MIT: Minors in Trouble Part 1/2
So, does everyone remember I occassionaly write, too? Yes! It's true. OMG you all say, 'I had no idea!' Well. Yes. Ha. It's been a while since I actually posted anything because I have been lacking the actual time to write anything... but the bug has hit me and hit me hard and OMGoodness, I've actually managed to finish a short piece that I have been writing for oh... at least 3 months. -___-
Now see all, this is why I do not NaNo, ok? Roughly 11.8 k words. 3 months. Ya. Not so fast with the writing am I...
Anyhoo. So this little tidbit I shall call:
"MIT: Minors in Trouble"
Note: Part 2 in next Post, here:
http://me-under-glass.livejournal.com/141845.html
It's a working title. :P
Characters: Con & Ty
Rating: A for Angst - brief nude scene (changing), boys non-con kiss, mild violence
Things You Need to Know: Con & Ty used to be boyfriends until Ty 'moved away' with his Mom and Grandparents for 2 years. He came back to be with Con. Con was dating Al. Ty was pissed. Ty and Con had a rather explosive and disastrously violent run-in in their friend's bathroom. For reasons best known to these two, they still talk and occassionally hang out in each other's presence without police involvement. Ty and Con are going on a roadtrip to MIT to check out the campus together.
* * *
"Don't worry..."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh, come on... don't be that way, Con."
Con lifts his throbbing temple from his fingers and turns to face Ty with a scowl, the other boy's icy blue eyes flicking back and forth to him from the road and back again as he drives. "I honestly... don't know what you're talking about," he says, with a tight-lipped smirk as he refuses to talk about it. Still.
"Fuck..." Ty sighs, leaning back into the heated leather seats of his BMW, feeling his muscles tense and his fingers work the supple wheel to get rid of the stress. "Fine, be that way. Not like you make great conversation, anyway..." But he continues to watch him, gaze moving from the road to his old friend every so often as if to make sure he's still there, he's been so quiet. Unusually quiet. But Con just goes back to staring out the window as if he doesn't even notice and Ty is reduced to watching the shadowy reflection of worried green eyes in his tinted passenger window, framed by the familiar shock of bright orange hair - a colour he hadn't seen for years until Con had finally come back from the war, come back home... but nothing else was like it had been... nothing else had gone back to being the same.
The car is strung with quiet tension and he wonders, not for the first time, if things would be any different if he hadn't made such a mess of things when he'd... hurt Con. That had been a mistake, he can admit that, now. It hadn't helped at all. Hadn't made anything better. It hadn't brought him any satisfaction and it sure as hell hadn't made him any happier. But things had been different before that, too. Things had fallen apart long before he'd come back to the city of his birth; back to Con. This silence wasn't all his fault, was it? Con had forgiven him... right? Why the hell else would the boy be here now if he hadn't, sitting in the passenger seat of his BMW... sulking... on the way to check out the MIT student orientation with him. So it must be them... Con's sister, his mother... neither of them had been pleased when they'd found out where their precious Connor was going and who with. No one fucking had. Even his own so-called friends had tried to talk him out of it.
"Hey..." he loosens the grip of his right hand to reach out across the center console, brushing Con's hand where it rests against the boy's leg. The touch is meant to comfort, but he stills as it's snatched away, just a little too fast, and Con shifts, leaning closer to his door on the other side of the car and out of easy reach. The slight tilt of an encouraging smile on his face drops instantly and his eyes go cold as he takes in a deep breath, fighting the tension in his jaw as he draws his own slender fingers back more slowly to curl tight and tense against the wheel once more. And then in a moment, it's back, eyes warming to the tune of a slow, charming smile as he forces his body to relax, "They just don't understand, you know... that's all. You and me... we understand each other, right? They're scared for you... but it's alright. You know that."
His tension drains further from him as Con once again deigns to look at him, clear, bright green eyes sharp, but not angry. "You and me," he starts, the low tenor of his voice careful, "We will never be together again... like we were. You understand that."
The charming smile seems to sink back into his skin as he meets the serious look in the other's eyes, feeling... uneasy with the statement. He nods slowly then tenses as Con himself reaches out to snake a strong hand behind him, fingers curling on the back of his neck in a movement that is both gentle and terribly serious. And still, even to him, against his own constantly burning skin, those hands feel warm.
