[Indigo]

Afternoon traffic in the city was godawful, and something about the absence of color seemed to suck the light out of everything too, or perhaps this was a separate effect from the same source; so it was already dark by the time Roman returned to the house. There was a light on in the living room, he noticed as he opened the door, but it did very little to illuminate the space for similar reasons.

Sauvage was sitting at one end of the couch with his knees pulled up against his chest, staring at the ceiling. "You came back," he said softly.

"Yes?" Roman said. His apartment in the back of the cafe, which barely qualified as such, had been restored in the course of the renovations, but he hadn't been back there since the flood, and it had not occurred to him to go there now. And where else would he go?

"I wish," Sauvage said in that same soft voice, "that were as obvious to me as it seems to be to you." He blinked, once, very slowly, and his eyes were huge and black in the darkness, vast pits with thin outlines of red. "I made dinner. An hour or two ago, but I have endeavored to keep it fresh. It doesn't hurt me," he added, anticipating Roman's concern. "It's only moving energy around, fending off bacteria and so forth. I hardly even have to think about it."

Roman nodded, and came over to sit next to him on the couch. He wanted to kiss Sauvage, to take his hand, something small that might bring some reassurance, but given how things had gone earlier he couldn't guess whether such a gesture would be welcome.

"I'm..." Sauvage, still not looking at him, took a deep breath. "I'm ready to talk, if...if you'd like."

"Please," Roman said.

Sauvage nodded, and then nodded again, as if confirming to himself that he had agreed, that he really did have to do this. Another deep breath. "We've known each other a long time," he said, and he said it in what Jules called his storytelling voice, the voice of high drama and events far away in time, and Roman said:

"Stop. Don't do that."

"You have no appreciation for the art of theatre," Sauvage said.

"I don't want theatre," Roman said wearily. "I want you to be honest with me."

"I am honest with you! You don't trust me?" He sounded so anguished that Roman wanted to take it back, let him continue spinning his yarn, let him put a pane of glass between himself and his life and his feelings; it would be easier for him that way. Easier for both of them, perhaps, for a little while. But one thing Roman had come to know—not in the time he'd known Sauvage, but in other, earlier parts of his life, though it had taken some time to figure out how to apply them to this confounding man in particular—was that a relationship could not be founded on a performance. One could not properly love someone who was always hiding.

[Indigo]

It was quite dark, and Sauvage wasn't facing him, and Roman didn't have the eyes of a night hunter, but he had the ears of a prey animal and the instincts of a man who has had a great many difficult conversations. Even with that on his side it took a moment to realize what he was hearing. "Sauvage," he said, "are you crying?"

"No," Sauvage lied.

"Oh—" Roman reached over and pulled an unresisting Sauvage into his lap. He was very warm and very heavy, though after the initial surprise wore off he endeavored to distribute his weight more evenly, and Roman stroked Sauvage's impossibly soft hair and felt tears trickle into his collar, and slowly, by imperceptible degrees, Sauvage relaxed into his arms.

"I do trust you," he said, when he could be sure Sauvage would listen and not just spiral further into panic. "I'm asking you to trust me. To tell me what's wrong—what's really wrong, not a story you're using to hide from yourself. I want to help you, but you have to let me."

"I don't..." Sauvage sniffed, though the tears had more or less stopped, which was something of a relief; Roman had never seen him cry before and it distressed him more than he would have imagined. "Why should you want to help me?"

"Because I love you. Even though you insist on being difficult."

Sauvage, predictably, couldn't resist: "You love me because I'm difficult."

"Quite so." And Roman sat there, and held him, and waited.

Another deep breath, then; but this one didn't feel so rehearsed. When Sauvage spoke again his voice quivered, just a little, which wasn't precisely better, because Roman hated to see him upset, but it was at least a sign that they were beginning to get somewhere. "I don't...I don't know how to be happy, Roman," he said quietly. "I can't let myself. I have never—so few things in my life have made me happy, even for a moment, and they have all been taken away. To punish me. Or as a natural consequence of my own foolishness." He laughed mirthlessly. "I suppose that's the same thing. But I'm...afraid to relax. I don't know how to, to, to be with you anymore."

"Why should you be any different than before? Well, apart from the obvious." They'd have to address the other part too, eventually, but first Roman had to swallow his immediate reaction, which was a near-incoherent tangle of emotion that wouldn't help anyone if given voice.

