Midsummer's nightfall blankets the sickly, sterile shrine in it's absoluteness. Ephemeral, yet blatant. Conspicuous as everything consumed sits in its twilight, those conscious in its maw can only aphonically pray for the eventual coming of daybreak. Under the spotless, white walls, the gifted pieces plucked straight from nature observe in silence from atop the tables and shelves. Between them, a vast array of colors and shapes. An even wider diversity of meaning, to each their very own. They all watch the exact same, their purpose entirely uniform. Against notably inhuman cleanliness, the two irregularly clash; in existence alone, they are flawed, they are human. The flowers still watch with unrelenting attention.
Zinnia. Lavender.
From the foot of an unkempt bed, everything is torn away and left entirely open when two pairs of windows face and instantly shatter, unmendable. Close was never close enough, not ever. The very concept of it was one that dissolved in seconds in the palm of a hand and felt impossible to reach again, to see again. Something to be seen only from a distance, moving farther and farther away the longer it is chased. But together, they chased it, hand-in-hand. Despite the mangling of limbs, the animalistic fistfuls of hair, the long-desired contentedness instantly disintegrates as soon as it is held. Greedy, bitten nails; digging, raking into cotton and gauze. Famished, touch-starved hands, selfish in their hold, bruising skin, pulling hair. All at once, it is everything and nothing. One at a time, it is temporary. Under a longing, natural temptation, rationality itself was roasted to cinders. Begging— demanding a physical truth. One that had gone unspoken far too long, yet had always lingered, contaminating the air they breathed. Making host in the lungs, seeping into the bloodstream, it had always been lingering. The two were always aware, neither ever said a word. Not until it was now or never, not until it was too late.
Against the unwritten rules and unspoken regulations, it was forbidden. An action unspeakable, to most. But for them, they had nothing but mangled scraps. Only slim pickings remained for those left completely desolate so early. Silence; pressuring, in a space they could never truly call their own. No matter how many nights they were held here, how familiar the room became. To them, however, it was everything. It had to be, they couldn't possibly have this any other way, not anymore. Not ever again.
Basil was right in front of him, pretty, perfect, despite his swollen skin, his teary eyes. Still, Sunny felt entirely paralyzed, keeping as close to himself as he could, it was normal. He felt a shudder on his neck, exhaling, shaky. He held completely still.
Camellia. Primrose.
His doll-like limbs were weightless, especially as their fingers intertwined. Laced tight, pulled together with a gentle squeeze that set fire to his core and erupted his insides into roaring flames. It came so easy to Sunny, it always had. It was so second-nature to unfurl like this in Basil's hands, unraveling, unraveling, under the intoxicating gaze provided by loving, pure cerulean. Without thought or effort, all he had to do was accept. Accept and allow Basil to pull him apart, let his graphic mangling blur with hypnotic ecstasy that never failed to reel him in. Raw, vulnerable, the urge to conceal and hide away again was constricting, almost fatal. But Basil always made it so easy to let go, leaving him paralyzed in mind and body. A perfectly sculpted marble statue; still, cold, unchanged and unfeeling. To be worshipped and praised right where he sat.
Basil's pretty pink lips curved into a smile, but his teary, shaking spools dart away. From beneath freckled skin, he was burning.
"I… I love you." Basil says, and his meek voice is hardly a whisper. "I really, really l-love you. I think I always have."
