Archive of Our Own

It was a sunny day when it all started. He doesn’t remember the exact date or even what year it was, only the fact that the sun was blinding. They had been dating for a short while. They walked side by side through the busy streets littered with shops of all shapes and sizes. Sometimes they would slow down to admire the clothes on the display, or the food being made, making comments and jokes, one topic leading into another. Their gait slowed again near Lush to smell the pleasant aroma, at which point Clef made a comment about bath bombs. More specifically, about never having used one.

He remembers Kondraki’s face as clear as day: his eyes completely focused on his face, scanning for a lie, his eyebrows as high as they could go with tiny wrinkles forming on his forehead, his mouth slightly open as if it wanted to say something but didn’t know what that something was… it was a sight to behold, to cherish forever. He tried not to laugh, to keep his poker face even as Kondraki stammered to find the words he wanted to say.

“You’ve never used a bath bomb? Ever?”

“No? Why is this a big deal?”

Kondraki composed himself after that, the only remains of his moment being a slight tint to his cheeks and ears. “Well-“ he cut himself off with a huff, “I just thought, it’s very you, you know?”

Clef couldn’t help the warmth that spread through his core. Konny had thought about him. It was still hard to fathom that other people thought about him when they weren’t face to face with him. He chuckled and looked at their intertwined hands. Kondraki was not other people, not anymore.

He looked up to see Kondraki giving him one of his rare smiles. The kindness in his eyes turned determined as he stepped towards the Lush store. “welp, we can’t have that! Time to get you a bath bomb!”

They spent an hour in Lush, just browsing and smelling bath bombs until one of the employees approached them and told them to leave unless they were going to buy something. They left shortly after without buying anything, but when they were a ways away from the store, Kondraki stopped to show Clef something he had in his inner jacket pocket.

“Here.” He said as he took out a berry-shaped pink bath bomb. “this one is my favorite, and it’s pink, so I hope you’ll like it too. I was gonna show you this in the store, if they didn’t kick us out like that.”

Clef grinned ear to ear when taking the bath bomb. It was a genuine grin and they both knew that. Instead of asking how he managed to take the bomb without anyone noticing, he twirled it around in his hand and let out a quiet “thank you”. He remembers the way Kondraki grinned back.

“Don’t mention it.”

And so, he hadn’t. At least not until Kondraki brought it up himself, a week or so later.

It was a cold day, and a storm was raging on. he remembers he had shut all the curtains in his office over the tightly closed windows, turned off the lights, taken some medication to stop the shaking of his hands and was sitting in his rolling chair, trying the breathing exercises Glass had showed him months prior. He recalls jumping in his seat as the door to his office was knocked on and opened with a soft click.

Standing at the door was Kondraki. His silhouette was framed by the fluorescent light from the well-lit corridor, making him look ethereal. When he asked, “are you alright?” with a concerned look on his face, Clef had almost been fully convinced he was an angel. He grinned at him in a last-ditch attempt to convince him he was, but he knew he wasn’t convincing at all.

Instead of repeatedly asking him if he could help or bombarding him with questions, Kondraki smiled, invited himself in and settled on the chair on the opposite side of the desk. He took out his Walkman and messed with it until some classical music erupted from its little speakers and raised the volume to the point where it drowned out the pitter-patter coming from the windows, all the while glancing at Clef’s face in search of opposition to what he was doing.

“Check this out,” he said, “this is my favorite part.”

Clef focused on the steady rhythm of the symphony as he tried to regulate his breathing. Eventually he calmed down enough to ask Kondraki what he was doing in his room, at which point Kondraki apologized for barging in and told him he had something important to tell him, not work related, as he lowered the volume of his Walkman.

Kondraki started a sentence several times, trying to find the right way to say what he wanted to as Clef waited patiently. He got tired quickly and sighed as he took out a round object encased in brown wrapping paper from his coat pocket.

“Happy month anniversary- Monthiversary? Happy monthiversary.” He said as he handed the item to Clef. He kept talking as Clef ripped the packaging up. “I just… figured that would be a nice way to celebrate.” Clef revealed the gift to be another bath bomb, this time fully round with blue specks inside. “it could be like… our thing, you know? If you liked the first one, of course.”  

Clef raised his gaze to meet the Polish man’s doubtful eyes. “Yes, I did. It was very...” He tried to think of an adjective to fit the bath bomb. “Pink.” Yup, this would do. “So, you want this to be our ‘thing’? Giving me bath bombs every month like a weird magazine subscription? Sounds to me like you’re just jealous of what Gears and Iceberg got going on and you want something like that for yourself.”

Honestly, who wouldn’t want what Gears and Iceberg had going on? Those two had been together for a few months and every month on the same day neither of them showed up to work. Nobody knew what they did that day, but everyone was sure they spent it together. Clef wouldn’t put it past Gears to have submitted a request at the beginning of the year for both him and Iceberg to have the 13th day of every month off, just as he wouldn’t put it past the O5 to have approved it. They were both hardworking individuals, after all. They deserved vacations, and it was easier for the higher-ups this way rather than if they were to take two weeks off at the same time.

“What? I’m not-!” Kondraki cut himself off with a huff. “I just want to share something special. You could just say you didn’t like the bath bomb I gave you and don’t want this and I’d stop, you know?”

“No no no, I liked it, I really did.” He tried to sound as genuine as possible while making a mental note to use the bath bomb as soon as he got home. Kondraki raised an eyebrow at him.

