you have (1) unheard message ; sable/indy blitz

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

The bruises around my wrists are pinpoint, petechiae pearls rubbed raw from handcuffs and where I've struggled against them.

"Thanks for coming." Nyx knocks her shoulder against mine, digging her tongue into the gash on her lip. She's wrecked from the keepers peacemaking, giggling under her breath like this is all some fucking joke. The station is a mite-invested hive, oozing with drones and the drunken disorderly. The sorts of things that pass for protest in Capitol borders.

They're going to kill me.

We're seated on a screeching aluminum bench that rattles against the tremor in my leg. "Thought high society was supposed to beat that shit outta you." She remarks, off hand, leaning in to make sure I don't miss the vitriol.

"Fuck off, Nyx."

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" The kiss she presses to my temple leaves a bloodied stain.

"____ Novoa, please ______ to interrogation ro__." A voice crackles over the loudspeakers, interference screams at the base of my skull. A couple peacekeepers snicker when my head snaps back against the brick.

"That's me, babe. Good luck." She makes to stand, I hook a finger around her chains.

"Wait. Can I borrow your phone?"

"What? You have your own."

"Come on, you owe me. Please?"

She rolls her eyes, but allows me to fish it out of her pocket, "Make sure you pick up next time I call, yeah?" She thinks her threats are pretty. Her heels click pleasantly against the tile until her footsteps fade out entirely.

Then I'm alone with only my own labored breathing and racing thoughts. It's a good thing he's gospel, I've committed all of it to memory. Even something as useless as a number. I place Nyx's phone between my shoulder and ear, the left one because I lost the right's aid in the struggle.

He picks up, I breathe out audible relief. His name wrapped up all that desperation, "Thank God, Indigo." Never did get out of the habit of undue gratitude, "I, uh, need some help. I'm sorry."

I swallow around shame and try to sob too quiet to catch, "How fast can you get to the Station?"

[arx]

 INDIGO AUCLAIR

I see her. Well, not her, but some pieces of her. I never saved her number, but I have it memorized. That's why I answer with such disdain-

"What did y-"

"Thank God, Indigo."

-and then I have to choose entirely different words.

"Sable?" And try my hardest not to choose disdain again.

He usually calls me, 'Indy'. I think I'm worried, wondering, willing him to tell me something more than what he's giving. I repeat his name—louder and with more emphasis into the receiver—

but I'm too anxious to ask. I have questions, but I need to go.

"Fast. So fast. Okay?"

I had always expected it would be Ives. But desert cold turns to mountain high chill and I'm asking desperately after someone else instead.

"Hi, um-" The keeper is intimidating; she reminds me of my dad. "I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm looking for a Sable Hawkeye?" And mostly I hope she isn't like my dad because that'd mean she hates looking at me.

"Oh, go on then, damn."

--------------------------------

"Hey, I-" A keeper raps his baton against my knuckles as I grasp the bars Sable sits behind. It rings in my ears, but I can see he is missing one of his. I press a hand to my heart, rub it around all in a circular 'a' because I can see the red bruises that have begun to rise on his wrists. "Back up. Now." I scoff, roll my eyes. "Back up where? Directly into your tiny prick? Fucking boot licker." His laugh is menacing enough to make me take that step back as he suggested—"I'm here now."—but not enough to keep me from speaking aloud, uselessly. So I say it again with my hands.

(I'm sorry. I'm here now.)

"Ah, relax, both of you." The keeper shoves us both aside as I just try to maintain eye contact with Sable over their shoulders as the move to let him out. "Let him out, his bail is paid."

And I can't really help myself. I just collide with him, some fingers in his hair, the others wrapped beneath his shoulder blade and paralleling his ribs. I don't cry, but I pull away so he can see me speak.

"So what'd you do then? Something badass, yeah?" I run my thumbs gently over his wrists all rubbed raw. "Let's go."

Come on. Let's go.

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

I wonder if I'll hang here or in my mother's District.

It's pathetic how quickly my composure crumbles after the line goes dead, "please." I say into the dial tone. Nyx's phone slips off my shoulder and clatters onto the floor, I pull my knees up to my chest and sink my teeth into the back of my hand to stifle the fear bordering a fever pitch. My father never liked how much I cried, said it made me look weak.

