YOU Get A Big Banana, and YOU Get A Big Banana, and YOU Get A Big Banana! [closed post]

[summerdude]

"Okay, just another minute," Magnus says.

It's a hot day out, so holding Galahad's hand is a sweaty affair... and Magnus's current use of his alf seidr isn't making matters any more comfortable. The grass is tickling at Magnus's back -- his shirt has ridden up while he lies, spread-eagle, in the middle of the lawn. Galahad is always so smart about his clothes, Magnus bets he's not getting the grass itches at all.

But he can put all that aside. Grass tickles are good tickles, and the heat of the sun is -- to Magnus -- always more refreshing than it is annoying. There's a trickle of sweat at the side of his neck, but even though it's hot out it's not really a temperature extreme, so as usual he feels regular about it.

All his attention is on the plants around them. Feverfew and milkweed, black-eyed susan and queen anne's lace, aster and boneset and flowering spurge and yarrow and tickseed and teasel and wild thyme and forget-me-nots and poppies and and and -- well. He's not sure what else is in the mix. He's been trying to get better at plant identification with Claudius's guidance, but the package he found earlier that morning only said FIELD SEEDS. He's doing his best! Right now, his 'best' is less focused on identification and more focused on growing them to flower, high enough that some of them are providing shade to both him and Galahad, in a very neat outline of the grass they've politely crushed between the two of them.

Eventually, he's done all he can without overtaxing the plants. "There," he tells Galahad. "Summer snow angels, check."

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[summerdude]

"And D of all," Magnus says triumphantly, "nuns! Don't they literally fantasize about being married to--" he clocks the cast to Galahad's eyes and cocks his head. "I'm way off base, huh," he guesses.

[onthewillowsthere]

"Nuns don't fantasize. They are spiritually married to Christ," Galahad says, once again unable to stop himself from making sure Magnus has the accurate information. And then, "Percival is faithful. Without proof. He is good -- he's always good. God should have chosen him, not me. That's what I thought before. But now I don't want God to choose him either. I want him to have what he deserves. Everything."

[summerdude]

"Okay, so what I'm not getting is why you being into him is bad, though," Magnus says. "Because to me that's internalized homophobia vibes, and I don't like it. Like he can be perfect and good, obviously, but wouldn't that just make it even more reasonable for you to be into him?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"What is internalized homophobia?" he asks.

[summerdude]

"It's when someone who's gay -- or bi, or queer, I guess -- thinks that being gay is wrong. And it makes them feel really bad about themselves. Homophobia directed at yourself."

[onthewillowsthere]

"No," decisively, relieved to have something clear-cut to reply. "It isn't that."

[summerdude]

Magnus, visibly enormously relieved -- and completely believing Galahad, since he never lies -- scratches his head. "So it's more about the sex than the gender?" he guesses.

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad rubs at his watchband. "When I met Claudius here and asked Crowley to take my memory, it wasn't because he was a man. It was because he asked to kiss me. It was the first time I wanted someone I could have had."

[summerdude]

"So it's about sex in relation to the flesh prison?" Magnus says, and then shakes his head, and says, "I think I mean 'desire' by that?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"My desire is sinful. But Claudius wants it. He is like me. We can choose together." His brows draw together ever so slightly as he looks at Magnus.

[summerdude]

"Okay, so why is it bad for Percival if he doesn't have to, like, engage with it if he doesn't want to?"

[onthewillowsthere]

Galahad presses his lips together. It's bad because Percival is precious. It's bad because he chooses the holy things he wants to debase, but he doesn't want to debase Percival, to let his own desires corrupt someone who is good -- the most good person Galahad has ever met. Percival wouldn't want him; Percival wouldn't choose this.

But the words won't quite get past his lips, so instead he just watches Magnus, in silence.

[summerdude]

I'm sorry I keep harping on this. I'm just trying to understand.

[onthewillowsthere]

Finally he signs, Afraid if he knew he would not still choose me.

[summerdude]

Obviously Magnus doesn't know Percival, but from every single story Galahad has told him about the guy, he can't imagine that being the case.

Still, he bundles Galahad into another sideways hug. "I can't imagine anyone calling takesies-backsies on choosing you," he says. "Like, he might not feel about you the way you feel about him but that wouldn't mean you couldn't be friends, right?"

[onthewillowsthere]

This is simpler territory, with a simpler answer -- Galahad can imagine someone calling takesies-backsies on him easily, after Camelot, but Magnus' insistence on their unshakeable friendship is always reassuring. "I don't know. I have never told him."

[summerdude]

"And your feelings about him wouldn't hurt him."

[onthewillowsthere]

"You cannot know that."

[summerdude]

No, Magnus can't, but he can't shake his conviction he's right anyway. "I don't know it, but I believe it," he tells Galahad, and then -- as a peace offering, since he's pretty sure Galahad didn't mean for the conversation to move in this direction, like, at all, he says, "So about his mouth. There's, like -- the sides of it make it look like even if he's not smiling in the moment, his mouth is built for it." He gestures to the corners of his own lips, trying to convey the shape of the vibe.

[onthewillowsthere]

Even though he can't picture it in his mind's eye, it feels right. "Yes," Galahad says. "He's-- warm."

[summerdude]

"Yeah," enthuses Magnus. Even though Galahad's memories were from Galahad's perspective, he can picture it: Percival's sun to Galahad's moon in, like, every possible sense. Percival's ruddy complexion and red-gold hair, his easy enthusiasm and steady, unwavering bright faith; Galahad's slight pale face and solemnity, his own faith tidally locked to god's stupid-ass meddling and involvement. (By process of elimination, in this mental image, Magnus assumes, the christian god must be like the earth: benefiting from Percival's warmth; depending on Galahad's attention, involved in life but certainly not the center of anything cosmic.)

It also helps him understand Galahad's earlier point a little bit better. The moon loves the sun, obviously, but that love can be occluded by the earth. It gets in the way, it muddies that clarity. ...Magnus's metaphor might be getting away from him, but he does resolve to get good enough at fighting that if the christian god ever shows up here, he can successfully defeat him and/or flyte him into a walnut shell and maybe feed it to Dro.

He says, "He has a cowlick in his hair, but it's long and floppy enough that it's hard to tell unless you're looking for it."

[onthewillowsthere]

There's a strange ache in Galahad's chest. Every time he thinks he's fully accepted that he won't see Percival again, something happens to make his absence newly painful. He wants to see Percival's dimples, his broad nose, his cowlick. He wants him to meet Magnus and Claudius and everyone who matters here, wants to show him the chapel, wants him to see Drosera and ask a thousand questions about what she eats and where she sleeps and how she's changed from a hatchling to a grown animal.

He misses him so much.

He tries to sketch in the cowlick.

[summerdude]

Magnus watches Galahad for a long moment, the movement of his charcoal on the paper, the way that the barest millimeter of the corner of his mouth tucks in. "What should I describe next?"

[onthewillowsthere]

"Tell me about his eyes." Do they have a halo of dark brown around warm brown, like Claudius? Are they flat and blue like his own? He doesn't remember.

[summerdude]

"Brown," Magnus says immediately. "Middle brown. Lighter than Claudius's, darker than Hanguang-jun's."