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The cop had betrayed them. Not only that, but he’d made Yok cry. Gram was so angry he couldn’t speak.
One of the cops came up behind him and forced his arms behind his back, ziptying his hands together and holding them there. The officer shoved him forward and he turned to face Dan as he passed, staring daggers. He spit in Dan’s face and the officer shoved him further.
They were led toward the elevator, Dan pushing Yok’s chair while Yok cried. The doors opened and the first officer walked inside.
And that’s when everything went fucking insane.
There was a thump and the officer in the elevator crumpled to the ground and out stepped Black, his Black.
Gram didn’t even have time to think. Without missing a beat Black moved forward and kicked the officer leading Sean and Gumpa in his chest, sending him to the ground.
Too quickly, the officer in the elevator had recovered and aimed his gun at Black and Gram wanted to scream because no no no, he just got him back.
Surprisingly, Dan was the one who kicked the gun out of the guy’s hand, bringing him forward and kneeing him in the chest and then slamming him into the wall. “Go now,” he said hurriedly. “This is all I can do for you.”
“Get in, Gram,” Gumpa called from the elevator.
Gram hurried in, Black right beside him, like it always should be. “Holy shit, I missed you so fucking much,” Gram said, quiet so only Black could hear.
Black gave him a look that was half smile half smirk, sharp as a knife, and Gram wondered how he could have ever mistaken White for Black.
White joined them in the elevator, then Sean and Yok, and the doors closed on Dan, leaving him standing there alone. Gram didn’t watch. Just cause he helped them this one time didn’t mean he hadn’t betrayed them still.
Black immediately took charge, pressing a button on the panel and saying, “We’ll go down to the sixth floor and use the fire exit.”
Everyone nodded, then looked to Yok. “Yok, can you handle that?” Sean asked.
Yok nodded weakly, and Sean and Gram helped haul him up by his arms.
He ended up helping Yok down to the second floor per Gumpa’s instructions while he waited for the others.
Except that, when they met back up, they were down one person. “Where’s Black?”
White avoided his eyes. “He’s distracting the police.”
“Alone?!”
“Gram, we don’t have time,” Gumpa said. “Black can handle himself, you know that.”
And he did. He’d see Black again, he wasn’t going to lose him, not this time.
Getting kidnapped and almost forcibly disappeared sucked, as it turned out.
Getting rescued by the very people they were trying to inspire, did not suck. In fact, it was pretty fucking awesome.
The gang ended up a crying, hugging mess, relieved to be alive and overwhelmed by the love of the people around them, but Gram still felt Black’s absence in their group like an open wound.
He hoped he was safe.
Black didn’t come around the garage for a while after that. After a few days, Gram ended up outside of Black's apartment in the middle of the night, a reverse of a scene that had played out so many times between them.
Gram felt jittery as he stood outside and rapped on the door with the back of his knuckles. He wasn’t sure if finally seeing Black in person, alone, after all of this would calm his nervous energy or make the shaking in his hands even worse.
Black pulled the door open and it was like a blow to the chest. Looking at him standing there like he had a thousand times before made Gram want to sob. “Hey,” he said.
Black tipped his head up in a nod. “Hey.”
“Can I come in?”
Black stepped aside in answer and Gram walked into the room. He heard the door shut behind him.
He stood awkwardly in the middle of the room. He had no idea where to even begin this conversation. “So,” he tried. “You, uh, have a twin.”
Black looked at him like he was stupid but only said, “Yeah.”
Gram nodded. “And he’s been pretending to be you for the last few months.”
“Observant, aren’t we?”
Gram frowned. “Don’t be a dick. I’m trying to be serious.” He met Black’s gaze straight on and felt a hollow pang in his chest. “I missed you,” he said quietly.
Black bristled at that. “Yeah, okay.”
Anger flared in Gram’s chest. “The fuck is that supposed to mean?”
