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quonah4dead · 15 days ago

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Closets may feel safe, but they sure are lonely

Word count: ~8.5k Rating: Teen+ for language, probably Pairing: Nellis Characters: Ellis, Keith

Summary: For a while, Ellis had been giddy like a little girl with a crush, running around in secret with whatever chick he'd fallen for, refusing to share any details with his best friend… Denying her existence… Confirming her existence before keeping it all hush-hush anyway… And it's been a bit over a month since she must have dumped him. Since then, to Keith, it's been like watching a corpse replace his partner in crime, and nothing Keith does seemed to get the life back in his brother's eyes. Keith's a stubborn man, but even he has his limits.

This is inspired by Primum, Non Nocere by ladyred and is set after Nick and Ellis mutually (miserably) agree to back off seeing each other, because they both suspected that people around Ellis were getting way too suspicious of him having a secret relationship. OR Nick broke it off 'cause he got scared of… something, idk what ladyred planned for them. I just know I was tormented with visions of this scene somewhere way down the line, and the cure for cursed visions is writing it. Proofread by self, if you see a typo either ignore it or let me know (gently).

warnings: angst, hurt/comfort, panic attack, brief reference to gay conversion horror stories but it's like one sentence, fear of abandonment, keith's got finger stumps, boy's a little confused but he's got the spirit, also keith uses the r-slur once. it's 201X and these boys probably grew up t-bagging in COD lobbies, you can't tell me Keith would be terribly delicate with the gamer words

CONTEXT and CREDIT for inspiration: First, Nijuukoo's art came across my dash during Gravity Falls brainrot hours, and it was delicious, so I feasted upon their blog. Then, I noticed they kept tagging shit "bmb," and saying things I didn't get, like there was a fanfic or something. Then bmb took over my life. Then I read ladyred's OTHER l4d shit, and all of it's been living rent free in my head, nellis brainrot restored after a decade of lying dormant. Then I wrote this.

"---, y'know? HA!" Keith lurched his body forward with a shout and smacked the steering wheel with his pinky-free right hand as he wrapped up whatever the hell he was saying. Honestly, if you asked him two seconds after he finished yapping, he wouldn't have been able to recall any of what he just said. The words didn't really matter anyway, Lord knows he said plenty more than he ever needed to.

What was far more important was how his words were affecting his passenger, and how few words he was getting in return. The issue was, the person next to him was being painfully quiet, compared to normal. He turned to point a lopsided grin at the man riding shotgun, only slightly forcing the expression through his worry, and slapped his best friend's shoulder with the back of his hand.

"Am I right, or am I right, brother?"

The impact jostled Ellis in his seat. If he jolted to awareness, the blow masked it, and he immediately snorted, shook his head, and pointed a slim, but genuine, smile out the rightmost corner of the windshield. "Yeeaahh... When you're right, you're right, man," he drawled, sounding slow and tired.

Keith kept the smile on his face as he scrutinized his buddy. Ellis' eyes squinted up with affection, warm and true, but there was also a sad distance to his expression that he couldn't quite hide. Maybe he could've hidden it from anyone else, but sure as hell not Keith. That look had seemingly taken up permanent residence on his friend's face a while ago, foreign and out of place. He was getting fuckin' sick of it.

He'd BEEN fuckin' sick of it. For like two weeks at least. The first two (three?) weeks of it were sad, but tolerable. Sure, it was hard to drag Ellis out of bed for literally anything for a few days there. And sure, he'd regularly space out while working, just slouching there looking like death while elbow-deep in car guts. And sure, it was fucking obvious that he was suffering from heartbreak.

The guy had been giddy and eager and happy and excruciatingly secretive for like a month or two, using Keith as cover regularly while running off to meet some sweet piece of ass (Keith assumed), while vehemently denying the existence of the girl. It was like watching a puppy try to hide how exited it was for treats. He was so obviously smitten that everyone, Keith, Dave, Ellis' Mom - hell, even Paul groused about it once, and he hates minding other peoples' business... Shit, everyone was wondering if anyone else had heard anything about who was making Ellis sneak around like a lovestruck teenage girl who fell for the bad boy. It wasn’t like they were all gossiping about it constantly or anything, but Ellis’ behavior had become a source of unspoken tension in the background of their lives, popping up whenever he was acting weird.

Eventually he admitted that she existed (in a private conversation with Keith aided by beer), but withheld all details about her, and then a while later he just started moping out of nowhere like he had no reason to live. And even though Keith had never actually seen Ellis bring a girl home or get upset over a breakup before... It was so obvious. So. Fucking. Obvious.

Keith felt the willpower for his upbeat façade wither, and his smile tightened and wilted into a stiff, frustrated frown. Air escaped his slightly-scrunched remainder-of-a-crooked-nose with a harsh and extended huff, and he let his head loll hard to the left, glancing out the driver’s-side window in exasperation, before directing a slightly-absent gaze back onto the road. Keith’s right hand began whacking the car’s gear shift, creating a crisp tap-a-tap-a-tap-a-tapping as his wrist flicked between hitting his knobby thumb and ring finger on the clutch handle.

Pinching one of the radial spokes of the steering wheel between his left hand's ring and middle fingers, the single-phalanx stumps of his index finger and thumb were unable to do much more than brace against the base of the bar where it attached to the central hub, weakly supporting his guidance of the car. He raised his eyebrows, spread his the fingers of his right hand conspiratorially, and angled his head vaguely toward Ellis. "So," he started with a glance toward his passenger, "Tomorrow. We go into the city proper. Laser tag?" He waited a beat before getting a better idea. "Ooh! Ooh! Or we could check out one'a them like, arcade-y wall climb-ey places, like whut Tom was talkin' about! Y'know?" Keith kept glancing over at Ellis, hoping for something to light up in his eyes.

