-I woke up earlier than I'm used to due to the sound of crashing going on in rooms further away. I get up rather quickly, another break in flowing through my mind and my worry for Brahms had grown. I hopped out of bed and stepped out of the room, preparing for anything. I can take a man with a gun, I know that much already, so I have got the confidence for this. But do I really want to put myself in the position to kill someone again? It was certainly not pleasant the first time around.

-Of course, when I make it to the scene I don't really have to worry much about that. It turns out that the crashing was Brahms pulling an entire bookshelf down, and he was standing there just waiting for me. I stand in the doorway, my features changing from worrisome to annoyed.

-"Okay?" I rub my eye as I look down at the shelf on the ground and then at Brahms. "Is there something you want to talk about?"

-"You're not leaving me."

-"I have already told you that I'm not. You are literally not the house. Are you the house Brahms?" He stays silent. "Exactly what I thought. If you don't want to he left alone you can just come with me. It's that simple."

-"I don't want to leave the house!"

-"Well that's not my problem is it Brahms? You can't make it my problem. I know what I want, and you know what you want. If it doesn't match then that isn't my problem neither. You just need to understand that I'm not your parents, I'm not gonna go on vacation and completely vanish! I'm not Greta neither!"

-"Stop!" So I do, and he stands there, hands fidgeting at his sides before they go to his head.

-He's trying so hard to relieve the stress in his mind, and I can tell it's not working, so... He turns around, grabs the desk off the wall and flips it onto its side, all the contents on top going to the floor. I simply cross my arms instead, watching him take his anger out on the room. Eventually however, it has to come to a stop, and I take a deep breath, walking over to him as he rips the blankets off the mattress and then turns to me as I approach him.

-"Do you want a hug Brahms?" I ask, rubbing my eyes before looking up at him. "I get that you're scared that I'll leave you forever, but I don't have any reason to do that now do I?"

-"Yes you do?"

-I blink. "Well, I clearly don't know those reasons. Do you want to enlighten me?"

He paused for a moment, if his mask wasn't strapped to his face I'd imagine his mouth was gaping open for answers. "Y-You've seen my face!"

-"Yeah? And I like your face."

-"No one likes my face."

-"That's not true because I like your face."

-"You're also leaving because you think I'm boring??"

-"Books are boring."

-"No they're not!" He throws the blankets at the ground and I stopped myself from smiling st the way he protected books.

-"Okay, okay they're not.. But there are other things in life that I want to experience, and.. That is, going out to eat and eating foods made by special chefs, going to the pet store and petting the puppies.. Have you ever gone to a skate park? Rollerblading?? I bet you haven't ever been to an amusement park before."

-"What if I don't want to go to those?"

-"Are you as picky with fun as you are with your food Brahms?.. You're not boring. People like change in life, and I know that you like your repetition, but I'm not like that. Taking care of you makes me feel old as hell too, like. My boyfriend is thirty years old and he's acting like my son."

-"Boyfriend?"

-I pause, looking up at him. I'm too tired for this. "Well we love each other don't we?"

-"..Right." Brahms nods. "Boyfriend."

-I guess it just caught him off guard, given we never talked about it before. Why would we need to, really? It was already set in stone by the way we acted, and by how I wasn't really allowed to leave without him.

-"Right.. Since you're my boyfriend, why would I leave you?.. Your parents left together, right? They never left each other, because they were important to each other. Even when they weren't standing beside each other, they never left the other."

-"I don't want to be like my parents."

-"I'm just using them as an example, Brahms. I don't know if you'd get it as well if I was talking about someone random.. Every good couple doesn't leave the other, and they trust each other. Do you trust me Brahms?"

-"...Yes."

-"Then you know I will always come back."

-"But I don't want to be left alone."

-"Well you left me all alone when you got angry didn't you?"

-"I was angry."

-"Mhm, and sometimes people get angry when they don't get what they want right?" He nods. "I want to leave the house.. I don't want to get mad at you Brahms, and fresh air always helps make people feel better. Fresh air is out there."

-He slowly crosses his arms, and I can tell he's still trying to wrap his head around the idea. "..I dunno."

-"Well, we have all the time in the world to think about it." I look around the room. "You can clean this up tomorrow, Brahms. How about we go to bed? I'm too tired to keep trying to talk about this, and we have a whole schedule to upkeep tomorrow."

-"Okay."

-Brahms begrudgingly spent a portion of his play time cleaning up the room he massacred, and then he and I spent the rest of it playing chess. Of course I'm getting to the point that I know how to play the game well, and Brahms is hating me for it. But he always wins regardless, mainly because he's spectacular at it.

-When play time was over and it came down to lunch he had all of these questions regarding the idea of me leaving. "If you left, you'd come straight back right?"

-"Yes."

-"Are you going to talk to people?"

-"Probably."

-"Would I have to talk to people if I went with you?"

-"Not if we can pretend that you're mute or something. Or deaf even, but I know you wanna be able to hear things."

-"Would people try to take you from me?"

-"With you standing beside me being all menacing? I highly doubt it."

-"Am I scary to you?"

-I paused at that question, about to put some food in my mouth as I look at him. I close my jaw, and I shrug. "You can be but I'm not afraid of you.. You'll be a little scary to other people though."

-He nods, humming before looking down at his lunch. "...Maybe we can go on a walk next weekend." He grumbles, and I can't help the smile on my face.

-"Thank you for giving it a shot Brahms. I promise you that it will all be worth it."

-He hums, and finally lifts his mask up and off of his face. The rest of the day goes exactly how it should, regardless of Brahms occasionally question dump that he gives me out of the blue about the outside world. About it's dangers, about the people in it. Might as well roll him out of the house in a thick plastic ball to keep him safe from something as simple as a hello. Lord knows that if he's in a ball like that, no one will bother.

-Bed time is no hassle.

(I apologize for the short part, I'm having my favorite writer's block moments with this story right now and it can be difficult to find ways to push the story forward when there isn't much space between the canon schedule, and my creativity is getting eaten alive by the angry gremlins in my brain that like to make me sleep constantly lol)

(Here's a picture of my cat)