latino_menace | OOM: The latest with Mary Anne

'You don't want me to come with you?'

...ow. Ramon swallows, curses himself and then nods.

'Of course. I'll look after him.

...you want me to sleep down here so I don't disturb you?'

"No, I want you."

He shakes his head vehemently.

"It's not that. It's just, he needs supper. More than that, he needs someone to ask how his day was and be excited when he shows you the picture of the frog he drew- I'll stay up. I need to stay up. Let me go get supper fixed."

'I'll do it!'

He says it strongly, and at once. Because Random knows how much he hates doing this stuff but he has to show him that he will . For him.

'Go to bed. I'll be up in an hour or so. I won't wake you if you're asleep.'

"Ask him about the picture," he insists, "and smile when he explains it to you. If there's a squiggle in the corner it's an 'M,' he's learning basic letters, it'll look more like a camel than anything but tell him it's a good job. Make sure he brushes his teeth."

God, what else might Ramon not know?

"Warm milk before bed if he says he's feeling jumpy, and a quarter of a banana. But he has to re-brush after."

Ramon listens, and nods, and siles and want to just collapse on the sofa and never get up again. But he won't, and he'll do what Random says.

'Yes baby, I've looked after a boy before. I can do it.' He kisses him lightly, then shifts so he can get up. 'Go on, and don't worry.'

"Kay."

Standing, and God, does he need to get some sleep. He looks like it, too.

"Wake me up if there's any trouble, anything at all."

Like me having a thousand things to say to you and not being able to tell you any of them?

He just smiles.

'Sure. It'll be fine. Go.'

He makes it up the stairs and into bed, but finds, oddly enough, that he can't sleep.

Missing a body, really.

Ramon is...coping, downstairs. Martin is quiet at first because he's never really that comfortable around Pai. But Ramon really does make an effort and soon he's chattering about his day and showing off the picture and Ramon's making the right noises and then ushering him off to bed.

The boy's happy, at least. Ramon, is not. He's just resigned himself to waiting until the morning to speak to Random, that's all - so he goes upstairs quietly and slips into the bathroom without looking to see if he's awake. He figures the sound of the shower won't wake him up.

He sits up in bed, because no, he couldn't sleep, and waits for him to get out.

He still wants to talk.

He gets a bit of a shock when he walks back into the bedroom, naked and towelling off his hair. But it's a nice surprise and he smiles thinly as he tosses the towel on to a chair and crawls under the covers.

'Did I wake you? Martin's OK, no problems.'

"No, I was just tossing and turning."

He reaches over for him, and wraps around him as much as he can.

"Hey."

'Hey.'

He kisses the top of his head and wraps right back.

'Miss me?'

"Yes."

Emphatically.

"I also feel like I didn't end that conversation, just escaped from it."

'You've got the right,' he says.

'I'm sure it's not something you really want to talk about.'

But he's going to ask him to anyway

"Doesn't make it a good thing to do, sweetheart."

And now he's waiting, kissing Ramon's shoulder gently, for what he needs to say.

'It's...awkward,' he says, slowly.

'Because I thought she just wanted to have sex with me but now I think it's more than that. I think she was in love with me, at some point, though not now because of Ruin. And she told me that if she started an affair with me, I'd be an obsession she wouldn't be able to kick.'

He'll be honest, part of him doesn't mind that thought. If he were single, he'd play on it mercilessly. But the idea of Random having to deal with seeing a woman who secretly wants him like that - it's not fun.

"You didn't know?"

A curious smile at him, because no one wants for that long, cares that much, hurts that badly, if there aren't emotional stakes envolved.

"Sweetheart."

Ramon looks at him oddly, then shakes his head.

'No. I thought she just wanted to sleep with me.'

He's not the sort of person who would automatically assume love is involved anywhere, because love is practically an alien thing to him. He easily knows how he feels about Random but outside of that, it doesn't come into play in his life.

'And now I don't know what to say to her.'

"Ask her what'd be best."

He shrugs, and lets his forehead rest against Ramon's shoulder.

"She'll know what she needs, and it'll make sense, and then we can just go back to normal, alright? She does have Ruin, she'll be fine."

'I know. And it doesn't matter anyway, because I told her that nothing had changed and I still wasn't going to cheat on you. But that was after she showed me what could happen and we both know it wouldn't work anyway - apart from in the timelines where it does - and now I don't think I want to see her anymore, for a while.'

He's terribly confused, which is why its nice to hold Random and know that that's the one thing that isn't changing.

"Then you'll do fine."

He kisses his shoulder, a little more.

"I've got you, you're away from her, you can stay here for a little while and just pass some time with me. Tomorrow, what say we go up in the plane? Martin's going to a playgroup."

'That sounds good.'

Just him and Random, his favourite kind of day. Only...

'...should really sort out the cops first. They'll probably want to see both of us and I'm going to have to clear most of the guns out of the office.'

"Of course."

He'd been looking forwards to talking to them, anyways.

"What are they going to do when they come? Just make vague threats? Or try to arrest you? Or what?"

'Well, they're going to want to know why one of our clubs had drugs worth about five million bucks in its basement yesterday. Lucky it was a small shipment really - if they're clean, they'll tell us about the investigation they're going to start. If they're dirty, they'll hint that it could be made to go away, at which point, I'll pay them off.'

And if they are clean, he'll...find other leverage. Because there's no fucking way he's closing down his operation now.

'I've already made sure that the rest of the places haven't got anything in them. But not obviously because there'll be people watching them at the moment.'

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