He rushed to the Campbell estate as fast as he could (it wasn’t fast enough for the energy coursing through him--waiting for the train felt like actual torture, the stillness like claws raking over his skin). When he got there, a crowd of Barrier Patrol officers swarmed around along with some other official looking people in suits carrying folders and pens cataloguing the scene. They could have been reporters, but he thought it more likely they were from the city council office. All of these people had gotten there before him, and he thought of Miria alone in this chaos and he rushed to the front door. Some officers tried to stop him before they realized who he was--ward of the deceased--though they did caution him not to touch anything inside the house.

Even after all the years that had passed since he moved out, the front door loomed forbiddingly, memories clouded by dread and anxiety bogging him down momentarily. With almost photorealistic clarity, he could picture coming to this very spot, a bad report card or failed test clutched in his shaking hands, not wanting to continue and face the disappointment waiting for him. But then, phantom fingers pushed gently on his back--Miria, who always coaxed him onward with a smile and some forced encouragement--and his limbs unfroze and again he was rushing. He passed Julia, the household cook, her face usually so warm and inviting, now blotchy and covered in tears. Their eyes connected and she gestured toward the back garden before she continued to talk to the officer who was questioning her. Footsteps thundered above his head, the old wood floors creaking under the weight of several people, and he guessed the--and here he hesitated, not able to fully give voice to the reality of a deceased Joseph Campbell, a man who had always seemed to run on more than what normal humans needed to survive and thus seemed practically immortal to Lysander.

Lysander passed the grand staircase, running his hands along the smooth wooden bannister as he went--a habit long ingrained after living there for fifteen years, the wood just starting to show signs of wear from the consistent abuse, the varnish rubbed to practically nothing--and entered the massive modern kitchen. The early morning sun shone through the French doors and reflected garishly off the gleaming steel of the appliances. The white painted cabinets gave the space an open and homely feel on most days, but the cheeriness of the scene felt wrong at the moment to Lysander. Gripping the gold door handle, Lysander let himself out into the garden. Immediately, he was surrounded by the scent of new spring flowers. While the estate sat on a small parcel of secluded land just outside of the urban city center, much of the actual property had been converted for farm and ranch use. Avianna had insisted upon it just after the Barrier had been erected. So, the garden was all that remained of the once sprawling lawns, but with its high bricked privacy wall and crawling flower vines, it was a pocket of serenity. The majority of the plants still showed the signs of recent awakening--flower buds just forming and stems shyly peeking above the soil--but some intrepid daffodils and tulips opened their petals, giving a touch of color to the greenery. Crunching on the gravel path, Lysander passed under a row of arbors and found Mirianna sitting curled up on a marble bench tucked into a natural alcove formed amidst several bushes. The bench faced the garden centerpiece--a marble fountain that wouldn’t be filled and run until May at least. The basin was filled with dead leaves that had caked to the bottom after a winter of neglect.

Slowing his steps, Lysander approached his best friend cautiously, not wanting to interrupt her if she needed to be alone, but as soon as he got closer, she looked up at him. “Lys,” she began, her voice hoarse from crying, “Thank god you’re here.”

Taking a seat next to her and feeling the deep chill from the marble creeping up his spine, he wrapped an arm around her. Even with her coat on, he could feel her shoulders shaking minutely, either from shock, the cold, grief, or some combination thereof. “I came right away. Sorry I hung up on you,” he apologized. After dropping the phone, he had unthinkingly slammed it back onto its receiver before rushing to get ready to leave the apartment.

“It’s fine,” she whispered, tucking her hands between her thighs to warm her fingers, “I figured you were on your way.”

“Yeah,” he replied. “What, uh, what happened?”

He hadn’t allowed himself to think about that question yet, about what the answer to it could mean, but he suddenly needed to know. He hoped in some deep part of him that Joseph had merely succumbed to some heretofore unknown illness or some freak accident, but he knew in the part of him that Joseph himself had honed to think logically that that couldn’t be possible.

“They’re not really sure. Julia got here this morning and found him dead in his study. She thought maybe he had an aneurysm or something, but my uncle is convinced he was poisoned.”

Both of these pieces of information unsettled him--that fact that Anthony was poking around made his skin itch, and the fact that he thought Joseph had been poisoned made his thoughts immediately jump to Red.

