holyposition | IC Inbox

[Goodsir pours out and adds cream, passing Tim the cup and saucer before seeing to his own. He then sits in the armchair, pleased by its warm scent.]

Ah, yes. Personal trials, even if they are objectively pointless in the grand scheme of things, are always important. After all, we are men and not gods. We only understand the present moment, and despite any intentions to the contrary we are feeling creatures. What we experience matters.

[He smiles softly.]

You matter, Tim. It isn't fair that your life be laid bare in such a callous manner, but please don't take that to mean people don't recognise you as a thinking, feeling individual. We do see you. Not as an object of ridicule, but as a man.

[ He takes the cup with a smile, warming his fingers against the sides. Tea isn't his favorite, if he's honest - it reminds him of October's killing games, of the gallons of tea with honey he must have had to soothe his throat enough to speak after being strangled very nearly to death. But this carries a different scent, and Goodsir's gentle reassurances. They're so earnest, so precisely what he needs to hear, that emotion wells within him once again, not anger or grief, but relief. ]

You're a really sweet person. Thank you. At least someone lets me have a little dignity.

[ Blowing on the surface of the liquid, and venturing a sip. It's not coffee, but it's cozy and pleasant. Calming. ]

What about you, though? Feeling any more settled in?

[Goodsir shrugs and sips his tea. He isn't certain that being sweet is a good thing - on a ship full of adventuring men such a word would have been more of an insult, but Tim clearly means it as a compliment.]

Everyone deserves their dignity.

[He takes another sip before he can give utterance to anything bitter about how, in the end, there may not be any.

Goodsir looks up and smiles.]

Ah. Yes, thank you. I've seen the library and it is most extraordinary. And the grounds are lovely to walk about.

I daresay I am actually beginning to believe this place is real, in spite of its eccentricities.

I don’t think this place agrees.

[ With more weariness than bitterness. There’s no dignity in making them fight like animals amongst themselves, or in making them rise from the grave with new and unpredictable curses upon them, or tearing their loved ones from them suddenly and without notice. This is not a place for dignity, even if it’s something they deserve. It’s a place to test how they’ll conduct themselves without it, and today, Tim’s failed. ]

It is, isn’t it? I hope you’ll get to see it in fall, when the leaves turn. It’s all very real, as fantastical as it all seems. And the fantastical isn’t all that bad, actually. A lot of people have abilities that they use for good. Empathy, and healing, and protection. It’s not all violence.

[ An offering, gentle, for him to take or leave. In case he’d be more willing to speak on what ails him, without the...specifically Catholic connotations around confession and peace. ]

[Goodsir smiles again with a sort of boyish enthusiasm.]

Oh, that would be ever so lovely. I haven't seen an autumn in years.

[Which unfortunately brings him back to what Tim is saying about violence. He sighs softly and looks to meet his gaze.]

We were ice locked in the fall of 1846, and spent two winters aboard the ships. Unfortunately, a portion of our canned provisions were rotten due to improper sealing. Those that were edible, I found later, contained lead.

We abandoned the ships in the spring of 1848. We walked a great distance, and we found no game to speak of.

[Goodsir's voice is soft and calm, but slightly detached - he sounds like he's reading a text aloud.]

We were all of us suffering the effects of starvation, scurvy, and lead poisoning. Things were very dire. There was a mutiny...

[He pauses and sets his cup and saucer aside because his hands have begun to tremble. He leans forward slightly.]

Desperate men consider desperate options. Unspeakable options. Do you understand?

[ The broad strokes are already known to Tim, at least those which can be known from books and reports, with no survivors to tell the story. Stuck in the ice, ships abandoned, frightened men trying their hardest to prolong a death march. Search parties leaving years too late, so few bodies recovered. An unthinkable tragedy.

But Goodsir isn’t a figure in a history book. He’s flesh and blood, breath and kindness, here to offer him kindness after knowing him for a week and dealing with so much himself. He tells his story and it’s even worse than he knew. They were starving before they should have been, slowly poisoning themselves for years.

