#so stop thinking about lestat and go have sexy photo shoot time with your boyfriend louis !

[andessence]

Armand is not prying. He is not seeking out Louis' thoughts ... but that flare of Lestat that comes off of Louis when he thinks of his maker is unmistakable — even through only the unfocused, idle extension of his senses toward Louis — now that he's learned to identify it. What did he say? What triggered the memory?

"Of course you know," he says, the unspoken 'I'm sorry' tinging each word. He doesn't want to lecture Louis, but to counsel, to talk things out as equals. Louis never seems to feel that Armand's suggestions are just that, suggestions, and not orders. Hadn't Armand made it clear when he permitted Louis to call him by his name and not Maître that he had forfeited his authority over him? Is Lestat the source of some lingering mistrust? Or does Louis feel even this soon how, in spite of this gesture, in spite of the yearning for equal companionship, Armand cannot help the impulse to control?

His hand slides from the table to Louis' thigh, half-exploratory, half-possessive. His wide eyes brighten a smile with their inquisitive glint. "The most dangerous thing." Armand repeats the words slowly, feeling the weight of them in his mouth. "But not to you. Never to you." His thumb rubs discreetly over Louis' knee. "So you are enamored of the streets, of capturing an instant with your mechanical immortality. I suppose... whatever makes the nights worth passing for now. I am glad that it makes you happy. I know you don't think so. You think I don't know what it is to have a passion for life anymore. Maybe it has been so, but recently someone has awakened passions I thought lost... Maybe I could understand your love of the photograph better if you showed me your process up close...?"

classic lestat : the disregard for mortal life beyond its ending. louis had resented it then, these warnings, however correct they'd been, to not get involved, and he resents it now. he resents even more the way armand says it to him, as though louis doesn't know well enough the transience of a mother and child in the lamplight. hadn't he learned it well enough in the war? hadn't he learned it when his mother had died ---- hadn't he learned it when grace had buried him in that same tomb as their mother, and resigned him to oblivion? his shoulder leans away from armand's, but it's so he can see him better ( funny, how much easier it is to look at someone dead - on when he's vexed at them, then when he's half - dead with love ) and with this turn comes to nudging of their knees together. " you don't gotta tell me how things move on. i know. i haven't seen as much as you, sure, but i've seen enough to know what stays and what don't. "

the lamp beckons. another passerby, an old woman. human mortality, passing beneath the lamp in phases, growing and mothering and dying in a single evening. the lamp will endure, but the passing humanity won't : should louis fascinate himself with the lamp? should he bore himself over the same photograph, the same frame, year after year? " we're gonna have centuries of time to fill, and for us, nothing's ever changing. but humans ---- human life ---- it's revolutionizing every day, with every new idea, every new piece of art, every new generation. sure, we're gonna out live them, but why should we lock ourselves up and mind our own business? i'm not getting involved or nothing, but the threatre . . . it's the same thing, year after year. why not take some inspiration from what's going on in the streets? i'm sick of being so careful that i can't move. " louis's thigh nudges armands with intention, and he's watching him again, feeling the way his skin prickles, a good - enough imitation of something electric between them. " anyhow, way i see it, the most dangerous thing in this city is you. "