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Chapter Text

14 December, 1969

If you would have asked Todd Anderson nine years and three hundred and sixty-four days ago where he would be in ten years, hiding alone in his bedroom is not what he would have answered.

Nine years and three hundred and sixty-four days ago he had a newfound confidence given to him by the Dead Poets Society and his dear friend, Neil Perry. He would have said that he’d be living lavishly in a big city. He would be a successful English professor, sought out by hundreds of exorbitant schools. While teaching, he would change the lives of many. Just like his own professor, John Keating.

However, nine years and three hundred and sixty-four days have not been kind. Todd has a teaching job at a normal high school and he, at the very least, lives outside of a big city. But there is someone missing that he would have never accounted for being missed all those years ago. Tomorrow is the ten year anniversary of the death of Neil Perry. Though Todd had still planned on his successes after this event, there was only so much therapy and swearing over and over again to your friends that you had moved on could do.

And Todd Anderson is hiding alone in his bedroom. The lights are shut off and, for lack of a better word, it is hot. It is three in the afternoon, eleven days before Christmas, but sweat has beaded up behind Todd’s neck. It drips, drips down, begging Todd to open the poor window less than a foot from his bed. Despite this, Todd keeps his comforter wrapped around his body and buries his face into his uncased pillow.

Hours tick by and sweat continues to pool under him. It’s six o’clock that evening when Todd finally decides he can no longer take the nagging from his own conscience. He opens his eyes, which are bloodshot, and tries to sit up. By the time he can do so, the window has already been opened by someone else. Charlie Dalton.

“W-When...how long…” Todd has to clear his throat, voice not at all warmed up from a day absent of speaking, “how long have you been in here?”

“Two seconds,” Charlie rolls his eyes. Once the window is opened, he leans against Todd’s wall, arms crossed with interest over his chest. “Air conditioning’s been out. I thought I would come check on you.”

It wasn’t uncommon for Charlie to come in unannounced to check on Todd. It was a habit that was formed years ago when he and Charlie started living together.

Yes, they live together. And they have been ever since their graduation from Welton Academy. It’s a spectacularly small apartment, their two bedroom, in the suburbs of New York City. The space has seen them through to their college graduations, the beginnings of their careers, and now it would see them through the ten year anniversary.  At this rate, Todd thinks it might see them through to their own deaths, too.

Along with seeing them through, this apartment is where Charlie and Todd can pretend that everything is okay. They can pretend they’re living the lives they always wanted. One where food is always on the table and the water pressure is decent. People always visit. The simple needs, really. 

When Todd’s parents bother to call him on the first of every month, he’ll keep up the act of acting like that is the case. He’ll tell them that everything has gone according to plan. His English degree was not a waste and being a teacher has filled his life with meaning. The pay doesn’t matter, but he has more than he needs. That’s what he says.

His parents don’t know and they don’t need to know the truth. They don’t have to know that Todd will talk a bit louder every time his stomach starts to growl or whenever Charlie yells from the living room that the water shut off again. They don’t need to know that money continues to get scarcer, depleting from Todd’s wallet faster than he can keep up. His teaching job is nothing more than exactly that. He isn’t inspiring or changing people and, some months, Charlie’s bank job is the only thing that keeps them afloat. No, they don’t need to know that.

And they don’t need to know that Todd is hiding alone in his bedroom nine years and three hundred and sixty-four days after the death of Neil Perry.

Todd always ends the call before they can know anything like that.

“Todd?”

Oh. Charlie is still in his room.

“Huh? Yeah?” His eyes fall onto Charlie’s face, which seems to be in much better shape than Todd’s own, but not by much. There’s dark circles under his eyes that are very telling in knowing how much sleep Charlie has been getting these days. His hair, nearly long enough to cover those circles, has not been combed, but Todd almost wants to applaud him because he can tell that it’s been washed. 

Todd revisits Charlie’s hands, which are slightly hidden in the way Charlie keeps his arms crossed. Todd can still see the scar on the fingers of his right hand, which connects into a clean line when he forms a fist. Charlie had punched a window the day Neil left and Todd supposes he’s remembering that now, too. He stands up straight and hides his hand behind his back.

“You all right? You haven’t left your room once today.” Charlie accuses him and it feels mean because obviously he isn’t doing okay. But it isn’t mean, is it? Not really. Charlie really is only checking on him and, no matter how many showers he takes, he feels the same way too. 

The difference is that Charlie can hide it, how he feels. He can go to work and fake it. He isn’t good at being alone, at finding comfort in sadness. Todd can’t go to work and he can’t fake it. But, he can be alone. There’s positives and negatives to both of these, both Charlie and Todd. It’s why they live together. Charlies takes care of Todd. He opens the windows Todd can’t bring himself to. Todd takes care of Charlie. He stays in the apartment and Charlie can always find him for company. Because Charlie can’t be alone. Not this week, not today, and not tomorrow.

Todd tugs his blanket off of himself. Both he and Charlie catch how he sighs audibly in relief when he allows the cold air from the outside to fully hit him.

“You know...You know the answer.” Todd eventually replies, pointing out the fact. He, again, has to clear his throat. This embarrasses him because there’s far less bite to your words when they have to push their way past the tightness of your windpipe. In an attempt to ignore it and focus on something else, Todd slips a hand into his short hair, kept mostly shaven over the past decade. He keeps it shaved as, when money is tight and the sadness takes over, his hair is the only thing he can control. No matter what. “I’m fine, Charlie. I am, I promise.”

“Pfft. Sure.” Charlie responds, voice rough and coming out from somewhere deep in the back of his throat. “You’re fine and that’s why you haven’t-”

“Left my room once today, I know.” Todd finishes the sentence for him and, for a long while, he cannot bring himself to say anything else. He starts to pick at the hangnail that protrudes from the ring finger on his left hand. When it begins to bleed, he speaks again. “I’m really tired.”

Charlie bites his bottom lip harshly and steps closer to Todd’s bed. “Listen, Todd…”

“I took the last few days of the semester off.” Todd, with urgency, explains himself before Charlie has any chance to berate him. “There’s a substitute. And I’m still getting paid, so don’t worry about my part of the rent or anything. I’ll get it to you.” Todd shifts uncomfortably in his bed and a loud creaking is heard.

“You can’t really think I’m going to ask you about rent right now, right?’ Charlies huffs like he’s annoyed, but there’s a gentle smile that curls the corners of his mouth up.

“You’re not…?” Todd, face now red with more than just what he assumes might be the edge of heat stroke, grabs his blanket and pulls it up to his chin to hide. 

“I’m not.” Charlie attests. “Like I said, there’s no air conditioning. I’m checking on you. It’s a difficult time of year.” 

Charlie mutters the last sentence out and shifts his gaze down to Todd’s bedsheets. The light pouring in from the window does little to compliment them. The once white sheets have an obvious yellowing to them, stained from years of neglect. There’s a corner of his mattress that becomes more and more bare with each of Todd’s movements, the sheet peeling away from it. There’s also a stench to the room that Charlie wants to believe is the natural smell of the aging apartment. But he knows that Todd hasn’t changed in days.

“I know,” Todd just about rolled his eyes, but decided it wasn’t a good time. “I know it’s a difficult time of year.

Charlie curses under his breath, like Todd has just bared some deep, indescribable wound to him. In a way, he had. When Charlie looks up at him, Todd has lied back down and hidden his face again. It’s unlikely Charlie will see him rise for the rest of the day. 

That’s fine. He’ll give Todd the rest he needs. There’s always tomorrow. 

He steps away from his place in front of Todd’s bed and heads for the door. “Eat when you can, okay?” He says, not unlike an order.

“Hm?”

“There’s a plate for you on your desk. Eat when you can.” Charlie repeats in a softer tone of voice, shutting Todd’s door with a final sounding click.

“A...huh?” Todd throws the sheets away from his face, curious as to what Charlie could have left for him. Surely, across the room and sitting on the center of his desk is a dish holding buttered toast and a bundle of purple grapes. A half-full glass of water is next to it.

Todd scowls, knowing well that Charlie had placed the food there because he knows Todd will have to get up to get it. That’s something else about Todd: he can go days without eating if he distracts himself long enough but if a plate full of food is in the room, he has to have it.

With a loud groan, Todd pulls himself back up, setting his feet on the floor. Slowly, he stands, struggling to balance with a body that hasn’t moved in hours. He treks to his desk and slumps down in the wooden chair. Protective over the meal now, Todd hunches over the plate and lifts a piece of bread to his lips. More animalistic than he intends, he rips off a chunk with his teeth, chews, and swallows.

It’s only out of appreciation for Charlie that he eats. It’s for Charlie and not the painful rumbling in his belly that yells ‘ food, please,’ . 

Once the bread is gone and the ache has faded, Todd slowly pops grapes into his mouth. He lets them sit on his tongue before crushing them between his molars. The juice delightfully spills into the back of his throat. The plate is eventually cleared and Todd sees a warped image of himself in the glass, staring back at him.This plate is one his mother had given him some Christmas after he received his degree. 

‘For you and the future Mrs.’ His father had said. 

‘It’s a fine glass, Todd, my mother gave me a plate just like it once.’ His mother had squealed in delight.

He thinks, Todd does, that he wouldn’t mind if it broke. He could accidentally drop it. He could tell his mother it was an accident if she ever asked.

He doesn’t. Instead, Todd takes a deep breath, placing his finger on the plate and moving the tip along the glass. He presses the now coated finger on his tongue and licks off all the leftover crumbs and butter. Then, he licks the flavor off of his lips. And he guzzles down the glass of water.

Todd doesn’t know when he starts crying, only that the plate now has droplets of water hitting it. He wipes his eyes, palming at them in desperation to get the wetness away. He hates crying, hates how puffy his face looks after and how he feels much like a toddler when he does. It’s not a fair thing, crying. He wishes he was a toddler then. There’s no point in crying as an adult when you’re not even allowed to fall on the floor and beat your fists against it like a toddler gets to. 

As Todd cries, the world is very quiet and he feels very alone. There’s a cricket singing somewhere in one of the shadowy corners of his bedroom and, for some reason, the thought that he’ll never find it makes him cry harder. Could Neil have felt like that cricket? Like he had to hide, like people, like things like him could only ever live in the dark?

His crying ceases and he thinks that, maybe, crickets don’t think as deep as humans do. Neil was a lot bigger and a lot better than a cricket.

At some point. Todd does make it back into his bed. He falls asleep on his stained sheets, under his old comforter, on a pillow with no case. It sounds rather meaningless, but things always sound like a lot less when they’re described exactly as they are.

He dreams of bigger things. Of a life where the sky is a lot more blue than cities have to offer. Of a world where there’s rivers to swim in and caves to take refuge in. Of a place where Neil is. 

It takes no time at all for Todd, the part of him that is aware that he’s dreaming, to realize he is dreaming of Welton Academy. A place he never thought he could be comforted by, now acts as a setting in his dreams. What all that means, he’ll never be able to say out loud.

Around five that next morning, on the ten year anniversary, Todd wakes up with dry eyes and an even drier throat. He wants nothing more now than another glass of water. Eyes still closed, Todd gets up and rests his feet against his bedroom floor. When he does this, there is an extreme wave of deja vu that washes over him; a sudden feeling that his feet have touched this floor before when he was much younger and much less wise.

He shakes the thought out of his head because of course he’s been here before. He lives here and has for years. 

But Todd opens his eyes and nearly jumps out of his skin at what he sees. This is not the bedroom he fell asleep in the night before. This place is familiar but not where he was. He shuts his eyes and tells himself he’s simply still dreaming. However, the bedroom does not change when he opens his eyes again.

“What the…” Todd shakily says, afraid because this is the bedroom he grew up in. He looks around and immediately remembers he had a map of the world above his bed for the first sixteen years of his life. There’s a desk right next to his bed instead of across the room like he has in his apartment with Charlie. And his pillow has a case on it.

“Oh, my God. Oh, my God…” Todd cries, his voice coming out gentle and much higher than he remembered it sounding. Like he sounded when he was a teenager. 

He’s about to touch his head, just to check if he has the hair to match his teenage self when there’s a knock on his door.

“Todd?”

He doesn’t know if it’s a good idea to answer, but he does anyway, without thinking. Like he’s supposed to answer. “Yes?’

“Come eat breakfast, honey, we have to leave soon.” The door opens and Todd is met with his mother, about ten years younger than he remembers her looking. 

“Leave? Wha-Wha-What do you mean?” Todd can’t stop the words from coming out of his mouth. “We’re going somewhere?” 

“Todd!” His mother shakes her head, “pretending you don’t know what day it is won’t get you out of school. Now, come eat. You don’t want to be late for the opening ceremony. Welton Academy is not the place for tardy students.”

Chapter Text

30 August, 1959

“Todd!” His mother shakes her head, “pretending you don’t know what day it is won’t get you out of school. Now, come eat. You don’t want us to be late for the opening ceremony. Welton Academy is not the place for tardy students.”

‘It’s a dream. It has to be a dream.’ Todd thinks to himself, a shiver of familiarity crawling up his spine.

“Be downstairs in the next two minutes,” she smiles warmly at him, “All right, honey?” She pushes a strand of her short blonde hair behind her ear.

“Uh, um, yeah!” Todd nods in urgency because, even if this is a dream, he won’t dare let his mother see the evident fear in his eyes. “I’ll be right there.”

“Two minutes,” she repeats and kindly shuts his door. Todd listens carefully to the clicking of her heels against the hardwood floor of the Anderson home. When he can no longer hear the clicking, when it’s silent, he does what anyone would do the moment they believed that they were dreaming something that felt all too real: he pinches himself. He pinches and pinches until there is a large group of angry red nail indents staring at him. The marks bounce off of his skin and he stares back, eyes squinting long enough for the damage to disappear.

Then, Todd raises his hand to his scalp and touches it like he had meant to just before his mother had interrupted. It’s covered, his scalp, in thick layers of hair. Hair that Todd has not felt since he was in high school. He jumps onto his feet and practically sprints (and almost makes it without tripping) to what he recognizes as his old bathroom; a small room thankfully connected by another door in his bedroom.

Now, he stands at his sink, meeting his own eyes in the mirror- the one he once spent every morning staring into for an abundance of his formative years. There he is.

Todd Anderson at sixteen years old.

He’s sixteen and the pinching didn’t work and he can clearly see himself in the mirror. He’s here and he’s real. And he’s sixteen.

“Oh, God…”

Todd can’t stop the bubbling in his stomach that rises up his throat in a thick bile. He spins on his heels and falls to his knees, heaving into the open toilet. Retching, face hot and nose running, tears start to well up in his eyes. He can’t tell if he’s crying because of the forceful hurling or because he’s so scared. Probably both. 

When the vomiting stops, a long whine escapes him. Even though he is alone, this embarrasses him enough to shut his mouth and stand back up.

“Okay,” Todd breathes, knuckles turning white with how hard he clenches his fists. He tugs the hand towel by his sink off the hook and wipes his mouth. “Okay, Todd, okay, focus,” he begs himself, leaning close to his reflection and wagging his finger. His face is red, blotchy, puffy as a result of the vomit and the tears. Slowly, he lowers his hand and looks into his eyes again. There’s an eyelash out of place on his left eye. Somehow, this small, fixable issue feels like the worst part.

His breath causes a slight fog to form on his mirror. He draws a smiling face in it and this causes him to chuckle. This is the first step, isn’t it? Acceptance? 

He can’t help but be impressed with what his younger self looks like the longer he looks in the mirror. Not that he thought he was particularly handsome or anything truly special, but he likes that the bags under his eyes aren’t as prominent as they are when he’s twenty-seven. The city hasn’t had the chance to age him yet. Todd looks down at his hands, undamaged with perfectly trimmed nails. He raises them and awkwardly contorts and tugs at his features with his fingertips.

Five minutes of this pass before Todd decides that it is safe for him to leave his bathroom. Before he can, however, he catches sight of the clothing his mother has hung upon a hook screwed into his bathroom door. If he didn’t remember how itchy the fabric was, he might have missed the clothing completely. There, hanging, is that poor brown suit and white button-up that his mother had ironed and had cleaned specially for that day. Todd laughs at this for two reasons:

One, he always hated that suit. Two, he’s lucky now if his clothes have even been washed. 

Now.

It’s weird, thinking that the now that Todd thinks of is technically a long ten years and maybe four months from, well, now. Despite everything telling him not to, despite everything telling him to crawl back into bed and fall asleep, he pulls on that white button-up and fastens a belt into the loops of his fitted slacks. When he slides his arms into the coat jacket, it becomes clear to Todd that waking up on his day was nothing more than a prank by God. Or maybe Charlie. It was something peculiar entirely and Todd wasn’t going to live through this that easily.

All of this.

He does throw up again. This time, he sits on his knees for much longer than before and actually lets the tears fall. His pant legs become covered with dirt and hair and no amount of wiping it away with his hands can rid of the newly formed wrinkles in the fabric. Todd doesn’t care. He once more wipes the residue from his mouth and, eventually, walks downstairs.

--

He makes it through the rest of the morning without incident. His mother seems to have forgotten when he walks downstairs that he was meant to be at the table in two minutes, not fifteen. She squeals in pleased excitement when she sees Todd and calls him handsome. Todd thanks her, stuttering more than he means to because something about talking to her like this feels so foreign. 

Todd supposes it feels foreign because he’s sixteen again and he needs his mother. He still needs her and he’s allowed to still need her. Not like how it feels when he’s twenty-seven. When he’s twenty-seven, he’s too afraid to need her. He doesn’t want to need her. Thinking about this, in their kitchen, makes his sickness start again. He swallows it down.

His father also says that he looks nice, but he isn’t actually looking at Todd when he says so. This doesn’t bother Todd because his father never had to look at him to know the important things, to be proud of him.

And one of the most important things to note about Todd, in his parents eyes, is that he isn’t his brother Jeffrey.

Jeffrey, who was a renowned scholar and a Welton alumni. Jeffrey, whose parents have never been disappointed in him a day in his life. Jeffrey, who is half-way across the country studying at some elite university that, even with his own Welton credentials under his belt, Todd could never get into. Not that he ever wanted to.

His father knows this. So, he doesn’t have to look at him. 

---

The Anderson’s are in their car and on their way to the Welton campus not long after their short-lived family meal. Todd has a single suitcase filled to the brim with clothes and what his parents would jokingly deem as the nonessential essentials; toothpaste, soap, hairbrush, etc. It’s Todd’s backpack that his parents have packed what they consider the true essential of a future respected scholar. In his bag, carefully packed, are extra notebooks and pens, items from a deskset generously gifted by his parents nearly a year ago. Todd has to constrain himself to not throw that out of the window of their vehicle. 

But only for one reason.

“We’re here, we’re here!” Todd’s mother, near screaming, holds her hands in fists at her collarbones and shakes them as she cheers. Todd looks out the window and sees the huge Welton campus, looking both castle-like and ‘prison-y.’ The combination was sold most truly by the gorgeous, hand-painted carvings in the Welton window frames and the gray, depressing steel bars welded into them.

His thoughts about the school construction are interrupted by the sudden opening of his side of the car door. His mother urges him out. “C’mon, Todd, let’s get a good seat inside.”

Todd feels his lower lip tremble like he’s grown fearful of what awaits him in this school, like he hasn’t done this before. He peeks his head out and glances around, licking his lips. Ten years and four months ago he only had this chance. Only one chance to be this age, only one chance to meet him. Meet Neil. If he was really going to do this again, he might as well make it worth it.

He steps out of the car, eyes shut tight like he’s awaiting something about to hit him in the chest. Of course, nothing like this happens. But, the atmosphere around him feels a lot heavier than it had in the safety of the automobile. When he opens his eyes, all he can see is his mother looking at him expectantly.

“Well?” She says, “let’s go!”

--

The inside of every building at Welton Academy matches the outside perfectly. Everything is huge and beautiful and gaudy. He and his parents pass many respectable looking families as they make their way to the church on campus. Some are towering over their children and ordering them to behave. Others are wiping tears from their own eyes, promising their children that all will be well. Todd, though he had his own family with him, felt very much alone watching these people speak to theirs. 

Inside the church, Todd has to avert his eyes from anyone he recognizes. He insists to his parents that he must sit in the back of the house in the last row of pews. When the bagpipes start, so does the racing of Todd’s heart. He clutches his chest and leans over himself. His posture immediately straightens when his father tells him through pressed-together teeth to “sit up.”

He can’t look when he knows that Neil, Knox, and Cameron are passing by, holding those banners. He can’t bear to look at them yet, not here. It doesn’t feel right. Fortunately, he can pass off the closed eyes to his father as an appreciation for the music.  The bagpipe screeches out a poor note and makes a humming noise like he enjoys the artistic vision of playing notes different than written.

Then, he sees Nolan and his blood runs a little colder. He looks proud of himself. There’s a cocky smile on his face to prove it. He starts his speech, the one about the four pillars. His father urges him to stand with the other boys when they all repeat the pillars to Nolan.

“I’m...I don’t have a uniform on yet, I don’t think-”

“Todd,” his father says, “it’ll make your mother smile, do it.”

He does. Flooded with the feeling of self-consciousness, Todd is the first of the boys to sit back down. His father was right, though. His mother is smiling like he just performed a solo at a childhood elementary concert. 

Todd smiles, too.

When Nolan introduces John Keating as the new English teacher, his smile falls. He hasn’t seen Mr. Keating in ten years and four months and, when he woke up this morning, he had completely forgotten that doing all of this again included that English class.

“Damn it.” Todd says, much louder than he intended. He freezes and hopes that no one has heard him. The turned heads in his direction tell him otherwise and he quickly gives an apology to those around him.

It might be in his head, but he thinks he can hear muffled laughing coming from the boys holding the banners.

---

His parents leave the second Todd gets his rooming assignment and a properly sized uniform. They give him a polite goodbye, hugging him for no more than three seconds and telling him to get all of his work done on time. He promises them that he will but the twenty-seven year old part of him can’t decide if that’s true. Sure, he’s gone to college and has his degree and is much more intelligent than he was at sixteen the first time. However, he isn’t smarter. 

Whatever. He doesn’t care to worry about that now. All he can do at this moment is keep his head down as he walks to his “future” dorm room. It’s terrifying, more so than any Chemistry homework, to know that any second now, he is going to meet Neil Perry.

He’s almost there. A bell tolls, a door opens behind him, and he knows. 

“Hey! I hear we’re gonna be roommates.”

He can’t turn around to face him but he doesn’t have to. Neil pats his shoulder with the palm of his hand and  it feels like the first time Neil has ever touched him because, in a way, it is. Then, Neil is facing him, looking at him with a grin that feels worse than nostalgic. Todd’s eyes become wet, brimming with tears when Neil says:

“I’m Neil Perry.”

Neil grabs his hand and shakes with a respectable grip, which makes everything more grim. Todd nods, unable to pull his hand away. 

He forgot how tall Neil was. 

He’s only a few inches taller than Todd, but it still feels like much more than Todd remembered. He doesn’t remember Neil’s hair being that dark either or how it seems to float with every tilt and movement of his head. It’s a lot like he’s in space, Todd thinks, the motion of his hair. Like Neil Perry could have taken the place of Neil Armstrong. 

But he can’t say so. Neil doesn’t know who that is.

A tear falls from Todd’s right eye and it’s difficult to tell if it’s because he forgot exactly what Neil looked like or if it’s because Neil doesn’t know they go to space. He finds comfort in the fact that he does remember that Neil has soft brown eyes that are complemented by his arched, elegantly thick eyebrows. And he remembers that grin so full of perfect teeth.

“Todd. Todd. I’m Todd Anderson,” he chokes out, saying it like he’s scared Neil will forget his name.

“Geez,” Neil lets go of his hand out of concern. “You okay? Hearing we would be roommates didn’t make you this upset, right? Or have you already discovered how much worse Welton is than Balincrest?”

Todd tries not to laugh but the upward curve of his lips and exhale of breath expose him. He never questioned how Neil knew that and he wouldn’t now. He wipes his eyes with the back of his hands. “No, no, sorry. Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize,” Neil says and it feels like they’re alone in this walkway, like there aren’t several students pushing past them to get to the door. It’s quiet for a minute and then he says, “it’s hard saying goodbye to parents, huh?”

“Huh?” Todd questions, then realizes what Neil just said. He can’t think of a proper way to answer so he decides on, “I guess. Not really.”

Neil decides not to push and tilts his head toward the direction of the dorms. “Yeah, I don’t think it’s hard either. Let's go find our room?”

“Okay. Yeah, let’s do that,” Todd peels his feet from the floor and starts to walk. Neil walks close to him. 

“So,” Neil wonders, “why’d you leave Balincrest, then?”

“I dunno,” Todd shrugs, “my brother went here. So, I guess I decided to come here, too.”

“Oh so you’re that Anderson.”

Chapter Text

30 August, 1959. Later.

Once their suitcases are in hand and that once-there familiarity with each other begins to blossom, Todd and Neil go on to find their dorm room. It’s easy. Todd remembers exactly where to go, what shortcuts are available, and how to miss the hallway it lies in completely. Because he is able to remember this, he assumes he may be able to find his classrooms as well. His anxiety towards this deplets. 

However, Todd’s natural anxieties towards most other social situations does not fail to show its ugly face. His feet drag more and more against the wood floor with every hit of his suitcase against his thigh. He gives sad, unneeded apologies to anyone he feels he is in the way of and gives tiny waves to those he remembers. He does so, despite them not knowing him yet and, yes, it results in receiving many weirded-out glances and confused waves back.

It might be the overstimulation and it might be his repressed anger or his apparent confusion but Todd has to stop walking. Neil doesn’t mean to not notice this. Todd’s positive that if he had noticed, Neil would apologize ten times over with the practiced politeness his father had taught him to have. Knowing this, Todd can’t be upset that he doesn’t.

He only needs to take a breath. That’s it. But it’s so noisy and that adds to the growing headache that pounds its cruel hello into his skull. He watches Neil smile at everyone that passes him. They don’t look at him funny because they know that they know him. Todd wants to shout “hey! You know me too! You know me!” He doesn’t. 

Neil disappears into their room. A once-known, once-hated Richard Cameron enters Todd’s view and leans into the entryway of the dorm. His wrist balances him by holding his position against the doorframe. He talks into the room, a grin to Neil that makes Todd feel queasy. 

Todd clenches his fist tight around the handle of his suitcase, forces a short, tight breath out, and treads on. Cameron hadn’t done anything yet, but Todd knew he would in four months. Was it fair to hate him already and risk the dynamic they once had? Probably not. Todd could play fair, but he wasn’t going to let Cameron steal his time with Neil now.

Cameron doesn’t notice Todd right away, blocking him from entering his own room. His grin has turned mischievous and he says the words that stung Todd all those years ago. “Hey, I heard you got the new kid. Looks like a stiff!”

In his twenty-seven year old mind, Todd would recall this memory and swear that it no longer bothered him. He was a bit stiff ast sixteen. And it’s not like he ever saw or knew what Cameron went and did after they graduated. He didn’t care and Cameron didn’t matter. But, Todd wasn’t once sixteen, right now he was sixteen. His emotions promised to match this born-again youthfulness. He feels like he could cry, Todd does. But he also wants to punch him.

Todd clears his throat and Cameron turns slightly to face him. His eyes go from suitcase to Todd to suitcase and, using his context clues, he gathers that this is the so-called stiff he was just poking fun at. “Oops.” Cameron says like he’d never mean to hurt Todd at all and hurries away, assumedly to his own room.

Neil’s smiling when Todd sees him. It’s cheerful and committed to kindness. It’s a smile to assure Todd and he knows it. Todd doesn’t indulge him and passes by, not smiling back. Instead, he sets his suitcase on his bed and opens it, busying himself with his belongings.

“Listen, don’t listen to Cameron,” Neil explains, “he was born with his foot in his mouth.” He hits Todd playfully with a bunch of paper he had tucked away in his blazer pocket.

“Must be a big foot.” Todd says, unable to keep the quick-witted thought to himself like he, too, was born like that.

“Ha!” Neil barks out a laugh that doesn’t feel like it’s out of pity or well-mannered behavior. It makes Todd beam.

More figures of students Todd is not supposed to know appear at Neil and Todd’s door: future roommate Charlie Dalton, romantic Knox Overstreet, and intelligent Steven Meeks.

“Rumor has it...you did summer school.” Charlie points at Neil with a shameful finger. There’s a smug look on his face. How young he and all the boys look surprises Todd. Seeing Neil was not shocking in that factor, as his young age was all Todd had ever known. Seeing people he had seen grow and receive degrees and marry become small and unknowing again? It was an unexplainable feeling for Todd, who was now small and knowing.

Neil blows air from his nose pleasedly and takes several steps towards his friends to close the distance. “Yep. Chemistry. My father thought I should get ahead.” He presses his hand into Charlie, shaking it firmly. The explanation plays out much like a business transaction. “How was your summer, Slick ?” The nickname slides sticky out of Neil’s mouth.

The name strikes a chord with the boys and they come farther into the room. The professional, mature demeanors held in front of their parents start to fade. 

“Meeks!” Charlie calls, “door closed.”

“Yes, sir,” he responds, questionable as he obviously had not expected the order. He follows the demand anyway.

Todd’s headache starts to give its goodbyes. He knows exactly what is to happen next and that silliness is enough to make Todd’s entire being want to be present; enjoy the show that was the boys of Welton Academy. They gather around in a circle, Meeks staying put at the door, Charlie on Neils bed, and Knox at Todd’s desk. He doesn’t ask or seem to notice Todd. Neil leans against the window between their beds.

“Gentlemen! What are the four pillars?” Neil waves his hands, counting off and conducting the next words of his friends.

“Travesty! Horror! Decadence! Excrement!” It’s a true song that’s stuck in the boy's head more than the true four pillars of Welton. It’s crude, but Todd still giggles because everything about this whole thing is silly. Here he is, watching his friends at sixteen, friends who don’t think he is a friend yet, and they’re all dressed in itchy suits their parents picked out for them. And they still aren’t as itchy as the uniforms they’ll be made to wear every day going on.

The conversation around him continues and Todd keeps himself occupied unpacking his things. A study group is planned.

Ten years ago, Todd had himself convinced that he couldn’t add anything to their study group. Not immediately. Now, both ten years later and before, Todd is pulling a desk set from his parents out of his suitcase and it hits him that he is going to be given eleven more of these in the future years to come. This desk set was replaceable, the next one was, and the other would be nothing more than repeats of uselessness if Todd didn’t allow it and himself to fly.

He sets the gift carefully on his desk and swears to his nervous conscience that begs him to stay silent, that this would prove to be a good idea. To change the past, he had to start small: the study group.

“I’m really good at English, too.” Todd spits out, glancing at Charlie who moments ago had mentioned that he hadn’t flunked that class. “I know I don’t know anything about the, um, the uh, Welton Academy curriculum, but...I am good. Good at English, I mean.”

No one responds. They only stare at him, which tells Todd they truly hadn’t noticed him before. Even Neil looks shocked, his possible presumptions about Todd and seeing him cry correcting and changing themselves.

‘Should have kept your mouth shut, Anderson,’ Todd thinks, wishing for nothing more than to turn back to his stuff. Could he get a third chance or is that too greedy? He wonders if he could crawl into his bed and hide. Would they notice if he did? Mabe they wouldn’t if Todd stepped back slowly enough and let the bed frame knock him back. Would they ignore him and go back to their conversation? Or back to thinking he didn’t exist? 

Maybe standing still would be better. Maybe he’d disappear that way and they would lose sight of him. Todd was sure he was nothing more than prey at this moment, waiting for the predators before him to strike. Yes. Staying frozen in place was his best bet. That’s exactly what he does.

Neil is the first one to break out of the trance that was noticing Todd. “Oh, yeah!” He says and hurriedly stands from his spot at the window. He pats Todd's shoulder. “Boys, this is Todd Anderson. He’ll be the newest member of our study group.” He sneaks a wink to Todd, forming the narrative with ease that joining the study group was his idea. It visibly excited the boys, who now feel urged to introduce themselves.

Meeks holds out his hand and Todd shakes it. “Sorry about that, my name is Steven Meeks. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you,” Todd shyly smiles, the confidence that burst from him mere seconds ago proving itself, as it always does, to be nothing more than a sudden false act of bravery.

“Charlie Dalton,” Todd hears and turns to see Charlie lying with comfort in Neil’s bed. He looks relaxed, though there’s a tenseness in his raised brow that says otherwise.

Knox counters Charlie’s stillness by reaching forward from Todd’s desk and grabbing Todd’s hand with animated exuberance. “Knox Overstreet.”

“Todd’s brother,” Neil grabs the room’s attention, “is Jeffrey Anderson.” Todd spots Charlie sliding Neil a lit cigarette that he positions with experience between his lips. “Can you believe that?”

“Oh, yeah, sure,” Charlie nods, impressed. “Guy was a valedictorian. National merit scholar. You the next one?” He probes Todd for answers.

“Oh, no-” Todd starts.

“Yeah, well, welcome to Hell-ton.” Meeks says and Todd is hit with a sense of ‘I haven’t heard that in years.’

“It’s every bit as tough as they say. Unless you’re a genius like Meeks.” Charlie points out. Todd feels a lightness in his chest. Charlie hasn’t changed.

“He flatters me,” Meeks scoffs, “Which is why I help him with Latin.”

“Don’t forget English and Trig.”

“How could I?”

Charlie snaps at Neil, who hands him the cigarette. He takes a drag and a coughing fit ensues. It’s no wonder to Todd that he eventually quit.

A sudden knocking sounds against the door. It is not the sound of someone asking to enter, but a warning that someone would. Knox tosses the cigarette to the floor and stomps it out with his polished show.

“It’s open.” Neil says, his relaxed body language forming back into rehearsed straight-back stiffness when his father enters the room. Everyone stands. Todd wishes that he had been sitting. He would stay doing so if that was the case. His blood runs cold but he swears, and would for all time, that no one was more chilling than Mr. Perry.

“Father! I thought you had gone.” Neil’s eyes widen and his voice cracks. He keeps his lips in a tight line, begging the smell of cigarettes on his breath to leave no or hide in the back of his throat. Whatever it takes for his father to never discover it.

If Mr. Perry knows he does not say anything.

“Keep your seats boys,” he says like a man who spent years inside a military school. The boys sit, not daring to raise their gazes to watch. They distract themselves by pretending to fluff pillows and tidy the desks. 

Todd stays standing and watches without care. Mr. Perry moves further into the room.

“Neil, I’ve just spoken to Mr. Nolan,” he begins, one hand hidden away and the other taking off his hat. “I think that you’re taking too many extracurricular activities this semester and I decided that you should drop the school annual.

“But,” Neil attempts an argument that he knows will fail, “I’m the assistant editor this year.”

All, even Meeks, look up when they hear this. They share wandering glances. The same question of whether or not this would be the year Neil stands up to his father goes through their minds.

Todd pretends to check the time.

Mr. Perry apologizes though he isn’t sorry at all.

“But, father, I can’t,” Neil begs, “it wouldn’t be fair.”

That word, fair, sets something off in Mr. Perry. He raises his voice to just under threatening. “Fellas. Would you excuse us?” Each boys nods but, like the knock, no actual permission was needed for Mr. Perry to enter or exit. He leaves. Neil looks around at his friends but they can’t offer him anything. Guilt paints itself on Neil’s face as he walks out, his confidence letting cowardice take the wheel.

Charlie wastes no time on giving his opinion on the whole ordeal, lowering his voice for the convenience of Neil and the wrath of his father. “What is this, the third year in a row that guy shows up and knocks something fun off his schedule?”

“Last year it was Book Club,” Meeks says to Todd. 

“I don’t get it!” Knox sighs, “ he wants Neil to read but only if its about math formulas and dead languages?”

“I’d like to see Perry if he saw Neil lay a finger on Fitzgerald or Wilde.” Charlie adds. 

“Before Book Club, it was Piano.” Knox points out.

“Piano?” Todd has never gotten to hear Neil play piano. He had once promised to do so, but the chance had never occured. “Why?” He knew the reason.

“Thinks careers in music are useless. I mean, there’s not much money in it.” Meeks shrugs, the comment being something he had heard himself before. “At least, not as much money as a doctor would make.” 

“Shh!” Charlie raises his whisper to a grit-teeth grumble. He stands up and tip-toes to the door. Knox and Meeks follow. They hold their fingers to their lips in pantomime together and Neil can be heard saying in perfect-son-stammer, “You know me. Always taking on too much.”

‘Bullshit.’ Charlie mouths and Todd agrees, his mouth forming into a pout.

Mr. Perry leaves and the boys jump on their chance to interrogate their friend. 

“Why doesn’t he let you do what you want?” Charlie asks.

“Yeah, tell him off, Neil. He couldn’t get any worse.” Knox sounds tired of the antics of the Perry family already and classes have yet to start.

Todd can’t see Neil, but he knows he’s not giving his buddies anything to work with. It won’t bide well with his ego to act like anything his father says has bothered him. And maybe it didn’t. If this really did happen every year, Neil had to be used to it or expecting it by now.

“Because you tell your parents off, Mr. Future Lawyer and Mr. Future Banker.”

“Okay, so I don’t like it anymore than you do.”

“Then don’t tell me how to talk to my father. You guys are the same way.”

“All right, all right, Jesus,” Knox steps in. “So, what are you gonna do?”

Neil audibly exhales. “What I have to do. I’ll drop the annual.”

Disappointment fills the air and glides into the room far enough for Todd to feel it. Charlie hears the true hurt in Neil’s voice, how his cool voice threatens to spill into a suppressed wail if he doesn’t fix it. “I wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. It’s just a bunch of jerks trying to impress Nolan.”

Again, it’s true that Charlie hasn’t changed. His pep talks have always been nothing more than over-questioning until you’re on the edge of bursting, then swearing that you’re too good for whatever you can’t have. Todd wouldn’t admit it, but they somehow made him feel better. Neil wouldn’t admit it either.

“I don’t care, I don’t give a damn about any of it.” Neil says, though he does. He cared for this because it was something he could do without his father over his shoulder telling him how to do it better. It was his and he was so close to leading the stupid group. The only thing that stood a chance at making Neil feel better now was not a pep talk or a new friend- it would be the promise that something greater he would lead was coming. All Neil was ever eager for was the next big thing he could be a part of. Todd knew it. And he’d support him through it right this time.

“So,” Meeks awkwardly changes the subject. “Latin, eight o’clock in the study room?”

Neil smirks. “Yeah, Meeks. I’ll be there.”

“Todd, you’re welcome to join us.” Meeks tilts his head into the room one last time before leaving. 

“Yeah, come along pal.” Knox says and waves as he leaves too. Charlie follows.

“He’ll be there.” Neil calls and takes a much needed breath. 

Todd is about to offer up some semblance of conversation when Neil starts to pace the room. Todd doesn’t stop him and Neil does so for more than five minutes. He does not stop until he catches sight of the desk set Todd had spent so long setting down.

“A desk set.” It isn’t a question or really a comment. Only an observation about an object that Todd doesn’t remember Neil ever noticing before his birthday; when he got the second one.

Todd forgets himself for a moment. “Yes. My parents got it for me for my birthday last year.” Neil laughs and Todd sputters out “what? It’s not really funny, Neil.”

Todd says his name out loud to his face for the first time in ten years. 

“Have you ever used it?” Neil touches it, flicking a pencil with a gentle finger. It rolls off of the desk and falls onto the floor.

“Well...no.” Todd admits, “I haven’t. I’ll try this year.”

“Mmhm.” Neil nods. He stays quiet after that.

Chapter Text

30 August, 1959. Even Later.

Neil and Todd finish unpacking the remainder of their belongings. The room is decorated (as decorated as a Welton dorm room can be) and their beds are made. They are only ever interrupted once, by Cameron, who stops by and apologizes for calling Todd stiff.

He had done this ten years ago and Todd had only silently nodded in response to show that he had appreciated it. However, Todd Anderson was not the Todd Anderson he once was. He didn’t just nod.

