Random OneShots

He didn't know

By: Maedelmae on Ao3

Alyssa x James (The End of the fucking world)

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James did not know what he was doing. He was sat down on the hotel bed, listening to Alyssa cry in the bathroom. He had his knife out before, had figured now was the best time to kill her, when she came out of the bathroom, but something had stayed his knife. He heard her crying. He didn't know why this in particular had made him stop, it didn't change anything. Or maybe it did. He didn't know.

He also didn't know why she was crying. Maybe she missed home. Maybe she didn't want to be there with him. He didn't understand why that thought made something in his chest hurt, but it did. He was used to the weird pain in his chest. He felt it when his mom rolled into the pond, he felt it when his father stopped paying attention to anything he did and threw himself into meaningless things, he felt it when the man grabbed his hand in the toilet not two hours ago, and he felt it now. He didn't know why he felt the pain, or why, or what was wrong. He didn't know.

That was the answer to a lot of things he did. He didn't know. He didn't know. He didn't know. He wanted to know. He wanted to know why his mom killed herself, he wanted to know why bad men touched him, he wanted to know why Alyssa liked him in the first place. He sighed and laid back down on the bed. He didn't know. And he would just have to deal with it like he had his whole life.

.oOo.

Alyssa felt her heart stop when she went into the bathroom to find James' hand on the other man's dick.
"What's going on?" she had asked, was James gay and just having one on her? James looked panicked at the question and hurried to zip himself up, the man zipped himself up and tried to leave.
"Are you gay?" It was okay if he was, but she didn't want to be the one that proved to him he really was gay. James looked so small when he said no.
"It's okay if you are."
"I'm not."
"But you should tell me if you are."
"I'm not gay."
"So what are you doing?"

She didn't know what was worse, James lying about not being gay, or him being molested. The man tried to slip past her, happy to be on his way after touching a teenage boy.
"Where do you think you are going?"
"Well, I... gotta go." He said something about a dog, but Alyssa wasn't paying attention. This man was a child molester. Disgusting. She wanted to cry and scream and yell. A small part of her was mildly relieved that the man went after James and not her. Double disgusting.

"Gimme your wallet." They needed money, and this stupid mother fucker deserved to be robbed. He wouldn't talk either, or else he would be in trouble for molesting someone. He tried to protest, but Alyssa was not about to let this go.
"Give. Me. Your. Wallet." More protests.
"Give me your wallet or I swear to fuck I'll go visit Liz and Abi and your weird potato baby, and tell them what you like to do to teenage boys in the toilet."
"You wouldn't do that." The family was most likely fake.
"I'll tell the police too." That got a rise out of him, He handed over the wallet and left, happy to get out of there before his actions caught up with him. She looked over at James. He was standing there, emotionless, staring at the wall. She felt like crying again.

They sat there together on the bench outside the diner, she grabbed the thick wad of cash and tossed the wallet aside. They would be caught using his credit cards. She was smarter than that. Don't leave a trail her father had said. God she missed him.
"He put my hand there," James said. Her chest felt tight at the affirmation. Did he not know that you can leave a situation if you aren't feeling comfortable?
"You know that if people wanna do stuff to you, you don't have to let them." She glanced at him from the corner of her eye, he looked sad.
"Yeah." His voice was tight and slightly wavered over the one word answer. She didn't think he really understood.
"Do you?"
"Yeah."
"So why did you?" Why did he let that old man touch him like that? He didn't answer. She turned her head to get a better look at him. "Did something bad happen to you when you were small?" He didn't answer for a long time. His head was turned towards Alyssa, but he wasn't looking at her when he responded after a few seconds of silence.
"No." He was lying. Something did happen to him when he was small, maybe that's what happened to his hand. The same disfigured hand the man used to pleasure himself not fifteen minutes ago. Alyssa felt like crying again. James was sad, and that made her chest tight again. It was the same feeling she got when she looked at her mom and Tony and the twins.
"I'm tired." She got up.