"And you will regret it, if you ever try what you did... again. I promise you... you understand?" Con waits for Ty to nod, holding his still gaze with his for a long moment despite the hurtling speed of the car, watching the understanding sink into sharp features, and then nods in turn and briefly slips his fingers up over the feel of short-cut, near-colourless, and softly bristly hair before trailing his thumb for an instant over the smooth pale skin of the boy's cheek and taking it back, turning to look out the front windshield this time and sink comfortably back into his seat. His voice, when it comes again, is less serious, more distant, completely ignoring the effect he knows he's had on his former friend, "Besides... it's not you I'm worried about. I was thinking about my sister... and my Mom."
He knew it. Fucking Con and his fucking family issues... He doesn't sigh. He carefully does not sigh. "Like I said... they worry--"
"Ya, no shit, they worry." Con cuts him off with a sharp look, fidgeting as he tenses, "Christ, Ty... just shut the fuck up, alright?"
* * *
The rest of the ride down had been silent. Every time he'd tried to say something, anything, Con had given him that look that said he didn't want to hear it. The tension in the car had only eased slightly when they'd finally entered into the Cambridge city limits, finding the orderly streets bordered by towering oak trees that led up Massachusetts Avenue into the heart of MIT.
Both of them had been a little distracted then, as the traffic took them past towering colonnades and squat buildings alike. The place looked clean and... respectable. It looked like it might suit him. A proper place, completely different from the crumbling-down, graffiti-tagged walls of any Winnipeg college or university - so small-town compared to... this. No. This was right.
By the time he's eased himself into a parking spot, having spent the last 30 minutes circling lots to find one that wasn't reserved, he's forgotten the tension of the ride. Looking over the hood of his car, he finds Con getting out the other side after him, pausing to look around, green eyes wide and face slack, just taking it in. He smiles then, shutting his door with an absent stroke of the shiny, though somewhat dusty now, exterior. Making a mental note to find directions to the nearest car wash, he strolls around to the trunk to retrieve his and Con's bags, slinging his own lightly-packed courier bag over his shoulder and adjusting it over the soft leather of his Dior jacket before handing Con his and shutting the trunk, pressing the small button on his keyring to beep the car locks shut.
"So this is it," he says, as Con's fingers brush his as his friend takes the black nylon computer bag from his grip and adjusts it over a neat brown hoodie, blue patterned tee beneath. Con's artfully tattered and pale blue jeans do not come with any impressive label, in fact he'd been with his friend when he'd bought them from the Warehouse One downtown, on sale, and he knows that in his own, low-waisted, dark, Dolce jeans and burgendy v-neck there is a world of difference in quality, an unmistakeable one to a trained eye and even easier to spot by touch, and yet... he can't help but think his old friend still looks good. Very good. Maybe even better since he'd come back than before he'd left... as if Connor had somehow grown up in his absence, no longer the carefree teen, but stronger and more... put-together, somehow. It's been hard to keep his eyes off him. Hard not to want to do things he knows he can't do. Shouldn't... do. "First order of business... find our beds?"
"Sounds like a plan..." Con's voice is distracted as the boy continues to look around at the buildings surrounding the lot, the trees lining the walkways, and the occasional student wandering by. Not too distracted to notice as Ty approaches, though, or make sure to take a step to the side as the other reaches out for his shoulder, or to keep walking to maintain the distance between them as he follows. The campus sprawls out around them, spreading out from the street into a carefully laid out concrete and brick maze of admin buildings and others bursting with classrooms. Sidewalks weave between them, bordered by stately oaks just starting to fill with new green leaves and as they walk further into the heart of it, a steady stream of students crowd the walkways until Con is finally forced to drop back, to stick closer to him, if only, he suspects, to keep from losing him altogether.
"You realize..." his voice a touch cool as he brushes up against Con, catching his wrist as he tries to slip away again and pulling him back beside him, even with his own stride, noting how his old friend seems to tense and finally letting go as Con twists hard out of his grip, though he doesn't let him get very far, matching the other's pace now, "We are going to be in the same room here..."
"Ya, well, you can still keep your distance, okay?"
