“Yes?” I said, my voice whisper-light.
“I don’t know if this is a good idea.”
Brave. Be brave, I urged myself. I took a deep breath. “The paint color or the sexual tension I may or may not be hallucinating?”
He smiled and shook his head. “Even now you make me want to laugh. Goddamn, woman.”
“So…itisin my head?”
He pushed from the wall and came to me. Hands big enough to palm basketballs rose to cradle my face. His gaze dropped to my mouth. “It’s not in your head."
Holy shit.
He brushed a thumb across my lips. I wanted to bite his finger, then drag it into my mouth and curl my tongue around its roughness to soothe the sting of my teeth.
Ben must have seen the open need on my face, because he shifted his thumb away, back to the relative safety of my cheekbone.
“Why isn’t this a good idea?” I asked.
He closed his eyes, leaned forward, and braced his forehead against mine. “Because I’m going through a lot of shit right now, and I don’t know if starting a physical relationship is a healthy decision.”
I had never, ever pushed him on why he was here. Instead, I’d expended endless amounts of energy to keep my usual nosy mouth shut. I didn’t know if it was the hormones or the fact that I was just sotired of being so careful, but I decided, for once, to ask the question that popped into my head. To speak the name I’d never heard him say.
“Zach?”
He jerked away like I’d hit him. “Yes.”
“CTE?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know for sure yet.”
Tears sprang to my eyes. I’d always cried easily. I’d always been overprotective of my friends and family. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to the people I cared about. Ben was my friend. I cared about him deeply already on that level. The thought of him experiencing even a handful of the CTE symptoms I’d read about was enough to break my heart.
“I’m so sorry, Ben.”
I expected him to get awkward, like so many men did around a crying woman. Or to tell me that I shouldn’t be upset. He did neither. Instead, he slid his thumbs forward and wiped away the moisture gathering at the edges of my eyes.
“I may not have it,” he told me.
“Have you had any tests done?”
“An inconclusive MRI. Nothing since. It was a lot, just getting that one done. I’ve been building up my bravery for round two.”
My tears spilled free. This big man, who looked strong enough to hold the entire world on his shoulders, just confessed to being afraid. No way in hell was I getting this crush back into its prison.
“I’m here if you ever want to talk about it,” I told him. “Or if you need someone to hold your hand while you’re having the tests done.”
“Thank you.” He sniffed, grinning. “You keep this up, you’re going to make me cry too.”
“Trying to stop,” I told him with a weak laugh. “Once I turn the waterworks on, it just all comes out.” Most of this was for him, but some was a release of all the tension I’d felt the past few weeks.
He lifted the edge of his ratty old t-shirt to blot my cheeks. I knew I was truly upset because not even the sight of his abs was enough to jolt me out of it.
“I have bad days sometimes, Ella,” he all but whispered. His gaze moved across my face as he followed the track of his t-shirt.
I gripped his forearm. Ineededhim to understand what I was about to say. “I hope you know that I will never, ever repeat anything you tell me.”
He nodded. “I know.” And then, so quick it almost sounded like one word, “Ihavedepressionandanxiety.”
