Chapter Text
The funeral is closed casket but there’s photographs at the wake, a handful of larger prints set out at the church. Most of them are from years ago, back when Ronan let his photo be taken, and Adam stands and stares at ruddy cheeks and curly black hair, barely recognizable as the Ronan that Adam knew. The only familiar part is the eyes, that Lynchian blue present in all the sons and in the father, like the skies beyond the cliff, tempting and dangerous, the color reaching farther into the distance than you realize.
Gansey and Adam help carry the coffin, alongside Declan and Matthew, and they stand silently while it’s lowered into the ground. Adam stays until it’s covered by dirt but Gansey says he can’t watch and leaves. A day after that, Matthew falls into the same slumber as Aurora, and Adam knows as soon as the news comes out and wonders how he never knew that Ronan dreamt something as complex and beautiful as Matthew.
Monmouth is terribly empty without Ronan; Gansey moves back into the dorms, a silent action done with the assistance of a large donation from his father. Aglionby doesn’t talk about either of their students, pretends like they didn’t exist so that their reputation stays clean. The entire thing is brushed over, and Adam likes it that way.
He sees Declan at St. Agnes’, the last of the Lynches. He doesn’t know how Declan can stand to be in that church after two funerals that led to two comas. Adam steps through the doors sometimes, just for a moment, to watch Declan’s dark head bowed over the pews, mouth moving in silent prayer. Adam can’t look at his eyes, doesn’t even try to talk to him even when he passes right by. He can’t stand to see the grief written across those same blue eyes, set into a slightly different face.
His rent at St. Agnes’ is still down two hundred dollars, despite everything. He pays on time and keeps working at Boyd’s, even when the man asks him about the raven boys that went up in flames on the Fourth of July. Adam says he didn’t know them, and he can tell that Boyd doesn’t believe him but he lets Adam lie anyway, because it’s easier for everyone.
Blue comes by the church every once and a while, gives him updates, but they both know that whatever strung the four of them together has crumbled, and their conversations are stunted and awkward. She stops coming by before the end of August, and Adam goes back to Aglionby and classes and keeps his head down. Adam thinks that the Fox Way women have kept her at home, citing the dangers that she could get into, and he doesn’t blame her, but he misses her all the same. He’s accepted that it’s over but he knows that Gansey still calls her, and he doesn’t want to be jealous but he hates the isolation.
Work is easy and consistent and Boyd doesn’t ask Adam about raven boys anymore. Adam still talks to Gansey when they can but he’s always off searching for Glendower, throwing himself into the search twice as hard now that Ronan’s gone, and Adam’s always working. He misses that, too; the companionship, the adventures, the kind of ethereal timelessness that always seemed to follow them on the ley lines.
He still sits with Gansey in their classes, watches the whispers pass over the both of them, the darting eyes that switch between them. They don’t talk, but they don’t have anything to say, either. Adam knows that Gansey knew Ronan before everything and that Adam will never know him as well as Gansey did, and so he silently believes that he can’t mourn the way Gansey is, that he isn’t allowed to grieve Ronan because he knew him so little.
In an attempt at concern, Aglionby sends both of them to the school counselor, a small lady with glasses who acts far more worried than she actually is. Adam refuses to talk to her, brings his schoolwork and does it during the period because he has work after school, and she stops trying to get him to talk about Ronan and Kavinsky within the first two sessions.
In early September, Declan Lynch and his blue eyes show up to Boyd’s in a shiny BMW, not the one his father and brother used to drive but similarly sleek and shark-like. There’s nothing wrong with it, not even a scratch. It’s lucky that Adam is even working that day; he took on an extra shift on Sunday, nothing better to do and the other mechanics are God-fearing men who go to church.
Adam looks straight into those blue eyes, reminiscent of incoming squalls on the ocean horizon, and says, “Good morning, can I help you?”
Declan says, stiffly, like the entire experience is below him: “I need to talk to you.”
Instead of meeting Declan’s eyes, Adam looks at his car, humming in the distance with a pretty blond girl waiting in the passenger seat. “About what?”
“The rent,” Declan says, in a rush of breath that smells like mint toothpaste, shoulders dropping an imperceptible amount.
“I need to do my job,” Adam tells him. “Can this wait at all?”
“I’m sorry,” Declan says, in a tone that means it is neither an apology nor an appeasement. “I just wasn’t sure how else to find you. I saw the charge, looked into it, wanted to learn more.”
