Tyed

chapter sixty seven

2AM. Tyler is walking slowly, cold, down the side of the highway. He's most of the way home. Probably should've just fare-evaded, but once he's home he'll have to sit in the truth of the moment and he can't do that. He wants to collapse of exhaustion once he arrives. He needs to do that.

He's fiddling with his phone as he walks, somewhat aware that if he's not careful he'll walk into traffic; he can't do it on purpose, but he can't bring himself to care that much if it happens. It is what it is. He wants, in the back of his mind, to find a way through this, to make it okay. To come out alive. But that's deep beneath the pain and so extremely buried underneath the desire to end that pain.

The phone screen is smashed. Somewhat predictably, he admits. He threw it in a panic across the road. All the tiny shards that were sticking to his fingers have disappeared now, but now the screen that will turn on is mostly green lines for no reason he can discern, and it keeps making this weird noise. He's using what little focus he has to try and make his phone work again, and to try not to think about the fact that he wants it to work so he can see if Colby has responded. Part of him doesn't want Colby to respond. He doesn't want to face what he's said or what he's done. He wants to run. The good thing is, when that nerve kicks in, he can run, making off down the road towards home like his life depends on it- until he runs out of breath and has to stop, to walk again, to take his time. Which, in this cycle of pain, is also what he wants, as he doesn't want to ever reach home. He wants today to be not quite over forever.

Until he's running along the highway and drops his phone, again, and despite the fact it's basically a shiny rock right now, he stops to pick it up, just in case. Just in case.

And it's the case, and his heart stops. Something hit itself back into place, and despite the bottom half of the screen being a green and black mess, the top shows the time- and 6 missed calls, from, Tyler wants to say, Colby.

He presses the notification and feels his phone begin to buzz; in his ear, it rings. He stands, stock still, on the side of the road, waiting. Waiting for him to answer. Waiting for hope.

He didn't see the name. It could be Nancy, or his mother, or the fucking ATO or some shit. Well, not the last one at 2AM, but still. Could be a scam. Doesn't have to be Colby.

Click. "Oh, thank god. Where the fuck are you, Tyler?" Deep, melodious even when it isn't; held low in Tyler's chest.

He sounds... he guesses angry, which is weirdly upsetting, but Tyler has just enough wherewithal to kind of get that it's anger born from panic. Which he's not quite lucid enough to manufacture into hope.

"I'm walking home." Tyler's voice is so fucking hoarse. He doesn't know how to talk, what he planned on saying; he's lost any sense he had. He can't say anything else.

"Where- okay, but where are you? I'll come and get you. It's too late to be walking alone."

Tyler didn't think he had any tears left in his body, but they start to well up now, and he doesn't even know why until he says it. "Why?"

"Why is it too late to be- what has gotten into you?"

"No, why-" his sob is probably audible. "Why would you- c-come get me?"

Colby sighs. "Have you actually lost your mind, Tyler? Why wouldn't I come get you?"

He probably has. "What?"

"I have no idea what the fuck happened, why you've just disappeared. Clearly you're- clearly you're upset, but I don't really understand why you're this upset. Can you help me understand?"

"You- you don't know?"

"I know it bothered you to be around your dad. And I'm assuming- well, that's what you didn't want to tell me, wasn't it?"