Finding Safety

It was the last place he should have gone. But it was the first, the only one he thought of. 

Safety was a feeling, not a location. And for him, there was no other place that came close. As he climbed the wooden ladder and pushed open the trap door, that feeling settled over him, a warm weight even through the chill of rain-drenched clothing. 

The darkness inside the tree-house was soft. Welcomed him. Like coming home in a way he never felt in his own haunted residence. A fragrance of used books and fresh paint filled the space, notes of pine and cinnamon mixed in, with some indefinable scent underneath it all, some secret but familiar musk that flushed his cheeks and made his head feel just a little dizzy. The staccato patter of the summer squall he'd limped through rose and fell against the roof, a comforting white noise now that he was free of it. Deep rumbles of thunder no longer held any terror, no longer echoed with cruel words or reverberated harshly against skin splotched angry scarlet and lurid purple and livid yellow.

He perched on the edge of the trapdoor and removed sodden shoes, placing them neatly on the mat set nearby for the purpose. Layers of clothing were peeled away one by one and wrung out into the open space, then laid out to dry. Shivering, goose bumps raising on bare flesh in the cool air gusting up from the opening, he quickly closed the trapdoor. 

Atop an ancient army foot locker in the corner was a pile of quilts, and he retrieved one, draping it over his shoulders and wrapping it tightly around himself. A wooden-framed futon couch sat opposite the foot locker, and he hobbled over and sat. Gingerly pulling his knees up to his chest and burrowing into soft cotton patchwork, he allowed his eyes to drift shut. 

Sharp screams. Hurled hate. Flying fists and furious feet and fluttering paper confetti raining down with the blows. Blue and red lights in the front window and a mad dash out the back door.

They said art could change your world, and he believed it now.

Eyes snapped open again, lungs gasping, burning, he scrambled with trembling hands for the electric lantern on a card table next to him. Amber light chased away the shadows as he labored to chase away his own, reaching through memory for a voice long gone, the voice of an angel.

Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth. Repeat. Repeat again. Repeat until the shaking stops. That's my brave boy.

Hand on your chest. Feel your heartbeat. Concentrate on every th-thump. Count them. Focus on them slowing. You're doing so well!

Take in your surroundings. Identify them. Three-shelf particle-board bookcase lined with tattered paperbacks and stacks of comic books and scattered with action figures underneath a plaid-curtained window. Small folding table with solitaire game in progress. Tarp and easel in another corner, blank canvas at the ready, sketchbooks stacked on a stool next to it, box of paint tubes and brushes haphazardly thrown in below. Come on...keep going. Pile of sleeping bags and pillows. A couple of stray socks on the floor and even a pair of blue and white plaid boxer shorts over next to the foot locker. Your friend should clean up a little.

Remember where you are, sweetheart.

Remember safety. 

He spoke it out loud, voice thready, tremulous. "Safety."

And as if he had called out a proper name, the trapdoor raised slowly and a head of dark auburn hair, wildly tousled and damp, rose up from it.

"Charlie?" 

"Hey, Will." Relief and shame got tangled up on the way to his mouth, and his whisper sounded like a sob. 

"I looked out my bedroom window to watch the storm for a bit and saw the light through the curtains." Will climbed the rest of the way in, plain white t-shirt like a candle flame in the lantern glow. An umbrella was chucked carelessly onto the mat, sneakers following soon after. Concerned eyes took in the pile of wet clothing neatly laid out. Ripped jeans, ragged long-sleeve with thumb-holes cut into it, threadbare hoodie, tube socks full of holes and too-big Fruit of The Looms that were white when his brother owned them. 

He could feel puzzle pieces fitting together, dots connecting behind the gaze that rose to stare at him as he huddled pathetically in his borrowed blanket. He couldn't seem to lift his own, blurred and burning, focused on an acorn-shaped knot in one of the floorboards. He never should have come here.

Will padded over to the foot locker, lifted the lid, and rummaged around inside, pulling out a few items before letting it slam shut. 

Clean white ankle socks without a single hole and thick gray sweatpants that looked plush and new obscured the acorn. Impossibly warm, strong fingers squeezed his shoulder briefly. 

"Here. Put these on. You know I always keep spares up here. What's mine is yours, man. That's how best friends work. You should remember that." Will's voice was vaguely chiding, but affectionate. The pile was placed next to the lantern, before Will crossed to the pile of sleeping gear and started pulling it apart.

He rose slowly, turning his back to Will, quilt like a robe. His cheeks flamed as he contemplated the pile of clothes. Will's clothes. A pair of red and black checkered boxers on top of the pile. He recognized the Spiderman t-shirt as an old one, art faded with years of wash and wear. A hand reached out with no prompting, informing him the black sweatpants were as thick and comforting as he guessed. There were even identical socks, just as clean and white. The pricking at his eyes got stronger. It was too much. Too nice. Too clean.