“If you say so.” He made no further comments, simply raised back the volume of his Walkman. The symphony was still playing, or was it another one? Clef couldn’t really tell. What he could tell was that Kondraki was leaning into the chair, getting comfortable, which didn’t bother Clef in the slightest. The rain on the window sounded like a distant memory, overshadowed by the presence of his boyfriend and his choice of classical music playing through the crappy speakers of his old music player.

Kondraki stayed there with him till the rain subsided that day. He knew they both had paperwork to complete, he knew Kondraki would be up all night reducing his workload to a manageable amount, yet he couldn’t find it in himself to ask him to leave. They both had needed this, needed some peace, needed to distract themselves from their responsibilities, their traumas, their emotions.

That day, Clef had felt like he got to know a side of his Konny that he didn’t know existed.

He got home a little late due to all the paperwork he had neglected to do. He was about to plop down onto his bed when he remembered his promise. He wanted to ignore it entirely and just go to sleep, but then he thought about how hopeful Konny had looked as he asked what Clef had thought of his gifts; and dragged his ass to the bathroom towards the least used item in his house: the bathtub.  

The truth was that Clef hadn’t stepped into a body of water in 20 years, let alone taken a bath. Showers were fine, however infrequent; he could stand under the cold water and cover the bothersome noise with his singing. But a bath? He hadn’t even attempted one until then.

He loudly sang some of the pop songs he heard on the radio while the water was pouring and sat next to the tub to compose himself when it was full. He was holding the berry-shaped bath bomb in his left hand, the color seeping out and staining his sweaty palm. He let his impulsivity override his hesitancy as he dropped the bath bomb into the awaiting waters.

Colorful bubbles arose from the moment the berry touched the water. It fizzed and popped, making a hissing sound and releasing a fruity scent into the air. Clef froze and watched the surface of the water quiver as if it were boiling.

Boiling.

Boiling. When it wasn’t before, when it wasn’t supposed to be. The waters rising, no matter how high he climbed. His ears ringing with the piercing cries of a newborn, the sound of several footsteps trailing behind him as he ran, ran, ran. The fear that carried him through the never-ending corridors, the fear that was clenching his chest in that exact moment.  

It was that fear that made him push himself as far away from the bathtub as he possibly could, kicking the ground till he felt his back lean into the cold tiles of the bathroom wall. It was that fear that made him curl into a ball by the tile, that had him looking around his bathroom frantically for an escape. And he would be blaming himself for this in the near future, but it was that same exact fear that caused the walls to deform, the tiles to melt into each other and steam to rise from the bathtub, the air filling with creaking noises as reality twisted in ways it wasn’t supposed to, just because he lost control, just because he was weak, just because he was stupid, stupid, stupid…

He didn’t know if he calmed down on his own, or if he passed out from hyperventilation, but by the time he lifted his head the distortions were gone. He pushed himself to his knees and then on his feet, realizing his back had suffered from his time on the floor. As he examined his surroundings for any anomalous remnants of his outburst, he noticed a crucial detail: the water in the bathtub was gone, only leftover trace being the now slightly deformed berry-shaped bath bomb lying at the bottom.

He held the bath bomb in his shaking hands to inspect it. It was completely dry, the bubbles on its surface coming apart at his touch. He moved to put it inside the big drawer under the sink that was originally intended to house all the bathroom cleaning products he didn’t have. After a bit of consideration, he placed the second bath bomb in there as well before closing it. Out of sight, out of mind.

Sleep came easy. After a dreamless night he got ready for work as usual, hitching a ride with Gerald and hoping the mundane morning would be enough to block out the storm in his head. He avoided Kondraki the whole day, stayed in his office for as long as possible and buried himself in paperwork until the day ended, at which point he booked a cab directly to his house.

That was it, it was over, it didn’t matter that his thoughts were still jumbled, it didn’t matter if the thought of his boyfriend gave him a headache. It was over, he shouldn’t have been affected by this. Heck, he shouldn’t have freaked out like that at all! It. Was. Over.

And if he caught his bathtub filling up with water by itself, broke it into pieces with a sledgehammer, drove to the countryside to throw the pieces in a sinkhole and got himself a new bathtub, nobody needed to know.

It had taken him a few days of collecting himself to speak to Kondraki again. Kondraki seemed concerned for him, but he managed to convince him that it was simply due to the amount of paperwork he had to do that they hadn’t seen face to face for that long. They made up for it with a coffee date that evening, and things were back to normal.

It went on like that for a while. Every month, Konny would bring him a bath bomb, Clef would thank him, tell him how much he liked it and throw it in the drawer when he went home. He was mad at himself for his cowardice, and the intensity of the feeling increased along with the number of unused bath bombs in his drawer.

It wasn’t long before his disdain reached the point where he wanted to try using a bath bomb again. He wouldn’t be filling up a whole tub for this, he decided quickly, he would instead cut off a small piece with a knife, place it inside a cup full of water and watch from a safe distance, all the while blasting music to cover up the sound of fizzing. It was the perfect plan.

His first attempt went rather smoothly. He had some difficulties cutting the sphere in half and he ended up smashing it into pieces instead, which he deemed was fair enough. He picked a medium-sized piece to use for his small experiment, threw it in and jumped back a few meters and behind the kitchen table to stare at it with unblinking eyes until it stopped moving. He got closer to inspect it once all movement ceased. The water in the cup had turned a bright cobalt color and was emitting a nice odor similar to cheap cologne.

