Hello lovers,

As you may or may not know, I'm taking a dip into writing new things...things I've been reading for a while, but never got around to writing. Today is a Seifer/Hayner piece, up next is one that features Sora/Riku rather than using them as a side dish, and, if I ever get my ass into gear, after that will be my first ever attempt at smut (I'm already terrified). I'm not entirely thrilled with the way this turned out, but it's a start, and I need to move on so I can finish the Sora/Riku one-shot that I started writing in October. Yup.

Things I Own: A playlist full of Hollywood Undead songs...uh, well I don't own a suit, I don't like gin, I don't own any prescription bottles of pills...my dad owns his dad's old police gun? I own a lot of empty bottles of wine. Yup. That I do own.

Things I Don't Own: Seifer, Hayner, the random smattering of characters mentioned/alluded to. They belong to people that are far cooler and richer than me. The song is "Bullet" by Hollywood Undead, and they own it and all their other songs about brilliant fuck-uppery.

Disclaimer: I'm not suicidal. I SWEAR. I just...posted two stories in a row about suicide? I'M A HAPPY PERSON, I PROMISE.

"I never bought a suit before in my life, but when you go to meet God you know you wanna look nice." is a quote from the song "Bullet" by Hollywood Undead. I wish I was that clever.

Seifer kicked his heels absently against the brick wall, an uncharacteristically childish action, particularly given the moment. The ground wasn't as far away as he would have liked, but it was far enough away that he felt that thrilling little gravity-defying tug in the pit of his stomach. The location wasn't ideal, the roof of the apartment building he'd grown up in, and if he was really honest with himself, he didn't much like the fact that the sun was still out. Seifer didn't want anyone to see...the people below him had little kids, for Christ's sake. No need to perpetuate the cycle.

"It's only five stories."

Seifer's eyelids fluttered closed over his aqua-colored eyes, two fingers coming up to pinch the scarred bridge of his nose. He should have expected this, really. Should have known that spontaneity wouldn't have dissuaded fate's little bitch.

"Huh?" He grunted at the intruder. Seifer didn't need to turn around, didn't even need to open his eyes. He knew without looking that Hayner stood a few steps to his left, leaning one hip against the waist-high parapet, thin arms crossed over a beater. It was a look he'd seen many times on his younger neighbor. Hayner never dropped the physical aspects of his tough guy look, even when they weren't on the streets and at each other's throats.

"The building," Hayner sighed exasperatedly. "It's only five stories high. That isn't nearly high enough for you to kill yourself. Break some bones for sure, paralyze yourself maybe too. I mean, you might get lucky and fall at a bad angle, snap your neck in the right place. But you probably wouldn't even reach terminal velocity...it's only what, 50 feet max?"

"Your point, Lamer?" Seifer asked dryly. He finally glanced towards his neighbor, pleased to see that he'd been entirely right about how Hayner had positioned himself. Something internal twitched at the thought of Hayner and positions in the same breath, something that he brushed firmly away.

"You know," Hayner mused, completely disregarding Seifer's question. "You should probably lose the coat, too. The thing'll act like a parachute, you'll barely even break a bone at that rate."

"I really don't need the physics lesson right –"

"Unless, of course, you already know this fall won't kill you, and that's why you picked it. Cause you're too scared to go through with it for real."

Seifer swung himself around and jumped to his feet, crossing the distance between them with two long strides. Hayner didn't even flinch as the older teen got right up in his face, blue eyes flashing threateningly.

"Who the fuck you calling scared, Chickenwuss?" he snarled.

Hayner smirked at him, smirkedat him, like he was amused by Seifer's anger.

The taller boy all but growled in frustration. It was so like this stupid little brat to just come right up here and barge into Seifer's business like this. Now he couldn'tthrow himself over the edge, even if he wanted to. He didn't give a damn about the lamer being scarred for life; it'd be his own damn fault, really. But no. No, the problem was...he was actually right. This drop wouldn't kill him. And if he actually tried and lived to realize his failure...Hayner would never let him forget it.

"Not scared then. Alright, go for it. Don't let me stop you." Hayner shrugged, like his arch enemy wasn't inches away from his face breathing harder than an angry dragon, like he hadn't just caught the boy he grew up next door to trying to throw himself over the side of a building. That damn smirk still lingered on his damn face too. Dammit.

