Title: The Genius Next Door

Number of chapters: 15 + epilogue

Word count: 70k + total, 5215 for this part

Cover image by: Eric Rougier

Summary: Francis wakes up in a white room, and tells Arthur everything.

Warnings: Please click on my profile for a full list of warnings if you need them.

Other notes: I'm going to update this every Monday and Friday from here on out. In other words, the last chapter of this story + the epilogue will both be posted on the 29th of July 2013. Thank you everyone for your support!


When Francis cracked open his eyes, he was occupying a space in a bleached-white room with walls that seemed to extend onward and onward. There was no ceiling in sight. Neither was there any sort of terrain below; he was simply free-floating. There.

He could almost say that he recognized the expanse of the room, as if it had about it a quality that was familiar to him. But the sensation he was encountering wasn't coming from the room, apparently — it was coming from the boy that materialized right then in front of him. With his sudden appearance, Francis felt immediately assured, although he couldn't remember ever having seen him before.

The boy, or the figure, was difficult to focus upon. Every time Francis tried to adjust his attention on him, a ringing noise would reverberate within the hollow of his skull — and he would have to turn away. If one was to ask Francis later to describe the other, Francis would be unable to respond, for he simply did not know. But he could be certain of one thing — that the boy's eyes were very, very green.

"I know you," he said suddenly, because he did, although he did not know how. It was like he had loved this boy sometime ago, in another place, another dimension.

"I know you," the boy echoed back.

Francis smiled briefly, slowly and deliberately lifting his hand and reaching for the smaller figure, fingers splayed open wide. The other took the hint and also raised his hand, and the tips of their fingers brushed.

"You're Arthur." Francis laughed. "You're the Arthur I met the very first time, back in Marseille. Your family had come to visit. We played together. I forgot your name. I fell in love with you."

Arthur smiled, a small mournful smile that distressed him. It was almost condescending, the kind you would give your friend when you found something particularly ironic, or somewhat funny, when it should not be; the sympathetic kind, the kind that ached and could stay inside your mind for weeks on end; the kind a person old beyond their years could give upon reminiscence.

"We met again in Paris," continued he. "We were both drawn there because we were both drawn to each other. That's what a soul mate is, you know. Matthew said that it is improbable for them to meet, and that it is inevitable that they find others in order to stifle their oppressive loneliness, but perhaps he was wrong. I can only ever be for you."

The jade-eyed boy said nothing.

"It was your eyes," continued Francis. "Your eyes. I forgot your face, I forgot everything about you even when you came back to haunt me, but not your eyes.

"When you told me you didn't remember me, it broke me."

"How can you be so sure that was me?" said Arthur. His voice was soft and tender.

"Arthur," laughed Francis. "You may as well ask the moon how she can be so sure she must follow, or the sun how she can be so sure she must burn."

"You don't know me," said Arthur. "You don't know me at all."

"I love you," said Francis, letting the other's fingers fall in the spaces between his own. "Isn't that enough?"

The jade-eyed boy of youth dropped his gaze for a second, the smile never leaving his face. Francis strove to study it, to imprint in his mind every particular of the memory that had fallen astray, but was unsuccessful each time for somehow he could never gaze upon it long enough to extract its projection for his own. Arthur, catching Francis' imploring looks, reached up and cupped his chin with an unwavering hand. His palm was layered with the tell-tale signs of childhood — the baby fat, the lack of tough keratin, the strange coolness.

"You've immortalized me," said Arthur. "I'm not going anywhere. You have all the time you need to see me."

Francis put his own free hand over the one on his face and closed his eyes, lowering his head so that his hair fell around his cheeks; the golden locks, he noticed, had become long again. This, this level of intimacy between himself and a child should have scared him, but it didn't.

"Good," he sighed into the hand. "Don't leave me again."

"You, you, you," said Arthur, lips widening so that a row of baby teeth showed. "It's always about you, isn't it? Try thinking about other people for once."

Francis' eyes opened. "What would you have me do?" he asked, dropping his voice so that it was no more than a hoarse mumble. "I'll do anything to prove myself to you, to show you how much I love you."

