Oneshots | Ryden

Fade Theory

Ryan gets up too, and gives the damn kid a shove on the shoulder for his assholery. “I was trying to help, Jesus Christ,” he spits. He doesn’t think he’s been this pissed off in a long time.

The kid looks up scathingly from his doubled over position and for two fleeting nanoseconds, Ryan watches the lights of the passing traffic glint over the boy’s eyes instead of moving away.

He winds up with a black eye, of course, and he staggers home with one hand clutching his face and thinks, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.

+++

“Shit, Ross. What happened to your pretty face?”

Ryan pauses on his way up the grimy concrete stairwell, glancing disdainfully down at William, the tall guy barely past twenty who’s main hobby appeared to be aggravating every tenant in the block, particularly Ryan. Ryan suspects his roommate just kicks him out when he can.

Despite his desire to avoid all conversation with William, he still lifts his hand automatically to his eye. “I fell,” he snaps. “Get the fuck out of the way, William.” The grocery bag was digging into his skin now.

“Bullshit,” William snorts. He stands up and brushes himself down. “Ross got into a fight, again,” he sing-songs. Long greasy hair falls into his eyes as he peers at Ryan’s face. “That looks like it hurt, man.”

Ryan shoves past William and hurries up the rest of the stairs, the bag banging against his leg. He can hear William clambering up behind him and asking questions in his grating lofty voice, but Ryan’s not listening.

His eye has had two days recovery time now, but it’s still bloodshot and bruised. Ryan’s spent those two days staring at himself in the mirror and cursing under his breath. That kid, that kid could fucking punch. Asshole.

He finally reaches his floor, the dull bang of the hall door falling shut behind him. It’s an old, run-down and on-the-verge of dangerous apartment block – he could admit. He’d openly admit.

He just couldn’t afford anything else. If he had to deal with absent elevators, drug raids and annoying tenants, than that’s what he had to deal with.

He scrapes his key through the lock and shifts the bag into the other hand as he closes the door behind him. His apartment is more like a claustrophobic room – a damp-walled, badly heated room, fitted with a kitchenette and bathroom just off the side of it. There’s a mattress spread on the floor in the corner and a tiny kitchen table hanging onto its final days, plus an outdated television set sitting on a plastic side table. He also managed to get hold of a small, suspiciously marked couch from down the street, which he was still pretty smug about.

He’s only gotten as far as putting the beer away, stacking the cans right in the middle of his empty little fridge, when he hears William banging the door down. Like hell was he letting him in.

He grabs his pack of cigarettes and treads to the window, pulling it up and climbing out while taking care not to rip his only remaining pair of jeans.

South Chicago was bright and clear that day, a polar opposite to how Ryan felt in his head. He pulls his knees into his chest and flicks his lighter on and off as he sits perched on the windowsill. The only view he has from here was the back alley between the two apartment buildings, and he thinks there must be some metaphorical meaning in that, somewhere.

Goosebumps start appearing on his bare arms. He’s more than sick of Chicago already.

The worst thing is that he knows he’s not getting out of here, not soon. His job cleaning toilets at the bowling alley had given him something, money for a haircut, for beer, for supplies he really needed. He frowns and shakes his cigarette box. For Marlboros. He’s dangerously close to running low.