dearest brother

Shifting restlessly under the tangled sheets, Chase raised a hand, ground his fingers into his eyes. It felt like they were full of grit, crunching under the pressure of his fingertips, burning even after he dropped his hand away.

A broken night full of dreams. The mental image of a woman out in the woods, blood slowly trickling down from wounds he couldn’t quite see as she twisted in the air. Screams, another woman’s laughter as he’d looked away. They’d cut off, the sudden silence ringing in his ears even in sleep. Turning back slowly it hadn’t been the vaguely familiar brunette hanging there but Roxxi. Chase had woken with a holler - once, twice, three times, the dreams feeding into one another before they’d shifted into more fractured dreams of his childhood. The tyre swing in the yard, the loose floorboard he kept all his secret shit in – the thirty bucks he’d made from the bet he’d made with the kids in his fifth grade class that he wouldn’t jump from the roof of the school down onto the principal’s car, the magazines he’d traded his mint Nolan Ryan baseball card for in the eighth grade, Mikey slithering back through the window that night bleeding everywhere.

Chase could still see the faintly red sheen over his vision when he peeled his eyes open. He hadn’t heard from Roxxi after she’d slipped out of Kitschy Kitschy Coo the night he’d met her. That was probably the reason she’d slipped into his head, a major case of blue balls instead of the night she’d promised when she’d dragged him up on stage.

He huffed in a breath, shifted under the sheets again until the bunched fabric had him pinned. A rough swallow, a throat that felt as desert dry as his eyes. Mikey’s presence in his dreams after months of him not being thrown back to his brother’s rapid downfall at the hands of the Agnellis no more a surprise. Not after the phone call.

20 years after his brother had gone down for a murder committed by Georgie Agnelli, Mikey was getting out.

Last night, staying late at the office he’d started to poke through the records. Cat burglar careful, not wanting news to spread through the department that he’d soon have a guy on parole living with him. A formar criminal, one who’d done his time and more, but still on parole, still able to be yanked back in a heartbeat if anything suspicious about his brother popped again, if Mikey slipped just once.

Parole for good behaviour, five years after he should’ve gotten out. The grip of the Agnellis had obviously finally loosened, the beating he himself had taken poking around the murders in New Orleans had maybe been their last gasp effort. Working well enough to leave him out cold for six days but not to crack him … not entirely.

Chase struggled free of the sheets, sitting up to dangle his legs over the side of the bed. Hands came up again, the heels of them grinding against his eyes this time. At least he was off today, he didn’t have to push past the exhaustion and shrug off the shadows under his eyes when coworkers called him on it again. He’d finish setting up what had been his home office for Mikey to sleep in, shove the files in boxes at the back of his closet, out of sight, out of mind, maybe get down to the grocery store so there was something more than beer and the barest basics in the fridge. Mikey had spent the last 20 years forcing down mystery meat and cardboard in a mess hall probably littered with guys ready to shank each other over who got their hands on a second pot of jello. It’d be different now, he’d made it different to keep Mikey out of trouble.

Standing, he went to pad out to the kitchen, a pot of coffee hot enough to scald on the agenda, but the buzzer for the door sounded. In the silent apartment it was loud enough to have him flinching. Chase frowned, the sun had peeked around the black out drapes he never managed to pull properly before he’d woken but this was still the crack of dawn on a Sunday. He bent, pulled on the jeans he left on the floor last night and padded to the intercom on the wall. The cameras had been installed just a few weeks back, one of the town’s attempts to help with the growing level of deaths and missing persons cases. Like someone was gonna ring on your bell and then murder you right there on the doorstep. Chase hit the button, brought up the feed and felt his stomach lurch. He’d come close to that … had found the body right on his own doorstep but this … Mikey.

His hand shook faintly as he hit the door release. Days before he expected him, his brother had made it to Mystic Falls in one piece and for the first time in 20 years there wouldn’t be a table or a sheet of glass separating them. ”Come on up.” The words rough, that fist done with spinning his stomach around rising to grip his throat. Chase stepped back, lifting a hand to knuckle at his mouth before he turned away, rushing on slightly unsteady legs for his bedroom, the bathroom. Cold water splashed on his face, a toothbrush ran around his mouth to try and take the remnants of that nightmarish night away, dark eyes staring at his reflection in the mirror, still pale around the edges, the bags under his eyes still heavy. He pulled away, snatching a t-shirt up off of the floor and yanking it on over his head as the thump came at the apartment door.

