Utterly Forgettable | MM Romance | Complete

One: Punch It Out Of You

There was something about returning to his best friend's chaotic apartment for Thursday game night that never failed to ease the grief Josh's work always etched into his bones.

More of a home than Josh's own flat could ever hope to become, Mark's place was Josh's haven when coming home from a client. Boxes of takeout were strewn on the too-small kitchen counter, one balanced right at the edge, one breath away from spilling onto the floor. There was debate on whether it was prudent to put the beers in the freezer 'just for a little bit, so they'll cool faster'. It was never prudent, and they'd forgotten all about the beer on two separate occasions already, to the detriment of Mark's freezer, but Josh, as the teetotaller of the group, couldn't be expected to remember the beers he didn't even drink.

An entire game night stretched ahead of him. In the living room, Zoe and Dan fought over the TV remote, completely ignoring Mark's protests of 'no TV on during game night, people!' Sam was late, most likely cooking something healthy and organic to counteract all their processed food; Sam was always late, and then never failed to complain they'd started without her. Good people, all three, and Josh clicked well enough with them, even though, to him, they were only Mark's coworkers — Mark was the only one of the group whom Josh called a friend.

Josh had no coworkers, and his clients had the unfortunate habit of dying; it didn't lend itself well to partying.

The latest funeral had been less than two weeks before; Josh was going to take some time to himself before accepting another client. A couple of months at least — he never bothered fighting against the emotional attachments he already knew he'd form, and, though he knew his life was richer for those connections, losing them left him raw and reeling every single time.

He'd just saved the box of Chinese takeout from certain doom, placing it on top of the pizza box, where it was safer, as the whining in the living room intensified.

"Come on, Zoe, I just want to see what's on, give me that!"

"I'm watching the news, that's what's on."

"You're watching the news on mute. Plus, the news is boring."

"You want to surf for two hours, that's what you want to do, until the downstairs neighbor has a seizure from the TV's flickering lights."

Josh rolled his eyes but couldn't suppress a grin at the playground shenanigans. If he were to tell anyone these people were respectable doctors in their mid-thirties to late-forties, he'd be laughed out of the room. Abandoning his investigation of what their takeout potluck had yielded, he leaned on the kitchen doorway to watch the scene devolve. Experience told him this was the point where it usually got entertaining. Sure enough, Dan's mature response was to stick his tongue out and then grab the remote out of Zoe's hand, prompting an outraged "Hey!" from Zoe, who kept jumping up and trying to take it back.

"Guys," Mark interrupted, forehead wrinkling as his eyebrows rose, "what did I say about TV on game nights? Let's have the remote, shall we?"

'Children, it's long past bedtime,' he might as well have said.

Dan laughed then danced out of his way, the offending item held high in his hand. "Come get it from me, then!"

Zoe, tiny nimble thing that she was, took the chance now that Dan was distracted by Mark and actually jumped on Dan's back, trying to wrestle the remote from him. Just the image of that had Josh losing the battle not to laugh and draw Mark's ire — Josh was a tall man, but Dan was almost a head taller than he was, and Zoe was a pixie. Mark glared at him as if he, too, were a misbehaving child. Dan pressed harder on the buttons, trying to shake Zoe off his back with no success.