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There was a Before and an After. Not ‘Before he got grabbed’ and ‘After he got grabbed’, but ‘Before they were gone’ and ‘After they were gone’. After Vance disappeared, that’s when things started going wrong. Finney knew–regardless of whether or not they found him–that he would never be the same after that.
He could delude himself into thinking he was fine, that Vance would show up on his doorstep with a bottle of soda and Bruce behind him with an invitation to do something that was probably illegal. He could try all he wanted to pretend everything would go back to normal one day, but deep down, that’s all it was. Pretend. A fantasy.
Even if he came home, that wouldn’t change the nights spent awake, the hours spent sneaking into Bruce’s bedroom so they wouldn’t be alone.
(To make sure he was okay, to make sure he wouldn’t lose someone else he loved)
Vance’s disappearance was one of the most painful things to happen to him, and no matter how much he wanted him safely back home, he doubted he could ever see him again without thinking of it.
He could remember with unfortunate clarity the day he found out. Not from a phone call, not from the cops, but from Gwen. He supposed that was better. He never told her about them, she figured it out herself. She knew him better than anyone.
He was mortified when she first confronted him about it.
“Are you going to introduce me to your boyfriends, or not?” She asked him. And he tried to deny it, but Gwen was smart.
That’s why, when she woke him up that day, with tears pooling in her eyes, he was grateful she knew how much Vance meant to him.
When he saw her state, he shot up and asked what she dreamt.
“The Grabber, he– Vance. He has Vance, Finney.”
His stomach dropped.
“No. No, Gwen, are you sure it was him?”
She nodded.
Vance. Why him? God, why him?
Don’t cry, he told himself. Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry.
Gwen didn’t comment on the tears that had begun to spill.
Bruce. How was he going to tell Bruce? He wouldn’t want to hear it from a phone call. He had to pull himself together, he had to get up and find Bruce and tell him that their fucking boyfriend got kidnapped. And shit, that’s when he realized that Vance might be dead.
Pull yourself together.
That was the first night he had snuck out to stay with Bruce. After that day, more often than not, he spent the night at Bruce’s, curled together, trying not to think about how there was a missing person between them.
Months later, he lost Bruce as well.
The moment Gwen told him, he broke. It had been years since he sobbed like that, all angry yelling, and snot, and cries that hurt to release. He didn’t care who he woke up, he lost them both. His best friends, his partners, his heart.
If it was possible, he felt half his soul break away with those 3 damned words.
“He got Bruce.”
There were four people Finney loved most in the world. Gwen, Robin, Vance, and Bruce. His sister, his closest friend, and his boyfriends.
Half of them were gone now, and there went half of his very being.
Still, he searched. He hadn’t stopped looking for even a day after Vance was grabbed, but now he was desperate. He needed them. At least, he needed to know they were alive.
He tried to act like it was fine, but it wasn’t that easy anymore. Now he didn’t have either of them there, now he spent the night cold and alone.
The ball started rolling after Vance, but it truly became ‘After’ once Bruce was gone, when there was nothing left. And just his luck, Robin only lasted a couple of months before he was grabbed as well. Finney himself went soon after.
He knew as soon as he was being dragged into that black van that they were gone. Forever. He knew as soon as he saw the balloons that the people who held his heart and soul were dead.
Finney woke up in the basement scared, and alone, and grieving. He couldn’t stop thinking ‘Vance was here, Vance died here. Bruce was here, Bruce died here. Robin was here, Robin died here.’
And fuck if there wasn’t a part of Finney that was grateful for that. For the closure, if nothing else.
Not long after he arrived, he got the first phone call. Like any sane person would do, he ignored it at first. He quickly got tired of it, though. The curiosity won out and he answered.
Sometimes he wished he hadn’t, sometimes he couldn’t be more grateful.
If it hurt to lose Bruce, it hurt even more to hear him lose himself. It tore him apart to hear one of the people he loved most talk with a voice void of the usual affection. It burned when Bruce started trying to comfort him. When he muttered encouragement and tips, and most of all when he said,
“I love you, Finn..”
Finney couldn’t smile and kiss him softly, all he could do was put a hand to his mouth to try and cover his cries. Bruce didn’t need to hear that, he deserved to rest in peace.
He hung up, and Finney knew he wouldn’t hear from him again.
The Grabber came down and asked why he was crying. Finney sat and stared at him. What could he say? My dead boyfriend called me and told me loves me? So he was quiet. It’s not like He deserved to know about Bruce anyway. He hurt him, he killed him.
Fuck.
It could have been days, could’ve been weeks, could’ve been hours, but he eventually got another call. Vance, this time.
It wasn’t the Vance he had come to know, the Vance he grew to love. It was the Vance everyone thought he was, the Vance who was filled to the brim with anger and rage. There was no softness in his voice at the start of that call, not even a hint of care. Finney couldn’t even bring himself to be mad about it.
Just as they were piecing themselves together, they were ripped apart. Just as Vance was starting to get a hold of his life, it was cut short. Fate doesn’t care about love, or progress, or hope. If there is a God out here, like the one Gwen believes in, he must be one cruel motherfucker.
Vance deserved his anger. He needed someone to listen, someone who would stick around and listen to his yelling without being scared. They promised to protect each other when the first boy got grabbed and Finney failed him. Failed them. The least he could do was listen.
He sat quietly as Vance screamed and yelled with everything he had how he wanted to kill The Grabber. How he wanted Finney, specifically, to kill him. Upon admitting that, he started to calm down.
“I saw him kill Bruce, Finn,” he said. “I saw him– fuck. I can’t do this. I can’t watch as he kills someone else I love. You’re getting the hell out of here and you’re killing that son of a bitch, you hear me?”
“Loud and clear,” Finney muttered. He wouldn’t cry. He would not cry. He didn’t.
Vance told him of a way out, his best bet so far, and Finney knew their time was coming to a close. Just before he hung up for good, he heard Vance say, “Bruce says hi, by the way. He’s been nagging me to tell you.”
“Tell him I say hi back. And both of you, I–”
“I know. We both do, and we do too.”
And he was gone.
The last time he heard either of their voices was when he had the phone cord wrapped around The Grabber’s neck and they were saying their last fuck you’s to him.
Just months ago, there were four people he loved, and they were all alive. Now, there was only one left. Finney was grateful beyond belief that Gwen was a girl. If he lost her too…
Well, he hadn’t. And at the very least, Vance and Bruce still had each other. They wouldn’t be alone. He hoped Robin wasn’t alone either.
Finney had to learn to live without them. He had been for ages, but he wasn’t sure back then. He didn’t know if they would ever come home. He knew now that they wouldn’t.
He couldn’t go to the Grab N’ Go anymore, it still hurt to see someone who wasn’t Vance playing on the pinball machine. He had to ditch his old baseball bat, the memories of his first game against Bruce drowned him every time he saw it. But he was living. Even if he saw Robin in every school fight, and felt ghosts in his bed when he knew they weren’t there, he was living.