Arc I: Fruitless [Elisha & Shiloh]

It was still early afternoon when Shiloh wandered out into the yard with a small block of cedar and his carving tools wrapped up in their leather case. He found his favorite spot, marked by the flattened grass from days spent resting there, and plopped himself down, quietly setting about unwrapping his tools. He turned over the wooden block in his hands, humming in thought. What wanted to come out of this one? Cedar was strong.. sturdy.. soothing, but fresh. Maybe a bird? Shiloh tilted his head, looking over the little chunk of wood from all possible angles before beginning to shave off the first few flakes. Maybe it would let him know after he started.

'He does spend so much time outside.' For another day in a row, Elisha could see Shiloh out the windows of the house, sitting, and so very focused on his craft. He could understand the appeal to carving-- shaping things under one's hands made them feel like they were in control. His father often had the same expression-- entirely absorbed but relaxed-- as he sutured jaws shut and dusted away the blemishes of aging in the morgue. But while his father had been wresting memories away from the jaws of death, he wasn't sure what Shiloh was trying to achieve. What was he looking for in the sunlight and scraps of wood? Elisha put a marker in his theology reading and closed the book, standing up and straightening the length of his skirt. Perhaps Shiloh had some of the right idea-- he could do this outside. He had to consider it carefully-- if it were anyone else, he'd probably have to bring food or some other token to justify the company, but Shiloh wasn't one who understood or cared about customs. Less care could be taken. Feeling enthusiastic, he exited the house and crossed the yard, casting a shadow over the younger man as he stood next to him. "Have you ever cut yourself, doing that?" He asked pleasantly, book clasped in his hands behind his back as he leaned to look at the little block of wood.

The wood was taking shape nicely. One edge had smoothed out into a gentle curve, while the rest of the mass shaped up into a rough blob. It was hard to tell at this point just what it was meant to be, but Shiloh was confident in his cuts. He was absorbed in it, not even realizing someone else had come into the yard until the shadow fell over his work. He paused, and tilted his head up towards the source, squinting just a little to make out Elisha's face in front of the bright sun. The bright light behind him left him in a sort of halo that Shiloh figured was probably appropriate. He was a cleric, after all.  Oh, right. He'd been asked a question. "..yes?" It seemed an odd thing to ask. What woodcarver hadn't slipped with the knife. It was a part of the craft, much like an athlete's sore muscles or a baker's burns. Shiloh paused in his carving, setting the wood down before splaying open his palms for Elisha to see.  They were far from unmarked. Well-worn calluses dotted the pads of his palms and several of his fingers where the tools rested. There were tiny little scars all over, long since healed. He didn't mind them. They were a reminder of just how long he'd been doing this and how much he'd learned.

The invitation to look lit Elisha's face up in genuine interest. "So, you don't fear the knife! That's admirable." He sat close to the other, leaning in to inspect the roughened hands-- going as far to gently take one in one of his own gloved ones. He turned the other's hand over, lips moving silently as if he was counting. "They say you can read a person through their hands." He mused after a moment, finally releasing Shiloh's fingers. "Lucky for you, I don't do that sort of divination~! Though maybe things would go much more smoothly, if others could read straight out of your little head, hm?" He gave Shiloh's head an unpermissed pat as an excuse to touch the ashy strands of hair-- it reminded him of sinew with its silvery blond color. "What is your native tongue, anyways?"

Shiloh blinked. He wasn't sure what he'd expected when he'd offered out his hands, but it certainly wasn't Elisha holding one of them, even if it was just to inspect it. After the initial moment of surprise he tilted his head, peering down at his own palms to try and see what Elisha was seeing. Was there something important there that he'd missed?  He certainly wasn't a diviner himself, but there was something to be said about what a person's hands gave away. He thought back briefly of Keon's hands, soft and ringed in gold, and then looked to Elisha's gloves. Maybe there were important things under there, too. The pat on his head interrupted Shiloh's wondering, and he looked up in quiet confusion, having missed the rest of the conversation. Elisha was very.. touchy? No.. physical? He wasn't sure of the right word, and frowned slightly as he tried to puzzle it out. Elisha reached out so plainly and so often to others. He made it look easy, bringing himself into someone else's space while keeping his own at a safe, gloved distance. Never an actual touch. More a performance. Oh, Elisha was looking at him expectantly. He must have missed a question again. Shiloh flushed in quiet embarrassment as he took a moment to try and remember what his ears had picked up while he'd been lost in his thoughts. "Oh.. I speak like Giants best."