Red, who had promised to take care of everything, who had acted oddly the day before, who had seemed very interested in Joseph’s normal diet, who had tracked his eating habits and watched this house and knew his routines better than even Lysander did most certainly, and he had to stop, but he couldn’t force the knowledge, the truth, the rightness of it away. Somehow and for some reason, Red had ignored his wishes and murdered Joseph Campbell. He knew it with a certainty he almost never felt, but everything he knew about her and how she worked screamed that this was her handiwork.

The realization made him bring his arm back from Miria’s shoulders and retreat physically into himself. Touching her was too much. He couldn’t be affectionate and supportive when it was his fault her father laid dead just inside. Not when she had no idea the role he had played in it.

God, how was he supposed to tell her? How could he admit to such a thing?

But he had to, she deserved to know. First, he had to be certain of his suspicions, and that required speaking to Red, hearing the truth from her own lips, and without a means of getting in contact with her, he would just have to wait for her to come to him.

For now, he would offer Miria what he could, even if that was just someone to sit next to her and commiserate in silence.

Clearing his throat, he finally replied to her revelation, “I’m sure Anthony will get to the bottom of it.” And Lysander was certain Anthony would.

She nodded listlessly, her golden hair falling around her shoulders in a tangled mess. A combination of the wind and not having the wherewithal to brush it had not done her hair any favors, the strands catching on the clasps and buttons of her coat and sticking to the dried tear tracks on her face.

Just as he worked up the nerve to smooth her hair back away from her face, a brunette woman came around the corner into their private sanctuary, breaking the moment. The newcomer moved with purpose, and while she was dressed professionally, the bright colors belied the appearance, especially when added together with the pattern of multi-colored parrots on her blouse completely at odds with the mood in the estate. As she neared, he got the growing sense that she looked familiar, but he couldn’t place her face. Her hair was cut short, just hitting the middle of her neck in a riot of thick waves, and her hazel eyes shone sympathetically at the pair of them.

“I’m so sorry to interrupt. My name is Tessa Fletcher, and I’m from the city council office. They sent me to discuss the vacancy of power with you, Ms. Campbell.” Her tone was appropriately somber, but she had an aura of vibrancy to her that was only marginally dimmed by the situation. The familiarity of her face was offset by the way her features came together on her like he had seen her before but only when she was a child or something. Also, the brightness of her eyes seemed wrong somehow, like he had seen those eyes but only in a darker aspect. Put together, he had an immediate sense of distrust, though he had no real reason for it.

Miria froze, her face transforming into a look of pure panic. She clearly hadn’t thought about the repercussions of her father’s death beyond the simple loss. Lysander didn’t blame her. After all, he had also managed to forget about Campbell Corporation and the CEO position Joseph had left behind.

“Is now really the right time?” he asked, just managing not to stutter through the question. At the sound of his voice, Miria shot him a grateful look, but the gratitude only made his stomach twist harder with guilt.

“I know it’s inopportune, but the council would really like to begin preparations for Ms. Campbell to take her place as the head of Campbell Corporation. There’s a lot of paperwork and information that needs to be passed on, and the sooner we start, the sooner we can get the city running smoothly again,” Tessa said, her hands folded in front of her demurely.

With a sigh, Miria got to her feet. “It’s fine. I understand. We can talk in the office by my old room. C’mon, Lys.”

Lysander followed, mostly because it was easier to follow simple commands at the moment than try to think through everything. He didn’t have room left to contemplate anything else.

Miria led them to what used to be the wing of the house designated for their use--his bedroom and personal bathroom taking up the entirety of the right side of the hall, and Miria’s taking up the left with the office where they worked on homework at the very end. A thick plush carpet had been laid over the hardwood here, and it muffled their footsteps. Their old office was large--two of his apartments could almost certainly fit inside it. The left side of the room was taken over by a collection of low bookshelves interspersed with potted plants and vases filled with flowers from the back garden while the right was dominated by a massive brick fireplace, the mantle of which jutted into the room. The top of the mantle was still decorated with some of their collected miscellany--a pencil holder shaped like a typewriter, a heart shaped wooden puzzle box that they used to leave notes to each other in as kids, a ceramic rocking horse from Miria’s nursery, and an assortment of pictures of them at all ages. Miria waved them into the cozy armchairs in front of the fireplace, and Tessa took that opportunity to set her bulging patchwork bag onto the coffee table that sat between them.

