fuguestates | Portrait of a Man on Fire (Painter/Subject)

They spend every afternoon for the next two weeks in this way: Alecto arranged gracefully across some form of chair, stool, or ottoman, and Joshua with his head down, buried in his work, his fingertips stained red, black, and chalky white.

Alecto observes his painter as much as Joshua studies him, commits to memory the arch of his high cheekbones, the curl of his golden hair, the way his brow would furrow gingerly when he was particularly focused. He looked particularly charming like that, Alecto thought, so lost in the details of his work that it was impossible for him to hide his clear love of the craft.

They start to talk, of course. Alecto couldn't stand the intense silence for very long and would often comment on anything that came to mind. Recently, he brought up something he had read in a local penny dreadful, a series he had been particularly taken by and had discovered, on pure accident, that Joshua was also an avid reader. A sort of warmth began to finally spread in the space between them and after nearly a full month, Alecto realized how much happier he had been having his painter in his home, at his dinner table, and by his side during their frequent morning walks by the sea cliffs.

But curiously, after all this time, a single portrait had not yet been completed. And the dark rot of his previous commissions, stacked and covered in hiding in the North Wing, is making Alecto worry.

A day ago, he cuts himself on a rosebush in the garden. It stuns him, the red line against his palm. Even more so when it doesn't immediately close and starts to ache.

Time is starting to tick again for Alecto Crabtree.

By now he'd filled three whole books, cover to cover, with studies, sketches, and details of Alecto. It's an unimaginable luxury, being able to devote himself so absolutely to a single, all-consuming subject. He had learned how to infer a mood in the minutest shift of that now-familiar face, the deceptive insouciance of his arm draped along the back of the couch. Sometimes it seemed he could draw Alecto with his eyes closed, could discern the sound of his step, the musical ring of that hard-to-earn laughter, even the pace of his breathing, could feel the unique weight of his presence even in Joshua's dreams. There was seemingly no angle, no lighting, no cloud-filtered slant of sunlight that he wouldn't be able to recognize him in. He could mix - had mixed - the exact right shade of his lips, the pale flush of his cheeks, the delicate threads of lighter color woven through his dark hair - had lined up his paints and palettes and brushes in anticipation.

And yet, he hadn't yet managed to bring himself to properly put paint to brush to canvas, the painstakingly mixed pigments drying in splotches, the brushes finer than he'd ever used before, but already becoming worn with the grooves of his fingers against the wood, alone in the guest room, recalling the motions and methods of his art, over and over every single night.

He brings a single sheet of paper today, his charcoal, his pencils, and his paints, newly mixed hues dolloped over the layered remains of the old. Alecto is there already, of course, arranged as he always was, and Joshua starts with a detail of that graceful hand, palm up, his fingers automatically selecting the colors he needs. It's not until he's finished that he registers the thinnest slice of crimson across the fleshy part of the palm, the muscles tensed against unexpected discomfort, despite the languid position Alecto has assumed.

"What happened to your hand?" he asks, coming out of his trance almost with a gasp of reaction, setting his tools doen messily and smudging the edges of the outline.

"Hm? Oh, this?" He speaks as if he had forgotten entirely about the thing, though in reality, he has been deeply worried. He lifts his hand, gazes upon it, the way the sunlight from the open window streams in and make the healing cut appear a bright red. Alecto hasn't seen this color on his body in a long, long time.

His bottom lip trembles slightly as he takes in a breath. He turns his face slightly away so that Joshua can see nothing more than just the fine slice of his jawline. "It's nothing. I was tending to the garden yesterday and got caught on a thorn." Pause. "I hardly even noticed."

Almost before he quite realizes what he's doing, he sets his things down and reaches out for Alecto's hand, peripherally conscious of the black smudges of charcoal and pencil, his fingers absolutely reverent and gentle as he cups Alecto's hand in his two, peering at the cut. "You..." he strokes his thumbs very carefully over the unbroken skin, not getting anywhere close to the cut, but feeling the tension in the muscles that he'd registered only subconsciously, reflected in his art.

It didn't look that painful, but - "Are you sure? You're...so tense..."

He can't meet Alecto's eyes with his face turned away like that, but he peers at him anyway, searching, noting the way his lip trembles, the sharp intake of breath.

