You're right....you ARE marked. It says to the world "I'm Sochi Chauhan's. I've given him my body, mind, heart, and soul...my best days and my worst days...all that I have for as long as I have." And you see, I'm marked too. Mine says "I'm Aleister Hyde's. I've given him my body, mind, heart, and soul...my best days and my worst days...all that I have for as long as I have." That's my mark. And I will wear it proudly.
((This is actually interesting. Despite his childhood behind the camera and the modeling he did for years, he really never took pictures of himself outside of anything performance related. He’d take pictures of friends and family on his phone, but selfies weren’t a thing. Any pictures of himself he posted were ones from his modeling portfolio, headshots, photos from the BIT or dance, and, generally, photos someone else took of him.
Mostly this was because he didn’t see the point in taking a selfie. They turned out worse than posed photos (in his mind), and it felt uncomfortable for him.
This changed when he started dating Aleister. Not only was Aleister a photographer with a deeper appreciation of the meaning behind a captured moment than Sochi had had, but Aleister wanted to see pictures of Sochi that weren’t posed and perfect. He wanted to see just plain Sochi.
I actually remember an off-tumblr text conversation between the two of them before they started dating where Aleister asked for a picture, Sochi sent one of his modeling headshots, and Aleister called him out and asked for a “real picture.” Wanting to be seen as the real him was very new for Sochi, was a factor that made his crush on Aleister skyrocket, and also lead to him starting to take selfies.
Aleister is probably the only one he takes selfies for, but his view of them has changed significantly along with his affection for photos that aren’t staged.))
((In all honesty, I’m just happy that he has healthy romantic and sexual habits now. None of his other relationships were entirely fulfilling or even positive, and considering all that happened to Sochi because of Shawn, it’s honestly a testament to his desire to recover that Sochi is even remotely sexual. Of course, it has a lot to do with Aleister as a character, and I’m grateful that Aleister was patient with him and gentle with him, especially because Sochi isn’t inherently either of those things with himself.
With that said, I do think Sochi can push himself (and Aleister) a little too hard without really thinking of the consequences. Sochi is a little shit, and that is even more noticeable in the bedroom–he definitely puts emphasis on the power in power bottom–meaning that if Sochi says he wants something, odds are he’s going to find a way to get it. I think he’s a little too selfish in that respect, but it’s often not the physical high he craves so much as the emotional high of getting what he wants.
All in all, any sexual experience is primarily emotional to Sochi. In his other relationships, sex was something he used to try and strengthen that emotional connection, which hardly ever worked the way he wanted to, or was something expected of/taken from him. With Aleister, emotional intimacy and connection is the goal, ultimately, and that’s much healthier. Sochi has always believed that how something makes him feel is the most important among anything he does, which includes sex. It’s not something I understand about Sochi–because I’m not an emotion centered individual–but it is important to him. I am, however, proud that Sochi has that viewpoint (and has held onto it through relationships like Chieu and especially Shawn), and glad it still guides him.
Otherwise, I have no issues with his romantic or sexual exploits, especially as he’s gotten a lot better at dealing with them in mature and healthy ways.))
Co-Habitate :: Do they live with anyone? What’s “need to know” before moving in?
((Fairly obvious by this point, but he lives with Aleister. They’ve lived together since November 11th, 2014 in their little obnoxiously yellow house. Honestly, this would be a better question for Aleister-mun–mostly because I’d be so amused to see what the trials of living with my crazy Mocha-boy have been, but here are some I know cropped up.
If Sochi’s concentrating while working on something, do not interrupt him. It will start a fight or, at the very least, make him very grouchy and cold towards you.
As an addendum to the above: if Sochi has been working on something, there are piles of his stuff in random places he’s plopped to work–don’t move the piles.
Sometimes he needs to be made more conscious of basic needs like eating and sleeping. Wait until he’s done working (or else bad things will happen), but make sure he can actually physically function to finish his work. Much like a predator, if you silently and cautiously leave a plate of snacks (or pillow and blanket) in front of him and then slowly back away, you are likely not to get bitten.
Shower-time is performance time, so is pretty much any other time he wants to sing or dance. This happens randomly and often without provocation, rhyme or reason.
Laundry is his chore. Do not touch his clothes unless you are A) going to wear them (with permission), B) helping him do laundry (with direct permission), or C) have a death wish. In the event you are his significant other, D may apply, so D) undressing him before sexy-fun-time. Unless it’s any of those categories, don’t touch the clothes.
Bonus addendum to the above: if you let him choose your clothes for you and take charge of your wardrobe, he will love you forever and ever.
He will organize your stuff to match his own organizational schema. Your input is valid, but it may or may not be listened to regardless of the fact that it’s your stuff.
