Elijah looks so much like the sweet, submissive boy from my dreams. From our past life. Yet, some part of him is different.
I don’t recall Benjamin bossing me around in any of my memories. But I like it—I really like it. Maybe we’ve evolved just slightly.
I watch as he taps his fingertips over the table, and moments later, a familiar face approaches him.
In blue jeans, a black apron around his waist, and a baseball cap thrown on backwards, is Bennett Hendrick. I almost forgot that we ran into his father. That he and Elijah were friends.
Bennett smiles brightly, obviously incredibly happy to see Elijah. Who wouldn’t be? But Elijah is grinning right back, throwing his head back in laughter as Bennett slides into the seat across from him.
What the hell? Are they having lunch together?
I watch the two of them interact. I watch as Bennett from high school leans in closer and closer, his boy-next-door charm clearly turned up to the max. He’s flirting.
Elijah doesn’t seem to care. As if the attention either means nothing or simply flatters him. And when Bennett finally gets up and walks away, Elijah turns his head to look out the window, hisface falling from that energetic smile to a look of apprehension and reflection.
I snap another picture.
Bennett returns with a plate, delivering it to Elijah as he sits back down in that seat across the table. As if it’s his. As if he’s taken a claim to any chair that partners with Elijah’s.
I didn’t care much for Bennett in high school, and I care less for him now. He wants Elijah. I can tell—just from this single interaction, I can almost smell it on him.
Bennett is trying to take something that belongs to me.
Should I go inside? Should I interrupt—say I was just passing through for lunch?
No, no one would believe that.
I’ll wait here. I’ll observe for the time being, and the next time I have Elijah alone, I’ll focus on the beat of his heart while I’m inside of him. It’ll remind me that Bennett means nothing—thatI’mhis destiny.
I take one more picture of a smiling Elijah and start my truck. I have some photos to develop.
A few hours later, the photos are developed, and I’m hanging the very last one on my corkboard. They sit nicely alongside the paper detailing my night spent with Benjamin.
God… one experience is never supposed to feel exactly like the other. Yet the way he gripped me, the way he cried and clung to me… it felt far too similar to every wet dream I’ve had.
That same desperation, that same feral need—I felt it with Elijah too. But I guess that makes sense when they’re the same person.
As I stare between the photos and the scrap of notebook paper, I begin to feel a bit crazy.
Am I making all of this up? Am I taking a completely innocent bystander and forcing my delusions onto him?
Could it be that I have been alone for far too long, and I have finally reached my breaking point? Have all of these years of solitude reached their peak?
But they’re identical. And theemotion—the pain and the longing that only feels whole when I’m in front of him.
Thesedelusionsare the only thing that makes sense. If I’m the only man on this planet who is experiencing this phenomenon, then so be it. But I’m not crazy.
Right?
Fuck. I think I need to talk to someone about this. And since my family is very obviously out of the picture, I call the only other person I have.
Marissa picks up on the third ring.
“Hey, Row. What’s up?” She sounds shocked, her slight Texan accent bleeding through every word.
“Nothing much. Why do you sound so freaked out?”
“Well, you never call first. I thought you might be dying,” Marissa laughs, and I hear voices in the background that slowly fade away as if she’s walked out of a crowded room.
