Chapter Text
“And… if it-- if it interests you, to call me Llewellyn, then you should. If we… After all of this, if we saw each other again.” He adds, as he closes the door behind himself, uncertain. But there’s no indication he’s done wrong. The door was left open for him to follow.
“Well… yes, I-- if we saw each other again, it might be best to behave as if we didn’t meet during an interrogation.” Jack says-- not half so harsh as it might have been. “Though I-- That’s to say, if we did see each other again. If you think it likely.”
He’s never been in a man’s room-- not in this precise sense. Not that he can say what this precise sense is. Is it not enough that the man’s shirtsleeves are rolled to the elbow? Is it not enough to have seen his collar undone? The invitation may be purely social, polite-- just as his overture might be taken as a polite kind of friendly, a ‘thank you for your help and shall we put this awful business behind us with something nicer’ kind of friendly, and not a ‘you’ve awoken something in me’ kind of friendly.
It is not fair to say it was Jack who awoke it, or not him alone. The subject of the investigation alone had been enough to raise old questions in his mind, a hundred things he’d once tried to put away, think no more on, change in himself. Perhaps had things been different, Scott might have awoken him as easily. And yet… despite his attempt at reaching out, Scott couldn’t extend him trust, and he had not been ready then to speak, to put a name to the common ground between them… he hadn’t known how. How to signal to him their similarity, the way other men must signal each other. But he’s never been any good at subtle social cues… He’d silently willed him to know and to understand and yet there was nothing… There was nothing on which to build.
Jack, though… they may not have had a common profession to bind them, but he had found him so easy to connect to-- or, to long to connect to. He’s never found very many people easy to connect to-- he’s lost all those he found easiest. He doesn’t like to think that this is a pattern. It’s one which must be broken, perhaps.
He had… noticed him. The first time they’d laid eyes on each other, it had been out-of-doors. The sunlight had been on him and his eyes had been lovely, like chips of sea glass, blue-green and soft. And Llewellyn… he had been struck, though not in the way poets write about. It didn’t feel quite like he had imagined, like he had tried to make himself feel, when a woman proved interesting company. Well, that hadn’t worked out at all… though things about her did strike him as interesting, or he would not have attempted a courtship, nor made so big a fool out of himself. He’s never had any trouble recognizing when a woman is beautiful, but that had always felt a matter of objective fact, not a thing that struck. But he had been struck on meeting Jack just the same, by some quality. By some combination of them.
“I am afraid I made the poorest of first impressions.” He touches the brim of his hat, nervous. Not removing it, he hopes, does not seem rude-- were he inclined to remove it, would it not be presumptuous to do so without invitation? Perhaps on some future visit, if-- but he gets ahead of himself. Concerning himself with the relative rudeness of doing anything at all with his hat has never been of much concern before now.
“Oh-- no-- You had your duty. I wouldn’t have thought better of you if you had been derelict in it.”
“Even so. I… I would have met you some other way. Or-- if I could not have done that, I… I found that I was… somewhat distracted by your freckles.”
“Oh.” Jack drifts towards where he has two chairs, leaning against one and not yet sitting.
“That is to say… not-- when I say ‘distracted’, you may wonder, that I did not seem it. My mind sometimes seems to run along two tracks, and as I am stoking the engine of useful thought, there is also… That I noted your freckles, and… They are not orderly. Freckles. A human being, if given a pen and a paper, and asked to produce a random scattering of dots, would build… patterns. We would find it difficult to mimic nature’s hand. Is what I was thinking about, which I thought best unspoken. Or perhaps it still is. Best unspoken. Should I not have spoken it?”
“No, I-- I’m glad you did, I think. It’s only… I should warn you, I’m a dangerous friend to have, just now.” He says, even as he motions him to sit, sinking into his own chair.
“I can promise you I’ve had more dangerous company.” Llewellyn smiles, or, he thinks he smiles. He means to smile, but sometimes he means to smile and people behave as if he hasn’t. “Or-- do you mean I have bothered you? I-- I know sometimes people do mean that, but I--”
“I just mean… my proclivities being well-known to your inspector now, I… don’t imagine you should like to be seen speaking to me.”
“Then perhaps much depends on whether he takes his business elsewhere. Or perhaps it doesn’t. My time is my own, when I am not working. But what I came to say-- besides the matter of freckles, and… distraction, and--” He finds himself briefly distracted again-- Jack moves to rub at one elbow, they are near enough he can see the near-golden dusting of freckles along his forearm, moreover the motion of muscle and tendon, strong from his work. “I cannot offer you any commendation, for your help with the case. But I think it’s better your name remain out of things, anyhow. Still… without you, we might not have discovered our murderer was more for philately than philandery.”
Jack laughs, sudden, surprised, soft. “Clever.”
