“I ah… that… it didn’t work out…” He could feel that traitorous want to be understood still in his bones. There was a temptation there to just open up, to say something, to show himself to someone, anyone and hope this time, maybe he would be understood. But he knew the terrible danger in that. Humans couldn’t actually hurt him. Not really. But they very much could. With every recoil, with every harsh word of rejection, with every time he was pushed away as something strange and other he was reminded he was not like them. And yet he wanted someone to understand.
“Did you eat?” He stared blankly at Lakes, not quite understanding how they had gotten to here. “Did you drink something?”
“I… had coffee. And I ate. Probably too little. I haven’t… I can’t eat in the morning a lot. Makes me feel weird. Then I’m not hungry. Or I forget.”
“Sit down then, have some water.” He pulled a little flask out from inside his vest and handed it to Anthony.
Anthony took a swig of mineral heavy, body temperature water that tasted far better than it should have. Lakes sat down on one of the cross pieces and started packing his pipe.
Anthony drank slowly, trying not to let more words spill out of him. He knew Lakes and he also didn’t. Lakes couldn’t get him fired here, but could get him fired as Ash if he said too much. He couldn’t afford that. Well… he could. He didn’t have to do things this way. He could go back to chasing Marsh through the salons of the East Coast, tempting him there. Go back to being Mr. Crowley, full of poisonous questions that turned knowledge into a terrible weapon.
He didn’t want to. Wasn’t sure he could. He’d been falling apart, losing time. Losing himself. Hell had given him a great deal of leeway with how to accomplish this job but they’d want more concrete results than people making social jabs at each other.
Here… he was losing himself as well. Pretending to be two different people. Two different people fighting over… what? Over the parts of him he didn’t really like much. The parts he was afraid made him unlovable even to himself.
He looked over at Lakes, who was looking off into the distance while smoking his pipe. He wasn’t even looking at him. He was totally unconcerned about the demon next to him. No… that was wrong. He was concerned. He just wasn’t worried about Anthony. He was worried for him. And that hurt more than it had any right to. That strangers, that humans, saw him falling apart, saw him losing himself, and were… treating him like a human.
More in Bone Wars on AO3. It has dinosaurs and a lot of pining.