Francis withdrew then, because his cheeks had all at once become very hot. When he could afford to look again, the boy in front of him had not a trace of the features that had made him so distinctly familiar. All Francis could see was just another green-eyed boy. The eyes were as beautiful as they always were. But they were empty.

And Francis had to wonder who the boy he had met by the Mediterranean was, if he was not Arthur.


Francis awoke, drifting back into the conscious world at his leisure. When he did come to full awareness, he noticed he was once again in a white room — and he thought for a moment that perhaps he had never left the other one — but with another blink of the eyes and the clearing of his field of vision he managed to perceive that there were bold differences between the two.

In this reality, the walls were finite. In the middle where they met there hung a ceiling fan that crooned pleasantly with every gyration. Francis was no longer hovering upright, but lying down, and beneath him he could feel the compliant suppleness of a bed and the bunches of smooth sheets that curled around his thin hips. His upper body was supported by a few tiers of stacked pillows, so that he was almost halfway sitting straight. His right hand felt warmer than his left, and Francis sat there for a moment, merely relishing that warmth. He wondered if the green-eyed boy from Marseille who may or may not be Arthur had followed him here.

He finally plucked up the courage to look to see the hand clasped around his own. It was attached to the arm of a sleeping man, whose face was buried in the crook of the elbow of his other arm, with disheveled hair sticking up in all directions. Francis could hardly suppress a relieved sigh.

He didn't wake Arthur — the real Arthur — for a lengthy period of time; he just sat there, taking in his surroundings and looking at his — dare he say it? — husband. Arthur had grown skinner since the last time Francis had last seen him — how many months ago now? — but not quite as skinny as Francis himself. The Brit was wearing one of his homely plaid grey sweater vests and some old black trousers that Francis remembered from college. He was sitting on a chair pulled up next to the bed, his torso leaning an uncomfortable distance towards Francis, and he was snoring lightly.

Francis tugged his hand out of Arthur's and ran his fingers through the bed hair. He hummed through his nose a made-up tune and tried to recollect in his mind the last thing that had happened to him. There was calling Matthew, and frenziedly running through the streets of Paris, but that was all. He couldn't remember why he had called Matthew or what had caused him to run. He thought that he might have said something dense, revealed something he shouldn't have to his brother, but he wasn't sure.

When Francis' thumb snagged on a knot in the hair, Arthur yanked his head backwards on a knee-jerk reaction and Francis immediately withdrew his hand. Their eyes met almost simultaneously, both pairs wide and unblinking. Seconds ticked by like this, with Francis' hand frozen in midair and Arthur's hair even more disorganized than it was before.

"You're awake," said Arthur finally, as though he had to establish that fact first.

"Yes," responded Francis.

Arthur sheepishly drew himself back to sit up properly, rustling the hospital sheets as he did so. He folded his hands neatly one on top of the other in his lap, never looking away from the Frenchman.

"You cut your hair," accused Arthur.

"Yes," responded Francis, pinching his lips together. He dared not tell him that he'd paid a visit to Chel to do so. "Um."

Neither said anything. Six, seven seconds went by. A million thoughts buzzed around Francis' head. When was the last time he'd gone to work? When was the last time he'd talked to Antonio or Gilbert? What happened to Matthew? Why was he, Francis, in a hospital in the first place? And more importantly, why was Arthur here as well? Why was Arthur here, if he didn't care?

"What happened?" he finally decided.

Arthur frowned. "Don't you remember?"

"No," he said, right as he did begin to remember. He had jumped off the Mirabeau bridge. He had attempted to commit suicide; there was the demon-child — one that looked like his mother — and she had pushed him. But those ideas seemed ludicrous. Sane men did not hallucinate images of their youthful mothers pushing their children to their deaths. Sane men did not jump the way he did, full of happiness and colour and fervency. He'd never wanted to die, even having known that his life was falling apart. He wasn't depressed or sad or sick. Why had he done it? What had happened?

"You tried committing suicide," said Arthur softly, affirming Francis' doubtful thoughts. "You — you jumped, sometime in the morning yesterday."

"Morning?"

Arthur nodded, throat moving as he swallowed. "A lot of people saw you do it. They managed to pull you out only after you'd fallen unconscious. You rode the river a long way."

