“I told you, no. I have no skills, no talents, no accomplishments.”
Micha was clearly in one of his darker humours, sour and obstinate, his capacity for cruelty turned inwards, upon himself. He reminded Thomas of a lion with a thorn in its paw, striking out at others in its own pain, incapable of alleviating its own distress. He did not like to bear the brunt of Micha’s bitterness, but the wounds it left upon him were shallow enough, and he would willingly have endured worse to protect the other man from the claws of all that self-directed hate. He risked a smile and a mischievous look. “Accomplishments? Well now, I should like to see you try your hand at needlework.”
Some of the bleakness faded from Micha’s face, and he gave an amused splutter. “Fuck you.”
Thomas smiled at him, unrepentantly. “Pianoforte?”
“Shut up.”
Sensing victory, Thomas grew solemn again. He reached across the space between them, his hand pressing close to Micha’s, though he did not dare to touch him. “Please, Micha. Before you fell upon hard times, there must have been something that gave you pleasure?”
“Oh there was.” He was sneering again. “But it’s not easy to find, believe me.”
“Something else then? Anything.”
Micha huffed out an exasperated breath. “I used to sketch a little, all right? Happy now?”
Thomas was, as it happened, delighted, but, knowing Micha was unlikely to react well to it, he asked with a tolerable display of indifference, “What did you sketch?”
The words came haltingly, as though it was a confession wrung from deep inside Micha’s heart. “People ... a person. Sometimes architecture. When we were in Italy. Landscapes, maybe.”
Thomas was smiling again, unable to help himself. And, to his surprise, Micha’s lips twitched, just a little in return. “I shall have some supplies sent from London at once.”
Micha immediately shook his head. “Don’t bother. I wasn’t very good.”
“What does that matter, if you enjoyed doing it?”
“But what’s the point?”
And, thus, it seemed they were back to stalemate. Micha rested his head against the window, his gaze sweeping the shadow-smothered gardens as restlessly and apathetically as a lighthouse illuminating only empty seas.
“Perhaps,” tried Thomas, “I shall send for some materials anyway. When they are here you may feel moved to use them?”
“Do what the fuck you like,” returned Micha, sleepily.
Thomas watched him, feeling like a fly crawling over glass, helpless and ignorant. Whatever ailed him, a few days in the country had not been enough to ease it.
“You know”—Thomas burst suddenly, and a little desperately, into speech again—“I think I might have some of Edward’s things somewhere. I’m sure I saw some paints and a sketchbook, if I haven’t thrown them away.”
Micha cast him an indifferent glance. “You want me to use your dead brother’s stuff?”
“Well.” Thomas smiled faintly. “He is in no position to use it.”
There was a long silence. Micha’s hand twitched with what was surely an idle reflex, the tip of his little finger inadvertently brushing the edge of Thomas’s, where it still rested close by. The gentle, careless pressure of his nail sent a silver-cold shiver running all the way to Thomas’s wrist. And suddenly he felt every breath he took as it moved between his lips.
“Your brother was ...” said Micha, eventually, “... quite talented. His pictures give me nightmares.”
“Do they really? I can have them moved.”
“No, don’t.” Micha shook his head. “I like them.”
Thomas tried to laugh, but it came out thin and shaky. A tiny patch of skin, never before heeded, had become a pinhead upon which hosts of angels danced. “That seems a rather peculiar sentiment.”
Micha’s eyes slid away from Thomas’s and, a second after, his hand did as well, leaving Thomas wildly, impossibly bereft. “I feel like they’re saying something I understand, even if it isn’t something I like hearing.”
Thomas was quietly in pieces. He grasped for words, like a miser after banknotes scattering upon a breeze. “Edward was the only one of us with any great talent.” He knew he was babbling and yet was utterly unable to control himself. “Though George did rather well in the army, we are told. Since he rarely speaks of it, however, I do not think it is a talent he is happy to own. And I’m afraid I know nothing of art at all. I always thought Edward’s paintings were rather beautiful. The colours, perhaps? But even if they weren’t, I would want to have them anyway.Death is very ... devouring. It takes so much. And all you have left to show for a life is a small pile of things.”
“Your funeral sermons,” drawled Micha, “must bring the house down, Father.”