"None of this is obvious to me. I've never thought about any of this before."

"You were," and it was hard for Roman to say this next with a straight face, but if there was ever a time this was it, "secretly in love with me for over a decade, and you never thought about what would happen if we ever had a relationship?"

"Of course not." His tone hovered between scorn and shock. "I...Roman, I don't get to have the things that I want. Not the important things, things like this. I couldn't allow myself to want it. The only thing I let myself want was to stop feeling this way, because I knew you would never love me back. And—ha. I didn't even get that, did I." He gave a laugh that turned into a sob, and buried his face in Roman's shoulder, and he was crying again, what might well have been a century of tears. Perhaps more.

[Indigo]

Eventually the tears subsided again, and Sauvage said, "I love you, Roman, I love you so much, and I am terrified. I don't understand why you...you nearly died because of me. You have seen the very worst of me, over and over and over again. And you have given me this, this chance I don't deserve, and I want to prove to you that you've made the right decision, that I can be whatever it is you see in me, but I don't think I can."

"Don't say that."

"You wanted me to tell you what was wrong," Sauvage said. "It's me. I am wrong. I know you imagine that one day, if you're patient, I will be good enough, I won't say things like the things I am saying now, I will be whole and good and right and I can be the partner you deserve. But it isn't true. I can never be that. I want to be that for you, I do, but I can't. I've been so afraid that I would slip and disappoint you again, I've been trying to be...but here we are." He sniffled again. "Here we are."

"Sauvage...no. No." Hard to say anything else, to force his thoughts into sentences. He tightened his arms around Sauvage as if to shield him from some unknown enemy. Himself, maybe. "Do you trust me?"

A pause, and then a muffled "Yes."

"Good. Listen. I am not here in your house having this conversation with you because of some aspiration to a perfect fairytale relationship, all right? I don't eat your food and sleep in your bed and talk to you for hours on end because I'm testing you and keeping some sort of tally of your mistakes." He had to pause here and do some deep breathing of his own, because he was so angry, not at Sauvage but at the people who had done this to him, bestowed upon him this terror and self-loathing; and he didn't want Sauvage to misunderstand. "This person you imagine I want, this fantasy man with no problems or feelings or personality of his own, is not you. That's true. And I wouldn't want that to be you, because he wouldn't tell a story like you do—I didn't say I never wanted that, just that I don't want one now—and he wouldn't engage with the world the way you do, with your ethical tangles and your sideways philosophy and hedonism, and your sense of humor and your absolutely infuriating overconfidence which I adore, and so many other things, Sauvage, that make you who you are."

"But—"

"Listen, I said. I know you have been hurt, many times, and I know you are afraid, and I do wish those things weren't true—because, as I said, I love you, and I prefer for bad things not to befall the people I love. I do believe that you might be able to reach a better place with some of these things, one day, and I'll help you if you let me. But I'm not holding it against you. I don't think of them as failings on your part. They're just...part of the package."

"Oh," Sauvage said. "Oh." And after a moment, "That is rather a lot to take in. You may...you may have to remind me of some of it, sometimes."

"That is also part of the package," Roman said, and Sauvage laughed, a real laugh this time.

[Indigo]

"I had dared to hope that when I told you the truth things would get easier," Sauvage said. "And yet the opposite seems to be true. There was so much I could ignore that I can't anymore, if I want this to work."

"That's very self-aware of you."

"I'm not a complete fool." He shifted so his head was tucked against Roman's chest, over his heart. "Just most of one."

"Mm." Roman rubbed his back lightly. "You have a long way to go, I think, but you will get there. And I will be there at your side, the whole way." There was almost certainly an argument to be made for a therapist, as well, but that would likely be a harder conversation and one better suited to a time when reality wasn't in apparent crisis, especially given that Sauvage still had enough trouble opening up to someone he knew.

"It's a sweet sentiment," Sauvage said. "I will do my best to believe it." After a moment, he added in a very different tone, "You really should eat dinner. I'd hate for all my effort to come to nothing."

"I rather thought this should come first, but yes, that's a good idea." He and Jules had spent some time running errands in the city after lunch, and between that and the weight of this conversation he was feeling a bit hollowed out.

