Prompt #19 & #20
Feb. 13th, 2010 05:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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pillowsofwind and rainbowblowpops !-------------------------------------------------------------
Title: Prompt #19
Genre: General
Pairing(s): LestatxLouis
Rating: U
Warnings: None
Summary: Louis and Lestat visit New Orleans after hurricane Katrina.
Prompt: Link
A journey that would have normally taken hours had taken days, but finally we were here. I felt something seize in my chest that I would have called my heart had it still been beating. Through our lives we had seen many kinds of devastation, we had seen massacres and wars, but this was like nothing we had ever witnessed. Beside me I heard Louis catch a breath in his throat, an expression of horror on his face and for a moment I pitied him, and I touched his shoulder. We had spent so many good, happy years here, long before our lives had been tainted with troubles and complicated by the humdrum of modern life. There had been a time when we would not have heard of something like this happening until we returned out of habit, but innovations like television and radio had meant that we had heard of the impending catastrophe before it had even happened.
We had tracked the path of the hurricane, dread falling over both of us as we watched its path take it over the city of New Orleans, though the damage was far worse than we had expected. It wasn’t that we cared for the people – at least, I can’t say that I did – but it was the place itself. If we as vampires had ever had a heartbeat then it was in this place, and it pained us, both of us, that it was barely recognisable from the bustling and cheerful city that we had visited only a year before. The smell of death was everywhere, and Louis took my arm, his fingers gripping to me so tightly that I looked to him in alarm.
“Louis?”
“I can hardly bear it,” he whispered to me.
“This was your idea,” I reminded him, and he said nothing.
It took commandeering a boat for us to find our old home, and we sat, the light from the moon showing us very little but it was enough. Perhaps, I thought privately, it was better this way. It had been so long, and we had always been drawn to this place, but now everything we knew had been washed away. New Orleans would be rebuilt but it would never be our city. You would think that living as long as we have, we would be accustomed to change, but if anything our age made change far more difficult.
The following night, we left New Orleans and caught the first train in the first station that we found. Louis did not say it but I know what he was thinking, because the same thought was in my mind.
We would not be coming here again.
Title: Prompt #20
Genre: General/Romance
Pairing(s): USxUK
Rating: T
Warnings: Sex (nothing graphic)
Summary: After not seeing a gentle side of Arthur for many years, Alfred witnesses something sweet that Arthur does out in the snow, and asks that Arthur could be sweet and gentle to him.
Prompt: Link
Alfred sighed; a soft, subdued sigh that years ago would have drawn strange looks on account of its lack of energy. It had snowed, and his head felt strange, and he was watching Arthur pick his way slowly across the garden.
It only stood to reason that some nations would grow weaker while others strengthened. Alfred had seen it happen but he had never once entertained the thought of it happening to him. That was why it had been too late, and why for all his heroics and bravado he had not been quick enough to stop the slow encroaching upon his territory. Old laws and treaties had been exploited and it had not been long before the entire east coast had slipped from his grasp, up to a hundred miles inland in some places. It felt like losing a limb. At first, several countries had laid claim, and eventually, through bargains and agreements, only France and England had remained. France soon became bored, and England had immediately seized upon the land left behind. It had been a clever ploy. Alfred could not go to war with England for fear of bringing the armies of the European Union down on his head. He had considered, briefly, pushing into Canada before he remembered the Commonwealth, and besides, his brother didn’t deserve that.
He had often told himself, ‘better Arthur than someone else’, and for a while that had been true. Arthur treated him kindly, and Alfred knew that it wasn’t Arthur’s fault. It was just politics. He loved Arthur, deeply and sincerely, and if he had no other honest feelings in him, he knew that he loved Arthur, but it had been so long since he had seen a warm smile, or heard the man laugh, or seen the soft and pleased blush that accompanied a quiet ‘I love you, too’ in response to an overly exaggerated declaration of affection. He always seemed to be working, and when he wasn’t working he was tired and irritable, and gradually Alfred had grown used to being ignored. After all, not being noticed was preferable by far to the hard and unfriendly looks that he would receive when Arthur was interrupted.
Alfred rested his elbows on the counter and watched Arthur walk across the garden, barely making a dent in the snow. Arthur was slightly crouched, one hand reaching out, and it took Alfred a moment to find the focus of his attention. A small cat was stood in the snow, quivering as it watched the man approach. Slowly but surely the distance between them closed, and the creature sniffed Arthur’s hand and rubbed up against it, and then the man scooped the animal up and tucked it inside his coat, turning back towards the house.
