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‘The love was there. It didn’t change anything. It didnt save anyone. There were just too many forces against it. But it still matters that the love was there.’
-
“You have one wish,” the foreign vampire says, his voice deep, “but there are rules.”
Lestat is about ninety-nine percent sure he is dreaming. Since the trial, his dreams have been erratic. When he does dream, he dreams of the trial.
He dreams of the look on Louis’ face when Lestat turned around on stage and saw him, Claudia and Madeleine on the chairs. He dreams about Claudia burning and looking at him.
As strange as this dream feels, Lestat will accept anything that isn’t his nightmares. So he goes along with it.
“And the rules cannot be avoided, so do not waste your precious time trying, as you only have one opportunity.”
Lestat looks around but he doesn’t recognize where he might be; it doesn’t even look like a material place. There is a fog enveloping everything around them, and the vampire in front of him, Lestat doesn’t recognize. Despite that, he can sense his ancient power.
“Rule number one.” the vampire says, “you are unable to change the past. No matter what.”
“Rule number two: you must not tamper with anyone’s decision. Vampire or mortal. It will not matter.”
“Rule number three: you cannot change the future, as it is only in the hands of the past.”
Lestat wants to wake up, but he can’t. He hopes the sun is close to the horizon, that the pull of the coffin will unleash him soon enough to wake on his own. In the meanwhile, he seeks comfort in not having to relive the worst day of his life in his sleep, even if for just one, fortunate day.
“Rule number four; your wish may be to go back in time to just one day. To your preferred memory, if you wish. But keep this in mind: nothing you do that day will matter. Nothing you do that day will change any outcome. When you go back to the present, once the sun rises again, the only thing that you will be allowed to keep is the memory.”
Lestat considers it, indulges the vampire in his subconscious because he is better than Santiago asking the crowd to sentence his family. It is better than feeling the pressure of the coven on his mind knowing Louis and Claudia are just behind him. And so he thinks. If it was real, what would he do?
What he truly wishes doesn’t matter, because what he truly wishes goes in direct contrast with the rules. Nothing of what he truly wishes, of the only thing that he could ever want, is obtainable.
When he thinks of a fond memory, he has quite a few to choose from. And if he can’t change what happens, what difference would it make, going back to the days he has been haunted by for decades? It would be torture, knowing he can’t do anything to change it.
Realization hits him then: maybe there is a fault in the system after all. Maybe there is a way to get what he wants, or almost.
Lestat thinks about it. He closes his eyes, suddenly no more hoping to wake up. He hopes the sun is far from the horizon, hopes he has hours to dream, hopes his wish grants him at least a sight of the faces he aches to see anywhere, anywhere but in that theater.
And then he wakes up. Lestat opens the lid of the coffin and sits up abruptly, panting in the empty and dark shack. Instinctively, he laughs. Secondly, he puts his face in his hands. At least he tried.
But then, something happens. Like a glimmer he can feel reverberating around him. And when Lestat takes his hands off his face, he’s on his bed. On his marital bed. In his bedroom. In his townhouse.
Startled, he looks down at himself, to find himself dressed in a suite and tie set he recognizes all too well: because Louis picked it out for him. Because he remembers the exact night he tried it on, when Louis looked at him and nodded his head, and so he bought it.
Lestat is in New Orleans.
He goes still. It takes him a few seconds to process. Has he not woken up yet? Was him waking up part of the dream, and he’s still in his coffin, sleeping and finally dreaming of something else?
There are quite a few things Lestat believes in, and there are even more things he doesn’t believe in, but he’s here now, and it feels real… this is real. He’s gotten his fair share of dreams, bad dreams and good dreams, and they feel nothing like this. As he gets off his bed and walks to the window, his mouth hangs half-open when he spots the night-life of the Quarter in all its splendor.
Lestat looks around the room frantically. He scrambles to the other side of the room, looking on the commodes, pushing any item on his way off and on the floor. He turns, and turns, looking for—
Lestat grabs the radio from the nightstand and turns it on, his fingers shaking slightly. He waits.
“Winter 1919 is currently the coldest it has been in a whi…”
Lestat turns the radio off and lets out a shaky, hysteric but over-joyful laughter. An exhale so heavy he blinks several times, trying to make sense. It worked. It actually worked.
