Since The Roof Fell In: Part Three
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Day Sixty-Two
Kevin doesn't like Jon Walker. He didn't like his easy smile when they first got to Pete's, because it's hard to trust someone whose smiles come effortlessly these days; didn't like the way he looked at Nicole, the way he kept inviting her along on his scrounging trips regardless whether she was busy at the time or not; didn't like finding them having sex on one of the mattresses in the room they share with Brendon, Spencer, Ryan, and Andy. He doesn't trust Jon's tendency to disappear for a few days at a time, or how subdued Nicole's been since she got back from disappearing with him.
Like, whatever, if he's one of those guys who think the appeal of being a musician is in the young groupies, whatever, good for him, but Nicole's been through way too much, so much she won't even talk about it, to deal with someone who apparently isn't bothered by the end of the world enough to stop smiling as long as he's getting some.
So Kevin doesn't like him, and Kevin doesn't trust him, except now Jon Walker's standing in front of him with an armload of kittens, and wow it's hard to think mean thoughts about someone with an armload of kittens.
"Just, Brendon said you're a cat person, and I just. I wanna go see if I can find the mama cat, and some food and stuff for them, and I can't just carry them around for that, it's not safe."
Kevin just nods, and suddenly he has a pile of kittens squirming over his lap, courtesy of Jon Walker.
"Awesome. I have no idea when the last time they ate was, so I'll see about a couple bottles and some milk or shit first."
"I. Yeah, right, sure," Kevin says, and then Jon's gone, leaving him with a whole bunch of kittens and a totally irrational sense of guilt.
They're little, probably too small to be away from their mother, but their eyes are open and they're only a little wobbly when they walk. Which, wow, cutest thing ever, wobbly kittens. Actually the cutest thing ever is their tiny little meows, except they're pitiful enough every one has Kevin more and more anxious for Jon to come back with food for them.
"Either Jon found you, or there's a bigger kitten problem than I thought," Brendon says, leaning against the doorframe.
"Um, no, these are Jon's."
Brendon just smiles a little, climbs onto the bed and scoops up the little gray one so he can stretch out next to Kevin. "I don't actually know if you're a cat person, I just guessed," he says, rests his head on Kevin's shoulders. When Kevin looks at him, Brendon's eyes are fixed on Kevin's fingers where he's wiggling them for the littlest one, the one with funny eyes.
"Good guess."
By the time Jon shows up again with an armload of bottles and towels, Brendon's dozed off. Jon only stays long enough to show Kevin how to feed them, and then he's gone again, with a nod to Kevin and a ruffle of Brendon's hair.
The sunset's vivid orange tonight, bright against the black silhouettes of ruined buildings. No one who was here the whole time comes out when the sky's like this, too much like when the fires were eating the city, apparently. No one but Jon, at least.
"We should head back," Nicole says, for the fifth time. Jon looks up from the basement window he's trying to see through, frowns at her.
"It's not dark yet."
"It will be by the time we get to Pete's. She's not here."
"You don't know that."
"Jon," she says, a little bit at a loss; he's not listening to her anymore, anyway, gone back to squinting through smudged glass. He found the kittens under a porch across the street, claimed they looked well-fed enough the mother had to be around somewhere. But there was no sign of her under the porch, in the ruins of the house, in any of the ruins they've poked through anywhere on the street. Maybe she was here, maybe she'll come back, but she's not here now.
"She might be hiding from us," Jon says, pushes himself off his hands and knees. "Maybe we're making too much noise."
"You wanna tell me how we're gonna dig through rubble silently?"
His frown deepens, thick creases forming in his forehead. He looks older, suddenly, looks as tired as everyone else for the first time since she showed up at Pete's. He lost his cats, she knows, remembers Spencer telling her he was kind of a crazy cat lady and the look on his face when she made the mistake of asking what happened to them, to his dog.
"We can come back tomorrow," she says, quieter; Jon slumps down on the steps next to her, rests his head on her shoulder.
"It'd be. I'd like to help someone."
When the roof caved in, Nicole couldn't get upstairs - even if she hadn't been scared out of her mind she'd get crushed, too, even if she'd really thought she could go marching in there and clear a path for her totally unharmed family to get out safely, there was no way up. No way in if she could get up. When she walked away, it was with the nagging worry in the back of her mind that she didn't try enough, that twenty-four full hours of trying the stairs at a slightly different angle, trying a ladder at every single window, that none of that had been enough and she could have gotten someone, anyone out.
"Yeah," she says, sweeps the hair back off his forehead. "You probably would."
She gets up and starts back towards Pete's without waiting for him to follow.
Day Sixty-Seven
Kevin doesn't leave the house, really; he'll go out to get food or whatever if he's asked, but mostly he stays in, helps with kids or kittens or cleaning or whatever other jobs Spencer has on whatever list he's come up with that day.
But the house has been shrinking, lately, closing in and leaving him itchy, restless. Brendon notices, either because Brendon's really good at reading Kevin or because he watches too closely to miss that kind of thing.
"You okay?" he asks, the hardest possible question to answer.
"There's not enough air in here."
Brendon nods, stands up without a word and reaches for Kevin's hand. It should bother him, that Brendon expects him to follow, that Kevin doesn't feel the need to ask what's this, where are they going, even when Brendon leads him out of the house and in the opposite direction of the small part of the city he's familiar with.
They walk for an hour, long enough Kevin stops wondering where they're going and assumes Brendon's just taking him for a walk, chose this direction 'cause the fires weren't as bad here, the buildings not quite as ruined. He's about to suggest they head back, thank Brendon for getting him out of the house, say he feels better (it's not even a lie, not totally), when there's a sharp tug on his arm and Brendon's pulling him up a driveway.
To a church. The driveway to a church. One that Kevin hadn't noticed, because the steeple's just a charred stump, the stained-glass windows smashed in; it could have been anything, but the battered sign says it's a Methodist Church. And this is just. It's.
Brendon isn't pulling him anymore, and Kevin waits, holds his breath a little, waits for the awe and the love and the fullness to flow through him, finally put his mind to rest.
He stays empty, though, finally has to let out his breath even though the thought of losing anything else from inside him aches, physically hurts. Brendon's watching him, watching all this, brow furrowed in concern, or anxious hope, or something. Kevin wants to say something, thank him for the effort, apologize for...something, for whatever he might have to apologize for, but nothing comes.
Inside, the sanctuary is cleaner than Kevin expected, dusty but fairly intact. Whoever smashed the windows apparently had at least enough respect not to damage the inside. There's a gold cross on the altar, almost gaudy in a world where people rioted over valuables at the first sign of trouble, stole and fought and killed when they still thought money might mean something.
And there's a piano. Despite everything, Kevin still expects some of the feeling church used to give him to start filling him any minute as he walks towards it; it was in music, always music, where he felt God the most. But just walking does nothing; sitting at the bench, running his fingers over the keys, playing the few chords Nick managed to teach him before he got frustrated (Nick's good at so many, many things, but teaching wasn't ever, won't ever be one of them), none of that does anything.
There's a music book open to "The Old Rugged Cross", too sad for Kevin to ever really like, but it was his mother's favorite (is his mother's favorite, past tense makes her sound dead, and he has to assume she isn't until he knows); he tries it, just the melody, but his fingers are clumsy and the notes aren't translating right from his eyes to the tips resting on the keys, anyway.
