Starter for 10 (2006)
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It’s fucking cold in the alleyway, Spencer can feel the droplets of rain sneaking underneath the collar of his leather jacket, lines of ice that continue to descend. Brian is in worse condition, shivering noticeably in his soaked through clothes, his normally light hair dark from rain water and matted to his forehead.
All Spencer wants to do is bundle him up, get him warm, get him safe; his hands twitching by his sides in the effort to resist doing just that.
He does not doubt Bri’s reaction were he to get any closer than he already is, the anger and hurt evident in the other boy’s rigid stance, the clear signs of betrayal hanging in the space between them like a presence of its own.
“You’re my best friend,” Brian is saying, his mouth half curling in a sardonic smile - empty and devoid of warmth. “Or at least you’re meant to be.”
His voice is wavering, trembling almost, and Brian looks so unbearably small inside the wide walls of the alley; eyes sad, his skin a stark pallor against the darkness of the night.
It hurts Spencer to watch - what hurts more is the realization that the last time he saw Brian like this he had been years ago, his small hand in his, clutching it like a lifeline as they’d lowered Bri’s father deep into the ground.
Spencer steps forward, the need to comfort his best friend still there, buried beneath all the aggression and violence that still lingered from the happenings of the night.
When Brian takes a step back, Spence almost convinces himself that he doesn’t flinch.
“I expect girls to kick me in the heart, but you? You.” Brian looks at him then, damp locks curling delicately around his ears, and Spencer is suddenly struck dumb by the sheer amount of emotion that lay there, the blue of his eyes now dull with pain.
“You were supposed to love me enough to treat me better than that.”
I do, Spencer wants to say, to shout, to scream; to grip Brian by his shoulders and shake the words bodily into him until he understands.
I do, I promise; I love you, I love you, I love you.
The words catch in his throat, a suffocating lump that doesn’t quite reach his lips. He says nothing - does nothing - as Brian gives him one last pained look before turning around and walking away.
“I want you gone, Spencer.”
The rain just keeps pouring.
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