Benches (Cobalt)

Cobalt hadn’t ever really fed the ducks before. At least, he had never bought bread and went to the lake with that specific purpose. He’d been to the lake before, when he was younger, and if the ducks looked sad enough, he would share his food with them. Sometimes, he would talk to them.

But Josh didn’t need to know any of that.

Speaking of Josh, Cobalt had been worried about him. He had been distant lately, to everyone. And while that was par for the course with, say, Cobalt, Josh was a social being. And he’d been retreating from everyone. Riley hadn’t heard from him in ages, since after that stupid barbeque, and Cobalt hadn’t either. It made him anxious, probably more than was necessary. It wasn’t as though he’d been very “there” either. His sleep had been restless of late, full of the regular, disturbing dreams and the sound of crunching leaves. It was irritating, and he couldn’t quite remember why.

But, like Josh, he was completely willing to let things go back to normal, and so, upon getting Josh’s invite, found some bread that had gone stale and made his way to the lake.

He waved back when Josh greeted him, “Hey Josh. Yeah, I’m sure they’ll appreciate the food.” And, as if to prove his point, several mallards caught sight of Josh’s bread bag that he had waved about and hopped out of the water and waddled towards them.

“So how’ve you been keeping?” Cobalt asked carefully, giving Josh a sidelong glance before untwisting his bag and ripping off a piece of bread, tossing it to the nearest duck. He wasn’t going to push, but he felt as though he should at least ask.

Cobalt huffed out a little laugh as the ducks edged towards him, torn between their caution towards the larger humans and their desire for more tasty bread. Taking pity on them, Cobalt tossed a few pieces of bread at the more cautious of the ducks, rewarding them for their prudence.

He eyed Josh cautiously as the older man aggressively tossed bread at the hapless ducks. Cobalt didn’t think it would be a good idea to press, so he said nothing. He almost, almost said something snide and judgmental about the other man’s comment about Occupy Pilot Ridge. Cobalt had certain opinions about how well he thought something like that would work, especially in a place like Pilot Ridge. However, Josh really wasn’t fine, and Cobalt wasn’t really interested in making things worse for the other man. Instead, he said, “…Oh. Imagine that.”

Cobalt trained a look at him, frowning slightly, “Operation Patriot? Is that what that thing is called? Huh. What are they all about, then?” He hadn’t heard a lot about them, but if Josh was going to protest them, he must know more about them.

“I heard about her,” Cobalt commented, his brow creased in concern, “Ben called me. I’m worried about her too.”

He would have commented further, but then Josh commented about his gun. Cobalt stopped, letting the piece of bread slide through his fingers. He tried to remember how Josh could have possibly known about that—

Oh. That’s right.

He turned to raise an eyebrow at his friend, “Yeah. I do. Um.” He wanted to ask what of it, but he thought that sounded awfully combatitive. So instead, he settled on, “Is that...a problem?" He didn't see why it would be, but it sounded like a thing Josh was objecting to.

“What?” Cobalt blinked in disbelief, “That’s absurd. There’s no way that’s gonna fly with the administration.” Of that, Cobalt was absolutely sure. There was no way any of Hammel’s faculty would let that happen.

Josh’s comment about the guns pulled his attention away from the disturbing news about Operation Patriot. He listened to his friend talk about violence and guns and being the better person without comment. Instinctually, he was angry, defensive and unsure how exactly someone could be so stupid and blind to how everything worked. To how the world worked, how people worked. And instinctually, his mind was already supplying him with comments to launch at the older man, delineating just how wrong he actually was.

But he didn’t. Because as Josh talked, he was reminded that the other attorney had different life experiences than he did, saw everything so much differently than he ever could. And that just because Josh was unaware of how some thing worked didn’t mean that he deserved to get yelled at for his beliefs.

Cobalt wouldn’t have thought about that ten years ago. He wasn’t even sure he would have considered that a valid excuse one year ago.

“Well,” Cobalt sighed, pushing up his glasses briefly to rub at his eyes with his forefinger and thumb, “You know me well enough by now to know that I’m not in the practice of apologizing for things, so I’m not going to apologize for any of my actions that day. Additionally, I’m not going too apologize for carrying a firearm, and I am going to assume you don’t expect me to.” He figured this might not be true, but hopefully that would at least truncate some of the argument.

“I don’t like violence,” Cobalt continued, tossing another scrap of bread to the ducks; he didn’t know why he hadn’t done this before. It was soothing, “And I think that in a perfect world, there would be no reason for it, and we would be out of a job and I would be happy.” He looked up at Josh seriously, “But the fact of the matter is, this isn’t a perfect world, and there are rules to follow.”

