Chapter Text
"Pretty boy
Natural blood-stained blond
With the holes in his sneakers
And his eyes all over me."
When Ryan Whelan was young, he’d always been told he was very ‘perceptive’. His mother said it proudly, his friends said it incredulously. It was a point of pride for him as a child, his ability to read a person or a room. But as it happened, he was never quite so good at knowing where to go from there. People don't like when you notice things they’re trying to hide. Especially if they don’t realize they're trying to hide them. Seeking vulnerability in others is impossible to do without approaching vulnerability of your own. And Ryan never figured out the latter part. He’d see himself in someone else and they’d deny it like it was a plague they didn’t want to catch.
After a while, he considered that maybe being perceptive was what made him feel so different. Any time he saw through a lie it only made him worry they’d be able to see through his too. That word he wore so proudly started to set him on edge. He stopped trying to read the room as much when he walked into it and started focusing on blending in. Perceptive people were dangerous, because as fun as it was to perceive, it was equally the opposite to be perceived. He realized if he wanted to fit in, to hide the things about him that were wrong, then he’d have to extend the same level of ignorance towards everyone else in return.
He’d spent so long teaching himself to take people at face value and nothing more- to accept as truth whatever version of themself they were selling- that he was never curious about people anymore. So he had absolutely no idea what possessed him to take such an interest in Naim Reid. Maybe it was the fact that Naim seemed to be presenting no front at all. He all but floated through school and practically haunted weekly church services. Or maybe it was the fact that as invisible as he seemed to think he was, his social camouflage only drew more attention his way. He imagined that Naim must be pretty perceptive. And he didn’t like to consider how that made him a threat.
“Please be home please be home please be home.” Ryan muttered to himself as he jogged up the drive. Arlene’s car was absent from view and that was enough to reassure him that at the very least he wouldn’t have to explain his presence to her. But that was only marginally less embarrassing than no one answering in the first place. He knocked on the door as casually as he could manage. At first he let his arms swing at his sides before changing his mind and stuffing them into his pockets. Naim answered the door infuriatingly slowly. He didn’t open the second door at first, just furrowed his eyebrows at Ryan through the screen.
“Hi?” Naim didn’t say more but the unspoken ‘What do you want?’ was written on his face.
“Hi.” Ryan quickly realized he had no idea what to say. “...Do you want to see something cool?”
Naim cautiously pushed the screen door open, glancing from side to side. “See what?”
“Just come on, I’ll show you.”
Naim did one more check for invisible cameras and then nodded awkwardly. “Okay, one second.”
Ryan took a couple steps back as Naim closed the door again. He caught himself staring intently at the house and quickly turned his back, hoisting his bike off the grass and pretending to care very much about the air pressure in the front tire. A second later, Naim coasted up to his side, balancing with his left foot on the right pedal. He hopped down and looked up at Ryan with something between curiosity and fear. Ryan couldn’t really tell, Naim’s expressions always seemed like slightly different variations of deer caught in headlights to him.
“Follow me.” Ryan gestured with his head and hopped onto his bike. He wove back and forth across the road, standing up on the pedals as he did. He glanced back over his shoulder and saw Naim pedaling viciously to keep up. For the first time that day, there was a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.
Ryan took that to heart and sped up down the road.
-------------
“Snakes and Heights?” Ryan ran his thumb over his rings. “Right.”
He turned his back on Naim quickly, praying he wouldn’t eat shit scaling the scaffolding. The worry of embarrassing himself was second only to the worry that the next time he looked back, Naim wouldn’t be following him anymore. The scaffolding creaked beneath him as he sprang to the top. He paused and glanced back, taking a moment to watch as Naim’s eyes frantically bounced around the structure. The other boy's eyes landed on Ryan’s for less than a second before returning to the first foothold. Ryan was a second away from offering a hand down when Naim launched himself at the scaffolds and began to climb. His eyes were glued to each spot he found a foothold so he didn’t see the grin spread over Ryan’s face as he watched. The taller boy hopped through the window down into the mill.
Each step kicked up clouds of dust, long undisturbed. For each of his own footsteps he could hear ringing through the structure, a gentler sound followed from Naim. A small but comforting echo. From behind him he heard the dust shift and then an impact over his shoulder. He turned around, his shoulders tensed as if braced for impact. Naim’s throw knocked an empty paint can off the top of the makeshift shelves but he didn’t seem to be watching where his throw would land. His small grin easily leapt onto Ryan's face as well. He scooped up his own rock- a much larger one than Naim’s- testing the weight in his hand once before launching it into the shelf. When he turned back towards the other boy afterwards their eye contact reunited as if it had never broken, and Ryan wondered for less than a moment if Naim had ever looked away.
When he finally did, Ryan knew exactly what he was thinking. Naim wrapped his hands around the chunk of metal piping that must have weighed half his own body weight and Ryan couldn’t help but laugh as he tried to hoist it.
“What makes you think you can pick that up?” He snickered. Knowing damn well he wouldn't be able to lift it either, he pushed Naim aside. “I can do it.”
Naim laughed as Ryan barely managed to wedge one or two centimeters of air between the pipe and the ground. The laughter danced through the air and around Ryan’s shoulders. It settled in his stomach, flapping its wings once. Ryan felt a jolt in his chest, a well rehearsed reflex to throw a joke, an insult, anything to distract from the moment. He focused his eyes on the shoulder seam of Naim’s shirt and purposely tensed his face.
