Alayna got three years for sexual assault, and Jonny got five years for sexual assault and six months for the misdemeanor charge of nonconsensual pornography. That one pissed him off the worst. It should have been more. It should have been longer.But they both had to register as sex offenders now, and that mattered, he supposed.
He never did ask what happened to the baby. He decided to hope the kid went somewhere with people who would love them the way they deserved to be loved because no child deserved parents like that.
But he was also grateful it wasn’t his responsibility.
And he’d gone entirely silent about it. He told Lucas the bare bones of what happened. He let his friend hug him, and then he tucked it away, only to come out during therapy sessions. It probably wasn’t healthy, but that was how he coped. And he’d figure out the rest later.
“You there?” Lucas asked, knocking his knuckles on the countertop. He did that whenever people got quiet and he was afraid someone had left the room without telling him.
Gage reached for his friend and squeezed Lucas’s fingers so he’d know where he was, even when he was silent. “Remember when I punched Fallon’s dickhead ex in the hallway?”
“Yep. One of your best moves, bud,” Lucas said absently.
“That night felt good. And, like, I’m just thinking that maybe the world can use more vigilante justice.”
Lucas wrinkled his nose. “I’m notnotagreeing with you on that,” he said slowly, “but I’m also saying that’s illegal, and we don’t live in a comic book.”
“We fuckin’ should.” Gage let him go, and he sagged back against his chair and laid his cheek on the counter. It was very cool and strangely soothing. “Or a campaign. Anything but this.”
Lucas’s face was soft with sympathy. His fingers reached out again and eventually found the top of Gage’s head. Instead of asking why he was lying on his face, Lucas started stroking his hair.
There were moments that Gage regretted not being able to fall in love with his best friend. The logic of it made sense. Lucaswas hot as fuck, he was funny, he was fun, he was caring and attentive. He would have made Gage feel like the most spoiled bastard on the entire planet and probably never get tired of it.
But there was no spark.
When he and Lucas kissed all those years ago, there had been an awkward fizzle, and even Lucas had to admit he hadn’t liked it.
But Gage supposed that Lucas also didn’t understand what it meant to be loved the way that Gage and the rest of his family loved. It was unreserved and unrepentant. It was wild and heavy and big.
Lucas had spent a good portion of his life being shuffled to the side by one dad who hated him and the other who was too afraid to let Lucas so much as stub a toe while also being too chicken-shit to do anything about his crappy husband.
Things were different for Lucas now though. He was in love and happy and safe and stable. It meant Gage could lean on him a little more and not worry that things would change between them again, because he didn’t know what he would do if he lost his best friend.
“How can I help?”
Gage looked up and smiled, this time softer. “I don’t need anything?—”
“Bullshit.”
“Really. Just…I don’t know.” The truth was, it was more than what Gage had been through. He was healing, especially now that he’d learned there was no child that had come from him. He could put that all behind him.
No, his melancholy was coming from the fact that in spite of his pain, and in spite of having sex on a night he probably shouldn’t have, being with Fallon had awakened something in him he hadn’t realized he could feel.
It wasn’t love, of course. But it was something.
But Fallon had ghosted him completely over the last three months. He hadn’t been brave enough to ask Frankie about his brother, but there was a notable absence every time Gage came over to visit and Fenton was there, but Fallon was not.
He couldn’t tell Lucas that though. No one knew he and Fallon had hooked up, and if Fallon wasn’t telling the people he was closest to, Gage wasn’t going to break that silence. Ghosted or not, he still cared about him.
More than he probably should.
“Everything’s been so chaotic lately,” he finally said, “and now it’s all quiet, but…also it’s not?”
“I understand. Frankie’s been all up in arms since Charlie was given fucking probation,” Lucas spat. That had happened three months ago too, right after Gage’s night with Fallon.
He figured Fallon would want to talk about that with him, but he hadn’t.
“Has anything happened with that?”
