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This place is a dump. He doesn’t know why Wilbur insists they meet here of all places. Tommy glares at the cracked plaster walls, dark water stains and who knows what else seeping down from the ceiling in a nasty yellow-brown sludge. It’s dark in the house, but Tommy doesn’t trust the electrics in here for shit, and his phone is already almost dead, so he’s stuck waiting for Wilbur in here or risk freezing outside.
At least it’s not windy inside.
Tommy shifts in the unsettling quiet, eyeing the single door that leads in and out of this dump. The frame is warped so much it can’t even close. The wood itself is practically rotted through. The only reason the door doesn’t blow completely open is because Tommy wedged a brick behind it. He’s smart like that.
It’s quiet in the house. That’s Tommy’s least favorite thing about the place. Well, besides literally everything else. He huffs as another minute passes and there’s no sign of the other. Maybe Wilbur blew him off (wouldn’t be the first time).
Nah, he promised. Besides, what else does Tommy have to do? It’s no better back at his own little square of shit, twiddling his thumbs until the bakery opens for the day. His fingers absentmindedly drum against crossed arms, and Tommy scowls at the door. He refuses to message Wilbur, he won’t look desperate. He won’t.
Wilbur is gonna get such a huge rant for this. Tommy’s gonna yell until the bastard’s ears bleed. Tommy shifts his weight, wincing as something squishes under his worn sneakers accompanied by yet another foul smell. Fuck, he hopes that’s not like, a dead animal or something. That would suck.
Tommy’s about ready to say fuck it and brave the outside before it gets cold and dark and someone other homeless bitch decides to claim his alley for their own when the door handle creaks and turns.
The door swings open- completely heedless of the blocker Tommy set in front of it- and a freezing wind blows past the figure standing in the frame, dark brown trench coat billowing in the air and an obnoxious smirk plastered on his face.
“Tommy!” Wilbur croons, “You made it!”
Wilbur takes no heed of the state of the building around them, or the fact that Tommy is glaring daggers at his face. He’s glancing around the room, clearly manic, which means that whatever they are about to do, it’s either stupid, or dangerous. Or both. Tommy doesn’t exactly hate the danger, quite the opposite, but it’s just. Tiring. He misses the times when Wilbur was the stable one, where it was Tommy that had to be reigned in, caught by the shoulders and forced to nap in a warm pile of blankets and limbs, a lullaby whisper-sang into his ear.
Wilbur’s looking at him expectantly, so Tommy hunches his shoulders, grumbling out, “Course I did. Dickhead.” He wants to say more, but Wilbur is already turning away. Starting an argument with the other doesn’t do anything but make them both miserable anyhow.
“Well, don’t just stand there, we have a lot to do,” Wilbur swivels around on his heels, stalking back out into the cold. Ever obedient to the elders whims, Tommy trots after.
“Why’d you make me meet you at this dump if we were just gonna leave immediately,” He whines as the wind nips against his threadbare jacket. He throws the hood up to conserve what little heat he can as he waits for Wilburs answer. “Wilbur?”
“Hmm?”
“I said, why did you make me go into that house when we were just going to leave it?” Tommy can’t help the bits of annoyance threading through his voice. It’s been tough, okay? This is the first time Tommy has heard from the other in almost a month, and only then it’s a cryptic set of coordinates and the stringent order to ‘make sure you aren’t followed’.
Wilbur stops then. His demeanor flips, like a switch was hit, and Tommy can’t help but take a stumbling step back. “Do you trust me, Toms?”
“Of course,” is Tommy’s immediate reply, and he tries to make himself believe the answer, he really does, but something cold settles in his gut at the idea. Wilbur begins to walk again, pace agitated but placated for the moment, and Tommy is left to follow once again.
Does he?
Tommy wants to. God, he wants to trust Wilbur. There was a time when he couldn’t even think of hesitating before responding. Wilbur was is his brother, in all but blood. He’s hurt for him, he would kill for him. The man proved himself worthy of Tommy’s loyalty when he took one look at the scrappy, starving kid, and decided there was something there worth saving. Worth loving.
