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Fezco fucking hated high school parties.
Which was funny, considering that he spent a lot of time at them. Unfortunately for him, his exact demographic of buyers was also the exact demographic of people who would enjoy a high school party. Most of the time, he would just claim a corner of a couch as his own, and smoke while he watched others enjoy themselves. He watched people dance on each other, drink until they passed out, argue, take pictures of each other, and drink more. There was a part of him that wondered, if his life were different, if he’d gone to school, if he had a normal job and actual friends, would he enjoy this kind of thing? But he never really let himself get that far in his thinking. The way he saw it, his life was the way it was, and it wasn’t changing.
Then there was that one party. The one that almost changed his mind. Then again, it wasn’t the party that he liked. In fact, he had wished that the couch they had been sitting on could be magically transported somewhere else– somewhere quiet, where he could talk to that brunette girl, and listen to her soft voice as she told him about Christians, and Pagans, and a bunch of other shit he knew nothing about.
So he had thought that tonight had the potential to be different. He had no choice whether or not he was going to attend this stupid fucking party, but now he felt like there was a chance that he could at least have a moment, one tiny good moment, if she was there.
Unfortunately Fez hadn’t run into Lexi. He’d found a couch, like he always did, and when he looked out into the sea of drunk teenagers, he was looking a little harder than usual. But he didn’t see her. Maybe it was that disappointment of not seeing her that had made him drop his guard more than usual. Maybe as he walked out to his car, instead of looking out for himself, his mind had been somewhere else; stuck on the memory of those soft braids that had circled her head like a crown. Or a halo.
So when something from out of the darkness collided with his face, and he felt a crushing sensation on the bridge of his nose, then a warm numbness that flowed down his body, he really hadn’t seen it coming at all.
He wasn’t sure if the gap in his memory that followed was a result of being punched in the face or if it was just one of many gaps in his memory that he regularly experienced, but when he finally got his grip back on reality, he was slumped against the hood of his car, staring at his phone, his hand shaking. He realized that he was trying to text Ash, to tell him to come bring the spare car key, he didn’t know how he’d lost his keys but he couldn’t find them, did those guys that jumped him steal them? But the letters on his keyboard seemed so blurry, and he squinted, trying to make them out.
“Christ, are you okay?”
Fez managed to lift his head, and despite the fact that his vision wasn’t quite clear, and the low light of the driveway, there was no mistaking who he was looking at. Her brown hair was down tonight, and caressed her neck and shoulders in a way that almost made him feel jealous. Her red lips were agape, her dark glittering eyes wide with fear.
“Huh?” He said. Smooth.
“Oh my god, Fez. Do you need to go to the hospital?” Suddenly she was closer to him, her eyes scanning him up and down. “You’re… covered in blood.”
His brain seemed to finally catch up with the situation, and he blinked, looking down at his shirt. Damn, he was covered in blood. He brought a hand up to his face and felt the warmth that was gushing like a waterfall from his nose. “Oh, shit. Yeah.” He tilted his head back, a pitiful attempt to slow the bleeding, and still he felt another small trail of blood drip down his cheek. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Lexi, still standing frozen in horror. “Nosebleed,” he said simply.
“I mean, yeah, your nose is definitely bleeding,” she said, rummaging around in her bag and pulling out something green Fez couldn’t quite make out. “You have about a minute to convince me why I shouldn’t take you to the hospital.”
“Chill, bro. You never just randomly got a nosebleed before?”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re trying to tell me your face just… started doing that.”
He shrugged.
“Fez, your nose is broken. I can see it.”
“Wait, for real?” He turned to look at his reflection in the window of his car. She was right. He was covered in blood. It was on his face, in his mouth, down his front, on his hands. And there was no mistaking it. His nose was crooked. He brought a tentative hand up to touch it, as if to ensure that it was real. He felt blinding pain where he touched. “This cannot be fuckin’ happening right now bro.”
“Please, just tell me what happened. Do you have any symptoms of a concussion? Do you feel like you’re gonna throw up?” Lexi’s gaze seemed to be switching from one of Fez’s eyes to the other frantically, observing his movements in detail.
“Yeah, my face is fucked up, of course I feel like I’m gonna puke. I might have a crooked nose for my whole fuckin’ life. That’s bullshit.”
