Archive of Our Own

Darren's lucky.

He's so fucking lucky, and he knows it.

He's got a set of parents that love him and love each other. He's got a brother he gets along with more often than not, someone he knows always has his back even though they're a whole country apart now.

He's got enough financial and emotional support to chase dreams and passions and that puts him so far ahead of the curve compared to a lot of people. He knows that - he's always known that.

It just doesn't hit home until he starts working at the Center.

*

The Center has a name but it's dedicated to some old dude who croaked and left the university a shit ton of money - awesome, really, that the guy cared so much about gay kids. His name was about fifteen syllables long, though, so everyone who works there just calls it the Center.

Darren's only been there for a couple of weeks. He took the gig because his parents wanted him to be doing something - prove his worth, prove he's willing to work, that he's not just blowing their money on something he won't follow through on. They told him get a job and they didn't care what it was. He's pretty sure his mom was actually proud when he emailed them back the link to the Center. His parents have always been a sucker for charity work.

So he gets the job. He goes through the week of training with a guy named Dev who doesn't wear deodorant but totally splits a joint with Darren while leaning against the brick wall outside of the break room. So it's cool, one of life's little give-and-takes.

When his training is through he is given a little more freedom to handle calls, but with a supervisor listening in. It’s nerve wracking but Darren’s never been one to shy away from a performance due to anxiety. He’s ready to accept the critique he’s given because this is the kind of job that doing well matters.

After three shifts of being constantly monitored, he's put in a little room by himself and left to stare at a phone that rings more often than anyone wishes. The Center itself isn’t too bad. They keep the break room supplied with snacks and drinks free to volunteers. There’s even a little rec room with an entertainment center that he’s told they can use on slow nights, which there are occasionally.

Most of the calls are pretty… okay, relatively. A lot of these kids really do just want someone to listen to while they bitch about their life. He’s only had a couple that he felt like he needed to transfer to someone more knowledgeable, one of the professionals who stay on staff.

He's only a volunteer. He gets the light stuff, and he's cool with that.

*

“Hi! This is Darren. What’s on your mind?”

“.... hi.”

“Hi. Is it your first time calling?”

“I, I can’t believe I’m doing this.”

“Yeah? Well, you’re not alone. This is a place you can call to talk about what’s on your mind, and everyone has something on their mind. Needing someone to talk to isn’t embarrassing.”

“Having to call a 1-800 number to find someone willing to listen is.”

“Well, I don’t think so. I think sometimes it’s hard to realize the people that are there for you. And sometimes, you know, people get dealt a crappy hand. Sometimes things are rough at school or home for a whole lot of reasons. So what’s going on in your life… can I get a name? If you’re comfortable. If not, that’s fine.”

“C-Chris. My name is Chris.”

“Well, Chris. I’m Darren, like I said, and I’d love to chat with you for a while.”

*

Darren had a good high school experience. He hopes like fuck he won't look back on it as the best years of his life, because he wants more than that, but he still had a blast while he was there.

For Darren, the ages of fourteen to eighteen were made up of music he played too loud, girlfriends who were probably levels above him, teachers who loved him, and a life where everyone he met was his new best friend.

His parents had enough money to make sure he could pursue any interest or talent he had. They made sure he and Chuck saw the world.

Some fifteen year-old punks got pummeled by their dads, while Darren at fifteen was taking trips with his family to Paris that are still some of the best family memories he has. He and his brother decided to sneak out of the hotel at just past midnight. When his dad found them on the banks of the nearby river splitting a beer, he sat down and shared it with them.

Yeah, he was pretty lucky.

Still is.

*

"School is just-"

"Just what?"

"Awful. It's... awful."

"Tell me about it."

"I get called names. People take my stuff. I had a jacket - my grandmother gave it to me for Christmas. I found it in a toilet. My teachers... don't care. I'm not a good student, I'm not one of the pets, so no one... cares. I can't wait to graduate."

"Are you graduating soon?"

"Less than a year."

"Do you have plans for after graduation yet?"

"Sort of. I want... I want to.... never mind. It's dumb."

"Hey, no, okay? It's not dumb. If it's what you want to do, it's not dumb."

"You don't even know what it is. Look, I just - I don't want to talk about it, okay?"

"Okay. That's fine. I'm here to talk about what you want to talk about."

"... I don't even know what I want to talk about."

"That's cool, too. We'll just chat. What'd you have for lunch today?"

"... you're ridiculous."

"Nope, I just really fu- freaking love food. Now, come on. Spill."

*

Darren had tacos from a food truck down the street for lunch while hanging out with a few of his friends before pulling his guitar out and spending an hour in the sunshine busking for twice as much as he paid for the lunch.

He gave the money to the homeless woman that hangs out near his building. He doesn't need it, and he figures even if she spends it on a pint of whiskey... well, that pint will probably be the best thing about her day.

His mother tells him he was always like that as a child. He always looked for the kid on the playground who looked loneliest, always wanted to take extra cookies for the classmates whose parents forgot, always just - wanted to help.

Now he's all grown up and he still wants to make sure everyone in the world that wants a damn cookie has one. And he can't, he gets that. For some people, the world is just shit. But if he can put his energy and his money and his education toward figuring out how to give a few people that think life has forgotten about them something to look forward to, he wants to do that.

*

"I want to act. I go on all these auditions... it's ridiculous, though, isn't it? Everyone wants to act."

"Is it your dream?"

"Yeah."

"Then it's not dumb. I mean, maybe it's a long shot, but if I said I wanted to be a musician, would you say that's dumb?"

"That would depend on if you're actually any good or not."

"Do you think you're bad at acting?"

"I think I'm okay. I think other people are better. I look like I'm twelve and I sound like a girl."

"You have an awesome voice. It stands out, which counts for a lot when you're trying to get roles."

"You sound like you know what you're talking about."

"I'm a Los Angeles transplant. You basically have to sign up for a few auditions before they even let you into the city."

"I want to live in Los Angeles."

"Well, that part you can definitely do. I mean, what's stopping you?"

"Money. My parents."

"You want to talk about your parents?"

"There's not much to talk about. They're fine."

"Wow, that was convincing."

"Are you supposed to be this sarcastic? My parents are fine. They love me. They're just distracted a lot."

"Distracted?"

"My sister has... medical issues. I don't - I don't want to talk about that."

"Fair enough. But your parents, they don't have a lot of time for you?"

"They try. They drive me to auditions, so that's something."

"So they're supportive?"

"More like they feel guilty. They don't think I'll ever get a part. I can tell by the look on their faces every time I walk out of an audition."

"But you still sound determined."

"I don't like it when people tell me I can't do things."

"I think that's an awesome attitude to have."

"I think it sucks. Because it hasn't gotten me anywhere. I just feel like... all I ever do is try to fool myself into thinking if I want something hard enough, it'll happen. If I work hard enough - but all that happens is I wake up and spend another day with people who can't stand what I am."

"What you are?"

"A fag."

*

From the time Darren was entering puberty, he’s always had plenty of girls interested in him. Sex and sexuality have never been a struggle because he never had to look very far to find someone that caught his interest.

But it still isn’t always easy. Darren isn't a very good boyfriend, and he'll be the first to admit it. It's not that he cheats - he doesn't, and if he were ever tempted, he's pretty sure he'd find the balls to at least break up with one person before pursuing another. It's not that he's mean or abusive - he can't fathom anyone treating a woman, or another human being at all, like that.

He's a bad boyfriend for the same reason he was a bad student throughout high school. It's just that his brain gets a little jumbled and he has problems prioritizing things. He's not the most attentive person always. He forgets birthdays, anniversaries, sometimes dates. He'll get caught up doing one thing and focus in so hard on it that everything else becomes unimportant.

He's never met a person who commanded his passion and interest the way that music does. In school, he'd do wonderfully at some subjects and awful at others. It all just depended on how passionate he felt toward the topic. He learned four languages before his twenty-first birthday but almost failed an American Revolution history class because he just didn't find anything in the material to relate to anything that captivated him.

He's had girls he thought he was in love with but the bloom always faded. His best girlfriends were more friend than lover; the casual ones who enjoyed the physical side of things but didn't get too hurt when he didn't have much more to give them.

He's hates that this is such a failing of his, but every time he meets a pretty girl with a sharp mind and thinks, this time I'll be better - it just ends in tears and apologies.

*

"Is that what you think you are?"

"I'm gay. I know I'm gay."

"Yeah, but that's not the word you used. Do you think you're a fag?"

"I'm gay, isn't that the same thing?"

"One of them has a shitload of derogatory connotations to it."

"Ooh, big words. Have we moved onto the psychoanalyzing me part?"

"Not what I'm here for, man. I just wanted to know if you felt like that was the word you're supposed to use to describe yourself."

"It's what everyone else uses to describe me."

"And you're just a reflection of what they say?"

"Aren't we all just a reflection of what other people think of us?"

