Page 58 of Obsessed

Rainstaredatthelight above the darkroom door, its bright orange hue indicating that Mason was hiding in there, but Rain couldn’t be mad at him because he’d been hiding too.

Despite Mason’s distress during the fire and the tightness of his hold once Rain had been rescued, things remained tense between them. Jumping from a burning building had exacerbated Rain’s earlier humiliation, breaking him down and leaving him even more shaken and hurt, so he’d been avoiding Mason for days.

It seemed that Mason had picked up on Rain’s cues, giving him the space he wanted, and while they did need to talk things over, Rain couldn’t muster the courage to put himself out there again because another rejection would hurt ten times worse. While Rain still thought of Mason as the safest person he knew, the stars in his eyes didn’t twinkle as brightly anymore, and it left him lost and directionless.

Fur brushed against his leg and he bent down, scooping Mouse up with both hands because she’d gotten even bigger and fluffier. Mewing, she clung to him and he held her, stroking her under the chin as he contemplated the darkroom door.

“Do you think I should knock, girl?”

After the fire, Rain had been checked out by the EMTs and they’d deemed him lucky and rattled, but in good health. Mouse had instantly clung to him when he’d gotten home, sniffing and letting out mournful meows as if she knew what had happened, and she’d been his shadow ever since.

He didn’t blame her, because sulking in John’s office and ignoring the fire alarm had been extremely stupid. In his defense, the door had been left unlocked and the room was always empty, so Rain had crawled under the desk, trying to calm down, but Finn and Dylan had kept calling for him.

When the blaring sirens had started, Rain thought it was a game to get him to come out, until he’d started smelling smoke. By then it had been too late to use the hallway, and the sprinklers had been disabled for John’s indoor cigar, leaving Rain to roast alive.

He didn’t remember much after that, but whenever he closed his eyes at night he heard the whoosh of air in his ears from the fall. That entire day had been traumatizing and Rain still hadn’t fully processed it; he knew that isolating wasn’t the answer but he couldn’t help himself. Even now, he was still too wary and shaken to initiate a conversation with Mason, so he just drilled his eyes into the outside of the door, willing Mason to come out instead.

But he didn’t.

Sighing, Rain put Mouse back on the floor and went outside, lying down under the weeping willow. It had become a friend, a silent sentinel that shaded and supported him as he worked through his various problems, and Rain had found himself under its umbrella too many times to count. Winter lurked in the cold ground beneath him but Rain ignored its chill, looking up through the swaying yellow leaves and catching glimpses of the sky. The peace here was unmatched, and Rain wished that he could store it for troubled times. Letting that serenity wash over him, he sorted through his mind once again.

After years of chaos under his mother’s thumb, it was nice to be with someone so taciturn and stoic, but Rain needed Mason to open up a bit more. Even though their argument in the storage room had been a disaster, based on Mason’s reactions during the fire it seemed like he had strong feelings for Rain; however, it was all a matter of Mason admitting it.

Why did he want Mason to admit it? Why was he obsessing?

Absently playing with the end of his braid, Rain watched a small sparrow as it tried to land on one of the flimsy branches, realizing that he didn’t need to ask himself these questions because he already knew the answer.

He felt something for Mason.

Unlike all the other men Rain had been with, Mason didn’t want to conquer Rain’s beauty. He wanted to create with it and Rain didn’t mind being an inspiration. Besides, while quiet and odd in his approach to things, Mason hadn’t done anything malicious or mean to Rain, and he didn’t seem to have a creepy bone in his body. In fact, aside from letting Rain and Mouse stay in this beautiful house for free, Mason had been kind on too many occasions to count. He remembered Rain’s favorite order, he drove him safely to and from work, and he listened to Rain, holding him and letting him pour out his heart.

No one had ever done so much for him, and as Rain mulled that over he found that hedidwant to talk to Mason, right now. And since he’d started this awkwardness and avoidance, if he wanted it to end, then he needed to be the one to reach out.

Hopefully, Mason would take his hand.

Standing, Rain brushed leaves from his pants, the motion causing the little bird to fly away. Going inside, he hung up his jacket, taking in the open studio and darkroom doors. Crossing the main room, he glanced around trepidatiously. His old self would think being this careful around Mason was ridiculous but their connection was fragile and littered with cracks. One false step and what they had would shatter.

Quietly searching, Rain checked the bedroom and the studio first, listening for sounds from upstairs. This wasn’t the first or even the twentieth time that Mason had vanished, hunting throughout the house for an old piece of equipment or something that his grandmother had, and Rain closed the studio door, poking his head into the darkroom just to be sure that Mason wasn’t lurking silently out of sight.

Covering his nose to keep the vinegar scent at bay, Rain peeked behind the small table in the back but Mason was still nowhere to be found. The space was messier than the last time he’d seen it, with more stacks of pictures in the front, and Rain glanced at one of them, noticing that it was from the day of the fire.

Picking up the top photo, his eyes widened. Mason had captured the moment when Kate had cried out in pain, the pan hovering in midair a few inches away from her burned hand. The next picture was of the pan hitting the floor, and as he sifted through the pile it was like a flip book, the fire catching so quickly that the flames grew an alarming amount from one shot to the next.

But he shouldn’t be in here gawking and rummaging through Mason’s things, especially when he wanted to sit down and talk to Mason, risk his feelings, and give it one more try. Becauselikewasn’t a strong enough word to describe how Rain felt. While he’d previously thought of it as obsession on both sides, now he was contemplating a different four-letter word that held much more meaning.

Distracted, one of the photos fell from his fingers and he tried to catch it, clumsily dropping two more. Sucking air through his teeth, Rain crouched down, gathering them quickly, but one had landed in the doorway, and as he reached for it he noticed that the sheet behind the shelving unit was twisted up on the bottom corner, and there was something on the wall under it, something familiar.

Getting down on his hands and knees, Rain studied the small sliver of photo he could see and adrenaline blasted through his system.

Was that…his chin?

Limbs shaking, he pushed himself back up, dropping the photos on the table and taking things off the shelving unit without hesitation. It was all remarkably light and he managed to clear it all in under a minute, squinting at the screech as he pulled the metal shelves along the floor.

The sheet fluttered from all the motion and Rain grasped it in a trembling fist, taking a deep breath that he choked on as he ripped the cloth away.

What the actual fuck.

The entire wall, from floor to ceiling, was covered in pictures of him, and Mason had gotten artistic with the development because Rain looked downright angelic in some shots and alien in others. But why hide this? He’d wallpapered the rest of the room with photos why was this differ-

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