lee_fallon | PSL - Chance Encounter

Lee's been in Darrow now about a week and a half, and he's been to every bar in the city limits, met all of the owners, and offered to tailor each of their wine lists. He wasn't getting paid for any of this, but based on the amount of money in his bank account, his monthly stipend, and the cost of rent, he didn't really need money to get by day to day. And he certainly didn't need to save up for anything.

He still hasn't bothered to see a doctor. He feels like he probably should, just so someone in the city (besides his dear friend Susan) knows what was going on with him. But he'll get to that later.

Today he's out for a run. His running shoes arrived in the mail yesterday, and he's been itching to get his pulse up. He never feels as alive as he does when he's out on the street, feet pounding against the pavement, sweating freely, breathing hard. Sex is a very close second, but nothing beats the adrenaline rush of a good, hard sprint.

He doesn't have a route yet, just sort of turning left and right at intersections with no rhyme or reason. He's planning on doing six miles today, using the app on his phone to track his progress; so far he's just over four miles, maintaining something close to an eight minute mile pace, nice and respectable.

But then, turning a corner, he stops, abruptly enough that he nearly stumbles. It's been a few days since he last saw Connor, his last glimpse when Connor slipped out of his apartment. He'd thought about calling a few times, just to check on him, but for some reason Lee had always changed his mind.

Here he is now, walking down the street, late afternoon sun lighting up his face. Lee's thought about him a lot, about what it had been like to be with him, but also worrying about him, all that sorrow filling him up, sending him on a self-destructive path. He looks good, right now, not happy really but not falling into himself like he had been a few nights ago.

He can't make himself say anything, just stands and watches Connor walk his way on the opposite side of the street. He's breathing heavily from running, covered in sweat, and his heart is pounding, but some of that has to do with seeing Connor again. More than he's willing to admit even to himself.

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He sees Lee and there's a part of him that contemplates pretending that he hadn't and just carrying on walking. It's far from the only sex he's had since arriving in Darrow by it was good, good enough for memories to have pushed their way through a vodka haze. He left his number, didn't he? He's pretty sure he did.

He lifts a hand and waves, looks both ways before starting to cross the street.

Lee was fully prepared for Connor to make like he didn't see him and walk past, and Connor keeps his eyes forward long enough that Lee's about ready to start running again. But then Connor looks at him and waves, crossing the street toward him.

"Hey," Lee says when Connor gets to the sidewalk again, smiling softly at him. Connor's somehow even more attractive in the daylight. "It's good to see you."

It's good to see that his memory of Lee isn't too hazy; he'd remembered the face, and he's got a fairly good idea of what the body under the running gear might look like.

"Made it home safe the other night," he says, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. "Managed to find my apartment and get my key in the lock."

“I’m glad,” Lee replies, and he’d had a feeling Connor was going to make it home alright, but it’s a bit of a relief to see he was right. He still feels a bit guilty about not calling, not sure if Connor would have been happy to hear from him or not.

This doesn’t happen to him often, but he doesn’t know what to say. He doesn’t want to bring up Connor’s heartache so he doesn’t want to ask how he’s doing, but he does want to know if he’s coping any better. It hasn’t been very long, so Lee’s pretty sure he knows the answer anyway.

“What are you up to today?” he finally asks, and it sounds exceptionally stupid and benign, especially since he knows what Connor looks like when he comes, what he sounds like when he’s begging. It’s always so strange to try to make small talk after something like that.

"Mostly trying to make it feel like I actually live here." A muscle in his jaw ticks; every time he admits to himself that he's not leaving here any time soon, he can't help but think about Olly, and everything that he's lost. He glances down at the shopping bags in his hands. "Clothes. Stuff for the apartment."

Lee knows exactly what Connor means, and what he’s not saying, too. Buying clothes and things is a necessity, but doing it feels like giving in. Lee didn’t mind too much, but he hadn’t really left anything behind that he hadn’t already mentally said goodbye to anyway.

“The first thing I bought was wine,” he tells Connor, smirking. “And then these,” he adds, gesturing to his shoes.

"I run," he says, smiling. "Back home, I run. A little. Not marathons or anything." He smiles. "I feel like I'm interrupting you."

“Marathons are an acquired taste,” Lee replies, and he’s done seven of them over the last few years, but, as much as he likes doing them, they’ve never been what he’d call easy. “You’re not interrupting,” he says, because he’s okay to stop running now, especially if that means he can spend a bit more time with Connor. “Also if you want to run together sometime, I’d love a training partner."

