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The Sanders house was finally calming down. Virgil was finally fully recovered and the Blues were lucky enough to avoid getting sick themselves. The tension with Dee was resolved and he had been over a few times but not as much as he had before. Patton still hadn’t brought up the “son” thing to Logan. Soon , he kept telling himself. He might have been avoiding Logan a little bit, as much as he could while living in the same house.
Patton had tucked himself away to handle the laundry. He wanted to make sure that all of their clothes were clean of whatever germs had caused Virgil to get sick. The older man had gotten up extra early to sneak into Virgil’s room to add his sweatshirt to the basket. It was a mission he had completed numerous times since moving in. Aside from the fresh smell of detergent, you couldn’t tell someone went in and out of there.
Patton smiled and hummed nonsense notes to himself. The house was always quiet, aside from when Roman was over, but the early morning sleepy quiet was its own special type of quiet. It was a good way for Patton to lose some of his extraverted energy before everyone woke up. Patton thought it worked pretty well for his small family.
“I haven’t washed those yet,” Patton chuckled as he noticed Squoosh preparing to jump into the half full laundry basket. The sassy cat jumped anyway and looked shocked that the clothes weren’t toasty warm. Her cat eyes stared down the man, truly betrayed.
“I warned you,” Patton shook his head and tried to shoo the cat away from the clothes. He didn’t need her ripping them apart in revenge. But Squoosh, stubborn as ever, unhappily curled into the dirt clothes. With a sigh, Patton went back to tossing the clothes into the washing machine. Am I running late or is Squoosh here early? Patton thought to himself. Squoosh didn’t have an internal clock as accurate as Virgil, but she was definitely getting better.
The teacher dug his hand through the pockets of one of Logan’s dress shirts. He had never known anyone as forgetful as Logan and Virgil, at least in terms of their pockets. The pair was always having pieces of paper, money, driver’s licenses, you name it, going through the wash. Virgil had been particularly upset one time when a leaf he got from Roman got ripped to shreds. Patton and Logan had spent over an hour picking out leaf bits from the laundry. A couple more loose coins were added to the growing pile on top of the washing machine. Patton had started up a change jar specifically for any money he pulled from dirty pockets. When Logan found out he had tried to take some of it back, Patton slapped his hand away and claimed it was his vacation fund now and thanked his boyfriend for his generous contributions. The jar was enough of an incentive for Logan to pay more attention to emptying his pockets, but that only lasted a week before he fell right back into his old habits.
Squoosh hissed and batted at Patton’s hand as he reached for the next piece of clothing. Her dirty cold pile was shrinking faster than she had expected. As much as she wanted the warm clothes right out of the dryer, it was a matter of principle.
“Come on,” Patton gave her a small nudge but she still refused to let him get the next item.
“Again, I gave you warning,” Patton shook his head and yanked the sweatshirt from beneath her. The small cat rolled backward into the side of the basket. After quickly orienting herself back onto her paws, she hissed and stalked away. Patton just hoped that she wasn’t going to go rip something up.
Virgil’s sweatshirts always had something left in them, always. Sometimes Patton would bet with himself to see if he could figure it out before he pulled the item, or items, out. Mostly it was his communication cards. He would mostly sign now instead of using the cards, but they were still used every now and then. One time there had been a crayon and Patton couldn’t tell you how relieved he was that he found in time.
A quick feel of the pockets had Patton betting on the communications cards, but he was surprised to pull out a neatly folded piece of paper. The edges were starting to wear down a bit, Virgil had to have been carrying it around for a while, but other than that it was in perfect condition. He could just make out some words through the page, but he didn’t look too closely. The older man respected Virgil’s privacy… even if he was really curious.
Patton sighed and went to toss the paper on the pocket pile when he noticed something written on the opposite side of the small square. On the outside, in a familiar handwriting that Patton couldn’t quite place, was “Patton Heart.”
Logan frowned when he woke to an empty bed. Patton was doing laundry this morning, but he would normally come back and cuddle. Disappointed but not too worried, Logan ran through his morning routine a bit faster than normal. Sometimes Patton would get distracted with breakfast or Squoosh or had some work he had to finish up before school. There wasn’t anything bad that could have happened, but Logan couldn’t shake the feeling of something being wrong.
