Chapter Text
Not so long ago… in the mysterious land of Toronto, Canada…
‘Young’ Neil Nordegraf was smoking a cigarette.
Neil shakily exhaled, a warm plume of smoke flowing from between his parted lips, his breath and tobacco mixing with the cool, sharpened air of Toronto. It’s a busy Friday morning; skies gloomy and grey, air threatening and unwelcoming. He rubbed the bottom of his sneaker against the concrete of the path leading to his and Stephen Stills’ shared house. Vehicles drove by on the street, their studded winter tires leaving unique marks in the slush—over the studs of the previous driver, and the driver before that—and what remained of last Saturday's snowfall. It was the start of those few, brisk couple weeks in November where the chill began to make you shiver. All the same, the people of Toronto still decided it was T-shirt and jeans weather. Neil included.
Not much was set to go on that day for Neil. And so, he sat outside, smoking and watching as the traffic passed the house by, impatiently waiting for Stephen to come home, hopefully with his other friends in tow. Stephen Stills was Neil’s best friend, although he was unsure if the feeling was mutual. Just today, Stephen had left to go record his band’s first album with the rest of his friends, leaving Neil by himself. Neil sighed- for what felt like the 20th time in the last 5 minutes, dropping his expended cigarette in the small banks of snow gathered underneath the lip of the roof. It hadn’t used to be like this—his friends used to be around more often.
Neil turned on his heel, walked up the patio, and creaked the door to their house open. Normally upon entering Neil and Stephen’s house, you’d be greeted by an explosion of rock music in the front room. Amps, an acoustic guitar- a bass guitar- and a drum set with a lazily painted bomb-esque logo of Stephen’s band on it all sat, begging to be played. But the band wasn’t practicing here, like they usually do. Instead, they were at Joseph's- recording their first proper album. Right above the drum set, lazily taped to the wall is a poster with the band’s name on it. “Sex Bob-Omb”— their name —“vs Crash and The Boys!!! Live at the Toronto International Battle Of The Bands at Rockit!!!” There were only six exclamation marks in the entire poster, but the presence of that many still annoyed Neil more than it should have.
Neil muttered under his breath. “Stupid band.” He shook his head. He knew he was being cynical, but he didn't know what exactly had been clouding his emotion. He sauntered past the amps set up in the front room, walking down the hallway towards the kitchen. Halfway down the hall, he peered into his room. It was a room he had inherited from his older sister, Steph Nordegraf- who had played in a band with Stephen in college. She moved away for further education to somewhere that Neil regrettably could not recall. When she moved away, Neil took her spot in the friend group.
It was nice at first, at least until it wasn’t.
Neil was fresh out of the University of Toronto when Steph moved. He was looking for a place to stay, and luckily his older sister had referenced him to her roommate, who was also Stephen. Neil was excited to be out on his own; making bad decisions, finding a job, becoming independent- it was all just stuff that he looked forward to. Being the youngest out of the friend group that he now found himself in, everyone started referring to him as ‘Young Neil’. It started out as an affectionate nickname- one that he liked. He grew to hate it over time, though, as he found it became condescending, a moniker that devalued him because it made his entire makeup sound immature in nature. He wasn't immature, right? He pondered that question every second of the day. When he wasn't occupied with something else, he found solace by locking himself in and staring out the window when it suited him.
Neil’s room didn’t carry much personality. It was pretty bare; walls painted a drab gray, blinds shut, and the only notable items of furniture were his bed and the desk where his computer sat. Recently, he’d picked up the habit of smoking in his own room, without an ashtray to be seen. Honestly, there wasn't much of anything important to Neil. The corners of his room collected dust, and it faintly smelled of tobacco. Something was just off about the air in the space, but he found an odd melancholy in it. It was a space where he was sure nobody would bother him, whether out of repugnance or disregard—he did not care.
