***Trigger warnings for panic attacks and brief violence.***

Start the song. It's Lenders in the Temple by Conor Oberst.

When Josh woke up in the morning, he was fully prepared to move on from the nightmare he'd had the night before, eat breakfast, walk Jim, and never talk to Jenna again. That was made difficult given that he was shaken awake by the same silent boy from the night before, his drowsy mind struggling to put together what was happening.

As soon as he heard the jingling of the lock and voices outside the cellar door though, he understood. Jenna was coming back. Fear pulsed through Josh as he allowed Tyler to just about yank him off of the cot and drag him across the floor to the chair across the room, tying him to it once again despite his fearful protests.

"Please don't. Please, I can't be tied up. It's going to make me freak out again. Being restrained is going to make me panic," Josh tried to explain even as his breathing started to become more shallow and uneven.

Tyler shook his head anxiously, shoving blankets back into the trunk in the corner of the room before nearly breaking one of the cots as he rapidly dismantled it and shoved it into its former place beneath a wooden shelf. Only one bed remained, hiding the fact that Tyler had been kind enough to defy Jenna and allow Josh to be free of his fetters for the night.

Before climbing back into his cot and pretending to still be asleep, Tyler soothed his palm along Josh's shaved head, giving him an incredibly reassuring smile. Having some solidarity from Tyler made Josh slightly less terrified, but the pressure on his wrists and chest from the ropes was still making it hard for him to breathe. Tyler glanced at the still unopened cellar doors before climbing back off of the cot and coming back over to Josh.

Voices were filtering through the door although the words were muffled beyond comprehension, but Tyler ignored them as he knelt down in front of Josh, capturing his gaze and giving him a gentle smile. Josh was starting to cry, which was humiliating in and of itself, but Tyler remained calm and gentle as he loosened the ropes slightly. He held eye contact as he did it, taking in a deep breath before letting it out.

It took Josh a second to realize that Tyler was helping him to regulate his breathing, but he gave in and followed Tyler's breathing pattern shakily. A sob broke through one of his exhales, but there was no judgment on Tyler's face. He just kept breathing with Josh as he made the ropes loose enough for Josh to move slightly within them.

"I'm sorry," Josh sobbed out.

Tyler shook his head, smiling softly at Josh before mouthing, "It's okay."

By the time the cellar doors opened, Tyler had Josh's sobs quieted down to occasional hiccups and whimpers. He didn't move away from where he was sitting in front of Josh when Jenna came down the stairs quickly.

Jenna beamed deviously at Tyler, grabbing his hand off of Josh's and pulling him to his feet and across the cellar to his arm chair, pushing him into it and climbing into his lap.

"You have to see this," she whispered to him excitedly. When he looked confused, she explained, "The girls are all coming this morning. I told them they needed to see something in the cellar, but I didn't tell them it was Josh. We'll be able to tell from their reactions to seeing him which one of them he cheated on me with." She looked excitedly up at the door, not seeming to notice the hurt and confusion on Tyler's face when she said the words.

"It's not cheating if you weren't my girlfriend," Josh told her irritably despite the tears still drying on his eyes.

"You're a pig," she told him simply. "Now we just have to wait and see which of my friends is a pig too."

Before Josh could defend himself, another pair of Mary Janes was clicking down the staircase. It took less than a second for Solána to give herself away. Tears filled her eyes when she saw that Josh was tied up, tear-stained, angry, and clearly very anxious.

"Oh my god. This is why you weren't home," she said worriedly as she ran over to Josh, quickly untying him. She looked at Jenna. "What is he doing down here?"

Jenna rolled her eyes, running her fingers through Tyler's hair and resting her head on his shoulder. "He broke the rules."

"What? What rule did he break?" Solána asked, dropping the rope on the floor and immediately climbing into Josh's lap, hugging him around his neck and letting him bury his face against her chest as he tried not to cry again. She held him protectively. "It's okay, baby. You're okay."

"He slept with someone who isn't me. That means he cheated, which is against the rules. Clearly, you're the slut whose bed he climbed into," Jenna explained calmly, seeming surprised when Tyler tapped her shoulder to get her attention before signing something to her.