For a moment, his eyes locked on Alfred’s and it was the American who quickly looked away. A few minutes later he heard the door open and close, and Arthur walked in, placing his coat in a bundle with the cat inside it on the kitchen table. He went to heat some milk and Alfred watched him, though their eyes never met. The cat sat and shivered miserably, and Alfred tickled under its chin, though he drew away when Arthur’s attention shifted. A bowl was placed on the table and the cat crept towards it, lapping at the warm liquid, and for a moment Alfred could swear he saw Arthur smile. The Englishman sat and petted the little cat as it drank, and now Alfred watched him openly, looking at him when green eyes lifted to meet his.
“What?” Arthur asked waspishly.
“Nothing,” Alfred replied. “I was just... thinking.”
“About?”
“You,” was the simple reply. They hadn’t sat down and talked in a long time. “It’s nice, what you did. You’re so cute when you do things like that.”
Arthur started, and looked from Alfred, to the cat, and back, and to Alfred’s delight, a slow blush worked its way across the older man’s cheeks. The American’s confidence skyrocketed.
“I mean,” he said. “You’re always cute, but especially when you do things like this.” The older man stared at him, as if he had only just realised that Alfred existed. “I just...” And here he faltered, as always, his pride and indignation at being treated like a colony buffeting against his wish to tell Arthur that he didn’t want to be treated like that anymore. “I just... wish that... maybe you could be that sweet to me.”
That touched some kind of nerve. Arthur shot to his feet and Alfred flinched, his eyes now fixed to the table. He couldn’t see the Englishman but he could hear him turning the stove on. A quiet sound of relief escaped as Arthur left the room and he all but sagged against the back of the chair.
“I think I’m in trouble,” he murmured to the cat, who looked at him and mewled. Arthur returned, and Alfred’s shoulders tensed, but any harsh words that he might have expected didn’t come. Instead, a blanket was draped over his shoulders, tucked gently around him and after a few moments a mug of warm milk was on the table in front of him. He blinked, and dared to look up, finding Arthur looking at him with the tiniest of smiles on his face.
“I...” Alfred began, glancing to the hand resting on his shoulder. He lifted his own and clasped Arthur’s fingers, turning his head to kiss them lightly. Arthur immediately flushed a very flattering shade of pink, and it seemed that something passed between them, something that neither of them had experienced for so long that it took Alfred a moment to recognise it.
As soon as he did, it was as if nothing had ever changed. He turned in his chair and pulled Arthur down into his lap, crushing their lips together and then Arthur’s fingers were in his hair, arms around his shoulders and he stood, pressing the man back against the kitchen counter, hearing his soft hiss of surprise when his lower back hit the solid marble, one hand dropping to grope for the edge and hold on tightly enough to crack it. Shirts were feverishly tugged at and pulled off, zippers fumbled with and when the Englishman was finally bared to his gaze and softly crying out as Alfred moved in him, he was sure he was having some amazing dream.
Three hours later, the wreckage of scattered papers, broken lamps and a table overturned in the hallway showed the path of their lovemaking. Alfred lay on his side, stroking one finger up and down the curve of Arthur’s spine as the Englishman slept peacefully. Alfred leaned down and pressed a kiss to his shoulder, and he stirred, making a quiet sound and shifting to move himself closer to the American’s touch.
“I love you,” Alfred murmured, touching Arthur’s cheek, his heart skipping a beat when those vibrant green eyes slowly opened and lifted to his.
A faint blush tinted Arthur’s cheeks, and he smiled, his lips parting to speak when a loud mewl distracted them and a small, furry animal hopped up onto the bed, curling up in the curve of Arthur’s legs. The Englishman laughed, and Alfred knew that things had changed for the better when their gazes locked and Arthur murmured almost shyly.
“I love you, too.”
Prompts List
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FIRST COMMENT ♥
Date: 2010-02-13 05:57 pm (UTC)I love these two, and it is rather heart-breaking to think about them coming back to New Orleans after what happened. D: I was there myself many months after Katrina, and it wasn't all that.. it lacked the vibrancy it was known for.. blah, anyway, I'll stop.
Aaaaaand.. that was not what I expected out of the second one. But.. ;A; I loved it. Dood, I loved it. ♥
Re: FIRST COMMENT ♥
Date: 2010-02-13 05:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-13 06:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-13 06:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 12:15 am (UTC)Thank you for doing my prompt! It's so cute! Like.. I totally squealed. :'3
(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 12:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 12:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 12:27 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 06:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 03:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 09:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-14 03:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-02-19 10:22 am (UTC)Prompt #19 & #20
Date: 2010-02-19 12:15 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 09:29 pm (UTC)And the ending, the exchange of 'I love you' s just made it perfect.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 09:36 pm (UTC)