Black cats and broken mirrors - [HIATUS]

02 - Hole on the sidewalk

Matt didn't see it, but Tom grinned softly, in slight surprise.

 As they walked, and got out of the shadows, to under the light of the lampposts of the streets, where everything was clearer, Matt could take a better look at the stranger, his sweatshirt was a dark blue colour, his jeans ripped, the hoodie covered his face from above. 

 Matt tried to know what his face was like, but maybe he bent forwards a little too much, Tom glared at him for a moment before looking forward again. "What are you doing." He asked with a low and mostly flat tone, that made it sound more like a statement, if anything, a threat.

 The ginger mumbled a quick "sorry" before straightening himself and looking away, a little embarrassed. It would be a long, quiet walk… If Matt himself wasn't there.

"Uh… Isn't the weather nice today?" He tried being optimistic, looking at the rain and smiling lightly. 

 Tom arched a brow at him, looking at the rain too. "... Yeah, very." He quietly replied. "It's very… rainy today." He completed, trying to sound interested on the talk, but failing miserably.

 "Do you like the rain? I do, the sound of it falling is my favorite thing." The ginger looked beside him, the other guy didn't seem to care, so Matt continued to talk. "Everything seems to get even more beautiful when it rains, the road, the nature, the people…" Matt looked at Tom to give meaning to his sentence, and Thomas also looked up at him, kind of curiously, too dense to understand what that tall ginger meant. And that was when Matt noticed, the stranger seemed to have no eyes, or he did have, those didn't look like just gaps, it was like he just had no pupils, or irises. It was all just one color. Either his pupils were gigantic, or his eyes were just entirely black. Just a pair of pitch black orbs, that looked to reflect the light, specks of whites, and blues, yellows and a glimpse of reds all around.

 Thomas arched only one eyebrow at the guy, was there something on his face? He brought a hand up to reach for his own features, but before he could, he tripped. Oh, a damn hole on the sidewalk, to match the ones on his jeans.

 "Oh gee, are you okay?" Matt stopped on his tracks abruptly, to help the other. He heard a groan, saw a little bit of red, and a perfectly polished penny on the ground, that he decided to ignore.

 Because sometimes good luck is annoying.

 Thomas held his knee and hissed at the stinging pain, what a nice day to go out with ripped jeans. "I'm fine, it's just a small scratch." And with his fall, he got soaked again as he fell into a puddle, and just as he said, it was nothing, he was unfazed, but Matt was still a little bothered. "...It happens all the time, literally." Tom said softly, and a little sadly, he got up and stuffed his hands into his pockets, his gaze traveling everywhere, but never landing anywhere. He heard shuffling, and looked up to see the ginger digging into a pocket, then into another, and another, a funny thing to see, since he was holding the umbrella with one hand.

 He muttered words while he did, and once he found what he was looking for, he smiled to himself. A band-aid. "There." He held it up to Tom, who just looked too proud to accept a little more of his help and didn't take it just yet. Matt rolled his eyes, reached for his hand and set the item on his palm. "You better protect it before it gets infected." He shrugged.

 'Maybe if I do what he says, he'll go away sooner.' The brunet thought, he got on his good knee, placing the band-aid onto the scratch, and once he was finished, he looked at Matt with both arms open. "There, happy now?" He earned a small nod, that made him (somehow) roll his eyes. Just one turn, and one street over, and that guy would be gone.

 A few more meters ahead, they stopped at a traffic light, no cars passing by, the light was red, but for Tom's own safety, he decided to wait until it was green again. While they waited, the rain was stopping, and Matt thought it was fine to close the umbrella, but just as he was about to do it, holding it open in front of him, someone thought it would be cool to pass over the puddle that formed in front of them. 

Splash.

 Muddy water all over the brunet, but not the ginger (except for some lower parts), who had the item held open in front of him. "I'm sorry, I didn't see that!" He panicked, but the other, expressionless. Unbothered. Almost as if he was dead.

"It's not your fault. It happens everyday." 

 And the light got green, he looked at both sides, and walked, Matt trailing behind him for a few steps, he grew confused. "Wait, it does happen like, everytime?"

 Only a hum was heard. 

"Oh, that must be tough." 

 He hummed again.

"You don't talk much, do you?" Matt nudged him, his tone light and amused.

No verbal response, just a small glare and a shake of head. Being a person that wanted to be alone all the time, Thomas was never that fond of conversations, mainly with people he just met. It took him a lot of effort to make up subjects, or talk about something as simple as the weather, not to mention how fast his social battery would die, and people sometimes did not understand that being around them for so much time was just so tiring, so he just gave up on talking, on socializing, as to not hurt or tire himself…

 Just a couple of minutes later, Tom stopped in front of a building, it looked a little old, the paint was chipped on the walls, and some of the grass around it was dead. It was the place he called home.

"I think, this is where you can go now…" Tom awkwardly looked up at Matt, hands into his pockets, fingers fiddling with each other.

 The ginger murmured an 'oh', but his feet did not move. "Well, then, when can I see you again?" He asked, in a kind of excited tone.

 Tom scoffed. "...I beg your pardon?"

 "When can I see you again? I actually thought we could hang out someday, you seem interesting and maybe we could get to know each other more.. How does that sound?" 

 Hang out? Interesting? Get to know each other? The brunet arched his eyebrows, why would anyone ever want to hang out with him? He wasn't interesting, if he didn't try to be. But well, what did he have to lose, anyway? He looked up at the ginger, that had a small hopeful grin, then sighed, he tried to correspond the smile with an even smaller one. "Good, that sounds good, I guess…"

 The taller one nodded, he took out his phone, tapped on a thing and another, and held it for the other. "Could you type your number? Then we could plan it out, and, I don't know, talk to each other?" He shrugged, always with that smile on his lips. It was starting to bother him, don't his cheeks start to sting from smiling so much? "I work at that one cafe near the park, you could pass by tomorrow."

 Tom nodded and did as he was asked, even though he would probably forget about it in the morning, on purpose, or ignore whatever texts he got, socializing is scary. He handed the phone back to its owner, and before he would even turn to the door, he saw a hand being held up before him.

 "I'll be going, it was nice to meet you, Tom." 

 Tom shook his hand, to be formal, and smiled back at him. "Nice to meet you too, Matt." He spoke quietly, and after that, he saw the other guy turn on his heels and walk to the opposite direction. 

 Thomas took a deep breath, in relief. He survived one more day. Now to get back into his apartment, he entered the building, tripped once or twice on the stairs (it was way safer than the elevator) and dug into the back pockets for his keys, luckily they were there, he tried to open the door.

 But gave up instantly when he heard the key break.

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Word count: 1441