Hand in hand. Daniel is as aged as ever, but the quality to him is different; less fragile, less changeable, steady, and of course, colder. The diamond-hard claws that tip each finger are just too long to be appropriately subtle. He'll have to have excuses that go beyond lackluster maintenance. Maybe he can paint them black.
He looks at Louis.
What's easy? What does that mean? Growing up with immigrant parents terrified of genocide, being a hustler, being a drug addict, being the worst parent, being terminally ill, being tortured for weeks at a time? What's easy ever gotten him? But he thing is, he can say anything. He just isn't going to.
Behind tinted glasses, orange glints. Eerie.
"I'm fine, Louis. Don't rush me into hating it, okay? I've got a while, with any luck. Plenty of time to get miserable eventually."
Gently, but firmly, Daniel withdraws his hand and reasserts his personal space. Hurts a little, for a lot of reasons. In a way he feels too young— easily bruised, the delirious high of a renewed existence sending him stumbling around like a kid again. But in this, he's very much leaning on old man instincts. He's very aware of what it feels like to not be a priority, and as much as he cares for Louis (wouldn't have done what he did if not), he just doesn't want to fall down a fucking hole.
"Don't do that," he says, sounding tired. Not unkind, but still. Gentle but firm to match the retrieval of his hand. "I don't blame you, it's not like that. But you did leave me with him. Those two things co-exist. So I can't— just, none of that. The what you wanted stuff."
It isn't true, and if it is, Daniel would almost find it worse. Louis what, wanted to make him a wrinkly old man vampire? How fucking ridiculous. Daniel is happier like this already, but it's definitely not ideal. The alternatives are all just even less ideal. At least in this reality, he gets superpowers and he doesn't hurt anymore.
"Besides, you might decide you're angry with me, when I tell you why I'm still London."
Daniel says, Don't do that, and Louis relinquishes his grip, looks steadily back into Daniel's face and bites down on a true thing he might have said otherwise.
Daniel doesn't want it, and so Louis puts it away. What use is it, what Louis would have offered? What he had wanted? Daniel doesn't want to hear him say it, and so Louis doesn't.
Daniel says, I don't blame you.
And Louis does not believe him.
This too, Louis holds in his chest. Lets the quiet settle before gamely asking, "Why are you still in London, Daniel?"
This could have been a phone call, he thinks. It's an unkind thought, but he just feels vulnerable. He's had to figure out most of this alone, working with his 'education' from the interview and navigating the not-always-helpful help from the Talamasca, whose priority is transparently trying to lock him in as an asset over anything else. It's fine, because he's been fine, he's already gone through the adjustment of being alone in life.
Reckoning with Louis, wondering about how to manage his reactions and his feelings about it, is alien. This has nothing to do with you, he could say. Considers saying. Because while Armand might have had motivations surrounding Louis, Daniel's existence is his own.
It's just—
He doesn't want to be an asshole. Happens pretty often, though. Ask his exes. Ask his kids.
"They're helping me publish the book." He spreads his hands, shrugs. "Ten million and lighting my laptop on fire might have been okay if I was going to die in a few years, but I can't let it go, now."
Daniel can't let it go. He is taking Louis' life and publishing it.
Louis is quiet, eyes moving over Daniel's face. Taking in his eyes, the absence of familiar blue. Thinking of messages flung into a void, unanswered. Daniel's hand in his, in those last moments.
A shuttering in Louis' face, controlling the initial rush of emotion. He feels distance, and withholds in turn. Uncertain of them, of what connection has survived. Louis had left and had trusted Armand, and now this. Now they are here, and Daniel is telling him this without apology, without any give to the words.
Breaks the winding tension by stepping back, away. Circling a few paces from Daniel, gaze moving from him to the room.
Louis is still looking away from him as he asks, "Were you going to tell me?"
Or would it have simply been the book, released into the world?
Flippant. Louis had signed over the rights already before Daniel even got to the penthouse. What was that going to look like, if he hadn't blown everything up? Was Armand only pretending to let it happen, waiting for Louis to look away before he killed the journalist then shrugged about the book never happening? Or was Louis going to do it himself, one last step to closure? He'd certainly been willing to hurt Daniel over the course of it.