There followed a great reshuffling of limbs and a hunt for where Sauvage had stashed the plate, and when Roman returned to the living room his love was curled up in the corner of the couch again, this time with a book. He leaned against Roman when he sat down, and they passed a fair amount of time in pleasant silence before Roman, wrung out, got up to go to bed. Sauvage remained where he was, either absorbed in his reading or still trying to calm himself down or quite possibly both, but it had never been entirely clear to Roman how much sleep he actually needed, so there was little point in suggesting he stop what he was doing.

Roman himself could not sleep, despite his exhaustion. He found himself scrolling through his inbox again, looking at that unread email and trying to decide what to do about it. There was some idea in his mind about inviting Moss to Bristlecone—most likely the others, too, but of all of them he'd always been closest to Moss, which was probably why she'd emailed him to begin with. She must know where he was now, because the flood had been capital-N News, but she hadn't swooped in to bring him back into the fold.

He wondered what she would think of him and Sauvage. She might well be relieved, if her reactions to his occasional soliloquies back in the day were anything to go by.

After some unknowable length of time, when he'd long since put his phone away and returned to the business of lying in the dark hoping for sleep to claim him, he heard Sauvage come into the room. "Roman? Are you awake?"

"Sadly, yes."

Sauvage slid under the covers next to him, and kissed him, and his sharp teeth scraped over Roman's lip, not hard enough to draw blood, a question, an invitation.

Roman said, "Some people might be put off by the conversation we've just had."

"Does some people mean you?" Sauvage murmured.

"Not necessarily."

"But?"

"But I want to be certain that...hmm." Hard to articulate this concern. "You've been very worried that telling me about your fears would upset me. I need to know that you aren't just doing this because you think you need to appease me."

"You were a good monster hunter," Sauvage said, "but I think your greatest talent may be finding things to worry about. Feel free to remove that one from your list." And then he paused, and sighed, and nestled closer against Roman. "I suppose it is odd timing. If we are still doing this...emotional honesty thing—"

"That is how relationships work, yes."

Sauvage sighed again, but this time it was to poorly cover a laugh. "Yes. Well. This...unnatural darkness. It reminds me of things I prefer to forget. Which I don't want to talk about, at least right now, but it has me feeling very alone. I want to be close to someone I love."

"As close as possible," Roman said, "as it were."

Whatever Sauvage tried to say dissolved into another laugh. When he recovered his composure he said, "You could put it that way, I suppose. Is that a satisfactory answer? Because it's the truth, but if you don't like it I am sure I could come up with a much more interesting lie."

Roman smiled, though it was almost certainly meaningless in the dark, and kissed him, and when Sauvage kissed back it was with teeth.

[Indigo]

Sauvage woke from a nightmare of darkness into a dead, empty light, and for a moment did not know where he was. Other sensations crept in as the seconds passed: the rumble of the heater left running all night, the patter of rain on the window. The softness of the sheets against his skin, the pressure of Roman's arm draped over him.

Roman, who was still here. But this thought felt as strange now as it had last night, because after all, Sauvage was the one who always ran away.

With a thought he sunk some of his prodigious body heat into the bed, so Roman wouldn't be immediately roused by his departure, and carefully disentangled himself from arms and sheets. He dressed quickly and as quietly as he could manage. Magic would be better for that, but he'd never gotten the hang of transposing clothes onto his body that way, and he wasn't about to ruin a perfectly good shirt practicing. He slipped on a robe over his clothes just for the feel of the fabric and the extra weight, slight though it might be.

Almost as an afterthought he extracted a book from the shelf in the hall, a volume of love poems that had been part of the collection in the cafe; by the time they'd found it, it was much too water-damaged to sell, but Roman had a sentimental attachment to books in general and had insisted on keeping it. Sauvage had developed an inordinate fondness for poetry in his time as a person, and now he paged through this book to one of his favorites, marked the page, and left it on the nightstand. A silly, sappy gesture, but one that felt good.

Then he went out the back door, and started to walk.

The hill Sauvage lived on was the tallest within the limits of Bristlecone, but there were others not far from it that rose to the same or even greater heights, and it was one of these that he selected as his destination. He climbed the hill, and felt the earth give under his feet, heard the rustle of startled wildlife, and when he reached the top he lay on his back in the wet grass and looked up into the dismal sky, and thought about being alive.