Green eyes barely touch him as he watches Con stalk the sidewalk beside him and he can feel his patience wearing thin. No matter how good he looks, he thinks, putting up with this kind of attitude would wear on anyone. His cool tone gets just a touch cooler as his jaw tightens, letting his eyes wander elsewhere as they narrow and speaking as if he were merely bored and a little irritated, instead of feeling his chest tightening with the same tense energy that curls his fingers, digging nails into the soft denim of his designer jean pockets, "Why... are you even here? If you're going to be such a little bitch, you might have just stayed at home and spared me the irritation."
He can hear the sharp huff as he sees Con shake his head out of the corner of his eye, but the silence lasts longer than he'd expected and when he turns back, brows low over cold but curious eyes, what he sees drains some of the furious tension of his body - bright green eyes pinched with an angry confusion, "Can we just... get through the weekend?" Con's voice seems uncertain now, though no less tense and even still a little pissed, but it's the uncertainty that softens him, makes him re-evaluate, re-think his approach, makes him think again that there might be something there to salvage.
He doesn't try to touch Con as they wander the maze of buildings looking for their temporary dorm room - a friend of a friend's who'd taken a weeklong break to head back home, leaving it empty and available - he sticks close, though, not letting the other boy run ahead or wander too far away despite the strange tension - tension that never used to be there before he'd left the city... before he'd been taken away by a mother who cared too much and grandparents who hadn't cared at all. It feels odd to him still, that skin-prickling, uncomfortable uneasiness between them, as if they'd somehow forgotten how to be together over their forced years apart. He'd hated that feeling so much when he'd first come back, raced back to find his friend only to discover the gap that had grown between them. He'd hated it so much it had burned away all sense, all logic in his head... even before he'd made it worse.
And now... he still hates it, now, but maybe he's getting used to it.
* * *
The place isn't horrible. But it's small. It's very small. It's really far too small. Just walking in the door and taking the three steps to the left to sling his pack off his shoulder and onto the bottom bunk of the single, narrow bunkbed, his skin creeps with the incongruity of himself in this tiny, unworthy dorm room. He takes a moment to at least be thankful that the guys who'd previously inhabited the place had taken more than a few minutes to tidy up and at least make the bed. At least nothing smells... "Fuck... how do people live in these shit-holes?"
"This is not a shit-hole." Con's even rebuke floats in over his shoulder as his friend closes the door behind them and steps up beside him to lay his own bag beside his on the brown corduroy comforter.
Ty turns to watch him with a sly smirk, leaning back slightly against the high top bunk he knows his temporary-roommate will never pick, "No?"
"No," Con shakes his head, vivid orange dull in the dusty light of the one small window, and in his voice, to Ty's amazement, he's sure he hears something like excitement... even approval, "This is okay."
"This... is not okay." Approval does not ring in Ty's voice as he takes a look around the room - barely enough space for the set of bunk beds, one low, overloaded bookcase, one large chest of drawers with one small mirror above it, one tattered loveseat, and the two cluttered desks full of half-finished projects, burnt-out hard-drives and three over-sized computers between them. "This is not acceptable, Con. Not for you and me."
"Hey. It's perfectly acceptable for me, jackass. Speak for yourself."
A slight rolling chuckle in Con's words makes Ty's smile catch and edge up, easing with relief at the sound of it, though his own words fall with an unimpressed air, almost disappointed with his friend's lack of taste, "There are plenty of apartments around here. Nice ones. We can find something better."
"We? Who says I'll be staying with you?"
The flat words wipe the smile from his features and he can feel the familiar tension clench in his fingers, "Why wouldn't you?" It's only practice that keeps his words smooth and even, unworried, aloof. He watches Con, the boy suddenly restless and anxious beside him, looking anywhere but at him, and he forces himself to be still and wait for the answer, eyes narrowing as seconds tick past, "I'll ask again, Con... why are you even here?"
"You expect me to know?" The words are crisp with a hollow anger that creeps under Ty's remaining calm, like a splinter under his skin. He can feel a familiar darkness rising in his gut, jaw tensing as he clamps down on the ragged, bitter stirring in his chest, forcing himself to be calm. And still he has to listen as Con goes on, "I don't fucking know, Ty, alright? I don't know why I don't just fucking well hate you like I should, alright?" Con's words twisting as they rise in volume, "I don't know! Now can you just shut the fuck up, please? Stop asking questions I don't fucking know the answers to and just... let's just get through this fucking weekend, okay?"
