Attachments (Tronnor AU)

Nerve

noun

       • any of the fibres or bundles of fibres that transmit impulses of sensation or of movement between the brain and spinal cord and all parts of the body; courage, coolness in face of danger; (infinitive) audacity, boldness; (plural) nervousness, anxiety.

transitive verb

       • to give strength, courage, or vigour to. 

"Hello?"

Troye flinches at the sound filtering through the small speaker of the phone in his hand, biting his lip hard as he leans far enough forward to see the hardwood floor beneath his feet. It's a real person, then, though there's no guarantee it's not still something pointless and irrelevant. Maybe it's just someone trying to sell him something, though Dan wouldn't have given him the card with a message that cryptic and concerning if that had been the case.

"Hey," he sighs after the man on the other end of the line attempts to greet him for a third time. He presses his toes into the floor hard enough to have them going white before tucking both legs up on the couch. "Uh, my friend gave me this card with your number on it. He... Can I ask who I'm speaking to, actually?"

"Oh," he hears the stranger breathe, sounding like the exclamation has been knocked right out of him with a hard kick to the gut. There's something disbelieving in his tone, like he'd tried to be prepared for this but is realizing he's not. "Oh. Your friend's Dan, right? He gave you the card?"

Troye hesitates, staring diligently at the dents in the floorboards and trying to decide whether he's more frightened or concerned. They're similar emotions, when he thinks about it, like hybrids stemming from the same origin. Maybe he's both.

He replies slowly, skepticism seeping consciously into his tone. "Yeah?"

The man sounds positively ecstatic at that, like hope is sending his heart soaring and the rest of his body is being kept afloat by disbelief. "Are you Troye?"

His tone remains the same as he leans against the back cushion of the couch again, but he has to take a moment to close his eyes and chew his lip until it bleeds before he can reply. "Yeah."

"I'm Phil," the man sighs happily, a smile evident in his tone as it trembles with something that might be nerves. The introduction makes Troye frown, wondering whether this is something personal if he's being given a first name, but he elects not to say anything until Phil has plucked up the courage to continue. "We should really meet in person. It'd be better not to do this over the phone."

It feels like a gale has swept through the living room, like its winds have derived from the air in Troye's lungs and it's sucking up every ounce of calm he'd so carefully collected. It swirls once, twice, doubles back to make sure it's got it all, before disappearing without a trace and leaving him sitting there with a racing heartbeat and the memory of what it felt like to be able to breathe. He'd only just learned what it was to have clean air circulating through his system, and now he's right back where he started all those months ago. The difference is that he's known how it feels to have more, now. He knows what he's missing as worry sits deep in his gut like the awful hunger he suffered through for nearly all seventeen years of his life.

"I don't know you," he says, grasping at straws and hoping they can fix whatever this is right now. He doesn't want to have to set a time to meet and spend his days waiting and worrying and letting the fear gnaw through his life until there's nothing left but the panic brought on by the idea that, whatever this is, it's going to put him right back where he started.

He doesn't want to go back to how things were before Connor.

"You can bring Dan," Phil suggests a little too desperately, sounding as terrified at the prospect of Troye rejecting his offer as Troye is at the idea of accepting.

The mention of Dan eases the monster of uncertainty away a little bit, exposed nerve endings tucked back beneath his skin as he remembers that Dan wouldn't have given him the card if he didn't think this was important. It doesn't matter that it came with a concerning warning, it was still handed to him by someone he would trust with more than his life.

"Actually," he replies slowly, swallowing back the worry as he darts a glance towards the hallway half a metre from the other end of the couch. "I think I'll be bringing someone else."