Adrian Moretti (theneedtofeed) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2022-08-02 00:42:00 |
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Entry tags: | #july 2018, adrian, adrian x toby, toby |
Who: Adrian & Toby
Where: Haven Park
When: Noon, Monday 7/2
Getting together with friends was tricky, especially when said friend was also a nurse and worked ridiculous hours. Adrian managed to get Toby to meet for brunch and as tempting as it was to meet at Moxie's or Joyland, he had a feeling they'd want privacy to talk. He brought some bakery goods over to Toby's place and let Toby handle the coffee. Maybe it was a good thing his new boyfriend couldn't make it, they still hadn't had time to sit down and talk about Toby's accidental and uncomfortable mental prying at the carnival.
He arrived at Haven Park shortly after noon with a couple of bags of assorted baked goodies in hand. It was a beautiful day, a relief from the storm the day before and he kinda wished he owned some swimwear when he remembered there was a pool on the premises. The idea of swimming in the sun sounded a bit too good to be true though, like it was too much of a good thing too soon. He knocked on Toby's door, checking his phone idly while he waited.
As curious as Toby was about Adrian’s sex life, he hadn’t thought much about it since that day. He’d been knocked off his feet by revelations in his own love life, then ended the week with an almost run-in with the mad scientist of his nightmares. Having Wilkes in his hospital had left him spooked and now nowhere felt safe. The man could turn up anywhere, except possibly his living room. It made staying in for coffee with Adrian far more appealing, despite his usual desire to get out. There he could talk without looking over his shoulder, worried that someone might overhear him like he’d overheard Wilkes. The knock on the door jarred him out of his daze and he hurried to answer it, checking through the little peep-hole to make sure it was Adrian before opening it. His paranoia was up these days.
“You’re here!” Toby cheered as he opened the door, enthusiasm skyrocketing. “Come in, honey, come in. We musn’t linger in doorways.” He wasn’t sure where the Ursula vibe was coming from, but he went with it. Disney villains were the best. “What did you bring me? More cookies?” he grinned.
Adrian grinned because he could usually rely on Toby's energy being a big pick-me-up even if the Disney reference was completely lost on him. He was also oblivious to Toby's underlying nervousness as he headed inside, wiggling the bags in his hand. "No cookies today, I brought bagels and uhm... danish." He really had no idea what Toby liked beyond wine and cookies but he knew he had a sweet tooth so he didn't think he could go wrong with danish. "Sorry I haven't come around sooner," he added as he kicked his shoes off and handed the bags off to Toby so he could get his jacket off too. "Time is weird. How've you been?"
“Ooo, danish!” Toby grinned, peering in the bag. “And bagels. I can work with that. What are you hungry for? I can make bacon? Eggs? Those are brunchy.” He had cream cheese to go with the bagels, but could also whip up the stuff to make breakfast sandwiches, should they want them. He was still trying to decide how hungry he was. He led Adrian towards the kitchen, gesturing towards a seat at the table. “And coffee. Tons of coffee.” He didn’t know a nurse alive that didn’t live on the stuff. “Time is good. I’ve been weird. We should talk. I’ve got personal gossip galore and I trust you not to spread it all over town. But tell me what you’ve been up to first and I’ll start breakfast. Brunch. Whatever we’re calling this.”
"I'm good with just bagels," Adrian said with a shrug. "But if you're making bacon and eggs anyway I'll take some." He knew he should eat more but these days he often forgot because the hunger he felt now was normal and compared to the persistent 'brink of starvation' feeling he'd had before Caius's ritual, normal was easily ignored. Eating was also just so fucking boring, it was like he needed a break from it now and having to eat was more of a chore than anything. He'd been trying to get around eating by drinking a lot of calories but too often his cue to eat something came from a dizzy spell. He took the seat he was offered and smothered the slightly exasperated but amused thought that Toby knew too damn well what he'd been up to. "I've got nothing to tell you that sounds half as exciting as gossip galore," he tittered. "Lay it on me!"
“I’ll make bacon and eggs then,” Toby smiled. It sounded good to him and he had the feeling that Adrian needed to eat and Toby always leaned on those feelings when he had them. He had more raw meat in the fridge if Adrian wanted it, but he suddenly knew that wouldn’t be necessary. He didn’t know why, just that it wasn’t, and he wasn’t going to pry. “I seriously doubt that,” he said, shooting Adrian a look. “We will circle back to you. But settle in, bitch. This is a ride.” He paused just briefly to get Adrian a cup of coffee, then started up as he got out the pan to start frying up some bacon. “Where to start… Maybe with the end? Zach and I are still together. We’re good. Things are, mmmm, complicated, to say the least,” he snorted, rolling his eyes at himself, then continued on with dramatic flair, hand gestures and all. “We went to the carnival last week and I’m convinced we were drugged with some kind of truth serum. Or maybe it was in the air, though I’m thinking it was our drinks. Anyways. We started telling each other everything. Like checking off a laundry list of our darkest secrets. I started by blurting out his, making it real fucking clear that I’m either some kind of a super spy or a psychic.”
"I knew there was something dodgy about that damn carnival," Adrian said with an air of vindication, even if he had only had a faint nagging feeling that didn't feel particularly strong until right this moment. "And shit, I'll never get used to your psychic thing. So he knows now, in the worst way possible. I'm glad you guys worked that out." It was a good thing Toby started off by telling him they hadn't broken up over it or anything, that really would have sucked. Adrian liked Zach - both for Toby and in general - but finding out something like this about a boyfriend couldn't be easy. "So I'm guessing he didn't react badly?" he asked, figuring that whatever Zach's secret was it was none of his business. Unless Toby wanted to share, it wasn't like Adrian was going to tell anyone. He kind of hoped he would.
“Well… it was a little overshadowed by the rest of the drama,” Toby said with a little laugh. “You know, the part where I’m teaming up with a bunch of other crazies to take down the evil corporation that tortured us as kids. And the fact that he’s fucking his brother.” He cringed. “Half-brother, technically. Who he’s magically bound to, courtesy of some spell his mother cast when they were kids. I realize it’s weird. I’m still working through it? ‘Cause it’s a lot. Oh, and he does porn streams. So he’s kind of perfect for me, because I feel like our crazy matches. And I adore him.” He sighed, his rambling finally pausing so he could put the bacon on to cook. All of that would have likely driven Toby away, had it not been for the little fact that he was falling for Zach and backing out now would have been even more painful. He’d have never started something if he’d known it all from the start, but now he felt like he could manage it. It was just going to take some work on his part. “It’s a lot, isn’t it? I’ve been digesting it for a week and it still feels like a lot.”
