Even if Logan had sent that message, it would probably have stayed unread, given that Kurt's Fluid is sitting resolutely on the other end of the bar, far enough away from he's currently polishing glasses to keep it out of sight if not out of mind. As so recently advised, he's trying very hard to just not think about anything. And failing, of course, because, like his tail, his mind has a tendency to wander and cause trouble.
He's expecting some form of response from Logan; their quarrels are rare enough that he knows his partner wouldn't want to leave words unsaid, not after everything that's happened between them, both in Deerington and the waking world. He knows the man well enough to expect it to happen in person rather than through the device he hates so much. So he's not exactly surprised when he hears the door at the top of the stairs vibrate in its frame, as if tried by someone not used to having them shut in his face.
Kurt briefly considers teleporting out -- he could make it back to the cabin easily, and probably be able to cover any side effects before Logan found him -- but that feels both cowardly and hypocritical. Staying silent and forcing Logan to use other means to get in would only make things worse. Kurt stares down at the glass in his hands as he weighs the alternatives and finds them wanting, then lets out a short breath and sets it down.
The stairs up to the door are cramped and dark, but by now Kurt knows them well. He trots easily up, throws the bolt on the door and immediately turns and heads back down, not saying a word to the man who is waiting for him, letting his silence and the fact that he unlocked the door at all speak for itself as he leads the way down to the empty bar.
The longer he waits the more he considers sitting himself down out there. Of course, Kurt could pass him undetected if he wanted to, but despite the man's skill at moving around unnoticed he's not the kind of person to avoid a difficult conversation. There's never been a cowardly bone in the man's body. But if it's time Kurt wants— on his own terms— he'll give him that.
He pats himself down for something to smoke while he waits but the bolt on the door makes a thunking noise before he can find it. He waits. And when the door doesn't move he eases it open himself, sighing into the long dark hallway before he makes his way down.
He rarely sees the place so dark and quiet as this, but even with a crowd to serve it still smells faintly sticky sweet of drying drink.
"You weren't home. So I though you might be here. But I don't hafta be, if you'd rather I wasn't."
Kurt has retreated back behind the bar by the time he hears Logan's heavy tread on the stairs. He glances up once, a brief flicker of glowing eyes that anyone else might miss, and tries to stay aloof. But he's never been the kind to sulk, and finds it an uncomfortable silence to maintain; Logan's words make him subside slightly, suddenly ashamed of himself. The tension doesn't disappear from the lines of his shoulders or the quick side-to-side switch of his tail, but he gives Logan his full attention, at least.
"Nein," he sighs, before the far more acid response can make its way out of his mind. "You can be here."
He turns and fetches a couple of bottles of beer from the fridge beneath the bar, thumbs the caps off and slides one carefully across the bartop in Logan's general direction. They've always talked better over a drink, and Kurt feels like he's earned it at least. He swallows a quick cold mouthful before continuing.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have.. what I said wasn't kind, Logan, I'm sorry I said that."
“Only if you want that,” he says, shuffling a little closer. If his mistake is making choices for the both of them, he’s determined not to do it again.
His gaze lingers on the beer a long moment, reading far more into it than he probably should. If it’s an olive branch, it ought to be him extending it, no? It does little to clarify just how badly he’s misstepped, but still, he’s never refused a drink with Kurt in his life and he’s not about to start now. “I don’t think anybody’d say you don’t deserve to give me a piece of your mind when you want to.
He leans on the bar with his hands around the bottle and for the first time since they left he sort of wishes that string still connected them. He takes no joy in telepathy, but it’s easy to catch himself wishing he knew if the younger man wanted to finish what he began in that message. Leave him with an earful. Or if he only wants Logan to find something worth saying for himself.
"Perhaps," Kurt sighs, unwilling to commit to defending himself when he feels that he's only making mistakes. "But not like that."
He doesn't move any closer to Logan, instead leaning back against the counter behind the bar, his arms loosely crossed as he tries to think through what he actually does want to say. Somehow the conversation has veered into slightly new territory: a discussion based on their relationship as partners, not just friends. Though they've talked before about and around it, this feels closer to dictating boundaries on something that still feels a little undefined. Part of Kurt wants to linger over that thought, but he doesn't want to leave Logan waiting too long.
He spares Logan a quick glance, then looks down at the bottle in his hand, picking restlessly at the label with his thumbnail.
"I'm not.. you know that I'm used to your having secrets from me. I've always understood that it's a necessary part of our relationship and I don't expect otherwise. Even when I was stood inside of your mind, I didn't want to open any of those doors unless I had to, unless you asked it of me. But.. there are secrets and then there is.. deliberately avoiding the truth, or avoiding me, because you want to save my feelings. I thought that what we talked about in the forest, after your nightmare, had cleared that up. That you would remember that you're not alone. But now I find out that you've been keeping things to yourself again, things that I could help with, that I need to know about, and I find myself feeling.. disappointed." Still avoiding Logan's gaze, he lets out a breath that seems to have been caught up somewhere under his ribs and forces himself to continue, the words coming from him almost unwillingly. "And wondering what else you're not telling me. And I know that is a selfish feeling, and it's unfair to expect you to want to be something you are not, but.."
