postscript:

A brief glance behind him, a hesitant step forward and an exhausted sigh; it all leads to Ray meeting his best friend. The boy is drenched in blood, standing stock still in the middle of an alleyway, bodies littering the floor around him. And, when Ray meets his gaze, there's something akin to panic in his eyes, almost as if he's unsure as to what he's done.

 (So what are you meant to do when you meet a murderer in an alleyway at three am? Not befriend them, that's for sure. But then again, Ray's never been one for following rules)

Michael crumbles under his touch when he reaches out for the boy, body sagging as if Satan is desperately trying to pull him under. He lets out a sound- something so broken and vulnerable that it makes Ray cringe involuntarily- but he lets the other manoeuvre him like clay.

"Hey kid."

"...Yeah?"

"Don't worry 'bout it, happens to the best of us."

Michael comes home with Ray that night. He sleeps in the spare bedroom, tucked up underneath the mountains of blankets that Ray throws at him. He doesn't talk at all. He eats breakfast slowly, a bowl of cereal that gets soggier with each passing minute. He doesn't leave. Ray's not sure that he actually has anywhere to go.

Ray ignores him most of the time, avoids touching him. He doesn't ask questions about why, or what, or who. He doesn't ask Michael his name, or his backstory either. He tells the boy that he's leaving for two weeks for something that Michael doesn't need to know about. He also tells Michael to stay as long as he likes.

When Ray gets back two weeks later, Michael is asleep on the couch- drooling and practically hanging off the edge- but he's still there.

So they stay like that and it works. Ray lets a boy he doesn't know live with him, he lets Michael eat his food and watch his television and cry in his spare bedroom at night. In return, Michael doesn't slit his throat with one of his kitchen knives. Michael doesn't steal his television and sell his adder for the money to get out of this hellish city.

It takes him two months for him to learn Michael's name.

"Ray?"

"What."

"It's Michael, by the way. At least now you can stop calling me kid since I'm fucking older than you."

"Whatever, if that's what you wanna tell yourself so you can fall asleep at night."

Strangely enough, it's oddly satisfying to not be alone anymore. It's been two and a half years since his service, back when his smiles never actually met his eyes and everyone else thought they knew what was best for him without asking first. Having Michael in the apartment- being able to climb out of his bed to hover at Michael's door if only to hear him breathing- it settles him.

He missed this. And sometimes- after he hasn't slept for a few nights and after he hits his bong- Ray can even pretend that it's Short Shot in his spare bedroom, fucking smiling in his sleep like usual.

So they last about another three months. And then Ray finds- and brings home- another stray.

Gavin catches them off guard, all by pressing a knife into the hollow of Michael's spine with a hand curled around his throat for added measure.

(Michael's eyes flash with panic the second he feels the blade against his spine. Ray, at first, assumes it's something to do with his past. The past that he specifically doesn't ask about. But later, when the adrenaline has faded from his blood stream and he can think more clearly, he understands. Michael didn't think that Ray would help him. He legitimately believed that Ray would just let Gavin kill him.