The Love You Can't Live Without

"Let's go feel something different."

     “So, then Georgie has this brilliant idea that if I work for her as her assistant or some shit then I can’t get my ass kicked out,” Fang chuckled as he explained how he came to save Chris’s ass. Oh yea, he was definitely leaving out some vital details too. Ya know, the whole lie detector test to prove he was a murderer. Yeah, he was leaving that out. 

     Chris squinted, smarter than that. “What does that have to do with me?”

     Godammit Chris, quick overthinking. “Because I’m in with Georgie and her shitbag dad owes her twenty years of fucking her over so I just flutter my lashes and ask reeeeal nice and there ya go, bitch. She's cool, don't worry about it. You’re fucking welcome.” 

     Chris’s squint didn’t subside. Just ask nicely? And Georgie owed Fang a favor for what? “You’re such a leech,” Chris muttered, shaking his head. “Well, my terms don’t involve begging but I saved your ass too. You’re fucking welcome.”

     Fang flicked the ashes of his smoke into the glass Chris shoved his way. “Oh, yea? That was fucking nice of you. What bullshit did you get me into now? Am I your personal whipping boy too? Because my schedule is starting to get pretty full these days.”

     “No,” Chris shook his head. “You're my charity project. Feel special.”

     “Chris-” Fang groaned loudly.

     “Shut the fuck up,” Chris cut him off. “You don’t even have to do anything. I’m the one making it look genuine. You just have to try not to be a total fuck up. You came here to get clean. Then just do that.”

     “Off of coke! Which I am! I’m not your little church boy,” Fang hissed. 

     “Well, then aren’t you doing just fucking fine then? Stop being so dramatic. You’re annoying when you whine.” Chris rolled his eyes. “I told you I have it handled. Fang, you know I…” how to word this? “I don’t really care but-”

     “Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Fang dismissed. “Everyone else does. I know. Wait, do you miss me all fucked up?” Fang grinned, teasing the idea. 

     “Honestly?” Chris led him on to wonder, pausing. “I can’t even tell the difference,” he snorted and chuckled, deflating his tires. 

     “Fucking bitch,” Fang muttered, leaning back into the chair. 

     “Truthfully, though,” he meant it this time. There was a time to be absolute dickheads to each other. And then there was a time to be honest without the shouting and fighting. “We’re talking and we haven’t done that before.”

     “Aaahhhh, man,” Fang shifted awkwardly, fanning off the feels. No thanks. “Yeeah, guess I always thought I was open to talk but guess I never said shit anyway. Too busy trying to crack your hard ass shell.”

     Chris smirked, “You won’t ever get in with brute force. The harder you try, the stronger I get, dickhead.” 

     Fang glanced up with a smirk too. “You’re kind of a gentle lover, aren’t you?” He watched Chris raise a brow and that cocky smirk lift even more. “Swear to shit, if you ever try a candlelit dinner on my ass, my dick will fall off and that’s no fun for either of us.”

     “Wow, that’s all it takes? Here I had elaborate plans…” Chris trailed off, his smirk fading away. Here they were saying words but not really talking again. It was a start. But there was so much more that had to be said. He glanced over to Fang making a motion to get up. “No, stay there,” Chris raised a hand for him to take his seat again. As if he couldn’t tell when Fang thought they were going to bang this one out too. “Fang, I have to leave soon again. No, I can’t reschedule it. It’s important to me. And while I’m here and you’re okay… while we’re okay. You still owe me that answer. And I can’t keep sweeping it under the rug, Fang. That protective order. I asked you once and you-”

     “Yeah, okay,” Fang interrupted before Chris imploded. “I do owe you that much.” He sighed heavily, blotting out his cigarette with nothing left of it anyway. The protective order. So he also dug into who Fang really was. But how did he figure that out? Made sense with Mr. Head of Security, Durant. He had all sorts of bullshit high tech crap at his disposal. 

PICKS UP FROM DEVIANTART.

     What if Fang was some sex predator? How could he not be? A stalker? How could he not be? Assault? Domestic violence? Battery? Yea, sure, why not? All of these were plausible theories in Chris's mind why someone would want Fang to stay the hell away from them. The real question was how bad could it be until Chris wanted to join that list? What was the line? Was it something that would make him regret ever vouching for Fang? But it ate at him ever since. Ignorance was bliss but not in this case. 

