It had been more than a day since he’d heard a goddamn thing from his boyfriend’s stupid a** brother. Not since he’d heard Celsus howling behind his back at the general as he took off after Tolliver, dragging him to safety - and there hadn’t been a lot of time to spare after that, not when he had his boyfriend to look after, to tend to, to hold and care for. And that hadn’t stopped now, and ******** honestly, the last thing he wanted to do was set foot out of the apartment and have Tolliver anywhere that wasn’t in his direct ******** line of sight.
But he’d been calling. Texting. Not so much as a goddamn peep had come back in response. And it wasn’t as though Fritz was exactly his responsibility. He was a ******** adult, he wasn’t ******** dating the a*****e (thank god - woe to anyone stupid enough to get wrapped up in that), but - no, actually, Fritz sort of was his responsibility. Because he loved Tolliver, and because Tolliver couldn’t and wouldn’t know that Fritz had gone out there risking life and limb and getting himself thrashed by a general for his brother’s sake.
For all Hitch knew, of course, there could be someone else there taking care of him right now. Yet there he was, one excuse to his fiance later and with a lot of promises of his speedy return, he was standing before the door of the loft. His knuckles had curled until they were nearly white before he finally sighed in resignation, rapping them hard against the door.
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There was no answer to the knock. In fact, there was no sound at all from the other side of the door, at least not for a good five or six minutes. A meowing on the other side indicated that at least one living presence was still in existence in the loft, and a faint scratching that followed would show that Crook was attempting to scratch at the door and whoever was behind it.
Eventually there was a distant thumping sound, and then footsteps, and then finally, the click of a lock and the slide of a deadbolt, a low voice saying ”Away, Crook, away - go on, git.”
The door opened. Fritz appeared in its wake, dressed in a pair of neatly pressed khaki pants, a button down with the sleeves rolled up, and his hair tugged back into a messy ponytail at the back of his neck, his glasses perched on the end of his narrow nose.
The expression on his face darkened almost immediately. Fritz said nothing at all, and just stood there, staring at Hitch.
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Hitch wished, maybe for the first time ever, and hopefully the last time ever, that he had a key to Fritz’s loft. He idly thought that maybe for this one venture he should’ve borrowed it from Tolliver, but there was really no way to get that key without garnering suspiciousion. The last thing he needed was for Tolliver to come along with him on this and see his brother hurt, and to not know why, and not be able to know the whole truth of why.
He’d be lying if he said he didn’t assume the worst in those five or six minutes, his own stupid anxieties bubbling up and over, and it wasn’t that he wanted to say he was worried about Fritz St. James of all ******** people in the world, but -
Finally, a sound that was not a cat. Shortly behind that, footsteps and a familiar voice that was and wasn’t like his lover’s, lacking the musical softness that was Tolliver. At first, when he opened the door, Fritz was treated to a too-brief, utterly and completely relieved look from Hitch as he took in the sight of him.
Darkness settled into his expression shortly after Fritz’s, though, and lucky for him, he didn’t have to say anything - instead, Hitch simply pushed past him, stepping into the loft he’d been in too many times already, mostly without Fritz there. “You didn’t ********’ answer my calls,” he snapped, coating his once-fears in a thick layer of gruffness. “Or my texts. - the ******** happened, huh?”
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He did not want to see Hitch.
In fact, Fritz did not want to see anyone. For the first time in his life, he did not want to be in Destiny City, wanting to be far, far away, back in England, where at least things were quieter and less likely to try and kill him. It would almost be worth putting up with the constant rain just to get away from it all, and maybe he could forget.
Maybe he could forget that his world was collapsing around him and that there was nothing he could do to stop it or change it.
There were bandages on the side of Fritz’s face, white gauze held in place by strips of medical tape. Dark circles were beneath his eyes, and he looked rather paler than normal, bruises along his temple, and at least the bandages were clearly clean, and well kept.
He made a growl low in his throat as Hitch pushed past him, Fritz saying flatly, “I don’t recall inviting you in.”
The briefly relieved expression on Hitch’s face had not been missed, but Fritz did not want to think about what it meant. Instead, he simply glowered at his brother’s boyfriend, a scowl replacing his normally pleasant features with harder, less kind ones.
