Chapter 3 – James #2
It took almost ten minutes in line before they were called up to a foldable table by a kid who definitely didn’t look old enough to drink.
“Welcome to Hell’s Haunted House. Two tickets for you?” he asked, holding up two wristbands.
“Yeah, thanks,” Leon said, pulling out his wallet and waving James away when he tried to pull out his.
“Okay, I have to check that you’re ready to encounter horrors of all kinds, and terrors like you can’t imagine. Like abandonment issues and the looming possibility of never being loved.”
Leon snorted, and James wanted to laugh because it was actually pretty funny, but instead, he felt like a clamp locked around his chest. He managed to wheeze out a short laugh, but he couldn’t quite seem to catch his breath.
“But, seriously, do either of you suffer from seizures, asthma, have a heart condition, or any physical, mental, or other medical condition you need to be concerned about? Please check the following boxes and sign at the bottom,” the kid said, picking up a clipboard and handing it to Leon.
Someone should hire him to read the warning label for drug commercials. He had the tone down and everything.
“Nah, man, I’m good,” Leon said. He accepted the form and filled it out in a few seconds before handing it back. “You good, James?”
“Yeah…I’m good.” James said, accepting his own form, checking no next to every box, signing, and handing it back.
James tried to shake off the joke, but it was doing a pretty good job of sinking its claws into his psyche. He didn’t have abandonment issues. By the time his dad finally left, it was good riddance. He was no good for James and his mom anyways.
But then, why did he feel like a part of his heart was being ripped out at the thought that his mom didn’t need him as much anymore?
Was he afraid not just of never being loved again, but of never being needed again?
‘Cause if someone didn’t need him, then they’d probably leave him.
Just like his ex, just like dad, just like it felt like his mom was going to do next.
James followed Leon away from the ticket table on numb legs.
When Leon asked if James could put on his wristband for him, James could only grunt.
Thankfully, he managed to do it with only a little fumbling, and when Leon offered to help in return, James’ brain couldn’t quite compute what it meant to accept the offer, until suddenly Leon’s hands were on his wrist.
With a gentleness that always surprised James, Leon pushed up the sleeve of his blazer and dress shirt.
They didn’t want to stay up, so Leon had to push them up a second time, pressing his fingers into the tender skin of James’ forearm as he did so.
Once the sleeves were finally in place, Leon dragged his fingers down to James’ wrist, causing goosebumps to break out along his arm.
Even with the newly exposed skin, James was anything but cold.
He hoped the chilly breeze would explain away his reaction, though.
Leon didn’t seem to notice, or if he did, he didn’t say anything. He seemed to be concentrating hard on getting the bracelet on, avoiding catching any of James’ arm hair with the sticker.
He could have waxed James’ entire arm, and he probably wouldn’t have cared, because even though James was plenty capable of holding his hand aloft, Leon kept one hand cradled under James’ hand almost protectively.
James wasn’t sure if he’d even touched Leon when hastily putting on his wristband.
Meanwhile, almost every one of Leon’s fingers brushed across James' wrist as he secured the band. As he let go, the callouses on his hand and one of his six rings brushed down James’ palm, and it felt like fire blazing across his skin.
He could still feel it as they walked towards the haunted house, up the stairs, and waited to be let in.
After around five minutes, the person manning the door said they were good to go in, and Leon stepped in first, with James following behind.
They entered into some sort of foyer with fake walls erected in front of them and to their right.
There was only one way to go, and Leon led them in that direction, leaving James no choice but to follow.
Immediately the colors, smell, and even the temperature changed.
The room was smaller, with lower ceilings that looked to be made up of branches and moss.
It smelled like dirt and leaves, and as James looked around the dimly lit space, it seemed that was because there were in fact brown rotting leaves spread across the floor.
The room was around the length of Leon’s apartment, and the entire thing was themed like a forest. James hadn’t known what to expect from the haunted house, but if each room had its own theme, that was kind of fun.
They took a few steps into the forest, and a potted plant suddenly sprung at him, like a haunted venus fly trap. James shouted in surprise and ducked out of the way. Leon let out a surprised huff and shook his head.
Before James could slow his pulse or try and regain any of his dignity that the first thing that got him in the haunted house was, upon closer inspection, a very fake looking plant, they walked a couple steps further down the path, and a snake literally flew across the room in front of them.
It was clearly made of rubber and must have been shot out of some sort of cannon or gun device, probably to be reloaded later, but all James saw was a flying snake, and he screamed again.
This time, Leon actually chuckled. He led the way around a very large bush set up in the middle of the walkway, and James cautiously looked around for anything on the walls that was going to jump out at him.
Of course, that meant he wasn’t prepared for something to go scuttling across his feet.
This time, he full-on shrieked, reaching an octave he hadn’t been able to achieve since starting T.
Leon absolutely cackled at that, having somehow managed to avoid the—Jesus, was it a large fake cockroach?—that had been pulled by some kind of wire across the ground.
