Participants:
| Scene Title | Unpardoned |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Six hours late for dinner, Teo comes 'home.' |
| Date | January 22, 2009 |
Fancy Complex — Sonny's Apartment
It's late and still and almost unnaturally quiet in the fancy condo. That's the beauty part about paying the kind of money he does - there's no sound at all from above, below or on either side. There's no traffic noise - not even a refrigerator hum. It's peaceful, still. For all its fancy sheen, it's still a refuge, at least for the doc.
Sonny is in his cave of a room, buried deep under a down duvet, clad in flannel pants and a long sleeved cotton shirt. He sleeps soundly on his stomach. It was easy for him to assume something important came up with the Ferrymen business, so he's not concerned or upset about being stood up for dinner - and thus, is sleeping soundly.
'Ferrymen business' would have been a more dignified excuse. Teo was busy alternating between walking and sitting in the snow, and it shows in the decided lack of dignity when he stumbles in through the door, disoriented by the clusterfuck that's left of his best friendship and further befuddled by the cold kisses of winter.
There is going to be a bit of a mess for Sonny to trip over when he gets up in the morning. Teo's boots come off one five feet after the other, the promise of dirty water rimed on their ridged edges, before his jacket is finally yanked adn popped free to slide off and hit the base of the staircase. One sweater hits the lip of a step and falls onto the one below, and he trips out of his jeans by the time he gets to the bedroom door.
Even with the mild disarray of actual use, Sonny's room is organized enough: it takes minimal effort and only a little intuition for Teo to locate another pair of flannel trousers, before he's a crawling weight on the edge of the mattress, denting the massed blankets with rough hands and slow knees. He bumps to a stop against the head of the bed, turns over, stuffs his legs under linens and proceeds to shunt himself into the crook under the good Doctor's arm, ungainly with insistence, an exhausted apology on the good Doctor's ear, chilled skin clamping dewy against the comfortably dry line of Sonny in proper pajamas. He's heavy.
Sonny is a deep sleeper. Most of Teo's entrance goes unnoticed. That is, until the weight hits the bed and there's suddenly a young man radiating cold invading his warm cocoon. He turns his head and blinks at the glowing face of the clock that displays the obnoxious hour. He shifts and tugs the blankets straight, then pulls the covers up to their necks.
"Jesus, you're freezing." His voice is rough from sleep. A hand goes up to rub at his cheeks, to touch Teo's ear. He shivers and gooseflesh rises. His bare foot under the cover rubs against the other Italian's. There's no questions. No 'where were you.' For one, it's bloody late. For two, well, he doesn't need an explanation.
As if Teo hasn't made enough of a mess and prevailed upon his host's courtesy enough, he is unrepentant about sticking his toes into the hollows of Sonny's feet. When that proves insufficient, through no fault of Sonny himself, he walks himself up into the cuffs of the other man's pant legs, blunt nails curling against long shin bones and a distant tug on short hairs. Teo has neither talent for nor experience with cuddling. He merely sops up warmth like a spectacularly large and unutilitarian sponge. It's better, perhaps, than hogging blankets. "Shou'nt use his name in vain," he answers blearily. The words reverberate faintly into Sonny's hand through the line of his jaw.
"I'm adding to the list from earlier. No lecturing at 4 AM." There's a rough, sleepy chuckle that follows. Sonny winces a bit with discomfort at the stiffness of Teo's movements. "Relax, man." He shifts so that his calves sandwich Teo's toes. Then a hand slides around his back and rubs up and down vigerously. The duvet is tugged up and over both of their heads to create a tent of warmth that gets warmer every minute thanks to exhalations. He shifts onto his side, then reaches out both hands to sandwich Teo's fingers, one hand at a time. Slowly, the temperature beneath the blanket starts to equalize, though it will take a little while until it's the same cozy cocoon as when he entered. "What'd you do, lay down in a snowbank?"
Absurdly enough, Teo nods his head. "Kind 'f." With gravity and the lassitude of sleep pulling at his head and the darkness inside layers of cotton and linen, it is a clumsy gesture, more felt than seen. Twists his hair into crazy straw patterns against the pillowcase, ruching the pillowcase itself before he stops, settles, drops an almost inadvertent sigh that sinks the slope of his spine deeper under the palm of Sonny's hand before Sonny's hands go elsewhere, abrading warmth back into Teo's. Teo lets him, naturally, either too tired or motivated by greed to protest at being treated like the five-year-old child he's behaving like. His fingertips weigh down his hands like bags of sand. Then, in the same dull whisper he had offered his initial salutation — apology in, there comes another: "I can't get past any-fuckin'-thing, you know."
