Berger kisses Sheila, walking her backwards to his bedroom; he stops for a moment and leans her against the door. Bringing the tips of her soft hair to his lips, he kisses it softly, smirking down at her as she runs her hands over his chest with laughter in her eyes. She's so beautiful, he tells her over and over making sure she knows he means it, then he takes her to bed. It's not the first time, it's not the last time, and it isn't a time he thought he would remember for years to come. As he moves over her, hands affixed on her breasts and ears full of her softs sighs and gasps, his mind wanders. Wanders down the hall into a different bedroom, into Claude's bedroom, imagining his face twisted in pleasure and muscles rippling as his entire body trembles in anticipation of pleasure.
"Claude…" He doesn't hear himself until later, once Sheila has screamed Berger's name with her hands tangled in his knotted hair and they're leaning against his headboard sharing a messy joint that was rolled between her shaking fingers. The room smells like a combination of the sweet grass, smoke, sweat, and the natural flowered scent Sheila seemed to float on.
"You're so beautiful." He tells her again, huffing in a deep breath and letting it sit in his lungs. She stares at him with a tired grin, taking the roll back from him and placing it between her bruised lips.
"I'm more than that, you know."
"I know," He tells her, "you're a smart, funny, talented person that just happens to be all wrapped up in this groovy body." A finger trails down between her breasts as he talks, and she laughs puffs of smoke up at him.
"Thanks…" Sheila watches him as she fiddles with the joint, his arms now crossed across his muscular chest and his concentrated gaze focused on his dresser, "You should tell him."
"Hm?" It's a musical hum, but he doesn't catch her eye as he takes the roll back from her.
"Nothing."
But he knows what she was getting at. She has the decency not to try to bring it up for the rest of the night, which he's grateful for, but at around one in the morning when she heads back to her room she gives him a small, sad smile that says everything she doesn't have to. She's too smart, Berger always thought so, because she wasn't just brilliant book-wise. Sheila was intuitive and perceptive to people in a way that amazed him, she had the sense of what people wanted, needed. He heads to the bathroom once he's heard the squeak of her door closing, but is confused by what he hears. Over the sound of their sink running, he can hear a buzzing noise; it reminds him vaguely of the sputter of his father's old car. But that's not possible for multiple reasons, his stoned mind reasons. Realizing that he is standing outside of his own bathroom with his ear pressed to peeling pink paint, he pushes the door open slowly. Then freezes.
"What're you doing?" His throat is tight and he's blinking back a burning sensation behind his eyes. But it's obvious what Claude is doing. Claude is making a decision, and he's doing it by shaving his head. Claude blinked back at him in a cross between fear, regret, and sorrow. He looks pathetic to Berger, frail hands holding the buzzing razor with a pale, half shaved head. Berger leans over far enough to turn the faucet of the sink off; covering the counter top was Claude's golden hair. Dead, sad, pathetic on the cracked tile, Berger doesn't blink the tears away anymore.
"What're you doing?" Its Claude's turn to ask as Berger pulls the razor away from him, but he is surprised to see that Berger doesn't toss it down like he was expecting.
Instead, Berger positions himself behind Claude and helps to shave the hair away. They don't speak as he uses one gentle hand to massage Claude's tense neck and another sturdy hand to remove the hair. It falls around them, patting lifelessly to the wooden floor beneath their bare feet. Claude is shaking under his strong hands, tears sliding silently down his sallow cheeks and Berger realizes that there is no hope for him, for any of them. Claude is leaving them, for good or for just a small while it doesn't matter, he's going. He doesn't think to be mad; he just knows that it hurts. Deep within his chest is a pain he's never experienced a stabbing, throbbing pain that makes him feel full and his throat feel tight. When Claude's hair is gone he clicks the razor off and pulls it from the plug, setting it on the hair-covered counter with a clatter.
"You look…"
"Pathetic?" Claude's voice is rough and coarse, he doesn't meet Berger's curious eyes.
"Different…You look like a grown up." Claude just laughs and shrugs, his hand wiping the hair away from the back of his neck.
"Heavy stuff, Cheese Berger." Claude tries to joke back, but Berger is serious as he brings his palm to rest again the soft skin of Claude's damp cheek.
"You look like a man." His eyes well up at his own words, and then the tears are pouring from both of them as Claude clasps his arms around Berger's neck in a tight hug. They're patting each other's backs, standing in the center of the dimly lit bathroom surrounded by clumps of Claude's lost hair, crying over everything they knew they could've had.
"All I had was my hair, Berger. That's all I had left." It's a gasping and broken sob that he says into Berger's neck.
"And you're all I had left, so now we're even-stevens." Claude forces out a choked laugh, pulling away from Berger's neck with a watery grin. He opens his mouth, searching for something to say, but Berger just shakes his head with a kind grin, the kind of pitying-grin Claude has seen him give Jeanie before. Claude presses his lips to Berger's in a kiss in the only way he can explain what he's feeling. He puts all of his pain and fear and love into that kiss, groaning as Berger presses him against the bathroom wall, with the understanding that Berger's feeling all of that, too. And then Claude thinks that maybe everybody is feeling that way, maybe that's why they're all people. Arms clinging around Berger's neck, Claude pulls away for a gasp of air and looks up into Berger's gentle green eyes.
"I love you." He whispers, watching pain flash in Berger's watering eyes.
"I love you too." Berger mumbles before dragging him back into a kiss, firm hands holding Claude tight to his strong body, and for the first time in what feels like years, Claude doesn't feel so lost.