"We don't have to be."

"That's one of those bullshit things people tell you. Everyone cares what other people think of them. Everyone does."

"Then maybe what you need is people around who don't think you're - that."

"Well. I wish I had that, too. But I don't."

"So you don't have a support system? Friends at school? Teachers you can talk to?"

"Not - no. I don't."

"No one?"

"Do you want me to describe in detail how I literally have one friend and the only person I hang out with is my sister?"

"Well, now you've got me."

"You probably didn't even tell me your real name."

"I did, actually. Darren. I can't give you a last name, it's against the policy here, but my middle name is Everett."

"That sounds like a pretentious name."

"I'll tell my Gramps you said so."

*

Darren lives in an old four bedroom house with a few of his friends.

They stay up too late, drink too much, play too many video games. They have parties every weekend except around finals time, and no one remembers to clean or cook quite as often as they should. It's a bachelor pad to the fullest, perpetually smelling slightly of feet and complete with a fridge always stocked with beer. The decor is eclectic nerd chic but Darren likes how it feels to look around and see the reflections of his colorful life at every turn.

The house was bought in his name, a gesture of good faith from his parents when he said he felt like the dorm life was too restrictive.

No one pays Darren as much rent as they should, and there's usually someone sleeping on the couch for free. The turnover rate for roommates is high as his friends graduate and move on, but so far he hasn't had any trouble filling any of the extra bedrooms. He lives on the cash he gets from that instead of taking money from his parents and he's fucking grateful for that.

Darren will be done with school in another year. He hasn't thought so far ahead as to what he'll do with the house after that. In his mind things will just sort of stay this way forever.

*

"What do you do besides acting? Anything for fun?"

"I like to practice staring at people in hopes that one day my latent superpower of causing spontaneous combustion in people I dislike will manifest."

"..."

"I write, too."

"With an imagination like that, I'd be disappointed if you didn't."

"Yes, that's what all the report cards in grade school said. 'Christopher has quite the imagination.'"

"And that wasn't a good thing?"

"Not when it's followed by a teacher telling my mom if I only put as much effort into schoolwork as I did making up stories, I'd be a great student."

"But you weren't? A great student, I mean?"

"Aren't. Why does this matter?"

"It doesn't. I was just curious. So you write, just for fun?"

"A concept that is alien to everyone in my school."

"Everyone needs an outlet. What do you write about?"

"My latest story is about a boy who dies."

"Uh. You wanna talk about that one?"

"It's autobiographical."

"Chris, are you... do you ever have thoughts-"

"In the story, he gets struck by lightning."

"-lightning?"

"Yeah."

"That's - okay. Lightning."

"He's a kid who is miserable his whole life and then the day he finally realizes how to be happy, he dies."

"That's an unhappy ending."

"It's an unhappy story."

"And autobiographical."

"Yeah. Well."

*

That's not actually the phone call that Darren thinks about when he's laying in bed that night.

Near the end of his shift - an hour or so after the call with Chris ended - a girl phoned in. Her voice was shaky with tears, barely there, and she whispered that she was just so tired of it all.

Darren went to transfer her, but she hung up some time between the call leaving his line and reaching the supervisor.

It's the worst part of this gig, the ones that just - disappear. The ones that go away and leave him to forever wonder what actually happened.

He's glad when Chris calls back during his shift the next week.

II.

Sometimes the calls with Chris are so normal that Darren forgets there must be a reason Chris picked the hotline to begin with. It feels like talking to a friend, a buddy. Chris has a wicked sense of humor, slightly morbid in a way that cracks Darren up every time.

Chris makes a lot of digs about how he's not that smart, but he's actually fucking clever and Darren considers it part of his job to make sure Chris knows that. The insecurity shows in the cracks here and there, the way he's too quick to express scorn over himself and his (lack of) accomplishments, the way he acts like his classmates giving him shit is just a fact of life and not something he should be fighting, the way he hand waves how his parents seem to think just because he can drive himself around now that it's okay for them to totally check out and put all their attention on his sister.

Darren learns all of this over the course of two months, one call a week like clockwork while Darren's there. He doesn't know it for sure since the volunteers are locked out of the call log system, but he thinks he's probably the only one Chris talks to.

It may not be the most ethical response, but Darren likes it that way. He likes fostering that kind of connection and Chris is his first 'regular.' He's not sure he'd trust anyone else to know just what to say to Chris to provoke him out of those darker spots.

And there are dark spots. Once or twice he calls and he doesn't even want to talk at all. It's a hard learning curve for Darren, figuring out when to be silent, but he's realizing what a big part of the job that actually is. He can't force Chris to talk and it isn't doing any good if Darren just rambles on about himself the entire time.

Sometimes Chris does want to know about Darren, though.

*

It's a balmy early March night when Chris calls in, full of questions.

"How old are you?" Chris asks.

"I turned twenty-one last month," Darren says. "What about you?"

"Seventeen. I won't be eighteen until May."

"Big one, though. You looking forward to it?" Darren asks.

"I guess. Not like I really have any plans."

"Do you have any birthday traditions?"

"Does crying alone in my room count?" It's said in that voice so dry that Darren knows he's joking, even if he doesn't like that Chris's humor always takes that turn.

"You should start one," Darren says. "Go buy yourself a cupcake. Take a drive somewhere. Do something you've never done before."

"Yeah..." Chris's voice goes faint. "Maybe I will."

There's silence. A beat of it, two, three. It's one of those moments where he has to bite down on the words.

Eventually, Chris asks, "What did you do on your last birthday?"

There was a party. It was a big party, a fuck all bash with all the alcohol a newly legal dude could fathom. He went home with a girl he didn't even know and sang happy birthday to himself at three am before passing out and sleeping until noon.

Then he'd gone home that weekend and had another party, a more dignified affair with family and friends. They all gave him cards stuffed with cash and his parents unveiled a new car. His mother bragged to all his family about his kind, giving heart and at the end of the night his father took him aside to tell Darren how proud he was.

"I had fun," Darren says lightly. "I'm lucky, though."

"Sounds like it." Chris sighs. "I should go."

“Why?”

“I have - family stuff.” Chris’s voice grows short.

Darren’s impulse is to try and keep him on the line, but he’s learning when to push and when to not.

He just tells himself that Chris will call back when he needs to.

*

It's raining in Los Angeles.

Darren dashes from his car inside the Center, wet dripping from coils of hair plastered to his head. The air inside the building is biting and he lets out a quiet but heartfelt curse under his breath. He would laugh if he weren't shivering quite so hard.

Shelly, the pretty girl with the big brown eyes and the long multitude of braids, laughs at him and loans him her cardigan. She flirts with him sometimes but his responses are default, a brand of friendliness not meant to be encouraging so much as just polite.

The break room has coffee but Darren goes for a hot chocolate. He makes a ridiculous picture perched behind his desk wearing a pink lace sweater with a band tee underneath it, soggy shoes kicked off to the corner of the room, hands clasped around a chipped teal mug.

From Hawaii to San Fran to Los Angeles he's a sunshine boy, not meant for this kind of tumultuous weather. It's probably a good thing he turned down Michigan, he thinks wryly. He's not sure he'd ever have acclimated to the snow.

His supervisor Eric pokes a head through the door. "Better get your game face on," Eric warns. "This kind of weather brings out the blues from the local crowd."

It's not an exaggeration. From the moment Darren logs in to the system and sets his line to active, it's hopping.

He talks to a crying girl whose pregnant mother hopes 'this one turns out normal.'

He gives a list of shelters and safe haven options to a trans boy whose parents just kicked him out.

He comforts a boy, barely into his teens, who thinks his teacher is failing him because he's queer.

He has to transfer two suicidal teenagers to a supervisor, queasy and heart pounding after each one. For someone who thrives so much on making people happy, making lives better, he can't do anything but send out a prayer to whatever might be listening that the right person says the right thing to them.

And then Chris calls. He can always tell it's Chris just from the first word. He has such a distinctive voice, high and soft and sharp when he's feeling something strongly.

"How's your night going, man?" Darren asks, shoulders slumping a little like he's just realized he can breathe out.

It's almost a relief, as much as Darren feels guilty even admitting that to himself. They're instructed not to rush any of the callers, never to make them feel like they aren't worth what the next person in line might have to say.

"Not good." Chris is quiet, too quiet.

Darren sits back up straight again. "Yeah, weather seems to be getting everyone down."

Chris laughs and it's so bitter and dark that Darren's skin almost crawls. "I'm not in Los Angeles. The weather here is fine."

"What's up? You seem off."

"Wow, really? I mean, calling a suicide help line wasn't a tip off?" Chris snaps. "Yes, I'm 'off' - I mean, that's the problem, isn't it? I'm always 'off'."

"Chris," Darren says gently.

