Who: Zee and Dorian/Hunter What: Post-Memories Meeting Where: Passages When: Not long after the memories Warnings/Rating: Angst, UST, fighting, stupid boys, Dorian being an old-fashioned racist jerk in his head
Zee was pretty sure he’d never driven quite as fast through a city as he did to get to the hotel after Hunter’s messages. He’d scrawled a few more replies of his own to other people as he drove, and parked haphazardly near the building, almost forgetting to lock the car door when he climbed out. It wasn’t the best car in the world, beat up and with an odometer count that was well into 6 digits, but it was one of the only things that was truly his, and he didn’t want some asshole messing with it.
Long strides carried him into the building, and he paused once over the threshold, needing to take a minute for his eyes to adjust to the dim gloom of the lobby. Looking around and not immediately seeing Hunter, he felt his stomach drop toward the floor in alarm. He knew he was still on edge from having the memories forced into his mind, but it didn’t stop the worry from escalating.
“Hunter!” His voice echoed through the lobby, and he wondered if he was going to have to search every corner of the hotel to find him.
Hunter actually wasn’t far, he was just pressed out of sight along the edge of the lobby, his presence marked only because the truck had been parked along the side of the building and the white collie was standing guard to one side. For once the collie did not come forward to greet Zee as the man strode past, and the man’s slow approach seemed to echo this impulse... but then, he wasn’t as much Hunter as he could be.
Unfolding from the shadow of the wall and the unsteady bench next to some long-dead palm, Hunter swayed into the better light on the faded carpet at the foot of the stair. “You are Zee,” not-Hunter said. It was Hunter, but instead of the hesitant scruffy sideways stride, he moved with a faintly sinuous grace that didn’t altogether suit the plaid.
Zee turned quickly at the first hint of motion from the shadows, and was moving instantly at the sight of plaid, two steps to close the distance before the words hit. He abruptly stopped his next long stride, and attempted to look closer in the half-light of the hotel. The skeptical look that crossed his face was accompanied by wariness. Looked like Hunter, yeah. But sure didn’t sound like Hunter. Or move like him either. All of which was unsettling in a way that Zee felt deep in his stomach.
“Yeah. ...an’ it seems you got me at a loss. Because that sure as hell isn’t something Hunter would say to me.” He hadn’t yet had to deal with someone that wasn’t quite themselves due to the hotel, and this was not the moment he wanted to start. He’d wanted to find Hunter and make sure he was okay, maybe take him back to the apartment and hole up there for a while. Not have to deal with some door shit making things even more complicated. “So you mind telling me who you are and why you’re hanging around?”
Hunter’s boots clunked unsteadily on the carpet, and the man wearing them looked down as if perplexed at their weight. “How untidy,” he commented, and though it was Hunter’s voice the diction just wasn’t the same. It wasn’t as if he could be British fully, but he certainly wasn’t entirely American, either. Straightening once more he advanced toward Zee until he was close enough to count the rings and examine the ink. He was definitely closer than Hunter came in a casual scenario, at least lately.
“My name,” the man in Hunter’s body said, “is Dorian Gray. Perhaps you have heard of me.” He smiled Hunter’s best bitter smile, and examined Zee’s mouth with the soft resin of Hunter’s eyes. “Hunter has excellent taste. I have never met a... man of your coloring.” He seemed to be under the impression he was paying a compliment. “Hunter is fine,” he added, forestalling the protest. “He is just a little unsteady, so he is accepting my, hm, assistance.”
The voice didn't match up with what Zee expected from Hunter, and it made the skin between his shoulderblades itch and crawl. It was that, more than the lack of space between them once the clunking footsteps stopped, that made Zee frown. The look in those eyes, so different than what he was used to, only added to the feeling of wrongness. In that moment, he didn't think he would ever mistake whoever was in Hunter's head for the real thing.