“It’s Ronan’s fault,” Adam says, even though he knows it’s bad to speak ill of the dead and worse to speak ill of them in front of their brother. “If you need to stop I’ll understand.”
Declan frowns. “You knew?”
“I figured it out,” Adam says. “He didn’t hide it well.” He finds that the grief is worst in the regular parts of his life built by Ronan in some way, always reminding of the things that used to be. When he walks through the door of his tiny apartment all he can think about is Ronan handing a nun money and asking her to keep a secret for him.
“I’ll keep paying it. There’s more money in the account than I know what to do with.” There’s an unspoken understanding between the two of them that there is nobody left to take the money, that Declan needs to find a way to spend it because its presence reminds him of the family he lost. “I wanted to ask if you need me to pay any more.”
Adam hates Declan in this instant, wants to leap across the front desk and throttle him here, smash him with one of the tools, watch the blood spill across the window. In this moment he wishes fiercely that Declan had died instead of Ronan, that the flames had swallowed a different Lynch. He hates him because he hates seeing people with enough money to throw away on charity cases, and because he hates being considered a charity case.
Adam says, as coldly as he can, “I don’t want your pity and I don’t want your money.”
Declan’s eyes narrow and his shoulders straighten again. “Do what you want. I’ll stop paying any of it.”
“Fine,” Adam says. The bell to the inner shop rings and Adam looks up to see an older man standing there, looking Declan up and down with a scowl that could turn even more sour if Declan didn’t get his ass out of here. “It’s your blood money anyway. I don’t care what pity party you throw it on but it’s not going to be me.”
Declan doesn’t say anything else and leaves. When Adam looks out, Declan’s leaning over and giving the girl a quick kiss, nothing particularly special, his face staying blank the entire time. Adam watches the brush of skin and turns his eyes away before he can do anything he’ll regret.
& & &
The rent stays lowered. Adam doesn’t do anything about it but he resents Declan anyway, a petty hill that he’s willing to die on. He hadn’t resented Ronan for it, not necessarily, but he had never been grateful because he had never wanted to be someone that other people thought they needed to take care of. It was easier for him to be isolated and self-sufficient than reliant on anyone or anything that he couldn’t control.
Between all of this, Adam sees his father again, sees his face reflected in the violence and hatred of Robert Parrish. His father says, with a self-satisfied grin, “Hear one of your little friends died in some kind of explosion. Can’t be good to associate with those kinds of people.”
Adam wishes desperately for Cabeswater, a ridiculous wish for something to overtake his hands and eyes again, but Cabeswater is dead and gone alongside Ronan and there is nothing for Adam to defend himself. Robert Parrish is still talking and Adam wants him to shut up and leave.
He says, “I’m not calling it off,” and Robert Parrish laughs and Adam can smell alcohol on his breath. The sound of the laughter, braying and rough, makes Adam flinch, makes his heart beat rabbit-fast with fear, and he had thought he was beyond all of this but at his core he is still a scared seven-year-old boy waiting for his father’s fist to fall.
There’s a second knock on the door; both of them turn, and in the back of his mind Adam registers the same way they move, the identical twisting of their bodies, and he wonders if this is his future—angry, bitter, destroyed. Robert is the one to open it, and Adam is surprised to see Declan behind the door.
“Parrish,” Declan says.
“Who the hell is this?” Robert Parrish asks, anger and beer twisting his tone into something that makes Adam want to hide.
“A friend,” Declan says, because Adam can’t find his tongue right now. “Who are you?”
“His father,” Robert says. “But he’s an ungrateful bitch, so I’m sure he didn’t tell you.”
Declan’s eyebrows raise. “Interesting. I would assume this is about the hearing?”
“Oh, I bet he told all of you how I fucked him over,” Robert sneers. “More lies about how awful I was. I housed him and fed him, you know.”
“I didn’t tell anyone,” Adam says, more for Declan than his father.
“I have connections,” Declan replies, more for Adam’s father than for Adam, and it works well enough, makes a bit of the ruddiness fade from Robert Parrish’s face. “But this is about Ronan.”
“Your dead druggie friend? Like that matters,” Robert says.
“My brother,” Declan replies, still as calm and collected as anything. “And it could matter. I think you should leave, Mr. Parrish.”