He doesn't really think so. But it's a plot hole, to so speak, and with his maker AWOL, he can't ask the person who probably has the actual answer.
But—
"Of course I was going to tell you. That's probably why Traitor Agent Rashid ratted me out. The nerds didn't want me to."
Talamasca muddles the picture. A whole other party, their own objectives. They didn't come to collect Daniel out of the goodness of their heart. They are not supporting the publishing of Louis' interview out of the goodness of their heart.
Something for later. This is about them, not the Talamasca. Not yet.
"I was never going to kill you," Louis answers. Easy honesty. Daniel has barred him from saying the rest, explaining the rest, so Louis leaves it there. Louis had always wanted Daniel to live, even when he didn't fully understand the whole of why.
How much to say to the rest? What he had wanted then, how much it had changed when Daniel had started digging? How much does it matter given what's been done now?
A breath, before asking, "Does it matter that I don't want you to publish it?"
Maybe that's what Louis really believes. Daniel's expression betrays his skepticism, though. Was Louis really going to let him walk out of there, perfectly (imperfectly, miserable, dying) alive, to go and publish their book, before he knew about Armand? ... No, he thinks. Even if Louis made himself believe that. No way. There was a plan he wasn't privy to. Daniel is certain.
A beat, then—
"Sort of." What an awful answer. Daniel is aware, but his awareness doesn't help much. "Not enough to throw it out. Look, man, I only have so much time left to do this as Daniel Molloy. And this is going to change the world, the world that I'm now a part of on both sides. I can't just not go out there with the truth of it, not after all that. And that's what you wanted, too. This half-life under a rock thing fucking sucks. You wanted to throw the grenade into the shadows."
Skepticism. Familiar on Daniel's face, not unexpected, but what does Louis do about it?
It becomes something to weigh in a hand as he looks at Daniel and listens to this answer. The appeal behind it.
"It was different then."
Daniel should know. Daniel had pulled down the foundation upon which Louis had been standing on. Uncovered truth.
He hadn't known about Lestat. Hadn't known where the blame truly laid for Claudia's death. Whatever Louis had thought the story would shake free, it hadn't been that particular revelation.
An observation after, "But now things have changed for you."
That Daniel won't be swayed. He wants this book. He wants to take Louis's story and shake the world with it. What can Louis truly do to dissuade him, if his own preference for the story isn't enough?
Very aware of that fact. He was there, after all. He saw it before Louis did, days before, maybe weeks before as soon as he got there, something rotten and fucked up and fake. If Daniel had been sicker, if he couldn't have come, Louis would still be stuck in a tower with Armand, playing house, having no opinions of his own, slowly wasting away.
Daniel doesn't want to say that. Doesn't want to say You owe me, because he hates that kind of shit, but it might be useful. Like he said, he does care— it's a personal kind of caring, because it's Louis.
But the story. He can't let go.
"Literal darkness is fine, for me. But figurative darkness isn't going to work."
It is only a little like being cornered, backed in and caught. Things have changed. Louis hadn't expected the end of his own story to become a reveal, to exonerate Lestat, to break him from Armand. There had been something misaligned. Louis had known that. He'd known Daniel would find it.
He had thought it was a fracture, something that would realign. The scope of it—
No.
Louis puts contemplation of it away.
Swerves anyway, direct, asks, "Why didn't you call me, not them?"
Did Daniel think he wouldn't have come? That Louis wouldn't have helped him?
Daniel tries not to look at him like he's grown a second head. Is maybe medium successful.
A pause that goes on long enough to touch the edges of awkward, as he regards Louis, before he finally musters up:
"I wanted to deal with it and move on."
No, he does not think Louis would have come, while he was in the midst of a total nervous breakdown and fleeing back to Louisiana. He does not think Louis would have helped him, at least not right away, and certainly not in a style that Daniel could have tolerated at the time. Might still not be able to tolerate now. He understands that Louis's lack of attention is not because he doesn't care (probably), but that doesn't erase the fact that he simply wasn't there. That he let the door shut behind him and kept walking even as Armand drained all the blood out of Daniel's body.
