Chapter Text
He’s twenty fucking years old.
He’s young, he’s rejuvenated, and he’s furious. “I’m leaving a scathing Yelp review,” he mutters, as Real Rashid brings him breakfast like nothing’s changed at all. Just once, Daniel wants someone in this goddamn penthouse to act like this is abnormal.
Maybe he can pay someone to come in and scream for a while, just to make him feel better. Maybe he’ll decide that today’s the day he goes insane and does it himself.
Eventually, Louis joins him – Daniel’s sleep schedule had already been fucked up before, but losing fifty years and adjusting to a mostly nocturnal sleeping pattern really does a number on him.
As always with the denizens of the penthouse, Daniel’s first reaction to anyone in on it is anger. Today marks a special difference, though. It’s the first time Armand isn’t lurking around. He’s gone hunting.
(Daniel is trying very hard not to be jealous about that and working doubly hard to ignore why that’s the emotion he’s feeling strongest of all)
“Did you know about this?” he demands, gesturing to his youthful face with a sharply-contained fury in the curt movements of his hand. “Did you agree to it?”
Daniel’s not sure which role Louis is playing today. Through it all, he’s been ally and villain in turns. He’s friend and foe. As Louis settles with a bag of blood brought to him (so he can share breakfast with Daniel, how fucking quaint), he looks up at Daniel speculatively and Daniel decides that today, Louis is definitely playing the role of Top Asshole, with Armand out of the house.
“You said you wanted a new start,” Louis says casually, as if he and Armand didn’t just plot and peel away fifty years from Daniel’s life, restarting his clock without even asking.
Daniel inhales sharply, using two fingers to gesture to Louis and the door Armand had left through earlier. “You know what? Claudia was right. Fuck these vampires.”
Louis, unfazed, gives Daniel a fond smile.
Asshole.
“Is that what you want to do with us? I did offer.”
“You’re not getting my mouth on your dick after all this, unless you want it bitten off.”
Louis raises a brow speculatively, amused by Daniel’s sharpness as if he’s got kitten claws and not a tiger’s. “...Armand, though?”
Daniel flushes fiercely, biting back jealousy and confusion and longing and desire, which can’t all be the blood. There’s something else that he’s not seeing – he keeps scratching away at the parts of his brain that seem to have more answers, but nothing ever shakes loose.
“Doesn’t this bother you?”
“Your youth? It pleases me to see you get a second chance, Daniel.”
Daniel is going to slap him again if he’s not careful. “Not that. Armand,” he says, leaning forward as if this is all a secret rather than the open knowledge it is. “The way he’s pursuing me. Why don’t you care?”
“Armand’s been after you for fifty years,” Louis says.
“I promise that’s not true,” Daniel argues back, proving that with youth comes some of the old idiocy flooding back.
“Between Armand’s cuts to the mind, the drugs, and time, I don’t know what’s really left for you to remember, but ever since San Francisco, he’s been fascinated by you,” Louis says. “I’ve allowed it. It’s good for couples to have hobbies outside of the relationship.”
“I’m not a fucking hobby.” He catches his turn of phrase, holding up a finger. “Don’t,” he warns, even though Louis has already opened his mouth at the set-up. “I’m not some chew toy for Armand to play with when you get bored of him.”
“You’re not an idiot, Daniel,” Louis says.
He’s not. He knows what Louis means. Louis didn’t start being bored with Armand. He’s earned back enough memories to remember San Francisco in the seventies and the lead weight accusations of Armand not being enough. He’s sat through hours of stories of Lestat’s vibrancy, of Claudia’s light, and even though Daniel’s got his own opinions, it’s clear how the pecking order goes in Louis’ mind.
“You called him the love of your life,” Daniel reminds him, digging into his food with the metabolism of a young boy again. “Was I not supposed to take that seriously?”
Never mind that he didn’t. He’d seen the attempt at a front for what it was, but now that Armand seems intent on pursuing him, he’s not about to become a homewrecker just because he saw the narrative unspooling in front of him long before he got his youth back.
“You’re too smart not to have noticed the difference in the way we talk of one another.”
Does Louis sound bitter about that or relieved? Does Daniel want to scratch the surface on this particular landmine? No, he decides, he absolutely doesn’t.
“So, when this is done. When we reach the inevitable end of your story.” Sooner rather than later at the pace they’re going. “Then what?” he hates himself for asking it, but he needs to know. “You and Armand swan off and leave me young and restless,” he deadpans. “You sit here waiting for Lestat to see my book? Armand kills me and leaves a pretty corpse?”
“I’m not privy to his plans, Daniel. You’ll have to ask him.”
He thinks he’s so clever, avoiding the Lestat-shaped elephant in the room.
“And you? I’m asking you now.”
“It’s been a long time since I’ve been back to New Orleans,” Louis muses aloud. “The music. The drink. The dancing. The wildness. The noise. The people. I think maybe it’s about time I went back home.”
Daniel wonders if that’s where Lestat is. He wonders if Louis plans to take the long way home, with a layover in Paris. After the story he’s heard, he’s not entirely sure if he should be cheering Louis on or begging him to have common sense and stay – except that by staying, it would be with the guard who’s been keeping him (them) trapped, so is that really having any sense?
“You should be careful. Sometimes, going back to something isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” he says evenly, staring at Louis with young eyes to get the point across.
Louis is too happy with the idea of his own fresh start to seemingly care, pleased to escape the pressing boredom of his cage. “And sometimes, you have to shed your expectations and open your mind to what you might discover that you never noticed before.”
“Have fun discovering the piles of vomit in New Orleans, then. Enjoy the beads,” Daniel quips, not feeling very charitable to wish Louis a bon voyage at this point.
Louis smiles like he actually might. It only reinforces Daniel’s belief that everyone in this penthouse is more than a little twisted.
“And you? What are you going to do next?”
What is Daniel going to do? Jump out the window like he keeps threatening? Go back to a co-op where his neighbors will think he’s his old self’s new plaything? Stay here and take Louis’ place as the new prisoner?
“I really don’t fucking know.”
