"You know, we should tell him," Ani said. She was leaning against the window, and Alec stared at her annoyedly.
"I agree with Ani. His boyfriend nearly died on his bed, and the boy didn't even ask questions," Alice said as she looked over at her brother, who rolled his eyes at her.
"He's probably scared we'll reject him," Matt said, and Alec frowned, which caught him off guard.
"What? Why? Why would he think we would reject him?" he asked.
"We all know his previous friend group wasn't the most inviting? Well, besides the boy and the girl who comes to see him regularly."
"You mean Claire and Lyric?" Ani said. She rolled her eyes at them. "At least, learn their names." She said, waving her hands around in annoyance. No matter how often she repeated their names, these fools would never use them.
"You're all getting off the topic here," Damian said, and yes, that was right. They even had Damian come here against Matt's wishes, but they moved on.
"I say we should tell Max," Ani repeated.
"What exactly would we tell him?" Oliver said. "Hey, man. I know we've only known each other for like six months and we're all very close, but we've been sort of hiding the fact that we're f*****g mercenaries for some very, very sketchy people. And we could die at any moment, but it's cool because it's not like your boyfriend nearly died on your bed!"
Alec sighed at the mention of Max being his boyfriend. "For the millionth time, Max isn't my boyfriend."
Alice laughed, moving her dark hair out of her face, her blue eyes shining. "Not yet, anyway."
"When Max comes back from his outing with the boy-" Oliver began.
"Lyric! His name is Lyric!" Ani yelled, exasperated. "If you're going to complain about the boy, the least you could do is learn his name!"
"I say we tell him," Alec said. "Max, not Lyric."
"I thought you would be against us telling Max," Oliver said, and Alec shrugged. He was against it, but he knew they all did; the longer they waited, the larger the fallout.
"The longer we hide this, the more it will most likely hurt him. I mean, we all got attached to one another really, really quick," Alec said quickly, and Oliver made a face.
"I mean, I wouldn't say attached-" he was cut off by Amber, who snorted.
"Please, besides Alec, you are the most attached and you can't even lie to us about it. Mr. 'oh, when's Max coming back?' or 'I'm bored, let's go steal Max from whoever he's out with.'”
"You piss me off," he said, glaring at her as he pushed his glasses up and she smiled.
"As I was saying," Alec winced a little. s**t, he got it, no sudden movements. "We tell Max. The longer we hide it from him, the more it will hurt him. He'll spiral."
"What do you mean, spiral?" Damian asked, a frown etching itself on his usual resting b***h face.
"It's a thing he does," Matt said, not looking at him but answering anyway. "Like overthink; I mean, once all of us were watching a movie and out of the blue, he made us promise him never to leave him. I mean, he had tears in his eyes and was panicking."
Damian scowled, crossing his arms over his chest, his Adam's apple bobbing, making the Medusa tattoo bob. "Don't tell me you were dumb enough to make it.”
"In our defence," Amber said, sighing. "you should have seen him. Of course, we made a promise!"
"All of you?" he asked, scowling. When all five nodded, Damian’s scowl deepened as he glared at them.
"You made the one promise none of you can keep!”
"We can try," Alec said, and he didn't think that was the correct answer because of the look Damian shot at him.
"You were half dead on his bed," he deadpanned. "No matter how hard you try, you won't be able to keep it. Not when you're all involved in the crime world. You all better fix this, and fix it soon.”
~*~