Chapter Text
The last school bell rang, informing that all the children could finally leave the stuffy school and head to their home ... well, or to their friend's house, or maybe to a completely different place - after this call, everyone had the opportunity to go exactly where they wanted to go.
Two boys ran out of the building almost the very first, almost crashing into other students, but they didn't care about it, because they were both talking to each other and didn't pay attention to everyone who was next to them.
"I have an idea what we can do now, Chris! We can go to the Pizzaplex!"
"You know I can't go there, Gregory."
Gregory immediately braked sharply on his sneakers and looked at Chris with displeasure, who, as soon as he noticed his friend's look and realized what it meant, pressed his head to his shoulders.
"Seriously?!" Gregory immediately asked with displeasure. He sighed when Chris nodded uncertainly.
" Mom said I can't go there and…"
"You're always obeying your mom," Gregory crossed his arms over his chest. "Has she ever explained why you can't go to the Pizzaplex? What does she see so bad about this place? This is stupid! Everyone likes the Pizzaplex."
"Well, she didn't tell me why, but," Chris shrugged. "I do not know... if mom says that I can't go there, she definitely says it for a reason. Every time I disobey my mom, she gets sad.… And I don't want her to be sad."
"Your mom won't even know we went there! What should she do there? No one who could tell your mother about your choice will see us."
" I don't know.… What if she does find out?" Chris asked uncertainly.
"You can lie that we were at my house and were doing a new project for the robotics club," Gregory suggested.
" I don't want to lie to Mom."
Gregory groaned in displeasure and pressed his palm to his face for a moment.
Even if he was glad that he had a best friend in Chris, Gregory could not ignore the fact that he sometimes hated what an obedient boy Chris was... If he had good grades, and not such himself because of an extreme love for a certain dreaminess and being somewhere outside of class despite the fact that he was sitting at his desk, Chris would definitely have received the title of mom's son, who is always better than you in the eyes of adults.
To be honest, when Gregory agreed to be friends with Chris (initially it was done very reluctantly and just for the reason that Chris annoying Gregory with his attempts to make friends and find at least some common language), he still hoped that he could slightly change Chris's behavior… He hoped that their friendship would at least make Chris a little less obedient to adults.…
But no.
Chris remained the way he was. Obedient.
But maybe obedience was something that Gregory missed very much.
Gregory didn't really complain. He didn't like it when others controlled his every move, as if they knew how a twelve-year-old boy like him wanted to live.
"Besides, there are so many other places in the city. Why don't we go somewhere there?" Chris asked.
"Many other places?" Gregory snorted. "Yes, they are, but they suck. If I were the people who own these establishments, I would have closed them long ago. The Pizzaplex is better and everyone knows it."
"Well, competition is quite important…"
"It doesn't matter," Gregory rolled his eyes and decided to end the conversation with these words.
"Um, you're going to go home and tell Mike that you're going to the Pizzaplex, aren't you?" Chris suddenly asked, not even a few seconds had passed since the end of the last part of their conversation.
Gregory stopped again, and this time the displeasure on his face became even more pronounced… Because he immediately imagined Mike's displeased face in front of him.
"No" Gregory shook his head. " If I come home and tell Mike that I want to go to the Pizzaplex, he won't let me do it. Going home immediately after school is a huge cross to any desire to walk. Mike will say something like "first of all you have to think about school" and make me sit for several hours in a stuffy room surrounded by school textbooks and notebooks! It's like he doesn't understand that lessons are boring and I don't leave school after the bell in order to come home and sit at all these textbooks again."
"Well, parents are always worried about their children's grades and their knowledge… My mom…"
"Mike is not my parent!" Gregory snapped, before Chris could finish his thought.
Chris blinked in surprise.
"Really?" Chris asked immediately.
Gregory was silent for a moment, fighting the urge to punch himself in the face.
Well, what was he thinking before he blurted it out?!
None of the children at school should know what kind of Gregory he really was and what his life story was. Everything the other kids and even his best friend knew was a lie, but a lie for a reason.… It was a way to protect himself from unwanted attention and all that.
"I always thought Mike was your father and…"
Gregory knew he needed to keep lying right now, and well enough for Chris to believe him.
"Mike is my older brother," it wasn't that hard to come up with something.
"Damn, I kept telling Sarah that Mike is your father..." Chris said in a whisper, not even noticing how a weak curse came out of his mouth at first. Chris had never said such words before his friendship with Gregory, but it wasn't exactly the influence of a friend.… Rather, an unsuccessful desire to somehow diversify their speech with something "cool and adult", not realizing that this is not necessary for their friendship.