“Whatever you decide, I hope you know that the gift we gave you was meant in kindness,” Louis says. “You didn’t want to die. You didn’t want the dark gift. You left us in a precarious position, but now you can live, as long as you like, until you’re seventy and find a new vampire to interview or even longer with the help of the blood.”
“It still wasn’t my decision,” is Daniel’s heavy reminder.
“You’re right. It was a gift.”
One that Daniel still wants to take back, most days, but he’s starting to get the sense that arguing with Louis is a pointless exercise. There’s no going back, there’s only going forward and maybe he should start looking at it as an opportunity to live and publish and love and fuck and try it all again, without the haze of divorce and drugs and depression haunting him.
“What about the book? Do you still want it published?”
“It’s our swan song,” Louis says. “I want it on every corner.”
“Gonna be a real awkward author photo.” That earns a warm laugh from Louis, which makes Daniel feel even more shitty. Everyone seems to be having a grand old time around him while he should be just as delighted, but can’t get over the burden of youth.
He’s an ungrateful son of a bitch, what do you want?
“I’m going to miss you, Daniel.”
“Yeah, well, seeing as I’m gonna be around a while, it’s not like you can’t come visit.”
“I’ll need to know where you are to do that.”
He does. He will. Daniel isn’t entirely sure where he’s going. Wherever that is, he already knows Armand will be ten steps behind. He’s stopped bristling at that idea, if only because it means he won’t be alone.
“I’ll make sure you have my cell number,” Daniel says – a useless offer because he’s pretty sure Louis could just scan the world and find his thoughts. Still, Daniel likes to play at being normal, so he’s going to pretend that cell phones and postcards are the norm and not rooting through his brain from continents away.
All that’s left for Daniel is decide what comes next – and where that next step of his new life is going to take place.
Easier said than done.
The manila envelope is waiting outside Daniel’s door when he wakes up.
“If I find a severed finger in here, I’m really walking off the balcony,” he tells the empty hallway, bending down to pick it up – and not even paying attention to the fact that his knees don’t creak, he’s not worried about standing back up, he just does it.
Opening the envelope reveals a slew of documents – passport, driver’s license, and a whole suite of new pieces of identification under the name Daniel Molloy, Jr.
That’s the moment it hits him.
The version of himself that he used to be is going to have to die to make way for the man he’s become. He sleepwalks his way out of the bedroom into the penthouse – quieter these days since Louis has fled to the United States in search of a long lost love – and lets the connection in his blood guide him to Armand.
“When did you even take this picture?” he demands as he foists the passport forward, finding Armand doing paperwork at the breakfast table. Daniel’s excellent eyesight tells him that it’s papers to sell some more of the artwork lingering on the penthouse walls.
Pocket change for the modern vampire.
“Louis had something in his camera roll.”
“...from when?” Daniel asks suspiciously.
“1973.” Armand isn’t looking at him. He’s lying. He’s always goddamn lying.
“Nice try, but Louis definitely wasn’t snapping pictures of me. It’s from those blank years, isn’t it? The holes you left in my brain.”
“I only put some of those holes in. Your drugs did the lion’s share of the work.” Armand peers forward to look at the passport in Daniel’s hands. “I think you look particularly handsome in this photo, just as you are now, and just as you were when you arrived on the private jet.” He returns to signing the papers.
Daniel glances around the walls, only noticing now how bare they look.
“You guys broke or something?” Daniel asks, gesturing to the papers, then to the remaining art. “Fire sale, everything must go?”
“Downsizing,” is Armand’s not-helpful–at-all explanation. “I don’t anticipate remaining here much longer.”
That’s two for two. It looks like Daniel’s managed to get a book and speed along a divorce in his time here in Dubai.
“What about you?” Armand asks, signing the last of the documents and gracefully setting the sheath of paper aside. “Have you thought on what you’d like to do next?”
Daniel doesn’t comment on whether Armand’s asking so he’ll know what to pack for his little jaunt across the world like he’s taking Daniel on dates or whether it’s because he’s waiting for Daniel’s resolve to splinter and welcome Armand with open arms (and legs).
“I’ll tell you what I’m not gonna do,” Daniel scoffs. “This time around, I’m not gonna be the same idiot I was before, sticking a thousand different drugs in my body to see which one felt the best.”
Is he really learning and growing? Or is he just trading in one addiction for another?
“Clever boy. More proof that youth is wasted on the young,” Armand says with a burning and fierce pride as he stares at Daniel with that unblinking leer.
The most infuriating thing about all of this is the way that both Armand and Louis have kept treating it like it’s nothing at all. Time doesn’t run them roughshod. They don’t change. They treat it casually, meanwhile it’s the most devastating thing that Daniel has ever come up against.
Aging, and the opposite, as he’s beginning to learn.
“Yeah, well, the wisdom to not fuck with somebody’s body without telling them is wasted on the vampire,” he snaps back, gripping the envelope a little tighter until it crumples. He digs into his pocket for the other little prop that he’s been carrying around for days now, ready to make the final sacrifice.
“Here,” he says, holding out his prescription glasses to Armand like he’s Adam in Michelangelo’s painting, reaching out to his god.
Armand eyes them speculatively, not taking the offering. “And what are these for?”
“I don’t know. Claudia kept body parts. Maybe you keep trophies too.”
It’s the last echo of the man Daniel used to be. The reflection in the mirror has no evidence of Daniel’s former age. At some point, Armand replaced most of his wardrobe when it became clear that other than the cardigans, his clothes made him look like a starving child. His identification is being replaced with a new version of himself – the shinier new model.
The glasses and his memories are all he has left of the man he’d been when he arrived.
“They’re yours,” Armand says.
“Not anymore,” Daniel replies, the bitterness swallowing the words whole and spitting them back out. “You made sure of that.”
Armand reaches out to gently take the glasses from Daniel’s hand, but he doesn’t leave his palm empty. He settles his own hand there, folds Daniel’s fingers around it, and tugs him in closer.
He’s chasing a kiss. He’s been damn near desperate for it since Daniel figured things out (even if he’s still missing a hell of a lot of his memory when it comes to Armand), but Armand’s going to be sorely disappointed because Daniel isn’t planning to give that to him. He’ll remain unkissed and unsatisfied, no matter how much it disappoints him.
