Archive of Our Own

The door’s cold against his back. Never had he expected himself to have so much beef with a piece of wood. 

His clothes are torn and bloody still— he should probably change, rinse the old blood off, but he can’t bring himself to move. Not yet. Not until he’s sure Grian’s okay. There’s only a door. The span of a bedroom. The soft shuffling of clothes and shutting of drawers on the opposite side.  Funny how wide the space between them feels, how much such a small distance can ache. Like an old break of bone, healed but crooked, aching when pressed on the wrong way. A twinge spreads through Scar’s chest. 

It hurts far worse than the road-burn stretching his arms or his bruised ribs, pulling and catching with each carefully measured breath. It hurts with each passing second Grian’s away from him, a fist around his throat. Scar bunches his fists up into the torn fabric of his shirt. Blood flakes off his fingers, dried and caked into the creases. It’s not his own. The stench of metal coats his mouth.

How had he messed up this badly?

“Grian?” Scar turns around and leans his forehead against the door. It takes every inch of self-restraint not to turn the knob and barge in, to insist on taking care of him each step of the way. Because this is his fault, and the helplessness of being able to do absolutely nothing about it is almost so insufferable that he’d be willing to selfishly deny Grian his space. 

But he can’t let himself. Grian needs this. No matter how much it kills him. 

After what feels like an eternity the door opens. Old hinges, a staple of the old dormitory buildings, squeak when Grian pushes the door open. Scar stumbles back to give Grian space, but to more selfishly allow himself a view. His hair is still matted and dirty. Scar spots a spotting of blood in his fringe he had missed. But he looks better now that he’s out of those clothes and into something warm. Safe. A red hoodie with paint splatters on the sleeves, a dark pair of sweatpants. If Scar squints in the low-light of the dorm, he can pretend that everything’s fine. He can pretend this is just any other night, Scar crawling through Grian’s window after a long, painful night of patrolling. That he’ll rest his head in Grian’s lap and doze off as Grian cards his hands through his hair, feeling for bumps and bruises. 

But no amount of shadow or imagination can hide the look on Grian’s face— the dark circles under his eyes, the way he refuses to look Scar in the eye, the way he favors his left leg. He licks his bottom lip, and even the small scowl he gives is enough to split it again, blood oozing from a scab. The curve of his right cheek— usually so soft— blossoms with dark bruising and scraped skin. The redness bleeds into his sclera.

Scar can do nothing but stare, feeling like he’s drowning. Because he doesn’t know what to do. He hasn’t known what to do since his phone rang, since his heart plummeted into his stomach, solid as a stone. 

His phone buzzed on his desk. The small screen lit up, and the tune that played was a familiar one that made the air taste sweet— one he programmed just for Grian. He was all too eager to abandon his communications homework, propping his feet up on the desk and pressing the phone to his ear. “Hey, G! To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Unfamiliar voices crackled through the speaker. Like Grian was somewhere crowded. The dining hall, maybe? But then, he heard the ragged, frantic breathing. Strained. 

Static. 

“Grian? Hello?” 

Grian hugs himself tightly. Whether it’s to keep Scar out or to keep himself together, Scar doesn’t know. It hurts him all the same. Is this how Grian feels every night Scar comes crawling up that fire escape, singed and battered and breathless? This endless pit in his stomach, the worry that’s crawling up the back of his throat like bile. 

Grian’s lips wobble. He’s trying to be brave. But his eyes, big and bleeding as they are, betray him. His fingers dig into his arms until the knuckles go white. Scar watches the bones of his jaw shift as he clenches his teeth, as he struggles to keep everything bottled up nice and neat inside. But the glass is already splintering. He’s already made up of jagged shards, ready to cut anything that comes too close. 

Scar steps forward anyway. He doesn’t mind getting cut. It’s the least he deserves, after what he let happen. 

“Are you okay?” he asks, because what else is he supposed to say? His hands hover uselessly at his side. He feels the need to hide them behind his back, as if Grian seeing the dried blood will only remind him of Scar’s failures. That he’ll shove Scar out the door, suddenly sobering up to the idea the Scar did this— that this is all his fault.

Grian’s shoulders tense. But he doesn’t move back. “I’m fine.” 

“Grian—” 

“I want something to eat.”

Scar blinks, chasing away the nerves gnawing away at his stomach. “Okay… Yeah. Sure. I’ll make you something.” 

Grian shuffles past him. He’s limping. Scar can only hope his ankle is just sprained. Not that he would know— Scar’s far out of his depth. Tossed in the deep end when he’s used to putzing around in the kiddie pool. And, of course, Grian had insisted on not going to the hospital. He’d just wanted to go home. And who was Scar to deny him? 

Scar turns into the little kitchen to rifle through the meager contents of Grian’s fridge and pantry for something to make. It’s painful to take his eyes off Grian again. The fear creeps in, slow and certain, with each second he stands pulling out a butter knife and a loaf of bread.

The city was a loud, roaring thing as he tore across rooftops. Wind lashed at his cheeks, car horns flooding his ears as he cut across traffic, cut through alleys. He couldn’t move fast enough. Each step felt like a gunshot to his chest, his desperation seeping out of him like the shrapnel had torn a vital artery. 

Grian, Grian, Grian.