That was a whole lot of information dump and Adrian went a little wide-eyed as he took it all in. Incest, magic, pornography. He almost asked Toby to run that by him again but no, he got it. Coming out as gay seemed like peanuts in comparison and he kind of wished he could steal Toby's powers for a second and get an insight into how Toby really felt about all that. "It's... a lot," he agreed, studying his face as best he could from where he was sitting, looking for any signs of distress or some micro expressions that might tell him more. "Are you okay with all that?" he asked because ultimately it only mattered what Toby thought, was his boyfriend they were talking about and Adrian was a little preoccupied by the present tense of it all. Not 'he used to fuck his brother', no, he was fucking his brother. Still? That was a whole mess of issues right there and Adrian wasn't so sure he'd be happy with that in Toby's shoes. Then again, if he found something like that out about Kane, would he back off? Probably not.
Toby made a whimpering noise in the back of his throat, his smile part cringe. “Oh, we’re fabulous. Absolutely fucking fantastic. Everything’s coming up roses, you know?” Lying came so naturally, even to someone he trusted, even when he knew he was failing at it. He scrubbed his hands over his face, then did a full body shake, starting with his hands and moving up his arms to his shoulders, then his hips and his head. Shaking off the negative energy always helped. “I want to be,” he sighed. “And I am, most of the time. It’s not the polyamory that bothers me. I mean, it’s not like I’ve been consistently monogamous. Though you can’t cheat on someone if you don’t actually have a relationship with them,” he said, mostly as an aside. “It’s…the feeling that I’m not enough? Which is weird. I’m often told I’m too much,” he laughed at himself. “I can’t compete with what they have. But it’s not a competition. But they’ve got this connection and I’ve got all the tools to see it and I just—gotta keep my head on straight.” He laughed again and he could tell he sounded like he was losing it. Maybe he was. A year ago he’d have said he had his powers under control, but lately they’d been reaching out left and right, pulling in things he should never know, and he had no idea how to get it to stop.
Adrian had met both brothers - half brothers, he reminded himself - at Toby's party and he never would have guessed in a million years they were that close. He didn't feel particularly qualified to comment on polyamory, a concept he could suss out the meaning of but had never thought about as such. He for sure was monogamous but that didn't really count when he'd only really been with two guys ever. "Hey, you gotta set boundaries if you need them," he said with a little frown because Toby sure as shit didn't seem very happy about all of this. "If you don't like it you shouldn't force yourself to be a part of it. If you don't want him fucking other people then it's absolutely your right to ask as much." It wasn't Toby's right to demand it, of course, and he might lose Zach as a result but that was better than losing himself, right? "Guess you just gotta work out if you're okay with it or not because if you're not..." He shrugged softly and leaned back in his chair with a pained grimace. He wasn't the right person to give advice so he hoped Toby wasn't asking for any.
“No, I know, I know, I know,” Toby said, shaking out his hands, then flipping the bacon to ensure it didn’t burn. “I think I’m okay with it. I know he’s sincere in his feelings about me. I just need—I need to feel it out, you know? You don’t know,” he laughed a little. “I’m sorry, this is the most un-relatable thing ever to happen to anyone. I don’t expect you to have advice. I just can’t talk to anyone about it and…and you showed up with danish.” While they weren’t super close, Toby had known Adrian a long time. He trusted him and knew Adrian could keep a secret if he had to. But he also knew that Adrian wasn’t even out and that Toby’s complicated sex life was probably freaking him out. “I’ll figure it out. And if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work. I’m good at lying, but I’m not good at faking feelings. We’ll both know if it goes sour.”
Adrian had liked Zach so he he didn't exactly feel like he needed to urge Toby to end things. He had to admit it was all very weird though and it was a good thing his opinion wasn't really needed here. It wasn't his boyfriend, it wasn't his decision to make and live with. He tittered a bit at the 'danish' part and hell, he couldn't really blame Toby for blurting it all out. Sometimes talking about things helped process them, even if Adrian rarely got to do that. "Hey I hope it all works out," he said and meant it. "Good connections are hard to find and Zach seems really nice." He wasn't sure how he'd feel meeting him again, knowing not one but two crazy secrets about him - three if he counted the magical thing - but at least Zach wasn't the mind-reader in this group and Adrian could probably keep a neutral face. "It's good not to rush to make a decision, take your time and see how you feel about it."
“He is,” Toby gushed. “He’s the nicest guy, and the sex is fantastic, and he puts up with my crazy. And fuck, there’s a lot of crazy.” He was glad that he’d told Adrian about it all because he could understand that it wasn’t just Toby and his powers. It was his past and AIR and the very real feeling that his past was catching up with him and colliding with his present life. It might all implode in a number of days, but Toby felt he had a bit longer than that. “It’ll work itself out. It’s got to,” he said, taking a sip of his coffee. “So how are you? What’s new? I keep hoping to see you back at Mercy.” They were perpetually short staffed at the hospital and Adrian had been a good nurse. Toby was eager to have him back, both as a coworker and a friend.
Adrian wondered if Zach knew about all of the crazy because there was indeed a lot of crazy. He wasn't even sure that he knew about it all; Toby had told him a thing or two and they had a few very strange things in common but Adrian didn't know if there was more lurking beneath the surface. He hoped for Toby's sake there wasn't, huffing softly in wry amusement at Toby's words. "Oh, yeah, I'm-" he started at the question and remembered that Toby already knew a lot of what was going on with him. "I'm good," he settled for. "Mila had a pregnancy scare last night so we're all a bit on our toes right now but I think she'll be okay. I might be looking at getting my own place soon and while they haven't cleared me yet, I've been offered a gig at the ICU. Not as a full nurse, so that kinda sucks, but it's a job." And then there was Kane and Adrian knew he should probably bring that up because Toby was worried about him. "I'm actually close to being happy right now," he said with a little shrug. "And getting closer with the smell of that bacon."
Toby knew some of what was going on with Adrian, but not near as much as Adrian probably thought. Yes, he could figure it out if he pushed, but it would take a lot of work and he had no interest in being more invasive than he already was. That being said, he took Adrian’s “good” to mean that Adrian’s boy toy was still not trying to kill him. Always a plus. The nurse in him wanted to go check on Mila himself, but he knew that was completely unnecessary. He already had Adrian. “I’m glad to hear Mila’s okay,” he said. “I hope it’s nothing too serious. And I’m glad to hear they offered you a spot in the ICU. We’re always short staffed. In, like, every department, not just the ER. They float me to other departments every time it gets slow, just to pull me right back.” Toby had been there long enough that he could work several different departments, something he’d never get to do in a big city, but Point Pleasant was small. “Happy is good. I want to hear more about it,” he said, then turned to take the bacon off. “Bacon’s almost ready. Eggs over easy or scrambled?”
