Hello! It is Wednesday and I am back with a new chapter. I wrote this one after watching a movie in the cinema where the main character really reminded me of Rupert - James' Great Uncle - and inspired me to think about his character some more and thus write this. This story takes place when Eli and Lucy stop their romantic relationship for good and he goes with Justin and needless to say, Lucy needs some encouragement and love. She actually lives with Rupert and his partner David (also Lynne's father) partially, because she and Eli used to live in an annexe of their home. So in this chapter, you learn of her closeness with those two men, and of course with each other. I hope you enjoy :)
Disclaimer: I own the story and the OCs mentioned!
There was a man adorning hair with a life of its own sitting and reading on the sofa and then suddenly he was engulfed, two arms wrapping around him from behind and pulling him close. Rupert had just a quick enough of a reaction time to grip the book further between his hands before it was sent tumbling down towards the carpet with the affection.
No kisses were exchanged. Instead, Rupert felt a hand roaming through his equally spiralling beard and a chin nuzzling against the crown of his head. There was no other person who would embrace him in such a way and during that time of night.
"What are you reading?" David inquired, his fingertips still making their way through his partner's beard as if there was somehow buried treasure located in there that only he knew the whereabouts.
His chin nuzzled against his locks a few more times too before he pulled away, adding a little distance between them both to try and work out the answer to his question by reading words on the page before it was actually revealed to him.
Rupert didn't speak for a couple of seconds, silently relishing in the touch of his partner. However, he soon enough broke the silence, a thumb dipping into the crack of the book between its pages, looking up to where David of course had beady eyes wandering down to him.
"Your book." He answered, managing to resist the fact that he wanted his hand to be roaming elsewhere and pried his book back open again, also encouraging himself to look back down at the plethora of words in front of him rather than the gentle, mirrored gaze of his long-term love.
Meanwhile, David's lips parted as disbelief filled the back of his throat, not quite believing Rupert but also not wanting to ponder reasons why he may be lying.
"You're not, are you?" These words of his tumbled out of his parted lips before he could stop them, forgoing using his eyes to scan the face of his loved one and instead encouraging his gaze to absorb as many words on the page as he could, deciphering whether he wrote them or not. "No you're not!"
In the seconds after David had initially inquired Rupert, the wild haired of the two foolishly tried to hide the pages of the book away from prying eyes and in the process accidentally flashed the front cover to him. A cover which portrayed a face that was familiar to them both but it was not the face of David.
Above Rupert's greying beard, the beginnings of a smirk began to form, immediately matching the jovial nature of his dark eyes. He couldn't tease him for all that long, even though he loved to tease him in the first place!
"No, it's my own ramblings." He admitted to David, and though he was the kind of man to mostly feign confidence even if he was putting on a show, in the presence of his partner, more vulnerable actions could be shown. The book clapped its pages together and coyly tried to conceal its front page. "A client today said that the piece of advice I offered in this book utterly contradicted what I suggested to him so I'm reading this to see if I am truly full of it."
Book lowering down to a lap, Rupert's eyes raised and he offered a prolonged glance upwards towards David. In spite of being the meeker of the two, David could not resist giving him a taste of his own medicine for luring his gullible streak.
"You always are." David deadpanned, in those seconds able to capture traits that Rupert often put on display as if second nature and portray them as if they were his own.
There was no sense of teasing within his forest orbs which resided behind two lenses. For all Rupert knew, he was being deadly serious towards him.
Rupert being Rupert, however, knew one hundred percent not to doubt his glasses adorned partner. The smile that stretched apart his lips had no reservations about showing their full potential. The man with curly hair locked eyes onto the other man and he shrugged his broad shoulders, his words speaking for themselves though his gestures gave a helping hand also.
"And yet here you are." Rupert reminded David, his voice unmoving and casual in contrast to the knowing, almost teasing nature of his smirk. When those dark eyes of his locked onto the woodland hued ones of the other man, he knew that he did not dare to be the one who looked away first.
He had no reason to, did he? The ball was in his court. As it often was, he reminded himself of this, though he did not allow his features to express it for anybody to see.
David being the quieter of the two didn't often even bother to feign confidence that did not exist within him. In fact, he rarely saw a reason to do anything other than tell the truth. I supposed in hindsight that he would rather be hated in all aspects of his life for who he was rather than adored for who he wasn't.
And so, the bespectacled older gentleman felt his arms hanging by his side after not being used to wrap around Rupert for quite some time. Then, when they were done swinging around his waist, light fingertips dug into his hips.
The pursing together of his lips and the drawing together of his brows while one roamed slightly above the other spoke volumes. Soon enough, his fingers did not want the company of his hips any longer and they both wanted to cup around the face of Rupert.
"So, are you coming to bed?" David questioned, his left hand disappearing back into the curls of the other male's beard and the forefinger and thumb on his right hand being used to feel the velvety pad of Rupert's ear lobe. That time, the man on the sofa could feel a pair of lips pressing against the centre of his forehead.
Rupert's eyes behind his own pair of glasses fluttered shut for just a second, only allowing himself that one second to relish in the affection as well as his own vulnerability when it came to being loved.
Soon enough, his eyes were back open but instead of looking back up at David, his shoulders shrugged in the couple of seconds before his partner's hands roamed to there instead.