“It helps to see violence as… a language,” Cobalt said after a moment, shuffling and reshuffling his thoughts, “It’s a way to communicate, and it’s a give and take of dominance and it’s the most unpleasant form of communication human beings can conceive of. But it’s a language. And there are some people who can’t speak any other language. And for them, there’s no compromise, they don’t understand, and if you don’t speak their language, you’re dead.” He paused, letting his words sink in, “I don’t like it, but I prefer to be able to keep myself and the people I care about safe. So I have seen the prudence in learning the language, as it were. And I’m not so proud as to think that any nonviolent actions of mine will sway anyone one way or another, when push comes to shove. I’m just one man.” He shrugged, letting Josh know that he wasn’t going to apologize for his views.

Cobalt tilted his head, not looking up from the ducks that were entreating for his attention and thus not catching Josh’s expression, “True. But if I don’t speak it at all, then I’m probably going to get hurt. Or someone I care about. And all things considered, I am willing to be, as you say, a worse person, if that means that the people I care about are safe.” He shrugged slightly. It wasn’t a perfect system, and perhaps he was being too callous about it, but it was how he processed it. He didn’t tell Josh about having nightmares, or periods of terror or depression or awful, awful anger that usually followed the times that he actually had to follow his own philosophy. Josh didn’t need to know that.

But when Josh continued speaking, Cobalt caught the change in voice, and turned towards him, his brow furrowed in concern. When it occurred to him that Josh was about ready to cry, Cobalt felt a little appalled at himself. Goddammit, he was trying to be sensitive about this. And this was what he got.

“Because there are some people who don’t care about other people.” Cobalt replied quietly, “Because there are some people who don’t know how to do anything else but hurt people. There are a thousand reasons that people do things like that to one another, and none of them are really simple. And I did what I did because I had to make a split second decision, and I understood that if I didn’t do what I did, then something terrible could have happened.”

Cobalt paused. “If it…makes you feel better, I didn’t shoot to actually hit them,” He offered hesitantly, because he really could have hit them. And he didn’t, “I didn’t want to hit them. I just needed to get their attention. Make them stop.” He wasn’t going to apologize for that. Because Josh was alive, and if Cobalt had to be a worse person in his friend’s eyes to achieve that, then fine.

Josh was actually crying at this point, and his plaintive words tugged at Cobalt’s heart and Cobalt didn’t know what he should do. Because he had had these questions as well, but had contented himself with never having them answered when he was fourteen. And it still hurt sometimes, but he wasn’t fourteen anymore, and he had to make difficult decisions. And he felt guilty every single time, but he had to live with that.

“Because that’s people, Josh.” Cobalt said, his voice harsh with his own emotions, his chest hurting, “Because there are people who want to hurt you or someone you care about, and you have to figure out what you wanna do about it. And some people don’t even want to. Sometimes, shit just happens, I don’t know.”

Cobalt turned slightly hurt eyes at Josh, “It’s not like I enjoy it. But I accept the consequences to my actions. Where is this all even coming from?” This all seemed out of nowhere, and Cobalt was scrambling, trying to figure out what brought this on.

“Yeah well.” Cobalt said gruffly, “I’ve never killed anyone before, and I’d like to keep it that way.” He crossed his arms protectively over his chest and forced himself to calm the hell down.

When Josh expressed gratitude, Cobalt turned fully and nodded slightly, reaching out with a hesitant hand, squeezing his friend’s shoulder briefly before dropping it. “I’m glad I was too,” He said quietly, “You’re my friend. I’d…prefer you to be safe.” He grimaced inwardly. This was hard, and he sounded stupid.

At Josh’s answer, Cobalt nodded in understanding. “It happens,” He said, busying himself with his own bag of bread, trying to untie his tongue, “Just… I’m sure you and Sean already talked about this. But um. Whatever way you choose to deal with it is valid. Getting attacked like that is…scary,” For lack of better word, “And…however long it takes to come to terms or whatever is…there’s no right amount of time. So.” He shrugged, frustrated with his inability to be comforting, or encouraging, or a thousand things he would like to be, but couldn’t seem to manage. He wanted to tell Josh that he understood because he had been there, and that Josh didn’t have to feel embarrassed or like he was being weak or vulnerable. But the words couldn’t form because it was hard and this wasn’t about Cobalt, and he didn’t know if he could say them right anyways.

So, he opted to give Josh a brief returning smile before shrugging awkwardly and turning back to the ducks, tossing another piece of bread to them.

“You know, I’ve never actually done this?” Cobalt grinned a little wider as the ducks waddled about near his feet, entreating him for another piece of bread, “Fed the ducks? It’s a little fun.”