“You might have brain damage, and you’re worried that your nose is going to be crooked?” Lexi asked incredulously.
“I like my face the way that it is,” Fez defended. “What’s the problem with that?” He pushed air out of his lungs, lining up his hands on both sides of his nose. He faced the car window again. “You should probably, like, look away.”
“What? Why?”
Lexi’s question was answered by Fez swiftly shoving his broken nose back into place, resulting in an obscene cracking noise and a sensation that felt like being shot directly in the face. He fell against the car, holding his head. “Fuck.”
“Oh, oh my god.” When Fez finally looked up, Lexi was hunched over, her hands on her knees, looking at the ground.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and he meant it. The adrenaline was starting to wear off, and even worse than the ache spreading across his face was the guilt he felt for scaring Lexi.
She let out a shaky breath, standing up straight. “When you tell somebody to look away, you have to actually give them a second to do it.”
“I know, I’m sorry.”
“I think you actually fixed it though.” She sounded impressed, in spite of everything. She reached for him, and Fez felt his heart stutter. She gingerly placed her hands on either side of his face, straightening out his head so she could see him clearly. “Yeah, it looks good.”
If Fez’s face wasn’t already covered in blood, it would be red.
She unwrapped the thing she was holding and handed it to him. It was a weird little white thing with a string on it.
“Fuck is this?”
“It’s a tampon.”
Fez’s brow furrowed. “I don’t got no vagina though.”
Lexi sighed. “Yes, I know that. It’s for your nose. Like in She’s the Man.”
“I dunno what that is,” he said, hesitantly taking the little white cotton thing from her.
“It’s a movie. Anyway, I don’t have any tissues. So this is gonna have to do for now.” She reached into her bag to pull out another one.
“I’m not… putting this up my nose.” Fez looked at the tampon like he was a six-year-old holding a piece of broccoli.
“Why not? It’s for blood. That’s literally its whole purpose.”
He held it out to give it back to her. “It’s fine, man. This shirt is ruined anyway.”
“Well, I don’t want you getting blood on my car,” she said, though she took the tampon back anyway.
“What you mean, your car?”
“You’re not driving.”
“Yes I am, I’m just waitin’ for Ash to come give me the key.”
“No, you’re not.”
In any other situation, Fez never would have let Lexi drive him home. Not because he didn’t want to be in her car, but because he still wasn’t quite sure why he’d been jumped, or even if there would be someone waiting for him when he got home. But there was nothing he could do. He was locked out of his own car. “You haven’t been drinkin’ or nothin’?” He said finally.
Lexi smiled grimly. “I’m always the designated driver.”
Fez still really wanted to argue with her. But he felt like there was a bullet in his face, and suddenly he was getting so, so tired. He just nodded.
Lexi appeared at his side, hooking his arm over her shoulder and supporting him as they walked. Fez wished more than anything that he was present, that he was conscious. He wanted to actually take in the feeling of Lexi holding him up, her arm around his waist. He wanted to remember it. But his body felt so far away.
He vaguely processed Lexi opening a car door for him and helping him inside. He tilted his head back to try to minimize his bleeding, resting his head against the car seat, and became transfixed with a polaroid that she had clipped to her visor. It was of her, Rue, and some other girl he didn’t really recognize. They looked dressed up, like they were at some kind of event. Lexi was the one holding the camera, and she was in the middle of a laugh. He absentmindedly thought about what it might feel like to make her laugh like that.
He realized that Lexi was sitting in the driver’s seat and that the car was running now.
“Put on your seatbelt,” she said, and Fez tried to do as he was told, but when he got to the part where he had to insert the buckle, he struggled, trying to blink away the blurriness in his vision.
Lexi reached over to do it for him, and their fingers touched. Even through the dull ache in his… everything, Fez could feel that.
Lexi started to drive. “Has this happened before?”
“Nah, I ain’t ever broken my nose.”
“I was more asking if you’ve ever had a head injury before.”
“Uh,” Fez considered telling the truth. But his brain couldn’t even process getting into that stupid painful story. So he didn’t. “No.”
Lexi looked at him funny, through narrowed eyes, and it seemed like she was looking at the side of his head instead of his face. He remembered the long scar that stretched down the side of his head, visible through his buzzed hair, and his insides churned a little. He hoped she wouldn’t say anything.
