Chapter Text
Something wasn’t right.
“Understatement of the century.” Ryan thought to himself, bitterly.
Obviously, nothing was right. He and the rest of his fellow counselors had just barely survived a nightmare he only perceived as possible in horror movies.
To be more specific, someone wasn’t alright. That person specifically being Dylan.
And as Ryan shot the man another quick glance from where he was standing by the entrance, his sense of unease only grew. Dylan was seated at the bottom of the lodge’s staircase, nestled in between Emma and Abi, and staring at the ground in complete silence. Refusing to meet anyone’s (Ryan’s) eyes.
He hasn’t said a single word to Ryan ever since he returned from his excursion with Laura and Travis. Hell, Dylan barely even reciprocated the hug that Ryan gave him when he first rushed inside the lodge, the fear he had been harboring since their separation at the pool house having only grown in the hours spent apart.
Ryan initially thought it was exhaustion when it took Dylan a few seconds to weakly return the hug, whereas for Ryan it was the tightest hug he could ever remember giving someone in recent memory. And he would have been happy to continue hugging the taller boy, but he was gently maneuvered away and was faced with Dylan’s grimace that quickly changed to a wobbly barely-there smile when the latter noticed his stare. Ryan furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.
“Are you okay? What happened—” Ryan started asking, cutting himself off when Dylan just turned around and walked away in silence. After that, he kept his distance.
That was almost an hour ago.
Crossing his arms across his chest, Ryan looked around the remainder of the room. Kaitlyn was sitting at one of the tables across from Jacob, both of them talking in hushed voices. Nick had returned a bit earlier, covered in blood and the torn remnants of his clothing, and asked to be left alone as he trekked to the second floor. Laura had yet to return with her boyfriend from the island, and who knew what Travis was doing. He curtly told the counselors to stay put as he tried to figure out the semantics of their story for the authorities.
Ryan felt as though he was missing a largely important puzzle piece. Now don't get him wrong: he embraced quietness and rarely found it to be awkward. But this stilted silence, from someone as eccentric and as friendly as Dylan, was making him paranoid. “Especially when that silence is directed at you,” his traitorous brain supplied. Coupled with the room’s tense atmosphere and Kaitlyn’s not-as-subtle looks, he was nearly ready to explode. He starts pacing to try and calm his nerves.
Clearly, something happened to cause this rift. Ryan thought back to their last interaction, belatedly realizing Dylan didn’t respond or look him in the eyes back then either. “Everything's gonna be fine,” he had said, about to offer more reassurances when he felt the stares of Kaitlyn, Laura, and Abi at that moment. He turns around and does another lap throughout the lodge.
Ryan briefly overheard that Dylan accompanied Kaitlyn to the scrapyard while Emma and Abi remained inside the storm shelter. Could something have happened on their journey? Did they talk about him? He understood that both Kaitlyn and Dylan liked him. He even admitted as such to Laura, to her blatant disbelief. Before the night turned to shit, Ryan was actually having fun with them at the bonfire, the buzz from his beer and adrenaline from sharing a kiss with Dylan still roaring in his bloodstream. For those precious few minutes, he was thrumming with excitement.
He briefly entertained the idea of how it could have turned out if he got the chance to ask Dylan his truth or dare options before Abi’s scream interrupted their game.
“Did that kiss mean as much to you as it did for me?”
“Kiss me again.”
Then, because his brain hated him, his conversation with Laura overshadowed his imagination. The words “maybe neither” rattling around only served to worsen his ever-growing migraine.
Ryan’s pacing had brought him to pass by the staircases and Dylan didn’t move or acknowledge him in the slightest, only Emma and Abi were watching his frantic movements in perplexity. He quickly passed by before he did something embarrassing, like dropping to his knees and begging Dylan for an explanation. Why the silent treatment? Why the standoffish attitude? Why won’t you look at me?
His emotions were running more rampant by the minute, this desperation for answers foreign even to himself. Never before had someone’s indifference bothered him this much. Ryan was the textbook definition of “do not disturb, heavy emphasis if my headphones are in!” but when faced with such disparity from Dylan, he felt hurt and disoriented and nauseated and worried and—
Someone grabbed his wrist, halting his frenzy both figuratively and literally.
“Dude, you’re going to wear the floorboards in at this rate,” Kaitlyn remarked, looking up at him from her seat. Ryan fidgeted beneath her gaze. “I can see the steam coming out of your ears, why don’t you sit for a while with me and Jacob?” Ryan shook his head and tried to release her grip from his arm to no avail, only receiving a raised brow in response. He had forgotten how detrimentally determined Kaitlyn could be when she wanted things to go her way.
