this is mine

Ghost said, “You lost?”

“Looking for my wash bag.”

“Try your room.”

“Left it in here earlier.”

“Then get it.”

Gaz’s mouth moved like he wanted to smile and thought better of it. He stepped inside and let the door fall shut behind him with a soft click.

Ghost’s shoulders locked.

Gaz noticed. Of course he did. He noticed and stopped where he was, still several feet away, hands open at his sides as if approaching a stray dog with its teeth bared. The comparison should have irritated Ghost more than it did. Instead, something in his chest shifted, low and unpleasantly careful.

“I’m not gonna touch you,” Gaz said. “Not unless you say.”

Ghost looked at him.

Gaz held his gaze in the mirror. There was no pity in it. That was the worst part. Pity would have been easier to punish. Pity had edges he knew how to grab. Gaz only looked at him like this was a problem with a solution, and Ghost had spent too long bleeding quietly in rooms where solutions were for other people.

“Looks like mask rash,” Gaz said after a moment. “Friction, sweat, blocked pores. Maybe some contact irritation.”

“You a dermatologist now?”

“No. Just prettier than you.”

That should have earned him something. A threat, at least. A shove. A rough, humorless bark of laughter.

What came out instead was a low, breathless sound through Ghost’s nose.

Gaz’s mouth did curve then, barely. Not triumphant. Not teasing in the way Soap teased, bright and reckless and begging for retaliation. This was softer. Warmer.

He moved to the sinks two down from Ghost and opened the cupboard beneath it. Ghost watched him crouch, rummage, then stand with a black wash bag in one hand.

It looked too nice for the barracks; smooth leather an expensive in a way Ghost did not associate with military bathrooms or men who had slept in mud with rifles tucked under their chins.

Gaz set it on the counter.

Ghost should have put the mask on.

Instead, he watched Gaz unzip the bag and line things up beside the sink with a kind of quiet competence that made something in Ghost itch. Cleanser. Moisturizer. A small tube of barrier cream. Little round cotton pads in a resealable sleeve. Some bottle with a dropper. Another with plain block lettering.

“You carry a chemist with you?” Ghost asked.

Gaz shrugged. “Skin doesn’t stop being skin because you’re getting shot at.”

“Mine did.”

Gaz glanced up at him.

The fluorescent light did unkind things to everyone, but it seemed to give up around Gaz. It slid over the brown of his skin, the dark sweep of long lashes, the small tired shadows beneath his eyes, and still he looked put together. Not untouched, Ghost knew better than that. Gaz had been through too much to look untouched. But there was something maintained about him. Like he had decided, somewhere along the line, that violence could take plenty, but it wasn’t taking his face if he could help it.

Ghost understood that more than he wanted to.

Gaz picked up the cleanser. “Can I?”

Ghost’s fingers closed around the edge of the sink until his knuckles bleached.

Gaz waited.

There it was again. That waiting. No pushing. No command. No impatient sigh. Price could wait like a sniper in tall grass, but there was always expectation in it, always the shape of an order waiting to be obeyed. Soap could wait for about three seconds before filling the air with himself, with chatter and restless affection, because silence made him feel like he had done something wrong.

Gaz just waited.

Ghost hated how much that helped.

“Don’t fuss,” Ghost muttered.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Liar.”

“Yeah,” Gaz said. “Probably.”

He wet a cloth with warm water, tested it on the inside of his own wrist first, then folded it neatly. He stepped closer, slow enough that Ghost could stop him, close enough that the air changed.

Gaz smelled sweet.

It hit Ghost so unexpectedly that his thoughts tripped over it. Not sweet like cheap body spray or the sugary rot of spilled lager on a pub floor. Sweet like something clean and expensive, something with bergamot in it maybe, or orange blossom, or whatever men like Gaz bought from shops with glass shelves and staff who never had to raise their voices. There was warmth beneath it too, skin and soap and laundry dried properly, not the metallic bite of gun oil or the sour churn of sweat trapped under gear.

Ghost had smelled Gaz before. Of course he had, one didn’t get close enough to someone and not smell them in trucks, in safehouses, shoulder to shoulder behind cover. He knew the smell of him in battle: cordite, dust, adrenaline, blood drying at the cuff. He knew the smell of him exhausted: damp cotton, stale coffee, the sharpness of stress leaking through deodorant.

This was different.

This was Gaz with the day stripped off him and it made Ghost feel like he had walked into a room meant for someone else.

“You alright?” Gaz asked.

Ghost realized he had gone too still.

“Fine.”

Gaz’s eyes flicked over his face, unconvinced but merciful. “Sit down, then. You’re too tall.”

“No.”

“Simon.”

The name landed gently.

That was the trouble with it. Soap threw his name like a stone through a window. Price used it like a hand on the back of his neck. Gaz said it like he had found it somewhere fragile and decided not to close his fist.

Ghost looked at him for one long second.

Then he sat on the closed lid of the toilet like he was making a tactical concession rather than surrendering to a bullshit nineteen step skincare ambush.

Gaz’s expression did not change, but Ghost saw the satisfaction in the small relaxation of his shoulders. Smug bastard.

Gaz came closer.

There wasn’t much space between the toilet and the sink. Barracks bathrooms were built for bodies to pass through, not linger. Gaz had to step between Ghost’s knees to reach him properly, and for a second both of them noticed the intimacy of it at the same time.