He doesn't remember if he called out. But it doesn't matter. Louis either didn't hear, or wouldn't have anyway, no matter how close he was.
"You still haven't told me how you are. Though I should have pressed for an answer there before handing you another bomb, huh."
Maybe, maybe a better idea to trap Louis into a status report before the past weeks and potential future are all drastically reframed for him.
But it's too late now.
Daniel is looking at him and Louis feels some stubborn, hurt impulse sparking in his chest. Vents it by treading away, further into the suite. It's a nice set of rooms. Not exactly on the level Louis would accept, but Louis is working with a very different budget. He runs a finger across the tabletop, disturbing none of the items laid across it.
"I'm fine."
Which was like, mostly true a few hours ago. A shrug of an answer, pushing past the question. Not important.
Turning, looking back to Daniel. Tugs out a chair, settles himself at the far end of the table. Familiar positioning. The interview is over but here they are, in a room, treading around difficult things.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there."
Is Daniel even going to allow this much of an apology?
It's shitty and he's aware, but Daniel is holding his ground about it. Not moving forward with the book is untenable, and always was— which Louis knows, somewhere deep down. He's partially responsible for it. Not just the content of the book, but for driving it into Daniel's head when he was a kid, giving him a throughline for his entire life. Always there. Always had a job, always wanted to work, even when everything else was sinking.
And things have been sinking in a very unique way, lately.
Watching Louis sit down, like they're getting ready for another interview, forces a lopsided smile onto his face. Things are tense and awkward, but he does care for Louis. A deep personal care completely sectioned away from his bullheaded inability to not publish, sure, but genuine. Louis, still all the things he is, and he gets to be them honestly now. Free from Armand. Even if Louis hates him for the book, Daniel's glad he blew everything up.
"I know."
Allows it, though whether or not that's accepting, Louis will have to decide for himself. Daniel's tone is soft, at least.
"And, hey." He shrugs. Considers a chair for himself, but does not yet pick one. "Armand can't get into my head anymore, which is a huge plus. Probably part of why he flipped and bolted."
Speaking the name into existence, making it real. Armand turned him, Armand is his maker, with his ancient blood from some pederast wannabe painter who walked the earth alongside Christ. Some real top shelf nonsense, given to the most annoying old man to ever live. Daniel's expression twists slightly, reluctant, shuttered. He can't stop himself from asking, and resents it.
The name. The name, pulled from the air and said aloud. The name linked with this silver lining Daniel is offering, met with a tilt of Louis' head, eyes searching as Daniel settles. Doubtful.
All his romanticisms and embellishments, all the ways Louis has described maker and fledgling, and there is the single truth: whatever form it takes, there is a link. Something to tie maker and fledgling together.
Something Armand will tug on.
Something Louis had wanted to tie, soul to soul.
Does Louis want to argue? Maybe. A little. Daniel is offering him options, things for Louis to kick against, if he decides it to be worth the argument.
In the meantime, the immediate question:
"No," Louis answers. "He was gone. He left no sign as to where."
Some things withheld: how entirely Armand has shielded himself from Louis. How long it has been since Louis walked the earth without feeling Armand at the edge of his mind, like the link of fingers.
How Louis has wondered whether that light touch was more than he realized then.
No sign for Louis to see, but did Louis really look into it? Did he put work into trying to track him down? Probably not, and Daniel can't expect to him to. And yet a part of him itches to ask to go through all his records, find every lawyer, alias, account number. Refrains. He can dig all that up himself, anyway, and has only been putting it off because other things have taken priority.
"Makes sense."
That's kinda funny, right?
Maybe not. Finally, Daniel sits down. Lets out a breath, and tries to find ease again.
"But I'm glad, for your sake. Glad he fucked off."
Daniel doesn't ask the question, and Louis doesn't volunteer anything more.
Did he seek Armand? Does he seek Armand now? Would he seek Armand if Daniel asked?
Varying levels of complicated, the answers to these questions. But there are answers. Louis holds onto them as Daniel moves them past the space in which they might be asked.
The sentiment is—
Daniel means it kindly. Sincerely.