Sirens screamed in the distance, breaking Tommy out of his thoughts. His head tilts towards the noise, and shoots back to Wilbur as the other begins to laugh. It wasn’t soothing, not like the genuine laughs Tommy used to coax out of him, ones that seemed so full of joy he couldn’t do anything but let them out. This laugh was reedy, cruel, decayed. It made Tommy want to run, made his throat close and his shoulders hunch up to protect his neck.
“C’mon, we gotta hurry or we’ll miss the show!” Wilbur breaks into a jog, twisting around to shoot Tommy a wide grin as one hand latched onto Tommy’s arm and pulled him along.
There was another night, another moment, just like this. Wilbur laughed as his fingers wrapped around Tommy’s bicep, pulling him along and almost tripping them both in his haste. It was summer then, and the sun had yet to set. Wilbur refused to tell Tommy where they were going, just repeating that it was a surprise, and laughing at the responding curses lobbed at his head.
Tommy remembers his grip then, remembers the warmth of the calloused fingers pressed against his arm and seemed to defuse through his entire being. He remembers getting to the top of the hill, seeing the view of the city below, vibrant beams of reds and yellows twisting through the streets. It was unforgettable, beautiful in a way he never thought the city could be.
“What?” Tommy yells over the sounds of their feet slapping against cold pavement, his breath sparking against the cold air. Wilbur just laughed, eyes glinting as he pulls them up the hill. Tommy recognizes it, of course he does, but he can’t begin to fathom why Wilbur would drag him here now, not when he refused to visit that place since the encounter with Schlatt and the fallout thereafter.
Tommy yanks at his trapped arm, but Wilbur’s grip only tightens further, and he won’t be surprised if he wakes up tomorrow with a new bruise.
There’s something in the air, warm and acidic and it makes his lungs itch as he takes in short breathes, helpless to do anything but try to stay on his feet as Wilbur drags them on relentlessly. His breath puffs in the air, and it’s dark out but Tommy swears he can see the beginning of a glow the higher they climb.
His foot slips on a patch of ice, and Tommy yelps as he goes down. Wilbur’s thrown off balance at the shift of weight, and he fails to keep balance on the iced path.
Wilbur laughed as Tommy tackled him to the ground. They rolled around on the grass, brown mud and leaves smearing across their clothes. Tommy went for Wilbur’s face, cackling at the look of horror on the older boy as he saw the pile of incoming gunk and dirt. He grabbedTommy by the shoulders and flipped them. The air leftTommy’s lungs in an oomph, and Wilbur took the momentary distraction to run his hands against Tommy’s sides.
Tommy’s eyes widened as unbidden laughter spurt forth out of his mouth. His sides heaved against the assault, and he bucked, but Wilbur was stronger and absurdly tall, and Tommy was half distracted by his lungs burning from the exertion. He screeched and threw his head forward, trying to bite Wilbur. Wilbur yelped in surprise, flailing back to avoid Tommy biting off his nose, and Tommy threw himself forward, pushing the advantage.
Wilbur dodged, rolling out of the way at the last moment, and Tommy only had a second to realize what happened before his face is smushed into the soft mud. He groaned and started to get up, but there’s an ‘oh no you don’t, you gremlin’ and a hand pressed his cheek back down against the floor. Tommy flailed, but he was incapacitated. He opened his mouth, and immediately closed it as dirt brushed against his inner lip. After a moment more of struggling, Tommy went limp, weakly glaring with his free eye at the other who was crouched above him, tousled and smirking.
Tommy groans as his face hits the hardened ice and packed snow, letting out a gasping oomph as Wilbur’s weight lands on him a moment later. Great, now he’s cold and wet, his face stings from the fall, and Wilbur is probably going to chew him out for this too. He’s starting to regret leaving his hideout for this, no matter how long it's been since Wilbur sought him out.
