Psync by Zile Elliven

Chapter Thirteen

Eli

Okay, so maybe Eli’s old method of feigning normality hadn’t worked, but shortly after Haruka had arrived, Eli’s anxiety levels had dropped to something much more manageable—even if he did feel like he’d swallowed a jar full of butterflies.

Which was why he couldn’t even begin to keep up with how much food Haruka kept trying to shove at him. “I’m fine, really!” Eli’s hand blocked his plate when Haruka tried to put a slice of grilled chicken on it.

“You’ve only had five grapes.”

He’d been counting? Even Juniper wasn’t that weird.

“I had a big breakfast.” Eli lied. He’d had coffee and the muffin he’d gotten with the coffee lay uneaten in his backpack.

Haruka raised an eyebrow.

Eli glared at him and ate another grape. Haruka took the opportunity to slide the chicken onto Eli’s plate.

Even if there hadn’t been a flock of butterflies throwing a rave inside his stomach, he wouldn’t have eaten much. He still had the pencil sharpener in his hand. He didn’t need it anymore, but he’d gotten overzealous in squeezing it and was pretty sure he’d cut himself enough that it would be hard to hide the blood seeping out. So, he was eating one-handed.

He shoved another grape in his mouth and wrinkled his nose. Ugh, it was sour.

A clatter from across the table made Eli look up. Haruka had dropped his fork on the table but made no motion to pick it up. Instead, he watched Eli with a strange look on his face.

“Are you okay?”

Haruka blinked a few times then nodded and continued eating.

Weird.

But then that was Haruka, as far as Eli could tell. Eli didn’t mind weird, though. It made him way less conscious of his own oddities. Maybe that was why he’d taken so quickly to Nate and Alice. They were their own giant buckets of weird, and Eli knew it was a privilege to be included.

Haruka’s brand of weird was intense, but also quiet. And very soothing—even if he was a bit of a pushy jerk.

Once Eli had consumed enough food to satisfy Haruka—enough to make him feel like he was about to explode—Eli said, “I’ve got a class in a few minutes, let me give you back your hoodie.” Even though he wanted to keep it. Wearing it made him feel like there was a lovely barrier between him and the world. Nothing constricting, just a nice, soft buffer to wallow in.

Haruka held out a hand, motioning him to stop. “Keep it, I have another just like it.”

“You do? Why did you tell me you needed it back?”

“Because I wanted to have lunch with you.” Haruka’s eyes were soft, and there was a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth.

“Oh.” The butterfly rave had officially become an army. “Okay.” What was he supposed to do with his hands right now? What was he supposed to do with his body? Why did every part of him feel so large and awkward right now?

He squeezed the pencil sharpener on reflex and winced. Haruka’s eyes flicked to Eli’s hand, and his own hand twitched as if he wanted to reach out but stopped himself. “I’ll let you go.”

Was it just Eli’s imagination, or was there a big fat for now that Haruka had left off the end of his sentence? He swallowed hard.

“O-okay.”

“Call me, if something happens.”

Eli nodded, knowing he would one hundred percent be willing to lose an arm before taking Haruka up on his offer. He turned and fled.

✽✽✽

Eli scratched at the bandage on his palm for the twentieth time that evening. For some reason, The Tale of Genji wasn’t capturing his attention like it had yesterday. And today had been so good, too. Well, the second half had been.

Alice and Nate didn’t hate him even a little bit, and—even crazier—Nate apologized for being overbearing and promised to try and rein it in next time. Though he had expressed reservations about Haruka.

“You don’t actually know anything about him, Eli.”

“I’m not marrying him, Nate, just taking a class with him.”

“And wearing his clothes?” Nate plucked at the overlong sleeve hanging past the tips of Eli’s fingers.

Eli didn’t have an answer for Nate. He still didn’t have one several hours later as he sat as his desk diligently working his way through his assignment. Though at the rate he was going, he might be better off going to bed now and waking up early to finish it.

His phone rattled against the glass of his desk. When he picked it up, he saw a text from Jace.

SpaceJace: I gotta go home for a bit, be back tomorrow night

Eli: Is everything okay?

SpaceJace: Not sure yet. I’ll let you know

Are you going to be okay on your own?

Eli: Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine

Good luck with your family!

