Chapter Text
Saps knows that, in hindsight, all this will be pretty funny. But right now, he's slumped in his white SUV at the back of a Burger King parking lot, gnawing on lukewarm fries to distract himself from the fact that there's literal shit raining into his new apartment. There's no shade, so the August sun lases him through the windshield, and he doesn't have the money to be wasting the eighth of gas he has left on the AC right now, so he's just sweaty and squinting at the phone in his hand, windows rolled all the way down in hopes of catching a breeze. There's no breeze. There's been no breeze for the half hour he's been here because the world hates him. He'd gotten tired of his Whopper halfway through, and now it's stinking up his car in the passenger seat. He doesn't even fucking like Burger King.
"Dude, that sucks," Snowbird's saying on speakerphone. "So, like, they've got nowhere for you to stay for the night? Absolutely nothing?"
"Nothing," Saps echoes. He takes a sip of flat, watered-down Sprite. It makes him feel worse.
"No way that's legal. You signed a contract to be there, surely they have to give you a place to stay."
"Apparently not. They said they'll clean the sewage leak for free, so there's that, I guess."
"I mean, is it bad?"
"It's bad," Saps laments. When he'd arrived to move into his apartment, he'd been met with the whir of a carpet scrubber in the hallway and a neon orange WARNING: SEWAGE DISPOSAL sign slapped on the front door. And just as Saps caught a whiff of the smell (shit, like shit from a butt), that's when the landlord decided to call him to say that he's so sorry, but a pipe burst this morning, and Saps won't be able to move in today, or tomorrow, or next week, but good news because the Bifrost Apartments will cover all cleanup expenses, so he won't have to worry about a thing!
Except for where I'll sleep tonight, Saps had stopped himself from saying. Or tomorrow, or next week. He's not sure what he did end up saying. He'd just been staring at the brown puddle in the entryway. He was carrying a backpack full of dishes that wouldn't fit into his moving boxes. It was heavy. With every shameful step out of the building, people gave him strange looks as the plates loudly clanked against each other.
"So what are you gonna do then?" Snowbird asks, then laughs, as if any of this is funny. "Sleep in your car?"
"I don't fucking know," Saps groans, just in time for a woman and her small child to cross in front of his car. He grimaces in apology as the woman shoots a glare over her shoulder. She, honest to god, clutches her ugly purse and puts her hands over her daughter's ears as if Saps is about to start shouting shit piss bitch ass just because he said fuck one time.
Saps crumples up the paper bag and throws it at full force into the passenger seat. It bounces off the Whopper. He is going to blow up this Burger King and then himself.
"I have the worst luck, dude," he says, "like I've got all this shit in my trunk and in my backseat, and classes start in a week, and I don't know if they'll even have my apartment cleaned by then, and I still have to get my textbooks and figure out where my classes are, and I don't know where anything is, and I don't know anyone else here except you, and my ass fucking hurts from sitting in this fucking car for ten fucking hours—"
"Okay, okay," Snowbird cuts in. "It's okay. I was joking. Worse comes to worst, you can crash at my place."
"Don't you have, like, three roommates? I thought you said you have someone sleeping on your couch."
"It's a futon, and we could find space for you somewhere, okay, I refuse to let you sleep in your car. Buuuut… I might know someone else who could help."
"Help how?"
"I said might! Emphasis on the might! He's a little…" Snowbird pauses for so long that Saps brings the phone closer to check that the line hasn't cut. "Well," Snowbird finally continues, "I'd have to talk to him before promising anything, so don't worry about it. Either way, you're not sleeping in your car tonight, okay?"
Reflexively, Saps flicks his gaze to the rearview mirror as he hears a car pull into the lot. It's useless since he can't actually see out of his back window because of all the moving boxes in his backseat. The lacrosse stick Ish shoved into the car seconds before Saps left is pressed up against a window. Ish said he should bring it "for the memories," whatever that means. Saps' memory works perfectly fine. He'll just sell it on Facebook Marketplace.
"Okay," says Saps, picking at his thumbnail. "Thanks, Snowbird. Seriously. I owe you one."
"Nah, it's not your fault your apartment's flooded with sewage on the day you're supposed to move in. Except that's, like, exactly the kind of thing to happen to you so maybe it is your fault."
