Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ronan could smell the fire dragon, all carbon and sulphur. Ronan dived for his brother. He dragged him away from the car. He shouted to Kavinsky, “Get down !” But Kavinsky didn’t look away from the two creatures. He said, “The world’s a nightmare.” Horror clawed its way up inside Ronan. It was precisely the feeling he’d had when he realized Kavinsky was going to blow up the Mitsubishi at the substance party. Dust swirled up from the dragon’s wings. Furious, Ronan shouted, “Come down, you bastard !”

Kavinsky didn’t answer. So Ronan told Matthew to run to Gansey and Blue, and hurled himself towards Kavinsky, a thousand curses popping in his head without getting shouted, because there was no time. He grabbed him by the shoulders and threw them both out of the falling dragon’s way. He didn’t see the monsters crash into the Mitsubishi, but the noise was deafening, and the heat something unbearable. And then it was over. Those acrobatics would leave some bruises on his back. Kavinsky seemed to be in a shock-like state, and didn’t move. Ronan reached inside his pockets and found what he was looking for ; he swallowed the pill ; everything still felt very urgent. Perhaps Kavinsky would kill him while he was out. And then he was asleep.

Cabeswater wasn’t happy. Cabeswater, Ronan felt with a dreadful certainty, wanted Kavinsky dead. Ronan stood his ground and woke up with a needle in his hand, and didn’t find it very funny. He couldn’t hesitate, he knew. Either Kavinsky died, or he didn’t pose a threat to Cabeswater anymore. Kavinsky still hadn’t moved an inch, his eyes vacant and his mouth set in a hard line. Ronan took his right arm and stabbed it with the needle. If it works in the dream, it works in the real world. He heard a car crash. He got up. Matthew was with Gansey. Kavinsky grabbed his wrist as he was walking away, his grip hard.

“What the fuck did you do to me, Lynch ?”

I’m sorry, Ronan thought. “There was no other way,” he said, yanking his arm free. Of course Kavinsky felt that the dreams were gone, and there was a new emptiness in his eyes, but Ronan wasn’t frightened, wasn’t worried, didn’t care.

Matthew seemed ok, would probably be ok. Gansey asked, “What now ?” and Ronan said Kavinsky wouldn’t be a problem anymore. Blue made an unconvinced face, which was how Ronan felt, but he tried very hard to believe it.

*

Kavinsky stayed out of Ronan’s life for four days.

On July 9^th, he got a text :

do you dream of me

July 10^th brought two :

now even sleep bores me to death thanks lynch

you should drop by

There was nothing on July 11^th, but three texts in ten minutes on July 12^th :

why don’t you drop by princess

hey

are you still mad or what

So Ronan sent a text. It said : yes.

On July 13^th, Kavinsky asked questions :

do dissociative hallucinations sound good to you

why are you being such a bitch

*

And then he was silent. Ronan didn’t exactly worry. He didn’t think about it all that much. It was summer. It was a relief. Until one day he ran into Swan, who didn’t look very good, and Ronan walked with every intention of ignoring him — had he even ever exchanged one word with him ? — but Swan called out, “Lynch !” so, politely, Ronan retorted, “What ?” And Swan seemed to hesitate, so Ronan shrugged and started walking away, and Swan said, “Kavinsky fell through a window, maybe you know already, he’s in the hospital, I thought maybe —” “What ?” Ronan cut him off. “What do you mean he fell through a window ?” So Swan said, “It was only a first floor window, it’s not as bad as it sounds, the main issue was the glass, really.” So Ronan went “What ?” again, and then, “When ? Which hospital ?” Fucking asshole.

It was only halfway to Saint-Joseph’s Hospital (humor that was quite lost on Ronan) that he wondered about visiting hours. It was still early. He was almost there anyway.

He was not too late, and the walls were painted some kind of cream color, and he met a doctor coming out of the room Kavinsky was in and she asked if he was his friend, so Ronan said yes, because there was no other option, and she said he’d be able to go home in two days, because they just needed to keep an eye on the stitches on the wound in his abdomen where a big piece of glass got in, without causing any really concerning damage. She said his mother wasn’t home when it happened and they hadn’t managed to get a hold of her since, and he was found by one of his friends. She said they’d run a few tests and the blood test results did not look good at all, and maybe he should consider rehab, and Ronan looked at her like she was mad but she didn’t seem to care much, only went on saying that sure they were young and didn’t care and thought they could do anything and it didn’t matter, until one day they were jumping out of windows, apparently. She said he’d regret it in his thirties, and the drinking too, that kids thought they were unbreakable but habits like these took a toll, and Ronan didn’t tell her that Kavinsky probably didn’t intend to live to ever be thirty years old.

Kavinsky looked fucking dull, and while he was forced to be still like this, as opposed to his usual frantic state, it was obvious that there should be more flesh on his bones. His eyes followed Ronan’s every small move, and there was a twitching in the left corner of his mouth. Ronan said, “Hi.”

“What are you doing here ?” Ronan only shrugged. “I’m lucky they didn’t have to bandage my fucking face,” Kavinsky said, vaguely gesturing towards healing cuts and his chin and cheeks, “I’d look like a total dick.” There was something rougher and new in his voice, in his enunciation. He was, Ronan realized, he had to be, completely sober. “How bad can you be at dying, right ?”

“Why don’t you shut up,” Ronan suggested. He added, “That doctor said you should think about rehab.” Kavinsky started laughing, and it was like he couldn’t stop, and it wasn’t very far from frightening, and when he’d managed to calm down he said, “Oh, fuck, trust me, you don’t want to see me clean.” Ronan thought, I don’t really enjoy seeing you high either, and he said, “I don’t want to see you at all.”

“That’s harsh Lynch, fucking insensitive even.”

It was, but Kavinsky deserved it. Then the silence was awkward. So Ronan said, “I’m gonna go now. I might drop by tomorrow, is there anything I get you, maybe ?” It sounded weird. It sounded every bit as forced and conventional and inappropriate to what they were to each other as it was, and Kavinsky looked at him with something akin to toned-down contempt and disgust and rage in his eyes, and he said “Nothing quite appropriate to smuggle into a hospital, I’m afraid.” And so Ronan left. He felt like hitting someone and bought a bottle of gin.

The next day found him waiting in the hospital’s hallway because he felt like he had to come because he’d kind of said he would, but he also wanted to be rid of it as soon as possible, so he’d come in too early, and he’d been there for about ten minutes when Swan walked through the door. He looked like a panicked rabbit or something, and sat down next to Ronan and said, “Hey.” Ronan barely acknowledged him, filled with regret and an urge to run away. Swan shifted in his seat, biting his nails, and started talking fast, out of the blue, he said, “He messed around with ketamine, you shouldn’t touch ketamine, we would never have, it’s just bad, never a good idea, but we just — I don’t know, we didn’t think we should be particularly careful, but we should’ve known, we were fucking stupid, do you know how fucking lucky you are, you’ve not seen him after the 4^th, it was — ok fuck I don’t like this, I don’t like hospitals, I think I’ll leave, tell him I was there, but I — I can’t do this, say I’m sorry, I need to go out, I need — I’m off now, bye Lynch.” And off he was. What was his damage. Why was everyone such a fucking asshole, Ronan wondered. What did he mean about him being lucky not to have seen Kavinsky after the 4^th, Ronan wondered. Most of all, he wondered what he was he doing here.

When he saw Kavinsky he told him Swan was there and then wasn’t, and he didn’t seem to think any of it weird. He also said, “You don’t look any better than you did yesterday, are they really letting you out tomorrow ?” and Kavinsky said, “I wouldn’t stay a day more.” Ronan nodded, and he was thinking it might be bad etiquette to leave just like that but that was what he was going to do anyway, but then Kavinsky asked, in a very low voice, “What do you think about rehab ?” Ronan was was taken aback. He didn't enjoy this question, he didn't enjoy being here, he didn't enjoy the implications, he enjoyed nothing.

“Just because I came here doesn’t mean I care about what you do, you — go to rehab if you want to, I’m not going to try and convince you or anything, jump out another window, you know, it’s all the same to me — fuck you.”

“Would you come see me if I jumped out another window ?”

Ronan left.

Chapter Text

i've not gone through any windows

what's up with you

hey lynch

swan says youre a dick

swan says a lot of other things because swan talks way too much

what's new

would it fking kjill you to aswzr for onxce

a friend's mom went missing, Ronan replied.

thats a thing mothers do i wouldn't worry too much about it

have you forgotten how to drive the piece of shit you call a car

i swear if i see you i'll ruin your fucking face

lynch

its amazing the shit people sell you you know

you deprived a lot of people of damn good stuff are you proud of yourself

you mlakz me so fukcing tired

hwhy do you eep ignoring me like this all the fuckign time

theres not much you can do once youre past suicide thraets blackmail you know im running outof ideas im running out of pretty much everything

but dont you worry your pretty littl head about it

i don’t have th energy to kidnap anyonz

On July the 25^th, Ronan received a picture. It was a visiting card, that of an expensive rehab centre located a little outside of Portsmouth, Virginia, as he found out from Google. It came with a few words, no visits on the first week. if anyone asks say free will doesn’t exist so technically i didn’t do this out of my own free will. Ronan resisted the urge to destroy his phone and wrote back, fuck you.