I don't wait very long - (so fast. okay?) - and the sight of him fractures sobs into choked laughter. The sound is just as raw. I'm on my feet though I don't particularly remember standing, the keepers sure as shit don't like the way I rush toward the bars. Reaching for the places his fingers-

"Hey! Stop!" And it's so loud my voice breaks entirely, as if I've forgotten the notes. "He hasn't done anything."

fucking boot licker

I wince.

Well, yet.

It's easy to forget that Indy has all the audacity of a man born with means and money.

Nyx's disdain wasn't entirely unfounded - ("what would that upper-crust boy of yours think if he knew?") - and it lent well to her leash.

My hands are still bound, even as he speaks to me I can't respond. Helpless, flinching away when they unlock the cuffs. I haven't looked at the keepers since Indy got here. "I'll pay you back." I mutter before the rest of my apologies are lost to the crook of his neck. I hum, sharp and low, when he tries to pull away - tugging on a fistful of his shirt to keep him in place.

(Let's go.)

The only time I leave Indy's grasp is at the station's entrance, to place my hand below my chin and curl the fingers in toward my palm.

And I'd known the questions were coming, but I don't like that they're here. It's late enough that the day has begun to turn over, a light mist catches the street lights. I turn his hand over and place it against my cheek, turning my face into his hand to muffle my response.

"Protesting." And I know I could leave it there, that Indy probably wouldn't press for more. But it matters that he knows - "I owed Nyx a favor, she cashed in. It wasn't like-" I trail off, not sure why I'm bothering to explain.

I still can't look away from him, half-convinced he'll disappear the minute I do. "I think I owe you my life now." The corner of my mouth jumps, it couldn't be in better hands.

The rain starts to pick up.

[arx]

 INDIGO AUCLAIR

Mist catches in the hair on my arms and begins to dust my lashes. It's cold and the chill in the air is what should be making me shiver, but instead it's the warmth resting in his cheek. As he presses my palm to his face and his lips to my calluses, I lean against my the seat of my motorcycle.

I try not to let my jaw knot too tightly when her name comes out of his mouth all broken around the 'x'. Somewhere I know Slate is rolling their eyes, feeling that same exasperation that was resonating through my bones.

I hate thinking of her, hate remembering what it was like watching Sable suffocate as she pinned him down with a clawed grip and heavy thumb and dared him to say anything other than, 'Please.'

The mist picks up, begins to turn to rain. I smile. Sable has always looked ethereal with snowflakes sparkling like a twilight dance in his hair and so maybe I hope the clouds will hold overhead long enough to grace me with that blessing. And we will linger long enough here together in the dusk for the flakes to sit and freeze and hold, and I will see them in a crown atop his head.

But for now, I use my free hand—thumb pressed to his temple, Earth's tears helping me to rid him of the bloodied, venom kiss she'd pressed into his temple. I wipe it away, careful not to rub her poison deeper into his skin, picking it all up within my own thumbprint instead.

I can't wait for it to flake off and swirl down the gutter where she fucking belongs.

I bet she made him feel so fucking small.

And how could I not despise her for it?

"I think I owe you my life now."

I rub tension from his jaw, pull his only working aid free from his ear with my thumb, dropping my hand away and steadying myself against a now slippery, leather seat. I'm feeling bolder than usual, more like-

like maybe-

maybe-

"Kiss me, then."

Maybe I was a man in love.

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

He's my worst kept secret.

Seven years in the making, another unmarked grave carved out for a corpse I wasn't willing to bury.

The rain starts in earnest, a low roar on the horizon. I tilt my head back to look at him, an aching fondness for the hair plastered to his forehead and the way it's gone darker in low light. Tangled gold melting around his eyes. There's an anger in them that I want all for myself.

Loving him has always been the easy part.

I wonder if, "did you wait 'til we made it to your bike on purpose?" mumbled because my tongue doesn't fit right around the words. I'll blame the chill, later, but I can't remember the last time I was cold around him. My eyes burn from saline, irritation cutting pink lines through my cheeks. I frown like this moment hasn't played out in my head a thousand times.