"May I?" Brendon asks. Kevin had forgotten he was there, almost, not used to Brendon being quiet enough for Kevin to get lost in his own thoughts for any length of time. He shifts over, because even if he can't play well enough to bring God back, maybe Brendon can. He shouldn't be sharing this with anyone, this hugely private moment, the almost-unbearable ache in his gut where the faith he thought couldn't be shaken used to live, but Brendon starts to play like he's known the song his whole life, and Kevin can't bring himself to regret letting him share.
Greta frowns and holds the needle out for Nicole. "I quit. Apparently my feminine whimsy has limits."
It's not much of a surprise; Greta's sighs have been getting more and more frustrated for the past half hour. And it's just as well, 'cause Nicole wants to give this to Greta and it probably doesn't mean as much to make someone work on her own present.
"The parts you did are pretty, at least," Greta says, running her fingers over the squares that end up on her lap when Nicole takes the hoop.
"You really didn't do that badly." Nicole kind of hopes Greta doesn't notice she's pulling out most of Greta's stitches; it'll drive her crazy forever if she leaves them.
Nicole probably shouldn't be working on this now - the colors keep blurring together, needle out of focus in her hand. She didn't sleep well again last night, woke up more than once to Greta holding her down so she didn't fall off the bed in the middle of her nightmare. But she doesn't want to stop, either; it's good for her, she thinks, to be normal a few hours a day.
"Maybe," Greta says, reaches out and taps her fingers against Nicole's knuckles, white from the force of her grip on the hoop, "different colors next time."
The quilt's muted, quiet, big spaces of blues and browns and smaller patches of oranges, purples. Nicole knows exactly what Greta means, what she thinks, because the thing looks like a walk across the desert. Nicole's not sure she could make sense of any other colors, though.
"I keep thinking, this is gonna be the day it gets easier, this is gonna be the night I stay asleep for a full eight hours, that it has to happen sometime so why not today?”
“I don’t think it just happens, I think you have to work at it.”
Nicole sighs, shifts on the couch so she can rest her head on Greta’s shoulder. “I don’t have any energy left.”
“You’ll find some,” Greta says, rests an arm around her shoulder. “Maybe in all that coffee you’re drinking.”
When Brendon wakes up the church is silent, an uneasy stillness that settles heavy in the pit of his stomach. It's not big enough for Kevin to be out of hearing range; even if he'd fallen asleep like Brendon, wouldn't a pew be creaking, or something?
He sits up too fast, back screeching in protest from too long lying on the hard wood of the pew. He was right; Kevin's not in the room, unless he’s lying down.
Brendon absolutely doesn't panic, because as weird as it might sound there isn't really much danger. Chicago's pretty deserted, no crazed survivors willing to do anything to anyone to stay survivors (other than Tom, and Tom knows Kevin now), and even before the mass wave of natural disasters died off there was nothing happening here but the fires. Kevin would have to be extremely stupid to get himself killed.
Except.
Except he doesn't know the city, at all, and Brendon knows from a month spent walking cross-country with him Kevin doesn't pay even a little attention to where he's going as long as there's someone who can lead him there and back, so it's totally possible he walked too far and got lost. And Brendon has no idea how long it's been, so he could possibly be very lost. Brendon could check the pews for him, go up and down the aisles and make sure he’s not napping, but any time he spends doing that is more time for Kevin to get more lost.
If Brendon's back was screeching before, it's waking the dead with its cries when he jumps off the pew and darts to the front door.
Kevin's right there, because Kevin might seem like he isn't totally grasping the severity of the end of the world thing sometimes, might act like he doesn't know he can't just stop at a gas station and ask for directions or make a quick stop at a convenience store if he doesn't drink enough water before leaving the house, but he's not stupid, wouldn't go wandering off like that.
"Hi," Brendon says, instead of sorry I thought you were an idiot.
"I didn't feel anything." Kevin's sitting on the steps, cold rough stone, looking up at the sky instead of Brendon when he talks. "Not even - nothing."
"Do you usually?"
There's an awkward pause there, because that was a stupid question, because why would he have said anything if that was normal for him. Just, Brendon doesn't remember ever feeling anything in a church, not anything God-related. But fuck, he's stupid today.
"Yeah," Kevin says; Brendon waits for him to add duh or obviously or you moron, but he doesn't. He wouldn't.
Brendon sits next to him, close enough he can wrap his arm around Kevin, comfort him with contact if that's what he needs, but far enough away he's not pushing it. Kevin lets his breath out in a long sigh, shifts a little and rests his head on Brendon's shoulder.
The sun's low in the sky, probably looked amazing through the stained glass windows before they were shattered, when Brendon shifts a little, says, "We need to head back, it's getting dark."
Kevin pulls his head off Brendon's shoulder, but doesn't stand up, doesn't move at all until Brendon turns his head and then he leans forward, brushes his lips against Brendon's (soft, Jesus, chapstick is kind of a luxury how are his lips so fucking soft) in the most innocent kiss Brendon's probably ever been a part of.
There are a million reasons Brendon shouldn't, Kevin's total fucked-up there-is-no-God state of mind being most of them, but he kisses back anyway, raises his hand to cup the back of Kevin's head and kiss him just a little harder, just enough Kevin knows it's okay.
Kevin pulls his head back a little, still close enough Brendon can feel Kevin's breath ghosting over his lips, can feel every word. "I want to go after Joe and Nick," he says, and there are a million reasons they shouldn't do that, either, but Brendon just nods.
"Okay."
Day Sixty-Eight
Being around the kittens makes Spencer want to cry, because fuck he misses his dogs, because what are the fucking odds that so many people lost their pets and these impossibly tiny things survived. But he's 80% sure Ryan's going to choke one with the bottle, so he grabs Nicole and intervenes anyway.
"It's really not that hard," Nicole's saying, ignoring the kitten and bottle in her own lap to help Ryan out. "You just have to, like, not shove the nipple down its throat."
Spencer's kitten, the little tabby Jon had claimed as his own with way more threats than were necessary to anyone who might challenge him, is drinking greedily, making these amazing little sounds that just. Fuck. Spencer misses his dogs. His mom's stupid lazy cats. His mom, God.
"Ryan, what the fuck, stop," Spencer hears Brendon say, a split second before Brendon's leaning over Spencer's shoulder and rescuing Ryan's poor hungry kitten. "You're scaring my baby."
"She's not scared, she's hungry, and if you people would just let me feed her - "
"We're going to New York," Kevin says, stops the brewing argument in its tracks.
"You are absolutely not going to New York," Nicole says, goes back to feeding her kitten like that's the end of it.
"Um. Yeah, we are. I need to find Joe and Nick, and I can't go alone, and - "
"Let's not forget I walked with you guys the whole way here, I know exactly how equipped you are to take care of yourselves walking cross-country."
"It's not really up for debate," Brendon says.
It's silent for too long after that, just the sounds of nursing kittens to underscore the quiet. Nicole sighs, runs a hand through her hair. "Fine. When are we leaving?"
Day Seventy
"Kevin Jonas," the last person Kevin wants to see says; when Kevin turns he's leaning in the doorway.
"Jon Walker."
"I've been told to remind you if you pack more than one change of clothes Nicole's not letting you bring any."
"Understood."
