Lights

To say it happened in two seconds flat would not be dramatic, for that is exactly how it happened. In one moment, Ryan was walking down the streets of New York City with his chin pointed upwards as he gazed at the sky scrapers surrounding him. In the next, he felt a sudden weight crash into his chest and throw him to the pavement, robbing him of his breath. His back jolted painfully as it collided with the concrete. And that was that – two seconds and everything changed.

The figure on top of him scrambled wildly to their feet, their arms flailing in an attempt to grasp some sort of leverage. They couldn't keep their balance and their feet kept tripping out from under them as their head whipped around crazily, trying to take in all their surroundings at once. They fell forward again, their hand hitting Ryan's shoulder. He was knocked to the ground for a second time.

“Calm down, calm down,” Ryan said, pushing himself into a half-sitting position, which was difficult with the strange person still kneeling across his legs.

The man couldn't seem to keep his eyes focused on one spot for a mere moment. His wide eyes were bulging and glancing in every direction. His mouth was open, taking gasping breaths, and his chest was heaving with them. He looked like he was going to explode – surely no one could be like this and not be in danger of such a thing.

Ryan carefully started to shimmy his legs out, keeping an eye on the individual to ensure that he wouldn't be frightened by any quick movements. He was a little concerned for this person's sanity. Once his legs were safely free, he pushed himself up so that he was kneeling, and his face was mostly level with the man's in front of him.

Ryan placed his large hands on the man's shoulders, and the man's head instantly snapped forward to look at him at the touch of his fingers.

“What's wrong?” Ryan asked, firmly.

The man merely gaped at him with his mouth ajar, his skin pulled taut across his jutting-out cheekbones. His face looked pale, and his cheeks sunken. He finally closed his mouth, and his eyes shrunk to a normal size as he tried to calm himself down, but Ryan could still hear the air being forced heavily up his nose and into his lungs.

Realising he wasn't about to get an answer, Ryan instead asked, “What's your name?”

“I-I... Brendon,” the man stammered, his eyes now focused directly on Ryan, rather than trying to look behind him for his threat.

“Okay, Brendon,” Ryan said, saying the name slowly. He couldn't help but think about how he was kneeling on the side of a pavement with a potentially crazy man, yet no one passing by seemed to be offering more than a confused glance in their direction. “What's wrong?”

Brendon's brow creased as he bit his lip uselessly. Ryan felt him shrug beneath his hands. “I can't tell you.”

Ryan raised an eyebrow sceptically. “Now, look. If you're in trouble, then maybe I can help. Someone after you?” Ryan leaned over to peer past Brendon into the throngs of people, looking for anyone particularly suspicious. He couldn't see anyone fitting the description.

“But... weren't you going somewhere?” Brendon asked. His breathing had mostly recovered now, though his sentences were divided by the occasional ragged gasp.

“Nowhere important,” Ryan brushed it off. He inspected Brendon quickly, then added, “You're really a mess. Let's get you home.”

Brendon's eyes darted to the concrete awkwardly as his lips quirked up in a slightly sheepish smile. “Well, see... about that... I don't exactly have a permanent residence at the moment...”

“God, this just keeps getting worse and worse. First, you're being chased by some mysterious villain, and now you don't even have anywhere to hide from this damn thing.” Ryan was smirking. Brendon bent his head slightly but didn't reply, not sure if he should be offended.

“Are you all right?” Ryan asked, more politely this time. “Can you, y'know, function okay?”

Brendon rubbed his hands down his arms and stomach in a search for bruises, then nodded. “I'm pretty sure I can function fine.”

Ryan climbed clumsily to his feet, then offered a hand to Brendon. The other man grasped it and pulled himself up, using all of his weight behind him. Ryan tried to act as if he hadn't just almost fallen over, so he turned on his heel and started marching away.

Brendon quickly ran after him, catching his hand on Ryan's shoulder when their stride was even again. “You're not just going to leave me, are you?” Brendon said in a quiet voice.

“Of course not,” Ryan responded with a snort. “You're coming home with me. Now, is this homelessness a temporary thing?”

Rubbing the back of his neck, the sheepish smile returned to Brendon's face. “Well, it's been temporary for a while now...”

“Do you have a job?”

“I should really get one of those,” Brendon answered with an apologetic tone.

“Well, yeah. You kind of should.”

Brendon, who seemed to have recovered fairly quickly from his fall, grinned heartily at him. His face looked a lot less sallow and gaunt when he smiled, which in turn made Ryan smile.

They soon began to approach the apartment complex that Ryan lived in. “Definitely do not expect a palace,” Ryan recommended. “I really wasn't expecting visitors, I haven't cleaned up.”

Brendon looked a little guilty as he nodded.

As Ryan pushed open the doors, he turned to Brendon with a slight frown. “So, you're just not gonna tell me why you were sprinting down the street then?”

“That was pretty much the plan.”

“You obviously weren't trying to get anywhere,” Ryan pointed out.

“Oh yeah, what makes you think that?”

Ryan rolled his eyes and gestured at the walls around them. “You're here, aren't you?”

