Seven days of not quite silence. Seven days of dead eyes and no touching. Seven days of uninspired performing, of frustration, of alcohol, of dark dreams. He�d expected it to be better on the seventh day. It seemed like a good number. One solid week of misery, and then things would be better.
He rutted against the mattress at night, desperate for James, desperate for those thick, rough fingers, desperate for any release that didn�t come at his own hands. Had he made a mistake? He didn�t think so, but he must have. Otherwise, wouldn�t James have come back to him?
No, no, no. Don�t think like that. That�s not healthy.
Lars was getting irritated. Said that he was playing for shit, that he sounded like a drunk idiot. It was hard to throw his emotion into the music the way he usually did. It was hard to play the hurt out, hard to drain it out through his fingers with James right there watching him. Every note that he played, James heard. Every spark of pain that escaped, James heard.
There shouldn�t have been pain. He�d made his choice. His choice, not James�s. He hadn�t been left, he�d done the leaving, but it felt like there were knives made of ice twisting in his gut. He hadn�t eaten for seven days, except for bits of food passed to him by Cliff. Beef jerky, half a Pop Tart, some orange slices.
It wasn�t supposed to hurt this fucking bad! He didn�t want James anymore. James was a selfish prick who couldn�t respect his boundaries, who kept pushing and pushing and god, he should have just fucking said yes. Anything to spare him from this.
Over a shared bag of tortilla chips, Cliff had observed that he�d been different lately. That he�d stared off into space, started when someone called his name, whimpered in his sleep. Cliff said he looked lovesick, and Kirk had laughed, three distinct words.
Ha.
Ha.
Ha.
And then he turned away to stare out the window. Lovesick? Maybe. Maybe it was just that he depended on James for too much. It was for the best, this little separation. He�d been feeling like a lost lamb who was gradually coming to grips with the fact that his protector was actually a starving wolf.
Still, seven days. It ought to have been over by now. James should have said something. He should have said something. He couldn�t bring himself to do it, though. He�d walked out, and that meant James was meant to come chasing after. It was hard to hold on to that, though. Every night he wanted to crawl in bed with James, curl around him like a cat. Every day he wanted to throw down his guitar and scream, just fucking let it all out. It was so hard to be strong.
