Kavinsky is defensive, and Derek doesn't actually blame him for that. He's pushed him into a corner here, seemingly out of nowhere, the low simmering combustion of their relationship together meeting this weird, sudden boiling point for no reason other than today being the day it decided to happen. Kavinsky gets angry and Derek just... watches.
If he doesn't want to talk, he doesn't have to talk. Derek's not going to ask him for details again. At the same time, though, he's not giving him an out - Kate, Julia, Ennis, Peter, Deucalion, Chris, they all fucked him up back home, but they all had their reasons. Things Derek could empathize with, once the dust had settled and he had to rationalise out everything they did. He wants Kavinsky to give him his reasons.
Kavinsky's as bad as the worst of them. Derek wants to know why. Maybe it's the beer, but the way that Derek's looking at Kavinsky now... it's actually pretty sympathetic. For the first time, he's starting to see how predictably quick he is to anger, and Christ, if that isn't relatable.
Derek keeps his mouth shut, but he still isn't leaving. He's just watching Kavinsky, silently yet toothless Lt prompting him to talk.
"Just fucking walk," he mutters, because he can't stand still right now and he doesn't want to walk away from Derek, either. "Please." He wants something Derek can give him, and he wants it more now that this conversation has taken a really weird fucking tun. Maybe he'll feel less trapped if he's moving.
"He was my best friend," he says again. "He's dead."
Why the fuck did Derek need to know any of this? Why did it matter? How often has he wanted Prokopenko here since he showed up in this fucking place? Any of his boys, but especially him.
If Derek were more cruel than he is, there would be a part of him filing this information away to use as ammunition the next time his time with Kavinsky does turn into a fight. As he is, though, he's just - listening, trying to decide if he believes him but not willing to say that he doesn't.
Derek starts walking, heading further into the city as people start to stir awake and cars start to line the street, sporadic and solitary. He knows what it's like to be see someone's death, knows what it's like to be the cause of it, and if Kavinsky turned to drugs after that, let his brain rot, lost his empathy, well - it wouldn't be an excuse, but it would certainly be an explanation.
"Why the fuck are you--" Kavinsky cuts himself off, jaw tight. He laughs. "You owe me one hell of a fuck, Hale."
This isn't fucking worth it. No one's dick game is so good that he wants to rehash this before getting it. He's quiet for almost a block.
"Why should I fucking tell you any of this? You got your answer."
He's capable of guilt, anxiety, regret. He feels all of them, though maybe not when Derek would have wanted him to. He takes his cigarette case out again, fidgets with it as he tries to decide what he wants. Pills. Powder. Something that just dissolves on his tongue. Anything to take him out of this moment since he isn't pinned against a wall somewhere with a cock in his mouth or his ass.
Kavinsky has no reason to tell him any of this, no, and if he's blowing him off, Derek's not going to push. He stays quiet, too, until they're moving closer and closer to the commercial district in the Up. More and more people are around, now, and Derek could take that as a sign to stop talking, but he just moves closer to Kavinsky, instead, keeping his voice down for some semblance of privacy.
"I've thought about killing you for a fucking year, now. Figured it would solve a lot of problems if you stayed dead. Put less people at risk, keep them safe. Keep Tate safe. Thought it would be justice for some of the things you've done - things I know about, things I don't."
He pauses, darts his tongue between his lips, lets his thoughts settle before he turns them into words.
"I still feel that way. I don't understand why nobody sees you the way I do."
He stops walking, hand on Kavinsky's arm. They just happen to be at a hotel, now - the same hotel Kavinsky got Derek drunk, so fucking long ago. They could go inside. Get a room. Talk this out there. Do more. Or they could leave - Kavinsky could stay angry, Derek could choose the integrity of his questions over the urge to hatefuck Kavinsky into the wall the way they both want him to. He stands in front of the building, staring at Kavinsky.
"But I'm not who I was a year ago. That kind of hate isn't sustainable for me anymore. After the blizzard, I just decided - something needs to be done. I either need to learn about you, figure you out, or I need to put you in the ground. It can't keep going like this."
He snorts when Derek mentions keeping Tate safe. Yeah, Kavinsky is totally the only thing that is fucking up Tate's life. Tate, in no way, is his own worst enemy. Jesus, he can't believe Derek's still wrapped around his fucking fingers.