“I’ll keep them safe, for when you need them again.”
Daniel stares at him in disbelief. “What? Like you’re going to be there after fifty years when I loop back to the start?”
He’s not expecting the earnest plea in Armand’s eyes as he stares at Daniel. That’s the face of a man who’s been wanting something for longer than is tolerable. Suddenly, Daniel feels guilty for spewing nothing but anger and bitterness in the face of that look.
Steady, he warns himself. Armand’s a world-class manipulator. This is just another trick.
“I don’t plan on leaving you for any of them.” It sounds earnest. He looks the part. He even reverently tucks the glasses into his pocket, holding Daniel’s hand like they’re sweethearts. “I’ll go anywhere you’d like, this time without a chase. If it’s fifty years, then I plan to enjoy the next five decades more than the last fifty.”
It’s not the first time Armand’s talked about the chase.
It’s unfortunate that it’s still a dark blot in Daniel’s memory.
“Don’t play,” Daniel warns quietly, an old warning that deserves heavy emphasis.
“This part isn’t a game,” Armand replies, serious in a way that actually makes Daniel believe him. “We didn’t give you this gift to simply turn you and keep you permanently this way. It’s so you can live, so I can be there at your side, and for us to chart a new path, for fifty years or more. I do have high hopes that your wisdom will change the course of your future.”
That’s absolutely not what Daniel’s been expecting.
Somehow, he’d gotten this idea stuck in his brain that Armand would try and keep this version of him forever – young and stupid and eager. The idea of getting gray hairs at his temples and earning his smile lines back without also developing the furrowed lines in his brow never really occurred to him.
“You’re serious?” he asks, asking a liar for the truth like an idiot.
“No one will touch you,” Armand vows. “Not even me, until you allow it.”
Armand’s a master manipulator. He lies. He obfuscates the truth.
Daniel believes him when he makes his vow. Instead of focusing on the tangled emotions that belong in a romance novel and not the horror film of his life, he points back to the papers on the table.
“So you’re really thinking of fleeing Dubai?”
“I am,” Armand agrees, rising to lean against the table, tugging Daniel to stand between his knees. “I was thinking of traveling the world for a while, seeing old haunts and new sights. The destination, of course, depending on my tour guide,” he jokes, his eyes lingering on Daniel’s lips. “Where did you intend on taking us first?”
“I’m still putting together the short list,” Daniel admits, and though he might not be willing to kiss Armand yet (or fuck him or really do anything for him), he still goes without much of a thought into the cool embrace. “Home, first,” he says. “I figured I’d give my neighbor a heart attack making her think I’ve started fucking a young twink.”
“Imagine if I joined you and she thought you’d started a harem.”
“It’d do wonders for my reputation as the neighborhood lothario. Then, I don’t know. Get this book published, figure out what I can do with another fifty years.” When he says it out loud, he doesn’t believe it. He’s not sure he ever will.
Armand makes a moue of his lips, his fingers carding through Daniel’s hair as he peers upwards. “There’s Paris.”
“Shithole.”
“Rome.”
Daniel grimaces. “I’m just gonna want to do an exposé on the Vatican.”
“Bali.”
“Too hot.”
Armand is going to pick up on Daniel’s game soon. There’s no place he can name that Daniel won’t find an excuse not to visit. It’s just a shame Daniel enjoys being a little shit, because it’s kind of a turn on to see how long he can wind up Armand. Turns out, it’s not much longer before he picks up on the game.
“Brooklyn?” Armand says with a disappointed sigh.
“Hey, you don’t want to stick around, you don’t have to.”
Armand’s smile goes tight as he grabs Daniel by the waist and tugs him closer. “I can’t wait to learn all the fascinating sights that Brooklyn has to offer.”
“Then I guess we’re heading to Brooklyn.” He lets himself indulge in the way Armand cups his neck, his thumb tracing circles behind his ear. “Don’t sell all the paintings,” he murmurs. “Whatever your favorite is. You should bring it. I really don’t want your coffin to be the only thing in the apartment.”
Armand seems stunned by the offer.
“I’ll think about which I’d like to bring,” he says. “You’d really hang that in your home?”
“If you’re gonna stick around, I want you to have something to look at that isn’t me.”
“I wouldn’t need a single other thing.”
It’s almost sweet, if you forget that it’s Armand being obsessively possessive of Daniel and refusing to let him go. It unsettles him because he can barely look at himself in the mirror (a dysmorphia he suspects he won’t be able to shed until he looks different enough to try), but Armand wants to look his fill now, tomorrow, and decades from now.
“Brooklyn,” Daniel echoes, holding tight to that as an anchor. “Brooklyn, and one of your paintings, and we’ll see how that new start goes.”
That’s all he can do. Step one, then two, and so on until the years start piling on again.
He never thought he’d be here.
For one thing, the fact that he’s still alive shocks him most days.
Daniel really thought that when he’d gone to Dubai, it would have been to get a book finished and to have a dramatic swan song that ended with him shuffling off the mortal coil. The fact that he’s alive and back in the United States is a goddamn miracle – except, not the kind you get in the bible and more the kind when someone comes back wrong and it takes a little too long to figure it out.
Secondly, he can’t believe that he’s here, witnessing something that was only ever a pipe dream. Of course, it’s not exactly the way he thought it’d go when he imagined this.
“I belong in a goddamn Twilight Zone cautionary tale episode.”
“Do you always complain this much at parties?”
“I can’t get within twenty feet of the goddamn fancy event or someone’s going to scream at the top of their lungs and then I don’t trust you not to drain them dry.”
“I ate on the way,” Armand replies primly, his arm casually draped over Daniel’s shoulders as they stand under a nearby willow tree, a secure hundred feet away from where the wedding is taking place.
Daniel, with his newly perfect eyesight, can see it all, and he can’t get any closer.
His youngest daughter is getting married and Daniel Molloy can’t even crash the party because too many people would recognize his face.