"I've heard of you." Zee had barely pushed through getting his GED, but it didn't mean he didn't read. He might not have picked up the book that shared a name with the man in Hunter's head, but he'd at least heard of it, knew the briefest sparse details about it: player is a jerk, has a painting, doesn't age. "Not much good, though." And he wasn't afraid to say so, while being inspected. The long stares deepened his own frown, feeling as if he was being judged for something he wasn't going to enjoy. The following comment only supported that feeling. "...Yeah, you better be talking about the ink, because if not, you might be coming real close to saying something I'm going to take offense over." There was just enough edge to the statement to carry threat, but he let it drop for the moment, switching to a more important topic. "Fine and unsteady don't quite seem to be the same thing. So maybe you let me know when exactly he's going to be back, so I can make sure he's 'fine' for myself, yeah?"
Hunter’s eyebrows, ungroomed and yet still as heavy as his gaze under the flop of his hair, rose gently aloft. He couldn’t imagine why the man would take offense, he was what he was, after all. Pondering the idea as they stood together, Dorian lifted one of Hunter’s rough hands and touched Zee’s chest over his heart, as if inspecting, but the gesture was no more than that. The brown eyes returned to Zee’s, and Dorian smiled a very soft smile. “I don’t know. Hunter is not the kind of boy to make a lot of plans, my dear, you know this. I imagine when he is on his metaphorical feet again. You can talk to him yourself, if you don’t believe me.” His index finger crept slightly lower along Zee’s first rib. “Unless you can think of a reason I should stay a little longer.”
Zee nearly took a step back at the touch of the hand on his chest. Hunter hadn't touched him voluntarily in too long, and while he remembered the hands, the dissonance of the touch coming from an alter was nearly overwhelming in its intensity. Talk of plans kept him grounded, though. "I know he's not. Hell, I'm not much for it either. I'm just needing to know he's alright. And I don't know you from Adam, or if you're likely to be telling the truth." It was a strong enough argument, but it began to wane under the assault of a gentle touch. Eyes on the face of the man in front of him, Zee leaned into the contact for just a second, nearly giving into it. His eyes had darkened slightly at the touch before narrowing, and he reached down to catch Hunter's - Dorian's - wrist in a tight grip. The words came seconds later, low and a little rough around the edges.
"Stop that."
Hunter’s mouth creased in Dorian’s rapidly spreading smile of delight. This man reacted like so many others to his touch, and he was obviously pleased with himself at the sight. Dorian knew very well what Hunter and Zee’s history was, and he also knew that the latter had been trying to reforge the connection, undoubtedly in the hope of a resumed physical relationship. Dorian thought that was delightful, like a play on a stage, but he could see Zee’s attraction now that he was so near. He was like one of those savages he saw from afar on his travels, except much smarter and of better speech. Delightful.
A second later Dorian fluttered Hunter’s lashes. “Stop what?” He let the man keep his wrist and showed a line of teeth under his lips. “So defensive. Hunter is right here still, and though I cannot vouch for his mental state I assure you he is not going anywhere at all. Are you satisfied?”
If Zee knew any of what was going through Dorian's mind, the man would likely end up on the floor with a broken nose, sharing a body with Hunter or not. But he didn't know why exactly Dorian was smiling, so he simply kept his frown well secured on his face. "Don't play. I don't believe you're stupid enough to not know what I'm talking about. So stop." The wrist in his hand was pushed back toward Dorian before Zee took a full step back, putting him just out of reach for the moment.
"I guess I have to be satisfied that he's still kicking around in that head with you. Doesn't mean I have to like it or be comfortable with your answers." There was a pause as he tried to figure out what else he should say. "Also doesn't mean I'm going to let you paw at me with his hands."
Dorian pouted. Hunter didn’t pout much, and it was strange to see it even on his boyish face. The surprising wet red of his lower lip revealed so abruptly, the extra sweep of his hair that was too long, the scrunching shadow of brows. “Oh, very well then. I would not hurt you, after all.” Dorian let Zee retreat from him, settling back on Hunter’s hips and spreading Hunter’s hands over the plaid of his chest. “I cannot imagine how you bear this clothing. Everything chafes so.” He was about to say something else, his mouth opened to continue the commentary, but something that Zee could not hear interrupted. Dorian’s expression grew somewhat cold, and then the pout returned. “Oh, very well then.”