Lestat’s stomach drops when he hears it: Claudia’s voice, coming from downstairs, happily humming a melody Lestat doesn’t recognize. What Lestat can hear next is the trotting of her feet on the floor downstairs.
“No running in the house, little miss!”
Claudia’s giggles in response echo in the house, but in the quiet of the bedroom, Lestat audibly gasps. He goes inhumanly still.
Louis.
Despite his first instinct and desire, his legs won’t let him move for a few initial moments. When Lestat snaps out of his freezing state, he slowly exits the bedroom, and makes his way downstairs with a feebleness in his bones.
Lestat’s eyes fill with tears when he takes the last step of the stairwell.
Louis is sitting on their couch, intent on reading a book.
Lestat gets swiped by a whirlwind of emotions he can barely keep inside, a sound close to a joyful whine escapes his lips without him meaning to, causing Louis to lifts his gaze.
The smile on Louis’ lips is warmer than a thousand suns. It is better than hot blood.
“Hey.” Louis says.
Lestat does not want to waste this. He lifts the corner of his lip, but doesn’t move just yet. He stands there for a few moments more, letting himself take Louis in in all the impossible beauty Lestat has never been able to wrap his head around. He tries to commit this to memory, the first of a few… if of today the only thing he will be able to keep is the memory, this sounds like an excellent one to keep.
Lestat thinks he could wait a millennia and then some with just the image of Louis reading on his couch again.
“Lestat?” Louis’s voice snaps him out of his thoughts.
“Yes, chéri?” Lestat hears himself say.
It feels all so familiar and yet so far away at the same time.
“Are you ready?”
Lestat feels tears prickling at his eyes, but he blinks them away. “For what, mon ami?”
Louis’ brows furrow, but then his forehead relaxes again and he just smiles. “The movie is starting soon.”
Louis closes his book and leaves it on the couch, then he gets up and straightens his sleeves. “Claudia?” he calls, “Claudia! We gon’ be late!”
“And what’s goin’ on with you?” Louis exclaims, chuckling at the end of the sentence as he makes his way to Lestat. The familiar southern intonation on his voice making Lestat’s eye turn pink again.
Lestat shakes his head, his eyes glued to Louis the whole time. “You’re just beautiful. That is all.”
Louis blinks, tilting his head at him. Then he smiles widely, and Lestat’ throat aches from trying to keep the tears back. He missed Louis’ smile so much. He missed this Louis’ smile so much.
“You ain’t so bad either.” Louis says, gliding his eyes up and down Lestat’s entire figure with a look that makes him shiver.
This, Lestat missed too. Louis’ desire, oozing out of him even when he doesn't speak it out loud.
Louis stops in front of him, he lifts one hand and brushes it against one of Lestat’s suspenders. His chin slightly lifted up, staring at Lestat with languid eyes, lips arched in a devious smile. “Told you this one woulda looked good on you.”
“Ready!” Claudia practically flies down the stairs, trotting past them to the door.
“No runnin’ down the stairs, little miss!” says Louis while taking his coat.
“Claudia.” Lestat breathes, turning to where Claudia is standing, wearing her own coat by the door.
Claudia looks at Lestat and adjusts her hair. When Lestat doesn’t say anything else, Claudia giggles.
“Did the cat eat your tongue, uncle Les?”
It’s strange, how the love of a daughter can change someone forever. For a long time Lestat hadn’t thought of himself as someone who could ever be a parent, and Claudia hadn’t changed that, if anything, it had only validated that feeling, the fear of ruining someone like you have been ruined, of repeating the same mistakes that made Lestat who he is.
Then Claudia had arrived, in the most complicated situation, died and born out of guilt, and nothing had ever been the same, ever again. It was like a part of Lestat’s heart had split from the rest of it, and it had been Claudia’s ever since: for Claudia to break, for Claudia to keep.
“Ma cherie.” blood-red tears sting in the back of Lestat’s eyes. “Let me look at you.”
Claudia makes a twirl on herself, making Louis smile. “It’s late, come on.”
Lestat is almost afraid to take a step closer, afraid to even so much as breathe, afraid he could blink his eyes and they would both be gone again.
And then Claudia smiles, and Lestat does it again, tries to commit it to memory. He stores it next to the image of Louis beaming at him, and tucks both of them in the safest place in his brain, silently praying they will stick.
