I enter Ziri's parents' house without knocking. I call my greeting into the house as I take off my shoes though get no response. The reason for that is easy to identify because Mariame's chiding voice reaches the entrance with no obstacles.

'All day, you're on this phone. For three hours now I watch you scroll on this Vine. Vine, Vine, all day you're doing this.'

I peek into the living room to find Ziri sitting between Mariame's legs on the same pillow I sat on yesterday. His phone screen casts a green light on his face and some Vine plays on repeat though his head is angled back to stare incredulously at his mother. Sucking her teeth, Mariame turns his head to the front so the cornrows she's braiding his hair into don't get skewed and Ziri sees me.

A smile blooms on his face, one that emphasises the wrinkles under his eyes, and he instinctively leans toward me only to be yanked back by his hair. 

Mariame's greying locs are gathered into a ball at the top of her head that sways with every word. 'What if you spent all that time you spend on your phone for somethin productive for your life, for prayin, for cleanin, for your family? You come here and you think it's a hotel. You don't even clean your own room. I don't need to keep your room. I can make an altar in there, bigger than this,' she flicks a wrist at the small Vodun altar under her painting of Black Jesus. Most people would probably consider their proximity sacrilegious but it's perfectly normal in their multi-faith home. 'I can make a swimmin pool in there. Five hours now, you're just scrollin on this Vine.'

His mouth falls open. 'Five hours? Two seconds ago it was three hours.' His voice gets shrill and loud though I see his lips twitch. 'What else could I possibly be doin right now?'

'You could braid the ends yourself.'

'I could braid the whole thing myself. You're the one who insisted on doin it!'

She pulls his hair a little harder than necessary and his hand flies to his scalp.

'Ow-uh! You literally never let me clean because you think I'll kill myself. Honestly, a guy drinks bleach once and people never let it go.'

'Not funny,' Mariame and I say at the same time.

Ignoring our feedback, Ziri makes a big a show of leaving his phone on the sofa table and reaches back for one of the cornrows that's been braided two inches from his scalp to finish it.

'Fine, I'll clean after this. What d'you want me to clean?'

Mariame lifts a hand, her palm flat in the air. 'Nothin. You always do it wrong and I already cleaned everythin yesterday.'

Eyes and mouth wide, he turns to me as if to say I can't win and the laughter I've been trying to contain bubbles out. I sink next to him on the floor, his body inclining naturally toward mine, and pick up a braid to finish the end; I've plaited Iris's hair enough to know how to do it neatly. He's been growing his hair out since it were shaved when he were sixteen and, when plaited, it nearly reaches his waist. Which means braiding it takes a good chunk of time.

For several minutes, we're silent as we focus on his hair. Then Mariame says, 'If I was born in this country, by now, I would own the moon.'

'You can't own the moon.'

'By now, I would own the moon. If I was born in this country, like you. But you are always on this Vine. You know, by the time you are my age, you will have your thumbs operated and your neck — with metal. You will have metal instead of bones like un cyborg. Because you are always on this phone.'

Ziri huffs but decides it best not to argue more.

I can't stop smiling as I help with the braids. After an entire day with Má, listening to her complaints about her boss and Bà Nội and random people who are rude to her in Asda while I helped her spring clean, this is bliss. Not that I mind! People are allowed to vent and get things off their chest and sometimes complaining genuinely helps. I don't mind helping Má around the house either. Sometimes I just wish my mum would be my mum and not my wife.

I need a few hours with Ziri to build up my energy again. Ziri always seems to have so much to spare. Save for when he's depressed, obviously...

When his cornrows are finally done, he thanks his mum and kisses her on the cheek before he grabs my hand. 'We're goin upstairs.' And he drags me after him without consultation.

Ziri's bedroom is lavender. As in, the walls, the ceiling, and the floor. It's the same room as mine in the house that mirrors it but they couldn't be more different. Ziri's childhood bedroom is an assault to the senses. The walls are covered in pages torn out of magazines ("free posters" he calls them), there are more books piled under the window than I could possibly read in my entire life, and every surface is covered with trinkets.

I couldn't step in here without sweating through my shirt for at least two months. The clutter activated my fight or flight response as if it could morph, Transformer-like, into a monster and kill me. But I got used to it over time. I can't really name what makes Ziri's trinkets sweet and Má's or Bà Ngoại's maladaptive but I doubt he'd scream for hours if someone chucked out a shampoo bottle that's been empty for three years.

He sits on his bed and scratches his cheek the way he does when he's about to cry. 'I went to see Dal this mornin.' He says it as a preface for what's to come, to prepare himself emotionally or maybe to warn me.