He emptied the contents of the cup into the sink and filled it up again. This time he broke off a piece of Konny’s latest gift. It was a green tablet with yellow specs, and it gave off a faint lime-like smell. He placed it in the water just as he had done last time and waited for it to dissolve completely.

Only after it fizzled out did he realize he hadn’t gone back to hiding behind the kitchen table, but rather was standing next to it. He counted this as a small victory, the still playing song and the scent of lime acting as his trumpets of triumph. He poured the light green water into the sink and decided to call it a day.

The next day, while talking to Kondraki, he mentioned how the lime tablet had smelled good, at least better than the blue one. The way Kondraki’s eyes had lit up would go onto his shrine of cherished memories, which was getting crowded with the grumpy scientist’s reactions already. The next bath bomb he received was also lime themed with hints of lavender thrown in. Kondraki had taken his preference into consideration. His heart had skipped a beat when he thought about it.

Kondraki continued to give him a bath bomb every month and he continued watch a piece of it dissolve and give feedback. Each time he stood closer to the glass, each time the music was a little bit quieter, each time the fizzing, the popping and the smell were a bit closer. It got to the point where he was standing a forearms length away from the cup and could feel tiny drops on his face. The sound, the movement, they didn’t affect him anymore.

The day he realized this, he felt freer than he had in years.

As the amount of bath bombs in his drawer grew, so did their relationship, developing through several milestones: their first kiss, first love confessions, first New Years spent together… They grew closer both emotionally and physically.  

It wasn’t unusual for them to stay over at the other’s house. With time, their wardrobes blended into each other as well. Kondraki’s bath products would find their way into Clef’s shower rack, Clef’s cosmetics would end up in Kondraki’s mirror cabinet, and as Clef was reminded with a burst of laughter one morning after seeing Konny sipping coffee out of one of his ‘Over 30 and Very Flirty’ mugs, even their cupboards were all mixed up.

They usually arrived at work together, left work together and were found in each other’s offices during work hours. They may not have explicitly stated it to anyone, but everyone on site knew they were dating. It wasn’t abnormal for Clef to walk by the break room and hear low level researchers whispering and giggling. They would mostly stop the moment they saw him enter, which meant they were talking about him. He was cool with it, he always liked being the center of attention.

It had never been to this extend before.

Something was different that morning. The whispers in the corridors were more urgent somehow. Konny had been acting suspicious for the past few days, too, and Clef knew something was up the moment Konny glanced at his watch after work and told him he couldn’t stay over for dinner. He said he needed to go somewhere. He said Clef wasn’t invited. Clef had told him it was fine, but as he lay down on the couch, he couldn’t help the tightness in his chest.

The house was eerily silent without Kondraki. It was as if his presence was as expected there as the light from the street, the yowling of stray cats and the fly absentmindedly slapping itself against the lightbulb. It didn’t help his jumpy mood in the slightest. It was as if the whole universe was on edge, waiting for something to happen.

He sat up on the couch and stared straight at the TV mounted on the wall. The anticipation felt somewhat familiar, and not in a good way.

“Stop.” He said out loud, trying to drown that train of thought with his voice. It didn’t work.

The train took him back to the days he would sit up straight, just like this, and wait for her to come home. He would have nothing to do, so he would spend his time staring at the wall, waiting for his dear girlfriend, as if his life revolved around hers, as if his existence was tied to her presence. He knew nothing good would happen when she arrived, but he waited anyway. He was in deep back then.

He froze.

He was deeply in love back then.

Just like he was with Kondraki.

“No.” he said, but it came out as a dry whisper. His thoughts were quick to overshadow the weak pleas of his logic as they grew more intense. He breathed in and out, but the air had grown thick and unbreathable. The room spinning around him made him notice he had left the couch. His knees buckled and he soon found himself on the floor, crawling towards the closest corner for some form of safety. He leaned his back onto the wall, closed his eyes and focused his on his breathing.

In, out.

In, out.

In, out.

The cold against his back helped him tremendously, but it still took him a while to calm down. By the time his breathing had returned to normal, the only remnants of his freak out were the echoes of a malice filled laughter, the ringing on his ears and the pang of shame in his gut for still being affected by what happened years ago.

He got on his feet with some difficulty and noticed he was exhausted. He wouldn’t be able to greet Konny when he came home, all his hazy brain could focus on was getting him to the bedroom and into the inviting arms of sleep as fast as possible. He was asleep practically the moment his head met the pillow.

He woke up the next morning to an empty bed. Raising his head, he could see a cup of something on his bed stand that wasn’t there the night before. He grabbed it and took a sniff, chocolate milk with coffee. The cup was still kind of warm, but the drink was not steaming, meaning it had grown cold. He brought it to his lips, theory confirmed. He smiled. He drank all of it before putting it down and getting out of bed.

The workday was intense but uneventful until lunch, when Kondraki walked up to him and gave him a paper bag with shaky hands. Inside the bag was a pink-green bath bomb. “I made this one myself, I hope you like it” was the answer he gave when Clef asked him why he was nervous. To say that Clef was perplexed would have been an understatement, but he didn’t think much of it. He put the bag on the couch in his office and took it home when it was time to leave. He was tired, so off to the Bath Bomb Drawer it went, to be chipped and tested later.

Later came quicker than expected in the form of Kondraki grabbing him and leading him to a secluded corner the next day. Before Clef could question him, he turned and asked, “Did you use the bath bomb I gave you yesterday?” To an outsider, Konny probably looked tired and agitated, but Clef could tell he was panicking. He let his confusion shine through as he shook his head. Kondraki breathed a deep sigh of relief and visibly relaxed. Clef waited a moment before demanding an explanation, at which point Kondraki gave him a sheepish smile.