Black’s arms were folded and something about him felt dangerous. Gram realized what it was in a flash— Black’s guard was up. It had been so long since Gram had been on the receiving end of Black’s distrust and it made his chest ache. “You didn’t even notice I was gone.”
He was stunned. “Excuse me?”
Black didn’t back down. “Spare me the act.” His voice was venomous.
“Of course I fucking noticed! He’s nothing like you! But what was I supposed to think?” He jabbed a finger at Black’s shoulder. “You never deigned to tell me you had a fucking twin!”
Black stood still as stone. His voice was scarily even as he said, “It wasn’t your goddamn business.”
“The hell it wasn’t!” Gram yelled. “It became my business the minute White walked in here in your clothes.”
“I never asked White to impersonate me!”
“But he did.”
“That’s not my fault.”
“I’m not saying it is! I just—“ Gram took a breath. “We’ve been friends for years, and you never even told me something so basic about you. And I didn’t even hear it from you, and I know damn well I wouldn’t have heard it from you at all had you not been put in a coma, which I also didn’t know.” Hurt bled into his words. “Like, what the fuck, dude? I thought we were friends.”
Black was quiet for a minute, arms still crossed, before he averted his gaze. He grated his teeth and said, “It’s not you, okay?”
Gram kept staring at him, waiting.
Black sighed. “White is— he’s my little brother. We did everything together when we were kids. When our parents split us up… it hurt. And it— it still hurts.”
Gram’s expression softened a little. Black still wasn’t looking at him.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see him again, and that was painful. I didn’t want to talk about it. Not with anyone.” He finally met Gram’s gaze again and his voice was firm. “Not even with you.”
There was a beat of quiet before Gram said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t think about it like that.” His anger had ebbed away. “I guess I was just… hurt.”
“I wasn’t purposefully keeping it a secret from you because I didn’t trust you or whatever,” Black said. “You should know that.” He always did know how to cut directly to the source of the pain.
It was what Gram had needed to hear. “I know. I can understand why you never talked about it. But like, obviously my immediate response to you acting different wasn’t going to be ‘oh this must be his secret twin he never mentioned,’ you know? That would be an insane conclusion.”
“I just thought…” Black’s voice was quiet now. “I thought that if anyone would be able to tell, it’d have been you. I get that you didn’t know, but it still fucking hurts to know that you couldn’t tell it wasn’t me.”
Gram’s tone was softer than before. “Just because I thought White was you doesn’t mean I didn’t notice you were gone.”
Black looked wary.
“It’s like, yeah, I thought he was you because I didn’t know there were any other possibilities. But he’s not you. Like, so clearly, painfully not you. It was like being shown a negative photo; it just made all your differences so much more visible to me. I meant it when I said I missed you.” Gram paused, and then asked, voice quiet, “Do you know what it’s like to desperately miss someone you have right next to you?”
Black didn’t answer, but his eyes looked shinier than normal and Gram wondered if he was blinking back tears, too. He kept going. “I was so lonely even when I thought I was talking to you. And then, I know it wasn’t you but I thought it was and— you stopped coming around. You— he was distant and acted like nothing had ever—“ He cut himself off so he could take a breath, closing his eyes for a moment. “And then he started hanging out with Sean, who you don’t even like and— do you know how that made me feel?”
Black was quiet.
“From where I was, you had just… dropped me. Without a word. And then started getting close to a guy you can’t even stand and I thought—” Gram’s voice broke. “I thought you didn’t want me anymore. Not as a friend, not as— not as anything.” He felt hot tears sliding down his cheeks.
Black stared at him for a moment, his expression unreadable. Then, wordlessly, he reached out and hooked his hand behind Gram’s neck and dragged him in to a tight embrace.
That’s when Gram really began to cry. He fisted his hands in the back of Black’s shirt and buried his head in his neck, hiccuping a sob. Black held him tightly, gently running his fingers through the short hair at the back of Gram’s neck as he cried. Gram couldn’t be sure, but he thought Black might have been crying too.