"Teo, I would love to counsel you buddy, really I would. Can we do it over coffee though? I have to get up in…three hours." A beat, "…two and a half." Despite all the disruptions, Sonny's breathing's already taking on the rhythmic pattern of dozing. In lieu of comforting words, he gets a gentle, rhythmic rub along his side. Occasionally, the caress pauses and rubs a smaller area, then returns to a slow up and down. His eyes are closed and his other arm is pillowed beneath his head. The movement seems to relax him.
"No need," comes the equally sleepy growl of reassurance, his vowels already lazy with exhaustion. Teo's muscles lengthen out, gradually, loosen and grow pliant under the older man's touch. "Just 'splaining." Not really. Apologizing, was more like it: other than his professional life, Teo isn't characterized by vast optimism when it comes to changing whatever situations he finds himself in. "Mi disp'ace." And another drop of rue to complete the moat, before he shuts the drawbridge with a quiet click of teeth and tightens his toes inside the nook between Sonny's calves. He waits for his eyes to fall shut of their own accord, deadened by the pitch and closeness of sensory deprivation and the slow insinuation of fatigue.
Sonny's departure back into sleep is signalled by the stilling of his hand. The full weight of his arm drops, drapes against Teo's side and his fingers slacken. He tends to breathe through his mouth, which makes an odd, but not entirely obnoxious sound. Though the mouth-breathing is likely more to do with the sniffle he occasionally makes than any kind of long-term habit.
The sheets are pristine Egyptian cotton, the duvet some high-density of down. The mattress itself is the finest available. Not all of his wealth is for show. Judging by the subtle scent of shampoo that lingers, captured by the tent of blankets, he showered just before crawling into bed.
They're probably beginning to smell the same, by now. Teo showers here frequently enough for that. In the dark, his expression fuzzes over with some mixture of belated gratitude and incipient affection. Nothing if not furtive, one muscled arm finally snakes around Sonny's ribs and hunkers down above the notch of his hipbone. Buona notte. He thinks it before he says it, and he's asleep before he can say anything at all. It will seesaw in and out of him, the snores, quiet when they arise and sometimes not at all, inobtrusive unless his nose finds its way into the spiral cartlidge of Sonny's ear and agreeable to retreat if rebuked, quietly or otherwise. The eagle tattooed on his shoulderblade contracts, pinions finding that final fractional inch of relaxation, in striped parallel to the drape of somebody else's fingers.
At some point over the next hour, Sonny parts from Teo unconsciously. It's a big bed and the tangle of limbs plus closeness means that extremeties are liable to tingle and fall asleep. He remains near, but apart, body splayed enough to indicate he's more accustomed to sleeping alone. His breathing evens out, but there's still the occasional half-snort or nose whistle that comes from impending conjestion.
And within the hour after, Teo's back. Despite that he is no less used to sleeping alone than his counterpart, it's inculcated deep in his Mediterranean forebrain— the fear and presence of winter. A crescent-shaped flick of eyes, and his weight creaks the mattress, a minute jumble of knees and cloth whispering against the grain of cloth. It doesn't matter a lot, tactically, that Sonny's taking up more room; the sprawl of limbs makes nooks enough for Teo to fit himself into, even if that asks an uncharacteristic amount of subtlety or smallness from him. His neck bends around the curve of Sonny's bicep, an arm bent to rest on the man's sternum against the blank, wrinkled canvas of sleep shirt.
Sonny is deeply enough asleep by the time the other Italian's tucked himself in again. He registers the renewed presence, but makes no effort to resist. The posture is more comfortable, at least. So Teo gets another forty five minutes or so of a warm, still body to sleep against until the alarm at his bedside starts bleating a series of shrill, rhythmic beeps. Teo gets jostled, uncomfortably at first, then with more care as he regretfully wriggles himself out of bed.
Once he's out, he's careful to pull the blankets back up around his bedmate. "Sorry," he murmurs in the dark stillness of the room. "Gotta go to work."
Teo phrases his complaint in a drawn-out monosyllable that has more breath to it than semblence of speech, a murmur framed in large hands crawling the tangled vortex of linens, failing to ensnare and get back to smothering what he was actually looking for when the older man reseals him within Egyptian cotton and the fat quilting of comforter. A lone blue eye splits open above the lumpy level of the pillow, making out the outline of Sonny's dim silhouette against the window. "Non perdonato," he exhales, before his jaws shut in a langorous sweep that dimly echoes the wings of the Duskywing moth flexing patiently on the wall.
 January 21st: To Break Fenrir's Chain |
 January 22nd: One Step At A Time |