Robert looks Declan up and down, curls his lip at the pressed dress shirt and slacks, then laughs. “What will you do about it?”
Declan smiles, a thin-lipped, polite thing, and it unsettles Adam. “Nothing today, but I’ll talk to Judge Harris tomorrow morning. He’s a family friend, you know.”
More color leeches from Robert Parrish’s face, and he does leave, not without a few swears and curses, but he does leave. Adam watches his car speed out of the St. Agnes’ lot.
“Why today?” Adam asks. “Why now?”
“Lucky timing,” Declan says. “I had to deal with something at the Barns, thought I would stop by before I drove back to D.C. I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
Adam won’t say thank you to Declan, because he doesn’t want to consider himself someone that needs to be saved from his own father, but they both understand it in the quiet breaths that Adam is letting out through his nose. “It’s fine. What about Ronan did you need to talk to me about?”
“Nothing,” Declan says, and at that moment Adam knows that the appearance was not a coincidence.
“What did you do?” Adam says, harsh and accusing in the low flickering light of the St. Agnes’ apartment.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Declan says.
“Don’t pretend. You’re not here by accident. What did you do? What are you doing?”
Declan sighs, resigned, and says, “I keep tabs on things. Henrietta, D.C., et cetera. My father knew a lot of people.”
“So you’ve been stalking me,” Adam says.
“No,” Declan says, in a way that means he definitely has, and Adam would punch him in the mouth if he thought he could win a fight between the two of them.
“I don’t need you to be my savior.”
“That was never my intention,” Declan says. “You had never been the main subject of my knowledge. This was long before I even knew you existed.”
This makes Adam feel better, a little, but he still resents Declan. He says, “I could have handled my father on my own.”
“I’m sure,” Declan says, which feels patronizing to Adam, and he’s sick of Declan treating him like a fragile kid. He still has no idea why Declan has chosen him, of all people, to even spend his time with; Adam thinks he’s nothing special compared to the others that Declan seems to surround himself with.
“I think you should go,” Adam says firmly, and to his surprise Declan does start moving towards the door.
Pale hand on the doorknob, Declan asks, “Would you like me to talk to the judge?”
Adam hesitates. He has never wanted to take a favor from Declan but he also wants his father gone from his life. He says, eventually, “It’s up to you.”
Declan raises a perfectly groomed, dark eyebrow. “Alright. Have a nice night, Parrish.”
“Yeah,” Adam says, still annoyed but less so, and he’s not sure why. Declan leaves, too, his BMW pulling out of the parking lot, slower than Robert Parrish’s. The last of the crickets chirp away, and Adam turns out his lights and wishes his hands weren’t still so helpless.
A few days later Adam goes to the hearing alone and hates how he looks sitting in a charity suit, in front of a judge that Declan supposedly knows. He remembers, vaguely, some kind of local internship Declan (or maybe one of Declan’s Aglionby friends) had done with the courts but Declan was more into legislative politics than judicial, so he’s not sure if Declan was bluffing or not.
“Your friend didn’t show,” Robert says as Adam passes by, a wide grin on his face, and Adam isn’t sure which friend he’s talking about but it doesn’t matter anyway because he’s here by himself.
He isn’t expecting Gansey and he certainly isn’t expecting Declan; Gansey makes himself a character witness but Declan sits quietly in the back. Adam hates that they thought he needed the help but he’s still grateful that they came, but he hates more to admit that he wanted the help anyway.
The judge knew both Declan and Gansey, which was both surprising and not; Adam thinks the judge’s son was one of Declan’s friends, and he’s suddenly grateful for the shallow connections Declan has maintained over the past few years, even if he finds them annoying.
When it’s over Adam goes to Declan and says, again, “I didn’t need your help and I didn’t need your pity.” Gansey has already returned to Aglionby but Adam has the rest of the day off.
“But you wanted it,” Declan says, and Adam has known for years that Declan is a liar, and so it’s even more frustrating to hear the truth from him.
“I didn’t ask,” Adam says, because he has never asked for help and he never plans to, thinks his hard work is worthless if it came from someone else.
Declan says, “I need to go.”
“You didn’t have to come in the first place,” Adam says, still dragging it on.
“But I did, and it’s over. Can’t change that now,” Declan says, and Adam’ll give him this fight but he hasn’t conceded yet. He doesn’t know why Declan sees him as some kind of charity case, doesn’t know if it has something to do with Ronan or not, but he doesn’t like it.