Scar returns to find Grian curled up on his futon. There’s an old blood stain on the right arm that Grian usually hides beneath the throw blanket that’s pooled in his lap— Scar has yet to make good on his promise to buy him a new one. It’s his fault for staining it after all, but in his defense he’d been bleeding out and a little too delirious to consider the consequences of his bleeding on upholstery. 

“Hope you like PB&J,” Scar says sheepishly, sinking onto the cushion beside him and holding out the plate. “The state of your pantry is a little sad.”

Grian sniffs, cringing. “You know… Finals and stuff.”

When Grian reaches to take the plate, his sleeve rides up and Scar catches a glimpse of the ring of red, swollen skin around his wrist. Scar’s knuckles ache, his anger a steady pulse in time with his heartbeat— he could’ve gone further. He could’ve hurt them good. It would’ve been the least those bastards deserved. But Grian’s face—

A parking garage. White and yellow lines. Sickly, fluorescent lighting. Scar’s anger. It bubbled hot and viciously in his chest. His worry, a muted secondary note hidden underneath it all. Desperate to be heard, but hopeless to be felt. 

Grian’s body was folded on the asphalt, hands wrapped up doubly in duct tape, shaking head to toe. Blood leaked from his nose and mouth like a faulty faucet. A fist curled in his hair, craning his head back. 

His voice, hoarse from screaming. “Scar, don’t—” 

“Scar?” 

Scar blinks. Grian’s looking at him, swollen cheek puffed up as he chews on a bite of his sandwich. The standing lamp in the corner washes his face in a soft golden light that only makes the bruises on his pale skin look even more sickly and severe. He’s looking at Scar with the same worry Scar feels building in his chest, pressurized like a shaken soda can ready to pop. 

“Yeah?” Scar clears his throat. 

Grian swallows with a wince. “Are you okay?” 

Guilt burns hot in Scar’s face. He clenches his aching knuckles, tucking them between his knees to hide them. “I should be asking you that.” 

“I just—” Grian swallows his next words. He holds himself rigidly. His brow creases, as if the simple act of breathing is enough to riddle him with pain. Each hitch of his shoulders is strained and stuttered. “The look on your face…” 

Scar forces a smile. Since when did it feel so difficult to scrounge one up? Since when did it hurt? Something that comes to him so naturally resorted to something painful, like the stretch of his lips made them split and bleed. Like he’s the one beaten, battered, and bruised shades of purple and blue. 

“I’m just worried about you,” Scar says. It’s not a lie, but it somehow feels like the biggest one he’s ever told.  

Grian cringes painfully, like he knows. Because of course he knows— it’s the most terrifying part about him. The way he looks at Scar like he’s see-through. He sets the sandwich aside, only one bite taken out of it. “I don’t mean now.” 

It felt good. 

It shouldn’t have felt good. It should’ve felt awful. He’d never wanted to hurt anyone. He wore the mask so no one would get hurt again. But Grian was hurt. It was Grian’s blood on the asphalt, on this man’s hands. 

So all Scar could do was hit this stranger, again and again, until blood bubbled out of his mouth and until the fire in Scar’s belly threatened to burn him up from the inside out. Until he fell backwards off the man, slumped and bloody, and his chest was heaving from the effort of his strained muscles and aching knuckles. Until he could hear the soft, broken sound of Grian’s breath.

Until he looked up. Grian’s eyes, wide and red-rimmed, staring at him. He looked afraid. Horrified. 

Of what? Of Scar?

Scar stares at his thighs and the hands tucked between them. The knees of his pants are torn, even through the padding. The laundry and tailoring bill is the least of his worries, though he can already hear the nice lady in the fabric shop on the corner nagging his ear off for his clumsiness. How many times can he tell her he fell down the stairs, or skinned his knee on a curb, or accidentally caught his sleeve on fire? 

Torn knees and roadburn are the least of his worries. He’d taken a beating in his effort in the parking garage, tearing through what felt like four separate mobs just to get to Grian. To get to the man who had his fingers curled in his hair. 

“It was like you were this different person,” Grian whispers. 

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” Scar says. “I don’t want you to see me like that. That’s not who I am. That’s not why I do this. It’s—”

“I wanted you to hurt them,” Grian says quickly. Like he’s ripping off a bandage that hurts him coming off more than it hurts Scar. Grian shuts his eyes, his chest stuttering as he draws as deep a breath in as he can manage. “I’m just sorry you had to.” 

How can he say that after what he saw? Scar can’t bear to look at Grian. Not after what he’s witnessed. It’s painful enough knowing that he hurt Grian, that this double-life he’s chosen put the one person that almost mattered more than the mask in danger. But to think Grian is apologizing? 

“I’m not. Not if it meant saving you.” Only part of him is horrified to find that he means it. Scar turns to face Grian properly. 

Grian’s here. Grian’s breathing. That has to be enough for tonight. Just for tonight. 

“Let me take a look at you,” he says, reaching for the sides of his face. 

Grian leans back and shields himself with a hand. But the simple motion alone is enough to make him jolt and wince with pain. The color of his face blanches. “Do you even know what you’re doing?”

“If you refuse to let me take you to a hospital, I’m your next best shot,” Scar says. “And I’m not asking.” 

