Chapter Text
There is, as far as Travis is concerned, two fundamental truths to living in Nockfell: One, everyone knows everyone. People here were born and raised because: Two, you would have to be either clinically insane or chronically stupid to willingly move to Nockfell.
Which brings Travis to Sal fucking Fisher, his problem as of late who neatly checks off both aforementioned boxes (though he’s still deciding if Sal leans more towards clinically insane or chronically stupid. Never mind that he always aces his math tests, and, compared to Travis, seems at least mentally put together enough to talk him out of that embarrassing moment earlier in the year where he basically had a-)
He needs to stop thinking about that.
But it was futile – one of those self-fulfilling failures where thinking about how he shouldn’t be thinking about something only leads to thinking more about it.
Fuck Sal, fuck him and his stupid mask and his stupid eyes peering into everything and everyone. Because apparently Sal never learned to mind his own business back where he came from, and took that annoying habit along with him, wherein the short period of time he’s been here has successfully wormed his way into his private life, coming at Travis with accusations across bathroom wall partitions.
And the worst part of it all was that he was right. Fuck – he couldn’t even be mad at him because of that. But the sheer audacity of it still pisses him off, that Sal thought he could just pry into such covert things as if they were buddies.
Though at the same time, (as much as he would never admit it out loud) it was… nice, to feel like someone could finally understand him. It’s the effect that Sal seems to have on people, and is what, Travis assumes, draws others to him. His nosiness was a side effect of wanting to understand people, of wanting to help.
And God did Travis need help.
His father’s decided to make his life hell, metaphorically breathing down his neck anytime he was around since the school’s phone calls to the Phelps’s household about Travis’s less-than-stellar (less-than-passing) grades had picked up in pace. Their message was clear enough after the first time: “‘Mr. Phelps, your son has failed this or that exam and has forgotten to turn in some assignment, yet again. As it is nearing the halfway mark of the school year, we recommend he improve his performance if he wishes to partake in graduation.” In lesser words: he’s going to be stuck here for another year if he fails those classes, and the thought of that made him want to choke and die.
If only his stomach didn’t twist at the prospect of approaching Sal. And if only Sal’s guard dogs stopped glowering at him whenever he got within their line of sight. Even when he so much as looked in his general direction, Larry or Ash (or worse yet, both) would seemingly manifest to his defense, as if Travis could even bring himself to attack Sal after the incident. Because as shitty as he was, he wasn’t shitty enough to keep pushing around the only person who’s tried comforting him in years.
Whatever. It’s a dick move to ask a favor of someone who’d been on the receiving end of his thesaurus-worthy citation of insults, so he’s hesitant to even try. Though, Sal seemed really insistent on wanting to be there for Travis if he needed him.
He’s tried to work out in his head how things would go if he took Sal up on his offer to hang out. It would be awkward, definitely, after all the things he’s said and done. And they’d probably have to sneak around too, because God forbid Sal’s actual friends find out they were spending time together. And his dad – well, he could deal with his dad if it meant finally having someone to talk to for once.
So he wouldn’t find himself like this, again, sitting alone in the park like some sort of loser.
But he prefers it like that for what he’s here for anyway.
The park’s more empty than he remembers it being when he was younger. Parents have been too scared to let their kids out ever since the disappearances started. A few of those who went missing had been part of their church, and their families would come in to beg the Lord for guidance, desperate enough that they’d ask Travis to pray for their kid all because they went to school together.
Though it’s been a few weeks since the last one happened, none of the fear seemed to subside and instead settled onto the town like a dense fog. He thinks they should add it to the sign they have: “Welcome to Nockfell, where nothing but bad shit happens!”, just one more shitty thing about this place. But even so, it means a quiet park for Travis, away from people who care only enough to gossip in the halls or neatly lined pews.