& & &
In late October the Hondayota gets smashed in the Aglionby parking lot, completely wrecked, taken away in pieces by a tow truck. When Adam goes to the office to ask about camera footage they shrug and said they can’t do anything about it, that they don’t know who did it. Gansey offers to get Adam a new car, but Adam refuses. He needs a car but he’s not trying get any more favors from Gansey than he already has.
He can’t tell if the car was an accident or a mistake; with the general IQ of the Aglionby population it could be either. Adam doesn’t think he’s made any enemies, but he knows it was probably on purpose, not even really targeted towards him specifically. It’s the kind of thing that an underclassman would do, run his shiny car into the shittiest one in the lot; a cruel punishment for being poorer than the others. They might not have even known it was his, though Adam thinks his poverty is written across his face and the loose threads on his hand-me-down sweaters.
Two days later there’s another junkyard car in the St. Agnes’ parking lot, the keys in an envelope slipped underneath Adam’s door. He takes his bike that morning to classes and then to Boyd’s; when he gets back the car is still waiting there, this time with a sheet of paper that reads Parrish . Adam rips it off, throws it out, and drives it the next morning, hating himself a little for it.
On Sunday Declan comes from D.C. for church, and Adam does talk to Declan this time, if only to accuse him of both the money and the car. The two of them talk in angry, hushed tones, boys playing at being men.
“I’m not trying to piss you off,” Declan finally says, in the same exasperated tone he used to use with Ronan, and it stuns Adam into silence for just a minute.
“Jesus Christ,” Adam says, pinching the bridge of his nose, because the tone throws him back into a time that he misses more than anything, and it hurts more than he expects it to. The grief is still raw, the Fourth only a few months ago, and Adam feels the absence of Ronan every day.
“Don’t think of this as a gift,” Declan says, misreading Adam’s expression. “It’s not meant to be anything.”
“You can’t call a car nothing,” Adam replies. He wants a fight, wants to feel something more than the burning kind of loneliness and grief that’s been rotting in his stomach.
“You drove it, though,” Declan says, face twitching into something like a smirk that lets them both know that he thinks he’s won this argument.
Adam doesn’t reply to this, doesn’t want to let Declan have the satisfaction of winning this petty argument the two of them have manufactured. He hates Declan just as much as he did that Sunday at Boyd’s, hates looking in his eyes and seeing Ronan peering back at him, hates the way that, from the back or the side, Declan can almost be Ronan, if Adam squints. He feels guilty for wishing Declan had died but he doesn’t feel guilty for wishing that someone had taken Ronan’s place.
The Lynch brothers were taught how to box but Adam never learned how to fight, just how to cower, and it’s obvious in the way that Declan and Adam stand, the way they face each other—Declan like he’s in a boxing ring, Adam like he’s cornered prey. Adam doesn’t accept the defeat but he lets Declan walk away anyway, wants him to make the drive back to his D.C. house that isn’t the Barns but is better than Henrietta. He doesn’t want to look at them anyways, doesn’t want to watch the dead reflected in the living.
“I’m not going to thank you,” Adam says, mostly to be petty, but he feels low doing it, standing in front of the church where Declan mourned his entire family. Declan just shrugs, says, “If that’s what you want,” and then he gets in his car and leaves.
Adam’s jealous, a little bit, of the way Declan can just get in his car and drive away, the way he’s gotten out of Henrietta, away from his past and previous life. He’s jealous of the ability to throw money away and of the kind of life that he imagines Declan lives in D.C.; lavish, elegant, important people in important places. He hates Declan for being the exact person that Adam has always wanted to be, is sick of seeing it flaunted in his face every time they talk, and yet he still looks at Declan and wants to be him more than anything else.
& & &
Gansey and Adam go to Nino’s sometimes, talk to Blue while she’s working, but all three of them can feel the absence, and it never goes back to what it used to be. When Adam asks him about Glendower Gansey gives this kind of half-hearted shrug, says it’s harder now. Cabeswater has disappeared too; took longer than Matthew, surprisingly, but even the ley lines have sensed Ronan’s death. Gansey says he’s lost the trail, that he’s going to keep looking, but Adam can tell that he doesn’t know how. Without Ronan the magic has seeped slowly out of Henrietta, and suddenly they’re no longer kings or magicians, just two high school boys.
