Okay, uhm... so this one jumped me about an hour ago. A little Ambreigns for you but not really slash. Maybe slightly slashy themes. My muse thought it would be fun to paint an image about the boys making the first step to become friends... or more. It wanted out. So I just wrote it down while watching an amusingly bad animal horror movie. I won't assume liabilty for this one :3

Have fun! (... I hope... ;)

I'm fine, you say.

The words leave your mouth, empty behind the veil of a smile you give the world around you. And I can see how fine you are. I can see how that smile you wear never really reaches your eyes or the way it dies on your lips when you think no one is looking. I can see the wariness, the loneliness.

But I see because I watch you. I always have ever since the first moment I laid my eyes on you but you don't seem to notice it. Me. Maybe because you are used to people looking at you but not seeing? It is what you think, isn't it? That people don't care?

I'm fine.

I wonder what has caused the void in you. Because it is there, isn't it? That nothing? All the being loud and big-mouthed, the antics you put up, your making people believe that you fear nothing and no one... it is just a thick wall that keeps the world away from what there is hidden behind and maybe even yourself from falling into the dark hole within yourself. You are far more insecure and doubting than people would ever guess. It is safely hidden behind that wall but I have caught glimpses.

One by one the others leave the side street to go back into the pub, the sound of their loud chatting like blinking neon-lights compared to your quietness as you stay behind in the half-light, a cigarette sticking out from the corner of your mouth. A clap on your shoulder and you throw a smart-ass comment as one of them makes a joke and again you smile. And again I can see how fine you are. How you pull your shoulder away from that hand as if its touch burns you. I can see how unsubstantial that thing you sell them as a smile is and how your eyes don't shine.

And then the side street is empty. Almost. I am still here, watching you from afar from a corner that lies in the dark yet not really hidden but you still haven't noticed me. You lean back against the wall and take the cigarette from your mouth. A pale cloud of smoke rises as you exhale a sigh and dip your head back against the wall as Moxley goes... and leaves Jonathan Good behind.

Quietness spreads. Whether this quietness brings ease to you or only makes the white noise in you louder... I don't know. A void is a soundproof room. Whether you sleep in it or scream, no one will hear.

The cigarette drops from your fingers, comes to lie on the ground. And you release another heavy breath of air into the night while you roll your head slightly against the rough surface, giving me an answer to the question if the quietness brings you ease. It does not. Something brushes against the insides of the shell you're hiding in and leaks through tiny cracks in it. Cracks you're probably not even aware of.

I don't know what has made you be like you are but it feels as if it's old, lingering over you, in you like a shadow. It is etching lines into your features like scar tissue crystallizing over wounds, always showing up when your guard slips. Like right now. It is visible even in the fuzzy light of the street lamp.

After a long moment you move, crossing your arms over your chest but you remain right where you are. There is the sound of cars driving by on the main street and the music that seeps through the closed door, dull and somehow far away even if it's only a few steps it would take to dive right back into an ocean of vibrant life again, yet obviously you don't want to be dragged away by its clashing waves. It can be choking, can't it? I know the feeling. It is like drowning.

We have barely talked to each other in those few weeks since our first hello. Maybe because we are two worlds colliding. Two alpha males. Moxley is loud, extroverted. An attention whore. I'm not. And I'm sure that although Moxley isn't just a role you're playing, the real Jon behind him is much quieter and much more sensibel than people grant you.

I guess it is what has caught my attention in the first place, the contradiction that you are. In the beginning you intrigued me and over the time it has become fascination. You are like a spark that can flare up any moment and die any moment. I have seen it so many times over the past few weeks already and in those moments I'm rooted in it, transfixed and watching the crash. You are like the universe unfurling, a blinding collision of unfiltered energy and I can't look away.

Yeah, I guess it is a good way to describe you. You are unfiltered energy, unpredictable and volatile in your nature, sometimes wayward and... I want to touch it, this energy. I want to reach into it and find out what is there in its core. I want to find out who you really are, want to already for a while now but the moment has never been there. But it is now, isn't it?

And so I walk over and you only seem to notice me as I come to stand right in front of you. You crack your eyes open and glance at me. A second... two... before you recognize me as that guy you barely ever have talked to but unlike you meet all the others, you don't give me that smile you use as a shield.

Joe, you murmur and I nod.

Your arms drop to your side and your eyes are weary as you push away from the wall and look at me fully, the usually clear blue dimmed and for another moment we just gaze at each other in silence. I've come over to you to talk to you but now as I stand here... it feels as if not saying anything at all will bring us closer than disturbing the quietness.

You look at me and I look at you and I'm sure that you see me, too, just like I see you. Something shifts in the air between us and suddenly you feel familiar, as if we have known each other for years already and I don't know if I should put the label funny or frightening on whatever just has happened.

I'm fine, you tell me then, giving an answer to a question I have never asked.

You are not I want to say but why telling you something you know yourself better than anyone else? Instead I do what I maybe should not... but there is no resistance as I pull you into an hug that is loose enough for you to step away if you want to yet tight enough to make you feel that I mean it. You don't step away. You don't even tense. You just let me do this.

I am fine, you repeat in a faraway voice that is as empty as the words.

Word which fade off in the nightly air. Words which make me only tighten my hold on you until the hug becomes an embrace. A sigh close to my ear... and I can feel you move eventually, your arms circling my waist... your head that finds a home on my shoulder. I don't know what is happening and why it is like this but it feels right and the way you hold on to me and let me hold you so close susurrates that you feel the same.

Someone has told me once that when something feels right, it'll be tangible. It's going to pull insistently, tug at your sleeve like an annoying five-year old, wave its arms until you look at it. And when you finally understand it, even if it's crazy, everything will stand still and make sense for a minute. Suddenly you'll have the last word in the irritating crossword puzzle. You'll fill it in, stand back and acknowledge, and everything's going to be right where you put it. And then everything will be clear. And you won't know when that will happen, or if it ever will... but when it feels right, you'll know. And this very moment... I do know. It's like having found something that I haven't even known I am missing.

I am here, I whisper and I almost miss your thanks because it is barely a breath.

We remain like this for a long moment until the door opens and breaks the moment. We step apart, both letting go only reluctantly though. I don't know where the path on which we have stepped tonight leads us but I hope that we will walk it side by side from now on and that every step will bring us closer. Because... it feels right.

The loudness is back as people flow out into the open like a tide, surrounding us and their chatting is once more like bright neon-lights that shred the quietness apart. But as we look at each other there is this one light that shines so much brighter in its silence, ghosting on your lips like a gem that couldn't be more real.

I'm fine, you say and for the first time I believe it... because you are believing it, too...

- Fin -

Got some words for me?