Pt. 2 of 2

Jamie Riley 

The hallway outside was colder. The door clicked shut behind them, sealing the noise inside. Jamie shoved him, a push meant to put space between them, to give himself room to breathe and stop the heat rising behind his ribs. But the edge in him bit deeper than planned, the force snapping through his arms before he could reel it back. It sent them all stumbling, Luis and Caleb still clutching at Tino, getting dragged with him, their grips slipping useless as the momentum carried them sideways. Tino slammed into the wall with a sick, full-bodied thud, the back of his head cracking against the plaster with a hollow, brutal sound that echoed. Jamie hadn’t meant to shove him that hard. He’d just needed space. A barrier to keep himself from doing exactly what he was now an inch away from doing. But it was too late. His hands were shaking, not from fear but from a raw, boiling anger clawing up his spine, his jaw locked down so tight it ached.

“You've lost your goddamn mind.” The words ripped out of Jamie before he could stop them. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

Tino’s eyes snapped to him, wide, pupils blown dark with fury and whatever cocktail of shit was still in his system. “What’s wrong with me?! You fucking pushed me! You pushed me for that bitch!”

“Oh my God, you’re delusional.” Jamie could feel the muscles in his arms coil like wire, his teeth grinding against each other. Control was a thin thread now. One more pull and it’d snap clean in two. “Use your fucking head, Tino. This is the last time I pull you out. Next time, I’ll let you sink with the rest of it.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” Tino yelled.

Jamie ignored him and turned to Caleb, who looked one wrong word away from making everything worse. “Get back inside,” he snapped and Caleb moved immediately, grabbing Luis by the arm and dragging him back through the door. They vanished without another word. Useless. Both of them.

“You don’t tell them what to do,” Tino growled, every word crawling under Jamie’s skin like a rash. “You ain’t anyone’s fucking boss, you bitch.”

It was probably a small miracle neither of them had a weapon in reach. Jamie’s vision narrowed. When his body stepped forward, it didn’t even register as a choice. His hand shot out, fingers clamping around Tino’s throat before he even had time to brace. Knuckles ground deep into the skin, palm pressing under Tino’s jaw, driving him back and locking him against the wall.

Tino’s eyes went wide, but he didn’t freeze. Instinct already taking over, his body started to shift, shoulders jerking up and legs twitching to regain ground. Jamie didn’t give him the chance. He slammed his boot down into the side of Tino’s shin, just above the ankle. The force was enough to buckle the leg. Tino staggered, knees giving. His balance broke and with it went the fight in his feet. He couldn’t plant, couldn’t lunge. His hands shot up fast, fingers clawing at Jamie’s wrist, one palm shoving hard against his arm, trying to pry him off. But Jamie only leaned in deeper, his body bracing the grip, pressing him down. His thumb dug tighter into Tino’s skin.

It was easy. Too easy to hold him like this, to feel the fight bleed out under his hands. Something in Jamie tightened, a pull he knew better than to look at directly. There was a flicker of… rightness in the way Tino went from snapping to helpless within seconds, beneath his grip. A shift Jamie felt more than understood. A dark hum beneath the adrenaline, gone as fast as it came, but very much there.

“Get your shit together, Anthony.” He didn’t shout it. The words came low, cold. A flat command, stripped of emotion.

Tino’s grip faltered for half a second, enough for Jamie to tighten the hold even more. He could feel the tremble starting in Tino’s frame from the raw effort of trying to fight back with no leverage. His shoes scraped the floor, trying to regain purchase, trying to dive upward. Jamie stared down at him and squeezed harder, so hard that his hand started to shake and his knuckles turned white. The throb beneath his grip pounded out of rhythm now, skin growing hot beneath his palm. He could feel Tino burning out.

And then, something shifted. Not in Tino’s legs, or in his shoulders. In his hands. The change was so subtle Jamie almost missed it. Tino’s fingers, which had been clawing and prying in blind instinct, slowed. The frantic scrapes eased into a tremor, then to a near-stillness. His fingers wavered, hovered for a breathless beat, then slid over Jamie’s wrist, the skin still tender where nails had raked it. They curled around it, holding him. Jamie’s breath caught hard. His body locked tighter in reflex, as his mind screamed to process what the fuck was happening. Because there wasn't panic in Tino’s grip anymore. It wasn’t fight anymore, but a choice.

Tino’s eyes lifted, hazy, bloodshot and wet, yet burning with a fierce clarity beneath it all. He looked at Jamie as if silently passing something over, as if conceding, fine, you win. It was a quiet surrender, an unspoken acknowledgment that if anyone was going to take this from him, it would be Jamie. Jamie’s throat went bone dry. He let go of Tino, not from forgiveness, not even from control, but because he couldn’t stomach it. Couldn’t hold him like that one second longer. The release was abrupt, and Tino slid down the wall like a string cut. His back hit the floor with a thump, one shoulder first, knees too shaky to hold him. A brutal cough tore out of him. He doubled forward, hands planted on the floor, trying to breathe, gagging once, twice, spit and air tearing at his throat. 

Jamie stepped back. He dragged both hands over his face, palms pushing into his eyes until colors sparked behind them. It didn’t help. The heat was still there, coiled too deep. He’d gone too far. He knew it. Sunk straight to Tino’s level, or maybe lower. And yet Tino hadn’t fought it. It clawed at Jamie now, the way those fingers had stilled, wrapped soft around his wrist like permission.

Tino didn’t lash out again once he finally managed to breathe. He just stared at Jamie, like he was still deciding what to do next, chest rising and falling fast. He didn’t look like someone angry anymore, just someone exhausted by what lived inside him.

When he spoke, his voice came rough, dragged out from somewhere raw. “You wanna fuck her?”

Jamie was thrown completely off course. “What?”

Tino coughed and his fingers began massaging his throat. “Just tell me if you wanna fuck her or no.” 

It could’ve been a joke. Jamie struggled to process it, forgetting for a brief moment what the hell had even started this in the first place.

“No, Tino. I don’t want your sloppy seconds.” 

Jamie stood there a moment longer than he should’ve, before he took a step closer, almost more for himself than for Tino, like he had to reclaim the ground between them. “You ever come at me like that again, and you won’t be getting back up. Do you understand me?” 

He didn’t wait for a reply. Instead, he turned and walked back toward the apartment, shoving the door open and disappearing inside without looking back.