Adam resents the car but he drives it anyway, because it’s cold enough that biking is just asking for some kind of illness. It’s a piece of shit, with heat that barely works and a rattling sound that Adam hasn’t been able to fix, but Adam feels less like a charity case with it, like he’s deserving of it somehow.
Blue still works at Nino’s and Adam sees her through the restaurant window whenever he passes on his way to Boyd’s, and she looks better than he does, so he never waves. He wants to talk to her but there’s not much they can talk about anymore. On the Fourth they weren’t on the best terms and Ronan’s death hadn’t made it any better. He knows from Gansey that they’re not talking much anymore, and that she’s told him about the curse.
Adam doesn’t work until noon on Sunday, so he does his homework and watches the churchgoers, and without fail, Declan comes, always alone, dressed in a suit, and when Mass is over he gets back in his car and drives away.
When Aglionby lets out for winter break, Gansey goes home for the first time since Ronan’s death, and Adam is left alone in Henrietta, the attic of St. Agnes’ getting drafty and dry in the incoming Virginia winter. Break is only a few weeks, and most of the Aglionby boys stay in town, but Adam isn’t close with any of them, so he works as much as he can.
He’s surprised to find out that Declan is staying in town for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. Adam wonders if he’s staying at the Barns, with his silent, sleeping brother and mother. Adam knew that at one point, Ronan was trying to change it, but he doesn’t know if he succeeded before the Fourth of July. Declan, in a dark suit with a face like a martyred saint, stands out amongst the cheery, red-cheeked Henrietta crowds at St. Agnes’.
Adam’s sleeping in on Christmas, pillow over his good ear to drown out the choir. It’s one of the few days he doesn’t work or go to class, and he wants to enjoy it while he can. The pillow is why he doesn’t hear the repeated knocks on the door, or hear the envelope slipped under the door. When he does wake up, at nine in the morning, impossibly late for him, there’s a check for two thousand dollars from the Lynch bank account and a phone number scrawled on a scrap of paper.
He calls the number, and when the phone picks up he says “What the hell is this?”
“Merry Christmas, Parrish,” Declan Lynch says, which pisses Adam off more than the check itself.
“I can’t take this,” Adam says. He stares at the number, blocky black letters spelling out a gift that he didn’t ever want.
“The rent is still being paid and you’re still driving the car,” Declan says, like it’s any kind of explanation. It’s infuriating to Adam. “Take the money.”
“Where are you staying?” Adam asks.
“Are you going to come and find me? Just rip the check if you don’t want it.”
Adam stares at the piece of paper and the envelope and does not rip it. “You’re not at the Barns.”
There’s a soft breath on the other side of the line. “No.”
“So where are you staying?”
“Why?”
“You don’t ever stay in Henrietta.”
“Keeping track of me when I’m here?”
“No,” Adam says. The check stares at him disapprovingly, and he wants to rip it but the figure is too much for him to consider passing up. “But it doesn’t mean I’m not curious.”
“Cash the check,” Declan says, and Adam almost thinks he can hear Ronan’s voice in it, albeit more strained and polite. “Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, Parrish.”
“I’m an atheist,” Adam tells him, but the call has already ended. He saves the number and saves the check, tells himself that he’ll rip it up but he knows that he won’t.
He does cash the check, two days after Christmas, and the woman at the bank looks at it and says, “You must have a very generous friend.”
“Something like that,” Adam replies, and he watches the amount be deposited into his account. It’s not much, but it’s enough to support him, enough that he doesn’t have to work every shift he can for a few months.
He toys with calling the number a few more times but never ends up dialing it, always stares at the button for a long time before turning the phone off and setting it aside. It’s been six months since Ronan and Kavinsky, six months since Adam’s world turned to something that he didn’t want to be in, and he needs no more reminders of Ronan in the form of his brother’s face.
& & &
Adam does his best to be out on Sundays so that he doesn’t see Declan at all, but in mid-January he’s coming back from the grocery store, eleven in the morning, late for him, and Declan is walking out, dressed in his church clothes, looking as neat as always.
“I’ll help you, Parrish,” Declan offers as Adam opens the trunk, which creaks and groans in the cold. He’s wearing leather gloves, which Adam finds ridiculously pretentious, and a thick wool coat; Adam’s in a thrifted ski jacket with a hole in the upper right arm that he’s duct-taped.
“Don’t need it,” Adam says. He lifts the bags, slings them onto his arms. “You usually do the nine o’clock Mass.”