"I had a fight with my parents." The words just seem to burst out of him. "I had a fight about college. They want me to go to junior college and I never applied. I was hoping they wouldn't realize until it was too late. They yelled and I yelled back and they're just so disappointed and they don't get at all what a prison sentence that would be for me. I spent the past thirteen years with the same numbskull backwards homophobic idiots and guess where they're all going to end up? Clovis fucking Community College. I would rather die than have that be my life for two more years."

I would rather die.

The words leap out at Darren. He's supposed to do a suicide assessment now to figure out if the call needs to be transferred to a supervisor.

"You'd rather die?" Darren prods.

"Of course that's the part you heard in that." Chris sighs. Darren has a gut feeling Chris isn't that bad off, but he can't ignore the script - especially not when Chris adds a bleak, "Basically."

"Is this something you've thought about before?"

"I'm a bullied, closeted seventeen-year-old virgin with no hope for the future," Chris answers. "Of course I have."

"Do you have a plan for how you would do it? How you would hurt yourself?"

"Do you get off on the details or something?"

He's pissing Chris off by asking, but he can't just - not. "I'm just trying to help you here."

"I don't know," Chris says. "I'm sure I could figure something out, I've got quite the imagination, remember?"

"Chris..." It's enough that he should be getting the supervisor.

But it's Chris, and he doesn't - he can't let this one go just yet. He knows Chris. He knows that Chris wouldn't talk to anyone else quite so openly.

"You sound almost as disappointed as my mom did earlier," Chris mocks. "Look, if I tell you that I'm definitely not going to kill myself tonight, can we go back to talking about something else?"

"That's not really how this works."

"Then maybe I don't fucking need this at all."

"Okay - hey, fine. We'll do it your way. As long as you're telling me the truth."

"I solemnly vow to not off myself before the clock strikes midnight tonight."

"Chris-"

"Look, I mean it, I'm not going to kill myself right now." Chris drops the snarky teenage act, and this time Darren feels like he can actually believe him.

"Do you have a plan for after high school is over?" Darren asks. "Do you know what you want to do?"

"No," Chris admits.

"Well, that's your problem." Darren drawls his legs up cross-style under him, settling in. "We need to figure you out a plan, so you can go back to your parents and turn the fight into a conversation."

"A plan."

"Yep. A plan. Like, are you opposed to college in general or just the one with all the dumbfucks in it?"

"I - I'm not a great student."

"Do you dislike the learning environment, or just what they made you learn there?"

"I-" Chris stops. "No one's ever quite put it like that. I like learning, I just-"

"Like learning things that already interest you?”

“Yeah. Exactly,” Chris says.

“You might really dig college then, you know.” It’s one of those moments where Darren’s training would indicate he should probably stop there, but his mouth is running ahead of his mind, fueled by his own natural enthusiasm. “You've got to get some shit out of the way early on that's boring but after that you've got a lot more freedom. If you could study anything, what would it be?"

"History. British history," Chris says. "I'm kind of obsessed."

"Nothing wrong with that." Darren is silently grateful that Chris sounds a little more engaged now, misery not solved but distracted away from. "So you could start there. Tell your parents that you're open to college but you want to make sure you're getting the most out of it. Are they paying your tuition?"

"Yeah," Chris says. "Community college won't cost much, but yeah."

"So there's a hook: you don't want to be wasting their money. And then come up with a plan for what you want to do if you don't go to college. Have you thought about that?"

"I don't... I don't know. I mean - yes. I've thought about it. I feel like I don't do anything but think about it. I just never - there's never an answer."

"But that's okay. It's okay not to know what you want. What's important is to figure out what steps you can take that are within reach right now. What's the first thing you need to get out on your own?"

"Money," Chris says."

"Right, makes sense. You want to move out of your parents place, you'll need money. To get money, you need a job. You graduate in a couple months, right?"

"Yeah," Chris says. "I have a job - but it doesn't pay much. It's um, ten hours a week, so."

"Hey, that's something. But you're right, you'll need more than that to bank some money for deposits and moving and shit. Have you thought about the possibility of getting a job right now?"

"I guess not," Chris says. "But you think I should?"

"I'm just trying to point out the possibilities for you to consider." Darren's not supposed to push his own opinions too much, he's supposed to lead with questions and not take over. But a little practical advice can't hurt, can it? "If you go ahead and try to find a job right now that you can do on weekends or after school, then this summer you can work full time... you can see how that feels. And it may turn out that you'd rather do the community college, but then you'd know."

Chris is quiet again, until he says, "That just sounds like giving up."

"On what?"

"Me. My dreams."

"Dreams don't happen overnight. You have to work for them. You have to start from the ground up, and that's what this is."

"But don't most people just end up stuck doing dead end jobs like that forever once they start?"

Darren smiles, and he fucking means it with every ounce of his being when he tells Chris: "Yeah, but you're not most people, are you?"

He can't be sure, but he thinks he hears a sniffle.

He and Chris talk for another half hour and by the end of the conversation he's coasting on the victory of coaxing a laugh from Chris.

It's still raining when he leaves, thunder cracking and skies angry, but he walks back to his car proud of what he's been able to accomplish. He tells himself it's all the calls, but it's Chris's voice that lingers in his mind.

Darren goes home to see his parents every few weeks, not because they guilt him or he feels like it's an obligation but because he wants to. Why wouldn't he? He gets his laundry done, gets a few free meals, a trip to the grocery store where he can usually get away with tossing a few extra indulgences in the car on his mother's dime, and he gets to sit and talk to the people in the world who most genuinely care and want to know how he's doing.

He pulls his car into the driveway and finds his mother outside, tending to the garden. She's such a tiny little figure on the big sprawling green, sun hat covering her hair and gloves up to her elbows. She's fierce and beautiful and his favorite person in the entire world, especially the way she laughs when he lifts her up for a twirling.

"Now, what was that for?" She asks, lightly accented voice soothing to something deep in his soul.

"I just love you, Mama." He gives her a kiss on the cheek then follows her inside so she can stuff him full of delicious food and tea and ask him about his life.

The truth is that he's feeling his privilege more keenly right now than he has in a long time.

His mother has a way of coaxing things out of him. After dinner and his second beer (because he's 21 now, he can do that) he ends up saying, "There's this kid that calls in at work..." He doesn't use a name, because that's against the rules. He's not even supposed to be sharing the stories, but - it's his mom.

She listens as he talks about Chris and tells her how bad Chris feels, and how bad that makes Darren feel.

"It's not like he's the hardest case I've had to deal with, but somehow that just makes it worse. I can hook a homeless kid up with shelters, I can connect abuse victims or suicidal ones to professionals, but Chris is just not quite bad enough off for me to actually be able to help."

"You listen. That helps." His mother points out.
.
“I want to do more,” Darren stubbornly insists.

“You will,” his mother says. “Once you get your degree and make your way into the world. Patience.”

Darren’s never been very good at being patient.

*

Chris cries.

Usually Darren can tell but he doesn’t say anything because he doesn’t want to embarrass Chris.

“I can’t.” Chris is defeated tonight, not the quiet dignified kind but the sort of messy where his unhappiness just spills over every broken gasp and bitten back sob.. “I can’t keep doing this. I don’t want to go there every day and be someone’s punching bag or what they use to make themselves feel superior.”

“Punching bag?” Darren asks. “Do you mean metaphorically or literally?”

Chris gives a wet snort. “If I say literally does that mean you stop everything and tell me go talk to an adult?”

There’s slightly helpless silence on Darren’s end, because yeah - that is actually what he is supposed to say.

“Then I meant it metaphorically,” Chris says. “They just shove me around a little and knock my books out of my hand, mostly, anyway.”

“You’d tell me if you were being seriously abused?” Darren asks. He has to make sure.

“I’d tell you,” Chris says.

“Okay. So then I guess my next question is… what makes you happy?” Darren asks. “Talk to me about something that makes you happy.”

He just wants to make it better so desperately badly.

It’s a stop and start for a few raspy sentences, but Chris begins talking about another story he’s writing and his words get more confident and his voice levels out and Darren doesn’t know if this is a bandaid over an unhealing wound or not but it’s something.

*

In some tiny part of the back of Darren’s mind, he does realize that he’s too attached to Chris and that he should probably start passing the calls to someone else.

The training seminar warned them about fostering too much of a connection.

The kid on the other end of the line is usually starved for attention and affection. It can be easy to get lost in that, and they’re just students - they’re not trained professionals, not yet. They can’t take on the responsibility of a kid’s entire mental state.

Maybe it’s that Chris sounds so normal most of the time when he calls. It’s easy for it to become just a conversation with a friend, just shooting the shit.

But May rolls around, first the exhilaration and frustration of finals then the slow process of remembering how to breathe again. Through it all he keeps in the back of his mind how he’d planned on an Italy trip, how his parents didn’t even seem all that opposed to it.

He doesn’t buy any plane tickets, though. When his mom asks, he says maybe next year. The idea of leaving just right now unsettles him in a way he can’t identify.