Jon frowns a little, walks in and sits on the bed. "Also, that if I'm coming, I need to clear it with you, because Nicole has this ridiculous idea you don't like me."
"You're not coming."
"Not so ridiculous, then?"
Kevin doesn't have anything to say to that. Maybe if he doesn't say anything, keeps his jaw clenched, keeps packing, Jon'll take the hint and leave him alone.
"Did I, uh, do something? Because if I did, it was an accident and if you tell me what it was, I'll apologize for it."
If Kevin hadn't let Pete burn the couple outfits he'd walked to Chicago in, this would be so much easier - the clothes he's scrounged up from abandoned stores aren't exactly practical. Maybe they can do a "shopping" trip before they get on their way.
"I don't think it's unfair to ask what I did."
"If you need so badly to get laid, because that's what's really important right now, having sex, it's not like the world ended and people died, it's not like there's suffering all around you, if you need it so badly, you could at least not take advantage of the scared kid who's, y'know, one of the people suffering."
"Whoa."
There's one pair of jeans at the bottom of the neat pile of clothes next to Brendon and Kevin's mattress, heck yes. Brendon is incapable of folding anything, so there's no danger he's grabbed anyone's pants but his own. He does have a t-shirt of Brendon's, but, again, didn't really think to get any practical clothes for himself.
"Have you, uh, called her a kid to her face?"
"I need to go see if they're ready to go, so, uh, this conversation's over."
"Okay, cool, I'll just, what, sit here and contemplate what a dirty old man I am?"
"It's not - just - "
"Not that this'll do anything for your opinion of me, but do you have any idea how many people here I'd slept with before this? Assuming you're right, and sex is my number one driving instinct, it doesn't really make all that much sense I'd pick someone I had to work to fuck."
"I'm just going - "
"And call her a kid to her face, no really, I bet she loves that."
Kevin just hoists his backpack over his shoulders, turns to get out of the room and away from the conversation he's pretty sure got away from him.
"Just out of curiosity, do you know what happened to her? Why she was so willing to get out of LA with you?"
"I can assume."
"But she didn't tell you."
"I don't see why it matters."
"She told me. So, y'know, while you're just guessing about what kind of suffering she's gone through, what she's going through, she thought I should actually know. But, y'know, I get it, I generally trust my booty calls more than my close friends."
"If you're not packed and ready to go when Nicole and Brendon are," Kevin says, standing in the door with his back to Jon, "we're leaving without you."
It's something to watch Pete and Spencer try to plan together - they're both good at it, there's a reason Brendon went to them, but they're so different about the best way to do it. Pete's grinning like a weirdo at his screen, babbling about how awesome it is they still have internet, and even though Google Maps is exactly how Spencer planned the walk to LA, he's frowning like Pete not being serious enough about it is somehow going to change the quality of the directions.
"This is the same route I gave Joe, so if they haven't gotten there yet, or if something...happened...you'll be right behind them. Well, not right."
Brendon just nods; Spencer's snatching up sheets of paper as they come out of the printer like it's the worst thing in the world Pete didn't print them out last-page-first so they'd make their own neat little pile.
"And be careful."
"I'm really not as bad as Nicole says."
Spencer snorts; Pete just turns to look at him, maniacal grin gone. "That's not what I meant."
Day Seventy-Six
"Will you stop fucking looking at me like that?"
Nicole's tired, God, she didn't expect it to be this bad but every bone and muscle in her body hates her for doing this again after only a few weeks of rest. She keeps stumbling, not often enough to justify the way Jon keeps looking at her like he thinks she's gonna fall over and not get up, but often enough they've slowed to a snail's pace, resting almost every hour.
"Sorry, I'll just stop, y'know, giving a shit," Jon says, in that infuriatingly calm voice of his.
"Good."
"Maybe we should go ba - "
"I'm not turning around, for the five hundredth time."
"Maybe," Brendon says from behind them, tentative, "we should take another break."
"You guys can do whatever the fuck you want, I'm gonna keep walking." Nicole's good at being pissed off, fucking excellent at it, and as soon as her body realizes she only wants to do it because she's mad her legs suddenly work, well enough Jon has to jog to catch up with her once he's left his backpack where Kevin and Brendon are sitting.
"Nicole, Jesus."
"If you want to turn around, turn the fuck around. You shouldn't even be here, you have your fucking family in Chicago, why the fuck did you come with us?"
"You - "
"I don't need you to take care of me." Ken was the kind of person who took care of her all the time. Chelsea, too, although she was a lot less big-brother about it (for obvious reasons). Caretakers are too important.
"I was gonna say your sunny disposition, except if that's my motivation I'm fucked."
"I'll try to be more cheerful."
"And, uh, I won't make any more jokes. Will you just calm the fuck down, for a minute? And you get all...I dunno, if you can concentrate on a mission or whatever, you stop worrying about yourself. And I just...don't want you to do that."
"How noble." She's smiling, though, even though she's not sure she's done being mad; apparently she's not as good at being pissed off when Jon's being all...Jon at her.
"Plus, if you tire yourself out walking, who do I get to fuck?"
The thing is, she absolutely believes both of those are true, and that the actual reason is somewhere in the middle. And it should bother her, because her goal, the one thing she's pretty sure she needs to do, is to care less, at least until it's safer, not find someone else to give a shit about until she’s fairly sure the body count’s not going to rise for a while.
They walk back to Kevin and Brendon, and Jon's about to pick up his backpack when he pauses, squints into the distance.
"Is he still there?" Brendon asks.
"Who?"
"The guy who's been following us," Brendon says.
"It's Bill," Jon says, squints into the sun and nods like anyone asked if he was sure.
The wait is excruciating. Jon won't let them keep going, says if it's important enough Bill left his wife and kid to come after them, it's important enough to wait for. Which is stupid, Jon isn't even supposed to be here, but Kevin's seen the way Bill is around his family enough to know that stupid Jon has a stupid point.
It's late afternoon when Bill catches up to them, finally, sun hot in the sky.
"I," he says, and Kevin braces himself for the big news Bill must have, "didn't bring nearly enough water bottles."
Nicole smiles a little, too nervous, obviously anxious to know what he walked out here for, and hands him a warm bottle out of her backpack. "I didn't pack a fridge, sorry."
"This is perfect," Bill says, doesn't seem to notice - or care about - the eight eyes watching his every move. He drains the bottle, tosses it back to Nicole with a grateful smile, and starts digging in his pocket.
"Bill," Jon starts, but Bill flaps his free hand at him, and Jon just rolls his eyes.
"I have, in the pocket of my impractically tight jeans - why did I think these were a good idea - a text message."
"That's great," Jon says, "but I'm gonna bet you didn't walk out here to show off your text-receiving capabilities."
"An excellent bet, you'd be a rich man right now if you'd put money down." Bill finally gets his phone out, tosses it to Kevin. "It's from Demi."
Kevin almost breaks Bill's phone mashing buttons; Brendon gently reaches out, coaxes the phone out of his hands. "You don't have a phone and this is the only other number she can reach us at, don't break it." He's smiling when he says it, with that look in his eyes he get sometimes, the one that makes Kevin think Brendon must expect him to crumple any minute.
Service! At last. Found Nick; headed back with him&Joe. About 2 weeks' walk away. Any word from Kevin?
"I already told her we have you," Bill says, quiet; everyone's quiet, too quiet, barely breathing, waiting for Kevin to react.
