“Matt!”
Ro’s screaming, her voice frantic with terror and anguish, and Matt can hear her but he can’t see her–
“Matt, please help me, I’m so scared–”
Matt claws at the ground – he’s laying in dirt and gravel, cold and sharp against his forearms – and tries to push himself up, trying to blink his eyes open so he can find Ro and save her from whatever is happening to her, but his body won’t move.
“Please, please, I don’t wanna die, I don’t wanna die– Matt!”
He can’t get his limbs to work, and no matter how hard he tries, he can’t get his voice unstuck from his throat. It’s like he’s dead all over again, except not even death was as bad as this, because death was empty.
“Matt, I don’t wanna die,” Ro sobs, and Matt’s never heard this kind of terror in someone’s voice before. “I don’t wanna die! I don’t wanna die!”
I don’t wanna die! The thought rings in Matt’s head as he gasps for breath, the gravel cold underneath him, Joey’s hands warm against his face, and he chokes on gritty, iron-flavored liquid, a disgusting, wet noise erupting from his throat as his muscles rebel and it splatters across his chin. Joey’s crying, and the only reason Matt knows that is because the salt of the savant’s tears burns the raw wounds across his broken face.
Matt wakes up unable to breathe.
He lurches to the side, where his trashcan sits next to his bedside table, scrambling to grab it as a dry heave cramps his muscles and his body tries to physically expel the trauma that’s latched itself onto his spine. Another heave, and Matt groans in pain, curling one arm around himself, but nothing comes up. It’s as though he’s entirely empty inside.
After a few long, expectant moments, Matt shoves the trashcan away and sits back up in bed, carefully leaning up against the headboard and pulling the blankets tight around himself. One look at his alarm clock tells him that it’s only been an hour or so since he fell asleep, but the sky outside is beginning to brighten, another morning dawning. The same morning is dawning on Everlock, and Matt wonders if JC’s body has slipped from its chains yet and fallen, stiff and silent, to the floor. His body considers trying to throw up again at the thought.
Last night was…not good. After he snapped at Joey, Matt retreated back to his bedroom, climbing into bed and staring at the ceiling for what felt like a very long time. His thoughts felt like they were eating each other, an ouroboros in his head, around and around, anger and love and guilt and grief all surrounding Joey at the center. Eventually, Matt’s brain burned itself out, and he faintly remembers the clock reading out some god awful early time before he finally fell asleep.
Stiffly, Matt reaches for his phone, seeking the distraction. If yesterday was the kind of day where the thought of doing anything was too much to bear, today is the kind of day where Matt wants to do anything to keep himself from thinking about what he’s seen. People still seem like too much, so he sends another message out to the Team Theorist group chat, telling them he’s still sick with the flu and can’t do much. Honestly, it doesn’t really feel all that different. His body still aches, and there’s a sort of haze hanging over his brain, making it hard to think, like the brain fog that comes with being sick. Even typing out a two-line message to his friends feels like climbing to the top of a skyscraper.
But Matt manages to get the message out, setting his phone down again so he can carefully, painfully, swing himself up into a sitting position on the edge of his bed.
Another day.
Work. He should get work done. He has things to do, a job that he should probably make an attempt to keep, and the distraction will be a welcome one. Matt manages to stand, stiff muscles protesting at first, and walks slowly to the bathroom. He brushes his teeth robotically, automatic after doing it religiously for over 25 years, but he gives one glance to the mess of his fluffy brown hair, mussed from sleep, and finds he can’t really give a crap about styling it. A similar feeling overtakes him as he examines his face in the mirror, taking in the stubble beginning to prickle his cheeks, the five o’clock shadow that comes from not shaving since before leaving for Everlock. Why should he care about his appearance? Why should he care about any of this, knowing what he knows?
Matt’s disheveled appearance just serves to make him even more weary, and so he doesn’t focus on it any longer than he already has. He turns the bathroom light off and closes the door behind him to make sure he doesn’t catch any glimpses of himself in the mirror, then walks to his office, feeling like he’s wading through syrup. His joints creak with every step, like they’re brittle and ready to snap, so it’s a relief to get to his desk and sit down in his relatively comfortable chair.
His latest script is still pulled up in his recent documents, and Matt clicks over to the document with the research team’s and his own links to sources and timestamps, blinking at it tiredly. It’s a good theory, he thinks. Matt remembers liking it. He even remembers thinking it was fun.
There’s not really much of those feelings anymore.
Still, Matt has an appearance to keep up, a channel to run and people to please. He sighs, scrubs a hand across his eyes to try and wipe the tiredness away as he reaches for his glasses with his other hand, and starts working.
Matt doesn’t get much work done.
It’s late morning by the time he finally gives up the ghost, having written a grand total of 23 words on his script and spending most of his time reading and re-reading the research document, staring at the words there and trying to find meaning in them. It’s not so much meaning, really; more like relevance. Video games and movies suddenly seem a lot less important. He tried to do company work, pulling up the latest data analytics, but the charts and graphs blurred together and eventually he gave up entirely on that and went back to video games.
All he can think about is Ro. He let Ro die. He watched it happen, and he didn’t do anything to stop it. She should never have been in Everlock in the first place, should never have come there, should have been safe at home next to the man she loved instead of fighting for her life in a town that wanted them all dead. Every time she voted, she teared up; every time someone came back from a challenge, she never hated them for winning. She wasn’t meant for a place like that. None of them were, really, but Matt and Safiya and the rest all managed it, they shut it away and compartmentalized and pretended they weren’t sending people to their deaths. Ro couldn’t do that. Maybe that makes her a better person than any of the rest of them.
Matt wonders if she’s in the World Between Worlds. It’s cold there, misty and dark like an autumn night, endless fields full of grass wet with dew that brushed his knees as he stumbled through it, searching for anything familiar, calling out with a weak, broken voice for anyone or anything that was listening. The image of Ro, trampling the sodden grass under her scuffed platform oxfords, looking for something after the end of everything, makes his throat tighten uncomfortably. No. She can’t be there. She can’t be in that empty, lonely place. She’s got to be somewhere better. Ro was a good person, damn it, she doesn’t deserve that purgatory, she didn’t deserve death, she didn’t deserve Everlock–
Matt wipes away tears, swallows back a sob, and blinks at the time. It’s late morning at this point, and when he checks his phone, he finds a few messages from his team, telling him to get well soon. It’s funny, in a bitter way. He’s not going to get better. Getting better would mean forgetting Everlock. Forgetting Ro.
He’ll never be able to do that, no matter how hard he tries.
Matt gives one last glance to his work, then pushes his chair back and stands from his desk. At this point, the constant pain doesn’t surprise him anymore, and so he limps only slightly as he heads out into the hall and heads downstairs. There’s a shape on the couch, curled up tightly underneath a small blanket printed with the Game Theory and Film Theory logos, and Matt doesn’t realize it’s Joey for a second.
He starts towards Joey, meaning to wake him up, but then the words Matt said to him last night come back to him, and he thinks better of it. Instead, he just goes to the kitchen, walking quietly to avoid bothering Joey, and sets Skip’s bowl down for him when he finally hauls his feline butt out of whatever spot he’s hiding in. Every few moments, Matt can’t help but to look back at Joey. Why didn’t he take the bed? Matt didn’t even check if it was slept in, and the couch can’t be that comfortable. Did Joey hate the sheets or something?
In between ogling the missing person crashed on his couch, Matt fills up the coffee maker with water, then pulls the coffee grounds down from the cabinet and pulls out the filter to make a pot of coffee for himself. Food sounds just as unappetizing as it did yesterday, but a cup of coffee might do well to snap his brain back into focus. Besides, maybe Joey likes coffee.
The smell of coffee fills the kitchen soon after, and the familiar sensations – the coffee machine bubbling, the late-morning sunlight shining in through the large windows, the scents and sounds and sights of a normal morning – do a little bit to soothe Matt. He’s not in Everlock anymore. He’s home. He’s safe. He doesn’t really believe it, but somewhere logical, he knows it’s true.
But then he turns, his gaze once again landing on Joey, and Matt thinks he might have brought Everlock home with him.
You can take the man out of Everlock, a part of him says, rather unhelpfully, but you can’t take Everlock out of the man. Just one of those things you just can’t take back, Matt supposes. Same as a kiss. You can’t take one of those back, either. No matter how much Matt wants to.
