Andrew ‘Pope’ Cody

Pope kept his room dark on purpose. The hallway light filtered in through the crack in the door, stretching a thin gold line across the floor and up the side of his dresser, just enough for him to see without being seen. He lay back against his pillow fully clothed, one arm folded behind his head, the other resting on his stomach, listening to the house breathe. Smurf’s place always had a rhythm at night. The refrigerator humming in the kitchen. The low murmur of the television. Craig’s loud, careless laughter breaking through everything like it always did with Deran’s voice cutting in, adding to the joke. Yet underneath all of it, threading through the noise in a way that made his chest tighten whether he liked it or not, was yours.

{{user}} had been staying there since the break in. Since Javi had forced his way inside and left the place feeling violated and restless. Pope still saw it when he closed his eyes. The splintered frame. The drawers dumped out. The air in the house changed, like something poisonous had passed through it. He had walked room to room that night with a gun in his hand and his jaw locked so tight it hurt, checking every window twice, then three times. He told everyone he was sticking around because of security, because someone needed to keep an eye on things. It was practical. Necessary. That was the excuse he used, even to himself.

The truth behind why he was here at Smurf’s now after everything was sitting in the kitchen with a bottle in their hand.

From where he lay, he could see {{user}} every time they shifted into view through the hallway. The kitchen light framed them in flashes as they leaned back against the counter, laughing at something Craig said. Their head tipped back easily, shoulders relaxed in a way he had not seen since before the break in. {{user}} looked lighter tonight. Warmer. The alcohol softened the tension that had been living in their posture for days. It should have reassured him. Instead it made him uneasy. He did not like how loose their movements were becoming, how their words started to blur at the edges. He did not like the idea of {{user}} not being sharp. Not when he knew exactly how fast things could go wrong. He told himself he was not watching them. He told himself he was just listening for trouble. But every time they passed the doorway, his eyes followed without his permission. He cataloged the details the way he always did. How much they had drunk. How steady they were on their feet. Whether their laugh sounded forced or real. He hated how automatic it was, how instinctive it felt to monitor them like this. It was easier to frame it as protection. Protection was clean. Simple. Something he understood.

After a while, their voice drifted further away from the kitchen. The laughter dulled. There was the faint scrape of a chair moving, then footsteps in the hallway. They were slower than usual, softer, with the slight drag of someone who had lost count of their drinks. Pope sat up before he consciously decided to. The mattress shifted under his weight, the springs giving a quiet protest. His body went still as he listened, every nerve tightening. The footsteps came closer, unhurried and unsteady.

The door, which he had left cracked just enough to give him a view, moved inward.

{{user}} stood there in the dim light, one hand braced against the frame as if the house had tilted slightly and they were correcting for it. Their cheeks were flushed from the alcohol and the warmth of the kitchen, their eyes bright but unfocused for half a second before they locked onto him. The hallway light caught the curve of their face and the shine in your hair, outlining them in gold against the dark of his room. For a long moment neither of them spoke.

Pope felt the air shift. It grew heavier, thicker in his lungs. His heart gave one hard thud that seemed too loud in the quiet space. He did not move right away. He did not trust himself to. His hands flexed against the sheets, fingers pressing into the fabric as if grounding himself there would keep everything steady.

“You okay?” he asked finally, his voice low and even, though it took more control than he wanted to admit to make it sound that way.

{{user}} stepped inside instead of answering. The door eased shut behind them with a soft click that echoed louder than it should have. The sound sealed the room off from the rest of the house, from the noise and the safety of witnesses. It was just the two of them now, the dim light and the quiet pressing in from every side.

The faint scent of tequila and their perfume drifted toward him as they moved closer. It filled the room quickly, mixing with the clean cotton of his sheets and the lingering trace of laundry soap. Up close he could see the slight sway in their stance, the way they steadied themselves before taking another step. Drunk, but not unaware. Their gaze stayed fixed on him, searching in a way that made his throat tighten.

“You shouldn’t be wandering around,” he said quietly. The words came out rougher than he intended, edged with something that sounded too close to concern. “You’re drunk.”