Dal is Ziri's friend...ish. Brother would be a more correct term though they aren't related. It's an odd relationship, one that can only exist in a lacklustre small town like Sufsdale — any place bigger or with more ambition, they wouldn't glance twice if they happened to pass on the street. Dal always looks seconds away from murdering everyone around him but he loves Ziri. Since his mum passed, though, Dal isn't responsive even to him.

When he don't go on, I prompt. 'How is he?'

Ziri shrugs. 'I don't think he's left his apartment since it happened. He blames himself for it, innit. Of course, he does — he blames himself for everythin and it don't matter how many times I tell him that it's not his fault, he refuses to listen. He wouldn't even let me pray with him, like—' His voice breaks and he drops his head into his hands.

I sit beside him, pull him against me, and selfishly find peace. Some sick part of me is pleased he's telling me and not his mum though the reasonable side knows it's nowt to do with the strength of our relationship or the weakness of theirs and only with the tension between Dal and Mariame. I mean, what kind of mother wants their son's only friend to be a dealer?

'He's always refused to join jama'ah — which is so frustratin because literally the only person who wouldn't welcome him is himself — but he wouldn't even let me pray with him. I just don't know what I'm supposed to do.'

Ziri's body trembles; the fat and muscle in mine absorb the vibrations without taking damage. Maybe sponging up others' pain is the only thing I'm good at. Does that make me selfless or greedy?

I hold him for several minutes in silence before I break it. 'You don't get it.' I press a kiss to his cheek so he knows I'm not saying this to hurt. 'And I'm happy you don't — I'd be happy if you never get it. But he's lost his dad, his brother, and now his mum too. Grief don't ever go away. We just... grow around it. I dunno if–' I cut myself off. 'He's got so much of it.'

Wiping his eyes, Ziri nods. 'You're right. I just wish I could help him. I don't know how he's supposed to...' he lowers his voice, not because it's a secret but because he's afraid of jinxing it, 'do his job if he doesn't leave his flat. I think they're gonna kill him if he doesn't. I don't want him to die but I... I think he doesn't care if he does.'

It's pretty lenient to call drug dealing "doing his job" but Ziri has a point. I don't know much about Dal's past or the people he works with but from what I've gathered, he's on thin ice as is.

When his mum were in the hospital, I told him to go visit her. Dal just shook his head and said he can't go to London. I asked why. Pissed off the wrong people, innit? At my shock, he laughed. Did I think he'd moved to Sufsdale cause always dreamed of living in some Tory town in the middle of nowhere? Nah, he's here cause there's no competition, no toes to step on, but it's close enough to London that they won't think he's running away and send someone to catch him. If he stops making money, they probably will send someone.

'His sisters have a really good foster family,' Ziri croaks. 'And he was sayin I'm better and I have you now, like I don't need him anymore if I'm not on the verge of a mental breakdown.' His tears leave large drops in the teal fabric of his parachute trousers when they fall. 'I don't want him to die.'

'I know you don't,' I say because I can't say that he won't.

            Ziri crawls into bed with a tub of body lotion in hand. He sits on his heels between my legs, facing me as he screws open the tub and scoops lotion out. 'I hated sleepin away from you.'

'Me too.' I pin my mouth into a smile even when my stomach clenches. I shouldn't be this relieved to be home, to be away from my family. It's Sunday and I definitely shouldn't already be full of dread because I promised Má I'd come visit again on my next day off.

'I'm sorry about — um, Thursday. I didn't mean to trigger you. It was wrong of me to push.' Ziri watches me earnestly as he lathers his elbows in lotion. After his arms are covered, he wipes the excess onto my forearms instinctively.

Unable to swallow the sincerity he offers, I look down at my hands, interlocking my fingers. 'Don't worry bout it.' I shake my head for emphasis. 'I just don't wanna call it that.'

I study all the ways my hands are asymmetrical: the fingernails of my right hand are shorter and the callouses in the pads of my palm are slightly thicker, one of the lines — head, I think — is severed on the left but intact on the right, the scarring on my left thumb from a decade of self-punishment is inflamed again.

'I'll be more careful with the words I use.' Ziri's hand falls onto my wrist. 'Is there anythin I can do?'

I lift my attention to the black of his eyes and fall forward in an imitation of a hug though I don't lift my arms. I bury my head into the crux of his neck so when I speak, my words tickle his skin and Ziri squirms for distance, laughing. 'I never wanna be away from you.'

