There was a particular little coffee shop he liked to visit. It was a further walk from the campus than the cheaper equivalent, but it was quaint, quiet and most importantly both the customers and staff didn’t feature judgemental eyes. It was where he had the first date with the person who had dragged him down further than anyone thought was possible. It was where he had charged out to beat a heartless bastard senseless until someone who proved themselves stronger than they looked pulled him away. After the months melted together, meshing with alcohol, pain and a mindless existence, Raleigh found himself within the walls again. He’d been trying to avoid the place because of all the memories it held, but it seemed to have muses living in the walls. Inspiration flowed like water through his head whenever he sat down in the old and worn seats. There was no other place quite like it and yet somehow all the praises that could be sung about it had been warped and twisted by his foolish actions.
Memories of those actions ran through Raleigh’s mind as he sat in a window booth. Elbows on the table, fingers linked together to provide a resting place for his chin. Warm heat floated upwards from the white ceramic coffee cup beneath the cover of his hands, the steam tickling his palms while his eyes lowered to the empty space that occupied the seat opposite. Green eyes, vibrant and sparkling like emeralds compared to his own jade glass should have been looking at him from that seat, not the vacant nothing that wasn’t there. Dwelling on the dead was a terrible thing to do. He had already allowed the dearly departed to pull him down to the point where the undertow had swallowed everything he held dear. Finding air and getting everything back was proving difficult, but he was going to do it. His heart couldn’t withstand being turned into dusk, the loss of his light would tear him apart into nothing and he knew it. Raleigh knew he couldn’t allow himself to give up and fall back on terrible times. He had to let the dead rest and not cling to a memory that wasn’t even true. It was the reason why he had been avoiding this cute little coffee shop. Burying the monster meant wiping this place off his mental map completely, and yet Raleigh couldn’t find it in himself to part with it. It had been his before Evan had come into his life. Not every whisper in the shadows belonged to the murdered soul.
Tearing his eyes away from the chair, Raleigh’s gaze washed over the rest of the interior. Wooden floors, booths at the walls for privacy, little tables set up with a few customers dotted about. There was a stage with comfy sofas and chairs to his right, and tucked just to the left of the entrance was the main counter, manned by a girl with flamingo pink hair in pigtails and black ‘geek chic’ glasses perched on the bridge of her pointed nose, freckles dotted over her sun-brushed skin. She had commented on how it had been a while since she seen him when he slipped into the building. She had had her braces removed since Raleigh last seen her. He just smiled a small smile and ordered a regular cup of coffee. The place was relatively empty, although that may have been mainly because most of the customers would be in class at this hour. What Raleigh hadn’t expected was for a person he thought he would never see again stride in. Fuzzy memories muddled by alcohol floated to the surface of Raleigh’s mind, dragging with them those thoughts of self hate and hate for the rest of society with them. Snapping his head away from the entrance where the figure stood talking with the barista, Raleigh forced his focus on the world through the window. People walked on by like the building was invisible.
However, it seemed as if he’d been noticed, despite attempts to blend in with the scenery. Having flaming red hair meant it was difficult to become one with the off-white walls. The man came over to the table and announced his presence by clearing his throat. “This seat taken?” he asked casually.
He could easily say yes and turn him away, but if he was to make amends with himself he had to fix those that had been affected by his self destruction. Just because he thought they would never meant did not mean he was never going to apologise if the situation ever arose. Let his eyes rest on the figure of the other male once again, Raleigh silently shook his head in response.
Given the signal, the other male placed his mug of coffee and cream down and settled down on the seat that had been the object of Raleigh’s scornful scrutiny. He shrugged off his jacket and arranged himself before looking at Raleigh again, a smile on his face that reminded Raleigh of a child with an all-you-can-eat ice cream in his favourite flavour. “Haven’t seen you for a while,” he said in as he ripped open the sugar packet and poured the contents into his mug. “How’ve you been?” He was acting quite amiable considering how Raleigh had last acted towards him.
Dropping his chin to sit only on his thumbs, Raleigh took a few moments before responding. “Good,” was all he said.
“It’s a shame that you don’t come out anymore. You used to be a lot of fun,” the other male mused as he stirred his drink. “I’ve had a few people asking where ‘Razzle’ is. You made quite the...” a pause “impression.”
Raleigh watched the spoon and the fingers swirling it around in the mug, the silence between them broken by the sound of the metal against the ceramic, the soft background music in the air and the voices of the other customers. Pressing his lips to his fingers, he didn’t know what to say. To put it quite simply, he didn’t know where to start. He could blurt out an almost comprehensible ‘I’m sorry!’ but that would hardly be enough, especially for someone like Jack. Finally, with a sigh he looked up once more to the green eyes of the other male; eyes that were green like polished emeralds. The only thing that was similar between the pair. It was the reason Raleigh had picked him – those eyes. Jack had dirty blond hair that hung long and shaggy in his eyes in such a way that a slight shift in his head had him blinking against the strands that brushed his lashes. There was a silver hoop in his right ear and a tribal tattoo that curled up from his shoulder blade to the left side of his neck just above the collar of his striped polo shirt. As he sat there inspecting the other man without saying a word a thought popped into his head that made him smile behind his linked hands.