Grian works his jaw back and forth. Part of Scar fears he’s still going to turn him away— and the worst thing is Scar wouldn’t have been able to blame him. Scar wouldn’t fight. He wouldn’t blame Grian if he wanted nothing to do with him anymore. But the most selfish parts of him, the parts that fill Scar with warmth the moment Grian closes his eyes in defeat and leans a fraction of an inch closer, cave with the relief that Grian isn’t running from him. Not yet anyway.

First, Scar turns Grian around. With careful hands he raises the hem of his hoodie to inspect the clusters of bruises on the skin of his back. Shades of purple and blue drown out the faint dusting of freckles across the small of his back. Scar ghosts his palms over the bruises, over the vertebrae down the middle of Grian’s back. 

“Are you hurting here?” Scar asks, pressing the heel of his palm across Grian’s back, where the  ribs meet his spine. “Does it hurt when you breathe?”

Grian shakes his head, shivering under the touch but not cringing away in pain. The smallest relief— the tiniest room for Scar to breathe. Fractured ribs are above his pay grade. Hell, he’s pretty sure even a busted lip is far too advanced for someone as clumsy and untalented in first-aid as Scar. But for whatever reason, despite everything, Grian still trusts him. He won’t let him down again. 

“Let me see your face.” Scar turns Grian back around. 

His skin jumps when Scar’s hand touches the side of his face. He’s as gentle as he can be, barely grazing the calloused pads of his fingers over the crest of Grian’s cheek. Where the swelling is the worst and where the bruise is dark and blistering. A cruel watercolor on paper skin. He’s careful when he takes a small damp rag (one thing he’s retained from what felt like endless nights on Grian’s futon, watching him tend to whatever little scrapes and bruises he accumulated throughout the night) and drags it over Grian’s cheeks, nose, and lips, taking with it any dried blood. He then dabs at the gash on the side of Grian’s head. The blood had made it look worse than it was, but he still probably should have it looked at. 

The entire time Grian sits as rigid as a wooden board, his breath coming in short pants through his nose. They’re close enough that Scar can feel each hot, strained breath fanning across his cheeks and nose. 

It’s painful to look at him— bruises and glassy eyes alike— but Scar’s been selfish enough. This is his punishment. He can’t hide from the pain he’s caused, from the dangers he’s forced Grian into. He has to take responsibility for this beyond throwing fists and spilling another man’s blood. 

“Stop,” Grian whispers, eyes shut, humming with displeasure. He looks oddly childish like this.

“What?” Scar’s lips twitch at the corners. “What am I doing?” 

“Thinking.” Grian licks his lips. “I can hear the gears turning. It’s annoying.” 

Scar’s heart dips. The same drop in your stomach when in a free-fall after the crest of a rollercoaster. Only the dive is slow and tortuous, the pit in your gut bottomless. “You could’ve died,” he says. 

“But I didn’t. I called you.” 

Scar doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the blood-cold terror that flooded him at the sound of Grian’s muffled shouts through his phone. “You shouldn’t have had to. You were hurt just because you know me. Maybe it’s better if you—”

“Don’t finish that sentence. I’m not a damsel.”  

There’s nothing Scar wants more. He’d rather pretend. He’d rather smile and laugh and say he’ll protect Grian no matter where they went, but how can he? “Knowing me is dangerous. My secret identity isn’t enough to protect you. I’m not enough to protect you. Maybe you’ll be safer without me.”

Grian opens his eyes. His face creases, a small dissatisfied scrunch that makes Scar’s heart flutter. “It’ll hurt me worse if you go.” 

Scar leans back, pulling his hands away as if Grian’s skin had shocked him. Like when Grian wore socks on the carpet and purposefully shuffled his feet back and forth as quickly as possible to build up tons of static energy and chase Scar around the apartment with his finger wielded like a sword. Only Grian’s not smiling and giggling. And Scar’s not running away. 

They’re staring at each other, Grian the most severe and hard-faced he’s ever seen him. Grian’s looking at him like he’s the most important thing in that room, like he’s drowning and Scar’s the only thing tethering him to solid ground. 

“Scar?” 

Scar jerked his head up. It took force to look away from the man who’d taken Grian. From his handiwork, the blood splattered on the asphalt. The bodies dropped around the parking garage, rolling and groaning in pain with arrows in their shoulders and shins. 

But when he raised his head Grian was staring back at him. Blood covered his mouth and cheek, his hair matted with it, a gash on his temple that stained the collar of his favorite sweater red. The red sweater Scar had bought him for his birthday. Grian never said it was his favorite, but Scar knew. Some days it felt like he knew everything about Grian. 

But that face— the desperation with which Grian stared at him, was completely unfamiliar. Scar stood shocked as Grian picked himself shakily off the ground and stumbled towards Scar. It was the only thing needed to shock Scar out of his trance. To propel him forward and catch Grian in his arms, to wrap his arms delicately around his shoulders and nestle his face into the crook of his neck. The desperate, short pants of air against the bare skin of his neck soothed the furious, angry pounding in Scar’s chest. 

“I got you,” Scar muttered, ignoring the way his own hands shook as he curled his fingers in Grian’s hair. “It’s okay.”

***

To Scar, the city is quieter than it’s ever been.

It’s his heart that’s loud, drumming like a rock star who’s getting paid for each drumstick he snaps hitting the tambourine. Poor guy’s got no sense or rhythm, striking each frantic beat like he’s somehow misunderstood the assignment and is trying to break his arms in two instead. It’s Grian that’s deafening— the creak of old dormitory plumbing as he shuts the shower off, the near-timid shutting of drawers, the little hitch in his breath. 