He didn't look happy as his hands moved to tell her something, and her face lost a bit of its colour as she watched him speak. Solána kept whispering to Josh that he was okay, rubbing his back and filling his nostrils with the soothing scent of lavender to calm his anxiety. She stopped only when Jenna slowly climbed out of Tyler's lap, glancing at Josh when Tyler gave her an irritated look and folded his arms.

"Um," Jenna began quietly, "Tyler says that Josh has to take medication every day and that Jim has to be around to help him with anxiety."

"I know, you idiot!" Solána yelled at Jenna. "He has a severe anxiety disorder. That's what Gefjon likes about him. I already talked to her about him. She knows everything, and she said it's okay. I'm Josh's primary need. You aren't. Get the fuck over yourself. How dare you put him in danger just because you're selfish? He needs to go home!"

"That's not a good idea," another voice said, drawing the attention of everyone in the cellar to Ashley and Bea. It was Ashley who'd said the words, marking the first time Josh had ever heard her speak. "If he leaves now, Gefjon will know where you stashed Tyler. She'll know he isn't dead, and she'll be angry."

"Well, he can't stay here," Solána insisted, holding him closer as she moved his head over to rest on her shoulder instead of her chest.

Silence fell across the cellar as they all tried to come up with another plan. Bea glanced at Josh, tears welling up in her eyes when she saw how frightened he clearly was. She didn't voice an opinion though, and Josh wondered if she ever did. She was an outsider like him, even if the girls had come to trust her since she'd moved to Ohio.

In the silence of the room, Bea started to cry fully. She was trembling as she stumbled away from Jenna and Ashley, who immediately reached out to soothe her. She went straight to Tyler, climbing into his lap and burying her face against his shoulder as she sobbed. He didn't hesitate for even a moment before shifting her to hold her almost like a baby, cradling her in his arms while she cried. She held onto the front of his sweater as she sobbed, looking at him and only him.

"What do we do?" She asked him through a sob. "We can't put you in danger, but now he's in danger, and it's all our fault, but we-"

Tyler hushed her silently with a gentle kiss against her forehead and another to her lips. "It's okay," he mouthed to her comfortingly, just as he had to Josh.

Was Tyler their rock? He was being held captive-supposedly for his own protection-in a cellar, yet he was still who they came to for answers. He couldn't speak, yet he was still their voice of reason. Somehow, Josh understood that. He understood how easy it was to trust Tyler. He understood how gentle and calming Tyler naturally was. It all made sense to him.

Josh hadn't even realized Hayley had made it into the cellar until she said, "We could steal his pills and the dog. That way he'd have them down here with him."

Josh's jaw clenched in anger at the thought, but before he could speak, Jenna said, "That could actually work. His parents would think he ran away back to Ohio if his pills and dog were gone with him. Solána, go with Hayley to do that. Jim trusts you, and you can shove some of Josh's clothes into his backpack and bring them."

"You're fucking insane!" Solána exclaimed angrily, taking all of the girls by surprise. "You're all insane! You want to not only kidnap a kid with a severe mental illness, but to also kidnap his service dog, and stage the whole thing so his parents think their child ran away? What the fuck is wrong with you people? Josh's mom is already really worried about him and feels beyond guilty for uprooting him. This would destroy her."

"So you want to hand my boyfriend over to Gefjon just so yours can go home?" Jenna asked angrily.

"This is your fault!" Solána yelled at Jenna, climbing off of Josh's lap. "You don't get to play the victim. We let you make the decision to keep Tyler down here because you were his main need, and he could help us give Gefjon what she wants as long as she didn't know he was alive. We let you do that, but you don't get to make decisions for Josh. He's my responsibility. Gefjon said so herself. You're not Josh's girlfriend. You're just a manipulative bitch who can't handle not being the center of the universe."

Everything seemed to be moving in fast forward when Jenna hit Solána across the face. Within a fraction of a second, Solána had her on the ground, punching her hard in the face twice before Josh got to her, pulling her off and practically dragging her away. Bea was deposited into the floor at warp speed before Tyler was dragging Jenna away as well. The two girls were still trying to get to each other, spitting nasty words across the room.