Ellis' eyes lost a portion of their glaze as Keith's words reached him. He took a breath and shook his head sluggishly, looking despondently through the passenger seat's air conditioning vents. His response was quiet, seated low in his chest, “I dunno if I’m—”

“— Feelin’ up to it right now, yeah, yeah…” Keith finished for him, trailing off and sighing. His voice lowered to just the barest mutter, “Never feel up for anything anymore.” He wasn’t entirely sure if Ellis could’ve heard that, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted him to. It was a little bit of a bitch thing to say, but Lord forgive him, he was gripped with an urge to be a bit of a bitch about it. He found his head shaking in tiny, quick jerks, lower jaw grinding forward as he suppressed whatever words were trying to throw themselves out his mouth on impulse. Sayin’ more bitch shit prob’ly wouldn’t help nothin’. His tapping against the clutch briefly got louder.

The hardly-winding rural roads provided little distraction. There was no traffic, beyond an occasional guy driving a junker, with whom Keith would exchange a slow chin-dip and leisurely salute with whatever left-hand fingers he could spare. Spiffier-looking vehicles didn’t get any such pleasantries.

The terrain was flat and predictable. Each side of the road was flanked by a lush, dense mixture of deciduous trees and swampy shrubs unique to their humid and subtropical climate, brought into a deep and vivid green by their typical 70-something-degree March rains. In the summer, the roadside ditches were practically always holding stagnant water, and frequent downpours made low-water crossings a regular chance to test the mettle of his latest preowned vehicle. Now, though, the water line was safely below his tires by a few feet, even at the lowest and least-maintained crossings. Boring.

And there were no turns that Keith could take at inadvisable speeds. Fucking boring.

Aaaaannd Ellis was still staring blankly out the window to the right, looking as dead inside as ever. Keith felt his chest pinch a little from… something that wasn’t exactly annoyance, but he wasn’t going to bother figuring out what it was. Fuckin’ annoying, he thought to himself.

Keith’s wide-open eyes darted rapidly below his furrowed brow at the greenery and straight county highway ahead of him, not really looking at anything. His gaze flicked to the right again, and he felt some kind of thought rise up behind his teeth.

His jaw ground a little tighter, and his right knee started wiggling left and right with the effort of withholding whatever the hell he was about to say. He felt his tongue rub the chasm left by the absence of his small left incisor tooth. The dam was breaking and his willpower was faltering, so he inhaled a hissing breath through his missing tooth, letting the breeze chill his bare gum, and just blurted out, “D’you know how much it sucks to see yuh like this, man?”

Ellis tipped his head back into the headrest and let out a delicate stream of air through his nose. His eyes rolled upward and then closed, irritation pinching at his brow while exhaustion slanted the corners of his lips downward. This did not deter Keith. He slapped and gripped the clutch with a bit more force than was necessary to emphasize his point. "Fuckin' sucks, dude."

Ellis directed a despondent gaze off to the side, a weak attempt at avoiding Keith's gaze. He dully shook his head, just a little, and sighed. "'M sorry, man. I..." His voice came out tired and husky. "Don't mean to be a downer, you know that."

Something in Ellis' tone suggested he had more to say, but Keith jumped on ahead before he had he chance. "It ain't that! You bein' a lil' sad ain't the problem! You bein' sad ain't--!" Keith smacked his hand on the clutch once, then another time, "--a problem! It's the fact that you've been like this for a month--,"

Ellis' head shaking intensified and his voice harshened as he tried to speak over Keith. "I don't got it in me for this right now, man--"

"-- and I ain't been able to do shit fer you, and I'm--"

"Keeeeiiith--"

"--startin' to feel like--"

"You don't gotta try to cheer me up, man!" That got Keith to shut up for about half a second, just enough to sneak in, "It ain't your job. If--" Despite the frustration Ellis put into the jerking of his head and the further raising of his voice, he felt like he was pleading with Keith to just-- he didn't even know. Just something.

"Uh, yes it is??" The interruption didn't stop the steamroller's inertia, apparently. "'S kinda how bein' a best bro works? Kinda in the job description?" He flared out all seven remaining fingers for a brief moment, at a loss. "I mean, what's even the point'a bein' a best friend if you can't do shit for your boy, y'know?" Keith started stammering out, "I-I-I-" as his mouth tried to buy time for his brain to come up with something to follow it with.

It was as close to stopping as he was going to get, and Ellis took the opportunity.

"It ain't got nothin' tuh do with you, man."

"Yes it does!" Keith struck his right hand on the steering wheel with a full-body jerk that bounced him in his seat, Ellis' contribution easily jolting his brain out of its stall. "It's got everything tuh do with me! You're miserable! Yuh look dead all the fuckin' time!" Keith furiously smashed his right index finger into his own sternum, sending staccato thumps rippling through his ribcage. "That's a me problem, man!"

Ellis punctuated every word as much as he could as he let his eyes close again, anger crinkling his nose. "No, it fuckin' ain't, Keith."

"Uhhh, yes, it fuckin' is, El!" Keith mimicked his deliberate cadence before falling right back into his agitated pace. "Why you actin' like this is just a you thing? Like ain't noooooobody got the right to worry 'bout'cha, like ain't nooooooo-one gonna-- fuckin'--" Keith's brain stalled out again, for a handful of seconds, but Ellis didn't try to get in a comment, so his mind could only resort to the program it had been running since this dumb moping started. "Why you actin' like-- like nothin' ain't gonna ever be worth doin' again if you can't keep runnin' off and playin' with yer special little lady friend?” His head roughly tilted left and right in a frustrated half-mockery. “It's been over a month, Ellis! I know breakups suck, but I--" Keith took one, maybe two seconds to pant and find words through an abrupt wave of anguish, powerful and alien and out of place on his face where it twisted his expression into one of pained desperation. The small choked sound of emotional pain, too, was alien in his throat, and his brow furrowed, lowered, as if some weak macho facsimile of anger could force the tension out of his voice. His eyes, however, would have betrayed his sorrow, had Ellis been able to glance at him.

