PFM #reunion scene - Reed

If your life was a book, it would undoubtedly be titled ‘Without a plan.’ That’s how you find yourself in Elazar, weeks before the due date. After walking two hours to the nearest bus stop amidst nothing but fields, then spending another two in a rickety vehicle, you’re here. Free. And somehow, you’re more lost now that you’re not alone.

The sleazy sub-central district looks ashen, stinking of fumes and human malodor. The stench is made worse by the rain, violently whipping the pavements. Monochrome cars and suit-clad people crowd the streets, rushing to escape the approaching storm.

And you? With some spare change and a wad of cash left from your government aid, you walk along the road, looking for a place to hole up in. Somewhere with a phone, ideally.

Straying from the city center, you duck into an alley of bars, all seedy, closed nightclubs, and a row of motels. You pick the cheapest one, hidden from view.

It’s a good choice. The woman behind the counter doesn’t ask for your ID when you hand her the cash. Her long acrylic nails scoop the banknotes like a claw machine, all but dumping them into the wooden drawer on her side of the counter. Her attention is mostly on the small, snowy TV airing a rerun of a dating show.

The host’s monologue is echo-y, drowning your “Can I use the phone?” The woman nods, though, so you take it as a ‘yes.’

The fiery red landline phone is sticky, and you hope against hope that it’s only the residual glue from the ad stickers. Given the nature of the pamphlets scattered around... you’d better make sure to wash your hands thoroughly.

Punching in Alcide’s number, you wait through his automated, ‘This is 6-6-8-blah-blah. Leave a message at the beep,’ two, three, then five times. With a glance through the front window - blurry cityscape, a flash of lightning - you decide to give it a rest.

You try again before bed, then once more when you pay for the next night’s stay. The line beeps beeps beeps, and you really start to panic now.

Then, at the last dial—

“Yes?” The lazy drawl is too hostile to be Alcide’s. The greeting is cut short, lacking the usual flare.

You almost say it’s a misdial, but you’d sooner forget your own name than Alcide’s number with how often you’ve been using it recently.

“Uh,” you start, very intelligently. “Is A— Is Reed around?”

There’s silence on the other side of the line. A faint exhale is the only thing that ensures you the call didn’t disconnect.

“Hello?”

“It’s not the best time,” the man says, then exhales again. Ah, he must be smoking.

“Tell him it’s—”

The man snorts at the impatience in your tone. “I’m sure you’re very important,” he retorts, tone dripping sarcasm, “like the rest of you lot. But he’s busy right now.”

“No, I’m rea—” The call ends before you can finish. “Wow. Thanks a lot, fucker,” you huff, slamming the receiver.

“Bad day?” the counter woman asks, eyes still glued to the screen.

“You could say that.” A bad week, too, from the look of it.

***

Instead of sitting in your room all day, you set out to explore the city - or a small part of it. Lucking out, you land yourself a job in a perfumery. It’s not exactly a lucrative position, but it pays in cash and without an employment contract.

A day of work is enough to cover the motel room and necessities. You’ll go from there. Slowly.

Before you leave, an idea strikes you.

“Sorry. Do you have a mobile phone by chance?” The owner looks rich enough, with her silky dress and fur coat. You don’t let her refuse you, if that’s what she’s planning, “It’s only that I need to leave my friend a message. Alci— Reed,” Reed, damn it, he goes by Reed now, “isn’t picking up his phone, and I need—”

“Reed?” Diana ‘It’s Dia, darling,’ blinks her wide green eyes at you. The warm, affable smile grows an edge. “You can’t mean our Reed?”

“...Uh?”

“Why are you— Wait. Are you the friend who was supposed to come next month? The one with... a peculiarity?”

“Yes, I— A peculiarity?” you parrot, glancing at the red-haired cashier, who’s either daydreaming or expertly avoiding your gaze.

“Yes, a peculiarity.” Dia looks you up and down, surveying you closely, as though seeing you for the first time. “Now, don’t be mad, he did try to keep it a secret. But, you see, it wasn’t hard to figure out why a student might need...”

She pauses, tilting her head. Her thin finger taps at her pearl necklace, deliberately so. The creamy dots remind you of pills. She knows about the blockers. She has to.

“That’s a good thing,” she says, noticing the flash of panic on your face. “Your peculiarity.”

“Really?”

“Really.” Dia’s red-tinted lips part, but she doesn’t look like she wants to eat you anymore. “Now, about that message. Reed is— Actually, that’s a funny story. You see, he works for my cousin, just across the road.”

Following the direction of her hand, you spot... a corner bar. Two entrances, no signboard, no name. “I thought he was an accountant.”

“That, too.”

“Well, then. Thanks for... everything. I’ll—”

“He’s...” There’s something in the way she says it, almost protective? Her scent remains unchanged - heavy perfume and fresh flowers - and you don’t know her well enough to tell if her care is genuine. She has to like him, at the very least. Far from the ordinary, that. “He’s on a break right now, though.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake. “Could I borrow your phone after all?”

“I’ll do you one better.” Dia pulls out her car keys, dangling them in front of you like a carrot on a stick. “Hop in.”

