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Alhaitham watches the door carefully from the couch. He waits for the lock to turn, for his blonde-haired roommate to get home. It’s two in the morning. He’s still waiting.
A couple of hours ago, Kaveh left the house for a drink and to catch up with some old Akademia acquaintances. He offered for Alhaitham to join, but to no avail. Kaveh left, a bit annoyed, and soon after he had left Alhaitham had tried to find a book to read. To his own annoyance, Kaveh had started alphabetizing the shelves earlier in the day. He had been organizing more and more things in Alhaitham’s house, and Alhaitham had enough of having to dig through his own stuff. In his opinion, his plates were already categorized in a way that made sense to him, but Kaveh, the damn perfectionist, kept on insisting it wasn’t. Either way, he sat down on the couch with a subpar book he found and waited to confront Kaveh about it when he returned home. No matter how drunk he was.
If he returns home, that is. If he’s even sober enough to stand. Alhaitham feels his eyes drift from the page again and again, until his hand is holding limply onto the pages of the book, and his head is supported only by his hand on his chin. He sits uncomfortably, the coffee table too low and couch too soft for him. He blinks slowly. Why am I even doing this? Kaveh made sure he took the keys before he left this time, and any matters could just wait until morning at this point.
Alhaitham lets go of the uninteresting book, resigned to being fixated on the door again. He’s worrying himself for no reason. Kaveh can take care of himself, or at least he won’t die, so there’s definitely no reason to be worried, he reasons. Alhaitham takes down his headphones onto his shoulders, deciding to head to his bedroom. Even though he stands to leave, knocking some probably well-organized books from the table, his gaze doesn’t move from the door. And just as it’s almost out of sight, he pauses.
Keys jingle against the door.
Kaveh tumbles in, Alhaitham moving just barely fast enough to catch him.
“Hey, leave me ‘lone,” Kaveh mumbles, shoving out of his hold and stumbling back. Alhaitham notices his ragged demeanor. Hair mussed, eyes shut tight, and a bright flush on his cheeks from the alcohol. He shuffles forward, one hand tucked near his chest out of sight, the other making a dismissive motion. “I’m not doing aanything tonight.”
Alhaithaim looks at his state and internally sighs. This is definitely no time to talk. “I wasn’t going to make you.”
Kaveh looks insulted, but turns fully away from Alhaitham before he can really read his expression. “You’re still up. Of course y-you want something from me, else you’d be sleeping. I am not. Doing anything.”
“It’s nothing. Get to bed.” Alhaitham starts to walk away, bitter feeling rising, but Kaveh grabs him by his arm harshly.
“So you were gonna make me do something? Liar.” Kaveh’s still hunched over, poorly hiding something in his right hand. Alhaitham makes an attempt to see what it is, but Kaveh’s death grip on his arm didn’t allow much maneuverability.
“What’s your problem?” Alhaitham says, then doubles back. Kaveh glares at him and Alhaitham avoids his eyes, sighing at the conflict that’s going to ensue. He knows Kaveh won’t get what he’s trying to say, so he attempts to rephrase. “I meant, we d-“
“What do you mean, problem?” Kaveh says impatiently.
“Can you give me a damn moment, Kaveh? I-” Alhaitham tries to articulate his thoughts, but then catches sight of what appears to be a whiskey glass in Kaveh’s hand, still half-full with a dark liquid. “You’re still drinking.”
“What about it-?” Kaveh drawls, waving the glass around freely now. “You can’t stop me.”
Kaveh takes a step forward, but Alhaitham stays where he is. “This is my house.”
“Oh, you say that all the time. You own the house, but you don’t own me.” Kaveh takes another long sip of the drink, stepping forward towards Alhaitham again. The glass is dangerously loose in his hand. “So, don’t. T-tell me what to do.”
Kaveh was already very drunk, and Alhaitham knew that the bit of whiskey left in his glass would probably push him into a blackout, paired with a much worse hangover in the morning. “Stop it.”
