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Gansey should buy a puppy.
They've never had a pet at Monmouth before, and Ronan has been fine with that, since it means there's nothing shedding fur and pissing on his bed and whatever else some spoiled Gansey puppy would get up to. Gansey would probably want Ronan to take it on walks. Ronan isn't going to pick up dog crap.
But it turns out Gansey has some goddamn mothering instinct he needs to work through, and if the choices are 'smelly ass dog' or 'teenage charity case', Ronan could get used to a dog.
"You know what this is?" Gansey asks over the roar of the Pig's engine.
"Waste of my time?"
Gansey answers his own question and ignores Ronan's input. Way to make Ronan feel listened to, Gansey.
"It's only child syndrome. Which is funny because you have two brothers."
"I have two brothers," Ronan says. "Which means I don't need any more sharing in my life."
"'Any more' sharing implies that you've managed to share anything before."
"If you know I can't do it, why are you trying?"
"Because I believe in the perfectibility of mankind," Gansey says. "And anyway, it's supposed to rain today. We can't make Parrish ride his bicycle to school in the rain. It's a safety issue."
Ronan doesn't see a problem. Parrish has apparently been doing just that all along and hasn't lost a limb yet. Unfortunately.
"He's the one who decided not to drive to school."
"Ronan Lynch," Gansey says. "Not everyone is born with money."
"Some have money thrust upon them? Are you going to thrust your money on -- "
"If you're going to be disgusting," Gansey says, "maybe you should walk the rest of the way."
"But it's going to rain," Ronan says. "That's a safety issue."
Gansey huffs, unhappy. "Just -- try to be friendly. Okay?"
"Why do I have to be friendly?" Ronan asks. "Doesn't he have his own friends?"
"Yes. Me."
Ronan waits for Gansey to say it. To say that Ronan would be alone without Gansey, too. To admit that's what he's doing, benevolently taking in strays like he's St. Richard, patron of the lonely and the broken.
But Gansey doesn't, and it pisses Ronan off.
Instead, he says, "You should give Parrish a chance. You'd like him. He knows about cars."
"So does the Blue Book, why don't you take it on a date."
"This upsets me." Gansey looms. Or tries to loom. Gansey is only ever intimidating when he doesn't want to be. "The way no one values platonic friendships anymore. Anytime anyone wants to do something for a friend, it's always assumed there has to be some sexual or romantic -- would you knock it off."
Apparently ten seconds is the longest he can handle Ronan making a blah blah blah hand gesture in his face. Good to know.
"Do you even know where we're going?" Ronan asks, as Gansey turns the Pig around again, driving them back the way they'd just come.
"It's around here somewhere, I'll find it," Gansey mutters, without any conviction.
"You and your new boyfriend are going to make me late for first period," Ronan says. "I'm not going to be able to turn in my homework."
"Oh, you do your homework now?" Gansey turns them down a dirt path that is not, in any way, a road. Ronan's pretty sure he only turned out of stubborn refusal to admit that he doesn't know where they're going. The Pig makes a truly alarming noise as it bottoms out.
Gansey swears, which Ronan usually enjoys, but right now he's busy worrying about the Camaro. It doesn't deserve this kind of abuse for the sake of some scholarship kid, not even if he was the one who got it running again the other day.
"Turn around before we get stranded out here," Ronan says, and Gansey has a look on his face like he's about to agree, before the path swerves and the first trailer comes into view.
"We found it?" Gansey sounds less convinced than before, even. His eyes are wide and glassy as he takes in peeling paint, broken bottles, howling mutts. There's a half-dressed child hanging out the door to one of the trailers, muddy and androgynous, who's calling them names that even Ronan didn't know at that age. Ronan scowls at it, which only eggs the kid on, like it has no sense of self-preservation. Or no self worth preserving.
"This is fucking bleak."
Gansey shoots him a look. "Maybe you shouldn't say anything."
"Then how am I supposed to make friends?"
"Look -- there he is." Gansey stops the Camaro in front of one of the trailers, indistinguishable from any of its neighbors except for the thin worried boy in the Aglionby uniform sitting on the stairs.
Parrish scrambles up as soon as he sees them, grabbing his bag.
"Just be decent, Ronan."
Ronan glances at Gansey, but can't hold his eyes.
"I'm not riding in the back."
"Fine," Gansey says, and gets out of the car to push his seat forward.