Either way, it seemed his faith had been misplaced, as his flip-phone made a beep-beep sound almost the second he sat down on his mattress. He dug it out of his pocket, flipping it open with as much enthusiasm on his face as you would expect from a grade schooler being told they have school on the day after a snowstorm.
Before Neil even had a chance to read the text that had popped up on his phone, it started ringing furiously in his hand. He declined the call without much thought, and began to read the text:
“NEIL UR FRIENDS R ACTUAL NO LIFES”
Again, his phone buzzed in his hand as someone tried to call him. He pinched the bridge of his nose in exhaustion, hemp bracelets sliding down his forearm as he answered the phone. He tried to sound as presentable as possible.
“Hi. I’m Neil.”
A loud, indecipherable, angry, female voice projected itself from his phone, and Neil brought it away from his ear for a moment, before bringing it back slowly.
“Sorry, could you, uh…?”
“-NEIL! It's Julie.”
“Julie Powers?”
“Who else, dingus?”
Julie Powers was a social butterfly that lived to party and get drunk with her girlfriends. She hosted parties all the time, and the last he heard, she had gotten a new loft apartment somewhere in the uptown, and she was partying hard before she moved to Montréal. She was a full-time bitch and a half. Neil wondered what could have possibly compelled her to call him, considering he is the polar opposite of her.
“I bet you're wondering why I called you.”
“Uh, yeah, you'd be right-”
“-I called you because your friends are total shitbrained idiots. Scott and those dicks ruined our Day of the Dead party on Halloween!”
Neil recalled the event. Scott had apparently gotten into a brawl with two of Ramona's exes. It was a blur to him at this point. Neil had a hard time keeping track of what Scott was up to nowadays, but he didn't feel guilty about it. He thought about how Scott never checked in on him, and he felt like less of an asshole.
“Right, okay, Scott's stupid, but why does that have to do anything with me?”
Static crackled through the line for a second, Julie yelling at someone in the background briefly, before clearing again. “First, Scott's retarded. Second, no one else is picking up their phone, and that's BAD, because I was going to tell them they can't come.”
“Come to what?”
“We're having a do-over. Another Day of the Dead party tonight.”
Neil glanced at the calendar hanging on his wall. “In November?”
“Shut up, Neil!”
“So… you, uh, want me to tell them they can't come?”
“Bingo. You're already smarter than all of those dumbasses combined.”
Neil chuckled darkly. “I doubt that.”
Julie clucked her tongue for a second in consideration, sucking air through her teeth that sort of made a horrible noise on Neil's end.
“Hm. Neil—why don't you come to my party?”
“What? Why? Don’t you ‘actively dislike’ me or whatever?”
“Because maybe they'll understand they fucked up really bad, when dorky lil’ Young Neil gets to come to the party but they don't. Anyway, I'm wasting my cell phone plan on you, I'll text you the address.”
“Julie-”
“GET HERE QUICK!”
The phone made another beep beep beep noise as Julie dropped the call. Neil stared at the screen, and about 10 seconds later he received a text with an address and another attached message:
“There will b girls. unless u r gay. then there will be boys 2”
Neil rolled his eyes so hard an x-ray might have mistaken them for his kidneys. A small part of him did consider Julie's offer, nonetheless completely aware he was being used to set an example to Scott and the rest of his friends. Parties to him anyway felt like a social deduction game- as if he were playing Clue or something. Somebody at this party definitely isn't a complete asshole, but who? Neil stuffed his face into his pillow, groaning in deliberation. After about half a minute, he flipped open his phone again and tapped away at the buttons, pressing ‘send’ on a text.
“can I bring my cigs 2 the party pls?”
Lainey DeCoff had just finished moving a month ago to Toronto. Her apartment was pretty small, and she had to share it with her best friend, Rachel- so she ended up packing most of her things into a small bedroom where at first, the boxes of her stuff piled up almost to the ceiling. Lainey was from Manitoba, and she was mostly used to living in rural, small town areas laden with farmland. The city was a big change from her definition of normal. It was loud, busy, and to her at least, annoying. She enjoyed some of it, though. The lights were pretty, and it seemed like it was never quite night-time further into the center of the city, which she enjoyed. She liked how it felt like life moved on, no matter what happened to her- good or bad.