He didn’t want to see green eyes looking back at him. He wanted a blue like ocean waves, set into a face of much younger years with skin untouched by ink and piercings. He had only gone after this person for his eyes. They certainly deserved an apology, but Raleigh didn’t have to make any more effort than that. “Thanks, for what you did for me.”
Jack tilted his head to the left and gave a grin and a short sound that seemed like a chuckle. “I never actively looked for you, I just always happened to come across you. I followed the gossip; if people were talking about seeing Razzle in a bar or a club, and I’d think to myself ‘Hey, I wonder how he’s doing?’ and go and find out. I figured out a long time ago that you were running from something that you couldn’t really escape from. I’ve seen a lot of people run and get lost to the point where they can never get back. You had something you didn’t want to completely run away from though and if you didn’t have something or someone to tether you, you’d lose it completely,” Jack explained, talking with his hands like he had always done in the few coherent moments in Raleigh’s memory that the pair had had an actual conversation. “It was a letter you kept in your jeans. You’d tried to start a fight with this suit and ended up getting the shit kicked out of you, and I carried you back to my place. You smelt like you hadn’t changed in days, so I washed your stuff. It was crumpled, like you’d read it thousands of times.”
“You didn’t read it did you?” Raleigh asked quickly, interjecting the other.
“Nah, it wasn’t my place,” Jack replied as he lifted his drink to his lips and blew over the surface, causing it to ripple like a pebble thrown into a vast like. “But it was what you were holding onto; it was your thing you didn’t want to run away from. If you had kept on going without something keep watch over you, you’d vanish – like those people you hear about in the news. Bodies that turn up months later to shatter those hopes families have of their loved ones returning to them as if they’d just gone to the shops and got a bit lost on the way back. I didn’t want to be sitting at home one day and hear that you’d been found dead in a gutter somewhere because you’d picked a fight with a guy who’d retaliated by sticking a knife in your gut.”
That was what had started him on his path to destroy himself, because someone he knew had done just that. Someone had turned up dead and instead of grieving like a normal person, Raleigh had taken his grief and thrashed it out on the whole world. In his head he knew that was how he had ended up, but it had never felt as real as it did with Jack explaining it all to him now even if it was months after the entire fiasco.
Despite the lack of response from Raleigh, Jack continued on regardless. “I followed you out that day, when I last saw you. I’d seen that kid around a few times, but I didn’t think you two knew each other. I thought you were going to cry when he found you stumbling down the street.” He took a few moments to watch the shift in Raleigh’s expression, and a knowing look entered his eyes. “You did cry.”
Raleigh had clung to Lake had cried tears that had been building up inside himself for months. Everything had swelled up into a maelstrom until just seeing Lake had sent the emotions toppling over the edge. He blinked his eyes slowly in recognition of Jack’s assumption.
“After then I didn’t see nor hear anything about you. I was worried that what I was trying to prevent happening to you had actually happened, but your name never cropped up. I don’t know your surname, but your first name is distinct enough for me to keep an eye out for.” He had drunk the contents of his mug down half way by the time he finished and lowered it once more onto the surface of the table. Reaching over, he placed his hand over Raleigh’s connected pair and held his stare. “I’m glad you’re okay.”
Listening and processing everything Jack said to him, there was one thing Raleigh noted that he felt he needed an answer for. Pulling his hands away and dropping them into his lap, Raleigh sat back in his seat, blinking to break the contact in their gaze. “You’ve seen it happen before haven’t you?” he asked, looking down into the cooling coffee in his cup, staring into the deep brown depths like the answer swam within like fish in the sea. “Someone ran and ended up completely lost.”
Jack nodded, taking another sip from his own drink. “My sister,” he said with just a beat between his response and Raleigh’s question. “and myself.” He curled both hands around his mug and swirled the liquid within. “When the police found her she was just a shell. She needs constant care and attention now; some days she doesn’t even remember her own family. I couldn’t believe that people let something like that happen to her – I hated myself for being unable to help her. I ran away from home and tried to be someone new, but I had a friend who wouldn’t let me go. She didn’t try to stop me, but she kept watch out for me. I had an anger I needed to get out, just like you did. When she felt me slipping too far, she’d pull me back in. She dragged my sorry ass all the way back home and showed me my sister to remind me of the fact she had done exactly what I was doing and she had ended up nothing more than a broken doll. When I got better I vowed that if I ever met someone in the same boat I’d try and do what my friend did for me.” He looked at Raleigh with honesty in his eyes. “I didn’t know enough about you to force you to confront things, but I hoped that I could at least keep an eye out for you.”
