Title: Material Culture
Author: Nemo the Everbeing
Rating: PG, but you can see slash on the horizon now. And it's only taken me seven installations!
Summary: Every object has significance. The goal of study is to determine what it is. (Finch/Dominic)
Disclaimer: 'V for Vendetta' belongs to Alan Moore and David Lloyd. The theatrical version of the story belongs to Warner Brothers, the Wachowski brothers, and possibly a few other brothers. I don't own any of it, am not a brother, and write this solely for my own pleasure.
oOo oOo Chapter 5: Key oOo oOo
Two weeks into Dominic's stay and Finch deposited his spare key on his desk. Dominic left it there, not to display it, but for convenience. It was not said aloud, but the moments when he would need to use that key were the moments in which he wouldn't have time to search for it. Finch understood. In fact, Finch approved.
When Creedy started to show an interest in Dominic, the other lads in the office had stopped showing theirs. Dominic started to stay in their office more, and while he was studying case files his fingers would play against the key hanging from the hook on the side of his desk. Sometimes he would lift it off. Once, when Finch glanced up to see Dominic deeply engrossed in the background of a suspected jewel thief, he slipped the end of the key between his lips and chewed at the teeth, a contemplative frown creasing his face.
Finch decided that, purely for selfish reasons, this tumult had been for the best. Dominic would come out of it wiser and more careful. He wasn't certain what would become of the key once Creedy declared him cleared of suspicion and Dominic's stay at his flat was ended, but he couldn't think he would ask for it back.
oOo oOo oOo oOo
It's the dead of night and Finch is thirsty. Sleep eludes him more nights than he cares to think about, but he's usually very good about keeping himself to himself when it happens. There's no point keeping them both awake.
Dominic has become a familiar presence in his front room, curled up under a sheet on his sofa in a gray t-shirt and flannel trousers. He looks young when he sleeps, and very still. Finch tries to pad by and get to his kitchen without drawing attention.
He treads on a loose board and Dominic startles at the creaking noise. Finch crosses the room to reassure him before Dominic makes for the gun in the end table.
"Sorry," he whispers.
Dominic blinks up at him, and then a slow, hazy smile crosses his face. His eyes are black in the darkness, and he sits up a bit. "Something wrong?" he asks, but sounds unconcerned. He's got good at reading Finch's moods.
"Just thirsty," Finch says. "Go back to sleep."
He makes for the kitchen. Behind him he hears Dominic's sleep roughened voice call out, "Could you get me some as well?" He doesn't even ask what Finch is drinking.
Finch pours them each a finger of whiskey and then brings them back to the couch. Dominic's shifted to make room, and Finch sits next to him. The sheets pucker around him.
Dominic takes his glass and yawns. "You should go back to sleep," Finch says.
Dominic shakes his head and takes a drink. "Can't. Every time I close my eyes I think someone's going to climb through your window and bag me." He snorts a bit of a laugh, and Finch thinks it's self-mocking. "Just a bit pathetic, me."
"Seems like a perfectly reasonable fear," Finch says.
"Yeah, I guess it is at that. You know what's funny, Chief? There's this big part of me that thinks this must be my fault, that the Party doesn't make this sort of mistake. I keep looking at what I did, trying to think of how I might have gone wrong without knowing it." He takes another drink and then swirls the glass. "When I was little, my da told me that the Party had saved us. He taught me that the Party was the best thing that ever happened to this country, that they had our best interests at heart."
Finch makes his interjection as non-intrusive as possible. He doesn't want to interrupt Dominic. He feels strange, like he's looking through a window he didn't know was there, and seeing something in Dominic he isn't supposed to. "And then they took your cousin," he says.
Dominic doesn't look at him. "Lizzie. Yeah. No one would talk about her after she got took. I didn't dare ask on it, but I kept wondering what she could have possibly done to get herself bagged. She was my age. What could a kid have done as bad as all that?" He frowns. There are lines around his eyes Finch can't remember having seen before. "And now I wonder if maybe she didn't do anything at all. They want to bag me, and all I did was my job. Maybe she never saw it coming: just going about, living her life one minute, and the next she's nothing but a few whispers from the neighbors and a compact lying in the street."
Finch doesn't know what to say. He's never been good in such personal situations when they matter. When it's witnesses he's fine, but when it's someone he cares about—and he's forced to admit that he does care about Dominic—he can't find words.
He lays an awkward hand over Dominic's in an attempt to comfort. Dominic looks up at him, startled. Then he sets down his whiskey and turns his hand over. There's hesitation in that gesture, and Finch can't say that he blames Dominic for being wary. They're both in uncharted territory. Dominic spreads his fingers and presses his palm to Finch's. It's cold and clammy from the tumbler, but it's warming fast. He moves his hand just a little and their fingers interlace. Dominic is staring at their hands like it's a puzzle he's only just figuring out. Or maybe like it's the most incredible thing he's ever seen.
Finch thinks he's missing a part of this equation but can't imagine asking about it. This is already far too close to crossing a half-dozen professional and personal boundaries. All his resolutions to keep his coworkers at arm's length—to steel himself against any possible betrayal—are falling apart under that grip. Because it feels wonderful to touch someone in any way after so many years. The world has discouraged touch to such an extent that even bumping into someone feels personal these days. And there's Dominic holding his hand, and it's more intense than anything in recent memory.
"No one's going to take you," Finch says. He sounds confident enough even he believes it.
"Going to take your truncheon to them if they try, Eric?" Dominic asks. Neither of them mentions the slip. It's just another crumbled professional boundary.
"You bet your arse," Finch says, his voice warmed by a humor he hasn't felt in years. This is right, them sitting like this in the night with a bit of scotch. "You go back to sleep. I'll keep an eye on the windows and my truncheon to hand."