"Scrambled, thanks" Adrian murmured and yes, he was happy to get something to do since something to do meant money, but it was still gonna suck not being allowed to use his full training. Burecracy was a bitch. "I miss the ER," he admitted. "I miss the Portland ER if I'm honest, even if it's crazy. Time went by so fast when things got busy." There were a lot of things he missed about Portland but the thought of moving back there now made his chest hurt. Too much loss, too much of a gap left behind. Maybe later, but for now he was staying put. Toby wanted to hear more about him being happy though so he wasn't going to delve into all that. "Well, you already know my big secret," he sighed. "Please don't blurt that out to Zach or anyone." He cocked a brow pointedly since Toby had just bombed him with Zach's secrets and the thought of other people knowing about him was daunting. "But yeah it's been fun. I'm looking forward to becoming an uncle and my sister's wedding is in three weeks. I might even be looking at getting my own place soon."
“I don’t tell anyone what I see,” Toby said as he went to retrieve the eggs from the fridge. “First, because it’s none of my fucking business, I shouldn’t have access to it anyways, but also because I get almost no context. It’s like seeing a two second clip of a movie. I don’t know the before or the after. I might not even have sound! I try not to jump to conclusions, but…I’m human.” He shrugged and began cracking eggs into a bowl. He couldn’t turn it off, but he could keep it to himself. He had years of keeping secrets and the only time he let them slip was when he felt like someone was in danger. Adrian’s had confused him enough to make that leap. “If your big secret was that you were gay, I’ve keep keeping that one for a while,” he confessed with a little smirk. “You been thinking an apartment or a house? I’ve been considering a house lately. I like the convenience of an apartment, but I kind of want more space. Maybe a room for yoga.”
Adrian could feel his cheeks heat up a little at the thought of Toby knowing about him for years. He'd done a good job of not bringing it up but it certainly made Adrian wonder who else might know. Not that psychics were common, at least he didn't think so, but what did he really know? "Apartment," he said. "Just a rental, that's all I can afford right now. I just need to see what's available. Part of me still wants to stay with Mila, in case something else comes up, you know?" He huffed softly, knowing it would be better for both of them if he got his own place but there was still that lingering worry that things would go horribly wrong and he wouldn't be there to help. "But I can still visit her, hang out with her when Aaron's working or whatever." It might still take weeks before he found anything and unless that place came with furniture, he was looking at the shopping hassle too.
“Aw, you’re cute when you blush,” Toby grinned, hands clasped to his chest before he put the eggs on. “Don’t worry. You’re not obvious.” Unless other people could peek into Adrian’s head the way that Toby could, he doubted anyone had a clue. Toby knew how intrusive his ability could be and he hoped Adrian forgave him. He tried his best not to use it and had it tuned back as far as possible this morning, since he knew it made Adrian uncomfortable. “What kind of things are coming up with Mila? Normal, pregnancy things? I’m sure she’s got you on speed dial. And she’s welcome to add me too, if you’re not available.” Though, in a true emergency, she’d be best to go to the ER, if only because there were doctors there and all the equipment they could need to save both her and the baby’s life. “I know it’s good for you to be there, super close, but they’re about to be newly weds. They might want a little space, even if they’re too nice to say it.”
"She just had a little scare," Adrian replied, not terribly eager to get into the details of that scare beyond what the doctors could explain, even if he was glad for the change of subject. "Braxton Hicks, I think. She's gonna see her doctor rather than take the ER doctor's word for it. And yeah, I'm eager to get out before the honeymoon phase starts." To be fair, Mila and Aaron had been in the honeymoon phase for a while now and Adrian had done his best to stay out of their way as much as he could and he was pretty sure Roxy had too. "Do you know her fiance? Aaron Lucas? He's such a sweetheart, couldn't wish for a better husband for her."
Toby nodded, the nurse in him completely agreeing that Mila’s OB would be better than the doctor on call in the ER. He was a good doctor, great even, but babies weren’t his specialty. He could deliver one in an emergency, as could Toby in a pinch, but Mila’s doctor probably knew her circumstances better than anyone. If there was more to it, Toby didn’t push for it, determined to keep his powers out of today’s conversation. “I don’t know Aaron specifically, but I know the name. The Lucases own The Porch, don’t they? Which one is he?” He could picture several of the men that worked there, but only one could he ever see Adrian describing as a sweetheart. That had to be him.
"He's the nice one," Adrian replied without hesitation and laughed as he nodded at Toby's question. That probably didn't tell Toby much if he didn't know them but he probably knew their reputation. "He's the youngest one. The one you're most likely to catch smiling," he added for clarification in case Toby had been hanging out at the Porch. He couldn't imagine Mila with either of the other brothers and was thankful he didn't have to see that happen for real. "One of the taller brothers. He's treating Mila like a queen and he's been like a brother to me since I came back. You'll probably meet him sometime." Not that he could see Aaron and Toby actually hang out, they were like two people from completely different worlds and Adrian was likely the only thing they had in common.
“I know which one he is then,” Toby smiled. “I prefer Dragonfly over The Porch, but I frequent both. Too small a town not to. Only one of those guys fits your description. The other two are Grumpy and Grumpier. Not the best names, but you know what I mean.” It was an interesting family to marry into, one that came with enough drama to rival Adrian’s and Mila’s combined. He recalled two of the Lucas kids going missing and only one returning… Or, no, that wasn’t right. Maybe they both came back? Toby wasn’t quite sure. But it was an itch to scratch another time, a secret he should probably stay away from. “Sounds like a great guy. And good for Mila. Never hurts to have more family.” His own was tiny, at least by blood. Lately, he’d considered a few more people like family, but it was probably too soon to call them that. They didn’t know him well enough and he didn’t know them.
"No, those are kinda perfect names for them," Adrian replied and grinned. "But yeah, Aaron's like the brother I never had and I'm like... the nice brother he never had?" He was joking, but he still knew there was some truth to it and every time they talked about family, he was unpleasantly reminded of how much worse Aaron's upbringing had been and how different from his and Mila's. "Do you have a big family?" he asked and realized he didn't really know much about Toby beyond socially and work related things.
