Warning for this chapter: An event that can be interpreted as dub-con (however, becomes explicitly consenting, because consent is hot.)
12
Wendy left and took familiarity with her, and the world looked alien and strange for a couple of days. He kept asking himself; am I really in Hutchinson? How the fuck did this happen? What am I going to fucking do with my life? He thought of Wendy as some kind of lawyer already, and couldn't imagine anything he would ever be good at, other than telling people how to flip burgers. That wasn't something he wanted to do for the rest of his life, was it?
Brian didn't call for a few days, but that was like him. He didn't like to spend too long talking on the phone, and generally only called to confirm a time to catch up. Also, Neil thought that maybe Brian needed a bit of space, he'd seemed more pensive than usual the last time they'd caught up, less talkative. If there was one thing they both understood about each other, it was that they would disappear from each other's lives to deal with their own shit when needed. And even if Neil missed Brian sometimes, or vice versa, they didn't broach that boundary unless absolutely necessary.
On the following Monday evening, Brian turned up with a pizza, which he handed off to Eric. Neil looked at him in confusion and then he realised what had happened and turned to Eric:
'You got him to bring you pizza?'
'I had a craving!' Eric sooked. He opened the box and took two massive bites.
'You have a car,' Neil said, 'and a licence.'
'I've been tired, you have no idea how exhausting it is to be me,' he said. Brian smiled benignly in the background.
'I've already had dinner, it wasn't a bother,' Brian offered, and Neil glared at him.
'You're a doormat.'
Brian simply shrugged and let his backpack fall heavily to the ground.
'I'm here now. Want to walk?'
'Go on,' Eric said, muffled around a mouthful of crust, 'leave me to my pizza. I'm not sharing.'
Neil snickered, turned and picked up his jacket from where it lay sprawled across the couch. He toed on his sneakers and they were a snug enough fit that he didn't bother tying up the laces. He lead the way and Brian followed, easier in Neil's presence than he used to be, but still tense in small ways.
'Why'd you do that? Get him something he could've gotten for himself?'
'Well, we're friends,' Brian said, 'and it gave me a reason to...' he trailed off.
'Really? Love me that much, huh?'
'I can just as soon go home,' Brian said, his prim defensiveness rising to the fore.
'Come on,' Neil said, 'don't be like that.'
They walked in peace for a while. Neil took lazy steps and his sneakers sometimes scuffed on the pavement. Brian's steps were shorter, so he walked faster to keep up. Their steps almost never fell in sync. Neil listened to the discordant beats and tried to make a song out of it in his head.
'I think about it sometimes,' Brian said, apropos of nothing. Neil squinted, wondered if he should know what he was talking about.
'Okay, what?' Neil said, giving in.
'I don't want to...have...do...you know. Sex. I don't want to do that. Yet. But I think about it sometimes.' His voice had gone quieter, like he didn't want the people in their houses to hear what they were talking about, or – more likely – he still couldn't stand the subject itself.
'Yeah?' Neil said, to cover his own rushing thoughts.
'I like what we've done. Y'know, it's been, that is...' He trailed off, and scrubbed a hand over his face, accidentally knocking his glasses askew. He resettled them and didn't say anything else.
'Whatever.'
'Do you think about it a lot?' Brian said, uncomfortable.
'Fucking you?' He paused, looked up at the stars. 'Mm. Yeah. I've thought about it. I think about kissing you, actually. But I know, I know that's not kosher. Anyway, it's different now, how I think about it.'
'What do you mean?'
'I think about it less. I...' Neil stopped, this was too hard, talking about this subject and walking did not go well together. He was used to serious subjects with Brian, but this was one that made him uncomfortable. He ran a hand through his hair and then scratched at the back of his neck. Brian waited, offering open silence.
'I'm fine with what we've done,' Neil affirmed and then shook his head, 'but I don't, I mean,' he decided to go with crudity, 'ass-fucking is a problem.'
Brian's eyes widened. Neil couldn't tell if he was shocked at the crassness, the subject, Neil's admission, and he didn't want to know. He stared down at his feet and then bent down and did up his shoelaces for something to do.
When he straightened, Brian was still just staring at him.
'Are you gonna fucking stare me all night?' Neil said, irritable, hostile, unhappy with the direction the conversation had taken, unhappy with the fact that he'd had to admit this at all.