     After a sudden outburst of coughs that jumped from his lungs, Fang leaned back, looking at Chris looking back at him. How the hell do people start these conversations? “I didn't kill anyone,” Fang bluntly explained to break the palpable tension.

     “No shit,” Chris kept a straight face. “You'd be in prison.”

     “Or would I?” Fang begged the question with a stupid smirk. How Chris raised his brows while still looking totally unimpressed clued him that his sense of humor had been killed instead. Fine. “Man, this fucking sucks.” He ran a hand through his hair.

     He could get on stage before a crowd, sing his guts out about whatever the lyrics cried on about but this was different. He could hide behind a stage persona or vague lyrics, he could change the narrative. But this wasn't like that. Just spewing out the bitter facts. Facts he couldn't take back, hide, or change. “I don't know how to talk about it,” he muttered in defeat, hanging his head. “It fucking sucks.” What he really meant was that it hurt. It hurt a lot to dig everything back up. After all he went through with his family coming back to haunt him, this was a whole other issue that had its own brand of pain. He still felt raw and bludgeoned after he tore himself open for Brody. Chris had no idea what this felt like for Fang. Saying the bare facts wouldn't seem so bad or maybe it would. But being the one to live through it, to cause it, to be there, to be the one at fault, fucking hurt. Seeing the signs of how bad things got but all too late… how it all bled into every relation going forward, Chris included.

     “When did it happen?” Chris asked, offering a starting point. Fang was usually so blunt and just blurted out whatever he wanted. He didn't struggle like Chris did. But he could see this was very different and closely guarded. Did it have to do with the Darcy family stuff? Fang wouldn't even look his way anymore. Chris would be lying if he said it didn't put him on edge just a little. Would this involve him in something he was better off not knowing? Was this the weird behavior he should be wary of? 

     “Few years ago. I was eighteen. She was too. So, no, nothing fucking creepy, asshole,” Fang went ahead and clarified that too. “It's a restraining order, not a fuckin’ creep alert.” 

     “I didn't say…” Chris just let that go. Whatever. At least that much was cleared up. An internal sigh of relief, honestly. Pissed off girlfriend, probably. He could relax just a touch. “Girlfriend?” Chris assumed that was the most likely given the age. 

     “Yea,” Fang admitted. “Back when I still fucked around with girls. Kind of over them now. You know how it goes,” Fang waved it off from one non-particular man seeking sex to another of similar tastes. “She was coming to some of the gigs and we hooked up. Stayed hooked up like we liked each other, I guess.” He shrugged, not really sure if they'd still be together even if the following incident hadn't happened. Probably not. Fleeting young attraction that was convenient for them both that felt deeper than it really ever was, looking back on it. Best to not compare that thought to the current young attraction before him along the same lines. 

Let me tell you the saddest story

Love lost left broken and empty

Put my heart in the hands of another

Set a fire to the past and watch me burn

     Chris waited patiently. Wasn't like he had any more information to work with to press for more. He was doing the math of their ages and the months they had been on and off again. Chris hooked up with Fang as a twenty year old. What all happened in the span of two years prior? 

     Fang coughed hard, a boxing match breaking out in his lungs. It always seemed to bite him more at night, the damned bullshit. And after a smoke… “Look,” Fang waved a hand, recollecting himself and scooting forward in the chair. “I know I'm beating around the bush. I'm practically you over here, fucking crissake.” He huffed and hung his head fully. “So, here we fucking go. You want to know what a piece of shit I am. Fair. Let's do this.”

     Rip the bandaid off, so to speak. “I've always been a little fucked up, no surprise, right. I'm a walking billboard for punk ass emo kids. My life is all one piece of bullshit after the next right from conception. When this girl and I were a thing, I was not okay. I mean, I'm still not okay but I mean even more fucked up, if you can imagine that. I split from my family a couple years earlier; I was still just trying to fucking survive. Pretending I had my shit sorted. I didn't. I was fucking falling apart. That was the first time I started snorting coke. Fuck, she did it with me so it wasn't like we were going to stop each other from a fun time. We'd get so fucking high and drunk wherever we went. But when we ran out of money for drugs and booze, we weren't good for each other.”

Somehow I guess it's better this way

Looking back was it all just a mistake?