"I miss my friend."

The statement hung there alone, for a minute or two. Neither man could bring himself to look at the other. Keith stared at some distant point through the asphalt in front of him. The raw admission narrowed his vision, and he didn't notice the days-old smear of raccoon on the highway's shoulder, even as it bumped underneath his tires.

Keith found himself deflating. He had all the fight in the world under the right circumstances, but without Ellis fighting back, all he had was... Being sad.

He reached for just a shred more of energy, tried to find something else to say to accomplish.... Something. Anything.

"I know you're hurtin', Ellis, but I--" He felt the last of his steam run out. There was no hot air left to blow. There wasn't even enough energy to complete the thought in his own head. A thin, tired wheeze escaped him as he slouched forward. His next utterance was just a whisper.

"Fuck."

Keith's mind went quiet. It was a weird feeling, having no schemes or jokes or anything running across his consciousness, nothing vying for his attention. Usually his head felt like a high school cafeteria pre-, during-, and post-food fight all at once. Right now, it was just a blank grey haze, somehow dulling all of his senses while the sound of the road seemed to roar in his ears. It was unfamiliar, and weird, and painful. Felt like broken ribs and black bruises, but in his heart and stomach and lungs. Internal bleeding. He sat there with the ache and the emptiness for... however long. A mile or two, maybe, before a miserable, hollow voice quietly piped up from the passenger's seat.

The sound was muffled. "... Ain't a girl, man..." Ellis had buried his face in his hands. Keith wasn't sure when it happened, if it was during his waning outburst or during the silence that followed. What he did know is that that phrase had, for quite a while now, been an inconsistent way for Ellis to terminate every conversation Keith tried to have with him. The shorter man oscillated between denial and admission, and Keith knew which one was true.

Keith's head shook slightly, and his reply was delicately soft in volume, but deep with the tone of his disappointment.

"And there yuh go, lyin' again."

He didn't really have anything else to say. They'd rehashed this small bit of dialogue so many times in the past few weeks. Keith didn't know which canned reply Ellis was going to pull out next, but he did know it wouldn't get them anywhere. But when Ellis replied, face still solidly planted in his hands, Keith stepped to his tune, anyway.

"Ain't a lie, man.

"If it ain't a girl, then whut is it." Not even asked as a question, really. Just a droll repetition of bullshit they've already been over.

"Can't tell yuh."

At this point in the exchange, Keith was supposed to say Why not? and Ellis would say Because I can't, man, and then they'd bash their heads together until they were both tired of it. But Keith was already tired. And so, instead of fighting, what came out of his mouth was--

"Sure."

And for the first time since the adrenaline and hype of their graveyard-dirt-bike parkour wore off, for the first time in miles during their drive back home, Keith felt Ellis' eyes on him.

That sky-blue gaze was flicking around the profile of his face. Something in Keith's chest tried to make some kind of feeling, but he was tired. And sad. And angry. So nothing in his posture or face changed in response to the new attention. He just kept staring out at the road with the tension in his brow.

Another something in Keith's chest tried to make a leap when Ellis actually re-engaged with the opening in the conversation, even if it was just more shit he'd heard already. "I--I really can't, Keith..."

"Sure."

Ellis jerked his head back in the bewilderment that surged up underneath his misery. His mouth flapped open and closed like a dumb fish, and true to form, apparently, he started desperately floundering for something to placate the wiry man next to him.

"I- You know I'd tell yuh if I could, right? You- I- Keith, I... Yuh can't-" Hurried breaths huffed out into the car as he kept searching the turbid conversational water for some kind of godsend. "Keith, please don't do this, man. I can't. Tell you."

Now that one managed to bring back Keith's temper, just a little. The sensation of being pissed came easily, even if the heat of the emotion was dampened by the exhaustion that had seized him previously. He let himself lean into it. His shoulders gave a harsh, quick shrug, he ran his tongue over his front teeth, and he jerked his jaw firmly forward.

"Sure."

He spat out the word like it was acid.

And like acid, it began burning a pit into Ellis' stomach.

"Keith..." Ellis pleaded. "I--," he gasped in a breath through his teeth, "--I can't! I'd tell yuh if I could, but--," a little grunt escaped him, "--I just-- can't!"

Ellis had tilted his face upward, hands palms-up in his lap as if he could collect droplets of apology and truth and forgiveness in them. His last words had come out as a near-whine as his throat tightened around them.

Keith didn't even respond.

The taller man kept his eyes fixed on the road, hands clenched on the steering wheel, and all Ellis' supplication seemed to do was make his friend's face pinch up further with a cold, stony anger.

He didn't even glance at Ellis.

The brunet's head flopped back against the headrest, pushing his hat slightly onto his forehead.

This is exactly the kind of thing he wanted to avoid.

Sure, Keith didn't know, because Ellis couldn't tell him, so it wasn't exactly the same, but the slim, scarred man next to Ellis wasn't even talking to him. Couldn't even look at him. His best friend hated him.

Was disgusted by him.

Was done with him.

It was all fucking over. Ellis did his best to keep his damning secrets and it didn't even matter, because now Keith was going to give up not only on cheering Ellis up, but also on their entire damn friendship. He's going to lose his best friend and it's not even--

Ellis' vision narrowed, whited out everywhere except for a tiny pinprick of red at the center of his vision.

His limbs went numb, needles piercing his fingers as his organs felt like they began shutting down.

