𝑅𝐸𝑄𝑈𝐼𝐸𝑀 - M.R.

[RETURN]

Mitch debates knocking on his dad's door for approximately thirty seconds before he decides on setting up shop in the only motel in Beacon Hills. His brain is running on fumes and a family reunion sounds like just about the worst thing right now.

It's a rundown, shady looking building, the kind with tacky neon signs where only half the letters light up. The kind with white curtains stained yellow from what Mitch will choose to believe is sun-bleaching. If he had a black light, he's sure he'd find a few too many suspicious stains on the bedsheets.

He gets a room with the numbers scratched out on the door and a tiny TV inside that only plays static. The key reads Room No. 251 despite the fact he's almost certain there are no more than 100 rooms in the whole place, the bed creaks at the weight of his gaze. The carpet looks straight from an 80's catalogue and the doesn't want to think about how many diseases are laying between the twisted cotton as the sole of his shoes stick to it with every step.

The room smells stagnant and he finds a half-used can of fresh linen air freshener in the little bathroom, the one with the continuously dripping tap and the limescale covered shower. He uses it all.

He scrunches up his nose at himself in the scratched up mirror, there's not a chance in hell this place passes any sanitation inspections and he's genuinely worried that washing here will make him dirtier. 

He'll go to Stilinski's tomorrow, he tells himself, fatigue overpowering his fear of catching something deadly if he lays under those sheets. He'll ask for his old room back and hope his dad doesn't punch him in the nose and slam the door in his face. He deserves worse.

For now, he sighs as he tries to make himself comfortable on the creaky mattress, pulling out his phone to alert Kennedy that he's arrived.

He gets a text ten minutes later from Stan, it's a simple message, one he's heard time and time before, 'don't let it get personal, kid'.

He resists the urge to argue that he's not been a kid for a long time and places his phone face down on the bedside chest, rolling onto his side and shutting his eyes.

For the first time in forever, he dreams of something other than Katrina.

He dreams of burnt down houses and treacherous lacrosse games, of great big tree stumps and bright red eyes. He dreams of fireflies and full moons and all the reasons he left and when he wakes up in the morning he picks up his phone.

For the first time since he got hired by the CIA, he almost quits a job before it's even begun.

Instead, he dubiously takes a shower, debates shaving the scruff around his jaw that's slowly growing into a beard but he doesn't. The less he looks like the scrawny teenage boy this town remembers, the better. Hopefully, it'll be easier that way for them to accept that he's gone.

Damp hair clings to the side of his face as he stares at himself in the mirror, faces down with the man he's become. There's no buzzcut or ridiculous spikes, no puffy cheeks or big round Bambi eyes. He looks like he's been through hell and he knows it, the dark circles under his eyes from a forty-hour drive still prominent even after a good nights sleep.

His chest is littered with scars, a prominent deep gash on the junction of his right shoulder that looks barely scabbed over, angry and red from a knife he didn't see coming, he traces it with his fingers.

He should've seen it coming.

He squints his eyes like he's searching for something before biting down on the inside of his cheek and shaking his head, clearly not pleased with whatever it is he finds.

With a sigh he rubs down his face with one hand, strolling back into the main room to get dressed and boot up his laptop where it sits on the wonky wooden table in the corner of the room by the door, Kennedy will want to check-in, even if he hasn't gotten the chance to even get started yet.