"Well, Mike is quite serious and... mature. I think many people, seeing him, think that he is my father," Gregory smiled nervously. "I'm even more used to it than he is."
Chris just shrugged in response and that was the end of their conversation.…
They just walked on and on, moving further and further away from the school.… They never returned to the joyous run.
"Are you sure you don't want to go to the Pizzaplex with me, Chris?" Gregory decided to ask when they stopped at the intersection where they usually went home.
Chris shook his head.
"I'm sorry," he replied sadly. " I really would like to go with you, but I also don't want my mom to scold me."
"It's okay," Gregory lied. "Maybe someday she'll let you go there and we'll spend time together."
"Maybe I'll try to talk about the Pizzaplex with my mom and... well, I don't know... at least find out the reason why she won't let me go there," Chris said, smiling nervously at the end.
"That would be cool," Gregory nodded. "I'll meet you at school tomorrow."
"Tomorrow is the day off,"Chris noted.
Gregory laughed.
" I don't want to sound like an adult, but time goes by so fast! I think it was only yesterday that you complained that the school week had just begun."
Chris laughed back.
"We can meet at my place tomorrow and still work on our project for the club," Chris suggested.
"If Mike let me go"
"Are you sure Mike isn't your father?"
"Just an overprotective older brother," Gregory lied. Well, the part about the overprotective wasn't such a lie. Overprotection was the thing that infuriated Gregory the most about Mike.
Left alone with himself, Gregory still did not move from his place.
It was really a sad fact that Gregory couldn't spend time with Chris exactly where Gregory wanted to spend time with him. It might have been selfish, but Gregory thought he had the right to think selfishly.
He could finally wish for everything he could think of and not think about how selfish it all was! Every child of his age had the right to want everything they could think of.
Finally, Gregory moved from his place, pulling the straps of his briefcase over his shoulders with displeasure. It wasn't worth taking so many things to school, he didn't really use anything and didn't want to brag about some cool things (of which there weren't many and only Chris knew about them, as Gregory's only friend at school)…
Gregory stopped near his house.
And now he remembered Mike again, but rather his displeased face. Mike will obviously be angry that Gregory didn't go home right away. It was possible, of course, to lie, but there was no point. Mike won't believe it. Mike had to report any activity to Gregory—other times Mike would start making up things for himself and worrying about nothing... Gregory really hated that Mike couldn't take it any easier.
Mike was exaggerating a lot and it was hard not to notice… Gregory would like to know why he behaves this way.… Maybe knowing the reason for Mike's disturbing behavior at least a little made Gregory not roll his eyes every time Mike worried too much and began to set too unpleasant boundaries of what he thought could be done and what could not be done.
Gregory pulled the straps of his backpack even tighter over his shoulders and finally shifted, moving as fast as he could without breaking into a run.…
It's not like Mike can leave the house at any moment.…
To be honest, Mike rarely went outside at all, and this was the only part of Mike's behavior that Gregory could understand. With an appearance like Mike's, it's better to go outside at night, or even better not to do it at all. It was rude. But that was what Mike said himself.
Gregory returned to his usual pace only when his house was behind him. It's funny that he even used the word "his" in relation to this house. A few months ago, Gregory couldn't even think of calling this place home, because he didn't think that this was really the place where he could live.…
Gregory sighed sadly against his will.
Life at the orphanage sucked, and Gregory understood it better every day at Mike's house.
Not to say, of course, that Gregory did not understand this before. He understood. Ever since the day he first found himself in the orphanage because his parents chose to abandon the boy. It was a rescue, but such a temporary one…
Life in the orphanage is sometimes painted as too cute, although in reality this is not the case at all… But who can really tell you about all the horrors of any of the orphanage where children were treated even worse than animals? In fact, only a few are capable of such a thing, and this is an extremely sad fact.
In any case, life at the orphanage was far in the past. Gregory had already gone through this period and now he had a new page in the book about his life.
Gregory sighed with displeasure when, pressing his palms against the door of the Pizzaplex, he could not open it. He did not understand how this door was designed... did children as short and thin, generally weak, as Gregory have to constantly face such injustice?
Gregory looked up for a moment when he felt his palms stop pressing against the glass door of the Pizzaplex.
Adults occasionally helped Gregory. The reason, of course, was more about what kind of adults these were, but Gregory was still a little surprised by the fact that there was an adult who didn't care about Gregory's problem with the door… No matter how dumb it sounds.
Gregory almost immediately smiled and ducked into the Pizzaplex, not even thinking about thanking the adult for helping him.
"What disgusting children these days."