It's fucking over.

I'm gonna die sad and alone under a bridge.

Keith didn't hear his friend's waffling, not really. Sure, the sounds hit his ears, but aside from, "I'd tell you if I could," nothing else registered. His mind filtered out everything else, and that little bit he did hear just pissed him off more. Lie after lie after dodged question after lie. He knew Ellis wouldn't tell him anything if he could, because Ellis could tell Keith anything, and he hadn't. He could tell Keith anything! How could that not be clear after how long they've been attached at the hip? How much they've done together?

Keith just kept his eyes locked to the road, his hands locked to the wheel, and his jaw locked down tight.

And then he heard a little stuttered breath, just loud enough to break through the fog of his cold seething.

Fuckin' great, now he's cryin', Keith thought to himself without looking over toward the other seat. I push him, he gets upset. I give up, he starts sobbing. Lord help me, I'm 'boutta lose it.

He heard another rushed, wheezed inhale.

Air leaked out of Keith's nose, and he felt the square of his shoulders soften a little.

Fuck's sake.

"El, I'm-- Okay, no, I am mad. I am. But couldjuh just-- put yerself in my shoes fer a second on this?" He glanced over at Ellis for a moment just to emphasize his point. In that brief second, he could see that his friend's head was planted into the headrest, eyes closed, with a weak grimace wrinkling his features.

"Wh-whuddya think my, fuck, my per-spec-tive is on this? How'd you feel, if I just shut'ya out've everything 'n' then kept givin' yuh shit excuses?" He looked over for a second longer, now, and saw the same thing. It hardly even seemed like Ellis was listening. Keith directed a frustrated glance to the sky, willing something to give him patience, 'cause Lord knows he wasn't born with any.

His thumb started tapping on the clutch again in a slow, irregular rhythm. "Y'gotta give me somethin', man. Y'can't get upset with me fer keepin' quiet, then pull this silent shit."

Keith found himself frequently peeking at Ellis, now, searching for any sign of engagement. Across the span of several quick glimpses, he noticed that Ellis wasn't really taking great, heaving breaths from crying. Hell, there weren't even any tears running down his face.

Actually, it hardly looked like he was breathing at all.

"El?" He started suspiciously, training a critical eye on his passenger.

Nothing.

Keith took a breath. "Ellis?" His attention was more fully on his friend now, the speed meter gradually dropping on his dashboard due to his diverted scrutiny. He was practically going the speed limit now.

Still, Ellis didn't respond at all. Didn't even budge.

What the hell...

A firm urgency entered Keith's voice now. "Ellis, c'mon, man, this ain't funny." He clasped his hand onto Ellis' forearm, gripping firmly. It made Ellis jolt, but all that accomplished was making him heave in a great, gasping breath, followed by panicked, shallow wheezes that bounced his ribcage in and out.

"Ellis?? Ellis, yer scarin' me, man, quit it!" Keith shook his friend's arm with an increased urgency. He rapidly flicked his eyes ahead and to the right, trying to avoid crashing while being far more concerned with the fact that his best bro was hyperventilating next to him.

The breathing wasn't slowing down, wasn't evening out. Keith kept his foot on the gas for just a couple moments longer before cursing under his breath, smashing the hazard lights button, and pulling over halfway off the backwoods road so people could pass him. He was unbuckling his seatbelt before the car had finished bumping its way to a stop, and the moment he was able to engage the emergency brake, he threw himself over the center console bin to wedge his torso between Ellis and his seat. He pressed Ellis tight to his chest, wrapping his long arms over and around Ellis' shoulders, and planted the side of his head against the back of his best friend's neck.

Ellis' hands jolted up to grip Keith's arms where they crossed ontop of his chest, white-knuckled grip pulling at the taller man's skin.

"C'mon, Ellis, c'mon. Breathe, brother, yer fine... Shit, man, breathe..."

Keith had no clue what to do. He just held fast to the compact, sturdy chest in his arms and ran his mouth with the hope that something good would come out. How do you convince a guy to breathe when he can't even hear you?

"It's alright, man, it's alright. Yer fine. I gotcha. 'S okay, 'm here. I gotcha... Jesus..."

Over the course of several minutes, Ellis' breathing became deeper. Gradually. His chest was still heaving and he still seemed unsteady, but at least the breaths were deeper now. He was getting air, at least. His hands started grabbing at Keith's arms with a bit more firm presence, and a bit less clawing desperation.

And then Ellis flopped his head onto Keith's left shoulder and shuddered throughout his whole body.

And then the waterworks started.

For a second, Keith was struck with the fear that Ellis had forgotten how to breathe again. He had gripped his friend's shirt and rubbed the thumb-and-a-third he had against his friend's stomach and chest, tension entering his grasp when Ellis' ribcage surged under his arms.

The feeling of a warm, damp droplet falling onto his forearm produced within him a morsel of sorrow, but also a surge of relief.

Crying is better.

He can handle crying.

The other thing made Keith feel like he was being dragged under by a gator, but crying was fine. Keith knew how to handle crying.

The slope of Ellis' seatbelt slid off his shoulder as he listed over to the left, and Keith's spine shifted to match him. Nothing needed saying right now. He just had to let Ellis collapse into him and ride out the tears, so that's what he did.

Ellis had always been a bit of a crier. He was tough as anything, resilient as hell, but movies, video games, and passings in the community had all gotten the shorter man anywhere between misty-eyed and bawling at some point. This was familiar territory.

Keith didn't have to see Ellis' face to know that this was some ugly crying.

He heard keening and groaning, sounds that were probably stifled wails. Little anguished chokes bubbled up around phlegm in Ellis' throat, accompanying what Keith was pretty sure was a line of watery snot dripping freely onto his forearm. Whatever. He'd covered himself in grosser. Couldn't fucking care less.