“I did work at it, some. On the way over. That is… so that I could tell you how the matter is resolved. I thought… it would be unfair, for you to read in the papers what you helped to set right, with no one considering your feelings.”
“I’m very pleased you did.”
“As for your friendship, and whether it is too costly… I do note that people prize costly things over uncostly ones.”
“I have been around costly things, and found most have an inflated value.”
“Mm. Well, a thing of great value is worth the cost, but setting that aside… setting that aside. You begin from the assumption that I am a good friend to keep.”
“Aren’t you?” He smiles, unreadable-- unreadable at present-- and leans back in his chair slightly.
“I assure you, I have my entire life been much taken against. Firstly, for my face, which I am told is not a kind face.” Llewellyn begins listing out his objectionable points, tapping the pad of one index finger to the other. “And for my voice, which I am told is a disagreeable voice. And for my manners, which I am told are nonexistent. I am not thoughtful, nor politic, nor couth.”
“Those who would describe you so can't know you. And I met you only yesterday. You have seemed politic and kind and agreeable for this long.”
“Mm. Well, nevertheless, I have been reliably informed. Also that I am not happy company, that my sense of humor is lacking, also that things which ought to come naturally to me do not, that things which do come naturally to me ought not to, and that conversation with me is insufferable.”
“Stop, stop, if you continue to brag about yourself, I’m afraid I won't be able to take it. But tell me, which are your bad points?”
“I’ve been known to be clumsy.”
Jack laughs, looking away a moment before turning back to him. “Clumsiness. That’s not so bad. And because you have trusted me--”
“I’m afraid among my bad points I ought to have listed that my nature is too trusting.”
“No-- I mean… I would like to thank you again, for having trusted me, when you had no reason to.”
“I had reason enough. And I know something of persecution. I consider it a grave injustice, but being as I have already been twice persecuted against for my own reasons, what’s one more?”
“I’m afraid if it’s for knowing me too well, it is too high a cost. I… have never been comfortable, with… parties, with candor, with… being known. I admire that kind of courage, but-- well, I repeat myself. I’m sure I’ve said all this before. And now I am... known, you must think about that.”
“I have thought about it. I have thought… I have thought that you and I share a preference for quiet, and for privacy. I have no interest in clubs, not that there are any which would have me, for a variety of reasons. I… I have thought that you are honest. And admirable. And you extended some trust to me, to work with me in the first place. I don’t mean to ask you for anything-- that’s not… Even I am aware that the timing would be… callous, to say the least. You have lost someone, and-- I know what it is to… Even if he was not a lover at the time, to be the one to see him like that. For myself, I don’t… I don’t know, what it is I want, whether I want… I want to know you. Perhaps in the morning I will… wake up, and wonder what I was thinking, and tell myself I have seen one good man forced from his position already, that I could put the noose around my own neck, and that it is… indiscreet even to speak to you. Maybe I won’t. But I-- But you did trust me, too, when you must have considered the possibility that I would go back on my word once I had what I wanted from you. Was it only desperation, or did you know?”
“I knew… when you took the chair beside me, and not across the table.” He smiles softly down at his folded hands. “I knew that I could trust you. It was a little thing. It was a little thing… and then another little thing. It was a few little things.”
“I should tell you…”
“Yes?”
“My handwriting is atrocious.” He finishes, feebly. It is not half of what he wishes he could say. But there are too many things he could say. That Jack’s friends would find their association not to be trusted, perhaps not to be tolerated, just as well as the other way around. That there are so many reasons not to like him-- some good, some unfair but not uncommon.
“Oh-- I… I would have imagined differently. You have… you have nice hands.”
Llewellyn looks at one, contemplating. It is his own, he doesn’t find he can judge its merits as with a stranger’s.
“Well. I’m afraid they aren’t good at anything.”
“I’m sure that’s not true. Handwriting may be struck off the list--”
“When I said I was clumsy, I mean… I mean it’s my hands, which are-- which are very clumsy. And I could never--” He makes the mistake of looking up, then. Jack looks back at him, and again he can’t read something in his expression. “Not like yours. You… work with them. It requires skill. Strength. The basic ability to… manipulate small objects. And given that your tools are sharp, and that your hands are all in one piece-- two pieces, technically?-- that is-- I would have to assume you are… good with them.”
“And you didn’t come to ask me for anything?” Jack rises, takes half a step closer.
“Oh-- no, I…” He stumbles to his own feet, hastily reviewing his words, this time with an eye towards possible double entendre. It is not… smooth, as double entendre, he thinks, but then, he wouldn’t describe himself as smooth either way, so… “That is-- I am afraid I have a habit of offending… it’s led to a professional transfer before, as I said, I am… difficult to like--”
“I wasn’t offended.”
“And I can see myself out if I hav-- no?”