Surprisingly, Lestat remembers how to drive. They arrive at the theater with only one minute to spare, and rush inside to their seats just before the movie starts.
Apparently, they are watching The Girl-Woman (1919).
Lestat cries awfully fifteen minutes in, and he’s in a fit of suffocated sobs before the credits roll. When he glances at Louis, he sees a red blood tears glistening in the dark. Louis holds his hand under the seat until the movie is over and the lights turn on again.
“See you at home.” Louis says sometime after the movie during their walk, and Lestat’s mind is still with the movie so he doesn’t realize yet he’s talking to him and Claudia.
Before he knows it Louis is gone, not before placing his hand on Lestat’s shoulder and giving it a familiar squeeze; one of the many ways they’d greet or say goodbye to each other in public when uninvited eyes were all around them.
Claudia stops in front of him and makes Lestat come back to reality. His eyes still burn.
“Where to today, uncle Les?”
Lestat does not understand what she means at first.
It is only when he sees the sparkle of Claudia’s fangs behind her lips that he recognizes the feeling inside his veins. Hunger. He has no idea when he last fed, both in his actual timeline and in this one, but being surrounded by Louis and Claudia had completely deafened all his other senses, dulling the ache for blood inside of him. He feels he does not even need it, somehow. Like he could just life off of Louis’s smiles and Claudia’s laugh for the rest of his life.
They walk to one of their usual hunt areas, close to the river. It is a cloudless night and the moon is full and bright up in the sky.
“Uncle Les? Can I ask you something?”
“Anything, ma chérie.”
“I asked the same question to Daddy Lou, but I wanted to ask you, too. Is that ok?”
Lestat looks at Claudia. The light of the moon makes her eyes glisten. “Of course.”
“What is it like? Love between two men?”
Lestat halts. Claudia stops a few steps ahead of him, and turns to look at him, her head tilted and all the curiosity of a teenager on her face.
“And what did Daddy Lou say?”
Claudia smiles cheerfully. “He said it works like love.”
Lestat feels his heart strikingly full.
“He is right.” Lestat answers.
No matter how much he tries, Lestat does not remember the last time he drank from a human. He thinks he remembers the taste of human blood, he thinks he still remembers the way it feels on his tongue, but then he tastes it again, and all his senses crumble under the overwhelming feeling. It is staggering, sensational.
He moves like it is natural, because it is. His body feels light, feels dexterous, feels strong. None of the weakness he feels in the shack. His vampire speed doesn’t betray him, and he takes hold of the woman when she escapes like it is light work, like he’s done many times before. Lestat pierces her neck with his fangs, and what comes next makes the world go technicolor. The blood of the kill flows sweetly inside of him, sweet syrup dancing in his veins.
Despite this, it doesn’t come close to watching Claudia hunt and feed. He remembers teaching her, and he sees her applying all his advices and corrections like she was born to do it. Lestat observes as Claudia drains his own victim’s friend slowly, taking her time to lap on her neck, taste her blood, holding the woman twice her size close to her.
Claudia throws her head back, letting the blood fall down her throat, and Lestat can’t look away. Tears sting his eyes again, and this time he can’t keep them in. He lets them stain his cheeks red, as he feels his stomach stirring with a familiar sensation: the claws of pure pride.
The cursed mirror of himself, the best of his vampiric self.
During the walk home, Claudia trots around joyfully.
“How did you and Daddy meet?”
Lestat can’t help but smile. “Did we not tell you that story already?”
“No.”
“Really?”
Claudia shrugs. “So?”
“I courted Louis for months.”
“How did you know he was the one for you?”
Lestat looks at Claudia. “I knew it instantly.”
“Really?”
“Really.” Lestat states.
“But how?”
Another smile tugs at the corner of Lestat’s lips, and he thinks about what Louis would say if he was with them, how he would tell Claudia something about being too curious and then give up when she would use her big pleading eyes to trick him into doing anything she wanted.
“Sometimes you just know, Claudia. I did. You will, too.”
“I will?” Claudia’s smile is hopeful, her eyes staring at Lestat in the darkness.
“Can you promise me something?”
Claudia stops walking, and tilts her head at him. “Of course.”