He lifts his head, distress written clearly in his expression. "I feel so outside of everything, Logan. There's so much here I don't know if I can trust. I don't want to feel that way about you." He pauses briefly, remembering darker days, years ago, shortly before Hope and a desperate act had cost him almost everything. "Not again."
“It’s no secret, darlin’. I wasn’t lookin’ to keep it from you,” he says plainly after a long drink. It hardly excuses him and he doesn’t hold himself as though he thinks it ought to, but neither does he look like he expects that fact will do anything to assuage the disappointment Kurt has laid at his feet.
Of all Logan’s admitted missteps one does feel different. This one isn’t born of his penchant for protection of those closest to him. Neither does he yet believe that Kurt’s frustration comes from his silence alone rather than the subject of that silence. That’s what makes him think this is not exactly a conversation they’ve had before. That this might be the kind of conversation they’ve managed to avoid in their lifetime if only because they’ve never before allowed themselves quite this kind of companionship. Always close, but never committed to it.
He’s certain Kurt knows, he’d rather the man tore a strip out of him. At least he’d feel like he offered up something satisfying if the other man could see to raise his voice or raise a fist. Some recompense for his transgressions. But that’s not Kurt.
Kurt, he thinks, wants only to be proven right about him. And as always Logan can’t imagine ever being half the man Kurt’s so often made him out to be.
“Maybe I don’t deserve it,” he says, watching Kurt’s expression from the corner of his eye to see if that thought finds a comfortable home this time. Sooner or later, he’s always expected it would. Eventually. And maybe that time has come.
Supporting his carefully cultivated sense of self-disgust is one of the few areas where Kurt is happy to be a constant disappointment to Logan. Years of experience allows for a little brevity in his response; he barely restrains himself from rolling his eyes and shoots Logan an unamused look instead, as if fending off a subject so obviously ridiculous that it's not even worth considering. Then he sighs and seems to subside a little, as if letting go of the weight of his own emotions has left him somehow depleted.
"One day I hope you'll stop feeling as though you need to test me, Liebchen," he points out in a low voice, almost to himself, then chases the words with a long swallow of beer. He sets the bottle down on the counter, his hands drifting together to turn the ring on his finger instead, a fidgeting habit that's become particularly ingrained since giving away his crucifix necklace.
"Testing what? Your conviction? I'm not dumb enough to think I'd get odds on that."He'd never admit it. Logan knows that. But that's not what he's watching for. It's subtler than that. There's a thorn in the man's expression that lets him know he's moved the needle. Edged him ever closer to exactly what Logan imagines to be the inevitable, no matter what he refuses to admit.
"I'm not lookin' for sympathy, Elf. I'm not sittin' here makin' excuses, am I? Would it make you happier if I did? Or would that just be givin' you something to other than me to blame for all the ways I'm not who you want me to be?"
He takes another drink when Kurt still doesn't continue. "Some half an hour ago, you were ready to cut me up. What changed?"
"Maybe I decided it wouldn't be worth proving you right," Kurt grumbles, the words escaping before he can stop himself. He rubs the bridge of his nose with a fingertip, then decides to fan the heat of that ember of frustration a little. Why not? It's what Logan wants, after all. He reminds himself bitterly that the man has always preferred a bar brawl to a conversation. Not for the first time, he wishes that Piotr was with them. The big Russian had always been able to provide a bulwark against the press of Logan's self-destructiveness.
"You know, part of me wishes you were sitting there making excuses, Logan. At least that way I might know what you're thinking and feeling and wouldn't have to argue with you in order to get you to spend time with me, or treat me as though I'm an adult who has shared your life for nearly thirty years instead of someone you can leave behind whenever you want! You tell me that you want me to be able to give you space because that just makes it easier for you to let go, isn't that right? How are any of us supposed to hold on to you when you're always halfway out the door?"
What crosses Logan’s expression is hard to call a smile. There’s certainly no mirth in it. Validation at most. A note of realization for the glimmer of proof he’s always on the lookout for. It hurts when it lands, but he’s always bracing for impact through whatever accusations Kurt wants to lob at him.
Save for one.
His brow furrows for the one perceived injustice he cannot abide. “Spend time with you? Elf, I will sit here and let you tell me what sorta fuck up I am all you want. But don’t for a second tell me you’d have to do anything short of say the words to get me to spend time with you.” He growls into the neck of that bottle before knocking the rest of it back.
“Ok,” he says evenly, nudging his empty bottle away when weight of knowing his effort to love someone he’s known so long has only amounted to insult and injury finally slips off his shoulders. “Here’s what I’m thinkin’. I’m thinkin’ this conversation woulda happened whether I came to you about Jeannie or not. Because I’aint done anything right by you since we ended up here. And someone who’s shared some thirty-years of your life— I gave myself a fool sense of hope that I’d make you happier than I do.” It takes a surprising amount of force to pull his eyes up from the bar rail and as soon as he looks at Kurt he wishes he hadn’t for the way it stabs him in the chest to think he’s failed to make himself understood by a man angling for the title of world’s most understanding man.
“What I know for sure is, you don’t like it when I try to hold onto you. And you don’t like it when I take a step back. Because I don’t do neither of those things in the ways you want me to. Maybe I just haven’t figured out what the right way is. Or maybe I’m just not built right.”
