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The bruises had started to fade. It had been two weeks now, and they were starting to fade, but he could still feel them.
They sat in the living room. It was dark, and the clock on the mantle kept ticking away each minute as the night slid further away from them. Paul was sullen. He had been quiet like Noel in the way that they both understood that they were free, but that it was a gilded cage type of freedom. They couldn't leave the house. Liam did, sometimes. If just to attend classes. He and Paul would watch hurried neighbours bustle past the street as Liam swooped in and out between their bodies like a metronome. They would sit around watching television or, as often the case, Noel would hide away in his room with his guitar and records until he grew so hungry he was forced to eat.
Liam would be shielded each day by his mates. They would form protective bubbles with Liam pocketed in the middle. Sometimes all the neighbourhood birds would tag along while Tommy came after him, spittle flying from his mouth and eyes like thunder underneath eyebrows that Noel—alongside many other features—unfortunately inherited. And then they would run, Liam's feet smacking against wet peat and grass until Tommy was just a shadow behind him.
Those days always led them here. Quiet conversations in the dark where they could chalk the moment of vulnerability up to the late hour.
Noel was pressed into the corner of the couch between the armrest and a cross-stitched pillow. His eyes were distant and trained on a series of old photographs above the mantle. Peggy had gone to bed hours before. It was just them.
Liam sat on the floor pressed up against his bony knees. He kept reaching up to play with his mouth or brush his hair back. A cigarette was pinched between his fingers, ash trailing to the carpet below, and Paul sat ahead of them with his wide shoulders hunched down over himself.
"I jus' hate 'im." Liam spat viciously under his breath. Paul's head bobbed up and then down once more. "Hate havin to see the fuckers face 'round whenever I go to me classes."
The cherry glowed and then flickered in the dark, dwindling down and burning away at the cheap paper it was rolled in. A small pool of ash was forming by Liam's foot. Paul was trying to brush it deeper into the carpet to hide its stain.
"Jus' wish we could do something d’you know what I mean?"
"We tried. The authorities don't care."
His voice, Paul's, was quiet when he spoke. Defeated.
Noel could still feel the bruises. They ached and pinched at his side whenever he moved; whenever he grazed them getting dressed in the morning, they'd act as a reminder. They spanned the length of his rib-cage, and maybe, he thought, it was a bad idea to use inhalants tonight. They always made him feel slightly ill. But the clock kept ticking and in his mind flashed the image of their father whenever it chimed, and he just had to escape for a little while.
Something broke inside Noel the day their father first sent him to the hospital. He thinks somewhere in his mind he could have been normal. But he wasn't normal and there was something twisted and wrong in his heart; cos' when he lay on the floor half dead and beaten blue, spitting blood and taunting where he knew it would best hurt, even knowing the pain to come could always get worse, unless he was unconscious, he knew there was something off about him. He was a bad breed. Dirty trodded pup that should have been left to die by their littermates. Paul fell into line after being beaten by Tommy: yes, sir. no, sir. Here's your beer, sir. Perfect Irish son. But Noel was a cold wall of barely contained rage biting at you. There was something deeply wrong with him when you peeled the veneer of uncaring son away, and most days it didn't bother those close to him. It didn't bother his mates until his own inner paranoia and self conciousness nipped at their heels.
"Noely." He felt a gentle nudge to his leg. Liam's monobrow was furrowed inward in concern.
Noel is glad that Liam never got beaten. He had no resentment over it. In fact, had Tommy touched Liam he would have finally killed him, right. He had promised their mam. Noel could lay awake in bed all night long after the beatings got really bad and it hurt to breathe, to move, and he’d imagine the different ways he would do it: put poison in his brandy with orange; bash him over the head when he was too drunk to do much besides slur and stumble over his two feet; slit his throat in his own marital bed. He would have done it sooner or later if Peggy hadn't gotten them away. She knew it as well as him. Sometimes it scared him—how willing he was to kill his da. But it had been clear to Noel that nobody else would save him: not God, not mam, not Paul, not the authorities. Authorities, what a laugh. He had to look out for his family. Had to look out for Liam. His beautiful baby brother with eyes like crystal glass and who had probably saved Noel's life more times than he could count, let alone ever let someone know about. What a mess.
