If it had been anyone else, being met with an extended silence might have made the pain worse, but Vash's quiet moments were well familiar by now. Part of him, the side of Nicholas that was used to himself showing such outward displays of weakness being met with equally loud displays in response, often with violence, wanted to worry and fuss. The part of him that had learned to read Vash better than he could himself simply sank into the hold, turning his head into his neck and letting the sobs work their way out of his system, knowing on an instinctive level that this, held by this man or the other he'd known longer, was perhaps the only place that was safe to show this side of himself, to seek out that feeling of comfort and protection. No matter how they fought and bickered and snarled at each other, he knew that if he had ever lost control in this way, Vash would never turn it against him.
So by the time he heard him speak again, the strength of his sobbing had finally begun to ebb, leaving behind a dull, foggy ache as he subtly swayed against him, self-soothing and unconscious, staring out muzzily at the disturbed ground in the distance where Vash had recovered the grave.
There was a moment, though brief, when the confirmation that he couldn't take back what he'd done almost made him shut down, where it felt as if Vash were reassuring him that he would help him keep going because what he had done was beyond repair. His face twisted, for less than a blink of an eye, before the words that followed after rolled over him, and he swallowed back another miserable sound, simply nodding weakly to show that he had heard, he was listening.
And then he just sat with the words, muddled his thoughts over in his head, for a long time.
There wasn't an answer to his pleas in what he'd said, no, but...it hadn't really been his question to answer in the first place, had it? Only the other man could ever answer that. And in the back of Nicholas' mind, the part of himself that still felt so much hate for the person he had become sneered, reminding him that Vash had said the other had intended to leave that morning, whether or not the weird slips in reality had sent him somewhere else while they slept or not. He had pushed him away, he'd broken the only good thing he'd had in his entire adult life, that was his fault.
Maybe it was because he was simply too exhausted to let the little voice take a proper hold the way it normally could, he wasn't sure, but at least for the time being, he was able to let the voice have its say and then move along, unheeded, leaving behind it simply a general, vague feeling of malaise.
"I don't...do this, you know. The whole...people. Thing. Not like you can. People like you when they're not bein' assholes. I can...pretend, for a while. But the only way I really know how to behave is with a gun." It was a miracle he'd made it as long as he had, without either of them sending him packing. The only thing he knew how to do was break shit.
"I am so...Fucked up." His voice dropped, hissing out the last words on a whispered snarl. He was so broken. He knew he was broken, had for a very, very long time. There'd been a time when he'd just accepted it, and let that bitterness effect the way he treated everyone else around him. Now, it just reinforced how wrong he was.
Yeah, no, they really are perfectly matched in the best and worst ways possible.
So by the time he heard him speak again, the strength of his sobbing had finally begun to ebb, leaving behind a dull, foggy ache as he subtly swayed against him, self-soothing and unconscious, staring out muzzily at the disturbed ground in the distance where Vash had recovered the grave.
There was a moment, though brief, when the confirmation that he couldn't take back what he'd done almost made him shut down, where it felt as if Vash were reassuring him that he would help him keep going because what he had done was beyond repair. His face twisted, for less than a blink of an eye, before the words that followed after rolled over him, and he swallowed back another miserable sound, simply nodding weakly to show that he had heard, he was listening.
And then he just sat with the words, muddled his thoughts over in his head, for a long time.
There wasn't an answer to his pleas in what he'd said, no, but...it hadn't really been his question to answer in the first place, had it? Only the other man could ever answer that. And in the back of Nicholas' mind, the part of himself that still felt so much hate for the person he had become sneered, reminding him that Vash had said the other had intended to leave that morning, whether or not the weird slips in reality had sent him somewhere else while they slept or not. He had pushed him away, he'd broken the only good thing he'd had in his entire adult life, that was his fault.
Maybe it was because he was simply too exhausted to let the little voice take a proper hold the way it normally could, he wasn't sure, but at least for the time being, he was able to let the voice have its say and then move along, unheeded, leaving behind it simply a general, vague feeling of malaise.
"I don't...do this, you know. The whole...people. Thing. Not like you can. People like you when they're not bein' assholes. I can...pretend, for a while. But the only way I really know how to behave is with a gun." It was a miracle he'd made it as long as he had, without either of them sending him packing. The only thing he knew how to do was break shit.
"I am so...Fucked up." His voice dropped, hissing out the last words on a whispered snarl. He was so broken. He knew he was broken, had for a very, very long time. There'd been a time when he'd just accepted it, and let that bitterness effect the way he treated everyone else around him. Now, it just reinforced how wrong he was.