"Okay," he says. "Okay. Um, okay. We need to. I need. We need to start walking again."
No one else stands up when Kevin does, which, come on, the sooner they get going the sooner they'll meet up with his brothers, what the heck is everyone waiting for?
"Kevin," Jon says, in that scared-animal-gentle tone that's apparently kind of insulting coming from anyone but Brendon or Nicole (or, occasionally, Bill). "Bill told them you're at Pete’s, you should be at Pete's."
"That's stupid."
"What if something happens to you out here? Think about how you felt when you got to Pete's and found out you'd just missed them - you wish that on them?"
"Nothing's gonna happen," Kevin says, but he knows it's a lie. "I just. I need to."
"You need to sit down for a second, come on." Brendon tangles his fingers with Kevin, tugs him down as gently as he'd spoken. "Just. Be reasonable."
"I am being reasonable. We're walking the same route they did. They're a week away; if we walk at the same speed they're going I'll get to see them three days earlier than I would otherwise. And what if something's wrong with one of them, maybe it'll be easier for them to have a fourth?"
"They walked the same route out, it doesn't mean they'll walk the same way back," Nicole says, and Kevin's not a violent person but the next person to treat him like a rabid dog that needs to be talked out of attacking is gonna get - something.
"And if there was something wrong, she would've said in the text," Bill points out. "She knows there's plenty of people around, we could've sent someone after them if they needed it."
"She didn't know you could send me."
Jon sighs and stands up, helps Nicole up before he reaches for his backpack. Finally, finally, someone on his side - maybe Kevin needs to rethink his opinion of Jon Walker.
"We need to find somewhere to stock up before heading back; if Bill doesn't have any water, we don't have enough to share around."
Rethinking over. "I'm not going back."
"Kevin," Brendon says, and Kevin doesn't want to look at him in case he looks as desperate as he sounds. "Please."
"I want to see them," he says, like that wasn't obvious already. "I just want to - it's not the worst idea in the world."
"It's not the best, either."
Jon, Nicole, and Bill are already walking away, Nicole pulling Jon and Bill trailing after them. When Kevin finally manages to look at Brendon, he's watching them walk away.
"Will you come with me if I go after them?"
"Yeah. But we're not going to, because you know we're right, and you're not good enough at being stubborn for the sake of it to win this one."
Brendon stands up, reaches out for Kevin; his eyes are hopeful, not desperate, and Kevin can't not give in to that. He lets Brendon pull him up, hand him his backpack, yell to the others to wait for them. Bill's phone is a too-heavy lump in Kevin's hand, and he starts to pocket it before lifting it up and typing out a quick message.
Walk fast. Be safe - K2
Day Eighty-Five
"I just don't know what to do," Brendon says, burrows back into the chair a little more. "We know they're okay, we know they'll be here soon, but he's as bad as he was when I met him."
"He's powerless right now," Spencer says. "Before he had stuff he could do. Now it's just...sitting around. Sitting isn't exactly a good distraction."
Brendon should know that as well as anyone, better, maybe, considering the first time he let himself be idle since they left LA was the first time he actually thought about what had happened. Still, it feels like it should be different, like Kevin shouldn't need to be distracted from such a hopeful situation.
"Plus, if something happens to them between where they were when they texted and here, he's never gonna stop blaming himself for turning around. Like - it's what Ryan does, he's the same way, if there's something bad to dwell on he can find it."
"He's not gonna blame himself," Brendon says, has a harder time than he should forcing himself out of the chair and towards the stairs. "He's gonna blame me."
Kevin looks smaller every time Brendon sees him, curled up tighter on the bed it's their turn to have for the night than he was when Brendon tried to get him to get up and have some lunch. But he unfolds a little when Brendon slides onto the bed, at least enough to shift so Brendon's holding him.
"Any news?" he asks, like the last update hadn't come less than three hours ago.
"No. You know Bill'll tell you right away when something happens."
"Yeah."
The room is too quiet, hasn't been this quiet for weeks. Or, it has, during the day, but Brendon's never in it during the day, and he's used to the sounds of six - seven if Nicole sleeps on Jon's mattress with him - people breathing.
"I - " he starts, but he doesn't know what to say next, knows he wants to break the silence but, for once, not how. So he does the only thing he can think of, or at least the first thing, tilts Kevin's chin up and kisses him softly.
"Brendon," he says, when Brendon pulls away, and God, he sounds so tired for someone who's been sleeping almost constantly since they got back. "I don't think - this isn't -"
"It's okay," Brendon says, except he can't say that, shouldn't say that, doesn't know what Kevin's objections are or whether they're anything he can brush off with two words.
"I'm kind of a mess," Kevin says, turns his face into Brendon's shoulder so the words are hard to catch. "I'm not - I spent a long, long time convincing myself this wasn't something I wanted."
"You've only known me for a couple months, not a long, long time." This isn't any kind of time to joke, and he's not sure Kevin's in the right place, mentally, to know that Brendon is just joking, not misunderstanding.
"I'm a mess."
"Kevin, look the fuck around, everyone's a mess."
"But."
Brendon tangles his fingers in Kevin's curls, tugs lightly, just enough to get Kevin to look up at him. "I don't think you actually do have a 'but'."
"If I didn't," Kevin says, and dear Lord he's actually smiling - a tiny, pathetic little ghost of a smile but it's there, "buying jeans would be a lot easier."
"I think I need to kiss you again."
“I’m still not sure I should let you.”
“But you’re going to.”
It’s a question, but it’s not; Kevin answers by not answering, just tilts his head up without the coaxing of Brendon's fingers and meets him in the middle.
Day Ninety
Spencer Smith is the most anal person Kevin's ever met; there are still bodies in the streets in some places, the stores within easy walking distance are getting emptier and emptier, and the guy still makes these incredibly neat "shopping" lists, sorted by category and with a small note next to some things so they know which recipe it's for.
"It's like crack for him," Brendon says, tucks the folded list into Kevin's pocket. "Watch him sometime; his eyes get all glazed over. I think I caught him drooling over a chore wheel, once."
Kevin smiles, but it must be weak 'cause Brendon doesn't smile back.
"If you wanna stay at the house, I don't mind. Ryan'll come with me."
"No, I need to do something other than lie there. Just. If they come when I'm gone, I don't want them to worry."
"I think there are enough people here that someone can explain you just stepped out for a minute."
"Yeah."
Brendon's smiling now, smiling as he loops his arm loosely around Kevin's waist and guides him across Pete's backyard. "You should check the list again before we get too far, in case there's a specific order Spencer wants us to go in."
"I - "
"Kevin! Holy - Kevin! Kevin!"
Kevin's mouth snaps shut when he hears his name, Greta's voice high and panicky. He looks at Brendon, like Brendon would know any better than Kevin why she's yelling; he looks as confused as Kevin feels, and drops his arm from Kevin's waist like it burned him so Kevin can spin around and run back through the house, follow her voice to the front door.
"Kev - Jesus, there you are."
"What - "
"Look," she says, insistent, and grabs his arm so she can turn him in the right direction. Pointing would have been - oh. Oh.
At the end of Pete's absurdly long driveway is the most beautiful sight Kevin's seen in his entire life, bar none - three people, filthy, shoulders slumped with exhaustion, slowly making their way towards the house.
