Work Text:
It’s not till later, when Felix is looking through his bag to check everything was still there, that he finds the unicorn.
He knows one of the others must have put it in there, when they came looking for him. They’d known they weren’t going to come back, one way or the other. He still doesn’t like to think about that, that the rescue had been necessary. That any of it had been necessary. But it had happened, and now he has to deal with it.
The unicorn watches as he makes the candles in his room burn bright and go out with a wave of his hand, over and over. He still finds it sort of creepy, and resolves to give it back to Jake as soon as possible. He really needs to apologise, as well – he’d said he was sorry to Sam, once they were home, but it’s not enough.
It’s surprisingly difficult to get out of the house the next day, because his mother will not stop fussing over him. It’s great that she’s finally paying attention to him (even if it did take him disappearing for two weeks), but it’s starting to feel a little smothering. He’s become used to slipping in and out of his house like a ghost, he doesn’t know how to handle her watching his every move.
(Oscar catches his eye over breakfast and gives him a look that says welcome to my world. Felix can only smile shakily back.)
When he finally makes it out of the house, he’s in baggy jeans and a hoodie he hasn’t worn for over two years. It feels soft and clean against his skin, but strange and a little uncomfortable too – he’d looked so different when he’d caught himself in the mirror, too much like who he used to be. He clutches tighter to the strap of his bag, the unicorn safely inside, and walks the streets to Jake’s house just like he has a thousand times before.
Jake’s house still looks the same. He’s not sure why that surprises him, but it does. He wonders if it’s still the same inside, if Jake’s room still looks like it used to. He shakes the thoughts out of his head. It’s only when he’s on the doorstep, softly knocking on the flyscreen, that he allows himself to properly think, and realise he has no idea what to say to Jake or how to begin to apologise or explain any of it. He’s still not sure whether to be worried or relieved when Jake’s mum answers the door.
She does a noticeable double take when she sees him, and he tries not to wince. He wonders what surprised her the most – the fact he was at her door, or that he was at her door wearing baggy jeans and a hoodie instead of the tight black armour he’d kept on for two years.
“Felix,” she says, and her voice is soft and her eyes are kind, just like he remembers. “How are you?”
“I’m fine,” he says, quickly. He’s still not used to people asking how he is all the time. “Is Jake around?”
“He’s in his room,” she says, smiling, and Felix remembers being a kid, bouncing up and down on his toes and asking, can Jake come out and play? “Would you like to come in?”
Felix freezes. “It’s not that important,” he says, “I can come back later if he’s busy, I just have-“
“Felix?”
He looks up sharply, to see Jake coming forward to stand in the doorway. It’s strange to see him in different clothes. “Hi.”
Jake’s mum glances between the two of them. “I’ll leave you boys to it,” she says, and slips past Jake and back into the house. Felix shifts uncomfortably.
“What’s up?” Jake asks, looking at him warily, and Felix finds himself thinking about the last moment they were really friends. Except now, their positions are reversed, and Felix doesn’t think he could really think he would blame Jake if he slammed the door in Felix’s face.
“Has anything weird happened to you lately?” he asks, before he can stop himself.
“Weird how?” Jake asks, frowning.
“Like,” Felix begins, but then stops. He can’t remember now what he was going to say, how he was going to ask have you recently gained the ability to make dirt move or you can feel that something’s not right too, can’t you and not make it sound like I screwed up and I still haven’t fixed it I might have made things worse and you should hate me. He can fix this himself, he doesn’t need to drag Jake or any of the others back into it; his list of things to apologise for is long enough. So he shakes his head, and just says, “Never mind.”
Jake frowns, that particular frown he gets when he wants to ask questions Felix doesn’t want to answer. He’s been wearing the expression an uncomfortable amount lately. So Felix reminds himself of what he supposedly came for, and breaks their eye contact to pull the stuffed unicorn out of his bag. “This was in my bag when we got back. I’m pretty sure it’s yours,” he says, as he pushes the toy into Jake’s hands.
Jake takes it, gently. “I thought… Andy must have put it there.”
Felix shrugs uncomfortably. He didn’t expect Jake to look so happy. He didn’t expect to want to keep that smile on Jake’s face. But their last conversation, when Jake had smiled and told him it wasn’t his fault and Felix had let him, is hanging in the space between them. And he owes him just as much as he owes the others, so he says, “I’m so sorry, for putting you through all that. I really am.”
Jake’s not smiling anymore, but he’s not really frowning either. “You were doing it for Oscar. I get it.” Felix nods, not trusting himself to speak. It’s not quite forgiveness, but Felix doesn’t expect that. He hasn’t earned it. “And you didn’t know all that was going to happen, right?”
“No, no way,” Felix assures him. “I didn’t know that it would take us to that place, and I really didn’t know about the demon.”
“We nearly died, because of you,” Jake tells him, and Felix looks away.
“It wanted me, not you,” he says. “You should’ve just stayed out of the way.”
“What, and let you die?” Jake asks. “You really think I’d do that?” Felix shrugs. “Felix.”
“I owed you,” Felix says. He can’t look at Jake’s face.
“Didn’t you want to get home?” Jake asks, and he sounds so disbelieving, like he can’t imagine wanting anything else. Like he still doesn’t understand Felix is different.
