a conversation without shouting

Who: Dorian and Caleb
Where: nevermore
When: afternoon

Dorian wasn't scheduled to work on Sundays, but he went in anyways, just for a reason to get out of the house. There were too many people in such a small space, but he'd never have guessed his little two bedroom would fill up so quickly. His guest bedroom held a pretty permanent guest, at least for a year, and his dining room had acquired an occupant as well. With Mathias on the sofa, the only room without a person sleeping in it was the kitchen. If asked, Dorian would turn away anyone else, no matter what their reason. He would not put up a guest on his kitchen floor.

Stocking books wasn't exactly a stress relieving activity, but it had to be done. He'd sent Harper on a lunch break, just to have the store to himself for a bit. A few customers lingered, one ringing the bell to check out. Dorian left the books and moved down to the register, ringing up a set of tarot cards and a book on magic in bed. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. High school girls had no business messing with that stuff unless they were looking to kill their boyfriends.

When Caleb had gotten up, he'd taken note that Dorian wasn't around. And for once, Caleb wanted to have a talk with his brother. He was pretty sure it was going to go terribly badly, but he was going to try. Not that he even knew what he'd say. The only place Caleb could think of that Dorian would be was the book store. Okay or at his friend Eury's house, but he didn't know where that was. Hell , he'd never met her. So he decided to try the bookstore just in case. Walking in, he sort of half looked around, not having ever actually been there before.

A little bell rang as someone entered the store and Dorian handed a receipt to the customer leaving. Looking up, he was surprised to see Caleb standing there, the girl with the tarot cards brushing past him as she exited. "Caleb," he said, surprised to see him here of all places. Mathias wouldn't have even known where to look. "Hey, what's up?" he asked, coming around the counter, a touch concerned. Dorian assumed Caleb was looking for him, unless he'd been frequenting the store when Dorian wasn't there, which could always be the case.

Caleb didn't know what to say exactly now that he was there, and hands shoved into his pockets, he regarded the floor. "Nothin. I guess. I don't know." he said. "Did Mathias tell you what happened?" he asked, finally glancing back up.

"With him and Tensiel? No," he said, rolling his eyes. "I really thought he was above arguing with a sixteen year old girl, but obviously not. Did she tell you anything?" he asked. Somehow he doubted that Mathias had told Caleb; he seemed inclined to keep his mouth shut on the matter.

He shook his head. "She won't tell me." he said. "She told me..." he paused, then sighed, dragging his fingers throug his hair. "She said that she couldn't say because she had people she'd promised she wouldn't say anything. She said it keeps them safe." Which was truly disconcerting.

Caleb wasn't the only one of that opinion. Dorian frowned and gestured for Caleb to follow him back to where he'd been stocking the shelves. "Math just said I'd be better off not knowing, which is probably the truth, but... I wonder who she's trying to keep safe," he said, picking up a book on Ancient Greek Blood Rituals. "I don't really think we're in danger from Math. At least not at the moment." No, he was about as subdued as Dorian had ever seen him. He suspected that was his fault.

"You'd know better than I would." Caleb muttered, sitting down on the floor and leaning back against the shelves, out of Dorian's way. "Still. Just...makes me think that something really major went down, and we don't know what that was. Or how bad it got." he added. "Doesn't exactly make me think things are all fine and everyone should move on now. Makes me think it's something I should know."

"Ten looked like she was second away from throwing things at him," Dorian said with a small laugh. "She doesn't seem the type to get that worked up over something small." But then, Mathias had causing chaos down to an art. If Tensiel was in the middle of that, it wouldn't surprise Dorian if she got pissed off. "I wish we knew. I just don't know how to find out without beating it out of one of them. I'm not gonna lay a hand on Ten though, and Math... well, I'd really prefer not to fight with him." Something like that could get bloody. Also, he really preferred to get along with his brother if he could help it.

"She mentioned she might have thrown a shoe at him." Caleb said with a sigh. "Which I don't get, because I haven't seen her like that at all before, so that's what's got me worried. She doesn't really get pissed, she just...she's just Ten. She's a little nuts, she puts broken windows back together, and she's sweet and naieve." he continued, picking at a loose thread on the cuff of his shirt. "Just makes me wonder all the more what the fuck happened." he muttered. "What would he have done?" Caleb asked, finally looking back up at Dorian. He hated having to ask, but the flat truth was he didn't know shit about his oldest brother. He didn't really know what he was like, what he did...nothing.