It didn’t matter anyway. He could just ignore this like he’d ignored so many things. He could pretend not to understand, he could pretend not to see what Kavinsky was doing, or just acknowledge it and decide he didn’t care — he didn’t know which of the two was the easiest, probably to just play dumb. He had better things to do, better people with whom to spend his time. He didn’t need to see Kavinsky like he once did, his heart did not race like it once did, he did not feel blood pumping through his whole body, in his ears, the thrill was gone, he didn’t need it anymore. (And the boy Kavinsky was these days couldn’t inspire all this anyway.) He would not let himself be played.

One week later, it was raining. Ronan got into his BMW and drove to Portsmouth.

When he gave his name, the man at the reception desk looked at him with raised eyebrows, and it was obvious Ronan wasn’t what he’d expected him to be. Ronan said, “What” and the man said he’d kind of imagined him to be, you know, an adult. Ronan didn’t ask for any more details, because he didn’t want to know, really — did this mean Kavinsky gave his name and number and all as only outside contact ? did this mean he was the only visitor Kavinsky allowed ? what a fucking asshole.

A woman with neatly tied hair guided him through a huge hallway, two living rooms and a few corridors, to a plywood door, and she said, “It should be open,” and looked at him expectantly, so Ronan knocked and turned the handle and it was indeed open and so he got in.

Kavinsky was sitting on a bed and he got up as he saw Ronan, and he said, “Lynch,” and there was almost an exclamation point there, but only almost, and there was too much written on his fucking face and it was so painfully obvious he’d been waiting for him, but kind of expecting him not to show up, but also hoping he would, he wore long sleeves, and also he looked like shit.

“You look —”

“There’s no nice way to put it so maybe don’t try. I look like someone did a sloppy job of raising me from the dead. Is my skin grey ? I think it is. It’s not an improvement. There’s a couch, do you want to, like, sit on that couch, so that you don’t just stand there ?”

He talked fast. They sat on the couch. Ronan asked how things were. Kavinsky rolled his eyes.

“I watch wildlife documentaries because people make me want to throw up. I lie to two therapists. Most of the time I feel like ripping my skin off. It’s supposed to get better. There is a garden, it has plants and trees and shit.”

Ronan started telling him in extremely vague terms about what he’d been up to, but Kavinsky cut him off, saying he’d rather not know and picture everyone who was not here as just as terribly bored as he was. So they talked about other fascinating things — such as, “Just how much does this shit cost though ?” —, and when Kavinsky laughed it sounded like a dying animal, and as time went by he dug his nail deeper into his palms. Ronan had been there for a little over thirty minutes when Kavinsky suggested he should go. So Ronan left, he said, “Bye,” and Kavinsky said, “See you.” Ronan stopped by the reception desk again to ask about how visits worked. He was informed that everything was pretty much personalized, which was the luxury that enormous amounts of money bought, and that he should discuss it with one of Kavinsy’s therapists if he could, maybe the next time he came.

In Henrietta, the air was alive with magic. There were timeless caves and disappearing mothers, an incredible quest and this growing feeling that something, something was happening, something was so terribly happening. He had no time to spend on Kavinsky. There was no place for him in all this.

Ronan came back three days later.

It went like this : they met in Kavinsky’s room, or in the garden, and they sat down to talk, and over time Kavinsky talked less and said more, and allowed Ronan to speak of what was happening without him, but never asked questions ; he was still angry, and three times Ronan left without a goodbye after they’d thrown at each other hurtful things they never mentioned again ; none of them ever expected the other to apologize, which was wise.

One day Ronan had been to Saint Agnes after his trip to Portsmouth, and then had stopped by Adam’s room, and stayed for a few hours, as often happened, and they’d gone over some school work (we're on holidays, Parrish), and they’d talked about things of various importance, and he’d noticed the subtle changes in Adam’s face and posture, how he seemed somehow more assured, and how diving deeper into Cabeswater’s magic turned him into something at the same time stranger and closer to Ronan. In the end he had managed to find the will to go back to Monmouth because he hadn’t felt like sleeping on the floor that night ; and when he’d come back to his room he’d thrown himself on his bed and had stayed there for a while, not bothering to undress, staring at the ceiling, and Noah had appeared, and for a few minutes had said nothing, but then pointedly remarked, “If you’re thinking that you can’t keep this up forever, then you’re right” and Ronan had rolled his eyes.

It went like this : Ronan asked if Kavinsky’s mother had tried to come see him, and Kavinsky said his mother wouldn’t come see him anywhere, except perhaps in a morgue to identify his corpse. Ronan asked if things were better, and Kavinsky answered in a shakier voice every time. Ronan asked if therapy was a total waste of time, and Kavinsky said the therapists were okay but he was tired of them trying to make him share fucking deep stuff with complete strangers.

At some point Ronan did meet with one of Kavinsky’s psychiatrists, and she told him that they could forbid visits when they had negative consequences, but that even when this was not the case, it was better when things weren’t completely anarchic, and that it would be great if instead of showing up whenever he had the time or felt like it, he set up a day of the week and a time when he would come — or two, or even three, but three was a big chance to take, since a missed day could be as damaging for Kavinsky as it would be inconsequential to him — like in The Little Prince, Ronan thought, not like he’d read it or anything, when to tame the fox the little prince must come always at the same hour, if, for example, you come at four o’clock in the afternoon, then at three o’clock I shall begin to be happy …

So Ronan said ok, and when he brought it up with him, Kavinsky said, “So we are setting up meetings now, I’m a proper fucking mistress” and Ronan was surprised to find how much this bitterness got to him.

He was, he knew, not being careful enough.

One day he came back to Monmouth to find everyone there, in the clutter of the main room, and Gansey looked up from his journal to say, “What is the point of you having a phone if you never answer it ? Noah said he knew where you were but wouldn’t say, and that's one hour of daylight wasted, but there’s still time to go to Cabeswater —” “And then eat something,” Blue interrupted him. “Where were you anyway ?”

This, Ronan found, was not very enjoyable ; he sighed and said, “I was in Portsmouth. It’s just the nicest drive from here.” He saw Adam smile. Gansey, incredulous, asked, “But what were you doing in Portsmouth ?” Feeling that the topic would not be dropped anytime soon if all his answers were sarcastic, he said, “I was visiting Kavinsky. I’m not asking for anyone’s opinion about that, by the way.” So instead of giving an opinion that was written as plainly as humanly possible all over her face, Blue asked what Kavinsky was doing in Portsmouth, and Ronan replied, “Rehab. Can we stop talking about this ?” and they did, but not before Blue had asked for how long, and Ronan had said it was a thirty days program, and she had remarked, only half whispering, that it would take more than thirty days to turn him into a decent human being.

On his ninth visit, Ronan held Kavinsky’s hair as he was bent over the toilet for what felt like hours and must have lasted ten minutes, and got him a glass of water to rinse his mouth, and wiped the sweat off his face with a cold damp towel.

Chapter Text

In the end, Kavinsky stayed in rehab for forty-seven days.

One morning, as Ronan was getting in his car, Adam, who did not work that day and had dropped by Monmouth, casually asked, “Do you want me to come with ?” It seemed like a bad idea, and Ronan felt vaguely guilty to consider it, but he knew Adam was offering support, and it was indeed tempting not to drive alone for once. He said, “It’s the most boring drive ever, and once we got there you’d only get to visit the parking lot, which is not fascinating.” Adam said, “I’ll get a book then.”

They talked of Adam’s witchcraft meetings, the prospect of professor Malory, who would be arriving in a few days — what would this older Gansey be like, and how would Gansey behave, and how much would he tell Ronan to try and be civilized — and the sky was clear and the wind pleasantly cool, so despite Ronan’s predictions, it actually was an enjoyable journey. Kavinsky was not mentioned once.

As he was parking, Ronan noticed what he must have known all along although it had not hit him quite so clearly before : you could see the garden from the parking lot, and it was fairly probable that the parking lot was just as visible from the garden. But there was nothing to be done about that now. He left Adam with his book and the car and went in.

He met with Kavinsky in the park, from there quickly spotted Adam, leaning against the BMW’s hood, and tried his best to avert his eyes. But Kavinsky obviously saw him too, and there was no pretending he had not come with Ronan since he was with his car, and anyway Kavinsky had to know Adam by sight, and everything would have been so much easier if he wasn’t so transparent, and now his eyes were wide and his jaw clenched and he hissed, “Did you really need to bring your wife ?”