She sifted through another box of her belongings, the second to last remaining in the apartment. Most of the things she had brought over were art-related, and you could basically smell the paint as soon as you stepped into her room, which had drawings plastered all over the wall that usually contained some form of angsty, gothic imagery. She really liked the gothic style- makeup and all. Even her boots had small skull pins on their laces. Honestly, all of her outfits had at least one skull included somewhere. It was part of the reason that she went to Julie Power’s Day of the Dead party on Halloween, which was rudely interrupted by one Scott Pilgrim and two Katayanagi twins. She went because it gave her an excuse to go overboard and dress how she wanted, but her fun had been cut short. She hummed to herself as she pulled yet another sketchbook out of the cardboard box, illuminated by the warm glow of the lamp on her nightstand.
“Laaaaineeey!”
Rachel MacDonnell’s voice echoed through the apartment, creeping in through Lainey’s ajar door.
“Yeaaaah?”
“Julie wants to know if you’re coming to her party!”
“Probably not!”
Lainey heard Rachel’s footsteps fast approaching, and she sighed as she shifted onto the side of her knees, looking at the door. Rachel pushed the door open gently, talking on her cell phone. “Yeah, yeah- she’s here. Lainey! Julie wants to talk to you!”
Lainey sighed. “Seriously?”
“Yes girl, here.”
Lainey took the phone from Rachel, muttering. “When did you get a cell phone? Wasn’t our landline fine?” She put the phone to her ear. “‘Ello?”
“Hey, Lainey- I wanted to invite you to our do-over party!”
Lainey looked up at Rachel, who gave her a nod with a smirk on her face. It seemed like she had already been roped into going to the party, as she was wearing a black dress that complimented her darker complexion nicely.
“Your do-over party? Like, we’re doing the Day of the Dead thing again?”
“Yeah! It’s been so fucking hard getting people to agree to show after what happened last time. It was complete garbage.”
Lainey chuckled. She remembered sitting and spectating the Scott versus Twins incident. “Yeah, I could imagine.”
“So are you in?”
“I mean…” Lainey bit her lip, considering the offer. “When is it?”
“Tonight, girl! You looked awesome last time- just.. do that again-”
Lainey smirked.
“-But don’t expect any more compliments from me, just show up!”
“Fine, I’ll be there.”
“Thanks-you’re-the-best! Bye!”
Lainey brought the phone down from her ear, flipping it closed. She stood up, careful not to fall over as you could almost touch both walls in the room, standing in the middle with your arms extended. She handed the phone back to Rachel, groaning dramatically. “I can’t believe I keep letting you guys talk me into this stuff.”
Rachel nudged Lainey’s arm playfully. “Come on, it’ll be fun. There’ll be no fights this time,” she chuckles. “Or I hope so, at least.”
Lainey sighed, turning around to open her tiny closet. “Yeah, somehow that doesn’t comfort me any.” She sifted through her clothes, trying to find something that she liked. She glanced at Rachel. “You’re ready early.”
“I have a date with this guy before the party.”
Lainey raised an eyebrow as she moved another coat hanger. “...And you’re bringing this guy to Julie’s party?”
“Yeah, if he wants.” Rachel opened her flip phone, typing away as she leaned against the doorframe. “He’s kind of wishy-washy. But he’s cute! Like-”
Lainey giggled, rolling her eyes. “-Let me stop you right there. I don’t wanna hear about your date.”
Rachel scoffed. “Geez, you asked.”
“Not for that much. All you talk about is guys. And gossip. Your life probably doesn’t pass the Bechdel test.”
“Oh, ha-ha.”
