braveoff | [ DUPLICITY ] inbox

Drake waits, just watching Jesus for a moment. Expecting another question. When it doesn't come and the other man's expression stays troubled, he huffs softly and tugs on his hand.

"Babe I said ease up, not shut down. Help me figure it out... why does me not liking it bother you, even though I'm not mad?"

Jesus wouldn't have come up here first thing in the morning if it that was all there was to it. It seems like they both need to dig a little here.

"I guess... It's just taken me a long time to get to where I'd do anything like that in public. I had boyfriends but I was always so careful with them. I could never let on that I liked boys when I was growing up. The times I got caught out meant violence, you know?" He looks down at their hands.

"I like that I can be all the way out here. I like that I can make out with my boss if I want to. I like that I have men I can care about, care deeply about, and that none of you try to own me. I hate the thought of hurting any of you because I don't know what I'm doing wrong."

"...you're not doing anything wrong," Drake says firmly. That wasn't his life back home, but their worlds were similar enough culturally that he understands. For all its flaws, Duplicity society is freeing in some ways -- this is one of them.

Unfortunately that response doesn't solve anything either, so Drake puzzles through it for another moment. What specifically bothered him. It was the collar, he's figured that much out. But why?

Maybe if he just. Starts talking, they can sort it out.

"I don't want you to feel like you've gotta be careful how you are with other guys around me. I don't wanna ever make you think you have to hide part of yourself. It's... just a sign, right? Like the game's on when you're wearing it for him?" Another pause after the confirmation, Drake's brow furrowing as he thinks. "Maybe I just got in my head about it, after talking to K about all this? How things look. How I can't -- shouldn't -- ever do anything that could look like I own you, because that's not true and the contract makes those games more complicated. But I saw you and fell into the same trap of thinking it was what it looked like. It's not rational, I just..."

Ah, fuck it.

"Are you? Happy, signed with me? I know it hasn't been easy."

"First of all," he turns slightly to face him. "It's been easier than you think. You've give through a lot. That hasn't made you hard to be with. I'm happy with you." Maybe it's needed to be said. Maybe more than once.

"Second, yeah, that's what the collar is. It's the start of the game. It lets him know I want to play with him. We have different rules every time."

The reassurance that Jesus wants to be here goes a lot farther than the reassurance that the collar isn't what it looks like, which makes sense to Drake since he knew that logically already. He doesn't need to know the details because it's not for him, and honestly he doesn't want the way they play with dominance to involve a collar. That's too close to the city's concept of ownership for his taste.

"Can you promise me something?"

Drake seems to relax a little bit, at least. It's something.

"What is it?"

"If that ever changes, you tell me. Don't resign again because you're worried, it'll hurt a lot more if you stay when you don't want to and I figure out you're unhappy later. You mean a lot more to me than contracts or quota, got it?"

"I promise." It's an easy one to make. He hasn't had any trouble telling Drake the truth so far, and Jesus tends to be honest by default anyway.

"And if I'm ever too much... Don't resign with me just to give me a contract. Okay?"

"Okay," Drake agrees, just as easily. He doubts that'd ever be the case but neither of them are psychic -- it could be, someday. And as difficult as it that type of boundary is for him, he's been able to set it before. So he nods and replies softly, "I promise."

The silence that falls as that settles isn't uncomfortable, but it's not entirely peaceful either. Drake exhales and squeezes Jesus' hand, not sure the conversation's done yet.

"Are you still worried?"

"Not as much." He chuckles softly, without much humor. "I always worry about close relationships, Drake... But I feel better now. Are you okay?"

"I will be." He's not happy that a discomfort he was planning to write off turned into such a stressful thing for Jesus, though, and hearing I always worry doesn't do much to help that. "What do you mean always?"

This is one of those times Jesus is very self-aware, and the awareness does nothing to actually help him. "I didn't have any models for stable relationships. I don't know how to have them. I try, but there's always...not a voice, but an urge, to see conflicts as signs the other person just wants out."

If nothing else, Drake is learning a lot about them both this conversation. Jesus from what he's being told and himself as he thinks about how their issues are influencing each other.

"Neither did I," he admits. "So I'm still trying to understand it, too, and every relationship is different. People are different. But I do know that's not always what conflict represents. On their own they're just obstacles, they're gonna happen. Like something that winds up in the road... they don't have to shut everything down unless you don't clear them and they pile up."

"They're something to be learned from," he agrees, but sounds like he's reciting something he wants to believe and doesn't quite.

"Are there sounds, situations, that send you back to when you were a kid? The bad parts of being a kid, I mean." The parts where Drake went through a similar hell to Jesus's.

It does sound like Jesus doesn't believe it... probably because like he said, he's never had it work. Drake only has the one example for himself and that was the blind leading the blind, fumbling to figure it out together. That's not something that can work for every relationship, no matter how much the people in it might want it to, but sometimes it does. Sometimes, with the right person, it's safe to have those conflicts and come out the other side of it stronger for what you've figured out.

He's trying to figure out how to say any of that when Jesus asks another question. The connection between the topics is obvious, and his expression sobers again. Darkens, just slightly.

"Yeah. Of course. Are you saying this felt like that, to you?"

"Not...exactly." He frowns, toying with words in his head, trying to find the right ones. "When I disappoint people, it feels like that. Like waiting for something worse to happen. Something worse usually does."

People rely on Jesus not to disappoint them, after all. Lives have depended on it. But even when they didn't, Jesus suffered when he let people down.

"I want to tell you that it's never gonna go that way with me, but I know my believing something doesn't make it reassuring to anybody else. All I can do is prove to you that if we keep talking these things through, we'll be okay. It does get easier because we learn more every time... and maybe every time you'll feel a little safer with me?"

"This has helped." Sitting here with him, their hands together. "Don't dismiss your feelings for me, all right? I need you to trust that they matter to me. That they do affect me, too, and that's okay."

That's a much more difficult promise to make, and Drake takes a moment to let Jesus' words sink in before nodding. He'll try, anyway. Because Jesus believes it's true, just like he believes there's never going to be any single obstacle that'd make him give up on this.

"Okay. But if it's ever not, I need you to tell me that too."

"I will." This, he reminds himself, is part of being in a society. Part of having friends, part of having lovers. Little things can upset the balance and you have to figure out how to right them again.

"Did you know, when I first got here, I planned to just have anonymous sex. Not exchange names, no contact information. And I planned to have a Dom who treated me poorly because, well, then I wouldn't feel bad about earning them citations." He laughs softly at how naive that plan ended up being. "I'm glad I changed my mind."

"I'm glad for that, too," Drake tells him, a hint of his smile returning. Because Jesus deserves to have people. Ones he trusts, ones he likes, who treat him well.

But he's curious, too.

"Why did you?"

He has to laugh, because Drake is asking and Drake really doesn't know. He looks up at him.

"Because of you. I met you after Crais vouched for you, and...I liked you. I liked how I felt talking to you."

Wait, what? Drake does that surprised-confused blink again, then shakes his head.

"You'd already changed your mind, hadn't you? If you knew Crais that well."

He laughs. "I didn't know him that well. I only met him twice."

"Oh. I thought you were friends," Drake admits, laughing a little himself as if Jesus' amusement is contagious. "Good job me, then?"

no subject

Cw homophobia, abuse

Re: Cw homophobia, abuse

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject