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juliaorpll78 · 1 month ago

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eyes that see part 22

Eyes That See Summary: You’ve cared for others your entire life. This is a story of you learning to take care of yourself.

Eyes That See Part 22 Summary: You tell Justine when you’ll be officially moving out, and you have an argument about it. Afterwards, you go to Sy for comfort. Length: Around 11-12k

Tags: passive-aggressiveness, fighting, emotional vulnerability

When Sy drops you off the morning after Amelia’s Christmas party, you linger in his truck while his engine stalls in the driveway. The weekend has felt so long and so short at the same time, jam-packed with activities and now coming to a screeching halt.

“Well,” you say as you plop your overnight bag on your lap, “guess this is bye for now.”

Your voice is a bit scratchy, your throat dry from dehydration. There’s an aching in your head that you entirely deserve.

With pink-tinged eyes, Sy’s not much better off. “Whatcha doin’ this week?” he asks.

You sigh. “Workin’ like usual. The portal’s gonna open for me to sign up for next semester’s classes, so there’s that…Oh, and I get to sign the lease for my new place.”

“When?”

“Sometime over a lunch break this week.”

“You doin’ that alone?” he asks, and when you nod, he follows up with, “You good?”

“Oh, yeah,” you answer. “It’ll be fine.”

“Read everything before signin’. Don't let ‘em fuck you over.”

“It's just a standard lease,” you chuckle.

Sy rubs his beard. “Yeah, well. Read everything before signin’,” he advises again.

You nod. Then it’s quiet again. You don’t want to exit the truck. Sy probably doesn’t want you to, either. You’re both procrastinating.

“Can we meet for lunch sometime this week?” you look over and ask.

He reaches out and puts a hand on your leg. “Of course, baby.”

“I didn’t know if you were busy or anything,” you say with a shrug.

“Never too busy for you,” he replies with a wink and an easy smile, and it’s cheesy enough that you lean in and kiss him.

When you back away, he puts his hand on the back of your head to keep you still, and he kisses you again, three long pecks in succession that end with you both softly and stupidly smiling at each other.

“Bye.”

Sy runs his thumb across your cheekbone before you move to open the passenger door. “Bye,” he repeats.

He waits until you’ve safely opened the front door of the house to reverse his truck down the driveway.

Moving your hair to cover your neck, you walk inside the house to unexpectedly find Justine sitting on the couch alone. You lift a hand to greet her and try to put a small smile on your face for good measure, as well, but you're not sure how it comes across.

Anyway, you’re sadly only masking; now that she knows about your plan to move out, things are tenser than ever before between you.

You’re gonna have to talk with her soon–really talk. Once you finalize when you’ll actually be moving into your new apartment, you'll have to share your plans with her, and you'll have to get some things off your chest at the same time, too.

And you dread it.

Without any children around making any noise–not even the dog–the room is quiet in a way that’s almost eery. As you walk in front of the television, the silence is anything but comfortable.

“Got the day to yourself,” you ask, “or is everyone still asleep?”

Justine briefly glances at you. “They’re out. Comin’ back tonight for school tomorrow.”

“Oh, cool,” you say, and then, after it gets weird, you internally sigh and just lug your bag down the hallway and into your bedroom.

You spend the day doing laundry, mindlessly picking up around the house, and catching up on a book. When the kids come home, you don’t let the weirdness between you and Justine keep you from eating at the kitchen table with them, and it’s a typical, normal evening.

In your bedroom at the end of the night, you mentally prepare yourself for your talk with Justine. You’ll approach her at just the right time some night this week... You’ll sit at the table and have coffee together. You’ll break the inevitable news. You’ll have the difficult conversation. It’ll suck at first, but it’ll be alright.

Later on, you text with Sy back and forth before waiting for sleep to come, but as you lay in your dark room, it just…doesn’t. After tossing and turning for a while, you realize that something’s different. The room’s darker than it usually is. Something’s off.

You stand up and peek out of your window blinds. Where Miss Donna’s house usually has a front-porch light shining so radiantly that the gleams actually show around your window blinds and literally change the environment of your room, her house is now entirely shrouded in shadows.

Subconsciously, you guess you’ve gotten used to the light, however distant, being there somehow, and it’s just weird seeing Miss Donna’s house entirely dark across the street.

Her car is outside in her long driveway, so she’s got to still be home, you reckon. Unless she’s in the hospital or something. But if that were the case, then Sy would’ve mentioned something.

You put on a robe, go into the hallway bathroom where a supply of lightbulbs are kept, and quietly step out onto the porch.

This is so stupid, you think while you scurry across the road to her house in your slippers, robe, and pajamas. As you knock on her front door, you think it again, over and over like a mantra. She’s probably entirely fine.

“Who's there?” a voice from inside the house calls out after several silent moments.

“It’s me,” you loudly answer. “Y/N. From across the street?”

The door opens. “Well, why didn’t you say so,” Miss Donna murmurs harmlessly, wrapping her own robe around herself. “Had me worried if I should even open the door this late at night. You never know.”

You make an apologetic face. “Right, I'm so sorry to scare you, but that’s actually why I’m here,” you tell her. “I don’t mean to be nosy at all, but you usually keep your porch light on all night long, ‘cause I’ve gotten used to seeing the light from the bottom of my blinds I guess, and it wasn’t on tonight, so I didn’t know if you just weren’t here or if the bulb needed to be replaced or if you were okay, or…"

You shrug after holding up the small package of lightbulbs.

She reaches out to the wall and flicks a light-switch up and down. “Oh, wouldja look at that. I had no clue.”

“Here.” You make quick work out of changing the lightbulb and sticking the old one back in the packet, and when she flicks on the inside switch next time, a glow spreads around.

Beginning to turn the other way and smiling with a small wave, you say, "I'm real sorry for botherin' you so late, but hope you have a good evening."

“Can’tchu come on in and sit for a spell?” she asks before you can step off the porch.

Your natural inclination is to deny the offer, knowing you’ll be an imposition. But are you really an imposition if she’s willingly offering?

“Are you sure?” you still ask.

“Come on,” she beckons you with a quick-waving hand. “I made too much for dinner. Sy’s on me for gettin’ too skinny, and here I’ve been cookin’ enough to feed a whole family. Even with Sy comin’ over to get leftovers, it’s entirely too much. My fridge is plumb full.”

“Cookin’ for one is hard,” you comment as you step inside and shut the door behind you.

“Let me heat you up a plate,” she says, but you politely decline.

“Oh, thanks, Miss Donna, but I actually had a big dinner myself.”

A college football game is playing on the television. After you’ve declined her food, Miss Donna wastes no time in sitting down and gluing her eyes to the screen.

"You really enjoy football, huh?" you ask after sitting on her couch.

"Oh, I just like to keep up," she brushes off, making it seem like she's a casual watcher, but the way you catch her moving her arms after every play signifies a much deeper attachment than she's leading on.

“All the bowl games are exciting,” you mention.

That gets her going, and you chat about football for a while until the game on TV goes to halftime.

"You sure you don’t want somethin' to eat?" she asks. "Sy said you got those food allergies, but I can whip up just about anything, you know."

You smile. "I'm seriously fine. Thanks, though."

"Alrighty, well, if you're lyin' 'cause you don't want me to get up and wait on ya, just go on in there yourself and take whatcha want, fix up whatcha want."

"That's sweet,” you say with a laugh, then you place your hands on your knees and stand up. “I’ve got work in the mornin’, though, so I’m gonna go ahead and get.”

“Alright, then. Thank you so much for fixin’ my lightbulb, now.”

“Oh, you’re so welcome, Miss Donna,” you answer before reaching out of the container of lightbulbs resting on the couch.

"By this point, you should just call me MaMaw like the rest of 'em."

You let out another little laugh. "I probably will," you honestly say, then you begin making your way across the street again.

For reasons that you can no longer continue to blame on MaMaw’s house-lights being off, you sleep lightly that night, so when your bedroom door opens and there stands a small child sometime in the early, early parts of the morning, you’re alert enough to notice it.

“Daniel,” you sit up and say, blinking quickly. He doesn’t move at all, so you bunch your eyebrows together in confusion and gesture for him to come inside your room. “What’s up?”

He steps closer to your bed but doesn’t actually say anything. You assess him the best you can in the darkness. “Didju have an accident?”

He shakes his head.

“Are you hurt?”

Again, he shakes his head.

“Did you have a bad dream?”

His face contorts before he starts to quietly cry.

“Oh, honey, it’s okay.” You swoop the blankets off yourself and sit upright. “It wasn’t real. You’re here at home. You’re safe.”

He wipes his eyes with the backs of his hands.

“It’s okay,” you say again, hugging him.

When he calms down enough to breathe regularly, you finally let him go. “You can sleep next to me if you want.”

He shakes his head and sniffs. “Luke’s gonna make fun of me.”

“No, he won’t.”

“Yes, he will,” Daniel sulks.

“He won’t even know,” you say. “When we get up in the morning for school, I’ll get you up first so you’ll already be in the living room. It’ll look like you just got up early.”

Daniel is quiet but obviously agreeable, so you start to prepare him a place in bed.

“Actually, you move constantly in your sleep,” you murmur, “so maybe I can set you up with a pallet on the floor…”

“I like sleepin’ on the floor,” he quietly says.

“Yeah, Weirdo,” you joke while preparing a comfy area of blankets next to your bed, but he barely laughs. Poor kid.

Once you’re both laying down with pillows under your head–you on your mattress and Danny on the floor–you look down in concern.

“You know Mr. Sy?” you ask.

Daniel sniffs. “Your boyfriend?”

“Yeah,” you murmur. “You know, he has bad dreams a lot.”

“Really?”

“Mm. Even grown-ups have bad dreams sometimes. And it’s okay.”

Daniel just nods and stares at the side of your bed. Before his eyes slip closed, he whispers out, “Night, Y/N.”

“Night, Danny.”

*******

Signing your lease is an exciting but quick event. Your first real apartment. You’ve lived in an apartment before back in Virginia, but this is your apartment. It’s different. There’s a feeling of independence unlike anything you’ve known before.

Justine’s in the kitchen when you get home from work, still riding the excitement of the lease-signing, and when you quickly glance at her and notice she's wearing sweatpants, you’re relieved. That means she won't be going out tonight. That means you can talk to her.

Maybe.

You dread-dread-dread it, but it’s got to be done. Your lease is signed. It’s done.

“I’m home,” you sing-song out in a funny voice to signal your presence to the house, but there’s no need; before you can even really close the door behind you, you drop down to your knees to accept a running hug from a full-speed Braylyn coming down the hall, then a just-as-excitable hug from Michael whose short legs take a while longer to reach you.

“Michael, Michael, Fo-Fiachle, Banana-Fanna Fo-Fichael, Me-Mi-Mo-Michaeelll.”

“You’re silly!”

You lean forward and blow a raspberry on his bare navel until he cackles. "So are you."

The living room is a wreck, and you sincerely don’t care for once. You hug the kids and accept messy dog-kisses from Molly and listen with exaggerated interest while tons of tiny voices talk over one another about what all they did today.

“I made a snowflake, Y/N,” Braylyn tells you, then she instantly runs into the kitchen and yanks a piece of paper off the refrigerator. “I use’ded scissors and paper and I folded it. Look.”

“Oh, it’s gorgeous,” you enthuse, but you’re interrupted by Luke.

“It’s thirteen more days ‘til Santa comes,” he tells you, and you nod, trying not to ignore Braylyn’s snowflake that’s being excitedly pushed in your face.

“Sure is,” you tell him while making another exaggerated-impressed face at Braylyn’s art. “Just under two weeks."

For no reason at all, Michael shrieks by your side. You momentarily cover an ear with one of your hands.

"So–What was for supper?" you ask over the commotion.

"Pusghetti," Braylyn answers.

You widen your eyes. "Oh, spaghetti, yum."

"Did you eat it all, Michael? You eat it all, Luke?"

"I don't like spaghetti," he says over Michael’s loud screams.

"So, what'd you eat?" you raise your voice and ask.

Luke sulks. "Nothin’.”

“Nothin’?”

“I don’t like spaghetti,” he mumbles. “Momma said if I didn't eat what was on my plate, I don't get supper at all."

You frown while trying to consider what else you can make him before he goes to bed. You’d have to do it secretly or else that’d be some sort of issue.

You sigh and give him as sympathetic a look as you can. "Where's Danny?"

“In his room.”

“Huh,” you utter, and you excuse yourself to quickly go to your bedroom and change clothes. Just moments later, you tip-toe across the hall.

The door to Daniel's bedroom is oddly closed, so you knock before you step in. When you do, you see Daniel at his small bedside desk staring grumpily at a book with a pencil in his hand.

You approach him carefully and bend down to kiss the top of his head. "Hey, dude."

“Hey,” he mutters, and he sounds even surlier than Luke.

“Had an okay day at school?” you ask, touching his shoulder.

He just grunts.

“Yeah,” you murmur. “Rough day, huh.” Poor kid’s been going through it this week.

In frustration, Daniel suddenly throws his pencil on top of the book. “I have to memorize this entire stupid poem.”

“Do you need any help?”

“No,” he answers moodily, “I just don’t wanna do it.”

“So you’re in a bad mood?”

“Hmpf.”

“Whenever I’m in a bad mood, I like to go for a walk,” you hint.

“Mom won’t let me go out this late,” he mumbles. “‘Cause the stupid sun sets at, like, five o’clock now.”

You tilt your head to the side. “Not if I go with you.”

He lifts his head like he’s considering it, but then he turns back to stare at his book. “Then everyone else is gonna wanna go.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.”

“They’re so stupid.”

“That’s not n–Well, that’s a very strong opinion.”

He doesn’t answer.

“Alright, little man,” you sigh. “I’ll let you chill. Let me know if I can help you study.”

You hold out your hand in offering, and for a minute you think he won’t take the bait, but he does: he reaches out his hand, too, and together, you give your secret handshake to one another. Before you walk out of his room, you see the tiniest twitch of his mouth, and you count that as a win.

There’s commotion throughout the next hour as the kids do their baths and nighttime routines, and after telling everyone goodnight individually–and sneaking Luke a bunch of snacks in bed–you go back to your bedroom again. You aren’t hiding from Justine. That’s not what you’re doing. You’re going to do this. You’ve got to.

Your thesis is almost entirely done, but it won’t be done-done until next semester. Still, you immerse yourself in schoolwork until your eyes get itchy. By the time you make yourself actually exit your bedroom, your palms are sweaty.

Justine’s still in the kitchen.

“Hey,” you greet her while opening the fridge and looking inside. You bought a buggy-full of groceries two days ago but don’t even know what there is that you could whip up right now. After grabbing some soy milk, you close the refrigerator door and start fixing up some coffee.

While keeping her focus on the plate she’s washing, Justine murmurs, “Hey.”

You’ve been so absent lately that it’s evident: dirty dishes are piled so high in one side of the sink that they’re overflowing onto the counter.

“Want me to make you a cup?” you look at the coffee-maker before asking Justine.

When she replies with, “It’s nine o’clock,” you assume she doesn’t want any.

“It actually helps me sleep sometimes,” you murmur.

As coffee finishes filling your mug, you continue the conversation. “You goin’ anywhere tonight?”

Justine turns her head to look at you over her shoulder. “Why, you goin’ to your boyfriend’s again?”

“No.” You shrug, trying to make it casual. “Just wanted to see if you had time to talk, that’s all.”

She’s silent for a minute. “I got these dishes to do, laundry…the house is a mess.”

“Yeah,” you murmur, instantly wanting to move around and clear off all the surrounding surfaces out of a mixture of guilt and the need to feel useful, but you push down your instincts. You didn’t make any of this mess.

But your agreement with her has always been to help out more around the house so you could get a deal on the rent, you can’t help thinking.

But–are you really getting a deal on the rent at all?

You clear your throat. You dread this, you dread this, you dread this.

“If you're too busy to chat tonight, then maybe tomorrow or something?”

Feeling you out, Justine stares at you over her shoulder for a moment. When she finally turns around, she wipes her hands on her pants and leans back against the sink.

“Oh,” you say when you realize she’s looking at you expectantly. “Like…” You shrug again. “Like–an actual sit-down chat.”

“Sure.”

You feel stupid just standing where you’re at without moving. “Oh, you mean like you’re good now?”

“I’ll be out most of the day tomorrow.”

“Oh, okay,” you say, and you walk to the table and pull out a chair. You don’t ask if she needs childcare because it’s a school-day tomorrow and you guess she’s got things figured out for after-school care.

Justine follows your lead and sits down at the opposite end of the kitchen table. It feels so much like deja’ vu of the most recent conversation you had with her that you almost frown.

You and Sy also had a hard conversation at this very same table, you recollect. In these very same seats. And it’d been one of the hardest conversations of your life.

But you’re gonna keep it positive right now. The talk with Sy was hard, yeah, but it had ended up being one of the greatest things of your life. You got everything out honestly and openly, and you felt a lot better afterwards. Your relationship is as solid as ever.

This conversation with Justine will be just like that. You take a sip of your hot coffee to steel yourself.

“Alright. So.” You sincerely make eye-contact with her. “First off, I wanted to apologize to you,” you say, and you briefly think of Sy and all the things he would tell you for starting this thing off by saying sorry–and to Justine of all people–but you’ve got to do it. You’ve got to.

Above all else, you have to stay true to yourself and do what you morally feel is right. Secondly, Sy–or anyone else, for that matter–can’t always be around to fight your battles for you, and you’ve got to make your decisions on your own without looking for external validation everywhere. Some things are just always going to be unpleasant, and you’re doing yourself a giant disservice by just continuing to avoid things at the sake of preventing arguments.

But–If you can at least start this discussion by bringing up your own imperfections in your friendship with her, hopefully it’ll even out the negative news you’re about to share about you moving out.

“For what?”

“Well…I know things haven’t been the greatest between us for the past few months,” you say. “And I know a lot of it’s been because you’re–because I’m not the greatest at…communicating.”

You leave your sentence floating in the air for a few moments, waiting to see how Justine reacts to your words, but so far, she just looks impassive. She does give you a slight nod, however.

“So this is me sayin’ sorry for that,” you sincerely go on, briefly looking down at your slowly wringing hands on the table. “I know I probably keep too much inside. Sometimes it’s just hard for me to get it out. But I’m working on it.”