Louis feels it like fingers pressing down on a bruise. Armand is gone. Daniel has paid a very high price to see this done. Louis is struggling with that now, the cost. Daniel is looking at him with someone else's eyes.
Abruptly: "I missed you. I been missing you."
The way Louis reached out, it had been for no other reason than wanting Daniel in his life. To maintain connection.
True now, still, even as Daniel seeks to publish Louis' story, deflects away his apologies.
Daniel had thought it was more likely than not he'd die, but that didn't mean he wanted to die. Weaponized insecure grandpa eyes at Raglan, an idle draft of his will the evening after, boldly downing a very good martini in a final salute then scrambling to try and get out when very professionally capslocked at— survival instinct's a funny thing. He's still spinning around a bit, adjusting, adapting, fixing his head with the situation.
A paltry summary. The situation. Jesus fuck.
Louis, now. Finds a way to wound him, bittersweet. In between hours writing and researching and coping with new sensations and needs, he has thought sometimes of Louis, and imagined some other world. A world he does not inhabit. Has anyone ever missed him? Genuinely? People have said it. But they don't mean him, they mean some role he fills, husband, father, employee, caretaker. He thinks Louis might actually be the first person to say it to him, and mean him.
"I thought about picking up," he admits. "And I'd think about you, after I didn't." His gaze ticks away, uncharacteristic. Daniel, who stares dead ahead, confrontational even casually, is not infallible that way; being alone with it had in fact been horrible, as Louis absolutely knows, he just doesn't want to talk about it. Another beat, orienting himself, and he looks back.
"I've been worried. They said you went to New Orleans."
How could it ever matter, that Louis had spent those days missing him? Would it ever matter that he had spent that time reaching out? Could it matter that Louis stubbornly clawed his way back into Daniel's space after all that silence, that he's here now?
He wasn't, when it counted.
Louis says it anyway. He had missed Daniel. All things are complicated and painful, but in the midst of it all, there is such relief to be each others company. Daniel looks away from him and Louis feels affection twisting in his chest.
Doesn't say, I wish you'd picked up.
Because he does, yes, but it wouldn't help Daniel to hear it. Louis would have come, would have helped. Maybe offered something more than the Talamasca had, than Armand did.
Doesn't matter.
"I did. Just for a few days," Louis confirms. Explains, "Called you on the way back."
That first call. The confusion at the absence of answer. Reaching out and finding empty space.
A similar experience trying to call Lestat, who must have almost immediately abandoned the phone Louis purchased for him. Abandoned, broke. Louis isn't certain. Has to make his peace with it.
"You shouldn't be worrying about me," Louis reminds. "I ain't the one with so much on my plate."
Another case of things co-existing. Daniel doesn't blame Louis, and Louis left him with Armand. Daniel missed Louis, and Daniel didn't want to face Louis. Days later when he first called was already ages too late, and Daniel had already decided how he wanted to move forward. No hand-holding, no sympathy, no rats, no lessons, just take what he'd already learned from the interview and forge ahead.
He'd made peace with being alone. Hell, he'd made peace with dying alone. Very handy, now, staring over the edge of the abyss of immortality. It had already been an easy enough concept to understand, the need for companionship driving an immortal insane, making them willing to do any and every awful thing to keep hold of it. Vampire loneliness, and tears rolling down cheeks, and very dramatic, and very sad, and all that.
So it was good, even if it was terrible. Start as you mean to go on.
Though, Daniel has to chuckle, soft and wry. "This has taken a lot off for me."
Another stark reminder that Louis doesn't know what it's like to be terminally ill, and he's never gotten old.
"Was it... I mean. Did I call it?"
Perhaps incredible to think, but at this point, Daniel doesn't know with absolute certainty that he was right, about Lestat. He's pretty fucking sure, but there's always the possibility of some other, unexpected angle.
No, he had never entertained the possibility that Daniel could have been wrong. It was never a sense that Daniel was infallible, only that Daniel was incisive, perceptive in a way Louis couldn't be when it came to his own life and what was amiss within it.
Daniel had pulled apart Louis' recollection of the trial, and put a finger upon the heart of the great lie: Armand didn't save you. Lestat did.
Incredible, that he is asking now if he was right.