Gregory rolled his eyes when he heard the growl of displeasure from that adult. Usually, only old ladies resorted to this kind of thing… There are exceptions to the rules too.
Gregory understood that in the opinion of this adult, he should have said "thank you", but Gregory did not want to say it — he did not see much point in it.
What has this adult done so great to thank him for it?
Gregory didn't even remember if he had said thank you to Mike when he decided to offer him a life in his house, which used to look like it was ready to fall apart at any moment (when Gregory first said this out loud, Mike was very unhappy with such a comment and said that Gregory was not in a position to to evaluate a house that is offered to him just like that).
Trying not to think for a long time about how right or wrong he acted in a situation with an adult that helped him open the main door of the Pizzaplex, and on the first day of life with Mike, Gregory ran further around the room… He wanted to be on a higher floor and stand in the middle so that he could have a better view of the coolest (and not so cool) places of the Pizzaplex.
Panting from the number of steps and his own haste, a few minutes later Gregory was able to look at the lower floors of the Pizzaplex, clutching the railing with his hands.
Gregory had learned almost every section of the Pizzaplex and he was proud of this fact. He could have won a competition to know the whole Pizzaplex... someone had to come up with such a competition. But only with cool prizes so that Gregory really wants to participate in it. If Gregory had an interesting and cool result of some kind of activity in front of him, then he was doing it no matter what… He would come up with anything to get himself an interesting or useful thing.
Seeing other children having fun with their friends, Gregory, as always, began to imagine the perfect trip to the Pizzaplex.
A very important detail was missing for the perfect trip to the Pizzaplex.
Chris.
In fact, Gregory hated getting attached to people. When he was eight, he became attached to a girl from the house next door. She stopped being friends with him after she found out that Gregory's parents never gave him pocket money (if only she knew what his parents spent most of the family's income on). When he got to the orphanage, he became attached to one woman because she was the only adult in the orphanage who had not lost humanity and care about the children in the orphanage. This woman was replaced pretty quickly… She was too good for the orphanage where Gregory lived.…
And of course, Gregory tried to remain independent of Mike. Mike helped him and all that, but Gregory wouldn't want to get attached to him. He wouldn't want to abruptly start giving up something just because he would begin to realize that it makes Mike nervous and worried. Gregory didn't want to get attached to Mike in order to feel something other than disgust when Mike closes himself in the bathroom for a few hours once a month because Mike is physically ill and Gregory still doesn't understand how Mike stays alive with this. He wouldn't want to get attached to feel anything beyond the irritation of Mike's desire to somehow influence Gregory's life.
But with Chris, this practice did not work out. Gregory became attached to him. They became best friends... if Chris was feeling bad, then Gregory wasn't laughing either. And Gregory, to be honest, didn't know how to feel about it.… On the one hand, he had a friend who cared about him and they often spent time together. On the other hand... he got attached to someone.
Gregory sighed softly... every time he thought about human connections, his head started to hurt. He's been pulling away from people all this time. He was hiding and didn't trust... the new sensations created a strange reaction now.
" Hey, kid."
Gregory turned around, tilting his head slightly to the side, when he heard a female voice that was definitely addressing him, and not some other child.… No other child has climbed to the floor above. Everyone was downstairs. Gregory saw it and noted it in his head a long time ago.
Gregory looked closely at the woman very close to him. This was an African-American woman with a rather dark complexion and red (definitely dyed) dreadlocks that rested on her shoulder. The woman was dressed in a guard's uniform, with her clothes almost hanging on her thin arms.
"Where are your parents?" the woman asked, coming a little closer to Gregory.
Gregory stared at her blankly, mentally considering what he should have said in such a situation. The guard had never paid attention to Gregory before—no one had ever asked him that.
"You do understand that children can't come to the Pizzaplex without their parents, right?"
Gregory blinked. Deep down, he hoped that seeing his stupid and uncomprehending (but still feigned) look, the guard would leave him alone.
But that didn't happen, and he should have started talking before this guard made a fuss and other employees of the complex would come here.
"I came with my older brother," Gregory lied. This was the first thing that came to his mind, most likely for the reason that Gregory had previously lied to Chris about Mike being his older brother.
"And where is your brother?" The guard immediately asked.
"He... he went to the bathroom," Gregory tried to look down and look towards the toilets of the Pizzaplex. He felt the guard trying to catch his eye... a strange feeling. Unpleasant feeling.
"I'll take your word for it," the guard crossed her arms over her chest and chuckled softly. "But I hope you're not lying."
"I'm telling the truth," Gregory tried to assure her. The guard looked at him for a couple more seconds, and then went downstairs.
