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***
It takes a while to get the Dead Boy Detective Agency back up and running after all that happened in Port Townsend.
With the joy shaped hole left by their new friend's absence, the detectives cannot even begin to fathom working a case. Speaking of death or dying feels too much like reliving their loss, over and over again.
The London office is filled with silence most days, Charles and Crystal with glassy eyes and intertwined hands and Edwin by the window, similarly bereft but seemingly utterly alone.
It isn't until the Night Nurse returns, ranting about the importance of their work and a 'job well done', that the group are forced back into action.
It seems strange moving on, wrong, like perhaps the last few weeks of their lives simply didn't exist. It feels like Niko might merely have been an imaginary friend, one a lonely child might conjure to fill a terrible void.
Edwin cannot help but feel as though, given his uniquely enduring solitude, that he is the only one that truly understands the magnitude of their loss.
For if their time in Port Townsend had never happened, then he still wouldn't sincerely know who he was.
So much of his romantic realisation, and of who he now is, is attributable to the beautiful, fanciful girl they lost.
She had been the first person to suggest that the type of love Edwin had always denied himself was okay. That it was special, valuable even.
She had been like a wonderful, nonjudgmental mirror in which he might finally see his reflection.
Without Niko, Edwin feels as though he must retreat back to the damaged, terribly restrained boy he has always been.
He feels as though he must stuff his feelings for Charles down to ensure the harmony of the group.
He is sure that Charles did not tell Crystal about his rather humiliating confession, for the girl is still able to look at him.
In fact, she has been startlingly kind. And that in itself is a curse.
He cannot stand her kindness, for the resentment which he cannot help but hold for her.
For she is something that Edwin could never be. She is something that Charles could actually want.
"You alright mate?" Charles' upsettingly chipper voice forces Edwin back from his spiralling thoughts. The younger ghost sits on the arm of his chair, as always paying no mind to decorum, nor the unwitting cruelty of sitting so close.
Edwin imagines that if they were alive, his friend's warm breath cast across the back of his neck might leave goosebumps in its wake, that if the boy leant down to regard their mail more closely, he might even be able to smell his cologne.
The idea of being human with Charles is nearly too much to bear. Edwin sucks in a deep breath, desperately staving off tears as he observes a worried looking Crystal from across the desk.
"Sorry," he apologies quickly, ashamedly, moving the papers around the tabletop as if with a purpose.
"Our workload has grown rather formidable in our absence and I find myself quite overwhelmed," he admits before he can restrain himself.
Crystal flashes him an infuriatingly understanding smile.
Edwin has to fight down the urge to rush to his feet and upend the table in her lap.
He does not truly want to hurt the girl, on the contrary, there is no one he would rather for his best friend, no one that could understand him more nor treat him better, except well...
"I think the fact that more people want our help is brills," Charles offers encouragingly, wringing Edwin's shoulder with his hand.
The older boy manages to feel almost joyful at the endeared touch, at the fact that his confession has not changed the gentle, easy tenderness between them, until his friend reaches across the desk with his unoccupied hand to grasp at the true object of his affection.
"Now that we're together, I reckon there's nothing we can't do."
"Agreed," Crystal contributes with surely faux enthusiasm. When she notices Edwin's eyes affixed to her and Charles' interlocked hands, she releases the boy, reaching for one of the many unopened letters scattered across the desk.
Edwin says nothing as the girl unfolds the paper, eyes scanning the document as if eager to distract herself from the apparent heaviness of the conversation.
Charles' fingers are still wrapped around Edwin's shoulder, the weight of him so familiar that the fairer boy could weep.
He isn't sure how long he can allow this to go on. He isn't sure that he can continue to sit by and watch his best friend fall in love whilst he languishes in his own unrequited affection.
He is about to free himself from Charles' intoxicating grasp when the other boy does it himself, leaning forward to gaze worriedly at their female companion.
"Everything okay, Crystal?" he asks, concernedly.
Edwin snaps back to his unfortunate reality with thankfully enough subtlety not to cause alarm.