Gaz paused.

Ghost could have shifted away but he didn’t and Gaz stepped in as a result. The air thinned.

Ghost’s hands moved before he thought better of it, settling on Gaz’s thighs to brace him, to make sure neither of them stumbled, to give his body something to do with the impossible closeness of another man standing there with care in his hands. Gaz inhaled once, not sharply, not obviously, but Ghost felt it under his palms. Felt the muscle there, the warmth through soft joggers, the human give of him. His fingers dug into the fat of Gaz’s thighs; not hard enough to hurt, but harder than he meant, a grasp that said stay in a language his mouth had never learned.

Gaz looked down at him.

Ghost loosened his grip by a fraction.

“Sorry.”

Gaz shook his head. “You’re fine.”

He said it like he meant more than the hands.

Ghost looked away first.

The first touch of the warm cloth to his jaw made him flinch.

Gaz stopped immediately.

“Too hot?”

“No.”

“Too much?”

Ghost’s throat worked. “No.”

Gaz waited anyway, the cloth hovering just off his skin, and that should not have done anything to Ghost. It was a small thing. A ridiculous thing. A man waiting for permission he already had.

It went through him anyway and made him feel, for one second, that he was human and someone worth waiting for.

After a moment, Ghost tipped his chin up the smallest amount.

Gaz began again. Careful strokes. No scrubbing. No rough practicality. He cleaned Ghost’s face like the skin there mattered, like it was not just the inconvenient surface of a weapon, like the redness and raw patches were not a failure Ghost should have handled alone in silence. The cloth moved over his jaw, his chin, the side of his mouth. Gaz’s fingers were cool where they rested lightly beneath Ghost’s cheek to steady him.

Ghost watched the tendons in Gaz’s wrist flex. Watched the concentration settle between his brows. Watched him bite the inside of his cheek when he leaned in to see the worst of the irritation near the mask line.

“Been using soap on this?” Gaz asked.

Ghost said nothing.

Gaz sighed through his nose. “Simon.”

“It’s soap.”

“It’s hand soap.”

“Hands have skin.”

Gaz gave him a flat looj.

Ghost’s mouth twitched despite himself.

“There he is,” Gaz murmured.

Ghost’s face went still again, but it was too late. Gaz had seen it. That tiny betrayal. That almost-smile dragged up from wherever Ghost buried such things before they became evidence.

Gaz didn’t point it out. He just put the cloth aside and squeezed cleanser into his palm.

“It might sting,” Gaz warned.

“Had worse.”

“I know,” Gaz said. “That doesn’t mean I’m aiming for it.”

Ghost had no answer for that.

The cleanser was cool and slippery at first, then warm under Gaz’s fingertips. He worked it over Ghost’s cheek in small circles, barely any pressure. The pads of his fingers moved with absurd patience along the edge of Ghost’s jaw, down to his chin, up where the mask had rubbed the bridge of his nose raw.

Ghost had to hold himself very still. There was nowhere to put the sensation. Nowhere useful. His body kept wanting to classify it as threat, then failing, then reaching for some other category and finding none prepared.

It was not medical. Medics had brisk hands and efficient sympathy. This was too slow for that.

It was not indulgent. Indulgence required ease, and there was none of that in Ghost. He sat with his knees bracketing Gaz’s legs, his hands still on Gaz’s thighs, breathing shallowly through his nose like one wrong inhale might break something.

It was not romance, not exactly. Romance was candles and beds and words people said because they wanted the shape of them returned. This had no script. No audience. No destination Ghost could identify without panicking. It was only Gaz’s thumb smoothing cleanser near the corner of his mouth while the barracks lived around them, and Ghost letting him.

That was the dangerous part.

Letting him.

Gaz leaned closer to rinse the cloth again, and his hip brushed Ghost’s knee. Barely anything. A mistake of space. Ghost felt it anyway, stored it anyway, stupid animal mind pressing it into memory like contraband.

“Mask’s trapping too much moisture,” Gaz said, voice low because there was no distance for volume. “And if you’re not washing it enough, the bacteria build up won’t help.”

“I wash it.”

Gaz glanced at the skull fabric on the sink.

Ghost followed his look.

“Sometimes,” he amended.

“Right.”

“Got sentimental value.”

“It can have sentimental value and still be nasty.”

Ghost gave him a slow look.

Gaz smiled, small and wicked. “I said what I said.”

The cleanser came off with warm water. Gaz patted him dry with a clean towel he had pulled from God knew where, because apparently his wash bag contained supplies for surviving both war and male negligence. He didn’t rub. Every touch was measured. Held back. Ghost could feel the restraint in him, which somehow made it worse.

Gaz had gentle hands by choice, not by nature. Ghost had seen those hands reload under fire, drag men twice his size over broken ground, clamp down over wounds pulsing red between his fingers. Gaz could be quick. Brutal. Effective.

Here, he chose softness.

Ghost wondered what it cost him.

Gaz uncapped the little dropper bottle. “Niacinamide. Helps with irritation. Don’t make that face.”

“I’m not.”

“You are. You look like I’ve offered to baptize you in acid.”

“Have you?”

“No. That’s Friday nights at the pub.”

Ghost huffed again, quieter this time.