Thought I could live in the arms of another

But I guess I wasn't enough for her

     Fang listed to one side, leaning on the arm of the chair, his eyes fixed on the floor. He noticed his leg started tapping after the thought of that white powdered nectar of life. Once an addict… He made himself sit still again. “We didn't fight, that wasn't the problem. She-” He sighed and started over. “I'd start spitting all the shit that was in my head out for anyone that was near to hear it. Misery likes company and all that shit. And I mean everything; no filter. Dumbass shit that she, or anyone with a shred of sanity, shouldn't have heard. Back when I thought talking about the fucked up shit up here,” he tapped his head, “was what you're supposed to do. Fuck,” he shook his head like he was disappointed in himself. “And I just kept doing it, drowning everyone with just how fucking miserable I was. For weeks. I didn't know how fucked up I was. I didn't know how fucked up she was. We all were. I thought we all felt the same… I didn't-…” 

I wanna feel the love you can't live without

The one that Johnny Cash wrote all his songs about

But I gave it all away for no return

Guess it's just another lesson that I'll never learn

     Chris could swear he actually heard Fang's voice catch in his throat. Shit. Maybe it was just from the coughing. This wasn't going where he thought it was…right? Chris felt the blood retract from his hands and feet like it was shielding itself from whatever trauma this was. 

     Fang brought a hand to his forehead, leaning his head into it. Fuck, it hurt to see her face again. She was so pretty. She wasn't some super model. She was just another human, lost and confused about where she belonged. “I fucked up, Chris,” Fang strained to admit. “I fucked up real bad. She saw me at my worst -when I was really fucking losing my shit- and I never fucking thought what that might do to her. I saw the cuts on her arms too. But that's just one more thing we shared. I actually thought it was fucking fine someone was like me. Like a sick fuck. Like we were walking through hell together. Fuck!”

I've been putting myself through your Hell

Holding on to things that don't even matter now

     Chris blinked and felt his eyes sting. Why? He didn't know this girl. But hearing Fang unload that much pain… All Chris could do was sit numbly, thinking of when it had been too much to bear anymore with his own dad. That kind of internal torture, to hold it all in. It fucking hurt to the point he had cried his eyes out too. As much of a pair of bastards as he and Fang could be to each other, Chris felt no inclination to use this vulnerable moment against Fang. What had Dave done? 

     While Chris couldn't convince himself to hug Fang- that wasn't who Chris was- what he did do was get up and move closer and sit on the edge of the coffee table in front of Fang's chair. Close is what he could offer.

     Seeing Chris's feet in front of him sent a rush over him. Dread, at first. He wanted Chris to get away from him. He had heard enough. He'd never look at him the same. He was a piece of shit. After they had just sorted their shit to move on. He didn't want this on Chris. But it’s not like he could keep it buried forever. Not when Chris kept asking. In two blinks, he didn't want the pity and then he did. 

     He felt Chris's hand under his chin and like a cold wave that put out the fires of his mind, those icy blues pierced through him. “What happened?” Chris asked softer softly, looking so sad. Fang hadn't seen him like this before. He knew this was basically the equivalent of Chris holding him like a baby in his arms. They were both so out of their element. Fang was not a crier when he got emotional- he was the kind that got angry instead. Crying wasn't his thing. Something he stopped doing as a young child. It took hard shit like this to really coax it out of him. But Chris right there, basically kissing his booboos set him right again. He would have laughed if he didn't feel ten feet under water.

     “She ended up shooting herself,” he said quietly, unable to look him in the eye as he uncorked more of his personal trauma. He hated how it tasted in his mouth. It was one thing to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. But to be so fucking stupid and be the cause of it all… 

He followed it with the motion with a finger gun under his chin, pulling away from Chris. He didn't want the shit to rub off on him. “Right in the head. Her friend called 911. I was too fucked up, I couldn't remember how to make my phone fucking work. I couldn't even figure out what she had done. I thought she was joking because she was supposed to be like me. Ya know, right up until you see the fucking blood sprayed everywhere. She would have died. Because this piece of shit couldn't do anything.” Another fucking life gone because of him. 

     “Fuck,” was all Chris could say while outwardly cringing, feeling his guts turn over. “You were there?” 

     “Yep. I was passing her friend the blunt we were sharing. Pow. We thought it was the neighbors above us dropping something heavy. When she dropped back… that's when I thought she was just bat shit on the coke and trying to scare us. We didn't even know she had that gun before that.”