Blood boils inside his skin by the time Con stops, and he senses more than sees his friend turn to go, hears the heavy, angry sigh and the beginning of some lame excuse about needing air as Con practically races for the door; for escape. Ty's eyes narrow and his mind swims fast against the current of anger in his head as he works to make sense of things, trying to judge what he's seeing, what he's heard, and piece it together. Why is Con here? If his friend should hate him... why doesn't he? For what he'd done... Con really should hate him, shouldn't he? Should he? What if Con hates him forever? If he's going to hate him... what does any of this even matter, anymore? This weekend... their friendship?
"Con, hey!" It would be foolish to say his hand moved without even thinking. He knows himself well enough to know that's rarely the case, every option weighed, every moment thought through, but as his fingers close hot and hard around Con's wrist, pulling him back with a sharp tug even as the other set reaches up to grip in short strands of sunset orange, even as his eyes shut and a searing burn of lips meets his... he's aware this moment is beyond him, beyond reason, and he knows he's missed something important... some detail of reason and logic that might have stopped him... some important factor that has made this decision... one of his rare, yet spectacularly wrong ones.
The sudden and furious blossoming of pain in his right eye socket attests to that as he's shoved away and knocked to the floor, his left elbow hitting the hardwood floor with a solid thump that leaves the room silent. Intensely, deathly quiet. Squinting up from the ground, his own pale eyes meet burning, vision-blurring green as Con barks at him, ripping the silence apart with a fury that seems to tear at him, too. "Don't you ever touch me!" he yells, bending low to grab at Ty's designer jacket and give the soft leather a hard shake, "I told you! Don't you fucking touch me! Get it?!"
Only Con doesn't wait for an answer, and he's not sure he has one for him yet anyway as he's shoved back to the floor and Con storms out of the shared dorm room, slamming the solid door behind him, leaving him alone, furious, and confused, lying on the floor and waiting for the world to make sense again. When it refuses to, he climbs back up to his feet, anyway.
There's a small wall-mirror by the dresser where he checks out the spreading purple bruise along his right cheekbone. It's going to be quite impressive once it settles in, he notes. His eyes are still narrowed in the churning fury and restlessness of his gut, but it's his head that's giving him the most problems. Or maybe it's his heart. Does he have one of those? Normally, in this kind of situation, he would simply give up. Nothing to gain by chasing after someone who doesn't want you, it only makes you look stupid. A fool. And he isn't one. And normally, if someone hits him, he would make very damn sure they understand why they should never, under any fucking circumstances, do it again... but this isn't just anyone, and the last thing he finds himself wanting to do is hurt Con. Again. And despite the rage of anger and bitterness in his chest, the red haze in his head, as he stares into the spreading purple in the mirror, the rage seems to disappear like a bumbling explorer mistepping into quicksand, disappearing into the sudden reaction of desperate fear as he thinks of what could happen if he did hurt Con again - fear of losing the one person still in his life, who knows him, who understands how he is and who doesn't let that be a reason to hate him or be afraid of him... well, who didn't used to be afraid of him or hate him. He can't lose Con. Some days it feels like Con is the only person he has left... and every day he feels that connection hanging by a thread.
He should go find him. Make it right. If he can.
He probably can't.
* * *
And two hours later, he's realizing that 'finding Con' was easier thought than done. His friend has effectively disappeared into the crowds of late teens and twenty-somethings outside their tiny, temporary room. Con won't answer his cell and hasn't returned his voicemail asking him to call him, no matter how calm and even he'd managed to keep the short message. He probably won't see him again until tonight, he thinks. Or at least he hopes he'll see him tonight, that Con will at least come back to the room once he's got whatever furiously rebellious reaction he'd felt out of his system. He's probably headed to the nearest campus bar, he thinks, and contemplates the futility of finding it himself and trying to talk Con out of his mood before his old friend finds someone else to help him fuck it away. His mood, that is. Con's not much of a drinker. Alcohol has never been how his one-time lover drowns his sorrows or regrets. But if that is what Con's doing... he's not really eager to watch him do it, and if Con's avoiding him, he's not likely to be able to talk him out of it, either.
So... he wanders. Mind quietly spinning while he focuses on the things he can control. Like finding that car wash. Ignoring the odd looks from passers-by gawking at the spreading bruise of his face, he asks around for a few minutes until he has directions and tries not to obsess as he takes care of what he can.