Muscles bunched in Chase’s door as he flipped the locks, more here than he’d had in New Orleans until things had started to unravel. By the time it was open and he was staring his brother in the face those grim lines had been replaced by a grin. A little watery maybe, the chuckle definitely emotional as he pulled his brother in, thumping his hands against his back. ”Hey, man. You shoulda called, I woulda picked you up from wherever you were. Come on in.” He held on a moment, thumped his fist against the solid muscle of his brother’s shoulder one last time before he stepped back. ”You just get here this morning?” There was the motel, a hotel somewhere, although that would’ve been way out of a newly released jailbird’s budget. A car slept in at a truck stop, a hundred places he didn’t want to imagine Mikey being as he ushered his brother towards the kitchen.

Tagged: MIKEY BUCKLEY * Word Count: 1135

Nerves jangled in the pit of Chase’s stomach as he hurried back towards the apartment door from his bedroom, those same alarms ringing in his head and sounding all too much like the shitty phone they’d had hanging on the kitchen wall his entire childhood. It’d ring for those weekly calls from Mikey before he’d been old enough to head to the jail himself to visit his brother, each shrill hammer of it cutting through him as he’d run to the kitchen. Disappointed half the time, some guy from one of his dad’s jobs or a friend of his mom’s. Handing the phone over there’d always been that sense of loss, at least until the next ring came and he was running back, feet pounding on the worn boards of the floor to snatch it up all over again.

Now his fingers were fumbling on the lock to get the door open. Nothing but air between the two of them. No glass, no table, no barked reminder from the guards that he couldn’t touch the prisoner. Total separation. 20 years held apart by the law, their parents … and the Agnellis.

All that was back in New Orleans though. This was Mystic Falls, Mikey was free and those nerves were giving way to a relief that tried to spill out in tears. Mikey was out. Free. Away from the neighbourhood where the lure of the gangs was still strong enough that kids were climbing all over each other in the streets to try and make a name for themselves. To impress the big boys in a way that only ever led to two places. Jail or the morgue.

Chase huffed out a breath again as he held onto his brother a moment longer. His throat worked hard as he swallowed, his tongue pressed to the roof of his mouth like that was gonna dial any of the emotion back. This day had been a long time coming and maybe some part of him had believed it’d never get here, the Agnelli’s hold on Mikey even within the walls of the prison too tight. ”Shoulda tossed it in the trash, got straight on the phone to let me know you were out.” It would’ve been hours of driving, that faint sense of dread that something else would happen before he got there driving him over the speeding limit. A flash of the bubble light on his dash goosing things along if he had to. Anything to make sure Mikey was finally out of there.

He nodded like something in the situation made sense, lifting a hand to rub his knuckles over his mouth. Another rusty laugh burst out around them, leaving Chase winging a brow at his brother as he turned around and leaned back against the counter. He saw the paperwork go down on the little four top table crammed into a corner, tried not to start focusing on it. ”I thought you’d have liked a little female company on the way. Was she a hot 90 year old at least?” A slip straight back into the ribbing they’d tossed back and forth constantly before the gang had gotten its claws into Mikey and that grim pall had settled over the house. It’d been stilted when Mikey was behind bars, voices always raw across that table or through the phone. You never knew who was listening or what’d be tossed back against you in an appeal. What would be taken to the higher ups who held his career in their hands, ready to crush it at any sign of impropriety.

His eyes were still aching with the unshed tears emotion was pushing past that fist in his throat. 20 years waiting for today and it was finally here. Chase paused mid-grin, staring at Mikey for a minute as he asked about bread and then he was pulling away. ”Shit, yeah man, of course. I was gonna get to the store, get some stuff in before I thought you were gettin’ here. Stuff’s a little scarce til then but we can go down there when they’re open … you want some coffee too?” He was turning around, tossing some bread into the slots in the toaster. Mikey was still talking as he did it, mentioning the paperwork he’d set down, drawing Chase’s attention back over his shoulder again. Turning, he brushed breadcrumbs off of his hands, walking back to the table to stare down at it. ”We can go through it later, it’ll be shit about the rules, what you gotta get done down here to make sure you’re meetin’ parole.” He should’ve been there for the meeting, a voice for his brother when the whole justice system had him under a microscope again.