Kavinsky stops when Derek does, vaguely aware that they're outside a hotel. The hotel. Derek's been thinking about killing him for a year and Kavinsky almost says, do it. What the fuck is stopping him from trying? Why is he still fucking alive?
He looks at the hotel, mind working as Derek keeps talking.
"Come on."
K moves toward the building, using Derek's grip on his arm to tug him along. They might as well get a fucking room if Derek wants to interrogate him. Kavinsky pays for it because he's the Dom and he kind of has to. He assumes Derek's contracted if he's spending so much time in the Up. He decides not to think of the shortlist of who he could be contracted to.
Kavinsky doesn't need to hold Derek's arm to drag him along. Whether or not he's intending to take this somewhere he knows god damn well he shouldn't take it, Derek at least wants to keep this conversation going, and having it somewhere private and relatively safe seems smarter than talking on the street or going back to Kavinsky's place in the down.
He gets led inside, pressing his lips together and saying nothing when Kavinsky pays for the room, the status that was stripped from him still infuriating to think about, even now. Derek doesn't resist when Kavinsky guides him to the room upstairs, saying nothing on the elevator ride, doing nothing to address the fucking stares he gets from Doms these days. They get into the room, calm and quiet and tidy, and Derek's the one who shuts the door behind them, heading inside.
There's a bad. Olive-green sheets, kind of tacky. Derek wets his lips and looks at Kavinsky, just - deciding, still. Thinking.
"Let's make a deal. I know you work on deals."
Information in exchange for action. It's a dangerous position to put himself into, but christ, he doesn't know how else to talk to Kavinsky. Doesn't know how to make this happen without one of them pulling a knife or a gun or a claw on the other.
"You give me something I want - and I give you something you want. If you don't want to answer, or if I don't want to do something, then... fine. Neither of us have to do it."
When they get up to the room, Kavinsky pushes his fingers through his hair, still feeling restless and trapped. He laughs at the deal presented to him.
“Oh, is this a business transaction now?”
He could argue that whatever he gives Derek is going to cost him more that whatever Derek gives him. But it might work better than a knife or gun or claw because all that would get Derek is a sharp do it. At least this way there a possibility of exchange. All Kavinsky wants is to stop thinking. Stop caring.
Derek wants Kavinsky to think and care. He wants Kavinsky to prove to him, on whatever level, that he's more than the vile, abusive piece of shit Derek sees him as. He wants Kavinsky to be more than just rotten to the core, even though he has no real reason to believe otherwise. Derek doesn't want to fucking kill a teenager.
"Tell me about your friend."
It's an easy start, he thinks. A low all. Derek stands, hands in his pockets, staring at Kavinsky. He's not angry. He's serious, but - relaxed. Tired.
"Doesn't have to be how he died. Just tell me who he was."
Kavinsky starts looking through the minibar and lines up whatever bottles he finds in there along the top of it.
Maybe he should be put down. Gansey thought it. Adam probably thought it. He wants to think that Ronan didn't, but maybe he did, too. Derek certainly seems to.
He regards the bottles like he's trying to decide which to down first.
"My best friend. First person I really talked to after Mom hauled us out to the middle of nowhere fucking Virginia to put me in a prep school."
It had been one of the few lucid decisions she ever made, and she made it after what happened with Kavinsky's father. Maybe the distance had been good, maybe it was fate or some shit that he was brought to a place in the world with another dreamer. He doesn't know. But it's where he found Prokopenko.
Derek doesn't want Kavinsky to drink through this, but he's not going to stop him if he tries. He doesn't hide the disappointment in the way he looks at him from the middle of the room, arms across his chest as he paces, but he keeps his comments to himself. Getting Kavinsky to stay sober is an uphill battle at the best of times.
"Kind of hard imagining you as a follower."
A stalker, maybe, sure, but - doesn't sound like that's what this was.
"Yeah, well. I was." He glances over his shoulder and rolls his eyes when he sees the disappointment on Derek's face. "You want me to do this sober? Fucking sadist."
It's cruel. Most of what he's taken that night is starting to wear off and he hasn't gotten home yet to top off. He doesn't want to keep remembering this. Kavinsky leaves the alcohol where it is - visible, within reach - but doesn't crack open any of the bottles yet. With an annoyed flourish, he tosses his cigarette case onto a table.
