Open RP

[goingtobeunwell]

[Open post for RP - games, one-off threads, etc.]

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[load_aim_shoot]

For a moment Raju stops pulling, looking surprised. His gaze darts over Francis' face, trying to imagine it. They've talked about it before, but it's harder to imagine now that suddenly it's nearly a reality. It isn't that Raju isn't curious, he wants to see it. But Francis has worn his beard more or less that way since they'd first met; the man's face seems made for something growing there. "Completely? You mean, all the way off? You're certain?"

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“I can always grow it back,” he reasons, still smiling. He lives for a good shocked expression on a pretty person. “Why? Would you be repulsed by a smooth face?”

It would be different. And maybe if Rama hates it it’ll give him a little reprieve from temptation!

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"Of course not," he grins, pulling the bench the rest of the way and then going for the dish of soap and bucket of pine needle water, his grooming kit, a sheet that hasn't yet been torn apart for rags. "It's only that you've always had it. As long as I've known you, anyway. And it covers so much of your face. What am I going to be seeing under there? There could be anything."

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“A chin, I imagine,” he says, closing his notebook and setting his pencil aside. He can do the prep work for Rama, sitting himself back and removing his shirt to keep the hair from falling on his jumper. “A lower lip.”

He does give the question a little more consideration, reaching for the pine needle water to give his beard a cursory scrub to soften the hair and his skin. “A few scars here and there. Imperfections.”

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Raju leans back, watching Francis take his shirt off and letting his eyes wander after. He wasn't going to ask for that, but if Francis is volunteering, Raju isn't going to stop him. As Francis goes on Raju's gaze flicks back to Francis' face; he sounds a little more serious at that than he did at chin and lip and Raju thinks of Francis' discomfort with compliments, studying him.

"Are you trying to warn me?" Raju smiles. "I'm going to like it. I like your face already, you know."

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He laughs softly. “I’m told it’s endearing, which sounds remarkably similar to being placated.”

But it’s his face, it’s the only one he has, and he doesn’t hate it. In fact, he’s looking forward to Rama seeing the rest of it.

“But I know you’ll like it.” He looks up at him with a quick smile and leans back into the chair, ready for the cold to hit his face again.

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"Good." Raju flashes him an eager, closemouthed smile that's eclipsed a second later by businesslike focus as he steps in close, taking Francis' chin between his fingers and turning his head this way and that. He doesn't have to move Francis to get a good look, he could move himself instead, but he wants to. He likes holding Francis' chin this way.

His hand rubs at the beard as he draws his hand away, fondly. Last time seeing it for a while, messy and unkempt as it is.

"I think I'm going to cut the excess off first," he says, reaching in his kit for his scissors, "and then wash what's left. Unless you'd like me to wash all of it before anything else. Who was it who was placating you about your face?"

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He doesn’t try hiding the preen in his smile as Rama holds his chin and inspects his beard. As far as beards go he knows it’s not a pretty sight - not clipped and trimmed and flattering like the one on Rama, but he’s been fond of it. It makes him feel less connected to the old world he left.

“Trim, then wash,” he agrees. “And no one you need to know about, Rama. They aren’t here for you to threaten.”

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"I wouldn't." Raju takes up the sheet, grinning at Francis as he drapes it around his shoulders, over his chest. "Unless you asked," he adds, then his free hand tugs a portion of Francis' beard just enough to hold it straight. "Last chance to keep your beard."

He waits but knows Francis won't tell him he's changed his mind, and in a moment he's holding the little scissors as close to Francis' face as he can get them. "Keep still now, this shouldn't take more than a minute." Jaw and cheeks first, then he'll move down to the neck. Bit by bit Raju starts cutting it away, holding Francis' jaw and turning his head by his firm, careful grip when he needs a new angle.

"I did think you preferred to keep it long, though," he says absently as he focuses on his hands and Francis' face. "What changed your mind?"

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He doesn’t change his mind, pushing for Rama to continue with a soft nod. Change doesn’t bother him. Once upon a time maybe it would have, but he wouldn’t have made for a very good explorer if he was too set in his ways.

“You know I stopped shaving after I came to stay with the Netsilik,” he recounts, raising his chin up absently. Being tended to in this way is oddly familiar. “But before that I stayed shaved. I’d preferred it then. I suppose I’m just eager to see if I’ll feel the same as I did then if I rid myself of the beard.”

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"No uniform," he notes, holding some of the chunks of beard under Francis' chin tight enough so he can start cutting them off. It's odd to see the length he's become so used to disappearing this way. Odd, and a little exciting; but he isn't done yet, so he doesn't yet let himself take a look at the whole picture of Francis' face. Only pieces, a section of his jawline here, part of his neck there. It isn't all uneven stubble quite yet, but it's close. "It won't be quite the same."

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The first ‘snip’ gives him a pleasant little shiver down his spine. No turning back now - not unless he wants to look even more a mess than before, at any rate.

“It’s only fitting; I’m a civilian now.”

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"Mm." Raju pulls and snips in a line over Francis' cheek, thinking about that. It isn't how he thinks about himself; but of course it wouldn't be. Francis' work is done.

There's something stirring under the thought. Now isn't the time to look on it, so he leaves all of it in the dark. He takes a slow, steadying breath, finishing the one cheek and moving to his neck on the other side. "You're a retired man now, hm? Is this what you thought retirement would look like?" He gives Francis a little grin as he glances at his eyes, the little joke — the stark difference between this and any civilization, particularly the kind Francis must have at one point expected back home — helping pull Raju's mind down other safer paths.