Gaz’s eyes warmed in a way that made Ghost look at the cracked tile behind him instead. The bathroom had terrible grout. Someone had drawn a tiny cock on the underside of the sink in permanent marker. There was a hairline crack in the mirror above them splitting Ghost’s reflected shoulder into two uneven pieces. All of it was easier to look at than Gaz being pleased with him.

The serum went on cold. Gaz tapped it over the reddened patches with two fingers, light as rain. Ghost’s grip shifted unconsciously, fingers pressing into Gaz’s thighs again when Gaz tipped his chin with the knuckle of one hand to reach the side of his face.

“Easy,” Gaz said.

Ghost almost laughed at that. Not because it was funny. Because there were so many things Gaz could have meant and none of them were easy.

He loosened his hands.

Gaz did not step back.

Outside, footsteps passed. Someone knocked once on the bathroom door, careless. “Oi, anyone in there?”

Soap.

Ghost’s whole body tightened.

Gaz didn’t move away from him. Didn’t jerk back like they’d been caught doing something shameful. He only turned his head and called, perfectly calm, “Occupied.”

There was a pause.

Then Soap said, “Kyle?”

“Yeah?”

“Ghost murderin’ ye?”

Gaz’s thumb was still resting beneath Ghost’s jaw. Ghost could feel the faint pressure of it. Could feel his own pulse knocking there, traitorous and obvious.

Gaz looked down at him, and there was something in his eyes Ghost did not know how to survive.

“No,” Gaz said, still looking at Ghost. “He’s behaving.”

Soap made a scandalized noise. “That so?”

“Go away, Johnny.”

“Och, fine, keep yer secrets.”

Footsteps retreated.

Ghost let out a breath he hadn’t meant to hold.

Gaz’s thumb moved once, barely. Not a stroke. Not comfort. Something smaller than that. A check in Ghost could deny if he needed to.

He didn’t.

“Soap would’ve made a meal of this,” Ghost said after a moment, because the words came safer if they were about someone else.

Gaz reached for the moisturizer. “Probably.”

“Price would’ve dragged me to medical.”

“Definitely.”

“You?”

Gaz squeezed a small amount onto his fingers. “I’m dragging you to hydration and SPF.”

Ghost stared at him.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

Gaz’s mouth softened. “You thought I’d be weird about it.”

Ghost said nothing.

“Thought I’d look at you different.”

The room seemed to shrink around that. Ghost could feel every point of contact between them: Gaz’s shin against the inside of his boot, Gaz’s thighs beneath his palms, Gaz’s fingertips at his cheek, Gaz standing close enough for Ghost to count the darker flecks in his eyes.

“People do,” Ghost said.

Gaz’s expression changed, but not much. A tightening at the corners. A quiet anger with nowhere to go.

“Well,” he said, “people are stupid.”

Ghost should have looked away but he didn’t.

Gaz smoothed moisturizer over his cheek. It had no scent, or almost none, but beneath it was Gaz again, sweet and expensive and warm. Ghost wondered, absurdly, what the bottle on Gaz’s shelf looked like. If he kept it lined beside the others. If he used it after shaving. If someone had bought it for him, or if Gaz had stood in a shop somewhere and chosen it because he liked smelling like something soft in a world that kept asking him to be hard.

Ghost wondered if Gaz knew he smelled like that.

He wondered if anyone had told him.

He wondered why the thought made something dark and possessive move under his ribs, not jealousy exactly, not want in any clean shape, but the sudden unreasonable conviction that this small knowledge should remain his. Gaz in the bathroom light. Gaz with damp curls and steady hands. Gaz smelling like sweetness, touching Ghost’s ruined face like it was allowed to be held.

“Stop thinking so loudly,” Gaz said.

Ghost blinked.

“You get a crease.” Gaz touched two fingers between Ghost’s brows briefly. “There.”

Ghost caught his wrist.

Not hard, not a threat but Gaz went still anyway.

Ghost’s fingers circled the warm narrowness of him. His thumb rested over the pulse point. It beat steady at first, then a little faster. Ghost felt the change like a confession neither of them had made.

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

The fluorescent light hummed. The vent fan rattled. Somewhere distant, Price’s voice cut low through the corridor, followed by Soap protesting innocence in the tone of a man absolutely guilty of something.

Gaz did not pull away.

Ghost did not let go.

Ghost had no language for this. Not here. Not with Gaz. Not with the kind of wanting that did not sit hot and simple in the gut, but ached behind the sternum like a bruise pressed by careful fingers. He did not want to take from Gaz. He did not even know if want was the right word. He wanted Gaz to keep standing there. He wanted the door locked. He wanted Soap not to come back. He wanted Price not to call them out. He wanted this strange, unbearable gentleness to go on until his body stopped expecting pain at the end of it.

Gaz looked down at Ghost’s hand around his wrist.

Then he turned his palm slightly, just enough that his fingers brushed Ghost’s.

Not holding.

Not not holding.

Ghost released him first because he had to. Because another second and he might have done something honest.

Gaz went back to the little tube of barrier cream as if nothing had happened, though his breathing had changed. Ghost noticed. Of course he noticed. Not because he was looking for weakness. Because it was Gaz, and Ghost had always watched Gaz even when he didn’t realize it. The tilt of his head when he was listening for distant movement. The way he tapped two fingers against his thigh when he was thinking. The particular silence he carried after close calls, all the humor gone out of him but none of the kindness.