Then he was walking away, and this was tiring, but Ronan went after him and caught his arm, and Kavinsky said, “Fucking let go” without much conviction, and Ronan said, “This is really unnecessary.” He saw Kavinsky try his best to stay angry, and fail, and dragged him to a bench on which they sat down, and said, “It’s a long drive, it was nice not to make it alone for once.”

“I don’t want to see — the people you chose over me. I don’t need you to rub it in my face to know that you don’t —”

“I’m here, for fuck’s sake !”

There was silence, and then Ronan intently studied the grass, and lowered his voice again to make some meaningless small talk, because Kavinsky was crying, and probably wouldn’t have wanted Ronan to acknowledge it, and what could he even have done if he had ; and he knew this wasn’t actually his fault, he knew he was just the last blow to land on a very breakable edifice, because Kavinsky’s walls were so badly built that they crumbled down as soon as someone took the time to look for a fault ; but he let Kavinsky clutch his hand so hard it hurt.

Minutes later, Kavinsky let himself slide a little to rest his head on Ronan’s arm, and he said, “I have a shrink who asks a lot about you.” Ronan said nothing, and Kavinsky didn’t elaborate, but went on to other subjects. “I hate all this, I hate your fucking friends and I hate that you’re not like me. I hate being weak enough to take your pity.” The way he said this was very matter-of-fact, voice flat.

“I know.”

Ronan also knew that when people said such things, you were supposed to deny them, it’s not pity, but he was not sure. There was nothing else he could think to say, and afterwards they stayed quiet until it was time for Ronan to go, and he wanted, he realised as he got up, to take Kavinsky in his arms or something, but that was neither a good idea nor a possibility, not there, not then, probably not ever, so they just stood facing each other until he said, “I’ll see you on Friday ?” and Kavinsky said, “Yeah.”

On the way back to Henrietta, Adam told Ronan he found him very forgiving. It was an accusation of sorts. “I’ve not forgiven anything,” Ronan said.

About a week before Kavinsky got out, Ronan met the psychiatrist he’d seen before again. She was waiting for him near the reception desk when he came in, and she said she’d like to have a word, it wouldn’t be long, so they went into an office that might have been hers, and she talked. She said they’d found a good therapist much nearer Henrietta for Kavinsky to see once he was out. She said he’d checked himself in for reasons that were all wrong, and looked at Ronan visibly wondering if he was aware of being every single one of them. He pretended not to notice. She said there was no cause to be overoptimistic given that, but some progress was actually made and you never knew, though it was unlikely maybe he’d get lucky and it would be enough. Ronan shared her doubts.

Then she said that it would certainly be hard, for Ronan and for other people, probably, to not feel like they somehow had a duty, or a responsibility, to keep an eye on him, or keep him in a relatively good place, or treat him very carefully for fear of “pushing him over the edge” (she seemed very reluctant to use the phrase, and disappointed in herself not to have found another.) She said it was pretty much inevitable and stemmed from great intentions, but would never work, because they’d not performed any magic and Kavinsky was still highly unstable and everything (still a fucking bastard, Ronan translated.) She said that they’d have to be careful with that because feeling guilty and beating yourself up never helped anyone, neither you nor those around you. She said Ronan was a kid, and had nothing to blame himself for, and that whatever happened next would not depend on him at all.

Ronan listened. It was all very sensible.

Then he saw Kavinsky, who was growing a little restless and quite impatient at the prospect of getting out, though it seemed it was only the idea of it that made him glad, the specifics, not so much. He said, “I don’t want to go back to Aglionby, Lynch, I can’t let all those pathetic fuckers see me like this, I can’t do it, I’m not, I’m not — I don’t know how completely you’ve ruined years of hard work, I don’t know how much is lost, I don’t—” “What else would you do though ?” “You’re so fucking helpful.”

He said, “At least Aglionby is not home. Your socks are mismatched, is it a fashion statement ?” It was not.

Four days later, Kavinsky was panicked and exhausting. Ronan was exhausted and avoided thinking. The afternoon found him moderately drunk, and Gansey was away … somewhere, he was pretty sure, and Noah refused to show up, so around six o’clock he went to knock on Adam’s door. “Hi,” he said when that door opened. Adam gauged him disapprovingly but let him in. At least he’d had the presence of mind to not bring something to drink with him ; mild idiocy.

They sat down on Adam’s bed, backs to the wall, and the veins in Adam’s hands stood out against the blue of his jeans, and sometimes he tapped his fingers against his knees as he talked, and he had one nail that must have been broken because it was cut much shorter than the others, and his socks matched, and he shifted from time to time, hugging a leg, or crossing them, and on his left hand that little round bone (pisi something) was more prominent than on his right hand, and it was only when Adam said “Sorry” as he bumped his elbow into Ronan’s arm while cracking his knuckles that he shook himself up and noticed how hyper aware he was being. Admittedly, not aware of everything, because while he was sure he heard Adam talk, he didn’t have the faintest idea of what he’d been saying.

Later on Adam was dozing off, although bravely trying to follow and contribute to Ronan’s elaborate and unconvincing comparison between dream magic and linguistics, and since it was getting more and more convoluted and somniferous every minute, soon enough he stopped even making vague approbatory noises, and then his head fell on Ronan’s shoulder, and Ronan stood very still until he made himself nudge him faintly.

Then Adam opened his eyes, and was very close, and Ronan didn’t dare move a muscle and was sure everything betrayed him — just how, he didn’t know, but he felt it acutely — and Adam’s expression was not sleepy but very intent, maybe calculating somehow, and he felt like he was being assessed with terrible precision, and, probably compensating for the lack of movement in his body, it was like his mind was running way too fast and time was unnaturally stretched out — and so, slowly, but probably faster, Adam’s hand came to be barely an inch from his skin, and Ronan thought he might have fallen asleep without noticing, and the air was heavy and the closeness itched, and burned.

But then Adam’s hands were on him, pressing on his nape and cheek, pulling him closer, and Ronan gave up, gave in, dived in. Then, he was kissing Adam. Adam was kissing him. It couldn’t be happening. It was a shy thing, a young, tender thing, and Adam — who was real, who was warm, who was human — smelled like Adam, and when they broke the kiss off he was fiercely beautiful, wide shining eyes and parted lips, slightly flustered.

Ronan wanted to rip something apart. He was panicking. Adam wasn’t supposed to be possible, Adam was never supposed to want this, Adam was never a viable option —

So he did the dickiest possible thing — which was the only one he could stand to do —, and stood up and almost ran to the door (which would have been ridiculous, given the small distance between it and the bed) and said “I’ve go to head back now. I’ll see you.” He felt so stupid, so stupid, so stupid, stupid didn’t even begin to cover it, and in his hurry to flee he’d forgotten to grab his jacket. So he was stupid and losing his nerve and outside and fucking cold. It did not feel good.

Kavinsky was coming back in two days.

Chapter Text

Gansey said, “Are you and Adam fighting again ? I thought you were over this.”

Kavinsky said, “What the fuck is up with you ?”

Noah asked, “How badly did you fuck up ?”

Ronan didn’t know.

On September the 13^th, he drove Kavinsky back to his place, and Kavinsky said he could have done it by himself, and Ronan said, yeah, he knew that. When they got there, they sat in Ronan’s car for a while, because he was trying to say something, and Kavinsky was waiting, and in the end what he came up with was, “Can’t you move out ?”

He didn’t know much about Mrs Kavinsky, other than she was an addict and never bothered to come see Kavinsky after his fall, nor did she once try to visit him in rehab. He remembered what Kavinsky had had to say about that. He also remembered Kavinsky saying he drugged her when she “took his stuff” — whatever that meant. It didn’t seem like someone he’d want to get back to. It seemed wrong, though Ronan couldn’t quite articulate why, that this Kavinsky, who was only a shadow of what he’d been, should go back to this home.

But Kavinsky said, “Not really, no.”

Then he swallowed something back, visibly, something that stayed stuck somewhere in his throat, something that made him speak very fast when he said, “See you,” and then got out. He slammed the car’s door. Ronan watched him walk to the door and open it. Then he went away.

Kavinsky came to class, and Ronan noticed that when he picked fights with random other students, which happened often, Jiang was never far. He also noticed that when Jiang caught him looking, the looks he shot back were far from friendly.

They met, most often alone, either at Kavinsky’s place when his mother was away (he said he never knew when she’d be back, but he checked his room to see if she’d packed some clothes and shit or not) or somewhere outside, and it was not something that had been agreed on, so when Ronan had gotten the first text that had read, do you want to come by this afternoon, he had not known immediately. There had been no promise there. He’d said ok.

He avoided Adam. Well, technically, he only avoided any and all situations that could result in his being alone with Adam. Since school had started again, it had gotten easier. Adam was busy. Around others, they both behaved, but it was obvious that Adam was angry. Rightfully so. Ronan really didn’t want to do anything about it. Gansey did this talking thing, he knew, this “sorting things out” thing, but he was not Gansey. How badly did you fuck up ?

