Chapter 2: Reckoning in the Rain
The damp chill of the alley seeped through Lee’s thin jacket as Seren dragged him through the coffee shop’s backdoor. The sharp tang of stale beer and wet concrete hit him, mingling oddly with the fading scent of roasted beans. The single streetlamp flickered overhead, its sickly yellow light stretching their shadows long and thin, twisting them into grotesque shapes against the grimy brick walls. Lee stumbled, his ribs protesting sharply where Aber’s hands had gripped too hard, twisted too violently.
"Seren, mun, wait—" Lee gasped, trying to pull his wrist free. Her grip was iron. "He was just... lost, like. Proper broken after his wife... you know?"
"I know he put his bloody hands on you," Seren hissed, not slowing down. Her voice was low, dangerous, vibrating with a fury that seemed to make the damp air crackle. Her eyes, dark pools reflecting the flickering light, scanned the alley ahead. "Doesn't matter what's broken in him. You don't fix it by breaking someone else, you pathetic twp."
She stopped abruptly near the alley’s mouth, where it opened onto a slightly wider, equally neglected service road. Parked askew, half on the kerb, was a familiar, battered white van. The interior light was on, casting a weak glow over the figure hunched in the driver’s seat. Aber. A big man, shoulders slumped, thick neck disappearing into a stained work shirt. He had one meaty hand pressed to his forehead, the other clutching a half-empty bottle of cheap whisky.
Seren didn’t hesitate. She strode forward, Lee trailing unwillingly in her wake. She rapped her knuckles hard, sharp and insistent, on the driver’s window. The sound echoed in the narrow space.
Aber flinched violently, his head snapping up. His eyes, bloodshot and swollen, widened in shock, then confusion, then a dawning horror as they landed on Lee standing slightly behind Seren. He fumbled the window down. The reek of stale whisky and unwashed misery poured out.
"Christ," Aber mumbled, his voice thick and slurred. "Lee? What...?" His gaze skittered away, unable to hold Lee’s.
"Get out," Seren commanded, her voice flat, cold. Utterly devoid of the warmth Lee associated with her. "Get out of the van. Now."
Aber blinked, trying to focus. Fear warred with belligerence in his bleary eyes. "Who the hell’re you? Piss off."
"I’m the one asking nicely," Seren said, leaning in slightly. The streetlight caught the fierce set of her jaw. "Once. Get. Out."
Something in her tone, the sheer, focused intensity of her rage, cut through Aber’s fog. With a grunt, he fumbled with the door handle, nearly falling as he swung his legs out and stood, swaying slightly, on the uneven pavement. He towered over Seren, a hulking mass of grief and alcohol against her contained fire. He avoided looking directly at Lee, who stood frozen, heart pounding against his bruised ribs.
"Look at him," Seren demanded, jerking her head towards Lee without taking her eyes off Aber. Her voice was quiet now, but every word carried, sharp as glass. "Look at what you did."
Aber’s gaze finally, reluctantly, dragged towards Lee. He flinched again, seeing the pale exhaustion on the young face, the shadows under the dark eyes, the faint, telltale edge of purple bruise just visible above the collar of his jacket where Lee had instinctively pulled it tight earlier. Lee felt naked under that look, exposed. He wanted to shrink away, but Seren’s presence, solid and unyielding beside him, held him rooted.
"God, Lee... I..." Aber stammered, a tremor running through him. He looked genuinely stricken, the booze momentarily clearing to reveal raw shame. "Last night... I wasn't... I didn't mean—"
"Didn't mean?" Seren cut him off, her voice rising now, slicing through his excuses. "Didn't mean to grab him? Didn't mean to shake him like a rag doll? Didn't mean to leave bruises on a kid half your size, you drunken bastard?" She took a step closer, forcing Aber to look down at her. "You think your grief gives you the right? You think because the world’s kicked you down, you get to kick someone smaller? Someone who actually tried to be kind to you?"
Aber’s face crumpled. He looked away, back towards his van, then down at his own thick hands, as if seeing them for the first time. "She's gone," he whispered, the words thick with anguish. "Everything... gone."
"And he," Seren stabbed a finger towards Lee, her voice trembling slightly now, though her stance remained rigid, "he’s still here. Trying to survive. Trying to find scraps of decency in this shithole. And you used yours to hurt him. To mark him. Like an animal marking territory." She spat the words. "That's all you are now, Aber? Just another animal?"
The insult hung in the damp air. Lee saw Aber’s shoulders hitch. He wasn't crying, not exactly, but a choked sound escaped him. He looked utterly broken, a different kind of broken than last night. Last night had been rage; this was despair, laced with a nauseating self-loathing. His eyes flickered back to Lee’s bruised throat.
Lee found his voice, surprisingly steady despite the tremor inside. "It wasn't... it wasn't right, Aber." His Welsh accent felt thicker, a shield. "What you did."
Aber flinched as if struck. He nodded, a jerky, almost imperceptible movement. He couldn't meet Lee’s eyes again. He just stared at Lee’s neck, at the visible evidence of his own brutality shining faintly in the unreliable light.
Seren watched him for a long moment, the fury in her eyes shifting into something colder, more assessing. Satisfied, perhaps, that the point had hit bone. "Right," she said, the heat gone from her voice, replaced by flat finality. "We're done here." She turned, her hand finding Lee’s elbow, gentler now but still firm. "Let’s go home, cariad."
She steered Lee away from the van, from the hulking figure crumbling under the flickering streetlamp. They walked back into the deeper shadows of the alley. Lee glanced back once. Aber hadn't moved. He was still standing by his van door, head bowed, staring at the wet pavement, the bottle forgotten at his feet. The alley swallowed the sight, leaving only the echo of Seren’s fury and the heavy silence that came after. Lee felt Seren’s hand tremble slightly on his arm. Not from fear, he realised. From the sheer, draining effort of holding back the storm.