Besides, it’s not like he’d actually been invited. It had been Armand’s idea to come witness it, insisting that he could be his plus one. Really, Daniel suspects that he’d just wanted an excuse to come to Key West and dress up like a local in his white linen suit, looking impeccable and infuriatingly handsome.
“I wonder if she misses me,” Daniel says, staring as his daughter walks down the aisle hand in hand with her newly pronounced husband, waving the bouquet in the air like she’s doing a victory lap. One of her friends had walked her down the aisle, and from what he can tell, no one misses Daniel.
Talk about a stark reminder of just how much he’d fucked up throughout his life.
(He can’t help thinking that Armand had wanted to tag along so he could keep reminding Daniel that he gets a new shot to avoid doing that)
“I could make her miss you.”
“We talked about this,” Daniel warns him.
When Armand had traipsed after Daniel to New York, they’d had a very long talk about Armand not doing things for Daniel unless he got three requests from him, and that jokes didn’t count, nor did sarcasm, and definitely not things he says before he’s had coffee.
(He didn’t add ‘when I’m post-coital’ to that list, only because he’s still enjoying the pleasure of keeping Armand at arm’s length, even if the whole game is starting to become an uncomfortable exercise in edging for Daniel’s young body)
“Fine,” Armand huffs, burying his face in Daniel’s neck as he begins to lay soft kisses to the skin there.
Daniel should pull away. This is bordering on allowing Armand too much, but he’s feeling a little heartsick and nostalgic, so tonight, he’ll allow it.
The music from the party is tinny in the distance. Soon, they’ll clear the tables from the reception and start dancing, only there won’t be a father-daughter dance because the father in question is currently ten years younger than the daughter – plus, he didn’t exactly earn any ‘father’s best’ mugs over the years.
That’s probably his cue to leave. “Hey,” he says, voice rough with the grief of the situation. “Let’s get out of here.” He tugs on Armand’s arm to pull him away, but encounters an unmovable stone in the process.
Armand’s planted himself in place, refusing to budge.
“You’re not picking up takeout here,” Daniel warns.
“I told you, I’m not hungry,” Armand counters. The moon makes the outline of his portrait soft and romantic. Daniel’s been enjoying the look of Armand before he’d even known who he was, but right now, he drinks in his fill because they’re both done playing games – or, at least, they’re done playing the game where Daniel pretends Armand isn’t the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. “I am lonely, though,” he says with a sad little sigh, holding out a hand. “Such a lovely wedding, and no one’s asked me to dance.”
Daniel bites his cheek to prevent the fond laugh from spilling past his lips.
He’s got to be careful, or Armand’s going to know just how charming and interesting Daniel finds him.
“I don’t dance. Even if you did give me back the legs for it,” Daniel quips, trying again to get Armand to move.
No dice.
The bastard will probably walk up and introduce himself to Daniel’s daughters if this escalates any further. He’ll offer his condolences for the loss of their father. He’ll probably even talk about how much Daniel had meant to him.
“If you won’t dance with me, I’m sure there are innumerable guests who’d like to indulge me,” Armand says, taking two steps towards the party.
Sometimes, it’s annoying always being right.
Armand moves swiftly enough that Daniel actually has to burst into a quick sprint to chase him down, tackling him from behind by the waist to pin him to the dewy grass. The fangs are out when Armand grins up at him from the position Daniel is straddling him in, clearly thrilled by this turn of events.
The way they’re positioned, Armand could push him off at any point. Daniel could walk away because he has the upper hand, not that he’s going to. The way Daniel’s heart is pounding, Armand’s probably going deaf from the sound and his mouth dry from the temptation.
“No dancing with your dear nieces? Cousin Ida? Not even the lovely bride?”
“Have fun with Ida. She’ll grope you until her handprints are tattooed on your ass,” Daniel snaps, allowing the jealousy to permeate every word. It’s not like Armand can’t read it off him, so why bother hiding it? He pins Armand down by the shoulders a little harder, but he doesn’t give him what he wants.
There’s no kiss. There’s no caress of a touch to his cheek. There’s no dance for him.
Luckily, Armand doesn’t need the physical offerings that Daniel is declining. He has full access to the menu of fantasies playing through Daniel’s mind at this very moment – most of which involve stripping him down to nothing and fucking him against one of the trees with the music from the wedding playing distantly in the background.
Armand smiles up at him, resplendent with smug delight. He lets his fingers spiderwalk up Daniel’s forearm towards his heart, splaying his palm atop it to feel the steady beat. He doesn’t pull himself up, because Daniel hasn’t said he gets to yet.
“Will you ever allow me to dance with you?”
“How about you try again when I’m thirty? I really came into my rhythm that decade,” Daniel quips, wondering how long he can string Armand along and how long he’ll endure it.
“What if you were one in a crowd?” Armand murmurs. “Pressed so tightly among the others that you could barely move. No one would see you dancing, but I would feel you. I would press in against you and indulge in the jealous looks I receive for holding you so tightly that there’s no question who you belong to.”
Armand sends whispers of dark club dance floors to his mind – images of Armand prying Daniel’s shirt off and marking up his skin with purple marks, all made by his mouth.
“Great. Where’s the portal to this alternate universe where everyone’s looking at me and not you?” Daniel quips.
“Daniel,” Armand whispers, making Daniel shiver. “They’re going to be looking at us. Perhaps we’ll even find someone for you to take home.” His fingers begin to spider-walk lower, gripping at the hem of his pants. “You can’t argue that denying me has had serious impacts on your sexual health. Imagine a proxy? Someone to take my place, until you’re ready to allow me.”
Daniel closes his eyes, hips rocking into Armand’s touch. It’s a very nice idea. It’s a very clever idea. It’s probably not the world’s smartest idea to go clubbing after spying on his daughter’s wedding, but how is she going to find out? She thinks he’s dead.
“I’m not fucking you,” Daniel warns, his breath unsteady as Armand takes a risk and slides his cool fingers to press against the bare skin of Daniel’s hip.
Armand bites his lower lip, manipulatively coquettish. “Not yet.”
He’s not wrong about Daniel’s issues. It’s been a long time since he’s been fucked. It’s been even longer since he’s been on his knees. He’s got these brand new healthy ones and he hasn’t even broken them in.
