The next morning, when Mark walks from his room to Roger's to check on him, see if he's awake, Roger's not there again.

This time, Mark doesn't freak out. He calmly checks every room, the balcony, and then checks them one more time. Only then does a little spark of panic light up in his chest.

But then he remembers the roof. It doesn't take long to get out there, and there he is, sitting on one of those folding chairs April had found in the dumpster behind the building. Mark stops when he sees him. Roger's holding his guitar.

"Hey," Mark says slowly, cautiously walking over to his friend. "You okay?"

Roger's mouth turns up, but Mark knows him well enough to know that it isn't a smile. "Yeah."

Mark gestures. "So. You've … you been playing?"

Roger sighs angrily and none too carefully drops the guitar. "Dammit, Mark."

Mark bristles. Can't Roger let him have this one thing, after all these months?

"What?"

Roger looks at him, and his eyes seem a little red, squinting against the sun. "Will you just let me breathe, for God's sake?" He grimaces. "Every minute you're there, breathing down my fucking neck like I'm going to break or something." Roger looks up at him, apology making his face a little less hard. "I just need some room."

Mark pauses, ridiculously aware of his chest rising and falling. It was like a slap to the face, hearing Roger say that. He swallows.

"Fine," he says, and turns around, walking back to the loft. Then he grabs his jacket, and walks around the city for the rest of the day.

- - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

It's almost nightfall when Mark returns. Maureen should be getting home any minute, and Mark is looking forward to it. He thinks he might try to talk her into going out, sharing a dinner somewhere, to get out, to be together, to feel light with each other for a while.

Mark pulls back the loft door, surprised to see the loft lit only by the fading rays of the sun. He walks in, and sees a figure sitting on the windowsill. Roger. And he's staring – just staring out the window, motionless – with his guitar in his lap. Mark can feel his mouth tightening as he walks over.

"No," he says when he's right beside him, and Roger looks up in surprise.

"No what?" he asks. "Where'd you come from?"

"Look, Roger, I don't know what's going on," Mark says roughly, wondering even as he speaks where these words are coming from. Not him. "I have no fucking idea. But fuck if I am gonna let it ruin you. And if that means – if it isn't already painfully clear, I'm not going anywhere. No matter what the fuck you say. No matter what you do."

Roger just stares at him a moment. Mark can see him swallowing, and wonders what the fuck he's doing. Why is he risking pissing off Roger? Why is he doing something that could scare him away?

Roger licks his lips, eyes never leaving Mark's. "Well, that's not going to work, Mark. Because I'm not some little pet for you to take care of and dress up."

Mark stares at him, disbelieving. Then he springs into action, grabbing a poster off the wall and pulling a pen out of a drawer, scribbling a quick note to Maureen. He can't stay and wait for her. He can't go out for dinner anymore. He just needs to walk. He needs to get out.

He can feel Roger's eyes on him as he hauls the door to the loft open one more time. But there are a couple more things fighting their way out of him.

"Fuck you," are his parting words to the man watching him from the windowsill.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Mark walks almost all night – it's probably not the smartest thing he could do, but he needs to. There's a burn in him he needs to put out, and this is the only way he can think of to do it.

When he gets home, Maureen is already awake, sitting curled up on the couch and drinking coffee.

"Hey, baby," she says, looking up at him, her face tight. "I was worried."

He collapses beside her. "I'm sorry."

She looks at him concernedly. "Where were you?"

"I was walking." Mark says simply, stretching his neck.

"…Are you okay?"

Mark looks at her, nods. "I … went somewhere, too."

She looks at him curiously, taking a sip of coffee.

Mark shifts uncomfortably. "I – I yelled at Roger last night. I really did," he adds wryly, seeing Maureen's look. "And I was worried – what if I made him use, you know? What if I – "

Mark pulls his knees up to his chest, hugging his legs, feeling like a five year old. He's feeling that way a lot lately, he realizes. "And, so, there was this clinic open, and I went in, and talked to them."

"And?" Maureen says intently. Mark can't help but wonder if she's hoping for something.

"And they said that if I think Roger is using again, I have the option to call an ambulance."

Maureen takes a quick little breath. "You mean – "

"I mean." Mark nods slowly, looking up but not seeing anything around him. "I just – they talked about all this stuff, about dealing with emotional problems …" Mark rubs his hand against the back of his neck, trying to massage out the knots. It doesn't work.

