Chapter 9 #2
“Look,” Tobias continued. “I know it’s been drilled into you that there’s only one way you can live your life.
But Alexander? You can do anything. Move to New York.
Open a café. Go to community college and do drag on the weekends.
Take up pottery with Donna. Spend a summer picking feijoas in New Zealand.
You’re a fully fucking realized creation, and there are no rules. What do you want?”
Alexander swallowed. Tobias was staring so deep into his eyes. It made him want to escape. Not the deadly glare of a werewolf glaring down a hunter, but the burrowing stare of someone who could force past Alexander’s walls better than anyone in his life.
“I want to go home,” Alexander insisted.
Tobias growled, the noise worryingly feral. “Say they never let you go back, say you have to find a life without them!”
“They’ll let me back.”
“Forget about them for a second! No family expectations, nothing guiding you where to go, just you. What do you want?”
“They have to let me back,” Alexander whispered. “I’ve been devoted. I’ve been loyal.”
Tobias shook him. “What do you want?”
It burst out of Alexander in a blinding rush. Something he hadn’t thought about in years, buried so deep he didn’t let himself think about it.
“I want to dye my hair,” he yelled.
The aisle went silent. Cart wheels creaked in the next aisle. The pimply clerk mumbled something into his headset about price tags.
Tobias grabbed Alexander’s face. For a heart-stopping moment Alexander was sure that Tobias would kiss him. And for that moment, Alexander wanted it so badly he could taste it.
But Tobias didn’t kiss him. He just shook him again, tousling his hair with such a look of victory that Alexander couldn’t bring himself to be disappointed.
“Let’s do it,” Tobias hissed.
“It looks terrible,” Alexander announced into the LIV-MART bathroom sink twenty minutes later.
“That’s why we got the one that washes out fast,” Tobias said, his thin plastic gloves crinkling as he lay a fresh coat of paper towels around Alexander’s shoulders. Alexander had only complained about the dripping once, and Tobias had been replacing the paper towels ever since.
“For a guy who took his own knife to the shoulder without complaint,” Tobias continued, flicking a stray black droplet off the nape of Alexander’s neck, “you sure bitch a lot. How’s the shoulder doing, anyway?”
“It’s fine,” Alexander said.
Tobias rolled his eyes. “I bet you’d say that if I cut your arm off.”
“The stitches are holding, no tears,” Alexander said, falling easily into the kind of injury report he had to do after his missions with his family. “Minimal bruising and bleed-through.”
Tobias’s face did something complicated in the mirror. Alexander watched him, very aware of their proximity. Tobias had smoothed the dye through Alexander’s hair, wiping water off his forehead with gloved fingers so gentle Alexander could almost pretend he wasn’t a monster.
Sometimes those fingers would tighten. But it was never for long before Tobias would mumble an apology and loosen his grip.
“How are you doing?” Alexander asked suspiciously.
“Dandy,” Tobias said quietly. He stood back, folding his arms tight over his chest. “Why black, by the way?”
Alexander paused, avoiding his gaze in the mirror. “I don’t know.”
Tobias leaned down, his breath ghosting over Alexander’s damp neck. “Aleeex.”
Alexander ignored the pleasurable flush that rose in response to Tobias’s hot breath, and sighed. “I…I had a crush on Danny Phantom as a kid, okay?”
Tobias whooped and started singing the Danny Phantom theme song. Or trying to, anyway.
“He’s gonna catch ’em all, ’cause he’s…Pokemon,” he finished.
“Not even close,” Alexander said. “I thought you liked cartoons.”
“I liked anime. Big difference.” Tobias plucked at Alexander’s wet hair dripping with dye.
“Okay. We need to get you home. Let’s wash this out.”
“On it.” Tobias stepped up behind Alexander and guided his head under the faucet.
Alexander closed his eyes as Tobias turned the faucet on. Water ran over his scalp, running over his eyelids. It felt oddly cleansing. Like Tobias was washing out something more than the sticky, dark dye that swirled down the drain.
The water stopped. Alexander straightened, wiped water off his forehead, and examined his wet reflection in the mirror.
“It’s going to look terrible,” he said.
Tobias made a strangled noise. He was standing very close, Alexander realized. Closer than he needed to be now that he’d finished rinsing.
Tobias gripped Alexander’s hips and buried his nose in his neck, inhaling hard.
A small, stupid noise escaped Alexander’s throat.
He should have been thinking about his ankle knives, or how to twist out of his grip.
But all he could think about was getting closer.
The pressure on his hips was incredible.
For a delirious moment, Alexander hoped for bruises in the shape of Tobias’s fingers.
Then he came back to himself and twisted in Tobias’s grip, bringing them face-to-face.
“Tobias,” he barked.
Tobias grunted. His eyes were golden, a shimmering wave radiating through his irises as he stared down at him. He looked like he wanted to eat Alexander up.
Alexander shoved down every part of him that wanted to let him, and shoved his arm against Tobias’s throat.
“Down,” he growled.
The growl worked. Tobias pulled back, gasping.
Alexander wiped a damp strand off his forehead and glared. “You said we had hours!”
“Usually do,” Tobias managed. He lurched forward, the movement pushing Alexander’s arm harder against his throat. “You…you’re…”
Alexander forced him back. Logically, he didn’t stand a chance. But Tobias moved back at the pressure, all of him stiff and trembling.
“You’re blaming me?” Alexander demanded. “What did I do?”
Tobias laughed, strained. “N-nothing. Let’s get out of here.”