Chapter 11

11

Luke

I whistle under my breath as I quickly clean myself off and head back into my room. Max is seated on the edge of my bed, briefs on and leg bouncing with apparent nervousness. I wouldn't usually bother, but I grab a clean pair of boxers from my dresser on my way over, hopping on one foot as I pull them on.

"Do you want something to drink?" I ask him, and point toward the mini fridge I have tucked into a corner.

"Oh, sure, thank you." He sounds stiff and formal.

I grab a water for each of us and set them on the nightstand before reaching over and running my fingers through his messy hair. He looks up at me, gold eyes wide with unease. Oh, baby , I think, and run my hand across his scalp again.

"You sure you want to stay?" I ask, trying to keep my voice as casual as possible.

"I'm sure," he says quickly, and not sounding at all certain. I'm not going to make him leave, even though I suspect he really does want to; holding out a hand I tug him to his feet so that I can lean over the bed and pull the covers back. Max eyes my body pillow and smiles.

"Should have brought my pajama pants," he says, smiling carefully.

"It would be a damn shame to hide those thighs underneath those ugly ass pajamas, Maxy." He laughs, eyes lighting up. "Are you a left side of the bed, or a right side of the bed kind of guy?"

"It's your bed," he points out.

"Mm. And you're my guest. I want to impress you and ensure that you keep coming back. So, left or right?"

"Right," he says immediately. "I'd rather not be by the wall."

I nod, pasting a smile on my face as I climb onto the bed first, even as my heart sinks. Of course, he'd prefer the outside position—less restricted and easier to get to the door. I settle on my back, entertaining thoughts of holding him against me all night, as Max climbs in next to me. He reaches over to flick off the light and the mattress shifts as he moves to lay down. I put an arm out, hoping he'll curl up right beside me. I can't see him, in the dark, but I can feel him pause. After a moment, the mattress shifts again and he's here, shoulder tucked under my armpit and head partly on the pillow but mostly on me. I curl my arm around him, smiling up at the ceiling in triumph.

It takes him a second to decide how he wants his arms and legs, but eventually settles with them draped cautiously across me. I can feel the pause again, as though he's holding his breath and waiting for me to adjust him. Tracing the pads of my fingers over his bare arm and back, I wait for him to relax.

"How many roommates do you have?" He asks suddenly.

"Four. We stay out of each other's way pretty good, though, and most of the time on the weekends they aren't here. I wish I had money for a place of my own, but this isn't too bad for now."

He lapses back into silence, adjusting his head into a more comfortable position on my shoulder. I'm extremely aware of the way I'm holding him, cognizant that I need to make it feel comforting and not aggressive.

"I sometimes have nightmares," he tells me, voice guarded and a little bit defensive. My heart, which had been flying high on happiness all evening with him, falls to the floor and shatters.

"Okay."

"Nothing crazy, I just sometimes have these dreams about not being able to move."

I'm glad for the dark room, helping conceal my facial expressions. I don't think it takes a genius to figure out why he might have nightmares like that, and to not like his arms being held down; the implication makes my blood boil. I could never grasp how perfectly normal people might be driven to murder, but I understand it now. I understand it perfectly.

"All right," I tell him, and I think I do an admirable job of concealing the way I went from zero to pissed off just now. God knows I don't want him to hear it and think I'm angry at him.

"So, sorry, if that happens. It's not every night, but with my luck I'll probably do something embarrassing tonight, if only because I'm with you," he laughs, the sound puffing out across my chest. I frown, tilting my head until my face is resting on his hair.

"You always apologize to me for things that don't need apologizing for. Don't worry about it—I can promise you that I'm not."

He laughs again, and scoots closer to me. "We didn't brush our teeth," he says, and now it's my turn to laugh.

"You can, if you want."

"Mm," he hums, "but then I'd have to get up. I don't think our teeth will rot if we miss a night; not like we ate a bunch of dessert."

"Well, I did," I tease, and run a finger along his stomach to remind him.

"Oh my god," he mumbles, face turned into my chest, "disgusting."

"Full disclosure: I'm going to kiss the shit out of you first thing in the morning."

He sighs, expansively. "Okay, let's just go brush them quick."

"Nope, too late." I slide a hand up into the hair at the back of his head, and kiss his hair until he turns his face up toward mine and I can get to his mouth. He's laughing, and I'm laughing, and I'm wishing time could stop because this moment is perfect.

"Sicko," he says, between kisses, but he makes no move to actually leave the bed and go to the bathroom.

"Do you need to text Marcos the Grouch and let him know you'll be staying at your boyfriend's place tonight?" I ask, placing clear emphasis on the word boyfriend and enjoying the way my stomach flutters in response.

"I already told him I'd probably be staying at my boyfriend's place, so he knows," Max fires back, and the words have me grinning up into the dark. He was planning on staying over.

"How very forward of you, Maxy."

He laughs again, and shakes his head. He mutters something under his breath that sounds like idiot, and shifts so that his nose brushes the crook of my neck. It kind of tickles but I bear it because it's also fucking adorable, the way he tucks his face in. I'd wonder if he could breathe properly, if I couldn't feel the exhalations against my skin.

"I'm tired," he says apologetically.

"I bet you are," I agree, thinking of all the nights where he comes and sees me at the diner and stays well into the early hours of the morning. Something tells me he's not getting good rest on those nights, even when he goes home to do so.

"Thanks," he mumbles, and I've no idea what he's thanking me for, but I squeeze him to let him know I heard it. I listen to the pattern of his breathing, still coasting my fingers up and down his arm and back as I wait for him to fall asleep.

I can tell the exact moment he does—the weight of his arm becomes heavier across my stomach and his leg slides boneless between mine. He curls toward me, as though blindly seeking contact or warmth, and I wrap my arm more firmly around him in a way I hope his subconscious mind recognizes as safety. It takes me a long time—far longer than it usually would after getting off and snuggling up with a man—to fall asleep with him. I'm nervous that I'll roll over onto him in the night, scaring the shit out of him; I'm nervous he won't want to stay over any more.

My nerves and his seem to have been for nothing, though. I wake up in the morning with copper hair in my mouth, and soft open-mouthed snores vibrating my chest as Max continues to sleep. Carefully, I reach up and brush his hair down, leaving my hand resting on the crown of his head. I can feel a damp spot on my chest where he's drooled a little bit, which I find unexplainably cute. Not only did he make it through the night without waking up, but he clearly slept deep enough to be snoring and drooling. Smiling, I close my eyes and rest my cheek back against his head, waiting for him to wake up on his own.

It's over an hour later before he does, turning his face into my neck and making groggy moaning noises that make me want to wrap my arms around him and squeeze. I almost wonder if he's fallen back asleep, until his hand slides up my side and he kisses my throat where his lips are already resting.

"Good morning," he mumbles, words barely audible.

"Good morning, baby," I reply, because I'm a fucking sap, and he drooled all over me, and I want to keep him here forever. He adjusts his head so that he can breathe easier, hand rising to touch my face.

"We slept good," he marvels, fingers tracing my ear. "This is the same position we fell asleep in."

He sounds incredulous—unable to believe his good fortune. If I thought he would go for it, I'd ask him to stay here every night so that he never missed another hour of sleep in his life.

"We did," I agree, leaning my face into his touch. "What time do you have class today? I don't start until late, but I can take you home whenever if you need to get ready."

"Not until eleven. We've got time, right?" He lifts his head to look at me, and that sappy heart of mine expands like a balloon against my ribs. His hair is insane, fluffed up like he got electrocuted, and his eyes are squinted half-shut, as though he's not awake enough to open them fully.

"We've got time. It's early, still. You could go back to sleep if you wanted," I suggest, because he could probably benefit from a solid ten hours of sleep.

"Mm, maybe. Or…," he rolls his hips against mine, as though making sure I noticed the massive boner he's rocking, "we could do something else."

