Human After All (II)

There was a knock at the door.

It seemed that when somebody knocked on Beau's apartment door, that particular sentence popped into his head. He couldn't explain why really, but it happened every single time.

Beau finished slipping on a black t-shirt and started for the front door. He hoped it was only someone lost, or maybe just a prank, because if it was Ethylon, Beau would have to talk with him and be late for work. He couldn't afford to be late, especially since it was "cirque-du-maine" week.

Beau had never taken much interest in this holiday when he was younger (it was all about drinking anyways), but now that Beau had a greater understanding of the holiday, he took part in it this year. Adults would come from all over and have this parade-like thing move through each town. It was sort of an event that gave them freedom, but the Main watched over it annually, and never allowed any extremely rowdy behavior. The adults drank like maniacs, and danced, and dressed like birds of paradise (honestly, Beau didn't understand their fashion at points). Tonight would be the last night the cirque was in the town before they moved onto the next town.

But fate never worked in Beau's favor, and he found himself staring at a bright, blue-eyed Ethylon in front of his apartment door. He seemed exceptionally happy. Usually Ethylon carried this glum vagueness around that made him a bit depressing to be around. Beau probably had the same thing, he was just oblivious to it.

"Hey there." Ethylon gleamed.

"Hey." Beau replied uneasily. "C'mon in." He motioned. "I can only talk for a f-few minutes." Beau shook his head quickly, as though trying to shake off the stutter that fell upon his words. It was one habit that had been developing slowly, though Beau was sure it was only from his own uncertainty and paranoia.

"Where ya going?" Ethylon asked. Beau looked at the clock; he had to be at work in 15 minutes. He could make it, or at least he hoped he could make it in time.

"Work. I, er, need to stop mooching off my parents. So I picked up slack and got a job."

"Cool." Ethylon nodded. "Sorry, should I leave then?"

"You can stay for a while. But I gotta leave in a few." Beau looked back at his room, sprinting before the stereo could play another song. Beau had chosen to listen to songs that Joshua favored. It sounded strange in his head, but he liked to keep Joshua in mind most of the time. After turning the stereo off and strolling back into the living room, an idea formed.

"Actually...." Beau trailed off.

"Huh?"

"You could probably hang with m-me at work. I mean, as long as you don't mind raving drunk people and bead necklaces." Beau shrugged. He secretly hoped that Rowan would call soon, and maybe keeping Ethylon around would give him a chance to talk to Rowan, but it was only a glimmer of hope.

"Oh!" Ethylon said. "You work in a bar! Nice, I'm jealous." Ethylon inferred. People around the Main weren't allowed to drink other than in bars. Drinking in public was against the law, and people really couldn't find a restaurant that would risk serving alcohol.

"Yeah, well cirque-du-maine week is killing me right now. They're always ordering ten or 15 drinks at a time." Beau said.

Ethylon agreed to walk to work with Beau after a few minutes of mindless chatter between them. It seemed that neither of them wanted to admit that there was something wrong happening around them. They just wanted everything to be the way it was before things went wrong. Beau wanted Joshua back, and Ethylon wanted his life to be the way it was before he rebelled. Of course, what they had was probably the most normalcy they were ever going to get.

***

Beau washed the counter, mindlessly counting in threes within his mind. Ethylon rambled on about Lejend, her cleaning habits, and his strange paranoia that had set in with a slight slur to his voice. Beau had given him three drinks so far. Ethylon just couldn't hold his alcohol very well.

The adults (and quite a few teens) sang drunkenly from the back of the bar, speaking dumbly to the human waitress that waited their tables. Not many robots did these kinds of jobs after Beau's and Ethylon's little rebellion, and if they did, they didn't have many emotions. They weren't like Joshua.

"Anyways," Ethylon rambled, "I saw this thing on TV about President Gile. No one's seen her in a few days, but everyone thinks she's- hic- dead." He laughed. "Wouldn't that be funny?"

"Why is that funny?" Beau said, furrowing his brows together while rounding up another ten glasses for shots of whiskey and vodka.

