#post-siege

Oz just smiled faintly as he poured hot water over the teabag in his own cup. “You gotta admit, there’s no way to really be sure when it’s someone of your caliber.” He walked over to the kitchen island and took the seat across the corner from his unexpected guest.

Julian didn’t answer. Oz gave him a few charitable moments of contemplative quiet as he steeped his own tea. He took the bag out with care, adding sugar generously, before reaching over to take his guest’s cup and swapping it with his cup. “This looks like it’d be better for you. You’re expecting too much out of your coffee from the way you stare at it.”

“What is this?” Julian asked with a mild grimace when he took a bracing sip.

Oz was pleased; getting some emotion out of him was good. “It’s herbal. Supposed to calm you. I wouldn’t know, I don’t drink it a lot.”

“Like you need any more calming…” Julian snorted and took another sip. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Oz replied, setting down his own drink. “So...are you...going to tell me what brings you to San Francisco?” He smirked slightly before taking another sip. “Without even a call to warn me that I was going to have an Oscar nominee sitting in my kitchen?”

“Don’t be like that,” Julian made a face at him. “That never mattered to you.”

“You’re right…” Oz laughed, hoping it was contagious enough to crack a smile from the other boy. He looked around again. “...but seriously, you need to tell someone where you are. You didn’t even bring a bodyguard?” He looked at Julian with a furrow on his brow. “Given what happened...I’d expect you’d have your own Secret Service at this point.”

Julian’s hands tightened around the cup as he stared into it. “...yeah, my handler thinks I’ve gone to see Berkeley.”

Oz lit up at that. “Are you? Did you change your mind? You’re going to college?”

“Do I look like I have time to go to college…?” Julian retorted, barely moving.

“You never know,” Oz replied with a smile. “You always make time when it matters to you.” He paused before adding with a sigh, “Which is why...I know there has to be a really good reason you’re sitting in my kitchen right now.”

The pause felt heavy, and Oz wasn’t used to that with this particular person. He remembered how Julian used to laugh in the same way light reflects from glass; it would scatter in echoes on the walls and you didn’t have a choice but to smile. Because he seemed so...young.

And looking at this boy, sunglasses on his messy chocolate-colored crown, oversized merch sweater from the last Haven tour, flushed from the sunny outdoors but heavy-lidded, and lashes smudged dark onto his cheeks--he looked younger than ever.

“I just...thought I’d come by.” Julian whispered.

It sounded like a secret. Like everything about this visit. Like everything about the two of them.

“...you look tired,” Oz remarked quietly. “You haven’t been sleeping well?”

“...sometimes I think I sleep too much.”

“Not back to work yet, are you?” Oz asked, concerned. “You don’t look to be in any condition to go back work the way you do.” That, and nothing in the news and gossip rags suggested that Julian Larson had ever even stirred out of his house. At least not from what Oz knew.

“I want to…” Julian sighed, stirring the cup as though the dredges would answer him. “...it’d be something to do. I don’t want to be inside anymore. Like…” The way he stared out to the sunshine outside made it seem like he was looking through worlds. “...I want to be somewhere else.”

There was a pause, and then Julian looked at him with a faint smile. “You were the first person I thought of.”

At that, Oz had the humility to blush as he looked away from that familiar smile. He remembered back when he was free to kiss it when he wanted, but never really took advantage of the fact. Now it just felt like something glimmering in the distance that he could admire and not touch. And he was alright with that.

What he wasn’t alright with was the reason it was here again. “I’m flattered, J. But...I’m just more worried about you than ever now.” He sighed. “Everyone’s heard about what happened to you, and then not much about you since.”

“You’ve kept tabs on me?”

“Hard not to,” Oz smiled. “You left an impression.”

“And what did you hear everyone say about me?” Julian asked, almost sarcastically.

“That you were healing, that your manager said that you’re resting, that your mother is looking after you, that rumor has it you’re going to a spa in the Netherlands for therapy, that you’re going to be okay…” Oz leaned back with a smile. Then he was serious again. “But you’re not okay.”

