flippin_peachy | RP With Oswald Cobblepot

RP With Oswald Cobblepot

He was cold.

It was the type of cold that seeps into you, past your flesh and straight down to your bones to make them ache, ache in a way that makes you feel as if you were slowly being turned to stone.

And maybe he was.
It certainly felt like he had been here in this spot for centuries, motionless and cold.
And alone.

He was alone now, his one true north taken from him and when that happened he had fallen into this cold, dark place where his bones ached and his head throbbed and his hands were wet and sticky with blood. He can still hear the soft exhale of breath as Bruce died in his arms, his body slowly going limp and heavy.

And then....
nothing.

Just a cold, black feeling that had swarmed up inside him. It was a feeling he had spent a long time keeping locked away, ever since the day he had left the Army, since the day he found Esme dead in their flat. It was familiar and cold.
So bloody cold.

Just as he is now, cold and empty now that he had found the wretched bitch who had murdered his boy and made her pay. Knocking her away from the poor sod she had been busy torturing and onto the ground, straddling her and wrapping his callused hands around her head and bashing it.
Over and over.
And over.

Until....

Nothing.
Just silence and the feeling of being cold.
As if his heart had turned to stone.

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[Gathered up into a ball, he stares at the wall across him, listening to Alfred's footsteps drifting out of earshot. And he waits. Not for Alfred’s return, but for the pain squeezing his temples to ease off, hoping against hope. It’s quiet now: he hears his soft, tear-clogged breathing; the mansion settling; the odd clink of a cup or a dish on another floor. To be left alone just like this, he thinks, would be the greatest kindness Alfred could show him now. But Alfred wants him back up for one reason or another, and Oswald lets out a halfhearted croak as he's moved, aware of every tendon and sinew and nerve he has wronged. He leans heavily against the hand bracing him, face slack, hollow. The press of a warm mug to his lips rouses him a little. The drink has a faintly woodsy scent to it; tea, most likely. Weary and wrung dry, his body couldn't care less what it is. He sips, wincing at the lemony tartness of it. The spicy hit of whisky on the second sip isn't any kinder on his throat. But it's a comfort in its own way, as he continues to drink. A way he never needed more badly than he does now.

His hands lift up, weakly clutching the mug.]

Edited 2024-11-02 17:55 (UTC)

[Alfred watches as Oswald grasps the mug like a child with a bottle, guzzling the hot whiskey almost greedily. A better man than he might scold him for bringing Oswald liquor but those men probably haven't gone through the type of grief he and Oswald have, so for now he will supply what small comforts he can for the smaller man. A comforting embrace and a couple of glasses of whiskey to dull the pain and hopefully allow them both to sleep better than they have.]

That should help ease your throat and headache a bit.

[He says softly and when Oswald has drained the cup he takes it away and sets it aside, still holding him close.]

[The top-up he's offered is just as strong, if not stronger. It goes down in a few pulls either way, pooling hot in Oswald’s empty stomach. His throat steadily numbs up and his nose unclogs; he can breathe again, mostly. And deep into his second refill, the world grows fuzzier at the edges and the pain in his head a little quieter, a little dimmer, less urgent. He just sits a moment in the glow of a warm and comfortable drunkenness, cradling the cup in his hands. It’ll never have any of the answers he’s looking for; he has had the deaths of several loved ones in the space of a few years to figure that out. But he gazes long into what's left of his drink, as if this time it might be different. Until a thought occurs to him twenty minutes too late and he looks up at Alfred again, into the face of a man who looks as deeply and inexpressibly tired as he feels. Brow gently furrowing, he asks:]

...why did you bring me here? [There’s no bite to the question.]

Edited 2024-11-06 03:56 (UTC)

[Alfred helps himself to a top up or two as well, but directly from the bottle, the sting of whiskey on his throat a welcome sort of pain as is the warmth it helps spread inside his chest. Or perhaps that warmth is from the man he still has cradled against him and when Oswald speaks he looks down at him, his eyes calm and compassionate.]