Mood shifts happen. For every succession of days that Sochi is bright and bushy tailed, up and moving about, there will be a day he’ll be unshaven, laying on the couch in old, stained sweats with food wrappers strewn about around him watching Netflix or HGTV reruns of “Fixer Upper.” Do not be alarmed. This is simply the Sochi in his most basic and natural state.
General Cautionary Disclaimer: Sochi’s a little shit.
In summary, Sochi’s fairly low-maintenance but definitely not easy to live with, and Aleister has the patience of a saint.))
Leonard: Last night, me wanting to try that stuff out of the Kama Sutra, was that fun for you or kind of racially insensitive?
Priya: Yeah, just because you're in bed with an Indian woman, you think that gives you permission to use crazy positions from an ancient Indian love manual?
Leonard: Hey, if you can find a book called Weird Sex With White Boys I'd be okay with that.
🎃 Together... for the first time... and getting to display it on their front porch!!!!
🎃 My muse carving a pumpkin for the first time [with Aleister].
Halloween Week 2015
It was their first Halloween in their new house. Sochi didn’t really even remember what they’d done last Halloween. They’d probably just handed out candy and watched movies, much like they’d be doing this year, except for one important difference–this was not just a house, it was their home.
Aleister had been more than excited to decorate the whole house, and they’d spent a whole weekend shopping for indoor and outdoor decorations complete with orange and black house lights, fake spider webs and spiders for the bushes, and they’d even gone to the craft store to get styrofoam balls, white fabric, and black buttons to make little ghosts to hang from the front patio’s lattice roof. Setting up the decorations to the collection of Danny Elfman soundtracks, especially alongside his boyfriend who’s pure, childish side had come out in full force, made it something of an event, one that Sochi wanted to enjoy as often and as long as he could.
[Text] I’m almost home, love, aaaand I’m gonna need your help. =^•.•^=
He’d gone to the grocery store to pick up some things Aleister needed for dinner, but on the ride home, his eyes had caught a sign from a local grower about pumpkins. Biting his lip, Sochi had veered off the main road, following a man-made gravel one into the dirt parking lot with the large outdoor overhangs.
There weren’t many pumpkins left–not the week of Halloween–and with them easy to purchase at any supermarket or craft goods store this time of year, Sochi doubted that these leftover ones would find a good home.
That would be doubly true for the slightly misshapen pumpkins weighing over a hundred pounds each, two of which were currently swimming among a sea of smaller pumpkins in the back of his Prius.
As he pulled in the driveway, he saw the front door open, Aleister turning just slightly to nudge one of their cats (probably Freddy) back into the house with his foot before heading towards Sochi’s car. Parking and turning it off quickly, Sochi threw open the car door and galloped to the trunk, lifting it open with a big smile as he gestured with both arms to the veritable pumpkin patch filling his trunk.
“Ta-da!”
“Oh for the love of…” Aleister’s rolling eyes, jutting hip, and arms crossed over his chest said one thing outwards, but Sochi knew it was all for show, giving a small chuckle as he slid forward, wrapping his arms around Aleister’s waist and propping himself into a small peck. His love’s lips returned the kiss warmly, arm’s dropping to slide until his hands set on Sochi’s hips, pulling away with a raised brow, “What did you do, Kitten?”
“Weeeell,” Dragging the word out as he looked playfully into blue eyes before backing up, turning to grab a pumpkin from the trunk, holding it in his arms as if he were giving it a hug, “I was going to pick another one up at the grocery store so we had two to carve, buuuut then I found a small little patch on one of the side-streets and couldn’t choose, so I just bought them all and now we have a pumpkin army!”
“And where do you propose we put them all?”
Eyes widening, Sochi took Aleister by the shoulders and turned him around, pointing towards the front porch, “We can put the big ones one each side of the stairs and then put all the little ones lined up on the railing!”
“Big ones?” The sigh was one of those happy ones that Sochi’d learned to decode, making him grin, lifting to give a soft peck to his cheek before moving a few of the small ones aside, reaching in to hoist one of the two large pumpkins up into his arms for show, “I see.”
“Soooo…what do you want me to do with them?”
“Let’s go ahead and get the tarps from the storage closet and set them up in the back. There is more room on the lawn. I’ll grab a couple things from the kitchen so we can carve them. Sound good?” Aleister stepped beside him, grabbing two of the pumpkins and tucking them in the crook of each of his arms before heading to the back gate to start getting things set up.
For the next few minutes, Sochi and Aleister moved from car to backyard to basement to kitchen transferring supplies and pumpkins from their various locations and into a nice set-up out on the back lawn.