See you tomorrow

Eli winced at the sudden pain in his mouth and tasted blood. Dammit, he’d chewed his lip to pieces again.

It was only one night alone. It shouldn’t be a big deal, especially since he’d need to become an actual adult who could sleep alone without nightmares at some point in his life.

And it was somewhat shitty of him to worry more about himself than Jace, who seemed to have an actual crisis to deal with.

Eli mentally pulled up his big boy pants and went back to his book.

Ten minutes later, the Tale of Genji took a short flight across the room when Eli realized he’d been staring at the same page since he’d gotten Jace’s text.

He crawled into his bed, made a little cocoon, curled up with his phone, and pulled up his bedtime playlist. Rather than songs, it was filled with background recordings from home. He turned it on and closed his eyes, listening to the low murmur of his mom and Juniper as they made food in the kitchen.

He was almost asleep when the face of Chad number one flashed in his mind. Eli bolted upright, blankets clutched around him, his breath coming harsh and fast.

Fuck.

He’d really been hoping the oddness of Haruka and the fun afternoon with his friends would let him sail right past the unpleasantness of the Chads.

No such luck.

He scrolled through TikTok until his eyes were heavy, but when he tried to sleep, another, older, face popped into his mind. Not the Chads.

Someone much worse.

He got up and turned on every light in the room, then climbed into Jace’s bed—apologizing silently to his roommate. He’d make sure and change the sheets for him before he came back.

Once he’d made a new cocoon, he dove back into his phone again, but instead of social media, he found himself scrolling through his contacts. It was way too late to text anyone now but looking at the names made him feel less alone.

He clicked on the contact labeled HotJerk and read through the short correspondence he’d exchanged with Haruka over the past week. The guy was laconic to say the least, but something about the words soothed Eli. His eyelids began to feel heavy, and he allowed himself to drift asleep.

Rough cloth covered his face, blocking out his surroundings. He’d been here before. Or was he still there now? Had he never left?

Eli tried to rip the bag off of his head, but his broken arm slowed him down, forcing him to struggle one-armed until he fell off the cot he’d been left on. He hit the floor, and a small avalanche of stacked cans rattled as they scattered across the floor.

Heavy footsteps pounded down the hall, and Eli froze. He’d woken him up!

He wiggled and twisted trying to shove his small body under the cot, but his arm was screaming, and the fall had left him disoriented. He couldn’t figure out which way to go.

The door slammed against the wall.

“The hell are you doing in here?” The hungover voice of his captor slurred loudly.

Eli didn’t answer. Instead, he curled into a small ball and waited for what would come next.

RRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!

Eli gasped and flailed trying to get his bearings. For a moment he wasn’t sure where he was, or how old he was. His heart was beating so loudly his ringtone didn’t even register at first.

It was still dark outside, but the brightly lit room gave Eli a fighting chance to find his phone in the tangled mess he’d made of Jace’s bed.

It took so long to find it, he was certain the caller would give up, but when it went to voicemail, it began to ring again almost immediately. His lock screen read HotJerk.

Why would Haruka be calling him so early?

“Hello?”

“Are you okay?” Haruka’s voice was husky, as though he too had just woken up.

No, he really wasn’t, but he wasn’t about to admit it. “Well enough for someone awoken from a dead sleep.”

Something Eli was extremely grateful for. He really didn’t like it when his nightmares progressed past that point. He would have been skittish all day if it had. Still might be if he didn’t do something to get his mind off of it.

“Actually, I’m glad you called.”

A pause. “Really?”

“I fell asleep before I could finish my reading assignment for today.” Eli glanced at the clock. It was five o’clock. Three hours before he needed to get ready for class. “Now I have time to finish it.”

“Hn.” There was a rustling sound. “What’s your assignment?”

“Tale of Genji.”

More rustling. “Want me to read it to you?”

“Um . . .”

Yes.

Right now, all Eli wanted was to sit in bed and have someone read to him to keep the shadows away, but he didn’t have it in him to verbalize it. So, he did what he usually did when he was nervous. He got bitchy. “You have a copy? Seems a bit cliché.”

Haruka snorted. “No, but I have access to the internet. It’s not like it would be hard to find.”

Eli heard the clicking sound of fingers on a keyboard.

“English or Japanese?”