“I’m fine, just a lot of pent-up energy.” He answered, tapping his foot for something to focus his mind on, rather than Dylan’s despondence radiating directly behind his back. Kaitlyn scoffed, “Yeah. Not buying it. You’ve been off since returning from your adventure with little miss eyepatch, what’s your issue?” And Ryan had to physically stop himself from staring at her slack-jawed. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for his brain-to-mouth filter.
“Me?! Out of everyone in this room, I’m the one acting off? You have got to be fucking with me!”
Ryan felt his paranoia rocket up a few notches when his raised voice grabbed the attention of nearly everyone in the room (except the one person who mattered) as he looked between his friends. Kaitlyn sighed and stood up, muttering something intelligible under her breath and tugging his wrist. “Let’s talk in private.” She said, walking away from the group and to the nurse’s office at the back of the lodge, not giving Ryan the opportunity to deny her request. He helplessly let himself be dragged, hoping he could get some answers out of the woman.
In a last-ditch effort, he turned around and felt a small flicker of hope blossom in his chest as Dylan finally picked his head up. Only to have that hope extinguished when he didn’t chance a glance in Ryan’s direction, no, he only repositioned himself to lay his head on Emma’s shoulder. The same shoulder that was oh-so-conveniently on the opposite end of the room as the nurse’s office.
The back of Kaitlyn’s hair was suddenly the most interesting thing in the building to look at.
The two of them didn’t speak until they reached the nurse’s office and only then, did Kaitlyn drop Ryan’s arm as she closed the door behind them and placed her hands on her hips. The blood coating her body only intensified the glare she was sending him across the room.
“Seriously, what is your deal? You’re ratcheting the anxiety tenfold in there, Ryan!” She exclaimed, and the one in question felt himself reach his boiling point.
“He won’t even fucking look at me!”
And Ryan knew at that moment that something definitely happened because Kaitlyn’s demeanor switched from blazing hot to chilling pity in an instant.
Ryan started pacing again.
“He won’t look at me, he won’t talk to me, fuck! He barely wanted to fucking touch me, let alone hug me! And I have no idea why!” Kaitlyn tried to interject, “Wait, just listen—,” but the metaphorical floodgates had been opened and Ryan couldn’t stop them even if he tried.
“I’m just so confused! I mean, is he that fucking upset that I didn’t want to kill Chris?! He was like fucking family to me, a father figure! Was it my rejection that fucking werewolves somehow exist?! Because excuse me for not jumping on the bandwagon based on a good-for-nothing poem as quickly as the rest of you!” Ryan heard his brain screaming at him to lower his voice, God knows he doesn’t want the others to hear his tangent, but he was so overwhelmed by everything being left unsaid and unanswered. “Did something happen at the scrapyard? Did he say something? It’s driving me crazy and the radio silence is making it worse!”
For the second time that night, Kaitlyn stopped his hysteria. Except this time, she shoved her hand over his mouth.
“Jesus dude, ever heard of using your inside voice?” She breathed out, checking the door to make sure none of the other counselors were about to burst in at the sound of Ryan’s yelling. He had the childish urge to bite her palm, but restrained himself because he was mature, thank you very much. “To answer your questions, yes he said something.” Ryan harshly inhaled and before he could rip the hand away from his mouth, Kaitlyn stepped closer. “Listen to me! I’ll try to explain what I feel comfortable sharing since it’s his place to say and not mine, but you have to take a fucking deep breath and chill out.” She stressed the last two words and stared expectantly at him, her stance indicating she was deadly serious about keeping his mouth covered if need be.
Ryan heeded her advice, having noticed how he could hear his heartbeat in his ears and wondering if Kaitlyn could feel it due to her close proximity. He nods his head and she watches him for a few seconds before slowly lowering her hand, assessing him the entire time.
“Her answers matter more than my pride.” He thinks callously, taking a seat on the bed in the corner. Kaitlyn pulls one of the chairs up close and situates herself right in front of Ryan’s legs.
“God, I deserve some kind of emotional compensation for dealing with you two all night.” She huffs and swiftly segues back onto the main topic of discussion before Ryan could object. “So. Like I said, yes he said something. And before I tell you what that something is, you have to remember that Dylan said this in a high-intensity, life-or-death situation that was this shitshow of a night. And I would also like to point out that I immediately disagreed with him, except you know Dylan, he gets stuck inside his own head.” Kaitlyn began, accentuating her points with her hands.
Ryan stays quiet, dreading whatever bombshell Kaitlyn was going to drop on him. How the fuck does he always manage to push away the people who matter most in his life? First his parents, then Chris, now Dylan—
Kaitlyn snaps her fingers. “I see what you’re doing, get out of that hamster-wheel brain of yours.” She remarks, and even though Ryan scoffs, he does redirect his attention to her.