When Cameron says “hey, sorry for calling you a stiff, see ya later,” and attempts to escape without another word, Todd replies.

“No worries.

Cameron barely hears him and, if he was really an asshole, he would have left and likely apologized later if Todd had brought it up again. But he isn’t and he stops for a split second in his tracks. He gives Todd the very nod he had expected for himself. They both smile and Todd has gained his respect.

Once Cameron leaves and they are alone again, Todd does not ruin the moment by looking at Neil to see his reaction. He keeps his chilled-out, ‘tough’ demeanor and busies himself by straightening out the stack of notebooks on his desk. If Neil wants to say anything, he does not.

Time ticks by and, after several hours without a word being spoken, Neil falls onto his bed, stomach first. He sprawls out and groans, the days frustrations spilling out alongside his unsaid fears for the semester. It’s a groan that begs for attention—specifically Todds. Todd uses his hand to push himself from his desk and turn to face Neil.

“Something…wrong?”

“Todd, what time is it?” Neil’s face is pressed against his pillow. 

Todd can hardly hear him. “Huh?” A moment later he realizes that Neil has asked for the time. He glances between both the watch on his wrist and the watch perched on his desk.

“What time is it-”

“The time” Todd sheepishly smiles and Neil adjusts his head so that Todd can see the lazy grin on his face. His eyes remain closed. “It’s seven fifteen. Almost seven thirty.”

“Then it’s seven thirty.”

“Yep. Almost.”

“But you said that it was seven fifteen first.” Neil pushes himself up and positions himself to face Todd, sitting. “Seven fifteen and almost seven thirty are very different.”

Neil speaks like everything he says is a plan or a secret or a secret plan. One that he can’t dare share and always bets that it could jump off the tip of his tongue if it wanted to. This way of speaking makes Neil come off as sarcastic at times and as having the ability to be a lot more mischievous than he let on. That is, when his father isn’t watching. Because Todd does not respond rapidly, Neil adds on.

“So, we’ve got about half an hour til study group.”

“Yes. We do.” Todd replies timely.

“Plenty of time to go exploring, don’t you think? His smile widens and Todd feels very, very nervous.

“Ex-exploring? Todd sputters. Neil nods in excitement. 

“Since you’re new, you haven’t seen all of Welton yet, right? Someone has to show you where all the classrooms are or you’ll be lost tomorrow, poor thing!” Neil is standing now. He looks hopeful. Todd, at this moment, is the only person around and, because of it, is the only one that can continually take his mind off of his father’s visit. Neil wants to do something his father wouldn’t approve of at all.

But, at this moment, Todd knows more than Neil does about what mischievous behaviors at Welton academy can result in. He knows that the coming months will be filled with Neil going against his father’s wishes beyond belief once he meets kindhearted John Keating.

He knows and he will not dare speed up the process towards what he fears more than anything.

“How about tomorrow, Neil? During school hours you can show me everything,” Todd offers. 

Neil’s grin falls into a disappointed frown, but he tries to flip the smile back on before Todd can notice. It’s bizarre to Todd that Neil wants to make friends with him this quickly. Ten years ago, it was a calmer process. Neil was still Neil and wanted his friendship, but he would have never offered sneaking around campus as a pastime the night they met. Had Todd’s bravery in joining the study group boosted Neil’s comfortability? Caused him to need Todd so soon?

If that was so, Todd was going to say yes to anything Neil offered him for the rest of time.

“Tomorrow?”

“Yeah. I think that…that would be better. Maybe during lunch?”

“Okay.” Neil decides that is more than all right. He takes a careful step towards Todd’s bed, a thoughtful finger touching his chin. “But you have to come to the study room with me now then. We can get a headstart.”

Todd understands that Neil is not going to leave him alone until he does, in fact, say yes. Neil is stubborn and, though without a short fuse, was needy and expecting. 

“Okay. I’ll come with you.” Todd picks up the neat pile of notebooks and shoves them without much thought into the school bag hanging off his chair. He checks for pencils by shoving his hand in his bag and nearly stabs his palm. “I’m not sure what we’re studying for though.”

“When you attend Hell-ton, you study for everything. You’ll catch on quickly.” Neil explains, seemingly cheered up due to Todd’s agreement. He heads towards the door without Todd, though expecting him to follow. Todd stands, nearly tripping over his own feet while throwing his bag over his shoulder. “Usually on our first days back we just catch up and look over some past notes.”

“Oh. That doesn’t sound too scary.” Todd halts about two inches from Neil, peeking up at him.

“Yeah,” Neil opens the door and starts walking down the dorm hallway. “I won’t be surprised if there’s a pop quiz in Latin tomorrow. Or trig.”

Todd nods, jutting out his lip and trembling. It’s a very real, fearful feeling but Todd knows they won’t be met with pop quizzes tomorrow. Only pages upon pages of books to read for pop quizzes that would inevitably occur on their second day of classes. Todd missed Neil. Not the tests that mindlessly maimed his brain without warning.

It takes maybe twenty steps to reach the end of the hallway, where they come upon wide double-doors that Neil pulls open to reveal a room lined with rows of wooden tables. There’s a couch in the center of the room, an ugly brown thing that must be brand new. A dartboard sits on the wall and bookshelves are filled to the brim with text that Todd was sure he never read during his time at Welton. Lamps and paintings hang, complimenting the aging green and beige of the walls nicely. 

“The student longue,” Neil says like he’s read Todd’s mind, “is a great space for studying, getting to know everyone…” he pulls out a chair from a table next to the doors. “Here, sit.” Neil sits in a seat next to the one he had pulled out for Todd. Todd accepts it.

“Thanks, Neil.” Todd says his name again, just to taste it. “Neil.”

“Yeah?” Neil perks up, pulling school supplies from an expensive looking bag of his own. The light from the lamp, considering how it hits the green on the wall, shines on Neil and makes him glow a sickly shade. Todd’s throat tightens. 

“Nothing. Nothing, sorry.” Todd feels the heat rise to his cheeks and he thinks that he and Neil must look like Christmas, so red and green together. “Making sure I said it right.”

‘Stupid.’ Todd thinks.

Neil stifles his laughter. “Neil? I don’t think you could mess that up, Todd.”

Todd shrugs.

“Todd…” Neil slumps his shoulders forward, “Todd, really, you didn’t think you could? Wouldn’t I have corrected you?”

Todd wants to shrug again, truly having backed himself into a corner. Like he would have ever gotten Neil’s name wrong, even the first time he met him. Todd wills himself to disappear but, of course, he does not. Even so, it doesn’t feel impossible for Todd anymore, willfully disappearing. If he says something stupid in front of Neil again, he’ll try once more.

Despite the embarrassment, the evidence of it showing in his cheeks, Todd doesn’t feel any more awkward around Neil than he does with anyone he’s just met. Which sounds odd, but again, it should be reiterated how much it does feel like the first time. He was glad for Neil, how good he was at making someone feel comfortable, even if they said something that would deem them forever idiotic to anyone else in the world.

Todd doesn’t have to say anything to defend himself as the doors to the room swing open. Charlie Dalton and Richard Cameron confidently swagger in. 

“Surprise, surprise, Neil Perry is the first one here.” Charlie teases. His tone communicates that this is no surprise at all. Neil is never late and always early, no matter what the engagement. 

“Hey now, Todd is here, too,” Neil says, “and he walked in first, so I was not, in fact, first.”

It’s a lie and by how Neil says it, he doesn’t mean for anyone to believe him. He glances at Todd to tell him so without further conversing. 

“You’re full of shit, Perry.” Charlie rolls his eyes and sits down next to Neil. Cameron sits next to Todd. “Tell me, Todd,” Charlie points to Todd with two fingers, elbow against the tabletop. His eyebrow is raised with interest. “Did you walk into the room first, yes or no?”

Cameron butts in, “don’t pull Anderson into Neil’s shit, you’ll scare him.”

“Oh shut up, Cameron, like you didn’t do that already. Anderson,” Charlie says with extreme emphasis that makes his tongue click, “is Neil a dirty liar or no?”

Todd can’t open his mouth. His future roommate, the one he saw at twenty-seven only yesterday, is pointing at him, treating him like they’re old friends and he can’t open his mouth. But they are old friends; Todd knows everything there is to know about him and he can’t open his mouth. He’s uncomfortable. He’s very aware of the hair on his head, the hair that wasn’t there yesterday, and that there’s still a dark, deepening blush on his face. He can’t open his mouth.

Neil answers for Todd. “Okay, okay, you caught me. I walked in first.”

“I knew it!”

“Of course I did, dipshit, Todd didn’t know where the longue was!”

“You’re not giving him enough credit.”

“That's not not giving him credit, he’s never been here before.” Neil looks to both Todd and Cameron for help.

“Actually-” Todd chokes out and is immediately met with the eyes of Neil and Charlie. “Actually, I have been here before.”

“You have?” Neil, Charlie, and Cameron all say, robots meeting their cue.

“Yes.” Todd’s jaw tightens and he notices a dull throb that comes with his clenched teeth. He meets Charlie’s eyes, who looks most curious. He nods. “With my brother Jeffrey, for his graduation.”

It was the one time Todd had ever visited Welton. He had never gotten the chance to actually tour the building, but he was told that anything that fits Jeffrey is beyond good enough for him. No need to tour when older siblings are there, right?

“Oh, yeah! What year was that?” Neil questions, looking around the room for an response to the question only Todd knew the answer to.

“A little over a year ago. He was a senior when I was a freshman. He’s a sophomore at university now.”

“Wow,” Cameron exhales, “I can’t wait for university. I’m gonna go to Harvard.”

Todd bites his tongue. Cameron does go to Harvard two years from now. He graduates and, as much as he wants to scream and fight about it, he is successful. And the Cameron in front of him has only once insulted him. He hasn’t gone against the Dead Poets and he hasn’t fallen before the higher-ups, a key to getting Keating fired. Not yet.

“Ah, Cameron, don’t tell me you’re talking about university,” a new voice belonging to Knox Overstreet enters the conversation. He, along with Steven Meeks and Gerard Pitts, fall into lonely, empty seats at a nearby table. “I can’t think about that when classes start tomorrow AND we have a new teacher.”

“What’s wrong with having a new teacher?” Meeks straightens his glasses.

“Everything! Junior year is the hardest year and,” Knox scowls, “the addition of a new teacher, who we don’t know anything about or how he teaches, is proof administration wants our lives to be hell.”

“C’mon, you don’t know anything about him,” Neil turns to a blank page in his notebook. 

“Don’t have to.” Knox cries, “he was hired by Nolan, which makes him, like, evil probably.”

Todd’s teeth are clamped down so tightly against his tongue he may draw blood. 

“Let’s just wait till we meet him, huh?” Neil matches Todd’s posture, leaning and bad for his back. Todd pretends not to notice. 

“Yeah, I mean, he can’t be worse than the last teacher.” Charlie adds on while staring at Todd, who doesn’t know who this last teacher was. His stare looks right through him and Todd, for a moment, considers the idea that he must be so pale at sixteen, that his bones can be seen through his skin.

“Oh, God,” Meeks agrees, “I remember that guy. He gave me an A minus.”

“Why?” Pitts tilts his head in question.

“I asked if our final would contain multiple choice questions. He took that as an insult.” 

“That has to be illegal.” Pitts howls with laughter that’s much too loud and undeserved.

“My parents almost had my head for that.”

“At least you got an A! I got a B and my parents took away phone privileges all summer,” Knox elbows Meeks, who holds his stomach with a yelp. “The only person I was allowed to talk to was my cranky old grandmother.”

“Oh, yeah!” Charlie points out, “you know, I had a fair share of conversations with grandmother this summer too.”

“Yours?”

“Nope, Knoxy boy, yours.” Charlie winks and Knox cries out, hopping up and setting a knee against his table— a threat that he’d climb over any moment. 

“Why, you can’t just!”

“What! She was a very nice lady.” Charlie laughs, delighted with himself.”

“You’re disgusting,” Cameron presses his hands against his hips. “I’ve met Knox’s grandmother you know and, and, I think she’d never talk to-”

“Christ, Cameron, you don’t gotta be jealous! If you wanted me to call and talk to you instead, I would have!” Charlie grows more amused by his own words, shoulders bouncing up and down with his repressed laughter. “All you had to do was ask.”

“I, I! Cameron scrambles for a response, “That’s not what I was saying and you know it.”

Neil, Meeks, and Pitts aren’t paying attention to the conversation anymore. They’ve all started writing either in their notebooks or on loose scraps on paper. Pitts and Meeks are whispering amongst themselves about tomorrow's Latin lesson and Neil eventually turns to look at the bookshelves behind him. He touches the spines, Todd observes, before even looking at the titles. Maybe he’s looking for a feeling, to touch the spine before the pages, before the title and know it's perfect for him.

Knox, aside from Todd, is the only one still hearing the conversation, but only to make sure the boys say nothing else of his grandmother.

It’s nostalgia at its finest for Todd, this manners of his friends. 

Neil finally grabs a book, his hand covering the title so Todd cannot see it. He kicks Todd’s ankle with the side of his foot to get his attention. When Todd looks at him, Neil smiles. He tilts his head towards Charlie and Cameron.

“They start every year with a fight like this. Welcome to the group.”

Todd loosens his bite on his tongue, takes a breath, and laughs.

Chapter Text

30 August, 1959. And finally, night.

Around nine o’clock, the boys take a much-needed break from their studying, now more occupied with catching up and telling stories than they are with Latin conjugations or chemical formulae. As the clock ticks towards ten, the first yawn sounds, coming from Knox. Then, the group agrees that their night is due for an end.

“Are we meeting again tomorrow night?” Meeks asks, closing his textbook with a relieved thud.

“Tomorrow?” Charlie makes a face that looks a lot like he had accidentally taken a bite from the world's most sour lemon. Todd laughs, having seen this face every day for the past ten years at any slightest inconvenience. “We aren’t gonna study every day like last year, right? I almost died halfway through the first semester.”

“I mean, the near-death experience would definitely be worse if we weren’t studying every day, yeah?” Meeks responds. “If you got low grades and your parents saw.”

“Nope, not worse,” Knox adds to the conversation, “my brain was fried doing school and group every day.”

“Then let’s balance the days and take breaks,” Neil suggests. “Let’s do what we can ourselves and only meet when we think we have to.”

“That’s too complicated, we should have set days to study together.” Cameron butts in.

Meeks makes an offer. “How about Mondays and Fridays? That way we can meet tomorrow after the first day and Fridays, right before the weekend.”

“Sounds good to me,” Charlie says for the group, standing up from his seat. He throws up his arms and stretches them tall. “All right. I’m going to my room. You comin’?” He looks at Cameron, who has his books neatly stacked and pressed to his chest.

“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m ready to leave, too.” Cameron, now sharing the sour lemon look, stands up and pushes in his chair. “I was just about to say that curfew is soon, anyways. We should go before someone has to come get us.” 

There’s a competitive air between them, one that follows Cameron everywhere he goes. Charlie is the only one able to combat it with a calm, straight toned demeanor. 

“Ah!” He replies, “Then we better get outta here, Cam. It’s too bad I didn’t just ask if you were ready to leave. Might have saved us some time and we wouldn’t be having this conversation if I just asked.” Charlie catches on quickly that this conversation is something Cameron is looking to win.

“That’s not-”

“Wouldn’t want to get expelled for missing curfew on the first day.”

“Actually, you wouldn’t be-”

“Huh? What’s that?” He holds his hand up to his ear. “I think I hear Nolan coming down the hall now!”

“You do? Cameron’s eyes, wide as the bowls they serve Welton hash in, looks towards the door fearfully. Without another word, he rushes out, taking an extra second to carefully shut the door behind him so it won’t make a sound. This second is wasted, contradicted by Cameron running down the hall, feet slamming loudly against the floors.

Todd’s mouth hangs open until Cameron can’t be heard any longer. Cameron did a lot of things that could be considered insane during his time at Welton in order to please the higher-ups and the more wealthy, but running down the hallways like a child afraid of being caught by his parents was not something expected.

Though, Todd remembers that Cameron had run away when he was caught speaking poorly of him in his room earlier. Hm. Maybe, Todd thinks, he doesn’t know Cameron at all. Or very well, at least. No, he only remembers being mad at Cameron after Welton on behalf of Keating and Neil. He didn’t want to remember Cameron’s humanity or good naturedness or cunning personality. He refused to remember it. But if Neil’s ending was going to change, so was Richard Cameron’s.

Todd starts to giggle, tongue held up against the roof of his mouth to quiet himself. So with Cameron, along with his small trait of childishness, came silliness that could make anyone laugh as well. Charlie is giggling too. 

“What’s so funny?” Neil wants to feel included, leaning forward in his seat.

“Does…he runs out of rooms like that all the time?” Todd asks.

“Like what?”

“Like…when, when he was in our room today he ran away and he ran away now.” 

“Oh,” Neil hums, seeming to have never noticed this. “I guess he does. He does run a lot.” He sits back again.

Charlie scoffs. “You’d think the running would tire him out at some point.” He rolls his eyes and falls back against the wall. “How many times have I messed with him by saying Nolan is coming down the hallway?” He eyes his friends, prodding them for answers, “he’s gotta know by now that Nolan is definitely never actually coming down that hallway. Right?”

“Is this all rhetorical or do you want us to actually answer?” Neil asks, prepared to run out of the room himself. Whatever went on between the lines of Charlie and Cameron’s friendly feud was none of his business.

“I’d say a billion more times should do the trick,” Knox says.

“Yeah, I vote a billion too.” Gerard agrees.

“You could just say an improbable amount of times,” Meeks says.

“Oh, c’mon Meeks, that’s something Cameron would say!” Charlie points out, leaving his place against the wall.

“Okay, okay, then I vote a billion, too.” Meeks throws his suggestion of improbability away.

The conversation dulls then silences and, as if patiently waiting for the boys to be ready, the clock chimes in with a bell ten times, signaling to students and faculty that their curfew has arrived.

By then, the boys are closing the doors to their rooms, teeth brushed and faces freshly dried after a quick toss of sink water against their skin. Todd buries himself in his bed and looks for added comfort in his sheets that his happiness of joining the study group cannot provide. The evening had been very enjoyable with his current, old, and past friends but now Todd needed his sleepy bones to rest.

While Todd tries to will himself to sleep, Neil stays sitting on top of his bedsheets, not quite ready for sleep. He speaks aloud to Todd, not sure if he is awake to listen or not. “I’m glad you joined us, Todd.”

Todd considers pretending that he has fallen asleep, though he would hate for Neil to keep talking, thinking Todd can’t hear him at all. He peeks out from under his covers. “You are?”

“Yeah!” Neil raises his voice as he's aware Todd hears him now. “We’ve been studying together since we started at Welton and no one’s ever asked to join us so…it’s cool to have someone new. Very cool.” He smiles at his use of language, not caring yet that his words aren’t intricate or well-thought out. “You know?”

“Yeah.” Todd feels giddy. One day into knowing Neil again and their relationship is like they’ve known each other for years. Was it like this the last time? Probably. Todd knows he was giddy then, too. But this time he will not lose this feeling again.

“My father,” Todd’s thoughts are interrupted by Neil speaking again, hesitantly. “He always says that to get something you want, you have to speak up for it. He says it shows you’re, I don’t know, intelligent?” Neil hides his true knowledge behind question marks. “I think he thinks someone could get into Harvard by true confidence alone,” he jokes, then catches himself coming out of his seriousness. He clears his throat and collects it again. “Anyway, yeah, it’s cool you asked to join us even though you just barely met us.”

Whatever Neil is looking to gain in this conversation, Todd can’t name. But it cements their friendship as true and not something that has to be kept up with. “I like you. Guys. I like you guys. I’m glad I joined, too.”

“Good.” Neil says. He leans over to the front of his bed and tugs the sheets forward just enough to crawl into. Todd turns away like it’s a private thing, Neil getting into bed. When he turns back, Neil is facing the wall. 

“Goodnight, Todd.”

“Goodnight, Neil.”

So, there they are. Todd on his stomach and Neil on his side. Todd shuts his eyes tight and once more wills his body to fall asleep. The bed cradles him as well as it can, but won’t truly be comfortable until his frame molds its memory into the mattress. That’s okay. The stiffness relays to Todd that this is only the beginning. He has all the time left in the world with Neil. The softer his mattress becomes, that’s when he’ll be scared again. That’s when he’ll know his time is running out.

31 August, 1959.

Todd wakes up before Neil, before the clock can ring out again and tell him that it is time for school. Neil is no longer turned towards the wall, body longued out, lanky legs hanging over the bed frame. He is not a still sleeper, unlike Todd who hasn’t moved since falling asleep.

The relief of morning coming is not something Todd knew he would feel. He knew, accepted, that he was here now. There was no worry that he would wake up in his apartment again, but the reassurance of it was still pleasing. He wasn’t waking up to peeling wallpaper in a single bedroom that smelled of missed opportunity and rotting fruit smoothies. Not even close. He was waking up, for the second time, to his second chance.

With Neil sleeping, Todd takes a chance to do something he wouldn’t be caught dead doing if anyone could see him. He slides out of bed and presses his knees against the floor, wincing when the hardwood does little to cushion him.

It is not exactly a prayer. It isn’t proper and he doesn't know if he’s thanking God or the sunlight slowly brightening up his room or even himself. But Todd opens his mouth and desperately he speaks: “thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. ”

He does that for several minutes before the clock sounds six o’clock. It happens so suddenly that Todd gasps and jumps to his feet. He looks as Neil stirs from his slumber, groaning disappointingly as his body realizes what the sound it hears means.

“Morning, sunshine.” Neil, more of a morning person than Todd on any other day, beams. “First day!”

“Uh,” Todd’s lips form a tight line, afraid that Neil had somehow caught him thankful for something he couldn’t even begin or dare to explain. “Yeah. First day!”

“Maybe we shouldn’t be too excited,” Neil’s voice is groggy, much deeper due to good sleep and coming from somewhere in the back of his throat. “The first day is always the worst.”

“Really?”

“Yep. You get reminded of the reason you were so happy school ended in the first place.” Neil’s face says he’s joking, but Todd knows the fierce curriculum is nothing to look forward to. But this first day will be different. Today, they will meet John Keating.

Ten minutes later, Todd and Neil are dressed with their hair neatly combed. Their ties are tied too tight and their shirts are perfectly tucked into their slacks. Yes, they look insanely silly, looking even more uptight than they had when they were with their parents the day before. But, they do not look out of place. Everyone at Welton wears the same horrible sweater and uncomfortable dress shoes.

Charlie is the least enthused about this uniform, coming out of his room when Neil knocks on his door with a look that could kill.

“Every year the uniform gets itchier, Nolan must be putting itching powder in the sleeves.” He scratches his wrist, gritting his teeth as he does so. 

“You’ll get used to it.” Cameron says. He doesn't look uncomfortable at all. In fact, he looks like he loves his uniform, standing with a sense of accomplishment. “It’s tradition to wear it anyway, so.”

“I know, I know,” Charlie sighs, the four of them walking towards the stairwell where they may be led to breakfast in the dining hall. “Doesn’t mean I can’t complain about it.”

“Doesn’t sound like you’re following the four pillars, Charlie.” Neil says, though he’s scratching his arms too. “It should be an honor to wear the uniform.”

“More like it instills discipline.” Todd comments, making Neil laugh enough to stop itching and point to Todd with an accepting, impressed finger.

“As long as I look excellent too, I’ll get used to it.” Charlie responds to finish the bit, but also in a way that would guarantee to Cameron that he promised he would keep wearing the uniform.

Their conversation continues as they make their way down the stairs, which is full of shouting boys that make crude jokes and gestures towards their friends three flights up. Charlie, Meeks, and Gerard meet the group at the ground floor, joining the discussion easily. It’s comfortable and remains constant through their breakfast of cold oatmeal and a fruit salad of barely pink watermelon, soft grapes, and tart strawberries.

Then their classes begin, passing slowly like honey being squeezed out of an old bottle. Todd knows little Latin and trigonometry was never his strong suit. The first time he attended Welton, his grades always teetered between low B’s and high C’s in every class but one: English. 

But that class will have to wait until after lunch. 

When the bell rings at the end of trigonometry class, Todd can hardly stand from his seat fast enough. But Neil is faster and before Todd can practically run for the door, Neil has grabbed his arm.

“Ready to go exploring?”

“What?”

“Don’t tell me you forgot, Todd!” Neil shames him, keeping his voice at a whisper so Dr. Hager can’t shut down his antics before they’ve even started. 

“Forgot what-” 

Then it hits him.

“Plenty of time to go exploring, don’t you think? His smile widens and Todd feels very, very nervous.

“How about tomorrow, Neil? During school hours you can show me everything,” Todd offers. 

“Tomorrow?”

“Yeah. I think that…that would be better. Maybe during lunch?”

“Okay.” Neil decides that is more than all right.

“Okay, Neil,” Todd nods his head, “let’s go exploring.”

Chapter Text

31 August, 1959.

“Where do you want to go?” Todd asks as Neil ushers them out of the classroom. There are no eyes on them, besides Charlie and Knox, who question why they don’t want to get to the dining room before lunch gets cold. Neil swears they’ll be there soon, but a tugging feeling in Todd’s mind tells him that they definitely will not be there soon.

But it does not matter. Neil’s hand is wrapped tightly around his wrist and, though nothing more than friendly, Todd’s ears are ringing and his stomach jumps.

“Well,” Neil hums, “showing you all of your classrooms is sort of useless now, huh?” He references his past offer to give Todd a grand tour of Welton the night before. “You know…since you’ve already been to most of them.” He sighs overdramatically, pretending to be disappointed.

Todd grins, “....so?”

“So!” Neil halts their walking. “I said I couldn’t show you all of your classrooms. We still have more classes after lunch, Todd. I can show you those.”

Oh, God.

“Neil, I don’t know-”

“C’mon!” Neil begins walking again, his hold on Todd’s wrist tightening. “We don’t know anything about the new teacher, let’s at least check out his classroom.”

“Neil!” Todd attempts to dig his heels into the floor. “Are we sure that’s a good idea? Maybe we should just go to lunch.” Todd pulls his arm away, not wanting to humor Neil any further with this ‘tour’ if it meant being seen or caught by Keating before class. Before Todd was ready to see him again. There’s only so many minutes in the lunch period and Todd wanted every second of that time to prepare himself. 

“I don’t think you think most things are good ideas.” Neil turns to look at Todd, eyes filled with a glimmer of mischelf and excitement. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

“We…” Todd’s arm goes limp and he lets Neil drag him as he decides what to say. “We could get caught. What, what if Keating’s super mean or something.” Unlikely, of course. Not probable. John Keating was never like that, even in his rare, colder moments. He was intelligent. Romantic. And he spoke with an intense quietness that held promised friendliness in it. Todd knew that and, soon, everyone else would too. “He was a student here and, and, and, for all we know, he knows every way we could get expelled.”

“Todd!” Neil laughs in disbelief. They’re outside of the English classroom now. The tall, brown door looks exactly like every other door at Welton, but it’s cracked open like it’s hoping that someone will sneak in. “We won’t get expelled. I’ll tell him I was showing you around, which I am. Okay?”

At some point, Neil has nearly closed the gap between the two of them. Todd’s back is pressed against the wall and Neil is leaning over him with pleading eyes. He hasn’t let go of Todd’s wrist. Noticing this, Todd pulls his hand away.

“Fine.” Todd responds and Neil practically jumps up, elated to have won Todd over in his ideas. 

“Yes!” Neil cheers, pushing open the door to John Keating’s classroom as quietly, as sneakily as he can. To Neil's eyes, the room is empty but Todd remembers where Keating is hiding. He’s in his office, tucked away past the door at the front of the room, composing himself before his first lesson.

Keating was, is, always so composed. But Todd, as he steps into the classroom with caution, does not know he remained this way after the events of all those years ago; after Neil died. He wonders, ten years from now, if Keating is sullenly staring at a clock, begging for a second chance like Todd was. Was Neil’s death marked on some neatly kept calendar on a wall of his home? Did he live in a home? An apartment? 

Did Keating go to a play ever again? Did he watch plays where characters died and cried both because of what Neil did and what he could have done if he played this character instead? Was that too morbid to think about? Maybe. But maybe Keating could find a way to place romanticism in death where Todd never wanted to.

Or, maybe Keating liked to pretend Neil’s death never happened. The nice thing, Todd thinks, is that, whatever it is, whatever Keating was like, he’d likely be a lot better this second time around. 

If Todd changes things for the better.

“Wow.” Neil says loud enough to knock Todd out of his thoughts. He’s looking around at the framed photos that sit above the ugly green chalkboard. The picture of Walt Whitman makes chills travel their way up Todd’s spine and whisper in his ear: “A blanket that always leaves your feet cold.”

“W-What?” The word falls out of Todd, tasting disgustingly of bad memory. “What? He corrects himself, his hand reaching to awkwardly twist and play with his loosening tie. 

Neil shrugs. “Nothing. I just kind of expected something different. But it’s just maps and photos of some old guys.”

“Walt Whitman is, uh, up there…” For some reason, Todd feels compelled to defend him. “What were you hoping for?”

Neil steps to the front of the classroom, stepping on the slightly ledged floor and up to Keating’s desk. He snatches an apple, too perfectly placed, from the desk. He jokingly shines it against his uniform and tosses it in the air. “Something to tell the boys about,” he says as he catches the apple in his hand.

“Pfft.” Todd rolls his eyes, taking a breath and telling himself, in his head of course, to be brave. He walks to his old desk at the left corner of the room. He sits. “Is that all?”

“It isn’t often we get new teachers at Hellton, so.” Neil continues tossing the apple. Todd watches, impressed that Neil hasn’t managed to drop it yet. “Someone’s got to take one for the team and check out the new teachers. See if they’ll make things interesting or not.”

“I guess.” Todd smiles. “Neil-”

Todd is interrupted by the creaking of an opening door. Both of their heads snap to Keatings office, greeted by the confused face of the very man. He doesn’t look angry or upset that he’s found students in his room. Only like he hadn’t expected this which, of course, he had not.

“Oh.” His lips are downturned, deciding how to continue this interaction. “Lost your way going to lunch, I see.”

He says this, but they all know that that is not the case at this moment. 

“No, sir, we-” Neil starts.

“We were just leaving!” Todd rises from his seat, wanting to run while he still can. It isn’t weirder than when he saw Neil for the first time, but the bubbling feeling of threatening vomit in his stomach still dares to rise in this throat. 

Keating raises his hand to stop him, shaking his head. “I just wasn’t expecting company, is all.”

“We know, uh, I know.” Todd freezes, hand flat on his desk and tense. 

Neil doesn’t seem alarmed. In fact, he seems like he expected this somehow. Keating does, too, though his face remains in its slightly surprised position. “I was showing a new student around Welton. We stepped in here, since I haven’t had a chance to see the new classroom either.”

Ah,” Keating chuckles, “you mean you haven’t had a chance to scope out the scary new teacher.” He corrects Neil. 

Neil raises both his hands up, stepping down from the desk area. “You’ve caught me, sir. I apologize.”

“Don’t be.” Keating shakes his head. “I, too, went to Welton and we did much worse than sneak into classrooms during lunch period. As long as you aren’t trying to put a tack in my seat or peek at the day's work plans, I see no problem.”

“Of course not, sir. Neil Perry.” He shakes Keatings hand.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Perry. And,” he turns and makes eye contact with Todd, who can’t believe what he’s seeing unfold in front of him. But then again, can’t he? Neil knew how to charm his way out of anything and John Keating was anything but sour. “Who’s your frightened friend?”

“Um, um,” Todd walks up, stopping about three feet in front of Keating. His eyes are wide, proving Keating’s description of ‘frightened.’ “I’m Todd Anderson, sir.”

“Mr. Anderson.” Keating meets him and shakes his hand. “Next time you get lost, the dining hall is about ten doors and a right turn from here. You can’t miss it.” He winks, continuing the supposed bit that they weren’t meaning to be in this room at all. That calms Todd, sure now that they weren’t in trouble and, like he would ten years ago, Keating would have his back this time around, too.

“Yes, sir.”

—-

Neil and Todd do not make it to lunch. 

Instead, they stay inside of the classroom and speak with each other while Keating places himself back in his office to allow them the privacy of conversation. It’s a very polite thing to do and the action coming from a superior makes Neil excited enough to talk Todd’s ear off about how he might actually enjoy English this year.

Eventually, the bell rings and Todd and Neil are no longer alone, but met with questioning peers who either want to know why the boys missed lunch or if they got to see the rumored ‘odd’ new English teacher. Neil tells Charlie and the others what happened and Todd lets him say the whole story, keeping his thoughts to himself. Though the interaction was interesting, he still has to get through the actual class period. 

Then, the whistling of the 1812 Overture starts and the buzzing classroom quiets. Keating enters, marching through and not paying any attention to the bewildered reactions from the students. He holds a clipboard. He exits the room, the door shutting behind him. All without a word, only melody.

Todd giggles.

Almost as soon as he’s left, Keating leans back into the room. “Well, come on.” He gestures for them to follow and, hesitant, the boys agree that they should do whatever the teacher says. They grab their books and follow Keating out of the room.

“Where are we going?” Meeks asks.

“Shhh!” Gerard hushes him, not wanting to speak unless allowed to.

Keating stops them at the entryway of the school. There’s cases that hold the school’s prized trophies, as well as pictures of the boys that attended before them. Todd wants to react, knowing that what Keating says next becomes more true than he ever expected it to. He isn’t ready to hear it. He hides at the back, behind the rest of his peers. Neil stands next to him.

Keating tucks his clipboard under his arm. “‘Oh, Captain, My Captain.’” He begins, his posture straight but still boyish as he switches his balance from left foot to right. “Who here knows where that comes from?”

Todd looks up. He knows the answer.

“Not a clue?” Keating says when no one raises their hand or speaks. He looks between the students, looking for a sign that one of them does know. He stops at Todd. “Mr. Anderson?”

Fuck. Fine. Todd takes the chance.

“It’s from a poem.”

Keating’s head tilts, pleased. “Yes. Do you know who wrote it?” He knows Todd does.

“Walt Whitman.” He answers. Before Keating can ask, Todd adds on with a confidence that isn’t broken by a stutter or falter, but a curl of his shoulders to his chest. “It’s…It’s about President Abraham Lincoln.”

Keatings smile widens, not mentioning anything about how Todd has become ‘C’ shaped. “Correct and impressive, Todd.” Not wanting to add to Todd’s discomfort, he turns his attention back to the entire class. “In this class, you may call me Mr. Keating. Or, for those of us who are more daring: Oh Captain, My Captain.”

Though completely serious, the implication of actually calling Keating the name makes the students laugh. Neil does so while patting Todd on the back. 

“You knew that?” Neil whispers out of the corner of his mouth to Todd. He looks envious.

Todd doesn’t know how to respond. He did know it, but only because he had learned it before. Was it fair to take the credit? “Yeah. I guess I did.”

“Wow.”

“Now. Let me dispel a few rumors so they don’t fester into facts.” Keating continues on, particular with his syllables. “Yes. I, too, attended Hellton and survived.”

There’s a soft collection of gasps that go throughout the rooms, voices that would scream their shock if they could: “you know we call it that, you call it that?”

“And no,” Keating’s tone does not heighten but it does command attention that is unable to be anything but respected, “at that time, I was not the mental giant you see before you. I was the intellectual equivalent of a ninety-eight pound weakling.” He shows this weakness by bending into himself, quite similarly to how Todd had just curled up. “I would go to the beach and people would kick copies of Byron in my face.”

More laughter. Todd wants to add, wants to ask if the Byron mention meant that they, his students, were now nothing more to him than English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. (Or, is Todd Byron’s Prometheus, challenging the deaf tyranny of fate?). Whatever they are, whatever Todd is trying to understand with this Byron mention, he only hopes this poem won’t end in a farewell. 

Keating removes the clipboard from under his arm and reads, his face twisting like he believes a fake name has been placed in the roster. “Now, Mr…Pitts? That’s a rather unfortunate name. Mr. Pitts, where are you?”

Gerard, embarrassed, gives a near silent gruff response, raising his hand while everyone snickers. 

Keating points at him. “Mr. Pitts, would you open your hymnal to page five forty-two and read the first stanza of the poem you find there?”

The hymnal is a large blue thing and the flipping of pages between the twenty or so students is roaring, fluttering quickly. 

“To the virgins, to make much of time?” Gerard clarifies. He’s awkward about it but so are the others. Charlie has to stifle a laugh from coming up and it results in an even louder snicker. 

“Yes that one.” Keating responds. Then, coyly, he says “Somewhat appropriate, isn’t it.” 

Gerard reads. “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, old time is still a-flying, and this same flower that smiles today, tomorrow will be dying.”

It’s sweet. It’s true. Keating thanks him for reading. “Gather ye rosebuds while ye may. The Latin term for that sentiment is Carpe Diem. Now who knows what that means?”

Todd doesn’t have to answer this question, Meeks knows the answer. 

“Carpe Diem. That’s ‘seize the day.’”

Keating leans forward on his toes. “Very good, Mr.-”

“Meeks.”

“Meeks!” Keating begins a slow pacing. “Another unusual name. Seize the day. Gather ye rosebuds while ye may. ” He stresses the rhyme. “Why does the writer use these lines?”

Charlie responds without raising his hand, “because he’s in a hurry.”

“No!” Keating says, placing his hand on an imaginary buzzer. “Bzzt! Thank you for playing anyway.” His pacing stops. He focuses. “Because we are food for worms, lads. Because, believe it or not, each and every one of us in this room is, one day, going to stop breathing, turn cold, and die.”

Die . Just the word makes Todd’s stomach flip.

Then, Keating’s back is turned towards him, looking inside the cases of trophies, footballs, and team pictures. He urges the class to step forward, asking them to peruse the faces of the boys in the photos. Todd can’t bring himself to fake interest. 

Because Keating is right. They are not different from these boys in the slightest, and the older Todd got the more he knew it to be true. And they aren’t invincible, not really. But, they’re all desperate to be something that means something, so hopeful. 

“Did they wait until it was too late to make from their lives even one iota of what they were capable?” Keating asks. Todd feels himself nod his head. “Because you see gentlemen, these boys are now fertilizing daffodils.” 

While Todd is nodding, Neil is shaking his head ‘no.’ Like he refuses to believe that anyone would waste their time on things that don’t matter, though he’s so willing to do what he has to do to please his father. He looks like he wants to touch the glass and beg them to try again. But they can’t. 

Keating ends his tangent on morality with “But if you listen real close, you can hear them whisper their legacy to you.” This sentence brings the boys out of their trance in the glass and Keating quickly works to bring them back there. “Go on, lean in.”

They do, all while Keating hovers over them, stopping at an annoyed Cameron’s shoulder. He whispers, voice rough. “Carpe…” Cameron looks back at him and he gives him a shocked face, confused as to where the voice had come from. 

“Hear it? Carpe…Carpe Diem. Seize the day boys. Make your lives extraordinary.”

“Carpe Diem.” Todd whispers, reminding himself of everything he may have not done all those years ago. His eyes flit towards Keating, who offers him a smile like he knows exactly what he has not done, will not do. He nods and Todd does too.

Chapter Text

31 August, 1959. Continued.

For the first time in all their years at Welton, the boys are disappointed when class ends. They rush back into Keating’s classroom to gather up belongings. Arms are piled high with books and pockets are stuffed with pointed pencils. Neil Perry opposed this chaos, moving slowly with his feet dragging against the concrete. He holds his books like it would be okay if they slipped from his grasp and fell to the floor.

Todd peeks at Neil’s lackadaisical, relaxed form. It’s obvious how quick Neil has been caught. He’s hooked onto the words of John Keating. This hook is sharp, stuck in Neil’s lower lip and wet with the slick swipe of his tongue when he says “That was different.”