"I could have sworn it was nighttime," said Francis, which was apparently the wrong thing to say.

Arthur's eyes blazed. "What does that even matter? You shouldn't have done it at all," he said, voice rising a little. "You're such a bloody fucking idiot. What's wrong with you?"

Francis moved his hands to grip his own hair, shaking his head slightly. "You did this to me," he accused Arthur. "Why did you do this to me?"

"What the hell do you mean?" demanded Arthur, jumping to his feet and knocking his chair over backwards.

"I hadn't meant to jump!" wailed Francis, shaking his head vigorously now. "I hadn't ever meant to try killing myself. It was you — it was all you."

He noticed that Arthur was barely swallowing anger now, eyes turning red and fists clenching and unclenching. "You cheated, you goddamn bastard. You had an affair with Chel! You're a married man, and you cheated on me! Do you have any idea how worried I was after Matthew called me - and then later when the hospital called to tell me that you'd almost drowned? It took me an hour to drive here, Francis, and I kept thinking, He might be dead by the time I get there. He might already be dead, and it'll be on me. And I was thinking about what I'd done to deserve your hatred - to deserve you sleeping around - and then to deserve you dying on me, and I was scared, Francis, I was -"

"Arthur, stop," said Francis, because although he was confused and lost and angry, he was most of all tired and he did not want to fight. Arthur, to his credit, did calm down a little.

He pulled his chair back up and took Francis' hands again, nodding all the while, breathing hard.

"Okay. Okay. Okay, sorry. Uh — the nurses said you needed to rest. We'll — we can talk about that later. Everything, I mean. Sorry."

Francis looked away, turning his head to face a window on his left. They were pretty high up, probably on the sixth or seventh floor. Below, the Parisians of France hustled around each other, oblivious to the drama that was Francis' life. The tell-tale signs of spring were showing, and the roads were pristine and black and it was raining slightly and Francis took that as a sign that perhaps winter was finally starting to draw to a close.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, daring not to look at Arthur.

"I know." Arthur was still breathing hard.

"We have a lot of problems," Francis said, bunching closed his eyes and trying to gulp the tears away. He couldn't look at Arthur, not like this.

Goddamn it, what was wrong with them? Why couldn't they have lived a normal, happily married life? Why did they have to have these problems, why did Francis have to have his sickness, why couldn't anything be the way they were supposed to be? Were they cursed? Were they damned? What was it? He'd never asked for anything in his entire life. All he wanted was to be happy, to be loved, to find someone he could love in return.

"Yeah," Arthur said, and it sounded as though he was choking back tears as well, as though the two had been sharing the exact same thoughts.

Francis finally turned back to look at the Brit, but the other had his face turned downward and was looking at his fists. Tears were dripping steadily on them, and Arthur's figure was trembling slightly; the second time Francis had ever seen Arthur cry. And it was so strange, that this second time actually opening up to Francis was during a time when the two were farthest apart.

"Don't cry," Francis said helplessly, because his heart ached. Arthur looked up, eyes glistening with wetness, and Francis reached out to him just as the other leaned forwards. The two met in the middle, embracing each other, Arthur's arms around Francis' torso and Francis' around his neck. It was ridiculous, and they were not acting like two grown men at all, but for a moment it didn't matter.

"I've missed you," Arthur whispered into his shoulder. Francis could only nod, not trusting himself to speak, but believing Arthur wholeheartedly. "I never stopped loving you, you know. All this time."

They remained like that for the longest time, and the Frenchman had never felt more comfortable and right in his entire life. There were still years of unspoken disagreement between them, and months of full-blown pain that would always separate them, but with his body in such close proximity to the other's it was difficult to remember that. Francis never wanted to let go, but he had to, and they both drew back, laughing a little at each other as they wiped at their eyes.

And Francis didn't want to break this unspoken, mutual consent they had going on, but he knew the news was inevitable and he had to stop running away from his problems. This was how he would start. And if Arthur could not love him for it, then nobody could and Francis had tried.

"I have something to tell you," he said, hesitating only a little bit.

