Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Matt has many names. A lot of earned titles.

A punching bag, the dog of his hockey team, a duck decoy, number nine. He’s also a “triplet” sometimes.

That should be his most prominent title, because that’s what he is, and not many people can say that about themselves. It’s rare, a fun thing to bring up in a game of two truths and a lie.

Being a “triplet” has many benefits, such as having two other people at your hip, knowing your every word and sharing thoughts and ideas.

Matt, however, doesn’t reap any of those benefits.

To him, “triplet” is just some shell of a title that comes with being in the womb with two other people.

He’s not a “triplet.” He’s a duck decoy. A punching bag. The angry looking one. He’s Matthew Sturniolo. The black sheep of his family.

And today he has hockey practice.

He wakes up in pain.

Every brush of cloth caressing his skin sends pain blooming all over his back. He’s in a hoodie, in bed, tangled in soft blankets and feather-stuffed pillows, surrounded by multitudes of plushies.

A bed is supposed to be delicate and gentle, a nest for the night. A place to rest.

Matt feels nothing but agony as he moves his shaky arms to push himself out of bed, slowly wiggling his torso out of the covers.

His room smells like Old Spice deodorant and decaying plants. Through the slither of his open window, cars hum on the distant highway.

His body groans in protest, sore muscles whining at him to keep still.

As he swings himself out of bed, the room spins.

He rubs his eyes with his palm and absently yanks his cold phone from the charger, knocking over a water bottle from his nightstand.

It clanks against the ground, cracking plastic. Matt winces at the spike in his head. He digs his fingers into his scalp, wishing he could rake the sharp pain from his skull. No luck.

He refreshes the Home Screen for messages. The photo of Trevor stares back at him with his black beady eyes.

It’s midday.

He sighs and shuffles over to his bathroom, pulling off the fresh love hoodie and shoving it deep into the closet. Chris dosen’t know he has it. Matt isn’t sure why, either. But it’s not his favorite hoodie. He just… sleeps in it.

The bathroom mirror is scary. It has a pale face and red rimmed eyes and a series of hokey-stick-shaped bruises swimming all over its ribs.

Matt looks away, rolling his shoulders. He wants to go back to bed, but the blankets will choke him alive.

He takes a quick shower before pulling on his red Boston hoodie. He digs his nose into the collar and inhales the fresh scent of laundry detergent. Matt shoves his hockey gear in the bag and carefully makes his way downstairs. Hopefully Chris and Nick aren’t filming a YouTube video again.

Nick has a tendency to leave him in the recording—for laughs. Their viewers enjoy him appearing from time to time, like a Disney channel guest or something.

The YouTubers fly to and from California, so Matt never knows when they’re home. They come and go, and he’s just here. The parasite in his parents’ house. 

Matt leaves his sports bag on the floor and shuffles over to the empty kitchen.

Eating is annoying, but playing a “hardcore” sport that consists of shoving and punching requires sustenance. Mary Lu’s words, not his. She’s lectured him on how important protein is, so he pops two frozen protein pancakes in the microwave.

Mom’s the only one who puts in the effort to make sure he’s somewhat stable in his games. He can’t neglect her advice. Especially when she’s right.

After watching him play recently, she complained how Hockey used to be much less violent. That specific game she saw was pretty normal.

He didn’t tell her his jersey number, so she didn’t know it was him being slammed against the boards. She didn’t know it was him starting the fights and getting knocked out. She dosen’t know about the constellation of bruises dotting his ribs and back. She doesn’t know that most of the violence happens after the game.

And she won’t.

He’ll eat his protein pancakes and let her chide him to be careful and that’s it.

No one else asks, so no one else gets to know.

The microwave beeps.

Matt flinches.

His headaches are getting worse. He can’t exactly tell if it’s from being rammed into the lockers or dehydration. The latter feels easier to go with.

He slides the plate onto the counter and grabs the peanut butter, and then the honey. He scoops a generous amount of Skippy onto the stack of pancakes, grimacing.

Nicks door squeaks open and Chris walks into the kitchen, blinking sleep from his eyes. He grabs a cup and makes his way to the fridge.

Chris is half awake, so he doesn’t see Matt stiffen and pointedly focus on his masterpiece.

He drizzles honey over the stack in a zigzag pattern.

“That looks awful,” grumbles Chris, side eyeing Matt’s breakfast as he fills his cup with water.

Matt twists the Skippy peanut butter cap and fishes for a fork in the sink. “Thanks.” His voice is even. Emotionless. It’s all he’s willing to give to somone like Chris. 

“Jeez, it’s twelve in the afternoon and you’re already spewing negativity.” He chugs the water. “Cool it, lava girl.”

“Fuck you.”

Chris places the cup in the sink and without sparing Matt a glance and strides back into Nicks room. 

Matt rubs the sponge around his fork, letting the water run hotter than it should. It burns his skin, but he keeps scrubbing.

He doesn’t know much about Chris, but from their videos he knows he loves Nick and he loves Nate and he loves designing his brand and making things. He loves talking and Pepsi and McDonald’s fires.

But Matt… he hates Matt. He doesn’t hide it, either. 

Matt sits on the island chair and digs his fork into his messy breakfast.

After his sixth birthday, Matt earned a sense of independence. Odd for a triplet, yeah, but its whatever.

He was the scaredy cat who cried when he had to meet new kids at their birthday parties. He needed someone to step up for him when one of Chris’ friends took his toy truck and another took his cupcake because it was her “favorite color.”

As they grew up, Nick and Chris grew closer together. They went to the same games and had the same friends. They went to their own birthday parties and called themselves twins when somone asked.

They started a YouTube channel together.

Matt was the guy Jimmy asked to third wheel on Chris first date. They left him at the park ‘by accident.’ He was being a mood kill apparently.

Instead of trailing behind his brothers , Matt joined a hockey team and found himself a place. Disappearing became easier. Being tired suddenly had a reason. Being angry was okay because he gave it all to the games. 

Matt leaves a lot, to avoiding poisoning the mood. It’s great.

To be needed in a game and not at home.

To throw punches with a purpose.

To let his teammates do that to him…to have secrets. 

He dosen’t need his “brothers” and they don’t need him.

Matt finishes his pancakes, swallowing the nausea crawling up his throat.

He definitely added too much peanut butter.

Fuck. If he hurls all over the ice rink today, he’s screwed.

Chapter Text

Matt’s practice lasts about three hours. 

Today was fine. The fights were…minimal. He didn’t hit his head. The mystery migraine he had earlier hurts about the same. Not more, and that’s good. His bruises get a chance to fade before the next game. 

He drives to his park, hands on the wheel and speeding seven over. He doesn’t own the park, no, but he’s the only one who exists in it, so calling it his hurts absolutely no one. 

If it does, tough luck.

Matt squeezes the leather around his steering wheel. From the moment he stepped into the rink this afternoon, his chest weighed him down, heavy with familiar pressure. 

It didn’t leave him—that feeling that something’s wrong. That he needs to be somewhere and he’s not. 

Breathe, Matt, he tells himself, parking his car in front of the playground. The headlights cut off and his little world turns silent.

Icy panic slides in between his organs like a snake. It settles there and waits. He doesn’t  understand it, but he’s lucky to be alone when this… this thing happens. 

When he gets like this, he can’t fake a smile to look socially acceptable. He wants to curl up in a ball and lay low until it ends.

Leaning over, he clicks the glovebox, pulls out his journal and examines the cover. 

The brown leather smells like Target. Buttons run down the spine and fuzzy string wraps around the book, turning into a bow tie at the center.

It’ll be a fancy addition to his collection of finished journals. 

Matt has three, one from his middle school years and two from high school. He finished the second one sitting in the principal's office after his English teacher sent him there. He couldn’t do a test. Apparently “not paying attention” deserves a referral.

How could he explain to an adult that he couldn’t breathe while breathing fine?

Matt slips out of the car. 

Blue-gray clouds crawl the sky. A crow squawks in the distance, echoing across the yard.

When Matt was little, this place used to be filled with snotty kids digging in the sandbox. During summer time, they collected static electricity in the tube slide and shocked each other.

Now, the pillars are worn around the edges. The mulch hasn’t been replaced in years, and the top layer only gets browner by the day. 

The smell of tobacco lingers in the air. Matt thinks it’s always been there, he just didn’t notice it when he was five, running after Nick and Chris, begging them to let him play tag with them.

He climbs the green stairs of the playground, plops himself on the tallest balcony and lets his legs dangle over the edge. 

Up here, the wind bites harder, but it makes for a great distraction. He almost forgets the weight on his chest. 

Digging in his pocket, he finds his pen, opens to the first page and writes. 

His hands shake with the hockey practice adrenaline, but he manages two whole pages of chicken scratching. 

The gray sky had turned electric blue and orange street lights flicker on, interrupting the evening cool. 

He wipes his nose, glancing around.

The park is still empty. Maybe he can imagine that the world has stopped, and he’s the only person existing. Just him. Unbothered with his “unprompted” frown or the way he flinches or how he can’t be like Chris and Nick.

The breeze penetrates through his hoodie, biting his skin, but the pressure in his chest has eased. 

He shifts, jostling his body to keep his legs from falling asleep. The bruises lining his back flower with pain and his overused muscles moan. 

His knuckles sting where the skin had peeled off, revealing dark brown blood under the surface. He makes a fist and digs it into the metal plate underneath him. 

And then his brain shuts up. 

Pain shoots up his arm like lightning. He presses on and bites his lower lip. It hurts.

No one’s here to stop it. 

Matt thinks he’s a psychopath.

It’s getting colder. He should go home. Mom’ll get worried. 

He releases his first and allows it to dangle in the air, soaking the cold like it’s an intangible ice pack. His fingers pulse with static heat.

He twists the tie around the book bind but it slips out, and the journal flaps open. Matt sees the words ‘hate’ and ‘fucking idiot’ before he shuts it and tries again. 

It takes him four times to tie it and do a double knot for good measure. 

Nick and Chris know nothing about him. They don’t know he does journaling so they don’t have anything to look for.

But…just in case. 

He doesn’t need to give them anymore reasons to hate him. His attitude does the job fine.

***

Later that evening, he pulls into the driveway and waits in his car.

It’s his routine. Preparing himself for either Nick and Chris’s antics, or a completely empty house. 

The empty house sounds more like heaven, but he glances at the windows where kitchen lights spill through the curtains.

Matt shuts the car off and quietly swears under his breath. He comes in through the garage. The crispy cold gets replaced with stuffy warmth and his senses are blessed with the smell of cooked onions and ground beef. 

Food is annoying to eat until Mary Lu makes it. He won’t tell her that because she’d be twisting a masterpiece every night just so he eats, and he can’t do that to her. She’s tired enough.

Navigating the piles of laundry, Matt pushes the door open, climbs the stairs and slips into the kitchen. 

Mom looks up from her pan and smiles. Her lips don’t quite reach her eyes.

“Hi honey,” she abandons her spatula and extends her arms. 

Letting his backpack drop to the floor, he leans into her embrace as she squeezes him tight. Tighter than usual. Matt's sharp inhale gets lost in the sizzling of the butter. 

“How was practice today?” She leans back and cups his cheek. “Why are you out so late?”

Matt wants to melt into her touch. 

He wants to cry.

Everything aches and it’s awful and it’s great and he’s tried.

“It was fine,” he lies. ”I went out with my friends.” 

His voice falters at ‘friends.’ 

Teammates. 

Who else anyway? He isn’t exactly popular amongst the youth.

Mary Lu narrows her eyes and brushes hair out of his eyes.

“Not with that Jason kid too, right?”

Matt forces a wry smile. “Him too, mom. He’s captain.”

He’s been lying to her about hockey since he was twelve. It never got easier, but she'd go into cardiac arrest if she saw his bare back after a random Tuesday. 

“He’s a piece of work is who he is,” she says, slipping her hand away. Matt ignores the chill that crawls in the wake of her touch. 

“Jason’s not that bad.” He is. He's worse than what Mary Lu saw of him. 

“If by ‘not that bad’ you mean when he cussed you out for being late,” she thwacks her spatula against the pan, “then I disagree.” 

“Let’s agree to disagree then.” Matt picks up his backpack. 

Mary Lu sighs and glances over his slouched shoulders, frowning.

Matt internally bristles.

Moms have superpowers. He wouldn’t be too surprised if she’s actively peeling back his layers. His carefully placed, guarded layers. 

“Just…” she glances on the floor and creases her eyebrows. “Don’t let anyone hurt you, okay?

Matt dwindles inside a little. ”’kay mom. I won’t.” 

Sorry.

***

It’s midnight. Matt scrolls through Tiktok. The window is propped open, cooling every nook and cranny of his room. The smell of firewood wafts from outside, blanketing him in nostalgia of winter nights in middle school, when he’d sneak out to play snowball with the neighbors kids. They moved away since then, when Matt was thirteen. 

He lays curled up on his side, screen extended in front of him. The videos fade in and out of focus as his eyelids slide shut. 

The bruises weakly whine from under his sleep hoodie. The Fresh Love merch.

He wiggles himself deeper into the blanket and clicks his phone off. Just as he begins to drift, his door squeaks open.

Only Mom and Dad dare step into his ‘evil lair,’ as Nick likes to call it. But It's not normal for either of them to creep around at three forty-five in the morning.

He keeps his eyes shut like he’s ten again, hiding a DS under the blanket.

“Yo.”

Chris. 

Matt’s eyes fly open. He clutches the blanket around his hoodie, keeping it concealed, and slowly sits. 

Chris never comes into Matt's room. Whatever possessed the guy to break that streak better be good. 

“What,” he croaks, pouring irritation into every letter.

“Me and Nick just came back from a vlog,” he says matter of factly. His tone reveals nothing. We came back from having fun without you, by the way. 

Matt waits. 

Chris stares.

Matt sinks back into his bed. “Great. Awesome for you. Get out.”

Chris shoves his hands into his hoodie and scowls. “Asshole. What if I came asking for help, like, I was injured or something, would you still be such a jerk?”

“I’d tell you to call an ambulance because I’m not a paramedic.” Matt buries his face in the blanket. “Fuck you.”

Chris sighs. “You know what? Whatever.”