“Naw,” Toby said with a shake of his head. “Just me, my mom, and my sister. My dad left us when I was three. Barely remember him. And my sister actually made it out of this town, so I don’t see her as often. When I do, I visit her.” As an adult, he recognized the danger of living in Point Pleasant, but it also felt like the place he belonged, with all the other weirdos. He’d lived in a big city and loved every minute of it, but he was also pretty sure it was just as dangerous in the long run. There were too many temptations. It was bizarre to think he was safer there, especially now that he knew AIR was back in business. “I kinda think of my friends as family,” he grinned, serving up the eggs and bacon. He set down a plate in front of Adrian, then began serving himself. “And anyone who brings me food is a friend.”
"Well, we're obviously friends," Adrian said with a smile. "You saved my life so now I'm your problem. Isn't that how that goes?" He'd always liked Toby, even if the first month or so of working with him had been a slight culture shock at the time. He was just so openly gay and flamboyant, his personality so big. Then Adrian had gotten used to it and preferred shifts where they worked together. That 'like' had gotten much deeper now after everything Toby had done for him and the fact they had so much in common that was so out there and strange. "I'm working tomorrow and Wednesday by the way, how about you?" he asked as he pulled the plate closer, looking forward to eating.
Toby blew a raspberry as he rolled his eyes. “You’re too cute to be a problem,” he grinned. “Just be prepared to return the favor someday. I’m only good in a crisis when it’s not my own. And even then, it’s questionable.” Working in the ER had taught him to think on his toes, but most of the situations were somewhat predictable. Or at least, managed chaos. The hospital provided grounding, a set environment he could rely on. Managing an emergency anywhere else felt like a bit of a crapshoot. “I work tonight and tomorrow, so we’ll get to hang out, but I took the fourth off. It’s not worth the overtime to deal with the idiots intent on blowing their bits off.”
Adrian hoped he would never have to save Toby's life because Toby's life really shouldn't be in danger at any point, but he wouldn't hesitate and he hoped Toby knew that. He tittered at being too cute to be a problem and nodded along to the rest of it. "I love dealing with drunk idiots who just blew their bits off," he said sarcastically between bites. "Not sure you'll get out of dealing with them, they'll start coming in any second now, the assholes always start a day or two early." A day was never enough for some people, those damn fireworks would start going off tonight, he was sure of it. "Are you uh... gonna be doing something risky anytime soon? I'm not psychic so it'd be good to get a heads up if you're gonna be in danger."
“Yeah, I know, but I can hope,” Toby said with a little laugh. He knew he wouldn’t get out of it completely, but he figured he’d miss the worst of it. And maybe he’d get to spend the holiday with Zach. They didn’t have any concrete plans, and he wasn’t especially patriotic, but there was still a lot going on in town that felt like it would be fun for a date. Their relationship might have gotten a bit more complicated, but Toby still wanted to make it work, which meant planning things for them to do together. “There’s no concrete plan, but… I feel like it’ll be sooner than we expect,” Toby said with a bit of a frown. “We have plans to take down a major corporation, but we’re not an organized group. And I think we’re all a little bit crazy. I’ll try to give you a head’s up though.”
"Yeah that doesn't sound like a formula for success," Adrian murmured and he had a hard time imagining what taking down a whole organization would look like. Especially for a group of people who were unorganized and, as Toby put it himself, a little crazy. Inevitably the memories of the strange monster he'd killed came to mind, all those dead people out in the woods, a building full of bodies and blood. It was a visceral memory and a strong one and he hoped Toby wasn't picking up on it but one look at his friend's suddenly shocked face told him he had. "I didn't do that," he said quietly, just in case Toby got the wrong idea. "And the thing that did it is dead." It was one way to take down an organization he supposed - unless this had just been one outpost of many - but he very much doubted that was the tactic Toby's friends were going for.
Adrian was right. It wasn’t a formula for success. But if a ragtag group of kids could manage it once, he felt like those same adults, plus a few more, could handle it a second time. Toby just didn’t want innocent blood on his hands, the thought of buildings full of dead people turning his stomach. It hit him so hard and fast that it took a second for him to realize the thought wasn’t even his. And before he could school his face and rein it back in, Adrian spoke, and he knew he’d been too late to hide it. “I didn’t think you did,” he said back softly, unable to close his eyes without seeing the image again. Toby tugged on his curls, needing to force the memory away physically, his teeth grinding at the effort. “I thought that was us for a second. A future. There was so much blood,” he said, wide eyes meeting Adrian’s. “Not enough fire. You killed the thing that did that?”
"Yeah," Adrian said, the word drawn out hesitantly. "Sounds crazy, doesn't it? I don't have control over all that yet. Sometimes I'm just... stronger." It was a lot more than that, sometimes he didn't even care about anything and only did the right thing because he remembered what he cared about when he wasn't high on whatever this monster inside of him was. He wasn't even sure he could feel proud of his accomplishment in killing that thing because all that strength and agility came from somewhere else, it wasn't like he'd practiced for years and worked out every day to get there. Could he be proud of that? "That wasn't your future," he said then, because even if Toby had already realized that, it probably didn't hurt to hear it from someone else. "You're not actually planning on something like that, right?"
Toby gave a little nod, though he was unable to picture it. Adrian, strong enough to kill the thing that had massacred all those people. If he pushed, he probably could, but he didn’t want to. The end result was bad enough, burned into his brain. “No, it shouldn’t be that bad,” he said, fingers nervously tapping on the table, the image still in his head. It morphed inside his head, the bodies suddenly burning, the rotten flesh stinging as he tried to breathe. He blinked hard, trying to focus on the here and now, not some crazed vision that his brain was trying to create. It wasn’t real. It wasn’t even a vision, just a twisted creation of his imagination. “Personally, I don’t want anyone to die, but… maybe all we have to do is cut off the head. I dunno. It’s all too much when I really think about it.”
Adrian didn't need to be psychic to guess where Toby's head was at. He looked paler, his face tense and eyebrows drawn together. An idiot could see he was upset. "None of that sounds good," Adrian said quietly. "More like you might be in too deep. Have you guys thought about exposing them somehow? People dying just sounds..." He shook his head, his appetite mostly gone now and so the food on his plate was ignored. "Do the others want to kill everyone?" A part of him wanted to help, he knew that if he was all pumped up on wendigo he'd be itching to join in but he wasn't and when he felt fully human, killing people sounded like a terrible idea. He also knew it was something that stayed with a man, weighed him down for the rest of his life and Toby was so not a killer. Neither was Adrian, before everything, but that didn't mean Toby had to walk the same path.
