“Everyone is okay. Physically,” he specifies. “No one is hurt.” He winces. “It’s not good.”
“Luc?” Ari asks, his voice barely above a whisper. He’s looking at Blake for the answer.
“We haven’t been able to reach Mr. Martín.”
“He’s playing right now. He’ll probably see the video before he even sees the missed calls,” Jesse says, voice raw.
“We’re doing everything we can to reach him. I can try reaching out to his coach?—”
“Are you crazy?!” Jesse yells, finally taking his head out of his hands. He looks worse than he did when he was in the hospital. Like there’s somehow less life inside him right now than there was when he had a tube down his throat to help him breathe. “That’ll just make it obvious that itishim! Don’t you understand? This could ruin him!”
“I know,” Blake says in a voice softer than I’ve ever heard from him. “We’re working on getting it taken down.”
Jesse scoffs. “It’s everywhere, Blake. You can’t stop something that went that viral that quickly. That’s not how the internet works.”
“We’re dealing with it however we can, as quickly as we can, to mitigate as much damage as possible.”
Ari clears his throat softly. “What exactly are we dealing with?”
Jesse pulls his knees to his chest and rests his forehead against them. “Someone hacked my phone or the cloud or whatever. There were pictures and… videos.”
“Videos?” I ask.
Naz answers. “Sensitivevideos.”
Ari gasps. “With Luc?”
“His face isn’t in any of them,” Naz says, but his pointed look says there’s enough in them that it might not matter.
“The important thing is that there’s reasonable deniability,” Blake supplies hopefully, only to get shot down again.
“In what they released so far,” Jesse says, his agitation ramping up. “Who knows what else they have. I’ve deleted everything, but it’s probably too late. How do we know that they didn’t also get our texts or the other stuff we’ve sent to each other?”
“You used an encrypted app to send most of those, this just happened to still be in your cloud. There’s a chance this is all they got.”
“Allthey got,” Jesse says, tone flat and defeated, “is everything. Because there’s no possibility that Luc won’t run for the hills after this. How could he not?”
We sit with Jesse for another hour before he decides to turn on the television, which was a bad choice. Ari tries to shut it off, but Jesse loses his shit. He lashes out at everyone who tries to help or comfort him, and when none of us fight back or blame him for it, it seems to be the last straw. He screams for everyone to get out.
Things go from bad to worse after that. Luc doesn’t take the news well, as expected. Jesse breaks down completely and has to be sedated. Seeing him in the hospital again, although this time thankfully not on a ventilator or in danger, makes me feel sick. It reminds me just how fragile all of us are, and how little control we have over our own lives. Jesse has gone from sad but feeling secure in his relationship, getting ready to meet Luc’s family, to a shell of himself because he feels like he lost everything.
While we sit, once again surrounding Jesse’s hospital bed, I make the mistake of flinching when Ari reaches for me. I try to recover by reaching for his hand, but he pulls away from me. We haven’t had a moment alone since the news broke and haven’t been able to discuss what this means for us. I have no idea where his head is at. Hell, right now, I’m not even sure where my head is at.
Now I understand what they were hoping to accomplish. They want to tear us down, to dismantle us not just by discrediting us publicly, but by making us doubt ourselves on a personal level. Because as I look over at Ari, I know there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do to keep him safe from these vultures, to keep him from feeling the pain Jesse is in right now. To prevent thelikelihood of ever seeing Ari in Jesse’s place again, to never have to listen to the sound of a machine telling me if his heart is beating the way it should, I’d even sit down and shut up when I know that using our voices matters most. I’d even walk away entirely if it meant protecting him.
Once we’re assured Jesse is going to be okay and confirm that his mother is staying with him, Ari, Naz, and I head back to our hotel suite. None of us says much. What is there really to say?
The rest of the tour is being cancelled, which is for the best, but it leaves us in a kind of limbo.
I want to rage. I want to cuss out and trash every single so-called journalist and talking head that’s had Jesse’s name in their mouths these past twenty-four hours. I want to track Luc Martín down and pummel him for hanging up on my friend in his worst moment, for letting Jesse take the weight of all his shame on himself. For not loving him enough to stand by him when he needs it most.
More than any of that, I want to scream for Ari to look at me. Just look at me.
Okay, I want so much more than that, but it would be a start. Maybe then I could understand even a little of what he’s thinking and feeling. We’re all afraid for our friend, but I’m afraid for us, too. If anything happens and our relationship were to get out… It was wrong of me to flinch away from him, and I want him to know that my fear of everything that’s happening doesn’t change how I feel about him.
Dinner is waiting for us when we get to the suite, but no one seems very hungry. We pick at the food in silence, until Ari says he’s ready to sleep off the day. He doesn’t shoot me any looks or text me to tell me he’ll meet me in my room or to come to his. A few minutes after he goes to bed, Naz and I decide to do the same. I stop at Ari’s room first, but the door is locked, and there’s no answer when I knock.
With a sigh, I step into my room across from his, leaving the door wide open. I take a quick shower and pull on a pair of thin sweatpants, thinking about texting Ari to apologize. I perk up when I hear my phone ping, but it’s not Ari.
