But he doesn’t pull away.
He chases my hand until it’s back in his, keeping his head right where it’s been this whole time. He looks up at me, and I look down at him, and his eyes are doing the careful thing, and Iknew this would happen—
“I’m not angry that you didn’t tell me.”
I nod, but I can’t get any words out.
“I just.” He searches my face. “Why didn’t you? I— I wouldn’t have—” He stops, his voice cracking and his eyes fill with tears,andthis is my fault. “If I had known, I never would have pressured you into—”
“I didn’t want you to know.”
His mouth snaps shut.
I didn’t want Mike to know, but now he does. And the only thing I can do is tell him the truth. It’s what he deserves after everything I’ve put him through.
“I didn’t want you to look at me differently,” I start, brushing the tears from his cheeks. “You looked at me like I was a person. Someone you wanted to be with. Everyone who knows looks at me like I’m broken.”
“If I told you,” I continue, “you would have looked at me the way they do. The careful look. The sad eyes. The way you are now. And I couldn’t lose that. For the first time in my entire life, someone actually wanted me, and I didn’t want to lethimruin that for me.”
Mike hasn’t said a single word, but he hasn’t let go of me either.
“But jokes on me. I went and ruined us because I couldn’t hold it together for five fucking minutes. So, I guess you were always gonna find out eventually.”
He keeps his eyes on his tears landing on the blanket, sniffling, and I’m sure I’ve lost him. Why would he want to put up with this? It’s too much. I know it is. I knew from the beginning, that’s why I never told him.
“I don’t see you any differently,” he speaks up, finally. “I want you to know that. Whatever you think is going to change about how I look at you.” He shakes his head. “That’s not true.”
I close my eyes, accepting my fate one way or another.
“What happened to you doesn’t change who you are,” he says, reaching for my cheek and tilting my face down to look at his tear-stained face. “You’re still Alex to me. That asshole doesn’t have any power here. He doesn’t change a thing abouthow much I—” He stops himself from finishing the sentence, clearing his throat and looking down.
“He was my boyfriend,” I tell him. If there’s a chance that we can move past this, I’m moving on with the whole truth out there. “Everyone thinks it was one time,” I say, feeling him freeze against me. “But it went on for almost a year. And it wasn’t always—”
I stop. Deep breathe. Try again.
“He wanted things all the time. And I did them because I wanted to. I thought he loved me. But he never wanted to touch me.”
Mike hugs me tighter, scoffing. “Who wouldn’t want to touch you?” He mumbles into my chest, breaking some of the tension I feel building in my body.
“Jason,apparently. He said it was too gay. I did everything he wanted because I thought we would be real someday. When he felt like he could come out.”
I look at the wall across the room, burying my face in Mike’s hair for the next part. But I have to tell him everything. Even if he doesn’t want me anymore after.
“It always hurt. He would fuck my mouth too hard. He would fuck me too hard. I don’t think it ever crossed his mind to worry about how it felt for me. And somewhere along the way, I started to think that was how it was for people like me.”
Mike makes a broken sound against me, and I almost stop, but I have to tell him this part.
“I know what it looks like. But I’m not—it’s not that I don’t want to suck your dick. Or get fucked. I do. You have no idea how badly I wish I could do that. But I can’t make my body understand that it’s safe with you.”
He nods, looking up with a smile. “We don’t have to do those things, Alex. I was happy with the way things were before until Trent got in my head. You know I love it when you fuck me.”
I shake my head, not willing to accept that this time. I know Mike needs more than what I can give him. “It’s not okay, Mike. Talking about what happened has made me realize that I didn’t treat you all that differently than he treated me.”
The words come, careless, but the nausea follows as the reality sets in.
I don’t bottom.
I can’t ever come out.