This is a better plan anyway, he tells himself. He’ll stay around Los Angeles. He can head to his parents for a week or two near the end, take lots of day trips and bond with his friends. It’ll be great, a summer of freedom, of beer and music and sex and being young.

He asks the Center if he can keep volunteering, and they’re happy to have him remain.

*

“So do you have a girlfriend?” Chris asks one day.

Darren is surprised by the question. “No, but I’m not - you know. I’m not really supposed to talk much about myself.”

“That seems unfair,” Chris says.

“That I don’t have a girlfriend?”

“That you can’t talk about yourself. You know everything about me.”

“I know what you’re comfortable sharing.”

“Well. That’s about everything.” Chris laughs like it’s a funny realization, but Darren has a different response - one he catalogs away to look back on later. “So, no girlfriend. Boyfriend?”

“I’m not - I’m not gay,” Darren says.

“Wait, really?”

“You thought I was?” It’s possibly the wrong response, professionally speaking, because they’re meant to be talking about Chris here, not Darren, but curiosity gets the better of him.

“Um, yeah. Kinda.”

“You asked if I had a girlfriend.”

“Because it’s not polite to just ask someone if they’re gay.”

“So why did you think…”

“You work for an LGBT hotline.”

“Well, I’m an… I care.” For some reason, the word ally feels weird in his mouth.

“Lots of people care. They don’t spend their free time listening to fucked up teenage closet cases on the phone.”

“You’re not fucked up,” Darren says automatically.

This also isn’t his free time, but Darren doesn’t say that. This is his job. In his free time he… he plays guitar. Goes out. Drinks. Has fun.

He wishes he could take Chris out for a drink, questionable legality of it notwithstanding. That’s what kills him about this whole thing - what Chris is going through, it won’t be forever. But Chris doesn’t get that, he doesn’t have any way of imagining what his life will be in just a year or two, if he just sticks it out. If Chris were a friend of his in real life, Darren would know exactly how to respond. He’d be able to take Chris out for a drink and have a real heart to heart and let his own enthusiasm bleed over onto Chris. It’s a tactic that’s worked for so many friends down in the dumps before, so many people Darren helped lift out of a dark place. Having such a penchant for that is exactly why this is the kind of job that Darren wants to do.

“So you’re not even bi?” Chris asks.

“Nope, but you know that doesn’t change anything, right?” Darren asks. He keeps his voice light, like he’ll spook Chris if he sounds too concerned.

“Have you tried?” Chris presses. “Being with a guy?”

“No…”

“Then how do you know…” Chris sounds almost wistful.

“The same way you know you’re gay,” Darren says gently.

“Right.” Chris’s voice goes distant. “Well, I guess we know which one of us got the short end of that cosmic stick.”

“Chris, there is nothing wrong with being gay.”

“Let me guess, you like the gays perfectly well, you even have gay friends?”

“Are you mad at me for not being gay?” Darren asks incredulously. “Chris, I’m sorry, I just-”

He stops when he realizes he’s talking to the empty space of a terminated call.

*

Chris doesn’t call back the next week. Darren sits there anxiously the entire time, taking other calls but in the back of his mind unable to think of the one voice he hasn’t heard.

It starts to bother him so much that he goes to talk to his supervisor.

“What do you do when someone stops calling and you’re fixating on it?” he asks bluntly, sitting in a chair across from her with his posture slanted forward. His fingers are clasped nervously together in front of him and one foot won’t stop tapping against the ground.

She’s instantly sympathetic, though she’s saying about what he expected to hear. “You just have to figure out how to let it go. Is this someone you spoke with multiple times?”

Darren nods. He won’t, for the sake of his own professionalism being called into question, go into how regularly Chris phoned in, but he knows it wouldn’t make sense to lie outright. “Yeah. A few times.”

“And at any point did you sense that it was a situation that needed to be elevated?” She asks, the polite way of wanting to know if he was suicidal and Darren ignored it.

Darren shakes his head. “No, he wasn’t. He was just depressed. But I think he stopped calling because I screwed up, and it just… it feels so bad to think I’m why he doesn’t have this outlet anymore.”

“How do you think you screwed up?” she asks gently.

“He asked if I was gay, and I told him the honest answer.” Darren cringes slightly at having to explain it. “I think he felt betrayed, like he assumed I was gay because I work for the hotline.”

“That kind of misunderstanding is unfortunate, but I don’t think you mishandled it as badly as you’re imagining,” she reassures him. “He’ll probably call back in at a different time and speak to someone else and be just fine. And if he doesn’t, then there’s nothing more you can do. Your time and energy are better spent on trying to help the people that you’re talking to in each moment than worrying. We provide a great service, but we can only help those who want to be helped.”

It’s a textbook answer, but it’s not really the one he was looking for. He’s aware as he stares over the desk at his boss that he can’t say what he’s really thinking - that this wasn’t just a caller, this was Chris, a real person that Darren feels like he knows and is close to. He can’t say that because that’s exactly the kind of connection he wasn’t supposed to form in the first place, and right now he’s understanding why.

*

Darren takes the next week off to go visit his brother. Chuck has lived in New York for a few years now, since he started college, and in Darren’s opinion the best perk to that is getting to visit with a free place to stay. Family bonding is great and all, but he just really fucking loves that place. The plane ticket was a birthday present put on reserve until the summer, and Darren’s been looking forward to hitting the city.

There is a little part of him that worries about not being there if Chris needs him, but his boss’s words trickle through his head. It’s not good that he’s this distracted with one specific caller.

He realizes at some point that he’s not just distracted with Chris, though. He’s also distracted with what Chris said. Darren’s always hated disappointing people, and the idea that Chris was so disappointed just by Darren’s not being gay - maybe it’s a personality flaw but it makes Darren think a little too hard about things he hasn’t really thought about before. It’s not like anyone has the power to make him gay just through suggestion, but there is something to be said for having a new perspective shoved onto you.

Chuck takes him to a karaoke bar full of drag queens and guys who look at Darren like he’s their next meal. He gets asked to dance by a cute guy with blue hair and a baby face that doesn’t match his punk wardrobe. Darren just shrugs at Chuck’s laugh as he lets himself be led away to dance.

There definitely isn’t a voice whispering in the back of his head, but how do you know… He likes dancing, that’s all.

And apparently he just likes handjobs, too, because three hours later he’s in a back alley with the guy’s hand down his pants and a messy mouth on his own. He comes too fast, laughing and fumbling with his own hand on Matt’s dick.

He hadn’t really been able to figure out if he’d like this or not. He’s spent his entire life being comfortable with aesthetic appreciation for men as well as women, but he does like women. He likes how they look, how the smell, he likes having sex with them. He’s never had that real reason to explore anything else when he was so happy with what was within easy reach.

He’s always kind of absorbed the sentiment all around him. Sex with a guy just wouldn’t be good; it wouldn’t turn him on, he wouldn’t get anything out of it. No big deal, just not his thing.

But it is every bit as nice as anything he’s done with a woman, if a little more exciting just for the fact that he’s outside of his normal comfort zone. When it’s over, Matt kicks a wadded up newspaper over the little puddle of come to make it not so obvious. There is no kiss goodbye, no exchange of numbers, just a grin shared as they head in their opposite directions.

Darren makes his way to the bathroom before finding Chuck. His hair is a sweaty mess and his face is flushed, but it’s no more damage than heavy dancing would do. He stares down at hands that just touched dick that wasn’t his own for the first time and marvels that this just happened. He tries to look into himself to see if there’s some potential freak out lingering under the surface, but so far there’s nothing but wonder and the buzz of a few drinks and a good, adrenaline fueled orgasm there. Someone pounds on the door, wanting in. Darren jumps like he’s been caught doing something wrong. He has to laugh at his own ridiculousness.

He washes his hands, and goes to find his brother.

*

“I tried to call you last week. You weren’t here.” Chris doesn’t sound angry, he just sounds… quiet. Empty.

“Yeah, but Becca took my shift, right? She’s awesome, I bet you had fun.”

“I didn’t talk to her.”

There’s a knot in Darren’s stomach. “You could have, you know.”

“I called you. I had news.”

“Chris, I’m sorry. I was visiting my brother in New York. I should have given you a heads up, but the trip kind of snuck up on me.” Darren takes a breath and tries to figure out how to turn this around. “You want to tell me about your news now?”

“No.”

Chris hangs up.

*

It’s late in the summer and he hasn’t heard from Chris in two months. He still thinks about Chris more than he should but not as often as he did in the beginning.

He keeps working at the Center, writes a few songs, plays a few gigs just for fun, has a few long weekends with his parents. Sometimes he thinks of Italy and is a little sad he didn’t take that trip, but he can’t really regret time he still finds a way to spend well.

