cosmicteadust

[cosmicteadust]

[LOGH fic] Guys Like Me

Fandom: Legend of the Galactic Heroes

Pairing: Oskar von Reuenthal/Yang Wen-li

Wordcount: 2600+

Summary: The opening scenes of an artist!Reuenthal and history professor!Yang modern AU for @beingevil. It’s incomplete for the time being and I don’t know when I’ll be able to pick it up again, but I wouldn’t consider it abandoned. Title from this song by Aimee Mann. 

i.

The human form is intimately familiar to Oskar von Reuenthal. He’s been studying it for as long as he’s allowed his past to stretch out; beginning in his adolescent days—devouring anatomy books and committing the various muscle groups to memory, back when he thought he might want to become a physician. The time he’d spent meticulously copying diagrams from those books soon gave way to an interest in drawing for drawing’s sake. Eventually, he found himself in an art college, his eye for detail insatiable despite the twice-weekly figure drawing classes he attended.

He’s been making a living as an artist for close to ten years now, still popping in to live drawing sessions whenever he can. He thought he’d mastered the various ways in which it was possible to draw the human body, clothed or unclothed. Thought he’d been confident in his ability to capture any posture, any curve of musculature, any drape of fabric or lock of hair. Until he met the stranger who would change that.

The human form was intimately familiar to Oskar von Reunthal, before he saw the man perched cross-legged on the top step of his front door, taking shelter under the awning.

Reuenthal’s breath catches in his chest.

“I’m sorry,” the stranger murmurs, glancing up before Reuenthal can speak. He has sorrowful eyes, a smile like a peace offering. Hair that looks like he’s threaded his fingers through it countless times before the rain plastered it to his face. Plain dark sweater vest over a cream-coloured shirt.

The man shakes his head, sending beads of water gracelessly flying in an arc around him. Doesn’t help the state of his hair. He twitches from a sharp inhalation before raising his arm to his face, muffling a violent sneeze.

Reuenthal is staring. He’s thinking about the wetness on the stranger’s cheeks and how the late afternoon light catches it. For the first time in a long while, he’s so captivated by detail that he can’t appraise the figure as a whole. The subject is eluding him. Reuenthal clears his throat. “You’re in my way,” he says firmly. To emphasise the point, he marches up the steps and plants a foot within millimetres of the stranger’s knee. If he made to kneel, it’s likely that he would end up straddling him. Reuenthal is tall, but his imposing silhouette is mostly accounted for by his oversized black umbrella. Raindrops slide off the waterproof coating, landing obnoxiously on the stranger’s face.

“You really didn’t have to do that,” the stranger says unhappily, head bowed. He shifts, revealing a crumpled sheaf of paper stuffed under his cardigan. “Just let me get these in order and I’ll go. It took me the better half of the morning to photocopy this lot, not that the fact is of any relevance to you.”

“It could be.” The words slip out before Reuenthal can stop himself. He moves back, then steps under the awning into what little space has been left for him, closing the umbrella as he turns to face the front door. The sheaf of paper is added context. With every new detail he notices, his curiosity about the stranger heightens. His dispassionate facade is starting to crack, and it won’t be long before he loses his resolve to send the stranger on his way.

He can almost hear Mittermeyer’s voice in his head. Every great artist needs a muse, idiot. You can’t keep drawing anonymous people forever. Reuenthal grudgingly admits to himself that Mittermeyer may be right. An intimate knowledge of the human body isn’t intimacy. But Reuenthal always thinks he knows better.

**

Yang hears the sound of a key turning in a lock somewhere above his head. He angles his body to peer up at the owner of the house, waiting for a cue. The door swings open behind him. A slow wall of heater-warmed air nudges invitingly against his back. A gesture from the owner as though to direct him inside—a single, decisive flourish, index finger extended to indicate that this is indeed a command to enter.

Yang levers himself off the step with an arm while attempting to stand on legs that have fallen asleep. The sheets of paper start to slide out from under his cardigan. Turns out, the world doesn’t tilt in slow-motion the way it does in films; it’s an artless backward tumble against a carpet that only marginally cushions the bump to his tailbone. “Ah...” Thousands of years of written history are now sprawled across the floor and his thighs. “Sorry. Thank you. Sorry,” he says. “In that order.” Added after a brief moment of thought. He rearranges himself, starts to shuffle the fallen sheets back into some semblance of a pile.