“I’m not,” Julian admitted. He hesitated for one more moment, and then maybe his internal walls started to crack, as it all came rushing out. “I can’t stay home and...watch my mother worry about me. Stare at me with that look on her face. I can’t eat another plate of aggressively healthy organic recovery food. I can’t...deal with cameras with the telephoto lenses around the corner down our street. Watching for me. I don’t...know how they knew where I go for physical therapy and I want to throw my phone every time there’s an update about an in-depth interview request or...or…an appearance at Oprah or...or…” He let out a shaking breath. “They said this was all in my head, it’s all up to me about getting “better” or that I’m so talented that I shouldn’t waste it and I need to get better, all that, but everyone’s doing things around me and looking at me and expecting me to do...something... It’s just…” He closed his eyes and pressed his hands to his temples.

He looks so young.

Oz smiled sadly. “...it’s too much noise, huh?”

“It’s...everyone wanting a piece of me.” Julian braced his elbows on the counter and stared into the distance again. “...I don’t even know if I want me. Or if I can be the me that everyone wants right now.”

“Nobody has the right to demand that of you,” Oz replied softly, after charitable consideration. “You shouldn’t be made to feel like you owe them anything.”

“Is that why you quit…?” Julian asked.

“I never quit,” Oz bristled back at him, and for the first time, that familiar laugh scattered onto his walls. “I’m just not as intense about my filmography as you. I do still work, you know.”

“S’not what your IMDB page says.”

“You’ve kept tabs on me?” Oz teasingly mimicked him. But he smiled. “I do theatre these days. You should try it. You’d be amazing at it.”

“What’s college like?” Julian asked with a soft smile at him. “Do you like it?”

“It’s alright,” Oz laughed, indulging his need to change the topic. “I’d rather be on the stage. But having a degree is an important part of my fallback plan, and it’d make my parents feel better, so I trudge through it.” He smiled warmly at Julian. “You don’t need a backup plan, though. You’ve always known what you wanted and where you wanted to be.”

Those beautiful brown eyes just stared at him, looking big and a little haunted. “...do I?”

“You do,” Oz replied firmly, taking his hand and giving it a firm squeeze. “You always have. And if you don’t yet...well… you’ll figure it out.”

“I’m trying,” Julian’s voice started to waver, his hands cold and they shook. “I’m trying so hard but…I can’t see it yet.”

“You will,” Oz replied, staring back at him. “Julian, you… You know, you’re literally the weirdest kid I know? I have never in my life met anyone like you. When we were...when we were still a thing, I was intimidated by the fact that you had such a clear, definite goal in front of you. And it was a crazy stupid goal too, a freaking EGOT by age twenty-one, like—” he paused for a moment when he heard Julian let out a laugh, “—seriously, like in what universe does someone your age, my age have that insane goal with a refusal to accept any other outcome, and you were so intense about it that you were literally within reach of it, huh? And there was just me, like, happy to just get another casting…Hell, I could’ve done Youtube and been happy. I kept asking myself, who are you, why is this person going out with me, like…?”

He smiled as he waited for Julian to wipe his eyes. Then he added, “...you’re a freak in the way that… you figure it out. All the time. Like how a cat always lands on its feet. I mean I’m not going to say all your choices are great, but…” He shrugged. “You get there. And I know you’ll figure it out when you give yourself the chance to.”

“Cat…” Julian smiled faintly, looking as though he were remembering something. It was a pause before he suddenly said, “You know my mom got me one? Like...supposedly he’s an emotional support cat but I think she just got him for me for...companionship purposes.”

“Always good to have a friend,” Oz replied with a grin. Then he blinked in realization. “...is that why you came to me?”

“...I didn’t know if you’d care, if I dropped in without telling you,” Julian gave him an almost apologetic smile. “But I just...needed someone away from...all that.”

That was big. Bigger than Oz had expected. Julian Larson was not someone he knew to really need anyone. Even when they worked together in Something Damaged, it was like the show needed Julian and not the other way around. He even knew everyone’s lines better than they did.

“I’m just...trying to get better,” Julian whispered, reminding Oz that he’d gone quiet. “I thought...going to someone away from all this would help.”

Oz smiled and squeezed his hands reassuringly. “See…? I told you you’d know where to go.” He received a small smile for that. “Screw what everyone wants you to do. What do you want to do? Where do you want to be?”

It was like the question frightened him. Julian’s eyes were wide and he looked like he was looking for an answer. But was it really the question that worried him, or the answer?