He doesn’t really know why he kissed Joey. Well, besides the fact that he loves him a little bit, but Matt’s loved a lot of people a little bit, and he’s never kissed any of them. Can he just write it off as blood loss? That he wasn’t thinking straight? He wasn’t, but Matt knows that using that as the only explanation would be lying to himself. It hurts less than the alternative, though, and so Matt repeats it to himself over and over as he watches the coffee brew, leaning against the island with his arms crossed. Truth is, he’s humiliated beyond belief that he kissed Joey. That he practically forced Joey to kiss him, really. Just because Joey might care about him doesn’t mean he ever wanted to kiss Matt, but Matt was so scared and so desperate for touch, and Joey went so willingly when Matt managed to reach up to his face…
“Matt?”
Matt nearly forgot that Joey was in the house, and so he jerks his head up quickly, finding Joey’s figure standing cautiously in the doorway before really registering who it is. After a second, Matt’s shoulders fall, and he shifts his weight, not really wanting to meet Joey’s eyes. Everything he said is coming back to him, and he wouldn’t be surprised if Joey was only talking to him to dish it out as good as Matt gave it to him, but Joey just awkwardly pets his hair down and nods in the direction of the coffee machine.
“Um…would you mind if I…had some?” Joey sounds so hesitant.
The weakness Joey shows doesn’t help Matt put the anger aside. Instead, it just makes it burn ever-brighter. This man killed people, damn it. And for what? To act like this? This is what he uses his second chance at life for?
Matt makes an effort to keep his voice even. “Sure, when it’s done.” The coffee machine burbles cheerily. “Have you eaten?”
Matt can’t stay mad at Joey’s weakness, not when he’s acting the same way. He still feels awful about what he said last night, so if Joey isn’t going to mention it, Matt won’t bring it up, either. He and Joey keep racking those kinds of things up, don’t they?
Joey furrows his eyebrows at Matt’s question, like he didn’t expect him to ask it. “No… Have you?”
“Yeah, I had something when I woke up. It was early, you were asleep,” Matt lies. He can’t bear the thought of food, but he doesn’t want any of Joey’s pity. “You can have any of the fruit on the counter. Bananas, oranges… I think there’s an apple in the fridge. And there’s milk and cereal. I– Do you drink milk? I know you’re kind of…”
Matt trails off, struggling to find the right words to describe what he knows of Joey without sounding like a total asshole. Joey seems to get it. The corner of his mouth quirks up in a small smile.
“I didn’t used to drink cow’s milk.” Joey walks to where a couple oranges sit on the kitchen island and grabs one. “I preferred soy. I didn’t like the thought of the poor cows being mistreated.” His hands shake as he splits the peel open with one thumbnail and starts to pull it away from the bright flesh. “But I don’t really think I can be that picky right now.”
Matt stays silent for a moment, struggling, wanting to say something without saying it. Eventually, he settles on, “If you need something, I’ll buy it for you.”
What Matt needs, Joey needs. Matt’s being nice to him because he sees himself in Joey now, in the shakiness of his hands and the haunted look in his eyes, and if someone was cruel to Matt right now, he’d break down, just like Joey did last night.
“You don’t need to do that, Matt, I–” Joey bites his lip. “I don’t want to be a burden, okay? I just–”
“Everyone’s a burden at some point in their lives,” Matt interrupts. “I’ve already carried you out of Everlock, Joey, and I didn’t do it for you to be miserable out in the real world. Just shut up and let me help.”
Maybe it’s not the kindest thing he could say, but it’s better than anything else he wants to say to Joey. Joey just blinks at him, holding the orange loosely in one hand, his blue eyes wide. The coffee maker has stopped bubbling by the time Matt looks away.
“I’ll go to the store today.” Matt pulls a magnetic notepad from the fridge and sets it down on the counter next to the container of pens and other miscellaneous writing utensils. “Make a list of things you want. I’ll see what I can find.”
Matt turns away to grab the creamer from the fridge and set it down on the counter next to the coffee machine, pulling two mugs from the cabinet above it and setting them next to the creamer. When he turns back around to face Joey, he’s momentarily surprised to see Joey staring at him with his eyes wet and his mouth tight like he’s holding himself back from crying.
Despite himself, Matt has to fight the urge to pull Joey into a hug and pet his hair and kiss away his tears. “Joey? Is everything okay? What–?”
“You’re so fucking nice,” Joey says, his voice quiet and close to tears. “You’re just– you’re such a good person. And I-I can’t– I don’t–”
A good person wouldn’t have let Ro die, Matt thinks. Instead of saying that, he hurriedly stammers, “It’s fine, Joey, don’t– don’t worry about it. It’s not– it’s not a big deal.”
He doesn’t want Joey to think of him as a good person, because he’s not. A good person wouldn’t have gotten out of Everlock alive. The only people who got out of Everlock alive are the ones who could ignore the fact that people died for it, the ones who could compartmentalize human suffering and violence and grief. Some snapped under the pressure, like Colleen, and some were just too nice, too gentle, like Ro.
Matt especially doesn’t want Joey to think of him as a good person when he’s still so mad at Joey he can taste it, when he looks at Joey and thinks of punching him right in his stupid, handsome face.
Matt clears his throat and looks down at the coffee he’s preparing to avoid looking at Joey as Joey sniffles and wipes his face. After a minute or so, Matt decides it’s safe to raise his head again. Joey is eating his orange slowly, methodically picking the pith away from each slice before raising it to his mouth. In Matt’s bright kitchen, the orange like a miniature sun in Joey’s hands, Joey’s hair just as messy as Matt’s and his body wrapped in a too-large sweater, Matt can almost imagine that they’re something more than this. Whatever this is. He pours some coffee into a mug and pushes it in Joey’s direction.
“Creamer, if you want it. It's a dairy creamer, obviously, so here’s sugar, too, if you’d just prefer to drink it black.” Matt picks his own mug up and cradles it in his hands, the warmth of the ceramic spreading through his palms and tethering him to right now, this moment. He takes a hesitant sip, and to his pleasant surprise, he can begin to taste the sweetness of the creamer and the dark roast coffee underneath it. It’s not as prominent as it used to be, but it’s there. Maybe the lack of taste won’t be permanent, then.
“Thanks, Matthew,” Joey says, his voice quiet. He gives Matt a quick, small smile. “Really. Thank you.”
Joey’s smile is as bright as the orange he’s holding, and Matt finds himself wanting to smile back. The expression feels stiff, like the rest of his muscles, but he thinks he manages it. For a few long seconds, he and Joey hold eye contact. Joey’s face is pale and drawn, his dark blonde stubble and the dark bags under his eyes standing out sharply against the sallowness, and Matt wishes he could run his fingers along the sharp lines of Joey’s cheekbones like he did out under the Everlock starlight, his fingers leaving trails of dirt on Joey’s perfect face, wanting to touch one last beautiful thing before the end.
“Don’t worry about it,” Matt replies. He looks down at his coffee mug. “I’m gonna…go get some work done. Feel free to use the TV. I think my YouTube is logged in, just log out so you don’t screw up my recommendations. There’s a couple different streaming services, too. And if you want something to eat, just tell me you’re eating it.”
He needs to stop thinking about Joey. If he keeps thinking about Joey, he’ll drive himself crazy with what if’s and wonderings and memories of Joey’s mouth on his and the knowledge of what Joey did to him and the people he cares about.
“Okay.” Joey watches as Matt takes a step back.
Matt’s almost out the door when he remembers something, stopping and turning halfway towards Joey. “Oh, one thing. You slept on the couch. Did you forget I have a spare bed?”
Joey’s eyes widen, giving him the appearance of a stricken deer. “I… No, I didn’t forget, I– I was just too tired to walk up the stairs.”
“...Um.” Matt knows enough about people to recognize that as a lie. But he doesn’t call Joey out on it. Instead, he just shrugs. “Alright, then. The spare bedroom’s free, though. Anytime you want it.”
“I know. Thanks.” Joey takes the cup of coffee and takes a sip without adding anything, making a thankful noise.
He’s so fucking weird, Matt thinks, glancing back one last time before leaving the room, and the thought is fond.
By mid-afternoon, Matt decides that maybe a change of scenery is in order. His office suddenly feels cramped, oppressive, his wall of shelves filled with books and the plaques that YouTube gave him to commemorate channel milestones looking like they’re about to topple over and crush him any second. Matt shuts down his computer and instead grabs his laptop, gathering his cup of coffee and his phone and making his way downstairs with the laptop tucked under one arm. Joey is watching TV, curled on the couch underneath the same Game Theory blanket he slept under, and he looks up at Matt warily as Matt approaches.
“Like the blanket?” Matt asks, because he doesn’t like the wariness on Joey’s face. He sits down on the other end of the couch and looks at the animated movie that’s playing. The Lion King, he realizes after a moment. Matt settles against the cushions and opens his laptop.
