Disclaimer: Not real, not mine, not making money from this
I'm delusion angel, I'm fantasy parade
(Title taken from "Delusion Angel" by David Jewell)
There was a graven image of Desire
Painted with red blood on a ground of gold
Passing between the young men and the old,
- "A Cameo" by Algernon Charles Swinburne
The muzzle feels cold and tastes like blood, his blood, he thinks, when Arthur forced the gun against his gums, blood overlaying the sharp metallic tinge, and underneath both a hint of cinnamon. Cinnamon…? Eames almost laughs at the absurdity of this composition, admiring the aptness of it all. He would have, except that it is rather difficult to laugh with a gun in your mouth.
He tries, Such a Romantic, aren't you? It comes out like a garbled ssshrrrrmmphoot.
"Shut the fuck up," Arthur hisses.
Well, Eames thinks (re: the cinnamon), at least that tells him he is dreaming. No totem necessary.
"Move."
Eames' eyes dances at him with an unplaceable look that is unnervingly devoid of fear. Arthur figures it is something between a phallic-motif-much?-macro and if-this-is-your-kind-of-sexy, and deepens his frown as a visible warning. His nails dig sharply into Eames' shoulder.
"Move."
Eames backs away for about fifteen paces before slamming into a wall. Since when was there a wall behind him?
The others have all shot themselves. This was back in the old days, before they discovered the application of a kick and the exit from a dream was a bullet to the head.
(But the whole idea of their not having a kick is so inelegant that Arthur supposes it must be some warped notion picked up by an errant strand of his subconscious which he is currently dreaming out, and that the only remaining question is how many layers deep.)
The alley walls are bricked and narrow. The street is dark and Eames is in front of him with a glare that spells desire. He gestures to Eames' face, "If you notice, this is rather…paedophilic."
Eames laughs. His eyebrows lift his forehead into many creases, one of which targets Arthur in a pointed tease, he's sure. Eames shrugs, if that's what you want, and ages backward into a youthful version of the mark's godfather, a conventionally handsome fellow with chiselled good looks, followed by an interpretation of himself with all-out flamboyance flaunted with a devil-may-care attitude. He finishes off with an apparition of Arthur, stick-in-the-mud Arthur, never-misses-the-mark Arthur, young-as-hell Arthur, younger than he supposes he actually looks, but him all the same. At least on the outside.
Arthur stares at Eames and Arthur (no, Eames) stares back. They are both him. Arthur's breath hitches and he hides it by swallowing, which makes his fascination even more pronounced as he traces an imaginary line from Arthur's temple to the cleft of a dimple in his cheek. Arthur leans in, purrs, it is possible to be young again, you know, before receding further back in time, marking each change with detailed impressions he has studied for god knows how long, reproducing them now with a studiousness bordering on love.
So this is what it's like, Eames blinks, how it feels under the skin of young skittish Arthur with the fidgeting fingers he has yet to cure himself of four years into the future. He runs a hand over his face, Arthur's face, his own face, memorizing the terrain of cheekbones, nose bridge and lips.
Arthur steps closer.
Eames raises his eyebrows again with a look that asks, younger?
"No…n..no,"
"Just like this, then,"
Arthur nods, just like this, and leans in.
They wake up.
As a forger, Eames is every one of these personas and yet in sooth none of them are like him in the least. He is everything at once and at the same time nothing at all. The only constancy in him is the lie.
Perhaps in a parallel reality Arthur is a young man with a dormant degree in architecture who goes around seeing symmetry in buildings and falling in love with the seasons. Maybe that is the life he will wake up to, or the dream he will fall into when he dozes off in this warmth that wraps him so close it is as real as anything he has ever lived.
And perhaps if Eames wasn't asleep at this moment he would be traversing the moors as a dark Byronic hero with a paralyzing glare. He's not sure whether he would like Eames in that manner, but then and again he knows deep down he does; he loves each and every role Eames has delved into and never stepped out of.
While Eames is always lying, always posturing, Arthur (in all seriousness) busies himself with a sick idea that Eames does it all for Arthur's amusement.
They are on the beach. The waves are lapping up the shore in long, sweeping, rhythmic beats. His own heart is buffeting against his ribcage and their faces are so close they might be kissing.
Scratch that.
It dawns on him that the one way to woo Arthur isn't with sweet talk and a busload of chivalry doused in barbed English humour. Well, it could be, Eames thinks, it should be, he corrects himself, but then it would take forever and it would require a lot of squabbling and unresolved sexual tension and all that, indicating the latter with an impatient wave of a hand, which would make their story far too difficult for telling. And besides, this afternoon finds him too indolent and the only thing he feels fit for is a placid admiration of the lines Arthur casts in a three-piece suit. Resplendent, sullen Arthur with a face marked more often by studied frowns than anything else.
Cut to the chase, Eames decides. As with all labyrinths, there'll always be a short cut.
Thank god for air ducts.
They wake up for the…
Arthur has lost count.
This time it is Arthur who finds himself backed against a wall. Eames has his fingers deep into the fabric of his suit, easing the buttons from their button holes till Arthur's stomach is bare and white and almost shining like some sort of perverse prize. Eames is grinning a jack-o-lantern grin. He twirls a knife in his hand.
He hovers his lips over Arthur's left ear, making sure to brush against his jaw line before he whispers, "There are ways to cut you without killing you, and I'm going to show you how." A thrill runs down Arthur's spine, as though someone has dragged a jagged piece of ice down the curve of his back. He shivers but nods his consent.
As Eames carves intricate patterns into his abdomen, Arthur chews the inside of his mouth to keep from crying out. His face is stoic, a sharp distinction from Eames' fluttery gaze. Arthur doesn't say it, but he likes it, likes this controlled hurt (and he knows Eames knows that he does, and likes it even more when it passes unsaid), this feeling of blood spilling out and over at exact, designated places in calculated amounts. It reminds him of a body straining against its own joints, a song straining against its component notes, distant and discordant but so, so right.
They wake up.
Eames has never bothered counting.
Sometimes he thinks the universe must have a hand in this. But this idea places them specifically in time, in space, and he would rather not have that. He wants them to be nameless, purposeless entities, caught in an endless cycle of drowsing and desiring and awakening that fans out far beyond his eye can see.
That much he's sure.
"Bloody hell, we're going to be late," Eames growls. He flips over, and in his haste falls out of bed and swears again.
Arthur lets reality sink in, taking his time, eyes on the ceiling and hands flat against his belly feeling the coldness of bare, unbroken skin before breaking away to smooth out the creases on the rumpled sheets. He takes in the room, the dimness around them, and of course Eames himself, unbearably charming even with bed hair and a five o'clock shadow on his chin, though sadly a little overweight. He watches his hand going gingerly over his bruised jaw.
Eames stumbles to the bathroom. His voices reverberates from within the walls of shower screen and water as he repeats with uncanny exasperation, "Arthur, we're going to be late,"
Darling, Arthur finishes soundlessly.
Eames pops his head out of the bathroom and stares into his eyes, dead serious, and Arthur is finally, finally, able to laugh about it.