“I think it was weird,” Gerard’s ego remains wounded by Keating’s teasing quip towards his name.

Knox agrees. “Spooky, too. If you ask me.” He also looks like he could drop his books at any moment. Something tells Todd it isn’t due to the trajectory of his life being positively affected by the words of John Keating.

“But it was different!” Neil reiterates. “It was good!”

Cameron, brows furrowed and bothered, shrugs. “You think he’s gonna test us on all that stuff?”

“On what stuff?” Meeks questions back.

“That carpe diem stuff,” he explains. “We already take Latin, so I’m not sure if-”

Neil interrupts him with a scoff. Todd mimics it.

“Jeez, Cameron. Don’t you get anything?” Charlie shakes his head.

“What!”

Ten years ago, Todd would barely be able to open his mouth to attempt to agree, verbalize his siding with Neil and Charlie. A failed attempt at speaking isn’t what stops him from adding more to the conversation now and neither is it his cowardice. What stops him now (ten years later and ten years ago) is what Neil says next.

“We should look for his school annual in the library.” 

Todd guffaws at this, neck bouncing his head forward. Neil looks at him questioningly and he excuses it as laughing at something he thought of that occurred a few days back. Neil doesn’t look convinced, but he doesn’t push it further.

Todd isn’t part of much conversation for the next couple of hours. This plot point of the Dead Poets Society in his life is about to officially begin and it is nerve-wracking, exciting, and heartbreaking. The rhythm of second chance beats in his heart and exhausts itself throughout his History class. He’s glad for this, as he cannot hear the teacher’s opinions on the last two decades.

Then, somehow, Todd has made it to his extracurricular for the day; soccer. It’s a nightmare-Todd wanted to do rowing.

In the locker room, Todd clothes himself in a horrendously large gym uniform. It was handed to him by a bitter looking coach who would likely be immensely bothered if Todd asked for a proper size. Oddly enough, the shirt reeks of rubber. He must have made a face at this discovery because the coach reminds him that he’ll have to pay for the uniform if he loses it. He promises that he will not.

Between the syncopation of memory in his chest, Todd has one coherent thought: ‘How do I fake a stomach bug or a sprained ankle or turn into a vampire so I’ll have an excuse to stay out of the sun.’

Todd gets through the hour of soccer without doing any of that, though. He couldn’t tell you what drills they did or how many laps they ran. But, he does have a second coherent thought while sitting on a ledge in the corner of the locker room.

Everyone but him is showering, the one’s finished doing so lined up at a row of mirrors across from Todd. Neil is one of these people, hair dripping wet. He runs his fingers through his hair when water droplets fall into his eyes. He’s intently focused, drying himself properly when Todd makes eye contact with Neil’s reflection.

Todd, knees pressed together and eyes unable to remove themselves from the polite smile Neil gives him, thinks this: ‘Fuck.’

“Are we still on for study group tonight?” Meeks comes around a corner, targeting his question towards his group of friends. Gerard and Neil answer together with an immediate “yes.” Todd holds up his hand awkwardly, but he says nothing. He pulls his arm down once Meeks nods in his direction. At least, he thinks Meeks nods in his direction.

Knox responds alone, “I can’t make it, guys.” He sighs like he’s heartbroken, but he’s smiling as if he’s about to make a joke. “I have to have dinner at the Danburry’s house.”

The Danburry’s. Todd’s heart skips a beat, finally falling out of its strict pattern. He’s happy to hear this plan of Knox’s. He and Chris had lasted all these years and, though it may be surprising to some, Todd adores their relationship. They fit together well: she understands Knox’s accidental overbearing tendencies and he understands her need for space and hand-holding. They pass time together at the theater when they can and stop time with intimate kisses. They get along and need each other, particularly so after Neil dies.

And hopefully even more so when Neil does not.

“The Danburry’s?” Gerard asks. “Who’s that?”

“They’re big alums.” Cameron replies, obviously impressed. “How’d you swing that?” There’s a twinge of jealousy and desperation for answers in his voice.

Knox acts like he doesn’t know how big of a deal this is by focusing all attention on fixing his hair. After a moment of this, he turns away from the mirror and says “They’re friends of my Dad’s. They’re probably in their nineties or something.”

“Ooh!” Charlie mocks. He pulls a comb from his slick hair and purses his lips. “Sounds great!”

Neil shrugs, “Anything’s better than Hell-ton hash.”

Charlie steps out of his satirical persona for a split second to say “I’ll second that.”

“Yeah, we’ll see.” Knox huffs.

Neil throws his towel around his neck. Todd’s mouth is suddenly very dry, becoming something equivalent to a desert when Neil turns to face him.

“Hey.” Neil says, eyes gleaming with a question. “So, you’re actually coming tonight?”

Todd fidgets, hands bouncing against his thighs. He shrugs, “Yeah, yeah, I said I would join. Didn’t I?” Now he isn’t completely sure. 

“You did.” Neil nods, “Thought I would make sure.”

“Hm,” Todd thinks. “You think I was gonna back out?”

“Would you blame me if I thought so?”

“Yes, I would.” Todd chuckles, the moisture in his mouth returning. He wipes his suddenly sweaty hands on his shorts. “I don’t really need help with Trig, though. I’m worried about the, the, um, homework for History. And Chemistry.”

“You’re in luck,” Neil’s shoulders are slightly hunched and his voice lowers. “I’ve never gotten lower than an A minus in History. I know everything.”

“And Chemistry?” Todd asks, not pointing out that an A minus would mean that Neil didn’t know everything. The way he smiles up at Neil tells him so anyways. 

“Ask Meeks.” He responds. The two of them laugh and Todd pretends not to be taken aback when Neil presses the palm of his hand against Todd’s knee as a goodbye before walking away to likely dress for dinner before all of the hot portions are gone.

Todd doesn’t join him. He stays sitting until the locker room is empty. Then, he replaces the heat in his face with the heat of the shower. The water pressure isn’t strong enough for how price-y and private Welton is. There’s only a community bar of soap and no curtains. He isn’t technically allowed to be in here alone. But he still takes his time, picking the dirt from his fingernails and acts out the motions of putting shampoo and conditioner in his hair like he’ll trick himself into feeling cleaner. 

And Todd skips out on that bar of soap. He’ll shower again later.

He shuts off the water once it runs cold and towels off, sure to be completely dry before putting on his school uniform. Dinner is over far before he’s done doing so.

—

That night, the student lounge is abuzz with studying and not-so-studying. Gerad and Meeks are working on a homemade radio system, hoping to reach some connection that may provide them with some semblance of sounds from the outside world. On the opposite end of the spectrum, Cameron is trying to help Todd, Neil, and Charlie with their trigonometry homework. 

Emphasis on ‘trying,’ since Neil is saying “of course” to everything, despite not getting the answers, Charlie isn’t paying attention, and Todd is munching on a dinner roll (not staring at Neil in his glasses) that Charlie surprisingly snuck for him from the meal he missed.

When Todd thanks him, Charlie says that Cameron is a lot more bearable to study with when one has a full stomach.

About an hour or two into their studying, Knox Overstreet enters the room, returning from the dinner he had fretted. He shuts the door behind him, breathing out and closing his eyes. It’s happened and Todd’s leer he had in the locker room is back. The lounge goes silent, except for Charlie who asks: “How was dinner?”

“Hm? Knox hums, jacket tossed over his shoulder. He delicately holds the fabric between his fingers. Charlie repeats himself and Knox thinks for a second before responding, “Terrible. Just awful.” He leaves his position at the door and sits down next to Charlie.

Todd doesn’t believe him for a second. “Really?” 

“Yes!” Knox says so, but he smiles sweetly, mouth tilted as he speaks out his secrets from the night. “Tonight, I met the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. The most beautiful girl in my entire life.”

Neil pulls off his glasses, shoulders moving up with a syllable of a laugh. “Are you crazy? What’s wrong with that?”

“She’s practically engaged…” Knox grows the tension, “to Chet Danburry.”

“Wow.” Charlie shakes his head, “that guy could eat a football.”

“That’s too bad.” Says Gerard,

“Too bad? It’s worse than too bad, Pitsie, it’s a tragedy! A girl this beautiful in love with such a jerk.” Knox says.

“All the good ones go for jerks, you know that.” Pitts.

Todd doesn’t believe that. 

“Are you gonna see her again?” Todd asks.

Knox jutted up lip tightens into a line. “I dunno. She goes to the public school in town.”

“So?”

“So, I won’t see her!” Charlie exasperates, throwing up his arms and standing up. He paces across the room and sits on the tabletop that holds Meeks and Gerard’s project. His body hides it and the two continue to work on it behind him.

“Knoxious, just because you won’t see her at school, that don’t mean you won’t see her again!” Charlie lies his arms on the table, palms facing up. 

“Yeah,” Neil agrees, “you only just met her.”

“And who knows if she’ll be with Chet forever.” Todd adds.

That seems to perk Charlie up. “Yeah…yeah, guys, you’re right.” He straightens his back and wraps his hands around the ledge of the table. His legs swing. “I’ll see her again! I have to!”

Cameron, frustrated they’ve been talking about a girl for so long and not homework, tries to move on. “Ahh, who cares, she’s just a girl. Forget her. Open your trig book and try to figure out problem five.”

Knox won’t have it. “I can’t just forget her, Cameron! And I can’t think about trig.” He motions to the book. “Not now. Not tonight.” His grin is all teeth and hope, which makes Cameron roll his eyes. “Not when Chris exists!”

“Don’t be like that, Cam,” Charlie reaches out and pokes his cheek. “Don’t be jealous Knoxy found a girl and you haven’t.”

“I’m not jealous! Don’t poke me!” Cameron looks like he’s thinking of biting Charlie. “Just, just, figure out problem five.”

“Cam-”

The radio Gerard and Meeks have been working on suddenly plays a high-pitched hum. The girl and Cameron’s annoyance is forgotten. Gerard shakes Meek’s shoulder excitedly with his hand. “We got it! We got it!”

Meeks cheers, “Holy cow!”

They don’t have time to celebrate, however, because the door to the lounge opens. Dr. Hager stands in the doorway, bowtie neatly tucked under his shirt collar and round glasses fogging up with every word he says. 

“All right, gentlemen, five minutes. Let’s go.”

Dr. Hager leaves as quickly as he came, uninterested in whatever the boys are working on, only that he will be able to go to bed himself as soon as possible. He doesn’t see the homemade radio, as Charlie is still hiding it by sitting in front of it. Not testing their luck, Gerard and Meeks pack it up the second the door shuts. 

Similar to his actions in the locker room earlier, Todd takes his time packing his things. The others leave far before he does, save for Neil, who stands against the door frame. He watches Todd pack, the expression on his face unreadable. 

“You don’t have to wait for me, Neil,” he says when Neil yawns.

“I’m not.” He answers without waiting a beat. 

“Oh.” Todd knows it’s a joke. “That’s, that’s too bad.” He stands up, holding his mathematics book up to his chest. Neil is smiling so he does too.

“I’m kidding. Promise.”

“Sure you are.” He meets Neil at the door. 

“You got a girl, Todd?”

For some reason, the question doesn’t surprise Todd. He wasn’t expecting it, sure, but it doesn’t surprise him. He doesn’t have a girl. Never needed one. Maybe wanted one is a better word. Todd did feel loneliness and on those days he did catch himself wondering about what it was like to be with another person. He did kiss someone in college during a somewhat adolescent-like game of spin-the-bottle. The girls lips had been dry and the kiss chaste, but it still happened. 

But unlike Charlie or Knox or, maybe Neil, Todd never wanted to marry or fall in love. He wrote of it plenty sure, but there was nothing physical in his life that was ever enough. No one that gave him that sort of soul-stirring after Neil Perry. 

“Why?” Todd tests him.

Neil shakes his head. They should leave the room, but they don’t. They stay planted in this doorway. “Knox got me thinking is all, talking about that girl.”

“Do you have one?” Todd asks, letting the words spill out, slurred together.

“No.” Neil gives him only that. “Think that’ll turn into anything?” He takes a step back in the conversation, back to Knox. “Knox and…and…what was her name?”

“Chris.” Todd replies. 

“Chris.” Neil repeats. 

“I don’t know,” Todd says. It’s not entirely honest, but he can’t count it as lying considering he doesn’t know what will change when this is all over. “Knowing Knox, I mean, um, for the day I have…” he says, a definite lie, “he says he has to see her. And he’s too stubborn to not try. Right?”

“Hit the nail right on the head, Anderson.”

Chapter Text

1 September, 1959. A quick Tuesday.

The second day of class, and the first of a new month, is unusably warm. It also passes uneventfully. One moment, Todd is holding a mug of black coffee to his lips like it’s life between his hands, the next it is replaced by a black tea that greets the nighttime kindly. Todd showers once the mug runs dry and says goodnight barely loud enough for Neil to hear it. He and Neil hold polite conversation when they can that day, though nothing is revealed to Todd that he did not already know about Neil.

However, Neil learns about Todd, as he is not aware he has lived and learned these things before. He learns that Todd likes black coffee and black tea and he holds hot cups with both of his hands, even if it’s warm out. He learns that Todd places his towel higher on his hips after he showers than another man might. He also learns that Todd’s breath comes out in a whistle when he sleeps.

Todd does find out one thing when he wakes up on the morning of September 2nd, something he had either forgotten or never knew. Neil can fall asleep with his glasses on. And they leave a soft imprint on his cheeks once removed with an annoyed mess of groggy hands.

2 September, 1959. Afternoon.

The third day of English class proves more interesting and memorable than the very ones before. Though better than their other classes, with less homework required, the first two days in Keating’s classroom, if thought about for too long, could be considered nothing more than introductions to the course and Keating asking questions that no one knew how to answer. Not that they were difficult questions. They just were not the sort of questions boys being trained to keep family riches and become doctors and bankers and lawyers could answer. 

“What is your goal in this class? Not what grade you want, your goal. What do you want to feel in this class?”

“Think about who you boys are as we start our poetry unit in the coming days. Who are your favorite poets? Do you have one? Mr. Anderson has mentioned that he likes Whitman. Is he your favorite?”

Todd nodded at this, but preferred not to say anything like he would be made fun of for it.

But on the third day of class, Todd does speak again, like he had done on the first day. It begins as only one word and it happens like this:

“Gentlemen,” Keating announces the second the final bell rings, “open your text to page twenty-one of the introduction.” He points to the books that sit, newly unwrapped and barely touched on the boys desks. “Mr. Perry,” he taps his hand against the wood of Neil’s desk, a questioning brow raised. “Will you read the opening paragraph of the preface entitled ‘Understanding Poetry.’”

Neil moves his head in a staccato nod, one that was usually reserved for his own father when given a direct order not meant to be fought against. He flips open his book and reads, keeping his place with the padding of his pointer finger. Even with his glasses, he leans forward in his seat, neck craning to see the writing.

“‘Understanding Poetry,’ by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D.” His voice cracks a minuscule bit on the word ‘doctor.’ There is a curse hidden between the consonants of the word, made especially for him. The unspoken artist in Neil reads but the future, the one of stethoscopes and codes, knows better. His fathers voice booms against the walls and shakes Walt Whitman’s photo: ‘An artist may be a content man, but he is also a poor man. A poor man is no better than a dead man.’ Can Todd hear this, too?

“To fully understand poetry,” Neil continues, “we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme, and figures of speech. Then, ask two questions-”

Is it possible to both hang on to every word someone says and not hear them at all? Todd hears the plucking of Neil’s vocal cords that result in the sounds coming out of his mouth and it is soothing, God-like. He hears Neil read the class the questions of artful poetry and the importance of objective in poetry but realizes other things, Neil begging under the descriptive words, ‘I am here, is this proof, can you hear me, I am here.”

“If the poem's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness.”

Keating draws out the graph on the board and lets the students copy it down without a word. And everyone does, except for Todd. Neil takes a breath, a break from speaking, when Todd interrupts with that one word.

“Wow.”

Somehow, the turn of everyone’s head facing Todd is louder than bullet trains, rocket ships, and atomic bombs. Even Keating stops drawing, his chalk coming to a screeching halt. He looks at Todd too, who is aware he’s interrupted and more aware that he will have to talk more to get out of this.

“Having some thoughts about Mr. Pritchard, Mr. Anderson?” Keating asks with true curiosity. He’s trying to save Todd from embarrassment by speaking before anyone can ask for themselves or laugh, though he can’t understand why Todd spoke in the first place. Todd isn’t sure himself, only coming to the conclusion that right then, right now, there was no better word to say.

“No! Um,” Todd is frozen, hand held in a fist and pulsing against his desk. “Yes, I mean. Um. I think so.”

Eloquence is not a frequent visitor and Todd’s house is always the last one it comes to.

“Go on.” Keating says, bowing his head. He sits on the ledge of his desk.

“I don’t get it.” Todd croaks. 

“Get what?” Again, no space for silence.

“Um…” Todd makes eye contact with Neil, whose lips are in a tight line. He nods, urging Todd to answer. He isn’t upset that Todd has interrupted. He looks a lot like Keating, inexplicably wondering about what Todd has to say. “It’s not fair, is all. The um, the um, rating thing.” Todd looks down at his shoes. One lace has fallen loose. “The scale. You can’t scale what makes a poem a good poem.” He shrugs. “Who’s to say what’s great and what isn’t?”

Keating's agreement comes so immediately, Todd almost believes he's become a victim of whiplash. “Mr. Anderson has made an excellent point. Who is to say what’s great and isn’t great? The people we say are great? Those we decided were intelligent?” He erases the unfinished graph on the board. “Excrement. That’s what I think of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard! We’re not laying pipes, boys. We’re talking about poetry. ”

Throughout all of his schooling, Todd could never quite grasp how John Keating was able to say things so plainly, so blunty, so crudely and, yet, so romantically. It isn’t enough explanation that he might have had a teacher like himself once. It isn’t enough to say that this was a natural occurrence. There had to be someone who had shown him what it meant to be a rough idealist. A girl, perhaps. Maybe.

Then, Todd’s hands are ripping out the pages of the introduction Neil had just read from. The whole room is. They’re roaring and cheering and throwing the crumpled pieces. Todd is just ripping. Even when Mr. McAllister interrupts, he’s ripping. Tearing, pulling apart, shredding. Whatever you want to call it, that’s what he’s doing. He’s sixteen and he’s destroying. But he’s building something at the same time, something he’s forgotten to nurture for the first time in ten years. (Childhood? Innocence?)

Keating tells them the book is no Bible, that they won’t go to hell for their demolition of the book, but Todd imagines it is anyways. Not exactly the Christian Bible, but a Bible nonetheless. A version of one that doesn’t even have to be called a Bible. There’s other books, other names. There’s beliefs in the book that he doesn’t agree with. He never had and he never will. 

“The casualties could be your hearts and souls.”

No one notices that Todd is the only one left in his seat when the other boys huddle up. That is, except Neil who, though hypnotized by Keatings words, stands hunched behind Todd’s desk. He closes Todd’s book, fingers pressed inside the blank space where the torn-out pages once were. Todd lets him. 

“ That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.”

That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.

Todd doesn’t see when Keating stands from his crouched space the others had surrounded. He stares directly at Todd and it’s that gaze he’s given Todd for three days now. It stings and is cognizant of something that Todd can’t say. But it knows.

“What will your verse be?”

Then, Keating looks at Neil, who is looking at Todd now, like he’s figured something out for himself too.

—

Neil and Todd are the last to leave the classroom. Even Keating has exited before them, waving them off with a reminder not to be late to their next class and a proud grin. When the door clicks shut, Neil is the first of the two to say anything.

“I can’t believe he came out of Hell-ton.”

Todd wants to laugh but it doesn’t come out. “Yeah. I can’t either.”

—

Neil misses dinner that night.

He’s done a bit of ‘missing’ things the past two, three days, but for the first time since they’d met, Neil had done so without Todd. Where Neil had been off to after racing out of History class with a mission, Todd didn’t know. He was left with only Charlie by his side at dinner and a bitter taste in his mouth.  Any worry he has, he swallows down with his tea.

What this missing had been for, Todd wouldn’t find out until he walked into his bedroom that night, face clean and hair combed out from the day's knots.

The room he had expected to be empty is crowded with friends, piled on Neil’s small bed with Neil himself sitting criss-crossed on the floor. He holds a book in his hands that he opens while saying “I found his senior annual in the library.” Neil says so with a certain smugness laced with elation.

“Whose?” Cameron asks. He sits next to Charlie, who answers without taking a breath.

“I would say it’s your mother’s but girls aren’t allowed at Welton.”

“Shut up! He said ‘his annual,’ asshole.”

“Okay, I’ll bite,” Charlie continues like Cameron hasn’t said anything at all. “She’s hiding in my room right now, but don’t tell anyone.” He holds his finger to his lips.

Cameron whines, “we share a room, genius. And I’m not afraid to lock you out of it.

Charlie imitates his whine, “Cam, if you need some alone time, you don’t have to lock me out! I’ll stay out, just ask. Try asking like this…” Charlie mockingly clears his throat, speaking his next words in an unserious, higher register. “ Charlie, please, can you stay out of our room for five minutes tonight? I need to-”

Cameron elbows Charlie hard in the ribcage, knocking the wind out of him. “Don’t finish that sentence! You’re so gross!”

Charlie flips him off, his free hand holding his wounded side. “Nothing is gross about human nature, but okay.”

“Guys!” Neil struggles not to laugh at the two. The rest of the group is howling in a fit of hysterics, hitting their hands against Neil’s comforter or whacking their knees like how a joke would end in a cartoon. Todd begins to laugh too, unable to help himself.

Neil’s attention snaps to the door. He beckons Todd in, looking between Todd and the book like he's deciding whether or not to toss the thing to the side and get to his feet. “Todd! Come in, come in! I was just telling them, I found Keating’s senior annual!” 

Todd steps inside and sits down on his own bed. Neil searches for a page and shows it to Todd before presenting it to the rest of the boys. “Listen to this: He was the captain of the soccer team, editor of the school annual, Cambridge bound, Thigh Man, and the Dead Poets Society.”

Cameron reads the one thing on Keating’s section that Neil had failed to point out. “Man Most Likely to Do Anything.”

Charlie’s interest piques. “Thigh Man? Mr. K was a hell-raiser!”

“What’s the Dead Poets Society?” Knox asks. He moves from his area of Neil’s bed and stands to stretch out his legs. Once done, he joins Todd on his much more free bed without asking. Todd doesn’t mind, though he does press himself closer to the wall. Not out of discomfort towards Knox, but discomfort towards saying anything about the Dead Poets that would mess this up. That would mess with what's supposed to happen next.

“Are there any pictures in the annual?” Meeks asks.

“I don’t know what it is! But there’s nothing, no other mention of it.” Neil’s combined disappointment and want for answers come out needy and callow. “I wanna ask him about it.” He shuts the book and shoves it under his bed, where it will live until Neil has the chance to return it. 

“Sounds like a secret thing,” Gerard says, “if there’s no pictures.”

“And if no one else has it listed.” Knox agrees. “Maybe it’s a club?”

“But if it’s a school club, it can’t be that secret, right?” Cameron, a stickler for the rules only if it affects him, attempts to keep his hope that someone teaching them wouldn’t actually have been a troublemaker in school.

“We’re just guessing, Cam.” Charlie lightly hits him on the shoulder. It’s teasing, though meant to make him feel better. “Let’s ask him about it after class tomorrow. When everyone’s gone.”

“Sounds good to me.” Neil responds and everyone murmurs in agreement. He opens his mouth to remark on Todd’s not-meant-to-be terrified expression, whose body is flat against the corner of his wall. But, Neil doesn’t say anything, possibly deciding that it was better not to. Not yet, anyways.

Todd couldn’t agree more.

—-

“So, what do you think?” Neil asks Todd once curfew hits and the other boys go to their respective bedrooms. Neil lies on his bed, still in his day clothes and over the covers. He’s wide awake. Todd, who’s been yawning for an hour now, is dressed appropriately for bed and under his blanket.

“What do I think?” Todd's eyes are closed.

“About this Dead Poets Society. What do you think it is?”

“Hm.” Todd hums. He thinks a lot, actually, about the Dead Poets Society. Not what it is, was, but about it. How it changed him for the better and forced him out of his shy, stupor state and made him braver. Though he would eventually go back to his nervous ways, as the valor of high school didn’t last forever. He was still thankful for it, of course, for the moments. As they came from the Dead Poets Society. And it was what he had of Neil.

But he also thinks (is sure) that a whole lot of pain comes from the Dead Poets Society as well. Not the sort that would stop his joining, but the sort that would make him more cautious of the world around him. The sort that would make him search for answers of how to save Neil in the walls of the cave. In the crows feet fanning out of Keating’s eyes when he smiles. In the green walls and yellow lighting of the study room.

He thinks about the Dead Poets Society and how Neil has to be a part of it. He has to feel and learn some more and Todd does, too. More than last time.

“I’m not sure what I think.” He settles on that answer. 

“I hope it’s something cool.”

“It will be.”

Chapter Text

3 September 1959.

John Keating notices something is going on between a group of his students when they stay after class that Thursday. He starts whistling out his usual tune of the ‘ Overture of 1812’ as he packs up his things so he may leave the classroom and attend to other business. He stops the song when he realizes that the boys are not packing up with him.

“Gentlemen.” He says. “You will be late for your next class if you’re not off soon.”

“We have a question.” Neil responds.

“Ah.” Keating starts up his whistling again. He holds his briefcase with such trust in his fingers, though it looks like it may slip from his grasp at any moment. He heads for the door and promptly exits without so much as a glance towards the boys.

“What the hell!” Cameron says, looking to the door that Keating had left open. It’s an invitation they aren’t aware of yet. “He just left!”

“Yeah,” Todd is the first to take the invitation. “He left.” He rushes out the door.

Neil goes after him, shouting “what are you all still sitting for! Let’s follow him.” Whether Neil is talking about Mr. Keating or Todd is not clear.

Whichever it is, the rest of the group does what they are told. For a moment, the hall is filled with boys pushing past their peers, calling for their teacher through grit teeth that attempt to be respectful of those around them. Although, the harsh shoulder checks and accidental tripping of others does little to help them.

“Mr. Keating? Mr. Keating? Sir? May we ask you something?” Neil is disappointed when Keating refuses to turn back. He’s only a few paces ahead of them, unaffected by the students around them as they part as he walks by. He teasingly presses the tip of his finger in his ear like he might have heard Neil say something and an abundance of ear wax had stopped him from hearing exactly what.

Then, Todd speaks and Neil does, too. They say the same thing.

“Oh, Captain, my Captain?”

And Keating halts, spinning around on his heels. He’s heard exactly what he had wanted. The way he is beaming says three things.

One, I expected this.

Two, I can’t say I’m not pleased, anyways.

And Three. Todd, you too?

Keating’s mouth, however, does not verbalize any of these things.

“We looked through your old annual.” Neil says before Keating can turn away again.

“I wouldn’t call myself old. I will say books age at an astonishingly faster rate than humans do.” Keating takes a second to ponder this new thought. He slowly nods his head. “So, if you’re saying ‘old annual’ to call the book itself old, you are correct. If that is the case.”

“Of course.” Neil breathes out. He grins so wide that his cheeks puff out and his eyes close. “Oh! Our question,” he motions to his friends, “is: what was the Dead Poets Society?”

The words hit Keating’s ears and the expectant look on his face becomes more hesitant. Not because he didn’t know what he was about to be asked, but he now has to consider how to word his response. Todd believes Keating must be thinking like him. He had once expected to hear those words, Dead Poets Society , for the last time. Back when things were different and evidence was a lot harder to keep track of. Back when there was more to say about less things and less to do about the bigger things.

Back when time only ever went forward.

“I don’t…” He pauses, mouth closing before something could spill out. He looks to see if anyone is listening to them, but the hall that was full moments ago has become empty in seconds. Everyone else has made their way to class before risking being late. He dissolves some of the space between him and the students in front of him. His voice is a lot softer than before when he speaks again. “Administration would not look too favorably upon starting that up again.”

“Why not?” Neil jumps onto the end of his sentence.

“Is it a bad thing?” Todd asks on top of Neil’s sentence. Keating steps back and tries to hide the fact that he does by taking a large stride forward. 

“No.” He says, strict and serious. “God, no, not at all. It’s not a bad thing.” Keating focuses on Todd for a brief moment to guarantee him that he is telling the truth. He lowers his shoulders, his posture becoming poor and a lot like a young boy’s and whispers, “Can you boys keep a secret?”

Instead of just one or two indications that they could, Keating receives seven enthusiastic affirmation’s and several promises that would keep Keating’s secret no matter what.

“The Dead Poets Society,” Keating begins, “were dedicated to sucking the marrow out of life.” He chuckles like he’s remembering something never worth forgetting in the first place. “That’s a phrase from Thoreau,” he explains, “that we’d invoke at the beginning of each meeting. You see…we’d gather at the old Indian cave and take turns reading from Thoreau, Whitman, Shelley; the biggies. When feeling particularly rhythmic, we’d read some Shakespeare. When feeling proud, we’d read our own verse,” Keating winks and Todd convinces himself that he's only seeing things. The wink was not aimed at him.

“And in the enchantment of the moment, we would let poetry work its magic.”

The monologue does nothing to rouse up Knox, who expresses his feelings first. “You mean it’s a bunch of guys…sitting around and reading poetry? That’s nothing!”

“Nothing, Mr. Overstreet?” Keating, disappointed, shakes his head. “Reading poetry is not nothing. And we were not just ‘guys,’ we were romantics. True ones, at that.” He fixes his stance with such intent he looks taller than before he had slouched. His broad shoulders tense up, matching the intensity of his feelings towards the Dead Poets. 

“We didn’t just read poetry. We let it drip from our tongues like honey. Every feeling we had was put into words before the emotions we had could boil over and spill from our hearts. Spirits soared, women swooned, and Gods were created, gentlemen.” 

The bell rings and they’re all late for class. No one jumps to move, standing frozen in the barren halls of Welton. There’s a sense of danger speaking of this secret out loud, a small sample of the adrenaline the actual club would give them. 

And Todd realizes that this is the conversation that’s connected the seven of them and John Keating forever. It’s the old and new words that would make it impossible for Todd to ever look at any one of them ten years from now and feel absolutely nothing. And right now, Todd feels everything. He always did and he always would. No matter what. 

“Not a bad way to spend an evening, huh, gentlemen?” Keating so endearingly returns Todd to the room. “Now, get to class and tell your teacher I kept you late for an extra assignment. Thank you for this trip down memory lane.”

Then, Keating starts whistling again. He turns his back on the group and continues to walk wherever he was going. 

Keating is barely out of sight when Neil says “Let’s go tonight.”

—

After a lot of complaining from Cameron, promises that can’t for sure be kept, and begging, Neil whines just enough to get everyone to agree to trying out the Dead Poets Society.

Charlie takes the least amount of convincing. He’s on board for anything if Neil is there. It helps a lot that this club reeks of rebellion. He says he’ll be there before Neil can finish asking.

Cameron’s only real concern is expulsion. He had spent all of History and soccer practice reminding them all that being expelled was a very real possibility and that they would never get into the Ivy Leagues if that happened. He finally agrees to join after Charlie calls him a scaredy-cat.

“Stop being such a scaredy-cat, Cam.”

“WHAT! I am not being a-, you can’t call me-, fine I’m going.”

Steven Meeks was on board, as long as Gerard was. Meeks had explained that he did not want Gerard’s grades to become worse if they wasted good studying time on a club that was not sanctioned by the school administration. Neil promises him that the club will act as a secondary study group and, though unsure of the logistics of how that works, both Meeks and Gerard agree to test the club out.

Neil does not ask Todd if he’ll be joining until towards the end of dinner time. They’re alone, as the others have left to wash up. Neil scoots himself close to Todd, his chair scraping against the floor. He either does not notice the horrid sound that this comes with or he does not care.

“You’re coming tonight, right?”

It’s amusing to Todd that Neil only asks him this when they’re alone. Neil’s always done that, Todd thinks, asked him the big things only if he can answer without the fear of someone else hearing.

There’s a tugging feeling in his stomach and chest. “I want to, I do.”

“Great!” Neil says, lowering his head so that he can look up at Todd, who’s staring at his almost empty plate of steamed vegetables and mashed potatoes. “I was nervous you weren’t going to.”

“You were?” Todd’s head pops up and Neil copies the movement so he can still look at him. 

“Yeah! You weren’t saying anything when Cameron was talking about being expelled. Don’t let him get in your head, we won’t get-”

“I’m not worried about that, Neil.” He knows they won’t get caught, as long as they’re as careful as they were before. Last time. But Neil is looking for an answer to Todd’s silence that he can’t explain without saying “I know everything that’s going to happen and I don’t feel like I need to say much except when I think it might change something.”

How could he ever explain, even when this is over, that he’s sixteen again and feeling all the fears that he thought he nipped in the bud years ago? That the feelings feel like he never accepted them and yet is experiencing only a recollection of them? He is supposed to be afraid but he isn’t. 

“Is there anything you’re worried about?” Neil asks. His hand reaches out and rests on Todd’s. 

“I don’t think I’m ready to read out loud.” Todd blurts out the second he feels the touch, like he’s short-circuited and Neil’s hand has cut the wire that makes things explode. But it’s a good explosion. Any touch Todd can get is good. It’s a reminder Neil is here. He wants to enjoy it selfishly.

“Oh?” Neil says, his hand not moving from its spot. “Who said you had to read?”

“We-Well…” Todd stammers, “Am I aloud to just come and listen?”

“Yes!” Neil answers, “of course you can. Gosh, I should’ve known not everyone would wanna read out loud. You’ve got a real problem with that, don’t you?” 

Todd lets himself become defensive. “No! I don’t. I, um, I just don’t want to, is all.”

“Okay,” Neil accepts the answer, glad Todd has admitted this to him. He removes his hand with one final reassuring press of his palm against the back of Todd’s own. “I’ll let the others know.”

—

Neil does let the other boys know that Todd will not be reading any poetry. Todd is not told how they respond to the silliness of Neil’s request to let poor, poor Todd only listen that night. If they do reply with criticisms, Todd is glad to never hear of it. When their curfew is called, Neil shows Todd that Keating had given him a book in passing that evening after dinner. He instantly recognizes it as ‘Five Centuries of Verse.’ 

He also shows Todd the aged writing of Keating's on the opening page of the book. The ink is lighter than it likely was when it was first written, but the dark cursive hits Todd’s eyes like the neon lights of a sign in the city. 

‘To Be Read At the Opening of D.P.S. Meetings.’

‘I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately.

I wanted to live deep and suck out all of the marrow of life!

To put to rout all that was not life

And not, when I come to die, discover that I had not lived.’

After Todd reads this, he and Neil pull on their cloaks and, together, they exit their bedroom.

—-

Running without care through open fields and woods you hardly know remind Todd of being six years old, not sixteen or twenty-six. It’s sweet and the trees are full of leaves that have already cycled through phases of greens and reds and oranges and yellows. Autumn lives in these woods now like it’s never left and even in the dark, dark, darkness, Todd can see it. The nocturnal melody of owls hooting pangs against their ear drums. Bugs and frogs and mushrooms crawl near their feet. There is a cold nip of night on their necks.

Charlie finds the cave first and says so through chattering teeth.

The group gathers hopefully into the cave and try to combat their chilled bones with a fire that does nothing but fill the space with smoke. It travels up to an opening at the pinnacle of the cave. While the smoke does this, the boys bite and inhale the smoke like it’s coming from a cigarette they can get a rush of a nicotine chill from.

Once the vapor has dissipated, Neil opens the meeting by lighting a real cigarette with an old metal box of a lighter. He’s kept both of these things in his pocket and laughs when he’s booed for doing so without telling. 

“Let’s go, gentlemen.” He takes a drag and passes it to Todd, who does the same. 

Neil’s shadow projects against the wall of the cave. It makes him look big and important and kinglike. He opens the ‘Five Centuries of Verse’ text and proudly states “I hereby reconvene the Dead Poets Society.”

The group cheers, Todd doing so with a huge enthusiasm that makes Charlie reach over and shake him by the shoulders. It’s so familiar and friendly. It’s brotherly like Todd never had. Any fear about being made fun of for not wanting to read tonight  dissolves.

“The meetings will be conducted by myself and the other new initiates now present.” Neil continues. “I’ll now read the traditional opening message by society member Henry David Thoreau.” Neil looks around for approval and, when Charlie motions him on with a wave of his hand, he reads  "I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life."

“I second that.” Charlie says.

Neil, though trying to remain serious, giggles at Charlie as he says “To put to rout all that was not life, and not, when I had come to die, discover I had not lived.” Neil bows his head once finished and the boys whistle and holler, impressed with Neil’s confidence in starting the meeting. 

Then, they take what Charlie calls an intermission to share their spoils of stolen food from the dining halls and cigarettes once stored in the secret compartments of their suitcases.

Once the shares are divided and their stomachs are satisfied with midnight snacks, the group delves into storytelling antics, ones that are meant to be terrifying and spine-tingling. But they don’t come off that way at all.

The only line Neil says that really, truly makes Todd shiver is when he says:

“There…the face of a demented madman at the window.”

‘Sweaty-toothed madman.’

Had Todd known, remembered that Neil had said this before that day he wrote that poem in Keating’s classroom? Is this where the descriptor of ‘madman’ came from? Maybe it was never in the portrait of Walt Whitman, but an echoing of what Neil had heard and relayed to them this day. Neil is always in his poems, isn't he? Buried somewhere in holes that were never quite filled right?

It’s been minutes since Neil had finished his story now. Cameron is saying something that everyone is reacting to with annoyance. But, Todd can’t make out what it is. Gerard is reading a poem from the book but Todd can hear nothing but the rhythm of poetry reflecting off the walls of the cave. Not words or rhymes, but a rhythm that beats after his heart. When the attention of the cave is on Charlie and he’s showing that lewd magazine centerfold, Todd thinks he might be laughing. 

And, like it had been hours before, Neil’s hand is suddenly on his.

“Hey.” Is what Neil says. "You all right?

“I think I have a poem I want to read.” Is how Todd responds. The words pass his lips and he’s already regretting letting them. “If that’s okay.”

“You do?” Knox asks.

“All right, Anderson!” Charlie cheers.

“One from the book?” Responds Cameron.

“No.” Todd answers Cameron. “No, not from the book,” Todd says with conviction, but he isn’t actually sure. “Well, it might be. But I have it memorized.”

“Of course it’s okay! When did you memorize a poem?” Neil asks. He looks at him like Todd just said he was actually Ernest Hemmingway in disguise or he ghost wrote all of Shakespeare's thirty-seven plays. He didn’t. All he did was memorize a poem. But he can’t say he memorized it four years from now.

“Once. I don’t know.”

“Get up there, then!” Neil retracts his hand and moves to the side, leaving Todd with plenty of space to stand up.

Todd does. When everyone is staring at him with bated breath, he explains “It’s a Walt Whitman one. It’s called ‘Whoever You are Holding Me Now in Hand.’”

The cave fills with the sound of snapping. Neil keeps snapping for much longer than the others. Todd wonders if Neil’s doing this because he’s trying to calm him down by showing that everyone’s excited for him. Or, if he’s doing so because he wants to be the last sound in the room Todd hears. Whichever it is, Todd thinks he feels better.

“Whoever you are holding me now in hand, Without one thing all will be useless, I give you fair warning before you attempt me further, I am not what you supposed, but far different.” The intended meaning of the poem differs from what Todd thinks he wants it to mean. Here, Whitman is talking to someone he doesn’t know. The reader. And Todd is talking to, well, maybe everyone in the cave. Maybe one person and maybe no one at all. Himself. 

His eyes shut somewhere during the lines and he’s already not too sure he can finish. His fists are balled up at his sides. He says “who is he that would become my follower? Who would sign himself a candidate for my, um, my affections?”

