MHA #15, Monday Evening

[pocketpretzels]

As had become habit over the past few months, on Monday evening Watts found himself seated at his kitchen table surrounded by a stack of paper as he wrote to folks back in Toronto.

The most detailed letter went to the Detective and Dr. Ogden, as per usual, given that the former had experience here and thus Watts could be entirely honest about the things he'd seen and done. Less detailed were the missives sent to George Crabtree and Mrs. Hart. And finally, this week, there was a short note he owed Miss Louise Cherry, who'd written him recently expressing doubt that this address was even real. So he was writing back to assure her that no, no one had killed him in a fit of exasperation and he was in fact alive and well, just in Baltimore rather than Toronto.

It was slow going, of course, as he was making an effort to keep his writing as legible as possible. Even then, there had been more than a few sheets he'd had to discard entirely, and the wastepaper basket was starting to fill up.

[ooc: for the neighbour! that he came over is ok to mention, details NFB please.]

Comments

[hasaknightjob]

It had been a weekend of a great deal of thinking, helped by a conversation with Stark, potentially a conversation Marc had with Liz, and a long chat he and Marc had had that afternoon. ("Since he moved in, Steven. How did you not notice?")

Which was why Steven was stood in front of Watts's door with a lump of fear very much in the pit of his stomach.

And still standing.

And continuing to stand.

And finally he forced himself to knock before he could give in to cowardice and race back into his flat.

[pocketpretzels]

Watts’s pencil slid across the paper as the knock startled him out of his concentration and he scowled at it briefly before standing up to go answer the door.

He wasn’t expecting anyone, so had no idea who it might-

“Steven!” the frustrated furrow to his brow evened out into please surprise. “Good evening.”

For the record, the suit jacket (and hat) had long since been discarded, tossed haphazardly over the back of a kitchen chair, though he still had on his waistcoat. Because naturally one would shed a few layers if all they were expecting was an evening at home alone.

[hasaknightjob]

It was very much Steven at the moment - in fact Marc had been firmly told to stay out of it because Steven felt this was his alone to handle - so he was dressed his his usual day to day wear.

"Evening," Steven said. "Er - do you have time? To talk? I would have called to ask but you don't have a mobile."

[pocketpretzels]

“I have been meaning to fix that…” Watts acknowledged. “But yes, of course, come on in. Can I get you…” he looked a little sheepish. “Well. Some water, I suppose. Or wine?” Coffee or tea were out of the question since he didn’t have a method for preparing either.

[hasaknightjob]

Alcohol was tempting but a clear head was needed. "Water's fine, cheers."

Steven came into Watts's flat and looked around to see any changes since the last time he'd been there.

[pocketpretzels]

There were not a whole lot of changes, mostly because Watts didn’t have a whole lot of possessions: probably the most noticeable difference was the bookshelf filled with an eclectic selection of both fiction and non fiction in a number of languages.

Watts puttered around in the kitchen, pouring a glass of water for both Steven and himself, and then gestured to the table (still littered with partially-written letters).

“Is this the sort of talk where we ought to be sitting down?” he asked.

[hasaknightjob]

Steven had gotten briefly distracted by the books, though he did have to squint to read the titles without his glasses on. The array of languages impressed him only - oh no. Was that French?

Fortunately Watts interrupted his train of thought before it could go any further.

"Possibly, yeah," Steven said, joining Watts in the kitchen. He didn't take a seat, though. Instead he stood as far to the side as the small space allowed, one hand rubbing nervously against the other. "Bit - bit of a serious chat, I'm afraid."

[pocketpretzels]

It was absolutely French. Luckily for Steven, Watts’ written French was far better than oral?

Watts swept the papers up into a haphazard pile on one corner of the table and then flopped down into one of the chairs, gesturing for Steven to go ahead and take one too.

“Go on, then.”

Steven’s nervousness was palpable, making Watts nervous in turn.

[hasaknightjob]

Steven remained standing, his nerves too much for him to feel like he could sit still.

He'd tried thinking of how to start the conversation what felt like hundreds of times before he'd come over. Now that he was in the reality of it none of the options were coming to mind. He decided to start talking and whatever came out was going to have to do.

"It's only that I feel like there needs to be a conversation," Steven said. "To - to clear things up. Regarding me and Marc."

