"What do you mean with gone? He's always gone." Thomas tries to sound calm and casually. He did not expect the call. He avoided thinking about her.
He still answered when Made Barrows name popped up on his phone.
They never were really close, but at least they had some sort of friendly thing going on since the day he stopped her hand from getting caught while stealing. And the fact she's calling him when her brother is missing adds to it. If this was about Maven he would have faked static noises and ended the call like a child. It's not her fault. None of it. He's an idiot, that's all.
He leans on one of the tables at work, already packing his bag. Cameron's been gone for a while and not one customer is ever going to show up.
"He wrote a message. And that was a week ago. It sounded like he..." he can hear her hesitation to open up a little and say it. "Look, you are friends, I thought he told you."
"He's like that. "Thomas brushes her off but he feels cold. All the secrecy this past week. The way they avoided him.
The violence and the freaking trouble.
I thought this was over, but it never even started.
"You tried the trusty Captain? Farley, I mean."
If he could see her, he knows, she'd hold her back straight and her head high, and she's not telling him all the truth. There's a tense silence between them.
He bites his lip. Then he makes the most pissed off sound he's able to provide.
"Barrow, I am done with secret shit. No one tells me anything. Join the club and keep it for yourself or spill it. I'm gonna call if I hear something." He promises.
There's nothing much to say. She's got answers and the boy he loves.
Winning this time, he thinks, bitter. But for how long?
Despite his jealousy, he 's finding himself in no position to dislike her. Sure he's pissed. But that's just going against everything at the moment.
And so they part again.
His worn out boots are still the same he possessed on the homeless days, just even more ruined.
Now they stumble along streets slowly turning into a war zone, with danger written on walls and hanging in the air.
No one is home.
He sits on her doorstep like he did so many times. Making himself small and being tired.
The sun sets.
She's still not back.
It gets dark.
He's playing with his phone, pretty spooked by the sounds around him.
When she finally comes back he stares at her.
"Hey Mom," he jokes half-heartedly. "Forgot my keys."
Her short hair is damp in the small lights and her pants are dirty like she crawled through the sewers. She glances down at his form, leaning before the entrance, illuminated by the white screen of his phone.
"Go home, Thomas." Is all she says. She sounds tough, always, holding herself up like a soldier.
"Yeah, no. " He refuses to make space.
"Thomas, go home." She repeats, with every bit of authority she has to offer, towering over him. He flinches a little, irritated.
"At least lemme know you're ok."
"I am okay." She says. "But you won't if you don't go home right now."
It's not a threat. She's tougher than him but he knows she wouldn't hurt him if he did not really, really deserve it.
It's a warning.
He takes her warnings very seriously.
"Please don't get yourself killed." He says, standing up. "I'd kinda miss you."
"I will try." Her hand touches his shoulder and he can't stop thinking she just said goodbye.
There are stitches in his heart opening again. He thinks of street rat Thomas and that guy that did not even know him but bailed him out regardless. That was friendly and funny and cared. He thinks of the times Farley's car pulled on some parking lot or how often he crashed at her place in the middle of the night. She never asked any questions. She fed him and kept him warm when he was sick and she didn't take shit from him.
It's warm but he's shaking when he leaves the staircase.
When people were busy before they are vanishing right now. He thought he had his downs.
It must be something in the summer air and the heat driving people crazy.
A few days later his phone rings in the dead of night. He knows only one person calling that early.
"HM?" Thomas makes and licks his dry lips.
"Are you at home?" No hello, just a voice that sounds strained and hurt. And angry. He didn't know Maven could sound so strange. Like a wounded predator, snarling.
"Eh, yeah?"
"Would you..Can I come around?" There's something in Maven's voice that isn't to his liking at all. It takes a moment before Thomas can process the words.
"I just woke up." He stretches, blinking."Gimme a moment."
He shoves the phone away, searching for a shirt that doesn't smell like old grease or sweat. In the end, he only finds the tank top that once belonged to Maven. Eh, who cares. Matches the too big pants at least.
"Something wrong?" Thomas sniffs and pushes his hair out of his face.
He doesn't really expect an answer.
By now Thomas is master of rhetorics questions.
Maven looks like shit. Thomas has no other description for it. His hair is wild and tangled, his eyes are red and his clothes crumbled.
"You look pretty terrible. "Thomas offers in sympathy. "Wanna come in and talk?"
There is something wild and hurt lurking behind that blue eyes.
