Fic: Free the Sparrows From the Tips of Your Fingers (Arthur/Eames)
When Eames closes the door of the bathroom behind him, welcome silence fills his ears. The silence of smooth plumbing, the muteness of mirrors and sinks, the hush of the marble tiles. No need to speak in this world of whiteness and quietness. Every bone in him is screaming to be still. To be relieved of the pain, dull and heavy like a blanket of fog.
Arthur hadn't pressed him. He hadn't asked him anything, except the one inquiry as to whether he should take him to the hospital. 'No,' Eames had said hesitantly. He wasn't sure what a hospital meant. Words sounded strange when people spewed them, and tasted still stranger when he spoke them. So he tries to be as quiet as possible.
'All right,' Arthur had said. Eames watched the movements of Arthur's body with a vague unease; he kept shoving his hands into his pockets, taking them out, and shoving them in again. His hands were coiled into fists. He paced back and forth. When Eames asked if he was allowed to go to the bathroom, Arthur stared at him for a long while and then nodded very quickly as though Eames had done something wrong.
Eames leans on the sink. The cigarette burns on his palm rub painfully against the cool metal, and he jerks it quickly away. He's not quite sure what he should do here, to be honest. He only wanted to escape to a peaceful place. No urgent bodily functions demand his attention. The last time he peed he was in handcuffs, only an hour ago. Arthur might have wanted him to wash away the blood soaking the shirt he's wearing, the one frayed shirt they let him keep, but the problem is he can't move. His body is frozen, pressed against the sink, and then his knees buckle slightly and he crumples.
He must have whimpered, because Arthur pushes the door open and his eyes widen. 'What happened?' There's the alarm again, Eames wishes it would stop trying to hide, he doesn't like voices that have things hiding inside them. He says nothing. His eyes slip shut and for an instant he feels weightless. The floor is dampening his shirt.
'Did you pass out? Shit, I shouldn't have let you in alone.' The next minute warmth is enfolding him, warmth and a musky scent that some dim recess of his mind identifies as distinctly Arthur.
Eames puts his face against the rough leather of Arthur's shoulder and the arms around him slacken a little, as if uncertain. Then they gather him in firmly, all his bulk of frail wasted muscle, and carry him off the tiles.
Arthur averts his eyes when he tells Eames to take off his clothes, and keeps his eyes turned away even as he soaps Eames down with a washcloth. Eames can't imagine why. But he likes how Arthur holds him up, so that he can let himself sag against his chest. Safe. Insubstantial.
After his bath, Eames is vaguely conscious of being toweled dry and deposited on the bed. The leather starts to pull away. He grips it tightly out of instinct, and by some miracle it stays, rough and warm against his cheek.
'I'm taking you to the hospital,' Arthur murmurs. 'In the morning... the first bloody thing I do - ' There's that tremble-shake-quiver beneath his words that Eames weakly pinpoints as tears, but he's too tired to reply. A chill is tiptoeing through his toes and down his back. He mentally puts Arthur in the place of a teddy he had when he was six and snuggles up to him. At first Arthur holds himself perfectly rigid and edges away; then he relaxes, just the tiniest bit, like a tight spring uncoiling, and puts an arm around Eames.
The clock on the mantelpiece strikes twelve.
*******************
Cobb says Eames isn't Arthur's responsibility. That that husk of a man isn't Eames, anyway.
Arthur tells Cobb to fuck off, and fast.
Yusuf chimes in with statistics about crazy people strangling their nearest and dearest. 'It doesn't matter if you...had a thing with the dude in the past, Arthur - he's one of them, and they'll pick on anyone.'
Arthur thinks of Eames, sweet and sleepy and limp in his arms every night since they got to the safe house, and hits Yusuf in the face. Yusuf doesn't hit him back, just crosses his arms and stares at Arthur with pity in his eyes. 'Arthur...' Arthur hits him again.