There was no warning before Dorian was absolutely gone. No reason returned behind Hunter’s eyes, and he collapsed forward like a puppet with his strings cut.
Every expression that crossed Hunter's face only reminded Zee that it was someone else behind the eyes. Someone he wasn't used to, and who wasn't supposed to be there. "I don't think you could hurt me. That's not what I meant," he argued, eyebrows pushing together in a displeased line. The comments about the clothes were just strange, and he fought for a response, but Dorian was speaking again before he'd come up with anything.
The few words and split second of blankness was all the hint Zee had that something was about to change, and by the time Hunter was falling forward, Zee had stepped in to close that small distance, arms just managing to catch a limp body. "Fuck," he managed under his breath, spurred by confusion and worry more than anything else. Knowing he could likely carry Hunter at least a short distance, he still didn't want to go far, so he eased the two of them down toward the floor so he could at least kneel. "Hunter?" And then, just in case, "...Dorian?"
Hunter’s arms came up to wrap around Zee’s in almost strangling, feverish heat. He barely got his feet under him so his weight wasn’t all on Zee’s shoulder, and he was shaking like a brittle winter leaf in a hard breeze. He did not pull back to look Zee in the face, instead sprawling awkwardly on one knee and hugging the other man close. Dry sobs with no volume cut into the dusty air, and Hunter’s pained voice, not at all the sly slide of Dorian’s, followed in ragged pieces. “There were bullets, and a prison... and he shot her... she died, Zee, she’s dead!” The words spiraled up until they were almost panic, and they would have been shrill if Hunter had any control of his voice at all.
It may have not been the right response, especially with Hunter obviously in distress, but for a few seconds the clinging and sobbing made Zee glad that Hunter had returned. The relief was short-lived as he pushed all other thoughts away in favor of focusing only on the boy in his arms. He pulled Hunter closer, upward, finding some sort of arrangement where he could still hold on but not have his knee forced up into Hunter’s ribs. And then he tried to listen to the words through the hitching sobs, force them to make sense. And they did, in an awful way, especially after Hunter’s confessions the other day about his missing sister and a phone call. Of all the things Zee was angry with in the moment, he held a special sharp rage for whatever it was that had given Hunter that memory.
His arms never faltered around Hunter, keeping a steady, close pressure around him. Just like the other day, there was nothing he could say in the moment that could possibly be right. Instead of trying to find words that would inevitably come out wrong, he simply rocked the boy in his arms and let him cry.
It wasn’t that long before the sounds stopped. There was very little more in the way of tears that Hunter had, and his reaction was not physical but mental. He didn’t seem much aware of where they were, or how they’d got there, or even that a little while ago he hadn’t been himself. Hunter was clinging not to Zee, but to the idea that eventually it would be okay, that he hadn’t seen what he’d seen, that it wasn’t him that hadn’t been able to stop it from happening. His imagination furnished her expression, that wild sense of hopelessness, every detail that he didn’t want to see. He went quiet in Zee’s arms, focused internal, the dry scratch of his jaw on Zee’s shirt, hard interruptions of breath as the edge of old hiccuping echoes of sobs gone days before.
When the sounds finally tapered off, Zee continued to stay quiet for a long while, letting the moments drag and pass as they would. Finally, when it seemed that Hunter wasn’t going to be the first to speak or move, he let out a quiet breath and tucked his chin down just enough to be able to see Hunter. “Hey,” he whispered, any roughness or want that had been present with Dorian long gone in the face of more important, pressing matters. “I got the rest of the day off. Wanna go home?” Home meant the apartment, Hunter’s things already finding their own places in the rooms.
Hunter’s expression was somewhat vacant, the absence of real turning thought and true comprehension. He tucked his chin down and touched Zee’s forehead with his own, a faintly needy gesture that at the same time took nothing. Hunter made a quiet sound of acquiesce that had no form, vowel or consonant, but there wasn’t a sign that he’d really understood the question. He did see Zee, though, and focused enough on the other man’s dark eyes to give him a slight, apologetic smile. Rough fingers touched Zee’s back and then parted away.
