Travis sat awkwardly on the other end of the sofa for several minutes while Charlie completely ignored him in favour of his textbooks before finally remembering he had homework he might as well be doing. Artemis settled between them and Charlie idly rubbed her ears with his toes while he flipped through the pages of his book. It was nice.

Even Robby's company had never been this easy. He liked it when Robby was around, but sharing space with him was always a series of minor discomforts and compromises. Robby listened to the football too loud and didn't clean up after himself and made crude comments about women that just made him seem insecure. Charlie was... comfortable. He fit here, in this tiny flat.

Travis had just begun to settle in and actually focus on his work when a rapid series of knocks on the door jerked both of their heads up. Charlie stayed where he was, but he glared at the door like it was his enemy.

The person at the door only paused for a few seconds before knocking again, more insistently this time, and Travis got to his feet. In the neighbourhood he'd grown up in he'd have answered with his old metal baseball bat in hand, but the area he lived in now was less prone to random lunatics.

When he opened the door, he discovered that the token neighbourhood looney had in fact decided to show up.

"Can I help you?" Travis asked Charlie's grandmother.

"My grandson, have you seen—" She peered past Travis into the flat, and her expression shifted. "Charlie, what are you doing here? Get out of there."

Travis glanced over his shoulder at Charlie, and saw that he had pulled his legs up against his chest and was tugging agitatedly at fistfuls of his hair, his gaze set firmly on his toes. Travis turned back around to face Charlie's grandmother. "I don't think he wants to."

Charlie's grandmother made a sound of annoyance. "I don't care whether he wants to or not. Charlie, you can't just walk out of the house at night without telling anyone. I was this close to calling the police!"

Charlie remained unresponsive, though the tugging on his hair had grown more vicious.

"Charlie—" Charlie's grandmother started again, irritation rising in her voice, but Travis cut her off.

"You know where he is now and that he's fine. Why not let him stay if he wants to?”

Charlie's grandmother shook her head and pressed her lips together so firmly that they trembled. “He can’t just do whatever he wants all the time with no regard for anyone else.”

Travis seriously disliked her, but he could tell she was genuinely distressed. She’d been worried when she thought she’d lost Charlie. She wasn’t uncaring, she was just monumentally bad at this. Starting a fight with her wouldn’t help any of them, least of all Charlie.

"You know what he's done tonight? He's said please and thank you every time I've given him something, he did my dishes without being asked, and then he settled down quietly to do his homework. I get that he worried you by leaving without telling you, but he’s not some delinquent. He’s just stressed out and trying to cope.”

Charlie's grandmother shook her head. "It's different, when you live with him all the time. He won't talk, he won't eat his food. I don't know how to get through to him. What am I supposed to do?" She let out a breathy, slightly hysterical laugh. "And I'm asking a teenage boy, as though you're going to have all the answers."

Travis looked back over his shoulder at Charlie. It felt weird to be talking about him when he was right there. He wasn't sure if it was his place. "Just... let him come over here if he wants to, okay? He's safe and he's getting his homework done."

Charlie's grandmother let out a huff. "He can't just be disappearing without warning whenever he feels like it. He half scared me to death."

"How about we exchange numbers and I call you whenever he comes over? He's most likely to end up here when he’s stressed, which might make it difficult for him to ask first."

She leant past Travis and frowned at Charlie, who was tugging at his hair and ignoring their presence. There was a stretch of silence while she just watched him. "You don't mind?"

A small smile crept onto Travis lips and he shrugged. "I get lonely."

Charlie's grandmother let out a sigh. "Okay. Do you have a piece of paper and a pen?"

Charlie had seemed to be too busy freaking out to take anything in, but when Travis ducked back inside Charlie handed him a pen that had been sitting on the coffee table. Travis tore a scrap of paper from the bottom of a worksheet he'd been working on before they'd been interrupted, and Charlie watched diligently as he scrawled down his phone number, the hands that had been tugging at his hair resting harmlessly on top of his knees.

Charlie’s grandmother was still waiting politely in the doorway by the time Travis returned, and she carefully wrote her phone number down for him when he offered her the piece of paper and the pen. Travis tore the paper in half, handing her the section with his number on and tucking the one with hers into his pocket.

"I'll call if you're not back by the time I go to bed, okay Charlie?" she called into the flat.

For a moment it looked like Charlie was going to ignore her, but after several long seconds he looked up, not quite making eye contact, and nodded.

Charlie's grandmother forced a smile for Travis. "Thank you for taking care of him. Send him home if he gets to be a bother."

"Sure," Travis said, though that didn't sound very likely.

With one last glance in at Charlie, Charlie's grandmother left. 

Travis let out a sigh of relief as he shut the door behind her. "Well."

Charlie was sitting with his knees up, wiggling his toes. He didn't acknowledge Travis when he sat back down on the other end of the sofa.

"You okay?" Travis asked after a few moments.

"That went... better than expected," Charlie said slowly. "I just don't know how to talk to her."

"She's tricky," Travis said. "But... I think she really cares about you, you know? I mean, she’s awful, but it’s not because she hates you or anything."

"I make things difficult," Charlie murmured, rubbing idly at the side of his face. "I tried to be good but I just can't. I'm tired and I want everything to stop."

Charlie's voice sounded sore and he swallowed just a bit too thickly. Travis wanted to reach out to him, to hug him, to do something, but he had no idea if that would be appreciated or only make things worse. God, he wanted so badly to just be able to fix everything. He and Charlie were very different people who had led very different lives, but Travis knew how hard it was to find any kind of peace when your whole world felt unstable.

"You're doing great, Charlie," Travis told him. "You've had so much going on in your life lately and I probably don't know the half of it, but you're still doing your best and carrying on. You're pretty amazing."

Charlie's brow tightened and for a moment he looked almost angry, then he made a small, broken sound and flopped face forward onto the sofa. It took Travis a few seconds to realise he was crying. Well, fuck.

Charlie made a quiet sound in the back of his throat when Travis' hand came to rest on the top of his head, but he didn't move away like Travis had been half expecting. When Travis began to rake his fingers slowly through Charlie's hair, Charlie surprised him by rolling his head into the touch. He sniffled for a few more seconds before shuffling forward until the top of his head rested against Travis' thigh.

From anyone else, Travis would have taken that as clear flirtation. From Charlie, he had no idea. He was fairly sure it meant Charlie liked having his hair petted, but that could easily be all it meant. There was no way to clarify without ruining the moment.

"You like this?" Travis asked as he continued stroking his hand over Charlie's hair.

Charlie made a grumbling sound and squirmed, butting his head against Travis' thigh.

Travis chuckled. "You're practically a cat."

Charlie rolled onto his back and smiled up at Travis. His eyes were still wet and red, but he no longer looked distressed. Just absolutely exhausted. "Yes. I could be your cat and just live here. No one minds if cats are useless. They're supposed to be."

"You're not useless, Charlie. Neither are cats. They're good company, and so are you."

Charlie's eyes jumped away from Travis' face and then slid shut. He yawned and stretched out, squirming around for a moment until he was comfortable and then settled in with his head still pressed against Travis' thigh. Travis continued petting his hair for another minute, and by the time he stopped Charlie seemed almost asleep.

Travis wanted to bend down and kiss his delicate eyelids, feel the soft curve of his lips with his tongue, find out what he was wearing under his hoodie. Instead, he reached for his textbook and did some biology revision as Charlie's breathing deepened and steadied.