Declan almost smiles. “Memorized my schedule?”
“You’re a punctual person,” Adam says, heaving the bags out of the back of the new Hondayota and heading to the back door of the church, where the stairs to his tiny apartment were. “And I live here. Excuse me,” he adds, moving past Declan, who opens the back door for him.
He gets up the stairs and opens his door; when he looks back down Declan’s standing there. Adam sets the groceries down, gets the milk in the mini-fridge, puts everything else away, and when he gets back out Declan’s still waiting there, pacing on a call but still there.
Adam goes down the steps, waits for the call to end. Declan is talking about the campaign, about the importance of clear policies, or something like that, and when Adam gets there Declan steps outside, despite the January cold. It takes a few minutes but Declan does come back inside, which Adam is surprised about because Declan never stays.
“Parrish,” Declan says, stiff and polite. Adam raises one eyebrow, crosses his arms. He feels small beside Declan in his suit, austere and neat as always. “You took the money.”
“Sorry I didn’t write you a thank you card,” Adam says dryly. He’s not sure if Declan’s intentionally rubbing the gift in his face or not, but he doesn’t appreciate it.
“Wasn’t waiting for one,” Declan replies. “You decide on a college yet?”
Adam knows Declan is here for something, because they’re too similar, and Adam would never do anything unless there was some deal to be made. “What do you want, Declan?”
“Come to dinner with me,” Declan says, pleasant and bland as always.
Adam blinks, takes a second. “What?”
“It’s a business dinner. Plenty of important people, most of whom will eventually offer you some kind of internship or job. Just a few hours.”
“When?” Adam asks.
“Three weeks from now. Saturday the 19th. It’s in D.C.”
Adam, still suspicious, asks “Why me?”
“Thought you would be interested,” Declan says. “If you don’t want to, it’s fine.”
“You have nobody else to ask?”
Declan looks away, eyes darting to the door. The parking lot is almost completely empty at this point; just the priest’s car and some of the nuns, a couple straggling churchgoers. “If you don’t want to, I understand.”
“I’ll go,” Adam says. “But I’ll need a suit.” He has one, from Gansey, but he’s hoping that the need for a suit might make Declan rescind his offer.
Declan looks him up and down; finally he says, “I think you could fit into one of Ronan’s old ones. I can get it altered.”
“I don’t want one of his,” Adam says immediately. He doesn’t think he could stand to wear it. “I don’t care how you get it but I don’t want the dead’s clothes.”
The tone makes Declan blink once, twice, in surprise. “Probably for the best. He hadn’t worn one in years anyway. I’ll find one for you.”
“Sure,” Adam says, and he doesn’t thank Declan, because he hasn’t yet and he still doesn’t want to. “I’ll be here.”
Declan leaves after that, just walks out of St. Agnes like he didn’t ask Adam to a formal dinner, like he didn’t offer to get him a suit. Adam doesn’t like it; he’s suspicious, thinks Declan must have some kind of ulterior motive. Things like this don’t happen to Adam, and they don’t ever happen because of men like Declan Lynch.
& & &
The 19th comes quickly; Adam is swamped with work and school, waiting on college acceptances and weighing the letters he’s already received, schools that are almost Ivies but not quite, who offer Adam money, full scholarships or almost-full.
A week before the dinner a package arrives at Adam’s door. He opens it, finds a suit, dark blue, and pressed white shirt. It fits nearly perfect; a little short in the sleeves, but it’s better than anything else Adam owns. He wants to get rid of it, can’t stand the idea of being given a gift like this.
He doesn’t tell Gansey about any of it, out of some twisted sense of pride or maybe disgust at himself, just another secret that he’s keeping stowed in his body. He doesn’t see the need to tell Gansey, anyway, so when Gansey asks about the weekend Adam lies and tells him he has work.
Declan picks him up from St. Agnes’ in the late afternoon and when Adam slides into the leather seat he says, “You look good in that, Parrish.”
Adam only says, “I hope it’s not from someone dead or sleeping.”
“It used to be mine,” Declan says, pulling out of the parking lot. “I had it adjusted slightly.”
Adam picks at the cuff, glares at the material like it’s suddenly done something to offend him. “I don’t want anything that used to be yours.”
“Wasn’t in the original terms.”
“What terms?”
“Not terms, then,” Declan amends. “Agreement. When I first asked you about it.”
