Toby Mitchell (likeacannonball) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2019-12-29 20:49:00 |
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Entry tags: | #january 2018, adrian, adrian x toby, toby |
Who: Adrian & Toby
Where: Gas station
When: Near midnight, Tuesday 01/09
Status: Complete
Putting gas on the car was one of the most depressing things Adrian did lately and he tried not to watch the price go up, up, up, correlating in his mind with his time dripping away, piece by piece. Aaron and Mila had offered to help him and it was becoming more and more tempting to accept that help because his money was running low and when he couldn't afford all the food he needed anymore he knew he was completely fucked. He'd never been a hunter unless he was teetering on that edge of becoming a monster and every time he went there it was harder to come back. Sometimes it was tempting to just let go but whenever he let his mind wander that way he thought of other people and thought better of it. He'd rather shoot himself in the head but he really didn't want to die. Damn it. The price kept going up on the digital screen and he forced himself to look away again. He needed a full tank. That wasn't something he could skip out on, not when he was living in his car.
He leaned against the car while he waited for it to be full, stared up at the fluffy white slowly twirling down from the sky and rubbed his hands together for warmth. At least it wasn't as crazy windy tonight, it was relatively still and kind of pretty out despite the cold. Nobody was around but the gas station attendant and Adrian had to admire the guy for taking the job after two of the former employees had died or gone missing. That wasn't a thought he wanted to get lost in but he almost did, only snapping out of it when another car rolled into the lot. Adrian tugged his hood up almost automatically, ready to hightail it out of there. He still couldn't risk being seen by people, there were too many who would recognize him.
It had been a hellishly long day and Toby was ready to go home and unwind, maybe run a bath and open a bottle of wine. He loved his job, but it could be exhausting at times, even when the night was relatively quiet. Those were the nights that the hospital itself seemed to act up, as if it couldn’t stand to let them go a few days without something weird and creepy happening. A body had gone missing earlier in the evening, only to later appear in one of the rooms, eyes wide open and grinning. None of the nurses wanted to touch it, least of all Toby, and they’d covered it with a sheet before wheeling it, bed and all, back to the morgue. Maybe he’d drink that wine straight from the bottle tonight just to wash the image away.
He pulled into the gas station and parked the car, shivering as he opened his door. Even with his jacket all zipped up it was cold and it was going to be cold for a few more months. He was heading inside when the guy pumping gas caught his attention, some flick of movement out of the corner of his eye. It was rare that people were out late on a weeknight, especially in the winter, and Toby wondered who it was. He couldn’t really see the guy’s face, which creeped him out a little, and he kept on moving a few more steps before he stopped cold. Something was tickling his senses, a sort of psychic alarm, but he couldn’t tell what it meant. “Hey,” he called out, not even sure what to say beyond that. With his hands in his pockets, he thumbed a cigarette out of the pack. “Got a light?” he asked, holding it up.
Adrian wanted to shrink in on himself. He could see Toby's reflection in the car window and while it wasn't the clearest image, he still recognized him. Toby Mitchell, they'd worked together, gone to school together, gotten drunk together at a couple of co-worker bashes. It felt like no matter what he did right now, Toby would pick up on who he was - or that something was off. Not speaking was weird, Adrian should have been good at weird by now but it felt like a crashing weight at the moment. "Shouldn't smoke at a gas station," he muttered quietly, bracing himself for the inevitable recognition while hoping against hope that Toby would be oblivious. It had been five years, maybe, maybe, maybe... He glanced at that reflection in the window again, caught Toby looking back and silently cursed himself for not keeping his face turned away. The recognition was clear as day.
“Shouldn’t smoke at all,” Toby said, his eyes on the guy acting all shadey, only half thinking about what was coming out of his mouth. “Statistics say the cigarettes ‘ll kill me before the gas station does, so…” His words trailed off as he caught sight of the guy in his reflection, his own eyes growing as big as saucers. “Holy shit,” he muttered, taking a hesitant step closer. “Adrian?” He knew the moment he said it that it was true, knew for certain, then did everything in his power to shut down abilities that might give him any more insight into the man before him. As intensely curious as he might be, he suspected knowing more than he should about why Adrian wasn’t dead could bite him in the ass. “They said you were dead.”
If it hadn't been for the circumstances and the way Adrian's heart was beating too loud and hard in his chest, this would almost have made him smile. It was so familiar, Toby Mitchell rambling about something, just like old times. The gas nozzle clicked off, the tank finally full, two minutes too damn late and Adrian left it there for the time being as he turned slowly to face Toby. "Don't go telling them differently," he said quietly, his voice and expression pleading. He had the passing thought that it was probably easier to just kill Toby, what was one more body, but he knew where that thought came from and he was in control right now, there was no way he was hurting his former coworker. There had been enough bodies. He had no idea if Toby was good with secrets, it wasn't the sort of thing that had really come up.
