"I'm rich," Lark shrugs, "I was born rich enough. And I can tell you we're not happy, either. Our kids scream just as loud. Our women gulp down pills, our men have tight fists looking for a small cheek to break."
It's as casually said as if he were assuring Tommy that rain falls in his world, too.
He shrugs, vaguely-- that's so normal that it doesn't even register. He doesn't know anyone who didn't grow up that way, and finds it slightly unbelievable when people say they haven't.
It's not something he would admit to most people. But he doesn't think Tommy will give a damn the way someone else might, and sometimes it's easier to talk to a wall than to share with a sympathetic ear. Lark is a miserable person if he doesn't work very hard not to be, and it completely ruins the effect if he admits that he has to work so much harder than other people just to enjoy being alive.
"No. Not really. There have been fleeting moments, but they're easy to forget." He shrugs. Lark has made himself forget most of them. "But I am here sometimes. Not all the time, you'd have to be a complete idiot to be happy more than one day a week. But it's more than I can remember being happy my whole life as a human."
He shifts in his chair and crosses his legs at the knee, considering that.
It's important. It is- to someone like Lark, who is so intrinsically against everything that the Barge stands for, who thought he'd never graduate... it sounds like he might have at least some chance, now. It's important, but Tommy tries not to get too excited just yet.
"What does that mean to you, then? That you attained that here?"
"That...I need to remember to adapt. It's the only way to keep my species from extinction." He says, but that's the easy answer, and he offers a weak smile. "And that there are people here whose example is rubbing off on me. At home, I am the example."
"Adaptation." Which is hard. Incredibly hard- Lark must know it's the only
way Tommy has been able to survive, to thrive, and he knows the toll it's
taken on him.
It hurts just to hear it. Which means it's true. "Even if you like the path you're on, the person you are. The thrill of almost having what you're fighting for?"
"We're fighting for the same thing, Tommy. Survival. Safety for ourselves, our loved ones. Dominance in our fields. You're really not that different from me." The reason Lark is an inmate and Tommy isn't comes down to sheer ruthlessness, maybe. Maybe. Lark still doesn't know.
Lark goes after revenge hard, he savors it. He enjoys it. Tommy has been willing to let things go that Lark later went in and avenged for him, so that has to be significant. And Tommy gets attached (to brothers, to his aunt, to Grace, to Rey now) far more easily than Lark gets attached to anyone; and maybe that's all it takes: to open yourself a fraction more than Lark knows how.
Or maybe Tommy's family is just easier to love than Lark's. (Part of him doubts that; Lark's family was dull and semi-rural, and predictable in their bad moods; Tommy's seems like chaos under one roof). Maybe it doesn't matter. (This is the loop Lark is always stuck in when he thinks of Tommy, when he gets close to breaking out of old thoughts.)
"We're both fighters, Lark. But you were always the leader." He shifts in his chair, leans his elbows on his knees and rubs at his mouth.
"There were always other people calling the shots, in my war. We would fight tooth and nail, we would lose men, and when were were exhausted, when we were almost there, there'd be some orders to leave. To pull out. And I got so bloody angry the first few times- what the fuck did we die for, then? There are boys now serving as fertilizer for the great country of France, who should have waited two hours- just two hours to die, and they might have been here now.
But there's no fighting orders. A strategy doesn't work, you might lose a few men, you might think back on how the initial strategy should have worked-- but in the end, you have to listen to orders. And you make the best of the next strategy."
"But that's what it is. When I want something back home, when I want it badly-- I think of my family first. I think is it worth it? And if it's going to hurt them more than it will benefit them, I don't."
"Tell me about a time you decided not to do something, because of them?" It's an honest question, because Lark? Lark never stops what he's doing for other people. Not primarily.
"It was an accident," he starts, moving to light a cigarette. "They were meant to steal a few motorcycles, to smuggle. Only when we opened that crate, we found rifles, pistols, rounds. Bound for Libya. And now it was sitting in one of our warehouses."
Lark snickers. "What gods have you pissed off, Tommy?"
He sips his drink. Then really gulps it down because Tommy's is significantly better than what he'd had an hour ago, and he's a wolf and he's done with self-moderation right now.
"But actually, I guess the god you managed to cozy up to is even better. I have no idea how you escape Libyans and their friends; were they as brutal then as they are now?"
"I'm fairly sure I've pissed off all of them at this point," he points out, faintly amused.
"It never got to that point. You see, I was going to sell these guns to the highest bidder, get a good profit, invest in the business. Only then both the IRA and the British police got involved."
He groans, nods. "So you potentially had two customers plus the cops, only the Libyans were likely out of reach, and the IRA were probably eager to take the guns off of you for free? And the cops, of course, will give you nothing for them except possibly a free visit to a prison."
"Ah, and the IRA would leave me with a lovely parting shot," he continues, shrugging.
"No-- I was going to find other parties. No one could prove that we had them, there was nothing saying it. But then this copper came 'round: Inspector Campbell of Belfast. And he-- he hated me, and he hated my family, and he hated communists. And as luck would have it, or Campbell's luck anyway, my sister was in love with a communist.