* * *
SEE CONTINUATION IN NEXT POST - too big for LJ alltogether
Part 2: http://me-under-glass.livejournal.com/141845.html
Now see all, this is why I do not NaNo, ok? Roughly 11.8 k words. 3 months. Ya. Not so fast with the writing am I...
Anyhoo. So this little tidbit I shall call:
"MIT: Minors in Trouble"
Note: Part 2 in next Post, here:
http://me-under-glass.livejournal.com/141845.html
It's a working title. :P
Characters: Con & Ty
Rating: A for Angst - brief nude scene (changing), boys non-con kiss, mild violence
Things You Need to Know: Con & Ty used to be boyfriends until Ty 'moved away' with his Mom and Grandparents for 2 years. He came back to be with Con. Con was dating Al. Ty was pissed. Ty and Con had a rather explosive and disastrously violent run-in in their friend's bathroom. For reasons best known to these two, they still talk and occassionally hang out in each other's presence without police involvement. Ty and Con are going on a roadtrip to MIT to check out the campus together.
* * *
"Don't worry..."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Oh, come on... don't be that way, Con."
Con lifts his throbbing temple from his fingers and turns to face Ty with a scowl, the other boy's icy blue eyes flicking back and forth to him from the road and back again as he drives. "I honestly... don't know what you're talking about," he says, with a tight-lipped smirk as he refuses to talk about it. Still.
"Fuck..." Ty sighs, leaning back into the heated leather seats of his BMW, feeling his muscles tense and his fingers work the supple wheel to get rid of the stress. "Fine, be that way. Not like you make great conversation, anyway..." But he continues to watch him, gaze moving from the road to his old friend every so often as if to make sure he's still there, he's been so quiet. Unusually quiet. But Con just goes back to staring out the window as if he doesn't even notice and Ty is reduced to watching the shadowy reflection of worried green eyes in his tinted passenger window, framed by the familiar shock of bright orange hair - a colour he hadn't seen for years until Con had finally come back from the war, come back home... but nothing else was like it had been... nothing else had gone back to being the same.
The car is strung with quiet tension and he wonders, not for the first time, if things would be any different if he hadn't made such a mess of things when he'd... hurt Con. That had been a mistake, he can admit that, now. It hadn't helped at all. Hadn't made anything better. It hadn't brought him any satisfaction and it sure as hell hadn't made him any happier. But things had been different before that, too. Things had fallen apart long before he'd come back to the city of his birth; back to Con. This silence wasn't all his fault, was it? Con had forgiven him... right? Why the hell else would the boy be here now if he hadn't, sitting in the passenger seat of his BMW... sulking... on the way to check out the MIT student orientation with him. So it must be them... Con's sister, his mother... neither of them had been pleased when they'd found out where their precious Connor was going and who with. No one fucking had. Even his own so-called friends had tried to talk him out of it.
"Hey..." he loosens the grip of his right hand to reach out across the center console, brushing Con's hand where it rests against the boy's leg. The touch is meant to comfort, but he stills as it's snatched away, just a little too fast, and Con shifts, leaning closer to his door on the other side of the car and out of easy reach. The slight tilt of an encouraging smile on his face drops instantly and his eyes go cold as he takes in a deep breath, fighting the tension in his jaw as he draws his own slender fingers back more slowly to curl tight and tense against the wheel once more. And then in a moment, it's back, eyes warming to the tune of a slow, charming smile as he forces his body to relax, "They just don't understand, you know... that's all. You and me... we understand each other, right? They're scared for you... but it's alright. You know that."
His tension drains further from him as Con once again deigns to look at him, clear, bright green eyes sharp, but not angry. "You and me," he starts, the low tenor of his voice careful, "We will never be together again... like we were. You understand that."
The charming smile seems to sink back into his skin as he meets the serious look in the other's eyes, feeling... uneasy with the statement. He nods slowly then tenses as Con himself reaches out to snake a strong hand behind him, fingers curling on the back of his neck in a movement that is both gentle and terribly serious. And still, even to him, against his own constantly burning skin, those hands feel warm.