Lestat kneels down so that he can look at Claudia face to face. He takes his time to take in her face staring at him with love in her eyes. He can let himself think it is love, right? He can let himself believe he is not mistaking it, right? That there was love, once? That it was not just a dream?
“If you find someone you love, don’t let it get away from you. Even if something happens. Love them fiercely, love them loudly. Love them. Whatever happens… if there is love there, it still matters. Love matters.”
He asks himself whom these words are for, which one of them needs them most.
But then Claudia beams at him and Lestat’s heart aches in his chest. Claudia throws herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him in a hug.
Tears wet his cheeks for the fourth time in that night, and he holds her close to him in her arms so tightly and for so long she chuckles until she wiggles out of his grip.
Claudia happily runs to her room once they get home, and Louis watches her go with a fond smile on his lips before greeting Lestat with another smile, this one reserved to him only.
Louis catches Lestat off guard when he throws his arms around Lestat’s neck and looks at him. “Took you longer than usual tonight.”
It is still hard to believe it’s real. Lestat wraps his arms around Louis and pushes him closer to himself, like touching every ounce of his skin and feeling Louis’ warm skin against his own is still not enough, like having him in his arms again is something that has felt so far out of reach for so long that it feels like a big joke.
But it isn’t, Lestat knows it isn’t when Louis leans closer and kisses him.
Lestat returns the kiss with fierceness and a sob that dies on his lips and gets swallowed by Louis. Louis moves his lips against Lestat intensely, and he gently slides his fingers through Lestat’s hair, making Lestat let out a moan inside Louis’ mouth.
It is the best kiss he has ever had and yet it is never enough. He wants to remember this, he thinks he could live forever just by remembering this: the way Louis’ lips move against his, the way Louis’ breath feels against his face, the way Louis’ hands travel down his body, Louis’ moan when Lestat swiftly turns them around and makes Louis’ back hit the wall.
They end up on the couch where they kiss for minutes—hours, maybe, Lestat doesn’t know; they are lost in each other, sweet pecks here and there, just them, just them.
They spend the night like hundreds other nights they spent together, but Lestat soaks in every second of it, filling his heart with Louis’ reprimands to an undisciplined Claudia, her laugh in response, the way her voice sounds when she says Lestat’s name. And Louis’ laugh, the image of Louis’ reading by the fireplace, the image of Claudia writing in her diary laid down on her stomach on the floor. The way Louis’ eyes drift to Lestat here and there, giving him mischievous looks that make Lestat shiver from head to toe. Even the way the air smells when it is filled with their voices.
Lestat laughs more than he’s laughed in almost a century, all decades combined. He laughs until his ribs hurt. He smiles and smiles and smiles and smiles until his face hurts from it. Until his lips ache from it, and he keeps going, silently prays—fully knowing of praying for the impossible— that the creases in the corners of his eyes stay forever like they do on humans, to be a reminder of these smiles.
They dance in their courtyard. Lestat savors the way his hands feel when they’re locked with Louis’ and Claudia’s hands, dancing together until Claudia breaks out in a fit of laughter and starts dancing around the courtyard on her own, occasionally standing in front of their incinerator, watching the corpses he and Claudia bled dry burn in awe.
Lestat holds out his hand for Louis. “May I?”
Louis rolls his eyes light-heartedly and takes Lestat’s hand in his, letting Lestat spin him around. They slow dance together, holding each other close, swaying left and right; Louis lays his cheek on Lestat’s shoulder, his warm breath against Lestat’s neck. Lestat turns his head and kisses Louis’ temple.
Louis’ hands travel up and down Lestat’s spine, and Lestat holds him with an unyielding grip. What does he have to do for this to happen every night? He doesn’t care about the consequences, doesn’t care this won’t change the future. If he can do this, why does it have to matter? He can stay like this forever. Nothing else matters. He can stay here for eternity and beyond.
“Do you want to go back to Monsieur Doucet tomorrow?” Louis whispers in the crook of his neck.
Lestat thinks for a second, but it takes him just a couple of them to remember: the tailor that accommodated them in everything ever since Lestat disembarked in New Orleans, the easily bribed man that did Lestat’s entire wardrobe under Louis’ fashion advice.
A smug smile grows on Lestat’s pink lip. “You like this one so much, mon cher?”
