“You know that doesn’t make any sense, right?” He tossed the gauze into the trash can and laid a couple band aids across Thomas’s knuckles. The scrapes weren’t deep, more like road rash, but he was sure they ached. “How did you hurt your hand? Did you punch the wall because you couldn’t put Cody into it?”
Thomas’s head hung low and, with his good hand, he rubbed at the bridge of his nose. “I grabbed him outside, I was so mad. I shouldn’t have done it, but the look on your face when you saw him…when you realized…”
“Thomas.”
“WhenIrealized.” Thomas looked up, eyes red. “When I realized my son was your ex. That my son was the one who’d done that shit to you. That he was the one who’d made you doubt your worth.”
Ben fell onto his ass, back against the wall. He mirrored Thomas’s posture, with his forearms on his knees. Dinner had taken a turn for the worst and he was starving, but nauseous at the idea of eating all at the same time. His stomach grumbled, and he wasn’t sure if he was from hunger or the need to throw up.
“What else happened?” he asked.
“I grabbed him, but then I realized…” Thomas shook his head and stared at the floor. “I let him go and he shoved me, saying it wasn’t his fault, spewing some nonsense about Trent and about you. Blaming it on me and his mother. My shirt tore…”
Thomas trailed off, flicking at the ruined placket of his shirt. Ben didn’t know what to do—or what to say—so he raised back onto his knees, reaching for Thomas and working to undo the remaining buttons on his shirt and helping him shrug out of it.
“Come on,” he said, pulling Thomas off the toilet.
He led him into the bedroom and pulled an old band t-shirt out of his dresser for Thomas to put on. The shirt was too long and a little too tight around the shoulders, but Thomas filled it out in a way that had Ben’s chest expanding in uncomfortable ways. It was the first, and likely the last, time he’d ever see Thomas in his clothes and a small part of him couldn’t help but mourn that.
“Then what?” he asked, sitting on the edge of his bed.
“Then Kenzie came out, chastised us both for making a scene. I backed down and Dakota didn’t, because he never does.”
“Yeah, I noticed that about him,” Ben murmured.
“I told him I didn’t have time to deal with him. That he was an adult and that I was disappointed in him.”
“Then what?”
“Then I came here.” Thomas fell to his knees at Ben’s feet, the opposite of the positioning they’d had in the bathroom. “I came to you.”
“Why?”
“At the risk of sounding like a broken record, are you serious?” Thomas grabbed his knees, and Ben stared down at the tension in his knuckles, the raw scratches that peeked out from beneath the strips of bandage.
“I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t.”
“Because you’re my boyfriend?” Thomas said it like a question. “Because I love you. Because you were ambushed by your abuser and then you ran away.”
“He wasn’t my…” Ben bit back the rest of the sentence because he wasn’t sure if it was the truth or not. He’d never had a problem giving a name to the things Cody had done to him, but it felt different in this moment. Like calling Cody what he was, acknowledging what transpired between them, would affect more than just the two of them now. The pain was clearly etched across Thomas’s face, and Ben hated to be responsible for any of it.
He sighed, changing course. “Have you talked with his husband?”
“Trent? No.” Thomas shook his head. “Why?”
“He probably needs checking on, all things considered.”
“Shit.” Thomas fell back onto his ass and he looked up at the ceiling like there were answers to be found. Ben followed his stare in case it were true. “I’ll call him in the morning.”
Ben’s stomach growled again and since he still didn’t know what to do or say, he stood up and held his hand down for Thomas. “Are you hungry?”
“No, but I should eat.”
Ben nodded and pulled Thomas to his feet. Together in the kitchen, they pulled vegetables out of the fridge. It was all Ben could manage. Thomas helped slice bell peppers and cucumbers, and Ben scooped hummus onto a plate. He carried it into the living room while Thomas washed the cutting board and the knives before joining him. He sat down as close as he normally did, and Ben wanted it to be a comfort, but the doubt lingered around him like a cloud.
“This doesn’t change anything between us,” Thomas finally said, casting a sideways glance at him.
“No? I thought it would change everything.”