A ripple of unease runs up his spine.

Something about having Chris stand in Matt’s room makes him want to throw himself out of the window, but it’s like some… empty space has been filled. He didn’t even know there was an empty space. Whatever. 

Matt wants to toss a pillow at the guy but he can’t. Not with his Fresh Love hoodie on. He wouldn’t live it down if Chris thought of him as some clingy fangirl, sneaking merch from under the mattress.

He’s stuck. Amazing.

“Why was mom upset today?” Asks Chris, examining Matt’s bookshelf for the first time ever.

“Ask her, dumbass. Do I look like a psychic?"

Chris picks up a mini wooden turtle. “She told me and Nick to ‘get along with you.’ Did you complain to her or something?” 

“What—,” Matt shoots up from his spot, keeping the blanket around himself. “No! Chris, get out, and don’t touch that. I don’t want to ‘get along with you’. Keep your YouTube shit to yourself.”

“I knew you’d say that,” Chris grimaces, “but have you like, noticed that most of Mary Lu’s worry lines come from you?”

Matt flinches and then lifts up one of his plushies, locking eyes with his brother. “If you tell me she’s sad because I’m negative, I’m shoving mister wiggles down your throat.”

Silence. 

“Get the hell out of my room, Chris. And put the turtle down”

The younger triplet rolls his eyes. “I worry about mom, grouchy.” His tone loses some of the hostility. He puts the figure back in place. ”I think—I think it’ll help If we… I don’t know, make a video together? Cause It’s been a while. Unless you’re too broad headed of a freak to—”

“—Get over yourself, Superman,” Matt says. He worries about mom too, but Chris doesn't believe he has feelings. “Fine. Yeah. Whatever. Let’s do a video.”

“You’re an ass.”

Matt puts the blanket over his head and falls back on the mattress. “Speak for yourself.”

A beat of silence and the door squeaks shut. The yawning emptiness Chris filled moments ago opens up again. 

Matt’s officially been in three YouTube videos since Nick and Chris started the channel. That’s not counting his appearances in the kitchen, when they do their baking challenge and Matt happens to have an appetite that day. 

Their fans make compilations of him. ‘Matt appearing on the Sturniolo videos for three minutes and forty five seconds,’ or ‘five times we remember the Sturniolo’s are triplets and not twins.’

After two years, their audiences grew, and so did the questions.

“Why isn’t Matt in your videos?” 

“Why isn’t it ‘Sturniolo triplets’ instead of just Sturniolos? it sounds so much better!”

Matt had the same questions, but Nick and Chris, the godsdamned duo, rushed in with their half baked explanations of Matt being uninterested in YouTube, and how he’s pursuing hockey instead. 

Half of that is true. Matt pointedly ignores their career, and just them in general. He doesn't—he doesn’t want to be with them, okay? All they do is tell him that he’s wrong. All the time. Speaking, opinions, thoughts. Everything! 

And fuck. He can’t prove them wrong.

Whatever. It’s for mom. He can handle being in a video for her peace of mind, even if it’s only once in a very, very long while.

***

Matt thinks the living room’s a battlefield unless Mom’s there.

Mary Lu’s routine mostly consists of helping people, and sometimes,—oftentimes—, that includes Matt.

In her presence, Chris bites his tongue, and then Matt doesn't have to defend himself, so Nick doesn’t have to defend Chris.  

Mom keeps the peace.

But she notices their glares. The tension from years of rubbing each other the wrong way, explosive fights and silent treatments. She shakes her head and zones in on her cooking or school paperwork. The three shut up and dismiss themselves.

Mom’s shoulders carry the weight of the world and they can tell. 

In those moments Matt thinks he can let his brothers spew nonsense at him, just so she knows they’re together. He wants her to have some hope of unity. That same hope that Matt lost a long time ago. 

Which is why he’s in a parking lot at two in the morning, leaning over the hood of their family van to see if the camera sits straight.

When they film a car video, Nick and Chris just sit in the garage. Actually, their whole career started because they hung out there during quarantine to get space from Matt. They kinda owe him their money for that, though he wouldn't dare consider that out loud.

Matt throws Nick a thumbs up and slides off the hood, walking back into the driver’s seat.

“It’s a QnA, by the way,” says Nick, frowning at his phone. “Try to be enthusiastic. Last time you were on video you got cake flour all over yourself, so they expect you to be, like, a guy who would get cake flour all over himself.”

Here it goes. “Nick, that was a year ago.”

“I’m aware! I’m just saying that you should answer the questions too. Talk louder.” His screen turns white, illuminating his face. “I got the submissions. Chris, do the intro.”

The recording isn’t a surprise. Nothing new. Chris yells at Matt to speak up. When they get a question specifically about him, the words get stuck in his throat. 

“What’s your favorite food? It’s not that hard to answer,” says Nick, throwing his hands in a mockingly confused manner. 

Matt glares. “I told you! I don’t have a favorite food! I don’t even like food.” His voice shakes and his chest feels heavy. Fuck, fuck, fuck, not now.

Chris groans. “Kid, no one cares, just say pizza or something. Peanut butter.” 

“What? No, peanut tastes likes fucking acid.” Matt feels his heartbeat race, hammering against his chest.

Chris gapes at him. “I saw you eat half of the jar the other day. Are you calling me delusional?”

“I eat it for sports reasons,” Matt scowls, swallowing the nausea crawling up his throat. “I hate it.”

“Yeah. Sports is like the only thing we can talk to our viewers about when it comes to you. Most interesting thing you do is swing a stick.”

“You’ve never even seen me play, Chris,” Matt deadpans, voice low and steady, like he’s balancing on a tight rope.

Nick groans loudly. “This is why we don’t film with you! I’ll have to cut half of the footage.”

“I didn’t-“ Matt's arms itch to throw a punch. It’s what he does, always.

But this is a new situation so he can’t hit like he does on the rink. Instead, Matt digs his nails into his palm until warm liquid sprouts from under his fingers. “I didn’t even want to be here.” Partially a lie. Something about Chris standing in his room the other night made him think — it made him feel… He shakes his head and sighs, releasing his fist.

He should’ve seen this from a mile away.

Always happens.

“Sure, my favorite food is pizza,” he grumbles, crossing his arms to keep them from shaking. Matt wants out of this van. This is exactly why he spends all his stupid time alone. 

“Great! Now say that again, but with a little more umph in it.” Nick leans over Matt’s shoulder, lacing his words with forced sarcasm. “You talk like you’re not even speaking. You mumble.”

“Get away from me.”

Chris snorts. “Okay, tough guy.”

Matt fixes his eyes on the steering wheel. The patterns are old, pressed in and worn out by Moms and Dads fingers.

Chris pulls his seatbelt to the buckle, sending Nick a knowing look that reads ‘I knew this would happen.’ “Let’s just go home since Matt wants to make everything about himself.”

Breathe in. Breathe out. 

Invisible tendrils curl around his throat. A mix of moldy fear and anger boils over him, slipping over, seeping into every crevice of his body. He inhales a deep breath, exhales and slumps forward. “Fine.”

The backseat light clicks off. They can’t see the tremor in his fingers or how he blinks away a spurt of hot tears. 

Never again.

He has a game tomorrow anyway. Sleep is important or something. 

Chapter Text

Matt’s back collides with the ground. 

He digs his elbow into the ice beneath him, propping himself up. 

“Ice hogs” number forty-eight towers over him like a mountain.

What a dumb team name, he thinks, pushing himself up and going for another punch.

Number forty-eight dodges. His fist reels back and connects with Matt's shoulder. He bites back a yelp and shoves forward with his entire body. 

A flash of black and white appears on the edge of his vision. Number forty-eight ignores the linesman and wraps his fingers around Matt’s arms, throwing him against the dasher boards. 

He presses his hand into the wall to stay upright. It slips. He crashes to the ice.

His teammates linger back, huddled side by side like a unit. They’re not coming to help. He’s used to it. 

The audience gasps and shrieks and roars. He wants to cover his ears, but he catches coach Ross’s stare from the benches. He’s frowning. 

The instructions were to take forty-eight down.

This shouldn’t be new. 

Matt lunges, but rough hands seize his jersey and rip him back. 

Forty-eight has a linesman pulling him, too, but he wrestles himself out and skates over to his side of the rink and into the penalty box.

Matt lets his linesman shove him away to his own box, where he throws himself over the dasher-board and stumbles to the bench. His gloves fly back at him.

“Up in five, kid,” the man says gruffly and skates away.

He nods mutely, glancing at the players bench.

Coach Ross isn’t looking at him anymore, but Matt shivers. He was told to immobilize number forty-eight. Instead he earned both of them a five minute penalty.

He had one job. 

His bare fist aches where new scabs replace the old. Fresh blood drips down his fingers, wiped over his shorts as he slides his gloves back on.

The adrenaline eases and shocked buzzing begins running under his skin like a swarm of bees. His back and side scream where he hit the wall. The blade of his skate goes up and down as he jitters his knee. 

The timer says three minutes. 

He watches Davis, their biggest guy, push the puck closer to the opposing goal. His movements are harsh and angry, swiftly parading around the ice.

The scoreboard glares at Cold-Blood's failure, and Jason, their team captain, must have seen it.

They all see it and that invisible cloud of tension creeps up on them, hanging over the rink like a storm cloud.

He ignores how some of his teammates glare at him.

From across the ice, Jason clenches his fist.

Matt knows the command. “Don’t go anywhere after the game, Sturniolo.” 

Despite nine years of playing with Cold-Blood, despite all the injuries and headaches and sprained ankles and lies to Mary Lu, there’s fear coiling in his gut. Cold and familiar, gripping his insides with anticipation for the inevitable that comes after a lost game.

But this is not like that other fear,—being at the edge of a cliff and not seeing the edge. 

No. This is different

This is staring him in the eye. It doesn't sneak around or play tricks. He’s good at dealing with it. It’s what he does. Lick his own wounds. The obvious ones at least.

The opposing team dances across the rink like they own it and Cold-Blood builds more aggression as the score goes up.

The penalty buzzer sounds like a drill biting into metal. Matt flinches, shoots up and flies back out. 

So does forty-eight.

He wishes he’d hit harder. Both would be out of commission. 

Clearly, Matt’s teammates agree.

The tension is heavier out here, where the air should be crisp and excitement-high. He glances at his angry team. They zoom past him, catching him by the shoulder. 

His entire body goes rigid and he almost spins out of control but steadies himself like he’s done this thousand times before. 

Go figure. 

***

Cold-blood loses. 

‘Ice hogs’ win.

Matt sits on the edge of the bench. His bloodied hand trembles more than usual, smudging brand-new red on the laces as he tries to untie them. 

His team silently scuffles on the far end of the bleachers.

He can feel eyes burning his back.

Mentally, he braces. 

***

He’s the first in the locker room. 

Water drips from a broken shower pipe somewhere, echoing through the cold building.

Broken lights flicker above him, outlining the century-old cobweb clinging to the lamps. 

He slides the soakers on his skates, puts them in his bag and shoves the whole thing in his locker, slamming it for good measure. 

Footsteps crowd the hallway. The door swings open and Cold-Blood files in, all broad shoulders and red faces. 

Some players head to the showers, the ones who don’t pay Matt any mind. He’s grateful for them. 

The rest linger in between stalls or lockers, hidden, changing and talking amongst themselves. Others just take their stuff and leave. He’s down to two guys near him. They fiddle with their bags, milling around the bench.

He’s at the very corner, boxed in.

Jason, their captain, tosses his bag on the bench next to Matt, barely missing him. 

“There‘s our little decoy!” He pats Matt on the shoulder before jamming his own locker open.

He knows better than to speak. Better than to move. 

Calm before the storm.

Davis, the hot head of the team, crosses his arms and leans on the wall. “What happened out there, Sturniolo?”

Somewhere in the back of the room, the murmuring stops.

Everything is suddenly quiet, anticipating his next move.

Matt fixes his eyes on Davis, half glaring. He’s feeling daring today, or maybe that’s the adrenaline talking.

The guy is all about confrontation. Attack first, pick up the mess later. The other teams dodge him out of fear, but Coach Ross doesn't send him to do the dirty work like he does Matt. Davis would do his job well, but he’s too important. Something about the most valuable hinges needing to be the brightest.

Matt ignores the rapid galloping of his heart. “Coach told me to take forty-eight down and I did.”

“Key words,” Jason sighs from behind him and inches closer to Matt. “Take. Him. Down. So why did he come back?”

Matt looks up at Davis through his hair. “Sorry. Can’t exactly give someone a concussion with the helmet on.” 

Davis clenches his fist, hard. He shoves an accusatory finger into Matt’s chest, who recoils before digging his feet into the floor and standing his ground.

“We lost,” Davis seethes. “We lost because you’re being lazy. You think you can find better than us? You think anyone else can deal with your bullshit?”

Matt swallows the urge to reel back, stuff himself in a corner and wait this out. “No. I can’t find anyone else. I get it.”  He tries to keep his voice steady and low. “I get it, alright? I know my job and I’ll try to do better.”

A fist collides with his temple. He stumbles back, catching himself by the locker and blinking off the stars in his vision. Davis grabs him by the collar and slams him into the door behind him.

The handle digs into a particularly tender spot on his back. He chokes mid word as Davis curls a fist around the hoodie and pushes into his throat. 

“You will do better,” he scowls, gesturing his head for Jason to come closer. ”I’ve seen you take down guys three times your size, no problem.”

“No problem?” Matt whispers, struggling to pull Davis’s hand away from his throat. “I broke my f—fucking arm that—that time.”

“And why didn’t you today?” He pulls Matt forward and quickly pushes him back down. White pain shoots from the back of his head, dimming the edges of his vision. 

“Do you understand fucking commitment? Team effort? If you want to stay here you will fight harder.”

Matt hates it the most when Davis initiates the fight lesson. He can fight Jason, who’s about the same build as Matt and throws kicks better than punches. 

Davis is different. He has him pinned, weak, cowering, admitting he's a useless piece of shit who should try harder.

Yes, he should’ve used his elbow to shove forty-eight. He should’ve thrown off his helmet and had a real brawl.

He was fucking pathetic today. 