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It’s safer to joke about ‘retirement’ than discuss the very depressing truth. He thinks about the last time he ever heard James Clark Ross’ voice, the heartbreak he couldn’t stand to listen to as one friend explained to the other that they’d all died miserably.

“I thought I’d be married,” he admits, smiling a little sheepishly. “Married, with a successful command under my belt, perhaps some children on the way.”

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"It'd suit you." Raju cuts one line off Francis' beard, then another, then another, then moves on to that side of his chin. "Fatherhood would suit you." He realises after he says it that, in trying to focus on that topic instead of the one the 'civilian' comment had first turned his mind to, he's forgotten to wonder whether he should be careful; it isn't easy to hear about what you'll never have, for all Francis had been smiling about it a second ago. His eyes move to Francis', his expression watchful and a little cautious.

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His smile has a touch of sadness to it, but there isn’t any threat to derailing the moment. He’s come to terms about the life he always wanted for himself, but would never have.

“I always thought it would,” he says somewhat breezily. “And marriage. I thought both would suit me well. But some dreams aren’t meant to be.”

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Raju makes an agreeing noise and turns his attention back to his hands. Some things Raju can't change only by willing it, no matter how sure he is that Francis should have had the life he'd wanted. It's an odd thought. But after everything Francis has lived through, even Raju can't argue that Francis might find his way back to that life now. He runs his thumb slowly over Francis' jaw instead of any other gesture that'd draw more attention to itself. Then he moves the scissors up to Francis' cheek, cuts there for a moment, and then he's done. With this one part, anyway. Mostly.

He considers the picture Francis makes, finds himself smiling, then moves the scissors to Francis' upper lip. "I'm looking forward to kissing you without this in the way," he says with a grin as he cuts the hair there shorter, then cleans off his scissors and puts them away, drawing out what he'll need for the rest and setting all of it aside. "And seeing what that lower lip really looks like."

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He hopes this means more kissing in his near future, and the thought of that alone is enough to drive away thoughts of Rama missing out on the chance to be a father. He can imagine it - he’d be anxious, worried about repeating past mistakes, worried about passing all the bad parts of himself onto his child, but sweet and fun and all the things a good father should be.

“You’ll be pleasantly surprised. There’s a birth mark shaped like Portugal under there,” he says with a deadpan smile.

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Raju half-tries at restraining his smile, mostly for show, a silent faux-protest against Francis saying ridiculous things. "I'll be taking you to task after all of this if there's not," he says, amused, and gathers a little of the pine needle water in his hands to spread it over the lower half of Francis' face. Then he rubs a sliver of soap between his fingers and smooths it over Francis' cheeks, feeling the long stubble beneath his hands.

"You're lucky there's not much direct sun here," he notes as he does, studying Francis' half-uncovered face. "Once I finished you'd be half-pale. Much more striking than Portugal down there."

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He laughs softly. He knows Rama wants to laugh, he just knows.

"Thank you for not making me look completely ridiculous," he tells him, raising his head so Rama can have better access to the remaining stubble. "One last farewell kiss to the bearded man?"

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Raju pauses, surprised, then smiles again. "Not farewell," he corrects, scooping water in his hands and spilling it over Francis' face as he bends, rinsing the soap off with the same gesture he uses to take Francis' face in both of his hands. "If I miss the layer of hair between my lips and yours I'm sure you'll grow it out again." And with that Raju kisses him, slow and thorough. A little more thorough than he'd intended to be, but as he does it he realises he doesn't see any reason to stop before Francis wants to.

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Crozier closes his eyes and lets himself be kissed, a low, satisfied rumble rising in his throat. “Mm.”

The last time they’d kissed like this his hair didn’t get finished, and so with great reluctance he pulls away, pressing a few quick kisses to his lips and then sitting back. “Well, let’s find out if you approve.”

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Raju makes a pleased noise to answer that rumble Raju can feel in their lips, in Francis' mouth. As Francis pulls back Raju realises he's licking his lips, then smiles in a bright, amused way at Francis. "I will," he says, and then turns to set things up. He hooks the strop over something nearby and unfolds the blade, starting to run it with quick, practised ease back and forth over the leather side.

"It's been a long time since I used this," he says as he does. "But I've been looking after it. You're in good hands."

A moment more and he's setting the blade aside again to start on the soap, glancing up to study Francis' face as he wets the brush, lathers the soap. "Your hair is longer than it was when you used to shave, isn't it? I'll be the first to see you looking this way." He looks pleased when he says it. Curious as he is about the man Francis says he used to be, the way that man used to look, the way Francis must have seemed when performing the work that would define the rest of his life, Raju finds he likes this too, the idea of seeing something new. Being the first to see something new, because his hand was the one that did it. There's something about that.

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“I wouldn’t assume otherwise,” he replies, because there isn’t any question in his mind otherwise. Rama is meticulous in caring for his things, especially something that came from home. There’s so little that came with them from their past lives.

He watches Rama prepare the blade and lather, smiling at the familiarity but intrigued by how intimate it feels with someone other than a steward wielding the blade. Rama is going to bring that razor to his throat and the delicate skin of his cheeks and around his lips, the trust blooming in his chest and overflowing into adoration.

“I suppose you will be,” he smiles, feeling a little heat in his face.

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Raju's hand slows as he looks up and catches that hint at a blush. His smile deepens as he pinches gently at Francis' cheek, leans down—

—and stops just short of kissing him, rolling his lips pointedly between his teeth while his eyes carry his smile. His false pinch tightens into a real one for just an instant, long enough to tease Francis, and then he straightens up again, starting to brush the lather over Francis' face. "If there's anything more you'd like to warn me about, say it now. Once I start I'll need you to keep your mouth closed until I'm finished."