Todd practically skips the entirety of the next verse and says only this: “The way is suspicious, the result uncertain, perhaps destructive…the whole past theory of your life and all conformity to the lives around you would…” he breathes in, “would have to be abandoned.”

Todd tries to continue. He really does but his mouth won’t let him. It doesn’t sound like he’s saying the poem for a group anymore because Neil is staring at him so intently. The poem means nothing to him, to Neil, in all actuality. But he’s listening like it does. Like Todd didn’t, deep down, pick it for a reason. 

“I don’t…I don’t remember the rest.”

Todd had anticipated something other than the loud cheers and clapping he receives in the cave, but his heart leaps when he hears it anyways. There would be no reason to be mad at Todd for not remembering the poem he said he had memorized, even if it is a poor excuse to get out of this situation he placed himself in. He smiles, happy, happy, happy.

Neil asks him if he wants to leave. When he insists that he does not, Neil does not press further. He also does not let the boys sit in their newfound silence, and is quick to offer a distraction from Todd. He turns the attention onto himself by reading a poem. 

In his poem, Neil says lines like “Tis not too late to seek a newer world” and “we are made weak by time and fate, but strong in will.”

Todd thinks Neil doesn’t know how true that is.

Chapter Text

10, September 1959.

“My brood of grown and part-grown tough boys accompanying me,

Who love to be with no one else so well as they love to be with me,

By day to work with me, and by night to sleep with me.

Onward we move, a gay gang of blackguards!”

-’Friendship and Loving Touch,’ Walt Whitman

The week that follows the first meeting of the born-again Dead Poets Society is one that only boys of possibly sixteen or seventeen can understand.

The group leaves that cave and, when you leave a place, it is expected that you leave older than you once were. Time has passed. You are supposedly older and wiser than the you that entered. But, these seven friends of sixteen or seventeen leave the cave, officially closing the first meeting of their Dead Poets Society, and they must be impossibly younger than what they say. They skip. They laugh. They roll in the grass fields.

There must be something about male friendships that causes you to be younger than the official number. In male friendships, you experience life in a constant adolescence where girls are not permitted. Boys stare aging in her alluring eyes and do not fear it; to develop is nothing when there are friends by your side experiencing it too.

And they all experience it, those seven, that entire week and onward.

They experience it when Neil runs out of that cave and clicks his heels. He dances through the dim-lit halls of Welton, kicking his feet and throwing up his hands. Everyone shushes him, Todd staring at him with his big brown eyes, and even that doesn’t force Neil to let up. He’s laughing and, eventually, his friends are laughing with him.

They experience it when Cameron falls asleep during their study hall session that Monday night. Charlie pokes Cameron’s cheek with the eraser-end of a pencil. Cameron awakens and Charlie (with the most mischievous grin) tells him that he is going to be late for class. Cameron bolts out the room with a cry, only to return with an annoyed scowl. He had only been asleep for about five minutes. The small hand on the clock had hardly crossed over the 10.

Todd thinks it’s probably the funniest thing to happen in years.

They experience it on the tenth of September when they slide into their desk in John Keating’s classroom.

“Good afternoon, boys.” Keating introduces them to the second half of their day, kicking a crumpled piece of paper on the floor towards the trash can by his desk. “Today, we will be discussing poetry!” He pauses like he’s waiting for the thunderous applause, but no one gives it to him. The only sound heard is a snort from a boy in the back of the class.

Keating sighs dramatically. “Yes, Yes. I can tell you are surprised by the look on your depressing mugs. Another day of,” he lowers his tone of voice and dons a particularly good British accent, “Poetry, which utters universal truth! Poetry, which demands a man with a touch of madness to him!” Another pause and another silence. “Ah, no one here has read from Aristotle’s ‘Poetics,’ hm? Mr. Pitts?”

Gerard shakes his head. “No! I haven’t read it. Yet.”

“Yet!” Keating parrots. “I wouldn’t be bothered, Mr. Pitts, I would throw the book away altogether given the chance. Listen-” He speedwalks to the front of the room and stops when he’s behind his desk. The tips of his fingers rest against the cover of a book on the tabletop. “Let’s take a page from my own book.”

“You have a book!” Cameron exclaims without raising his hand. He vocalizes some odd combination of screaming and gasping, throwing that unused hand over his mouth.

“Yes!” Keating answers, unbothered by Cameron’s inability to speak with permission. Like he has forgotten what he had gone behind his desk for, Keating travels back into the sea of teenagers sitting before him. “However, it is not physical. It is mental, as all books start.” He taps his pointer finger against his skull three times. “In my book, it says we write poetry to do what? Anyone? No? C’mon, boys!” His swift speed has evolved into a slow stroll. “To understand poetry means to understand why it is written in the first place. Why do we write poetry?”

“For fun.” Charlie answers sarcastically

“No!” Keating says, glad only because someone attempted to answer at all. “Sure, poetry writing can be for fun, but we do not write it because it is fun. His fists clench and pulse together like a heartbeat. He releases the tension and lets himself smile. “We write poetry to describe ! We use language in ways unthought us, let me reiterate, we use language! Use it!

Keating circles his hands around each other as he wanders. “For example, a man is not very tired, he is exhausted. ” He explains, standing above Todd’s desk. “And don’t use very sad, use-” He snaps in Knox’s direction. “Come on, Overstreet, you twerp!”

Knox picks the first word he can think of. “Morose?”

“Exactly! Morose!” Keating tests the word like he won’t know the meaning unless he uses it himself. “We use language to describe and what was language developed for? Well, it was developed for one endeavor and that is?” He looks down at Todd. “Mr. Anderson? Come on, are you a man or an amoeba?”

Keating asks him the same question he had ten years ago, but it is said differently than the first time. Now. Ten years ago and now, it’s softer. There’s less force to the words and said more like a poem to a friend than a student. The right answer is fogged somewhere in Todd’s mind behind the thoughts of ‘Oh, God, he wants me to answer. What’s the answer? I remember it. Ah, no I don't. Is he still here?’

But Keating has moved onto Neil Perry. He doesn’t give Keating the answer he’s looking for either and Todd hears it ring in his ears: to woo women.

And Todd is groaning far before Keating says that their focus over the next few weeks would be on the works of William Shakespeare.

It isn’t that Todd really likes or hates Shakespeare. He hadn’t been to any live performances since Neil, but he had studied it enough in college to know more than the basics. Keating had been right about it though, Shakespeare was far more interesting when done by people like Marlon Brando and John Wayne and Neil Perry.

And John Keating, of course.

—-

“God, I’m no good at writing poetry.” Neil enters his and Todd’s bedroom without a ‘hello’ to spare. Their long day of classes and a never-ending hour of soccer practice had tired Todd out. He had escaped to his bed long before Neil had been done for the day. Neil, who was still full of energy, walked with a bounce to his step and a shake of his hands. One of these shaky hands holds a piece of paper, bent where Neil grips it between his palm and fingers.

Todd doesn’t have to ask to know exactly what it is.

Todd is listening to Neil talk, but it does not look like he is. His head is down and he’s writing as fast as his hand will allow into his notebook. This writing of Todd’s and qualms of Neil’s are due to John Keating assigning not only an essay on Tennyson, but an original poem to be read aloud to the class that coming Monday.

“I’m sure your poem will be good, Neil.” Todd responds. He squints his eyes like he can’t read his own writing, but he really just hates what he reads.

Neil positions himself onto the edge of Todd’s bed. “That’s it though, Todd! I don’t want to be good, I wanna be great! And…” He shoves the paper he had been protectively holding onto in Todd’s direction. “I found what I could be great at.” 

Todd’s head shoots right up and his pencil stops writing. Okay. These are dangerous waters to tread. Printed on this piece of paper is the night that leads to the end of Neil Perry. Todd knows he won’t stop Neil and he doesn’t want to. He wants to support Neil now more than ever. But, there are still facts likely locked into time that have to be stated and questions that have to be asked. If Todd wants to be careful, if he wants Neil’s safety, he has to ask them. Avoiding the hard questions is a death sentence.

“You found…what?” He doesn’t look down at the paper.

“What I wanna do right now, look!” Neil’s excitement takes over any proper explanation. “What’s really, really inside me.” He raises the piece of paper to Todd’s line of sight so he’ll read it.

Auditions: A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’

“You’re gonna…audition?” Todd reaches for the paper. It’s warm like it’s just been printed, but with how carelessly Neil had handled it the page looks days old. He sets it down with his notebook.

“They’re putting it on at Henley Hall. Open tryouts.” Neil repeats himself for emphasis. “Open tryouts!” He pounds his open palm against Todd’s mattress then leaps up, pulling the blanket off of Todd’s bed. The motion makes Todd’s notebook, the audition notice, and his mess of ripped out sheets littered with failures of writing fly away from him.

While Todd tries to gather his things back up, Neil wraps the blanket around his shoulders. He stands with his legs spread equal to his shoulders and his chest puffed. He looked like a king, the blanket like a cape. All he is missing is a crown. But, if Todd squints like he had at his writing, he can almost imagine it’s there.

“I’m gonna act,” Neil says, throwing the blanket back at Todd. Todd catches the bunched up mound of cloth in his hands. Or, he tries too. It’s far too much fabric so the blanket explodes out and falls against Todd’s lap. “I’m gonna be an actor! God, ever since I can remember I’ve wanted to try this!”

“Really?” Todd asks.

“Yes, really, dummy!” Neil drops to his knees, sitting between his and Todd’s bed. He inches closer to Todd as he speaks, voice coming out synonymous to a deep breath. “I tried to go to summer stock auditions last year but, of course, my father wouldn’t let me.” He whispers, admitting this to not only Todd, but himself. “For the first time in my whole life, I know what I wanna do.

The pile of papers Todd had put together after Neil had stolen his blanket turns out to be collected for no reason, as Neil stretches his arm out to grab them. He tosses them into the air and cheers as the white pages fall around them like snow. This snow isn’t soft. It cuts and scratches and makes you bleed. It is snow tainted by words Todd Anderson can’t suitably write. But both Todd and Neil feel untouchable. 

“What do you think?” Neil asks as the moment passes. The loud chaoticism of snow and paper had quieted. It was only them. Only Todd and Neil. And Neil wanted, needed, to hear Todd’s opinion.

“What do you think?”

It’s the third time Todd has to think about exactly what he’s thinking about the day. The first is when Keating asked him ‘ man or amoeba’ and the second was at the end of Keating’s class. He had asked his students to look at his classroom in a new way. This wasn’t Todd’s favorite memory he had from Keating’s class, though Todd will admit that reliving it was a lot less scary than experiencing it for the first time. However, his nervousness towards standing in front of everyone on the desk had been replaced by something much scarier. The question: ‘ What do you think?’

‘Don’t just consider what the author thinks. Consider what you think.’

And now, the third time.

Well, what did Todd think? He thinks a lot of things about a lot of things. He thinks that he’s nervous about this poetry assignment. He thinks that he’s scared. He thinks that auditioning for a play sounds like the bravest thing he could ever think of. Todd must say this out loud because Neil is nodding at him like he’s encouraging him to keep talking. The support from Neil, as it always does, knocks the wind out of him.

And Todd thinks that he wants Neil to feel that way, too. Like Todd supports him with such an openness that breathing air becomes a second thought. He thinks that ten years from now he lives in quiet desperation for someone. He thinks that he has constantly been begging for his life to become something he can be proud of without knowing how to make it that way.

He thinks that he wouldn’t mind if his life stays in the mundane ten years from now, as long as Neil is there to ask him what he thinks.

“I think you should do it.”

“Yeah?” Neil pushes forward on his heels. His arms rest against Todd’s bed and almost touch Todd’s knees.

“Y-Yeah. Yes.” Todd nods. He lets out a breath so small it’s almost a whistle. “Are you gonna tell your father?”

“No.” Neil shakes his head, retreating back by flattening his feet against the floor. “Not until I get the part. But, as far as I’m concerned,” he stands up, “my father won’t have to know about any of this.”

“Nothing feels impossible to you…does it?”

“What do you mean, Todd? Nothing’s impossible!”

Todd smiles splittingly wide as the words leave Neil’s mouth. It’s so like Neil to not be worried about the smaller possibilities and the questions he would never give more than a single second worth of thought to. Or, he is really good at pretending to not be worried. Todd is envious. But Neil would be too, in the other’s shoes.

There’s an upper hand in both knowing the future and not. Both are a curse and both mean everything. And Todd is smiling because of it. Because of Neil.

“What are you smiling at?” Neil says. He also smiles, gentler and wondering.

Todd tilts his head, ignoring the question. “Are you going to tell the others?”

“Hm.” Neil doesn’t quite ponder the thought, though gives the impression that he had thought of this already. “I haven’t gotten the part yet, so there’s nothing to tell.”

“Are you going to tell them you're auditioning?” Todd rephrases his inquiry, but Neil knew what he meant.

“I like the idea of no one knowing,” Neil answers. “I can keep the idea to myself for a while and enjoy it. Before I get the part or not, I can imagine I have it anyways.” There’s a faraway look in Neil’s eyes, but he’s more present than ever in front of Todd. “I don’t want to get everyone all excited just to not get cast.”

“You told me, though.”

“Hm?”

“You said you like the idea of no one knowing,” Todd says, “but you told me.”

“Yeah, well…you’re different, not no one. I like you knowing.”

‘I like you. I like you. I like you.’ 

It’s seventy-five  percent of the phrase and Todd’s favorite part. The part that matters. The part that makes his chest ache for some reason. To hear someone say ‘I like you’ and know that they mean it is incomparable to anything else. And Neil means it. To tell someone you like them, in Todd’s mind, is to tell them you see them.

The room is silent now, save for the rustling of Todd throwing the blanket off of himself and reaching for his forgotten notebook. He writes, small and hidden in the margins: ‘I like you knowing.’

“You coming to the meeting this afternoon?” Neil asks, watching Todd write.

“Yeah, I am.”

“Good.” Neil stands towards the window now. He purposely kicks the furnace before walking away from it and perching on his own bed. “I’ve been thinking about the first meeting all week now, I guess. And, you know, Keating is always preaching about being stirred up by things that matter. I think the group really, really matters.”

“You do?”

“Yeah! Yes, God, and you were stirred up by something, weren’t you?” Neil’s hands form claws and he reaches for something that isn’t there near his chest. “That’s why you read when you said you weren’t going to, right? Will you read again tonight?”

After going on about being asked what he thinks all day, Todd had not thought about that. He was stirred up last week, but not because of anything Keating had really said. He knows that. But how can you say ‘I read when I said I wouldn’t and I think it might be because you touched my hand and I think every poem I write has you in it but I don’t know what everything being because of you means.’

“I don’t know.” Todd decides.

“What do you know?”

“What?”

“Exactly what I said.” Neil repeats, “what do you know?”

“What do you mean, what do I know?”

“What do you know?” 

Their conversation goes in circles and Neil knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s getting under Todd’s skin in this teasing way. It delights him. He takes the opportunity, while Todd sits in his confusion, to grab Todd’s notebook out of his hands. Todd yelps, but Neil is off already, running across the room.

“Neil!” Todd springs up after him. “Give that back!” His face reddens. He should have seen this coming. The idea of Neil seeing what he’s written greatly embarrasses him. But the pit in his stomach lurches him forward despite it. The two of them race around the room, jumping from bed to bed. 

Neil screams with laughter as he tries to read from the book. “Let me reach into my chest and squeeze the- Oh!” He figures out what he’s reading. “It’s poetry!” 

Todd’s hand swipes for the book, landing on Neil’s shoulder. 

“Ah!” Neil responds to the touch. “I’m being chased by Walt Whitman! Help!” 

When they land on Todd’s bed, Neil almost hits the wall, dropping the notebook. Todd is satisfied, picking it up when the door flies open and Cameron comes into view. 

“What are you guys doing!” He says, lifting up his Chemistry workbook. “Some of us are trying to- Hey!” Cameron gets forced into Neil’s antics, as Neil snatches the book from him and takes off running. Todd follows and Cameron takes the invitation, joining. Now the three of them, Neil, Todd, and Cameron, are sprinting around the room.

“Come on, Neil, I need that!”

Charlie, who must have followed Cameron, replaces him in the doorway. He laughs, waving his hands around to get Neil’s attention. “Hey! Give it to me!

Neil tosses it to him and Charlie mimics the toss to Todd, who catches what Charlie is proposing. The three of them exclude Cameron, throwing the book between each other. It’s horribly, amazingly pandemonius. They shout, squeal, and banter, Todd's laughter combining with Charlie’s, who has found a set of bongos to play an off-beat tune on. Neil blows air into a recorder. The music that plays is awful and so, so boyish.

Soon, the chase and horseplay has to stop. There’s a crowd of boys watching them and, if they continue for too long, a teacher is bound to see. So, they stop. Cameron holds a hand to his chest, catching his breath. He does get his Chemistry work back from Charlie, who soothingly pats him on the back.

Neil and Todd both end up on Neil’s bed. Their legs are tangled together, but neither of them move apart. Neither Charlie nor Cameron say anything about it. The two of them sit together on Todd’s bed. And they sit like that for a long time, the four of them, and continue to say nothing. Because they don’t have to.

Chapter Text

10 September, 1959. The Second Meeting of the Dead Poets

There is such soundness in the beauty of having seconds. That is what Todd learns from the second meeting of the Dead Poets. Whether it be the seconds counted on a clock, a second try, or a second time: it didn’t matter. Beauty was bound to appear.

Todd counts the seconds.

Charlie is reading a Tennyson piece from ‘Five Centuries of Verse.’ He speaks low and intently, like he’s convincing himself of the verse in his hands. “I feel it,” he says, “when I sorrow most: ‘Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’

While Charlie reads, Neil’s hand has snaked its way to Todd, where it often is these days. It feels natural and it is.

Todd counts the seconds until his hand moves away. 34, 35, 36…

Tonight, it takes a whole 256 seconds for Neil to squeeze Todd’s hand and pull away gently. It feels like an apology when he does, but Todd doesn’t try to keep the contact.

Then, Todd tries for a second time.

He makes an attempt to read a poem out loud, like he had one week ago at the first Dead Poets meeting. As soon as he says he wants to try, Neil excitedly shoves the book into his hands.

“There, Toddy, pick something out of here.” No risk of forgetting the words when they’re printed right in front of you.

Todd nods at Neil, breath caught between his vocal cords and the question “is the book warm because it’s leather-bound? Is the horribly mediocre fire Charlie keeps nursing to life? Or is it warm because you touched it?” If it is the third option, if the book holds the heat of Neil’s hands, Todd will have to take a moment to retain his balance. The thought threatens to knock him over and catch him on the pages of poetry; hook, line, and sinker.

Because it’s so mercurial, it is, connecting yourself, by hand, to the same book spine your friend has. There’s a celestial promise in the comfort of human grazing, one that runs just as deep as holding hands. There is a communication unnamed and only described by Todd wanting to ask Neil if he feels the lingering, too.

And Todd reads, for the second time. It’s John Keats and he’s written something good about fear and the magical hand of chance and unreflecting love, love, love.

Whatever that might mean.

Finally, Todd hears something for the second time.

The Dead Poets have made their way back to their respective bedrooms. The open window in Todd’s room lets in a wind that blows like a death rattle under the singing crickets. And, for a second time, Neil gives Todd a proposition. The very same proposition he had given Todd on their first day at Welton Academy nearly two weeks ago. It’s after eleven o’clock and Neil asks Todd if he would like to go exploring.

“Psst…” Neil’s question hangs from his lips like moss on a brick wall. It slowly peels away, coming out before Todd can fully give it his attention. “There’s plenty of time to go exploring before morning, don’t you think?”

“So, we’ve got about half an hour til study group.”

“Yes. We do.” Todd replies timely.

“Plenty of time to go exploring, don’t you think?” His smile widens and Todd feels very, very nervous.

“We won’t go far. Promise.”

So, Todd follows Neil out of their room. The ‘exploring’ turns out to result in him and Neil ending up in the exact place they had the first time Neil asked for this. Only mere steps from their bedroom, Neil leads Todd to the study room.

Todd asks “this is the adventure?” 

Neil responds, “Toddy, this is exactly an adventure.” And Todd decides that maybe Neil is right. Adventures and exploring, they can happen in the places you rest and recognize. They can happen right outside your home and not much further.

The two of them sit idle at their now regular table in the study room. Neil rests his head between his folded arms and Todd rests against his open palm. His elbow is not comfortable against the hardwood table, but he doesn’t dare move. Not now. Not when Neil has made it clear that he believes in the act of sharing space with someone. The intimacy of this, being with someone, is exploration enough. They do not talk. They only rest.

Todd wants to cry, wants to understand why his face feels so hot and his hands are clammy But he doesn’t and, for now, that’s okay.

—

13 September, 1959. Sunday.

‘Todd Anderson’s Poetry Writing Intervention,’ that’s what Steven Meeks calls it when he asks the boys to get Todd to leave the study room Sunday evening. He’s been in the same position for hours, opting to skip dinner in preference of editing his poem for John Keating’s class. The assignment is due in less than twenty-four hours and, by the looks of it, Todd is the only one working this hard on it.

The boys walk into the study room, totally nonchalant and natural. Charlie coughs as he enters and stretches his arms, throwing them behind his head. Meeks and Gerard fake a conversation about their latest radio attempt. Knox pretends to know what they’re talking about. Cameron whistles.

Neil waves at Todd, who looks up only when Neil verbally says hello. He waves back.

“Hey, Todd!” Charlie sits down too close to Todd, eyes searching over what Todd has been working on. The page he’s currently writing is mostly littered with scratched out lines. There’s pages just like it crumpled up by his feet.

“Hi, Charlie.”

“Oh, shit,” Charlie says, “you’re working on this already?”

“It is due tomorrow,” Meeks says. No one is sure if Charlie is joking or not.

“That is what I call a ‘tomorrow problem’ then.”

“Not to me it isn’t,” Todd rolls his eyes. “I can’t think of anything.”

Neil offers a solution.“So, take a break. There’s no use sitting here with no ideas.” He sits down on Todd’s free side. Knox balances himself on the ledge of the table and Cameron sits next to Charlie. Meeks and Gerard favor standing, backs against the wall.

“That’s exactly why I can’t take a break.”

Meeks points to the papers by Todd’s feet. ‘It looks like you’ve had some ideas. There’s gotta be a good line or two somewhere.” He bits the inside of his cheek, worry creasing in his forehead. “We could find one and take a break.”

“Yeah!” Charlie picks up a paper and flattens it out against the table. He reads, “What does it mean? Bread rolls and pinched-red cheeks?” He hums in thought for a moment, pushing the paper aside and asking Todd: “Huh? What does that mean?”

“Stop that!” Todd scowls, taking the page from Charlie. When he rears back his arm, Todd hits Neil in the chest with his elbow. “Oh, sorry!”

Neil waves him off, “Charlie should be the one saying sorry.”

“What did I do! I’m just teasing him, Neil,” Charlie decorates his tone with innocence. 

“Yeah?” Neil reaches behind Todd and tries to pinch Charlie, who dodges by scooting his chair away. Neil’s heart sits against Todd’s shoulder. “Let’s see if you think it’s just teasing if Todd read one of your poems before you were ready.”

It’s very, very hypocritical of Neil to say. After all, Neil had done that to Todd himself. Three days before, Neil plucked Todd’s notebook out of his grasp and read the poetry in it outloud before it was ready. But, Neil doesn’t see that action as similar to Charlie’s. It’s something Charlie is doing to Todd. Not something Neil is doing to Todd. That’s the difference.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry, Todd.” Charlie sounds sincere. “I know the poem’s important to you, yeah?” He continues when Todd nods. ‘Okay. That’s good! But don’t stress yourself out over it too much.”

“I’m not stressed,” Todd lies.

“And there’s not a vein about to pop outta your temple right now.” Charlie points to Todd’s forehead.

“C'mon, Todd, take a break,” Knox voices his agreement with Charlie, voice teetering between whine and worry. His foot has been tapping non stop against the floor since he sat down.

“Just for an hour,” Gerard says.

“That’s all,” says Meeks.

“Or two!” Neil’s adds.

“Fine.” Todd lets out a breath. There’s tears that prick up in his eyes because, well, of course there is. Ten years from now, the only one he has a constant connection to is Charlie. The friends he had spent two years of high school with had grown apart, phone calls growing sparser and evenings out never on Todd’s list of activities he can stand. But here his friends are, asking him to take a break. Here his friends are, in 1959. It’s his second chance to keep Neil and his second chance to keep his friends, too. “You guys are right.”

—

Neil shows Todd his poem during his break. It’s a haiku. Three lines and seventeen syllables.

‘The poor animal

In my ribcage is no bird

But a shy monster’

—

14 September, 1959.

Knox is the first to read his poem to the class Monday afternoon. It’s a poem that he hadn’t let on about writing the night before and, to no one’s surprise, he addresses it to Chris. To the surprise of many, it isn’t a bad poem. It isn’t bad at all, actually, even if a few people snicker here and there. Todd is sure to clap loudest when Knox finishes.

Then, Anthony Hopkins reads his poem. It’s hardly a poem at all and to call it “his poem” is a huge stretch. “The cat sat on the mat” can’t be exactly original but Todd can’t judge. His poem isn’t much at all, either. His two hour break had started on track, but became more permanent when Todd ultimately fell asleep about forty-five minutes in. By the time he woke up, it was time to go to class. Neil had set a tray of food, snuck in from the dining hall, onto Todd’s desk. 

“Now, who’s next?” Keating asks, interrupting Todd from his sweet memory.

Oh, God, his stomach starts to hurt.

Keating eyes him. “Mr. Anderson, he grins. “I see you sitting there in agony. Come one, Todd, step up.” He’s only called Todd by his name once or twice. “Let’s put you out of your misery.”

Todd swallows any pride he has left. “I didn’t…I d-didn’t do it.”

“Didn’t do what?” He’s heard Todd clearly, but he doesn’t believe him.

“I didn’t write a poem.”

“Hmph.” Keating shakes his head. “Nothing at all?”

Todd shrugs. “I mean, I wrote one line, maybe. I couldn’t figure out what, what else to write, so…” He trails off.

“Not a problem at all, Todd! Class, a poem,” Keating explains, “can be as short as you want. We saw that from Mr. Hopkins. What I want to know, Mr. Anderson, is your one line interesting?” He gives Todd a moment to answer. “Well? Is it?”

The agonizing pain in his stomach evolves into absolute terrifying fear. It feels like ten years have passed and he has never written anything at all. Because he hasn’t. If this is all permanent, if he is himself at sixteen, Todd Anderson has written absolutely nothing for a second time. He knows what this day is supposed to go like, what he’s supposed to say, but the twenty-seven year old version of him answers for him.

“Let me reach into my chest and squeeze the grief out of my heart.” It’s the line that Neil had tried to read from his notebook. It’s the line that feels like all of him and Neil intertwined. It’s memory and loss and so stupid, too. But it’s his. “That’s the one line.” His voice cracks and he instantly regrets talking at all. He pretends that looking down where he can't see anyone means they can't see him either.

Todd's awkwardness seems to launch Keating right into his next thought. He walks through his next words carefully, like he's crossing a wild river downstream. He doesn't move his focus off of Todd. "Congratulations, Mr. Anderson, you've written a line more than interesting, mustered up the brilliant courage to say it and still..." his next words feel uncalled for but Todd needs to hear them now more than ever. "You look away like everything inside of you is worthless and embarrassing. It’s your worst fear, I know. But you’re wrong.” He leans down to Todd’s level and he speaks to only him, even if the entire class can hear. “You’ve got something inside you that is worth a great deal.”

Keating winks at him and Todd's mouth falls open.

It shouldn't have been so telling. All it was was a wink.

But Keating winks at him and a balloon of instinct pops against Todd's skull. The pop echoes with "this is how it's meant to go."

His mouth stays open, all the way up to Keating excusing himself to step up to his blackboard. 

It stays open because John Keating knows. Doesn't he?

He knows that this isn’t the first time they’ve been here. John Keating is here for a second time and Todd has finally figured it out.

“I sound my barbaric yawp over the rooftops of the world.” Keating sounds out what he writes on the board and smiles adoringly at the quote. “W.W. Uncle Walt again. Now, for those of you who don’t know, a ‘yawp’ is a loud cry or yell.” He motions for Todd to stand. “I would like you to give us a demonstration of a barbaric yawp.”

Todd, still in shock, does not stand. Keating urges him some more. “Come on, you can’t yawp sitting down, you know that.”

Everything in Todd is screaming at him to run out of the room. He can come back when he figures out how he’s supposed to go on pretending that Keating doesn’t know he’s been here before. Keating has somehow been able to blend so seamlessly in this fantasy of Todd’s and it hits him now more than ever that Keating has been playing this game by the rules. There’s so little changes in Keating’s demeanor because some things he has to let happen. For the sake of Neil, things have to happen.

And one of those things is Todd getting to the front of that classroom.

He stands up and walks to the blackboard, feet heavy like there’s tar on the bottom of his shoes.

“Mr. Keating.” Todd almost gags on his words, throat tight. “I can’t. ”

“You can.” Keating says. “Try once. A barbaric yawp.”

Todd sighs louder than he speaks. “Yawp.”

“That was a mouse’s yawp. Come on, again.” Keating urges, “louder.”

“Yawp.” Todd repeats, a decimal point louder.

Keating heightens his own voice, hoping that Todd will match the volume out of the need to match the energy around him or out of frustration. “Oh, good God, boy! Yell like a man!”

Todd does it. He moves his chest forward with such force he nearly falls. “Yawp!”

“There it is!” Keating holds out his arms in triumph. “You see, Todd, you have a barbarian in you after all.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Todd waves him off, then goes for his seat once more. He’s heard it all before.

Keating stops Todd with both his physical body, stepping in front of him, and his words. “Mr. Anderson, you don’t get away that easily.” He gingerly turns Todd around with a hand on his shoulder. Keating points to a portrait on the wall. “You remember that picture of ‘Ol Uncle Walt up there. What did he remind you of?”

What did he remind you of? Not ‘does he remind you of anyone?’ Did.

“Don’t think,” Keating says, “answer. Go on.”

Todd is standing in the center of the room, like in-the-round theater. It’s a play, that’s all this is. An improv performance and John Keating is the director of it all. 

“He’s a madman.”

“There…the face of a demented madman at the window.”

Todd adds on, “A sweaty-toothed madman.”

“There’s that poet inside you, boy!” Keating cheers. “Now close your eyes, close your eyes,” he places his hand over Todd’s eyes. “Describe what you see.”

It’s such a dance, this spin that the two of them do. Todd, within his nervousness and fear and bubbling stomach, has a sense of adrenaline. 

“Uh, I close my eyes. And the image floats beside me.”

“The sweaty-toothed madman.”

“Yes,” Todd nods, “the sweaty-toothed madman with a stare that pounds my brain.”

“Now give him his action.” Keating let’s go of Todd.

His hands reach out and choke me and, and, and-” His hands turn into fists at his sides, and it feels like the room temperature has risen twenty degrees. “And he looks just like me.”

“Just like you,” Keating repeats.

“Just like me.”

The so-called sweaty-toothed madman. It’s Walt Whitman but it’s also Todd. The twenty-seven year old who stays, sweaty in his bed in 1969 because he won’t open a window. His teeth yellowing due to skipping the brushing teeth. It is also the sixteen year old that stands here, where Todd is currently sentient. A madman who’s desperately trying to hold on to everything and everyone in front of him. The Todd who must be insane, the one who’s chest has been heavy with something he can’t name for days, weeks, and years. 

Todd’s eyes fly open, wet with tears that finally spill. Neil is watching him, hanging onto every word and he looks so proud. 

“And he’s crying.” Todd says, keeping his stare on Neil. His head shakes back and forward. “He’s crying.

“Why is he crying?” Keating asks.

“He’s crying. I’m crying. I’m begging, I think to remember something about the truth. Truth is like a blanket that always leaves your feet cold.”

Someone laughs and Todd’s head flicks around impossibly fast to find its owner. He can’t tell who it is or if it’s multiple culprits and God, it feels like someone is always laughing at him.

Keating waves his hands in front of Todd. “Forget them, forget them, Todd. Stay with the blanket, tell us about that blanket.” 

Todd’s head goes back in position and he’s back to watching Neil watching him. 

“You, Y-Y-You push it, stretch it. It’ll never, ever be enough. You want it to be, you need it to be, but it’ll never cover any of us.” Todd closes his eyes again, unable to bear the blurry vision and vulnerability of being seen by Neil Perry any longer. 

Neil Perry, Neil Perry, Neil Perry.

“It’ll never cover any of us, from the moment we enter crying, to the moment we leave dying, it will just cover your face as you wail and cry and scream and beg for, for, for…for…”

Neil Perry, Neil Perry, Neil Perry.

No, not Neil Perry. Something Neil Perry adjacent, something that comes with Neil, something that is Neil. What is it, what comes with all of this? Is there something worth begging for that is a close descriptor to the feeling Todd gets when he is with Neil? The word is somewhere in Todd’s chest, not his brain. There’s something blocking the word from coming up, though, his tongue acting as something impervious to the lush feeling of the word he’s looking for.

Then, it’s there. It’s there as bright as yellow paint and as loud as it, too. It’s there when his eyes open back up and Neil looks at him like he’s never seen anyone more impressive in his life. All Todd feels like is a tear-streaked face. And Neil is still impressed. The word is there, in the adventures and hand-holding and introductions. 

“For…for…” Todd’s mouth can only keep saying that. 

“Beg for what?” Keating asks Todd. It’s quieter than the hectic questioning of before.

But Todd can’t answer.

Instead, he runs out of the room without looking back.

Chapter Text

14 September, 1959. Cont.

Todd soars out of John Keating’s classroom without looking back. There’s some commotion and yelling for him to stop, but he keeps running. Running through hallways you aren’t usually allowed to run in, Todd finds, is very freeing. He runs past every door, office, and exit; Neil’s name is a melody playing over and over again in his mind. It doesn’t stop, not even when Todd makes it up the stairway to his bedroom and slams his door shut.

The first thing he does is kick off his shoes and claw his tie off of his throat. Every article of clothing on him feels overwhelming. Once those are off, Todd fills the space of his room with his own footsteps. Pacing and pacing, Todd frantically wipes at his eyes. He can’t keep up with the steady flow of tears and assumes he must look silly. His face is so saturated with the state of his blubbering. But, he keeps crying. He cries and cries, then cries some more.

Todd cries and can’t tell if it’s because of the name in his head or the feelings it comes with. He cries because it’s unfair. It’s so unfair. He’s been swung into an intense epiphany in front of his peers: one he’s only beginning to understand himself and can’t dare utter a word about. Discovering big things alone always feels like such a spectacle, but to discover big things in front of almost everyone you know, in front of Neil, is highlighted text. It’s the full performance without a rehearsal. 

And he’s crying. Todd cries until there’s no sound coming out of his mouth and the tears have to work a lot harder to form. His thighs are burning, pleading him to sit down, but he won’t.

He’s too embarrassed. Too heartbroken and scared.

Then, when it feels like he’s been crying for much too long, Todd stubs his toe on the corner of Neil’s desk. He curses loudly and hunches over to hold his foot. Bouncing with each of his winces, Todd allows himself to act with adolescent anger. Nobody is watching him, so he can. It’s a nice alternative to the crying and he indulges himself in his tantrum.

Soon the throbbing in his foot calms and Todd lets go. He listens to his body and falls onto his bed. One hand hides under his pillow and the other he holds clenched towards his chest.

‘Let me reach into my chest and squeeze the grief out.’

It really hurts. His chest hurts and he’s angry. His toe might be bleeding beneath his sock, but he can’t be bothered to check. He'd be a bit thankful if it was bleeding. Maybe then the heat in his heart will rush to the aid of anywhere else.

And, wow, is Todd so sick of this heat and hurting. He’s so sick of accidentally hurting himself. Of never seeing the maiming and bruising coming until it’s already there. He’s sick of it, but there’s a sicker part of him that might like it. He doesn’t like being hurt. He doesn’t like the feeling of being hurt. But the horrible, underlying comfort in feeling hurt and getting to put all the pieces of yourself back together is there. It’s that feeling of ‘I’m angry and embarrassed and sad and it’s all I’ve ever known.’ It’s the tantrum he just threw and the crawling into bed after the fact.

And that feeling of hurt and healing himself has been permanently placed as a warning bile in the back of his throat ever since he met Neil Perry. Todd Anderson has hurt and broken his own heart over Neil for years. And it was never only because he was gone. No, it was there in the months before and Todd’s only realized it now.

Now, in bed and too warm to be under the covers, Todd Anderson has found himself exactly how he was ten years ago and ten years from now. Only, Charlie won’t knock on his door to check on him. Now, it could be Neil.

The thought of that forces Todd to sit up and out of the corner of his eye, Todd sees it. Right there on his desk is the tray Neil had brought his breakfast on this morning. It’s still there. The biscuit crumbs and half-empty glass of water are the only proof that there was ever food to be eaten in the room at all.

Then, Todd looks over at Neil’s bed. It isn’t made. The sheets are about to untuck themselves from under his mattress and his blanket is hanging so low off the edge, it touches the floor. His pillows are flat, lifeless against the metal headboard. 

Unburying itself from under the sadness and anger, Todd lets out a laugh. Then another. And another. He’s laughing and it’s a big, big laugh because Neil Perry brought him breakfast. Neil Perry brought him breakfast and he didn’t make his bed. Somehow, that feels like a sacrifice. All the sudden, the plates Todd’s mother had bought him that one Christmas makes sense.

His father had called the plates a gift for him and his future wife, but that wasn’t all it was. They weren’t just plates. Maybe to his parents, they were. They were likely nothing more than decorative. They would collect dust in a china cabinet for twenty, thirty years, but Todd knew now that’s not all they had to be. The plates were meant to eat and serve food from. They were plates to share with someone you love, a plate for a lover. Someone to give breakfast and your time to. 

Because that’s what love is, right? Making the choice to help someone feel full? It’s the sacrifice of your unkempt bedsheets and making a choice for someone else, without having to ask. It’s holding hands when you can and stealing glances when you can’t.

It’s wanting to go back in time for them. It’s deciding to get up and go to your underpaid job so they can do the things that make them feel full, too. It’s losing sleep and crying really hard over the little things. It’s taking adventures that aren’t really anything more than errands or time well spent. And it’s a choice.

Todd Anderson is in love with Neil Perry.

And maybe, just maybe, Neil Perry loves him too.

The fact makes Todd cry and hurt and laugh. It makes him want to run until he’s out of breath and pace even more after that. It makes him want to cry enough tears to fill up that half-empty glass. He wants to cry enough to fill a cup that’ll hydrate him enough to cry some more. It makes him want to stub his toe over and over again. It makes him full enough to be pleased and empty enough to ask for more.

It makes him laugh and that’s it.

It makes the last ten years make sense.

Academia feels so useless now. Nothing Todd will ever be taught at the hands of someone else will ignite something more important than what he’s just learned himself. He doesn’t go back to class and he skips History. And he’ll skip soccer that day, too. Assuming he’ll be alone for a few more hours, Todd lies back down in his ecstasy and turmoil. If he cries again, he won’t say. But there’s evidence of an answer in his corneas. 

Then, around the time Welton extracurriculars should be starting, Todd’s door creaks open. He shoots up in his bed and finds a tiptoeing Neil Perry sneaking into their room.

“Todd!” He says, relief on his face. “Thank God, you’re here. They wouldn’t let me come find you.”

Todd, whose eyes are wide with panic, answers with “w-what?”

“But I escaped while Charlie wasn’t looking and I thought you might be up here.” Neil sits down on Todd’s bed. Todd brings his legs up to his chest so that Neil has the room to do so. He also does this so that they won’t risk touching each other. Todd’s pretty sure he’d burst into flames if they touched right now. 

“What do you mean-” His voice falters on him, so he takes a breath and tries again. “What do you mean you escaped?”