***

As promised, your new employer delivers you to one of the residential districts where your mutual acquaintance lives.

The neighborhood is, as Alcide described, ‘not bad’. It’s clean, modern, filled with miscellaneous shops and lofts. The vehicles parked on the driveways seem middle- to high-end. You notice Reed’s car, too, red and sporty, but unusually unkept.

Dia stops you before you exit, but then shakes her head and wishes you, “Good luck.”

She doesn’t stay to watch if you find your way. The instructions she gave you are enough. Besides, the building by which Reed’s car is parked has only four apartments. You think you’d manage to get into the correct one without her aid. Eventually.

Scratch that. If she didn’t give you the exact number, you’d take one look at the letters stuck behind the frame and bypass the door entirely, thinking that the tenant must have been gone for a while. Even now, you peer at the number twice, just to make sure, before you come closer.

The notices are dated only two days ago, but there are many of them. When you pull the thickest one out to read the sender, the door opens. Just like that.

It’s not dread that fills you yet, but apprehension. Alcide, of all people, would never leave his doors unlocked. Contrary to the way he carries himself, he’s meticulous, naggy even. Forgetting all about the letters, you push through.

When you set foot in the apartment, you see that the corridor is... messy. Not catastrophically but for Reed’s apartment it’s alarming. The doormat is kicked to the side, blanketed with torn paper, unopened envelopes, and several pairs of shoes. There’s even a jacket laying haphazardly, playing the role of a rug.

The table between the entrance and the closest room is occupied by a row of bottles - vodka, champagne, you name it. There is a sole glass, but it’s filled to the brim with cigarette butts. The area above looks empty, save for a nail. Only the scratches in the wall tell you that whatever was hung there was removed violently.

As you wade further, you almost fall victim to another wayward shoe, kicking it forward until it collides with a mountain of paperwork and clothes. Here, aside from the persistent smell of menthol, alcohol, and floral air freshener, a wave of pure, unadulterated misery hits you full force, making your head spin.

You can barely breathe, and it doesn’t get better. Despite the window being open wide, the bitter scent seeped into every corner of the trashed room, every piece of furniture.

This time, when you stumble, you have to brace yourself against the wall so as to not fall face-first into a pile of laundry. The clothes have no scent of their own. Whatever fabric softener they were doused in has long since faded.

Your near trapeze act makes more racket than you closing the door. The shadow stretched along the wooden floor shifts at the noise.

“Alan, I told you—”

The owner of the shadows comes into view, and if the rugged quality of his speech didn’t startle you, his appearance does, and all that leaves your throat is a broken, “What the hell, Alcide.”

His hair is a mess. Soggy, unbrushed strands are plastered to his swollen face, wetting the front of his crumpled white tee. His eyes are almost as wide-open in surprise as yours, though his are puffy and bloodshot, underlined by dark circles.

An unlit cigarette hangs from his open mouth, the filter chewed up and moist. It falls to the ground when he makes a noise, something close to your name, but not entirely.

Before you know it, you’re by the window. You’re not sure who moved first, if that even matters, but in no time, you find yourself with an armful of Alcide, but his tackle-hug has nothing from its customary glee. He tenses momentarily as if meaning to back away, and his action is so wrong, so alien, that you wrap your arms around him as tightly as you can to prevent him from moving.

You intended for it to be a support, but it seems that’s all he needed to crumble. It takes but a second.

Your heart drums against your ribcage with every wail that sends his frame shaking. He looked dead on his feet, but now he’s so painfully alive, lips brushing against your neck as he tries - and fails - to form proper words in between the breathless sobbing.

It’s only when you’re this close that you catch the whiff of copper and gunpowder still clinging to Alcide’s skin. Under the layer of despair, booze, and antiseptic, there’s an unmistakable stench of death.

He can’t lie to you. An ‘I’m fine’ won’t cut it either. He’s too far gone to act composed. Maybe if you’d met a week from now, it would have been different. Maybe he’d brush it off as an anecdote. Maybe he’d never mention it at all. Maybe, maybe, maybe. You’re so sick of maybes.

You leave your burning questions for later, at once forgetting about your own plight. If only for a moment.

***

By the time Alcide calms down, the room imbues the warm, orange light of the streetlamps. Little gasps of breath still squeeze out of him involuntarily, even as he bites his lips to stop himself from keening out loud.

Everything smells and tastes like salt, even your own tongue glued to the roof of your mouth, parched from disuse.

“I’m fucked.” Alcide’s voice, which already sounded like it was run through a grinder, is sandpaper-dry. His head rests in the crook of your neck, arms hanging limply by his sides, like a broken doll.

“It’s going to be all right,” you say, unsure if it will. But you know how important a white lie is, how integral when there’s nowhere to go but down.

With the adrenaline shooting through your body, you’d think sleep is a faraway thing, but somewhere along your condoling nonsense, you both drift off. Alcide, as exhausted as he was, gets what is most likely his first full night of sleep since your last phone call two weeks ago.

***

You wake up sprawled out on a pull-out sofa, covered with a thick blanket. The sky is dark, but the lamps are off.

The room looks... new. Put together. On the surface. The aroma of misery is mixed with that of shame.

