Tyed

chapter sixty four

"Mum, I'm going to fucking kill you," is the first thing Tyler says. Colby's hand falls from his shoulder. Tyler doesn't want to turn around and look at his face. Surely he can hear the fear in Tyler's voice?

Scarlett looks confused; Saxon's avoiding his face being seen; Tyler checks on Trey, and he's also looking at Tyler in confusion. Probably hasn't put the pieces together yet. Oh god. Tyler wishes he hadn't.

But his mum knows full well what he's talking about. Saxon must as well. "Tyler-"

"I'm leaving. I don't care. I told you so many fucking times-"

"That ain't the point of you being here-"

"I wouldn't have come if I knew," Tyler says, his voice locking in his throat, "if I knew he was going to be here."

Immediately, Tyler hears Trey struggling to speak, a "w-who?", in a panicked tone of voice that tells Tyler he knows exactly what the expected answer is going to be.

"I'm going home. Right now," Tyler says, walking towards the door. He hears footsteps following him, and Colby catches him on the exit.

"We're not going anywhere," Colby says, and Tyler's defiance meets eyes that simply don't care. Oh, how he'd love to see that in literally any other context. "We're not finished here. Nobody said- nobody said you actually have to go find your father and talk to him."

So he did realise. More likely from Tyler's actions, but still. He verbalises what Tyler was avoiding saying. Trey covers his ears, like he can make it untrue by not hearing what Colby just said.

"If he's here, and he's awake, he's not going to give any of us the courtesy of leaving us alone." Tyler's still angry, but he wonders if the pleading in his eyes is visible. It must not be, because Colby isn't budging.

"If the simple knowledge of your father's existence sends you running, you're never going to get over anything," Colby says, and he might make sense if everything Tyler knew about his father wasn't true. "Are you going to run away from everything that hurts you, forever?"

"Yes," Tyler spits, and tries to wrest away from his boyfriend. Colby doesn't let him go. "Let the fuck go of me-"

Carol finally forms words. "He's going to be asleep-"

"Not from us all yelling," Tyler returns. His feverish terror is rising. "Do you not remember, Mum? Do you not remember everything he fucking did to you?"

"We ain't having this argument," Carol crosses her arms. "You're just immature."

Trey's trying his hardest to block it all out. Tyler tries not to look at him. "Immature because I hate the man who made our lives hell? What the fuck?"

"Immature because- because you can't put aside your emotions for five god damn minutes-"

"It's not about my fucking emotions, it's about whether or not he deserves-"

"Do you think hating him is going to undo-"

"Let me the fuck out of here-"

"He's going to die, there's nothing he can-"

"STOP IT," Trey yells, and what that makes Tyler realise is not what, most likely, he should.

What he probably should realise, what he probably should think, is that it's got to be serious. Trey tends to be quiet, reserved, going along with what he's told. It's how he's survived so long. If he's yelling, he's got to be seriously upset. If he's yelling, Tyler has fucked up.

But what Tyler does realise, tangential to this thought, alongside it, is that if Trey is able to yell like this, able to overcome the fear that rises and locks down his throat every time he tries to speak- then something has fundamentally changed. From when he was fourteen until today at twenty-one, Trey has managed to undo a chokehold their father had on him, of keeping him silent and obedient; suffering without making a sound. Trey could break that, could yell and be heard. How cruel would it be to re-expose him to that chokehold again, just in case it got even the faintest grip on him again?