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“Remind me why I agreed to this,” Logan said, picking his way through the junk around him.
“No idea,” Dee replied. “I’m sure it has nothing to do with Patton’s pretty face.”
In response, Patton turned to face them and tilted his head at them with a smile.
“…Right,” said Logan in a slightly scratchy voice that made Patton giggle.
“Come on Logan,” Roman whined. “There’s a lot of cool stuff here! We could do all sorts of stuff with it.”
“It is all literal garbage,” Logan pointed out. “What exactly could we do with any of it?”
“Um,” said Roman looking around him at the piles of trash. “Ooo this could be a sword!” he suggested while pulling out a long, slightly bent stick that had probably been a shower rod at one point.
“That is nowhere near the right shape to be a sword,” Logan scoffed.
Dee rolled his eyes at them and Patton whacked him lightly on the shoulder in reprimand.
Roman narrowed his eyes at Logan. “I bet it’d still hurt if I whacked you with it.
“Don’t you dare.”
“En garde!”
“Don’t you dare touch me with that disgusting thing, Roman.”
Roman lunged forward “sword” in hand and Logan dashed away. Dee snorted as he watched them go dashing off deeper into the dump.
Patton gave a fond headshake before bumping his hand into Dee’s. Dee took the hint and interlocked their fingers. Patton swung their hands between them happily as they followed the other two at a much sedater pace.
They heard a yelp from a bit ahead and both picked up the pace, though the noise had sounded more startled than pained.
They rounded a pile of garbage only to see Roman face down on the ground on top of the “sword” and Logan standing with his arms crossed a couple of feet away looking 100% done.
“What happened?” Dee asked raising an eyebrow.
“Roman fell on his own sword as the saying goes. Or in other words, he’s clumsy and tripped himself.”
Roman gave a high-pitched noise of rebuttal, picking his face off the ground to glare at Logan.
“Aw poor baby,” Patton cooed, releasing Dee’s hand and going down onto his knees to give him a forehead kiss. Roman gave him a wobbly pout in return, likely knowing Patton would be the only one who would give him any sympathy and taking advantage of that. Patton patted his cheek.
“He deserves it,” Logan said.
“Doubtlessly,” was Dee’s reply.
“I have been forsaken,” Roman wailed, pushing himself off the ground and getting to his feet.
Logan snorted when he saw Roman’s front as it was completely covered in dirt. Roman narrowed his eyes and Patton could see what was about to happen a moment before it did.
Roman gave a war cry of “hug time” and lunged forward, throwing his arms around him.
“No!” Logan shrieked trying to get away, but it was no use. After a moment, Roman stopped hugging him, but instead of releasing him, he bent down and grabbed him around his waist to haul him over his shoulder. “Release me, you uncouth dolt.”
“Logan’s the prince and I’ve captured him from his home because of his father’s unjust laws,” Roman proclaimed.
“I’m not playing,” Logan hissed.
“Whatever you say, my prince.”
“And he’ll fall in love with his rough and tumble kidnapper with a heart of gold in the end and help create change across the kingdom,” Patton supplied.
“He’ll slit the throat of his rough and tumble kidnapper is what he’ll do,” Logan grumbled. Crossing his arms and glaring back at Patton and Dee.
“Well that would certainly be just as interesting of a story,” Dee said.
Roman’s face twisted up. “Nope, I’m pretty sure it’ll be love and happily ever after like Patton said, but first we’ll have to continue on this mission. Now, we must travel through this haunted forest to find…”
“The hidden magical cave!” Patton supplied, clapping his hands.
“The hidden magical cave!” Roman agreed. “Dee’s the merchant for hire from a neighboring kingdom and Pat’s the guide and healer. Off to adventure!”
They trudged through the dump for about half an hour and Roman eventually let Logan back on his feet. Many times, Roman tried to point to location in the mounds of trash and proclaim that it was the secret cave, but Patton would always shake his head and say they weren’t there yet. They eventually ended up all trailing behind him with varying levels of bemusement.
“Oh, here it is!” Patton said eventually. He pulled away the old sheet of metal to reveal a little structure mostly hidden in the piles of garbage.
“Patton don’t just go climbing in there!” Logan said concerned as he bent forward.
“It’s fine Lo,” Patton said, ignoring the instructions to wiggle through the makeshift door.
“Well I’m not missing out on the garbage cave of adventure,” Roman declared and was soon squeezing himself through the doorway as well after Patton. Patton settled himself against the far wall and giggled as he watched Roman writhe a bit like a worm before he was able to push himself into a sitting position.
“Dee please be reasonable,” Logan’s voice said from outside the shelter and then in the next moment another body pushed into the little house.
“Fucking honestly?” Logan muttered.
“Language!” Patton reminded.
He mumbled something else Patton could not hear but sounded suspiciously like more potty language, but then he was also poking his head into the shelter. “Degenerates,” he mumbled as he pulled himself inside.
There wasn’t quite enough room for four almost fully-grown adults and Dee ended up sprawled on Roman’s lap not that either seemed to mind and Logan’s shin brushed Patton’s knee even though he had his own knees bent.
“Well, we’re all going to get tetanus,” Logan grumbled, folding his arms.
“Only if one of us gets cut,” Patton said.
“Roman is here,” Logan said resulting in an indignant squawk from the named boy. “Anyway. How did you know this place was here, Patton?”