Lestat can feel Louis smile against his neck. “Oui.”
Lestat breathes in, inhaling Louis’ scent in his nostrils, filling his lungs with the one scent he calls home.
“Wait until you see what is underneath.”
Louis snorts against his neck, pushing Lestat away light-heartedly but Lestat is quicker, he grabs Louis hands and pulls him closer again, smiling devilishly.
“Quit it.” Louis says, and Lestat knows him too well to know he doesn’t mean it in the slightest. He knows this used to be their game, the tease, Louis pretending he didn’t enjoy when Lestat would push his buttons, turning a light flirt into a contest between who would last longer keeping their hands to themselves. In the early days, this was their routine.
“I do not think you want me to quit.” Lestat murmurs, sliding his hands on Louis’ hips and pushing him flat against himself.
“That’s a whole damn lot of talk and little to no action for my likings.”
“Oh I will show you action, my sweet.”
“Uncle Les!”
Lestat lets his devilish smirk turn into a fond smile. He sighs, happily. He doesn’t think he enjoyed it enough—the simplicity of it all.
“Yes, ma petite?” Lestat says, looking from Louis in his arms to Claudia.
“Can we play the piano?”
“Yes, Uncle Les will play the piano with you.” Louis replies for him, and gets himself out of Lestat’s grip, but not before Lestat can steal a kiss on his cheek.
Claudia’s fingers move hesitantly on the keys, following attentively Lestat’s hands. They play Adagio E Cantabile, or at least Lestat plays it and lets Claudia accompany him—apparently they had been practicing it for days, if memory does not betray him. Sometimes details are lost in a haze. Lestat knows the notes by heart, his fingers move with little to no effort, and so he takes his time to look at Claudia. Somehow, she does not look like a kid at all. What Lestat sees is the great, strong woman she’s become. That she will become.
Lestat is aware of Louis’ gaze on them. When he steals a look or two at Louis, he is staring at them with the fondest smile he has ever seen on Louis. Lestat lifts his eyes from the keys and sends a kiss in the air aimed for Louis. He sees Louis actually blush from it, biting his bottom lip.
When Lestat got catapulted into this reality, he swore to make the best of it, to not sulk or think of the inevitable. But as he stares at Claudia now, he can’t help but feel it all, all the pain, the guilt, the resentment, the remorse, the grief. He can’t change it. He can’t change her future. He can’t help but hurt her, and he can’t change her life, for the better or the worse. The image of Claudia at the trial flashes in his mind, and he feels like he can’t breathe.
“Uh-” Claudia stops playing and looks up at him when he misses a note.
“I apologize.” Lestat utters, trying to remember where he went wrong. In every sense.
“It’s okay,” Claudia’s voice sings beside him, “we can always start over.”
Lestat looks at her and he is aware of the tears in his eyes. His lips trembles. He nods. “Yeah,” he croaks out. “Maybe.”
When Claudia goes to get ready for bed, Louis approaches him outside.
“What’s up with you tonight?” he asks, lighting his cigarette with Lestat’s already lit one.
Lestat shrugs.
I miss you. I miss you terribly.
“Are you okay? You looked out of it earlier. Is it the piece you played?”
Lestat feels so full of love he can hardly breathe.
”No. Everything is perfect.”
“Hm.” Louis throws a tentative look at Lestat before nodding.
“I’m sorry, Louis.”
Louis’ brows furrow. “What for?” he asks, taking the first drag of his cigarette.
Lestat shakes his head.
“I don’t know.”
Louis lets out a breathy laugh. “You’re bein’ weird.”
“Maybe I just…” Lestat starts, uncertain of how to continue. “I am glad. You are with me.” is all he says. Because it’s true. Because it is the only eternity he can picture.
Louis’s face turns tender after that. “I’m glad you’re here with me, too. But you’re scarin’ me.”
Lestat laughs. He throws his cigarette away and stomps on it.
”Do you remember the first time we met?”
Louis’ eyes narrow. “‘Course I do. I could never forget it.”
“Me neither, Louis. I never will forget it.”
Louis leans his back against the wall and stands next to Lestat. He nudges his shoulder with his own. “Okay,” he says. “You’d tell me if there was something wrong?”