     “Why- how did she have a gun?” Chris was almost sorry he asked but how did shit like that just happen? Chris didn't hang out with people like that. How the actual fuck does someone just… 

     “Band mate of mine had one. He was passed out drunk in the other room. She took it. No one knew she had it.” Fang rubbed his eyes. The worst of it was out. 

     “You said she would have died… She didn't die?” Chris asked for clarification because how does someone take a bullet to the head that close and survive? 

    Fang shook his head, “She didn't. If she were more like me like I thought, she would have had better aim. Bad joke, shit. Sorry. I hate this. Fucking end me,” Fang sighed heavily and continued while rubbing his stinging eyes. “Me and her friend got slapped with four months jail, six months probation, and 72 hours of community service for the weed. Thank fuck they didn't find the coke. In the meantime, she's healing up in the hospital. When I got out, I wanted to go see her, to see how she was doing. Fucking apologize, something.” 

     “And that's when I got slapped with a protective order. I just walked into her room and she starts screaming at me. It's all my fault. I did that to her. I ruined her life. She's calling the cops and I'll be put away again. Court bullshit later… I'm the one to blame for it all. I made her do that to herself. I’m considered a danger to her life. That she would press further charges if she ever saw me again. She never wanted to end up like me…” 

All the years that we spent together have come to an end

(Regret is all I had)

Not sure I would if I could do it all over again

(I can't take it back)

The memories, the pictures, I love you's will wither

(Regret is all I had)

But this is the last song I'll write about you

     Chris heard his own words at the end. That's the words he had used too. This girl… had become the thing Chris was afraid would happen to him too. Fang, he… he wasn't the one that told her to put the gun to herself or pull the trigger. Just as he wasn't even near Chris when he had his outburst in the arena all by himself. Chris let his eyes drift to Fang's knees. “I'm sorry, Fang,” was all he could add, quietly and very somber. And very genuinely sincere.

     Fang let the silence sink over them. He was reliving the whole thing again and again. The gunshot. The spray. How sober the silence made them. Followed by the chaos. The sounds of his jail cell slamming shut. Her screams. How terrified she looked to see him. She still looked so beautiful, scars and misshapen wounds she’d never heal from. He was the ugly stain that had tainted her. She was right. 

Forget my name

Forget my face

It was all just empty space

Deadweight; no longer part of me

     “What was I supposed to do? Just…fucking shut all of this shit away?” He rubbed his knuckles into his scalp, drilling all of the misery back into his skull. “Then I get told I'm too secretive, I don't speak my mind, share my fucking feelings. And when I do, fuck, here we go again. I just can't-” He growled, dragging his hand down his face, resisting the urge to just drop a hammer fist to his own knee. “I just keep getting told the same shit. Talk to me- but, oh, not like that. You don't see what you do to others! Act like a regular person but what the fuck even is that!? People just want to see what they fucking want to see. Not me. I am fucking struggling and I can’t catch a fucking break that I’m just always going to be a little fucked up!” 

     “This is why I get so pissed off at you, Chris.” Fang finally had the will to look up again, seeing Chris was the one with his eyes lowered now. “When you don't tell me shit. I…don't want you to end up like me either. I know what you meant when you said that. I know you're dealing with shit, dude. You know I know. Takes one to know one.” Fang physically felt a punch to his heart when Chris looked back up. Fuck. Those blues. May as well just rip his heart out and stomp it into oblivion. 

     “Don't ever let my shit do that to you,” Fang pleaded. Chris had to have some kind of understanding why Fang was on his ass so much about being shoved away from Chris's feelings. He wasn't trying to pry just for the sake of being nosey or wanting some kind of narcissistic response. He was terrified he was going to ruin another person. “Or you'll be the last person it'll ever happen to again.” The words just fell out of his mouth. Just how Fang always was. No thinking it through. He wasn’t going to ruin another life like that ever again. Fuck everyone at this park that thought he didn't care about those around him. It was a constant alarm squealing at him. But only he could hear it. 

     Chris fought the shudder that gripped his spine. He knew exactly what Fang meant. He wasn't going to survive seeing another person go so far into their own misery. He really thought he was a scourge. How could he not? People like this girl or even Chris just spit on him, telling him he was the problem. That's all he had been saying since they ran into each other here. That's all anyone here kept telling him. No wonder he was so quick to snap in their last fight. Turn the tables and maybe Chris would have done the same. Actually, would he be able to even handle the same criticism again and again? Chris lowered his eyes, feeling like the real shitbag here. Fang had always been the scapegoat. The convenient excuse because Chris couldn't accept he had a fucking problem but it was easy to point the finger at Fang's behavior being the main issue. 