“Not here. Follow me.”

He let Konny drag him to their destination. It was a small balcony on the rooftop, the same balcony they confessed their mutual love for the first time on. He chuckled, recalling how adorable Kondraki used to be. He looked at the nervous wreck before him. Used to? His boyfriend was still adorable, thank you very much. Then he remembered that his adorable boyfriend was currently a nervous wreck and something that made Kondraki this apprehensive could not be good.

He watched Konny take three deep breaths with his eyes closed, open and close his mouth four times and fumble around in his pockets for something. He locked eyes with Clef when he found what he was looking for.

“Alto, I brought you here because this place is dear to me- us, and I figured my earlier plan was just… too stupid, and I wanted to ask this face to face.”

Before Clef could put two and two together, Kondraki was on one knee.

Clef gasped.

“Will you marry me?”

For a moment, there was silence as both men held their breaths. Clef opened his mouth to answer, but the answer was not one that he knew. He examined the ring. It was gold, and instead of a single diamond, it had three gems: an emerald, a ruby and a sapphire. The ruby in the center was slightly bigger and rounder than the other two. The ring looked his size. God, he loved this man.

He loved him. Just like he loved her.

His breakdown two days ago was still fresh in his mind, and that single thought brought all the memories with it. The sight of the ring became nauseating yet he couldn’t tear his eyes away from it. His hands were shaking, his heart was beating in his ears and at that second he noticed he hadn’t been breathing for a while. he took a sharp breath, shutting his eyes and turning away from the ring, away from Kondraki. He grabbed the railing with both hands to get the shaking under control. When he opened his eyes, his knuckles had turned white. They were high up; it was a long drop down to the concrete floor. He focused on the ground below.

“Alto, is everything alright?” Right, he had a question to answer. He opened his mouth but his lungs still didn’t have enough air in them to reply. He pressed his lips together. That was when he felt a warm hand on his shoulder.

Trapped. He was trapped. Trapped by the very thing that always brought him comfort, those concern filled eyes terrorizing him, the image of the ring burned in his mind, even though the object was nowhere to be seen. He tried to make a noise but all he could manage was a pathetic little whimper. That was enough for Kondraki, however, as he flinched away and took a few steps back to allow Clef some space. Clef booked it inside, running through the corridors like his life depended on it. Didn’t it? The corridors morphed in his mind, the white walls and tiles fading into dull red wallpaper and mahogany parquets. He could hear his muffled steps on the carpet that wasn’t there, the echoes of a baby crying in his empty arms, a life he was leaving behind as he climbed down, down, down the stairs and…

There was nothing there.

He collapsed on his knees to catch his breath. His mind was fuzzy. He could feel a tingling sensation on his lips, hands and feet. He looked at his hands, tried to move his fingers, they were stuck in a claw shape. He looked around; nobody was there. He could see the door to his office just a few meters ahead. He pulled himself up on his feet and took a step, then another, then another. Soon enough, he was at his door. He went inside, locked the door, walked up to the couch just as his knees got weak, held onto the lamp and crumpled onto the couch. The last thing he heard before he lost consciousness was the lamp falling over. When he woke up several hours later, he assessed the damage. The lamp was on the floor and the lightbulb was broken. He would have to call the cleanup crew and request a new lightbulb the next day. With that thought, he packed his stuff and left.

He didn’t see Kondraki again until next afternoon, right after an electrician finished screwing in the new lightbulb. There was a knock on his door, and with his invitation, the taller man walked inside. He was carrying a little paper bag.

“Cinnamon rolls.” He explained. “After… all that, I figured you would like something sweet.” Clef took the bag and thanked him. “There was actually- yesterday, that was a no, right?” Clef did not remove his gaze from his paperwork as he nodded. Kondraki snorted. “Heh, figured as much. Just wanted to say, it’s fine, you know. It’s fine if you’re not ready. I’ll wait, and I’ll continue lovi-“

Clef turned over the paper harshly, making Kondraki flinch. His eyes found his for the first time since the question.

“There was actually something I wanted to talk to you about.” His tone was cold and calculated. Kondraki held his breath.

“I think we should break up.”

That breath was released as a shocked cough. He managed to wheeze out a “Why?” between all the coughing, at which point Clef stood up. “We have grown too close,” he explained, “I can’t, I don’t want- I can’t go on like this.”

Kondraki looked like he had a million things to say, but he ended up not voicing any of them. “Well, then.” He said, after a brief pause. “I respect your decision.” Clef looked startled, the weight of this dawning on him.

Without another word, Kondraki turned to walk out the door. His hand grabbed the handle and rested there for a moment.

“I love you.” Clef blurted out; not as a plea, but as a reminder. Kondraki turned to glance at him once more, his smile bittersweet. “I love you too.” A farewell.

Kondraki walked out of the room. The new light must have been strong, because his eyes shimmered brighter than normal as he did so.

It was hard, the following days, getting used to living alone again after all this time. He ate out instead of preparing something at home, because he would instinctively put out two plates each time. But he got through it, out of obligation if nothing else. That is not to say he got used to it, no. he never got used to the loneliness, the silence; he simply learned to cope with it. When the silence bothered him, he played a song. When he felt lonely, he provoked other people. When it got really bad, he opened the Bath Bomb Drawer and took some of them out, examined them in his hands and memorized their dry smells. He didn’t have the heart to chip pieces of them and use them piece by piece anymore, so their dry smells would do.