"You...I...you're an infuriating little shit, Lamer." Seifer snarled. He stormed away without another word, white coat billowing around his knees, hands clenched at his sides. Seifer didn't look back, not once, so he never say the way Hayner's smirk morphed into a small, triumphant smile.

The first time Seifer tried to kill himself he was thirteen. He didn't even remember anymore what his motivation had been, just that he was thirteen and bitter and that he'd seen a lot of pirate movies and hanging sounded like as good a plan as any. He hadn't put much thought into his plan, really. Found a length of rope mixed in with his dad's old stuff that Mom hadn't been able to move yet, climbed out on the fire escape outside their kitchen window, and started looping the rope around the railing.

"You're doing it wrong."

Seifer jumped about a foot in the air, ends of the rope still clutched in his hands as he spun around on the thin metal rails. Hayner stood on the fire escape next door with his hands on his hips like the prissy little eleven-year-old brat he was, glaring at Seifer with critical eyes. Seifer scowled at him. He didn't like his neighbor, not one bit, and he definitely didn't need the lame little kid butting into his business.

"What?" He snapped, fingers tightening around the rope.

"You're doing it wrong. The knot." Hayner reached out for the length of rope, tugging it from Seifer's grip with a few surprisingly sharp jerks for a twerp his size. "It won't work."

Seifer schooled his face into an appropriately non-plussed expression, watching the way the smaller blond's nimbly fingers manipulated the rope almost effortlessly until it looked just like the ones Seifer had seen in the movies. Hayner held it up triumphantly, dangling the noose in front of Seifer's face despite their considerable height difference.

"See," he boasted, swinging the end of the rope slightly. "This is how they used to do it when they would hang pirates out in Tortuga."

"Dweeb," Seifer sneered. "Maybe if you didn't spend all your time reading geeky books about Tortuga you wouldn't look like such a chicken-legged shrimp."

Hayner never reacted the way Seifer wanted to, even when they were kids. The younger blond barely flinched, just crossed his arms over his ribs, hugging the noose to his side as his eyes darted to the side.

"My dad took me there once," he said. Seifer, at least, had the grace to feel sheepish. He didn't know much about Hayner or his family, but he knew enough to know that Hayner's dad, like his own dad, wasn't around anymore. Only difference was, if he remembered right, his dad died, Hayner's dad left.

"Right," he said awkwardly. "Well...later wuss." Seifer crawled back into his apartment before he did something embarrassing like apologize. He was already embarrassed enough; being schooled by a nerdy little elementary school twerp was sucky, but feeling bad about it was even worse. It wasn't until much later, sidestepping an overflowing bin of empty wine bottles as he crept back to his room in the dark, that Seifer realized that the little brat had taken his damn rope.

He never quite managed to figure out if Hayner's steady interruptions were intentional or not. Sometimes he figured they must be; how was it statistically possible that Hayner, who generally avoided approaching Seifer like the plague, especially once they hit high school, just so happened to strike up a conversation with the older blond every single time he was thinking about trying to off himself? Then again, how could he possibly know? His timing was uncanny, he'd never once missed a single attempt, a single plan. Sometimes they were shamefully obvious, the incident with the noose was in broad daylight, hard to miss that one, but sometimes there was just no way Hayner could have known.

When he was sixteen, for example. His mom was, by now, spending most of her nights in a drunken stupor, so Seifer really was, for all intents and purposes, home alone the night that he decided to drag a kitchen knife across his wrist. He had even thought this one through a little bit; he would do it in the kitchen, and not just an obvious line down his forearm but starting across the palm of his hand, making it look at least a little bit like he'd had an accident. Just in case Mom ever woke up from wherever it was her head was at; he didn't want her to think her only son had killed himself on purpose.

He was just about to pick up the knife, shining temptingly on the counter he'd cleaned vigorously just for the occasion, when someone knocked on the door. Seifer was going to ignore it too, really had every intention of just pretending no one was home, until his mother started yelling from the other room.

"No one's home!" she slurred. "Useless mother of a useless son. Bunch of nobodies. Nobody's home."