Closing his eyes, Scar tries to picture the bruises instead of trying to forget them. How they stretched across Grian’s back, how he might accidentally pull something tender, lifting a comb to his hair and biting back a hiss of pain, how the suds of shampoo must’ve stung the asphalt scrapes on his cheeks. Each and every detail, Scar ays again and again until he’s sure it’ll never leave him— like an old computer screen burned-in with a display left on it too long. 

Does this make him a masochist? Scar sighs and slumps against the door, his skull hitting the wood with a dull thunk. He’s tired. He’s angry. His split knuckles are still hungry. More blood, more justice, more payback. But that’s not what either of them need. Scar knows that. He knows it, but it doesn’t make it a truth any less difficult to swallow. 

But memorizing Grian’s misery the same way he had Grian’s joy— laugh lines soft around the eyes and the hitch to his shoulders when he giggles— that’s what Scar needs to remember. 

You can’t have one without the other. Is it worth it?

He’s afraid he already knows the answer. He’s never hated himself more. 

Before Scar registers the dull click of the lock, the door behind him suddenly disappears and he flops flat on his back on the bathroom tile. A thin wall of steam passes over his face before he’s draped in a dark shadow. Grian stares down at him with wide, red-rimmed eyes— God, Scar hopes he just got shampoo in his eye— and a little scowl that tosses Scar right back in time. Covered in vinegar and shattered glass, a cute boy with cute goggles in a cute lab coat looking at him with an upside-down frown like he was some mysterious creature on the dissection table.

As much as Scar would love to go back, he couldn’t. He couldn’t give it up. Because misery and joy both, for Scar, are worth it. Whether it’s his or Grian’s. They are worth it. And doesn’t Grian feel the same?

“It’ll hurt me worse if you go,” is all Scar can hear when Grian mumbles something. 

He blinks, not thinking to sit back up. “Huh? Whadda?”

The corner of Grian’s mouth quirks. “I said, what are you doing down here?” 

“Oh!” Scar’s lip wobbles. “Admiring the view?” 

“Move,” Grian scoffs. It’s the most beautiful sound, the one that disrupts the drummer’s furious beat in his chest. Scar’s never been happier to hear it. Even when Grian nudges him with his foot, like he’s nothing more than a pile of dirty laundry left abandoned in the doorway that he’s too lazy to step over. 

Scar wastes no time scrambling back to his feet, bracing his weight in the doorframe in a way that sort of traps Grian inside the bathroom, but it’s the most selfish of seconds Scar needs to look at him properly, without blood rushing to his head or upside down optical illusions to disrupt the sight. His face is cleaner, and if Scar squints and lets the shower steam cloud his vision, he can pretend nothing’s happened. He can pretend the scratch high on Grian’s cheekbone is nothing more than a streak of red pen Scar made as Grian dozed off over his homework— just to prove he could get away with it. 

He could pretend that the bags under Grian’s eyes are a product of nothing other than a long, stressful week slaving away at lab reports and repeating failed experiments. Scar knows next to nothing about the type of work Grian does when he tugs on that coat and puts on his goggles, and he understands far less, but at least Grian would be tired doing what he enjoyed doing. He’d be tired, but he’d be okay, and if he wasn’t it wouldn’t be Scar’s fault.

Maybe that’s selfish, wishing Grian’s misery was someone else’s responsibility, just so he didn’t have to carry the weight with him when he finally shifted out of the doorway to let Grian out. 

“Feeling any better?” Scar asks, mouth stale as if he’d stuffed his cheeks with cotton balls. 

Grian keeps his weight on one side, hugging his arm to his side as he shrugs. The sleeves of his shirt hang low, but not low enough. It’s impossible to ignore his wrists, a strip of swollen red ringing his pale wrists. A souvenir of Scar’s failures; not a permanent one, Scar has to remind himself. Grian will heal. He just wishes he didn’t have to heal to start with. 

“I could make you something else to eat?” Grian had made it clear his appetite was paper-thin with his pecking at Scar’s mediocre sandwich earlier. But Scar needs to do something. Something other than just standing there, slack jawed and desperate to prove that he can do something. 

Somehow, Grian manages to smile at him. It’s weak, brittle. But it’s undoubtedly Grian’s and the sight unravels a tight stitch in Scar’s chest before the wound has healed shut. But that’s alright. Scar’s used to bleeding. It’ll only be a matter of time before Grian patches him back together again, even if he doesn’t even know he’s doing it. 

“I appreciate the sandwich, Scar,” Grian says. “But you should really stick with crime fighting.”

Scar winces, a nervous chuckle caught in his throat. It tasted like bile. “That bad, huh?” 

“It was a lot of jelly.”

“What? Jelly’s the best part!” 

Grian pulls a face that, despite the bruises and scrapes and eye-bags, makes him look ten years younger. It’s a Grian that Scar can imagine on the other side of the playground, insisting he’s too big to play with the other kids on the swings or the jungle gym, instead insistent on loitering by the blacktop and waiting for someone to throw the basketball his way. It’s a Grian that makes Scar wonder if maybe he can be a kid again too. He can meet Grian earlier and start again; he can let go of duty and fear and regret and toss a ball across a blacktop.It’s a Grian that Scar only sees when he thinks Scar isn’t looking directly at him, as if he thinks he can hide little shards of authenticity in Scar’s blindspot.

