[ it's a quick response, said with the same casual, incidentally-but-unintentionally flirtatious lilt he always has when marcus responds to billy's incessant gay jokes with one of his own. he doesn't mean anything by it, really, just like he doesn't expect billy to mean anything by it every time he says something like that. it's just - how things are, growing up in the eighties as an outsider in a world that expects you to fit a certain mold. the world wants you to be this straight-laced, christian heterosexual, your country wants you to fuck cheerleaders and win football games. open subversion is how you cope.
granted, it's been hard not to wonder about billy, and vegas - the things billy said about his dad - only made those suspicions ramp up a little, after the petra thing threw them into question. marcus knows it's not his right to wonder, though. if billy ever wants to talk, then - marcus hopes he's made it clear in his own subtle way that he's not going to lose his shit at whatever it is billy might want to talk about. if there's even anything to talk about in the first place.
but it doesn't matter. this shit doesn't matter. marcus drains half of his beer and stares out over where the sunset should be, where the horizon should be, if it hadn't all been replaced by the earth and the shadows from the up. he's still thinking about stiles, still thinking about the hit, still has no fucking idea what he's going to do or how he's going to do it, but this talk has given him some amount of perspective, at least. no matter how much he might like stiles, no matter how much he might see him as a friend, he doesn't have the loyalty to him that he has to billy. if it comes down to one or the other, he's gotta save billy. maybe that means something. maybe that's the point of billy showing up in roughly the same period of time lin decided to contact him. maybe that's the lesson.
or maybe it's not. damned if you do, damned if you don't. either way - marcus doesn't want to think about this anymore, at least for a while. another swig of his beer and then he's setting his bottle down next to him, the side of his hand accidentally brushing against billy's elbow. he doesn't move it away, because he doesn't really care, but he's still hyperaware of the physical contact, in no small part due to what he asks next. ]
Uh, speaking of which - how's the... quota thing going?
no subject
[ it's a quick response, said with the same casual, incidentally-but-unintentionally flirtatious lilt he always has when marcus responds to billy's incessant gay jokes with one of his own. he doesn't mean anything by it, really, just like he doesn't expect billy to mean anything by it every time he says something like that. it's just - how things are, growing up in the eighties as an outsider in a world that expects you to fit a certain mold. the world wants you to be this straight-laced, christian heterosexual, your country wants you to fuck cheerleaders and win football games. open subversion is how you cope.
granted, it's been hard not to wonder about billy, and vegas - the things billy said about his dad - only made those suspicions ramp up a little, after the petra thing threw them into question. marcus knows it's not his right to wonder, though. if billy ever wants to talk, then - marcus hopes he's made it clear in his own subtle way that he's not going to lose his shit at whatever it is billy might want to talk about. if there's even anything to talk about in the first place.
but it doesn't matter. this shit doesn't matter. marcus drains half of his beer and stares out over where the sunset should be, where the horizon should be, if it hadn't all been replaced by the earth and the shadows from the up. he's still thinking about stiles, still thinking about the hit, still has no fucking idea what he's going to do or how he's going to do it, but this talk has given him some amount of perspective, at least. no matter how much he might like stiles, no matter how much he might see him as a friend, he doesn't have the loyalty to him that he has to billy. if it comes down to one or the other, he's gotta save billy. maybe that means something. maybe that's the point of billy showing up in roughly the same period of time lin decided to contact him. maybe that's the lesson.
or maybe it's not. damned if you do, damned if you don't. either way - marcus doesn't want to think about this anymore, at least for a while. another swig of his beer and then he's setting his bottle down next to him, the side of his hand accidentally brushing against billy's elbow. he doesn't move it away, because he doesn't really care, but he's still hyperaware of the physical contact, in no small part due to what he asks next. ]
Uh, speaking of which - how's the... quota thing going?