"It's all clean, just so you know. I wouldn't give you my dirty undies. That's bad manners." Good-natured teasing, a chuckle in the words, but he could still hear the worry underneath. Will could have worn them for a week and rolled in the mud for kicks, and they'd still be more than he deserved.

"I can just put on my own stuff. It should be mostly dry by now." Thick with snot, stuttered, full of the mortification he was trying so hard not to show.

"Don't be crazy, dude." A wet slap sounded from the other side of the room. "That was your shirt I just threw. It left a print. A big, soggy, Charlie shaped print. It's not even kind of dry. I swear my stuff isn't that gross, man."

Just the opposite. Too clean. Too clean for him anyway. But he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and reached for the boxers. Crouched to pull them up, trusting the weight of the quilt to maintain dignity. More misplaced trust though, and what dignity anyway? 

His foot caught a fold as he rose, and his shield, his barrier against the truth dropped with a quiet rustle.

Strangled. Choked. Guttural. The noise from behind him was almost animal, laced with a whimper, followed by a harsh intake of breath. Two tears leaked through clenched eyelids as a shudder rolled through his exposed body. Everything was exposed now.

Will was anything but stupid. Had discerning eyes and an intuitive heart and could read between lines he never spoke aloud to know how things were. No locker room showers. Always a hoodie. Roughhousing sometimes halted before it could really begin. Missed days at school and a missing parent at school functions. 

Knew why too. The funeral three years ago. A diseased man and two young boys in a house far too big and silent now. A brother who packed his bag and left six months later, no warning or forwarding address, just a note. 

He'd never shown anyone, but the words were engraved on his heart forever.

You've always been the strong one. Way stronger than me. 

I love you, Charlie. Always. Mom did too. I'm sorry. Keep being strong for both of us until I can.

Remember safety. Find it again if you have to.

Love, Callum

Will wasn't stupid, not at all. But he'd been so careful. So painstakingly, unfailingly careful to keep his guard up, to cover the truth in layers and smiles. Especially with Will. Always with Will. 

"Please don't look." He blurted it out forcefully, edging into panic. He grabbed for the shirt and it seemed to come alive in his frantic grip, twisting around itself to prevent him yanking it on. Pillows and sleeping bags dropped unceremoniously onto the futon and those impossibly warm, strong fingers cradled his own. He froze, eyes squeezing shut as saline flowed down his cheeks.

"Stop, Charlie." Gentle. Calm. Placating. "It's okay, I promise. Let me look. If you need it, I can get the first aid kit. Or whatever you need. Just let me look. I swear I won't hurt you. Ever, Charlie. I would never." 

If Will only knew. 

The touches were feather-light, barely there. Fingertips gently prodded at patches of swelling, grazed over each red-crusted cut. Every probe tentative, trembling, assessing damage but trying so hard not to cause more pain. It was a feeling he couldn't ever remember having, new and terrifying and indescribable all at once. Not even his mother had been so tender with him. A rough cloth from who knows where gingerly dabbed away at a few of the more vicious scrapes, cleaning away excess blood as his frame shivered at the cold. He heard a soft sniffle slip out, followed with a hoarse cough. Completely unearned. 

"Does anything feel broken?" The tiniest shake of a head. "Then I think the most important thing is to get you warm. Don't need you coming down with a cold. I'm a terrible nursemaid, and my chicken soup tastes like chicken piss." He couldn't help the giggle even as the waterworks continued, dripping from his chin to the fabric in his hands. 

Will tugged the shirt from his hands and he didn't fight it, eyes still refusing to open. If he looked at Will, that meant this was actually happening. The shirt was pulled over his head and his arms instinctively fit through the armholes. He was being dressed like a toddler, and he hung his head, humiliation complete, tears collecting on the tip of his nose before falling. "Left leg up." Compliance. First the sock, then the pant leg. "Right leg up." Obedience. First the sock, then the pant leg. Will drew the sweats up, thumbs trailing up thighs and waist lightly, causing a full-body spasm that was studiously ignored. Got them settled on bony hips, knotted the drawstring at the front. Too clean. He felt greedy. Needy for how he relished the attention. 

Quilt redeposited around his shoulders like armor, he hunched in on himself. Listened dully as the futon dropped into a bed, as the sleeping bag was unzipped and spread on top, as pillows were fluffed.

Hide. Comply. Obey. Wait for it to be over. Once he's done playing good Samaritan, he'll leave. You'll remember safety for a little while longer. But you have to come back sometime. And I'll be waiting.

"Charlie." Pain. Sadness. Grief. An almost undetectable rage. He didn't know his name could hold so much. Was surprised not to find any mockery or pity. "Look at me. Please. It's just me. And you're my best friend." 

"If I look at you, this is all real and it happened and you see me and I can't lose you too. Not you."

