Voicemail (IC Contact Post) OLD - at capcha

[abrightboy]

 This is Bright. Leave a message.

Comments

[abrightboy]

"Yeah, why not? Can't they let them out again if things... change?" Malcolm asks.

[conning]

"Yeah. Depending on how they're adjusted." He lifts his hand to his lips, nipping at a hangnail on his thumb in agitation. He's bothered. Very bothered. He can't figure out why he's so bothered.

[abrightboy]

“So what’s the big deal?” Malcolm presses.

[conning]

He glances at Malcolm, looks back at his clothes. “I don’t know.”

But there is a great deal of personal agitation he can’t get to settle. Neal paces around the bed and back, like changing the angle he’s looking at the pile of clothes from will make a difference in figuring it out.

A pause, then, offhand, in a tone that indicates it’s not related and thus isn’t that important, he says, “I did the psych evaluation.”

[abrightboy]

“What did they say?” Malcolm asks.

[conning]

He tugs at the cuff of a pant leg. “Apparently I have ADHD. I’m worried if Rue has to take this in too much it’ll look lumpy if they don’t cut out the excess cloth.”

[abrightboy]

“So cut it off and steal another one if you get tall again. Are you getting treatment?”

[conning]

“No.” Neal is not, at this moment, getting treatment. He fusses with the pant leg some more. “Apparently I also have OCD.”

Which irritates him, because it’s not like it’s disordered to be organized. “Well on my way to alphabet soup. I didn’t steal these, I bought them, and I don’t want to steal new ones.”

[abrightboy]

"I'm not sure what you want me to say about the suits," Malcolm tells him. "You can wear mine if you don't want to alter yours."

[conning]

Neal stays quiet for a few more fussy seconds. “I don’t know either. I just—everything is wrong, feels wrong.”

[abrightboy]

"Everything is different and you didn't choose it. It feels like a violation." He might normally slow-walk someone to their own conclusions, but he's been reining himself in all week.

[conning]

He looks at Malcolm, surprised for a moment before a look of enlightenment follows. It does feel like a violation. He’s been twisted around inside his own skin and no, it’s not as dramatic a change as some people have been through and he should be grateful for that, he knows he should be. But—

He feels wrong. And something unknown and possibly unknowable did it to him. And having letters be dumped on him when he already feels unsettled… hasn’t helped.

He looks back at the clothes on the bed. “I’ll ask Rue to take them in,” he says quietly.

Then, “I’m not disordered. I’m tidy and precise.”

[abrightboy]

"It's up to you if you take your doctors' advice," Malcolm tells him quietly. "Or if you take more time to sit with it."

[conning]

He smooths his fingers along the pleat of a pair of slacks. “If I take their advice and I get… better, somehow. What does that say about the first thirty-eight years of my life?”

[abrightboy]

"It has to comment on the first thirty-eight years of your life? They're the last phase. This will be the next one. You weren't married for the first thirty-eight years of your life. What does that say about them?" Malcolm asks.

[conning]

“That’s different.” He chose to propose. Neal finally turns away from the bed, coming over to put his arms around Malcolm’s waist and take in the unfamiliar angle of his face. “It’s not thirty-eight years I could have been a better person.”

[abrightboy]

A smile twitches the corners of Malcolm's lips.

"Now you're saying I don't make you a better person? I didn't come in here to be insulted," he jokes.

[conning]

Neal snorts. "You unequivocally do."

He leans up to kiss Malcolm, feeling a little like he's missed a step while walking. A motion that should be natural, thrown off. "Not even a question."

[abrightboy]

"See? New day, new life," Malcolm tells him. "Don't you want to enjoy it to the fullest?"

[conning]

He does. Neal kisses Malcolm again, the motion almost exploratory, Neal trying to feel out the differences in his physical leverage now versus seven inches of height ago.

A pause, and he studies Malcolm’s beautiful blue eyes. “Do you still think I’m attractive?”

[abrightboy]

Malcolm is genuinely confused by the question.

“You’re exactly the same,” he points out.

And, in fairness, he felt he was exactly the same Neal when he was still partly a weasel. The same in all the important ways. There’s no missing how stunning he looks and it kind of pleases him that other people do notice that, it’s just not the source of his quintessential Nealness. So Neal’s either marrying the wrong person or exactly the right one.

[conning]

The right one. Neal melts internally at the genuine confusion on Malcolm’s face, the fact that it’s so real. He nuzzles his face into Malcolm’s neck, still unconscious of the fact that he picked the gesture up while Neaseled. “That’s all I need.”

[abrightboy]

He said something right.

“Oh. Well. There’s lots more where that came from,” he declares.

[conning]

Neal laughs quietly and wraps his arms around Malcolm waist. He layers himself against Malcolm, pressing as close to the other man as possible. Mapping the contours of their bodies with a new elevation. As it were.

“I don’t like feeling like I can’t protect you, even though I would’ve been terrible at protecting you before anyway.”

[abrightboy]

“You protect me all the time,” Malcolm murmurs against his hair. “Why do you suddenly think physical protection is what I need?”