Seifer scrambled for the door, yanking it open before whoever it was could knock again. Hayner stood there in all his fourteen-year-old glory, all gangly limbs and hands and feet like a damn puppy, stumbling all over himself. His cheeks were red under a perfunctory smattering of pimples, whether from sympathy or embarrassment Seifer sure as hell didn't want to find out.

"You're never going to believe this," Hayner muttered, rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly with one hand, holding up a chipped mug with the other,"but do you have any sugar?"

Seifer gaped at the awkward teen shuffling nervously in his doorway. He'd been interrupted at midnight by his lame-ass neighbor for the most cliched excuse in the book?'Can I borrow a cup of sugar?' That couldn't possibly be real. Forget his own wrists, Seifer was going to slit Hayner's damn throat.

"I just – " Hayner cut in quickly, before Seifer could push the words out or slam the door in his face. "Mom's out again. I just wanted to wait until she got home, you know? But I'm falling asleep, so I thought I'd make coffee. There's no sugar though...and it's just...ugh."

Seifer's gape turned rapidly into a glare. Hayner had played the mother card. It was the only thing he could have said to stop the older boy from closing the door, instead pulling the cheap wood back further to let Hayner step into his apartment. He didn't like the younger boy, they hadn't quite reached future levels of antagonism yet but that didn't mean he likedthe kid, but he could empathize on the mother situation. Hayner's mom was dealing with a different loss than his was, and they were handling it in different ways, but his room shared a wall with Hayner's mom's room. He heard plenty enough to know what was going on in Hayner's apartment at night.

"Were you cooking something? Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt." Hayner winced, gesturing with the hand still curled around a coffee mug at the knife on Seifer's counter. The older blond glanced quickly at it; he hadn't even realized that he'd left the knife on top of the cutting board, a bowl of overly-ripe fruit right behind it.

"Oh, uh..." he wasn't prepared for this, didn't know how to answer the freshman beyond pulling the container of sugar out of the cabinet next to the fridge and grudgingly handing it over. Seifer watched with raised eyebrows as Hayner added no less than six spoonfuls into his still-steaming mug.

"I should learn how to cook," the shorter boy said after a grateful sip of coffee. "Or at least start stocking up on microwave stuff. Burnt dinner again tonight...it tasted like crap."

Seifer ground his teeth together, willing himself not to say it. Oh god, he could feel it, the words creeping up the back of his throat and climbing towards his tongue, threatening to overflow right past his lips. No, no, no, he had a plan. He needed to get Hayner the hell out of there as soon as possible, he had things to do.

"I think we have a frozen pizza in the fridge," he muttered through gritted teeth. Dammit. Seifer groaned internally at the way Hayner's eyes lit up, fighting the urge to look at the knife still gleaming temptingly on the countertop. Ugh. He didn't even like the damn kid. "Come on, Chickenwuss, lets learn how to use the oven."

Somewhere over the course of the evening the knife was misplaced. Seifer strongly suspected Hayner, still did, even though he couldn't even begin to figure how the younger boy might have realized what was going on. How was it possible that Hayner could know when Seifer had reached that limit again, when he finally crossed the line from sticking it out to needing to end it? It had to be a coincidence, but how could it be when Hayner never, ever failed to interrupt any of Seifer's attempts?

Like this one time, when Seifer was eighteen. Mom had died too by then, leaving Seifer alone in an apartment he couldn't afford full of empty liquor bottles and rooms full of crap. He'd been cleaning out his dad's old stuff, years and years after he'd been killed while on duty with the Twilight Town Police Department, when he found the gun. He'd never considered a gun before, way too messy, Mom probably would have just bitched about the fact that he'd left her to clean it all up on her own, but Mom was dead.

At first he thought the pounding sound echoing through his apartment was his own heartbeat resounding in his ears. Didn't even notice it, really, until the yelling started. Muffled shouting accompanied the banging that, Seifer realized belatedly, was coming from the front door.

"Ma!" someone was shouting, knocking hard enough to rattle the door in its frame. "Ma, come on, open the fucking door."

Seifer didn't even remember to put the gun down, yanking the front door open with a fierce scowl. Hayner, who the fuck else, stood with one fist still raised, using the other arm to prop himself up against the doorframe.

"Whoa," Hayner blinked at him, rocking back on his heels. "Dude, what? Don't tell me you're fucking banging my mom or something."

