If the orangery were far smaller, Loki might have taken it over by now. As it is, he's made himself very much at home in a nook by one of the vast glass windows. The spread around him has grown from coffee and book to coffee, coffee pot, stack of books, current book being read, phone downloading all the day's RSS feeds into sorted lists, and a jacket spread across the back of the chair. He looks almost comfortable; by his usual standards, he has metaphorically kicked off his shoes and propped his feet up on the coffee table.
     (The literal shoes, of course, remain on. And even in shirtsleeves he looks crisper than is strictly necessary.)

     He has been wandering today, wearily, wearily and with the confusion borne of turmoil both internal and external. This time he's a bit slower as he crosses through the orangery, his cane tapping lightly on the flagstones. It signals his approach in a way that voice alone could not or would not do.
     Of course, it is easy enough for you to sense his approach. He is sick and weary at heart, confused and in turmoil and turbulence that makes his emotions sensed long before he comes back into view. Pres sighs as he turns around a corner - and spots you. "Oh. Hey."
     He isn't dressed up much today. A white linen button-up shirt is paired with dark slate grey trousers, a pair of black dress shoes on his feet. He looks as if he has slept well, but perhaps over-long, a slight slackness of weariness in his face. "Mind if I join you?"

     Loki didn't look up until you spoke. There is knowing someone is coming, and then there's knowing if they want you to know. "Sit," he says, waving towards a free chair at the table. He does not say anything about how you look, or not having seen you for longer than expected. "You want any coffee? I didn't think to bring a second cup."
     A stack of books is moved to the side, and then the one he was reading, phone set on top to hold his place. He gives you a look that is not exactly anxious, but carries a lot of the Where have you been? that he's not asking out loud.

     "Nah." Pres sits down heavily, with an inscrutable look at you before he turns a brooding look onto the garden. He slouches in the chair, sticking his legs out in front of him and leaning the cane against the arm of the chair. "Not thirsty. Except maybe for Red Bull and vodka."
     He inhales, noting your look but not exactly responding to it, not immediately. Instead, he examines his hands. "So I got offered a job, kinda."

     "By someone in the family here." It's a guess, but now Loki looks a little weary himself. "If I could pull drinks out of the air for you I would, but since I can't, I'll offer to play designated driver at the next opportunity to hit a bar."

     "Yeah, right about now I've had enough of drinks being pulled out of thin air." Pres gives you a steady look, and waits for a moment to see how you'll react to that before he continues. "The job's a little weird, but I kinda seem to have signed on for it without being asked if I wanted it. I'm not sure how I feel about it. Oh, and I ran into your pal this morning here - I think I pissed him off, but that just makes us even."

     "They do that. Giving the job without you applying for it. As I recall, when I agreed to work for Gwilym, I was jet-lagged to hell and thought I was answering a completely different question." Loki pours himself more coffee, watching you just as steadily. "It's sort of irrelevant at this point, I figure. I got all of the yelling at him out of my system a while back. If you're up to 'not sure' on how you feel about it, you're already doing better than I was."
     He sits back for a sip of coffee. "I'd apologize for not warning you about this kind of shit, but I didn't actually think that the entire family had a thing for yours."

     "Which one's Gwilym?" Pres has not met Gwilym. He leans forward and folds his arms on the edge of the table. "Sure as hell looks like they do - well. I can't say that. Aside from your pal's brief interest in Gilly, she seems well out of it. Thank god one of us is."
     He smiles briefly, though it's a skew, pained sort of a smile. "It's not entirely without benefits. I just ... I'm a mess now, Loki. I don't know what to think. Some of the things that've happened - it's hard to believe we've only been here two and a half freakin' days."
     He exhales again, sitting up and dragging a hand back through his hair. "Can I get you to promise not to tell anybody about it? I - really I don't want my family to know. I guess Maddie's going to have to know sooner or later, but I just can't deal with it right now. Fuck." He laughs, though it's halfway to being a sob. "I'm supposed to protect her. I can't do a damn thing right by her or Gilly, in something like this. He's replacing me, y'know."

