bakerstreet | (no subject)

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(no subject)

The HAUNTED HOUSE Meme

For whatever reason, you've ended up in a creepy house - possibly in the middle of nowhere, possibly not. Nothing else to do but explore, and see where you've ended up.

... did you hear that?

INSTRUCTIONS
- Tag with your character's name and fandom in the subject line!
- Find other awesome people to tag!
- Tag them by rolling the RNG for a choice of prompt!
- GET SCARING.

PROMPTS
1 - Car Broke Down
2 - Poor Choice of Vacation Home
3 - Everywhere Else Was Booked Up
4 - New Home
5 - Lost a Bet
6 - Ancestral Home/Grandma's Got Weird Taste in Wall Decoration
7 - Secluded in the Woods
8 - You're the Ghost!
9 - Free Roll/Combine

By the very nature of this being a scary/horror meme, there may be triggers within, so tread carefully!

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Guess what matters is that it got here.

[He unscrews the bourbon with shaking hands and takes a swig from the bottle. Some of it splashes onto his shirt.]fucker - now I need a napkin.

I could try but that might be too much fine motor skills right now, picking up a napkin.

[He drops onto the couch beside McCoy--and it's legitimately onto the couch and not through it, for once.]

You could just change your shirt later?

Gonna have to. I don't think I can get up now that I'm here.

[He looks over.]

Look at you, not on the floor.

Yeah, yeah. I've been practicing since that one time I went through the couch and freaked you out.

...I'd do whatever I could, you know?

Not to sit on the floor or not to freak me out?

[He chuckles, lightly.]

A little of both.

[And something else, something he keeps edging toward but then shying away from.]

...But mostly the second.

That is -

[His hand comes out and swings right through Jim's knee. A look of horror crosses his face, and he pulls his hand back, curling it into a fist, looking frightened and a lot younger, more vulnerable, than he does normally.]

- real nice of you.

[Jim's face falls, full of conflicted emotions. He hates that he's done this to McCoy--"this" covering everything from dying to not being able to be there for him like he used to be to upsetting him just now. He always wonders, despite what Bones says, if he shouldn't just move on, and moments like this bring that worry back all over again.

...And, God, what he wouldn't give to still be able to feel that hand on his knee.]

Bones... I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. This isn't what I wanted for us.

[He keeps saying that. It's about as close as he can come to explaining how he feels without, he thinks, making things worse. And he's not even sure he has the right to talk about the feelings behind them anymore, as if bringing those up now would just be adding insult to injury.

He shouldn't have waited, he supposes, shouldn't have assumed he'd have all the time in the world to get around to how he felt. And now he's dead, and who the hell brings up something like this for the first time after he's dead and nothing can be done about it?]

[McCoy laughs, but it's not really a laugh. It's that noise you make when you're trying to force something out of your throat but it's closed so tightly in the prelude to tears you can hardly breathe.]

Makes two of us, kid. I didn't really want this, either.

[The way McCoy's laugh catches guts him. He never thought he'd actually cause the man so much pain. Jim shakes his head, his chin dropping.]

It's the damnedest thing, you know. I don't have a body anymore, I can't feel anything physical. But I can still feel, my emotions were left intact.

[And now his voice is choked too, words coming more haltingly, less sure of themselves.]

I'm sorry, Bones. I'm sorry I did this to us. It's not what I wanted, I thought I had more time, I thought I'd figure out how to tell you all the important things. Maybe it would've made things worse, I don't know. But I never meant to do this to you, make you hurt so much.

[He looks over, and his eyes are bright with tears that he's too drunk to hold back.]

What the hell were you trying to figure out what to tell me?

[He's not even doing that much to hide his tears, one ghostly one rolling down his face. His voice is soft, full of the emotion he can finally admit to, but also so, so full of regret and sorrow. Because he should have said this when he had the chance, when he could have done something about it.]

How much I love you. And wanted to be with you.

[He's overwhelmed, and he has to turn away. When he blinks, tears spill down his own cheeks, and he wipes them away angrily with the sleeve of his shirt.]

Fuck you, Jim Kirk. How dare you fucking say that - say that to me now.

[It guts him, everything guts him right now. And that fact is written all over his face.]

I know. I know. I have no right. I'm sorry.

[This time, he can't even disguise the sob as a laugh when it bubbles up, and he presses his knuckles to his mouth to stifle it.]

Can't even tell you to get the hell out, 'cause if I do, where will you go?

I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I know I fucked everything up. Everything.

[He takes a moment to breathe, sounding a hell of a lot like a little boy, sniffling.]

You deserved better than this and I fucked it all up and never gave it to you.

Takes two to tango, Jim.

[He tries to wipe at his eyes, but somehow the tears just don't stop coming.]

Coulda said something too, but I was just too chickenshit.

...what.

You...

what.

[He blinks a few times, still crying, bewildered.]

I didn't think-- I mean-- I knew you cared but not like... not like that.

Of course I cared like that. You were the best thing to ever happen to me, Jim.

You were to me, too.

[And then he crumbles all over again.]

And I screwed it all up, I'm sorry...

Jim -

[He can't stop himself - he reaches out again. His hand encounters some resistance as it reaches Jim's leg, but then it lands on the couch. McCoy stares, and when he blinks, tears drip down his cheeks.]

Shit.

Wait, Bones, hang on.

[He takes a deep, sniffling breath--the effect is rather like a small boy trying to will himself to stop crying.

...And it's not far off the mark, really.

He looks over at McCoy's knee, and he holds out a hand. The same look of concentration he had on his face in the kitchen is back, but now it's far more intense. He holds that for a long handful of moments, and then he puts his hand on the other man's knee.

And it stays. It doesn't pass through. It's cool, the touch nearly not there, feather-light. But it's there.]

Jim -

[He stares at the hand on his knee, tears freely falling down his face, and he almost moves to touch it as well. And he wants to say something else, but no words can encapsulate how much that small, barely there gesture means to him. No words are big enough. No words will ever be big enough.]

[Jim lets out this sound somewhere between a barked laugh and a heaving sob. He's pleased he pulled off this trick, and surprised and joyful at what he's learned about how McCoy felt about him. But it's tempered with grief and regret for everything they've now lost, for all the ways he'll never be able to follow through.

He finds himself thinking about all the theories he's read, in passing, about ghosts. About how, maybe, souls linger because there's unfinished business.

He wonders if this is why he needed to stay. If this is what he needed to finish.]

[He stares, overwhelmed, for a few moments longer, then shifts his tear-filled gaze to Jim's face.]

What now?