“It’s nice,” Joey says, a little sheepishly. “You can have it, if you want it–”
“No, it’s alright. Keep it.” Matt guesses Joey’s probably cold with the amount of weight he’s lost. “It’s just a blanket.”
Joey goes back to the movie, and though Matt tries to focus on work, eventually he just ends up watching it with Joey. It’s not the worst use of his time. He even manages to crack a smile at something the characters do.
By the end of the movie about half an hour later, Matt almost feels halfway normal. He stretches, setting his now-asleep laptop aside, and reaches for the remote, suddenly wanting to watch something else. Maybe this time he’ll actually be able to focus on it. Sitting here with Joey feels like limbo, and Matt can ignore the world except for them, sitting together on his couch watching children’s movies. Joey watches him scroll through the selections of animated movies before settling on Megamind. Joey seems to approve of his selection, because he relaxes back against the couch slightly, pulling the blanket tighter around him.
“Oh, I wrote down a list,” Joey says, as the intro credits start to roll. “I put a bunch of stuff down, but I don’t– I mean, I don’t expect you to buy all of it.”
“That’s fine.” Matt keeps his eyes on the TV. “I was going to go…later. When there’s less people.”
He actually entirely forgot about his promise to go to the store for Joey, but now that he’s been reminded of it, he doesn’t really want to take it back. Besides, he needs some things, too. Even if the thought of going out in public makes him feel queasy.
“You need some clothes, too.” Matt finally looks over at Joey, taking in his tall figure all folded up on the couch. “What size do you wear for shirts and pants?”
“Um…shirts, large. Sometimes extra large, depending on the brand.” Joey cracks his knuckles absentmindedly. “Pant size 36 by 38, or large. In women’s shirts, extra large.” Then he frowns. “I think. I don’t know. It’s been a while since I’ve bought clothes, and…I’m probably not the same size as I was then.”
“Probably not, but you’re getting sweatpants, so I don’t really think it’ll matter much.” Matt makes a quick note of Joey’s sizes down in his phone, then tucks it back into his pocket. The Walmart not far from his neighborhood has a good enough selection of generic men’s clothes to make sure that Joey doesn’t have to wander around in Matt’s for any longer than it takes Matt to go to the store.
“You know, I don’t mind wearing your clothes–” Joey starts, but Matt cuts him off.
“Sure, but you still need some of your own.”
Joey wearing Matt’s clothes is giving Matt conflicted feelings. Not because of any worry about hygiene – Matt’s clothes are clean, and he has a washing machine, so as long as Joey doesn’t go out and kill someone in them, Matt doesn’t care – or about Joey stealing them; no, he’s just a little taken aback by how damn cute Joey is wearing Matt’s oversized sweaters and jogging pants that make him look disproportionate and lanky.
“I do,” Joey concedes. “But it’s fine if you don’t wanna go to the store today. I mean…I get it.”
Matt meets Joey’s eyes defiantly, knowing what Joey is implying and not liking it one bit. “Get what? I’m fine.”
Now he’s going to go to the store out of sheer spite. Even if the prospect of someone seeing him, or even worse, recognizing him, makes him nauseous. That’s why he’ll wait until just before closing, when it’s all but the most frantic of late-dinner makers and the elderly, both groups unlikely to recognize him as that guy from the internet. He’s normally less worried about it – contrary to what some people say, he does actually enjoy most meetings with fans – but right now, he can’t imagine being able to smile and laugh and accept a picture in a Walmart aisle in front of the feminine hygiene section (true story).
“Okay,” Joey says, obviously unconvinced. “Sure.”
“Don’t ‘sure’ me,” Matt snaps, glaring at Joey, but Joey’s already looking back at the TV, leaning his head back against the back of the couch. His eyes flick to Matt, then away, and the tiny motion makes Matt rethink the tirade he was half-tempted to aim at Joey. Matt deliberately takes a breath and sits back against his side of the couch. What good would snapping at Joey do? Did it do any good last night?
Matt grabs a corner of the blanket, drapes it over his legs, and focuses on Megamind.
Joey’s fallen asleep by the time Matt turns off the TV and checks the clock to see if it’s a good time to leave for the store yet. They finished Megamind, then went to The Little Mermaid, and now they’re almost to the end of Kung Fu Panda. Joey fell asleep sometime around Tai Lung’s escape, and Matt’s taken the chance to really look at Joey. He hasn’t gotten many chances to do that, on account of the fact that most of the time he’s known Joey, they’ve been running for their life. So he looks now, taking in the sharp, angular lines of Joey’s face, lit by the screen as the movie plays in the background. The stubble that covers Joey’s jaw and neck cuts sharply to the platinum blonde of his dyed hair, his dark roots showing where it hangs messily over his forehead. Joey doesn’t have a house anymore, and so the image Matt has is of Joey bleaching his hair in a gas station bathroom, shirtless and bent over the sink.
Kind of a nice image, actually.
Matt admitted it to himself long ago, before Everlock, before the missing people: Joey Graceffa is an attractive man. The few conventions Matt interacted with him at never really gave him a chance to get to know Joey, but there was always a part of him, the lonely, gay part of him, that kind of wanted to. Joey is handsome, with a movie-star jawline and those big blue eyes. Matt read an article once that said the color of the universe, all the wavelengths of light put together from all the galaxies and stars that humans know of, is blue. He wonders if it’s the same blue as Joey’s eyes.
He gets up from the couch slowly, not wanting to wake Joey up. Joey’s lost a lot of weight, and he’s probably lost a lot of blood, too, if he was being held captive by vampires. Matt wouldn’t be surprised if he has a laundry list of vitamin and mineral deficiencies, and anemia to boot, so it’s no wonder Joey’s falling asleep in whatever place he can sit down in. Matt makes a mental note to pick up some multivitamins for Joey along with the food and clothes.
Joey’s list is sitting on the counter, his handwriting messy but legible. Rice crackers, hummus, pita chips, grapes, strawberries, carrots, cucumbers – everything you’d expect an animal loving health nut to want to eat. Matt knows he has a few of these things, and so he grabs a pen and crosses those off, leaving himself some options. He can definitely get Joey this stuff. God knows he should probably eat healthier, too.
If he eats at all. It’s already almost dinner time, and the only thing Matt’s had today is a cup of coffee. He has to really think about it to realize he’s hungry, the painful sensation distant and unimportant. Still, he needs to eat, if not because he wants to, because he has to. Matt puts a piece of bread in the toaster and scribbles down Joey’s clothing sizes as he waits for it to finish. When it pops up, he eats it plain, holding it absentmindedly in one hand and mentally categorizing the list as he does. Really, he’s just putting off leaving the house.
But he can’t put it off forever. Eventually, Matt steels himself, glancing down at his attire and realizing he’s still in the rumpled shirt and sweatpants he put on the morning after Everlock. He should make an effort to change, even if it’s just into clean clothes; though it’s unlikely anyone will recognize him, he still doesn’t want pictures of himself looking like he crawled out of a dumpster circling around on the Game Theory hate subreddit. He heads upstairs to switch his shirt for a clean one and throw on a pair of jeans. He slips a hat over his messy hair, then after a moment of deliberation, picks up his sunglasses and tucks them in his pocket.
Joey doesn’t wake up when Matt walks back downstairs. He’s shifted position now that Matt isn’t on the couch anymore, curled on his side with his hair strewn over the pillow and the blanket haphazardly covering him. He looks…soft. Matt gets the strangest urge to lean down and kiss him on the cheek. He doesn’t, though. Instead, he tears off a piece of paper from the same pad Joey wrote his list on and scribbles a quick note on it.
At store. Will be back soon. – Matthew.
He leaves it on the coffee table where Joey will find it, then grabs his keys and leaves the quiet house.
The drive to the store is a short one, and Matt turns the radio on to fill the silence. The evening talk show is on, and though he’d normally be loath to listen to the radio instead of just using his phone, he craves the normalcy of it. He wants to be just another man, driving to the store, listening to the radio. The man he was before Everlock. Is he really going to pretend that he can ever go back to that, Joey or no Joey? Is he going to pretend he can come back from Everlock? Is he really going to pretend he can ever actually escape the horror of that night?
Matt doesn’t really think he has a choice in the matter. He can’t break down. He has a life, a job, friends that don’t know about Everlock who won’t ever know if he has his way. He has no choice but to keep going. Even if he can’t ever really leave it behind. He’ll carry it with him like he hauled that tire, watching Manny get further and further ahead, a weight making it hard to move and harder to think beyond the frantic pounding of his heart and the alarm bells in his brain: I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die.