Again, Justine nods, and awkwardly, you clear your throat. Afterwards, you raise your head and look at a spot next to Justine’s face so you don’t have to directly look her in the eyes anymore. It’s just–she’s being really quiet right now, and it’s making you feel strange having all of the attention like this. Like you’re being examined.

“Okay, so first off,” you hop to it, “I just…I wanted to let you know that I’ve gotten things finalized at the place I told you I was lookin’ at. The efficiency apartment by the police station."

Justine remains quiet, and you clear your dry throat again before going on.

"I’ll be movin’ in during the first week of January," you tell her, and then you're instantly on the defensive: "And I know that’s pretty quick, so I wanted to tell you as soon as I found out. Which was today.”

“Mm,” she murmurs, and you close your eyes.

The tone she’s using isn't pleasant. She isn’t open for an authentic discussion, you can tell. She’s got her guard up. This isn't good news for her.

Worry starts filling your stomach and tightening your chest, but you breathe through it. You’re an adult, you tell yourself, and then: It’s just Justine. And then even more: You’ve got to deal with unpleasant things instead of avoiding them. That’s life. It’s inevitable. In your day-to-day work duties, you deal with the public all the time.

“So…I really wasn’t imaginin’ it bein’ so quick when I first told you last month,” you look her dead-in-the-eye again and state, “but the tenants there now are movin’ out at the end of the year, and if I don’t move in after they move out and get the place cleaned, the rental agency would give it away to someone else to get more prorated rent." You shrug. "You know…You know how those things go.”

The side of Justine’s mouth twitches. “I don’t think the whole town’ll be linin’ up tryin’ to snag that apartment before you do, Y/N,” she says with a little chuckle, and normally you’d chuckle, too, to keep things friendly, to coat your unpleasant words with a smile, but you don’t. You don't really find what she’s said to be amusing. It’s like she’s making fun of you for the apartment you chose.

She speaks up after neither of you says anything for a while. "So. First week of January."

In guilt, you sit frozen while internally warring with yourself. Is this conversation going to inevitably go in the direction of finances? Should you offer to pay her January’s rent in full for the inconvenience of shorthanded notice? February’s? What’s even the standard procedure for something like this? A notice for leaving employment is at least two weeks, but what is it for moving out of someone's home? You don’t know the rules for this kind of thing.

“Hello?” she finally asks, and you blanch at her tone.

"Sorry, I–"

You thought you had your shit together in your head for this conversation, but you guess not.

You take a deep breath. “Yeah," you murmur. "First week of January."

“Alright, so…” Justine puts her elbows on the table and quietly sighs. “Is that it? You’re apologizing that you’re bad at communicating right before you tell me you’re movin’ out in…three weeks?”

Instinctively, your eyes close. Because that’s what you do to hide.

But you open them right back up. Tilting your head, you finally look at her straight on. Dead-in-the-eyes. "What have I ever done to you to make you dislike me so much, Justine?" you quietly ask, almost in wonder.

She blinks a few times in succession. “Wh–What? Where’s that comin’ from?” she asks. “I don’t dislike you.”

“But you do, though,” you murmur conversationally. With a light tone, you're speaking as if you're just making an observation. “It's...” You let out a little laugh. “It’s extremely obvious you do. I know I’m not perfect, and I’m ownin’ that, but to feel like I’m not even liked…" You swallow. “Like, not even a little bit. Or appreciated whatsoever. And then to feel like I’m being made fun of, even…By someone who was supposed to be my friend…I just don’t get what I’ve done that’s been so terrible to you to treat me like this.”

Looking away, she sighs. Putting this out there so bluntly must be making her uncomfortable.

But you've been the one walking on eggshells around her for months.

“It’s not that I don’t like you, Y/N. We’ve been friends forever.” She crosses her arms and slouches back in the chair she’s using. “There’s just…The things you do irritate me, I guess.”

You look back at the table. “Like what?”

“Well…” Loudly enough for you to hear it again, she sighs once more. “You don’t ever come out of your room,” she says, uncrossing her arms to gesture down the hall with them. “We used to hang out together, watch shows together out in the living room…We used to have fun with each other. Now it’s like the only conversations you have with me anymore have to do with when something’s off with your schedule and you can’t be around or whatever. And more times than not, it’s usually with no real notice. So, yeah. That irritates me. That would irritate anyone."

Your lips part, your mouth falling open. Your shoulders raise as you instinctively want to argue with what she’s said, but it’s true. That’s why you’re having this conversation, after all. You’re bad at communicating.

“I get that, and I really am sorry,” you look up again and utter. “I know I haven't really hung out with you that much lately. This semester’s been pretty rough for me, honestly, so that’s a big part of why I’m in my room a lot doin’ work, but…I think it’s also ‘cause I have a lot of–”

You cut yourself off. You won’t talk about your social anxiety. You won’t talk about your random exhaustion keeping you in bed. You won’t talk about how the pressure of cleaning the entire house and cooking for the kids and driving clients around every day and typing case-notes and cramming for exams and talking on the phone all day every day completely depletes you of energy. You won't mention how sometimes the weight of all you do makes you feel like you're suffocating and can't bear human interaction for another second once you enter the house.

But there is something you do need to talk about. And that is how you've only found comfort in your bedroom recently because the rest of the house is so unwelcoming. Because you've been avoiding her. Because after all this time, the miscommunication after miscommunication has led you to withdraw entirely, and how that's led to passive acceptance of being used, and how that's led to true resentment.

“Alright, so…” You sigh a little, starting to feel a little happy that you’re both getting things off your chest. “I sorta feel like any time I ever come to you with anything that’s, like, in any way inconvenient, that I get some sort of bad reaction. And for whatever reason, it…triggers me. So over time, I’ve learned to just sorta be quiet and keep to myself so I don’t have to deal with it. And then that makes me wait until the last minute to bring some things up to you, which isn’t the best way to be, and I really do apologize for that. Like I said, I’m workin’ on it. I know it doesn’t make up for me doin’ it so much in the past, though. But I hope you understand where I’m comin’ from. Like…Where my mind’s at.”

You know you’re being less than eloquent here, but Justine will understand. She should, at least. After knowing one another all this time, after living with each other for so long, after taking care of her children for her, after cleaning her house and walking her dog and trying to do all types of overlooked things to make living together as stress-free as possible, she should be receptive to the unpleasant realities you’ve admitted. Hopefully she’ll even do some soul-searching right here along with you.

“Deal with it?” she repeats instead, and from her offended expression alone, you know your expectations of how this conversation is going to go won’t pan out. “Deal with what? What does that mean? Like, deal with me?”

You swallow thickly. “The–The reaction. From you.”

“Y/N, you–”

“I’m really not tryin’ to argue or anything,” you interrupt as reasonably and as gently as possible, your eyes wider than before, your hands open. “That’s not what this is. I just told you that I’m takin’ the blame for not speakin’ up when I should’ve. It’s just that–People havin' bad reactions to stuff I say or do has been the way it’s always been my entire life, and–”

“Your entire life?” she smacks her lips and asks, putting her hands in the air. “Y/N, we grew up together, come on.”

And then your mouth falls open.

This isn’t how this played out in your head at all. You thought you could both share the things about one another that you’ve been having issues with without arguing. Everyone has faults, after all. Everyone makes mistakes. You just thought…You thought you could work through them. Like adults.

“I mean…You don’t–You don’t know every single thing I’ve been through," you almost whisper. "So–yes,” you maintain. “It has been my entire life.”

The look on her face and the echoes of her mean voice and the frustration she’s exuding makes something snap inside you, and your body grows prickly as you feel it building within your limbs. This is going to be an argument.

And how could it not be? Your friendship has rotted.

Initially, you came into this conversation openly, wanting to apologize for any hurt you’ve caused and for any wrongdoings from the past, for the misunderstandings due to your inability to speak up, for anything you weren’t even aware of, even. Just to have a clean slate. It sounds like despite your willingness to apologize, though, Justine’s further attacking you.

“Since I was a kid,” you explain, using your shaky hands to help you articulate, “everything's always been brushed on me to do. You should know how my home-life was, Justine. I had to figure things out. I had to keep the peace in my own family because no one else could figure out their own emotions and talk about things like mature adults. I had to bust my ass doin’ everything and bein’ everything to everyone because no one else did shit. As a child. As a teenager. And it’s still that way to this day as an adult, Justine. And it’s like that in this house, too.” You pause and realize that you’ve begun to squint your eyes so strongly that you feel the skin in between them bunch up. “And I know it’s my own fault, ‘cause I’ve never, like, made boundaries or rules with you when we moved down here to start with, but–”

“This is unbelievable,” she interrupts, and you almost scowl.

Instead, you sigh. She just doesn't get it. “What is, Justine?”

“This sob-story,” she shakes her head and says. “When we’re the ones who’re gonna suffer until I get somethin’ set up because I don’t know how we’re gonna pay the mortgage now. But this is ‘cause of your childhood somehow?”

If possible, your mouth drops wider than it did before, but you get yourself together within seconds. “Look, I know that me movin’ out is gonna mean that you’re not as…comfortable as you are right now,” you slowly figure out the appropriate phrase to say, “but c’mon, Justine. You…You have a great job. You really do. You’re a per diem nurse. And I know you get child support and alimony, too.”

She heaves a sigh. “The point,” she replies like you’re stupid, “is the expenses.”

You close your eyes, tense all over. The thought of moving out of this house and leaving the children in any type of struggle financially has you feeling almost guilty enough to stay for a few more months–maybe more–but you can’t keep doing this to yourself. You know that Justine has a lot of bills, but…you do, too.

That’s selfishyou’rebeingselfish–

Nostrils flaring, mouth terse, you sit there and just breathe, trying to keep it together. “I don’t feel like you’re really gettin’ what I’m tryin’ to say here.”

“I get it exactly,” she replies, “because I’ve known you all your life. You're playin' the victim. Just like you always do."

You freeze. "I…What?”

She stares you down. “Y/N. I’m the single mom with four kids here. You don’t hear me complainin’ about it. And I haven’t complained about you movin’ out, either–not once–even though you’ve given me, like, hardly any notice. Like usual.”

You want to give in so, so badly. You blink a few times in a row, clearing your throat afterwards so you don’t end up doing something stupid like breaking down in tears while yelling at her or something. Even though that’s what you want to do, instead, you take a deep, even breath.

"And I'm sorry," you utter. "I'm sorry for the short notice, okay? But I really don’t think it’s fair to say that I’m playin’ the victim or something when I’m just tellin’ you how I feel.”

She sighs. “Feel how you wanna feel, then,” she says. “I don’t know what you want me to say anymore. I’m a shitty person–I’m such a shitty person that you’ve locked yourself away in your room for months and now you’re movin’ out–and I gotta deal with all the aftermath myself. That’s it. That’s all there is to it.”

Sighing, you say, “That’s not all there is to it. I'm not tryin’ to say you're this horrible person. That’s never what I intended from any of this.”

“Then what did you intend?” she crosses her arms and asks.

You just frown. “For you to understand me a little bit, I guess. And the things that I do.”

“I dunno about all that.” She huffs out a tiny laugh. “I don’t know if I’ll ever really understand…”

“I mean, I’m here to try to communicate, so. I can…I can try.”

“Yeah, well.” She sighs. “Here’s what I don’t get. You’re movin’ out, but you’re not even movin’ in with your boyfriend. You’re movin’ into an economy apartment by yourself. And for what? Seriously? When you could stay here and save money.”

"Living here isn't saving me money," you reply, not able to keep the frustration from your voice. You put your elbows on the table and lower your head in your hands. "It's not."

After doing all the math, you’re saving money by moving out. Not even counting the rent you pay, how often do you buy food for the entire family? How often do you get the kids little things they want when you're at the store? Groceries? Dog food? How often do you help out when random things around the house need to be fixed? How much have you spent on gasoline alone taking the kids to their sporting events?

“I know a lot of this tension between us lately is my own fault ‘cause I never speak up for myself, and I know that,” you tell her. “I’ve said that, like, four times to you already, but it…it still just doesn’t make any of this right.”

Confusion covers Justine's face. “Doesn’t make what right?”

You pause, not able to reply, and you must look stupid for a while as your mouth opens and stays that way. “Justine, you’ve brushed off everything on me since we moved down here, just about, and–”

“I have not,” she deflects. “Our agreement since the beginning was–”

“You were supposed to help me out by chargin’ me less rent, and I was supposed to help you when I could with the kids to make up the difference in childcare you’d be payin’ otherwise,” you tell her. “It was supposed to even out. But you took advantage of that. From the start, you did, and you just kept expectin’ a little more, and a little more, and then a little more, seein’ what you could get away with. And my spineless ass never did a thing about it, so then it became the way it was. Well, now I’m doing something about it.”

“Movin’ out,” she states. “Movin’ out entirely instead of just comin’ to me for a different arrangement. A pretty big fuck-you to me and the kids, don’t you think?”

“It’s not like that,” you retaliate. “I’ll always love the kids. I’m just…done. I’m done with this arrangement, Justine. I can't keep doin' this. I need to do something for myself for a change. It’s time I–It’s time I live for me.”

"But Y/N–” She makes a long, drawn-out noise. “I don't get how stayin’ here is keepin' you from that."

Tensely, you inhale through your nostrils. "I just–I don't think we're ever really gonna see eye-to-eye on this.”

"I guess not." Justine mirrors your sigh with one of her own, then it's quiet.

"Y’know, I thought you'd maybe actually be happy for me," you sadly chuckle. "About to get my Masters. Doin' stuff for myself for once. Finally datin' someone really great. After…everything that happened back in Virginia."

“I am happy for you."

“I really feel the support,” you mutter.

“Y/N, come on.”

“No, I have the right to be upset,” you tell her. “I get that me movin’ out is a big inconvenience for you, but–I know you won’t agree with this since we’ve already talked around and around and around it–you’re gonna be fine without me here. Really, you are. You have a really good job and two exes who financially support you and the kids. And here I am doin’ somethin’ for myself for once after workin’ two jobs for the longest freaking time, and I hardly have anyone down here to really share it with, and honestly, I just thought it’d be nice if–”

“Oh, my God,” she groans. “This is what I mean! You act like you don’t have a boyfriend whose ass you’re up all the time. Or people from work–at those two different jobs you’ve got–or even people from your classes. You’re around people all the time.”

At first, you don’t get the point she’s trying to make. You don’t get her meaning at all, actually. You don’t even have two jobs anymore, but you realize belatedly that you’ve never even told her you’ve quit Johnson’s, so of course that’s what she still thinks.

You stutter for a second before she clarifies herself. “If you don’t have other people to ‘share your happiness’ with when so many people are available out there,” she explains, “then that’s an issue with yourself at this point, Y/N. And that’s what I’ve been tryin’ to say.”

“Wait, what?”

“The fact that you don’t have friends isn’t on me!” Justine says in irritation. “I know you’re pissed off at me but won’t ever tell me what I’ve specifically done to you to drive you out, but I’m just one person. You’ve been here two years just like I have, Y/N. You’ve had the same chances I’ve had to make friends. But you sit in your room all the damn time. That’s why you don’t.”

Your eyes start burning with hot, welled-up water, but you pointedly try to keep yourself from crying. She’s dug up your biggest vulnerability again–the fact that you’re bad at making friends–and instantly, you feel like absolute shit.

Mentally, your brain begins agreeing with Justine. You have had the same chances she’s had to make friends while living here. Maybe even more chances. You’ve been around endless coworkers and peers your age in school. Because of how you are, though, you haven’t.

Justine notices your stinging eyes and sighs in frustration. “Look, I’m not tryin’ to be mean or anything, alright? But it’s the truth. This is what I mean about you playin’ the victim, Y/N–You don’t even try to–”

“Stop,” you interrupt with a rough, croaky voice. “Please, just stop.”

“I thought you wanted to get stuff out, though,” she retorts, and you stare at her for a long time.

You can’t tell if she’s mocking you or if she’s being sincere. “Maybe you are a horrible person,” you mumble despite your common sense telling you not to.

You’ve just let her get so into your head all of a sudden, so much that you can’t tell what’s real and what’s not anymore, that you feel like you’re the only one who’s problematic in this friendship at all, and that just can’t be right. It can’t be. You’re not perfect, and you know you’re not, but you alone can’t be the purpose for this downfall. You’ve played a part in it, yeah, but you’re not the sole reason for everything going stale. You can’t be.

But maybe you really can be! Maybe you are! Maybe you really do play the victim without realizing it, and you really do keep yourself in your room all the time even though you really don’t think you do unless you’re doing homework or decompressing. You just–You just don’t know anymore–anything!–and while two tears fall out of your eyes, you feel crazier than ever.

Justine tilts her head to the side. “What?” she asks.

And something about her expression challenges you somehow, to the point where you lift up your chin. Sy’s not with you, but you pretend he is.

Maybe you don’t have a confident voice yet, but you’re forming one. And it’s the internal voice of Sy. Reminding you of your worth. Reminding you of everything you do that’s not been appreciated–hell, that’s not even been noticed until you stopped doing so much to begin with.

The image of Sy sitting in the exact same kitchen chair that Justine’s sitting in now…pointing down the hall to Justine’s room…listing off everything you do for her that’s taken for granted…speaking up for you because at that time you couldn’t do it yourself…

But you can speak up for yourself now. You no longer have to push down your emotions in fear of hurting someone else’s feelings. Not anymore.

“I said, maybe you are a horrible person,” you repeat louder, so loud that it’s clear what you mean but not loud enough for the kids to hear anything. “I get that you’re mad at me, or–we’re mad at each other, at this point–but here I am tryin’ to actually say sorry for makin’ you feel like I was springin’ this on you ‘cause I didn’t tell you how unhappy I’ve been all this time. I’m the one actually tryin’ to fix some of this. But you know what? Even if I had actually spoken up a few months ago when it started gettin’ bad, I don’t think it even would’ve made a difference.”

Justine tries to interrupt you, but you keep talking.

“I still don’t think you would’ve cared if I did try to tell you how I felt earlier,” you tell her. “You wouldn’t’ve cared. You wouldn’t’ve cared at all. Because all you want is your free childcare, and your free kennel service, and all your extra money, and the freedom to go out and do the kinda stuff you used to do when you were single. But you're not single anymore, Justine."