He starts at the feeling of skin against skin. His face remains somewhat stiff and alert, eyes widening in surprise. But, he doesn't pull away, nor does he say anything cruel or unpleasant.

Alecto turns his face back, glancing down at their joined hands, resists the odd (very odd indeed) inclination to thread their fingers together. "I'm sure, Joshua," he says in such a soft and tender tone it might actually have come off as more shocking than if he had yelled or snapped. "It's just that it's been...a while since I've...hurt myself in such a way. I suppose I thought myself invincible for quite some time."

Edited 2022-10-06 00:23 (UTC)

He nods at Alecto's words, his fingers still gently stroking against his hand, but after a moment he seems to come back to himself and startle, as though he hadn't been wholly aware of what he was doing.

"I'm sorry, I- " he glances down at Alecto's fine, pale hand, now smudged with gray and black from the residue of charcoal and graphite dust, "...perhaps we should stop here for the day," he says apologetically, and awkwardly returns Alecto's hand, suddenly feeling deeply self-conscious of the marks from his own fingers now marring Alecto's skin (determinedly ignoring the twinge of heat that runs down his spine at the same thought). If the man had had calluses before, he didn't have them anymore, and the contrast between them was so obvious. Joshua is deeply, unexpected aware of exactly what that gulf between them was, for all that they'd settled into this odd fellowship and exchange. He doesn't wait for an answer, simply picks up his supplies, stands with a hurried bow, and flees back to his rooms, his dirty hands further smudging the depiction of Alecto's own on the torn-out page, feeling somehow guilty.

It's later that evening that he finally opens to a fresh page. Unexpectedly, he sets his charcoals and pencils aside and lays out his paints instead. It almost seems that he falls into a trance, painting from memory - afternoon sunlight filtering in past the gauzy curtains, and those so-familiar fingers, long and slender, wrapped delicately around the stem of a rose. There are still thorns, but the injustice of the injury is rectified here - Alecto's fingers are perfectly placed along the cut green stem, every inch of visible skin flawless and whole, though the careful shadows and curves insinuate the bumps and indentations of the stem against his fingertips, the folds of his joints and muscles curved in an exact configuration, but utterly relaxed, not a hint of tension apparent despite the positioning.

It is early morning by the time he feels satisfied with his work, and yet he stares at the drying paint, frowning, feeling unexpectedly drained, and yet elated at the same time. The image looks - exactly right, exactly how he held Alecto's hand in his memory, exactly what he saw when he closed his eyes. But that hunger in the back of his mind, that had seemingly always been present since he'd first laid eyes on Alecto, is a loud, droning roar in his ears.

He wakes up late the next morning - later in the morning - even missing the seaside walk that he and Alecto had somehow formed the habit of taking together. He dresses hurriedly, messily, and stumbles through the now-familiar paths through the house to the drawing room again, unsure of what he'll find there.

Early that same morning, the sky still grey with the previous night, Alecto had sat by the window and stared at his hand. The palm of it was smooth and supple again, no trace of a wound ever having been there. His nails were slightly longer too, an uneven set compared to his left hand.

He breathes a shaky sigh of...relief mixed with trepidation. It's working. It must be.

He spends the next few hours alone, lost deeply in thought, wandering the house by muscle memory until he arrives to the drawing room by sheer accident, completely unaware of the time. It's then, the other set of doors directly opposite of him fling open and, due to their old and loose hinges, slam against the walls with a bang. Alecto blinks, immediately looking up to see his painter, rosy-cheeked from some earlier exertion and his brows pinched together in their usual anxious shape...

Alecto's smile is warm, genuine, and pleased. "Joshua," he says, calling the man by his given name for the very first time since they've met. "I missed you at breakfast."

He stops short, panting slightly, and startles at Alecto calling him by his first name. Once invited - so casually and automatically - he hadn't been able to make that switch back to calling him by his title, though Alecto had always kept him at armslength, calling him by his surname.

"I... I'm sorry, I - overslept," he says, lamely, suddenly feeling deeply self-conscious, running his paint-flecked fingers through his untidy hair and mussing it further, trying to suppress the urge to fidget under that smile - a real smile, not the pallid, polite expressions that usually made their home on Alecto's face. "Were you waiting long?"

