What exactly did Sveinn think was going to happen? That he would spill some sweet nothing to Dionysus and time would just rewind? That they could go back to the way things were before Sveinn disappeared off the face of the planet, out of Dioâs life without a word, without a text message or even a fucking postcard? Sveinn was a lot of things, most of them varieties of âstrangeâ, but he wasnât stupid. Not like that anyway. Stupid when it came to Dionysus, maybe. The wine god couldnât deny he could be stupid where it came to Sveinn. But this wasnât that.
Could it have been cruelty? From everything that Dionysus knew about Sveinn, that didnât seem like a particularly likely option. The fact that Dio couldnât 100% rule it out, however, felt like swallowing acid that ate at his throat and sat burning slowly through the lining of his stomach. Sveinnâs words had put most of that fear to rest. But not all. Previously, Sveinnâs radio silence had been playful, something to joke about - or to play dumb about - when next the two met. Again, this wasnât that. This was radio silence and physical disappearance like only the memory of smoke. As if Sveinn had never existed in the first place. The only thing that kept Dionysus from thinking he had imagined all their time together was the memory of Sveinn telling him that he could never feel entirely settled in a place. Dionysus understood wanderlust. He understood thrill-seeking better than anyone. But to disappear without even a single word? That was harder to swallow.
After those words were spoken to him by the man he had loved and probably should have known better than to trust, Dioâs plans for the day melted away. The words - and, moreso, the voice speaking them - refused to leave his head. There was no working after that, no playing around with friends or messing about on his own. All that was left was wandering, step by step, until eventually the god found himself in the residential district facing a particular apartment building. Part of him, the part that he would have preferred to lean further towards, hoped to look up and find himself standing before his own apartment building where he would go home and spend the night drinking and who knows what else. The other part, the one that knew him better, wasnât the least bit surprised to find the Norse building towering before him. It was so predictable, he almost sighed.
Dionysus followed his gut then, stepping through the doorway, entering the elevator and pressing the familiar cold metal of the button for Sveinnâs floor (he didnât trust his legs to take him up the stairs, not now), and leaving the cold chrome coffin to walk through a hallway that looked so much like his own and felt so much like home. He wanted to hate that it felt that way. He wanted to.
Before his mind could change itself, Dio found his knuckles meeting the door in a sharp but quiet tunk, tunk, tunk. He almost expected the sound to echo in the empty hallway, but it died almost as it hit the wood. As each moment passed, the god felt more and more like he was watching himself move, seeing the knocks and the way he shifted on his feet more than he felt himself doing them.
Then all at once he was sitting across from Sveinn, staring into the demigod, staring through him, then avoiding the manâs form altogether. It was like living in a memory. Dionysus wanted to laugh. Or cry. Or both. He doesnât think about the words before he says them, allowing the pure swirling aubergine chaos of his emotions to take control. That was how he was meant to be, after all.
âTell me,â Sveinn says.
And he does.
âIâm right here,â Sveinn says, and Dionysus wants to scream, but his throat has tightened and thickened and the treasonous flesh probably knows whatâs better for him anyway.
âYou donât have to miss me.â
But he does, gods, he does, and if he doesnât he thinks he might just burn alive.