Very.

One day he met with Kavinsky in the clearing, the one that was once filled with white Mitsubishis, and Ronan didn’t have time to say hi or hello or anything at all before Kavinsky started throwing at him things he’d thought, naively, that he wouldn’t have to hear again.

“Is it comfortable in Dick III’s lap ?” he asked. “Do you squirm in there ? Do you squeal in there ?”

“I thought we’d been over this,” Ronan said. What the hell.

“Oh, right — right, I almost forgot. You’re into charity now. Is the Parrish boy grateful ? Does he thank you ? Does he beg ? Does it make you feel good about yourself ? I bet it does, you must feel very noble, do you feel noble with your dick in —”

Ronan punched him in the stomach.

But then he saw Kavinsky’s face and he was smiling, and weird smile that made Ronan’s insides twist, and he said, “You want to hit me again, don’t you ? come on, do it ! do it !” and that was when Ronan noticed the huge bruises on his arms, some fading, others obviously new, and he said, “God, no, I’m not doing this, this is fucking sick, find someone else for this, I’m not — I’m not doing this.” Kavinsky shouted a few profanities as he walked away, but Ronan couldn’t care. Perhaps he was too angry for anything more to get to him.

The next day he caught Kavinsky at school, shoved him with minimal but sufficient violence against a wall, and asked, “Do you see your shrink ? Have you talked to him about this ?”

“It’s a she,” Kavinsky said. “Apparently I’m a little shit who antagonizes men too much, so — and “this” what, anyway ?”

Ronan’s eyes drifted all over Kavinsky’s body. Autumn was there, and the day before had been warm but this one was cool, so all that was left for Ronan to see now was a half-healed cut on Kavinsky’s bottom lip, which he did not allow himself to look at for too long, because he was not giving Kavinsky this, not now, he was not giving him a victory when what he deserved was a few kicks in the brain.

“This thing you do, the way you get into fights to get hurt, that.”

“Is that not what everyone does ?”

“No, it’s not.”

Maybe it was what Ronan had done once, but it was only a maybe, it might never have been at all. Introspection wasn’t Ronan’s thing. Putting words on what was wrong with Kavinsky wasn’t his thing either, and he felt stupid to care, and he felt ridiculous to have come there. Then Kavinsky was laying a hand on Ronan’s arm, which was a signal for him to let go, and a touch that sent thrills through Ronan’s every muscle.

“I do see my shrink.”

One night, when Ronan came back to his room and checked his phone, he found three missed phone calls from Kavinsky, and had received a dozen texts. They read :

hey

pick up lynch

lychn

dude ?? ???

cant call you a 4^th time that’d be neeeeeedy

heeeeeeey

srsly pick up

are you choking on some dick or sth

lynch

fuck man

are you ignoring me

The last one was from 9:37, and it was over 10 PM, so Ronan called Kavinsky back immediately, but it went straight to voicemail. So he stormed out of Monmouth — Gansey called out, “Where are you go —” and Ronan just waved a hand in a gesture that didn’t mean anything — and got into his BMW and drove to Kavinsky’s faster than he’d expected to, and rang the doorbell quite aggressively. It was Jiang who came to the door, and he looked at him with raised eyebrows, muttering, “What the hell —” but Ronan only asked, “Where is Kavinsky ?”

Jiang said he was upstairs, but what the fuck though, and Ronan almost ran up to Kavinsky’s room, and opened the door, and Kavinsky was lying on his bed, very still, eyes vacant, a vague and fading smile on his lips, and Ronan shook him by the shoulders, saying things that went along the lines of hey, are you okay, hey but were only vaguely coherent.

Then Kavinsky straightened up and looked at Ronan like it was he who had reasons to be worried, and said, slowly, “Yeah, yeah, I’m — I’m not, uh, I’m not dying, Jesus, calm down dude.”

Ronan looked around and there was an empty bottle of medium-high quality vodka on the floor, and nothing else that looked like a culprit anywhere he could see — the nightstand’s drawer was half-opened though — and Ronan breathed in and out, trying to deal with the relief crashing over him and the anger that was building up. He said, “I thought — why didn’t you answer your phone, for fuck’s sake !”

“Oh,” Kavinsky said, gesturing to the other end of the room, “I got tired of waiting.” And there Ronan saw the remains of a phone shattered on the floor. Apparently it had been thrown against the wall.

“Fuck this”, Ronan whispered as he let himself slide against Kavinsky’s bed, and he sat there on the floor a while, fighting the urge to wreck something, anything — preferably Kavinsky’s face, though. He noticed Jiang going back down the stairs, which meant he’d followed him, and had borne witness to his ridicule.

“So,” Kavinsky said, “I didn’t pick up my phone and you drove up here ?”

“I did, and don’t think of pulling something like this willingly, ever. I’m serious. Don’t. Not ever.” Ronan turned to look at Kavinsky. “You’re wasted,” he observed.

“Yeah, I am.”

He was having a hard time calming down.

“Chill, Lynch, I’m not going to OD just because you ignore my calls, I’m not that much of a needy bitch.” Kavinsky laughed, but it was forced, and so Ronan grabbed his face and kissed him, and he felt the heavy sigh that Kavinsky let out, like he’d been waiting for so long, and perhaps Ronan had, too.

He said, “I’ll keep the damn phone near from now on, I swear,” and Kavinsky said “I’m not asking for any—” but Ronan shut him up and they were a mess, both of them, holding on to each other as to dear life, all whispered names and gripping hands. Maybe this needed to stop happening, Ronan thought, the kissing and not thinking thing, but this had not happened, he had made it happen, and there would be time for the thinking later, and he already had such shit to try to fix, this seemed much more simple.

That night Ronan slept on Kavinsky’s bed (but not before answering Gansey’s Ronan Lynch, where are you text by saying he’d be back in the morning) or at least he lied down with his back to him, listening to the muffled sounds of a TV that came from downstairs, and to Kavinsky’s breathing, waiting for him to fall asleep, but he just kept on shuffling slightly ; yet at some point Ronan stopped listening, and did sleep.

When he woke up the house was silent and the time 7:23, and Kavinsky was lightly snoring and lying on his stomach and his face was inches from Ronan’s, and he looked strange. Ronan got up and dressed himself slowly, and when he got back to Monmouth Gansey was awake and asked where he’d been, and Ronan knew he knew, and disapproved, which was also a thing he’d have to deal with at some point, so he told the truth and walked to the fridge to get some orange juice. In the afternoon he got a text from Kavinsky that said, I have a phone again.

Chapter Text

It was on a cloudy Monday afternoon that Ronan found himself cornered. It was his fault — he’d thought, ever the optimist, that he’d be safe at school, but he’d not been careful enough, and so on that afternoon, he was alone in a classroom with Adam, before Latin class — obviously. Under normal circumstances, this would not have been a problem at all. They might have discussed the Greenmantle issue before said sinister character arrived. He might have showed off the Latin skills he largely overestimated, and Adam would have been an indulgent audience.

But on that afternoon, Adam walked up to his desk and stood in front of it, towering over Ronan — something unusual and not unpleasant as such, but again, circumstances — and he said, “Is your plan to just avoid me forever ? Is it something that’s working for you ?”

It had worked just fine up to this point, Ronan thought, but voicing that thought would only be asking for trouble.

“It had worked until now,” Ronan said.

The look in Adam’s eyes meant he couldn’t believe how much of an idiot Ronan was being, and so it was very appropriate. But he decided to ignore that, it seemed, and looked very serious, and Ronan knew he was going to hate every minute of what was coming.

“I’ll start, then. The truth is, I took a calculated risk. I’m not blind, and you’ve had a crush on me for a while, I’m pretty sure I didn’t imagine it, and I won’t say it’s not flattering, because it is, and I was — I was jealous, so I thought, I thought that even if I wasn’t sure of what I wanted, I could try and find out what you wanted, so, what do you want, Ronan ?”

Ronan had been right ; he hated this. There was one thing he knew he couldn’t say — he couldn’t say he was sorry. Saying I’m sorry would be, he felt it, an insult to Adam, and what would it even mean. He also knew that Adam had been clever there : he had opened up, he had spoken sincerely, he had even admitted to shameful things, and this forced Ronan to offer an actual answer, he couldn’t just get away with a snarky remark and praying for someone to get there soon and interrupt this.

What do you want ? a voice asked in his head — but it was Kavinsky’s now, and it meant, do you want me to blow you ? and it meant I’m going to the kitchen, do you want a beer or something ? and it meant a lot more, because a lot of things Kavinsky said to him meant a lot more, and he tried not to dwell on that, and he was not managing so well. (Like when one evening not so long ago Ronan had knelt for a new prayer, and Kavinsky’s legs had shaken when he’d come, and he’d fallen down to kiss Ronan, and whispered a barely audible thank you, his forehead resting on Ronan’s shoulder, and it had sounded like something so much bigger than post-blowjob courtesy.)

