Disclaimer: Definitely not mine.

Author's Notes: Hey guys! Sorry for the long wait in fics, life's been difficult and I've been struggling with the longer stories. Plenty of drabbles to be found on my tumblr, though!

Dedications: To Evil-Pixie-Dust, because without her, this flat-out never would have happened.

Ghosts With Just Voices

You don't know what keeps you looking, really. There's just this overwhelming sense of not-quite-right that's been hounding you with everyone you've ever been with, lurking in the angle of their smiles, the way they don't respond exactly right when you rap at them, and you-

-hate it. It's wrong. They should mock you, roll their eyes, their blue-

-but no, not everyone you've dated has had blue eyes. Statistical improbability. It can't happen like that all the time. Or even most of the time.

You wish you understood the looks that Rose gives you when you try explaining all of this to her. When she rolls her eyes at you and calls you overly picky, you're not sure why you expected her, of all people, to understand.

Instead, you're left chasing a breeze, a scent on the wind, and everyone calls you restless, a player, any number of things that aren't quite right because when it all boils down to it, you're just Dave. You're just Dave, and you're just looking for someone who… fits. You simply haven't found him-them-him yet.

And so you wait, and you keep sliding between people like oil through their fingertips, leaving behind only a residue of yourself as you continue your (hah) quest. There are some people who make you stay longer. They're closer, closer, but still not. Not quite right and you can't do that. He's waiting. You're sure he is.

(He has to be.)

(You're not sure what you'd do if he wasn't.)

As time passes, the feeling comes and goes. It's there as you're walking down the street one fall day, when you turn and completely expect someone to be there next to you - you can hear his voice- and no one's there. It fades when you're on your turntables, when you string up your photographs and catch glimpses of something right in the lines of other people's bodies.

But, most importantly, it's there whenever you're around Bro, when he gets the same anxious and faraway look to him that you do, and you're surprised when he just turns to you and gets it. He knows. And he understands. It calms you, knowing that yes, someone else feels it too, the endless and ineffable yearning for someone you've never met.

It's awful.

You're in love with someone you're not sure exists outside of a conglomeration of other people's body parts.

And then there are the days where you feel like you want to crawl out of your skin, like the entire world is set off-plum and slightly skewed, and it's absolutely impossible to get your head on straight. You just need to go, get out of here, move until you can find him and it drives you mad that you can't.

You don't even know his name.

You don't know what he looks like or who he is, and you're sometimes sure that you're actually just making him up. (But it is completely absurd to miss someone you don't know. It's absurd and you do it anyway, missing him with the very marrow of your bones.)

And so you go to class, to work, hands shoved deep in your pockets to brace against the howling wind, hurting for no reason. Your camera sways around your neck, and you have the half-thought of grabbing it right before the wind tears it from you and sends it hurtling away. You make a grab for it in vain-

-a startled laugh on the breeze that sends a knife of wonder into you-

-as you run straight into someone, bowling them over into the grass. For a second, you don't look up at whoever you ran into, just grab the camera from their hands and inspect it for damage. It's fine, and you let out a sigh of relief.

"Are you alright? I didn't see you there, I'm sorry."

Only to immediately inhale sharply because. That voice! Those hands, the taper of his fingers, the angle of his wrists, shoulders, chest, the achingly familiar cant of his mouth and jaw, and the smile in his eyes and oh-

-your body screams at you, and you've never felt more like you were about to pass out in your life.

But it passes. And you are left staring, wordlessly, at… him. He smiles at you, crooked like you knew it would be, and quirks a dark eyebrow.

"Hey?"

You shake yourself. "Yeah, I'm fine. Sorry." And you stand up, offering him a hand as well. "Name's Dave. Thanks for the catch."

"John," he replies as he takes you hand and hoists himself upright. "And no problem. It wouldn't be the first time someone's run into me like that. The wind and I seem to have a thing."

There's a beat of silence where you know, you know that he could just walk away, but you're not lonely for the first time since you can really remember. You blurt out, "Hey, so, wanna grab a coffee and a movie or some shit like that? Make up for me knocking you on your ass."

And you can see John consider it, notice the puzzled do-i-know-you look cross his face (fuck your heart is pounding too hard for this, you can't breathe and your blood is just pumping in your veins, overloading everything else), before he grins and nods. "Yeah, sure. I'm up for that, Dave."

You breathe out and smile back and walk too close to him while he talks on the way to your favorite coffeehouse and you know him, you know him, and you are. Settled. You found him.

(And the wind always brought him exactly what he needed, didn't it?)

He kisses you when you leave the theater, and even he seems surprised at himself, but when he mouths "I missed you" into your collarbone, you just smile at him and say it back.

(It shouldn't surprise you that it brought him you.)

Beta-d by: Evil-Pixie-Dust!

Reviews are appreciated, but not required!