“Did it ever occur to you,” he said, in a voice positively dripping with sarcasm. “That perhaps I didn’t want to answer your calls and messages?”
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‘Personal space’ didn’t seem to be much of a thought to Hitch right now. Not as he simply reached right past Fritz to go ahead and slam the door shut behind him, and not as he took a step closer to him, subconsciously rolling up onto the balls of his feet to lend himself more height he didn’t have.
“Did it ever ********’ occur to you that you don’t get the luxury of ********’ choice in this anymore, huh?!” he snapped back, and although there were traces of sarcasm (okay, maybe more than traces), more than anything, Hitch was just plain pissed. “Last time I ********’ saw you, you were ********’ -” He gestured to the bandages on Fritz’s cheek and made a frustrated noise in the back of his throat. “********’ gettin’ your a** handed to you by a ********’ general! I -”
He trailed off into another frustrated sound, his hand dropping again along with his gaze. I felt like s**t leavin’ you there. Even if it was for Tolli. Like he could actually ******** come out and say that. “I’ve ********’ lied for you, you a**. You were ********’ there when he got taken, who the ******** do you think he was askin’ about, huh? - I said I ********’ texted you, I ********’ said you were fine, I said - what if you weren’t, huh?! What if you made a ********’ liar out of me, you - “
Hitch gritted his teeth and clutched his hands into fists. “Do you - do you even ********’ understand how shitty that was to do?!”
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The more that Hitch talked, the more thunderous Fritz’s expression became. He felt like a child being reprimanded, like a toddler being talked down to - and it was about the last thing that he had any intention of dealing with whatsoever. Especially from Logan ******** Hitchcock, his brother’s damned boyfriend.
“You always have a choice,” said Fritz, turning away and stalking towards the kitchen. He flung open a cabinet and started gathering supplies for tea, setting a saucer down a little too hard on the countertop so that it clattered noisily and almost fell off. He stabilized it with a touch of a hand, then reached for the cup to match.
“I’m well aware of what I was doing when you just ran off,” Fritz continued coldly. “And I’m fine.”
It was so far from the truth it was almost ludicrous.
“Sounds like you did a bang-up job, then,” snarled Fritz, and all but slammed the kettle down onto the burner, flipping the switch of the stove to turn it on. He felt the guilt eating away at him, felt the swell of shame, hot and thick in his stomach, and he knew that Hitch was right - but admitting it was far out of his head, far out of what he would ever do.
“I’m sure he’s fine,” Fritz said sardonically pulling open the fridge with a bit more force than necessary to get the milk. “He’s got you, after all.”
He could not - would not - tell Hitch that the feelings of worry for Tolliver were so heavy in his head that he felt almost drowned by them.
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The more Fritz talked, the more frustrated Hitch rapidly found himself becoming. His nails, blunt as they were, bit into the palms of his hands. It’d been building up more and more throughout the last day, and he’d been biting it back, trying his hardest just to be there for Tolliver, trying to hide his own fears as he’d subtly checked his phone again and again for a message that had never come.
Especially that last part. He’s got you after all. His teeth ground together, his shoulders tense and rigid, and as usual, as ******** usual, he had no ******** idea what to do with himself when it got like this. All manner of different scenarios flashed through his hand in an instant - hit Fritz, slap the stupid clattering teacup off the counter - instead, he fell back on a classic, snarling as his fist slammed into a wall with a heavy slam, his hair falling too long and too shaggy into his eyes.
“You ********’ know him better than anyone,” he snapped without really looking at Fritz. “Since ********’ when would Tolli be okay after somethin’ like that?! Huh?! He’s not! He’s not okay! He’s a goddamn mess! And -”
His fist shook once before falling stiffly at his side. “Even Tolli aside, you ********’ shitbag a*****e douchebag ********>,” Hitch hissed. Although he sounded no less angry, there was something decidedly, frustratingly choked in his voice. “You could’ve been dead. I thought you were ********’ dead, you stupid ********’ p***k.”