"I'm quite comfortable here." He began. Well, David tells me that at the time he hoped that Rupert was only beginning. He couldn't bare it if that was the only sentence that he would utter in response to his offering! "I don't want to disturb you. I'm going to be reading for quite some time, I should think."
David didn't need to worry. Not about that, anyway.
Without a second of hesitation, his eyebrows drew even closer together all over again and his head moved from side to side, inadvertently encouraging his almost boy-ish curtained hair to swish together as if they really were curtains swaying in a breeze.
"You wouldn't disturb me." David's confident streak was when it came to Rupert and not many other occasions. The curtains hanging about in front of his face managed to stop swaying though his head continued shaking from side to side. "You know me; it would take more than a bedside lamp and rustling of pages of keep me up at night."
The quieter, bespectacled of the two male's didn't bother to hide the fact that he was near enough begging, though he did not exactly exclaim pleading words. David's two hands were on either shoulder of Rupert, absentmindedly rolling them around in his touch and his thumbs nestling in to the back of them.
As I am told this tale, I wonder if it was pain from a disturbed knot in either of his shoulders that caused Rupert to utter vehemently that time.
"I am perfectly comfortable." Rupert insisted, the book that he wrote then in his lap and his eyebrows contorting behind his glasses, though you could hardly tell from the thick black decoration adorning the lenses. That was the last of his sturdy attitude. "My back is sore. I think I'm here for the night."
The way his voice quietened down and evened out following his previous insistence when thumbs were digging into the backs of his shoulders encouraged David to not make a big deal out of the fact that Rupert was facing up to something that was quite hard for him by admitting that he wasn't actually at the peak level of comfort.
David did not have to fake empathy in his eyes. While those mirrored orbs of his flickered in motion, they still managed to look down at Rupert enough and in the meantime, his touch lessened on the pair of shoulders. Instead, one was lightly patted at.
"I think you would be more comfortable in bed." He gently suggested, hands falling away from any part of Rupert for good and one of them wandering to his own chin as if what was being discussed required a great deal of thinking. "Come on. We'll soon have you settled there."
Rupert must've understood and appreciated the way that David did not make too much of a fuss for his own benefit. And this level of care must've penetrated even the stubborn walls that sometimes hung pretty tall over and around the curly haired male.
Though a torrent of air rushed through his nostrils and his eyelids briefly joined together, David did not need to worry. The level of care that came natural to him cut through Rupert in the right way and allowed him to not only be real with him, but unguarded in his own way too.
Rupert's eyes opened back up again only to scrunch together with the rest of his face too, a hand that was no longer holding his own book to slide down his own spine, fingers bunching together to indicate the hurt.
"I think I'm here for the rest of the night." He repeated, forgoing shaking his head and his fingers rubbing at the base of his own spine in an attempt to massage and console the twinge that he had trying to hide. "My back has given up on me."
Such dramatic words that were uttered as flat as a newly paved road! Thankfully, David did not take them too seriously and again, he did not allow himself to worry too much, instead his lips pressing together in a fond manner and his hands falling back away from his own face and residing on Rupert's shoulders again.
For a second time that night, the gentle curve of a chin was sharing company with curly sprigs of hair on top of a head.
"Your back still has life in you, as do you." David consoled him, ignoring the disagreeing scoff that could not help but ripple from the back of Rupert's throat. "Come on." He encouraged a second time, both of his shoulders being patted on that occasion. "Let me carry you to our bed, my dearest."
One hand of David's fell away from Rupert's shoulder and was used to adjust one of the lenses of his glasses in front of his face. Yet still, as the dim light of the living room reflected and bounced off the glass, that light paled to insignificance in comparison to the kindness that shone from within David's eyes.
Regardless of this, the curly haired of the two did not stop himself from conveying a scoff and this time it was far heartier. He did not need to look in the direction of David for it to be clear what he was thinking!
In return, David decided that he did not want to hold him at all anymore and his arms in his long sleeved night shirt fell over his chest. Instead, of being confident in himself, he was hurt. Nonetheless, he went on to attempt to insist.
"Now I'm giving up on you." Rupert told him, unbothered by the sweet nature of his long-term partner and speaking his mind without a moment of hesitation!
David forwent adjusting his glasses all over again, his arms not falling away from folding over his chest as he maintained his stance and did not allow himself to falter.
His determination came and came quietly.
"I could carry you to bed." Quiet certainty oozed from David but to contradict it, one of his hands clumsily slid away from his elbows as he attempted to hold onto himself tightly. That time, Rupert did instead crane his neck backwards in order to look directly at the other male, not needing words to clearly speak what he was getting at. "I so could. I can do a decent attempt with the right encouragement."
There was a level to David's tone of voice that was miffed. Though while he was absolutely used to Rupert and his ways, there was still part of him that was disbelieving – and hurt – that he was being doubted in this particular way.
The curly haired of the two did not go on to correct the situation, or act like he actually did have faith in David because truthfully he didn't!
Either way, Rupert did relinquish in some way. Moving his book back into his hand rather than his lap, his legs appeared more stretched out than usual even though that he been continually reaching out towards and resting on a footstool a few metres from the sofa.
