"Try Again" (A DHMIS OC insert)

• two •

Despite himself, Roy found he was on edge for the remainder of the evening. Behind his impassive facade he was likely just as perturbed as his companion, perhaps even more. Routinely peering into the living room to see if the kid had woken up, only to find them still sparked out on the sofa; it only quelled his nerves for a short time. Marvin didn't help matters with his incessant reams of 'what if's' that drove Roy up the wall. In the end he supposed his friend had good reason to be worrying so much. They had technically taken a random child off of the street and into their house, which sounded leagues more sinister than it was in actuality. If the coppers showed up at their door, it wouldn't look very promising, Roy realised.

"For god's sake."

Roy brought his mug to his lips again, taking a half-hearted sip of his now cold tea as he watched the sleeping figure with a grave expression. He was in the tattered two seater that sat opposite the sofa, wondering what to do about the predicament he'd got himself into. Asking Marv for ideas proved to be useless, because the hirsute man always responded with blatant fear-mongering that didn't help at all. No, because he was bleeding useless. He couldn't ask the pair of halfwits his son lived with either, because they were just as useless as Marv. It was laughable to think that they'd been working for him at some point. Ultimately, he concluded that he was on his own with this one.

His internal monologue was cut short when Marvin walked into the room, two steaming mugs poised in each of his hands.
"You haven't finished that one yet? I made it forty five minutes ago, mate." Marvin said, raising his eyebrow when he saw Roy was still fussing with his tea. Roy huffed into his cup, not bothering to acknowledge his roommates smart remark as the other man sat beside him. "What's up with you?"
"I don't know, Marv. Maybe it's because we've made ourselves look like weirdos by bringing a random person into the flat." Roy grumbled. He leaned forward to place his mug on the coffee table and sat back with his arms folded tightly over his chest.

"I think you'll find that you were the one who came up with the idea. This isn't on me." Came the reply. It was enough for Roy to roll his eyes, but he didn't bite back, because it was true. He sighed, shaking his head somewhat.
"What are we gonna do, eh, Marv?" Roy's voice was low, vaguely saddened. He felt Marvin hesitate for a few moments before he put an arm around him, patting his shoulder in silent encouragement, and clumsily holding his cup in the other hand.
"S'pose we'll have to wait for her to wake up. I mean, what was she even doing sprinting out into the road like that? Must've been running away from something." Marvin suggested. Roy supposed it made sense, given the circumstances.

He supposed all he could do was wait for them to wake up.

—

It took only another half-hour for that to happen.

Roy had retired to his bedroom after about another five minutes, and spent the rest of that time reading in bed. He was interrupted by a crash, followed by a grunt and a loud shriek, notifying him that their pseudo "guest" had likely regained consciousness. He quickly got out of bed, and jogged into the living room, only to be rendered frozen by the sight that he was met with. His sofa cushions were scattered all about the room and Marvin had seemingly fallen on his backside, and a few items that had once been on the coffee table were laying at his feet. The girl- or he assumed them to be a girl given the high pitch of their shrieking- had backed up into a corner and had squared herself up against the wall, trying to distance herself from Marvin as much as she could. If it wasn't such a shock to be greeted with, Roy might've found it halfway funny.

But before he could find any humour in the situation he realised that all the stuff on the floor was his. Suitably annoyed, Roy cleared his throat loudly to alert the two of his presence, causing both Marv and the nameless person to swivel around to face him.
"What the hell is going on in 'ere?" He demanded, folding his arms across his chest and raising his eyebrows. Neither said a word. He assessed the state of the two once more, taking in the stunned look on his companions face before moving his gaze to where the girl was, arm reared back, readying to throw a particularly expensive pot at Marvin. Her scared appearance brought to mind images of how Yellow had been the day before, and the thought of his son was enough to calm him. "Do you really need to throw my things about, love? No need to get nasty, eh? We didn't have to bring you out of the cold, we could've left you on the road."

The girl looked mystified, eyes wide and frightened but after a few silent moments they lowered their arm, looking down at their shoes. Marvin then clambered to his feet and made a show of glaring hard at the girl, shaking his head and tsking before turning to jostle past Roy, presumably to go sulk in the kitchen. Testy buggar. Choosing to focus on the situation at hand, Roy heaved a long, heavy sigh before walking towards the mess on the floor and beginning to pick up the fallen vases and books and other items that, apparently, had been launched at Marvin. Once everything was back in a state of normalcy Roy finally acknowledged the other person in the room and look at them with a censuring eye. They were fiddling with the chain around their neck, pointedly avoiding his eyes.

"Any reason you decided to vandalise my house?" Roy asked sarcastically. The girl recoiled slightly, reminded about what they had done moments before. From their demeanour alone it was clear they were embarrassed. However they didn't talk. Instead they shook their head, almost imperceptibly, causing Roy to shoot them a weird look. "Right. Well then." Silence lapsed over them. Roy coughed in an effort to fill it. "Uh, just before you get the wrong end of the stick, me and my mate aren't a pair of weirdos, you... you ran into the road and we didn't want to just leave you there, so. Yeah, that's why you're here."

The girl nodded meekly. They were tapping the pads of their fingers together, presumably fidgeting out of nervousness. Roy waited a bit for them to respond, but one never came.
"Do you not talk, then?" He offered jokily, hoping to ease the pressure of the atmosphere to some degree. To his surprise the girl actually shook their head. "What, seriously?" He pried, once again met with a shake of their head. All the while they were either tilting their head away from his eyes, or messing with their necklace. "Right then."

More silence.

Roy's eyes skimmed over the coffee table, searching for something. He found it after a few seconds and leaned to grab it, that being a notebook, and a pen that Marv was using to do a word search. He held them out for the girl to take and they stared dumbly for a few seconds, before hesitantly taking them from him. "Let's start with a name, then, eh? I'm Roy, and that morngy sod in there is Marv." The girl nodded their understanding and set about writing on the shoddy lined paper. It was a rushed scribble that only took a few seconds before they handed the notepad back to Roy for him to read. On the paper there were two words that he could make out.

'It's Mal.'