Fandom: Outlast
Characters: Miles Upshur/Waylon Park
Word Count: 2688
Warnings: Casual death mention. That's about it. Unbeta'd/Typos as always.
Summary: Miles is the one who drives but- It's Waylon who takes to the open stretch of road, the expanse of time swallowed by mile markers and radio fuzz, who sinks into the isolation that only traversing along the interstate brings.
Notes: I started this just before my flight to Texas- travelling always fills me with a kind of feel-good blues. Anyway, so I started this, but, when I got back I forgot what I wanted to write, and also, I just couldnt write. I was homesick, but i think it's mostly passed now. Title lifted from the poem Don't Go Far Off by Neruda.
The lines that make up Waylon are another language Miles is only just beginning to grasp. Hieroglyphs etched into the round curve of a bent wrist, the hollowed shadows of collarbones, the set of lips bitten raw.
Miles isn't good with languages.
He's good with words, but that's something different (and as of late, Miles is beginning to doubt that too, vocabulary deserting him in the face of this new life).
Maybe in the coming of months he'll become conversational in that language, be able to translate the meaning behind the bare slope of Waylon's shoulders when he sits in the pale flickering light of motel signs. Too optimistic maybe, but Miles sets his goals high when he can.
Miles finds himself measuring time by the little things he manages to figure out about Waylon. Miles knows that Waylon writes letters on notebook paper. They're addressed to no one in particular- sometimes they'll start off with Lisa in mind but will trail off, become a disjointed ode to passing landscape. A confessional and a distraction. When he's done he'll fold each and every one of those letters into crisp lined shapes. Flowers and animals, every fold careful, precise. Fingers creasing the paper, rhythmic practiced movements; another delicate type of poetry. After, Waylon will toss each and every one of them. The road behind them is dotted with sunflowers and cranes made with blue lined notebook paper, Waylon's slanted handwriting bleeding through the pages.
Miles knows that when Waylon's nightmares get bad (unbearable) he'll pace until his leg is in agonizing pain the next morning, until it's practically useless. Knows that even then, Waylon will try to walk without help, jaw clenched- stubborn. Desperate, half lost to memory of the asylum, the scars it's carved into his mind. ("i'm not sorry," rasps the tiny man in front of Miles, lip chewed bloody and leaning heavily on his crutch. It takes Miles' breath away, anger and something like awe snapping the static into silence in his skull. "i can't be sorry.")
There isn't much he can say he's learned for sure, but. It's something.
He knows that tonight neither of them will sleep.
Neither of them have said anything to the other, but it's written in the in the soft lines of Waylon's face where his slender fingers press into his cheek. It's in Miles' fingers too, the way his grip comes and goes over the steering wheel, like a cat kneading its claws.
Miles can't read the lines, doesn't know the words they spell out, but he thinks Waylon can hear the words Miles hasn't said, translated everything into the silence they're both fluent in.
Miles isn't good with silence either, but he learnt it years ago. Never dropped it even when it stopped being of use to him. Idly he wonders if that was the first language Waylon ever learnt, then he sighs, aggravated and a little shamed.
That was.
A cruel thing to think.
Miles thinks of a little boy with black-brown hair and skinned knees, bright eyes gone honeyed with tears, soundless sobs pouring like mist from familiar bitten lips. It's a memory, not even his own.
A hand, pale in the dark of the jeep, touches his own. Dry, cool fingers trace the sore bruises on Miles knuckles, then the touch slips away. Tries to, anyway. Miles' grabs Waylon's wrist, the skin there a little warmer, paper thin. He can feel blood as it courses through blue veins.
"You're holding my hand again," Waylon says. Somehow, even though the silence quivers it does not break.
Waylon has thin wrists, or, that's what Miles always seems to think- really Miles just has giant paws for hands. His thumb and middle finger overlap when he grabs Waylon's wrist. "I'm not holding your hand, this is your wrist," Miles corrects him, and this time the silence does break.
He squeezes, gently and just once, reminds himself that the bones under his fingers won't snap.
Waylon nods slowly, agreeable even as he rolls his eyes skyward. "Alright." His hand curls into a loose fist, and Miles turns away from the road to look. The feeling of muscle and tendon and bone all working together for such a simple movement is fascinating, strange. Somehow terrifying. "But why?"
The silence creeps back when Waylon speaks, hesitant like a wary animal. Miles nearly feels guilty when he break it again. He knows silence, but he's still learning how to be quiet. He's sure he'll never get it, no matter how hard he tries. Thinks maybe that's okay.
"Because I want to. Is there a reason you need?" Over the air from the vents, the smooth humming from the road, his voice comes out rough, too loud; unsubtle like a boat horn in the middle of dawn. Miles laughs, remembers Waylon jumping like a startled cat when they walked along the harbor in Long Beach a few weeks back, the Queen Mary blasting her horn on the hour.