What do you want ?

It was very simple sometimes. He wanted Kavinsky’s eyes on him like he was the only thing that mattered at all, and his hands on his body, confident or shaky ; he wanted when Kavinsky tried out his name, rolled it on his tongue, only ever saying Ronan when they were not facing each other, and pretending that it didn’t matter, wanting was the shiver that prickled every inch of Ronan’s skin then ; he wanted and nothing else mattered at all when Kavinsky greeted him by crashing his body against Ronan’s, pressing him closer and closer until they couldn’t breathe properly, and when Kavinsky said please or God or fuck and it all meant the same thing.

Right then though, Ronan was also acutely aware of how Kavinsky was too much, how accepting to be what he was to Kavinsky would wear him out, how it had started to already, how caring would ineluctably become unbearable — but he wanted this, however stupid it was, he wanted this too.

“I was selfish,” Ronan said eventually, “and I didn’t think much, and I was an idiot to just run away and avoid you afterwards, and I shouldn’t even have let it happen in the first place, that was—”

“You’ve wanted me for, like, a year, Ronan,” Adam interrupted him, his voice the most aggressive whisper Ronan had ever heard — he was badly impressed. “So what’s up with being an irresponsible dick now ?”

Ronan could only swallow back answers that would have sent the whole discussion down an even more uncomfortable road, but he couldn’t just keep his mouth shut either — couldn’t someone come into the damn classroom already ? — so he said, “I’m just not sure,” holding back an anymore that Adam heard anyway — and it was a lie, it was sort of a lie, it was a lot like a lie, it was an enormous lie —, and the whisper grew louder.

“And why ? Because of that piece of shit who’s guilt-tripping you into caring about him ?” Ronan looked up swiftly.

“My fucking up doesn’t give you the right to talk like that, and I’m not — I’m not listening to this, this is not something I’m going to discuss now.”

Adam would have said more, and things would have become even less nice, but fortunately other students finally came in, chatting and destroying the tensed atmosphere that had enveloped them, and Adam shot him a look that was not kind, and went to sit at his desk. Perhaps things could have been worse — quite probably this whole thing could have gone worse. But it was not a very satisfactory situation. He had never meant to offend or hurt Adam, or damage his confidence, or anything like that. He thought about it often, and he blamed himself, and sure he probably would never have started this conversation, but now he had to try and fix this mess, and quickly, because it was getting quite uncomfortable.

Before Ronan got around to that, however, two things happened.

The first thing occurred as he was hanging out at Kavinsky’s, and Jiang was there, and so was Swan, and Ronan asked a question that had been on his mind for a while.

“Where is Skov, anyway ?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Swan retreat to the kitchen. That was not a good sign. Next to him, Kavinsky stood still. “That’s not really —” Jiang started tentatively, but Kavinsky cut him off, his voice close to a snarl.

“Skov,” he said, “is a fucking disloyal piece of shit of a dog.” Then he got up and went into the kitchen as well.

There was about half a minute of silence, until Jiang started to talk. “Listen to me,” he said. And as he turned towards him, Ronan was made very aware that Jiang resented him, and for much more than what had just passed. Not that it mattered, because as for that Ronan’s conscience was clear, or almost, since it had crossed his mind that he had been a little reckless with how far he had played dumb — but Kavinsky had been heading to his 4^th of July party long before their paths ever crossed.

“First of all, don’t ever mention Skov again — but I guess, or I hope, that I don’t really need to tell you this. Then, you may be here now, but not so long ago you were very intent on staying away. Fine. But it might be useful for you to know a few things — you have no idea the state he was in after the 4^th. You may think you do, but you don’t. I’d say he was a fucking mess, but that doesn’t cover it. He didn’t get out of his house, not once, not until he somehow went through that window. We saw him a few times before that, and it was not often that he could manage to say things that made any sense, or to get any words out at all, for that matter. It was only slightly better after — the incident. Swan and I stayed, like we waited when he went to rehab without fucking telling us anything — Skov didn’t. He was gone after three days of this, right after we went to see Kavinsky at his place for the first time after the 4^th. And that’s not the only thing that went away. The state he was in — I had to go and see people, I had to go and make myself seem like much more that what I am, to make sure that some people not getting what they used to get from us anymore didn’t meant the end of things like our functioning legs. Shit fell apart. I have a few friends. People were very understanding. It’s okay now but it wasn’t always. I’m telling you this — I’m telling you this because maybe then you won’t behave like a total dick and start mentioning shit you know nothing about. I’m also telling you this because no one else would and I don’t think it fair that you should live in blissful ignorance. You may disagree, but I really don’t care.”

“Okay,” Ronan said eventually.

“Great,” Jiang said.

Fortunately, Ronan’s life was not made only of mildly terrifying and very thinly veiled declarations of hostility — not that he was terrified, he was only reasonably wary, because he knew, from experience and from observation, that Jiang could kick his ass any time he wanted, could probably kick almost anyone’s ass for that matter, because when it seemed that he couldn’t or that it would take too long to his taste, he fought dirty, extremely dirty, the kind of dirty that required him to wash blood off his hands and clothes afterwards — Jiang hadn’t said it in so many words, but Ronan had heard the message loud and clear nevertheless ; something along the lines of if you fuck up again, I’ll fucking end you ; perhaps it was time to practice his fighting skills intensively.

Then one night, it was getting pretty late, and Ronan was sprawled out gracelessly across the floor of Monmouth Manufacturing’s main room while Gansey was reading things and scribbling things and overall doing his Gansey thing, and sometimes he asked Ronan for his opinion, and sometimes Ronan gave it — at other times he just snorted and Gansey sighed —, and Ronan’s phone vibrated and it was a text from Kavinsky asking if he’d mind stopping by his place. Feeling slightly audacious as he hit send, Ronan suggested that he might come by Monmouth instead.

It was almost an hour later that Kavinsky texted back ok ; but 30 minutes more passed after that and still no one had rung the doorbell, so Ronan went to the door, and opened it, and Kavinsky was there, standing like an idiot, because he couldn’t fucking ring, so Ronan sighed heavily and dragged him inside.

Gansey watched this unfold with a look on his face that said, are you serious right now, what the hell, and Kavinsky said, “Hi Dick,” and Gansey said, “Hi,” and the awkwardness was threatening to choke everyone in the room, and Kavinsky was visibly debating whether to run away or not, so Ronan caught his hand again and lead him upstairs.

At some point that night, Ronan thought of pulling a Gansey — that was, asking Kavinsky what he knew about Welsh kings ; he thought better of it, however, and instead said, “Do you want to hear about the magical quest we’re on ?”

It was not a sudden inspiration at all, it was something that had been hanging in the back of his mind for a while, something he had debated with himself a number of times, because was it a good idea to tell Kavinsky about this, would Kavinsky even care about this, there was no place for Kavinsky in this — and on Kavinsky’s face now he saw the rest of it : how telling him would be trusting him with it, and how absurd it was, how Kavinsky himself thought it absurd ; how he might not want to know any more about this thing that would never involve him, about a thing that brought Ronan closer to the friends that Kavinsky would rather forget existed altogether, and set them apart from Kavinsky in a very definite way — Kavinsky said, “Yes.”

And so Ronan talked for a long time, longer than he thought he’d ever care to, and Kavinsky didn’t say much, after having initially exclaimed that oh so that was what Dick Gansey was always pestering everyone about, and remarking that he was not that into fucking metaphysical bullshit, and he fell asleep before Ronan was finished explaining about Mr Gray and Blue’s mother, so Ronan carefully moved Kavinsky’s head from his thigh onto the pillow, and then went downstairs, where Gansey was still awake. He sat down on the couch.

Gansey didn’t bother hovering around it, probably because he was a little too tired to deal with Ronan’s avoidance skills, and so he bluntly asked, “Why are you wasting your time on Kavinsky ?” and Ronan only replied, “I’m not.” Visibly aware that he was threading on thin ice, Gansey pushed it a little further anyway and said, “I just didn’t think you’d keep on seeing him after what he did, that’s all.” Ronan said, “I didn’t either.”

He had used up his limited tolerance for lengthy conversation for the day, so he just stayed there, hoping that Gansey understood that he was asking him to have a little faith in his knowing what he was doing, and perhaps Gansey did, since after a few minutes of silence he suggested that Ronan should go back up, and he’d fill him in on his night reading in the morning.

Back in his room, Kavinsky was awake again, perhaps only just roused from sleep by the sound of the door opening, and his left hand was light on Ronan’s cheek, and his right hand firm on Ronan’s waist, and his lips soft on Ronan’s jaw ; and he said, “Thank you for the bedtime story,” and they slept.

Two days later Ronan was brave enough to seek Adam out, and so early evening found him before Adam’s door at Saint Agnes. He’d given himself a prep talk before going, because he didn’t want to stand there wondering if he shouldn’t go away instead, so he did not let himself hesitate, and knocked. Adam opened the door and didn’t seem surprised to see him, rather a little amused, even. It was annoying but encouraging, Ronan supposed.