“Not necessarily, but… that wasn’t the plan last time either,” Toby said, hands running through his hair, eventually pulling it back into a bun, just to give himself something to do. “Fear motivates people to take extreme measures.” He didn’t think anyone there was planning a massacre, but he hadn’t spent a lot of time trying to get that deep a read on them. Every one of them was haunted in some way, their past experience with AIR holding them prisoner even after they’d escaped. “I don’t know how to expose them without exposing ourselves. What we did, we never spoke of it.” Memories of that night still gave him nightmares from time to time. He remembered running through the corridors, guiding the group away from the guards, while Shane directed his fire towards them. He remembered the screams and the scent of burning flesh. He’d become a nurse to try and right his wrongs, but he still couldn’t set foot in the burn ward. The memories it evoked were too strong.
Adrian had been a little drunk already the last time Toby told him about AIR and the great escape and he still wasn't so sure he'd gotten a lot of the details. He couldn't blame Toby for not getting into it all but his group of friends - if they could call them that - sounded powerful as well as crazy. "Yeah, you're right," he sighed and thought again of his own stupid experiments and wondered whether someone had a ton of research on him in their file cabinet. It made him want to go back out there, get the coordinates from Aaron and Mila and burn the whole damn thing down - if it was even all still there. "Do you... Need help?" he asked hesitantly because he wasn't sure what all he could do, especially when he felt this human.
“Yes, probably. Professionally,” Toby said with a little laugh. “But no. I’m not dragging you into this.” Adrian had so much baggage already that Toby couldn’t stand to add to it. He was still trying to get his life back together. He deserved a moment’s peace, not to be pulled into their mess. “We’ve got a fire starter and a dream walker. A guy that can shoot electricity out of his fingers, and one that has visions. A full on telepath and someone who can manipulate gravity. A sin eater and a null. And witches. I don’t even know what all they do, just that they’re tied in. If I need you, it’ll be to help patch us up. If we need a wendigo on our team, we’re really screwed.” He wanted to believe they were only up against scientists, that if they took out the one in charge that it would all fall like a house of cards, but until they got better intel, they didn’t know.
"So, crazy question," Adrian muttered. "And probably none of my business, but were any of these insanely powerful people at your birthday party?" It all sounded so insane but it was easy to believe after everything he'd seen and been through already. It somehow felt more surreal to think they were all in this town and that he might have run into them, shared a drink with them, clueless about the kind of danger they could pose to him if they wanted to. He wasn't sure which of these was the most worrying but for his own sake, the full on telepath was not someone he wanted to run into and yet he might have already, someone at Toby's party might know even more about him than Toby did. It was an insignificant thing to focus on in the grand scheme of things, but knowing that Toby kept picking up on radio signals from him was distressing enough and they were friends.
“Some of them,” Toby said with an amused twist of his lips. He wasn’t reading Adrian’s mind right that moment, but he could see the wheels turning, trying to put the pieces together. “Not Neil. Because he wouldn’t know how to have fun if it bit him on the nose. We’re less friends and more acquaintances with shared trauma. And not the telepath because he gives me the creeps and he’s a pastor, so every time I feel him in my head I blast porn at him.” He couldn’t help but grin at that. He didn’t have anything specific against church folk, but the vibes coming off Mal were just bad. He had the feeling he’d know why if he did some digging, but he couldn’t do it without Mal knowing and the last thing he wanted was the tables turned on him. “But the rest? Mostly. Don’t worry, you were in good company. I try not to surround myself with psychopaths if I can help it.”
“Of course you do," Adrian said with a little laugh because blasting pornography at a pastor was very much something Toby would do. "I don't even know what a null is," he admitted then, trying to resist the urge to ask who was what at that party. Looks could be deceiving and he didn't want to try to guess based on appearances alone but it was hard not to fall into wondering. "And a sin-eater doesn't make a lot of sense as a superpower. I mean I'm sure it's not the same as what I know it as, so- how does it work?" Everything else seemed pretty straight forward but that one - and null - caught his attention.
“I’d never heard of a null until I met him. And he didn’t realize he was one, except someone else in the group could feel it. Basically, it’s someone that nullifies your powers. Our fire starter can’t start fires around him. He makes my brain all fuzzy. It’s kinda cool,” Toby explained. He’d become far more comfortable with the ability upon meeting Oliver, who seemed too nice to do any harm. It was weird not being able to get a read on him, but he could read Diego and that was good enough. “And I’m not sure ‘sin eater’ is official. It’s just what I get from her. You haven’t met her, she’s just a teenager, but she can, like, push people to give into their base desires. I’ve never seen it in action, but I picked up hints that she could be pretty strong, and dangerous, if she wanted to be.”
All of them sounded like they could be dangerous if they wanted to be and all of them had gifts that could be exploited. It was just too big for Adrian to wrap his head around and he had enough problems of his own without starting to worry about theoretical problems too. "It's probably a good thing there's someone out there who can put those powers on pause," he said with a wry smile. "You know, in case someone snaps." Which was probably a terribly pessimistic way of looking at it but he'd just seen too much shit to not let his mind go there. He wondered what Kane would think of these people, so clearly human but with inhuman abilities and he wondered if they were anything like witches and wondered where all those abilities and oddities overlapped.
Toby studied Adrian for a moment as he took a sip of coffee, then tore a bite of a danish and popped it in his mouth. “Your mind is loud right now,” he said, though he was doing his best to tune it out. There was an underlying sense of worry or fear that made Toby want to take a look, just to soothe Adrian’s nerves, but that wasn’t really how things worked. He knew people didn’t like it when he poked into their thoughts and there was nothing soothing about knowing someone was spying on your mind. Toby sometimes found himself doing it more with Adrian and he had to wonder why that was. Was it because he worried about him? Or because he felt safe around him? Maybe it was because he wasn’t near as worried about what he might find. He had a bad habit of telling him all his own secrets, so it didn’t feel like he was hiding. It was unsettling on Toby’s end. The last thing he wanted was to scare Adrian away. Of all his friends, he felt like Adrian knew him best. “What are you thinking?”
"I really wish I knew how to turn the volume down," Adrian sighed and watched Toby curiously as he wondered what exactly he was picking up on. "And I don't really know, it's a lot to think about in general," he sighed. "Supernatural craziness everywhere, people who can burn things down with their minds, control people's behaviors, read their minds, shoot lightning out of their fingertips. I mean, I felt like a freak for years, I had no idea how saturated this town was in it so I always thought I'd feel out of place here. Turns out I'm just one of many who are going through some crap that doesn't really make sense. Witches, psychics, nulls..." Reapers. He huffed softly and shook his head. "Makes you wonder just how many people in this town are just normal."
