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Fights were not unusual for Elliot Nightray and Leo Baskerville. Fights before some sorts of changes or upheavals, such as going back to school after a break, were even less so. Because of this, Elliot and Leo were not speaking as they got back to school at around five in the morning on the second day that students were able to move back in, and neither looked at the other when the headmaster informed them that one Oz Vessalius was to be their new roommate, that he’d been through a lot and that they should be nice.
Elliot scoffed at that, because Elliot hated the Vessalius family on principle, and Leo smiled and agreed and privately resolved to ruin the other boy if he’d fucked with literally any of their stuff (which, as a Vessalius, he probably had, if only because of the inter-familial rivalry) or hurt Elliot in any way. The headmaster seemed relieved by Leo’s response, which meant that he hadn’t properly realized which teenager was the real threat here.
Good.
Elliot and Leo did not even try to be quiet on their way to their room, but as they were still in the middle of a fight, they also didn’t speak, and when they got to their dorm and opened the door to the common area, the boy on their couch had not awoken.
He was small for someone in their grade, and his pajamas were just a little dirty. Two new school uniforms were folded neatly on top of the couch, though one uniform jacket was wrapped around the boy’s shoulders like a blanket. Elliot and Leo stared at him for a moment—this looked a lot like their new roommate had decided to sleep on the couch instead of claiming one of the three unused beds—and then Leo noticed something else, something perhaps more unsettling. One of the sleeves of their new roommate’s pajama shirt had gotten tugged slightly down in the night, and a few peeling burns were visible—some fresher than others—looking identical to the burn Elliot had gotten on his foot, once, when he’d stepped accidentally on the hot water pipe in their bathroom. They had insulated that pipe with cloth afterwards, so that it was impossible to accidentally burn yourself on it, but—Leo couldn’t think of anything else that could have left burns like that on their new roommate’s arms.
Oz Vessalius was fifteen, Leo knew, from his extensive research on absolutely anyone Elliot held a grudge against. He was fifteen, and seemingly in some sort of secret relationship with Elliot’s older brother Vincent, who was eighteen, and Leo had found evidence of this going back at least two years, which was—
Well.
That plus the burns on the other boy’s arms was suddenly painting an intensely concerning picture. Leo frowned, and then poked Elliot in the side and pointed towards the burns on Oz Vessalius’s arm. Elliot frowned, looking confused at first, and then he put his bags down and approached the couch, pulling back their new roommate’s sleeve to reveal even more burns—five of them—
Oz Vessalius flinched away and sat up quickly, staring at Elliot in shock with what appeared to be some slight fear in his eyes before a cheerful mask slammed down over his face, and he said, “Oh, good morning. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to take up your couch.”
“What the fuck is wrong with your arm?” said Elliot. “Is ‘good coping mechanisms’ another thing Vessaliuses suck shit at?”
Oz scowled at him. “I have no idea what you mean,” he said. “There’s definitely nothing wrong with my arm at all.”
“Those were second-fucking-degree burns!”
“Yeah, well, maybe I made a mistake—cooking,” said Oz. “Or something. I don’t know. I didn’t really notice getting them. It could have been anything.”
Elliot scoffed and rolled his eyes, standing. “Well, whatever,” he said. “Super not my problem. Don’t kill yourself in here, you suicidal freak, I don’t want to have to clean up the body.”
Oz went rigid. “I’m not suicidal,” he said.
“Second fucking degree burns on your arm!”
“They aren’t fatal!”
“Yeah, but self-harm is definitely a warning sign for suicide, you little freak!”
“Father ordered me to kill myself after graduation, not before it!” Oz shouted back. “He explicitly told me to die within a few months of graduating so that I wouldn’t be the family’s problem anymore, stupid! So I’m not suicidal at all! And the burns were—unrelated!”
“Your father told you to kill yourself ?!”
Oz’s lips thinned. “I—didn’t mean to say that,” he said.
“Why the fuck would he—”
“That’s none of your business.”
“Why would your family want you dead ?!”
“Maybe because I was never supposed to be born in the first place, and explaining my existence was already enough trouble that everyone burnt out on dealing with the rest of me,” Oz hissed, “or maybe it’s none of your business, so leave me alone about it!”
Elliot, Leo knew, was kind and noble enough that he would never be able to ignore a suicidal, self-harming roommate, even if that roommate was a Vessalius, but he also had a bad enough temper and was dishonest enough with himself that he probably wouldn’t handle any of that information well, so when he threw his hands in the air, cursed Oz Vessalius out, and stormed out of the room, Leo wasn’t all that surprised.