"If I wake up without a hangover any day soon I'll be sure to give you a call," says Connor wryly. He's drinking too much - he knows that. Which doesn't mean that he could stop. "I'd ask you if you want to get something to eat but I'm pretty sure you'd prefer to go home and change."

Lee gives Connor a sympathetic smile. He gets the drinking, and he won't give Connor a bad time about it. He know if he was in a similar position he'd do the same thing.

"I'd actually love to go eat," he replies. "But then you'd have to be seen in public with me looking like this." Lee's not exactly dressed for dinner, even if he wasn't sweaty from his run.

"I'm okay if you're okay," says Connor, and he doesn't know when he became this person - this person who clings to familiar things, who actually cares about making friends. He blames Michaela for it. Michaela, Laurel...Weightless. Even Asher. Oliver. He hadn't cared about anyone before.

"I'm okay," Lee replies with a smile, and he wasn't planning to see Connor again, especially not like this, but he already likes Connor, and going and having a bite to eat with him seems like a good idea. Lunch doesn't mean there's an attachment, and Lee should probably eat something anyway. "I don't know what restaurants they even have around here," he admits, knowing Connor probably has even less an idea, being even newer here than Lee is.

"I have no freaking idea what's good around here," says Connor, pulling a face for a moment. "But I think I walked past a Thai place a few blocks ago. You want to try that?"

If he concentrates, maybe he can even stop the image of the way that Lee looks fucking from popping into his head every two seconds.

"Yeah, Thai sounds good," Lee replies, and he unplugs his headphones from his iPod and wraps them up so he can tuck them into his pocket. He wants to make small talk, because if they don't talk they're probably both going to just sit there and think about the noises they make during sex or something. Lee knows he hasn't been able to forget the sound of Connor's voice pleading with him to fuck him harder in the days since they slept together.

"Have you seen the internet they have here yet?" he asks, and it's a dumb question, but he knows he doesn't want to dig into Connor's real life, the one he left behind. If Connor wants to talk about it, Lee absolutely will, but the last thing Lee wants is to bring up painful things.

"Only a little bit through my phone," he says, glancing across at Lee as they fall into step with each other. "Why? Is there something I ought to be looking out for?"

"No," Lee replies as he and Connor walk toward the restaurant. "It's just sort of weird and restrictive. You can't get information about the current world outside of Darrow, they have their own version of Google and Amazon. For instance, I ordered these shoes online, but it didn't tell me where they were shipping from, just when they were arriving."

"Wow. Sort of like China, only more...localised?" says Connor, and that sort of weirds him out, actually. He's not as connected to the internet as, say, Olly, but he can see the creepy implications of that. "I pretty much used to just rely on the internet for porn, anyway."

“Yes, exactly,” Lee replies, and he hadn’t thought of it that way, but now that Connor mentions it he’s starting to realize how fucked up it is that they’re trapped here with no way out and no contact with the outside world.

“I didn’t go looking for porn. That might still be out there,” Lee says. “I can’t imagine any internet without porn."

"It's got to still be out there," says Connor, who knows it's out there because he found some on his phone the night before, lonely and desperate but not really in the mood to leave the apartment. "I think porn's pretty much the glue holding the internet together at this point."

"I'm sure it is," Lee agrees with a soft laugh. "I personally think sex is the path to peace. Imagine if everyone got to be sexually satisfied on a regular basis. Who wouldn't be happy with that?"

Connor's never really thought about it like that, but it does make sense. He certainly has always felt like he's got a better handle on his life when he's getting laid on a regular basis.

"You've got a point," he admits.

"It's my personal philosophy to enjoy life as much as possible, guilt free," Lee tells Connor as they arrive at the Thai restaurant. He reaches out and pulls open the door, motioning for Connor to go in ahead of him. "As long as you're not hurting anyone, I feel like denying yourself things is a total waste of time."

Conner walks in ahead of Lee, automatically starting to shrug out of his coat. There's a girl waiting to take it and he nods his thanks.

"Hey - I agree," he says, smiling. "I'm just saying, it's not always convenient to live in the moment."

Lee doesn't reply right away, waiting until they're lead to a table and left with menus. "Practically goes out the window in a place like this, doesn't it?" he wonders. "Why can't we live in the moment here? What do we have to lose?"

"I'm...I guess I'm hoping that I get back to some freaking semblance of the life I used to have," he admits. "I'm not ready to admit that I have to move on from it, yet."