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It took everything in him to not look over his shoulder on the walk back to his apartment. He barely breathed until he was standing in his entryway, locking his door behind him. Ryland doesn't even take the time to loosen the laces of his converses enough to take them off, he marches straight to his room completely uncaring of the dirt he drags in. He barely has the mind to weave through the stacks of scattered textbooks and papers on his living room floor.
Colt calls him first most of the time, there used to be a balance to who would call first but grad school had completely consumed Ryland and he hardly had the time to remember to be a real person anymore. This is why, when his call to his brother finally goes through, the first thing Colt asks is, "has hell frozen over?"
Grace slumps into his desk chair, letting out a long sigh before responding. "It probably has. Listen, Colt, I need you to hear me out, just really quickly. I know working on my thesis is melting the parts of my brain not completely devoted to research but I swear to everything good that I haven't gone insane, and I just really need you to believe me when I tell you this."
There's shuffling on the other side of the line and whatever background noise was there to begin with is gone now. It's just Colt and Ryland, Ryland and Colt— just like it's nearly always been. "Of course," Colt says easily. He sounds like he did Ryland had first explained his thesis to him, like it's his life mission to be an entirely nonjudgmental and understanding ear.
He has to hype himself up for it, he sounds insane he's sure of it. Regardless he says, "I think I saw Court, he was following me through a Whole Foods."
And, for what it's worth, Colt doesn't laugh at the obscenity of his statement, or tell him that he's really truly lost it. "Are you sick?" He asks gently and Ryland all but slams his head into his desk. "That's impossible, Ry. For one, I'm certain you're not a medium. You would've told me when we lived in that place with the cemetery right down the street. And for two, there's no way you can afford to go to Whole Foods on your salary."
"Are you doubting the fact that I went to Whole Foods? Because that was real and I'll never recover financially from buying those strawberries but that's really not as important as the fact that I saw our dead brother." Only he wasn't dead, he was alive and he had followed Ryland through the store, just a few paces out of sight, the entire time.
"It could have been anyone. He had one of those faces, you know?"
Ryland sighs, heavy and beyond dramatically. "You're supposed to be believing me right now." What Colt chose to put his faith into was fickle sometimes, he had always been so difficult to get on board with things like stove top s'mores (which ended with a small house fire three out of the five times they had tried it when they were younger), or not jumping off the roof onto the trampoline (Colt only had to break his leg once before he listened to Ryland on that one), or now that their brother had been watching him buy overpriced groceries.
"Right, I'm having a hard time with it," Colt said and Ryland was glad he wasn't here in person because he knows his twin is making that face where his eyebrows are raised in disbelief .
Ryland wouldn't believe himself either, had he not been in the store watching Court watching him. "You're so unhelpful, I'm hanging up."
Colt laughs, not entirely unkindly. "I'll come over after work and we can go down to the Whole Foods and force the manager to show us the CCTV," he says jokingly.
"You're unhelpful and you're mocking me."
"Only a little. I think you should get some sleep, Ry. I bet you're just not getting enough sleep." He's not wrong, but Ryland knows what he saw. He huffs and agrees before they say their goodbyes and hang up. But it was a good idea, he can badger a person working minimum wage for the camera feed, his soul will never see the gates of heaven but at least he'll know if Court was a figment of his imagination.
The walk back to the Whole Foods was a difficult one, he almost turned around nearly fifty times but he had to know if he saw what he thought he did.
He was going to get banned from Whole Foods for life, he was going to get banned and he felt like the most evil man the world could ever possibly think up. "I can call your manager if you aren't willing to cooperate," he said to a tired looking twenty something year old who had tried to explain kindly that they weren't allowed to just show the security footage to anyone who asked for it.
Ryland's going to have to do a thousand good deeds to make up for how awful he feels, he'd probably have to save all of humanity a hundred times over before he felt okay about himself again.
"Please don't do that, sir."
"Well, I won't have to if you just let me see the footage from this afternoon," he said as the pit in his stomach grew. Forget saving all of humanity, the only was to clear his conscious from this clear affront to mankind would be exile— they'd have to send him light years away from every other person on Earth as penance for his crimes here today.
The manager sighed heavily before glancing around. "Okay, fine, whatever. They don't pay me enough for this shit. Follow me sir." Ryland is really grateful that the whole Karen act worked out for him because he didn't have a plan-b but he was nearly certain that he was in so deep that he probably would have kept pushing until they kicked him out. "What are you looking for again?" They ask as they lead Ryland to the computer in the stale smelling office in the back of the store.
"There was a man following me, earlier this afternoon. Around three"
The CCTV is already playing across the computer screen, they just drag the time back to a couple hours ago. There are six different angles shown covering the whole layout of the store. Ryland sees himself enter, B-line for his beloved strawberries. And then… and then nothing. For the next five minutes, Ryland watches himself prod at fruit that he could only imagine eating in his wildest, most financially stable, dreams.
Then a man walks in, sunglasses shield his eyes and he moves quicker than Ryland would expect with such a bulky build. Sure enough, the man follows Ryland through the rest of his time at the store. "Wait, pause it! Pause it there," he says, pointing frantically. It's the first time the man's face is in clear view of the cameras with only his sunglasses to obstruct the sight.
