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He could feel them — craters in his face so deep they could form reservoirs. Rough dunes, occasionally broken up by fields of scarring and the sharp shavings of stubble. He ran his fingers over the chapped skin of his lips, grabbing dead skin and peeling it off like tree bark and flicking it off onto the floor. Whilst he was doing that, his other hand was idly rolling a black pen back and forth between his thumb and index finger. The report, the very important work report, the one he needed to complete by tomorrow, was still lying on his desk a virgin. It, along with other items he was really trying quite hard not to think about, bobbed about in the backwaters of his mind.
He was staring, unblinking, at the two figures spinning at the desk a few feet away from his. Spinning in their own universe, weighed by each other's center of mass. And he was orbiting with them too, whether he liked it or not. It was Harry's world, after all, Jean just happened to live in it.
"He's getting better," Judit had told him a few weeks ago over a cold cup of coffee, "he hasn't been drinking."
He'd muttered a "We'll see." After all, you should never get your hopes up when it comes to the shitkid, no sir. He'll come over and announce some grand scheme to become a sober, smarter, better person; also he's discovered that all his problems are being caused by the patriarchy, so he's become a feminist whilst he's at it, or perhaps, it's capitalism causing him harm, so he's a communist now, no, wait, he's an ultraliberal — scratch feminist — all women are bourgeoisie, riding the… what was the word he so skillfully used?
It emerged from the waters like a bloated corpse: the cock carousel.
Yet, the weeks came and passed, and Harry was still sober as a nun, no doubt helped by forgetting why he needed the drink in the first place. He was going steady with his new partner, Kitsuragi, and everything was going fine for him. Well, good for him. Well done, Harry. You fixed you all by yourself, no help — psychiatric or otherwise — needed . You're still insane, but somehow you're holding it all together, somehow you haven't put a bullet through your soft-palate and left the mess for the rest of the department to clean up. Really, well done.
Kitsuragi trusted him. He'd realised it one day when he was on a smoke break on the balcony that Harry and his new partner just so happened to be standing under. Harry was looking at the trees and the cars and the little shards of glass they cement into the concrete like it was the most important clue in a case about nothing, and Kitsuragi was standing there like a saint, with his hands clasped behind his back, nodding along like any of it made sense.
Now they were spinning, endlessly, bouncing electrons between eachother. Though Jean liked to think Kitsuragi would burn out eventually, he knew they'd never run out of energy. They'd burn long after the universe had darkened, and they'd outshine the pale.
The pen slipped from his fingers, clattering against his desk. It hadn't made much noise, yet Harry's head spun at lightning speed, pinning down the sound and Jean like a fighter pilot. But when their eyes made contact, his dazzling, disco-mad, eyes, Harry turned his head back to Kitsuragi just as quickly. He was like a shy dog now. Every time they passed in the halls Harry would duck his head and jog past. It wasn't specific to Jean, Harry jogged everywhere, past everyone, and simply expected the world to keep up. Similarly, when he had fallen, he expected the world to stop in his regard. He was a gym teacher once. Then he joined the force and relied on Jean for help, then he'd been fucked by the bitch and relied on Jean for comfort, then he'd spiraled and relied on Jean to take the gun out of his hands, then Jean had let go, and Harry had been fine, and in one week he had changed and Jean was the same man he'd been years ago, and Harry, and Harry.
He grabbed a pencil from his pocket. It was sharp as a blade. He began turning it in a sharpener anyway. After all, the harsh scraping of wood against metal was much less grating than listening to whatever web Harry had spun over there.
Jean hadn't been given a new partner yet. He was still being called satellite officer out of habit, but really he was just plain "officer" for now AKA asshole with a badge. He was a man without mass, not quite floating in space as much stuck in it like jello. He could flail around but if couldn't produce enough momentum to move, he'd die here.
Working with Harry had helped. Rock bottom doesn't feel so rock bottom when you discover someone who's found a way to dig himself in deeper. Now he was staring down that abyss and wondering just how far despair can go. Harry proved anything to be possible.
Harry. That was the word clogging his thoughts. Harry, the big, gold-plated name lodged in his brain like a spear. Everything was backlogging behind it. He needed to flush him out.
The pencil had been sharpened to it's very end. His fingertips were black with graphite and pencil sharpenings littered his lap. He wiped them off to the floor, then, with his shoes, scuffed them under the desk.
