The Stains Beneath Our Skin [mxm] ✔

2.2 | Surrender to Instinct

Inside the Chinese was warm and clean, and it smelt like five spice and soy sauce. Real dream come true, that. Casper could bathe in soy all day long and sniff himself all night and never get sick of the scent. His shoes clicked against the tiles and the lucky cat on the counter waved hello. Yeah, it was nice here. Sort of place he'd come all the time if he had as much money as rich boy outside.

Really ruined the atmosphere when the old Chinese lady at the till got really shifty with him and asked if he knew tall sir outside.

Casper scowled at her. "No. I just want some food."

But she just huffed, hands flying up in the air as her brows got tighter. "You talk to tall sir outside. You friend?"

"No, I've literally met him twice. Can I get some food, please?"

"No, but you talk to tall sir, yes?"

Fuck this man was giving him so many fucking obstructions to his monotonic trudging apathy it was unreal. Casper rubbed his hand over his scarred cheek and sighed. The heat had started to itch beneath his collars, trapped against his throat. "Yes, I talked to him. I just want some vegetable udon noodles and the vegetarian spring rolls. Please."

With a sage nod, the woman finally tapped his order into her register. It came up four pounds forty no matter that Casper was staring at the menu and putting two and two together to make eight.

"That's not right," he told her. Like a total idiot.

"Four pound forty," she told him right back.

Like he was going to argue over a half price meal twice.

Then for some stupid reason, Casper went back outside. Dickhead was still there. Obviously. The door opening startled him from his smog-gazing and that same stupid grin brightened his face.

"It's far too warm in there, isn't it?"

Casper raised his eyebrow and as soon as he did, the man's fingers trapped the bridge of his nose and his eyes rolled skyward, his lips moving around some inaudible muttering.

God, he was so endearing Casper just wanted to run away.

The shop window didn't creak and bow as he put his back to it, unlike his old Chinese. Rock solid like a window probably should be, and no steel grating waiting to drop come close. All those bare branches sketched motionless through the air, the tips trembling as they reached for the touch of their neighbours and fell achingly short. Everyone who walked past looked at him. People usually did, and it made his skin crawl, but the trees were almost like a veil between him and the world. Few enough frequented the street this late on a Sunday as it was. All the more a strange coincidence meeting him here.

At the flare of his lighter, the cigarette smoke flooded his mouth and nose and lungs. A dry drowning. He pulled deeper and closed his eyes, trapping the smoke down in his lungs with his lips pressed tight together. Too easily, his head whirled, floating up to heaven as an offering to the stars in place of the smoke. His stomach growled its reminder. His legs trembled. One by one, the nerves in his body woke up until the whole intricate web screamed out a plea to breathe. Casper denied it until with a final, petulant wail, his body asserted its will and let the smoke go. Survival, lighting up his nerves.

Surrender to instinct.

"What's your name?"

The man's eyes flew back down to him, the light from inside flashing across the brown. "What?"

Casper's lips twitched. "You seemed a lot more together last time we talked."

"Oh, I—" The man's voice stalled, and he rubbed at the bridge of his nose again, the smile making its inevitable return to his lips. "That wasn't what you said."