Never outside a peackeeper's station, though, for some reason that part never made it into my fantasies.

He should ask more questions. He shouldn't be so trusting.

I think my face falls at first. I've got a habit of hiding my lips when I'm about to say something I don't like, so he keeps my face firmly in place. Gentle, like I could pull away if I wanted. Hopeful cause he thinks I won't want to.

Which, of course, he's right about.

I know what I should do, and it is absolutely not kiss Indigo Auclair.

A button in his shirt breaks when I pull him in by the collar. "You're gonna regret this." 'Cause when this all falls to shit, at the very least I can say I warned him it would.

And then I kiss Indigo Auclair.

He tastes like regret. The sting of tears and nicotine, I'm crying again and smiling into it all the while. He shifts beneath my wandering hands, slots into place, I mourn the way nothing will ever be the same.

I didn't need to worry about losing something I'd never have.

Now?

Well.

Fuck.

[arx]

 INDIGO AUCLAIR

I remember the first time I saw him. I doubt he could recall when he first met me, but I'd just gotten my first job and smoked my first cigarette with my first ever boss all in one go. ("Nice try, blondie. Real good effort, but there is no way you know what you're doing here.") And she was right.

I thank her everyday for not minding my very obvious incompetence. I would've never been able to see him for that second time. And I remember it was the second time, too, that made him stick in my mind like a song.

I saw him through the service window. I didn't know his name yet, of course. But I remember he didn't wait to be seated and that I'd remembered him for his mannerisms. The way he looked over his shoulder and managed to pluck at the straws too loudly. He didn't do much but talk without a filter and look a little like he was lost all bundled up in a booth near the emergency exit.

Sounded like a song though.

We were in the diner.

I thought to myself,

'Well, he's familiar.'

He didn't know it just yet,

but I adored the way his eyes bound me

so tightly,

and were quite alright

all intertwined with mine.

But kitchens were loud, the ovens hummed at the same baritone as me, the sizzling reached a roar, the faucets ran into deep sinks that rumbled if you didn't bash the fire extinguisher against the exhaust pipes out back, and all the while dishes clattered against each other and patrons' voices overlapped.

It's only years later that I realize that he never could've possibly heard me.

Ives called it, Indy's Diner'. And I had scolded her for saying:

'Indy's Sable'.

("Hey, just- maybe call him, Sable? Not-") I remember hating having to say it. I remember wishing it were true. ("Not 'Indy's' Sable.") My sister always pretended she wasn't good at something and then made me look like I had two left feet that clearly had never known what they were doing.

I can't believe the way his lips burn scars of scripture I never had to memorize into my skin. The rain grows colder, falls heavier. I pull him closer, find myself standing because I still don't feel close enough to him. When I whisk my fingers through his hair, raindrops wet his scalp—the only baptism worth a damn.

"You're gonna regret this."

I taste salt and so I come up for air—"No."—but don't stay at the surface for long. I shake my head—No.—repeat the word softer, breathe it against the goosebumps along his jawline—"No."—and again—"No."—when I thumb his tears from his cheeks.

And when I press my smile to his lips.

No.

He's never been more wrong.

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

No.

He says it certain as a prayer. It falls on deaf ears, as all such things tend to.

I catch my breath in hiccups and laughter, kissing the corners of his mouth when they're close enough. "We should-" He keeps interrupting my better judgement, stealing it out from under my tongue.

I think we've found eternity, or something close to it. A place where time is counted in how long I can stand to feel myself going numb in a Spring storm. Endless until I swing the helmet hanging on his handlebars over his head. "It's raining. We should go." I say with hands on either side of fiberglass temples, holding him in place. Silenced by the plastic mouthpiece reaching over his chin. "Are you complaining? I'm sorry, I can't hear you."

And an impulsive afterthought, timid because the motion still feels somehow forbidden, I kiss the helmet where his lips would be.

Shouting starts up from inside the building still buzzing with peacekeepers and their prey. He's a lot more willing to get us out of there after that.