"Okay, fuck you."
"You've got bad karma or something, man, what did you do?"
Saps squawks. "I literally didn't do anything! The universe just hates me—"
Crash, crunch, thud.
Saps slams into the steering wheel, teeth clattering as his chin catches on the rim. The horn blares against his bruised chest. He tastes copper. In the side mirror, he sees a red Kia Soul reverse and speed out of the lot with a screech and a skid mark. The front bumper is dented, headlights cracked.
"Oh my god." Snowbird's voice is coming from underneath the driver's seat. Saps feels around for his phone with shaky fingers. "Are you okay? Did you just get hit?"
Saps' tongue is swollen and throbbing. He closes his eyes, and counts, very slowly, to ten. With a long sigh, he opens his eyes again, blinking against the too-cheery sun. Stupid bright fucker. It's mocking him.
"I'm fine," Saps says numbly. "Car does not sound fine. I'll text you later.""
"Oh, okay—"
As Saps hangs up, he notices the crack at the top left corner of his screen, spiderwebbing toward the middle.
Right. Right right right. Yeah, sure, okay, of course.
He rolls his windows up, presses his forehead to the steering wheel, then screams at the floorboard.
And just as Saps pushes the door open to assess the damage, cracked phone in hand, something that feels suspiciously like a raindrop falls on his head. But it's sunny out. The sun is literally right there. There's, like, one fucking cloud in the sky. Surely that wasn't rain, right, surely Saps just imagined—
A crack of thunder.
"No," he says to himself.
That's when the downpour starts.
—
So his car has a crushed bumper and cracked taillights, and his trunk is misaligned so it can't quite close all the way, but he can still drive it, and that's all that matters right now. Saps might have whiplash though. But that's a problem for another day, because Snowbird texted him twenty minutes ago—his friend is willing to house him for the night. Saps is so irritated he can't find it in him to feel embarrassed at the thought of having to rely on a stranger. He can treat the guy to lunch or something as a thank you. And who knows? He and Snowbird's friend might click, and they can laugh about all this later.
The lobby of the Bifrost Apartments is all dark, shiny tile and tall windows. The rain falls in torrential sheets against the glass. Even though it's August, the electric fireplace by the entryway is on, and it smells like hot dust and something sickly sweet. Past it, a woman with a sleek bun sits at a desk in the leasing office.
When the elevator arrives, inside is an elderly woman carrying a small dog and a middle-aged man wearing too much cologne. They stare at him as he steps inside. He's drenched to the bone, hair plastered to his forehead and the back of his neck. His white tee is thin and see-through and stuck to his chest—he'd considered throwing a jacket on, but he forgot where in the car he put his clothes, so he opted to sprint from the outdoor lot to the apartment building in the pouring rain.
"Oh, honey, you're shivering," the woman coos as the doors close. Her dog is in a pink harness. It's fluffy and white, except for where it's brown around the mouth and underneath the eyes. The fur at the top of its head is tied in a bow. "Got caught in the storm?"
Saps laughs politely. "Yeah," he says. "Didn't even see it coming."
In the corner, the man is using his index finger to type on a giant iPhone. His ringer is on, so Saps can hear each key. As Saps looks over, he sees the man is texting, I'm On my way! There is someone next to me and he looks like a wet dog laughing emoji laughing emoji. And then it appears he gives up on his keyboard suggesting the laughing emoji because he finally switches to the emoji keyboard.
Rapid puffs of air brush against Saps' elbow. The dog is leaning out of the woman's arms to sniff him. It smells like Fritos.
And then, the cherry on top: the elevator dings. Parking two, says an automated voice.
"Wait, are we going down?" Saps says.
"Uh huh," says the man without looking up. He slams a hairy thumb down onto his (uncracked) screen. The iOS send vwoop is obnoxiously loud.
"Oh."
The elevator doors open up to the lower parking garage. The intense wave of Dior Sauvage is like a flashbang before the man rams into Saps' shoulder as he exits. Saps stumbles. Apparently the words excuse me don't exist anymore.
The woman pats him on the other arm. "Get something warm once you're home, honey," she says, looking him up and down. Her dog is genuinely trying to stick its nose in his armpit. She licks her lips and continues, "A good boy like you doesn't wanna get sick."