"Brush our teeth?" I ask innocently. His laugh propels him forward, face bumping into my chin. Cupping a hand over the back of his head, I keep him there, kissing along his scalp and forehead—any place I can reach.

He props himself up on an elbow and looks down at me. He opens his mouth to speak, but shakes his head once and closes it again. Raising my eyebrows, I reach up and pinch his chin.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"Come on, say it," I pull his bottom lip down with my thumb, grinning up at him. He gives another small shake of his head. "All right, well, if you won't tell me then I'm just going to have to fill in the blanks. You were going to tell me that I have the body of a Greek god," he snorts, and I trace my fingers down the line of his throat and over his collarbone, "and that my sexual prowess knows no bounds," his breath hitches as my knuckles graze over his abdomen, "and that you cannot fathom how you've survived so long without me." I slide my hand under the waistband of his boxers and rest it along his hip. "Did I get it?"

"Yes," he says solemnly, "you took the words right out of my mouth."

"I knew it. "

"Greek god?" He asks, lips twitching. "Seriously?"

"Do you want to know what I think about you ?" I ask, and he's already shaking his head even before I can finish. I open my mouth to keep talking but he captures my lips with his and there is no more talking for the rest of the morning.

Whistling, I change back into my street clothes after practice, propping my phone up so I can use the screen to check my hair. I'm heading over to Max's, bag packed with toiletries and a change of clothes; we've been spending nearly every night together the past few weeks, as though that first sleepover was all that was needed to break the dam. We trade off most nights, alternating between his place and mine, getting each other off before wrapping ourselves around one another and falling asleep.

There is an unmissable change in Max, and I don't know if it can all be attributed to being well rested. He seems more relaxed, easier with himself and the world. His skin has lost the sallow, pinched look of one who doesn't eat or sleep enough, and he's missing much of the vulnerability he used to radiate. I feel more comfortable reaching for him and initiating things that I might not have attempted before, and even though we've gone no further than touching and using our mouths, it still feels like some great sexual hurdle has been cleared.

He feels safe with me.

Tugging my shirt down, I glance across the room as I bend over to put on my shoes. Marcos is a few lockers away from mine, chin tucked as he carefully buttons up his shirt. As though he can feel my eyes on him, he looks over and tips his head in greeting. Shoes on, I swing my bag over my shoulder and walk over to talk to him. To say things have been easier between us lately is an understatement; he so obviously loves Max that I can't hold his overprotectiveness against him. Particularly not when I feel the same.

"Hey."

"Hey," he grunts. "I'm not going to be home tonight, if that's what you came over to ask."

"Can't I just want to say hi?" I ask innocently, and he rolls his eyes. I don't miss the way his lip twitches though, as if he wants to smile.

"I've got a couple tickets to Max's game this weekend, since it's not too far away. Figured you could join me if you wanted to," he says, carefully holding out the olive branch and watching me to see if I'll take it.

"Thanks, I will. And you don't have to vacate the apartment every time I come over," I say, falling into step beside him as we leave the locker room. "I can bite down on something so that I'm not too loud when I?—."

"Fucking hell, Luke, you can't just have a normal conversation, can you?" He asks, scowling at me as I crack up.

"I can't help it, you're so easy to piss off." I nudge his shoulder with mine to let him know I'm joking. "Seriously, though, don't feel like you have to leave just because I'm there. And thanks for inviting me to the game this weekend."

He shrugs, looking uncomfortable. "Max will be happy you're going."

"Speaking of," I say, hitching my bag more firmly up my shoulder, "I've got to get going. Don't want to keep him waiting."

Jogging backwards a few steps, I give him a goodbye salute before turning and hastening toward my car. Here I come, Maxy, I think, as my car fires up on the first try and I pull out of the parking lot. He doesn't live that far off campus, but the parking lots are always a damn mess and it's forty-five minutes before I park in front of his apartment building. I knock before popping the door open and calling out for him.

