[right][sup][color=lightgray][@Aces Away] & [@LovelyComplex][/color][/sup][/right]
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[indent][indent][color=lightgray][i]Rye was sitting in the school cafeteria with everyone he cared about, their blurred faces open in a laughter that he couldn't hear as he struggled to focus on the person closest to him. Their lips seem to disappear as he goes to read them and the world is ringing like a dutiful alarm clock. The unintelligible conversation around him fades out as a hand grasps his shirt collar to get his attention. All the smudged out faces turn to the scene as he himself looks down the arm to its owner, the seconds dragging on like the world had been set at half speed. Ringing filled the stony silence as his heart thundered in his ears. An empty face of pale skin against curly brown hair tilted his head questioningly at him, and Rye felt his scream stick in his throat and begin to choke him slowly.

[color=ff7f50]"You got off pretty easy, all things considered,"[/color] the thing pretending to be Danny Boaz spoke with no mouth. He jerked away and lost his balance, and for what felt like an eternity, Gavriel fell backwards off the bench and onto the ground, Danny's hand still clenched tightly at his collar.[/i] [color=ff7f50][i]"Just a bum shoulder after all that? You let me go in the first place. Followed[/i] behind [i]me.[/i]"[/color]

[color=28e0af]I didn't,[/color] [i]Rye wanted to say.[/i] [color=28e0af]You snuck past me. I was trying to grab you back![/color] [i]But there was another burning hand on his person and his head painstakingly turned to who he instinctively knew to be Decky Boaz. The blood was streaming from his temple and thigh as he knelt down to get close to Gavriel's terrified face.

[color=dc143c]"I told ya ta look after 'im, look what you've done,"[/color] the faceless man accused, and Rye's viewpoint was forcibly swung back around to see young Danny on the ground, body limp and lifeless. Instead of being empty, the bullet hole contained a blood-red eye that stared into his soul and questioned his every action. He tried again to take a breath. When was the last time Rye had breathed? Who can hold their breath this long without-?  [color=dc143c]"I trusted you with one'a the most precious things in my life, and ya got 'im killed. What kinda person are you?"[/color]

Rye tried again to defend himself but the vice like grip on his throat wouldn't let up. He choked on his words and they all fell short before they could form as the rest of the table of familiar-but-blank faces watched. One by one as he reached to them for help, the people surrounding him were shot down, and suddenly Gavriel was on his hands and knees, coughing up blood covered letters from a journal he'd never seen and one more gunshot rang out in the heaving silence, bringing the action to a standstill as the small man remained in his bowed position at the feet of Decky Boaz and the body of Danny, his shoulder now bloody and arm limp at his side. Charlie Decker’s disembodied laughter began echoing through the room, and Rye had almost forgotten that chilling, dead tone until just then.

He looked up just in time for Danny's cold eyes to settle on him as the boy's blurry face finally came into focus, just as it did on that actual day in the cafeteria. The lifeless body opened its mouth wide in order to scream and a noise like the world's loudest TV static emitted from his lips as it reached towards him, intent on dragging him down with it into the melting floor-[/i]
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Gavriel awoke flailing, his voice already cracking as he screamed and tears streaming down his face. The blank faces were still surrounding him as the distraught man tore at the bedsheets constricting his movement, breath coming in short and erratic.

Instinctively, a shirtless boy beside Gavriel lifted himself up. Groggily, he pulled Rye up from his lying position, through all the flailing and force, and tightly wrapped him into his arms. Hushing the intrusive thoughts and whispering [color=a8d16a]“It’s going to be okay,”[/color] like clockwork, the boy restricted Rye from moving, embracing and protecting him from whatever bad dream he had just had. 

Whether Rye remembered it or not, he had crept down the hall, locked the door behind him, and crawled into Jericho’s bed at 3 in the morning. This has happened more often than not in the past month than it had before Gavriel left to take care of his Savta. Holding Rye close, his fingers wiping the tears away from his lover’s face, JP repeated a mantra that seemed to work on his delicate bellflower of a step brother, especially with all the information he was aware of thus far about Rye’s trauma and grief, [color=a8d16a]“It’s not your fault… it’s not your fault… it’s not your fault…”[/color] 

When the hyperventilating gradually slowed down, JP lifted Rye’s chin up and affectionately brushed his lips against his lover’s, [color=a8d16a]“I’m here, Sprinkles,”[/color] he breathed, inches away. Fixated on the emotions seeping out of Rye’s painstricken eyes, JP carefully watched him, never once looking away from the boy that needed him. He made sure to keep him close. Make him feel safe. Loved. 