"Not at all. I had quite a nice morning in fact."

His smile stays as he stalks over to the chaise once more, his shoes clicking against the hardwood. He sits, crossing his ankle over his knee. "Don't apologize if you've done nothing wrong," he says, breezily. He gestures to the seat next to him, Joshua's usual one. "Should we begin?"

For once, Alecto seems...eager to start the process.

It's on the tip of Josh's tongue to joke - because I wasn't there? - but he's silent in the face of Alecto's unexpected smile, the warm, inviting bloom of it, the tension that seemed to always live in the set of his jaw dissolved utterly away. He sits, obediently, and then seems to belatedly remember that he didn't even have his supplies with him, and pushes himself back onto his feet to fetch the expensive, top-of-the-line materials that Alecto kept stock of in the room back to the chair again.

He starts, today, with Alecto's mouth, with the fine-boned curve of his jaw and the shadows of his slender neck, picking out minute shifts in expression, the slightest twitch of a muscle, Alecto's lips parted around a deeper inhale than usual. He works lower - picking out the Adam's apple and the hollow of his throat, peeking out just above where Alecto's undone cravat was folded unevenly against pale skin, revealing just a hint of his collarbone. His fingers stop, suddenly, a sense of uncertainty stealing over him. He was certainly capable of drawing and painting clothing, had developed a good sense for drape and texture with his paints. But something in him balks at the exercise, and he stares down at the paper, his cheeks pinking with an odd realization.

He notices when the familiar scratch of red chalk on paper stops and silence fills the space left behind. He turns, rather elegantly, a slice of dark hair sliding over his face.

“What’s the matter?”

"I..." He trails off, uncertainty stopping up his mouth, the magnitude of the desire filling him seeming too disrespectful to let out. But something within him is demanding it, his fingers utterly slack and immobile, refusing to obey the rational part of his mind.

"Have... you ever posed as a life drawing model, for other painters?" he forces out, his head ducked low, his voice a mere whisper, staring at the page.

He doesn’t reply immediately, studying Josh’s face instead, the way his cheeks pink and his eyes are deliberately looking down as if wishing to melt completely into the paper in his lap.

…it’s almost cute.

“Yes, in fact,” he says finally. “I was wondering when you’d ask.”

He starts immediately removing his clothes, unbuttoning his shirt and letting the cravat fall to the ground. The fine fabrics slide off of him like warm butter and soon enough he’s entirely nude, rearranging himself on the chaise once more. Alecto is relaxed and casual, the sunlight streaming in from the open windows all around him cloaking him in gold.

“How’s this?” He asks, resting his chin against his hand.

Alecto strips with utter unself-consciousness, not a hint of shame, shedding all his clothes with graceful, unstudied movements, as easily as if he were utterly alone in his own room, rather than in the light, airy drawing room, with the curtains open to the gardens outside, where passing servants could easily look in.

Oddly enough, as Alecto's entire body is bared before Josh's eyes, his fingers unclench. He knows his thoughts are not wholly focused on his art, but his devotion to it is still the motivating factor, his hands moving once more on the page, tracing out the lines of Alecto's bare shoulders, his torso, his upper arms. There is an odd familiarity to it, despite this being only the second time Josh had laid eyes on him in his entirety - he knows this body, has inferred it from the deep study he has made of every other visible part, neck to wrists to knees.

He falls under that spell and doesn't even answer Alecto's question.

He knows this feeling. The feeling of being known and seen and understood. He wonders if he really needed to remove his clothes at all, or if Joshua Archer has already seen through him enough these past few weeks to be able to intuit his form and all of its detail by sheer imagination.

He wonders also if the painter has already imagined his body in a different way, alone and under the safe, dark cover of evening.

“For the final portrait, would you want it like this as well?” He’s grinning, amused, curious how the other man would respond. As he speaks, he shifts, letting one long leg fall to dangle off the edge of the chaise. It’s not an inherently refined position at all and yet Alecto somehow still appears graceful instead of sloppy.

He startles at being addressed, feeling suddenly skittish, like a nervous deer, and it takes a long fraught moment before Alecto's words actually register to his uncertain ear.