“Fine,” Daniel huffs. “One gay bar! One guy,” he negotiates. “You can tell him what you want him to do to me, but I don’t touch you, and no one kisses anyone.” Those are rules he thinks he can live with.
That seems to please Armand. He takes hold of Daniel by the waist and floats them upwards like it’s nothing at all – proving that he could have done that anytime.
“I know just the place.”
He hasn’t set Daniel on his feet yet. They’re floating in mid-air, a few inches from the ground, leaving Daniel flush with relief that the party is far enough away that they’re not going to notice the little mid-air non-dance happening just a few feet away.
He spares one last look to the wedding, thinks one last time about asking Armand to skim their thoughts just to see if anyone there misses him, and decides he’s better off not knowing.
“Let’s go,” he says, voice rough with the grief of a life he fucked up a long time ago. “I wanna change before we go.”
Armand gives him a knowing smile as he sets his feet upon the ground, reaching out to tug Daniel’s silk gray tie loose, draping it around his neck as he pops three buttons loose to leave his neck, clavicle, and most of his chest open. “No,” is his fond reply, going for the fourth button so he can slide his palm down Daniel’s abdomen.
Daniel exhales sharply at the touch, groaning as the need builds up pressure within him, making him prone to bursting. Never mind Armand’s strength – Daniel’s libido managed to get stronger with every regained year and he hasn’t done much about it other than a couple solo sessions.
“Y-yeah,” he manages to get out, “Okay.” Because maybe Armand’s right. Why delay when it’s been so goddamn long? He’s dressed like he’s just come from a funeral.
That’s got to be someone’s thing, right?
(If nothing else, it’s works for him and Armand and he’s just selfish to admit that he doesn’t care about anyone else)
“So,” Daniel says one night, days after his daughter got married and they’ve exhausted Key West’s supply of gay bars (though he doubts they’d ever run out of eager young men who want to touch Daniel while Armand watches. With Armand’s encouragement and Daniel’s general everything these days, they’re a persuasive duo). “What happens now?”
He asks that rhetorically, but he should have known that there’s an answer, because Armand always has a plan.
They’d stumbled home from the alleyway behind the bar at four in the morning last night, Armand tucking Daniel into bed. He’d fallen asleep alone, but at some point in the night, Daniel had delighted in the cool press of Armand’s body against his.
Daniel wraps his arms around him, tangling their legs together – his own personal air conditioning unit and security blanket and alarm system, all in one.
Armand wakes Daniel up long before noon which is unfair and extremely rude. Daniel’s exhausted from finally testing the limits of his young body, plus the Florida heat is killing him. His hair (longer now than he ever kept it in his youth, as if he’s fighting against things being the same) is frizzing and curling around his ears. He’s been sleeping naked on the plush silk sheets of the place Armand’s rented out for them.
It’s too hot. He’s too tired. He’s too old for this shit – except that he’s not, and it’s going to be years before his brain catches up with his body.
“I’ve packed your things and laid out an outfit.”
Daniel turns on his back, tugging the sheets with him, to stare at the villain who’s awoken him. Armand’s wearing a short-sleeved silk shirt with art deco patterns, extremely fitted chinos, Italian loafers, and a trilby. All he’s missing is the cigar and he’d fit right into the local scene.
“Have fun,” Daniel replies, arm draped over his eyes. “I need another decade to process that I’m never gonna see my daughters again and time for my ass to heal.”
Armand interrupts his self-pity, lifting his arm off his face. He’s close enough to kiss, but Daniel doesn’t. Even though it’s all he wants to do, he hasn’t given himself over to Armand. There’s been no absent-minded kisses, no desultory handjobs, no enthusiastic blowjobs, and definitely no sex – not with Armand, at least.
“Were you ever going to see them with your old plan?” Armand taunts. “Step into a suicidal situation, publish a book, then die and leave them all your money?”
He’s not wrong. It doesn’t mean it doesn’t annoy the fuck out of Daniel anyway.
“Sometimes, I really wish the sun could burn you up.”
“No, you don’t,” Armand replies smugly, made worse by the fact that Daniel’s pretty sure he didn’t even read his mind to know that. That connection of theirs is as strong as ever, even though Daniel’s been trying his best to keep a buffer of space between them for his own sanity while he figures out his feelings.
“Whatever,” Daniel mutters. “I’m still not getting up.”
“Yes, you are! We’ve got places to be! The boat leaves in an hour!” Armand’s energy borders on manic as he flits about, a cruise director on steroids trying to nudge Daniel in the direction he wants him to go.
At least he’s left the room, which means Daniel can grab the pillow and shove it over his face for the blissful peace of darkness and quiet for at least a few more minutes. He doesn’t scream into it because the truth is that most of his protests are for show these days.
Armand seems happy and he’s as eager to please as ever. If Daniel didn’t know any better, he’d think it’s penance for turning back Daniel’s clock, but the truth is that it’s whatever Armand wants, because he’s first and foremost a selfish creature.
Right now, he’s a selfish creature who wants to lavish Daniel with fine clothes, fancy hotels, and the best espresso he’s tasted in years waiting for him on the side table.
Spitefully, Daniel wants until there’s only five minutes left before he surfaces in the outfit Armand’s picked out for him – a breezy short-sleeve t-shirt, a pair of navy shorts, and sandals to match.
He meets Armand at the dock, just as the last piece of luggage is being loaded onto a fancy boat.
Hands in his pockets, he struts onto the dock like he’s got all the time in the world. “What’s the rush?” he asks. “You ate a little too much at the breakfast buffet? We’re gonna get charged for anything you left on your plate.”
“I’ve been waiting since we left Dubai to reach our destination,” Armand says impatiently, sitting in the driver’s seat of the boat. Daniel accepts the hand to help him inside the mahogany-paneled beauty idling at the dock, holding on a few moments longer than he needs to. “Finally, you’ll get to see where the money’s gone.”
“And here I thought bribing the doc and paying him for his silence was the big ticket item,” he mutters, settling into the leather chair near the front of what appears to be more of a yacht than a speedboat.