Meanwhile, the other arm of his that was not containing his own book, stretched out in a manner of compliance. He was allowing David to do as he wished. Though he still did not believe in him in ways that David wished to be believed in!
However, before the taller, yet meeker of the two could even wrap either of his arms around Rupert in an attempt to pick him up let alone actually show which one out of them was correct, a muffled sound against the front door brought any of their antics to a halt.
Two heads turned in sync, finally in unison on that particular night. It was a knock at the door. But they were not expecting any visitors.
"Who on earth could that be at this time of night?" David wondered, having just half a second to look over at Rupert before the knocking sound made its appearance a second time, causing his head to swing back around to the direction that it was coming in.
Like David, Rupert also had just a split second to look at the face of his partner before it was turned in the direction of other things. Though for him, he looked down into the face of a different thing entirely, his elbow bent as it was drawn closer to line of vision.
"It better not be any gentleman callers for-" Rupert tried to begin, attempting to look at David's features again but he had since taken the time to lean backwards and peer around the doorway to get a sense of who had been disturbing them.
The undrawn blind and the transparent glass of the panes of their door made it clear who was knocking. Though, it would have been undeniable even with crystallised panels from the recognisable silhouette of the man.
"It's Eli." David informed Rupert after leaning back closer towards him, not wanting to be spotted peeping around the doorway and not answering to the familiar face at the first second that he heard the noise that he had put forth.
The curtain-locked of the two males showed of the beginnings of another head shake and in those scarce moments, Rupert clocked on and he quickly put forth his own words.
"My point still stands." He insisted almost grumpily, but at that point David wasn't shaking his head nor was he listening, instead looking down at the buttoned up pyjamas he was wearing. This told Rupert everything he needed to know. He started to make an attempt to leave the sofa. "Fine." He grumbled a second time, moving just a couple of inches. "But if my back does give up on me then you're not invited to my funeral."
And it was fortunate that David composed himself enough to not allow his eyes to become like the watch face that Rupert had looked down at moments before and held his head high, surveying the situation instead.
While he had complained, Rupert hardly hobbled off towards the door at all. In fact, he had time to stop past the kitchen along the way and David was encouraged to focus on this rather than wondering if his other half had been putting on an act or he was just so stubborn that he was even better at concealing pain than he had once believed. Probably the latter!
David was not ignorant to the fact that Rupert paused by the kitchen, nearing on asking the person sat wordlessly at the kitchen table if she wanted to go and answer because it was surely for her – before knowing the drill without having to say anything at all.
In the next few moments, the door was opened to Eli and poor Eli on the other end was greeted in a way that he still wasn't used to!
"I don't want to buy any of your nerdy computer techy stuff that you're going to try and sell to me." Rupert barked at Eli the second that the door swung open, only giving the other curly haired male on the other side only enough time to part his lips as a greeting. "I don't want a brochure either. I've bought enough crap from you in the past, whoever you are."
Rupert's hand clutching at the door frame, his face leaned closer to the unsuspecting Eli. The shorter of the two was granted time to portray eyes as wide as the moon that hung about in the sky on that particular chilly, March night belonging to Kanto to contrast the slight part of his lips.
With Rupert's face growing closer and closer to his, Eli drew back a couple of centimetres and began with his own words as soon as he could, his wide eyes filled with bewilderment.
"But sir, I'm not-"
The Unovan male tried to explain but Rupert's face had gotten as close to his as it possibly could have done without exchanging oxygen before it retracted back with a lot of speed for a man of his age, his steely expression washing away and a jovial one taking its place instead which stunned Eli.
Rupert's hand collided against his shoulder, almost knocking him onto the driveway in the chill of the night.
"Messing with you." He told Eli, no ounce of an apology for pranking him being uttered on his lips and instead moving onto to the subject at hand, giving him no time to allow his eyes to relax towards the man in the doorway. "You're here to see Lucy?" Rupert gathered. Eli not the time to twitch his head, out of nerves or otherwise. "I'm afraid you've just missed her. She's gone out for the night with some friends."
Following a couple of seconds silence and a pause, the night time from the world outside the household being the only thing that spoke for a couple of moments, Eli's body finally caught up and his head fully twitched as he listened to the words that were being put forth to him.
In the meantime, his eyes managed to relax just enough but they still stayed their usual wide and inquisitive yet sunken size. His lower lip fell into his mouth before he followed suit with his top lip, his eyebrows dancing, wordlessly indicating that he was thinking.
Then finally, he shrugged. Somehow, Rupert did not grow bored in between all of this.
"Gone out for the night?" Eli chose to repeat, not bothering to utter the words that he wasn't pre-told because it was clear as the night sky on that March occasion from the way that his eyebrows continually danced. Rupert's head blandly bobbed while the shorter of the two pondered some more, hands seeking refuge in the pockets of his smart trousers. "Doesn't she have work in the morning?"
From the doorway, Rupert needed a second or two to ponder for himself, getting idea for himself what the day of the week actually was. When it became clear to him after what felt like a lifetime to Eli, his pointed finger shot out towards the chest of the younger male, almost colliding with him.
"Tuesday." Rupert agreed, only allowing Eli just enough time to bob that similarly curls decorated head of his before he added, not from loving the sound of his own voice. "You know what it's like. Those girls just want to have fun."