He even meets someone. He meets a guy on his second or third solo trip out to WeHo. They don’t fuck in the club, they don’t even fuck at all until they’ve hung out a few times because Darren puts all his cards on the table and makes sure the guy knows that this is new for Darren.

It’s the guy who asks Darren if he just wants to date and see where it goes. It’s not exclusive and that’s okay, but it’s still fun and it’s the perfect no-pressure situation that Darren feels comfortable exploring without the guilt of hurting someone.

So he dates a guy. It’s weird for him and weird for his friends and weird for his parents and then after a few weeks suddenly it isn’t really that weird at all.

The second week in they do have sex, and the sex is good, but it fizzles after about a month. They have a long conversation and Darren admits that he isn’t sure if it’s just that he’s not as into guys as he thought or if it’s just a personal chemistry thing, but there don’t seem to be any hard feelings.

Darren sleeps with a couple more guys after that, and all he can think afterward is just that sex feels like sex to him. Guy or girl, it’s fun and it’s a rush and it’s a physical connection and he digs that.

He’s happy with this level of self-exploration and it feels productive. It feels good and true to himself but in the back of his mind he can’t completely set aside what brought him to it. He thinks about Chris and sometimes when he’s lying in bed alone at night he replays that conversation in his head to try and imagine how Chris might have reacted if Darren’s answer then had been what his answer now would be.

*

It’s early September when Chris calls back.

Darren’s just started his university classes again. He spent the weekend before helping one of his friends move out, getting him drunk and wishing him well on his transfer to a school in Michigan. He’s still a little hungover but he’s not letting it get to him.

Chris’s voice is like a jolt of straight coffee to his system, though. He literally sits up in his seat, saying “Chris!” loudly enough that he hears a shh from down the hall. “I missed you, man! Where have you been?”

“I got a job,” he blurts out.

“That’s awesome!” Darren can’t stop smiling. “So that’s been keeping you busy?”

“No, I just didn’t-” Chris stops. “That doesn’t matter. I just got the job, though, it’s an acting job. I can’t even…”

“Wait, you got a gig? Holy shit, Chris, that’s amazing!”

“Yeah, but - I don’t know what to do.” Chris sounds like a different person, more alive than he ever did before. “I took your advice and I worked all summer and it sucked. So I gave in to what my parents wanted and I started school, I’ve only been in classes for a week - but I did this audition last month and apparently they liked me. Like, a lot. It’s for a tv show and they’re actually writing in a new role for me and I don’t… I don’t know what to do. It’s just a pilot so it might not even get picked up, and my parents will be furious if I drop out of school and it doesn’t work out.”

“Have you told them yet?” Darren asks.

“No,” Chris admits, then almost shyly adds, “You’re… you’re the first person I’ve told.”

“I’m honored.” Darren smiles down at the desk, biting his lip. “Seriously, that’s amazing. I told you, you were talented.”

“I just don’t know what to do. I feel happy about it now, but my parents won’t. They were so relieved when they thought I was giving up on acting. They talked me into majoring in business. I hate it, though. I’ve only been in classes for a week and I hate it.”

“I think you need to go for this one,” Darren says.

“They want me in Los Angeles next week. For a day to begin with and then when I go back again it’ll be a week. I’m supposed to do chemistry tests with some of the other cast and meet with the directors and something about wardrobe and a photo shoot… I need to figure out somewhere to stay, they didn’t even mention that - they’ll pay for it right?”

“Do you have an agent?” Darren interrupts him to ask.

“Yeah, but she’s never really done that much for me,” Chris says. “Just line up auditions and tell me where to go.”

“Well, make her earn her keep this time.” Darren has enough actor friends to know how this goes. “Tell them to make arrangements for you at a hotel and have a car ready for you. If the studio is serious about this, that’ll just be small change for them.”

“This is so scary. I don’t even know anyone in LA.” Chris sounds slightly panicky.

Darren pauses. He thinks about it, he really does, for all the five seconds he allows himself. “Yeah, you do.”

“What-”

“Me.” He glances around like he expects someone to pop out of nowhere and fire him just for saying it. “You know me. I’ll be your tour guide.”

“Is that against the rules?” Chris asks.

“Depends on why you really called me today.”

“Because you helped me a few months ago when I needed it, and when I found this out… it’s not like I have any friends around here to tell.”

“So you called because we’re friends and you wanted to share your news?” Darren asks. “If we’re friends, I can’t be your counselor anymore. But I can totally be your LA tour guide. You said they just want you for a day at first? You can stay with me.”

“Are you sure?” Chris asks.

“Come on,” Darren wheedles him. “I’m awesome. I know all the best cheap food and cool music joints. If you would be more comfortable staying somewhere on your own, that’s perfectly cool. But I’d love the chance to make the city a little less scary for you.”

He can tell Chris is smiling just through his words. “Okay, then. I’d like that.”

“Sweet!” Darren actually kicks his feet up a little in his excitement. There’s a little niggling sense of guilt in the back of his mind over breaking about half a dozen Center rules, but he’s already broken the spirit of them long before this. Chris needs a friend right now, maybe not more than he needs a counselor but certainly as much as. And anyone moving to LA needs a taco joint tour guide. “Now that we’re officially friends, I can call you an asshole for leaving me hanging all summer and demand you tell me everything that’s going on in your life.”

“Only if you do the same,” Chris says hesitantly.

“That’s a dangerous offer,” Darren says. “I’ve been known to never shut up once I get going.”

“Well, I’ve been known to be a decent listener, so I think that’ll work out fine.”

They talk for another half hour and before they hang up this time, Darren gives Chris his cell phone number.

III.

Chris is amazing.

Chris is also a little bit of a mess. Darren’s imagined what Chris might look like a hundred different ways over the past week, and maybe he never quite landed on something that resembled reality but Chris looks perfectly Chris to him in a wonderful way. His face is round and his eyes are a sharp, deep blue and he’s wearing glasses and his hair flops over his forehead unstyled and the exterior just clicks so well with what Darren knows Chris to be on the inside. Even the jeans and t-shirt he’s wearing just fit his personality so well. He might not be the kind of person Darren would seek out at a bar or linger on in a room full of people, but on the other hand - maybe he is that kind of person because Darren likes to gravitate toward people that are interesting to talk to. Chris is nothing if not interesting, to have started where he was and landed on this path to where he’s going.

Standing on Darren’s doorstep his cheeks are pink and he’s sweating a little bit and he looks terrified but brave and Darren’s bowled over by the sense of pride that Chris is actually here.

So he throws his arms around Chris and hugs him tight until Chris grunts a little but hugs back. And they stand there just like that, in the doorway to Darren’s house, Darren hugging the shit out of Chris until Chris starts to cling back just a little.

“I’m so fucking glad you’re here,” Darren says, taking a step back. He looks Chris up and down again, then grabs the bag from where Chris had let it fall beside him mid-hug. “Come on, come in.”

Chris follows him, still not really having said a word.

“You want something to drink?” Darren asks. “We’ve got some soft drinks, I could make some coffee or tea, beer…”

“Soft drink is fine,” Chris says. His voice sounds higher than it usually does on the phone. “Diet Coke if you have it?”

“I think we do,” Darren says, disappearing into the kitchen. The girl Joe’s been seeing only drinks diet soda so there’s the remains of a twelve pack of cans in one of the bins.

Darren grabs a bottle of water for himself and takes the drink to Chris. “So, your drive was okay?”

“Just long,” Chris says.

“Good for jamming out to the radio.” Darren smiles. “I kind of dig road trips alone just because I can sing as loud as I want and no one gives a fuck.”

“That is nice,” Chris admits. “I like to listen to audiobooks, too. Well - just Harry Potter.”

“Oh, man - Stephen Fry or Jim Dale?”

“Stephen Fry, of course.” Chris looks scandalized that Darren would have to ask.

“Like a true anglophile,” Darren nods. “Awesome. Hey, let’s put your stuff in my room for now, okay? We can figure out sleeping arrangements later, but it’ll be out of the way in there.”

“Sure.” The momentary perk fades, Chris trailing behind Darren while Darren keeps up a chatty ramble. Chris is quiet in a cautious way and it goes against Darren’s nature to not try and soothe that out of a person.

But Chris has obviously had years to cultivate how he carries himself in a new, strange situation - and Darren has the vantage point of understanding why. One look at Chris and it’s obvious that there’s just so much going on in Chris’s head, so much happening behind the scenes that he’s learned how to shut away. It hurts Darren to know how that behavior was beaten into him, both literally and just by virtue of being who he is in the situation he was born into.

So he doesn’t hold it against Chris when Chris is quieter. Darren is more than capable of carrying a conversation, but he doesn’t want to make Chris feel like there’s some other end of it he’s failing to uphold.

“Are you hungry yet?” Darren asks.

Chris shrugs. “I had lunch a couple of hours ago. I stopped somewhere on my way.”