“You ran out of Keating’s so fast,” Neil says. It’s clear how desperate he is to explain himself, Todd can’t blame him if he doesn’t answer any of his questions. “I would have been here earlier, but Keating wouldn’t let me leave and Charlie dragged me to History.” Neil seems to notice the sadness or anger or laughter etched into Todd’s face and it stops him in his tracks. “What happened?” His voice is so, so quiet.

Todd’s brain short circuits. It takes him a lot longer to respond than it should. Neil looks so worried about him. He’s worried about him. And he’s not at soccer like he should be, which means he’s also skipping or he’s late. Which he’s doing as a sacrifice to check on Todd.

“I’m fine. I’m fine, I promise.” Todd says, feeling very exposed. His socks feel too tight on his feet. He wants to hide under his blanket and he wants Neil to hide with him. “Really, I am.”

“Are you sure?” You look…” Neil motions to his own face, unable to word what he thinks. He takes a different route. “Do you need water or anything?”

“I have some.” Todd points to the glass on his desk. Neil looks over and Todd thinks he might smile when he sees it next to the plate.

“Good.” Neil turns back, “if you need more, I’ll get some more.”

“Okay,” Todd grins, the fire in his chest turning his face red. The two of them are smiling at each other and Todd can’t help but wonder if love is also what it means to want to smile at someone no matter how much your cheeks hurt. Then, though Todd is delighted by the company, he makes a decision for Neil. There’s no use in the both of them getting marked up for missing required club meetings. “You should go to soccer, Neil. You shouldn’t get in trouble because of me.”

“I won’t get in trouble.” Neil scoots closer to him. “Don’t worry about that.”

“I am worried about it,” Todd admits. “Seriously, go.” He risks the touch he was so afraid of before and pushes Neil, palm against his chest. 

Neil puffs up, grabbing Todd’s hand before he can pull away. Now, Todd can feel his heartbeat. It’s moving at a rate a lot like his own, fast and racing. Todd’s entire body tenses up and he regrets the shock because Neil lets his hand go. 

“Okay,” Neil says. He leaves Todd’s bed without more disagreements. Once at the door, he leaves Todd with one more thought. “We’ve got study group tonight. I’ll see you then?”

Todd shrugs. “I dunno. I feel kind of-”

“If you’re not going, I won’t either.”

“Neil-”

“Seriously, I won’t. We can study alone.”

“Don’t be…” Todd sighs, shaking his head. However, his smile is still bright and beaming. “Don’t be like that, Neil.”

Neil huffs, “I’m not being like anything.” He leans against the doorway, one foot crossed over an ankle. “I’m…I’m telling the boys about my audition tonight,” Neil explains, “it’d be nice if you were there, is all.”

Todd is touched, to say the least. Neil wants him to be there. In fact, he needs him to be there. And Todd would be a fool not to be there for him. That’s the final discovery about love, Todd thinks, for the day. It’s being there, truly and loyally. It’s Neil in their room right now and Todd if he’s there that night. It’s the easiest and hardest thing.

“I’ll be there,” Todd decides.

“Yes!” Neil cheers. When he ultimately turns to leave, Neil tells Todd that he shouldn’t skip things anymore and Todd promises that he won’t as the door clicks shut.

And, he keeps his promise. Todd does. Even when Charlie laughs at his agape mouth and shocked expression when Neil tells them about his audition that night, Todd doesn’t skip anything. He works through the self-conscious tugging in his stomach and he shows up. He doesn’t run out of the room whenever Neil does something that makes him want to shout as loud as his lungs will let him. He acts as normal as Todd Anderson is capable of acting.

Todd doesn’t skip the weekly Dead Poets meeting that Thursday either. 

It feels like a reward now when Neil holds his hand again in the cave or under the table in History. Todd almost forgets to keep track of how long it lasts. The touches leave something unsaid and Todd spends hours upon hours convincing himself that it means what he wants it to mean. 

And what Todd wants it to mean launches him into all those big feelings again. He isn’t sure what would happen if Neil found out. Or if anyone found out. He isn’t sure if he’s even ready for whatever the ‘next’ is. The ‘next,’ Todd remembers when Neil auditions that Saturday morning, should occur after Neil lives past December fifteenth. 

There’s so many technicalities and apprehension. 

When he’s ready, Todd goes to the only person who might be able to help.

—

21 September, 1959. Monday.

After an entire week of avoiding glances and ignoring the elephant in the room, Todd Anderson places himself in front of the door to John Keating’s office. Dinner is long over, the clock on the wall tick, ticking towards the eighth hour. There’s very little time until he needs to be at the study group and he needs help with Latin.

But he needs help with Neil, too.

The door to Keating’s office feels a lot more like the door to a castle dungeon or a therapist than a door to a cramped space belonging to an underpaid teacher. He knocks on the door and it rings out like it really is a castle door, too. When Todd hears Keating’s voice telling him to come in, his legs suddenly form into solid concrete. With each deep breath, he picks and picks at it until the concrete is gravel he can slide his feet through.

Opening the door, Todd is met with a smiling Keating. He’s holding a cup of tea to his lips. There’s an empty chair across from his desk. In front of the chair, is a freshly poured tea Keating is not drinking.

Was Keating expecting him?

“I wasn’t expecting company.” Keating reads his mind. “Don’t look so frightened, boy, I heard you walk in and poured tea. Are you more interested in coffee?”

“Hi, Mr. Keating.” Todd mumbles, clearing his throat. “Tea is fine.”

“It’s nice to see you, Mr. Anderson.” He’s truthful. “What can I do for you?”

“Are you busy? Can we talk?” Todd asks and Keating nods towards the empty seat. Todd sits and picks up the cup of tea, sipping from it gratefully. 

The two of them perch silently for a few minutes, drinking and breathing and deciding how to break the tension. Once their cups have run dry, Keating asks if there’s something specific Todd wanted to talk about while refilling his cup. His lips are moist with the drink and he wipes them dry with a napkin. “Or did you want to talk plainly?

“I don’t know.” Todd is truthful, too.” He came here to talk about Neil and needs Keating to admit that he knows that without any metaphors and riddles. He needs to hear it outright and true. Admitting that you’ve experienced the future days before and that you know the person in front of you has too? It isn’t going to sound very smart or scientific. 

Keating sees Todd's inner troubles and turbulence. “How about we start with this: How are you?”

Simple enough, Todd can answer that. “I’m good. Much better than I was doing before.”

“Hm,” Keating nods, “you gave us all quite the scare last week.”

“I know,” Todd leans forward. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have run off like that.”

“It’s all right, son, I understand.” Keating says. 

“You do?”

“I do.”

“Oh.”

Then, it’s quiet again. Todd feels like it’s his turn to start something to avoid the conversation being nothing. He hasn’t touched his new cup of tea, so he picks it up and drinks from the cup to give him more stalling time. However, before Todd can set the teacup back on the desk, Keating has already asked him another question.

“How’s Neil?”

Todd almost tips over the cup, hand slipping off and his knee hitting the underside of the desk. “Neil?” He says. “He’s fine,” Todd tries to latch onto the bait that Keating has possibly purposely given him. “He auditioned for a play this weekend.”

“Oh,” Keating sounds impressed. “How did it go?”

Neil had come back to their room that afternoon ecstatic. The director had apparently told him he had a natural gift and looked forward to the possibility of working with him. The excitement from that alone made Todd want to send Neil off to a million more auditions. The idea that Neil had thought to tell Todd first made Todd want to lock the door. It made him want to tell Neil every secret of his he could think of. It made him want to be behind the audition table himself if it meant he’d see Neil in his first’s all the time.

“He said it was good,” Todd answers, “that he liked getting to try something new.”

“The kid could definitely use something new.” Keating says.

Todd agrees. “You think so?”

“I think we both know.”

When Keating says that, Todd makes a huge decision. He makes the decision, so overcome with the idea that, yes someone does know exactly how he feels. There is someone who woke up and discovered that, out of their control, they had a second chance to do something really, really important. Maybe this is where one might say Todd Anderson was too brave or he ‘jumped the shark.’ But after a week of thinking and thinking, he had to know for himself.

“He’s going to be Puck.”

“Hm?”

“In the show, in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ Neil is going to play Puck.” Todd makes himself as clear as possible.

“Oh?” Keating doesn’t look more intrigued, nor does he look confused. Todd envies that about him in the same way he envies Neil. The two of them are so good at hiding any trace of uneasiness or unchecked interest. “He got the part already?”

“No. But I know he’s going to get it.”

Now is when Keating could have said something like he was pleased to see Todd supporting Neil. He could have said that he would pray on it for Neil’s sake or that he’d be on the lookout for a cast list. But he doesn’t do that. Instead, John Keating makes a decision, just like Todd.

“I know, too.”

“ Why? ” Todd spills out his anguish the second the confirmation comes. “Why do we know?”

“I don’t know, Todd,” Keating shrugs his shoulders, which feels out of character and, like Todd’s tantrum, a debauchery of childhood feeling. 

“It’s so strange.”

“Yes,” Kearing says, “but, truth is always strange. Stranger than fiction.”

Todd notices the reference. It might have been a test of Keating’s. “Lord Byron.”

“One of the more extreme poets.” Keating bows his head and chuckles. “Perfect for the situation.”

“How are you so calm? This whole time, you’ve been so…normal.” Todd picks out his words carefully, though they still don’t feel right when he says them.

“Oh, I wasn’t.” Keating looks at Todd seriously. “I was a mess, considerably much like you were if I was to guess.” He explains, “you see, I woke up, like you, in a bed I hadn’t known in years with lesson plans I haven’t looked at in longer. Lesson plans for a school I was fired from, no less, and a roster with a student that, as far as I knew, hadn’t been alive in a decade.” A flash of emotion crosses his features. The humor of it all is there, but the distress is even darker. “I hadn’t a clue what to do-”

“But some of it felt natural, right?”

“Right. I knew the things I said before like they were written down right in front of me.” Keating continues, “but it was like I could edit them and pick them apart where I needed to.”

“Exactly!” Todd understands it more than anyone. He’s the only one who can understand it. Then, a thought crosses him. “Do you think anyone else is…like us?”

“No.” Keating answers quicker than Todd expects. “I considered the possibility that Mr. Dalton or Mr. Meeks knew, but the changes in them are too minute. I could tell you knew, however, right away.”

“You could?”

“Well, I don’t remember you and Neil sneaking into my classroom or you being able to answer any of my questions with any ounce of confidence.”

Todd blushes at that. He wants to make a point and say that he still doesn’t feel like he has much confidence. “That’s…true.” An attempt at defending himself is useless, considering Keating remembers as much as he does. He takes a long drink from his cup of tea. It’s cooled down enough to not make him jump back at the feeling of the liquid down his throat. 

He should probably leave soon, before anyone comes looking for him or he’s late to study. He asks Keating one more question.

“Do you think it’ll turn out differently this time?”

“I can feel it,” Keating says.

“How?”

“Because I can see it.” Keating’s gaze is locked on Todd’’s. “Keep doing what you’re doing.”

And that feels like a completely fruitless answer. What does he mean he can see it? Can he see the changes in the story or the changes in Neil? Is it nothing more than the clairvoyance Todd is still sometimes afraid to lean into? And what is Todd doing that he has to keep up? It comes off like a chore, the way Keating says it, but nothing Todd has done in the past month strikes him as anything he hasn’t wanted to do. Or change. 

Maybe that’s the point, then. And that seems easy enough.

“If anything noteworthy happens, let me know,” Keating says, “if nothing noteworthy happens, my door is still open.”

Todd grins, the blush on his cheeks fading. He nods his head and finishes the rest of his drink. Rising from his seat, he thanks Keating for the tea and his time.

Chapter Text

12 October, 1959. Three Weeks Pass. Monday.

One month ago, Todd Anderson was counting every second passing by him. He counted the seconds when Neil was near him, holding his hand, or looking at him. He counted and counted until he lost his place; then he started over again. But something changed. Todd spoke to John Keating and gained a safety blanket in him knowing the truth of being here before. Because of this, Todd is now a lot more comfortable with his time.

The trouble, however, with letting yourself be comfortable with your time passing is that, well, it will continue to pass.

And three weeks pass without Todd realizing it.

Instead of the hours and days tick-tocking steadily, the clock disappears altogether. There are no more lazy mornings or slow afternoons. The difference between evenings and full days is absolute. A week is no longer a lifetime, but the pull of a light switch.

To Todd, there is nothing left but time spent with Neil.

It is easily the best three weeks of his life. Todd lets the time out of his grasp without any trouble. Neil, as he always is, is constantly by Todd’s side these weeks. The difference now, besides the absence of a clock, is that Todd is spending his days with Neil in love. He is spending his time with Neil knowing that he is in love with him. 

Neil is always there and Todd loves him.

Permitting himself to gorge on growing optimism towards the future, Todd starts walking with a slight skip to his step. It’s noticeable enough for Neil to ask him, on several occasions, what has him feeling so merry. Todd never answers Neil with more than a twisty, butterfly sanctuary of a stomach and a shrug. 

Oh, the dread weighing down his shoulders has notably lost its pull.

But, again, three weeks have gone by and time is only becoming quicker in speed. It’s been exactly twenty-one days since Todd told Keating that Neil would be Puck in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ It’s been exactly twenty days since Neil ran down the halls of the dormitory shouting about landing that very role. Today, twenty and twenty-one days later, rehearsals for the play are finally beginning.

Neil has to borrow Knox’s bike to get to Henley Hall- which he was happily given access to practically before he could finish asking. Todd has a small thought that Neil might’ve been thankful enough to kiss Knox when he told him so. There’s a very sudden lurch in chest that tells him he should get a bike, too. By the time Todd is able to consider the logistics of getting a bike, Neil is off.

All of the Dead Poets watch him leave. Charlie screams his goodbye, which makes Cameron wince. 

“Quiet down and say goodbye like a normal person,” Cameron says. 

Charlie, who’s started wiping away fake tears, responds with even louder screaming, reminding Neil that their study group is still on that night. The other boys aren’t phased by the bickering, though Meeks does give Gerard a knowing look. Todd sees this look as he’s pretending to not see that Neil almost loses his balance peddling.

But Todd has to laugh because he can hear that Neil is cackling at himself. When he gains a bit of confidence, Neil turns his head and grins a grin so wide, his eyes crinkle and his nostrils flare. Once Neil’s long gone, melted away behind dying grassy hills, leaves, and fog, the boys remain standing outside Welton like he hasn’t left at all. It’s half past six when Charlie gently taps Todd to get him to move back inside.

“He’ll be back by nine thirty,” Charlie reminds him. Todd huffs back in response. It isn’t a large amount of time, sure, and it isn’t Charlie’s fault that he doesn’t get it. He doesn’t get that Todd isn’t actually sad that Neil left for his rehearsal. He only feels funny.

Really, it’s the first time since ten years ago or two months from now that Neil isn’t there. 

And Todd feels funny.

He feels funny like his parents just brought up bills and something pricey Todd had needed months ago in the same sentence. He feels funny like how he did the first time he had to call off work because he was sick. He feels funny like he’s woken up in the middle of one of those nights where he swears he can see a phantomly figure in the corner of his bedroom.

It’s that funniness that comes with money, jobs, life, death, and Neil Perry. It’s a feeling that isn’t a venomous sting or a pinch to a nerve. It sits low in his stomach and sloshes around like a warm, thickening soup.

But maybe, just maybe, Charlie does get it. He might get it because he leads Todd through the Welton Academy doors with his hands shoved in his pockets and asks Todd if he’s hungry. 

“No, I’m not,” Todd says.

Then, Charlie asks Cameron if he’s full. It’s weird wording, but Cameron still responds.

“‘M fine,” Cameron says, like he’s irritated but he’s tilting towards Charlie like he’s searching for a way for the conversation to continue.

Charlie gets it because he asks Cameron again, just to make sure.

Then, Todd wonders if all five of his friends get it because they all follow him, attached like leeches on bare skin, to the study room fifteen minutes before nine o’clock. They have to get it because they give Todd excuses for why they accompanied him like they needed to get extra help on Latin or they were really excited to study. Todd knows they get it because everyone is still waiting in the room with Todd at ten thirty, an entire hour after Neil was meant to show up.

“I think I need more help with History,” Charlie says to the group. They’re all slumped over their chairs like laundry out to dry, all tired eyes and sore hands. There’s a seat purposely left open next to Todd.

“I do, too.” Knox agrees, “I can hardly remember my mother’s birthday, let alone when World War One started.”

Meeks easily supplies him with an answer, “June of 1914.”

Knox sighs, “Not all of us have freaky huge brains, Meeksy.”

“I bet you remember Chris’ birthday,” Charlie teases in a sing-song tone.

Knox perks up at her name. Then, he’s hit with a memory of something and collapses back into his seat. “I don’t even know her birthday, Charlie. I haven’t seen her since dinner at the Danburry’s.”

“Then you have a reason to talk to her,” Gerard says, “you could see her and ask her when her birthday is!”

“No!” Knox replies speedily. “I can’t just…I can’t just go see her like that. I’ll call her when I’m ready,” he decides.

“Very gentlemanly.” Charlie whistles. He tears a piece of paper from his notebook, turns it into a crumpled ball with his hands, and throws it at Knox. “Will this phone call be before or after your funeral?” He looks down and skims through his notebook like a calendar.

Before Knox can answer, the door to the study room clicks open. Todd’s head, which has been upturned towards the clock since about nine twenty-five, snaps down. Neil enters the space, escorted by a chaperone Todd does not know the name of. The person leaves and Neil says a polite goodbye.

It takes everything in Todd to not shoot across the room and jump onto Neil. He restrains himself from going that far, but he does bounce up from his seat. His hands grip the edge of the table. “Neil!” Todd hears himself shout, loud like a train whistle, when the door shuts. His face immediately fills with burning red.

“Hey, Perry! About time you showed up,” Charlie saves Todd by standing up with him. “First official rehearsal done, huh?”

“Was it fun?” Gerard asks.

“Mmhm!” Neil responds with an excited nod, bursting into explanation. “We did a read-through.” He finds the open spot next to Todd and sits. The boys crowd around him to listen. It looks an awful lot like the scene where Keating had explained that hearts and souls were casualties of mundane existence itself, but Todd is involved in the huddle now. In this scene, Todd feels it and knows it: the words he hadn’t focused on before, too stuck on contributing verses.

“But poetry, beauty, romance, love; these are what we stay alive for.”

“A read-through,” Neil continues, “is when the whole cast sits in a big circle and, and, you read the entire play together! I understood more than I think I would have, thanks to Keating.” He chuckles, then answers Gerard. “It was great fun!”

“That’s great, Neil!” Charlie says. “Are you over there every night?”

‘Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays.’ Neil's words buzz in Todd’s ears. 'Though I won't always be called.' 

“Then, the week before the show, I’ll be there every day until it’s over.”

“Every day?” Knox grumbles, “you have to practice that much?”

“Yeah!” Neil leans forward onto his toes, stomach pressed against the table. He’s struck on the idea of it, being on that stage every day for two whole weeks. “We have a week where we rehearse with lights and sound and all that stuff. Ginny Danburry, she’s playing Hermia, explained everything to me.”

It’s the happiest Neil has probably ever looked in his life. It’s real happiness, not the false narrative he puts on in front of his father. God, his father. Todd can’t understand how his father could see Neil like this, decorated in such gleam and golden, and ask anything else of him. There’s nothing better than this. 

Neil goes on a bit longer and, when finished, sets his hand on Todd’s knee like he’s asking for permission. Todd nods and Neil’s hand turns into an open palm. Todd puts his hand into Neils, who intertwines their fingers. 

“And you have to memorize all of those lines…” Gerard says so as a fact and not a question. He looks at Neil with envious awe. 

“Oh, yeah!” Neil says, and then questions Todd. “Todd, could you help me with that? Test me on lines every once in a while?”

Todd feels like Neil just asked him to participate in something intimate in front of all of their friends. Todd had helped Neil with his lines the first time around, but Neil hadn’t asked for help so clearly then. He handed Todd his script one night and sweetly asked, “read the lines before mine?” If that was sweet, this was a toothache. It’s enthralling.

Todd answers. “Absolutely.”

He’s rewarded with Neil giving him a delighted hum and a tight squeeze of his hand.

—-

31 October, 1959. Halloween, Saturday Night.

On Halloween night, Neil asks Todd if he is afraid of ghosts.

He doesn’t come right out and say it like that, but the question is between the lines of what he actually does say. It goes like this:

Todd Anderson’s favorite holiday, without question, is Halloween. This surprises everyone he tells this to. When first meeting and understanding Todd, it’s incredibly easy to assume that anything involving the ghastly or vomit-inducing would have Todd running in the opposite direction. While that is true, Halloween has never been about those things to Todd.

What Todd loves about Halloween is dressing up in silly costumes and eating candy he would otherwise stay away from. He loves that it’s, above anything, a day that he knows he will spend with Charlie in that apartment of theirs. He loves when he and Charlie tell stories and guess children’s costumes. He loves that Knox and Chris join them, too.

So, when Meeks comes up with an impromptu, last minute idea to have a Dead Poets meeting on Halloween night, Todd is the first to agree to it. 

“I know who I’ll be,” Neil whispers to Todd as they dress for the event. He tears off his bed sheet with dramatic flourish and wraps it around himself. Arms outstretched, he proudly proclaims himself to be Mark Antony of ‘Julius Caesar’ fame; specially, Marlon Brandon’s Mark Antony.

Todd calls it a perfectly appropriate costume. “You can’t be Puck all the time,” he says and Neil laughs. Following Neil’s movie idea, Todd puts on his white undershirt, layering a red button-up over it. He pulls up the collar.

“James Dean in, uh, ‘Rebel Without A Cause.’ ” 

Neil responds with, “My father hated that movie.”

“What about you?”

“I loved it,” Neil smiles, all teeth. “It’s a perfectly appropriate costume.” He mimics what Todd told him, down to the cadence. Todd laughs so hard, he’s afraid that sanctuary kept in his tummy might become loose and the butterflies will pour out of his mouth. So, he shuts his mouth- but he’s beaming all the way up to the cave. Todd’s so happy that he strips from his black cloak faster than the others so that Neil might compliment him again.

Neil takes off his cloak and, in kindness, sets it on the wet floor of the cave. With the floor covered, it allows the group to throw their snacks and stolen dinner items into the center. Knox opens some bags of candy his mother sent in the mail and lets it fall into the center of the pile. He picks up a lollipop and shoves it into his mouth.

“All right, explain the costumes, all of you,” Neil sits down next to Todd. He points his finger at his own face, then Todds. “Toddy and I went for movie characters.” He explains who they are then says, “your turn, Knox.”

Knox wears a white button-up with the collar upturned, just like Todd’s. His hair is neatly slicked back with gel or water. The hairstyle looks sort of funny on him, making his face look thinner and his jawline protruding. “I’m Elvis,” he says brazenly, “the King of Rock and Roll and romance.”

“What do you know about any of those things,” Charlie remarks snidely.

“I know more than you!” Knox scoffs. He reaches up like he’s going to mess with his hair, but he stops himself. “Shut up, Charlie, at least I have a costume. You’re wearing your uniform.”

Todd looks over at Charlie and Knox is right. Charlie is wearing his uniform. He isn’t the only one, though. Cameron is wearing one as well.

“This is a costume! I needed the uniform,” Charlie defends himself. He tugs at the fabric of his shirt and scratches at his tie like it’s choking him. “Can’t you tell who I am by how prissy I look? I’m Cameron!”

Cameron holds his arms crossed over his chest. By the sour expression on his face, he definitely knew that Charlie was going to do this. His lips are impossibly pouted and his freckles pop against his blushed cheeks.

“I am not prissy!” Cameron uncrosses his arm to point his finger angrily at Charlie. “I told you already, you can’t dress up like me, asshole. You can be Neil. You can be Todd. You could be Meeks. Anyone! You cannot be me.”

“Why not, Cam?” Charlie whines, “why can’t I dress like you when you’re dressed like me?”

“I did not dress like you.”

“Who are you, then?” Todd is the first to question him, curious.

Cameron’s eyes soften and he looks delightedly to Todd. His hand plays absentmindedly with a button on his vest. “I’m a lawyer.”

The stunned silence that hits the group is immediate which, when realized, is destroyed by the boys squealing with glee. Todd laughs the loudest because the answer is so, so Cameron, his stomach aches. He covers his mouth to hide his amusement, but Cameron looks betrayed by him anyways.

“Aw, what?” Cameron cries, “Why are you laughing!”

“That’s not a costume!” Charlie shakes his head. “You’re wearing a Welton uniform, Cam, how is that a lawyer?”

“I’m going to be a lawyer!” Cameron huffs, “wearing this is just a reiteration of who I will be.” No one lets up their laughter. “This was the best I could come up with!”

Charlie rolls his eyes. “Halloween is supposed to be about dressing up as something fun.” He eyes Cameron, “you look about as fun as watching paint dry.”

“We’re wearing the same thing.”

“Yes, but I’m a lot funnier about it.”

“I dunno,” Meeks interrupts, taking a breath. “You might be funnier than Cameron, but are you funnier than Pitts and I?”

The group now faces the two of them. They aren’t wearing anything special, though it’s noticed that they hold their actual costume between clenched fists. Todd realized that their costumes involve the same bed sheets as Neil. Then, without another word, Gerard and Meeks share a sneaky glance between each other and toss their sheets over their heads. It takes some fumbling around, but their costumes are soon on. The sheets have been massacred by whatever pair of scissors they could grab while a teacher wasn’t looking, adding two holes for eyes in the fabric.

Gerard and Meeks are ghosts. Sheet ghosts. 

“Oh, my God.”

“Fantastic!”

“Thank you, thank you,” says Meeks.

“Ghosts!” Neil claps, “Wish I thought of that.”

“There’s always next year,” Knox says.

“Yes, but today,” Neil stands and assumes the leaderly position he always does. “Today, Friends, Romans, Dead Poets…I hereby declare this meeting started.” He leans over and pulls the official ‘Five Centuries of Verse’ book from a pocket of his cloak. Back straight and tall, Neil flips around the book before landing on what he believes to be the perfect page. He skips over the official Dead Poets "rout to life" poem in favor for something more spooky. “In the spirit of the holiday, I shall begin with this: All houses wherein men have lived and died,” Neil reads, “are haunted houses. Through the open doors and harmless phantoms on their errands glide, with feet that make no sound on the floor.”

“Woah,” Knox gasps, “that’s pretty spooky.”

“Scared of ghosts, Knoxious?” Charlie teases, “Don’t let Meeks and Pittsie know.”

“I am not,” Knox pouts, “but you wouldn’t be a little nervous if you heard the sound of a ghost walking through your room or something?”

“The poem says their feet don’t make sound, so how would you hear them?”

“I don’t know,” Knox admits.

“Technically,” Cameron has a thought, the second Knox’s mouth shuts, “ghosts wouldn’t have feet at all.”

“Tell that to Henry Wadsworth Longefellow.” Neil holds out his book, showing the page he’s reading from.

Charlie whistles, “ain’t that a name.”

“I will,” Cameron doesn’t crack a smile. “Ghosts don’t have feet.”

“I mean,” Knox says, cheek puffed up with the lollipop he’s been nursing. “I guess not. Their feer would have to be see-through like the rest of them.”

“No, they wouldn’t have feet at all.” Cameron rolls his eyes.

This time when the silence hits, no laughter follows. There is only confusion and a need for clarity.

“Cameron,” Charlie starts, “are you saying ghosts don’t have feet at all because-”

“That’s what I just said.”

“You think ghosts look like Meeks and Gerard over there.” Knox tilts his head to Meeks, who looked bemused, even under his sheet.

“They do, dumbass.”

“Oh, my God,” Charlie claps his hands. “Please introduce me to these sheet ghosts you’ve clearly met.”

“Shut up, asshole,” Cameron’s pout returns. ‘I’m right.”

“You’re absolutely not.”

“Boo!”

“No way!”

The chorus of disagreements comes hurling towards Cameron, along with the more physical like candy wrappers, dry cookies, and annoyance.  Cameron bats them away with a fury of hands, his attempts to protect his dignity worthless. He gets hit on his knee with a piece of fruit candy, which he unwraps and pops into his mouth. Charlie cheers, as he sees that as a sign that they’ve won. 

Eventually, when the yelling stops and their hearts have stopped racing with adrenaline, Neil is able to finish reading his chosen poem. There isn’t much more reading after that, since everyone would much rather try their hand at ghost stories or seeing how many pieces of candy they can shove in their mouths at once (Knox wins that). They also chose a favorite costume of the night. Meeks and Gerard won by a landslide.

When their tongues are raw with sour stuff and colored all sorts of colors, they call it a night. There’s only so many cavities one can gain in an evening and the craters in their teeth are definite if they continue any longer. So, when all cloaks are on, the Dead Poets, illuminated by the moonlight, take their time to get back to Welton. They listen to Charlie tell one last story and Todd explains that Halloween has always been his favorite. 

“Really?” Neil says.

“Yes,” Todd replies.

“Hm,” he thinks, “I would have thought you were a Christmas guy.”

“I don’t like Christmas very much.”

“Really?”

“I think it’s the idea of gift-giving,” Todd says, “makes me nervous, I guess.”

“And ghosts don’t?” Neil asks. 

“Ghost’s don’t.

Then, Neil thinks for a very long time. He thinks something deep and something very, very meaningful. “If I were a ghost, I’d haunt you.” ‘ Are you afraid of ghosts?’‘

And he says so with a sweet smile and so honest. Todd wants to say that he agrees that, yes Neil, he would haunt Todd if he were a ghost. But Todd’s spent enough hours up in his room to know that’s more fiction than Neil knows. He wants to respond with something mean like ‘you didn’t! You didn’t haunt me!’ 

“Sure, Neil.”

Chapter Text

15 November, 1959. Sunday.

One more month.

—

16 November, 1959. Todd Anderson’s Birthday.

Todd had not intended on keeping his birthday a secret from Neil and the others on purpose. He was not hiding it like he might have been before. It never came up, is all. But on the sixteenth of November in 1959, Todd Anderson turns seventeen for the second time. It’s a beautiful, horrible thing to be on the verge of adulthood, though Todd would point out years later that he never actually felt like an adult anyways. Perpetually stuck at sixteen, seventeen is a cruel irony. But maybe everyone feels that way.

Even though his friends do not know it is his birthday, Todd has a fine day. He wakes up and that’s good. He showers and scrubs the dirt from under his fingernails. When he eats breakfast, the eggs aren’t runny and the bread is still warm. The best part of his morning, however, is that Neil waits for him to finish breakfast, even if it makes him late for class. He doesn’t even look a little upset when he does, familiar with the fact that Todd is so slow-moving on Mondays.

Soccer is a mediocre kind of miserable, which is a huge upgrade from other Monday soccer practices. The second shower Todd takes after the extracurricular is even better than the first, too. The water runs warm and doesn’t edge into cold. The soap slips from his hands less than five times and his towel doesn’t smell moldy.

So, it’s a fine day. Not newsworthy, but fine. Keating is the only one that wishes him well and Todd is fine with that.

He’s fine with it until Neil enters their bedroom after dinner before he does and sees it: a neatly wrapped package set on Todd’s pillow with care.

“What’s this?” He asks, lifting the package from its place to show Todd. The ugly brown paper crinkles under his grasp. 

“Oh,” Todd says, unphased. He takes the bundle from Neil. To the unknowing eye, a surprise letter or gift in your bedroom might stimulate some interest. But, Todd does know and he doesn’t feel up to finding the unhappy offering under the paper wrapping. “It's a package from my parents. It’s for my birthday.” He tosses the phrase aside as he sits on his bed. 

“What?” Neil’s eyes widen and he follows Todd onto his bed. He extends over Todd’s lap to get to the gift. “Is today your birthday?” 

“Yeah, it is.” Todd uneasily answers. 

“Todd!” Neil’s exclamation comes out shocked and gentle. “Happy birthday, geez, I had no clue.

“I didn’t tell you,” Todd wants to apologize for it. “I guess I never really thought to. He fidgets awkwardly to position himself, placing his back against his wall. Neil copies his movements so that he and Todd sit shoulder-to-shoulder. Todd’s hand falls open against his thigh like he’s expecting something, but it doesn’t come.

Neil doesn’t sense any of Todd’s disappointment at that. He holds up the present in anticipation to Todd’s chest. “Let’s see, open it.”

Grimacing, Todd forces himself not to curl up into a ball. His jaw locks and he grinds his teeth. Opening gifts from your parents was such an awkward affair without an audience. Todd tears open the package, pushing the thought aside. He pulls out a desk set. The same desk set that sits, hardly touched, on the desk in his Welton dorm. It’s as worthless than the last one is.

Neither of them speak at first, but it’s easy to catch Neil’s eyes going from the tools on Todd’s desk to the set in his hands. As he does this, Todd’s throat binds and his teeth move on from grinding against each other to new territory. The inside of his cheek falls victim to his mouth’s boney reprisal.

Neil breaks the tension with a joke. “Maybe they thought you needed another one.”

Todd guffaws at this, reliving the traction in his mouth. Like a diseased entity, Todd lets the poor gift fall to the floor. It clatters against the wood with an unsatisfactory clunk. “Maybe they weren’t thinking about anything at all.” Todd says, “the funny thing is, I didn’t even like it the first time.”

It is not that the conversation ends, but there’s a pause where Todd is stuck deciding whether or not to grab Neil’s hand himself or crawl under the bed covers and rot away with the remaining hours of his birthday.

Neil allows for neither to happen, as he doesn’t let the conversation end. “You know,” he says, “there’s a study session tonight, but I can tell the boys to make it a party for your birthday.”

Todd’s never really had a proper birthday party, but he does know that a study session is no place for a birthday. The grounds of Welton in general are not really fit for parties, which is why the cave was such a good space for their Halloween celebration. But, that was different. Halloween wasn’t a party for him, it was for all of them. 

“Not really a party Todd,” Neil adds on, “just five minutes to tell you happy birthday, then I’ll tell them to never mention it again.”

Now, Todd doesn’t like parties, but it isn’t that serious. He makes sure Neil knows and says “I think that would be fine. Thanks.”

They’re staring at each other now, because there’s a moment happening here. It passes like the past few months have, in a sweeping motion of a picturesque gaze and a cloudy-headed feeling. There’s no reason to yell cut on the scene until finally, like he’s boiled over and spilled over the edges too, Neil takes Todd’s hand. He looks at Todd like he has to do something dangerous like climb Mount Everest or lie to his father. Then, for the third and final time, Neil attempts to ask Todd the question.

“There’s some time before we have to meet up,” he says, “plenty of time-”

“To go exploring?” It’s an attempt since Todd finishes the question before he can. He doesn’t feel like that was a very funny thing to do, but Neil laughs too hard. 

“You know me well, Toddy, what do you think? It could be like we’re doing something for your birthday.”

“We can’t really do much, Neil,” Todd stares down at their hands. He rubs his thumb in circles over Neil’s skin, like Neil usually does to him. That’s what the idea of push and pull is in a relationship is, Todd thinks, taking things your friends do and doing them back. That’s what admiration is meant to be; not copying everything your lover does, but mimicking them in subtle ways to say ‘I’m listening. I promise.’ “Sounds fun.”

“It can’t sound fun if we haven’t said what we’ll do yet,” Neil teases. “But, lucky for you, I’ve got the perfect idea.” He stands up and tries to pull Todd with him. But, Todd’s too stiff and Neil practically catapults back to his spot. He amusingly says he blames Todd for that and let's go so that Todd can stand up alone. Once upright, Todd takes Neil’s hand again. In the time Todd takes to do this, Neil picks up the desk set and places it under his arm.

“You’re bringing the desk set?”

“I am bringing the desk set.”

In an instant, Todd figures exactly what Neil’s idea of exploring is today. It’s a bit embarrassing, but Todd has to take a deep breath to stop himself from looking too excited. The memory he might have lost here is about to happen again. It’s absolutely macabre, but this is his favorite part of, with Neil. It’s his favorite part of their time together.

“Can I bring something too?”

“Of course!”

“I’ll bring…” Todd searches around the room for an answer. He finds it in the script for ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ open on Neil’s desk. He squeezes Neil's hand so he’ll walk forward with him, enough release to grab the book. “Your script,” he decides, “I told you we would go over your lines together and, and we still haven’t.”

“Todd,” Neil grins, obviously touched. “We don’t have to do that. That’ll be no fun, it’s your birthday.”

“I want to,” Todd tells him, “I think it would be nice to practice with you.”

That’s enough to get Neil to leave the room with Todd, absent of worry that he might be bored out of his mind reading Shakespeare on his birthday. Neil isn’t hiding the fact that he’s holding Todd’s hand as they walk, though it looks incredibly friendly. Neil’s not far from running and his hand is slipping towards Todd’s wrist. Todd is breathless about it, even if Neil does look unbelievably awkward running with a desk set tucked against his elbow.

The crevices and earth of Welton has been covered in a sheet of snow for about two weeks now. The cold is stronger than the fabrics of student’s jackets or uniforms, but it becomes more bearable when snowfall isn’t occurring. Todd thinks they're lucky that it isn’t snowing now, but the tip of his nose is frozen the second they enter the outside world. 

Then, before Todd can get used to the jogging and the wintry air, they’re there. They’re at the walkway that all of this happened at before. The one that Todd had sullenly walked to alone when he found the package on his bed the first time. Nolan had seen him with it and told him that he was asked to deliver it special. Todd cried when Nolan walked away and sat here. 

Where Neil had found him.

This time, though, they’re both standing and no crying has been done. They silently agree to let go of each other and look out to the view in front of them. There’s a cluster of trees and stars popping out between the pillars of the Welton building. The cobblestone edging of the walkway looks grouted with ice. When Todd touches it, he sucks in his breath. It’s a moment to take in, the feeling, the idea of the future written in the leaves; in the cosmos they can’t see.

“Todd?”

“Yeah, Neil?”

“I think,” Neil starts, “you’ve been underestimating the power of this desk set.” He lifts it up to show Todd, examining it like he’s searching for an engraving that’ll show this is a very important gift after all. “I mean, who would want a football or a baseball…or-”

“A car?” Todd says.

“Or a car! If they could have a desk set as wonderful as this one. I mean, if, if, if I were ever going to buy a, uh, a desk set, I would probably buy this one…both times.” He speaks in a nervous cadence, like he’s putting on a performance he hasn’t read the script to. Neil is skittish about something and it’s charming. It’s Todd’s Neil.

Looking right at Todd, Neil stops the mischievous glint in his eyes to ask: is it okay if I continue?

Todd can’t say ‘yes’ fast enough.

“In fact, it’s shape,” Neil explains, “is a shape that is rather aerodynamic, isn’t it?”

“Like it can fly?” Todd questions.

Neil blows air out between his puckered lips. “Hey, your idea, not mine.” He jests, though it really is his idea. “I can feel it. I know it. This desk set wants to fly.” And Neil is right because it does. It flies through the air for the split second Neil tosses it up and catches it. He hands it to Todd then, giving him the honors of completing the desk set’s flight. Todd trades him for it with his script.

Todd flings it over the side of the walkway and, before it can hit the ground, the thing falls through the air and into pieces. The impact against the ground isn’t as loud as he had hoped, but it’s clear that the desk set will never be seen again. “Oh, my!” 

Todd and Neil giggle together like they’re no older than seven. “I wouldn’t worry about it,” Neil says, “you’ll get another one next year.”

Neil is also right about that. Todd does get another one a year later, which is a lot less funny then and a lot more sad. Though he stays at Welton, Todd was never able to bring himself to throw the third desk set over that walkway ledge. It wouldn’t fly without Neil there. But, he did bury it where Neil asks him to go next.

“Wanna go to the wharf? Where they go out in row boats?”

“To practice your lines?”

Neil switches the weight between his feet, swaying before he gives an answer. “We don’t have to practice my lines if you change your mind. But it’s quiet out there. No one’s out there most night’s and I like it.”

“Are you there a lot?”