"Hey," Liam nudged him again and he blinked slowly, attempting to clear his head.
"I'm fine. I'm fine." he whispered, and threaded his fingers feathersoft between the strands of Liam's hair. Their eyes caught in orbit and the hour struck two.
Paul left soon after that. He stood up with a groan and rolled his head side to side until his neck let out a crack. "'M off to bed. Night."
They bid him goodnight and then Noel bent forward to steal a drag off Liam's cigarette before it burnt down to the filter. His dry lips brushed against Liam's fingers before pressing firmly against them, inhaling through his mouth, and breathing out through his nose so that his airways burned and smoke swirled between them in a dark cloud.
"C'mon."
Noel had to grow used to knowing, seeing, and hearing his brother inside and out. When they had first moved in, once Noel realized that they'd always, in some integral way, be together, he ran into the washroom and sicked up all over the toilet.
It wasn't the rooms fault. It was all him.
This is what he meant when he figured Tommy broke something in him; done his head in and tore up the wires that connected to the proper spots and plugged them into new ones because God. He would wake up in the middle of the night to the sight of Liam wanking off not even two feet next to him. He would make out the sheen of sweat on his thin arms and forehead when it wasn't covered by his fringe—and he wanted him. Liam was just a kid. His kid brother. There was no avoiding it; it was inevitable. It pushed him further into himself and his music. He was cursed by his father and the God above he stopped believing in, and when he noticed that Liam had started looking back his insides turned slick as tar in the deepest shame imaginable.
As soon as the door behind them closed Liam had him pressed against it.
"Does it still hurt, Noel? Does it? You'd tell me, right? Noel?"
Liam wore his heart on his sleeve, and Noel never understood how it was possible he could after seeing the things the kid had seen. Maybe there was a point in time where Noel could have been as open and full of life as Liam. As it were, the only words he could speak true about were the words he wrote down on paper and stashed under his mattress in bent notebooks. Somehow Liam could take one glance at the contents in them and understand him completely. Liam thought it was because they were psychically connected; that they were meant to be one person but something up in the sky made a mistake and turned them into two instead. Noel let’s Liam believe whatever the kid wanted to believe because it was easier than the truth: that Noel's want had broke something in Liam too.
His head bumped back against the door with a thump and he stared up at the undefined ceiling. No corners. Just one big grey mass.
"Noely, can I see?"
"You shouldn't."
"But I want to."
There was no reasoning with Liam, was the thing. If he wanted something he would have it. Noel had spent so long trying to deny him.
Without further words Liam tugged his shirt up by the hem and tugged it over and above his head. His eyes were wide and hungry in that manic way of his. Noel had never understood why Liam looked at him like that, like he was desirable. It made his throat tight and his eyes sting every time, because Noel was bruised and beaten and short and thin from not having eaten enough. He had eyebrows thick as could be and was nowhere near as pretty as Liam who looked like a bird and made everyone who met him fall deeply in love, even now without hair sprouting on his chest.
But it was Noel that he wanted. Somehow.
"Y'er so pretty Noel..."
"Daft."
Liam's mouth curled up in an endearing grin and he leaned closer until their chests pressed together, expanding as one as they breathed in at the same time.
"'S true."
Noel could feel Liam's breath drifting over his closed lips and his eyes fell shut. He smelled like stolen nicotine and crisps.
"Please Noel..." So quiet he could barely make out the words but, as always, he gave in.
He only had to nod once before Liam was on him capturing his lips in a heated wet glide. Liam was particularly fond of using his tongue while kissing people, not that Noel minded. Nothing got him hotter than his little brothers tongue shoved into his mouth. He could feel his cock throb and twitch in his trousers and he panted against Liam’s mouth every time they parted.