While Josh appreciated that Solána was defending him, he was getting really overwhelmed. Bea was crying even harder. Hayley and Ashley had ducked behind a shelving unit to shield themselves from the fight. Tyler looked just as afraid as Josh.

Solána calmed before Jenna, mainly because Josh was starting to hyperventilate as he held her back. She pulled him down to sit on the dusty floor with her before laying him onto his back and sitting on his hips. He looked at her as he tried to calm his breathing, but he couldn't. She laid down atop him, letting her body weight press into him in the same way Jim had been trained to do. He squeezed his eyes shut, focusing on the smell of gardenia that clung to her hair and the gentle kiss she pressed to his forehead.

"Shhh, don't cry, baby. I'm not going to let anything hurt you. I've got your back. You know that. Shhh. Breathe, Josh. Breathe," she told him gently before looking over her shoulder at the two girls emerging tentatively from behind the shelving unit. "There's a tupperware full of muffins in my backpack outside. Go get it, and bring it to me. It'll calm him down."

The girls nodded, running up the stairs as Solána kissed his lips softly and pressed their foreheads together gently. Just her presence was starting to calm Josh down slightly.

"Tyler, please don't-" Jenna started carefully from across the room, but she stopped talking abruptly.

Josh wasn't looking to see what shut her up, but suddenly Tyler was sitting next to him. He wasn't facing Josh, and it took Josh a second to realize that he was taking the post of a protector. He was making sure Josh knew that he was safe right now despite how vulnerable his panic attack had made him.

A muffin was handed to Solána, who immediately broke a piece off and fed it to Josh. She smiled at him warmly as the fresh blueberry muffin made his muscles start the relax. He didn't know what she'd added to the muffins to make him so calm, but he suddenly felt a bit sleepy. His eyelids began to droop.

"That's alright, baby. You can sleep if you need to," she assured him empathetically. "You're doing such a good job getting your breathing under control, sweetheart. I'm so proud of you."

She fed him another bite that he almost felt too drowsy to chew. Exhaustion from his panic attack was already taking over.

"Can you put him in your bed, Ty?" Solána asked, almost instantly resulting in Josh being lifted off of the ground and tucked into the quilts on the cot. "Thank you, baby."

Tyler was careful with Josh as he helped him to get comfortable. He sat down beside the bed, once again allowing Josh to feel protected despite his anxiety. Everybody seemed to be waiting for someone else to make a decision on how best to handle this situation. When no one said anything for a few minutes, Jenna broke the silence.

"Solána, go get the dog. Hayley can steal the pills. Be fast. We can't be late to school," Jenna instructed.

Solána glared at Jenna before looking at Josh, who was struggling to meet her eyes. He'd never felt less safe or less comforted in his life. Finally, she nodded.

"I'll be right back," she told Josh regrettably. "Try to rest." When he nodded stiffly, she looked to Jenna. "If you touch him, I'll cut your fingers off and give them to Gefjon."

With that, Solána disappeared from view. Tyler turned around to face Josh, brushing his fingertips along Josh's buzzed hair, the shell of his ear, the tunnel in his earlobe, his throat. His gentle hands were lulling Josh's drained body to sleep slowly, and he seemed patient with Josh as he worked on relaxing each of his aching muscles enough to sleep.

"Tyler, I think you should-" Jenna started, but she fell silent when Tyler glowered at her and signed something. "Tyler-"

He signed the same thing again. Josh didn't know what it meant. Jenna clearly did though.

"Stop telling me to go fuck myself and just listen to me!" She snapped.

Then Tyler was standing, signing so quickly and so angrily that Josh started to get anxious again. Josh still didn't know what Tyler was saying, but Jenna, Bea, and Ashley looked horrified as they watched his hands. Whatever he said was punctuated with the same sign before-the one that told Jenna to go fuck herself. She didn't respond this time, tears welling up in her eyes as she looked at her feet and shuffled closer to her friends.

Tyler was calm again when he sat down next to Josh, meeting Josh's gaze for just a moment. He gave Josh a half-hearted smile, gaining half that in return. They remained silent again until Jim came thundering down the steps, dragging his leash behind him as Solána and Hayley tried to catch up.