Matt’s next breath is shuddering. He’s parked in a space away from other people, near the back, and the cool air of his car burns in his tight throat, automatic in response to the memories of the challenge that feel like they’re sitting in the car with him, hovering next to him like phantoms. If he looks to the side, he’s afraid he’ll see Wilmer sitting in the passenger seat, his bulk and height crammed into Matt’s compact little Acura, leering at Matt and meaning to smash his face in for good this time.
Another shuddering breath. Matt’s hands come up to grab the steering wheel, leaning forward to rest his forehead on them, and for a half-second he considers giving up and just going home. Does he really expect to be able to get out of his car, walk into the store, and browse the aisles like any of the other hundreds of people that have passed through there today?
You don’t have a choice, Safiya’s voice reminds him sternly, and Matt knows his dead friend is right.
Matt stiffly climbs out of his car, grabbing his bags from the backseat and starting the long walk to the doors of the store. The parking lot isn’t exceedingly busy, but it still feels like every person he passes is staring at him, their eyes boring into his soul and figuring out exactly what he’s done. Matt hunches his shoulders and pulls his hat lower, making sure his sunglasses are secure on his face. They’re not looking at me, he tells himself, an edge of franticity to his voice, as he passes a family laughing and joking as they load their car up. They’re not looking at me. They don’t know anything. They don’t know and they’re not looking at me.
By the time the doors automatically slide open for him, Matt’s heart rate has picked up into an anxious skitter, his pulse in his ears. He wishes he had brought his headphones, because the store is so loud, sound bouncing around the high, industrial ceiling, and even with sunglasses on the fluorescent lights are so bright they make his head throb with a low-grade headache. His hands feel numb as he takes a basket and makes his way into the store proper, keeping his head low and his eyes on the floor.
Matt fumbles the list from his pocket once he’s standing next to the little seasonal display, Halloween candy and cookies this time of year, reading the words on the scrap of paper without really seeing them. Milk. Bread. Grapes, oranges, cucumbers. Hummus. Pita chips and regular chips. Vitamins. Coffee. Joey’s clothing size.
For some reason, he can manage to focus on Joey’s clothing size. He should probably get that stuff first anyways, so the cold items don’t warm up as he walks around the clothing section, and the direction it gives him is welcome. He swallows down the panic that rises like a firework in his gut as someone brushes past him – he’s standing in the middle of the walkway, like the fool he is – and begins to shakily walk towards the section labeled Men’s Clothing, where rows of generic sweatpants and various graphic tees are displayed.
He grabs a two-pack of sweatpants first, knowing Joey probably just wants comfort over appearance. Then, upon thinking a little harder about it, Matt also picks out a pair of black chinos. Joey will have to leave the house at some point, and he’ll probably want to look halfway presentable when he does. The appropriate underwear and socks are thrown into his basket as well, and then he moves to where rows of shirts hang. First, he grabs a simple, blue hoodie, then a three-pack of plain white short-sleeve shirts. That should be enough for Joey to get through everyday life for a bit until he gets his bank account back. But as Matt turns to leave, a shirt hanging in the women’s clearance section catches his eye: bright blue tie-dye fading to pastel purple. It’s cheerful, and it looks like exactly the kind of thing Joey would wear. After a moment of deliberation, Matt takes it, draping it over the edge of the basket.
Okay. Clothing: done. Matt fishes out a pen from the pocket of his jeans and crosses it off. Food next. He feels a little calmer now, and it’s a little easier to block out the hum of people and the constant bustle of the checkout section and the buzz of the fluorescent lights that he’s pretty sure he’s imagining. He turns and heads towards the grocery section, ending up in the coffee and baking aisle. The aisles feel so close suddenly, cramped and busy even though he’s the only one standing in it. He suddenly wishes he had more layers on. The t-shirt he’s wearing seems too thin, too revealing, showing off the lack of definition in his arms and the softness of his stomach.
You’re weak. Weak!
Matt grabs the first bag of coffee that catches his eye and hurriedly scratches it off the list. He needs to get his things and get out of here, where there’s too many people, too many things. It’s too unfamiliar and too open and Matt suddenly craves the warm darkness of the closet he still records in, his coats and shirts hanging above him, like the warmth and darkness of death after the harsh pain of dying. Matt’s next breath is a gasp as though his body is making sure his lungs still work.
Distraction, he needs distraction. What’s next? Produce. His legs don’t want to work, but somehow he manages to make it to the produce section, picking out a bag of grapes for Joey and a few other vegetables and fruits he likes to keep in the house to make an excuse that he’s eating healthy and offset the ungodly amount of soda he drinks. They’re all crossed off the list. He could stop now. He doesn’t need anything else urgently, and Joey’s got clothes and at least some snacking materials that should sustain him until–
Until what? This is Matt’s new reality. This isn’t ever going away. He has a degree in neuroscience, he knows how trauma works. This is going to stick with him for the rest of his life. Is he just never going to go into a store ever again? Matt can’t let this change him any more than it already has. He takes a few deep breaths standing in front of the apples, closing his eyes for a moment and trying to calm his racing heart, and looks over the rest of what he needs. He can just get it done fast. It’s only a few items.
The chips, bread, vitamins, and hummus are all grabbed quickly, Matt knowing where they are after years of shopping at the same store. Then he heads towards the milk section, up against the back wall with the meat, eggs, and creamer, past the frozen section. He briefly pauses in the frozen section, wondering if he wants something from it, but then he catches a glimpse of his reflection in the glass, and quickly walks out.
Directly into the lunch meat and sausage aisle.
Matt realizes his mistake too late. The sight of the sausages coiled in their vacuum sealed packages reminds him too much of Safiya’s intestines, the raw meat like the rawness of her muscles underneath layers of viscera. Human flesh looks just like cow flesh when it’s been torn open by a fish hook, bright red and meaty as blood gushes from it, a brutal wound. Matt can almost feel the heat of it on his hands, and he barely registers his muscles failing and the clatter of the basket falling to the floor next to him.
“We didn’t go into the challenge!” Joey’s words run together with panic, stumbling back away from Willie as Willie stalks towards him – no, not towards him, towards Safiya. “What happened to them?!” Joey scrambles back, leaving Safiya pinned in the corner, and Willie’s deadlocked on her.
“No, wait–” Safiya tries to hold her hands out placatingly, her eyes wide. “Wait–”
Willie doesn’t wait. Joey and Rosanna both scream as he steps up and slashes across Safiya’s slender body with the rusty, cruel edge of the fish hook, the sound of flesh ripping apart too loud in what was supposed to be a safe lounge. Safiya collapses, convulsing, dark blood staining the bright red of her sweater and the fabric torn open to reveal flesh torn open underneath. Willie says something but Matt’s already rushing towards Safiya and clamping his hands down on her stomach, but it’s too long, the wound is too wide, and oh, God, he can see the bright pink of organs, blood gushing into the body cavity, and Safiya bucks under his hands, moaning in pain as she throws her head back, a painting of agony.
Matt feels such a roiling of nausea in his stomach that he nearly doubles over, his mouth tasting like bile. Safiya died quick, but there was a bloodstain on the carpet of the lounge afterwards, after Matt and Joey carefully carried her body out like she was fucking trash instead of Matt’s friend–
There’s tears streaming down his face from underneath his sunglasses, and Matt collapses, his legs giving out underneath him. Safiya shouldn’t have died in that challenge, it should have been Manny, should have been Nikita, should have been anyone but her, because she was smart and witty and Matt knew she could have escaped had she been given the chance. Matt sobs, leaning up against the aisle end cap with his hand over his mouth. The lights are too bright again, the noise of the store too loud, the squeaking of cart wheels and the hum of people pressing against the sides of his skull as he sits on the floor and cries.
It’s humiliating. It’s shameful, and the Strong Man’s words run on a loop in his head – weak, weak, weak – as Matt tries to take deep breaths, but every time he blinks he sees the bright red meat and it’s just like Safiya’s stomach torn open underneath his hands, his hands have so much blood on them, the cuffs of his sleeves stained with it, dripping from his palms. Matt sobs again, quieter, and curls his knees up tight to his chest. He’s an adult man crying on the floor of Walmart, distantly absurd, but Matt can’t be anything else right now.
“Sir…? Sir, are you okay?”
Matt jerks his head up to meet the eyes of the person that’s standing a few paces away. It’s an employee, their blue vest covered in pins, with short, curly hair and a worried expression on their round face. For a moment, Matt can’t make out their nametag past the tears in his eyes.
“Are you okay, sir?”
