the sun has faded

don't leave me alone

There is someone banging at his door. Correction, it is the middle of the night and there is someone banging at his door. In Joshes experience that never means anything good.

"You fucking lazy asswipe I swear to fucking god I will tear your dick off and feed it to a pack of wild dogs and take fucking flash photography of the whole thing if you don't pull your shit together and open your fucking door!"

So it is Johanna banging at his door then. Even worse. Groaning, he drags himself out of bed and yanks on some sweats before stumbling over to unlock his door.

He is expecting that maybe Johanna is just angry about something or other and wants to vent. She gets angry about a lot of things that Josh can never really bring himself to care about. He realizes that something is actually seriously wrong when she doesn't even comment about the fact that half his pubes are showing. "Come with me." She grabs his arm and begins marching down the corridor.

"What?" he asks stupidly as he trips along beside her.

"He won't stop crying," Johanna says through gritted teeth. "I can't talk any sense into him. He can't breathe properly and he looks like he is going to rip his skin off. You need to fix him."

Josh barely has a second to wrap his mind around what she is saying before he is being shoved into another bedroom. Tyler is curled up on the bed, crying hysterically.

Joshes breath catches in his throat as he appraises the situation. Tyler is wearing only a small pair of boxers, and it is therefore easy to see the red scratches running down the length of his chest and the bruises circling his neck. Usually the first meeting with Snow is just to inform you about what is expected of you in the near future. It would appear that this time Snow had already had someone waiting for Tyler.

He carefully sits on the bed next to Tyler, making sure not to initiate physical contact lest it upset him even more. Johanna was right, Tyler couldn't even seem to breathe properly. His breath was coming in painful wheezes amidst choked off sobs. "Shhh..." Josh soothes. It's going to be okay. Just breathe."

Tyler looks up at him. His eyes are terrified. He's trying to stop crying, Josh realizes. He wants to breathe and he wants to calm down but he can't. And it's the most terrifying thing.

With that realization Josh pulls Tyler into his lap. The frail boy buries his face into Joshes tummy, crying even harder. "I can't stop crying," he croaks into Joshes skin. "Why can't I stop?"

"It's normal," Josh strokes his hair back soothingly. "Just give it some time. I'm not going anywhere."

Tyler cries for two hours. He's terrified the entire time, periodically begging Josh to make it stop. Johanna passes out against the bedside table an hour in. Her face is pinched and worried even in sleep.

The crying eventually stops, but that only makes way for the full body tremors. Tyler starts to scratch frantically at the skin on his arms, his tummy, his neck. He's all but ripping chunks of his skin off. Josh yanks his arms back harsher then he intended. Tyler freezes and then starts shaking even more violently.

"I'm sorry," Tyler whispers hastily. "I'm not going to hurt you. I just don't want you scratching your skin off. Do you want a shower? Is that what it is?" Josh personally spends hours scrubbing their touch off his skin.

"Y-yeah," Tyler answers shakily. He makes no attempt to move, too exhausted to even get himself to the bathroom.

Josh scoops him up into his arms and carries him there. Tyler is big but he is mostly bones, light and easy to lift. He carefully deposits him into the bathtub, turning the shower on scalding hot and letting Tyler curl up under the stream of water.

Tyler is still unmoving, so Josh hesitantly sits on the edge of the tub. "Do you want me to wash your hair?"

Tyler nods ever so slightly. Josh begins to work shampoo into Tyler's damp hair as gently as possible. Tyler closes his eyes and tips his head back. Without ever ceasing his soft movements he washes Tyler's chest and back with a soapy loofah.

When he is finally done he helps Tyler out of the tub and wraps him up in a fluffy towel. Tyler looks up at him with wide eyes and wet hair sticking to his skull. He looks like a tiny kid, all bundled up in the towel.

Josh leads him back to bed and lets him cuddle back onto his lap. "It's going to get better," he murmurs into Tyler's damp hair. "I'll help you. I promise."