Lestat laughs again, this time breathily, like the air doesn’t quite reach his lungs. “Yes.”
Louis nods, visible reassured. He kisses Lestat’s shoulder before taking another drag of his cigarette.
“Tell me of the time Grace brought home that stray cat and it ended up scratching you again.” Lestat utters in the silence of the night.
Louis laughs, shaking his head. “I told you that story a hundred times.”
“Tell me again. Please.”
Louis indulges him, and Lestat listens to him talking about how Florence had contacted any medic available in town to make sure Louis had not gotten rabies. The truth is that Lestat just likes the way Louis laugh when the tells the story.
“I love seeing you like this.” Lestat tells him at last.
“Like what?” asks Louis, throwing the cigarette away.
”Happy. You are so beautiful when you smile. I never want to see you not smiling.”
Louis searches for Lestat’s face. He takes Lestat’s hand in his, sighing happily. “You know,” he says, “seeing you two together makes me really happy.”
Lestat goes still.
”It really does.”
Lestat swallows heavily. He pushes from the wall and goes to stand in front of Louis.
For a bit, he just smiles without saying anything. Then, Lestat brings his hand to cradle Louis’s cheek. Green glimmering eyes stare back at him lovingly.
“You are my life, Louis. You give meaning to my entire existence. Always remember this. You are all I am, mon coeur. Forever.”
If the dark is not deceiving him, Louis’ green eyes start to look wet. He pulls Lestat closer and kisses him sweetly, tenderly but intensely, with all himself, and Lestat abandons into the kiss completely.
Their tongues lap at each other, and it grows hungrier as Lestat pushes against Louis against the wall. Louis grabs Lestat’s belt and pulls him even closer, like if they could melt together into one entity they would, and Lestat’s whole body shivers.
“Forever.” Lestat whispers against Louis’s lips.
“Yes.” Louis breathes out inside his mouth. “Yes.”
Later that night, as Louis drags him to the couch to cuddle and listen to music, Lestat can feel the night ending. He knows the sun is close to rising, and when Claudia steps in the living room in her pajamas, he feels his heart in his throat. He needs longer than this.
“Will you do me my hair, Uncle Les?”
Lestat lets Claudia sit on the floor as he tries to recall everything Louis taught him.
He braids Claudia’s hair like he did many times before, like Louis did to him many times even before that.
“Thank you!” Claudia exclaims, and she’s on her feet again, taking her diary and her pen.
“Time for bed, little miss.” Louis kisses the top of her head and Claudia hugs him instead.
Louis shakes his head, but smiling fondly, and holds her. “And no writing in the coffin no more, you know we can hear the pen!”
“But-”
“No but! You gotta sleep, chérie.”
Lestat watches them in silence, and he doesn’t even realize it when he breaks into a fit of silent laughter. He quickly dries his wet cheek with his pointer finger.
“What are you doing?” Louis says, letting Claudia go and looking at Lestat with a puzzled expression.
Lestat pushes a strand of hair behind his ear, a smile on his lips. “Just committing this to memory.” he confesses.
He safely stores the image of Louis and Claudia hugging next to all the others.
“Night. Uncle Les!”
“Goodnight, chérie.” Lestat says, “Sweet dreams.”
Claudia sends a flying kiss to both men before disappearing upstairs. Lestat really means it: he does hope she dreams, he does home her dreams are happy.
When Lestat wears his pajama and looks at himself in the mirror of their bedroom, the pull of the coffin is nothing compared to the knot that he feels in his stomach. In the midst of it all, though, he finds himself deeply grateful.
They lay in Louis’ coffin. Lestat had forgotten what it felt like to not lay in a coffin alone. His coffin was too big for him, it had always felt too empty without Louis in it. Too much space unoccupied, a mirror of his inhabited heart. With Louis, any coffin is perfect. They always fit perfectly, like two pieces of a puzzle whose borders fit only each other.
They talk. They talk about anything and everything. Lestat tells Louis about Claudia haunting; he remembers Louis always wanted to hear about it, how he used to say he didn’t want to be there but he felt bad for missing out on seeing her, and so Lestat had made it his mission to take out all the worse details he knew Louis did not want to hear about and filter it through his eyes, where only pride and adoration were present, two things he knew—he knows— Louis shares for Claudia. Louis tells him the gossip about the two employees of the new club on Liberty Street who are having an affair, and how all the clubs near it are talking about it and it won’t be long until it reaches everyone’s ears. Louis tells him of his plans for the following week, of which movie he wants to go see. Lestat tells him he likes the sound of his voice,
”My voice?”
