Page 85 of Hilarina and the Ogre

And all the accusations were true.

He had run away, just like Hilary said. Had betrayed his beloved and run off and left him when he needed him most. Not once, which would have been bad enough, but seven times. Seven separate instances of forgetting that spanned over a decade, two of which had been longer than this one now. Hilary was right about the kitchen. Trenton had chosen not just the paint, but the appliances, the placement of everything. Hilary had given him free rein. And in all that time, in all those meetings and lives together, they had been many things to each other. Friends, colleagues, neighbors, fellow students, rivals, and even lovers. He was not, as he had thought, a virgin. He and Hilary had slept together in two of their seven relationships. One of those times had been a disaster. Trenton had remembered a part of their past together halfway through the act, and the next moment he’d been out in the street, his feet bare, having forgotten again. But the other time—two meetings before—had not been anxious at all. Maybe they hadn’t had sex as much as other couples, reserving it mostly for special occasions, but it had been loving. Passionate. And just thinking of it had the tears streaming down his face. All of it—every one of those sacred meetings—he’d dumped from his mind like so much trash. They’d gone to college together. Worked at a café together. Had even come close to disliking each other once during the period of nursing school when Hilary had been so burned out with stress and loneliness that the man had tried, for once, to cut him off. That terrible time had lasted nearly nine months before the pull became too strong, and they were brought together again. But always, always, Hilary had loved him. Not for one day—not for one minute—had that waned. Hilary had been there for him. Had protected him. And had never, not once, punished him for it.

Hilary should have. Like his mother had with Amelia, so small, and so loud. The little creature would cry and cry, his sister and her sore tummy. Trenton hadn’t been allowed to touch her. She’d been too little, and so had he been. But he’d rubbed that small tummy over and over with his chubby hand and told her not to cry, please not to cry, mommy would be home soon, and it would all be okay. Except it hadn’t been. For little Amelia, nothing had been okay.

And then she’d died.

She’d been dead before his mother had ever left the house that day. Trenton knew, because she’d been quiet that whole night—and night was her worst time. Always before he’d been up for large chunks of it, with one of his fat arms stuck between the bars of her crib, rubbing her tummy over and over and waiting for the morning to come. But that night he had slept the whole way through, and when he woke, his mother had been quiet too, and then she’d left the house, and it had only been him and his sister and all that quiet. It was the first time he'd lifted her, had taken her up into his lap, her little mouth tinted blue, only a doll, not his sister anymore, and he’d rubbed her tummy, even though she didn’t need it anymore, telling her that mommy would be home soon and that it would be okay. But it hadn’t been okay, and when the police found him three days later, he was in the kitchen, alone. And he didn’t have a little sister, he told them. Because he had forgotten. They found Amelia under the bed, wrapped in her blanket with a bottle of old formula tucked inside of it with her. His tiny sister. The only person in the world he had loved as much as Hilary. And he had forgotten both of them.

Hilary dragged him to the main room before his energy gave out. Then his beloved crawled a short way to the end of the room and had a panic attack that was mostly silent except for the vomiting at the end.

Trenton watched it happen. He could squirm around a little, and he did, angling himself to see Hilary as best as he could. But he didn’t go to him, sure that would only make it worse. He had done this, had made Hilary believe he had to go through it alone, and that’s what Hilary was doing, being quietly sick, unable to look at him, to go to him, to trust him enough to see him through it—because he hadn’t.

Hilary left to shower after that. Or maybe he only turned on the shower and sat in the bathroom. The man did that sometimes. For the sound of it, and to be alone. Hilary left the door open, though. Probably to listen out to hear of any potential escaping. It was one of the reasons Trenton needed Hilary to take the tape off his mouth. With that, he could have promised, at least, not to go anywhere. That he wouldn’t leave even if he was forced to. But what would that do? A few words couldn’t erase fifteen years of betrayal. He could only watch the bathroom and wait.

The shower was shorter than usual. When Hilary came out, he came to the bed to look at his partner, eyes intent, desperate but untrusting. The man never turned his back on Trenton, eyes on him as he pulled on some sweats. But Hilary couldn’t approach. As if his friend was toxic now with his memories back. But Hilary couldn’t keep away either. He hovered there at the edge of the bed, his breathing shallow and fast.

Come. If the man had ever truly been a mind reader, Hilary would have heard the verbal command, repeated over and over. And maybe he did, because Hilary seemed to grow more distressed with each passing minute until he let out an angry kind of wail and kicked the bed frame. “Why now? Is it all just a joke? Is my whole life a joke to you?”

Trenton couldn’t speak. He could try to make sounds through the tape, maybe, but he knew that would cause distress. Hilary was saying the words, but not really asking. The man didn’t expect, or even want, an answer. Not from him. So Trenton only looked at his beloved, trying to be calm, to be thinking of what was best, but the memories were an endless onslaught. He kept seeing it, feeling it, the way his body had reacted to that invasion, how his own flesh seemed to tear with it. And the demon who had done it, alive even in death. It wasn’t enough to have killed him, and Trenton hadn’t forgotten. It had been inside him all that time and always would be.

Hilary knelt, pressing his face into the mattress, and made that angry wail again. Each time he did it, Trenton felt his wrists jerk against the tape. Needing to take hold, to check over and analyze every hurt, every place that touch may have scarred his darling.