The hospital's sashes did little to conceal the collar. Bruises, cuts, stitches, band-aids, illuminated by pale moonlight. Pillowy lips touch baby soft skin. Sunny's skin was so plush beneath his touch. It wasn't okay, it wasn't fair. Basil couldn't keep this skin forever. Couldn't lock it away and keep it perfect, even from himself. He wished he could have it, he wished he could keep it. Again, he pecks, and everything about him is soft and warm. Beneath his touch, he feels like petals. He always had reminded him of—
Basil dips down to his hands, interlocking their fingers. The difference in size was subtle, almost unable to be seen at all. He had always appreciated how perfectly Sunny's hand fit into his own. Kissing his knuckles, he dips down further to peck every joint and pulls their hands together in an almost painful squeeze. It was bitter, it was nostalgic. Those frail hands were so familiar, each ridge and dip of the fingers only more prominent with time. His hands were still so frigid, so pale. These hands had loved him, intertwined tightly with his own during the longest nights and wiped his tears away when he simply couldn't do it on his own. Long days and nights where these hands held tightly onto him were any self-restraint broke in two and his mind and limbs lost touch as he could only register how to love. Recently, these hands had hurt him, pushed him away, used his crudely bitten nails to scratch at his eyes while he beat his face to a periwinkle, swelling pulp. Basil hadn't seen these hands for years, he was starved of their desperate hold. It was never comfortable, it was never confident, but it was from Sunny, that made it perfect. Basil wondered why he was going to miss them.
He slides his hands upwards until he feels the skin of Sunny's elbow jutting into his palms. Basil appreciated Sunny's arms. Arms once gifted for warm, loving embraces; memories that Basil now held so close to his thrumming heart. The arms in those sweet memories had since been tainted by fresh rows of jagged valleys on papier mâché flesh. Slices deep into the sheen of translucent that marked up and down the lower arms. So many, so deep, it was a wonder how he was even okay. His diaphanous, cobweb skin, thinly severed into ruby scores that dried and scabbed on the well-worn flesh.
Again, Sunny had hurt himself. Again, Basil would make it better.
He didn't bother touching the wounds, the fear it might even pinch when touched was enough to drive away the idea. Yet between the bruising skin, he left behind gentle pecks. On the unblemished side of Sunny's arm, Basil rested his fingers, gently rubbing into the skin, feeling it slowly warm under the gentle circling. Underneath supple lips, he felt icy skin bloom into slowly-traveling warmth with each kiss. From seed, to sprout, bud to blossom. Basil reaches up to the shoulder blade, then pulls back with reluctance in his motion. Softly, he smiles: it's cautious, but it's warm. In return, he receives nothing, he knows Sunny well. Deep inside, he's yearning. A throbbing, burning sensation in his heart that makes it's beating pound against his eardrums in a harrowing crescendo that's slowly drowning out the already scarce noise around him. So badly, Basil wants reciprocation. In his face, in his touch, maybe once in his words. It leaves him in pieces searching, tearing Sunny, Basil, Sunny, Basil apart, until all that's left is Sunny and Sunny alone. Maybe when left with the pieces long enough, he'll find Sunny, Basil, Sunny, Basil again.
Lily. Aster.
His eyes flutter shut when algid meets blistering, and it takes only seconds and they're melting, fusing. Taking, taking, reaching salvation. It's desperate, nails clawing into skin, hands into scalps, pulling straight at the roots. Flesh, gums, nails and teeth, it was merely a matter of taking. It's hardly anything; it's perfect. It felt so good to feel so wanted again, it felt so good to be honest. Soft, smooth, slick, everything registered by their minds are surface-level. Pure, unknowing adjectives that stray far from the reality of each action, as well as their poorly masked intent. If they think hard enough, it is sacred and holy. It isn't embarrassingly eager, amateurishly filthy, not so long as they didn't even entertain the idea. For a moth to live, it had to stay away from the tempting, yet fatal light. So Basil genially threads his fingers through atramentous locks, feeling himself absentmindedly lean back into the other boy when air finally makes home in his lungs once more.
For a second, he wonders. Wonders if Sunny knew he possessed Basil's mind like he owned it. That all of Basil's memories, good and bad and both of the two, revolved around him? He wondered if he knew, if he had even the slightest inkling. Basil falls into the sheets right next to Sunny, and though the hospital beds once felt firm and uninviting, they felt just like Basil's own with Sunny right next to him, fumbling for purchase in his hands. Once more, all Basil's thoughts blend, then merge and splatter when he hears Sunny swallow a noise. He lets out a similar one once Basil chases it back into his throat and it's so incredibly overwhelming. Susceptible and alive, Basil braids their legs together. Chest-to-chest, they're one again in a small home of flowers, shimmering in moonlight's pearly incandescence. Pushing, pulling, pulling, pulling again. Sunny and Basil are just children.