Zee sighed quietly through his nose at the soft contact of forehead to forehead. It was hard to focus that close up, but he kept his eyes on Hunter’s as best as he could. At the soft sound, before Hunter pulled away again, Zee brought his hand up to spread against the side of Hunter’s neck. It was comfort and support offered in a simple gesture. He could see the strange apology in Hunter’s smile and shook his head. “Shh. None of that...” The tentative touch to his back made him smile again, and his thumb traced along Hunter’s jaw. His expression was a mess of worry and fondness, and although he didn’t want to break the quiet moment, he finally pulled back and began to stand, reaching down to take Hunter’s hand and tug gently once he was on his feet again.
Hunter obeyed the movement blindly, assembling his limbs into an upright position and then propping himself there like a scarecrow. His focus moved in and out as the things he had seen interrupted his stream of thought, but he made an effort to return that was so obvious it might as well have been painful. “You okay?” he asked, in the diminished, rough tone of someone recently graveside. A slow blink of the dark fringe of his lashes. “Dorian said he would... help. Said you had come, that you were upset... not pleased...” He trailed off, trying to think of what had been said, but he couldn’t immediately recall, and Dorian was in no mood to be cooperative.
Zee watched Hunter closely, concerned about the wavering balance and wavering focus. He gave a supportive smile when Hunter finally focused, but there was still a deep wariness in his eyes. Hand still holding Hunter’s, he gave the fingers a quick squeeze. “I’m fine, baby. Just worried like I am all the time lately.” His voice was quiet, barely carrying beyond the two of them even in the echoing lobby, but it was warm and all sorts of fond. An expectant moment passed as he tried to think of how to address the matter of Dorian and his own displeasure. “I think he was helping, yeah. I also think he’s a handsy sort, and I didn’t think that was right. Especially not while you’re working through things.”
Hunter automatically pulled on his shirt, an old habit that caused the old plaid to bunch in strange places over his skin, and then spring back as soon as he released it. He squinted against the sun as they departed from the building, but he showed some real signs of life when he put his hand down to greet the collie as she came cautiously over. She wasn’t as bouncy or as friendly as she had been before, obviously aware that something had gone wrong with Hunter but not what. “Handsy?” Hunter echoed, somewhat distant and having difficulty comprehending anything that wasn’t Maren and the gun pointed at her.
In some way, seeing Hunter greet the dog made the worry in Zee’s stomach start to ease at least a little bit. Hunter’s truck was right there, waiting to be driven back to the apartment or somewhere else, and seeing it parked there made Zee wonder how Hunter had even managed to get it there in the first place. He didn’t think that Dorian was real familiar with driving a beat-up pick up. He pushed that thought away as he reached down to ruffle the softness of the collie’s ears too, keeping Hunter in the very edges of his vision. He’d never had a dog before, not even when he’d been at home as a kid, but he was quickly becoming used to the little Fluff being around.
“Handsy,” Zee repeated, fingers still scratching behind one canine ear. “Likes to touch things that aren’t his...” He knew he should make it clearer, could tell that Hunter wasn’t completely following the conversation yet, and he sighed. “Using your hands to go feeling across me. That’s not a thing that should be happening, and I knew you wouldn’t appreciate it much.” He’d looked down at the dog partway through, giving her his attention so that he wouldn’t have to see whatever reaction crossed Hunter’s face.
That was probably a very good idea, because Hunter stopped short. His face was glass transparent as he obviously realized that Dorian was some sort of physical threat to his relationship with Zee, a relationship that was shaky and dangerous to begin with. Hunter was aware he had been leaning on Zee’s presence even if he didn’t know why and didn’t attempt to find an alternative, and he was also aware Zee hadn’t done anything to push him into bed, either. The combination of circumstances, and the conviction that Zee liked a certain type that Hunter most certainly did not fit, struck a tremor into Hunter’s uncertain balance.