"This is probably the only time we're going to talk like this," Derek says, not sure if Kavinsky's making him feel defensive or not. "Doesn't seem like it'll be worth it if you can't keep your thoughts in line."
Derek's not trying to be insulting, or whatever, that's genuinely how he feels - but he's Derek, so maybe it comes off sharper and more insidiously mean than he intended it to. He runs his hand over the side of his neck, sighing softly, and when he pushes a little more, he tries to phrase it in a way that gives Kavinsky an out, if he wants to take it.
"You gonna tell me how he died?"
This isn't supposed to be sadistic, it's just supposed to be - something. Probably hard to defend a yourself asking questions like these when they're asked on the backdrop of i don't want to kill you but i will if you don't give me a reason not to, but whatever.
Kavinsky moves to the window and leans on the frame, staring at the glass like it might be a way out. His heart is beating fast, like it did that night, and the memories flood him in a way they haven't in years. Not outside of dreams.
"Not sure," he admits as he looks down. "Don't know if he OD'd or if something that happened during the fight did it."
He has no idea if he killed Prokopenko or if it was an accident of proportions. Maybe it was both. Almost completely sober, he remembers vividly how Proko looked when he stopped breathing.
Kavinsky's best friend died while he was high, or - because he was in a fight, or something - and Kavinsky still sells drugs? Tate came to Derek with a bloody nose, once, said that Kavinsky gave it to him - it's so, so hard to understand why Kavinsky would keep doing the things that killed someone he clearly cared about.
Derek needs a second - he's pacing a little faster, struggling not to make any shitty accusations, struggling not to trap Kavinsky in a corner without meaning to. He wants to keep a level head, learn what he needs to learn, fucking understand this kid, and this is all just - this is so much.
He stops pacing by the foot of the bed, listens to the drum of Kavinsky's heartbeat from half a room away.Maybe he's misinterpreting - Kavinsky said he saw this guy die, but that doesn't mean he was involved. Maybe he didn't give him the drugs, either, not like that would make Kavinsky's dealing any better. Derek rubs at his temple, just trying to fucking think.
Kavinsky seems impervious to Derek's pacing, still where Derek can't stop moving.
"I kissed him," he says quietly, voice tight as he tries to hold everything in. "I kissed him and he--freaked out. We got into a fight. I thought it was okay, I thought--"
He's never talked about this with anyone. He has never spoken a word of it since he hauled his friend's body out of his house. Part of him is pissed that Derek is the one to hear it now. This asshole that wants him dead, who will never believe his side of any story because he knows better. Who still apparently thinks Tate is completely inculpable. Whatever. If Derek kills him in this fucking hotel room to make himself feel better, fine.
He remembers the half-dazed panic, the struggle between two boys both too high to do anything reasonable. Kavinsky doesn't want to remember any of it. He moves away from the window to grab his cigarette case, though when he opens it he can't decide what exactly he wants. So he just kind of stands there, looking at it, thinking of fucking Prokopenko, who he misses like a limb. Like air.
Derek doesn't have any reason to believe Kavinsky, really, but - well, he was searching for something real, something humanizing, and if this is true, it explains a lot about him. Derek stops pacing and stands very, very still, watching Kavinsky coil up tight from the stress of telling him all this.
Kavinsky made a friend, made a move, got rejected and got the guy killed. It's not hard to connect the dots and see how something like that could transition to the Kavinsky Derek knows now - someone who makes himself useful through party favors and dealing, violent and unhinged and completely lacking control. He thinks of Paige, distantly. Of the trajectory that death sent him on.
"Stop. Breathe."
This isn't ennough to make Derek forgive Kavinsky for the things he's done while he's here, but it helps make him a little more.. something. Real. Derek exhales, dropping to the edge of the bed. A part of him wants to say I'm sorry, or something, but even if he's been willing to listen, willing to try and empathize, verbalizing the start of those feelings is an entirely different matter. This is still Kavinsky. They're not exactly friends.
"That's - christ."
Hard to know what to say, when your conscience is telling you to try to be kind while the rest of you is too wary and burned to try.
Kavinsky leans against the table and tosses his cigarette case down again. He doesn't want anything. He wants everything. And he doesn't know what to do with the way Derek is looking at him right now.
"Yeah, well, while we're rehashing pleasant memories, my dad used to beat the shit out of me and my mom and she spent most of her time kind of off in la la land."