Come up on the bed. He was begging it with his eyes, trying to get Hilary to lift his face. Look at me. Come up where I can see you.

But Hilary didn’t look at him. Even when he finally did rise, it wasn’t to look at him. The man lay down there on the bed, at the edge of it, and cried like a puppy without a mother.

Trenton felt it when his wrists began to bleed, trickling down into his palms to dry in a sticky kind of residue, but there was no point to it. Hilary needed him to be still, to not escape, but god, what he wouldn’t have given to pull the man closer, every one of those sobs another accusation, one more sin for him to carry. Call Annette, was the next order he tried to push out with the mental shouting. Please call her. Perhaps she was on her way already. He couldn’t imagine she’d stay away if she thought Hilary was in danger. But they weren’t in the same town anymore. Not the same state. Nor even the same part of the country. It wouldn’t be easy for her to come, and not soon in any case.

Trenton made the choice to move. The wrong choice, it turned out. The moment he clenched his muscles to take that first squirming inch, Hilary was up like a strike of lightning. “Don’t!” It was pure panic again, his shout going shrill with it.

Trenton froze where he was, but it wasn’t enough. Hilary made a sound like he was being torn apart and flung himself down against the mattress again, sobbing like his heart was being crushed inside him.

Chapter Twenty-Five

Take a Bite

It was a long night. A very long night. Hilary dozed on and off. But every time he woke, it was with a jolt that inevitably brought the crying with it. Exhaustion was doing the man no favors, and the stress of his situation was only making him more and more vulnerable to the pain of it. It was like watching his friend’s sanity shred to powder in real time. “I hate you!” Hilary shouted during the peak of it. Right after a nightmare when the waking was particularly frightening. “I hate loving you! I hate it!” But of course, that wasn’t like hating at all. Hilary wouldn’t be hurting nearly this much if he truly hated him. And Trenton knew it was despicable to find relief in that. He should have been hoping for Hilary’s hate, for the man to find release in it. But he couldn’t want that. So long as they were both alive, he would always try to meet him. Would always try to win him and take that love again. Always. It was the most important thing. And Hilary suffered for it. Was suffering right now in front of him.

Trenton gave up trying to unclench his fists. The pain of it was soothing, in a way. Like being punished for his thoughts. But not enough. He kept wishing for Hilary to be closer and not getting it.

The day passed in that way. Hilary didn’t go to work. He wasn’t sure the man even called in to cancel, though he must have, or his phone would have been ringing off the hook. Hilary didn’t eat. He did have some juice, but he threw it up.

Trenton told himself not to panic. Panicking wouldn’t help. But seeing Hilary in that state and knowing he could do nothing about it was so frightening he was starting to lose it, the black at the edges of his vision warning him that he was hyperventilating. He promised himself that in the event Hilary did get sicker, he might manage something. Hilary had taped him all around, and his wrists weren’t just lashed to each other but to his body as well. It was the same with his ankles and his legs. It would be difficult even to squirm, never mind cut himself free, so it would take at least a day to manage. If that was the timeline, then to keep Hilary from the worst of the danger, he couldn’t put off his escape for much longer. If his beloved hadn’t eaten or drunk anything by that night, he’d make his move no matter what reaction Hilary might have to it.

But Hilary did manage to take in a little something. Some water at least. Trenton thought maybe there would be food too, but when Hilary finally got up, it was to feed him, not himself, or at least, some version of feeding. Hilary cut away a little of the tape, enough to expose one of his arms and the crook of one elbow. And as his friend tied the tourniquet, Hilary spoke to him for the first time that day. “Make a fist.”

Trenton’s hands weren’t quite numb, but they weren’t exactly responsive. Not that he was planning to listen. He jerked his head toward the kitchen and glared.

Hilary glared right back, his eyes still puffy from crying, his mouth bloodless. “I’m not letting you out.”

To be thinking of escape would have put him in the same vile pit as Axel and his cronies. No, Trenton had no intention of escaping. He was exactly where he wanted to be, albeit in less-than-ideal circumstances. He jerked his head toward the kitchen again and made a low sound, trying to issue it like a command.

Hilary turned away from him to prepare the needle. It wasn’t propofol like he’d threatened, but intravenous fluids—a double standard, and Trenton put his mental commands out on blast the whole time Hilary was hooking him up, which wasn’t for very long. The man was an uncommonly good stick, even for a hospital nurse with a decade’s experience. Honestly, Trenton was still waiting for the needle to prick him when he realized it was already over, and the fluid was dripping into him, everything taped neatly down. Hilary had already left the room.

Trenton could only pray it was to go to the kitchen, and he was right. A few minutes later, the man returned with a peanut butter sandwich. It was disappointing to see only one when he knew Hilary could put away four, but Trenton did give some allowance for the situation. Or so he thought, but then the sandwich was set down on the nightstand without a single bite taken. That brought the glare back to his face in full force, but Hilary didn’t even notice. He was messing around with yet another thing. There was a water basin and something Trenton recognized as baby oil once it was close enough.

That was when Hilary took him by the chin—the first deliberate touch (apart from the intravenous hookup, which didn’t count) and said, with draconian seriousness. “One word, any word, and you can forget about me taking it off again. I’ll do tubal feedings. Don’t think I won’t.”