     "Gwilym's--it's hard to explain. He's a charming bastard." Loki shrugs that off as not relevant to the conversation at hand, and just watches you. "I won't tell anyone. I'm getting pretty fucking good at holding secrets for people lately. You think I've told my dad about any of this? He'd have me kidnapped by a deprogrammer by now."
     He breaks his gaze from you for a moment, eyes closing. Trying to sort through the waves of your frustration to get back to some kind of calm at the bottom of himself. It'd be easier if he couldn't empathize quite this much, in the old-fashioned prosaic sense of the word.
     If wishes were espresso shots, he'd be far more wired right now. Pale blue eyes meet yours again. "I don't know what to tell you about Maddie. That she'll handle all of this better than either of us? I do think that you trying to protect her is fucking you up, and that you'd be better off if you could let go a little. You've got enough to deal with on your own without trying to borrow trouble for her when she's already happy."
     He finds brief refuge in more coffee. "I could try to make you happier. Sometimes it helps, working through a problem, if you don't have all that emotional flood screwing over any attempts to work through it on a more rational level. But I don't know if you want that."

     "I don't think it'd help." Pres admits it bluntly, looking at you and then away. "It's just - I can't be there for my sisters, you know? When the shark took half my leg, I just - I pulled away from everybody. Not anybody's fault. Just the way it is. And they kept going while I was sitting there trying to figure out how to get back to step one."
     He inhales deeply, then stands up to pull down a piece of fruit, slouching back into his seat and beginning to pick it apart with his fingernails, piece by slow piece. He isn't eating it, just destroying it. Better that than his skin or the like. "I was trying to figure out what I'd do because school shit wasn't exactly panning out and I don't want to go into politics, and then there's the entire business of I might fucking like guys. Yeah, my sisters would probably be okay with it, but have you ever seen Maddie or Gillian hold a secret around someone they think is okay to know it? And the rest of my family... you know them. You've met enough of the extended fam to know how they are. Being gay is fine for other people. Not for a West."
     Bits of apricot are already littering the ground around Pres' chair, his blue-eyed gaze downcast onto the fruit. The orange flesh is visible, the darker purple around the kernel beginning to show. "Well, apparently I do like guys, and apparently Balthazar's brother is a king, or going to be, and apparently he's decided to claim me as his consort, and I'm damned if I know how the fuck that's going to work, or how I'm going to explain any of this to mumsie and dad and everybody else, that it looks like I'm going to be working in a whole other dimension. I guess I could say 'hey, mumsie, guess what! Good news, looks like I'll be working in politics after all! You could say I'll be working under a V.I.P."

     Loki watches apricot bits fall on the ground, and drinks his coffee. "If you're not okay with what's being asked of you, Pres, tell me. And I'll--fuck. Fuck if I know what I'll do. I couldn't even get out of the job I didn't know I was agreeing to, and I tried. But if you want out of this, tell me, and I will do whatever I can to help."
     He has to stop to pour himself another cup of coffee. This conversation requires stronger measures than he has at hand. "You're not sure, or you want to take the job and you're not sure how to handle it, I'll do what I can to help with that. I'm not really sure my help is going to be any better there either. I've got three magic tricks and none of them seem really applicable right now. Even the one that gives me headaches."

     He looks up at you, expression mournful. "I - I don't know. I like him, and that - fuck." Pres sighs, and looks down again, dropping his shoulders. "I really like the guy. I don't get it. Why do I have to like him like this? But there's just something. About him, I mean."
     He is wobbling, visibly uncertain of how to explain it, the hard outer shell stripped away for the first time in years. There is nothing tough and cocky and confident about him. Even the bitterness is assuaged somewhat, in how he is now; everything has been churned up to the surface as by turbulent oceanic currents. The fruit falls from his hands, and he wipes off his fingers on his trousers. "I tried to explain to your pal how I feel about it," Pres confides in you, voice quieter. "I don't think he understood, but I tried, Loki. I really did. But - I just - there's something I have to show you. I want to hear what's goin' on with you in this too, but I have to show you first. Okay?"

     Loki sets his coffee down. "Sure. Anything you need." He means it somewhat more than he realizes.

     Pres stands up very carefully. And then he starts taking off his belt, and opening his trousers.

     There is a split second of This is awfully public before Loki drags his mind back out of the gutter to wait for--what you need to show him. Though he is still enough himself to check around for any signs of other people coming.