Before he can respond, I scoop him into my arms and he shrieks. I squeeze him against my chest and fall back so he collapses on top of me. Laughter bubbling from him, he nuzzles into me.

I ease my hold just enough to catch his eyes. If eyes are the window to the soul, Ziri's soul contains the entirety of the universe. Are mine black holes?

'I love you.'

His laughter eases into a gentle smile that melts my insides. He worms his arms free from my hug that has pinned them to his sides and caresses my temple, tucking phantom hair behind my ear. 'I love you.'

Dominic always responded with me too. Naively, I understood it to be the same, tricked myself into the belief that when he kissed me and spit the words back into my mouth, they were his.

Kissing my nose, Ziri sits up to exchange his tub of lotion with The Farthest Shore.

'I'm gonna stop therapy,' I blurt and immediately grimace.

He halts with the novel awkwardly in mid-air. 'Oh... Okay.' I'm sure he attempts to come off as indifferent but he wears all his emotions on his face.

With my first breath, smoke fills my lungs. I'm overreacting, I know I'm overreacting — I know I'm going to overreact before any words leave my mouth. But I can't wind it in. I've spent all my energy holding it together over the weekend and my patience only takes a split second to snap. 'What, are you gonna be radged about it now? Cause I tried like you wanted and it only makes me feel worse — clearly, it ain't working.'

'I'm not angry...'

'What, just disappointed?' Sarcasm drips from my voice and Ziri places The Farthest Shore back onto the nightstand. He keeps his hand there, shifting all his weight into his arm so he don't have to place it on me.

'A little.' His eyes bounce around before he forces them to meet mine. 'I know it's scary, but–'

'No, you don't know. You go to therapy and get told how nowt's ever your fault and you can't control being ill. I go and get shown all the ways I'm dense that I didn't already know.' I sit upright so he's forced to as well. I try to bore my eyes into his but he looks down at his lap. 'You wanted me to try, I tried. That were the agreement.'

'What did he say?'

'Course he wants me to continue. He wants money, don't he?' I jeer. 'Why is this so important to you? It's got nowt to do with you.'

'Because you never–' Ziri cuts himself off, flattening his lip. His eyes glisten. 'I tell you everythin. Every thought and feelin I have, I tell you. And–'

'Have you ever considered maybe I don't wanna hear every thought that crosses your mind?'

He blinks. Hugging himself, he visibly shrinks and my eyes burn. 'Okay. That's good to know.' Ziri tries his best to keep his voice steady but I know it too well not to pick up on the slight raise in pitch, the tautness that means he has a lump in his throat. 'But I do. I'd like to hear your thoughts and feelings. You don't ever tell me anythin... Sometimes I feel like I'm the only person in this relationship.'

I scoff a laugh. Because he's seated between my legs, it takes much longer for me to manoeuvre myself off the bed than I'd like; my exit from the room is much better described as clumsy than dramatic. That only makes me feel worse when I plop down on the sofa. I grab a pillow and, hugging it, stare at the crocheted suncatcher against the black sky.

It's not true, I talk to him about things. I do. Why does everyone need me to talk so badly anyway? I've got nowt to say. My thoughts are boring. I don't understand my emotions enough to talk about them; I don't wanna burden him with shit before I even know what to say, before I can even make sense of it myself. And I rarely manage to make sense of things. 

I sink so that the pillow is squeezed between my thighs and chest, tears finally brimming in my eyes. He deserves someone with summat to contribute...

I'm not sure how much time passes but the smoke has dispersed from my mind when Ziri's shuffled footsteps approach. He never picks up his feet. I love him more than the world. The sofa dips as he sits down but I don't look up.

'I'm sorry,' I croak. 'It's not true, I love that you tell me every thought you have. Even when I don't understand.'

His hand falls to my forearm because my hands are fisted against the cushion. 'Miles, you don't have to go to counsellin if you don't want to. It's a clinical and Western tradition that won't work for everyone and there are infinite other ways you can process. That said, I know it feels like it's making things worse at first. The thing is that you have to pass through that for things to get better... You don't have to go to therapy,' he reiterates. 'But you have to do somethin. You can't keep repressin things forever — it's not sustainable.'

I hug the pillow tighter, try to force it to absorb the lump from my throat and the tightness from my chest. The more I try, the worse they get so I sit up instead. If I don't go back to therapy, we'll probably never have sex and what kind of boyfriend does that make me? 'I'm scared.'

'I know.' Ziri squeezes my arm as he wipes his cheeks with his other hand. 'It is scary. But I promise I'm here for you the whole way whenever you're ready.'