River. Their name is River, and they’re an employee, checking to make sure the grown man crying on the floor isn’t overdosing or having a mental breakdown. Well, Matt is kind of having a mental breakdown. But he needs to get it together and act like an adult instead of a child throwing a tantrum.
The interruption to his panicked thoughts gives him enough sense to sniffle pathetically and croak out, “Y-Yeah. I-I’m sorry, I just–” He swallows back a sob. “I’m sorry. It’s been– a hard day.”
“Do you need help? Should I call someone?” The employee gives him a concerned look. “I can call an ambulance, if you need it.”
“No, no, don’t, I’m– I’m okay.” Matt rushes to reassure them, the panic coming right back at the thought of an EMT asking him questions, or Stephanie being called to come pick him up because he cried in the middle of a Walmart. Slowly, he pulls himself up and makes a show of brushing himself off to try and reassure the poor underpaid employee. “I’m fine. I’m sorry.”
“...Okay, sir. If you need help, there’s a police station just down the road.” They seem unconvinced, but with another look over his body, they walk away, back to a cart full of items that they seem to be adding to. The poor person isn’t paid enough to deal with this shit, so Matt doesn’t blame them for not pressing further.
God, how fucking pathetic is he? He’s judging Joey for acting like he is, and then he goes and has a panic attack because he saw a slice of steak? Shame burns hot on Matt’s cheeks as he quickly stumbles away from the deli section. He’s tempted to just dump his basket and get the hell out of here, but the thought of coming home empty-handed stings after the bullshit he’s gone through to get these items. Matt heads towards the self checkout to avoid interacting with anyone else and determines that he can probably never show his face at this store ever again.
The tears have mostly dried when Matt finally gets back home, the short drive having felt much longer than normal. Were the groceries worth it? Matt can’t say. Either way, he’s glad to be home. Joey is sitting at the kitchen counter when he walks in, a cup of coffee in front of him, and he looks up thankfully when Matt walks in.
“Hi,” Matt says, for lack of anything else to say. He puts one bag down on the counter, and the other, the one full of clothes, he gives to Joey. “Been awake long?”
“Not really. Fifteen minutes or so.” Joey looks in the bag Matt hands to him, his face lighting up. “Clothes. Matt, you really didn’t–”
“Shut up, Joey.” Matt starts putting things away. He’s really not interested in Joey’s excuses as to why Matt’s some kind of saint for doing the bare minimum for him. He knows his voice is a little sharp, but he doesn’t really make too much of an effort to soften it. “They’re just cheap Walmart clothes.”
Joey falls silent and stares at Matt as Matt opens the fridge and puts the hummus and cucumbers and grapes away. Then, he finally asks, “Are you okay, Matt?”
Matt is so not doing this with Joey right now.
“I got you some multivitamins.” Matt fishes them from the bag and pushes them across the counter to Joey. “With how much weight you’ve lost, and if the vampires were feeding on you–” There’s a sentence Matt never expected to say unironically, but here he is, “–you’ve probably got a lot of deficiencies.”
“Are you okay, Matthew?” Joey asks again, slower this time, as if he thinks Matt just didn’t hear him.
Matt stops what he’s doing, his back to Joey, and carefully puts his hands on the edge of the counter as he takes a breath. “Joey.”
He’s not doing this. He’s not letting Joey act like he cares about Matt, not when Matt knows exactly how much Joey really cares about him, being so willing to let Matt die for him. That’s what he’s worth to Joey. A fucking sacrifice.
A sacrifice that Joey kissed–
But still a sacrifice.
“Don’t just brush me off, Matthew,” Joey says, and there’s a hint of his usual sassiness back in his tone. “What–?”
“Stop talking to me like I’m one of your fucking errant dogs!” Matt whirls around to face Joey, his hands in fists at his sides. If there’s one thing that’s true about Matt, it’s that he’s a stubborn fucker who doesn’t learn lessons the first time they’re taught to him, no matter how terrified Joey looked last night or how horrible Matt felt afterwards. Angry tears flood Matt’s eyes as he glares at Joey across the island. “You wanna know what happened? You really want to know, Joey?” He doesn’t give Joey the chance to answer. “I walked into the meat section and the first thing I thought of was Safiya’s fucking guts in my hands, the way her stomach looked after Willie fucking ripped her open like she was a goddamn feather pillow. You wanna know how it felt to have my hand slip inside her, Joey? Huh? You wanna know that, too?”
Matt’s voice has risen to a fever pitch, and there’s something about making Joey look as guilty as Matt feels that satisfies an ugly part of him. But it makes the rest of him shrivel in even more shame.
Joey tries for placation, but Matt can see the fear in his eyes. “Matthew–”
“Don’t fucking ‘Matthew’ me!” Matt’s yelling now, and he hates yelling, he hates being an angry man, but Joey is just sitting there and Safiya’s dead body might as well be sitting between them. “Don’t! I don’t want your– your sympathy, I don’t want your praise, you used me as a goddamn sacrifice and– and– and you–”
Matt’s about to tell Joey that Joey doesn’t care, but he knows that’s not true. Joey cares. Joey covered Matt’s body with a jacket, tucked it around him like a shroud, and Matt’s anthropology professor in his first year of college told him that humans became human when they started burying their dead.
“You took something from me,” Matt finishes eventually, his voice breaking as the tears overflow. “You took something from me that I’ll never get back.”
That empty feeling inside of him is still there, the part of him that’s been missing ever since he woke up underneath Joey’s jacket, his body aching like an open wound as the magic of the Lazarus Harp knitted broken bones and burst organs back together. Matt used to read stories about people being brought back from the dead and thinking that even if it did ever become possible, it should never happen – things that are dead are supposed to stay dead. He still thinks that’s true.
“Matthew…” There’s tears rolling down Joey’s cheeks too, and he looks like he wants to reach out for Matt, or maybe that’s just the part of Matt’s brain that wants to be held until it hurts just to prove it can hurt. “I…”
“Don’t,” Matt snarls, because he doesn’t know when to leave well enough alone. “Don’t. This is your fault, Joey, all of it, and maybe you should deal with it for a change instead of letting other people die for you.”
Matt shoves the empty grocery bag under the counter where he keeps them, leaving a few groceries still sitting out on the counter, and then turns and walks away. Let Joey do something for once instead of sitting back and letting other people do it for him. Maybe next time he dies, it’ll fucking stick.
The violence of his thought stops Matt in his tracks halfway up the stairs, his hand on the banister. What the fuck? He doesn’t– he doesn’t want Joey to die, no matter how angry at him he is, because Joey being dead means that everyone else who died, died for nothing. Sure, maybe they died to save Everlock on paper, but Matt knows what the true purpose of that mission was, and so did everyone else as soon as Joey finally came clean about why he brought them there. If Joey died, then everyone’s death would be in vain. Matt’s death would be in vain.
Jesus Christ, Matt hates himself. Joey didn’t even do anything wrong, all he did was ask Matt what was wrong with him, and there was something wrong with Matt, quite obviously, too. Why can’t Matt just be normal? Why does it feel like his emotions are an out-of-control train careening off the tracks, mowing down anyone stupid enough to get in front of it? Why is Joey stupid enough to get in front of it?
Matt ends up in his bedroom, where Skip is sprawled on the end of his bed, asleep. He cracks his eyes open and blinks slowly at Matt as Matt enters.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Matt says half-heartedly, feeling as though Skip’s gaze is judgemental even if Skip is just a cat. Then again, if any cat would be judgemental, it would be Skip. “Stop it.”
Skip blinks at him again, then yawns, an eldritch horror instead of a cat for a half-second, before adjusting his position on Matt’s bed and going back to sleep. Matt thinks Skip’s got the right idea. His hands are shaking too hard to do anything but clench them hard in his pockets, and Matt sits down on the edge of his bed, staring at the picture frame on his bedside table of him and his friend Stephanie at college graduation, him holding the bouquet her parents gave her and her holding a rose that someone gave to him. The things that he’d give to go back to that moment, elated, with a new degree and a best friend that he loved…
For a moment, he considers calling Stephanie. She’s a good person. She’d know how to help him. But Matt can’t bear the thought of telling her what happened – even if she believed him, he doesn’t want her to know that he let people die for him, doesn’t want any more people to know how guilty he feels, how tainted his soul is. He could call Nikita and bitch about Joey to her, but… He doesn’t want to bother her. She’s so proud, she’d probably take it as a sign that he thought she needed help.
