semi-open post: portraiture

[peaklordshen]

After shifting his way through oil pastels, watercolors, house paint, colored pencils, and an endless variety of paint markers, Shen Yuan has finally managed to get the Mansion to produce a decent set of oil paints, and—wonder of wonders—an easel. He's set up in a spacious, well-lit hall, probably for dancing or salons or whatever, where he's arranged a bunch of furniture in various configurations—wooden screens that he's draped cloth¹ over for backdrops; armchairs stolen from the lounge, wooden stools and high-backed dining chairs from the kitchens; even a lovely chaise lounge in a deep purple that he wistfully thinks he won't actually use, because it would definitely be for Aleksander, and he doubts he'll be doing that entry in his protagonists of the Mansion series after all. He has one of the stools pulled up next to the easel to hold his paints, and is wearing a wide-necked sweater over a black turtleneck and some loose, worn jeans that already have a few flecks of paint on them from when he was doing his color tests.² He's pulled his hair back in a practical bun, and he's currently laying down a layer of gesso on his canvas.

¹ Look, he has to do something with all of those robes he accidentally conjured in his last post.
² After days of feeling very lost and confused about how he's not required to LARP anymore, he's pretty much decided that it actually means he can just change who he's LARPing as at will, and the main way to do this is through fashion. Today he is An Artist.

[Primarily for those Shen Yuan has offered to paint, but anyone else is also welcome to come bother him while he works.]

Comments

[sagramore]

"No," he agrees, with some relief at Shen Yuan understanding. "He's very thoughtful, deliberate-- his smiles are so serious." He laughs. "But I can undo him a little, and make him laugh, and make him almost impulsive. That felt good. We could be together all afternoon and hardly speak, but he'd-- share his work with me. He remembers things I'd said in passing to give to me. He trusts so few people; he's not used to having friends. I was so grateful to be one of them. Christ, that's so maudlin, and I'm not even drunk--"

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan doesn't like how they're arranged, right now, anymore than he'd liked it in the gallery. None of it lets him touch Sagramore the way he wants to, to be comforting the way he wants while he listens. He picks up the wine bottle and his cup and jerks his head toward the other end of the room where there are some more comfortable chairs and couches around some shorter tables. He doesn't wait for Sagramore to follow, just puts the bottle and his cup on one of the tables and sits at one end of a couch, then opens his arms like he had when they'd napped together, except this is less an offer and more a silent demand.

[sagramore]

Sagramore huffs a breath at him, slightly reproving, but he settles down on the couch and gingerly eases into Shen Yuan's arms. "Thou'rt fussing," mildly.

[peaklordshen]

"Deal it with," Shen Yuan tells him, unbothered, and slips a hand into his hair so he can cradle his head to his shoulder and run his nails soothingly over his scalp. He will release Sagramore, in a minute, but only as far as the other side of the couch, so that if the mood strikes he can be unreleased again later when he's drunker and more willing to be fussed over.

[sagramore]

He laughs. "I am, I think," finishing the wine in his cup.

[peaklordshen]

"If you've already gotten maudlin despite not being drunk, you may as well also get hugged despite not being drunk," says Shen Yuan, reasonably. He finishes his own wine and offers the bottle in case Sagramore wants more. "Plus, I don't think you're being maudlin. I think you're being sad, which is both justified and probably good for you. So they say, anyway." This last with a slight smile, acknowledging the irony that he's recommending sitting with your feelings.

[sagramore]

"Thank you," for the refill. "I've no practice at this, thou knowst."

[peaklordshen]

"I'm not sure it would be any easier even if you did," says Shen Yuan. "Your husband told me the language of love is different with every lover.¹ I imagine it's the same with grief."

¹ See? He was listening! Kind of.

[sagramore]

"Did he say that?" fondly. "He's got such a gift. He always surprises me."

[peaklordshen]

"I like him very much," Shen Yuan admits. "I wasn't sure he liked me, until our most recent conversation—I was kind of dedicated to making a fool of myself around him for a while." He sips his wine again. Has he drunk enough to bring up the furry thing?? How does he bring up the furry thing?? He doesn't want to reveal Laertes' commission, but he's unbelievably curious. How do a Shakespearean guy and an Arthurian guy back themselves into inventing furries out of whole cloth??

[sagramore]

Sagramore laughs again. "Half the time I make a fool of myself around him as well. Jesu, he has the light of the world in him, hasn't he? He's so bright."

[peaklordshen]

"He is," Shen Yuan agrees, making a mental note to add more gold to his firelight portrait of Laertes. "You're a lucky man," meaning, despite it all.

[sagramore]

"I am. Too fortunate to feel sorry for myself," shooting Shen Yuan a Look.

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan nods placidly. "It's a good thing we've established how different sadness is from self-pity, then."

[sagramore]

"A very good thing." He finishes his cup again, and looks into it meditatively. "Hast thou any habits thou knowst to be an injury to thyself, that comfort thee nonetheless?"