Arthur nodded. Francis looked at the Brit for a long time, wishing with all his might that he did not have to do this. He'd found hope, just now, in Arthur's arms; now he had to give that hope away.

It took Francis a long time to get his words out. He licked his lips, and tried to force them out of his throat, and then coax them out, but try as he might the words simply wouldn't come. He tried once, twice, three more times. Arthur sat, patient as ever. The Brit saw his struggle and he reached up and took Francis' hand once more, giving him an encouraging smile. The green eyes never left his face. In them, there was age. Maturity. Sorrow. Trust.

"I'm HIV positive," Francis said. "No one else knows."

Arthur went very still. His lips were slightly agape, though they closed together for a split second and then parted again. His eyes shifted across the room, as though there was something else there that could refute the statement or perhaps clarify it some more as a kind of mistake.

"What did you say?" he asked, brows pulling together.

"Arthur," Francis said instead, putting a hand over the one Arthur had on his own. "Arthur, please don't be upset with me. Please listen —"

"No," Arthur shook his head. "No, I just — I, I need a moment."

Francis nodded. He watched with terror in his heart as Arthur breathed in, out, in, out, looking everywhere except at him. His grip on Francis' hand had tightened painfully, and Francis watched as the swelling in the Brit's eyes became more prominent once again.

"How long?" Arthur asked bravely.

"Mid-December," Francis responded, heart hammering in his chest like punches. Everything was up to Arthur now, because that — the disease — had been the last of his real secrets. Marseille, the affair, the disease. And everything was out now. "I mean, probably earlier than that. But that's when I found out."

"I wanted to work things out with you," Arthur said. "When I got the call about you and I saw you lying here for the first time, the first thing I thought was, Oh God, let him be okay. I would do anything to make sure he was okay."

Francis' throat constricted painfully. Arthur had come here willing to give him another chance. Arthur had come wanting to make it work with him. Arthur had come here looking for his husband, to invite his husband back home.

His husband — not a diseased individual he could not afford to take care of.

"I understand," Francis nodded, because he did, although it hurt.

"I need to go," said Arthur, gathering his coat in his arms and getting off the chair. "I need to go — I, I just. I need to leave." He looked almost apologetic, but he was in no hurry running out the door.

Francis collapsed back on the bed, regretful. He hadn't known what to expect. He didn't blame Arthur for the decision. He would have left himself, too. There was no room in anyone's hearts for a broken man.


Antonio and Gilbert came into the room later, a long time after Arthur had left.

"Francis," breathed Antonio, rushing to the bed and throwing his arms around Francis' neck, knocking the breath out of him. "Francis! Francis!" the Spaniard wailed, shaking his head back and forth as though refusing to believe it. "Arthur called, we came as fast as we could -"

Gilbert hung back, looking terrifically out of place in his unkempt suit and crooked tie. His face was a mask of impending brood, his hands buried in too-deep pockets, the upper row of his front teeth stained with the maroon seeping from his lips. He nodded at Francis, and that was all.

Antonio pulled away, hands still clasped on Francis' aching shoulders. "You had us worried sick," he cried. "You should have called. When was the last time you called? Months ago!"

"We thought you were dead," Gilbert said flatly.

"I hadn't meant to worry you," Francis responded, for lack of anything better to say in consolation.

"Yeah?" Gilbert advanced, rolling up the sleeves of his jacket. "Move, Tony."

Antonio seemed to realize exactly what Gilbert was planning on doing and intuitively moved over to cover his bedridden friend, which put the Frenchman in an exceedingly disagreeable position with half the Spaniard's body draped over him. "No, Gilbert," Antonio said firmly. "You need to control yourself. Francis is still recovering."

"Move, Tony," Gilbert growled. "Or I'll punch your fucking head in too."

"You can't mean that," protested Antonio.

Francis gently removed Antonio from his torso. He didn't say a single thing, because although he felt grateful towards his friend for attempting to protect him, his gratitude could not be quenched by the staggering self-loathing that fell heavy on his current state of mind. And he felt that should Gilbert move to strike him, he had no right to protest nor was he in any position to ask Antonio's protest in his place.

Antonio had only drawn back for a second, mouth halfway open to chastise, when Gilbert surged forwards.