Tim listens attentively, warm brown eyes going glassy with feeling. Despair on a new friend’s behalf, impotent anger that’s over a century too late for the lack of rescue, the lack of...something, whatever could have avoided this. ]

I...

[ Cut marks on the bones. The scandal, the ungodly implications. He’d almost forgotten. Tim takes another sip of his tea, suddenly craving the warmth, and then puts the cup down softly next to the tray. ]

I think so. Does that mean you were...?

[ Eaten? He dare not say it. But Goodsir has such a gentle disposition, it’s hard to see it the other way around. ]

[Goodsir has yet to look at any history books relating to the ill fated Franklin Expedition. He isn't sure that it even existed in this world. But he won't be surprised to discover that so few of them were ever found. Upset, but not surprised.

He studies Tim's face and, seeing no judgement there, he continues.]

You spoke earlier of vampires. Those, sir, are monsters. Monsters cannot help their nature, can they? But men can.

Yes, men can.

[Goodsir sighs and sits back. His voice stays even, but his eyes are haunted.]

I was taken by the mutineers. They wanted a medical man for their sick, and an anatomist for their dead. To spare them, you see, of the reality of what they were going to do.

I saw a man stabbed to death. He died in my arms. Before the day was out I was butchering his body. I was coerced, but that seems a piss poor excuse for slicing a man into steaks.

I did not ever eat anything but what provisions we had in tins. In that sense, at least, I am innocent.

[He smiles sadly at his new friend. He thinks of lying by omission, of simply leaving his story there. It's tempting - he could be an innocent, a heroic man doing his best.]

But you may think me a monster still, Tim. I butchered one man and tried to kill eleven more. Yes, I believe they ate me. I hope they did. I was quite thoroughly poisoned.

[ He’d struggled so much last month, with the ghouls. It was easy, using his new powers to set them ablaze. Second nature, like he’d been doing it all his life. It was too easy, too quick, to put an end to what was once a whole person, with a family, with a soul. Their burned to ash with a snap of his fingers, no burial, no prayers. The smoke still lingers in his nose, stings his eyes in his dreams.

But that’s nothing compared to this. Betrayal within the crew, from men that he’d known and lived with for years, forced to desecrate one of their own. Feed him to the wolves only to postpone the inevitable. Tim sees fog forming in his vision, and takes his glasses off, setting them aside on Hawk’s pillow. ]

I don’t think you’re a monster.

[ He’s forgiven less desperate men for more heinous deeds. ]

I think... [ Chewing his lip. It sounds absurd, and he would have never believed this if he were there, but the hindsight of history makes it a little easier: ] The rescues wouldn’t have gotten there for years, still. Even if every last one of you had... [ Been eaten by the others, sustaining the strongest as long as possible. Too grisly a thought to speak. ] Maybe, in some terrible way, it was a mercy.

[ Even if the intention was punitive, even if it was an act of defiance. It’s the result that matters. Suffering was cut short. Fewer men were carved like pigs. ]

[Goodsir listens, fully expecting a more judgemental response. When it doesn't come, he's not sure how to react at first. So he just sits there, looking at Tim a while before he sighs and drops his gaze.]

I'm not sure. If what I did worked as intended, it would be a bad way to go.

I slit my wrists, once I was sure that the poison took hold. A final deception. I condemned them to a more painful end.

[Goodsir reaches for his tea and sips it before he dares look at Tim again.]

I believed us to be good men. I was so very wrong.

And even now, I don't regret it. I wish only it hadn't all been so pointless.

Dying of scurvy is no way to go, either. And it takes longer.

[ He offers, feeling stupid as soon as he says it. Goodsir was there. He would know a hell of a lot better than Tim would. Still, he feels the need to offer comfort. A good man wouldn’t confess it like a sin, with ghosts behind his eyes, or come to comfort him when his own troubles are so small in comparison. It tugs at his heart, the depth of a pain he can hardly imagine.