“I was.” Neil says, “I used to go all the time last year.”

“Let’s go now, then.”

Todd takes the script back from Neil, reading to him as they walk. Neil reiterates between every line that they don’t have to be doing this, but Todd will make it clear over and over that he wants to be doing this. Neil has written his blocking out on a few pages in messy shorthand. It's a secret. His lines are underlined with deep, dark indents of pencil. Todd is seeing straight into Neil’s process. It’s a better present than any.

When they get to the wharf, they’re reading through the first scene of the third act. They tumble through snowbeds, which meet their sprightly feet and giggling graces with ease. Neil is no longer trying to convince Todd of anything other than his memorization. He speaks his lines with flamboyant flourish.

“Here villain,” Neil shouts, “drawn and ready, where art thou?”

“I will be with thee straight,” Todd squints so that he can read the lines. The leftover light from the setting sun and the gleam of the brightening moon do little for his eyesight. 

“Follow me then, to plainer ground.” Neil responds, then ascends in arms up in ecstasy like he’s finished saying all of his parts, but there’s a number to go. “I love it!”

“What, this scene?” Todd halfway closes the book against his fingers, expecting that this isn’t a throwaway side thought for Neil.

“No!” Neil shakes his head. The snow has become dirty-looking, scarred by the patterns of their dress shoes. “Acting; acting’s got to be one of the most wonderful things in the world. Think about it,” he lifts a branch off the ground. “Most people, if they’re lucky, get to lead half an exciting life, right?” Neil waves the branch around like it’s a great sword, pointed in Todd’s direction. “If I keep getting parts, I could live dozens of great lives! I could be Hamlet! To be or not to be, that is the question!” Neil quotes, not asking the question at all, but screaming a fact into the wide oblivion of icy lake and dead tree.

“Todd,” Neil throws the branch to the ground. “For the first time in my life, I feel completely, utterly alive. You,” He points again to Todd, only now with his fingers that he drips in the nook of Todd’s clothed collarbone. “You should come to rehearsals.”

“I should?”

“Yes! They need people to run lights and stuff.”

Todd considers the offer to see the show from a new angle, literally and figuratively. He could be up  high, shining the light that Neil deserves. He thinks that Neil should always have a light on him, especially when he talks like this. There’s no fear of the incoming when Neil speaks in this mood of his, so drunk on the spread of life he doesn’t know about yet. 

If Todd started coming to rehearsals, he could take in the instances that he doesn’t know about, either. Maybe he’d find that Neil scrunches his nose each time he gets a note, like it has to come into him to be understood. Or, maybe he’d discover that Neil is naturally good at set building or makeup. The cast would know Todd. They would know that, without diving too deep, that Neil was his.

And, yeah, Todd would probably sneeze a lot up there with the dust of the lights uncleaned. But, he would learn about Neil in a way he never contemplated. It would be the same as agreeing to joining that study group or the Dead Poets without question. This was a third occurrence of a second chance to be in all the acts.

Ah, but there’s everything else, too, isn’t there? There’s Knox, who Todd knows will soon bite off more than he can chew with Chris. Charlie and Cameron’s friendship will toe all sorts of lines he can’t help with if he isn’t there. There’s expulsions and memberships and meetings he should involve himself with.

But, Todd will think about it.

“I’d like it if you were there,” Neil promises, “I would, really. But only if you want to.”

Todd crooks his head. “Would I even fit in?”

“Fit in, of course you would fit in!” Neil stammers, “I’ve told ‘em everything about you. About everyone here, really, they’d love to have you. Think about it.”

He can’t think about it right now.

“I will,” he swears. “From the top?”

Neil isn’t so good at hiding his disheartedness when Todd taps on the script, bending in his hands. “Let’s start from the line you said before we stopped, the be with thee one.”

“Sure.” Todd clears his throat. “I will be with thee straight.”

“Can I tell you something?” Neil asks him sincerely. 

“That’s not the line.” Todd remains with his face buried in the book. 

Neil presses the script down with the tips of his fingers, so Todd will look at him. “I’m not reading a line, silly, I’m asking you. Can I tell you something? It’s important.”

“More important than practicing your lines?”

“More important than practicing lines or going to college or Keating’s class.” 

That’s a huge declaration coming from Neil. Todd shuts the book completely and turns his attention all the way up. There’s no hints of the nature of what Neil must tell him, but his anxiety abruptly skyrockets and bubbles in the back of his throat.

“What is it about?”

“You.”

That makes Todd feel simultaneously better and worse. 

“You can tell me anything, Neil.”

“There’s a line in the show that I can’t get out of my head,” Neil jumps on the end of Todd’s sentence. “It’s been stuck there ever since my first rehearsal and I want to tell it to you.”

Now, this doesn’t sound so important. Todd’s curiosity spikes anyways. “What is it?”

“Okay,” Neil says, “it goes like this.” He holds his breath like he’s scared he’ll say it too fast. Or he won’t say it at all. Regardless, Neil does say it. His voice counteracts the romance of the line, since it does come out too rapidly. “I’ll follow thee and make a Heaven of Hell, to die upon the hand I love so well.”

Todd doesn’t get it at first. The quickness of the line from Neil is to blame and his incessant need for clear explanations is too. He makes out the ‘follow thee and make a Heaven of Hell’ clearly. It’s easy to understand that hellish life can be made Heavenly with someone else. Whether it be a platonic companion or a partner, Todd knows that. The uncountable nights in his apartment bedroom where Charlie always knocked on his door before going to bed said that enough. Life is hellish, fiery, and mean, mean, mean. With someone else, anyone else with you, it feels a lot better.

And Neil is saying that to Todd. 

“I’ll follow thee and make a Heaven of Hell,” Neil repeats, slower and refined. He’s caught his breath and he speaks more amorous. He’s taken Todd’s hand in his, but Todd doesn’t know when. “To die upon the hand I love so well. Do you know what it means?”

“It’s-” Todd’s voice cracks, “Helena,” he’s read the play a million times more than Neil, which he’ll never admit. “she’s telling Demetrius that she’d follow him and-”

“No,” Neil softly interrupts. “You’re right, Helena is saying it. But that’s not what…I’m saying it right now. When I say it, do you know what I mean?”

Todd doesn’t, not completely. After understanding the first half of the line, he tackles the second. “To die upon the hand I love so well.” That and the Hamlet quote Neil had said before become star-crossed in his mind. To die upon, to sleep, perchance to dream. To die, to end them, to die, to die. Todd’s soul sticks to the word, baring its loud alarm as a reminder to where they’re standing now.

“I don’t understand,” Todd admits. “You, You’re…we’re…”

“It’s how I feel, Todd.” Neil says. “Is that okay?” His knees are bent like he’s ready to run if Todd doesn’t understand soon.

But Todd still isn’t there yet. He isn’t hearing entirely what Neil means, they’re focusing on different words. 

“It’s how you feel?”

“How do you feel?” Neil asks.

“Like I don’t like…that word.”

“Which one?”

“To die. How do you…” Todd’s cheeks are red from the cold and from Neil’s voice. His eyes are watery and he doesn’t know how much longer he can look at Neil like this, saying the word die. It doesn’t sound right. Todd wants to rewrite the script, say live or to be, always. “I don’t…”

And Neil understands something that Todd doesn’t mean. They’re comprehending each other’s feelings on opposite spectrums, in different ways. “No, no, God, no, Todd, no.” He shakes his head in percussive, short bursts. “Let’s change that word, okay? God, maybe I picked a bad line after all.” He pulls Todd into him, resting his head on top of Todd’s.

Todd’s heartbeat is loud enough to destroy glass and eardrums.

Two of their hands stay together, while their free hands wrap around each other. Todd’s hand is on Neil’s spine and Neil’s is in Todd’s hair. 

“How about we say to lie upon the hand?” Neil offers, “or to hold the hand? Say that instead. That’s better.”

‘I’ll follow thee and make a Heaven of Hell, to hold the hand I love so well.’

It is better and it hits Todd’s chest hard enough to fracture his ribs. He’d give up all of his ribs and start new if Neil says what Todd wants him to say. That he might want Todd like he wants him and there’s no death in between the plot lines. Only a growing field underneath all of this snow that never leaves forever.

His face is against Neil’s chest and he hears his heartbeat, too. It isn’t as quick as Todd’s, but it’s still a rhythm to blood circulation and a rhythm that says exactly what Todd’s does.. It feels like he’s processing his own insignificance against Neil’s chest, like all of this, everything has led to this and it almost seems like he had nothing to worry about at all. But love should feel this way when it’s finally admitted between the two parties. It should be a release. It should make you cry and laugh, like Todd does alone. It should feel like nothing in the world matters because it doesn’t. Not when you have each other. 

It’s calming. It’s no longer earth-shattering, heart-pattering, or a tribulation. It doesn't sting. Not now. It’s only a fact that can only be described as soft like snow. Or like a daisy. Something floral, probably. Never embellished with harsh descriptors. It lives as it is.

“Do you understand now?” Neil asks.

“Can you say it? Out loud? Please?” Maybe Todd’s crying and maybe he isn’t. His face is wet, though, and when he lifts his head away from Neil’s chest, there's evidence of it.

Before saying it, Neil steps back. He lifts Todd’s hand up to his mouth and presses his lips to it. His touch, though electric, isn’t the harsh kind that kills or burns. It’s a lifeline that always stays plugged in. Todd wants all of it.

“I’ll follow thee and make a Heaven of Hell, to hold the hand I love so well.”

“Yes?” Todd says.

“I love you so well.”

“I love you.” Todd says. Not better or more, but just as well.

Chapter Text

16 November, 1959. After Admitting.

Todd always knew that something about he and Neil’s dynamic changed after his birthday all those years ago. Their relationship with each other became etched into each other’s skin with permanent ink. There was a place for Todd published officially and not last-minute written into the margins. It was less romantic and more friendly, then. But still the same as now, said out loud with bated breath and cold noses.

“I love you so well,” Neil says like it hurt this whole time not to.

“I love you.” Todd admits back. It’s not hard to say, as he’s merged through these feelings himself already. He thinks Neil must have gone through this, too, because his shoulder fall, relieved like melted butter on a warm pan.

“Wow,” Neil responds. He is somewhere on the high grounds of competence and the ledge of devotedness. “You do.” He doesn’t ask for anything, only says so because he has to. He gazes up at Todd from his place at his hand, only straightening back up so that he may see Todd better in this moonlight. “You love me.”

“I do.” Todd nods, “I really do. I feel it. I know it.” He echoes what Neil had spoken about his desk set flying only twenty minutes ago.

“How long have you known?” Neil asks him, softly. His eyes are wide with wonderment and his mouth is curved up with curiosity. 

“It feels like I’ve known for years.

Neil laughs kindly at what he assumes to be a joke from Todd. “It sure does feel that way, huh?”

Todd can’t find anything to say to that, really, since it is that way. He opens his mouth to speak, stopping himself when he feels Neil’s hands slide from their locked position around his fingers, to his wrists, to his elbows. They stay there long enough for Todd to tense up, then glide up to his shoulders, to his neck, to his cheeks. They stay on his cheeks for a long time.

And Todd thinks that there’s probably poetry somewhere here, hands against cheeks. There’s something marvelous to be said about the crescent shape of a finger set against the sharpness of jaw, of mouth. What does it mean to be opposite like this? To let someone place their hands too close to the divots in your neck. The flowers and softness of love place their roots here, Todd thinks, from the seed of human nature. To love someone is to let them in close.

To love someone is to admit that you don’t want to die enough times that you’ll place your morality in their hands. Your neck, their palms. Your spirit, their bones.

Then, Neil admits another thing to Todd once winter gives up on trying to penetrate past his touch on Todd’s skin. “I don’t know what to do with my hands.”

“Keep them here a minute longer?” Todd asks, croaky and somewhat unsure. He lifts up his arms so that his hands rests over Neil’s.

To love someone is to hold your hands over the ones that hold you. I don’t want to die, not if it’s not by your hands. I want to live, especially when you hold me.

Neil nods, biting his lip so that he’ll think about what he says before saying it. It does not work very well. “Oh, my God,” he says, absolutely smitten. “Anything, anything. Anything you want.” Neil’s partially calm, false demeanor fades in an instant and he gives into his urges. He pecks Todd’s forehead with a mwah sound and Todd laughs at him.

“Anything?” Todd muses, chest held high with his held breath. “I wouldn’t promise that.”

“I would,” Neil says, “I did! I would do it again, too. Anything, Toddy, anything you want. Just say the word.”

It hasn’t been stated, but Todd probably started crying several minutes ago. Neil’s crying, too. They don’t sob or slobber, or become mucus messes. But the tears do flow in lustful longing, one met so sweetly. Todd’s never seen Neil cry. His eyelashes look longer. It’s beautiful, only here.

Todd swallows the lump in his throat. Even if Todd is the one to come up with all the cheesy lines in his head, even if he thinks up all these ideas of love, Neil is much better at being naturally romantic than he is. Actors don’t have to think of the lines. They only do. Neil promises without second thoughts, too. He touches Todd like there isn’t anything worth worrying about. Neil’s so warm, Todd wonders if his hands will blister his cheeks if they aren’t careful. And, he kissed Todd’s hand and his forehead. He’s beating Todd by two. 

Writers are thinkers. So, Todd doesn’t give himself the chance to think. “Can I promise the same thing? To try and give you anything you ask?”

“I don’t know what more I could ask for.”

Then, Todd presses his fingers into the spaces between Neil’s. He pulls their hands away from his face, keeping them together. Todd steps forward and gives Neil a single, sentimental kiss on his cheek.

“I’ll start there, then.” Todd says with his breath hot. When he steps away, Neil looks like he’s ready to implode.

‘Oh, my God,” Neil’s voice cracks. “Do that again…do that all the time.”

“Neil!”

—

When they go to study hall that evening, Todd walks in thinking the obvious will be written all over their faces. He thinks there must be a sign he can’t see on his back that has everything that’s ever happened written down. It’s taped down with, well, really good tape. That, or there’s an announcement being made that Todd can’t hear that screams ‘Neil Perry and Todd Anderson caught out by the wharf! More information coming soon!” 

But, there isn’t. Because no one says anything for a record-breaking half hour before Charlie makes a single comment like “Neil, I meant to say earlier, but you’re looking peppier than usual.” Which, would have been fine if he hadn’t followed it with “and Todd! You are looking adorably nervous, so–”

“Lay off, Charlie.” Neil jokingly tells him and, surprisingly, that’s all it takes. He does.

He says nothing more, even when Neil openly holds Todd’s hand when they leave to get to bed on time. Again, no one does. Which, in hindsight, shouldn’t shock Todd, but it does have him interested in looking back on if Neil had been this brave all this time. If he was, no one told him.

When they’re alone now, though, Neil does more than hold his hand. It’s nothing too intense or mind-boggling. He kisses his cheeks and hands and shoulders whenever the doors are closed or classrooms are empty. It’s overly infatuous and Todd can’t get enough of it. He tries to do the same to Neil, since Neil looks like he’ll pass out every time he does. But, he finds that holding Neil’s hand and setting his head on his shoulder is a lot more his style. That doesn’t mean his kiss on the wharf was the only one Neil was treated to. But, it’s nice to be close to Neil in all the ways that come with that.

It starts off this slow because they’re both learning. Even if Neil keeps Todd up with every story about when he found Todd just darling or when Todd tells Neil he feels sick whenever Neil is near him and when he is not…it’s enough. They know how they feel and don’t kiss, lip against lip, yet. It’s not but they don’t kiss. And. And, that’s what works for now.

—

19 November, 1959.

The ‘walking class’ is what Todd remembers it as. It happens that Thursday afternoon, when snow has let up and there’s only a slight breeze. John Keating urges his class outside with a promise of an easy lesson. Once there, he lines the boys up and picks out Knox, Cameron, and Gerard. 

“I want you boys to walk.” Keating says, he himself strutting about in dizzying circles around the cobblestone courtyard. “That’s all. There’s no grades at stake, gentlemen.” He eyes a tense, stiff Meeks. “Just take a stroll.” He lengthens the syllable, pleased when the three boys begin their own migrants. Cameron steps in the front, then Gerard, then Knox.

The grand Welton clock ticks out steadily over the precinct. The class claps to this noise and, eventually, one-by-one, that boys that walk match their steps to the metronome. 

“There it is,” Keating says. Struck by his own unnamed hypothesis, Keating calls out. “I don’t know, but I’ve been told–” He speaks in military, sing-song. 

The class repeats him.

“Doing poetry is old!”

More repetition, then the trio circles around a final time and Keating joins them. He calls out their steps, left, right, left. Finally satisfied, he gives them all permission to halt. He thanks them, giving the three some time to find space back in line.

“If you noticed, everyone started out with their own stride, their own pace…” Very slowly, Keating strolls between different boys, mimicking the footsteps he just witnessed. He points them each out like a line-up of victim after victim. “Mr. Pitts took his time. He knew he would get to his destination one day…Contrary to Mr. Cameron.”

Keating lowers his stance and walks with a quickened step. “Mr. Cameron walked like he had to prove something. You can see him thinking, head forward, ‘Is this right? It might be right, it might be right. Maybe it isn’t, I don’t know!”

“Ha!” Charlie cackles, hand pressing into Cameron’s shoulder. Cameron swats his hand away.

“Now, Mr. Overstreet,” Keating chuckles, standing tall and sauntering with his pelvis pressed forward. “Is driven by the deeper force. Yes,” the class crows and whoops, hollering, “we know that, all right. Now, I didn’t bring them up here to ridicule. I brought them up here to demonstrate the point of conformity; maintaining your own beliefs in the face of others. I see the look in your eyes,” he continues, “you might think you would have walked differently. Well, ask yourselves why you were clapping.”

“Let’s try with another group, yes?” Without looking at anyone specific, Keating calls out “Mr. Anderson, Mr. Perry, and Mr. Meeks, please join me. Remember, no grading here. Walk, however you like.”

Todd doesn’t want to, confused by the change in the lesson. There’s more to say, more that Keating means and he hasn’t said it. Last time he had the class move together from here. This is different. But Keating isn’t budging. He stares at them until Neil starts walking first, then Todd follows. It feels awkward and a bit third-wheely with Meeks right behind them. They go around in three circles before Keating steps out of line and another six when he tells them to stop.

“Boys, I stopped you because of something quite peculiar. You see, two of you walked at the same pace and the other could not catch up. Mr. Meeks, you are the other,” he says. “You walk just like your name, shoulders hunched, please don’t look at me! Please,’ Keating smiles, “do not feel like you have to change it. The meek inherit the Earth.”

It’s a speedily said comment, and that’s when Todd knows that Keating picked Meeks for no reason other than they needed a third person. The focus was really about Neil and Todd.

“Mr. Perry and Mr. Anderson, the two of you walked the same, from the beginning. You are possibly driven by the same thing.” He speaks with one hand in a pocket and the other with clawed fingers, held out like he’s holding the skull of Yorick. “You see, gentlemen, these two young men before you walked not only in the same meter, but with their chests up. You might be thinking, doesn’t a chest raised prove an arrogant man? If you think that, I invite you boys to answer this: what does man hold inside our chests?”

“Our hearts?” Todd says without raising his hand.

“Ding, ding, ding! Point for Mr. Anderson, you are correct. Our beating hearts, lad, are inside the cavity of our chests. A raised chest can be arrogant, yes, but a raised chest shows a vulnerable heart. A confident chest holds a confident heart. Please, whenever you think something has one meaning, I beg you, explore it. Explore it like a metaphor or a friend or a lover. And, whatever you do, do not let the meaning die, dormant.” He looks directly at Todd. “Good job,” he congratulates. Then, Keating falls back into the script. “It’s everyone’s turn. I want you all to find your own walk right now. Your own striding, pacing…any direction, anything you want. It can be proud of silly, anything. Gentlemen,” Keating nods, “the courtyard is yours.”

Todd does what he’s told. He walks even if his feet want to stay against the floor. He walks because he knows Keating is watching him and he knows Keating is smiling. He lets it go when Keating does, who asks Charlie if he'll be joining them on their exercise.

“I’m exercising the right not to walk.” He responds.

Fine by him, Keating grins. “Thank you, Mr. Dalton. You’ve illustrated the point: swim against the stream.”

—

19 November, 1959. Night.

Neil and Todd are late to the Dead Poets meeting that evening. It’s during dinner, since Neil isn’t called to rehearsal that day and finals are just around the corner. It made everyone feel better to do it now, than to miss it completely or wake up tomorrow too sleepy for their own good.

But somehow, Neil and Todd are late.

It’s Neil’s fault, if they’re placing blame. He tells Todd that there’s something he has to grab from the room and, instead of sprinting to find it, he moves at a snail’s pace up the stairs. Todd tries to get him to move faster or to find it later, but Neil tells him he wants to take his time. “It can’t wait, Todd!”

The thing Neil has to grab doesn’t look so important when it’s in his hands, though. It’s a lamp that, when the shade is pulled up, shows a statue of a funny man as the base. Todd questions what it is and Neil tells him. “I found it at Henley Hall, in their prop closet. It’s perfect. We need a God for the cave!”

“Do we…need one?”

“We do!”

Todd doesn’t push on, hiding the way he thinks Neil is very, very cute for this by covering his face with the palms of his hands. He looks like he’s filled with disbelief at Neil’s doing so, but Neil knows better. The tips of Todd’s ears are tinged pink.

“Neil.”

“Yes, darling?”

It’s the first time Neil’s called him anything other than his name and that pink in his face turns a deep red. He slides his hands down and squeaks out. “W-What?”

“What, Todd?”

“What did you say?”

Neil clears his throat loudly, suddenly very afraid that he’s done something wrong or maybe he’s said something before Todd was ready to hear it. Which Todd thinks is silly, considering they’ve admitted everything else already. A nickname, however, it’s daring. It’s the syllables that happen before love that hint at it. It says I think of you, in your name and this one. All names are yours. It’s a reminder that Todd is his and, if Todd can bring himself to say one out loud, that Neil is his, too.

“Is that okay that I said that? Called you that?”

Todd’s arms have pricked up with goosebumps. He doesn’t scream or shout or give himself a chance to stutter out an answer. Instead, he points to the lamp in Neil’s hands. “Bring that to the meeting, we’re already late.”

It’s confirmation.

Neil hums, overly-pleased. “You didn’t have to come up here with me. I could have been late alone.”

“I wanted to come with you.”

Neil smiles. “Have you thought about joining me at rehearsals, yet?’

In truth, he had. It was one of the main components that showed up in his thought process over the last few days. He'd watch Neil bike away and feel a twinge of guilt that he wasn't there with him. But, there was another shadowy whisper that spoke to Todd in the back of his mind. It told him that he needed to highly consider staying at Welton all the time. It told him that he had friends here, too. It told him that he hadn't saved Neil yet, but he was allowed to focus his efforts elsewhere. 

And Todd had to agree. Neil was safe at rehearsals. His father hadn't visited yet and there was nothing to tell Todd when he would. There was something here, at Welton, though. That Todd couldn't leave for the future. He had to search for it before it broke something unnamed apart. It was like there was a dam somewhere that Todd needed to find. But all he can hear is the spilling of water from a source he can hear behind a wall, but can't break into. It needed to be repaired and built back stronger. 

Whatever that was, Todd had to see it. 

“I have. I, um, I have." Todd nervously taps his hand against his chest as his anxiety grows. "I'm sorry, um," he doesn't look at Neil, but at the corner of his forehead. "I don't think I'm ready to be part of all that stuff yet."

“Yeah?” Neil doesn’t look hurt at all, which calms Todd, at least a little bit. It's enough to get Todd to fall back to Neil's eyes.

“Is that okay?”

“It’s perfectly okay!” Neil answers. He reaches for Todd’s hand from his chest carefully, giving Todd the chance to pull back. “It’d be no fun for you to join if you weren’t ready to. I’ll have more plays. You can join me on the next one or the next one or the next one…” He unfolds Todd’s clenched hands and sets it against his own chest. “As long as you’re in the audience, you’re there enough.”

You’re there enough.

It's a piece of confirmation that comes from Neil now. The validation that, even when they're apart from each other, the outside forces of the world cannot destroy how they feel about each other. They can learn to walk different steps and take different speeds, different routes. They can go to their destinations and return when the air is cold and their chests are spilling with tales of adventure and yearning. It won't matter how it happens, like their first kiss or their lives. Feelings, true and known, cannot be harmed by which that cannot be controlled. And not being ready or an overwhelming urge to stay in place, to not walk at all; that can't be controlled either.

Enough and always enough. 

“Oh.” is all Todd says.

“Oh.” Neil responds.

Chapter Text

19 November, 1959. Continued.

A part of Todd feels guilty that he does not immediately remember that Charlie Dalton can play the saxophone. His music fills the sooty air of the cave, made that way by the pipes each of the boys breathe in and out of. At first, it’s a plethora of nothing, a blurb of sound with no discernable melody. The only thing that Charlie gets out of his non-tune is Gerard upset with him; the match he lit gets extinguished when Charlie blows the instrument in his face. He also gets asked to prove if he can play well at all.

‘Poetrusic,’ that’s the word Charlie uses, playing a short slurry of notes that slide into a poem that forms Charlie’s truth.

Gotta do more, gotta be more.

In that cave, under Neil’s arm, Todd convinces himself that he hadn’t forgotten Charlie could play. He only needed to be reminded. Besides, the first time around Charlie stops playing maybe three years after graduation. When that happened, when Todd noticed that his case was packed up in the back of his closet, he asked about it. Charlie answered that he always hated the instrument. Todd told him then that it was the clarinet he always hated. To that, Charlie said that they were practically the same thing, clarinets and saxophones.

They absolutely were not. But with how proud Charlie looks of his skills now, playing for his friends for the first time, Todd hopes that he sticks with it when all this is said and done.

“I love the clarinet,” says a smiling Cameron when Charlie finishes his performance.

“I hated it.” Charlie says. Cameron’s smile falls as fast as it had come. “The saxophone…the saxophone is more…sonorous.”

Todd can agree with that. He’s about to say so when Knox jumps to his feet, overcome by a feeling he’s been stewing in. He’s had plenty of time to do this, as he’s been in a slump ever since Neil and Todd had joined the group for that evening’s meeting. It’s a big feeling, one big enough that he tells his friends that if he can’t have Chris, he’ll kill himself.

Now, Todd can’t fully agree with that. Maybe it’s hypocritical or thought up purely due to experience. After all, Todd had run out of Keating’s class when he realized how in love he was. That was a dramatic thing and certainly a counterpart of what Knox is experiencing now. But perhaps that’s the before and afterthoughts. 

So, when Knox runs out of the cave, back to Welton, shouting that he has to call Chris, Todd tries his best not to trip following. And when he calls her, Todd stays quiet. He doesn’t want to take a chance on advice he cannot fully consider. That’s also why he does not speak up when Knox tells them Chris has invited him to a party occurring the next night at Chet’s house. Some things, Todd decides, do not need second chances.

The only second that happens in this enclosed space is when Knox hangs up the phone and shouts ‘YAWP!’ He’s the first one to use the word after Todd, which makes that hypocritical feeling return a lot more familiar than neighborly. That barbaric yawp is more proof that he is here, that Knox is here. It’s a declaration of a discovery, shouted only when on the perimeters of winnings. Yeah. Todd thinks that’s it.

That’s exactly it. And even though Todd keeps quiet, he does nod his head noticeably more than the others when Knox tells them that it’s going to happen, him and Chris. Even when this was the first time he had heard this, Todd believes he agreed then, too. Because, really, he had seen crazier things. He’s seen crazier things. He saw Knox get Chris the first time and Neil get him the second.

And even though Charlie seems far from believing in Knox now, Todd also thinks that he’ll believe in him, in time. He’ll believe in Knox because Charlie’s got his own growing yawp inside of him. When they all part their ways into their rooms for the night, Charlie has his hand on the small of Cameron’s back. Cameron doesn’t say anything about it, which would mean that he isn’t upset by this. By Charlie touching him.

It’s what Charlie does the next night that upsets Cameron.

—

20 November, 1959. Friday, a Second Meeting.

There’s not much to be said other than Todd sees it coming. Charlie proposes a last minute Dead Poets meeting, in place of their study group. It sounds innocent at first, since Charlie tells them that he wants to have one, as their last meeting ran so short. They might as well entertain themselves with the poetics, he says, while Knox is away. 

“Aw, man,” Knox says, “I’ll be missing out.”

“No, no, Knoxious,” Charlie says, waving his hand back and forward in disagreement. “You go get your girl. We’ll tell you all about the meeting when you get back.”

But Todd knows Charlie. He isn’t doing this because he’s itching for the adrenaline that comes from sneaking past Nolan. It’s possible that he’s doing this because Charlie is jealous of Knox. He’s spending time with a girl. Technically multiple girls if you count all of the guests at this party. That would be an easy explanation, if Charlie wasn’t too cowardly to admit it. 

Instead, Todd gets to feel it, the before and aftermath of what Charlie does. It’s fierce to say this ruins the sanctity of the Dead Poets Society. But Todd can feel some part of themselves rot and wither the second he hears the girls on the outskirts of the cave.

Todd has nothing against these girls. They’re nice enough. They don’t pose a threat and they don’t look at Todd funny when Neil pulls him close. It’s not their fault that their pawns in this game that Charlie has decided to be the master to. Really, it’s a lighthearted situation, but Todd knows something’s been breached. The trust or the romantics of what they do here, of what the Dead Poets do: it’s changed. 

And he can’t ask Charlie why he’s really doing this, not now. Not ever.

Cameron reacts to everything Charlie says and does. It must be exactly the attention Charlie is longing for. He grins at every groan and stifles his laughs at every stutter. When Charlie introduces them to his distasteful, yet fitting new name ‘Nuwanda,’ Cameron is not impressed. And he’s even less so when Charlie borrows one of the girl's red lipsticks and draws up some marks on his face with it. Cameron does not drink out of the bottle that passes around the group either.

When Charlie thinks no one is looking, Todd sees how desperate he is in contrast to Cameron’s catatonic. 

Todd and Neil both take drawn out sips from the mystery bottle.

In the buzz of chatter and the buzz in his veins, Charlie shakes off his desperation with a new idea. Todd also feels that flutter of booze in his system. He can barely stop himself from telling Charlie to stop before he goes too far. This isn’t something he can risk a chance with either.

So, Charlie makes the announcement. He tells them all that he’s getting an article published in the school paper, one that argues that girls should be allowed to go to Welton. The lightheartedness of this weird evening isn’t so funny anymore.

It’s so confusing to hear that Charlie’s actually done something, Meeks has to take off his glasses and clean them with the cloth of his shirt. It’s like he has to take time to consider if his glasses are dirty enough to somehow affect his hearing. Pitts looks intrigued by the idea, though with an undercurrent of worry. Neil’s hand trickles down to Todd’s waist, lowered with that same intention that Meeks cleans his glasses with. An ask of why and a reason to understand. Unable to let go of what you’re used to. Cameron tells Charlie off, largely upset while the other’s are stunned.

“Are we just playing around out here, or do we mean what we say?” Charlie remarks, commenting on Knox’s actions from yesterday evening. It’s also a comment on Meeks and Gerard, who built their radio together on Welton grounds. And it’s a comment on Neil’s play. It’s a comment on how close Todd is to him and the things he’s written, too. 

That’s it. Charlie’s doing this because he hasn’t taken any big chances yet. Has he? Is that it? Todd can’t tell. None of them can. 

When they leave the cave, the walk back is treacherous.

“I can’t believe you, Charlie.” Cameron huffs, breath coming out in haze from his mouth. “If I get expelled because of you–”

“You’re not going to get expelled,” Charlie throws back his head, having to say this multiple times already. “I told you. No one will find out who wrote it, okay?”

“Why do you even…” Cameron trails off, unable to verbalize. 

Todd fills in for him. “When will it go out? Monday?”

“Nah,” Charlie says, “I submitted it too late. It’ll be in next week's paper.”

“And you aren’t scared Nolan will find out before then?” Cameron asks.

“Cam, Nolan has never read a single paper Hell-ton has put out. He’s not going to start now.”

“You always say that.” Cameron scoffs.

“I have never said that before.”

“Not that,” Cameron sighs. “Not that exactly. You’re always shoving things away and saying they aren’t a big deal. Well,” Cameron stops walking, “it is a big deal, Charlie.”

“Why do you even care!” Charlie stops too, which prompts the rest to do so with him.

“Why do you!”

Their voices raise and Gerard, kind as can be, tries to stop them. It doesn’t work. They can only see each other, Cameron and Charlie.

“You’ve also had a stick up your ass about the Poets, and you know it,” Charlie says. “I care about what we do. You’d give in to Nolan if he asked you about us right now.”

Cameron’s voice falls dangerously low. He points his fingers and stabs it into Charlie’s chest. “Just because I care about school, doesn’t mean I don’t care about this, too.”

“Yeah, but it’s different. You can say it’s not, but it is.” Charlie’s voice cracks harshly. It’s too dark to tell if he’s about to cry, but it’s in his throat. At that, at that brink of real mercy, Charlie walks away. He leaves them, but not behind, since everyone follows. Cameron is the last to move.

No one speaks until they reach Welton again. Neil hums a soothing song as they walk, though, more to Todd than anyone. Todd doesn’t know the name, but it sounds like a lullaby. It sounds like the song that plays in a movie when someone dies. It’s fitting in multiple ways. No one knows what else to do after a fight where all you can do is watch it unfold. 

When everyone is at their doors, eyes heavy with sleepiness, Charlie leaves them with one more thing.

“Damn,” he whispers. “Maybe we should have all gone to that party tonight, instead.”

It isn’t even a good joke. It isn’t a joke at all. But everyone, besides Cameron, does laugh a little bit. 

—

30 November, 1959. Monday.

It happens a week later, a few days after a canceled Dead Poets meeting and two cut-short study sessions. On the thirtieth of November, a Monday morning, the student newspaper is released. Above the centerfold is the article, submitted by the anonymous Dead Poets Society: ‘Girls at Welton: A Not so Impossible Possibility.’

The assembly hall at Welton is a lot bleaker when there’s no warm weather to drift into the place. The entire school is jammed into the rows of benches. Each student stands with their back ruler-straight and their mouths in lines. The appearance, however, is absurd. As far as Todd has heard, most students have been impressed by this week’s paper. Some are even reading it for the first time. There’s been at least three petitions started in support of the composition.

This dignified look is done for a peeved Nolan, who stalks the aisles of boys with a mean glint in his eyes and a newspaper crunched up in his hand. He positions himself before them all and gives an order to sit, which no one takes their time to obey.

He calls it a profane piece of literature, unauthorized. Todd doesn’t listen much to Nolan’s commentary, too stuck on the definitions of those two words. For the article to be profane, it would have to obtain material that went against all religious code. But there’s nothing non-biblical, Todd thinks, about wanting girls to be in attendance at a school. It would be, by definition, moreso. There’s nothing atheistic about women, if they are what all man are made of. 

But what’s so biblical about being sixteen anyways?. Todd’s seventeen now, but the Todd that exists at seventeen isn’t different from the sixteen he was last week. Sixteen and seventeen aren’t biblical. Sixteen is a minefield and seventeen are the bombs buried in it. They aren’t active, but there’s still that overflowing anxiety that everything will go wrong. With one wrong step, you’re done for.

But there are no wrong steps. Religion cannot be placed in the confines of age, of teenage, of that field. If anything in this assembly hall is profane, it’s that Nolan let every sixteen and seventeen year boy into the same room at once.

Todd thinks that being twenty-seven wasn’t very biblical either. No, not at all. It was a lot like being sixteen and seventeen. Only, at twenty-seven he could kind of afford not-so-sect things like cigarettes and unbothered imagination. Imagination. Twenty-seven is feeling dreamlike to Todd now, like a faraway story he can no longer pick out all the details too. It’s a light turned off and an unclosed closet door. 

It feels exactly like he is now because maybe, just maybe, we don’t ever age past who we were at seventeen.

But if Nolan wants something religious, Todd can explain all of it to him. He can explain the ways he’s found it in the past few months and the past ten years. If he could, he’d shout that it won’t always be found in the holy book. You’ll find it in the opposite of metaphysical. In the people you know, especially in the rifts. You’ll find it in what’s absolute, like the touch of a lover or the scratches of a fingernail or a newspaper. It’s in the humane mindedness of others.

Anyways, the girls at Welton article is not profane. 

The word ‘unauthorized,’ that’s a bit more difficult to dance around. Honestly, it’s Welton’s own problem for placing Charlie in charge of anything.

Todd’s brought out of his thoughts by the sound of a ringing telephone. Where Charlie got it, he’ll never know. He picks up the receiver and answers. “Welton Academy. Hello. Yes, he is, just a moment,” Charlie stands up and holds the phone towards Nolan. He speaks ostentatiously, proud of himself. “Mr. Nolan, it’s for you. It’s God. He says we should have girls at Welton.”

The room erupts in laughter, the loudest ones coming from the Dead Poets. Even Cameron lets out a breathy snicker after he gets over his disappointment.

Laughter must be the best medicine because Todd can feel the tension of the last Dead Poets meeting stitch itself up.

—

They’re all in a crowd together, six of the Dead Poets, outside of their dorm doors. Waiting for Charlie to get out of Nolan’s office is a nightmare. Time isn’t passing and each instance the clock inches towards another minute feels like the same one as before.

Neil talks first, though he really only speaks to Todd. “How long do you think he’ll be in there?” He gazes down at Todd, who’s resting against a free space on the wall. The few inches of height Neil has on him rises taller with his stress and shadow.

“I don’t know,” Todd answers. “But you know he’ll be fine, he’s Charlie.” He holds onto Neil’s hand, only for a second before letting it fall. 

“I don’t know that, Todd.” Neil’s words are fierce but his voice is tender. He sighs. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Todd, I’m worried about him.”

“I know,” Todd smiles up at him, which allows Neil to relax. Todd reaches up and messes up his hair. To the people around them, it looks like camaraderie, something boys would do to fool around with each other on the playground. Neil leans into his touch, almost following his hand when it leaves. “He’ll be fine, Neil.”

“How do you do that?” Neil asks suddenly.

“Do…what?”

“That. That thing you do, where you make me feel better.”

“Oh,” Todd can’t look away from Neil, but he doesn’t have an answer to explain that. He doesn’t know what he’s doing to make Neil feel better. But he knows that Neil makes him feel better, too. He tells him that, which compels Neil to groan like he’s frustrated at something he can’t control. He bows his head and backs away right when someone calls to them that Charlie’s coming.

Then, Charlie’s walking towards them, tight-legged and grimacing. He is nearly in his room, which Cameron is standing guard at, when Neil asks him: “You kicked out?” Hands are shoved into pockets. Neil’s arms are crossed over his chest.

“No,” he answers.

“So, what happened?” Neil searches for more. Charlie isn’t looking at him.

That’s a relief to hear, even if Todd knows that. Nolan had seen red at Charlie’s joke, which he named a travesty to the Welton name. He had Charlie dragged up to his office and it’s obvious what happened behind those closed doors.

“I’m to turn everybody in, apologize to the school, and all will be forgiven,” Charlie throws the sentence over his shoulder. He inches deeper into his bedroom.

“So, what are you gonna do! Charlie?” Neil tries to follow him.

“Damn it, Neil,” Charlie spits out, teeth grit to assist in lowering his voice. He looks between the boys before him and adds a final note. “The name is Nuwanda.” His sorrow turns into a smile, a prouder one than the one that appeared with his ‘God Called’ mess. He shuts his door, leaving the boys, including Cameron, out.

“So stupid,” Cameron comments under his breath.

And he’s right. Charlie is very, very stupid. But he’s also an incredible amount of smart. He’s pious and suave and downright incomparable. Cameron knows that, even if he does only speak the first part. 

At their study group that evening, Cameron makes sure to reiterate that.