Still tying his tie, Logan started down the stairs trying to keep his pace calm and collected. A quick check of the living room and kitchen and still no sign of Patton.
“Patton?” Logan whispered as he started toward their small laundry room. Logan sighed as he rounded the corner and found his boyfriend on the floor with Squoosh in his lap. Relief washed over him and he couldn’t help but smile.
“I hope you took your allergy medication first,” Logan chuckled as Patton sniffled and lifted his face from Squoosh’s fur. But Logan’s light attitude quickly darkened again as he noticed Patton’s face wasn’t red and blotchy because of allergies. The other man was crying.
“Patton…” Logan moved forward with his arms open as he knelt down. Patton didn’t even bother shifting Squoosh as he lurched forward into the other’s arms. Squoosh, to her credit, gave a small purr and rubbed against Patton’s leg before leaving the two alone. Who knew she could be so nice to anyone but Virgil.
After a few minutes Patton was able to calm down and catch his breath.
“Would you like to talk about it?” Logan asked, loosening his arms around Patton.
Patton started to nod but stopped as he caught the time on Logan’s watch. “Crumb cakes. I have to get ready or I’m going to be late.”
Despite saying so, Patton made no move to move from Logan’s embrace.
“You don’t have to go in today. We can call you in sick,” Logan offered. Patton’s face was still red and blotchy. How long had he been there crying before Logan found him?
“No, it’s too close to opening,” Patton shook his head. He turned and kissed Logan before finally standing up.
Logan sighed and looked at the laundry. He quickly loaded the rest of the clothes in, not checking any pockets, and started it up. It was the least he could do.
“I will call you at lunch,” Logan made a point to say as Patton dashed out of the door less than a half an hour later.
Logan ended up missing Patton’s lunch break. Despite his best efforts, Logan hadn’t been able to get the laundry done before Virgil woke up. In fact, it had taken a while after Virgil woke up that everything was finally done. So Virgil had woken up upset, which Logan had been expecting. His schedule was slightly off but they’d handled that before. Although all of Virgil’s symptoms of his illness were gone, he was still a bit off. He was getting used to his body feeling well again, which again was something Logan had been expecting. What Logan hadn’t been expecting was Virgil to continue being upset.
So when lunch rolled around instead of calling Patton, Logan first wanted to figure out what was going on with his son. The pair barely ate either of their sandwiches. Each of them mostly just poked it around their plates.
“Hi Purple,” Logan started. Virgil was very quiet today, so Logan wanted to start off with some basic structured conversation.
Virgil poked his sandwich a few more times before pulling the communication cards from his pocket. He moved quickly, not letting his hand linger in his pocket making Logan think he’d messed up the laundry somehow. Was the texture wrong somehow? <Hi.>
“How are you?” Logan asked. That was really the question he wanted to know the answer to but he knew he’d get the cookie-cutter reply first.
<Good. How are you?>
“I’m doing good too,” Logan tried taking a bite of his food. The small conversation seemed to be going fine. Virgil wasn’t anymore tense than he had been, although he didn’t seem any more relaxed either.
“How are you feeling today?” Logan asked more specifically. Virgil had difficulties expressing his emotions in words. Rather than apply an emotion for Virgil to explain, Logan wanted Virgil to name it. He had his own understanding of his emotions and his own way for naming them.
Virgil’s hand flitted around the different faces on his card. They only had a few emotions on the cards, it was mostly for conversational words. As Virgil’s hand swept back and forth, Logan worried that they didn’t have a good representation for the boy’s current feeling. After a minute, Virgil slammed his hand down flat on the card covering all the emotions.
“Are you overwhelmed?” Logan tried.
Virgil hesitated before flexing his hand, letting it curl into a fist before splaying out again.
Logan nodded, recognizing it as a response but was still unsure of what it meant. “Are you having a lot of feelings right now?”
[A lot.]
Logan gave a small understanding smile. “Do you know why you have a lot of feelings right now?”
At the question Virgil pulled his hand back up to his chest, snaking them back up his sleeves.
“Okay, we don’t have to talk about it,” Logan said gently, “but I do want to be able to help make you feel better.”
Logan could just make out the motion of Virgil signing ‘a lot’ again under his sweatshirt. He took that as Virgil wanted to work it out. With Virgil hiding his hands now, their conversation was going to have to be reduced to ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers which weren’t that great.