     Off come the trousers. He's still wearing his boxers, so it's not immediately a precursor to lewd and licentious acts. And so far nobody's coming, though if someone where, well, there's multiple angles they could be coming from. Pres steps out of his trousers to stand straight, giving you an expectant look.

     It takes a moment for realization to hit. After tattoos that magically appear overnight and other such flashy results, magic with very ordinary-looking results takes a little longer to notice. "...oh." Loki leans back a little, and looks down, then up again. "The next time we go out for drinks, it's coming out of that account of siphoned money. I'm just saying."

     Pres snorts at that, almost laughing although not quite. He pulls up his pants, replacing the belt and then half-falling into the chair again, closing his eyes. "All I did was take a fucking date off his plate. Next thing I know I'm in this - this modernized Roman villa or some shit, a fucking palace," he curses a lot more when there's magic involved, "and he has wings. I didn't even notice my leg was fixed. I'm still having trouble believing it's not going to - y'know - wear off at the wrong moment."
     He rubs his face with both hands, groaning. "But he acts like I'm something special," Pres says more quietly. "And - y'know, I want to believe him. I want to believe in what he says. Not just the magic bits, but ... that I'd actually matter, I could be useful, I could do something meaningful, more than a life of wheeling and dealing and death by painful slow compromises in D.C. the way mumsie thinks I should go. I know it's still not rock and roll, I know it's not ... well, your thing, I guess, but ... I don't know. The stuff with your pal, that's all separate. Connected, but separate."
     There's another long exhale, and he glances at you. "Enough about my damage, I know, right? What about you? How - how do you cope with this? What's happened with you?"

     "You're better off not going into politics. You'd end up like my dad." Loki looks around the orangery a moment. Still trying to collect himself. Somehow, it's easier to find calm beneath Balthazar's impending supernova than beneath your worry.
     "There's this guy--Gwilym. Balthazar's uncle. And to your guy too, I guess, if it's the up-and-coming High King. Anyway. He's sort of the opposite to the sun king thing, which makes what's going on here..." He pauses a moment, realizing just how much there is to explain.
     "Let me try this again, chronologically. I met this guy in a bar. He started showing up in my dreams. Got me to agree to I didn't know what, next thing I know I'm picking up on the emotions of everyone nearby. I spent a while shouting at him over it, finally gave up. What he does is important to how the universe runs. I'm supposed to help him with it. It's this, uh. Priest thing." He actually flushes to use that word for it. Life-long atheist, and now he has to describe it like that. "I cope by yelling at him about fucking up my life, and then trying to figure out what the fuck I'm supposed to be doing. It's, uh, it could be going better than it has been. There's a long gap between accepting that since I have this job I might as well do it right, and having any idea how."

     He listens quietly, cracking his knuckles with nervous energy, fidgeting a little in his seat. It isn't that he's not interested - he clearly is, his attention remaining on you fully. It's just hard to parse, hard to accept, and yet, he has to parse it, has to accept it. Make sense of it.
     "Sounds like it'd piss me of," Pres admits, glancing away from you and then back. "And you don't want to tell him to fuck off? To take the job and shove it? Or is he just not letting you? Not that I'd know anything about that," he adds with a smirk. "If he's anything like Gruffydd, he - well. He's a bitch to argue with. He just keeps making sense, and then I find myself making concessions, and then... well. You know."

     "Yes. He's exactly like that. I never won an argument with him, not once." Loki has to stop as yet another little fact falls into place with a click against something else. "He actually warned me about getting too near Gruffydd. I'm not sure if the warning is now moot or not."
     His coffee pot has run out of coffee, and there's no one around to pull more out of the air for him. He pokes the empty cup somewhat morosely. "Probably beside the point. You're going to be heading off to live in that other place if you take the job?"

     "I dunno, seems like good advice to me," Pres retorts, mouth twisting wryly. He's calmer than he was when the conversation began, though there's still uneasiness and doubt and turmoil within him. "And - yeah, pretty much. I don't know." He chews at his lower lip viciously. "He's evidently already cleared it with his - with his wife. And talking about rooms for me to stay in, and stuff. I don't know. What d'you think?"