They made it.
Day Sixty-Two
Kevin doesn't like Jon Walker. He didn't like his easy smile when they first got to Pete's, because it's hard to trust someone whose smiles come effortlessly these days; didn't like the way he looked at Nicole, the way he kept inviting her along on his scrounging trips regardless whether she was busy at the time or not; didn't like finding them having sex on one of the mattresses in the room they share with Brendon, Spencer, Ryan, and Andy. He doesn't trust Jon's tendency to disappear for a few days at a time, or how subdued Nicole's been since she got back from disappearing with him.
Like, whatever, if he's one of those guys who think the appeal of being a musician is in the young groupies, whatever, good for him, but Nicole's been through way too much, so much she won't even talk about it, to deal with someone who apparently isn't bothered by the end of the world enough to stop smiling as long as he's getting some.
So Kevin doesn't like him, and Kevin doesn't trust him, except now Jon Walker's standing in front of him with an armload of kittens, and wow it's hard to think mean thoughts about someone with an armload of kittens.
"Just, Brendon said you're a cat person, and I just. I wanna go see if I can find the mama cat, and some food and stuff for them, and I can't just carry them around for that, it's not safe."
Kevin just nods, and suddenly he has a pile of kittens squirming over his lap, courtesy of Jon Walker.
"Awesome. I have no idea when the last time they ate was, so I'll see about a couple bottles and some milk or shit first."
"I. Yeah, right, sure," Kevin says, and then Jon's gone, leaving him with a whole bunch of kittens and a totally irrational sense of guilt.
They're little, probably too small to be away from their mother, but their eyes are open and they're only a little wobbly when they walk. Which, wow, cutest thing ever, wobbly kittens. Actually the cutest thing ever is their tiny little meows, except they're pitiful enough every one has Kevin more and more anxious for Jon to come back with food for them.
"Either Jon found you, or there's a bigger kitten problem than I thought," Brendon says, leaning against the doorframe.
"Um, no, these are Jon's."
Brendon just smiles a little, climbs onto the bed and scoops up the little gray one so he can stretch out next to Kevin. "I don't actually know if you're a cat person, I just guessed," he says, rests his head on Kevin's shoulders. When Kevin looks at him, Brendon's eyes are fixed on Kevin's fingers where he's wiggling them for the littlest one, the one with funny eyes.
"Good guess."
By the time Jon shows up again with an armload of bottles and towels, Brendon's dozed off. Jon only stays long enough to show Kevin how to feed them, and then he's gone again, with a nod to Kevin and a ruffle of Brendon's hair.
The sunset's vivid orange tonight, bright against the black silhouettes of ruined buildings. No one who was here the whole time comes out when the sky's like this, too much like when the fires were eating the city, apparently. No one but Jon, at least.
"We should head back," Nicole says, for the fifth time. Jon looks up from the basement window he's trying to see through, frowns at her.
"It's not dark yet."
"It will be by the time we get to Pete's. She's not here."
"You don't know that."
"Jon," she says, a little bit at a loss; he's not listening to her anymore, anyway, gone back to squinting through smudged glass. He found the kittens under a porch across the street, claimed they looked well-fed enough the mother had to be around somewhere. But there was no sign of her under the porch, in the ruins of the house, in any of the ruins they've poked through anywhere on the street. Maybe she was here, maybe she'll come back, but she's not here now.
"She might be hiding from us," Jon says, pushes himself off his hands and knees. "Maybe we're making too much noise."
"You wanna tell me how we're gonna dig through rubble silently?"
His frown deepens, thick creases forming in his forehead. He looks older, suddenly, looks as tired as everyone else for the first time since she showed up at Pete's. He lost his cats, she knows, remembers Spencer telling her he was kind of a crazy cat lady and the look on his face when she made the mistake of asking what happened to them, to his dog.
"We can come back tomorrow," she says, quieter; Jon slumps down on the steps next to her, rests his head on her shoulder.
"It'd be. I'd like to help someone."
When the roof caved in, Nicole couldn't get upstairs - even if she hadn't been scared out of her mind she'd get crushed, too, even if she'd really thought she could go marching in there and clear a path for her totally unharmed family to get out safely, there was no way up. No way in if she could get up. When she walked away, it was with the nagging worry in the back of her mind that she didn't try enough, that twenty-four full hours of trying the stairs at a slightly different angle, trying a ladder at every single window, that none of that had been enough and she could have gotten someone, anyone out.
"Yeah," she says, sweeps the hair back off his forehead. "You probably would."
She gets up and starts back towards Pete's without waiting for him to follow.
Day Sixty-Seven
Kevin doesn't leave the house, really; he'll go out to get food or whatever if he's asked, but mostly he stays in, helps with kids or kittens or cleaning or whatever other jobs Spencer has on whatever list he's come up with that day.
But the house has been shrinking, lately, closing in and leaving him itchy, restless. Brendon notices, either because Brendon's really good at reading Kevin or because he watches too closely to miss that kind of thing.
"You okay?" he asks, the hardest possible question to answer.
"There's not enough air in here."
Brendon nods, stands up without a word and reaches for Kevin's hand. It should bother him, that Brendon expects him to follow, that Kevin doesn't feel the need to ask what's this, where are they going, even when Brendon leads him out of the house and in the opposite direction of the small part of the city he's familiar with.
They walk for an hour, long enough Kevin stops wondering where they're going and assumes Brendon's just taking him for a walk, chose this direction 'cause the fires weren't as bad here, the buildings not quite as ruined. He's about to suggest they head back, thank Brendon for getting him out of the house, say he feels better (it's not even a lie, not totally), when there's a sharp tug on his arm and Brendon's pulling him up a driveway.
To a church. The driveway to a church. One that Kevin hadn't noticed, because the steeple's just a charred stump, the stained-glass windows smashed in; it could have been anything, but the battered sign says it's a Methodist Church. And this is just. It's.
Brendon isn't pulling him anymore, and Kevin waits, holds his breath a little, waits for the awe and the love and the fullness to flow through him, finally put his mind to rest.
He stays empty, though, finally has to let out his breath even though the thought of losing anything else from inside him aches, physically hurts. Brendon's watching him, watching all this, brow furrowed in concern, or anxious hope, or something. Kevin wants to say something, thank him for the effort, apologize for...something, for whatever he might have to apologize for, but nothing comes.
Inside, the sanctuary is cleaner than Kevin expected, dusty but fairly intact. Whoever smashed the windows apparently had at least enough respect not to damage the inside. There's a gold cross on the altar, almost gaudy in a world where people rioted over valuables at the first sign of trouble, stole and fought and killed when they still thought money might mean something.
And there's a piano. Despite everything, Kevin still expects some of the feeling church used to give him to start filling him any minute as he walks towards it; it was in music, always music, where he felt God the most. But just walking does nothing; sitting at the bench, running his fingers over the keys, playing the few chords Nick managed to teach him before he got frustrated (Nick's good at so many, many things, but teaching wasn't ever, won't ever be one of them), none of that does anything.
There's a music book open to "The Old Rugged Cross", too sad for Kevin to ever really like, but it was his mother's favorite (is his mother's favorite, past tense makes her sound dead, and he has to assume she isn't until he knows); he tries it, just the melody, but his fingers are clumsy and the notes aren't translating right from his eyes to the tips resting on the keys, anyway.