Matt lays down on his back, still fully clothed, and looks up at the ceiling. His anger comes and goes so quickly, and now that he’s not looking at Joey any more, he just feels empty and ashamed. He hates feeling angry. It reminds him too much of how he felt right before the Strong Man’s challenge, when he glared at Joey and wanted to tell him to his face that he hoped he was beaten to death. Now that Matt knows how that feels, he’s not sure he’d wish it on anyone. Even Joey. Especially Joey.
Matt turns onto his side, pulling his knees up to his chest and tucking his arm underneath his pillow. He’s just…tired. Tired, and guilty, and so grief-stricken that he still feels a little sick with it. Or maybe that’s just the fact that he’s consumed about 180 calories today. Matt buries his head in his pillow and ignores the vague sense that if he opens his eyes, he’ll see JC’s dead body hanging from the ceiling.
Matt finally climbs out of bed about two hours later. To say he slept is not quite right; more like he dozed, and this time his dreams were slimy and full of the scent of popcorn and the sound of gunshots. When he drags himself from his tangled blankets, his throat dry, his shirt is damp with sweat. His brain feels thick and overheated, like he has a fever, and for a moment, Matt worries he really is sick. He did come into contact with some pretty questionable things in Everlock…
But the feeling starts to ease as soon as he trudges to the bathroom and splashes some cold water on his face, easing the flush in his cheeks and the redness of his eyes. He faintly remembers crying at some point. He thinks it was about the time he opened his eyes and thought Manny was looking at him, his skull blown out by the force of a revolver’s bullet, sitting on the edge of Matt’s bed with bits of his brain sliding down the side of his face. Matt stares at himself in the mirror, his eyes weary. The five o’clock shadow from this morning has morphed into full stubble, prickly over his face, and his eyes are dull and flat as he looks into his reflection.
“I’m alive,” Matt says, just to make sure he really is alive and this isn’t a dream, the last seven minutes of brain activity before his oxygen runs out and he dies on the ground of Everlock. Matt wraps his arms around his midsection and tries to pay attention to the way his chest rises and falls with each staggered breath. “I’m alive. I’m alive. Oh, God, I’m alive.”
He repeats it like a mantra, softly at first and then louder, because Joey might have taken something but he didn’t take Matt’s life, not permanently. Matt sobs and doubles over. Suddenly everything is too much, he’s too horrible of a person to be here, and he’s alive but he shouldn’t be because dead things are supposed to stay dead. His mantra suddenly seems more like a curse than a blessing. Oh, doesn’t Matt wish he was dead, somewhere deep down inside him? Doesn’t he wish he didn’t have to feel these things? Wouldn’t it be so nice to take the razor on his shelf to his neck and forget about Safiya, forget about Ro, forget about Manny’s blank eyes staring at him as blood bloomed in morbid red roses over his white straitjacket?
Matt chokes on another sob and leans against the sink. No, he can’t die, he can’t die, not when Ro did so he could escape, not when Joey sobbed over his body like Matt was the only thing in the world that mattered. He hasn’t even gotten to kiss Joey again, for real this time.
That makes him stop, so surprised it stops his panic attack in its tracks. For some reason, the thought of kissing Joey seems stranger than the suicidal ideation. At least suicidal ideation is understandable. But kissing Joey? In full possession of his faculties, not half-dead from blood loss and knowing he’s about to meet whoever’s after this mortal coil? Sure, Matt wants to. But that doesn’t mean he thinks he’ll ever get to. Not with the way he’s been treating Joey.
Matt stares at himself in the mirror for a moment longer, then gives a low, bitter laugh, shaking his head at his reflection. “Fucking dumbass.”
God, he really should just off himself. He’s already killed people, what’s one more life taken? Joey would find him, bled like a stuck pig in the clean white tub, the picture of guilt and shame in a pool of red water. Stephanie would come to his funeral, and Jason and Chris would too, and hell, maybe Nikita would even make an appearance. This time, it really would be the end. Maybe he’d end up somewhere better than the World Between Worlds, or maybe he wouldn’t end up anywhere at all. Maybe the warm darkness would be the end.
Or maybe he’d end up in hell, or whatever hell is, because it probably exists in some way if purgatory does, and Matt did enough terrible things in Everlock to earn him a spot next to the devil. Matt shivers at the thought. He doesn’t want to find out what the punishment for sending his friends to die is anytime soon. Probably best to hold off on the razor to the jugular.
Matt wipes his face with the back of his hand and squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, then leaves the bathroom. For a moment, he considers trying to go back to bed, but he isn’t really looking forward to dreams filled with blood and gore and the sounds of his friends dying. He gives Skip – now curled up on the small cushioned bench at the foot of Matt’s bed – a pat as he leaves the room and walks to his office. Maybe he’ll have better luck working this time around.
He turns his desktop back on, leaning back in his chair and tipping his head back to look up at the stucco ceiling. A part of him still can’t believe Everlock is real. The rest of him can’t believe all of this is real. He drops his head to look down at his computer background as if it’ll give him the secrets of the universe. It’s a photo collage of him and his team and friends, Stephanie and Chris and Jason and all the rest, various pictures of them at conventions or events or just hanging out in his living room. He’s going to have to face them again at some point, he realizes. He can’t be “sick” forever. How the hell is he going to manage that?
Matt will cross that bridge when he comes to it. Unfortunately, work just makes him think about that bridge, and so he gives up on that venture pretty quickly. But he’s already at his computer…
Might as well do something.
He switches to an incognito window, where he won’t have to see it in his history and feel ashamed of it, and goes to Reddit. In the search bar, he looks up the biggest hate subreddit he knows of: r/GameTheoryCirclejerk. It was created on November 15th a few years ago – his birthday. Matt doesn’t know if that was purposeful or not. The purpose of the sub is, at least on paper, to debunk his videos and nitpick his theories. As the king of nitpicking, Matt doesn’t actually care too much about that. He can take it as good as he gives, and besides, sometimes they do actually find mistakes.
However, as with any internet forum dedicated to making fun of a YouTube channel, at some point it inevitably became making fun of him. Matt usually makes an effort not to look at it, and in fact only knows what goes on in there because his fans like to bitch about it on Twitter and the main Game Theory subreddit. He doesn’t need the negativity in his life, and besides, he’s accepted that some people just aren’t going to like him. You can’t please everyone.
But right now, he just feels like such utter crap that he needs a pick-me-up. He’s old enough now to not worry too much about what other people think of him, and so reading through the comments of people too bitter to have anything better to do than post internet hate seems like a good enough use of his time as any. At least…that's what he tells himself he's doing. It’s probably better than just staring at the wall.
There’s a couple posts about the theory that automatically went up yesterday, about a newer adventure game called Rallus, talking about how it’s idiotic that he could ever say the player character might be an enemy-turned-ally. Matt rolls his eyes. Do these people know how theories work? Did his channel name change to The Game Fact Checkers when he wasn’t looking?
Still, he reads the thread, eyes flicking over the screen and reading countless phrases along the lines of he’s such an idiot and his theories are cringe. The concept of cringe is an interesting one, Matt thinks, and if he was still in academia he’d certainly do a paper on it, but safe to say that among certain circles of the internet, his content is the absolute peak of cringe.
The thread doesn’t really have any comedy gold in it, unfortunately, just people complaining about his writing and one minor roast about how his voice sounds like a cat being strangled. Matt exits the thread and scrolls aimlessly past a couple more before he finds one that was created three days ago.
Matt’s sure this will be good.
I’ll have you know that my jackets are not cheap, Matt rebukes in his head, because god damn it, he’ll buy a lot of things cheap but his jackets are not one of them. He buys his jackets tailored and makes sure they’re from reputable stores instead of cheap sweatshop labor. That’s why he wears them everywhere. As for shirts: okay, yeah, he does buy those from the discount bin sometimes. But if he wore fancy shirts, these people would say that he’s full of himself and pretentious (they already say that, actually). Matt knows enough to know he can’t win.
Ah, of course, his voice. His voice is apparently a divisive topic. He’s never heard anyone in his day-to-day life say that his voice is anything special in either direction. His choir and theater directors both said his voice was fine, a good voice for a man of his singing level but probably not the next Sinatra or McCartney. According to bitter individuals on the internet, though, his voice is akin to the wails of the damned. With how much time they spend talking about it, you’d think he was an audiobook narrator instead of just a guy who does voice overs.
But…is it really that annoying? Obviously he can’t hear his own voice like everyone else does, except when he’s listening to recordings of himself, and he’s become so desensitized to those that it doesn’t even register anymore. Maybe it really is as obnoxious as people say and everyone he’s around has just gotten used to it…
What is he thinking? These people hate him just to hate him. He shouldn’t even be reading this stuff, it’s not good for him at the best of times and especially not now, but now that Matt’s gotten a taste he doesn’t want to stop. He wants to find out the rest of what they have to say about him. He scrolls through a couple more comments about his voice, past one talking about a specific theory that someone hated and thought was stupid, and as he lands on a longer comment, finally stops.