“I’ll knock the next guy out, okay? Just—just let me go,” gasps Matt, cringing at the strangled sound of his voice. “Don’t take me off the roster.”

Davis’s grip loosens, but he jerks Matt down, forcing him to the ground.

His palms dig into the tiled floor, but before he can collect himself, Jason approaches, throwing a kick to the ribs. 

Matt collides with the cold tiles, hard. 

His head throbs—no, fuck that—his whole body. 

Everything hurts like hell.

He tries to scramble up but the boot returns full force, this time to the stomach. 

Jason's shadow looms over him. Matt props himself up by the elbow, but he can’t avoid the next hit. His insides feel like they’ve caved in and he’s trying to cover up the hollowness with his hands and knees.

The hum of the locker room drops into loud silence. 

Hands grab his hoodie and yank him sideways. His ribs dig into the bench.

“Do you know why we keep you around?” Jason’s voice rings through the dimming silence. Matt grimaces, watching how the patterns on the ceiling dance. 

A fist cracks against his face and tries pulling away, cursing quietly. Jason gives him a hard shake. “Earth to fuck face!” 

“Because I fight,” Matt grits through his teeth. He wishes he had the strength to punch back, but there’s two of them and one of him.

He’s jostled again. “Because that’s all you're good for. Understand? We need you here. If you weren’t a good decoy, coach Ross would write your ass off of the roster.”

Jason releases his hoodie and Matt falls back into the bench.

The two guys stroll out of the now empty locker. The door slams with a loud slap. Matt flinches, blinking away the heat behind his eyes.

“Fuck you guys,” he whispers.

He tries propping himself up, falls back, clenches his jaw and with a shaking arm, straightens out.

His torso is on fire. 

Matt licks his lip. Tastes like iron. Lots of it. 

Pulling his bag from the locker, he walks over to the mirrors and faces the messed up guy on the other side. An angry bruise flowers on his temple, blooming over to his eye and making it look like a black-eye. It’s stark against his pale face.

He stares back at himself with a stone cold expression. 

In another life, he's bolder. Nick and Chris never started being sick of him. Im another life he never lost everything good to give to his family.

He swings his bag over his shoulder and limps out.

***

Next to his car, the cold rakes his skin. 

Nature’s taunting him, he’s sure of it.

With his knees in the concrete, he digs for the keys in his backpack, movements growing frantic with every passing second. He always puts them in, just in case. Keeping them on his person puts them in danger of being slammed and broken with him. 

And now they're lost.

The scabs on his knuckles brush every rough edge of his equipment, tearing skin with it. 

Blood sprouts. Matt blinks back tears and uses his left hand to keep plowing at his equipment.

Finally, he finds a tiny smooth surface and he yanks them out. The hockey skate keychain jiggles in his trembling hands as he navigates the unlock button.  

Finally, finally he opens the door, tumbles in, tosses his backpack to the backseat and starts the car. 

The rumbling of the engine begins, deep and strong. Warm air blows from the air conditioner, but it’ll take a while for Matt to stop shivering. Every bruise on his back pingpongs the ache.

He wraps his arms around himself and presses his forehead against the wheel. The skin on his back stretches and whines. For a moment, Matt thinks he’s going to cry. 

He carefully fishes for the phone in his pocket and lifts it to his face, placing the cold screen against his temple. Goosebumps prickle his skin. He wants to pull away but he wants to lean in all at the same time. Indecision. His middle fucking name.

After a while he dials ‘mom <3.’ It only rings once before she picks up. 

‘Matt? Are you alright? Did something happen?’ Her panicked voice pierces through the tiny speaker, breaking his silence. Matt lowers the sound, scrunching his features when the world tilts. He definitely has a concussion.

“I’m okay mom,” he says, closing his eyes and adjusting his forehead on the wheel. “I’m sleeping over at a friend's house today, don’t worry about me.”

‘Which friend?’ Her words are laced with suspicion. Mom powers. Matt swears by them.

“Connor. Blonde kid, tall?”

‘Oh, yes I remember,’ she halts. ‘When will I get to meet your friends? You always hang out with them but they never hang out with us.’

“One of them has a cat.” Matt forces a smile. “You know I can’t resist.”

She laughs. ‘Well you guys have fun. Oh and Matt, be home no later than ten in the morning, okay?’

Cold guilt churns in his gut. “Yeah. Okay. Bye mom.”

‘Bye honey.’

He tosses his phone into the passenger seat.

The movement makes him want to scream. 

He bites his lower lip instead. Fucking lockers and their stupid steel locks. 

He sighs, digging his hands into his armpits. 

When he was twelve, he read a book on easy deception. Something something psychology, blah blah blah, but believing your lie helps it sound real. Being casual about it all, too. 

He doesn't exactly lie too often.

When punching, Matt’s team is always careful to avoid his face. Coach Ross’s orders. He’s afraid of the administrators because Matt can’t be caught coming out of regular practice with dark purple all over his face.

But Matt glared a second too long today, pissed off Davis of all people. The guy forgot the no-face-punching rule.

He can’t go to the nurse. Again, coach Ross’s orders. They’ll raise suspicion.

He can’t go home like this, either.

Matt sighs, slowly backing out of the driveway. 

Mary Lou will be at work in the morning and he’ll be able to sneak into his room safely. 

Which means another night in the car. 

Yay.

***

It's three twenty-one in the morning. Matt heaves over the toilet, emptying the last contents of his stomach. 

Normally, these specific public bathroom lights are dimmer, but his concussion begs to differ.

He closes his eyes, using his arm to steady himself against the stall. 

Sweat clings cold against his skin, chilling him for the inside and out.

His body begs him to lay down. The ache in his back, his muscles, bones, and whatever else there is. 

His shallow breaths echo against the walls of the empty building. 

For a minute, time slows down and he can’t tell if an hour has passed or he’s being crazy. 

Where the fuck am I?

He rubs his eyes and remembers. 

His phone lights up from the top of the toilet paper holder.

Over Trevor as the background, there’s a notification: Sturniolo’s Uploaded: REACTING TO ANONYMOUS CONFESSIONS!!!

Matt swipes the tab away and puts the screen face down. The nausea dims.  

He pushes himself off of the wall, carefully, slowly, like he’s going to break, and walks over to the sink. 

The finger numbing tap water runs over the dried blood on his knuckles.

The old mirror warps his face, but even here, his black hole of a bruise takes the spotlight.

When he leaves the bathroom, it’s three twenty-nine. The state-park is quiet. Robert, the old guy who patrols the area, lets him stay overnight. Matt has been hiding out here for as long as he’s had a car.

It’s that time of winter where the bugs have gone to hell where they belong. The only disturbance is the traffic that roars in the distance. 

Matt shoves his hands into his pockets and approaches the corner where blackberries grow.

He's almost in the ray of the street light when he hears a series of footsteps on the other side of the beam. Excited chattering of an ongoing conversation interrupting the night, followed by a bellowing reply smothered with laughter.

Matt slows his pace and frowns. They sound…familiar, but he can’t quite place it. 

The group dives under the street-lamp at the same time as him. Of course it’s Nick and Chris, and their friend Nate because the universe hates Matt. They all turn their heads to him. 

Nick halts first, frowning. “Matt, is that you?”

Matt shrinks under his hoodie and wishes to disappear forever. 

Fuck.

Chapter Text

It wouldn’t hurt if someone dropped a building on him one of these days. 

He locks eyes with Nick, who frowns and takes a reluctant step forward.

Matt pulls his hood over his face, trying to hide the big purple blotch on his temple with the shadow.

The street light buzzes faintly, its glow burning through his skull. 

“I was just leaving,” he says, clenching his jaw to ward off the headache. It doesn’t work.

Nick and Chris exchange a look. 

“Wait, Matt,” Nick squints at him before his eyes go wide. “What the fuck happened to your face?” 

Older brother Nick, to the rescue. Always the hero, the responsible one. The one who knows what to do about every little problem in his stressed-out-yet-productive way. Well, fuck him because he doesn’t know shit about Matt. 

“Hockey game tonight,” he says. Classic excuse. Not exactly a lie, either. 

Nate glances at each brother. “Oh yeah, I was there.” He looks at Matt, who sends him a warning glare. Nate either doesn't catch his drift or gives zero fucks. Matt’s given up trying to understand the kid. 

Nate loves hockey. He was in Cold-Blood when they were kids, back when Chris and Nick were forced to attend Matt's games. That’s how they met Nate, the replacement brother. 

Matt thinks of him as less of a traitor and more like a diffuser. He’s there when Matt isn’t. 

And anyway, he’s lucky it’s Nate who comes over to their house almost every day. Could’ve been Davis, or Jason. 

“Rink five, seven P.M. Cold-Blood versus Ice-Hogs?” Nate says, raising an eyebrow. “It was a good game. Sucks that you guys lost.”

Matt thinks he wants to run away. Or punch Nate, but Mary Lou would disown him. She loves the kid. “Wow. You're spying on me?”

He’s not fazed. “They don’t let you guys take your helmets off. I saw you pick that fight and it was pretty tame—”

“A punch got through. It happens. Good day.” Matt  begins walking back to his car, hoping the hood of the night dissolves him in darkness. 

“Wait, Matt!” 

Someone catches him by the arm. He reels back, wrestling away the attacker. 

Nick lets him step back, palms up as if Matt was going to hit him. “Calm down, Batman.”

Matt shoves the arm into his pocket. He pretends it doesn't ache, that there won’t be a new bruise there. “Fuck off, maybe?”

Behind him, Chris mutters ‘ asshole ’ under his breath. 

Nick crosses his arms. “You pick the fights on the rink?” He raises and eyebrow, baffled at the sheer idea of physical violence. Fucking armatures, the two of them.

Nate sends him an apologetic look.

If Matt got a coin for every time he wanted to be buried six feet underground today, he’d be a billionaire.

He sighs and tilts his head, defeated. “I know. I'm selfish and rude and negative. Did you stop me to tell me all that? Oh wait,” he forces his mouth into a wry smile. “Did you come up with a new nickname, too? What’s next, burden? Or no, wait, how about shame of the family? Has a ring to it, right?”

Chris strides closer, coming nose to nose with Matt, bunching his shoulders and making an almost-shield in front of Nick.

His eyes blaze. “Poor Matty and his Mattitude. ‘Everyone, feel sorry for me.’”

Matt drops his voice into a low growl. “I don’t ask you to feel sorry for me.” Sharp needles dig into his skull. He almost winces. Almost. Chris doesn't deserve the satisfaction of seeing him flinch.

As much as they despise each other, they never hurt one another physically. Nick and Chris tend to do all the pushing amongst themselves, as a joke. They get some flame for it on the internet, but it’s always been friendly. If it’s not, (and that’s rare), they resolve the issue before it escalates.  

But Chris is staring him square in the face, fists clenched, smothering anger under something fragile, ready to blow up in his face.

Matt was twelve when he was told to pick a dangerous fight. The guy was twice his size. Strong too… 

After that game, he sat in the locker room and pressed an ice pack to his eye.

Coach Ross had blamed him for their loss. He told a handful of boys to ‘teach Matt a lesson about effort.’ He didn’t understand what was happening until one kid, Alan, came very close,  smiled, and sucker punched him in the gut.

He knew hockey came with risks. A team player should be willing to take it all. So he did. 

But he won't take it with Chris. This isn’t like hockey and they're not a team.

“Back off.” 

He doesn't back off. He’s too close, and Matt is too exposed, like a fish on a metal cutting board, guts and blood everywhere, making a mess that he can’t clean up. 

Slowly, he moves his arms closer to his ribs, closer to where Jason kicked him. A pretend shield.

He inches back by a millimeter, heartbeat pounding in his ears.

Chris clenches his jaw. “Nick wanted to see if you were okay. You know, like a good brother—” 

“—again, didn’t ask him to—”

“—and you react like a child with a stick so very far up his ass—”

Matt shoves him. 

Nick gasps, darting forward to catch Chris mid fall. The younger clings to him like a newborn kitten, eyes blown wide.

Matt draws back, guilt washing over him like a tidal wave. 

Nick looks at Matt like he pulled a gun and opened fire. He pushes Chris to his feet. “Okay, that was so uncalled for.” 

They stand shoulder to shoulder, eyeing him coldly.

A unit, the two of them, and he’s the unfortunate hurricane passing through their city.

Something sour curdles in his stomach. Fuck, he needs to leave.

“That was your fault.” He digs his nails into his palm and scowls. “You got in my fucking way.”

“That’s what you do,” Chris scales the sidewalk and shoves his index finger into Matt’s chest, just like Davis… “You blame people even though you cause whatever the fuck is wrong with you! Stand up for yourself, actually for once just be a normal human!”

The streetlight flickers. 

A siren wails in the distance and dogs bark in its wake. 

No matter how many concussions bring him amnesia, Matt never forgets how he feels about his “triplet brothers.”

Scorn trickles into his limbs like molten lava. Every shove, kick and punch from earlier feels like a lightning-bolt stab all over again. 

For a millisecond, Chris’s expression skips into something softer. 

Regret…? 

No. 

Matt works his jaw. “I guess…I guess you think every person in the world should be like you two.” The words sound like he’s dragging them through the mud. “But I’m not.” 

Chris’s stone cold expression waves. “That’s not even what I—” 

“How this—” Matt gestures to his face, “—happened is none of your business. Let me play my hockey, brother. I don’t need your…whatever you thought you were doing.” Matt shoves his hands into his pockets and turns around, staring towards the parking lot.

Behind him, Nick makes an offended noise.

Nate whispers something in his ear.

“Dude, no! He’s just being a…” 

Matt is already halfway across the park. 

He doesn't want to hear them. 

He doesn’t care.

Chris’s words ring in his mind. Be a normal human? 

Every interaction with them becomes a new reminder why they don’t talk.

Why it’s just the two of them and one of him.

Why it’s always Matt’s fault.

They hated him from the start. He hates them back. It’s a two way street.

Yeah, he can’t defend himself from his team.

He doesn't want to. 

Being a puppet suits him better than being a brother, so that’s exactly who he’ll be.

+++

“The world isn’t all that bad.” Chris plops himself onto Nick's bed. It’s his favorite place to be apart from Nate’s house. “Like, he’s acting like everything is our fault and it’s genuinely so annoying.” 