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He felt like the blackness was coiling in the pit of his stomach; like it was spreading outwards and up, seizing his heart like a vice until there was nothing left at all. Fritz knew, on some level, that he should have replied; that he should have responded to whatever messages Hitch had sent him, that he should have called Tolliver, just to make sure, even though he knew Eurydike had saved him.
The thought alone made him feel like he was choking. Fritz double checked the kettle and a sudden, sharp thud made him jump a little, whipping around to find that Hitch had slammed his fist into his loft wall.
“What the bloody hell - “
But the rest of his words were lost behind Hitch’s, and somehow it felt like a mockery. Somehow it felt like a sarcastic reminder: You know him better than anyone.
No, thought Fritz, his chest tight, No, I don’t. Not anymore. Or maybe I didn’t really know him as well as I thought I did.
Maybe he’d just taken things for granted all this time - including his relationship with Tolliver.
Fritz’s expression was growing steadily more angry. “I never said he was okay, of course he’s not okay, but like I bloody said, he’s got you, you know, his magical knight in shining armor - oh wait, I’m the knight, or maybe I’m not anymore, who the bloody hell knows anymore.” A hand rose and waved dismissively. “But he’s got you, that’s all he wants and needs, so - “
I thought you were dead.
For a moment, Fritz’s face registered nothing but shock and - maybe - just a tiny, small bit of guilt; the only time he had ever let those feelings rise to the surface, his heart hammering rapidly in his chest. He had not missed the roughness of Hitch’s voice, nor the angry way that he was staring at him so resolutely, but Fritz did not comment, merely pressed his lips together, reeling his emotions back in and tamping them down once more.
“Well, sorry to disappoint,” he said, half a snarl, and turned back to the stove. “Next time I’ll be sure to check with you before I go and get sucker punched by a general.”
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Fritz did not know Hitch as well as Tolliver did; if it had been the other twin, he probably would’ve caught the way Hitch’s eyes were just a little too bright in the light of the loft, biting down painfully hard on his lower lip as Fritz went back to his stove.
“You know that’s not what I ********’ meant you piece of s**t,” he snarled more gruffly than he needed to, stalking a step forward. “You know what I ********’ meant. You and your goddamn theatrics.”
Do you really hate me this much?
The question didn’t leave Hitch’s mouth, instead sitting heavily inside of his chest like a weight. Whether it was because he was too stubborn to ask or if he was maybe just a little afraid of the answer he’d heard, there was no way to know. Maybe it was stupid. Maybe he was being stupid to assume that their stupid talk that night in the park had meant anything, that it would change anything, but - he kind of had. It felt like things had been different after that, even just a little. They’d been texting, talking, they’d even come over for their birthday, he’d thought -
“You’re selfish.”
The words left his mouth before he could stop them.
“You’re real goddamn selfish, Fritz. Y’know that?”
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He did know what Hitch meant. He knew, and he had still diverted, because he hadn’t wanted to face anything, hadn’t wanted to be reminded of what he had lost already. And although they were talking now, although they were spending time together again, Fritz could not think of a single time when his relationship with Tolliver had ever been worse. Things were rocky at best, everything that Fritz knew falling apart at the seams.
His fingers were shaking as he reached for the cup and saucer, so that the cup rattled noisily against the China - one of the few traits that, unknown to most, he shared with Tolliver. Fritz was just better at hiding things, at pretending that everything was okay when it wasn’t, it never was, and there was nothing to be done to change that. His life was sliding slowly downward, until there was nothing left but blackness, pain, and confusion.
You’re selfish.
He almost dropped the cup his hand was shaking so badly, Fritz setting it down on the counter, every inch of him rigid with the emotions he was barely keeping at bay. He wanted to scream, wanted to shout, wanted to yell that he knew this already, knew that he was not worth any of their time because he could not seem to separate his own feelings from whatever situation he was in. He was drowning again, the black tides swelling until they were threatening to overwhelm him, and every single inadequacy and reminder that he was not good enough, not strong enough, just not enough clogged his throat and his heart and his mind.
A bitter laugh escaped before he could stop it, and when he turned slowly around to look at Hitch, his expression was back to the mask he wore, light and unfeeling, the smile too wide and too much to be genuine.