"Ew, what?" Seifer blurted out, completely taken aback. Why was Hayner looking at him like that, like he couldn't understand where Seifer had come from? Who had he expected, Mickey Mouse?

"Why you in my apartment?" Hayner slurred. Slurred. Oh god, the lamer was drunk. Drunk. He was like, sixteen, for crissake.

"Lamer," Seifer said slowly, "this is my apartment. Yours has a big number seven on it, remember? Not a fucking fi – oh shit."

Hayner swayed on the spot, looking dangerously unbalanced as he leaned forward. Seifer reached forward instinctively, catching the younger teen by his arm, butt of the gun pressed against Hayner's bicep. The smaller blond looked up at him through hazy brown eyes, squinting slightly between Seifer's face and the door behind him.

"Word. Sorry, sorry." He mumbled, stumbling to get his feet back under him again. It was a pretty useless attempt. Seifer's grip on the smaller blond tightened.

"You must be drunk," he mumbled, more to himself than to Hayner. "Don't think I've heard you say sorry in years."

"Not drunk," Hayner said crossly. "Just havin a little fun with Rox." He hiccuped very convincingly, looking sheepishly at the older guy. Seifer did notwhat to know what kind of fun Hayner got up to with Roxas, nor did he ever, ever want to examine the flare of jealousy the thought sparked in his gut. "Now I just...bed...which one's mine again?"

Seifer sucked air through his gritted teeth, hauling the door closed behind him as he jerked Hayner around, steering the smaller boy towards the correct apartment. He didn't bother knocking, didn't bother asking either, just stuck his gun in his waistband and reached his now free hand into Hayner's pockets, searching for a key. He ignored Hayner's noise of surprise as he pulled the key ring out triumphantly, shoving them at random into the lock until he felt the telltale catch.

Hayner's mom wasn't anywhere to be seen, nor, from the sound of it, was she home. Seifer dragged the stumbling blond down a hallway that was the mirror image of his own apartment, shoving him towards the door with a large Struggle poster hanging on it. Hayner almost went flying over the threshold, saved only by the large hand still wrapped around his upper arm.

"You're too young to drink, Chickenwuss. Don't start now," Seifer scolded, nudging Hayner towards his bed. The younger teen fell face-first onto the messy pile of blankets, sighing contentedly as he curled his arms around his pillow.

"Hey Seifer?" Hayner's voice was muffled, slur even more pronounced. Seifer turned back from the doorway, eyes scanning over the pictures taped over the loser's desk. They were all of Hayner and his lamer friends, the chick and her boyfriend, Roxas and some redheaded freak, the little blond girl.

"What?" Seifer leaned forward. There was one picture that seemed out of place, older, yellowed slightly by age. It showed two boys, much, much younger than they were now, sitting side by side at a picnic table Seifer recognized as the one in the courtyard behind their apartment building. The smaller one, big brown doe-eyes glancing up at the camera, held a messy pile of glue-covered popsicle sticks towards the bigger one. Seifer, the younger version, was leaning across the table for a bottle of glue, no doubt hell-bent on fixing the monstrosity of a craft a dejected-looking Hayner was holding out to him.

"Don't use your dad's gun. He wouldn't want that."

Seifer rocked back on his heels. He didn't say anything for a minute, and neither did Hayner. He figured the lightweight had probably passed out; he wouldn't ask him about the gun, and he definitely wouldn't ask about the picture.

"Night, Lamer."

"See you tomorrow?"

Seifer paused in the doorway, not turning around. He really didn't think Hayner was awake, and he could feel the weight of the gun in his pocket and the other blond's words bouncing around in his head, and he couldn't find a way to deny it.

"Yeah."

"Hey, we told you to stay out of here, you know?"

Seifer all but rolled his eyes, lifting his head from where he'd been lounging on a large overturned create. Rai, as he had suspected, was addressing Hayner and his crew. Hayner himself stood in the front with his arms crossed over his chest, eyes narrowing at Seifer even though Rai had been the one to speak. Roxas, in his typical, hot-headed fashion, already had his mouth open to fire back, even with his redheaded watchdog hovering next to him with a sadistic gleam in his green eyes.

"It's not yours," Roxas snapped hotly, glaring at the larger man.