“I’m only asking because if you have, then getting another concussion could be really dangerous.”
Fez just hummed quietly in response. God, he was really fucking tired. He closed his eyes.
“All right, you have to stay awake, okay? Because if you have a concussion and you go to sleep, something really bad could happen.” The fear in Lexi’s voice jumpstarted Fez a little.
“I’m cool, I swear,” he assured her, sitting up a little. He looked at Lexi, and watched how she only kept her eyes on the road for a few seconds at a time, constantly looking over at him. “My face fucking kills.”
“Okay, okay,” Lexi muttered, pulling off to the side of the road. She pulled out her phone and started typing something into Google.
“What?” Fez mumbled.
“Okay, Tylenol is okay.” Lexi reached over him and for a moment she was practically laying in his lap. She opened the glove box and pulled out a pill bottle, and she unscrewed the top. “Take this.”
Fez looked down at the Tylenol she had placed between his bloody fingers. “One?”
“It’s extra-strength. Take it, please.” Her voice was firm but Fez could still hear the fear in there.
He swallowed it, resting his head back against the seat again.
Satisfied, Lexi looked over her shoulder to check her blind spot, then pulled back onto the road. Fez tried to focus, to stay awake. He stared at that polaroid, at Rue and Lexi and the mystery girl. But the rumbling of the car beneath him and the hum of the engine was working like a white noise machine. His mind started to drift, his eyes falling closed.
“Hey, don’t,” he heard Lexi say, and suddenly her hand was grasping his, squeezing it to get his attention. It definitely got his attention.
“I’m good,” he assured her again, although it was incredibly obvious that wasn’t true. Her hand was warm, and her skin was soft. He thought of the blood that he was inevitably getting all over her hand, and he winced internally. He wished he was somebody different. Somebody who wasn’t so gross, and scary. Somebody clean, who smelled nice, who had soft smooth hands like Lexi. Somebody who wasn’t currently getting his grossness all over her.
“We’re almost at the hospital,” she said, moving to withdraw her hand from his.
He grasped at her hand, not letting her go. “No, Lexi, you can’t take me there. I’m fucking dead serious.”
Fez saying her name seemed to get her attention, and she pressed her mouth into a thin line, not saying anything.
“I can’t. I’d be in a lot of fucking trouble. They’d be tryin’ to see my documents and my insurance and shit.”
Lexi let out a shaky breath, staring at the road. “You could die.”
Fez ignored that comment. “I wanna go home.”
Maybe it was the way he sounded like a little kid that convinced her. “Okay,” she said, but still, Fez didn’t let her go, holding onto her hand as if it was for his own survival.
Oddly, despite the pain in his face, and the drowsiness that attacked him intermittently, he didn’t want the car ride to come to an end. He wanted to keep holding her hand, to keep being a passenger in her car. He dreamed up a scenario where she was taking him somewhere nice, and she was holding his hand just because she wanted to– not because she was scared. Lexi pulled up in front of his apartment and the dream crumbled.
“Hey, how’d you know where I live?”
“I mean, I just figured you lived behind the convenience store.” She gently withdrew her hand from his and killed the engine, and his heart fell a little.
Fez undid the seat belt and pulled the door handle, pushing the door open. He was starting to come back to reality a bit; he didn’t know if it was the evening air or the pain medication doing its job. He carefully brought his hand up to his face to check the state of the bleeding, and found that the blood on his face was beginning to dry. He stood up, pulling air into his lungs.
Lexi got around to his side and closed the passenger door behind him. To his surprise, she took his hand again, leading him up the stairs to his front door. “It’s this one, right?”
He nodded, slowly reaching for the door handle before freezing. “Wait. Fuck.”
“What?”
“My keys, bro. I lost my fuckin’ keys.”
“What about your brother? Where’s he?”
Fez pounded on the door. “Ash! You better fuckin’ be in there, man.”
The apartment was dead silent, inside and out.
“Goddamn.”
Lexi spoke up. “What about that girl?”
“Aw, Faye? Nah, she’s gone.”
“So, what, we just wait here until Ash gets back?”
He walked along the side of his apartment, inspecting one of the windows. Then he brought his elbow up and lined it up with the pane of glass. But he didn’t just go ahead and break it; he wasn’t going to do that to Lexi again. Instead he waited, looking at her.