He could see the appeal of it. Being alive. Many, many times in his 232 years it had seemed a tiresome obligation, or a prison he could not escape, but for the last several months he'd occupied a different world. A world where he was free from any dictates he did not choose, and had the understanding to make those choices responsibly; where he was not a disappointment simply by being himself. A world where the people he loved could love him in return. He thought he might be able to live in a world like that. Perhaps even to enjoy the living.

[Wild Pet Found]

[Indigo]

Part of being functionally immortal was having a dreadful sense of time, but he idly tracked the position of the sun as he lay there, and so managed not to spend more than a couple of hours deep in thought. When he returned to the house he found Roman awake and reading at the kitchen table in a robe that definitely belonged to Sauvage, which made a pleasant warm feeling bloom in his chest. He kissed Roman's forehead, earning himself a smile, and went past him into the kitchen to prevent him from burning the eggs. "Really, you ought to set a timer or something."

"I usually don't hear the timer, either," Roman said absently.

"Then have you considered not reading and cooking at the same time?"

"Mm...no."

Sauvage chuckled as he hunted for a spatula. There was something he wanted to offer Roman, after last night, that he didn't quite know how to bring up, and so while he mulled it over he allowed himself to enjoy this morning, this moment. It wasn't always easy, living this life; but sometimes it was. He said, "I will never understand why you put things in the places you do."

"I could say the same."

"Ah, but when you take them from these nonsensical places, would it not be more reasonable to put them back where you found them?"

"Honestly, Sauvage," Roman said, in that way he had when he was trying not to smile. "Where would be the fun in that?"

There was no answer to such an absurd question, but it didn't matter anyway; he'd found his opportunity. "You know," he said, with a casualness that he knew sounded forced but couldn't correct now, "you could call me James, if you wanted."

For a minute Roman didn't say anything, and Sauvage thought he might not have heard, too focused on his book. Then he said, "That's an interesting proposition, considering that I didn't know it was your name until yesterday. Do you want me to?"

Here Sauvage faltered, because he did, very much, but he didn't know how to explain this sudden desire. How to explain that nobody had ever called him James except the clerk at the DMV—well, and Kettle, of course—that it was something that belonged to only him, and that a name nobody used wasn't really a name at all. That with Roman he'd found an intimacy he'd never had with anyone else, never even allowed himself to fully imagine, and he wanted to give Roman something in return. That there was a need he couldn't fully articulate even to himself, but that he knew this would somehow fill. A hidden layer of the self that demanded recognition.

Roman came up behind him and leaned against him, chin on his shoulder. "Sau—James," he said, and hearing that name in his voice sent a strange thrill up Sauvage's back, "you don't have to justify asking for the things you want. Not to me."

Sauvage scraped at the stubborn edge of an egg and nodded. "I'd like it if you did, I think," he said. "If you don't mind."

"Of course I don't mind, you ridiculous man." Roman kissed him, a kiss that somehow conveyed fond exasperation without voice, and wrapped his arms around his waist. He said, "There's something I've been meaning to ask you about. Not about names, in fact it isn't related at all. How do you feel about the other hunters?"

Of all the questions Roman could ask him, that might be the one he'd expected the least. "Doesn't it matter more how they feel about me?" He had been at fault in their altercations, after all.

"I suppose that depends on who you ask. I am asking you, and I doubt you can answer that question," Roman said. "Moss sent me an email. I'm trying to decide what to do about it."

"What did she say?"

"I don't know, I haven't read it yet."

"Roman, really," he said, but he knew even this wouldn't get him out of answering the question, and so he thought about it. It was a subject he'd largely shied away from considering directly over the course of the last decade, so it took a while to sort out his feelings. "I miss them," he finally said. "They were the closest thing I ever had to friends, until I came here."

"Odd choice of words," Roman said, completely incomprehensibly. He did not elaborate, but continued, "In that case, I suppose I'll read the message. I don't know if I can rebuild that bridge, precisely. But maybe we can build a new one instead." There was something in his voice Sauvage couldn't place, a sign that this weighed on him more than he was saying, in a way Sauvage didn't intuitively understand. But that was all right. They could talk about it later, after breakfast. Or whenever Roman was ready.

"Maybe we can," Sauvage said, and offered up his best reassuring smile. "Maybe we can."