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Ness hums in the kitchen as he washes dishes, which is really no more than half a set of porcelain tableware. Kaiser stands in the doorway with his mouth shut, so that he may for a moment take him in that way; as himself as he will ever be— wordlessly voicing a tune that exists to them now, at the end of the world, only within his head— because people are always the most of themselves when they are alone.
Kaiser is the sort of person who both knows and exudes this quality especially so.
And so he knows most of all to appreciate the gift of getting to witness it himself. The window before the sink allows for the gentle gold of the sun as it sinks low, and it catches playfully upon stray hairs that stick up from Ness’ head, and the edges of the clothing he wears. If he had it his way, Kaiser might like to linger in this moment forever— where he himself could cease to exist in the eyes of the world with no one to perceive him, while simultaneously experiencing the privilege of observing the person who matters most simply indulging in the natural act of life.
But then he shifts his weight and something creaks— whether it be the doorframe or the floorboards, he wishes he knew what to curse— and Ness knows he’s there. For a fleeting moment, Kaiser’s heart sinks in such an inexplicable manner that it briefly drags his attention away, for what could possibly be so weighing about the loss of a simple moment? Somewhere in the distance, though, chimes tinkle softly in the wind with a special kind of loveliness that has that intrusively awful feeling melting away.
When Kaiser was experiencing the very beginnings of life— and also the worst it had to offer— he was accustomed to the hate of man and the harshness of the outer world. But only a certain type of people liked to keep chimes. Those were the people who would let him root through their garbage, and would sometimes peer at him through windows with a kind of shallow sadness in their eyes. Perhaps they’d leave out a water bottle or something similar for him too on some days, making things just a little bit easier.
These were the magical sort of people like Ness was— though of course Ness trumped them by far, as he was the only one who'd done something beyond pitying him through a window— but ultimately, the light tinkling of chimes spoke to Kaiser of goodness, and with their comforting and nostalgic sound went his worries.
Ness doesn’t turn from what he’s doing, but when his voice reaches Kaiser’s ears, there’s a certain warmth that sparks the strangest sensation akin to homesickness in his chest.
“Is everything alright?” is all he asks, and Kaiser's thoughts momentarily stumble over themselves as he tries to understand what might've prompted it. Is he alright? Well, the world had ended, and they were living without human connection or utility. He wouldn't call himself alright. But at the same time, he has found himself happier in this life. He didn’t care for other socialization outside of Ness and did not miss it, and without the pressures to be something great to prove to the world that he was human too, the horrible tension within him had finally given way to nearly-comfortable relief. He would almost consider himself glad to be where he was.
Perhaps sensing his confusion, Ness clarifies this abstract thought with an amused, “With the birds, I mean. Are they all fed and alright?”
Another dish clinks against the edge of the sink as the fog in Kaiser’s head clears, and he remembers where he’s come from. The feathers of caught quail and chicken drift through his mind— although strangely wistful and somewhat unrealized— and he pieces back together what should have only been a few moments ago and not nearly so hard to recall.
“Oh,” he says dumbly, still being drawn in by the evening light softening Ness’ edges. “Yes, I fed them. They were all still there and alright.”
Any attempt at picturing them further is gently dispersed by the quiet tinkling of chimes outside, preventing him worrying about silly things like head counts and eggs any longer. Instead when he blinks, the back of his eyelids remain bright with the evening light of the window before him, and the imagination he tries to use to fish out his memories is blinded just the same.
It seemed as though in this moment everything just so happened to be right in the world, and they were doing Kaiser the natural favor of urging him to indulge in that mundane joy while he had it. His simple worries could hold, for everything was as it should be.
“That’s good,” Ness hums warmly, and it carries the same richness that his tune from earlier was composed of. But that’s all he says, and suddenly Kaiser’s chest sinks once more at the prospect of this moment with him ending— as though he didn’t spend every single day with him just like this anyway.
So, before he can think on it, his mouth is open and there’s a distantly heard, "My hair is getting a little long,” leaving his lips— vulnerable in nature although simplistic-seeming in content.