As Rupert spoke this, a smile at last finally took over his lips during the first time on that night that he was answering the door to Eli. His hand was back on the door frame, clutching into it. all over again, the Unovan male's eyebrows danced on his face, not foolish enough to be naïve to the words that were being put forth to him but not going along with them all that immediately either.
"I see…" he started, eyes travelling down to the boots decorating his own feet and ignoring the bordering on goofy smile that had been decorating Rupert's lips from across the doorway. Thankfully, he thought, that smile was gone by the time Eli looked back up again and Eli finally nodded. "Well… You'll make sure that she returns home safely, I gather? And you will tell her that I stopped by?"
Forcing Eli to have to resist the urge to look back down to the ground again as a pallet cleanser when Rupert looked rather impertinently back at him, he then was glad that he had stood his ground so to speak and didn't break the contact of his eyes away from the taller male.
That time when he felt a touch on his shoulder, it was not a shoving motion and it did not nearly send him crashing towards the driveway. He must've read the expression wrong, Eli told himself; Rupert was then nodding and as his hand drew backwards, he took a step back at the same time to show compliance.
"I will certainly do both of these things." He agreed but still, Eli did not get too relaxed in case he pretended to not know him again like he had done when he first answered the door! He tried not to make it obvious that he was looking at him continually cautiously as Rupert remained further back in the doorway and he gestured with his head. "Would you like to come in?" he offered. It was no longer just Eli who was feeling on edge. "David and I are just about to divulge in some very riveting albeit highly involved research papers."
David was still lingering in the living room but from the presence of Eli at the doorway as well as the way that Rupert had briefly checked in on the woman at the kitchen table, he knew that if she heard these words then her shoulders would have certainly been drawing upwards towards her ears at the things that he was offering.
Like David oftentimes, though, the yellow haired woman did not need to fret. It goes without saying that Rupert's line of work made him completely capable when it came to twisting things, saying words that sounded like a welcome but was actually an attempt to push away.
Somehow, even Eli fell for it.
After shaking his head vehemently, his hand promptly raised and went to the back of the neck to massage it in an attempt to fake composure, those wide eyes of his blinking and praying that he got away with things scot free. Both lying and being invited in!
"Oh. Oh, that sounds completely delightful but I really must give my eyes a rest in the next couple of days." Eli answered, taking his turn to add distance between him and the man on the other side of the door, stepping back down from the exterior door step and making it plainly obvious that he was about to flee. "You two enjoy, though." He drew closer again in order to firmly but fleetingly shake the hand of Rupert but then he really had to disappear into the night. "Give my love to David and Lucy too. I'll see you all very soon."
And with that, Eli must've wished that he hadn't turned his back on his hooded look quite so much because it really would have done well in concealing his features before heading off into the equally dark night!
Either way, he made his intention perfectly clear. And it was one that everybody inside the house was glad about. Though Rupert had been confident in the way that he had been twisting words to get the reaction that he wanted, he knew that he would have been kicking himself for days on end if Eli had happily joined them for a reading session.
And while David was not ignorant enough to believe that Rupert's offering was pure kindness, there was still a part of him that believed it quite sweet – even though he himself would have been kicking both himself and his partner at the presence of Eli that would linger to the early hours of the morning.
This is not even mentioning how the yellow haired woman at the kitchen table felt at that moment. Shutting the front door behind him and making sure that he locked it for the night, Rupert knew to head there next and David was in the same mind as him.
For a rare occasion, the two of them were in sync once again when it came to their footsteps and they were in unison with regards to their silence. Rupert padded along the tiled floor first and then came David a couple of seconds later and from a different direction.
While David lingered in the doorway, his hands seeking refuge in the fleece lined pockets of his pyjama bottoms in the same way that Eli outside had done in his trouser ones, Rupert absentmindedly wandered over to the kitchen window, making sure that he really was seeing Eli walking back out towards the night. He was.
For a good amount of time, neither of them properly turned towards Lucy at the kitchen table. But then as expected, David did so first and his naturally gentle eyes practically melted to a forest green puddle behind his glasses when he took in the sight of her sitting there, not saying anything to them either.
In spite of the fact that Eli had not complied and joined the rest of them on that particular night, her narrow shoulders were still drawn upwards to her naked ear lobes and her hands were planted in her lap, joined together in a union that still did not offer any comfort towards her.
Rupert was second to properly look over at her and he was second to actually say something but he was not left behind in regards to seeing things as clear as day. Appearing quite steely looking with his mostly greying hair and beard that barely had any lavender wash to it anymore, his stance was sturdy and impenetrable but his gaze intuitive.
He longed to reach out to the woman in their kitchen but he did not. Among a great many things, he felt like any contact towards her would cause her to break. She was in her own world. She needed not to be touched. She needed coaxing. And David tried to do that.
"Lucy, sweetheart, I don't suppose you saw the article this morning in the newspaper about-"
The way that irises rotated in Rupert's sockets might not have caused the scene to shatter but they still had their affect in an undoubted manner. And Rupert being Rupert, he did not bother to leave it there.