*******************
Behavioral patterns. The doctors jabber on about them and make impressive gestures, but really the one to ask is Arthur because he knows Patient Number 67's behavioral patterns inside out.
Some days Eames sits with his hands on his forehead, as though he's trying to pluck out the little slivers of glass between his eyes all over again.
Some days he lounges against the window, tracing the pattern of the curtains which are always closed.
Others he spends staring at the ceiling, with grey eyes so blank it gives Arthur the shudders.
But Arthur feels guilty then, because there is still a piece of Eames in those eyes.
Warm and alive, all him, but hiding.
Arthur is going to seek that piece out.
He has no doubt he will put Eames together again because he's Arthur, capable and efficient and layered with confidence from years of being smarter than everybody else. He can heal Eames because he's set on it. He can heal Eames because Eames is his, all of Arthur's very own, and most importantly, he'll die if Eames doesn't get better.
Self preservation is a powerful instinct.
The moments Arthur washes away long dusty days at work - planning, extracting, planting, like a sophisticated form of farming - are when he presses his face against Eames' collarbones. The calloused white skin and the blood flowing beneath it; thank God they've not reached the stage where touching brings on hysterics. Things like opening the curtains do. (He tried that once; he won't do it again.)
Eames lies quietly and purrs like a cat when Arthur brushes his thumb across his face; and it's always nice touching his fingers to Eames' wrist because that's where a pulse jumps out at him and it's solid evidence he's not dead.
Arthur likes solid evidence; hell, he's built his life around it. Carefully skirting fancy and eschewing roundabout paths, unlike Eames. Eames was the kind of person who immersed himself in the thousand little irrationalities of other people, their hopes and dreams and the way they brushed their teeth. Eames was the first and the only person to ever tell him (and irritably) that logic was for drunkards who grasped at straws to find the way home.
But he's the one in Ward 49 now. Arthur immediately clamps down the thought, horrified at himself. It was only chance that saved him from insanity, after all. Chance that he wasn't in the wrong place at the wrong time as Eames was, and chance that he never had to have bamboo shoved under his fingernails every day of his life for six years. He's not entirely sure that this isn't worse, though; watching rationality spill out of Eames like wine. Last week the only time Eames spoke was to say Arthur's tie was crooked and there were goblins watching them from the top of the cupboard. The week before that, he didn't speak at all, playing with the magazines Arthur brought him and teasing the pages to and fro, eyes blank and unseeing, until Arthur sighed and almost fell asleep in the silence.
****************
At its best, it's regression. At its worst, it's mental paralysis.
To the world, Eames had an accident. An accident involving a truck, and the thud of a head hitting the ground.
People take Arthur aside at gatherings and try to express their own ways of commiseration that to him are filthy and nettle-sharp with condescension. An old lady he'd never seen in his life walked up to him and said she'd known Eames as a kid, he'd always been a bad apple, and God was cleansing him of his sins. Ariadne had had to take his arm and hold it very tight to stop him from punching someone so old in the face. A lady, at that. Arthur used to be a gentleman, but then he also used to be kind.
He's not kind now. Just tired.
Ariadne stayed over last night, ostensibly because she was too lazy to brave the 9 pm traffic and drive home, but Arthur suspects she really just wanted to clean his apartment. There are pillows on the floor and clothes strewn around the bed, and it's almost like the morning-after post a night of debauchery except that anyone who knows Arthur knows he hasn't dated in months. It's just untidiness that clutters and smells, and yesterday he could tell Ariadne was trying very hard not to wrinkle her nose. She performed a kind of unseen magic, however, around the time he went to bed, and when he woke up this morning she was gone and so was the dirt.
Arthur prods himself to feel grateful. To feel.
Today Eames is better than usual. He smiles when Arthur enters and plants himself on the bed. (It took six months to come that close, and now Arthur summons gratitude without effort)
'You look amazing,' Arthur says, a smile clambering all the way up to purple-rimmed eyes.