"And you will regret it, if you ever try what you did... again. I promise you... you understand?" Con waits for Ty to nod, holding his still gaze with his for a long moment despite the hurtling speed of the car, watching the understanding sink into sharp features, and then nods in turn and briefly slips his fingers up over the feel of short-cut, near-colourless, and softly bristly hair before trailing his thumb for an instant over the smooth pale skin of the boy's cheek and taking it back, turning to look out the front windshield this time and sink comfortably back into his seat. His voice, when it comes again, is less serious, more distant, completely ignoring the effect he knows he's had on his former friend, "Besides... it's not you I'm worried about. I was thinking about my sister... and my Mom."
He knew it. Fucking Con and his fucking family issues... He doesn't sigh. He carefully does not sigh. "Like I said... they worry--"
"Ya, no shit, they worry." Con cuts him off with a sharp look, fidgeting as he tenses, "Christ, Ty... just shut the fuck up, alright?"
* * *
The rest of the ride down had been silent. Every time he'd tried to say something, anything, Con had given him that look that said he didn't want to hear it. The tension in the car had only eased slightly when they'd finally entered into the Cambridge city limits, finding the orderly streets bordered by towering oak trees that led up Massachusetts Avenue into the heart of MIT.
Both of them had been a little distracted then, as the traffic took them past towering colonnades and squat buildings alike. The place looked clean and... respectable. It looked like it might suit him. A proper place, completely different from the crumbling-down, graffiti-tagged walls of any Winnipeg college or university - so small-town compared to... this. No. This was right.
By the time he's eased himself into a parking spot, having spent the last 30 minutes circling lots to find one that wasn't reserved, he's forgotten the tension of the ride. Looking over the hood of his car, he finds Con getting out the other side after him, pausing to look around, green eyes wide and face slack, just taking it in. He smiles then, shutting his door with an absent stroke of the shiny, though somewhat dusty now, exterior. Making a mental note to find directions to the nearest car wash, he strolls around to the trunk to retrieve his and Con's bags, slinging his own lightly-packed courier bag over his shoulder and adjusting it over the soft leather of his Dior jacket before handing Con his and shutting the trunk, pressing the small button on his keyring to beep the car locks shut.
"So this is it," he says, as Con's fingers brush his as his friend takes the black nylon computer bag from his grip and adjusts it over a neat brown hoodie, blue patterned tee beneath. Con's artfully tattered and pale blue jeans do not come with any impressive label, in fact he'd been with his friend when he'd bought them from the Warehouse One downtown, on sale, and he knows that in his own, low-waisted, dark, Dolce jeans and burgendy v-neck there is a world of difference in quality, an unmistakeable one to a trained eye and even easier to spot by touch, and yet... he can't help but think his old friend still looks good. Very good. Maybe even better since he'd come back than before he'd left... as if Connor had somehow grown up in his absence, no longer the carefree teen, but stronger and more... put-together, somehow. It's been hard to keep his eyes off him. Hard not to want to do things he knows he can't do. Shouldn't... do. "First order of business... find our beds?"
"Sounds like a plan..." Con's voice is distracted as the boy continues to look around at the buildings surrounding the lot, the trees lining the walkways, and the occasional student wandering by. Not too distracted to notice as Ty approaches, though, or make sure to take a step to the side as the other reaches out for his shoulder, or to keep walking to maintain the distance between them as he follows. The campus sprawls out around them, spreading out from the street into a carefully laid out concrete and brick maze of admin buildings and others bursting with classrooms. Sidewalks weave between them, bordered by stately oaks just starting to fill with new green leaves and as they walk further into the heart of it, a steady stream of students crowd the walkways until Con is finally forced to drop back, to stick closer to him, if only, he suspects, to keep from losing him altogether.
"You realize..." his voice a touch cool as he brushes up against Con, catching his wrist as he tries to slip away again and pulling him back beside him, even with his own stride, noting how his old friend seems to tense and finally letting go as Con twists hard out of his grip, though he doesn't let him get very far, matching the other's pace now, "We are going to be in the same room here..."
"Ya, well, you can still keep your distance, okay?"
Green eyes barely touch him as he watches Con stalk the sidewalk beside him and he can feel his patience wearing thin. No matter how good he looks, he thinks, putting up with this kind of attitude would wear on anyone. His cool tone gets just a touch cooler as his jaw tightens, letting his eyes wander elsewhere as they narrow and speaking as if he were merely bored and a little irritated, instead of feeling his chest tightening with the same tense energy that curls his fingers, digging nails into the soft denim of his designer jean pockets, "Why... are you even here? If you're going to be such a little bitch, you might have just stayed at home and spared me the irritation."