Unfortunately for him, Scar has no blindspots. Not when it comes to Grian. 

“I’m probably just gonna—” Grian gestures over his shoulder to his bedroom door with his thumb. 

“Right,” Scar says, stamping down the flickering flame of disappointment threatening to spark on the spilt oil inside of his chest. He has no right to Grian’s time or presence. Not after everything that’s happened. But that doesn’t stop him from wanting. It will never stop him from needing it. “Of course. Big day, big day.” 

Grian gnaws on his lower lip, weary, watery eyes flickering between Scar’s, before he turns around to duck inside his bedroom. 

Scar digs his heels into the hardwood to keep himself from reaching for Grian. Instead, he digs his nails into his palm and asks, “Will you be okay?’

The words tug Grian back like a leash around his throat. He staggers to a stop, head hung as he grasps the doorframe with one hand. There’s a little patch of peeling paint that he starts picking at, little white flecks coming off on his fingers and fluttering to the ground, revealing a light pine wood beneath it. Grain drags the pad of his thumb over the exposed spot. 

Scar waits. He’ll always wait. 

When Grian finds his voice again he says, “You don’t have to go.” He doesn’t look at Scar. He doesn’t ask. Scar knows Grian never can ask, even if he doesn’t know why. Even if it kills Scar— like somehow drowning on dry land— every time Grian looks at him a second too long.

Even if Grian had kicked him out, he wouldn’t have been able to leave. He’d camp out on the fire-escape if he had to, just to be sure. Just to make sure Grian was safe. America’s most ineffective, charismatic security system. Keep you safe at the low low cost of your unending companionship, except for when you need it most! Dial XXX-XXX-XXXX now for a 50% discount on your first installation!

“Okay,” Scar says quietly so as not to disrupt the faux peace. If Grian wants to pretend, then fine. He’ll pretend. “I’ll take the couch?” 

Grain finally looks at him, bottom lip caught in his teeth. His hair’s only halfway dry, a bit frizzy at the top and fringe in his eyes, and with his glasses and shower-red cheeks he looks a particular kind of squeezable that Scar would immediately give into if he wasn’t bruised to hell. Maybe he can save up— a cute aggression piggy-bank.

But then Grian’s puffy eyes sweep Scar head to toe and he scowls. “Not dressed like that.” 

“Hey!” Scar barks— rearing to tell Grian that he spent hours designing this exact outfit and as far as he was concerned it was tailored to perfection— before remembering the state of his suit. Of him. Stinking of sweat and anxiety and tarnished metal. Torn, pilled, stained with everyone else’s blood but his own. Though Scar’s not sure which is worse: being covered in his own blood or Grian’s? To Scar there’s a clear answer, but he has an inkling Grian would fight him on it, as he tends to fight Scar on anything that he deems important enough to disagree over. 

It’d be a fight of epic proportions— the biggest since the dreadful March Pickle Debate. 

“Yeah—“ Scar mutters, picking at a hole burned torn in the ribs of his shirt, tugging loose, fraying threads free. He tries to ignore the blood that flakes off his fingers. “Fair.” 

“Hang on.” Grian disappears into the dark pit that is his bedroom, shortly shuffling around before he comes out with a folded pair of pants.

Scar recognizes them immediately, so he hesitates to reach out for them. 

“Is there a problem?” Grian raises an eyebrow at him. “They’re literally yours.”

“That’s not—” Scar chokes on his retort. “I mean. Yeah. I know.”

“Good,” Grian says, pressing them into Scar’s chest and forcing him to accept it. At the very least Scar’s glad to see the debacle hasn’t completely stripped Grian of what makes him so uniquely irresistible. A type of grit and bite that Scar couldn’t love any more.

Scar stares down at the pajama pants, running his thumbs over the fuzzy fabric and trying to remember a time where they felt like his instead of Grian’s. And somehow in that slip of time, they end up right back where they started. Grian, hunched in his bedroom doorway, awkward and hesitant in all the wrong, painful ways. He hesitates, like he wants to say something. He even opens his mouth— halfway there— and Scar leans forward with nothing but the hope and prayers unspoken on his tongue that Grian will say it. 

Whatever Grian wanted, Scar would grant. If only Grian would ask.

But he doesn’t. The only sound in that awful, bitter silence is the shaky breath Grian draws in as he clamps his lips shut and tugs at the collar of his shirt. It’s a silence so caustic that Scar misses the pounding of that self-destructive drummer, or the pained hisses behind the bathroom door. Because at least through a door, Grian didn’t hide from him. Through the door, the truth could creep through, as if he thought those few inches of wood protected him from Scar’s hawk-eye (pun intended).

But this? Grian pulling his arms tighter into himself, waiting to shut the door between them and hiding the fear that Scar knows is there— it’s torture. No, It’s worse. Scar would’ve rather endured ten vex militias piled on top of one another with a little ravager as a cherry on the top— so long as it was him battered. Not Grian. 

At least when Scar breaks, Grian knows how to put him back together. 

Grian looks at him, and sounding every bit as hurt as he looks, whispers, “Good night, Scar.” 

Before Scar can manage a quiet “Good night,” of his own, Grian shuts the door with a soft click. 