He’s sitting on a grated floor that’s seen better days; the bolts are rusted and the stripped-down structure complains at every shifting weight. The roof that used to sit atop the playground tower is gone, too, leaving the supporting poles to ominously stretch upwards and reach for the birds that migrate overhead in swarms of black dots. He doesn’t really know the exact science behind it, just enough to appreciate the random patterns they seem to make as the smoke from his cigarette furls around them. He takes another hit, hoping that it would warm him somehow. The open bars of the tower do nothing to keep out the breeze.
Time passes easily like this, smoking and watching the birds fly above. He’s about to light another one up when-
“Hey.”
“-Shit!” The sudden noise startles him and his lighter fumbles out of his hand onto the wood chips below. He jumps up to the edge of the platform, leaning against the metallic fence trying to glance at who-
“You dropped this-”
“-Fuck!” He bangs his head against the archway, turning to see a hand offering the black box to him.
He’s still blinking the stars out of his fucking eyes until he processes that it’s Sally Face reaching up from the ground with his lighter in his outstretched hand and an abnormally large – dare he say cat? – cat in the other.
He snatches the lighter out of Sal’s grasp.
“What the fuck is your problem?” He says, the panic in his voice makes his words shrill, still recovering from the second of contact.
Sal keeps staring at him with his blank-faced mask. If he made any expression with his eyes, Travis would have missed it.
“Why can’t you – I don’t know? Show up normally?”
“I did say ‘hello’ first. To be fair.” Sal answers in an even tone, and adds a hmm at the end as if he plans to continue that thought. “I guess I didn’t expect to catch you so off guard.”
“What do you mean by that?” He has to keep himself from saying it like he’s accusing Sal of something, though it doesn’t seem to do much – bad habit.
“You always seem to be on edge, is all,” and Sal drops the harnessed animal to the ground, grabbing the end of the leash instead, which Travis is sure does fuck-all. Somehow the animal seems sentient enough to escape if it wanted to.
“His name’s Gizmo. I’m taking him out for a walk before it gets dark,” Sal explains, seeing Travis eyeing the monstrosity. The cat sniffs around before plopping down on what it deems to be a comfortable enough spot.
So much for Sal’s idea of taking it on a walk.
“Don’t people usually let them do that on their own.”
“You mean like having an outdoor cat? He’s more of an indoor baby. Besides, it’s not safe for local wildlife. Or for Gizmo, he might get attacked.”
Travis bites back a comment of whatever dumbass creature thinks to attack a cat that big has it coming, natural selection at that point. To say the cat was huge was an understatement; he didn’t even know cats came in that size. He’s sure half of it is fur, though, judging from how the orange-white coat parted lightly in the breeze and exposed its skin beneath. If he doused the thing in water he imagines it would shrink like a sweater left cycling in the dryer.
“Travis?” Sal starts, breaking Travis out of his thoughts of cat-fur-deflation. “You mind if I sit up there with you? The park’s pretty far from where I live, and I’m kinda tired.”
He finds himself stumbling over his words at the sudden prospect of being in a four-by-four foot space with Sal Fisher, “I- Isn’t there a bench there?”
“I want to talk with you more.” Sal says, cocking his head, as if it's something so natural to want to talk with Travis more.
The thought of it makes him flustered enough to look away, not wanting Sal to see the red in his ears, and he shoves a hand into his mental compartment of excuses before he says something really stupid like “Come up here then.”
“I have to go home.”
“Oh.” And Travis could almost trick himself into thinking that Sal sounded disappointed. “Well. I’ll see you around then, yeah?”
“Yeah.” He mutters, grabbing his things and shoving them into his school bag. He hops out from the other side of the tower, wanting to spare himself the awkwardness of going past Sal, before he heads back towards the main road, not bothering to look over his shoulder.
The lights downstairs are on when he gets home, meaning his father’s already back.
He can only hope that he isn’t going through voicemails from the school to remind him of his incompetent son’s shortcomings.
“You’re shivering.” His father sits at the dinner table. “And you’re home early.”
“We didn’t have a lot of chapters to go over,” says Travis, starting up the stairs. He hears his father mutter something, but he leaves that problem for another day, hoping that it’ll be forgotten come tomorrow morning.
