It wasn't that they hadn't tried. They had, a few times: tried living together, tried living in the same house but different wings, tried having apartments on the same block. It never worked. They couldn't sustain it, couldn't keep it going. Three weeks, a month, six months in, something broke and they ended up snarling at each other across the kitchen table, saying things they'd never say otherwise, storming out on the other and slamming doors because they couldn't maintain anything more than what they had.
Arthur wanted — well, he wanted a lot of things. He wanted Dom to be happy. He wanted Mal to come back to life. He wanted Ari to quit dreamwork and go back to school. He wanted his mother to heal, he wanted his father alive again, he wanted his sister to come back to him. He wanted his accent to disappear for good and he wanted to be someone else and he wanted to start his whole life over again. And he wanted Eames in his bed and in his life, and it would never, ever happen, just like all those other things he wanted would never, ever happen because the universe doesn't bend itself to one man's wishes.
And so, when Eames showed up for the Fischer job, Arthur just…didn't try. He smiled and condescended and argued and flirted with Eames, like always, but when those moments came, the times when normally he would make a move, or let his hand show, or imply that advances would be welcomed, he just didn't. He let the moments pass, let Eames move away, let the standing invitation remain standing and empty. He didn't find Eames's hotel room. He didn't text Eames his address. He didn't stock up on supplies and he didn't touch Eames more than necessary and he didn't shove him up against a wall and bite him like he wanted to so fucking much. He didn't do any of the things he wanted to do, because what was the point?
Instead, Arthur kissed Ariadne in the dream. He thought, maybe, it might be the same. Or not the same, because Eames was incomparable, but it might be enough to…but it wasn't, and Ari wasn't interested anyway, and Arthur pulled her aside at the baggage claim, later, to apologize. She seemed to understand, and Arthur almost told her to quit and go home, build towers and paint pictures and never go under again. But she patted his arm like a sister would, and spun away to talk mazes with Yusuf as they shared a cab somewhere.
Arthur's bags were last, as usual, and Eames stood idly, still wincing a bit from a dream wound, exhausted and perfect, slouching by the carousel. "Plans, pet?" He was beautiful, and Arthur wanted, so much, but he had to be smarter this time, had to do the better thing, had to get what he needed not what he wanted.
"Yes." He wanted to shake hands, at least, but that brief whisper of skin-on-skin was enough to shake his will, to open his mouth and prepare the words. Only the memory of the last screaming fight in Paris kept him from asking. Instead, it was, "Nice to see you, Mr. Eames. Bye," and Arthur spun on his heel like a good soldier and strode away, just below the speed level that would be considered fleeing.
And then, because he couldn't stay there very long, Arthur went home.
—-
Home, in this case, was his mother's house in Indiana. It looked the same as it always had: a hideous brick block built in the sixties without a single thought to beauty. He'd begged,begged her to move. "I've got the money, Ma, you can live anywhere you want," but she refused. She'd lived there long enough to get comfortable and she had no intention of leaving.
"Artie, honey!" She burst through the door, a wide grin and curly dark hair and looking healthier than she had in years. "What a surprise, I wish you'd called!" Wrapped him in a bear hug, trapped and confined him, and he found that for the first time it didn't bother him. She looked good: gained a little weight back, seemed to have gotten some sun, and walking on her own two feet. He loosed his arms and hugged her back, the top of her head just touching the point of his chin.
"Hi, Ma," pressed a kiss to her head.
She pulled back, that same radiant smile on her face. "Are you hungry? I've got some soup I can warm up, and bread in the oven, and it's Passover next week if you can stay."
"Yeah, of course I'll stay, Ma, if you've got room for me."