“Chris, don’t mess up my bedsheets.” Nick sits hunched over the laptop, editing clips from their Wednesday video when they played Headbandz. 

“You suck at that game by the way,” he says, shifting himself into a more comfortable position.

Nick sighs. “That has been established already. You were saying?”

He flips over on his back and studies the ceiling. “Did you see how he shoved me? Like, who does that? I said the right thing, and then you were worried about mom, and he was being a fucking jerk about it. I don’t want to be near people like him.” 

It’s one of those nights when Matt is the focal point of the conversation. Chris can’t help but complain. 

In senior year, he sat at a table with four girls. All they did was talk about some girl named Abby and how she manipulated them for three years. 

It’s like they were addicted to talking shit. But it was reasonable shit. Chris thinks he has reasonable shit about Matt, too. The kid is a mood killer. Can’t he see how tired Mary Lu looks? He has a million chances to be a little nicer but he never takes them.

“I agree.” Nick types something on the keyboard. “And did you see mom last night?” He glances at Chris, worry written all over his face. “She looked so tired. And I know it’s from her volunteering and all, but I genuinely think she’s stressed about him—”

“—see, the thing is, I would be too.” He sits up. “Matt walks around with a storm cloud over his head and he rains on everyone. It’s so annoying. Like if your life’s all that bad just leave.”

“Don’t say that, Chris,” Nick chides, giving him a look. 

A stab of guilt makes him pause, but he quickly shrugs it off. 

“What?” Chris gestures with his hands. “I’m just saying that it’s impossible to have an actual, like, interaction with him, you know? Did you see that bruise? He’s going to give mom a heart attack.”

Nick glances at the alarm clock in his nightstand. “It’s three in the morning. Where is he even?” 

“No clue.” Chris checks his phone for messages, scrolling down his contact list to Matt’s profile picture; A bold ‘M’. He opens the chat, scanning their last exchange. 

Matt

Have yiy seen the gummy bears mom bought last week
You*

No
Check the pantry.

Can you get some form the store?
I’ll pay you back

Last read on December 12/22

Chris glares at his phone and shuts it off. “I don’t think that he has friends.”

Nick leans back on his chair. “Well, he has teammates. But that’s different, right? Like, they never hang out I think.”

“Dunno,” he shrugs, lifting his hand to flip his hair. “I wouldn’t if I were them.”

Nick stops typing, frowning in thought. “Nate said something about his game tonight.”

Chris lays sideways, resting his head in his hand,  elbow propped against the bed. “What did he say? That Matt picked the fight?”

“Yeah.”

“Why does he even do that? Does he want to be miserable—”

“No, it’s… I have a weird feeling. He’s an asshole and everything, but you gotta admit, that bruise looked so…eugh. What’s the word? Gnarly.”

Chris frowns. Matt’s been playing hockey as long as they can remember, but he’s always fine, apart from the knuckle scabs from the supposed fights. It’s a given.

Like, Matt walks okay and he talks… fine. Quiet, sure, but it’s not abnormal. That’s just Matt. Negative and brooding, but he’s fine. Which is why the temple bruise was a jump-scare tonight. If it was ever bad, Chris doesn’t remember. 

And anyway, Matt killed any chance of sympathy the moment he shoved him. 

He shakes his head, half smiling. “Gnarly is such a slimy word, you know? Gnaaarrrllyy.”

“Chris. I’m serious.” Nick picks up a pencil from the desk and rolls it between his fingers. “He shouldn’t have shoved you, I agree, but we should've left him alone first. He doesn’t like chit-chat.”

Irrigation crawls up his throat and he has to swallow it so it doesn't spill all over Nick. Doesn’t like chit-chat. He doesn't do normal human interaction period, and it’s honestly the weirdest thing. 

“I just don’t get him. He makes it impossible to get even close to him but then like, he’s acting like it’s our fault even though he’s the asshole.” Chris takes a steady breath. 

“No, yeah, it’s just—”

“—he has a family and a—a hockey team and our parents are good parents. Like, life is so much worse for other people.” He crosses his arms. “He should be happy.”

“I agree that he should, I won’t argue with that.” Nick cups his chin with his hands, resting his elbows on his legs. “But If he comes home in a bad…well, worse mood, I don’t want mom to see him like that.” He glances at the carpet. “She gets so upset.”

So upset that she has bags under her eyes. So upset that she picks up Matt’s calls with lightning speed. She asks him what he wants for dinner and the fucker replies with ‘I’m not hungry.’ 

Fire burns in his veins. He rolls his eyes for moms sake. “So, what are you suggesting? That we hide him in the attic until the bruise goes away?” 

Nick shrugs, closing his eyes. “Would be nice. I can just imagine the positive atmosphere entering the house. But no. Sadly, we can’t do that.” He smiles. “But I have an idea.”

Chris yawns, grabbing a pillow. “Whatever it is, I don’t want to know.”

“Chris I need you to—”

“Nick, no.” He glances at the door and lowers his voice. “That kid is violent. I don’t want him near me. Do your idea thing, but I’m staying out of it.”

“I’m going to brunch with Chloe tomorrow.” Nick looks back at the screen. “He won’t hurt you, don't be scared. And to be fair you were in his face. Thats why he shoved you”

“I was defending you, jackass, and I’m not scared of him.” A pause. Chris gasps in mock offence. “Wait, are you defending him?”

“No, I'm just saying.” 

“Whatever.” Chris turns away and buries his head in the pillow. After a few beats of silence, he feels Nick's weight next to him. 

Gentle fingers begin running though his hair, slow and reassuring. Chris melts, pressing himself closer to his brother.

Nick is his safe haven. Chris wouldn’t hesitate to take a bullet for him and he knows it. 

“C’mon.” A smile hints at Nick's voice. “For mom.” 

Chris whines, burying his face in the pillow. 

Matt’s annoying face flashes in his mind.

He’s lucky they look alike, because Chris would've sucker punched the kid without thinking twice, like in those action movies. 

Left hook, dodge, knee to the ribs. 

Matt has no idea what he avoided by walking away tonight.

“Chriiiiissssss. Please? Think of mom.”

“Fine, but only for mom.” He turns around and glares at Nick. “What’s your plan?”

***

It’s ten in the morning. Despite the overcast weather, Boston buzzes with life behind him. His backyard does a good job of blocking out most of the traffic noise.

Matt fiddles with the cold handle. The basement key is old, and it takes a few tries for the lock to make a clicking noise. 

He dives into the house, closing the door behind himself and drinking in the warmth.

The smell of laundry detergent and burnt wood lingers in the basement. It used to smell like old toys and chlorine soaked pool noodles, but after the fire and the renovation…it’s not the same.

Sometimes it feels like their house was uprooted and replaced with a pretend copy, and now they have to go on with their lives and call it home.

He rubs one eye with his palm. Sharp pain shoots into his skull and he jerks his hand back, remembering the tender bruise on his temple. 

Stupid headache, he thinks, rubbing his other eye.

It’s too early for this. He needs a shower.Also food. Definitely food. Probably. 

The stairs next to him feel like a mountain. His muscles ache just thinking about the climb. 

He could’ve used the front door, but that would  risk him bumping into Nick or Chris in the living room. Not an option.

He tries to forget the elastic-tight soreness in his muscles. Cautiously, one step at a time, he climbs the stairs. 

The backpack weighs him down, reminding him of the heavy gear inside. All he can think about is the blood on his shorts and laces. He’ll have to do his own laundry today. 

Matt halts on the last step, peering into the kitchen.

If he expected someone to be home, it wasn’t Chris, leaning on the counter with his phone in hand. He’s usually still asleep by this time.

Matt swallows the lump in his throat and as uncaring as he can, walks into the kitchen, heading fir the second staircase to his bedroom.

So much for using the basement door.

He can feel Chris’s eyes burning into his back. 

Hockey has an audience, sure. Eyes are trained on him when he picks fights almost every game. Matt got used to their jumping enthusiasm and  rattling the bleachers when Cold-Blood scores. 

Here, he’s like a bug under a microscope. 

He’s almost out of the kitchen when Chris calls his name.

Chapter Text

“Hey,” says Chris, voice unreadable. 

Matt looks at him, wary. “If you want an apology, think again.”

“I don’t need—” he inhales sharply, “I don’t need an apology, Matt. Okay? I just want to talk.”

Matt pauses. To talk? He remembers being ten and wishing to hear those exact words from him.

Now it feels odd, but a sliver of hope makes its way into his chest. It’s familiar. It’s what he held on to so dearly as a kid. 

“About what?” He rubs his eye and involuntarily yawns. Shit, he must look pathetic. 

“Did you have breakfast?”

Okay, what is going on?!

Matt narrows his eyes, studying the triplet. “Where would I have breakfast, Chris?”

“I don’t fucking know! I was just asking! You’re actually so annoying!” Chris snaps, throwing his arms in the air. 

Matt’s little bubble of hope pops. 

He’s not an idiot—he knows he provoked him. Talking back is his secret weapon. He retaliates before everyone jumps at him with jabs and accusations. 

Whatever. It was nice while it lasted. 

Chris sighs, lowering his head and pinching the bridge of his nose. “Look, Nick just wanted to know if you wanted to go to the movies with us on Thursday.”

It’s too early to think about anything, but Matt knows better than to agree to this. Their last few encounters were enough for a while.

He also knows he could have a few new bruises to show on Thursday after the game. He won’t be in the right state to sit in the same room as them and keep himself more or less… passive.

He shrugs and turns away. “Sorry, can’t do. I’ll be a buzzkill.” 

“Whatever you say,” mutters Chris, almost sounding… disappointed? What the hell?!

Matt thinks for a moment before asking, “is this about my face?”

Chris doesn’t answer.

Matt sighs, closing his eyes. Ofcourse. Too good to be true. “Mom won’t know about it, don’t worry.”

“How?” Chris looks puzzled. “Will you hide out in your room till it heals?”

“Something like that.” It gets less purple in about two days, which is when he can tell mom he bumped into a pole or something. She freaks out a lot less.

Chris nods, looking to the side. “Cool.”

“Cool.”

“We have cereal…by the way.”

Matt frowns, eyeing him. “Okay. Thanks.” 

“Yeah,” he shrugs and looks at his phone. “We’re out of eggs.”

“Oh.”

One somewhat civil conversation with Chris and it’s awkward as hell. 

Matt isn’t sure what he’s waiting for. Maybe for another offer? A second chance?

No. 

He’s not that pathetic. Plus, it won't end well.

Chris leans his elbows on the counter and starts typing on his phone. Probably to Nick about his unsuccessful mission to keep Matt from worrying mom.

Matt takes that as his cue to leave.

+++

Chris leans over the hood, adjusting the camera until Nick sends him a thumbs up from the passenger seat. 

Chris nods and walks over to the driver’s side. 

Sitting here always feels wrong, like he’s trying to slip into someone else’s role. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t have his license yet.

“I think we should leave him alone.” he says, closing the door with a clap. “He doesn’t want anything to do with us.”

The elder rolls his eyes, scrolling through the photos mom sent them for the video. “He’s an ungrateful mother fucker. We’re over here trying and he’s denying us. He’s impossible.” 

Chris nods, fixing his eye on the steering wheel. “Yeah. Let’s just film the video and forget about it.

“Yeah. That's the best idea you’ve had in years.”

Chris shifts in his seat. Nick was the one who suggested inviting Matt, but he couldn’t help the twinge of disappointment when Matt declined. Rudely.  Like a bitch, because he can’t say anything normal just once. 

But still. They are triplets—Chris forgets that sometimes. One movie night could’ve helped them exist next to each other… maybe? 

Whatever. Matt doesn’t need them. It’s over now and they’ll just get back to normal. Ignoring Matt, since that’s what he wants so bad.

“What are you thinking about? ” Nick absently asks, smiling down at his phone.

Chris shrugs, fiddling with the thread of his sweater. “Nothin’. Let’s just film the video.”

Nick frowns and places the phone face down. “Chris? What’s wrong?” He studies his face. “Is this about Matt?”

Chris shrugs. “Maybe.”

“I’ll kill that mother fucker.”

“No—like, I mean, I told you how he didn’t want to go to the movies, right? I don’t know. It seems—“ he shakes his head. “Seems wrong to like, leave it alone.”

Nick takes his DrPepper can out of the cup holder. “I mean, he told you that Mom won’t know. That kid is weird, but he probably has his own… I don't know, methods for hiding secrets. He doesn’t need our help.”

Chris can only nod. “Yeah. I don’t know. I don’t care about his stupid hockey fights if he’s the one causing  them, but I have a weird gut feeling.”

“Okay, explain.”

“Something feels wrong.” He gnaws at his lip. “I don’t know how else to explain it.”

Nick smiles sheepishly. “Triplet senses?"

The corners of his mouth twitch up and he turns away.“Nah. We don’t spend enough time with Matt to get triplet senses about him. I bet he doesn't even know what that is.”

“So what do we do?” Nick leans over to adjust the camera. “We tried my idea, which wasn't even bad, by the way.”

“Not saying it was. Matt just doesn't understand our efforts.” Chris says. “Wait! Nate goes to watch hockey pretty often.”

Nick grins sarcastically wide. “Are you saying I should walk my sport-loving ass to that stadium and watch a game?” 

Chris rolls his eyes. “Come ooooon. It's good for intel! Just go check it out. Tell me about how Matt picked a fight and I’ll peacefully keep hating.”

“Let's film the video.” Nick purses his lips and begins scrolling through his photos. “Mom sent some pretty good outfits. Look,” he tilts the screen to Chris. 

It's him and Nick holding laser-tag guns and standing back to back like a cover for a spy-kids movie.

He grins, but as he examines the photo, his smile slowly falls. 

Matt isn't there. 

Why does that bother him all of a sudden? Matt didn’t even want to come with them that day. Something about Nick and Chris having too many friends invited.

Still. It's like someone dropped a stone in his stomach. 

Nick sighs and lets his shoulders fall. “Fine, I'll go with Nate and see what’s up if it wipes that look off your face.

“Thanks kid.” Chris lazily reaches over Nick's chest, arms straining for a semi-hug. 