"Thanks." Parrish has an accent Ronan could wallow in. Ronan doesn't remember him sounding like that in class, but maybe there's no other way for him to sound, surrounded by all this. Or maybe Ronan is mis-remembering. He doesn't pay a lot of attention to Parrish, or to class in general. "I hope you didn't have too much trouble finding the place."
"Not at all," Gansey lies, and Ronan snorts.
Parrish pauses for a second, half-way crawled into the back seat, and flattens his eyebrows at Ronan.
Ronan flattens his eyebrows right back. That's only half a scowl. That's decent.
Then the door of Parrish's trailer opens with a bang.
Parrish throws himself the rest of the way into the car as an unshaven man comes charges out of the trailer.
"Dammit." Parrish tries to flatten himself against the seat, keeping his face out of the window. Like he can hide, like there's anywhere else he could have gone in this depressing fucking Dickensian landscape.
"You must be Mr. Parrish," Gansey says, because sometimes Gansey is too stupid to go outside on his own.
"Get in the car," Ronan hisses.
Parrish says, "Just go, God," at the same time.
But Ronan thinks what really settles it for Gansey is Parrish's dad pointing at the car and bellowing, "Get that fucking thing off my property, you -- " and a string of words that Ronan is absolutely going to throw back in Gansey's face the next time Gansey tries to make Ronan be decent or make friends.
Parrish has a hand over his eyes. Ronan is absolutely going to throw this back in his face, too, whenever he does whatever it is he's going to do to piss Ronan off.
Gansey, the idiot, has finally gotten himself back in the car and shifted it into gear, but this doesn't do much to appease Parrish's redneck dad. He hollers after them until they're out of view up the shitty not-a-dirt-road.
Parrish slides even lower in the seat.
Ronan can't stop smirking.
"So," Gansey coughs, and Parrish meets his eyes in the rear-view mirror, looking cagey. "Adam Parrish, you've met Ronan Lynch, right?"
Parrish looks over from Gansey to Ronan. His expression grows even warier.
"Sure," Parrish says. The accent is receding, like he's becoming more of a real person the further they take him away from the shit hole he lives in. "He looks familiar, I think I've seen him in class once or twice."
Gansey nods at that, because Gansey is still in idiot mode. But Ronan doesn't fall for it, keeps his eyes on Parrish's, lets the smirk drop off his face for his natural, hostile expression.
Parrish doesn't waver.
So he's not going to pretend to like Ronan either -- good. It's not like Ronan was going to be decent to him, in any case. It's not his fucking job to look out for Parrish.
-
First there's the bruise over Parrish's cheekbone, the unintentionally hilarious explanation that "I dropped a wrench on my face."
Then there's the split lip. Ronan doesn't hear what Parrish tells Gansey about that. When Ronan comments on it he just gets a dry "I didn't know you cared, Lynch."
The next week Parrish misses a day of school. When he comes back it's with a black eye. The split lip is re-opened, and he moves his right arm stiffly, like he wrenched a muscle.
He must know how pathetic his appearance is, because he doesn't try to make up a story about being clumsy.
"You look like shit," Ronan tells him.
"Thanks." Parrish shoots him a dirty look. "I got in fight."
There are bruises peeking out from Parrish's shirtsleeve, like someone had grabbed his wrist too hard and yanked him by it. There are not any scrapes or bruises on his knuckles.
Someone had hit him, but Parrish hadn't hit back.
"Really." Ronan stares him down.
But Parrish has had a lot of exposure to Ronan by now, and he was never that easy to push around in the first place.
"Yeah," he says. "Really."
It could have been someone at Aglionby. Bullying or hazing or whatever the fuck special episode bullshit teenagers are supposed to be doing to each other.
But the timing doesn't work. There's no reason for Parrish to get picked on now, after Gansey has taken him under his wing like an ugly little baby bird. And he was out sick, yesterday.
"That's stupid," Ronan tells him.
"I can't believe I'm getting a lecture from you, Lynch." Parrish frowns, and then winces. There's blood on his lip. "Have you decided to add enormous hypocrite to your resume?"
Parrish subscribes to the best defense is a good offense policy.
It usually is, but Ronan doesn't actually care what happens to Parrish. And not caring is a pretty good defense, too.
"When I get in a fight, I win."
"Congrats," Parrish says. "You must be so proud of yourself."
-
"He didn't get in a fight."
Ronan sits in the passenger seat of the Pig and doesn't say anything. It isn't a question if they both know the answer.
"Someone did that to him."
Ronan looks out the window. Endless Virginia countryside, and nowhere in it that he wants to go.