She led him in by the arm, like he was a little boy caught in a schoolyard scuffle again. "I've always got room for you, honey, and you'll be happy, Angela's coming, too, she's met some boy in Long Island and she's bringing him home to meet us," talk talk talk and Arthur closed his eyes, surfed on the sound of home. The creaks in the crappy floorboards, the hiss of the cheap air conditioner, the crackle of the occasionally-working refrigerator. He made lists in his head as his mother prattled on: repairs to make, things to replace altogether, things to wash and clean and mend. It would be good, for a while, to mend instead of tear.
She stirred soup on the stovetop, pointed him to the kitchen chair that had always been his. "Where's that handsome boy you brought home last time, the limey?"
"Ma, don't call him a limey, it's—" he broke off, because he'd honestly forgotten about bringing Eames to Passover three years ago. It'd been a good patch in their last attempt at something real, a period of time where they'd been half-living together and working for different people. It had been going so well, Arthur had let himself hope, and he'd brought Eames home to meet the family. He'd completely put it out of his mind. "We, uh, broke up. I guess. It's not important, Ma, what's your doctor's name?"
"Doctor, piffle," she waved her free hand at him, "I'm healthy as a horse now, honey, don't fret. What happened with the boy?"
"Ma—" he was not going to have this conversation with his mother. It wasn't going to happen.
"Did you have a fight? Your father and I fought like wildcats, you know, but we always made up like wildcats too." She winked at him, and he was absolutely not going to listen to his mother talk about having sex with his father.
"No, Ma, we. Well, yeah, we fought, but—"
"Was it your fault?" Kept stirring, didn't let him answer. "If it was your fault, honey, just say so. You've got my pride, az och un vai! The times I had to crawl back to your father and beg him to forgive me, ah, Artie." Sipped a bit of soup, frowned. "Artie, honey, hand me the paprika will you? In the little red tub on the—"
"I know where it is, Ma." He reached into the very top of the counter and found it. Returned to his seat and fiddled idly with his cufflinks.
"You dress so snappy now, my little boy, so handsome. That boy, he was handsome, too, and a charmer!" She grinned at him, the steam making her hair get full and frizz a bit, and he loved her so much it hurt. "You shouldn't let that one get away, little ziskeit, he's a catch."
"Eames."
"What, honey?"
"His name is Eames, and he's not that great, really, I mean—"
"Don't talk bad about him, Artie, he was wonderful, and you seemed so happy with him. Tell me true, what happened?" Her wide, happy face suddenly angered him, and he answered much too harshly.
"Ma, it's nothing, all right, we just broke up. It's fine. We work together, you know, it's bad for business."
"Business!" She whirled, pointing the spoon at him like an accusation. "Don't tell me about business, Artie, if you like this boy you make it your business," spinning the words with scorn, "to keep him." She turned back to the stove, muttering and shaking her head over the steaming pot. "Business, he says, like I don't know anything about business, pfeh!"
Sensing he'd better hide, Arthur slid out of the room, treading softly up the stairs to his old bedroom. It was exactly the same, just as it had been three years ago when he and Eames had made love in the bunkbed, giggling at the ridiculousness of it.
Eames had peered at pictures of infant Arthur scowling, of teenage Arthur frowning, of Arthur in military dress finally looking like he didn't hate everything around him. He'd laughed, long and loud, at the discovery of Arthur's baseball card collection — meticulously organized, in mint condition, locked in an airtight safe beneath the bottom bunk. "You've never changed, have you,Artie?" Eames had said with a wide grin.
Arthur had responded with a smile against Eames's mouth, something along the lines of "Put your hand down my pants and I'll show you how much I've changed," and they'd fallen into bed and laughed all the way through. It had been. Well, it had been perfect, really, and Arthur had a hard time shaking away the memory.
—-
Passover was…difficult. It was always hard, ever since his father, but it had only gotten harder since. The "boy" Angela had brought home with her was all wrong, and Angela wouldn't listen. She exhausted Arthur, always had since they'd been thirteen and she'd told him she wasn't going to be smart anymore.
"Why?" He hadn't understood. They were the smart Jewish twins in the ugly house, that was who they were.