***

Church was never really Scar’s thing growing up, though he remembers his mom stuffing him in a suit that was one size too big in order to shamble into church on Sunday mornings. It wasn’t lack of care on  his parents’ part. In fact, they were pretty fanatical about the whole God thing, though most of the time Scar spent with his head tilted back, staring at the pretty stained glass and wondering what’d it’d take to get his likeness up there, a pretty mirage of red and golden glass, right alongside the big man himself. He’d forgotten the sermons, the Sunday school lessons, the communions. Gospel and prayer rolling off him like water from a duck’s back. 

Now, he wishes he’d paid attention. Because lying on Grian’s futon, a blood stain right beside his head that he’d left behind months earlier, in the heart-patterned pajama pants he’d given Grian with (selfishly) the intent to see Grian wearing his clothes, feels something close to sacrilege. Like he’d cursed in front of the crucifix, or used God’s name in vain when playing a violent video game. But this feels worse. Because Scar never feared God. 

Though he does fear Grian.

He fears what he means to Scar; he fears how easily it is for someone to know all it takes to hurt Scar is to hurt Grian. 

He’s wearing the pants he gave Grian. Grian should be wearing them, curled up in his excessive mound of blankets that he doesn’t need because Scar isn’t climbing through his open window tonight. Sure, they were his to begin with and the only thing in Grian’s closet that would fit Scar without making him look like a pilgrim. But right now he’s lying on his couch, staring at the moonlit shadows drawn across the popcorn ceiling and wondering if he can remember what prayer feels like. If it’s a muscle you can lose, or if it’s like riding a bike. 

What will he even pray for? He’s never done Scar any favors before. Why would he start now?

Scar sighs and turns onto his side, curling up as tight as the skinny futon will allow and pillowing his hand between his knees. The fabric even smells like Grian— like the cinnamon candles he’s hellbent on burning no matter the time of the year. It feels tight in all the wrong places, like he’s an intruder in his own skin. 

It’s all Scar can do to shut his eyes and to breathe. To drown out the sound of the stirring city with the thudding of his heart and pretending it’s Grian’s— pretending he has some kind of power that lets him hear every twitch of Grian’s muscles from the next room over. Just to be sure he’s okay. It’s all he can do to keep from trying to pray for such a gift, to keep from turning to a higher deity that he doesn’t even like for a problem Scar had no problem causing all on his own. 

Sleep comes to him in fuzzy spurts, in some he’s not even sure time’s passing at all, and others he can tell he slept at least for a little while due to the small collection of drool on the cushion. If he’s not tossing, he’s dozing, and the second he does it feels like he’s snapping back to reality— a sharp, sudden wash of cold, a ringing in his ears that sounds all too similar to Grian’s ragged, terrified breathing through the phone speaker. 

He doesn’t dare look at the clock. The last thing he needs is any sort of quantitative proof of his failure to one— pretend to be casual and normal and fine it— and two— sleep enough that he doesn’t give Grian another reason to fret over him in the morning. Scar huffs in frustration, twisting the throw-blanket to cover his bare chest as he turns over onto his other side.

It’s dark, but the glimpses of light from buildings opposite the alley cast a small mosaic of blue and orange specks across the floor. Or— what should be the floor. Scar furrows his brow, staring at the strange shape of the carpet. It wasn’t like that before, was it? 

Its not until he sits up and rubs the haze from his eyes that he makes out the soft breathing— like hearing a song playing in a noisy restaurant and squinting your eyes to try to hear it better. The nondescript lump sharpens into rising and falling shoulders wrapped in a blanket, Grian asleep on his side with his comforter haphazardly pulled over him. On the floor.

Scar blinks a few times— just in case, because it wouldn’t be the weirdest mundane dream he’s ever had— but after one second, after ten, Grian’s still there, snoozing away. Somehow he looks peaceful, despite the fact that he’s curled up on the hardwood with nothing more than a comforter and a pillow that’s not even fully under his head. But will waking him do any good? Grian needs sleep— maybe even if that means he gets it on the floor— but he’s also hurt. Probably a lot more than he’s been willing to let on. Each time Scar had pressed into a bruise, expecting a flinch or a groan, all Grian did was grit his teeth and say “It doesn’t hurt.”

Of course Scar knew he was lying. He’d been there, bruises and cuts aching but pride an even more tender wound. Though that hadn’t made it hurt any less, seeing that same reluctance on Grian’s face. Grian— whose only crime had been caring about Scar. 

He can’t leave him here. Not where his neck will be sore in the morning. So Scar slides carefully off the futon and onto the ground next to Grian’s mediocre makeshift bed. Grian doesn’t do so much as stir, face slack and half-turned into his pillow as he softly snores. It pains Scar to reach out, to touch the bed of curls— less out of guilt of waking him and more out of the memory of what it felt like greasy and blood-crusted as Scar carded his fingers through. 

They’re soft, if not still the slightest bit damp. Scar drags his fingers over Grian’s forehead, his scalp, before resting at the bundle of baby hairs against Grian’s nape. He lightly squeezes it the way he knows Grian likes but can never admit to. 

“Grian,” he says in a whisper. “Wakey wakey, sleeping beauty.” 