Because I wanted to help you.

[He says but then pauses, thinking a little on why he didn't just bring a first aid kit into Oswald's room and tuck him back into bed.]

And because seeing the blood reminded me finding Bruce in his bedroom.

[He says slowly and then looks into Oswald's eyes as he admits the full truth.]

I got scared.

[Oswald watches him through his puffy, heavy-lidded eye, his chest rising and falling slowly. Even from his dreamy, whisky-soaked daze, he can sense a weight to the confession. He doesn’t know what to say to that, for a while, any more than he knows what to make of the expression Alfred’s face is holding. It’s achingly soft and frank and open; a look meant for the dead boy in the backyard, he decides. Not him. He has done nothing to earn it.]

Well... fortunately for you, [Oswald spreads his hands in a weary, bitter parody of some once-triumphant gesture, fingers still hooked around the mug] I am not dead yet.

[To claim he is ‘very much alive’ would have been an overstatement. It’s not just that’s he’s bruised all over, stiff and swelling up. Not just all the scars he collects from year after year of brushing shoulders with death, the toll this life has taken on his body. But that this – stumbling his way from moment to moment like a disaster survivor, bleeding and lost – isn’t living at all; he’s just watching time going by.]

Edited 2024-11-09 03:51 (UTC)

[The little gesture, even if it is a parody of Oswald's once smug to a fault confidence, goes a long way to soothing the panic Alfred felt when he saw the smear of blood on the floor and on the other man's skin. Not to mention the panic and shame he feels in admitting he is scared of the home he lives in.

He utters a small little chuckle, it's no more than a wheeze really and his eyes move across Oswald's face tenderly.]

A fact I find a lot of comfort in, sir.

[He rumbles softly and reaches out with his free hand to brush his thumb across Oswald's cheek.]

Comfort and strength.

[Moving slowly and carefully as to not hurt him, Alfred plucks the mug from Oswald and then hoists him up enough to wrap his arms around him in a warm embrace. Hugging him against his chest where he will be able to feel slow, steady beating of his heart.]

[It’s a strange sound, that chuckle.

These days, it’s what he’d expect to hear in the moments leading up to a nervous breakdown. But Alfred is regarding him with calm, gentle eyes. Patient eyes. Oswald’s pulse beats in his throat, and there’s a feeling, in that silence, that he’s missing something, something just on the trembling edge of his awareness. Something he realizes that he’s no closer to understanding when a hand reaches out to touch him. A warm, calloused thumb brushes his cheek, where his tears have dried tacky on his skin, and he starts a little. Blinks back at Alfred, lashes flickering uneasily. No slap. Suddenly, the cup is easing from his fingers – he has already forgotten about it – and then Alfred is folding him into his arms again, the collar of Oswald’s shirt crumpling as he’s tucked into the heat of Alfred’s skin.

His mind turns, puzzling. He still isn’t sure what’s happening, what he’s supposed to do. But his body, looser and heavier with drink, has already made its choice, is already relaxing into his. And as the sting of whisky begins to settle into a softer, deeper burn, the kind he could fall asleep to, the unexpectedness of this, whatever this is, grows uncomplicated, less threatening. It’s not what he asked for but it’s what he needs – and, for now, that’s all that matters.

He hears himself heave a slow, shaky sigh, and he closes his eye a moment.]

Some days... I find myself wishing I could forget him, for just a moment.

[The words have been rolling over and over in his head. But saying it makes it real. Saying it seems like a kind of betrayal. He sniffs, adding thickly:]

Does that make me a bad person?

Edited 2024-11-14 16:03 (UTC)

No.

[Alfred breathes and holds Oswald a little tighter against his chest which has grown tight with emotion at Oswald's honest admission.]

No, not at all.

[He closes his own eyes for a moment against the sudden flood of memories; memories of Bruce, Reggie, and of course Esme. People he's loved and lost and while he would never trade his memories of them he knows how tempting a moment of peace and silence would be should someone give it to him.]