'You do, too.' As usual, Eames grins and reciprocates enthusiastically when Arthur pays him a compliment. He really does look amazing today, like a shadow of his former self; he's wearing an elegant black suit. Sometimes he likes to dress up and the nurses indulge him even though they aren't supposed to. (One time Arthur found him in a gingham apron decked with sunflowers and he laughed, he couldn't help it)
'Your suit looks nice.'
'I chose it myself,' Eames says, eyes dancing with suppressed glee. Arthur attempts to conceal his incredulity. On one hand, Eames hasn't bothered to comb his own hair for months; on the other, he's never lied to Arthur before. Picking out clothing: that's huge. A warm glow spreads through Arthur's stomach.
'Brilliant,' Arthur says approvingly. Eames' smile widens and then Arthur really, really needs to hug him so he shifts forward. There's a pale blue pillow on his lap and as Arthur pushes it to the side he notices 'Eames' written on it in black marker. It wasn't there before. Arthur knows he shouldn't ask for too much, Eames hasn't written a word in six months, but it's been a long hard day and it's okay to hope, occasionally...
'Eames, did you write this?'
The grey eyes flicker. 'No. Mrs. Kinsey.'
'Okay.' But Eames' face falls. He must have seen the disappointment lurking in the corners of Arthur's mouth because he leans forward and presses his lips to his cheek. Eames must have learnt how much this boosts Arthur's mood because he does it every time Arthur stops smiling. 'Sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry.' Often Eames becomes fascinated with a word, worrying it like a dog with a bone, until it loses meaning.
Arthur sighs. 'It's not a problem.' He puts his arms around Eames, relishing in the warmth and the clean soap-and-water smell of him. Eames is finally beginning to gain weight. It's a delightful contrast to the paper thin ribs Arthur hugged before. He makes a mental note to thank Ariadne; she executed an intricate, minutely detailed operation to fatten Eames up the minute she clapped eyes on him after the rescue.
(Rescue. Arthur secretly refrains using that term because there wasn't much of Eames to rescue by the time Arthur arrived...too late, you bastard, croaks the voice inside him)
Still, the things Ariadne makes Arthur deliver to the hospital are nothing less than labors of love; steaming hot pies smuggled under his shirt, chocolate brownies, and an enormous cake one time with strawberry icing Arthur licked a bit off on the way. (He's not proud of it, but lunch had been terrible and it was strawberry, damn it)
Arthur presses closer to Eames and his right hand bumps into his, accidentally shaking it. 'Pleased to meet you,' Eames responds gravely. Arthur laughs. Today might be a good day.
**********************
Ariadne bites her lip. 'What if he doesn't get better?'
'Then he doesn't get better,' says Arthur evenly. 'End of story.'
**********************
(and it's months and it's years and trees lose their leaves)
Eames is happy. He feels gloriously lazy, stretched out on the bed, with rain speckling the windowpanes. He let Arthur open the curtains when the big crack sound came, because unlike most patients, Eames isn't afraid of thunderstorms and loves watching lightning dance on the forks of trees. It's like a circus with clouds for elephants. Elephants crying.
He points this out to Arthur and Arthur laughs. Arthur's been laughing a lot more since Eames started letting him open the curtains. He looks younger and at peace now, head pillowed on Eames' lap with Eames stroking his hair. Arthur isn't allowed to lie on the bed with Eames, but Eames screamed his lungs out until the nurses let him.
Arthur took the men in white coats aside a few months ago, and gave them green bills so he could see Eames more often. Eames knows this because Arthur told him.
Now Arthur stays after visiting hours all the time. There was even one wonderful night when Arthur lay in his lap and Eames told him stories about the moon, and Eames watched his eyes drifting shut and determinedly jerking open again until Eames figured out that if Arthur went to sleep, he would stay. No leaving. So Eames lowered his voice and slowed down his words the way Nurse Kinsey did that always put him to sleep, and soon Arthur's head lolled against his chest and remained there the entire night.
