bryanzilla | age switch [early May]

age switch [early May]

Bryan hadn't gotten very far after successfully fleeing to what he assumed had to be safety earlier that morning. He made it a few blocks before he was sure he wasn't being followed, asked an elderly man out walking his dog where he was and how far out that was from where he wanted to be. Like all the answers David had given him, none of his answers made sense and all they did was invite more and more questions.

After that unhelpful interaction, Bryan decided to do what he should have done the second David left him alone in that bedroom the first time and call the authorities. When he'd gone to do just that, though, he noticed that the phone he'd grabbed off the nightstand wasn't his. In fact, it wasn't like any he'd seen before. It took him a while to even get into it, the first thing to greet him once he figured it out being an image of David, that baby and himself in front of a house. The house he came from, maybe. Bryan hadn't exactly stuck around the outside long enough to be able to tell for sure.

He forgot about the phone call, instead helping himself to some random homeowner's bench swing outside their house as he navigated the phone, learning as he went. Call history, text threads, video clips, photo after photo after photo. The phone's memory was jam packed with nothing but him and David and a baby, and yet none of it was ringing any bells in his own memory.

His chest tightened with every swipe, every message he read or video he watched, the growing anxiety nearly suffocating.

Bryan's not sure how long he sat there, how many times he viewed the same images over and over again, waiting for something to click. It never happened, though, and the only reason he stopped is because his phone had stopped working.

Something's wrong. With him, maybe with everything. He wants to cry and he wants to go home. When he knocks on the front door, he's not sure that he wants to go back inside, but he doesn't know what else to do or who else can explain what's happening.

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"Not yet," Bryan mutters once David is out of sight. Instead of sitting, he walks over and stands a short distance away from the baby as he clumsily maneuvers his way around the box. After watching his struggles for a moment, he helps, picking the him up and placing him inside. Once inside, the boy smiles, his way of saying thank you, Bryan assumes. "You're very cute," he says begrudgingly. None of this is his fault, but he can't help it. "And you have great skin."

David waits outside the room when he returns, watching to see if Sawyer brings back any memories for Bryan. His stomach twists when it is blatantly obvious that the connection between them has entirely vanished.

He clears his throat to make himself known, walking in with a charger in one hand and a medical torch in the other.

"I'll give you this if you let me check you over," he offers, trying to keep the tone of his voice on an even, detached keel. If he freaks out, Bryan will and then the dogs will and Sawyer too, like a domino effect. "I need to make sure you've not suffered a trauma to your head."

Bryan blinks, looking back and forth between the charger and the light before looking at David. "If I have suffered trauma to my head there's only so many people to blame under this roof," he says, snatching the cord and searching the perimeter of the room of an outlet.

Pushing a box of books out of the way, he finds a place to plug in, immediately doing so and taking a seat on the floor, his back against the wall.

Bowing his head, David presses thumb and forefinger against his eyes, losing the battle with his headache for a moment. His wedding vows, despite never having gotten to say any, mean something to him. Marriage is a promise to stick together through the good times and the bad.

He's not sure much much worse it can get than Bryan not only forgetting the whole of their relationship but also thinking David is capable of harming him. It feels like rock bottom.

"Bry." Rather than tower over him, which would add to the menacing image he's apparently portraying, David crouches in front of him. "What year is it? How old are you?"

"2006," he says, eyes on the screen until it comes back to life and he breathes a sigh of relief. Brow furrowed, he turns his gaze back to David while the phone loads. "I already told you how old I am. And, yes, I lied at first, but I told you that, too. Nobody in LA is as old as they say they are the first time. Twenty-six. I am twenty-six, okay?"

It feels to David like his brain starts working in slow motion. Bryan might not look too different but when you go to sleep and wake up next to the same person, day in, day out, even the smallest of changes is noticeable. David's not ready to admit it though.

