“Well, I didn’t want one until you made me try yours, then I changed my mind, so that wasn’t really my fault,” they mumbled.
“Itwasyour fault,” he bellowed. “You could have gone back to get your own, but you didn’t.”
Cya scowled. “I would have missed some of the movie. How’s that fair?”
“No!” He pointed a finger intheirface, this time. “What’s not fair is that you tell me to stand up for myself and get mad at you, but when I do, you still try to turn it back on me. Because you’re a spoiled little rich kid who can’t ever take accountability for anything.”
“I know,” they said quietly.
“And I get your life isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, but we all have hard lives. But, newsflash, most of us don’t have the privilege of wealth and status on our side like you do. Yet, you still find the audacity to make everyone around you miserable, because if you have to be miserable, gods forbid any of us actually be allowed to be happy.”
Their breath hitched. “I know.”
“And you wanna know the real kicker? You could be fun. You could be cool and awesome and have lots of friends because, in the rare moments you stop thinking about yourself, you’re actually a decent person.” Dex closed his fingers around the railing on either side of them, boxing them in, and they sank lower on their tail, head bowed. “But that requires vulnerability, and that’s just too big an ask for a coward like you, isn’t it? So yeah, Cya, maybe that does make you a selfish piece of shit.”
“I know,” Cya whispered, and something wet dripped onto Dex’s foot where it flanked their tail.
“And—wait, what?”
Chest heaving with emotion, Dex blinked away the anger he’d never known was bottled inside him and scrutinized the cowering Sypent. Head down, shoulders hunched, they hugged themself loosely, body lost to Dex’s hoodie. They were sniffling again, and something was dripping off their chin and pinging against the metal floor like raindrops. He inhaled, and he smelled salt and sour sadness and…
“Cy?” he asked, remorse crashing over him as they choked on a sob. “No, no, no, that wasn’t—this isn’t what I wanted. Please, don’t cry.”
“I’m not crying,” they lied, voice breaking.
“Yes, you are, and it’s my fault. I thought you wanted me to—I mean, you told me to yell at you, but I didn’t—I never…” Carefully, so carefully, he cradled their face between his palms. “I take back everything I said, okay? I’m sorry.”
They tried to hide their face, but he added gentle pressure until they were looking at him, cheeks streaked with tears. Even crying, they were beautiful. How was that even possible?
“I didn’t mean it,” he said, and they offered him a sad, resigned smile.
“But you did, because it’s true. I am all those things.”
And oh, how those words twined around his heart and squeezed. “But it’s not all you are. You contain multiples, remember?”
An indistinguishable sound scraped their throat. “Multitudes.”
“That too,” he agreed, and they choked on a laugh. Then they burst into tears, and he didn’t know what to do.
After several long seconds of indecision, Dex did the only thing he could think of. He drew Cya in until their head nestled under his chin. He cupped the back of their neck, fingers tangling in their soft hair. Slowly, he wrapped his other arm around their shoulders and held them.
They didn’t hug him back. Cya’s arms remained curled between their torsos, but he felt the soft tug of their fingers knotting in his t-shirt. They trembled, but he didn’t think it was from the cold.
“What are you doing, Dex?” they asked between stuttered inhales.
“I’m hugging you.”
“Why?”
“Because—” His own breach caught, and he swallowed thickly as he nuzzled the side of their head and breathed in their herby shampoo and incense. “Because I don’t know how else to fix this. Is that okay?”
It took Cya almost thirty seconds to respond, and, worried he’d once again ignored a boundary, he loosened his grip on the back of their head. Before he could release them entirely, they pressed into his body the barest millimeter, a near indiscernible shift of pressure, but he felt it.
“Okay,” they whispered so quietly he almost missed it.
“Okay,” he echoed, slipping his fingers through their hair again.
He lost track of how long they stood like that. Cya cried themself empty, though he wouldn’t have known it, if not for the growing moisture in his fur. They were so quiet. Even their jagged breaths were muffled against their fists.
