everything was off. it was like the lense of a camera that had too many smudges. he forgot what was up and down.
his head was trapped in a wonderland, a delightfully twisted dreamscape masquerading as reality. he danced between reality and delusion and it often seemed to all be delusion.
it was probably the benzos that keep his smile too wide and too dark. his mind conjured up all sorts of things, stuck in a world of nightmares with his favorite friends.
right now the world was blurry, but it was also pretty shades of red and yellow and black. faceless people laughing and the smell of carnival food. it was just how he liked it, just blurry enough to forget his purpose but lucid enough to enjoy his personal playground.
he summoned dreams from thin air and sent them off. twisted glee and fear together in hopes that someone would understand, would relate to his too full, too empty head.
this particular night, he tempted a dreamer who he would soon come to understand.
the doctor showed up several hours later. all pretty and yellow in just the right way, he instantly seemed to be the realest dream in a land of night.
drawn like a moth to a lamp, he introduced himself to the newcomer and learned that he had been tempted to join the carnival by some of the most particular dreams. dark and twisted, they seemed achingly familiar and endlessly happy-sad.
he was inappropriately delighted by this news and asked if the doctor would join him in his rounds around the bustling carnival. they walked side-by-side all throughout the endless twilight and visited every too-cheery attraction. by the end of the encounter, he was enamored. the doctor made sense of his cheshire grin and his cyrptic words. the doctor's lightness perfectly contrasted his darkness and he never wanted to let go.
so he did something he had never considered before, and asked the doctor to stay. no one stayed in the hours that the carnival closed, where things where too empty and quiet, but he felt like the doctor could make sense of the dark spaces in between dreams.
the doctor declined but promised to come to the next carnival.
so that's how it was. each cheery twilight the doctor would return and make more and more sense of his mind. the doctor's stays grew longer and longer but never lasted too long after the carnival's closing.
soon enough he couldn't bear to be away from the doctor anymore. he begged the doctor to stay, said he wouldn't last without him. but the doctor refused every offer, stating that he wasn't allowed, according to the carnival's rules.
he devised a plan to get the doctor to finally become his. one carnival, they were in an especially great mood. the colors were especially bright and the dreams were sweet and lovely. they were crowded on the ferris wheel and the moment felt right. so he did what he knew would work and leaned towards the other man.
"i'm in love with my own sins," he purred, capturing the doctor's plush lips with his own.
the world burst in that moment. saccharine sweet yellows and reds melted away and all that was left was the dull pounding of something more real than everything before. the world had stopped just being half-imagined dreams and become something out of his or the doctor's control.
it was midnight near lake michigan and the world was quiet and peaceful, only interrupted by the sounds of two boys seemed to break it. the two were inseparably tangled together and curiously enough, one was named pete and the other patrick.
"i've let my love loose again" was the only phrase that could be heard between the two lover's mouths.