ABOMINATIONS

CHAPTER EIGHT

M A X

Max clicked away on his keyboard, almost done with his blog post. This time it was a review for a mod for his favorite open-world fantasy game, and it was just as wonderful as he hoped it would be. His Discord chirped incessantly in the background, a group chat constantly sending messages, probably. He opened the window briefly to mute the chat responsible, and got back to his post. Even though it was late, he posted it, and after a few minutes he refreshed the page and already had multiple comments. Instead of reading them he returned to Discord, and his blowing up group chat, trying to speed-read and keep up with the onslaught of memes that were being sent by the friends he had never actually met before.

When he heard murmuring of voices outside his room he stopped typing. Previously all he could hear was the humming of the TV Skye was watching, but the low voice on the other side of the door was definitely Kyle's, then followed by Skye's. It was four in the morning, Max realized with a start when he looked at his desktop computer. Why were the other two still awake?

Half of his mind wanted to listen on his side of the door to what they were saying, because he knew that if the two of them were talking it was serious, but he decided against it. He turned back to his computer, typing away at his keyboard once again to respond to his quick-moving Discord group chat.

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S K Y E

Skye wasn't sure what to do with himself once Kyle retreated back to his room. His stomach growled at him, probably irritated because the only thing he had put into it recently was ice cream and a packet of gushers. After his upsetting conversation with Kyle he was barely able to keep up with New Girl, and eventually went back to the Netflix menu and just stared at the screen for a while trying to process how weird the encounter had been. The older man was hardly a friend, despite being roommates. Skye did care for Kyle and liked to think of him, as well as Max, as almost like his brothers, but he knew that Kyle didn't feel the same about him and as a result he wasn't sure which actions of his were encroaching on Kyle's boundaries. Whenever Skye could tell he was having issues with Andi still being missing, or anything else, he wanted to help but was unsure if he was, or ever would be, in a position to do so. He sighed and turned the TV off, not exactly tired but not focused enough to pay attention to the TV either. He knew Max was probably awake, hell the kid was basically nocturnal, but he didn't want to bother him. He ended up staring at the ceiling for a while, scrolling through Reddit on his phone, then going back to staring at the ceiling.

Before he knew it the sun was coming up and sleep had still managed to evade him. Giving up, Skye threw off the blanket and put his robe on, heading to the bathroom to take a shower. The digital clock on the counter read 6:47. The rest of the house was quiet and Skye guessed that Max had finally gone to sleep, but he wasn't sure what had happened with Kyle.

Closing the door behind him, Skye untied the robe and hung it on the doorknob, staring at himself in the mirror and striking a few poses, flexing his arms in an attempt to make himself look more muscular than he was. When he had his fill he turned on the shower and got a clean towel out of the cabinet. When it was warm enough for him to stand he stepped inside and closed the curtain, settling into a comfortable stance and just letting the water wash over him. He took down his braid and let the water soak through his thick hair and continue to flow down his back and legs. One of Skye's favorite things to do was shower. To him, it was worth it to take a two hour shower and run the hot water out before promptly getting his ass beat by Kyle, who got stuck with ice cold water. It wasn't his fault that the water felt so good.

Light was beginning to filter into the small window above the shower when Skye finally put shampoo in his hair. Not too long later the doorknob jiggled and then there was a loud knock.