║ in-character contact ║ (all types of spam welcomed)

[mumbled_truth]

VOICEMAIL



Hello.

Um... Th-this is Todd. If... if you leave me a message, I'll get back to you as soon as I can. Thank you.

Feel free to use this post for any other kind of in-character contact; voicemail message applicable only if appropriate.



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☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[had_not_lived]

"I told him I'd save my congratulations for when it actually happens," he admits softly, with a bit of a laugh. "I think he's kind of nervous about it. Which makes sense, that's... big."

☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[mumbled_truth]

"Well, yeah. I mean... I think most people would get nervous about that."

Which makes him empathize a bit more, trying to imagine how nerve-wracking it must be. And that's really the first he's thinking of the concept it in the context of them, of him and Neil, and that thought sort of catches him off guard. So he swaps it back to Billy.

"Maybe he'll be back again in a few months. We can see how nervous he is then."

☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[had_not_lived]

He laughs, though it isn't all that easy of a laugh. Keeping this entirely focused on their friend helps, but it's still a bit uncomfortable. They never talk about this sort of thing.

"I have a feeling it'll take more than a couple of months for him to get comfortable with the idea."

After all, back home, Billy's a teenager again. Even if he remembers, and maybe he doesn't, when he's there. Age is a strange sort of distance that creeps up on you. Neil is, perhaps, twenty or twenty-one or seventy, depending on how one does the math; old enough that in the real world, if he'd lived, marriage wouldn't be such an impossible idea. Maybe there could have been a world where they'd wait patiently and choose to walk down the aisle as old men. Or maybe (and maybe likelier) they'd both have wives and children because that was what one ought to do.

But it strikes him, in a way it never has-- not that he'd ever doubted them, outside a stray, miserable curse-- that here, as they are, they might as well be married. What a way to look at it.

☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[mumbled_truth]

"Well, I didn't say he'd necessarily be less nervous. He might be more."

It's easier to talk about Billy, to be happy for him and Teddy, or to laugh sympathetically about how nerve-wracking it all must be, than to consider how close they are to being married themselves. For all intents and purposes, they already are - Todd never has any intention of going home, if he's given a choice in the matter, or of going off and dating someone else (the concept frankly sounds ridiculous), and would never dream of leaving Neil. He's perfectly content to spend the rest of eternity here, in the City, with Neil just as they are. Back home, he'd undoubtedly have a wife by now or soon - if he'd built up the courage to talk to a girl long enough - and be thinking of children. Even if things had been different - if Neil were still there - he doubts the thought ever would have occurred to them. With things being as they are, though, he can't really bear to think of home - he'd likely never realize exactly how much the best friend that he'd lost truly meant to him - so he tries to avoid that entire line of thought as much as possible.

☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[had_not_lived]

"Maybe that'd be a good sign?" he says, with a note of laughter behind the words. And then he lapses into silence, not sure what more he can say without saying far too much.

It's not an uncomfortable silence, exactly; better than the uncomfortable conversation that might otherwise occur. He takes a deep breath, and lets his eyes fall shut, leaning against Todd.

☞ fold into the dent of my chest, the crook of my shoulder || backdated to early November-ish

[mumbled_truth]

"It might mean they've stepped it up from eventually."

Todd's content to fall into silence with Neil, though, after that. He just curls his arm more tightly across the other boy and pulls himself close.