He pushed the report away from him like a stubborn child refusing dinner, then pushed himself away from the table and decided to go to the bathroom. He kept the pencil sharpener in his clenched fist.
He very deliberately walked past Harry's desk. He set his chin angling upwards slightly, like he was balancing a saucer plate upon it and swung his arms back and forth like scissors. Truthfully, he looked very unnatural, but neither of them paid it any attention. He thought they were pretending not to notice him, but that wasn't true. They simply didn't care what Jean did.
And Jean, likewise, didn't care either.
As he left the office, rounding the corner, he deflated, dropping his head and hunching his shoulders.
He felt strangely numb to everything around him. He didn't so much as walk to the toilets as he glided, lighter than air, yet so compressed in the heavy walls of the precinct he couldn't quite get enough oxygen. There was absolutely nothing on his mind at all as he shut himself into one of the stools, sat on the toilet seat with his pants on and felt the crevices of his war-torn face, the mountain ranges of jagged cheekbone, the hanging eye bags, the hollow eyes. The hollow soul.
He skillfully unscrewed the nail of the sharpener with just his fingernail, releasing the metal blade within. His heart palpitated wildly as he stared at it in debate. As some side of him lost, he rolled up the white sleeve of his shirt. Should've worn black. Oh well, the blazer would cover anything.
Everyone had their vices; Harry had the booze, Jean had this. A terrible habit, some ridiculous teenage angst leftover in him.
Yet once he completed the act, he didn't feel better. There was no confetti, gratification, no validation. All he had succeeded in doing was adding another mark on his already revolting flesh, and he had received nothing for it.
The drain flies climbed up the walls around him. He left the stall, tugging his sleeves down, tucking his gun into his waistband.
After a short scrutinisation of himself in the mirror, he decided he wasn't feeling very well and made up his mind to go home and clear his head.
As he went to leave, the door swung open.
Enter: Harry.
He pauses at the door, like he's surprised to see Jean. Then, he awkwardly saddles up next to him at the sinks.
Jean rolls his eyes as he waits for Harry to speak.
A few seconds pass in silence before Harry animates, haphazardly unloading his finger guns. "Hey, Jean, what's up?"
Really? Thirty seconds for that?
"Nothing! What's up with you?" He replied wryly
Harry's eyes go wide. "Oh! uh… I… uh…"
"What're you doing here, shitkid?"
"Khm, I'm just washing my hands. Totally normal-cop thing to do."
He's sweating, like he always is, and it produces a weird musty smell that makes the bathroom stink worse than it had already.
"Okay."
Jean walked past him.
"Jean, wait!—" Harry reached out, grabbing him by the arm.
A stinging pain rippled up to his shoulder. He wrenched himself free, hissing, "Ow! Fuck!—" he clenched the arm with his own hand, panting.
"Sorry, I didn't think I grabbed you so hard…"
He hadn't. Harry knew he hadn't. So why?…
Suddenly his eyes lit up, like a terrible thought had just struck him. Terrible because he was going to hound Jean on this, and Jean knew this all too well, so he tried to get out as soon as he could.
"Thank you for the riveting conversation, Harry," Jean said with sarcasm so thick it hurt, "I'm going home because I'm sick. Do you have a problem with that?"
"Did you injure your arm?" Harry asked quickly.
"You probably did when you yanked it out of its socket." Jean scowled
But Harry didn't seem convinced. "Did something happen to your arm?"
"For fuck's sake — there's nothing wrong with my arm, now will you leave it? You grabbed me and it hurt, that's all."
"Why did it hurt?"
Jean frowned. "I'm not doing this with you."
"Doing what?"
"This dialogue tree bullshit. I'm not fucking entertaining it."
"That sharpener's missing a blade." He said
In Jean's loose fist was the metal gleam of a pencil sharpener. How had he even seen it…
Of course he'd see it. He's Harry.
"Thanks, Harry, I hadn't noticed." Jean shoved it into his trousers pocket sourly.
"Do you know where it is?"
"The blade? No."
"But I heard you using it in the office."
"That was a different sharpener."
"Where's that one."
"At my desk."
"So why do you have this one?"
"I don't know, because I like carrying useless shit around with me — call it a habit."
"Did it come broken?"
"Who knows!"
"Do you know?"
"What do you think?" Before Harry could answer, Jean raised a hand. "Don't even ask. No, I don't know why a cheap, mass produced office pencil sharpener is missing a part. Call the company if you care so much. Why not waste more time than you do already?"