“It was implied,” Adam says. He doesn’t mean to be petty, or maybe he does, but he doesn’t like the idea of wearing Declan’s things.
“I thought you would be more offended if I bought you a new one,” Declan adds. It pisses Adam off even more that he’s right.
The drive is mostly silent. Declan puts on classical music and Adam listens to it, watches the Virginia landscape slip beside the window, rushing layers of brown and green and blue. It makes him miss driving with Ronan and Gansey, their various adventures in the Pig, wandering around forests and abandoned homesteads, and there’s a sudden wave of grief that passes over him in the form of nausea.
“Your mother and Matthew are doing okay?” Adam asks, in some semblance of polite conversation.
“Sure,” Declan says, blue eyes not moving from the stretch of road in front of them. His eyes aren’t the same kind of blue as his father’s or Ronan’s; they’re more tempered, less reminiscent of the hottest part of the flame, but just as dangerous, and Adam likes the thrill of it all, the odd rush that came with standing beside a Lynch. “As well as they can be.”
Adam doesn’t know what to say to this. “I’m sorry it happened like that.”
Declan’s hands tighten on the wheel ever so slightly, knuckles tensing on the black leather. The car speeds up; not fast enough to be dangerous but enough to mean something to Adam, who had been near-fluent in the language of silent tension and hidden anger since he was a child.
The dinner is being held in some kind of event hall, people milling around in elegant dresses and sharp suits. Adam catches a glimpse of himself in a passing mirror and wonders if the others can tell the suit is someone else’s, if they can tell that he doesn’t belong here.
The conversations are dull but Adam pretends to be terribly interested in the droll lives of young white businessmen whose fathers paid their way into school. They remind him of Declan, or at least the version of himself that he puts forth, this kind of put together, white-toothed men, whose lives were miles from Adam’s wildest dreams.
Adam shakes hands and introduces himself beside Declan; he is repeatedly introduced as Declan’s friend, who went to Declan’s school, who is from Declan’s hometown. He is reminded, briefly, of a dinner several months ago with Gansey, closer to Henrietta but just as far from the Henrietta that runs through Adam’s blood, the Henrietta that crusts beneath his nails.
“You going to university, Parrish?” someone asks; Adam thinks it is someone Declan introduced him to, a James or John or Jack, a few years older than him but already married, his young wife smiling on his arm.
“Haven’t decided,” Adam says. “If everything works out, Harvard.” Beside him, Declan smiles a little, self-satisfied smile, as if the answer pleases him.
“Oh, shame,” James-John-Jack says. “Yale is much better. My father is a professor of economics there.”
“We’ll see,” Adam says, with a forced smile that the other man doesn’t register. They drift away, Adam talks to a different professor, this one from Georgetown, and Declan moves away, talks to men with silver-streaked hair while wearing a smile that tells them he’s trustworthy, he’s brilliant, he’s the fresh blood they need. Adam is desperately jealous of his ability to charm a crowd.
The swarm of the crowd continues, voices ebbing and flowing as conversations change. Adam thinks there’s a small band playing but he can’t see it, just hears the music slightly in his good ear, and when he turns it goes quiet.
“I’ve heard about your brother,” another man says, claps Adam on the back, which throws him into a trailer in Henrietta, makes his breath come short and sour.
“I think you have the wrong person,” Adam says, smoothly turning away and smiling brighter than before, like it can hide everything else.
“Declan Lynch?” the man says. He’s handsome, Adam thinks, an older version of the sweet-talking young men roaming the room.
“No, I’m just his friend,” Adam says, forcing another smile. He hates being seen as an accessory, a sidekick; he is tired of being Gansey’s or Declan’s friend, tired of being seen as something other than Adam Parrish. “I’ll pass the message along to him, though.”
“It isn’t that surprising, though,” the man adds. “Niall Lynch’s son was always destined to go up in flames. All of them, really. Good thing you’re not one of them. What’s your name, then?”
“Adam Parrish,” he says, with what he hopes is a winning smile. “You knew Niall, then?”
“Not so well,” he says. Adam still doesn’t know his name. “Familiar with the family, though. Lucky to run into his son. He looks like him, a bit.”
“Ronan did, more,” Adam says before he can stop himself.
“Sorry for your loss,” the man repeats, then he walks away, and when Adam searches the crowd he can’t find him, just a dozen other men who look almost like him.