Her expression was a mix of concern and confusion. “What are you doing?”
“I’m waiting so you can look away,” he stated.
It was pretty dark, but he was almost convinced her cheeks turned pink. She did as he asked, turning slightly so that she was looking out at the parking lot, although Fez spotted her still watching him through the corner of her eye.
Fez braced himself, then struck the pane of glass with his elbow. It didn’t hurt as much as he thought it would, though maybe he was just distracted by the throbbing in his face. Shards of glass scattered all over the floor of his bedroom, and he sighed. That was gonna be a bitch to clean up.
He looked back at Lexi, who was fully looking at him now. She stepped towards him, and he stopped her. “Nah, you wait here.”
Fez carefully reached through the jagged hole in the window and flicked the lock, then opened the window and climbed through. The glass crunched beneath his shoes. As he walked in the direction of the front door, he inspected his elbow. He couldn’t really tell if he’d cut himself at all due to the blood that was already, well, everywhere. He reached the door and opened it, smiling at Lexi.
“Welcome,” he said.
Her tense expression shifted into a smile. She let out a little laugh, maybe at what Fez said, maybe at the situation, maybe both. She stepped inside.
Fez closed the door behind her and watched as she awkwardly hovered in the kitchen, her arms crossed.
“Did you hurt yourself?” She asked.
“Uh, I don’t think so,” Fez replied, and got to work on taking off his shoes. They were spattered with blood, and he sighed. He liked those shoes.
Lexi saw what he was doing and started to take off her own. He was about to tell her that she didn’t have to, but under her black mary janes were the cutest striped socks Fez had ever seen. He stared blankly at them.
“You should have a glass of water or something,” Lexi said, and he looked up.
“Oh. Yeah.” He ambled over to the cupboard and pulled out a glass, filling it up at the sink. He didn’t know why Lexi wanted him to have a glass of water, but if she wanted him to do it, he would. After what he had put her through, she deserved him listening to her a little bit. He leaned against the sink and drank it down, watching the tiny spots of blood drip onto the stainless steel.
When he finished, he looked up to see Lexi on her phone again, reading something. Then she turned her phone flashlight on. “Come here.”
He was hesitant, but he complied. She shined the flashlight in both of his ears, which was weird, but he let her. “Okay, your ears look fine.”
“I didn’t really think my ears were the problem,” he said.
“I’m just checking if they’re bleeding,” she assured him, and turned the light off, holding a finger up in front of his face. “Can you follow this with your eyes?”
Her request was difficult, because behind her finger was her face, with that concerned look, and those red lips pulled into a focused pout. But he tried, just for her.
“Okay, good job,” she said plainly, and his stomach felt warm. “Are you dizzy at all?”
Yes, he thought.
“No,” he said, knowing she was talking about potential-brain-injury kind of dizzy, not having-a-pretty-girl-in-front-of-you kind of dizzy.
“Do you know what year it is?”
“Twenty-twenty two, I think.”
She nodded. “What’s your name?”
“Fezco.”
“Your full name,” she pressed.
Fez hesitated. Nobody knew his full name. Not Rue, maybe not even Ashtray.
Lexi looked at him expectantly. “If you genuinely don’t remember, you’re going to the hospital.”
“O’Neill,” he said.
She looked sort of taken aback. “You’re Irish?”
“I mean, why do you think I look like this, bro?” He replied, gesturing to himself.
Lexi laughed, and Fez thought of the polaroid. He was right about what it felt like to make her laugh: it felt good.
“How’s your face?” She asked.
“You know. Been better.” He brought a hand up to touch his face again. He could feel the heat radiating off of himself.
“Where’s the bathroom?”
“End of the hall,” he answered. He was surprised by her taking his hand again, more gently this time than the others. She led him down the hall and into the bathroom, turning on the light.
Fez saw himself in the mirror for the first time, and god, he looked fucking awful. The bottom half of his face was covered in blood, some of it dried, some of it fresh. It was in his mouth and down his shirt. He hadn’t noticed until now, but his lip was busted too. Worse than that, though, was his face. The area around his eyes was red and puffy, like a wasp had stung under each one. At least his nose wasn’t crooked.