Ness pauses the movement of his hands as those faraway chimes sing in the wind to fill the space, before drying them and giving a good-natured, “Then I should help you cut it, yeah?”
This was the predicted response, of course. For him to drop what he was doing to help give Kaiser the luxury of groomed hair. It seems so silly, worrying about such a thing at the end of the world. Kaiser no longer cares for his appearance— not as he once did, standing before his mirror and loathing his reflection’s ties to his soul. Now when he sees himself, he thinks this is me in a more neutral manner, more as proof of life than as cause to show it. Now, when he asks Ness to cut his hair, it is to feel the warmth and gentleness of his hands rather than to cultivate an appearance that would prove to him he’s worthy of those feelings.
And suddenly, after apparently giving back his own ‘yeah’ that he does not recall hearing, Kaiser finds himself sitting on the old creaky wood of the porch in front of the bench swing with Ness’ fingers carding through his hair, tediously trimming nothing of real consequence off of sections that really didn’t need a cut in the first place. He doesn’t say anything as he does it— gently pulling his bangs away from his face to thin them out a little— but rather starts humming again; soft and would-be-imperceptible were it not for the fact that he was so close.
The wind is the only other sound as the sun puts itself to sleep, along with the gentle clinking of metal that has continued its steady sound. Ness’ voice is quiet enough that sometimes it gets lost within those other noises, and it makes for what’s possibly the most calming song Kaiser’s ever heard. But then his chest is tightening again with something he still can’t understand, and he feels a sense of something similar to impending doom— as though the worst is about to come to pass. Compelled by this strange affliction he finds his mouth opening, the words ‘I think there are things I want to tell you’ leaving his lips before he can even understand why.
Ness just continues the soothing work of his hands, huffing something of light amusement through his nose before giving a quiet, “Okay, I’m listening," back.
Kaiser swallows then, unsure of what exactly is causing this great distress, but something pushes him to say things he never thought he would admit all the same. ‘You are my favorite something’ he thinks, because he knows not the word. Friend, probably— but felt all too immature and lacking in the depth he knows, so he says nothing of it at all. Instead, what he does know how to express:
“I’m glad you’re here with me.”
Ness makes another light noise that indicates something about this was funny, and answers with a good-natured, “Where else would I go?” Kaiser himself didn’t particularly find it amusing. Instead, a sickness settled in his stomach at the idea of him going elsewhere, with an intensity that spoke of experience even though things were just fine.
“You know what I mean.”
Nothing but the wind and the chimes and the hands in his hair, before a simple, “Yes, I think I do.”
He doesn’t, though, because Kaiser doesn’t himself. And normally it wouldn’t be unheard of for Ness to understand something about him when he himself doesn’t— but this is different. And so, under the influence of this overwhelming sense that he won’t always have this, he strives to clarify.
“The things you do for me,” he begins slowly, the act of gratitude awkward on his tongue. “mean more to me than I let on. I’m… sorry for not showing that I appreciate it— you— as much as I probably… should.”
It’s obviously quite the struggle for him to get out, and if he could see Ness’ face, he’s sure the revelation would make him smile.
He licks his lips, something in his heart urging him on. There are many things he would like to say, and many things his worries warn he’ll regret omitting when he’s not here. Still, he settles on the most vague of renditions that doesn’t quite emulate the truth of what he feels, for fear of Ness’ sure discomfort and horror. Maybe in the past he would not have cared how he felt, but when you’re stuck with one person until the end of your time on earth, suddenly simple discomfort is more imposing of an issue.
“You matter more than anything else does to me,” he says quietly, too afraid of verbally admitting how wholly he’s harnessed his hopes upon another, and to his great relief, Ness doesn’t even stop his cutting. And maybe it’s not as surprising a thing now, when he was also really the only thing that could matter to Kaiser— for even he was not the sort of monster that could put an object above a man like him— but he had been just the same before the world ended. “And I think I’ll be okay with living like this, if I get to spend my life with you.”
