The Good Side Tyrus Song Fic
It ended, as it had started, in a cafe.
Well, not a cafe per se, but the Spoon. The place you would go to grab a milkshake, some baby taters, and pour your heart out to your best friends, let them in on a secret, fall in love, and soon fall out of it. That’s what it was, a place where life happened.
The last time Cyrus walked through its doors while in high school, it had been raining. Appropriately so. Soaked in the rain, Cyrus pulled his hoodie around himself, pushing open the doors to find TJ sitting in a booth alone, staring at the empty space in front of him. He was pulling at the skin on his thumb, his hair dripping wet, and his eyes were sunken.
That wasn’t something new to Cyrus. They had both been growing apart for a while now. College and the future loomed before them, stretching the fabric of their relationship apart. They were holding on by mere threads, both refusing to acknowledge the consequences. But they weren’t fools, they knew it was coming. The decreasing number of calls, of texts, of stolen moments under the gym bleachers. It was bound to happen. But it didn’t mean Cyrus was ready for it happen just then. But he knew there was no stopping it, so he took a deep breath and walked up to the booth, sliding into the seat in front of TJ, making him look up at him.
“Hey Teej,” Cyrus said softly, pulling the sleeves of his hoodie over his hands. TJ looked up at him, giving him a small smile, but anyone could see it was forced, a facade to pretend everything was okay.
“Is everything okay?” he asked, and TJ let out a shaky breath.
“I got into University of California.”
“TJ, that’s great. I’m really happy for you,” Cyrus said, grabbing TJ’s hand, but he could feel the way TJ shrunk away. It had been a while since he had spontaneously grabbed TJ’s hand, them usually resorting to holding hands when others were around, because that’s what couples did. Just then, the waitress came and set down their two milkshakes and two baskets of baby taters. Cyrus took a sip, dipping the tater in the milkshake as he saw TJ do the same. His mind unhelpfully reminded him of a much warmer time, when only one milkshake and one basket of baby taters were on the table between them.
Cyrus let go of TJ’s hand, drawing back into himself. “You don’t seem happy.”
“No, I, I am, happy,” TJ muttered, keeping his gaze down. “But, I can’t help but think, about us. What will happen to us?”
Cyrus sighed, thinking he knew where the conversation was headed. “Yeah, that’s what we need to talk about-”
“Like, we’ll obviously FaceTime, and text. And if it’s too much we can email?”
Cyrus narrowed his eyes, looking at TJ, who was looking up at him. “W-What?”
“And every now and then, we can meet up when we have breaks. It’ll be great!” TJ said, his voice sounding more and more desperate.
“TJ,” Cyrus said softly, trying to catch his attention, but TJ was looking at his hands, his breath shallow.
“I mean, we, we can make this work. We can, cuz I love you and I know we can,” TJ said, his words hinging on wild.
“TJ,” Cyrus said forcefully, grabbing both of his hands, finally forcing TJ to stop talking and look up at him. “You know that’s not what is gonna happen.”
TJ stopped talking, gulping. He finally looked up at Cyrus, the small thread of desperate hope that he had built up finally snapping. Slowly, he looked back down, nodding slightly.
Cyrus sighed, letting go of TJ’s hands, almost thankful for the distance. “It’s not a surprise, honestly. I mean, we’ve been drifting apart for a while now, you and I know that equally well,” Cyrus continued, looking at TJ. “And, and. This is a better option than us staying together, not talking, and just growing to resent each other.”
TJ just nodded along, his eyes trained to the table. After Cyrus finished speaking, silence hung between them like a black veil, one waiting expectantly for the other to say something, anything. Finally, TJ looked up, tears brimming in his eyes.
“I just thought we could last,” he said in a broken, choked up voice.
That was what made Cyrus have to look down, because that was the one thing that had still tried to hold him back from doing what he did. They were supposed to be the ones who made it through till the end. But he couldn’t dwell on that.
Cyrus looked down at his left hand, the silver ring on his finger shining as he had been twisting it around nervously. He still remembered the way TJ had walked up to him on their one year anniversary, and had pressed it into his hand with a kiss. It’s our promise, he had said, and Cyrus had kissed him again through his tears.
How fitting that it was through tears again that Cyrus would be twisting it off, pressing it into TJ’s hand, and taking his things, and walking out of the Spoon for the last time in high school.
Even though they had drifted apart, even though this was the only way things were going to end up, Cyrus couldn’t help but feel the hollow, broken sadness spread through him like ink in water.