"All roads lead to this fucking diner," I complain, unlacing my shoe to slip bobby pins out of the heel. I'm pretty sure there's a spare key hidden in the drainpipe, but seeing as I'm officially a hardened criminal this feels far more appropriate. Linh'll just take whatever we steal out of our paychecks anyway.

She found me sleeping under a bench when I was sixteen - a couple months after my dad had died
- and told me I'd start picking up shifts the next evening. More a demand than a job offer. I despise everything about this place with one notable exception.

And I'm grinning over at it with canine teeth, blinking heavy because I wanna look pretty "Wanna see something cool?" I edge the bobby pin into place with a pocket knife stashed similarly out of reach of the peacekeeper's initial search; the backdoor clicks open.

I give him a little more of myself, piece by wretched piece. His to do with as he pleases.

"The cameras are definitely going to catch this."

[arx]

 INDIGO AUCLAIR

His kiss fogs my visor and I pray the rain away so the dot where the tip of his nose had pressed into my helmet might stick forever, freeze over, a unique frosted beauty. Because,  y e s ,  again—oh, so selfishly—I ask Mother Earth for that last, late snow. I'd make an angel out of myself for him, let the dust in his eyelashes leave a frost burn against my cheeks and sear the skin along my jaw all the way to the bone. And then I'd beg him to sizzle the marrow in my jaw.

("Kiss me, then.")

And I want nothing more than to turn around and ask him to do it again.

But, instead, I settle. I take a gloved hand off my handlebar and force his arms to wrap tighter around my waist as I take a sharp, mountain curve at the speed my heart was racing.


So-

fast.

The sooner I was at the diner, the sooner I could take off my helmet.  Take off his.

And then I could kiss him again.

I sign to him and kick off the wall as the door swings open with a click, clack, tick-tock toe all the way inside before him.

"Well, Linh will have to suffer then," I say, emboldened by the way he blinks at me. His lids are slow and steady and deep—a baseline set at bassline. I'd always loved that. I yearned for it to be all mine.

But Nyx's number was still ringing in my ears.

Protesting. Owed her a favor? Her?

("It wasn't like-")

I should ask.

But I don't even bother pressing him for the toll I was going to require as safe passage through the threshold. I smile because I can't help but tell him—"You're pretty."—and I had done nothing but dreamed of punctuating that statement for years. But I still never realized what it would feel like without music as justification, with only rain as back track against a tin roof that need to be replaced.

Well, and our lungs exhaling and inhaling and exhaling one another in perfect harmony as I pulled him into me, tangling my fingers only where I was certain it wouldn't hurt.

I can feel my knees begin to buckle as I pull him out of the rain by the elbows—"We should dry off."—and into my arms, chest. Into me. I slip and the wanted ads and lost pet fliers on the bulletin splice off the tacks keeping them in place and flutter to the floor.

I sound demanding between each kiss—"Kitchen."—but only because I can feel him shivering. I fire the ovens, start the heat, let open flames threaten to brand us all while desperation drove me to keep his lips pressed to mine.

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

("Been a while, love."
"Yeah. Well. Your message sounded urgent."
"It was. They'll be here soon."
"They? What do you-")

The blunted edge of thumbtacks press into my shoulder blades, water stains running ink into sunbursts of black and blue. He coaxes the kitchen back to life, open mouths revealing rows of ember teeth. Baring them like me, a little dazed as I watch him move. With fluid certainty, wanting, knowing, taking.

"Remember you offered to make dinner." Which he manages to gather in spite of pointed interference. I'm not very good at guiltless wanting, but this is the closest I've come to worship in a very long time.

Even still, it's not enough. I've pulled his hair out of place, drying in tangled cowlicks around my fingers. Perhaps there's a few apologies hidden when I bury my face in the crook of his neck, blinking heavy where the memory of iron bars rise unbidden. He's done his best to make the kitchen warm, I was not shaking because I was cold.

("On your knees, hands behind your head!"
"He's trying to run!")

Oh, death, I still feel its hands around my throat. "Let's go home." I plead, thumbs scraping the stubble on his jaw. Though home is here, wherever he may be, the headlights beaming through the windows at steady intervals make me nervous. Like we're being watched.