“How about we go through your day so far?” Logan tried. Breaking the problem into smaller easier chunks was a good strategy for nearly every problem.
The pair slowly went over the events of Virgil’s morning. Looking at the day from Virgil’s perspective, Logan couldn’t see any reason why Virgil was having such a hard time yet. As they were getting closer to Virgil coming down for breakfast, Squoosh seemed to have detected some growing discomfort because she hopped up and curled into Virgil’s lap. Logan would normally shoo her away from the table when there was still food on it, but one of Virgil’s hands popped out from the top of his sweatshirt to pet her and Logan just couldn’t bring himself to do so.
“You came down for breakfast. You sat in your seat while I put together your waffles,” Logan rubbed his chin trying to remember every step of the day. “Did having waffles make you feel a lot?”
His son dropped his head and focused more on Squoosh but didn’t give a definitive answer. Not the waffles, but something about breakfast shook him up.
“I ate breakfast with you,” Logan remembered taking the slightly burnt ones for himself. Virgil’s shoulders started to rise to his ears just a little bit. “But Blue didn’t eat with us.”
Virgil’s hand snaked back into his sweatshirt. Logan could just make out the fabric scrunching in Virgil’s flexing fists behind Squoosh. The cat stood up and for a second Logan thought she was going to leave Virgil, but she simply started rubbing her side against Virgil’s chest gently kneading her paws into his lap.
“I’m sorry Blue couldn’t eat with us. He…” Logan wasn’t sure how to phrase what happened. He wasn’t even sure what had happened. “He was running late today. He’ll be back on time for dinner though.”
Silence formed between the two as Squoosh let out a quiet purr trying her best to comfort her owner. Logan felt like there was more to the story, he seemed more upset than usual over a schedule change, but Logan thought that was enough questions from him. He needed to head back to work at some point and he would always be around if Virgil felt more comfortable later.
“Do you want to go back to your schoolwork or do you want to keep talking?” Logan asked.
Virgil’s fingers popped out of his sweatshirt again to gently pet Squoosh as she pressed against him. “Blue.”
“I know, Blue was running late this morning.” Logan nodded.
“Blue,” Virgil repeated. His eyes flicked slightly towards his word cards.
“It wasn’t because Blue was running late?” Logan clarified. Virgil seemed to stare more intently at the word cards but made no move to use them. Emotions . Virgil had been using the card to describe his emotions.“Blue was upset this morning.”
Virgil’s fingers accidentally dug a bit too hard into Squoosh’s fur causing her hair to raise but she stayed put.
“I know. I was worried too.” There wasn’t more Logan could say to comfort his son. He himself knew nothing of what was going on. He should have kept Patton home today.
As he rose to clear the table of the barely touched sandwiches Virgil started to shake his head.
No. No. No. No.
Logan immediately sat down and Squoosh let out a concerned meow.
“It’s okay Purple. Blue’s going to be okay,” Logan tried.
Virgil continued to shake his head and started to pound his fist against his chest. [Me. Me. Me. Me].
“Blue couldn’t be upset with you,” Logan stood again and moved toward his son. He knelt down trying to give off comforting vibes. Why would Virgil even think that Patton would be upset because of him? They barely interacted this morning; Patton was too busy trying to get to work on time. “He’ll be home in a few hours and we’ll sort all of this out, okay? I promise he’s not upset because of you.”
Logan hated breaking promises.
He had given Patton a few minutes to relax after coming home, but he needed answers. Virgil was absolutely wracked with guilt and it was breaking Logan’s heart.
“Purp thinks he did something to upset you,” Logan blurted out as they sat on the couch together. Normally Patton would curl into his side but today they were just sitting, their sides barely brushing against each other.
Patton hesitated a few seconds and Logan nearly burst out of his skin with impatience.
“I’m not upset,” Patton whispered. He sounded so tired which just added more cracks to Logan’s already fragile heart.
“But he did something?” Logan hesitantly prodded.
Patton sighed and dropped his head against Logan’s shoulder. “How long ago did you go to the bookstore?”
“I was just feeling a lot too, kiddo,” Patton explained. Sure his immediate reaction had been to get mad that Virgil had been holding on to this for who knows how long, but he knew Virgil had just forgotten about it. Putting the note into his pocket had just become part of his routine.