Right. Whatever that means. The woman gives his bicep a firm squeeze before she finally leaves.
Dazed, Saps presses the button for floor 5.
No one gets on the elevator all the way up, so he gets to reflect on that interaction in peace. But he'd actually rather not, so he takes out his (cracked) phone and double-checks the apartment number. According to Snowbird, his friend lives in 5456. He said u can sleep in the second bedroom as long as ur not messy and weird, Snowbird had texted.
why does he have a whole second bedroom? Saps had asked.
Roommate drama lol. Now he has the whole apt to himself. Bedroom's furnished tho!! So u won't have to sleep on the couch
is he chill? ur friend
Ummmm. You'll see
wtf?
I mean his prev roommate moved out without even taking his stuff lol
But you'll be fineeee I'm friends w him for a reason. I feel like you'll each other
He might be a little bitchy but that's how he always is
bruh lolll??
ok i guess
thanks for asking him
If this friend is giving Saps an actual bed, he can be as bitchy as he wants. After driving ten hours just to be met with a sewage leak in his new apartment, becoming the victim of a hit-and-run, cracking his phone screen, getting stuck in a rainstorm, and experiencing whatever the hell that elevator ride was, Saps thinks he can deal with a little snark. He used to have a friend who was kind of a bitch, too. He'd like to think he has tough skin.
On his way to apartment 5456, Saps gets lost, because of course he does. The hallway lights are gaudy and too-bright and vaguely mammiform, and the carpet looks like a giant gray spatial puzzle. Saps feels lightheaded and dizzy. The base of his skull is throbbing, pain radiating into his temples. His tongue is sore and swollen. This day feels like that Greek myth with the guy pushing the boulder.
Eventually, he finds the apartment tucked into the corner, far from the elevators and stairwells. The door is black like the rest, but it's conspicuously bare. It's in stark contrast to the neighbor who has a pink HomeGoods tulip wreath hanging around the peephole and a doormat that says, "Do you want the house tour? Take your shoes off!"
Saps smiles a little. The Bifrost Apartments are a five-minute walk away from Pandora University, so it's filled with college students. Snowbird lives here, too, all the way up on the eighth floor. He figures his friend probably goes to Pandora too. Maybe Saps should be optimistic—if he and Saps become friends, today won't be so bad. Maybe things like this happen for a reason.
He raises a hand and knocks.
No answer.
His neck twinges as he leans into the door to see if he can hear anyone inside.
He knocks again, louder this time.
Nothing.
There's someone coming his way down the hallway. He hears the swish of a plastic bag before he hears the footsteps. Saps glances at the figure before unlocking his phone.
i dont think ur friend is home, he texts Snowbird. did u tell him i was coming? also whats his name even lol
Just as he presses send, he hears it.
The voice is low, drawling, and achingly familiar: "I didn't know you meant now," it's saying. Swish, step, swish, step, slow, unbothered. "He can wait a couple minutes. I'm the one doing him the favor."
No, he thinks desperately.
Swish, step, swish, step, in time with the echoing beats of Saps' heart. Swish, beat, step, beat, swish, beat, step.
Saps finally finds the courage to look up.
For a moment, his vision blurs; a three-year-old wound reopens. His stomach clenches like he's just slipped on ice. And as he stands there, frozen stupid, he kicks himself for the fleeting, knee-jerk thought: Oh, like a sigh of relief. There you are.
His hair is longer now, inky and curling around his ears. It's uncharacteristically messy, like he's been running his hands through it—though Saps supposes that, after everything, he wouldn't know what is and isn't characteristic for him anymore. He's got his phone tucked between his shoulder and his cheek. One hand is carrying a Walgreens bag, the other is rifling in the pockets of his vintage bomber jacket. Watching him approach is like standing in front of a moving train.
But he can't help it. Just like the first time Saps saw him, it's impossible to look away from Fluixon.
Saps considers running. Maybe if he moves fast enough, Flux won't recognize him. Oh god, what if Flux goes to Pandora? He totally goes to Pandora, that's probably where he and Snowbird met. Saps is going to have to transfer. All his moving stuff is still in his car. It's not too late. Maybe he should see if the neighbor's door is unlocked so he can hide until the coast is clear.
Flux is getting closer.