“Or. It don’t matter at all because it amounts to the same. Me not knowin’ where to put myself between here and the door that’ll make you happy. Right now, halfway feels about the only place I can still be near you without fucking things up worse.”
Very few things in Kurt's life have hurt the way that Logan's glance does, when he drags his gaze up to pin him against the back of the bar. Breaking his leg against the salt-doused rocks around Exalibur's lighthouse had been painful, as had Bastion's arm through his chest, but he thinks in that moment he would take them both in exchange for the way that look feels.
It's an effort not to drop his eyes and teleport away to avoid the rest of the words that await him. He stands and takes it, believing he's earned every bit of the weary disgust and frustration in Logan's tone, and when he's done he finally lets himself look away, dropping his head, his arms not so much crossed over his chest as clutching at himself as if trying not to fly into a thousand shattered pieces.
The memory of their last discussion on this subject is overwhelmingly present. Those difficult first weeks in town, walking on eggshells around each other, both of them convinced that they were the offended party. Examining it again, Kurt can only see how ridiculous it all was and how easily it could have been avoided. And how much more Logan's presence in his life means to him now, if it's at all possible. How much more he stands to lose.
That thought brings about a resolution in his heart. Kurt sniffs and lets out a shaking breath, then moves without letting himself think about it. He picks up a bottle of whiskey from the back of the bar, dusts it off with his tail, then sets it and two shot glasses down in front of Logan. Only then does he meet his gaze again, something like apology and a fragile plea in his expression.
"Maybe this is why we've never done this before," he points out, working hard to keep his tone even as he pours a shot for each of them. If they're going to talk about it, he's decided, it's going to happen on terms agreeable to both of them. "Being together, I mean. Properly."
The words leave him watching Kurt carefully from beneath his brow, trying to suss out from his expression or his posture whether it’s merely an observation or if he’s trying to insinuate something more finite. Something that suggests they’ve bitten off more than they can chew.
It’s not surprising exactly. That’s not the word for it. Not when the deep vein of cynicism in Logan is far too rich to have ever let himself think this would end with a happily ever after. Still, he’d be lying to say he didn’t think they’d get more years out of this. And no amount of certainty for the end of all things manages to prepare him for the cold, bottomless feeling that settles in his heart just to entertain the idea that Kurt, could right now, be on the cusp of telling him goodbye.
A sternness settles on his expression because it’s a good sturdy facade for something far more vulnerable, but anyone who knows his face can see the cracks in it. The way he avoids eye contact. The way he sets his jaw a touch crooked to bite the inside of his cheek where there’s no cigar there to gnaw on.
The surface of the whiskey in that glass sparkles golden in the reflection of the lights above the back of the bar and he fixes his gaze there. A poor substitute for the shine of Kurt’s eyes.
“Startin’ to regret?” he asks, knocking that drink back. But as an effort to steel himself against whatever he gets it does little good. He still finds himself holding his breath for an answer. So much so his request for mercy barely manages a whisper. “Please darlin’, don’t drag it out.”
The whiskey settles around the stab of Logan's question with a soft blanket of heat, the more gentle pain seeming to settle into Kurt's chest in a steady throb. He glances up at the other man, his mouth already opening to deny it when that quiet request chokes his words before they appear.
Any response, he thinks, would be too clumsy, clearly he's not being understood; instead, he uses a language they're both more familiar with. Setting down his shot glass, he reaches over with both hands and takes one of Logan's between his palms, refusing to let him look away, trying to press into warm skin and heavy bones what words alone can't achieve.
"Logan, meine Geliebte, I don't regret anything. I don't want to end this. Only.." He lets out a breath and turns his head to settle his cheek against the backs of Logan's fingers, caught in his hands, then straightens up again. His tail wanders in pensive curls through the air as he tries to think his words through. "I don't know what to do, so much of the time. I don't know how to help you. Before here, what we had -- I always knew it would be there, when we both needed it, and we didn't need to call it anything. Now, it's.. more. And I find myself wanting more. But still making mistakes."
He chews his lower lip and sighs, frustrated, a long day and the end of a roller coaster of emotions making it difficult to pinpoint his thoughts. "I don't know how to say it."
His hand feels heavy and cloddish in Kurt’s warm grasp. The mans natural grace makes it hard not to see the his own inelegance by contrast. Especially when it comes to delicate conversations. Still the gentle touch salves the wound that threatens to open up in his chest. His knuckles move just faintly through the velvet fur of Kurt’s cheek. A softness that tempers the idea that the younger man is merely looking for a kind way couch his regrets.
“S’all right. Not knowing’ how to say anything. That’s my problem too, you know? I never… I wasn’t tryna hide anything from you, darlin’. Not about Jeannie. Not about anything. I just… I knew you’d wanna know how I felt about it. And I didn’t know what to tell you yet. I still don’t. I don’t come to those words as fast as you do, Elf. Or as nicely.”
More than that though, it’s Kurt’s musing out loud about what they are and what they’ve so long been to each other than makes him realize there may well be a gap between their individual definitions of this relationship. One he intends to fill if he should figure out how. Logan hasn’t changed much, he supposes. Foolishly he hasn’t properly considered what Kurt needs from him that the boundaries of their relationship has never required of him before.