Now this, too.

The slight unsteadiness after Ghost touched his wrist.

Ghost tucked it away where no one could get at it, greedy, one of the few private moments that nobody else had and nobody else could demand he tell so they could put it on paper and stamp over it with black boxes.

“This one goes where the mask rubs,” Gaz said, voice almost normal. “Bridge of your nose, cheekbones, jaw. Thin layer. Don’t cake it on like war paint.”

“Shame.”

“You’d find a way to make it terrifying.”

Ghost’s eyes moved over him. “You scared?”

Gaz’s fingers paused at his jaw.

There were a dozen easy answers. A dozen jokes. Gaz had always been good at knowing which kind of truth could pass as humor.

This time he only said, “No.”

Ghost believed him.

The barrier cream was thicker, leaving a faint protective sheen over the worst patches. Gaz applied it with the same careful focus, and Ghost let himself watch. Let himself memorize the slope of Gaz’s lashes, the crease in his lower lip where his teeth had worried it earlier, the clean curve of his throat above his collar. None of it felt like looking at a target. None of it felt like assessment.

It felt like standing too close to a fire after years of sleeping cold.

When Gaz finished, he didn’t step away immediately. His hands lowered, but the space between them remained full.

“You’ll need to wash the mask properly,” Gaz said. “Rotate them if you can. Let your skin dry before putting it back on. Use the cleanser at night. Moisturizer after. Barrier cream before missions.”

Ghost raised an eyebrow. “Yes, Mum.”

Gaz gave him the look again. “I’m serious.”

“I know.”

“I’ll write it down.”

“Don’t.”

“You’ll forget.”

“I won’t.”

Gaz’s eyes searched his face, and Ghost hated that there was less to hide behind now. No mask, no greasepaint, no skull, only the bare ruin of him under bathroom lights and Gaz looking anyway.

Finally, Gaz nodded. He stepped back, and Ghost’s hands slipped from his thighs.

The absence was immediate.

Embarrassing, that. How quickly his palms felt empty. How the air cooled where Gaz had been standing. How the room became only a bathroom again- tile, sink, mirror, fluorescent hum- and not whatever impossible little country they had occupied between breath and touch.

Gaz began packing the bottles back into his wash bag.

Ghost stood.

He reached for the mask.

Gaz didn’t tell him not to. That might have been the kindest thing. He only watched as Ghost picked it up, fingers resting on the worn black fabric, the skull face turned inward against his palm.

“You don’t have to put it on for me,” Gaz said.

Ghost’s grip tightened.

The words were quiet. Almost careless. The sort of thing that could be shrugged off if Ghost needed to make it nothing.

He looked at Gaz in the mirror. Barefaced, raw, treated in patches with Gaz’s expensive little remedies. He looked tired. Older than he felt in some places and younger in others. The scars did what scars always did: announced history without explaining it. His mouth looked unfamiliar without cloth over it.

Gaz stood behind him, close but not crowding, gaze steady.

Ghost thought of Soap, bright and loyal and too brave with other people’s hurt. Thought of Price, solid as a wall, always trying to keep the roof from coming down. They loved him in the ways they knew how. He knew that. He trusted it most days. But Soap would not stand in silence with moisturizer on his fingers and let Ghost decide what kind of seen he could bear. Price would not smell like orange blossom and clean money and wait for Ghost’s hands to stop shaking before pretending not to notice they had started.

This was Gaz.

This was different.

Ghost set the mask back on the sink.

Gaz’s reflection did not smile, exactly. But something eased in his face, something Ghost felt more than saw.

“Just until I leave,” Ghost said, rough.

Gaz nodded. “Just until then.”

Neither of them moved.

The bathroom door remained shut. The corridor beyond stayed loud and alive and far away. Ghost leaned back against the sink, bare face cooling under the tacky layer of cream, while Gaz finished putting away the bottles he had used like offerings. When he zipped the bag, he did it slowly, as if sudden sound might startle the moment out of existence.

At the door, Gaz paused.

“Same time tomorrow?” he asked, like it was nothing. Like men like them made rituals easily. Like Ghost had not spent half his life making sure no one could ever expect him anywhere without armor.

Ghost looked at the mask on the sink, then at Gaz.

“Got a whole routine planned, have you?”

Gaz’s mouth curved. “You need one.”

“Bossy.”

“Neglected.”

Ghost should have bristled.

Instead, he looked down, and the almost-smile returned before he could kill it.

Gaz saw it. Again.

This time, he let himself smile back.

It was small. Private. Sweet in a way Ghost had no defense for.

“Tomorrow,” Ghost said.

Gaz opened the door. The corridor noise spilled in, harsh and ordinary. Before he stepped through, he looked back once, not at the mask, not at the red patches, not at the evidence of Ghost’s body failing to remain untouchable beneath fabric and sweat.

At him.

“Night, Simon.”

Ghost’s throat tightened around nothing useful.

“Night, Kyle.”

Gaz left.

The door clicked shut.

Ghost stood in the bathroom alone, barefaced under the humming light, the scent of expensive sweetness still caught in the air where Gaz had been. For a long moment, he did not reach for the mask. He only looked at himself in the mirror and felt, with a slow and terrible confusion, the shape of Gaz’s hands lingering on his skin like care had weight.

