Homocide Fifty || DNF

12. Confidential

"Shit—" George mutters under his breath before looking up at Clay, composing himself. "Hi."

"Hi," he laughs confusedly. Great. Clay is already suspicious.

"Funny seeing you here," Clay says, adding to the silent conversation. George raises a brow, smiling at Clay.

"Yeah," George says breathing out.

"You okay?" He asks innocently. Of course he has to ask that.

George smiles lightly, letting pale hands travel through his hair. He breathes out again, continuing.

"Long day at work," he reassures.

Clay's eyes squint and George can see that he doesn't believe him. "You go to the bar when you're stressed, yeah?" Clay asks.

How does he know that?

George's brows knit, his lips pursing. Clay looks at them for a split second before looking at George's brown eyes.

George notices Clay's stare, redirecting them to his hands. He's shaking. He needs to calm down.

"You're shaking," Clay says. George swears to god he might just strangle Clay because of how observant he is.

George looks askance at Clay. He gives him an annoyed look, though smirking playfully afterwards.

George holds mutual gaze, "no shit," he finally answers.

Clay takes George's hand in his own and presses lightly to control the shaking. George looks at their hands for a bit too long before looking at the caramel haired again.

"Do you want to go to my place? Sapnap's shift is done soon so I suppose we can finally have that sushi dinner we've been talking about forever."

"It's 2."

"I know. Still," he laughs.

George sighs, agreeing. He figures it'll take his mind off the case.

When Sapnap is done, the three of them head to Clay and Sapnap's place. The weather is surprisingly cold, sending shivers down George's spine when they walk home.

When they arrive, George makes sure to scrub his shoes on their welcoming matte. It'd begun raining while they were walking home and now his hair was humid.

Sapnap playfully ruffles George's hair as they step inside. George notices how his hair is the most wet out of the three. He sighs.

Clay takes out the sushi and prepares it, while Sapnap and George sit down at the dining table.

Sapnap yawns, looking at George. "How come you stopped by so early?" He checks the clock, "it's 2.35," he calmly airs.

He hesitates for a moment before answering, "I guess I wasn't feeling work today."

Sapnap raises a brow, pocketing his phone. The rain is still falling in rapid amounts, but somehow he still gets the suns ray right in his eye. He stands up to close the curtains, turning on the lights instead.

He looks out the window, asking George from behind, "okay. That's okay, I have many off days too. Any specific reason?" He says, still looking out the window.

He notices Clay staring, but he swiftly looks down at the sauce he's opening. Then he answers Sapnap and decides to answer somewhat truthfully, because why not? He might as well take Wilbur's advice and let people in.

If he can.

"My employees," he speaks almost formally as if he doesn't count them as friends, "are just being kind of— stressful. I guess I don't know how to handle it well, because I always freak out," he sighs, "one of them got mad at me a few days ago because— well, I'm kind of secretive or enclosed. I keep things to myself and they can't seem to accept that."