Thomas just rubs his head and makes some space for the ghost of the boy he loved.
He doesn't fit in the room. Even miserable and like a drowned cat, he looks deranged in the poorly lit orange painted kitchen. Maybe that's how it is. He'll never fit in Thomas life. As if he hadn't always known that. The kitchen isn't only the center of the flat but also the biggest room Only a little bigger than the broom closet that is Thomas bedroom. Thanks to the gas stove , the table and the fridge it looks stuffed. The shelves are bursting with stuff. There's a mushroom poster on the door of the drawer and a lot of notes and papers on the fridge, stuck with bright magnets. None look the same. They are mostly plastered with Thomas lanky writing, big letters that hang on the paper like a fourth grader has written them, smearing over too much space .
The gas on the stove flickers alive, blue and hot. Thomas leans next to it and tries to process what's happening, watching water boil.
For a while Maven just sits hunched on the chair and watches Thomas on the stove.
"We're still friends, right?"
There's so much desperation in his voice he might as well drown in it.
Once upon a time, Thomas would have been hurt by the assumption all they could ever be was friends. But that was before he decided he wants to be back in that boy's life no matter the hurt and no matter the cost. Being friends is better than nothing.
Beggars can't be choosers.
Thomas told himself he was back on track to pursuing something with Maven. Maybe really just make it up somehow. In truth, all that ever mattered was to hear him say he loved him all the time. But that is stupid and straight out of a fairytale. The moment he saw them in the theater he knew that admiration.
He agreed to be a friend.
He should at least try.
"I hope we are." Thomas looks over and smiles. He wants to hold his hand into the flame just to stop this wrong smile from spreading further. "Or else I'd wonder why you sit in my kitchen at the dead of night."
Thomas takes the full cups and places them on the table. His contains a pile of sugar. Some of it sticks to the brim of the cup, glazing it.
"Spit it out." Thomas urges, lounging on his chair, legs crossed.
He doesn't.
Thomas takes the spoon out of his cup and licks it, a fat and disgusting pile of sugar on it that won't dissolve in it anymore.
And he waits.
The clock over the fridge makes a rhythmic ticking beat, matching Thomas' heart.
Ah, he'll not go through with it, Thomas thinks, and there's something very wrong and not at all relaxing in the way they stare at each other.
When he finally speaks it's not about anything Thomas has anticipated. He is prepared for family trouble, knowing a share about complicated relationships, and he's not half bad with them right now.
"When you said I was in love with Mare Barrow," Maven starts and there's a tiny precious part of Thomas that hopes Maven will deny it. When you said I was in love with her, you were wrong. But he knows it will not happen. Not in the way Maven anchors himself on the chair, holding the cup and not even attempting to keep the cold façade on. "You were right. I feel…drawn to her, to say the least."
For the tiniest of seconds, Thomas' hand stops. Then it takes the cup again. Suddenly the tea tastes bitter and stale. Like it's adapted to heartbreak itself.
"No shit," Thomas mutters but stops himself from going further down that road.
Who would have thought the boy he loves would want relationship advice from him? If anyone is terribly bad and useless at that it's Thomas and Maven should know better. Maybe he does. There's something Thomas can't put his finger on but he's too familiar with. About the shit look and the hunched back. For now, he can't do anything. Just listen. Maybe there is something more. Maybe THomas still has the most wishful thinking and hopes the boy is still lying like he always does, cloaking truths behind smaller ones.
Maven buries his face in his hands. "This feels wrong. I should not be discussing this with you."
Thomas smirks like he used to when he bluffed confidence. A tiny crack in a mirror, an irritating confident expression to get under someone's skin.
"Who else would know better about your dorkiness and your problems with feelings?"
Maven scoffs softly. "Truer words have never been spoken."
Thomas toasts in mock and drinks again to stop himself from saying something they will both regret.
"She was nice to me. When I was alone. " Maven says. "She made me laugh. And I think I am not just grateful."
"Well, that's not good."
Hurts, he thinks, doesn't it? To want something you can't have?
Nothing can ever be easy.
Maven loves Mare, Thomas loves Maven and Mare?
"Seems she's with your brother. They are not bad together."
Maven looks at him as if Thomas just told him the sky is blue. "I know."
"Well, I ain't Barrow, so I don't know what's her take."Thomas shrugs. " Just thinking your brother always was a good guy."
Something about that changes the look he's giving Thomas. There's some sort of anger and hurt, biting. It's really not pretty. It's as soon gone as it was there.