One month passed this way. A whole month without the man he loved. He hadn’t kept track, there weren’t even any reminders, but he just knew. He had developed an internal clock for it, almost. A sense for it, like ah yes, today is the day my beloved Konny brings me a gift! How wonderful! Except he wouldn’t, would he? They had been avoiding one another like the plague, he hadn’t caught a single glimpse of him since that day. Not that he would have liked to, anyway.

His thoughts were interrupted by three knocks on his door, the door opening before he told whoever it is to come in. His annoyance eased once he recognized the mop of hair and the roman nose, though he didn’t dial down the bitterness in his voice.

“What is it?” He asked to the younger man standing before him. The man winced, but quickly recovered.

“Hi Clef, they told me to bring this package to you.” He said, holding out a package. Clef knew he shouldn’t take his anger out on the Turkish errand boy. He took a deep breath.

“You look down. Is everything alright? Want me to make you tea? Coffee? Wanna watch old movies after work? I can bring ice cream if you’d like!” He listed off with a small smile. The other researchers weren’t kidding, he really was too pure for the job.

“No, but thank you, İsmet. You can go do something else now.”

“You sure? Ok, if you need anything, I’m around. You know where to find me”

With a pair of finger guns and a huge smile, İsmet disappeared through the door. Clef turned his attention to the unassuming little box. The label attached to the packaging only had the word “Stinky” on it. He stood up to close the door and took it back in his hands when he sat down. He tore down the wrapping paper only to come face to face with a bath bomb. 

A Bath bomb. From his beloved. Despite their breakup.

A logical part of his brain wanted to investigate it because it could be a trap, but the rest were repeating those three statements over and over again in disbelief. What was this? Another challenge? A crooked apology? A wish to get back together? He stared at the bathroom product like he was expecting it to answer his questions. Eventually, he came to his senses and wrapped the gift back, putting it to the side. Because that’s what it was, a gift. Kondraki was a man of patterns and rituals, so it was predictable that he would be reluctant to give up on this one. Clef was the one who should have known better! It was to keep a tradition in place; nothing more, nothing less.

These were the thoughts Clef had as he placed the new addition in the Bath Bomb Drawer. He took a step back with a small smile. A gift, despite the way things ended between them. He felt a pang of guilt but shook it off immediately. This was the better thing to do, for his and Kondraki’s own good.

Kondraki sent him another gift the following month. Same as before, a small package with the word “Stinky” on it. He didn’t put it in the drawer right away this time, he chipped off a piece like he used to do, put it in a glass of water and watched it melt with a smile on his face. Jasmine and vanilla, an unexpected combination, but it worked, somehow.

The next day he got a bunch of jasmine flowers, tore them up, covered them in vanilla extract and threw them into the vent system. It took 30 minutes for the whole wing of the facility to smell like vanilla with a faint hint of jasmine. Clef could swear he heard a hysterical laughter in the distance, his message had been delivered.

The following gift smelled of vanilla and cinnamon, he responded by putting cinnamon in the coffee machine. Next one was cinnamon and coffee. He had heard Kondraki transferred to a different site that month, so he got İsmet to buy 5 jars of honey from his home country (for only 100 liras, what a deal!) and mixed in different types of milk in 4 of those jars before sending them off to Kondraki. His next gift was honey and milk.

Time passed, the drawer got fuller and so did Clef’s work life. He got back to working on the field, training new recruits and leading them on their missions until they either died or became parts of proper task force groups. He would go on long missions and come back to find another gift standing neatly on his desk, take it home, chip a piece, send feedback, rinse and repeat. It was a comforting pattern, and it brought warmth to his life.

Sometimes he would have solo missions, where he tracked down a green by his lonesome and shot it before it knew what was coming. Those usually took one to two weeks, three if the green caught a wind of his presence. These solo missions had become his favorite, especially when he came home to another gift after a long one.

That is why he was perplexed when he returned to an empty office.

He checked the calendar. Four days had passed after their monthiversary. Kondraki should have sent him a gift by then. Kondraki was never late with his gifts. He checked his desk, the drawers, even the closet. No sign of a little box. He grew worried. Trying to ignore the tightness in his chest, he booted his computer, only to notice something green sticking out of the case. Grabbing it, he noticed it was a feather. A green feather with a small card tied to it. The card was empty except for a single sentence.

“Przykro mi z powodu twojej straty."

He rushed out of his office.

It didn’t take him long to find İsmet. When he did, he grabbed him by the shoulders to get his attention. He shook him as he asked:

“What happened? Where is Konny?”

İsmet looked startled at first, then despondent when he registered the question. “Miste- Doctor Kondraki, he… all the more life to you, Clef, sir. I’m sorry.”

His panic subsided as he asked, gentler this time, “What do you mean?” He dreaded the answer, he knew what it was.

“He passed away a week ago. Weren’t you at his funeral?”

No. That couldn’t be true. Kondraki was a trooper. He was unstoppable, indestructible. He couldn’t have just- died, right? It didn’t make any sense.

Clef could see İsmet’s mouth moving, but the words were muffled and indecipherable. He watched the young man’s expression go from sorrow to confusion as he realized Clef wasn’t listening.

Clef surprised both of them by looking up at İsmet with a smirk. “It’s fine,” he said, “the bastard had it long coming.” With that, he calmly walked over to his office, got inside and closed the door after himself, all with an empty smile on his face. He sat on his chair and stared at his desk, where Konny’s gift should have been. The green feather was laying there, mocking him. He grabbed the card and brought it closer to read the sentence. He read it again, again, again. He read it until the words made no sense anymore.

