Tyed - Chapter 10: Chapter 10

"Excuse me," Tyler says, forcing a smile at James, Ash and Kuro. The smile falters a little when he looks at Colby. Was he only invited here because Colby found out about his past, and he wanted to look good? Is that what it was? "I'm just going to go find the... restroom."
A brief expression passes Colby's face, and it's clear he knows something is up. Tyler breaks from the group, and he sees James do the same, heading up towards the stage. He focusses on finding any sort of sign indicating where the toilets are, but he can still hear a woman's voice welcoming everyone, and it's so distracting: any moment now, it feels like she's going to call him out by name. Tyler knows he's being ridiculous, that he'd know if he was somehow involved with this, but there's a kind of carnal fear associated with his secrets being discovered, and he has to run from it.
Besides, if it were really so ridiculous, why would James and Ash have recognised his name? Why would Colby have brought him here, of all places?
Tyler doesn't realise how much he's rushing until he crashes into someone, and the sensation of cold all down his torso only magnifies his fear. When he looks, he sees an apologetic waiter stumbling over his words, asking if he's okay, but he's not sure that's real. He thinks he mutters something that might be a reassurance that it's fine, or might be complete nonsense, he's not sure. His eyes glaze over, and there might be people around him, or they might be trees. He could be nineteen or nine.
He's aware of what he's doing in one sense, but completely at the same time, it feels like he's doing something else; he knows he's walking as fast as one can acceptably walk towards the bathroom, but it mirrors memories stronger than reality wherein Tyler's shivering from the same cold, wandering through the forest alone. He was always searching for warmth, searching for somewhere where he'd be safe. Eventually, he started creating the fire he so longed for.
There's no fire here, though. Only a stall in a room where Tyler can hide for as long as it takes him to calm down.
He leans against the door of the stall, breathing heavily. He closes his eyes, and all he can see is the forest. Being shoved out onto the porch into the frosty air whenever he upset him, and even though he hated what happened in there, he hated being out in the cold even more.
He went to therapy for years and in all that time he learned how to breathe. He focusses on his lungs, in and out, focusses on what he can see and hear and touch and realises it's tile and not bark. After he feels like there's oxygen in his lungs again, he takes a moment to assess the damage. He's got wine on his shirt, but luckily, it was white wine, so the stain it leaves won't be extremely bright and visible, although he'll smell like wine for the rest of the night. If he buttons his blazer, it hides it almost entirely. That damage is minimal.
However, he's just run out at a crucial moment, and his escape seems pretty suspicious, at least if anyone was paying attention. He's sure Colby was, but then again, he's sure Colby knows.
He closes his eyes. He has a few options, and they all suck. He could go out there, pretend everything is fine, and if anyone mentions anything, pretend he knew. He could go out there and outright demand to know what the fuck Colby thinks he's pulling. That has the benefit of being the one thing that Tyler thinks will soothe his anger, and the extreme drawback of making a scene with the man who- Tyler can't forget- has just paid his rent for the year. He could stay here until further notice, and maybe at some point soon he'll have figured out what the fuck he's supposed to do to get out of this situation with any kind of favourable outcome. Hiding here for the rest of the night is an option, as is pretending to be sick and needing to go home. Either way, he's going to have to answer to Colby at a later date; perhaps then is the right time to ask him what the fuck he's pulling.
He doesn't get a chance to decide before there's a gentle knock on the stall door. "Tyler?"
Colby's voice doesn't give away anything at all, and it's frustrating. "How'd you know I was here?" Tyler asks, deciding that that question needs answering before any of the bigger ones he has.
"Because the bathroom's otherwise empty. Can we talk?"
"About what?" Tyler asks through the door.
"Can you open the door first?"
"Not until I know what it's about." Tyler knows he's being pissier than he should be towards Colby, he knows he's fucking this up, but what did he expect? He royally fucked every opportunity that was ever given to him. Wasn't this inevitable?
