[ He doesn't know what to thank for this unlooked-for blessing. Two years, and he'd never seen Verso again, and when the Gommage came he tried not to think about letting the man go without saying goodbye to him, about how he might have drifted away into ash and petals and the last thing Gustave would have said to him would be a stupid joke.
The Verso-in-his-head stares at him, flecked with blood and dirt just like he is, some projection of a longing Gustave had spent two long years pretending he didn't feel. But maybe it makes sense, in a way. He'd been able to make... some kind of peace with Sophie, be there with her at the end, make sure she saw the face of the person who loved her most as she drifted away into oblivion. Perhaps his mind is just giving him a last chance to get the same sort of closure with Verso, who two years later never returned the piece of Gustave's heart he stole along with him when he left in that glowing evening.
Maybe it's enough. And he's grateful, he is, to be able to see this face and hear this voice and feel this touch one last time. His finger shifts, a little more deliberately.
โAnd then that hand tightens, shoving his up, the muzzle of the pistol carving through the air, and Verso is there, just like he remembers, crowding into him, mouth hard on his, demanding. As illusions go, it's a heady one, and he closes his eyes, his free hand with its metal fingers reaching and gripping for the uniform he knows isn't really there. His eyes sting; maybe this is just a final attempt, some part of his subconscious disguising itself as Verso and trying to get him to live.
It almost doesn't matter. It's another chance, isn't it, even if it isn't real? A chance for him to part his lips and kiss this man that he's thought of almost every day for almost three years, lashes wet when he closes his eyes, his breath calm but shaking. He wants to feel every part of this, to savor it, a last moment of beauty and warmth and love before his own body allows him to lower the gun again. ]
Verso.
[ Murmured into what must be open air, smiled against lips that aren't there. ]
Maybe I'll see you again soon, mon cher Monsieur le pianiste. Wherever we go from here.
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Date: 2025-05-30 09:36 pm (UTC)The Verso-in-his-head stares at him, flecked with blood and dirt just like he is, some projection of a longing Gustave had spent two long years pretending he didn't feel. But maybe it makes sense, in a way. He'd been able to make... some kind of peace with Sophie, be there with her at the end, make sure she saw the face of the person who loved her most as she drifted away into oblivion. Perhaps his mind is just giving him a last chance to get the same sort of closure with Verso, who two years later never returned the piece of Gustave's heart he stole along with him when he left in that glowing evening.
Maybe it's enough. And he's grateful, he is, to be able to see this face and hear this voice and feel this touch one last time. His finger shifts, a little more deliberately.
โAnd then that hand tightens, shoving his up, the muzzle of the pistol carving through the air, and Verso is there, just like he remembers, crowding into him, mouth hard on his, demanding. As illusions go, it's a heady one, and he closes his eyes, his free hand with its metal fingers reaching and gripping for the uniform he knows isn't really there. His eyes sting; maybe this is just a final attempt, some part of his subconscious disguising itself as Verso and trying to get him to live.
It almost doesn't matter. It's another chance, isn't it, even if it isn't real? A chance for him to part his lips and kiss this man that he's thought of almost every day for almost three years, lashes wet when he closes his eyes, his breath calm but shaking. He wants to feel every part of this, to savor it, a last moment of beauty and warmth and love before his own body allows him to lower the gun again. ]
Verso.
[ Murmured into what must be open air, smiled against lips that aren't there. ]
Maybe I'll see you again soon, mon cher Monsieur le pianiste. Wherever we go from here.