Disclaimer: This story is completely fictional. The use of famous persons (members of Tokio Hotel) within the storyline is not meant to cause any harm; Hustler Magazine, Inc. v. Falwell, 485 U.S. 46 (1988).

Warning: Alternate Universe, non-Related Twincest, Homoerotic themes, language, and psychological angst.

Intro…

Tom put a caring hand to Mrs. Romanowski's frail shoulder as she wept into a lace handkerchief.

"I'm sorry," the elderly woman said. "I know it's just stuff…but it's my stuff, ya know?" she tried to explain.

"It's okay, Helen. You don't have to apologize. Letting go is very hard for someone like you. Chronic hoarding is a serious addiction and you've finally made the right decision to get help," Tom reassured his client while eyeing the hills of garbage that surrounded them. He'd been assigned to Helen Romanowski's case three months ago, but it wasn't until today that they'd gotten any real progress done. Every week they'd reorganize or throw things away or stack reusable items in the front yard for transport to the thrift store. And each time, she would decide to keep it all at the last minute. At least this week she had allowed 6 large boxes of pet soiled clothing, spoiled food goods, and other debris to be removed from her home for good. Minuscule as it was, at this rate the Department of Health Services would have no reason to condemn her property like they had threatened to do so in the past.

Tom waved at Helen from his car window as he dragged the seat belt over his abdomen. He felt proud of himself for not quitting on her. It was always something special when a tough case finally started softening up and he couldn't wait to relay the good news back to his superior the next day.

After a brief trip to the grocery store, Tom came home to his meager apartment exhausted. With Julian gone, he was all alone. Not that Jules had ever been a good boyfriend; he was a liar, pretentious, and vain…but at least he was someone to talk to. With a job like his, it was hard to find a mate that would tolerate the long hours and dedication it took to help change the life of another human being.

Tom resigned to having dinner with Alex Trebek as he ate in front of the television. He didn't even like Jeopardy, but here he was a on a Friday night, yelling answers at a game show. Without much cause to stay awake, he went to bed early. Maybe tomorrow would be different.

It was Sunday afternoon. The last few hours of freedom before the start of the work week were beginning to dwindle and Tom was in the middle of ironing clothes. His cell phone rang, but he didn't answer. The only person likely to call was Julian and Tom was just too busy to even hang up on him. But in his haste to take care of business at home, he realized that it was his work phone that had been ringing, not his personal phone.

"Shit," he cursed himself, feeling dumb for not recognizing the difference in ringtones. He saw that the missed call was from Mrs. Romanowski. She'd left a voicemail, but it was completely unintelligible. He dialed her up to see what she needed.

"Hello, Mrs.—,"

"Tom! Tom, they're trying to take everything from me!" the woman sobbed.

"Who? What's going on?"

"Oh, please help me. I tried, didn't I? I tried to clean up my house! They're taking everything!" Mrs. Romanowski practically screamed.

"Just try to stay calm. I'll be there as quickly as I can!"

Tom dropped everything to get to his client's home. He had a good idea of exactly what was going on and had feared that something like this might happen.

Pulling up to Helen's house, he was greeted by a barrage of trucks. Some were from the dump; others were from a towing company. All were there to take something away; furniture, electronics, old cars.

"Hey!" Tom yelled, nearly leaping out of his vehicle after pulling up to the curb. "You don't have permission to take this woman's belongings. This is stealing!" he tried to convince the men in blue jumpsuits as they dragged more items out of the home.

"Who are you?" asked a woman who seemingly appeared out of nowhere. She looked a lot like Mrs. Romanowski, but about 30 years younger. He knew that this must be her daughter, Claudia.

"My name is Tom Kaulitz. I'm a life-coach working with Helen Romanowski. Where is she?"

"Life-coach? Right," the woman scoffed as she eyed his lip piercing and blond dreadlocks with scrutiny. "No offense Tom, but in one year, all you've managed to do is unclutter the main hallway and part of the kitchen. I've only been here for one hour and already the entire house is starting to show signs of improvement."

"You call this improvement, mercilessly throwing away the possessions of an old woman with emotional problems? Don't you know that this is the reason for her hoarding in the first place; the fear of being destitute, the fear of losing everything?" Tom demanded to know. "And I haven't been on her case for a year. She had other coaches that all gave up on her when things got tough, but I stuck around. I got her to trust me after a few months. We were making progress and now you're about to send her into a relapse. This is not the way you help a hoarder!"

"Listen, I'm Helen's daughter and I know what's best for her. She obviously can't be trusted to take care of herself anymore, so I'm putting her in a home and we're selling the house."

"But—!"

"Good bye, Mr. Kaulitz. Please don't make me call the police," the woman raised an eyebrow before turning away. That's when Tom noticed Mrs. Romanowski sitting on the porch steps, her eyes glossed over and lifeless as all of her belongings continued to be taken away. Her spirit was broken.

Reluctantly, Tom got back into his car, but he wasn't done yet. He called his boss immediately.

