Read Cactus Flowers :: Incense Cedar

It's getting dark now. Max has been walking through redwoods for what seems like five thousand years and he's pretty thirsty but he can't seem to find the road. This isn't the first time he's been lost but normally he can find his way back a lot faster than it's taking him now. You learn how to do that when no one comes looking for you and normally he's a lot better at it. He's starting to get scared, but he tries to avoid thinking of that word.

Echeveria. Calocedrus. Felicia. There has to more. Think.

Any sun left in the sky isn't doing a great job getting through the trees and Max is thoroughly freaked out now. If someone wasn't planning on brutally murdering him before, it's a huge possibility now, he thinks.

Snap.

Max looks behind him at lightning speed. There's nothing there. Of course there isn't. Because this is just a bunch of trees around a town, not the haunted forest beneath Mt. Fuji so he should just relax.

But he doesn't relax.

He keeps walking.

It feels like he's walking very slow.

It also feels like someone is following him.

Step.

Max feels like there's some black mass creeping up behind him about to grab him and he turns around again.

There's nothing there.

He lets out a frustrated noise that sounds like something between a sigh and a grunt and kicks the ground.

“There's no one here. Stop freaking out.”

Then a voice from behind says, “I wouldn't be so sure about that,” and Max nearly jumps out of his skin. He turns around and backs up until a tree blocks his path.

“Wh-who, why are, where did you, who are you?” Very articulate. He had thought that maybe there was a monster about the grab him, but it’s just another boy around his age.

Max’s eyes slowly transform the monster in his mind back into this boy before him. Claws into pale, tattooed hands. Red glowing eyes to Blue-green ones with long eyelashes. Talons into dirty black boots over ripped jeans.

Oh, he thinks. It's just some delinquent.

The delinquent ignores his question. “There's something out here that's trying to find us. You're an idiot coming out here alone at your age. There's no way you can defend yourself against something so... wild.”

The way he says that is weird and Max is almost positive that he's missing some context, but all he can think to do is defend himself.

“Y-you don't look m-much older than I am.” He mentally curses himself for stuttering. That's so embarrassing.

The delinquent looks mad. Flustered, maybe? No, way, he's probably just mad. “It's different for us! I'm definitely stronger than you.”

“For… us?”

The delinquent looks like he's just realized something. Then he's looking behind him and suddenly he's rushing at Max and Max is freaking out so he doesn't realize what's happening until they're both inside some kind of shed and the guy is holding him in his arms like a princess and looking through the crack in the doors like something's really chasing them.

What the hell is going on here? Max is pretty sure he didn't say that out loud but the delinquent answers him just the same.

“I've been tracking down this creature but it's too stealthy. It can find me easily because of my aura.” Then he looks Max directly in the eyes and his eyes are almost glowing in the dark and Max can't look away. “But maybe I can stay hidden from it if you're next to me.” And it sounds seductive and Max is suddenly hyper-aware of this guys hands on his back and his thighs and all he can think about is if he's close enough to smell his breath or if his body is too stiff or too sweaty and now his hands are definitely sweating because he's thinking about it so much. So he shoves the delinquent off of him and backs up as far as he can without touching anything because there's no way there are no spiders in here and if he does that stupid dance in front of this hot guy that would be super embarrassing.

“Wh-what the h-hell are you talking about??”

“I thought so.” The guy looks like he understands something. “You're not from around here, are you?”

Max thinks better of answering that.

“You have no idea what you are.” The guy walks closer and Max regrets moving back as far as he could. “You must've lived a sad life up until now.”

“I don't know what you mean.” Max retaliates reflexively, his eyes on their shoes. It's half true, but mostly he just doesn't want to let this guy know he's right. Then he's examining Max with bright eyes and a confident expression and Max is pretty sure that he knows anyway.

“Well if you don't know already, then you should know you're a leech and since it's pretty obvious you've spent most of your time around humans you should also know that you've been sucking the life out of them. Like, literally.”

Max opens his mouth like he's going to say something but he doesn't and it just looks like he's a fish or something. What the hell is this guy's deal? It seems like this should be a joke, but this guy looks dead ass serious and this would actually explain a lot of things in his life.

“But that's fine right? Because no one in this town is really all the way human so you don't have to worry about that anymore.”

Is he trying to make Max feel better? He looks kind of concerned. Is it obvious that Max is having a hard time breathing? Maybe if he just doesn't say anything it won't be obvious. But then it's not normal if he doesn't respond, right? Oh, no, his hands are sweaty again and he's wiping them on his shirt but they don't seem to dry. Not like his throat. His throat is really dry.

“Hey. Are you okay?” The delinquent says but Max doesn't catch all of it because he kind of sounds like he's underwater. “Whoa!” The guy holds Max up as his knees buckle and Max reaches his hand out without thinking to steady himself.

Oh, Max thinks. He's having a panic attack.

If he wasn't then he definitely would've been hyper-aware of his hands gripping onto this guys biceps. “Hey, you're hyperventilating! You need to calm down!” The delinquent says, and he clearly doesn't know Max or he wouldn't have even bothered saying it. Max does that fish things again with his mouth. Then the guy grabs his arm and suddenly Max is being held close to his chest and his perfect muscles are all around him and Max is trying not to think about how he doesn't have perfect muscles or how he's in the arms of someone who's probably clinically insane.

Max shuts his eyes tightly and tries to think about botanical names.

Echeveria, Calocedrus, Felicia.

Max squeezes harder on those biceps.

Echeveria, Calocedrus, Felicia.

Loud, slow, deep breaths sound far off in the distance and Max feels like his head is getting closer to the surface. He's trying to find it with his ears and then he's trying to match it with his own breathing but it's so hard. He’s almost kind of calm but then he remembers that he's having a panic attack in the arms of this random guy and it's hard to say if it's more or less embarrassing than the stupid spider dance so he goes right back to panicking. Now it's getting worse and his arm feels like it's going numb and hot tears are welling up in his eyes and Max feels like getting sucked up into a black hole.

Then the guy pulls a little away. “Hey.” He whispers softly into Max's ear. “Look at me.”

Max takes long enough to do so that the guy bends his neck to peek at his face. “It's going to be okay. But you need to try to breathe slower.” He makes an exaggerated breathing motion and Max tries to follow him. The delinquent sits them down and keeps a steady hand on his back. Max pulls his knees to his chest and buries his face because it's comfortable and not at all to hide his tears from this total stranger.

Finally, it's quiet except for two sets of steady breathing.

The guy smells like cologne, but it's probably just deodorant or something. Max thinks he could fall asleep like this.

“Shit. Did he pass out? Ugh! I can just hear Uncle Arto now.” He groans like a teenager and says the next line with a stupidly deep voice. “You need to be more delicate with people, Usko.”

“Is that your name? Usko?”

“Oh, you're alive.”

Then Max tries to shove down the embarrassment of what just happened but it's really hard so he tries to start a conversation but he's shitty at that so he just says, “My name is… um, Max.”

“Call me Narhi.” The delinquent answers. “Usko is a lame old man name.”

“Nah-ree?” Max lets out a shaky breath and looks at the guy in the face for the first time. He sounds like a teenager and Max relaxes a bit until he sees that Narhi has a tattoo on his face and then he thinks this guy might be a criminal or a gang member but then he opens his mouth again.

“Yeah, I mean it's a little bit lame too, but it's better than Usko. That's a stupid name. Like, I hate hearing people say it, it makes me mad.”

Max laughs at this and he thinks, for the first time in a while, that it's probably a real laugh.