'It just surprised me,' Brian said, apologetic. 'It used to be more the other way around.'
'Yeah,' Neil laughed, brittle, 'it's ten kinds of fucked up.'
Brian stepped closer and frowned. Neil thought that maybe he was going to be judged, maybe Brian just wouldn't get it.
'It's also not surprising,' he said, his voice gentler, even soothing. Neil bristled that Brian even thought he needed that tone of voice, he wanted to scrape against it, push him away, but his heart hammered with appreciation and his face felt flushed.
'It's ironic and shit. That you're more okay with what we do than I am. You're going forwards. I'm going backwards.'
'I don't think you're going backwards.'
'No?' Neil said, angry, 'what would you call it then?'
Brian opened his mouth several times, but silenced every sentence before it could emerge. Finally, he sighed and shoved his hands back into his pockets.
'You don't even know,' Neil jeered and Brian frowned.
'I do so. But, that's not, that doesn't matter. Um. I think it's more normal for you to have problems with...this stuff, than to not have problems with it.'
'Feeling like shit is the new normal,' Neil said, deflated and Brian's shoulders slumped.
'I'm sorry, I didn't come over to make you feel bad.'
'Then,' why the fuck did you come over? Neil didn't finish the sentence. He ground his teeth together.
'Talk to me about work,' Brian said, changing the subject, and Neil gratefully fell into the next subject.
They started walking again, and talked instead about work, work hours, how no one who deserved to get fired ever really got fired, and any other subject he can think of to get as far away from the subject of him not wanting to fuck ever again.
A week and a half later and Eric was out for the day, on a 'budget-friendly shopping jaunt' followed by a 'budget-friendly night on the town.' Brian and Neil were sprawled on the couch, two plates of junk-food on the coffee table and half-asleep anyway. The days where they didn't talk about anything serious were still days where they found a simple and easy connection with each other. Neil leaned on one of the armrests and Brian leaned on the other, and their legs were entangled at their ankles. Brian's weight had become painful and he had pins and needles in his right foot, but he didn't care, and was too tired to move.
A new advertisement came on TV, some food product that he was hardly interested in. The mom was trying to convince her son that it was the best food ever, and the son was refusing to eat it.
Then she said, 'open your mouth wide.'
Neil's eyes widened, he jerked his ankles out from between Brian's and swung upright. The advertisement passed into the show they were watching, but Neil hardly noticed. His chest felt tight and breathing was becoming a challenge.
The foot with pins and needles was a deadweight on the ground, and the toes in his other foot curled with distress. Something wasn't right, and Neil didn't know what it was. And in his head, the words 'open your mouth wide,' hammered and hammered, until it echoed in his heart and in the pulse points throughout his body. It felt like a blackout, how quickly the scenery of his lounge-room melted into a bedroom with a sparkly, speckled ceiling, that smelled of sex and all those things that Neil had once found so fucking hot.
He couldn't get out of that room, and for the first time in memory, he wanted to. He was angry at himself for projecting emotions onto the whole event that he was sure he hadn't felt at the time, had he? No. What happened with Coach was right, and fine, and what the fuck was happening? His fingers scrabbled at his chest. It felt half allergic response, half terror, and mostly 'the world is ending.' He'd never felt anything like it. He wanted to claw his own lungs open. And there, in his chest, his heart was a burning, hungry muscle, unforgiving and painful.
Someone jostled him and he turned to ask them to stop, but he couldn't see anything other than subdued lighting, Coach near him, the room, the room, the room. He was going insane, he was sure. This was...he didn't have a word for what this was.
Time passed and he gasped himself back into awareness. He was light-headed, dizzy, tired, wide-awake, too alert and foggy all at the same time.
The TV was off, and Brian was crouching in front of him, upset and frightened.
'Neil?' Brian said, his voice shaking. Spasmodically, he reached up and wiped at his nose, that old gesture to see if any blood was coming. It wasn't. In that moment Neil realised with a startling clarity just how far Brian had come. He hadn't seen that gesture in maybe a month or more, even though they'd discussed difficult things since.
'I don't feel good,' he heard himself say, and his voice cracked. He swallowed, and realised his mouth was dry. He started to reach for a can of pop, but Brian saw and handed it to him.
'Water would be better,' Brian said, thin and worried.
