Work Text:
My God, you're idiots. The pair of you. One perfectly well-placed shoe and you, Angry, you don't even have the decency to trip and let your father catch you. Idiot.
"Who put this here? Max, have you been playing with these?"
Max watches Angry Human toss the shoe back with the others, and puts his head on his paws. I'm so very wasted here. Why don't you just tell him how you feel, Angry Human?
"Don't bitch at the dog. It's your mess. Here, Maxie."
Ears pricking, Max waddles -shut up, I'm just big boned - over to Sad Human, pressing his nose into the offered hand, along with half a gallon of drool. He woofs happily, wonders if telling Sad how much he loves him might make Angry jealous enough to make a move and stop being such a stupid sod.
He'd even tried, once, dumping Angry's alphabet-shaped cereal on the floor to spell out a message for Sad, until he realized he was a dog and couldn't bloody spell.
"Traitor," says Angry. "I'm going for dinner. You coming?"
"I'll be there."
Angry looks at Max, raising a brow, but Max stays where he is.
"Fine, I'll see you both there, I guess."
Yes, that's right. Trot along. I've got important things to do, here.
As soon as Angry's gone, Max gets up and wanders over to his bunk.
"Max, not on the bed."
As if I could get up there without any help. Big bones, remember? He has other methods, though. Grabs the edge of Angry's blanket in his mouth and tugs, growling and hehehe this is fun shaking it back and forth until it dislodges from where it's tucked in and he can drag it off the bed.
"For chrissake, Max, what are you doing, boy?"
I've had enough of your nonsense! Look, this is me taking matters into my own hands. Paws. My own paws. Look!
And Sad does, when something flutters free of the blanket and drops to the floor. Max sits, watching Sad pick it up and turn it over.
"Where the heck did he get this?"
Max isn't exactly sure what it is, but he knows that Angry looks through it every night before he shoves Max off the bed and then there's only the whispering of sheets and a smell Max knows means that Angry is actually happy for once - even if it only lasts a few seconds - and a murmur of a name that Max knows belongs to Sad.
Something else falls free of the pages that Sad's holding, and he bends again, though doesn't even make it as far as picking the photo up because he's grabbing at the edge of the bunk and falling onto it, stunned.
Yes, it is rather a good picture of you, isn't it? Do you get it now? God, I hope you do, because I really don't know how else I'm supposed to tell you. It's not like I can bash your heads together, is it?
"Oh, Chuck. You bloody idiot."
Max whines, and Sad puts a hand absently on his head, scratches his ears and what was I trying to tell you oh my word that's nice keep doing it forever if I was a cat I'd be purring right now but thank heavens I'm not oh this is glorious.
+
He isn't sure what they spend hours talking about that night, when Angry comes back from dinner. He smells the fear at first, until Sad puts his arms around Angry, tells him it's okay. Somehow, they'll make it okay, they'll make it work. Max dozes off for a while, but when he wakes up he notices that Angry's bunk is empty, and the two of them are crowded onto Sad's, curled into one another, bare flesh showing above the sheets. A hand hanging down that's ripe for licking.
This, Max decides, is exactly how things should be.