“Cool, then why don’t we just hang out and watch some TV until we want dinner?” Television is always a good transition. Darren grabs his remote from where it rests on the table and then flings himself onto the sofa. He flips channels rapidly. “So our options are bad movie that just started, decent movie that’s halfway over, reality show, reality show, or Netflix.”

They look at each other, eyes meeting, before saying, “Netflix.” at the same time.

Darren laughs. “It’s never even a question anymore.”

In the moments when he thinks Chris is deciding he feels comfortable, there’s just something there that’s so - wonderful. The humor that Darren got so used to over the phone line peeks out, that quick wit… Chris is only just eighteen, but makes Darren excited to get to know the person Chris is on the verge of becoming.

*

Joe comes home halfway through their third episode of Death Note. Chris didn’t have much input on what to watch, so Darren took advantage of a captive audience. Luckily, Chris does seem to actually like it.

There are quick introductions but Chris seems intimidated by Joe. Darren can understand why. He knows Joe’s an awesome guy, but he probably looks more like the type of person Chris would have avoided in school.

“We were just about to grab some food,” Darren says.

Joe wanders into his bedroom then back out, shirtless. It’s a struggle not to laugh at how wide Chris’s eyes go.

“Cool, I’m heading out. I’ll text you the bar we’re at later if you want to meet up?” Joe says.

“We’ll probably stay in. Chris drove for like half the day to get here, he’s probably beat.” Darren won’t call attention to Chris being underaged. He doesn’t want to make Chris feel awkward.

*

Chris tries to insist on sleeping on the couch, but Darren knows his roommates will come trouncing in at all hours of the night. Joe is still on bartending shifts so he doesn’t get to bed before dawn even when he’s not working, and Brian isn’t officially living here but he tends to show up more often than not.

“I don’t mind,” Chris says again.

“No, seriously, it’d probably freak them out just as much to come in and see a stranger laying on the couch,” Darren insists. The truth is that they wouldn’t be phased at all, but Darren’s more concerned with Chris being comfortable than anything else

“If you’re sure…” Chris looks toward the bedroom again.

“I’m sure.” Darren puts a hand on each of Chris’s shoulders and guides him into the bedroom. “Do you need extra pillows or blankets or anything? I washed the sheets yesterday, so I did sleep on them last night but I promise I didn’t jerk off or anything,

Chris goes red again but it doesn’t stop him from responding with a laughingly sarcastic, “Should I blacklight test that to be sure?”

“... um.” Darren laughs. “Well, the sheets would come through okay, but I’m suddenly not as confident about everything else in here.”

“That doesn’t inspire confidence.” Chris looks amused. “But I guess it’s probably still cleaner than a hotel would have been.”

“Definitely,” Darren says. “Okay, I’ll leave you to it - just let me know if you need anything.”

“I will- oh.” The last bit is uttered quietly, because Darren has just pulled Chris in for another hug. He’s quicker to reciprocate this time, arms locking around Darren’s shoulders and fingers digging in just a little bit.

Chris hugs like he needs it but didn’t know how to ask for it, and it’s sad but at least it’s a problem Darren feels like he can actually do something about.

*

Chris takes his own car to the studio next day. Darren offers to drive him, but he gets the sense that Chris either wants very much to prove he’s capable of being independent about things like this… or he’s afraid he’ll screw up and feels better about it if no one is around to witness his mistakes.

Darren spends the day tackling homework for his classes and playing Mario Kart. It feels pretty much like any other Saturday, except that he keeps glancing toward his phone or at the door. There’s a constant low level buzz of excitement, some of it secondhand for Chris and some of it because of him.

When he does finally get back to Darren’s place (after admitting to two wrong GPS turns and feeling completely lost) he’s in a good enough mood that he doesn’t flinch over Darren suggesting they go to dinner with some of his friends. It’s just dinner, no drinking, and Chris is quiet when left to his own devices but warms up easily when Darren pulls him into conversation.

It helps for Chris that in a city full of struggling actors, having just gotten cast is a hot topic. Darren finds himself sitting back just enjoying how Chris seems to open up, especially with Joey and one of Joey’s other friends who tagged along.

*

Chris has to be on the road before noon on Sunday, so Darren wakes up early (or what feels like early for him) to throw together a pancake breakfast. Chris is already awake when Darren knocks on the door to the bedroom, making Darren wonder how long he was hiding out in there and if it was just because Chris was nervous about waking him up if he was still asleep.

They eat across from each other at Darren’s little dining nook, chasing off sleep with sugary syrup and soda (once established that neither of them actually likes coffee). Darren occupies himself cleaning up a little while Chris showers and gets dressed, and then spends another half hour trying to delay Chris leaving in ridiculous ways.

He doesn’t really think Chris wants to go, though, so he doesn’t feel too bad. The only bright spot to saying goodbye is that it’s the perfect time to get another hug in.

*

There’s a period of about two weeks between when Chris goes home after the first day of meetings, and when the studio needs him back in town again.

In that two week span, Darren answers a hundred tiny questions Chris has about Los Angeles and where to live and what kind of clothes to pack. He gets used to picking up his phone to see at least one or two messages from Chris an hour, and sometimes their conversations just go casually back and forth for days at a time with only breaks for sleeping and Darren working.

*

C: Help, my mother is looking up crime statistics in Los Angeles.
C: She is now convinced I’m going to be raped, mugged, and murdered.
D: I hope not all at once. That’d make for a bummer night.
C: You are not helpful.
D: I can be helpful! Redirect her attention with some good ones.
C: There are good ones:
D: Los Angeles is the world capital of parades. Who doesn’t love parades?
D: People in Los Angeles are 24.7% more likely to find five dollars on the ground.
D: You can literally get pot anywhere in LA and it isn’t illegal.
C: I am not telling my mother that.
D: Okay, point. But just for your general knowledge.
D: She’s not gonna have to worry about you ever getting killed in a snowstorm avalanche or a tornado.
C: Just earthquakes and tsunamis.
D: Shh. Shhhh. Focus on the positives.
D: She’ll also never have to worry that you’re bored.
C: Well, definitely not with you around. :)

*

C: What if my neighbors hate me?
C: I’ve never had neighbors before.
C: I mean, my parents do, but it’s a house not an apartment. I’ve never had APARTMENT neighbors.
D: Okay, here’s your quick guide to not pissing off your neighbors: 1) don’t play music too loudly 2) don’t watch porn too loudly 3) don’t have house parties without giving them a heads up and/or inviting them 4) invite me over a lot, i’m charming as fuck
C: Why would anyone watch porn too loudly? That’s what headphones are for.
D: Oh, man. You have not discovered the benefit to surround sound stereo porn.
C: Suddenly I’m uncomfortable with this conversation.
D: Just sayin. ;) You’ll find out one day.
C: Stop.
D: … PORN.
D: Okay, I’m stopping.

*

C: Wait, how do I know how loud is too loud?
D: Trust me. Someone will inform you.

*

What they don’t talk about are any of the serious issues, the things Darren wants to ask - and felt comfortable asking, before, when the boundaries between them were clearly outlined by Chris calling in and Darren doing his job.

He doesn’t want to push or pry now, but he can’t turn off the part of him that is constantly running in the background, the concerned part. He wants Chris to know that he can still talk to him without making Chris uncomfortable by bringing things to the forefront that he’s trying to not focus on.

So in the end Darren decides that for now he’ll just let Chris set the pace for them.

*

Chris seems to prefer text messages to phone calls now, which is strange to Darren since they started talking over the phone before they even knew anything about each other as actual people.

He does call once, though. He’s in the car on the way to pick up his sister and from the moment Darren answers the phone he understands that this is one of those times when Chris just needs someone to talk to - someone to listen.

“Did you notice when I stopped calling?” Chris asks. “Over the summer?”

“Of course.” Darren’s sure he’s said it before, but he doesn’t mind saying it again. “I missed you.”

“I shouldn’t have stopped calling,” Chris admits.

“Why?” It’s hard for Darren not to add onto that sentence, but he wants to know what Chris answers and how Chris takes the question without more guidance.

“I knew you’d wonder,” Chris says. He takes a breath so ragged Darren can hear the hitch in it. “It made me happy thinking of you caring what happened to me. I would think about… if you were upset. How much you thought about me. If you were still hoping I’d call. I liked to imagine you giving a fuck. And then enough time passed that I knew if I called and you, you didn’t care, you hadn’t even noticed-”

“I would have noticed,” Darren says, quiet urgency in his voice. “I noticed every week, okay? And I wish you hadn’t stopped calling, but I understand the way you felt. That’s a valid feeling, wanting people to notice you. I hope you understand by now that I care, though.”

“I do. I think I do,” Chris says.

“Don’t think. Know it. And if you start to doubt it, call me up and I’ll tell you again.”

“Thank you,” Chris says, after a long moment of silence. “I have to go now, but - thank you.”

*

Someone at the studio lines up a few living options for Chris.