"Because no one likes it. I wanna have friends, Artie. You be the smart one, I'll be the pretty one." She'd stared at him, and he'd realized that she wasn't joking, and he'd felt tears well up in his eyes.
"You don't need to be stupid for people to like you."
"Yeah, you do. If you're me. But don't worry, Artie, it's gonna be fine." A wide, sly grin and she'd been off to flirt with the Smith brothers next door, and he'd never seen that calculating cleverness again.
She still looked wrong, like someone stifling themselves, like a drowning woman caught beneath a mask of someone utterly happy. Dragged the boyfriend behind her like a puppy. The boyfriend was good-looking enough, and seemed stupidly in love with Angela, and maybe for anyone else that would have been enough. But instead, helpless, Arthur seethed with rage, because his brilliant and beautiful sister was wasting herself on a dead-end job in Long Island and a beefcake heir to a Buick dealership named Vance, which wasn't even a real name, who names their kidVance, and Arthur had to excuse himself before he punched something or someone.
Muttering to himself, Arthur sped upstairs to the bathroom he'd shared with Angela, closed the door, crouched on the cold linoleum. He'd replaced the cracked squares, waxed the whole thing: it looked nice and new despite sitting on a bad foundation. It struck him as all-too-neat of a parallel, and he ached for Eames to be here to laugh at it with him. He pulled out his phone and, before he could think about it, fired off a message.
My sister is dating someone named Vance. - Arthur
Immediate regret, immediate shame, and he wanted nothing more than to set himself on fire right there and then. But a ping, soft and sweet, and he read:
who the fuck names someone vance - e
And it was…it made him laugh, and he felt better, and closed the phone and went back downstairs and made nice for the rest of the night.
—-
hows yr mum - e
Why? - Arthur
she was in a bad way last time i saw her - e
She's better now, thanks for asking. - Arthur
and yr sister other than "vance" - e
She's all right. She works in a shop in Long Island now. - Arthur
bloody waste of a brain - e
sorry - e
not my place to say that - e
No, you're right. - Arthur
I don't think it's wise to keep talking to you. - Arthur
probably not but i dont want to stop now - e
do you - e
What I want doesn't matter. - Arthur
i'm sorry pet - e
For what? - Arthur
everything all of it - e
What, now you're going to say you'll change, we'll change, it'll get better? - Arthur
probably not - e
we're fucked up both of us - e
neither of us are sane healthy or good at this - e
but i'm asking anyway - e
What are you asking? - Arthur
you know leonard cohen - e
Yes, sort of. Why? - Arthur
this song right its i mean - e
What? That was a little garbled. - Arthur
its what i'd say to you if youd listen - e
What song? - Arthur
—-
It was "I'm Your Man," and Arthur listened to it nine times in a row, headphones plugged into his laptop, Eames's text waiting on his phone. He'd lied, of course he knew Leonard Cohen, but this song hadn't ever really drawn him the way others had. That meant, in the end, that it was immediately and permanently an Eames song in his head.
Raunchy, yes, and clever and heartfelt with the edge of sarcasm anyway, odd and funny and kind in the strangest ways, and he understood why Eames had mentioned it, because it was him, it was them in song, as much as any song could be, and Arthur wanted Eames, wanted him more than he had any time before, and it hurt. It couldn't happen, and it hurt because Arthur wanted, Arthur who so rarely got what he wanted, and wasn't going to get it this time, no matter what eighth-grade style long-distance dedications Eames sent through text messages. He turned off the laptop, turned off the phone, and went to sleep.
—-
And then it was the end of spring, moving into a blazing hot summer, and Arthur's sister was getting married. To Vance, who despite his beefcake empty eyes and stupid name did genuinely care about Angela, and who'd asked Arthur and their mother, and had asked Angela three times so she had to say yes three times, a cute little-boy thing to do that struck Angela just the right way. Arthur wasn't shocked, exactly, but he was pleasantly surprised: still thought Angela was wasting her potential, still missed her cutting clever words, but mostly he felt relieved that she wouldn't be alone anymore.