You're not a bad person, just someone who is hurting.

[Just like he is and Oswald's words repeat in his mind, soft and sad.]

Just for a moment...

[He echoes and with that Alfred shifts so he can look down at Oswald, noting his tear streaked cheeks and tired, lonely eyes before pressing his lips down and against Oswald's in a tender, slow kiss.]

[There's no time to process it, starbursts of colours lighting up Oswald’s brain as Alfred presses closer and he feels that fierce heat of him through his shirt, feels his mouth on his, warm and wet and laced with whisky. And then the moment breaks, and it's like jerking awake from a dream again, the hazy-lit bedroom and the smell of incense and the loneliness snapping back into awareness. He rears back with a sharp, startled inhale, a spasm of emotions on his face. Fear, confusion, childish hurt. He blinks back, throat heaving. Mouth hanging open for several long, wordless seconds. And, suddenly, he’s more sober than he’s been in the last half hour, his heart rabbiting in his chest.]

--what are you doing...?

[It’s all he can manage, after he has swallowed and found his voice. And it’s so small, so fragile for Oswald Cobblepot.]

[Well that wasn't exactly the reaction Alfred was hoping for and his face burns hot with embarrassment.]

I beg your pardon, sir. I just wanted to...

[To what? To lose himself in another for at least a moment? To find some kind of warmth in one another?]

...show you some kindness.
If only for a moment.

[There’s a blank look on Oswald's face, as if something is now slipping into place.]

...No one has ever kissed me before.

[The realization sits with him a while, long enough that the shock of it drains from his face and there's a slow softening of his expression, a settling into something dangerously close to resignation. He turns his half-lidded eye away, towards a bedpost. The lamplight catches the side of his face, bleaching his eyelashes.]

I had always wanted my first to be special in some way.

[In a different tone, it could have been read as an accusation, a guilt-trip. But here and now, it’s none of these things. Just a solemn statement of fact.]

...I held to this idea that whenever I would have the chance to experience it myself, it would be with someone who loved me, and who I loved in turn. A memory I would look back on with fondness and longing in equal measure.

[And then it’s his turn to laugh. He lets out a chuckle into that silence settling heavily around them – because if he doesn’t laugh, he think he’ll cry. If not over Ed again, or something else taken from him that couldn’t be given back, then for a kiss that could have meant something in another time and another place, with another man – if only Ed had said, I do too.

The walls of the room are suddenly closing in around him and it’s hard to breathe. His chest feels heavy.]

I don’t... feel very well.

[He settles back into bed. Loneliness and whisky are a dangerous mix, but the only answer he can see seems to be drinking himself back into a state of warm, woolly numbness.]

Just bring me the bottle.

Edited 2024-11-23 19:05 (UTC)

[Alfred jerks, as if slapped, with the realization that he is Oswald's first kiss and he suddenly feels ashamed of himself. No one's first kiss should be from an old war dog like him.]

I...I didn't know.

[Is all he can say as Oswald pulls away from him in favor of curling up in his bed but when he is ordered to bring him the bottle the butler in him finds it hard to say no so he goes to do just that. Part of him knowing that it will just add to the other man's troubles but also wanting to do something right for him.]

Here you are, sir.

[He holds out his hand - the one with all its fingers intact - without so much as a glance. The bottle has a weight to it that’s all in the glass; it isn’t so full that he needs to prop himself up on an elbow to drink without spilling over the sheets. Not so full that he can crawl back into some corner of his mind and disappear into a dream of what could’ve been, might’ve been, should’ve been. But he’ll take what he can get while he still can, just like he always has. There’s nothing else to hold out for, nothing better than this.

Ed would have something to say, he's sure, about wallowing in self-pity without at least downing a few glasses of water first. But the dead can’t speak, and Oswald's belief in ghosts is fading away in the cruelty of their absence.