The innuendo within his words is not at all subtle, and Kaiser doubts the possibility of it having gone over his head, but Ness says nothing of it. Instead, as he waits sickly with baited breath, he makes the last few touches to his already-fine hair, before Kaiser hears the creak of the swing as he leans back.
“I think I’ll be okay too. I'm glad at least I get to be with you,” he finally returns, although Kaiser recognizes it for the lie it is. Ness was and always had been an especially rich soul, filled with love and life and all the things Kaiser didn’t especially possess. He missed the world and people and family and friends and society and everything, and that was always going to be true. And that’s a bit strange, for Ness never was a liar. He would try and say the things that would appease him most, maybe, but he would never lie to do so. He wouldn’t tell Kaiser what he wanted to hear if it wasn’t just a little true. That was just not who he was.
But the moment passes and Kaiser can question him no longer, and worse than that: there’s still much he would like to say. Instead it jumbles up in his head and gets caught in his throat before he can force it out, and with the task at hand having been finished, he hears the tired groan of old wood as Ness rises to his feet. Disappointment like no other washes over him, accompanied by the oddly familiar sensation that he’s let something he knew how to hold slip away from him anyway. He decides not to turn and watch him leave, and not to follow him in right away. Instead, he soaks in the odd silence filled with only the wind and the retreating sound of his steps, taking a moment to linger in that feeling.
—
The room is dark, and the world is silent aside from his own breathing, and the life behind him. There is a hand upon his shoulder. It is warm and steady and still, and that is all it is.
It was only two whole nights into their life after the world had ended, that one of them shuffled shamefully into the other's room with a blanket and mumbled their hopes of not sleeping alone, for fear of the danger outside. It was about a week more before Ness placed a checking hand on his shoulder the first time before they went to sleep, as if he feared that if he couldn't feel the fact that Kaiser was still there, he might one day wake up to find him gone.
And here they are, several months later, with Ness’ hand still gentle and warm against his arm. It gives Kaiser his only taste or what it would feel like to be loved enough that it follows you into the night; with someone who wants to hold you close because you are warm and alive and so are they, and that spark within you just so happens to be their favorite.
You're my favorite something, Kaiser thinks again, once again unable to find a word that properly emulates what that something is. Then, as he feels Ness’ steady breath ghost along his spine: And I'm sorry I want you like a lover.
How awful was it of him, to take the genuine and necessary nature of companionship at the end of the world, and still think I want more. How vile was it of him to be unable to seek and give support, and nothing more. To be a friend and stop there?
Was it even real? He hadn't ever felt these things before the world fell apart. Was the omnipresent fear of everything coercing him into mistaking dependence for something more in order to better enjoy that attachment? Or was it something more pathetic: fearing his life could come to an end at any moment, he so desperately yearns to experience this extra great and powerful form of love that everyone speaks of at least once, that he's hitched all those lofty human hopes upon the only person he could.
Or maybe he had, he tries to tell himself. Maybe he just hadn't the means of recognizing it. Maybe he just hadn't known. Maybe it just took some fear to give someone as abnormal as him the right push, and the way he felt was still something authentic.
I am human, he tries to remind himself, I am. If he was, then it would be okay to feel all these horrible, wonderful, awful things— because that's what humans did. But, the unfeeling, unthinking, unliving— he would not call them undead, for that would imply that if one of them got turned it would be this frightening and finite thing— roamed outside numbering him one-hundred to one, and somehow, as one of the few people who have made it this far at the end of the world, he is still the odd one out. Still the outsider, still the one who is different.
How is that any fair? He had the balls to do it, the will to keep on living. He fought for his right to be human when so many others fell prey to the disease that took that from them, or simply chose to give that right up out of fear. Kaiser didn't. Kaiser was still here, still kicking, still thriving, heart still beating. Shouldn't that mean something? Shouldn't he finally be allowed to finally taste the joys of human experience? Hasn't he earned it?
You are my favorite something Kaiser thinks pathetically, and I want you to hold me and to touch me and to feel me and to love me.