“So you let me do the things I did to you because you thought it would help? Because you thought you were just looking out for me?”
There was a one sided grin on his face, almost sick and twisted. “If it wasn’t me then it could be that person who’d pull a knife on you. Yeah, you were rough sometimes, but now and again something would slip through. You talked in your sleep now and again and sometimes it’d be like a switch had been flicked in your head and you’d go from a wild animal to something...softer, and I’d hear you say some name. Eli, Elliot, or something, I never heard it properly.” Draining the rest of his coffee, Jack sat back as the base of his mug tapped against the table. Both hands were palm flat on the tabletop, forcing his arms out straight. “Judging from the fact I’ve not seen you around, and the way you look, I’d say you’re no longer running, right?”
Raleigh had never taken into account Jack’s point of view. He had always assumed it was simply because he liked taking care of lost things, like in some kind of sick and twisted fairytale. If there had been someone like Jack in the beginning to keep watch then perhaps Raleigh would have never thrown himself into his self-made punishment. “Again, thank you for what you did. I know I was a dick to you, and you didn’t deserve the things I did, but you achieved exactly what you set out to do, I’m just sorry I couldn’t be something more for you in the end.”
Jack gave a small laugh, waving his hand at him. “I’m just glad to know you’re doing better. Didn’t think I’d meet you here though – a friend introduced this place to me a few weeks ago. I had no idea you came here.”
“I didn’t – not since...well, then,” Raleigh expressed with a small sigh. “I’ve always liked this place though, it helps me think in a way a lot of other ‘artsy’ cafe’s don’t. I’ve tried to avoid it because it brings back a lot of bad memories, and I must admit that seeing you has brought back even more, but I don’t feel as...bad...as I thought I would.”
“Just don’t go doing it again, okay? As fun as Razzle was, I think I prefer the Raleigh right here.” He motioned Raleigh’s entire person with a slow and purposeful move of his hand through the air.
Raleigh chuckled, shaking his head. “That was a stupid nickname anyway. I don’t even know who gave it to me; although I was pretty sure I was answering to anything by a certain point.” He shook his head once more, only this time with more force to dissolve the thoughts and memories building up inside his mind. “I’m not completely fixed, but I’m getting there. I’m not going to give up this time. I learned the pain once of loosing someone because of what I did – I don’t want to go through it a second time.”
“That person wrote you that note didn’t they?”
“I thought you said you didn’t read it?”
“I didn’t, but the way it looked was obvious that whoever had written it was important to you. I’m glad you still have them in your life. You’re really lucky to have someone who’ll accept you, even with your flaws.”
Rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, Raleigh nodded. They could have stayed in that foreign country and never come back, but they had. Raleigh had promised never to let anything come between them again, and he was going to keep that promise. He would do anything to keep the one person who made his heart feel alive in his life for as long as humanly possible.
Letting a silence descend over them once more, Raleigh stared into the now cold depths of his coffee. He had only bought it out of sheer habit, but now that he had allowed it to cool it felt as if he’d wasted his money. Sliding the hand that had been rubbing the back of his neck down to squeeze and massage his own shoulder, he sighed once more. He really didn’t know much about Jack, despite the things they had done together and what he had discovered today. They liked the same coffee shop and had both had a similar life experience but for the moment that was all they had in common. He really didn’t know what to say now. The air was different between them than it had been all those months ago. He had picked Jack for his eyes, but now he didn’t need them.
“You can leave if you want to,” Jack said, snapping the growing lack of words that was developing between them. “I let you out of my life once before, I can do it again. You don’t have to force yourself to stay just because of what happened between us during the time you were trying not to be yourself. I completely understand.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit heartless?” he asked, returning his gaze back onto the form of the other man. “Saying that I don’t have to stay and build something between us?”
“Do you want to?”
“Well...Uhm...I’m not sure.”
Another grin slipped onto Jack’s lips, this time honest and understanding, splitting the seam to reveal the teeth within his mouth. “You have that person in your life that you care deeply for, so I’m not going to try and replace that if that’s what you’re suggesting,” he countered. “But I would like to be your friend, if I can. If it’s too uncomfortable I won’t complain. We can start from the very beginning if you like.”
Raleigh took a few moments to mull over Jack’s suggestion. They had a history, but it was a pile of matchsticks compared to an actual brick-built friendship that Jack was offering. Slowly, he held out one hand to the other male. “Hello, I’m Raleigh.”
“Nice to meet you, Raleigh, my name’s Jack.”
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