A breathless shift from surprise to affection, bypassing any other emotion that might have lived in-between. (His life, in pieces. His life, rendered into a book.)
"Yes," Louis tells him. "You were right."
Lestat, glossy-eyed in low light, shrugging off Louis' questions. Confirmation of the act, no answer for the rest.
It's not really a relief, because he wasn't worried he was wrong, but there's still a great spike of satisfaction, and Daniel's smile is a smug one like a sure bet payed off. Victory.
"I was one thousand percent sure about Armand," he says. Something funny about his tone there, personal heel-grinding, before he continues. "And I really, really believed it, about Lestat, but you know—" he gestures. "Vampires and shit, what if there was a million year old alien who was puppeting everyone, he was full of sentient worms that slowly replaced his body over the previous twenty years, or something, and I couldn't guess. But I'm glad it was him. I really am, Louis."
One good reveal, in a series of utterly bullshit reveals. At least Lestat cared, in the end. Or 'the end', because there's still an endless road of immortality ahead of each of them, on which they can do anything, everything they want. Mend broken fences or never see each other again, at least now Louis can decide with all the correct information.
Affection still, expression softening as he takes in Daniel's reaction. Affection mixed with amusement, head tipping as he takes in Daniel's satisfaction. Standing at a remove, enjoying Daniel process his victory, Louis can sever away all the rest.
"I'm glad you were right."
About Armand.
About Lestat.
True, regardless of how messy Louis' existence is now. Standing in so much rubble, sifting through piece by piece, he is certain of this: he is grateful for Daniel.
Daniel, who saved him.
(And Louis failed him in turn.)
And then, carefully: "Do you want me to go?"
There's a possibility he is intruding. Unwelcome. Daniel deserves the opportunity to tell him as much.
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"You can't tell me he made it easy for you."
Not the way Louis would have, wanted to.
Maybe Armand made it a punishment. Maybe Armand made it a nightmare. Louis doesn't know. Daniel isn't saying.
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He looks at Louis.
What's easy? What does that mean? Growing up with immigrant parents terrified of genocide, being a hustler, being a drug addict, being the worst parent, being terminally ill, being tortured for weeks at a time? What's easy ever gotten him? But he thing is, he can say anything. He just isn't going to.
Behind tinted glasses, orange glints. Eerie.
"I'm fine, Louis. Don't rush me into hating it, okay? I've got a while, with any luck. Plenty of time to get miserable eventually."
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Louis had wanted to give him that. Time. The Gift, to make of it what he would.
A thought to be boxed away. What would Daniel do with it? What does it matter?
His thumb runs across Daniel's palm.
"I'm not rushing you into anything," Lous reassures. "I'm only sorry for how it happened. It's not what I wanted for you."
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"Don't do that," he says, sounding tired. Not unkind, but still. Gentle but firm to match the retrieval of his hand. "I don't blame you, it's not like that. But you did leave me with him. Those two things co-exist. So I can't— just, none of that. The what you wanted stuff."
It isn't true, and if it is, Daniel would almost find it worse. Louis what, wanted to make him a wrinkly old man vampire? How fucking ridiculous. Daniel is happier like this already, but it's definitely not ideal. The alternatives are all just even less ideal. At least in this reality, he gets superpowers and he doesn't hurt anymore.
"Besides, you might decide you're angry with me, when I tell you why I'm still London."
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Daniel doesn't want it, and so Louis puts it away. What use is it, what Louis would have offered? What he had wanted? Daniel doesn't want to hear him say it, and so Louis doesn't.
Daniel says, I don't blame you.
And Louis does not believe him.
This too, Louis holds in his chest. Lets the quiet settle before gamely asking, "Why are you still in London, Daniel?"
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Reckoning with Louis, wondering about how to manage his reactions and his feelings about it, is alien. This has nothing to do with you, he could say. Considers saying. Because while Armand might have had motivations surrounding Louis, Daniel's existence is his own.
It's just—
He doesn't want to be an asshole. Happens pretty often, though. Ask his exes. Ask his kids.
"They're helping me publish the book." He spreads his hands, shrugs. "Ten million and lighting my laptop on fire might have been okay if I was going to die in a few years, but I can't let it go, now."
