[9/19] when after you see your face

[thedreamthief]

Hywel is far from empty by the time Ronan makes it back. Hercules scampers over as Ronan stalks his way past the barn area and Cinnamon turns her large head to blink huge, brown eyes at him.

The upstairs is equally occupied, the door to Gansey's room wide open and Adam out in the front room, a scatter of books and papers around him. Ronan doesn't so much as say hello before he stalks straight for the bathroom, stripping off his shirt once he's inside to examine the bruise already blooming across his side.

Fuck.

He checks out his hand next, frowning at the singed skin between his fingers before dunking it under the faucet, trying to clean out the dirt and ash, hissing at the slight sting.

There'll be no hiding this from Adam and, already, he's trying to come up with a decent lie. A believable lie. He fucking hates lying, especially to Adam, but he can already picture that shuttered off expression of disapproval and disappointment. Ronan had made a promise and he'd intended to keep it, but he hadn't been expecting some asshole with his face and his name to show up and kick Noah around.

He doesn't know how he could be expected to not react.

Scowling, and stomach still twisted in knots, Ronan flings the water off his hands and reaches for a towel, ignoring the ache in his side all the while.

Comments

[thedreamthief]

"I don't like anything about him," Ronan agrees with a scowl, his arms hanging loose at his sides as he relaxes back into the cushions.

The fact that this other Ronan exists isn't the worst of it as far as Ronan's concerned. The worst part is he isn't so different from himself. He's still violent, still foul-mouthed. He's everything Ronan is, at heart. Everything he's become.

But worse.

[incognoscibilis]

Improbably, they have ice, though there's no guessing when it was made. Long enough ago that it's covered in chunky crystals and is difficult to extract, much less wrap in a towel but Adam's had practice in this kind of thing. He brings the towel over, gently putting on Ronan's side.

"Ronan..." he says, eyes trailing from Ronan's stomach to his hand where a raw mark is angrily made. Adam knows that mark, though he'd been bleakly fortunate not to suffer it himself.

[thedreamthief]

Adam sits carefully beside him and, just as carefully, presses a towel full of ice to his bruised side. Ronan hisses in protest, but he doesn't fight it at all, reaches down instead to hold it to himself, which is when Adam notices the mark between his fingers.

"Apparently this other version of me's a smoker," he says with clear distaste. He shifts to hold his ice pack with the other hand, curling the burned one so Adam doesn't have to see the mark. "It's fine, Parrish."

[incognoscibilis]

Adam's mouth twists in distress, unable to articulate his fear, the way he feels suddenly small and unprotected. Cabeswater wraps vines around his heart and lungs, trying to steady him. It offers the memory of quiet sunlight and undisturbed piles of leaves. It's enough to keep Adam from screaming.

He blows out a breath and lays a hand on the wrist of Ronan's burned one, thumb tracing the shape of the bones in his wrist.

"It doesn't seem fine."

[thedreamthief]

It's the same sort of fine as he'd been after his father's death, after Robert Parrish tried to bash Adam's head in, after he woke up in a hospital with his arms bandaged. It's the sort of fine that has to be because there's nothing else to be done.

"He's me," he says, surprising even himself when the words come. "He's me, Parrish. He's a fucking asshole and he's me."

[incognoscibilis]

"Bullshit," Adam says. The answer flies out of him so stubbornly, so immediately, that he looks shocked at himself. He doesn't take it back though. "Just because you have the same face, it doesn't make him you."

The Ronan in front of him, for instance, would never burn someone with a cigarette. He's angry and hurt and violent and he's gotten into more shit than Adam would like but his worst violence has always been directed inward.

[thedreamthief]

"It's not just the face," Ronan snaps back, confusion and terror and shame flaring white-hot. "It's not a case of some asshole just looking like me, he is me. He has my name, my clothes, my history."

The last of that Ronan's only guessing, but given everything else he's seen, he has no reason to believe it isn't true. "He has fucking Chainsaw."

He rubs a hand against his eye then, hard enough to make himself see spots as he scowls. "It's not like I have a fucking reputation to uphold, but it's still-- Noah thought he was me and that asshole fucking shoved him to the ground." And how many times has Adam told him not to go to Fight Club, how scared had he been when Ronan trashed Gansey's room? Noah'd been afraid of him just as Adam had. He'd had no reason to believe something could be wrong.

[incognoscibilis]

"I know," Adam says, because in his mind he's traveling back a year in time. He's remembering that dark, foggy Darrow. In his head he can still hear that other Adam that had spoken in his voice and said the most hateful things, been the cruelest version of everything Adam hates.

