Chapter Text
Dawn breaks peculiarly and Till jolts awake. Groggy, unpleasantly alert, he sits up, blankets heavy atop a hangover and the nagging, persistent sense that something is wrong. Cramped. The room filters into sensibility, rattling through his skull like puzzle pieces.
Yesternight courses into mind like a tsunami. He checks his boxers. Dry. Still on.
Because life is not guaranteed, and he has to feed himself, he goes to work.
“Yo,” leaps one of his coworkers by. “They fixed the radio last week.”
“Hm.”
“Pass me that screwdriver, kid. …This is a hammer. Screwdriver.”
“Hm.”
It’s so bad that his supervisor finally caves and politely suggests that he take the week off, paid.
So Till goes looking for Ivan. It isn’t the first time, nor will it be the last. It’s clumsy work.
The metal door to the back of the kitchen where Ivan volunteers is unlocked, but nobody is manning the reception area. He stops and looks around uncertainly at rows of locked doors in the dark. Low conversation and rustling papers fall from farther up front. A few families wait furtively behind the produce desk, divided from the workspace. Pallets block the road.
Feeling adventurous, he carves through aisles of canned food and broken boxes, trawling the warehouse Ivan rambles about fondly when he thinks Till isn’t listening.
Things are quiet today. Less imports to sort since planets started getting blown up again.
Quick hands hesitate as volunteers take the time to smile at him and point the way.
There are traces of Ivan everywhere he stops. Calendars thick with clippings mark his meddling, and the bright sticky notes dotted with his smudged, crowded handwriting are actually Till’s. A wistfulness runs through him when he finds one of his drafting pencils smothered in pages of scribbled lists (donations, names, dates). Its thief is easy to sniff out.
Lights are off in the break room. He nearly passes it, but the side of his neck itches violently with all its concomitant worries.
When sun barges into the room, it glows white against the tile floor, uncovers a table crowded with snacks and, with a few more hesitant steps, peels back the obsidian edges that make up the top of Ivan’s head.
Stirring from sleep, the culprit squints, confused.
Tension unravels all at once across Till’s shoulders and he exhales, “Loser.”
Oddly, the man doesn’t reply. His gaze drifts around the room before nodding off, and he puts his head down with a yawn.
It occurs to Till that he should have been more vigilant. “Did you sleep at all last night?”
“I’m fine,” Ivan mumbles, which means no, probably four hours.
“No, you’re stupid.” With a mind to push him awake, Till touches his back. It’s soaked. Scalding! Fingers flying away, he flinches. The rancid smell of oranges from before floods into focus so forcefully that he has to slap an arm over his mouth, lightheaded. A little disgusted cough slips through Till’s throat. “You’re sick,” he realizes. “Why didn’t you call me? Or stay home?”
Ivan shakes his head weakly. “I’m not sick. My cycle caught up and it’s making me a little ill.”
Unsure, Till blinks, shuffling through diluted memories. Had he never noticed? A lump rises in his throat, mixing with thick saliva. “Urgh,” he says, figuring to help without feeding or demolishing Ivan’s voluptuous ego. “Um. Hmm. You look ill though. Does it hurt?”
Instead of responding with bullsh*t or a biting I’m sure you can see that it does, Ivan sighs. He hides his neck with a wrist. His voice comes out straight, soothing, with a strange unlifted tone. “You look close to passing out, and my heat isn’t helping. Get away from me.” Heart pounding sharply, unable to quell a well of pity, Till watches the line of Ivan’s shoulders shake as Ivan wipes glistening sweat off the glands below his ear with a sleeve.
It would be so easy. How long has he been here, in the dark, alone?
Something skitters up Till’s spine.
“No, we’re going home.” Till kicks him from the chair.
With uncharacteristic force Ivan pushes him off. Turning his back, he sways the few steps to the door, fingers flattening the patch against his nape, and as he keeps walking forward a perfect red picture erupts into the present, the ghosts of small children running past their side.This time Till calls after him with annoyance. Rotten sneakers break grassy puddles of bottled water standing on the wood floor. Dust sparkles, kicked up from brooms and the warm air from wide fans marking the path they came.
Ivan bounces from wall to wall but is otherwise fine, and clearly a stone. He doesn’t smile.
“Don’t ignore me!” Till boils once they’re home. “What’s your goddamn deal?”
Ivan takes a rehearsed breath. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while, but it’s better if you move out. This rebellion thing was a good run. I’m glad you showed me the ropes. Fortunately I didn’t have any issues until now but it was bound to happen eventually.” His demeanor softens artificially. “I’ll hide away here for a few days, that’s all. You don’t have to follow me out of pity.”
“What the f*ck are you talking about?” It clicks. “You think I’m still on your sh*tty suicide story?”
Ivan whirls around and grabs his throat. On instinct Till’s hands fly to his forearms.
His fists pound against Ivan’s chest. A scuffle. They stumble backwards.
Then Till’s back hits the wall and it slaps all the breath out of him.
Unforgiving pressure closes against his windpipe. Choking, Till gasps. Static, his skin and he’s back on camera. Empty. His body is not his own. He wheezes. His scratches grow weaker.