He gestures around his head. Her self-medicating was somewhat legendary. Enough so that Kavinsky didn't know what to do with her once they were away from his father, once she started taking an active interest in him. Too late.
"Anything else you wanna know?"
Kavinsky has no reason to believe that love and affection are things that he can have. And he has no reason to believe that, even if he asked for them, he'd get them. So he doesn't ask for anything. He takes it or he buys it or he finds other ways to make people want him around.
What else could he possibly ask after all that? Derek sets his jaw and says nothing, for a moment, focused on processing Kavinsky's confession and struggling to figure out if he believes him or not, struggling to figure out if he's being manipulated into feeling pity. Even if he did believe him, a bad childhood is no excuse for half the shit he's done - but Derek didn't go into this looking for an excuse. Again, he was just looking for some sign of humanity in Kavinsky. Anything. This is certainly that.
So - he shakes his head. He doesn't look sympathetic, he doesn't look like he bought this, if it's all an act - he just looks the way he usually does. Despondent and bitter and angry. He's so sick of being angry all the time.
"No," Derek mumbles. "Maybe in a little while."
After he's had some time to think. Derek grips the edge of the bed, giving Kavinsky a long, silent stare. He needs to give Kavinsky a break. There's no point in trying to - figure him out, or whatever it is he's doing, if he's just going to get upset. He can't drill into a ticking timebomb.
"Dea's a deal."
He said he'd do something if Kavinsky answered his questions, so - he'll honor that, even if part of that decision is made because he expects Kavinsky's going to be too pissed off to do anything other than order him to leave.
Of all the lies he's told, he's never been obtuse about the nature of his childhood. Even Lynch knew about his father. Well, he knows what Kavinsky did to his father.
"I wonder about my mom, y'know," he says as he pushes away from the furniture he'd been leaning on. He approaches Derek and the bed, trying to decide if he actually wants to fuck anymore. Of course he does - he wants to get as far out of his head as possible. He's trying to figure out if Derek wants to. Despite popular opinion, K likes most of his partners to be into it.
"Why she was so fucked up all the time. Was it him? Was it me?" He shrugs and stops when he's close enough to stand between Derek's thighs.
Of course Derek wants to do this. He won't say it - how the fuck could he, when he won't even admit this to himself? - but nobody makes Derek feel half as complicated as Kavinsky does. He makes him angry, angrier than anyone has in a long, long time, fills him with disgust, floods him with pity and shame and an unparalleled lust for violence and revenge and retribution. He wants Kavinsky to suffer, and after everything he's been through, wanting someone to suffer doesn't come easy to him.
But fuck, the amount of willpower he's had to spend just to stop himsef from stroking his cock in the dead of night while picturing Kavinsky's face. He's rationalized it in his head - he's attracted to the physical outlet he's had with Kavinsky the few times they've fucked, the intense aphrodisiacs, the primal brutality, rather than Kavinsky himself - but that doesn't change the fact that his mouth goes dry when Kavinsky steps closer.
Still, any physical attraction here doesn't change who Kavinsky is, and hearing the casual, barely concealed bitterness in him as he asks was it me doesn't exactly get Derek hard. Just gives him more of that complicated pity, battling it out with his deep distrust for the guy. He darts his tongue between his lips and stares up at Kavinsky, put out by the height disadvantage and staying anchored to the conversation. He feels like Kavinsky's trying to psyche him out, asking about his mom.
"She's dead."
That's all he gets. He's holding eye contact with Kavinsky, concerned more about losing whatever position of power he had in this conversation than he is about what might come next.
Derek pisses him off and turns him on in equal measure, but at least that isn't that weird for Kavinsky. He feels the same about Adam some days. Feels the same about Lynch. Nick. The difference is that Derek is the only one that's actively wanted him dead. The chemistry is insane, though, and Kavinsky's sense of self-preservation is low.
Kind of perfect, really.
His dreams that have Derek in him always feel like the world is catching fire in all the best ways. They're the ones he doesn't want to wake up from.
Derek says that his mother is dead and Kavinsky nods a bit. There's something sympathetic there, but he can't bring himself to utter an apology. He hates that shit. Sorry. What does it change? What does it heal? His fingers brush along Derek's jaw and back into his hair as the man looks up at him.
