A/N: One of two silly little things I wrote for Elliot's birthday on August 8th (Both scrapped up from old ideas wasting away in half written documents on my computer) This one involves my usual mindless angst that I pull out of who knows where. I hadn't been planning on posting this on anywhere other than tumblr, but I sort of figured 'why the heck not?'. So here it is. I hope you enjoy, and all reviews are appreciated.
Gone:
There's a piano playing. Sunlight streams through the open window, and some maids are bustling about outside the music room, gossiping together quietly. Two figures sit at the piano, one playing, the other surveying approvingly.
"Happy birthday, Elliot."
…
He should have known.
Should have known that he was dreaming.
That everything he wants, depends on, needs…is gone.
A fantasy.
They are all fantasies.
Childish dreams and nothing but fiction—things that never will be and never can be reality.
He can't comprehend why these dreams still haunt him nightly.
Why it still hurts.
Why does it still hurt?
He has numbed himself to the rest of the frivolities of the world, the dark, the pure, the happiness—nothing matters anymore, and yet the hurt remains, and he doesn't understand why.
Why can't it just stop?
He sighs into his palm, the hand that stopped him from crying out but moments ago in his anger. The vase he smashed remains on the floor in a pool of water, flower stems, and broken fragments of white ceramic stained in blood.
He's even numb to the pain in his hand, which is steadily blotting his sleeve with crimson, and yet this feeling in his chest—
He staggers his way back to the edge of his bed, suddenly resigned, rubbing his temples with his uninjured hand and a sigh.
He wishes he didn't have to deal with this. The random pangs of guilt or grief or just overall fear… Those are hard enough to put up with. Enough vulnerability. He doesn't need these dreams as well.
These warm dreams that encased him in buried feelings, memories, and smiles—
He thought he put them behind him, but here they are, resurfacing in his dreams…
Yet he knows why today of all days they were at their worst.
He leans down to pick up one of the flowers he crushed under his foot in his outrage, twirling it mindlessly between his finger and thumb.
They had been his favorite flower.
The thought sends a chill up his spine because he knows he's breaching his own rules, and he is an off-limits topic—
Statice.
The stem crumbles under his touch, and he smiles bitterly as he stands, reaching down for a handful more of the flowers as he does so.
Elliot would appreciate them—even such a small token as this for his birthday—and Leo really has nothing more to give.
Nothing left to give.
His smile falters, then disappears.
But no.
No. He's not Leo the valet anymore. Not Elliot's Leo.
Not anymore.
His chest aches as the flowers fall through his fingers, scattering again on the ground.
Somewhere deep down, he knew it wouldn't stop.
Not ever.
Not while he still loved him.
"I miss you."