He was cruel, leaving behind both the rings in TJ’s hands. Like he threw it all on him and took off running, trying to escape the heartbreak and the aftermath. Like he was a coward.
Because that’s what he was, a coward. They could have made it last, could have figured out their problems, could have stuck it out. But he was scared. He was the one who left. It was all his fault.
Opening the door to his now mostly packed up room, Cyrus fell onto his bed, breathing shakily as the thoughts consumed his mind. His fault, his fault, his fault.
Tears streamed down his face like an endless waterfall, staining his shirt, and no matter how hard he tried, Cyrus couldn’t wipe it away. He reached over to his bedside drawer, pulling out his worn out notebook and fumbled around for a pen. As soon as he found one, he hastily scrawled whatever words formed a cohesive sentence in his mind, a semblance of a story emerging as he penned down the messy words. The ink ran in the places where his tears fell on the notebook, wrinkling the page, but frankly, he couldn’t really bring himself to care. After he managed to write all the feelings he could ever experience, Cyrus was so worn out that he ignored the insistent buzzing of his phone and the calls for dinner to just fall asleep.
When he came to the next day, Cyrus found it hard to peel his eyes open, the lids feeling glued together from the tears. He sniffed, pushing himself up as he rubbed his eyes, looking down at the crumpled pages of his notebook. As he flipped through the messy, tear stained words he had scrawled down, Cyrus was frankly impressed by his somewhat coherence, as a story emerged pretty clearly from the emotional mess that was his journal.
But what to do with that story?
Cyrus looked around his room curiously, trying to think of what he could do, when his eyes landed on his video camera, one he had gotten from an extended family member on the occasion of his Bar Mitzvah. Rubbing his nose, Cyrus got up from his bed and walked over to it, picking up the camera.
Well, one little silly short film to YouTube wouldn’t do much.
The effect resembled a snowball, an avalanche, but in a way that was both beautiful and gut-wrenching.
Cyrus could never have anticipated the effect posting that short film would have had. For him, it was just a way to vent, to let his emotions out, but a few days after he had posted the film he had made, Buffy and Andi ran up to him excitedly with their phones, showing him the way it had gone viral.
So he made more, not as frequently, but people who subscribed to his channel were patient. Cyrus couldn’t help but draw inspiration from everything that had happened with TJ. But it helped him heal, and he was glad of that. But he couldn’t help but feel guilty as he saw the world appreciate and cheer to TJ’s heart falling apart.
He left for Harvard soon, excited to actually go to an Ivy League college. And that was where he soon met James, a fellow classmate. It didn't take long for Cyrus to find his home in James’ arms, soon enough moving in with him, and not hesitating to tell everyone he could about it. But whenever the rare occasion came when TJ’s name popped up on his social media, Cyrus grew acutely aware of how it all probably looked to him, how he had moved on so quickly. But, that had NOT been the plan.
He would understand. Maybe not just then, but one day he would.
Turned out the fortune teller was right about Cyrus. He ended up dropping out of Harvard. Leaving to pursue directing short films, and soon his work began to gain a lot of professional and industry buzz, his work being screened at festivals of all prestige.
Cyrus couldn’t have found a better way to heal.
It started, as it ended, in a cafe.
Well, again, not a cafe, but the Spoon. The one place that had not changed in the many years of Shadyside, still home to baby taters and milkshakes, still the place for hearts to heal, break, fall and learn.
The first time Cyrus walked into the Spoon after coming up on 8 years, it was a warm and sunny spring day. Appropriately so, Cyrus running a hand through his hair as he smiled at the waitress who came to take his order. His gaze fell on the simple silver band on his left hand and he couldn’t help but smile.
Not James, no. James waltzed out of his life as smoothly as he had come in. That ring was given to him by Gabriel, a charming fellow director he had met at Sundance, and the rest was, as they say, history.
Cyrus looked around from where he sat in the booth, noting the irony at that it seemed to be the same one he had sat in the last time he was there, the mood and circumstances very much different. Today, it was about rebuilding bridges, finding old relationships and once and for all making things right.
Cyrus hoped tha when he walked in, they could catch up on everything that had happened, and he hoped he could say he was proud, as he hoped he was proud of him. He wanted to thank him, for teaching him the ropes of love, for showing him the way.
But more than anything, he wanted to apologise. That Cyrus ended up getting the good side of the breakup, the good side of healing, the good side of mending. The good side was what he got.
The door opened from behind him, and a figure approached Cyrus. Even before he spoke, he knew just who it was. But he only turned around when he heard a soft but reserved, “Hi Cyrus.”
Cyrus smiled, looking up.
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