Though he knew that the yellow haired woman needed gentility and coaxing, he did not bother to waste those traits on his partner! In not so many words, he told him what was what with the eye roll that erupted from him and then the fixed glance that came afterwards.
Rupert managed to shut David up by taking a seat at the kitchen table with Lucy and trying a different approach. Truthfulness.
"Are you still certain in your decision that you need not to see him?" he asked, a level of quietness to his question which greatly contrasted his direct approach. Still, he continued, and he continued though Lucy had not even given him an answer at that point. "That's okay. You do what you need to do, kid."
Both Rupert and David too watched as Lucy at the very at least attempted to act as though she could be composed, encouraging a wave of air to waft through her lungs and for her shoulders to drop from her ears a couple of millimetres. But regardless, her hands did not part from each other. If they had, fingernails that were unusually bitten and unkempt for her would be revealed.
Lucy's taut lips pressed together and she nodded her head just once, inside of her knowing that she longed to look at them both as she did this but also knowing that her emotions would spill and she did not want that – not on that night or ever.
So instead of anything else, she allowed these mere gestures and no words to ring out of her, leaving it up to the two men instead. David looked over at Rupert quite helplessly, not knowing whether he should speak up or not from the way that he had been silenced before.
Meanwhile, Rupert did not look at anybody other than Lucy. And for once, he took a good few moments of contemplating before saying actual words. It was the fact that neither of his hands roamed through his own beard to indicate any sort of thinking going on that caught David who had been watching him off guard the most.
"What are you afraid of feeling?" Rupert took a potential chance by wondering out loud before he answered his own question, wasting a couple of seconds by taking his glasses off his face for no particular reason, rubbing them against the fuzziness of his beard before finding them on the end of his nose yet again. "A great many things, I wouldn't wonder."
Raw fingertips of Lucy's dug into the palm of her own hand and her shoulders shot back closer to her ears, going even higher this time and causing David's lower lip to fall into his mouth, silently hoping that his partner knew what he was doing and the words that he was saying were actually helpful.
He knew not to doubt him out loud, though. The last thing that Lucy needed was them not appearing as a united front in front of them, even though she wasn't silly enough to think that they agreed on things most of the time anyway.
A scoff escaped from the back of Lucy's throat and this was the only thing that she allowed, willing her eyes to remain dry and fixed on the boring blankness of the dining room table, knowing herself well enough to not look at either Rupert or David.
"Our futures both lie with not each other." She began, for a small second, one hand of hers breaking away from the other. After it had ridden towards her nostril, any beginnings of water dripping from there were a thing of the past. "So it makes no sense to see each other frequently during a time such as this."
From her peripheral vision, though she was also concentrating on willing her nostrils to betray herself and her eyes by dripping in ways that they longed to, she also caught on to the way that Rupert and David glanced at each other there and then. Her shoulders dropped away from her naked lobes for a different reason that time.
Following the glance in which they shared, Rupert was then not the only one who had taken a seat at the kitchen table next to Lucy. David pulled out the wooden chair on the opposite side of her and he sat down.
Because of this gesture, she was encouraged to speak parts of her truth some more and as she did this, her body inadvertently leaned towards David. While she did not look at him either, it became clear that he was the safer bet because he had not severely questioned her in the way that Rupert had.
"I know I made this happen, I know…" Lucy tried to say more words than just that but she couldn't she really couldn't. Her throat felt red hot and more constricted in her life and that was saying something. To prove this, her delicate, lightly trembling hand made its way to the front of her throat. She continued as best as she could. "But does that mean that I can't…?"
Lucy trailed off. Following the lava sensation that had erupted from the pit of her stomach and sent scorching to the back of her throat, her voice faltered. And when she could not speak anymore, she knew that the wetness in her eyes could not be contained anymore either. She clamped them shut before anything oozed from her.
Thankfully both of the men could read her well. And they understood her enough to decipher what she meant before she trailed off. During the second part of her words, her body had changed its mind and switched in the direction of Rupert instead.
He knew that it was his turn to speak again.
"Of course not." Though Rupert's words came with a level of certainty in how they were structured, his tone of voice was softer than usual, as if he was feeling Lucy's sensations in his own throat and it rendered him a bit more voiceless than usual. "Just because you set this in motion, does not mean you don't get to mourn a loss." One more word from Rupert. "Hell."
That last word of his somehow said equally as much as the sentiment from the rest of them.
At that point, though Lucy did not dare nod her head or even allow any words to travel into her too much for fear of absorbing them into her skin and feel them crawling over the very surface area of her, she altered her position at the table.
Her body was then facing forward, subtly relaxing into the company of them both. Nonetheless, the question that she proffered next was there for one of the men in particular to answer.
"How am I supposed to feel…?" she wondered, the redness surrounded her unkempt polished nails only being revealed as her elbows planted onto the table and she held into her hands, unable to look at either of them though she was seeking advice from them both.
It was Rupert's time to be quiet. And it was David's turn to answer. He was usually less inclined to speak up and especially so after his first intentions had been pushed to the side. However, matters of the heart meant a great deal to him and even though navigating them was not his profession, it was one that he held dear all the same.
He appeared very serious yet highly composed behind his glasses, his beady eyes flickering because Lucy was not looking at him either.
