Fuck! He'd never fucking walked home in his Seventen greens before.
Oh gods. What a mistake—
skipping out of duty,
getting drunk,
and now this—
Over half a years' time since Charity'd dragged his broken, useless body out of his favorite flat and into the crusty old house too big for them both and he'd not once revealed to his neighbors what he did for a living. While folks on their street had to know the couple were gollies by now—didn't they? weren't they fooled!—he'd never wanted anyone to know what his employment was, if only because patrolling the Dives and arresting their relatives on occasion was probably not the best way to get in anyone else's good graces. So, he left earlier than any of his patrol shifts required, changing at Headquarters, and hoping no one on his street was ever in his paperwork.
Panic welled in his chest, hot and furious like the sweltering temperatures outside, like the whiskey that still ran through his veins despite how much he'd cried. Not that he'd cried over the death of a friend, either. Usoji Ibutatu'd never been his fucking friend, but that sort of death was too close, the edge of that same blade too sharp against his own half-bred bastard throat not to feel the sting of it, not to anticipate the cut of it through flesh that'd already been bruised and broken but not knit back together the same way it'd once been. Charity'd already wept like that over a body that breathed for fuck's sake (his!), but she'd also already drowned it all in King's Crop by now.
Did she remember that day in Vortas as clearly as he did?
What an ersehole thought—Rhys' scarred lip curled in disgust at his guttered self, handing out coins to the driver with some slurred, mumbled thanks. He sniffed, ignoring the burn at the edges of his eyes, and stared at the rowhouses of the Painted Ladies, finding the one that he'd worked so damn hard at restoring all winter long. Just like his marriage, that old house was damn prettier on the inside than it used to be. Mostly. Some parts, though? Still needed a bit more sweat and nails. He shrugged off his coat, tossing it over his shoulder, suspenders dangling alongside his belt, laden as it was with his equipment. He attempted to saunter, to swagger like he meant to be here all along, like he fit right in with the lower races that scraped and saved to live here—
Oh wait, he was one of them.
Just not one of them.
He was the same, beneath it all, only he wore the lie like the starched lines of his Seventen uniform.
The tall blond didn't hide his face, didn't disguise a thing as he slipped through the old metal gate and staggered up his steps—gods, he really needed to get to fixing this clocking front porch with its rotting wood and crooked stairs, but it was too damn hot and too much work to do alone. He didn't care who saw him right now, too plumb wasted and too damn deliriously sad. He knocked on the door, rapping knuckles in the pattern that his petite Bastian wife would recognize—hopefully, if she wasn't half out of her mind—and let himself in,
"By Alioe's good graces, I'm home early!"
He sloshed a little while he shouted, wobbling with half a sob and half a giggle, trying not to let his voice break so obviously over the words. Slipping out of his boots and fumbling to hang his coat by the door, he dumped his belt with a heavy thunk just right there on the floor without a second thought, shaking fingers already reaching for the buttons of his shirt collar, eager to open the thick green fabric and free himself from it with a desperate need to no longer be a drunk, sweaty mess.
He didn't wait for a reply, breezing toward the sitting room, drifting toward the quaint antique bar he'd waxed himself months ago, glittering with alcohol both found and purchased, fully stocked and ready to stoke the fires of his already inebriated state. It wasn't as though he needed to be sober all the time at home, did he?
Rhys glanced down when he missed a button, blue eyes catching a hint of mascara, and he scowled, shrugging the fabric open enough to bare tanned, freckled skin while he pressed teeth against the scar that split his bottom lip. Shaking hands reached for whatever bottle struck his fancy and a glass, and the blond not-galdor attempted to steady himself enough to pour a fresh drink,
"Where's my beautiful wife?" The words tumbled easy enough from his mouth, even if they soured on his tongue. He didn't deserve any of this, not by birth and not by behavior. He'd been a bastard all along—fresh from his human mother's womb all the way until testing day on Brunnhold's campus, that first day he and Charity shared a class together until that day he clocking cowered in front of that chroveserse she called father.
Gods, he'd wasted so much time. Fucking around out of fear, convincing himself he'd ever love someone else while her own house fell apart, while her own family poisoned her and held her captive.
It was his fault, he knew.
And while he could've died that day in Achtus, while it would've been what he deserved, the Circle saw fit to give him another chance, even if he had no fucking clue how to heal what was broken in the petite pianist's life, for it wasn't anything that could be mended like smashed bones or cut flesh.