it's 1:33 a.m., on 2001-07-17 - a bitchy and bitter Bobby and Remy.
~
It's been two or three days, maybe four or five.
And so, of course, Al gives me the urge to tell you all these things. Al me tradit [urge] omnia dicere. She said:
They mention a four-year-old girl whose imaginary friend is Lance. At dinner every night, her family has to set a place for him at the table, and tell him goodnight when they go to bed. See, this girl gets it. Lance is her spirit animal.
I had a crazy-assed imaginary friend when I was a kid. But like, I think I knew that he wasn't real. I'm pretty sure. It didn't last long. My mythology as a kid disappeared pretty fast.
Al also said that Lance always looks half-human.
I feel half-human. I feel like the tin-man. River can't decide whether she wants to be the scarecrow or Toto more. And if beecher is Dorothy, then there's things you never knew about the scarecrow and the tin-man, and the Wizard ain't Tim McManus because Tim whines too much.
I don't know.
Al says that I say things like that and constantly disclaim myself, and that it looks exhausting. Al dicit illud et me disclaim, et illud fessum est. I, I don't know. I think I have to figure out why that phrasing in particular made me... have a disquiet in my bones. Because I get very sensitive about certain phrasings, and it's stupid. I'm stupid -- I'm not disclaiming that. It's true.
I'm also feeling a down-on-myself day. I feel like feeling like shit. I am shit.
I, I.
My sister, who's fourteen, is more or less fucking around with her boyfriend. I think about the first time Paris and I fooled around, got down and dirty and made to fool around with hands and tongues and stuff, and I weep for her even though I'm too apathetic to do anything to discourage it. But she's not like me, so I should be less sensitive about it.
Whatever. Shauna and her teenage problems really don't affect me in any way. They don't matter to me, either.
I think, I want Al to find me someone worth knowing.
I think I want her to because I'm pretty sure she doesn't. I tend to work hardest at being upset over people who I think see that I am what I am, and that I'm not so good.
~*~
I think, even more than anything else, I'm feeling insecurity.
And I feel shitty.
--I want to wallow.
Wallow wallow wallow.
I also feel the need to fizz, but that makes me miss River more.
~*~
I just disclaimed in the channel that I'm in no mood to chat, and so I should get offline. Which is an obvious, even to me, statement meant to rouse the question, 'what's wrong'. If Riv was online, I'd out and out tell her, and I've already emailed her once today. I don't think I know anyone else who I'm that sure of that I can just imagine myself laying down on and saying, 'help'. Or 'I need you'.
Matt's online. Maybe I should talk to him.
Matt and I have drifted. I want to weep for that, too.
~*~
I feel like hiding.
I want to fade away.
As I said in that river-email: I have this from this afternoon. It's the closest thing to a mythos that I've got:
His voice is low. "You don't look so well."
"Yeah." I laugh, harsh and dry and scratchy. The sound hurts my throat. "You didn't ever notice before."
"I know." He considers sitting down, then does so. He's here for himself, this time, his concern... not because I asked him. "I was worried about you."
I scrub at my face, tired and worn and say, "You used to be too afraid to sit until I said you could."
Even quieter. "I am worried for you."
My eyes glitter in that crazy way, with that intensity and that way that used to scare him so. But it's faded since then. So much. He looks at me, and I can read his mind thinking I am a sad, lonely man, now. I answer without a smile. "Well, some things never change."
~*~
I feel old and bitter; I feel like I have that wrinkled up harsh did-it-to-yourself vibe. I don't really want it, but I have it.
I feel like everything that comes out of my mouth is stupid and vile and wrong, like if I speak it's going to be offensive and stupid and make me look like an ass. Like, I have to be silent. Like I have to be silent like Lance. Who's only half-human and any minute now, someone will figure that out so he has to be quiet, he has to be polite, he has to watch himself all the time because the other guys don't know. He doesn't have a heart, but he kinda doesn't want anyone to know it, so he pretends extra-hard and people call him the kind one.
Did I mention I'm stupid as hell and I know way too much about n-sync to be cool?
Everything that comes out of my mouth is vile. Yeah.
~*~
On top of the self-loathing and petty shit mulching around, I'm also scattered.
I wonder if that piece in fight club where Ed's standing in front of a wall with 'I like myself I like myself I like myself' graffitied on it a thousand times is ironic.
I just read Sheila and she talked about qaf. Which has brought me to sorrow of another type, an outward type (I'll keep off the spoilers, let's just say that 1.22 of the american qaf sucked ass for crying).