"I don't know what it's about," Colby replies, and although he sounds relatively calm, there's an undercurrent of annoyance that Tyler can detect, thanks to years of having to notice minute signs of anger to avoid his father's wrath. "That's why I'm asking you."
Tyler closes his eyes. He wants to give Colby the benefit of the doubt, but it's very, very difficult to believe that Colby didn't somehow know. Still, Tyler's willing to indulge him, to hear him out. He's normally the one dishing the bullshit, not hearing it. It's going to be interesting to be on the other side.
Tyler opens the door, meeting Colby's eyes and staring him down. "I find it hard to believe you don't actually know what I'm upset about."
"I don't, Tyler, I genuinely don't. Did I do something? Is it because of them? I know they were at the club last night, but you were fine for a while, right?"
"It's not that." Tyler crosses his arms, watching the bathroom door in case someone comes in. "Do you seriously not know? Is this all a coincidence?"
"No offence, Tyler," Colby begins, the anger rising slowly in his voice, "but I don't know what the fuck you're on about. I can't tell you whether or not it's a coincidence if I don't know what 'it' is."
Tyler bites his lip, looking up at Colby. "So you didn't google me."
"What? Why would I google you?" Colby's confusion makes sense, Tyler figures. He leans against the wall, not wanting to be wrong but beginning to believe he is. "Why, what the hell would I find if I did? What did you do?"
"I didn't do anything! Why are you assuming I did something wrong?" Tyler straightens up, getting in closer to Colby's face.
"Because why else wouldn't you want me to find out?" Colby doesn't back down. "Maybe I will look you up later just to find out what you don't want to tell me."
"Think, Colby," Tyler hisses, realising suddenly how close they are also recognising at the same time that there isn't any way to back out of the argument at this point. "Think of where we are. They knew my name. Not my face, but my name."
"So...?" Colby's hand is hovering over Tyler's back, clearly recognising the way that their bodies and minds are at odds right now. The heat he gives off is the fire Tyler was looking for, the escape from the cold and fear. "What, you used to work for a nonprofit? I'm sorry, Tyler, I don't get it."
Honestly, Tyler's not sure how they got his name either; they must've been looking through case files or something. That's not really the main concern on his mind right now. Colby's acting stupid enough that if he were lying, he would've just admitted he'd known by now, and wouldn't be keeping up the facade.
"God," Tyler mutters, leaning even closer to Colby's face. "You're stupid."
He presses their lips together, drawing the heat from Colby like he used to draw it from the flames. Colby pushes him up against the stall wall, not breaking their kiss for a long moment.
When he does, he kisses down Tyler's throat, and Tyler closes his eyes, groaning into the touch. It's rough and hard, not simple and easy, but like the scratch of inhaling smoke, Tyler endures it for the heat the burns his eyes because that's far better than the lack of. Colby nips the skin of his throat and Tyler gasps with the way it feels, like a line of nerves lighting up straight from his neck to his groin. It's embarrassing to say that that's never happened before, despite how many times Tyler's had sex. Maybe nobody's ever bitten him before, or maybe Colby's just that different. Maybe Colby is something that nobody has been before.
Suddenly, he's staring in Colby's eyes. "Don't fucking say that," Colby growls, and one of his hands is on Tyler's stomach, and the other's pressing his shoulder into the wall. Colby's slowly travelling under Tyler's blazer, and Tyler's sure that if he doesn't do something to somehow fuck this up, he might finally get what he wants. In a random bathroom, sure, but he licks his lips in anticipation anyway. He's not sure, but he has a strong suspicion that his body is very much ready to go. Part of him feels kind of gross for it, but it's not like he hasn't done this kind of thing before.
"What?" Tyler says, smirking. Pushing Colby to get what he wanted has almost worked before. "Don't call you stupid?"