But it’s nothing like before. That silver water washed clean and sterile, and in the shock of it Ivan had grabbed him gently, as self-effacing as that rain. Instead now a crisp inescapable burst of oranges crackles through the air. This is unrecognizably colorful.
Till gurgles, miserable. Overwhelming emotion pricks at his cheeks. With unrecognizable pupils swollen completely black, Ivan bears down with his full weight and strength. Dark spots flit around his feral face.
Relief crushes Till like a tight hug.
I’m fine going like this, he thinks, giddy, and finds he isn’t afraid. His arms drop to his sides, palms pressed flat against the wall.
All he can hear narrows to breathing.
Out. In. Out.
Ivan’s grip slackens. “I’m sorry.” Ears ringing, air shoots in with a gasp but all Ivan does is stroke the tender indentations looping like a noose around his neck. Like that.
“What? What the f*ck?” Till slaps him off. The words come out high and reedy. Hysterical. “I’m not your victim, you psycho.”
But there’s no shot when Ivan opens his mouth. His jaw cracks shut with the force of Till’s punch. Oh goody, he’s pissed, so familiarly pissed that the parasitic ever-present pit of annoyance has crawled into his stomach and screams to be satiated.
Till happens to be in an indulgent mood today.
He slams all the cabinets open, clattering stacks of plates carelessly. Four glasses roll across the counter. A large square bottle with a thick neck rifles into his grasp, and Till also slams it against the table and pours himself four transparent drinks, neat.
When Ivan makes a sound, Till tosses one back immediately. Repours it with excessive force. Coughs. “I’m too sober for this,” he scoffs manically. “Every time I see you it’s a new headache.”
“I’m sorry about that,” Ivan responds dumbly.
“Yeah, should be.” Tipsy, Till swallows another bite of warmth. “I know you, hate humans and you think ev-veryone here sucks. I think you suck. Never fitting in with the people you don’t like.” I could kiss him, he considers suddenly. I could pin him against the wall and rip his face apart and he wouldn’t refuse, he wouldn’t try a thing.
But Till knows how it feels to be pinned. He can’t do that to another pet.
Ivan’s eyes, like black holes, bore into his shoulder, pulling bits into their centers.
“Say,” Till drags into another glass. “Was that k-k-kiss worth it?”
That hazy gaze drops with a smile. “So you don’t get it.”
“This annoying bastard—”
“We were live,” Ivan enunciates. “I had nothing better to do.”
It’s easy to understand. Disappointment twisting, Till suddenly feels very small.
It isn’t like Ivan to say that. It wasn’t like them to lose steam. They both gave up at the end.
Wounds too raw to ignore, Till lashes out like a hit dog. “You’re a piece of trash. Doing sh*t like a creep when I’m not looking. f*ck off. That time in th-the bar, what was that? Huh? Who were you performing for?” Ivan’s face cracks in half. “Was that another distraction?”
“You touch me like that,” Till squeezes the back of his neck, asks, “and think nothing changes?” and his voice breaks. The shame swirls with vodka on his face. “Did you think I deserved it?”
If he keeps drinking he can block off the haywire rank of mold rising with the full weight of what neither of them wants to say.
He’s at the bottom of the third glass. Damn this pisswater.
The world numbs in bits and pieces, kitchen taking on a distinct underwater quality, and with no etiquette Till forgoes the glasses for a swig of the bottle itself. Through the tension of hot unshed tears the drops fall on his Adam’s apple like snow and he thinks in incoherent terms wow. What am I doing? What do I know I hope I overdose on this nasty gasoline sewage. I want to. Bottoms up he finds Ivan quiet, shoulders slumped. Helpless.
Eyebrows crooked with distinct agitation, he glances at Till a little too young and true. What if? It’s the same way Till had looked at the back of his black head in the middle of nowhere under a falling red sky, at green lights cutting and running in rivulets before he had turned back for the girl he had loved: it wasn’t fair for anyone. He couldn’t.
A gaping, old bitterness looms at his feet. Don’t make me choose.
There are only consequences. The growing lump in Till’s throat pops.
“I’ll get out in the morning,” he spits like acid after his fourth glass. “Bitchass.”
Shoving his clothes into the backpack that he’d brought from the bar is easy (the one day stay hadn’t unpacked more than a toothbrush), but hitting the curb for bed is not.
Only a handful of friends have his number. While chewing on several unfortunate messages, he decides his supervisor needs to receive an urgent email demanding a stop to his paid time off right away and that he can sleep out on the stone-cold floor of the garage for nostalgia’s sake. Because Till is not a complete asshole, he clearly and explicitly informs Ivan of his plans.
“I’ll be back in a week to tow your coffin out.” He comes to expect no response.
Locked, the bedroom door laughs against his knuckles. Ivan hasn’t said a word to him since yesterday. As if his presence physically pains the man. But he won’t begrudge Ivan space. Territoriality thrums a tune that he understands.
“Take care of yourself,” Till says instead of sorry for being mean and hopes that the sentiment comes through. “Cheer up.”
