Chapter 17 Weston #2
When he stands up he’s smiling again and I’m shaking my head, still in disbelief that this can even be real.
I fit so perfectly with another person.
Finally.
After years of thinking it wasn’t possible for me.
But it’s him, it’s Sevan goddamn Berlant, standing right there in front of me and starting to make me smile too because when he looks that way it’s too contagious.
“You’re…” I say, trailing off.
He touches the lower part of my cheek, his gaze following his hand. “I love your dimples.”
I’m still trying to catch my breath, and I pull in a lungful of steamy air. “They’ve been there since I was a kid.”
“Never even knew you had them until we started hanging out more.”
“Liar. You knew me before.”
“Yeah, but you used to just scowl so much when you saw me.”
“I don’t scowl.”
“You scowl, babe.”
I glare at him for a moment but then I can’t help myself from smiling again, so I try to hide it by crushing my mouth against his in a kiss.
He laughs softly as I move, pinning him to the shower wall, squeezing his hips as I kiss him over and over again.
Reality is there, somewhere, dim in the background of my mind: I’m not going to have this forever.
I’d be crazy to think I would.
But if I think about that too hard I’ll collapse. For now, I’m taking everything I can get. Staying in a fantasy for as long as I can until reality shatters back into my world.
I’m zoning out, staring at his tattoos while we’re drying off, when he finally talks again.
“Any specific plans for the alumni dinner next week?” he asks. “Execs you want to talk to, internships you’re gunning for?”
The truth is I’ve barely thought about it at all.
I work up some semblance of an answer for him, though.
“Uh, there’s one guy, Nevinson. He seems like the exact opposite of my father, so that’s good enough for me when it comes to schmoozing with a CEO.”
I don’t mention that it doesn’t matter what I want.
I’m not getting any internship, and I’m hoping that every single one goes to Daggers and Luros members this year.
Sev glances up at me in the mirror, leaning over the countertop for a moment. “Niko told me your dad was awful to you and Hunter.”
I look down, adjusting the towel wrapped around my waist. “He wasn’t exactly a Mr. Rogers type of dad, no.”
I don’t know how much Niko told him, but judging by the serious look on Sev’s face, he probably knows the worst of it.
The air in the room suddenly seems to shift.
Like we’re no longer in our own bubble anymore, and my real life is making its way back in, uninvited.
“I got bullied really badly in early elementary school, too,” he says, applying lotion to his arms in a way that only highlights his muscles.
I furrow my brow. “Niko told you that part, too?”
“Niko knows what I went through. He knew I’d relate.”
I pull in a long, slow breath. “It wasn’t fun. But it’s just a part of me, now. You know?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“There were kids who made fun of me for being dumb, just because I didn’t speak up in class,” I tell him. “They didn’t realize I just didn’t feel like talking.”
He puffs out a laugh. “Little did they know, you don’t shut up when you’re comfortable.”
I grin. “You think I’m comfortable with you, Sev? Not a chance.”
“You’re comfortable shoving your ass back against me in bed. Yeah, I felt that. All night and in the morning, too.”
“Not my fault you were warm,” I tell him.
“Anyway. I just wanted to tell you that you’re a lot stronger than you know, Wes.”
I pause for a moment, glancing down and then back up at his reflection in the mirror.
It’s a small thing, but it feels big, coming from Sevan.
“I’ve spent my whole life trying to be strong, and I still feel like I’m… nothing, sometimes.”
His gaze becomes serious. “The fact that you are still trying is why I know you’re strong. It matters. You know that, right?”
He’s peering into me again.
Like I’m acutely aware that he’s seeing the dark ocean just below my surface.
An ocean I don’t even let myself acknowledge.
And suddenly it’s like the tables are flipped. Am I the one who’s actually afraid of intimacy?
Can we go back to sex, please?
Something easier than this?
“I’m trying very hard,” I say. “All of the time.”
My throat goes tight as I say it. Everything is contained in that murky water.
My father’s cruel heart.
His recent death.
The fact that I didn’t get to grow up with a mother, and I unexpectedly lost my sister to a freak accident when I was barely through puberty. All of that on top of the tense relationship I’ve had with my brother, which has only started to blossom in the past few months.
I’m trying so, so fucking hard.
All.
Of.
The.
Time.
“Wes,” Sevan says, putting a hand on my hip.
Don’t look at it.
Don’t look at this iceberg inside me, the one that no one ever sees.
“I’m fine,” I tell him.
He closes his arms around me in a hug, ignoring my words. His comforting warmth surrounding me is like a ballast back toward Earth.
I don’t let myself need anyone.
And I can’t need Sev, but in this moment, I do. He doesn’t have to know how deeply I needed any of this.
Just another secret.
Another drop in the ocean.
“Well. I can’t wait to see you in your fancy suit at the dinner, Sheriff.”
Something about him using his old nickname for me cracks the tension that’s been filling my veins.
The tightness in my throat loosens.
Out of nowhere I feel myself smiling again, involuntarily. A laugh escapes me and I look up at the ceiling for a moment, and then Sev is laughing too, both of us acting like giggling kids in the corner at a party.
“I should go sheriff-mode on you, after you called me that name for the past billion years,” I tell him, shaking my head. “I’m getting fuzzy cuffs and locking you the fuck in.”
“Lock me to your bedpost and put your tongue over every inch of me,” he says. “I’ll pretend not to love every second of it.”
“I’m out of here,” I tell him. “You have your meeting tonight, and if I don’t finish my paper for Sellwood’s class, you’re the one who will grade it and give me an F.”
He blows me a kiss after I get dressed and swing the door open to leave, and somehow, even after everything, that little blown kiss makes my cheeks go hot.
As I’m heading down the staircase, I feel like I’m on a surreal cloud, like the past hour has been a roller coaster of every goddamn emotion I usually keep at bay.
Sev knows me now.
Better than some of my own friends even do.
And finally I’m letting myself admit how much I enjoy that.
I take the stairs down quickly, going for the front door. But as I’m walking out the front hall, I catch a strange glance.
It’s Kieran, one of the Double Daggers guys I never knew very well, sitting alone in one of the front rooms.
He’s staring at me.
Intently.
And I can’t read his expression.
He lifts a hand and waves at me before I head out the front doors.
“See you at the dinner next week, Knox,” he calls after me, like there’s a warning in his tone.