Lainey pulled out an aggressive looking spiky jacket from her wardrobe, looking at it up and down. “And to be honest, mine doesn’t either, because you keep bringing them up when talking to me! We’ve been here a month!”
Rachel laughed, putting her hand against her forehead. “Okay, okay, let’s have a conversation then. Without talking about dudes.”
“Fine. Hmm. Uh-what’s your favorite fairytale?”
“Huh. Red Riding Hood. So- do you like athletic guys or…”
“Shut up!!”
Rachel laughed as she left the room, and Lainey grinned. She and Rachel didn’t exactly share the same mindset, but they got each other nonetheless. They both met in grade school, but didn’t talk to each other properly until they were in high school- when they both briefly played on the girls’ volleyball team. Lainey usually didn’t get to play very much, as she wasn’t as stellar a player as some of the other girls on the team, and Rachel was in the same boat as her. And so, they began to talk on the bench, during training, and in the locker room. Through their mutual sucking-at-volleyball, they became best friends.
When Rachel said she was moving to Toronto after she got out of college, Lainey decided she would come with her. Lainey’s parents didn't understand why she wanted to uproot herself and move away from Manitoba- she had basically everything she could need. Mr. and Mrs. DeCoff were wealthy people, but Lainey rejected the lavish lifestyle they put on her. It didn't suit her, she thought. She didn't want to worry about putting her elbows on the table whenever she ate, nor be concerned about going into an office and sitting there for eight hours a day, five days a week- even if it paid her bills.
And so she moved, and quickly got a job at a cozy little coffee shop named A.C Ranch Cafe- which she liked better than her old job at Value Village. She was happy, sure, but it was hard leaving everything behind. Her province-wide journey had left her in a storm of displacement. The city seemed mostly indifferent to her, and that was okay. She was mostly indifferent to it, too. It had yet to warm up to her fully, and had yet to show where her real place in it was, but she had to admit she met more people since moving to Toronto than in her entire life. She hoped to get into an art university one day.
She sighed as she slipped on her jacket, spiky at the shoulders with the sleeves rolled up to her forearms. It wasn’t quite busted up enough to match the look of some of her other, more punk clothing, but it was the first jacket she bought in Toronto and it had served her well. She had to come up with something good for the party tonight. Last time, she went pretty overboard with the Day of the Dead makeup and it ended up being a bit hard to manage- but she thought it looked great at the start of the night. She eventually decided to settle on something more subtle, combining goth with small hints of the traditional Mexican holiday that would be easier to manage. Satisfied with her plan, she wondered when she'd have to start putting real effort into it.
“Rachel?” Lainey called.
“Yeah?” Rachel yelled back from inside their bathroom.
“What time is the party?” She sauntered close to her doorframe, leaning her temple against it; her eyes closed. It was only the beginning of the afternoon.
“About eight thirty!”
“Kay. I'm gonna go get a coffee.” Lainey turned around, grabbing her set of keys off of her tiny desk and shoved them lazily into her pocket. “Be good on your date, Rach! You're my drive. Don't get smashed before the party, please.” Lainey was half-joking, but she remembered an incident in their senior year of high school where exactly that had happened- and it ended with her consoling Rachel in the bathroom as she threw up her guts fifteen minutes into the party.
Rachel sighed in half mock annoyance, half actual annoyance as she remembered that night too, face red from the embarrassment fresh in her memory. “Yes, ma'am.”
“Cool. Thanks.” Lainey creaked their front door open, pulling it shut behind her.
Neil stuffed his hands deep into the pockets of his zip up, turtle-necked jacket, shielding them from the biting cold air as he walked down the somewhat quiet street. He leaned forward a little much, eyes to the sidewalk as he prepared himself for the night ahead. “I’m cool, I’m cool,” he muttered under his icy breath, feeling the crunch of the salt on the sidewalk underneath his boots. The salt didn’t always do anything- as most Torontonians were readily aware, and as Neil had been reminded on his walk. He hated the colder months, although that was what most of Toronto weather was like, anyway. The summers were too hot, and the winters were too cold, and sometimes it was warm in November and cold in May. Dumb, he thought. That’s really dumb.