Neil drank half the can and felt it all sloshing around in his stomach. His internal organs felt cold, his forehead hot.
'You, you had a p-panic attack,' Brian said, eyes widening at the reality of what he was saying.
'Why are you getting so much better?' Neil said, antagonistic and brittle, 'why am I getting so much worse?'
'I don't know,' Brian said, rather uselessly, Neil thought. He felt vulnerable and awkward and awful. He wanted to kick Brian until he went away. Wanted to bury himself in forgetting and not thinking about it. Wanted violence and tearing holes into the world.
'I wish I could make it stop,' Brian added and Neil sneered.
'No, you don't. You started this shit. You wanted someone to talk to about it,' Neil was standing now, mad and unable to sit still, his foot alive and painful beneath him where it was waking up, 'you wanted someone who knew. You fucking pushed at me, made me become this fucked up piece of shit.'
Brian stood. His expression had shifted from worried, to confused, to defensive, and now he just looked angry. His eyes were glinting behind his glasses, and his teeth were clenched in his jaw. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again, took a deep, deliberate breath and sighed it out. Neil thought he should try to do the same thing, but when he attempted to drag more oxygen into his lungs, they wouldn't cooperate.
About a minute passed, a minute where Neil felt jittery, felt like he wanted to get high, just do something, and then Brian finally said:
'I didn't make you like this.'
'Fucking seriously?' Neil said, incredulous. 'I might have gone through my whole fucking life and been fine.'
Brian shook his head and looked really mad, and Neil didn't care, he wanted to fight. He wanted to see how far Brian would go. He wanted Brian yelling at him and making him not think about what just happened and why it happened and how easy it was to slip down that far, that fast.
'Quit doing this! You keep making these sorts of excuses, you're so dumb sometimes, and you do it on purpose so you don't have to think about anything. It's not like you want me to talk about what I think, because you can't handle it, so why do you say this...this shit that makes me want to point out what's actually happening?'
Brian paused, waited for a response, but Neil was rendered mute, and Brian wrung his hands together as he continued.
'You were done when you came back from New York. Remember? You were done. It had nothing to do with me, you didn't know me! You hardly remembered me! I didn't hurt you or beat you up like that...like that man did, and you weren't fine when that happened, and you weren't fine when you met me, and you weren't fine that Christmas Eve when I had to help you out of the house, just like you'd helped me into it, because you were so out of it.'
'Stop it,' Neil heard himself say.
'I might have a-accelerated whatever downward spiral you're on, but you were on it already. You could've got HIV, you could've been murdered, you were raped, and-'
'Okay,' Neil said, taking a step back and accidentally stumbling on the corner of the coffee table.
'I didn't make you like this,' Brian said, irritated as hell, from what Neil could see, 'and I'm tired of you saying it all the time to make yourself feel better, to have someone to blame who's a s-safe target. I don't like it. I'm worried about you and the first thing you do is blame me. I wasn't the one who molested you, I wasn't even the one recruiting other kids to be hurt by that man like you were! If anyone had a right to say 'you made me this way,' it's me, and I'm not saying it, so stop saying it!'
Brian was exhaling hard by the time he'd finished, and his hand shot up to check the underside of his nose again. It still wasn't bleeding, but the gesture was telling. Neil could hear himself trying to gather his breath, and though it wasn't as hard as during whatever 'panic attack' he may have had, it was still difficult.
It was the first time Brian had ever talked about how he'd been 'recruited' before, the first time he'd done it in anger, the first time he'd brought up the fact that Neil had a hand in taking him home that rainy night in for those reasons.
Neil felt it like a thick, black weight in his gut. He wanted to be sick.
A moment later he half-ran, half-staggered to the toilet and threw up bile, junk-food, the fizziness of acidic pop. The taste alone was enough to keep him retching.
Brian hadn't followed, and Neil tried not to think about why, tried not to think about what a monster he was for doing all those things to Brian, tried and failed. He flushed and made his way into the bathroom, rinsed his mouth and swallowed mouthfuls of tap-water. He wanted to brush his teeth but thought he might throw up again, so instead he just put toothpaste directly into his mouth with his finger, gargled it, spat it out.
He didn't want to leave the bathroom.
He didn't want to go back out into the lounge where Brian was. Dammit, it had been such a good fucking day too. Lazy and easy and relaxed.