Eames had never been so thrilled in his life. Even when Arthur hopped around the room in a panic the next morning yelling about where his socks were and the hospital suing him, Eames just sniggered and wiggled his toes to make sure the socks were still rolled up under the blanket.
Whatever it took to put off Arthur leaving.
******************
One day a man and a woman come to visit him, with Arthur sitting in the corner of the room. The man shakes Eames' hand, squinting at him. It's a very brief handshake. The woman, in contrast, envelops Eames in a ginormous hug. She's tiny, but there's a lot of her, somehow.
'I made all your cakes,' she says proudly, and Eames loves her instantly.
They talk to him for awhile, or rather the woman does. She chatters on and on and Eames can't always keep up but he listens because she seems friendly. The man doesn't speak much but smiles at Eames once, steadily, his eyes crinkling, and Eames knows he's all right.
Arthur listens along with Eames, occasionally pausing to interrupt the woman and tell her to repeat something. Eames knows that if Arthur is with him he'll never have to worry about not understanding what's going on.
When his visitors leave they go out into the hallway but forget to close the door behind them. Eames hears the man mutter '...sorry for Arthur...' in a way that makes the hairs on Eames' arms bristle. But the next instant the woman's voice rings out, loud and clear, 'There's nothing to be sorry about.'
Arthur catches Eames' eye and smiles.
(finis)
- The poem that inspired the title:
Distant light
by Walid Khazindar
Harsh and cold
autumn holds to it our naked trees:
If only you would free, at least, the sparrows
from the tips of your fingers
and release a smile, a small smile
from the imprisoned cry I see.
Sing! Can we sing
as if we were light, hand in hand
sheltered in shade, under a strong sun?
Will you remain, this way
stoking the fire, more beautiful than necessary, and quiet?
Darkness intensifies
and the distant light is our only consolation -
that one, which from the beginning
has, little by little, been flickering
and is now about to go out.
Come to me. Closer and closer.
I don't want to know my hand from yours.
And let's beware of sleep, lest the snow smother us.
Arthur hadn't pressed him. He hadn't asked him anything, except the one inquiry as to whether he should take him to the hospital. 'No,' Eames had said hesitantly. He wasn't sure what a hospital meant. Words sounded strange when people spewed them, and tasted still stranger when he spoke them. So he tries to be as quiet as possible.
'All right,' Arthur had said. Eames watched the movements of Arthur's body with a vague unease; he kept shoving his hands into his pockets, taking them out, and shoving them in again. His hands were coiled into fists. He paced back and forth. When Eames asked if he was allowed to go to the bathroom, Arthur stared at him for a long while and then nodded very quickly as though Eames had done something wrong.
Eames leans on the sink. The cigarette burns on his palm rub painfully against the cool metal, and he jerks it quickly away. He's not quite sure what he should do here, to be honest. He only wanted to escape to a peaceful place. No urgent bodily functions demand his attention. The last time he peed he was in handcuffs, only an hour ago. Arthur might have wanted him to wash away the blood soaking the shirt he's wearing, the one frayed shirt they let him keep, but the problem is he can't move. His body is frozen, pressed against the sink, and then his knees buckle slightly and he crumples.
He must have whimpered, because Arthur pushes the door open and his eyes widen. 'What happened?' There's the alarm again, Eames wishes it would stop trying to hide, he doesn't like voices that have things hiding inside them. He says nothing. His eyes slip shut and for an instant he feels weightless. The floor is dampening his shirt.
'Did you pass out? Shit, I shouldn't have let you in alone.' The next minute warmth is enfolding him, warmth and a musky scent that some dim recess of his mind identifies as distinctly Arthur.
Eames puts his face against the rough leather of Arthur's shoulder and the arms around him slacken a little, as if uncertain. Then they gather him in firmly, all his bulk of frail wasted muscle, and carry him off the tiles.