"Listen, pr-' If you call him pretty boy now, you'll not help yourself. "pretty sure you 'll have to spill the tea at some point. You hang out with her. Tell Barrow and figure it out together. She's a good one." And because it's true he adds:"She's not me."
There's a very long look. It glides along his skinny frame, collarbones standing out, down his shoulders and along the arm, resting on the tattoo curling up his wrist.
The eyes wander down again, Thomas feels a very unwelcome feeling in his stomach, heat rising and heart fluttering. The eyes find his ankle and lower leg peeking out where the too big pants leg of his have slipped up, presenting the wonky bat-symbol.
"She's not." Maven says.
"You stare at me like you never seen me." Thomas huffs to keep himself from mistakes.
"I haven't. Not like this." Maven leans on his hand, still tracing Thomas form, but frowning a little now. " You've got your life in control. It's something I wasn't sure I would ever see."
"Yeah. Street rat Thomas was filthy and an idiot." He agrees.
"Only a little." There is a gleam in the eyes. "Filthy, I mean."
An older, past vision of Thomas leans over the kitchen table and kisses him. The present version snorts and drinks, feeling like he was stabbed in the gut repeatedly.
"Thank you, Thomas."
"Yeah, just don't mention it." Thomas looks at the clock.
Well, he ain't going to sleep anytime soon and he's got work in the early afternoon. And needs to do other things in the morning. The pedal of the tattoo machine is blocking and if he doesn't find out why he can forget working with it any time soon. Because of he sure as hell can't afford a new one.
Then he looks at Maven's hunched over form.
He cannot just leave him to himself. That boy is no good to himself all alone.
"Wanna see my room?"
Thomas spends a lot of time alone in the tiny space. It looks like him. There's his mattress with too many bright colored pillows, the drawer, old and scratched, wood. The tattoo machine rests on it in its bag, and thankfully it hides the shirt, still carelessly lying around.
Not like Thomas expected visitors this night.
The small free space of the wall is plastered with sketches, notes. Maven's eyes wander over the rough forms of animals, hands, and patterns. Some of the will never be finished. Some are just good the way they are. Maven stares especially on the Phoenix and Thomas remembers the one he drew a summer ago.
Pictures have snuck between them.
One of his family, one with Farley and Shade, and the newest addition the one with Cameron. He doesn't even know why he made the effort to print it out.
Maybe she's just very important to his frail balance in life. He can't deny it after all the times they have hung out and the way she spitefully protected him.
He realizes despite all the hours Thomas spend with Maven he never had one picture of him.
"I know, not much."
Maven huffs and stares at the pile of clothes on the floor.
"This is so you."
"Is that good or bad?"
Instead of an answer, he gets the shake of a head.
"I should go."
"You can," Thomas says helplessly drawn like a moth to the flame. "Or stay and tell me what's really bugging you. You didn't come to talk about Barrow. That was just convenient."
"How would you know?"
"Known you, "Thomas shrugs. "and seen you had it bad way before her."
There's something pondering and hesitating in the way Maven's head tilts.
"You can sleep in my bed." Thomas offers, and realizes that's probably not the most attractive reason. " You need some peace, dude. I'll crash on the floor or in the kitchen."
He can smell the protest before it's even spoken out loud.
"No, no." Thomas stops him. "Slept way worse than on the ground. Homeless, remember?"
He's surprised and worried by the answer. "I don't want to be alone."
Thomas thinks of the way he curled together on the stones in the cold, shaking and lost.
"Yeah, I understand that."
They lie back to back, and Thomas is sure he'll explode with every breath next to him. He presses himself against the wall as if his life depends on it (it does. In some way.) and wishes to melt into it.
"You're out of the loop, Mave." He dares to say into the depths of the night. "Is this about your family?"
"Maybe. I am not sure." There's something nervous and twitching in the answer, and Thomas feels tendrils of another darkness creep through the blanket and making Thomas shiver.
"You need to figure it out," Thomas whispers back. " I'm no expert, maybe you should just-"
"No," there is cold aversion at the mere thought. "I'm done with people telling me I am wrong. I don't need to talk about the way my father ignores me or how my brother is the better person. I don't need them. I am not weak, and I won't-"
"Dude, remember how you told me I should go home and talk it out with my family? This is the same. You matter. And people don't make you weak." Thomas cuts him off, sharply. "Who'd say shit like that?"
There's no answer.
You'll never be enough, boy, he suddenly thinks.