He notices the moisture in Crystal's eyes, the trembling of her hand with the note.
"This client wants us to help her sixteen year old daughter move on," she whispers, holding the document out for Charles to continue reading.
The younger boy stands from his place, eyeing Edwin and Crystal anxiously before resuming their task.
"She... she ki- she hurt herself. And she died. And her mom believes she's still in the house. The name's Niya Abe," he explains shakily, moving toward Crystal, with his back turned to Edwin, so that he might place a tender hand on her shoulder.
Edwin cannot hear whatever gentle consolations Charles offers the girl for the dreaded ringing in his ears.
The maddening scene before him blurs so until he is somewhere completely different, strapped to a dreadfully familiar table, watching one of his only friends die.
He can see the terror in Niko's eyes as clearly now as if they were still trapped in the moment, stuck in some heinous loop, reliving the loss again and again.
Despite knowing himself dead, Edwin feels his heart hammering in his chest, threatening to rupture at the very seams with his grief.
No matter how tightly he shuts his eyes he cannot get the girl out of his head. No matter how hard he tries he cannot escape the memory.
***
As a general rule, ghosts do not dream. Without the ability to sleep, it is something Charles was sure that he and Edwin weren't able to do. That they would never be able to do again. And for the nightmares of his father that had plagued his human life, he'd been glad for the reprieve.
As he turns with the sound of his friend's gasped grief however, he cannot be sure that the other boy isn't trapped in a waking nightmare.
Edwin's hands are clasped so tightly to the table that Charles fears for the integrity of the wood, his eyes are filled to the precipice with tears. Their time in Hell aside, the younger ghost cannot be sure he remembers the last time he saw his friend cry, if ever.
The older boy stares unblinkingly through the table before him, seemingly unseeing and unaware of the deeply concerned pair desperate to regain his attention.
"Edwin."
Charles moves back toward his friend, acutely aware of Crystal's eyes on him.
He's spent the last few weeks feeling like a grief-laden ping pong ball, bouncing between the comfort of his oldest friend and the comfort of the girl he likes.
It's been an exhausting dance, especially given Edwin's insistence that he needs no comfort, and Crystal's dire need of the same.
He feels guilty ever time he picks one over the other. He feels guilty for having concealed Edwin's confession from Crystal.
More than anything though, he feels responsible for their friend's death, for not being there for either of them when it happened.
"Edwin!" he says again, firmer this time, bracing the boy by the shoulders.
The older ghost gasps like he must have been holding his breath. He grasps Charles' forearms as if they might be the only thing left to tether him to reality.
"Hey," Charles tries, sitting in front of his friend on the table, completely obscuring him from Crystal's view.
"It's alright, Edwin, you're alright," he soothes. Without a thought to the implication, he places a hand on the boy's cheek.
"Come back to me, mate," he encourages, softly.
Once more Edwin draws what sounds like a pained breath, he is unresponsive as he reaches a desperate hand upward to clasp Charles' wrist. At the touch of their hands, he seems to return to himself, blinking a heartbreaking wave of tears down his face.
"I'm- I'm sorry." He swallows hard, breathing as though he's been chased, dark eyebrows drawn together.
"I- I need to be alone," he insists, pulling out of Charles' embrace and moving hastily in the direction of the office's water closet.
"Edwin!" Charles calls desperately after his friend. He is on his feet to pursue the boy before the door has even slammed shut between them.
He feels Crystal catch him by the hand.
"Just leave him, Charles," she offers, softly. Through no fault of her own, her words send a shiver of anger up the remaining boy's spine.
He pulls more harshly than he should out of her hold.
"I can't."
***
His sanctuary within the water closet is only brief. He barely has time to regain his breath before Charles is at the door, hammering away at the thin wood like a particularly determined bird.
Edwin has to fight past visions of his lost friend to keep his eyes affixed to the door.
'Luckily, love requires no logic.'