He thinks it’s the best thing he can do. And maybe it is, but that doesn’t mean it’s enough. Grian jerks awake, a sharp inhale painfully loud in his throat as he reaches instinctively for Scar’s wrist. Dark eyes blown wide in panic, Grian’s about to explode out of his skin before Scar tightens his hold on his neck and gives him the tiniest jostle.

“Hey, hey, G,” he shushes, cupping Grian’s cheek with the other hand and angling his face to Scar’s. “Look, look! It’s just me.”

Grian’s cheek trembles under Scar’s feather-light touch. “I—”

“It’s okay.” Scar drags his thumb over Grian’s nape, the skin soft and chilly. He’s not used to doing the comforting. He can only hope it’s good enough, or the next closet thing. “You’re okay. You’re safe.” 

Almost as quickly as it’d blanched in fear, Grian’s face flickers and settles. He sighs, a content little sound as he dips his head into Scar’s hand as if intending on using it as a pillow. So when Scar forces his head back up an inch, Grian only clamps onto his wrist with an unhappy grumble. Under any other circumstances Scar would’ve laughed at the sound. 

There’s a lot Scar would do differently, if the circumstances were anything but this. If none of this ever happened. If the world wasn’t cruel to him and let him have pretty things without threatening to crush them. 

Thanks, God, I guess.

Smile strained and made out of paper-mache, Scar continues to card his other hand through Grian’s hair. “Well hello there,” he says. “Whatcha doing on the floor, G?” 

Grian looks up at him, eyes puffy and weary and his mouth flat. And without so much as a word, he lifts the edge of the comforter. 

Scar blinks, and as tempting as it is to climb inside Grian’s invitation without a second of complaint, he has to complain. For Grian’s sake.  “It can’t be comfy down here, Grian—”

Grian’s only response is a very deliberate and very impatient shake of the comfort he’s still holding up, arm shaking from the effort it takes to hold it up, half asleep and at such an odd angle, at that. And really, when Grian’s looking at Scar with those big eyes, what is a man to do? He’s only so strong. 

Those villains were right to come after Grian. This will be the death of Scar. 

It doesn’t matter that the cool hardwood saps Scar’s warmth from his bare back, it doesn’t matter that his hips and lower back will definitely ache for a day or two. What matters is Grian’s head pillowed over his heart— jeez, he hopes this drummer reels it in— and the hand on his chest, hot and heavy as a brand. One Scar is all too happy to sport. 

So long as Grian’s here, Scar doesn’t care how he gets it. Or what he has to give up to keep it there, to keep him safe. 

It’s quiet for a moment, for a few of them. It’s quiet, because Scar’s focusing hard on not holding his breath and listening too keenly for Grian’s. He can feel it— his beating heart, his breathing, the puff of air across his collarbones. Doesn’t scare him any less. 

Fingers ghosting over Grian’s hair, Scar mumbles, “This is uncomfortable.” 

“Get over it.” The words are more tangible than they are audible, a huff of warm air across Scar’s chest that makes his skin erupt in goosebumps. 

“I will if you tell me why we’re lying down here. It just seems a little… y’know.”

“Are you giving me an ultimatum?” Grian asks without a lick of bite to his words. “After I got pummeled? Chivalry been dead that long already?”

“Exactly. You got pummeled,” Scar says, dismayed, and more than anything surprised to find himself on this end of the argument. Usually it’s Scar, dizzy with blood loss or Grian’s close proximity (though more likely an intoxicating concoction of both), spouting out nonsense to mess with Grian. It’s strange hearing Grian’s tongue so loose, though Scar’s half sure that’s because he’s not even fully awake. 

“I couldn’t sleep.” 

“So you decided to come sleep on the cold, hard floor,” Scar teases. “And here I thought you were the next Einstein.” 

“Ew, don’t say that.” Grian huffs and lightly hits Scar’s chest with the hand resting over his diaphragm. There’s no heat to it, no power, and all it manages to do is make Scar smile a painful, adoring smile. “Don’t make me say it.” 

Scar holds his breath. Say what, he wants to ask. He wants to push and prod and unpeel Grian layer by layer until he finds all the little questions and requests he’s been hiding away, too scared to show Scar for reasons Scar’s not sure he’ll ever comprehend. What’s the point of this— of them— otherwise?

“I won’t,” Scar says in lieu of pushing. His luck’s already a thinning, fragile thing he can’t bear the thought of losing. Not yet, at least. Not when this is the closest Grian’s been in a while, not just in proximity but in vulnerability as well. He can feel Grian’s quickening heartbeat against his own ribcage. Scar wishes he could tell it to slow down, to give Grian a bit of mercy. But all he can really do is hold him. So Scar does. 

He doesn’t know how long they lie there for. But eventually when Grian’s breath starts to even out and Scar assumes he’s drifted off to sleep again, he says, “Did I ever tell you I have a sister?”

Scar freezes, thinking for a second he fell asleep and he was dreaming this. “No,” he says carefully. “Is she older or younger than you?” 

“Older,” Grian says, a bit too quickly considering the way he chuckles after.  “Only by about two minutes, though she’ll never let you forget it.” 

“You have a twin?” Not that it’s beyond surprising itself, but more so that the revelation makes Scar realize just how little he knows about Grian beyond this little college apartment and his lab coats and the fact that the little golden stain on the left pocket is from chicken nugget grease and not the pH solution Grian tells people it’s from. 

“Before you ask,” Grian says. “The twin telepathy thing isn’t real. There’s no science for it.”