By the time he looked up, it was lunchtime. A bagel and a glass of tea were standing on his desk. He hadn’t heard İsmet come in. His eyes were burning and his fingers were tingly. He gently placed the feather inside his pencil holder and slid it over the card before reaching for the bagel. Making a mental note to thank him later.

The rest of the day was a blur; as well as the day after that, the day after that and the day after that. Each passing second felt duller, and it wasn’t long before his few remaining sources of happiness were withering away. Pranking researchers was one of the first activities to stop sparking joy, so he ceased. Teasing and bothering others was next, and soon enough he had no reason to go to the cafeteria anymore. It didn’t even sting when nobody noticed his absence.

He felt empty, like he wasn’t the main character of his own life. He just existed to the side, walking around to fill the space. That was his sole purpose. He didn’t need to feel to fulfill it, and thus he didn’t.

His apathy carried him for the better part of a month. He was even starting to like the numbness until one evening, when he was washing his hands in his bathroom. His gaze slipped from his hands towards the cabinets; more specifically, the Bath Bomb Drawer.

He stood still, looking at the cursed drawer for a solid minute. Before his mind could catch up with it, his hand moved and pulled the knob. He was immediately hit by the vibrant colors and smells of the bath bombs within. He took a moment to stare at them blankly. That was when a stray thought appeared in his head.

The drawer would never be filled.

In hindsight, this shouldn’t have bothered him as much as it did. It was nothing he didn’t know before, after all. But seeing the three-finger deep gap between the bath bomb pile and the top of the drawer, realizing he could fit a few more in there and that he wouldn’t, couldn’t do that devastated him.

The next few minutes were a blur. He recalled turning around and walking to the bathtub to do… something, then staring at it for a minute or two as the water rose. Did he turn it on? He must have. He was holding something in his hand. What was it? He turned off the water when it reached an inch past the midpoint, raised whatever was in his hand to eye level and kept it still until his eyes adjusted. It was an indigo bath bomb with pink and yellow spots. The last one Kondraki had given him before he…

He smiled. His final gift from the love of his life. How sweet.

He loosened his grip and let it drop into the water.

The bath bomb spun around, releasing yellow, blue and pink foam that covered the surface in bubbles. The fizzing sound reminded him of newly opened soda, while the smell of saltwater filled his bathroom. His empty smile didn’t leave his face while he wondered how they managed to copy the smell of the ocean.

As he was getting lost in the big swirls on the water, a big, heavy drop landed on the surface, leaving an empty spot in its way. Clef looked up. There was no leak, and even if there was, it wasn’t raining. Another drop traveled down his cheek, ending up at his chin. Oh, so that’s what it was.

He sat up straighter and kept smiling as his face got wetter and wetter, closing his eyes when his sight got blurry, holding his breath when he felt a rising sob and swallowing profusely to make the lump in his throat disappear. It was fine, nothing in his life was changed, he wasn’t even feeling sad about anything. He grabbed the edge of his bathtub with shaking hands and waited for this… tantrum, that his body was throwing, to pass.

He waited until the pressure in his head became unbearable, until he had to gasp for air and taste the aroma of saltwater in his mouth. He let out a sob, followed by another and another. His smile never left, making it look like he was laughing. Maybe he was, he didn’t know. His whole body was shaking. He kept his eyes on the water, looking at it, laughing and sobbing without a care in the world.

He didn’t remember falling asleep near the bathtub, but he figured he must have after waking up to a backache in that position. His face felt icky and dry, and his cheeks hurt from smiling that long. The bubbles on the surface had long since disappeared and what awaited him was blue tinted glittery water.

He got on his feet and left the bathroom without emptying the bathtub.

The bathtub stayed like that for three days, at which point Clef drained it as it had stopped smelling like the sea. It was filled again the next day for another bath bomb. Then emptied and filled once more the following week.

This became a habit of sorts for him. Whenever numbness set in, he would pop another bath bomb and cry over his lost love. He sat and watched the honey and milk one spin in the water, dipped his arm in the coffee and cinnamon bath water and got a horrible rash that he laughed off as a prank from over the grave, got lost in the smell of cinnamon and vanilla, brought the jasmine water close to his face and ended up having glitter on his nose for three days…

He stopped after that, dreading what was to come. He tried to resist but after the return of his emotions, the numb void felt like hell. He lasted a week before he gave in and grabbed the next bath bomb in line.

It was the last bath bomb Kondraki had given him in person, before he broke off their relationship; and soon he was holding it over a bathtub half-full of clear water.

He could still hear him laugh, see his nervous smile as he gave this to him. “I made this one myself,” he had said, “I hope you like it.”

The bath bomb was a light, minty blue and a little disfigured. It had pastel pink and indigo streaks along its middle, as well as some spots of yellow sprinkled around for a pop of color. By itself, it smelled… fresh, as if it hadn’t been sitting in the drawer for months. Just looking at it gave him pain, so he turned his head towards the water instead.  

It had been such a simple question, the next big step in their relationship, why hadn’t he said yes? He took a shaky breath and tried to clear his head. It was too early to cry.

Why had he chosen to ruin the best thing he had?

Because he didn’t think he deserved it.