"Year and a half in July since I saw my mom. Longer since I saw my dad."
He tells himself he doesn't care. He knows what happens to him in the world he left behind, so why should he?
Kavinsky's sympathy makes his skin crawl, but for once, it's not actually his fault. A nod is actually the best thing he could do - the Hale family deaths were somewhat notorious back in Derek's home town, and until he moved away with his sister, the half-hearted sympathy and the witless apologies from neighbours who he never spoke to drove him fucking insane. People showed sympathy for him because it made them feel better to cross that obligation off once they saw him. He always hated that.
Derek seems like he's not receptive to Kavinsky's touch, but he waits until Kavinsky's done running his nails through his hair before he bothers to reach up and grab his wrist. It would be easy to just - yank his arm away, but he doesn't. He keeps it there, still holding eye contact, any anger or disinterest in his expression betrayed by the way he holds Kavinsky's arm just firm enough to avoid hurting him.
"How did..."
How did you leave things with your parents. He - doesn't ask that, even though he's tempted to, because he stalls out, distracted by another thought.
Kavinsky's breath catches when Derek grabs his wrist. His arm tenses for a second as he expects to be yanked or shoved away, but nothing happens. Derek just holds on and Kavinsky slowly relaxes under his touch. The pulse beneath Derek's fingers is steady and it picks up at his touch.
"No one," he answers. "No one else has been into this kinda foreplay."
He plays it off with a joke and a small smirk, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. He doesn't talk about things like this with anyone because no one really wants to hear it. Why would they? They get what they want from him and that's all that really matters. Kavinsky is perfectly happy with that arrangement. Derek's the only person that's really asked about his past and seemed to listen when he talked. He's pretty sure he's told Tate some things, but not much. That was commiserating if it was anything.
It's not shocking to hear that, though again, he doubts if Kavinsky's telling the truth. It's not hard to play up a role - to act isolated when you're not. There has to be someone in Kavinsky's life he's opened up to like this. It's far too fucking sad if there's not.
Derek wets his lips, and there's something softer in him, now. He curls his fingers aroudn Kavinsky's wrist like he's doubling down on keeping him where he is, but it's tender and kind in a way that he doesn't think Kavinsky deserves. He's still learning about this kid. Still learning who he is, when he isn't helping kids OD and setting his life on fire.
What comes next is... thoughtful. Experimental. For once, Derek says what he says next without the intention to hurt or to get into Kavinsky's head. He's curious, and he's cautious, like he's not sure what's going to happen once these two short syllables leave his mouth, but he wants to figure out if this is something good, or if this is something bad. Joseph was bad, but -
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If he doesn't want to talk, he doesn't have to talk. Derek's not going to ask him for details again. At the same time, though, he's not giving him an out - Kate, Julia, Ennis, Peter, Deucalion, Chris, they all fucked him up back home, but they all had their reasons. Things Derek could empathize with, once the dust had settled and he had to rationalise out everything they did. He wants Kavinsky to give him his reasons.
Kavinsky's as bad as the worst of them. Derek wants to know why. Maybe it's the beer, but the way that Derek's looking at Kavinsky now... it's actually pretty sympathetic. For the first time, he's starting to see how predictably quick he is to anger, and Christ, if that isn't relatable.
Derek keeps his mouth shut, but he still isn't leaving. He's just watching Kavinsky, silently yet toothless Lt prompting him to talk.
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"He was my best friend," he says again. "He's dead."
Why the fuck did Derek need to know any of this? Why did it matter? How often has he wanted Prokopenko here since he showed up in this fucking place? Any of his boys, but especially him.
"I saw him die."
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Derek starts walking, heading further into the city as people start to stir awake and cars start to line the street, sporadic and solitary. He knows what it's like to be see someone's death, knows what it's like to be the cause of it, and if Kavinsky turned to drugs after that, let his brain rot, lost his empathy, well - it wouldn't be an excuse, but it would certainly be an explanation.
"What happened, exactly?"
How did he die.
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This isn't fucking worth it. No one's dick game is so good that he wants to rehash this before getting it. He's quiet for almost a block.
"Why should I fucking tell you any of this? You got your answer."