Elisha tilted his head slightly as he took glances at Shiloh's face. He wished he could read straight out of that head-- Shiloh was always so quiet, eyes going to some place distant, and then the young man would often pipe up with something unexpectedly acute or... well if not that, at least startlingly hilarious. "Giant... Perhaps I'll pick it up as an extracurricular next year. Then you can tutor me, hm?" He mostly just said this to be nice. Elisha shifted to sit sideways so that he could take down Shiloh's hair. The other hadn't protested or pulled his hand away, so it was time to see how far he could push. "Maman only acknowledged me when I spoke French. She said that common was tiring." He laughed softly as if making a joke. "So, knowing how tiresome it is, you're very impressive."

By now Shiloh was thoroughly confused. First his hands, now his hair? Maybe this was how to make friends. He wasn't really sure it was friendly at all. It felt like a test, and one which he was rapidly failing. He picked up the block of wood he'd been shaping and held it tightly to his chest, just in case that might strike Elisha's fancy and be taken into gloved hands next. "Common.. is tiring," he agreed quietly. It was too flighty to be Giant. Too blunt to be Sylvan. It never felt quite right to speak in, words sticking out at odd angles in his throat. Not that he had any choice in the matter if he wanted to say anything for others to understand.  It wasn't that he hadn't tried to find the beauty in it--he had. He'd spent hours pouring over his poetry assignments looking for phrases without the rough edges that so much of his classmates' speech seemed to carry. But no one spoke like that. It wouldn't be practical in Common, he guessed, to have something carry meaning and still sound lovely.  He felt a quiet pang of homesickness in his chest, and squeezed the wooden block in his hands a little tighter.

There was the tension he'd been expecting, but still the other didn't fuss or bat him away or even verbally protest. As always, Shiloh seemed distracted. Perhaps he would be harder to pin down than Elisha assumed. Working the hair into a braid took longer to do neatly with gloved hands, but he worked patiently. He was not in any rush, after all. "Well, I suppose should words fail you, art and food are supposed to be the second best ways into a person's good will. Especially for things like finding a date. You said you invited a nice person to the house the other day? Should have asked them to the gala, too..."

Shiloh sat as still as he could while Elisha braided his hair, not quite willing to begin carving again while the other was so close. It wasn't that he disliked having company, but rather that he disliked this company in particular, this careful, critical company that lingered over his shoulder.  He wished it wasn't such a familiar feeling as of late, but he'd became acutely aware of how people watched him when he said something odd. Elisha wasn't so much of a spotlight like Keon. Not as focused or intense. More like when he'd go through the woods at home--watching from everywhere and nowhere all at once. Maybe he ought to keep a healthy fear of the cleric as well. If that was the case, this was certainly a good start. Any words he might have picked out to carry on a conversation felt far off and out of reach. Instead, he just sat in an increasingly uncomfortable silence.

Elisha felt the beginnings of frustration boil up as Shiloh fell entirely silent-- but the other wasn't entirely ignoring him. Shiloh was more too focused on him-- he could see it in the curve of his shoulders, feel it in his stillness. Like a mouse under his hand, holding absolutely still and playing dead. Why pretend to be dead? It made him want to prod, to see it flinch or breath or squeak. Strongly resisting the urge to pull hair or act curt, he tied off the braid and pulled away from Shiloh-- boundary found, he supposed. "Well, if you don't find anyone, you'll just have to go with me~" And the way he said it sounded like a cheery threat.

Well, that got some sort of sound out of him, even if it was just a choked off sort of squeak. At least with Elisha no longer right behind him, Shiloh felt like he could breathe again, but the relief was short-lived as he realized he would be expected to give a response. "I.. don't--" Want to? No, that wasn't right. He didn't not want to. It was just that the thought of having to stand in a room full of fancy people judging each other on how fancy they were with Elisha watching his every mistake made him want to be swallowed up by the ground right where he was sat, and he had no fucking clue how to begin explaining that. He thought it might actually be what Elisha wanted, anyway. Wasn't there someone else Elisha could watch? Someone who liked it? Plenty of people here liked being watched. Why hadn't he found someone like that? Shiloh's face was undeniably panicked, and more than a little red as he scrambled for some sort of answer, but all he came up with was a small and exasperated question in return. "Why?"