Gregory let out a relaxed sigh.
"What a fool," a thought slipped through his mind.
Gregory chuckled softly and turned around to continue thinking about his own.
So, Chris…
Gregory was wondering what exactly Chris would like in the Pizzaplex…
To be honest, Gregory was sure that Chris would really like it here and his reaction would be very happy. Chris reacted that way to most things.
For some reason, Gregory was sure that Chris would have liked slot machines. Chris sometimes just needed something to do with his hands. Gregory noticed this habit of Chris's a long time ago... noticed how he twists strands of hair on his fingers… How he pull the edges of his shirt or any other outerwear… How he turns a pen in his hands in class... how he tears up pieces of paper at recess… The list of things Chris did to keep his hands busy could go on for a long time. Therefore, Gregory was sure that Chris would have liked slot machines. His hands would have been busy with something... however, one detail made Gregory doubt that Chris would have liked slot machines. Slot machines required you to stand for a long time. It was difficult for Chris.
For some reason, Gregory immediately remembered Chris's sister, Sarah. She was thirteen, but she had already decided to take additional classes and chose additional classes in psychology.
Once, Sarah said to Gregory in a very whisper: "Mom should sign Chris up for a psychologist. I'm sure he has ADHD."
Gregory didn't know how to feel about it.
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder? It sounded like something that suited Chris even more than his name. But Gregory was not a specialist to give people diagnoses. Especially to his best friend, who would hardly like such assumptions.
Most likely, Chris would have liked slot machines, but he would not have been able to feel them completely, because he would have started to get distracted or shift from foot to foot, wanting to move at least a little ... Gregory was lucky that such behavior was not part of him. He knew that his initials were proudly on the top lines of the top players.
Lately, Gregory has been approaching slot machines less and less often… Usually just to check if there was a more savvy player who could get ahead of him. And sometimes Gregory would slightly increase his score.
Gregory loved the rivalry, but it was feeble at the Pizzaplex.
Even teenagers older than him couldn't handle slot machines the way he could.
Gregory snorted softly and turned his gaze to the stage of the Pizzaplex. But Chris would have liked that without any "buts". What Chris loved so much was happening on stage. Bright lights, music, animatronics, the ability to move as much as you need.
When Gregory first came to the Pizzaplex, his mouth really stayed open after he saw the animatronics perform. It was an incredible sight that was worth seeing for everyone!
The only thing Gregory didn't like about animatronics was that they looked kind of childish.… Although the bias towards the aesthetics of the 90s (or 80s... Gregory was confused about such dates) and should have awakened memories in an older generation, animatronics looked too bright… Gregory didn't like it very much. According to Chris's stories, animatronics seemed to Gregory a little different…
But Gregory immediately looked back down and noticed that there were... mostly children... so it would be strange if animatronics looked scary... other children definitely liked them. No one had to adjust to Gregory's preferences.
Speaking of animatronics perform, Gregory hoped it would start as soon as possible. He didn't want to go back to his boring house until he saw the performance!
"Gregory?"
Michael went to the door of Gregory's room and knocked lightly on the door, waiting for at least some kind of answer.
"Gregory," Michael called a little louder, "Gregory, if you don't answer me, then I'll come into your room without permission," he added with displeasure when he didn't hear an answer for the second time.
Michael sighed with displeasure when there was no response for the third time. He really didn't want to enter Gregory's room without permission, but what else could he do when this boy decided to play silent with him?
Michael needed to know that Gregory had been sitting in his room all this time and just hadn't bothered to tell Michael about his arrival from school.
Sighing with displeasure one more time, Michael grabbed the door handles with his hand.
"Gregory, I'm opening the door. You still have a chance to do it yourself or give me permission to enter," Michael said a little more gently this time. He hoped Gregory would compromise.
To hell with it, Michael thought immediately when nothing happened. He lowered the door handle down and abruptly opened the door.
Almost immediately, Michael blinked in surprise, peering into Gregory's empty room. Michael's gaze immediately swept across all corners of the room, only for Michael to realize that nothing had changed in the room since Michael decided to clean up a little here in the morning.
"Where is he…"
Michael looked around the room once more. There wasn't even Gregory's school bag.
Michael pressed one hand against the wall… He felt faintly dizzy.
"Take it easy, Michael Afton, take it easy," Michael tried to calm himself in his mind as his fingers tightened.
Michael sighed and tried to straighten his palm.
Michael hoped that Gregory had just decided to take a walk after school, as always, without telling Michael about it, because he didn't really take into account the feelings of that one.
A lost child was not what Michael needed. Just not now. Not after everything that happened a few years ago.
