abstracts | ghost of a chance.

"I do."

Neil talks, his voice breaking, his body wrapped tightly in Alex's embrace. Those lacking perception might think Neil refers to the topic at hand, but another might understand. He may not deserve the comment itself. He may, however, deserve the abuse the comment brings.

Ah, that may require clarification, no?

"Wife's dead because of me. Of course, he thinks I deserve it."

Anger sweeps over him, followed by something close to sorrow. He squeezes Neil harder. "No, you don't. This is--"

Your dad's a fucking asshole. Nothing he says is valid. This is bullshit you should just set aside. It'd be easier if the man was dead. Alex would say those things and care little to none. But the guy is alive and actively in Neil's face, and Alex isn't going to alienate the kid further by making him feel alone with Alex getting pissed off and talking shit about his dad.

He makes a frustrated sound in his throat. "I fucking love you," he forces out through a tightened throat. "And I know you. You are worth so much more than all of this crap. You shouldn't have to deal with it."

His bones crack as Alex squeezes him, and the sensation's pleasant. It's so fucking pleasant that Neil might cry.

He doesn't. Of course, he doesn't. Alex says he loves Neil, and Neil cannot process the affection. He's struggling through sorting out the emotions being confessed; maybe he should sort them out aloud. "I didn't do anything to you," he states simply, quietly.

"I didn't fuck over your plans. Fuck over your future." He breathes in Alex's scent and thinks of arid desert and dancing lights. His voice loses its emotion, becoming dead. "I didn't take away the love of your life. It's easy--"

A pause. "Easy to say I'm worth anything without that."

It's conflicting. His mind, his head, something in his chest--they all conflict and shift. There are a thousand, thousand things to do here.

Alex grabs Neil's shoulders, pulls him back away from him to stare. "It's not easy. People aren't inherently valuable based on what they don't do. People lack value by default--you earn that in each person's eyes, sure. You can fight that your value is greater to me than it is to him," Alex says, chin cocking toward the door the bastard came from. "And you'd probably be right. But you proved that value to me, and you've shown that in your other actions. You make choices that matter, and you've helped people. Hell, you've helped me, and you've fucking busted your ass trying to fix this shitty place. Just because one blind asshole can't see it does not mean you don't have value.

"Neil," he says, after a single breath. "If you're stuck on this guilt of yours, fine. But you have to remember one fact as well. You didn't ask to be brought into this world. You didn't decide to be born. They decided to have you, and you didn't get a choice in that. You aren't responsible for someone's death with an act that you didn't choose."

Right. I didn't make that choice. If I could've chosen, I--

The ending frightens Neil. Scares him right out of Alex's hold. He backpedals, eyes widening in panic, in realization, before he stops against one of his gutted machines. From the feel and the position, it was once his meteorological instrument.

The recognition brings a wave of apathy, an indifference that overwhelms all other emotions, until he is able to stand straight and look the other man in the eye. "This isn't something I'm ever able to make up for, right?" he asks flatly. The query's rhetorical, but one he can't help voicing. "Is it better to just give up on trying to make peace with my old man?"

Alex had been staring. Even if he hadn't, he knows the kid enough to read the flood of shifting emotions. Shock, fear, panic, realization... Then death, creeping into the downward spiral of apathy eating everything else. It all plays off of the emotions that had been riding in Alex since this shit all began, the anger and protectiveness and threat of loss. He closes his eyes; wishes for something like peace. It's not in this place. Not in this Wasteland.

Maybe not anywhere anymore.

When he opens his eyes, he moves, closing the distance between them until Neil is pressed against the machine behind him, and Alex reaches to move Neil's head upward, to kiss him with an absence of normal passion but an addition of something with further meaning. The act completed, Alex leaves his hand there, staring at Neil. "Find a different way," he states, distance in his voice. "Your father in caught in delusions--there's no halfway to meet. There's other ways to make him happy, if that's what you want. Really obvious ones."

There are moments between them, sometimes. Moments when Neil thinks they might understand each other more than he's willing to admit. And when Alex steps forward to take him by the lips, Neil wonders if this might be one of those moments.

A hand lingers on Alex's arm, and Neil doesn't know how it got there. He only stares back at the other. "What," he begins, "do you mean?"

Neil is touching him and the subject matter combined with the affection Alex has been waiting for all this time makes him feel like laughing. Screaming or crying, at least. He should step away. Talk about this with distance between him, but he can't. He fucking can't move away.

"He has a problem with me," Alex says calmly. Quietly. "Has a problem with you being with me. So get rid of the problem, Wanderer."

Something quiet starts scratching within the confines of his brain, and Neil-- There is a coldness forming in his belly, and somehow, Neil laughs. Chortles darkly.

"Yeah, no," he gives after a moment. "Dad doesn't get to dictate who I associate with and how. Not after Vault 101." After skipping out on Neil's life and endangering the dwellers, James does not get the privilege of providing input to his son's relationships. "I'm not getting rid of the problem because that isn't my problem. It's his shit to get over."

His issue to resolve.

It makes him smile, that response, but not for the reasons one might think. The expression is pained, older; something wounded. "You don't understand, kid. People like that--that react like that--they don't get over it. You and me... We're abnormal," he says lightly, a bad taste in his mouth and history written over his face. "People don't like that. People can and will do a shit ton more than just get pissed off over it."