“Cross my heart and hope to die,” Toby said, drawing a little X over his chest. While the words were childlike, he meant what he said. He knew more about most people than he would ever let on and he knew not to let it show. Gossip was fun, but this wasn’t gossip. People had died. “Now I really need that light,” he snorted, dipping his hand into his other pocket to retrieve his lighter. “How? I mean-- Really. I thought-- Honey, I cannot believe you’re standing here,” he said, lighting his cigarette. “You had family, didn’t you? Do they know? Please tell me they know.” He was having a hard time wrapping his mind around this, the details of Adrian’s case slow to come back to him, but he recalled that there hadn’t been a body. It was another case of people gone missing, though this time there’d been someone to accuse. “Wait, the guy that they thought killed you, did he-- I mean, are you the only one? Or is there more?”
Adrian wasn't really surprised to see Toby had a lighter after all. The guy had always had sharp instincts, of course he'd use that easy ice breaker to start a conversation with a stranger if he thought something was up. "Only ones who survived were me and Cruz," he told him, turning again to get the nozzle out and put it back in its place. "It was a fucking massacre," he added under his breath. "The only one who knows I'm back is my little sister, I need to keep it that way." It had been hard enough to explain why to Mila and Aaron, he didn't know Toby that well though it was hard to believe he was oblivious to the horrors of Point Pleasant after the fog events.
“I said I won’t tell and I’m good for it,” Toby said, moving a little bit closer. Fuck, it really was cold outside. “So if you’re a ghost, what’re you doing back here? I can’t be the only one who’d recognize you.” It seemed a little risky, if you asked him. Toby could keep his mouth shut, but there were plenty of people in town that couldn’t. And Point Pleasant was small enough that just being there increased his chances of running into someone he knew, even close to midnight at a gas station. Toby had a million questions, but the knowledge that Adrian had survived something gruesome kept him from prying too much. He didn’t need the details pushing their way into his brain unsolicited.
Adrian started pulling his hands into the sleeves of his sweater and watched the air he huffed steam in front of his face. "My sister needed help," he replied and Toby probably didn't remember who Adrian's sister was but if he did he might have seen her at Mercy - if he still worked there. Adrian had no idea. "And people see what they wanna see. They think I'm dead so all they see is someone who looks like me." He shrugged and gave Toby a rueful smile. "And I thought I was being careful." Obviously not careful enough. He should have gotten the hell out of dodge the moment another car pulled in to the lot. That nagging voice in the back of his voice told him Toby might be able to keep a secret, but what if he came to the conclusion that it was Adrian who killed everyone, why else would he need to keep his existence a secret? That might prompt him to go to the cops. Kill him. "I know this is weird, but you have to trust me, okay? There's a reason I can't- nobody can know I'm here. There's a good reason for it. I can't tell you but you have to trust me, okay?"
It was horribly suspicious and Toby kept wondering if he was standing in front of someone who’d murdered multiple people and let another guy take the fall for it. That didn’t seem like the Adrian he remembered, but people changed, circumstances changed, and who was to say that he ever really knew him? There were plenty of things Adrian didn’t know about him, so the same could be said in reverse. He came closer, his heart beating rapidly as he ramped himself up to doing something he absolutely, positively hated doing, but he felt like he had to know. “Did you kill ‘em? The guys that were with you when you went missing?” he whispered, one hand shooting out to grab Adrian’s by the wrist. Skin on skin would’ve been better, but he also didn’t want to know too much. He didn’t want the details, just the truth. “That’s all I need to know, honey. Nothing else.”
The contact startled Adrian a little and it was so fucking cold, he just wanted to shake Toby off and shove his hands in his pockets. The question was fair though and he gave him a pained look as he shook his head. "They were my friends," he muttered and heaved a quiet sigh, glancing down at Toby's hand on his wrist. "I don't know how much you've seen, if you saw what happened in the fog. There are things out there, darker than you wanna know." He glanced up at Toby's face again, pulling his hand away to pull it into his sleeve. "So you probably shouldn't talk to strangers at an empty gas station in the middle of the night." It wasn't a warning, he didn't want to hurt Toby, but this could have ended badly if he was someone - or something - else.
It would’ve been easier if Adrian had just answered the question directly; a simple ‘no’ would’ve been enough when Toby was fired up like a human lie detector. He wanted to shout at him to stop talking, relieved when Adrian pulled his hand away, and studied him for a long moment. He was telling the truth, Toby was sure of it, but he was telling the truth about all of it. “You’re not a stranger,” he said, lips quirking up to a smile as he took a step back. “I don’t think you’ll hurt me, but you’re right, there are monsters in the dark and not all of them need the fog to come for us.” His eyes turned towards the road, so quiet in both directions, the city gone to sleep for the night. It seemed peaceful, but looks could be deceiving. “I’d say we should get a drink sometime, but I guess the bars are kind of off limits.”