Fuck. Saps knows he looks so stupid right now. During the months after his and Flux's final argument, he fantasized about this moment, the first time he and Flux would see each other again. In his dreams, Saps would be sitting in a sleek white Lamborghini holding a spread of hundred-dollar bills and he would be really jacked and also wearing, like, Ray-Bans or something. Snowbird would be sitting in the passenger seat and they'd have their friends in the back, too, and Flux would walk in front of the car and look at Saps all longing and lonely, and Snowbird would say something like, "Who's that? Do you know him?" And Saps would fan himself with his money and say to everyone, real nonchalant and cool, "Oh, him? Just someone I used to know."
But right now Saps is homeless and disheveled and his car is fucked and Flux's hair looks really good and his ears are pierced. The last time Saps wanted to kill himself this badly was freshman year. Saps remembers the man texting in the elevator: There is someone next to me and he looks like a wet dog laughing emoji laughing emoji. Fuck this. Fuck optimism. Nothing happens for any reason, and he should've died in the Burger King parking lot.
Flux doesn't recognize him until it's too late. There's nowhere for either of them to run—Saps is quite literally cornered, and Flux can't turn around because Saps is in the way of his apartment. All Flux can do is stand there and blink. All Saps can do is blink back.
Flux continues to stare at him as he takes his hand out of his pocket to hold the phone to his ear. "Snowbird," he says slowly. "You never told me your friend's name." A pause. "…Right." Another pause. "And you've known him since…? Middle school…? What the fuck is a long-distance low-commitment best friend, that's not a thing, and how close could you be if I've never heard you mention—" Flux flinches and pulls the phone away from his ear. He waits five whole seconds before saying, "Are you done now? No? Okay."
Flux hangs up.
Immediately, his phone begins ringing again.
He silences it, but the screen is flashing like a strobe light so Snowbird's clearly blowing up his phone.
And now they're just standing there and looking at each other and Saps is really uncomfortable. In fact, it's the most uncomfortable Saps has felt all day, which is crazy since he got hit by a car, like, an hour ago. He doesn't know how much more he can take before doing a backflip off the roof.
Saps gets a wave of deja vu as Flux crosses his arms over his chest, grasping at his jacket sleeves. It's a very Fluixon gesture. He's chewing on the inside of his lip the way he used to.
Something young and buried drop kicks Saps' heart, sends it flying. Flux looks nearly the same as he did when they parted ways. His face has lost most of its baby fat, giving way to prominent cheekbones and a sharp jaw, but he's still got that beauty mark underneath his right eye.
Flux gives him an obvious once over. Something about it feels condescending. His eyes linger for a beat too long on the thin, wet shirt stretched across Saps' chest, then on his rain-mussed hair. Saps knows he's judging him right now. In the past, Flux would've laughed and said, You look like shit.
But right now, he just says, rigid, "What are you doing here?"
Saps swallows. There's nothing that can save him now. "Snowbird said you have extra space."
"He told me a close friend needed a place to sleep for the night."
"That's me."
Flux laughs, humorless. "Really. Out of the eight billion people on the planet."
He's right, but with the day Saps is having, he can't find it in him to be surprised.
"Look, Flux," Saps says, defeated. "You don't have to help me, okay? I get it. I don't really want to be around you either. But if you want me to fuck off, then tell me now so I can figure something else out."
Flux just stares at him again, eyes traveling across his face. Saps has always felt unnerved when he looks at him like that. It's like he's trying to peer into his brain.
"Flux," Saps sighs. "Please."
Flux inhales sharply. "You make it very easy to pity you."
"At this point, I'll take anything I can get."
Flux raises his eyebrows. "Desperate."
"If I wasn't desperate, I would've left the second I saw you."
"Oh my god." There's a hint of a smile at the corner of Flux's mouth. "You're desperate and you're admitting to it."
Saps' neck throbs as he tries to shake his head. Of course he'd gloat. If Saps were in his position, he'd be gloating too.
He swallows his pride. "Are you gonna help me or not?"
"Hmm." Flux tilts his head. "I don't know. It would be really funny if you had to sleep in your car."
"Yeah," Saps deadpans. "Hilarious."
"Let's say I let you stay. What's in it for me?"
"Snowbird won't be pissed at you."