“All my life I’ve put myself first,” said Fritz calmly. “Why would I stop that now?”
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Hitch knew the tell-tale sign of shaking, the rattling of the cup against the plate, the way Fritz’s fingers fumbled with it until he had to set it down - after that, for the redhead to turn to him with a smile of all things, a stupidly forced, ridiculous smile that made him grit his teeth all over again, his fists shaking with rage, one of them visibly battered them colliding with the wall -
-it pissed him off. It pissed him the ******** off that not only had Fritz gone unapologetic for his radio silence, not only had he gone ahead and started distancing himself again, but to do that, to ******** try and put further distance with that goddamn fake a** smile on his face -
His frustration poured over again. But rather than any words, rather than a wall - he simply stepped forward in a fluid movement and shoved at Fritz, and hard.
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The smile was painful to wear.
It was like forcing acid down his throat, like swallowing sandpaper. Fritz knew it was failing to be convincing, because he had practiced these smiles so often and for so long that he’d almost forgotten what it was to smile for real, to smile because you were genuinely happy. How long had it been since he had smiled and actually meant it? How long had it been since he had smiled for a reason other than an attempt at convincing someone that he was Just Fine?
He couldn’t remember.
Hitch would not know that unapologetic was about the last thing that could have possibly described Fritz; that his guilt and his shame and his agonizing sorrow over what he could not do was eating him away with each and every day that passed, so that he was swallowed by it, so that he didn’t know anything else but that. Every part of him hurt, like he’d been hit by truck, his heart aching with the loss of what he had once had.
And he could not fix it, did not know how to fix it.
A hand hit his shoulder - two of them, and Fritz’s eyes flew open, his smile dropping so fast it was like a lightbulb blowing. The force of Hitch’s shove made him stagger and stumble, Fritz crashing into the counter and almost falling over, but he grabbed it at the last second, staring at Hitch with wide eyes.
And then the anger came.
“What the bloody hell was that?” he snarled, and stepped forward, pushing back with as much force as he could. “You sodding git - “
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There was a split-second before the anger where Hitch almost regretted what he’d done, thought that maybe he’d done the wrong thing - when the anger flared up, raw and honest, those feelings temporarily fell to the wayside. Maybe it was because shoving and shouting had been what had led to Fritz’s little breakdown before - Hitch had accidentally reached him that way once, and frankly, he didn’t know another way to reach anyone.
He stumbled backwards with the force of the shove, his back tapping one of the chairs, with hand thrown out for balance even though he didn’t really need it. Hitch’s fingers curled around the back of the chair before releasing it as he swept forward again. He aimed a punch at Fritz’s face, although really, he had no intention of the blow actually connecting - he just wanted it to seem like he would, wanted -
If you hate me so much, ******** hit me then.
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Fritz had never been one to resort to violence.
Even as Celsus, he’d always try talking to get to the agents of Chaos, trying to deliberately not fight them. It hadn’t always worked - in many cases, his opponent had not wanted to hear what he’d had to say. But in others, he’d been able to simply talk, to listen, and sometimes that was enough.
He didn’t know what was enough now. What wasn’t, what he was even supposed to do, his mind a blur.
Hitch might not have expected his hit to land, but it did, knuckles grazing Fritz’s cheek even as he tried to dodge, and he staggered back, gasping, a hand flying up to automatically reach for his bruised face. But with a snarl, he leapt forward again, seizing the front of Hitch’s shirt and shoving him back, eyes blazing behind his glasses.
“What the bloody hell is wrong with you?”
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It all happened fast - fast enough that the odds that Fritz wouldn’t have caught the brief, almost horrified look that passed over Hitch’s features when his knuckles made contact was probably lost to time and a whirlwind of hair on both ends. He hadn’t actually wanted to hit him, to hurt him any more than he already was.
