MANIACAL | TRACOB

Eight.

Troye tried to fight off the sleep that was pulling at him, but he eventually had to give in. His small body finally relaxed against Jacob's, his thumb resting in his mouth. There were dried tears on his cheeks, a scrape on his elbow that Jacob did not know the origin of. Troye truly was beautiful, and Jacob could not get enough of it. The man almost felt bad for taking Troye away. Not because of his family - they did not matter to him. He really did not care about their feelings at all. He cared for Troye though, and it hurt him when he pouted and cried. It hurt him that Troye did not care for him back and that he wanted to go home. He worked so hard to bring the boy here, and he was excited to teach him and take care of him and make sure he was happy. He just needed to help him get over his fears and then everything would be great. They could stay here and love each other and eventually,

eventually,

Jacob could turn Troye into the perfect little robot.

His perfect little lover who would do anything he asked without a second thought.

Just what Jacob had needed for so long.

"Jakey?"

Jacob looked down to see Troye looking back up at him. He still had his thumb in his mouth and tears in his eyes.

"Yes darling?"

"What're ya smiling about?"

"Us."

"Oh."

"Are you still scared of me?"

Troye nodded slightly.

Jacob sighed, hugging him tightly. "I took care of you," he mumbled against Troye's hair. "Made sure that you had no bad dreams and kept you safe. Why don't you trust me?"

"Because you took me from my family and lied to me. And you-you yelled at me, and I don't like yelling."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

Troye did not say anything more on the matter, just sitting up and wiping his thumb off. "Do you know where Strawberry is?"

"She was downstairs last time I saw her."

"Mkay." Troye crawled off of the bed and put on his shoes, pattering out of the room and going down the stairs. He wandered through the house for a while before finding the kitten. He picked her up and brushed the dust off of her, giving her a kiss. He carried her outside and sat in the grass of the backyard, patting some down around himself. He could barely see over the grass when he was sat down, which was kind of fun. It was like a jungle. Troye played with strawberry for a few minutes, picking one piece of grass and waving it around in front of her face, giggling as she hopped around and tried to catch it.

Troye flinched when he heard Jacob calling from the house, sighing and standing up. He took Strawberry with him and walked up the steps. "I'm here Jakey!" he yelled back, his eyes widening when he saw a snail on the concrete. "Hi little snail!" he gasped, bending down and picking it up. He set Strawberry down so that she would not try to get him and ran into the house, tracking down Jacob. "Look! I found a snail!" he said, obviously proud of himself. He kept a safe distance between himself and Jacob, but held his hand out as far as he could reach so that Jacob could observe his discovery. The hazel eyed man did not seem as excited as Troye was about the little mollusk, but he tried to make that factor unnoticeable. He was just happy that Troye had even home to him.

"Very cute," Jacob said. "What were you doing outside?"

"Just playing in the grass with Strawberry. I wanna go back outside if I'm allowed to, the grass is fun to play in."