jealousy is not a four-letter word

Who: Dodge and Roach
Where: Their place
When: dawn

The sun was just starting to filter through the shadows when Dodge started the climb up the stairs into his building. He was more than tired and it showed in the dark circles under his eyes. Maddy had nightmares during the night, waking him up as she thrashed. He’d stayed with her for a few moments, cooing softly into her ear until she fell asleep again. At that point though it was almost morning and he couldn’t sleep again. His clothes were rumpled from either being slept in or slept on from where they’d been discarded, and his tie was only done loosely around his neck and his shirt was half untucked under the open vest. He was merely a shade of the Prince of Thieves as he leaned on the door to the apartment he shared with his boys, hell bent on hitting his room as soon as he could and at least getting in another hour or so of sleep.

Roach couldn’t sleep. He didn’t have nightmares, but he sometimes woke with an uncomfortable sensation of weight between his shoulder blades. Sometimes it was just a cat, but other times there was nothing there, just an unseen pressure that refused to allow him to relax. Today, it was the latter.

He’d tiptoed out of the apartment’s second bedroom which he shared with Mud, stepping between cots and swaying hammocks to the bathroom. There was a box of matches on the windowsill, but Roach rolled his own cigarettes, using small pinches of tobacco in each one to make a store-bought pack last as long as possible. He lit one now, blowing the smoke out of the open bathroom window. As far as he knew, Dodge hadn’t come back yet. He was his own man, sure, but Roach couldn’t help but wonder if he’d gotten himself into trouble--either with the ladies or a bunch of thugs.

Dodge should have expected someone to be up, but as always he’d hoped his late night coming goings would be ignore. He’d been off and on for days though, and he realized that even if he didn’t want them shadowing his every move? That had his boys on high alert. The flare of the match in the bathroom shouldn’t have caught him off guard, but Dodge still found himself drawn to it, passing his own bedroom and his precious sleep to slip into the bathroom and push himself up on the small counter that held the sink. “Still up?”

“Yep,” Roach said, glancing over at Dodge as he hopped onto the counter. He looked the other boy over: he looked disheveled, so obviously he’d slept somewhere. “Hell of a night?” He tapped ash out of the window, brushing away some that had fallen onto the sill. The paper burned quick, especially with so little tobacco. They were better for him that way, he told himself. One of the cats that liked Dodge best wandered in, peering up at him and mewling.

“Something like that,” Dodge commented, looking away and thankful for the dim light that hid part of the flush in his cheeks. When the small cat meowed at him he clicked his tongued against the roof of his mouth, a small noise that usually had the little creature jumping up into his lap, just as it did now, hopping lightly onto the counter and rubbing against his elbow for attention. “Ran into some guy messing with Doll tonight. Had to put him in his place.” Of course that had nothing to do at all with his disheveled person. That was all Maddy on her own.

“Who?” Roach asked immediately. He and Maddy weren’t as close as they used to be, but he still cared about what happened to her and would gladly break the legs, or worse, of anyone that tried to hurt her. If the guy could still walk after Dodge had taken care of, Roach would gladly track him down and change that. “She okay?”

“No one we know, though he won’t be around again.” It wasn’t lost on Dodge, that moment where she’d called him her boyfriend. He hadn’t said anything about it because he wasn’t sure how he felt about it. He’d walked into that fight on his own because he’d ditched his boys to spend the day with Jessie. That was hardly boyfriend material. “She’s alright, little shaken up but she seemed fine when I left.” She’d seemed fine when she had his back pressed against the door kissing him.

“Hm.” Roach smoked the last of his cigarette until the cherry burned his fingertips, then flicked the butt out of the open window. That was good enough, he guessed, though he would rather have hurt the guy himself. That he now knew better than to mess with Maddy again was going to have to do.

He put the toilet seat town and sat on it, looking up at Dodge. “Anything else?”

Dodge finally started paying attention to the small cat at his side, though part of it was just to avoid Roach’s gaze. “Should there be something else?”

Roach shrugged his big shoulders. “I’m just asking if there’s anything else I oughta know about, Dodge. You know, things people might try attacking me for just ‘cause I know you.” He smirked, just one corner of his mouth lifting slightly, his scar creasing his face. “You know how you are.”