"It's me."

"I'm back here," his muffled voice comes from the direction of his bathroom. Slipping off my shoes, I walk down the hall just as he opens the door. Steam escapes the bathroom and I duck inside to see Max standing in front of the mirror with a towel wrapped around his waist.

"Hello, you," I say, propping myself in the doorway and leaning my head against the wood. He steps over, leaning in to give me a kiss in greeting.

"Hi, sorry, I decided to shower here instead of the rink. Time kind of got away from me."

"Good lord, don't apologize on my account. I'm very much on board with all of this," I wave a hand to indicate his naked chest, dappled with beads of water, and the towel slung low on his hips. His wet hair is darkened to solid brown, and his face flushed with heat from the shower. In this moment I understand precisely what might drive a person to become a cannibal; I want to eat him up.

"Stop it," he says, pointing at me sternly and grasping the edge of the towel. "We have work to do and I don't need you distracting me with sex eyes."

I close my eyes and hold up my hands in surrender. He laughs, brushing another kiss across my lips before stepping into his bedroom to get changed. I follow him, greedily watching the way his back muscles move and the way water drips from his hair down his spine. My phone buzzes in my pocket as he starts pulling on the clothes he'd left laid out on the bed. I check it, reading the message but not bothering to reply before tucking the phone back into my pocket. Max glances at me, adjusting his shirt over his still damp skin.

"Who's that?"

"Bryce. Him and the rest of my roommates are going to go to a party out on Sorority Row. I told him you and I had plans but now he just wants me to bring you along." I grin at him, shrugging. He's fully dressed now, so I reach out a hand to take the towel from him and hang it back up in the bathroom. "The five of us usually go to shit like that together, so he's feeling abandoned."

"Oh," Max says, running a hand through his hair as I step back into the room. "I mean…do you want to go?"

"Nah. Trust me, they'll be all right." Reaching a hand out to cup his face, I brush a bit of his hair back from his ear. "I wouldn't want to go without you."

"We can, though, if you really wanted?—."

"No, I don't even want to go, and I'm sure as hell not making you go to a party with me, especially after what happened last time."

He freezes, and my hand falls to his shoulder like a dead weight. My words catch up to me a second too late, and I don't even have time to hope that he didn't register what I said—it's obvious that he heard it, loud and clear.

"Max—."

"What does that mean?" He interrupts, eyes skating rapidly over my face as he tries to catch every small change in my expression. "What do you mean, ‘after what happened last time'?"

"Nothing. I didn't mean anything by it, just forget I said anything."

He takes a step away from me and my hand slides from his shoulder. The wariness in his eyes has my palms breaking out in a sweat, and I rub them back and forth on my legs; Luke, you fucking idiot.

"Oh my god," he says, and he takes yet another step away from me. In less than thirty seconds the warmth has gone from his eyes, and he's looking at me like I might be a stranger.

"Max, hold on?—."

"You know, don't you?" He says, voice rising. "You know about…you…"

He can't bring himself to say it, and I can't bring myself to hear it. I cut across him with a single word, fired into the space between us like a gunshot: "Yes."

He breathes in so hard it sounds like it hurts. The look on his face is so transparently pained, I take an unconscious step toward him, automatically wanting to comfort him. He backs up another step, and I change my direction immediately, skin burning with shame as I scramble to try and find the words to say to rectify this.

"How long have you known about that? How the fuck do you know?" His voice ping-pongs between anger and pain, and I instantly open my mouth to lie to him before snapping my jaw closed, ashamed that my first instinct was dishonesty.

"I…I found out right after your panic attack. The next day."

If I'd hoped that telling the truth was the best course of action, I don't have to wait long before I'm swamped with disappointment. The color drains from his face so fast he sways unsteadily, cupping the back of his neck with his hand in a gesture of discomfort that I haven't seen in quite some time. He shakes his head at me.

"Oh my god," he breathes .