Kaveh scoffed. “I just said not to tell me what to do, asshole.”
“Kaveh, I’m not ordering you around. You need to stop that.” Kaveh makes a sour expression, almost taunting in its nature. Alhaitham’s brows furrow, trying to come up with the proper words, but giving up. He just needs to get the alcohol out of Kaveh’s hands. He reaches for the drink.
Kaveh flinches out of the way and punches Alhaitham in the chest. Hard. Alhaitham doesn’t react much, but stumbles back slightly and finds himself with his back against the wall. Kaveh closes their distance, his hand finding a place on the wall next to Alhaitham’s head. Drops of his drink hit the floor.
“You never listen, do you? Because you’re so much better than me, right? Fuck that. I know you’re stupid when it comes to shit like this.” Kaveh enunciates each word by pushing Alhaitham further, right in the place where Kaveh punched him, where he’ll have a bruise later. Alhaitham can’t stand his eye contact, and looks away.
“I’m not trying to control you, I just- I don’t-“ Alhaitham becomes frustrated with the lack of words coming to his mind. Kaveh looked at him smugly, and was about to say something before Alhaitham interrupted, “I can’t stand it when you act like this, you know.”
Something in that statement shuts Kaveh up for a moment. His gaze flits around, scrutinizing Alhaitham. It makes him even more uncomfortable. Quieter, Kaveh says, “Then why are you even waiting for me?” After a breath, “Why do you let me live here at all?”
They settle into a heavy silence. Alhaitham tries to speak, but it comes out as just a low sound. Kaveh abruptly downed the rest of his drink, to Alhaitham’s disappointment. Kaveh says, with a certain pained hope in his eyes, “What? What the hell is it?”
“Kaveh,“ Alhaitham falters. There was just nothing coming to his mind. There was an emotion, but there was something about it that he just couldn’t figure out how to say. Looking at Kaveh’s expression, he knew that he really, really wanted to tell Kaveh something, anything, he just needed more time. He didn’t know where this was going, and he needed somewhere he could think. Just two minutes of silence would work. He needed that time, and Kaveh was just not giving him that. And so, what he finally said was, “Leave me alone. We’re done talking.”
For now, damnit. I should have said, “for now.” Or something, anything else, please-
“You… you bitch!” What, are you scared?” Kaveh takes a step back, a betrayed expression on his face. Alhaitham was still avoiding making eye contact, trying to sort out his thoughts the best he could in the noise. He feels so tired of thinking, and how loud Kaveh was being, and how little time he had to respond. Why can’t Kaveh see that right now? “You clearly have something to say to me!” Kaveh continued, oblivious to Alhaitham’s thoughts. “Why don’t you fuck yourself, instead of telling me to go away, or ignoring me, or belittling me, or leading me on just to chicken out!”
“I can’t ever think when you’re around, Kaveh. If you think you should be gone, then leave the house.” For now, just for now, come back sometime for the love of the Archons-, Alhaitham’s thoughts screamed.
“ And you turn right back around and contradict yourself!” Kaveh kept yelling, to Alhaitham’s eternal dismay. His head starts to hurt. He notices his nails harshly digging themselves into the skin of his palm, and tries to stop it but only ends up pulling on his fingers or scratching his wrist a second later, and feeling so much worse. All of his energy went to his hands.
His lungs feel tight, and it’s hard to breathe. Alhaitham makes out another sentence, still not the words he needs to find. “Pipe down ple-“
“No! I’m not shutting up until you explain yourself!” Couldn’t even fucking let me say please. “You have something to say to me. Or are you talking total bullshit? Like usual?”
“I can’t. Just, actually- no, be quiet!” Alhaitham pulls on his hands, arms, back of his shirt, anything. He could tear the whole world apart, and it still won’t be enough.