The lines on Waylon's face shift, just a little. He's not frowning, but the expression he has is close. They pass under a streetlight. The lines have shifted again and this time it looks like Waylon could be smiling. "I need you to look at the road."
"For what? There aren't any cars."
Miles gestures expansively around them with the hand still gripping onto Waylon. The lines shift again, but Miles can't tell if they go up or down, but he thinks it's fine either way. Waylon is lax, following Miles' movements without fuss.
This time theres definitely a smile, pretty and phantomlike in the green glow from the dash.
Watching Waylon makes something deep in his chest ache.
"Car crashes aren't in my top ten ways to die."
Miles fingers tighten, thumb pressed over a calm pulse. He knows, somehow, that that isn't the entire truth. Probably because he feels the same lately. Dying in a car crash isn't the way to he'd want to go either, but comparatively, it's not bad. Not quite fitting, but there is a type of poetry to the thought of meeting their ends in this jeep. He can't deny that. A neat ending to everything.
"I'll bet you're an in your sleep kind of person." Miles says, amused. Their hands have moved to rest near the base of the gear shift.
Waylon taps his fingers, tendons moving like slick machinery under Miles' hand. Theres a considering hum, then: "No, not really."
"Die standing up?" Miles asks, another bad joke with no punch. He moves the jeep into the next lane, feels the tires move on their axises.
"Of course not." Waylon scoffs. Catches the words snagging on the notches of Miles' ribcage. "That didn't turn out so well for you."
Theres a beat, Miles can time it by the pulse under his thumb. The cloak of silence is broken again, Miles is laughing and it's a good laugh. Stirs up his insides and makes his sides ache dully. A cough starts up when he tries to take a breath, part smoker's cough and part death rattle, bullet shards in his ribs and tar in his lungs. The grip he has on Waylon loosens, and in between stifling his coughs, Miles is sure Waylon will pull back his hand.
He doesnt.
Just adjusts to hold Miles' hand properly, with palms pressed together and fingers interlocked.
Clearing his throat, Miles says, "No, m-ah- my bad."
He glances down at their hands, wonders if there's any meaning behind the way the lines of their fingers weave together.
Thinks, probably nothing grand.
It's a good thought.
Silence has been their conversation, but it isn't till the dashboard clock switches to four am that the silence becomes ill fitting over Miles shoulders, itchy and tight. They are in a town now, or a city. Miles can never tell which is which. He tells Waylon that.
"You're a writer," Waylon says, incredulous. He taps the syllables of 'writ·er' on the back of Miles' hand for emphasis.
"Do you know?" Miles shoots back, raising one expectant eyebrow.
Waylon pops his knuckles using Miles' fingers. "I work with code, not grammar."
The talking feels better, makes the looming skyscrapers and condos and tall apartments and cozy little lots fall to the back of his mind. Waylon hates crowds, Miles has come to be wary of buildings. He thinks it's the cement, or the plaster. Whatever is used to build up all the walls everywhere. Makes the static echo off building sides when it's silent.
Cages him in. (I am free)
It's not a constant thing, so he's grateful for that, can block it out most days. Miles pulls the jeep into park by a church tucked away in a sleeping neighborhood. They sit for a moment, fingers and palms still pressed together. And then Waylon is slipping away, easy without hesitating and Miles can breathe, gratefulness flooding his veins. Miles is grateful that, for all Waylon's hang ups, he's easy to be with.
When they step out, the air is damp and warm, sends goosebumps crawling up and down their arms, Waylon curses, wipes away the fog building up on his glasses. Oily light from the street lamp casts him in a dirty gold halo, throws the shadows of his face into murky relief, dips the hollow of his throat into shadow. Miles has to look away, has to resettle the line of his sight on to wrinkles on the back of Waylon's shirt, the subtle outline of a delicate spine.
Pretty dove hands lift crooked wire rimmed glasses to the light, the glass catching, shimmering like far away-close stars. The stumps of Miles' fingers itch, a need to immortalize this moment clawing into the wet cave of Miles' chest. Waylon slips back on his glasses but the itch still prickles at Miles. He tries to calm it by interpreting the new lines. The purse of Waylon's mouth means...
"You're standing in the middle of the road."
Miles blinks, leans back to glance at the empty street. The traffic lights flash green, then yellow, crosswalk pinging from 'go' to 'stop'. Back again in the stillness.
"So I am," Miles replies, too airy. He's still looking at the changing lights, times them with the sluggish beat of his heart. In his peripheral Waylon hitches his left shoulder, shrugging, then walks to stand next to Miles. Fox slanted eyes watching the damp road, the street light still captured in his glasses.