Colby kisses him again, and the force of it slams into Tyler like the loveliest of hurricanes. When he bites Tyler's lip, Tyler lets out a noise that isn't supposed to be a moan, but it is. Colby's hand is hovering around Tyler's belt, his fingers hooked on it, and Tyler moves his hips just enough to silently suggest to Colby what he should do.
Then the bathroom door opens, and they're apart like they don't even know each other, even though they're still standing in the same stall with the door ajar. They both freeze as someone walks over and uses the urinal. The eye contact that Tyler and Colby make tells a whole conversation that they can't have out loud. Someone's there, do they see us? Wait, what were we doing? Were we really about to do that? There? Did we ever figure out what we were talking about?
As soon as the person leaves, Tyler can let his breath go. He opens his mouth to say something, but Colby's quicker.
"Let's get back out there," he says, and that's the opposite of what Tyler wanted to hear. He didn't care if they did it here or if they left, but he didn't want to be doing anything other than whatever they were about to be doing. "We can... talk later."
Tyler swallows. When he thinks about it, even though that was only the tiniest bit rougher than he was used to, there was something that stopped him from admitting how much he liked that. When he thought it through, and followed it to its logical conclusion, he figured out what it was.
Lachlen brought up BDSM, said that was what the club that he'd met Colby at was about. Tyler's aware of the concept, although it isn't something he's into. He'd used handcuffs on someone else once, and that was about as kinky as he'd personally gotten. Imagining himself as the dominant is good, fine, if not something he cared to search out.
But when Colby shoved him against the wall like that, bit him, it hurt and it put Tyler in a position of vulnerability, and it was the best making out ever. He struggles with vulnerability, finding it beyond difficult to open up to anyone; that's why, in theory, submission should suck, alongside the fact that Tyler's pride simply won't allow him to get in such a humiliating position.
But that was amazing. That was simply true. The vulnerability was fine when it was rough and painful and taken like that, because it was taken on Tyler's terms, and it was nothing at all like what Tyler felt in the dark parts of his past. It was distinct from that in such a way that it doesn't even come close to the same ballpark. That's a wholly different emotion, new and raw and powerful, one Tyler's interested to push.
He follows Colby out of the bathroom, not because he wants to per se- what he wants to do is fuck- but because it's so easy to do what Colby says. He feels oddly secure in the knowledge that Colby din't know about his past, and although he can't guarantee that Colby won't go and look it up now, or make Tyler tell him, he does feel better for knowing that he didn't bring him here for that reason.
"So," Tyler asks as they're leaving, keeping his voice down so as not to draw attention, "why this particular charity, then?"
Colby gives him a look, but then he figures out the unspoken end of Tyler's sentence, the "if not because of me." He thinks it over for a moment. "A friend of mine approached me about it, and I felt it was an important cause to support. It may surprise you to hear I love children."
Someone's on stage, thanking various groups of people for their help in setting up the night, but it's nothing that Tyler feels he shouldn't interrupt with quiet conversation. "Well, I don't know you well enough to dispute that," Tyler shrugs, "but it's nice. You don't have kids, do you?"
He only realises the way that came across when he sees Colby's face. "I didn't- I didn't mean it like that," he stutters over himself. "I don't mean it would be a bad thing. It's just that you're old enough and it might be important for me to know, you know?"
Tyler says that, but he's not entirely sure it wouldn't be a bad thing. It's not like he's suddenly going to become a stepfather, but that possibility exists sometime in the future, and he's not sure he's ever going to have kids. He might adopt or foster at some point in his life, if his mental health is ever ready for it, but he's definitely not going to be ready anytime soon to become a parental figure of any kind.
Colby takes a long moment, and Tyler's about to offer apologies or figure out a way to backtrack even further. If he's offended him, he already has.
"No, I don't," Colby says after a moment. "I'm not... offended, no. Let's talk about this later, alright?"