The owner of the house has moved past him and is already making his way up to the second floor. His overcoat has been hung on the coat stand, the umbrella deposited into a tasteful steel mesh holder beside it. His furniture seems purposeful, like his stride. Every movement he makes. “Wait in the living room. And close the door when you’re done,” he calls to Yang without even turning back to look. Yang feels his cheeks burn, but he’s too exhausted to be humiliated. He gets to his feet, groaning at the prickling sensation of pins and needles in his calves. Shoves the door shut with his free hand, defiantly using more force than necessary. Slowly, he hobbles further inside.

The house is sparsely furnished, the decor a blend of minimalist aesthetics and accents inspired by brutalism? Baroque architecture? Yang isn’t sure. Wooden floorboards, concrete feature walls, a large mirror with an embellished frame. A curious yet coherent mixture of the angular and the ornate. He can identify some of the design elements present thanks to the elective art history module he took as an undergraduate. An incongruous splash of colour by the far window catches his attention. Two generously stuffed cushions resting on a window seat—one red, the other royal blue.

A window seat! He heads toward it eagerly before remembering that his clothes are still damp from the rain. Comes to a stop by the table and rests his precious sheets of paper down on it, lets out a soft, wistful sigh in the general direction of the window.

Still standing, Yang starts on the arduous task of sorting through his notes. They’ve gotten hopelessly jumbled, many pages sporting dog ears and splotches of moisture that threaten to smudge the printed text beyond legibility. He’s made copies of chapters from at least fifteen ‘Reference Only’ books and had left a mess in the library’s photocopying room. Ms. Greenhill hadn’t been pleased, but she’d slipped him a cling-wrapped home-made sandwich which served as his lunch later on in the staff lounge.

**

Reuenthal pauses on the way down, leans casually against the banister to watch the stranger in his home. The other man is too absorbed in his task to notice. He’s a strange sight in his mismatched outfit. The top is alright, but the slacks simply don’t match. On the whole, they produce the effect of a student in an ill-considered public school uniform. He’s of average height and build, has an admittedly plain face. What, then, makes him so compelling?

“Here.”

The stranger nearly jumps when Reuenthal appears beside him and offers him the change of clothes. Reuenthal doesn’t apologise, waits patiently for him to take the clothes off his hands before pointing him round a corner. “There’s a bathroom on the left. Light switch is behind the door.”

“You’re really too kind.”

Reuenthal waits until the man is out of earshot before scoffing.

**

The clothes smell faintly of mothballs. For no reason in particular, Yang buries his face into them and breathes in. They remind him of his childhood. His father was always moving for work. They lived like nomads, on the move so often that his clothes spent more time in boxes than out of them. He didn’t mind. The only thing he cared about was his father’s mouldering collection of old history books.

Yang has been given a plain black shirt with long sleeves and a pair of dark grey sweatpants. He wouldn’t have guessed that his host had these lying around. Not with the way he was dressed: fitted black jeans and a black turtleneck shirt which made his arms and torso seem endless. Though the broad shoulders did not escape Yang’s notice. Their recent interaction was the first time he’d been able to get a good look at his host since the kerfuffle in the doorway. Up close, the shimmer of blue in his left eye seemed almost supernatural.

Genetic quirk or vanity lens? He wonders as he struggles out of his own clothes. Lost in thought, navigating his vague first impressions of the man, it takes him longer than usual to get dressed. He puts the shirt on inside-out on his first attempt, wears it back-to-front on the second. It’s a little too large for him, but comfortable.

When Yang finally leaves the bathroom, damp clothes tucked under his arm, his host is seated at the table, leafing through his notes. “Would you like a comb?” He is asked, in a tone that seems to imply that hair tousled dry with a shirt is not a good look on him.

“I’m fine, thanks.” Unconsciously running his hand through the offending unruly hair, a reflex he found impossible to rid himself of. “If you don’t mind, I’ll stay till the rain stops.” Yang slides into a chair, leaving an empty seat between himself and his host.  

“As you like.” His host gives him a lopsided smile, eyes crinkling into an approximation of genuine contentment. “I never did introduce myself. Rude of me.” He leans back to ease a leather cardholder from the pocket of his jeans, offers a name card elegantly poised between index and middle finger, like one would ash a cigarette over an ashtray. It’s printed on high quality card stock; Yang satisfies his tactile nature by enjoying the marvellous texture, stroking his thumb over it appreciatively.

Oskar von Reuenthal. Portrait Artist.

“It’s pronounced Reuenthal,” the man says. His deep voice wraps around the name possessively, as though daring Yang to speak it aloud himself. “You can call me that. I’ve been told I don’t look like an Oskar.”