“Hey,” he said.

“I wasn’t expecting you so soon,” Adam said.

And then Ronan talked, and it wasn’t very long because there wasn’t much to say, except you’re my friend and I wish I hadn’t been an idiot and how he hoped it wouldn’t fuck up everything because it wasn’t a sustainable situation, and how even if it were sustainable he would be looking for a way to fix it, because he missed the way things were, and at some point Adam cut him off, saying, “Okay.”

And Ronan just looked up at him, and asked, “Okay what ?” and Adam waved his hand and said, “I recognize the effort it took you to do this, this thing, the talking thing, and I’ll — I’ll just — it’s okay.”

“So, we’re good ?”

“Yeah, we’re good.”

The next day, Ronan took Adam with him to the Barns.

Chapter Text

It was a chilly afternoon, and they were in Kavinsky’s room (and his mother had gone out the night before and not come back since) and they were kissing, and touching each other wherever they could, and all the air Ronan could breathe smelled like Kavinsky, Kavinsky who whispered in his ear he wished Ronan would be his only, would not (fucking) care about anyone else, would not ever (fucking) look at anyone else. His fingers dug hard into Ronan’s arms and lower back — it felt as if there were a heavy cloud inside his brain, and his body was heavy and very here —, as he pressed him against the wall — and his jeans were way too tight, and Kavinsky’s breath was way too warm —, and then he was moving towards Ronan’s belt, and starting to get on his knees, but Ronan said,

“Wait, wait, wait, wait a sec’, I — I think I want —”

The smile spread wide on Kavinsky’s face, and Ronan could see the battle that was raging behind it — between his absolute lack of any patience whatsoever and the desire to hear Ronan really say it —

“You want me to do you, Lynch ?”

He enunciated each word very clearly, detaching them, enjoying them, and Ronan wanted to slam his head into the wall, but he wanted Kavinsky to slam into him more, enough not to be embarrassed, enough to forget about being ashamed, enough not to punch Kavinsly in the stomach.

“I do,” Ronan said.

“I have never —” Ronan started tentatively a few minutes later, as Kavinsky had done away with most of his clothes and seemed intent on showing him just how much he’d waited for this, and he chuckled, and said, “I know,” and Ronan muttered, “Fucking creep,” and Kavinsky said, “Hush now.”

And Ronan complied and was silent for a while, but when Kavinsky took lube and a condom out of his nightstand drawer he felt compelled to mention that he didn’t want to be scarred for life, and Kavinsky said, “Don’t you ?” but didn’t leave Ronan any time to ponder on whether or not that was a joke, as he added, “I know what I’m doing, you know.”

“Most people think they do, but some others end up traumatized nevertheless —”

“Do you want to try now or some other time ?”

“No no no no no now, now, but —”

“Then try shutting the fuck up for a minute.”

And sure in the end it wasn’t perfectly smooth, and Ronan didn’t quite keep silent, and Kavinsky wasn’t exactly gentle, though it was obvious he tried, and it didn’t matter much and all hurt and discomfort faded as their bodies found a way to fit together and move in concert, and Ronan’s mouth sang a song he’d never learnt, muffled by a pillow whenever he remembered to care about his pride, and Kavinsky’s teeth bit new marks onto his shoulders that would not fade in a day, just in case Ronan the next morning felt like forgetting about what had passed before the night.

It was not quite a mystical experience (“Fuck fuck fuck fuck don’t, don’t do that, fucking stay still, or I’ll — Ronan, for the love of —) but somehow, in all its imperfection, it came close.

About a week later, there was that one evening, on which Ronan was dining at Nino’s with Gansey, Blue, Adam, and even Noah — although he had flickered out at some point, before popping back —, and Kavinsky texted him, and the text read, i need you.

Ronan had to briefly consider the possibility that he’d hit his head and suffered some kind of brain trauma, somehow, because he couldn’t quite believe that Kavinsky would type these words, all naked, without an insult or a joke or just anything alongside them, anything to distract attention, to hide those words behind. Once the shock had passed he had to choose a guilt, either the one that would come from deserting his friends to run to Kavinsky — something he did not doubt at least one of them would find amusing —, or the other one, that was creeping up inside him already, from having not ran yet when surely only an extraordinarily bad situation — and an inconceivable amount trust for Kavinsky, a voice whispered, to show vulnerability, or maybe it was only a trick, said another — would justify such a straightforward message.

It was Jiang who opened the door to Kavinsky’s house, and he seemed to examine him, not discretely at all, before allowing him to come in. He called out, “Lynch’s here !” and Kavinsky came out of the living room and when he caught Ronan’s eye there was a tremor in his lips and a panicked look on his face, brutally transitioning into relief, so Ronan followed him up the stairs to his room and held him tight as he cried.

They were ugly, violent, loud sobs, and Ronan had to remind Kavinsky to breathe every now and then, and he kept his head in his hands, and when Ronan got up to grab a box of tissues he curled up into a ball, and it took Ronan two minutes to get him to straighten up and let himself be held again. The raw despair, the gasps for air, the inarticulate sounds and Kavinsky biting down on his wrists, all of it hurt, but Ronan made himself not think about that, it was not the time to think about himself, and he possibly never wanted to reflect on those feelings ever anyway.

It took Kavinsky about half an hour to calm down, and when he had he asked, “Can you stay ? I might make it through the night if you stay,” and Ronan wanted to run away, and Ronan wanted to never leave, and Ronan said, “Sure.”

Kavinsky talked for most of the night, and Ronan listened. Kavinsky said,

“When I was little, my father would bring girls at least half his age home almost every night, except on Sundays, never on Sundays, and most of the time my mother was too far gone to really care, but when she did, she took it out on the girls, always, never yelled at him or anything, and he liked that, he found that really fun — once she threw a glass at a girl’s head and he laughed, and he congratulated her, and she left the room and the girl had a cut on her face that bled so he sent me to get some antiseptic and stuff, and my mother was in the bathroom and she gave me alcohol and the bitch cried when he put it on the wound.”

He said,

“When I was fourteen one of his friends came for dinner with his daughter, she was twenty-one, I think, and it was the first time I was allowed to drink wine with them, and when they were having a digestive before dessert my father told me to show her my room, and I thought we were a bit old for this, but I wasn’t stupid enough to argue, so we went, and she had a ridiculous bird tattoo under her right breast, and when we came back they were eating my mother’s rice pudding, and I remember, he said, How did the boy do ? and she was ashamed, and her father was too, and shocked at how rude it was to ask, the shamelessness, but she replied, He did well, and we ate rice pudding and she kissed me on the cheek and I shook her father’s hand when they left.”

He said,

“I’d just turned fifteen and one day he came home and I heard my mother say, that son you made me is a faggot, and I was in the kitchen I was eating brownies and she said she heard it from a friend who knew I was hanging out with Alex Herger and his degenerate crew so he came into the kitchen and I said it wasn’t true, it wasn’t true, and he grabbed me by my shirt and he slapped me four times, I thought my neck would snap, and he said he didn’t want to hear anything like that ever again. Not long after we moved into Henrietta and I banged a bunch of posh little whores who thought my bad boy persona would spice up their lives.”

He said,

“He used to say my mother’s cunt had dried out when I was born.”

He said,

“I would stay out as late as I could after school, but I had to be back at 7:30 for dinner, because if I was late he’d get angry, but he got angry as soon as he saw me, most days, I noticed it even when it didn’t show so much, so I was careful, all the time, and my mother was too, and when I’d make a mistake, say something I shouldn’t have, or — or, like, didn’t like my food, or broke something — she’d scold me before he even said anything, sometimes she sent me to my room, but often my father wouldn’t let me leave, and he yelled at her, hit her sometimes, said she needed to stop trying to protect me, but I don’t think — I think she was just tired of it all and just tried to avoid his blowing up, but not for my sake, just because she was tired of it, and he took his temper out on her too. Most days he wasn’t violent, but I knew any day could be the day he would hit me, the day I would piss him off to much, I think somehow I was sort of relieved when it happened, because at least I could stop waiting for it.”

He said,

“So that one day I slipped my mother something so she’d sleep and I waited, and he came home drunk, called for my mother, then for me, demanded a beer, so I got him one, and he looked at me and he asked if I ever planned on bringing something other than shame home and where had I been slumming these days and I didn’t answer so he was pissed and he got up and I backed up against the wall and his breath reeked of alcohol and he said, do you whine like a bitch when you take it up the ass, and I said I didn’t, and I stabbed him in the stomach with a kitchen knife, and I yanked it up, yanked it up, up, up, up, and he spurted blood in my face, it was warm, and he looked so surprised, and I pushed him away as hard as I could, and he fell, and I cut his throat, I had to go at it three times, it wasn’t as easy as I’d thought.”

