she slipped ; malum

charcoal

MICHAEL WAS M.I.A FOR THREE DAYS. He didn't even turn up to the trenches. He wasn't in the area of his tent, he wasn't reloading guns, he wasn't talking to the enemy, he just wasn't there. Calum was worried, but he didn't leave the house, because that was where Michael knew to find him.

He went back to his usual self. No eating. No sleeping. No caring.

And then, Michael knocked on the door one day. Calum was pretending to be asleep. It was three in the afternoon. The redhead came in, a wide grin on his face. The black-haired boy returned it with a glare.

"Where were you?"

"My Mum got a couple of days off work, and my phone stopped working."

Likely story. He rolled his eyes. "If you didn't want to be friends, you could've just told me." Michael grabbed the TV remote off of his bed and hit him in the head with it. Calum groaned and clutched his head. "Ow, what the fuck, Michael!"

"Don't be an asshole. I told you my reason for not being here, but you don't have to believe it. That doesn't give you any right to be a dick about it either." When he was done with yelling at him, he sat down on the edge of the bed. "I see you've been using charcoal." He said, looking at Calum's fingertips.

"When I'm angry I use charcoal." He stated.

Michael knew that that was meant to come out angry, but Calum just looked fucking adorable. Adorably grouchy seemed to fit. He had a pout on his lips, and his eyebrows furrowed as his fingers curled a little like he was still holding the charcoal.

"Cute." He muttered, a slight smile on his face as he reached over and grabbed Calum's art book.

Calum closed his fingers around the book, shaking his head. The pale boy just gave him a look. "I won't judge. If it's super depressing or weird, I'd understand."

The pages were black. Like Calum had spent hours just covering the white with darkness, until Michael felt like he was staring into nothing. Some part seemed to be clawed at, like somebody was scratching on the paper, as if they wanted to get out.

Green eyes flicked to pitch black fingertips, and the white of the nails turned black, and Michael understood that it was Calum who wanted to get out. Calum who wanted to leave the darkness.

Page after page, the picture started to get a little lighter. It was Calum's watercolour work. Paintings of faces that seemed to be melting away, like they were turning from solid to gas right in front of his eyes.

There were paintings of a girl, and the watercolour was soft on her features – delicate, almost. Her auburn hair swirled in the wind, and her brown eyes looked straight out of the page, staring at Michael.

"Avery," Calum mumbled, a sad look on his face appearing.

Michael continued.

Calum didn't stop him.

There were abstract paintings consisting of blue and purple, and they just kept going, and Michael was about to shut it, when he saw himself. His hair was watercoloured to perfection, but Calum had left the facial features out, making him have a blank face. In the background behind him, was the word 'IDIOT'.

"I saw you on the first day, and I liked your hair, but I didn't know your facial features very well, and I thought you were an idiot."

Michael grinned. "Cute." He mumbled again.

"What?"

"Nothing." He said dismissively. "We should do something."

"No. Today's a lazy day." Calum whined, crossing his arms.

Michael laid back so his head was on Calum's thigh. He was warm, and Michael liked that. He reached up and slapped his friend's face, giggling at his expression. "Okay, what are we doing, then?"

He then caught sight of something on the TV cabinet, and sat up straight. "Are those . . . home videos?"

"No, we're not watching them!" Calum groaned, not wanting Michael to see him so cringe-worthy and disappointing. He also didn't want Michael to ask heaps of questions about when he was younger.

The redhead rolled his eyes, putting it into the VCR. "We so are, Calum, come on."

He turned the TV on, and the Maori grumbled something incoherent. It started with baby Calum wrapped in a blanket, his mother holding him with a smile on his face, Mali leaning over to see her little brother.

"Can we call him La-La?" She asked, holding onto her Teletubbies doll.

"His name's Calum, Mali."

It switched to a different time. Calum had teeth and hair, but was still small as he walked around the house, butt-naked. He was took a bite out of an apple, and put it down on the floor, and then got another one, repeating the process until there were apples everywhere.

"Calum!" Mali giggled, her pink dress coming into view as she took his hand and dragged him away. "Mum, Calum's being silly!" she laughed again.

"Silly Calum." Came the voice from behind the camera.

Calum looked at Michael, shaking his head as he got up. He turned off the TV. "You got my attention, Michael; what do you want to do?"

Michael understood that the tapes were a very private part of his life. It showed his Mum being nice to him, him being innocent, him being pure, his girlfriend and his ex-best friend. So, he quickly made something up, and told him that they should go outside for a while.

They sat out on the fire-escape, it being wet, but Calum put a blanket over where they sat so they didn't get their clothes saturated. It was cold, so Michael started to shiver, cuddling into Calum's side.

The Maori put his arm behind the pale boy's back and brought the blanket up and put it over Michael's shoulder.

"If you're cold you can go get one of my jumpers."

Michael nodded, and went through the window, even though he still wanted to hug Calum a little longer. He slipped one of Calum's jumpers on, and liked how long it was on him. He made paws with his sleeves and stepped out of the window, sitting down next to Calum again. He crashed into the Maori's side.

"You're comfortable."

"Am I?"

"Yeah."

The two boys sat in silence. The fog was heavy, and they couldn't see the street over. They both tried to see what was past that, but they failed.

"Calum,"

"Yeah?"

"I don't want to be called a faggot again."

Calum turned to him, frowning. "Is it really bothering you that much?"

"Yeah."

The next day, another Monday, he walked up to Luke and punched him in the face. The blond was shocked, holding his bleeding nose, asking why. He grabbed the collar of his shirt, gritting his teeth. "Never call me or Michael faggots again."

It was early, so Michael or Luke's group weren't there to witness it, but Luke didn't say a single insult to him all day. He ignored the questions about his nose, and said he got into a fight at a party the night before.

Calum was happy with himself. So happy that he made a proper conversation with Ashton when him and Calum had a free period. Ashton was yelling at his script, and Calum tried to help him.

"I can't believe I fucking die!"

Calum almost smiled at Ashton being so hysterical, but instead raised an eyebrow. "Did you not read the book?"

"Of course I didn't. I googled most of it."

The Maori rolled his eyes. "Jesus, Ash,"

pls read bad it makes my heart hurt

i also have another malum fic called TOXIC. it's a bad relationship between the two and calum just doesn't know how to deal and he likes teasing michael about the fact that they'll never go out and yeah.