Elisha couldn't help that his smile warmed at Shiloh's response. You could almost see the smoke coming out of the other's ears from how hard he was thinking. 'You can say no. You can stand up and set boundaries.' He would have said, except he wasn't sure if he wanted him to. Wasn't sure if he had it in him even if he was told. Besides, perhaps Elisha was being cruel, but he wasn't being mean. He feigned a dejected look, but still looked far too pleased. "I thought that would reassure you. You know-- a backup plan~!" He sighed and leaned away, picking at the edge of his cuffs. "Besides, I don't really know how to choose. Advantage? Convenience? I don't want to stand out as an influential person. I'd rather be left in peace to do as I like. And you're rather adorable." Someone would come along eventually and snap him up, probably.

Shiloh fidgeted for a moment longer, his face burning. He looked down at his unfinished chunk of wood with a small frown. The words were kind, but rang hollow in his ears. Elisha thought he was useful. Maybe that was enough for Spoken. Maybe it was a compliment to them. Maybe it was selfish of him to hope for more.  He ran his thumb along the curved edge he'd whittled away before the older boy had arrived, and took a deep breath. "A man had an apple tree in his garden." On its own, the sentence was wildly out of place, so Shiloh quickly carried on with the rest of the story. "The tree made no fruit, but it sheltered sparrows in its branches from the heat. The man was upset it would not give him fruit, and got his axe to cut it down. When the sparrows saw what he wanted to do, they begged for him to spare the tree. They said, 'If you destroy the tree, we shall have to go elsewhere, and you will no longer have our singing to listen to while you work in your garden.'" "It did not sway him. He chopped at the trunk and found it hollow inside, a home for bees with their honey. For this, he threw down his axe and said 'The old tree is worth keeping after all.'"  Shiloh glanced towards Elisha at the end of his story, though not directly at him. "You would not care for the sparrows, either.. I think."

Oh, that was... a lot of words. Elisha smiled politely, but his wide-eyed blinking betrayed his surprise at the sudden shift in the conversation. A fable, hm? He'd come out to procrastinate his theology studies and Shiloh would slap him on the wrist with a pretty metaphor for the trouble. Was he supposed to feel chastised? Foolish? Or thoughtful? Perhaps all three. "So..." He pursed his lips, looking perplexed. "... Be shallow, then?" Be empathetic was perhaps more the point of the story, but there were enough elements that that passed over Elisha's head. Song nor fruit nor honey mattered to him, metaphorically-- if one wasn't going to cut the tree open for the sake of cutting the tree open, why bother with the effort just because of a little self-entitled anger? All that he took away from it was that one should appreciate art for its own sake, not for what it could have been.  "That's what I'm trying to do--! I know I'm not going to be stumbling across honey-- that is, you know, deep romantic bonds. I'm not looking for apples-- the substantial desirable ones-- either. You're the metaphorical sparrow. I want that." He tilted his head. "Though I suppose sparrows aren't fond of cages. I'm not much of a tree myself."

"No.. that's not.." Shiloh shook his head with a frustrated little huff. Maybe he'd translated it wrong? No, he was fairly sure he'd gotten it right. Or at least, right enough. He was beginning to think that maybe he'd never understand the people here.  He wasn't a sparrow. He was the tree of the metaphor. Overlooked for the lack of obvious fruit people could pick off and use. Only worth keeping when he offered something in return. Why did he have to be useful? Did he really add nothing worthy by existing? Why couldn't he just be and be appreciated for what he was? Was that such a foreign concept? The storm of thoughts brought something in him to a boiling point. Shiloh abruptly picked up his tools, plopped them in their leather wrap, hastily rolled it up without bothering to organize them, and rose from his spot in the grass. For once, he could look down on Elisha rather than the other way around. "You're stupid." There wasn't any anger in his voice, just disappointment as he turned on his heel and retreated back in the house before the older boy could get in another word.