"You are supposed to feel however it is that you may feel. Enraged. Insecure. Weepy. Jealous. Heartbroken…" he trailed off. No doubt was that the word that summed it all up pretty perfectly. Rupert happened to glance over at him but for a rare occasion, he did not return the gaze. "But Lucy, dear, if I may…" David started again. He did not even get a sniff of permission. "Embrace the feeling of being uplifted when it finally comes. Because you still have so much life left. Though this is a diversion you never expected… It doesn't mean that the road has come to an end."
The man with hair flopping about in the front of his face did receive a sniff at that point but it was not a gesture of permission and it was not even from Lucy either. You see, Rupert agreed with David's words up to a certain point.
But when he grew lost in disagreement, he did not hesitate to speak his mind. Perhaps not having Lucy's best interests at heart in that moment.
"If I may…" Rupert at least invited himself back into the conversation again that way, and in turn he captured Lucy's attention equally as much as David's. Her head lifted a few centimetres off the clammy palms of her hands. "I think it's something she did expect to some degree." He shrugged, scraps of his beard feeling the tugging sensation from fingers. "But it's still not ideal. And she still can feel. And yes, it does not mean more for her is not right around the corner."
It was David's turn to be unable to stop his features from expressing the way that he felt. Eyes behind lenses widened and with a head twitched, his curtain-like grey locks with hardly a hint of ginger left, flicked to the side.
Were they ever a united front? And why must he insist on always stating his mind?
It turned out not to be as he feared though. Lucy had a great deal of practice facing up to reality. After all, when it became clear who her boyfriend was – or rather, who he longed to be – she encouraged him in that way.
When Justin found himself to be single and pondering whether a long-forgotten romance really was all that behind him, she encouraged that same boyfriend of hers to go where he needed to go. And be with that man that he needed to be with.
If there was anyone who was an expert at taking things for how they were rather than how she wished they would be, then it was Lucy.
This definitely gave her strength and clarity of mind on that day. Instead of focusing on the raw truth, she heard the way that she was being encouraged – encouraged to look towards better days even if her own invisible lenses were hazy.
All the same, she still found herself saying words that were not as composed as they could have been. But she finally felt able to look at them both. With a weary hand cupping at her own chin, her eyes flickered between both men at the table with her and they did not leak.
"How easy it is for you to say that, though…" she started, a silent torrent of air escaping from her damp nostrils before looking back down to the boring blankness of the dining room table, holding onto the sight of something mundane in her new-found world of chaos. "You found each other, it's true. But how often does that happen?" A louder rush of air from her lungs that time. "Rarely. You're soul mates."
Words from Lucy were not spoken out of bitterness but they were spoken through a dull ache of the chest that could not be denied. But naturally, they had a different effect on the other people at the table.
It goes without saying that David managed to hone in his reaction just enough, understanding that while Lucy's words were flattering to hear, there was no reason for him to flaunt any part of life, even if in usual circumstances he was very comfortable to share all.
A gentle cough could be heard escaping from his throat. After the lenses of his glasses bobbed up and down on his face from a single touch, he spoke words, trying to conceal a chunk of how truly touched he felt.
"That's not strictly true." David ventured, a brief hand in the air before that hand came back down and lightly collided with the porcelain arm of Lucy, poking momentarily on the inside of the crook of her arm before keeping his hands to himself. Beady eyes flickered all around rather than focusing on the man he knew that he was soulmates with. "Life is full of surprises."
One thing that he should not have been surprised by, however, is the way that after his flickering eyes behind glasses locked onto Rupert for a couple of heartbeats, he heard words that could have not been more different to his own ones.
Lucy's head was forced to turn in Rupert's direction and Rupert's direction only when he corrected.
"None of that is true." He boldly claimed, garnering four sets of eyes and two expressions that were vastly different. All the same, neither of them deterred him from speaking the complete and utter truth as he found it. "I mean… Soul mates?"
In case there was any doubt left in anybody's minds, the last parts of Rupert's words made it undeniable what he was getting at!
Lucy for one felt inwardly grateful that her eyes for the next couple of moments were occupied doing something else rather than trying to keep tears within like a toddler blurting out what kind of informational titbit they had discovered on that day.
Her eyes felt as though they could have been competition for the dinner plates that usually resided on the dinner table instead of her elbows, allowing them to dart between the two men.
Meanwhile, although it pained him, David knew where exactly to look. If his glasses had been car windows then he would've certainly needed windscreen wipers from the way that they misted up so.
"You… You don't think that everything was laid out for us for the moment that we met?" David questioned. The further that he got into his notion, the more that he wishes that he could swallow his own words back and forget the whole thing. He wished that he had not been as eager to face up to reality as Lucy!
He had to watch as though, while Rupert did show some semblance of awareness by pressing his lips together and a dimple camouflaging itself between curls of his beard and his shoulders shrugging, he did go on to answer truthfully in the way that David had asked of him.
Somehow, he kept up a flickering eye contact from behind his glasses. Lucy felt compelled to look away again.
"You know I don't." Rupert reiterated. Another shrug rolled off his shoulders and then more words came. His fingers were back in his beard and pulling and plucking and David probably wished he would do it harder. "I am deeply, deeply fond of you and do not wish to share my life with anybody else. But we work hard at our relationship. And I would have probably found someone else if you hadn't come along."