Indy drives like he has nothing to lose and I've given up telling him to be careful. If anything, I'm glad we reach the apartment sooner rather than later. My knees give out once we're past the threshold, laughing through a sob - "Don't look at me for a sec."

But the absence of his eyes hurts too.

The apartment is old and empty. Scattered remnants of a prepackaged meal sit out on the coffee table. Ivory isn't here which means she's sitting behind a drum set somewhere, ruining someone else's sleep for once.

"Oh, I love you." I say into my palms to hide my lips again. A revelation I've worked through a thousand times before. Never aloud, slumped against the arm of his couch and looking at him through the gaps in my fingers, I catch him behind the neck and tap the four corners of the cross on his chest. I say it with my hands too, curled into the first word I'd ever taught him. "Gospel truth."

[arx]

 INDIGO AUCLAIR

I press my forehead into his a little too hard, a sort of ungraceful headbutt that included lips and bared teeth, but I don't falter as I gasp against his cheek and swipe rain away from his knuckles.

"Distracted?" I breathe the question into his ear, all tongue-in-cheek and something he wouldn't hear. But I know he can feel my voice better at the base of my throat. Which is where his lips were already. Fuck, 'distracted.' I was somewhere beyond obsessed, overly smitten-

"What could possibly be distracting me right now, huh?"

-a perfect witness to all that was good, gracious, and glorious. And I say his name—"Sable?"—and know it's something you're not supposed to say in vain, the name of a god. Or something. But I've seen Slate bow toward a piece of stone before, seen them scrawl the same script furiously through music sheets. Different rapture, different scripture. Sure, whatever. But, just, all the same.

I wanted to write something else, strum his ribs like they belonged all strung and tuned across the fretboard of my bass. I know they'd make the most beautiful song.

-------------------------------

When the door is locked I sigh a breath of relief. Ives isn't home. A thousand blessings for that as I toss our helmets into the corner and shove aside empty cans and mugs and cigarette boxes to make room for the contraband we'd just obtained.

He asks—"Don't look at me for a sec."—and so I cover my eyes with my hand, backing my way toward my room with a smile so bright I know I should try to contain it or else I might blind him. A lighter clatters to the floor alongside sheet music that I proceed to slip on. But I catch myself against the wall, latch onto Sable's wrist for stability and hope it doesn't hurt when I pull at raw pieces of him.

"Alright, not looking," I say through what felt like a mouth full of eternal joy. "Not even peeking," I say as I sneak a glance at him through split fingers. He's blushing, hiding his lips in his palm. But I can still hear him without my sense of sight—the way he hears me.

"I swear."

I know him. I like him.

I really am a man in lo-

"Oh, I love you."

So in love.

"What?" I'm feeling cheeky as I glance at my toes to make sure I don't trip over a shirt with a cartoon-ish dog thing on it, or something, or- "Ah, shit." -or some empty wrapper I had never bothered to swish out of his sight before now.

This was- we were- I don't want to go back to before.

"Get closer, I can't hear you. You should probably press your lips to my neck and repeat that. Just to make sure I understood you."

And I know I should make him something to eat. He's surely exhausted, freezing. I should've offered him my jacket, maybe taken him to someone who knew how to keep bruises from rising or pain from ever searing the surface of his skin.

I don't want him to hurt.

And I know Nyx didn't offer him anything. She never had. All she's ever done is take—no, fucking steal—from Sable. But I-

"I know I promised breakfast for dinner," My right hip jams into my bedpost; and his left hand guides me in the proper direction. "But if I am being honest, I can't focus on anything but him. "I want nothing more than to be near you. Right now."

And I move my hand down my own face, away from my eyes, fingers bumping slowly over the tip of my nose, and covering my mouth. Hiding my words. Because maybe I'm still a little scared. I bet my cowardice has sounded like a taunt for seven years now and I'd truly rather just replace all those bitter bits with these bright, brave moments instead.

He's just still so pretty. It's beyond difficult to focus on anything else.

"Right now and forever."