Brendon's mouth snapped shut and he started to ignore Ryan as they walked up the many stairs to Ryan's apartment.

“Why don't we use the elevator?” Brendon asked.

Ryan stared at him blankly and shrugged. “Just the way I do things, I guess.”

As they neared Ryan's room, Ryan dug his hand into his pocket and withdrew his jingling keys.

“Room fifty seven, huh?” Brendon said in a monotone as Ryan unlocked the door.

Ryan took his turn to ignore the man as he stepped lightly between Brendon and the door. He pushed down the handle, arched his eyebrows expectantly, the threw open the door with an elegant flourish. He even added in a, “Ta da!” for good measure.

Ryan's apartment was not a palace – in fact, it may have been the complete opposite. The space was very small and cramped, with the kitchen immediately in front of the door blending into the living room in a way where it was difficult to tell where one ended and the other began. Every available surface was covered in something. The counter, coffee table and the couch had things like CDs, clothes, and books scattered across them. The floor was mercifully less messy, though there were things starting to pile up in the available corners.

Ryan walked in and hung his keys up as Brendon hesitantly skittered in behind him. He stood awkwardly behind Ryan in the kitchen.

“Go on, make yourself at home. Go sit on the couch,” Ryan said. “Just move the stuff on it anywhere, it doesn't really matter.”

Brendon glanced at him with his eyebrows raised, then sighed as he started to trudge over to the couch. He inspected the pile of things on it, then carefully began to pull off the hoodie, pants and Beatles CDs that took up the left-hand side of it. He put them on the ground beside the couch, the perched on the edge of it nervously, looking back at Ryan in the kitchen.

Ryan filled a pot with water and placed it on top of the stove. He glanced at Brendon with an apologetic grin. “Nothing fancy, sorry. We're doing things the old-fashioned way.”

“With an electric stove?” Brendon pointed out.

“Doing things the old-fashioned way, the new-fashioned way,” Ryan corrected with a nod. “I'm hoping you like hot chocolate.”

“Y-yeah!” Brendon responded enthusiastically. “I haven't had hot chocolate in ages.”

“Let me tell you,” Ryan said as he pulled two mugs from the cupboard, “I make the best hot chocolate you have ever tasted in your life. I've been perfecting this for years. When you taste it, you will start calling me Saint Ryan. Though I will also offer you coffee, tea and noodles if you want.”

Brendon grinned. “Wow, I haven't had that sort of range for a long time. I think I'll stick with the hot chocolate though.”

“That's a fine choice.”

“Hey, apparently it's fantastic, I'm not gonna miss that.”

Ryan smirked at the praise. “So, Brendon, how old are you?”

A little taken aback, Brendon responded, “Twenty one.”

“Twenty two,” Ryan countered. “How long have you been without... uh, permanent residence?”

“Dunno,” Brendon said, vaguely. “A while.”

Ryan studied him closely for a moment, murmuring a small, “Mm,” as if he weren't quite satisfied with this answer. Instead of pursuing it, he brushed it off with a decisive nod. “Y'know, Bren – can I call you Bren?”

Brendon blinked and his brow creased slightly in confusion. “Well, sure. Go ahead, I guess.”

“Good. Well, y'know, Bren. You can definitely stay here and all, but I just don't know if my pay check will cut it when it comes to both of us living here.”

“I don't want to be a burden --”

“Hey, hey! That's not where I was going.” Ryan pointed the spoon he had just used to dump sugar into one of the cups at Brendon accusingly. “I'm not cruel. I'm just saying you might want to go down the job route. But you're allowed to stay here.”

“And you decided that after, what? Half an hour?”

Ryan pulled himself up to his full height and puffed out his chest proudly. “I am an excellent judge of character, actually.”

“Well... thanks for giving me a home and stuff,” Brendon said, awkwardly. “You're all right too.”

Ryan snorted. “Thanks for the compliment.”

The pot suddenly started whistling behind Ryan, so he darted across the tiny kitchen to switch off the element. He picked it up by the handle and rushed back over to the cups, pouring it into them carefully. He even lowered himself down to ensure he had the most precision.

“You really take hot chocolate making seriously, huh?” Brendon said, after eying up Ryan cautiously.

“That I most certainly do. It's an art form.”

A few moments later, after the clanging of spoons on the side of the cup, Ryan cleaned up and carried the two hot chocolates over to where Brendon sat. He paused for a moment, realising there was nowhere to put them. He passed Brendon his drink and approached the coffee table, the surface of which was practically invisible. Still holding his own hot chocolate, he raised a foot up and started pushing all the stuff off. He then leaned down to get the remaining objects off with his hand, and pulled the coffee table in front of the both of them. He placed his hot chocolate down with a grin.

“Don't worry,” he added. “My shoe didn't touch it, I promise.”

Brendon merely blinked and nodded, then placed his hot chocolate down after taking a sip. He couldn't help but notice that he was drinking out of a Winnie the Pooh cup.