Like it could stay.

Eddie’s lounging in the hammock with his guitar heavy on his chest, half playing, half napping, when he hears a deep ‘mmmrrp’ from underneath him.

He rocks awkwardly back and forth, only catching the tip of a twitching white tail.

“Gandalf, you little shit,” he snaps, flailing to sit up. “Where the hell have you been?”

The cat purrs in reply, sauntering across the porch toward the trailer door expectantly, rubbing along the molding, wanting to be let in (and fed some slices of bologna no doubt).

“Yeah, no,” Eddie tells the smug little creature. “You’re gone for like four days and you think you get a treat for that? I thought you were dead, you dick!”

Gandalf meows deeply, scratching lazily at the molding, blatantly ignoring him. Eddie grumbles in annoyance as he swings a leg over out of the hammock, pulling himself up heavily to his feet.

Eddie hates to admit how attached he’s grown to the scruffy furball he fished out of a trashcan when he was just a shrimpy flea-bitten kitten. Promptly christened Gandalf the White after Eddie gave him a bath to discover his dusty, matted coat was actually white as freshly fallen snow.

He also hates how worried he was about him when the cat strangely didn’t stop in for a few days, enough to waste gas driving around the county looking for him.

Eddie wouldn’t necessarily consider Gandalf his cat, the stray has always come and gone as he pleased since he was strong enough to be on his own, but he and Wayne are definitely his main source of food and shelter and any and all of his extended absences are noted. The poor old man fretted all morning before going to bed, hoping nothing bad had happened to the nice little guy.

“Alright, fine let’s get you some breakfast—” Eddie freezes mid step when Gandalf turns up and around; his face and head and neck are covered with shimmery pink lipstick stains.

“What the damn hell?!” He nearly drops his acoustic from the shock. He stares down at the perfect kisses marking the cat. “Gandalf…you… you little slut!!”

Gandalf purrs happily in agreement, prancing over to rub against him, weaving between his legs and getting white cat hair all over his dark jeans. Eddie bends down and snatches him up, holding him at arm's length under his front legs.

Someone vandalized his cat! With their lips!!

“Who did this to you?!”

“Mrrp,” Gandalf replies as he hangs contently from the hold, but it sounds more like: I’ll never tell.

Eddie swings him one way then the other in bafflement. “Yeah, okay, Casanova… how am I supposed to get this off you?”

He meows loudly, his patience worn out as he starts squirming to be set down, obviously not all that concerned about his new pink markings.

“Alright, alright,” Eddie huffs, letting him drop back to the ground and opening the door. “Dinner first and then a bath.”

Gandalf growls lightly at the word bath and he bolts inside.

Wayne wakes up at the smell of fried bologna and cheese about a half hour later, pleased to see Gandalf has returned home safely.

“Well there you are, Mr. Gandalf sir, we were quite worried about you,” he cajoles as the cat prances over happily to him for some attention. Wayne hesitates as he reaches out to scratch his ears, his salt and pepper brows jumping when he sees the kissy marks all over him.

“Goodness,” he exclaims. “You seemed to have found yourself a lady friend, Mr. Gandalf.”

“Yeah, he’s being all smug about it,” Eddie tells his uncle as he searches around the cupboard for some plates.

“I would be too,” Wayne chuckles in amusement. “To be fair.”

“Gross, Wayne.”

“Quit being moody and get this fine gentleman some supper,” his uncle orders, petting the cat all the more fondly. “Don’t want him to stop visiting us on account of poor hospitality.”

“Looks like he’s been eating just fine to me,” Eddie grumbles, noting that Gandalf’s maybe put on two pounds around his middle.

Fat ass.

“Yes, well, I’m sure his lady friend, whoever she is, enjoys his company too and makes sure he’s well fed.”

“Double dealing, little bastard,” Eddie mutters as he fills the empty tuna can, that’s been converted into a cat dish with bologna. “Probably getting some Fancy Feast or some shit.”

Gandalf strides over to the kitchenette, purring as he rubs against Eddie’s leg in anticipation for his treat.

“See, no need to be jealous, boy,” Wayne tells him. “He still loves you.”

“I’m not jealous!” Eddie snaps as he sets the can on the ground by his old sweatshirt that he turned into a makeshift cat bed. Gandalf eats happily, making little nom nom nom sounds. “He’s a stray, he can go and be with whatever family he wants.”

“Well then, maybe you’re just jealous that he has a lady friend and you don’t.”

Eddie glowers silently at his uncle.

…

Gandalf stays the night, falling asleep in a round ball on Eddie’s chest. It took him about an hour to come around after his bath. There were seven sticky lipstick kisses that he had to wash off of him… The stupid cat was getting more action than Eddie has in the last four (ten) months. He begrudgingly keeps petting the sleeping feral beast, noting that he has a subtle scent of strawberries and cream shampoo beneath the plain hotel soap that Eddie scrubbed him down with.

“You got the full princess treatment wherever you were,” Eddie mumbles, feeling his eyes growing heavy. He has half a mind to roll on his side and toss Gandalf onto the floor where he belongs, but he can’t bring himself to disrupt the perfect circle the cat has formed, he’s as round as a dinner plate. Plus, he likes the sound and the feel of his purring, it helps him sleep. “I wonder why you came back at all.”