“This is going to be how the whole thing goes. It’s literally a haunted house,” James said, going for growling but coming out a bit closer to whining. “You could at least be supportive.”
Leon raised that stupid pierced eyebrow at him. “Supportive? You want me to hold your hand and call you darlin’? Wouldn’t that make me as bad as you accused Zach of being?”
What he had meant was Leon could at least pretend to be scared so James didn’t feel pathetic about every jump and flinch. But Leon holding his hand…that sounded amazing and far too good to be true. But also…
“Really? Darlin’?” James snorted. “That’s the term of endearment you’d go with? I picture you more as a babe or baby kinda person.”
Leon’s lip slowly curled up into a smirk—which was unfairly attractive and not at all helpful. “There you go stereotyping again, little mensch. I like darlin’.”
God, so did James. It curled around him like smoke and crept into his clothes, pressing into the skin of his back and making his thighs clench.
“Alright,” James said, right as a spider dropped down from the ceiling in front of them. James squealed and cringed back several steps, falling out of line with Leon as he dodged around the spider.
How was James going to get through this ridiculous house of horrors? Didn’t he have enough horrors to deal with? Like the fact that, when he’d texted his mom earlier to ask how her evening was going, she’d sent back two heart eye emojis and nothing else since?
Halloween was his mom’s favorite holiday, and Christmas was James’.
What if by then she was in a relationship with Howard and Linda, and they wanted to spend the week together without him?
Not only would he have nowhere to go, he was pretty sure there was no chance he could subtly ask Leon to spend Christmas with him.
James was so distracted, he tripped over a branch and had to catch himself on a prickly bush.
Why was he worrying about this now? All he had to do was get through this stupid haunted house, with its jump scares and fake blood that smelled horrific and paid actors that were probably waiting around every corner to surprise them.
If he could somehow do that, he’d be rewarded with couch time with Leon and Yarmen.
Maybe he’d get super lucky, and Leon’s hand would brush his hand as they petted Yarmen.
The kitty had already spent a lot of time with James today, though.
There was no telling if he’d be lucky enough to get both Yarmen and Leon’s affection, even if accidentally.
God, he was pathetic, wasn’t he?
The backs of James’ eyes began to burn, and he had to squint to focus on the spider, making sure it was fully retracted into the ceiling before he walked forward again.
Leon was several paces ahead, stepping over what looked to be a disemboweled pig carcass. Why. Why was that a thing they had to do today?
When Leon had cleared the obstacle, he turned to look back at James, who was still desperately trying to blink away his tears.
“You coming?” Leon asked.
James swallowed hard. “Yeah,” he said, but his voice cracked, and he had to scowl to hide how his lip was beginning to tremble.
As he approached the pig, he realized his legs were several inches shorter than Leon’s. He was going to have to sort of jump over it, or perhaps try and squeeze himself between the carcass and the fake tree planted in the floor next to it.
And he still couldn’t see well!
He sniffled, just once, to try and clear his vision, and made the unfortunate mistake of meeting Leon’s gaze.
His brown eyes were nearly black in the dim lighting, and yet, for just a moment, they practically shone with concern.
It was quickly replaced with his usual flat look… but not before he held out his hand.
James stared at it like it was yet another horror he had to face.
“Come on,” Leon said. “I don’t want to have to schlep you off the floor. Your short-ass legs aren’t going to make it.”
James’ scowl came much more naturally this time. He grabbed onto Leon’s hand, trying to channel all his angst and fear into his grip, and allowed Leon to yank him over the carcass.
Unfortunately, Leon was rather strong, James didn’t weigh a whole heck of a lot, and the rotting leaves didn’t make the most stable surface to land on. His right foot landed solidly enough, but his left foot tried to fly out from under him.
“Oh, shit,” Leon mumbled as he gripped James’ hand tighter and jerked him backwards so he didn’t have a devastating banana-peel moment.
He ended up pressed against Leon’s chest, and James wondered if it would be possible to turn off his blushing for the rest of the haunted house. Lord knew it was just going to get worse from here.
“Thanks,” James mumbled.
“You’re welcome,” Leon said, as he began walking forward, still holding onto James’ hand.
James allowed himself to be led for several steps, and when Leon dodged out of the way of a demented gopher popping out of a shrub, it felt easy to dodge with him, and James only made a small whimpering noise of surprise.
They continued on like this around a bloodied chainsaw embedded in a tree stump, past a tree wielding an axe—seriously, what?—and underneath a giant hornet.
When they got to the doorway of the next room, James walked up next to Leon and not so subtly glanced down at their hands.
Leon tightened his grip, staring pointedly forward into the dark room ahead of them. “Come on. Can’t have you falling behind, or we’re never gonna get out of here.”
That was all he said before pulling James across the threshold into whatever next layer of hell awaited them.