String people up, hunt them down like animals, kill each and every people loved or affiliated with by the person in question: Alex has seen all of the bad ends. All of the reasons that most men who didn't love the fairer sex stayed quiet.

"He won't understand," he continues. "And he's not going to accept it. If you want a relationship with your dad, just... have us go our separate ways. You were going to break up with me in Novak, remember? So just stick to that."

There are missing pieces, Neil recognizes, from the expression and the words. Things that he will likely never understand because he is a step removed from this bullshit. Because honestly, sex is sex, and this is all the same type of historical shit drama that caused the world to light up in flames.

But the question remains. Neil raises an eyebrow in suspicion. "You want to break up because my dad hates our relationship?" he asks. "Seriously?"

Edited 2016-06-26 07:18 (UTC)

He hears a sound, and a beat behind, is surprised to find his fist nearly embedded in one of the broken machines close to the side. He swallows, breathes in loudly, the sound filling the air as he struggles for calm. It's not coming, not really, the trick of breathing deep for some fucking shit beat of peace. He shakes, his body trembling, as he just. Fucking. Tries.

"...I...do not want to break up with you. You asked," he says, each and every word harsh and thick. "For a way to make peace with him."

Alex slams a fist into another dead machine (one that once measured the chemical composition of various rocks), and Neil can only watch clinically. Analyze the misstep and move from it. Despite the surprise rising within him, he gives his response with little feeling.

Neil does, however, place a hand on the center of Alex's chest. "Sorry. I misunderstood." is the apology given. "And I'm not breaking up with you."

If Neil had just replied, it would not have been enough. But he speaks and reaches to press his hand against Alex, and Alex trembles again, shivers under the touch like a skittish animal.

He takes in a breath. This time it sticks.

His hand is pulled out, metal shards and blood marring skin, but he still reaches out, reaches to wrap his arms around Neil and press his body against his. Tucking his head down, Alex breathes in Neil's scent at the place where neck and shoulder meet, and exhales. Breathes out. Breathes.

They're pressed together-- Contact, blood, and emotions mingling, and Neil finally gets that it's gotten far more into Alex's head than initially expected. Enough to evoke a severe reaction. For once, Neil reaches back and loops his free arm around the older man's waist, his lips unmoving and his voice silent.

Neil allows this break, this moment of calm. They can reconvene on things once they both breathe more easily.

Alex stays like that. He doesn't know how long. Eventually his grip loosens by increments, and he moves to speak quietly. "It's just history, you know. I've seen those reactions before. It doesn't get better. I'm sorry--"

He cuts off, a flash of anger heating his gut. He presses it down.

"--Sorry that we were seen like that."

History. History speaks of experience, and this sort of experience has a grown man upset to the point of pain. And it angers Neil, somewhere. That this was shoved onto Alex's plate without so much as a warning.

"Don't," Neil says tersely. He then amends his tone to something softer. "I get it, but nothing's changed with what I said. Dad's issue. Not yours or mine. Also, the fucktard who gave him that spare key. I'm going to kill him."

Simms.

There's a shift. A change in the air. And it's not something Alex had expected. He backs slightly, so he can look at Neil. He ignores the tail-end of the statement for now. "Not your issue? Doesn't this change things?"

Neil notes the surprise and chooses to ignore it. "No," is the reply. "Dad doesn't dictate my associations. I'm not fucking ten." A child under the guidance of his parent.

The confused expression makes it to Alex's face. He swallows, once. "...You're really going to stay with me for now? Despite that?"

"Yeah," says Neil firmly. He looks over the confusion written clearly on Alex's face before reaching up to pat a cheek. "Don't worry about it."

The confusion turns into a light snarl. Alex glares, grabbing Neil's hand. "Condescending behavior," he drawls in a dry tone. "How charming."

He rolls his eyes, pulling Neil forward, off the machine. "'Course I'm going to worry. You've had a daddy complex since I've known you. And daddy dear caught you with the big bad older man from outside and does not approve. 'Course I'd think you'd drop me in a second to please him."

He understands he crossed a line, but after Alex gives his piece, Neil finds himself not caring. The lack of care leads to a surge of anger, and as Alex tries to pull him forward, Neil pulls back and away, slamming back against the machine.

"I'm his child, not his fucking lapdog!" he yells, the disgust clear in his voice. "My fucking complex is because he doesn't give me the fucking time of day, not because I fucking want his approval!"

The anger is something nice to see. Alex wonders if it's genuine--if the reasons Neil gives are the actual ones. Neil pulls away and Alex doesn't fight it, holding his hands palm up and out. "And you know that's not going to change," he says calmly, like neither of their reactions happened. "Even if you abandoned everything to do actually as he says, he'll still just use you up and not give a damn."

Screw careful words.

Hot, angry breaths come rushing out of his nostrils as Neil attempts for calm. It's easier than expected when logic enters the picture, because in the end--

"Yeah," he gives in, defeated. "You're right. I'm just someone to use." Nothing more to his own damn father, and the mere thought of it makes him sick. His eyes fall on Alex's injured hand.

"You need help with that?"

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