“W- come on, what?” Kaveh’s voice cracks. Alhaitham knows the look of confusion and anger in Kaveh’s face well, and though he still looked away he knew that it’s really bad. This is really bad.“I don’t understand what you’re saying at all sometimes.” A pause. “God damnit, look at me!”
Kaveh grabs Alhaitham by the jaw, forcing him to look into his eyes.
And it’s so, so much worse than he thought.
Kaveh betrays everything. His expression is frustrated and violent, irritable from the alcohol but, at the same time, dripping with sorrow. There’s fear and sadness dampening his eyes, confusion and resentment tugging his lips, cold hopelessness hanging onto the aftertaste of every word he may speak. It blends in a way so identifiable but so utterly incomprehensible, making the confusion (and pain) pulsing in Alhaitham’s brain worse. The sound has abruptly stopped, but that leaves an unbearable ringing in his ears and no more distractions from the pain in his body. His nails broke skin on his palm, an extremely small amount of blood pooling in his hand, as well as the bruise on his chest started to ache. His lungs burnt for no identifiable reason, and his mouth felt dry. Kaveh holds Alhaitham’s head at his level, and his eyes bore into his soul. The room feels so incredibly hot. Alhaitham can’t handle being stared at for much longer.
Above all, Kaveh has a desire to know. To see inside Alhaitham’s brain the same way Alhaitham once did at the bar they met again at so many nights ago. He wants to pick apart the pieces of him more thoroughly than Alhaitham ever could, whether out of curiosity or some kind of twisted revenge. They’re so close, Alhaitham might lose his mind. He will lose his mind. And maybe he should pull himself together. He should come up with something, save this, save them.
But he just couldn’t.
And so he looked away.
Kaveh stepped back, expression sad at first, like he was going to resign. but then, he tensed up again. He bit his lip so hard it bled, and shouted words that Alhaitham couldn’t really hear anymore. He threw the glass on the ground.
With a deep breath in, Kaveh walked away, cussing loudly as he left. Tears streamed down his face. Alhaitham remained frozen, watching as it unfolded. Only once Kaveh was gone, not of his own volition, Alhaitham’s knees buckled and he fell to the floor, rather painfully.
It’s finally silent, and Alhaitham feels the breath he had lost return to him all at once. The ringing in his ears leaves rather slowly, but at least it’s left. His shoulders untense against the wall, and he pushes himself to lean back on it. The glass shards on the floor stab through his hand and his breath hitches uncomfortably. His headphones fall off of his neck and clatter on the floor next to his hands. Alhaitham’s tired brain takes a moment to realize what they are.
“Damn it….” he says when he realizes, hand clenching the rim of it and weakly bringing it up to look at. His headphones. He had forgotten to put them back on.
He groans, closes his eyes tight, and the regret washes over him like a cold shower. These headphones.. why?
It had always been like this. Ruining relationships by never even being able to speak proplerly to friends. He had never even cared about that kind of thing before Kaveh, who loved him unconditionally like only his family ever had. Who was different from him, but tried and tried to understand him. Who was still trying, even now. Alhaitham wanted to help him, but didn’t know how to tell him. He wants to talk about what he feels but just can’t figure out how to say it. How to say things that any other person could’ve. It’s pitiful. He dosen’t know how he can be so smart yet not even figure out something so simple. No one else needs headphones like he does, struggles to articulate themselves like he does, no one seemed to try as hard as he does. He made a whole fight out of nothing, and now Kaveh was going to leave. It was all his fault.
There’s something horribly wrong with me. Alhaitham shuttered. Why can’t I just be what Kaveh needs? Why do I even care this much anymore?
He stared at the headphones in his hands, the outward sign of his inadequacies. It was shameful. He drops them and starts to solemnly examine the wounds on his hands. He watches as a small drop of blood slowly drips from his palm to mingle with the remains of the shattered whiskey glass, coating the floor like a glistening paint.
Kaveh’s going to leave. This time, he doesn’t think that they can be salvaged.