Trout couldn't look at the stranger wandering around the boarding house dressed as his friend. He moved his things away from the bunk they'd shared since they were just small boys and to the farthest bed away he could. He couldn't even make himself sleep on the top bunk anymore, Any time his hand or foot felt the open air while he slept, his mind went back to that eighth story window, staring up at Spot's blank face. Some nights, he couldn't sleep unless he moved his mattress to the floor. Some nights he didn't sleep at all, watching Spot writhe in his sleep or going down to sit outside of Marta's door, keeping watch over her the best he could.

Marta didn't seem to know how to act or who to be. When she let herself, the old Kisser, her loud laugh and wicked tongue would come out and have all the boys in either stitches or shaking in their boots, but, just as quickly, her eyes would go sad and wide and she would retreat to her room or walk out the door, not stopping until she reached Most Holy Trinity. The first few times, he followed her, but when she just went to confession or sat in the church day after day, hour after hour, he stopped and let her be.

He sat his own silent reverie at the front desk of the Lodging House, just hoping no one would come to the door while he tried to make peace with everything that had happened. As usual, his wish didn't come true. A soft knock was followed by the door opening a crack. "Hello?" a familiar, soft but gritty voice called in. Darcy's blonde head peeked around the door and she smiled. Her dress and her coat were simple but new. The bruises on her face still looked just as angry as all of theirs did though. She tugged at her coat, looking so uncomfortable in her own skin that he felt bad for her. "Heya Trout," she said quietly. He stared at her through shadowed eyes and raised an eyebrow at her. She smiled shyly, "Can you help me find Spot, please?" He sighed and swung his legs off the desk, wincing at the tug of the stitches the tiny girl in front of him put in his legs. Waving her forward, he led her to the stairs, stopping in the bunk room.

Spot's coat and hat hung together on the wall, his boots lined up below. "You know how much he talked about you when he was with me?" she asked as he pulled the grey wool blanket off of Spot's bunk and folded it carefully. "He said you was like his brother, told me about all the trouble you two used to get into as kids." She was pretty when she talked about him; the smile actually looked happy. "He trusts you with his life, you know that?" He looked up at her through his eyelashes as he handed over the blanket. They stopped, just staring at each other for a moment. "But that isn't everything, is it." Her voice was soft and sad.

He moved his hands, knowing she had no way to understand what his gestures meant. 'It's your turn,' he signed. 'I can't.' The strange feeling of understanding in the gray-green mist of her eyes pulled at his heart. He had to get rid of her. He beckoned her to follow and led her to the stairs up to the roof. Though he knew he should go down, he sat on the top step and watched her move tentatively across the rooftop.

Spot sat in the corner, no coat despite the small, icy snowflakes that the cold wind pelted him with. His feet were stockinged and his big toe stuck out of a hole in them. He didn't see her; he was lost in his thoughts. She stood silently watching him for a few moments, hoping he would notice her. When he didn't she called to him softly, "Spot?" He jumped to his feet ready to fight and breathing heavily. Trout's heart was slamming against his eardrums. He could hear it and feel it in every inch of his body. Only Darcy could understand that fear, because she was the only other person who had tried to tame that beast. She didn't dare move until he straightened up. He was panting and sweating despite his purple lips and cold nipped face. "You ok?" she called from her place by the roof access door, still afraid to step forward.

"Yeah,"he groaned, sinking back down. She approached cautiously ad plopped his grey cap onto his head. It didn't fit as well as the one he lost the day Niko attacked him and fell over his eyes. He righted it as she draped his coat over his shoulders and dropped the blanket over his lap.

"Whattaya doing up here all alone? Trying to catch your death?" she asked as she sat down.

Trout rolled his eyes, knowing exactly what Spot would say. His outbursts were always worse when it was cold. Like the chill pulled out that monster, but thanks to Mick, there was now nothing but monster left. Spot spent all of his time huddled on the roof. He always left when it happened, always had. He could remember waking up on cold nights when he was the new kid to find Spot out of bed pulling his clothes on in the dark. Everyone else was still asleep, even Kisser, who seemed to be awake anytime anyone else opened their eyes. Trout would sit up and watch Spot move, knowing something was off. Normally, he could see the thought in every move his friend made, but times like this, he would throw his limbs about, like one would slam a door. Trout would climb down from his bunk, but Spot whirled around and fixed him with a steely and frightening glare. "You ain't coming with me," he growled in a voice that chilled Trout more than the cold air outside the blankets. "You ain't gotta follow me everywhere, you keep away from me!" Before he could even react Spot would slam the window shut behind him as he ran down the fire escape. Trout was so confused. He knew he couldn't have done anything to make Spot mad, he was asleep, but he obviously did something. The sun rose on a cold, but sunny day while Trout tried to understand those few moments.