He does not say Sorry. He would not mean it.
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Daniel can't let it go. He is taking Louis' life and publishing it.
Louis is quiet, eyes moving over Daniel's face. Taking in his eyes, the absence of familiar blue. Thinking of messages flung into a void, unanswered. Daniel's hand in his, in those last moments.
A shuttering in Louis' face, controlling the initial rush of emotion. He feels distance, and withholds in turn. Uncertain of them, of what connection has survived. Louis had left and had trusted Armand, and now this. Now they are here, and Daniel is telling him this without apology, without any give to the words.
Breaks the winding tension by stepping back, away. Circling a few paces from Daniel, gaze moving from him to the room.
Louis is still looking away from him as he asks, "Were you going to tell me?"
Or would it have simply been the book, released into the world?
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Flippant. Louis had signed over the rights already before Daniel even got to the penthouse. What was that going to look like, if he hadn't blown everything up? Was Armand only pretending to let it happen, waiting for Louis to look away before he killed the journalist then shrugged about the book never happening? Or was Louis going to do it himself, one last step to closure? He'd certainly been willing to hurt Daniel over the course of it.
He doesn't really think so. But it's a plot hole, to so speak, and with his maker AWOL, he can't ask the person who probably has the actual answer.
But—
"Of course I was going to tell you. That's probably why Traitor Agent Rashid ratted me out. The nerds didn't want me to."
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Something for later. This is about them, not the Talamasca. Not yet.
"I was never going to kill you," Louis answers. Easy honesty. Daniel has barred him from saying the rest, explaining the rest, so Louis leaves it there. Louis had always wanted Daniel to live, even when he didn't fully understand the whole of why.
How much to say to the rest? What he had wanted then, how much it had changed when Daniel had started digging? How much does it matter given what's been done now?
A breath, before asking, "Does it matter that I don't want you to publish it?"
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A beat, then—
"Sort of." What an awful answer. Daniel is aware, but his awareness doesn't help much. "Not enough to throw it out. Look, man, I only have so much time left to do this as Daniel Molloy. And this is going to change the world, the world that I'm now a part of on both sides. I can't just not go out there with the truth of it, not after all that. And that's what you wanted, too. This half-life under a rock thing fucking sucks. You wanted to throw the grenade into the shadows."
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It becomes something to weigh in a hand as he looks at Daniel and listens to this answer. The appeal behind it.
"It was different then."
Daniel should know. Daniel had pulled down the foundation upon which Louis had been standing on. Uncovered truth.
He hadn't known about Lestat. Hadn't known where the blame truly laid for Claudia's death. Whatever Louis had thought the story would shake free, it hadn't been that particular revelation.
An observation after, "But now things have changed for you."
That Daniel won't be swayed. He wants this book. He wants to take Louis's story and shake the world with it. What can Louis truly do to dissuade him, if his own preference for the story isn't enough?
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Very aware of that fact. He was there, after all. He saw it before Louis did, days before, maybe weeks before as soon as he got there, something rotten and fucked up and fake. If Daniel had been sicker, if he couldn't have come, Louis would still be stuck in a tower with Armand, playing house, having no opinions of his own, slowly wasting away.
Daniel doesn't want to say that. Doesn't want to say You owe me, because he hates that kind of shit, but it might be useful. Like he said, he does care— it's a personal kind of caring, because it's Louis.
But the story. He can't let go.
"Literal darkness is fine, for me. But figurative darkness isn't going to work."
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It is only a little like being cornered, backed in and caught. Things have changed. Louis hadn't expected the end of his own story to become a reveal, to exonerate Lestat, to break him from Armand. There had been something misaligned. Louis had known that. He'd known Daniel would find it.
He had thought it was a fracture, something that would realign. The scope of it—
No.
Louis puts contemplation of it away.
Swerves anyway, direct, asks, "Why didn't you call me, not them?"
Did Daniel think he wouldn't have come? That Louis wouldn't have helped him?
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A pause that goes on long enough to touch the edges of awkward, as he regards Louis, before he finally musters up:
"I wanted to deal with it and move on."
