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It’s in moments like this that Theo hates it the most. He hates this society and how the human brain is conceived and how people just think about it all the time. How it is everywhere and how it seems to be both the problem and the solution; how it’s just on everyone’s mind and tongue.
He just hates it, he hates how people have been conditioned to think, how it all evolved. He finds himself thinking he would like the censure to be up again, how much better it was when in movies there wasn’t anything shocking and kisses couldn’t last longer than 2 seconds on screens. How sex was taboo, how kids back then wouldn’t even dare to mention things like that.
Moments like this remind him how worthless he is, how different and looked down on he is.
Theo watches as the kid, 13 at best, walks up to him and Liam with a smile. “Have you guys…?” he says, filthy gestures finishing the sentence, and Theo feels tears sting his eyes at the sudden sickness inside.
“Cut it out, what the fuck!” he snaps before he can stop himself. Heads turns his way but he’s talking so quickly he only notices when it’s too late. “That’s not something you ask!” he says harshly, his teeth clenched so hard it almost hurts, and it takes Liam’s hand in his own to bring him back from the flood of anger.
He realises he shouldn’t have talked like this to the friend of Liam’s cousin when his gaze suddenly leaves the now-surprised face of the kid, and he catches the look of everyone else in the room. The air is a bit hard to find, even though it’s supposed to be surrounding him. He knows he’s been rude, and it makes it so much harder to keep the tears at bay. He hates how he’d lost control. How now he is sure he’s the one everyone’s judging even though he shouldn’t be.
And he walks away, he flees, feeling the eyes on him as if the fault was his own and his only, as if those kids had any right to ask things like that, as if it was right of people to think of him that way, to imagine it, to stain him this way.
He feels weak, so weak. His limbs feel too heavy, his heart weighting him down. And he feels wrong, so wrong to run away, to sit in the back of the garden like the reject he is. And Liam, who’s supposed to enjoy his family’s company, is joining him in his hiding place. Always by his side, somehow.
He wants the thoughts to stop spinning, he wants to stop them from telling him about everything that is wrong with him, screaming at him about everything that is wrong in the world, reminding him about everything bad.
He wants to disappear.
Liam finds him in the dark again, a hand going through his hair like he’s gotten used to do when Theo is surrounded by back fumes, black shadows, black thoughts.
I’m not at fault, I’m not filthy, I’m not at fault. They don’t know me. I’m not filthy. The only part of his mind that is willing to fight again, that’s still able to, tries to bring him back, tries to make him forget the rest, tries to blow away the darkness suffocating him.
He focuses on Liam’s fingers threading through his hair.
He’s sure the palms of his hands pressing into his eyes are actually making it worse, but he feels like it is the only way to keep the tears from flowing. He waits, breathes in, breathes out, doesn’t think about the comment, doesn’t think about what the people are thinking of his outburst and how he is hiding in the garden, doesn’t think about anything else but Liam’s fingertips. Liam. Liam. Liam.
He finally lets his hands drop, and Liam brings him closer. “Better?” the soft voice is like a blanket enveloping him. If he wasn’t better, he would have been by the time he heard the two syllables, he’s sure.
He nods, his face burying in the crook of Liam’s neck – just to hide a bit more from the world, in his personal gateway, in his personal heaven. The air here is pure, a sweet scent always present, and it glows yellow, everywhere he looks at.
When they both walk back in, most people don’t turn around, probably trying to ignore what happened and not make the atmosphere worse than it already is. Theo feels his inside burn, as well as his face, but Liam standing by his side makes it easier to not be swallowed by the earth.
“I’m sorry, I told him off for it.” a woman tells Theo, a hand lightly touching his upper arm, as if afraid she shouldn’t. He guesses she is the mother of the boy. Theo nods politely at her, unable to smile even though he tries to. He knows it would have looked fake anyway.
“Thank you.” Liam says, and Theo doesn’t mind the fact that he is talking for him. They both know he can’t really form words right now. He is grateful though, and he hopes she can see it in his slightly red eyes.
She smiles at Liam when he speaks, and she looks back at Theo, her hand squeezing his arm almost shyly before she walks away.
In bed that night, Theo stares at the ceiling, unable to stop his mind from replaying the afternoon at Liam’s aunt’s house. He shudders in displeasure, unable to stop the reaction to the thoughts, too. Liam is facing him the next second, his eyelids weighing heavy over his irises, his face painted with worry.
Theo can’t even tell himself that Liam doesn’t know what he’s thinking, because of course he does. Each time it happens, each time something like this happens, Theo can’t help thinking about it until he feels sick and lost again. And Liam knows that all too well.
Liam sits up by his side, hands reaching for Theo’s head and tugging it against his chest. “I’ll prevent your falling apart.” he tells Theo, and the words are like the opening of the dam, letting the tears flow out, letting the emotions take over him.