They sat there for a long time, rocking gently in their car seats. The sobbing came and eased in slow waves, repeatedly fooling Keith into thinking it was tapering off before something in Ellis' head reopened the flood gates. Three vehicles had driven by them, and Keith was grateful that none of them stopped to offer any kindness.

It had been thirty minutes, maybe? An hour? Keith had no real grasp on time. He just knew he'd sit there hugging his friend forever if that's what it took.

Slowly, finally, the flow of tears and snot ebbed for more than a few scarce moments. Keith directed his gaze from its previous position over Ellis' right shoulder, and glanced at the back of his friend's jaw. He let himself hope for the best, and kept his voice at its softest possible rumble when he decided to speak.

"Y'with me, buddy...?"

He heard a little hissed gasp through teeth, and Ellis pushed his head into Keith's left shoulder. It was something, but...

"Don't gotta talk, just-- just lemme know yer here."

Another sniffle met his request while Ellis managed to grind a nod back into the taller man's collarbone.

"Okay," Keith whispered. "Good."

He nervously plucked at the material of Ellis' t-shirt, pinching it up and smoothing it back down again, mind helpless and blank. When Ellis breathed as if to speak, Keith's spine tensed with unwavering attention.

"Duh-don't-," Ellis panted out, interrupted by another sniffle and a gasp. "- hate me."

Keith froze.

He was mortified. Maybe a little offended, too.

"Whut the hell are you on about, Ellis? Whuh-- How--"

The calloused hands on Keith's forearms tightened their grip.

"D-don't. Please," Ellis begged, "Keith, I-"

"Ellis, man, what the hell's got you thinkin' I hate you?"

"I s-saw it on yer-- face."

Bewildered, Keith's head shook a little on its own. He tried to keep his volume gentle through the shock of Ellis' assertions.

"Ellis, I- I just got a lil' pissy..! That ain't... I don't hate you, man. I could never hate you. What's gotten intuh you?"

A small mewl accompanied the agonized head-shake on his chest. The friction of the movement finally pushed Ellis' cap off his head and into the gap between the seat and the median, but neither man reached for it. Ellis knew Keith was bit of a bull-headed prick sometimes. How could this possibly have gone so far down shit creek? He followed the compulsion to smooth over... Whatever the fuck this was. Maybe he could find a paddle. Reverse course.

"I'm sorry, man, I didn't... I didn't think--" He couldn't figure out what to say next. I didn't think you'd go'n start dyin' if I stopped fighting you on your shit.

Ellis's thumb started gently rubbing back and forth on Keith's arm. It was a bittersweet feeling that pulsed through Keith's heart when he realized that Ellis was trying to make him feel better.

"'S'okay, Keith... I get it."

He sounded so defeated.

What the fuck is goin' on that makes you think I'd ever hate you? What the fuck do you think could make me hate you? Keith squeezed the man in his arms, let the silence drag on a minute. His tongue darted out to wet his lips before carrying on.

"So... Okay, y'don't gotta tell me nothin', man. You don't, honest. I'm done pushin' yuh." He didn't actually know if that one was true. Seemed like the kind of claim he'd forget about in two days. "It's just--" Keith bit his scarred lips between his teeth and jostled Ellis slightly in his embrace. "I just gotta get somethin' straight, okay? And y'don't gotta answer me on these, neither. I just- have to get this straight."

The only response he got was a little press of fingers clasping harder to the lean meat on his arms.

"So- you can't tell me what's gotcha all upset. Can't tell me why yer all fucked in the head." It was a half-statement, half-question. He gave Ellis space to say something, but the opportunity was left untouched.

"And you can't tell me why you can't tell me why."

At this, Ellis shook his head and made a pathetic little negative mm-mm sound in his throat.

"And you can't tell me, 'cuz you... Think I hate'cha?"

Ellis shook his head again. "Y-you-- will."

If it weren't for what was coming out of Ellis' mouth, Keith would've been ecstatic at how much more he was getting out of the brunet right now. As it stood, however, he kinda wished he wasn't hearing it. The relief and the pain, the disbelief, mixed together into something that was almost numbing. Almost.

"You can't tell me why you can't tell me... Because you think I'll... hate'cha. If'ya do."

Ellis nodded his head weakly and squeaked.

Keith shook his a moment after.

"El?" Keith started gently.

"... That's gotta be the dumbest fuckin' thing I ever heard'ya say in my life."

Ellis made a little huffing noise, and Keith didn't know what it meant. He didn't ask about it, though, and he certainly didn't let it stop him.

"I'm serious, man, that's fuckin' retarded." Affection bled from his voice as he said it. He tried to infuse every word with as much gentle passion as he could, though his voice was ill-suited to it. "Ain't nothin' in the world you could do or say to get me tuh stop bein' your problem, brother. You're stuck with me fer life, whether you like it'er not." He jostled Ellis a little, trying to make sure what he said made it to Ellis' mind. "Feel like that's pretty obvious. But, okay, fuck me. You can't tell me what's got'cha all fucked in the head. And you can't tell me why you can't tell me, 'cause you think I'll hate you."

He couldn't stop himself from tacking on a small indictment.

"Which is stupid."

His thumbs just briefly tapped on Ellis' arms as he tried to figure out what to say next. God, he was so ass with delicate shit.

"... Can you tell me why you can't tell me why you can't tell me why..."

He felt like it was the wrong thing to say. He also felt like it was a stupid thing to say. Self-consciousness furrowed his eyebrows as his mind began to parse what his mouth put out there, and he started slowly counting the number of 'whys' in that question on his fingers, getting the words all mixed up in his head and having to restart the finger-count at least twice.