He can hear the sharp huff as he sees Con shake his head out of the corner of his eye, but the silence lasts longer than he'd expected and when he turns back, brows low over cold but curious eyes, what he sees drains some of the furious tension of his body - bright green eyes pinched with an angry confusion, "Can we just... get through the weekend?" Con's voice seems uncertain now, though no less tense and even still a little pissed, but it's the uncertainty that softens him, makes him re-evaluate, re-think his approach, makes him think again that there might be something there to salvage.
He doesn't try to touch Con as they wander the maze of buildings looking for their temporary dorm room - a friend of a friend's who'd taken a weeklong break to head back home, leaving it empty and available - he sticks close, though, not letting the other boy run ahead or wander too far away despite the strange tension - tension that never used to be there before he'd left the city... before he'd been taken away by a mother who cared too much and grandparents who hadn't cared at all. It feels odd to him still, that skin-prickling, uncomfortable uneasiness between them, as if they'd somehow forgotten how to be together over their forced years apart. He'd hated that feeling so much when he'd first come back, raced back to find his friend only to discover the gap that had grown between them. He'd hated it so much it had burned away all sense, all logic in his head... even before he'd made it worse.
And now... he still hates it, now, but maybe he's getting used to it.
* * *
The place isn't horrible. But it's small. It's very small. It's really far too small. Just walking in the door and taking the three steps to the left to sling his pack off his shoulder and onto the bottom bunk of the single, narrow bunkbed, his skin creeps with the incongruity of himself in this tiny, unworthy dorm room. He takes a moment to at least be thankful that the guys who'd previously inhabited the place had taken more than a few minutes to tidy up and at least make the bed. At least nothing smells... "Fuck... how do people live in these shit-holes?"
"This is not a shit-hole." Con's even rebuke floats in over his shoulder as his friend closes the door behind them and steps up beside him to lay his own bag beside his on the brown corduroy comforter.
Ty turns to watch him with a sly smirk, leaning back slightly against the high top bunk he knows his temporary-roommate will never pick, "No?"
"No," Con shakes his head, vivid orange dull in the dusty light of the one small window, and in his voice, to Ty's amazement, he's sure he hears something like excitement... even approval, "This is okay."
"This... is not okay." Approval does not ring in Ty's voice as he takes a look around the room - barely enough space for the set of bunk beds, one low, overloaded bookcase, one large chest of drawers with one small mirror above it, one tattered loveseat, and the two cluttered desks full of half-finished projects, burnt-out hard-drives and three over-sized computers between them. "This is not acceptable, Con. Not for you and me."
"Hey. It's perfectly acceptable for me, jackass. Speak for yourself."
A slight rolling chuckle in Con's words makes Ty's smile catch and edge up, easing with relief at the sound of it, though his own words fall with an unimpressed air, almost disappointed with his friend's lack of taste, "There are plenty of apartments around here. Nice ones. We can find something better."
"We? Who says I'll be staying with you?"
The flat words wipe the smile from his features and he can feel the familiar tension clench in his fingers, "Why wouldn't you?" It's only practice that keeps his words smooth and even, unworried, aloof. He watches Con, the boy suddenly restless and anxious beside him, looking anywhere but at him, and he forces himself to be still and wait for the answer, eyes narrowing as seconds tick past, "I'll ask again, Con... why are you even here?"
"You expect me to know?" The words are crisp with a hollow anger that creeps under Ty's remaining calm, like a splinter under his skin. He can feel a familiar darkness rising in his gut, jaw tensing as he clamps down on the ragged, bitter stirring in his chest, forcing himself to be calm. And still he has to listen as Con goes on, "I don't fucking know, Ty, alright? I don't know why I don't just fucking well hate you like I should, alright?" Con's words twisting as they rise in volume, "I don't know! Now can you just shut the fuck up, please? Stop asking questions I don't fucking know the answers to and just... let's just get through this fucking weekend, okay?"