Gansey is silent for so long that Ronan thinks that might be the end of the conversation.
But, no.
"Have you ever heard him talk about his parents?"
"What," Ronan asks, "on our Sunday brunches where we do our nails and talk about our feelings?"
"Ronan, I'm serious. This is important."
"Then why are you asking me? He doesn't even like me. You think he's going to tell me Lynch, my dad beats the shit out of me -- "
Gansey flinches so hard that Ronan feels it, in his gut.
For a second Ronan is so fucking sick of himself that he wants to die.
"We could tell someone," Gansey says, utterly wretched but still trying to make a decision, because that's what leaders do, that's what friends do. "At school. They know how to deal with this sort of thing. I think they get trained on -- child abuse."
Ronan snorts. He doesn't trust the school's judgment. They've seen Parrish every day and failed to notice that anything is wrong. They've seen Ronan over the last year and decided the best way to handle his behavioral issues is to bitch at him about his attendance, so how much could they know about anything?
"We could call the cops," Gansey says.
"He can call the cops," Ronan says. "It's a three digit phone number, it's not hard to do."
"You could have a little more sympathy, Ronan," but Ronan can't, he can't, he can't. There is too much grief in his heart. He has none left for Parrish and his split lip. "It's hard to make a decision when you're in the middle of a situation. Maybe he needs us to do it for him."
"He'd never forgive you."
"Do you mean that?"
The truth of this is too obvious to repeat. Parrish clings to grudges like a drowning man trying to stay afloat.
Gansey shakes his head. "That's not the point. The right thing is the right thing, even if it costs you a friend. Don't you think?"
Ronan thinks that nothing right is ever easy. He thinks that a person's secrets are their own damn business. He thinks cops are useless assholes. He thinks a man has to fight his own battles.
He tells Gansey, "I think pissing Parrish off is my job."
-
Ronan waits until Parrish is using his arm normally again, because there's no point in starting him off with bad habits, and then he waits until they have a moment where Gansey isn't around, because there's no point in letting Gansey see him do anything that could be construed as nice. It would only give Gansey ideas.
But there's an afternoon where they're out in the middle of fuck-off nowhere, loitering around the Pig while Gansey goes hiking off a mile in the distance trying to get signal on his phone to talk to his ancient professor buddy, and it's not like they have anything better to do.
"Parrish," Ronan says. Parrish gives him an extremely bored look. Like he does think there's something better he could be doing in the middle of fuck-off nowhere than talking to Ronan. "Put your hands up."
"No."
"C'mon." Ronan demonstrates, holds his hands up in front of him, chest-high, palms out, and drops them.
"Yeah, I'm not doing that."
"Fine," Ronan says, and swings his fist toward Parrish.
It's a slow punch, wouldn't have hurt even if it had landed, even if Ronan had been aiming at Parrish and not at the air two inches in front of him.
It doesn't get there anyway, because Parrish avoids. He takes one single step back, no more than that, and the expression on his face settles on anger.
But for a split second before that he's white and wide-eyed with terror.
"What the hell."
"I'm not going to hit you, moron."
"Right. Where could I have possibly gotten that idea?"
"I'm going to teach you how to fight," Ronan says.
Parrish is toying with being confused. "What? Why?"
"I'm sick of seeing your pitiful bashed in face," which is even true. "Put your hands up."
"No," and since Parrish is not an idiot, he adds, "and don't take another swing at me, jackass."
Angry is winning out against confused. Ronan can work with angry. "Fine, you try. Make a fist."
Parrish's hand twitches, like he's thinking about doing just that, but he doesn't. "I'm trying not to get in fights," he says. "Learning how to fight doesn't help that."
"Yeah, and if you don't teach teenagers about condoms they won't have sex." Ronan rolls his eyes. "If you're going to get in fights you should win."
"I don't need advice, Lynch, and if I did you would be the last person I went to."
"Right, I'm sure you get lots of great advice from your trailer park family -- "
Parrish takes a step forward, and then another, until they're closer than when they started. "Shut the hell up about my family."
"Make me."
There's a split second where he thinks about it, curls his hand into a fist and takes another step forward --
But then, with a visible effort, he holds back.
His fist is still clenched.
"You're disturbed," he snarls at Ronan. "What, do you get off on violence or something?"
"In your dreams, Parrish."
Parrish is freezing over -- not any less angry, but less explosively angry. Ronan might be able to provoke him into attacking, or he might just provoke him into murdering Ronan in his sleep three months from now. Parrish has a little bit of that psychopath energy.
