A little over a week passed, in the pattern of Antonio offering to give Lovino rides to and from work, and him always declining; and Antonio showing up before his E-Z Mart shift was over, usually with a gift of some sort and dinner, before walking him to McDonalds. Lovino stopped refusing or destroying his gifts, although he still wouldn't allow Antonio to give him a ride; and Antonio stopped trying to talk about the past or anything relating to Lovino, for Lovino would always clam up and end the conversation if it ever turned to himself or what they had been before, or what had happened in the four years he had been gone.

Although neither of them were honest with each other, or even remotely okay or over what had happened all those years ago; they reached a kind of familiarity, where Antonio had accepted that Lovino was pissed at him, and Lovino had accepted that Antonio wouldn't leave him alone, no matter how mean he was to him. That didn't stop him from trying, however.

At least not until a week and two days passed since they had met again.

It began like any other evening, with Antonio visiting Lovino during his E-Z Mart shift- he bought Lovino Aster flowers this time; "They mean patience," he had said, handing them to him over the counter with a deep, flamboyant bow which made all the other customers stare- and watched as Lovino ate dinner before taking him to his next job at McDonald's.

As soon as he walked in, he was handed a mop.

"Thank god you're here," said his manager gratefully. "There's been an accident in the PlayPlace. You'll want to double up your gloves," he added in a hush.

"Okay," said Lovino slowly, processing the information. Everyone in the kitchen seemed to be looking at him with a grim expression. "Where in the PlayPlace is it?"

The manager looked down, as if he couldn't bear to look Lovino in the eyes. "Everywhere," he said, voice barely a whisper.

As soon as Lovino stepped into the PlayPlace, the smell hit him like a wave- he staggered backwards, clapping a gloved hand over his nose and mouth. He could barely breathe.

Eyes stinging from the stench, he managed to take a couple steps, and then another few, until he was mostly mobile again. It wasn't the first time he had cleaned up feces in the PlayPlace, but this was on a whole new level- shit was everywhere; on the slide, coating balls in the ballpit, through the tubes. It was smeared on walls, and there were little brown puddles in some of the tubes, and handprints to match. He couldn't believe just one kid had had such explosive diarrhea- it must have been a conspiracy, a shit orgy, just to punish him- he longed to just quit on the spot. But he needed the money, the meager $8.25 an hour, and it wouldn't be much different at Burger King, or KFC, or Chuck-e Cheese.

Feeling nauseous, he approached the first shit-pile trepidatiously. He wondered how much a gas mask cost, and if he could fit that into his monthly expenses somehow.

He looked back through the doors of the PlayPlace. Luis, at the register, gave him a small, sad smile.

"Good luck," he mouthed. Lovino nodded back, turned, set his shoulders, and began to clean.

It was hard work, scrubbing the spread feces off the twisty slide while balancing awkwardly, trying not to fall into the pile of shit-coated balls below him. Every time he finished one spot, there'd be another to clean and move on to, and after a while he felt his brain begin to shut down. He followed the trail of shit, cleaning dutifully on autopilot. His whole mind felt numb, and his back and thighs ached from bending over and squatting to clean the mess.

He felt distant, somehow, as if this weren't really happening to him; as if he were separate in mind and body, his conscience floating above himself, watching, as he wiped shit from the sides of tubes. The smell, the disgust- these were all false, imagined- he was really back home, except this home had a bathtub and he was in it, with bubbles up to his chest- he was drinking wine, real wine, from a bottle, not the gas station boxed wine he had become accustomed to. He was a real person, with free time and money and a hot water tank- yes, surely that was reality, and this was all some horrible, filthy dream and any moment now, he'd wake up to a better tomorrow.

It took almost the whole night to clean the PlayPlace. He finished around 4:30 am and, for once, wanted to go home early. Fuck the extra $20, he needed sleep and a bottle of red wine- he had an unopened 2009 Chianti he'd been dying to try- and a long shower. Yet when he finished, and washed his hands up to his elbows in the sink, the manager approached him again.

"Urinal's clogged," he said.

"And?" asked Lovino wearily, although he already knew the answer.

"Fix it."

"How?"

His manager paused. "Make it not clogged."

Lovino chewed his lip. Can't you just hire a plumber? he was dying to ask, but he had only been working there for two months and was very easily replaceable.

"Oh," his manager added after a second, handing him a bucket and a cup. "You'll need these."

"What for?"

"The pee," he called over his shoulder, hurrying back to the kitchen. Lovino looked down at the cup in his hand.

Wake up, he willed himself. Wake up and make this nightmare disappear.

