Work Text:
i'm sick of dancing with the beast
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sometimes they find gavin in an alley in italy, blank eyed and lost, and he stays like that for two weeks until he wakes up in bed and he remembers the first time he told michael he loved him, but not that michael drowns his coffee in sugar and often comes to bed smelling like sulfur and how sometimes gavin wakes up at night to find him staring blankly at a computer, searching for shards of himself he’ll never find.
sometimes ryan wakes up on a beach in the eye of a storm, waves rolling up past his ankles and washing away everything but him. he digs his feet into the sand and waits. when the clouds clear and he watches jack slide down a dune towards him, he sees a rainbow and he’s quite sure it’s jack’s shirt reflecting into the sky. she smiles, he smiles back, they both know each other for the first time in months. on the drive home, he smells salt and wonders whether it’s the sea or jack’s bitter perfume he was missing.
and sometimes ray opens his eyes underwater, closes his eyes, and lets himself drown.
later, he sits up under a tree and stares at the stars for what feels like hours. he stands up and walks towards the nearest light, where he steals a bike from a helpless civilian and rides in the direction his instinct takes him. when he pulls up in front of a penthouse, he checks to make sure the right cars are in the driveway. when he knocks, he checks to make sure the lights are on inside.
geoff answers the door with a welcoming grin. “new recruit, huh? michael told me you were coming.”
michael shoves his way in next to geoff, pushing the door open wider. “ignore him, just come in.” there’s an unspoken welcome home there, but ray just smiles thinly and steps inside.
he ignores the fact that the wrong cars were in the driveway. he ignores the fact that he doesn’t recognize the pictures in the hallway. he ignores the fact that he doesn’t recognize these people, and people who don’t recognize him don’t usually smile at him. this is where his heart says home is. he ignores the fact that home has forgotten about him.
and sometimes jack pattillo stares down the barrel of a gun, held in michael's steady hands. "betrayal is so much sweeter when no one will remember it," he tells her. he's never been more wrong.
she'll remember this. she'll remember all of it.
michael jones takes his first new breath on the floor of a forest. now, his hands are shaking. when he stands up, a baby deer stumbles over and noses his hand gently. he has to be somewhere, he knows it, but for now he will just rest.
-
jack pattillo will remember everything.
michael jones will remember nothing but blood and sulfur as he burned their house to the ground.
somewhere else, geoff ramsey will build an empire into eternity; and gavin will sit at his side, staring into an empty coffee mug.
ray will stand and watch a tornado from miles away. ryan will go back out to that beach and let it wash him away.
this is what they deserve, after all.