Arthur averts his eyes when he tells Eames to take off his clothes, and keeps his eyes turned away even as he soaps Eames down with a washcloth. Eames can't imagine why. But he likes how Arthur holds him up, so that he can let himself sag against his chest. Safe. Insubstantial.
After his bath, Eames is vaguely conscious of being toweled dry and deposited on the bed. The leather starts to pull away. He grips it tightly out of instinct, and by some miracle it stays, rough and warm against his cheek.
'I'm taking you to the hospital,' Arthur murmurs. 'In the morning... the first bloody thing I do - ' There's that tremble-shake-quiver beneath his words that Eames weakly pinpoints as tears, but he's too tired to reply. A chill is tiptoeing through his toes and down his back. He mentally puts Arthur in the place of a teddy he had when he was six and snuggles up to him. At first Arthur holds himself perfectly rigid and edges away; then he relaxes, just the tiniest bit, like a tight spring uncoiling, and puts an arm around Eames.
The clock on the mantelpiece strikes twelve.
*******************
Cobb says Eames isn't Arthur's responsibility. That that husk of a man isn't Eames, anyway.
Arthur tells Cobb to fuck off, and fast.
Yusuf chimes in with statistics about crazy people strangling their nearest and dearest. 'It doesn't matter if you...had a thing with the dude in the past, Arthur - he's one of them, and they'll pick on anyone.'
Arthur thinks of Eames, sweet and sleepy and limp in his arms every night since they got to the safe house, and hits Yusuf in the face. Yusuf doesn't hit him back, just crosses his arms and stares at Arthur with pity in his eyes. 'Arthur...' Arthur hits him again.
*******************
Behavioral patterns. The doctors jabber on about them and make impressive gestures, but really the one to ask is Arthur because he knows Patient Number 67's behavioral patterns inside out.
Some days Eames sits with his hands on his forehead, as though he's trying to pluck out the little slivers of glass between his eyes all over again.
Some days he lounges against the window, tracing the pattern of the curtains which are always closed.
Others he spends staring at the ceiling, with grey eyes so blank it gives Arthur the shudders.
But Arthur feels guilty then, because there is still a piece of Eames in those eyes.
Warm and alive, all him, but hiding.
Arthur is going to seek that piece out.
He has no doubt he will put Eames together again because he's Arthur, capable and efficient and layered with confidence from years of being smarter than everybody else. He can heal Eames because he's set on it. He can heal Eames because Eames is his, all of Arthur's very own, and most importantly, he'll die if Eames doesn't get better.
Self preservation is a powerful instinct.
The moments Arthur washes away long dusty days at work - planning, extracting, planting, like a sophisticated form of farming - are when he presses his face against Eames' collarbones. The calloused white skin and the blood flowing beneath it; thank God they've not reached the stage where touching brings on hysterics. Things like opening the curtains do. (He tried that once; he won't do it again.)
Eames lies quietly and purrs like a cat when Arthur brushes his thumb across his face; and it's always nice touching his fingers to Eames' wrist because that's where a pulse jumps out at him and it's solid evidence he's not dead.
Arthur likes solid evidence; hell, he's built his life around it. Carefully skirting fancy and eschewing roundabout paths, unlike Eames. Eames was the kind of person who immersed himself in the thousand little irrationalities of other people, their hopes and dreams and the way they brushed their teeth. Eames was the first and the only person to ever tell him (and irritably) that logic was for drunkards who grasped at straws to find the way home.
But he's the one in Ward 49 now. Arthur immediately clamps down the thought, horrified at himself. It was only chance that saved him from insanity, after all. Chance that he wasn't in the wrong place at the wrong time as Eames was, and chance that he never had to have bamboo shoved under his fingernails every day of his life for six years. He's not entirely sure that this isn't worse, though; watching rationality spill out of Eames like wine. Last week the only time Eames spoke was to say Arthur's tie was crooked and there were goblins watching them from the top of the cupboard. The week before that, he didn't speak at all, playing with the magazines Arthur brought him and teasing the pages to and fro, eyes blank and unseeing, until Arthur sighed and almost fell asleep in the silence.