It's definitely Courtland, older now and far more sturdy than he was when Ryland last saw him. He's pretty sure he tells the Whole Food manager thank you, but he's not sure because he doesn't feel like he's in his body right now. His hands shake as he dials Colt's number again.
His brother picks up quicker than he did earlier and without a greeting says, "I thought I told you to go to sleep."
Ryland doesn't bother with any of the fanfare, especially not if Colt doesn't bother to either. "It was him."
There's a pause on the other end of the phone. "What?" Colt asks but Ryland knows he's not lost of the topic of conversation because the word sounds like it was punched out of his brother.
"I went back to the Whole Foods, and okay I know you were joking but I kind of berated the manager until they let me see the surveillance footage and Colt, it was him. and he was there. I don't know where he went and I don't know what any of it means or what to do with this information and I'm kind of wishing I had just gone to sleep because what am I supposed to do with this and I just—"
"Ryland," Colt interrupts. "You're spiraling, I need you to go back to your apartment and make a cup of tea or have some of those strawberries, okay? I need you to calm down, don't think about it right now. I'm— I get off of work in twenty minutes and I'll come straight to yours. We'll figure it out."
"Right, okay," he agrees easily because it's Colt, they can figure anything out when they put their minds together. He takes a deep breath. "Okay," He says far more certain now. "We'll figure it out."
"We always do, Ry. I'll see you soon, it'll be okay."
Only, when Ryland gets to his apartment he's not sure it will be okay. His door is unlocked even though he knows he locked it, because he triple checked. This is probably when his bad luck for being rude to someone barely earning minimum wage kicks in. Colt was going to get here and discover him beyond dead on the floor and all his meager belongings stolen.
He'll deserve it, but man will it suck, he thinks as he pushes the door open.
The smell hits him first, a punch of nostalgia so sweet it makes his stomach churn. Then the sounds, something sizzling in the pan as someone drums their fingers against the counter top. He has half the mind to text Colt something along the lines of, forget your stupid job it's family reunion time right now, but Court pokes his head out of the kitchen before he can get his phone out of his pocket.
"You're not dead," he says dumbly.
"I'm making breakfast for dinner," Court replies as if this is all normal. As if they were kids again and their dad is on another bender and Court's taking care of him and Colt, just like he always does.
Ryland's going to be sick, he thinks. He's going to throw up all over his messy floors, only they're not messy anymore because Court's here and he never could stand how Ryland would get so absorbed in studying that his room would become it's own ecosystem. "You're not dead," he repeats, sounding even more dumb. His floors are spotless, all his work is piled neatly on the coffee table.
This is all a really messed up dream, it has to be. Only, it isn't because Court is here and he's making breakfast for dinner and it smells like the good parts of Ryland's childhood. He needs this to be real, he decides. He needs his brother.
"I'm not dead. Set the table." Ryland works his way through his apartment on auto pilot, setting out three spots at his table that has only ever held two people. Court finishes cooking, turns around taking a lay of the land before humming in contemplation. "Colt's coming?"
"I was panicking a bit so he said he was going to come over when he gets off of work. It's really not every day your brother, who died in prison when you were a kid, shows up to shadow your grocery shopping, y'know? It's just– Court what are you doing here? Not that I'm not happy to see you, I'm so glad that you're here. Just why now?" His voice cracks towards the end and his eyes burn a bit.
"You caught me."
"If I hadn't, you wouldn't be here?" He doesn't wait for an answer and tears course down his cheeks— they're wet and uncomfortable and he scrubs his hands over his face in a poor attempt to get rid of them "Have you done this before? Is this… I don't understand."
"I know, it's complicated and it's better if you don't understand. It's best if you don't know, but we're past that point. I'm going to finish making breakfast and I need you to go clean your face up so Colt doesn't get too mad that I made you cry, he used to hate when that happened."
"You used to be so stubborn, I'd never get my way."
"Yeah well you used to be such a crybaby, guess you still are. Go get cleaned up, kid."
Ryland could probably cut the tension that he comes back to with a butter knife. He takes a seat at the table with his brothers and its like leaping back into his childhood.
It's uncomfortable in a comfortable way, like coming in from a snowstorm and running your hand under warm water and feeling the blood rush.
"So," Colt starts, dragging out the o. "You faked your death, you've been keeping tabs on us, you can't tell us where you've been or what you've been doing, and we're not allowed to tell anyone we've seen you. Did I get all that right?" He asks, mostly just to be an ass but Court nods with something that almost looks like a smile gracing his lips. "What do you work for the mob or something?"
"Or something," Court says gruffly.
"I bet he works for the government," Ryland says, pushing his glasses up. Court exhales sharply through his nose and the twins share a glance before bursting out in laughter. It's the strangest dinner any of the three of them have ever had but it's warm and although they know that it'll end and they'll have to part again, they relish in it while they have it.
It's not perfect, and they can't keep this moment but for a stretch of this dinner, things are good again just like they used to be.