“More what?” he asks with an uncharacteristic caution in his tone. Not afraid of what might be asked of him but concerned for his own inability to deliver it. “Forget about how things are a minute, darlin’. What is it you imagined for us? How did you picture things would be if we ever made a go of it?” His question turns him sheepish as he realizes exposes something perhaps not so secret of his own. “I mean… I figure you thought about it before now. I know I did.”
Kurt expects confusion, maybe even a little frustration with his lack of clarity -- he can't blame Logan for not being able to puzzle it out when he's still struggling to define his own feelings on the subject. What he gets is forgiveness and acquiescence he's not sure he's earned, then an unexpected request that leaves him blinking, not sure he's heard it right.
Warmth immediately floods into his face below his fur; he drops his gaze to their still joined hands as the truth is surprised out of him.
"I thought about it, but not --" he glances up again, his expression somewhere between embarrassed and asking for Logan's understanding, "not properly, until recently, being here. Before, I always assumed -- well, there was Mariko and Melita, and Ororo, so I never really thought that we would ever.."
He lets that particular confession trail away, knowing that Logan will be able to fill in the gaps well enough. Their relationship had always existed, by mutual consent, on the sidelines, not so much a secret as something they never felt they needed to tell anyone about. That had both advantages and disadvantages; Kurt's a little surprised to find, even now, the tiniest spark of jealousy in the pit of his stomach.
"But," he continues, looking away, the tip of his tail flicking quickly from side to side, "I used to imagine, sometimes, when I was feeling lonely.. that one day we could find somewhere, retire -- provided we would both live long enough to do that," a wry smile, "somewhere quiet, in the mountains, in Japan or Canada, or Bavaria even. Big enough for our friends to visit but.. private. Peaceful. And you would hunt and fish, and I would write, I suppose, or something, and we would go on long walks and just.. live our lives, for a little while. Together."
It's as far as he's willing to run towards that fantasy for the moment. In any case, curiosity tugs at him, and he looks back at Logan.
The temptation to dwell in that frustration of having tried and failed despite his efforts is there, but tempered easily by both Kurt’s effort not to scold him for his missteps and even more by the validation he finds in knowing the man, whom he so often thinks of as something of an interpreter of intangible things, is perhaps just as at a loss to explain his feelings as Logan is.
He listens patiently, and watches Kurt watch their hands the way people gaze into the flicker of a fireplace. Letting your mind rest in its warmth hypnotic comfort. He knows what the other man means intrinsically. They’ve always met a certain need in each other lives, but there’s a humility in their relationship they’ve never discussed. The modest assumption that wouldn’t dare to claim either one of them might be capable of being so much more to one another.
Asking why that is has always seemed a foolish question to broach. One that might only lead to the complication of something that’s always been sweet and good and simple. But the picture Kurt paints now demands that question. Striking him now with the stupor of bygone epiphany. The pain of having missed something all too obvious for all too long. And the bittersweet relief of hearing Kurt’s words reflect something he’d never imagined existed anywhere but his own imagination.
By the time Kurt pulls his gaze away from their fingers, that ache in Logan’s chest brims to his eyes in unshed tears. His feet shuffle him closer when he doesn’t trust his voice to surface without trembling under the weight of his heart.
“For a long time,” he clears his throat, “no matter where we were. Or who else we were involved with. When I thought about the end my life. Or at least, when I thought about a time things might be easier. Quieter. I always pictured you. You’re the one I think of when I let myself imagine growin’ old with someone. Because you feel to me just like those places in the mountains have always felt. Those private, peaceful places that make me feel whole.”
It's difficult to let Logan continue after he sees the glitter of those tears in his eyes, but Kurt holds himself back, catching his lower lip under his fangs until that sharp point of pain keeps him grounded. When his partner outlines that serene picture, so close to what he himself has been considering, he lets out a breath that trembles on out of his chest.
"Oh," he breathes, feeling as though he's been handed a gift he's scarcely worthy of, or perhaps just a part of himself that he's only now realising he's been missing for a long time. The words settle into him like a balm, healing wounds both recent and far older than their time in Deerington, back before he had to watch Logan be buried in cold dark earth. "Oh, Logan."
His elbow knocks against one of the shot glasses, uncharacteristically clumsy, as he leans across the bar, sending it rolling off to bounce onto the floor. He takes Logan's face between his hands and kisses him, as if trying to seal the words between them as a promise instead of a fantasy.
After a long, long moment he pulls back, but only far enough to rest his forehead against the other man's, thumbs sweeping across his cheeks. Up close, everything is blurrier, or maybe that's because he's crying a little too. He sniffs and breathes out a laugh for the foolishness of the last few hours.
"I will be there, Logan. I don't care how, or what I have to do, we'll have that one day."
He can’t help the reflexive glance towards that tumbling glass, but Kurt’s reach pulls his gaze back easily. Leaving him too fumbling for a way to encourage that touch, hold on to the man offering it and echo that same promise.
“I want that more than anything,” he mumbles against Kurt’s lips, stealing another kiss before either of them can think to ease away over the bar top between them.
It’s a cathartic thing to say. Even more so to have it reflected in the words of the man such a hope revolves around. But the kind of catharsis that takes something from you to express. It leaves a void, not a painful one, but one left by the tension it takes to carry such a heavy hope that it leaves the muscles required to hold it in feeling suddenly void of purpose. As if he has to figure out what his posture looks like now without that load to carry.
