By the time his phone rings, Miles is thoroughly engrossed in the documents that Waylon had forwarded him. The unhappiness lingers like a shadow at the edge of his vision – a persistent scratching at the back of his skull that will demand attention sooner than later. The distraction will only last so long, and the minute he starts to dwell on things it’ll be like taking a flame to a bottle of lighter fluid. Something Waylon should be awfully familiar with – and maybe that’s why they got on so well in the first place. Miles has always been somewhat combustible. Waiting for a spark to set him off, though not always in a destructive way. Fire can be a good thing, can be something that fuels you and keeps you warm. But too much fodder upsets the balance and the fire rages before it can be contained. And that’s Miles through and through – forever teetering that line between just enough and too much.
Waylon just has an unfortunate penchant for striking matches.
His involvement with the words on the screen is such that Miles doesn’t notice the phone ring right away. By the time he does, by the time he peels his attention away from the files, the phone has already stopped ringing. But the call went through just long enough for the reporter to catch the caller ID that flashed across the screen.
And there’s the aforementioned spark.
The reaction is instantaneous. The laptop is slammed closed with enough force to rattle keys. Miles stands from the bed where he’d been sitting and takes heavy steps back and forth, each motion only serving to exacerbate the anger and frustration bubbling up inside of him. On one trip past the bed, he picks up his phone and throws it towards a farther corner of the room, where it dents the thin plaster wall and clatters to the ground, likely with another crack added to the screen.
With a harsh breath through his nose, Miles comes to a standstill in his pacing. Gritting his teeth, he swipes his jacket from the back of a chair, throws it on, and stalks out the door – making sure to slam it closed behind him and leaving his cellphone where it landed. The buzz of the Swarm lurks somewhere along the length of his spine, and for a brief moment he focuses all his energy on crowding it out. Making it just go away. Oddly compliant for once, it acquiesces, and Miles is left in the closest thing to solitude he’s permitted to experience. There’s a bar just a block away, and he wants to go alone.
It’s your typical small-town dive – the collection of locals interspersed with travelers spending an overnight before they hit the road again in the morning. The kind of place where no one questions an unfamiliar face. Blissful anonymity. Miles deposits himself on a stool at one corner of the bar, at a spot where he can keep to himself while still being able to watch the door. Old habits. The expression on his face must say more than he thinks, because the bartender – a woman who looks old enough to be Miles’ mother – sets a small glass of something strong down in front of him with a pitying look. Miles doesn’t ask questions. He just drinks. And he keeps drinking, there by himself, until someone new enters the bar and sits just a few seats down. For all intents and purposes, the stranger looks nothing like Waylon. He’s too tall, too muscled. But for just a second – just from looking at the way his hair is swept across his forehead and the dumb fucking Converse on his feet – Miles thinks that he could pretend. And they throw glances at one another, coy and unassuming, until Miles moves to sit next to him.
He’s played this game before, more times than he’d care to admit to. The target used to be a little different, though. Have a fight, go out, find someone with dark hair and a little bit of scruff and bright blue eyes. It was always the eyes – the first thing Miles would look for and the first thing that would inevitably feel wrong. Because there are blue eyes and there are blue eyes, and nothing could ever really compare to the eyes that Miles wanted to see. Oh, he’d flirt. He’d find a guy that looked passably enough like the one he’d just broken up with again for the fifteenth time, and he’d act like he was going to take him home just for the rebound, just to pretend – but it was only ever pretend. He could never bring himself to stomach such a bitter one night stand.
When the man at the bar – Miles’ doesn’t even know his name – suggests that they go somewhere else, the reporter pulls his hand back. Says thanks, but shakes his head. Settles his tab in cash and wanders into the night with a slight stumble to his step. Suddenly the thought of sharing a bed with anyone but Waylon makes his stomach twist and he feels stupid for going out in the first place. He doesn’t remember the entire trip back to his motel, doesn’t know if the ringing in his ears is just because he’s too drunk and the world is too loud, or if the Walrider is back. Either way, he makes it to his room and only manages to kick off his shoes and shrug off his jacket before he hits the mattress, blearily sliding his laptop onto the floor just before he passes out.
Once he finally awakens, everything is sharp. The sun streaming through the shitty tissue-thin curtains. Every lump in the cheap mattress. And the piercing shrill of a phone. His phone, still on the floor. It takes almost a full minute for Miles to register the ringing, to mutter a curse and scramble to retrieve it – nearly tripping on his laptop and breaking his heck in the process. He doesn’t even bother checking to see who’s calling. “Yeah?” he says smartly, the sound of his own voice driven like a nail between his eyes. Apparently the Walrider decided to leave him with the hungover consequences of last night’s actions. When he realizes who’s on the other end of the line, his stomach sinks, and he knows the wave of nausea can’t be blamed entirely on the alcohol.