The problem was not forgotten tomorrow morning, nor the following days after that. It rears its ugly head when the school inevitably phones home about Travis missing more than a couple of assignments in a few of his classes and leaves him with some ‘fun’ new additions to his growing catalogue of bruises and a leg that hasn’t stopped aching since.
He doesn’t run into Sal at the park again until the start of the weekend.
He wasn’t expecting for it to happen a second time. Sal had said that the park was a ways from where he lived, which meant that he didn’t really have a reason to be there. Unless he was looking to run into Travis, which – is not a thought that he wants to entertain.
“What the fuck are you doing here?” He shouts before he can really stop himself, bewildered to see the other boy already in the tower.
“Oh, sorry.” Sal turns to look down from where he stands. “I didn’t think you were coming by.”
Travis’s mind races with the sudden anxiety that floods his chest. Was Sal snooping around again? What the hell was he trying to find? He’s replaying every moment he spent up there, wondering if he’d left something- a bag?- a book? He always makes sure he cleans up after himself, even taking his trash away. Nothing up there but ash – shouldn’t be anything up there but ash.
Sal walks to the edge of the platform, turning around and placing his hands on the bars to steady himself and takes two rungs down the ladder, jumping the rest of the short distance. “I’m not here to steal your space or anything,” he starts. “Me and Lar sometimes hang around here too.”
Well. Good to know Larry or Sal could’ve barged in on him any day. The thought of that does nothing to ease Travis’s nerves, and neither does the way Sal keeps walking towards him.
He stops, probably making eye contact with Travis. He isn’t sure, since he’s entirely occupied looking at anywhere but Sal’s eyes. “So,” Sal says, “come here often?”
He’s standing really close. If he were to reach his arm out, Travis could press the tips of his fingers against his chest. He’s close enough that he can see how the shadows dip between the scratches on Sal’s mask, bits of fur clinging to his sweater that collected at the bottom, like Sal had tried fruitlessly to wipe the offending bits off.
“Travis?” Fuck.
Travis flushes in embarrassment. “Not- not really. Just, whenever, you know?” (Fucking stupid idiot, he doesnt know, that’s why he asked-) “Whenever I need some time away from stuff.”
He finally meets Sal’s gaze, bright blue that stares right back. “I understand. Everyone needs a place like that.” Sal pauses for a moment, thinking, “You wanna walk home with me?”
“To Addison’s?” and Sal nods.
Truth be told, it’s the last place he’d ever want to walk to. He’s never been inside, really, but he’s heard that nothing good comes in or out of there. When he was too young to be left at home, his dad would leave him in the car, parked in the building’s lot, and he’d hide in the foot-space of the back seat. Even though a decade’s passed since, he still remembers the unsettling feeling of being watched by something inside.
But, “Yeah, sure,” he finds himself saying anyway.
Like an idiot.
“Cool. We can take a shortcut, just follow me.” Sal starts towards an unmarked path that leads into the woods, away from the park entrance.
He sets his pace to match, already regretting his decision as they walk further in, both from the pain radiating up and down his messed up leg and the emotional unease of spending time with someone for the first time. He tries easing his nerves by convincing himself that he’s doing this to work up the guts to ask Sal if he can help his grade situation, and not just to sort-of-want-to become friends with the guy.
“Y’know, I meant what I said before.”
Shit.
He wasn’t paying attention.
“About what?”
Sal has his hands in his pockets, hair swaying as he surveys the trees around them like he’s looking for landmarks to lead the way. “I don’t think you’re a bad guy, Travis, and my offer to hang out still stands.”
Oh, that conversation.
“I’d… like that,” he says. “Your friends probably wouldn’t though.”
“They’ll come around. We’ve been through a lot together, so we’re just protective.”
“Right.” Travis is unsure what to add, because Sal’s definitely left out the part where ‘a lot’ likely included Travis’s years of torment.
“But it’s not like they can tell me who I can hang out with.”