Jim was whimpering and whining as soon as he saw Josh, resting his snout on top of the cot so he could lick Josh's cheek and nudge him with his wet nose. Josh wanted to cry, and he didn't know if it was because Jim was finally here or because Jim was going to be trapped down here. Either way, he was relieved to have his dog here with him.

The dog lifted his nose off of the cot before curling up on the ground beside Josh. That was when Jim saw Jenna. A low growl emanated from Jim's curled up chops, making Tyler startle beside him. Jim must have noticed Tyler's momentary panic though, because he gently licked Tyler's arm before watching Jenna once again, every muscle in his little body suddenly made of stone.

"Jim, it's fine," Josh said tiredly to the dog.

It was not fine to Jim though because he didn't stop growling or relax his muscles until the girls left for school. Ashley gave Tyler a notebook, a pencil, and some extra paper before she left, and Hayley gave Josh one of his anxiety pills. Solána filled a bowl with water for Jim, promised to get some dog food after school, kissed Josh's forehead and then Jim's, and led the girls out into the chilly morning air. The cellar doors were locked behind them.

Then Josh, Jim, and Tyler were left alone in the dim cellar. Tyler set up the other cot and covered it with pillows and blankets again, sliding it against Josh's before laying down on it. They boys were silent as they laid in their beds, both exhausted and feeling extremely betrayed.

"No offence, but your girlfriend is the worst," Josh told Tyler after a moment.

Tyler smirked at Josh, nodding in agreement. He picked up the notebook Ashley had given him, scribbling something before handing it to Josh.

"Solána is a much better person than Jenna," it said.

Josh laughed, handing the notebook back before looking to Tyler and asking, "So if you know Jenna sucks, why are you still with her?"

Tyler let out a breath that could almost have been a chuckle as he wrote again. He handed the notebook have to Josh.

"We don't get to pick and choose what we need most."

Josh read that a couple times before looking up at Tyler. Tyler held his gaze for a second before holding his hand out for the notebook. Josh handed it back to him.

"So you just need to fuck someone all the time?" He asked.

Tyler did laugh that time, and it was the same slightly concerning choking sound as before. He wrote rather quickly this time: "Jenna isn't just meant to fulfil sexual needs. She's relationships and friendships and intimacy and all that stupid shit. I haven't been able to talk to anyone in almost a year. She was my friend before then though, and she's the one who helped me learn sign language and put up with me coughing up blood and shutting everyone out. For a long time, she was the only person who gave a shit."

The words made Josh's chest ache. He knew he shouldn't, but he asked, "Why can't you talk?"

Tyler's pen didn't move. He looked down at the page for a moment, suddenly looking very frustrated.

"Sorry. You don't have to answer that," Josh insisted quickly.

Tyler started writing. He pulled the page out and crumpled it into a ball before discarding it on the floor. He scrapped his explanation like that several times before he finally settled for handing Josh a page that said, "My dad pissed some people off by saying Gefjon shouldn't be given so much respect when all she causes is destruction. They couldn't shut him up, so they dragged me out of my bed one night and cut out my voice box and cut all my vocal chords with a knife. They didn't know what they were doing and they fucked up my whole throat. They buried my voice box under Gefjon's scarecrow as an offering. She kept it. Now she can talk, and I can't."

Josh felt sick as he read the note. He slowly looked up at Tyler, who looked drained. They both looked over at Jim when he stood up, walking around to Tyler's cot and plopping down beside it to slather Tyler's cheek in saliva with his tongue. Tyler let him, reaching out to scratch behind Jim's ears.

"You didn't deserve that," Josh said simply. Tyler nodded, still watching Jim sadly. "I'm really sorry."

Tyler shrugged, but his hand found Josh's under the blankets. His notebook remained sitting between the two boys as they watched Jim mirthlessly. Even the air in the room felt solemn as the boys let silence settle across them.

"Thanks for telling Jenna about Jim and my medicine," Josh said after several wordless moments.

Tyler nodded, stroking the fur on Jim's back softly. He yawned, rolling over to be facing Josh as he pulled his blankets up and closed his eyes. Josh's hand felt cold without Tyler's to fill it, but it was okay. Within five minutes of Tyler falling asleep, his arm was wrapped around Josh's waist. Josh didn't move it off.