Maureen looks away, her eyes troubled. "But he hasn't used in a really long time, right? So maybe – maybe he is dealing with it … Maybe you don't have to worry … "

Mark shakes his head, a small movement that barely registers. "No. I mean, right now it's okay, yeah. But if he uses again – if he – it means he doesn't have a handle on it." Mark casts his eyes down. "And I would have to call – "

He catches the widening of her eyes. "They'd force him?" Maureen breathes.

"I wouldn't have any other choice!" Mark bursts out, loud, months of tension coiling in his body. He takes a deep breath, and lowers his voice. "I'm not even sure we could afford it, if they'd do it if we couldn't pay …"

"It won't come to that. And if you can't pay …" Maureen shrugs as if to say that then, the choice would be taken out of his hands. Mark scowls and turns away, eyes burning dryly and feeling forced open. He doesn't think he wants to see Maureen's reaction to his words.

"If it worked, I'd fucking sell my blood every fucking week to pay for it."

Maureen doesn't say anything, doesn't react to the low, intense tone in his voice that surprises even him, and Mark looks at her for a second, suddenly feeling impossibly tired. "Look, I'm – I'm on no sleep, I'm not making sense … I'm gonna go lay down, try to nap – or something."

Mark turns away when she nods, kissing her lightly before he heads into their bedroom. He turns back one last time, and can see Maureen staring at the floor intently before looking up quickly to glance at the door of Roger's room.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"Come in," Roger calls tiredly, feeling slightly annoyed by the knock. Mark has seen him naked and puking and shiveringly incoherent. He doesn't need to fucking knock.

But the door opens and the dark haired girl peeks her head in. Maureen. Roger sits up quickly, a little resentment burning through his chest. It's bad enough Collins and Benny and Mark had to see him this way. A stranger seeing him is practically unforgivable.

"Hi," she says, sounding a little shy, giving him a wave. Roger has to keep himself in check and not roll his eyes.

He satisfies himself by simply staring at her, not returning the greeting. He's a little surprised by her reaction. She stares back levelly, and then walks in and grins.

"You really are an amazing bastard, you know that?"

Roger smirks. "Thank you."

She crosses her arms over her chest, leaning against the wall in a surprisingly Mark-like pose. "Yeah, well, it's not like it was a compliment."

Roger shakes his head, but doesn't feel comfortable enough to lie down and face away from her. "I figured."

"Look, I don't know you," she says after a moment, not meeting his eyes. "And god knows I'm the last person on Earth who should make judgements on anybody."

Roger waits, looking at her. He can't imagine what all this is about.

"But I love Mark," she continues, and Roger feels another inexplicable little stab of dislike. "I really do. And he's so worried about you, so scared and works so hard for you – "

"Hey," Roger interrupts, sitting up straighter now, feeling pissed. "I haven't used in ages. Where was this little lecture when I was shooting up every night?"

"When you were shooting up every night you wouldn't have remembered a goddamned word I said."

If he didn't care about Mark so much – "It's really none of your fucking business, is it?"

"But it is," she says, and her voice is softer now as she looks down at the floor. "I don't want him to be hurt." Maureen pauses, looking down at her hands on her chest before looking back at him. When she speaks, it's quietly, almost a whisper. "I just don't see what makes you so fucking special."

Roger keeps himself from starting, from looking up sharply to see what she means. But he thinks about it.

She laughs suddenly, and it's not a nice laugh. "I bet you can't stand me. But we're more alike than you think."

Roger looks at her, stubbornly silent. He's not going to let one drop of his curiosity show on his face. After a few moments of this quiet stand-off, she sighs.

"The way he sees us – we can never be what he needs for us to be."

Roger feels a quick blaze of fury, of determination. "Speak for yourself."

She glances at him, eyes hard. "I'm glad you said that. And you are doing good. So I'm just telling you to keep doing good. And to not fuck this up."

Roger can't believe the nerve of this chick. His only defence is to keep staring at her, trying in the only way he can to be as unnerving to her as she is to him right now.

Maureen looks away, then glances back at Roger again, almost smiles. "You count on him, right?"

Roger's never thought about it before, but he knows the answer. "Yeah."

"Well, he needs someone to count on, too. And I've never seen anybody – " She pauses, watching him, like she's trying to figure something out. He fidgets inwardly a little under those searching eyes. "He loves you. A lot. That should mean something to you."

"It does."

"Then like I said," she says, straightening up and turning towards the door. "Don't fuck this up."