“If it makes you feel better, I’ve only ever met one person in this town who can do what I can do. The pastor. Mal, should you ever meet him. So unless you’re a member of his church, you should be safe,” Toby said with a smile. He watched Adrian to make sure there wasn’t a sudden look of panic and recognition in his eyes, then moved on, assuming Adrian had avoided Mal so far. “Actually, I think most of the people in this town are normal. I just seem hellbent on collecting the oddities. Which I blame on Jane. I was perfectly fine staying out of all this until she showed up.” Toby sighed and shook his head. She hadn’t truly twisted his arm, but it hadn’t taken much for Toby to understand that sitting out wasn’t really an option. “A lot of ‘em came into town recently. Like in the past year. I do get the sense that there’s an awful lot of witches here though, just from the way people talk. Makes you wonder why they’d be attracted to a place known for burning them.”
"I'm not even going to begin to pretend to understand," Adrian said with a shake of his head. "People always come home though, maybe it's the same for them. Some reclaiming kinda thing." He wasn't ever going to go to Mal's church, on one hand his mother might have a stroke if he went to a protestant church but mostly he wasn't sure where he stood with religion anymore. If anything he should believe more in a higher power now than ever before. There certainly was enough evil in the world, but God just didn't seem like the Good that was needed to balance things out. And yet, he'd been raised within the catholic church and all that guilt and doubt was hard to shake. "I don't think I've met Jane, have I?" he asked, taking his mind off the uncomfortable thought of a mind-reading preacher. Jane hadn't been at the birthday party and he couldn't recall the name from anywhere else so he wasn't too sure. He tucked the name away for later along with the preacher's name, mostly to know who the hell to avoid but that left everyone else whose names he didn't know yet.
“Mmm, maybe?” Toby said, trying to remember who’d talked to who when they’d all been at Dragonfly. “She was one of, like, two girls at my party. The other was Adalyn Rayner, who is, like, the most adorable little thing ever. And completely normal, except for the fact that she’s a mortician.” Normal was not usually how he’d describe Adalyn, but he knew Adrian was concerned about people with powers, not people who were just fantastically quirky. Oftentimes they went hand in hand, but Adalyn didn’t need anything else to make her fabulous. “I was worried Jane was going to out me to Zach, which I guess wasn’t very fair to her. And then I went and did it all myself in one massive dump,” Toby said with a roll of his eyes and an expression that conveyed just how unimpressed he was with his actions. It made his choice of words feel appropriate.
"Yeah I met Adalyn," Adrian said with a smile and that in turn made him remember Jane, who apparently had powers. "And hey, you found out some crazy shit about Zach too so I think you guys are even," he added though he had no idea how Toby was going to handle all that. It was a lot to take in, for both of them and he had no sort of advice for him because it was so far outside his own scope of experiences. "So what does Jane do?" he asked instead of lingering on it and was a little relieved he hadn't really talked to her that night. By the time he'd noticed her he'd already been sloshed from the miniscule amount of alcohol he'd had and deep in conversation with Shane and Reza. "I mean, you don't have to tell me, I know it's none of my business," he added quickly and let out a little laugh. "I mean, if you'd rather not say."
Toby wasn’t sure that he and Zach were even so much as both so wildly outside the norm that they related to each other despite the chaos. He truly didn’t expect anyone to relate to what he was going through and he knew Zach felt the same. It created patience and understanding that might not have otherwise been there, but it didn’t quite negate the panic that came with being pulled into something completely unexpected. But Toby wanted it to work, so he’d try his best until that wasn’t good enough. Jane was a far easier conversation topic than Zach, so Toby put his focus there. “Jane dream walks,” he explained. “Meaning she can visit you in your dreams and manipulate them if she wants to. She’s harmless when she’s awake.”
Adrian thought he wouldn't mind hiring someone like Jane to come into his dreams and manipulate them into something nice for a change. The carnage of every dream he remembered had become almost mundane at this point but some days it took him a while to calm down. Of course that meant letting a stranger into his head and he had no interest in having anyone see the things he dreamed of, too many of them based on things he'd really seen and done. "I like harmless when awake," he muttered. "And I wasn't gonna... ask. But. I'm too curious. Who are the others?" He sounded like a crappy spy or something and almost backtracked his question so that Toby wouldn't suddenly think he was working for the enemy or something, but the idea was kind of laughable and he didn't think anyone could really do that without Toby picking up on it.
Toby knew Adrian wasn’t working for AIR because, well, he wasn’t that good at concealing his thoughts. If he was, if all of this was a ruse, then they were silly to think they even had a chance against AIR. But Toby didn’t think that for a second. Adrian was a safe person to talk to and if he didn’t tell him, he’d wonder about every person he met. “Shane’s the fire starter,” he said, thinking that might be the one Adrian was most curious about. “His boyfriend, Reza, just happens to be a witch. Throw a rock in this town and you’ll hit one. Diego can manipulate gravity and his partner, Oliver, is a null. I think that’s all that was at the party. My other friends are weird, but normal.” It turned out that Zach and Jai weren’t actually normal, but they were in comparison to the rest. And Silas was fabulous, but not someone Adrian needed to be concerned about.
"So who nullifies it all?" Adrian asked and it somehow made perfect sense that Shane was a firestarter and that Reza was a witch. They both exuded some kind of powerful auras and confidence though it would have been easy to chalk it up to being handsome and wealthy. "I'd like to hang out with that person a lot." It would be so nice to not worry about who was reading his mind, or if someone got a sneezing fit and accidentally shot lightning his way or whatever else might be a concern. He doubted the latter was a real risk but what the hell did he know. He hadn't had any control over his own condition before Caius D'Onofrio worked his magic on him, but then his thing was a curse and not a gift.
“Oliver,” Toby smiled. “And he works at Mercy, so you might actually run into him. He’s not super powerful, so he doesn’t have a huge radius of effect, but it’s really weird to be around someone I can’t get a read on. Kinda nice, actually.” If he didn’t have such a thing for Zach and if Oliver wasn’t clearly in a committed relationship, Toby would’ve been all over that. He knew it scared Shane, and it had made him nervous at first, sure he’d go crazy without the constant noise in his head, but it was kind of amazing that there were people that could turn all other psychic powers off. He’d searched for that kind of thing in college, in a bottle, in drugs, but nothing would really work like a true null.
"Yeah I bet," Adrian murmured with a smile. "He was at your party, wasn't he?" He wasn't sure at this point, much of the night after he finally got into talking to people was such a blur. It had been a hell of a way to find out he could not handle his liquor, he was just grateful there had been good people there to catch him and get him home. "Yeah, him and Diego. Have you ever asked him to take you for a spin?" Gravity manipulation was actually a power that sounded like fun for a change, it was probably just as destructive as the others but it also seemed like it could be harmless fun. Floating like he was in outer space? Yeah, that sounded like a good time.
