“Oh God.” Jodi twisted himself from Rupert’s grasp and abruptly sat on the floor, like his legs wouldn’t hold him any longer.
Alarmed, Rupert dropped beside him and took his face in his hands. “What is it? Are you okay? Are you dizzy?”
“I’m fine.” Jodi pushed Rupert’s hands away. “It just feels like we’re going round in circles. Am I being totally fucking dense, or are we both saying the same thing? You think it’s wrong to want a broken man, and I think I’m too broken for you to want me in the first place?”
Rupert replayed Jodi’s words. Matched them with his own, then sat back on his heels as a crashing wave of perspective rocked his equilibrium. “Jesus.”
Jodi laughed humourlessly. “I know, right? I think one of us needs to spell it out, and it has to be you, because I need to believe it. Will you do that for me? Please? I need to know it’s real.”
“It’s real, boyo. I promise.” But was it? Jodi’s emotions had been volatile and unreliable since the accident, often swinging from one inappropriate reaction to another too fast for Rupert to keep up. What if this was just a cruel trick played by the shadow clouding his brain? What if they woke up tomorrow and Jodi hated him all over again?
He never hated me. He just didn’t know me.And as far as being wrong goes ... we’re both bloody wrong, or not. Perhaps we never were.
For once, Rupert’s relentless inner monologue was worth listening to. He crawled closer to Jodi and put his hands on his bent knees, waiting for Jodi to meet his gaze. It didn’t happen.
“Listen to me,” Rupert said. “Something terrible happened to you, to us, and it took everything we had. This—” He gestured around the dimly lit kitchen. “—all of this, is just the remnants, but it’s enough for us to build something new. I want to, Jodi, because I wantyou, because I love you. I know you can’t say the same right now, but maybe, if we go back to the start, you might learn to love me again.”
Jodi finally looked up. His eyes were red-rimmed and watery. “Do you really love me?”
“Yes. Have done since the moment I met you.”
“Do you want me?”
“More than ever. It just scares me a bit.”
“I know how that feels,” Jodi said. “But I wish I’d known the rest of it from the beginning.”
Rupert swiped at his face. “I’m so sorry. I told you every day until you started talking, then I got scared, because you were scared too, and I didn’t want me loving you to be the reason you couldn’t get better.”
Jodi moved, his body blurring in Rupert’s gaze until they were nose to nose. “I think I got betterbecauseyou still loved me, even though I was gone. I must have known on some level, because it feels so right now.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Now all we need to do is figure out how to make it awesome.”
“Awesome?”
“Indie told me we were awesome. She said I made you happy. I want to do that again.”
“Sounds like we want a lot of things.” Rupert blew out a breath.
Jodi frowned. “Is that bad?”
“No, just means we’ve got a lot of work to do.”
“Then we’re going to need some more chips. I kinda chucked mine away.”
Rupert laughed, feeling somehow lighter than he had in a long time. “Get your coat then, boyo. Chippie shuts in ten.”
Seventeen
That night, with Rupert by his side, Jodi slept better than he could ever remember doing before: long, deep, and pain-free. He felt like he’d just blinked when he opened his eyes in the morning. Shame he hadn’t meant to fall asleep in the first place.
He rolled over, searching for Rupert’s warmth, but found only cool sheets. He bolted upright. Panic roared through him. Had he dreamed it all? Had the long hours talking into the night, stretched out on the bed with a bag of chips between them, been nothing more than a figment of his defunct imagination?
“Easy, boyo.” Rupert popped up from nowhere at the side of the bed, his hand comforting and warm on Jodi’s knee. “Gonna give yourself whiplash, sitting up like that. What’s the matter?”
Jodi shrugged, unwilling to admit he’d been on the verge of a meltdown. “What are you doing on the floor?”