****************
At its best, it's regression. At its worst, it's mental paralysis.
To the world, Eames had an accident. An accident involving a truck, and the thud of a head hitting the ground.
People take Arthur aside at gatherings and try to express their own ways of commiseration that to him are filthy and nettle-sharp with condescension. An old lady he'd never seen in his life walked up to him and said she'd known Eames as a kid, he'd always been a bad apple, and God was cleansing him of his sins. Ariadne had had to take his arm and hold it very tight to stop him from punching someone so old in the face. A lady, at that. Arthur used to be a gentleman, but then he also used to be kind.
He's not kind now. Just tired.
Ariadne stayed over last night, ostensibly because she was too lazy to brave the 9 pm traffic and drive home, but Arthur suspects she really just wanted to clean his apartment. There are pillows on the floor and clothes strewn around the bed, and it's almost like the morning-after post a night of debauchery except that anyone who knows Arthur knows he hasn't dated in months. It's just untidiness that clutters and smells, and yesterday he could tell Ariadne was trying very hard not to wrinkle her nose. She performed a kind of unseen magic, however, around the time he went to bed, and when he woke up this morning she was gone and so was the dirt.
Arthur prods himself to feel grateful. To feel.
Today Eames is better than usual. He smiles when Arthur enters and plants himself on the bed. (It took six months to come that close, and now Arthur summons gratitude without effort)
'You look amazing,' Arthur says, a smile clambering all the way up to purple-rimmed eyes.
'You do, too.' As usual, Eames grins and reciprocates enthusiastically when Arthur pays him a compliment. He really does look amazing today, like a shadow of his former self; he's wearing an elegant black suit. Sometimes he likes to dress up and the nurses indulge him even though they aren't supposed to. (One time Arthur found him in a gingham apron decked with sunflowers and he laughed, he couldn't help it)
'Your suit looks nice.'
'I chose it myself,' Eames says, eyes dancing with suppressed glee. Arthur attempts to conceal his incredulity. On one hand, Eames hasn't bothered to comb his own hair for months; on the other, he's never lied to Arthur before. Picking out clothing: that's huge. A warm glow spreads through Arthur's stomach.
'Brilliant,' Arthur says approvingly. Eames' smile widens and then Arthur really, really needs to hug him so he shifts forward. There's a pale blue pillow on his lap and as Arthur pushes it to the side he notices 'Eames' written on it in black marker. It wasn't there before. Arthur knows he shouldn't ask for too much, Eames hasn't written a word in six months, but it's been a long hard day and it's okay to hope, occasionally...
'Eames, did you write this?'
The grey eyes flicker. 'No. Mrs. Kinsey.'
'Okay.' But Eames' face falls. He must have seen the disappointment lurking in the corners of Arthur's mouth because he leans forward and presses his lips to his cheek. Eames must have learnt how much this boosts Arthur's mood because he does it every time Arthur stops smiling. 'Sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry.' Often Eames becomes fascinated with a word, worrying it like a dog with a bone, until it loses meaning.
Arthur sighs. 'It's not a problem.' He puts his arms around Eames, relishing in the warmth and the clean soap-and-water smell of him. Eames is finally beginning to gain weight. It's a delightful contrast to the paper thin ribs Arthur hugged before. He makes a mental note to thank Ariadne; she executed an intricate, minutely detailed operation to fatten Eames up the minute she clapped eyes on him after the rescue.
