Needle and Thread

8

Jj doesn't smile, doesn't betray any satisfaction in Harry's hesitant acceptance of the invitation, but his eyes lose their sharpness and his shoulders look far less like they carry the weight of the world.

He doesn't know what to do. He stands gormlessly by Jj's swinging feet, sweating palms pressed against the material of his school trousers.

"You are allowed to sit, you know," Jj snorts, eyeing Harry with something strictly amused swimming in his gaze.

"I know," Harry says, clearing his throat when his voice cracks awkwardly. "I'm okay with standing."

Jj remains unconvinced. "Fine. Have it your way."

The conversation ends there, dying a swift but rather painful death, limp and bloody where the air hangs thick between the two of them. Jj resumes eating his cookie, and Harry has nothing else to do but let his gaze dance across the spotless kitchen and listen to Jj eat - however unpleasant the sound is.

It's not terrible at first. The silence. It's almost peaceful if Harry pretends, and he has always been good at pretending. Then again, pretending can only get you so far, and reality rears its ugly head far sooner than Harry is sure either of them would like.

"So..." He begins, only to trail off in a matter of seconds. Harry's confidence has always been a short lived thing whenever it bothers to exist, and his current predicament is no exception to that rule.

Jj arches an eyebrow. "So..." He echoes, a little heavy handed with the sardonicism.

"You going to Alex's tonight?" Harry knows it's a stupid question before he even asks it, but suffering in this thick, sweltering silence is almost as bad.

Jj seems to agree - with the acknowledgement of Harry's stupidity, at least - and gestures towards his half-eaten cookie. "Does it look like I'm going?"

You see, Jj doesn't go to parties. Scratch that - Jj doesn't get invited to parties. Harry isn't sure why he's volunteering as the first one to break the unwritten rules of St Mary's social hierarchy, but it seems that the speed of his mouth has won the race against the dwindling functionality of his brain.

He shrugs helplessly. "Dunno. People do weird things at parties. Weirder things than eating cookies on a kitchen counter."

"I can believe that," Jj scoffs, and this time he does sound rude.

It's not that Harry doesn't think his rudeness isn't warranted, but it's such a backhanded comment he can hardly believe it came from Jj. Jj who never holds back. Jj who can't keep a thought to himself without having some sort of aneurysm. Jj who has never said something he means without saying it in its entirety.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry prompts, his voice the steadiest it's been since he set foot in this house.

"Well, you're... friends aren't exactly the sharpest tools in the shed, are they?"

Oh. So it wasn't a direct attack.

Personal, sure, but not direct.

Harry knows he should jump to his friend's defence. He knows he should amp up the snark and bite back. He knows he should protect them from Jj's judgement.

Harry knows all of these things, and yet, he finds himself incapable of putting such knowledge into practice.

He doesn't deny the comment, nor does he validate it with a nod or a smile or an overly friendly high five like Luke would. He chooses to meet Jj's eyes, a dreadful, dreadful decision, and is horrified by what he sees.

Jealousy. Bright. Green. Beautiful. It pools in Jj's eyes, shadowing everything with a strangely compelling darkness Harry struggles to look away from. A sick sense of satisfaction twirls inside him, flooding the veins pumping blood to his heart. Is he selfish for relishing in the feeling? Perhaps. Does he regret it? Maybe, but his satisfaction outweighs all else.

"You should come," Harry says, and this time he thinks his attempt to smile might be successful. Jj's eyes drop to Harry's mouth, and his brow furrows, darkening his jealous gaze to something far more dangerous than Harry is prepared to deal with. "To Alex's, I mean. You should come."

Jj studies Harry's face like the pages of a textbook, intense and scrutinising, reading each feature like an overly complicated, jargon-filled chapter. Harry thinks he might be searching for any evidence of foul play, but Jj should know by now that Harry has never been a very good liar. If there were any untoward intentions behind his invitation, they'd be written across his face in perfectly legible text.

"I'll think about it once I've finished my cookie," Jj decides, concluding that no ulterior motives plague the suggestion, but that he also lacks the trust necessary to commit to something as serious as a party invitation. From an ex-best friend, no less.

"Cool."

Before another awkward silence has the chance to ensue, Harry's grandmother makes her long-awaited appearance, hobbling in through the utility room door with a heavy wicker basket in her grasp.

"I'll just be a minute," She says in lieu of a proper greeting, smiling thinly when Harry approaches and takes the basket off her hands. That smile grows into something bright and real when she catches sight of Jj, popping the last morsel of cookie into his mouth.

"Ah, Olajide! How did they taste?"

"Divine, Mrs Lewis. Absolutely divine."

Harry drowns out their conversation, not wanting to intrude on what he's sure has become a routine between his grandmother and Jj by this point. Instead, he places the basket of washing on the dining table, stares at the copse of trees visible through the window, and thinks.

A cobweb hangs in gossamer strings across one of the window panes, glinting in the sunlight like the wink of an eye. Tiny black specks dot the web, a collection of dead flies caught in its sticky clutches, but there is no spider in sight. Harry wonders if it ever plans on coming back.

Just then, Jj lets out a chiming laugh, and it's perhaps the one thing about him that hasn't changed in the slightest. The sound makes Harry's stomach twist again, only this time, it doesn't make him feel sick. Not at all.

On this sunny afternoon, in the lifeless kitchen of the Olatunji's alien house, Harry realises that Jj has always existed in his eyes, and that Harry has always missed him. Whether that is a bad or a good thing, only time will tell - because it must be one or the other. It must. It has to be.