…

The cat’s gone a few mornings later, and Eddie’s not surprised at all. He must have climbed out his window sometime after Wayne got home from his shift.

Keeping up with his summer schedule, Eddie wastes his AM smoking and rotting in his bed and then at noon he grabs the last strawberry poptart from the pantry before heading to band practice at Gareth’s.

The poptart is wedged between his teeth as he drives through the suburbs, running about twenty minutes late as usual. When he makes the left on Maple he suddenly spots a white cat prancing down the sidewalk, taking the hill up Loch Nora.

Gandalf?

Eddie brakes hard, the rest of his precious poptart falling down into the cursed chasm of forgotten snacks, the equipment in the back crashing around against the side of the van.

He swears colorfully under his breath. Jeff is going to actually kill him if he damages one more amp.

But he was right! That mangy stray was indeed shacking it up with some rich family uptown. He battles with himself for a full minute before someone honks loudly behind him and he finally turns, following after the traitorous white wizard.

He should have named him Saruman.

Gandalf seems to know exactly where he’s going, practically skipping past all the big, fancy houses.

Eddie eventually catches up with him and rolls down the window.

“Gandalf,” he hisses, motioning for him to get in the van. “Get in here! What do you think you’re doing?”

Gandalf stops, looks Eddie directly in the eye, mrrps, and then takes off like a bullet up the sidewalk.

Eddie seethes loudly, wrenching the gear shift.

It’s personal now.

Knowing better than to drive his van any deeper into the wealthier part of town, he pulls over to the side of the street and continues his pursuit on foot after the damn cat. He sprints between the aged oak trees, trying to be stealthy as well as quick.

“Get back here, you scruffy little hairball,” he growls angrily after him. Gandalf slows down just enough for Eddie to catch up before taking off again “Where are you getting these ideas of grandeur? Huh?” He huffs loudly, his blackened lungs beginning to quit on him. “You were born in a trashcan! You are of the trash!”

At that, Gandalf sidewinds into the shrubbery and then a small stretch of woods that runs along behind the houses. Eddie does not care. He will not be detoured. He jumps right in after him, pushing past the branches and prickers.

He’s catching that smug cat and dragging his spoiled ass back home where he belongs.

Gandalf rounds behind a tree into a secluded backyard, and Eddie almost has him.

“I’ve gotcha now, you cheeky little bastard—”

“Casper? Here kitty—AHH!”

A small cry of alarm is cut off as Eddie collides at full speed into a much smaller human being, railroading them flat along the perfectly manicured lawn.

The impact leaves them both laying there motionless for God knows how long, as Eddie tries to assess what hit him or rather who he hit.

With a groan, his chest throbbing in pain, he rolls his neck and lifts his head to find a pair of stunning blue eyes staring up at him, wide and shaking.

Eddie stills, staring back, his long mop of dark curls falling like a curtain around them, hiding them away from the rest of the world.

“Chrissy?” he wheezes in disbelief, barely an inch away from the senior cheer captain’s face. For a moment he thinks he’s having that dream again; she smells like fresh strawberries and sunscreen and summer, her body so warm and soft beneath his.

She remains stunned still, only her pink glossy lips moving, parting into a perfect little o shape. Gazing at her pouty mouth, he realizes she’s trying to say something, but he’s crushing her into the earth under his weight.

This isn’t a dream, it’s a nightmare!

“Oh God—I’m sorry—I’m so sorry-I-I-I-didn’t mean—Are you alright?” He frantically tries to get himself off of her, his arms and legs all a tangle as he barely manages to get up to his knees. The poor innocent collateral damage remains prostrate on the ground, releasing a pained breath as soon as she’s free of him, struggling to take another in.

He’s knocked the wind clean out of her.

“I’m—I—I’m so, so sorry,” he pants, utterly horrified at what he’s done, hands hovering over her, not knowing what to do or say. “I swear I didn’t mean to—I had no idea that this is—that you’d—I just—”

“I’m-I’m okay,” she grunts, trying to get up to her elbows as he continues to spiral. “Really, I—Ahn.”

She winces in pain, holding her ribs.

Eddie makes a startled, terrified noise, reaching for her when she nearly falls back down.

“Oh Jesus-God!” he exclaims, taking her shoulders in his hands. “What is it!? What’s wrong!? Did I break something!? I’ll call an ambulance!”

He broke her! He broke the Queen of Hawkins High!

“No,” she breathes out tightly, and it almost sounds like a laugh. “I’m fine.”

He doesn’t believe her.

He’s not entirely sure if he should be touching or moving her, but he can’t help himself. He has to do something! “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He gently picks her up, helping her back to her feet. She’s worrisomely light, just a wisp of a thing. “I’m sorry. Sorry. Sorry.”

It’s only when he smooths a hand over her rib cage, checking for any fractured or broken bones that he realizes she’s only wearing a ribbed white swimsuit with no back or sides underneath a pink oversized button-down shirt.

Skin.

So. Much. Skin.

A jolt of electricity shoots up the length of his arm as he draws his shaky fingers over her bare back, rolling them up tightly into his hand. With the way she shivers at the contact, he wonders if she felt it too.

He stares down at her while she stares up at him, both of them flushed, panting, bewildered.

