But he could only avoid Ned for so long. Once Cole finished his cigarette without coming up with any answers to the questions in his head, he got up from the rusty pipe he’d used for a bench and dragged his feet over the floor littered with rat droppings.
Ned and Tommy had stayed in one of the two office rooms with boarded-up windows. Smoke might have given them away, but the night was warm enough to pass on making a fire, and the two kerosene lamps they had would illuminate the space well enough.
Cole walked up the creaking stairs to the second floor, but as he approached the door of the room where they made camp, his ears picked up Ned’s soft voice as if it were a chime deep in the forest. Ned stopped speaking every now and then, presumably to let Tommy write down his answer.
“Oh, Tommy…” Ned sighed with the tiredness of a man who’d borne the weight of his sins for far too long, and the pained note in his voice had Cole pressing his back to the wall separating the production area from the office.
He stared at the faint moonlight coming through windows that, miraculously, remained whole since the factory’s closure, and listened, envious of the close bond his two companions had developed in such a short time. He was the only outsider in their small group, always leaving the door open and keeping his foot in the threshold so it wouldn’t shut by accident.
“I won’t say it’s fine, but you can’t change the past now. I’m just… I’m sorry for you. It’s a heavy burden for a boy so young. I would know. I lost someone I loved dearly because I couldn’t let go of the past, and getting my revenge didn’t bring back my parents anyway, even if I felt righteous for a while. Keeping this kind of grudge is like carrying a stone in your heart. You wade too far in, and you sink.”
Cole’s heart was so heavy the floor seemed crumbly under his feet, as if it might collapse if he took on any more guilt or grief. Was it him Ned was speaking of? He tried telling himself Ned might mean the living members of his estranged family, but like any man, Cole wanted to be special to someone, even if that person caused him so much pain and continued derailing his life.
The boy scribbled something so furiously Cole could hear the pencil scratching the paper through the door.
“I know,” Ned said after a while, and Cole’s lips itched for another cigarette, but he didn’t want to draw attention to his presence in the corridor. “I promise you’ll be taken care of.”
Perhaps Tommy would grow up smarter than both Ned and Cole. Maybe he’d just live his life as he saw fit and find happiness instead of burning everything in his path in order to feel the heat of blood on his fingers?
“Sure you can. Just come back in a bit.”
Dog paws hit the floor, and Tommy ran out of the room all too fast, followed by his three-legged companion. Cole froze, wondering if the boy had seen him, but when Tommy ran along the walkway, toward the staircase, Cole released the breath he’d been holding and stepped inside the office.
It was still decorated with cheap blue wallpaper, and somehow no one had bothered to take what few pieces of furniture remained after the business closed. There was even a photograph of a man with his family standing on the desk by the window, as if he were only gone for the night.
“All safe?” Ned mumbled, not looking up at Cole. He sat on the heavy wooden desk with paper crumpled in both hands.
“It is,” Cole told him and leaned against the desk too, his gaze gravitating to the script covering the loose page. “Where did he run off to?”
Tommy. The one topic they both wanted to discuss.
Ned shrugged and stuffed the note in his pocket. “He just wanted to play with Dog, take him on a tour of the ‘mansion’. It’ll be best if we all sleep here, I think. It’s a small room so it will warm up easier than the factory floor.”
“That’s true. Might get cold out there,” Cole muttered, for lack of better things to say.
Where had he left his silver tongue? Or rather, why did it feel like lead with Ned O’Leary around? Tension simmered in the wrinkles around Ned’s eyes, and his freckled skin appeared paler than usual. It distracted Cole, made him wonder what the conversation had been about. Was he worried about Tommy? Or did he regret dragging Cole into an argument in front of everyone?
Ned ran his fingers through his hair. “Are you all right? After… you know, Zeb?”
“It needed to happen. If I could let go of revenge, so could he,” Cole said, more dryly than he’d intended. Once again, he’d shot a man to protect Ned, and that fact hung in the air like fog obscuring truths neither of them wanted to acknowledge.
Ned shrugged. “So… Which corner do you want? You got a preference?”
“No. No preference.” Even now, after everything they’d been through, Cole regretted hurting Ned’s feelings last night, but there was no point in trying to take back what he’d said. It was better to have this clean break. They would part forever, in hopes that each of them would find a place to call home and live out his days in safety.
But Cole’s heart wanted what it wanted, and as he avoided Ned’s eyes, his gaze ended up swiping along Ned’s deliciously firm hands, covered by too many freckles to count and auburn hair that used to tickle Cole’s bare skin.
He would remember their touch till the end of his days, and once his time came, he hoped the angel to come for him would have Ned’s face.
Even breathing the same air hurt.
Ned grabbed his bedroll off the desk and tossed it into the right corner. He cleared his throat. “This is awkward, but it is yours. I had no right to wreck it.” He passed Cole the other half of the photo they’d ripped last night. He’d folded it in two, to hide the image, but Cole knew what it was anyway.
He snatched it out of Ned’s hand, and slid it into the inner pocket of his duster, where the upper part of Ned’s naked picture was. “Thank you. That’s… thoughtful of you,” he said and met the green gaze. There had been a time when staring at Ned was like resting in the heat of the sun in the lushest of valleys, even when in reality they’d been trudging through the desert with the Gotham Boys.
Back then, Cole had so often felt like he was drunk without any liquor touching his lips, but the past still seemed clearer than the vague future he now envisioned. With the old Ned at his side, there had been no obstacle too big to overcome. He was alive, and joyful, not at all like the rotting shell he’d become.
He missed that naive Cole Flores, but there would be no going back to him, so he kept staring at Ned, because one of them needed to look away first, and it would not be him.
Ned turned away and glanced at the door. “All safe out there?”
“You already asked.”
Ned’s shoulders sagged. “Oh. Sorry.”
“Do you want to see my pictures?” Cole asked right away, stuffing his hands down his pockets while the back of Ned’s neck reddened.
“Are they all of naked men you fucked?” he snapped, clenching his fists.
Cole had to stop himself from recoiling. “That’s a no then,” he forced out of his stiff lips and stared at his saddlebags, which rested by one of the walls.
Ned groaned and patted the desktop next to him. “Come on. Show me. We have time to kill.”
Cole swallowed, staring at the empty space where Ned held his hand, at his chest, at the tension around his lips.