“This is what you been lookin’ at this whole time?” He said to Lexi, who was wetting a towel under the tap.
She just shrugged. “Is it okay if I use this? It’s gonna get blood on it.”
“Yeah, whatever you need,” Fez replied.
Lexi reached up to wipe his face, then stopped. “Um, it might be easier if you sit down.”
He awkwardly closed the lid of the toilet, then sat down.
She looked at him with a pleased expression, bringing the towel to his face and wiping gently. The water was warm, and Fez hardly felt the stinging of his nose over the sweet feeling of her carefully tending to his face. “Here, this might hurt a bit. Just tell me.” She cautiously wiped the blood away from under his nose, and Fez tried his best not to wince.
Lexi’s towel traveled down his neck, wiping away the blood there, and she stopped when she got to his shirt collar. “You’ll probably have to shower.”
“Yeah,” Fez said.
Lexi looked at him, her eyes containing something indecipherable. She just stared, for what felt like forever.
“Tell me what you’re thinkin’,” Fez said gently.
She sighed. “You scared the shit out of me, Fez.”
“I know, I’m sorry.”
“I’ve never felt like anyone has ever really cared about me. Or even noticed me. And then I meet you,” Lexi paused, “and suddenly there’s someone who actually listens to what I say. And he tells me he misses me, even when I’m only gone for two minutes. Maybe to you it was just talking to some girl at a party, but to me, it was… special.” Fez wanted to speak up, but she continued. “And then tonight I see you, and you’re just covered in blood. I thought somebody shot you.”
The reality of Lexi’s words weren’t lost on Fez. Unfortunately, there was a high chance that one of these days, he might actually get shot. And where would that leave her? He wanted to be the type of guy who protected the girl he liked. But so far, all that he’d done to Lexi was make her clean up his mess.
Now she was looking at him, waiting for him to say something, her eyes glossy.
He pulled her into his lap, wrapping his arms around her tightly, and she hugged him back, resting her head on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he repeated. And they weren’t just words. He really was.
“I don’t know why I’m getting so worked up,” she said against his neck.
“No, no, it makes sense, considering.”
Lexi removed herself from him, standing up. “You should shower now. Sorry for being so… dumb.”
“Don’t do that. You’re not dumb,” he said, standing up. He carefully pulled his shirt off, avoiding touching his face. His shirt had by far taken the worst of the damage. Looking at it, he wasn’t surprised at Lexi thinking he’d been shot. “Goddamn, I just fuckin’ bought this too.”
“I’ll fix it,” Lexi said quietly. She took the shirt from him, inspecting the stain.
“I dunno if that’s possible, but knock yourself out,” Fez replied.
She turned on the sink, testing the temperature of the water, before submerging the shirt, making the clear tap water turn a hazy brownish-reddish color. “You guys have salt?”
“Yeah, there’s a box by the stove,” he said, not knowing why she was asking, but trusting her judgment. Fez didn’t know shit about getting stains out of clothes. His strategy up until this point had just been to throw out anything that was stained.
Lexi disappeared, then returned with the salt, pouring it onto the shirt.
He watched her meticulously scrub the fabric, then rinse it. He wondered what she’d be doing right now if she hadn’t spotted him outside that party. Would she be with her friends? Would she be home by now, taking off her makeup and getting into bed? The thought that she could be somewhere else right now, somewhere safer, made Fez’s insides twist with guilt. “Lexi, I feel awful.”
She looked up, concerned. “Like, physically?”
“Yeah, that, but…” Fez sighed, sitting back down on the toilet lid. “Look at you, man. I got you in this situation.”
Lexi glanced down at herself, at the splotches of blood that stained her blouse from when she helped Fez into her car. She shook her head. “It’s really not that bad.”
“It is that bad,” Fez insisted. “I don’t want to scare you anymore.” He paused, letting his words sink in, then he laughed without much humor. “And like, it’s funny that I’m even fuckin’ saying this, ‘cause I know how I look right now. I look fucking scary, bro.”
Her eyes connected with his, and she smiled in a kind of soft and sad way. “There are worse things than being scared. You scare me because I care about you. Not caring is worse.” She shrugged like she hadn’t just said the most wonderful thing Fez had ever heard, and she went back to cleaning his shirt.