He’s not…
Matt’s not perfect. He never says he’s perfect. He’s made mistakes, he’s said stupid shit, he’s liked stuff on Twitter that he probably shouldn’t have.
He’s let his friends die to save his own skin.
Matt blinks at his computer screen, suddenly feeling hot and cold all over, his hands numb once again as his body is jerked into instinctive fight or flight by the nonexistent threat on the other side of the screen. He’s not perfect, he doesn’t want to seem perfect, he just tries to be good because people should be good to each other. He does fundraisers and spreads awareness because that’s what a person with his platform should use it for, not because he wants to hide some horrible past.
But I’ll use it to hide a horrible past now, Matt thinks numbly. He’ll go back to his channel, post memes on Twitter, pretend to be a good person to hide the things he did in Everlock even if it feels like nothing can hide it. He’s worried that if people look close enough, they’ll see it in his eyes. They’re the windows to the soul, right? What does his soul look like now? Is it stained with Safiya’s blood, just like his hands are?
When did it become acceptable? About the time Matt watched JC die stuck to a spinning wheel and had to walk back across Everlock with Safiya and Teala next to him and face everyone as a failure. Matt knows these people have no idea about Everlock, that to them he’s just another YouTuber to deride and make fun of, but it still hits too close to the part of him that feels like it got ripped apart and put back together wrong in Everlock. When did it become acceptable for him to spend all day watching TV with Joey? When did it become acceptable for him to break down on the floor of a supermarket? When did it become acceptable for him to seek out fucking hate comments about himself just to validate his own self-loathing?
Disgusted with himself, Matt clicks away from the tab. He doesn’t want to read any more of this, because no matter how thick his skin has gotten as he edges ever-closer to middle age, it still hurts sometimes, knowing these people have just decided to hate him. Matt has a good enough grasp on his own personality – or at least, his personality before Everlock – to know that all he wants is to be wanted. It’s come in handy, giving him extra motivation to learn all the tricks and social scripts that normal people seem to grasp so easily, but even if he tells himself that haters don’t bother him, somewhere deep down inside, they do.
Matt rolls his chair back from his desk, pushing his hair back from his forehead and checking the time again. Technically too late for dinner, but self-hatred is boiling in the pit of his stomach and all Matt wants to do is go downstairs and soothe himself with a hug tight enough to hurt. Joey felt so fragile last time Matt had his arms around him that Matt just wanted to protect him, wrap him up tight and keep him safe from anyone else that would want to hurt him. He also kind of wants to yell at Joey until his voice is hoarse.
He should do neither of those things. Joey isn’t his boyfriend. Matt can’t keep using him as his punching bag anymore, either. What he can do is go make sure Joey is actually eating.
Matt walks downstairs carrying Skip, the cat giving his signature pathetic mews to show that he is not at all pleased with Matt’s unfair ability to pick him up. Matt’s just hoping that a cat will be enough of an olive branch for Joey not to hate him when he sees Matt again.
Joey’s once again sprawled out on the couch underneath the blanket he’s seemingly claimed, his eyes closed and his face slack. He’s still wearing the Game Theory sweater, but Matt can see the bright hem of the tie-dye shirt poking out from underneath the neckline, and he’s got his socks and the new sweatpants on as well. So, the clothes fit, and seem to be at least passable. Matt dumps Skip on the back of the couch, where Skip sits down, curls his tail around his paws, and glares judgmentally at Joey, and then he goes to turn down the AC so it’s not so cold in his house. Joey is probably dressed in so many layers because without any weight on him, he can’t thermoregulate very well, and Matt doesn’t want his guest to be freezing.
That’s all Joey is, of course. A guest. That will eventually leave.
It feels like the only thing tethering Matt to the ground is Joey, and if Joey is gone, he’ll just fly right out into outer space, so the thought of Joey leaving is nearly panic-attack-inducing all on its own. Joey’s only been here for a day and a half, and already Matt’s gotten used to the sight of him on the couch, sleeping off the blood loss and the running he did in Everlock. The thought of coming downstairs one morning and not finding Joey is horrifying. How did he ever do it without him? Could he do it without him ever again?
These are the things that run on repeat over and over in Matt’s head as he once again sets water to boil on the stove, determined to try and find some solace in the simple act of cooking for someone. He used to love cooking for people – did it all the time for Stephanie and Chris and Jason, letting them hang out after a stream and eat a big pot of spaghetti or having weekend dinners, potluck style. But something about cooking for Joey feels different. As Matt pulls down the pasta from the cabinet and pulls out ingredients from the fridge to make a simple sauce to go with it, it feels…like more. And like less, all at once.
Matt scrubs the cucumber and sweet peppers under the tap, then dries them off and sets them on a cutting board as he goes to the knife block in the corner and, unthinkingly, reaches for his favorite chef’s knife.
“We have a winner!” The clown’s eyes are wide with unrestrained glee under their smudged, heavy makeup, holding up an assortment of throwing knives like a salesman showing off his wares. “And better yet, a loser!”
JC barely has time to scream before the knife is thrust inside him, a pained yell forced from his chest as the clown rips it out with a splattering of blood and drives it right back in, the meaty sound of flesh being punctured as JC writhes, still yelling out in agony, his head rolling from side to side, his hands yanking desperately at the chains until finally, his body jerks once or twice and he moans before falling still. Blood stains his shirt and pieces of viscera hang from the wounds cleaved into his body, still upright only because of the chains.
“Oh, God, oh, God…” Teala sounds like she’s going to be sick, and Matt can’t blame her. His brain refuses to process what he’s seeing – he’s never watched someone die before, never seen them at the moment of death like this, and for a moment he still thinks JC’s going to shudder once again and reawaken. Maybe this is all a trick. Please, let this all be a trick.
Matt stops with his hand halfway to the knife block. JC–
“It’s okay, Ro,” Matt says, just like Joey did to him when he was dying. “It’s okay. You– You can get through it.”
But he’s not talking about the challenge any more, he’s talking about what it feels like to die, to be marched to your death in a challenge you knew you couldn’t win.
“Ro…” The sound of Joey saying her name sounds closer to a sob than anything else, and he shakes his head, looking away for a moment before glancing back up at her. “Oh, fuck. Ro.”
Manny’s underneath the string now, his velour jumpsuit covered in dirt and leaves as he claws his way to the finish line, and Ro’s still at the starting table–
Matt’s vision is hot and blurry with tears as he manages a broken grin. “Ro, you’ve been the best friend I could ask for.”
Joey’s voice, a memory, too close. ‘You don’t deserve this, Matthew, you shouldn’t– this shouldn’t be how it ended for you, I’m– I’m so sorry, I–’
“I love you,” Ro replies, and her smile is so genuine, so sunny, even in the face of the obliviating darkness that signifies the end.
“I love you too, Ro.”
And Ro, too, both their lives ended with knives to the chest, and suddenly the knife block doesn’t look so innocent anymore. Matt stares at it like it’s going to leap up and bite him, his heart racing, that same numb, icy-hot sensation of adrenaline washing through him as he imagines the gleaming edges of the witches’ blades raised in the moonlight, JC’s jagged cries as he was gutted like a pig. Matt can’t hold that knife. He can’t hold that knife, that same implement, not without thinking of them–
“I love you too, Ro.”
“Matt, please!”
Matt’s hands are trembling and the kitchen is spinning around him and there’s suddenly not enough air for him to breathe, he’s going to suffocate and die again–
Matt reaches out, and deliberately grabs the handle of the knife.
As soon as he withdraws it from the knife block with a small shink, he drops it as though it’s burned him. A knife was the last thing Ro saw, was the last thing JC saw, the last thing they felt before it all went black, and even through his panic Matt envies them a little. He wishes it had been that clean for him. Some still-functional part of him manages to stagger back as the chef’s blade clatters to the ceramic floor and lies, inanimate and sharp, not far from Matt’s feet.
He needs to grab it before he steps on it like the idiot that he is, because he’s the one who thought he could push past the panic, but the sight of a knife just makes him want to curl up and cry and now he doesn’t know how he’s going to be able to pick it up, much less use it. He leans back against the counter on shaking legs and blinks blindly, staring around the kitchen at something else, anything else, to focus on. The water– he’s boiling water. For pasta. No, he’s boiling pasta, and it has five minutes left. Matt’s eyes fall to the handle of the oven, where an assortment of kitchen towels are draped.