“I decided that they were worth taking when I left home,” Ryan explained quickly, noticing Brendon looking sceptically at his cup. “And there's nothing wrong with drinking out of a Winnie the Pooh cup, right?”

“Of course not,” Brendon said quickly. “It, uh, it adds to the drinking experience. And you know, this is actually really good.”

Ryan beamed in pride. “Hot chocolate wins again. I knew it.” He took a sip from his own drink before adding, “I only have one room here, so you can either sleep on the couch, or I'm pretty sure I have a mattress lurking around here somewhere.”

Brendon's eyes widened at the thought of having to open a closet in search of a mattress in this place – surely a mountain of things would fall out and flood the entire place. “I'll take the couch.”

“You sure? If it starts fucking with your neck or something, just tell me.”

Nodding, Brendon smiled, quite enjoying having someone be considerate toward him.

“Oh! By the way, I have a TV,” Ryan stated, pointing at the small black box nestled on a cabinet between a messy pile of books. “How long has it been since you've watched television?”

“A while,” Brendon responded, his answer equally as vague as all the others he had given.

Ryan frowned, then shrugged it off. “It can be a little fuzzy, but it's definitely watch-able.” He put his cup down and darted over to it. He removed the books from around it and pulled a jacket that's sleeve had fallen down in front of the screen from it, then switched it on. It started up, whirring slightly before the screen snapped into slightly dulled colour.

He threw himself back onto the couch contentedly, grabbed the remote (from where, Brendon was not sure) and started flicking through the channels until he found The Simpsons.

The pair of them stared at the TV until the light began to fade and shadows started to crawl into view. Their cups of hot chocolate sat empty and forgotten on the table, well into the night. As one show ended, Ryan started flicking through the channels until they found something else to watch, then it began again.

Eventually, Brendon fell asleep and his head lolled onto the older man's shoulder, who jumped when he noticed. He then grinned as he saw the sleeping boy, and tried to prop Brendon back up into a sitting position as he slid out from beneath him. He tried to lie him down, but Brendon's eyelids fluttered open, his brow creased in confusion.

“Too dark for morning,” he mumbled, his words barely intelligible.

“Sorry, Bren,” Ryan whispered. “It's not morning, you just fell asleep. I'll get you a blanket, alright?”

Ryan disappeared from Brendon's sight for a few moments, then returned with a comfy looking duvet bunched up in his arms, obscuring his view as he stumbled through the darkness back to the couch.

Brendon lay down as Ryan threw it on top of him. “Thanks for letting me stay,” Brendon said through a large yawn.

“No problem, Bren.”

*

The complete silence within the apartment was shattered by three belts of high-pitched screaming. The loud noise instantly jolted Ryan into consciousness, whose heart started battering at his rib-cage in fear. He threw himself up into a sitting position and turned on his lamp, looking around his room with his duvet pulled up to his mouth hesitantly. It looked just as it did when he went to sleep.

Cautiously, he pushed his duvet down his bed and clambered away from the comforting warmness, out into the living room.

He fumbled across the wall for the light switch, his fingers finally coming across the bump. He flicked it, revealing Brendon sitting wide-eyed on the couch, though as the room was illuminated he let out a small squeal and buried his face under his blanket.

“Brendon, are you all right? Did you hear that?” Ryan tried to curb his anxious breathing, but couldn't.

“I'm really sorry,” he heard Brendon say, though his voice was muffled. “I think that this was a bad idea. I'll go, if you want.”

“What are you talking about? Wait – was that you?”

“I'm really sorry!” Brendon repeated, peeking out from under the covers. Ryan noticed a shine to his eyes and the way his eyebrows were knitted and twisted. “I'll just go if you want, I don't mind.”

Ryan couldn't help but smile as he rubbed at the back of his neck. This was good – there was no one being murdered like he'd first thought. He swallowed away his frightened breaths and took a few steps toward Brendon, who had retreated back beneath his blanket in shame.

“Look, Bren,” Ryan said once he was standing right next to the arm of the couch. He lowered himself so that he was sitting on the floor with his elbows over the padded surface. “Nightmares happen to everyone, do you honestly think I'm going to send you away for having them? I know we don't know each other, but you are seriously underestimating me here.”

“I get them kind of often,” Brendon said.

“Uh, so? My apartment is messy kind of often. You seem to be okay with that so far.”

“Your messy apartment doesn't keep me up at night,” Brendon countered.

Ryan grinned, then tilted his head slightly. “Are you all right though, seriously?”

Brendon took a deep breath in and nodded. “I'm fine. You'd better go back to bed now, Ryan. I really don't want to keep you up.”

“Are you sure you don't need anything –?”

Brendon looked at him with a raised eyebrow, propping himself up on his elbows. He looked more confident now, especially since he looked extremely close to a mess before. “I don't need anything. Go to bed. I'm really sleepy, anyway.”

Ryan paused for a few moments before nodding and climbing to his feet. He trudged sleepily back into his room, realising that he was tired as well. He fell back into his bed and grappled around for the covers to pull them back over his cold body. His new room mate was interesting – that was definitely true.