“I’ve…I’ve broken plenty of bones before,” she finally tells him between short huffs, remembering herself. “I think I’m okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah I’m sure.” She smiles brightly, right before blood begins to leak slowly down her nose.

“You’re bleeding!” he cries out, panicking.

Startled by his outburst, Chrissy reaches up under her nose, pulling away to see her fingers coated with red. She gasps in shock, quickly blocking the stream with her hand, looking up at him in desperate mortification.

“Jesus, hold on, hold on!” He reaches behind his back and grabs the bandana hanging from his pocket. He gently pulls her hand away by the wrist and presses the cloth under her nose to catch the stream of blood. “Here. Tilt your head back.”

She does as she’s told, bringing both her hands up to hold the bandana in place.

“You got it?” he asks her, carefully pulling his hands away, inanely worried that she’ll stain her pretty white swimsuit.

“I gobib,” she confirms adorably, her nasal passages all clogged up.

Spotting a set of a patio table and chairs, he carefully ushers her back and lifts her to sit on top of the glass table by her half naked waist.

“Still okay?” he asks, both very exasperated and exhilarated at the same time.

“Ugh.” She nods, lowering her head back to meet his gaze once the worst of it is over, keeping the black cloth against her nose. “Yeah, I think so.”

“Good, good.” He bobs his head up and down resolutely. “Well, I’m going to go throw myself into oncoming traffic now.”

“No!” She lets out a startled laugh, snagging his hand as he tries to leave her side. “Don’t do that.”

He dejectedly lets her tug him back in front of her, head hanging lowly in shame. “Yeah, no, have to, I just trespassed and probably broke your rib…Nothing else for it.”

Her cute muffled giggles help ease the raging humiliation and dread burning like a wildfire inside him.

“I’m fine, Eddie,” she laughs, removing the cloth from her nose as if to prove it, still a little breathless. “Really.”

Oh, she knows his name.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles again, shuffling his feet.

“Yes, I gathered,” she replies softly, releasing his hand shyly when she notices she’s still holding onto it. “You’re um, just a few houses off, by the way.”

He blinks up at her silently, worried now that he might have given her a concussion too.

“Cindy’s is the first house down the left.” She points down the street when he only frowns at her in confusion.

“Cindy?”

“Yeah, Cindy Wojeski,” Chrissy clarifies breezily. “She’s the one having the party tonight.”

“Oh…you think that uh…yeah, no,” he blunders, face flaring up again. “I’m not dealing.”

“It’s okay,” she tells him quietly, leaning in and growing very serious like they’re sharing a secret. “I won’t tell anybody.”

He lets out a surprised, delighted chuckle. “That’s very nice of you, but I’m really not… I was looking for my cat.”

“…Your cat?”

As if on cue, and like this whole mess isn’t his fault, Gandalf hops up on the table beside Chrissy with his signature mmrrp, purring loudly as he pushes his head against her arm lovingly.

“Oh, there you are!” She giggles happily, kissing the soft fur between his ears, leaving a stain of pink from her lip gloss. “Where have you been, you little goblin?”

“Yeeeaahh,” Eddie monotones in realization as Gandalf props his hind legs on her shoulder and nuzzles Chrissy’s face with his nose. Eddie motions towards the mangy scoundrel. “My cat.”

They’re not kissy marks. They’re Chrissy marks!

“Ohhhh….” Chrissy glances between them in understanding, her fingers gliding over Gandalf from nose to tail. “I see, Casper’s your cat.”

“Yeah, Gandalf.” Eddie snickers, relenting and giving the little shit a scratch behind the ears when he settles between them in the divot of Chrissy’s bare thighs. God, her fucking legs. “At my house, anyway.”

“Gandalf?” She repeats thoughtfully, tilting her head back up to him. “Like from The Hobbit?”

Eddie stares at her silently, another spiral of heat rolling through him in a full body flush. He worries that his nose is bleeding now too.

“Y-yeah.” He finally manages to tune his brain to a working station after several seconds of radio static. “I mean technically The Two Towers, but…”

But she’s nice and very, very pretty. Who fucking cares!?

“That’s right.” She nods wistfully. “Gandalf the Grey becomes Gandalf the White… It’s been so long since I read those books with my grandad, I forgot about that…That’s clever!”

“Oh well, thanks.” He almost finds himself giggling and twirling his hair at the compliment. She’s read Tolkien and she thinks he’s clever. “And um Casper… the Friendly Ghost, I presume.”

“Yes.” She does giggle, but more in self deprecation than crippling infatuation. “Not quite as clever.”

“No,” he replies assuredly. “It suits him…he’s definitely always disappearing like a ghost.”

“I’m sorry…” She ponders quietly as she strokes Gandalf/Casper’s back. “I didn’t know he belonged to anyone… I always wondered where he got off too.”

“Well, I mean he’s not actually mine,” Eddie explains to her. “Not really, I just found him as a kitten—in the trash by the way—and I feed him when he comes around. I uh figured that he might be double dealing after he came home covered in pink kisses.”

Chrissy blushes prettily, noting the lipstick she just stained on Gandalf/Casper’s fur as Eddie runs his thumb over it. “Oh yes, sorry about that, I thought it was so funny, but he bolted away before I could wash it off.”

“He probably wanted to brag,” Eddie says. “I mean who can blame him.”