No, he does not think Louis would have come, while he was in the midst of a total nervous breakdown and fleeing back to Louisiana. He does not think Louis would have helped him, at least not right away, and certainly not in a style that Daniel could have tolerated at the time. Might still not be able to tolerate now. He understands that Louis's lack of attention is not because he doesn't care (probably), but that doesn't erase the fact that he simply wasn't there. That he let the door shut behind him and kept walking even as Armand drained all the blood out of Daniel's body.
He doesn't remember if he called out. But it doesn't matter. Louis either didn't hear, or wouldn't have anyway, no matter how close he was.
"You still haven't told me how you are. Though I should have pressed for an answer there before handing you another bomb, huh."
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But it's too late now.
Daniel is looking at him and Louis feels some stubborn, hurt impulse sparking in his chest. Vents it by treading away, further into the suite. It's a nice set of rooms. Not exactly on the level Louis would accept, but Louis is working with a very different budget. He runs a finger across the tabletop, disturbing none of the items laid across it.
"I'm fine."
Which was like, mostly true a few hours ago. A shrug of an answer, pushing past the question. Not important.
Turning, looking back to Daniel. Tugs out a chair, settles himself at the far end of the table. Familiar positioning. The interview is over but here they are, in a room, treading around difficult things.
"I'm sorry I wasn't there."
Is Daniel even going to allow this much of an apology?
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And things have been sinking in a very unique way, lately.
Watching Louis sit down, like they're getting ready for another interview, forces a lopsided smile onto his face. Things are tense and awkward, but he does care for Louis. A deep personal care completely sectioned away from his bullheaded inability to not publish, sure, but genuine. Louis, still all the things he is, and he gets to be them honestly now. Free from Armand. Even if Louis hates him for the book, Daniel's glad he blew everything up.
"I know."
Allows it, though whether or not that's accepting, Louis will have to decide for himself. Daniel's tone is soft, at least.
"And, hey." He shrugs. Considers a chair for himself, but does not yet pick one. "Armand can't get into my head anymore, which is a huge plus. Probably part of why he flipped and bolted."
Speaking the name into existence, making it real. Armand turned him, Armand is his maker, with his ancient blood from some pederast wannabe painter who walked the earth alongside Christ. Some real top shelf nonsense, given to the most annoying old man to ever live. Daniel's expression twists slightly, reluctant, shuttered. He can't stop himself from asking, and resents it.
"Have you heard from him?"
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All his romanticisms and embellishments, all the ways Louis has described maker and fledgling, and there is the single truth: whatever form it takes, there is a link. Something to tie maker and fledgling together.
Something Armand will tug on.
Something Louis had wanted to tie, soul to soul.
Does Louis want to argue? Maybe. A little. Daniel is offering him options, things for Louis to kick against, if he decides it to be worth the argument.
In the meantime, the immediate question:
"No," Louis answers. "He was gone. He left no sign as to where."
Some things withheld: how entirely Armand has shielded himself from Louis. How long it has been since Louis walked the earth without feeling Armand at the edge of his mind, like the link of fingers.
How Louis has wondered whether that light touch was more than he realized then.
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"Makes sense."
That's kinda funny, right?
Maybe not. Finally, Daniel sits down. Lets out a breath, and tries to find ease again.
"But I'm glad, for your sake. Glad he fucked off."
Listened to Louis halfway, at least.
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Did he seek Armand? Does he seek Armand now? Would he seek Armand if Daniel asked?
Varying levels of complicated, the answers to these questions. But there are answers. Louis holds onto them as Daniel moves them past the space in which they might be asked.
The sentiment is—
Daniel means it kindly. Sincerely.
Louis feels it like fingers pressing down on a bruise. Armand is gone. Daniel has paid a very high price to see this done. Louis is struggling with that now, the cost. Daniel is looking at him with someone else's eyes.
Abruptly: "I missed you. I been missing you."
The way Louis reached out, it had been for no other reason than wanting Daniel in his life. To maintain connection.
True now, still, even as Daniel seeks to publish Louis' story, deflects away his apologies.
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A paltry summary. The situation. Jesus fuck.