[pocketpretzels]

Oh. Perhaps Marc had taken issue with the amount of time Steven had been spending around Watts lately.

“I hope he hasn’t gotten the wrong idea,” Watts said. “I know the two of you are- involved.”

[hasaknightjob]

"Well I don't know that he had the wrong idea so much as - " Steven started to say and then stopped when the rest of Watts's sentence hit him. Nerves were now completely derailed by confusion. "Involved?"

[pocketpretzels]

Watts nodded. “Courting? Or- dating, to use your term.”

[hasaknightjob]

Yeah, no, still took a second for Steven to process that because his mind was nowhere near that area - in many senses of the phrase, in fact.

"Dating?" Steven shook his head. "Marc and I aren't - I mean it'd be like dating family, first of all, so very much no. Never mind it's not even physically possible."

It was amazing how stunned confusion was pushing him right past where nerves had made him reluctant to go.

[pocketpretzels]

“I am afraid you’ve lost me,” Watts confessed, now thoroughly confused as that was not the reaction he had expected at all. “If he is not your paramour, then what? You’ve stated before that he is your priority.”

[hasaknightjob]

"He is," Steven said, because that was a truth he could cling on to in any circumstance. "I mean, again, to be very clear not my paramour. But yeah he is my priority. He always is. He always will be. He and I are - are a package deal, you see. We share everything."

Steven knew that wasn't nearly clear enough so he continued, gesturing towards himself. "Including our body."

[pocketpretzels]

"Your... what?" Watts said, still not feeling as if things were any clearer.

[hasaknightjob]

"Marc and I share our body," Steven said. He wished he knew a better way to explain it at all, let alone across whatever historic vocabulary divide there was for Watts. He tapped the side of his head with a finger. "He's in here with me. It's - it's like two souls but only one physical form."

[pocketpretzels]

Now, Watts preferred philosophy and fiction over science and medical journals, but even he had heard of the case of Christine Beauchamp in the United States. Still, it was quite one thing to read about it and yet another to apparently be confronted with it outright.

"I see," Watts said, clearly still digesting this information.

[hasaknightjob]

Well it wasn't as though Steven had expected Watts to be thrilled about the information.

"I know it's a lot," Steven said. He glanced towards the door, wondering at what point Watts was going to ask him to leave. "It was for me as well when I learned. But that's why - it felt wrong not telling you. I am sorry about that. It's only we've had to be careful. Back home you say you've heard from a god and that's almost normal. Say you've got a little American man living in your head and you can get locked away."

[pocketpretzels]

Okay, that startled a laugh out of him, which to his credit he managed to clamp down on quickly.

“I’m sorry!” he said hurriedly, not wanting Steven to think he was poking fun, even as this was a lot to digest. “I’m not- I don’t mean to- I just- of all the things you could have said, I was not expecting ‘little American man’.”

[hasaknightjob]

Laughing was better than disgust or horror at least?

"No, it's all right," Steven said. "I didn't either. I mean he's actually same size as me since - " again he gestured towards himself to indicate the body " - but, you know. Bit of a learning curve when you find out about it. He was a voice before he was anything."

[pocketpretzels]

Llewellyn Watts was a philosopher at heart, with all sorts of ideas regarding what constituted ‘personhood’.

Not to mention he’d had his own experiences with disgust and horror being leveled at him because of some aspect of his person that he could not change.

This was new, yes, and not something he entirely understood, but there were plenty of things out in the world that puzzled him, what was one more? If anything, what hurt was Steven taking so long to decide to tell him, but even that on some level he could understand.

“So. How long have you…”

[hasaknightjob]

"All my life if you mean 'been'," Steven said. The nerves were coming back now. "A few months if you mean how long have I known. Not long before we moved here, actually."

[pocketpretzels]

He hadn’t actually known which he’d meant when he asked the question, so he appreciated the answer being given for both.

“So,” he said slowly, “why tell me now, then?”

[hasaknightjob]

"A lie of not telling someone is still a lie, isn't it?" Steven said, the question rhetorical. He looked down at his hands, not having courage enough for eye contact. "Even if there's good reason at the start it gets worse the longer you wait, doesn't it? I didn't mean for it to be so long but we kept meeting and I liked chatting with you and... It was nice to just be me. Even though I can't be."