Francis only heard the quick clang in his ears before tasting metallic blood rush thick in his mouth. Eyes squeezed shut, he moved to spit out the contents instinctively — but then Gilbert was there once more, bashing his head over and over again into the bed relentlessly, screaming himself hoarse all the while. Suddenly there were other people scrambling into the room, noises and voices, and a clamor of sounds and a crowd of bodies. And suddenly Francis almost lost complete and utter control of his bladder in pure terror — an urge that hadn't swept across him since he was in diapers.

Suddenly, suddenly they were all gone — his focus returned, his doubles turned to ones, and there was a young man leaning over him pressing a bag of ice to his nose. There was blood — blood everywhere, and though the damage could not possibly have been that significant nor the pain that prominent, Francis was bawling. There was just so much of the stuff, and it didn't stop flowing, and everything was so loud. He faintly heard Antonio's own voice rising through the fissures of the music of blood pulsating through his ears and he could feel the nurses with their cold cool fingers on his pulse and all over his face and he bat them away, all of them, with furious swats. He just wanted Gilbert and Antonio back — it had been too, too long since they were together — he wanted to grip Gilbert tight and beg his forgiveness even if the German tried to pummel him to dust. And he wanted Arthur, he wanted Arthur, he wanted Arthur.

Arthur would make it all okay.

And then Francis was screaming, hands outstretched towards the door he could not see, blinded by hysterics as he was. He beat the bed down with his fists, arching into it even as the nurses tried to push him down, calm him down. He was sobbing for all that had gone wrong, all that was so unfair — for a husband that would leave him at his lowest, for a best friend who would hurt him at his most vulnerable. For the blood that stained the white room red — the room that had been Francis' solace just a dream ago, the room that contained within it the boy with piercing eyes whom Francis had adored his entire life. For having loved and being loved and knowing love as all he is until he gave too much of himself, invested too thoughtlessly, reached out too far. It hurt, loving so many things at the same time, stretching yourself out so thin until there was nothing left to love yourself with.


Arthur returned later, when the echoes of the white-haired bright-eyed child and his lovely curly-haired kind-hearted best friend had long ago died down and were but the remnants of a memory one could never be too sure truly happened.

He shuffled into the room like a quivering destitute seeking shelter, like a wronged man seeking renewed faith before a holy altar. Though Francis was now motionless on the bed, his consciousness drifting between the now and then, his head turned away from the entrance and half-lidded eyes staring blankly out the window, he caught every motion of the Brit — every fidgeting twitch of his fingers, every unsure scuffle of his feet. And Francis remained still, cautious of the shallow rise and fall of his lungs as he watched Arthur from the corners of his eyes with his limbs limp by his side, feeling breakable.

Arthur closed the door quietly behind him.

"I told you I'd come back," said he, stopping in the middle of the room, speaking to Francis' back where a single sheet of blanket lay stretched over.

"You didn't," murmured Francis into his pillow.

"Alright, so I didn't. Sue me."

Arthur walked as though he was afraid Francis would suddenly leap out of the bed and chase him away, but the Frenchman no longer had the energy to do so even if he wanted. The Brit lowered himself onto the edge of the bed, lifting his hand hesitatingly before running it through Francis' short locks. They remained like that for a while, Francis lulled to almost-sleep by the steady pull of Arthur's fingers across his scalp. Francis wondered if Arthur knew the extent of his self-hatred.

"What have I done to you?" whispered Arthur finally.

Francis said nothing. He kept hearing the voices in his head of the nurses that had spoken after Gilbert and Antonio left — his body is unusually pale and weak. He's forty pounds underweight. Although we didn't have to put him on oxygen after we pulled him out of that river, just a second longer in there and he would have been a goner. Even now, he's close to it. We should keep him here. For a while, at least. Run some tests. Figure out what's wrong.

"It's not you," breathed Francis. "I'm a horrible life partner."

"I'm a shittier one," laughed Arthur.

Francis rolled over, bed moaning, so that he and Arthur were face to face. They smiled at each other, and Arthur moved his hand from Francis' hair to Francis' hand and held it tightly. He leaned in, and pressed his forehead against the other's.

