Page 31

Liam

The flicker of blue from the television was the only light in the room, giving a dreamlike glow to the scene: Jonah in a hospital bed, bruised but alive, and Liam in a chair at his side.

He was holding Jonah’s hand.

Liam had scarcely let go of him since arriving a few hours earlier, sure that without the anchor of physical touch, he would wake from the dream that Jonah was here with him, safe and alive and real. Every few minutes, Liam felt himself hold on a little tighter, just to reassure himself. He took great comfort in the fact that Jonah returned the squeeze, every time.

Nearly every channel was playing back-to-back Christmas movies. It provided both a familiar backdrop and an unsettling reminder that the world continued to spin, even as their own stuttered to a halt, stuck in this quiet moment, just the two of them .

A glance at the clock told him that in just a few minutes, it would be the morning of Christmas Eve. He was sure this was one he would never forget.

It had taken some convincing for Liam’s mom to drop him at the hospital entrance. She had offered to stay, to come up to the room with him or find somewhere to wait, but Liam had decided, before Jonah had ever hung up the phone, that he would stay with him for however long he needed.

He didn’t know how long that would be, and his mother had already gone so far out of her way for him. Liam assured her, with a tight hug across the center console of the car and a kiss on the cheek, that he would be alright from there. That he wouldn’t be alone.

The moment he had laid eyes on Jonah from the doorway of the hospital room, he knew he had made the right call.

He still didn’t know everything. There were so many questions Liam wanted to ask, but the last thing Jonah needed in his state was an interrogation. Liam had gotten just enough information to understand the basics of how Jonah had gotten here: that the man who hurt him was dead, and that the fucking FBI had been involved in getting him out.

And hadn’t that been a shock—arriving to find the man he had thought to be Jonah’s abuser sitting in his hospital room? Liam had nearly re-opened his split knuckles before Jonah could explain.

Beyond that, Liam could only glean information from what he saw with his own eyes, and that was bad enough .

He watched Jonah’s face in the muted lighting, no room left within himself to be guarded in the way he looked at him. Probably, he’d leapt past the point of no return long ago.

Every few seconds, the screen would flash brightly enough to illuminate the bruises on Jonah’s face. Even on his worst day, Liam had never seen Jonah so badly injured. His face and neck were mottled in shades of red and purple, swelling one eye shut almost completely.

Jonah must have sensed him staring, because he rolled his head along the pillow to meet his eyes.

“Did Nathan do this to you?” Liam whispered.

Jonah blinked with his one good eye, looking a little more aware. “He told you?”

“Not in so many words,” Liam said. “It’s a long story, but I know he saw you Friday night. Did he really do all of this?” He gestured at the mass of bruising covering Jonah’s face.

Jonah watched him through dark eyes.

“Not all of it,” he said finally. “Liam, there’s something I haven’t told you. About Nathan.” He hesitated, turning his eyes forward again. “I knew him for months before I met you. That night we found each other in the bar, I was there because Nathan asked for me.”

Liam was sure he wasn’t understanding. “For my birthday,” he clarified, not quite a question.

Jonah shook his head. “No. The overnight with you wasn’t part of the original plan. He wanted something quick and discreet at the bar. I had to borrow his phone to get permission for the rest. ”

Liam felt dizzy. “You were crying that night,” he recalled. “And at the diner, you...” Horror swelled in him.“You didn’t look at him. Oh, god. Jonah, I’m so sorry. I had no idea he was... I never expected...”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Jonah said. “Nothing he did had anything to do with you. I know that.”

“I should have known something was wrong by the way he acted that night we saw him together. I might have never known what he did if it weren’t for the giant fucking gash you left on him. Good on you, by the way. Made it much easier to break his face open a second time.”

“You hit him?” There was something like genuine awe in his voice.

“He deserved a lot worse than what he got.” Liam’s smile was short-lived, falling quickly back into a flat line. “I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to make this right.”

“It’s not yours to make right,” Jonah assured him. “I’ve always maintained that you’re much better than your friends.”

“He’s not,” Liam said sharply. “He is not my friend.” If he ever really was.

“Good. You deserve better,” Jonah said.

Liam squeezed his hand. Now I have it, he thought.

“Are you going to press charges?” he asked, cautious. “Against Nathan?”

Jonah’s expression went tight .

“I didn’t mean to imply that you should,” Liam added quickly. “I just wanted to let you know that I would support you if you did. Or if you didn’t. Whatever you do.”

“No,” Jonah said after a moment. “Pressing charges would open the door to months of dragging myself back to this place. To talk to police, to lawyers. That’s on top of whatever trial may or may not...” He breathed a heavy exhale, as if the thought alone was exhausting. “No. I just want it to be over.”

“I want...” Liam’s voice broke off. “I want to kill him. All of them. Anyone who ever touched you.”

“They weren’t all bad people,” Jonah said. “Most of them didn’t know.”

“Just because they weren’t terrible doesn’t mean it wasn’t terrible for you.”

Jonah didn’t argue with him there.