“What do you think?” he snaps, with more anger than he’d intended.
Jake looks taken aback. “I thought-“
“That I was just as eager to come back as the rest of you?” Felix demands, the anger he normally keeps supressed and cold now coursing hotly through him. “Where my family hates me, my brother can’t walk, and you and your braindead friends throw footballs at me every day?”
Jake actually takes a step back, and Felix wants to laugh. “I said-“
“I know!” Felix cuts him off. He feels invigorated, lit up. He feels like he imagines a bushfire does. But he keeps his voice as calm and cutting as he can. “You’re sorry. It doesn’t just magically fix everything. Believe me, I know,” he adds, darkly.
“You couldn’t have stayed,” Jake says, because he’s stubborn and stupid and for some reason wanted to protect them all, even Felix. “What about Oscar? Or Ellen?”
“Ellen doesn’t need me,” Felix replies, even though she’d hit him if he said anything like it to her face. She’ll figure out he’s a waste of her time eventually. “And we’ve established Oscar is better off without me.” It still hurts a little, to be back home, to have his brother smile at him and it’s his fault, it’s all Felix’s fault-
“Felix, you’re being stupid,” Jake says, interrupting the flow of his thoughts. Felix grinds his teeth.
“Why do you care?” he demands. “I thought you would’ve been glad to get rid of me.”
That seems to throw Jake off more than anything else; he looks genuinely shocked. “I- I said I didn’t hate you.”
Felix remembers. He wishes he didn’t. “You said you tried.”
Jake swallows, and his next words are quieter. “’Cause it was easier.”
“Yeah, easy to push me around,” Felix scoffs, because those two years he trained himself not to care weren’t for nothing. Because Jake had pushed him around and spat insults and called him freak like he didn’t care how much it hurt, and he’d done it all with a smile and a laugh, and still there’d been moments where Felix had missed him.
“We’ve been over this, Felix!” Jake snaps. “I thought you hated me, and it sucked, okay? But I’m sorry, and I’ve changed, and if Trent or anyone does anything to you again I’ll stop it, alright?” He looks at Felix, eyes wide and insistent, and Felix can’t help being a little taken aback. It’s a look he hasn’t seen for years, the look Jake used to give him when he was telling him that no, he didn’t hate Felix, didn’t think he was weird for being who he was. Even when they’d talked before, on the bus or outside the magic shop, Jake didn’t look at him like that. Felix isn’t sure how to deal with it.
He lets out a breath, and realises he doesn’t really feel angry anymore. Tired maybe, and kind of sad. “I don’t get you,” he says, and he really doesn’t. “Why are you trying so hard?”
Jake shrugs. “Sorry doesn’t fix everything, right?” Felix just blinks at him, not expecting to have his own words used against him like that. Jake looks back at him for a moment, silent, then reaches out towards him.
Felix flinches, purely out of instinct, and Jake drops his arms as quickly as he raised them. Felix stares at him. “Were you trying to hug me?”
“So?” Jake asks. He’s not looking Felix in the eye, instead looking down at the unicorn he’s still holding in his hand.
Part of Felix wants to laugh, but the rest of him is too busy being shocked. “It’s been a while.”
“I’m trying to make up for what I should’ve been doing,” Jake says, and Felix almost swallows his tongue. “What, do you not do hugs now?” he asks, and it’s teasing, friendly. Felix wants to snap back something snarky and cynical, because he kind of doesn’t. His family haven’t hugged him for years, and Ellen has never been the most physically affectionate person in the world. But all he can make himself do is shrug, and stay still when Jake reaches for him again.
It’s different from how it used to be. They’ve both grown, and they don’t fit together in quite the same way, and the years spent trying to hate each other are there in the spaces between them. All told, it’s really awkward. But it’s also kind of nice. And Jake pulls away before Felix can get really uncomfortable, for which he’s silently grateful.
“I’m so sorry for what I put you through,” he says, because he has to make sure Jake knows. “I know it doesn’t fix anything, but. I’m really sorry.”
Jake smiles. “It’s okay.”
Felix opens his mouth, not even sure of what he’s going to say, but then Jake’s mother appears in the doorway and he snaps his mouth shut. “Jakey,” she says, and Jake immediately turns to her. “Lunch is nearly ready.”
“I’m sorry, I’ll get out of your way,” Felix says, already stepping back. He’d completely forgotten about her, and they’d been talking pretty loudly. He wonders how much she’d heard.
“You’re welcome to join us if you’d like, Felix,” she tells him, smiling kindly, like she hadn’t heard any of it, but Felix already shaking his head.
“Thanks, Mrs Riles, but I really should be getting home,” he says, clutching the strap of his bag.
“Well, maybe next time?” she asks, like it’s that easy, like him and Jake are back to being best friends just like that, sharing meals and mattresses and secrets.
Felix starts to say something non-committal, but then Jake says, “Yeah,” and he freezes. “I mean, that’d be cool,” Jake mutters, and his mother looks proud of him but Jake’s only looking at Felix.
“Sure,” Felix says, and is not really that surprised that he means it. “Next time.” Then he says his goodbyes and makes his escape, before he can say anything else. He’s not sure yet if he really believes there’ll be a next time, but he knows he wants there to be. And when he thinks of the way Jake smiled at him, he doesn’t think he’s so stupid to want it.