“I’m sorry about Elliot, he can have a bit of a temper sometimes,” Leo said, giving Oz his best smile. “My name is Leo Baskerville, it’s nice to meet you. I’m assuming you’re our new roommate? Oz Vessalius, right?”
“Right, yeah,” said Oz, smiling while still looking like a rabbit on the knife’s edge of bolting. “It’s nice to meet you as well. You’re—a Baskerville?”
“Biologically,” said Leo. “I was raised by my mother, who didn’t really have much contact with, ah, that side of the family, so I don’t really know much about it.” Before Oz had the chance to respond, Leo added, “You haven’t been sleeping on the couch this entire time, right? Any one of the three unclaimed beds in there could be yours.”
Oz shrugged. “I didn’t know which ones had already been taken, so this was just easier,” he said. “And I was already borrowing some of your shampoo for the first few days, too, so I didn’t want to impose.”
Leo frowned. “What did you come here with?” he asked.
Oz grimaced a little. “Literally just my pajamas,” he said. “But Headmaster Turner helped me get a couple of uniforms, and toiletries, and school supplies, and such. I’m very grateful to him.”
Before she had died, Leo’s mother had worked herself to the bone to make sure he had a roof over his head, and food to eat, and supplies for school, and books to read. She had done everything she could for him. And Oz’s father—one of the richest men in the world—had refused to shell out for his son to come to school with anything other than the literal clothes on his back?!
“He’s a very kind man,” Leo agreed, smiling at Oz. “If you didn’t come here with anything, what have you been doing since you arrived? Just preparing for the semester?”
“That and reading through the library, mainly,” Oz said. “I—really love to read. And I’ve been spending time with Echo Baskerville, too, though now that her sister Noise is on campus that isn’t really…possible anymore.” His hand drifted to the burns on his arm before he snatched it away; Leo politely pretended not to notice.
“Elliot and I love reading as well,” said Leo, as though that hadn’t been obvious from the sheer amount of books scattered about their dorm. “What’s your favorite book?”
“Holy Knight Volume I,” Oz said, his eyes lighting up and giving substance to the smile that had stayed firm on his face since Leo had introduced himself. “I love the whole series, really, but Volume I—where Edwin and Edgar meet—that one’s my absolute favorite. What’s your favorite book?”
“Curry Drenched in Sin,” said Leo. “It’s—a lot better than it sounds.” And was also hardcore porn, which maybe he shouldn’t be recommending to his new roommate within mere minutes of meeting him, but if Leo was in the habit of making good life choices then he never would have befriended Elliot.
“What’s it about?” Oz asked.
“It’s…a romance novel,” said Leo carefully. Most boys his age didn’t like romance—maybe Oz would be the same and Leo would be spared from having to explain his tastes in pornography to his new roommate.
“Cool!” said Oz, cheerful and interested. “What’s the premise?”
Leo hesitated. This was not the direction he wanted the conversation to go, but he supposed that there were worse feet to start off on with your new roommate, probably. At least he hadn’t poked the other boy’s literal open wounds and then called him suicidal. “Well,” he said, “Curry Drenched in Sin is about a young man who—”
“Are you recommending fucking porn to our new roommate?!” Elliot shouted from the other room. “Have you no shame?!”
Oz turned pink. “It’s—erotica?” he squeaked.
“It’s a literary classic, Elliot!” Leo shouted back instead of addressing that question.
“That book gives more detailed sex ed than our fucking health class!”
“Yes, and it’s great!”
Oz Vessalius’s face was the color of a ripe tomato at this point, and before the argument could continue he muttered an excuse, grabbed the top uniform on the couch, and fled the room. This, Leo thought, could only be blamed on himself, and so he didn’t tell Elliot off for scaring off their new roommate. Instead, he started poking through the books he’d left scattered around the suite to find something good to recommend to Oz in the hopes of keeping the conversation going. Elliot would probably realize that there was no point of holding his grudge against the Vessalius family against Oz Vessalius personally soon enough—sooner or later, he would realize that Oz had been hurt by the Vessaliuses worst of all, and that it wasn’t worth attacking Oz in hopes of hurting the people who had literally thrown him out with nothing but the clothes on his back and then told him to kill himself the moment his death wouldn’t reflect poorly on them. And Elliot and Oz both liked Holy Knight, too, which meant, Leo thought, that Elliot might be about to make his second-ever friend, and Leo just had to keep conversation with their new roommate open long enough for Elliot to get down to it.