Maybe honesty wasn't always the best policy; Lucy and David were both quickly learning this! Because of this same reason, it felt only natural for them to look at each other there and then. Rupert was none the wiser. Or moreover, he was not affected.
Honesty would always be the best policy to him. And after all, he shared a life and family with David. In many ways, he shared that woman sitting at the dining table with David. He might not have used cliché words but his feelings were true. He would just have to get on board with that.
After both David and Lucy had had a couple of moments to look away from each other too and then the yellow haired woman's dull ache in her heart wasn't only because of her own situations, David knew that he must feign composure. And then it actually came.
He offered Rupert a look with a slightly damp brow and eyebrows knotting together. But he knew he must focus on the positive part of his words. So he did. Though he still stood his own ground!
"Well let's at least act like ours is a relationship that not going nowhere, at least for Lucy's sake." This was intended as a beginning part of bigger words to come. But David was stopped in his tracks by the sensation of a hand on his face which travelled down towards the collar of his pyjamas, a blush catching up and residing on every place that finger tips trailed. "D-Do you have any more pearls of wisdom for the sweet girl here?"
David stammered. He stammered after he was given the confirmation that while they would have to agree to disagree, they had a relationship that was being nurtured on both accounts. So because of this, he did hold onto the wrist that was attached to the hand that was caressing him before he playfully shoved it away, turning his body towards Lucy in the same manner that she had done to him earlier on.
She did not mirror his actions. And was then tilted a bit more towards Rupert while he pondered, she too awaited anything that he had to say. She hoped that she would not be burned in the same way that David had been or else she would have surely been unable to cope!
"Actually, I don't. I think all of mine has been said." Rupert spoke pointedly, ignorant to the fact that both David and Lucy longed to share yet another look, wondering how a man of his profession could run out on advice so very quickly! "Heartbreak is shit. Even if the separation was done with dignity like in this case, it's still shit. Things not turning out the way you hoped is shit." A shrug rolled off Rupert's shoulders which turned into a stretch. "It's just shit. But eventually it won't be so shit. And that is always worth powering through."
And after the two other people at the dining table heard all of that, David for one was pretty regretful that he had encouraged Rupert to say anything at all. However, it was Lucy's turn to not be united with David.
Although her unusually thin and softer eyelashes clapped together a great many times at all of the words (or just one of them in particular) that kept escaping Rupert's mouth, she soon enough had the beginnings of a twinkle within her eye that had been hard to come by in moments of late.
Her hands falling back to her lap and away from the table but not reaching out to each other nearly as tightly that time, she could not stop her own words from forming, honesty being the driving force behind her own sentences, causing that twinkle to become all the more prevalent.
"Is that the kind of advice that you give to your clients?" she mused, the diamond that was setting up a home within her irises being greatly contrasted by the dark orbed and blank look that she started to receive from Rupert.
Then words from him came. In a low and monotone voice that could often be the case for him.
"No." Was all he spoke at first before his fixed expression faltered and far more of a playful one took over, even going so far as winking at Lucy from in the middle of him and his partner, David. "I have a swear box and if I do it too much then they get to take the money off me then their sessions are cheaper." He answered. Lucy's expression did more than just have a diamond in her gaze and it made Rupert light up more himself. "That got you showing off your beautiful smile, didn't it, kid? In not too much time at all, you'll be doing more of that than shedding any kind of tears. Promise ya."
Rupert told Lucy with a smile on his face and a hand reaching out to Lucy's own face, the corners of her nose unable to resist crinkling in disagreement. Though the diamond in her eye from bemusement faded away, a softer, more lingering one remained there that was hope. Hope for indeed better days. Hope for more smiles and tears. And the hope that they would always be there to pick her up.
Especially Rupert. Because his stoic yet jovial ways uplifted her in more ways than she could ever dream of saying.
"Well, I can only hope, can't I?" she asked Rupert and then she asked them both, the two of them momentarily feeling contact of a lady-like hand on top of their own ones before she showed off a head shake, her bottom only just rising from her own seat. "I supposed I had better go to bed. So I am well rested for the better days to come and all that."
The two men on either side of her watched as she got up for good, their aging hands still tingling with the sensation of a woman who was still fresh faced in spite of it all. And still indeed had so much life left. And so much adventure just around the corner.
He was usually the second one out of the couple to be an action-taker but it was David who rose from his seat first. However, it was Rupert who stood quicker and it was him who got words in there first though.
Catching everyone off guard all the same, he was not trying to get the last word in there. He was trying to do the right thing. Lucy felt a hand on her cheek all over again. And it prompted the back of her hand to brush against the fuzzy beard of Rupert that had hardly even one lavender hair in it left.
"You want me to follow you and tuck you up?" he offered, and almost as soon as he uttered these words, he followed up with more although he didn't need to. "Make sure you do get that proper night's sleep and all that."
Rupert copied some of Lucy's words. And if David wasn't mistaken, then he could have sworn that he noticed the faintest, rosiest of blushes creeping up behind the greying hairs surrounding his cheekbones. But David being David, he didn't dream of saying anything. He merely allowed Lucy to be the one that spoke.