“I told you everything would be fine,” Charlie has his legs criss-crossed. He’s holding his bongos between the hole between his outstretched knees. A pair of sunglasses sits unwelcome on his nose. He speaks to not only the Dead Poets, but a large number of boys who want to hear his story of how he survived Nolan’s office.

“No, you told us that nobody would find out who wrote it. Which Nolan did, because you pulled that stupid move.”

“Not stupid if I lived to tell the tale,” Charlie taps rhythmically on the bongos. “Now, there I was,” he says, “standing tall, something Cameron cannot say,” he stops drumming, twitching his lip up towards Cameron, who sits directly in front of him.

Cameron flicks his foot. He can’t feel it under his shoe, but Charlie jolts his foot up like he did. “You are such an asshole.” Cameron snipes. Then, he rolls his eyes. “So, what happened?”

“Nolan enters the room,” Charlie smirks when he answers. “ Creaks,” he mimics the noise of the floorboards with his mouth and the noise of Nolan’s steps with his bongos. “He started walking around my left. Creak…Creak… Then he says: Assume the position, Mr. Dalton.”

A chill crawls up Todd’s spine and tugs his hair. It pulls him to scraping of the heavy doors to the study room opening. There, at the doorway is John Keating. He looks not entirely displeased, but like he has something to teach them. Something that can only be said outside of school hours. At the sight of him, the boys neaten themselves up. Todd steps back, caught by Neil’s arm around the center of his back.

“It’s all right, gentlemen,” Keating says.

“Mr. Keating.” Charlie lifts his glasses to his hairline.

“Mr. Dalton,” Keating looks down on him. “That was a pretty lame stunt you pulled today.”

Charlie is appalled. “You’re siding with Mr. Nolan? What, what about ‘Carpe Diem,’ and sucking all the marrow out of life? All that?”

Keating answers intelligently. “Sucking the marrow out of life doesn’t mean choking on the bone.” That sticks, push-pinned into Charlie’s chest. “Sure, there’s a time for daring and there’s a time for caution. A wise man understands which one is called for.”

“But I thought you’d like that.” Charlie says and all that he stands for is spoken for right then. There’s a need to impress older people he looks up to, no matter how often he toils on sticking it to the man, going against the grain. Even when he hadn’t participated in the walking activity in Keating’s class, that was the very same thing. A respect for who respects you. A need to impress those to seem unable to be.

“No,” Keating says truthfully. “You being expelled from school is not daring to me. It’s stupid.” It’s the only thing Keating says that shows its effect fully on Charlie’s face. That word, that stupid word. 

Keating does make it better. He teases Charlie and tells him he’ll miss the opportunity to attend his classes if he pulls any more stunts. That makes Charlie feel like he’s earned something, which raises his spirits even more when Keating mutters something about that “damn phone call from God” while laughing. He turns and leaves as he does to hide his amusement.

With Keating, the other boys outside of their usual group leave. They do so slowly, with apologetic feet and an understanding of a soon curfew. 

Then, Todd realizes that he’s crying. It started somewhere between Keating leaving and the silence that followed it. That’s something he’s been doing a lot these days, these days that he’s sixteen or seventeen. He cried the last day he was twenty-seven and he cried when he became sixteen again. And he cried a lot more after that. Sometimes it was for Neil and sometimes it was for Charlie. Sometimes it was for himself. But he’s crying and it isn’t because he’s in the middle of the study room.

It’s because of all three of those things; Neil, Charlie, and himself. It’s because he has two weeks left with this beautiful scenario before he might be nothing again. He’s crying because phone calls from God do not exist and John Keating understands that. He’s crying because of all the good, all the healing in the conversation that just happened, and the future.

“Woah, hey, hey,” Neil sees it so fast, that Todd has wetness on his cheeks. It’s like he saw Todd crying before he even was. He steps to the side and positions himself so that the rest of the group won’t see Todd as well. It’s not much for privacy, but it’s a sweet gesture. “What’s going on?”

“N-Nothing,” Todd sputters out, which makes all of the boys' heads turn towards him. They all rise up, shoulders back and prepared to help. But besides a few “ woahs ” and “ Todd’s ?” they don’t say anything else, almost waiting for a signal. 

“Toddy, you’re…” Neil stops himself from saying that’s Todd’s crying out loud, in case Todd doesn’t want him to say it in front of their friends.

“I know,” Todd says. “It’s okay, real-really, it is.” He promises Neil and the others, proving so by wiping his tears with the back of his hands. “I’m emotional, that's all.”

Neil believes him, but it’s obvious that he’s wanting Todd to say more. Todd doesn’t, not there. But, when they’re locked in the rooms an hour later, freshly showered and faces red only from the steam of the locker room, he asks Todd again if he’s okay.

Todd answers. He tells Neil that it’s true, he really is emotional and a lot more often these days. That doesn’t bother him, being emotional. Being shy all your life will teach that to you, that you can’t be bothered by emotions when you’re feeling all of them all of the time. 

He tells Neil that he doesn’t mind that he’s a crier, and he likes doing so sometimes. 

Neil says that he understands. He tells Todd that he cries a lot, too. He tells Todd that he does so sometimes when he’s riding Knox’s bike back from rehearsal. He says that he cries because there’s not a moment in life that makes someone feel more alive than the moment they’re on a bike they cannot keep up peddling. The most human thing in the world is to act like someone else. 

And Neil tells Todd that he cries when he thinks about them sometimes. About their feelings and Todd says that he does, too. Neil jokes that he knows because he sees it all the time. Todd rolls his eyes and says he sees Neil do it, too.

“So we’re on the same page, then.” Neil responds.

“Yes. We’re on the same page.”

Chapter Text

14 December, 1959. 

Two weeks, like bread off of the plate of someone starving, disappear. They are incredibly filling, filled with nothing but splendor and strawberry and the other sweet things that come with being Neil Perry and Todd Anderson. The boys spend their time like dollars, they know that they will always get change back. They know that it all eventually comes back to them. In time.

Around the sixth of December, Neil’s schedule gets busier. The free time once given between rehearsals and classes strains, fading together like a kaleidoscope of swirling color. This does not hurt them, having less time. They talk in all of the open minutes available that are not focused on final exams. At meal times, they chew slower. Todd waits up for Neil at night.

If Todd does fall asleep before Neil arrives back at their dorm, Neil always makes it a point to stay up a little longer, so it’s like he’s still hanging out with Todd. He’ll pull Todd’s blanket up to his chin and whisper kind things to him. Todd’s forehead never goes unkissed.

Again, they’re never hurt. In the missed moments together, no one gets hurt.

No one gets hurt until Todd is the one that isn’t there.

He does not mean to miss it. Todd does not mean to miss the moment Neil’s father surprises Neil with a last-minute visit and a stern talking-to. Todd had originally planned for this. He was going to join Neil in their room before dinner on the night of the fourteenth. He was going to be there and he was going to help Neil stand up to his father.

But things happen.

Todd gets thrown off. Charlie asks him for help that day in Trigonometry, which he isn’t so great at either. Lunch is cold and not in a good way. The History final gets pushed back. In the grand scheme of things, these are small happenings. Todd would say that his brain got busy, though. He’d say that he was down on his luck, especially when half of the showers in the locker room stop producing hot water. 

He needs a breath. Todd tells Neil to shower before he does. Forgetful, Todd tells Neil to go on to dinner without him. He tells Neil that he needs to eat before his final dress rehearsal. He tells him that he’ll see him when he gets back that night, that they’ll celebrate. He promises to stay up no matter what this time. And Todd keeps that promise.

And he’s aware of what he’s missed hours before Neil gets back.

Distressed, Todd can’t even try to fall asleep. He lies on his bed, fully clothed, staring up at his ceiling. He’s freezing. He feels terrible. But he shouldn’t call himself evil for missing the meeting with Neil’s father. It’s a mistake Neil will never be made aware of. It’s a mistake that Todd will do anything to make up for.

He does, when Neil finally gets back from rehearsal, the clock ticks towards the twelfth hour. It is nearly the fifteenth of December. He enters he and Todd’s room in near silence. The air flows from the doorway and seeps into Todd’s pillow with the past and evening’s truth. It does not surprise Todd when Neil crawls into Todd’s bed and not his own.

Neil’s father had stood in this room when Todd was not there too. He was not there with Neil, the Neil that now lies his head against Todd’s heart. Neil breathes deeply, chest raising and pushing into Todd’s like a pillar of Hercules off the strait of Gilbraltor. They’re connected. His heart prays to Todd’s for an act of altruism against all this. He worships the body that lies on this Welton bed like an altar. Todd's guilt worsens at the selfish idea of feeling guilty for this.

It’s their very own world atop that box spring mattress. Their bodies meld together, fit together, melt together. Neil’s weight presses Todd down. Todd wraps his arms around Neil like they’ll both fall through the solid cushioning. The apology Neil does not know about lies in the hair that raises on the back of Todd’s neck. The touch of hair against skin, like grass, is itchy. At some point, Neil laughs hollowly. His laughter shakes the both of them, a slow shift of tectonics. In other words, their heartbeats are reminiscent of earthquakes. 

The waves settle and Todd asks Neil a question. “Did you..Did you, um, um, have a bad rehearsal?”

Neil answers him, possibly knowing that this is not what he’s really being asked. “My father visited me today.”

Todd nods, nervous. “He did.” His hold on Neil does not entirely tighten, but Todd’s palms flatten against the shirt on Neil’s back like God’s hands outstretched over the newly created Earth. 

When Neil laughs again, it is emptier than the first. The licking of fingers, moist and searching for crumbs on the bottom of the cookie jar. He cranes up his head and buries his nose in the crook of Todd’s neck. “He found out that, I uh…He found out that I’m in the play.” Neil swallows, “He wants me to quit.”

“Are you going to?” One of Todd’s hands finds Neil’s hair.

“No,” Neil supplies quickly. “I talked to Keating about it, just now.”

Todd must tense up because Neil’s fingers press against Todd’s chest, resting next to his face. A neighbor to Todd’s heartbeat. Neil pushes himself up, propping against his elbow so that he can look down at Todd. 

Todd asks what Keating had said. It might ruin the moment. Neil sighs, then falls back into his position on Todd’s torso.

“Keating,” Neil explains, “he told me that I need to tell my father. I need  to prove my passion for acting to him. I have to, uh,” Neil thinks back on the conversation, “I have to tell him what I want with my life. It’s my life.” He groans, though not frustrated. “I told Keating I felt trapped. He said that I wasn’t.”

“You're not.” Todd says, perhaps more desperate for freedom than Neil. “You’re not trapped.”

“I know, darling, I know.” Neil kisses the edge of Todd’s jawline, then sits up again. Whatever moment he was searching for is back. “So, I’m gonna tell my father tomorrow morning. I’m gonna call him and tell him I’m doing the play no matter what.”

Todd smiles, refusing to miss out on this, on anything having to do with Neil’s father, again. “Good. Good, Neil, you…you have to. I’ll come with you. I’ll come with you when you call him.” He swears, rising up slightly from his pillow.

Neil smiles back. “Are you sure? You don’t have to.”

“I am sure,” Todd says. “I want to come with you when you call him.”

Neil stares at Todd like he’s the very moon that they sleep under. He doesn’t have to squint to see him. He’s got a gravitational pull that Neil can’t resist. And maybe this is not the right time, there’s too much at stake and something like stars will burn them. But Neil kisses Todd. 

He kisses him, not on his cheeks or jaw or forehead. He kisses him and he kisses him on his mouth, his lips. Really. It’s perfect and it’s awkward. Neither of them know what angle to go in at, questioning if their noses are always this in the way. It’s only a few seconds before a natural instinct in the both of them kicks in. It’s not tongue, teeth, and gums. Only lips, only this, only now. And that’s everything.

Todd parts ways with a mumble almost against Neil’s mouth. “Oh, my God.”

“Oh, my God.” Neil agrees. He moves forward like he isn’t finished, but stops a mere inch from Todd. “Was that okay?”

“Can you, um, can you, will you-” Todd’s voice suddenly gets a lot louder. He gasps at himself, shutting his mouth. He talks again only when Neil chuckles. “Do that again? Please?”

‘Do that again. Do it forever’

Neil does. He kisses Todd again, following Todd’s mouth with all of the comfortable places he’s visited before. His cheeks, his forehead, his shoulders, his jaw. It is innocent, in the way it’s always been, but there’s an intimate confession here too. There’s a confession that Neil feels, that he wants and yearns. He needs and he babbles, somehow without speaking at all. Todd thinks babbling without speaking is another way of saying your mind is full. It probably is. It’s what he’s doing now, too.

The kissing does not stop, but they do take longer pauses between their moments of contact to look at each other. They have not moved much, Neil still over Todd and Todd still under Neil. Then, like a period at the end of a sentence, Neil presses a kiss to Todd’s neck. It is not the end of the paragraph, he will kiss Todd again. But for now, Neil lies his head back down on Todd’s chest. They’re back to where they began, seconds older and years wiser.

Neil asks Todd a question. It is rhetorical and it isn’t. “How did I ever survive Welton without you?”

Todd has an answer. “Because you’re you.”

“I’m me?” Neil begs for more. “What do you mean?”

Todd’s honest, unable to be anything but that now. “I don’t know. I mean a lot of things.”

“Tell me,” Neil says, “tell me a lot of things, then.”

For a few minutes, all Todd can seem to answer with is “um’s” and “I think’s.” His mouth is too wide open to excuse it as being sewn shut, but Neil has taken all of his air from him. His honesty will be too loud, too long for his lung capacity. He doesn’t have enough. He’s finally able to muster through a whole answer when Neil surprises him with a peck. It’s enough air to last him.

“Um! I think that…I think that you’re smart,” Todd says. “You’ve gotten through school and everything, everything, because you’re smart. You know things. You’re interesting. You’re so interesting. I want to watch you all the time. You’ve survived because you had to. You have to. You’ve survived and I think, maybe, it’s so we could meet. It’s so we could be right here. I want to see you all the time. I wish that time went slower. I wish that it paused, Neil, I wish that we were only ever here. In this room, with no one else. But I also wish it was ten years from now and we were somewhere far away. Maybe a few states away, in a town. In a city. I wish ten years from now was right now and I wish that it never comes.” He’s evolving away from the question and answering everything Neil could ever ask him. “I wish that it never comes, but only because I’m afraid of seeing it. I’m afraid of seeing it and you not being there. I’m afraid because this is all so scary. I’m scared. I’m scared because you have survived this long and I need you for longer. I need you for always. I love you. You’re you. You’re you, you’re you, you’re you.”

It’s more than Todd has ever admitted out loud in his life. With his lips against Todd’s neck, Neil smiles. Todd can feel the movement of his mouth like a pen against paper. He’ll feel Neil’s mouth there forever at this rate, a feeling unable to be erased. 

Neil’s response comes, flowing easily. It counteracts Todd’s spilled ink soliloquy. The words that Neil says are typewriter thought-out without being planned at all. He rises, pulling Todd up with him. Todd, however, cannot bring himself to sit, having exhausted himself.  He curls up, lying his head down in Neil’s lap.

“Darling, Todd,” Neil starts. He says the nickname and Todd’s name like they’re the same thing. They are when coming out of Neil’s mouth. “You are brilliant, do you know that? I think that you’re right. I think that I’ve stayed here so that we could be here. We’ll be somewhere in ten years. We’ll be somewhere in twenty, in thirty…in one hundred years, somehow, we’ll be together. Don’t worry about that and don’t be afraid. I’m scared, too. I’m always scared, especially when I’m around my father. I’m scared because he’s always had this hold on my life, but anymore. Not since you, never again since you. You, you beautiful, beautiful being. You’re you. Beloved, you’re you. I love you, always.”

“You’re scared, too?” Todd, as he always is now, has begun crying. His nails have embedded themselves in the cotton of Neil’s pants. It hits Todd that neither of them have changed out of their day clothes. Neil seems to realize this, too. He gently taps Todd’s hand, beckoning Todd to sit up. Todd does.

“I am.” Neil says, kissing Todd gently. “I think it’s a good thing we’re scared together. Means we can be brave together, too.”

Todd agrees. He lets Neil take the reins from here, lifting his arms so that Neil can take his shirt away from his body. He stays in that position when Neil stands and grabs a new shirt that Todd may sleep in. Neil puts that shirt on him then, before continuing with Todd, does the same for himself. Neil continues to follow that pattern, a ‘one for you, one for me ,’ for the next articles of clothing. 

Todd stands when his jeans are replaced with comfortable cotton, balancing with his hands on Neil’s shoulders. He lets Neil take off his socks. He lets Neil lie him back down. He lets Neil take his time. Then, he asks Neil if he will stay with him, in the same bed, and now three feet across the room on his own. Neil tells him that he would love to. He tells Todd that he loves him and Todd tells Neil the same.

Eyes closed and bodies cuddled up in fresh clothing, Todd is nearly asleep when Neil asks him a question that means nothing, but makes Todd smile.

“Did you know that Keating has a photo of a girl in his office?”

Todd opens his eyes. “I’ve seen it.”

“I didn’t know he had someone. She’s in London.”

“I wish we were in London.”

Neil agrees. “I pointed it out and you know what he told me?”

“What did he tell you?”

“He told me I have everything I need,” Neil says, “to keep going.”

Poetry. Beauty. Romance. Love.

These are the things Neil found and Todd remembered on the day of his first rehearsal for ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ Those three things, the things said before love, are buried deep and on the sleeves of Todd and Neil. There is poetry in Todd, who writes, and Neil, who acts. Beauty lies in how Neil touches Todd. It lies in how Todd looks at Neil. Romance inserts herself in the poetry, in the beauty. And it all leads to the love of them. To Todd and Neil. To Neil and Todd.

—

15 December, 1959. Opening Night.

When Todd and Neil wake up the next morning, their legs are twisted and their backs are sore. There isn't much room on a twin bed. Despite that, they fall into a fit of giggles when they remember how they got here.

Neil is smiling all day, even when he calls his father and tells him that he won’t quit the play. He tells him that he has to do this, that it’s only for the week and then the play is over forever. Of course, this will not be Neil’s only brush with acting, but anything to please his father for now. Todd hears how Neil’s father roars over the receiver, quieting dangerously when he says he won’t be able to make it anyways. When Neil hangs up, he’s still smiling.

“That went well.” Neil says.

“ That’s well?

When they go to breakfast, Todd sits on Neil’s left side. Neil’s hand rests on Todd’s right thigh. No one asks Neil if he’s always been right handed, too busy buzzing with their excitement for Neil’s play that evening. Though, Knox is not there. He left early that morning, whispering his secret to his friends that he “had to see Chris and show her his poem before it was too late.”

Todd begs him to be careful doing this, but Knox explains to him that his feelings towards Chris are on par with Neil's feelings towards acting and more. Todd can say nothing else after hearing that. He’s proud of Knox.

Charlie kicks Neil’s leg under the table. It’s done hard enough to shock Neil, his hand on Todd’s thigh jumping from its place.

“Hey!” Neil says,

“Your fault,” Charlie shrugs.

Neither Todd nor Neil asks what he means. 

—

The group sees Knox again right before Keating’s class. The boys are grabbing their books, speeding out from lunch when Knox appears. He’s working on a piece of bread he’s stolen from the kitchen. There’s a sly look on his face.

Charlie notices him first, grabbing his jacket and going after him. “Hey, Knoxious! Hey, how did it go? Did you read it to her?”

“Did she like it?” Todd asks.

“Yes,” Knox says, answering all three questions at once. At that, the remnants of excitement the boys had over Neil’s play appear again. Charlie shushes them, looking around in case someone important is listening. When he sees no one, he cheers. It’s so interesting, this gossip, that even Cameron joins in.

“What did she say?” Pitts asks.

“Nothing,” Knox says.

“Nothing.” Charlie’s shocked. “What do you mean? She said nothing?”

“Yep. Nothing. But I did it.” Knox turns, walking down the hallway. The others look at each other, confused, then hurry themselves to run after Knox. 

Charlie calls for him, not caring if anyone can hear them now. “What did she say! I know she had to say something!”

“Come here, Knox!” Pitts shouts.

Knox runs faster. They’ll get nothing out of him but a “Seize the day!”

Todd laughs at the sight of his friends running to class. If Chris really did say nothing to Knox’s confession, Todd knows it is simply because most people do not know what they are supposed to say when they are loved publicly. A lot of things should not happen in public spaces and, growing up, love was one of those things to Todd and possibly Chris. But, Todd hopes that being loved is one of those things that becomes more public in time. For everyone. For all of his friends and him.

With that, maybe that nothing, that no response, was Chris’ way of publicly announcing her love for Knox back. Todd thinks that might be it while sitting in Keating’s lesson for the day. They’ve all got blindfolds on and Keating is playing a classical piece of music on vinyl. Todd does not know the name of it.

Before the music ends, Keating speaks over it with an explanation to the class. He says that words can not express as music does. “The unsayable grace that cannot be defined. It leaps like light from mind to mind.” It’s Gwen Harwood and she says it exactly right. Todd is grinning and he hopes that Knox is too.

That silence, that nothing from Chris, that has to be its own form of music. It has to be. Her confession, though unspeakable, bounced against soundscape walls and into Knox’s ears. It was heavier than the light described in the quote, though. It was more like a pebble skipping against a wide, shallow lake.

When the class is released, Todd pulls off his blindfold to see that Neil is the only one that has not moved from his seat. His hands are clasped together like he’s praying to Todd’s martyr heart again and his blindfold is still on. Todd looks at Keating, who is also watching Neil. He gives Todd a polite nod, to which Todd stands and steps to Neil’s desk. Keating follows, perching atop the desk in front of Neil.

Sensing the movement near him, Neil takes off his blindfold. He grins when he sees Todd. Todd puts his hand on Neil’s shoulder and Neil covers it with his own.

“Hello,” Neil says.

“Hi,” Todd responds.

Neil sets down the blindfold and acknowledges Keating. “Hey, Captain.”

Keating matches the smile from the boy, delighted at Neil, Todd, and the name title. “Neil,” he starts to speak, then stops himself to think before continuing. “Did you talk to your father?”

“Oh, yeah!” Neil says, sitting up tall. He pulls down his hand from his shoulder. Todd keeps his hand still. “He, um, he didn’t like it one bit, but he’s letting me stay in the play!” He looks up at Todd for a second before looking back at Keating. “He won’t be able to, um, make, make it. He’s in Chicago.” Neil takes a breath. “But, that’s okay. I’m going to stay with acting, so he can see me another time.”

“Really?” Keating takes in what Neil says. “You told him what you told me and more?”

“Yeah,” Neil says. “He wasn’t happy at all. But he’ll be gone for at least four days. I don’t think he’ll make the show, but I don’t care. You’ll all be there.” He repositions himself at his desk, slightly nervous, then stands when he cannot get comfortable. “I’m gonna stay with it,” Neil repeats. “He’ll be okay with that, I think.” He mimics his father, saying “Keep up the school work!” 

He grabs Todd's hand and the two of them walk out of the classroom. Before exiting fully, Neil turns back and thanks Keating. Keating tells him “any time.”

—

After classes are finished for the day, Neil and Todd find themselves alone in the locker room. They have maybe fifteen minutes together before Neil has to be on his way to the theater. Most of those minutes are spent with Todd fixing his hair and Neil in the shower.

Todd discovers that Neil sings in the shower and he isn’t too bad. He’s not singing anything real, more just humming a melody that comes out through open lips. Every once in a while, he’ll sing what he’s doing. Todd can’t think up a word or a metaphor for how this makes him feel, but if he could it would be something that sounds religious.

“Todd!” Neil calls, turning off the shower.

Todd nearly jumps. “Y-Y-Yes? Yeah, Neil?”

“Could you grab a towel for me? Please?’

Neil’s towel is sitting on a rack Neil cannot reach. Todd picks it up, shutting his eyes and shoving it past the shower curtain. Neil takes it, coming out of the shower a moment later. His hair is dripping wet and the white towel wraps itself around his waist, hugging his hip bones. The water trickles from his hair, onto his eyelashes, and down his face. Todd thinks he’s so handsome. He’s so beautiful.

He doesn’t get the chance to tell him so. The sound of boys chattering fills the vicinity. It’s the other Dead Poets. They’ve arrived to get ready for the play themselves.

“Perry!’ Charlie says when he lays eyes on Neil, who’s too close for friendliness to Todd. Todd’s eyes are wide and his face is scarlet. Charlie clicks his tongue at the sight, looking between Todd and Neil like he’s caught them doing something inappropriate on school grounds. “What are you still doing here?’

“Yeah, Neil, you’ll be late!” Knox says.

“Get outta here,” Meeks points to the exit. They’re all laughing because they know, just like Charlie does. 

“All right, all right,” Neil backs away from Todd, taking his discarded clothing off the sink counter. “Five seconds, give me five seconds to get dressed and I’m out.”

“And why weren’t you dressed before?” Charlie raises a brow.

Neil points to his towel, stepping into a bathroom stall. “I showered, Dalton.”

“Yeah,” Gerard pipes up. “Maybe you should do the same, Charlie.”

“Huh!” Charlie gasps, hand on his chest. “Pittsie, how could you? I would expect a comment like that from the gremlin over there, but you! ”

The gremlin in question, Richard Cameron, puffs out his cheeks. “You wish I would say something about you right now.”

“I don’t wish for anything, Cam, except for your adoration.”

“Barf.” Cameron rolls his eyes.

A moment later, Neil emerges from the bathroom stall dressed and ready to leave. His shirt is damp from his still-wet hair, but he doesn’t care. It’s like he’s recognized what he’s about to do, perform, in that bathroom stall. He tosses his towel into a hamper in the corner, then bids his friends goodbye.

“Sit in the middle,” he says, “you’ll be in the perfect spot for my final monologue.” Like decorating the fact that he has the ending monologue, Neil adds on to that proudness by kissing Todd’s cheek as he leaves. He does so without any worry or thoughts of how his friends might react. And they don’t react, which makes Todd more nervous somehow. He still isn’t over his friends catching them in the bathroom doing nothing at all.

When Neil leaves, they don’t say anything either. They’re too focused on brushing their hair, adding the perfect amount of gel to it. Knox hops into the same shower Neil used and sings a lot more out-of-tune. Gerard and Meeks share a mirror. Charlie and Cameron do the same until Charlie moves to get dressed. 

Relaxed now, Todd takes a chance to join in on the singing and the antics of the others. He messes up Cameron’s hair in a quick, sweeping motion. Cameron berates him for it. Charlie’s laughter roars over the door of the bathroom stall.

This situation, this getting ready in the bathroom for Neil’s play, like all of the events of the months before, is not new. It’s happened before. Only this time, Todd recognizes that this is the last evening he will have where he knows exactly what will happen. These are the last hours that he can expect and know where they’ll all end up. It’s like closing a book while you’re in the middle of it. There’s ten years left till Todd is back where he was in the beginning of all this, but there’s no predicting it when Neil’s there with him. It’s exciting. It’s wind blowing clouds in the direction of a drought. It’s terrifying like people are and it’s horrifying like people are not. Todd’s anxiety won’t leave him. Neither will his happiness.

When Charlie exits the bathroom stall with a stain of red paint in the shape of a lightning bolt on his chest, he knows that to be even truer. He looks stupid. Todd loves it. Cameron says he doesn’t. He says that the paint will ruin his shirt.

The group walks out of the bathroom and out of Welton, where Keating stands waiting for them by his car. Todd stands in the back, stopping when he sees the flash of blonde hair across from them. Chris is here, dressed up and looking very nervous. She waves to Knox, looking down when Charlie whistles. Cameron pushes Charlie forward. Knox nearly trips over his own feet walking towards Chris. 

She’s holding a twig that she must’ve grabbed from the Welton yard. It likely had flowers upon it when it wasn’t snowing and winter. It’s the best she can do and when she hands it to Knox, he whispers her name. He turns to the group and tells them not to wait up. He’ll join them at the theater. He’ll walk with Chris.

In the car, Charlie, Cameron, and Todd sit in the back. Keating drives, Gerard and Meeks sitting with him on the bench seat. It’s a little cramped, which makes the boys elbow each other. They never complain though, too gossipy about Knox and too anxious about Neil. When Keating parks his car, he explains theater etiquette to the boys and makes them promise that they’ll behave. 

Stepping into the theater is a visceral experience. It feels a lot like being a phantom gliding through Heaven’s gates. It feels like a home of sorts, but one Todd has not been to in a long while. Welton was Purgatory. This is the eternal reward.

Sitting in the exact middle of the theater, just as Neil told them, Todd allows himself to feel a little restless. His knees start bouncing and his heart pitter-patters. When the show starts, it worsens. He wonders if everyone can hear just how fast his heart is beating, knowing Neil is backstage and about to start the beginning of his performance career. This is Neil’s version of Todd’s poem in Keating’s classroom. This is him giving everything he has to offer.

When Neil appears behind the painted trees onstage, Todd claps. He cheers Neil’s name, just so he knows he is there.

And Neil is good. He is really, really good. He’s natural, having an upper-hand against someone that was perhaps more seasoned. He doesn’t think about the words or what his body is doing, if it matches his character. It just does. Todd thinks he might become more thoughtful in his choices the more he learns about theater acting. For now, this is good. It’s good.

During intermission, Todd says so over and over again. He says so loud and proud. When his eyes connect to Neil’s father, standing in the back of the theater, he screams it. Keating tells him to quiet down, like a father would a son, but he’s chuckling like a friend.

He doesn’t have any questions about his father being here this time. 

When Neil starts his final monologue, ‘if we shadows have offended,’ Todd sobs. It’s somehow more beautiful than it was the first time. Neil speaks slowly, taking his time like he’ll never get the opportunity for someone to listen to only him again. He holds out his twigged, covered hands and Todd wants to take them. He wants to pin-prick bleed against them and hold them tighter for it. He wants. He wants and he wants.

Todd stands during the curtain call, but not in standing ovation. He trips over some feet and apologizes to everyone he passes by. But he has to get backstage. If they knew why, Todd thinks that they would understand.

Tod doesn’t run onstage, but he finds a door that he pushes open, that leads to another door backstage. He’ll push open any door he can find if it means Neil is behind it. When he’s backstage, Todd sees Neil surrounded by his adoring castmates. There’s a glow on Neil’s cheeks and celebratory sweat on his brow. Neil is so proud of himself. He should be. Todd is proud of him. 

At first, Neil does not see him. Todd watches as a girl who must be the stage manager or director tell Neil that his father is looking for him. There’s a look on her face that tells Todd that Neil might be open about his family life when he’s here. For a second, Todd smiles. Neil has safety with him, and with others. Then, Todd’s mind takes in what Neil has been told. His father is here. He is waiting for Neil. And he’s going to take him away.

And then. And then. God, that’s not fair.

And it doesn’t make sense, right? If Neil talks to his father, he won’t go. Right? Not this time, not this time, not this time. 

He can’t risk it.

Todd is still crying. He hasn’t stopped since Neil’s monologue. It’s ironic that Todd does not realize it until a cast member, Ginny Danburry, tells him so. She asks him if he’s okay. It’s ironic to be so moved that only your body realizes it. Your mind does not. Before Todd can answer her with anything worthwhile, Neil is standing in front of him. 

“Darling?” Neil murmurs, astonished to see Todd backstage with him. Even more so to see Todd crying. “Why are you crying, what’s wrong?”

Instead of telling Neil he’s fine or how amazing he did, Todd throws his arms around Neil’s waist. His feet become part of the floor, so, so stiff. His body acts as a pole he’s tied Neil to. He cannot let him go. He doesn’t want Neil to go. 

“Don’t go with him,” Todd sniffs, voice a grumble of tears and begging.

Not prepared for the sudden hug, Neil steps backwards. His arms fly up to balance himself, but Todd’s tenseness won’t let him fall. He lowers his arms, hugging Todd back. “Toddy, what? What, what’s wrong?”

“Don’t go with him.” Todd repeats. “C-Come back to Welton with, with me or, or let’s stay here.” There’s no true logistics or validity to finding a way to stay in this theater forever. There’s nothing but concessions for food and a rickety water fountain. This wouldn’t last them longer than they would hiding out in their Welton dorm, but if Neil’s chances are better never leaving this stage, Todd will take it.

“What do you mean?” Neil’s voice is quiet, not freaked out, but heavy with concern. He wants to understand what has Todd so shaken up. Then, remembering his father, Neil does.

“Don’t go with your father, don’t.” Todd looks up at Neil. “Let’s stay right here.”

The entirety of the cast, save for a few who have left to see their families, are watching them. There’s several cast members who seem to understand that Todd is important to Neil. That Neil is important to Todd. They look away to give them their privacy.

“Neil?” The stage manager or director calls him again. It sounds a lot like Todd really did enter the gates of Heaven walking into this theater. That woman is God, sending Neil into the unknown, into a new world, after he went against order.

And though Neil understands Todd’s worry, he makes a decision that he doesn’t understand. It makes Todd’s life flash before his eyes. In an instant, he’s a child, he’s a teenager, he’s twenty-seven, and he’s a teenager again. It stings.

“I’ll tell you what, Todd,” He taps Todd’s arms so that he’ll loosen his grip. When Todd does, despite not wanting to, Neil puts his hands on Todd’s cheeks. Neil grins down at him, wiping away Todd’s tears with the pads of his thumbs. “Give me three minutes. I’ll say goodbye to my father then we’ll be on our way, back to Welton. Okay? Three minutes.”

“No!” Todd can’t help that he cries harder, ear-splitting. “You can’t see him, please don’t go out there. Please, please Neil, you don’t-”

“Darling,” Neil’s own eyes are flushed with tears now. Todd knows that he must hate to see him like this. If he doesn’t hate it, he’d rather not see it. “Please, tell me what’s wrong? Why can't I go see him?

“He, he doesn’t deserve it, N-Neil.” Todd pushes his hands into the fabric of Neil’s costume. “Stay here, he’ll leave eventually. He’ll leave. You said that we’ll have all these years, ten, twenty, thirty years, you said. Let’s have them. You can’t leave. He can leave and, and you won’t-”

“Come with me.” Neil says.

Todd stops, a tilt to his head. “Come with you?”

“Outside. Come outside with me, just for a few minutes. We can say goodbye together.”

If Neil won’t let up and Todd can’t explain it, Todd can work with this. He can work with going out to see Neil’s father with Neil. This way, he’ll know it’s all over exactly when it’s over. It’s so close.

When he’s changed out of his costume, Neil still has his crown tucked under his arm. He had told Todd weeks ago that he wanted to take it as a memento after the show. He wants to show everyone. 

Todd follows Neil out, then. Neil does not hold his hand out, which feels like a loss of some kind. Todd does not push for it and he doesn’t reach for it. He understands.

When they are outside, the cold weather is not sympathetic to Todd’s feelings. It’s needle-numbing. There’s a crowd of people, all telling Neil how great he is. Todd hears it, but the stare of Mr. Perry is clamorous above it all. Neil approaches him.

“Get in the car, Neil.” He says. 

“Father-”

“I don’t want to hear it. Car. Now.” 

And Neil looks back at Todd with a look that apologizes. It’s a look that, in an instant, shows that Neil is afraid. In a nanosecond, Neil goes from a man who promises his time to a boy that owns none of it. Todd feels like he can’t be upset with him, because it's how he is around his own parents. They all are like this, all of the Dead Poets. They all beg for their parents to see them. They don’t. Todd should have known this. He should have fought harder and not given in to Neil leaving that stage. He should have known.

Neil replaces his original promise with a new one. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

Todd doesn’t want it. “No,” he says, grabbing Neil’s arm; the one that holds his crown. “Don’t go, you promised! You said that it would be only a few…you said, you promised, Neil, you promised!”

“Todd,” Neil’s voice cracks. His arms become rigid. They don’t do so at Todd’s touch, but the tightness raises up his chest. This is not the Pillars of Hercules. This is the cliff that leads to Tartarus. It is much less beautiful. It is much less promising. He looks like a soldier, calm enough to trick his father and calm enough to trick anyone that does not know him. He smiles. “I have to promise this now, I’ll be back in the morning. I have to go.”

“You don’t. God, you don’t have to.” Todd pulls himself away from Neil, side-stepping and leaping in front of him. He blocks Neil’s father, holding out his arms. They look in each others eyes, Todd and Mr. Perry. “Don’t take him. You can’t take him.”

Neil’s father is unimpressed. He motions for Todd to back away. “Neil, get your friend out of the way and come on.” He moves his gaze away from Todd and pretends he does not see him, only his son.

“You can’t. You can’t take him.”

Someone calls for Todd then. It’s Charlie, who jogs over from a large group on the side of the theater building. Cameron, Meeks, and Gerard follow. Keating walks slowly behind them. Of course, he had expected this. Todd has hope he’ll step in, even if he isn't jumping in to join the action. He can’t ask him why.

“Toddy, I’ll be back in the morning,” Neil reiterates, tucking his crown under his arm and placing his hands on Todd’s shoulders. “I’ll be back in the morning.”

“It’ll kill him.” Todd looks at Neil as he says this the first time, then turns back to Mr. Perry. “You’ll kill him.”

Cameron butts in. He doesn’t know what’s happening, but he’s smart enough to process that it isn’t good. “We’re going back to Welton with Keating, you coming?”

“It’ll kill him.” Todd repeats. “Neil. ”

“Neil.” His father’s voice is fierce. “Come on.”

“Todd, in the morning I’ll see you.” Neil says.

“Neil ,” he says again.

“Todd?” Charlie says, sounding very, very scared. He looks back at Mr. Keating. “Mr. Keating! Mr. Keating, help!”

“No!” Todd says, “No, stop it!”

Then, Todd is being pulled away. He’s being pulled away from Neil. It’s Charlie and Gerard that are pulling him away and Keating doesn’t stop them. He replaces Todd’s spot in front of Neil. Keating tells Neil to go on with his father, that he’ll see him in class the next day. He lowers his head and whispers something to Neil that Todd cannot hear.

“What are you doing!” Todd yells, “Stop! What are you saying to him, what did you say to him!” Todd keeps screaming for answers. He kicks his feet, trying to get some traction in the snow. He wails some more for Neil to not go. It’s such a scene, worse than the one that happened between them backstage. There’s people running out of the doors to the theater to see what the ruckus is. 

Todd keeps going. His heels keep digging into the ground, to no avail. The crunching sound is not unlike the sound of a grief-squeezed heart. He reaches up for the hands on him and all Todd can think is that they are not Neil’s. “Stop! Stop it! Let me go, he’ll kill him! He’ll kill him, he’ll kill him!” It’s a fact that Todd tastes as the bitter, bitter truth when Neil gets into that car.

You cannot defeat fathers. No matter how hard you try, no matter what promises their holy sons make, you cannot defeat fathers. You can love their sons as hard and as good as you can muster. But Fathers and Godliness are undefeatable, impenetrable, by any mortal man. There’s a million thoughts racing through his mind and they all tell him this. This is how it is. It’s always only ever been like this.

Like eyeshadow stained eyelids, the truth bruises into his brain.

“What is he saying!” Meeks yells, pacing around because he does not know how to help. His glasses are foggy and tilted, It looks like someone’s pushed him away. Maybe it was Todd, but he does not remember doing this. Cameron is stepping around similarly to Meeks, distressed as well. He cannot help either, which makes him feel worthless.

“I don’t know, he’s freaking out!” Gerard sounds wrecked, his hold on Todd tightening. Charlie does the same. 

“Mr. Keating!” Cameron calls. “Mr. Keating!”

“Mr. Anderson, it’ll be all right.” Keating says, opening the door to his own car. He helps the boys get him in. This takes a long time because Todd keeps trying to open the door and run after Neil. When his bones feel too hulking to move any longer, Todd settles in. His eyes never stop crying.

As Keating starts driving and his friends calm, Todd thinks that he’s only ever made friends with the nefarious. When he beats his fists, poorly, against Keating’s car windows, no one stops him. He faces Keating and screams some more. He screams that it isn’t fair. He screams that he’s done so much. He screams that he’s so tired and he cannot survive this again. He screams that he doesn’t understand why Keating knew and he screams that Keating did nothing to help. He screams and he cries because Keating isn’t.

