Horrific Propositions
Marcus’s POV
“How much do you know about what happened back then?” Qiang says after a while.
I didn’t push, just like I said I wouldn’t. When we got home, Qiang curled up on the couch, and I got us both drinks before joining them. I had been idly playing a game on my phone when they finally broke the silence.
“Not much. Just the parts you’ve told me, and that Qi got into a fight with Kingston after he outed you at school,” I respond, putting my phone down and focusing my attention on Qiang.
Can’t really say that wasn’t where it was before, since I was paying more attention to Qiang’s facial expressions and body language than to my phone, but that’s neither here nor there.
“The fight happened the same day Kingston aired that stupid video. I had run to the market down the road from our house. I don’t even know what it was for anymore.
On my way back home, Kingston showed up and pushed me into the alleyway behind the building.
At first, he was just making a bunch of threats about what would happen if I didn’t keep my mouth shut.
The mask he’d worn around me for so long that I’d fallen for was gone, and I was seeing his true face.
“The sad part is, I recognized it. As much as I want to say he completely hoodwinked me, it’d be a lie. I knew him for what he was, and I trusted him anyway. It was absolutely reckless, and there was just nothing that happened that should have come as a surprise.”
I reach over and run my thumb across the knuckles of their hand.
“Qiang, we’ve been over this. Putting your trust in someone and having that trust taken for granted simply means you are brave, and he is scum for taking the very best gift you could have given him and stomping it into the ground.
If anyone should feel like a stupid-idiot-schmuck, it’s him, not you.
Stop taking his share of the blame and carrying it on your shoulders. ”
Qiang sighs and looks over at me, with both defeat and acceptance of the defeat in their eyes. “Part of me knows that, Marcus. It really does. But part of me just can’t let go of the amount of damage trusting him caused, especially knowing that I should have known better.”
“I think that’s you trying to hold onto some semblance of control.”
Their brow furrows at that, and I can see the wheels turning, but they aren’t producing any understanding of what I meant.
“What?”
I angle my body more towards them and take one of their hands in mine, brushing my thumb along the back of their hand as an anchor for both of us.
“He obviously did something, or many things, I’m sure, that gave you adequate reason to believe him and trust him.
So when the video, the lies, the manipulation, and the fallout came about, they were all things outside your control.
So, reaching out to snag some semblance of blame and clinging to it is your subconscious trying to have some modicum of control over something you had no control over.
You can’t be a victim if you were part of the crime.
And sometimes admitting you were a victim and understanding that someone had that much control over you is scarier than burying the trauma in a corner of your head and not facing it. ”
Qiang frowns at that, their eyes focused back on that silly loose string that, if it weren’t providing them the comfort the distraction of having it there gave them, I would have cut it off a while ago.
“Grant said something similar as well,” they say quietly, and I know they’re processing what I said, so I leave the concept to percolate while readdressing the more immediate topic at hand.
“So what happened in the alleyway?”
They take a deep breath, as though steadying themself.
“At first, it was just a series of threats. What you’d imagine, you know.
Don’t tell anyone, it never meant anything, you were just a fun time until you weren’t, the typical stuff,” they say, their face twisting as the words work themselves out of them.
“None of that is typical, but go on,” I point out, wanting to point out their habit of lightening things that shouldn’t be lightened.
Qiang rolls their eyes and huffs out a sardonic chuckle at my interruption.
“Qi showed up while Kingston had me backed against the wall. He’d never liked Kingston, and he was already pissed about everything that had happened, so it took no provocation at all for Qi to lose his shit, and Kingston was in no way trying to de-escalate the situation either.
“It was infantile to watch Kingston deliberately rile Qi up, but it worked. Qi was fourteen, full of hormones and really fucking pissed off for my sake, so it spiraled out of control fast.
“I tried to stop it, but Kingston purposely shoved me to the ground to make Qi snap. What Kingston didn’t take into account was that Qi’s a fighter.