Here, in the new silence, surrounded by buildings and covered in nighttime rain, Miles thinks:
Waylon has a traveller's soul.
Miles is the one who drives but- It's Waylon who takes to the open stretch of road, the expanse of time swallowed by mile markers and radio fuzz, who sinks into the isolation that only traversing along the interstate brings.
"You're thinking something idiotic, again." Waylon says. His mouth has an embarrassed pucker to it- almost a pout really. And his eyes are averted, body shifted like he's trying to decide if he wants to bring himself closer or further from Miles' side; weight leaned on his good leg.
Miles tugs at Waylon's belt loops, brings him closer. Nearer. There's a huff, muttering under breath, except Waylon is moving with the motion of it, allowing. Thrills race up Miles' spinal cord, pooling electric in his joints. "No more than usual, babe." Miles says, hiding the beginnings of grin in the curls atop Waylon's head. He has to hunch down a bit, and just to be an ass (because he's greedy and childish and has the beginnings of what might be heartsickness) rests more weight than Waylon can take comfortably. (That's how this (they work), easy and hedging on too much, too little). "You just don't have any faith in me."
Waylon groans irritably (fondly), pushes up against Miles, standing on tip toes to get him to let up. Rocks them backwards, and then they're bumping into the jeep. "I believe in what I can see. And all I see is you being an ass, Paddles."
Miles laughs, crossing his arms over Waylon's stomach, lets the sound in his chest rumble through to Waylon. Hopes it resonates in his bones, stays there carving notches out over Waylon's ribcage, leave traces of himself inside Waylon, tangle up their strings and their words and their languages. "That fucking nickname, dude. What am I, a dog?"
The most obvious thing to say here, of course, is 'You act like it,', but Waylon is a good sport. Just makes another hitch-shrug with his shoulders, the lines of the motion smooth, easy for Miles' to translate. Drops down his hands to rest over Miles', leans forward, just a little, just enough to make the touch tolerable. Distantly they can hear the warble of sirens, far away and close all at once, sound coming and going.
If Miles closes his eyes, if he really focuses.
He can make out snatches from the dispatch.
So he doesn't.
Just leans down with Waylon, fitting their backs together snugly.
"Stop that," Waylon says, his voice spinning away in Miles' mind, words nibbled on by static, dark fleshy skeletal fingers.
"I'm," Miles begins, breath and words (only it's just a word) pressed like mist over the sweet smelling nape of Waylon's neck. Loses the string of what he was going to say.
He knows… He knows Waylon does not like to be held (down), knows he's pushing his boundaries. But Miles is not good at languages the same way he's not good at finding the line to back off at. But. Waylon is (weak) (easy) (safe) (malleable)
Miles laughs again, voice box dotted with static and stale smoke; remembers the feeling of their palms together. Thinks-
Wants.
"I'm," He tries again, the reverb of static pooling from him and into Waylon. His eyes are probably black, now. Waylon's scar must be acting up. "beginning to think your car sickness is contagious, shortstack."
The road is secular, vast and narrow. No room for things like the divine, no room for the things Father Martin liked to write about. Often, Miles thinks the land scape with its peaks and valleys, its alternating terrain, its lines and veins and bloodless sand is what will kill him (the walrider, the monster). Or the silence.
Everything that is inherent to Waylon, who was born in the desert in the winter in the quiet.
This is not a pilgrimage, Miles tells himself. That's just fucking silly. This isnt a death march. He's already dead, and. That's fine.
"We don't have to be there until Thursday." Waylon says, aloud. For Miles' benefit or his own, it's hard to tell. The lines obscured and the white noise unfocused. "Waiting a while is fine."
"Alright, alright."
Later, they walk, just for a little. An hour, maybe more. Maybe less. Matching up strides, only slightly uneven for Waylon's limp and Miles' wide footsteps. Waylon is folding a wrinkled receipt he had in his pocket into a crane, fingers smooth lines and creases into the paper. He doesnt need to watch what he's doing, so Miles watches for both of them. Memorizes a new set of hieroglyphs in the tuck of Waylon's elbows against his sides, the bunch of denim as he walks, the lock of hair curling behind his ear.
It's a language Miles wants to learn so he can draw- can write out the landscape of themselves. A map or final testament. Leave the finished draft of it on a roadside bench in New York, Texas (a joke, perhaps). Maybe further back where they started in Colorado. A hotel in Minnesota.
"It feels good." Miles says, even later when the make it back to the jeep.
"Yeah," Waylon says, trailing his hand along the hood, eyes distant as he drops his crane to the curb, its white form blackening with mud and oil and refuse. Looks Miles in the eye, glasses crooked, changing the meaning of lines. Miles is thankful when he doesn't ask for the keys, just slides into his seat. "It does, doesn't it."