Softly, Oz said, “Forget their expectations of you. And forget what you’re expecting of yourself. You haven’t let anything or anyone down. All this...it’s...just a setback. You’re getting back to your feet, that’s what it is. So… if there’s someplace you want to be, just for right now, or the immediate future… You should be there. Like when you picked to be here suddenly.”

He gave Julian an intent stare. “When you think of where you want to be...where’s the first place you think of…?”

Julian was very quiet as he stared back at him. But Oz knew, behind those brown eyes, he was seeing something or someone. A place or a person. Something. Like he was seeing an instant flashback. Julian did know where he wanted to be. He always did. Oz knew that well.

But wherever it is… it may not be a place he can be in just yet.

So he smiled instead. “Hey. You don’t have to go there this second. You don’t have to look so afraid. I’m not going to throw you out my door to go. You’re welcome to stay for as long as you like.”

“...I guess not.” Julian managed to smile.

“Well, if you’re not going anywhere for a bit, then…” Oz poured him another cup of tea, beaming at him and trying to lighten the mood. “So...tell me about your new cat, and I’ll tell you about theatre.”

“I would like that.”

It was sweet of her, he conceded, to pretend to 'make dinner' so she had an excuse or a setting to drop such a personal bomb on him, in spite of the fact that he's known for eight weeks or more. "That's not an issue."

She still wasn't convinced. She drummed her immaculately manicured nails on the marble. "Then...you don't have an opinion on it, anything? I've never even introduced anyone to you and I tell you I've been seeing someone now and..."

Julian took another bite before leaning back on the barstool, pushing away the food. "What's for me to have an opinion on? You like him, don't you?"

"...well...yes," Dolce replied doubtfully, looking at her son, who hasn't quite been the same since the last time she's ever seen him whole and healthy. Julian just shrugged in response, and she scooped up the plate with a sigh. "...could've sworn you still liked kani salad..."

"Look, mom..." Julian leaned on his elbows and sighed. "Don't worry about me. I'm glad that you're in love. Or that you at least think you are."

She passed by behind him and jabbed his cheek with a cucumber stick. "Don't be cheeky." She dumped the plates into the sink.

"Well aren't you?" Julian smirked a little.

"I don't know, sweetie, but I do like him very much. The whole in-love business seems so...serious." She laughed nervously, but then she paused and slowly turned to look at him fully. "...you know what that's like, don't you?"

Julian considered for a moment, not quite able to look at her. "...you could say that."

There were many things that had been said about the incident that took place in the school. There were many rumors and half-truths and no one really knew what was behind all of it. Except for the kids who were really there.

Something more had happened behind the fire and the stalker and the kids jumping out of the third floor. It made her realize that she didn't know her son as well as she thought she did.

"...should I be happy for you that you are?" she asked carefully.

There wasn't an answer at once. So she added, "Are you...happy that you are? Is it...okay to you that you are?"

Julian wasn't sure what to say to her. He stared out of the window, into the bright, blinding California sun that obscured everything. "...it's different with me."

She put down the dishcloth and walked up to him, trying to understand him, her little boy who hasn't yet lost that haunted expression in his eyes now and again. "Do you want to talk about it?"

What happened? Were the stories all true? Why won't you tell anyone what happened up there? Why have you never brought up what you want to do with school anymore, even though you keep your uniform and books neatly in the closet? Ever since you were given your own control over anything, you knew what you wanted to do, but why now do you duck your head and let me decide for you? Why do you eat the things you hate now and why do you hesitate when I bring you things you like?

Why does your phone keep ringing but you never look at it? Why do you still keep it at your side?

"To be honest..." Julian replied with a faint smile, "...I'd rather talk about something happier." He looked at her with a smile. "...so tell me about your new boyfriend."

Who are you trying to protect this time?

She smiled back at him. "...Will you tell me something in exchange?"

Bargaining to a little boy who won't eat.

"I might," he conceded, nodding.

Sebastian pulled himself up from bed and rubbed his eyes, feeling like they were full of sand and bad decisions from last night. He could still smell whatever wine he had last night on his pillows, he figured this may be a bad way to start a day. But who would tell on him? He was ‘accompanied’ by people of legal age.