Tim’s eyes meet his with softness. Not judgement or fear. Sorrow, maybe. For Goodsir, and all the other men made real with his presence here, the gravity of a doomed expedition so much stronger for it than it had been reading from a book. ]

Maybe you’re not perfectly innocent. [ Who is? Even Tim, who’s tried his best to do good and live justly, has bartered with lives, weighed their worth. There’s blood on his hands, too. Not directly, but how long until this place forces that too? ] But you were put in an impossible situation. With no good choices. Get up.

[ Tim stands, motioning with his hand for Goodsir to do the same. If he does, Tim will pull him closer, strong arms holding him in a tight hug. ]

[Goodsir manages a feeble smile.]

Yes. Quite so. We lost some that way.

[He's surprised by Tim's instruction, but he doesn't consider not obeying. He sets his tea down and stands.

Goodsir has touched many men in the context of medicinal care. He's soothed fevered brows and changed bandages and even examined intimate parts, but to be held in comfort is not something that he's used to. And so he is stiff for a moment, unsure of what to do.

Slowly, he brings his arms up to hug Tim back. The other man is solid and warm (and, he notes with a clinical detachment, in extremely good shape) and it feels good to have someone to lean on. Physically and emotionally.

He speaks into Tim's shoulder, soft as always.]

I am sorry for bringing this all to you. I know it is deeply unpleasant, and I considered not revealing any of it. Ever.

But I do not wish to lie to you, Tim. You've been a tremendous friend even in such a short time.

[ It's funny how used to it he's become. Embracing other men. Even platonically, it wasn't done back home. What if someone interpreted it as something more? What if someone noticed how comfortable he was, that he might long for a gentle touch instead of a pat on the back, like a woman, like some sort of fairy. This was only for lovers, behind closed doors. And even then, it was a danger. Too much intimacy was a weakness. It softens the mask, encourages cracks.

But it's become so easy here, to share the warmth he's always had, to cry on someone else's behalf. Someone still frail, malnourished, smaller than he'd realized before he'd gotten his arms around him. Tim's tall enough to tuck him into his shoulder, run a hand down the back of his head, calming motions. ]

Thank you for trusting me. It can't be easy. [ Doing it, remembering it, talking about it at all, much less to a man he's known for a week. ] I'm sorry. For everything you went through. You don't deserve that, nobody does.

[Goodsir is small, and right now he feels it. A part of him wants to weep, and another part wants to just stay pressed against Tim and go to sleep.]

Thank you. Even if I cannot entirely believe you, I thank you.

[He dares to squeeze Tim briefly.]

I trust you understand that I would rather this not be public knowledge. It's... all a bit much.

[ Tim squeezes back. It verges on the edge of being tight, just so that he knows that he’s sturdy enough to lean on. He’s been keeping secrets his whole life, and that hasn’t stopped here. Ironic that he’s so good at it, with how much he hates having to be the one to omit the truth or lie outright, but Goodsir’s secrets are his own to share. It’s part of why the blind item ordeal has bothered him so much, revealing even the benign revelations of his or Hawk’s rumors could get them blacklisted, disowned, or attacked by people with hate in their hearts that outsizes Goodsir’s by a mile. Old fears bubbling up at the worst possible time. ]

Of course. I’m a locked box. Won’t tell a soul.

[ Muttered into his messy curls, while the hug lingers. No hurry. He’ll let go if Goodsir wants him to, or hold him until dinnertime. Whatever brings him peace. ]

Thank you.

[The naked gratitude in Goodsir's voice should probably embarrass him, but it doesn't. He's too tired, for one thing. Being in the manor is more comfortable than sleeping in a tent, but it turns out that a nice blanket isn't a cure for nightmares.

He hugs Tim until it occurs to him that it's probably inappropriate to keep doing so. When he lets go and steps back he's smiling in that sweetly awkward way he has.]