So Ronan changes tactics.
He takes Parrish by the forearm -- not the wrist -- and lifts his hand, presses his thumb against the crease between Parrish's index and middle fingers.
"Don't clench your fist so tight, you'll break something," Ronan says. "I know you're repressed and all, but -- "
"Like you can talk." Parrish does, actually, relax his grip the tiniest bit, probably because he's fucking programmed to follow instructions. Goddamn teacher's pet. He doesn't try to pull his arm free, which would be more interesting.
But of course he doesn't. Parrish doesn't fight back.
"Never stick your thumb inside your fist," Ronan says, even though Parrish got it right this time. That could just be luck.
"Yeah, everyone knows that," Parrish says. "I'm really starting to doubt your expertise."
Ronan smirks, because Parrish is somehow failing to get under Ronan's skin, when it's the easiest thing in the world to do. Most of the time people do it without trying.
And Parrish's sore spots might as well have neon signs pointing to them.
"Step forward when you throw the punch," Ronan says, slowly and enunciating his words like he's talking to a child. "Not before. Because that way your whole body is behind the blow -- "
"I'm not an idiot," Parrish snaps. It's sort of beautiful, the way fury splashes across his features. Ronan might actually be disturbed.
"You're doing something wrong," Ronan says. "If you get in this many fights and you never win any."
There. That flick of the eyes, away from Ronan and back.
He knows he's being called out.
He tilts his head up, defiant, like he's waiting for Ronan to say something more, but Ronan's not Gansey. He doesn't need to have a big emotional moment where they cry and feel better about themselves. He's told Parrish what he wants, and so now it's up to Parrish. He can learn how to fight or he can tell the truth and Ronan will --
Ronan doesn't know what he'll do if that happens. Go beat the shit out of Parrish's dad, probably. Or just -- take him, lock him in the car and drive off somewhere.
Except there's nothing to stop him from doing any of that now. He knows Parrish is lying and Parrish knows he knows he's lying, so why isn't he doing something instead of standing here holding Parrish's hand?
"That's my problem," Parrish says, not angry and not defensive but just so goddamn tired. "And I'm dealing with it."
"Right," Ronan says. "This is you dealing."
"It's better than punching my way through. You know 'live by the sword, die by the sword'?"
"Because it's not like this ends with you dead anyway."
"Because I don't want to be good at hurting people," Parrish snaps, "I don't want to be like -- you."
That isn't what he was going to say, but it's still true. He doesn't want to be like Ronan. Ronan can't blame him. Most of the time, Ronan doesn't want to be like Ronan.
This may be the first honest moment the two of them have ever had. Gansey would be so proud.
"Look, Parrish," Ronan says. "I don't really give a shit about you."
"I can tell."
Ronan glares at him, and Parrish glares back.
"So I don't care what the hell you do. But Gansey likes you for some reason, and he deserves better than you lying to him. You can tell him to fuck off when he's nosy, he's used to that. But don't lie."
There's a long moment where Ronan thinks Parrish is going to tell him to go to hell, and then Parrish is not glaring anymore.
It leaves Ronan off-balance. Like pushing against a wall and finding out it's a door when someone opens it from the other side.
If Parrish doesn't hate him, there's no reason for them to be standing so close, touching each other, talking at all.
Ronan lets him go.
"Thanks," Parrish says, "I'll keep that in mind."
-
A month later, it's bruising on his jaw, invisible from one side, grotesque from the other.
Ronan isn't disappointed. It isn't like he thought one conversation where Parrish didn't even listen to him was going to change anything. That's not how the world works. Ronan knows that.
Parrish catches him staring.
"Getting in fights again?" Ronan asks.
Parrish hesitates, before he says, "No."
At least Parrish isn't lying anymore.
But God, everything else about this fucking sucks.
-
Ronan stops riding to school with Gansey, most days.
Gansey despairs, and takes every opportunity to lecture Ronan about his attendance. It is true that driving himself to school lets him skip out early, or come in late, or not show up at all. And that's why Ronan does it.
That, and so he doesn't have to sit in the Pig and make small talk with Parrish every goddamn day.
It's nothing to do with that moment, pulling up to the end of the dirt road, waiting to see the damage on Parrish's face, reminding himself to be decent so he doesn't get out of the car and go looking for Parrish's dad.
Ronan drives himself to school, and lets Parrish handle his own damn problems, and doesn't worry about him at all.