He can hear the girl's sweet voice in his mind, feel the weight of her head on his shoulder. He pushes away the image of her body laid out of the floor of the witch's house, his lungs aching as though he has swallowed fire.
He cannot help the tormenting feeling that things will always be like this. That he will miss the lost girl for the rest of his miserable existence.
For one terrible moment he misses the simplicity of Hell. At least there he knew his suffering was unjust, that he was not to blame. Now it feels as though all of his agony is his own fault. His companion died attempting to save him, he ruined his longest friendship with his own foolish desires.
He thinks, achingly that he must have destroyed his own (after)life. That maybe, he deserves Hell.
"Edwin, you better open the bloody door or I'm gunna break it down," the younger boy demands desperately through the hardwood.
Edwin feels an exasperated endearment crest the wave of his panic. He feels the fond heat that is reserved solely for his oldest friend pool in his gut, quelling his terror some.
He moves forward reluctantly, pulling open the door.
"You could simply walk through the door, could you not?" he offers with a breathy chuckle. He can see from the other boy's face that this is very much not the time for jokes.
"It's not funny. You scared the life outta me," Charles whispers, stepping into the water closet and pulling the door shut behind him.
The incredibly small space consists of a closed stall and a sink with an adorning mirror, forcing Edwin and Charles to stand practically chest to chest between the doors.
Edwin has to bite back the urge to explain that 'scare the life out of' might be redundant in their case, instead, he smiles sadly down at his friend.
"I had not intended to cause such a scene," he explains, dropping his head with shame.
He hears Charles exhale humourlessly through his nose.
"I'm not here to have a go at you for 'causing a scene'," he responds, embellishing the sentence with air quotes in a manner that is so totally Charles that Edwin nearly welcomes another set of tears.
He could never end what they have, no matter how painful it is for him now. This is enough. What he has with Charles is enough. It has to be.
"I'm worried about you. Out there, you looked like Crystal does when she has a bad vision, or like someone having a nightmare," the younger boy explains, worriedly.
Edwin inhales sharply as Charles takes his hand.
"You can talk to me. I know since Niko..."
The words of comfort Charles diligently offers are lost once again to the image of their friend's last moments, of the disbelieving gasp the girl had made as she fell into Crystal's arms. Edwin can feel the bereaved scream he unleashed that day building in his throat.
"Edwin!" Charles' anxious plea brings him back to the present. They are just inches from one another, the younger boy’s hands pressed to either side of his inconsolable companion's face.
"Stay with me, yeah?" Charles whispers, running an uncharacteristically uncoordinated thumb across his friend's cheek.
Edwin draws a series of stuttering, unfulfilling breaths, his panic rising dangerously like reservoir water during a storm. He feels the frigid substance thrash against his insides.
"I keep seeing her," he confesses, taking Charles' arms in his hands.
"I keep watching her die, and it feels like it is going to end me."
In response to his confession, Charles' eyes too fill with tears. Edwin watches chocolate irises flicker over his face as the younger boy contemplates his next words.
"You're not there anymore," he reassures gently, taking one of Edwin's hands in his own and placing it on his chest, just below his gold chain.
"You're here with me. It's just you and me," he continues, drawing long exaggerated breaths as if encouraging Edwin to do the same.
The older boy closes his eyes, allowing himself to be calmed markedly by the rhythmic rise and fall of his friend's chest.
"That's it," Charles encourages, sweetly.
Before Edwin can open his eyes, the younger ghost is pulling him into an embrace. He wraps tight, determined arms around the other boy's shoulders, pressing his lips, still whispering praise, into the crook of his neck.
Edwin had never much cared for physical affection in his life. With his parents distant and disappointed as they were, and his apathy for contact sport, he had little experience with touch. The first person to touch him, to hold him had been Charles.
The first person to love him had been Charles.
And now the other boy cannot even hug Edwin without the deluded elder spectre feeling the thrum of romantic affection.
He instantly feels guilt at his enjoyment of the touch.
He cannot stand the idea that he has forever ruined what they have with his own selfish wanting.
