The knife had gone in wrong and the man wasn't dead yet and Kit was pretty sure the car was on fire.

He stood in the alley behind the parking garage and looked at the situation he had created and ate a fruit snack.

Watermelon. He'd packed well, at least.

The car wasn't fully on fire. Just the passenger side mirror, which had caught when Kit knocked the lighter fluid off the seat during the struggle, which had happened because the man had fought back, which had happened because Kit had gone in at the wrong angle and instead of a clean job he had a very much still-breathing loan shark dragging himself toward the garage exit leaving a trail that was going to be very hard to explain.

Kit caught up with him in four steps and finished it.

He stood there after, breathing through his nose, and assessed the situation the way Apollo had taught him. Slow down. List the problems. Solve in order.

Okay.

The problems were:

Car fire small but growing. Blood on the concrete a lot. Lighter fluid on his jacket he'd noticed the smell the second it hit him and it was still there, sharp and chemical and horrible, sitting right at the base of his skull and refusing to leave. His hoodie was ruined. His favorite hoodie, the grey one, the soft one that had finally been washed enough times to feel right. The fruit snack pocket was probably salvageable but the rest of it was a loss and he couldn't think about that right now.

He really wished he had his headphones.

He'd left them in the car. His car, parked two blocks over, sitting there with his headphones inside them, and the walk back was going to be loud because the city was always loud and his ears were already doing that thing where every sound had its own sharp edge a bottle breaking somewhere above him, a radio from a window he couldn't see, the wet sound of the fire eating through plastic. All of it separate. All of it too loud. All of it competing.

List the problems. Solve in order.

Right. Phone.

He pulled it out and scrolled.

Apollo 🔪 (do not call unless dying)

Okay so technically he wasn't dying. Technically. The loan shark was dying was, in fact, done dying but that wasn't the same thing. Apollo was cleanup. Apollo was the one who showed up with trash bags and a mop and the quiet, specific, deeply exhausting disappointment of someone who had expected this and was still somehow let down by it.

Rain ☁️

Kit's thumb hovered.

Rain was the oldest. Rain had a voice that could make Kit feel about nine years old in under thirty seconds and then keep going. Rain didn't yell, which somehow made it worse. Rain had this way of going very calm and very quiet right before he said something that would bounce around Kit's head for the next six to eight business days.

He scrolled past Rain without stopping.

Mads 🤡 (he put this himself)

Mads would tell this story at Christmas. Mads would tell this story at Christmas every year for the rest of Kit's life.

Kit put his phone in his pocket.

He could fix this himself. It was one scene, one body, one small car fire. He was a professional. He was almost a professional. He was a professional in training and this was just-

The mirror finished burning and fell off the car with a sound like a small sad cymbal crash.

Kit stared at it.

Okay, he thought. New problem.

Twenty minutes later he had made things worse.

He didn't want to talk about the details. The point was that he'd tried to move the car and that had been a mistake and he'd tried to address the blood situation and that had also been a mistake and now he was sitting on the ground with his back against the bumper because his legs had decided they were done.

The sounds were really bad now.

The city had gotten louder, or he had gotten worse at handling it, which was the same thing from the inside. Tires on asphalt. Someone's music three floors up. A dog. His own heartbeat, which he could feel in his teeth for some reason. The lighter fluid smell was still there underneath the smoke and both of those things were pressing on the inside of his nose and he couldn't

He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.

Four counts in.

He didn't have his hoodie anymore it was in a dumpster half a block away, which had been the right call and he still felt awful about it and without the hood he felt like the sounds had more surface area to land on. Like his ears were suddenly bigger. Like the whole city could tell.

Hold.

He could call Apollo.

Apollo would answer on the second ring. Apollo would say what did you do in the voice, and then he'd ask for the location, and he'd show up with the supplies and the competence and the forty-minute lecture that felt less like concern and more like a performance review. And Kit would have to sit in the car on the way home while Apollo talked and he couldn't put his headphones in because that was rude and he'd have to just. Sit there. Receiving it.

Four counts out.

He wasn't calling Apollo.

He pulled out another fruit snack. Eating was good. Eating was grounding, something to do with his mouth that wasn't talking, something that tasted like something normal.

"Are those watermelon?"

Kit's hand stopped.