Toby nodded as Adrian answered his own question, likely remembering a brief conversation with them at one point in the evening. He didn’t know either of them very well, but they both put off good enough vibes that he didn’t need to hear their life stories to welcome them to the fold. “No, but it’d be fun, wouldn’t it?” he grinned. “I don’t know if he just creates a sense of weightlessness and then you can move through it on your own? Or if he’s moving you and you just have to go with the flow. The later sounds a lot like telekinesis, so it’s probably not right. That’s another power that’d be cool to have.” Dangerous, but also too showy to use on a regular basis. Toby had been lucky in that case, as no one knew what he could do if he managed to keep his mouth shut.
"I mean, I imagine it must be something like being in outer space," Adrian said with a smile. "I mean, zero gravity. I'm sure he can make things heavier too, but that would suck. Man, he'd be handy to have around when moving big things. Think he'd help me move?" He was joking, of course, and it wasn't like he had stuff to move in the first place. The carrying heavy things part would come if he bought himself a new bed and the like. He really hoped that would be soon too, if Kane came through it very well might be. He hadn't told Toby he might be moving and he didn't think feeding him a lie about insurance and taxes would fly when he was literally psychic.
“I would probably have to introduce you first. And, like, apologize for outing him power-wise, since I probably shouldn’t tell you what everyone can do. But then, yeah, he probably would help you move,” Toby smiled, taking a sip of coffee before the words clicked into place. “Wait, are you moving? Like, you have a place picked out? Or is it still an eventual thing?” He knew Adrian couldn’t live with his sister and fiancé long term, especially with a baby on the way, but he was under the impression Adrian wanted to be more settled into a job first. A reliable form of income was usually essential to securing an apartment or a down payment on a house.
"Just an eventual thing," Adrian said and waved his hand dismissively to show he'd been (mostly) joking. "I mean, I hope soon. My sister's getting married in a couple of weeks, it'd be nice for her and Aaron to get rid of me and Roxy by then. It's not like I really own anything that needs to be moved, if I can get a temporary place that's fully furnished that'd be ideal but... yeah I know if that'll happen." He'd been thinking about it too much lately, but really all he needed to start with was just the very basics and a mattress to sleep on. He'd spent so long sleeping in his car that he was no longer picky about his living quarters. "Don't worry though, secrets are safe with me and you don't have to tell Diego you outed him to me."
A fully furnished place was probably just what Adrian needed, but Toby wasn’t sure if there was anything like that around there. Then again, he hadn’t had to apartment hunt in forever, so he was probably the last person to ask. He’d been in his little apartment for so long that he was finally thinking of getting something bigger. He just wasn’t quite there yet. It always seemed like a big, adult thing to do, and Toby didn’t feel like an adult most days, despite his age. “It’s not just Diego. It’s all of ‘em,” he laughed. “I trust you, but I doubt they’d like me telling people what they can do, so just… keep it to yourself.” He knew Adrian was capable of keeping secrets, which might have been why he was so comfortable sharing with him.
"Yeah," Adrian drawled because he absolutely got that and then he had to wonder if Toby was this open about everyone's secrets. "Have you told them about me?" he asked with slightly wary amusement. He wasn't even sure what Toby could tell them other than 'something is seriously wrong with Adrian'. Even Adrian didn't know what to call it beyond the cliché 'infected by a wendigo curse' explanation that seemed the simplest. It certainly fit some of the stories but he didn't know for sure what he'd been attacked by or what he was inflicted with.
“No,” Toby said, suddenly serious. “I tell you about them because… because of how it relates to me. All this AIR shit. Their stories are their own, but we’re so similar. And so different. All fucked up and connected. I don’t have any reason to tell them about you. If I thought you were held at the same facility, I might mention that part, but I haven’t. I don’t think it’s the same. And I don’t want to drag you into this.” As he’d said, he’d go to Adrian if he really had to, but he was hoping to keep him out of it. Adrian had no direct ties to AIR. It wasn’t his fight and he’d already been through enough.
Adrian hoped that was true, but he wouldn't be surprised if there were plenty of weird stories out there about him and the truth was weirder than all of them and probably harder to believe. "You want the rest of my bacon?" he asked rather than dwell on the subject, pushing his plate toward Toby. "Think I just want some bakery goods now, the eggs were yummy though." He wasn't sick of meat, he ate plenty of it even after the ritual - trying to be a vegetarian as Maria Moretti's son would be crazy - but he definitely ate less of it lately and bacon was very, very meaty.
“Sure,” Toby said, snatching the bacon off Adrian’s plate. “Did something change? Something changed. With your eating, I mean. That sounds weird. I mean, you seem better. Than before. Which you should, since you were dying at the time, but you know what I mean. Are things good? With you?” He was rambling again, trying to be a good friend, but not get too personal, but also curious. Adrian had been eating raw meat the last time he’d sat in his kitchen and while Toby figured it was a good thing he wasn’t doing that, he wondered at him turning away a piece of bacon.
Adrian laughed at the way Toby didn't quite get the question out, nodding along because yes he knew and yes things were good. "I had some help from a witch," he said. "I guess you could say whatever this thing is inside of me is uhm... Tamed? Chained? There was a whole ritual, I don't remember any of it but I woke up and I haven't really felt hungry since. I'm like a regular person now, it's amazing." Aside from the random times when he wasn't but he had no explanation for that and it had been under control so it didn't alarm him too badly. The loss of time however... It made him wonder again if he should ask Toby to try to suss out what had happened to him or if he should just leave it all alone. He decided on the latter for now, not wanting to go digging into something potentially bad. "I sometimes forget to eat and get all woozy, but I don't get messed up like I used to. All I have to do is eat, even if it's just some cereal."
“That’s good!” Toby said brightly. “Not that you forget to eat, but I’d take cereal over raw meat any day. And, you know, it’s pretty normal to get a little woozy with low blood sugar and an empty stomach. If you’re anything like me, a bit of normality can be nice, even when it’s not.” It had to be inconvenient, but not near as much as the alternative. He was thrilled to hear that Adrian had found someone who could help him, even if he was a tad curious about how that had come about. Witches weren’t exactly advertising themselves for hire, but then again, he knew a few himself. They seemed handy to have around. “Man, I didn’t even know witches were capable of something like that. That’s really fantastic.”