“Alrighty! So, we’re walking to the scrapyard and Dylan starts talking about you and Laura. Not a pretty picture I might add, seeing as I would compare you two to cats needing a spray bottle.” Ryan barely resists rolling his eyes. “We both said some unfavorable comments, which I will not be repeating seeing as how I’m currently positioned right in front of you—” Ryan feels his withering patience snap.
“Kaitlyn! Get to the point!”
She throws her hands up in mock defeat. “Fine! He said, and I quote, ‘Honestly... I don’t know if he’s worth the effort.’”
Ryan is almost positive he feels his heart flatline for half a second.
His face must convey the same image because Kaitlyn launches into her explanation, all pretenses thrown out the window. “As I said, I immediately tried to tell him no! Definitely not! But, Dylan is a master at deflection and refuses to hear me out about matters of the heart. Trust me, Ryan, he looked absolutely dejected and it hurt like hell to see him like that, but at the same time, I don’t think he means what he says.” Unbeknownst to Kaitlyn, Ryan had started tuning her out after her revelation.
Not worth the effort.
Not worth the effort.
Not worth the effort.
God, Ryan thinks he might actually be sick.
He thought they were getting somewhere. Sure, they were good friends over the course of camp and casually flirted all summer. However, Ryan has learned more about Dylan in the past 12 hours than he has the past 2 months, he learned tidbits he was sure none of the counselors knew about. He knew Dylan wanted to major in quantum physics, that he was insanely smart when it comes to technology, how blasé Dylan is just a mask and Dylan-Dylan was raw and shy and vulnerable and felt comfortable enough to share his truth with Ryan.
Ryan thought he was cracking Dylan’s walls and wanted to dismantle his own in return.
“So much for that fucking pipe dream.” He’s willing to bash his skull against the floor if it means shutting his subconscious off.
Kaitlyn was still talking, he realized, so absorbed in his downward spiral. “—wallowing in his thoughts and I think he just needs you to talk to him. Ryan? Ryan, did you hear anything I just said?” He shakes his head, more so to clear it but she interprets it as a negative to her question. “Go out there and talk to him! Clear the air!” She repeats.
Ryan really wished she wasn’t crowding him on the bed so he could move around, opting to wring his hands together instead. “Talk to him?! And say what? ‘Hey! Kaitlyn told me that you said you don’t think I’m worth the effort even though I thought we were building something special, I mean I fucking tackled you when I came back to the lodge, but no worries! Not like I wanted to give you my fucking number and actually see where this thing between us goes but no harm no foul! Good luck with the cops!’”
Kaitlyn frowns at his exaggeration. “I swear, it’s like I’m starring in a drama soap-opera with the way you two handle your emotional constipation.” She grabs his forearms and shakes them to demand his attention. “Now, you listen to me. I am going to leave this room and you are going to take a few minutes to calm down and think about everything. Then, you’re going to go out there and have an honest-to-god open conversation with Dylan. And I swear on the Hag itself, Ryan, if you somehow manage to hurt his feelings or fuck this up, you will feel my wrath.”
He can only gape at her speech, his brain and emotions having gone through the wringer in the what? 10 minutes since they left the group? The concept of time is fleeting at this point.
“I’m serious Ryan, this night was already fucking horrible,” Kaitlyn said, gesturing to the liters of blood covering them. She pushes the chair back and stands up, “Don’t lose or jeopardize both of your chances at a happy ending just because you want to be headstrong and Dylan wants to give you the silent treatment without hearing your side.” She pats his shoulder and Ryan tenses, the urge to just hide and not speak to anyone growing stronger by the minute. He’s reached his quota of social interaction and emotional transparency for a year once this night officially ends.
Kaitlyn removes her hand and waits for a few beats, gesturing with her hand for him to answer. He complies, too tired to continue bickering with her. “Okay, yes I hear you. Can you just... leave already.” And if she thinks he’s being rude, oh fucking well. She didn’t just have her heart trampled.
He feels her eyes roaming across his face, certain he must capture quite a scene, and he’s at his wits end from the trauma, the betrayal, the grief, the heartbreak, all of it. “Fucking go, Kaitlyn!” He bites out, looking out the window at the steadily rising morning sun. She sighs and walks towards the door. “When you’re done being such an ass, remember we’re all here for you, Ryan. Especially Dylan, even if he doesn’t realize it yet.” She leaves, closing the door behind her.
And Ryan's alone.
He punches the wall and it feels cathartic.
Then he starts crying.
He tries to blame it on the sunlight. It doesn’t work.
Looking down at his bleeding knuckles, Ryan sniffs. Broken. Not worth the effort.