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The scent of cigarette smoke is the first thing that hits Louis when he strides into M’s office. Of course, the lingering, earthy aroma could only be attributed to one man.
“About time you showed up.”
The unhelpful remark is ignored by Louis as the door clicks shut. He leans against it with both palms, grateful to have the outside world closed off once again. His forehead is pressed to the cool, varnished mahogany, eyes squeezing closed as he breathes the familiarity of his daily reality deep into his lungs.
“Why are you here.”
It is a musing aloud rather than a direct question.
At his back, he feels rather than sees Moran’s presence— a presence he’s sure by now he could detect anywhere, in any situation— at the window; the swish of his overcoat as he loiters disturbing the air in little flurries that ghost Louis’s nape. There’s a familiar, throaty chuckle. The hiss of a match struck against its packet.
“Where else am I supposed to go, hm?” The words are slurred, as though around a cigarette butt.
After another lungful of air, Louis makes himself stand up. “To William. I’m sure he’s better equipped to deal with you as things stand currently. Or Albert, even—“
“Christ, no! Albert?” Moran snorts as Louis studies the wood grain in the door. He imagines the way Moran’s cigarette must bounce between the lines of an incredulous smirk as he stares at his back. “Don’t you think I’ve been through enough this last week?”
Louis swallows. He doesn’t want to think about that, right now. About what Moran has been through.
There’s a painful twinge in his chest. He rubs at the left side through his shirt.
“You don’t look yourself, Lou,” Moran comments.
“No?” Louis fingers his tie absently. Or, he would, if he’d actually put one around his neck before leaving his room.
He isn’t wearing his jacket, either. Heavens, what is becoming of him?
“No. You’re usually a lot more put together than this.”
Even though the words are gentle, the insinuation pierces Louis’ vulnerability all too easily; he’s bare without his carefully ironed, brushed and tied shield, and the result is automatically raised hackles.
“Is that right? Well. I’ve had rather a lot to deal with, in recent days. What with all the paperwork—“
“The paperwork?” Moran cuts him off. “Oh. I see. That’s what it is, is it. The paperwork. In that case, please accept my humble apologies for putting so much admin on your desk.”
Louis’ fists clench at his sides, but still he can’t bear to turn around. Instead, he listens as Moran’s fingertips— prosthetic; he can tell by the sound of cotton catching on paper— leaf through what must be the report left unfinished upon his desk from five nights ago.
“S’not up to your usual standard though either, you know.”
Louis swallows. “I’m well aware.”
He remembers the gas lamplight stinging his eyes as he had tried to complete the document. It had been gone midnight when he finally gave in, too exhausted to find any more words— clinical, professional, unfeeling— when his vocabulary had been reduced to nothing but echoes of the most horrific pain in his chest; worse even than when they’d cut him open as a child with scalpel and little else.
M has no use for emotion. This task called only for facts, and since Louis found it impossible to separate the two, he conceded defeat and put himself to bed— not that sleep was anywhere to be found— and has not returned to the office until the present moment.
“That’s why I’m here.”
Moran hums softly at his back, as though distracted. “The ink’s smudged, an’ all. You might have to start again. Like this here, I can’t even make this word out— ‘took a bullet to the what’ now?”
“Heart.”
It splinters as it slips from Louis, his voice catching roughly in his throat.
“Ah … yeah. Of course. That’s right.”
Silence descends in the room like an ominous, suffocating thing; too much of it. Too loud. Louis remembers how he’d yearned for it once; for god’s sake, couldn’t everyone just give him a little peace and quiet to work? Couldn’t he just find other ways to amuse himself, rather than delighting in riling Louis up during working hours just so he could be shoved up against the same door right in front of Louis now and made to shut up with a—
Knock—knock—knock.
William.
Louis stares at the wood, knowing that his brother is just on the other side of it. But he can’t speak.
“Louis? Are you alright in there?”
“Yes.” By some miracle, he manages to answer. “I’m— I’m fine. Busy. Catching up with things.”
“Liar.” He hears Moran whisper at his back.
“Well, okay then. I’ll bring some tea for you in a little while.”
Before Louis can force out words of gratitude, he can already hear William’s footfalls fading down the hallway carpet.
“You’ll have to face them all sooner or later, you know,” Moran says.
“I know,” Louis concedes to the doorway.
That sickening silence begins to crawl back in between the nooks and crevices of the room. But then—
“A shot to the heart, huh.” Moran whistles exaggeratedly. “Bet that must hurt like hell.”
“Please—“ Louis starts.
“Fitting way to go though, if you think about it.”
“Please, stop,” Louis says again. His voice is trembling.
“Suppose it’s what a sniper deserves, after all. Head would have been a bit quicker. Kinder. Still,”
“Don’t,” Louis says, desperate now. Every one of Moran’s words are leaving raw scorch marks on his skin.
“Didn’t I once say my heart belonged to y—“
“Sebastian.”
It might as well be a gunshot, for all the bluster it tears through that little office with. It’s intended harsh, in reprimand— or perhaps it’s a plea, a yearning— but all of the explosive force Louis can muster dies out midway through the shot. The word is haunted, filled with a devastating ache.
Sebastian.
How beautiful it sounds. It catches him by surprise, the softness of the syllables hissing off his tongue. So much sweeter, so much more elegant than Moran.
His lone heart beats hard in his ears, and he waits, praying for some response.
Finally, mercifully, it comes:
“Well now, you’ve never called me that before …”
There is a smile in the statement. A quiet satisfaction sewn into the words; a late victory. And it all comes flooding back to Louis in a rush— oh, how he loves that sort of smile the best of all. When he thinks he’s won the argument, when he says something clever, trips Louis, sweeps his feet from under him, gets his sly little way. Louis aches for it; he aches for Moran’s victory, for their bickering, for the myriad of infuriating-captivating-handsome-devilish expressions Moran can sport, just a single look and that’s all it would—
Louis can stand it no more. He turns.
The room is empty. The gaslamps are not lit. The box of matches lies quietly in the spot upon the windowsill where Moran has left it. Waiting patiently for a warm, calloused hand that will never materialise.
Louis can still feel the ghost of his touch everywhere— upon everything— as though it’s a physical presence.
Even on himself.
At his desk, the tear-stained half-completed report lies strewn.
Abandoned.
Louis swallows down the lump in his throat. But it keeps coming back up. He swallows and swallows and swallows until he finds himself audibly gasping for air. His back thuds against a bookshelf and he presses the heels of his palms to the sockets of his eyes until they smart.
“No. I never called you by your name.” He finds himself speaking aloud to the dead room, uncaring for the ridiculousness of it all. “I never once did. And I wish I had with all my heart.” Finally, a sob wracks his chest as he slides to the floor.
There he sits, knees spread, elbows resting upon them, forehead clutched between his hands. Rivers flow silently down his cheeks, like rain-spatter on window-panes. He watches the fat droplets of moisture hit the carpet, leaving damp circles.
But they will dry. Tears do not stain.
He has not cried like this since he thought he’d lost both of them, back in that hotel room, where the carpet was littered with ash and glass.
He wonders if those marks remain, still. Charred, clumsy little mistakes. Now whispers of Sebastian Moran’s existence.
This time, there will be no second chances.
Knock—knock—knock.
The reprieve of the closed door does not last for long:
“Louis, I’ve brought tea. I’m coming in.”