Harry inspected the fingers on the raised hand. "Why are your fingers black? Is that graphite?"
"I said I have two sharpeners."
"You don't have two sharpeners I've never seen you with two."
"I have two." He seethed, a vein bulging on his temple.
Shit, cool it, Jean. Just walk away.
But he couldn't. He was stuck between the branches of a fucking dialogue tree and Harry was pouring fertiliser over the roots.
Harry was counting his every twitch, every gulp, every breath and using it to calculate his words. Harry saw all. If he could just stop talking about him like he's an innocence he's not anything he's just Harry Du Bois the chronic down-on-his-luck drunk with no family to speak of, possible pale-induced amnesia, a somewhat impressive bicep girth — would you shut up about Harrier Du Bois. Just shut up just STOP TALKING.
Jean's knees went weak. He grabbed the wall. Oxygen deprivation causes by excessive panting, caused by excessive stress. Harry was already rushing towards him, arms open — but Jean dodged out of the way.
"I'm going home," he pronounced with some difficulty, "go back to Kitsuragi and make out with him for all I care. I'm going… home."
He fell into the door, pushing it open. Recovering what strength he had reserved, he marched to the stairwell, then down to the bottom floor.
The other officers gave him cautious looks, like one would a madman on a rampage. Maybe he was. It took a few tries but he managed to stammer to one of them to let the captain know he wasn't feeling well.
Walking down the street he could hardly see where his feet was going. He could only trust they were leading him home.
Just tell him. Just tell him. It's what he wanted to hear to hear, so let him, why not? What was with the foreplay?
Harry was a cat and Jean was a rat. Cats like to play with their food. Simple.
Enough with this Harry bullshit. Who's Harry? There's no Harries here!!!
he scrubbed his face with his hands. shut up. keep it together. was this how Harry felt? No No No can't you go one fucking sentence without thinking of him. Shut up. Shut up about Harry. Just shut up.
As soon as he broke through the door to his apartment, he crawled to his bedroom, stripped off his shirt, and tossed it away. Next, he pulled off his boots, one by one. When he was done, he placed them at the foot off his bed. Briefly, he caught himself in the mirror. His skin was sagging at his waist, like an overstretched wool jumper. His collarbones jutted out sharply like horns either side of his shoulders. It was only his height that gave the illusion of strength, really. His spine was slightly curved and neck stuck out like a turtle's.
Next, he dragged himself to the gap between his wardrobe and his bed, fisher the gun from his waistband and holding it out in front of him. It was a good gun. A loyal gun. He looked up at the bottle of beer on the bed with a scowl. Harry might've taken a swig, but he wouldn't because he wasn't a coward.
His bony back tensed against the wall. For a while he just stared at the eggshell ceiling, looking at continents of water stains.
When he was finished, he shoved the business end of the gun into his mouth, aiming for the soft pallette near the back of his throat. His breath moistened the muzzle. He gulped a few times. For a while that was all there was, angry, heavy breathing, the chattering of his teeth against the gun, his dry eyes blinking. He squeezed them shut — imagined squeezing the trigger — imagined his brain splattering over the walls — imagined the neurons running out of his exposed skull — imagined Harry — imagined the clean up — imagined —
Fuck.
He yanked it out and fired at the wall opposite.
BANG!
A small cloud of dust exploded from the drywall. The pistol itself chased after it, hitting the wall with another BANG!
Jean was panting, staring at his work.
It was then he heard the door to his apartment burst open.
He didn't move.
Heavy feet jogged through the house, yelling his name, then they burst into the bedroom and stopped.
"What are you looking at?" Jean scowled, throat burning.
Harry panted, "I thought you were dead." he's not sure the limp limbed, sweating, bag of bone on the floor isn't. Harry spots the gun on the floor and beelines over to it, feeling the muzzle.
Then he turns to him with a look of sincere, sickening pity. "Jean…"
"I don't want to hear it," he growled, "especially not from you…"
Like a snake he snapped for the gun.
But Harry clutched it tightly to his chest, staring at him like it was the sorriest sight he had ever seen.
Jean was humiliated, plain and simple. "Fine," he scowled, "just stand there like an idiot then. What? Not used to seeing a suicidal asshole? Never looked yourself in the mirror? Not pretty, is it, partner?"
He felt the burning urge to berate Harry. Make fun of his stupid disco flairs, or the greasy sideburns Harry insisted made him look like Kras Masov.