But he couldn't. He had a urinal to clean.

The bathroom door creaked eerily as he opened it. He smelled the urinal before he saw it.

It was full of pee, to the point of overflowing; and, judging by the puddle on the floor beneath it, it had. Evidently customers had just kept peeing in it instead of using another urinal.

The pit of disgust and nausea in Lovino's stomach grew, churning unpleasantly. As he reached out with one double-gloved hand, clutching the cup, he saw it was shaking.

Lovino held his breath, then counted to three before finally forcing himself to stick his hand into the piss-pool and scoop out a cup. The gloves he were wearing were the flimsy sandwich making gloves, and had no suction at all. When he drew out his hand, the glove fingers were filled with pee.

It took twenty minutes to scoop all of the pee out of the urinal and into the bucket. During that time, his gloves fell off a total of eight times, and were almost always filled with piss when he took them out. Eventually he just gave up on them completely and resigned himself to plunging his bare hands into lukewarm piss.

The source of the clogging turned out to be simple enough: an almost two foot long mass of matted pubic hairs and god knew what else. Lovino had to pull it, hand-over-hand, from the drain- it seemed determined to stay put, clinging to the sides of the drain. When he finally managed to yank it out, the momentum and power in his pull caused the two-foot long pubic monstrosity to leap into the air, causing an arc of yellow piss to shower down on Lovino and the rest of the bathroom, before falling in a manner less than graceful and slapping him square in the face.

There was one moment: one horrible, awful, disgusting moment, where Lovino could feel it slithering down his face, dripping down his collar and off the bridge of his nose, before he was able to move again and snatch it from his face and toss it into the bucket. Afraid to open his eyes in case piss dripped in them, he felt around for the sink and stuck as much of his body under the tap as he could. Chest heaving, he gripped the sides of the sink for support. It was a while before he turned off the tap, but his heart was still racing, stomach still churning.

Antonio woke, as usual, to the sound of the door closing. He checked his phone: 6:32, later than usual. Groaning, he fumbled around in the backseat until he found a shirt and was beginning to pull it on when he heard a noise that he was not used to hearing. It sounded like something large and wet hitting concrete, and as he stuck his head mistakenly through one of the sleeves of the shirt, he saw through the fabric that it was Lovino, projectile vomiting by one of the trash cans.

Antonio swore and abandoned his attempts at putting the shirt on and leapt out of the car, rushing over to Lovino.

"Lovi!" he called, almost tripping over his shoelaces but righting himself at the last second. "Lovi! Hey, Lovi, you okay?" He reached his friend, but got no response. Nervously he placed a hand on his heaving shoulder.

"You're wet," he realized aloud, brushing back Lovino's bangs. "Why are you wet?"

"I-" Lovino began to say, but was interrupted as another volley of puke came spurting out his mouth. He had both hands on the dumpster and was leaning heavily on them, but they were shaking perilously beneath him.

Antonio was amazed at how much Lovino was able to vomit. He had barely eaten, to the best of his knowledge, having only an apple and peanut butter for dinner and a hard-boiled egg for breakfast.

It was several minutes before the vomiting finished completely, and even then, Lovino stayed hunched over, breathing heavily.

"You good?" asked Antonio, rubbing his back. Lovino paused, straightening up. He stumbled, beginning to fall, but Antonio caught him in time and hauled him back to his feet. He stood silently, shifting his weight from foot to foot, still swaying a little.

"Yeah," he croaked, bile hanging from his lower lip. He took a step forward, but his ankle trembled beneath him and he tumbled to the ground; yet again, Antonio grabbed him. He draped his arm around his shoulders and brought him to his car. Lovino leaned against it, sinking to a sitting position on the concrete. Antonio joined him.

"Sorry," Lovino apologized. "Just a bit… dizzy."

"No, no, it's fine." Antonio paused. "Are you okay? Are you sick or something?"

Lovino shook his head.

"Then what happened? Did you eat something bad?"

"No, nothing like that." Lovino pursed his lips, afraid if he said it aloud it might solidify what he wished was just a dream into reality. "Some kid, uh.. shat. In the PlayPlace."

Antonio's expression changed from one of concern to disgust. "Where in the PlayPlace?"

Lovino groaned, rubbing his temples with his fingertips. "Everywhere," he mumbled, voice low. "The slide, the ballpit, the tubes- even the fucking walls, oh god, it was-" he broke off, feeling nauseous again.

"For real? And they made you clean it?! How could you?"