There’s stuff he wants to ask, like what exactly Sal gets out of hanging out with him. But he’s not sure if he wants to know the answer, too scared to prod at whatever this is that’s starting between them, so he stays quiet.
They walk in silence for a length of time that feels much longer than it should, each second stretching into two as Travis trudges over decaying pine needles and…. Well, other sorts of needles. Looking around, it seems like a lot of people like going here for that sort of stuff with the number of bottles, cups, and other trash that scatter the ground every so often. He blushes at the condom wrappers thrown haphazardly along the bases of the trees. Fucking gross, do people not have anywhere better to do that shit? It wasn’t something that made sense to him, why people had their “fun” someplace where literally anyone could walk in on them – like he and Sal right now.
Which made Travis wonder how exactly Sal knew his way back through the woods like this. Was he into that stuff? He was friends with Johnson, after all, who definitely was into this stuff. But Sal seemed content to do his own thing, including being friends with Travis, so maybe that was another thing he just didn’t share with the other boy.
They continue on like this, with Sal following some invisible trail and Travis lost in his head and feeling too uncertain to say anything. At some point his leg starts to ache from overuse, and, much to his dismay, Sal is as perceptive as ever.
“How’d you hurt your leg?” Sal asks, picking at a pinecone that he’d taken off the ground at some point.
He takes a moment to decide if it’s even worth trying to pretend like he hadn’t limped his way through a mile of Nockfell’s forestry, and hopes that Sal takes the hint that he’d rather not talk about it. But based on previous experience he knows he has a better chance of a freak-accident taking him out of this confrontational misery.
“I got in a fight.”
“Really?”
“Why do you care?” He asks. “Call it karma for everything I did.”
“You’re my friend now, Travis. So obviously I care.” Fucking, damnit – there goes Sal again. The words come out of his mouth like it’s so easy, as if Travis isn’t choking over every genuine sentence he tries to speak. “Everyone figures you get into fights, but I don’t think that’s true.”
“I do.” He retorts, because he’s not technically lying when he says so, just leaving out the fact of who he’s fighting with a majority of the time, and the fact that he doesn’t really fight back and it’s more of a one-sided beating.
“I don’t know, man. It doesn’t add up.”
“Well, maybe your math’s shit.”
He’s pushing his buttons at this point. Intentionally or not, Sal’s bringing them dangerously close to falling back on word-sparring and threats and he just wants Sal to keep his mouth shut before Travis gets to the point of saying something he’s going to regret.
“I know I’m relatively new here but it’s been a pretty long time for me to only have heard about you getting into fights twice.”
Travis stops walking, and tries hiding the fact that he’s putting weight off of his bad leg, as fruitful as that could be at that point because what is Travis’s life besides keeping up appearances.
Then Sal turns to him with that accusatory look in his eyes.
“You’d have to be throwing hands every week to be coming into class looking like that all the time.”
“And what if I do? That’s none of your business.” And it really isn’t and Travis would fucking appreciate it if Sal just left it at that.
“Is someone hurting you, Travis?”
“What? No! Wh- you –You can’t just go around accusing people of shit!”
“I didn’t accuse anyone of anything, man,” Sal says, calm as ever, and it’s starting to get on his nerves. “I’m just worried about you.”
“You-” His face heats. “You don’t know anything about me!”
“But I want to. If you don’t want to talk about it-”
“I’m not one of your stupid games to solve!” he shouts.
“I’m not-”
“Shut- just, just stop!”
Sal takes a step forward -
“Just- Fuck off!”
Travis turns his heel, before Sal can finish whatever he meant to do – leaning towards Travis like he was a spooked animal, and sprints back towards the park, towards the main road, feet punching into the dirt below. It’s probably fucking his leg up even more, but he can’t bring himself to care, just one more thing he’s fucked up that day, like pushing Sal away for the second time when he’s been trying for weeks to approach him.
His leg aches. And by the time he’s at his front door, the view of Addison Apartments just down the horizon, he doesn’t feel any less further from Sal’s scrutinizing gaze.