The best thing about JP was his gift of making people feel like they were the only person that mattered in a room, like they belonged. He saw them, listened to them, and made them feel special. Worthy to be alive. He treated them with human decency and inspired them to want to live life to the fullest. His spirit spoke volumes and Rye got the best of it all. Whenever he stressed about the little things. Whenever he was sad over the big things. Whenever he couldn’t carry the weight of the world by himself. Whenever he needed someone to love him. Always, there was JP at his side. Ready to take care of him.

His constant, his rock, his anchor. There are plenty of ways that Gavriel could describe the man holding him. He’d known JP for almost the entire time he’d lived in Edenridge, and while they never had labels on it, they’ve had their own relationship for just as long. Rye loved JP in a way that he didn’t know was possible before the other man entered his life, and he didn’t mean in some cheesy romcom way either; JP somehow managed to get past all of Rye’s defenses just to [i]be there[/i] for him, something not even his own mother could always do. Something so simple as the use of a silly nickname falling off of JP’s lips as he kissed him had Rye calming down from his horror-filled state as he all but collapsed against the musical prodigy. With his breath evened out and his heart rate kicking at just above average, Rye swallowed dryly and looked around his room to prove that all the faces in the shadows were just that. Shadows.

Only to realize he had once again found himself in JP’s room next door.

[color=28e0af]“I woke you up again,”[/color] Rye both acknowledged and deflected with a cracked voice, watching as the hallway light under the door disappeared as whoever had woken up to come check on him- one of their mothers, most likely- realized he was not in his own room and returned to bed. Annoyed with himself, he half-joked, [color=28e0af]“How do I even keep ending up in your room? You should lock your door.”[/color]

Because he was doing good. He swears he was doing good! He had three months of self reflection away from Edenridge, and had grown out of sleepwalking to JP’s room almost six month before even that. Yet since he returned it’s been a common occurrence once more. He wasn’t happy with his backsliding, even though he was aware it was bound to happen, especially returning to a place of high stress. There’s only so many times you can say it’s okay to relapse on something before you don’t even believe yourself.

Luckily for him, JP has never made a habit of kicking him out of bed, even over the course of Rye and Danny’s game in highschool when the smaller boy had been keeping neck and neck with the Belmonte boy. Rye considered himself to be extremely lucky to have such a caring and non-judgemental lover, and he relied on JP like he relied on his own breath to keep him going. Rye couldn’t even imagine having lived in Edenridge if JP weren’t in it, keeping him sure footed in his times of turmoil such as tonight.

[color=28e0af]“It was the cafeteria again,”[/color] He admitted quietly, finally taking his eyes off of his lover’s lips and meeting his dark hickory gaze. Self loathing entered his tone as he reached up and tightly gripped the hand wiping away his tears, his own hand shaking as he did so. Dream Danny and Decky’s words were swirling in his brain and he couldn’t seem to turn it off. [color=28e0af]“And it [i]was[/i] my fault, no matter what I try to say in my dreams. No matter what I tell myself. [i]I[/i] was supposed to keep him safe.”[/color]

[color=a8d16a]“The fuck you were,”[/color] JP bluntly corrected, still holding his step brother in his embrace but now with a strained expression. Rarely in public did Jericho curse and rarely in public did he act anything but carefree, lax, and amiable. For Rye, he was okay with showing more than just this Edenridge local that had his life together. This Edenridge local that no one had a problem with. This Edenridge local that just wanted to play music and vibe. Feeling exasperated, but keeping it to himself, JP wondered when the day would come when his words didn’t fall on deaf ears (metaphorically speaking since Rye had tinnitus). 

Clearing his headspace to focus on the boy that couldn’t live without him, JP calmly asked, reeling back his annoyance, [color=a8d16a]“So you had the power to predict Charlie Decker was going to shoot up the school and take something important away from one of his childhood friends? One of [b]your[/b] friends?”[/color] He emphasized the last question before continuing, [color=a8d16a]“So you [i]knew[/i] he was gonna’ come in that day, straight into that cafeteria and traumatize you and everyone else in that room? You were totally prepared for that, right?”[/color] 

At this point, Jericho loosened his grip on his lover and glanced over at the clock, noticing it was 4:30 AM. Great. He wasn’t going back to sleep. Once he was up, he was up. Laying back down on his pillow, his hands behind his head, he stared up at the ceiling. If he was coming off as harsh and rude, he didn’t mean it but this last month had been the same thing over and over and not once did Rye ask about him and maybe it was getting to him. Maybe he was frustrated that things still hadn’t changed between them, after all these years. 