"May I?" Brendon asks. Kevin had forgotten he was there, almost, not used to Brendon being quiet enough for Kevin to get lost in his own thoughts for any length of time. He shifts over, because even if he can't play well enough to bring God back, maybe Brendon can. He shouldn't be sharing this with anyone, this hugely private moment, the almost-unbearable ache in his gut where the faith he thought couldn't be shaken used to live, but Brendon starts to play like he's known the song his whole life, and Kevin can't bring himself to regret letting him share.
Greta frowns and holds the needle out for Nicole. "I quit. Apparently my feminine whimsy has limits."
It's not much of a surprise; Greta's sighs have been getting more and more frustrated for the past half hour. And it's just as well, 'cause Nicole wants to give this to Greta and it probably doesn't mean as much to make someone work on her own present.
"The parts you did are pretty, at least," Greta says, running her fingers over the squares that end up on her lap when Nicole takes the hoop.
"You really didn't do that badly." Nicole kind of hopes Greta doesn't notice she's pulling out most of Greta's stitches; it'll drive her crazy forever if she leaves them.
Nicole probably shouldn't be working on this now - the colors keep blurring together, needle out of focus in her hand. She didn't sleep well again last night, woke up more than once to Greta holding her down so she didn't fall off the bed in the middle of her nightmare. But she doesn't want to stop, either; it's good for her, she thinks, to be normal a few hours a day.
"Maybe," Greta says, reaches out and taps her fingers against Nicole's knuckles, white from the force of her grip on the hoop, "different colors next time."
The quilt's muted, quiet, big spaces of blues and browns and smaller patches of oranges, purples. Nicole knows exactly what Greta means, what she thinks, because the thing looks like a walk across the desert. Nicole's not sure she could make sense of any other colors, though.
"I keep thinking, this is gonna be the day it gets easier, this is gonna be the night I stay asleep for a full eight hours, that it has to happen sometime so why not today?”
“I don’t think it just happens, I think you have to work at it.”
Nicole sighs, shifts on the couch so she can rest her head on Greta’s shoulder. “I don’t have any energy left.”
“You’ll find some,” Greta says, rests an arm around her shoulder. “Maybe in all that coffee you’re drinking.”
When Brendon wakes up the church is silent, an uneasy stillness that settles heavy in the pit of his stomach. It's not big enough for Kevin to be out of hearing range; even if he'd fallen asleep like Brendon, wouldn't a pew be creaking, or something?
He sits up too fast, back screeching in protest from too long lying on the hard wood of the pew. He was right; Kevin's not in the room, unless he’s lying down.
Brendon absolutely doesn't panic, because as weird as it might sound there isn't really much danger. Chicago's pretty deserted, no crazed survivors willing to do anything to anyone to stay survivors (other than Tom, and Tom knows Kevin now), and even before the mass wave of natural disasters died off there was nothing happening here but the fires. Kevin would have to be extremely stupid to get himself killed.
Except.
Except he doesn't know the city, at all, and Brendon knows from a month spent walking cross-country with him Kevin doesn't pay even a little attention to where he's going as long as there's someone who can lead him there and back, so it's totally possible he walked too far and got lost. And Brendon has no idea how long it's been, so he could possibly be very lost. Brendon could check the pews for him, go up and down the aisles and make sure he’s not napping, but any time he spends doing that is more time for Kevin to get more lost.
If Brendon's back was screeching before, it's waking the dead with its cries when he jumps off the pew and darts to the front door.
Kevin's right there, because Kevin might seem like he isn't totally grasping the severity of the end of the world thing sometimes, might act like he doesn't know he can't just stop at a gas station and ask for directions or make a quick stop at a convenience store if he doesn't drink enough water before leaving the house, but he's not stupid, wouldn't go wandering off like that.
"Hi," Brendon says, instead of sorry I thought you were an idiot.
"I didn't feel anything." Kevin's sitting on the steps, cold rough stone, looking up at the sky instead of Brendon when he talks. "Not even - nothing."
"Do you usually?"
There's an awkward pause there, because that was a stupid question, because why would he have said anything if that was normal for him. Just, Brendon doesn't remember ever feeling anything in a church, not anything God-related. But fuck, he's stupid today.
"Yeah," Kevin says; Brendon waits for him to add duh or obviously or you moron, but he doesn't. He wouldn't.
Brendon sits next to him, close enough he can wrap his arm around Kevin, comfort him with contact if that's what he needs, but far enough away he's not pushing it. Kevin lets his breath out in a long sigh, shifts a little and rests his head on Brendon's shoulder.
The sun's low in the sky, probably looked amazing through the stained glass windows before they were shattered, when Brendon shifts a little, says, "We need to head back, it's getting dark."
Kevin pulls his head off Brendon's shoulder, but doesn't stand up, doesn't move at all until Brendon turns his head and then he leans forward, brushes his lips against Brendon's (soft, Jesus, chapstick is kind of a luxury how are his lips so fucking soft) in the most innocent kiss Brendon's probably ever been a part of.
There are a million reasons Brendon shouldn't, Kevin's total fucked-up there-is-no-God state of mind being most of them, but he kisses back anyway, raises his hand to cup the back of Kevin's head and kiss him just a little harder, just enough Kevin knows it's okay.
Kevin pulls his head back a little, still close enough Brendon can feel Kevin's breath ghosting over his lips, can feel every word. "I want to go after Joe and Nick," he says, and there are a million reasons they shouldn't do that, either, but Brendon just nods.
"Okay."
Day Sixty-Eight
Being around the kittens makes Spencer want to cry, because fuck he misses his dogs, because what are the fucking odds that so many people lost their pets and these impossibly tiny things survived. But he's 80% sure Ryan's going to choke one with the bottle, so he grabs Nicole and intervenes anyway.
"It's really not that hard," Nicole's saying, ignoring the kitten and bottle in her own lap to help Ryan out. "You just have to, like, not shove the nipple down its throat."
Spencer's kitten, the little tabby Jon had claimed as his own with way more threats than were necessary to anyone who might challenge him, is drinking greedily, making these amazing little sounds that just. Fuck. Spencer misses his dogs. His mom's stupid lazy cats. His mom, God.
"Ryan, what the fuck, stop," Spencer hears Brendon say, a split second before Brendon's leaning over Spencer's shoulder and rescuing Ryan's poor hungry kitten. "You're scaring my baby."
"She's not scared, she's hungry, and if you people would just let me feed her - "
"We're going to New York," Kevin says, stops the brewing argument in its tracks.
"You are absolutely not going to New York," Nicole says, goes back to feeding her kitten like that's the end of it.
"Um. Yeah, we are. I need to find Joe and Nick, and I can't go alone, and - "
"Let's not forget I walked with you guys the whole way here, I know exactly how equipped you are to take care of yourselves walking cross-country."
"It's not really up for debate," Brendon says.
It's silent for too long after that, just the sounds of nursing kittens to underscore the quiet. Nicole sighs, runs a hand through her hair. "Fine. When are we leaving?"
Day Seventy
"Kevin Jonas," the last person Kevin wants to see says; when Kevin turns he's leaning in the doorway.
"Jon Walker."
"I've been told to remind you if you pack more than one change of clothes Nicole's not letting you bring any."
"Understood."
