HANDCUFFS

did fletcher have any right to go snooping into elliot’s personal business ?? no . would that stop him ?? absolutely not . they were the most important person in fletcher’s life , and if there was even a breath of doubt that they weren’t doing okay he would throw himself head-first in the fire to protect them . protect them from what ?? well , he wasn’t entirely sure himself ; calliban looked like fletcher could snap them into two pieces over his knee effortlessly . “ listen , i don’t know what you’re doing with elliot or why they’re acting different , but i’m here to tell you that if you fuck with their heart , i’m gonna kill you , and i’m not over-exaggerating . i mean life imprisonment . whenever you text them they’re smilin’ like i haven’t ever seen , “ the more he spoke the more he realised that he had come punching down the door like a debt-collector for what was effectively a text message , perhaps even just a friendship , but he had to maintain his role of overprotective older brother somehow . gulping down his earlier bellows , fletcher straightened himself up and crossed both bulging biceps across his broad chest , responding rather dejectedly : “ yeah . i’m elliot’s brother , “ which was obvious with one look at him . if it wasn’t for the clear age gap between the siblings it would have been an easy assumption to call them twins .

“ sweet mother o’ mary , “ the male cursed , almost rushed off his feet by a sudden gust of unrelenting wind that was taking absolutely no prisoners . trust striker to be out in the literal eye of the storm , ignoring any and all warnings for his wellbeing , putting the safety of livestock before .. well .. anything else , as usual . he didn’t expect any other idiot to be out in the throws of the freak weather , and yet eyes settled on the first figure he saw as hands struggled with the doors of the barn , attempting to shove their group of cows to safety . “ well , don’t jus’ stand there !! help me out . “ 

Staying at a hotel was a new experience. Having always crashed at couches, they weren’t so sure what to do with themselves now. Yet, the world had decided, that perhaps the best thing was to loose their keycard. They sat in front of the door to their room, their few groceries on the ground, knees to their chest, and making a slice of bread with cheese. When someone appeared from their room, Suraj looked up like they were caught red-handed. “I lost my keycard,” they explained. In case the other wanted to know why they were sitting on the floor. 

         floor three is too small to be housing this many people. they’re crammed in, sardines in a tin, and the air in the hotel is fraught like a horror movie. sparrow was right ; this is full on kubrick’s the shining vibes. bridget breaks the tension with the snap of a bright blue bubble of gum against her lips and scoops the gum back into her mouth with her tongue. “not to be dramatic, but rounding up the trailer trash and shoving us in some lame motel for an unspecified period of time? triggering.” plus she’s bored shitless, so provoking conversation is the least she can do to stop someone from suggesting an ice breaker activity. ( her bets are on would you rather, two truths and a lie or singing ‘this little light of mine’ ). “it’s a total coloniser move. feel like i’m about to be hate-crimed.” where the fuck is elliot? bridget drags a chair across the hallway, props it up against the bookcase and stands on it, holding her phone in the air, searching for bars. still nothing. “this is the worst. what’s the point in being involved in a traumatic event if i can’t even live-blog it? i’m totally gonna draft a load of tweets in the notes app of my phone to post when this shit’s over like an asian-american mary shelley.” she thinks better of it and fetches her DSLR from her rucksack instead, thankful that it was one of the few things she had on her when the storm hit. the battery’s on sixty percent— good enough. bridget flips off the lens cap and begins to shoot, her eye against the focus finder as she pans around the hotel corridor. people respond to crisis in different ways — some with anger, like the guy slamming his fists against the ( predictably ) out of service elevator, some with isolation, like the kid holed up in the laundry room playing wordle on his phone. bridget responds by immortalising her immediate surroundings through fiction or film. there’s a family sharing a packet of chips and someone ugly-crying at the end of the hall. why hadn’t she thought of documenting this before? this is the kind of shit that film festivals would eat up ! actual trauma happening real-time? hello sundance grand jury prize for documentary !

        there’s a grate in the ceiling above them. from on top of the bookshelf she could probably reach it, check if there’s a wifi signal up there, and although she knows better than to go crawling through an air vent in a storm, she’s bored out of her mind, plus it could make for good cinematography. gotta think about that mise-en-scene. “hey, would you give me a leg up?” she asks, closing in on another occupant of the hallway, camera still rolling. she’d shoot from now until she ran out of film. it was more authentic that way. “i’m gonna go shoot some b-roll in that ventilation shaft.” proper stranger things-style — she loves that show — bridget just hopes she doesn’t have a john bender moment and fall through the ceiling. “you coming or what?”

