"What can I do about it?" Bubba hesitated. Being that the question was preposterous, even from the lips of someone always speaking of preposterous things, he wasn't quite sure how to react to it. What could be done? And what made it anyone's responsibility outside of his own? He was pensive in his pondering, as it was particularly unusual for him to share his burdens, much less allow someone else's opinion or support on the subject matter.

"I told you not to freak out," he reminded, a teacher chiding their student for their behavioral incongruence. He was still on his knees, which made the statement all the more awkward and contrasting.

"And I'm not," Marshall protested, "Or at least I'm trying my best not to. But it's a wee bit difficult considering there's criminal on the loose and he has your number." Bubba knew that Marshall was right, and that by the feigned steadiness of his speaking pattern, that he was really trying to keep his cool for the both of them. Still. What was he supposed to do with this information? To what extent could he possibly solve this problem? Not to mention that in a way, he still blamed Marshall as much he did Ms. Mint for this particular predicament. How could he not? The only two people still prevalent enough in his life had to be some way responsible for his current state, otherwise all he would have to blame was himself.

Realizing that Bubba would not be replying to him anytime soon, Marshall tried again. "Come here," he said, "Come here and sit next to me." He was patting at the car seat next to him, like a child that only knew to demand solace in closeness.

"Since when are you the boss of me?" But Bubba got up off of the floor of the car and sat alongside him anyways, a tad bit closer than what was technically necessary. Despite his stressed and hell-bent stage, Marshall could tell that he was content to be in physical adjacency to someone again, even though it was in a way quite different from what he had originally intended. Perhaps that was for the best. They sat beside each other in mutual silence for what felt like hours, but was probably no more than a couple minutes.

This time Bubba spoke first. His hand was resting atop Marshall's, not that he had moved it there, but that it had simply "accidentally" found itself in such a position when he fell against the softness of the seat, and he couldn't be fucked to move it. "What should I do," he said, and for the first time he sounded like a scared little boy as opposed to the man pursuing him, as he repeated the question to provide further clarification, "What should I do?'" Marshall sighed a little, and given the tight spacing, it was quite likely that that breath would mingle itself in Bubba's own inhalation. That was intimate, in a way that going down or tangling bodies was not. Just breathing. Together. Like a decaying person, he had found his life support in the inhales and exhales of another.

"I asked first."

Bubba now laced his fingers into his. This was the first time Marshall truly noticed the smallness of his hands. And the softness. It was almost like cradling a newborn babe.

"You asked what you could do. That's a very different question, Marshall. And shameless at that. I mean, are you the kind of person who just offers himself up wholly to the first stranger he meets?" Marshall understood that to be a ridicule of his sexual eagerness as well, but he did not quite get the point of the remark. One minute Bubba was putting out and saying how much he loved him, and the next he was scolding all of Marshall's attempts to so much as bask in the glory of his presence. So Marshall ignored the question.

"I mean, that's why you want to run away, isn't it?"

"Your zipper's only half up."

"Bubba."

This time it was he who sighed. It was the same morning it had been just ten minutes ago, though it felt to be a very different hour, a very different year even. "Yes," he said, "yes, it is. You act as if you're going to help me, but you wouldn't even do a little thing like that." Marshall knew that Bubba knew that it was no "little thing", just as he knew the birds were still outside chirping, even when he couldn't hear them over his own heartbeat, over someone else's that was so near in proximity to him. He finally mustered the courage to look Bubba in the eye again, and he saw that he was crying.

Marshall didn't know too much about crying. He knew that when he cried (which was often), it always helped to put on some Amy Winehouse and think of the future, a future with his own kids and his own house from which he could see all the stars. But Marshall wasn't sure if Bubba would be keen on all that. So instead he squeezed the other's hand more tightly, like it was a promise they both new he couldn't keep.

"Come here," he said again, this time with furthered intent, "come here and let me hold you." Bubba blinked at the tears, far too frustrated and generally humiliated to be bothered with wiping them away. He thought he looked ugly look with them still, an ugly boy and his ugly tears. Worse than that, he felt he looked weak. He had only been weak once before in front of Marshall, and the time before that had been many years ago with a different sort of someone.

"You say that like it means something," he said, "Like you mean something. You're a fool to so much as look at the likes of me when I speak, much less offer consolation. You'll hurt me and I'll let you. And now he's back and god forbid you call attention to the irony of it being so soon after you became him! You are nothing to me. Why would I ever do as I say, or entertain you any longer or in a more ridiculous fashion then I already have?"

"Is that it?" Marshall asked, "Is it all out now?" Bubba then nodded wordlessly, letting another one of those alligator tears snake its way down his face. They made his face glitter and glow, a divinity even in sadness.

"Good." Marshall said. And then he pulled him in so tightly against his chest that his face was buried and those tears became his own, sticking to his jacket like that was where they were meant to be.

An effort was made. And rereading this over and over until I could bear it made me realize...my writing has improved significantly over the course of this story, and even over the course of these past few months. I think it helps that I'm very into my current lit class, and was pretty heavily influenced by Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter to step up my frilliness game. God, does that not sound depressingly pretentious? I don't mean to say I'm as talented or experienced as someone like that, just that I tend to draw from older works and abstract poetry and I think exposing myself to more of that has been helping. Again, more rambling regarding updates is on my tumblr, so I'll try to stop cluttering up my actual story so much.