Todd wants to hate him. He wants to hate John Keating for not doing more, for not providing more answers. He wants to tell him that he feels everything. Everything Todd has ever felt has ended in one word: unbearable. He wants Keating to feel that. Keating deserves to feel that.

It’s a long car ride. When Keating parks, he finally faces Todd, misty-eyed and truthful. “I think you needed me to know. I think you needed someone on your side and that’s it.”

Out of the car, Keating hugs him.

Todd doesn’t want to go back to his room. The hallway is haunted with grieving ghosts and his steel-heavy feet. His groans sound like the agely apparitions around him. Todd thinks he’s alone with them, but he isn’t. They don’t warn him, but Gerard, Meeks, Cameron, and Charlie follow Todd into his room.

Todd practically falls into Neil’s bed, his head edging the pillow. Gerard sits on the floor. Meeks sits on the lower half on the bed. Charlie stays standing, staring at the people in front of him. He hasn’t said a word since getting into the car. No one has, but it’s noticeable with Charlie.

They all let Todd continue to cry, though worried he’ll dehydrate himself at this rate. Charlie sneaks away to get a glass of water. When he returns, he sets it on Neil’s desk, where Todd can reach it when he’s ready. No one recoils when Todd kicks. They watch and they don’t speak. They share glances of confusion. They don’t know what else to do. 

Maybe half an hour of this passes when Charlie speaks again.

“We should sneak off campus tomorrow and skip class. We can get breakfast and celebrate with Neil.”

“That sounds like a good idea.” Cameron agrees, which is heartbreakingly out of character. There’s two days until finals.

“What do you think, Todd?” Meeks asks.

They all look for his approval. Todd shrugs, the bed creaking under him.  “I don’t…I don’t know.”

“C’mon, we couldn’t celebrate without you.” Gerard says. “It could be fun.

“But, Neil.” Todd says. “Neil.” It isn’t much of a response, or a cry for help. It just is.

“Neil will be there,” Charlie says.

Todd wants to believe him. He wants to believe that good things can happen to him, that Neil will be there in the morning. But Neil promised that they would be in front of his father for three minutes, together, then he left. He got into that car, that coffin, and left. It’s like a breakup they never got to talk about or put a title on. It stings, worse than the first time.

In the middle of that burning sting, Knox opens the door to Todd’s room. He must have seen the light on, growing his curiosity. Chris is with him, her hair stuffed up into a hat. It’s a downright terrible disguise, but Todd does feel a bit better when she says hello to him. They don’t have to ask why Todd is upset. They know some things are better left unsaid and not repeated.

They all talk for a long time, the dominoes falling due to Charlie’s breakfast ask. Eventually, the Poets get Todd to sit up. They get him to smile some more. They each take time to tell Todd stories about Neil. Some of them are so stomach-achingly funny and embarrassing, Todd has to swear that he won’t tell Neil he knows about them. They talk about how they met Neil. They talk about what Neil was like when he was a kid. Charlie says that there were always signs that he wanted to perform, even when they were little.

“When he took piano lessons,” Charlie explains, “and recitals came up, he always looked at the audience instead of his sheet music.”

“God, Mr. Perry hated that,” Knox says.

“Yeah,” Charlie grimaces. “Yeah, he did.”

Eventually, when it’s officially the sixteenth of December and Todd feels somewhere between grieving and death, the conversation fades out. It’s not long after the mention of Neil’s father that it does. Todd wonders if they also can’t bear the idea of Neil with him right now, even if they don’t know the future. One by one, his friends leave. Todd isn’t sad, definite he’ll see them in a few hours, in his room again.

Todd’s all cried out. His eyes are puffed up with pessimism and his throat is a sentimental sort of scratchy. But the weight on the mattress in Neil’s bed shifts and Todd opens his eyes to see Charlie sitting with him.

“Hey, Todd.”

“H-H…” Todd clears his throat and tries again. “Hi.”

“Feeling any better?”

Todd isn’t better. Not even close, he never will be. A few stories and some real smiles, sadly, cannot fix that. “Yes.”

Charlie sees right through his lie. “That bad, huh?”

“Mmhm…”

“He’ll be back in the morning.”

Todd moans his upset in response. He’s tired of hearing that. If he hears it one more time he might have to pluck his eardrums out of his ear canal. But looking at Charlie, Todd’s upset softens into mourning. He looks so, so sure. He is sure because he doesn’t know. 

“Todd,” Charlie asks him then, "Can I talk to you about something?"

What Charlie could possibly need to say, at this moment, Todd cannot imagine. It’s nearly two in the morning. He’s so few hours away from hearing the worst news he’ll hear in his life for a second time. He needs to try to sleep. He tells Charlie yes anyways.

For a long time, for too long, Charlie doesn’t ask Todd anything. It’s likely that he’s working up the courage, like he’s going to admit his darkest secret to Todd. He probably is, and that doesn’t feel great to Todd. He can’t be a good friend right now, not after spending so many hours swearing the entire universe, friends included, was out to get him. He’ll try, though. Especially because of what Charlie does ask.

“Do you remember a few weeks ago…when I invited those girls to a Dead Poets Meeting. Do you remember that?”

Todd does, of course he does. “Yes, I do.” He sits up, balancing on both of his elbows. “What about them?

Charlie continues on, but not about the girls. “Remember how Cam and I fought after? On the way back to Welton?”

‘Yes. Why?”

“Todd, I don’t think…” Charlie lowers to a bell chime quiet tone. “No, I know. It wasn’t about the girls. We weren’t fighting because I brought them or because I published that article in the fucking school paper without asking, it…” He pauses to laugh at himself, but it isn’t funny. “Do you know what I’m saying?”

“N-No…” Todd, interested fully now, sits all the way up so that he can sit eye-to-eye with Charlie. He picks up Neil’s pillow and hugs it to his chest.

Charlie nods. He gets Todd’s need for a better explanation. “It’s like…do you ever feel something so strong you wanna tear everything apart? It’s like you have to ruin it?”

Todd cannot say that he does. The strongest feeling he’s ever felt is how deeply he loves Neil. And he doesn’t want to tear the world apart. He wants to live in it, comfortable with Neil. He wants to be serene with him. Neil feels the same way. They don’t rip everything to pieces for each other because they don’t have to. They fight for the world they could have, even in the worst moments like in front of Neil’s fathers car that past evening. They hold onto each other. Tearing apart what they have could never be a question. They belong together, simple as that. Even with Neil away.

Charlie’s biting his lip. He’s watching, waiting for Todd to get it. When Todd does get it, it’s only because he doesn’t get it at all. He and Neil are not like that. But that doesn’t mean love can’t be done as something more fiery. It doesn’t mean other people don’t commit anarchy for each other. In fact, that sort of love might be more common.

“Cameron.” Todd says.

“Cameron.” Charlie nods.

The fight, even with Cameron, was about Cameron. That argument was Charlie’s way of saying ‘I don’t have you, but I want you. Let me make you squirm so I’m not the only one.’ That argument was Cameron’s way of saying ‘You could have me, if you understood I hate squirming.’ The two of them were different from Todd and Neil. Neil and Todd were puzzle pieces. Charlie and Cameron were the torn apart box and the ripped up plastic wrapping the puzzle came in. It’s soft, but not mendable without admitting to destroying it in the first place.

“You love him.” Todd says.

“And you love him.” Charlie nods, not saying Neil’s name.

Todd nods back. “I do.”

“Hm.” The importance of the moment passes and Charlie stands up off of Neil’s bed. He’s content with their conversation. There’s nothing left to say. He opens the door, opening it slowly. Without looking back, Charlie says “I’ll see both of you in the morning.”

“Me and Neil? Or me and Cameron?”

Charlie corrects himself. “I’ll see the three of you in the morning.”

“You should tell him before then.” Todd dares Charlie.

Charlie doesn't answer. Todd’s door closes.

—-

Around four in the morning, Todd Anderson is not yet asleep. He can’t. He can’t sleep. It’s impossible to do so. Todd is much too anxious. He despises reliving this. He still doesn’t know how he’s supposed to survive an entire extra decade if Neil doesn’t walk through that door soon. Unable to take the wondering any longer, Todd gets out of bed. He never got under the covers anyways. 

From there, he exits the room. There’s a small, tugging thought in the back of his mind that asks himself what he’ll do. Will he come back to this room later? Can he ever enter it again? Maybe one of his friends will let him crash for the night. Morning. Whatever.

The hallway that felt so haunted hours ago feels barren of any spirits now. They’ve all gone to rest themselves. The lines in the wallpaper, Todd notices, look carved into the walls. Like gravestones, they show the history of who’s walked here before.

‘Carpe…Carpe Diem.’

The stairs have a similar look and feeling. Todd has never gone into Welton’s basement, but he ponders if walking down those stairs feels like walking six feet under, too. He walks further than six feet, though. He walks all the way down those stairs, then he goes further. He walks and walks until he’s inside a classroom. He walks and walks until he’s at an office door. The lights are on.

“Hi.” 

“Hello, Mr. Anderson.” 

Todd steps into Keating’s office without question. It’s very sullen. Keating has no tea brewing, the room not evident with any notes of lavender or peach. There’s a book open on his desk, but it doesn’t look truly read, only opened. Todd steps on a pencil that breaks under his foot. When Todd looks up from the broken thing, he sees, for the first time, how exhausted Keating is.

Keating asks him how he is, but Todd thinks that he should be asking Keating that instead.

Todd won’t waste his time to make up for not asking. “I’m bad.”

“Sit,” Keating motions with his eyes to the empty chair in front of his desk. Todd sits. When he does, the chair under him screeches. It’s somehow the loudest thing Todd’s ever heard, the greatest lamentation ever expressed. Todd sympathizes with it, with the chair. He is the chair. He’s the person sitting in the chair, he’s the room the chair is in.

And John Keating is only himself.

“Why do you feel bad?” Keating asks, leaning forward in his chair. If Todd could squint hard enough, he’d see the indent of Keating’s back in his seat. He’s been here as long as they’ve been back. Keating in his chair is equal to Todd in Neil’s bed that evening. Both still, both keening.

A hint of the anger and sobbing Todd had demonstrated to Keating in his car shows in Todd’s eyes. He takes a breath. They both need to explain themselves. “Neil’s gone. That’s why. Neil’s gone and I couldn’t stop him.”

“He’s away for the night.” Keating replies. “He’ll be back.”

“You saw, Mr. Keating,” Todd’s throat holds in his words, making them sound pinched. “He went with his father, it’s what happened last time.” He almost laughs when he says ‘last time.’ It’s cruel, seeing this again. Being here, again. “It’s the same thing, over and over again.”

“It’s not, Todd. It’s not.” Keating goes back to his former position, relaxed in his chair. “It’s different.”

“How do you know?” Todd’s itching to stand up, but he doesn’t. “Why didn’t you help me stop him?”

Keating isn’t bothered by this question. He gives Todd a question back. “Do you remember the conversation we had several months back? You realized I knew everything that you did. You came to my office. Do you remember that?” Keating sounds a lot like Charlie had when he asked Todd if he remembered his fight with Cameron. 

“Yes, sir.”

Todd had come here, that time, because he was so sure he had all the answers. Keating knew. He knew and that was going to help Todd. Keating was going to help save Neil, that was the point of him knowing, right? But here Todd is, back is his office. It turns out that he never had all the answers.

“Do you remember what you asked me?” Keating muses.

Todd thinks back.

“He’s going to be Puck.”

“Hm?”

“In the show, in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream.’ Neil is going to play Puck.” Todd makes himself as clear as possible.

“Oh?” Keating doesn’t look more intrigued, nor does he look confused. Todd envies that about him in the same way he envies Neil. The two of them are so good at hiding any trace of uneasiness or unchecked interest. “He got the part already?”

“No. But I know he’s going to get it.”

Now is when Keating could have said something like he was pleased to see Todd supporting Neil. He could have said that he would pray on it for Neil’s sake or that he’d be on the lookout for a cast list. But he doesn’t do that. Instead, John Keating makes a decision, just like Todd.

“I know, too.”

“Why? ” Todd spills out his anguish the second the confirmation comes. “Why do we know?”

Todd breathes in like he’s just been born, like he’s never breathed air before. “I asked you why we know,” he says. “I asked you why.”

“Mmhm,” Keating nods like he’s remembering it now, too. “I didn’t know why.”

“Do you know now?”

“No.” Keating says, his word ending with a long, drawn out 'O.' “I didn’t know then and I don’t know now. I have an idea, but it isn’t a fact.”

“What is it?” 

Keating looks at him, surprised. “I've told you, haven't I?”

“N-” Todd starts to say no, then quiets. Keating had told him, in the end of his tantrum and the beginning of his hours of crying. He looked at Todd squarely and told him, with every fiber of his being, that he believed he was there for Todd.

‘I think you needed me to know. I think you needed someone on your side and that’s it.’

Keating reaches for the book in front of him and reads a passage. Todd realizes that Keating had planned for this. Out loud, he reads this:

“Not I, nor anyone else can travel that road for you. You must travel it by yourself. It is not far. It is in reach. Perhaps you have been on it since you were born and did not know.”

Oh. More Whitman.

Keating could never stand, side-by-side, on this journey with Todd. Todd was always going to be the deciding factor of Neil’s survival. Only Todd. Only he could save Neil, as crestfallen as that sounds. But, survival was not impossible. And, if Keating means the passage he’s chosen, it was always meant to be. Everything would always lead to this.

“But,” Keating continues, putting the book down. “Traveling the road alone does not mean you do not meet people along the way. I couldn’t save Neil. I could do everything in my power to nail it in that skull of his that he has everything he needs to live, right at his disposal. But, Todd, you were always the only one who could prove it. You’re the only one who could give him all the things we stay alive for. But you…” There’s tears threatening to fall from the duct of Keating’s eyes. “You needed somebody to meet you there. You needed somebody in your corner. You needed somebody who sees you and knows you, that isn’t your parents or your friends. You needed somebody who was once unlucky and in love and just like you.”

Todd’s eyes immediately search for the photo of Keating’s lover on his desk. It’s still there. It looks like it’s been recently cleaned.

Keating is right. Todd needed somebody who could understand him. It couldn't have been Charlie. The Charlie in his apartment ten years from now is not the one he needs here in 1959. Now, he needed the Charlie that could be brave enough admit his feelings about Cameron. He needed the Charlie that was brave enough to do so because Todd was, too. He needed the Charlie who’s only a teenager. Now, in the second try, he needed the John Keating who was conscious of the feeling of love before Todd knew of it himself.

“What did you say to him?” Todd asks the only question Keating hasn’t answered.

“Hm?”

“What did you say to Neil before he left? You said something to him.”

“Oh.” Keating perks up like he forgot that occurred. He opens his mouth to answer, then promptly shuts it. “When Neil is back, ask him yourself.”

—

It’s possibly the most annoying, worst answer Keating has ever given Todd to any of his questions. However, Todd laughs the second Keating says it. It’s the sound of Neil’s name, it rings and Todd feels the memory of realizing he was in love surge through his body.

‘Unburying itself from under the sadness and anger, Todd lets out a laugh. Then another. And another. He’s laughing and it’s a big, big laugh because Neil Perry brought him breakfast. Neil Perry brought him breakfast and he didn’t make his bed. Somehow, that feels like a sacrifice.”

The laughter lasts all the way back up to his bedroom, at nearly five in the morning. Keating ushers him out, telling Todd that he understands if he is not in class the next day. There’s not much time left in the night time for sleep before the school will be awoken for breakfast. Todd would be lucky if he got even fifteen minutes.

He stands in front of his bedroom door for most of those fifteen minutes. That worry of walking back into his room again shows itself, but acts more as a conscious decision than something Todd will have to use effort against. So, Todd opens the door.

And the first thing he sees is not a thing at all. On his bed, on Todd Anderson’s bed, curled up under his covers is Neil Perry.

Chapter Text

16 December, 1959.

“Neil?” The name pours out of Todd’s mouth like a dam’s been broken. His arms reach out in front of himself, trying to reach for that being in his bed. “Neil!” Todd says again, louder. His tone is a distant cousin to the desperation he had given the name, Neil, the night before.

Neil rises from his sleepy positions, rubbing his eyes with curled up fists. When he looks at Todd, he first seems calm. Then, the alarm sets on his features. It’s like he’s been slapped with clarity; last night was not a fabricated fable of the mind.

“Todd!” Neil’s croaky, tired throat says.

Todd falls forward onto his knees. The pain that visits him in his kneecaps shoots up and kisses the bottom vertebrae of his spine. He doesn’t care. Neil is here. Neil is alive and nothing else matters- nor bursting bones, not shattered spines.

Neil nearly trips twice getting to Todd. There’s too many sheets and bed posts to knock him off balance. But, when he does make it, Todd bands his arms around Neil’s legs. Neil sets one hand on the back of Todd’s scalp, the other on Todd’s shoulder.

They sit like that for a long time. If anyone passes by their open door and catches them like this, they don’t notice. It’s too early to be concerned and too late at the same time. It’s the sixteenth of December.

“You’re here,” Todd breathes, his voice muffled. His face is nuzzled against Neil’s waist and stomach. “You came back.”

Neil nods. “Of course I did.”

If it was a better moment, one not so heavy with unsaid words and memories Todd cannot explain, Neil might’ve added a joke to that. He would have quipped something like “Of course I did, we have finals soon” or “I promised Charlie I’d sneak him extra toast at breakfast this morning.” He doesn’t. Instead, he adds this: 

“I promised you I would be back in the morning.” Like he’s asking permission, Neil slowly moves the hand on Todd’s scalp down to his jaw. He guides Todd's head up with his fingers so they can look at each other.

Todd professes, “I couldn’t be sure.”

“I know,” Neil says and Todd thinks, for a short moment, that Neil does. The moment passes, however, when Neil smiles. Todd’s glad for it. It means that Neil will never have to understand the depravity, the truisms that cut and bleed when you’re not completely sure someone will be alive at dawn.

To Neil, the one that’s here now, death is not an unstoppable force. Todd believes that might be how he feels now too because, really, death isn’t. Not this time, not here. Death is not something to pick and choose, no matter how lasting it felt in front of Neil’s father. The only thing Neil has to choose is who sits in front of him now, nervous on his knees.

Neil taps Todd’s arms with the tips of his fingers. When Todd’s grip falls, Neil lowers himself down so that they are on the same level. Neils sits, criss-crossed legs, and Todd mirrors that position. Taking his hand and pulling it into his lap, Neil rubs comforting circles into Todd’s palm with his thumb.

Suddenly, Neil asks Todd, “You know I had to go, right?” The circles under Neil’s eyes look dark and deep. The half-moon shape gives the impression that eclipses have appeared here before. Sun in eyes, moons beneath them. 

Todd knows. “I didn’t want you to.”

For some reason, Neil smiles at this. He laughs a little, too. Looking into Todd’s eyes, Neil’s stare sits somewhere between contempt, loveliness, and graveyard memory. “I know you didn’t. I didn’t want to go either, but I knew that it was important that I did.” He raises Todd’s hand to his lips and kisses his knuckles, one at a time; like it’ll soften everything, every blow. It works because, by the last kiss, Todd is smiling, too.

Todd sighs, then admits, “I was really upset.”

“With me?” Neil squeezes his hand.

“No.” Todd answers quickly.

“With what, then?”

“Everything else,” Todd sniffs, throat instantaneously tightening. “I was, I was upset because it felt like I couldn’t stop you from leaving but I don’t think that’s fair. I couldn’t stop you and that should’ve been okay. It is okay. But I couldn’t stop you.” He takes a deep breath, one that lasts for eight counts and feels like eight minutes. “I was upset with Keating for telling you to stay and Charlie for holding me back and your father…God, life, all of it, I was upset with everything because it felt like it was over.”

Neil understands better than anyone. He knows what Todd means when he says everything felt like it was over. He felt it, too. He listens to Todd speak and holds onto every syllable. He urges Todd to keep going with every instance of his lips to Todd’s skin and squeeze to his hand. He holds his breath. When Todd finishes, Neil breathes out like he spilled his own upsets, too. Then, when Neil is ready, he does it for real.

“I promised a lot last night. I told you I would stay. Even if you aren’t upset with me, you could be. I wouldn’t mind,” Neil chuckles. “When I got into my father’s car, all I could think about was how I was going to make it up to you in the morning.”

“There’s nothing to make up for.”

“There is.” Neil says, “I told my father what must have been a billion times that he would have to drive me back here in the morning. You know what he said to that? Nothing. He said absolutely nothing.”

Todd is shocked. “He said nothing?”

“Nothing in the car,” Neil exclaims. “Outside of the car and inside the house, he said a lot. He told me that I wouldn’t come back here in the morning. He told me that he was going to take me out of Welton, Todd, and put me in military school. ‘You’re going to be a doctor,’ that’s what he said.”

It’s weird hearing about a conversation Todd had spent years making up in his head for years and years. There’s a chill on the back of Todd’s neck, like the ghost of his past breathing into his skin, that tells Todd that maybe he shouldn’t know this. But Neil is sharing it with him and it feels therapeutic. It wants to drink in the words like sweet tea.

“What…What did you say? Are you going?”

“No!” Neil shakes his head dramatically. “That’s the best part! I told him that I wouldn’t. I told him that, that, that the best chance I had at any sort of future was at Welton. And, Todd, I told him how I felt. I told him everything.”

Todd whispers, “everything?”

“I couldn’t stop thinking about what you said.” Neil lowers his voice with Todd, “In my father’s house, he’s yelling at me and all I can think is that you said this would kill me.”

Todd wants to apologize, but Neil stops him like he’s already said it. “No, no, it’s good you said that. The last thing I said before he went to bed is that, if he took me out of Welton and didn’t start trying to understand that I should be able to live my own life, it would kill me. And you know what, Todd?”

“What?” Todd, eyes wide, wonders.

“I think he believed me.”

“Yeah? You really think so?”

“Mmhm,” Neil hums. “After all of that, I got back into my father’s car and just… sat there until he got into the car, too.” Even in the aftermath, Neil is surprised at himself. There’s a flush to his cheeks that’s colored with ambition. “I think I fell asleep. When I woke up, he was driving and, and there was a part of me, I think, uh…” He trails off like the words he wants to say will sound too otherworldly. He thinks up some new ones. “He’s driving and it felt like I was driving past my old life and into a new one. I know, I know that doesn’t make sense. I’m the same me I was yesterday. But, Todd, I don’t know, I feel a lot newer. I feel a lot better.” 

He ends his sentence with another kiss to Todd’s knuckle. Then, he adds on what he possibly wanted to say in the first place. “I feel like standing up to my father gave me, well, um…”

“A second chance?” Todd asks, the answer like a church bell singing. 

“Maybe.” Neil isn’t sure what to make of that. Then, he says something that makes Todd hear Keating’s voice in his ears so clearly it’s like he’s in the room with them. “Keating talked to me about second chances, too, right as I was leaving.”

“What did you say to Neil before he left? You said something to him.”

“Oh.” Keating perks up like he forgot that occurred. He opens his mouth to answer, then promptly shuts it. “When Neil is back, ask him yourself.”

“What did he say?” Todd asks.

“My father was so mad Keating was whispering and he couldn’t hear him. You would have thought Kearing was doing a spell or something, but,” Neil answers, “he said to remember that second chances don’t come around often.”

“Neil, remember everything we’ve talked about. No matter what that man says to you, take control and let it run off your shoulders into a stream of second chances. They don’t come around often. Think of that boy over there begging you to stay. Good luck.”

Todd’s lips curve up into a smile. Oh. So, that was what Keating had whispered to him. And Todd had thanked him by screaming at him for it, like Keating was ruining everything, too. Todd will apologize for it later and thank him, truly, for being in his corner.

“Do you think it could be true?” Neil questions, “that I’ve been given a second chance? Do we get second chances in this life, Todd? Is that possible?” Neil asks him like he expects a negative answer. Todd doesn’t give it to him.

“Yes. We do. I know it.”

Neil, the smallest bit afraid of that not being true, let’s go of Todd’s hand. While doing so, he gives a half-hearted laugh. He’s interested in whatever poetry Todd has thought up to be sure of second chances. He’s feeling poetic, too. Neil backs himself up, leaning against Todd’s bed frame. He pats the space next to him so Todd will sit next to him. Todd does.

“Do you?” Neil grins, playfully elbowing him. 

“I’ve had a second chance.” Todd says.

“Did you at least wait to take it? That second chance? Until the world was more peaceful, more kind?” With his own poetry, Neil asks Todd for more than a bare minimum answer. He’s asking if there’s any explanation for why he feels so free and transcendental. Does everyone feel this way? Is it possible? If that’s possible, what else is? Is the world not so bad? What happens next?

And, to all of that, Todd has an answer.

Todd didn’t wait ten years for his second chance. Sure, he waited ten years for it, but he didn’t know he was doing it. And second chances don’t wait for peace and kindness, they wait for the exact moment your life could not be more fucked up. Somehow though, it’s worth the wait.

There are no worlds that exist that are perfect, peaceful, and kind in all their entirety. What there is, however, is what Todd wanted all along; a world small enough to count with your fingers. The Dead Poets Society, including Neil Perry. That world is kind. That world is peaceful. And it's a lot of other things, too. It’s arrogant and romantic and stuffy and sour. Sometimes, it’s the worst thing you’ve ever seen. It never comes before the second chance, either. Todd had to work for it. He had to wait only for a world he could understand.

“No.” Todd says.

“Hm?”

“No.” Todd repeats. 

That second ‘no’ makes Neil laugh out loud. He bows his head forward and puts his palms on Todd’s cheeks. “No!” Then, without much of a warning, Neil kisses Todd. It’s not a quick peck, but a passionate, funny thing that mollifies into something more tender.

When they part, Todd tells Neil it was completely worth it.

“Ugh, you’re disgusting, it’s six in the morning!”

Neil and Todd jump back from each other, each facing the door to see an annoyed looking Cameron. Charlie’s right behind him.

“Ah, grow up, Cam,” Charlie says. “You’re one to talk about being disgusting when-”

“I don’t know what you’re about to say but! Um! How dare you-” Cameron’s sputtering makes his attempt at defending himself futile. 

“Are you two coming with us to breakfast?” Charlie offers, ignoring Cameron. “Rumor has it, the eggs today are not going to be scrambled. Personally, I’m hoping for sunny-side up. It’ll match the weather.”

“Oh, can the weather be described as sunny-side up now? I didn’t know.” Neil easily jests with Charlie.

“No, it cannot,” Cameron says.

“The sun is UP, Cam.”

“It’s snowing, Charlie.”

“The sun doesn’t rise up anymore because it’s snowing?”

“The yolk of the egg showing is what makes a sunny-side up egg, sunny-side up. The sun is not showing because it’s snowing and there’s too many clouds. The sun not showing means the weather cannot be described as sunny.” Cameron’s arms are crossed, but there’s no pulsing vein to his temple that would show any other sign of anger. He’s not angry. He’s not annoyed.

Todd sees it happen so quickly that anyone else might have, would have missed it. While Cameron speaks his truth on the technicalities of weather and eggs, Charlie makes direct eye contact with Todd and winks. 

Todd nods at that, but says nothing. Their conversation a few hours ago was worth it.

After a few minutes of hurrying to get dressed (and a few more kisses), Neil and Todd join the others at breakfast. Sitting down next to Neil, Todd thinks this might be the best meal he’s ever had. Not because it’s actually the best. It’s okay. The eggs are, in fact, sunny-side up, and the hashbrowns actually look cooked. But, the reason it’s actually the best meal is because all of the Dead Poets are together. All of them. On the sixteenth of December.

“What happened to going off campus?” Gerard is the one to ask as he shovels hashbrowns onto his plate. He speaks at a hushed volume, though the room is quite empty. Even some of the teachers have missed their prayer before meal times. The end of the semester is getting to them all.

“I wouldn’t want any of us getting expelled for leaving campus.” Surprisingly, it isn’t Richard Cameron who says this. It’s Charlie Dalton. He takes a large bite from a lightly toasted piece of sourdough.Cameron tries to hide it by lowering his face, but he’s softly smiling. He’s rolling his eyes too, like Charlie is repeating his own words back to him.

Knox shrugs, reaching across the table to pick a grape off of Neil’s plate. “Could you really get expelled for sneaking off campus?”

“Maybe not if your last name is Overstreet,” Meeks says. Gerard has to cover his mouth to stop potato and ketchup from spilling out.

“Yeah, how many times did you go see Chris?” Neil asks.

“Okay, okay,” Knox huffs. “A guy wants to get away from campus once or twice, can you blame him?”

“Yes.” Neil responds.

“Boo!” Charlie throws a used napkin in Knox’s direction.

“Oh, you’re one to talk, Charlie!” Cameron says. “I know for a fact you snuck off campus at least once a month sophomore year.”

“What can I say, I’m a changed man.” Charlie responds like he was expecting the accusatory remark from Cameron. 

“Guys.” Todd pipes up. He tries to stop himself from smiling, but his sides are beginning to hurt because he’s stopping himself from laughing, too. “We’ve all snuck off of campus. We do that every week, remember?”

“Oh.” Charlie says. “You’re right.

Then, like it was the funniest thing any of them have ever heard, the group howls in laughter. Knox beats his fist against the table and Neil grabs onto Todd’s shoulder. Charlie is leaning so far forward his hair might be touching his eggs. Gerard looks like he’s about to cry. Meeks is hiding his giggling face in his hands. Cameron’s absolutely cackling. It’s the loudest Todd has ever heard him. Neil asks if it’s different if they sneak out at night and not during school hours.

“Boys!” A voice booms over their laughter, which makes the group want to laugh harder. But they calm when they see it's only John Keating, whose lips are held together so thinly, because he wants to laugh with them.

“Captain!” Charlie says. 

“Mr. Dalton,” He acknowledges Charlie. “I can see you boys are absolutely delighted at what I must assume is Welton’s finest breakfast?”

“Of course, sir.” Neil gestures to the food in front of him. “Delicious.”

“Mmmm..” Keating nods. Like it’s turned into a private conversation, Keating tells Neil: “Oh, and last night you were wonderful, Neil. You have a gift. I’m sure I don’t speak for only myself when I say you left me speechless. I hope you’ll keep up with this.”

“Oh!” Neil blushes, the scarlet darkening when the boys around him start cheering. They bombard him with compliments they realized they haven’t gotten the chance to say. It’s sweet. Todd grabs onto Neil’s hand under the table. “Thank you, Mr. Keating. I plan on it. We run through the weekend, but I’m already…excited for the next one.”

“Good.” Keating says. “I’ll leave you boys to it.”

Keating walks away from them. Before he does, though, he looks at Todd. Todd mouths ‘thank you.’ They both smile in victory. 

–

17 December, 1959. Thursday. The Final Dead Poets Society Meeting of the Semester.

When they’re in the cave for the last time in the Winter of 1959, each of the boys read a singular line from a poem. The line is meant to embody themselves, their feelings towards the semester, and their current lives. Todd reads his first.

“O days of the future I believe in you. I do not know what is untried and afterward, but I know it cannot fail.”

Then, Charlie reads his.

“The soul of a man is audible, not visible.”

The third line comes from Meeks.

“The greater your real strength and power, the quieter it will be exercised.”

After, Gerard stands up and says his, eyes closed.

“I am a happy camper, so I guess I’m doing something right. Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it, the more it will elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.”

Knox follows.

“Once, if I remember well, my life was a feast where all hearts opened and all wines flowed.”

After Knox, Cameron reads.

“It's better to lose your ego to the one you love than to lose the one you love to your ego.”

And, finally, Neil reads his last.

“The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, but I have promises to keep. And miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go before I sleep.”

—

19 December, 1959. Onwards.

When the first semester of the boys junior year ends, it feels a lot like they’re saying goodbye forever. They’ll only be apart for seventeen days, until the fourth of January. But it’s the first time in four months they won’t see each other every day. Charlie says so for days. It makes Knox teary-eyed every time.

“This has happened every semester since third grade,” Meeks says to Todd in between the group hugging and saying their farewells outside of Welton. “Charlie says its the first time we’ll be apart in months and Knox cries. Then-”

Cameron hits Charlie’s shoulder hard. The sound the contact makes crackles like lightning. Charlie’s whine afterwards is thunder.

“That happens…” Gerard sighs.

Todd can’t act too amused. Neil told him the night before, after the Dead Poets meeting, how sad he was to leave Todd for the first time. Even though Todd will see him tomorrow evening for the closing performance of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream,’ he’s sad, too. It will be odd remembering what it’s like to sleep without Neil. 

Todd hugs Neil the longest and does not let go until Neil’s mother honks her horn at them. He feels pleasure knowing that Neil’s father hasn’t yet returned from Chicago. Good. Whenever he does show up, it’ll be too soon.

They aren’t there for the closing performance, Neil’s parents. It’s fine. Todd somehow convinces his own parents to join. He tells them on the drive up that Neil is amazing and, during intermission, they agree with him. They even stand up when Neil bows at curtain call. It’s not enough to make up for the last seventeen years, give or take a decade, but it’s something. They like Neil.

The goodbye backstage is longer than the one back at Welton. Todd’s sitting on the counter in Neil’s dressing room and Neil’s kissing him, stopping only when their names are called for the tenth time. The lights to the building are being turned off. They giggle with their foreheads pressed together. They sound like wind chimes.

Though this goodbye hurts worse, it is made better when Todd receives his first letter in the mail from Neil. Todd writes back. It’s exciting and secretive and makes Todd feel like forbidden love is a lot more interesting than love seen by everyone. When Neil writes back, it doesn’t appear until they’re back in their dorm for the second half of the year.

Neil tells him to write back when he’s home for the summer. Todd does, of course. They’re apart for two months and able to share a total of twelve letters with each other. When the other Poets find out about this, they send letters, too. That summer, Todd gets five letters from Charlie, two from Cameron, three from Knox, three from Meeks, and two from Gerard. Todd’s hand gets cramped writing back. His parents comment that he gets more mail than any of them. He gets more mail than even his brother, Jeffrey.

Todd cries a lot  that summer. It’s good.

The letter writing habit of the boys turns into passing notes during class throughout their senior year. The only teacher that never stops them is John Keating who, if they were lucky, would slip his own notes to the group during lunch.

Todd keeps all the notes he gets inside his desk. The notes from Keating say things like ‘Remember the poetry assignment due next Tuesday.’ and ‘I’m proud. Every moment of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle. -W.W.’ The notes with poetry on them are brought to Dead Poets Meetings. They are everyone’s favorites.

Neil keeps his notes tacked up on the wall above his bed. He tells Todd that he doesn’t care if Nolan finds out and gets mad. He likes them where he can see them, Todd’s scrawled out hearts and Charlie’s awful handwriting.Todd shakes his head and tells Neil to remember to be careful. He doesn’t tell Neil he likes them hanging up too, but Neil knows.

When their senior year ends, Neil sobs harder at graduation than anyone. He cries and cries and tells his friends it’s because he’ll miss them all so much. Neil explains that, after playing Richard II at Henley Hall that year, he hasn’t been afraid of their lives changing. 'Mine Honor is my life,' he says. But he’s afraid because, even if most of them are going to the same university, they aren’t majoring in the same things. They won’t see each other. That makes him feel hollower than any king.

That night, Charlie calls Todd and proposes that they all get an apartment together. 

So, that’s how they end up. They move to a place in between Fordham and the city of New York, Todd, Neil, and Charlie. It doesn’t happen all at once. Charlie’s the one to sign off on the apartment, but Neil and Todd move in first, at the beginning of summer. It’s a two bedroom place. Charlie moves in closer to the beginning of the school year. Cameron takes a lot longer to decide to move in. He stays with them during holidays, but he doesn’t have his clothes in the closet until four years later, when he graduates. 

Meeks, Gerard, Knox, and Chris like to visit, too. It's cramped when they all come. Todd likes it this way.

Neil is away sometimes too, starting the Autumn of his sophomore year, late in 1962. He has auditions and college productions to be involved in. At these times, when nights are late, he’ll stay in friends' college dorms. When the college productions evolve to professional contracts, Neil stays with friends or in housing paid for with his contract. There’s a letter in Todd’s mailbox at least once a week, when Neil is gone for long. Sometimes the letters are weighed down with seashells and tea leaves. Todd always writes back with heart-heavy things like poetry and updates on his English degree.

They graduate university together. Most of the parents make it, but the best part of the day isn’t the attendance. It’s speeding Neil into the city for a particularly special audition. It's worth it to Todd every time he does this for Neil, travels with him, because he can see him in every audition, callback, heartbreak, and celebration.

And a few months later, Todd does it again. He travels to the city. Only this time it’s Charlie and Cameron who come with him, not Neil. Knox, Chris, Gerard, and Meeks meet them in front of the theatre. John Keating is there, too, visiting from London. There’s a girl with him, the one in the frame that lived in Keating’s office. Together, they see an off-broadway production of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ where Neil stars as Lysander. 

It’s great, rumored to get a Broadway transfer. Not that that matters, of course. Todd will see any production Neil is in, no matter what the industry claims to be important. Neil knows this and, when the audience has left and the last program has been signed, he goes home with Todd to their apartment for the night. There, Neil pulls Todd into their bedroom and gives him a letter heavier than all the others.

It’s not the first piece of jewelry Neil has bought for Todd, but it’s certainly the nicest.

“I’ve been saving up. I know it’s not really possible. Not here, not now. But will you have it?” Neil says as Todd carefully puts the ring on his finger. It’s snug in a good way. It’s perfect, a thin silver band that looks like it’s been carved out of the moon. 

Todd reaches out and touches Neil’s jawline with the edge of his finger, only one finger. He promises to get Neil one of his own through blubbering tears and a million versions of ‘yes.’ He cries harder when he hears the thunderous applause outside his bedroom door. Todd squeals in delight when he opens the door and sees all his friends are there to celebrate.

A year later, in the Summer 1966, they hold a small, private ceremony in their apartment. Within that year, Todd gets a job teaching, like he had been the first time, but it’s nicer. He’s inspired to write, kept alive by the very subject that sleeps next to him every night. He publishes a few things in the paper and writes a book that sells pretty well. 

And the ceremony is sweet. It’s nothing much. It’s perfect. A lucky number seven years after Neil and Todd met for the second time. Todd gives him a gold ring, a bit thicker than his own band. They have a dinner on the plates Todd’s parents gave him some Christmas after he received his degree.

—

15 December, 1969. Ten Years Later

If you would have asked Todd Anderson nine years and three hundred and sixty four days ago where he would be in ten years, waking up in his bedroom with Neil Perry would have felt like a faraway aspiration.

But when Todd Anderson wakes up for the second time on the fifteenth of December in 1969, it is not the once death date of Neil Perry. It is not ten years after. There is no before or after Neil. There only ever is. Todd feels it for certainty whenever Neil stirs in his sleep next to him. He feels it when Neil makes him breakfast and kisses him goodbye before going to a rehearsal for a play Todd’s never read. He feels it when he reads the newspaper and sees Neil’s face on the front page, having been interviewed about the rehearsal process. He feels it when Neil comes home that night and wraps Christmas presents.

When Charlie and Cameron knock on their door to join, holding mugs of cocoa and wearing their pajamas, Todd feels it. When Neil shoos them away because “they’re gifts for you two!” he feels it. He feels like his toes are buried in sand and will never leave. There's claws of crabs and there's seaweed. They all add something. It all means something. Todd feels it.

There are pillows with clean cases and good friends in Todd's life, ten years after meeting Neil Perry for the second time. In the world that he’s in now. There’s hot cocoa and cold hands. There’s hope and love and bark and bite. It’s all good because Todd exists. He exists like snow, he exists like stars, he exists like rain, moons, suns, cosmos, he exists. He exists and Neil Perry exists, too. They exist and they're alive.

It’s good.