The smile was there, that Cheshire cat grin that looked perfectly in place even with Dodge’s rumpled attire and dark circles under his eyes. He knew exactly how he was. “Nothing of note,” he told his right hand man. “I stayed out of trouble tonight. Though if Jessie James ever challenges you to a game of pool, don’t bet money on it.”

Roach’s smirk fell, arching an eyebrow in its stead. “Really, Dodge?” He leaned back against the toilet bowl, arms crossed over his chest. “Jessie? And then Maddy?” Roach didn’t need to have feelings for Maddy to see that Dodge playing both girls was shady behavior. Dodge could do whatever the hell he wanted, of course, but that didn’t mean Roach approved of everything he did.

“Just friends with JJ. She did a good job of reminding me of that,” Dodge pointed out. He’d told the girl he liked her, which had been pretty honest on his part and she’d shot the idea straight into the ground. It didn’t mean Dodge was giving up, it just meant he had to work harder. “And then Maddy what?” Dodge really wanted to know what Roach was thinking. Whatever it was? What was going on might be worse, but Dodge was still curious.

Roach snorted. “It’s dawn and you look like you spent all night in an alley. Since I’m pretty sure you didn’t sleep in an alley, there’s only a couple other places you could’ve been. C’mon, Dodge, I’m not dumb.” He ran his fingers through his hair then spread his arms out, palms up. “Everybody knows Maddy’s nuts about you. Don’t go messing that up.”

“I’m hardly dirty enough to have spent the night in an alley,” Dodge said, giving Roach a look. “It’s complicated. With Maddy.” That was the best he could muster as far as describing things went.

“Yeah? So don’t make it more complicated.” Roach looked at Dodge plainly, like it all made perfect sense. He wasn’t in the middle of it, so it did, for him. His own investment in Maddy sometimes made it seem like he wasn’t actually on the sidelines, but that’s what he was: a spectator. “Gimmie my cat, you two-timing bastard.” Roach made a grab for the feline in Dodge’s lap, though that and his comment were made in jest.

“I sure as hell hope you’re call the cat the two timing bastard and not me,” Dodge quipped turning away from Roach to hold on to the cat. Not making it more complicated sounded like a fine plan up until Maddy was undoing the buttons on his shirt. Then whatever plan he had sort of fell away.

Roach smirked and let Dodge hold onto the cat. It liked him best anyway. The others had boys that they favored, but they all knew who to come to when they wanted to get fed and not just lavished with attention. “I think we both know who I’m talking about,” he said, looking expectantly at Dodge, elbow on the counter. “And don’t dodge the subject, Dodge.”

Dodge frowned and looked away from his friend. “It’s complicated,” he tried again, watching the sun glint off the buildings as it rose. “It’s different. It’s not two-timing because it’s not the same thing.”

“You’re not a one-man band,” Roach said. “You can’t play ‘em both at the same time.” He knew how Dodge could get, avoiding the subject, making excuses. He didn’t know all the details about what was going on with Maddy and Jessie, but from a distance, it didn’t look all that great.

“I’m not playing anything. It’s just different. JJ, she’s got this spunk, this life and she’s there and friendly. And Maddy, it’s just.. she’s mine.” The words didn’t make sense, not at all, and it was hard to explain how the only thing he’d ever taken from Maddy was her bed, which he gave back. It wasn’t something of Maddy’s he wanted, it was Maddy herself.

“And you don’t see how that’s kind of messed up?” It made Roach a little angry, honestly, and getting angry about Maddy was the one thing he’d learned to keep a nice, tight lid on. It got too complicated with Dodge, and the matter was much better off bottled up. “Maddy’s yours, sure, but you’re not hers. You’ve got a claim on her but you’re free to go chasing after Jessie. ‘Cause she’s spunky.”

Dodge shrugged, trying to ignore the fact that Roach sounded pissed. “I told her I’d always come back to her, and I meant it. I did tonight didn’t I?” Though that hadn’t exactly been planned, more of just how it happened. That was how it always worked out though didn’t it? “She said...that it didn’t matter. Just so long as I came back.”