     “I'd shoot you long before I even considered myself,” Chris muttered. 

     Fang smirked, “Have at me, bitch. Do me a fucking favor,” he laughed it off. He could tell Chris had overloaded. He didn't do so well with all this emotional roller coaster stuff. Fang wanted him off the ride. He couldn't take this shit. He probably had dug the hole deeper between them but… he wanted to know. Now he knew. 

     Fang got to his feet, nudging his knees into Chris. Once Chris looked up at him, he smiled. “Just get one thing straight about me. I fucking survive my shit. Don't forget it. These?” He turned his arms inward to showcase the numerous scars scattered throughout the tattoos. Some deep and old. Some shallow and recent. They scared Chris before. He had every right to think of Fang as some ticking time bomb. Hell, even Fang didn't know when or what would finally push him over the edge. “This is not me quitting, just coping.”

     “Stop coping,” Chris mumbled, refusing to look at them. He stared up at Fang instead with a hard, serious look. 

     Fang’s smirk arched upwards more. He leaned down, picking Chris's chin up. “Make me.” 

     Chris sighed, leaning into Fang's hand. What was it about Fang that had his attention? All of this baggage, all of this emotional trauma and clearly that wasn't even the most of it judging on the family dynamic. Chris was attractive, relatively wealthy for his age, and very successful at his job. He had enough charisma that he could find another partner if he really wanted to. It would be gross to say there was a line, but truthfully, he had turned down a few brave souls that wanted to give him his heart or try to. Even before Fang came back into his life. He had been so convinced after Kate crushed him into numb soup and Fang had scared what was left of him into hiding, he just wasn't seeking another person to take a stab at his heart. 

     But Fang… had a kind of gravity about him. Maybe it only worked on Chris. Some kind of twisted misery magnet. It wasn't like Chris was out to “fix him” as the cliche went. He wasn't broken. He was a loudmouth and a jackass just trying to live his life like everyone else. Like he thought before: if Fang can, so could he.  

     Somehow, Fang felt like he was the one that should be comforting Chris now. Stop coping. Yea, how the fuck would that happen? Everything day was coping. “Hey,” he stroked his fingers underneath Chris's chin, “You got your answer. Do I get some pity sex? Feels like I should get some pity sex,” Fang mumbled with a grin after it looked like Chris melted into his hand. Chances were a strong maybe at this point, might as well throw his hand in.  

     Chris looked up, his expression unchanging. He stood up, taking Fang's hand away and leaned closer with a kiss. “Maybe. Are you going to cry because I'm not into that.” 

     Fang smirked, frisking his sides, “I can be a big boy. Are you going to cry for me? Because I might be into that.” 

     “Eugh,” Chris cringed, running his fingers through Fang’s hair. “Are you planning on being that bad to bore me to tears?”

     “You're supposed to be nice to me. I'm sad,” Fang giggled, tucking his hands into the back of Chris's sweats. Yay, he was gonna get ass~ More importantly, they could move passed this grisly topic that would only bring more sadness the more it was talked about. There was nothing cathartic about sharing that history. Just another chapter of Fang's running list of trauma. 

     “Good,” Chris whispered, controlling Fang by his lips alone. “Means you're not the psychopath I thought you might be.” Chris never wanted to be in a situation like that. Just Kate breaking up with him had made him angry and miserable. How the fuck did Fang ever move on from that? Shit, he was way stronger than Chris originally thought. Not some pathetic attention-seeking wannabe. Genuinely fucked up but not too removed from human compassion. “Let's go feel something different.” 

     “Yessir,” Fang hummed, totally hypnotized. He didn't hate him? He wasn't disgusted? He wasn't scared of him? He didn't want to throw him out and lock the door? Oho no. He was just teasing him earlier but… Chris really might just be someone sweeter than he would have ever guessed. When was the last time he had ever been with someone nice? That cared? Did he… could he… feel what he was feeling? The pull he felt so long ago that scared the shit out of him? Fang's love was wrong. He grew up without it. It wasn't the same as others. Would Chris ever understand that? Would it ever be enough? How did he show it? 

     He hadn't felt his heart yearn for someone like this. It was nauseating and invigorating. How… how did he deserve any of this?

I wanna feel the love you can't live without

The one that Johnny Cash wrote all his songs about