Their eyes meet. Paul's are only ordinary, in the face of the divine, but they hold John's all the same.
The fire in him doesn't die all at once. It ebbs out of him slowly, doused bit by bit in the empty, aching cold of John's exhaustion. The ebullient certainty he carried with him out of the water collapses in on itself as a paper lantern sags in rain, laying bare its scaffolding under the weight of what it cannot withstand.
There's only Paul left. Older than he was, but it's nothing, next to the ages behind John's eyes. He might as well still be a child, the one he was on that other beach, struggling under the terrible realizations of his own limits. His breath stutters as it draws up in his chest.
"...I know," Paul murmurs, "I know. The tyranny of the linear."
He closes his eyes, a flinch more hideous than his calm, his mouth screwing up into a wounded, unhappy line. Paul turns his face back out towards the sea, and his hand moves tentatively from John's shoulder to the back of his neck, a slipping anchor to keep him grounded.
"It's only - I wanted -"
When he leans into John's side, it's the shameful, shameless curl of someone much younger than he is, even in his callow handful of years compared to John's myriad of them. It's a boy waking from a nightmare and crawling into his parents' bed to tuck himself into the safety of their warmth. He stays there too long, one heartbeat, the next.
"Was there ever anything I could have done for you?" He asks, quietly, eyes still shut. "Anything that would have changed any of it?"
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The fire in him doesn't die all at once. It ebbs out of him slowly, doused bit by bit in the empty, aching cold of John's exhaustion. The ebullient certainty he carried with him out of the water collapses in on itself as a paper lantern sags in rain, laying bare its scaffolding under the weight of what it cannot withstand.
There's only Paul left. Older than he was, but it's nothing, next to the ages behind John's eyes. He might as well still be a child, the one he was on that other beach, struggling under the terrible realizations of his own limits. His breath stutters as it draws up in his chest.
"...I know," Paul murmurs, "I know. The tyranny of the linear."
He closes his eyes, a flinch more hideous than his calm, his mouth screwing up into a wounded, unhappy line. Paul turns his face back out towards the sea, and his hand moves tentatively from John's shoulder to the back of his neck, a slipping anchor to keep him grounded.
"It's only - I wanted -"
When he leans into John's side, it's the shameful, shameless curl of someone much younger than he is, even in his callow handful of years compared to John's myriad of them. It's a boy waking from a nightmare and crawling into his parents' bed to tuck himself into the safety of their warmth. He stays there too long, one heartbeat, the next.
"Was there ever anything I could have done for you?" He asks, quietly, eyes still shut. "Anything that would have changed any of it?"