With a soft sigh he retrieves that escaped glass and sets it gently back on the bar as he rounds the end of it to get closer still to Kurt. “I don’t remember exactly when I stoped thinking things would end like that for us, but I know it was after I lost you. Things changed for good. Nothing’s felt… stable since. Everything’s just been another threat to take care of. Another tragedy to try and steer us out of. Another goal to accomplish in Scott and Chuck’s game plan. Maybe I ain’t shook that since bein’ here.”
“I’m sorry I ain’t been who you need me to be. I just can’t shake the feelin’ it’s all sorta… precarious. Like all I can do is try to hold on to things. For that hope for some quiet little future. For some kinda control. For you. I don’t mean to be heavy handed about it.”
There's a small moment of loss as Logan steps back, moving around the bar and stooping to pick up the shot glass on the way. As soon as he's back within reach, Kurt indulges himself, drawing his fingertips across the other man's hip as he leans against the bar, his tail chasing out to curl around his calf. He sighs briefly, trying not to let Logan's words settle on his shoulders. He can't find anything to regret in the final leap of faith -- in so many ways -- which lead to his death, except for the look in Logan's eyes when he talks about it.
"Well, I don't mind a little heavy handedness," he murmurs, a teasing glint in his eyes and quirked in the corner of his mouth. "But.. I'm sorry too, Liebling. I'm not.. the last relationship I was in, properly, was Rachel, and that -- well, you know enough of how that ended. And before that, everything has always been so busy, I always assumed there would be time one day, and I've never.."
He drops his gaze, embarrassed and vulnerable. "I think I'm learning that perhaps I should have taken time for it, before now. So I could be a better partner for you, and for Wes and Jean-Paul. I'm doing too many things for the first time."
The way he draws in a long sigh almost looks as though he's cleansing himself of something or perhaps savouring the first breath of fresh air he's allowed himself in a while. Whichever it is, it seems to relax him as he hooks a finger under the hem of Kurt's shirt and tugs him close again. "Don't be sorry," he smiles. "I know I shoulda said something. I was just avoidin' a conversation I wasn't ready for."
Kurt apologies seem to extend well beyond that though, into places Logan only has the scarcest understanding of. Only the details Kurt himself has shared. It's a half formed picture at best, but one he knows holds an intensity. A depth that the younger man has yet to extricate himself from. Not that Logan of all people can fault him for that. "It's easy, ain't it?" He chuckles, but it's one of those laughs more amused with the absurdity of things than expressing any genuine mirth. "To feel like there's always time. Especially with someone you can't picture life without. They just sort of become, like the sun and the sky. Course they'll always be there. The world would end if they weren't."
When Kurt shies away Logan closes the space between them to press his lips to the cord of Kurt's neck that the turn of his head so brilliantly exposes. "You don't have to change nuthin to be good for me. You always been good for me."
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He's expecting some form of response from Logan; their quarrels are rare enough that he knows his partner wouldn't want to leave words unsaid, not after everything that's happened between them, both in Deerington and the waking world. He knows the man well enough to expect it to happen in person rather than through the device he hates so much. So he's not exactly surprised when he hears the door at the top of the stairs vibrate in its frame, as if tried by someone not used to having them shut in his face.
Kurt briefly considers teleporting out -- he could make it back to the cabin easily, and probably be able to cover any side effects before Logan found him -- but that feels both cowardly and hypocritical. Staying silent and forcing Logan to use other means to get in would only make things worse. Kurt stares down at the glass in his hands as he weighs the alternatives and finds them wanting, then lets out a short breath and sets it down.
The stairs up to the door are cramped and dark, but by now Kurt knows them well. He trots easily up, throws the bolt on the door and immediately turns and heads back down, not saying a word to the man who is waiting for him, letting his silence and the fact that he unlocked the door at all speak for itself as he leads the way down to the empty bar.
no subject
He pats himself down for something to smoke while he waits but the bolt on the door makes a thunking noise before he can find it. He waits. And when the door doesn't move he eases it open himself, sighing into the long dark hallway before he makes his way down.
He rarely sees the place so dark and quiet as this, but even with a crowd to serve it still smells faintly sticky sweet of drying drink.
"You weren't home. So I though you might be here. But I don't hafta be, if you'd rather I wasn't."
no subject
"Nein," he sighs, before the far more acid response can make its way out of his mind. "You can be here."
He turns and fetches a couple of bottles of beer from the fridge beneath the bar, thumbs the caps off and slides one carefully across the bartop in Logan's general direction. They've always talked better over a drink, and Kurt feels like he's earned it at least. He swallows a quick cold mouthful before continuing.
"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have.. what I said wasn't kind, Logan, I'm sorry I said that."
no subject
His gaze lingers on the beer a long moment, reading far more into it than he probably should. If it’s an olive branch, it ought to be him extending it, no? It does little to clarify just how badly he’s misstepped, but still, he’s never refused a drink with Kurt in his life and he’s not about to start now. “I don’t think anybody’d say you don’t deserve to give me a piece of your mind when you want to.