'Fuck!' He shouted into the bathroom sink, and then, 'fuck,' in an undertone as he rested his forearms around the basin and his head sank down.
He heard footsteps and tensed, and then tensed hard when he felt a light hand between his shoulder-blades.
'I shouldn't have said anything,' Brian said, and Neil shook his head.
'You're right though.'
'No, you don't hear me properly, when you're like this. I...' Brian sighed, 'you didn't hear me. I don't think you made me this way.'
'You don't know,' Neil said, and the hand on his back became fingers curling down his spine. He shivered.
'Would you've done those things to me, if you'd never met him?' Brian said, and Neil squinted into the basin. All he could smell was the minty-freshness of toothpaste, but he could taste bile in the back of his throat.
'Maybe.'
'Sure,' Brian scoffed, 'I don't mean to correct you, but I don't think so. I bet you would have been a little shit, as a kid, and probably a bully, but I don't think you would have done that.'
'You don't know. It's fucked up that we're even talking about this.'
There was silence then, and even though it must have been awkward, Brian raised his other hand and put it on Neil's back. It gentled him, even though he didn't want it to, even though his blood still felt like it had bubbles in it. Those two points of contact, and he didn't even want to stand, he had no idea what Brian was offering but he wanted to drown in it. His forearms were starting to hurt where they were braced on the sink.
'So...what, what made you freak out?' Brian said and Neil shook his head, the only clue he had was that stupid sentence, 'open your mouth wide,' and he didn't want to talk about it, he didn't want Brian to be right, he didn't want any of it.
One of the hands rubbed back and forth, back and forth, warmth over his shoulder blade. He wanted what Brian was offering, but the price was too high. Awkwardly, he stood up and faced Brian, stared at him, felt blank and empty. Brian's hands hung by his side. Neil still felt the impression of them on his back.
He opened his mouth to say something, but words wouldn't come. In the end he just walked back into the lounge and started watching TV again. Brian did the same thing a moment later. At first he kept glancing at Neil as though expecting him to say something, but as time passed he settled back into the couch and stretched his legs out. They tangled their ankles together again, and Neil could barely tell what he was watching, he was so tired.
Neil dozed, and when he woke up, an hour later, he felt brittle and irritated. He turned and saw Brian still watching TV, a sleepy look on his face. Their ankles were still touching, but both of his feet were awake this time. His fingers curled against the nubby fabric of the sofa and against his own shirt. He exhaled slow and deliberate.
He turned and paused, and Brian turned over to look at him. His face was slack with sleepiness, his lips full, his hair mussed from shifting on the sofa so often.
'I'm comin' over,' Neil warned him, which was more than he would usually offer anyone else.
Brian's eyes narrowed, like he didn't understand, and then they widened when Neil straddled his legs, when he bracketed his arms on either side of his shoulders. Other people might have found manoeuvring on a sofa uncomfortable, but Neil was used to doing this kind of shit in cars, in toilets, in single beds, on chairs, and nothing really bothered him anymore.
He realised he was hard, and he wanted. He wanted something from Brian that he wasn't sure Brian was willing to give.
'Wh-what are you doing?' Brian said, and Neil just stared down at him, wondering where to start, what to do. Kissing wasn't allowed, no tongue exploring what he was sure would be an afternoon-sour, hot mouth that would turn sweet as he chased the old sugar out of it, so instead he lowered his head and licked at his stubble, traced his tongue down to the place where neck met jaw. Brian made a startled sound, his body jerked. One of his arms reached up, but instead of pushing him away, his hand just clung onto Neil's upper arm.
'Neil-'
'Shut up,' Neil said against the heat of his neck, annoyed for no good reason. He felt him swallow against the side of his face and bit at his earlobe for good measure.
'Sh-shit,' Brian said, and Neil took that as permission. Brian's whole torso shifted so that it was easier to access his lower body, and Neil ground down hungrily. Even through clothing, it felt good. But he didn't want good and gentle and easy. He wanted fast and unforgiving and taking.
He licked and bit at Brian's neck, distracting him as his hand moved between them and made short work of Brian's fly. When his hand slipped beneath boxers, Brian tensed, and Neil shook his head.
'You scared?'