With her mouth dropped open, she scoffs. “Seriously? So after everything else, this is you slut-shamin' me now?”

“Oh, my God,” you say in irritation. “Do what you want, Justine. Do whatever the hell you want. Again, that’s not the goddamn point I’m tryin’ to make.”

“Then what is?” she loudly asks.

Feeling like a child backed into a corner with no other defense but her voice, you almost scream in retaliation. You almost do, you’re so close, you’re so mad and fed up and hurt that you almost do, but coincidentally, it’s the fact that the actual children are in the house that stops you.

“Your kids come to me when they get hurt,” you tell her through tightly-gritted teeth, waiting for your tears to dry up before falling once more. “When they need something. When they’re scared. In the middle of the night, they come to me when they have nightmares. They don’t know any different. Do you–Do you even realize that, Justine?”

Her mouth turns into a straight line. “If you don’t tell me, Y/N, then, no,” she mutters through similarly gritted teeth, “I wouldn’t know that.”

As you stare her down, your tears dry. “I don’t think that’s true,” you stonily say.

“They’re my own damn kids, Y/N. What does that even mean?”

“Now, I take a lot of blame for not speakin’ up when I should’ve,” you tell her. “I just apologized about a dozen times for that. It would’ve made things a hell of a lot easier if I hadn’t kept so much inside. But I did. And I’m sorry.” You blink, but you don’t look away. “But you’re their mother. You can’t tell me you’ve had no idea this whole time. If it weren’t for me, they’d be goin’ to school with dirty hair and dirty clothes. They wouldn’t’ve had their homework done, no–no lunch sometimes. Sometimes no dinner at night. You cannot sit here and tell me you never realized what all I’ve done for you. If you can’t see it at all for yourself, at least see it for your kids.”

“It’s always been about my kids,” she retorts. “I moved down here to be closer to Rob–you know that. I went to school so I could get the job I have now for them. So they could have a better life.”

“Right, but–”

She interrupts you with: “But, but, but. There’s always a ‘but’ with you.”

“Because you still aren’t recognizing how much I do for them!" you argue. "And you! How much I’ve done for so long. Just because I’m not their biological mom doesn’t mean that I’m not busy, too. I seriously–"

“Try havin’ four kids and see how busy you’ll be then.”

Sighing, you give up trying to get your point across. Your pointlessly-made coffee is going cold. “This is going nowhere.”

"Guess so,” Justine agrees. “This is the thing–We had a very clear arrangement from the very beginning–like, before we even moved down here–about finances. About how we'd do things evenly, how you’d have cheaper rent in exchange for help with the kids. We agreed on it."

"Stop with the arrangement," you want to beg. Instead, you just sigh again. “But it hasn’t been even,” you say.

"According to you,” she mumbles. “So in summary, you're movin' out because you feel like I don't acknowledge how busy you are?"

"I'm movin' out because you're a bad friend," you correct sharply, watching Justine as she blanches, “and I can't take it anymore."

“And now we’re all just fucked,” she states. “We’re probably gonna have to move somewhere else entirely–”

“Justine–Here’s what I don’t get,” you reply in exasperation. “Your name is on the mortgage. Just yours. This is your house. It’s always been your house. You got this place because the bank literally said your income alone could cover it with no regard to mine whatsoever. So if you want to be pissed off at me for not understanding all your expenses, then maybe you should re-evaluate whatever the fuck you’re buying.”

You stand up, wipe your eyes, and turn around to begin walking to your bedroom.

“Don’t you do that.” Justine stands up and begins following you. “Don’t say something bitchy like that and then just walk away.”

You whip around. “I’ve tried being civil the entire time, Justine. If you won't take accountability for your part in this at all, I'm done.”

She looks unhappy, but he crosses her arms. "Fine."

"Fine," you repeat, trying not to shout it or slam your door as you speed-walk into your room and throw yourself on your bed.

You're crying within seconds. "Fuck," you mutter to yourself, angrily wiping your eyes.

That didn't go how you wanted it to at all.

You don’t want to be in this house a minute longer. The thing is, where would you even go? You won’t get keys for your new apartment for weeks.

…Obviously, you know a place you could go.

You just hope he won’t mind.

He won’t. You know he won’t.

You reach for your phone on your nightstand, pocketing it before rushing around to pack a quick overnight bag. You throw in all types of work clothes and comfortable clothes, your glasses, and all your medicine, and for a minute, you impulsively consider taking a bunch of other stuff into the car, too. You end up stopping yourself. You aren’t moving out yet.

You really wish you could, though. You wish you could temporarily stash belongings at Sy’s house. Things had gone so badly with Justine that you fear she’s going to go in your room and pour bleach all over your bed or something.

Honestly, though, Sy probably would have no problem if you took some of your stuff to his place. You unplug your bedside lamp, grab your succulent off your bookshelf, then sling your bag over your shoulder. It's not much, but it's all you can carry without struggling, and the small act of rebellion feels nice.

In the hall outside the boys' bedroom, you pause as a new set of tears stream down your face. This just fucking sucks.

You don’t bother telling Justine that you’re leaving. If one of her kids wakes up wanting water in the middle of the night, you guess she’ll have to get off her own ass and get it for them herself.

Walking outside while shushing Molly, you feel even shittier that a thought so mean would even pass through your head. You don’t want to leave the kids. You really, really don’t. And you don’t want to have this type of hate in your heart, either.

This feels like a break-up. With the kids' innocence at stake.

Sy’s grandma lives right across the street from them, though, you remind yourself. You’ll see them as often as Justine allows you to. Maybe someday you two can be civil enough for the kids' sake. Maybe she'll still let you take them out sometimes. Somewhere. Not due to any obligation, but because you want to.

None of it was any obligation to you, anyway. It's always been a lot, but you aren't bitter towards the children at all. You love them. So much that you can’t even be as happy as you want to be about getting your own apartment because you fear what their lives will be like with you gone.

That's giving yourself way too much credit, though. You're not a savior in their lives. You've been a glorified nanny.

…But still. You love them.

After drying off your face, you march back into the kitchen to wash out your coffee cup, and after you dry it off, you place it back into the cabinet, turn on your heels, and stomp back outside.

The drive to Sy's house is automatic. You take the few easy turns out of the residential area where the houses are a little closer together, then you pass the library, Pop’s Ice Cream Shop, and the Bait & Tackle. After that, you find yourself on the first long and dark road to Sy’s, and after you switch on your bright-lights, you pull out your phone and press a few memorized buttons.

“Hey, pretty girl,” Sy’s easy voice answers right away, and it minimally eases your ongoing heightened emotions.

“Hey, Sy,” you breathe out. “Can I–I know it's last-minute, but–Can I come over tonight? Would that be okay?”

“‘Course,” he immediately tells you, then just as immediately: “What’s goin’ on?”

He must’ve heard you sniff. “I just–I sorta feel like shit right now, and I was hopin’..." You let out the breath you weren't aware you were holding in. "I was just hopin’ it’d be okay to sleep over.”

“Stay put,” he tells you. “I’ll getchu.”

“Oh,” you mumble. “I’m actually–I’m actually already in my car.”

He’s quiet for a second. “Watch out for deer.”

“Okay.”

It’s silent, but neither of you hang up.

“What happened?”

“I finalized my lease this afternoon during my lunch break,” you tell him. “I get to move in a little over three weeks.”

“That’s great,” he says, but there’s underlying confusion in his tone. He probably thinks you got ripped off. You know he was worried about that.

“So, uh. I talked to Justine about it just now,” you eventually say, and Sy makes a deep noise to let you know he knows where this is going.

“Didn’t go so hot?”

“Uh…No. Not at all,” you answer. “Told her when I’m gonna be movin’ out and…tried to talk things out with her. We just ended up in a big argument.”

Sy grunts. You know he’s holding back what he wants to say.

"I’m really sorry. I promise I don’t mean to ruin your night," you explain.

“Y/N,” he starts.

"I know, I know. I’m not burdening you,” you say aloud what he would probably tell you, “but still–you were probably gonna have a relaxing night, and now, this. I promise I won’t, like, cry on your shoulder or anything," you chuckle quietly. "Just wanted to…I just wanted to be with you tonight."

You stay on the phone until you arrive at his house. At the front door waiting on you under a lit porch light, Sy ends the phone call, puts his phone in his pocket, and walks to your car where he grabs your overnight bag and carries it inside for you.

When you walk into the kitchen, there are two shot glasses full of amber-colored whiskey on the counter, and you can't help but smile.

"Thanks," you murmur, and silently, both you and Sy reach out to lift the glasses into the air.

He's not one for meaningless toasts, so neither of you bother with making something up to lighten the mood, but you stare at one another before tossing the bourbon back and speak with your eyes. It's gonna be okay. While your chest burns, you step closer to him and place your head on his chest.

“Life’s a bitch, ain’t it?”

You wrap your hands around his waist until they touch the small of his back. "Yeah," you say.

And then you just stand there together.

A few moments later when you're feeling somewhat lighter, you both make your way to the couch. Sy lifts both of your legs to rest over top of his thighs, and you place a pillow between your back and the arm of the couch. With the warmth of the fireplace before you, the serenity of the Christmas tree in the corner, and the comfort of Sy sitting directly next to you, things honestly do feel a little better.

The prospect of actually packing up your belongings and leaving Justine's house seems…possible now. It's not a giant thing anymore. You’ve had your conversation with her and it didn’t end well, but now it’s over. The dreaded communication part is done.

Now there’s all the other shit that comes after it.

Sy nudges you, and you up at him to see him lifting his eyebrows curiously. You’re brooding.

“Fuck her,” Sy dismissively says, tugging on your socked foot. “Soon you won’t even gotta deal with her shit.”

“Yeah,” you mumble, shrugging. “I dunno. I’m just upset with myself, I guess.”

“For what?”

You shrug again.

“What’d she say?”

“Nothin’ that wasn’t already true,” you mutter. “I just let it get to me. Said things I told myself I wouldn’t say.”

“Lemme guess…You told her when you’d be movin’ out…maybe tried to talk through some shit about why you’re movin’ out…and she prob’ly had some way of blamin’ you for everything.”

You tilt your head to the side. “In a nutshell.”

"Narcissists’re all the same,” he mutters.

Frowning, you glance at him. “You mean Justine?”

“Justine, my piece-of-shit stepdad, your old piece-of-shit boss. Don’t matter who it is. Nothin’s ever their fault.”

You never really considered that that’s what she is. Selfish, maybe.

“Don’t listen to people’s words,” Sy advises. “At the end of the day, talkin’ is just bullshittin’. People lie. Look at what they do. Look at how they act. That’s where they’re gonna tell you the most.”

"Talkin' isn't just bullshittin' to me."

"Not to me, either," he agrees, "but we’re not most people."

“I raised my voice at her,” you mumble. “And I cussed. And I was trying so, so hard to not make it into a fight.”

He softly grunts. “Around her, I woulda raised my voice, too.”

You make eye contact with him and almost smirk. Cussing would be a given.

“She said that I–I don’t know if she was tryin’ to imply that I’ve lied to her about what happened in my childhood or somethin’ to get attention, but I brought it up, kinda to explain why I have problems with conflict and stuff, and she said that I play the victim all the time.”

Sy snaps. “Ah, that's another thing narcissists do,” he says, and you look at him in confusion. “That’ll be called some good old-fashioned projection.”

Your lips part. “Huh?”

“That’s what they do,” he persists. “They don’t wanna live with the guilt themselves, so they’ll push all their shit on someone else to make that person the bad one.”

“But, like–that’s my thing. What if I am the bad one in this? I keep analyzing everything, and, like, from the outside I can see that okay–it’s clear she’s using me–but then I over-think it and I’m, like, but what if she wasn’t? And I’m just a really bad person screwing her over now?”

Sy sighs. There’s a half-finished bottle of Coors on the coffee table that he reaches for, lifts, and takes a long swig of. When he lowers it and places it back on the table, he licks his bottom lip and then slightly shakes his head.

You start biting your thumbnail. “...What?”

“It’s like these people share a fuckin’ textbook,” he mutters. “That’s ‘cause she’s makin’ you question your reality.”

You just sit there, blinking while distantly gazing into the burning logs in the fireplace. Gaslighting. “I swear, it’s like epiphany after epiphany with you,” you mutter.

“Think about it,” he proposes. “How’re you playin’ the victim? In anything? The person who’d rather lie about her own discomfort than complain? Are you fuckin’ kiddin’ me?”

You start biting the nail on your index finger next. "Well, I mean, yeah, you’re right," you agree, "but I really can’t help but feelin’ like I am the problem in all this. I feel like the stuff she said…” Stupidly, tears sting at the sides of your eyes. “I feel like it’s true."

You said you wouldn’t be crying on his shoulder tonight, but what you really meant was that you wouldn’t be crying at all once you got here, and already, here you freaking go.

“And feelin’ like nobody likes you has to be one of the worst feelings there is," you squeak out. You angrily swipe the sides of your eyes to clear them, but more tears just take their place.

“Oh, hell,” Sy murmurs. “C’mere.”

Reluctantly, you let Sy pull you closer into his body. With one arm around your shoulders and one hand on top of your thigh, it feels nice, of course it does, but you still feel dumb.

You wipe your eyes again and try to dry them out for good. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“Cryin’ over somethin’ so stupid when it’s true. I don’t have many friends,” you admit.

Instead of saying what everyone always says–Yes, you do–Sy just ponders what you’ve said. “Why d’you think that is?”

You shrug. “I repel people,” you dully joke.

He chuckles. “Y’know, I’ve had that said about me, too.”

“No clue why that could be,” you murmur, and your voice is nasally.

“This ain’t gonna help none, I’m sure, but I don’t got many friends by choice,” Sy admits. “I got a few, and I stick to ‘em. If it weren’t for our poker nights each month, we’d probably go years without even talkin’. It’s about quality, not quantity.”

“Yeah,” you murmur softly.

You sit in silence with your head against Sy’s arm while staring at the fire.

"You want another drink?" he asks into the quiet air.

“Nah.” You ruefully shake your head. "I’m not really supposed to even drink alcohol with the medicine I take."

“Wait, what?” he sharply asks.

“A little bit is okay,” you explain, but Sy raises a dubious eyebrow at you.

His voice is uncharacteristically stern. “Y/N…”

“Don’t be mad at me,” you quickly let out. “I didn’t, like, intentionally keep that from you or anything. I just didn’t think to mention it before now.”

“I’m not mad at you,” he finally replies.

You close your eyes. “Just disappointed?”

“No.” He sighs. “Concerned.”

You open your eyes but keep them diverted. After clearing your throat, you say, “One of Justine’s main things was that I haven’t communicated enough with her. And she’s right. It’s one of the worst things about me.”

“Hey, now,” Sy warns.

“But it’s true. Sometimes I just don’t feel like talkin’,” you admit, sniffing. “It’s probably a really weird thing to say, but…I just don’t.”

“I’m the same way.”

“But it’s not like I hide information on purpose or anything,” you say. “It just doesn’t come to me to even say stuff sometimes–like the alcohol thing. And with Justine–now it’s built up where she’s, like, resentful of me for tellin’ her how I’m feelin’ when I could’ve told her a long time ago. So it just sucks.”

"You did everything you coulda done," he tells you, and you want to scoff.

Apparently you do scoff because in the next moment, Sy's firmer with his voice.

“You did everything you coulda done,” he repeats himself.

“And now she hates me,” you mumble childishly, “just like everyone else.”

“I don’t hate’chu,” Sy speaks up, and you chuckle a little. “MaMaw don’t hate’chu. My sisters don’t hate’chu, those kids don’t hate’chu…Amelia don’t hate’chu…That chick at the bar that you helped that one time don’t hate’chu…I could go on. Everyone loves you.”

“That’s not true,” you can’t help but argue.

“Everyone that knows the real you does,” he corrects. “And fuck the rest.”

“Well, I still feel like the world’s shittiest person alive right now,” you admit. “She said after I move out that it’s gonna be a struggle.”

“That might be true. But that ain’t your problem,” he tells you. “Now, if she was smart, she’d’a saved up what she could while you were there helpin’ her out, and she’d be set. Maybe even be able to still do the monthly trips to Disneyland. But if not…” He shrugs.

“But the kids…”

“Child support, right?”

“Yeah,” you utter, and you’re silent for a minute until you sharply look up at Sy. “Wait, do you think she’s making it up? Like, them havin’ to struggle with me gone?”

“Hard to say.”

“It’s just–She’s a single parent,” you murmur. “And a nurse. She’s got a lot on her plate.”

Sy touches the bridge of his nose with his forefinger and thumb, and it’s one of the first times–if not the first time–he’s outwardly shown any sort of annoyance with you.

You frown. “But she does,” you say quietly.

He caresses his thumb along your shoulder to show his support, but still, his voice is passionate when he speaks. “You have got to stop stickin’ up for people who’ve fucked you over, Y/N. You’ve got to. Stop justifyin’ her bullshit. Just ‘cause a person’s under a lotta stress don’t give ‘em a free pass for bein’ an asshole.”

You look down. “Yeah.”

“Lookatchu,” Sy hums. “Look at all the shit you’ve been through just since we met.”

“I mean, it’s been a lot, yeah,” you admit, “but it’s not really anything anyone else couldn’t handle.”

“Give yourself some credit here,” he sighs. “Since I met you, you–shit, you’ve had two jobs, you’ve finished a semester in graduate school, you got a tetanus shot, had your car break down, had a panic attack on my bike, signed a lease to a new apartment, and you’re basically like a mother to four kids that ain’t even yours…I think it’s safe to say that a lot of other people couldn’t handle every single thing that you’ve been able to.”

You know internally that he’s right. You even brought it up to Justine, all of the things that you do. There’s just some odd part of you that thinks you’re egotistical for giving yourself credit for things.

You’ve got to get out of these dysfunctional thinking patterns you find yourself caught in all the time.

“What’s wrong?” Sy asks. “Don’t agree?”

“No, it’s just–I just feel dumb,” you admit. “I’m–I’m not stupid, and I know I’m not, but…it’s like, I can talk all day about human behavior and psychology and this and that, but when it comes to stuff actually goin’ on in my real life, it’s like I’m blind or something. I don’t get it.”

“It ain’t that easy,” he says quietly. “I get that.”

“Yeah,” you mutter.