Nick pats his arm, smiling. “Whatever your weird little heart desires.” He points to the camera. “Do the intro.”

***

Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths. Deep breaths.

Matt stands in the midst of the main hall brimming with people. Some are high school kids, red-faced and clutching hockey gear that always feels too big for Matt. Some are overly-cheerful parents, milling around the kids his age like ants surrounding their queen.

People snap their heads to Matt as he hastily maneuvers himself around the sea of people, stuttering apologies in his wake.

Bodies. Breathing. Talking. Buzzing. Too hot. Too close. Too loud. Too loud. Too loud.

Nearing the back exit feels like seeing the heavenly gates. He rams his shoulder into the door and explodes into the dimly lit street.

The metal door closes behind him with a tiny ‘click’ but Matt feels it vibrate in his skull.

August crickets sing their static song into the quiet night, but Matt can’t breathe. He grabs his sweater at his chest, squeezing the cloth in his trembling fist. 

He thuds his back to the wall and slides down on the ground. 

His breaths come in terrifyingly short huffs. He squeezes his eyes shut as hot tears wander down his face, dripping on his knuckles. 

The terror of… something crawls from every side. Invisible claws. Invisible void. Invisible fear. 

I'm stuck. 

I'm stuck. 

I'm stuck. 

I'm stuck. 

I'm stuck. 

Moms not here. She’s with Nick and Chris, celebrating their thirteenth birthday. 

He had a game today. If he skipped—if he skipped it… He digs his free hand into his hair and winces, but doesn’t let go.

“It’s fine Matt,” he whispers through gritted teeth. “You’re fine, it was just a game.”

He missed one chance to celebrate with his brothers for a game. An important one, sure, but he could’ve taken the punishment for being absent. He’s a whole teenager now, he can deal with bruises without his momma! 

No. A teammate wouldn’t think like that. 

Matt sniffles and forces himself to breathe. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. 

The tears feel sticky on his lips, but he loosens the grip on his hair. 

His fingers shake from the adrenaline. The leftover terror that dimly echoes through his bones.

He rubs his eyes, and yawns. It’s good that Mary Lu isn’t here. She’d be looking for him. Luckily, Matt can stay here for as long as he wants. 

Because that is what he wants. 

To be alone.

He exhales one last time and quietly—under his breath— hums ‘happy birthday.’

***

Matt’s legs dangle over the floor as he sits on the locker room vanity, shifting himself away from the sinks on either side.

He rubs a generous amount of Neosporin on his right knuckles and sighs, relishing the cool of the ointment. Pulling out a roll of gauze from the front pocket of his backpack, he begins wrapping it around his hand.

This game wasn’t even bad. Coach Ross told him to cool it this time. They can’t have fights back to back, so Matt didn’t get to punch anyone.

Would’ve been nice, though.

He can’t stop thinking about Chris’s invitation to the movies. Matt knows that If he just had a few more painful scabs to worry about, he wouldn’t be here, frowning over something so stupid and small. 

Without thinking, he sharply tightens the gauze, letting it rub the infection so it burns like hell. 

He secures the tape just enough for it to hurt. Not enough to cause any real damage. Bruises always felt better than infections anyway. 

Matt leans his back to the mirror behind him and frowns. 

Nick and Chris are always together—side by side, trusting each other, hanging out, messing around… sharing ideas. All the stuff Matt never had. 

Their invitation to the movies wasn’t genuine, but something so weak and frail in his gut punches him again and again every time he remembers the disregarding ‘no’ he gave to Chris. How could he miss this? For a game? 

Matt rubs his eyes with his palms until white spots flower in his vision. 

The movies were just a stupid fucking way of saying ‘you’re a hazard and we don’t want you near mom.’ He’s not missing anything.

But that alone isn’t enough to quiet the murmuring in his head. That tug at his heart to run back to Chris, get on his knees and say “yes, Please let me come with you.”

That’s not happening. He’s not a dog. He won’t just trail behind them with a grin and a thumbs up.

Still. He hasn’t been invited to go with them since…since his thirteenth birthday. A part of him wonders if coming could’ve changed things.

He shakes his head. 

Fantasies.

Suddenly, his phone vibrates in his pocket. With his left hand, Matt watches his screen light up a second time with two messages linger just under Trevor’s nose. 

Nick on messages
Can I have a ride? I was here with Nate but he had to leave earlier so he can’t drive me back.

Nick on messages
please? 

Chapter Text

Matt

Can I have a ride?

I was here with Nate but

he can’t drive me back.

Ok Wya?

Outside near the bushes

Raindrops tip-toe the copper roof of the pavilion. Nick rubs his arm and presses against the column next to him, hiding from the plinks of water bouncing from the pavement. The stench of gasoline and smoke carries from the parking lot, covered by the pungent smell of damp soil. 

Nick shoves his hands into his pockets and sighs.

Should’ve stayed inside the building. It’s too fucking cold out here, even under the two sweaters he borrowed from Chris.

Matt’s game was boring as fuck. Nate desperately tried explaining the rules while the crowd roared and cheered about who knows what.

To Nick, the game was just a bunch of guys fighting over an Oreo with sticks. He said so out loud and earned himself a handful of nasty looks. One kid with scary dark eyes whispered amature and Nick had to ground himself before making any violent decisions.

Nate said “it gets interesting later,” but it did not. Apparently fights break out often when Cold-Blood gets involved. Not today though. Today was “clean,” whatever the fuck that means.

At least he can bring Chris some good news. It’s all just hockey. 

Nick snaps out of his head at a series of loud footsteps filling the pavilion. 

What kind of dinosaurs…? 

Nick peers into the hallway, keeping his body concealed behind the column. 

A cohesive unit of players make their way down the hall, pushing against each other and laughing at some inside joke. Their jerseys are crimson red, Cold-blood displayed on the front in bold white letters. 

Matt must be nearby. Nick closes his eyes briefly, surrendering to the thought of his room and silence. He’s dreading the ride home because Negative Nancy is behind the wheel, but Nick can ignore him if that’s what he wants so badly. 

He pulls back, obscuring himself from view and hoped the group will pass him by. 

“Hey kid!” 

He freezes. Are they talking to him because if they are—

“I’m leaving, Jason.”

Matt. 

Ugh, Nick wants to go home! He glances over the pillar just as Matt shrugs his backpack over his shoulder and maneuvers around his team, but he’s not met with the same comradery they shared moments ago. Guys elbow each other's ribs and whisper like gossiping girls.

Nick frowns and double checks the jerseys.

That’s Matt’s team… right?

The blonde kid with the ‘captain’ jersey walks a few paces forward, catching up next to Matt. “You in a rush?”

“Kinda.” He keeps walking with his eyes on the pavement.

“Wow, what a coincidence. So are we!” Blondie smiles and Nick feels his skin crawl. This guy sounds like a bitch “Me and the guys were going to grab some pizza.”

“Great.”

“Yeah, great.” He puts his hand on Matt’s shoulder but Matt jerks back like he got punched. 

What the—

Matt glares, jaw tensing like he’s expecting something. “Someone’s waiting for me, Jason.”

“Bold kid,” says Jason, smirking before he suddenly jerks forward, palms up and fingers curled. “Boo!” 

Matt stumbles back, shoulders at his ears and then like nothing happened, keeps walking. 

Nick watches with his mouth parted.

Why didn’t he—what the hell just happened? 

Matt is all spikes and stone walls when he’s remotely threatened, lashing out every chance he gets. 

Looking at him now, he’s not fighting back to that blonde asshole. Why? And what’s the captain's deal?

“Come on buddy!” Jason laughs and elbows one of the players behind him. “He can’t take a joke, can he?”

Nick doesn’t know why, but anger bubbles under his skin, hot and rushing in like a tidal wave. He has a sudden urge to kill. 

He watches the group of assholes disperse into the parking lot, taking off in their asshole cars with their loud asshole engines. 

If it was Chris out there, being shoved around by his own team, Nick would be behind bars, on trial for mass homicide.

But it’s Matt. Negative, angry, annoying Matt… who stops in the middle of the hall and dips his head to rub his eyes.

His hands are bandaged, a detail Nick hadn’t noticed before.

A sense of wrongness runs through his skin, seeping into his limbs as if the universe had shifted and he’s not where he’s supposed to be. 

Hockey injury. It’s all the usual, normal stuff Matt comes home with, so why is Nick urged to speed walk over to his brother like he might disappear any minute.

He stops midway and lingers a few paces back, remembering who he’s approaching.

Matt hasn’t noticed him. 

Nick shoves his hands into his sweatpants and glances to the side for invisible help. “What happened?” 

Matt startles and snaps his gaze up. “Fuck, Were you here this whole time?” 

The bruise on his jaw resembles spilled ink. It hasn’t gotten better, and something about that doesn’t sit right with Nick. 

What’s wrong with him today? He shouldn't care so much. Matt’s teammates are shit, but he doesn’t know everything. What if—what if Matt’s the asshole and they're just retaliating? In a shit way, but still.

Nick pretends to roll his eyes. ”Calm down, kid. I was around the corner.” He gestures to his bandaged hand. “Are you okay?” 

Matt quickly jerks his hands down, paling. “Uh, fine.”

Nick heard Matt’s ‘fine’ about million times and he didn’t care to squint, to lean in and listen for a little bit. But now the gap between them feels tighter, like it’s pulling them in and they're the subjects tied to each end.

Matt is lying. 

There’s a twinge in his voice that’s always been there, but it sounds different this time.  

What does Nick say now? Accuse him of lying? About what? He’s out of his league. Dealing with Chris on a bad day goes differently than with Matt.

Chris gets all clingy and rude at the same time, but Matt covers himself in spikes and barbed wire. 

“Fine doesn’t sound convincing,” says Nick, narrowing his eyes to see what kind of pitch he’ll throw, but the kid just shrugs and mutters whatever. 

Nick feels like he’s prodding a lion that’s ready to pounce on him. “Whatever you say.” 

Matt reaches down to pick up his backpack only to flinch back like it burned him. 

Oh. So he’s hurt-hurt.

Nick ignores how his stomach contracts into a tight knot, but he doesn’t say anything as he picks up the backpack and swings it over his shoulders. He grunts at the sudden weight, muscles straining to keep himself from stumbling over. “What did you fucking put in here, a house?”

Matt studies him, pale blue eyes wide and unblinking. “I can take—“

Nick rolls his eyes and sighs, starting towards the parking lot. “Shut up, Matt.” 

Matt shuts up. 

What the fuck. 

He should be fighting back and swearing like a sailor. Did someone drug this kid?

Nick isn’t like Chris. He has an immunity to Matt’s bullshit because he’s the oldest, and he won’t retaliate. But he’s used to being threatened and shut down or disrespected by Matt. 

This feels like a day-pass to his little world. A tiny, short chance to get something right and not get his head bitten off.

“So, why didn’t you go with them?” Asks Nick, glancing at his phone. 

Tactic one: pretend like you’re not paying attention. This removes the spotlight from the other person, forcing them to relax. A random fact that Chris told him.

He expects Matt to blow up for being interrogated, but he tucks his hands into his armpits and lets his hair dangle over his eyes. “Wasn’t invited.”

“Oh.” He swallows, opening instagram and refreshing the ‘Sturniolo’s’ page. “Did you lose them a game or something?”

Matt glances at the screen before turning away and shaking his head. “Fuck, Nick I don’t know! Why do you care?!”

There it is. Same old Matt. He can deal with this. 

“I don’t,” says Nick, keeping his voice steady.

“Give me the backpack.” he clenches his bandaged fist. “I need my keys.” Dark red blooms on the creases of the gauze, interrupting the pure white of the bandage. 

Nick stares at his hand, eyes blown wide, suprised the sight of blood. “What the hell are you doing with your hand, Matt? Stop!”

Matt sighs, rubbing his eyes like it’s fucking nothing. Crimson red continues to spread across the bandage. 

Nausea creeps up his throat. “Matt…”

“Just give me the keys, Nick.”

He does and they finally get to the car and Nick watches him start it, movements are careful and calculated, as if he’s cautious not to break something important. 

His fingers hover above the wheel like he’s thinking hard about driving home. He clamps down 

Tighter than he should. 

“Be careful.” Nick glances away. “You’ll rip your…wound thing.”

Matt starts backing out of the driveway. “What were you doing here?” 

Great, now he’s being interrogated. “I came here with Nate.” 

He gives him an apprehensive look. “For fun? Thought you hated sports.”

“To spend time with my friend. And I do hate sports.” How does he even know that? They haven’t had a normal conversation since middle school. 

They don’t say anything for the rest of the drive. 

Once in their driveway, Matt shuts off the car. 

“Thanks for the ride,” says Nick.

“No problem.”

Lies again.

They leave the car and Nick strides over to the front door, rubbing his bare hands together, already picturing his warm bedsheets and clean clothes. 

He glances back.

Matt’s fingers hover over the backseat handle. 

Before Nick thinks, his legs move. 

Matt notices him coming and stiffens. “Nick, I got it.”

“I can tell how you got it.” He opens the door, scoops up the backpack and walks into the house. 

He takes one step at the stairs before Matt pushes ahead, blocking his path. ”What are you doing?” 

Nick groans, running his cold hand down his face. Is Matt allergic to everything nice? Can’t he take a lending hand? 

“What does it look like, motherfucker? You can’t pick up your backpack so I’m doing it for you. Move.” Nick shoves past him, climbing the steps until he reaches Matt’s door and slides into his room. He finds himself surrounded by four walls of nothing. 

This room is only inhabited by Matt and it shows. 

The floor is naked, old wood. Glossy, clean and perfect, exactly like when they moved back in after the fire. After the remodel. The walls are sleek with new paint, even and bare. 

Traffic noise hums from the propped open window across the room.

“Just put it on the floor.” Matt stands in the doorway, shuffling from foot to foot

Nick remembers where he is. 

In Matt’s space. 

His brother's room. 

He hasn’t been here for a while.

Nick props the backpack against the bedframe and heads for the door.

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

He should leave now. It’s cold in here and he needs a hot shower. 

Matt doesn’t meet his eyes as he approaches his nightstand, picks up a brown leather notebook and tosses it in the cabinet. He leans over the table and plugs his phone with a neon green charger.