Louis, now. Finds a way to wound him, bittersweet. In between hours writing and researching and coping with new sensations and needs, he has thought sometimes of Louis, and imagined some other world. A world he does not inhabit. Has anyone ever missed him? Genuinely? People have said it. But they don't mean him, they mean some role he fills, husband, father, employee, caretaker. He thinks Louis might actually be the first person to say it to him, and mean him.
"I thought about picking up," he admits. "And I'd think about you, after I didn't." His gaze ticks away, uncharacteristic. Daniel, who stares dead ahead, confrontational even casually, is not infallible that way; being alone with it had in fact been horrible, as Louis absolutely knows, he just doesn't want to talk about it. Another beat, orienting himself, and he looks back.
"I've been worried. They said you went to New Orleans."
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He wasn't, when it counted.
Louis says it anyway. He had missed Daniel. All things are complicated and painful, but in the midst of it all, there is such relief to be each others company. Daniel looks away from him and Louis feels affection twisting in his chest.
Doesn't say, I wish you'd picked up.
Because he does, yes, but it wouldn't help Daniel to hear it. Louis would have come, would have helped. Maybe offered something more than the Talamasca had, than Armand did.
Doesn't matter.
"I did. Just for a few days," Louis confirms. Explains, "Called you on the way back."
That first call. The confusion at the absence of answer. Reaching out and finding empty space.
A similar experience trying to call Lestat, who must have almost immediately abandoned the phone Louis purchased for him. Abandoned, broke. Louis isn't certain. Has to make his peace with it.
"You shouldn't be worrying about me," Louis reminds. "I ain't the one with so much on my plate."
Just a moderate amount, suddenly.
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He'd made peace with being alone. Hell, he'd made peace with dying alone. Very handy, now, staring over the edge of the abyss of immortality. It had already been an easy enough concept to understand, the need for companionship driving an immortal insane, making them willing to do any and every awful thing to keep hold of it. Vampire loneliness, and tears rolling down cheeks, and very dramatic, and very sad, and all that.
So it was good, even if it was terrible. Start as you mean to go on.
Though, Daniel has to chuckle, soft and wry. "This has taken a lot off for me."
Another stark reminder that Louis doesn't know what it's like to be terminally ill, and he's never gotten old.
"Was it... I mean. Did I call it?"
Perhaps incredible to think, but at this point, Daniel doesn't know with absolute certainty that he was right, about Lestat. He's pretty fucking sure, but there's always the possibility of some other, unexpected angle.
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No, he had never entertained the possibility that Daniel could have been wrong. It was never a sense that Daniel was infallible, only that Daniel was incisive, perceptive in a way Louis couldn't be when it came to his own life and what was amiss within it.
Daniel had pulled apart Louis' recollection of the trial, and put a finger upon the heart of the great lie: Armand didn't save you. Lestat did.
Incredible, that he is asking now if he was right.
A breathless shift from surprise to affection, bypassing any other emotion that might have lived in-between. (His life, in pieces. His life, rendered into a book.)
"Yes," Louis tells him. "You were right."
Lestat, glossy-eyed in low light, shrugging off Louis' questions. Confirmation of the act, no answer for the rest.
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"I was one thousand percent sure about Armand," he says. Something funny about his tone there, personal heel-grinding, before he continues. "And I really, really believed it, about Lestat, but you know—" he gestures. "Vampires and shit, what if there was a million year old alien who was puppeting everyone, he was full of sentient worms that slowly replaced his body over the previous twenty years, or something, and I couldn't guess. But I'm glad it was him. I really am, Louis."
One good reveal, in a series of utterly bullshit reveals. At least Lestat cared, in the end. Or 'the end', because there's still an endless road of immortality ahead of each of them, on which they can do anything, everything they want. Mend broken fences or never see each other again, at least now Louis can decide with all the correct information.
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"I'm glad you were right."
About Armand.
About Lestat.
True, regardless of how messy Louis' existence is now. Standing in so much rubble, sifting through piece by piece, he is certain of this: he is grateful for Daniel.
Daniel, who saved him.
(And Louis failed him in turn.)
And then, carefully: "Do you want me to go?"
There's a possibility he is intruding. Unwelcome. Daniel deserves the opportunity to tell him as much.
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