He pulls the bottle from his lips with a wet pop and sniffs, eyebrows wearily drawing together over the rim.]

You could have taken me to my bed. [He says, dull-eyed, to the wall.] But you brought me here, where I am unable to leave under my own power, and no one is coming to find me. [He feels a muted twang of fear in his gut.] ...well, if your intentions are to take advantage of me, you wouldn’t be the first to try.

Edited 2024-12-01 18:40 (UTC)

I would never! [Alfred says, his tone offended that Oswald would even suggest such a thing. He might not have grown up a posh lad but he was a gentleman through and through.]

...

[There's a small pause though as he side steps his own feelings and focuses on what Oswald just said, his brows furrowing and he sits down on the edges of the bed.]

Who has tried that before??

[The bed dips slightly under Alfred’s weight and he feels his shoulders hunch up, his spine pulling tight. It’s not a question he was expecting at all, and Oswald thinks about Jim again. About how he had swung the barrel of the gun on him back at City Hall and how he could look him square in the eye and accuse him, now, with the same unflinching, unfeeling certainty, of bringing this on himself. How Harvey, grimacing, would suggest that he should feel grateful a woman had thought to touch him at all. Neither would come as a shock to him, not anymore.]

No one who is not already dead.

[He answers, aware of the sick, lingering throb low in his belly. He has no desire to confront the pity or disgust he thinks he’d find in Alfred’s face.]

...my own stepsister attempted to force herself on me when I was in a compromised state. Had I been myself, I surely would have killed her sooner.

[Would Alfred have stormed in, eyes blazing with righteous fury, and torn Sasha off him, thrashing her senseless, too? He nearly chuffs another sad, bitter laugh at the idea - the only kind he has left in him. But he swings the bottle back for another gulp instead, the last of the whisky sloshing against his lips.]

Edited 2024-12-04 07:17 (UTC)

[There is a look of disgust on Alfred's face but it's not angled towards Oswald, it's towards his stepsister and he feels his own belly tighten in anger at what the woman tried to do.]

And rightfully so!

[He exclaims, the sincerity in his voice unmistakable. He looks down and sees that his hands have rolled themselves into fists, as if he could punish a ghost on Oswald's behalf. Slowly he forces himself to unclench them as he lets out a long breath.]

You've been on the end of a lot of cruelty, haven't you? [He asks after a moment of silence and then nods to himself. Oswald doesn't have to answer, he knows the truth now. Why else would the smaller man be so hell bent on gaining power? It was because he was always made to feel like he had none.]

I'm sorry that you were mistreated and hurt so much, I swear on my life that I won't do that but if you want I will carry you back to your quarters right this instant so you can feel safe.

That's all I want really, is for you to feel safe and to at least try to show you some kindness.

[His face wrenches up. And in the silence, he fights to quietly swallow back the sob swollen in his throat, the grief too big for his body. Left mourning an offer that seems too little too late in a world that has done all it could to beat him to his knees and fold in his heart. Tears slide, tickly-hot, down his cheeks, dripping into the blanket.

He never thought the idea of receiving kindness could hurt as much as the absence of it. But after everything that has happened, it shouldn’t surprise him at all. Nothing should anymore.

He draws a sharp, quivering breath.]

There is nothing you can do for me.

[He rests the empty whisky bottle over the bed and puts his arms around himself.]

Just let me be.

Edited 2024-12-08 19:17 (UTC)

Very well, sir.

[Obedient as always Alfred leaves Oswald alone, moving silently to the closet where he pulls down an extra blanket so he can put together a make-shift bed for himself on the small loveseat that sits on the other side of the room. He doesn't expect to sleep but eventually exhaustion takes over and he drifts off, but not completely, a small part of his body stays alert just as it always did when he was a solider. Listening and staying ready should trouble arise.

Trouble comes in the form of memories wrapped in the shape of dreams and Alfred jerks awake when he hears Oswald cry out in his sleep, a watery heart breaking moan that jabs at Alfred's heart. He is up and on his feet in a flash, moving over to check on the smaller man who is whimpering and jerking about in the large bed.]

