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Growing up, Ronan has his fair share of bruises.
He’s seven when he trips over the top stair and busts his lip on the banister. He has a fat lip and a chipped tooth for his trouble; Niall spends a month calling him “Champ.”
He’s (“You fell!” “You pushed me!”) pushed off the porch when he and Declan are ten. He lands hard enough that his shoulder is black and blue for a week. The grudge against Declan lasts longer.
He’s fourteen when he catches a soccer ball in the eye – all Matthew had asked for was a little help with his shots – and Aurora cheerily slaps a steak over it as Matthew apologizes profusely.
Ronan’s taken boxing lessons, jumped from high bridges, and generally been careless with his personal space. Bruises don’t bother him; on the worst days, the aches remind him he’s still alive, even when he’s not sure if he wants to be. Half the time he picks a fight with Declan, it’s for the sheer blood rush of knowing that any bruise he gets – and lands – is a fucked-up love language that neither of them can escape.
When he’s sixteen, Ronan looks back just as Adam’s pulling off his Aglionby sweater in the back of the Pig (stop looking, stop being so obvious, stop before he notices, just stop) and notices a wide, gorgeous purple swath over his ribs. It’s beautiful in its ugliness, a perfect painting of violence. Ronan had one like that over his ribs the summer he’d learned how to take a man down with the strength of his body – one wrong move and he’d broken a rib. He’d had trouble breathing for a month.
“Christ, Parrish,” he says scornfully. “What happened to you?”
Adam’s blue eyes, normally so brilliant and alert at school, have faded to an exhausted shine; Ronan’s question turns them positively distrustful.
“Nothing,” he says, tugging his white t-shirt down around his hips. “I slept funny.”
“The fuck—” “Ronan, language, please,” “—that’s the least funny thing I’ve ever seen.”
Really, Ronan knows he should just let it go. The more attention he draws to Parrish, the more attention he draws to himself and that sends DANGER, WILL ROBINSON signals pulsing nauseatingly through his brain.
“It’s nothing,” Adam says again, vicious, and Ronan winds up, ready to fight again but Gansey makes a disapproving noise in the back of his throat. Adam’s eyes spark, Ronan’s lip curls, and the Pig makes a grinding noise that makes them all glance hastily at out the windshield at the hood.
He’d seen Niall slap Declan, once, when he was thirteen. Declan had just stood there afterward, mulish fury etched across his forehead as his right cheek flushed a darker red than the rest of his face.
Niall never hit him or Matthew.
Ronan doesn’t ask again but he sees more bruises. A red, raw ring around Adam’s wrist that gets hastily tucked under a sleeve; yellow, mottled circles that dot Adam’s shoulder when Ronan catches a glimpse of him changing into his jumpsuit for Boyd’s garage. He turns away before Adam finishes dressing, something unfamiliar and hot in his stomach.
He worries, silently, through October and November. It’s not like Parrish has been around their group long enough to get truly attached, but Ronan still thinks about the way he flushes red when he pulls the arms of his sweater down or doesn’t let Gansey get close enough to clap him on the shoulder, the only love language Gansey knows, and he feels sick. Parrish has always been a jumpy fucker but after seeing pieces, the whole puzzle lurks unpleasantly at the edge of his subconscious and Ronan’s not sure how to feel.
It comes to head right before Christmas. Gansey goes up to D.C. for some family thing and the snows keep Adam off his bike so Ronan gives him a ride home. He can see the refusal in Adam’s eyes so he makes an offhand comment about going to find Declan for a little brotherly bonding and that threat of a Lynch brawl is enough to get Adam’s butt in gear. Ronan refuses to feel guilty for the emotional manipulation. After all, he’s doing it for Adam’s own good.
They keep quiet as Ronan navigates the BMW down Henrietta’s county roads and it feels like he’s holding his breath once they reach the trailer park.
“Here’s good,” Adam says quietly, shamefully, and Ronan pulls to an easy stop before one trailer that looks indistinguishable from the rest. He takes in the way Adam’s curled in on himself, at the rusty truck parked under the carport, at the way the curtains twitch suspiciously in the living room window. The whole things look abysmal.
The puzzle solves itself and Ronan feels very cold.
“Parrish,” he says carefully. “Don’t go in there.”
Adam’s eyes are exhausted again when he glances over at Ronan. “Lynch. Fuck off.”
Ronan could bristle, but he’s suddenly very afraid. It makes his hands tremble. “Seriously, man. Come crash at Monmouth while Gansey’s gone.”
Adam’s mouth puckers and Ronan is tired. He’s tired of fighting this beautiful boy; he’s tired of pretending like he likes to fight him.
Wordlessly, Adam gathers up his secondhand sweater, his beaten-up book bag. “You’d better go,” he says. His accent isn’t nearly so crisp as it is when they’re with Gansey and Ronan’s heart skips. Ronan feels lost; he hears the crack of Niall’s palm against Declan’s check and sees the dark, deep circles under Adam’s eyes.
“Don’t come back. You’ll make it worse,” Adam says as he shuts the door and then he’s gone, trudging through the snow to the trailer steps. He disappears inside and a moment later, a man’s head is poking out, glaring at Ronan and his fancy car.
Ronan resists the temptation to flip the man off and carefully navigates his way out of the park. His knuckles tighten over the steering wheel. The leather creaks under his hands and he beats his palms against it, uselessly, as he drives away from Adam Parrish and the worst secret Ronan’s ever heard.