Chase’s eyes flicked up from the paperwork to his brother, his throat thickening again. He swallowed, reached out a hand to clap it on Mikey’s shoulder. Good wasn’t covering it. Nodding, he tried to dislodge that fist around his throat but ended up laughing hoarsely instead. ”You too man. Although you start cryin’ we’re gonna set me off. Pair of us sittin’ here blubbin’ like babies. It’s good … so damn good.” A watery chuckle broke off as one of those tears crept out. He’d never been the emotional sort, locking that shit down inside until it burst out volcano hot to almost consume him entirely. Now it was dripping out, a dam with a crack that left him staring at his brother with his throat aching.

Tagged: MIKEY BUCKLEY * Word Count: 920

His brother was home. Well, as close to home as an apartment in a town he didn’t know was.

Chase’s gaze had flicked over the apartment as he’d carted crap in and out of his office for an hour last night. It was nothing like the house their old man had put back together one problem at a time. No real memories ingrained in its walls and floors yet, no gouge in the newel post on the stairs where’d he’d flipped out and thrown his backpack full strength when he’d arrived home to the news that Mikey wasn’t being released. He’d been found guilty on all charges and he was heading to prison for years. No pale spots on the bedroom floor where his brother’s bed had once stood, everything there erased like the Buckleys had only ever had one son.

Better, it was better they were here. No awkward reunion with their parents, no devastation when there’d be no reunion at all. They wouldn’t have been standing there waiting for Mikey with open arms and a welcome home son, no matter the circumstances. He hadn’t been there himself, Mikey taking the long way, but there was a welcome home in that hug, and an ache – the good kind – in his chest as he got a laugh out of his brother at least. It didn’t matter how Mikey had gotten here, being here was everything though.

Free of the confinement of a cell and the choke chain the Agnellis seemed to have kept him on, Mikey had a chance at a life now. It might be slow starting but it was there he could hear the stories about it without having to study his brother’s face like there was something Mikey wasn’t telling him. Dark eyes that had been on the paperwork rose to Mikey as his brother started laughing at his comment. Chase grinned, something smug in it as he shrugged. ”Sounds pretty hot to me … I’m sure she’d have been happy to take you home to Tiddles if you got friendly.” Twenty years without female company had to have been torture, conjugal visits not the sort of they thing the prison would’ve allowed, let alone the Agnellis.

Their reach didn’t extend this far. The rats never wanting to leave their nest and cross state lines. Mikey was free here. To eat the practically dry toast that was gonna be all he had on hand for now. Chase tossed it into the toaster, knowing he – or they – were gonna have to go out to the store later. Maybe with Mikey was for the best, loading the cart up with all the crap the prison budget didn’t stretch to. The punishment hadn’t only been an eight by ten cell for decades. Heading back to the table, Chase stared down at the paperwork. All familiar, all an extension of the shackles that had him sinking his teeth into his lip. ”You know it’s gonna be OK, right? All of this, it’s temporary. We get you through it and then you’re free.” He didn’t need to emphasise that his brother wasn’t entirely free yet. The rules of his probation were just a looser collar around his neck.

They both fucking knew it too. The tears were coming, more relief, he thought, than anything but there like napalm in his eyes that no amount of laughing was gonna push away yet. Chase tried to sniff it back as Mikey laughed, a grin bright under the cover of his curled fingers as he lifted a hand to knuckle at his nose. He wasn’t gonna let himself get to the point of a full on ugly cry. ”You sure? I think I got some Kleenex around here.” He might need them himself in the end, his lean hips sagging back against the table as he reached out to set that hand back on Mikey’s shoulder. ”I know, man,” Chase managed hoarsely. ”We got here though. First day of a new fuckin’ era.” One that had been so long coming that the day had felt like it’d never be there, the years eaten by up more and more time added until Mikey was a 90 year old shuffling around in the prison laundry.

Chase’s hand stayed there as Mikey cried, some part of him wanting to pull his brother back in so they could both just get all those tears out. Burn them out and keep them gone. He sniffed in a breath in the end, nodding a couple of times before he glanced down at his bare feet. ”Work, y’know, startin’ over here. Spendin’ some time at this store in town. All that comic book shit you’d hate. I’ll drag you along next time, get you playing some sort of ogre in the game.” As kids he would’ve joked his brother was ugly enough for it but now it still felt too close to the knuckle. Talk of their parents was even closer. Eyes locked on his toes like they’d offer some better answer than they’re not gonna want to see you. Chase pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth and shook his head before he looked up, trying to keep the grim off his face. ”Not since just after I moved down here. Keep meanin’ to call and then work suckers me in.” A job he couldn’t even talk too much about because it was gonna trigger every person related to him by blood.