Rye stared after JP as the other man lied back down, confusion on his features at his unusual reaction. The mantra was similar to all the other times JP had reassured him but his tone had changed, as well as his actions, and Rye wasn’t sure what to do about that. Typically, the older boy would keep him in his arms while he talked him down from his night terrors and the irrational thought that always came with it. For him to flop down and go silent, staring up at the ceiling like he hadn’t just bulldozed through a process that typically took several minutes left Rye unsure and suddenly a bit insecure, a feeling he is extremely used to if it were with anyone else [i]but[/i] the other man in the bed.

[color=28e0af]“I- n…no of course not I…I j-just-”[/color] He stumbled over his words, face feeling hot as the ringing in his ears filled the void of silence after he cut himself off.  He dropped his gaze away from JP’s face before he started making up expressions to fill the shadows that disappearing from the moonlit window had cast onto it. It was just his anxiety getting the better of him, just like it always did, it had to be. The dream had him discombobulated and he was just being sensitive, he had to just be being sensitive because if JP, the one person in the whole world who had never shown annoyance at him, was getting sick of him…he didn’t even know what to expect from that. He was scared of whatever outcome there would be, that’s for sure. Shamefaced, he turned away from JP.

[color=28e0af]“Sorry, I’ll just go back to my room, I was being stupid,”[/color] He said, his voice small and shakey. He threw his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, taking a moment at the side of the bed to steady himself. [color=28e0af]“Goodnight.”[/color]

[color=a8d16a]“No, you won’t and no you aren’t. Get back over here.”[/color] JP didn’t reach for Rye, not one to grab anyone’s wrists unless they were into it, but instead used commanding words. [color=a8d16a]“The last thing we need is you being alone in your room. Just lay here with me.”[/color] JP adjusted his position, turning on his side and opening the covers. [color=a8d16a]“Please.”[/color] 

Rye stayed at the edge of the bed for a long moment, fidgeting with his own nails as he looked at the dark door several feet away that led into a shadow hallway and then to his dark, silent room. He didn’t want to go, he wanted to slide right back into bed and rest his head on JP’s chest and fall asleep to his heartbeat, and the sound of his fan in his room was always a poor substitute to blocking out the noise. A cool breeze brushed across his bare chest and he looked back to a similarly undressed JP and the comforter that he held aloft, waiting for Rye to return.

[color=28e0af]“Ok,”[/color] He relented, slipping back under the covers and doing exactly what he had been thinking a moment before, slinging an arm over JP’s bare stomach and putting his head to his lover’s chest, ear right over his heart. He gave a light squeeze as the blanket fell around them, clenching his eyes against tears he shouldn’t be having and the feeling that something was wrong wrong [i]wrong[/i]. And then, once again like clockwork, he whispered out, [color=28e0af]“I’m sorry.”[/color]

[color=a8d16a]“No, I’m sorry,”[/color] JP breathed before kissing Rye’s head. [color=a8d16a]“I shouldn’t have gone at you like that. I’m just tired. I won’t let it happen again.”[/color] There he was locking up his own feelings, compartmentalizing his thoughts, and focusing on Rye’s needs. This was how things were supposed to be for them. Rye cried, JP held him. Rye ranted, JP listened. Rye wanted to feel loved, JP loved. Jericho knew what he was getting himself into the moment they met and fell so hard for one another. If Rye begged him to come, he would in a heartbeat. He was just tired. Really tired. [color=a8d16a]“I’m sorry,”[/color] He whispered once more, making sure his hold on his lover never loosened. That Rye felt wanted. [color=a8d16a]“For everything.”[/color]

[color=28e0af]“You don’t have to apologize,”[/color] Rye sighed out, already feeling safer again in his lover’s hold. [color=28e0af]“You didn’t do anything wrong, I’m just a mess.”[/color] 

[color=a8d16a]“You’re my mess.”[/color]

Rye smiled tiredly, the exhaustion was already starting to creep up on him as if he’d had no sleep at all, and he knew he’d probably fall back asleep in the next few minutes like he always does. When he wakes up, JP will be there still, already awake and watching him. Like always. [color=28e0af]“You gonna get some sleep too?”[/color]

Nuzzling his face against Rye’s hair, JP lied behind a smile, [color=a8d16a]“Yeah, of course. Like always.”[/color] Relaxing his body, but still keeping Rye in his arms, to show his lover that he was seemingly falling asleep, Jericho drawled, [color=a8d16a]“Sleep. I’m going nowhere.”[/color] 

And just like clockwork, Gavriel did fall asleep and Jericho found himself staring at the door, stuck in his own thoughts while trailing his fingers on Rye’s bare back. Waiting. Waiting for the sun to rise so that he can watch his lover wake up and smile. 
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