Still buzzing with panic, Matt grabs the nearest one and throws it over the knife. As soon as it’s out of his vision, he feels a little better. He still can’t stop thinking about Ro’s final, agonized shriek, or the utter guilt of letting JC die – but if JC hadn’t died, Teala would have, and Matt liked Teala, too. God damn it, none of them deserved to die, and it’s all because of Joey that they did. Matt should just grab the knife and slit Joey’s fucking throat with it.
No. No, Matt shakes his head as if physically shaking away the thought. He hates the sudden violence of his thoughts. It makes him sick. He grabs the bundle of the towel to try and distract himself and shoves it and the knife into his miscellaneous kitchen items drawer where he won’t have to look at it.
Okay. He can’t chop the vegetables with a chef’s knife. He can’t exactly tear them up, either, but his cutlery drawer is right there, and maybe a butter knife won’t be quite so threatening. Carefully, like he’s expecting a snake to leap out and bite him when the door opens, he pulls the drawer open and looks down at the butter knives in their tray.
I love you, Matt, Ro says, and it’s half-memory and half-hallucination as he imagines her sitting at the countertop, her hair long and falling around her shoulders and her arms crossed in front of her as she grins and tells some story or other about Mike. You can do this. For Joey. For yourself.
Matt’s got a lot of years left – he can’t go through them being unable to chop vegetables. He takes a deep, shaky breath, and reaches for the butter knife. His hands are trembling and he can’t quite feel them, but he’s able to clasp his hand around the handle and slowly withdraw it from the drawer. The lights gleam on the edge of the dull blade – the witches raise the knives high, and Ro sobs – but Matt looks away, past the blurriness of his eyes, and focuses on breathing away the tightness in his chest.
It’s slower than he’s used to, chopping vegetables with a butter knife, but it works. His hands gradually stop shaking. It’s just a knife. It’s not the tool that’s the problem, it’s how you use it. He can use a knife without killing anyone. The cucumber pieces and slices of bell pepper get tossed into a bowl, and when the noodles are done, those are strained and then dumped in, too. What’s easier than pasta salad? It keeps well, too. He won’t have to cook lunch for Joey for a bit.
Matt doesn’t really know when he decided that Joey is his responsibility, but it feels true. Of course Joey is his responsibility. He’s just…repaying the favor Joey gave to him. After all, if Joey had wanted to leave Matt out there in the cold, Matt would understand why. He was…a mess.
“Joey?” Matt says softly, walking into the living room and drying his hands on a towel once it’s all put together. He stops in the doorway and stares at Joey on the couch as Joey slowly stirs. “Hey, Joey. I…um, I made food.”
Joey looks up at Matt blearily. “Food…?”
“Pasta salad. No animal products. Pasta, bell peppers, and cucumbers, in Italian dressing.” Matt feels a little self-conscious listing it off like this. Ah, shit, does Joey even like pasta? Or bell peppers? He asked for the cucumbers, but maybe he hates Italian dressing–
“I didn’t know you could cook,” Joey says, cutting Matt’s rambling train of thought off.
Matt makes a face. “Cook? I boiled pasta, chopped vegetables, and put it all together with a sauce. I’d hardly call that cooking.”
Joey’s expression remains blank for a moment. Then, slowly, he smiles, and sits up on the couch. “Can I have some?”
“I made it for you,” Matt says, and the sassiness feels…normal. Good. “Come on. It’s in the kitchen. Bring the blanket, if you want.”
They sit in silence that’s only slightly uncomfortable, Joey eating and Matt reading a paper on his phone just to keep himself busy. At least, it’s only slightly uncomfortable until Joey takes a deep breath, sets his fork down, and says, deliberately: “I’m going to go to the police tomorrow.”
Matt nearly chokes. “What?”
Joey’s going to the police? Why the hell would he do that? He could confess to what he did, but for what purpose? Joey isn’t exactly the self-sacrificing type, so going to jail doesn’t strike Matt as something he’d want. He can’t really see Joey being eager to go get locked up in an asylum, either, which is exactly what would happen to him. He’d be locked up before he could even finish rambling about secret societies and demonic forces.
“I want my stuff back,” Joey says, as if it was self-explanatory. “My accounts, my house, everything.”
Matt clears his throat, some of the panic fading. He’s not going to confess. He just wants his belongings back. “Oh. Right. That…makes sense.”
“I guess I just go in and…tell them I’m not missing anymore?” Joey frowns. “I don’t actually know how you become a no-longer-missing person…”
“You could just go wander around LA until people start to notice,” Matt suggests, and, wholly unexpected, Joey laughs.
Christ, Matt’s fallen hard for him. The sound of Joey’s laugh throws him off guard with how undeniably cute it is. Joey’s got a broad grin, and his laughter sounds just like his voice does, high and musical. At the sound of it, Matt cracks a smile. Joey catches his eye and smiles back, and for a moment, they share something, a brief second of light in what feels like all-consuming darkness.
But then Matt looks away and swallows thickly, remembering what Joey did to him. “I guess you really do just walk in and tell them you’re alive. They’ll probably ask you questions, you know. What are you going to tell them?”
Joey falls quiet. He didn’t seem to have considered that. “I’ll… I’ll tell them I was on a journey to find myself. I’m…I’m an influencer, right? Influencers are always doing stupid crap like that.”
“Some people thought you all joined a cult,” Matt says. “So that might actually work.” “They thought I…” Joey shakes his head in disbelief. “They thought I joined a cult?”
“Well, actually, people thought a cult was luring influencers and YouTubers to join to make itself seem more credible, and all the missing people were just being brainwashed somewhere,” Matt explains, motioning with his hands. “What else were they supposed to think?”
“I guess that’s fair,” Joey says grudgingly. “Still. A cult? Really?”
Matt shrugs. “It’s not like they had much to go on.”
Joey shakes his head again and looks out the window. “I wish it had been a cult. Maybe they’d all still be alive.”
“Or maybe you’d all be dead with kool aid cups in your hands.” Matt’s voice is biting. “You’re not gonna change it by whining, Joey.” As if Matt doesn’t want to whine, too.
“That’s why I need my stuff back,” Joey says, and now he sounds earnest. He leans closer to Matt, his blue eyes bright. “I know there’s gotta be a way to fix this, Matt, but I won’t be able to find it if I’m sleeping on my…friend’s…couch.”
Matt doesn’t fail to notice the hesitation before the word friend. Does Joey think he’s a friend? Does he think they’re more? Less? Does he wish they were more? Matt wants to know, but he won’t allow himself to ask. Instead, he says, “You could sleep in a bed.”
Joey rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean.”
“Besides…” Matt hates himself for the words he’s about to say, but he hardens his resolve and says them anyways. “There isn’t always a way to take things back, Joey. Sometimes you just…you just have to live with what you’ve done.”
Joey shakes his head even before Matt has finished speaking. “No. Come on, both of us were brought back from the dead, weren’t we? Why not the others, too? The Society probably has something we could use–”
“Stop it, Joey.” Matt can feel his anger building and building. He can’t even begin to entertain the idea of reversing what Joey has done, because Matt can’t take the false hope. “Look, the Lazarus Harp was– it was– it was just one artifact, and you only got brought back because you– you made a fucking blood sacrifice! What’s the price going to be for bringing our friends back, Joey? Eight more people die?”
The anger is threatening to boil over once again, hot in his chest, at the thought of trading someone else’s life for Ro’s. The worst part? Matt just might be willing to do it.
“Look, the Society–”
“Shut up about the Society, Joey!” Matt just barely resists slamming his hand down on the counter to make his point. “Just– stop! The Society was willing to kill people to save you, and they refuse to tell us why, so forgive me if I’m not exactly willing to swear allegiance to them.”
Joey goes silent. Matt goes silent, too, and for a moment there’s just the sound of the clock ticking.
It’s Matt who speaks first. “Sorry. I’m…I’m sorry.”
The apology burns like acid up his throat, and Joey stares at him for a long while. Even though Joey was laughing just seconds ago, it feels like a million miles away now. Why can’t Matt keep control of himself? Why does every little thing send him flying off the handle?
Matt ducks his head with an embarrassed flush. “Are you done? I’ll get your bowl if you’re done, and…I’ll put the rest away. Have some whenever you want.”
Wordlessly, Joey hands him his empty bowl, and Matt takes it to the sink, running it under hot water for a moment before putting it in the dishwasher. Then he covers the bowl of pasta salad with cling wrap and sticks it in the fridge. Joey’s already gone by the time Matt looks up to say something to him.