Then, he wanted Harry to berate him the way Jean used to. Mock his attempt at sobriety, welcome the return of the animal he had always been. Maybe Harry's yank him to his feet, slam him against the wall and …
But he doesn't.
Harry just stands there, analysing.
He saw the patches of dirt on his skin, the little bumps of scars and burn marks. Trailing further upwards to his near-exposed ribcage, and at the center of this, his irregularly beating heart. Harry's eyes shone down his arm, counting the neat tally's of thin red lines. Finally, with pity, Harry's eyes met Jean's.
For a moment, a small, fleeting, insignificant moment, Jean wanted to kiss him.
"Just fuck off, Harry. What do you care? You don't give a shit for seven years and all of the sudden you're Captain mental health awareness."
He picked at the scabs on his face nervously. Why was he nervous? It's just Harry.
"I know I'm a mess. Sorry if that cramps your style."
He still wasn't saying anything. What was this guys problem? Was he stuck in some internal loop?
Finally, very slowly, Harry moved, squeezing in-between the space next to Jean. He pulled his legs to his chest, keeping the gun out of Jean's reach.
He was doing anything. He wasn't saying anything. Yet a warmth emitted from his body, and an odour. It was the odour of food you'd find under a fridge, yet it wasn't unwelcome. Their shoulders touched.
Fuck was he…
Jean quickly wiped his eyes with his fists, but without further warning he found himself bowing his head and sobbing with great, ugly heaving. The sound was strange, like that of a dying animal, and his whole body shook with the force of it. The heaving was separated by intervals of rapid gaspings of air, to be expelled but a second later as the noise continued.
Harry's paws rubbed his back soothingly. They were warm, calloused from weight lifting, and full of compassion. There there, they seemed to say, let it all out.
He wanted to cry. Part of him did at least. The fight between dignity and the wail that physically hurt to hold back was evidenced through occasional sharp whimpers that escaped.
Fuck, this was embarrassing. Was he crying because he was embarrassed? Was that a thing? Or was it just the feeling of another human being actually touching him and not feeling repulsed by the scars marking his skin, and being made to feel just as human as everybody else, even if just for a fleeting moment. Connection. That was all he wanted.
As his thoughts slowed down, his breathing settled too. His stomach hurt.
Harry retrieved a shirt from his Clothes Pile in the corner of the room and handed it to him. Jean obliged silently.
He climbed onto the edge of his bed and pulled the sweater over his head. It was slightly damp, but warm as it had been near the radiator.
He heard the tap run in the bathroom, then Harry returned with a glass of water which he set on Jean's bedside table.
He stood awkwardly in front of him, then rested his hand on his shoulder. Jean knocked it off as politely as he could.
"I'm fine." He said
"You sound like shit."
"I feel like shit. All the time." But not right now.
Harry drummed a rhythm on his knee. His dazzling blue eyes looked around the apartment skittishly. "I could sleep on your couch."
"What?"
"I said, I could sleep on your couch."
"Yeah, I heard you — no, you can't."
Jean stood, brushing himself off. "Don't you have a job to get back to?"
"Not really."
That was a lie.
"I'm still not all there in terms of…" Harry pointed to his head. "But when I was drunk or high, or drunk and high, I know you stayed with me, I know that. I'm guessing I wasn't happy with it either."
"You weren't." Oh boy he wasn't.
"So why did you stay?"
"Because you were my partner," was the easy answer, and it was the one he used, but…
"But it was more than that." Harry added
In silence, they both agreed to leave it at that.
"I'm going to stay whether you like it or not, Jean. You can curse me or call me shitkid, but I won't budge. I'm not leaving because I know you didn't leave me."
"That's real heartwarming, Harry." Jean snarked
"I mean, it's the least I could do, right? At the Whirling, you sat in that cafeteria wearing stupid wig for days to keep an eye on me."
Jean laughed. Completely by accident. It felt good.
"Hetero-sexual life partners, huh?"
So, that evening, Harry stayed in Jean's flat, stinking up the place. Like an annoying mosquito he hovered near Jean, checking up on him and talking to him.
As day melted into night, Harry set himself up on the sofa like he said he would, clearly having mastered the technique of sofa sleeping, and Jean laid beside him. Harry snored loudly. He mumbled in his sleep. Jean was used to it. He shifted closer.
He hadn't slept on a couch in a long time. Actually, he hadn't been that close to a man for a while. As sleep began to take it's hold, he knew they'd get up soon, and Harry would be gone again.
But at that moment, he felt such warmth.