If You Miss It

6. neutral

CHAPTER SIX

NEUTRAL

—

Today was a good day.

Dmitri knew that it was a good day, because for the first time in what felt like years but was just around two weeks, he woke up without a weight pressing down on his chest.

And when he got out of bed, for the first time in a long time, he wasn't dragging himself through calf-deep mud with no energy, where he could move forward, but the effort just seemed more and more taxing until he just wanted to sit down, stop walking, and wallow.

Today was different. There was no valid reason, and honestly he wasn't even extraordinarily happy or anything. He was just a seven on the pH scale, a perfect balance. Neutral.

It had been a while since he had felt neutral. Normal.

"Are you ready?" Trinh's voice blared through the closed door of his bedroom, knuckles rapping against his door. "We need to drop Eden off at school, so if you could hurry the fuck up, I think we would all appreciate it. Annoying ass."

Rolling his eyes, Dmitri tugged on his pants, grabbing a belt from one of the piles of clothes in his room and buckling it, poking his finger in the process. "Eden, Trinh's being a fuckin' annoyance," he yelled out from his room, only doing so because he was sure that Juno was awake, if her small purrs from the corner of the room were anything to go by. "Tell your girlfr— partner, fuck. I'm sorry. Tell your partner to shut their trap." Fuck.

At that, Trinh just began to pound harder on the door. I fucking hate these people. Groaning in frustration, Dmitri yanked the door open, Trinh nearly pounding their fucking fists into his face as he did so.

"What do you want?" he asked, suddenly painfully aware of the fact that his upper body was on full display. "It's not even that late, so why the fuck are you rushing me? Jesus."

Trinh just shrugged, launching themself into his bed with a yelp. "Because I like to piss you off. Brings me joy. Also, I don't mind being called Eden's girlfriend! Sure, partner is nicer, but girlfriend is good, too," they assured, tossing his shirt at him and cackling when it fell to the ground.

"You can annoy me how much ever you want," Dmitri began as he picked up his shirt from the ground and smoothening it. "You can't bring me down, because I'm actually normal today!" Then, as an afterthought, he added, "Well, as normal as I can get, I guess."

Out of nowhere, Trinh stretched their hand forward, gesturing for Dmitri to come closer. With a confused hum, Dmitri took two steps forward, cocking his head to the side and waiting for Trinh to do something.

And they did, by reaching over and smacking him directly on his abdomen, hand slapping against his skin.

"Motherfuck— ! What the fuck, Trinh?" he complained as he tugged on his t-shirt, the plain black one they were told to wear to work, thankfully without any itchy logos on it.

"That was for being annoying. You're perfectly normal all the time." Before Dmitri could protest, Trinh spoke again, "You can't argue with me, I know that I'm right. And you know that I'm right, too."

Dmitri didn't believe that, not even for a second, but he didn't really want to argue with Trinh when they were so adamant about it, so he just gave them a tight-lipped smile and a nod. Good day. It's a good day.

A minute later, when Dmitri was done getting himself ready to go to work, both physically and mentally, he bent down and petted Juno's head once, her small purrs enough to let a smile spread across his face.