“Rest,” Armand says, plunking a straw boater’s hat atop Daniel’s curls.
Daniel glowers at him as he fixes the string in place. “We’re gonna talk about banning that word in our household,” he mutters, but he can tell Armand’s keeping his influence away from him. Besides, he’s exhausted and the sun is beating down on him, making him sleepy enough to obey that wretched command.
Armand doesn’t seem ruffled at all by the irritation. It’s become like water sloughing off a duck’s back – it exists, it’s there, but it doesn’t affect him. In fact, he almost seems to welcome it.
“Then, sleep your mortal sleep,” Armand says. “We’re hours away from reaching our final destination.”
“Could’ve let me sleep in,” Daniel mutters, tipping the brim of his hat forward to block out the sun. He’s exhausted, and the gentle rocking of the boat is already allowing him to drift off. “Wouldn’t have had this problem if you did,” is lost to the wind as he settles in for a nap.
When he wakes, the sun has already started its descent in the sky. Armand has stepped inside the small cabin of the boat, allowing some of the help to drive. Daniel hasn’t been moved, but he can feel a stickiness on his skin that implies that Armand’s lathered him in sunscreen while he’d been sleeping.
“We’re nearly there,” Armand says, emerging from the cabin the moment Daniel’s alertness returned.
There’s something in his voice that Daniel wants to pick at – the journalist’s impulse. “You’re nervous,” he calls out. “I can hear it.” It’s not just that he hears it in his voice, but he can feel it in his blood too. Wherever they’re going, Armand’s got a lot of emotions about it.
“I’ve spent a long time putting the pieces into motion for this,” Armand replies, avoiding Daniel’s gaze. “Longer than you know.”
With Daniel’s memory gap, that usually means that this isn’t something that happened in the last few months, but instead, something that started decades ago before things all went to shit. Daniel pries the hat off his head, trying to fix his hair, but it’s a lost cause.
He’s probably due a haircut, but Armand seems to enjoy the way it’s started to curl up behind his ears as it approaches his chin. It’s a real seventies look, and hey, if Daniel’s going to relive his twenties, why not the seventies fashions too?
“What do you think?”
He can barely hear Armand over the noise of the motor, but as they approach whatever Armand wants an opinion about, the driver begins to slowly reduce speed. The sun’s begun to dip, allowing Daniel a view of the neon monstrosity they’re approaching, with a huge house that looks distinctly out of place in the midst of the mall aesthetic.
“I think you puked up Vegas off the coast of Florida,” Daniel says, unimpressed.
“Changes can be made to suit your tastes.”
“Why would I care?” Daniel scoffs.
“Because if you’ll have it, this will be your home.”
Daniel’s discovered that Armand has a habit of dropping bombshells into conversations as casually as one might bring up the weather.
If it’s not paying him in youth, tagging along with Daniel as he flees back to the United States, lingering at his side while his daughter gets married (and plying him with alcohol through the rest of the night), then apparently it’s taking Daniel to a gaudy island and then announcing that it’s his.
“...you mean, this is a place to settle down and lie low for a while?” Daniel carefully asks, even though he knows the answer.
Of course Armand isn’t speaking in the metaphorical. This asshole only deals in literal.
“I’ll show you the deeds later. Welcome to Night Island, Mr. Molloy. Welcome home.”
There’s a staff of four waiting on the dock as they arrive to take away the luggage and greet them with fruity drinks that don’t have nearly enough alcohol in them for Daniel to cope. He’s trying, hard, not to let this revamped youth descend into the bacchanalistic chaos of the last time, but right now, he really wants some cocaine. Maybe a little heroin.
Anything to take the edge off.
“None of that,” Armand chides, gliding past him and reading his mind like it’s nothing. “Come, I’ll show you to our room.”
Our room. Their household. Neither of them are very good at pretending like they haven’t already mapped out the next few decades and that they’re planning to do it together.
Daniel’s not sure if it’s loneliness or a different kind of addiction or desire that’s making his choices for him. He’s got a bunch of blanks in his memory that don’t help him understand why he feels the obsessive need to keep Armand close, whether it’s for answers or to keep punishing him or because he just wants him.
For Armand, it’s a lot simpler.
He’s decided that Daniel is his. Daniel’s not sure of the exact moment, but he gets the feeling that the final straw was finding out that the only blood that gave Daniel back his youth had been his.
Talk about confirmation bias.
“Up here,” Armand summons, leaving Daniel to ascend a sprawling staircase in a game of Marco Polo through a house that would probably look a little gauche, even on all those fancy real estate shows.
Daniel winds his way into a sprawling master bedroom that has marble floors and gold accents and gorgeous paintings on every wall that Daniel recognizes. Armand had shown them off, tentatively, before they’d left Dubai.
Each of them is something Armand has painted over the years, but there’s a new one on the West wall. “When’d you do this one?” Daniel asks, approaching it to study the contrast of colors. It’s wild and chaotic – a penthouse on fire – but in the corner, there’s a soothing phthalo green sea that beckons.
“Most of it has been done for decades,” Armand replies, carrying in the luggage. “I finished it after you’d arrived in Dubai.”
Daniel reaches out, careful not to touch. It wouldn’t take a symbologist to figure out the meaning behind it, especially not when you look at how the tumultuous brushstrokes turn to smoother glides as red and yellow and orange turn to soothing blue and green.
“I’m glad you brought it. It’s nice,” he says, glancing over his shoulder as he grabs his suitcase to start unpacking. “This is…” He trails off, because it’s not just nice. It’s more than fine. It’s better than that, but he feels guilty for enjoying it.
Armand takes advantage of the lull in Daniel’s speech to ask the recurring question that haunts their lives these days.
He’s a fearsome vampire. He’s an ancient eldritch beast.
He also happens to be a needy boyfriend (or whatever it is that he is to Daniel). “Does that mean you’re not angry with me anymore about what I’ve done?”
“You don’t get to just buy me an island, paint some emotional pictures, sulk manipulatively, and get away with everything you’ve pulled,” Daniel mutters, dumping the contents of his suitcase onto the bed.