The origin of the blend sits on the opposite side, in a chair. Expensive clothes, straightened hair. For the first time since you became friends, you don’t know what he’s thinking.

“So,” Alcide says, but his composure wavers at once when his voice creaks. He coughs to clear his throat, mouth twisting into a bitter smile. The stretch must sting - his lips are bitten raw. Worse than they were. “What brings you here?”

“That’s how you want to play it?” He’s going to give you that cocky attitude as though he didn’t just bawl his eyes out like a baby? You were terrified for him. As if you’d let him brush you off.

He seems to realize his own position, too, because his facade all but crumbles in front of your eyes. He leans back in his chair as if the room of distance isn’t enough.

“ I’m dead,” he blurts out, and at your aborted question, he hurries to add, “Legally! Legally, I’m dead.” When all you can do in your confusion is blink, he continues, fingers alternatively tapping against the upholstery and picking at it. “Remember the guy I’m workin’ for? He— He has a bar?”

“Yeah.” And he has a cousin who drove you here. But that’s a story for another day.

“Turns out he launders cash on the side.”

“O-oh.”

“Yeah, and it, uh, it pays well.”

“I’m sure it does.”

“He hired me as an accountant.”

“I—” You knew that, but you let him carry the story the way he wants, interrupted and muddled up. “Well, you are good at math.”

“Yeah.” Alcide snorts, but then he goes quiet. His hands pause, too, though not for long. “Yeah. And he has a few other people who run odd jobs for him. Long story short, I got, uh, mixed up.”

Mixed up. He says it so casually. “How?” And what’s with the smell of blood? That query you leave for yourself. You don’t think he’d appreciate the reminder of your affiliation. Most people don’t.

“They put me on. I’m not even— They used my phone, made arrangements under my name, asked me for a favor. Next thing I know, there’s a shoot-out, and an SPD squad storms the building.”

Sucking in a breath, you clutch the blanket in your hands. So while you were at the Academy, worrying about finding a job, Alcide was out there, getting hunted like a dog?

“Impressive, right?”

“Were you injured?” you ask, ignoring his attempt at humor.

“No. No. Flavio was—”

“Is he okay?” It dawns on you, that he’s not here. Alcide is distressed, but Flavio is gone. What if he’s—

“He was with them.”

“With whom? Your boss’ odd-jobs guys?”

“The SPD.”

The world stops like a broken record. You must have misunderstood. “...What?”

“You heard me.”

“But— But how? Why? That doesn’t make sense.”

“Beats me,” Reed shrugs, like he doesn’t care despite everything about him screaming otherwise. Even his jaw is clenched so hard you can hear the raps of his teeth as he speaks. “He thinks I’ve done it.”

“Done what?”

“The drug traffickin’, the whole shebang.”

“Did you try—”

“Try to explain? Yes, I fuckin’ did. You think he wanted to listen?!” When you recoil at the venom in his tone, Alcide hunches into himself. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s...”

You can’t comprehend anything that’s being said. Flavio, the guy who stood five hours in a queue to get Alcide the limited jacket he wanted so much? Who brought his brother snacks for years on end and sneaked into the academy to deliver them? Who dropped out of school to take care of Alcide? Who was hiding from the SPD for years just for his sake? That Flavio?

No wonder that out of all the things that happened to Alcide, Flavio’s lack of trust is the thing that hurts your friend the most. Not the betrayal of his coworkers, not his ‘death,’ but this. Being abandoned.

“So...” you say, only slightly less confused than you were when you entered the apartment. “So you’re lying low?”

Alcide flinches, but then his expression brightens into a smile so bright it’s blinding. “Oh, me? I’m golden. I’m chillin’ really.”

“Alcide...”

“Sorry, I—” Hiding his face in the cradle of his palms, Alcide stays silent for a long, long time. When he finally speaks, his tone is hollow. “I can trust you, right?”

What a question. “I have no one other than you, Alcide.”

“That’s true.” Alcide straightens in his seat, facing you fully. His expression shifts between hopefully, relieved, and calculative. It returns to schooled, and then he remembers who he’s dealing with. “I can’t hide anythin’, huh?”

He’s more amused than resentful. You don’t know what you’d do if he, of all people, hated you. Over your affliction, no less. It’s a scary thought.

“Do you want to hide?”

“...No. No, I can’t—”

“Then don’t. It’s just us, yeah?” you say, patting the space by your side, expecting him to jump on the occasion.

He doesn’t. Perhaps he just doesn’t notice your gesture, since his gaze is drifting to the floor. “I can still help you,” he says. “Probably more so now than— Than before.”

You wish you could say you don’t need help, his or otherwise, but...

“Thanks. We... We’ll make it work, right?” you ask, forcing a smile. “We’re—”

“Hm?”

“We’re friends.” It’s half a question, half a statement. It feels right, it feels true. But also wrong.

Alcide looks at you intently. His face is the same, exactly the same, but there’s nothing left of the boy you knew. Even his smile is warped.

“Of course, yeah. Best friends,” he says, and then, at last, he’s honest. “You’re the only one I have.”

“Yeah. Same here.”