Liam's hand came up and brushed sweetly against the darkest bruise colouring his skin, and Noel sucked in a sharp breath. When his eyes opened he came face to face with his brothers, whose eyes were already open and staring. Their noses were brushing and they were so close that in maintaining eye contact Noel went a bit cross eyed.
They stumbled backwards, further into the room until they fell back into bed as one.
Liam was insatiable whenever they did this. Always begging and pleading for Noel to touch him, kiss him, suck him, just touch him. Getting caught felt so far away when they were like this. Like they were fucking untouchable.
"Fuck Noel take it off, take it off." Liam grunted and rolled back, kicking off his jeans and socks and sending them flying. Noel was just unzipping his own jeans when Liam shoved him back hard into the pillows and undressed him himself with his grabby hands and prick pointed upwards throbbing a deep dark red.
When they were both naked Liam covered Noel's body with his own and grabbed at every inch of skin he could reach, smearing wet kisses across his shoulders and his chest. When Liam's mouth pressed against his island of bruises he let out a higher pitch of a moan than he expected, startled by the feeling and the desperation that accompanied it. His body tensed up. Liam's head shot up and his mouth fell open in wonder. Slowly, while maintaining eye contact, he stuck his tongue out and traced the shape of the bruise.
Noel shuddered and reached down to brush Liam's hair free from his face. His hands cupped his brothers cheek as a proper lover would—delicate as glass, and a reason for living.
How sick it was, Noel thought, that he allowed this.
His knees were pressed back against his chest, and the soles of his feet were held between Liam's hands as his brother thrust steadily into him. How sick it was, that this was what made him feel most alive.
"Fuck, Noel. Noel. Noel."
"Liam."
Liam was at that age where he had just started to want to shag anything that walked. Noel didn’t mind being that release for him.
Had anyone been walking outside their room and down the hall there's no doubt they would figure out what was going on. The headboard was thumping against the wall and the springs in his mattress creaked each time Liam moved. But they would never understand. They wouldn't understand just how much Noel loved Liam, because it was with every inch of his soul. He had been willing to kill for him, and he would be willing to do anything for him so long as Liam loved him back. Always by his side.
Liam's young bollocks were slapping against his arse every time he pushed further in, and Noel felt his toes curl. They were breathing into each others mouths now, and it was making him so lightheaded the world was spinning.
"Love you Noel, love you."
"I love you too, Liam."
They said love you more than anyone else Noel had ever known. He's my brother and I love him. He's my best friend and I love him. He's my lover and I'm in love with him. I hate him and I’m in love with him. How could it be wrong to love someone this much? Sometimes he couldn’t comprehend it, but Liam was his. His kid, right.
Liam sped up his thrusts, arching his back and falling forward until he was held up by his elbows on either side of Noel's head. His long lashes were fluttering and casting shadows across his cheekbones and the corners of his eyes. He was so beautiful.
Noel wrapped his legs tight as he could around Liam's thin hips so that he couldn't pull away or out. It made Liam choke on a strangled groan, made him tuck his face into Noel's sweaty neck.
"Tight fucking arse Noel, fuck, fuck."
Noel doesn't know why he did it. It was probably that part of him that wasn’t wired right, but Liam felt so good and smelled so sweet, and he had kissed his bruises so tenderly. So he sunk his crooked teeth into Liam's arm, into the fatty soft spot, and bit down as hard as he could, hoping to take a piece of his brother with him deep down inside into his bones and organs and veins so they could be one like Liam (and himself, secretly) had always wanted.
Liam let out a cry that was much too loud and faltered, finishing deep inside of him with a gasp and a moan before falling to Noel's chest. The taste of Liam's sweaty skin and a tang of iron sent Noel after him with a suppressed sigh of pleasure.
After wiping up their mess Noel lay on top of Liam, simply stroking his face and chest and imagining embarrassingly some far away world where they were allowed to have this.
When Liam started to drift off into sleep Noel leaned up on his elbow and kissed his forehead. He tucked them in, smoothed out the bed sheets, then lay awake staring out the window at the soft amber glow of a streetlamp.