"Never." No hesitation. No weakness. Clear, clean, too clean for him. But impossibly warm, strong fingers raised his chin. "Never. Hear me? I don't care what happened. It was not your fault. I swear it. And I don't care what's going to happen either. I know you're never going back there if I can help it, but we can cross that bridge later. You. Are. My. Best. Friend." Each word punctuated with a small shake. "You can never lose me. Never." Sincerity rang every syllable in a way that he felt down in his soul. Felt like safety.

When he opened his eyes, Will was smiling a genuine Will smile, even through the dampness of his own pale cheeks.

"Come on. Lay down. Get comfortable." There was much less hesitation as he lay down underneath the quilt, exhaustion hitting like a wave. He expected Will to tidy up and then reach for his sneakers to leave. Instead, the lantern was turned to its lowest setting, glowing like embers, and an impossibly warm body stole up next to him, head bouncing down on the other pillow and tugging the quilt over them both. 

"Body heat helps you get warmer faster." Said with a shrug, then a very pregnant pause. "You don't have to, but if you want, can you tell me what happened?"

About thirty heartbeats passed before he answered in a rasp. "He really didn't like one of my paintings."

Something akin to a growl welled up in Will's throat, an indignant exclamation close behind it. "A painting of WHAT?"

"True beauty." He couldn't hide the wistfulness in the word.

"He doesn't like DRAGONS?" It was a blatant, over-dramatic, giggling attempt to lighten the mood, and he let himself respond in the matter Will was hoping for, a weak grin and giggle of his own. But he could see it in his mind, watercolor and charcoal, now destroyed in rage. It held a different kind of beauty entirely.

It was the kind of beauty that was blinding and awe-inspiring and occasionally just the tiniest bit flash. Like fireworks on a Fourth of July night, iridescent color on black, there and gone so quickly but lingering on the backs of your eyelids for minutes after.

In the same breath, it was beauty that wasn't very beautiful by any conventional standard. Skinned and scrawny and scarred. Pale and dark in abrupt contrasts. Crooked here, malformed there, curves and angles patched together like the rough draft of an abstract painting. Awkward movement and limbs that still appeared to need some growing into, yet comfortable with it. Impossibly warm and strong.

The smile sealed it. More contradictions there, but oh did it ever make his knees weak. A little lopsided, a barely crooked tooth, bashful and hopeful and so eager to please. Gleaming below kind, laughing cobalt eyes and that unruly hair that he was sure had to be even softer than it looked. A smile that gave him tremors in his belly just shy of queasy, music in his ears and stars in his eyes and a low-pooling heat.

A smile that seemed to be always for him, no matter who was in the room.

Ordinary and everyday and nothing like those magazines the other boys gawked at, but he couldn't fathom wanting anything more. Wanted to wear it like a favorite old Spiderman t-shirt. Sing it like the love songs his mom used to hum while she did the laundry. Drink it in like the spiced cider Callum used to make for him on winter mornings. Dance in it like the summer rain on a tree-house roof.

It was the kind of beauty that made him think even he could be something wonderful if only he could get close enough. Close enough to let it work a true miracle, the kind that people had been beseeching the divine for since creation. Turn straw to gold and water to wine. Make him clean.

The kind of beauty that made him remember what it was like to hope.

Even if that hope would never amount to anything. "Hope" and "close" and "beauty" were things that happened to good, decent people. Not freaks and abominations. Not undeserving filth.

But as he lay there with an impossibly warm shoulder against his own, soft laughter at a joke that wasn't really that funny vibrating through that friendly press, beauty there and close but a million miles from him just the same, it was nice to remember the feeling anyway. To remember safety. 

"But seriously. A painting?" Confused and incredulous.

"Yep. It's gone now." He sighed, catching that indefinable scent that made him light-headed before, so much stronger under shared covers and shared secrets, and waited.

"Of beauty. And that apparently caused him to go full super-villain. A total monster." Downright dumbfounded.

"Yep. The most beautiful thing in the world. The one thing I want more than anything, even if I can't ever have it. And it's okay that I can't. Truly okay. He didn't let me get to that part." It was the last thing left that hadn't been exposed. The only remaining secret. He could get it out in the open, acknowledge it, tell Will it never had to mean or change anything. Then they could move on, and he'd still have Will, or safety was a lie, and he had nothing left he cared about losing. For the first time in his life, he didn't immediately expect the latter.

"What was the painting of?" Hushed, almost cautious. Bait taken.

"You." Like a skydive of the heart, he felt the freefall begin.

About sixty heartbeats of stillness, silence. He opened his mouth to speak the disclaimer. 

But an impossibly warm, strong hand slid into his own, lacing fingers together. And when he looked over, there was that Will smile, that seemed to be always for him, no matter what ghosts or super-villains or monsters were in the room. 

One soft press of lips. He was caught. Parachute open.

"Do you think you might want to paint another one together?"

His own smile answered. He remembered safety, and knew he'd truly found it again.