Magnolia. Forget-me-not.
A content Basil sighs once air becomes a rarity. At last, he returns to the face.
With the intrusion of a gauze, held tight by bandages, it's so, so obvious. Basil wants to peel them away, look directly at the mess he made of the other boy. Hold him near, kiss his wounds, make it better. He looks deep into his piercing, auburn eye— it's the only one he has to look at anyway— and notices now how far it has sunk into its skeletal cavity. Basil didn't know this face, not until recent, when mourning was interrupted, only to be broken apart into now, something even more broken than before. Something that was thought to be impossible after a pitch-black childhood, one that strayed only further and further from the light with age.
Ugly, ugly, ugly. What's left of his friend is only skin and bone. He's so, so used, he's rotting in Basil's hands. His bones are tearing away at the skin, so desperately they want to break free, piercing through pathetic sheets that have been clumsily slashed over and over again. His hair sheds at the slightest winds, his skin pulls over his skeleton like faulty cloth covers vintage holdings. He looks fake, he looks plastic, but there isn't a part of him that isn't ruined. The word 'neglect' is seared all over his face, all over his body, and Basil just couldn't pull his eyes away. Beneath this sheath of a corpse and his mask of a ghost, Basil could still feel Sunny's human, beating heart.
"You're… You're beautiful."
Sunny's so angelic, he's perfect. He's always been perfect, in his body, in his voice. Black stains lay faded, yet permanent in his heart and mind, yet underneath the seeping of black in his soul, he remains the same. This pure being of light who only seemed to bear pain and repression, Basil longed for him more than anything. His expression spoke even less than his silence, yet Basil didn't need a single sign. Sunny— his Sunny— his best friend that he loved more than the world and everything else on it, who had been haunted by demons, and left all alone, and never felt like enough since the day he was born. Living bleak and cold in the shadow of his sister, then left alone in complete darkness when he tried to step into the light. Who felt the need to push everyone away because he knew how much he could hurt with a poltergeist pulling his strings, and let himself hurt Basil and let Basil hurt him in the process. Sunny made more mistakes than Basil ever could and Sunny was still perfect. Basil's heart swelled as he embraced Sunny with every bit of strength in his bones. It was everything he longed for all those painful years.
Soon, he would be forcefully torn out of his arms, maybe he would never see Sunny again. For now, Basil held on tight to him. Not a second went by uncherished.
By the time Basil catches himself holding on for too long, he swallows hard and lets out a choke. Basil's crying again, face left an absolute mess by tears and mucus. The face above him remains unphased.
"I'm—" he chokes, brings his hand to his face and just holds it there "I'm going to miss you."
Together, his smile and his voice began to waver, his entire body shakes and they both know what's to follow.
"I'm going to miss you so, so much."
This isn't the first time Sunny witnessed Basil break down into tears. Maybe in the best reality, it wouldn't be the last, Sunny thought. He gasped, choked, broken sobs, crying harder, getting louder. In the past, it was commonplace for the two of them. In the present, he had hardly seen Basil any other way, grief had become their new normal. Between past and present, it all felt different, somehow. Even as Basil's cries muffled in the junction of a stinging bruise on Sunny's neck and tears stained into the fabric of the hospital gown that fell off his shoulders and curtained over his knees. Basil's sobbing sounded the same, Sunny felt the same as he always did in Basil's claiming hold. It all felt different somehow.
Sunny didn't move, didn't even flinch. Instead, he held still, letting Basil hold him there as he wept. He gripped onto Sunny's hand, squeezed it tight until he knew it hurt, soaking it with tears, kissing the delicate skin.
This would be the last time.
White tulips. Sunflowers.