He almost wishes he could convince himself that Tseng is delirious, mumbling something like that. He almost wishes he could maintain it's the morphine clouding his thoughts, sending him off on idle flights of nonsense fancy that he won't remember long enough to regret later. The problem, though, is that he knows Tseng isn't — not least of which because he's monitored everything they've given him in every precise degree, that he knows exactly what the drugs they're administering can and can't do to the person who receives them. He almost wishes that he wasn't saying this with that guarantee of lucidity, with that modicum of clarity. It would be so much easier, however agonizing, to hear it and keep it and never speak of it again.
What that means, instead, is that he has to sit there and hear Tseng say you're the reason I fought to live and live with what that makes him. To press his lips together and choke on his own breath and still not know if that means anything other than that Tseng's loyalty rests with him and not just the chair he sits in. To bask in the bold, brash courage of the admission and be forced to ask himself if Tseng is braver than he is, or if he too is willing to risk his own secrets coming to light without the benefits of the painkillers to blame them on later.]
What if I never let you?
[He sets the cup of ice aside, placing it in the middle of the nightstand's surface because his coordination is abruptly poor and clumsy. Because his hands are shaking. He'd never hit a target with his limbs like this, with such an unexpected anxiety rising like a tide inside him.]
What if I say I have to be the one to go first?
[There's a different way he could've phrased that. It goes something like I'd rather die than live without you. But that's not precisely true, is it? If Tseng had died in that jungle, on the table, in this bed, Rufus still wouldn't have chosen death.
Wished for it, maybe. But he loathes leaving unfinished business just as much as Tseng does.]
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He almost wishes he could convince himself that Tseng is delirious, mumbling something like that. He almost wishes he could maintain it's the morphine clouding his thoughts, sending him off on idle flights of nonsense fancy that he won't remember long enough to regret later. The problem, though, is that he knows Tseng isn't — not least of which because he's monitored everything they've given him in every precise degree, that he knows exactly what the drugs they're administering can and can't do to the person who receives them. He almost wishes that he wasn't saying this with that guarantee of lucidity, with that modicum of clarity. It would be so much easier, however agonizing, to hear it and keep it and never speak of it again.
What that means, instead, is that he has to sit there and hear Tseng say you're the reason I fought to live and live with what that makes him. To press his lips together and choke on his own breath and still not know if that means anything other than that Tseng's loyalty rests with him and not just the chair he sits in. To bask in the bold, brash courage of the admission and be forced to ask himself if Tseng is braver than he is, or if he too is willing to risk his own secrets coming to light without the benefits of the painkillers to blame them on later.]
What if I never let you?
[He sets the cup of ice aside, placing it in the middle of the nightstand's surface because his coordination is abruptly poor and clumsy. Because his hands are shaking. He'd never hit a target with his limbs like this, with such an unexpected anxiety rising like a tide inside him.]
What if I say I have to be the one to go first?
[There's a different way he could've phrased that. It goes something like I'd rather die than live without you. But that's not precisely true, is it? If Tseng had died in that jungle, on the table, in this bed, Rufus still wouldn't have chosen death.
Wished for it, maybe. But he loathes leaving unfinished business just as much as Tseng does.]
Will you let me?