Storm winds buffet the side of the building, howling through the streets, making it somehow feel colder within the confines of the hotel than it really should. There's a soft rustling sound that's drowned out by the chaos beyond the outer walls, the slip of a cigarette out of it's package, like somehow fidgeting with the things will make Caliban feel better about not actually being supposed to smoke them in here. Instead, it seems to be doing the opposite, making the itch that he can't scratch even more persistently irritating than it had been before. The restlessness hiding just under the calm surface of his waters is obvious only around the edges, frayed in places, and slowly unraveling despite his best efforts to keep it together. High-tension situations give him so much anxiety it's borderline difficult to breathe past it, and he knows, he knows why that is, but there's nothing that he can really do to cope with it aside from what he already is doing. Keeping to himself is necessary, or at least that's how it feels when the weight of the world is on his shoulders, on his mind.

For what feels like the thousandth time tonight --- redundancy seems to be his thing --- Cali pulls out his phone from his jacket pocket, peering hopelessly at the complete and utter lack of a signal, and wonders again how dangerous it would be to just go outside and try to find a place to catch a bar or two. The only person he can think about right now is the only person that he can't seem to find, and the longer this goes on without him being able to talk to them, to find out if they're okay, the more tense he gets. Tumultuous emotions roiling inside of him, Cali finally turns away from the window to slide down to the ratty carpeted floor, sitting with his back against the wall. His dog, Patches, immediately moves to lay her had down in his lap, and his fingers automatically card into her fur. It's habit, a self-soothing tactic really, and he lets his eyes slide shut with a long, drawn out exhale. Fuck. Fuck. What is he going to do? Just hope that this ends soon, maybe. Every minute that ticks by makes the walls close in tighter, the air thicken... Maybe it's in his head, but does that make it any less of a problem?

Street lights do very little to illuminate the path home, early-morning darkness seeming to cover the whole world like a blanket. Normally, Caliban wouldn’t have stayed out so late, and that goes especially so for when he’s attending a party, but tonight he’d had his own reasons for wanting to stick around despite that. Casting his gaze to where Elliot walks at his side, he gives their hand a gentle squeeze, the little smile that curves up the corners of his lips visible despite the lack of light. “Your brother would probably literally kill me if he knew we were out here together.” Even walking home, and even perfectly safe, Cali can certainly imagine that. This is the first time he’s mentioned Fletcher, and after their encounter the other day, it will still come out of the blue for Elliot because of that reason.

❝  can  i  get  you  anything  else,  or  were  you  intending  to  HOG  the  booth  for  another  two  hours  ??  ❞  even  a  feigned  attempt  at  something  congenial  couldn’t  mask  her  frustration.  in  all  her  years,  &&  in  the  million  lives  she’d  lived  since  then,  there  were  two  things  for  sure,  and  one  thing  for  certain  ( CUSTOMER  SERVICE  WAS  ANDREA’S  FORTE. )  with  a  split  shift  &&  fleeting  across  town  to  cover  an  odd-job  in  the  meantime,  the  ravenette  hadn’t  been  off  her  feet  since  the  angry  red  numeric  of  her  alarm  awoke  her  this  morning.  and  if  it  hadn’t  been  made  evident  by  the  snide  remark,  her  patience  had  been  worn  thin.  nonetheless,  andrea  refilled  the  patrons  drink,  AWAITING  at  the  edge  of  the  booth  for  their  retortion.

he stared through the tempered glass like a child at the zoo . the action figure — a twelve inch standing plastic model of ‘ cyclops ‘ from x-men — stared back at him through that moulded-on mask , almost taunting the male who could never afford it , not in a million years . clearing his throat and turning , the male realised he hadn’t been alone : another patron had been watching his pathetic yearning , his silent prayers . nonchalant , or as nonchalant as he could be , he gestured towards the case . “ pretty cool , huh ?? “ 

Even if he had only really spoken to a few handful of people, Samuel was having a blast at the party. The music was filling his veins with a rhythm he hadn’t felt in a while, causing his body to naturally sway along with every other song that blared over the speaks, he gave silent kudos to whoever put the playlist together. With a red solo cup in his hand, filled with a drink he’d been babysitting for what felt like the majority of the evening, he makes his way out towards the pool area for a bit of fresh air. As he sits down, barely dipping his feet into the cold water, he hears someone approaching. “Oh, sorry! Was this your seat?” He quickly asks, starting to stand up, “I just saw the first open spot and figured nobody was sitting here. Sorry about that! I guess that’s what they mean by assuming, right? It makes an ass out of you and me.” He pauses, suddenly hating himself for saying that, looking at the other with an apologetic gaze, “I mean, it’s just me. I’m the ass, not you, I didn’t mean you. Uh…right. I’m going to go jump into the deep end of the pool now.”