"Because you know that she- hic- would have killed us sooner or later. But she- hic - died first, but y'know, that's just what I heard. I'm still not sure." Ethylon seemed to hiccup every time he said 'she' in his sentences. It made Beau laugh to himself.

There came a faint buzzing from Ethylon's pocket, and he laughed, pulling a cell phone out of his pocket. He flipped it open and hiccuped once more before answering with a hazy, "Hello?"

"Ethylon!" Rowan's loud voice came from the speaker of the phone. Ethylon jumped at the sound of his voice, pushing the phone away from his ear.

"Shhh." Ethylon said with a snicker. "You're so loud." He carried out his words.

"Are you drunk?" Rowan said accusingly. Beau smiled. Rowan wasn't stupid, he knew when his brother was screwed up.

"Psh.... Yes." Ethylon laughed. "Whatdya want, you killjoy?"

"Is Beau there?" Rowan asked anxiously. "I need to talk to him."

"Maybe Beau is here.... Maybe he isn't! What's in it for me?" Ethylon laughed. Beau scoffed and snatched the phone out of Ethylon's hands, turning the speaker off before he pressed it against his own ear, ignoring Ethylon's drunken spout of anger.

"H-hello." Beau said quickly.

"Beau! The man of the hour. Listen, I gotta ask you something. Now, after long hours of research, I've found that...."

Beau chewed on his fingernail, his eyes darting between the floor and the wall as though he were looking for something. His heart seemed as loud as it had ever been. He laughed at the thought of Joshua listening to his heartbeat and being startled by the pounding sound. Heat rushed in Beau's cheeks, and this cool sensation flowed through his veins. This was angst at its finest, and Beau was flooded with feelings too powerful for words. He hadn't even listened to what Rowan was saying.

"Beau?" Rowan said. "Are you there?"

"Huh? Yeah, I'm here." Beau murmured. "Sorry, I didn't catch that last part."

"When do you want to see Joshua again?"

The question seemed like it echoed for hours, and Beau nearly squealed with joy. His knuckles were white from holding onto the phone tightly, though Beau almost dropped it at that second.

"He's okay! He's okay, right? I can see him?" Beau said quickly. "Rowan, I can see him, right? Can I bring him home? Please, Rowan, I—"

"Beau!" Rowan shouted, finally catching Beau's attention after his last rant. "Take a breath. Now, Joshua is absolutely fine. I'm just giving him his final nourishment before he wakes up. I can control when he wakes up, so whenever you want to come, you can. I have this medication that I just slip through the IV and he'll wake up."

"Just like that?" Beau asked uneasily.

"Just like that." Rowan said. "Wait, what do you mean 'just like that'?! You've waited almost four months for this one moment!"

"I know...." Beau said squeamishly. "But it's just.... I mean, when I really think about it, it was nothing. Especially to be together with him again...." Then a thought struck Beau dumb. "Rowan, what if he doesn't remember me?"

Rowan choked on something from the other line, maybe water, from the sudden comment Beau made. Beau chewed on his bottom lip uneasily, to the point where he thought it was raw and bleeding. He couldn't help but think the worst and assume that Joshua wouldn't remember him.

"I could wake him up now and make sure he remembers... if you want." Rowan offered. Something shuffled in the background of their conversation.

"No!" Beau said. "No, don't wake him up. I wanna be the first one he sees...." A blush appeared on Beau's face, and he was so glad nobody else could see it in their drunken stupors. "If he doesn't remember me, then what?"

"I... I don't know." Rowan murmured. "But let's not think like that."

"When can I see h-him?" Beau asked, grabbing onto a glass that Ethylon placed on the counter. Rowan cleared his throat.

"If you can catch the train, then within a few hours." Rowan said. "I'll authorize your anklet so you can come here."

In a matter of seconds, Beau dropped Ethylon's phone onto the counter, and the glass cup that Ethylon had set down went flying across the counter and onto the ground before anyone could blink. Beau had gone sprinting (well, as much as he could sprint anyways) for the train, and he took absolutely nothing with him. Nothing but hope.

