side’s remnants of a presence, the crinkle of the bed sheets and the residual warmth in them, coupled with imprints of the weight of a body. The sound of their shower wasn’t breaching the stillness, which made his mind wander where his husband might’ve gone. Instead, he decided that between going to get some water and taking a walk to let out unwanted energy, the answer would come.
Entering the kitchen, he had not reached the glass, however. Instead, he stopped at the entrance and stood there, giving the space of a room for the uncharacteristically quiet figure and the white noise breaching.
Fulgrim sat on the floor, legs criss-crossed and staring into a dent of the balcony's granite texture as if it was the most interesting thing in the world. His hair was down and not as perfectly aligned as usual, not with the working braids much less the sleeping ones, the satin cap he customarily wears on the floor. His eyes had dark circles underneath. Some music played in the lowest volume in his phone — Ferrus recognized it, with how he knows Fulgrim's taste in music like the back of his hand, and that was some song of that Björk.
Over the balcony, there was a grid sheet and some different pens to its left and right, the words hard to discern at that distance.
"You can read it, by the way." The voice cut the silence. It was a perfectly, intentionally, forced plain voice. "Maybe that will make it easier to fill."
Ferrus didn't pause or hesitate— honesty made him who he was, and it helped his husband not to evade with his silver tongue.
"You want me to read it."
The sigh that came was less resigned and more relieved, and that wall crumbled easier than usual. "Indeed."
He made no ceremony of taking the paper to read, only careful not to crease it. He forced his eyes to read with only the help of the moonlight. The words 'Fearless Moral Inventory' were center stage and written in a metallic purple, with one of the more refined calligraphy styles Fulgrim took to, glinting in a different light.
The list itself only had one item: when Fulgrim stole Ferrus' tool set and his favorite hammer from their workshop and sold for drugs. He glanced away for a moment, back at the balcony, and noticed all the other lists behind it. They all carried the same title and different, but back-to-back dates. With one glance back to Fulgrim and a nod in return, he began reading them. Each page had three or two items, all in the same vein: words in gruesome detail of things left behind, as if they were at arm's reach.
One list contained the fear that he was past the point of being deserving of forgiveness. The other went into a plan he once had, and the note he would write and leave it over a painting where he'd be far gone and unseen, and why he didn't do it, mentioning a moment where Ferrus held his hand out of nowhere and mentioned making dinner. Ferrus vaguely recalled that through the first half of the day, Fulgrim seemed better than ever, only breaking down during the affection, and Ferrus started to tell himself to trust his instincts. One further in described one time Roboute offered help to Fulgrim, only to be threatened to death with a scalpel; the words were shaky, trying to recollect as much as they could about his husband's brain convinced he was not seeing a friend, but a threatening stranger instead.
These things once would have sat under Ferrus’ skin, but now they were barely a wave of vaguely unpleasant sensations, numbed down by the passage of time and hope made concrete. What really cut under was the distress written in ink, sat on the floor, sprawling, echoing in the song, and how quelling it was beyond him.
He put the lists down. The silence rustled, and Fulgrim looked like he would go into one of his monologues — the ones that were far more him that any of the things that were in the list. Instead, when he opened his mouth, no sound came. He swallowed down and tried again, placing a hand on his forehead. A moment or two passed before he spoke.
"It's not... Really that fearless."
"I noticed." If Ferrus sat down or painted his words, that would be condescending. These little actions, he's learned from his husband, had an unsung rhythm to them. Convenient ways to signal things would be better without really going through the effort of turning them so. "I just don't understand why's it got to be without fear."
There was no response, just a shrug. Shame settled onto Fulgrim and hung on the air. Ferrus decided to speak again.
"You're redoing the rehab list, then."
"I wonder if I ever did it properly." It comes out with a humorless laughter. "The original was too gauche, safe and short. I avoided going into details over how I harmed you, or anyone else."
With a hum, Ferrus reached his arm over the opposite end of the counter, grabbing two cups and pausing to think for a second.
"What do you think will happen if you write while I'm here?"
The pause stretched longer at his husband's side. "You would hold me accountable. Or at least, make me comfortable enough to go through with it for once."
"The latter is fine, but the former’s redundant. It seems you're holding yourself accountable well."
There was a giggle and a scoff, this time of disbelief and confusion. Fulgrim processed the words with the same care he would appraise the damages of a masterful painting, and his eyes began to gleam like amethysts under the moonlight.
Only when he seemed to finish thinking was that Ferrus offered the glass to him, filled with water. Fulgrim took it, nodding in gratitude and holding the other’s hand for a moment before sipping generously. Ferrus mustered the strength not to point the slight tremble in the slender fingers as they proceeded to pull his own for a soft kiss in cool, damp lips.
"Weren't you asleep as a rock?" His husband’s words came with a chuckle.
"That's what I thought, too." Ferrus helped Fulgrim get up once he was done with the water with a pull of the arm, and much to his surprise, the response was quick and followed by a gentle settling of hands to his face and a chaste kiss. Some tension in his muscles washed away.
"If you aren't going to sleep, then, I'd appreciate the company. Maybe you can braid my hair in the meantime?"
There was a smile that took a while for Ferrus to register he had on his lips; the kind to crinkle his eyes, he’s sure. Picking up the satin cap on the floor, smoothing it in his hands and feeling the soft texture of it, he gave way for his husband to sit by the balcony. He stood behind, already separating the locks into three sections, carefully making them even in volume.
Maybe when Fulgrim spoke about what was behind creations, he only meant art, objects, their line of work even— but when Ferrus finished the braid and placed his two hands, calloused as they were, on his husband's shoulders, he decided to believe the love he held was being imprinted, as Fulgrim's handwriting turned a little smoother and a little easier under his watch.