He’d been taking karate classes and earning belts with so many colors and stripes I lost count and don’t even know which one he was wearing at the time.
“So, when he lost control of his temper completely, he punched Kingston until Kingston stopped moving. I knew he was alive and still breathing when I finally pried Qi off of him, but I knew there was no way Kingston’s pride would let the humiliation pass when he woke up.
"I needed to get Qi out of there and figure out something quick because between Kingston’s recollection and the surveillance cameras, there was no denying what Qi had done.”
Qiang curls up more, bringing their feet up on the couch in front of them and leaning forward to lay their head down on their knees, their eyes meeting mine.
“Qi had never trusted Kingston. Not for a moment. He’d tell me all the time things he’d see Kingston do that rubbed him the wrong way.
What I didn’t realize was that Qi had been slowly taking pictures and videos and saving them to a thumb drive.
Not just of Kingston’s indiscretions, but also little snippets of us together.
I don’t know why he thought doing that was necessary, but between Kingston and my ongoing text threads, and the things Qi had saved, there was enough to leave no doubt about the nature of our relationship.
“He’d shown me the thumb drive as soon as he’d found out what happened.
He believed Kingston should have had the same punishment, if not more, than I did, and he thought the thumb drive would be the proof we needed to make sure that happened.
Instead, after what went down in the alleyway, I knew how the thumb drive really needed to be used.
“While Qi slept, I grabbed it and snuck out of the house. There was a housekeeper Kingston had that I knew would tell me where he was, and that’s how I knew which hospital to find him at.
“I had hoped to use the thumb drive to threaten Kingston into not pressing charges against Qi. Out of everything that happened, if there was anything I believed, it was that he was terrified of his dad finding out that he was bisexual.”
They stop for a moment, the memories playing behind their eyes. Their eyes glisten, and their shoulders stiffen, and somehow I know we’re getting to the part that has Qiang in knots.
“But when I got there, his dad, Sterling Adair, stopped me. Before I could even tell him what I had against Kingston, he approached me and told me he knew of his son’s unnatural indiscretions, as he called it.
“Sterling was trying to scare it out of him, or some stupid shit like that. I don’t know.
I think in his mind, he believed if Kingston continued to live in fear, that he’d still screw around with guys on the down low, but only go public with hetero relationships, which kept Sterling’s cookie-cutter pristine family image up front and center.
“And of course, Sterling knew everything else. He knew who had put Kingston in the hospital and why, so he knew I’d eventually show up to beg for Kingston’s silence in exchange for mine. So Sterling came prepared with terms of his own to barter with me.
“He thought he had complete control of the situation. He didn’t know what I had.
He told me that men like him could do whatever they wanted, as long as the public didn’t get hold of it.
And then that’s when he told me he’d make sure Qi didn’t suffer the consequences of his actions earlier that night if I introduced them,” Qiang grates out with fury and disgust on their face.
I furrow my brow, an alarm ringing in my head that I know what this is leading to, and I want to recoil because it’s one of those things that are so completely unnatural that it sickens the system and twists the brain at the very notion that it does, in fact, exist.
“Introduce who?”
Qiang swallows, a tear falling down their face before they sniffle. “Introduce Qi to Sterling.”
“What for?”
I already know the answer, but my brain is hoping with everything I have that I’m wrong. Qiang blinks, fighting back tears, but there are too many, and they start falling.
“Because he wanted him, Marcus. Sterling isn’t into men; he’s into boys.
Qi was only fourteen at the time. He was barely taller than me, and with all the child youth still in his face, he looked even younger than that.
It was ironically devastating that he had the audacity to call Kingston’s indiscretions unnatural and then turned around to seek after Qi, which was just so completely worse on every level. ”
For a moment, I trip on the words that confirmed my worst fears.
Cade said there were rumors of the father being a different kind of evil.
I doubt he knows about this particular one, though, because I feel he would have mentioned it if he had.
I’ll have to message him later to see if he can find anything linking Sterling to more children.