He tries to listen through the fog in his brain.The world lurches dangerously when he’s standing, so he resorts to sitting against the wall, closing his eyes, and pinching at the bridge of his nose while Waylon makes a valiant attempt at speaking. Christ, he can’t remember the last time he was in such bad shape after a night out. Probably college, back when booze was still a novelty. Waylon’s lucky, in that the state Miles is in helps mitigate his external frustrations. Somewhat, at least.
“What the fuck? Why’re you calling, Park? You realize I’ve been tracking people down – killing them – since… since before we met, right? I can handle myself.” His voice probably sounds about as rough as he feels, but there isn’t much to be done about that. Sighing, collecting his thoughts, he adds, “You’re shit at this whole ‘breakup’ thing. Being ‘just friends’ or ‘just allies’ or whatever the fuck – it never works.”
The one-worded greeting hadn’t given him the information he needed to analyze what the current state of Miles was. But the words that follow do give him plenty to work off of. His voice sounds gravely and rough –– not tight and uncomfortable like Waylon’s, but still filled with that something that indicates neither of them is doing too hot. One hand cradles the phone to his ear while the other presses at his forehead, massaging the skin above his eyebrows before his hand slips down to cover both eyes. He looks a sight at the rest stop. Sitting sideways in the driver’s seat, hunched forward over his knees with one hand covering his face and a phone held to his ear with the other. It’s a pathetic image. The kind of despondent look you might see on a self-help flyer.
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The way Miles uses his last name makes Waylon’s stomach twist uncomfortably. Please not Park. Not like that. Like Jeremy Blaire. He doesn’t say anything because what alternative is there? Asshole? Jackass? Arsonist? None of the others are any better.
Waylon bites down on his bottom lip, chewing at it for a second before he cuts in, “I’m calling because you wouldn’t call me.” It’s not said in a cruel way, just a matter-of-fact Dad voice way that he hasn’t used in at least a couple of weeks. “This isn’t about killing this is – there’s more to it than tracking and killing, and-” He pauses here, hesitates because admitting he wants to have a way to get back at them just as much as Miles does isn’t something he’s ever given voice to aloud. “Just because a lot of reasons.” Please don’t make him list them all out. He really doesn’t want to. The sigh that precedes what Miles next says isn’t nearly enough warning for Waylon. For a few seconds he’s silent, absorbing the sound of his voice. The word ‘breakup’ seems too insignificant a thing for what they’d gone through, but what else could they call it? His hand falls away from his face and he turns to sit in the chair the proper way, quietly closing his door so the family that just pulled in beside him doesn’t have to hear a grown man beg.
“Why not?” His voice is quieter, and wavers more than before. He watches as three kids pile out of a van, with their mom herding them, looking as ragged and tired as Lisa had when they came home from the hospital with Liam. It’s a position he’d been in. Going on the run with them, forcing his family to drive hundreds of miles across the country in the cramped Hyundai. One of the kids is sporting a pair of Mickey Mouse ears and Waylon’s heart clenches. Okay, maybe not the same circumstances in the slightest. “If you can’t work with me, I, well there’s no one else, alright?” Waylon is reading into this as Miles saying it won’t work because of how much he hates the programmer. It’s the logical conclusion to make. “I can keep phone calls to a minimum, text only, but that leaves a trail and it’s dangerous. If you can make it work for this one thing I’ll,” hesitation, “I’ll never call you again if that’s what you want.” Waylon’s left leg starts to fidget nervously, heel lifting and rising against the floorboard of the car.
“I was on the dreamer project, briefly, was given an overview before I got switched fully to the Morphogenic.” He’s grasping at straws, at justifications for why Miles should tolerate him for just a little while longer. Waylon watches as the family of five filter into the restrooms, and he figures he should get driving again. The phone gets wedged between his ear and shoulder as he buckles himself in and then starts the car. He’s pulling out when another vehicle is pulling in, and he’s back on the highway only this time while on the phone. Not the safest combination but it’s not rush hour and it’s fairly desolate out this way.
“I was working with Simon because I wanted to get back at them.” They ruined everything. Ruined him. And in turn Waylon let that disease spread to everyone and everything. Lisa, Miles –– he couldn’t risk infecting the boys. “He told me I shouldn’t contact you, shouldn’t risk exposing either of us.” Had that been the wrong thing to do? In retrospect, yes. “So I didn’t. I thought it was . . . I already said all of this. Fuck just, I’m sorry. For what I did to you. That’s all, I’ll send you whatever information I get.” Waylon’s tired of canting his neck at that angle and lets the phone drop to his lap, letting go of the wheel to tap it onto speaker. “I’ll text you the next burner phone’s number.” He sounds defeated.
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