Finally Hunter’s gaze cleared of Maren’s terror long enough to give Zee a searching look that was laced with acidic suspicion and naked worry. “He hit on you?”
“Mm.” The sound was soft but nonetheless affirmative. “Got the feeling he does that a lot.” His gaze was still down at the dog, but he finally raised his head to glance back up at Hunter. “Also got the feeling he doesn’t see folks like me very often.” Zee may not have known the exact thoughts going through Dorian’s mind, but the stares combined with the old-fashioned-ness of him didn’t point at anything good. The expression on Hunter’s face took a minute to register, but when it did, he frowned again and stood. “Hey,” he said, voice going softer and a little careful. “What’s that look for now?”
Hunter chewed on his lower lip but didn’t answer the last question. He tried to see in Zee’s face if the man enjoyed the attention, but he couldn’t tell, not at all. Hunter was unused to having an alter, and he didn’t really even understand completely what was happening, so it didn’t occur to him to try to force Dorian to speak to him. Instead he looked at Zee, looked for some sign like all the times he had tried to think what he had missed after leaving him the last time. “What do you mean, folks like you?” He asked, holding his real question behind his teeth.
Zee didn't like the expression that was still lingering on Hunter's face, the almost nervous worry that switched to a closer study. It didn't have the same feel as Dorian's had, but it still wasn't comfortable to have someone looking at him like they were searching for something. "Folks with skin a hell of a lot darker than his, since I think his story's got him in England a while back. He started talking about coloring and maybe he meant my ink, but I'm gonna guess not." Zee'd been nearly everywhere across the country, and he knew what it felt like to have someone staring at him because of the color of his skin (the color under all the other colors). It hadn't always ended badly, but it was never very good either. And he didn't want to deal with that with the guy living in Hunter's head.
Hunter wasn’t surprised by that, even if he didn’t yet know Dorian all that well. He talked high and old, like rich people did, and Hunter knew that came part and parcel with all kinds of little hatreds. He blinked slowly at Zee and looked away from him out into the hovering heatbeds on the pavement. “You like him?” He tried to sound neutral about it, but it didn’t work, not a bit.
Zee blinked at Hunter a few times before frowning at the question. "I talked to him for all of a few minutes and then he tried to put hands on me that weren't his." It seemed like it should be a clear enough answer to him, and it hung in the air between them. He stood there as Hunter's gaze traveled out, looking in the same direction but seeing nothing of interest. After a few seconds, thinking that maybe he did need to be blunter, especially after everything Hunter'd been through, he cleared his throat. "Can't say I'm very fond..."
Hunter did not look convinced. It was a simple, transparent expression, the green-in-the-gills jealousy and obvious mistrust at what he was being told. Especially when that expression did not change at the first explanation of what had gone on. Hunter was under the obvious impression that Zee didn’t need more than a few minutes and a pair of hands, even if he didn’t say it. “Okay.” He was more wary than angry, however, and he pulled away onto his own two feet to work his fingers into tight pockets for a mostly smashed pack of cigarettes.
"Hey." The frown that had been mostly confusion before slipped into something darker - frustration overlaid with the constant worry. He'd played the game before of trying to convince Hunter of something, but that time he'd been guilty, and this time he refused to accept that he'd done a damn thing wrong. He reached out to catch Hunter's wrist, the one that was working a hand into a pocket, the same one that he'd grabbed earlier when Dorian had reached out to touch him. "I know you've got your reasons to hate me still, but I've done nothing to earn it this time. So I don't like the guy in your head, won't let him feel me up while he's wearing your face. Doesn't mean you've gotta be angry at me for it."
Hunter’s hand was too big for that pocket, and Zee stuck it in place by linking his wrist. The whiskey pools were a little shallower than usual as Hunter lifted them in Zee’s direction, and in his other hand the lighter disappeared in a fist, as if Hunter was ready to strike out at the man for touching him when he was so unhappy. He didn’t, but the impulse was there, an old impulse that made him think of his old home and everything that happened there. Hunter’s nostrils flared and the distrust in his eyes surfaced as an old rotting thing with sharp splinters. “I don’t care if you like some guy,” he said, with too much vehemence for truth.