As soon as they were all settled, Tessa began, “As I’m sure you’ve realized, your father has left the company and the running of it to you, Ms. Campbell, which means that you would also be responsible for taking his place as the executive branch in the city government.”

“What about the house and the staff?” Miria asked, cutting Tessa off.

“The other aspects of your father’s will are unfortunately unknown to me. I’m just in charge of this portion,” Tessa confessed.

“Oh, alright, continue then,” Miria said, sounding deflated. She had probably been trying to postpone the conversation by asking.

“Of course. So, should you choose to accept this inherited position, I’ll just need you to sign these forms and then we’ll have yet more to discuss.” With that, she pulled a purple folder from her bag and handed it to Miria, who took it with shaking hands.

Flipping through the paperwork without really seeing any of the words, Miria questioned, “So, if I don’t take the job, then who does?” Lysander had been wondering the same thing. Would they promote someone from inside the company? Maybe one of Joseph’s other executives. Or would it be put to public vote? He doubted that highly given that the only elected officials in the city were those on the Council--both the Committee members and the CEO of Campbell’s had always been appointed positions. But, to be fair, Joseph had been in charge for as long as this system had been in place, so this was all uncharted territory.

“Well, your father stipulated that if you were not able to accept for some reason that the company’s leadership would then pass to his brother, Anthony Campbell.” His gut clenched at the information. The last thing he needed was for Anthony to have yet more power, but he couldn’t pressure Miria to take up this job if she didn’t want to. The stress of it would be immense.

Miria’s eyebrows puckered, ridges of tension appearing on her forehead. “Then I’ll do it, of course.”

“Are-are you sure?” he asked. Relief had flooded him as soon as he heard her acceptance, but he had to ask out of concern for her. She merely shot him a glance in response. While Miria loved her uncle, she knew as well as Lysander that Anthony had no business being in charge of so many people’s lives.

After Tessa handed over a pen, Miria began scribbling her signature over a truly baffling amount of papers. Once she finally finished and handed the folder back to Tessa, the weight of it seemed to catch up to Miria, her shoulders sagging and tears beginning to prickle against her lashes once more.

“Now that that’s over, we do have some rather serious things we need to discuss, Ms. Campbell,” Tessa stated, shooting a look toward Lysander that suggested the conversation should be held in private.

“Whatever you want to discuss can be said in front of Lysander. He is an honorary Campbell, after all,” Miria said, grabbing his arm where it lay on his chair before he even had a chance to begin leaving. Bile rose in the back of his throat at her statement. He had never felt further from her in that moment. For better or worse, he had been part of this family since he was six, but with the potential reality of what he had done swirling around in his mind, he felt cast adrift like he had sawed through his own tether to them.

Tessa had a moment where it looked like she might protest more, but then she simply settled deeper into her armchair and clasped her hands in her lap, looking between them with a serious expression, and suddenly Lysander knew what she was going to talk to them about before she even began. He wanted to stop her, to halt time, but he also knew that he had no chance of keeping this information to himself any longer--not with Miria now in charge of Campbell’s. “Before I start, I just want to mention that what I’m about to say may be alarming, but it is a plan that was decided nationwide by the leaders of each city government, meaning our own council signed on rather readily. Your father, Ms. Campbell, put into place a plan that will, within the next six months, permanently cut the Barrier down to the emergency circle and will reduce the city’s population by approximately three quarters of what it is now.”

Having the entire reason for his secret plan exposed to Miria in one fell swoop left him with a feeling akin to being sucker punched. He had known that she would find out, even if his plan had gone off correctly, but still he had wanted to ease her into it, preferably with Joseph there to tell her he had changed his mind. He thought of Red sitting in his apartment and calling him “painfully naive”.

Yet, part of him also unclenched as the truth came out. At least it was one less thing that he had to hide.

“What?! Why?!” Miria shouted, shooting straight up in her chair, her spine locked in a perfect line. Lysander winced at the outburst and tried to school his features into an appropriately shocked expression, though he needn’t have bothered because Miria was laser focused on Tessa, which was probably for the best given that Lysander couldn’t lie--even visually--to save his life. Instead of the surprise he was trying to convey, he looked more like he was sucking on an especially sour piece of candy or like someone had kicked him squarely in the groin.