He's capable of guilt, anxiety, regret. He feels all of them, though maybe not when Derek would have wanted him to. He takes his cigarette case out again, fidgets with it as he tries to decide what he wants. Pills. Powder. Something that just dissolves on his tongue. Anything to take him out of this moment since he isn't pinned against a wall somewhere with a cock in his mouth or his ass.
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"I've thought about killing you for a fucking year, now. Figured it would solve a lot of problems if you stayed dead. Put less people at risk, keep them safe. Keep Tate safe. Thought it would be justice for some of the things you've done - things I know about, things I don't."
He pauses, darts his tongue between his lips, lets his thoughts settle before he turns them into words.
"I still feel that way. I don't understand why nobody sees you the way I do."
He stops walking, hand on Kavinsky's arm. They just happen to be at a hotel, now - the same hotel Kavinsky got Derek drunk, so fucking long ago. They could go inside. Get a room. Talk this out there. Do more. Or they could leave - Kavinsky could stay angry, Derek could choose the integrity of his questions over the urge to hatefuck Kavinsky into the wall the way they both want him to. He stands in front of the building, staring at Kavinsky.
"But I'm not who I was a year ago. That kind of hate isn't sustainable for me anymore. After the blizzard, I just decided - something needs to be done. I either need to learn about you, figure you out, or I need to put you in the ground. It can't keep going like this."
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Kavinsky stops when Derek does, vaguely aware that they're outside a hotel. The hotel. Derek's been thinking about killing him for a year and Kavinsky almost says, do it. What the fuck is stopping him from trying? Why is he still fucking alive?
He looks at the hotel, mind working as Derek keeps talking.
"Come on."
K moves toward the building, using Derek's grip on his arm to tug him along. They might as well get a fucking room if Derek wants to interrogate him. Kavinsky pays for it because he's the Dom and he kind of has to. He assumes Derek's contracted if he's spending so much time in the Up. He decides not to think of the shortlist of who he could be contracted to.
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He gets led inside, pressing his lips together and saying nothing when Kavinsky pays for the room, the status that was stripped from him still infuriating to think about, even now. Derek doesn't resist when Kavinsky guides him to the room upstairs, saying nothing on the elevator ride, doing nothing to address the fucking stares he gets from Doms these days. They get into the room, calm and quiet and tidy, and Derek's the one who shuts the door behind them, heading inside.
There's a bad. Olive-green sheets, kind of tacky. Derek wets his lips and looks at Kavinsky, just - deciding, still. Thinking.
"Let's make a deal. I know you work on deals."
Information in exchange for action. It's a dangerous position to put himself into, but christ, he doesn't know how else to talk to Kavinsky. Doesn't know how to make this happen without one of them pulling a knife or a gun or a claw on the other.
"You give me something I want - and I give you something you want. If you don't want to answer, or if I don't want to do something, then... fine. Neither of us have to do it."
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When they get up to the room, Kavinsky pushes his fingers through his hair, still feeling restless and trapped. He laughs at the deal presented to him.
“Oh, is this a business transaction now?”
He could argue that whatever he gives Derek is going to cost him more that whatever Derek gives him. But it might work better than a knife or gun or claw because all that would get Derek is a sharp do it. At least this way there a possibility of exchange. All Kavinsky wants is to stop thinking. Stop caring.
“Fuck you. Fine, what do you want?”
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"Tell me about your friend."
It's an easy start, he thinks. A low all. Derek stands, hands in his pockets, staring at Kavinsky. He's not angry. He's serious, but - relaxed. Tired.
"Doesn't have to be how he died. Just tell me who he was."
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Maybe he should be put down. Gansey thought it. Adam probably thought it. He wants to think that Ronan didn't, but maybe he did, too. Derek certainly seems to.
He regards the bottles like he's trying to decide which to down first.
"My best friend. First person I really talked to after Mom hauled us out to the middle of nowhere fucking Virginia to put me in a prep school."
It had been one of the few lucid decisions she ever made, and she made it after what happened with Kavinsky's father. Maybe the distance had been good, maybe it was fate or some shit that he was brought to a place in the world with another dreamer. He doesn't know. But it's where he found Prokopenko.
"I followed him everywhere."
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"Kind of hard imagining you as a follower."
A stalker, maybe, sure, but - doesn't sound like that's what this was.