The frown was firmly in place now, even though Zee knew this was the last place or time to have what was shaping up to be a fight. Hopefully not with fists, though he did catch the way Hunter's hand clenched around the lighter. And yeah, that expression on Hunter's face was something Zee'd seen before. "You're not even listening to me, are you?" His voice went low, gritty with irritation. "I don't like him, even when he's wearing your face. It's not right to look over and see someone else looking back at me outta your eyes."
Hunter’s expression twisted. “Yeah, I’ll bet he’s not real good at acting like stupid me.” He pulled his arm roughly out of Zee’s hand and barely avoided crushing the few remaining cigarettes. He started trying to parse one out of the rest, but his fingers were shaking and he couldn’t manage it.
"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?" The question came quick and sharp, and though Zee tried to hang onto Hunter's arm, the pull was too harsh for him to keep his grip. He took a step in, using his height to loom over Hunter in a way he almost never did with anyone. Even though his brows were pulled darkly down over his eyes, he fished his own pack of cigarettes out of a much looser pocket and held them out.
Hunter refused the cigarettes and also refused to retreat. Instead he pushed forward, the way he’d been brought up, walking into the aggression with his own in an attempt to make it go away. “It means I know you like that type better, Zee, don’t bullshit me.” He stuck one of his own bent cigarettes into his mouth just to show he didn’t care about what he was saying. It was about as successful as everything else he’d done.
A little alarm warning began to go off in the back of Zee's head. The one that always seemed to go off when he was doing something stupid, but that he so rarely listened to. So the volume of his voice inched up just a little and he refused to back away as well. "I don't know what kind you mean, H. The kind that takes over your body, or the kind that's sort of an asshole about everything when I'm worried?"
Zee wasn’t backing off so Hunter’s eyes went hard, like amber in the sun, and he stepped in so his chest bumped off Zee’s. Even without height Hunter was a thickly corded set of shoulders that was all sun-bleached work, and you could see the bar fight behind the hurt in his eyes. “The pretty sweet-talkin’ kind,” he said, belligerently.
Someday, maybe, if he was lucky, Zee would get to feel Hunter against him again when it wasn’t just for comfort and wasn’t during a shouting match. But it didn’t seem to be that day. His voice caught somewhere between too loud and too rough, and pushing its way into too honest. “Pretty? I don’t even know what that asshole looks like, unless you mean because he was wearing your face, and then yeah, I do like that kind of pretty, which should be fucking obvious at this point. And even if I did like sweet talkers, he wasn’t doing much of it, so you can shut the hell up.” The last words escalated in volume as Zee’s glare went intense, ignoring the fact that they were having a shouted conversation right outside the hotel, where anyone else could walk by and hear them.
Hunter looked up through the height difference into Zee’s face. In general, people who were bigger than Hunter usually got a pass when he was angry, because Hunter didn’t start fights he was going to lose. Apparently Zee was an exception on all counts. Hunter didn’t remember Zee getting angry the last time he’d been guilty, and the difference in reaction made Hunter pause long enough to listen to what he was saying. The look of jealous suspicion crossed his eyes one more time, and then finally tamed, crouching somewhere out of sight. Hunter backed off three inches and put his chin to the side and down in a peculiarly dog-like gesture of apology. “Fine.”
Hunter’s sudden backing down threw cold water on the anger that had been continuing to build in the back of Zee’s mind. “Listen,” he started, voice softer again, “I know you got no reason to trust me yet, but I’m trying my best to be a good guy here, H. Yeah, I fucked up with us before, but it doesn’t mean I’m racing to do it again. Found you again, and I’m trying to do right by you, and I get that it means not jumping into bed with someone else, even if he’s wearing your face at the time.”