“Well, I admittedly don’t understand all the technical aspects, but I am given to understand that this option, while understandably undesirable, is the only one that meets the needs of the city as it stands. Given the enormity of this project, the council thought it best to include you as soon as possible, in order to continue the monumental amount of planning that still needs done. This binder has all the information you need, including statements from the council and Committee members about why they made this decision,” Tessa explained, pulling a massive binder from her bag, which promptly fell over as though the binder had been it’s only structural support.

Miria snatched the binder from Tessa’s hands and immediately started flipping through the documents. Her expression was tightly controlled, but he could see panic, grief, and anger warring behind her eyes. Lysander didn’t have a good view of what the paperwork entailed, but he did see a lot of numbers and graphs. Part of him felt relieved that Miria was now roped into this gigantic secret that he had been holding onto for the better part of three weeks. Having her help would be amazing, and he still felt sure that the two of them could figure something else out, a feeling which probably prompted what came out of his mouth next. “What if we can make a different plan? Something less horrible, I mean?”

Both women stopped what they were doing to stare at him, and he could see the wheels turning behind Miria’s eyes. Because he was watching her so closely, he saw the exact moment that resolve--firm and unyielding--settled over Miria’s shoulders, and amidst all the other complicated feelings he was having about the situation, he felt good, knowing he had at least given her a purpose to distract from her father’s death.

A mischievous glimmer sparkled to life in Tessa’s eyes for a brief flicker of a second, but it was gone so fast that Lysander wasn’t sure if he had imagined it or not. “Well, any plan you come up with would have to be voted on by the council, of course, but I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t at least try. There are lives at stake, after all.” It was the first time over the course of the entire conversation that Tessa hadn’t sounded completely robotic as though she was reading lines from a strict script.

Miria nodded and stood from her seat, still clutching the binder in her hands. “I apologize, but I think I need a moment alone,” she said, talking mostly to the floor.

“Of course, Mir, whatever you need,” he replied, his own grief and mixed up thoughts stirring together and making her desire entirely understandable to him.

After the door clicked closed with Miria’s departure, Tessa turned to him and gave him an appraising look. Uneasy with the sudden, baffling attention, his eyes darted around the room, trying to focus on anything other than her face, a desperate attempt to find a topic of conversation. Ignoring his obvious panic, she crossed to his side of the table and took the seat that Miria had recently vacated.

Had he done something to offend her somehow?

Leaning over the armrest, Tessa glanced at the closed door and whispered to him, “I know this has something to do with Red.”

The sentence caused him to break into an immediate cold sweat. His unthinking shocked reaction almost certainly gave away that he knew exactly what Tessa was talking about, but he didn’t have the acting experience necessary to try to temper any of his facial features, especially not after that.

“Wh-what?” he babbled out. He bit his tongue before he could continue and expose any more unintentional information to her.

“You know exactly what I’m talking about. I have a friend who works in Border Patrol who I pay to pass me any sightings of Red from the security cams, and I’ve seen her with you more than once,” she hissed. He swept his eyes over her face, noting that she didn’t seem angry or accusing, oddly enough. Her expression was more reminiscent of a crazed obsession, her eyes heated and pleading.

The information about the sightings of them on the security footage around the city was deeply worrying, but he had to push that aside for the time being.

“I, uh, don’t know what you’re talking about,” he muttered, less because he thought she might believe that and more because he didn’t want to point blank admit to a complete stranger his involvement with a Shifted assassin.

Shaking her head, causing her short waves to whip her cheeks, she contradicted him with a skeptical look, “I’m not an idiot, Lysander Badeaux. This whole scene screams Red’s MO, and I have literally seen you two together. Look, my guy in BP erases any footage of her for me after he shows it to me, so Campbell won’t find out, but I need you to tell me you know her.”

For some reason, the sound of his full name from her lips caused the cogs in his brain to finally align--her familiar appearance, her need to hear about Red, why her familiarity felt off to him.

“Wait, are you--are you related to Noah?” he asked, incredulity painting his words.

“You know my brother?!” she asked in return, excitement now perking her up in her seat.

“Brother?”

“Yes, Noah is my twin,” she confided.

