Random Vampire stuff 1

Really, really bored thought I'd post the random story I made for my ocs Claude and Jake. It's about the only thing I have written that isn't fanfiction (lol). I like writing, it does something for me. This is really disjointed and is based on, like, the idea there's already pre-existing information to the reader so sorry if it's really weird. (There's nothing pre-written, I have adhd and I feel like its easier to write things randomly and try and fit them in later on like puzzle pieces.) Be nice if you have criticisms I guess?? Mainly this is for fun and my own little ego.

It's weird to see Claude on his hands and knees digging through the forest dirt like a carefree happy child. His clothes, always so meticulously clean and white, are getting stained. Jake thinks if it was anyone else besides Claude he would've found the act endearing, but he finds it heartbreaking. Forever trapped at eighteen. It sounds like a nightmare. No, it is a nightmare Jake corrects quickly to himself. His teen years had been horrible — raging hormones and angst. He can't imagine being stuck at that specific age for the rest of… well, however long the world goes on. But Claude looks so happy right now, exhilarated in a way Jake doesn't see often. He thinks if he imagines hard enough he'll be able to see a red, healthy flush of excitement on his friend's face. But Claude's complexion remains the same, as the way it has for hundreds of years surely, pale — near ivory-like. Like a marble statue, hauntingly beautiful beyond humanity.

"Ah, look at this one, Jacob," Claude says, his voice light, full of awe and wonder. In his cupped palm, there is a rough, jagged stone the color of ash. He flips it over delicately, showing Jake the impression of leaves on the other side. They're small, nearly less than an inch long. It's not entirely impressive as far as fossils go but Jake knows Claude will treasure it like a precious gem regardless — the guy is crazy about fossils, he has an entire hoard back at the estate. 

He can't help but think snidely, Claude Holt and his lonely estate, twelve rooms filled with useless knick-knacks and pretty things. 

For a while they just sit there, Claude on his knees in the dirt, fingers running over the rough edge of the fossil and Jake just watching him. The silence is nice until Claude looks back up at Jake with those great big honey eyes of his.

"Very pretty." Jake finally settles on, realizing he should've commented earlier.

Claude, predictably, rolls his eyes. 

"Pretty," the vampire scoffs, looking more and more like the eternally trapped youth he is than the ethereal immortal he's become. "You're ridiculous. It's magnificent, fool!"

Jake laughs at that.

Fool, Claude who always looks so young always sounds so old. Like a gentle old uncle.

"Hey, man, you know I'm not really into this stuff — what do you want me to say? Besides, you have cooler ones back at your hideout."

Claude's nose wrinkles predictably, puffing up indignantly in defense of his fossils. 

"Granted, I do have grander ones at home," Claude says, tone sharp and all pure aristocracy now. "But all these are amazing in their own right. They need the right conditions to be formed — to be made, preserved. They are rare glimpses into the past and should be considered with respect."

Ah. So Jake had accidentally stepped on some kind of landmine there.

"Bud, you know I'm not making fun of your fossils… right?"

And there Claude goes, shifting back into his teenage self, all insecurity and hunched shoulders. Jake will never understand why Claude is the way he is — partly because he's so fucking secretive and stubborn. You won't be winning any battles of the will against someone who's immortal. Jake's tried for years to pry out any useful information and the rare stuff he has to go on just leads to barely even there assumptions. He just knows someone had taken Claude's being and stomped all over it, squashing whatever self-confidence he had had at the beginning. If there was any, at the least.

"Look," Jake starts again, tone considerably softer. "Fossils; they're amazing in the same capacity as they were to me as a kid." Jake reaches out slowly, fingers taking the old stone from Claude's lax grasp. Their fingers brush and Jake resists the urge to take Claude's cool, dirty hand in his. He examines the little fossil closely now, wishing he could see the same kind of value Claude has for these things but he feels nothing but a faint acknowledgment of hey, that's pretty cool.

"They're old — ancient, dinosaurs and shit. Who wouldn't be impressed by something like that?"

He returns the fossil to Claude, who's looking less like a sad puppy and more so stoic sculpture, a mask firmly fixed in place. 

"But, there's just other things that capture my attention more."

Like you, goes unsaid between them both. Jake cares about Claude so much and he's not entirely sure in what capacity — a bratty cousin? A could've been lover if Claude wasn't immortal and always young and Jake mortal and always getting older? He's scared to acknowledge it. 

Jake hurries on, quick to move on from that particular plaguing thought.

"They're just fossils. They don't change. They don't do anything for me."

“But they’re like me,” Claude says, voice somber and so full of hurt. “I don’t change. I’m... old. We’re alike.”

Jake closes his eyes at that, thoughts swirling inside of his head as he tries to find something to say. What can he say? Sorry for accidentally hurting your feelings when I didn’t know you were comparing literal fossils to yourself? 

Claude’s confession turns his stomach something awful and it’s taking everything within him not to be visibly upset. The image of Claude, encased in stone for all eternity comes to mind. What kind of life is this? Does Claude see a piece of himself within every fossil? Does he relive the past, hurting and wanting?

Jake exhales shakily, thinking to himself not for the first time this is really above my pay grade.

“Help me understand,” he says eventually. “I know you don’t like to talk about it. The beginning. Any of it, really. But I can’t understand what I don’t know.”

Claude’s sad expression fades just the tiniest bit, replaced by consideration. He worries at his bottom lip, turning the stone over and over in his gentle grasp, thumbs running along the rough edge of the fossil. “Okay.”