He looked to his right, past the overly cheery sunshine, and to the clock on his bedstead that said quite clearly the time and date today. The days seem to crawl, and he blearily realized that considering when he lost consciousness last night, he’d only gotten about five hours of sleep.

A glove without a mate was dangling from the drawer.

Grasping for his phone, he stared into it seeking answers, and only found a lot of angry texts from Reggie (“Where are you?!” “You could at least call me back!” “You better be on time tomorrow, I’m not kidding!”), incoherent replies from friends (“You’re insane!” “How did you even get that bottle, haha!” “Gotta do this again, I’ll bring that model you like!”), and the day’s news.

He shut his eyes and leaned back on the headboard. This wasn’t the worst way to start the day, but he often wondered if there were better ways to do it.

He absently typed,

Are you haunting me?

Pausing, he set the phone down. That wasn’t the right word. It shouldn’t be the right word, and it wasn’t. Haunting was for the dead. And the one he was addressing wasn’t. Thank god.

But no one had seen him.

But he was okay.

Where was he? And why does he hear his laugh again? After trying so hard not to?

Ding!

A bleary glance revealed a text from Alphonse. “Take me to school.”

“Yeah, okay.” Sebastian sighed and got up.

Standing outside his parents’ house, hands in his pockets, and wearing sunglasses that weren’t his, Sebastian huffed and shifted on his heels. He wondered what was the point of him living in the apartment if they were just going to call him back home every other day. He’d wanted to live there on the pretext of learning how to live independently, but given that hardly any upkeep of the apartment was done “independently,” he knew that his parents must have only agreed so that someone was living in the property and that it would ease some of the tension growing at home.

He remembered feeling some amusement that his parents still cared enough to not want their children to see that they were having issues with their marriage. And it didn’t help that he’d become so largely apathetic that he couldn’t even bring himself to care what they planned to do, and it was obvious.

That he knew, that they knew he knew, and they knew that he didn’t care. And it made them a little uncomfortable that he cared so little.

Maybe he was the one doing the haunting.

Sebastian didn’t even know when it started—when he started to not care. Things just…got away from him. Maybe it was the lifestyle or him knowing that they expected nothing from him (unlike Reggie, who they expected everything from, and Al, who they expected to be a sweet boy forever).

But he didn’t often care about much, because it had no repercussions on him.

…or at least, most of the time, they didn’t.

Why do you like wearing old fashioned sunglasses anyway? He put his phone away as soon as he’d typed it. He knew the answer. He could hear the voice answering him plain as day. “It’s a classic, wouldn’t you French boys know about style like that??”

“What are you doing, Bastian?”

He looked up to see Alphonse standing there, in uniform and coat, staring at him with his serious little face that was no longer so sweet, like a little church cherub. He was growing. Sebastian smiled. “Hey.” He nodded to the car as the driver opened the door. “Get in.”

Alphonse stared at him with some suspicion before scuttling along out the gate, climbing into the car. Getting into the car after him and the door slamming shut, he absently nodded to the driver to indicate that they could go.

His little brother was digging into his bag for something, and quipped at Sebastian, “You took your time.”

“Why do you need me to take you to school?” Sebastian asked with a sigh as he stared out the window.

“Because Mama took one car, she’s going to Centre Pompidou, and Papa and Reggie took the other,” Alphonse huffed, pushing Sebastian’s bag away. “You didn’t bring anything for me?”

Sebastian smirked. He drew his hand out of his pocket and held out a bagful of soft caramel squares. Alphonse lit up for an instant before grabbing the bag. “You used to carry more around.”

“The other one who likes it isn’t here,” Sebastian remarked softly as he watched his brother take one square to eat in the car. “Aren’t you getting too old to be this intense about candy?”

“You’re never too old for that,” Alphonse replied between chews, opening a book.

To his right, he heard that laugh again and it made him look up. But outside, there were just people on their way to their lives. There was nothing but the sound of people walking, noise of traffic, doors of shops—

“We need to get more of those, your brother likes them!”

He closed his eyes quickly. It has to be the hangover. He didn’t often do this twice in one morning. He’d been so good at trying to forget.

But after he saw the news…

You really need to stop leaving your influences for me to clean up.

The glove without a mate. The sunglasses. But he couldn’t hit ‘send.’