As he was hauling the two bigger pumpkins, Sochi couldn’t help but notice the little bop to his boyfriend’s step, nor could he mistake the humming of the Nightmare Before Christmas anthem for anything other than excitement at their sudden afternoon plans. Neither of them had really had your typical childhood, and even if the foster and group homes Aleister lived in celebrated Halloween, Sochi knew that celebrating something–anything–at his home, held something special. Besides, Sochi was getting the feeling that Halloween to his partner was like Christmas was to him.
Memories. Moments.
Sochi had always been a lover of the small things, but he’d never really understood just how important they could be.
He’d kept pictures before, kept souvenirs, but he didn’t hold onto anything especially tightly, choosing to focus on new experiences rather than old ones. Sochi knew how fortunate he was to have lived the life he had. His bumps and bruises weren’t so bad compared to those other people had lived with, other people like Aleister.
Plunking the pumpkin that weighed more than half his body weight on the tarp, he watched as the other male’s face grew less and less stoic and more and more giddy, a childlike sparkle in his eyes, as he looked through the pack of face-shaped pumpkin carving stencils they’d bought at the craft store.
Aleister was a person that lived in moments. The man paid so much careful attention to the things that were going on around him, to his music, to his plans, and to Sochi. Typically it was Sochi who people found energetic and effervescent, but in moments like these, Sochi could only shake his head and laugh at that because he knew the truth. He might have boundless energy and smiles, but he never really appreciated how full life could be. Moments like these, moments where that pure gleam in those vibrant blue-violets made Sochi feel like everything was moving in slow motion as his knees grew weak, gave him an understanding of just how important really living was.
“That’s all the pumpkins!” Sochi swallowed, finally breaking his mind from the picture he’d been grinning at and kneeling down, laying over the large pumpkin and drumming its orange side with his hands, “What’cha thinking in that beautiful mind of yours, love?”
“You bought a lot of pumpkins, baby, and we didn’t buy that many different kinds of stencils. These stencils aren’t going to work on the bigger pumpkins either,” Baby. Aleister was the only one who could use that pet-name and not make it sound diminutive. He’d explained, once, that he used it when he was feeling particularly tender, particularly loved, and that single explanation placed the name on the opposite end of the spectrum than its normal connotations. If anything, it showed that plush, vulnerable side of the man he loved so deeply, and Sochi liked that.
“I knooow, and I know neither of us are really any good at drawing…hmmmm…” Sochi tilted his head, thinking. There were probably about seven different stencils they bought, but they were the only ones the store had. Sochi hadn’t even known that there were stencils for this sort of thing, “I think there’s about twenty three different normal size pumpkins, and then the one we bought at the grocery store, so we could always make little squads with the same faces. That just leaves the big one.”
“You have access to the printer at the BIT right? We should be able to find stencils or at least patterns on the computer. Maybe we could find a few stencils that are Tim Burton themed?”
“Victor and Emily! We should do them from Corpse Bride! Do you think they’d have stencils for those?!” His eyes were wide, thinking about how good those two would look on the huge pumpkins, “We could make them big enough, right?!”
“Certainly,” Aleister’s smile widened, eyes taking in the two large pumpkins and nodding again, “Perhaps we could make a space for Nightmare Before Christmas characters in the corner by one of the hedges? It sure would give that part of the front lawn a bit more character.”
“You’re right! That’s an awesome idea. Our lawn is going to look awesome!” Leaning to the side, he grabbed one of the kitchen knives that Aleister had brought out, placing one of the medium sized pumpkins between his legs, moving to straddle it so he could cut a circle for the top and begin tearing out the insides.
“It is. This is going to take a while, but it really will look good once it’s all finished. Did you happen to buy candles for your army after you conscripted them into service?” Aleister raised an eyebrow towards his mate, reaching for the second kitchen knife and assuming the same position with another one of the pumpkins.
The way Sochi’s lips thinned and his eyes remained intensely focused on the top of the pumpkin as he slid the tip of the knife a couple inches from the center and began sawing to create the removable tip meant that Sochi hadn’t thought to get the candles necessary for making the pumpkins shine.
Aleister laughed, making Sochi’s lips curl into their knowing smile.
“That’s not a problem. We’ll make time to get a few bigger candles this week since our tea-light candles won’t be strong enough to light some of these. We’ll also have to get some salt so I can bake all these pumpkin seeds. Would you like that, Kitten? I already brought a strainer out so we have something to put the raw ones in.”
“I was wondering what that was for!” Sochi’s head bolted up with a grin, nodding at the question, “Yes, please!”
“Alright then,” Aleister’s grin mirrored the one Sochi had given him, the two continuing to look at one another for a few moments before turning their faces back down to their respective pumpkins. Their smiles would be permanently placed for the rest of the afternoon, voices playing ping pong with conversational topics while hands worked inside the gushy centers of each pumpkin as they worked to prepare their home for Halloween.