"We're just trying to get to the tram," Olette said gently, laying one hand on Roxas' arm. Her other hand was tangled loosely with Pence's fingers, hanging between them like a dead fish. Seifer actually did roll his eyes this time, thudding his head back down on the wooden box and closing his eyes. He missed the way Hayner frowned at him.

"Leave them," Fuu suggested, looking pointedly at her own boyfriend. Rai glanced back at Seifer, waiting some indication of what their leader expected from them. Seifer, eyed still closed, didn't notice.
"Get out of here, Lamers," he called tiredly, rubbing one hand over the bridge of his nose. He was sick of this; tired of playing stupid games with the twerps. He was twenty years old, for fuck's sake, he should have better things to do with his life than antagonize children.

No one protested. At least, they didn't out loud, and Seifer didn't open his eyes to check. He heard, rather than saw, the larger group troop by, veering dangerously close to the crate the older blond was still sprawled on as they headed down the alleyway behind him. Only one came close enough to brush against Seifer's crate, leaning in just long enough to hiss quiet words in Seifer's ear.

"You're slipping again. Don't do anything stupid."

Seifer jumped up, fingers closing around Hayner's throat before he had even fully opened his eyes. By the time Seifer was completely aware of his movements he had slammed the younger boy up against the alley wall, one hand wrapped around smooth, tan skin, body flush up against the shorter blond.

No one made a sound. No one moved. Only Hayner and Seifer even seemed to be breathing, both of them with their chests heaving at the sudden, unexpected move. Hayner stared up at the older man with wide brown eyes, something that resembled a smirk lingering in the upturned corners of his lips.

"Not now, dear," Hayner chided. Seifer could feel each exhalation ghost across his skin, the vibrating vocal chords against his fingers still curled around Hayner's neck. The younger teen stretched up as much as he could, bringing his face even closer to Seifer's. "The children are watching."

Seifer dropped his hand as though he'd been burned, stumbling back away from Hayner. The younger blond was smirking outright now, fingers running absently over the reddened skin on his neck as he studied the taller man. Seifer didn't wait around to see what Hayner, or any of their stupefied friends, would say; for the first time he could remember, he turned on his heel and stopped just short of running away.

Despite his initial reaction, Seifer actually tried to avoid doing 'something stupid.' He did. Not because he gave a rat's rear end about what Hayner thought; he definitely didn't give a shit about the lamer's opinion. But still, to have someone point it out to him in advance...it was infuriating, to be so predictable. He held out as long as he could, determined to prove Hayner wrong, but they both knew he wouldn't make it.

Waiting probably made it worse, actually. Fighting against that itch, that need to do something, letting that itch slowly fester until it built into a fire burning through him. Waiting gave him a chance to plan, a chance to reallythink it through this time, planning every little detail. He found the tallest building in Twilight Town, and then made sure he could gain access to the roof. He found an acquaintance with some even shader acquaintances and, in turn, acquainted himself with a bottle of gin and a bottle of pills, just in case. He even found a suit. He'd never bought a suit before in his life...but he figured if he was going to meet God he wanted to look nice.

The most important thing he did, though, was make absolutely certain that Hayner was going to be occupied. He'd given Rai and Fuu very explicit instructions; find Hayner and detain him at all costs. He didn't give them specifics as to why, exactly. Just told them that he had something he needed to do and Hayner had an infuriating habit of being a nosy neighbor and getting in the way.

It was a month before he found himself sitting on yet another parapet, significantly better dressed than he had been the last time (and, though he stubbornly refused to admit it, in a much more aerodynamic coat than his previous wardrobe choice), dress shoes dangling over the edge of the back side of the Clock Tower. A half-empty bottle of gin dangled precariously from three fingers on his right hand; those on his left were curled around the little orange bottle safely stored in his jacket pocket.

"You're a fucking idiot, you know that?"

The bottle slipped from Seifer's hand, dropping heavily through all thirteen stories between the roof and the ground. Seifer didn't notice the sound of glass shattering against cobblestone; he was far too busy staring unblinkingly at the scowling figure standing behind him.

"How the hell..."

"Fucking. Idiot." Hayner reiterated. "Sending Rai and Fuu after us? In all the years I've known them they've never oncecome looking for us, especially without you. You might as well have sent me an engraved note, 'Dear Lamer, about to try offing myself again, best of luck trying to find me before I get that far.' And really, the Clock Tower? Could you have picked a more cliché place for a suicide?"

