devil's in the backseat ; heartbreakay

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devil's got a hold and we're laughing

Leon stirs awake to fog-thick tension rolling off the still form beside him in suffocating waves. For a moment he's suffocating, too, with the creeping edges of panic bleeding into his dreams: the earth quakes beneath him and his, wrecking the easy silence he'd fallen asleep to here in Glamour's home. His complacent fingers dig half-heartedly into the downy mattress, a feeble attempt against the violent tremors that have overtaken Panem.

But--

Laughter still rises up to the windows of Glamour's penthouse home, youthful and youth-wanting Capitolites making merry yet in the streets. There's no smash of glass and ceramic as Glamour's many ridiculous trinkets finally give way to gravity and shatter across the floor, no groan of concrete incapable of withstanding the terrors of nature.

Leon's eyelids drag open to take in the still-bright lights of a sleepless city and the shuddering that has yet to overtake it. 

But it is not the city, and it is not the earth that trembles so violently. The bed itself creaks and trembles, but the penthouse is hushed, as though everything holds its own breath and waits for the pin to drop.

Leon stirs, rolling over sleepily. His hands trail over silken sheets to find the warmth of his lover, who has yet to speak. He finds smooth skin and muscle, but the warmth he has grown to love is missing. "Glamour?" he asks, voice sleep-rough and concerned. Glamour's skin is chilled as life overrun, his fingers cold and bloodless. Leon weaves his own fingers through Glamour's and brings both hands to his lips to blow warmth gently back into his shivering frame. Gently, he cradles Glamour's hand against his cheek. "You're cold, love. Did something happen?"

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[Baby Wessex d9b [earthling]]

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Glamour Kinkade

your compliments look good on me

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So much had happened in so little time. He could no longer parse minutes from days. Had the announcement just happened? Or had it been months ago? Had he just visited the arena site - nearly constructed - or was it still merely a sketch? Had he spent endless boring hours listening to the Capitol scientists drone on and on about the new mutt DNA splicing, improved tracker implants, microscopic cameras? Or had he dreamt that too?

Somehow, he knew in the pit of his stomach, that once dawn rose, those uncountable hours would not matter. Even if he'd been preparing for this for years, he would still be behind. Nothing and no one was going to make this easier on him.

He laid still, arms at his side, gaze fixed to the ceiling. Coffin-like. Maybe halfway there. He understood fully now the President's intent; instead of waiting for Glamour to fuck up this time, he would set the stakes so impossibly high, that it would be logical to have him executed. No one would judge the President.

May the odds...

"You're cold, love. Did something happen?"

He let out a long breath, and then with great effort, rolled onto his side to face his lover. Leon, who had crowned himself. Leon, who was a living Adonis. His hands in his hands. "I feel like this whole Quell has been setup for me to fail. Just one long line of dominoes I don't understand, ready to fall like that," he whispered, and would have snapped, except that he could finally feel his fingertips again, and didn't want to lose Leon's warmth. "If you know you're going to fail at something, do you even bother? Is it stupid to even try?"

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with those big blue eyes

Sleep-dry lips brush gently over Glamour's knuckles as he speaks, and Leon allows their fingers to tangle together on the pillows. He takes a moment to look at their hands, together, the a thin band of skin on the fourth finger of his left hand distinctly paler than the rest of him. It's an imperfection that he's allowed to keep every year when they buff and shine and smoothen out life's marks from his body, if only if Snow enjoys parading them both about: the fallen Gamemaker and his Victor pet. Look at his hand, look how he is marked - look, for am I not benevolent to allow this union even to those who have failed?

He would have fought to keep it, nevertheless: this little pale band of skin that is more real than any diamond-encrusted gem Glamour could adorn his hands with. A preservation, perhaps, of the heart-stopping moment that Glamour had asked, and Leon had whispered, "Yes."

The ring itself sits on his bedside table, winking in the lights that sway to the steady thrum of intoxicated Capitolites, each whiling away the last few days of the interim before the Quell explodes across the country. In a few days, the ring would find a temporary home on a chain around his neck when he returns to Four and goes through the yearly rite of losing two children to the forsaken system. 

"No," Leon says presently, as the tremulous echo of Glamour's hollow words fade into the silence of their home. He smooths Glamour's hand over his cheek, allowing half his smile to curve into his lover's skin. "It's not stupid. You can't ever give up, you know. Not now, not ever. Every year, I..." He trails off, then, to picture the many, many tributes he's watched fall to some bloody wound or other. Too many, and too soon.

He swallows and says instead, "Do you remember Owen? From my Games?" Leon does, picturing the boy from Eight as clear as day. For a single moment, he's in stifling, sweltering heat with Owen in his arms and weight of the past three days dragging his heart into the dust. Then, he blinks, and Glamour's watching him in the dim light of their shared home, and he's real, and solid, and alive.

Steadily, simply, Leon says, "I loved him, you know." He releases Glamour's hand to cup his jaw, thumb smoothing over the sharp lines of his lover's face. Gently, his eyes on Glamour's, he continues, "The time I shared with him was too short, but even then we both knew we were doomed to fail. Even if had been him and not Siren, only one of us would still be here. But I have never, ever regretted giving him my heart."

It's the first time he's ever said Owen's name aloud since he'd died thirteen years ago. It's the first time he's ever spoken to Glamour about him, and it doesn't hurt as much as he thought it would. Time's scarred over the hollow spaces, and Glamour's filled in the rest. Softer, he adds, "It hurt to lose him, G, but I think I love you so much that I'll die from it. I'll die without you. Please, my love, don't give up."

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