He didn’t push me away. He didn’t scold me. He just held me tighter for a second. Like he understood the danger of that sentence. Like he also understood why it existed. And why it scared him.
“Let’s just get you through this moment,” he said softly. “Okay?”
I nodded against his chest.
That was enough.
That was everything.
I didn’t want forever. I wanted this. His arms around me. This warmth invading my body. His steady breathing that my own could follow when it forgot how. I didn’t want to be whole. I wanted to be held. For now—that was the only way I knew how to stay.
We stayed like that, me curled against him longer than I meant to. Not because I needed comfort. Because I needed containment. Because when he held me like this, the edges of me stopped feeling like they were dissolving.
Anthony didn’t move right away. His grip didn’t loosen. He didn’t tell me to sit up and pull myself together. He just breathed with me. Slow. Steady. Like he was lending me a rhythm I’d forgotten to keep.
After a while, his hand moved. Not away—just down my arm. His fingers brushed my wrist.
I stilled. Held my breath. Felt the change in him before he spoke.
“Elliot,” he said quietly. Not accusing, not panicked or disgusted. Just… aware. Alert.
My stomach dropped. “What?!”
His thumb pressed gently against the inside of my wrist, just below the bone. I realized too late what he felt there. The faint sting. The heat registered a second too slow. The place I hadn't covered well enough. His stubbled jaw tightened. Not in anger. In something like fear.
I flinched. Pulled back too fast. “I’m fine,” I said automatically. The lie came out smooth. Practiced.
Anthony didn’t argue with me. That scared me more than if he had. He looked at me for a long moment. Not at my wrist. My face. Like he was trying to understand the shape of what I was saying.
The dark circles under his eyes mirrored my own. Time seemed suspended as he kept his dark eyes on mine and slowly pulled the sleeve of my henley back.
Anthony sucked in a sharp breath when he saw the blood stained gauze wrapped around my wrist. A pained sound tore its way from his lips as he unwrapped it. “Elliot?—”
“I—I…”
“Shhh, baby boy. It's okay.” He brushed his lips over the red, raw skin before slipping out from underneath me. “Just let me take care of you.”
It wasn’t a question so I didn’t answer. Heat burned the back of my eyes as he left my room and padded down the landing. I heard his door creak open and a few minutes later, he came back with a first aid box of his own.
“U-up,” he rasped softly. “Let me clean this up and dress it properly for you.”
“You don’t?—”
Anthony shook his head. A pained smile flickered at the corners of his lips. “Years working on and running construction sites have given me a lot of practice with first-aid.” He tried to lighten the tone, but the strain was palpable in the air. Tension lined his shoulders.
He worked in silence as he cleaned my wounds. Words formed and died on his lips. His head shook more than it stayed still, but his touch was gentle.
A warmth filled me, one I hadn’t felt before. That I hadn’t allowed myself to feel before. This was the second time he was cleaning my injuries. It somehow felt more profound this time. There was so much emotion in the words he didn’t say.
“There,” he announced when he was done and placed the first aid box on the nightstand and settled on the bed behind me. “You look exhausted, sweetheart.”
“Not real—” I started but yawned before I could finish. My body giving me up as stars danced in front of my dry eyes.
“You need to get some sleep, Elliot.”
I shook my head, ready to push up and get out of this room. The walls were starting to close in. I felt too raw and exposed to be in his presence any longer. But Anthony shocked me by climbing on my bed behind me, pulling my back into his chest and wrapping me in his embrace.
“Sleep, baby. Just for a little while. I’ll stay with you for a while…”
