Day 265 - Friday, September 12th

[papalobo]

[A Chinese man who is definitely a mature adult and not a teenager checks in to the Hyatt, one of their more exclusive rooms, along with his half-white half brother who is also certainly not a teenager and most definitely not the notorious gang leader wanted on suspicion of a September 11th New York City bombing in retaliation for an angry rogue sect of anti-American zealots.

The entire suite floor has been rented out, and it requires a special key card in the elevator and on the stairs to enter that floor. But they can rent one of the still very luxe rooms directly beneath.

A familiar white limo is in the car garage, though the opportunity to gawk or investigate is slim, between the security cameras and live guards.

There's still no contact from Max, but the Department of Homeland Security has become involved, and has begun to enter Ash's territory with intent to arrest any known figures within his gang to bring in for questioning.]

Day 284, Wednesday, Oct 1st

Comments

[jadedlynx]

[ Before Blanca's able to begin the massage, when Ash's hair is moved out of the way to begin his work, he'll discover one more bruise that was hidden by the platinum strands. In spite of skin so pale as to almost be porcelain, Ash doesn't bruise from a simple touch. Like a canyon can be carved by water over time, rough and consistent treatment had left bruises dark enough that they were taking days to fade. Some liked to hold him down by his hair, some by his neck, some by his hips, some by threat alone. Some liked him on his back, some on his knees. No matter the position, the implication is clear: there were enough someones to do this when bruising was never their intention. These were men who really thought their misdeeds would go unpunished.

Now, Ash is a legal name in yet another system, photos of bruises and blood-stained thighs added to some file. Medical records use words like 'internal tearing' and 'infection caused by'. Psychological reports will mention the delirium and outbursts. All of it was legal and had practical purposes, but none of it can capture the way it feels to be so helpless and in the hands of men who want to harm you.

A bath is nice, and Blanca has taken enough of the burden from Ash's shoulders that he can relax. Nothing he's done is for naught. But none of it erases that ball of disgust or pulsating pain from Ash's body. Still, they're all steps forward. ]

[sentimentalstoic]

[Ash is just as helpless in the hands of a man who doesn't presently wish him any ill will. The agency and normalcy and sense of self, something that can't simply be given back is taken when that happens, something that, by Blanca's initial calculations, Ash should have long enough been out of that such a thing was no longer a risk or a threat. Something that it was pointless to allow to grow back. Now he was here trying to foster it by tending to his body, as if he could reach beyond the skin to the intangible feeling stored somewhere not so physical but that feels undesirably real just the same.

If Ash's actual lover didn't exist, or more precisely if guilt over a monogamy the other man was himself supposed to have freed Ash from but still lords over him with his own self destructive actions, then maybe he would be able to reach further, maybe he would be able to matter just a little more here. He was able to once, when Ash had thought the man dead.

And look where that lead them. Blanca's quite happy with the outcome, but if time were to turn back, Ash would, without a doubt, undo it all.

To think back then he thought Ash would grow past even wanting to undo his childhood and find it all a worthwhile struggle to stand where he should have. Truly, Ash was determined to make his own way.]

[jadedlynx]

Ah.

[ The soft sound is one of satisfaction. He's been in the kind of life that didn't always afford him a bath so it's not as if he doesn't know the sensation, but it's easy to forget how good a long-awaited bath can feel. ]

I should've done this sooner.

[ It's easy to assume Ash is already moving past it. It's a traumatizing situation that should have left him unwilling to be touched at all. It isn't realistic to expect anyone to function after such abuse no matter how strong they are. Ash didn't when it happened to him the first time. Even after, when Marvin and his men grabbed him, he wasn't bouncing back immediately.

Still, as he told Jessica, he never had the luxury of time so he learned how to keep functioning even through the pain. ]

Next time I get out of interrogation, meet me at the car with a portable bath.

[sentimentalstoic]

[But now that there's no functioning left that he can do at the moment, it only piles up, like dirt to be washed away.]

I'll have to stalk you to know, but if you insist.

[Still, he's not of a mind to let his hands lose even to the hot water and aromatherapy he'd prepared. A gentle nudge urges Ash to lean forward rather than backwards, rolling up the bathrobe sleeves enough to begin working lower along his spine, to ease the arch, the muscles abused and compensating for internal tearing, likely having cramped in pain lately around his waistline.]

