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Nick had never thought he would see Troy again. It had been crushing, the way his mother had killed him, had taken him out like he was nothing. Because she was jealous (Nick knew this in his heart), she was jealous of anything that might take Nick away, especially if that something was bad news. Or someone.
And Nick knew that Troy was bad, in a way – how could he grow up in a crazy cult without being bad? But, there had been something there. The way his eyes only seemed to light up when Nick was in the room.
And Nick’s own heart seemed to have stopped beating when Troy’s had, too. He had managed to make his way back, to go through the motions, but when he closed his eyes, Troy was always there – sometimes he expected to open them and see Troy staring back at him, that unreadable look.
The look that made Nick wonder exactly what went on in that head of his, whether it was dusty up there and unknowable and dark and silent, like a graveyard, or whether there was something that Nick had always been meant to shake loose and he just hadn’t quite gotten the chance yet.
He dreamed of Troy. He’d never tell Madison – how could he? And it wasn’t as if Alicia would understand. So Nick simply drifted through life, or what was left of it with all of these zombies walking around. Sometimes he wondered if it was even worth it.
Something would have to appear to remind him, one day, that everything was worth it.
***
Victor Strand slipped by the wayside, and Alicia joined another group. They were fracturing; and if Nick had his druthers, he’d probably have gone his own way just the same. But what did it matter?
He was with Troy, still, always. If he had tried to get rid of him, that would be an impossible withdrawal, like nothing else. Even if Troy was only in his head, now.
Even if Troy only lived on in his dreams.
Up until they had been kidnapped. Up until Nick and Madison had looked at Victor Strand and his fake attempt at amnesia (Nick had seen that kind of thing on Madison’s soap operas enough to be able to roll his eyes at someone going for it in real life).
And then, when he’d thought his heart was stone…
Someone walked in. He felt him before he heard him, felt like someone had reached into his chest and pulled out his heart the way that mummies or gods or demons used to do in the old horror movies, the ones he would stay up and watch before the world had caught fire.
And then, Nick was staring up at him.
Madison was shaking in her chair, tied up. Not with fear, no, with fury. She saw him, too, and if they survived this, that would be a conversation, or a conversation shelved all over again.
Nick’s voice didn’t work. He was sure his eyes must have been deceiving him, to see Troy’s… well, to see one of his eyes, the other glassy, staring back at him. What had Madison done to him?
Not enough, and Nick wanted to cry out in thanks for that. Troy lived. Troy lived, and he was here right in front of him, and nothing else in the world mattered.
***
“So, are you a general now?”
Nick’s hands were free. They were standing in a back room, a fortified one, and everyone else was going back and forth with the group. With Troy’s group.
“I’m not sure it would count as a general,” Troy replied, “But I’m in charge. They saw that I looked death in the eye, and I survived. So I got to be in charge.” He let out a dry laugh.
“They were too afraid to send me away.”
“They saw you and how strong you were,” Nick said. It all felt hollow. He didn’t know what to say for this moment he never thought he would find – a dream that he had never thought had any hope of coming true. If he blinked, Troy could have turned – Troy could be gone.
Troy snorted.
“Strong? Is that the word you want to use? Your mother always said that I was crazy. That I’d been born wrong, somehow… She was always trying to dismantle me, one way or another.”
“She couldn’t,” Nick said. “That’s what she tries to do. She tries to fix people, but sometimes when you try to fix somebody, you’re actually breaking them.”
“And for you? Am I too crazy for you?” Troy tilted his head to the side, giving Nick a perfect view of that perfect, milky eye, the one that seemed like it was always looking at him, there just for Nick. All of Troy seemed to be just for Nick; maybe he was the only one who could understand.
“You’re just crazy enough for me, Troy. You’re… You know I used to be an addict. You think I could go for anyone who wasn’t a little bit crazy? But I thought… I thought you were dead. I thought I would never see you again. So now… I don’t know what to do. I’m worried that I’m going to close my eyes and everything will be gone all over again. That you’ll be gone.”
“I’m not going anywhere, Nick. I’ve been looking for you… But trying to find someone in these days… Well, even back on the compound there was never anyone I wanted to try to find before. Everyone I loved was around me, already. And then, well, you came along. You showed me another way.”
Nick wasn’t sure what “another way” even meant when it came to Troy, and he found that he was okay with that. He just wanted to be closer to him, to move in to his scent, that musk, that earthy quality of him that hadn’t changed.
And so he leaned in. He couldn’t think about any of the people in the other room, couldn’t think about the state of the world, couldn’t think about anything other than Troy and how the universe had somehow beautifully brought him to Nick all over again.
