Papers and Envelopes

[palaceharry.livejournal.com]

(Eric and Harry... this is directly after Elijah has left the office, and Harry has left an anonymous post on Eric's com...)

 

Buzzzz! Buzzzzz!

Eric looked round distractedly at the noise, blushing as the faces on the table next to him turned to stare. He picked up his com quickly and looked at the screen:

Email from unknown. Press 1 to Accept, 2 to Decline.

Eric pressed the '1' button and read the message, a smile spreading across his face as he did so.

Anyone seen a big dumb deer around? Anyone... anyone...

It could only be one person. Harry must be back. Grabbing his things he walked out of the cafeteria and towards the admin dept. hoping Harry would be in his office.

He knocked on the door to Harry's office, hearing a muffled, "Come in!" He grinned and peeked his head round the door, "Where the hell have you been then?"

Harry smiled and frowned at the same time. "Off playing spy for David... you knew that- right? Just got in last night." Harry has a stack of unopened mail piled up on his desk, but he's not in a big rush to get to it anytime soon.

"Yeah I knew... David emailed. I was just kidding." Eric smiled and stuffed his hands in his pocket, not sure what to do. Giving in to his urges to strode across the room and enveloped Harry in a hug, "C'mere... missed you."

Harry stiffens for the briefest of moments, then relaxes into Eric's arms. He hasn't seen Eric in weeks... and while that wasn't entirely an accident, he did miss him. "Missed you too. Haven't been away like that in ages."

"You've been away a lot longer than you've been out of Palace Harry," Eric commented, "But I won't press you about that if you don't want me to..." He plonked himself down on the edge of Harry's desk, shuffling papers out of the way as he moved. "So... find out anything useful?"

Harry winced as he flipped a chair around to sit down in. It was too much to hope for that Eric hadn't noticed that he'd avoided him ever since the raid. "Just got busy and stuff. You know... things, stuff, whatever." Sinclair... you fucking suck at lying. Harry avoids Eric's eyes. "And I dunno if I found anything useful or not. Kept passing it up to David, he'll tell me if it spins anything loose. Or not, whatever. Did what he wanted, briefed him in person, my part's finished."

Eric sighed openly at Harry's lack of... well cooperation really. That and him refusing to meet Eric's eyes concerned him somewhat. "You're a shit liar Harry, now are you really going to tell me what’s going on?" he leaned back, looking at Harry as one would look at a naughty child. "It won't leave this room."

Harry let his head drop. "Fuck Eric, I don't know. Everything was fucked up, and I had to go away, and it didn't fix anything- not that I expected it to. I'm glad I went, but I'm not and I don't even know anymore. You know?" Harry looked up at Eric, not entirely sure that anything he just said made sense.

Eric took a moment for his thoughts to settle before replying, "Has this got anything to do with the basement boy, and where he came from?"

Harry froze. He had forgotten that Eric was the one who located Johnny in the first place. Another person you need to let know you're back... don't forget that. Still... "How do you... I mean, I know you were there when he... but how what do you..." Harry cuts off in frustration.

"You don't read the papers much do you?" Eric commented wryly before adding, "Be back in a minute..." Eric lept off the desk and out into the hall, Dominic was bound to have a copy of an old paper or something. Sure enough there it was, he flicked through it quickly, just making sure if was the right one before bounding back into Harry's office. "Here..." he said, thrusting the paper at Harry, "Read."

Harry looked up at Eric and started to whine. "Eric I don't wanna read Sally - she's totally full of shit."

"Read it... you wanted to know how I knew, so bloody read"

Harry growled and started drudging through Sally's usual dreck. "Blah blah Sean, blah blah, Dom..." Harry falls silent as he realizes that she's just announced not only Jake's presence, but Anna's to anyone and everyone who reads the column. "Well fuck." He carries on, his jaw dropping open a little bit as he looks up at Eric from the paper. "We are not that loud! And even if we were, this is Palace for Christ's sake- there is a certain amount of soundproofing in the walls, ya know!" Harry fumed.

Eric raised an eyebrow and tried to smother a grin, "Carry on."

Harry grumbled under his breath. "He's the screamer anyway... s'not me..." Harry is having a tough time letting this one go after appearing in Sally's column AGAIN! "Can't we just get Sean to fall on the sword, take one for the team and fuck this bitch already? It would shut her up for a bit- take some of the heat off of, well, me for example."

"Harry..." Eric said warningly.

"What! He'd be doing us all a favor. Good of the many and all that. Stupid cow."

"Fine then... I'll just leave shall I and come back when you're willing to talk..." Eric is irritated now, and jumps off the desk heading towards the door.

