eiremagic | (no subject)

[Funny thing, this.

He's thought about going back-- whether he would, if he could. Feels like stepping backwards, though. Things in the City-- fuck, they were easier. Easy a way he can hardly remember, can scarce believe was ever true. Frankie was, he knows, at his best there and then-- no small part Eden's fault, though a lot of it was his too, shaping up after a shit decade wasted while dead. All that's old ghosts, though. Weird as it is he's gotten used to life now-- life that shouldn't be-- so he's decided it'd be rude to run out and back to monopolizing Eden in an alternate dimension, if he had a choice. Not that any of them are thrilled with the arrangement, but it's getting a little more stable and a little less grudging every day. Shame to lose all that hard work.

Visiting, though-- that's not so bad.

The place is as bright and bizarre as ever, living up to the hot technicolor memories that haven't faded yet, years on in his new borrowed home. He corners someone on the street-- a stranger, which is a careful choice-- and gets the date and does the math and realizes he remembers this one from the other side, so he keeps his head down and he curses his luck and he goes looking for a bar he'd never stop in for a drink. He'd figured he might drop by their flat-- he's still got the keys in his pocket, a world away, just in case-- but that seems far too dangerous under the circumstances.

He ducks into the Coliseum on the grounds that he never goes to the Coliseum, doesn't think he knows any regulars, so it ought to be safe enough.

He manages to beg a beer off someone, and settles in to brood over it a while, wondering if he ought to call her up or let things lie. Well, it could be worse.]

[Funny thing, that.

Eden used to like these days. She used to like them because they meant a visit from someone she loves - like Matt, or who knows, John. But they've been coming fewer and further between, except for Moore, who she still loves, but he's not her husband, she's married to someone else here, Frankie deserves better.

She goes to the Coliseum because it's a bar that not a lot of her friends patronize, and she doesn't expect to see him there. She sighs and moves to sit next to him]

Moore's at the flat, sorry, he's sleeping on couch. I'll let Dewey know, aright?

[It takes her a moment, she is holding his hand when she sees the lines, the difference in his face, and her own widen]

Shite, I'm sorry, I thought you were-

[His first thought is, uncharitably, of course he came too, greedy fuck, didn't bother to say he was gonna march right up, but to his credit Frankie manages to sort it out pretty fast. He's been around the interdimensional block enough.

A cleverer man might've managed to play it off, but he can't smother his faint grin, sheepish as it is. Being glad to see her's just about written into his blood. (If it wasn't, maybe none of them would be in this mess.) That funny little twist of his lip must be a dead giveaway.]

So much for staying out of the way,

[he murmurs, not really upset, and doesn't let her pull her hand away.]

[She stares for a second, and leans in a little.]

Frankie?

[There's something there. Something desperate for this to be easy, or maybe just something desperate for this to be true. Frankie, older. Maybe he goes home. Maybe things are all right. She would give anything to make sure he didn't die.

Anything and everything.]

C'mon, I don't look that bad.

[he jokes, aware it's unfair, since this is bound to be a lot less weird for him than for her. Not that it's not weird.

She looks good, here. Happy enough, not marked by years she hasn't lived yet. Not that he loves her any less for the time she'll spend without remembering-- but Frankie's old enough to think of himself as an old man, even if he doesn't look it, which pretty much means he's entitled to be nostalgic.]

Barely recognizable, yeah?

[She knows she shouldn't. She knows that on some level, this is cheating, that this might hurt someone - although she's not sure who, at this point, because the world is complicated and so is time and the passage of it.

She kisses him.

She kisses him on the mouth, and there's nothing but please live in that kiss. When they part she looks almost embarrassed.]

No, boyo. You look grand.

[There's something flattering in that desperation, and even if he feels a little bad about it he doesn't pull away. He catches her wrist and lets himself miss it, how simple this used to be.

Not that she doesn't love him, in Belfast. But she doesn't know. She doesn't remember everything like he does. He can't stop grinning at her. Moore's gonna slap him.]

Yeah? Good. Girl I know got me patched up pretty well.

[Possibly he deserves slapping.]

[She runs a hand through his hair.

(Moore will punch him)

And wonders, for a moment, if she should be jealous of someone. Of someone else.]

Yeah? You love her?

[This someone else.]

[Even if he'd made it through that at home, even if he'd lived a life in the world he was born into, even if he'd gone on to rebuild and remake and rediscover-- she'd have no cause to be jealous.

As it is? Fuck, he remade reality for her. Multiple realities. This might be cheating in some weird way, but she shouldn't doubt he loves her.]

I love you, [he answers, maybe a little cryptic but it's the truth.] Have for a long while.

[he says low and softly, the way he'd say it to her now. So honest it aches a little. He leans in just before he says it to brush a kiss on her forehead, the way he always liked 'cos she's just the right height for it, and hopes she takes his meaning.]

[She looks - not afraid. Confused, for a moment, but then-]

You're in Belfast.

[There's a gasp, ragged, and she has her arms around him, and she's holding him, tight, tight. Shit. What about Moore? What the fuck about Moore?]

How, how, how?

Long story.

[Selfish of him to keep letting her do that but he's only wronging himself, really. He's fairly sure he'd forgive himself.]

Too much magic, is the short version.

No, no, when magic is good, you can't say too much, never too much-

[She's moving her hands, to pull his hair back from his face, to look at him, to look at him]

Boyo.

What about Moore?

[He looks pretty damn good for a man who ought to have been torn apart. That's magic too, some of it, though a lot's just luck. If you can call fast, massive blood loss luck.

Thing is, he really does.]

He's still an a- [He bites it off and laughs instead, more than a bit rueful.] It's rough, can't lie. We get by, though.

[She reaches for his necklace, where he keeps his wedding ring, and her fingers linger there, for a moment]

Whose heart do I break for this?

Would you really wanna know?

[She takes a moment, a quiet one, and nods. Yes. She wants to know. She needs to know.]

You don't. [There's a pause, like maybe he means he thinks she doesn't want to know, but he picks it up with a slight shake of his head, too-long hair falling back over his face.] All of us end up pretty bruised, though.

I'm not sorry.

[She says it, quiet, hands on his face]

Nothing to be sorry about.

Boyo.

[She doesn't say a word]

So, Moore, does he know? The one here?

Dunno,

[he says with a shrug, pulling back a bit. Just enough to grab his beer. He's still wearing the cuff she gave him an age ago, the leather near blackened, the design almost wholly worn away.]

Have to ask him.

Where are you staying?

[She reaches for a hand, to hold it, because maybe that will make this more real]

Dunno. Can't with you, figured someone's gotta have a room to let.

I'll find a place for you.

Still better than I deserve.