“I’m sorry.” Theo says, and he is not even apologising for anything in particular. He is apologising for everything that he’s ever done wrong, for every single drop of guilt running through his veins.
Sorry for today, sorry for being an embarrassment, sorry for being a burden, sorry for the turn-ons, sorry for the late nights, sorry for the darkness, sorry for the nightmares, sorry for when I can’t believe some things you say to me, sorry for the wrong and the weak. Sorry for the apologies.
“You have nothing to apologise for. You don’t need my pardon, there’s nothing to forgive.” Liam tells him, because all these thoughts, all these things he feels sorry for, Liam knows.
A hand goes up and down his back, anchoring, the other draws a single motion of the thumb, caressing his cheek that keeps getting wet from the tears flowing down, softening the edges.
“I’m still sorry.” Theo says, his voice cracking, and Liam tugs him impossibly closer, as if to turn them into a single being, as if to say your hands are my hands, your skin my skin, your guilt my guilt.
This time Liam doesn’t answer him though. He knows that words saying he shouldn’t feel sorry won’t change the fact that he is, that Theo has heard him once, and that he just needs Liam there, Liam existing, warm and shining in the dark, to make himself believe them. To make the regrets and guilt wash away.
Theo surfaces again when he is sure there are no more tears available in his body. It isn’t like throwing up, he can’t keep going even though it is already empty. He is thankful for that. At least, even if his body still feels like crying, the fact that tears have stopped flowing brings back a calmness in the room.
The air doesn’t feel so suffocating anymore, feels a bit fresher; he just breathes in the quiet, Liam’s arms still holding him close and making sure his dodgy pieces aren’t falling apart.
Liam’s skin is warm, it almost feels unreal. It makes him float somewhere else, that safe place of his own. There’s nowhere he’d rather be, it’s just that he really wants to watch the stars right now. He wants to feel the fresh air of the night, and watch the city sleep through his tired, too heavy and stingy eyes.
He shifts slightly, looking slowly at Liam’s face. He looks tired, and soft, and Theo is glad the curtains are not closed so the moon and street lights can get in to say hello, and contour his lover’s face.
Sometimes Liam radiates love. Some times more than others. On nights like these, when Theo is falling apart, it’s when his eyes are spelling out how much he loves him, how much he’d do for him. How he’d stay up all night if he had to. How he’d fight the whole world just to keep Theo safe.
Theo leans in and lands a kiss on the corner of his lips. He can feel them tug upwards sleepily. It makes him smile back slightly.
“Is there anything you’d like?” Liam asks, voice soft, matching his appearance, matching his whole being and the gentle light outside.
Theo silently nods, moving slowly, realising how much his body actually aches. His limbs are heavy, a hand suddenly being flooded back by blood leaving an uncomfortable sensation, his neck aching when he sits up.
“The stars.” he whispers, leaning into Liam’s hand caressing his cheek.
“Of course.” he answers, not quite a whisper, but quiet enough to be fitting with the calmness of the night. He kisses Theo’s forehead, keeping his lips in contact for a long second, both their eyes falling close until he leans away.
Then Liam slowly and carefully untangles their limbs, shaking his legs as if he, too, had to get rid of the sensation as the blood runs back down to his feet. One of his hands takes hold of the blanket, the other finds Theo’s, gently guiding him to the balcony door, silently, patiently.
Theo’s body feels heavy, the pillow he’s holding feeling a bit bigger than it usually is, but Liam’s hand in his somehow feels like he's holding him up. The fresh night air rushing into the room when Liam turns the handle and slides the windowglass open awakes Theo, slowly taking him back to reality – luckily one that’s still asleep, where the world is calm and quiet. He’s thankful for that.
The fresh air filling his lungs is resourceful. He knows that view all too well, the two lampposts not having moved since Liam and he settled in, the buildings the same height, the red neon light from the store at his right still as bright.
Each time he steps outside though, mostly after an episode at the centre of the earth, it feels new. The moon is never the same size, never the same place in the sky, there are not always the clouds that are here tonight, that car passing by down the road is never the same one, either.
It feels like being reborn. The night, as are Liam’s hands, is healing. The moon is looking over him. He’s sure she’s smiling when he thanks her in a whisper.
They sit in silence, huddled up together under the huge blanket that Theo remembers Liam forbidding him to bring outside, but is now one of his companions when he watches the sky.
Theo breathes in the night. The stars are visible, and the trees from the park not far away are swinging in the wind. Theo breathes in the night, and he can tell himself it’s okay. He’ll be okay.
Theo breathes in the night, and he catches the scent of Liam’s hair, that’s brushing the side of his face. His skin is warm behind him, his lips even warmer against his shoulder.
“Thank you.” he tells him, letting his head fall gently against Liam’s, whose smile can be felt against his skin.
“Love you.” is what he gets as an answer, muffled by the blanket, by his mouth against skin, by the mop of hair between them.
Theo still hears it clear as day.