He leans on the bar with his hands around the bottle and for the first time since they left he sort of wishes that string still connected them. He takes no joy in telepathy, but it’s easy to catch himself wishing he knew if the younger man wanted to finish what he began in that message. Leave him with an earful. Or if he only wants Logan to find something worth saying for himself.
no subject
He doesn't move any closer to Logan, instead leaning back against the counter behind the bar, his arms loosely crossed as he tries to think through what he actually does want to say. Somehow the conversation has veered into slightly new territory: a discussion based on their relationship as partners, not just friends. Though they've talked before about and around it, this feels closer to dictating boundaries on something that still feels a little undefined. Part of Kurt wants to linger over that thought, but he doesn't want to leave Logan waiting too long.
He spares Logan a quick glance, then looks down at the bottle in his hand, picking restlessly at the label with his thumbnail.
"I'm not.. you know that I'm used to your having secrets from me. I've always understood that it's a necessary part of our relationship and I don't expect otherwise. Even when I was stood inside of your mind, I didn't want to open any of those doors unless I had to, unless you asked it of me. But.. there are secrets and then there is.. deliberately avoiding the truth, or avoiding me, because you want to save my feelings. I thought that what we talked about in the forest, after your nightmare, had cleared that up. That you would remember that you're not alone. But now I find out that you've been keeping things to yourself again, things that I could help with, that I need to know about, and I find myself feeling.. disappointed." Still avoiding Logan's gaze, he lets out a breath that seems to have been caught up somewhere under his ribs and forces himself to continue, the words coming from him almost unwillingly. "And wondering what else you're not telling me. And I know that is a selfish feeling, and it's unfair to expect you to want to be something you are not, but.."
He lifts his head, distress written clearly in his expression. "I feel so outside of everything, Logan. There's so much here I don't know if I can trust. I don't want to feel that way about you." He pauses briefly, remembering darker days, years ago, shortly before Hope and a desperate act had cost him almost everything. "Not again."
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“It’s no secret, darlin’. I wasn’t lookin’ to keep it from you,” he says plainly after a long drink. It hardly excuses him and he doesn’t hold himself as though he thinks it ought to, but neither does he look like he expects that fact will do anything to assuage the disappointment Kurt has laid at his feet.
Of all Logan’s admitted missteps one does feel different. This one isn’t born of his penchant for protection of those closest to him. Neither does he yet believe that Kurt’s frustration comes from his silence alone rather than the subject of that silence. That’s what makes him think this is not exactly a conversation they’ve had before. That this might be the kind of conversation they’ve managed to avoid in their lifetime if only because they’ve never before allowed themselves quite this kind of companionship. Always close, but never committed to it.
He’s certain Kurt knows, he’d rather the man tore a strip out of him. At least he’d feel like he offered up something satisfying if the other man could see to raise his voice or raise a fist. Some recompense for his transgressions. But that’s not Kurt.
Kurt, he thinks, wants only to be proven right about him. And as always Logan can’t imagine ever being half the man Kurt’s so often made him out to be.
“Maybe I don’t deserve it,” he says, watching Kurt’s expression from the corner of his eye to see if that thought finds a comfortable home this time. Sooner or later, he’s always expected it would. Eventually. And maybe that time has come.
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"One day I hope you'll stop feeling as though you need to test me, Liebchen," he points out in a low voice, almost to himself, then chases the words with a long swallow of beer. He sets the bottle down on the counter, his hands drifting together to turn the ring on his finger instead, a fidgeting habit that's become particularly ingrained since giving away his crucifix necklace.
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"I'm not lookin' for sympathy, Elf. I'm not sittin' here makin' excuses, am I? Would it make you happier if I did? Or would that just be givin' you something to other than me to blame for all the ways I'm not who you want me to be?"
He takes another drink when Kurt still doesn't continue. "Some half an hour ago, you were ready to cut me up. What changed?"
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"You know, part of me wishes you were sitting there making excuses, Logan. At least that way I might know what you're thinking and feeling and wouldn't have to argue with you in order to get you to spend time with me, or treat me as though I'm an adult who has shared your life for nearly thirty years instead of someone you can leave behind whenever you want! You tell me that you want me to be able to give you space because that just makes it easier for you to let go, isn't that right? How are any of us supposed to hold on to you when you're always halfway out the door?"
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Save for one.
His brow furrows for the one perceived injustice he cannot abide. “Spend time with you? Elf, I will sit here and let you tell me what sorta fuck up I am all you want. But don’t for a second tell me you’d have to do anything short of say the words to get me to spend time with you.” He growls into the neck of that bottle before knocking the rest of it back.
“Ok,” he says evenly, nudging his empty bottle away when weight of knowing his effort to love someone he’s known so long has only amounted to insult and injury finally slips off his shoulders. “Here’s what I’m thinkin’. I’m thinkin’ this conversation woulda happened whether I came to you about Jeannie or not. Because I’aint done anything right by you since we ended up here. And someone who’s shared some thirty-years of your life— I gave myself a fool sense of hope that I’d make you happier than I do.” It takes a surprising amount of force to pull his eyes up from the bar rail and as soon as he looks at Kurt he wishes he hadn’t for the way it stabs him in the chest to think he’s failed to make himself understood by a man angling for the title of world’s most understanding man.
“What I know for sure is, you don’t like it when I try to hold onto you. And you don’t like it when I take a step back. Because I don’t do neither of those things in the ways you want me to. Maybe I just haven’t figured out what the right way is. Or maybe I’m just not built right.”