Blood boils inside his skin by the time Con stops, and he senses more than sees his friend turn to go, hears the heavy, angry sigh and the beginning of some lame excuse about needing air as Con practically races for the door; for escape. Ty's eyes narrow and his mind swims fast against the current of anger in his head as he works to make sense of things, trying to judge what he's seeing, what he's heard, and piece it together. Why is Con here? If his friend should hate him... why doesn't he? For what he'd done... Con really should hate him, shouldn't he? Should he? What if Con hates him forever? If he's going to hate him... what does any of this even matter, anymore? This weekend... their friendship?
"Con, hey!" It would be foolish to say his hand moved without even thinking. He knows himself well enough to know that's rarely the case, every option weighed, every moment thought through, but as his fingers close hot and hard around Con's wrist, pulling him back with a sharp tug even as the other set reaches up to grip in short strands of sunset orange, even as his eyes shut and a searing burn of lips meets his... he's aware this moment is beyond him, beyond reason, and he knows he's missed something important... some detail of reason and logic that might have stopped him... some important factor that has made this decision... one of his rare, yet spectacularly wrong ones.
The sudden and furious blossoming of pain in his right eye socket attests to that as he's shoved away and knocked to the floor, his left elbow hitting the hardwood floor with a solid thump that leaves the room silent. Intensely, deathly quiet. Squinting up from the ground, his own pale eyes meet burning, vision-blurring green as Con barks at him, ripping the silence apart with a fury that seems to tear at him, too. "Don't you ever touch me!" he yells, bending low to grab at Ty's designer jacket and give the soft leather a hard shake, "I told you! Don't you fucking touch me! Get it?!"
Only Con doesn't wait for an answer, and he's not sure he has one for him yet anyway as he's shoved back to the floor and Con storms out of the shared dorm room, slamming the solid door behind him, leaving him alone, furious, and confused, lying on the floor and waiting for the world to make sense again. When it refuses to, he climbs back up to his feet, anyway.
There's a small wall-mirror by the dresser where he checks out the spreading purple bruise along his right cheekbone. It's going to be quite impressive once it settles in, he notes. His eyes are still narrowed in the churning fury and restlessness of his gut, but it's his head that's giving him the most problems. Or maybe it's his heart. Does he have one of those? Normally, in this kind of situation, he would simply give up. Nothing to gain by chasing after someone who doesn't want you, it only makes you look stupid. A fool. And he isn't one. And normally, if someone hits him, he would make very damn sure they understand why they should never, under any fucking circumstances, do it again... but this isn't just anyone, and the last thing he finds himself wanting to do is hurt Con. Again. And despite the rage of anger and bitterness in his chest, the red haze in his head, as he stares into the spreading purple in the mirror, the rage seems to disappear like a bumbling explorer mistepping into quicksand, disappearing into the sudden reaction of desperate fear as he thinks of what could happen if he did hurt Con again - fear of losing the one person still in his life, who knows him, who understands how he is and who doesn't let that be a reason to hate him or be afraid of him... well, who didn't used to be afraid of him or hate him. He can't lose Con. Some days it feels like Con is the only person he has left... and every day he feels that connection hanging by a thread.
He should go find him. Make it right. If he can.
He probably can't.
* * *
And two hours later, he's realizing that 'finding Con' was easier thought than done. His friend has effectively disappeared into the crowds of late teens and twenty-somethings outside their tiny, temporary room. Con won't answer his cell and hasn't returned his voicemail asking him to call him, no matter how calm and even he'd managed to keep the short message. He probably won't see him again until tonight, he thinks. Or at least he hopes he'll see him tonight, that Con will at least come back to the room once he's got whatever furiously rebellious reaction he'd felt out of his system. He's probably headed to the nearest campus bar, he thinks, and contemplates the futility of finding it himself and trying to talk Con out of his mood before his old friend finds someone else to help him fuck it away. His mood, that is. Con's not much of a drinker. Alcohol has never been how his one-time lover drowns his sorrows or regrets. But if that is what Con's doing... he's not really eager to watch him do it, and if Con's avoiding him, he's not likely to be able to talk him out of it, either.
So... he wanders. Mind quietly spinning while he focuses on the things he can control. Like finding that car wash. Ignoring the odd looks from passers-by gawking at the spreading bruise of his face, he asks around for a few minutes until he has directions and tries not to obsess as he takes care of what he can.
* * *
SEE CONTINUATION IN NEXT POST - too big for LJ alltogether
Part 2: http://me-under-glass.livejournal.com/141845.html