"Not good enough. Try again."
"Try again," Saps echoes with a bitter laugh. "What do you want?"
Flux gives him that intense look again, like he’s searching for something. There’s a tiny crease between his brows. "Let's say you owe me a favor."
"…What kind of favor?"
"I guess we'll have to see," Flux says, then with a whiff of rain and lavender shampoo, he brushes past to unlock the door.
That doesn't bode well for Saps at all. He lingers in the hallway, fidgeting with his hands, as Flux kicks his shoes off in the entryway of the apartment. He half expects Flux to say, Just kidding, fuck you and slam the door in his face. But Flux just raises his eyebrows, looks at Saps like he's stupid.
"Well?" he says. "Are you coming or not?"
—
Saps has only seen Flux's childhood home one time, back when they were seventeen. Flux's family lived on a large plot of land in a white, three-story, Victorian-style house. Saps remembers turning off the road to bike up that long, winding driveway on an arid summer day. There were no flowers or trees on the lawn, just sprawling lattices of professionally manicured grass. No neighbors either. It made him think of that image he'd see in his eye exams. That lonely barn in an empty field.
Saps had leaned his bike on the veranda railing and knocked on the front door. It was Flux's sister Cynikka who answered it. She was only older than them by a year, so they saw each other at school, and at that point, she was familiar enough with Saps to just crinkle her nose at his sweating and panting then shout "Fluuuuuux!" up the stairs. "Your friend's here!"
Cynikka had a pair of big sunglasses perched on her head. As Saps left his dirty Air Forces on the monogrammed welcome mat and followed her into the kitchen, she grabbed a slouchy leather bag off the island and slung it over a shoulder. It said COACH on it.
"Tell Flux when he comes down that I'm going out," she said around a mouthful of gum. "And that Dad called and said to order dinner off his card since he won't be home. Thanks, bye."
"Uh, okay," Saps said, but Cynikka was already leaving. He felt very stupid standing there in that massive kitchen. Everything was glossy—the floor, the counters, the cabinets, the electric stove. There was a hole in his sock, and through it he felt the cold pinch of the marble floor. Out of curiosity, Saps crouched to look under the fridge. There weren't even any crumbs under there. Saps sort of felt like he was in an IKEA display. Or whatever the rich person equivalent to IKEA is.
All of this is to say that Saps is surprised to see Flux's apartment is sort of a mess. The door opens into a cluttered living room in front of a sunlit kitchen. There's a crumpled crewneck and a black ThinkPad tossed carelessly on the navy blue couch. On the coffee table is an Estes Park mug atop a crocheted coaster, three multicolored ballpoint pens, a pair of blue light glasses, and a spread of open books with scribbles in the margins. He's got a copy of Dorian Gray because of course he does. They had to read it for English in high school. Saps bets he brought it here to look intellectual.
Saps eyes the cat tree in the corner, precariously close to the TV. There's an empty cardboard box on the area rug next to a toy that looks like a banana. "You have a cat?" he says.
Flux is in the kitchen washing his hands. "Don't ask me personal questions," he says.
"Oh, so the cat tree's for you then?" Saps laughs. "New hobby?"
"I'm serious," Flux says. "We're not friends. I don't want to talk to you any more than I have to."
Saps feels a bit like he did right after getting hit by that car. "Oh."
Flux finally turns to face him, sighing. "Don't look at me like that."
"I'm not looking at you like anything."
"Yes you are, and you know exactly what you're doing—"
"That's just my face," Saps retorts. "If you can't handle my face, I'll find somewhere else to stay."
"I can handle it just fine."
"Can you? Because you just said you can't even look at me."
"That's not what I said."
"It's what you meant!"
"Don't tell me what I meant!" Flux glares at him over the counter. "You know what I think, Saps? I think you're projecting. All I said is that we're not friends, which is true, and now you're sitting here with your feelings hurt."
"Who said my feelings were hurt? All I said was 'Oh!' Literally one syllable!"
"You made a face! I know what that face means, I'm not stupid!"
"No, you don't!" Saps fires back. "You don't know anything about me anymore, Flux!"
And that's what finally gets him to shut up. The silence should be satisfying, but Saps just feels hollow. Flux's hands are white-knuckled and clenched into fists on the countertop.