A small smirk tugs at the corner of Scar’s mouth, despite himself. Grian really knows him too well. “Right,” he says, moving one of his hands to rest in the center of Grian’s back so he can feel the rumbling of his voice through his body when he speaks. “Science. Of course.” 

“When we were eight,  Pearl and I snuck-watched this R-rated horror movie behind our parents’ backs.” Grian speaks in an almost disinhibited way, like he’s not realizing just how much his tongue’s been knocked loose. “I mostly thought it was funny, but she had nightmares so bad she couldn’t sleep for days. We didn’t wanna get in trouble, so I started sleeping in her room at night to keep her from waking our parents up with her nightmares.”

That image is back with fierce vengeance— a young Grian, eight-years-old now, maybe with two front teeth that have grown a bit too big for his face yet and eyes that took up more space in his head. “I’m sure you’re a great brother. Even if she’s older than you,” Scar teases.

Scar can feel the twitch of Grian’s cheeks when he attempts to smile. “She said it made her feel safe, having me there. I made a big stink about it, teasing her for being a scaredy-cat, but… really, I was glad she asked me to.”

Running his fingers through Grian’s hair again, just to keep his hands busy enough to keep them from anxiously wandering across Grian’s skin again, checking for more injuries, Scar waits for him to continue.  

“I wish I could say I did it for her—  just because she asked, but that’s not true,” Grian says, his voice now so quiet and small that Scar strains to hear it. “I wasn’t a great brother. I was selfish. I had nightmares too. Not about the movie, I’d had them for a few months before— the same dream every single night. I’d wake up, like I was just getting ready for school, but when I came downstairs no one was there. My dad wasn’t making breakfast, my mom wasn’t getting ready for work. And I’d sit and wait at the table and I’d wait and I’d wait but no matter how long I sat there, no one ever came. Pearl’s bedroom was empty. Hell, even our cat was gone. It was just me, and it—“

Grian’s voice falters, but he persists. “It always felt so real. It tricked me every time.”

Scar doesn’t understand what Grian is trying to tell him. Not yet at least, but if he knows one thing about Grian its that nothing comes easy. Feelings, honesty, it comes like pulling teeth. Luckily for Grian, Scar’s good at being patient. He sits and waits and he pets Grian’s hair all the while, afraid one wrong move, word, or breath will shatter the spell that’s come over Grian and send him spiraling into silence once again.

“They didn’t go away. Not really. But at least when I woke up, I knew if I was dreaming or not because Pearl was right there next to me. I didn’t have to sit in my bedroom wondering if they’d be there when I got the courage to get up.” 

A tiny fracture ripples through Scar’s chest. “For how long?” 

“Long as I can remember, really,” Grian says, but not despairingly. He says it with the same objective, if not resigned, disconnect he used when he was telling Scar about his experiment groups or how expensive the newest microbiology textbook would be next semester. “It didn’t take long for Pearl’s nightmares to go away. So I went back to sleeping in my room.”

“And your dreams?” 

“I couldn’t tell her,” Grian says. “I couldn’t ask.” 

Scar understands now. He hates that it’s taken him this long, that he’s so blinded by his worry for Grian’s reluctance that he couldn’t see the question right there in front of him. 

“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you,” Scar says. “You know that, right?”

“I know. That’s what scares me.” 

Grian sniffs, and Scar wonders if he’s also remembering the sounds of fists against skin as Scar tore through man after man in the parking garage to get to him. He can’t blame him, regardless. Though Scar isn’t sorry for it. He wasn’t then, isn’t now, and he’s sure he never will be. 

They had it coming the second they touched him. 

But Scar can’t talk about it. Not now, not when Grian’s finally asked him for something— something Scar will give him time and time again without needing anything in return. He pulls his arms tighter around Grian, though careful not to press too harshly on the bruises he’s already mapped and memorized along his spine and biceps. He pulls Grian up until his nose is buried into the junction of Scar’s neck and Scar can wrap both arms around him properly. 

“I mean,” Scar says with the slightest chuckle muffled by Grian’s bedhead. “What kinda monster would I have to be to turn down cuddles?”

“Do not call them cuddles,” Grian grumbles, though his attempts at trying to squirrel free are half-hearted at best. 

“Oh no, mister.” Scar only holds him tighter. “It’s too late now. I’m cuddling you. It’s cuddle time. You’re just gonna have to deal with it, I’m afraid.” 

It works. Grian laughs, even though it’s a quiet, private sound. It’s the only thing Scar will ever need. Forget the drummer in his chest or the distant wailing of an ambulance a few streets over. 

After a second of peace— the real kind, this time, and not the bandaid they’ve been plastering over their silences since Scar brought Grian back home— Scar works up the courage to prod Grian between the shoulder blades. “You wanna stay on the floor still?” he asks. 

“I don’t—” Grian falters. “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

“I’m tough, I’m strong, I’m hardy. Some old hardwood has nothing on me!” Scar smiles, hoping that Grian can hear it. “I wanna know where you will be most comfy.” 

“Erm…” Grian’s fingers drum an anxious, restless beat against Scar’s collarbone. The other tucks beneath his chin as he curls further into Scar’s warmth. “I don’t… know.”

“That’s okay,” Scar says, and he’s never meant anything more. “We can stay here until you figure it out.”