i'm a thinker, not a talker
Casimir thinks this is perhaps the most silent he’s ever seen Thorn at his bar, the weary exhaustion radiating in waves off the man’s slumped figure. He sees the way he pours himself onto counter and cushions himself crossed arms, sighing as if he was going to slip right there into sleep, and he wonders where the man has been that drained him so. There’s a stillness imbued in him he didn’t think was even possible for someone as shining and sparkling as Thorn.
It’s only then he realizes too how the stillness, the silence, extends to Thorn’s usual chatter, and though the bar is loud and joyous and raucous as ever, the absence of the one voice that matters fills his ears like flies buzzing over carrion. Had he broken whatever gentle and tenuous thing was between them so irrevocably they couldn’t even return to their easy game of bartender and bar-drinker? He’s not self-centered enough to leap to the conclusion that he’d driven Thorn away into whatever caused this exhaustion — but what if he did?
The bottles of liquor are cool and sticky under his hands as he continues to work, pouring drinks and sliding them across the counter like an automaton, all the while staring Thorn down from the corner of his cool blue eyes. The flickering light of the bar, so warm and cozy just a few moments ago, now presses claustrophobic against the corners of his vision. His mind, so pleasantly drifted away from his body as he worked and ignored all his problems, has now slammed back into consciousness, all too aware of the huddle at the end of the bar.
Too long he’d been making Thorn chase him, cleaning up the blood he trailed behind. It wouldn’t be fair to ask him to do that now, as his head lay buried on the bar and that strange-looking mud-flecked hat told the beginnings of a long and likely sordid tale. Ghosting back to Thorn’s side of the counter, he filled a glass with cold water and slid it towards the exhausted thing that was wearing Thorn’s face. He tapped the counter twice, soft and unobtrusive, and waited, still-faced and eyes dark.
It’s only then he realizes too how the stillness, the silence, extends to Thorn’s usual chatter, and though the bar is loud and joyous and raucous as ever, the absence of the one voice that matters fills his ears like flies buzzing over carrion. Had he broken whatever gentle and tenuous thing was between them so irrevocably they couldn’t even return to their easy game of bartender and bar-drinker? He’s not self-centered enough to leap to the conclusion that he’d driven Thorn away into whatever caused this exhaustion — but what if he did?
The bottles of liquor are cool and sticky under his hands as he continues to work, pouring drinks and sliding them across the counter like an automaton, all the while staring Thorn down from the corner of his cool blue eyes. The flickering light of the bar, so warm and cozy just a few moments ago, now presses claustrophobic against the corners of his vision. His mind, so pleasantly drifted away from his body as he worked and ignored all his problems, has now slammed back into consciousness, all too aware of the huddle at the end of the bar.
Too long he’d been making Thorn chase him, cleaning up the blood he trailed behind. It wouldn’t be fair to ask him to do that now, as his head lay buried on the bar and that strange-looking mud-flecked hat told the beginnings of a long and likely sordid tale. Ghosting back to Thorn’s side of the counter, he filled a glass with cold water and slid it towards the exhausted thing that was wearing Thorn’s face. He tapped the counter twice, soft and unobtrusive, and waited, still-faced and eyes dark.
Casimir
i've no one to talk to, anyway
