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You’re walking back to your place when you see him, contorted into an ill-fitting cardboard box in the alleyway. Your first instinct is to hold your bag a little tighter, drift to the other side of the street. It’s gray and rainy and you don’t want to deal with any hobos pan-handling right about now, because you always feel bad and your wallet is always empty.

But this guy...he doesn’t even approach you. In fact, it’s the opposite: when he sees you, he clutches his arms around his knees tighter, making himself even smaller. His eyes stare down, at a piece of trash by the box. And as you turn to look, feeling guilty and wondering if you should give him a dollar anyway, you notice the horns--sets of two, pointed and dulled.

A troll? Here, in the city? You’ve never seen one this big before in the flesh; the only ones they sell are the cute baby ones with button eyes and twitchy ears in the windows of pet stores. You’ve seen them online though--those fangs and tails definitely aren’t as cute when they hit their growth spurt and shoot up in height. You’ve heard they can get up to as tall as seven feet. This one is stick-skinny and clad in a giant black shirt approximately the size of a tent, messy, sodden black hair going every which way.

You want to say something, but when he looks up timidly at you, his sunken yellow eyes coupled with the standard gray troll skin almost give you a heart attack. He notices you flinch, because he grimaces and buries his head in his arms again.

Aren’t trolls...really vicious? You feel like you should be scared, but all you feel is pity. They’re supposed to be really human, especially when they’re older. Everyone treats them like they’re monsters, but this one doesn’t seem to be cruel, just scared.

“H-hey,” you say softly. “Is everything okay?”

His head bolts upright, and stares at you wildly with his strange mustard gaze. He’s trembling, either from the cold or fear.

“Don’t...don’t hurt me,” he squeaks. Then he coughs, a congested sound that makes you wince.

Your heart squeezes like a dishrag. “I won’t hurt you,” you say carefully. “Do you need some money or food?”

He continues to stare at you, water dripping down his face. “W-what?”

“You look like you need care or something,” you reply hesitantly. That cough sounded nasty. What to do with a humanoid troll, though? Will he claw you if you try to help him, get him some food? Aside from the grayscale skin and horns, he seems so...human. “What happened to you? Do you have an owner?”

“I was...abandoned several days ago,” he mumbles, not looking at your face. “Nobody wanted me because I got too big.” He spits a little when he talks, and he has the kind of lisp that makes you cringe in almost-pain.

Okay, you can not leave this guy alone here.

“Hey,” you say quietly. “Come with me, okay? I’ll get you some food. You can stay with me.” This is probably a terrible idea, but somehow the idea of bringing a troll into your apartment is much less dangerous than, say, picking a hobo off the street. Mainly because his pleading eyes and twitching ears are burned into your mind.

The troll’s eyes widen, and he blinks up at you. “R….really?”

“Yeah,” you say, holding out a hand. He flinches as you reach out, like he’s afraid you’re going to hit him, but then he very hesitantly takes your hand in his and allows you to pull him to his feet. Then he practically falls, and you have to catch him. He’s tall, at least a foot taller than you, and he trembles violently as he leans on you, limping.

You attract more than a few stares as you, quite slowly now, trudge through the soaking streets. You glare at them. Any of them could have abandoned this troll to die in the rain.

Eventually, you get back to your apartment. When you unlock the door and usher the troll inside, he collapses, and you heave him up onto the couch. He’s still trembling.

You are so not qualified to deal with this kind of thing. What to do with a troll? Have you just adopted a kid or a tenent?

You realize you should get his sopping clothes off him, which bothers you for only a moment. He’s an alien, and he’ll only get worse unless you get over yourself.

You ease the wet shirt off his body and find him to be...well, pretty similar to a human male, except his ribs are almost showing. The threadbare pants are far more awkward, but you quickly get a towel and dry him off, and get him a really big pair of sweat pants. Then you bundle him in three blankets.

“I’m Sollux,” he tells you as you rush over to get him a glass of water. The way he says it makes it sound really important.

“I’m (y/n),” you reply absentmindedly, feeling his forehead. “Okay, just stay on the couch, alright? Do you want more blankets?”

Sollux turns a deeper shade of yellow, and hunches his shoulders, clutching his pillow like a child. For a moment, he’s silent, and then he blurts out, “Can I sleep with you?”

Your face is on fire before you realize he most likely doesn’t understand what he’s implying. Still, you splutter a bit before managing, “Uh...that’s…my bed...won’t fit two people?”

The troll looks slightly hurt, his tail slumping, and you decide he didn’t understand at all what that phrase connotated. Besides, he’s so strange, and so timid, and so decidedly inhuman that you know he’s only looking for affection. That, more than anything, makes you swallow and say, “Fine, come on.”

Sollux’s ears perk up, his blush deepening but his mouth curling into a tiny smile. He has to duck through your doorframe into your cluttered room, where you make a halfassed attempt to make the bed before awkwardly slipping under the covers. Sollux picks his way across the room, and you slide all the way to the wall to fit him on the twin bed.

As it turns out, sideways isn’t a problem. Sollux’s feet stick out the bottom of the bed, and he has to curl tightly to fit. With your back to him, you keep trying to breathe as he snuggles closer to you, burying his face in your neck and making a noise that sounds and feels suspiciously like purring. He wraps his arms around you tightly, and it takes you a moment to realize that it feels so incredibly good to have someone hold you like--well, like they care.

“I love you,” he whisper-purrs into your neck, and your heart near jumps out of your chest.

“W-what?” you stammer, suddenly extremely warm.

“(y/n),” he says, sounding quizzical. “You’ve been so kind to me. That is what...that is what humans say to each other, right?”

You consider telling him that, like his earlier request, the connotation goes far beyond the basic meaning of the words. That no one has told you they loved you since your parents before you left home--and outside of family, no one that you can remember. High school dating for you was brief and pointless, and although you’ve met many a cute boy, your relationship status never seemed to become anything other than “single.” And now a troll is acting completely infatuated with you, like a child. It would be stupid to take him seriously, as precious as Sollux is. He probably hasn’t ever had anyone show him real kindness before.

But you’ll be damned if you aren’t going to play along.

“Yeah,” you murmur, nestling closer to the troll. “Yeah, I love you too, Sol.”