Work Text:
Armand was there to witness Daniel’s marriage. Unbeknownst to Daniel, he was sitting in the back row of the wedding hall watching the whole ceremony. He saw the light in his eyes, so loving and hopeful. He looked beautiful.
The suit he wore was tailored perfectly for his body, though not as lavish or expensive as anything Armand could have gotten him. When Alice began her descent down the aisle, he noticed how his posture stiffened, how his eyes glistened and his smile brightened. Armand hated that he could hear his thoughts fawning over how beautiful she was. Still he wilfully chose to keep listening. Either way it would feel like torture.
What Armand hated most of all, however, was how affected he was by the wedding. He’d wanted this—he wanted Daniel to live a long, normal life. Yet, the sight made him nauseous, it made him feel hollow, it made him want to rip someone apart. Maybe it was the fact that, underneath it all, he knew it wasn’t what Daniel (or even Alice) truly wanted. Sure, they loved each other, the knowledge of that ate away at Armand, but when was that ever enough? It certainly wasn’t for Daniel and Armand.
Sometimes Armand wondered if it was the love that doomed their relationship in the first place. Armand, too weak to Daniel’s pleading, offered up his blood without considering the consequences. Daniel, too weak to Armand’s presence, took anything he would give. Armand was all too aware how vampirism drew people into the depths of madness, and still he dragged Daniel through it desperately and cowardly.
They exchanged vows, neither earnestly meaning them though they wanted to. The house of cards the marriage was built on was the condition that Daniel stayed clean—clean of drink, clean of drugs and clean of all his other vices. Neither of them trusted him to keep that promise. Even after Daniel had gone through rehab and stayed clean for a couple months, they both were anticipating failure—perhaps dooming them even more, the curse of the self-fulfilling prophecy.
Armand forced himself to watch as they kissed—the ache in his heart panging through him like a stab wound. It was a soft, chaste kiss. Armand wasn’t sure he’d ever kissed Daniel in that way. All their kisses had felt so heated or passionate or violent. The rest of the audience erupted into congratulatory applause, while Armand wallowed in pain of his own making. The loud claps and cheers felt almost mocking in his dark and gloomy mood.
Quickly, he vanished, unseen by any of those in attendance, as Daniel and Alice walked down the aisle. Eventually, he found his way back to the apartment he shared with Louis, after walking through the sun his skin tingling approaching the start of a burn. He joined him in their bed and cuddled into his arms, desperate for comfort and warmth for his aching soul.