Kerry

[Five months after the breakup...]

Veluric City, away from him. Limelight still crept into his thoughts at odd moments, and because of him, Kerry had stopped drinking coffee altogether. Coffee wasn’t worth the reminder. No more coffee.

There’s a string of texts on his phone that he thumbs over. He expects they’re about work, his favorite horse Sassy Nipper had a sore leg.

Text: PARAGORE: Report, 6/26 5pm, site A.

“Ah.” Kerry says. Not horses. Paragore. He was being called in.

He decided to get ready and go now, maybe Petre would be in, or one of the big-timers might be lingering in the hallway. His mentor, she’d been like a second mom, retired and moved to Hawaii. His circle, the people he could call when he was low, was shrinking. Always shrinking. He’d even considered trying to rekindle lost ties with family but then, nah. Too much, too much everything.

Paragore Site Alpha was a skyscraper of black glass and gunmetal, orange lights snaked up straight lines and dotted the first floor. A black bodysuit fitted tightly to his small frame was simply adorned with a long loose orange scarf and, today, a black facemask. His identity was public, the mask was for looks and because he liked the way it made him feel.

Sometimes he forgot this place was full of everything. Demihumans, superheroes, creatures. He never liked thinking of anyone as a creature, but, he had no idea what to call a lot of the individuals he saw.

Heading to the third floor, he wasn’t called into the sub-levels anymore. Hadn’t been since he quit the B-Team.

Since I quit Limelight, he corrected himself.

As he opened the door he saw them sitting by the window and blinked, “Did you get the text too?” It hadn’t said anything about someone else being there, usually a nervous and pale handler would come with a folder and explain what needed to be done. They didn’t have a folder and didn’t look like a handler. Kerry moved closer, loneliness he didn’t care to address pulling him in, and he hoped that might disarm the stranger. Sitting in the chair directly across from them, hardly two feet between their knees, he leaned in.

Kerry was small, smaller than a lot of women. “I’m Kerry,” He paused, tugging the face mask down and around his neck. “Fragment. I make things shatter.” He always led with the weird; better to get it out of the way. An uneven grin presented for the sake of politeness, not because he felt it.

[The Breakup]

Afternoon sun filtered through massive floor-to-ceiling windows, throwing geometric shadows across sleek black tile and cold glass. The apartment gleamed with curated wealth, abstract blown-glass sculptures perched on asymmetrical shelves, each of them vague in shape, like frozen emotions. All of it so unlike him, far removed from the person Kerry had the misfortune of falling in love with. The skyline outside glowed with 8 a.m. quiet, distant and uncaring. It was beautiful, and Kerry hated it, a big, gorgeous backdrop for ugly reality.

“GET OUT!”

The words cracked through stillness like a glass pane shattering from the inside out. It was always that way with Kerry.

He was okay until he shattered. Things were okay until he shattered them.

Kerry’s voice, already frayed and trembling, bounced off the modern surfaces like it didn’t belong here. Even his voice wanted to find a way to escape. Cheeks flushed, jaw tight, eyes glossed with unshed tears. Across from him, Theo looked like he’d rolled out of bed. His shirt rumpled, hair askew, the skin under his eyes hollow with too many nights spent doing things Kerry had only now confirmed.

“For starters,” Theo began with a yawn and zero urgency. “I’m not leaving until I’ve had my coffee. And also…” He lifted a hand, palm up, mockingly gracious. “This is my apartment.”

Kerry’s sob broke through the moment like a dam cracking at the seams. He pressed both hands against his face, trying to shove the grief back in, but it only came out muffled, raw and wet through his fingers. “...just—hrk—hrk—nnnghhhaa…”

Theo turned toward the counter, reaching lazily for the mug sitting on the single-cup warmer of his obscenely expensive coffee machine. The quiet hum and click of it filled the air between them, and then the soft clink of ceramic. He leaned back against the counter, sipping slowly as he watched like Kerry was acting in a bad soap opera, mildly amused, already half-considering flipping the channel. “God,” he said, savoring the coffee. “That’s good.”

Kerry lowered his hands from his face, eyes big and wild. His breath stuttered, his shoulders quaked, but his feet carried him forward, like they already knew what needed to break.

“Kerry,” the other man warned, not moving. “Don’t. Mom sent me that crap.”

Kerry didn’t stop. He stalked toward the glass display wall, fury and heartbreak making him clumsy, erratic. His fingers grazed the first sculpture, and it began to spiderweb instantly, the crack of pressure screaming through it. Then another. Then another. “The third time!” he cried, voice hoarse. Each one responded to his will, turning brittle, glass veins crawling up their cores before they split and broke in pieces. “Cheating on me, since the start! You don’t care!”

Theo said nothing, watched, sipping his coffee. He made no effort to stop Kerry from breaking the blown glass sculptures.

“I’m done!” Kerry gasped. “You’re an awful person. I can’t do this anymore-”

“Kerry.” The sound of his name made him pause, just long enough to turn. They looked at each other. “Don’t be such a girl,” he said flatly. “He was nothing. It didn’t matter. It didn’t mean anything.” A small shrug. “Forgive me? Come on, baby, you always forgive me. It’s nothing, you’re special. No one else is special to me, you know that.”

Silence. Kerry’s eyes locked on him like he was trying to see through a wall that had been there all along. Theo there, smug and impervious to shame, and broken glass at his back. Fitting. There was no bottom to how much this could ache. His lips parted, barely. “Okay, Theo…” The words fell out, not with forgiveness, but with the hollow, heavy resignation of someone who had given up trying to be enough. Kerry fought secondary shame, why did I stay before?

There was no peace in the limelight.

He ran. He ran. He pretended to be one of the horses he loved, fast and a winner. Not this. Not a sobbing loser. He burst out of the apartment's lobby doors and almost stumble into the street, unaware of how he looked.