"Listen Max, just let me explain. My friend, Margot, her brother is a cop and he told her about what happened. I didn't mean to find out—I wasn't trying to…to invade your privacy, but she thought I needed to know, and…" I trail off, stomach falling to my feet as I see the effect these words have on Max. I want to tell him it doesn't matter that I know, but am smart enough to bite this particular sentence back. It's very clear that it does matter to Max.

"You've known this entire time," he says, voice small in a way that breaks my fucking heart. "You…so, what, you thought you'd date me out of pity? Thought you might try a savior complex on for size?"

"No, fuck, of course not," I run a shaking hand through my hair, noticing the way his voice has risen as his anxiety spirals upward into a fever pitch.

"You said to me—after you didn't talk to me for a few days—that you had been working a few things out. That's what you said," he reminds me. "Me. That's what you were trying to work out, huh? How to fuck the guy who's been raped?"

The words land between us and lie on the floor, as horrible and disgusting as a dead body. His face is tight with anger, but not even that can mask the hurt in his eyes. He doesn't even let me respond before he continues, voice breaking on every word.

"You weren't supposed to know. Nobody is supposed to know."

"I'm sorry, Max. I didn't mean to find out, and I didn't want to bring it up unless you did…I thought," I put a hand through my hair again, annoyed with myself and my complete inability to explain. "I don't know, okay, I just thought you'd tell me at some point and then we could?—."

"No," he says, the word as forceful as a shove to the chest. " I would never have told you. I don't fucking want you to know ."

He's pissed, now, anger finally succeeding in drowning the hurt. He looks like the Max I've seen on the ice—the one who drops his gloves and fights for his teammates. I almost hope he does try to hit me. Anything is better than the betrayal in his eyes. I'm relieved when he looks away, pacing across the room and cupping his hand back over his nape before he whirls back around to face me.

"You asked me all those fucking questions, about what I liked and didn't like. You…these last couple of weeks, you kept telling me we didn't have to rush. I wanted to…I tried to get you to take things further and you kept telling me we shouldn't. Oh my god," he presses both palms to his eyes, mentally realigning everything I've done to fit in this narrative. "Pity can only get you so far, huh? Damaged goods aren't so attractive when you've got your dick out, right?"

" Stop ." My voice is raised now, too, and I'm horribly aware of how out of control this conversation has gotten. He's shouting at me, and now I'm shouting back; it's time to walk away, Luke, before you say something that can't be fixed.

"It's true," he spits, "it's fucking true. I'm…I'm…"

Words fail him as he struggles to come up with a word to describe himself. I don't want to hear it, anyway; I don't want to hear any more about how he's ‘damaged goods' and worthy of my pity.

"You're not," I tell him quietly. "There isn't a single fucking thing wrong with you, and of all the things I feel for you, pity isn't one of them. I'm sorry that I didn't tell you, I'm really sorry."

"I want you to leave," he says, voice breaking on the last word. I nod, sadly .

"I know. I'll go."

He looks away as I pad quietly across the room, pausing with my hand on the door handle. I stare hard at my hand, feeling as though I'm standing on the edge of a precipice with my toes curled over the edge. He doesn't understand, and if I leave this room without saying my piece, I might never again have the chance. I pull the door open, but stand in the doorway and look at him; he's still resolutely looking away, hiding his face.

"You're not broken, Max. You're beautiful and kind; you make me fucking laugh , and it's not like you're even trying to do it, but everything you say always ends up being what I needed to hear. I wanted you the moment you walked into the diner that night—I wanted to know you, and touch you, and just be around you. None of that changed when I found out about the party. I know you're mad at me, and I'm going to do what you asked and leave, but I'm not leaving for good, okay? I'm not walking away."

Before I can do something catastrophic like try and touch him, I clench my hands into fists and step through the open doorway. I've said what I wanted to say, to the best of my ability; I tried to convey that I'm leaving because he asked and not because I'm leaving him . There's nothing more I can do, and even though it makes me sick as I do it, I open the front door and leave his apartment.