Saps' anger dissipates, giving way to a throbbing headache. Part of him wants to leave. Clearly this arrangement is a bad idea, and, as tempting as it is, a bed for a night isn't worth being in debt to Flux—besides, they couldn't last ten minutes without going at each other's throats. But then he thinks about Flux glaring at him, the mean curve of his mouth. I think you're projecting.
Saps is not projecting. He doesn't care about Flux at all. If he leaves, then Flux will think he was right. He'd rather die than give Flux the satisfaction of seeing him run away with his tail tucked.
Most of all, Saps' headache is getting worse. On his way back to the apartment complex, he'd considered stopping at an urgent care, but then he'd have to tell Ish what happened, and he'd really rather not. He should be fine with some ice and some rest.
"Where's the bedroom?" Saps asks.
Flux jolts. "What?"
"Snowbird said you have an extra bed," Saps says slowly. "Where is it?"
A scowl. "Down the hall," Flux says. "Last door on the right. My room's on the left side, so don't go in there."
Saps rolls his eyes. As if he'd want to. "Do you have ice?" he says.
"Ice," Flux repeats.
"Like, frozen water?"
Flux hums, and Saps just knows he's about to say some bullshit. "Maybe it would be in the freezer. Since it's frozen."
Deep breaths. Saps gives him a plastic smile. "Obviously I was asking as a courtesy."
Flux gives him one right back. "Then maybe a better question would've been, 'may I please have some ice?'"
"May I please have a towel too, your highness?"
Flux glances at the dish towel hanging from the oven handle. "For what?"
"None of your business. Didn't you just say you didn't want to talk to me?"
"You're using my stuff."
Saps could kill him. The deep breaths aren't working. "I'd like to ice my neck since I got rear-ended today," he says pleasantly. "Happy?"
There's a beat of surprise before Flux bursts into a laugh. It's short, but it's genuine. Saps has always thought he looks younger when he smiles like that, all crinkled eyes and white teeth. He feels lightheaded. From anger. Or the whiplash.
"You got rear-ended?" Flux snickers.
"Oh my god, can I get ice or not?"
Flux is still smiling. He balls up the dish towel and tosses it to him. "You got a sewage leak in your apartment and you got rear-ended."
"And now I have to talk to you," Saps says.
"How bad was it?"
Saps goes to open the freezer. "I can still drive my car if that's what you're asking," he says. The refrigerator is covered in magnets. There's some that look like souvenirs—Costa Rica, Denver, Tokyo. Snowbird probably gave him the one that says Snowbird. There's a smattering of multicolored letter magnets that spell "SERA WAS HRE."
"Where's all this from?" Saps asks.
"Gifts."
"Who's Sera?"
"A friend."
"Hm." Saps puts a handful of ice cubes into the dish towel. "You said the bedroom's on the right?"
"Yeah. Bathroom’s on the right, too. First door." Flux glances at his shirt again then turns away. "There's, um, spare clothes in the dresser. For you to change."
"Okay." They just stand there for an awkward moment. Then, stilted, Saps says, "Thanks."
"It's fine," Flux says. "Don't make it weird."
"You made it weird by saying that."
"You're making it weirder by saying I made it weird."
Saps grits his teeth. "Right. I'm leaving now."
"Okay," says Flux.
"Bye."
"Bye."
Saps throws his arms up. "Do you just have to have the last word or something? Is that it?"
”I can’t say ‘Bye?’”
"You know what you're doing!"
"Just shut up and leave, Saps!"
"Fine!"
"Great!"
"Fantastic!"
"Amazing!"
"Oh my fucking god.” Saps stomps off into the bedroom.
—
Saps thinks that after the day he's had, he at least deserves the sweet relief of sleep. But despite how bone-tired he feels, he just can't seem to find it.
Maybe it's because he's got a dishrag full of ice on the back of his neck and it's so cold it kind of burns. Maybe it's because he's lying face-first in a pillow to balance said dishrag, and the pillowcase smells like it hasn't been washed since, like, 2016. Maybe it's because fucking Fluixon is less than twenty feet away and he can hear him moving whatever was in that Walgreens bag into his cabinets.