“I’ve been here before,” Patton said simply. Then he turned a bit to the side and reached back into a “shelf” to find a little metal lunchbox. He struggled a bit with the latch, but managed to get it open without much fuss, letting out a little hum as he did. “You liked The Boxcar Children when you were a kid right, Lo?” he asked.
“Um, yes I did.”
“Here,” Patton said and handed him the thin book from inside the box. It wasn’t the best copy, just a cheap one from an old used bookstore with a few loose pages and a bent cover.”
“Thanks, um how…?”
Patton was already digging through the box again and found the string of gold beads he knew were there. They were just plastic ones someone could get at a party store, and some of the paint was chipped. “Here you go, Roman,” he said reaching past Dee to press the necklace into his hand. He blinked down at the object as Patton grabbed three more things from the box and held them out to Dee. “And these are for you.” They were three little mismatched animals: a kitten, a dinosaur, and a snake. Patton looked back at what was left in the box. There were a couple of pictures, a bit faded, but not completely unsalvageable and…
“And Critter,” he said cheerfully, taking the stuffed cat carefully out of the plastic baggie it had been wrapped in and inspecting it before putting it in his lap and stroking one of its little torn ears.
“Patton,” Dee asked softly. “What is this place?”
Patton sighed. He had, of course, been intending to talk to them about it, else he would have just come alone, but he had still been avoiding the conversation the whole way here. “This is where we lived for about 6 months once: me and Virgil. After my mom and dad died, we got placed with my aunt and she wasn’t a particularly nice person, so I took Virge and ran. I was 12 and he was 8. We lived here till it got cold and Virgil caught a bad fever. We got picked up when I was trying to get him medicine. Luckily Social Services didn’t make us go back to our aunt since we’d been missing for six months and she never bothered to call the cops. So, then we ended up with Papa and it all worked out. So yeah…”
“Patton…” Logan said.
Dee yelped as Roman jerked forward to hug Patton, tossing him half onto the ground and half onto Patton’s lap. He tried to squirm out of the middle of the embrace and got nowhere. “Let me go you big lug!” He demanded, kicking his feet.
“The structural integrity of the shelter!” Logan shrieked. “It’s held together by god knows what! You can’t wrestle in here!!”
Patton laughed lightly and pulled back gently from Roman’s embrace. He bent to kiss Dee’s cheek soothingly and scratched his fingers softly on-top of his head till he settled.
Roman settled himself back into place and patted his lap for Dee.
“I’m staying with Patton now,” Dee said.
“Ah, come on.”
He hissed and wrapped his arms around Patton’s waist, pressing his forehead into Patton’s stomach.
Patton giggled at him and continued the hair stroking while Roman pouted. After a moment, he looked back up at the two still sitting. “We’re about to graduate,” Patton explained, “and I was listening to all those past commencement speeches with Lo while he tried to write one and they were all talking about times changing and memories. It got me thinking about my own memories: the good and the bad. He paused, “and I’m going to go off to college soon. It’s going to be the first time Virgil and I haven’t lived together, ever… it was just the two of us for so long and it’ll be… different.” He could feel his eyes starting to water as he clutched the old stuffed animal. “I’m going to fix Critter up a bit and give him to Virgil before I go so,” he sniffed a bit, “so he doesn’t forget me.”
“Oh Patton,” Roman said softly, reaching over to grab his hands.
“I know,” Patton said, wiping away his tears, “I know I’m being a bit silly. It’s not like I’m never coming home and he’s going to be 15 soon. He can take care of himself. Plus, he’ll have Papa so it’ll be fine and it’s good that we… we’re in a place where we can be apart and…” He cut himself off with a little sob.
Logan scooted forward a bit until he was even closer to Patton, his legs touching Dee’s shoulder. He dithered for a moment before cupping Patton’s cheek with a gentle palm. “He’ll love it Patton,” he assured. “He’s a good kid, smart, and he loves you too.” Patton pressed his face back against his hand and smiled a bit.
He took a breath. “Okay,” he said. He pulled away slightly and carefully put Critter back in the lunchbox before shutting it tight. “That’s everything here that matters. Let’s go home.”
The other three nodded and they all carefully pulled themselves out of the structure.
Patton paused at the doorway, about to put back the sheet of metal on instinct and instead put it down on the ground. He used his foot to nudge one of the blocks he’d put down all those years ago as foundation to make the little hidden shelter when he and Virgil had first come to this dump. He wiggled the block and pushed until it popped out of place and with a creek and a crash, the whole little house came tumbling down.
“Wow,” Logan said. “We easily could have all died.” Roman whacked him upside the head, but Patton just chuckled and grabbed his arm, tilting his head to lay it on his shoulders.
“Ah, but to die well-loved and together,” Patton said.
“To die in a hole in a garbage dump,” Logan protested.
“They’d just think we all ran away to be together,” Roman said, throwing his arm around Logan’s other shoulder.
“Why would we do that? None of our parents disapprove!”
“Until,” Dee said. “They find our bodies 50 years into the future. What explanation would they come up with?”
“Tragic lovers whose lives ended too soon, crushed under their hopes and dreams,” Roman said.
“Under garbage you mean,” Logan replied.
“Archaeologists would have surely claimed we were sacrificed to the gods of plastic,” Dee said. Patton just smiled as they continued to bicker above his head, clutching the lunchbox with one hand and Logan’s arm with the other as they made their way home.