They stayed like that for a long time, just holding each other in Black’s dimly light apartment.
When Gram had calmed down enough to speak again he whispered, “I really missed you.”
Black seemed to relax more into the hug. “I know.” He pulled back so he could look at Gram head-on. “Look, I’m gonna say this once and then if you ever mention it again I’ll kill you. Got it?”
Gram laughed wetly. “Yeah.”
“Okay.” He closed his eyes for a second. “I’m sorry, alright? I’m not gonna stand here and say that I’d go back and tell you about White if I could cause we both know that would be bullshit, but I’m sorry that this whole shitshow went how it did. I’m sorry that— I’m sorry I hurt you.”
That just made Gram start crying anew.
“Ah, fuck, no, don’t do that.” Black’s voice was exasperated. “You just stopped crying, you can’t start crying again.”
Gram laughed and reached up to swipe at his face. “Sorry, I didn’t realize crying was against the rules.”
“It is.”
“You were crying too.”
Black arched an eyebrow. “The fuck I was.”
“You were.”
“You can’t prove shit.”
“Then why are my clothes wet?” Gram asked smugly.
“Maybe you pissed yourself.”
Gram just grinned at him.
Black rolled his eyes and flopped backwards to lay on his bed, closing his eyes momentarily. When a few moments passed and Gram was still silent, Black opened his eyes to look up at him. Gram wasn’t smiling anymore; he had that look on his face that he got when he was thinking about something too hard.
“Hey, stupid,” Black called, drawing Gram out of his thoughts. He motioned for Gram to lie down with him.
Gram stood for a moment more and then crawled to lay on top of Black, long limbs wrapped around his body and head pressed into his neck. Black scoffed fondly and rested a hand in Gram’s bleached hair. “Better?”
Gram nodded.
“Good. Now out with it. What’s wrong.”
Gram made a dissatisfied noise.
“Gram.”
Gram sighed. He reached to pick up one of the strings hanging from Black’s sleeveless sweatshirt, turning it in his fingers. When he did speak, it was quietly. “I’m sorry.”
Black gave Gram’s head a light shove. “Use your words, dumbass. Sorry for what?”
Gram let go of the string in favor of burying his head in Black’s sweatshirt. He mumbled something Black didn’t catch.
“Louder, I can’t understand shit when you talk into my shirt.” He picked Gram’s head up with both hands and looked right into his eyes. “C’mon.”
Gram held his gaze for a moment and then sighed again. “It’s just— it was stupid. For me to think that— that you could do that to me. That you would do that to me.”
Black gave him a puzzled look. “What do you mean.”
“Like, I know you better than that. I should’ve known that you’d never do that to me. But I was hurt and confused and… I’m just sorry for believing it so easily.”
Black considered this for a moment. Then, “That’s dumb as fuck.”
Gram made a confused noise.
“Like, do you think I expect you to be psychic or something? You thought White was me, so you believed it. There was no other option. You don’t need to feel guilty about it, Gram.”
“But—“
“No.” Black’s voice was firm. “We talked about it, I get it. Don’t be stupid. We’re done with the apologies. Got it?”
Gram nodded. “Got it.”
“Good.” Black shoved at Gram’s head again. “Dumbass,” he muttered. Despite trying, he couldn’t hide the slight fondness in his voice.
That made Gram smile a little.
Black reached over to turn off the light. “Sleep.”
They stayed like that for a long while, and Gram thanked whatever god was out there that he got to have this back.
Eventually Gram broke the silence with a quiet, “Can I hold you?”
He could picture Black rolling his eyes even in the dark. “God, you’re sappy,” Black said, but he still reached back to bring Gram’s arm around him tight.
Gram kissed the back of his neck. Black sighed contentedly and leaned back against him. Gram relaxed like he hadn’t been able to in weeks and closed his eyes.