The two were nothing alike, but there was enough similarity in their facial features and how they carried themselves--a confident swagger in both tone and demeanor--that he immediately believed her assertion.

Before he could ask more, Miria reentered the room, her cheeks and eyes red from more crying. He noticed that she had retied her hair, the golden strands now tucked securely back from her face in a tight high ponytail where before pieces had hung haphazardly around her face and down her back. Seeing the pair of them so close to each other, Miria’s eyebrows pinched. She looked at him and he minutely shrugged at her, noverbally showing that he also had no idea what was going on.

“Um, sorry about that,” she said at last, clearly deciding not to comment on their new positions.

“No problem at all! Completely understandable!” Tessa said, shooting up to her feet with a clap of her hands. Lysander felt like he had whiplash from the sudden shift in her tone. “I think I’ve overstayed my welcome, anyways. I’ll leave that paperwork with you, and we can talk again once your situation has settled. I’ll be in touch with you as well, Mr. Badeaux, in regards to your part in Mr. Campbell’s will.” The last comment was directed at him entirely, Tessa’s face hidden from Miria’s view, thus the other woman didn’t see the jaunty wink Tessa gave him before her features smoothed back into professional courtesy mode. He could practically feel sweat coalescing on his hairline and behind his knees, and he was sure he would have a collection of white hairs peppering his black tresses soon.

Tessa gave Miria a firm handshake and a pat on the shoulder, and then she was gone. After Tessa had disappeared down the hall, Miria turned to him and deflated, every aspect of her turning downcast. “This is a lot,” she said, leaning her body against the doorframe, “My dad and I had our issues, but god, maybe he was all that was keeping me together, Lys. I feel like pieces of me are just floating away, like he always pressured me, but at least trying to live up to his expectations kept me moving, y’know?”

He didn’t really know, but he didn’t like what she was saying. It sounded too much like defeat, too sad for the sunshine personified that Miria was. “That can’t be true. We’re gonna get through this, you and me like old times, okay?”

At the mention of their shared history, Miria smiled, just a quirk in the corner of her lips, but it was an astronomical improvement over the pall that had settled over her. “Yeah, thanks Lys.”

He spent the rest of the day lurking behind Miria as they both answered questions from BP detectives. Anthony was puzzlingly absent from any of these interactions. In fact, the only time Lysander caught a glimpse of him was a brief flash of his blond hair illuminated by the light of the setting sun streaming in through the large domed windows in the foyer. The other man descended the grand staircase and left without even glancing in their direction. Miria watched him leave, her face inscrutable and shoulders tight before continuing her account of her whereabouts from the previous night to the officer in front of them.

Once the daylight had well and truly fled, the officers welcomed them to get some rest, leaving only a smattering of a skeleton crew to continue work overnight. Lysander got the impression that the people left behind were more tasked with guarding the crime scene than investigating it, the tiny contingent grouping together and whispering before retreating upstairs and leaving Miria and him alone in the expansive entrance hall. He heard pacing above them once more, which only served to further cement his earlier hypothesis. Privately, he wondered if this was normal protocol at a crime scene.

Aloud, he questioned Miria, “Why don’t you try to get some rest? I need to head home and let Bingley out and all, but I’ll be right back here in the morning.”

At the sound of his voice, Miria started slightly like she had been deep in her own thoughts. “Are you sure you can’t stay?”

She sounded so small and tired that he immediately and desperately wanted to say yes, but he couldn’t leave his poor dog cooped up and alone for an entire night. “I wish I could, Mir. How ‘bout this? I’ll just run home super quick and let Bingley out and then I’ll be right back.” He had truthfully wanted badly to have even just a few hours to himself in his own space to think through things, but if Miria needed him here, then here he would be.

“I haven’t slept here in years,” she whispered instead of responding to him, her gaze sweeping the ornate bannister of the grand staircase and the sweeping arches of the high windows far overhead.

Lysander hadn’t either, hadn’t even set foot in the building since he had left all those years ago, and he wondered what it was like for other people to return to their childhood homes, if they felt the same mixture of familiarity and dread and nostalgia practically bleeding from the otherwise innocuous wooden panelling. “I’ll be back super quick,” he said finally. He convinced her to hole up in their office to wait for him after briefly considering bringing her along for his errand. Deciding against it for his own selfish desire to be alone, he left with yet another promise to be back soon.