"Yeah, neither did I," Adrian said with a bit of a scoff. "I'm pretty sure I got a discount job from the first witch who was supposed to be helping me. I didn't even know witches were real a few years ago and now it's like they're everywhere." Witches and monsters and reapers and psychics... Life was a bit mental now and he missed the innocence of his younger years. Toby had known since he was a kid so he had completely missed out on that sweet obliviousness and Adrian felt bad for him for it even if he wasn't really sure which was worse: always knowing or abruptly waking up to the fact that monsters were real. "The only real downside is that I can't drink anymore without getting wasted from a couple of sips." That wasn't the only downside but he didn't want to get into the other things, the loss of time, his unexplainable shift into something so much stronger. At least he seemed more in control of it now. "Are you relieved you've always known about all this stuff? Or do you kinda wish you were in the dark like most of the people in this town seem to be?"
“Cheap drunk,” Toby grinned, lightly teasing. He enjoyed drinking and would probably be annoyed if he could only handle a thimble’s worth before getting knocked on his ass. It was a weird side effect and Toby wondered about why that happened, but decided now was not the time to quiz Adrian about his body chemistry and how it worked. He might not even know. It wasn’t like there was someone around to tell him. “I… I wish I hadn’t learned the way that I did, or as early. But I’m glad I wasn’t alone in knowing I was different,” Toby said thoughtfully. “It made it easier to accept. I sometimes wonder what might’ve happened if they hadn’t taken me. Would my abilities have ever come out? I would have been oblivious to everything. Maybe that’s easier if you’re normal. Even with what I lived through, I still didn’t know shit until I was older. I feel like I learned the most the first few years working the ER. It was just impossible to miss how fucked up this town was and my powers amplified it. That’s part of why I went into it. I wanted to use ‘em to help people.”
"Trust me, it's easy to be oblivious to everything," Adrian said with a wan smile. "I didn't know anything was really off until I was pushing thirty. I mean, I knew the stories and the rumors but those are everywhere, especially when you're a kid. Everything is a little spooky and strange when you're little, then you grow up and reality starts taking up more space. I thought all that supernatural stuff was just that, childhood crap I grew out of." And he'd had a rude awakening. "I kinda wish I'd always known, maybe we would have been more careful out there, maybe everyone would be okay. Then again, maybe not. I've seen this town take people and change their personality around temporarily. We might have gone out there camping even if we knew better."
“You can’t dwell on the what-ifs. It’ll drive you mad,” Toby smiled sadly. “I don’t think anywhere’s safe. Like when that fog rolled in—it didn’t matter where you were, you were trapped. Things happen all the time that turn the most innocent situation into a catastrophe. I think if you live here, you just have to live your best life and be ready for anything. Otherwise you’ll, like, drown in fear, and that’s no fun.” Maybe it was a weird attitude to take, but Toby had known the town’s potential from a young age and it was all he could do to keep afloat. If he let it get to him, he’d end up curled up in a closet somewhere, scared to even go outside. He had powers, but they weren’t really the sort to keep him safe when there was real danger around. “You made it this far. You’re a survivor. Best we can do is try to help those that are still a little naive, right?”
"Yeah," Adrian said and he knew they couldn't survive if they were always expecting the worst to happen. Right now things were going well and he sometimes had to force himself to actually enjoy it and not get ahead of himself wondering when the other shoe was going to drop. "At least we chose the right job for that," he added as he reached for another danish, relishing the sweet taste of it. "It was weird, in the fog... Those monsters ignored me. Maybe because I'm no longer fully human, I don't know." He was possibly the only person in town who hadn't been trapped, though he suspected Westin hadn't been either but then he wasn't so sure Westin was a person at all.
“I was stuck at Mercy, so it was like—like a never-ending shift from hell,” Toby said with a shake of his head. Almost everyone that had tried to leave had gotten themselves killed. Same with everyone that tried to come in. It had sucked being stuck in Mercy, but wandering around out in the fog had been a death wish for most. “That whole block of time feels surreal. You’re lucky those things ignored you. They were way too happy to rip everyone else to shreds.” He’d had nightmares for weeks just about the fog and the carnage that it brought. While he was always up for a change in atmosphere, he almost preferred his AIR paranoia over the massacre those monsters left in their tracks. He should be used to it, as an ER nurse, but that was something else entirely.
"I was at Mercy too," Adrian replied and he couldn't remember if they'd talked about that before, suspecting that if they had they hadn't done so in depth. There were so many things that people seemed to avoid talking about, including the fog. "I walked there from Seaview because Mila was there. The memory of it is - yeah. Surreal. I'm trying to imagine doing it now and it just feels like a weird dream, you know? We all just sat in the stairwell, it felt like the safest place and I didn't want to be around all the other people there. God it felt like forever. There were worse places to be stuck though, at least Mercy has everything you need to survive."
“You walked from Seaview. Through the fog,” Toby said, his eyes wide as those words sunk in. He knew Adrian had said those monsters hadn’t seemed to bother with him, but he hadn’t realized how much peril he’d been, or how he’d tested that out in the most dangerous way possible. He wasn’t sure anyone else would have been able to make that journey on foot. Some had tried to come by car and still hadn’t made it. That Adrian was alive was a miracle. “Holy shit. I can’t believe you did that. Yeah, surreal is right.” He shook his head, astounded. He couldn’t even imagine working up the nerve to walk out into the fog, even without knowing what was out there. “I forgot Mila was here during all that. I don’t think I knew you were alive back then.”
"Nobody did," Adrian replied and it felt like a dream thinking back on it now. He hadn't been in control, everything had been painful and crazy so it had made sense to venture out into the fog. He wasn't so sure he would do that now that his mind was mostly clear, not unless he learned how to bring out that stronger side of himself. "Well, except Mila and Aaron." And Westin. "I don't even remember when I met you at that gas station, it all blurs together into just a big mess of crazy, you know? But I'm okay now." Thanks to not the grace of God, but some witches. His mother would probably have a stroke if she knew.
“Everything blurs together eventually,” Toby said, feeling a little like it was a blur himself. Most of what he remembered about the gas station encounter was the feeling that he’d seen a ghost, even after he’d driven away. Now that he knew more of the story, it was easier to accept it all, but it still felt weird to think that less than a year ago he’d thought Adrian was dead. “I’m glad you came back,” he smiled. “I know this place is nuts, but it’s better with you in it.” And if Adrian was going to fit in anywhere, it made sense that it was Point Pleasant. There was enough weird going on around them that it practically made him normal.
Adrian smiled, feeling a little sappy hearing something like that. He absolutely considered Toby a friend by now so he wasn't sure why he was surprised to hear it was mutual. "This place needs all the good people it can get," he murmured. "I'm glad you're here and didn't fuck off to Portland or something to work there." Glad for more than just social reasons, Toby had saved his ass and made him feel a little more human and that wasn't something you could put a price on.