"What else would I do?" sighed Lovino, tossing his head upwards. The sun was beginning to peek out from behind purple clouds, the sky streaked with pink in the dawn; like the delicate, inside whorls of a conch shell, mother pearl peeking out cheekily.

"Quit?" suggested Antonio.

"Nah, I need this job. Plus, they mentioned that if I keep up the good performance, I might be promoted to shift or even kitchen manager, and they get $12 an hour."

"$12 an hour? That's pretty good." Antonio frowned. "That still doesn't explain why you're wet, though."

"The urinal was clogged, so they had me unclog it. I had to-" Lovino broke off, laughing sourly. "I had to siphon the piss out of it, it was full to the brim. Then it turned out the source of the clogging was this giant wad," he held up his hands to demonstrate how big it was, "of pubes, and when I pulled it out, it slapped me in the face."

"So you're, uh, covered in pee?" Antonio looked at his hand, which had just a couple minutes ago been rubbing Lovino's wet back, nervously.

"No, no." Lovino dismissed his fears with a wave of his hand. "I washed myself in the sink."

"Oh." Antonio sighed in relief. He got to his feet, then held out a hand for Lovino. "You want a ride?"

Lovino looked up at him with hollow eyes. He should say no, he knew that- accepting Antonio's help and offers of friendship would only lead to him growing soft and trusting him, or, in the worst possible scenario, forgiving him- but he was too tired to protest anymore, let alone walk home.

Lovino sighed, giving in. "Fine," he grumbled, and took Antonio's hand. His grip was surprisingly strong, and he hauled Lovino to his feet with no problem.

They got into Antonio's car, which wobbled as Lovino stepped in. It took a couple tries for the door to close properly, but once it did, Antonio could properly smell Lovino.

"You smell like fries and poo," he coughed, holding his nose.

"I know," said Lovino, with a sort of resigned air that told Antonio this was not the first time he had finished work smelling like this.

"So, uh, where do you live?" asked Antonio, speaking as best he could while holding his nose. Lovino hesitated, thinking of his small, dirty room; the wallpaper stained with smoke; the shower that ran brown and at a slow drizzle and never heated up.

"I don't want to go home," he said eventually.

"O-Okay," said Antonio, a little startled. "Then where should I take you? We could go to my place, or your brother's-"

"Your place," said Lovino immediately.

"You- you're sure?" asked Antonio, trying not to sound surprised.

"Yes," confirmed Lovino, looking straight at Antonio. "I want to go to your place."

"Okay," said Antonio. His heart seemed to be beating awfully fast, and his face felt hot under Lovino's direct gaze. He managed a quick smile. "Let's go to my place."

"Sorry it's not much," apologized Antonio nervously, opening the door to his apartment. He lived on the fifth floor of his building, which was little more than an off-white rectangle with seven floors. Each floor jutted out as a balcony, from which the entrances to each apartment room was. Antonio's was 513 B. A staircase connected the floors to each other, and although there was an elevator, it hadn't been working properly since 2005.

It was much comfier inside than it appeared outside; or at least it was in Antonio's case. He had a small bed, and a desk next to it, upon which was an old computer monitor, whirring away loudly. The small Windows 2005 logo bounced around the screen, illuminating the apartment better than the single circular light on the ceiling, which seemed to serve more as a graveyard for lost insects than as a functioning lamp.

The room was messy, but in a kindly, inoffensive way: lost socks and old jeans were piled randomly in corners; the sink was full of unwashed dishes, upon which a fat fly buzzed lazily; the trash can was overflowing with instant ramen cups and wadded tissues, which also littered the floor near Antonio's bed; and there were tape remains from posters that had long since fallen off the beige walls and joined their forgotten brethren under Antonio's bed.

"If I had known you were coming, I would have cleaned up," continued Antonio nervously, darting to and fro and collecting the wadded tissues and stray underwear and shoving them all under his bed.

"It's fine," said Lovino stepping in gratefully. "I don't mind." He sank down onto Antonio's bed and then flopped sideways, so he was lying on his side with his torso twisted around, knees bent over the edge. Something crinkled under Antonio's pillow and he frowned, sitting up again.

"Wait- no, don't-" Antonio began to say, but Lovino had already lifted the pillow, exposing the source of the noise:

The letter he had written Antonio, so long ago, was nestled neatly beneath the pillow, along with a photo of himself- the one Antonio had taken in the hospital, he remembered so vividly it hurt- and a note he had scribbled, saying only 'thanks.'

Lovino's face- no, his whole body- flushed, throbbing with heat and embarrassment and he quickly dropped the photo and letter as if it burned.