'I don't know what you're doing,' Brian gasped, and then made a low, full noise in the back of his throat as Neil grasped his length and wished for lube, or something, but decided friction would have to do. It matched his mood anyway. Brian's breathing went shallow, he squirmed, his mouth fell open. Neil could feel the breaths on his cheek. They made his dick jump.
'You didn't answer my question,' Neil said, moving his hand again, drinking in Brian's shifts, his tension so clear alongside his arousal.
'A-a little.'
'This is so fucked up,' Neil muttered, trying to prove something to him, though he didn't know what. He stuck his tongue into Brian's ear and tasted soap and wax and licked until the taste went away and Brian twisted and moaned and Neil grinned because damn, he was good at this.
'It-it doesn't have to be fucked up,' Brian said, voice hoarse.
Neil ignored him, rolled his whole body over Brian's, moved his hand firmly, and Brian arched as his hips responded and Neil didn't even care about himself anymore, he just cared about reducing Brian to a limp mass of pliancy. He only cared about the outcome.
'I don't,' Brian started, and then stopped and grunted when Neil bit at his collarbone, hard this time, 'maybe this isn't a good idea.'
Neil's hand moved faster and Brian groaned, his hand scrabbled for a moment on Neil's arm and then gripped even harder, fingers digging in with a bruising pressure.
'Should I stop?' Neil said, bored with patience, bored with taking it slow, bored with reassurance and gentleness and all that other bullshit. But he would still ask. He would still ask because he wanted Brian willing. His hand was still moving as he waited for an answer. He didn't think Brian would take too long to blow his load, even with all his hang-ups.
Brian screwed his eyes up, trying to concentrate, and then he seemed to come to the same decision Neil had made five minutes ago. He shook his head.
'D-don't stop,' he whispered, his cheeks red.
'I just wanna take it from you, anyway,' Neil said, his own voice straining from the force of what he wanted and Brian shivered.
'Wh-what?'
'Shut up and find out.'
Neil leaned forward and closed his teeth around Brian's adam's apple, and his reaction to that was electric. Brian's spine bent in a curve, twisted up, pressed their hips together hard. His other hand flew up and landed on Neil's scalp, and soon fingers tugged impatiently on his hair. Neil thought, for a second, that Brian was saying 'stop,' but when he lifted his head to ask, Brian's hand shoved him back down again. When Neil laid his teeth back over his throat, Brian sighed and his fingers gentled, stroked as if to say 'good, good.' Neil shuddered.
'You kinky fuck,' Neil managed, scraping his teeth from jawbone to collarbone and gathering up every single hitched breath he heard along the way, tucking it under his heart so he could remember it later.
'It's...all those stupid movies...Eric...uh,' Brian didn't finish his sentence, groaned instead. Neil was starting to get uncomfortable, leaning his weight on one arm and his legs, moving his hips even as he kept enough room to keep moving his hand on Brian's hard on.
He started to shift, but Brian had other ideas. The fingers in his hair turned into a hand gripping, pulling, and Neil resisted at first and then went with it, felt his head get pulled back, turned to the side. He didn't know what Brian was doing until he felt it, teeth biting down on the side of his neck, a tongue behind it, hot and warm and fluid.
'Fuck,' Neil exhaled, and felt the tension in Brian's lips, the smile.
Any other time, maybe he would have gone with it. Maybe it would have become more about give and take, because he liked this side of Brian, unexplored as it was. Because he thought it was good for him to have a space to explore this side of himself, and because let's face it, Neil knew he could be lazy, and wouldn't mind if Brian sometimes picked up some of the slack. But there was a hard, hollow pit in his gut and a fervent hunger that thrummed through his pulse points and it said not today, not today, not today. He moved his head back and stuck his tongue in Brian's ear, and his hand down between Brian's legs moved faster despite the soreness in his wrist.
Brian whined, his breathing stuttered and then found a faster, deeper pace. Neil knew he was close, knew it from the way the hand in his hair simply hung on, from the way the other hand on his arm dug fingers in. And he knew it from the way his hips were basically vibrating up against Neil's pumping wrist and hand, from the trembling.
'Come on,' Neil said, under his breath, right into Brian's ear. 'Come on, come on.'
