[SB] A Dark Cloud On A Sunny Day

[Artemis James]

Artemis still was finding it so odd that a guy like Franck, good natured and kind hearted, was dating Jasper, a guy who clearly cared little for his personal feelings. At least, that was how it appeared to Artemis.
He felt a touch awkward towards the guy after he admitted the kiss that had happened between him and Franck's boyfriend, despite it being all one sided; His next comment however caused Artemis to blink rapidly at the other boy, raising an eyebrow before flinching slightly when he realised what he was implying. They had an agreement? So, an open relationship? Well, at least that made him feel a touch less awkward, but it didn't change his thoughts towards Jasper being insensitive towards his partner. Artemis however was quite happy not to further discuss it, and was thankful when Franck spoke no more on the subject.

As the French boy began to quickly explain his reasons for what he'd said, Artemis listened, giving Franck a chance to explain his standpoint; Although he still did not agree. Perhaps he was sugarcoating the actions of the twins, since he was involved with one of them? When people had feelings for another, they often disregarded most of their bad points, which Artemis understood. It was almost endearing how he was defending to a degree his partner.
"Didn't fall on deaf ears? Well you could have fooled me," Artemis replied sadly with a shrug of his shoulders; The twins had made no hint towards considering leaving Lucy alone, and from what he could deduce from the time frame of Lucy's texts, had pretty much gone straight to her after their confrontation. "They didn't seem to show any consideration, at all. In fact I suspect Casper pretty much went straight after her after I asked him not to."
Artemis again found himself shaking his head slowly to Franck's next comments, a small smile adorning his lips. He took a deep breath, before blowing out the air in an exasperated manner. "... Being curious about how far you can push people, making them feel uncomfortable or seeing what'll upset them is just another form of bullying," Artemis commented in response. "I mean, maybe it doesn't bother you as much as it bothers others, maybe you're thicker skinned. But at the end of the day, they know exactly what they're doing. They rile people up on purpose, upset them, just to see what they'll do. Taking pleasure from the pain or upset of others is, well to me anyway, kinda sadistic." He then trailed off, realising that Franck wasn't going to see it his way, and that talking like this about people he cared for was just going to upset him, and that was the last thing Artemis wanted.

He quickly shook his head at Franck's suggestion, offering him a warm smile and a wave of his hands. "Nah, it's okay. I appreciate the thought, but I don't think it'll do much," He replied. "Thanks, though. It means a lot that you'd do that."

[François Laffont]

Franck obviously didn’t like what Artemis was saying. It was always hard to hear that someone you knew was a bully, especially when the person who talked had a point. What they did to Artemis... the twins needed to learn when they were going too far. He also didn’t like admitting it was an open relationship. It probably explained why he didn’t talk a lot about his relationship with Jasper to begin with. The Dirty Laundry loved to talk of it, but nobody cared what the Dirty Laundry had to say. Everything about Franck seemed to scream good guy and so called for a steady and serious relationship. Two words you wouldn’t used to describe whatever Jasper may have with people.

“I’m not really surprised,” he admitted as Artemis claimed Casper must have gone straight to his sister after their conversation. He still wanted to defend them but no sound came out as he opened his mouth. In the end, he just sighed. Artemis had an opinion about the twins and it was not anything he could say that would change it. He could argue it was like the opinion he had about his sister, but Franck didn’t want to upset Artemis. It was quite the opposite, in fact.

He looked at the water as Artemis gave his point of view on the twins. As much as he might not like what he heard, he knew those words were not meant to hurt him. “I wouldn’t say that,” he replied, in reference to him being thicker-skinned. Sometimes, he felt like he was very vulnerable. “But I’m an empath. I know how they really feel inside.” He sighed again. It was true that, the way he said it, it made them pretty sadistic. “Maybe I just can’t get mad at them because I don’t get any real desire to inflict pain. Because when they want to, they really can do it.” He turned his gaze on Artemis and forced a smile. “But I get why you feel like this towards them. I’m not asking you to like them anyway. We’ll just... skip this topic whenever we meet again, for both our sake.” Franck thought it was more for his sake, as he didn’t know how much he could take before it hurt him too much.

His smile was still on, not all that genuine but still there. He didn’t want this conversation to demoralize him. He forced it to grow a little wider. “Come on. The trip is nearly over. You need to have at least one good memory of it,” he told him. He wasn’t quite sure what they could do but the cruise ship offered so much entertainment that they would really have to be unlucky not to find something that would put a genuine smile on their face.