Armand has bequeathed unasked-for youth upon him. He’s given him a new identity. He’s bought him an island. This is one fucked-up mating dance, but the worst part is that Daniel thinks that part of it might be working.
“Will you ever forgive me?”
Daniel keeps his attention fixed forward, but all it does is give him a reminder of all the luxuries that Armand bought for him and decides he’s not done torturing him. “We’ve got decades for that, don’t we?” is his sharp comment.
Let Armand think that’s what he’s going to get – give Daniel back fifty years and have to spend those five decades playing for penance.
Never mind that Daniel can feel himself relenting a little more every day.
Every day that he wakes up without the aches of his future self, he thinks about the possibilities and opportunities. He might take up skiing or bungee-jumping or some other ridiculous adrenaline-fuelled activity (that isn’t fucking with a vampire who’s obsessed with him). Every time he tastes a new type of food or drinks an amazing wine and realizes he gets to do this thousands more times, he starts to realize that Armand had been right.
There is going to come a day that he forgives him. Maybe even thanks him.
And the truth of the matter is, Daniel’s beginning to think that day isn’t very far off.
His instincts are proven right fairly quickly.
Night Island is a combination of activity, buzz, commerce, and interesting people that have Daniel sitting at the local watering hole to see what new point of view he can discover. He hasn’t figured out how his career is going to continue, but he figures he can don a pseudonym and keep going.
Armand’s created a destination that pulls people in – stories for Daniel, dinner for Armand – and the house is a sprawling masterpiece that has open doors that allow people to wander through it as easily as the breeze.
Compared to the penthouse in Dubai, this is an oasis.
Every day, Daniel likes it a little more.
And the days he likes it the most are the ones when he indulges in the repetitive crash of the waves on the shore in the in-between hours of dawn or dusk, when the rest of the island is asleep or setting out for the night, and its beaches are empty.
Today, Daniel wakes up on a whim, heading out to the seashore to bask in something he thought he’d lose forever with the last rattling gasps of a dying man’s breath.
The sun kisses the ocean as it begins to rise.
Years ago, he would’ve stayed up this late to watch the sunrise, tweaked on the drugs and the adrenaline rush from questionable activities of the night before. Today, he digs his bare feet in the white sand of his island, reveling in the way his knees don’t ache, his hands don’t shake, and his eyesight lets him pick out every color in the sky.
There’s still absent flashes of anger that hit him unexpectedly when he thinks too long about his situation, but the seesaw is starting to tip the other way towards gratitude, acknowledging that there’s a lot of good moments in his life to make up for the bad.
This moment is one of the best.
It’s made better by Armand’s presence, something he doesn’t say aloud, but that doesn’t matter. He can feel Armand’s satisfaction through their connection.
“Well? Is it what you imagined it might be? Your new start?”
The sand is gritty between his toes. He’ll have it in the pockets of his pants soon enough. Florida is already goddamn hot. He’s had the clock turned back on him until the second-hand nearly strangled him with the speed it unwound, but here he is, where time’s slowed to allow him a peaceful respite..
So, yeah, it really is everything he wanted, and the funny cascading tumble in his chest when Armand sits beside him is equal parts annoying and promising.
“I’m just glad I get to see it,” he admits, opting for rare vulnerability that’s becoming more common around Armand these days. “If you’d turned me to give my youth back…”
“I told you I would never…”
“...and if you had,” Daniel cuts him off, still not believing him, “then this would’ve been gone. I wouldn’t get it.” There’s a quiet part of him that still wants the gift. That idiot version of himself is still inside him (and outside, these days, judging by his reflection), but right now, he’s really appreciating the warmth of the sun on his skin – no matter how strong it will get. “If you’d have let me die from the disease, I wouldn’t get to appreciate this incredible sunrise.”
Armand, pushy and nosy as ever, skims his mind and notes, “We really should get you some sunscreen. Avoid melanoma this time around.”
He shifts like he’s about to stand and play at being Rashid again, serving Daniel’s whims, but that’s not really what Daniel wants.
(Okay, fine, he probably does need the sunscreen and he does want Armand on his knees for him, but that’s a matter for later)
Right now, with the sun dappling over the gentle waves, an island dedicated to him behind him and a whole life ahead, the only thing Daniel actually wants is the one thing he would’ve laughed at if you’d told him that he’d need it like oxygen even a year ago. He reaches out and grabs hold of Armand’s wrist, preventing him from leaving.
Armand really has perfected the sopping wet pathetic look, but right now when he turns it on Daniel, it’s almost sweet – or it would be, if Daniel didn’t know it’s a manipulative tic (which is still working on him).
“No sunscreen?” Armand asks. Daniel feels the light touch of his probing vanish from his thoughts.
He’s allowing himself to be surprised. There’s even a cautious lift of his lips, like he can sense that whatever’s going to happen next won’t go badly.
“Not yet,” Daniel says, letting his fingers slide up towards the short-sleeve of Armand’s Hawaiian-print shirt (which probably cost more than his monthly rent in New York), hooking two fingers within the fabric of the sleeve so he can tug Armand towards him.
When Armand’s lips are about to collide with his, Daniel ducks back, just slightly. He’s grinning, watching the impatient press of Armand’s lips and the ire in the amber glow of his eyes. He’s pissed, but he still wants it, and yeah. Yeah. It’s about time Daniel let himself have something he can’t remember, but knows he wants with every cell of his body.
(Both of them – young and old – know one thing; that he has a connection with Armand that goes deeper than what Daniel can remember, but feels stronger than anything he’s ever felt before)
“Are you going to make me beg?” Armand demands in a huff.
“Nah, that doesn’t get me off,” Daniel replies, and waits just long enough that Armand starts sighing before he uses his momentum to straddle Armand and pin him to the beach, getting him plenty sandy as he kisses him for the first time since…
Well, he can’t remember when – literally.
Armand mutters complaints against Daniel’s seeking kisses – “You’re going to get me filthy,” murmured between slow explorations of Armand’s mouth, and “You’re going to burn soon” when the kiss grows deeper – but he never pushes Daniel away. In fact, he grabs at him with a fierceness that reveals all.
It’s been killing him not having this.