Nick is halfway out the door when he stops. 

He knows Matt’s fine. He likes his liminal space bedroom and brooding at hockey games and pushing everyone away, but Nick is full of spontaneity today. He leans on the frame and clears his throat. “Are you sure you don’t wanna go to the movies with us? We're going to see ‘the Adam project.’ I heard it’s good, so…” 

Matt looks up from his phone and frowns. “Are you inviting me?”

What possessed him to do this, Nick has no idea.

“I am.” But it’s for mom. She’ll be happy seeing them together for one night, and that’s the only explanation. Nick ignores how his heart leaps at the surprise on Matt’s face.

“Is Chris on board? Or is this another thing where you guys—“

“Yes, he’s on board. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind.” Don't make me regret this, but the words catch in his throat and he swallows the thought. Matt has a way of twisting them and making a huge deal out of nothing.  He’s tired today, and that shit show Cold-Blood put on could’ve set him on edge. Maybe this was a bad idea and maybe it’ll end like it always does. 

Nick fidgets with his hoodie. “Mom was gonna drive us, but if you want—“

“I’ll drive.”

Nick nods and slips out of the room. ”Okay. See ya.”

“Mhm.” 

He hopes this isn’t a mistake. Negative Matt is negative Matt, even if he has an okay reason to be one today.

***

After Nick leaves, Matt takes a shower, pulls on a fresh set of clothes and plops into his bed. He lets his sore muscles relax, melting into the over-stuffed mattress like liquid glue.

The afternoon sun broke through the stubborn clouds earlier. Fiery light blankets his walls, illuminating every last corner in rich orange. 

On the windowsill, tiny rainbows scatter from his glass Charmander Pokémon figure and stretch across the floor.

Matt carefully pulls the blanket over himself, keeping his knuckles mostly untouched. His damp hair holds a marrow-deep cold against him, making the freezing air bite harder.

His wet strands stick out in numerous directions but he doesn’t have the strength to grab a comb and put himself together. His hands ducking burn and his head fucking hurts and the light, as beautiful as it is, makes it worse. He screws his face against the pounding headache and rolls himself into a burrito. 

Why did he agree to go with them? 

Nick was there.

He saw. 

Matt mutters profanities and buries his face into his bedsheets. What was Nick, of all people, doing at the stadium in the first place? He crossed over into Matt’s arena. The life that Nick and Chris can’t touch because the moment they step into his fighting ring, they’ll point out his missed punches or his dead face or how he’s supposed to be friends with his teammates.

He had set his boundary line a long time ago for that exact reason, and it looks like the Atlantic and Pacific Ocean. Nick tried to cross it, but Matt knows he won’t like what he sees past that line. Gloom. Deliberate suffering. Maybe even insanity, but that’s Matt’s business. 

His hope is like a dying bouquet of flowers, and it should be in the trash by now because the stems are rotting. But he said yes, I’ll go with you, and he doesn’t know why. He shouldn’t have. 

Whatever. 

Chris will complain about his tired face and Nick will regret helping him in the first place and then it’ll be over. 

Back to normal. 

Back to being alone, because he likes it. Even though the dying bouquet of flowers is still a little bit alive and it’s bleeding specks of hope. 

Nick saw him, pathetic and tired, and he still helped. 

Fucking weirdo. 

Chapter Text

The first time Matt went to the movies was when he was eleven. Dad found him curled up in the janitor's closet, crying. 

He forgot what happened that day, but he recalls harsh reprimand from coach Ross, who threatened to take him off the roster for ’unwillingness to participate’ or some shit.

Matt kept his mouth shut about all of it because he wasn’t supposed to be crying in the first place. 

Jimmy didn’t ask any more questions—he just took him to the theatre, talking about Marvel superheroes as if Matt wasn’t wiping stray tears from his face. They saw Captain America: the winter soldier and Matt scarfed down a family-sized bag of sour gummy worms.

Coolest day of his life.

But coming here again was a mistake. 

The theatre floor is a black carpet, dotted in a broken pattern of pretend-paint blotches, just like he remembers.

A cheap butter smell wafts from the popcorn machines. On a good day, he would be sent in a surge of nostalgia about childhood and all the sappy shit Nick and Chris always talk about in their videos. 

Today, he’s looking for the nearest trashcan to throw up in. 

The floor sways under his feet as he trails behind Nick and Chris. His teeth chatter despite the hoodie and heat rolling under his skin. The scabs on his knuckles burn, radiating heat from under the bandages. 

Fever. Infection. Headache. His body hates him. Or he hates his body. It goes both ways.

Nick holds out his phone to the receptionist, a middle aged woman with crimson lipstick. She lazily glances at the ticket before pointing them to theatre seven. 

“Thank you!” Chris smiles sweetly and Matt feels a twinge of jealousy toward the receptionist. They never smile at him like that. He quickly shakes his head. 

“Thanks.” Nick says, walking into the hall and hoisting the tote bag of contraband snacks over his shoulder. The wrappers crinkle around and Chris runs up to Nick, pressing his index finger to his lips and grinning “Shhhhh! Those aren’t allowed here!” He looks over his shoulder. 

Nick shrugs him off and rolls his eyes. “Your shushing’s louder than the fucking candy. Mister shusher.”

Chris starts laughing before Nick claps his hand over his mouth and pulls him into the movie theater. 

A uniform hum from the soda machines fills the halls.

Matt stares at the door.

What if he left? Screwed them over? He’s not going to eat any of the candy they bought, which—spoiler alert—is ‘mood killer behavior.’ Throwing up his guts is mood killer behavior, too. 

But Nick invited him. Matt came shadowing them like a third wheel but he’s here for once in his life. Maybe if he can pretend to be someone else, someone chipper and energetic for long enough this could be good. 

He rubs his eyes, sighing. Stupid hope. Stupid movie. Stupid fever. Stupid Nick and his stupid heart and whatever it is that he wanted to accomplish.

Matt is unsteady as he shoves the door and walks into the theater. He knows he can’t be someone else today.

***

Matt grips the wheel, hard. The knuckle injuries seem to be tearing at the seams, but he thinks screw it. He shouldn’t be driving like this. 

Especially at night.

With passengers. 

His low fever had flared into a wildfire fast, and he was grateful the dim theatre lights kept his dying face hidden in shadow. Nick and Chris don’t suspect a thing. Matt gets to keep his dignity. Yay.

On the passenger seat, Chris chugs a can of Pepsi and speaks nonsense at the same time. Something about how he could’ve made the move better and how the ending didn’t make any sense. 

His words blur together in a mush of syllables and fuck all vocabulary in Matt’s head. He winces at another headache spike in his temple. 

“How did they even pick the actors? Like, I think that blonde kid looked nothing like Ryan Reynolds.” He drops the Pepsi can in his cup holder. It lands with a clink that shouldn’t be as loud as it is. “What actor do you think they should they’ve picked? Like, I think they could’ve dyed the kids’ hair—“

“I don’t know Chris,” Matt mumbles, narrowing his eyes on the empty road. Lucky us, he thinks. Because driving in midday traffic is a whole new kind of torture. 

Chris sighs. “You’re so rude Matt. I’m literally like, talking to you right now.”

“Talk to Nick. He’s right there.” He flips the right blinker and turns on their street. Nick leans close to Matt’s shoulder, who swallows the urge to swat at him. He never has people in his car. This is so weird. 

“What’s wrong Matt?”

Again with the questions. If Nick had asked earlier, Matt would’ve snapped like a glowstick and admitted his infection and the concussion and the prolonged headaches that his hockey helmet never prevents. 

But right now he’s nauseous and he can’t decide if he wants to bash someone’s head in or break down crying. 

“Matt?”

“I’m fine.”

Chris stares at him. “Then talk. Have a conversation!”

Matt rolls his car into their driveway and turns off the ignition. The lights flicker off and the engine goes still. “The movie was great,” he says. ”Is that what you wanted to hear?”

Nick places the tote bag in his lap and leans back. “Unbelievable.”

Right. 

Of course. 

Because if Nick really saw the little scene Jason performed today, he would see through the cracks. Just a little bit. But he doesn’t. Nick doesn’t give two fucks about putting two and two together. And that’s  good… means he doesn’t give a fuck. Means neither of them give a fuck and everything is—it’s normal. That's good, right? 

He expects relief from that. Confirmation for his privacy back. Some normalcy because he needs it. 

Instead, an elephant settles on his chest. The familiar one that suffocates him from time to time. It shouldn’t be there.

“You didn’t even want to come,” says Chris, gesturing with his hands. “You just wanted to rot in your bed all night, right? Fucking asshole.” He looks at Nick. “We’re over here inviting this kid and he can’t even tell us if he liked the movie.

Matt suddenly feels the cold sweat brushing against the inside of his hoodie. He wonders when it’s going to be socially acceptable to rip his skin off.

“So what if I wanted to rot in bed all night? I’d be away from you when you run your mouth.“ His voice shakes and he hates it. He should shut up. He should stop talking and leave the car before he ruins what’s already ruined, but this feels too much like letting blood ooze out of his scabs a second too long, or pressing his bruises until they scream. “You always talk, Chris, you talk way too much, and that’s what’s wrong with you! You’re all up in my business about how I should live my life—well, look at yours and learn to shut the fuck up for once!” 

His jaw aches. He can’t remember the last time he spilled so many words at once.

A few moments pass before Chris opens the passenger door and claps it shut. The scented pine tree on his rear view mirror shakes. Matt flinches, squeezing his eyes like he’s back in the locker room, waiting for the next hit. His headache blooms on a tender spot on his temple where the old bruise is supposed to be healing. 

Nick doesn’t notice. 

No. He doesn’t care. Matt thinks. Good fucking riddance.

Because it doesn’t matter.

”I hope you don’t wonder why we never invite you anywhere, “ says Nick, his voice a low growl.

Right. Matt just insulted Nick’s little brother. The tone is deserved… or something. 

He keeps his body still, carefully exhaling and inhaling so the silence doesn’t catch his sick, raspy breaths. “I don’t need you to.”

Nick opens the door. “Good, then it's mutual. Fuck you, Matt.” And then he’s gone, too.

Matt doesn’t know what he expected. 

No, that’s a lie. He expected every word, so what’s with the elephant? What’s with the frustration lodged in his throat? Pushing them away used to be fucking easier.

He wonders if he’d get along with a rabid coyote. Foaming at the mouth, ready to sink its gummy teeth into flesh and tearing it apart. Punishing the trespassers for wanting to light his forest on fire. But they were the ones holding a lighter in his woods. The rabid dog has teeth. The rabid dog will bite. 

Matt presses his forehead against the steering wheel. The silence screams at him. He bites his lower lip to keep himself contained. He tastes copper. Stray tears river down in hot streaks of sticky saltiness, dripping from his chin. He rubs his face and ignores the white pain straining under his bandages. 

It wouldn’t be their first time burning his woods into ashes. Wouldn’t be his first time being the rabid dog, either. 

+++

Nick sits criss-cross at his desk, sliding his mouse over the table and struggling to grip it with his numb fingers. His room currently resembles a Star Market refrigerator. Wind billows outside, caressing the windows with its frosty nails. The neighbors gate bangs against its lock, struggling with the wind in a losing fight. 

Somewhere downstairs, the washing machine rumbles, fabric scuffling against the metallic wall. 

Chris is sprawled out on Nick's bed, swiping through one TikTok after another. His shoulders are tense and eyes unfocused, like he’s thinking really hard but trying not to. 

He’s distracting himself. They haven’t spoken yet.

“We’ve been dipping below average on views lately,” Nick says, tracing his eyes over the laptop monitor. 

Chris momentarily flickers his eyes away from the screen. “What do you want me to do, fly?”

Rude ass bitch. “We could do something unexpected for a vlog. Ideas?”

“Nick, am I too much?”

He doesn’t expect the loaded question. He stares at the triplet, dumbfounded. “What are you talking about?” His tone comes out harsher than he means and he softens his voice. “You’re not too much, Chris, don’t ever say that.”

Chris sits up and wraps his arms around his torso. “I know a lot of our viewers love my ‘energy,’ but it’s like, maybe I’m way too emotional sometimes. Invasive, or whatever.”

Nick keeps the blanket over himself, walks over to the end of the bed and sits. The mattress squeaks like a chorus of ghosts as he adjusts himself. “Go on.”

“I know that you don’t really like hugs,” Chris continues, “but I love them and I’m sorry if I make you uncomfortable—“

“Chris, I'm gonna have to slap you and tape your mouth shut.” 

’You always talk, Chris, you talk way too much, and that’s what’s wrong with you!’

He should’ve stepped in earlier. He allowed Matt to run his mouth for way too long and now he needs to fix this. Nick scoots himself closer to Chris and wraps his arm over his back, pulling him close. “Don’t stop being you because of jealous people like him.” 

“I just wish—,” he sniffles and runs his forearm across his nose, “—that he wasn’t like that, you know? We’re triplets and—and,” he chokes on his words and Nick thinks he could punch someone. Matt specifically. 

Chris—his happy, overly optimistic, hyper little brother—should never sound like this.  

“He’s having a bad day.“ He pauses. “Life.” Five starts for supportive words from Nick, he thinks. Everyone clap. 

“But he’s always like that,” chokes Chris. 

Nick presses him close. “I know.”

Mom and Dad’s voices filter from the kitchen. Cabinets open and close and Nick catches the words fever and sick and something about a snow storm this Sunday. Mom wishes Dad goodnight and says she’s going to find the winter blankets. 

The heater starts humming underneath the floorboards. Dad must’ve turned it on. 

Chris breathes fast, like he’s trying to keep himself contained. Shit. Nick’s not good with tears and the thought of hurting Chris more makes him feel like a monster. He digs his brain for something to say. 

“Not an excuse,” he starts, “but I saw his team being jerks earlier today, when I went to the game.” 

Chris looks up at him, eyes glossy with tears. “Jerks how?”

Nick shrugs. “I think they were leaving him out of a hangout. On purpose.”

Chris falters, processing. “Oh.”

“Again, not an excuse.”

Someone knocks on the door and Chris quickly wipes his eyes. “Yeah, I know.”

“Come in,” calls Nick.

