One Remarkable Mistake [USUK]

Chapter 7

"I've had my suspicions for quite some time Alfred. The only issue was my incapability to pin-point exactly what it was with you, as I lingered in your presence it became increasingly more difficult to trespass your boundaries." Fixed to his left arm, mark temporarily etched into his skin forevermore, long lines that gained volume as they turned in and out, thinning until they reached his inner wrist and elbow, with further examination stirred a throb in his head. "For awhile you had me convinced, unfortunately for you I am not slow enough to believe that is a scar. So, why don't you tell me, who are you?" 

Convinced this was the end he had no way to run, doing his best to rationalize as he scanned the one who stood in-front of him, eyebrows slightly turned up, no anger or patronizing malice laced into his words. Despite what he had been told he saw it now, Arthur was safe, he was concerned in this moment, frail effort to hide what so desperately desired to seep out.

Hand shaking he linked their fingers an action that was reciprocated, expression dipping of concern for the tension now inflicted upon the man. "I'm the King of Spades. Well, I will be, in November." Haste in his tone.

 A clap startled the younger who cringed in turn at the sound, a smile of relief coming over, "No shit!" He cheered in exultation, springing forth from where he had once been nerve wracked. Quickly undoing his ascot without a second of thought over his actions, buttons undone in a quick manner as Alfred jumped attempting to stop the other from stripping, believing he had gone mad. Article dropped to his shoulder he gave a glance over to his respective, smirk danced present where that firm expression once remained. "Fancy what you see?

Had his voice of gone then and he turned silent from then on it would not have mattered, unfocused on what had been presented, "Come, examine for yourself."

The offer taken to either of their awe, one that would not have been given to simply anyone and one that Alfred would never have taken but found himself closer by the mere though, fingers gently brushed along the nape, an honest attempt to remain respectful as an sense of dread and excitement overcame his senses. That of similar marks ingrained into his own skin that turned and twisted in their own graceful manners to form the sequence of a necklace wrapped only around the bottom half of his neck, stopped before the lines reached the front of his throat, a spade settled onto the back where his shirt collar pressed. 

"This is unbelievable." He whispered softly, thumb running across the spade, a sensation sent through the two as Alfred retracted his hand, a tense noticeable in Arthur's shoulders. Lasting only a few seconds before hands laced into his own, grip tight. 

The verity of it, of how unlikely it would be that the very person was the one he desperately had wanted to avoid only to engage in a full-staged rumba, yet fell for in a few short months during their joke of a performance. "It appeared half a decade ago. I did good to keep it hidden, you're the only one who has ever seen it with my permission." Those who had were long gone, but as he reached up to stroked his taller companions cheek he found no ability to do so, for a moment struck that it was weakness that had overtaken him, only to come to the realization that it was far stronger than even his own fear of being exposed. "Alfred, understand, I ran. That life, it's oppressive, they form a mold of you and expect you to uphold it or whatever freedom you're given is taken in exchange for what you are incapable of doing. Never did I run from my responsibilities or my people, it was those who would have changed me, in return I became someone they would fear, someone they wouldn't expect." 

Unlikely to admit to his own misery, the type that had been brought by other's hands and pushed upon him in an attempt to make him the perfect King, more had been done, isolation mandatory that it altered his very being, that once carefree teen long drowned by their own sense of having no place in the world, that they no longer belonged and were to be ashamed of who they were. Focus now turned to one who had realized far longer without placing a foot in the palace walls, who had carried the panic of someone digging too deep, or a loose thread, just the right cut, all of which had accumulated in their time, quelled only through the sound of a mag shoved into place, what sound elicited once the trigger was put under pressure. Years reprimanded for a smile being too genuine, posture not straight enough, hours too short, slacking, those same sentiments that he had strained over only to do the same now, only now for something had induced that overwhelming sickness that he would often work through to lessen; as though someone had forced him to take a break, to breathe and sit back to point that it was more than enough. Arthur would be under no free choice but to be subjected to it, perhaps worse. What personality either of them carved out from deep within, acts of rebellion quelled. The perfect mirror. Glass so eloquently thinned, brought forth from the heat and pressure of those that surrounded and swarmed deep into their very thought process to make it their own, until those very pieces shattered.