“No.”
“One thing I should tell you… it’s not the same, but… when my best friend was killed, I-- I found him. The men he was attacked with survived, and he… Well. It’s not the same. He put his life on the line in duty’s name, he had done before and would have done again, if-- But I was… not fast enough, or not good enough, to prevent… Finding someone you care about, regardless of the nature of the relationship… I just wanted to tell you. I know.”
“Does it ever leave you?”
He shakes his head. “I have lost a great many people, compared to the number I might have had to begin with. It never does. But… there comes an ease. The grief… it isn’t going anywhere. But it will be balmed over. Like a broken arm, set and healed. Agonizing at first, and then you bear it for so long that you forget what a life without pain was, and then one day you realize you move more freely and you ache less. And then, someday, you only feel it when a storm is coming.”
“Thank you.” And his hand hovers very near to touching Llewellyn's elbow, for a moment, and his voice is soft.
“Mm. If you ever need to talk, about the shock or the grief… I will do my best not to be...” And he gestures to himself in whole. “Uncouth. Offensive.”
“I wasn’t offended.” Jack repeats, ducking his head. “I took it for a compliment. A professional compliment, if that’s how it was meant, which is hardly uncouth.”
Llewellyn nods, relieved. “I’m glad, then.”
“If you needed me, in a professional capacity… it wouldn’t be strange. If I lose your inspector’s custom, he wouldn’t need to know, if I gained yours.”
“Ah… well, I had been… experimenting, with vegetarianism. And, largely, of late, I--” He swallows, sets his jaw. “I find it makes it… easier. To keep kosher.”
This is the moment, where he expects he might see some coldness, some shuttering. He has had enough occasion to see it in the short time since discovering his roots. And yet, there is none. And if they did talk again, somewhere down the line, he could say that, having not been raised in the faith, he’s decided he doesn’t need to keep kosher. His trouble with meat was with the industry and not the morals nor the enjoyment, there really is nothing keeping him from going back, were it to someone he trusted. But he’d needed to know that he could say… that it wouldn’t matter.
“So you would have very little need of me, professionally, I imagine.” Jack nods.
“It’s… all somewhat recent, for me, so… who’s to say? I may yet decide neither diet suits. But-- if I didn’t come to see you, at your business, that’s why. I’m sorry. It… would have been easy.”
“It would never have been easy.” Jack shakes his head. “But it would have been agreeable.”
“Yes.”
He walks him to the door. Not much of a walk, and he hesitates a moment before he turns the knob.
“I would rather not list my own bad points. I have them… And after tonight, you and I have no real business together, and it would be unwise-- But I would rather… Please remember me by my good ones, if you have no other excuse to talk to me. Or discover my bad ones in time. The choice is yours.” And he opens the door.
“Whether or not you list me your bad points, I would remember your better ones.” Llewellyn swings around to lean beside the doorframe just a moment. “You didn’t have to come back for me.”
“Oh, I disagree.” Jack smiles, and with Jack on the one side of his door and Llewellyn on the other, he holds out his hand.
They both glance along the corridor. No other doors open, and yet the fact they could hangs heavy. Llewellyn takes his hand… but he thinks he might have taken it more softly, if there were no neighbors. He might have turned it in his, and lingered over the pattern of calluses of his trade.
“Thank you again for coming by, Detective Watts.” Jack says-- another door opens, before Llewellyn can protest any formality.
“Well… I should thank you, again, for your assistance. And my apologies, for… your being mixed up in the unpleasantness.” And the neighbor is hovering to eavesdrop, he has to release Jack’s hand sooner than he would like, has to lose the warmth of it, the firm grip… “Er-- regards. I mean-- yes. Dreadful mess. But! The killer is off the streets, thanks in part to you, and the constabulary should be grateful.”
“Oh, my!” The neighbor takes the mention of a killer for an invitation to join them rather than merely lingering around her own front door. “Mister Walker, whatever did you stumble into!”
“Delivery.” He doesn’t miss a beat, though the lie is stiff at first. “I had made a large delivery, for a party. When I went to settle, I… I discovered the host.”
“Mm. Poor fellow.” Llewellyn nods. “Mister Walker was mistakenly named a person of interest, but thanks to his… keen eye, we were soon enough put onto the right path with it. And I just wanted to offer some-- well, thanks and apologies and… reassurance, that the matter is entirely settled, I hope with no further cause for worry.”
“And if I can ever be of help again, Detective.” Jack gives him a smile. He has a certain way of smiling. It is… tight, but not cold. Contained. That, he thinks he understands. Warm. That… he’s not sure.
“I’ll know where to find you.” He tips his hat, turns and heads off, isn’t sure if he’s walking too fast or not fast enough, but suddenly it’s hard to breathe. It's a long time before it gets any easier.