"We have a lot to talk about later," Tyler mutters, and Colby half-laughs, but there's no humour in it. He's got a story to tell, and it's almost surely not going to be anywhere near as crazy as Tyler's story, but Tyler can already tell it's not going to be a happy one.
They're silent for a while, listening to what's going on onstage. James comes on, and Tyler glares at him, deciding his dislikes him, although he's not sure why. James starts to tell stories about some of the kids the charity's helped, pressing along a powerpoint with a picture of each kid and how they were helped. Tyler's not paying too much attention, mainly because at one point Colby's fingers found their way to the middle of Tyler's back and Tyler's thinking about that, when he hears his name- or he thinks he does. He has to do a double take, and Colby straightens up too, squinting at the screen like he can't quite read it.
"Trey Kristenssen," is what James said, and Tyler sees Ash looking around to try and catch his eye. He goes white, reaching up and gripping Colby's arm; luckily enough for him, the picture that they show of Trey is from somewhat of a distance, taken outside the facility he lives at. It's a good thing, because he looks almost exactly like Tyler, if Tyler got his jaw broken and it never healed properly. Luckily, that's not at all obvious from the photo.
Tyler's still got a chance to pretend that he just happens to share a surname, but his nervousness may or may not prohibit that. "I guess that's where they recognise my name from, huh?" he says, looking up at Colby with his heart beating fast. "That certainly sounds like my name."
"Huh?" Tyler speaking appears to have distracted Colby, at least a little. Tyler's already picked up that Colby has a very good memory, so he's going to have to be careful to never mention his brother's name until he's certain he wants to tell Colby the whole truth. Unless he's already figured it out. There's a good chance.
Tyler and Trey were never extremely close, but they were never normal siblings. They fought over little things, as every modicum of space and privacy was precious. Their parents never treated them the same, and there could've been resentment, if Trey had the capacity for it. He never seemed too badly off as a child, except for the seizures he'd had his whole life. It was only later on, as the genetic disease he had went untreated, that it became worse.
Tyler didn't know what a seizure was until he was thirteen. His father always said that Trey was experiencing demonic possession, and he would always scream things Tyler didn't understand at him until the seizure was over, at which point Trey would be beaten. Tyler was beaten too, but it happened to Trey far more often. Tyler remembers trying to hide in his mother's skirt, but being unable to shut his ears in the same way he could shut his eyes, and he'd always hear Trey crying and begging for their father to stop.
When Trey was much slower to pick up on developmental milestones, he was never helped or taken to see a doctor. He was yelled at at best, and he had the label of idiot drilled into him. It still affected his confidence now; even though he's stuck at the mental ability of a nine year old for the rest of his life, he somehow kept the ability to hate himself.
James is speaking, and Tyler can hear it, and is just hoping that Colby isn't paying close attention. "...seven years ago, Trey came from a dark place. You may have heard about Darkfilly Copse."
Tyler's trying to think of the various ways he can distract Colby and stop him from listening when Colby interrupts his thoughts. "Do you want to leave?"
"Really?" Tyler looks up at him, and Colby finally looks him in the eyes. It's impossible for Tyler to tell when he's thinking, and he hates it. "But we've hardly been here at all."
"I'll make some excuse. The donation's been made, we only really have to be here for as long as we want," Colby says, a softness about him. Tyler wants to reject the softness- he doesn't want pity- but he wants to be here even less.
"If that's what you want," Tyler says, deflecting the decision onto him. It's still kind of about Tyler, though. He can just pretend it's not, and that'll be enough.
"...Trey was given another chance that many kids in his place and condition did not get," James says, and Tyler has to bite his tongue and hope for all he can hope that he doesn't know. That nobody found out. "Having the people that hurt him put in prison wasn't enough, because when kids go through trauma like that, when they're born into trauma like that, they grow up to be traumatised adults."
Colby takes Tyler's hand and begins leading him through the crowd. A few judgemental looks are thrown their way, mainly at the reckless way with which Colby's waltzing through the crowd without attempting to be respectful of the person talking, but most people don't take notice. It's simply not something worth noticing.