Mary Lu pushes the door with her back, a stack of blankets folded up to her chin. Chris shoots out of the bed and takes them from her.

She sighs, letting her shoulders fall and rolls her wrists. “Thank you sweetheart.”

Chris places the stack of blankets on the bed and presses his palms against the cloth. “These are warm.”

Mom sits next to Nick, who relishes the interrupting warmth next to his body. No matter how old he gets, mom is always a safe haven. 

“These are fresh out of the dryer. It’s going to be extra cold tonight.”

Nick shrugs and drapes his blanket over his head. “It already is.”

She laughs and pulls him into a semi hug. His eyes slide shut and he wants nothing more than to drift away. Just like this. Just like when he was fourteen and depressed out of his mind. 

Chris unwraps a red-green Christmas blanket and wrestles with it to get it over his shoulders, ruffling his already messy hair in the process. Nick smothers his smile, burying his face in Mom’s shoulder. He knows Chris gets over things fast and when he does, Nick tries to do the same for his sake.

“Everything okay hun?” She rubs her hand over his back. 

“Yeah. Long night. Editing.” And Matt. He makes sure to leave that part out. 

She makes a consoling noise and kisses his hair. “Get some sleep. Take a break from editing.”

“Yeah Nick.” Chris lays down in a blanket cocoon next to Mary Lu. She reaches over to ruffle his hair and stands up. The warmth is gone but he doesn’t dare ask for it back. She’s tired, too.

“Don’t get sick.” The door squeals as she opens it. “Matt is running a fever and I don’t want all three of you getting it.”

Nick straightens up and frowns. “Wait, he’s sick?” 

She smiles, shrugging half-heartedly and pulling the door closed. “Yes. Good night boys.” 

Right. She knows they don’t like talking about Matt. It was a long conversation about getting along and brotherhood and effort and personal choices. She respects the rift between her triplets, no matter how much it hurts for a mother.

Nick never guessed there would be a day where he’d strain for more information about that kid. Not now, especially. 

Chris pulls himself up and furrows his brows. “He was sick the whole time?”

“I don’t know.” He ignores the tightness coiling in his chest. “Why didn’t he say anything?”

“He’s like a hamster.”

Nick gives him a bewildered what-the-fuck face. Chris tells him that hamsters tend to hide their illness until it’s too late. He sits back against the wall. “My friend from junior year had a hamster and she said it died out of the blue because of some hamster flu. She knew a lot about hamsters.”

“Could be why he snapped,” Nick falters. “He should’ve said something. Why didn’t he say anything?” He remembers how Matt’s voice shook yelling at Chris or how his hands trembled when he drove. 

No. It’s not Nick’s job to notice…

Chris fiddles with the stringy ends of his blanket. “Because he likes to pretend like he’s so cool and the main character. Or looking for a new reason to be a fucking jerk and ruin peoples days.”

“Chris.” 

“What? It’s not an excuse! Are you on my side or what?”

“I am! Being sick is not an excuse for that asshole to get all close and personal. He has no right to hurt you like that. I would never agree with him.” 

Chris crosses his arms and looks at Nick, challenge shadowing his eyes. “But?”

“But… it’s an explanation.”

Chapter Text

The crowd roars one last time before two men in black and white skate in to break the fight. Chris gnaws on his lip as Matt shrugs off the referee and bee-lines into the penalty box. 

“Is that supposed to happen?!” Chris shouts against the cheering. 

“Yeah! Fights are normal!” Says Nate, grinning from ear to ear. The puck is dropped and the game starts again, but Chris keeps his eyes on the hunched over figure in the penalty box. Matt unclips his helmet and runs his hand through his hair. He can’t see his face clearly, but moments prior the other guy knocked him down a few times, bare fists and all. 

Chris knows hockey is a brutal sport, but to an extent, right? He doesn’t remember Matt’s games from when they were kids, but clearly, his tactics have changed. What was once a kitty pool of ten year olds under their laughable team name is now a riot of stampeding players with knives for shoes, and none of them play around. That bruise on Matt’s face suddenly makes more sense. 

Chris doesn’t know how he feels about it. A part of him wants to burn this place down, but he knows it’s because Matt looks like Nick. Everyone in that ice rink would be fucked if it was Nick.

But that jab at the gut could’ve injured Matt, and maybe it did. Chris won’t know. He doesn’t know Matt well enough. For some reason, that doesn’t sit right with him today.

The small timer on the wall hits zero. Matt’s referee blows the whistle and he’s out again, helmet on and stick in hand. 

Chris can’t deny it—the kid is good. He glides on the ice at an impressive speed, catching up around his team. 

He recovered fast. Like it’s rehearsed to just suck up the blows and get back in. 

The game ends an hour and a half later. Cold-Blood’s loss. The players stiffly gather on their side of the rink to take off their gear while the opposing team celebrates. 

Matt is nowhere to be seen. 

Chris shouldn’t care. He shouldn’t be ‘looking into Matt’s life’ or something. Last week's leftover anger simmers under his skin like a poisonous stew because Matt had meant every single word, grit them through his teeth. So full of range. So full of hate.

They exit the stands. People swarm and discuss or argue and children squeal, playing tag around their parents legs.

Chris presses his shoulder against Nate’s as Nate leads them into the lobby. They could call Nate’s and drive to his house so they could play fortnight and eat leftover chicken Alfredo from Olivegarden. Chris could forget about the game and the fight and his resentful triplet brother. But something shifts low in his stomach, so faint he could ignore it if he tried. 

“Nate,” he says, tugging his arm like a toddler. “Where’s the locker room? I gotta find Matt.”

“Why?”

Why? What is he hoping to find? Another rant about how Chris is a fucking nuisance to the reserved kind? Or maybe the way Matt was being handled on the ice is ingrained in his mind and he doesn’t know how Matt handles the consequences. Bruises, headaches, broken ribs…? Had hockey always been like this!

Nate points to the curve behind the crowd. ”It’s down there. You’ll see it.” 

“Meet you outside in five, I’ll text you,” he says, shaking his phone up and slips into the crowd. 

He comes out on the other side, where the concentration of people disperse and the hall stretches out into a prolonged corridor. As he makes his way down, the crowd becomes a distant chatter. 

The hall smells like iron and laundry detergent, all mixed in with the low temperature from the artificial cold. Chris pulls the hood over his head and rubs his hands. What is he doing? Why is he looking for Matt of all people? The kid still manages to ruin his day without even being next to him. It’s like walking into a lion's den. Whatever. Committing to shit is Chris’s thing.

Further down the hall, a worn out navy green door swings open and Chris slows his pace. It’s the locker room. 

Tall and short, bunchy guys spill out, their sport bags scuffling against one another. 

“Yo, Davis,” a kid with spiky dirty blonde hair pokes his head out from the ‘nurse’ office across from the green door. He tosses an ice pack and Davis catches it, pressing it to his knuckles. He clenches his jaw and glares at his hand, anger silently seething through his teeth. “Thanks, Rob,” he says. His white Converse click against the tiled floor as he marches down the hall and disappears around the corner, flanking his teammates.

The nurses door claps shut and Chris hurries behind the door. It slams with a heavy clang behind him and he blows his breath out, disbelief and adrenaline roaring in his ears. He runs his fingers through his hair and lets the hood fall back. What was his deal? Chris wonders  

if all hockey players are just angry all the time. Was brooding and scowling part of the job requirement?

He purses his lips, examining the hall leading to the showers. “Matt? Are you here?” 

No answer.

He rounds the corner. Matt’s Jansport backpack is propped against the wall. His chunky pair of mahogany skates hang from the open bag, red laces spilling out like liquid snakes. A hockey stick lays discarded next to it. 

“Matt?”

Something scuffles in the neighboring locker bank. Before Chris could get around the wall, he collides with a body. Hands grab his shoulders and push him back. The opponent releases his jacket and retreats a few paces away. Chris stumbles, but his legs keep him grounded. He balls his fists, preparing for another push or blow or something. He looks up and freezes. 

Matt’s haunted pale blue eyes stare back at him. Bangs hanging over his face and the half healed bruise hugging his temple.

And blood. 

Deep red, gushing from his nose like a river, over his mouth and crawling to his chin, dripping down his neck. 

What. The. Fuck.

Matt pins Chris with his gaze. Like a rabbit at gunpoint. Like he’s daring for him to move, to shoot, to do the wrong thing in this situation. But Chris didn’t get an instruction manual for this fucking shit!

Matt reaches over and grabs him by the jacket. “What the hell are you doing here?!” He pulls him into the locker bank, away from the view of the exit.

Chris shrugs his hands away, stepping back and narrowing his eyes. He studies Matt’s face for the first time in years. Before now, all he ever found was rage and hatred and spite. 

Now there’s fear. 

Chris opens his mouth, closes it and opens it again. “M-Matt…what the fuck.”

“It's from the game, Chris. Calm down,” he says, carefully setting his jaw. 

“Bullshit. We saw you! You went back!” He doesn’t know why he’s yelling. Maybe because he’s looking at his brother covered in fucking blood, who’s pretending like it’s fine and now lying about it for hell knows what reason. “Go to the nurse, dipshit.”

Matt doesn’t yell back. He just dips his head and rubs his eyes with his palms. So horribly, terribly un-Matt like. 

Chris’s stomach twists into a knot as he lingers near him. “Shit. Look, Matt,” he stutters, swallowing past the lump in his throat. “I—I just, do you want to go to the nurse? I can take you.”

“I know where the nurse is, dipshit,” he mutters into his hands, mocking the last word. 

Now this is a Matt thing to say. Chris could say his own thing. The bickering will begin and the shit Matt pulled last week will resurface and then it’ll all blow to hell. The worst part is that through it all Matt will still have blood all over his face and the lie he said through his teeth. 

Chris inhales, exhales, collects his scattered anger into a plastic bag and tosses it for later. He can’t argue with Matt when he looks so…bone tired. 

It’s not a fair fight. 

Yeah. Chris nods to himself. Just for now. Just until Matt takes a warm shower and gets all that fucking blood off of his face. And changes the dirty bandages hanging from his knuckles. And a warm plate of food. And gets some sleep.

“I’m here with Nate—”

“Of course you are.”

“Do those faucets work?” He points to the row of sinks across the splitting hallway. “At least wash your face or something.”

Matt shakes his head and lets his hands fall at his sides. “They decided to turn off the system two days ago.”

“What? Why?”

“Dunno.” He paces around the bench and picks up his backpack, shoving the skates inside and pulling the zipper. 

Chris nibbles at the inside of his lip, watching him adjust the bag on his shoulder. He rushes forward and grabs the hockey stick before Matt can. It tilts in his hand, heavier than expected, and he squeezes his fingers around the frayed tape. “Are you gonna go out looking like this?”

“Yes, mother,” Matt rolls his eyes and starts for the exit. “This is a sports building. Shit happens all the time.”

Chris sidesteps the bench and follows him, stealing glances at the maroon flood glistening under his nose. “How often? Like, how often does shit happen? To you.”

Bruises can’t be the extent of it all, right? Games look rough, and that’s besides the fighting. Chris isn’t sure if he wants to let that go. Matt’s an absolute idiot and a liar and a fucking asshole, but the blood is still on his face and he’s acting like it’s an every day occurrence. 

Matt pushes the metal door and holds it out for Chris on the other side. “You and Nate both need a ride?” 

“Uh, sure.” Chris enters the main hall. “Thanks.”

***

Matt rolls the car into the Shell gas station, pulling up to fuel pump seven. 

Next to him, Chris digs in his pocket and announces he’s getting candy before slipping out and marching to the store. He’s not so chipper today. Maybe Matt disturbed his vibe or something. 

Nate lightly taps his shoulder from the back seat. “Do you want anything? Cause I’m going with him.” 

Matt takes out his card and pushes the door open. “I’m good.” 

Nate calls after Chris and scrambles to catch up. They disappear behind the glass door.

As Matt fiddles with his card, frosty air jams up his nose and makes his eyes water. He scrunches his face, ignoring the way his cheek burns where Davis cracked him. 

He adjusts the nozzle into the fuel tank and crosses his arms, inclining one shoulder against the wall. Sore spots moan on his back. He winces and carefully adjusts his position. 

Wind sweeps the skeletal branches and brambles lining the gas station. A man with a yellow windbreaker leans on the building, smoking. 

In the neighboring pump station, a wrinkly man with a shiny head gives him a look over, cocking an eyebrow. He looks like the type of dude who calls teenagers ‘punk’ and calls the police on high school parties.

Matt smiles innocently, stretching the sticky blood on his lips. The man cringes and turns away and Matt relishes the dull spark of satisfaction flickering deep in his chest before it’s replaced with a grating throb in his skull. 

He sighs, pulling the nozzle from the compartment and plopping it back in place. He returns to the driver’s seat and quickly lights up the ignition, turning up the heaters to the highest setting. 

A few minutes pass. Matt checks the pokemon app on his phone as he grinds his teeth against the headache. The back door opens and Nate tosses his plastic bag across the seat before slipping in. 

Chris adjusts himself on the passenger side, digging through his own groceries. “Here,” he extends a hot pink pack of baby wipes to Matt. 

“What?” 

“Clean your face up. I don’t want the cops pulling us over.” He glances at his phone and his lips form a mute o. “Wait, is that Pokémon Go?”

Matt tosses his phone in the cup holder and opens the napkins. He’s not in the mood to get made fun of today. “If the cops pull us over, you wouldn’t be the one dealing with the consequences.”

“You’re welcome by the way,” says Chris, side eyeing him before clawing at his nerd clusters.

Nate shakes a small bottle of pills in front of Matt, who jerks away. Shit. But Chris doesn’t notice and Matt wonders if God is on his side.

“You said you had a headache earlier,” Nate explains.

“Oh.” Matt slowly takes the bottle, furrowing his brows. It’s Ibuprofen. “Thanks.” 

He flips the sun visor and opens the scratched up mirror with a tired click. Over the years Matt has eaten through thousands of dollars worth of baby wipes, but none did the job as well as this off brand shit Chris gave him. The blood clings to the cloth like magic and he makes a mental note to get more of this. 

By the time he finishes, Chris had wriggled his candy open and shoved a handful in his mouth. He extends the bag to Matt. “Just take some.”