As the front door thudded closed behind him, a wave of emotions crashed over him--all of his own grief and anxiety and guilt catching up at last after being held at bay for Miria’s sake. Taking a moment, he squatted down right there on the stoop to breathe deeply and settle his stomach, a few tears escaping down his cheeks as Joseph’s phantom fingers pressed down into his hair again. Standing, he shook out his arms and exhaled into the night, once more forcing the feelings back in favor of the task at hand.

He spent the entirety of the train ride back to Mapleview trying not to think of anything, exhaustion giving him the perfect headspace to nestle into--a fuzzy black space where he could be nothing at all for a breath of time.

One year ago

Ramon had been spending a lot of time in Mapleview lately. The town was just on the border and it was small enough to have a consistent client base but large enough to escape into a crowd if he had to. His uncle had an easy time dropping goods in the area as well. The Barrier Patrol guards this far from the city were much easier to bribe to turn a blind eye every once in a while. Even so, Ramon was too careful--borderline paranoid--and he insisted on changing their meeting place every week. For the same reason, he would keep a collection of ripped pieces of paper all labeled with a different address for client drops--all easily accessible public spaces. If someone bought from him, they never picked up in the same place twice. He did his research and kept meticulous records of locations. After losing his aunt and all but one cousin to the Spread sickness just two years after the family was exiled, he didn’t want to risk his own family’s safety.

Yet, he couldn’t bring himself to stop being a fence, even if quitting the job would mean his mother and father would be undeniably safer. As someone who prided himself on being able to read another person, he saw everyday the desperation some people felt--people on their last legs of either hope or health who needed things the world beyond the Barrier could still provide. Medicines were especially necessary, things like insulin or epipens that weren’t produced in large enough quantities in the city but still existed in abandoned pharmacies outside. He couldn’t just walk away when those people needed him. His uncle had needed to go further and further from the Barrier to acquire those supplies as resources dried up, but he had mentioned last time they met that he had heard rumours of a roving band of Shifted who worked with Clingers (the somewhat derogatory term other Shifteds had for exiled people who lingered near Barriers) to move needed products, for a fee of course. Ramon would pay it, if it meant his uncle and cousin didn’t have to get too far away and risk the unknown wilds the countryside had become.

Not that all of his clientele had such pure motivations. He had his fair share of collectors too; people motivated by a desire to own outlawed electronics or books no longer in circulation. But those things were harder to find, the Spread doing a magnificent job of destroying most everything technological.

Scanning the bar, he noted a couple patrons who had the marks of someone who could be a new customer--a flighty looking woman on the edges of the crowd, her eyes too wide and hands restless, and a man in the middle of the noise, his nose just barely raised to everyone else and his clothes tidy and tailored, always a sure sign of someone with money to spend. But before he could make any moves toward either person, a man took a seat at the table with him. Momentarily surprised, he looked the newcomer up and down and recognized him as someone he had written off earlier. The other man was too drunk and looked too sheltered to need his services, he had thought, but he had been surprised before.

“What can I do for ya?” Ramon asked, his tone genial.

“You looked lonely,” the other man slurred out.

Ramon was once more thrown off.

“Lonely?” The word blurted out of him before he could stop it. The man had a drink in his hand--something fruity from the color--and kept sloshing it over the table between them as he gesticulated. He didn’t seem to be able to speak a single word without some kind of hand gesture.

“Yeah, y’know, lonely, like alone,” his new companion stated firmly as though he had singlehandedly defined the word, “I know all about that. Loneliness, I mean.”

Ramon wanted to extricate himself from the situation delicately, but he had a feeling like the man would just follow him, which would be problematic for business.

“Oh yeah?” he asked, playing along. The fastest way to get rid of him would be to foist him off on someone else, so he visually swept the joint again, this time looking for someone who would be willing to put up with his new friend.

“She hates me now,” the man stated, seemingly from nowhere. The complete conversational about face caused Ramon to turn his eyes back to the other man. His whole demeanor screamed downcast, other than the manic hand gestures--his shoulders drooped down so far that the line of his neck was verging on giraffe territory.