"Um..." He desperately tries to regain his train of thought. "Traumas can be, be internal with no obvious external injury. Blood clots on the brain can sometimes cause um, problems with memory. Can I please just," he lifts the torch, "I won't touch you, I promise. I just need to check that you're okay."

He feels fine. He'd know if there was something physically wrong with him and so would anyone within earshot since he'd complain about it endlessly. Bryan is not the type to suffer in silence.

"Okay," he says, because he did come back for answers, after all. Crossing his legs, Bryan lowers the phone for the moment. He's not sure what a vagina doctor is going to tell him about the state of his brain, but what choice does he have? "What do you remember about last night?"

"Okay," David echoes, visibly relieved. One step at a time. "Just look at me. Look between my eyes." He clicks the torch on and holds it in front of Bryan's head, flicking the light into his eyes and away again a few times each side, testing his pupils' reactions. "Yesterday I moved into this house with my son and my husband," he answers distractedly. His thirty five year old husband. "We unpacked the essentials, ate take out and fell asleep before we could try out the tub."

"...is he out back, buried underneath a birdbath now?" Bryan asks, looking straight ahead. And he doesn't mean to sound so hopeful about it this time around, but he can't help it. At this point, David being a murderer is just the scenario that would make the most logical sense to him. It makes him feel a bit better if the potential issue is with David, not himself. Even if that means he's currently getting a physical from a killer.

David drops his arm, stopping his checks, and looks Bryan dead in the eyes.

"He's you. You're my husband. Or you were..." He swallows and shakes his head. "Or you will be."

Bryan's grip tightens around the phone, fingers brushing over the ring still on his finger. He doesn't know what to do with the information and it shows plainly on his face.

"I don't-- That doesn't make any sense." Except, in a lot of ways, it does. The ring, the pictures, the house. It all fits, even if he feels like he doesn't. It makes sense... if this were a rom-com starring Jennifer Garner and Mark Ruffalo, but this is his life.

David doesn't need to finish the check up, he decides, turning the torch off. This is far bigger than a bump on the head, no matter how much he tries to deny it.

"Tell me about it." They have reached new, terrifying levels insanity in this city. "When I fell asleep last night, you were thirty five years old, same as me. Now you're not. Now you're...you."

"Oh my God. That sounds like a nightmare," Bryan says, wide-eyed, nose scrunched in disgust. "Being thirty-five, I mean." He can't really speak on what married life is like since he has no experience with it. That he remembers.

"How? Why? This is... insane. This stuff doesn't just happen. Not outside of movies or television."

Starting to lose the feelings in his legs, David cast a glance over his shoulder to check on Sawyer, then sits down in front of Bryan in a mirror image position.

"Well..." He's not entirely convinced that this kind of thing 'doesn't just happen'. Not in Darrow anyway. "Complete honesty? If you'd said that to me a year ago, I'd have agreed with you. But strange things happen in this city that you will never, ever wrap your head around. This could be like that."

"Darrow." That's where he is. It's the only useful thing he'd gotten out of his conversation with that elderly man.

Bryan goes back to studying the pictures again, willing them to fix what's wrong or spark a memory. Anything, good or bad. He stops on one and enlarges it, turning the screen to David. There's nothing special about it over any of the others. It's just one of dozens, them and the baby, happy. The stuff of nightmares for every One Million Mom, he's sure.

"So, we're married..." With a son. He looks exactly like David, so there's one question he doesn't have to ask. "I guess I'm sorry I thought you were a kidnapping murderer."

David's not actually sure if they are married, given that the Bryan in front of him is clearly not the same one he exchanged rings with, but he locks that conundrum away to deal with later.

"That's okay. I was a little more offended by the comment about being thirty-five," he insists in good humor, trying to calm the situation, even if inside he feels anything but. "I know you joke about not intending to age but don't you think you've taken it a tad too far?"

"If any of this was my doing I would have gone younger than twenty-six." Twenty-six is practically thirty and that's just depressing.