Jon frowns a little, walks in and sits on the bed. "Also, that if I'm coming, I need to clear it with you, because Nicole has this ridiculous idea you don't like me."
"You're not coming."
"Not so ridiculous, then?"
Kevin doesn't have anything to say to that. Maybe if he doesn't say anything, keeps his jaw clenched, keeps packing, Jon'll take the hint and leave him alone.
"Did I, uh, do something? Because if I did, it was an accident and if you tell me what it was, I'll apologize for it."
If Kevin hadn't let Pete burn the couple outfits he'd walked to Chicago in, this would be so much easier - the clothes he's scrounged up from abandoned stores aren't exactly practical. Maybe they can do a "shopping" trip before they get on their way.
"I don't think it's unfair to ask what I did."
"If you need so badly to get laid, because that's what's really important right now, having sex, it's not like the world ended and people died, it's not like there's suffering all around you, if you need it so badly, you could at least not take advantage of the scared kid who's, y'know, one of the people suffering."
"Whoa."
There's one pair of jeans at the bottom of the neat pile of clothes next to Brendon and Kevin's mattress, heck yes. Brendon is incapable of folding anything, so there's no danger he's grabbed anyone's pants but his own. He does have a t-shirt of Brendon's, but, again, didn't really think to get any practical clothes for himself.
"Have you, uh, called her a kid to her face?"
"I need to go see if they're ready to go, so, uh, this conversation's over."
"Okay, cool, I'll just, what, sit here and contemplate what a dirty old man I am?"
"It's not - just - "
"Not that this'll do anything for your opinion of me, but do you have any idea how many people here I'd slept with before this? Assuming you're right, and sex is my number one driving instinct, it doesn't really make all that much sense I'd pick someone I had to work to fuck."
"I'm just going - "
"And call her a kid to her face, no really, I bet she loves that."
Kevin just hoists his backpack over his shoulders, turns to get out of the room and away from the conversation he's pretty sure got away from him.
"Just out of curiosity, do you know what happened to her? Why she was so willing to get out of LA with you?"
"I can assume."
"But she didn't tell you."
"I don't see why it matters."
"She told me. So, y'know, while you're just guessing about what kind of suffering she's gone through, what she's going through, she thought I should actually know. But, y'know, I get it, I generally trust my booty calls more than my close friends."
"If you're not packed and ready to go when Nicole and Brendon are," Kevin says, standing in the door with his back to Jon, "we're leaving without you."
It's something to watch Pete and Spencer try to plan together - they're both good at it, there's a reason Brendon went to them, but they're so different about the best way to do it. Pete's grinning like a weirdo at his screen, babbling about how awesome it is they still have internet, and even though Google Maps is exactly how Spencer planned the walk to LA, he's frowning like Pete not being serious enough about it is somehow going to change the quality of the directions.
"This is the same route I gave Joe, so if they haven't gotten there yet, or if something...happened...you'll be right behind them. Well, not right."
Brendon just nods; Spencer's snatching up sheets of paper as they come out of the printer like it's the worst thing in the world Pete didn't print them out last-page-first so they'd make their own neat little pile.
"And be careful."
"I'm really not as bad as Nicole says."
Spencer snorts; Pete just turns to look at him, maniacal grin gone. "That's not what I meant."
Day Seventy-Six
"Will you stop fucking looking at me like that?"
Nicole's tired, God, she didn't expect it to be this bad but every bone and muscle in her body hates her for doing this again after only a few weeks of rest. She keeps stumbling, not often enough to justify the way Jon keeps looking at her like he thinks she's gonna fall over and not get up, but often enough they've slowed to a snail's pace, resting almost every hour.
"Sorry, I'll just stop, y'know, giving a shit," Jon says, in that infuriatingly calm voice of his.
"Good."
"Maybe we should go ba - "
"I'm not turning around, for the five hundredth time."
"Maybe," Brendon says from behind them, tentative, "we should take another break."
"You guys can do whatever the fuck you want, I'm gonna keep walking." Nicole's good at being pissed off, fucking excellent at it, and as soon as her body realizes she only wants to do it because she's mad her legs suddenly work, well enough Jon has to jog to catch up with her once he's left his backpack where Kevin and Brendon are sitting.
"Nicole, Jesus."
"If you want to turn around, turn the fuck around. You shouldn't even be here, you have your fucking family in Chicago, why the fuck did you come with us?"
"You - "
"I don't need you to take care of me." Ken was the kind of person who took care of her all the time. Chelsea, too, although she was a lot less big-brother about it (for obvious reasons). Caretakers are too important.
"I was gonna say your sunny disposition, except if that's my motivation I'm fucked."
"I'll try to be more cheerful."
"And, uh, I won't make any more jokes. Will you just calm the fuck down, for a minute? And you get all...I dunno, if you can concentrate on a mission or whatever, you stop worrying about yourself. And I just...don't want you to do that."
"How noble." She's smiling, though, even though she's not sure she's done being mad; apparently she's not as good at being pissed off when Jon's being all...Jon at her.
"Plus, if you tire yourself out walking, who do I get to fuck?"
The thing is, she absolutely believes both of those are true, and that the actual reason is somewhere in the middle. And it should bother her, because her goal, the one thing she's pretty sure she needs to do, is to care less, at least until it's safer, not find someone else to give a shit about until she’s fairly sure the body count’s not going to rise for a while.
They walk back to Kevin and Brendon, and Jon's about to pick up his backpack when he pauses, squints into the distance.
"Is he still there?" Brendon asks.
"Who?"
"The guy who's been following us," Brendon says.
"It's Bill," Jon says, squints into the sun and nods like anyone asked if he was sure.
The wait is excruciating. Jon won't let them keep going, says if it's important enough Bill left his wife and kid to come after them, it's important enough to wait for. Which is stupid, Jon isn't even supposed to be here, but Kevin's seen the way Bill is around his family enough to know that stupid Jon has a stupid point.
It's late afternoon when Bill catches up to them, finally, sun hot in the sky.
"I," he says, and Kevin braces himself for the big news Bill must have, "didn't bring nearly enough water bottles."
Nicole smiles a little, too nervous, obviously anxious to know what he walked out here for, and hands him a warm bottle out of her backpack. "I didn't pack a fridge, sorry."
"This is perfect," Bill says, doesn't seem to notice - or care about - the eight eyes watching his every move. He drains the bottle, tosses it back to Nicole with a grateful smile, and starts digging in his pocket.
"Bill," Jon starts, but Bill flaps his free hand at him, and Jon just rolls his eyes.
"I have, in the pocket of my impractically tight jeans - why did I think these were a good idea - a text message."
"That's great," Jon says, "but I'm gonna bet you didn't walk out here to show off your text-receiving capabilities."
"An excellent bet, you'd be a rich man right now if you'd put money down." Bill finally gets his phone out, tosses it to Kevin. "It's from Demi."
Kevin almost breaks Bill's phone mashing buttons; Brendon gently reaches out, coaxes the phone out of his hands. "You don't have a phone and this is the only other number she can reach us at, don't break it." He's smiling when he says it, with that look in his eyes he get sometimes, the one that makes Kevin think Brendon must expect him to crumple any minute.
Service! At last. Found Nick; headed back with him&Joe. About 2 weeks' walk away. Any word from Kevin?
"I already told her we have you," Bill says, quiet; everyone's quiet, too quiet, barely breathing, waiting for Kevin to react.