You take a deep breath and slowly breathe outwardly through your mouth. After putting your hand up to your jaw and moving your head to one side to crack your neck and then the other, you then shake out your hands. You're good.

“I’m gettin’ in with a counselor,” you say so lightly that it could be a whisper. “I can’t be seen ‘til the end of next month, though.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah.”

Maybe I won’t feel so crazy then.

“Sy?” you utter, and when Sy questioningly lifts his eyebrows, you softly smile. Your eyes have entirely dried, and you honestly do feel much better. “Thank you for listening to me.”

Sy’s eyes bore into yours. “Happy to.”

“But here I’ve done nothin’ but talk about myself this entire time,” you mumble, wiggling in his lap. “How was your day? How are you?”

“Been a shit day for me, too, honestly,” he admits.

You frown while trying not to feel guilty for taking over the entire night with your own bullshit while ignoring Sy entirely. “What’s wrong?”

“Knee’s flarin’ up somethin’ awful,” he admits. “Nothin’s helpin’ but whiskey.”

“Sy,” you mumble in sympathy. “Did you go get your shot this week?”

He nods. “At this rate, they’re fixin’ to refer me to an actual specialist. And when I say that, I mean they’ve been threatenin’ it for ages and are gonna come down hard now.”

“‘Cause you’ve been too stubborn?”

He grunts.

“Maybe I should amp you up, then,” you suggest. “Sit here and tell you how great you are and how everyone loves you and how everyone wants your bum knee to be in better shape so you can drop-kick all the narcissists and–”

“I only care about one person who loves me,” Sy interrupts as he coaxes you backwards against the actual arm of the couch.

“Yeah?” you ask while you lay back a bit. “Your grandma is a special lady.”

After he leans down and presses his lips to yours, he chuckles out of his nostrils. The hot air against your face makes you smile. The kisses that follow are ungraceful.

Sy doesn’t care. When he breaks away, he looks down at you with a calm peace covering his face, a brightness filling his eyes. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

“You feelin’ any better now?”

You lift your hands to wrap around his neck and nod. “Thanks to you.”

He kisses you. When your mouths break apart, he speaks against your lips. “Come to Chattannooga with me.”

Maybe too tired by now, you don’t understand him at first. “Huh?”

“This weekend,” Sy says before sneaking another kiss. “Come to Chattannooga with me.”

“...What’s in Chattanooga?”

“Us. This weekend.”

You roll your eyes. “I mean, what’dju wanna do there?”

“Take you out.”

Sy puts his forehead down onto yours. You’re almost cross-eyed as you try to maintain eye-contact with him.

“Out on the town?” you ask. “The big city Chattanooga nights?”

“Yeah.” His eyes flash around your face. “Somewhere away from here for a while.”

Your eyes trail around his face, as well. “Yeah,” you whisper. “Alright.”

#eyes that see fic #captain syverson #eyes that see #captain syverson fic #captain syverson x reader

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juliaorpll78 · 1 month ago

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Eyes That See Part 21

Eyes That See Summary: Your life consists of taking care of others. This is a story of you learning to take care of yourself. Eyes That See Part 21 Summary: You and Sy go to Amelia and Johnny’s farmhouse for an Ugly Sweater Christmas Party. Words: Close to 18k Tags: mention of Christianity/religion/death, alcohol consumption, topics of anxiety, drunk characters, military characters with outward injuries. A/N: Like with many of the recent chapters, this chapter is a lot of words for a small period of time, but it’s a good connector for the next few parts of the story that I sincerely hope won’t take nearly as long to update as this has been (coming up soon: fight with Justine, trip to Virginia, Y/N moving into a new place!). Also, to everyone who has commented on this fic, I love you more than you will ever know. Any sort of engagement is welcome, so if you want to comment, reblog, send an ask, key-smash, send a gif–even criticize–just know that it means more than you’ll ever know! pic credit: here

An air of excitement permeates the inside of the truck while Sy drives through town. Though intrusive thoughts from earlier in the day still linger somewhat, Sy easily quells your anxiety simply by being next to him.

As a passenger, you’re calm in a way you hardly ever are. Intrinsically, you trust his driving.

With a container of cookies on your lap and a case of alcohol at your feet, you happily sip your seltzer and look outside with a sort of youthful, whimsical anticipation. Colorful lights frame the passing-by houses, and in the wind, inflatable figurines dance in people’s front yards. Candles and wreaths adorn the well-lit windows, and your eyesight is drawn to the Christmas trees on display behind them.

Personally, none of the trees are as great as the one you’d picked out this morning, of course, and you’re sure to mention that to Sy. He just smiles.

Some time later, you arrive at Johnny's place, and you roll your eyes good-naturedly at the large leg-lamp on display at the main front window. Sy drives straight through the dead grass in the yard before approaching a large number of parked vehicles off to the side–most of them are other pickup trucks with their tailgates down–and as he slows down behind them and finally brakes, you gently crush the aluminum can you’re holding with one hand and unbuckle your seat-belt with the other.

Sy gestures with his head for you to drop your can on the floorboard to join the other random bits of trash there, then reaches in the backseat for his case of beer. He reaches out to take your case of seltzer next and lifts them both like air on his way out the truck.

Since Amelia and Johnny never really use the front door, you and Sy begin walking along the side of the house towards the back entrance after he kicks his truck door shut with his boot. Together, you quietly both take in your surroundings–you, because you’re curious; Sy, because he’s scoping out the scene as usual.

By the semi-circle of trucks, a crowd is standing around a fire, and though the flames are nothing in comparison to the last bonfire here, it's still large. Among the scent of the woodsmoke in the air, the significant odor of cigarettes passes by in the chilly wind. It’s a smell that reminds you of your father which, in turn, reminds you of your upcoming Virginia trip, and that, in turn, immediately reminds you of yet another thing: Sy’s going with you on said Virginia trip.

You're so happy that it almost takes you aback. With life. With this party. Just–You're never this happy to make big plans and to go to social events. Even the fun ones.

First Thanksgiving at Sy’s grandma’s house and now this. Look at you. A regular socialite. A Lifetime Hallmark movie supporting actress.

You should host something yourself, you briefly consider, but at Sy's house. The halls would be decked and the Charlie Brown tree would be lit, and you'd have hors d'oeuvres and entrees and a gingerbread-house table and a sugar-cookie table and a taking-shots-of-Fireball table and all types of stuff. Food. Games. Friends.

The thought doesn’t even stress you out. It’d be…nice. Just like tonight will be.

Of course, you're not actually going to host anything, but… Maybe one day.

Moments later, there’s a general acknowledgement of you and Sy entering the house from the sporadic individuals hanging around the kitchen making small-talk, and you smile politely before placing the container of cookies you’re holding onto a giant table in the nearby dining room. The table is pushed back against a wall and is already covered with tons of other food: cookies, brownies, and haystacks; veggie trays and fruit trays and meat trays and cheese trays; several crock-pots near the back; an assortment of pies; and chips, pretzels, and peanuts.

After putting the two cases of alcohol down on the floor under the table, Sy helps himself to a giant handful of peanuts. Looking around and not seeing anybody you immediately know well enough to approach, you follow him back into the kitchen where he helps you shrug off your jacket. In an easy display of protection, he then trails his hand down your back and over your hip before dropping it to his side.

This is where, even as excited as you are, you remain frozen next to him. You wonder if you should’ve drank a little more than just one seltzer before coming here so you’d be able to be a little more extroverted. You wonder if you’re going to come across as weird tonight.

"You good?" Sy checks in with his mouth close to your ear, and you nod.

"Fine," you promise, looking up and giving him a smile. "Just lookin' around."

Sy looks around, as well. From your spot in the kitchen, it’s closed off enough for privacy while the two of you peer through both thresholds in the room–one that leads into the dining room you were just in and the other that leads to the hall and offers a greater view of the living room.

“Don't see anyone just yet,” he tells you.

“Well, I have to find somewhere to put down my coat anyway, so maybe we should just walk around until we find someone we know, I guess,” you suggest with a shrug, but just then, a group of three men walk into the kitchen with plastic red cups in their hands. They make an instant bee-line for Sy, obviously having spotted him from the other room, and instantly begin laughing at his sweater.

“Look atchu, man!” the one in front happily says in greeting, and you watch Sy grin and reach out to shake his hand.

“You remember Thompson," Sy half-asks and half-says to you, and you nod. “We came to Johnson’s together here recently.”

Waving at the man you once referred to as Guy Who Lost To Sy At Arm Wrestling, you then take note of the men beside him, the ones you dubbed Long Hair and Quiet and Might Be Stoned. Mentally, as Sy introduces you to everyone individually, you practice repeating their names so you won’t forget them. You’ll probably forget them anyway.

“Oh, I remember y’all,” you say, taking in everyone’s ridiculous sweaters and repeating in your head: Guy Who Lost At Arm Wrestling is Thompson, Quiet and Might Be Stoned is Hawk, Long Hair is Doug; Guy Who Lost at Arm Wrestling is Thompson... “Y’all came by after playin’ poker that one night.”

"Playin’ poker ain't really nothin' more than Syverson takin' all our money then usin' it to buy us all beer," the man named Thompson clarifies, “but yeah, if that’s whatchu wanna call it.”

“Well, I guess you would’ve spent it on the beer yourself, anyway,” you say with a smile, “so it all evens out, huh?”

The men smile back, and for a brief moment, you wonder–what now? Do you comment on their funny-looking sweaters, too?--but then, you see a flash of brightly-colored hair rush through the kitchen. Sy’s sister Samantha, followed closely by Liana, approaches you before she even approaches her own brother and gives you a short but fierce hug.

“What?!” you exclaim once she lets go. “I didn’t know y’all would be here!”

Then you’re finding yourself being hugged by Liana, a little softer.

While Sy’s friends stand there looking at his sisters, you notice him squint his eyes at them. You get the impression that if he weren’t holding your coat, he'd be crossing his arms right now.

“Neither did I,” Sy pointedly says to Sam. “Y’all never actually said if y’all were comin’ or not.”

Samantha shrugs. “The thumbs-up emoji meant that I was gonna be here, Sy,” she replies.

Sy tilts his head to the side. “It means you’re confirmin’ you got the invite,” he corrects.

She rolls her eyes. “Sorry my communication isn’t up to your military standards. Next time I’ll be sure to just say affirmative or somethin’--how’s that?”

The back door suddenly opens. As a gust of cold air breezes in, so do two extremely tall men. Collectively, everyone standing around conversing in the kitchen looks towards the sound, and in walks a bald man with dark skin carrying a six-pack of beer, followed by a shorter man with an olive complexion. While a general uproar of conversation exudes from Sy’s friends at their arrival, you take a few seconds to observe them.

The taller man's wearing a blue sweater splattered with white snowflakes, and an eye-patch covers his left eye. He's about the same height and build as Sy is, and immediately after Sy spots him, you hear Sy incredulously murmur, "Get the fuck outta here.”

Both men approach one another for a loose but firm hug, and it’s clear that seeing one another is a pleasant surprise for both of them. The second they disengage, they instantly begin insulting each other with matching grins.

“Still keepin’ that head buzzed so no one has to see them ugly ass curls grow out?” the tall man says while tapping Sy a few hard times on the back.

Instead of retaliating with a joke of his own, Sy just smiles–a large smile, a showing-all-his-teeth smile–and he side-hugs the man before moving a few steps away. In response to his friend's statement, he simply rubs a hand over his head.

"You know it."

“And look atchu with them damn shorts on in the cold,” the man points to his knee-brace and comments with a grin, almost crouching down to talk to it. “That knee still predict the weather? What’s it lookin’ like for Christmas, huh? We finally gonna get us some snow?”

“Lemme rub your head an’ make a wish, maybe we will,” Sy answers with a laugh, then he turns around to face you, Liana, and Samantha. “Willie, y’remember my sisters.”

The man walks like his muscles are stiff as he steps closer to Liana and Sam. "I remember y'all," he says, briefly looking at you. "Well, I remember two'a y'all."

“Hey, Willie,” Samantha says nicely, holding up a hand and moving her fingers. She continues to stare at Sy’s friend with her hand uplifted as Sy gestures to Liana next and then finally to you.

“Now, who’s this?” the man bluntly asks. “This ain't your sister.”

“Willie, Y/N,” Sy introduces you, and you reach out and shake his hand. His skin is cold from the outdoors yet somehow still warm as he firmly but kindly takes your own, and he lets go relatively quickly after Sy approaches you and puts an arm around your shoulder.

“You gotchu a lady?” Willie picks up on the gesture before asking Sy, his grin never leaving his face.

“Nice to meet you," you smile and greet him.

“You, too, darlin’. You, too. Careful gettin’ too close to me, now,” he says, bending over to show off his head. “If you touch the bald head, I grow taller. Go on, now. Try it."

Sy harmlessly raises an eyebrow. “Alright, Slick Willie, enough.”

Sy's friend holds up his arms in surrender before looking all around the kitchen and shaking everyone’s hands. Next, he mutters under his breath that he's going to take his jacket off and find a drink somewhere. That leaves the other man Willie had entered the house with standing alone by the back door.

While Samantha and Liana whisper to each other, you stand nearby and watch Sy approach the man at the door. They both loosely embrace one another in a short, sideways hug. Seeing one another is obviously welcome, but there’s not the same surprise as the interaction with his first friend. He must see this person more regularly than he sees Willie for there to be less enthusiasm displayed.

"Missed you at the Veteran's Day parade last month, man," the man says after they disengage, and Sy nods.

"Didn’t know you were in town for it. Had somethin' goin' on with my grandma, anyway," he answers, and you watch him curiously. He never brought up a parade that he had to miss. Or anything particular going on with his grandma.

"She still hangin' in?"

Sy rubs his beard. "Oh, yeah. Tryna get her to move out is damn near impossible."

"What, you are going to put that poor old lady in a home?"

Sy chuckles before shaking his head. "Fixin’ to get her set up out on my land, actually. And she ain't no poor old lady. She's stubborn as a damn mule. Only sits down if she’s watchin’ Georgia Tech or Walker, Texas Ranger on TV.”

The man just chuckles, then his eyes meet yours. He raises his eyebrows politely.

Taking a step closer to Sy, you lift a hand to shyly yet politely wave. The man puts both of his hands together and slightly bows to you, professional yet nice.

“You must be a very special woman,” he tells you.

“Oh.” That wasn’t what you were expecting to hear, so you struggle with a reply. “Um.”

“She is,” Sy speaks up to affirm.

You look at your feet.

There's a warm fondness between Sy and this man that's not particularly missing from Willie, but Sy shows it differently. Somehow, he seems somewhat protective of this guy–like a brother. You're quickly interrupted from your observations by another crashing hug from your side. From the fruity scent alone, you know it's Amelia, and you grin and twist yourself around to hug her properly.

"Heyyy," you sing-song.

You try disengaging after about ten seconds of squeezing and rocking side-to-side before realizing you don’t care if you’re hugging one another like you haven’t seen each other in years. She’s your best friend.

Your only friend, really.

You think of Justine and quickly push the thought of her out of your head.

“I’m so glad you caaaame,” Amy gushes, her excitement already infectious. “Oh wow, those earrings are beautiful!”

“Thanks!” You widely grin as you bring a hand up to your earlobe. “I'm so glad we're here, too!"

“So did y’all just get here?” she asks, acting a little hyper and talking fast. “I’ve been runnin’ around so much my boobs are startin’ to fuckin’ sweat under this damn thing.” She pulls her sweater out in front of her and flapping it in the air to get some air under her shirt.

You chuckle. “Yeah, literally just got here a few minutes ago.”

Quickly, Amy takes hold of both of your hands and squeezes them. “And you’re stayin’, right? You’re stayin’ the night so you can drink?”

“Yup.” You nod. "As long as that's still okay."

“OhmyGod, yes,” she says. “Y’all got the guest room, you know that.”

Amelia instantly starts walking you into the dining room, calling out, “Hey, Sy! Hey, Mahmoud!” over her shoulder, and you follow, happy to not feel so awkward just standing in the middle of the kitchen. “Okay, we obviously have beer everywhere,” she explains, “but check it out. Here’s the bar.”

She gestures to a long collapsible table near the large table full of food. Covered with a bright red tablecloth and displaying literally dozens of liquor bottles, wine, and mixers, you observe everything with a smile, matching Amelia’s enthusiasm. Red and green cups of various sizes are stacked on the end of the table by a big bowl of punch, and there's also a small cocktail shaker set. Flashbacks of Johnson's Bar momentarily enter your mind, and bad memories be damned–you’re still excited to see all the stuff on display.

“Damn. You should be proud of yourself,” you enthuse. “This looks awesome. You've got everything.”

“Cleared out the liquor store last week, just about,” she jokes, and then she grabs a cup and reaches into a cooler full of ice under the table. “I mean, obviously it would’ve made more sense to have this by the actual sink, I guess, but whatever–it’s like six steps away if anyone needs it.”

You nod and look towards the kitchen where Sy is still holding your coat and still in deep conversation with the man from before–Mahmoud.

"So whatcha makin'?" you turn back to Amelia and ask with a smirk.

“A screwdriver,” she says when she stands upright again, filling the cup halfway full of clear vodka before pouring orange juice to the top.

You lower your voice. “Amy.”

“Oh, I’ll be fine,” she promises. "I'll drink it slow."

"Mmhm."

"I will," she maintains. "I'm the host. I gotta stay awake and do host shit."

You watch her in amusement for a few moments.

"So what about you? What’re you drinkin'?"

"Uh…" You look at all the options. “Well, I brought seltzers ‘cause I wasn’t sure,” you answer slowly, looking around at the different mixers and options of whiskey and liquor. “But let’s see…”

You find cranberry juice and vodka, and while you pour a drink for yourself, you side-eye Amy because you know she’s going to make fun of you.

“Baaasic,” she chirps, and you laugh.

“Says the girl who’s literally also drinking juice and vodka.”

“Hey,” she retaliates, “it’s different.”

You purse your lips. “Mmhm. Drinkin’ like a college freshman.”

“Johnny always says that, too,” she laughs.

“Where’s he at, anyway?”

“Who even knows,” someone from behind says.

Both you and Amelia turn around at the same time.

“Oh, hey!” Amy calls out before turning back to you. “Y/N, this is Johnny’s sister, Jen.”

