thisismybar | Elijah

Elijah

It was probably the silliest, weirdest, and possibly most inappropriate thing Ric had ever done, and he'd done some pretty silly, weird, and outright stupid things in his life. A lot of them, granted, with the help of alcohol. This one might just take the cake.

But after sleeping with Elijah (metaphorically and literally), he found himself getting steadily less certain about just what the hell he was supposed to do, now. He'd had sex with people, but never a vampire, never a man, and certainly never an Original Vampire. Did he want it to continue? Yes, he did. Was it appropriate so soon after Jenna died? Probably not. Was it more necessary because of that? Probably.

Even if the sex didn't continue -and really, Ric would be fine with that- he wanted the friendship to. Which meant figuring out a way to communicate that to Elijah. Everything he could think of just didn't seem to fit, or he second guessed until he'd talked himself out of it. Second guessing wasn't really in his nature, though, so he eventually bit the metaphorical bullet.

He sent Elijah a colorful bouquet of flowers that the internet told him meant nobility, and signed the card with a request for his presence. It was silly. He could have called. Old fashioned seemed to fit Elijah, though, and well. If he'd gotten flowers in the last century, Ric might eat them.

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Ric wasn't as surprised by the affectionate gesture as he would have been, before. He still wasn't sure how to handle himself, but he was feeling a bit better after seeing the reception that his affectionate, albeit silly, gesture had gotten. He squeezed Elijah's arm while he was close. "It was that, or gluing a dozen tiny bottles of booze to dowels and tying them with a ribbon.... You're welcome."

"That would have occasioned far different comment," Elijah remarked with a smile and a shake of his head. "Now you've presented a mystery and given me something to smile about for days."

Ric moved further into the house, headed for the glasses and bottle without giving it a second thought. He frowned a bit, over his shoulder, at Elijah. "A mystery?" he asked, then thought he got it. "For your siblings?"

"For my siblings," he confirmed, following him and leaning against the counter. "It's petty, but after a thousand years, it's fun to watch them run in circles trying to figure it out."

Ric frowned, and brought Elijah his drink. "After a thousand years, they're surprised that someone might send you flowers?" he asked. "...Weren't you confused by my expectation that you weren't interested in sex?"

"There is a difference between sex and sending flowers." Elijah had gotten laid, yes. But he hadn't seen many people more than a few times. He'd certainly not formed any lasting connections.

The answer made Ric smile, though it was a soft expression. More fondness than amusement.

He went to perch on the arm of the sofa with his drink. "Well.... I'm glad I could be a first, and make you smile. Especially since it was ridiculous."

He was glad to have gotten it right.

Elijah wandered over to sit comfortably down on the sofa, not sprawling, still contained and controlled but somehow managing to look relaxed instead of uptight.

"I'm glad you could, too," he said with a smile. "Somehow I'll have to find a way to return the gesture."

"You really don't see it, do you?" he asked, giving Elijah a quizzical look along with the smile. "You already did. I was the one returning the gesture."

Elijah's look was a little bemused, given he'd...enjoyed their time together, too. In his mind he hadn't given anything--just pleased himself, as well as Ric. But he didn't want to argue semantics, so he just shrugged, still looking bemused. "Okay."

Ric wasn't thinking about the sex so much as the fact that Elijah had put up with him crying like a hysterical teenaged girl on him. He was still a little bit sheepish about that, almost embarrassed, but has to admit he's felt so much better since then. "How are things going over there, anyway? Did you tell them what you found in the cave?"

A shadow crossed Elijah's face and he shook his head. "Telling them won't accomplish anything, right now. I've thought about trying to find our father, tell him I know the truth, but..." He shrugged. "That's a millennium of messed up interactions I'm not sure I'm ready to tackle, yet, either."

"If it's been messed up for that long, taking some time to recover yourself isn't going to hurt anything...." He moved off the arm of the sofa to sit beside Elijah, knee just brushing the vampire's. "Just don't be afraid to off load some of the weight if you need to."

Elijah shifted, just a little, into him so their knees were more solidly in contact. "I may have to take you up on that, depending on how the next few weeks go."

He couldn't keep what he knew from his siblings forever. But he needed to talk to Klaus first, to find out what had really happened.

"You're planning to tell them eventually, then?" He thought that was good, but he also knew it wasn't going to be easy. "The offer will be here, when you need it." He reached down and squeezed Elijah's knee. Not a come on, at least not an overt one, just a silent show of support to go with the spoken one.

He nodded a little. "I have to talk to Klaus first." As always around Ric, he felt uncomfortable bringing up his brother. The fact that he lived with him, was working to try and stabilize his family, that he could still love him...weren't things he really felt most people could understand, especially those here.

"I need to hear it from him." His explanation, really--for why he'd lied for so long, perhaps.

Ric's issues with Klaus were his own, and he was pretty good -or trying to be- not to project them all over Elijah. That meant not jumping to villify Klaus, even when the person being wronged was Elijah. He took a drink, and stayed quiet for a few moments so he could be sure that what was coming out of his mouth was what he wanted to.

"And you need some time to be ready to hear the answers.... Let me know when you do talk to him?"

Elijah appreciated him not taking his Klaus hate out on him in a lot of ways. His smile was a little wry. "Thing is? I'm pretty sure I know the answers, could probably tell you near word for word what he'll say."

Honestly, Elijah couldn't even blame him. All they'd been to each other, though, made it sting.

"Knowing what the answers are going to be, doesn't mean you're ready to hear them," he said, quietly and thinking of Isobel. "Sometimes, you have to work through some of the shit before you can even begin to... have that conversation."

Elijah nodded, just once. "I suppose you're right." His lips twisted in a bit of a grimace, self-mocking. In a burst of rare openness, he added, "I don't think it's the answers or conversation I'm dreading so much as the aftermath." He paused, not knowing how to clarify. "The divide between how I think I should feel and how I feel and what I'm upset about and what I'm not, and the guilt inherent in all of that."

Ric was surprised by the openness, but it was a really, really pleasant surprise. In as much as the subject matter would allow it to be, anyway. "How do you think you should feel and be upset about?" he asked, reaching out for Elijah's hand.

Elijah took his hand, fingers curling around Ric's and...really grateful for the contact. "I'm fairly certain I should be horrified and furious that he killed our mother," he said dryly. "Outraged he blamed it on Father. Upset he lied about it for a thousand years. Something violently emotional at the realization that it's possible I lived a thousand years in fear I didn't have to."

He squeezed Elijah's hand lightly, settled back and took another drink. That all sounded completely reasonable, but he remembered damn well that Elijah had said what he should be feeling wasn't necessarily what he was. "What are you feeling...?"

Elijah gave him a wry smile. "Anger at my parents. Sadness for my father, I suppose. But...mostly sad that Klaus never thought he could tell us the truth. That he never trusted us enough to stay if he did. Which...pretty much brings us back to anger at my parents."

Ric came really close to making a remark that he would have regretted, but he was making a concerted effort to move past his personal feelings about Klaus, raw and painful as they were, to listen to Elijah and try to understand from his point of view. Which meant trying to understand Klaus. Which was uncomfortable as hell for him, but. If he could extend it to Damon, he could make an effort to do the same with Klaus, for Elijah's sake.

That meant a long period of silence, while he mulled it over. He rubbed his thumb over the back of Elijah's hand while he did, and he drank. "I don't know if I really understand, but... it sounds close enough to some of the interactions I've had with Damon, where I'm pissed the fuck off about whatever he did, but the underlying feeling is just wanting to go back a couple of hundred years, find Damon's father and knock his teeth down his throat. Or- everyone else who feeds into his shit."

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