"Edwin," Charles voice is achingly gentle, yearning. Everything the fairer boy could ever hope it would be. He watches his friend pull back minutely from their embrace, so that their mouths are a whisper from one another.
Endlessly warm, kind, brown eyes regard him with an agonising devotion.
The desire to close the space between them nearly destroys Edwin.
Without warning, he pulls desperately from the embrace, slamming his palm against the glass of the bathroom mirror and envisioning literally anywhere else by means of escape.
***
He is disoriented for a moment, landing in a seemingly innocuous, empty apartment. There is a few seconds of confusion before the terrible realisation of where he is.
An image of he and Niko splayed out atop her bedspread, watching Scooby Do on her portable computing device plays cruelly behind his eyes.
The apartment is agonisingly bare. There is nothing left of Niko's spirit, no posters or pictures. No colour. None of the life she so easily exuded.
Edwin sinks to his knees on the wooden floor, pressing his palms to the ground in an attempt to centre himself the way Charles had helped him to.
Charles.
The feeling of the other boy's hands on his face, at the gates of Hell, in the water closet. It comes back to him so viscerally he could scream.
He is desperate to return to the time before. Before Niko and Port Townsend, before he had a name for this dreaded feeling in his chest.
Love.
He allows himself to truly grieve for the first time since their loss. For what feels like eternity, he wails and sobs until he is left a pathetic, heaving mess on the floor of his lost friend's apartment.
He screams so loud that he is sure, despite his non-corporeality, that someone will hear.
And wouldn't that be wonderful. If someone were to hear him crying and move to comfort him.
He remembers being a small boy, terrified of thunder storms. He remembers standing at his parent's door and begging them to let him in. He remembers the cool silence, their assurance that if he was left alone long enough he would learn not to fear things he cannot control.
Instead, the boy had learned to internalise his fear, to survive off of the dread.
He was terrified his entire life, to the moment of his death, and for the seventy years of Hell that followed. The first time he can remember being unafraid was when Charles had sworn to stay with him. When the boy had forgone his chance at a peaceful afterlife to remain his companion.
He makes a sound somewhere between a scream and a sob.
He might never have imagined that love could be so painful. He had spent all of his life and subsequent death dreaming of a love that might save him.
His love for Niko, his love for Charles, where it had once bolstered him, now sees him tormented.
But how could he ever complain?
How could he ever have denied them?
Despite the ferocity with which it aches now, their only crime had been unsparing love.
As if conjured by his desperation alone, he hears a familiar set of footsteps land in the apartment. He hears the quickened pace of his best friend, before the boy slides to his knees, wrapping his arms around Edwin from behind.
The older boy melts backward into his companion's embrace, grasping fervently at the hands interlinked tightly over his heaving chest. He allows himself to sob loudly, openly, with the assurance that Charles will keep him from falling apart.
After a while, wretched sobs turn into slight whimpers. Edwin relaxes into Charles' embrace more heavily, exhausted by his grief. The younger boy does not waver in his ardent hold, simply moves a hand to clear his friend's usually immaculate hair from his face.
"You found me," Edwin manages after a lengthy silence, filled by only by their echoed, desperate intake of air.
"'Course I did," Charles breaths, his voice trembling.
"There aren't many places you call home. If you were fleeing the office, I knew you'd go somewhere you felt safe," he explains, strengthening his hold on Edwin endearingly.
"What about Crystal?" the older boy asks, almost against his will. Despite his terrible jealousy, he cannot help but worry for the girl.
"She shouldn't be alone right now either," he continues, moving out of Charles' embrace so that he might turn to regard his friend. They both remain on their knees, glassy eyes appraising one another.
Charles huffs abashedly, turning his face away from his companion.
"We broke up. Again," he admits, voice low and guarded.
He looks up at Edwin with a hesitancy and timidness that the older boy has never seen from his usually bold, winsome friend.
"Didn't seem right, to keep on..." he continues, timorously.
Edwin feels a sudden, surely foolish hope bloom in his stomach like a once neglected flower in well kept and watered soil.