Johnny and Jen. You smile, feeling more at ease now that Amelia is by your side during the early meet-and-greet phase that all parties like this have. You don’t know if you should shake hands with Johnny’s sister or hug her or—You don’t know what to do. You end up just waving.

“Nice to meet you,” you genuinely tell her, then you notice where you’re standing and move aside. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I’m in your way.”

“You’re totally fine,” Jen tells you. “I don’t even know what to do with all these options.”

“It’s a house full of military men,” Amelia explains, gesturing to three bottles of whiskey like a game-show sidekick. “I had to plan accordingly.”

While she and Johnny’s sister chat, you ruminate briefly, thinking that you should’ve actually introduced yourself to Jen, should’ve said your name at the very least. Or to Sy’s friend, Mahmoud, back there, too, actually. If you do that now, though, it’ll be weird. You move closer to the wall.

You take a sip of your drink and try to loosen up a bit. Not everything you do tonight is going to be scrutinized, you remind yourself. There's no reason for anxiety to creep in.

“Oh, hang on…I have an app,” you hear Amy murmur while taking out her phone and scrolling through it.

When you look back at her and notice that she’s looking up drinks to make with the ingredients available, you break out of your thoughts and step forward again. “What is it you’re in the mood for?” you ask Johnny’s sister. “I can help.”

Jen shrugs. “I really don't know. I normally just get margaritas when I go to bars and stuff.” She moves her hair away from her face. “Which is hardly, like, ever.”

"Oh, cool–I can make you one, easy," you offer, stepping into action right away to be helpful. “What kind?”

“Umm…”

You wait a beat and then turn towards the various liquor bottles and mixers, deciding on her behalf.

“I gotchu,” you just tell her, and once you've confirmed that all the ingredients are available for what you’re about to concoct, you make use of the smaller shot glasses to measure everything and start pouring it all together into a shaker—triple sec, pomegranate juice, cranberry juice, tequila.

You shake the drink over your shoulder while simultaneously bending down to get some ice from the cooler underneath the table. After using the strainer Amelia’s set out to pour the cocktail into a cup, you hand it over to Jen. She accepts it enthusiastically and immediately takes a sip, but you hesitate while waiting for her reaction. On the rocks margaritas aren’t for everyone.

You shift your weight from one leg to the other. “Uh, I could find a blender if you’d prefer it that way… Also, I didn’t see any salt or anything for the–”

“Shit,” Amy cusses at herself, going so far as to actually stomp on the ground with her boot. “I knew I forgot somethin’ at the store.”

“It’s great,” Jen reassuringly tells both you and Amelia before meeting eyes with you. “Thanks so much! What was your name again?”

“Oh–it’s Y/N,” you answer. “I’m Sy’s…I’m with Sy.”

“She’s Sy’s girlfriend,” Amelia supplants, “but we’re friends from work, too.”

“Oh, cool. Nice to meet you,” Jen says. You may simply imagine it, but you think you see her glance at Amelia after that, and you don’t know what they’re silently communicating about–if anything. Usually people do that when they’re being rude, but you can’t believe that’s possibly the case with Johnny’s sister.

To save you from letting your thoughts travel somewhere unwelcome, you look over into the kitchen and see both Johnny and Sy in there together, Sy holding a beer and listening to an animated story from Johnny, your jacket now gone from his grasp and Mahmoud now gone from the room.

You jut your head to gesture to the other room. “Looks like we found your brother.”

While Jen smiles at you–a genuine smile, a nice smile–Liana walks up to you from the other direction. “Hey, lady,” she says, and you beam at her. She’s chosen a not-ugly-at-all-outfit to wear and looks super cute in black leggings and an oversized red sweater.

“Hey, hey. Gettin' a drink?”

“Might as well. Can't drink much, though.”

“Whatcha want?”

“Oh, I’m just gonna pour myself some wine,” Liana tells you, then she does a double-take. “What, are you makin’ people drinks?”

You shrug. “If they want.”

“Can you do a Moscow mule?” Samantha suddenly appears and shamelessly asks, putting her elbow on your shoulder. Liana rolls her eyes while Samantha widely smiles.

“You’ve always gotta be so freakin’ weird,” Liana says. “Who even drinks that?”

Sam straightens up. “I’ll have you know that it’s festive.”

“Just like your sweater,” you wink at her and say before starting to get the ingredients together for her request. Her sweater is utterly ridiculous. Covered in colored, blinking lights, it’s almost worse than your own.

While you scurry into the kitchen to quickly rinse off the stuff you've already used to mix Jen’s drink, you hear Amelia cuss at herself for not considering that she should've set up the drink station by the sink after all.

“Honestly, I bet no one cares,” you tell her. “I wouldn’t sweat it.”

You hum under your breath and work your way through the three simple ingredients for Sam's drink. She doesn’t seem to care that it’s not technically traditional since you’re working with limited glassware and garnishes, and she accepts it just as enthusiastically as Jen had. It's not until you're methodically shaking the third drink for a person who’s approached you asking for help–Willie himself–that you realize a crowd has begun to stare at you, distantly including Sy himself. Your face heats up.

"I, uh. I used to bartend," you mumble in explanation to whoever’s around.

Amy takes the jigger from your hands. “Girl, you need to stop. You're not here to work."

“It’s really not that much work, though,” you joke, snatching the small glass back. "It'll keep me from over-pourin' the alcohol like some people."

"My momma didn't raise no bitch," Amy says around the straw in her mouth she's procured from somewhere.

You're unable to stop yourself from laughing. "Jesus, Amy," you mutter under your breath.

"Seriously, though,” she persists, “put it down. You haven’t even picked up your own drink.”

That's not necessarily true, but– "Okay, okay," you relent. You hand Willie his drink and then instantly grab one more plastic cup as Amelia lightly smacks your shoulder.

“Y/N!” she chastises.

"Wait up,” you laugh, grabbing a bottle of rum and a container of store-bought eggnog. “Just let me mix this eggnog for Sy and then I'll be done."

Amelia lets you finish up your gig at the table before walking into the kitchen with you. She approaches Johnny and exaggeratedly pouts. “I didn’t think about the fact that the strainer and stuff would need to be rinsed out every time a new drink was made,” she whines. “I knew I shoulda set everything up in here…”

“Ah, fuck it,” Johnny tells her as he hooks an arm around her shoulder. “Most of the guys are drinkin’ beer or whiskey straight. It’s y’all chicks who’re over there makin’ all the fruity stuff.”

At that, Sy accepts the eggnog from you with a small smile before raising an eyebrow at your drink of choice. “Whatchu got there?”

“Vodka craaan,” you sing-song while stepping into his space and getting up on your tip-toes.

He puts his beer on the counter behind him to free up one of his hands and then instantly moves some hair away from your face. "You went and made ‘bout everyone in this place drinks, and here you’re drinkin' that."

“What’s that even mean?” you laugh. “It’s good. Wanna try it?”

He takes a sip of your drink and makes a sour expression that causes you to fondly stare at his cute fucking stupid scrunched-up face, then he offers the eggnog to you in turn.

"It’s for you–It'll hurt my stomach," you decline, then lower your voice. "Plus I don't wanna drink too much and act stupid in front of all these people or anything. Or throw up."

He nods. "Just go slow. Ain't no one here about to do keg stands tonight."

"Ha, ha.”

"Unfortunately," Johnny speaks up. "These days, we're all too injured."

“Think the word you’re lookin’ for is old,” Sy corrects.

“Speak for yourself, OMS,” he retaliates.

You choose not to comment on whatever the hell OMS means and instead ask, "So wait, did y'all used to do keg-stands?"

"Did we used to do keg-stands, she asks," Johnny looks at Sy and laughs.

"They went through this thing together called their twenties," Amy chimes in.

You smile. “I want pictures.”

“Too bad, darlin’,” Sy gives you his signature wink and says. “We weren’t stupid enough to record it.”

You stew on that for a minute. So Sy wouldn’t take incriminating pictures of drunkenness, but he…he’ll take pictures of you. Doing things. Intimate things. Without replying, you just look at him, and as he often does, he calmly looks back. Then he takes a sip of his eggnog without blinking and licks the residual cream off his mustache.

Suddenly, Willie steps into the kitchen and pretends to lower his face to kiss Amelia. Johnny lifts a hand to fake-backhand him while Willie lifts his hands in humored innocence. Some liquid from the drink he’s holding spills on his sweater.

He ignores the spill and steps closer to Johnny. "Dayumm. You hangin' around Sy too long,” he says as he yanks Johnny's beard. “Y'all all be lookin' like damn lumberjacks ‘round here.”

"No-Shave November carries on," Johnny simply says, scratching his beard to accentuate it after smacking Willie’s hand away.

“No-Shave November?” Willie asks while he touches his smooth face. “No one told me. Thought it was No-Nut November.”

Johnny laughs. “No one needs to hear about that from you, man.”

“Hey, the ladies just might,” Willie persists. “Maybe they’ll feel bad for me. Havin’ one eye is bad enough, right? But then add a drought to the mix–”

Sy looks at you and smiles with his eyes after Willie’s crassness. You’re used to it from Sy himself, so you smirk back.

Willie–clearly a very extroverted and lively man–then goes on to yet another topic, clapping Sy on the shoulder. As they start talking, that’s Amelia’s cue to cart you away again, and she slips out from Johnny’s arm, links elbows with you, and starts leading you into the next room.

“Soooo.” She takes a sip of her drink. “What were you and Sy talkin’ about a minute ago?”

“Hm?”

“Back there makin’ heart eyes at each other.”

“Nosy,” you chuckle. "I was just tellin’ him I don't wanna drink too fast and get sick tonight, that's all."

Amelia makes a face. "Yeah, we don't want that," she agrees. "So–Things are goin’ good with y’all, though?”

“Things are goin’…really good,” you tell her while you continue to stroll into the next room. A football game is on the television with the sound muted to allow for the Christmas music playing from a large speaker to be heard instead. “Things are great.”

You take a look around the room. Where there used to be a large couch in the middle of the living room, now there's an even larger sectional couch pushed against the back walls, opening up more space for small groups of people to congregate. Amelia smiles brightly at the few people hanging around casually talking but doesn’t interrupt their conversations.

Beside the window where the leg-lamp is proudly on display, a rotating artificial Christmas tree wrapped with colorful lights slowly spins. You notice a handful of presents under the tree before your eyes continue their journey through the room’s decorations. You laugh when you notice a deer-head mounted on the wall behind the sofa with a fake red nose and a Santa hat on it.

“You changed it up in here,” you say, still checking out all the updates Amelia has made since the last time you came by.

“Yeah. Got the couch off Facebook Marketplace,” she just murmurs.

“Ooh, lucky you. I never find anything good on there,” you sit down on the couch and say after comfortably bouncing a few times on the cushion. “Your tree looks so cool, too.”

“Oh, thanks. I honestly hate fake ones,” she admits while sitting next to you, “but I got a good deal on it, too.”

“It’s really cool that it rotates like that.”

Amy makes a noise in her throat. “Means I had to decorate the whole damn thing instead of just throwing ornaments on the front and shoving the thing in the corner.”

You laugh. “So, Sy and I went to a Christmas tree farm just this mornin’. Got a little tree for his place.”

“Which one?”

“Like, a really small one.”

“What’s the name?”

“Um…” You blink. “I dunno. Pine?”

Amy laughs. “The name of the tree farm, not the tree.”

“Oh.” Normally embarrassed by now, you just laugh along with her. “I have no clue. The big one out by Miller’s Gap.”

“Ohh, I love that lot,” she comments. “There’re some good hiking spots over that way, too, if you didn’t already know.”

“I actually didn’t know that, thanks.” You lower your voice. “So get this–His family freakin’ owns the farm. The land…The whole operation…it’s all theirs.”

Amelia drops her jaw. “Y/N, I bet he’s loaded,” she says with no filter. “Y’know, I knew it. He’s always had that vibe. I bet he’s absolutely loaded. Like those old farmers around here that go around wearin’ all their old clothes, drivin' their same old truck that’s days away from breakin’ down, but when they go out to eat and open their wallets, there's a stack of hundreds in there two inches thick. Bags of cash in their closets 'cause they don't trust the banks."

“Jars full of coins buried in their yards,” you go on.

She snaps her fingers. “Yes!”

You shrug. “I…never really thought about it, honestly. It’s his extended family, anyway, so who even knows.”

"I mean, I don't care or anything,” Amelia clarifies. “It’s not like I'm not a gold digger."

"Well, obviously you know I'm not, either,” you chuckle. “We’re both freakin’ social workers.”

She wags her eyebrows. "I'm just sayin'..."

"Yeah," you laugh. "I mean, not havin' to worry about money would be definitely be nice. I honestly wouldn't know what that'd even feel like.”

“Girl, same.”

You take a sip of your drink so you don’t have to dwell on student loans and your stupid financial situation with Justine too much.

“But even if Sy did have some crazy stash somewhere,” you go on, “it's his, not mine.”

Amy side-eyes you. “You honestly think that’s how he’d consider it?”

"I mean…I dunno. It makes me uncomfortable even imagining him wasting money on me," you mumble, and you see the visible frown on your friend's face.

"It wouldn’t be–If he wants to spoil you, let him," she says. “That's not wasting.”

You let out a noise of discomfort and shake your head, and before you can say anything else, Amelia gets a strange, far-away look on her face that makes you scrunch your eyebrows together in confusion.

“What’s wrong?”

She shrugs. “I dunno.”

You sit up straighter and peek into her drink. It’s not even half-gone yet, so she can’t be feeling sick or something. “Did I say something?”

Heavily, she sighs. “Okay, so here's the thing. I'm not complaining at all when I say this, but Johnny and I usually go out on dates at least, like, once a week. Every Saturday night–that's always been our thing. But it's been a little tight lately, so we haven't gone out in over a month." She looks at you with something like guilt on her face. “Doesn’t that sound like the stupidest thing? Like I’m being shallow as fuck?”

“Oh, Amy…” You purse your lips in consideration. “I mean, not necessarily. Not if that’s what you’re used to doing. It makes sense you’d miss it.”

She shrugs again. "It’s not like I have a right to complain, either. Blue collar work’s just like that. Everything depends on the jobs available. It’s easier in the summer when there’s more work to do."

You frown. “I'm sure if he said somethin’ to Sy…I bet Sy would put him to work. He's gonna need help clearin' all the property he just got so he can build on it."

"Yeah, Johnny actually mentioned somethin' about it already," Amelia acknowledges. "They're gonna wait ‘til spring when the ground’s softer, though.”

“Gotcha. Well..I mean, if y’all needed any money or anything, I can–I can give you all my beeper-duty shifts if you wanted some extra hours. And I’ll chip in for the food and drinks tonight, too, how’s that?”

“Oh, my God,” she laughs. “It’s not like–it’s fine. Don’t even worry about it.”

“But that’s what I do,” you murmur.

She smiles. “Well, stop.”

You can’t help it; you feel bad that she’s letting you in on the fact that she and Johnny are having money issues. Well…potentially. You don’t even know. Maybe her version of ‘money being tight’ isn’t what you’ve always been used to. To you, money being ‘tight’ means there’s a genuine struggle, an imminent fear of food insecurity and sleeping with your jacket on and maybe having to stay at an aunt’s house for the next month.

This is Amy and Johnny, though. They’re not like how you were raised. They’re responsible. They’ve likely got savings.

“All the food and drinks you got for tonight probably cost as much as a month’s worth of dates,” you mention. “You reckon that’s the reason why you haven’t been goin’ out as much? Johnny’s bein’ smart? Especially with Christmas right around the corner?”

She tilts her head. “I mean, that does make a lotta sense. He did let me go overboard, didn’t he?” she laughs.

While you put your thumb and forefinger together to gesture to her ‘just a tad’, she reaches out and mechanically begins moving the arm you’re holding your cup with upwards to your mouth. “Well, make it worth it, then, and drink up!”

Through a smile, you take another small sip of your drink. “Let me know when y’all are back in action, though. We've still gotta have our double-date, you know,” you remind her.

And just like that, she's bubbly again. “Yes!” she exclaims.

After a little more alcohol flows through you, all rigid outlines of any residual social anxiety from earlier soften out, melting. You may pay for it tomorrow, but for once you feel…normal. As more people steadily enter the house, filling it with high-energy noise and enthusiasm, you find yourself being more outgoing than you usually would be. Amelia flutters around to speak to all the new arrivals, and you find yourself matching the energy of the house, happily talking to people–strangers, even. It’s not for very long, though; Amelia snags you away to hang out with her again the first moment she’s able to.

A brief thought enters your mind that she must feel sorry for you or something and is only hanging out with you to save you from being awkwardly alone in her house, but you carelessly toss the thought aside as quickly as it comes to you. She’s not like that. You actually get the impression that she truly prefers to be with you over all of the other people she’s invited, and it’s…it’s an unknown feeling to have.

It’s friendship.

Back in the living room with Amy, you quickly find yourself in the middle of a conversation with some co-workers she invited, and while you’re catching up on your work-weeks, you think everything’s going really well. There’s none of the weirdness that being in the office together brings, and having some alcohol to lower your weird inhibitions is nice. Just like in the office, however, it’s not long before the women group themselves off to go somewhere else, but it’s totally fine–Soon after that, you hear the distinctive voices of Sy’s sisters as they walk into the living room.

“It’s a nice thought and everything,” Liana’s saying to a person behind her as she walks closer to the couch, “but I don’t really need a bag just ‘cause it’s got some famous person’s name on it.”

Sam follows Liana and heavily sighs before she sits on the couch cushion directly next to you. Instantly, she nudges your arm with her elbow to get your attention. “Liana’s new boyfriend wants to–”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Liana interjects before she sits down on the couch, too.

Samantha rolls her eyes. “The man Liana has been seeing lately wants to get her a designer purse for Christmas.”

“Oh,” you comment, then you piece together what Liana was just saying and turn towards her. “But you don’t want one?”

She shrugs. “It just seems weird, that’s all,” she says. “We’ve only been talkin’ for, like, a month and a half. Doesn’t that seem weird to you?”

“I mean…” You tilt your head to the side. “Kinda.”

Liana gives Samantha a look. “See?” she asks before taking a sip of her wine.

“But to be fair, I’m really horrible with the whole ‘present’ thing," you admit. “So I’m probably not the best person to ask.”