My apologies.

You're very, ah, well built. What did you say you did before arriving here?

[ Tim steps back gently, and reaches for his tea again once he's seated. It's cooled off, maybe a bit more than he'd like, but he'll finish quickly. ]

Oh. Thank you.

[ With a soft dust of pink on his cheeks, unsure how to take the compliment in the wake of the blind items nightmare. It's made him feel objectified and uncomfortable, the tone of the post salacious, as if his body, his person were a scandal - an idea he's worked a very long time to dispel.

But Goodsir doesn't leer at him, or press with any further innuendo. Maybe he'd be a good person to be strong for. ]

I was just - I worked for a senator. But I played baseball in college.

[ And in lieu of a job to take his mind off of various other stressors, he likes to spend time at the gym. This place is stressful frequently. ]

[It's debatable if Goodsir even understands how to make a sexual innuendo.

He brightens, happy to have the focus off of a past so horrible and still so fresh.]

Oh, goodness. So you're a man of some standing! No wonder your manners are so impeccable.

My apologies if it was an odd question. It's been quite some time since I've known anyone who wasn't a sailor or an officer. Terribly strong fellows, you know. I'm afraid I could never measure up to them. The first time I tried to pull a sledge I fell over.

[He sips his tea. It's a veneer of civility that he pulls over himself like a blanket. He can be normal, he tells himself. Yes, he's admitted to awful things, but he's still capable of making polite conversation.

Well, as capable as he ever was.]

There is ever so much I've still to learn about you. I apologise if anything I say is inappropriate.

[He's made a very strong mental note that gay men are not wives.]

Oh, no, not really.

[ Shaking his head, and looking down at his hands, while he wipes a smudge off his glasses with the hem of his shirt. ]

That was all my parents. The man I worked for...he wasn't a good man. Corrupt. I really believed in him, but he proved me wrong. So I left. Enlisted. I was due at training tomorrow, but I woke up here, instead.

[ And when he goes back, he won't be allowed, because he's become too spoiled here to keep living a lie. Booted from the military, blacklisted, probably disowned. He'll suffer the consequences of an honest life eventually. Here, though? He smiles. That painful disillusionment of learning that his hero was a fraud has turned out to be a blessing. ]

You've sure shared plenty. Ask me anything.

[ Replacing the glasses on his face, the world back in focus. ]

I'm sorry. It's never easy to discover that the people you admire are not who they say they are.

[Now that he's no longer recounting his own experiences Goodsir's voice is warm again. Sympathetic.

He smiles.]

You are so patient with me, Tim. You've taught me much about what is and is not acceptable here, and I appreciate it greatly. Truly, I feel you can be trusted with most anything.

So I hope you will not be offended if I ask... would you choose to stay here rather than go home? Because you have, ah, love here? In spite of the hardships.

[ He nods softly, resisting the temptation to reach for a cookie. Biscuit? After all this time here, he doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to the English way of saying things.

As for his question, it’s simple. More simple than it should be. ]

No. I’d go home. My partner, Hawk, we were... [ how to say it politely... ] on and off, back home. We're from the same place. But you can't be the way that we are and work for the government, so we were sneaking around in secret. It was really hard. On both of us. But now that we know the world can be a kinder, more accepting place, I don't think I have a choice. We have to go back and help transform it.

[ 'We', in this case, largely means 'him', but Hawk told him that he'd follow. Leave Washington behind. To even think about the way those words sounded, the fears he's long held being soothed, makes his heart flutter. It's clear on his face, bright eyed and grinning as if they weren't talking about murder and cannibalism only minutes ago. This boy is in love. ]

I would miss a lot about this place. And a lot of the people. But people like me are suffering back home. I know it sounds naive, but knowing what I know from fifty years ahead, I could really make a difference.

[Goodsir has no such hesitation - this man is going to eat as often as possible.