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan, after a moment's hesitation, leaves the bottle where it is rather than offering it again, though he does drain his own cup in solidarity. He winces, a little, at the question, remembering his conversation with Galahad. "I am slow to change any habits, whether injurious or not, because simply knowing them as me is a comfort."

[sagramore]

"I can understand that, though it sounds as if you mean that differently from the way I would."

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan regards him. "Tell me the way you mean, then?"

[sagramore]

"I suppose I mean-- I know I drink more than I should. But sometimes I find the alternative worse." He frowns. "And I've never particularly cared about that, but-- Laertes cares."

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan nods at this, remembering how he'd almost instinctively dodged around Sagramore's drink, earlier, only to realize it wasn't there. On some level, though, he is surprised—it had seemed such a part and parcel with Sagramore's charm, the ex-knight with his curls, the twinkle in his eye, the drink in his hand. It's yet another reminder of the reality of the people he's surrounded by, rather than their fictional counterparts. No charmingly drunken knights in any myth he's heard have husbands concerned about their alcoholism.

"What about the alternative is worse?" he asks, curious. "Or—I suppose—what is it that drink gives you? I've never really understood the appeal, other than as a social thing."

[sagramore]

He sighs. "I don't like myself very much. I never have. I was a burdensome sickly child, and then a surly young man, and--" A pause, during which he's thinking about his conversation with Laertes the day before. "The man I was in love with was very good at cutting me down to size. I had been drunk a handful of times in Constantinople and it made me feel less sullen and more pleasant to be around, and, Christ, everyone in Britain drinks. The water's no good, and half the year the day is short and there's nothing to do. I drank a great deal with other people and after a while I drank a great deal by myself as well, especially when we were fighting, and Jesu knows we were often fighting. People seemed to like me better, or perhaps I just felt as though they liked me better, and in any case I always feel as though I'm thinking too much, I can never stop thinking, and the more I drink the more I can quiet myself down." He sighs again, not looking at Shen Yuan: he can imagine how Laertes would look if he'd said all this to him. He doesn't want to see it on Shen Yuan's face any more than he does on Laertes'. "It's easier than learning how to live with myself, I think."

[peaklordshen]

Shen Yuan has a lot of immediate reactions to this speech, both verbal and non. He squashes most of them; the urge to be angry with the man Sagramore had been(?) in love with; the urge to tell him he understands about not liking yourself very much; the urge to tell him he's living with himself either way, there's no escaping that, even if you die and get transported to a world where you're supposed to be someone else entirely.

The nonverbal reaction he doesn't suppress is that he shifts sideways, just a little, so his thigh is pressed a little harder to Sagramore's, and then he turns his empty cup over in his hands, examining it. "So—there's two parts to that, it sounds like. Habit—there was nothing else to do, in dark old Britain, and everyone was doing it; that part seems easier to me to change, or to replace with something else." He knows people who are trying to get sober sometimes drink a lot of seltzer, or energy drinks. Maybe he should introduce Sagramore to Mountain Dew. "The second part is the harder part. I'd tell you you're actually a very lovely person to live with, and I have an entire Mansion full of your current housemates who would agree, but I know that doesn't mean you'll believe it."

[sagramore]

"I'd tell you that you've mostly been living with me at least a little drunk," with a short laugh; he presses his thigh back against Shen Yuan's. "And-- both parts are hard. If I don't drink, I do feel it. My hands shake, I get a headache, I go hot and cold. I consider selling my nonexistent firstborn."

[peaklordshen]

"Of course. I didn't mean to minimize the difficulties of withdrawal, just that psychologically I understand how habits can change, in contrast to your nonsensical and very stubborn lack of self-worth," says Shen Yuan, both genuine and a little teasing. "I do think all of that is temporary, but also that quitting cold turkey—that is, all at once, I don't know why that's a phrase, actually—is supposedly a pretty bad idea. So." He pours himself more wine, and lets Sagramore decide if he'll do the same.

He's never missed search engines more than right now. They have this stuff figured out, in the 21st century! Whole programs for it! Enormous backlogs of research on what's good and bad for alcoholics! If he had his phone right now he could call upon the probably contradictory, fake news and snake-oil filled collective wisdom of the entire internet to help him with this conversation! Okay, maybe Sagramore's better off with just what Shen Yuan remembers. Which—might include something about weed?

"I have something that might help," he says. "With the headaches, anyway, and maybe some of the other symptoms. It's also an intoxicant, technically, but very different from alcohol, and from what I know not nearly so addictive. It might be worth a shot, next time, if you're interested." He looks at Sagramore, holding his eyes. "Even if you're not, you can always come to me when you're feeling it, even—especially if you're irritable. As we've already established, some of my favorite people are breathtakingly mean."

[sagramore]

"Wait, wait, go back--- there's a word for that?" holding up a hand. "Withdrawal?" He's sufficiently distracted that he doesn't refill his cup.