They lapsed into a sleepy silence. The weight of the day was crashing over him, and Liam felt his eyelids starting to droop. Without letting go of Jonah’s hand, he tilted his head against the bed rail and let his eyes shut for just a few seconds.

When he woke, probably several minutes later, it was to gentle fingers in his hair.

“Hey,” Jonah whispered. “C’mere.”

Liam sat up blearily, wiping at an embarrassing string of drool at the corner of his mouth. “Come where?” he said.

Jonah shifted his body, with what appeared to be no small amount of effort, to make room beside him. Liam looked at the empty space on the bed, then back at him. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said .

“You won’t.”

It required a level of coordination that Liam didn’t possess on his best day, but eventually he managed to slot himself beside Jonah without jostling him too much.

“Are you sure this is okay?” he asked, lips brushing Jonah’s hair. He felt the answering nod against his shoulder and allowed himself to relax.

Sleep was just beginning to claim him again when Jonah’s voice brought him back to the surface.

“Liam?” he said. “How did you get here so quickly?”

Liam opened his eyes.

“After I called you,” Jonah continued. “You were here in under an hour. I’ve ridden in a car with you, remember? I know you don’t drive that fast.”

Liam took a breath, relishing in the close proximity, in case it wouldn’t be welcome after this. “I was already in the city,” he forced himself to say. “I’m a little afraid you’ll hate me if I tell you why.”

The mattress dipped as Jonah leaned back, just far enough to see his face. There was apprehension there, but it sounded like he meant it when he said, “I could never hate you.”

Liam wasn’t sure if that was true, but Jonah deserved the truth regardless.

“After I found out about Nathan, I sort of...broke.” There was no better word for what had happened that night. “I was already at the end of my rope after a week of worrying about you and feeling so... so fucking awful about how everything went down—”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Jonah cut in. “I hated the way we left things, too. I could see that you blamed yourself, and that wasn’t my intention.”

Liam shook his head. “I never should have risked bringing you home with me in the first place.”

“I took the risk, too,” Jonah argued. “I chose it just as much as you did.”

“Well.” Liam swallowed back the urge to plead his guilt further. “Regardless, I hit a breaking point, and I ended up telling my mom. Everything, I mean. About you, and about how scared I was that I hadn’t done enough to help you, and... I don’t know. After hearing it all out loud for the first time, I...” He made himself look Jonah in the eye when he said it. “I was at the police station when you called me. I was going to make a report.”

Jonah was quiet for a long time, nothing but the near-silent buzz of the television and the sounds of medical machinery in the background. Liam was braced for outrage and betrayal, braced to be kicked out of this bed and this room and this hospital and Jonah’s life, so he nearly flinched when he felt a hand close over his.

“He was going to kill me,” Jonah said. “He would have, I think, if Ellis hadn’t intervened. And if not then, eventually. I don’t hate you, Liam. You were right to be afraid for me. And I’m sorry I made you carry that weight for all this time.”

“You were never a burden, Jonah.”

Jonah smiled, kind but sad. “I know you’re too nice to see it that way, but I’m still sorry. ”

“Maybe,” Liam began cautiously, “between the two of us, we’ve had enough apologies for now?”

Some of the tension seemed to leave Jonah’s body. He relaxed against Liam once again, resting his head on his shoulder

“So, you told your mom everything,” Jonah said. “How did she take that?”

Liam thought about it. “Honestly?” he said. “Better than I expected. She drove me here, you know? I mean, she wasn’t thrilled at the idea of me putting myself in potential danger, but she seemed to get it when I told her that I—” He bit his tongue, ears warming. “When I told her about you.”

Jonah went quiet again, long enough to make Liam nervous. Then he said, quietly, “She loves you.”

“She does,” Liam agreed, his voice going a little watery. “I think she’s more understanding than I give her credit for. And Jonah?” He squeezed his hand to make sure he had his attention. “I think that would extend to you as well. If you need somewhere to stay until you figure things out, or for however long...”

“I don’t think you can make that offer on your parents’ behalf,” Jonah said.

“I’ll call them right now, if you want,” Liam insisted, already reaching for the phone in his back pocket. Jonah stopped him.

“I don’t think they’d appreciate the midnight phone call, either. ”

He could hear the tick of amusement in Jonah’s voice, but Liam was overcome by a tidal wave of grief. They hadn’t yet talked about Jonah’s plan forward from here, if he even had one, but Liam was suddenly, keenly aware of just how few people Jonah had left to turn to, and keenly aware of how that had landed him in such an impossible spot in the first place. Liam wouldn’t let him be left out in the cold again. He refused.

“Jonah, I’m not going to abandon you,” he promised. “I won’t.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

What are you asking for, Liam wanted to beg. Anything . He couldn’t imagine denying Jonah a single thing.

But he couldn’t put that on him now. Not in a hospital bed, in the middle of the night, when his life had just been ripped out from under him again . There would be time to figure out the next step, but for now, Liam’s job wasn’t to plan for Jonah’s future. It was simply to be there for him in the moment. That much he could do.

“Liam?” Jonah whispered, so small that he felt the name against his chest more than he heard it. “I think I want to call my mom.”