whiskeycoffee | "Say No Sleep" (Metanoia, Star/Zan, 1/1, PG-13) (Reply)

Title: Say No Sleep
Author: m.jules
Fandom: Metanoia
Disclaimer: Not mine. They belong to Jesse Hajicek and Rah. I wouldn't dare try to make money off them. But if you wanna, you know, pay - you can make a donation to the webcomic!
Author's Notes: So I asked my friendlist for prompts to get through my writer's slump, and my darling cohort in underappreciated fandoms, aka

aidara, said, "Metanoia. Star/Zan. 'take me with you'." In further exchange for the lovely icon you see here, I wrote her this ficlet. It's pure self-indulgence, and I hope she likes it. <3

Zan wouldn't admit to any jealousy that Jane had apparently done what he could not -- that is, she'd gotten through to Star. There hadn't been any more "stigmata murders" or anything else that Zan could link to him. Not that he wanted to; he wanted to trust Star. While he was making a wish list, he'd also like to learn how to block empathic projections before he lost his damn mind.

Star or Zan or maybe both were having dreams on an increasingly frequent basis that were alarmingly efficient at getting under Zan's skin. He knew now that desire had a taste; he woke up with its salty longing on the back of his tongue, the scent of his own sweat clinging to him. Not only that, but he was starting to feel waves of the stuff rolling off of Star, especially when they were both barely in the world of the waking, the fading tendrils of one of those dreams curling around them like smoke, ethereal and pungent. They would wake together in their separate rooms, stumble through their doors, and brew coffee by mutual unspoken necessity. Zan would do everything in his power to not blush or stare or, God forbid, lick his damn lips while Star, sleep-tousled and shirtless, watched him from across the table with half-lidded, smirking eyes.

Star knew. There was no way he could not know, if that growling, hungry-tiger feeling prowling low in Zan's belly was anything to go by. Zan wasn't an empath; he didn't know how to tell what was his own and what Star was projecting, but he was pretty sure they had a lot in common.

Star still went driving at night, sometimes, and still wouldn't tell Zan where he went or what he did there. Zan tried not to mind, tried not to fidget, tried not to watch through the window when his wandering roommate left. One night, staring after the red taillights disappearing down the road, Zan heard himself think (whisper? yell?), "Take me with you."

The flutter of wings in the windowpane seemed concerned. "Why aren't you going after him?"

Zan took a deep breath, held it, blew it out; ruffled his long hair with one restless hand. "I trust him. That's what we do, after all." Was that bitterness he heard in his voice? Anxiety? "He doesn't need a babysitter." Reminding himself. Convincing himself.

There was a shifting of white feathers, a shake of long white hair, and a thoughtful moue on a beautiful face. "I think you and I both know that isn't why you want to go after him."

Zan shifted, tensed, fingers tightening on the windowsill. His voice was rough, almost strangled when he spoke. "Then you know why I'm not going." Why I can't.

He told himself he wasn't waiting up, told himself it was just that he had work to do, told himself he didn't jerk upright instantly when he heard the door click, the growing-familiar sound of his roommate's footsteps. His eyes flickered over Star's form, relieved when he saw no marks of pain or pleasure. Concern was the only reason he looked; certainly not jealousy.

"Goin' ta sleep," Star said around a yawn that didn't seem entirely genuine.

"Night," Zan answered, a study in distance, his eyes fixed on his monitor.

He wondered how he'd never known before how he could hear soft sounds of clothes rustling, dropping to the floor, even through a closed door. And when he sent the computer to sleep, too-casually stretching for an audience that couldn't see him, he told himself he was only going to bed because he was tired. That's all.