[jadedlynx]

[ The intention is good. If Ash could allow it, it would even be useful, but he can't. He reaches to catch the hand, shaking his head. ]

I can't, yet.

[ He'd had so many hands on his back the last two weeks. ]

[sentimentalstoic]

I can reach your back from the front if that's better.

[Though he certainly doesn't mind massaging Ash's front.]

[jadedlynx]

Not yet.

[ The less touch on his back, the better. ]

[sentimentalstoic]

[Likely, working at his hips directly won't go over very well, either.

No matter. He reaches for the hand that, not that long ago, had had a knife through it. Having been the one to have stitched it up, much to Ash's confusion at the time, he runs a thumb over the shockingly already near invisible marking, lightly feeling out how said hand has been recovering on the inside.

Ash's body is a wonderland he can play in for hours no matter which sections of the park may be closed.]

[jadedlynx]

It's a lot better.

[ He trusts Blanca enough that his eyes close. Naked and with a man who could easily overcome him, Ash knows that he's in good hands, not in danger of being a victim yet again. ]

It'd have been annoying to lose the ability to use it.

[sentimentalstoic]

[And yet, some part of Ash would be tense if he were to touch him in the same places.]

You've a knack for understatement.

[But he had thought the same thing when treating him. He had decided not to reveal himself, and yet, back then, he had determined even at the very real risk of blowing his identity, that hand had to be saved.]

[jadedlynx]

I spent 20 minutes crying in your lap in the last 6 hours. That wasn't enough dramatics for you?

[sentimentalstoic]

I'd rather have an eternity of seeing you at the other end of that spectrum, but it seems over the years I have grown more decadent in taste.

[jadedlynx]

At this rate, I'm thinking I might make it to 22 if I'm being generous.

[ Maybe less if the Lings try again. ]

An eternity is a little too far out.

[sentimentalstoic]

Thank you for offering a part of your remaining limited years to me.

[jadedlynx]

It makes them a limited-time item.

[ Ash would say they're also exclusive, but... ]

[sentimentalstoic]

Most things are.

[jadedlynx]

[ Ash smirks. ]

Limited-er time.

[ He does know that's not the actual way to say it. ]

[sentimentalstoic]

But does this style of living make you happy?

[Blanca could, is tempted to lecture him, to inform him what he already knows: if he hadn't been trying to juggle a regular life with this, likely, he would now be above the law as much as Golzine ever was. This happened because he needed to return to normalcy, which meant going through that system he was meant to look down upon as a mere toy.

He doesn't disagree that this really can't last as long as a normal human lifespan.]

[jadedlynx]

The way it is right now, no. Things are too strained with Max.

Usually? Yeah.

[ Head leaning back against the tub, his eyes stare at the ceiling. ]

If I can get out of gang life, that's the side I plan to leave behind. If I can't, I know it'll have been a better run when it's over. What's the point of living 80 years when you're not enjoying it?

[sentimentalstoic]

[So he believes things will go back, does he?

He continues to massage that hand, as good an excuse to hold it as any.]

And enjoyment is its own reward? How hedonic.

[jadedlynx]

[ He believes it might. Ash does know how screwed things are right now. ]

As opposed to what reward? Another year? It's not a video game with a high score.

[sentimentalstoic]

If one has a one in one hundred chance of enjoyment every day, one has approximately three and a half enjoyments per year. Even if those odds reduce by year at some point, there is always the chance for more per "score."

[jadedlynx]

If you thought every choice brought the same chances of enjoyment, you'd be in the Bahamas, not here playing nurse to me.

[ Ash splashes water at him. ]

You get it, too. Maybe not the choices I make, but why I make them.

[sentimentalstoic]

Yes. For you, at least, "enjoyment" isn't what you're really looking to maximize.

[As for himself, he's in a fluffy white bathrobe in a scent bathroom with a gloriously attractive naked blonde whom he can pet almost freely, in a beachside mansion.]

[jadedlynx]

Quality.

[ Blanca can fill in the blank of 'over quantity'. ]

I'm going to remember Ireland and that sky for most of my life.

[ Ash has never pretended not to be enchanted by their date. ]

But I'm not going to forget that you came here for me, either.