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It's cruel. Most of what he's taken that night is starting to wear off and he hasn't gotten home yet to top off. He doesn't want to keep remembering this. Kavinsky leaves the alcohol where it is - visible, within reach - but doesn't crack open any of the bottles yet. With an annoyed flourish, he tosses his cigarette case onto a table.
"Right up until he died."
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Derek's not trying to be insulting, or whatever, that's genuinely how he feels - but he's Derek, so maybe it comes off sharper and more insidiously mean than he intended it to. He runs his hand over the side of his neck, sighing softly, and when he pushes a little more, he tries to phrase it in a way that gives Kavinsky an out, if he wants to take it.
"You gonna tell me how he died?"
This isn't supposed to be sadistic, it's just supposed to be - something. Probably hard to defend a yourself asking questions like these when they're asked on the backdrop of i don't want to kill you but i will if you don't give me a reason not to, but whatever.
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"Not sure," he admits as he looks down. "Don't know if he OD'd or if something that happened during the fight did it."
He has no idea if he killed Prokopenko or if it was an accident of proportions. Maybe it was both. Almost completely sober, he remembers vividly how Proko looked when he stopped breathing.
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"You..."
Kavinsky's best friend died while he was high, or - because he was in a fight, or something - and Kavinsky still sells drugs? Tate came to Derek with a bloody nose, once, said that Kavinsky gave it to him - it's so, so hard to understand why Kavinsky would keep doing the things that killed someone he clearly cared about.
Derek needs a second - he's pacing a little faster, struggling not to make any shitty accusations, struggling not to trap Kavinsky in a corner without meaning to. He wants to keep a level head, learn what he needs to learn, fucking understand this kid, and this is all just - this is so much.
He stops pacing by the foot of the bed, listens to the drum of Kavinsky's heartbeat from half a room away.Maybe he's misinterpreting - Kavinsky said he saw this guy die, but that doesn't mean he was involved. Maybe he didn't give him the drugs, either, not like that would make Kavinsky's dealing any better. Derek rubs at his temple, just trying to fucking think.
"Who was he fighting? You?"
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"I kissed him," he says quietly, voice tight as he tries to hold everything in. "I kissed him and he--freaked out. We got into a fight. I thought it was okay, I thought--"
He's never talked about this with anyone. He has never spoken a word of it since he hauled his friend's body out of his house. Part of him is pissed that Derek is the one to hear it now. This asshole that wants him dead, who will never believe his side of any story because he knows better. Who still apparently thinks Tate is completely inculpable. Whatever. If Derek kills him in this fucking hotel room to make himself feel better, fine.
He remembers the half-dazed panic, the struggle between two boys both too high to do anything reasonable. Kavinsky doesn't want to remember any of it. He moves away from the window to grab his cigarette case, though when he opens it he can't decide what exactly he wants. So he just kind of stands there, looking at it, thinking of fucking Prokopenko, who he misses like a limb. Like air.
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Kavinsky made a friend, made a move, got rejected and got the guy killed. It's not hard to connect the dots and see how something like that could transition to the Kavinsky Derek knows now - someone who makes himself useful through party favors and dealing, violent and unhinged and completely lacking control. He thinks of Paige, distantly. Of the trajectory that death sent him on.
"Stop. Breathe."
This isn't ennough to make Derek forgive Kavinsky for the things he's done while he's here, but it helps make him a little more.. something. Real. Derek exhales, dropping to the edge of the bed. A part of him wants to say I'm sorry, or something, but even if he's been willing to listen, willing to try and empathize, verbalizing the start of those feelings is an entirely different matter. This is still Kavinsky. They're not exactly friends.
"That's - christ."
Hard to know what to say, when your conscience is telling you to try to be kind while the rest of you is too wary and burned to try.
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"Yeah, well, while we're rehashing pleasant memories, my dad used to beat the shit out of me and my mom and she spent most of her time kind of off in la la land."
He gestures around his head. Her self-medicating was somewhat legendary. Enough so that Kavinsky didn't know what to do with her once they were away from his father, once she started taking an active interest in him. Too late.
"Anything else you wanna know?"
Kavinsky has no reason to believe that love and affection are things that he can have. And he has no reason to believe that, even if he asked for them, he'd get them. So he doesn't ask for anything. He takes it or he buys it or he finds other ways to make people want him around.
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So - he shakes his head. He doesn't look sympathetic, he doesn't look like he bought this, if it's all an act - he just looks the way he usually does. Despondent and bitter and angry. He's so sick of being angry all the time.
