A Tragedy With Tits

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You: tommy and i are gonna be holding hands around la

You: you know i’m so famous we’ll be paparazzied

Dag takes another bite of his burrito, and is surprised when she starts messaging him back almost immediately. She doesn't entertain his joke in the slightest.

Birgit: good that reminds me I have a press release drafted

Birgit: do you identify was bisexual or pansexual or queer or what?

Dag stares at his phone in shock.

“What’s that face?” Tommy asks, before taking a loud sip of his drink.

Dag just holds the screen out so he can read it, watches in delight as Tommy’s eyes narrow and he slowly reads the Swedish words. A lot of them are pretty similar to the English ones.

“Is she asking how you identify?” Tommy asks curiously.

“I guess she has a press release,” Dag says. “I warned her we were gonna be gaying it up.”

“Oh interesting,” Tommy says. “How’re you gonna answer?”

“Fuck, I dunno.” Dag grumbles, stealing Tommy’s drink and taking a sip. The taste is entirely new to him in a beverage, sugar and cinnamon and something else, ice cold. “Bleagh, what is that?”

“Horchata,” Tommy says, which doesn’t answer anything, stealing his drink back. “You don’t have to specify if you don’t want, just tell her to say you’re private or something.”

“I guess,” Dag takes a sip of his own, cucumber lime, which is still a little too sweet, but much better than Tommy’s. “What’s pansexual mean?”

Tommy blows a long raspberry and then shoves more burrito into his mouth.

“More or less complicated then explaining your bottom surgery to me?” Dag asks with a snicker.

“Probably less, but I guess it depends on how much you wanna get into it,” Tommy says, hand hovering in front of his face as he speaks with his mouth full. “I’m also not an expert or anything, I just know shit from online and talking to other people.”

“Maybe I’ll enroll in an online course on it.” Dag says, only half joking. “They have uh, women’s studies. Gay studies probably exists.”

He doesn't want to, but the images race through his mind. Chris on the pier. The water. The bodies in the water. The top of that fire truck. Losing sight of him. His glasses.

The bodies. The smaller body face-down. He's still not sure if it was him, but it might have been. It could have been. He hadn't been anywhere else. And then— and then he couldn't check. He's… not sure why, but there was blood in the water, and waking up in a black bag, like there had been some sort of mistake, and then everything had been too bright, too loud, too much—

Something crunches dangerously. His hand is still pressing a dirty shirt to The Guy's neck. His other hand is somehow holding a phone with a crack in the screen. He thumbs at it, and the screen undims. There's a view of an L.A. sunset from above and the words [Emergency Call] at the bottom. Fuck. Fuck. Of course. He needs to get help.

He hesitates over the button. What if it's Maddie? What if it's someone else but they recognize his voice?

There's a weak groan and a shifting below him, and The Guy's eyelids flicker. He's pale, really pale. "Okay, shit," Buck mumbles, pocketing the phone and pulling The Guy's bulky weight into a fireman's carry. He needs to get him help, but not here. Not where emergency services will get ages to get to. Where he will have to give up his hiding place.

He takes a deep, unneeded breath, nearly going dizzy with the scent of blood, and takes off. Somehow, impossibly, he makes it to the road within moments.

He hits the call button before he can think about it. Rattles off his location to thankfully-not-Maddie, and leaves as soon as he's spotted the lights in the distance.