Roach bit down on the inside of his cheek. It was hard to argue when Maddy herself had said otherwise, though how much of that had been out of fear of the alternative, that Dodge wouldn’t come back. He didn’t know though--all he could do was speculate. “All right, all right. Just... make sure that you do. Maddy is too damn good not to.”

Dodge didn’t answer for a moment, shifting to rest his shoulder against the wall while he thought about things. Roach was right, Maddy was good, but JJ was good too. She had that vitality that Evie had, but she was more open with it, and she was her own girl without being arrogant about it. All of that appealed to Dodge in so many ways, but it didn’t change things about Maddy. Or how he always wound up back with Maddy when it was all said and done. “I always do, even when I don’t mean to, I always do.”

Roach could see it, the “yeah, but...” gears working on Dodge’s face. The boy was his best friend and he didn’t know where the hell he’d be without him, but that didn’t mean Roach didn’t know he was the prince of excuses as well as thieves. He didn’t know what Dodge was thinking, not literally, but he knew that his answer wasn’t really an assurance. “Dodge,” Roach said, making sure he was looking at him. “Don’t you fucking break her heart. If she’s yours, that means you take care of her. You should know that better than anyone. If you’re not paying attention to what’s in your pocket, somebody’s gonna brush right by and next thing you know, it’ll be gone.”

At the sound of his name Dodge turned to Roach, listening with an eyebrow raised. It was something special between him and Roach, no one else in their group would speak as candidly to him, not even Mud. “I always take care of my own, Roach. Always have. Always will. I’m the best damned thief in this town, I won’t lose what’s mine.” Roach knew what he did, how he took care of his own, Roach had benefited from it. Sighing he looked away again. “I’ll be careful.”

“Being a thief isn’t what’s going to help you here,” Roach said. He stood up again, cracking the window, grabbing another of his rolled cigarettes. “You should get some sleep. You look like a damn mess. Any of the boys see you like that and they won’t recognize you.”

“What will help?” Dodge asked ignoring the comment about sleep and miming for Roach to bum him a smoke. It wasn’t something Dodge partook in normally, but it seemed fitting at the moment. Plus if Roach loaned him one there was a good chance Dodge would steal him a new pack within a day or two.

“Not running around with other girls, for starters,” Roach said, passing Dodge one of the cigarettes and the book of matches. He opened the window more so the two sets of smoke could make their way out the window. “You’ve gotta pick one. One, Dodge. You wouldn’t like it if Maddy played around with other guys like you do. Why’s she gotta deal with it, huh? It’s not fair, it’s not right.”

Dodge frowned around the cigarette as he lit it. “Why just one? I tried that, with Evie, worked out horribly.” He had been willing to commit completely to the older girl, but she’d decided the age gap was too much, that he was just a child. It was strange, he supposed, that he’d taken up with Jessie not long after, but that had been a chance encounter. Nothing but pure luck. Roach was right though, Dodge had no desire to share Maddy with anyone, even though at times he wondered if he shared her with Roy. “As for Maddy, she’s already tried to leave me once. You remember how that went.”

Roach rolled his eyes, hard. He considered telling Dodge that doting on Evie was bad idea to begin with, but the other boy had been sore about being rejected by her for so long that it was probably a bad idea to throw salt on wounds that hadn’t totally healed over just yet. That was fine, though; Dodge had said plenty of other things that were worthy of an eyeroll. “Yeah, but just because she won’t leave you doesn’t mean you can walk all over her. Just think about how you’d feel if the situations were reversed, and don’t say that they never would be. Just think about it.”

Saying it never would be had been on the tip of Dodge’s tongue, but to appease his friend he paused, taking a long drag on the cigarette. He’d found himself thinking about Evelyn and realizing it had been almost a week since he’d seen her last, that he had no idea how her date had gone, or if there’d been others yet. Part of that was due to being distracted by Jessie, part of that due to Maddy and the rest was the result of his pride being a little more bruised than normal. Breathing out the smoke slowly he considered what Roach was saying, if Maddy double played him like that, and it would be horrible. It reminded him a little of her jokes at turning tricks, how he’d refused to put the bed together the first time because of it. “I’d be jealous,” he finally settled on.