He said,

“I thought I’d frame his brother for it but then I didn’t. I thought hard for like an hour and it was pretty clear things would be much simpler if my father was alive, I didn’t know what might have happened otherwise, I didn’t know how secure our money was, I thought if I had only my mother someone might notice how unfit a parent she was and that might have lead to some trouble, so — so I knocked myself out and I dreamt and it wasn’t easy, I was panicking, I was so scared of messing up, I hadn’t been scared just before but then I was, but I did it, and I puked when I saw him, but he was — he was like I had wanted him to be, and so my new father and I got rid of the body, and he moved back to Jersey for business reasons, and my mother never said a thing but obviously she knows, but who could she tell.”

He said,

“I should have kept him dead and pinned it on her.”

He said,

“She said she’d tried to love me because it was what mothers were supposed to do, and my father had wanted a child, she said they never tried to have another one because they couldn’t take a second momentous failure, she said she could barely look at me when they handed me to her at the maternity, she said she lost my father because of me, she said I should have brought her happiness but I’d only ruined her life, she said while my father was away she’d go visit a friend for a few days, and I said, would I be all alone then, and she said, well yes, was I retarded on top of it all.”

Kavinsky’s fingers were too tight around Ronan’s wrists, and Ronan’s arms held him too firmly. Kavinsky talked about the dreaming, too, about himself, about Ronan.

He said,

“I get even less sleep than before, and I can’t get hammered every night to sink into it ‘cause it doesn’t play well with these stomach aches I’ve been having, or the nauseas, and I have those rashes on my arms and chest sometimes, and they itch like hell and they’re ugly, and I look like shit all the time, and I’m so sick of everything — and I hate having to go back to Aglionby, I can’t have everyone — I don’t care what they think but I look so fucking weak.”

He said,

“I dreamed myself a gun like my father’s.”

He said,

“I thought if you saw we were the same, if I made you to see, if I dragged you to where I was, then you’d have no choice but to choose me, and now — you’re farther than you ever were — and I can’t help but — you’re going to leave again some day but I can’t tell you it’ll destroy me ‘cause that’ll be emotionally manipulative, I’m told.”

He said,

“I’m not beautiful like you are.”

He said,

“I wish you would need me.”

He said,

“I’ve never been to Bulgaria.”

Eventually he fell silent, and Ronan ran a hand through his hair and said, “I can be there on good days, too,” and Kavinsky said, “There’s not many of those.”

Chapter Text

The air was warm and loud deep beats echoed through Kavinsky’s head and merged with his blood, and his tank top stuck to his chest and there was a cold bottle in his hand and he didn’t remember what it was and he checked and it was rum, he didn’t really like rum, who drank this, who brought this — it was a party, it was Jiang’s house, the garden, his parents were on vacation on some island — his body felt light and his head was heavy.

And Lynch was there and he was there because Kavinsky had sort of assumed he’d come and possibly he’d rather have been elsewhere but — he was there, and Jiang had reopened the pool and there were people and empty bottles floating in it, and Kavinsky tried looking away, really tried for a while, minutes, only seconds, but time slipped away and he was beautiful, he was beautiful, he was beautiful, which felt like swallowing glass that climbed back up his throat again, which felt like ice in his stomach, which felt like falling, fast.

Ronan Lynch was looking at him, too. And that — that felt like getting punched in the gut but not hard enough, like waking up from the dreams he died in, like driving fast and knowing that at any time he could simply stay on course until he crashed, and he was close and Kavinsky was aware in some way that they were not alone but they were, and it dawned on him that he was drunk, but that wasn’t the only thing that made his vision blurry because he could see Lynch clearly, he could see his eyes and his jaw and his mouth and they were clear and real. Abruptly he felt waves of desire crashing against the unwelcome barrier of his skin and his body was back and it was hungry and he glanced at his hands because they wanted to touch, and they knew there was the slightest stubble on Lynch’s jaw and they ached to catch his hips —

Then someone shoved him and he hit the water, slowly, and then he was underwater, and it wasn’t all that cold and he was weightless, but Lynch yanked him up and he was shouting something at Jiang because it was Jiang who had pushed them into the pool, fucking asshole, and Kavinsky dove to get his glasses back, and then he got out and he was soaked and his hair fell on his forehead and he smoothed it back.

“First floor, there’s a dryer in the bathroom, and my room’s next to it, you can probably find things to wear while you wait,” Jiang informed. “Leave the shoes outside, though.”

“Fuck you,” Kavinsky said.

But they went in and Lynch caught his hand as they went up the stairs and he couldn’t take his eyes off of it, and in the bathroom he took his clothes off and Kavinsky couldn’t move, his skin was cold and water dripped from his hair onto his shoulders and it was cold also.

“Hey, you okay ?”

Fuck. He tried to say something but what came out of his mouth was not a recognizable word and somehow Lynch was undressing him now and it felt like he was catching fire and he thought, maybe his hands will leave burns, he thought, perhaps he would melt him then shape him again. He felt like crying, and the bathroom lights were harsh so he closed his eyes, there was still music and people outside were being loud but it was all very far away.

“Come on,” Lynch said, with a loose grip on his arm.

Jiang’s room was a mess. Lynch closed the door behind them and Kavinsky caught him as he was moving away, pulled him in and he’d wanted him so violently moments before but he held him tight and breathed him in and he was held, too, kisses on his neck, his hearth was beating steadily and he was exhausted.

When he woke up, Lynch was gone.

It took him three hours to drag himself out of the bed. Three hours trying not to think back to confidences spilled in the dark, touches too soft and embraces too gentle, and he certainly did not want to reflect on how it felt when Ronan Lynch held his hand but it was a thing that happened a thing that had happened not only once more than once and there was a longing now inside him that he didn’t want to acknowledge just like he wasn’t hoping to get a text, he was the one who texted first, that was a fact, he wasn’t in any way worthy of what he dared want, that was another one and fuck he missed Lynch so much already which was pathetic and too excessive to bear and maybe if he could kill him it would stop.

It felt to Ronan like he was leading two lives. He didn’t like it. Everyday that passed got them closer to Glendower, he felt it, they all felt it, and with Gwenllian out of the ground all the magic in their lives was more palpable, undeniable, realer than ever, and this thing they shared brought them all closer and closer, shutting everyone else out — and yet somehow, Kavinsky was still there.

It wasn’t that Ronan wished he weren’t — but there was no denying that he was on the outside of what was the most important part of his life, this prodigious thing that filled them with purpose and bound them together and there was no question in his mind that if he ever had to choose (he hoped he wouldn’t) Kavinsky wouldn’t come first, and he carried the weight of this knowledge along with the acute awareness of just how much he mattered to Kavinsky — this wasn’t pretension, he’d tried to be blind but it was painfully obvious. What was worse was he knew that Kavinsky knew all this too, and he couldn’t picture a scenario in which this unspoken thing didn’t blow up loudly and messily in their faces one day. He expected every day to be that day.

It felt like it would be smart to get ahead of it and distance himself as much as he could, or break it up altogether, cleanly, if it was possible, before it all got ugly, but he didn’t really want to try, and he didn’t even know what was there to break up, he didn’t care to find out. Earlier that day, jokingly, with a hint of malice perhaps, Adam had asked him, No plans with your boyfriend for today ? and he’d had nothing but a rude gesture to supply as an answer. He didn’t have anything to argue against this designation, but boyfriend didn’t seem all that appropriate either.

And so a few hours later, when his phone rang and it was Kavinsky calling him, he didn’t pick up, telling himself that if he called again he would, in case it was important. It didn’t ring again, but twenty minutes or so later he got a text that said, you can drop by tonight if you want (it meant : I want you to, it would mean so much if you did, I will wait for you to show up anyway) and then another one, we’re ordering too much pizza. Those were by far some of the most innocuous texts he’d ever gotten from Kavinsky, and yet they carried inordinate weight — he heard his own voice, he’d said he could be there on good days too, and that had been a lot like a promise, what did it mean if not that he would come even if Kavinsky didn’t need him to — as if saying yes, going, that day, would be commitment more than anything he’d done up to this point.

So Ronan took a shower and let an hour pass before texting back, I’m on my way.

When he got there it was Kavinsky who opened the door and he said, “Hey”, and there were things written on his face that Ronan didn’t want to think about, and he also said, “Hey”, and they went into the living room where Jiang and Swan were watching Raiders of the lost ark and they said, “Hey”, and Ronan somewhat waved at them because he didn’t want to say hey again. Swan moved to the side of the couch so that Ronan could sit down, and Kavinsky handed him a lukewarm slice of pepperoni before settling on the floor, his back resting on Ronan’s legs.

Later into the night Kavinsky had shifted backwards toward the couch, between Ronan’s legs, his head resting on his thigh, and Ronan’s hand was in his hair, on his neck, negligently pushing strands of hair away from his forehead, and he noticed that the outline of Kavinsky and his weight against him were much more fascinating than the screen before him, and that was when he had to let himself think that, fuck, they were probably dating. The concept felt inadequate. He wondered whether Kavinsky had allowed that thought to occur to him too.