Shhhhh.

[Alfred soothes and rubs his hand down Oswald's back, his touch is firm but kind, as if he were trying to penetrate through the sad dreams to show tenderness. It seems to work as Oswald's moaning quiets and Alfred is about to return to his position on the couch when Oswald reaches around to take hold of his hand. His thin, bony fingers scrabbling at Alfred's thick, sturdy ones.]

....please.

[He thinks he hears the other man whisper, the desperate, lonely tone making his chest constrict painfully.]

Very well, sir.

[He says and slips into the bed next to Oswald, wrapping his strong arms around him in an effort to shield him from the despair that seems to be so set on settling into his heart.]

You rest easy now. [He whispers softly, his hand rubbing Oswald's back steadily.]

I'm here.

[By the time he feels a hand snap around his ankle, he's already being dragged off, away from Alfred and the pillar, for what feels like forever, his skin squealing over marble tiles. Then he's dropped and Ed looms into view above him. He’s bleeding from the hole in his head, his glasses cracked, crooked. And he just stares the kind of stare that pins the breath in Oswald's throat.

'Ed... Ed, I am so sorry,' Oswald squeaks out; it’s all he can ever seem to say. And it's always the wrong thing, because he can see Ed's eyes go dark behind the harsh glare of his lenses. Then Ed pounces and locks his hands around his throat, pressing him down. Squeezing and squeezing with his ice-cold fingers. Oswald feels the furious throbbing of blood behind his eyes, feels them balloon in their sockets, his mouth dropping open in a scream he can't make. He heaves and scrabbles at Ed's arms, his face. At Alfred’s arms, Alfred’s face.

Wailing, he jerks awake in the dark with his pajama top sticking to his skin. His breath rattles through him. And for a moment, while staring through Alfred, his eye big and shiny, dreams and memories begin to blur and he isn't sure what was and what wasn't. Can't remember what colour of tie Ed had been wearing the day Nyssa shot him; can't remember what the colour of Ed's eyes really were. Brown? Green? It seems to change the harder he struggles to bring it into focus, and he chokes out sob, terrified by his own brokenness.

The only thing that makes any sense at all is the hand smoothing down his shuddering back: long, slow strokes. He doesn't understand what he has done to deserve it but all he knows is that he needs it now more than he has ever needed anything. And as he slots his chin into the warm crook of Alfred’s neck, he finds himself listening for the words he desperately needs to hear. That he’s safe. That someday, weeks from now, he'd find himself in a place where the Ed from his ugliest, guiltiest dreams wouldn't reach out to strangle him in his sleep. And that he would wake up in the morning to the realization that life went on and that he could too, just like he used to. But these are not promises Alfred seems able to make, that anyone can. Because this is Gotham, and there’s no refuge here, no rest.

He blinks up at Alfred, his heart still rabbiting in his chest. In his vulnerability he looks too young, too harmless, for all that he has done.]

...you are all that I have left... [He rasps into the dark, his clammy fingers tightening around him.]

Edited 2024-12-18 06:54 (UTC)

[I see them at night, when I'm alone. The faces of those we killed.
Do you?

I don't have to look for them Reg, they find me.

Alfred knows better than most about the type of nightmares that plague Oswald, having had similar ones ever since he was a young solider. He has been visited by dead friends more often than living ones and when the smaller man wails out in the dark he doesn't even have to ask why. The panic and raspy breathing as one tries to break away from the icy cold touch of death and decay, the voices of people he's wronged or killed clanging about in his head like church bells, not to mention the endless cacophony of gunfire that seems to have followed him for most his life.

Oh yes, he knows those dreams very well.]

It's okay.

[He soothes, his voice a tender grumble as he wraps his arms tighter around Oswald's small, shaking form.]

I'm right here and I'm not going to leave you.
I swear.

💙🐧💙

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RP With Oswald Cobblepot

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