Roach nodded, slowly, blowing a stream of smoke out of the corner of his mouth. “You’d be jealous,” he echoed. “So how do you think Maddy feels?” If Dodge said anything other than the obvious answer, Roach swore the god, he’d give up on the whole damn thing.

No, that wasn’t true. He’d keep at it. For Maddy’s sake, and for Dodge’s. Sooner or later he wasn’t going to have to realize he wasn’t digging himself into a grave with all the running around he was doing.

“You know the last time she called me jealous? She told me I was jealous of those creeps, those guys who came by Little Angels,” Dodge told Roach hating himself a little because part of him had been jealous. “Maybe I earned the right to make her a little jealous every once in a while.” It was just another lie, another way to convince himself that what he’d been up to the past week wasn’t wrong.

“No, Dodge,” Roach said, tapping ash out of the window. “You didn’t. Nobody gets the right to make somebody jealous. It sucks.” He got that Dodge and Maddy were complicated, he knew that--every time Dodge came around looking pissed as hell, he knew that. But Dodge didn’t have to make it worse by running with other girls and being vindictive. “Besides, aren’t things better with her? Why you wanna mess it all up again?”

Were things better with Maddy? She wasn’t going to Little Angels, she wasn’t giving him reasons to leave, but it wasn’t like things were fixed. In fact, Dodge was pretty sure even last night they’d successfully avoided and ignored everything that was wrong between them and focused instead on the clumsy physicality that seemed to make things feel right. “Things aren’t better, they are just...different.” That was what it was, something had just changed.

“Different? Like how Maddy and Jessie are different?” Roach lifted an eyebrow, slugging Dodge in the arm, playfully. He hated it when Dodge got all upset, got all serious. It just meant that bad things were headed down their way soon. “Work on making them better with Maddy first, then. You can’t do that and be with JJ at the same time. That’ll make things worse for sure.”

Dodge frowned again. If things were going to be better with Maddy? He and Maddy were actually going to have to face their issues, not just crowd in her bed and pretend the outside world didn’t exist. “For the millionth time, I’m just friends with JJ,” Dodge reminded Roach, skirting the issue of making things better with Maddy.

“All right, all right,” Roach said, putting his hands up. He didn’t believe Dodge for a second, though. He was hardly ever just friends with a girl, especially one that he’d already started to pursue. Even if JJ had said no, unless somebody had replaced the Dodge he knew with somebody else, Dodge wasn’t going to leave it there. He hadn’t said anything about Maddy though, Roach noticed, but he’d figured he’d said enough for one night. Morning. Whatever.

Dodge finished off the last of his cigarette, looking at the rising sun with disdain. Normally he wanted to be up at this hour, not just going back to sleep again. Flicking the butt out the window he slipped from the counter with a grace that a boy his age shouldn’t have. “Two hours,” he told Roach, holding up two fingers. “Wake me then. I trust you can get this parade started on your own? We need them on the streets today. Looks like the weather’s going to be nice again. The park, the shopping district, the church, anywhere they’re gonna congregate for the warm weather.” Rent was due in a few days, and though it hardly cost much for their run down apartment, that didn’t meant there wasn’t money that needed to be made.

“You look like you need a hell of a lot more than two hours, but all right.” Roach flicked his own butt out of the window, shutting it, gently, to keep out the cool morning air. “Yeah, I got it. Go get your ass to bed.” Roach wasn’t going to get any more sleep himself, he knew that, not with the heaviness of not-nightmares on his shoulders. There wouldn’t be any rainy day parades today.

Dodge smiled, friendly at first, but after a moment it shifted into the assured, sly grin he usually wore. “As you demand,” he teased drawing out the last word as he danced out of Roach’s reach, still lithe on his feet despite being tired. Tipping his fedora in mock salute he turned and made his way to his room, silent even in shoes.

Roach threw a playful punch at Dodge, missing when the boy darted away. Goddamn Dodge... he liked that, though. That was more of the Dodge he knew, uncomplicated by all of this other stuff that was going on in their world.

He got himself washed up and dressed, giving the boys a few more moments of sleep before he started shaking them out of their cots and hammocks. Quietly, though, so Dodge could get himself settled in his room. Clean, fed, and off to work before the sun had even gone fully yellow, taking their places like mice in the fields of the city.