“Funnel web, on your shoulder.” He raised a hand and took a cautious step towards Naim. Then another. “Dont move, alright?”
Once he’d crept right up to Naim, he softly flicked the side of his jaw. Naim’s wide fearful eyes shifted to confusion. The shorter boy's gaze bounced back and forth between Ryan’s eyes. Ryan felt a dangerously familiar heat bubbling up in his chest, threatening to rise visibly to his face. There was an innate fear in him that had always followed, an animalistic urge to desperately protect these feelings from the outside world. He forced that tell tale warmth to turn into anger and lashed out, using both hands to shove Naim backwards. He quickly turned his back.
“Fuck you, cunt!”
“..What?”
It felt like clockwork to him, the way Naim collided with him a moment later.
“What the fuck was that?” Ryan laughed because there was nothing else he would do. “Do it one more time.”
Naim shoved headlong into Ryan’s chest. The second Ryan had his arms around him, Naim started flailing pathetically. He pelted Ryan’s waist with quick jabs but Ryan was strangely confident that he wasn’t making any actual effort to get away. He had Naim’s head and shoulders locked in his grip and as Naim squirmed their legs tangled and then they were rolling on the floor. Ryan planted his knees on either side of Naim easily and pinned his wild limbs to the ground on either side of his head.
“Fuck you doing?” Ryan’s chain hung in the air, reaching delicately from his own neck towards Naim’s. “Is there anything you’re not afraid of, huh?”
There was this absolutely ridiculous pout on Naim’s face and the only thing Ryan could think about was the distance between their mouths. Until..
…Fuck.
Naim turned his head quickly, separating their mouths. It was like the heat from Naim’s breath was the only thing keeping Ryan warm. His entire body ran cold as Naim stared up at him incredulously. He immediately released Naim’s wrists and leaned back, a million different useless excuses flying through his mind. Then Naim’s hands were on the sides of his face, his touch returning the warmth to Ryan's body. Naim didn’t have to expend any force to bring their lips back together. Ryan felt the relief flood over his body as he moved against Naim. There was something else there, something unlike anything he’d felt before, but it was buried in the butterflies writhing in his stomach as he leaned more of his weight against Naim. The other boy breathed life back into him, his tongue creeping into Ryan's mouth and chasing away the pit of dread that had been growing in his stomach all day. Maybe even longer.
His fully melted brain must have poured out from his ear as he rolled off Naim. He felt Naim’s hands dancing so gently over his body in a way he couldn’t help but reciprocate. He waited for them to find purchase and grip him more tightly. He waited for Naim’s hands to hurt him. But they didn’t. Instead, his fingers traced the zipper of his jeans. Ryan mimicked the action with more intention and Naim all but melted against the cement floor. Ryan felt that heat redoubling in his chest, he felt the blush rise in his cheeks, and he felt his heartbeat roaring in his ears as if his heart were daring him to silence it. He layered kisses over the pulse in the side of Naim’s neck
And then Naim went stiff in Ryan's grasp and sat up. Ryan’s eyes raced to find Naim’s as he wildly looked around the space. When Naim finally returned Ryan's gaze his eyes seemed to soften.
“We should go.”
---------------
“Have you ever been there before?” Naim had clearly been working up to asking this for the last couple minutes of the walk to Ryan’s house. “The- the mill?”
“Nah, first time.” Ryan knew what he was implying, but he wanted to keep pretending he couldn’t read between the lines. At least for a little bit longer. “...You?”
“Yeah, first time.”
Ryan felt guilty for the purposeful misunderstanding, but he didn’t actually feel like he was telling a lie. He had done something for the first time today, he just wasn’t sure what. Whatever it was, he wanted to protect it.
“Don’t tell anyone about it. The mill.”
“Nah, I won’t”
“See you later?” He’d said that plenty of times and not meant it, but this time he did.
“Yeah.”
Ryan looked at Naim until he felt that damn warmth in his chest threaten to grow again and turned away. He stowed his bike and slipped into the house as quietly as possible. He breathed a sigh of relief when he found neither of his parents in the living room or kitchen. To some degree, his room was safe. It was more dangerous to stumble upon his father than for his father to come seek him out. Plus, the room had actually started to finally feel like it was entirely his. It was still more empty than not, but one or two of his posters had drifted away from the corner they'd been consolidated to for so many years.
As he shut the door and caught his own eye in the mirror on the back of it, he realized he had carried most of the dust and grass from the day home with him. His shoulder ached as he reached up to pull the tank over his head, effectively guiding his attention to a smoldering bruise that rested neatly between his right shoulder blade and collarbone. It was a couple days old by now and noticeably fainter than it had been the day before. Ryan flexed his arm a couple more times, relishing the pain.
His thoughts were interrupted by a loud tap at his window. He spun around, throwing the blinds open. Hunter stood there in the yard, farther away from the window than was necessary. The bruise on his shoulder pulsed pain down his arm. He shook his head and mouthed “Go away.”
Hunter narrowed his eyes and threw another rock. It hit the glass opposite Ryan’s face and he tried not to flinch. He popped the window open.
“I mean it, piss off.”
Hunter raised his hand with his last rock but stopped when he saw Ryan reaching to close the window. “Wait, seriously?”
“Seriously.” Ryan closed the window, muffling whatever Hunter shouted at him. And then closed the blinds for good measure.
"Pretty boy
Scared of the rain, by God
Tend to the row of your violets
With your eyes all over me."