"Better not." She said and a second smile on that night came, revealing two front teeth for just a second before they faded away again. Nevertheless, Lucy herself did not fade away into the night.
In ways that were equal measures of bordering on shy to Rupert, she had a moment of hesitation to herself before she acted in ways that she needed to, being guided by the unfaltering self that was Rupert as well as other people in her life that she would hold dear even if they were causing her heartache during that moment of time.
Lucy paused to herself, her hands clasping together and near the pit of her stomach before they fell away, deciding to have more confidence in herself. And after she decided to have this, she bobbed between both David and Rupert and planted a kiss on either of their cheeks before saying goodnight for good.
Her lips lingered on the cheek of Rupert's that was far softer than she ever could have imagined. And though she had initially cowered away from his directness, she knew that it was because of that that she no longer felt some of the heaviness on her shoulders.
To be sure, it would remain there for quite some time. But thanks to Rupert and David too, the load was easy to carry. And that was something to carry with her, as well as their wisdom.
The two men watched as she headed out of the kitchen, only just managing to conceal a yawn with the back of her hand as she left both of them in the room. They were each other's mirror images in their silence, standing there and watching the sight of the young lady heading away from them.
It should not have surprised either of them when it was of course Rupert to break the silence that took over the room that was empty apart from their presence. But it was the words that he uttered that healed David's heart from the previous potential rip surrounding the soul mate comments!
His affections were often shown in ways that weren't conventional, nor were they obvious. When it came to David himself, as well as Lucy, too.
"Makes you feel like we have a daughter, doesn't it?" Rupert began, the night sky filling his eyes for a fleeting second and then it was absorbed as if concealed by clouds. However, the quirk of his lips gave everything away, even if it tried to even out for what came next. "Helping the lass through heartbreak, bless her…"
His focus there and then was for sitting back down on the wooden chair of the dining room table after they had not been standing for all that long. Though David probably wished he had copied the same actions with the words that he heard, he managed to stay composed and he managed to stay standing!
And he also managed to resist shaking his head. He did not know why he doubted him before, or ever, really. His ways of affection were peculiar to say the least. But they were worth searching for. It made it all the more valuable, he decided to tell himself.
One hand on the back of Rupert's chair to steady himself, David allowed silence to ring out and then his hand made contact with his shoulder. A gaze was shared in the single second that followed, and David could not resist one last time making sure affections were there for him and him alone. As well as a bit of teasing too!
"You better not end up breaking my heart." He warned him, the touch of the ball of his shoulder leaving there and creeping up towards his neck, his whole hand cupping around the warm side that he could feel gently beating behind his touch.
Immediately, Rupert looked up at him with a focus that said it all. But then he decided to rethink some things. Softening his eyes all over again and encouraging his eyebrows to be comfortable having a bit of distance between them, he continually looked back up at David from his chair.
There was a fleeting moment where his hand was back on his face. But then that same touch of his resided over his own chest. His chest that was surely thudding for David in his own way.
"I couldn't if I tried…" he re-affirmed to him and while from behind his lenses, those beady forest eyes of his revolved around and around, when he focused slightly, dizzy, on Rupert all over again, he saw the way that his hand extended outwards and his arm reached, no longer cupping over his heart. He leaned back. "Now…" Two eyes behind his own glasses shut. And then one of them opened, fixating on David. "Are you going to carry me to bed like you boasted you could do? Because I believe anything you could possibly want awaits you too."
And with that, all David could do was stare back at the face of Rupert that had eyes shut and a chin jutted towards the ceiling, deciding to allow fate to remain up to him. And would he let him down in return? Of course he wouldn't! Or at least, he would give it his darnedest try.
With Lucy in another room of the house that they all shared, she was none the wiser to the way that David successfully managed to wrap his arms around Rupert and pick him up and carry him to bed and Rupert's back ache was apparently a thing of the past. Not that he was lying. He could just put anything to one side if he wanted to for David. And he did want to. So he could.
The thing about a family is that they pick each other up. Literally. Figuratively. Spontaneously. Sometimes with no warning. Sometimes with encouragement.
Together, the three of them would learn that. Together, the three of them would lift each other up in more ways than one. And form their own little family.
Lucy didn't realise that she would lose a boyfriend but she would gain a friend and confidant for life – one that he had always been. And she didn't realise that she would gain not only one dad but practically two dads in the process too.
There would always be wins and losses - that was a part of life. But it was always about who you shared those moments with. Who you could count on. Who could pick you up when you felt like there was no lifting yourself off the ground at all.
It is never the end, is it? Not even at the final chapter. There is always more. There is always tomorrow. The never-ending uncertainty and craziness yet blessing that is life. One that I cherish each and every day no matter what. Containing tales that never leave my memory. Nor my heart.
The End.
There you go! Thanks so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed :) This one was really enjoyable to tackle! It had been in my head a while the possiblity of tackling a story where Lucy finds comfort from both David and Rupert but like sometimes is the case, I thought it would be just a daydream of mine rather than an actual story! I was stood correct, and for that I am glad. I always enjoy Rupert and David, separately and together. And this was a nice first to be able to tackle some romance - or at least some companionship - between the two of them :3 Thanks again and I will be back next Wednesday again so see you then!
Amy signing out :P