"No one asked you to stick your nose in where it doesn't belong, asshat," Seifer snapped.

"Where it doesn't...Seifer, how many times do I have to stop you before you get it?" Hayner was actually shouting at him, and it was maybe the first time that the older blond had really seen him truly angry. Irritated, sure, frustrated, all the time, but really, genuinely angry like he was now? Seifer had never seen anything like it, the way Hayner's eyes blazed at him as the younger teen spit words into the air between them. "I'm always going to be here to catch you in the act. You really want to die, you're going to have to do it in front of me, and you're probably going to have to kill me first, because I will never stop trying to stop you."

"WHY?" Seifer yelled just as loudly as the younger blond, but where Hayner was angry and forceful, Seifer was bitter and maybe just a little bit desperate. He turned away from Hayner before he could see the other teen's reaction, glancing down over the ledge to check on the shattered remains of the gin bottle.

Hayner didn't answer right away. Seifer knew he was still there, could still feel him standing there, far enough away that he was out of reach but close enough that the older man could still hear his slow breathing, but he didn't say anything. They waited in silence, waiting for the right words to come or for Seifer to grow impatient, neither sure which outcome would happen first.

"Do you really not know?" Hayner asked finally.

It was Seifer's turn to stay quiet. If he thought about it, really thought about it, in a way that he had never allowed himself to before, he probably could hazard a guess. If he really, really thought about it, it no doubt was the same reason Hayner was always so much more successful at stopping Seifer than Seifer was at his own attempts.

"I'll make a deal with you," Hayner said slowly after a minute or two of Seifer's silence. Any trace of previous anger in his voice was gone, replaced with an uncharacteristically quiet seriousness. "If it really doesn't mean anything to you, okay. I won't leave, but I won't stop you either. But," Seifer heard him take a step forward, closing the distance between them just slightly, "if you come back here, if you walk away, I'll tell you."

The longest silence yet stretched between them. Neither of them moved, Seifer staring unseeingly at the ground dozens and dozens of feet beneath him, Hayner watching him as though trying to pin the older boy in place with just the force of his stare alone. Seifer, if he was honest with himself, knew what Hayner was offering him, and knew what would be expected of him in return. While he was still being honest he knew that the question wasn't whether or not he could accept Hayner's explanation. He knew he could accept it, knew there had always been some part of him that had always known it. The question was, of course, whether or not he was ready for it.

Seifer moved slowly, hitching first one leg over the ledge, then the next, shifting until both feet were planted firmly on the solid rooftop. Hayner watched him without a word, keeping his distance as the older blond pushed himself to his feet unsteadily. Seifer hadn't moved from the parapet since he'd opened the lost bottle of gin; he hadn't realized how unstable he was on his legs until he was upright and rapidly losing control of his balance.

Lightning fast hands reached out and grabbed him by the lapels of his jacket, tugging him further away from the dangerous edge. Hayner backed them up until they were nearly against the clock itself, white knuckles betraying his otherwise calm exterior. Seifer made no attempt to loosen the younger teen's grip; as much as he was loathe to admit it, it felt good to have someone holding on to him like that, anchoring him in the here and the now for the first time in as long as he could remember. He reached into his pocket again, slowly withdrawing the orange bottle of pills and flicking off the lid, tilting the bottle until large white pills rained down around their feet.

Hayner yanked Seifer forward the remaining distance between them, pulling the taller man flush up against him. Seifer dropped the empty pill bottle, using his now-free hands to grab Hayner's hips, holding the eighteen-year-old steady as the shorter blond leaned up on the balls of his feet and pressed his lips firmly against Seifer's.

For two aggressive, dominating boys the kiss was a far cry from the assault it could have been. It was almost innocent, chaste, a careful brush of lip against lip, the barest hint of the soft slide of tongue. Hayner pulled back first, lowering himself back down onto his heels.

"I just can't really imagine life without you in it," he admittedly carefully, not looking at Seifer. "Whether that's a good thing or not, or whether it's reciprocated or not, I"m not really sure."

"Let me know when you figure it out," Seifer suggested. "I'm not going anywhere."

Hayner, for the first time Seifer could ever remember seeing, grinned.