"I... don't know yet," he mumbles, looking down at the page again, though he can't help but glance up at Alecto, at the sun-limned expanse of limbs and bare skin, of the sight of his body on perfect display in the last of the morning sunlight, as the clock strikes noon. "I... what would you like, Alecto?"

"It's not about what I like," he says, and when he realizes immediately after just how chilly his tone had been, he sighs. "...I mean," he ads, carefully, "I prefer not to have a hand in your creative process. Whatever that might mean for you. It works best if everything is done as organically as possible."

Alecto pauses to consider his last phrasing. It was...odd, he's aware. He glances at Joshua, his gaze curious and sharp as always. "...There's no rush," he says, trying hard to be encouraging and patient. "I enjoy being your muse."

That was not the first time Alecto had said something along those lines - that it was Josh's preferences that mattered, rather than Alecto's, despite Alecto being the customer in this situation. For all that they'd become more familiar over the past few weeks, there were still so many things Josh didn't fully understand about his eccentric and inspiring host's expectations for the work he'd been engaged to create. But he does know that there's something within him that's turning the question over internally, that has a vision for what he eventually wanted to produce. He can hear the patience and encouragement in Alecto's tone, but the unspoken weight of expectation still presses down heavily on him.

"I just...don't understand what you're getting out of this," he says, quietly, glancing up again between Alecto and the page and setting down his chalk. "Surely there are other painters - more skilled than I am - you could engage for this."

He sighs, his eyes set resolutely on Josh's face. "I suppose I could. But it's not about skill, Joshua. This portrait will mean a lot to me, you must understand. And I alone will judge its value. I'll know when I see it and from just the studies you've engaged in so far, I'm certain you're capable of delivering what I need."

Suddenly, he reaches out to hold the painter's stained hand. It's a light slotting of their fingers together and a loose grip overall but it is a shock to feel skin against skin after so many days of merely looking.

"...Perhaps you simply need a little more encouragement?"

Edited 2022-10-11 16:09 (UTC)

His pad of paper and charcoals and pencils fall down to the floor as he startles, his fingers clenching reflexively against Alecto's before they loosen again. There is naked longing in his expression, but it is subdued, repressed, as he whispers, "What do you mean by that?"

He can't seem to help running his thumb along Alecto's palm, and then he glances down, suddenly distracted, turning his hand over, facing up. "What...what happened to your cut? It was still here yesterday..."

"That's a secret," he murmurs and gives Josh's hand a small tug, trying to capture his attention once more. They're seated so closely already that Alecto barely has to lean forward to close the distance between their faces -

In the past, this has always helped things, had always been the root of the entire process, the core of this unique magic. Alecto couldn't explain why but so far, it hasn't failed him yet.

His fingers squeeze tight, automatically, and then he lets go, bending down to pick up his papers, and blindly groping for at least a few of his other tools before stumbling backwards, away from Alecto. "I-" he stutters, fidgeting, "I - we shouldn't -" but oh how he wanted to, "I should go."

If Joshua's reaction upsets or disturbs him, Alecto doesn't show it. Instead, he watches the painter turn to leave before he slowly gets dressed and walks out, heading towards a particular cliff's edge he knew the other man favored.

The winds are warm but wild this late in the afternoon, tossing Alecto's clothes about him in a whirl as he calls out Joshua's name.

He retreats, but he knows he doesn't really want to stay away. If anything, the offer had been far too tempting, too much the physical culmination of all the desires he'd felt building within him for all these weeks. But at the same time, there's a part of him that's reluctant, afraid of what it would mean for things to change so seemingly irrevocably.

There's a spot just off the pathway that overlooks the water, one that the two of them often passed on their morning walks, with a few pine trees lined up along the edge of the cliff, their branches hanging above the waves. Josh settles on one of the rocks, looking out at the horizon, his knees drawn up to his chest. When he hears Alecto's voice - still calm and composed - he hesitates a moment before he calls back, carried by the wind: "I'm here."

He makes his way over, flings his coattails out behind him and takes a seat calmly beside Joshua, careful not to be too close to him.

"...I suppose that was a bit presumptuous of me," he says, after a moment's silence, though he doesn't sound regretful in the least.

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