"Many of the kids from Darkfilly Copse are adults now. And they're integrating into society, and it's the services that these wonderful people provide- getting Trey to a therapist who specialises in trauma, to a caretaker who can handle his deep set issues, to a doctor who can work with his unique condition-"
It's then that James' voice becomes too far away to hear, as they walk out into the night. They haven't been there long, and Tyler thinks it's surely possible that their abscence will be noted. Tyler may- may- be able to hide the truth from Colby, but James must've seen that picture closer up, must've known that Tyler was Trey's brother. He probably also knew the full story, knew the secret that Tyler was so intent on keeping.
Tyler's not sure he can keep Darkfilly Copse from Colby for long. He doesn't want to ask Colby about his thing, pretty much exclusively because it means he'll have to discuss his own thing. Colby might've been being stupid before, but the longer Tyler thinks about it, the more obvious it seems that it must've clicked. Colby let him leave because he understood, without Tyler having to tell him, what had happened.
Thinking about what Colby said, Tyler's got a clue about what might've happened in his case as well, but he'll wait. He's not going to make assumptions, and if he's right, it's going to be a pretty sad thing for Colby to bring up. Tyler regrets having mentioned the topic at all, although it's probably a good thing that they got to talking about it this early.
"So where are we going?" Tyler asks once they're comfortably outside. He stops as Colby does, standing in front of him and leaning up to get his attention. He likes having Colby's attention on him; it's difficult to live otherwise once he's had a taste of it.
Colby's eyes search his face, like he's trying to figure him out. Tyler shifts, blinking softly, trying to draw his attention away from whatever he's thinking about Tyler and towards the fact that Tyler is physically here, now, and he wants his attention.
It takes Colby a moment to answer. "I don't know," he says after a moment. "I suppose, since we didn't have dinner, that?"
"Mmm." Tyler rides the relative normalcy, the surface of happiness, while he can. He wants Colby's mind off of Darkfilly Copse as long as possible. "Not going to lie, I was looking forward to seeing how the 1% dines. Although I'm also craving a burger."
Colby smiles at that, and Tyler reaches up and grabs his tie, pulling him into a gentle kiss. Colby seems just the littlest bit resistant, and that both upsets and infuriates Tyler. Tyler doesn't talk about his childhood to people he hooks up with- it's usually hookups- but once, when he was really fucked up, he accidentally spilled a lot, if not everything, to someone he was planning on fucking. They felt bad, and after some awkward comforting, they ended up leaving. His sob story is, far too often, a cockblock, and Tyler is not by any stretch of the imagination going to let that be the case with Colby.
So Tyler pulls him with much more force, running his fingers through the back of Colby's hair and tugging him closer. He kisses with a passion that's unfamiliar to him, but it's genuine.
He decides right then and there that he's going to fuck Colby tonight.
---
Apparently most kids hate school, but Tyler wouldn't know. Going to school is always the nicest time of the day, because when Tyler was at school he didn't have to see Daddy being mean and Mummy could get a break, because she always said that looking after Tyler and Trey was really hard. She said she was too young to be a mother and she wanted Tyler and Trey to go away. It hurt when she said that, but at least when Tyler was at school she didn't have to hurt in the same way.
Every kid in town was in the same class, which Tyler thought was really nice, because it meant all his friends were all with each other all the time. Apparently kids were supposed to be split by age, that's what Kevin said, but it was nice to learn things alongside his brother and his best friend. He sees her, his best friend, outside the heavy wooden door, toeing off her shoes.
Tyler runs up with what energy he has- his body kinda hurts a little, but Daddy told him to make sure nobody knows it hurts- and throws his arms around her. "Kali!" he grins. She's always been a lot softer and quieter and kinder than him, so she shrinks a little when someone jumps on her and she doesn't know who it is, but when she hears Tyler's voice and realises it's him she calms down a little.
