Keeper of the Lost Cities: Somewhere [Completed]

Thirteen

A/N: I'm trying to finish this fanfic, so...here we go! Another awesome POV; hopefully I did him justice!

Tam

Tam wasn't sure what he was doing.

As his footsteps echoed on the hallways of Foxfire, he thought about the past few weeks. After their last revelation with Keefe, Sophie and Fitz had stopped trying to fix him. They hadn't given up on him, they promised, but they had decided not to prod Keefe. Instead, they told Tam and his friends to talk to Keefe, because he was still there.

Tam knew that Sophie visited Keefe every single morning to tell him about the day before, and that Dex sometimes joined her. He knew that Fitz and Biana visited Keefe after classes and talked to him. He knew that Linh liked to see Keefe most days after school, when the Vackers left.

But Tam himself had yet to see Keefe yet. He was...

Okay, the truth was, Tam was scared. He was scared to see Keefe Sencen in his broken state, and that Keefe would hate him.

Keefe doesn't want me to come. We're enemies; we've been enemies since we met. Why would he want to hear me?

If he's even in there...

Sophie and Fitz had promised that Keefe was still in there, listening; and he was. The Vackers had told them all what happened. One afternoon, during Fitz and Biana's visit, Fitz had gone into Keefe's head and found a message left for Biana. It was like a letter. Biana hadn't yielded exactly what it said, but now they knew that Keefe was still communicating with them.

Tam wasn't expecting anything, but he was doing this. He had to.

It was nighttime, and Linh was waiting for him down the hall. He wasn't entirely sure if he was supposed to be here, but...he was here, and there was no going back.

The lights in the Healing Centre were dark as he slipped inside. Ro was sitting beside Keefe's bed. Even in Keefe's state, she stayed vigilantly next to him, determined to protect him as she had failed to before. King Dimitar had requested that she come home, since her charge was "dead" (his words, not Tam's), but Ro had asked to stay.

"Ro. It's me. Tam," Tam whispered. Ro rolled her eyes.

"I know," she muttered, turning on the lights as she stood. "I'll be outside the door." Somehow, she sensed that Tam didn't want company. Tam nodded in thanks as she left the room.

"Hey...Sencen." Tam cleared his throat. "Keefe, I mean." He looked down at Keefe's pale face. There was a soft smirk curling on his lips, like even when broken, Keefe Sencen was still up to no good.

"So..." Tam felt extremely awkward. But there was no going back. "You're broken. But...you're still here."

He shook his head, pressing his fists to his eyes in frustration. He was not doing this right.

Tam sat on the chair beside Keefe's cot. "Look...I know we had our differences in the past, and to be honest, I have no idea why. And I guess...well, everybody kept telling me that you and I were so alike, that we should be good friends. So...now that you're broken, now that I can't reach you, I finally feel..."

He brushed his fingers over Keefe's shoulder. "I finally regret that we weren't able to be friends."

The words felt like a relief, like a heavy weight lifting off his shoulders. But the guilt was still there, the regret. Maybe they always would be. But at least Keefe knew.

"I mean...you're still an idiot. I still have better hair. You are still the guy that didn't let me see his shadow. But...despite all that I said..."

Tam took a deep breath. "I guess what I'm trying to say is...I trust you, Sencen. And I kinda hope that you trust me, too."

There wasn't much else to say, and Tam felt like a fool anyway, so he stood up and patted Keefe's shoulder again.

"Look, everyone keeps begging you to come back, but I'm not gonna do that. You'll come home when you're ready, and only then. So...until then..."

Tam walked to the door and glanced over his shoulder.

"Just know that I wouldn't mind another friend."

***

The next morning, when Tam and Linh arrived at school, Sophie ran up to them. She had a piece of parchment that she had projected a memory on.

"It's from Keefe."

Tam stared at the parchment.

You're not so bad after all, Bangs Boy.