TYLER

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Tyler hated feeling useless, and he'd been feeling like that a lot lately. As grateful as he was for the three month leave, he needed to get back to work or else he'd explode. His job was just another distraction, something that kept Brendon and the nightmares at bay.

The sex worked, but they couldn't keep that up for long. Normally, they were anything but vanilla in bed, but that was before Tyler could let Josh manhandle him without it being painful. His scar tissue was so tender under the skin that any pressure would make him wince and cower away.

He constantly hurt everywhere- most of the pain was psychosomatic at best- yet he refused to take painkillers. After Sarah's slip into addiction a couple years prior, Tyler wasn't going to take any risk of getting hooked on drugs.

What he did become addicted to was finding out who the hell killed Kehlani's daughter. Tyler didn't remember shooting her and he hoped he had a strict mental policy against killing children, witness or not. The gun used on her daughter didn't match Kehlani's, but since she confessed to the rehab murders in her note and the police station didn't want to deal with the mess she and Jeremy had created any longer than they had to, her case closed fairly quickly.

Jeremy confessed to the murders as well, and he earned 3 life sentences and the death penalty. Jenna and the team came back for a week before leaving again for Maryland on a stalker-murder case.

Most days were almost normal, the closest to domesticity they'd ever been. Josh would wake up before Tyler, cook them breakfast and they'd eat in front of the television, their free hands clasped together. When Tyler got into the shower, he'd join him, and Josh would massage Tyler's skin, applying scar cream all over his body.

If the weather was warm enough, they'd go to a local dog park and pay with Jim until Tyler couldn't walk anymore. He still had to use a cane, given the nerve damage done to his legs and feet. Josh loved to carry Tyler around, and Tyler loved being close to him, to be able to steal the warmth of his body for himself when the wind became to cold for his sensitive skin to handle.

He wondered what would Josh say if he knew that he was officially considered a serial killer.

While most days were normal, the others were unbearable. Whenever Josh wasn't in the house, Tyler would throw things, break things, scream at God for giving him a gift- his memory- and wrenching it away in the worst way possible.

The thought of an omniscient being who knew every nook and cranny of the universe should've been comforting, if not unnerving, but Tyler couldn't let himself believe in something so childish. It felt like he was being taunted, and he was having none of God's shit.

Josh would come home and find Tyler in the midst of broken glass, quaking from sobs, and he'd hold him until he calmed down enough to tell him why he'd broken his favorite vase.

Having Josh around made the chaos in Tyler's head a little quieter. He helped especially with Brendon hovering just where he couldn't see him, urging him to go and kill anyone he lied his eyes on.

It didn't help that Tyler could feel his memory slipping, slowly but surely. He forgot the address of the house he lived in as a kid first, followed old faces from his childhood. One day, for a whole hour, Tyler couldn't remember the name of the cemetery his mother was buried at. Josh didn't tell him per his own request, but he looked distraught as Tyler mental kicked himself for forgetting something so important.

But those days were bearable because of Josh. Tyler feared what he'd become without him as a tether.

Six weeks into their leave, he and Josh were lying in Josh's master room, Jim and Ned snoozing at the foot of the bed. Tyler had his head on Josh's chest, his hand under his shirt at an attempt to steal his body heat. They'd been binge watching every new Netflix show they hadn't seen, and were currently a quarter of the way through Haunting of Hill House.

Josh was asleep, and Tyler was halfway there but his stomach didn't allow him to fall asleep. He got out of the bed, being very careful not to wake up his fiancé, and scribbled in a sticky note that he was going to grab food from the pizza place down the street from Josh's apartment building.

As soon he stepped into the elevator, the hair on Tyler's arms stood up. His back instinctively straightened, and he set his hand over his holster before realizing again, he didn't have his gun.

There was someone standing behind him. Even though that shouldn't be odd on its own, Tyler's 'spidey-senses,' as Dallon called them, kept telling him there was something wrong.

"What do you want?" Tyler asked, the words barely leaving his lips before feeling the metal end of a gun pressing against the square of his back. He rolled his eyes, annoyance quelling the uneasy feeling in his gut. "Why do people keep pointing guns at me?"

"Maybe because you're always in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Fear ran through Tyler's veins like icy water. He could hear the smile in Spencer's voice.

"Bet you thought you saw the last of me."

After a moment of thinking about the possibility of Spencer finding him, Tyler rolled his eyes. He must be losing his mind after all. Just another hallucination, another mind trick making him go even crazier than he already was. "Don't bother. You're not real."

"Oh, I'm real alright," Spencer said, cocking the gun.

"Sure you are." Brendon was leaning against the elevator door, grinning. "And so is he."

"What?"

Tyler pressed the down button. "Just go away. I don't need to deal with you or Brendon right now. I'm on leave, so leave me alone."

As they began to go down, Spencer shoved him forward with both hands, Tyler hitting the elevator doors. Sharp pains ran up his arms. He should've been scared. Tyler should've shit his pants right then and there after realizing that Spencer was real and aiming a loaded gun at him. But he wasn't.

"You're real?"

Spencer growled, "Of course I am. What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Your batshit roommate turned me into a goddamn monster, that's what," Tyler hissed, shoving Spencer back to instigate a fight. "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't snap your neck with my bare hands."

Spencer held up the gun. "I could just shoot you."

Brendon scoffed. "I can't believe he was my partner. It's not loaded, you moron."

"It's not loaded," Tyler said.

Spencer bristled. "How the hell-"

"I didn't know, but thank you for confirming your inordinate stupidity."

The doors separated and Tyler turned and walked out of the elevator, slipping his hand into his coat pocket in search for the pocket knife he took with him everywhere. Spencer walked out of the elevator behind him and through the front doors, grabbing Tyler's arm and taking him to the alley behind the apartment building.

Spencer shoved Tyler forward, pocketing the gun. "I wasn't going to kill you."

"Sorry for the misconception, given you had a fucking gun in my face," Tyler snapped. "Just leave me alone, or I'll call the cops."

He started to walk away towards the pizza place, but Spencer stopped him by calling out, "You can, but then you'll never find out why I killed Kehlani's kid."

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