Roger's furious. This presumptuous incredible bitch. "Well, thanks for this little visit, I really fucking appreciate it!"

She turns back at his yelling, already halfway down the hall.

"Yeah," she answers. "You should."

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

When Mark is making coffee one day, it hits him.

Forty five days. Forty five days and Roger hasn't used.

Mark puts down his mug, astonished. My god, this is by far the longest he's gone, and the time has snuck up on Mark. He's used to counting but now barely registers the significance of whatever number he's on. Roger still gets cold occasionally, still has sleepless nights when Mark can hear him pacing through his room –

But he hasn't used.

Mark can feel a giddiness rising up in him. He can't say anything to Roger, that would be the absolute stupidest thing he could do – but he wants to be with him, see him for a while, and for the first time just acknowledge how far they've both come.

He's scared, but he knows he's less scared than he used to be. And he'd really like to share that feeling with Roger. If he'll let him.

Mark decides he's going to go out. He leaves the coffee warm and runs out of the loft and down the street, until he comes to the nearest café. He ducks inside and asks to use the bathroom, ignoring the annoyed look of the host and stopping by a table on the way out, grabbing a handful of sugar packets and little plastic cups of cream and stuffing them in his pants pockets.

The sun is shining on the walk back, and Mark looks around, amazed. Spring has hit New York now – real spring, with sunshine and things blossoming and warmth shimmering in the air. Another thing that's snuck up on him.

He gets back to the loft and finds the biggest mug they own, pouring in steaming coffee and then adding a ridiculous amount of sugar and cream. He grins to himself, a little. This needs to be his celebration. As far as he knows, Roger won't even look at him when he goes in.

He gives a quick knock but walks right in, and Roger looks up at him, a little grin on his face.

"I could have been jerking off, you know."

Mark raises his eyebrows, and hands Roger the mug. "You've got nothing I haven't seen."

Roger sits up and takes the mug, glancing at it as Mark goes to stand by the door. "We have milk?"

"Cream," Mark says, nodding at the cup. "Enough for that, at least."

"Nice," Roger says, and takes a sip, and Mark has to hold back a grin. It's stupid to feel this good about something that small, it really is.

"Can I stay a while?"

Roger nods, taking another drink, and Mark slides to the floor, watching him. After a moment he catches himself and looks down to the bottom of Roger's bed, feeling a slight flush in his face. Most of the time, he doesn't think about what he feels for Roger now. He just gets through the day.

But when simply bringing someone a special cup of coffee can be so good, can make him feel this way …

"You okay?"

Mark looks up sharply, thinking Roger has finally gone and read his mind. He's trying to formulate the right response when Roger continues.

"I mean, I know it's … hard. And without Collins …"

Oh. Right. Collins. Mark nods. "I'm okay."

"You sure?"

Mark wonders if Roger really cares, if he's even listening, but when he looks up Roger is staring at him, connecting and there. Another surprise. There's more and more of those these days.

"Yeah, I'm sure."

Mark looks down again, feeling Roger's eyes on him.

"I should have known that," Roger says quietly, breaking the suddenly heavy silence in the room.

"Known what?" Mark asks curiously.

"That you'd be okay," Roger answers, looking at his door and not at Mark. "You always are. It's like … it's like you have this whole other world that you can slip into, whenever you want." Roger smiles a little tightly. "It used to drive me crazy, feeling like I couldn't follow where you went when we were pissed at each other. But I could almost see it on your face – you cutting off and going into yourself."

Mark watches Roger silently, feeling taken aback and wondering what's coming next. Did he really do that? What is Roger talking about?

"You're always so strong, Mark," Roger says after a moment, a small sigh hinting through his voice, and Mark feels another electric shock of surprise. What?

"I wish I was more like you … if I could just get away … not think about it, not feel so much, not be so in it all the time …" Roger coughs lightly. "I miss her." And then he laughs, just a little, sounding like he's about to cry. "And I miss playing my fucking guitar. How stupid and ridiculous is that, huh?"

Mark wonders, if Roger looked up at him right now instead of staring into his lap, if Roger would be able to see how his heart was breaking right now. Would see how there was no way in hell he could ever speak because his throat is closed off too tightly.

But no. Roger thinks he's strong.

That's what's ridiculous. Because right now Mark's heart is so big and so filled with pain for Roger that he can barely stand it. It's one of those times, the ones that come on so suddenly and are so hard to get through. Mark leans back and hits his head lightly on the wall, and wishes Roger could look just a little closer.

