noun

       • a repetition of sound caused by the reflection of sound waves; imitation; the reflection of a radio signal caused by an object.

intransitive verb

       • to resound; to produce an echo.

transitive verb

       • to repeat; to imitate; to send back (a sound) by an echo. 

The door is soft and quiet where it clicks shut behind him, but louder than machine gunfire where it ricochets through the otherwise silent apartment. It slams back against the bulletproof vest over his heart, jolting him to the core as it lands hard against the only thing present to hit.

Troye's not here, not sprawled on the couch with the television on or swinging his legs against the counter as he flips through a magazine, and the worn pair of sneakers still sitting by the coat rack sends his heart plummeting into his stomach with the aftereffects of the bullet. Connor frowns, bracing for impact as he drops his keys and slips off his coat, but moves towards the hallway nonetheless.

He's not entirely sure what he's going to find when he reaches their bedroom, much in the same way he's not entirely sure what Troye's definition of 'fine' really means. Troye doesn't lie to him, he never has, but sometimes his version of the truth is different than Connor's. Sometimes his version of 'fine' means suffering but surviving, sad and upset and hurt but still very much alive and something close to functioning. Sometimes it means he's not okay, not really, but he's not quite bad enough to say so.

Troye has a higher tolerance for pain than him, of that much Connor is painfully aware, but he doesn't really realize what that entails until he slips into the bedroom. He can't see him at first, blinds drawn and blankets bunched as Troye curls himself across the far side of the bed, but it doesn't take more than a moment to notice the figure huddled beneath the sheets.

Connor doesn't say anything. He stands with his hand on the door handle, halfway through closing it behind him, and traces his eyes across his lover's figure with the kind of rapt attention to detail only a seasoned photographer could manage. Silently, he lets the door fall shut.

He works his way around the bed at a languid pace, footfalls making hardly a sound as socked feet slide across the hardwood floor and onto thin pressed carpet. The bed creaks as he rests his arms against it, crouched down until the disheveled pillows are at eye level. His voice is quiet, cushioned by the covers he lifts from his boyfriend's face, "Troye, love."

He doesn't say anything else, just gnaws his lower lip and smooths out the wrinkles of Troye's sanctioned-off oceans, runs his hand over his shoulder to try to allay away the trembles. He presses harder, pulls him closer, curls his body over Troye's as both a shield and a comfort at once, before he closes he shadows his forests and pulls away.

"You should shower," he advises gently, because some conversations can't be forgotten no matter how close to unconscious he may have been. Troye's response is clenching knuckles folded against his chest and knees hiked up harder against his stomach, but he unravels when Connor coaxes him up with firm hands and a soft kiss to his forehead.

They step towards the bathroom without another word, Troye leaning exhaustively against the counter as Connor slips him from his clothes and turns the water on hot enough to send rivets of steam glazing over the mirror. They're silent even as he pushes his boyfriend under the spray, strips free from his own fabrics and shifts in beside him, runs a hand through Troye's soaking curls to sweep them away from his eyes.

"I'm sorry," Troye mutters after another moment has passed, pressed back against the wall of the shower as steady streams of cleansing heat caress the muscles of his chest.

Connor frowns at him, stepping closer to wrap his arms around his waist and lean his head against the wall beside him. He watches the side of his face, the lack of luster to his sapphire eyes and the way the furrows of his forehead twitch in thought, lips pinching and parting as they decide whether to allow any more words to pass through their heavy iron gates.

"I don't..." he trails off, turns his head until their noses are almost touching and gives Connor a desperate look. "It's a bad day."

Connor knows this. He probably knew it from the moment he woke up to an empty bed and an unusually jaunty send off. He knows Troye has bad days and bad nights and sometimes bad weeks and he's not mad or upset or even the least bit annoyed, but he's more than a lot concerned that Troye didn't feel the need to tell him.

And he gets it, he really does. Troye's not good at talking or reaching out because he's used to having his outstretched hand slapped harshly away and it's not that he doesn't trust Connor, it's just that he has a tendency to believe bad things are normal and incurable and the only way to deal with them is to let them beat him down until they're tired of watching him spew blood across the concrete. Connor can't change that in a day or a month or maybe even a year, as much as he wishes he could.

It's just hard to look at someone he loves so much and know they won't tell him when they're suffering, won't let him grab their hand and pull them to safety no matter how steady his footing may be. It's hard to know Troye trusts him and loves him, he really does, but it's still not enough to erase seventeen years of constant affliction.

Connor can't tell him that, though, so instead he lets his eyes fall shut and lips find Troye's. "I know," he mutters, trying to keep it sweet and understanding and unexpectant of anything even as he craves to gather his boyfriend in his arms and shield him from the whole wide world. "How can I make it better?"

Troye takes a moment, thorax expanding and compressing at an even pace as his eyes flutter. Their lips are still so close they brush when he speaks, voice softly shrouded by the thrum of the flowing water pounding hard against the tiled floor. "I don't know. Just- Be here, maybe?"

Humming, Connor moves one of the arms wrapped across his waist until his hand's sliding up his rib cage. "I'm here," he tells him, a reply three times louder than the question yet still below a whisper.

Troye takes a great, lurching breath, clinging viciously to Connor's shoulders with blunt nails and soaked fingertips. "Can you - I just-"

And then Troye's crying and Connor doesn't know what to do because Troye doesn't cry, he doesn't. He lashes out and withdraws and goes deathly silent or sickeningly loud with every action, but he doesn't cry.

It's not much, not heavy sobs or a jerking frame, but he's trembling and burying his face in the crease of Connor's neck, dropping his grip from his shoulders to his hips as he holds hard enough to bruise. Connor's shaking too, tremors of uncertain relief whirring through his veins as he exhales a breath down Troye's spine. Holding him close, Connor lets the water wash away the empty bed before he left and the bundled sheets before he came home.

He doesn't tell him he loves him with concrete words, but he knows Troye understands the sentiment better through fingers combed into his hair and gentle hands scrubbing his tenacious past from his skin. Troye doesn't tell him he loves him, either, but it's murmured carefully into the place he presses kisses to on Connor's neck.

Connor holds Troye and Troye holds Connor and they hold each other harder than they've ever held anyone because maybe, maybe, if they leach into a single being it'll filter out their corrupted parts in the process.

Later, when they've curled together beneath cleans sheets in a bed that doesn't creak, their grips will loosen but their bodies will press even closer together. They won't move, will settle with Troye's back to Connor's front and not a single secret space between them, and Troye will fall asleep before Connor even thinks to close his eyes.

"It doesn't always have to be okay," he'll murmur against the back of his lover's neck. He can't say it when Troye's awake, as much as he wishes he could, because Troye will take it as a reassurance that suffering through bad days unaided is the best way to go. He doesn't know how to make him understand that he doesn't have to be this strong, beautiful boy he almost always is. He doesn't know how to tell him that he wishes, he wishes, Troye could understand that he's allowed to have a bad day and he's allowed to tell Connor he's having one. It's okay for him to not be okay and it's okay to say so.

Connor knows him well enough to know he probably does understand that. He also knows him well enough to know he probably won't acknowledge it until two hundred bad days have come and gone without a word.