The kicked-apology expression did something painful deep in Zee’s stomach, and he wanted to find something that would make it go away. Even if it meant that he had to go away, as much as he didn’t want that. The thought passed through his mind, but it took him a second to register it. When he did, the last of the worry and anger slipped from his own expression, leaving one full of confusion and a little bit of fear. “Shit,” he whispered, taking a step, then two, back from Hunter. It had finally hit him that maybe Jules had been right - that things weren’t done between him and Hunter. Not in a big way. And that maybe there was something more there than just a friend to sleep with while driving across the country.
Hunter had decided there was nothing to get angry about, and it was so strange to have a conversation about what somebody had been doing in his body that he successfully conquered the jealousy long enough to light a cigarette and try to push the remainder of the pack back down into a pocket, a movement which took the hem of his jeans down an inch or so against his hip. Dorian’s comment about chafing was brought immediately to mind.
The look on Zee’s face was new, and Hunter didn’t know what it meant. He gave Zee a fatigued and yet wary expression from under both brows, hissing out smoke with a baring of his throat. “What?”
The hanging smoke and revelation still attacking his mind made Zee want a cigarette of his own, the flash of skin at Hunter’s hip made him want to reach out and touch, but he took another step back and shook his head. The thought had only just solidified in his mind, he wasn’t certain he could actually say it out loud. And with the tired expression on Hunter’s face, he thought that maybe it wasn’t the right time for it, either. “Nothing,” he finally managed, voice thin and hard to get out. “It’s... nothing.”
“Bullshit. You got a look on your face.” Hunter hesitated, chewing on tar and smoke before he let it out again through his nose, and then he took a small step forward in an awkward but obvious attempt to make reparations. “I’m sorry I said that stuff. This place and the stuff I saw. I’m not...” Hunter threaded two fingers through his hair with the same hand that held his cigarette. “I don’t like it.” It was not a very good apology.
“I know,” Zee replied, softly, even though he couldn’t possibly know completely what Hunter had been through. “It’s okay.” And no, it wasn’t completely okay either. Everything was a little not-okay. But he wasn’t going to push or demand or make a big deal out of it, not at this point. The small step forward seemed like a mile when it was Hunter moving back towards him. Even a small shrinking of the space between them pointed toward things being at least a little better than they used to be. After a pause that was almost long enough to be awkward, he tipped a strange little smile. “And my face always looks like this, H. Don’t know what else you’re expecting it to look like.”
Hunter wasn’t even aware enough to realize that this back and forth with Zee repeated almost every time they were face to face, and his frown relaxed away slowly, leaving behind that bone deep fatigue and empty admissions of guilt. “You want to drive?” he asked, tentatively closing the last subject of conversation while the good note hung on. “I don’t got my keys so they’re probably in there.” Hunter gave his truck a vague look, as he couldn’t remember exactly how he’d gotten there, either.
Zee glanced over at the truck and nodded. “Yeah, I got my keys. I parked...” He waved vaguely over his shoulder where the car was parked (not very well) nearby. He whistled softly to the collie, hoping that she’d follow along with, but he stopped before turning toward the car. “Did you want to check for them first?” He hesitated into a slouch, not quite sure what to do now that they’d stopped shouting at each other.
The collie’s ears perked up at the whistle and she trotted happily forward, tail flagged, obviously relieved that someone decided to be sane and normal today. “Oh,” Hunter said, somewhat delayed at realizing of course, Zee had his own transportation. After another too-long pause, he moved away at his long-legged lope to the truck, lifting a boot to plant it on the front right tire and leaning into the open passenger window. It took some maneuvering but he pulled the keys from where he’d left them in the ignition and dropped back down onto his worn heels. “Can you bring me back later? I don’t want to--” Drive. He looked back at the truck after returning to Zee’s side.
“Yeah, of course,” Zee replied, digging up a gentle smile. “Wasn’t planning on leaving you stranded without a ride.” He’d barely even thought about Hunter driving himself, not after everything that had just happened and not knowing if Dorian was likely to make a reappearance any time soon. He popped the passenger’s side door open to let the dog climb inside, leaving it hanging wide for Hunter to climb in. He moved around to the driver’s side, climbing in and smiling at the wet nose that nudged his elbow. Once Hunter was in too, he started the engine to take them back to the apartment.