“Or. It don’t matter at all because it amounts to the same. Me not knowin’ where to put myself between here and the door that’ll make you happy. Right now, halfway feels about the only place I can still be near you without fucking things up worse.”
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It's an effort not to drop his eyes and teleport away to avoid the rest of the words that await him. He stands and takes it, believing he's earned every bit of the weary disgust and frustration in Logan's tone, and when he's done he finally lets himself look away, dropping his head, his arms not so much crossed over his chest as clutching at himself as if trying not to fly into a thousand shattered pieces.
The memory of their last discussion on this subject is overwhelmingly present. Those difficult first weeks in town, walking on eggshells around each other, both of them convinced that they were the offended party. Examining it again, Kurt can only see how ridiculous it all was and how easily it could have been avoided. And how much more Logan's presence in his life means to him now, if it's at all possible. How much more he stands to lose.
That thought brings about a resolution in his heart. Kurt sniffs and lets out a shaking breath, then moves without letting himself think about it. He picks up a bottle of whiskey from the back of the bar, dusts it off with his tail, then sets it and two shot glasses down in front of Logan. Only then does he meet his gaze again, something like apology and a fragile plea in his expression.
"Maybe this is why we've never done this before," he points out, working hard to keep his tone even as he pours a shot for each of them. If they're going to talk about it, he's decided, it's going to happen on terms agreeable to both of them. "Being together, I mean. Properly."
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It’s not surprising exactly. That’s not the word for it. Not when the deep vein of cynicism in Logan is far too rich to have ever let himself think this would end with a happily ever after. Still, he’d be lying to say he didn’t think they’d get more years out of this. And no amount of certainty for the end of all things manages to prepare him for the cold, bottomless feeling that settles in his heart just to entertain the idea that Kurt, could right now, be on the cusp of telling him goodbye.
A sternness settles on his expression because it’s a good sturdy facade for something far more vulnerable, but anyone who knows his face can see the cracks in it. The way he avoids eye contact. The way he sets his jaw a touch crooked to bite the inside of his cheek where there’s no cigar there to gnaw on.
The surface of the whiskey in that glass sparkles golden in the reflection of the lights above the back of the bar and he fixes his gaze there. A poor substitute for the shine of Kurt’s eyes.
“Startin’ to regret?” he asks, knocking that drink back. But as an effort to steel himself against whatever he gets it does little good. He still finds himself holding his breath for an answer. So much so his request for mercy barely manages a whisper. “Please darlin’, don’t drag it out.”
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Any response, he thinks, would be too clumsy, clearly he's not being understood; instead, he uses a language they're both more familiar with. Setting down his shot glass, he reaches over with both hands and takes one of Logan's between his palms, refusing to let him look away, trying to press into warm skin and heavy bones what words alone can't achieve.
"Logan, meine Geliebte, I don't regret anything. I don't want to end this. Only.." He lets out a breath and turns his head to settle his cheek against the backs of Logan's fingers, caught in his hands, then straightens up again. His tail wanders in pensive curls through the air as he tries to think his words through. "I don't know what to do, so much of the time. I don't know how to help you. Before here, what we had -- I always knew it would be there, when we both needed it, and we didn't need to call it anything. Now, it's.. more. And I find myself wanting more. But still making mistakes."
He chews his lower lip and sighs, frustrated, a long day and the end of a roller coaster of emotions making it difficult to pinpoint his thoughts. "I don't know how to say it."
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“S’all right. Not knowing’ how to say anything. That’s my problem too, you know? I never… I wasn’t tryna hide anything from you, darlin’. Not about Jeannie. Not about anything. I just… I knew you’d wanna know how I felt about it. And I didn’t know what to tell you yet. I still don’t. I don’t come to those words as fast as you do, Elf. Or as nicely.”
More than that though, it’s Kurt’s musing out loud about what they are and what they’ve so long been to each other than makes him realize there may well be a gap between their individual definitions of this relationship. One he intends to fill if he should figure out how. Logan hasn’t changed much, he supposes. Foolishly he hasn’t properly considered what Kurt needs from him that the boundaries of their relationship has never required of him before.
“More what?” he asks with an uncharacteristic caution in his tone. Not afraid of what might be asked of him but concerned for his own inability to deliver it. “Forget about how things are a minute, darlin’. What is it you imagined for us? How did you picture things would be if we ever made a go of it?” His question turns him sheepish as he realizes exposes something perhaps not so secret of his own. “I mean… I figure you thought about it before now. I know I did.”
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Warmth immediately floods into his face below his fur; he drops his gaze to their still joined hands as the truth is surprised out of him.
"I thought about it, but not --" he glances up again, his expression somewhere between embarrassed and asking for Logan's understanding, "not properly, until recently, being here. Before, I always assumed -- well, there was Mariko and Melita, and Ororo, so I never really thought that we would ever.."
He lets that particular confession trail away, knowing that Logan will be able to fill in the gaps well enough. Their relationship had always existed, by mutual consent, on the sidelines, not so much a secret as something they never felt they needed to tell anyone about. That had both advantages and disadvantages; Kurt's a little surprised to find, even now, the tiniest spark of jealousy in the pit of his stomach.
