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The room felt heavy beneath a blanket of unspoken words.
Sunset eyes bored into ones that matched the color of an approaching dawn.
Searching.
Yet unable to find.
Aventurine languidly leaned against one of the doctor’s many bookshelves, precariously balancing a gambling chip on the tip of his index. His attention was far from that glimmering disk, however, as it was trapped under the oppressive intensity of emotions boiling behind Veritas’ mask.
He’s not entirely sure when he began to refer to the man before him as Veritas rather than Doctor Ratio or any other sort of impersonal moniker, but in any case it only occurs within the intricate traps of his mind. A feign of intimacy he cannot truly ever possess.
Much like ice under the unrelenting sun, Aventurine observes as Veritas sighs, ever so slightly, seeming to realize that he will hear no truths today.
“Your persistence to make your life more difficult than it needs to be is becoming aggravating.”
Aventurine smiles.
It doesn’t reach his eyes.
“What can I say, doctor? I like a challenge now and then.”
Veritas scoffs.
It seems to tear itself from his throat.
“ Now and then is a vast understatement, you know that as well as I do.”
They both clasp their hands behind their backs like a lifeline.
It does very little to help.
The lashing gales howl beyond the window, almost sounding like the keening of those who mourn. It leaves Aventurine to wonder what the wind might have lost. As it whips against the glass panes, he can imagine that it's a desperate man pounding at the last hope for salvation. Slowly his focus falters, his eyes drift from Veritas’ face. They affix on some distant point of which not even his mind is certain. It’s just an indistinct blur to him.
“Aventurine.”
An iron voice lined with the finest velvet.
“Ratio,” he mimics, forcing his mouth to stretch into its distantly familiar grin.
Aventurine can feel the frown pulling at Veritas’ lips rather than see it. It’s not the doctor’s usual stern expression, but instead something disquiet, melting.
“Talk to me.”
Three words have never fallen against Aventurine’s ears with such dreadful exhilaration. An offered hand, palm upturned, fingers strained and tendons taut. One extended from a statue of unfeeling stability and logic, an alabaster fortress possessing a tongue made of thorns and petals alike. The stone of his guard trembles before it - but those walls do not crumble.
“Woah, usually you’re telling me to stop talking! Are you feeling alright, doc?”
Another sigh, this one not nearly so slight.
“I mean, you can talk to me. That is to say, in full honesty.”
“Honesty isn’t one of my strong points, which I’m sure you know very well by now - being a genius and everything.”
Inexplicably, Veritas moves forward. His steps are near silent, calculated and precise to land him right in front of Aventurine within five curt strides. He’s not sure they’ve ever really been this close, face to face. Heart to heart. It’s slightly irking how he has to raise his chin to maintain eye contact, like a manifestation of his vulnerability. Resisting the urge to grimace, Aventurine tucks his golden chip away.
“Weak things can be trained to be strong, via practice.”
“Do you intend to train me like a dog?”
“Only if you see yourself as one.”
This damn doctor always knows how to knock him unsteady, turning things back onto himself and throwing aside the taunts Aventurine tries to raise in feeble defense.
“You are not a dog,” Veritas continues, “and I have never seen you as one.”
The words settle on his mind like fresh snow, covering the burning rush of thoughts in feather-light frost. Growing numb from the chill, his head feels dull. In the absence of his bitter thought, Aventurine becomes startlingly aware of just how close they really are. Close enough for him to smell the delicate cologne that clings to skin he aches to know. With something nearly akin to fright, he studies Veritas’ face as if he may never see it again. Certainly that may be true to an extent. He will likely never see it this closely again.
“How do you see me then, Ratio?”
“A troubled man. Much like myself, or any other person to exist.”
“I’m not another problem for you to solve,” Aventurine snaps. He’s unsure where this sudden blaze came from, but it pours from his lungs before he has the ability to restrain it. How out of character.
Veritas simply shakes his head, hair like the twilight sky caressing his face and neck in a way Aventurine grows sharply envious of.
“Don’t force your twisted perception of yourself onto me, Aventurine. I do not see you the way you see yourself.”
“Tell me then, how do you see me?”
“I told you already.”
“Well, tell me more.”
“What I’ve already said was not enough?”
Chewing at his bottom lip, Aventurine fruitlessly struggles to reign in his emotions. The cage of his chest feels as if it is being blown apart by some strange, swelling thing that has wrapped like a vice around his heart. Should his torso be torn to bits, would Veritas still look so clinically calm? He wants to claw at that stoic expression, shred it into terror or disgust - something he knows, understands.
“No.”
The word falls from behind his teeth, breathless and unsupported.
Veritas seems to think for a moment, his brow knitting together and eyes shifting down and to the right, like always. His lips purse just a little, head tilting to follow his eyes, like always.
“I think of you as someone I wish to know, should you let me in. I pursue all knowledge, that is my life, but in regards to you, my desire to know does not stem from an academic curiosity. It’s… an inexorable tug at the root of my being.”
He tosses Aventurine into a swirling abyss of strange and terrifying feeling , like always.
Grasping onto his last vestige of stability, only one word managed to free itself from his mouth.
“Why?”
Sinfully, Veritas laughs, “Why does man yearn for anything at all? Nobody knows the answer to that, certainly not myself.”
Those silken strands of violet hair sway as he gestures with his arms, a controlled sweeping motion that exposes his chest. The doctor always has perfectly prim posture, to the point of being uptight. Seeing him act so nonchalant and comfortable makes Aventurine feel a bit off-kilter. He shies away from the senseless, fuzzy feeling rippling from his stomach as he realizes very few people have likely seen the esteemed doctor this way. Leaning more of his weight against the bookshelf in an attempt to stave away the dizziness settling into his bones, he continues with his constant deflection.
"Something not even you know the answer to? This is shocking news!"
"You're hopeless. I thought for a moment there you had finally dropped that mask of yours. Why, pray tell, do you cling to such a flimsy thing so desperately?"
Aventurine falls dead silent. This is all wrong, his footing has been deftly yanked from beneath him and he stands on shifting quicksand. As if he senses the other's instability, Veritas decides to press him even further. Leaning in closer, to the point of practically caging Aventurine in, those severe eyes study every minutia of his expression. Picking him apart bit by infinitesimal bit.
Softly now, Veritas keeps speaking, "You may feel a lot better if you simply allowed yourself a break. Shouldering all of your problems entirely by yourself is a surefire way to run yourself right into the ground. I assure you, my dear fool, I am strong enough to uphold much of your burden."
They hold silent eye contact for a collection of moments, until by some strange force, Aventurine is compelled to move. One trembling hand swiftly catches the steady fingers of Veritas' own, tangling them together as if he's worried they'll be ripped apart. He lowers his head, and they stay that way as time trickles past, running away from them on the currents of an unseen stream. After too many stolen minutes, the rather gaudy phone resting atop one pristine shelf buzzes obnoxiously, startling away the tender reverie that had settled across the room.
Alas, there's no rest for the wicked.