He takes a moment to study the man in front of him instead of the one in the pictures, looking for subtle differences brought on by time. The glasses are gone, so he's either blind right no or he's wearing contacts. His smile lines are deeper, which might be a horrible thing by LA standards, but in this case, Bryan has a differing opinion. Over all, he looks exactly like his David, just more mature and refined and somehow even more handsome, if that's possible. "You got rid of the Jewfro."

"Then you wouldn't have known me at all," David points out. Darrow has been cruel but at least it has allowed them that.

Harvey pads past behind David, meandering his way over to Sawyer and nosing in the box, looking for attention.

"I did. But only after your hair dropped a story or two. How long ago did we meet?" he asks, trying to work back from the Hollywood party Bryan mentioned before.

Bryan cracks a small smile, lifting a hand to his hair and finger-combing it back. It's definitely lacking its usual height, but be did run out of the house not long after rolling out of bed.

"Just over three weeks..." Three great, relatively normal weeks. And here he'd been under the impression that his ex cheating on him with a woman was the strangest thing he'd ever have to deal with in a relationship. "How long have we been married?"

"Three hundred and sixty one days," David answers with little need for math. Time is complicated in Darrow, so they had already acknowledged the date back in April, but David had been clear about wanting to recognise the actual whole year anniversary in May. He hadn't wanted to be robbed of any time with Bryan, a desire that is heavy with irony now.

"Sawyer gatecrashed our first wedding but we got there in the end." He starts shaking his head and wrings his clasped fingers in his lap. It's hard not to take Bryan's hand but he had promised not to touch him. "Oh my God, you barely know me."

"Yeah, and you know me way too well. Assuming it's not a sexless marriage," Bryan counters, drawing his knees up and hugging them. David's not allowed to freak out on him.

"I know you said you'd never get married until everyone in the country had the right to. So either America pulled its head out of its own ass and changed its hive mind or you did."

Bryan's body language shouldn't be as shocking as it is, given the circumstances. David finds it difficult to deal with though, especially when feeling self-conscious around Bryan is a foreign concept. He mutters an apology and drags himself back a bit to give Bryan some space.

"Bit of both." He places his hands deliberately where Bryan can see them, changing his mind a few times before he ends up gripping his knees. "California changed its laws and building a family with you changed my mind."

Taking in a deep breath, Bryan releases it in a frustrated rush of air. He wants a do over of today, to go back to sleep and wake up where he's supposed to be. Or when he's supposed to be.

"So what do we do?" He asks, drawing a blank there, too. Is there anything they can do, or is he just stuck like this? Waiting for David's reply, something behind him catches his attention. Pushing to his feet and leaving the phone to continue charging, Bryan walks over to the mantel above the fireplace and the row of pictures sitting on it. They aren't images he'd seen on his phone, and none of the other people in them are in those other pictures, either. There is one face he recognizes mixed in with the others, though.

"My mother." Holding a baby. After Sawyer was born, it has to be. "...this is real," Bryan says, as if it's just now dawning on him. In a way, it is.

David sits in silence, unable to answer Bryan's question. Surely what they do depends on how long this is going to last. It's too early to let himself even consider the possibility that it's a permanent change, so as soon as the beginning of the thought enters his head, David pushes it away.

He seizes the photo as an opportunity to distract himself and pushes to his feet. "And my mom," he points at a different frame when he reaches Bryan's side, "and...I don't have one of my dad but this woman here, that's Goldie. She was our surrogate and very close friend. And the little girl next to her is her daughter, Shania."

"I'm pretty sure I had a Cabbage Patch Kid that looked exactly like her," Bryan says, looking at the little girl in coke bottle glasses. "Not... recently," he insists, awkwardly clearing his throat.

"Your mom looks nice," he continues. There was one positive thing about this whole ordeal. He doesn't have to worry about either of the awkward meeting the parents dinners if they already happened. "And them?" There's a picture of a tall, glamazon of an African American woman and an adorable baby covered in Post-it notes. Fashionable and functional.

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