Dorian listened to Caleb with a little smile on his face. It really was cute, the way he talked about Tensiel, but he wasn't stupid enough to say anything about it. Realizing that this conversation needed to be had without doing some stupid monotonous task, Dorian put the book down and took a seat on the floor as well. "I don't know, exactly. I know some of the things he has done though, which gives me an idea. Mathias, he... likes to cause trouble. Make chaos. Whatever. I know at one point he got in the middle of a battle between a coven of witches and some demon. Ended up getting all the witches killed. The summer I spent with him in Scotland, we literally fled the country. It was a mess." A fun mess, but looking back on it, he was surprised they hadn't gotten themselves killed.

That left a cold feeling in Caleb's stomach. What if he'd gotten Tensiel killed? Was that what the big secret was? That neither of them were going to talk about? He looked away, nodding in acknowledgement that he'd heard, but he didnt' know what to say just yet. "I don't know anything about him." he said. "But I do know that Ten wouldn't do anything to hurt anyone, and...I don't know." he trailed off, frustrated because he didn't know what to do, and sitting back and doing nothing felt like a failure of some kind.

"I wouldn't expect you to," Dorian said, tilting his head a little to the side as he looked at Caleb. "He left home when you were four. And if you think I didn't come home often, then he might as well have disappeared." It had sure felt that way to Dorian and he'd been eleven. He'd wanted to be like Mathias so bad... His brother wasn't even around when he finally started to have any power of his own, and Mathias still didn't remember what it was he could do. He had learned a few things about his brother over the years though. Mathias may have deserted his family, but he didn't think he had. In fact, he seemed to think they were rather close at the oddest of times. "I do know that he wouldn't do anything to hurt you, though. And it's likely the only reason he's not fighting with Ten is because she's your friend. He told me not to worry about it and... I have to believe him."

Caleb looked back at Dorian with the mixture of surprise and blatant disbelief. "Because of me." he repeated. "Wouldn't want to hurt me why exactly? It's not like he knows me. It's not like he's ever even...why?" he demanded, not understanding, and until he did, he wasn't going to relax about this shit. "If he can run around and get people killed, and just do whatever, can't even keep what you do straight--why exactly would he give a damn about me or who I was friends with?"

"Because you're family," Dorian shrugged. "Doesn't matter that he doesn't know you. I'm sure he thinks he does. Maybe a sense of obligation. I don't know. He and I aren't exactly close, but sometimes it feels like it. Sometimes I'm impressed he remembers my name." Mathias could go months without talking to Dorian and then suddenly things would click in place and they'd be friends. Dorian had just come to accept that he and his older brother were two totally different creatures and that he would never understand him. He just had to accept things as they were. "Caleb, I know I don't know that much about you, but I still care about you. I want to get to know you better. I've never quite understood Math's mind though, so I'm not sure I can explain it to you, except that... Ten's your friend. That's why I let her stay. Mathias has to see that. Especially since, if you were to choose, I seriously doubt you'd pick him."

Caleb listened, not looking overwhelmingly pleased. "If it's just obligation, he can shove it." he muttered. "I don't need the charity." He glanced back over at Dorian when he actually came out and said he cared. "I'm still working out why there." he muttered. "If I had to choose, I'd just leave. Find someplace else for her to stay, and...I don't know. Go. Maybe I should." he said, honestly pondering it. "It'd make the situation less...volitile."

"No, it wouldn't," Dorian said seriously. For one, he'd be pissed as hell. That usually meant things were volatile, even if he was living alone. "I wish you didn't feel that way. I was hoping that it would get better, but then then Math showed up..." Dorian shook his head. "I don't know what his reasons are. I honestly couldn't guess. I'd like to say he cares about you too, but I'm not even gonna try to fight that battle when I'm still trying to prove it to you myself." He knew the arguments, knew exactly why Caleb wouldn't believe him. Mathias would have to do some work there on his own if he wanted Caleb to believe him. "I don't want you to leave, Caleb. Please stop considering it."

Caleb sighed. He looked away again, not sure what to say. But at least this time it was a more rational conversation. "Dorian, it's not like I don't get it. Okay? Stop thinking I'm stupid. It's not like you ever really got to know me well, you didn't want me here in the first place, and now you're stuck with me. Not even the parents wanted me, I can't imagine you would either." He paused for a long moment. "...besides, it wouldn't be the first time I didn't have anywhere to go, you know."

"Caleb, that was never about you, not for me. It was about mom and dad being inconsiderate. It was the fact that I'd barely moved in here and I felt like they were taking advantage of it. It made me wonder that, if I'd waited a year, would they have waited, you know? It was never personal. I'm sure that if I was in your position, I'd have been pissed too." He really couldn't imagine what had gotten into their parents. One more year wouldn't have killed them. "What do you mean?" Dorian said, frowning. There was something foreboding about that wording, but he needed to know what Caleb was talking about.