“What do you mean?” Samantha asks with interest.

Blinking, you remain quiet. How do you even begin to answer that question? “I’ve been conditioned for a very, very long time that I don’t deserve anything nice, so receiving presents is something that makes me extremely uncomfortable”?” “I hate being watched for my reaction when opening presents because I feel like I have to perform to satisfy someone else’s expectations”? “I still can’t help but view presents as a tool of manipulation or as some sort of way to get something from me”? Any of these explanations would be entirely off-putting.

You settle with, “Um, I really can’t explain it. Presents just–they’re just stressful sometimes. I mean, this time of year it’s mainly the actual shopping that really stresses me out, though, I guess,” you explain, probably sounding predictable.

“Why,” Sam says quickly, "'cause inflation's a motherfucker?”

You grin. She seems so much like Sy sometimes. “Well, there’s that," you reply with a laugh.

“Oh, trust me, I get it, but I didn’t mean giving away presents,” she clarifies. “I mean accepting presents.”

You look to the side. Here you were, being normal for once, and now you’ve gone and made things weird. Saying something that other people can’t relate to because it’s so bizarre.

"Well, when you’re buyin’ presents,” Liana steps in and says, “you have to think about what everyone's gonna like, you know? And once you finally find somethin', then you worry if the person has it already or if they're even gonna like it at all or if they’ll just return it and think you’re stupid. And it’s a lot of pressure.”

Eyes brightening, you snap your fingers and point to her. “Exactly.”

“And then when you’re actually gettin’ gifts,” Liana goes on, “it’s the same thing. It’s like–well, what if they got me way more than I got them? Or what if I already have it, or what if I don’t actually like it, and what if the other person’s gonna feel bad? I wouldn’t want someone to get upset or anything, so then it’s like you have to be really careful not to hurt someone’s feelings. It’s just a lot to consider.”

“Oh, it’s just meant to be fun, y'all, c’mon," Amelia says lightheartedly.

You sigh. “Yeah.”

"Did Sy getchu anything yet?" Liana asks Samantha, sympathetically looking at you directly afterwards to show you that she understands where you’re coming from. You offer her a small smile before you take a sip of your drink.

"No, why?"

“Oh, 'cause he got me somethin’ already,” she answers. "I was wonderin' if you got somethin' early, too."

"What?" Sam asks in a high-pitched voice. "Why d'you always get the special treatment?"

Liana drops her mouth. "Your freakin' art school's paid off thanks to him, Sam, shut the hell up."

Samantha gets quiet. "Yeah, he really is too much sometimes," she agrees, almost guiltily. "So, what'd he get you?"

“A set of new tires,” Liana murmurs, also with a touch of guilt, and Sam just rolls her eyes.

“God, he’s so extra.”

You sit there listening while your face grows hot. You really hope he wouldn't do something too big for you for a Christmas present. Art school and four new tires for his sisters? What's he gonna get you, then? A car from his giant collection?

Oh, God. What if he really did?

You really don't handle large gifts well. In the most evident example, you interpreted just the nice dinner and roses he set up for you recently as some sort of elaborate scheme, and you honestly don't trust your own brain to graciously accept anything above the price of, like, forty dollars.

But then you remember–these are Sy’s sisters he’s bought these things for. People he’s known for years and years and years. With the amount of time he’s known you, you don’t have to worry about extravagance. He wouldn’t.

"What's he gettin' you, huh?" you hear, and it takes a few seconds before you realize Samantha is directing the question at you.

"Oh." You shrug and nervously pick at your pants with the hand that’s not holding your drink. "Um. Does Sy usually tell people what he's gettin' them beforehand?"

She laughs. "No, no, he doesn't actually do that or anything. Usually. I mean, sometimes there are hints, but I just mean: what'd you ask for?"

"Nothing…" you answer, and his sisters stare at you.

"Aww, bet he's gonna surprise you, then,” Samantha says.

"If he knows me at all," you mutter, "I really hope he wouldn't."

Liana cuts her eyes towards her sister. "Sam, stop naggin' her. She just said it stresses her out."

Sam loses the smile. "Oh, shit. I'm sorry. I really didn't mean to–"

"It's totally cool," you interrupt, smiling back. "I'm honestly just weird with gifts, that’s all. Or–weird in general. Not your fault at all."

“You’re not weird,” Liana says. “Our family’s just…We just really like the holidays ‘cause there were so many years that Sy never got to be around. And now he is. It’s just meant to be fun. But I know exactly how it can be stressful. Especially, you know, since my…since my separation."

You frown a bit and nod at her in understanding.

“You and Sy could just skip the gift-givin',” Samantha suggests. “There's nothin' wrong with that.”

"Oh, well, I actually did get him something already.”

"Ooh! What?"

“Um.” You hesitate. "It’s really not much... I honestly don't know if it's even appropriate."

While Amelia cackles, Sam holds up a hand. "Oh, Jesus. Say no more. I don't wanna hear about any of that stuff." She makes a face. "Not my fuckin' brother."

"No, no, no," you quickly clarify, laughing. "Not, like–No. Not inappropriate like that."

They stare at you. You sigh.

"It's a picture frame with a paw print on the side," you mutter. "And it says All Dogs Go To Heaven on it."

Collectively, Sy’s sisters make "aww" sounds, so that's good, at least, but still, you shrug.

"I just saw it and thought–" You sigh. "He's sorta touchy about it. Like, he won't talk about…that. Not since the day it happened."

Samantha nods.

"Plus, the heaven thing…. I don't know. He's…It’s not like he’s really religious."

"That's fair," she says. "Doesn’t mean he doesn't believe in it somewhere on the inside."

"We haven't really talked much about that topic," you say, "but I do know y’all grew up goin’ to church."

"Yeah, MaMaw used to make Sy comb his hair and everything back then. It's curly when it’s long, didju know? So he used to part it on the side and wet it all down before combing it, and he'd be stuck with, like, this giant nest of curls just on one side of his head. He was such a nerd."

You grin, having a hard time imagining that. "He just hasn’t ever mentioned wantin' to go back to church or any of that, that's all,” you explain. “Not that it’s a thing–I mean, I don’t go, either.”

"'Cause it ain't what it used to be," Sam replies. "But like I said, it doesn't mean he doesn't believe in an afterlife. He just struggles with it. He's known too many people who've died. It…It messes with him."

To her side, Liana remains quiet.

"Yeah," you softly reply, not knowing what else to say.

"Startin' with our parents and then the military," Sam continues. "I'd be lyin' if I said he didn't have a hard time dealin' with it. But honestly, I think he'll love what you got him.”

"You don’t think it’ll be sorta sad to give on Christmas, though?"

"Meaningful," she corrects.

“I think so, too,” Amelia pipes in. You give her a small smile.

After a few quiet moments, Samantha shakes her empty cup and abruptly asks, “Anyone up for a refill?”

You, Amelia, and Liana immediately stand up, and you make an apologetic face at everyone for dampening the mood. “Let’s do it.”

Back at the drink table, Amelia makes another screwdriver, much weaker than her first, and you decide to reach underneath the table for one of your selzters instead of drinking more vodka. Before you crack open the can, you ask Samantha, “You want another Moscow Mule?”

“Only if you’re offerin’!”

You smile and get to work, happy that you’re bonding so well with her, and as had happened earlier in the night, you eventually find yourself skillfully mixing drinks for stray individuals who end up lingering near the drink table. When Johnny’s sister, Jennifer, steps up and asks for another margarita like she’s been waiting for you, you decide to make her one in a different flavor that you think she’ll like.

Perpendicular to the drink table is the now-messy food table where a half-empty charcuterie board still displays some fruits and cheeses. You steal a few cherries for Jennifer’s drink and, just for fun, wave one of them in front of Samantha’s nose.

“You should tie one in a knot with your tongue,” Samantha jokes before chanting, ”Do it, do it, do it.”

Amelia laughs. "Oh, please! No one can really do that.”

"Oh, actually I can," you offhandedly say as you start pouring mixers together.

Amelia drops her jaw. "What?"

"Yeah," you slowly say while shaking the cocktail mixer above your shoulder. "It's really not anything special."

"O-kay," she laughs. "It's only, like, next to impossible for most people to even attempt doing."

You squint your eyes and turn to her. "That can't be right. All the chicks at Johnson's could do it, too."

She stares at you dully. "Yeah, 'cause y'all are bartenders."

You laugh and pour out the drink into Jennifer’s cup. "What's bein' a bartender got to do with it?"

"I dunno," she giggles. "The rest of society doesn't have that talent. You're, like, around cherries more or somethin'."

You find yourself giggling back. "Yeah, okay. At Johnson's, all there was was stale beer and fruit flies. I never got to make any special drinks. Well, kinda," you go on, realizing the alcohol you’ve been imbibing is hitting you because you're feeling extra social. "I had tried to start a drink program and even trained everyone and stuff, but no one ever really caught on or pushed the drinks or anything, and when someone did order somethin' besides beer, half the time the drinks were made all crazy-different, so people just learned to just order beer, I guess. From a glass, though. Not the kegs."

After you garnish Jennifer’s drink with a few cherries on top and hand it to her, happy to note that she’s excited, Amy holds up a sole cherry by her face.

“What?” you ask her.

As she twirls the cherry by its stem, you just stare at her.

"Is this a dare?"

"I'm dying to see this.” Amelia lowers her voice before saying between her lips, "I'm sure Sy is, too."

In your peripheral vision, you notice Sy from his ugly sweater alone, and you slyly glance at him. Still in the damn kitchen and now leaning against the back countertop with his arms folded, it appears that though his friends around him are all animatedly conversing together, he’s looking at you. You make quick eye-contact and then look back at Amelia.

As you take the cherry from her, she grins. "Should I time you? How long's it gonna take?"

"Uhh, like, twenty seconds, I dunno."

"Twenty seconds?"

"I mean, I dunno," you concede, shrugging. "Watch me not even be able to do it at all."

You place the cherry in your mouth and give Amy a little head-shake when you see her going for her phone to record you. She rolls her eyes.

“Stop looking at me,” you tell her around the fruit in your mouth, starting to laugh with slight anxiety.

Looking to the side so you don't have to feel the weight of people's stares, you strategically move your tongue and jaw together to get the cherry positioned where you want it, and though you know you look odd because there's no other way about it, you use your tongue to take control of the cherry's stem to twist it in a loop. Eventually you just hover your hand over your mouth to hide it.

It's simply a matter of manipulating the cherry stem enough to bend where you want it to. Since you've done it enough times in your life, it doesn't take long for you to complete. When you're finished, you’re brazen enough to stick out your tongue to show Sy off in the distance, then you remove the stem from your mouth entirely and hold it up. Even though it was honestly no big feat, you're met with rowdy cheers that make you grin and take a bow.

Amy takes your hand and discreetly pulls you to the side–you guess so no one else will ask you to make any more drinks. "Sy's watchin' you like a damn hawk over there."

"Yeah, he's got good vision," you say while finally opening your can of seltzer, and she laughs.

"What?"

"He can see long distances," you explain.

She laughs again. "Yeah, okay, true. But I was talkin' about you, dumbass. Give yourself some credit here."

"Oh, I know I'm awesome," you say, flipping your hair, and she beams at you. You'd only talk like this while buzzed, so you grin back at her and take a long drink.

"You're gonna get some tonight," she sing-songs, and you shake your head at her.

You just look down, trying not to let your thoughts show all over your face. After last night and this morning, you highly doubt that.

"What?" Amy asks.

“Nothin’,” you tell her.

"Girl…" She grins. “You’ve got the whole guest room!”

“We’re not gonna–Stop. We're not gonna use the room for that.”

She smirks around the straw in her mouth. "What?! Oh, come on. I'll wash the sheets, it's totally fine."

You turn your head to stare at her. "Ew, Amy."

"Ew?" she repeats. "I have been invested in this relationship from the very, very beginning, and I’ll do everything in my power to keep this thing goin' strong."

"Including providing the bed," you joke.

She nods. "Damn straight."

"I mean–" You laugh. "Thanks, I guess," you tell her, feeling reminiscent of a college party, back when couples hooked up all over the place by the end of the night. "I just don't think we're gonna, that's all."

"Booo."

You stick out your tongue. "Peer pressurin' me isn't cool," you tell her, and she straightens up.

"I seriously was only tryin' to be funny," she promises. "I didn't mean it. I'll stop."

You softly smile at her. "It's all good. You wanna know why I said it's probably not gonna happen?"

She squints her eyes. "Why?"

"'Cause we've already done it twice in the past twenty-four hours," you whisper, and Amelia's eyes get big.

"What the fuck?" she whisper-hisses, and you start laughing.

To drive home the point, you reach upwards for the collar of your turtleneck and pull it down to show her the noticeably discolored skin on the side of your neck.

With her eyes unable to get any bigger, Amelia just reaches out her hand and grabs your arm, shaking there because she can’t contain herself. You lean your head into her neck and just laugh.

It’s not often that you feel loose like this, but you guess with no type of pending worry weighing you down–no time you’ve got to be back home by, no beeper that might go off from work because you’re on call, no work you’ve got to get up for early the next morning, no kids you have to go home to take care of–you’re able to just…have fun and drink. And talk.

And talk and talk and talk. The women group themselves off in the living room again–meaning you, Amelia, Jen, and Sy’s sisters–and on your third drink now, you find yourself feeling silly while telling stories and listening to stories and singing songs and taking pictures. When Amelia grabs your hips from behind and begins dancing with you, you go with it gleefully–to Christmas music–unable to stop laughing.

Eventually you all calm down again on the couch, and by that time, there’s a new person sitting on the very end of it, quietly invested in the college football game playing on the television ahead. After you peek at him and vaguely recollect who he is, you get the impression that he’s maybe trying to avoid you. Or maybe he just doesn’t feel like talking. With a little bit of liquid courage imbibing you, though, you decide to speak.

“Garrison, right?” you ask slowly, and the man ducks his head briefly. "'Member me?"

"Oh, yeah, hi," he murmurs. "Syverson won't let me live it down."

You knew he was feeling odd about what happened at the bonfire this summer. You knew it. Instead of regretting the decision to talk to him, now you're glad you said something.

"Aw, don't even worry about it," you casually let slide. "If it weren’t for you, we might never've met, me and Sy."

That technically is a true statement, you guess, and you watch while Garrison nods a bit in consideration. After making a small grunt that all the men in this group of friends must share as a part of their caveman communication, he even lets a little smile show on his rugged face.

"So, how ya been doin'?" you ask.

Garrison looks surprised you're continuing to talk to him. "Not bad," he answers. "You?"

"Oh, just fine, thanks," you say. To make a joke out of the situation that had occurred last time you'd crossed paths, you then grin and say, "Stayin' away from the bonfire tonight."

Garrison rolls his eyes at himself. "Yeah, I…can't really apologize enough for that night…They had 'shine goin' 'round," he explains. "Shit goes right–Stuff goes right to my head."

"You don't have to censor yourself," you laugh. "I'm the same way with moonshine. And I really am okay–I was totally just jokin'."

The man still looks sheepish, and it's a bit funny to you because he's so large. "Yeah, well…"

"It's seriously okay," you say again, and you turn your attention back to the television and idly begin watching along with Garrison.

Eventually, you excuse yourself to use the bathroom, and in front of the mirror, you dance to yourself while washing your hands. “Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock,” you sing under your breath, and when you open the door whistling, you’re greeted by Sy standing outside in the hallway.

You gasp before beaming at him. “Oh, hi!”

“Hey, you.” He smiles. “Figured waitin’ out here was a good way to get you alone for a second.”

Your face somewhat falls. “I’m so sorry. I really don’t mean to be ignoring you or anything. It’s just–I’ve been talking a lot and I wasn’t thinking–”

Sy takes a step forward. “Hey, no. It ain’t like that.”

“But you wanted to introduce me to the—to your friends.”

“And I did,” Sy says.

“Oh,” you reply, growing relieved. “So I’m not being rude?”

He touches your elbow and fondly stares at you with slightly glossy eyes. “No.”

“Okay. Good.”

“Good,” he repeats.

There’s something glinting in his eyes, and it’s oddly reminiscent of some sort of prideful adoration. The only thing you know to equate it to is drunkenness. “...Are you drunk?”

He chuckles. “No.”

“Oh.” You continue looking up at him. “Me either. Not that it matters. I was just asking. Neither of us have to driv–”

“C’mere.”

Sy’s lips are slightly wet when they meet yours. Yours are slightly parted. When you register that he’s kissing you kissing you, you gasp in surprise, but at the direction of his mouth, your own lips change course within moments. You can only lean back against the wall and accept the sudden affection.

Soon, Sy is holding both of your arms at the elbows, and you’re finding it hard to think. You’re finding it hard to do anything, really, since he’s gloriously in your space making it his own, taking up your air. The beer on his breath makes your lips tingle, the sweetness mixing with the alcohol on your own, and with your arms practically pinned to the wall, they twitch by your sides with the desire to clutch onto his sweater. Soon, you pour that desire into the kiss alone, gently moving your face to the left and then to the right again, chasing the taste.

This same spot is where he kissed you over the summer. Back when you’d stayed at the farmhouse overnight together for the first time…he’d kissed you right here against this same wall. With just your swimsuit on. With his hands all over you.

You could easily get carried away like this.

“Wait, wait,” you say against his beard, grabbing his forearms and shifting out of his grip a bit.

As you begin to walk backwards down the hall and guide him with you, he mumbles, “What’re you doin’?”

When you get to where you want to be, you point above you to the threshold separating the hallway from the living room. On the side of the threshold hangs a small chalkboard with the words “Love is just a kiss away” written in cursive on it. On the top of it is a low-hanging bunch of green leaves and white berries.

Sy looks up. “Gettin' me under the mistletoe?”

You guess it really doesn’t make any sense to go from kissing entirely privately in the hallway to being out in the open like this, but oh well. Replying to Sy with a big, closed-mouth smile, you happily nod, and then you place your hand on his chest, step onto your tip-toes, and give him another kiss. His hands fall to your waist instantly.

Entirely different from how you’d kissed privately just moments ago, you keep it appropriate while still stretching it out. Still, you see Amelia indulgently watching you from the nearby couch in the living room with her phone conspicuously pointed in your direction.

When you stand on solid ground again, you wipe your mouth and give her a look. "What?" you call out.