They eat; Adam listens to Declan talk about D.C. politics (not the real kind; the social kind that seems to plague the rich elites) and money, all kinds. The men and their wives that are sitting with them complain about their yachts, their vacations in the Maldives and Maui, their expensive brand-new cars that seem to constantly require repairs worth five figures. Adam hates himself for smiling along with it.
“Who’s your father, Adam?” one of them asks. It takes Adam a second to register the question because the man is sitting on his left. “Parrish seems familiar. Your father ran with Niall?”
Adam opens his mouth before Declan, smiles politely and says, “Not that close, but on occasion. He spent most of his time overseas. Japan and Korea.”
“Oh, how nice,” a wife says with a pink-lipped smile. “Franklin and I went two years ago. A little cheap for us, but still quite beautiful. Those flights are terribly long, though.”
“Sure,” Adam says, with a fake smile. “But I’d say it’s worth it.” The woman laughs, charmed by him, a novel experience for Adam.
Declan purses his lips, finishes the salmon on his plate without saying anything else. Adam smiles like he’s seen the others do, the kind of smile that tells everyone he knows who he is and where he came from and that it’s enough to get him wherever he wants to go. Declan looks at him like he’s studying something, and then he asks one of the men about their recent client’s deal, and the conversation shifts again.
After Declan decides to leave, they wait in the dark for a valet amongst the rest of the D.C. political elites. Adam’s pockets are stuffed with various business cards made of sleek monochrome. It’s almost midnight, after all the goodbyes, but Declan has promised that he’ll drive Adam back anyway, that he has Mass in the morning anyway.
Adam says, low enough that nobody else hears, “Someone gave me condolences for Ronan. Thought I was you.”
“Hm,” is all Declan says.
“I don’t know who it was,” Adam adds.
“Okay,” Declan says. The BMW is pulled around; Declan hands over a tip and slides into the driver’s seat. Classical music beats softly beneath Adam’s feet, and he rolls down the window to feel the rush of cool February air.
“Roll that up before we get on the highway, please,” Declan says, and Adam sticks his hand out and lets it nearly freeze before he pulls it back in.
When they reach the highway, Adam rolls the window back up. Declan murmurs a quiet thank you, and Adam says nothing. It’s late and he thinks he has work the next day, on top of an English paper that’s due on Monday.
“There were quite a few people who were impressed with you,” Declan says finally. They’re halfway to Henrietta, the drive feeling shorter with the ever-pressing dark of the night. “I think you made a good impression.”
“I hoped so,” Adam replies, tone flat. He doesn’t like it, but he’s willing to do anything to get out of Henrietta. “They all seemed like you.”
Declan’s forehead wrinkles. “To like me? I would hope so.”
“No, like you,” Adam corrects. “Like I was standing in a room of five dozen Declans.”
This, surprisingly, makes Declan laugh, a short thing that sounds more bitter than joyful, but the sound is loud in the otherwise quiet car. “You think so?”
“You don’t?”
“To a certain degree. Not as much as you make it seem.”
“You’re different,” Adam says. “Less—I don’t know, less shiny. Like everyone there has put on their best show and you’re waiting in the audience.”
“Interesting, Parrish,” Declan says, and leaves it at that.
“Not that you’re not putting on a show,” Adam adds, not wanting Declan to think he’s that different, that unique. “It’s just one that’s been designed to not stand out.”
“Hm,” Declan says, pressing something on the wheel. Adam crosses his arms, the suit jacket tight on the elbows when he does. “A fascinating observation. What are you planning on majoring in, again?”
Adam shrugs. “I was going to do pre-law, political science, something like that. Maybe sociology.”
“Hm,” Declan says again, and he reaches over to turn up the music.
Adam looks at Declan and thinks what makes him different, at least a little, from the other young men in their suits is that he’s part Niall Lynch, like his demeanor and behaviors are directly drawn from the dark hair and blue eyes. He knows that Niall Lynch told plenty of lies and kept plenty of secrets and Declan has followed this path, and Ronan did, too, though his lies were more like separate truths.
The dark highway stretches into Henrietta roads, and Declan makes the exit into the town, one that Adam is only familiar with from the other side. St. Agnes’ is barely lit but the winter air gives everything a faint dusty glow, and Adam makes his way to the side door using that. When he turns the BMW is already gone, spitting dirty snow behind it.