And she mentioned the need to write a michael story. And I want a good Justin story (a good anyone story, let's be honest here), so we're going to hope that Sheila writes lots and lots and lots and-- what the fuck am I saying, I always hope that, man.
Sheila's my hero. Blatant love, here.
I'm still full of sorrow. I need some cds.
My sister and my cousin are going out to meet some boys right now; I don't know if I should be trying to stop them or trying to just care some. I don't care. My cousin almost got thrown out, but it's not real, because my aunt gets worked up and my cousin is actually way better than Shaun, my aunt just doesn't know it.
Whatever. They won't get killed. We live in fucking farm country. They're going to the McD's across the street.
Okay, I'm going to wallow tonight and buy a coffee tomorrow. Or skip class, maybe -- I understand what's going on right now, it's not pronouns, so I can maybe afford to miss a day of Latin. I'm going to take a night for me. I'll get up tomorrow anyway. I can do it.
My Rob Thomas is playing. He's crooning and he's saying, 'what we've learned here's love tastes better when it's gone'.
I want to write bitter and bitchy Bobby/Remy tonight, I'm wallowing so bad.
~*~
Remy drinks red wine with dinner every night, now, because it dulls the senses. He loves Paris -- loved its roads and its buildings and its beauty and its anonymity. He loves it now because it's the only place he feels at home, and that's just because he feels ghosts here. Everywhere else that hurts his stomach -- New Orleans, his real home with huge pillars and the Garden district and sticky concrete with the voodoo queens; Seattle, rain and rain and the windy west coast and rain; Africa even, Egypt where he found Ororo all those years ago... New York.
All his homes aren't safe right now, what with the rebellion and all those agents looking. Remy isn't safe. Paris is safe.
What an irony.
His accent pegs him instantly as Acadian, not true-french, and people treat him differently, like an outsider, but he's used to it. All through his thieving years, all through those years that hurt and that turned his heart to lead, he loved this damned city and its red wine.
Remy gulps it down and feels vaguely like a bitter old queen himself. He crosses his legs at dinner, just like a gentleman and people looked at him for it in the States. Here he fits in, even as people edge away.
His ghosts drink with him, sometimes. In the back of his mind, he wants to hallucinate and really see them all, the faces that have gone before. Few were X-men -- less than the rest of the team would probably expect. He sees Logan, gruff and unapologetic. He sees, and he even misses, 'Ro.
Jubilee emailed him 'what we've learned here's love tastes better when it's gone' last week. She said she got the address from Bobby.
His father was the one who taught him to drink fine wine. He buys it cheap now, in comparison. Bad vintages. Drinks it to get drunk, not for appreciation. The taste is bad and it burns his palate... but Remy feels good to burn. He deserves it.
Somewhere, he knows he hates himself. Somewhere, he knows this should be different. But not in Paris. That's another reason he stays.
~*~
I feel fucking indulgent, and not worth my weight in water, because of these thoughts.
Mel just said, 'but you do such good bitter.' I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Either is indulgent.
~*~
Bobby comes to him late one night, and doesn't explain why. He sits down. "You don't look so well."
"Yeah, well." And remy laughs harsh, bitter. Low. Coughs. "I don't feel so hot, mon ami." Looks away from Bobby with mad, intense eyes. "S'been a while."
"Yeah." Bobby's come to validate a theory. "I was worried about you, you know."
"Mmm."
He looks at Remy, and instead of that intensity being magic filled, instead of those things catching his breath and scaring him, instead of them being irresistable and catching his heart... they just make him sad. "I am worried about you."
Remy's face crumples up, but he doesn't make a sound when it does. His voice is hoarse. "Yeah, well. Some things never change."
Bobby knows it, now. He's not sure all the things he knows, but he's sure he knows them. He can feel them. And one of them is definitely that Remy isn't magic anymore. He's just an old, sad, lonely man who drinks too much and can't find any peace.
Remy looks at Bobby, finally, and he nods cryptically. "Y'learned some things, ami."
"Yeah."
"Didja find what you were lookin' for?"
Bobby's eyes are sympathetic, and Remy can feel himself crumple up again because of his gaze. Bobby sat down, without being asked, and it's just another little proof of how Remy's mystique has gone, his allure is dried up and shrivelled and just, gone. Softly, Bobby answers, "No. I wanted to find you well."
Remy puts his hands over his face. Says through his fingers, "Y'found me."
It's Bobby's turn to nod. "Yeah."
There might have been love, once. Now there is just sadness.
~
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