“Honestly, you look like less like an artist than you do an Oskar.” The comment bubbles to the surface before Yang can stop himself. He’d been expecting something else. Real estate mogul. Surgeon. Lawyer. “That was uncalled for. My apologies.” Hand in hair again, fussing. “Uh... I don’t know much about artists. My father was an art collector who never directly liaised with anyone who made art. He didn’t think it was necessary. Turned out, he’d been purchasing forgeries.”

A piercing stare from Reuenthal. “As an artist, I find it difficult to extend my sympathies.”

Yang laughs in spite of himself. “There’s no need for that. He died before anyone found out what his collection was really worth, or if they even knew he’d been duped. Who knows what he was thinking? He was always so earnest about that particular interest of his. I never understood. Never understood his actual work as a stock trader either. Business. Money.” He shakes his head.

“So, what do you do?” Reuenthal waves a hand over Yang’s notes for emphasis. “You seem unusually preoccupied with events and warfare of ages past. Or is this just a hobby?”

Nervous laughter. “I’m an adjunct professor. Working towards a second Ph.D. in Military History.” He reaches out across the table, fervently hoping that Reuenthal recognises that a handshake is being initiated. He does. “I’m Yang, by the way. Yang Wen Li.” The language of his childhood rarely sees use these days, but it lives on in every self-introduction; he’s careful to enunciate well, employing the tonal lilt of the Mandarin tongue. People in this country tend to iron out the intonation of his full name. While they  aren’t to blame, he resists in his own way.

“Yang.” Reuenthal repeats. And Yang never thought he’d want to hear another person speak his name over and over again, but he does. Reuenthal says it like an incantation that would seek his soul out if it were lost and anchor it to his corporeal form.

They sit in silence, allowing the hum of the radiator to fill the room. Without a word, Reuenthal continues to sort Yang’s notes. Most of them are easily discernible as belonging to disparate sources. His attention to detail comes in useful, picking out minor differences in typeface, line spacing, margin width. Yang puts each smaller pile in order by page number. Sometime during the afternoon, a pot of unsweetened black tea is brewed, the contents duly contemplated and consumed. Reuenthal mentions nothing of his preference for coffee, nor does Yang drop the slightest hint that his choice of beverage contains a warmed shot of brandy.

ii.

Yang returns home just past twilight, moments before Julian would have hit the dial button on his phone to check up on him. “There you are!” The adolescent exclaims. “If you’ll tolerate my saying of something completely disrespectful, I’ve been thinking about getting you a collar with my number on it for easier retrieval.”

“You could have called, if you were worried.” Yang mumbles, his tone tinged with guilt. He tosses his notes onto the couch (neatly organised and filed in the thickest ring binder Reuenthal could spare him). As discreetly as he can manage, he slides his hand behind the cushions in search of his own misplaced phone. There it is, wedged beside the remote. He suspects that the crafty Admiral had noticed it and taken it upon himself to paw it out of sight for Julian’s sake.

“I’ll start on dinner!” Julian calls from the kitchen. “You’re getting the Yang Household Special: Quick and Creatively Re-purposed Leftovers for Adult Students and Child-Like Educators.”

“If it’s edible, it’s good enough for me,” Yang answers. He privately resolves to bribe Walter and Alex with decent whiskey so that they will, in future, refrain from being openly sarcastic around his impressionable young housemate.

Later, over creatively re-purposed ratatouille with a side of pasta:

“I met a man,” Yang confesses.

“Good. So you’re finally ready to settle down?” Julian teases, with shades of Caselnes.

Yang frowns. “Settle down...? Oh, you meant a relationship. Aren’t those the very opposite of settling down? I’m too tired for that sort of thing. Upend my comfortable way of life? Not a chance.” Hastily, he shovels a forkful of pasta into his mouth so as not to segue into an unintended monologue. He’s reminded uncomfortably of the talk he and Ms. Greenhill had about a month ago, after she’d confessed her attraction to him in a quiet corner of the cafe two blocks down from the administrative building exit. In short, it seemed clear to Yang that he did not feel as strongly for her as she did for him, nor could he even promise that he had the capacity to identify and reciprocate expressions of affection. “My heart’s more like a part of my mind,” he’d mumbled into the beret he’d nervously pressed to his mouth, wishing that he could shrink and crawl under it to hibernate. “And my mind is near constantly on my work these days, and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.”

Julian butts into his reverie with a statement that comes out of nowhere. “Things always happen to you,” the youth observes.

“Don’t things happen to people as a general rule of life?”

“No, not like that.” A serious look that makes him appear well beyond his years. “I mean, you don’t steer yourself very much. Or navigate currents. You’re like a leaf drifting along a river.”

Yang is surprised, but not offended. “So you think that I lack direction?”

Julian winces. “Not that either. You’re just... you.”

Yang blinks at him.