Rubbing his forehead to disperse the oncoming tension headache, Ramon reluctantly continued talking to him, “Aye yi yi, alright, let’s start over, eh? My name is Skittles.” Daming his good nature internally, he felt obligated to hear this stranger out, even if he wasn’t a potential customer or even a hook-up. He looked too pathetic to leave alone, like a wet puppy shunted into the rain.

“Skittles? My mom loved those. She called them ‘happy candy’,” he said with a nostalgic chuckle--and honestly Ramon could barely keep up with this dude’s drunken inability to hold a single line of conversation--“I’m Lysander.” To his credit, his tongue only tripped a little on his own name, the ‘s’ sound coming out closer to a ‘z’ and the ‘n’ getting stuck on his palette before he could finish the whole word.

“Weird ass name, but that’s cool,” Ramon commented before continuing, “So what’s this about a chick hating you?”

“Oh god, Skittles, I’m so stupid. I knew she didn’t like me like me, y’know? But I just went ahead and told her I was like, in love with her, right? Like, who does that? Just blurts it out over spaghetti like some kind of psycho! There she is, eating a piece of garlic bread, and I’m just like, in my own feelings, thinking she’s the most perfect thing to ever live, and my dumb mouth just tells her out of nowhere, and now she never wants to see me again.” The whole mess of words rambled out of him with much more difficulty than a sober person would have, and much of it didn’t make sense to Ramon, but he got the gist easily enough.

Ramon took a moment to wonder how his life had led him to this moment of playing romantic counselor to a random straight white guy he had just met, but he had always been the type to just roll with things. His mom used to praise him for ‘going with the flow’, which was parent code for being too easy going to really misbehave.

Plus, it didn’t cost him anything to lend an ear to someone who needed it--one botched night of work wouldn’t matter too overly much in the long term, not with so many people always in need.

He’d probably never even see the dude again after that night.

Later, after listening and giving intermittent advice that mostly went along the lines of varying degrees of half-supportive ‘you’re not dumb’s and ‘she probably doesn’t hate you, man’s, a frazzled looking blonde woman appeared at their table, her hair plastered to her head from the rain that must have started while they were inside.

“Cheese and crackers, Lys, you’re a mess. I’ve been looking for you everywhere,” she stated as soon as she saw the taller man.

Lysander reacted immediately to her presence, tears forming in his eyes, “Miiir, I’m so sorry,” he cried, grabbing hold of her wet yellow rain jacket. Upon coming into contact with the slick surface, he pulled back and looked at his hands in confusion, “You’re so wet. That’s so weird.”

Sighing, she began the arduous process of getting him up from his seat to shuffle him home, “It’s raining, Lys.”

“Oh, that makes sense then.”

Finally seeming to notice that her friend had a drinking companion, she looked up at Ramon and gave him an embarrassed smile, “Thanks so much for hanging out with him. I’m Miria, by the way.” Using the hand not clutching Lysander’s side to keep him standing, she reached out for a handshake.

“They call me Skittles,” he replied, taking her small hand into his own and shaking.

At the moniker, a wave of suspicion passed through her eyes--she wasn’t drunk, so she realized immediately that the name was an alias--before clearing, her polite demeanor resettling over her facade. “My mom used to call Skittles the happy candy because of all the colors,” she told him with a little laugh.

Ramon blinked at the familiar phrase, looking between the two. “Are you guys related or something?” He didn’t like to judge, but any kind of incenstuous shit was a little too much for him.

“What? Oh no, not by blood. My parents took Lysander in when he was really young.”

“Ah, gotcha.” The explanation was enough for him. He didn’t need a full run down on this guy’s life or anything.

“Well, thanks again,” she said and then proceeded to drag the much larger Lysander back through the bar.

Before they had made it too far, Lysander shouted back to Ramon, “I told her over spaghetti, Skittles! Spaghetti!”

Shushing him, Miria directed him out into the rainy night, and they were gone. Ramon shook his head and chuckled to himself before paying up his tab and heading home for the night, feeling he had had enough excitement for one day.

When Lysander Badeaux somehow tracked him down just one week later to apologize for his behavior, Ramon came to the realization that he had accidentally endeared himself to the stranger, but what harm could it do, really? It’s not like he hated having acquaintances, and having a drinking buddy who wasn’t trying to sleep with him might be nice sometimes. Thus resolved, he made plans to hang out with Lysander again, never realizing--and how could he?--what he had set into motion for his life.