“Why didn’t they take you to school on the way?” Sebastian asked, and it felt less like a question and more like running away from his thoughts.

“That’s what you’re for,” Alphonse replied simply.

It was strange; just last night he’d seen all these outside scenes before. These places were familiar to him as they always have been, after living in this city long enough. Just last night, he’d been across most of them, with his friends—and were they his friends?—living the luxurious, over-the-top lifestyle he’d been so accustomed.

But now, as he watched a familiar street go by, a nice café with a breakfast that he enjoyed, he thought he could see pictures of himself and someone else, from a time that wasn’t as long ago as it seemed.

He wanted to shut his eyes from it, but he saw pictures in the black every time he did so.

And he could still hear that familiar laugh that woke him. In fact—

“Jeez, get it together, will you? Why are you so hung up on this?”

He looked up quickly when the laugh rippled, distorted, along with a familiar voice, from inside the car. And he saw Alphonse watching something on his phone. “What is that?” he demanded.

Alphonse looked up and stared at him like he was crazy. “YouTube.”

On the little screen in his hands, in living color, was a boy he recognized more easily when the lamp lights blazed on him in the evenings at the city of lights. It looked like some kind of interview for a movie he’d done. The smile was brilliant on his face and his laugh shattered in the weak audio of the phone.

Sebastian ripped his eyes away immediately, focusing on the world outside. And the streets. And the sights. And the shops. Anything.

He’d been doing so well, keeping to himself, keeping to the deal. The occasional text where they don’t respond to what the other says. Everything else stayed in the drafts. He was keeping to the deal.

For once.

“How is he doing now?” Alphonse asked.

“How would I know that?” Sebastian replied tightly.

“He’s your friend, isn’t he?”

Sebastian glanced at him and let out his breath, pulling out his phone to browse. “I’m not his… No.”

Alphonse stared with the same suspicion again before resuming what he was watching. Sebastian desperately wished he had headphones.

Are we friends?

But that one stayed too.

He dropped off Alphonse at school. As for himself, he felt no reason to attend. It felt a lot like the void was calling, and all he needed was a high place right now.

Reggie seemed incapable of looking at him without some kind of judgment. Right now, in spite of the fact that they were supposed to be having a meal together, he mostly felt like he was getting appraised.

“How was school?” he prompted.

Sebastian rolled his eyes, knowing full well that he didn’t attend, and knowing very well that Reggie may already have an inkling that he didn’t. “So-so.”

“Haven’t you anything interesting about it to say?”

“No,” Sebastian replied before a sip of coffee, and apparently, that was the full sentence of it.

He wondered if Reggie would press on, or if he, like his parents, may have somehow given up on him. It appeared it would be the latter, as after a glower, Reggie resumed eating. In spite of appearances, Sebastian actually liked the companionable silence that he had when eating with his brothers. The rest of his nightlife was typically loud.

He glanced at his phone, and remarked, “I’m on time…but mama and papa aren’t.”

“More’s the pity,” Reggie snorted. He shifted his food around. “You haven’t been yourself lately.”

“What would you know about that?” Sebastian smirked.

“What I mean is, you’ve been a little more…distracted than usual,” Reggie side-eyed him. “And here I thought that we’d seen the last of your distractions back in December.”

Alright. Sebastian put his fork down, wiping his mouth with as little menace as possible. And Reggie seemed pleased, even when he tried to rise from the table. “Sit down, Sebastian.”

“I’ve places to be, honestly—”

“You’ve nowhere to be, sit down.”

Sebastian remained standing, glaring at him. And he glared even more when Reggie snatched the sunglasses from the table when he meant to reach for them. “Give those back.”

“Sit.”

“Now.”

Reggie leaned back and tucked the sunglasses to his side of the table, gesturing for Sebastian to sit in silence. The stare-down between the two of them would’ve made other patrons of the restaurant uncomfortable, were the two of them not ensconced in a private area.

Clenching the napkin in his fist, Sebastian sat back down and opened his palm to his brother. Reggie did not return the sunglasses.

“If you’re having problems, you’re supposed to tell us,” Reggie told him with maddening calm. “You don’t think we don’t know what’s going on with you?”

“I know that you know, I had the assumption that you really don’t care or you wouldn’t let me.” Sebastian’s smile was far from genuine.