He played with his hat and stared at Spot's coat and hat hanging on his hooks on the wall, and his boots on the floor underneath while all the other boys filed out. "Trout!" Scat bellowed from the doorway. "Bells about to ring, getta move on!" Trout stood and turned, shuffling over to Scatter. "Jesus kid, whatssamattah? You got a face gloomier than a chimney sweep's this morning." Trout jerked his head over and Spot's empty bed. Scat smiled, rubbing his chin, "Yeah, he does that. Those dreams of his…they cut him deep sometimes and he needs to get away. Honestly, I'm surprised he's let you be glued to his side as long as he has."

Trout touched his pocket, which had become his sign for Spot after learning that he got the name from having his spot at Kisser's side where he grabbed her pocket when he was too little to sell by himself, and made the meanest monster face he could manage. Scat chuckled and patted his shoulder.

"He ain't mad, not at you. He just gets spooked. You'll probably see him in the yard and he'll be back to normal. I mean, don't expect an apology or nothing from the little bastard, but he'll be back to normal."

He took a deep breath, feeling very alone all of a sudden and reached out to grab Scat's hand, pulling him to the door without looking back at him. He was able to breathe again when Scat chuckled and returned the grip. When they returned to the lodging house after selling their second round of papers, all the boys were downstairs looking up at the bunk room. "What gives?" Scat asked.

"Spot's been out since dawn, no shoes, no coat. Kiss and Noakes are with him, but he's being a pill, even by his standards."

As if on cue, Spot's surly little voice yelled, "I ain't sick! Get offa me! Don't touch me!" There was a crash and a clatter before old, bearded Noakes stumbled out into the hallway, red faced and flustered.

He wiped his face with a handkerchief and muttered, "That youngin' has the Devil in him, I swear."

Kisser slipped out next, locking the door behind her. Her braid was unraveled and messy and she had red handprints and scratch marks down her face. Spot continued to throw his body against the door over and over again, screaming incoherently. Kiss looked up at Scat, her hazel eyes shiny with tears. "I don't know what's wrong with him. He knows me, he called me by my name, but he thinks I'm going to hurt him." She winced as the door behind her back rattled in it's frame with the force of Spot's body hitting it. Trout had never seen her look so shaken. Scat's face was stony, his jaw set and squared. "He's sure Noakes and I were trying to hold him down and hurt him, but we were just trying to put a blanket on him. He's blue. The things he accused us of, Scat…how does a seven year old even know about things like that? I didn't know about things like that!" The longer she talked the higher the pitch of her voice got and the more the words rushed out of her mouth as if she wasn't really in control of them. She wasn't normally one for tears and hysterics, but whatever Spot did or said had her thoroughly spooked and Scat reached out to her, wrapping one hand around the back of her neck gently and one around her waist pulling her into him tightly to soothe her.

Trout snuck past them and laid down on the floor in front of the door watching Spot's dirty, bloodied feet shuffle, stomp and kick through the crack. He knew how that felt, to have a hurricane blowing in his body and to be powerless to stop it, powerless to even contain who it hurt. That was how he felt in the schoolroom. He thought about how Kisser had held him and talked quietly in his ear to bring him back out of the storm and how she sang to Spot at night. He thought of that warm, full feeling he got earlier playing the harmonica. When he was so angry, he felt empty of everything but the anger and wondered if Spot felt empty too. He pursed his lips and let out a whistle, chirping out the tune of the lullaby that Kiss sang in the night. The hits and kicks and body slams slowed and then stopped and Spot slid down to sit against the door, breathing heavily. "I'll be damned," Scat whispered, while Trout continued to whistle the song. He felt them all watching him, his skin prickled with the feeling of all of the eyes on him. After a few minutes of silence, Spot also laid down on the floor and they looked at each other through the crack. His lips were blue, his nose red from cold and his eyes bloodshot. His slender fingers slipped under the door, reaching for human contact for the first time anyone could remember and Trout gingerly slid his in-between Spots. His fingers were like icicles, sucking the warmth from Trout's much softer, thicker digits, but Trout didn't pull away. He wished he could send more warmth through his skin and into Spot's.