It’s not a surprise that he asks Darren to check them out with him. Chris hadn’t been exaggerating about not knowing anyone else in Los Angeles. His agent doesn’t seem like the coddling type, and Chris won’t let his parents accompany him. (Though they tried, Darren knows.)

Darren isn’t exactly sorry for another weekend of hanging out. He manages to convince Joe to give them a night and sends a group text to everyone else telling them the Hotel Criss is closed for the night. They probably all think he’s getting laid or something, but the truth is just that he doesn’t really want to share Chris - especially not since next time Chris is in Los Angeles he’ll have his own place.

There is a tiny bit of worry in the back of Darren’s mind that once Darren isn’t useful as a tour guide, Chris might find some way to marginalize him. He tells himself that he’ll do whatever is healthy for Chris, even if that means stepping back, but selfishly the idea is gutting.

*

Darren can tell the minute they leave the second apartment on the list that Chris loves it. Two bedrooms, the second of which Chris is excited about turning into a study. It’s already furnished but with the studio checks he’ll be getting a few new pieces of furniture won’t even be a drop in the bucket.

Darren doesn’t ask if part of why Chris likes it has to do with the fact that it’s only a few streets over from Darren. He doesn’t want to embarrass Chris if that’s actually true, though Darren would happily admit that’s why he’s glad Chris is leaning towards it.

“You don’t want a guest bedroom?” Darren asks.

“Who would come visit me?” Chris gives him a confused look.

Darren shrugs. “Me?”

He says it before really thinking.

“Oh.” Chris frowns. “I could get a couch that turns into a pullout?”

Somehow, the answer is almost disappointing. It’s not like he expected Chris to say they’d sleep in the same bed. They certainly haven’t when Chris has stayed over at Darren’s. But still the unsettled feeling lingers.

He can tell Chris is still mulling over it, too. The silence between them stretches a little until it hits the point where the extrovert in Darren has to break it, to try and inject some levity back into the conversation. “That place had the perfect balcony for creeping on your neighbors, too!”

Chris laughs. “With my luck they’d be geriatric. Or lesbians.”

“Oh, the horror, perving on lesbian sex.” Darren snorts. “That’s some guys’ fantasies.”

Chris makes a disgusted face. “Oh, god, don’t tell me you’re one of those straight guys.”

“I’m not-” Darren starts to protest, but it suddenly feels strange to just announce he’s discovered his latent bisexuality during a random conversation as they walk back to his car.

Chris misunderstands the disagreement, reaching out and patting Darren on the arm. “It’s okay. I guess that’s even a pretty normal straight guy fetish. It’s not like you’re into clowns licking shoes or anything.”

“Oh god, you did go through my Google search history!” Darren pulls a horrified face.

Chris has to stop walking, covering his mouth to muffle his laugh. “Well, I guess we’ve established our own personality flaws to work around,” he says. “You perv on lesbians having sex, and I spy on your search history.”

“Well, we’re clearly meant to be.”

Chris gives him a little surprised smile. “Guess so.”

*

Chris’s parents come with him when he moves in. They’re only supposed to stay long enough to help unload the car. Chris has invited Darren over afterward to actually help him unpack, luring him with the promise of pizza and limitless soda if he wants it.

Their paths shouldn’t cross, but Chris’s parents drag their feet with leaving and Darren ends up meeting them in the hallway outside of Chris’s apartment.

They’re perfectly pleasant to him, of course. Chris’s mother gives him a hug and tells him how glad she is that Chris has a friend in the city. Chris’s dad shakes his hand and gives an approving nod, though Darren isn’t really sure why he’d need approval like that.

Out loud, it’s all pleasantries and Chris looking slightly uncomfortable. But in Darren’s mind he looks at Chris’s parents and remembers things Chris has said about them and his therapist mind kicks in hard. He stands back while they say their goodbyes and observes how Chris’s dad isn’t too ready with the hug and his mom chatters on and on about things that doesn’t really matter. She isn’t saying what seems to Darren to be the obvious things he’d need to hear, that he’ll be fine and he’s strong enough to live on his own and she believes in him. Instead she gives him warning after warning about what not to do, like a kid being left home alone for the first time, and he can practically see Chris’s defensiveness rising. He can see the confidence that begins to peek out when Chris has been in LA for a few days just wither away, and it feels like a fucking crime.

Darren decides his new goal for the night is to learn all the best ways to put a smile back on Chris’s face.

*

Darren does realize that he should say something to Chris about his sexuality.

It’s not an outright lie, but it is a lie of omission and considering Darren’s professed straightness caused a rift between them before…

He’s just not sure how to approach it. He’s aware that Chris had an attachment to him, maybe even a crush on him, but he doesn’t know how much that has to do with him as a person and how much it has to do with him just being the person that was there when Chris called in. Darren listened and was there at a vulnerable point for Chris, and he doesn’t know if Chris was confusing real interest with gratitude.

Not for the first time, Darren wonders if maybe he should be asking someone else for professional advice. But this isn’t work, this isn’t a Center call. This is Chris, who is his real friend now, and he wants to be able to handle this on his own.

He just wants some guarantee that he’s not going to fuck it up, too. Chris matters to him - a lot. It’s nothing he’s quite ready to put a name to, just that twisting hopeful feeling deep down inside.

It’s a crush. A silly, inconvenient, confusingly-timed crush and Darren has no idea what to do about it except set it aside for now.

*

In the end, there’s no easy way to work it in, so Darren just - says it.

“Do you remember when you asked me if I was straight?” he says.

They’ve spent most of the day moving Chris’s car load of stuff into his new apartment, then browsing the internet to shop for what he doesn’t have. Chris offered to buy Darren dinner to thank him for the help, so they’re sitting across from each other in a little two person booth at a taco place Darren loves.

Introducing Chris to all his favorite places is definitely going to be one of the big perks to Chris living nearby.

“Yeah.” Chris tenses visibly and Darren wonders if he shouldn’t have at least waited until they were done eating, in case Chris actually gets mad at him and wants to leave.

“And I told you I was,” Darren says.

“... yeah.”

“So, I guess, when I said that…” Darren wipes his fingers on his napkin and looks at Chris. “The thing is, you kind of opened my eyes up a little, because until you asked me if I was sure I guess I just hadn’t really questioned it.”

Chris gives him a confused look. “What?”

“I’m saying - my answer changed. And this is like, this is an awkward as fuck conversation to have, but I felt like not telling you was some kind of lie by omission. Because I did a little - um. Soul searching. And I still like women, I just… discovered I like men, too.”

It’s only after Darren says it out loud that he realizes it’s the first time he’s done that. It was so much easier to just announce that he was going on a date and casually reference it being a guy. This feels like a statement, and for as much as Darren actually felt little struggle with it somehow there’s still a feeling of liberation with speaking the words out loud.

“You decided this… because of me?” Chris asks. His eyes are wide and slightly overwhelmed.

Darren hadn’t really decided if it would be wise to mention his hook ups or not, but he decides maybe it’s a good idea - just so Chris doesn’t feel any pressure. “Yes and no. You put the idea in my head, but all you did was make me look at something that was already there in me. And I… got some practical experience, to try it out, just to see. So, I guess you can say it was really that um - real world application - that made me realize it.”

“Oh god, do you - you have a boyfriend?”

“No, no!” Darren hurries to say. “No, it was… well, I just went to a couple bars in New York, when I went to visit my brother. There’s nothing - there’s no one here.”

He’s had hook ups in Los Angeles, but he decides not to mention those to Chris. Maybe later, if it becomes relevant to what they are (or what Darren hopes they’ll be) but for now… he doesn’t need to know.

Chris is quieter than normal for the rest of the night, but Darren isn’t unaccustomed to his silent spells. He tries to make Chris laugh without being too obvious about it, and when it doesn’t really work just lets the conversation lull in a way he hopes is comfortable.

At the end of the night when Chris drives Darren back to his car, he pauses before letting Darren get out. “Thank you for telling me,” he says.

Darren smiles and grabs Chris for a hug. “Of course.”

Chris holds onto the hug, like he always does. It leaves Darren wanting to make some kind of offer, some kind of promise that this doesn’t change anything. He wants Chris to know that he can still count on Darren, because he knows what he just told Chris is probably confusing Chris a hell of a lot.

But he thinks it’s more important to let Chris figure some things out on his own before Darren steamrolls in. Chris is stronger than he looks, and he’s figuring out more about himself every day.

*

Darren keeps working at the Center.

He loves the job, and somehow the perspective he’s gained through seeing Chris’s situation from start to - well, not finish, but wherever it is now - has helped reinvigorate him.

He talks to people on the calls the same way he always did before, reeling off lines from the same basic script tailored to each person’s problems. All of that is the same - it’s just that he believes it a little more when he tells people it gets better. He can’t tell them any specifics about Chris, of course, but he just injects a little more passion into reassuring them that they won’t be as miserable as they are right now for the rest of their lives. Things may not improve all at once, they may not be able to overcome every obstacle, and nothing is ever entirely perfect, but: it does get better.