Caleb wasn't about to look back at Dorian, and he was regretting having said anything at all. But now he had, and maybe it would help his case if Dorian knew that he was capable of looking after himself. "A while back, I left home." he said. "Just...took off. I was gone for a week. ...seven days, eight nights. Whatever. But I was fine." Sort of. Not really, but he'd survived it, therefore in Caleb's mind that equated to fine.

"And nobody noticed?" Dorian said, anger flaring, though not at Caleb. Had he known, he'd have thrown a fit. It pissed him off to high heaven that his parents seemed incapable of caring for their children when they were still at home. He remembered that feeling of frustration that Caleb might've been describing, but he'd never left home over it. It only had to make things worse when they didn't seem to care. Dorian glared at the floor, then tried to swallow his anger back. It so wasn't working. "I'm glad you were okay," he said. "I'm pissed as hell at Dad, but I'm glad you were okay. What did you do for that long?"

"I don't think they knew I was gone." Caleb said. Of course, the deeper, harder thing to think about was that they had, and they just didn't give a fuck. Which the deepest parts of his mind believed was really the truth there. He was a little suprirsed and confused at the reaction Dorian was having, and he looked over for a minute, that sort of flicker of partially vulnerable and confused on his face for a second before it was gone again, and his eyes were back away from his brother. "I don't know. Stuff." he shrugged it off. Nearly got killed a few times. Learned blood magic. Found out I was actually good at it. Got into other scrapes.

"Fuckers," he muttered, wondering what the hell was wrong with them. Yes, their mother was a demon, but that didn't excuse her behavior. And their father, their completely human father, should have had a brain somewhere in his head. Yeah, there might be something wrong with him for falling for a demon, but still... "Stuff," he said with a small snort. "You sound like Mathias. Wandering the world. Probably getting yourself into some kind of trouble. Cause no one disappears for a week to sit in a park and do nothing," he said, looking up at Caleb with a small smile. "It's not that I think you incapable of taking care of yourself. It's that I'd like to know you're safe. If you wander off and you don't come home... Well, Marquette's small, but it's not that small."

"Well, put it this way, Marquette's probably a lot safer to run around in than New Orleans was." Caleb said. And that was with the run-in with the vamp. The punctures were still there, the stitches were still in his back, though Dorian didn't know about those. "I...I guess I'm just worried about her. Whatever happened was fucked up, and I don't want her to be afraid that something's going to happen to her, and I sure as fuck don't want to feel that way all the time either." But it wasn't an option to kick Mathias out, which was why Caleb wasn't considering it.

"That... is probably true," Dorian said after a moment's consideration. Damn. He knew there were vampires down south, even if he hadn't run into them. There were also a lot of other things as well. "I know," he sighed. "I can't kick Mathias out unless I really wanna burn a bridge. And I don't. But I'm not comfortable turning out Tensiel either. Though I also don't think my dining room is an optimal place for her to take up permanent residence. I'm kinda stuck here, but I do think she's safe. I don't think Mathias is out to get her or we'd have had a war in the living room yesterday."

"...I didn't ask you to kick him out." Caleb said, voice quiet but strong. "I'm not going to, either." Absently, Caleb started picking at the scabs on his hurt knuckles, when he'd punched the wall at home. "And I don't know. He wouldn't still be around if he didn't know how to be underhanded, now would he?" Caleb asked. "So he's probably smarter than to try to do that when we were both there, because c'mon. Would we really just let him attack some teenage girl in the living room?"

"I know you didn't, but I considered it," Dorian said. Mathias was the one making things difficult. There was no doubt in his mind that whatever went down between Mathias and Tensiel was completely Mathias' fault. It wouldn't surprise him if Tensiel had been hurt. The whole situation pissed him off, but he wasn't going to fight family over it if at all possible. "He's not the only one in this family that can be underhanded, Caleb," Dorian said, lips turning up just a touch. "And he's not the smartest. Smarter than that, yes, but if something happens to Tensiel while she's in my care? There will be more than words."

"I appreciate the sentiment, but I'd prefer she not be within range for him to get the chance." Caleb said. He kept coming back to that. He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, massive headache settling in. "But the again, if he's around, all he would have to do is wait for her to be walking home, or out somewhere, or..." he trailed off. Well wasn't that just a whole new world of worries.