He hissed out a curse as he threw the bath bomb into the bathtub. It hit the bottom with more force than needed, splitting into 5 pieces and doing its colorful dance. The surface of the water was covered in thick blue foam within seconds, the minty aroma it brought out accompanied by vanilla and coconut. He stood there paralyzed as Kondraki’s handiwork dissolved before his very eyes.

He could only move once the fizzing stopped. He sat down next to the bathtub and dipped his arm into the mint-colored water. Breathing in, he choked on the beautiful scent as his eyes watered. His choking turned to sobs that shook his body and once again he was crying his heart out. He tried to ignore any coherent thoughts by staring into the water and focusing on his breathing. That’s when he noticed a glint at the bottom of the bathtub.

Blinking his tears away, he paused to figure out what he was seeing. Moving his arm in the water had dissipated some of the foam, exposing something at the bottom that wasn’t there before. It must have been inside the bath bomb, he thought as he reached in to grab it. He brought it closer and froze once he realized what it was.

It was a ring.

A resin copy of the ring Konny had proposed to him with.

“Did you use the bath bomb I gave you yesterday yet?”

His panic, his relief when his answer was negative…

He twirled it around to inspect it. there was something carved inside the ring.

“I figured my earlier plan was just… too stupid, and I wanted to ask this face to face.”

Earlier plan, too stupid, face to face…

Words, he realized. He leaned onto the bathtub to reduce the shaking and squinted to read the words.

Will you marry me?

His breath got caught in his throat.

“Yes.” He gasped out. “Yes, yes, a million times yes!” He squeezed the ring in his palm, hugging it to his chest as his words turned to sobs and his sobs turned to wails. Slowly sliding down, he found his back touching the cold tile floor and struggled to care. He continued wailing as his eyes skimmed the room and landed on the mirror. For a brief moment, he wondered what he looked like to an outsider. One of the greatest field agents and doctors working for the foundation, known for his feral trickster nature, lying on the bathroom floor and ugly crying over a damn ring. The mental image almost put a smile on his face.

He was pretty sure he spent the night in that position.

When he came to his senses, he found himself curled up, staring blankly at the door. Licking his lips, he grimaced at the taste of snot and pushed himself on his elbows, only then remembering the object tightly embedded in his palm. He took a look at the ring and the red marks he had gotten from holding onto it for that long.

He stood up, pulled the plug and left the bathroom, and was only slightly surprised when the morning sun greeted him. He sat on his bed to inspect the ring under better lighting. It was mostly made out of glittery gold colored resin with some blue, red and green on the top part. He absentmindedly put it on his finger. It was a perfect fit. Feeling another sob rise in his throat, he ripped out the ring and threw it away, only to scramble after it when it slid under the closet. Luckily, it was still in reach. He held it like it was hazardous and tossed it inside his bedside drawer, where it would lay untouched and unseen for the foreseeable future.

After closing the drawer, he dressed up and went to work as if nothing had happened. Some questioning looks were thrown his way for being late, but with a glance from his hollow eyes they were gone. He was headed to his office, but he bypassed his floor and kept climbing. He didn’t know what prompted him, and he didn’t have the willpower to stop it as he reached the rooftop balcony.

It was, as always, empty and isolated. He walked to the edge and leaned on the bars. The sight was not as pretty as it once was, he realized. It was as if Mona Lisa had left her canvas and all he had to see was a background that was supposed to frame true beauty. His thoughts left a bitter taste in his mouth.

Without thinking, he slowly took off his shoes. The bars creaked under his weight as he threw a leg over them, followed by another, and then he was fully sitting on them. He wiggled around, discovering that the bars shook along with his body. He allowed himself a moment to imagine the bars giving out under his weight and sending him tumbling to his death. The thought was oddly comforting.

He stayed there watching the shadows move from one side to another until his feet felt cold and his hands grew tired of grabbing the rusty metal. A full body shiver brought him back to his senses; and as if nothing had happened, he swung himself over the railing in a swift motion, took his time putting on his shoes and skipped back towards his office.

Nothing happened the rest of the week. He kept the bathtub curtains closed, requested the door to the rooftop balcony to be sealed and even considered taping the Bath Bomb Drawer shut, but didn’t have the energy to do so. Eventually he stopped thinking about it, and his life was back to being an empty abyss. Half of the time he didn’t feel in charge of his body, it was like he was watching a cutscene and endlessly waiting for the controls to be passed down to him again. Did he even want control? What had control brought him other than pain?

He decided he did want it back, simply because there wasn’t anything else for him to want.

A few weeks later, he found himself standing before the balcony door once more. The door had been sealed with metal bars and painted the same color as the wall. For a second he wanted to rip the bars off and open the door again, but the urge vanished as soon as it appeared.

That evening, when he went home, he opened the Bath Bomb drawer again to gaze over its contents. Every single bath bomb remaining in the drawer had been given to him personally by Konny. Every single one of them had some memories attached to them, like the eggplant shaped one Konny got him after their first kiss, the strawberry scented one from their mutual love confession, or the minty candy cane he found in his Christmas stocking.

He grabbed the candy cane and opened the bathtub curtains, only to find that his bathtub had been discolored. He put aside the cane bath bomb to inspect the random bursts of color on the sides, tried rubbing them off with water, but they wouldn’t go away.

They must be from Konny’s bath bomb, his mind supplied. He did say he made it himself; it’s possible he used the wrong type of dye. This thought made Clef smile and caress one of the color splotches, another imperfection to remember his perfect partner by.