Brian's mouth opened on a cry but snapped shut halfway through on a long, keening whine. His back tensed hard and Neil bit his own tongue in response as body-warm jets of come shot onto his hand, onto their clothing. Neil rode it out with Brian, and then pressed his head down onto Brian's shoulder and reached between them both, snuck a come-slick hand into his own jeans after undoing the fly and then came so fast that Brian was still gathering his breath when Neil was done.
Neil dropped heavy and tired, wedged between the couch and half on top of Brian's body. Their chests were heaving, and it smelled like sex, or whoring, or some of those times with Coach, and Neil swallowed and tried not to think about it, and failed.
'Are you,' Brian started, and then inhaled and began again, 'are you okay?'
'Fuck off,' Neil said, rolling his eyes, even though they were closed.
Minutes passed, and Brian shifted and rested one of his arms over Neil's back in a sleepy embrace. Neil couldn't decide if he liked it, or if it was wimpy and pathetic. He decided he'd leave it for a bit before making a decision.
'Are you okay?' He heard himself ask.
Brian cleared his throat, shivered.
'I-I don't know.'
Neil frowned. He'd been thinking so hard about the hunger, the wanting and the taking that he hadn't imagined how it would be afterwards. The awkwardness and hesitation and shyness.
'I just,' Brian stopped and made a small, wet sound of frustration. Neil raised his head, but Brian's eyes were dry, he looked confused, hurt, sated, beautiful, but he didn't look like he was going to cry.
'What?'
'I just can't stop thinking about it, sometimes.'
Neil closed his eyes. Of course. Their past loomed between them, thicker than blood. Probably the way he'd gone about everything hadn't helped.
'Me too,' Neil admitted, helpless, 'me too.'
Brian's hand fisted into the back of Neil's shirt. Anger, empathy, or something else entirely, Neil couldn't even tell.
Brian fell asleep first, and Neil followed soon after.
Later, after a subdued dinner of noodles, because neither felt like take-away, Brian went through Neil's collector's cards with a serious expression on his face. He lay them all out, and then started grouping them together. Neil realised with a smile that he was grouping them by hair colour, the pile of redheads sadly forlorn.
'Do you still have the cassette?' Brian asked suddenly.
Neil's mouth went dry, he froze. Last time this had come up, things had not gone well for him, for any of them, even Eric. That whole event had seared in his mind as something he didn't want to think about again anytime soon. Brian stopped sorting the cards and looked up at him.
'I'm not going to get mad,' Brian said, gentle.
'No?'
'I promise,' he said, even softer now, his voice retreating to that place where Neil's ears had to reach to hear him.
Neil started at his knee for a minute longer and then stood up, sat down on his bed instead. He spread his fingers out absently on the bedspread and felt the cassette like a physical presence in the chest of drawers next to him.
'Yep,' he said in eventual answer. His mouth was dry, and he tried to work some saliva, but what he swallowed was thick and hardly helped. He reached out for the glass of water and let the single remaining mouthful of twelve hour old water do the job for him.
Brian didn't say anything, and Neil didn't look at him.
'I can't listen to it anymore,' he said, after some time had passed. It could have been hours, for all he knew, but it was probably only five minutes.
Brian waited, and Neil wondered if it helped that he wasn't saying anything. That he wasn't yelling at him or stealing his stuff. Neil's cheeks flushed and he put the glass of water back down on the drawers and folded his hands in his lap.
'It's like finding out the apple that tasted so good has a worm in it. And then...' he couldn't finish the sentence. Even admitting that much to Brian was like prodding at some terrible, internal wound. He shook his head in the futility of trying to communicate anything at all, when Brian stood up and clambered onto the bed.
When he reached out to put a hand on Neil's shoulder, Neil jerked away and then looked at him, a firm 'no' in his expression.
Brian hung back, his bottom lip bitten between his teeth, his eyes wide and worried. Neil wanted to tell him to go away, to take his stupid comfort and his stupid affection and get out of his goddamn house.
Instead, he leaned forwards and Brian's hand shot out straight away, wrapping around him. Neither decided they'd lie down, but they both ended up lying side by side anyway. Neil couldn't close his eyes, and they gazed at each other. After a moment, Neil rested his own hand on Brian's chest and left it there.
In that moment, their brokenness was the most visible thing about both of them.
Author's Note: Phew, still going. On track for the next chapter (in which Neil's life completely implodes to a catastrophic degree).
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