Wilbur is silent as he gets back up. Tommy hears him grunt at the effort, and can picture the way Wilbur dusts the snow off his coat and readjusts his stupid beanie. He loves the stupid trench coat, and snapped at Tommy the last time he tried to mess around and stained it as a prank. He’s expecting Wilbur to yell, to snap at him that he needs to be more careful. He waits face down for the verbal barbs to come, but Wilbur just huffs. Then. Tommy hears him turn and continue to walk. It takes another moment of Tommy just laying there, face aching, to realize that Wilbur just left him on the ground.
It’s not fair. Any of this. Tommy from before never would have let anyone act like this towards him. Tommy from before didn’t care about anyone but himself, and made sure to make that known to everyone who tried to befriend him. This is why he swore to give no one his allegiance, this is why he only risked things for himself, because when he is down, no one will bother to pick him back up. (Wilbur did. Wilbur is the only one who did.)
“Well?” Wilbur’s voice calls out to him. Tommy startles, sitting up. Wilbur has paused on his journey upwards, and is now looking down at the other, arms crossed over his chest as he looks at Tommy imploringly. “You coming?”
He looks at Wilbur, and a part of him aches at the fact that the other man didn’t leave him behind. He’s not helping him up, but he’s looking, and that’s more than Tommy got in the past month. He almost looks like the old Wilbur, like Tommy’s Wilbur, staying even if Tommy never wanted him to.
It gives him a spark of hope, and he hates it. This is why he can’t leave. Wilbur will be distant, less present than a damn ghost, and then all it takes is one look, and Tommy is faithfully back at his side, unable or unwilling to let Wilbur down. For a moment, he considers staying on the ground. He could let the ice numb him, or make Wilbur decide to choose if he cares enough to fight still.
Wilbur helping, or Wilbur leaving. Tommy doesn’t know which one would hurt worse.
Tommy gets up.
They continue to walk up the hill, though the pace has slowed down and Wilbur hasn’t grabbed Tommy again. He side eyes the man, keeping a step behind so he can stare at Wilbur’s back. The smell is stronger, and Tommy lets himself zone out into another memory.
Tommy was having a fucking awful week, and that Sunday was just the fucked up icing on the cake.
The cops had cornered him and, when they found out he was yet another orphan runaway, did the very thing he didn’t want them to do-- sent him back into the damn system.
His fosters weren’t any better than the last ones that got their grimy hands on his guardianship papers. They locked his windows, took away what few possessions he had, and when he tried to argue back against them, the man decided that he deserved a more corporal punishment.
Corporal. Wilbur taught him that word, after explaining why some members of L’manberg left the office with bloody noses and black eyes. But not him, Wilbur promised when Tommy stiffened, no one would ever touch him. At the time, Tommy believed him.
But L’mangerg was just one gang, and not even a large one at that. It’s been a week, there’s no way that Wilbur hadn’t noticed him missing. He probably thought Tommy just up and left like he kept threatening too. A lost cause, that’s all Tommy was.
That night, there was a knock on his window. Tommy pulled back the blinds, and there Wilbur was, clinging to the windowsill and balancing on a tree branch. Tommy watched as Wilbur’s grin faded, eyes roaming over the puffy and swollen face. He motioned for Tommy to lift the window, and Tommy pointed to the lock. Wilbur frowns, then motioned Tommy to wait. Tommy watched as the other grabbed something out of his pocket, and something flashed before embedding itself in the glass with a sharp crack.
Tommy yelped, jumping back as Wilbur rams the blade into the window a second time. When Wilbur deemed the cracks to be sufficiently branched throughout the window, he pocketed the knife and wrapped his hand in his red and blue flannel. One solid punch was all it took for the glass to shatter, and Wilbur grinned at the gaping Tommy.
“There, now you can get out,” Wilbur’s voice was light, though his eyes betrayed the wrath Tommy knew hid underneath.
Once Wilbur moved back enough, Tommy climbed out of the window and onto the tree. Wilbur moved down, leading the younger through the steps so he wouldn’t fall, and Tommy called Wilbur a fucking mother hen when he asked if Tommy was okay as Tommy stumbled from the pain.