He does because Nerds Clusters fucking rock, even from Chris. Who shouldn’t be giving him shit. Who shouldn’t be nice. Not after last week. 

“Shit,” Nate whispers. “Uh, Matt, give me like five minutes, okay? I forgot to get something that my mom asked for.” He jumps out of the car and hurries into the store.

Matt’s half lidded eyes pretend to focus on the dash board. “Sorry about last Saturday,” he mumbles, tone unfriendly and mopy, just like Chris hates. In his defense, apologizing to this fucker is like swallowing a live bird. “I was um— I had a fever.” He leans over and adjusts the heaters. 

Chris wraps the Nerds bag like a soft taco and puts his phone down, working his jaw like he’s thinking hard. “Why didn’t you say anything before?”

Because it’s negative and you’re allergic to me. “Why would I say anything to you?” He leans back in the heated chair and starts popping every sore knuckle and joint in his hands. 

“Because even if you’re the biggest asshole, you're still my brother, Matt.”

A trapdoor opens in his stomach and suddenly all he wants to do is fall through it and hope it kills him. 

Liar, he thinks, because brothers want their own around. Brothers stick together through thick and thin. Brothers move forward as a unit, even when it’s hard. And maybe Cold-Blood is the last thing in this world classified as a family, but they take what they can get from him. They’ve seen him down and bruised and bloody and ugly crying at fourteen and falling on the ice and lingering behind like a fucking loser and they kept him. 

“Sure Chris,” he says instead. “Still your brother.”

Chapter Text

Chris opens the microwave with a popping click, pulling out the meat lover's pizza box. “YouTube studio says our latest videos were twenty percent lower than last month, right?”

“Yes, Chris,” says Nick, frowning at his laptop. “I just said that. Do you ever listen?”

“Calm down, kid. We’ll figure it out.” He places the box on the counter and grabs a slice, sending yellow crumbs jumping across the marble.

Nick groans and rubs his eyes. “What do we do? Maybe we can make another ’try not to laugh’ challenge? It did pretty well last time.”

“No, that’s too soon.” Chris takes a bite. “If we overdo stuff, they won’t be as good.”

“You’re the creative one! Come up with something crazy or fucking—I don’t know— interesting.”

Chris straightens up, squaring his shoulders defensively. “I can’t, asshole! It’s eleven in the morning!”

“That doesn’t—“ Nick sighs and drops his head into his arms. “Sorry, we just need to film today so I can edit.”

Justin walks through the doorway carrying a recycled box piled with Costco items. He heaves the groceries onto the counter and rubs his hands like a fly, reaching for the extra large package of Hershey's chocolate bars. He leans on the fridge and bites into a chocolate. “What’re you guys talking about?” 

Nick cups his hands around his chin and leans his elbows on the table. “We need video ideas, but they can’t be something that we usually do. We need something unique!”

“Yeah, give us an idea.” Chris rips the pizza crust into two and offers the second half to Nick. “What typa’ stuff did you do back in the day?”

“I’m not that old, but try trespassing!” He crumbles the wrapper and opens the trash cabinet, tossing it in like a basketball player. “Live a little. Get into some legal trouble!” He hesitates. “Don’t tell Mary-Lu I said that.”

“We can’t afford to get in trouble online,” says Nick through a mouth full of pizza bread. “It’s our job. Imagine, like, If a cop’s daughter watches our video—“

“Okay, I get it.” Justin slides the grocery box towards himself and hooks the milk carton with his finger, hoisting it into the fridge. “But what if it's a low profile area? Ever heard of the train station behind that Walmart?” 

Matt appears from the stairs with his metal water bottle in hand. 

Justin’s eyes light up. “Matt! Remember you used to explore that train station when you just got your license?"

Matt pauses in the middle of the hall, expression warning and cautious. “Yeah, and I asked you not to tell anyone,” he grits through his teeth and gestures to Nick and Chris with his head.

Chris digs his palms into the counter. “Wait, you went, like, urban exploring!?” 

He sees videos on instagram all the time. POVs of guys jumping around on rusty rooftops and abandoned factories. He wishes he had the guts to do all that shit, and apparently Matt has them. Matt. No fun, routine, boring old Matt went urban exploring on his own, and Chris is only finding that out now? How much more does this kid do?

He hates to admit it, but that’s cool as shit. 

“Are you, like, Spider-Man? Did you go at night? Did someone go with you? Did you bust a drug deal? Does mom know because I know for sure mom would never let—”

“No.” He pushes past Justin and walks over to the sink.

Nick looks at Chris, arching an eyebrow.

Chris shrugs and lightly nods. This could be a good opportunity. Plus, their fans love Matt. The edits go crazy every time he appears on camera for less than a second, that pretty bastard. 

“Come on.” Justin lightly punches Matt on the shoulder. “You guys should film a video together.” 

Matt glares at him. “I don’t go there anymore. The place is in shambles and it’s hard to get around.”

“Suit yourself.” He lowers his voice and says, “you’re missing out.” Justin isn’t around enough to see all of their feuds, but he knows what he needs and manages to stay unbiased about it all. Coldest older brother, in Chris’s opinion.

Matt sighs and unscrews his water bottle, placing the neck under the faucet. 

Justin walks past Chris and pats his shoulder, whispering “Bribe him with candy. Works every time,” and disappears into the garage.

Chris remembers the other day, when he extended his nerd clusters to Matt and he took them without hesitation. He didn’t put up a fight. He didn’t yell or talk back. He looked so fucking tired. Chris wonders if he’s seen too much. 

This is so fucking stupid. Matt was being… different. Vulnerable. If real life was actually a video game—Chris had gone off script—and now the whole world is tipping over. 

Matt clinks his water bottle on the counter. “If you just want a ride, I’m not giving you shit—“

“Not a ride,” says Chris, walking around the table and blocking Nick. “It would be cool if you could take us, though. Show us around, you know?”

“What’s in it for me? Your dazzling company?”

Your company, he almost says, startling himself with the thought. 

Nick stands up. “I’m not going to a fucking slaughter house with you two. Matt’s a maniac and Chris can’t take shit seriously. We’ll die in there. Perish!” He slams the laptop and marches into his room.

Chris smirks, side-eyeing Matt. “He’s really funny when he’s complaining. The video would be great.”

“And?” Matt crosses his arms. “I don’t give a fuck about your YouTube shit.”

“What is this?“ Chris frowns and crosses his arms. “You’re not bleeding all over the place, and suddenly it’s okay to be an asshole?” Is aggression his defense? Chris thinks about how he lied through his teeth, how he refused to go to the nurse, how he pins every injury on the game. The temple bruise, the fever, his torn knuckles…this little fucker is hiding something. 

Matt averts his gaze. “Stop interrogating me, maybe then we’ll talk.”

“Did you tell mom about what happened? Does she know?”

“Kid, shut up! Fine, I’ll take you to the fucking train station.”

Chris raises his arms in mock surrender and Matt flinches. 

Chris ignores how his chest grows tight. “Are you in a gang?” He asks because he needs to defuse this. 

“What? No!” Matt grabs his water bottle and stomps out of the kitchen, giving Chris the middle finger before disappearing up the stairs.

“Just checking,” he mutters, biting his bottom lip. What are you so afraid of?

***

They say when someone does something multiple times and expects a different result, it defines insanity. Matt thinks he’s past that point, but he falls under the familiar category of individuals who ignore the blaring neon signs. Who mindlessly claw at the stubborn barriers of life for broken pieces of a vase that could never be put back. Matt swore he walked away from the mess, yet here he is again, hunched over the shards and pressing the corners together with hot glue. 

“Slow the fuck down, Matt,” says Chris, grabbing his armrest. “This isn’t Fast and Furious.”

Matt trains his eyes on the speedometer as he accelerates. The wheels kick up clouds, fuming in his wake, as he speeds through the suburban neighborhood. Blood-orange rays fight against the wiry woods. The naked field obscures the half-destroyed eighteenth century farms, hiding behind overgrown tendrils. 

“There’s no speed limit here,” he answers. 

From the rear view mirror, he sees Nick clutching the buckle straps and looking positively horrified. Matt releases the pedal and lets the car slow down five dials.

“Holy shit, I’ve never seen this part of town before,” says Chris, ogling the red-bricked church with a missing roof.

“Okay, we can do the intro when we pull up.” Nick fiddles with the camera settings. His voice betrays his nervousness. “Matt, park in the shadow. I need the lighting to be right.”

When they pull up, Matt goes outside and leans over the hood, checking the camera while Chris adjusts it on the dashboard. He flashes a thumbs up and Chris does the same. For a moment, Matt wonders if telling him everything would be as terrible as he thinks. 

No.

He’s not nine anymore. He should use his critical thinking skills. Coming here is just promising a repeat of the last few times he let them in his car, in his life, in his fighting ring. Fuck, yesterday was cutting it close. Chris saw. And maybe he didn’t go off on an aggressive tangent in how it’s all Matt’s fault, but now he has an unfair advantage. Matt’s stuck trying to make him look the other way just like he’s stuck trying to make mom look the other way. Theo could get exhausting really quick. 

He opens the door and lands in the passenger seat, sliding into frame.

“Yeeeee—action!” 

Matt covers his right ear and side eyes Chris. “Why would you do that?”

“It’s our thing,” shrugs Nick and looks straight into the camera. “He’s new around these parts. So today—“

“Wait, Nick can I say it?” Chris tucks his leg underneath himself and turns around. “You did the intro last time.”

Nick widens his eyes in mock surprise. “Go ahead motherfucker. You agreed to this!”

“Okay,” laughs Chris. “So today, we have our triplet brother Matt with us, and we’re going urban exploring. Matt, is this legal?”

Fuck. This video is way too impromptu. Matt forces some bravado into his voice. “Uh, well… There aren’t any trespassing warnings anywhere around here, and this isn’t private property, so we’re good.” He smiles wryly. 

Chris nods. “You heard it here folks. Our personal tour guide approved this mission.”

“Chris, what are you even talking about?” Nick deadpans. “Anyway. This is an abandoned train station and the sun is about to set, so we should go.”

“Wait.” Matt points to the glove compartment. “Open that.”

“For what?” Chris pops open the compartment, revealing a small pile of bandannas.

Matt reaches over and snatches the only blue one. “Abandoned buildings have a lot of dust in the air.”

“Like diseases and shit?” Chris pulls out a neon-orange cloth, still in the package. “Ooh, this one’s new.”

”Yeah.” He ties the bandana over his nose so it covers half of his face. The knot feels familiar on the back of his head. 

“Dude, you look like a vigilante” says Chris and crumbles a plum colored bandana into a ball. He tossed it over his shoulder, Nick barely catching it. 

Both of them tie their masks and Chris grabs the camera on the way out. Matt locks the car and pockets his keys. 

Afternoon sun peeks through the doorless concrete building. A myriad of government-cursing graffiti overlap each other on the walls, the platforms, the broken windows. 

Just like Matt remembers. Just like two years ago. Bad season.

When Covid started, they closed down the stadium for ‘safety reasons.’ He thought they’d never come back, that his team would disband. He thought he lost everything. 

Three months before they opened the rink, Matt got the incentive to get his drivers license to escape their sorry-your-home-burned-down house just for the hell of it. Getting panic attacks every fucking day had him driving back to this excuse for a train station. It was falling apart, just like him. 

Looking at this same building…the memories…fuck, he forgot about all of them until now. 

“Kid.” Chris waves a hand in front of his face. “You okay?”

“What?” He blinks the fog from his eyes and shifts away from Chris. “Yeah, fine. Let’s go.” 

He catches Matt by the shoulder. “Dude—“

“Get off, Chris. I’m here so you can shut your mouth about what happened and leave me alone, alright?” He’s getting too close. He’s pushing the wrong buttons. 

“Okay, tough guy! Sorry for asking.”

Nick takes the camera from Chris and rewinds the tape. “No fighting, girls. You’re both pretty. Matt, you don’t have to be super upbeat. Just,” he hesitates. “Be nice.”

“Negative Matt,” mumbles Chris.

Thank you, Chris. Let’s go back to normal, shall we? He thinks and starts for the train tracks. 

+++

Two hours later, the sun had set. Chris hops over another set of tracks in the rail yard, littered with old station wagons and shipping containers on wheels. Wind penetrates his jacket and the air smells like snow and iron.

“We found a bird nest on the train,” he says, aiming the camera to the platform on one of the wagons. A fluffy mama bird with a black cap is nestled in a pile of dead leaves, sheltering her eggs with her body and sleeping.

“Chris, don’t do that.” Nick presses his elbows into his ribs and shuffles back. 

“Nick is terrified of birds—“

“—as I’ve stated before, stupid. They know.”

Matt reaches out and grabs Chris’s jacket, pulling him back. “Let’s go home. It’s getting cold.”

“Don’t talk to me, fuckass. You always ruin the fun.”

Chris almost regrets it. Almost. But anger boils under his skin, hot and cold and he never wanted to punch anyone more in his life. If Matt wants to deal with his issues himself, he can. Chris should’ve never stepped in. Stubborn asshole. He’s like a brick wall. With barbed fucking wire around. 

Matt stiffens and retreats, palms up in mock surrender, expression hard. “You brought us out here. If you wanted fun you should’ve asked Justin to take you. What the hell do you need me for?”

“Nothing,” Chris grits through his teeth, nose flaring. “We don’t need you for anything, Matt.

Suddenly, the bird startles, making a tiny shriek before lunging at him. 

“Oh shit—“ it swoops past him. He whirls around to see Nick cover his head with his arms, stumble back and trip on the railing. He goes careening to the ground, elbow hitting the metal plate with a sickening blow. 

“Nick!” Chris feels his stomach flip as he rushes to his side. 

Nick wrestles himself upright, burying his forearm in his sweater. A dark spot swims over the gray patterns.

Chris can only make out the blood roaring in his ears as he struggles to register the sight. His hands rest on Nick's back, the only solid reminder he’s not gone, that he’s here and that it’s not the end of his whole world. “Nicky, talk to me buddy!”

“Fucking shit,” Nick breathes, tears shimmering on his cheeks as he squeezes his eyes shut. “Fucking shit. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. I think I cut my arm.”