     "I think I'm going to miss seeing you." Loki cuts a fast, sharp smile. "And maybe envy you a little. Make sure they have a fucking internet connection somewhere in that palace, would you? I don't know what Gruffydd's like, but that's a serious job offer. You want it, take it. If he really wants to give you the job, he'll help you work out the weird little details. If Balthazar can be a an official Duke with the paperwork to prove it in this place while also being part of the royal family there, I'm pretty sure they know how to give you some good excuses for your parents."

     "I think something's been setting this up for a while."
     Pres says it and then falls silent for a minute, then looks over at you, hunching forward over his lap with his forearms on his thighs. "I think Balthazar's taking my place in this world."
     He admits it, the thought that he woke up with that's still stuck in his head, going round and round chasing its own tail. The look he gives you is sad and a little angry - but also grimly resigned, the corners of his mouth turned down.

     It's not the weirdest thing he's heard, though it may be the weirdest in the last hour or so. Loki gives that some honest thought, chin resting on his hands.
     "It doesn't really add up," he says, finally. "He's dating your sister, not being brotherly to her. He's not filling the careers you'd planned on taking for your life, or the ones your mother wanted for you. I don't think it's a zero-sum game."
     He looks you in the eye again, not challenging, but making it clear he's giving this serious consideration. "I don't know how much of the way this family's spreading across yours, and people you know, is magical fate or whatever, and how much is just the very ordinary fact that people get to know the friends and relatives of other people they know. But he's not taking your place. You're too different for that to make any sense. It'd be like--if you decided you preferred women after all, and got married, and your mother saying your wife was taking her place. Don't read more mystical stuff into it than there has to be. You can't get the damn magic out once the stain sets."

     "Maybe." He's not entirely convinced, but he nods to you, rubbing his face with a sigh. "Maybe. I don't know. But - damn it. I don't even know what I feel and I have to figure out how to talk to people about this? Maybe not everybody, but Maddie... fuck. I really don't want to have that conversation, y'know?"
     Pres looks over at you. "What d'you think I should do?"

     "Ask questions. Even the nitpicky ones or the stupid ones. You don't know what you're in for or how you'll like it until you get all the context that they're not giving you. Not because anyone is trying to keep it secret, but because the whole lot of them are so steeped in this background it never even occurs to them to tell us what we need to know unless they're asked."
     Loki shrugs jerkily. "Maybe you'll even get answers that make sense. Beyond that--try to relax a little." He knows what it sounds like, that advice coming from him. "You've found someone who likes you enough that he actively wants you nearby on a regular basis. You might as well enjoy it."

     He laughs a little, at that. "Maybe. Maybe." Pres sighs. "I think I need to go - lie down or something. Fuck, I don't know. My head's a mess, you know? Thanks for letting me rant. Listen. Is there anything maybe I can do for you? I don't know what, but if you can think of anything..."

     "Not really." Loki absently adjusts a stack of books to line up more neatly with each other. "I can't do much for the facts, but if you want a better chance at getting some rest..." The offer dissolves into a shrug, and he looks away. "It is what it is. We all figure out to cope in our own way. Wish I could do more to help."

     "You already did a lot. But you know me better than most so it's easier for me to talk to you about stuff. I hate that it feels like I lost you as my best friend, kinda, as it is." Pres' smile is lopsided. "I just don't want to slide any further down the list. Okay?"

     "You haven't." Loki can't entirely hide the tinge of hurt in his voice. "Go get some rest, anyway. We can haul out of this castle for a while later and get a drink somewhere more normal."

     "That sounds good," Pres admits wistfully. "I think I'm beginning to forget what normal is." He stands, bending to pick up his cane, then leans over to lightly punch you in the shoulder. "Hey. Still friends no matter what, right? Girls, boys, whatever."

     "No matter what." Loki does a quick cross-his-heart that's only mostly ironic. "Text me when you want to get that drink. I'll find the most normal pub within an hour's drive."

     "'Kay. I'm going to go lie down. If anybody comes looking for me - heh. Not that they will - tell 'em you think you saw me about to go explore the west side of the castle." Pres' grin is a quick thing, a glimmering echo of what it used to be once upon a time. Which is still about a thousand times better than what it's been for the past couple of years. "Don't take any wooden nickels, Loki. Thanks." He turns to head into the castle, walking slowly.

Posted by rowan at June 02, 2009 08:41 PM