***

Beau thought the train ride couldn't have been any longer as they neared the Main, but it was exactly that. Beau was shifting his legs uneasily during the entire ride, and even groaned impatiently as the train stopped for an unscheduled pick-up on the side, even though the stop was only a few seconds long. Just the thought of being reunited with Joshua made time tick slower!

It was nearing midnight, and the Main was bustling with people, much to Beau's surprise. Women and men giggled together in small couples, walking hand in hand down the sidewalks. Beau couldn't help but be a little jealous of them, though there was a voice telling him in not to be jealous in the back of his mind, because he would have Joshua back soon, and he would be happier than anybody else in any of Abionmaton.

Beau could no long keep up his steady pace after his wounds began to act up again, both the scar upon his chest, and the wound behind his leg. Although the scar on his chest was only a scar, it felt like he took longer to catch his breath. This all led to his slow trudge among many bustling people.

"Hey, aren't you that kid?" A girl said as she passed him. Beau nodded, to which she replied with some strange signal that had became the icon for Beau. He just smiled weakly back at her before glancing back down the seemingly endless sidewalk.

Perhaps it was the simplicity of the Main that really boggled Beau's mind. He enjoyed walking around and staring at the freakish fashions the men and women wore. It seemed like characters out of an old style movie done by one of the best directors he had ever studied. The style was creepy, yet completely functional, and that was how Beau viewed the people in the Main. Maybe it was just the way he grew up, sheltered and quiet, that made him very uncomfortable with the fashions.

While moving through a crowd of these strange looking people with stiff hair, pointed shoulders, heels made out of needle-thin substances and tight pants that looked as though they could hardly move, Beau was being pushed in between people, and many in the crowd recognized him as "the boy who escaped the Main". They asked him the same questions everybody else did.

"Did you fear for your life— where is your mate— is he out of the coma yet— are you going to visit him now—" The voices overlapped into one irritating voice that rang out from each person. Beau shoved his way through with ease, nearly emerging from the rough crowd before his bad leg gave out on him again. Always at the worst times, Beau thought. On the way down, his hand caught on the shirt of one of the many in the crowd.

Beau laid his head against the sidewalk with a deep sigh, rolling over on his back. He turned slightly to glance at the person he brought down with him, who had only been dropped to their knees, unlike Beau. Then, as the person heaved a sigh and rubbed their chest where Beau had nearly torn the shirt, Beau had an inkling that he knew the person in front of him.

"Hey." Beau said, pushing himself up on his elbows. "Sorry." He murmured, waiting for the other to reply. They nodded, though they didn't bother to look up. "I just kinda t-tripped and then I reached from something. Seriously, I'm sorry—"

Beau stopped himself short as the dark-haired stranger looked up and revealed that he wasn't actually much of a stranger. Though his hair was noticeably darker, the face revealed Drew.

"Drew?" Beau said.

Drew swallowed hard, making an obvious gulp come from his throat. Beau sat himself up, though his leg had became numb again.

"Where ya been?" Beau asked. Drew pushed himself up on his wobbly legs, but he offered a shaky hand to Beau. Beau stood up, wiping non-existent dirt from his shirt for effect. After Drew snapped his hand away from Beau, he took one step away without a word. Beau knitted his brows together in confusion.

"Where are you here?" He paused. "And where you goin' in such a rush?"

"No, Beau." Drew said quietly. "I gotta go."

"Where?"

"No." Drew shook his head. "Nice seeing you." That was all of an explanation Drew gave Beau before sprinting down the sidewalk past crowds of darkly dressed people. Beau, stricken dumb, stood in silence while the encounter with Drew became stranger and stranger with every second that came back. Beau didn't mind Drew's strange actions, for in the back of his mind was still that voice pining for a chance to see Joshua again, and that voice seemed to control his body more than anything, and it propelled himself to Rowan's lab with the last bit of energy he truly had.