"I'm sorry- I'm so so so sorry- I don't know what that's doing there- I must have misplaced it while cleaning- I'm-" stammered Antonio helplessly.

"You just… walked away." Lovino lifted his head slowly, stared at Antonio with depthless, saddened eyes. The McDonalds visor tilted limply on his soggy curls, and the wet shirt clung to his thin shoulders. The bags under his eyes appeared to weigh more than he did, and for the millionth time that day, Antonio cursed himself for ever hurting him.

"How could you walk away?"

"I'm sorry," whispered Antonio, rooted to the spot.

"Sorry?" repeated Lovino listlessly. "'Sorry' doesn't help anything! Do you know what you did to me?!" He leaned forward, rubbing his face with his hands. "You- you knew I had trust issues, I was afraid of being left behind, and you still- still-!"

"I'm sorry." Antonio felt like a wooden puppet, unable to move, unable to feel; the only words he could say was 'I'm sorry;' over and over again until he wasn't even sure to whom he was apologizing, himself or Lovino.

"For years I've been wondering what I did wrong, what I could have done to make you stay- do you know how painful that is? How exhausting? I've spend years blaming myself for something you did, and all you can say is 'sorry?!'"

Antonio opened his mouth to say sorry once again, but no words came out. "Wha- what else can I say?" he croaked, voice barely a whisper.

"The truth!" yelled Lovino, getting off the bed and stomping over to Antonio. "Tell me the truth, for once!" He crabbed Antonio by the collar, yanked him inches from himself. "Why'd you do it? Why'd you leave?!"

"I-" stammered Antonio.

"Just say it!" screamed Lovino, his face screwed up as if he were in pain. "Tell me! Tell me you h- hate me!" His jaw trembled, and his eyes glistened strangely, threatening to spill over onto his cheeks. "I know you do!"

"I don't hate you," said Antonio softly.

"Yes, you do! How could you leave like that, if you don't hate me? If you really liked me, you wouldn't be able to!"

"But I don't!" cried Antonio, reaching up and grabbing Lovino by the shoulders. "I don't hate you, I never could!"

"Then why?! Why'd you do it? Why'd you leave?!"

"Because I was afraid!" blurted Antonio, unsure of what he was saying, even as he was saying it, but unable to stop. Lovino blinked, his hands growing slack on Antonio's lapel. They fell limply to his side, swung a bit.

Antonio's grip on his shoulders tightened, his knuckles white. He couldn't find it in him to look Lovino in the eye and lowered his head, staring at his feet. He blinked, and a tear slid freely down his nose and landed on the carpet.

"I was afraid," he continued, voice thick. "I was afraid of- of falling in love with you!"

"You… what?"

"I was afraid of falling in love with you, so I left! I- I thought that if you hated me, it would be easier for me to not love you, but I was wrong, I was too late- I've loved you since the moment I met you and I can't stop! I've tried everything- everything- and still, for the past four years, have thought of nothing but you!"

"I-" Lovino shook his head, taking a step back. Antonio's hands grew limp, sliding off his shoulders and down his arms slowly, coming to rest at his hands. He made an effort to hold them, but Lovino pulled away quickly, stepping back against the door. He pressed himself against it, wishing he could just melt through and escape, for Antonio's eager green eyes, spotted with tears like dew on grass, were boring through him, waiting for an answer, an answer Lovino had tried his hardest not to think about for four years.

He felt behind him with his hand and grasped the door handle but did not turn it though he willed himself to; his mind and body seemed to be miscommunicating as they did whenever he was around Antonio; and though he wanted nothing more than to run out that door his legs- no, his whole body- was frozen, trembling from head to toe.

"No," he croaked, eyes wide, shaking his head disbelievingly. "You don't. You're lying."

"I'm not, I'm not! I wish I were, but I can't!" Antonio strode over to Lovino, taking his hand desperately and falling to his knees. "Please believe me, Lovi- I love you so much it hurts!"

"No, you don't!" screamed Lovino, wrenching his hand away. He turned the doorknob and the door fell open behind him. He staggered out backwards- it was raining, hard, and the path was slick- he began to fall and grabbed the rail behind him.

"No one does!" he yelled, and the pattering of the rain drowned out Antonio's pleas, seeming to confirm his claim. He stared at Antonio a moment longer; groveling, weeping, pathetic, before turning and bolting down the stairs.

Sorry again for the long wait between chapters. Hopefully I'll be able to quit my second job soon, but until then you might have to wait a while for the next chapter. I'll try to publish a chapter every two weeks from now on, but I can't really promise anything. I will finish this story, but it may take me a while.