Tommy was ready to get out of that hellhole, but Wilbur stopped him. He held Tommy’s face in his hands, one thumb gently swiping across the cut in his cheek. “No one touches what’s mine and gets away with it.” There was a glint of steel in the way Wilbur held himself that told Tommy there was no way to get Wilbur before he got his revenge.
Tommy didn’t mind. Not when Wilbur wanted this for him. He simply watched as Wilbur picked the lock of the front door and disappeared inside. He came back out a minute later, Tommy’s stuff in one hand and a lighter in the other.
Tommy accepted the offered bag of things, he didn’t really need it but it was a nice thought, and went to ask what Wilbur planned to do, when Wilbur raised his lighter. He flicked it open, lighting it like he did a thousand times before, and winked at Tommy.
Then he lobbed it through the open door, and the house went up in flames.
They watched it, Wilbur’s arm draped across his. Watched at smoke began to billow, and the fuckers inside started to scream. Only when the distant sounds of sirens could be heard did Wilbur finally turn them away from the flame and back home.
The smell and the memory connect as they crest the top of the hill. Tommy’s breath leaves his lungs. Reds and oranges light up the southern district of the city, and a dark plume rises from the wreckage. The fire is huge; its brilliant tongues of flame reach up towards the pitch black sky, the lights of firetrucks barely a glimmer in opposition. He’s too far away to hear the screams, but he has no doubt that it’s a cacophony rising up from the people who have been caught in the line of fire.
Tommy whips around at different sound. Wilbur is cackling, spreading his arms wide as if he wants to embrace the destruction being wrecked below the duo. His body is angled at the flames, but his eyes rest solely on Tommy himself, rage and pride and possession all fighting for dominance in his features.
“Isn’t it great?” Wilbur laughs and takes a step towards Tommy, one arm lifting as though to drape it across Tommy’s shoulders. Tommy takes a shaky step back, and the arm falls back to Wilbur’s side.
Tommy opens his mouth. Closes it. His eyes flick from Wilbur to the flames and back again. “What did you do?”
Wilbur’s smile twists, and the flames flash against his teeth. “What did I do? I did what I was meant to do, what I was born to do. L’manberg was mine, and they took it from me. No one gets to do that. No one.”
Tommy is barely listening. His eyes scan the flames, looking for the little bakery he slept behind. He thought of the kind baker that let him in and gave him food or hot chocolate on especially cold nights. It’s gone now, no doubt lost to the flames that lick up the sides of every building.
“But,” Tommy swallows, hard. “But my home-”
“You have no home.” Wilbur’s smile drops.
Anger, and fear, well up Tommy’s throat. “L’manberg is my-”
“L’manberg is nothing,” Wilbur mocks, taking a step forward. Tommy wants to move further back, but he’s pinned by Wilbur’s stare. “L’manberg died when it decided to cast me out. Me, it’s creator, it’s founder, it’s father.”
“I could have been down there. You could have killed me!” Tommy accused, but his voice came out small, showcasing his sudden fear.
Arms encase Tommy, dragging him to rest against a pounding chest. He can feel fingers digging into his back, clawing his shirt to get him even closer. Tommy’s frozen, brain unable to even begin to comprehend what’s happening.
“Never. I would never let you get hurt. You’re mine,” Wilbur snarls in his ear. Tommy struggles to take in a breath with how tight Wilbur is clinging to him.
“My stuff-” He protests weakly. Wilbur huffs, arms shifting but not releasing.
“It’s safe. I gathered it all up while you were waiting at the house.” Wilbur dips his chin to rest against Tommy’s curls, and Tommy can’t help but relax into the embrace. It’s bullshit, that Wilbur could pacify him so easily after destroying everything he worked for, but--
But he still saved Tommy’s things. He still cared enough to do that.
Tommy’s arms wrap around Wilbur’s chest grabbing onto the back of his sweater. They hold each other, just like they used to. For the first time in too long, Tommy is warm.