Adrian expected that answer but Toby hadn't known who he was when he asked for a light. Or maybe he had, maybe he'd already seen him and wondered. The next statement had him smiling again, faint but genuine. "A little bit," he agreed. He'd gone into some places like Joyland when he'd made sure he didn't know whoever was working but never so sit there a while, that was too risky. Everything was too risky. "You'd be surprised at how easy it is to be invisible though, even in a place like this." People saw what they wanted to see, Toby was just one of the people who were fully awake, Adrian supposed. More willing to accept weird shit. "You still at Mercy?"
Toby had been awake for a long time, since he was a child, when normal humans had tortured him and so many other children. Since then he had a bad habit of knowing things he shouldn’t, though he did his best not to pick them up or show it. He’d never be invisible, that wasn’t his way, he was just too loud, but he’d learned how to appear normal enough. “Yeah, I’m still there,” he smiled. “Thinking about picking up something on the side, but we’ll see. Nothing much changes around here. We did get a new doc though. Guy’s so hot it’s distracting sometimes.” Toby didn’t know why in the world Connor had come to Point Pleasant, but he was a nice addition. “We’re always short staffed though, especially after things like the fog. Wish you could come back.”
Adrian had a sneaking suspicion he knew which doctor Toby was talking about - unless there was more than one new hot doctor at Mercy now. Maybe the one he'd met was the hot doctor who'd been there for years now, Adrian hadn't been home in a while. The statement made him laugh a little anyway, memories flooding back of petty jealousy that Toby could talk like that and nobody cared. If Adrian had come out, his mother would have had a heart attack. Maybe he'd just been a coward, it seemed so insignificant now in light of the secrets he was currently carrying. "Try to focus," he said needlessly because he knew Toby was a good nurse. "Don't let the guy get you too flustered." He huddled his shoulders and looked around. "Are you going to or coming from work?"
“So long as he keeps his pants on I’m fine,” Toby teased. “And if he doesn’t, then I’m not the only one who’d sneak a peek.” He was joking, of course, and if Adrian remembered anything about him he’d know that. Toby enjoyed being over the top, had a bad habit of lying just for fun, but when it came to his job he was a professional. He was good at his job and truly cared for his patients, something that often surprised people that only knew him socially. He could come across as an irresponsible goof, but a good part of it was just for show. “Just got off the 3 to 11 shift. Not my favorite shift to work, but I don’t have to get up at the crack of dawn and I actually get to sleep at night, so it’s not so bad. What’re you doing these days?” It seemed like it would be hard to find a job if you were technically dead.
That was a hard question and Adrian smiled again, pained this time, almost coy. "Not a lot of anything, really," he muttered. "Trying to stay alive, hiding." He looked around again, his smile turning sardonic. "Freezing my ass off. We should probably move on before we freeze out here." He considered offering Toby to get in the car but that meant more talking, and that meant possibly more explaining. Talking with Toby felt so normal, a part of him wanted to keep at it, just to believe for a second things were normal. He didn't get that very often and his soul was craving it. But the smart thing to do was to get out of here, park the car in the woods for the night and get some sleep.
Part of the reason Toby made such a good nurse was that he actually felt a drive to take care of people. They didn’t have to be sick or injured--it included his friends and family, though he didn’t get paid for them. Adrian didn’t need a nurse, he was a nurse for fuck’s sake, but something abouut what he said struck a cord with Toby. “One sec,” he said, holding up a finger. Before he could think better of it, he was walking back to his car, digging through his glove box, and returning with an old receipt and a pen. “It’s definitely too fucking cold to sit and chat, and I’ll probably pass out in an hour anyways,” he said as he scribbled on the paper, then offered it to Adrian, his name and number on the back. “But if you ever want to get out of the cold and have a hot toddy or something, give me a call.”
"Seriously?" Adrian asked, a faint and questioning smile ghosting over his lips. It was tempting if he was being honest. Nobody out there knew Toby, there was no obvious connection between them, they'd never really been friends though they'd been friendly at work, they weren't related, nobody would think to look for him there. And Adrian liked Toby, most people did once they got to know him. "I might take you up on that," he murmured and filed it away for emergencies only. Toby didn't need a fugitive in his house - or a monster, Adrian's brain not so helpfully added.
“You should,” Toby smiled, though he was beginning to shiver. “But right now, I’m heading in before I freeze my balls off. You should too.” Both his hands moved into his pockets and he backed his way towards the door so he could give Adrian a little wave. “Hope to see you around.” It might’ve been a stupid offer to make, Adrian was definitely hiding something, but he’d meant it when he said he didn’t think Adrian would hurt him. It would be good to catch up some other time, when he wasn’t quite so tired and it wasn’t quite so cold.