Eli sucked in a breath and his stomach got all tingly. Why did the idea of Haruka reading to him in Japanese make him feel so dizzy? “Ah, my Japanese isn’t good enough for me to follow along, especially since it’s for a class,” Eli lied. He didn’t speak it well, but years of watching anime made him very good at understanding the language. But the tingly feeling inside was too much to process right now.

“English then.” There were a few more clicks on Haruka’s end, then, “Where did you leave off?”

“I just started section two.”

Eli listened to Haruka’s voice as he narrated the marriage of Onna San no Miya to a commoner. It was deep and rich and sent slow, lazy swirls of sensation through Eli. It washed away the terror he’d been steeped in when he’d first awoken.

After a while, Eli’s eyes started to drift closed, but he forced them open—he didn’t want to miss anything. “You should be a voice actor.”

“What?”

Shit, had he said that out loud?

“Nothing. I didn’t say anything.” Eli buried his face under the blankets and silently screamed into the mattress. Stupid mouth saying stupid things without stupid permission. “Keep reading.”

“How far do you need to read for class?”

“Part four chapter 8.” Which they had passed some time ago. “Sorry, I spaced out.”

“No, it’s okay, it’s just . . . it’s getting late. You should eat breakfast before class. Do you want to go get something?”

Yes. He very much did, but Eli was also a massive chicken. “No, it’s okay. I’m not much of a breakfast person.”

“You should become a breakfast person.” There was an edge to Haruka’s voice. What was up with him and food?

“I should take a shower though.” Eli deflected. With the way his stomach felt right now, there was no way he’d be able to bring himself to eat anything.

“What room are you in? I’ll bring you something.”

Yeah, that wasn’t happening. Just the idea of Haruka in his room sent Eli’s stress level to an eight. “Oh crap, my phone is on one percent battery, I gotta go, bye!”

He clicked end call and threw his phone across the room like it had burned him. The power cord he’d plugged in half an hour ago caused it to halt halfway through its journey and slam to the floor with a clatter.

“Oh shit!”

Eli lunged for the phone and hit the floor in an undignified sprawl. His feet had been tangled in the sheets so thoroughly he was now hanging from the bed by one leg. His free foot had left a sock behind. He groaned and looked at his phone in sympathy.

“And that’s what instant karma looks like.”

He kicked his leg until it was free, somehow managing to retain that sock. Then he reached for his phone. He really didn’t want to turn it over.

“Listen. If my head isn’t cracked from taking a dive, your screen can’t be cracked, okay?”

Eli flipped it over.

Oh, thank god. Undamaged.

Eli punched a fist into the air and rolled to his feet.

Okay. Time for maximum effort.

He wasn’t exactly in a rush, but if he didn’t want to look and smell like a hobo and get coffee before class, he needed to get going. What should have been a long morning of hugging his knees in a corner had gone by in the blink of an eye.

If he kept going—and was very lucky—he might not spend the entire day hiding under twelve layers of clothing.

He made his way to the shower room and found Ash rubbing a towel through his hair in the changing area. “Hey, what are you doing here?”

“Well, I’d like to say it’s a social visit, but our shower room is busted. I guess it’s my turn to visit your floor.”

Eli laughed awkwardly. “If you ever do decide to make social visits to the shower room, warn me first so I can be in Florida.”

“You’re not my type, dude.” Ash snapped his towel at Eli, who yelped and ran, nearly losing his bath supplies in the process.

Eli had reached his usual shower stall when a thought hit him. Haruka and Ash lived on the same floor, and if their shower was broken . . .

It was like someone hit fast-forward on Eli. He found himself taking the quickest shower of his life. He was shrugging his shirt onto his wet body and sliding on bare feet through the changing area before Ash had even finished getting dressed.

“Where’s the fire? Or did you miss me?” Ash yelled to him over the sound of the blow-dryer he had aimed at his head.

“I forgot I had something to do!” Eli yelled over his shoulder as he ran out the door. If he ran into Haruka right now, he wasn’t sure he could handle it. His heart was already going crazy just thinking about it.

He finished getting dressed in his room, managing to keep it down to only a green hoodie, a white long-sleeved shirt, and jeans. Then he put in his earbuds, cranked up his Distraction playlist, and took the stairs instead of the elevator—just in case.