"What are we going to do?" asked Arthur, voicing aloud the question that had been on their minds for what seemed like forever. He said it so quietly, his breath just barely grazed the other's lips.

Francis closed his eyes. "I'll let you make the call."

"Don't be an idiot. We're going to make this work together, Francis, because the moment we got married to each other we promised there'd be no more 'I'; it's going to be us. You and me."

The Frenchman smiled again, faintly. He almost wanted to point out all the times the past few months when Arthur hadn't been there for him, when he'd had to get here by himself without another soul in the world to lean on.

"I would have stayed with you anyway," Arthur said softly, bringing his other hand up to cup Francis' cheek like the green-eyed boy in his dreams had. "You know that, right? I would have stayed with you if I'd known. I was just," he shuddered, "Angry. I was so blinded by anger I couldn't think straight — and then it was only pride that held me back from picking up that phone and calling you." He sounded like he was having difficulties getting his words out, and when Francis opened his eyes he saw that Arthur was once again tearing up. It was so goddamned easy to cry nowadays.

"I'm so sorry," choked the Brit, gulping down huge swallows as he worked his mouth around the words. "I did this to you. I did."

"Stop that," chided Francis, meaning for the other to both stop crying and stop blaming himself. He would have reached for Arthur himself with a hand, but his only remaining arm was pressed too tightly against his side and the bed. "You're going to make me cry."

"I've never cried so many times in a single day before," admitted Arthur. "It's pathetic."

Francis half-laughed.

"God," said Arthur. "God." He leaned in just as Francis leaned forwards, their lips crushing together with a desperate, hungry need. Francis could taste the salty tears that had coated themselves over the other's chapped lips and felt Arthur's free hand move to the back of his head, locking him in place. He ran his tongue over Arthur's teeth, felt it as Arthur's lips parted over his to allow a gasp of hastily gulped air, sensed the crushing embrace of their collision. The temperature around them seemed to drop a hundred degrees. Suddenly all and everything was just Arthur — Arthur's insistent, willing tongue, Arthur's noises at the back of his throat, Arthur's hand now on the side of his burning hot skin. It was messy, and urgent, but not sloppy and awkward; they fit together perfectly, like they always have, moving and responding as the other did, pressing to each other as though needing to converge into one. They parted briefly, and then Arthur was on his right cheek, forehead, left cheek, before returning to the lips and then pulling away one final time.

Francis was halfway sitting up now using his elbow as a prop, his other arm gripping the edge of the bed. The Brit was half an arm's distance away, both his hands cupping the sides of Francis' face, eyes ravaging the other apart. They took each other in, breathing hard; Francis would not be able to tear his stare away from this man if his life depended on it in that moment. Arthur filled his entire view then — his dark, glittering eyes and long blond lashes and his swollen, slightly parted lips and mussed hair. And it was as though a million questions he'd been asking all his existence had suddenly been answered. And it was as though that moment was eternity.

"I'm not going to leave you," Arthur affirmed. It was all Francis could ask for — to be taken care of for once, to not have to worry about anything else, to place his responsibilities and burdens on another and for that to be okay. And how glorious that was — how lightheaded, light-shouldered he felt with that single utterance! To know that there was someone out there who still cared for him, that he and the other stood as equals, that together they could conquer the free world — that, that was utter, indescribable euphoria. There was nothing Francis could have said or done that would have accurately captured the immensity of his wildly rushing emotions: the pure joy that swept through him, the shock that ran down his spinal cord and touched down on every extremity in his nervous system, the reassurance that he'd been hoping for all along — I knew it. I knew it all along. Arthur would never leave me. Not him — his belief, his life source, his oxygen in a world without.

And Arthur must have caught that little smile that tugged on the tips of Francis' lips as well, for he leaned down and pressed two soft, gentle kisses to each side. And Francis could forget about everything that had happened to him. His smoking, his alcoholism, his substance abuse, his depression, his hallucinations, his HIV and loss of beauty and weight and his throwing up blood and near suicidal attempt — and maybe, maybe even the affair, for a moment. Because they were going to work through this, together. And that, that was all that mattered for now.