There was someone leaning against the wall across from him. Comfortable, like he'd been there a while, one shoulder propped against the brick, watching Kit with an expression that wasn't threatening and wasn't pitying. Just interested. Like Kit was something worth looking at.

He was tall. Black hair, a little messy. Green eyes that caught the light from somewhere Kit couldn't identify, which meant they were probably just that green on their own.

Kit's brain, which had been a disaster for the last twenty minutes, did something it almost never did in a stressful situation.

It got quiet.

"How long have you been there," Kit said.

"A while." The stranger nodded at Kit's hand. "Watermelon?"

"Yes." Kit looked at him. "You can't have one."

"I wasn't going to ask." He glanced at the body. Then back at Kit, unhurried, like the body was a minor detail in a more interesting scene. "Rough night?"

"I'm fine."

"You're sitting on the ground in an alley."

"I'm fine."

The stranger looked at him for a moment in a way that Kit couldn't quite categorize. Not judgment. Something more like recognition, almost. Like he was looking at something familiar.

"Loan shark?" he asked.

Kit went still. "How do you know that."

"I've been watching him for two weeks." He said it like it was nothing. Like surveillance was just a thing people did with their Tuesdays. "He had it coming." A pause. "You made a mess though."

"I'm aware."

"You tried to fix it and made it worse."

"I'm aware."

"And now you're sitting on the ground eating fruit snacks instead of calling whoever you're supposed to call."

Kit pointed at him. "I don't know you."

"Forest." He pushed off the wall, easy, hands in his pockets. Not approaching, just adjusting. Like he wanted a slightly better angle. "I can clean this up. I've got supplies. I'm actually good at it."

Kit looked at him.

Forest looked back.

He had a scar through his left eyebrow, small and old. He had the kind of face that Kit's brain wanted to keep looking at, which was information Kit received and then immediately set aside because this was not the time.

"What do you want?" Kit said.

"A BlowJob" he says without hesitation

Kit thought about it for exactly two seconds. He thought about the specific vulnerability of it, the closeness, a stranger with their hands, and then he thought about Apollo's voice in his ear on the drive home and Rain going very quiet before he said something Kit would carry for a week.

"Handjob," Kit said. "Or nothing."

Forest stared at him.

"Those are the options," Kit said. "I don't know you. I'm not doing that for someone I just met. A handjob is a completely reasonable compromise, and frankly, you should be grateful I'm negotiating at all because I could just leave."

"You weren't going to leave."

"That's not the point."

Forest was quiet for a moment. Something moved through his expression, complicated, ending somewhere that looked almost like he was trying not to smile and losing.

He held out his hand.

Kit looked at it.

"Deal," Forest said.

Kit put a fruit snack in his palm.

Forest looked at it.

"We can shake after," Kit said, and stood up.

Kit doesn't do sex like his brothers; they fuck anything that moves. Sex is too messy, too loud, and just so gross. He did try once in high school, but the guy pushed him off mid blowjob and told him he was the worst lay ever. So he never tried again.

Dropping to his knees, he pushes the zipper down and takes out Forest's cock, and it was definitely big.

"Go on, pretty boy, no need to be scared," He says, humor lacing his voice

Kit wraps a hand around the pulsing cock and starts slowly jacking him off. He looks up to see Forest staring at him. He stares back as he speeds up his hand. Kit hasn't been this turned on in forever. He's about to put his hand in his pants when Forest stops him.

"If you wanna get off, I'll do it for you."

He suddenly put his boot in between Kit's legs, directly on his cock, moving it back and forth on the fabric of his pants, and the shoe's weight feels incredible. He starts jacking Forest off again as he moves forward, chasing his orgasam he was so close, just a little more

"You gonna cum, pretty boy?" Forest Laughs

"Yes Yes" Kit chants

"Go on, then cum for me." Forest presses down hard on his cock, and Kit loves it as he cums in his jeans. Forest grabs Kit's head and brings it right up to his cock, and his cum hits Kit's face, and the high he was on is gone immediately

Ew gross, he hops up to his feet, and Forest's hands suddenly go to his pocket as he takes out some tissues, and he hands them to Kit

"Not a fan of messes." He asks

"None of your business," Kit says, like he didn't just beg to cum as a stranger got him off with his shoe.

Kit went back over to his corner as he ate his fruit snacks. The man got to work cleaning up the dead body. Kit fucked up. Kit can't help but smile

God, he was so fucked up