“Troy, I don’t…”
There was a sound from the next room over, and then they were no longer alone. There was an audience – Troy’s men, and Strand too, and goddamned Madison there and ready to ruin it all over again. And she was holding a rifle – where had she gotten that?
Even though she was only trying to save Nick. Maybe he didn’t want saving, not this time.
Not from Troy.
“Troy, get away from him, or I’m going to end you.”
“You’re not going to do anything to him.” Nick’s voice seemed to come from outside himself; he had never been this strong with Madison. But he wouldn’t let her do anything to
Troy, not this time, not again.
“Oh, come on, Nick. Not this again.” Madison sounded exasperated, like she was trying to get Nick to come home from a party he had insisted on going to against her wishes.
“Mom… Just go.”
“I’m not going to go, Nick. You want me to leave you here with him so you can ruin your whole life all over again?” She tilted the rifle down at the ground, hesitating, and then leaned it against a chair. Then, reached out and cupped his face between the sides of her hands, letting out a sigh. “He’s dangerous. You know he’s dangerous.”
“I know he is,” Nick replied, “And I don’t care. You’re dangerous, too. I’ll be fine, Mom, just… I need you to go, and I need to keep Troy safe. It’s never going to work, the two of you in the same place. And I have to go my own way.”
“This isn’t moving to New York to find yourself, Nick.”
“But I found myself anyway.” He wrenched out of Madison’s reach. “I’ll be safe. Troy will help keep me safe.”
She snorted, and reached for the rifle again.
“I’ll stand between you and him,” Nick said. It wasn’t anger; it wasn’t a threat. He simply knew it to be true in his heart.
“Madison,” Troy echoed, “Nick is going to come with me. I won’t let anything happen to him. I swear.”
“I don’t believe you.”
She locked eyes with him.
“I wouldn’t let anything happen to him. Not even from you,” Troy repeated. He locked eyes right back.
“You know how he is, Mom.”
Troy’s agreement was a growl. Nick moved closer, wanted to take a look at Troy’s face, trace the scars with his finger and tell him that he was going to protect him, too, that nothing would ever hurt him again. That he was the only thing out there that wasn’t dead, the only thing that reminded Nick that he wasn’t.
The only thing that made Nick’s heart want to keep beating in all of this craziness, this… what was the word Alicia loved to use? This dystopia.
This world in which all he had to see was Troy, again and again. And that was all right.
“I do,” Madison retorted, “And I know that nothing good is going to happen with you and him.”
“That’s up to me.”
Troy growled again.
“All right, all right. Tell Fido to quit trying to do his junkyard dog routine.”
Nick reached up and rubbed at his temples, and he looked at Troy.
“Can you let them go? Mom, Strand, all of them?”
Troy tilted his head.
“If you’ll stay.”
“Nick, don’t…” Madison began. “Stay with us. It took so long to find you again.”
“It took even longer to find Troy again,” Nick said. And that was that.
***
Troy seemed more confident, now, without Jake and their father to order him around, to remember the past and to always feel as if Troy had somehow been wrong all along. Without Madison, to play to Troy’s need of a mother one second and cast him out the next.
Nick didn’t know the other people working with Troy, but he didn’t need to. He rose above them in a second.
There wasn’t a lot of room to be alone, but Troy seemed to find a way. Maybe after all of those years living out in the compound, being alone no matter what he tried, it was something he could always go back to.
They would shuffle into a room, and Nick would vow his loyalty. There was nothing that he wouldn’t give up to keep Troy safe, to keep him in power. Sometimes, Troy may be wrong (that was Madison’s voice in his head, all over again, reminding him), but that didn’t matter.
The door would shut behind him, but Nick never checked to ensure that it was locked, as he didn’t really care who saw him. But he wanted to drink in Troy, to make sure that he was real and not just a dream. To make sure that he could let him know that he couldn’t think of anyone else but him.
So the door would click, and then Nick would drop to his knees, scabbed and well-worn but not in pain; he could never be in pain with Troy nearby. The only throb was the thought of being without him, of him out there lonely and looking for Nick, waiting for a day that might never come.
Troy would look down at him, and Nick would stare up into that milky eye, wondering if he would ever find out all of what lay behind it, whatever existed in the dreams of Troy Otto.
He had the rest of his life to find out, and that was a relief. That made everything worth it.
Nick would lean up, finally breaking his gaze only to kiss Troy’s hand, to trace each of the scars with his tongue and his lips, begging silently for Troy to tell him everything, everything that had happened every second that they had been apart.
And then to never, never let them be separated again.