He could not see Ellis' dam breaking. He couldn't see the built-up reservoir of the misery of hiding, of years upon years of the fear of being known. Being caught. The perception that being discovered would simply end his life the moment anyone found out.

He also couldn't see that at that moment, for Ellis, the fear of losing his best friend was far greater and seemed far more imminent right now, due to Keith not knowing. A feeling had settled within him, that he would lose Keith, closet or no, and there was some kind of weird peace in the sensation of standing on train tracks over a pit of spikes. He would be impaled if he jumped, and crushed if he didn't. It was freeing, in a way. He'd die no matter what, so why not give Keith an olive branch? Just a little something, to ease the pain of being discarded. Or maybe it was to revel in being vindicated while he burned on the pyre.

It took Ellis speaking to break Keith out of his linguistic counting loop.

"If anyone... Finds out," Ellis started, sounding mournful, sure, but sounding a whole lotta resigned, too, "... I'll lose fuckin' everyone, Keith."

He left a space for Keith to interrupt, but he didn't. Keith waited.

"I'll lose you. Paul. My job."

"... Mama."

"You guys are my everything, man. If I lose y'all, I ain't got nuthin', and I can't--"

Ellis sighed here and let his head roll forward, just a little away from Keith's embrace. He didn't care to finish the sentence, and he also wanted to skip past any protesting Keith might try.

"And don't tell me I won't, neither. That nothin'll happen. Y'can't know that, Keith, I've heard more'n enough stories to know that- that people lose people over this shit. Some people get--"

Ellis didn't want to finish that one, either. Some guys get sent away'n' tortured for this kind'a shit.

Their own mothers do it to 'em.

"So that's why I can't tell yuh, Keith. It ain't got nothin' tuh do with you, 'n' I'm sorry. But it just can't-- No one can know."

Keith was struck with a roaring urge to contradict Ellis, and he accidentally blurted, "Well that ain't--," before managing to stop himself with a herculean effort. That was exactly the thing Ellis specifically said not to do.

He took a deep breath and tried again. Lord, this was hard.

"Okay, so- y'said not tuh- tell yuh- that you won't... That yer mom'n everyone'll stick around if yer big dirty secret gets out. So I won't. I guess." Keith lowered his voice and narrowed his eyes. "Even though you're bein' a shithead."

"But I ain't goin' nowhere, El.” His pace started slow and deliberate as he tried to come up with things to prove his dedication. “If yuh killed someone, I'd help you hide the body. If yuh robbed a bank, I'd get pissed at'cha fer not invitin' me, 'cause that'd be sick.” The prickle of a scheme poked at his mind demanding attention, though he was mercifully able to stay on topic. “You pulled me outta so much bullshit, man, and you still keep draggin' me to the doc, even though yuh don't gotta. I ain't makin' you."

While Keith misinterpreted the reason for Ellis cringing at the mention his medical mishaps, he certainly didn't miss it. He waited for a second, and Ellis took the chance to protest.

"Well that's- all that was..." Fun. Funny. Necessary to save your life. Different.

"That was all 'cause we're bros. Ride or die, together forever, tuh hell'n'back. You— lookit me, Ellis, c'mon, look at me." Keith pulled himself out from behind Ellis, still leaning over to clap his hand on his friend's shoulder and shake it.

When that didn't get him any eye contact, he snatched Ellis' left hand up in a crushing, pinkyless grip, and planted his other fist on his left thigh.

"Lookit me," he enunciated heavily, meaning to leave no room for resistance.

He only continued when Ellis' miserable look met his fiery stare.

"I ain't goin' nowhere, Ellis. An' that ain't a promise, that's a threat. I know I get a bit weak about promises sometimes, so-," he cut off there, feeling slightly guilty in that admission. He was a bit surprised at it, too, because he'd never really thought about it before... But then he snapped his attention back on track and threw himself right back into whatever the hell he was saying.

"But Keith don't make no idle threats! I ain't a pussy, man, and- everyone- so, I--" So many different things were trying to come out of his mouth, now, he couldn't out get a single coherent phrase, but god damnit he had so much to say and he was so close to some kind of breakthrough, he knew it, and he just had to- fucking- say something, and-

"So I am threatening you, with bein' stuck with my exploded ass, forever, no matter fuckin' what you do, 'cause you're the worst, and the only righteous punishment God has for you fer bein' too goddamn nice is- is-- is havin' tuh deal with my bullshit for the rest of yer stupid life."

Keith let his eyes settle on Ellis' after his outburst, and he felt... Weird. Felt like rugburn in his guts. He felt like he was clawing his way to the surface of whitewater, and he felt like the air had been knocked out of him. Kinda reminded him of panic. Was he panicking?

"Y'hear?"

Yeah, maybe he was panicking a little. Or something else close to it. Fear? Was he about to cry? His voice wobbled when he wrapped it up. That was weird. Not normal.

And he felt more pressure build in his chest when Ellis fixed him with an intense, scrutinizing look. He was looking for something on Keith's face, and Keith wasn't sure if he'd found it.

But whatever he saw, it must have been enough, because the next thing he said made Keith's heart fly into his throat.

It came out quietly, and cautiously, starkly contrasting with the tension of their eye contact.

"... Yuh promise...?"

Keith was flabbergasted. Desperate hope exploded in his chest.

"Uh- A'course. Of course...! Obviously? Dumbass?"

"No, Keith, I-- do you promise??" Ellis gripped hard and shook their clasped hands for emphasis. It was so important. It was so important.

Keith steeled his expression with all the grim determination he had ever felt in his life.

"Ellis? You ain't never gettin' rid'uh me. You can't, 'less you let me bleed out on the pavement."

And he fucking. Meant it. He proclaimed it into existence, into truth. So he hath threatened, and so it shall be.