"Noah and Blue never told you what I saw in that other Darrow." Adam hasn't talked about it. He hadn't wanted to and the days after returning from Darrow had been fraught with other hurts, long since resolved. "He had my name, my clothes, my history too."

That's a cruelty that Ronan doesn't have. Even in the story Gansey had told him about Noah and the window. As rude as it'd been, it hadn't been done to harm Noah, a then-total ghost.

[thedreamthief]

Ronan doesn't know the other Ronan's history. He doesn't want to know; face and name and clothing are enough.

He hasn't thought of Adam's experiences in that other Darrow in months. Adam had never explained much and Ronan had known better than to push. That's Adam speaks of it now can only mean that it's relevant. It means he gets it, on some level at least.

"But he didn't act like you, did he?" he says, taking a guess based entirely off what Noah's told him, off what he's heard from others. "That's a difference, isn't it? You're not an asshole, Parrish. Not the way I am."

[incognoscibilis]

Adam presses his mouth into a thin line that manages to communicate what he thinks of that. They both know how capable he is of being brittle, the temper and violence that he fears inside himself. That other Adam was someone who had given into circumstances and never aspired to better but that doesn't change the intrinsic sameness he'd shared with his double.

"He acted like I would if I hadn't decided to be better than that," he says, very deliberate in his words because Ronan's made choices too. He believes that.

[thedreamthief]

There's a finality to Adam's tone, a clear implication that Adam isn't in any mood for argument of self-flagellation.

So Ronan shuts his mouth and stares straight ahead. The feeling under his skin doesn't slide away, the burn between his fingers still stings. And he's still worried about this guy with his face and his name might do. What more he could fuck up.

And how he's not so different from Ronan himself, whatever Adam says.

He hazards a glance then, just a cut of his eyes as he says, "I've never been afraid of you, though. Not ever."

[incognoscibilis]

Adam frowns and then slides a hand under Ronan's shoulders, gently pressing him to sit up just long enough for Adam to sit in that space and rest Ronan's head on his lap. Being the protective one feels like a strange. For the longest time, the status quo has always been Ronan charging in first like everyone's knight in a charcoal-colored Beemer.

"I've never been afraid of you either," he says. He's been scared by Ronan's actions and afraid for Ronan and what he's doing for himself but Adam has never felt reason to think that Ronan is anything but his ally.

"And don't call bullshit. It's not."

[thedreamthief]

Ronan arches an eyebrow at Adam's maneuvering, but doesn't fight it any, relaxing back against Adam's thigh and looking up at him. It's not a perspective he's used to, but it's far from unpleasant.

Even if he still has a hard time believing what Adam says.

He doesn't respond for a long moment though, studying Adam's jaw and throat, the hint of stubble on his skin, the stretch of fabric across his shoulders. "I would've killed him," he says finally, his voice quiet but sincere. "Your dad. If you hadn't stopped me, I would've kicked the living shit out of him and I wouldn't have been sorry about it."

[incognoscibilis]

It's true and Adam knows that. Adam cards two fingers through Ronan's mohawk, pushing little chunks of hair until they all go in the same direction. It's quiet, deliberate. Loving.

"Beating the shit out of my dad is different from hurting Noah," Adam says, because even Ronan's world of absolutes has to have room for that truth.

[thedreamthief]

Not for the first time, Rona's glad he's decided to grow his hair out some. It's not something he would've considered a year or so ago, but he likes the way it still makes people look at him, those gazes as appreciative as they are wary most of the time. But, more than that, he likes the way Adam curls his fingers through the strands, how it sends a slow roll of pleasure all down Ronan's spine.

"Well, I did throw him out a window that one time," Ronan reminds Adam, but it's hardly an argument. Despite Noah's protesting, that'd been as fun for him as it had been for Ronan.

He lets out a breath then, slowly relaxing under Adam's touch. Under his warmth. He closes his eyes as he lets out another slow breath and it feels easier then to consider things he's been trying to ignore for months, things he's tried to shove down. "Remember, uhm. Remember when Prom?"

[incognoscibilis]

"Well, yeah," Adam says, still playing with Ronan's hair. They both know it's not the same. Ronan is capable of rage and playful malice but not sadism. Adam wouldn't be here if that wasn't the case.

"What part of prom?" It had been an eventful night and an eventful few days after and though Adam thinks he can guess what part, it also feels important to let Ronan say what he means.

[thedreamthief]

Adam's touch doesn't falter, still gently carding his fingers through the curls of Ronan's mohawk. Ronan keeps his eyes closed.