Mark is in it, in it all, all the time. But so much of that, so much of the emotion that builds up in him – it's unsharable. No one can ever know. Not even Roger. Especially not Roger. Not now. So he keeps it to himself.

But that doesn't mean he doesn't feel it.

When he feels like he has enough control, Mark dares to get up and go lay beside Roger on the bed, stretching out with his head resting by the knee of the boy sitting cross-legged beside him. He looks up at the ceiling, and can feel Roger turning to look down at him. Somehow Mark knows what Roger is about to ask. But that doesn't mean he has any idea of how the hell to answer him.

"Mark?"

"Yeah?"

Roger pauses. "Why do you put up with it?"

Mark laughs suddenly, forced and uncomfortable. "What?"

"I know we've been – you know, best friends, or whatever – since practically the moment we met." Mark turns in time to see Roger looking down at him, Roger's lip curled up softly, and Mark smiles back, maybe the first genuine smile he's given Roger since that night.

"But, still, man – I mean, shit, my own mother … I don't think my mom would have stuck through all this."

Roger stares at Mark, right in his eyes, making him feel like those green eyes are seeing right through him, seeing every thought and molecule that makes him up. Mark remembers suddenly how he was the one to make the call to Roger's mother; he was the one to tell the barest of details he could and still hear her near-hysteria, the one to convince her that her coming to the city immediately would not be the best thing, the one who promised her that he would take care – good care – of her son.

Mark is flooded with memories then, playing just behind his eyes, released by the thought of that phone call. The first night he came here, following up on some offer his roommate from Brown had casually made almost a year before. Mark had suddenly decided one day to just quit school and actually try and do with his life what he'd always wanted, and fuck everything else. He was standing dripping in Benny's doorway that night, holding Benny's last letter, hadn't called beforehand, hadn't even told his parents yet, it was raining and cold and dirty and he was pretty sure he'd just seen somebody getting mugged. Mark was fucking terrified.

And this boy with an easy grace and bleached blonde spiked hair had walked over to him and Benny, interest in his eyes, and slung an arm over Mark's shoulder, laughing.

"You're soaking wet," he'd said, looking earnestly down into Mark's eyes, as if Mark didn't already know how pathetic he was without being made fun of. Then he'd raised his head to Benny.

"Are you the cat that dragged this one in?"

It turned out that Roger had been dragged in the month before by Collins, who had immediately pulled out his stash of pot and given Mark his first ever hit of a drug. They'd all talked and laughed, but Mark and Roger had stayed up the longest, sitting on a pile of blankets in front of the loft's windows, talking until the sun started streaking through the loft while the other boys snored softly.

It had happened so easily – Roger had been the outsider, and then he was the big brother that Mark had never had taking him under his wing. After that first night Mark was never scared about living in New York again.

The club. That one time, not long before Roger had met April – and now Mark wonders if Roger was high then, but at the time it hadn't even crossed his mind, he hadn't known the signs – in the back after a show, at this tiny table, knees touching, and Mark had only had one beer, so he couldn't blame it on that, and he'd giggled that he'd never slept with a girl.

Roger's eyebrows had hit the ceiling. "Really? You're a virgin? I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but – "

"Shut up," Mark had said easily, grinning and taking another sip of beer. "I said I've never slept with a girl. I didn't say I was a virgin."

It takes a few moments for this to sink in before a slow smile spreads across Roger's face. "No shit?"

"No shit," Mark confirms, nodding.

"So who's your type?" Roger asks, gesturing to all the people dancing around them. Mark points out one couple, a girl with long blonde hair and a guy with brown messy hair and tattoos, their arms wrapped around each other.

"I like them. They're both cute."

In the lights of the club, Roger's eyes look like they're sparkling. "No shit," he says again, and he almost sounds admiring, and before Mark can try to analyze that Roger's mouth is on his and they're kissing, tongues warm in each other's mouths.

When Roger breaks away, he laughs, looking away as he asks, "So would I be your type?"

And Mark only has time to think Hell, yes, before Roger jumps up and throws himself into the crowd of dancers.

And then that night, Roger cradling April's still face, his eyes burning into Mark. Just – burning. Mark's heart clutching and calling the ambulance and crawling into bed next to Roger when he was scared to even look at him.

Mark turns slightly away from Roger now to stare at the ceiling. "I don't know," he says simply.

But it's a lie. He knows.