"Okay," he says. "Okay. Um, okay. We need to. I need. We need to start walking again."
No one else stands up when Kevin does, which, come on, the sooner they get going the sooner they'll meet up with his brothers, what the heck is everyone waiting for?
"Kevin," Jon says, in that scared-animal-gentle tone that's apparently kind of insulting coming from anyone but Brendon or Nicole (or, occasionally, Bill). "Bill told them you're at Pete’s, you should be at Pete's."
"That's stupid."
"What if something happens to you out here? Think about how you felt when you got to Pete's and found out you'd just missed them - you wish that on them?"
"Nothing's gonna happen," Kevin says, but he knows it's a lie. "I just. I need to."
"You need to sit down for a second, come on." Brendon tangles his fingers with Kevin, tugs him down as gently as he'd spoken. "Just. Be reasonable."
"I am being reasonable. We're walking the same route they did. They're a week away; if we walk at the same speed they're going I'll get to see them three days earlier than I would otherwise. And what if something's wrong with one of them, maybe it'll be easier for them to have a fourth?"
"They walked the same route out, it doesn't mean they'll walk the same way back," Nicole says, and Kevin's not a violent person but the next person to treat him like a rabid dog that needs to be talked out of attacking is gonna get - something.
"And if there was something wrong, she would've said in the text," Bill points out. "She knows there's plenty of people around, we could've sent someone after them if they needed it."
"She didn't know you could send me."
Jon sighs and stands up, helps Nicole up before he reaches for his backpack. Finally, finally, someone on his side - maybe Kevin needs to rethink his opinion of Jon Walker.
"We need to find somewhere to stock up before heading back; if Bill doesn't have any water, we don't have enough to share around."
Rethinking over. "I'm not going back."
"Kevin," Brendon says, and Kevin doesn't want to look at him in case he looks as desperate as he sounds. "Please."
"I want to see them," he says, like that wasn't obvious already. "I just want to - it's not the worst idea in the world."
"It's not the best, either."
Jon, Nicole, and Bill are already walking away, Nicole pulling Jon and Bill trailing after them. When Kevin finally manages to look at Brendon, he's watching them walk away.
"Will you come with me if I go after them?"
"Yeah. But we're not going to, because you know we're right, and you're not good enough at being stubborn for the sake of it to win this one."
Brendon stands up, reaches out for Kevin; his eyes are hopeful, not desperate, and Kevin can't not give in to that. He lets Brendon pull him up, hand him his backpack, yell to the others to wait for them. Bill's phone is a too-heavy lump in Kevin's hand, and he starts to pocket it before lifting it up and typing out a quick message.
Walk fast. Be safe - K2
Day Eighty-Five
"I just don't know what to do," Brendon says, burrows back into the chair a little more. "We know they're okay, we know they'll be here soon, but he's as bad as he was when I met him."
"He's powerless right now," Spencer says. "Before he had stuff he could do. Now it's just...sitting around. Sitting isn't exactly a good distraction."
Brendon should know that as well as anyone, better, maybe, considering the first time he let himself be idle since they left LA was the first time he actually thought about what had happened. Still, it feels like it should be different, like Kevin shouldn't need to be distracted from such a hopeful situation.
"Plus, if something happens to them between where they were when they texted and here, he's never gonna stop blaming himself for turning around. Like - it's what Ryan does, he's the same way, if there's something bad to dwell on he can find it."
"He's not gonna blame himself," Brendon says, has a harder time than he should forcing himself out of the chair and towards the stairs. "He's gonna blame me."
Kevin looks smaller every time Brendon sees him, curled up tighter on the bed it's their turn to have for the night than he was when Brendon tried to get him to get up and have some lunch. But he unfolds a little when Brendon slides onto the bed, at least enough to shift so Brendon's holding him.
"Any news?" he asks, like the last update hadn't come less than three hours ago.
"No. You know Bill'll tell you right away when something happens."
"Yeah."
The room is too quiet, hasn't been this quiet for weeks. Or, it has, during the day, but Brendon's never in it during the day, and he's used to the sounds of six - seven if Nicole sleeps on Jon's mattress with him - people breathing.
"I - " he starts, but he doesn't know what to say next, knows he wants to break the silence but, for once, not how. So he does the only thing he can think of, or at least the first thing, tilts Kevin's chin up and kisses him softly.
"Brendon," he says, when Brendon pulls away, and God, he sounds so tired for someone who's been sleeping almost constantly since they got back. "I don't think - this isn't -"
"It's okay," Brendon says, except he can't say that, shouldn't say that, doesn't know what Kevin's objections are or whether they're anything he can brush off with two words.
"I'm kind of a mess," Kevin says, turns his face into Brendon's shoulder so the words are hard to catch. "I'm not - I spent a long, long time convincing myself this wasn't something I wanted."
"You've only known me for a couple months, not a long, long time." This isn't any kind of time to joke, and he's not sure Kevin's in the right place, mentally, to know that Brendon is just joking, not misunderstanding.
"I'm a mess."
"Kevin, look the fuck around, everyone's a mess."
"But."
Brendon tangles his fingers in Kevin's curls, tugs lightly, just enough to get Kevin to look up at him. "I don't think you actually do have a 'but'."
"If I didn't," Kevin says, and dear Lord he's actually smiling - a tiny, pathetic little ghost of a smile but it's there, "buying jeans would be a lot easier."
"I think I need to kiss you again."
“I’m still not sure I should let you.”
“But you’re going to.”
It’s a question, but it’s not; Kevin answers by not answering, just tilts his head up without the coaxing of Brendon's fingers and meets him in the middle.
Day Ninety
Spencer Smith is the most anal person Kevin's ever met; there are still bodies in the streets in some places, the stores within easy walking distance are getting emptier and emptier, and the guy still makes these incredibly neat "shopping" lists, sorted by category and with a small note next to some things so they know which recipe it's for.
"It's like crack for him," Brendon says, tucks the folded list into Kevin's pocket. "Watch him sometime; his eyes get all glazed over. I think I caught him drooling over a chore wheel, once."
Kevin smiles, but it must be weak 'cause Brendon doesn't smile back.
"If you wanna stay at the house, I don't mind. Ryan'll come with me."
"No, I need to do something other than lie there. Just. If they come when I'm gone, I don't want them to worry."
"I think there are enough people here that someone can explain you just stepped out for a minute."
"Yeah."
Brendon's smiling now, smiling as he loops his arm loosely around Kevin's waist and guides him across Pete's backyard. "You should check the list again before we get too far, in case there's a specific order Spencer wants us to go in."
"I - "
"Kevin! Holy - Kevin! Kevin!"
Kevin's mouth snaps shut when he hears his name, Greta's voice high and panicky. He looks at Brendon, like Brendon would know any better than Kevin why she's yelling; he looks as confused as Kevin feels, and drops his arm from Kevin's waist like it burned him so Kevin can spin around and run back through the house, follow her voice to the front door.
"Kev - Jesus, there you are."
"What - "
"Look," she says, insistent, and grabs his arm so she can turn him in the right direction. Pointing would have been - oh. Oh.
At the end of Pete's absurdly long driveway is the most beautiful sight Kevin's seen in his entire life, bar none - three people, filthy, shoulders slumped with exhaustion, slowly making their way towards the house.
They made it.