She wanted to be with him. She ran when I told him she couldn't," because he's a fool, and he knows that now. "And Campbell told me that if I gave him those guns, he would no longer go hunting for my sister and her lover."
He sits back again, exhales, and knocks back his drink. "So I promised him. I promised him those guns, so that my sister might elope with the commie fuck I used to call a friend."
Of course, nothing worked out like that. But that was the plan.
Lark offers his glass for a refill. "...Somehow I can't see a cop of any persuasion giving up on a grudge just because you promised him what he wanted."
The only member of Tommy's family who Lark has a clear picture of is Arthur, and for various reasons Lark avoids ever asking about him. The sister, he can't picture at all. Is her hair like Tommy's? Her eyes?
"We're spending far too much time together if you can read me that well," Lark grins, which is how he admits that Tommy's right. "I was just wondering about your sister. I know about Polly, your brothers, Grace...but you don't mention your sister as often."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cw: vague mention of child abuse
It's as casually said as if he were assuring Tommy that rain falls in his world, too.
cw: vague mention of child abuse
"So you don't think you've been happy."
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"No. Not really. There have been fleeting moments, but they're easy to forget." He shrugs. Lark has made himself forget most of them. "But I am here sometimes. Not all the time, you'd have to be a complete idiot to be happy more than one day a week. But it's more than I can remember being happy my whole life as a human."
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It's important. It is- to someone like Lark, who is so intrinsically against everything that the Barge stands for, who thought he'd never graduate... it sounds like he might have at least some chance, now. It's important, but Tommy tries not to get too excited just yet.
"What does that mean to you, then? That you attained that here?"
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"So will you go back to the way you'd been at home, because you feel you have to? Or will you just be a different example for your pack?"
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Gone. For good.
"So what does that leave me with?"
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"Adaptation." Which is hard. Incredibly hard- Lark must know it's the only way Tommy has been able to survive, to thrive, and he knows the toll it's taken on him.
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Lark goes after revenge hard, he savors it. He enjoys it. Tommy has been willing to let things go that Lark later went in and avenged for him, so that has to be significant. And Tommy gets attached (to brothers, to his aunt, to Grace, to Rey now) far more easily than Lark gets attached to anyone; and maybe that's all it takes: to open yourself a fraction more than Lark knows how.
Or maybe Tommy's family is just easier to love than Lark's. (Part of him doubts that; Lark's family was dull and semi-rural, and predictable in their bad moods; Tommy's seems like chaos under one roof). Maybe it doesn't matter. (This is the loop Lark is always stuck in when he thinks of Tommy, when he gets close to breaking out of old thoughts.)
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"There were always other people calling the shots, in my war. We would fight tooth and nail, we would lose men, and when were were exhausted, when we were almost there, there'd be some orders to leave. To pull out. And I got so bloody angry the first few times- what the fuck did we die for, then? There are boys now serving as fertilizer for the great country of France, who should have waited two hours- just two hours to die, and they might have been here now.
But there's no fighting orders. A strategy doesn't work, you might lose a few men, you might think back on how the initial strategy should have worked-- but in the end, you have to listen to orders. And you make the best of the next strategy."
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Which is why even Tati hadn't been able to hold Lark steady.
"Blue says- said. He said he stayed for the other men but I don't know if I could."
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Which is, in the end, why he's a warden.
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He can't quite remember- it's not a story he tells often, and he's told Lark quite a lot, but he's not sure.
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And Lark hadn't asked because, at the time, they'd been quietly sharing details about Lisbeth and Grace.
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He sips his drink. Then really gulps it down because Tommy's is significantly better than what he'd had an hour ago, and he's a wolf and he's done with self-moderation right now.
"But actually, I guess the god you managed to cozy up to is even better. I have no idea how you escape Libyans and their friends; were they as brutal then as they are now?"
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"It never got to that point. You see, I was going to sell these guns to the highest bidder, get a good profit, invest in the business. Only then both the IRA and the British police got involved."
You can surely see his dilemma.
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"No-- I was going to find other parties. No one could prove that we had them, there was nothing saying it. But then this copper came 'round: Inspector Campbell of Belfast. And he-- he hated me, and he hated my family, and he hated communists. And as luck would have it, or Campbell's luck anyway, my sister was in love with a communist.
She wanted to be with him. She ran when I told him she couldn't," because he's a fool, and he knows that now. "And Campbell told me that if I gave him those guns, he would no longer go hunting for my sister and her lover."
He sits back again, exhales, and knocks back his drink. "So I promised him. I promised him those guns, so that my sister might elope with the commie fuck I used to call a friend."
Of course, nothing worked out like that. But that was the plan.
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The only member of Tommy's family who Lark has a clear picture of is Arthur, and for various reasons Lark avoids ever asking about him. The sister, he can't picture at all. Is her hair like Tommy's? Her eyes?
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"You look like you want to ask something else."
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(no subject)