He had. He had, much earlier, when Lynch had invited him into Monmouth. It had felt meaningful. It made him want to burn that house down, sometimes. He was used to violence and he was used to boredom (he couldn’t stand boredom, and he knew that would be what would compel him to use again, tomorrow, in a week, a month, someday) and he was used to wants and cravings and screams and bruises but he didn’t know what to do with — this. For every kiss that didn’t bite and for every touch that wasn’t hard and for every word that wasn’t shouted and for every night they slept next to each other he needed something else that would hurt but it wasn’t enough — a strong blow to his gut and the one that messed up his face couldn’t make up for how hard it was to keep breathing when Ronan was inches away but not touching him yet.

A bloody nose didn’t help either with how loud and clear his father’s voice echoed in his mind when he was drunk and weak enough to acknowledge what he yearned for more and more every time he was unable to ask — would he whine like a bitch ? what would it mean if he did — did he want to find out — why couldn’t he be strong enough to stop wanting this, on top of everything else, worse than everything else, more shameful than any of it — maybe — he couldn’t tell really, what made him want to throw his whole self up more, wanting to hold Ronan Lynch’s hand or hoping he would fuck him.

Chapter Text

Kavinsky woke up and it was 4:48 in the afternoon and sunlight was warming his legs. His skin was sticking to the leather couch so he didn’t move, but his mouth was dry and his stomach grumbled. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten — it might have been in the morning, or the day before — he didn’t really know what he’d done, if anything, for the last 48 hours. The TV’s remote was digging into his thigh. He moved to get it out from under himself, and grabbed the bottle sitting beside the couch. It was water, and he didn’t know if that made him want to laugh or cry. He wasn’t sure that it made him anything. It was warm, and dribbled onto his chest.

That morning (maybe) he’d spent more than an hour in the shower and hadn’t even thought about jacking off. He was thinking about it now, but too idly to do anything about it. He sat up. He could hear the wind blowing softly outside, and not a sound in the house except for the low humming of the TV he hadn’t properly turned off. His mother wasn’t home. He could get up and get something to eat. He was seeing his mother more than before, had seen her much more than he (and she) cared to for the past few weeks, because he was spending more and more time in this house, contemplating going out but seldom actually doing it. He hadn’t seen Ronan Lynch for days — how many days he couldn’t tell, really; but he knew they were seeing each other less and less and he missed him, his hands, his mouth, the shape of him, of his shoulderblades, and not telling him this was exhausting. He lay back down and turned on the TV.

When he opened his eyes again, it was raining.

When he opened his eyes again, it was dark. He was cold. Standing up his head started spinning; he would have to get something to eat at some point. He turned the TV off and texted Ronan.

                  you busy?

It took him an absurdly long time to get into the shower, but then the water was warm scalding hot warm, warmer, and lights danced in the dark when he closed his eyes, and he washed his come off his hands and the tiles and got out. He was cold again. He found a white T-shirt and put it on. The light from the fridge was too bright and he downed a bottle of water and ate slices of bread sitting on the kitchen counter.

Back upstairs he looked for his phone and found it and Lynch had texted back.

                  it’s 3am

He supposed it was.

                  yeah

                  busy?

He drove to Monmouth fast. Everything was blurry but himself and the Mitsubishi and he could crash them at this turn or the next or into that grey car he almost didn’t see and in his grip the wheel was so solid he almost felt alive. When he saw Ronan in the flashlights waiting for him he wished he’d thought to get drunk before coming. Somehow he felt his heartbeat in his fingertips. Perhaps it would be wiser not to get out of the car.

He got out of the car.

He tried to say hi but no sound came out. He couldn’t remember how long it had been since he’d last spoken to someone — days. He tried again. His voice sounded strange to his ears. He wanted to touch Ronan so he did, and he closed his eyes when Kavinsky’s hand brushed against his forehead and someone said,

“I missed you.”

Ronan caught his wrist. Kavinsky froze.

“Shit. Shit. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not.”

Ronan kissed him.

“You pity me,” Kavinsky whispered.

Ronan said,

“Want to come in?”

It was late, or early and he’d only wanted to see Ronan, and he was there, and they went up to his room and without saying anything Kavinsky undressed quickly and got into his bed, and then Ronan was next to him and idly caressing his back and it would have been a nice way to live, and it would have been a nice moment to die. He felt Ronan fall asleep and he turned around to watch him ; he still wanted to own him and have him in every possible way and keep him and never, ever, relinquish him ; it was getting harder every day to live the way he did with everything so dull, himself so dull, so slow, getting drunk and passing out and waking up to find only two hours had gone by, and nothing to look forward to — had he ever had anything to look forward to — most days ; and there were two easy solutions to this problem that he could think of.

Sleep wouldn’t come. He’d slept too much for days, he supposed. He didn’t look at the time. Sometimes a car passed by the house, the light from the headlights flooding the room for a moment. He lay on his back. He didn’t move. He didn’t think — that was something he was good at, a skill he’d honed over the years, necessary to his survival. Then Ronan shifted next to him, shuffling away just enough so that they weren’t touching anymore. It could have broken his heart. He thought —

He was never one for what ifs, but ok, what if —

What if he’d been someone else, what if he’d been better, what if he’d been good enough for Ronan to want him, truly, not for five minutes, not to be discarded once his usefulness had run its course, what if he’d been worth it, what if this — this relationship, this thing, that, them — hadn’t happened the way it had, with the violence, and the pity, and how pathetic it all was —

But there was this also : what if, had he been someone else, better, good enough, Ronan had never seen him ; he knew what brought them together before (a thrill, a fire, raw desire, simple, a need for recklessness, an inclination towards self-destruction, the dreams, the smell of gasoline) and after (he didn’t want to think about it) (oh he was thinking about it now) — he’d been burning up, he’d been consumed and burning bright and Ronan had barely noticed him, and been bored so fast — who he was now, this Kavinsky, this wretched apathetic mess — Ronan would never have known he even existed.

He missed the fire. He missed desire. He’d been dying but he’d felt alive. Now he wasn’t sure he felt anything at all, nor that it would be worth it to try.

There were two easy solutions to this problem that he could think of.

He watched his chest rise and fall with every breath ; he wondered how much it was possible for a person to change, and specifically how much he could change, if one day he could be someone who cared about — stupid shit, like the colour of the sky, the sound of flowing water — dumb shit that people waxed poetics about like the smell of freshly-cut grass, the sun on one’s skin — dumb shit ; he tried to remember if he’d had dreams, when he was younger, or not dreams perhaps but things he wanted to do, things he liked, goals others than having enough money to buy anything he might feel like owning.

He thought about how you always heard people say, do something you love, or how they urged you not to give up on a passion, a calling, even if it seemed impossible, in spite of any obstacles. He wondered what it meant for people who didn’t have such a drive, no such ambition ; he supposed they, he, would have to find some sort of happiness, or contentment, in other parts of their lives, and he wondered where. It wasn’t an easy question, this : what do I love ? especially when you were barely alive.

When the sun rose he reached out to catch Ronan’s hip, and he pressed himself against his back, and he breathed him in, and Ronan put his hand on top of his and it was hours or maybe minutes until he turned to face Kavinsky and he seemed puzzled as he looked over his face, and Kavinsky supposed he looked — well, like he hadn’t slept at all, but he kissed him, and kissed him again, and again, and then Kavinsky was straddling him and (he didn’t try to trace the bones of his face, the muscles in his arms, take in everything so he could be sure to remember, because he knew he wouldn’t anyway, all that’s ever left are inaccurate memories, and then they fade, everything does) it was quick and messy, how they both came over Ronan’s chest, in the early morning, silently, a non-event.

It was unbearable, how beautiful Ronan was. How far away he was.

There were two easy solutions to this problem that he could think of.

When Kavinsky left, it was misty outside and Ronan said, later, and Kavinsky kissed him with one hand on his neck and the other at the back of his head, his grip only slightly too tight, and then he left. He went back to his mother’s place, packed a suitcase and a bag, and he left. He drove to an ATM, withdrew some cash, thought about warning his friends and texted Ronan instead, took the sim card out of his phone, and threw it in a bin, and then, he left.

                  bye lynch

                  i never asked why you did it

                  you know the not letting me die thing that you did

                  i almost did this morning

                  and then i didnt

                  guess id rather not know

                  i dont think i’ll see you around

                  since i wont be around

                  anyway im gone not dead

                  thats what i wanted to say

There was something about leaving everything behind, a mother, a past, everyone who ever knew you, who you were. He didn’t think his mother would mind, him being gone ; if she did, perhaps she'd try calling him, and maybe the cops after a while; he supposed he’d deal with it then. There was something about leaving everything behind, a city, everything you ever knew — leaving yourself behind, perhaps, that appealed to him enough to give it a try.