There was no chance to process it beyond the basic s**t, I did that before Fritz was moving, and one way or another, Hitch had gotten what he wanted. Fritz might not have the experience of fighting that Hitch did from one too many raw fistfights in schools and on the streets, but he had one thing Hitch lacked, and that was sheer height. With a good five inches on him, Hitch was easily shoved back - although to be fair, he wasn’t really trying to resist - his back striking the countertop and sending the teacup clattering to shatter on the floor. His breath left him in a sharp exhale, although by then his eyes were blazing again as he, in turn, grabbed Fritz’s collar to try and tug him down to his level.
“Everythin’, goin’ by you!” he snarled. “I ********’ piss you off so bad?! ********’ do something ‘bout it then! Hit me!” His fingers shook as he held tighter to the fabric of Fritz’s collar. “You know you ********’ want to, so do it! Or ain’t you even man enough to do that?!”
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Through the bandages already covering one side of his face, spots of red began to appear, darkening the gauze; and it became suddenly apparent that, in spite of his injuries, Fritz had clearly not gone to a doctor or a hospital after his fight with the general. The cuts to his face had not yet healed, though they should have, if taken care of properly, and the dark circles under his eyes, the bruises that had yet to fade, were left as they were.
His face felt as though it was on fire. Fritz, however, ignored the pain completely and felt the two of them stumbling together, a few things falling to the ground as Hitch was shoved against the counter. He heard the teacup shatter, and somewhere in the back of his mind, he heard the whistle of the kettle as the water began to bubble and boil.
He wanted to say that wasn’t it. He wanted to say that it wasn’t Hitch at all, that it was himself, that it was nothing and never had been more than just his own stupid inadequacies, his own faults, that he knew perfectly well what had happened to Tolliver was entirely his own fault. But the words would not come, as much as he tried to make them, and Fritz felt his chest growing tighter and tighter with each breath dragged into his lungs.
Unclean, whispered the voice in his head. You’re already disgusting, what’s another thing to add to that?
He almost raised his fist. Almost. But although Fritz’s grasp tightened on Hitch’s shirt, and his eyes blazed with a fury that was rarely seen by anyone, he didn’t hit him. Instead, he gave a half strangled snarl and threw Hitch to the side, away from him, his heart hammering in his chest.
“Get out,” he said, his voice dangerously thick, like he was biting at the words as they left his mouth. Tension was making his shoulders so stiff it was almost painful to stand, and Fritz felt the first few drops of blood sliding down his cheek, under his jaw.
”Get. Out.”
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He’d seen it. In even that instant, he’d seen Fritz bleeding through the bandages, and his stomach had twisted in the most frustrating way. And by the time that instant was over, rather than the results he wanted, rather than the blow he expected and probably deserved, Hitch was simply cast aside, thrown and discarded.
What really got him was, somehow, it managed to hurt - more than a fist would’ve. And Hitch didn’t even understand why. It wasn’t as though him and Fritz were close, it wasn’t as though they were even friends, but - the words still stung. The rejection still ached.
He opened his mouth to snarl something harsh back, but there was just no more fire in the pit of his stomach. It hadn’t done a damn bit of good. So he turned and headed for the door, his hand lingering on the knob.
“I’m sorry.”
For taking your brother, for being here, for ******** up your life.
Hitch didn’t even realize how deflated he sounded.
“At least call your brother. - an’ ********’ take care of yourself, “ and he tried to pack some more of that fire into the last part. But his voice shook and ashamed on a low of levels, his face burning, he opened the door and moments later was gone.
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Stop.
Don't say that, don't tell me that, don't apologize, don't put it on yourself when it's just me, it's always me, don't do that, don't -
Fritz did not reply. He did not turn around, though his hands were shaking so violently that he couldn't hold them still anymore, couldn't hide them. His face was burning, in more ways than one, his throat so tight that he hardly felt able to breathe with the weight of it all upon his shoulders, in his heart.
The door shut with a click. Fritz stood for another second and then, slowly, he sank to his knees on the kitchen floor, one of his hands still holding onto the countertop, the other clutching at his chest. His gasping, rasping breath shuddered out of him, and then it was building higher and higher, until what erupted from his throat was a ragged, raw scream, a yell that encompassed every single thing that he felt but could not say, could never say, until his throat burned with the sound of it.
He stayed where he was for a very long time after Hitch had left.
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