 Ali walked around the party, hands in his pocket with his camera hanging around his neck. He smiled, at the scene happening around him. He saw a moment that would be perfect to take a picture. So he raised his camera to his face, looking through the viewfinder and clicked on the shutter button to take a picture. At that exact moment, someone stepped into the frame the moment the picture was taken. “Oh uh sorry, I got you in the shot.” He said pulling the picture up and showing them. “I can delete it if you want.”

if there was anyone that knew his sibling it was fletcher , and that meant that he had noted the strange changes in their demeanour , the way they would smile whenever a text illuminated their phone . it was something he couldn’t just stand by and just let happen . knuckles drummed against the metal sheet that cali considered a ‘ door ‘ to their trailer and , when it opened, there he was : the older brother of the individual they had been staring at a little too hard across the crashdown tables . “ you’ve got some explaining to do . “ 

location: outside of planet 7

closed starter for: @calimarks·

when it came to dragging cali out of their trailer, wren liked to think she was becoming more and more of an expert. she didn’t know how or when she’d gravitated towards them, but now that they were in her life, they were someone she held near and dear. despite already having a sibling, wren liked to consider them part of her family, treating them might like an older sister would treat their younger family members. maybe that’s why she was always so hellbent on cali keeping her company, or why she was now holding a little tube of glitter that she fully intended on convincing them to let her spread across their cheeks. a trip to planet 7 meant that they needed to go all out, and if she had suffered the pain of wriggling herself into a dress, then cali would need to put some effort in too. 

“just let me put a little on you,” she practically begged, eyes soft as she practically pouted at them. “i promise it won’t be hard to get off, and you won’t be finding it for weeks on end. you just need to look a little more sparkly before we can waltz in there.” why were they even there? wren really couldn’t tell you, but she was far too stubborn to turn back now. “please?”

Going out isn’t really something that he does a lot --- particularly so at night, and particularly so after he’s already had a long day at work. However, there are few people that he has met in his life that were even half as convincing (or relentless) as Wren, and Cali is sort of swept up in the storm of her every time they’re around each other. It isn’t a bad thing by any means, but rather something that turns out good for him more often than not; spending all of his time by himself is far worse than him being lead out of his comfort zone from time-to-time, or maybe even more frequently than that.

elliot had a roommate, and bandmates, and friends that they were around often. whenever they got too lost in their own mind, the first thing they would do was go to a bar, surrounding themselves with other people despite not making conversation with them often. their extroverted nature came from their mother, their random dance parties and trips to the mall conditioning them to have a rather friendly demeanor. but deep down, even elliot liked being alone every now and then, the solitude just enough to help them gather themselves a bit before they continued on with their business. but cali was someone they knew they could be around all of the time, if that were even possible, able to sit with them in silence and still feel comfortable and safe. that was a scary thought to have. weren’t crushes meant to be awkward and secretive? 

maybe it would always be a mystery as to why caliban let elliot into their life, something that would always make them scratch their head and question every little thing. as was their nature, elliot embarrassed themselves in front of them on a regular basis, the blush that would take over their cheeks usually hidden as they focused their attention on patches or even wandered back to their own trailer. they tried not to come around too often, never wanting to overstay their welcome, but they were grateful for the time they spent in cal’s little shed. this was, by far, one of their favorite places to be. 

as cali’s gaze met theirs, elliot felt their features go soft, their lips tugging at the corners to form a sweet smile. it was a smile that was specifically for cali, and one that happened relatively often. watching them work was just routine at this point, and while they sat near each other in that little shed, elliot felt at peace once more. shifting on their stool, they released a soft sigh, their chin resting against their knee as caliban spoke, full attention on their face now. “sounds like a typical artist,” they teased now, cheeks blooming in a soft pink color before they hid their face against their leg. they weren’t very good at this whole ‘unrequited crush’ thing, the temptation to reveal their feelings sometimes overwhelming when they thought about it. elliot knew the only thing stopping them was the fact that they didn’t want to scare cali off; they’d managed to be friends this long, and the last thing elliot needed was to lose them entirely. they were too important to them. 

“i gotta go romp with dead people,” they replied, finally recovered from the latest bout of butterflies in the pit of their stomach. they thought that, after years of harboring feelings for the same person, that feeling would have gone away by now. “i get to put my little coveralls on with the flashlight in the pocket and pretend to be a big, tough guy.” their lips were in a full grin now, their eyes focused once more on cali’s features. they were both strong and soft at the same time, showing years of both sadness and survival without becoming too weathered. it was their eyes that really drew elliot in, and they found that they couldn’t help but study the brown hues. caliban was the most beautiful person they’d ever seen, and if they had an excuse to look at them, they would take it. “what about you? are you and patches gonna throw a party without me?”