“That was our mistake, apparently. Are you really just going to get drunk and party all night every night until you turn eighteen? Haven’t you any plans for yourself? What you’ll be?”

“Shall I be like you?” Sebastian asked with the same tight cheer. “It seems so much more fun than what I’m doing now.”

“You’re not even in college yet.”

“What makes you think I won’t go to college and do exactly the same thing?”

“Oh? With the way you treat your schoolwork?”

“You have nothing on me.” And he knew they didn’t. He made sure they didn’t. He was excellent when he had to be. And the rest of the time…

Reggie observed him for a moment, then continued as he ate. “How about the arts, Sebastian? You seem to be quite good at that. You write music. You’re good at singing. Have you tried that direction?”

Sebastian raised an eyebrow, not having expected this approach. “…that’s a direction? An option?”

“It’s certainly one better than the road towards alcoholism.” Reggie scooped up the goblet of wine that was freshly poured. “No, he won’t be having any tonight.”

“I know what I’m doing,” Sebastian glared as the waiter departed.

“Do you?” Reggie sipped the wine himself and sighed. “I just think that you’re wasting your potential. Whatever that potential may be.”

“Why do you even care?” Sebastian asked.

“Because though it may surprise you, I do give a damn about what happens to my brothers,” Reggie replied coolly. “Especially ones who are going through something I can’t understand, because he refuses to tell me.”

“I’m not going through anything,” Sebastian replied with gritted teeth.

“That’s not what Alphonse says,” Reggie remarked with a raised eyebrow. “That’s not what your actions say either. And it is not…” and he very carefully placed the sunglasses with a clack in front of Sebastian, “…what I saw in you in your room that night.”

Sebastian stared at the sunglasses. He heard it in his ears, as he did in the nights when he tried to sleep; the news report with the sirens and the reporter. The news that the boy whose laugh he still hears in his ears had been—

He closed his eyes, trying not to see again.

When he opened them, he saw Reggie staring at him.

He grabbed the sunglasses and fled.

…are you okay?

Even as he stared at the words on the phone, he didn’t think it was worth sending. It was a stupid question.

He leaned back on the sill of the apartment and stared out into the lights of the evening. The view wasn’t terrible. But it hurt to see. He loved it all the same, but it still hurt to see for some reason.

He should’ve figured a while ago that there was no getting away from it. He had done his best and everything he could to look away. He had tried to get on with his life. He didn’t even think they were still friends at this point, even though he’d sent a gift once.

And he had to admit, that in spite of his best efforts, it didn’t work. Nothing ever worked.

None of the deals and promises ever worked out.

The key in his palm was warm by now, and he found himself smiling as he looked down at it. It wasn’t the first time that he wondered if he should’ve thrown it into the Seine. Carefully, he set it down on top of his piano keyboard.

There were traces everywhere that he hadn’t put away.

He flopped back into bed, ignoring the prompting texts of his friends, asking where he was. Closing his eyes, he tried to not imagine. That was the worst part: no matter how hard he tried, he kept wondering what would’ve happened. And then the next part of the haunting, which was what he would do…if he’d see him again.

Wasn’t that the most frightening part of a facing your fear? To see exactly what had been lurking there? What he had been trying to turn his eyes away from all this time?

Would the person on the other side even want to look back?

I’m tired of seeing you everywhere.

It was funny. Because he said those same words to him last December, when his posters were everywhere for that movie he was promoting.

But like some of the things that they’d told each other through the course of that time…it was just another thing that he probably didn’t mean.

Ding!

He sighed and checked his phone with the intention of deleting all his friends’ texts. All they ever did was use him for bottle service or get into VIP or catch all the models, and it was likely it was just more whining about not seeing him or asking when he was coming or—

“Bastian, Papa is going to be sent on a diplomatic meeting of some kind to America. Come home tomorrow, they want to talk to us.”

Sebastian stared at that text for a very long time. Then he looked back up at the ceiling, willing it to give him answers.

But it seldom did when there was no alcohol involved.

That laugh echoed in his ears.

Or maybe it was just someone in the streets outside, strolling down the pavement, arm in arm with someone they were smiling at as they vanished into the lights.

Sebastian sat up. Slowly, he typed out a message.

He smiled.