boldygoing | [IC] Voicemail

"No. It doesn't make it less useful." Hunter continues to use the gold lacquer to reconnect the broken pieces of what used to be a pottery bowl. Jim can see that it is slowly becoming a bowl once again. Just with the cracks highlighted, instead of hidden.

"The practice is related to the Japanese philosophy of wabi-sabi, which calls for seeing beauty in the flawed or imperfect. The repair method was also born from the Japanese feeling of mottainai, which expresses regret when something is wasted, as well as mushin, the acceptance of change."

"Our lives take us down many different paths. It is import to remember that we can adapt and change. And even during times when we feel broken... that we are only closer to finding our true identity." Hunter looks up to meet Jim's eyes with his own. "We become stronger because of the breakage. We find a way to overcome."

Jim is a guy who can appreciate subtlety and metaphor, even if he's not exactly the best person to actually use it himself. Hunter's gift to him today may be a little on the nose, but... the kindness at the heart of the gesture is honest, and he couldn't turn it away, even if he wanted to.

There are a half dozen jokes he could crack to break the strangeness of the moment, but it doesn't seem right to deflect, not again, not when it would do nothing but take away from the thoughtfulness that Hunter has put into all of this. "You've done a lot of research on this," he says instead, watching the bowl take shape in their hands, its sharp broken edges covered up by the gold lacquer holding the pieces together.

"I have." Hunter smiles. He had put a lot of thought into each of the gifts, and the origami animals that accompanied the notes.

"But there is a little selfishness here... I can do this one-handed." He smiles.

There are another few pieces laying nearby, if Jim wants to start his own project.

Jim is quiet a moment, not sure how to respond, old habits and newer impulses conflicting within him. He's spent a long time trying to fix himself alone. By necessity, by choice, it doesn't really matter. He'd thought he was dealing with it all okay, enough to keep going, enough to bury it all as deep as he could and never look at it again. Halloween proved him wrong.

Talking to his older counterpart had helped, secrets shared with the one person he feels he can truly trust with anything, their differences only casting greater clarity on what he'd done and seen and felt, a shared pain with the only one who would truly understand.

But now even the other captain has gone silent. And Jim has missed being around other people, people who know him and don't want to drive the knife deeper, like so many strangers do this time of year. People who care about James Tiberius Kirk, not the Kelvin baby, not George Kirk's son. Someone who has seen the brokenness inside of him and, instead of sweeping away the pieces, wants to find a way to fit them together again. Not exactly as it was before, scarred and patchwork, forever marked by the shattering, but whole.

"You can do it alone," he says at last, lifting his gaze to meet Hunter's, "but you shouldn't have to."

Edited 2017-12-29 13:49 (UTC)

Hunter nods. And pauses in his work to reach out to Jim and gently squeeze the other man's hand. "That is why I am glad I have support from my friends, and from you."

"I would have never been able to repair the apartment, like you guys did. You all took what was broken and made it beautiful again."

Jim's smile is faint, but real, and he squeezes Hunter's hand back. "It was a group effort." Home should always feel like a safe place. He knows, far too intimately, how it feels to have someone rip that away. But as the Enterprise has been slowly rebuilt and refitted under the watchful eye of Starfleet's Corps of Engineers, Jim wanted Hunter's apartment to experience that same kind of healing, creating something new from the ashes of what was destroyed.

After a moment, he adds, "There's a famous novel from the twenty-second century that revolves around the phrase 'let me help.' The author recommends those three little words, even over 'I love you.'"

"I was honestly afraid of coming back to this place... especially coming back alone. But you all helped me face my fears." Hunter reveals.

Hunter smiles, giving Jim's hand another squeeze. "I am so grateful for your help."

Jim holds Hunter's hand in his own, just glad to have this contact, no matter what horrible shit this year has put them through, together and separately. "It's all I want." Whatever he can do to help, whether it's as big as fixing up the apartment, or as small as helping put pottery back together, one piece at a time.

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