"Nothin'," she replies airily yet loudly enough for you to hear before placing the straw to her drink in her mouth and speaking around it: "Feel free to continue."

Next, Samantha gives Sy a grossed-out look that you know is just to tease, and then she stands up from the sofa and walks closer to him. "Well, move over, asshole. Let me stand under this mess of twigs next," she says while leaning against the wall. "Maybe I'll get lucky."

Amelia gets up from the couch next and approaches Samantha with a mischievous look in her eyes. "Actually, let me introduce you to someone," she links elbows with Sam and says, leading her away down the hall.

You look upwards at Sy. "That woman," you mutter with a vague smile on your mouth. "Always tryin' to set someone up."

Sy watches his sister disappear down the hall and around the corner where the basement stairs are, and he shakes his head before looking back at you. You stand there smiling wistfully back at him.

"What?" he eventually asks, teasing.

You hook your index fingers into the belt-loop of his khakis. "What d'you mean, what?"

Sy slightly squeezes his hands on your waist. "You're lookin' at me funny."

“You’re lookin’ at me funny,” you counter.

“Guess we’re both funny then.”

Feeling entirely stupid, you grin. “Guess we are.”

Softly, Sy continues to look at you, and with the way you’re standing with his hands on your hips, it’s almost like you could start swaying any minute, letting the background music guide you together.

The thought of Sy dancing causes you to smile, then grin, then laugh, but after that, Johnny inadvertently breaks up you and Sy’s flirtatious moment by approaching from the side, his red sweater blaringly loud. He clears his throat to get Sy’s attention, and you see the ghost of a smirk on his mouth.

“You been in this kitchen all night, man,” he says.

“Catchin’ up with folks,” Sy replies. “That a problem?”

Genuinely, Johnny lets his smirk free, but you don’t really know what he’s finding so amusing. “Nah, man, do your thing. Everyone’s finally ready for cards downstairs, though. You in?”

Sy looks at you and raises an eyebrow–his form of inviting you.

“Uhh…Sure,” you agree, then you amend it to, “Maybe.”

Johnny leads the way down the hall before opening a door and loudly descending the stairs that are revealed. Before following him directly, you step to the side for Sy to go downstairs next, but he shakes his head and gestures for you to go ahead of him. As you go downstairs, you wonder why.

Whenever he’s in a bed, he sleeps in the spot that’s closest to the door. Whenever he’s in a restaurant, he sits in the spot that’s furthest away from the door. Now, whenever he’s going down the stairs, he goes last? Is that a new thing or have you just been oblivious to this habit before now?

Sy’s hand touches the small of your back when you both reach the bottom of the stairs. All around the panel-covered basement, you notice several mismatched couches and chairs positioned around an old circular table in the middle of the room. Almost every spot is occupied by a large man either holding a long-neck bottle of beer or a clear plastic cup of amber liquid on ice.

“Ah, so this is where everyone’s been,” you quietly murmur, noticing a bunch of the guys who had spoken to Sy in the kitchen earlier in the night.

Sy leads you further into the room to find a spot to sit around the card-table. “The noise was gettin’ too much for a lot of ‘em.”

After Sy picks out a small love-seat to occupy, you sit down beside him and look around to find Amelia in the corner of the basement talking with Samantha and Long Hair. Shit, what is that guy’s name? You knew you’d forget.

Leaning closer to Sy, you quietly ask, “What’s that guy’s name again over there?”

Sy matches where your eyes are looking and then answers, “Dub.”

“Oh, that’s right–Wait, Dub?” you ask, unable to stop a strange expression from taking over your face. “I thought you said his name was Doug.”

Sy smiles. “His name’s actually Waylon, but he don’t like bein’ called that.”

With confusion still covering your face, Sy further explains, “Waylon starts with ‘w’.”

It takes you far too long to figure out what that has to do with anything. “Ah, but the letter alone has too many syllables, so y’all had to shorten it to just Dub.”

“Good job,” he says with a wink, and you playfully roll your eyes. You don’t say it out loud, but if you were that guy, you’d stick to being known as Waylon.

In the distance of the room, Samantha’s laughter rings out, and you watch as she reaches out to touch Dub’s arm while smiling. A smile crosses your face, too; Amelia’s over there being a good wing-woman, clearly leading the conversation and only pausing to sip her drink when Samantha starts talking.

Your smile slightly falters when you notice that next to you, Sy’s also staring ahead at the trio, but his expression is blank.

“Sy.” You wait until he looks at you before saying, “She’s a grown adult.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Sy mumbles, but when he immediately looks back at his sister, you smirk.

“Mmhm.”

Beyond Amelia, Dub, and Sam, the back door opens, and Johnny steps inside with Willie trailing behind him holding a drink.

“Think we finally got everyone,” Johnny calls out while walking to the table and pulling up a metal chair to sit on.

While Johnny sits beside Sy, Willie follows suit by finding a spot across from you, and, after sitting down, he greets you like an old friend. “Y/N! Whatcha know good?”

You smile. “Hey, Willie.”

“What’dju ask Santa for this year?”

“Hmm…A new house,” you answer half-honestly with a chuckle.

“Damn,” he says. “Didn’t know somethin’ that big could fit in Santa’s sack.”

Johnny starts to shuffle a deck of cards. “Just ‘cause nothin’ big fits in your sack,” he mumbles, and just then, Amelia approaches him, hears what he says, and smacks his arm.

“How ‘bout you?” you ask Willie, subtly witnessing Samantha and Dub talking to one another on their own in the distance. “What’d you ask for?”

“To win the lottery,” he answers, tilting his head back and downing the rest of his drink.

“So, what d’y’all say–Texas Hold ‘Em?” Johnny asks while continuing to shuffle the deck of cards.

Willie puts both of his hands out in front of him and moves them in a grand gesture of declination. "Nah, man. No way I'm playin' fuckin’ poker, no Texas Hold ‘Em, no nothing like that," he says as he looks at Sy. "Not against Syverson."

"Ain't try'na lose all your money tonight?" Sy asks while cracking his knuckles, and Willie just gives him a look.

"Ain't got no money to lose," he counters, and you can tell it’s meant to be a joke, but at that, Sy loses the playfulness in his tone. You see his jaw tighten up, almost turning into an underbite while he stares at Willie.

“Well, it ain’t gonna be worth it if you don’t play,” Johnny mumbles to Willie, then he looks at the other guys sitting at the table. “Anyone else in?”

“Not tonight, man,” the man known as Hawk answers, and Thompson answers by taking a swig of beer and looking away.

Johnny sighs before looking towards Amelia. “Babe, don’tchu have games down here?”

Amy walks to the other side of the room where another small group of people are crowded around a television watching the same football game that was playing upstairs, and she opens the console center the TV’s sitting on to reveal a bunch of party games underneath.

“There’s like, Apples to Apples…Cards Against Humanity…Ooh, here’s Game of Phones,” Amelia holds up a box and suggests. “I haven’t played it yet, but everyone plays it with their phones.”

“Like Jackbox?” you ask.

“No, like–You pick a card,” Amy walks to the table and answers, “and there’ll be questions about, like, who has the most apps on their phones…or notifications…or who has a picture of whatever the card says, stuff like that.”

“Ehh, I dunno about that one, babe,” Johnny says, reading the back of the game box. “Says here you gotta switch phones to play.”

“Only for, like, one part of the game,” Amelia clarifies, but the table ends up making grumbling noises after that.

“No one's gonna be goin’ in my phone,” Sy decides, and you turn to look at him. He always has a unique way of making decisions that sound so…final…yet doing it in a way that doesn’t come across as rude or off-putting.

"Why not?" Johnny asks, his smirk from earlier back center-stage. "Too many dick pics?"

While your face positively heats up, Sy looks unbothered. "Somethin' like that."

"We could just play drinkin' games," you suggest questioningly. “We already got a deck of cards.”

“Yeah, let’s do that!” Amy agrees.

“College girl has spoken,” Johnny says, and you lift your middle finger in his direction.

While Johnny goes back to unnecessarily re-shuffling the deck of cards, Amy looks around for a spot to sit at the table. Sy taps your leg to beckon you to stand up, and after you do, he slides to the spot you’d just vacated and pulls you on his lap with zero hesitation. While he takes a sip of beer, he acts like it’s the most normal and comfortable position to be in.

Instead of taking Sy’s old spot at the loveseat, Amy chooses to sit on the arm of the piece of furniture instead; Sy’s so wide that if she sat next to him, she’d be squished. It allows you to squirm a little on Sy’s lap and stretch out your legs onto the cushions, and while Johnny starts dispersing cards around the table, you happily grin in Amy’s direction.

"Hey, Sy," Willie says. "You ever catch any flies with that beard'a yours?"

Sy barely looks at him while starting to lift every individual card he’s dealt and placing it in a particular order in his hand each time. "The beard stays clean."

"Yeah,” Willie says, “'cause there ain't no flies in here right now."

Johnny and the other men around him crack up laughing, and you and Amelia make eye-contact and start laughing, too. "What the fuck does that even mean?" Johnny asks.

“Means it’s ‘bout time y’all got them things gone,” Willie says before lifting his own hand and rubbing his cheek. “Feel mine–here, feel,” he says to nobody in particular. “Smooth as silk, baby.”

“Not happenin’,” Sy murmurs. “Y’know, you got a lotta concern about our beards tonight for some reason. I’m half-a-mind to thinkin’ you’re jealous.”

“Y’all’s ugly mugs are jealous’a me,” Willie corrects.

After Johnny finishes dealing out the cards, Thompson picks up his stack from the table. “Yeah, ‘cause we’ve always wanted to be pirates.”

Your lips part while you try to keep your mouth from entirely opening in shock, and as you raise your cards to half-cover your face, you look among all the men to see how Willie’s going to react. It’s evident that he’s wearing an eye-patch, and it’s evident that he even mentioned his own injury earlier in the night, but still…it’s a different thing when someone else talks about something like that.

Clearly, this topic is out in the open and not taboo whatsoever, though, and there’s not even a semblance of tension that arises after Thompson’s statement; there’s just more laughter, even from Willie himself who playfully grumbles, “Wouldn’t be sharin’ my treasure with y’all no how.”

"This is just how they are,” Sy quietly explains to you, and then, to prove his point, he calls out, “Hey, Willie, when you wash your face, how high up d’you even go, anyway?”

"Your bald ass oughta know the answer to that yourself."

Sy grins and looks at his cards. Afterwards, he leans in close to you and whispers in your ear.

"Naw, naw, naw, now, none'a that,” Willie says from across the table. “Fraternizing.”

“Ah, we’re doin’ more than fraternizin’,” Sy says before the game starts.

As these things go, there is some confusion in the beginning about people not remembering the rules of the game, so the first rotation is slow. The game picks up speed and humor after a little while, but every time it’s Sy’s turn, you notice that he waits a few extra seconds before seriously making a play, like he’s intently strategizing a simple drinking game.

It gets the attention of others.

“Yo, it’s been your turn for twenty minutes, OMS,'' Thompson calls out after a while. “Whatchu thinkin’ over there, man?"

There’s that OMS thing again. You look to Sy. “What’s that even mean? OMS?”

“Operational Mission Scenario,” Sy mutters under his breath.

“Oh, hell no,” Willie looks at you and says. “That means Old Man Syverson.”

“Old Man, look at my life,” Hawk starts singing, and the table joins in to finish, “I’m a lot like you were.”

“Who’re y’all even callin’ old?” you ask innocently enough. “Y’all can’t be much younger than he is.”

The words simply exit your mouth on their own, no bite to them whatsoever, but the table breaks out with appreciative jeers that make you feel shocked at first and then welcome. Sy grins the largest at you, and having that sort of pride directed at you makes little octopus tentacles crawl around your insides.

Sy continues taking his time looking at the cards in his hand.

“Hurry the fuck up, Yokel,” Willie calls out.

“Wait just a damn minute, Nick Fury,” Sy retaliates without lifting his eyes.

“Gimme somethin’ original over here, Country Boy,” he mutters. “Actin’ like I ain’t heard that one every day since my eye got shot out.”

“How ‘bout this,” Sy says, and he’s got a shit-eating grin on his face as he lays out a wild-card to clear the current play and then sets down his last two cards at once to win the game. “How ‘bout I call you…Asshole?”

“Motherfucker.” Willie shakes his head and throws all of his cards down on the table. “I’m done. Done. I ain’t playin’ with this man no more. Can’t win a damn thing.”

Sy’s smile only grows.

“You’re not Asshole yet,” you remind Willie. “Just ‘cause he’s President doesn’t mean you’re automatically gonna lose.”

“Hear that?” Sy asks Willie as he smugly leans back on the loveseat. “President.”

You shake your head while the game goes on. "You win at everything," you comment.

"I play to win," he simply says, then he slyly looks at your cards. While he seems to study what Amelia lays down–then Johnny, then Thompson, then Willie, then Hawk–he guides you with which cards to play next. By the next rotation, you find yourself laying out all your cards in your hand and easily winning the role of Vice President.

“Cheatin’ ass,” Willie says, and you just lean into Sy and giggle.

“I’m gonna go back upstairs,” Amelia announces to everyone after she carelessly loses the game and is crowned Asshole.

“Bein’ a sore loser?” Johnny jokes.

“I just got a text that some people are leavin’,” she pokes his chest and says, “and I wanna be sure to say goodbye.”

You stand up. “I’ll go with you.”

“You don’t wanna play again?” Sy asks.

“Nah, that’s all you,” you decline with a wink. “But win big for me.”

Sy lightly pinches your ass before you walk away towards the staircase, and as you take one final look over your shoulder, you see him watching you. You might sway your hips a little on your ascent up the stairs.

Back upstairs, the main parts of the house are much quieter than before; some people have already snuck out. After the person who texted Amelia hugs her and thanks her for the invitation before leaving, several other people start doing the same, too. You stick around Amelia to say goodbye to the people you either already know or have recently met like Johnny’s sister, then you pour another vodka-cran and take it into the living room with you.

Waiting around while watching football, you listen as Amelia graciously thanks everyone individually for coming, and you laugh while she takes forever actually letting them get outside to their cars. When she finally walks into the living room, she looks tired yet buzzed.

“Is everyone mostly gone now?” you ask as she plops down on the couch next to you.

“Some people are still outside by the fire, but a lot of people have cleared out, yeah,” she answers, laying entirely down on the sofa. “Once a few people go, you know how it is. The rest who don’t really wanna stay use it as an excuse to make their exit, too.”

“Yeah,” you agree, laughing. A second later, you grab your sweater and all-but tear it off while pulling it over your head. “This thing–is–so–heavy,” you say before throwing it to the ground.

Amelia looks at you in just your black turtleneck. “You look like a German DJ,” she grills you, then she decides to take off her thick sweater, too. When it’s off, she’s left in a form-fitting tank top that makes you cold just looking at it. You cup your hands in front of your own chest to comment on how big her boobs look, and she throws her head back and loudly laughs.

You both continue to talk about the party while continuing to drink, and you share stories about how you think everything went. Loose-lipped and in a good mood, you both mainly end up laughing at everything you each say–funny or not. With just the two of you, time goes by without you even realizing it.

You’ve got more than a buzz going sometime around midnight or so–which may as well be three in the morning by your standards–so while Amelia’s texting someone with one eye squinted down at her phone, you head into the kitchen to throw away your empty cup. You might go to the drink table for one more drink–maybe. If you do, you tell yourself that it’ll be your last and that you’ll drink it slowly. You’ll drink it slowly and then find Sy again.

You don’t expect anyone to be lingering in the kitchen like they've been doing all night because the house has gotten so quiet, and when you approach the room, you confirm that the area is entirely cleared out. You blindly walk directly ahead to cut through to the nearby trash can when suddenly, you pause in the middle of the room with a silent gasp. The room isn’t empty, after all.

From both the scene occurring beside you and from the thick atmosphere in the room, you instantly know you've just walked in on something emotional. Sy's got his arms wrapped around Liana, holding her against him while she quietly yet blatantly cries into his sweater. Your mouth drops open, your feet suddenly frozen on the floor. Your inhibitionless side wants to rush to her to hug her from behind. Your reserved side wins out and just stands there, helplessly staring.

You make out the words Liana outrightly sobs. “I miss her s-s-so much."

“I know,” Sy whispers down to her. “I know. I do, too.”

You begin taking a heavy-footed step back to give them their privacy, but when your shoe catches on the threshold of the floor, you're outed. Liana lifts her forehead from Sy's chest to look in your direction with red eyes. Sy's frowning face turns your way the second after that.

"...I am so sorry, y'all," you say with wide eyes as you take another step back, but they each put a hand up to keep you from going. You just shake your head, feeling upset you've intruded on something very obviously personal and very obviously sad. You hadn’t heard either one of them before entering the room.

"No, no, no, really, it's fine," Liana replies, moving her hand to wipe off her wet cheek. "It's totally fine."

“Are you…” You look between her and Sy to try to discern exactly what's going on, but Sy's face gives nothing away. “Is everything okay?”

"Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine. God, I'm bein' so stupid,” Liana mutters to herself, wiping off her other cheek.

"You ain't stupid," Sy states.

Sy’s sister begins wiping the corners of her eyes next. "I'm not wine-drunk, I swear," she tells you, trying to wetly chuckle, and you just slowly nod.

"God, this happens every year," she whispers, almost to herself, and again, you look towards Sy, still not knowing what's going on.

Liana starts fanning her eyes with her hands once they start filling with tears again, and even though you still have no idea what’s wrong, you're fully compelled to hug her just like Sy had just done. Choosing to hold off on your inclination for now, you simply step closer to her.

"...What does?"

"This fucking song," she wetly gets out, and her voice turns squeaky like she’s about to cry again.

In the silence that follows, you begin to vaguely make out the music playing from the other room. The deep, soulful instrumentals you hear are telling enough, but there’s no way the actual voice that’s singing could ever be mistaken for someone else. It’s Elvis. It’s Elvis’s Christmas album.

“I’ll go turn it off,” Sy says, taking a step away from Liana, but she quickly reaches out and grabs his arm to try to stop him.

“No,” she declines. “Don’t.”

Sy freezes. His tense body relaxes with a heavy sigh. "Lee…"

"Our momma loved Elvis," Liana looks at you and explains. "She–She loved this song."

In sympathy, your face falls. "Oh.”