"But," he continues, looking away, the tip of his tail flicking quickly from side to side, "I used to imagine, sometimes, when I was feeling lonely.. that one day we could find somewhere, retire -- provided we would both live long enough to do that," a wry smile, "somewhere quiet, in the mountains, in Japan or Canada, or Bavaria even. Big enough for our friends to visit but.. private. Peaceful. And you would hunt and fish, and I would write, I suppose, or something, and we would go on long walks and just.. live our lives, for a little while. Together."
It's as far as he's willing to run towards that fantasy for the moment. In any case, curiosity tugs at him, and he looks back at Logan.
"What did you think about?"
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He listens patiently, and watches Kurt watch their hands the way people gaze into the flicker of a fireplace. Letting your mind rest in its warmth hypnotic comfort. He knows what the other man means intrinsically. They’ve always met a certain need in each other lives, but there’s a humility in their relationship they’ve never discussed. The modest assumption that wouldn’t dare to claim either one of them might be capable of being so much more to one another.
Asking why that is has always seemed a foolish question to broach. One that might only lead to the complication of something that’s always been sweet and good and simple. But the picture Kurt paints now demands that question. Striking him now with the stupor of bygone epiphany. The pain of having missed something all too obvious for all too long. And the bittersweet relief of hearing Kurt’s words reflect something he’d never imagined existed anywhere but his own imagination.
By the time Kurt pulls his gaze away from their fingers, that ache in Logan’s chest brims to his eyes in unshed tears. His feet shuffle him closer when he doesn’t trust his voice to surface without trembling under the weight of his heart.
“For a long time,” he clears his throat, “no matter where we were. Or who else we were involved with. When I thought about the end my life. Or at least, when I thought about a time things might be easier. Quieter. I always pictured you. You’re the one I think of when I let myself imagine growin’ old with someone. Because you feel to me just like those places in the mountains have always felt. Those private, peaceful places that make me feel whole.”
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"Oh," he breathes, feeling as though he's been handed a gift he's scarcely worthy of, or perhaps just a part of himself that he's only now realising he's been missing for a long time. The words settle into him like a balm, healing wounds both recent and far older than their time in Deerington, back before he had to watch Logan be buried in cold dark earth. "Oh, Logan."
His elbow knocks against one of the shot glasses, uncharacteristically clumsy, as he leans across the bar, sending it rolling off to bounce onto the floor. He takes Logan's face between his hands and kisses him, as if trying to seal the words between them as a promise instead of a fantasy.
After a long, long moment he pulls back, but only far enough to rest his forehead against the other man's, thumbs sweeping across his cheeks. Up close, everything is blurrier, or maybe that's because he's crying a little too. He sniffs and breathes out a laugh for the foolishness of the last few hours.
"I will be there, Logan. I don't care how, or what I have to do, we'll have that one day."
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“I want that more than anything,” he mumbles against Kurt’s lips, stealing another kiss before either of them can think to ease away over the bar top between them.
It’s a cathartic thing to say. Even more so to have it reflected in the words of the man such a hope revolves around. But the kind of catharsis that takes something from you to express. It leaves a void, not a painful one, but one left by the tension it takes to carry such a heavy hope that it leaves the muscles required to hold it in feeling suddenly void of purpose. As if he has to figure out what his posture looks like now without that load to carry.
With a soft sigh he retrieves that escaped glass and sets it gently back on the bar as he rounds the end of it to get closer still to Kurt. “I don’t remember exactly when I stoped thinking things would end like that for us, but I know it was after I lost you. Things changed for good. Nothing’s felt… stable since. Everything’s just been another threat to take care of. Another tragedy to try and steer us out of. Another goal to accomplish in Scott and Chuck’s game plan. Maybe I ain’t shook that since bein’ here.”
“I’m sorry I ain’t been who you need me to be. I just can’t shake the feelin’ it’s all sorta… precarious. Like all I can do is try to hold on to things. For that hope for some quiet little future. For some kinda control. For you. I don’t mean to be heavy handed about it.”
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"Well, I don't mind a little heavy handedness," he murmurs, a teasing glint in his eyes and quirked in the corner of his mouth. "But.. I'm sorry too, Liebling. I'm not.. the last relationship I was in, properly, was Rachel, and that -- well, you know enough of how that ended. And before that, everything has always been so busy, I always assumed there would be time one day, and I've never.."
He drops his gaze, embarrassed and vulnerable. "I think I'm learning that perhaps I should have taken time for it, before now. So I could be a better partner for you, and for Wes and Jean-Paul. I'm doing too many things for the first time."
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Kurt apologies seem to extend well beyond that though, into places Logan only has the scarcest understanding of. Only the details Kurt himself has shared. It's a half formed picture at best, but one he knows holds an intensity. A depth that the younger man has yet to extricate himself from. Not that Logan of all people can fault him for that. "It's easy, ain't it?" He chuckles, but it's one of those laughs more amused with the absurdity of things than expressing any genuine mirth. "To feel like there's always time. Especially with someone you can't picture life without. They just sort of become, like the sun and the sky. Course they'll always be there. The world would end if they weren't."
When Kurt shies away Logan closes the space between them to press his lips to the cord of Kurt's neck that the turn of his head so brilliantly exposes. "You don't have to change nuthin to be good for me. You always been good for me."