Virgil gave a small hum and wiggled his fingers which were pinned under Squoosh who had curled up on his chest the second he laid down.
“So this woman, Lavender, who Purple had met at the bookstore had given him a note to pass along to you,” Logan summarized. “She must have seen your name on his ID card.”
Patton nodded as a warm feeling grew in his chest. His name was listed right after Logan’s and before Thomas’ and Roman’s. It’s listed in order of importance , Logan had said with a small shrug when Patton asked why he was ahead of the Princes.
Patton traced a small heart on Logan’s leg before taking a deep breath. “When I was twelve, my mom and I got into a really bad car accident…”
Tires screeched.
Glass shattered.
Metal crunched.
Someone screamed.
Patton stared down at his new bright blue cast as the monitors attached to his mother beeped, filling the room with a horrible noise. A noise that meant everything was not okay, no matter what the doctors and the nurse and the counselors told him. His mother was in a coma. No one knew when she’d wake up. Only a few weeks ago his father had set off for his assignment overseas. They were still trying to reach him, but Patton knew he wouldn’t be able to cut his 6 month trip short. But Patton wanted him here taking care of his mom, not strangers in another country. It was selfish and the thought just made him feel worse.
“Hi Patton, this is Miss. Lavender,” the social worker, more guilt filled Patton as he couldn’t recall her name, motioned to another woman who had entered the room together. Much like her name Miss. Lavender was wearing a lavender blouse and matching pants.
“Hello,” Patton whispered and traced the bumps on his cast. He knew why she was here. Someone had to look after him. He was alone.
“Call me Lavender,” the woman smiled. A natural one, Patton noted. No one had given him a real smile since the accident.
“I know you’re an only child, but I do foster a couple of children so it may be a bit of a shock,” Lavender explained again as they pulled up to her house. They had let Patton stop by his own house to get some clothes and other essentials. They had tried to compare it to a sleepover party but Patton couldn’t do it. A party didn’t last six months. “Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’m here for you. You’re not alone.”
And even though everyone else had been wrong, she was right. She was there. He wasn’t alone. Lavender was the first person he had come out to. She would take him everyday for two months to see his mother in the hospital. She would explain what she could from what the doctors had said. She made sure he did his homework and praised him no matter what grade he got back. She gave his principal the verbal beatdown of his life after he did nothing to stop the homophobic bullying at school. She threw him a party for his birthday after barely knowing him for two weeks.
When his mom woke up before his dad finished his assignment, she stayed with him as his mom went through physical therapy. She visited at least twice a week to lend a hand once Patton’s mom was able to return home. She’d bring leftovers from her own dinners and invited them to game nights at her house with the rest of her foster kids.
“When my dad finished his assignment, we ended up moving out of Florida,” Patton stopped to wipe some tears from his face. “She would call once or twice a month for a while, but we just lost contact with each other.”
Logan placed a soft kiss atop Patton’s head. “That had to have been rough.”
“What a small world though,” Patton gave a watery smile, “that you and Purple would run into her of all people. I hope she hasn’t thought I was ignoring her…”
“Of course not,” Logan shook his head and squeezed Patton closer to him.
“Can you start dinner so I can call her?” Patton asked like a child asking for candy at the check-out.
Logan kissed him again, “Of course! I’m really happy you two are going to be able to reconnect. She sounds like an amazing woman.”
Patton ran his fingers over the four crayons Virgil had gifted him: lavender, purple, and two blues. The lavender was specifically meant to be passed along to Lavender, but the rest were to comfort him. Virgil had even let him give the boy a half side hug before he left. It had been a few days since discovering the note, but Virgil still seemed guilty about the incident. Patton knew they’d be okay though.
He looked around the small coffee shop trying to let the cozy atmosphere calm his nerves. The building was warm and bright. There were only a few people floating around, either hunched over a laptop or chatting quietly with another patron. Patton had held off ordering any pastries or drinks until Lavender arrived. He was a gentleman after all.
“Patty,” Lavender’s voice called out over the ring of the bell as she entered. Her voice had aged but it still had the unmistakable soft sweetness to it that Patton remembered.
“Miss. Lavender,” Patton couldn’t stop his voice from thickening.
“What I have I told you,” Lavender chastised as she wrapped the man she hadn’t seen since he was a boy into a tight hug, “call me Lavender.”