Truthfully, it’s been doing a number on Daniel too.
He might have a whole future ahead of him, but it’s the unknown past that haunts him. Eventually, he eases back, the question on his mind more pressing than the need to kiss Armand (for now, at least).
“Do you think I’ll ever get the memories back?” Daniel asks.
Armand eases back to stare up at him, unblinking and unflinching and unerringly Armand. “I don’t know,” he admits candidly. “I thought that perhaps the treatments would undo the gaps that the drugs and my editorializing had done, but it seems that the lingering memories of our past refuse to break through the surface, despite your heart guiding you back to me.”
It’s all emotion and gut instinct that Daniel feels, no actual memory. He knows that there’s a swirling, sick, sweet, sadomasochistic streak running through him when it comes to his relationship with Armand. He can’t ignore the desire. He barely could fifty years ago (fifty years from now).
It’s created a tangled and complicated web. It’s left Daniel’s head and heart bickering most days, typically over whether he’s ready to thank Armand for this gift and live this new life without bitterness and guilt.
He’s not sure he’s there yet, but he thinks he’s done being angry about it. That’s the thought that accompanies him as he wraps his arms around Armand’s waist, tangling their legs together as he lazily makes out with the vampire who’s been after him for fifty years and who’s wicked and cruel and obsessive and manipulative, but fascinating and interesting and devoted and determined and all the things a million people wished they could be.
He doesn’t know how long they spend there, but sweat prickles at the back of Daniel’s neck as the sun rises higher in the sky. Armand might not feel the effects of the sun like others, but he still can’t be enjoying this.
Too bad Daniel’s not ready to move yet.
He pins Armand in place with his head on his chest, his knee pressed between Armand’s thighs, lying there at rest and at peace. “Maybe the memories are never coming back,” Daniel admits. “Maybe that’s for the best. I get the feeling you weren’t exactly Mr. Darcy to me back then.”
Armand’s eyes flash angrily as he huffs. “I was a perfect gentleman.”
Lies. All lies.
“Fine,” Armand sighs. “Perhaps I was better suited to Brontë.” That gets a bright laugh from Daniel, imagining him on the moors. It’s contagious, drawing a warm laugh from Armand – a rare trinket that Daniel treasures for its value.
It’s a sliver of humanity that he’s been offering to Daniel, proving that he’s more than the monster in the shadows.
“I got an idea.”
Armand waits patiently. He doesn’t even make a snide comment about how Daniel’s ideas lead to terrible outcomes. Maybe he’s decided to be sweet, or maybe Daniel’s just scrambled his mind by finally giving him a sliver of what he’s been yearning for.
“Instead of chasing down all the old memories, I think I’m gonna focus on the new ones,” Daniel says. “Whatever this place brings me. Whatever career I pursue. Watching my girls from a distance for as long as I’ve got. Deciding what I want to do next…”
He pauses. Armand waits, hearing the hesitation.
“And?” Armand finally prods.
Say something out loud and it becomes real. Daniel’s always believed that. “And maybe letting myself have this,” he says, whatever this is. “You, for as many years as you want until you get bored. And when you do,” he says, eyes shining bright as he rocks back to squat in the sand, standing slowly as he stretches, ready to run, “you’ll have given me the body I need for the world’s best rebound.”
He doesn’t have to wait long. Armand’s eyes flash fiercely in the sunlight as he kicks sand and pounces on Daniel from behind with a hiss that promises that the fangs are poised to strike.
Too bad Daniel likes it.
(As if Armand doesn’t know)
“Anyone who touches you will die,” Armand tells him, a possessive hand on his waist as he presses up behind him, walking them back towards the house. “I’m ancient. I don’t bore with my toys so quickly.”
“Not your toy,” Daniel counters in a sing-song voice.
“Something far better,” Armand agrees, the fangs pricking the warm skin of Daniel’s neck as Armand teases him with the tiniest drink, continuing to walk them onward. It’s torture. Daniel’s harder than he’s been in his life between the teasing, the drink, and Armand’s heavy presence against his back. Armand can feel it. Of course he can. “Is this it, then? Forgiveness?” he murmurs, laving his tongue over the pinprick marks he’s left to heal them.
Daniel’s not sure he’s ready to forgive, especially not when he’s already forgotten so much. He’s tired of being angry, though. It burns through him and he’s learning that there’s much better things to feel apart from bitter rage.
He tangles his fingers between Armand’s and shifts them higher, stacked near his heart.
“It’s a new start,” he says, which is the most accurate description he’s got. “Is that enough?”
Judging by the fierce kiss Armand steals as he grabs Daniel’s jaw to twist his neck for a possessive kiss, he’s guessing that it’s more than he’d been expecting. It’s going to take a long while for them to get back to the master bedroom and if Daniel didn’t apparently own this island, then he might care a little more.
He’s a stranger to these people. He’s not even Daniel Molloy to them, not really.
Daniel’s living a brand new life, and he’s got years to figure it all out – years he didn’t have before. He’s got the sun shining in the sky, all his favorite food at beck and call, a good glass of wine or beer or tequila or whiskey when he needs it (alongside Armand’s perfect martinis) and he’s got the best thing of all.
He’s got time.
“You’re welcome,” Armand murmurs, skimming the thoughts off his mind.
“Shut the fuck up,” is a warm riposte.
Armand grabs hold of Daniel’s shirt and yanks. “You’re going to make me with all that time of yours.” He lets Armand pull him along, a willing lamb to slaughter because it’s exciting and it’s what he wants and fuck the complicated tangle of emotions and thoughts. He’s got years to process them.
“You got it, boss,” is Daniel’s promise – one he looks forward to living up to.
There’s plenty of time to figure out the rest of how this works. There’s decades to become a wiser, better, more mature person.
Today? Daniel’s ready to be a young idiot and nothing more.
After everything he’s been through, he dares anyone to tell him that he doesn’t deserve that. So let the wisdom of age come back to him slowly. Today, he gets to be stupid, get fucked, and bask in the bliss of finally letting himself have what he wants – and this time, he’ll remember it all.
That’s the new start he wants – and it’s exactly what Armand is going to make sure he gets.