Page 28 of Forever Not Yours

“I didn’t think you wanted…someone like me.”

Oh god. Here were the tears again. My eyes squeezed shut as I held onto him. Oh, Bastien. Did he have any idea what he did to me?

“You’re not an easy man to love,” came out of me with more force than I expected. “But I have. From the first day I met you. It’s just like it is, and I havespent my whole life dealing with it. And I still do. I deal with it every day. Like I am dealing with it right here. I am lying here thinking that if I let go of you now, you’ll leave me and never come back. And then I’ll go on forever not being…yours. It’s all I ever wanted to be, yours. The one you loved back.”

Fuck me and my bloody emotions. Enough, Jake. Fucking enough.

“I think Flossie has pooped on the floor. I can smell it.”

I laughed. A weird bit of relief, where I felt so tense that I thought I would just shatter.

He let go of me, and moved, and as he did my whole body tensed up. Like I’d just laid myself bare, right here on a Saturday morning, and he would just walk away. Leave me to lie here, broken and crushed.

He didn’t. He just turned around and scooped me up, let my head come to a rest against his chest. His stupid T-shirt all crumpled. Wet on the back from my tears no doubt. I bunched up the fabric in my hand and held on to him as he wriggled around, tugged the duvet over my back and sighed. Then we lay there in the silence. Flossie running around, yapping out inthe living room, but it was almost like time stood still. Just for a little while.

“I didn’t know…how you felt,” he said, almost like he was tasting the words. “Not until Juliet told me, and even then, I didn’t. I still don’t get what is going on here. Why I behaved the way I did that night. And most of all why you let me.”

“You let me. I was off my head too, but Bastien?” I lifted my head and made him look at me. My finger tilting his chin. Back in control. Fuck. I needed to be in control here. “I have no regrets. Zero. Absolutely none. Because, like I said, it took me years to figure out what I like, and with that I learnt a thing or two about my partners. And looking back, I should have seen things, and done things differently, years ago. Because it was always there. The way I felt around you and the way you reacted to things I said. And if I’d been braver and more on the ball, I might have acted on it and we would have been in a different place now.”

“Or things would have gone horribly wrong.”

“Maybe.”

He was right. But I felt better now, having finally almost stopped the crying. I wasn’t even embarrassed about that, instead feeling more in control.

“You are brilliant, hardworking and successful. I don’t need to know anything about what you do at work to know that. You’re sharp and clever and straightforward.”

“Work is simple. Easy rules and I just follow them. Even when I have to pit up and play the numbers against each other, there are still rules. But out of work I just feel like everything is chaotic. Especially now.”

“I get that,” I mumbled into his chest. How lovely this was. Just lying here, talking to him. Listening to his soft voice rumbling in his chest. His breaths. The steady beat of his heart.

“You keep saying that I need things. That you will give me what I need. I don’t know what the fuck I need, Jake, but what do you need? I mean, yeah, all right, there are feelings there, as strange as it seems to me, but the hell, Jake. You need to talk too.”

Wow. We were actually doing this. Talking.

“This,” I answered. I was as bad as him. One-word answers. “It’s hard to explain how this would all panout. In an ideal world I want you in my life. As my partner. But I don’t even know how you feel about me. About this. About the fact that you let me fuck you, yet you were going to marry Juliet, and I haven’t got a fucking clue about what is going on in your head.”

Bad move, Jake. Bad move. I could feel him tense up, his breath back to small huffs. But I just couldn’t stop myself.

“I just know that sometimes you feel out of control, but I know you, I know what you’re like, and then I hear all these things about you, and it just doesn’t add up, Bastien.”

Another huff. Silence. A long, drawn-out breath.

“You need to ask, then,” he whispered.

We were on the same page. Thank fuck for that.

“When did you first get with a man?”

He snickered, half flustered. His arm rising and then falling back onto my shoulder, moving to my head. Soft strokes through my hair. I wasn’t kidding when I’d said I needed this. Being held. Feeling close to him.

“Get with a man,” he repeated, softly mocking me. “First time I let someone fuck me was one of those stupid drunk encounters. Thought it would be a good idea at the time. It was a bloody disaster, because he was a bit rough, and I was terrified, but then at the same time? I fucking loved it. Not the best thing to happen to a straight bloke.”

Good stuff. I tapped him gently on the chest. Laid my head back down. He wouldn’t look at me anyway. I didn’t expect him to.

“See, I’m not like you,” he continued, his voice stronger. “I’m not one of these gay blokes. I love women. Really love girls, and everything they are. I love the company, and the curves and softness, and nice boobs and all the hair…” He drew a breath, moved gently in what I thought might have been frustration. “It’s a problem. A huge fucking problem.”

I nodded, because that part made sense.

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