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This is not rational. This is not rational. He kept repeating those words like a mantra, holding tightly onto his arms in a self soothing gesture. This is not rational. This is not rational. The smell seemed to fill him up entirely, invading his nostril, his head, his mind, his belly, his very core, his very being. Overwhelming.
The fear is irrational. This is irrational. How is it that a smell, of all things, a smell like sweet and strawberries, a smell he’d smelt so often before, from her, from her mouth, from her hair, the smoke curling in his eyes, the smoke filling his nostrils, filling his lungs - How could a smell do this to him. He felt a trickle from his lips.
Drew his hand back, not realizing he’d even brought it up in the first place. Red, with blood. Red, like her bloodshot eyes and her bloodshot knuckles when she’d- no.
This is not rational. If only he could get away from the smell! Get away from it, and from her, he had to run, run away, run away now! He stood up on shaky legs and bolted, running away from that dreaded smell. Sweet, sweet, strawberries, so fake and so sweet. Smoke in his lungs. Smoke, everywhere, smoke in his eyes, in his mind, smoke as she raised her hand to strike- smoke.
Smoke. This one didn’t smell like strawberries. It smelled ashy, like fire and ash and his childhood, smelt like before she started smelling like strawberries, smelt so real and so grounding. He breathed in deep, deeply, inhaling that earthy smell to get rid of the sweet fake strawberries, to get rid of the fake sweet smoke and get away from her-
“Los?"
He didn’t answer the familiar voice, too busy gasping in the air, the air that wasn’t made of hurt and strawberries. He gasped, and gasped, and perhaps the gasping just wasn’t getting enough air in his lungs because he kept gasping, choking desperately on a sob that wouldn’t get out.
“‘Los, you gotta breath, ‘Los, come on-”
He felt a hand grabbing at him, a hand grabbing him- “‘Los?”
Mother never called him ‘Los'. Only, only he called him ‘Los', at first, before his friends started calling him- calling him- only…
“Harry?” he choked out, in between gasps, reaching back towards the hand he’d just shied away from.
“Yeah. Hi, ‘Los”
The sob finally came out in between gasps at the familiar voice, at the familiar smoke.
“Could you breathe for me ‘Los?” He shook his head desperately, desperately, trying to convey the strawberries and the hurt, but… but there were no more strawberries here.
“I’m gonna take your hand now ‘Los” Harry took his hand, and gently, so gently, too gently for a seasoned pirate, gently held it to his own chest, to the calming motion of his chest, his lungs rising up, and down, and up again in an exaggerated repetition of habit.
“Breathe, Los. I gotcha.”
Carlos shakily tried to follow the rise, and the fall, and the rise again of Harry’s chest, choking down a sob that kept threatening to build. He squizzed his eyes shut as Harry squizzed his shaking hands, letting the other take over, relinquishing control, you should never let go of control-
He managed to speak up after a good few minutes of simply breathing together “Can you smoke again?”
“What?”
“Can you- can you smoke? Can you smoke again? I- the smell…”
Harry might’ve nodded, or not, but the smoke- real, deep, toxic, overwhelming but not strawberries, took over. It was just as toxic, just as overwhelming, but the cigarette burns never bothered him as much as the fake strawberries. If anything, the cigarette burns had been a welcome ache, back when she smoked real, earthy smoke - if she simply gave him a light cigarette burn, he’d be left alone for a while. And once she started smoking those fake strawberry smells, he’d no longer had an escape. Tobacco had meant childhood and escape, and running away in later years to find his friends only to end up with Harry, smoking much as he was now.
Strawberry meant being trapped, endlessly, inside the closet that long since stopped smelling like the earth and wood of tobacco and now smelt only like those overwhelming strawberries.
They stayed wrapped in smoke and silence for a few minutes, sitting against the wall they’d slipped down next to, Carlos’ hand still in Harry’s, though they’d dropped down from his chest and now hung above their knees. The smoke from Harry’s cigarette filled the air, the sharp tobacco washing away strawberries the way it used to back on the Isle.
“You wanna talk about it?"
Carlos shrugged. “It’s- it smelled… Did you know some people vape here?”
Harry hummed, inviting him to speak on.
“I just… freaked out. When I smelt it. I couldn’t get away from the smell, so I- I ran.”
Harry’s fingers rubbed over his knuckles softly, grounding him.
“Was lucky to run into you.” He whispered finally.
“I’m glad you did,” he whispered back, the soft words the only witnesses to the soft secrets of their own fragilities.
Harry’s cigarette had burned itself out, but the strawberries were gone, and their own warm breaths curled into smoke in the cold winter air.
“Do you think they’ll be mad?” Carlos asked, whispering still into the silence.
“Who’ll be mad?”
“The teachers. That I ran out. I skipped class.”
“I skipped too. If they’re mad, they’ll be mad at the both of us” Carlos smiled slightly at the expression of loyalty, and at Harry’s thick accent, so unlike anyone else’s here.
Here, leaning against the stone in a tucked away corner of the school, nothing felt rushed. He could rest a little while. Time passed like sludge, and he could breathe easier without the sweet strawberry scent filling his head.
“And why are you skipping?”
Harry shrugged. “Dont know, I just… I needed a smoke, y’know? Needed a break from all the preppy assholes in there.”
“Did anyone say anything?” His fingers tightened around Harry’s as if he could convey his anger at a potential insult to Harry through their linked hands, as if it’d be enough to combat the injustices.
“They’re always saying somethin’, ain’t they? But no, I just, y’know. It’s so different here. Guess I’m not really made for this.”
Carlos nodded, and scooted closer to the other boy, leaning his hand against his shoulder.
“Yeah, me either.”
A while passed, perhaps a minute or a year, a blink in the revolving of the earth. They stayed in their soft embrace, in the scent of leftover smoke and each other.
“It’s ok. We can not belong together.”