He shook himself out of that memory. He was done always being the one sticking his fingers under the door. It was someone else's turn, and Darcy was willing to listen to Spot explain himself. "I like the cold, it lets me know what's what. And I ain't trying to catch nothing, just keeping my boys safe." Despite his words, he pulled his arms into the sleeves of his coat and pulled it tightly around himself. Trout had to stifle a snort.

She scrunched her nose, "Safe from what? Mick is gone; your boys is safe Spot."

"From me," he said in a voice that was more vibrations than sound. That stopped Trout. It was the first sign of his friend that he'd seen. She clasped her hands tightly in her lap to keep the one closest to him from seeking his to hold onto. Her fear that her touch would turn him feral again, that she'd end up alone on a roof with the beast that killed Mick, was palpable.

She rubbed her palms together and tried to change the subject, "Your face is healing good. The scar wont be too bad." His hand darted out from under the blanket and captured hers, drawing it in and sandwiching it between his icy palms.

"I dunno know how to do this," he mumbled, not looking up. He'd never sounded so young, or so lost or so broken, not in all the times they'd come out the other side of one of Spot's episodes."They all know what I did, how I was in there. They ain't looking at me the same. They used to respect me, now they's just scared."

"Me neither," she answered, placing her other hand onto of his. "My sisters expect me to be like I was when I left, but its not like I spent the last five years at finishing school doing needlepoint! Everything I say and how I say it is wrong. My mother looks at me like I'm a roach in the kitchen. She knows what I am now."

"What you was never bothered me none. And you ain't doing it no more. You can do whatever else you want now, Kid." She loved that it didn't bother him and that he emphasized 'was'. It was a solid truth of their…friendship. She was Mick's whore, paid in room and board, and he didn't lie. He fully believed that she could do whatever else she wanted now that she was free.

She sighed and rested her head against his shoulder and furrowed her brow, "You been eating? Your shoulder is like a plumbing fixture." He scowled at her as he wrapped a lanky arm and the flap of his coat around her and she dropped it.

"Trout won't even look me in the face. I can see it when I'm around, all he sees is me holding him out the window, or stabbing Mick. He can't find me behind what he saw at the tenement." It hurt to hear, but how could Spot not know? It had always been the two of them together, Trout at Spot's side. And now he couldn't stand being in the same room. Sitting this close on the rooftop, with the edge of the building so close was enough to make Trout nauseated.

She shrugged, unsure whether it was ok to tell him what she was thinking or not. "He feels things different than you do. Trust is important to him." Trout wondered how she knew that. She was so sharp and quick, but so deeply observant, it was unnerving.

"Trust is important to me!" he squawked, but pulled her closer rather than pushing her away.

"Shut up," she snapped. "Loyalty is important to you and that's different. Loyalty is a one was street, trust goes both ways." She giggled at the shocked look on his face. "It's gotta go both ways for him, Spot. You never really hurt him before, but now that you have, you's gonna have to show him that he can trust you again and that you trust him."

He sat, his mouth hanging open, his eyes wide and glassy. "Did you tell me to shut up?"

She smirked, "I sure did." She leaned into him harder, "And I'll do it again and again, anytime youse being stupid." He found himself smiling as he turned her hand over in between his. He kissed her fingertips, they were still warmer than his lips. He leaned down and drew warmth from her lips, her warmth was the only warmth he trusted. Trout couldn't sit anymore. He could watch Spot become loved, something he'd always wanted, while he felt more alone than ever.

Trout stumbled down the stairs and closed himself in the kitchen, tucking himself into the seat in the corner behind the worn little round table. He dug in his pockets, emptying their contents onto the tabletop. One harmonica, one notepads and three whittled down pencil stubs. Normally, he would play himself some music when he felt alone like this. The people he loved had a way of slipping through his fingers, doing things they said they wouldn't. Trout felt about music the way Spot felt about the cold. It told him the truth that he needed to hear. He flipped up the front cover of the notepad and pulled a worn photograph out. Her big eyes stared back at him, deep and dark. She wasn't the first, but she was the one who hit the hardest because he never saw it coming with her. He stayed where he was when she left, because he had Marta and Spot. At fifteen, he didn't think he could make it without them, but now...now things were different. In two years, she never made it back to him. Trout decided that it was time for him to look for her. It was time for her to come first, not Spot. Spot had Darcy; someone else to take over as main keeper and punching bag of the legend of Brooklyn.