She turns to look at him, a small smile on her face. "Hi," she says, pulling her cardigan a little tighter around her shoulders. She shivers slightly in the cold that Tyler's trying his hardest to ignore.
"How is Princess Chelsea?" Tyler asks, reaching up and grabbing the heavy door. Jeremiah, one of the older boys, helps him, pulling it back so he and Kali can get through. Tyler smiles at Jeremiah; he flashes back a weaker smile than usual, and the bruises on his wrists explain why. It's normal, though.
"Oh." That brings a little bit of a smile to Kali's face. Something was bothering her, but as soon as Princess Chelsea comes up, the sadness fades. Tyler likes the stories she comes up with. They're kind of like escaping the life that Tyler has when it gets too hard. He's no good at stories, but hers are always really pretty. "I have to tell you about her adventure with the emerald!"
The classroom they enter is just as cold as outside, with the wooden walls barely keeping any heat in. The teacher sits on a chair near the blackboard, watching grumpily as two students organise the chairs so that two sit at each desk. Tyler goes and puts his bag down on one chair, looking behind him for his brother. Trey is talking to Jeremiah, stuttering and shaking a little. Jeremiah claps him on the shoulder and says something Tyler can't hear.
Kali puts her bag down next to Tyler before Trey can take that spot. He notices her bag is mostly empty but he doesn't say anything about it. "What's the emerald?" he asks.
Tyler keeps an eye on the teacher just in case he's told to do something, but really he's listening to Kali. "It's this magic gem that she found in the gardens of her castle, but she has to find out what it does."
"I thought her castle was in the sea," Tyler says, feeling the cold that seeps under his skin and closing his eyes. If he's imagining himself sitting on the roof of Princess Chelsea's castle, looking over the sea on a sunny day, it doesn't feel so cold.
"It is, but there's gardens on the roof just above the sea," Kali says, and Tyler imagines himself in those warm gardens. The sun is not warm enough.
"Oi, Trey." Tyler opens his eyes when he hears snapping in front of his face. Anger comes over him when he sees Kevin. He hates Kevin.
"I'm Tyler and you know it," Tyler snaps, standing and facing Kevin head on. What little patience he had left is gone. He and Kevin are both seven years old; Kali's a bit younger. "What do you want, Kevin?"
"Mum said you have to do cleanup duty today," he says, crossing his arms and nodding at his mother, who also happened to be the teacher. Tyler liked having a class with every kid in town, but he didn't like having the teacher's son in his class.
"But it's your turn," Tyler frowns, crossing his arms. He doesn't get to stand up for himself often but he sure has to try.
"You're doing it," Kevin says, "and that's final!"
When Tyler reaches out and smacks Kevin, he expects that it won't be good for anyone, but it makes the anger inside of him feel good instead of bad. He understands why Daddy does this a lot. Kevin yells and tries to hit back at him, and Tyler tries to keep him at arm's length, but Kevin is fast, and Kevin hits him hard in the side of the head. Tyler cries out, but then he hears a dull, heavy sound that makes him feel sick and Kevin collapses on top of him.
"Don't be mean," Trey says to Kevin, who doesn't respond. Tyler gets down on the ground and shakes him, and Kevin groans really quietly, but other than that he's still.
"What the fuck did you just do?!" The teacher screams, running over to her son. She reaches out and hits Trey, who stumbles back; Tyler runs up to him, grabbing at his arm. He looks over at Kali, whose hand is held over her mouth.
"I'm sorry," Trey says, not because he knows what he's done, but because that's what you say when an adult is mad at you. Sometimes it makes them less mad.
When the teacher looks up at him, that's when the true anger shows on her face, and it sinks in just how much trouble they're both going to be in.
"You two are going home," the teacher says, and Tyler feels all of his insides turn to iron. That's called dread, he thinks. He hangs onto Trey's arm and hopes Daddy won't be too mad.