*

Or maybe sometimes it gets better, and then it gets worse again. There’s a phone call, going on three am one Sunday night.

Darren answers with a groggy, “Chris?”

“Hi.”

It’s a tone Darren’s heard before, but not in a while. It takes him right back to six months ago, to Chris struggling so hard.

He sits up in bed. “What’s wrong?”

“... everything.”

“Did something happen?”

“No, I just - this isn’t what I thought it would be.”

“What do you mean?”

“Why don’t I feel better?” Chris’s voice breaks, and so does Darren’s heart a little. “I’m out. I didn’t have to do the college thing. I don’t have to worry about money. I’m - I should be happy.”

“I’m coming over,” Darren says.

“Don’t.” Chris protests, but it’s a flimsy one.

“No, look, this is the first time I’ve had you on the phone like this and been able to really do something, so unless you actually tell me you don’t want company right now then I’m coming over.”

Chris’s silence says everything.

*

Chris is shaking, crying, folded in on himself. They’re sitting on his couch and it’s not even dawn yet, Darren in the tank top he’d been sleeping in and the jeans he threw on. Chris is in pajamas still, a large long sleeved shirt with the sleeves tucked over his fingers like paws and thin pants. His eyes are red and wet and his face is pinked and he looks achingly young.

Darren feels completely unprepared for this.

“I thought,” Chris says between gasping breaths. “I thought it would get better here. I thought I wouldn’t feel so- alone.”

The part of Darren that’s been falling for Chris in every way for months now is affronted; Chris isn’t alone. He’s got Darren.

But the part of Darren who answers the phone for people just like Chris every single week understands. What hurts in Chris can’t be fixed by one person alone. It can’t be fixed by moving or getting a job. Sometimes, maybe, for some people that’s enough; but this is more.

Darren can’t fix it but he can try to help it. He draws Chris in close and rubs a hand over his back as Chris cries, and when the tears run dry he says, “If I find someone for you to talk to, would you?”

“I’m talking to you,” Chris says.

“I know. And I’m here. I’m gonna be here, I’m not going anywhere.” Darren rubs his fingers over the back of Chris’s neck, stroking through his hair. “There’s nowhere else I would even want to be.”

There’s a painful, vulnerable kind of honesty in saying it, even if Chris is too wrapped up in his own mind right now to really understand how much Darren means it.

“But,” Darren continues. “You need to talk to someone who can really help you. Someone who can do more than listen, you know?”

“You want me to go on antidepressants or something,” Chris guesses.

“That’s one option,” Darren says. “There might be others.”

“It’s just scary.” Chris’s voice cracks a little. “I’ve never - my parents… wouldn’t.. I mean. They made jokes when my cousin talked about her therapist.”

“Well, that was dumb of them.” Darren cuddles Chris in close again, kissing his forehead.

Chris seems to just soak up the affection, his body relaxing in tiny measures the more they talk. He’s probably exhausted, but Darren doesn’t want to let him go without coaxing some kind of promise from him.

“Help me find someone?” Chris finally asks.

“Of course.” Darren kisses his forehead again, smiling against it. “I’ll help you with whatever you need.”

*

Darren drives Chris to his first appointment. He waits in the car with headphones in, playing games and listening to music on his phone for the hour long session.

The time goes by slowly. He’s nervous, for Chris and for himself, hoping he picked well.

His heart rate quickens when he sees Chris walk out. His eyes are slightly red but Darren can’t tell if it’s actually from crying or just the stress and lack of sleep he’s complained about lately, if maybe they were like that the whole time and Darren just wasn’t looking for it before.

Chris gets in the car and slumps back against the seat, like a puppet whose strings were loosened all at once. “So. That was a thing.”

“Good thing or bad thing?” Darren asks.

Chris doesn’t answer, just sighs and rubs his hand across his jaw. “Can we - go somewhere?”

“Sure,” Darren says. “How about ice cream? My mom always took me for ice cream after a doctor’s appointment.”

Chris laughs a little, roughly. “Probably not the same kind of doctor. It’s not like I got shots or anything.”

“Still a doctor,” Darren insists. “Come on. Ice cream?”

Chris relents with a nod. “Ice cream would be good.”

*

Darren doesn’t ask Chris about what was said. He’ll let Chris share what he wants to share; if that’s everything, Darren’s here to listen and offer insight. If that’s nothing at all, that’s fine too. He doesn’t doubt Chris’s ability to process things on his own time, in his own way.

“She asked me about-” Chris starts, then hesitates. “She asked me if I was with anyone. I wasn’t… I didn’t know what to say.”

“Yeah?” Darren stops mid-lick to his cone. “Um, yeah, I guess that’s a pretty standard question for them.”

“You didn’t prep me for that one.” Chris’s eyes are slightly averted. “I didn’t really know what to say. I felt dumb. It’s usually a yes or no question, isn’t it?”

Darren shrugs. “Not always. I mean, even Facebook gets that. ‘It’s complicated.’”

“Is it… complicated?” Chris eyes, finally looking at Darren. “I’ve never had a boyfriend. I’ve never had - anyone. I’ve never even been kissed. I don’t really know what… I don’t think I know what I’d even be looking at. If someone were even interested.”

Here it is, that moment - the one Darren’s been waiting for. He knows he still has to tread carefully but he’s actually proud of Chris for opening the door in the first place.

That’s why he’s smiling when he reaches across the table and covers Chris’s hand with his own. “You know what it looks like, when someone is into you.”

“I-” Chris stares between Darren’s hand on his and Darren’s face. “I do?”

“Yeah. You do.” Darren squeezes slightly then pulls his hand away.

“Then why haven’t you…” Chris trails off.

“You kind of just said it yourself,” Darren points out. “I know this is new to you, and so is basically everything else in your life right now. New city, new job, and a fucking weird stressful one at that. I want you to be able to get a handle on everything else before you start this new thing, if you even decide it’s something you’re interested in - if I’m something you’re interested in.”

“You are,” Chris says, a touch of incredulity in his voice. “I’m… interested. Very.”

“Great.” Darren’s ice cream is dripping but he’s too busy smiling at Chris to worry about it. “So we’ve established a mutual interest. And there’s no time limit on it, okay? Relationships are stressful. Especially new relationships, when you’ve never really done it before. I don’t want to be something to makes you feel more pressured.”

“But don’t you want…” Chris can’t even quite bring himself to say it, but Darren gets the gist. “More?”

The corner of Darren’s mouth twitches slightly. “Eventually, sure. But I just… fucking love hanging out with you, no matter what label we’re applying to us. I want to be someone in your life that makes you feel better, not another thing you feel responsible for. And don’t tell me you wouldn’t - I know you, Chris Colfer. I know that’s a thing you do.”

“Shut up,” Chris says. He’s smiling a little.

“So, you tell me - are you happy with whatever’s going on between us right now? Do you want more out of it?”

Chris thinks about it, at least enough to satisfy Darren’s desire for a real answer and not just what Chris thinks Darren wants to hear. “I’m happy with this much, right now.”

“Then so am I.” Darren grabs Chris’s hand and slightly squeezes it.

Chris smiles tentatively back at him. “Okay. So we’re… something.”

“We’re something,” Darren nods. “Something awesome.”

*

Chris does keep seeing the therapist, and he doesn’t really talk to Darren about it - but that’s okay. He talks to Darren about everything else. He’s an eighteen year old suddenly thrust into a spotlight. He’s gone from ducking quietly down halls to try and avoid attention he didn’t want, to walking into a mall in the middle of America and being greeted with deafening screams just because he’s on a TV show that apparently a lot of people are excited about. He veers from terrified to excited to overwhelmed at any given moment, and Darren may not always be able to relate but he can certainly do what he’s always done best for Chris: listen.

And now he can do more than that, too.

Darren’s the one he goes out to dinner with after his first day on set.

Darren’s the one he invites as his plus one to the first cast party.

Darren’s the one he calls at two am the first time he gets drunk.

They might be taking things slow but they’re together in all the ways that count to both of them. It’s still Darren that sits beside him on the couch the night they air the first teaser episode, so many months after first moving to Los Angeles. Darren cooes and awws over Chris on screen, instantly charmed by Kurt even though he isn’t even really a focus of the episode.

And when it’s over, when Chris looks at him with bright, shining eyes and a hint of a smile, Darren falls for the hundredth time into the depth of that gaze. “You liked it?” Chris asks.

“I loved it,” Darren says.

There’s a moment of hesitation then Chris leans forward and ever so briefly presses his lips to Darren’s. While Darren’s still surprised into silence, Chris says, “Go on a date with me?”

Darren recovers enough to laugh, a giddy pleased sound, and says. “I’d be honored.”

Darren’s lucky, and he knows it.