-------------------------------

"We will have to share a fork, but here," I hand him a four high stack of pancakes with too much maple syrup, powdered sugar, cinnamon butter, and apricot jam. "Couldn't find a cigarette though." I join him in my bed again, brush his hair out of his face and swoop it behind his ear. "Oh, and I definitely think I have a spare of-" I dig through my bedside drawer, swiping around guitar picks and crumpled receipts until- "AH HA!"

I hold it up to him, an offering. Something insignificant compared to my life. At least, I hoped.

"A spare ear." I hold it up. "Ah, shit. Wrong ear. Here," I crawl my way under his arms, sprawling across his lap to search for more I might have stashed in my bass case. I unsnap the latches with one hand, use my other to guide his plate down onto my back. "Hurry up and eat," I grumble when I can't find anymore of his aids and roll onto my back, replacing his plate onto my stomach. I breathe gently to keep from distracting him, smiling up at him through slitted lids.

"I want to play music."

[ᴥ]

 SABLE HAWKEYE

I settle into his skin like a cigarette burn. Watching as ash blooms in the wake of my touch, gentle as I try to make it. It's only a matter of time, I did not tell him that I don't know how to love in a way that doesn't also destroy. He's seen the evidence of it, speaks of her like all the wounds she left were not guided by my hand.

He holds a man who does not exist, a collection of all the things I thought he'd adore. That is not me.

Is it?

Fuck, I feel fuzzy. Like a child's drawing, crayon bleeding outside the lines.

I let my head fall back against the headboard as he places the hearing aid, smile curling my lips like lingering smoke. I wince into his palm as the amplifier turns on, "you have more of these things laying around than I do." Sticky fingers, so familiar, with a habit of taking me apart or perhaps just collecting souvenirs. Greed would not be so deadly if it always looked like this.

Precious - sprawled across my lap, earnest like it's the easiest thing in the world to be. I fight the urge to press my ear to his chest and steal all the skipped beats.

I meant it when I said I loved him and I'm so glad he didn't say it back. I'd hate to make a liar of him too. "Hurry up?" I repeat, around incredulity and a mouthful of jelly-smeared pancake. I chew slower, counting the bites, hook my thumb beneath his chin and tilt his jaw to the side. Away from me. "If you said please, I might have listened."'

I wouldn't have.

The bruises on my wrists have settled into an angry stain, in jagged emphasis of my defiance. An ugly reminder of this night in spite of Indy's attempts to dress it up in sugar. My gaze keeps finding it, I hate that these are the hands that have to hold everything I've ever wanted.

"And what would I even play?" The fork slips against the plate, my brows scrunch at the high-pitched screech it earns, "forgot that sounds." I mumble in apology and offer him the offending bite. "Didn't bring my guitar when I went out."

He's got a one track mind and, hell, I'd quite enjoyed being it's sole focus before it slipped back into musical notation. I flex my fingers around the temptation to wedge my way back into it. It’s pathetic how quickly I have become selfish.

I should not be here. I do not deserve this.

I hold all my father's guilt, and I finally understand why he had so goddamn much of it.

"And crying wrecked my throat." I find more excuses, while clinging to the warmth of his weight. I pluck at his fingers, betraying the lie. I'd made all my melodies with only the thought of him. Now the words in my throat are fucking suffocating, I adore the way I struggle to draw breath. I could make something beautiful with this brand new kind of suffering.

The sweet kind, the gentle kind. I set the empty plate aside and cradle his face in my hands, like I can’t believe it’s mine to hold.

"My notes might go sour." My shoulder slump, betraying exhaustion, "you were the only good thing about today."

I have never had anything before.

But I called, and he came.

I think about carving my name into his chest. I can’t think of any other way to make sure I never lose it. ”Though you usually are, I guess.” And when I said something like that before it did not land quite so heavy. I feel like the words take the breath out of me, I taste vinegar as I try to find a place for my tongue to dig into my cheek.

The absence of a lie, I cannot pretend I meant anything other than I love you, dressed up in as many words. He must know how often I’ve been saying it, in clever ways for years and years. ”That was corny. Strike that from the record.”

I laugh, ”If the keepers do ever get me, you get custody of my guitar.” and it wouldn’t be so bad if this night were my last, is it really a tragedy to die happy? ”Slate can have my distortion pedals.”