”Yes, my sweet. Your voice. I miss your voice when you are not around.”
Lestat listens to Louis as he explains to him the plot of the new book he’s reading, talking for hours about his interpretation of the writers’ thoughts.
Lestat lays his head and his ear on Louis’ chest, he closes his eyes and listens to the drum of his other heart.
They cuddle. They exchange stolen kisses.
Lestat breathes in Louis’ scent in silence while he reads. Then, Louis’ hand travels to Lestat’s hair, and his fingers massage his scalp in rotating motions that make Lestat heart burst with joy. He sighs happily against Louis’ neck without even realizing it, and hears Louis’ satisfied hum.
For a while, Lestat just stares at Louis, soaking every single crease of his focused expression when he reads. listening to their hearts beating together for what feels like hours.
“Louis?” Lestat asks at one point.
A hum answers for him, Louis’ eyes on the book but his hand stays on Lestat’s thigh, caressing it in circles.
Lestat looks at it and he smiles softly. He places his hand on top of Louis’s, and Louis lifts his gaze from the book, looking at him with loving eyes.
“What is it?” his tender voice makes Lestat want to cry. But no, this is a happy memory.
This is a happy memory.
Lestat brings their hands now joined to his mouth, and he kisses Louis’ hand softly before bringing them back to his thigh.
Lestat wets his lips. This is a happy memory. Would it change anything? No. Would it matter? Yes. Yes, it matters. It matters to him.
“I love you, Louis.”
Louis blinks twice, then slowly shows Lestat a tender smile that makes Lestat’s heart flutter. He leans over, and kisses Lestat’s jaw oh so tenderly.
This is the way, Lestat remembers like it was yesterday, this is Louis. This is his Louis, doting lips on his skin, kissing him. And it is enough, how could it ever not be?
Lestat opens his eyes again and looks at the windows, knowing the first sun rays will soon come. He doesn’t want to let go. He would do anything to stay.
Lestat wraps his arms around Louis and Louis melts into the touch, discarding his book completely and shoving his face in the crook of Lestat’s neck.
Louis starts kissing it, tender little kisses on Lestat’s skin and Lestat feels like maybe there is a God out there after all.
Louis whispers against Lestat’s throat, “Shall we try to beat the sun?”
Lestat’s eyes fill with tears. He kisses the top of Louis’ head. He laughs.
“Yeah.” he croaks out, still laughing. “Yes. Yes.”
Lestat closes his eyes again, letting Louis’ small kisses on his skin lull him to the other, dreaded side. If he has to go, he chooses this way. He would choose this way over and over and over again.
Louis starts getting handsy, his hands traveling to Lestat’s zipper and Lestat’s lips arch in a smile, melting into the touch.
“Still a few minutes to sunrise…” Louis whispers before kissing Lestat’s neck again, this time hungrier, “Feel like we can make it work.”
They so can, they did countless times.
“Yes.” Lestat breathes out. “Please.”
He holds Louis close to him. When a tear escapes his left eye, he is glad Louis is still tenderly kissing his neck, unbuttoning his blouse with his right hand.
This is bliss.
Lestat thinks about Louis visiting him in cave.
He thinks about his words, Let’s see how long it holds.
It’s been so long, too long.
He needs to trust in Louis, trust that he will figure it out, trust that he will trust Lestat again, trust that he will forgive him, maybe, someday. Trust that Louis will hurry up. He is so tired of waiting.
Softly, Lestat kisses Louis’ temple. His voice is barely above a whisper, “Please, hurry up,” he quietly murmurs, holding Louis close, like maybe he can bring him to the other side, too. “I miss you.”
They make love until the sun is up, and the last thing Lestat feels is Louis’s lips on his. Lestat opens his eyes to himself, once again, alone in his coffin.
Lestat sits on his chair and starts playing Adagio E Cantabile on his plank of wood. He closes his eyes, and he can feel the ghost of Louis’ lips on his neck.
And he waits.
If he has to, he will wait forever.