Better Than I'd Thought | Sally Face x Travis Phelps

twelve

"You have pretty hands," Sal commented, dragging a nail polish brush along Travis's thumbnail.

"Thanks." He blushed, shivering. He looked down at his knuckles. "What makes my hands pretty?"

"The person they're attached to," Sal mumbled quietly, a faint shade of pink growing on his ears.

Travis's eyes widened, and he felt his heart pound. "Sally face!" He mumbled. "Don't say things like that."

"Why not?" Sal smiled under his mask. "Are you embarrassed?"

"No..." He grumbled. "You just surprised me."

Sal chuckled, knowing that he was lying. "This color is nice." He said, referring to the shade that he was painting on Travis's nails.

When he had told Sal that his favorite color was purple, the blue-haired boy brought out a container filled with purple nail polishes. Travis had picked the one that was called Iris. It was a bright purple that was slightly more red than blue.

Sal thought that the color suited him well.

"Sal?"

"I know that I used to be a jerk, " Travis mumbled, "and I made fun of it in the past, but I really like um- I like your prosthetic."

Sal smiled. "Thank you," He chuckled, touching the plastic with his fingertips, "It's actually two separate prosthetics hot glued together."

"You glued them?" Travis asked.

   He nodded and pointed to the pink section on his mask, "This part is from the original, my first prosthetic." He said, shifting his finger to the white side, "this part is my new prosthetic."

   "Ah," Travis looked away. "I-It looks nice."

"Thanks." Sal felt himself grin. "I have other ones too. I could show you later."

   "How come you don't wear them?"

   "Ah, it's mostly because Gizmo's a little scared of any prosthetic that's not this one. I don't think he recognizes me." Sal laughed.

   "I like Gizmo..." Travis looked down at his hand, adorned with purple nails.

   "Have you ever had a pet?" Sal asked.

   "Yeah," Travis mumbled, face dropping. "My dog. She's at my house."

   "I didn't know you had a dog." Sal looked up at him, seemingly surprised.

   He nodded. "She's a german shepherd." He mumbled, becoming quiet.

   Sal furrowed his brows. "Are you okay?"

    "Yeah." He tried to smile. "Her name is Bella."

   "That's cute." He made eye contact with him.

   "I'll probably never see her again. I've had her since the third grade."

   Sal frowned, seeing how upset Travis had become. He didn't know that he was so into animals. "Let's go get her then."

  "What?" He stiffened.

   "So you can have her." Sal titled his head. "Let's go get her."

   "Are you insane?" Travis scoffed. "You're gonna march into my father's house and steal my dog back?"

   "Well," He shrugged. "Yeah. We could get some stuff that you left behind too."

   "We can't do that." Travis asserted. "I can't go back there."

   "Oh," Sal mumbled, "then I guess I'll go alone."

   "Sally face," Travis warned, "It's really okay. If my dad catches you alone, stealing stuff from his house, he'll-"

  "Ah, you're right." He looked up at the ceiling, deep in thought. "I should take Larry with me. He's good at this type of thing."

   Travis shuddered. "You act like you've done this before."

  "Well, not this specifically," Sal laughed, "but we have snuck around a fair amount in the past."

"Sal..." Travis mumbled. "This is wrong. If he catches you-"

"He won't. We'll go when he's not home." He assured him.

"Sal, really-"

"Don't worry, Trav, " Sal gave him a thumbs up, "I'll be fi-"

"Fisher, I'm telling you no!" Travis raised his voice, balling his hands into fists.

Sal flinched silently, before unfolding Travis's hand. "You almost messed up the polish."

"Don't go. My dad, you shouldn't go anywhere near him, please."

"Sorry..." Sal mumbled, "I just wanna help."

"I know, " Travis sighed, "and... I'm sorry for yelling. I didn't mean to. It's just that, if g dad sees you, then he'll- he'll probably-"

Sal watched with wonder as Travis expressed genuine worry for him. It was sweet. "Don't worry. I won't go."

__

Long story short, he did go. Did Sal feel slightly guilty about sneaking out at night to break into a pastor's house? Yes. Did he feel bad for lying about it? Of course. Was he going to turn around now that he was on his way? Not in a million years.

He'd already roped Larry in and the two of them were standing in front of the man's house already.

Travis had mentioned, in the past, that his father would leave in the middle of the night to go to church.

Sal noticed that there were no cars in the driveway, so they were probably going to be fine.

"Just the dog?" Larry asked. "Is there anything else we need?"

"I'm not sure," Sal admitted. "I'll check Travis's room and see if there's anything that seems like it would be important to him. You get the dog in the car."

"Got it, dude." Larry mumbled. "I'm gonna try to get this lock open. Check to see if there's an open window."

"Alright," Sal mumbled, turned to walk around the side of the house, pushing up on locker windows as he did so. He could hear faint barking inside.

Normally, Sal would've respected Travis's concern about him going, and held back, but this time, he couldn't. The look in Travis's eyes when he spoke about his dog made Sal confident in his decision immediately. He needed to get this dog.

"Larry, " He whispered, "This one's open."

Sal pushed the window open completely as Larry jogged over to him.

"Dude, "

"Yeah?" Sal mumbled.

"What're we going to do if this dog is territorial?" Larry frowned.

"Uh," Fuck, he hadn't thought of that. Sal winced. "We'll... throw pieces of food at her or something, I don't know."

Larry sighed, shaking his head, "After you, little buddy."

Sal hesitantly climbed in through the window, cutting his leg on the thorn bush that was under him in the process.