Ellis held his gaze a little longer. Keith couldn't tell what he was thinking, but that didn't matter. Keith could feel in his bones that they were on the verge of something great. His boundless confidence had come surging back in a great swell, and with bright, brimming gold lining his vision, he couldn't imagine any outcome other than unadulterated triumph shared between himself and his best friend.

Which is why it kinda confused and deflated him when Ellis's face pinched up, chin trembling just a tad. He cradled his head in his other arm, his right arm, to hide it, and muttered, in shame, "... It ain't a girl."

Keith... Didn't know what to do with that. He kind of just stared, brain buffering and jaw tightening. He thought Ellis was gonna start spilling the beans, and instead he just repeated the same line as always...?

He sat there, silent and unmoving, for however long it took for Ellis to pause, take a deeeep breath, and hold it until it puffed out in a different answer.

"It's a guy."

Ellis kept himself folded over, arm pressed against his eyes. Keith was at a loss. It took a moment for the words to register, and he immediately began puzzling out what the hell that could mean.

It's a guy...?

What, like he's gettin' bullied or somethin'...?

Is someone threatening him...?

Ellis didn't follow up the statement very quickly, but Keith was so busy being confused that there was plenty of room for him to continue when he piped back up.

"We... People were startin'tuh... Get wise that I was up'tuh somethin', seein' someone in secret, so he- we thought it'd be best tuh... Break up. Before anyone found out."

Break up

It's a guy

Ain't a girl

Seein' someone

All the words bounced around in Keith's head like ping pong balls. It took a few moments for the right wires to connect in his many-times-concussed brain. But when those neurons finally fired properly, it was as if a thousand pins dropped at once.

Oh.

He felt like a deer staring into headlights. His words came out like molasses, like he was processing them as he was saying them.

"So, you were... Datin' a... guy...?"

Ellis didn't respond at all. He just sat there, hiding from Keith while holding onto his hand. He didn't really need to say anything, though. The silence was confirmation enough.

"Oh."

A gentle thumping began sounding out as Keith's left thumb stump set itself to tapping against the driver's side window controls. When that didn't seem to be enough stimulation, his fingers started pushing and pulling the window levers with minds of their own.

He had nooooo clue what to do with that information.

A gentle mechanical vrr-vrr-vrr sounded out from all four corners of the car as he clicked the controls up and down.

It wasn't like that was a problem, not really. It's just...

Well, shit, that kind of thing had never crossed his mind before. He'd never had to think about it.

He knew it was a thing that, like... Happened? Guys dating guys wasn't unheard of. It was a thing he knew about, in a vague background awareness kind of way. But...

It just never mattered. There was no reason to bother thinking about it, turning that fact into a part of his worldview. Nobody he knew was like that, and nobody he knew had friends who were like that, and it just... Was a blind spot.

And now that that blind spot was being smashed, he didn't know what to think.

Did this change anything?

Was this supposed to change anything?

Was he supposed to feel some kind of way? Was he supposed to say something? Was there a user's manual for... This situation?

vrr- vrrrr- click- vrr- click- tap-a-tap-a- vrrrrrt-

Keith almost didn't hear Ellis speak over his fidgeting, so quietly and slowly he began.

"I... get it, if you don't- wanna hang out, anymore. I really do." Keith felt his stomach give a panicked jolt, kicking hard against the static that had been occupying his mind. "It's fine. You just- wanted--"

"Woah, woah, woah, hold on there!" Keith put his left palm out, placating. "I said I ain't goin' nowhere, an' I meant it, I just- uh..." He scratched the back of his head with his free hand. "Well, shit, man, I just wasn't expectin' that answer, that's all."

With the windows still open, the roar of car tires on pavement filled their space for a brief moment as another vehicle passed them by. He floundered.

"I just don't know what tuh..."

The uncommon sting of awkwardness prickled across Keith's back.

"Shit, I'm fuckin' this up... Dammit, Keith, yuh dumb asshole, stupid, stupid, stupid..."

Keith rubbed at his eyes in frustration. He was too busy cursing under his breath to notice Ellis lift his head and look at him, but when Ellis started speaking, his eyes snapped over to the right. The brunet seemed like he was bracing for something.

"You... Aren't disgusted, or... Gonna- yell at me, or...?"

"No! No, hell no! Why'd I do that?! That's dumb!"

The scrutiny Ellis directed his way was uncomfortable. "Yer... Not weirded out by it...?"

"Whuh- no! It ain't-" Keith couldn't stop a little bit of truth from leaking out in a little awkward admission. "I mean it's- a lil' weird... B-But that ain't bad'er nothin'!" He quickly amended. "I mean, hah, I'm a lot weird, 'n' I'm the greatest! So..."

Keith didn't even have to look at Ellis to know that that had to have been the wrong thing to say. He immediately flopped his face into his free hand again.

"Dammit."

The silence that settled between them felt excruciating to the taller man. It was such an unfamiliar thing, to feel like so much was riding on the words he chose and how he assembled them, and to actually be concerned about it. To have to mind his step when normally he just bowled into every conversation the way he bowled himself into junkyard obstacle courses. He was not built for delicate situations. When put in delicate situations, he usually just accepted that he'd break shit, leave shards lying everywhere, and step on 'em. Usually, that was fine.

Right now, getting cut up on emotional glass shards and rusty nails didn't feel very badass at all.

Kinda felt like shit.

Abruptly, Keith dragged his palm upward against his forehead, pushing back his coarse, ashy-blond bangs to bare the text underneath. He tilted his face to the right, though his eyes stayed averted, and shook Ellis' hand urgently where they still held their grips.

When Ellis didn't react, he pressed harder. Shook their hands harder.

Tired blue eyes looked up from where Ellis was slouching, head moving loosely as if it was only just attached to his neck. He was quick to notice it.