"You know what part," he murmurs a moment later, his voice quiet, a soft plea for Adam to not make him spell it out entirely. "You forgave me, but." He pauses again, still struggling to find his words, still scared to open his eyes and see if Adam's frowning down at him. "Nothing's happened since then," he adds quickly because he needs to make that much clear still. "Nothing will either, but uh. But Noah heard my thoughts. A few weeks ago."

[incognoscibilis]

"I still forgive you," Adam says. It hasn't been retracted and it will take more than thoughts to do it. "What was it you were thinking about?" Noah, obviously, but that isn't everything.

All through it, he still keeps petting Ronan's hair, listening.

He doesn't know that he would be mad if something did happen, as long as Ronan doesn't keep it a secret. There's a difference between an affair and loving more than one person. If Darrow's taught him anything, it's that.

[thedreamthief]

Here it is, then. No backing out now.

Ronan takes another breath, focuses on the feel of Adam's fingers through his hair. The touch doesn't waver in the slightest and there isn't a hint of anger or upset in Adam's tone.

"I was thinking about us," he says, for once in his life, choosing his words carefully. "All of us. How I feel about you and Noah and Gansey. And about that secret of Blue's, how it said she's a little in love with all of us. Except... except it's more than a little for me, I think. With you three."

[incognoscibilis]

"It's true," he says. What point is there in denying it? They're all woven together with hundreds of different threads. "And that's also true." Ronan lives and breathes for all of them, in different ways. Adam's surprised by his own comfort with it, even though he sort of can't actually picture himself kissing Gansey or Noah. Or Blue, anymore.

He loves Ronan and he's rotten enough to play favorites. It doesn't change that the thought of falling asleep next to Gansey or Blue is still a comforting, safe one.

[thedreamthief]

Again, there's no hint of hurt or upset in Adam's voice and he's still touching Ronan's hair gently. From his vantage point, Ronan can see that Adam's thinking, can see him mulling Ronan's words over in his mind, but there's no clouding of his expression.

And Ronan isn't sure yet how to interpret it.

Slowly, Ronan lifts one arm to reach for Adam's hand, curling their fingers and squeezing tight. "I don't know what the fuck this means, Parrish," he says, not hiding the plea in his voice. "Any of it. Does it even fucking matter?" After all, Noah clearly doesn't feel the same way and Gansey's not even into dick. What does it matter what Ronan feels? Especially when he has Adam, when Adam loves him so fiercely that he's all Ronan really needs.

[incognoscibilis]

"I don't have much of an answer," Adam says, distracted enough that his damn accent slips out. Momentarily, he pauses and reels it back in, reminding himself of who he is and who he doesn't have to be either. Stroking Ronan's cheek, Adam shrugs.

"I know you can love more than one person." They've seen it now in many of their friends, even beyond just Krem and Noah, however badly that had gone. "I also know it'd be different if it wasn't one of us." He doesn't need to specify. There's only one Us in their world, followed by the small bubble that surrounds that concept.

[thedreamthief]

The idea that Ronan ever could love someone outside of Adam or Gansey or Noah hadn't even occurred to him. When he'd first arrived in Darrow, when he'd had no one but Chainsaw and his own nightmares to keep him company, he'd fallen in with Grantaire. It'd been companionship, a friendship, but nothing like what Ronan feels for his Raven Boys. Nothing even close.

"What about you?" he asks, pressing his cheek against Adam's fingers. "Am I the only greedy fuck here?"

His words are flippant and tone dry, a necessary reaction to keep his nerves from prickling too close to the surface.

[incognoscibilis]

He shrugs, because it's a very open-ended question. "I'm greedy for a lot of things," Adam says. For accomplishments, for success. But Ronan's love? It's strange to him how he has complete faith in it. He doesn't believe for a second that Ronan loves him any less and the certainty of it after a lifetime of selfish, shriveled meanness leaves him at peace.

"I've never thought about it. Sometimes I'm not sure I've got enough love in me for one person." But, he supposes, that's just another way in which Adam is fundamentally broken.

[thedreamthief]

Again, Adam doesn't seem upset. His statement doesn't come off as petulant or self-deprecating, but more of a genuine declaration. A simple fact.

Ronan frowns, twisting a little to sit up, still draped largely over Adam's lap with his hand pressed to the other side of the cushion to hold his weight. The angle places his face right in front of Adam's as he says, "It's not that you're not enough." It's something he needs to make clear, that he needs Adam to know. "You get that, right? Whatever the fuck I feel for them, it has nothing to do with how I feel for you. If it's just you and me for the rest of our lives, I'm good with that."

It feels like a heavier statement once it's past his lips, but Ronan doesn't pull it back. Heavy or not, he means it completely.