contact part deux

[bouchonne]

if this were modern times byerly would probably make you listen to total eclipse of the heart before you were able to leave a message

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[bouchonne]

Hm.

[ He leans into the kiss, but his tone is dry when he says: ]

If our positions had been reversed, what sorts of things do you think I would have done?

[ Things far less dignified than anything Bastien had just listed off. ]

[cozen]

You would have fallen on your knees and cried into my stomach.

[ Dryness heard, dryness acknowledged. He knocks his nose against Byerly's. ]

But you'd have looked like a painting while you did it.

[bouchonne]

Oh, so my good looks would keep me from being pathetic? Shall I point out how good-looking you are?

[cozen]

[ There's a brief pause, serious in character, because he does see it. The hypocrisy of it. Of what he considers beneath him not being beneath Byerly — when all the love stories about nobles and commoners promised it would be the other way around.

But he comes out of the pause with some cheek: ]

Yes.

[bouchonne]

[ All right, then: ]

I would devour you from nose to toes.

[ His wriggle against Bastien is a little less snuggly and a little more lascivious. ]

And if we weren't in front of our children, I'd say more about what it does to me when I see you on your knees.

[cozen]

You can tell me later,

[ is a promise, half-laughed.

The mirth lingers even as he grows more serious, ducking his head and pressing the remnants of his smile into Byerly's neck, just below his ear, so he's talking against his skin. ]

I'm sorry, mon cher. If I knew it was happening — if a spirit stood here and told me I could keep you or I could keep my pride — I would choose you. But I don't always see it so clearly.

[bouchonne]

I'm hardly one to scold you for being too proud.

[ Though their pride is of very different sorts, isn't it? Part of what makes this all so complicated. Byerly is cursed by his perverse spirit of rebellion - his refusal to bow to propriety, his need to show that he's better than the standards of decency and morality that govern others' lives. Bastien, though...He wants to win the game. If, under pain of death, they were commanded to dance, Bastien would likely try to perform a jig that would put everyone else to shame; Byerly would look for a rock he could use to smash his own foot.

Funny, isn't it? How the Marcher became so ludicrously Orlesian, and the Orlesian became so very Fereldan? ]

I suppose all I can ask for would be that you would see it. Even if it took some time. But that eventually, you'd realize that perhaps it's worth it to be pathetic.

[cozen]

[ Bastien's nod is pressed into Byerly's neck, too. His arms tighten around him. He's never wanted Byerly to settle for all he can ask. He's wanted to be everything — or if he couldn't, to be cool about Byerly getting anything he wasn't elsewhere —

It is what it is. He is what he is. He can only try. ]

Maybe I should tattoo it on my hand.

[ He does not sound especially amused by his own joke. ]

[bouchonne]

Absolutely not.

[ Byerly laces his fingers through Bastien's, as though to protect those hands. ]

These are far too comely to be marred in that way. And I trust that it's not needed.

[ He hopes that it's not needed. ]

[cozen]

[ Is it true? Should it be?

He smiles anyway. ]

You are too good for me sometimes.

[bouchonne]

Absolute nonsense.

[ He squeezes Bastien's hand. ]

I'm lucky you give me the time of day. A maudlin, penniless wreck like me, and you such a talented and sensible and lovable man.

[cozen]

You're a puzzle box, [ Bastien counters, ] and a prince.

[ Neither literal. Obviously. ]

You are the misunderstood artist of half of my dreams and you are the kind, gentle love from the other half, too. And you forgot me, [ does hurt, his voice quieter, bravado set aside to be a little pathetic, ] but you've made a place in your heart for me so big your head couldn't paper it over. So I'm lucky.