He should be better than this. But he’s not. He’s not, and he feels the desire to be held so viscerally now that he’s gotten a taste of it with Ness’ hand on his shoulder that it begins to hurt— because he’s so close to experiencing this wonderful thing we call love, and yet can’t imagine how to even begin feeling it without it being physical. He just wouldn’t know.
Maybe he already has it. That wouldn’t be so far out of the question. Maybe that’s what the hand on his shoulder was, and the neat length of his hair and his patched up clothes and his dinner every night and everything Ness didn’t have to do for him, and maybe he just didn’t know how to recognise it.
But, of course, he does recognise it. He knows that’s what that is— he’s not stupid, and wouldn’t do Ness the disservice by denying it. But he doesn’t know how to feel that brand of love— had never learned it, never felt it— and he's so sorry he can't just take what Ness has given him and be grateful.
I'm sorry I want you like a lover.
Was that even true? Kaiser doesn't know. He just wants to be held close, so that he may feel this wonderful thing in a way he can finally experience for his own— physically and tangibly, so there can be no mistaking it.
And as Kaiser’s throat constricts tight in the silence of their room, it’s suddenly almost as if Ness has, by some impossibility, read his mind— because all of a sudden there's a soft shifting against sheets, and the checking hand at his shoulder slides down to curl around his torso and pull him back just enough that he can feel the warmth of his chest.
Kaiser goes still. It's so insignificant, so mundane in the grand scheme of things— but he still feels his chest tighten and his heart stop nonetheless. He doesn't dare even breathe too strongly, lest the rise and fall of his chest make Ness realize who he's holding and reconsider. From within him blooms this impossible and foreign warmth that mingles with the warmth of Ness’ hands and arms and chest and body and everything— and he’s stunned.
Ness simply tips his forehead to rest at his shoulder, nose and lips somewhere near the crook of his neck. Each breath tickles the skin there and makes Kaiser shiver, and with it his heart sparks alight with this childish sort of joy. Suddenly his mind is flooded with all the other things he wants like this, because he’s always been a selfish man. He wants to see him smile because Kaiser has told him something grossly sweet, wants to see a flush on his cheeks out of silly embarrassment, wants to hear the quickened beating of his heart, wants to press kisses to his eyelid and nose and cheeks and hands and everything, because he’s gone so long not quite knowing what this feeling might be like. It’s almost giddy in nature, filling him with thoughts of see, see, this is what it feels like! This is what it feels like, isn't it incredible? I knew it would be!
And it is. So much so that suddenly his heart sinks. It's wonderful, so unbelievably wonderful that it's impossible. Ness would never. Not without invitation.
There was this sort of line between them— something that they looked at and agreed you can push this, but never cross it. Push it they had— plenty, even— but it was always respected. And even if Ness had taken Kaiser’s words on the porch as moving that line, he would never explore it without being certain.
It’s impossible, he thinks— knows— and the warm tightening in his chest turns into something constricting. Impossible in such a way that even he could not trick himself into believing. He knows Ness, and he knows this is something he would not do. Not to someone like him, who had spent years teaching him that such a thing— pressing too close without being beckoned first— was forbidden.
Why did I do that? He thinks pitifully, voice small and weak even in his own head. The world was so grand, so vast, that it was almost silly to dwell on mundane insecurities like that. Who knows when the next time Ness would ask to comb his hair and sit close enough to feel his body heat and ask him about himself without being prompted?
The answer was never, because Kaiser had taught him not to. He’d broken that habit very early on.
And that’s how Kaiser knows he would never do this, either. Because if he felt he couldn’t even run his fingers through his hair before being asked to, in what world would he pull him close?
He wouldn’t, and that’s why Kaiser regrets pushing him away so deeply. Not because he mourns the loss of the closeness that could have been normal for them— though he certainly does— but because it would have allowed him to believe in this fantasy a moment longer.
Just as he knows the gentle tinkling of chimes somewhere off on the wind have no explanation, he knows deep within his heart that his Ness would not. He closes his eyes anyway, and decides to indulge in its loveliness all the same.