Mitch took the Sprite and held on to it until Cam asked for it. Then he put the straw in Cam’s mouth. He knew how holding a drink could throw off someone’s whole balance in their body and make things hurt.
When the soup came out, he set up a TV tray so Cam could sit and use his good hand to eat. It was on the same level as his waist, so it was easy to eat from.
By the time Cam had finished eating, the house was emptying out. People were realizing he was drooping and leaving him alone.
“Hey, babe, let’s get you to bed,” he finally said when Cam’s mom had trundled out the door with the rest of the grandkids. Except for his. They were all either in the living room or in their own rooms.
“Thanks.” Cam let Mitch ease him into standing and then support him all the way to the bedroom. He crawled into the bed fully dressed except for his shoes, which had come off a while ago, but Mitch wasn’t going to let that happen. He undid the button-up shirt underneath the sling and got it pretty much off without having to get the sling undone all the way. And then got Cam out of his pants, putting him into a pair of pajama pants before pulling the covers up over top of him.
“Do you want a pill now, while you still have some food in your stomach?” Mitch stroked Cam’s hair back from his face.
Cam shook his head, his eyes closing immediately. So Mitch let it go. He would give Cam one later when he woke up and got a snack. His man was asleep before Mitch even left the room.
Mark met him in the front room. “Is he gonna be okay?”
“He’s hurting pretty good, but he’ll be all right.”
“The house is looking great. You’ve really done some work on it, I can tell.”
Mitch rolled his eyes a little. “A lot of that was Cam. I was pretty low when he showed up, but yeah. All of the little honey-dos have been taken care of, and I put in a new vanity for the girls. The guest room is nice, because Cam had been staying there before he moved into my room, so you’ve got a good place to stay. It’s solid.”
They sat down together after they raided the kitchen one more time. Someone had made him mac and cheese with bits of ham. It was his favorite, and somebody clearly knew it, so he was over the moon.
It looked like Mark had found himself some Colorado Cowboy Casserole, which smelled amazing. Tater tots, hamburger, and cheese—it was a win-win.
“I’m glad you’re here. I can’t—” He shrugged and looked at Mark. “I’m never going to be able to pay you back for everything you’ve done.”
“That’s what friends are for.” Mark gave him a sad grin. “It’s like you letting me stay here for the holidays. I— things haven’t been going so good for me.”
“Well, man, what happened?” He hated that Mark was so down, so…haunted.
“I got into a situation with a guy; isn’t it always a guy?”
They both kind of chuckled together even though there wasn’t a whole lot of humor in it, and then Mitch winked at him.
“Well in my case, it’s not always a guy.”
“Shut up you shit.” Mark shook his head at him. “It—I really don’t want to get into details, but suffice it to say that I trusted him when I shouldn’t have, I ended up in a compromising position, and the police had to get involved.”
“Jesus fuck.” Mitch just stared for half a second while his heart and his brain caught up to each other. “Are you okay? Are you safe? Why didn’t you call?”
Mark stared at him, blue eyes shimmering with tears. “What was I supposed to do? Call and say, hey I got roofied, and then the guy I was in love with and thinking about asking to move in took a bunch of compromising pictures with me and another man that I didn’t even know?”
“Oh.” Fuck. Fuck, meet wild energy with calm energy. He knew this. He had daughters. “Well, you could have. I would have listened.”
“You were kind of busy being broken, and to be honest being able to help you made me feel like I could do this, as if I could handle this shit, so I’ll take it. But I have to say I’m not happy now in Denver. I always feel like folks are staring at me. I know it’s not true. I’m fully aware of that. I mean, Denver’s huge, but doesn’t help that that’s how I feel.”
“You can stay here.” That was easy.
“What?”
“You can stay here. You can work from home. You can stay in this house until you find something you like somewhere else. You can stay in this house until you figure out what you want to do. I’ve already talked to Cam. This can be your home as long as you need it. Hell, as soon as Cam is stable and can watch the girls pretty reasonably, I’ll even come out with you and we’ll pack your shit up. We’ll put it in one of those pod dealies and bring it back down here, easy peasy.”
Mark rolled his eyes. “Lemon squeezy?”
Mitch had no doubts. None. Mark was family. “You know it. In fact, I’ll take a bat with me when we go get your stuff. You can point out your ex, and I will express things to him.” He looked at Mark making sure his intention showed on his face. “Nobody fucks with my family. Nobody.”
Mark stared at him, then his eyelashes flickered hard for a moment as if he was fighting off tears before he grinned. “I would like that. All-inclusive.”