Dorian sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. "I don't know what to tell you there. I don't think he'll touch her, but maybe you should talk to him. Just ask-- not about what happened, but if there's gonna be a problem. Or I can ask, if you prefer." Though Dorian was already under the impression that it wouldn't be. Something about the way things had gone after Caleb and Tensiel left made him feel that way. It hadn't been said, but the fact that Mathias had practically offered to leave said a ton. He didn't want to cause problems, not within family. It wasn't the same as causing trouble elsewhere.

"I'll ask." Caleb said. That was going to be a great conversation. And he wasn't even sure he'd buy anything Mathias had to say. But he'd do it. He wasn't the type to hide behind anyone, and he wasn't really going to start now.
"Good," Dorian said, nodding a little. He preferred it that way. It would also give Caleb a chance to talk to Mathias, which could go good or bad, but at least it would be something. "Anything I can do to help?" Dorian offered.

Instead of his usual brushoff, Caleb thought about it for a minute or two. "I don't know. Nothing comes to mind, but I'm still trying to figure all of this out." he said. "Keep me posted, I guess." he said. Maybe Dorian just had a better handle on the situation, but Caleb knew he sure as hell didn't. He didn't know enough about anything to really see where anything was going.

"If you think of anything, the offer's always open," Dorian said, trying to figure it all out himself. He didn't have all the answers. He didn't even know the questions to ask. "I'm sure he'll tell me at some point. I'll let you know if I hear anything, or if I think she's in danger." If that was the case, he'd put a stop to it quick.

"Thank you." That last bit was really all Caleb had to hear. And with the way Dorian had acted yesterday, he thought he would probably keep his word on that, which was a good thing. "Guess I should get going." he added, knowing he was interrupting Dorian's work and all that shit. And he didn't know what else to say.

"Not a problem," Dorian said with a small smile, then started to rise to his feet. "Off to do anything fun?" he asked, then looked towards the front as the bell rang. It was Harper returning, which meant he could go when he wanted. "I don't even work today," he said with a laugh.

Caleb got up, and shrugged. "Not really." he said. Stalking Ten was on his mind, going to see if she was alright doing...whatever it was she was doing, and he had to go talk to Mathias now. Beyond that? Nothing that really qualified as 'fun'. He gave a light frown. "I don't even know what there is to do here that's fun." he added, because in his time so far, he'd not really had much of it. Sort of at all. In fact, it hadn't occurred to him at all that he could go out and do something entertaining with his day.

Well, now that was sad. At least Dorian could make the excuse that he needed to help out at the shop, but Caleb shouldn't be wasting his last few days of summer doing nothing. "Well... What do you like to do?" he asked, aware this was a question that he wouldn't have to ask if he knew his brother better. "If you wanted to catch a movie, I'd go with you." It was hard, since school hadn't started yet. Dorian was sure his brother would have a few more friends if he could get around other kids his age.

"I don't know." Caleb said. He really was a person who took things in life far too seriously, and didn't have much of a mind about doing things that weren't serious. "I listen to music, stuff like that, I guess." he fidgeted. "I wanted to check on Ten to see that she's okay." he added. "Maybe a movie would be okay after that." And it would put off talking to Mathias for a little while longer.

"Okay," Dorian said, pleased that his offer hadn't been completely disregarded. "I'm gonna run by the grocery store, but then I'll check the movie schedule. Maybe we can catch something for later this afternoon. Tensiel's welcome to come, if you want to invite her." Which he actually encouraged. He wanted to spend time with Caleb, but it seemed healthy for him to spend time with people his own age as well. Even if they were nutty little girls living in his dining room.

"I'll ask." Caleb said. If it was later, she might actually get to go. Might be nice. Semi-normal, and not something that was overcomplicated and weird. Just...going out to the movies with his brother and...whatever the hell category Tensiel fell under. He half smirked at his own thoughts. "Remind me...when did I get to the Twilight Zone?"

"Just keeps getting weirder and weirder, doesn't it?" Dorian laughed. He didn't mind Caleb joking about it, if it gave him a reason to smile, or half smile. Anything was better than raging bitterness. Maybe they could actually get along. Dorian knew it was bad when the closer they got to normal, the more out of place it felt, but he liked it. It was certainly better than yelling at each other.

"Seems to." Caleb agreed. Then started to head for the door. "Later." he said, since he probably would actually see him later. Hey, at least he hadn't hit anything this time, and there hadn't been fighting.

"See ya," Dorian said, watching his brother walk out the door. It had been a hard topic of conversation, but definitely their best so far. Maybe, sometime in the future, they could even enjoy each other's company. It was certainly worth working for.