The most important things in life are the hardest ones to say. They’re the things that seem so vibrant, so vivid within, that when you try to put them on the page, to send them out into the world, they simply vanish into thin air faster than your hand can cramp. Henry had the same problem with his mouth as he did his hands. He wanted to close his eyes and let the words flow like a river, but all that would exit is the sputtering, clogging sound of a half built dam. It was both a blessing and a curse to be so silenced by himself.
Murphy’s sleeping body was draped across a chair that was too small for him, being made with a specific purpose that certainly wasn’t sleeping. His sturdy chest rose and fell in rhythm with the quiet rain outside Henry’s bedroom window. If he listened hard enough, he could just make out every little breath beneath the steady tapping. It was…comforting, in a way. Seeing Murphy so relaxed despite the darkness in this room. Henry wanted to reach out, but found himself frozen and silent, as if bed had suddenly sprouted hands to keep him there. He wouldn’t fight it, sinking down into his single pillow in hopes of a slumber that would never come.
“Morning, sunshine. Coffee?” Murphy was looming above him, extending his hand to display a white mug full of steaming, dark liquid. Henry stared at the cup with empty eyes, feeling Murphy’s own boring holes straight through his skull. He swallows, not wanting to be stared at, but not liking coffee much either. The racing of his heart suggested death as the only option, but his brain was a step ahead and his hand inches.
“I…” Henry mindlessly takes the mug as he sits up in bed, trying not to show his distaste for the beverage as he sets it on a nearby nightstand. There was a phone there. It’s gone now, the dreadful ringing had followed suit. He glances around the empty apartment now that it was silent, finding the air to have changed between him and its grim and polluted walls. The tense fist in his back slowly unclenched. “Thanks Murphy, you didn’t have to make this.”
“It’s no chocolate milk, but you look like you could use the caffeine.” Murphy also ‘looked like he could use the caffeine’. His brown eyes looked sunken and hollow. The scars on his face had darkened from days in the sun, and appeared even darker still in the shadows of Henry’s room. Despite having slept last night, Murphy was ragged - and not just because his beard needed a trim. Henry closed his blue eyes and sighed.
“Did you drink it all again?” A single lid opened in a pouting feign of annoyance. He could never be mad at Murphy, not really. Not after the break of an isolation that had started to feel endless. A rare, though small, smile tugged at his usually silent lips. Despite Murphy claiming otherwise, he knew the man dabbled in the consumption of sweets from the now shared refrigeration unit.
Murphy's face changed as he snorted. There was a hint of boyish mischief behind his wire frame glasses, as he shook his head at Henry. Those same eyes solemnly held his gaze, before flicking back up and to the left as he turned around and headed back towards the kitchen area with a hidden smirk. “I don't know what you're talking about, Henry.”
“So you did!” Henry pulled himself out of bed, moving faster than he had in years. It was such a strange, almost instinctual reaction. Murphy had a way of pulling living from the dead. He smiled, laughter pouring from him and emptying the septic tanks of emotions he so wished to drain. A lifetime had been lifted off his angular shoulders, pooling beneath his swift feet in puddles of relinquished doubt and fear. Though still in the room that started it all, there was a glimmer of light that crept in through the parted blinds of Henry's window, illuminating corners he never knew existed, as if every inch of rain had simply vanished.
Murphy jumped in surprise as timid Henry was atop of him, clinging like a freed spider monkey with a vendetta against its captors. He swiftly turned around, pinning the other to the counter behind them with a single, solid swoop. Henry's heart seized in his chest, the air suddenly leaving his lungs without so much as a gasp or utterance of protest. He stared up at the older man's graying hair, for once making eye contact with something other than the floor. Silence swept Time into her kind and gentle arms, snuffing out the minutes, seconds, and hours between them as his blue eyes continued to roam the haggard expanse of Murphy's gentle face.
"Easy now, Cupcake. Wouldn't want to swing at the wrong guy-" Murphy's playful barb would have paralyzed Henry with fear, had it come from anyone else. As a child, he had grown so used to being hit, kicked and threatened. The closet had become a safe place for him in more ways than one, offering sanctuary from his father's flying fists and his mother's wicked tongue.
With Murphy, he never felt that. In some ways... the man felt more like home than this dingy little room. His window to the outside, shelter from the storm. Murphy was the sea, both powerful and frightening, but he'd give anything to dip his feet in, to feel the wind against his face as he sailed those turbid waters. Henry raised his hand slowly, softly placing it against the overgrown stubble before him.
"I won't."