"No," Derek mumbles. "Maybe in a little while."
After he's had some time to think. Derek grips the edge of the bed, giving Kavinsky a long, silent stare. He needs to give Kavinsky a break. There's no point in trying to - figure him out, or whatever it is he's doing, if he's just going to get upset. He can't drill into a ticking timebomb.
"Dea's a deal."
He said he'd do something if Kavinsky answered his questions, so - he'll honor that, even if part of that decision is made because he expects Kavinsky's going to be too pissed off to do anything other than order him to leave.
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"I wonder about my mom, y'know," he says as he pushes away from the furniture he'd been leaning on. He approaches Derek and the bed, trying to decide if he actually wants to fuck anymore. Of course he does - he wants to get as far out of his head as possible. He's trying to figure out if Derek wants to. Despite popular opinion, K likes most of his partners to be into it.
"Why she was so fucked up all the time. Was it him? Was it me?" He shrugs and stops when he's close enough to stand between Derek's thighs.
"You close with yours?"
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But fuck, the amount of willpower he's had to spend just to stop himsef from stroking his cock in the dead of night while picturing Kavinsky's face. He's rationalized it in his head - he's attracted to the physical outlet he's had with Kavinsky the few times they've fucked, the intense aphrodisiacs, the primal brutality, rather than Kavinsky himself - but that doesn't change the fact that his mouth goes dry when Kavinsky steps closer.
Still, any physical attraction here doesn't change who Kavinsky is, and hearing the casual, barely concealed bitterness in him as he asks was it me doesn't exactly get Derek hard. Just gives him more of that complicated pity, battling it out with his deep distrust for the guy. He darts his tongue between his lips and stares up at Kavinsky, put out by the height disadvantage and staying anchored to the conversation. He feels like Kavinsky's trying to psyche him out, asking about his mom.
"She's dead."
That's all he gets. He's holding eye contact with Kavinsky, concerned more about losing whatever position of power he had in this conversation than he is about what might come next.
"When was the last time you saw your family?"
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Kind of perfect, really.
His dreams that have Derek in him always feel like the world is catching fire in all the best ways. They're the ones he doesn't want to wake up from.
Derek says that his mother is dead and Kavinsky nods a bit. There's something sympathetic there, but he can't bring himself to utter an apology. He hates that shit. Sorry. What does it change? What does it heal? His fingers brush along Derek's jaw and back into his hair as the man looks up at him.
"Year and a half in July since I saw my mom. Longer since I saw my dad."
He tells himself he doesn't care. He knows what happens to him in the world he left behind, so why should he?
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Derek seems like he's not receptive to Kavinsky's touch, but he waits until Kavinsky's done running his nails through his hair before he bothers to reach up and grab his wrist. It would be easy to just - yank his arm away, but he doesn't. He keeps it there, still holding eye contact, any anger or disinterest in his expression betrayed by the way he holds Kavinsky's arm just firm enough to avoid hurting him.
"How did..."
How did you leave things with your parents. He - doesn't ask that, even though he's tempted to, because he stalls out, distracted by another thought.
"Who else have you talked to about all this?"
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"No one," he answers. "No one else has been into this kinda foreplay."
He plays it off with a joke and a small smirk, but it doesn't quite reach his eyes. He doesn't talk about things like this with anyone because no one really wants to hear it. Why would they? They get what they want from him and that's all that really matters. Kavinsky is perfectly happy with that arrangement. Derek's the only person that's really asked about his past and seemed to listen when he talked. He's pretty sure he's told Tate some things, but not much. That was commiserating if it was anything.
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Derek wets his lips, and there's something softer in him, now. He curls his fingers aroudn Kavinsky's wrist like he's doubling down on keeping him where he is, but it's tender and kind in a way that he doesn't think Kavinsky deserves. He's still learning about this kid. Still learning who he is, when he isn't helping kids OD and setting his life on fire.
What comes next is... thoughtful. Experimental. For once, Derek says what he says next without the intention to hurt or to get into Kavinsky's head. He's curious, and he's cautious, like he's not sure what's going to happen once these two short syllables leave his mouth, but he wants to figure out if this is something good, or if this is something bad. Joseph was bad, but -
"Joey."
- he can never quite tell with Joey.
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