"Eric come on... fucking hell- give me a break already. I'm sorry, okay?" Harry is petulant but sincere.

Eric sits back down in his space on the desk again, folding his arms not saying a word.

Harry stared at Eric for a moment, then remembered the paper in his hand. Scowling, he went back to the article again, skimming past the stuff about him and Orlando and reading... "Shit. Shit fuck hell. How did she get this? How did they know I was... Goddammit." Harry quickly skimmed the rest of the article, managing to give Eric a bit of a raised eyebrow at his mention, then throwing the paper to the ground.

"So that’s how I know." Eric said finally, "Want to talk about it?"

Harry looked down at the paper. "I don't know.

"Well you don't have to," Eric started sympathetically, "But it might help you if you did you know..." Eric placed a hand on Harry's shoulder and rubbed softly, "It’s up to you."

"I don't know where the start is. Johnny was hurt... he wasn't a libertine, he was a slave. There was a plan to get the people who did it- to get the other kids like Johnny out. Fucking Sally found out about Johnny being at Palace and we had to go in early, before they realized he'd been found and their secrets were out. And it went wrong. Well, I thought it went wrong. And it was bad. Worse than I knew... those kids... Eric, I don't think I can talk about that part." Harry looked up at Eric with panic in his eyes.

Eric moved off the table and stood behind Harry wrapping his arms around his shoulders, "I don't think I want to know..." Poor Poor Harry, he thought, hugging him tighter, "It must be horrible, to have seen that."

Harry is relieved that Eric isn't going to make him talk about it. "But that's what's bad, Eric. I just had to see it- those *children*- some of them not even Orlando's age..." Harry cuts off, takes a few deep breaths and tries again. "They all had to live through it. And they did. And they're healing. And I can't. How fucked up is that? Johnny can be-" Harry stops himself again. "He's trying, and moving past it, and healing. And I'm feeling sorry for myself, and nothing happened to me." This is the first time Harry has said any of this out loud, and the self loathing is clear in his voice.

"Well people get affected differently, you will heal, it'll just take time." Eric bends down and kisses Harry's shoulder, it feels right for some reason. "Maybe the children now have closure, so they feel like they can start to heal. You on the other hand can't get closure because what you saw isn't the kind of thing that you can forget easily." Eric paused a moment, "You will heal..."

Harry spoke in a whisper. "You didn't see them, smell the blood, the acid..." Harry looked up at Eric. "Tell me something else please. I can't- I don't want this in your head too Eric. Not after what you went through yourself. It isn't fair."

"Amy!" Eric said grasping at something in the back of his mind, "You still need to work with Amy, get her talent under control. Would you still be up for that?" Eric rubbed a hand against Harry's cheek smiling softly.

Harry looked up at Eric, confused for a moment, then latches onto the distraction. "Amy... right! I can help her_ right?" Harry leans his cheek into Eric's hand, closing his eyes, and breathing steadily.

"Yeah of course you can..." Eric enthused, "In fact you're the only person who can. Remember what David said? You'd be great at it."

Harry nodded along with Eric, eyes still closed, calming himself down, regulating his breathing. He looked up at Eric with a smile, which tried, but didn't quite meet his eyes. "I'm sorry. Thi\s isn't where I planned on going when I emailed you. And I'll do my best with Amy. might be a day or two though... should I contact her directly, or go through you to schedule with her?"

"Contact her directly, I think she'd like that, she needs a few people to go and speak to her I think." Eric smiled softly, "I have to go now, but promise me if you need to talk more you'll beep my com or come to my room or something ok?" He patted Harry's shoulder again, "Don't hold out on me..."

"I will talk to Amy... and I won't hold out on you... but I don't know if this is something I can share. I couldn't tell Orlando- couldn't tell you. Maybe it's just gonna stay where it is." Harry looked up at Eric. "Thank you though. It means something that you listened- even if I didn't get anywhere. And I'm sorry I avoided you so I wouldn't have to deal with this. I was avoiding your insight gift- not you. Okay?-

"Okay. I understand Harry." He kissed the man softly on the cheek and moved away. "Take care, don't make me worry about you." He waved and opened the door walking out into the outer room. God Harry! Whatever am I going to do with you?

Harry watched Eric walk out the door and turned to look at his pile of mail. May as well deal with it now as later. He picked up the first thing on the pile... a large padded envelope...

Comments

Comment

[palaceelijah.livejournal.com]

Poor Harry.... Great scene and Jess doesn't want Harry to open that damned envelope....

Re: Comment

[palace-dom.livejournal.com]

Ditto! And you made me tense this whole scene and the one in front of it -- like the envelope was just sitting there driving me insane.

Damn the tension! (heehee - go away and come back and drive us all insane will ya?)