It would sound strange coming from anybody except for Elliot, that sentence, and the thought makes Cali smile a little bit. Casting them in the role of somebody who would spend their nights wandering about a graveyard, taking care of where the dead rest, was difficult for their mind when they first met, but they have long since gotten used to it. It’s unfortunate that it sometimes puts them both on opposite schedules --- farm work is early work --- but they still manage to find time to spend with each other. More so lately than ever before, it would seem, and even that sometimes doesn’t feel like enough, which begs the question: what would be enough? Caliban isn’t really sure. They aren’t really sure they even want to think about it overly much; thinking too hard about things has always gotten them into trouble, and over the past five years, while they HAVE been careful, they’re still trying to do less of that. 

“If it helps at all, I wouldn’t mess with you if I came across you in a graveyard in the middle of the night. Ghouls and ghosts and zombies don’t stand a chance. Or... graverobbers?” The thought of that even being a THING in this town actually makes Caliban laugh, the sort of thoughtless sound that just tumbles out of them of its own accord. There’s a degree of softness to it, a delicacy that only contributes to the over-all fickle way they manage to actually express their feelings. At least Elliot understands more than pretty much anyone else could, the subtleties and nuances and all of the details that shouldn’t have to matter, but somehow do. They feel comfortable right now. They seem to always feel comfortable around them.

     The smile on her lips widened when they shifted their body to face hers more . She hummed and nodded when they questioned about whether they had a light or not . “ Perfect , ” Talia answered and grinned , humming softly as she watched them dig into one of the inner pockets of their jacket , pulling a lighter out . “ Thank you , ” she smiled when they leaned forward and flicked the trigger , which resulted in a flame showing up on the end of her joint . She leaned back once it was lit evenly and she took a deep drag of it .

     She put the joint between her hands and looked at Cali who stretched their arms above their head and settled their hands into their lap afterwards . The question that was asked made her giggle and she shrugged her shoulders , taking another drag . “ Honestly ? A little bit of both . Free booze and the possibility of maybe seeing aliens? Ya girl can’t miss out on that , ” she replied and winked at them . “ Want a drag ? ” Talia asked , holding the joint out in front of her , smiling at them . “ You don’t have to if you don’t want to , okay ? No pressure or anything . ”

No pressure or anything. The words almost come out sounding humorous to Cali, although they recognize the fact that she was just trying to be courteous; they don’t really partake of this sort of smoking very often, if at all. Still, they aren’t opposed to it at all, and while they were just itching for a cigarette, they may as well give it a go. Reaching to accept the joint, they take it between their fingers and draw it to their mouth. A hit is taken, slow and deep, before they hand it back. It’s a few seconds before they start to cough the smoke out of their lungs, raising their arm to hide their face in the crook of their elbow. “Shit.” It’s not that the product itself is necessarily any harsher than expected, but more that their lungs just aren’t used to it. 

After a full morning of classes, the last thing Grace wanted to do was close at the arcade. Her desired evening would be in front of her computer playing Stardew Valley with Muffy curled in her lap. Unfortunately, she was on the schedule for the next four days. Week days. Though she liked her job, the afternoons could be slow at times. One evening she stood at the prizes counter for seven hours and only handed out two yo-yos. If she was going to get through this shift, she was going to need some help. 

Grace shuffled into the Forbidden Planet, suffering to pull open their ridiculously heavy door. She managed maneuvered in, no thanks to the person at the front desk who only observed her struggle. Grace darted into the aisle with flushed cheeks, hoping to escape from the clerk’s judgmental eyes. “Jerk,” she muttered. “He didn’t have to stare.” 

Fortunately, she was able to locate the image comics section without asking for help from employees (which, yikes, would have been mortifying to go back up there). She scanned the shelf of Paper Girls volumes only to find the one she needed was missing. Moreover, someone was holding the last available copy. 

She gestured to the comic book. “I bet I need that more than you do.” Her tone was light but she also thought it to be true. 

Just browsing, Caliban tells himself for what must me the thousandth time. This is the fourth comic book he’s picked up since he wandered inside on a whim, bored and without anything much to do for once. Patches should be fine by herself for a while longer, and he doesn’t exactly have social obligations. Like, ever.

It’s rather unusual for him to spend money on anything besides his basic necessities, and while a big, almost childish part of him just wants to whip out his debit card and purchase half the shop, he knows he can’t exactly do that right now. Instead, he’s doing the equivalent of window shopping, and maybe spending a bit too long leafing through the glossy pages. It’s a preview, technically. He’s only skimming.