Listening to Tim, Goodsir finds his heart opening, his spirit lifting. Since awakening in this place he's been trying very hard to recapture his belief in people. Almost everyone he's met has been a joy, but the shadow of "what if" haunts his thoughts late at night. As he'd just related, men are capable of such evil.

But to hear Tim speak this way... people are good. They care.

Goodsir has to clear his throat, not quite teary eyed.]

I don't think it's naive at all.

[ Dedication to Lenten sacrifices trumps the craving. More for Goodsir. ]

I’m glad you think so. And I know it’ll be hard. And dangerous. My family’s stricter than I am, they’ll probably want nothing to do with me.

[ A painful admission, for as much as he loves them, as defeated as he was by the library’s rejection of a couple of photos. But he thinks of everyone who needs this: of Mary, forced to choose her livelihood over her love, of Frankie who doesn’t have the luxury of being able to pass for straight, and Marcus who’s afraid to want him because of it. He thinks of sweet Bob, his first lover, wherever he is now. Still hiding, still singing God’s praises in the day and cursing Him at night for making him so abnormal. If he can help those people and the countless others like them, every sacrifice, every wound will be worth it. ]

There’s people I’d take with me though, if I could. Guess you’re one of them, now.

[ Seeing as he’s got nothing to return to. ]

[If God can forgive all the murder, He can surely allow some biscuits.]

Yes. I imagine that you are probably correct, which is a shame. Your, ah, preferences? Certainly do not somehow negate the many things that make you a good son. Do you think they would actually be surprised? I know that, at least in my time, many choose to simply... not mention it. We've a great many confirmed bachelors, and they continue to speak to their families.

[Goodsir looks surprised, and then he smiles, blushing lightly.] Oh, goodness. I. That's terribly kind. Thank you.

I'm not certain what I would even do, in your time.

My mother’s still asking if I’ve met any nice girls I might want to settle down with, so I think so.

[ he lies, insists that working for McCarthy keeps him too busy, and she seems satisfied enough. A noble crusade before marriage. When he got that job, his parents had never been prouder. Now he’s betrayed McCarthy, quit, and has spent his time since living in sin and sodomy. She’ll have nothing good to say. ]

It’s not just that it’s not allowed, where I’m from. They’re actively looking for anyone with same-sex proclivities in the government to weed us out. They think that our perversion [ air quotes implied with his tone ] makes us more susceptible to foreign or subversive influences. They want us in the open, so they can ruin us. I was seeing a woman for a while. She likes women, so we used each other for cover.

[ Another long sip, more of a gulp, and he’ll concede: ]

I think my sister Margaret might suspect something. She hasn’t said anything, though.

[ The curious look on her face when he’d lied about his gift from Hawk said enough. ]

You could...go back to medical school. It’d probably be all new, after so long. You could move to California, so you never have to see ice again. That’s where I’d probably go. Far from Washington.

It seems mothers remain exactly the same across centuries, then.

[A bit of levity. But only a bit, because what Tim says certainly is serious.]

That seems all a bit paranoid of them, doesn't it? That is... [Goodsir stops, frowning. Sodomy is a sin, granted. A crime, also. But as wide-eyed as Goodsir often seems, he's not actually naive. Men he knew to be perfectly capable and perfectly loyal dabbled in some occasional trysts. Was it wrong? Yes. But did it endanger national security? Heavens no.]

To be perfectly frank, Tim, normal intercourse was a greater source of concern from a medical standpoint, at least in any military service. Syphilis is a terrible problem. Buggery not so much.

[He smiles sweetly.]

That is one of the former Spanish colonies, yes? I do wonder how I'd fare in a warmer climate. It's still on the coast, isn't it? That would be lovely. I'm certain there are many animals that I've never seen before who make the Pacific their home.

[Give this man a crab to watch and he's happy.]

Very well. If we are ever driven from this place, I shall accompany you to see California.

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cw: cannibal! the musical

all that continued ok

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cw: and more suicide

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cw for 50s homophobia

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