(Rescue. Arthur secretly refrains using that term because there wasn't much of Eames to rescue by the time Arthur arrived...too late, you bastard, croaks the voice inside him)
Still, the things Ariadne makes Arthur deliver to the hospital are nothing less than labors of love; steaming hot pies smuggled under his shirt, chocolate brownies, and an enormous cake one time with strawberry icing Arthur licked a bit off on the way. (He's not proud of it, but lunch had been terrible and it was strawberry, damn it)
Arthur presses closer to Eames and his right hand bumps into his, accidentally shaking it. 'Pleased to meet you,' Eames responds gravely. Arthur laughs. Today might be a good day.
**********************
Ariadne bites her lip. 'What if he doesn't get better?'
'Then he doesn't get better,' says Arthur evenly. 'End of story.'
**********************
(and it's months and it's years and trees lose their leaves)
Eames is happy. He feels gloriously lazy, stretched out on the bed, with rain speckling the windowpanes. He let Arthur open the curtains when the big crack sound came, because unlike most patients, Eames isn't afraid of thunderstorms and loves watching lightning dance on the forks of trees. It's like a circus with clouds for elephants. Elephants crying.
He points this out to Arthur and Arthur laughs. Arthur's been laughing a lot more since Eames started letting him open the curtains. He looks younger and at peace now, head pillowed on Eames' lap with Eames stroking his hair. Arthur isn't allowed to lie on the bed with Eames, but Eames screamed his lungs out until the nurses let him.
Arthur took the men in white coats aside a few months ago, and gave them green bills so he could see Eames more often. Eames knows this because Arthur told him.
Now Arthur stays after visiting hours all the time. There was even one wonderful night when Arthur lay in his lap and Eames told him stories about the moon, and Eames watched his eyes drifting shut and determinedly jerking open again until Eames figured out that if Arthur went to sleep, he would stay. No leaving. So Eames lowered his voice and slowed down his words the way Nurse Kinsey did that always put him to sleep, and soon Arthur's head lolled against his chest and remained there the entire night.
Eames had never been so thrilled in his life. Even when Arthur hopped around the room in a panic the next morning yelling about where his socks were and the hospital suing him, Eames just sniggered and wiggled his toes to make sure the socks were still rolled up under the blanket.
Whatever it took to put off Arthur leaving.
******************
One day a man and a woman come to visit him, with Arthur sitting in the corner of the room. The man shakes Eames' hand, squinting at him. It's a very brief handshake. The woman, in contrast, envelops Eames in a ginormous hug. She's tiny, but there's a lot of her, somehow.
'I made all your cakes,' she says proudly, and Eames loves her instantly.
They talk to him for awhile, or rather the woman does. She chatters on and on and Eames can't always keep up but he listens because she seems friendly. The man doesn't speak much but smiles at Eames once, steadily, his eyes crinkling, and Eames knows he's all right.
Arthur listens along with Eames, occasionally pausing to interrupt the woman and tell her to repeat something. Eames knows that if Arthur is with him he'll never have to worry about not understanding what's going on.
When his visitors leave they go out into the hallway but forget to close the door behind them. Eames hears the man mutter '...sorry for Arthur...' in a way that makes the hairs on Eames' arms bristle. But the next instant the woman's voice rings out, loud and clear, 'There's nothing to be sorry about.'
Arthur catches Eames' eye and smiles.
(finis)
- The poem that inspired the title:
Distant light
by Walid Khazindar
Harsh and cold
autumn holds to it our naked trees:
If only you would free, at least, the sparrows
from the tips of your fingers
and release a smile, a small smile
from the imprisoned cry I see.
Sing! Can we sing
as if we were light, hand in hand
sheltered in shade, under a strong sun?
Will you remain, this way
stoking the fire, more beautiful than necessary, and quiet?
Darkness intensifies
and the distant light is our only consolation -
that one, which from the beginning
has, little by little, been flickering
and is now about to go out.
Come to me. Closer and closer.
I don't want to know my hand from yours.
And let's beware of sleep, lest the snow smother us.