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[abrightboy]

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[abrightboy]

Malcolm considers that.

“Is that the one where they repair pottery so you can see the cracks?” he asks.

[empathicfault]

"Mmmhmmm," Will acknowledges, eyes heavy-lidded as he looks at Malcolm. "They repair them with gold or platinum, mixed in with the lacquer. The idea is that instead of hiding imperfections and trying to cover over scars, you highlight them. Use them to make the broken pieces stronger and more beautiful."

He reaches up and gently touches Malcolm's face, near the temple. His fingers trace near the hairline and back around the shell of the ear. "Sometimes, when I look at you, I see the golden lines tracing back and forth. The places where you've repaired yourself, where you're stronger now. I'll see obsidian on me, but that's...starting to change, too." He turns the hand near Malcolm's face towards himself, so that palm faces him. He curls the fingers a little, watching the light shift over it. "The gold is starting to peek through."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm's smile broadens and he takes Will's hand, keeping it palm up to set a kiss in the middle of it. He looks at his face again and slides his hands across his shoulders and then around behind his neck.

"You see gold in me?"

[empathicfault]

Will's smile widens at the kiss. The hands on his shoulders and neck have his eyes fluttering shut for a brief moment.

"I do," he replies. "All the hard work you've done, your whole life...running in shining lines along the contours of your body, over arms and feet and...there's a lot on your fingers," he adds, unsure why. Maybe that's just something Will enjoys focusing on.

"It's rare that I get to 'see' something so...uncontroversially beautiful."

[abrightboy]

Malcolm pulls his hand back onto Will's shoulder so he can turn it over and examine it, then he looks at Will again.

"What's making you turn golden?"

[empathicfault]

"You don't really have to ask that, do you?" Surely Malcolm knows and just wants to hear him say it. Well, Will is happy to oblige. "It's you. Of course it's you, and how much you've helped me already. Carefully helping me put some of my pieces back together."

[abrightboy]

He hoped. He didn't know. Not for sure. But at the answer, he smiles with undisguised happiness.

Sometimes he feels like he doesn't help anyone here. But Will was right when he pointed out that was catastrophizing.

And he helps Will.

"I always, always will," he promises.