Oh no. Thomas is far from willing to go there.
"I don't know what's happening in your head. But just...I dunno. I'm a little scared."
There's a sharp breath shattering something between their bodies. "I scare you?"
"Oh please, " Thomas forces himself to stay calm. "Fuck no, I am scared for you."
There's nothing more left to say. None of them tries to move on the too small floating island of the mattress.
Maven sleeps until afternoon like he's dead, and Thomas doesn't attempt to wake him. He just does things that afford little attention, staying close and watching. A number he doesn't recognize has attempted to call him three times in the morning. When he tries to call back no one answers. He hopes it's nothing serious. But people know where he lives if they need him. Or they'll call again. He hopes.
The empty apartment comes to mind and he feels so down he just stares at Maven's sleeping form for a moment, trying to force his body to function.
When Maven finally wakes up he's still drowsy and doesn't move much.
"Your mother called. Like twenty times. Cal too." Thomas says, daring to be a little noisy.
There's little to no reaction to that.
"I texted him. Told him you were with me and you're..not hurt." Thomas thinks of the hurling questions and snapping answers as if he just had dragged Maven out of his house and duct taped him in a trunk. "Funny. He thought you were still mad at me."
Not like he isn't used to being a dirty secret.
"Wanna have some breakfast?"
Maven stares at his phone, like he's hungover and just woke up in the strangest place.
"It's almost two."
Thomas shrugs. "Lunch then. Whatever. Food is food."
"I am not hungry." He's making no attempt to leave the bed. Thomas takes the pedal he wants to check off the drawer and quickly shoves the blasted shirt away and out of sight."Don't you have to work?"
Another shrug. He's not turning around, fiddling with the machine. "Called in sick. And even if they fire me, who cares? My best friend hangs around there, but she'll just move along to annoy me."
"The girl on the picture?"
"Forgot you know the others from Barrow. Yeah, that one. Tough cookie."
"She's pretty, I suppose."
Doesn't mean shit, just wait, he remembers Cameron say.
I owe her another terrible concert, he thinks. When this whole shit town calms a little.
"Yeah you tell her once, "Thomas says, mocking, thinking of her mean right. "Don't wanna see the day people try to hit on Cameron Cole."
Something in the way Maven leans forward is suspicious curious. "Cole, you say?"
Thomas draws his eyebrows together. " Know her?"
"Never met her." Maven assures him and it's not a complete lie.
"She hates you, by the way," Thomas informs him, pushing the pedal up and down, feeling the resistance behind the smooth mechanism. Probably just needs to be cleaned for starters. "But that's just how she's always. There's a chocolate chunk hidden in that cookie."
His hands get to work and he stares at the calloused fingers in disgust before he concentrates on doing his job.
"Found the problem?" Maven's voice asks.
Thomas breathes deep.
"Maybe, need to take it piece by piece, clean it, but it's older stuff so I need to be careful or else-" when he turns his head his nose almost collides into Mavens' face, leaning over his shoulder. For the longest of seconds, he's just staring. Get a grip, he tells himself." It falls apart. Can't afford a new one."
"I have no clue about any kind of mechanics. That was always-" Maven stops himself.
"Don't worry, I'll get around somehow." Thomas tries to reassure him before he gets back to the piece of metal in his hand. Maven watches him silent. For a while, they just sit on the floor and don't talk.
When he finally is all alone again he can't really say what's going on.
Everything is falling apart.
Everything he tried to keep or retrieve.
He can't hold it together. Thomas is sure he can't stop. Maybe he'll die trying. He attempts to call the stranger's number again. A part of him hopes it's his weird rebel parents. That one of them picks up and they'll have a good laugh.
Some small and unimportant reason.
He knows better and no one answers.
The next day at work Cameron doesn't show up until the evening.
She looks terrible.
Her hair is dirty and there's dried blood on her face.
Thomas almost drops his back.
"Shit." is the only thing his mouth mutters and makes a step forward.
"I called you, asshole," she says, and there's something in her voice he never thought he would hear. She sounds tired. "I stole a phone and fucking called you. You didn't even come to work."
"What happened?"
"What do you think?!"
It's the second time this day he sees that hurt look, limping and weak under the surface of the sharpest razor blade.
So neither Shade or Farley called him.
And he let his best friend down too.
"Shit." He repeats, wanting nothing more than to curl into a tight ball." Come on, let's get the fuck away from here. You can punch me if it helps."
" S'not the same if you want it." She scoffs.