Her blush deepens as she ducks her head shyly and he really hopes that rush of color is not just from the blunt force trauma.

“Anyway...” He clears his throat, scratching the back of his neck, the fire in his own cheeks raging. “He seems a lot happier with you, if you uh want to keep him.”

Gandalf/Casper is almost asleep on Chrissy’s lap now as she combs her fingers through his soft white fur.

“I wish I could,” she sighs, deflating. “But my mom’s allergic and she’d never let me…I’ve been sneaking him in through my window whenever my parents are out.”

“Oh gotcha,” Eddie mumbles, glaring daggers of envy down at Gandalf/Casper who he swears is smiling up at him.

He didn’t know cats could smile.

This garbage cat has been in Chrissy’s room. Heck, he’s probably slept in her bed with her!!

How on earth is that fair?

“He’s very clever,” Chrissy tells him. Oh so Gandalf/Casper is clever too. Not just him. Okay.

“He always seems to know when it’s safe to come around… My parents are away for the week for a conference and my brother’s staying at a friend's house so I’m all by myself—” Chrissy stops herself abruptly, lips pursing, eyes widening.

Eddie’s confused for a moment until he realizes that she just caught herself divulging to a drug dealer who she barely knows that she will be alone in a mansion all week long. No parents. No brother. No…

“No Carver?” he asks before he can stop himself.

“He’s away at basketball camp,” she replies without thinking again, immediately cringing. She closes her eyes tight, silently scolding herself.

Eddie hides his smile, fighting the amused laugh that threatens to bubble up his throat.

She’s as cute as a goddamn button.

Although… he does hope he’s an exception and she’s not this sweet and trusting with just any guy off the street who trespasses into her backyard and tackles her into the ground.

It makes him a little concerned for her safety.

And maybe a little jealous.

“So… you’re here all by your lonesome?” He tries to come off as teasing, harmless, glancing around the vast yard. His gaze falls back over her, noting her attire again and the inground pool behind her.

She was going swimming by herself!?

He was never a lifeguard or anything but that’s not safe!

He relaxes a bit when he sees a book folded open on one of the lawn chairs with a pair of white-rimmed sunglasses, a bottle of sunscreen and a fluffy pink towel.

Maybe she was just sunning. Hopefully. It’s not his business. But they’re co-parenting a cat now. So maybe it is?

She smiles, her pink, sun-kissed nose scrunching up like an albino bunny’s. “I guess so.”

“You’re not going to Mindy’s party?”

“Cindy’s? No.” She laughs, and he’s growing more and more fond of the sound. It sounds like those tiny gold bells at Christmas time.

“Oh?” He grins. Is it him or are they flirting? It has to be just him. “How come?”

“I don’t um…” She shrugs her shoulders. “I don’t get a lot of time to myself and… I just kind of like the quiet sometimes.”

“Which me and the white menace have now totally ruined,” Eddie drawls in realization, becoming increasingly aware of the July heat and humidity and how he’s wearing all black and denim. “I’m sorry, I should leave, you’re obviously—”

“No,” she says quickly, catching his hand again to keep him from shuffling off. “That’s not what I meant at all, you don’t have to go.”

He pauses mid turn and they’re both back at square one, just staring at one another. His eyes drop to the tether of her hand holding his before his fingers curl around hers.

“Would you like to come in for a bit?” Chrissy asks, coy, hopeful. “For some lemonade? It’s really hot out here and I was just about to go for a quick swim.”

Eddie’s mouth hangs open silently at her offer (flies welcome), exchanging a quick glance with Gandalf/Casper, who wakes briefly from his catnap just to fix him with a loaded side eye that seems to say you’re welcome.

“Uhrm uh,” he coughs helplessly for some air. They were/are flirting! “I mean sure! Yeah! Yes!”

She shrinks shyly. “Unless you have somewhere else to be.”

“No, not at all,” he replies immediately. This is the fourth band practice he’s missed this year, but who is fucking counting or who fucking cares!? “That sounds great, actually.”

“I’ve got some leftover haddock for Casper too.” The cat jumps down from her lap and bolts to the sliding glass door across the patio at the word haddock.

They both giggle after him as Eddie chivalrously lifts her down from the table by her waist (or as chivalrous as he can be with that skimpy swimsuit and all her exposed dovey skin). They’re both nervous and giddy as he helps Chrissy walk steadily across the lawn.

“It’s probably best that you stick around,” Chrissy tells him. “Just in case I have some internal bleeding or something.”

Eddie fixes her a look. “Please don’t even joke like that.”

She laughs jovially as she guides him inside from under his supporting arm. “Plus we have to come up with a custody agreement for the cat.”

“True.” Eddie cocks his head toward Gandalf/Casper who is trailing closely after them, encouraging them to move faster, his tail swishing back and forth. “We have some very important matters to discuss, Miss Cunningham.”

…

By rule of thumb, Wayne always gave his nephew three days to turn up before he started to get worried for him. Sometimes Eddie would get himself into a bit of trouble and need to lay low for a few days, sometimes he’d go up to the city for a rock concert or what not.

Either way, by day three he usually found a way to let Wayne know that he was still alive and when he would eventually be home.

So with no sight or sound from that punk the morning of the fourth day, Wayne changes into a fresh set of clothes after his night shift to go out looking for the boy.