"Hello, Tom," a tired voice sighed into the receiver. "I thought you might call. Let me guess, you're at the Romanowski house?"

"So then you knew about this? You knew that this was going to happen with my client today and you didn't call me first? Gus, we're supposed to be friends."

"Don't do this again, Tom. Don't let your ego get in the way. I know you spent a lot of time on this case, but you have to let it go. Some you win and some you don't. Just focus on the successes, not the losses."

"No! This wasn't right. We were making progress! We—,"

"I'm sorry, Tom. You're client's daughter has legal authority over the matter and there's nothing we can do; nothing we should do. Justice isn't part of this job and neither is being competitive," Tom's boss, Gustav, emphasized. "Remember, it's not about how many people we can't help, it's about how many we can," Tom's boss rattled off that tired, old company motto that he liked to use during office pep-talks. There was complete silence over the line. "You still there?"

"Yeah."

"Look, you're just going to have to put this out of your mind. Monday you've got other assignments to take care of, okay?"

"Sure," Tom said quietly. "I gotta go." He hung up the phone feeling more depressed than ever. Mrs. Romanowski hadn't just been a regular client. She was one of the worst cases he had ever seen; a recluse, who nearly died in her home after a fall that caused a rib to fracture. It only took an ambulance 12 minutes to get to her home, but 45 to dig through garbage at the front door. So much effort had gone into controlling her illness, but now that was all sabotaged.

Tom had been working as a life coach for the Adult Welfare Department for nearly 3 years. Most of his cases were simple. He'd be assigned to a client who just couldn't organize by themselves or a person physically unable to do so based on age or health. These were reasonable people who had just become overwhelmed. Then there were cases like that of Helen Romanowski, chronic hoarders with totally unreasonable, irrational attachments to anything and everything.

In the early days, Tom always used to get the hard cases. Other employees would purposely swap his files with theirs. They all felt it was pretty coincidental that Tom was hired the very same day that a former co-worker of theirs had been fired without warning and that was their way of getting back at him. Ironically, it was this ongoing prank that forced Tom to develop his coaching skills. Eventually, he became a regular "miracle worker" around the office. He loved the feeling of accomplishment and even more so, the look of resentment in the eyes of his workplace antagonists. Back then, Gustav was his only supportive co-worker and once he got promoted to Director, he corrected all of the case assignments for his friend. But by that time Tom didn't need anyone to trick him into taking hard cases, he was requesting them. Something inside just made him feel like he needed to prove himself over and over again, taking his share of responsibilities and more…

Tom took one last look at Helen as she sat on the porch, staring at her miserable face while all of her dignity was stripped away one chair, bicycle, and broken lamp shade at a time.

"…Some you win and some you don't…" he could hear Gustav's voice in his head. Putting his car in drive, Tom left the scene feeling like a failure.

It was 9:00 am Monday morning, but Tom was already checking off names from his new assignment sheet. It wasn't uncommon for some clients to spontaneously relapse and jump right back to square one. So it was always best to do regular bi-yearly inspections. First, he stopped by Mr. and Mrs. Hank Elroy's house for a visit. He'd helped them stay hoard free for almost two years, but they hadn't been a tough case to begin with. They were just old and had no one to help them at first. The inspection was over quickly, moving on to the next case.

"May I have a look around?" Tom asked Jenna Peterson when she came to the front door with a baby on her hip. Her apartment wasn't exactly tidy at the moment, but he could tell that she and her boyfriend had really been trying to keep the place clean. Her hoarding had never been chronic either, but with 4 kids by 3 different lack-luster fathers, housekeeping had been put on the back burner until concerned neighbors began to complain. Tom could hardly stand the bug spray smell in her home, but at least she didn't have roaches anymore.

"Back so soon?" asked Mrs. Chan when her life-coach pulled into the driveway. She was watering a garden that used to be knee deep with car parts and Chinese newspapers. Tom greeted her then, thought to himself for a moment. She was right. Hadn't he just been here a couple months earlier?

"Excuse me a moment," Tom smiled.

After taking a good look at his assignment sheet again, he realized that none of the cases were new and all were simply "due for inspection." Easy stuff. He quickly dialed up his superior.

"Yes, this is Mr. Schäfer speaking. How may I help you?" Gustav answered the phone angelically.

"Oh, don't get cute!" Tom huffed. "You know who this is."

"Let me guess, you're upset about the work load?"

"If you can even call it that! Why am I stuck doing busy-work this week? It's cause I fucked up with the last one, isn't it?" Tom asked somberly, not actually wanting to know the answer, but needing to know the truth anyway. "I've made you lose faith in me…" his voice trailed off.

"What? No. It's because I think you need a break. I think you should stay away from the hard stuff for a while and give yourself a chance to calm down. You have a tendency to really beat yourself up when a case goes bad."

"So I'm passionate about my work. Isn't that the idea? I wish you would just trust me."