For a short, bizarre moment, Saps feels like he's not in his own body. He hasn't had a pit in his stomach like this in years. Flux is so familiar, but he's different enough that it feels uncanny. Saps thinks about all those magnets on his fridge. The hand-crocheted coaster on the coffee table. Sera was here.
Saps moved to Theria in the middle of their sophomore year of high school. There, Flux was his first friend. They only properly met during lacrosse tryouts when Saps immediately recognized Flux as the quiet guy with the RBF who sat in the back of their English class. Before warmups, Saps had approached him on the track and said, Hey, I'm Saps, I think we have a few classes together, only for Flux to just give him the nastiest side-eye he'd ever seen in his fifteen years of life. And as Flux left to set his water bottle on the bleachers, he thought, Wow, what a dick. I wonder what he's like.
So on that first day of tryouts, Saps picked Flux as his partner every time he could. He did his conditioning at Flux's side. He sat next to him during their cooldown. And when Saps approached him again during the second day, Flux surprised him by being the first to talk. What are you doing? he'd said. Saps had shrugged. I'm new here. I wanna be your friend. Flux had stared at him, skeptical. Then he said, Okay, and walked away.
Saps wasn't sure what he meant by that. Flux didn't move, though, when Saps came up next to him for drills, or when they split into groups for a half-field scrimmage, or when the coach closed out the session and they were all waiting for their rides home. The following day, when their English teacher announced a group project, Saps had turned to Flux to initiate a partnership and found that Flux was already looking at him. That's how Saps knew he'd unlocked the first door.
Obviously Flux has changed since then. In high school, they'd been friendly with everyone on the lacrosse team, but Saps was really Flux's only actual friend. It took him months to explicitly earn that title. A year to be allowed to step foot into his house. The fact that, now, Flux has opened himself up enough that traces of his friends are strewn across his apartment is… well, Saps doesn't know. He's not sure how to feel. He knows he shouldn't care. He doesn't care. Really, he should be happy for him, and he is, okay—but not, like, overly happy because that would be weird and they're not friends so Saps doesn't actually care (see previous). How about this: he is pleasantly surprised that his former friend seems to have become less guarded and is now living a more fulfilled life as a result. There.
Saps knows he's changed too. They were kids back then, after all. But for some reason, talking to Flux almost makes him feel like a teenager again. Even though they're not friends, Saps can't help but talk to him like they're still close like that. Maybe it's some innate psychological reflex. Maybe it's because he knows that Flux knows more about him than anyone else so it feels stupid to keep up pretenses.
But, like, surely Flux doesn't have to be so weird. What did he say when Saps asked if he had a cat? Don't ask me personal questions? How was that a personal question? Obviously he has a cat! Who the fuck just has a cat tree in their living room? And the favor thing earlier? Saps isn't surprised he asked for one, of course the one thing Flux didn't grow out of is being an opportunistic freak. But what could Flux possibly want from him? Not money, he's rich. And he's made it clear he wants nothing to do with Saps himself. It'll probably be something humiliating. Something to get back at him for what happened after graduation.
Fuck. All that was Flux's fault anyway. If anything, Flux owes him, and letting Saps stay over should even the score. But no, of course not, because in Fluixon's great, almighty mind, he can do no wrong. Stupid idiot. Annoying fuckass douchebag.
In a pitiful surge of anger, Saps rips the dishrag from his neck and tosses it onto the dusty nightstand. The room spins as a twinge of pain shoots up to the base of his skull. God, this sucks. He can't even throw things in a fit of rage. What is there to live for anymore?
And his car, fuck, Saps almost forgot about the car. Can he file a police report for a hit and run even though he didn't see the license plate of the car that hit him? Would the police even find the person who did it or is that more of just a civic duty thing? Is he morally obligated to file a report? Surely the police have better things to do?
No, actually, Saps doesn't care right now. He can deal with all this later. Right now, he is going to close his eyes and lie very, very still because he read once that if you don't move then eventually your body has to fall asleep. Maybe he should count sheep, too. Yeah, maybe.
One, he thinks, picturing a cartoon sheep in a neon green field. Two… three…
Saps snaps his eyes open.
Starfished and staring at the ceiling, he thinks, not for the first time today, This is so fucking stupid.
—
Sooooo? How'd it go with Flux?
R u best buds yet
i need to buy a gun
???????????