Smiling, chuckling, muttering to herself–You know she's trying to act like she's fine.

And you know how it feels pretending to be fine when you’re not fine at all.

After that, there's no stopping you. You step even closer to Liana, opening your empathetic arms.

"You don't–"

But Liana cuts off her rebuttal once you're actually hugging her, and she even hugs you back. For a long time, you stand there squeezing each other in the middle of the kitchen. Right next to Sy. All the while, There Will Be Peace In The Valley plays in the distance.

"Okay," Liana takes a deep breath and says once she disengages from you a few minutes later, as soon as the song is done. "I'm okay. It's fine. I'm okay now. Just a song."

"More than a song," you justify. "It's memories and it's…I get it. It's more than just a song."

"This time'a year is just really hard," she agrees, taking purposefully even breaths in what you know is an attempt to not begin crying again.

Feeling like you're watching an orphaned child for a second, you gaze at Liana with the gentlest sympathy you have within you. That might be how she feels, actually–orphaned. With how young she would've been when their dad passed away…Added to the recent passing of their mother just two years ago…And her grandma's health declining…And her chaotic ex-husband being back in town…All of the pressures and all of the stress of raising two kids on her own…

"Okay," Liana says with a stronger-than-before voice. "I really oughta get goin' now."

You frown. "You can't stay?"

“Nah,” she regretfully answers. “I know I'm bein' the life of the party right now, but I’ve stayed way too late as it is. I gotta get the boys before I drink any more and start cryin’ all over your shoulder.”

You softly smile. "I'd cry with you," you say. "It'd be fine. We'd put on Pretty Paper next and boo-hoo together."

While walking to a nearby chair for her coat, she lowers her voice. "Pretty paper, pretty ribbons of bluuue."

You, Sy, and Liana make your way to the back door where you all huddle together slightly solemnly. "If you need anything," you tell her, "let me know."

She nods. "Thanks."

“Really," you sincerely go on. "Like babysitting, anything. If you ever needed a sitter you don’t have to pay or somethin’, you could always just drop your kids off at my place. I’m a lot more available than I used to be. And they got along really well with Justine’s kids last time.”

“Oh, that’s really sweet, Y/N,” Liana responds while putting on a big puffy black jacket, “but there’s no way I wouldn’t pay you. If you wanna do it, I won’t complain one bit,” she chuckles, “but for free? No. You’ll get paid. It’s a lotta work keepin’ up with them boys.”

“Oh, they'd probably hang out and play with Justine’s kids,” you say. “Easy.”

Liana briefly glances at Sy and then back to you. “Aren’t you movin’ out soon?”

“Oh, well, yeah,” you answer, “but I'm just sayin’...And they’re welcome where I’m movin’, too. Just won't be other kids there, is all."

She waves off the statement and walks out onto the back deck. "They don't need entertainment from a bunch'a other kids,” she chuckles. “It's all I can do to keep their noses outta their tablets every day."

"That's the entertainment alone, huh," you follow her down the porch stairs and say as you wrap your arms around yourself to ward off the cold air.

"Right," she agrees. "They're actually with their grandma tonight. I'm sure there’s tons of entertainment there. Bet they aren’t even tired when I pick ‘em up."

Though his face is already slightly wincing from bending his sore knee on his way down the porch stairs, Sy’s face turns even sharper in an instant. “They’re where?”

Beside her car, Liana rolls her eyes. "It’s Christmastime, Sy,” she says. “I can't just keep their grandparents from seein' 'em.”

Sy crosses his arms. “What if he’s there?”

“He won’t be,” she mumbles.

"How’re you so sure?”

She looks up at him. "Because he’s in jail, Sy," she stonily says. “He got pulled over last week for runnin' a red light and turns out he’s got warrants from outta town.”

"Imagine that,” Sy mutters, his jaw stern.

Liana ignores his sarcasm. "Well, his parents aren't goin' behind my back tonight to take my children to the jailhouse for a visit, so stop worryin'."

“I still don't like it."

Liana gives her brother a sharp look to rival his own. “Don’t make this a thing,” she tells him.

Sy’s eyebrows get severe, but he remains quiet. Whether it's to spare her any more grief after her earlier breakdown in the kitchen or if it's just him relenting on the topic only for now with the expectation of bringing it up later, you don't know. You place your hand on his forearm and gently squeeze there to calm him down. You know how fiercely protective of his family he is.

"So.” You clear your throat to break the tension. "Babysittin' in the future. You've got my number if you ever need help. Reach out anytime."

Liana opens her car door. "Thanks, Y/N."

“I know how busy you’ve gotta be," you go on. "Especially at this time of year–”

“Oh, definitely. But just ‘cause you don’t have kids doesn’t mean it’s any less busy for you. I know first-hand how hard bein’ on-call is.”

You close your mouth. Well, that was nice of her to consider.

“But I might have to take you up on the offer sometime soon, actually, if only just to get some Christmas shoppin' done. I’m runnin’ short on time here."

You give her a brief goodbye hug, nothing long and sentimental like the one from earlier. It's really strange, but you almost say "Love you" to her as you break away from one another, almost like she's your own sister or something, but you stop yourself.

Sy hugs her next. It’s quick, but there’s love there.

"You gotch'yerself a good one," she tells him after disengaging, and she gives you one final look with a smile in her eyes. “Alright, y’all. Don’t have too much fun now.”

You lift your hand while returning her small smile. “Bye.”

After Liana gets in her car and shuts the door, Sy taps on the top of the vehicle twice. You both watch her drive away before turning around and heading back inside the house.

So. Sy's family is becoming your family. There are a lot of thoughts you have about that.

You should be scared. Right? You should be overwhelmed. You should be hesitant on the “what even is this” relationship label.

As it is, you’re nothing but happy. You feel secure.

You’re also extremely, extremely tired all of a sudden.

To keep you warm, Sy keeps an arm around you on your way back inside the farmhouse, and Johnny and Amelia are in the kitchen when you and Sy walk back inside. You greet them by letting out a huge, audible yawn.

“I’m really sorry, but I think I oughta get ready for bed,” you tell everyone at once, almost apologetically. “I can’t hang.”

Contagiously, Amelia yawns, too. “Me, either.”

“‘Cause you drank a whole bottle of vodka,” you laugh.

“Yeah, but did I throw up?”

You give her finger-guns and make a clicking noise with your tongue. “Winnnning.”

In the middle of the kitchen, she gives you a high five that you over-zealously return.

“Here, lemme help you clean up,” you almost slur, heavily walking to the food and drinks tables.

“Tomorrow,” she says, but you ignore her.

“At least unplug the crock-pots, Amy,” you chide, uselessly getting down on the floor to crawl to the outlet under the table instead of finding a more logical way to go about your task.

You hit your head when you try to stand up, but only one time. The second time is successful, and Sy is there to help you up. You lean into him while walking back into the kitchen.

“I’m tired,” you murmur to yourself.

“So where’s everyone else?” Amy asks Johnny with alcohol coating her words. “Who else ‘s still here?”

“Mahmoud left forever ago. My sister left a while back...Sy's sister left a few minutes ago...his other sister left just now...Rest’a the guys are just gonna crash downstairs,” Johnny says. “Sy already hid their keys.”

After giving Johnny a thumbs-up, Amy messily props herself up on the counter and opens a bottle of water that Johnny hands her. Sy immediately hands you a bottle of water next, and you gladly accept it. You walk up to Amy and give her a long, drawn-out hug while you hear Sy and Johnny talk to each other in low tones behind you.

“It’s bedtime,” you mumble sleepily. When you stand upright, you each press your water bottles together before opening them and taking several long drinks.

“It was fun tonight, right?” Amy wipes her mouth and asks. “It wasn’t lame, was it?”

You heavily shake your head. “No way,” you solemnly answer. “It was great. It’s always fun here at your parties. There was just the right amount of food and drinks, too! You did great.”

“You were the best bartender,” Amelia compliments you. “You shoulda got tips.”

“You shoulda got your decorations in a magazine,” you reply.

“Alright, girls,” Johnny says, and you turn around to see both him and Sy watching you and Amelia in clear amusement.

“Okay, yeah, I gotta go to bed,” you murmur. “Night, Johnny. Night, Amy!”

While Johnny literally carries Amelia to lift her off the counter, she cackles and says, “Niiiiiight!”

Even though exhaustion and alcohol have hit you really hard all of a sudden and you literally can’t wait to fall asleep, as you walk down the hall to the guest room, you still can’t help but worry that you didn’t really get to talk to many of Sy’s friends at all tonight. Even though you had a lot of fun, you’re anxious that you came across as rude for mainly hanging out with Amelia.

But if Sy took his friends’ keys to keep them from leaving, that means they should be here in the morning, so you can still see them then.

That makes you feel better.

In the guest room, you’re pleased to find your overnight bag on the left side of the bed once Sy switches on a lamp.

“Yayyy,” you exclaim while walking around the bed. “You brought it inside.”

“I did.”

You glance at him with thanks and notice him already in the middle of removing his sweater. As he pulls it over his head from the back, the skin of his stomach is gradually exposed until his entire torso and then chest is bare, and, frozen, you intently watch him until he’s entirely shirtless.

You’ll never get over it. He’s just–he’s just so big. And he has so much hair. When both of his hands move to the top of his khakis next, he senses you watching him, and he doesn’t break eye-contact with you as he undoes his belt-buckle and lets his pants fall down to the floor. In just his boxers and knee-brace, he pushes the bedsheets down, lays back on the mattress, and continues looking at you.

After taking off your turtleneck, you reach under your camisole to unclasp your bra. Even as open as you are from drinking, you have to look away from Sy’s shameless gaze as you toss your bra aside and then jump out of your jeans to change into some loose pajama pants. Finally, you collapse on the mattress next to Sy, almost moving the entire bed frame with how uncoordinated you're being.

"Whoa, there," Sy murmurs, steadying you, and you just giggle and start yanking the blanket and sheets around to cover yourself.

"Hey," you hear once you're all settled on your left side, practically melted onto the mattress and against Sy’s flank. "Open your eyes."

Moving closer to him, you open just your right eye, and Sy smiles.

"Hey," you speak against his beard, grinning because he's gorgeous and he's yours and you're gonna find his mouth and kiss him.

You slide your lips along Sy's beard until you reach his mouth, and his hand suddenly on the back of your head helps keep your own in place while you kiss. It's a kiss without purpose–or, with purpose but without direction. It's making out without using tongues.

It's really, really good is what it is, and you know from experience how it can get even better, but that's the thing–you don't even need it to go further right now because it's already so good like this, and he won't pressure you for anything more because he just won’t, and it's so so so refreshing to just feel happy in the moment and not anxious about the fact that now you're drunk in bed with a man.

But it's Sy. So much more than just a man. He wouldn’t pressure you regardless. Drunk or not. But you are right now–drunk, that is–and you feel like kissing, and it’s a good thing he’s so good at taking control or else you’d be, like, kissing his shoulder right now or something.

Actually, taking control isn't something that's even necessary for Sy. He's simply always in control. You feel his hand on your chin guiding your mouth with his, and it’s a reminder of just that–that he’s Sy–and you continue kissing him until you just can’t anymore.

You're so fucking lucky. You laugh into his mouth. Sy wants you. You want him, and he wants you. He wants you as his girlfriend, to sit on his lap and be known publicly as his girlfriend. To introduce you to people as his girlfriend. He wants to sleep next to you in bed. He wants to watch you at parties.

“I need to brush my teeth,” you burrow your head against his chest and say while closing your eyes. You probably should’ve done that before making out. But Sy doesn’t care. So it’s all good.

It’s all good. The night was fun. Easy. Fun and easy. Drinking and talking and music. A regular party. No tension. No fights. Nothing crazy. Happy times. Just a regular party.

“C’mon,” you distantly hear.

“Hm?”

“Y/N.”

You open your eyes, and suddenly, Sy’s standing next to the bed. “Jesus Christ,” you gasp. “What the hell. How’d you get there?”

He holds out a hand. “Up.”

You just stare at him. “Where are we goin’?”

“The bathroom.”

“Why?” You close your eyes. “D’you need an escort to go? Am I gonna hold your dick?”

“We’re brushin’ our teeth.”

You roll over and secure the blanket around you. “We can skip,” you slur.

Sy taps your leg. “Y/N.”

Something about his tone brings you to full attention, and you open your eyes, sit up, and pointedly begin to blink in an effort to stop drifting off to sleep.

You rub your eyes. “Shit,” you curse, then you push all the blankets off you and pivot on the mattress.

“Sorry I’m–Sorry,” you tell him, but there isn’t any frustration in his reflection. “I’m a little drunk.”

You scrub your eyes with your fingers and then instantly stop, remembering you’re going to fuck up your makeup and your contacts. You accept Sy’s help to stand up and then lean on his body on your walk to the bathroom to wash all your makeup off.

And to brush your teeth. Your breath is fruity. You’re gonna turn it minty.

Happily finding your toothbrush and toothpaste magically in the bathroom, too, you hip-check Sy in front of the mirror and then start brushing your teeth. Beside you, Sy brushes his teeth with strange precision, without even showing his teeth–just his strong hand gripping the toothbrush and moving it all around his mouth. You copy him pointedly, wrapping your lips around your toothbrush and vigorously moving it over your teeth, as well, and Sy elbows you gently before spitting in the sink. You elbow him back and spit on top of his spit, and you also copy him while using mouthwash, too. Though you’re being dumb, it makes him laugh, and that’s the best reinforcement you could ever think of.

You wash your face next, then even lower–all over your throat and neck to get off the leftover makeup from this morning. The clean skin that’s exposed makes you feel like a leper, but at least Sy doesn’t look at you in disgust.

Once you’re all finished removing your contacts and putting on your glasses, Sy touches your ears. “Gonna take these out?”

You shake your head. “I’ll sleep in ‘em. I don’t wanna lose ‘em.”

Back in bed, you’re semi-alert again, so once you’re next to Sy again, you stare at him while faintly smiling, no desire to look away.

Eventually, he touches your nose. “Thought you was sleepy?”

“I am,” you tell him. “I just wanna look at you first.”

“Just look?”

You grin. “Yes.”

"Last time you were drunk in this bed, you were singin' a different tune."

“What’s that mean?”

“Was layin’ here in your little thong with your legs spread wantin’ me to–”

"Oh my God, stop," you almost shriek. Sy shushes your entirely-too-loud response with a finger on your lips. "Nooo," you start cackling.

When he places his entire palm on top of your mouth, you lick it until he backs away in slight astonishment, and you stare back at him in victorious glee that you'd succeeded in grossing him out. That is–until he licks his own palm that you’d just licked, in turn grossing you out.

“Okay–You win, you win.”

“I always do,” he smugly says.

“Yeah?”

The twinkle of his eyes is evident even in the darkness of the room. “You know I do.”

Easily, he gets entirely on top of you, spreads out your legs with just his knees, and finds your hands. He places them above your head on the pillow and holds them together with one hand. With his other, he gently removes your glasses and places them on the nightstand. For a long moment, he stares down at you.

His stomach fully covers yours, and though everything in your brain is screaming this is what a man is, you…you’ve had too much to drink. “I…Uh, I don’t think I–”

“I’m just kissin’ you goodnight, darlin’,” he murmurs.

And he does. He kisses your lips and your nose and your chin, then down your jawline until he finds your earlobe, and he kisses that, too. Once he’s gotten to the expanse of your neck, that’s where he stays, and you’re so tired that the soreness there is barely a distant hum while he kisses every single splotch there, much gentler than how he’d put the marks there in the first place.

Closing your eyes, you truly dissolve atop the mattress and relish in the heavy feeling of Sy on top of you, in the contradicting softness of his mouth.

“You smell so good,” you slur, almost ready to fall asleep just like this. “Even your armpits.”

Sy lifts his head, and when you heavily blink open your eyes, he’s staring down at you like you’ve said something funny.

With your arms still over your head, you squirm. “You know you fuckin’ smell good, shut up.”

You close your eyes again, smacking your lips together. Able to tell that you’re seriously tired now, Sy rolls off you, hooks his arm around your waist, and situates your bodies together so you’re spooning with your legs tangled up. After stretching out your arms, you blindly reach for his fingers and cuddle his hand close to your chest.

“Night, baby,” he says in your ear.

“Night, baby,” you repeat. “Luh you.”

There’s a kiss to your ear. “I love you.”

Minutes pass with both of you just breathing, and even though you’re close to passing out, you manage to get out, "Does your knee feel any better?"

"Why're you askin' about my knee?" he asks from behind you. "Go your ass to bed."

Even though he can’t see, you pout. "Don’t be mean.”

“Just jokin’, sweetheart,” he says, and, in satisfaction, you wiggle even further back against him.

Is that new? Sweetheart?

“Your knees been botherin' you today," you tell him.

"Huh?"

"It's been hurtin'.”

“I took meds earlier for it,” he reminds you.

“But I wantchu t'--I wantchu ta get the shots. It's time t’ get the shots again."

"Alright, baby. I'll do that."

He's finding you amusing again. He’s doing that voice. "You think I'm sooo drunk," you surmise.

He grunts. "There’s thinkin’, then there’s knowin’.”

“Yeah, well.” You grunt back in a deep tone to imitate him. “There’s shrinkin’, then there’s growin’,” you make up on the spot, and when it rhymes, you bolt upright in Sy’s arms. “Heyyy!”

He raises an eyebrow. “Is that some sorta dick joke?”

“Do you want it to be?”

You lay back down and feel Sy’s nose-chuckle-breath on your shoulder.

“You keep laughin’ at me.”

“You’re talkin’ a lot more than you usually do.”

"Yeah, ‘cause you give me confidence. Like, when I’m with you, I feel like you…like–I'm drunk," you give up and admit.

Sy laughs at you again.

"But really," you maintain through a giant yawn. "Bein' with you makes me feel like I'm stronger."

"Y/N…"

“It does, though.”

"Alright, darlin’," he sighs. "Close your damn eyes."

You audibly yawn. “They already are.”

“Sleep.”

“I am.”

You literally fall asleep with a smile on your face, and your evening ends the same way your morning had started: in bed with Sy’s arms around you, a heavy blanket covering both of your bodies.

#eyes that see fic #eyes that see #captain syverson #captain syverson fic #captain syverson fanfic #captain syverson x you #ets

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