He crossed the street, making his way towards a small duplex. He tried calling Stephen as well- but he hadn’t picked up, just as Julie described, and so Neil decided to pay the group a visit. They were recording the album in some girl’s apartment- Hollie, who was a coworker of Kim Pine’s. Kim was also the drummer for Sex Bob-omb. Neil pushed the door to the building open, walking straight inside without an invite. Hollie's apartment was pretty nice, Neil thought- even though it was small. She also had a roommate, Joseph, who stayed with a bunch of sound equipment. Neil recalled Stephen begging Joseph to help them record their album the second he found out about his set-up, and ever since then, most of Stephen’s days have been spent here.
Hollie was sitting on the couch, hunched over, reading a book. She glanced at Neil as he entered, raising an eyebrow. “You are…?”
“I’m Neil.” He kicked off his snow covered boots.
“Oh, right- Neil. Knock next time, maybe?” She sipped a cup of what appeared to be coffee, furrowing her brow. Neil raised a hand.
“I’ll just be a sec. Need to talk to Stephen.”
“Right. He and his boyfriend are upstairs.”
Neil shook his head in confusion. “Joseph?”
“Yeah- Joseph. His boyfriend. They got together…?” She trailed off, clocking Neil’s furrowed brow. “...Oh, he didn’t tell you…” Her eyes widened slightly as they wandered to the stairs. “You… uh, didn’t hear it from me, then.”
“They’re like… together?” Neil looked at Hollie. She shrugged. Neil sighed, waving his hand. “I really don’t care. Gay or not, I gotta talk to him.” He sauntered up the stairs, warming his palms with his breath. He walked down the short hallway, pausing in front of Joseph's door. There was loud chatter coming from indoors. Neil began knocking fiercely at the door. “Yo, Stephen! Kim?” There was a pause for a second. He yelled again. “Scott?”
The door opened, and a gruff-looking Stephen appeared with a huff, headphones on his neck, sitting in a chair. He raised an eyebrow at the sight of Neil. “Neil? Why are you here?”
Joseph leaned forward in his chair, looking out the door with his permanent bitch face. He whispered back at someone unseen in the room. “Neil? Who’s he?”
Neil looked past Stephen at Joseph, raising his hand. “I’m Neil. Stephen’s roommate.” He looked back at Stephen. “First of all, Stephen, I’m here to tell you something. Second of all, Julie wanted me to tell you that you guys aren’t allowed to come to her party tonight.”
Stephen blinked. “I could care less about that, Neil.”
Kim Pines appeared at the door, pushing it open wider to see Neil. “All of us could care less, because we got booked to play at some random underground place.” Kim’s gaze of daggers shifted down to Stephen, sitting in the chair. “Which is why I keep saying to this retard that we need to rehearse-”
“We will, geez!”
“-Instead of recording this lame-ass album.” She turned around with an exasperated sigh, waltzing away to watch the conversation from a distance. Stephen sighed, rolling his eyes before settling his gaze back on Neil. “Really, Neil? You just came here to tell us… that?”
Neil shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. I guess it was more for Scott’s sake, but… you really got booked again? I thought you said-” He fumbled with a pack of cigarettes in his jacket pocket.
“-Scott isn’t here, man. ...And you shouldn’t hang with Julie. Sorry. Now please shoo.”
Stephen moved to shut the door, but Neil stopped it with the palm of his hand. “Are you still mad at me for dating Knives?”
Stephen looked back at Joseph, scratching his stubble. He scoffed, turning back towards the door. “Neil, I don’t want to talk about it with you right now.”
“I broke up with her! I don’t know what else you want me to do!” Neil’s voice broke, desperate. He threw his hands out at his sides in frustration.
“We’ll talk about it later.”