"I do trust you," Gustav tried to convince his friend. "But, fine…if you want a challenge so bad, I've got one for you. There's a client I've been working with myself for a while, but I don't seem to be getting anywhere with him."

"What? Quitting a case? That's not like you."

"It's complicated. Anyway, come down to the office for a new print out and it's y—,"

"I've got a pen and paper. Hit me with it," Tom interrupted.

"Okay," Gustav agreed begrudgingly. He was hoping for the opportunity to change his friend's mind after luring him back to the office, but Tom was all too familiar with that old trick.

"The name is Bill Trümper. He's been a chronic hoarder for the past two years. He lives at…"

Tom kept taking notes as the information was relayed to him, feeling happy, but also anxious. This wasn't just some new case; it was a chance to redeem himself as a successful coach.

Tom hung up before continuing a brief conversation with Mrs. Chan. He left apologetically for any inconvenience he may have caused her and practically sped to the Trümper house.

"1453 Arrowhead Drive…" Tom thought out loud while keeping his eyes peeled for the right house. Or was it 1458? His handwriting had gotten smudged. Typically, he could just look for the messiest house on the street, but that wouldn't work this time. This was the Shenandoah area, a very upscale neighborhood. Every home looked pristine, every yard was finely manicured. Slowly, he progressed down the road before making an abrupt stop. "That's gotta be the one," he said to himself. Today was obviously garbage day. Every other home had their dumpsters lined up against the curb, all except for one rebellious brick Tudor. Normal people throw away their garbage. Chronic hoarders almost never do. Based on that hunch, Tom advanced to the front door.

Sometimes it was hard for older people to hear when he arrived, so Tom rang the doorbell twice and knocked for good measure.

"Hello! Mr. Trümper, are you home?" he questioned with his hands cupped around his mouth for better voice projection. Suddenly the front door swung open.

"Must you be so loud?" a young man with long black hair snapped at him from the threshold.

Tom paused for a moment. He was completely caught off guard.

"I'm so sorry. Uhm, does a Mr. Bill Trümper live here? I'm from the Adult Welfare Department and—,"

"That'd be me."

"Oh…"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Bill folded a pair of slender arms across his chest.

"Nothing," Tom started laughing to himself. I guess I just pictured a crotchety old man living by himself with a bunch of cats or something."

Suddenly, an orange and white tabby meowed its way onto the front porch from Bill's living room. A grey one followed shortly afterward.

"I only have two, okay!" Bill said defensively after looking at the expression on Tom's face. He was embarrassed enough about the state of his house without people thinking that he lived like a cat lady. This was getting to be humiliating.

"Well, uh…let's get started, shall we?"

"Just give a minute," Tom's new client sighed. He took a deep breath before moving out of the threshold and allowing this unfamiliar person into his home, this stranger who might judge or exploit him.

Tom entered the house cautiously, as protocol would have it and was surprised to see what actually looked like a very organized mess. There wasn't much space for walking and it was hard to judge the true width of the living room due to the density of the hoard, but there was definitely some type of method to the madness. It was clean and orderly. Unfortunately, Bill's neatness made Tom wonder if his client also suffered from obsessive compulsive disorder. Dealing with someone who had more than one behavioral issue meant that he had a lot of work ahead of him.

"May I have a look around?"

"If you must," Bill answered, not sparing an ounce of attitude. Tom could sense that his presence was barely being tolerated. His new client's personality would take some getting used to and it might even take some ignoring.

Upon closer inspection of the home, it became immediately obvious that most of Bill's keepsakes all possessed a common theme. The front room was bombarded with two living room suites; one of which still had showroom tags from the furniture gallery. A jungle of untouched floor lamps and coat racks camouflaged the back wall. Tom wasn't at all surprised to find a collection of Oriental rugs, coffee tables, paintings, and mirrors to be in the same state.

"Is all of this stuff brand new?"

"Well, I've never really used it, if that's what you mean."

"So, maybe you have a problem with impulsive spending as well, buying things without a purpose?"

"No, they have a purpose."

"Like?"

"I bought them for my boyfriend."

"Well, you shouldn't be going through this alone if he's letting you buy this stuff. Where is he?"

"He's dead."

"Oh…" Tom replied quietly. "I'm so sorr—,"

"Whatever, let's just move on," Bill glared impatiently, as if it were all no big deal. But the state of his crowded house betrayed that logic. This was a very big deal.

"Is that why you hold onto all of this stuff? Because it belonged to someone you loved?" Tom prepared for the other man to snap at him, but it was a question worth asking.

"Do I really have to start getting rid of things today?" Bill changed the subject. He looked worried.

"No, I don't like that approach. It's too invasive. Today I'm just here to introduce myself. What we do and when is up to you."

"Thank you," the other man nodded, his face expressing genuine gratuity with just the hint of a smile.

Tom smirked at how humble he seemed for once. Maybe Bill wasn't as tough as he looked.

Dedicated to Jolene. Now you can't say I never write anything for you.