Meat and Fluids (JTHM Fanfiction) (Nny x Me)

Chapter 16

(Roy's POV)

"Connie!"

Everything's going well so far. He hasn't gotten up from the table, Connie wasn't dead, or asking questions-

"Who's this?" Fuck.

"This is..." Fuck, Fuck, FUCK!

"My name's Johnny, but my friends call me Nny, how you doing," Johnny suddenly spoke, sounding way, WAY, too nice for it not to be an act. His hand clutched his wrist, while the other grabbed at the underside of the chair. I really should change the gauze.

"Well, nice to meet you," she started, before turning to me, "You finally found a cute one, huh?"

"What?" Did she think we were... wait...

She sat down at the table, across from Johnny, and I sat next to him, feeling awkward to be the only one standing.

"So," she started, "How long have you been dating without me knowing, huh? It's not every day you have company now is it?" You have no idea. The look on her face said that she was actually happy for me. But the look on Johnny's face wasn't as cheery. In fact, he looked just about ready to lunge at her.

I grabbed his wrist under the table, pressing his hand flat to the seat of the chair. He stared at me, irritated and annoyed.

But Connie just gave me an escape... So I went with it.

"Just a few days, a few dates. Eating with each other, nothing much," I stated convincingly. He looked at me in shock and confusion, but said nothing, knowing he'd just have to go with it. And thankfully, he did.

I mean, he didn't say anything, but he wasn't refusing the false information, so... Good enough.

"Well aren't you a busy bee! I bet you don't have any time left for your hobbies now, with the dogs and all this."

"Hobby?" Nny questioned, now slightly interested.

"I paint when I don't have clients, or- dogs to take care of." I tried to say nonchalantly. Johnny's nails dug into the wood of the chair, pulling up paint while he looked at my hand against his. "They're not great, but it feels good to get ideas down so I can look at them more clearly. Like, I can paint out my problems to get a new angle and a more clear view of what's wrong... maybe even try to fix it if I can see what's actually wrong."

I think he looked around the house to try and find some of the pieces, but I didn't have any hung up. Anything with a frame or canvas could be used as a weapon, and anything taped to the wall just looked like shit.

"Oh, you're not gonna find them hung up," Connie started, "he's too shy to display his idea out in the open." She said it with a confidence that told him she had been one to already seen them herself. "Welp, I should get going, I was just making a lasagna and was wondering if you wanted to join, but I see you're busy," she stood, leaving the CD on my table and headed for the door. "I will be coming back to talk about this though," she said, pointing between the two of us before leaving. I ran up to lock the door again, pressing my back against it, and making sure she hadn't left anything behind to come back to get.

And then Johnny started talking, "I think... I use to paint. Or at least draw..." And now I was intrigued. I stopped him for a second, asking him to follow me to the bathroom, and he did without question, watching as I unlocked the cabinet to get out the same first aid kit as before. He knowingly sat on the toilet's lit, oddly calm as he let me change the dirtied gauze. "I remember that I was good at it..."

"What did you paint?" I asked, unwrapping a new, white strand of fabric to cover the healing scar.

"That I don't remember. It feels like such a long time ago, it's so fuzzy. I don't know if I still have the ability to create something so simple as a drawing. Or even if I did, I don't think I'd know what to make."

"What do you mean?"

"Aside from stick figures, I don't even know how long it's been. An old friend of mine once said that she felt like... since her work defined her, that if she ever stopped painting, that her work was all she had, so if she stopped, she'd just die."

"Or the person she was would cease to exist. Like she's no longer the person she was before she had stopped." I said back.

"... That's what I thought."

"Do you think," I cut off the gauze, neatly tucking it in on itself, "that your work on the wall brought you away from who you really were?" He didn't answer me. "That the Doughboys pulled you away from it so it would change you?" he didn't look at it me, so I figured I was getting close. "I know my work changed me. Times were getting tough, and I was days from getting kicked out, nowhere to go, and people already looking for me. Hell, I'm Pan, but to everyone else, I was the 'gay kid' it was okay to pick on. There were death threats and everything, so I started looking up things on the deep web to try to fix my problems."

The look on Nny's face told me to keep going, that I couldn't just stop a story like that. So I started again, "I RUINED people. Their lives. And then someone messaged me. I was close to a person they wanted, a guy in my college at the time. This... short dick with too much confidence, and apparently he was a wanted figure in the community. For what,  didn't know... or care. I couldn't refuse the five thousand I was given, the broke college student I was didn't want to. I never knew who either of them was, or what happened, and I was... Okay with that. and whenever I needed money, I'd just look for that kind or easy work. And then... it was all I did."

"At least you know what happened. I just have vague memories of the few past years. Anything past that is just. POOF! Nothing."

"I sometimes wish I couldn't remember. I never knew the end of those people, but I just assume that as soon as they're handed off, it's their deaths."

"...I'd like to know. I'd like to know what made it all go so wrong..." Johnny fidgeted, almost looking guilty from what he had said. As if he knew it was a memory he was glad he didn't have, but knew he needed.

"... Want your wrap?"