is fic
I wrote more fic! Uh, it's kind of weird fic. I hope it makes sense...
i.
There were certain areas of the streets - certain alleys, certain basements - that felt hungry, somehow, openmouthed and gaping. Carnivorous.
Star learned to avoid those places fast. Refused to work their corners, took roundabout side streets to bypass them - shuddered when he couldn’t avoid going near. He had instincts and they were honed as well as a lifetime of mistrust and violence could sharpen them; he knew where there were predators, even if he couldn’t see them.
Other places weren’t dangerous, just sad. The end of a particular street, the doorway of an abandoned A-frame house. Palpable grief lingered there. If Star happened by at a quiet time of day he could manage to hear soft weeping, low mournful wails. Sometimes he stayed, listening to keening cries, wondering.
ii.
Jaime was closed to him, most of the time, mysterious and walled off in a way that so few ever had been. His mother had been like that. Star could never read her, could never tell what it was that lurked beneath her skin, the thoughts behind her eyes. His little brother had been difficult sometimes, unless he opened to Star - crawled into Star’s bed, pressed his frightened face into Star’s neck, said, “What’s going to happen to us?” on those strangled nights that were both profoundly silent and screamingly loud. Then Star could feel River, not just his body (his heartbeat, his small fingers) but his little brother trust.
Jaime, though - he could never feel Jaime. He learned the cues of Jaime’s body, Jaime’s face changing expressions as naturally and openly as the day shifting to night, knew the lilt of Jaime’s voice, the hitch of his breathing when particularly delighted with something Star had accomplished. But never that other sensation, never that interior knowing; and Star had been glad of it. When he was near Jaime, the rest of the world was muffled. As if Jaime wrapped him up on cotton wool, hushed his raw nerves; deafened the screams he couldn’t help but feel frissoning under his skin.
It was as if he’d lost a sense, being with Jaime; as if there were no longer as many dimensions to the universe. As if he were anchored, held, loved.
The one time he felt Jaime was that instant when Jaime died. The flare of shock, of love, of nothing.
iii.
The first time he killed someone he had been paid to kill, Star had been startled at how easy it was. How the sensation of death followed him home, haloed around him, made him effervesce.
He was giddy with death. Wondered how it could feel so familiar.
Could hear, distantly, dimly, the far-off howl of dogs.
iv.
Star knew Milo loved him. He felt Milo’s love as physical heat. It made the sex especially hot.
Sometimes Star almost loved Milo back. But then he figured he was just reflecting, like the moon does the sun’s light, and laughed at himself (and at Milo, foolish gorgeous Milo, who loved him but loved to play games more, and of course Star knew that too).
v.
That flare of nothing accompanied each death. Star kept in the business for as long as he did to keep sensing it. He sought it out, hunted it down, swallowed it and kept it in his chest.
Thought: Jaime.
vi.
The frustrating thing about Zander is that Star can feel Zan’s want pressing against him, constant prickling pressure into Star’s skin, hungry and devouring; and something in Star responds, presses back.
Most of this primal interplay occurs beneath Star’s notice - beneath the notice of even his subconscious. But enough of it filters through for Star to be so very confused when Zan doesn’t respond to him the way Star knows Zan wants to respond. Confused, and irritated, and aroused, constantly aroused, always feeling what Zan feels, always feeling back, never with any release, God, it could drive a guy to murder -
vii.
Riverside is a building that doesn’t feel like a building. It feels like an open space, it feels like fresh air all the time, it feels sanctified and holy and unbounded.
Sometimes Star just wanders its hallways, brushes his hands over its walls. He thinks he can hear the structure of Riverside move around him, shift and rustle as if a living thing, breathing in and out. It’s ultimately benign, though curious about him - initially a bit distrustful, sensing the metaphorical blood he has on his hands. It relaxes when he greets it, welcomes him wordlessly with an interior breeze that ruffles his hair.
Stay, it says.
Yes, Star says.
viii.
Gina trails ghosts in her footsteps. Star catches her sleepwalking, in the grip of her visions; sees the dim outline of ghostly figures whispering to her of future events, imprinting their hate and love and pain into her eyes, into her skin.
Star stays away from Gina when she’s having a vision. If he touched her, brushed against her, gripped her to keep her from falling - it would burn him. He knows this without having experienced it. Can feel the almost-sensation of pain, lurking all around her.
When she wakes up she’s as open as a puppy, eager, all breathless innocence. Star doesn’t touch her even then because he’s afraid he’ll somehow corrode that joy, afraid that she’ll take in some of his taint - and he’s never really cared about stuff like that, doesn’t really care now, but figures he’s trying to turn over a new leaf, trying to be a good guy (or at least not so bad), and this counts, too.
ix.
Star thinks about dying.
Star thinks about flinging himself off of a balcony, spreading his arms into parodies of wings, attempting to take flight.
Star thinks about shooting himself in the head, bullet aimed for the base of his skull, gunshot residue on his fingers.
Star thinks about overdosing - he has the money to do it with the good drugs now, knows the mechanics of it - he thinks about a needle, about his veins, about his blood and his heart.
Star thinks about that nothing, that moment of perfect peace and silence and resonance, thinks about moving into it, existing inside of it, echoing.
x.
Zan says, “Don’t,” and so Star doesn’t.