I'm a moron

The sudden dryness in Ellis' mouth didn't keep his throat from constricting around a reflexive swallow.

Uncovering that tattoo was something Keith only really did under two conditions.

Either he was bragging about something absurd he'd done, was doing, or was actively planning to do, wearing the tattoo loud and proud like a battle standard of badassery. That was actually a rather common occurrence.

The other condition was that… He was so desperately at a loss that he resorted to the text on his forehead like a lifeline.

It was Keith showing his belly, and he was asking Ellis to witness it being bared.

It was an apology, a plea for help, and a request for forgiveness all wrapped up into one gesture. Once, a year or so ago, when Keith had pulled this move before, he'd said he felt like he was getting his dick ripped off. The guy was struggling.

A sad kind of compassion softened the tension in Ellis' face. Air blew out his nose as he found something to say to ease his friend's fear.

"S'okay, man. I ain't gonna be mad atcha for- feelin' however you do. Not gonna pretend..." He shook his head, redirecting to what was more important to get out. "But'chu wanted to know, and now you know. That's why I been so lame lately." Ellis picked at a loose thread on the seam of his jeans. "I just- I just gotta ask one thing'a you. Even if yuh can't bring yerself to- even if you end up thinkin' different'a me."

A deep sincerity, firming Ellis' expression despite the gentleness of his voice, pierced straight through Keith as he held the eye contact.

"Y'can't tell nobody. This can't get out. However you end up feelin', whatever you're gonna do, no one else can know. Okay? I- I can handle losin' one person, I think, but if I- if I lose Ma over this, I misewell just throw myself under a car now'n' save us all the trouble."

Horror washed over Keith, a churning sensation rising in his stomach. He didn't have the awareness to hold back what he started blurting out.

"Ellis, she would never-"

A sudden surge of anger rose to meet him, abrupt and shocking, and Ellis' tone demanded compliance. "Dammit, Keith, I ain't playin'! You don't know that, and’ya can't know that. I know ya wanna tell me that it wouldn't change nothin', but I heard enough horror stories to know that it ain't worth riskin'. I can't lose her, man. This can't get out to no one."

Those blue eyes flicked between Keith's golden brown ones, and Ellis thumped their hands, still clasped, against the arm rest between them. "Okay?"

Agreeing to this felt like the wrong thing to do. Keith knew Ellis' mom would never abandon him or hurt him or whatever the hell Ellis thought would happen. The woman was too good and too smart to ever do that to her son. There was nothing so certain as the breadth and depth of her goodness, passed down directly to her son and cultivated with more love than mankind was meant to contain in their frail bodies. There was no way in hell that telling her could be a mistake, and yet... Ellis made it sound so dire. The shorter man was certain of his conviction, and... Hell, what the fuck did Keith know about this? Discomfort pinched at Keith's brows and he bit at the inside of his bottom lip a little. Unfortunately, it felt like there were no other options.

"Okay," he conceded with a heap of regret that lingered even as cautious hope entered Ellis' posture.

"I ain't gonna tell no one. I'll keep it to m'self. I still think you're wrong, but..." His mouth moved around his face after he gritted out the word 'wrong,' jaw flexing and nose crinkling, as he wrestled with the bad taste that had taken up residence there. "I'll keep yer damn secret."

Relief and disbelief both were tangible, then, emanating from the passenger's seat. Didn't really make him feel better about any of this, though. He started rolling up all the windows, and he could tell he caught Ellis' attention as his left hand grabbed for the keys in the ignition, right one still locked in its nine-finger embrace with Ellis' left.

The car rumbled to life, and he took a second to crane his neck, checking his mirrors and blind spots.

"But'cher stayin' at my place. You walk intuh Ma's house with your face like that, she's gonna know somethin' went down."

Gawking greeted him at that, Ellis' jaw slack and eyes wide, though a furrowed brow betrayed a still-guarded element to how he was feeling. Like it was too good to be true, and he was waiting for someone to leap out and beat his face in for being so stupid as to believe it.

Keith didn't feel like humoring it with kid gloves.

"What, you wanna go to yer mom's place, lookin' like that? Y'look like shit. I toldja, man, you ain't gettin' rid'a me. I'm still yer damn problem. Best bros ferever, ride'r'die, tuh hell'n'back, and I'll hold yer damn hand all the way home if I gotta," Keith said, drawing back his upper lip aggressively and shoving his left index finger-stump in Ellis' face with shoulders high. "Fuck you."

He turned harshly back in his seat, shifting into gear and then slapping the steering wheel into position with one hand. He pulled back onto the road with way more gas than was needed, as usual, and as he floored it back up to twenty over the speed limit, he vaguely noticed the way Ellis's eyebrows raised out of their skepticism and into incredulity. He ignored it.

What Keith missed was how Ellis' lower lip trembled briefly, and how dampness touched his eyes when he looked off through the passenger's window. Ellis let his eyelids drift closed, and his shoulders rose and fell with slightly-hurried breaths. But this time, he was not going to cry from distress.

This time, his eyes misted with a flood of relief.

Pressure was applied to Keith's sinewy hand, gradually ramping up to a firm squeeze before relaxing into a soft thumb-rub of probably-gratitude.

Keith gave a quick, bone-crushing double-squeeze in return.

They didn't talk at all for the remainder of the drive, beyond the driver's occasional muttered cursing at people driving reasonably. By the time they got to Keith's apartment, their palms were gross and damp, shared sweat turning soil into gritty, thin mud.

But, true to his word, Keith didn't let go once the whole way there.

#l4d2 #ellis l4d2 #keith l4d2 #nellis #fanfiction #fanfic #my shit #long post #left 4 dead 2 #primum non nocere

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