“No we won’t. You’re still gonna be here in this stupid studio later.”
“It’s not just about Knives, Neil.” Stephen pushed the door shut, leaving the brown-haired, wide eyed boy standing in the hall by himself. He shut his eyes, beating back emotion as he silently wished that his friends would accept him in the same way they had his sister. He knew he never had the same chemistry with his friends the way Steph had, but recently, it’d been getting worse: harder to ignore, brush off as ‘just how they are’. It depressed him. Made him angry. He muttered under his breath. “Shit.”
Neil turned and started down the stairs, feeling his footsteps grow heavier with every step. The stairs creaked under the pressure of him and whined, like he was bearing an invisible weight on his chest- dragging him down. Everything felt brighter than usual, way louder and more stimulating. He kept his eyes on the floor as he walked past Hollie, still sitting on the couch. She glanced up at him, her eyes widening at the sight of him. “Neil? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he mumbled. “I’m okay.” He staggered over to his boots laying by the door, slipping them on. Hollie squinted.
“Your head-” She paused. “It’s… glowing?”
There was an odd, yellow halo of bright lines emitting from the back of Neil’s head- reflecting off his shaggy brown hair and big, soft eyes. He looked up from his boots, locking eyes with Hollie. She looked concerned- but Neil didn’t want her pity.
“I’m fine.”
Neil opened the door, and closed it gently behind him as he stepped out into the Toronto evening.
Lainey looked outside the window of the coffee shop. It was the same one she had been working in since she moved, and it was an incredibly cozy little store. Her co-workers were pretty nice, and their customers were usually on the older side, meaning the days went by pretty slowly in A.C Ranch. She was listening to someone drivel on about their personal life, sipping her americano gently. Outside, the grey clouds had turned darker- and small raindrops had begun to fall alongside a smattering of flurries. The rain was nice, Lainey thought. It gave her a comforting feeling she couldn’t quite describe, like a soft buzz that trailed down her spine. She watched some of the raindrops race down the window, humming softly to herself. As she had liked to do.
A few minutes later, she grabbed a napkin from the table and took out a pen from her pocket, uncapping it as she brushed her free hand through her red hair. She let the ballpoint run over the texture of the napkin, drawing a curving storm of black lines that ran through one another, joining seemingly at random. One of her co-workers; some guy named Keith, she was pretty sure, stopped to look as he got ready to clock out, eyebrow raising at the sketch unfolding in front of him. “Geez. Something like this would’ve put you in a ward fifty years ago.”
Lainey giggled, but her focus did not wane. “Yeah.. no, definitely.”
Keith smiled, scratched his head, and sucked air through his teeth. “Hey, so, can you cover for me on Tuesday? I have a doctor’s appointment.”
“Sure thing, dude. No worries.”
“Awesome, thanks!”
She waved him off as he left the building, still hunched over her small napkin sketch. She let the pen ride off the napkin a minute or two later, and she tilted her head, looking at her creation. She wasn’t really quite sure what she made. She thought it mostly just looked like an erratic ball of lines, sort of like those inkblot image things that psychologists would show you and ask, “What do you see?”
She shrugged to herself as she picked it up and shoved it in her pocket. Maybe she could add it to her art wall, or maybe it would turn into something else before that. She wasn’t sure yet, but she knew she wanted to keep it. She couldn’t always remember the origin of a drawing or sketch she made, but somehow, to her; it always conveyed the emotion she was feeling when she made it. She found it hard to regulate her feelings most days, but drawing helped her explain the things that words couldn’t quite manage to: quite ironically, because it was something she didn’t have to explain.
Speaking of which, she had a pit in her stomach about Julie's party; as much as she wanted to go, the prospect terrified her. She knew she wouldn't be going otherwise if it wasn't for her want to express herself. Lainey sipped her coffee and stood up from her seat. The pit in her only grew larger- and she had a hard time imagining getting through tonight.
Underneath it all, however, something pushed her to go.