"What are you saying?" he begs, eyes darting rapidly between Charles', trying to understand the nature of his confession.
"Since Hell, since you said... what you said, I've felt guilty every time I touched her," Charles clarifies, he moves uncertainly to take Edwin's hand in his own.
The usually confident, easily affectionate boy seems to tremble with the simple embrace of their fingers. It is as though they are touching for the very first time.
Edwin feels it too, an energy, an expectancy. He struggles to maintain his composure.
"Guilty?" he leads, running his thumb over Charles' jittering palm.
"I never told her- about us. What you said. Not because I thought she wouldn't understand. She's a lot more modern than both of us. But it felt like something I wanted to keep, just for myself.
Since Niko, the only way I can ever cheer myself up is repeating your words in my head," Charles responds, his voice quick and frenzied, as if he there is no consideration from one word to the next, as though the truth pours from him involuntarily, like blood from an open wound.
"And thinking about what you said, over and over, got me thinking about what I said and how stupid it was and how obvious to everyone else in the bloody world it must have been that I loved you back. Because just now when I told Crystal we couldn't be together, she said 'it's him isn't it' like even she knew how I felt and I was too dense to even-"
Edwin interrupts the other boy's clumsy, impassioned confession with his lips. He rushes forward and presses a yearning kiss to his friend's running mouth.
The younger boy makes a surprised sound in the back of his throat, but does not withdraw from the embrace. Instead, his arms come up to cup Edwin's cheeks, lengthening the kiss, deepening it.
Edwin had only ever been kissed once before, and by a human. He had never allowed himself to consider much the way love might be between two ghosts.
In what can only be described as a small miracle, a mercy in the horrid life and death he has led so far, kissing Charles feels much as he imagines two mortals kissing might.
He feels something like electricity beneath his skin. As though his heart were a powerless city, thrumming back to life, illuminating the night sky.
Kissing Charles feels like sunlight and snowfall and poetry, like every beautiful, gentle thing Edwin adores.
Though he has had little joy in his life (and afterlife), none of that seems to matter in the embrace of their mouths.
He feels as though he would endure all of it again for this singular moment.
If holding Charles as this meant seventy more years in Hell then Edwin would gladly pack his bags.
The younger boy had compared them to Orpheus and Eurydice, likely supposing himself the tragic hero, given that he liberated Edwin from Hell. Now, the once-damned ghost can only see himself as Orpheus, with Charles as his Eurydice, so maddened with love that he would walk headlong into Hell for it, no matter the torment that awaited him.
Charles is the first to pull away from the embrace. He rests his forehead against Edwin's, eyes still affixed to the boy, as though he might never want to lose sight of his companion again.
"I'm in love with you too," he admits, laughing gently.
"If that was unclear, from all the rambling." He grins.
"Well it is rather clear now," Edwin agrees cheekily.
He bites his lip as his briefly abated grief returns to him full force.
He watches Charles' face contort with concern.
"What is it, love?" he asks, worriedly, making Edwin's heart flutter in his chest despite himself.
"She's really gone," Edwin whimpers, running his nose against Charles' the way a cat might endearingly demand affection.
"She's the only person I'd want to tell about this. The only person that would care and she's gone. I'm alone," he cries.
"Hey," Charles interjects, his tone firm but endeared. In an act that is rapidly growing into a habit, he takes the bereaved boy's face in his hands.
"You're not alone, yeah?" he insists, pressing an achingly gentle kiss upon Edwin's trembling lips.
The older ghost pulls Charles fervently into his arms in response, pressing their chests together, burying his head in broader boy's shoulder.
"I love you," he swears, his words muffled some by his friend's coat.
"I love you too, Edwin," the boy agrees, curling tanned, comforting fingers in his dark, grief-tousled hair.
"So long as I'm around," he continues, his steadfast words drowning out the anguish and terror Edwin has felt since leaving Port Townsend. He grasps the younger boy impossibly tighter.
"You never have to be alone again," Charles vows.
***