"Your sister, she's no good at being single." His mother sat in the shade, watching Angela bully the florist into rearranging the centerpieces at the last minute.
Arthur sipped his beer, trying to stave off hunger pains. "She hasn't been single since she was thirteen, Ma, she's never had to be good at it." Just a few more hours and they'd be eating roast beef and Arthur could drink and dance, both of which he loved, loved, loved to do.
"Yeah, yeah, you're right, Artie." She shot him a sly look. "You know what they picked for the wedding song?"
"What?" He didn't really care — probably some execrable recent hit about being together forever or someone having the lips of an angel or something equally schmaltzy. Angela had liked opera when no one was listening, and top 40 when anyone was around, and he would bet money onVance having quite the extensive dudebro "rock" collection.
"A Leonard Cohen song, the one about dancing. That gravelly voice!" She fanned herself with a paper plate. "I always told your father, I'd leave him for Leonard Cohen in a hot minute." She laughed, and Arthur felt himself laughing, too. He was surprised, but nicely so.
"It's a good song, though, Ma."
"Yeah, yeah." She stood, hollered across the lawn at the caterer, who was apparently ruining everything, and that's when Arthur saw him.
—-
"Fuck you, Eames, what the fuck are you doing here, get out, go home, shit," and Arthur shoved him away, pushed him towards the cab, so angry his skin felt like he'd gotten sunburned.
"No, pet, no, listen, your sister—"
"My sister is getting married, Eames, and I'm not gonna have you sit here and make mooncalf eyes all through the ceremony and then fuck me in the bedroom and act like you've changed, all right, so get out!"
"Arthur, Arthur, your sister invited me. And your mum. I know you don't want me here, love, I do, but they asked me. I'm, you know, I couldn't tell your mum no, she'd roast me over an open flame."
Arthur frowned and snarled and argued, but it was pointless, and Eames hugged his mother and chatted with his sister and managed not to roll his eyes at Vance and it was…not as bad as he'd expected, which seemed to be becoming a running theme in his life.
—-
The ceremony was short and only nominally Jewish: Angela hadn't practiced in decades andVance was a very lapsed Lutheran, so no one cared. Vance's brother, the even-worse Chad, was best man, and Angela had one of her single sorority sisters for maid of honor, and that was that.Vance had asked Arthur to be an attendant, but had seemed very relieved to be turned down.
The rabbi mumbled his way through the service and the couple stepped on the glass and laughed, and twirled down the aisle to the dancefloor. When the strains of "Dance Me to the End of Love" came up, Arthur caught Eames looking at him.
"Want to dance, Artie?" A young cousin whose name he couldn't quite remember asked.
"Yeah, sure," and they spun out on the floor. Arthur was a good dancer, even self-conscious under Eames's gaze and saddled with a gawky fifteen-year-old, and he soon lost himself in the movement. Song after song after song, and eventually he felt a familiar hand on his waist.
"What do you want, Eames?" But he wasn't angry, really, just tired. A long day, a long month, a long three years with no one in his bed.
"Dance with me?" And Eames looked, well. He looked like Eames, crinkle-faced and grinning, but there was something else there, too, just a hint around the eyes. Eames was tired, too, and Arthur felt something small and irreversible shift within him.
"Yeah, yeah."
They swayed then, under the tent and the twinkling lights. No one bothered to be outraged — it was a wedding and a happy day, and most of the family knew Eames from before — and no one bothered them. They tried to use the dance, the contact, the movement to say all the things they wanted to say: apologies and repentance, silent promises to try harder if not to do better, wishes to make up for lost time. They swayed and twirled and Arthur grinned into Eames's shoulder when he realized what the music was.
"It's our song, pet."
"I guess it is."