Standing up, Chase thumped his brother on the shoulder again. Affection, opportunity, distraction, he didn’t know why but he bumped knuckles into that solid knot of muscle before he headed for the counter and the toast that was just popping back up into sight. ”You didn’t answer my question, man. You want some coffee? It ain’t fancy shit, but it’s not been burned into tar for two days straight either. I … there ain’t much to go on this either but there’s some butter …” Anything else that might’ve lingered in the fridge or cupboard would probably be a dicey prospect, far enough along the evolution chain that it’d probably start spouting Einstein before it was chewed into submission.

Tagged: MIKEY BUCKLEY * Word Count: 1032

It didn’t matter if you’d turned away at the last minute and had been caught trying to do the right thing under the wrong circumstances, you were still marked. The indelible stamp that prison put on someone, forever scarring a kid who shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Their parents hadn’t been able to see past it, still couldn’t, even though Mikey had done his time, keeping his nose clean in prison. Chase didn’t give a shit what rumours had slipped out with the Agnellis, what threats had slipped through when they’d tried to bend his arm into filthying himself up. Mikey had done his time for a crime that wasn’t his and he was out, that mark shoulda been gone but the minute he’d brought it up on the bus with the old broad, that mark had obviously been shining bright enough that the old woman had seen it. A shuffle away, in case.

Chase could see it too but he was blinding himself to it. Pulling his brother into those hugs, bringing him into his home cause none of that mattered to him now. They were gonna get those papers signed, wait out the parole and when that time under watch was over they were gonna put it all out of sight. Even if it didn’t end up out of mind. His own throat had gone thick as he squeezed Mikey’s shoulder, trying to choke him as he sniffed his own tears back. ”I might need a handful,” he admitted roughly, trying to ease the shame of it as he sniffed the burn of his own emotions, trying to choke them back down inside. The tears were out of relief, the tension of the last couple of decades finally giving way, a wall crumbling to show the sun on the other side. Chase nodded, his jaw tight for a moment til he slugged his brother on the shoulder and his own smile broke through in response. ”Our fucking era.” Too long coming.

For those twenty years, twenty long fucking painful years, he’d set the ground work for that era. Keeping himself out of the Agnellis’ hands. Working his ass off in uniform and out of it to stamp them out like cockroaches – failing in the end. He’d plunged waist deep into his own trouble, some of which was still clinging to him, those dark smears of things he couldn’t quite see in his dreams, but he’d pulled himself out, found himself a fresh start here and the room for one for Mikey too.

There wasn’t an ounce of shame about that life as he glanced up from his feet, giving his brother an almost bashful smile. The chuckle rumbled out, amusing lighting up those dark eyes. ”More fun than you’d know what to do with. Hey!” Another slug, the admonishment of one brother to another. They’d traded them a thousand times over as kids, the rite of passage scuffles of young boys who hadn’t yet seen what real damage could be done. ”Maybe I’ll finally get you into some of that shit, ‘specially if you see some of the women who hang out down there.” Most of them too many years younger than his brother but … her … That lump in his throat shifted towards something warm and molten, the phantom brush of her lips against his throat reminding Chase of it. Too much maybe.

He cleared his throat, eyes back on his feet again. The twitch of toes against the tile floor, left restless by the admission that he hadn’t reached out to their parents. They’d washed their hands of their eldest son and as stuff had gone to shit in New Orleans and he’d seen that look in his mom’s eyes when he’d woken to find her at his bed side in the hospital when the coma had finally loosed its grip on his brain – they didn’t want to watch him slip away either. It’d been easier to take himself out of the equation instead.

Now he was building a new one, pushing all that kept them shackled to the old one aside. Pushing to his feet Chase was starting to solve it, offering up the breakfast Mikey hadn’t gotten on the bus. Practically rations but it was a start. He popped the cupboard open, rattled down a couple of plates, cups. ”No more living on gruel,” he promised. ”We’ll do one of those cart fills we always wanted as kids. You still like Cap’n Crunch? That sugared neon shit? We’ll get some of that. Fill the fridge up and you can just … anything in here you want, you just take, ‘k? Soon as we’ve downed this I’ll grab a shower and we’ll head out.” Chase tipped grounds into the coffee machine, set it to percolating before he snagged the butter from the fridge and turned back. ”I’m so fucking glad you’re here.” Finally. The word stuck in his throat but Chase knew his brother would hear it as he put what was passing for breakfast down in front of him. Here by the grace of God and the New Orleans prison board.

Tagged: MIKEY BUCKLEY * Word Count: 861