Taking the candy cane back in his off hand and turning on the water, he thought. When he had seen the candy cane in his stocking, he had thought it was a real candy cane. He had figured out it wasn’t once he touched it, but that didn’t stop him from pretending to eat it. Kondraki had tried to stop him and they had ended up falling to the ground, wrestling for the fake candy cane. They had forgotten about the candy cane at one point and gotten lost in one another’s lips, and then…

The bathtub was full, and his vision was blurry. He wiped the bittersweet smile off his face before dumping the candy cane into the water. It covered the surface in red and white foam and the fizzing released a minty aroma that stung his eyes. The smile found its way back onto his face but this time he was too distracted by the show to wipe it off.

It didn’t take long for the candy cane to fully dissolve. Clef stood up when it did and left the room, glancing at the Bath Bomb Drawer one last time before closing the bathroom door.

What he was doing was the same as it had been, wasn’t it? Why was it harder then, why did it feel like such a heavy weight on his chest? He thought back to that Christmas morning, holding back a smile at the memory. It was only a memory now, with nothing left to remember it by. He felt disgusting, like a murderer burning away his bloody weapon, the evidence of a happier time.

A significantly longer time passed till he needed the closure of the bath bombs again. Maybe he had been avoiding it, maybe he had been getting better, it did not matter as he found himself back at his bathtub.

Another bath bomb melted in the tub as another memory flickered before his eyes, leading him to yet another crying session. It continued like that, he watched through their happy memories, their first love confession, their first kiss, all the while feeling like an outsider, a pathetic little man who couldn’t do anything but destroy.

That’s what he did, he destroyed.

He destroyed the eggplant, the lime tablet, whatever remained of the blue cologne-smelling sphere.. they all met the same fate, they all fizzed and popped and melted in the tub, they all were reduced to pigment in the water, they all were flushed away…

Until all but one were gone.

He only noticed it when he opened the Bath Bomb Drawer and reached into it the way he had been doing for months, years; only for his hand to touch wooden surface. Despondent, he gazed into the empty drawer. There, in the back, he could see a single, disfigured bath bomb glittering back at him. He swallowed.

It was the first ever bath bomb Kondraki had given him, the one he had stolen from lush all those years ago.

With shaking hands, he grabbed the final bath bomb, the sole carrier of Kondraki’s memory. He inspected the broken-up product one last time before it dawned on him: That wasn’t true.

 He put the bath bomb on the counter and went into his room to search for something. It didn’t take long as she was right where he left her.

His beloved shotgun.

Modified to kill even the strongest of reality benders.

Modified to kill even him.

He carried her to the bathroom with newfound determination, not bothering to shut the door as he turned on the tap. The sound of hot water flowing into the bathtub was just white noise to accent his running thoughts. Shotgun still in hand, he grabbed the bath bomb from the counter.

The moment his eyes locked onto it; he felt the world stop. He couldn’t hear the running water, couldn’t feel the edge of the bathtub getting warmer against his back as it filled up. He was back at that sunny street, holding the stolen bath product in his hands for the first time. He chucked as he examined the brand-new bath bomb. He mimed a “thanks”, hearing his own voice despite not putting any air into it.

“Don’t mention it.”

He looked up from the bath bomb and there he was; with his stupid grin, stupid hands in the pockets of his stupid coat, squinting at him because his stupid eyes were irritated from the sun… those eyes that were filled with love, so much love that Clef could drown in them. He reached out a hand at his face. NO, screamed a voice in his head, this was not a part of the memory- his Konny leaned into his touch, his cheek warm against Clef’s fingers. Clef pulled his face towards him until he could feel his breath on his lips once more. His Konny was there again, all he had to do was to close that gap and-

He jumped to his feet at the hot, damp sensation on his back. Instantly on guard, he glared at the bathtub; it was overfilled and water was seeping out all over his floors. He reached out to turn off the tap. Seeing as his shirt and pants were already soaked, he sighed and plopped down onto the ground.

He held up the bath bomb; it was old, deformed and so broken up that it didn’t resemble a berry anymore. The parts where the bomb was wet were goopy and his hand was stained with pink colorant.

He lowered the bath bomb gently into the water, washing off the pink on his fingers as the bath bomb started fizzing. It broke into several pieces as it dissolved into pink and white foam, covering the water surface and releasing a faint berry scent into the air. Clef breathed it in, and out. He wasn’t surprised by the shakiness of his breath, nor was he surprised to discover the dampness of his cheeks when he touched them with his dry hand.  He longingly gazed at the incomprehensible shapes the bath bomb left behind. They dissolved when he ran his fingers through the water’s surface. They were no more, it was no more, Kondraki’s memory was gone. He caressed his beloved shotgun absentmindedly. Soon he would be as well.

Turning his back to the bathtub, he rolled back his shoulders and took a deep breath. The ceiling light hurt his eyes, but he kept looking directly at it. His tears left an odd sensation sliding down his temples. He blinked a few times, letting out a broken chuckle when they tickled his ears. He felt lighter, in a way, as if a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He pulled the shotgun onto his lap.

He took another deep breath, lowered his gaze to his trembling hands and forced them to lift the shotgun and point the muzzle about two inches down the center of his collarbone. His hands continued shaking, which was very unprofessional for a hitman like him, but who was there to judge? He tried to hold it steady with his left hand while the right hand fumbled with the trigger. He had never pulled the trigger from this angle before; would it even be called “pulling” the trigger? Since the motion was more like pushing it? Anyway, that didn’t matter anymore. Nothing did, nothing would.

With his mind emptied and his finger in the right position, he took one final breath and pushed the trigger.

BANG