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He reached out with a napkin and awkwardly wiped down my chin. “That’s okay.”
“Sorry,” I mumbled, trying to swallow at the same time. The embarrassment flooded in, but the food felt so good. My stomach was screaming but in a different way. Food. Tastes. Textures.
Ben picked up the mini burger with his fingertips and took a careful bite.
“Needs more seasoning. Perhaps a dash of barbecue sauce.”
I smiled. “I think I like barbecue sauce, if that’s what you put in this one.”
The whole mini burger disappeared into his mouth. Those lips. A droplet of juice ran into his stubble, and I reached out and wiped it away but kept my hand on his cheek.
My fingers were covered in sauce. I didn’t care. I was so overwhelmed by the world, and in that moment, it was just him and me here. The real me. Almost the old me I’d been as a child, but then I was a different me too, someone who had figured a few things out. Someone who took another handful of chips and shoved them into the ketchup without even thinking how it would look.
There was nobody watching. Just him and me. Us.
“You okay?” he asked quietly. “What do you need?”
I tried to breathe around the mouthful of wonder. There was a glass of water there too. I drained it in one go. Grabbed the last chip off my plate. Scrunched a lettuce leaf between my fingers and ate that as well. I wasn’t a fan of lettuce, but this one was crunchy, sweet perfection. I looked down at the plate, on which was a single crumb. I picked it up and ate it too.
My stomach was ready to explode. Heavy. So bloody heavy.
I felt like I hadn’t eaten in years.
“Have you got any chocolate?” I asked.
He looked at me like I’d lost all of my marbles, then reached out and held my hand.
“Just sit here with me for a minute. Then, if you want to go home, we’ll go right now. I don’t care about anything else. Work can sort itself out.”
“I’m good,” I said with conviction. My head was a bit cloudy, and I felt high—on calories no doubt—but it felt so good not to care. There was still a droplet of ketchup on my finger. I licked it off.
“Do you still want to go to this concert thing tonight?” he asked.
“Not really,” I admitted and released a breath. I hadn’t realised how wound up I was, but he had. Still holding my hand, he carefully extracted the napkin from my clenching fingers and took hold of that one too. Brought them up to his lips and kissed my knuckles.
Looked at me. The way he always did. With…
With love. Awe. And wonder.
I wanted to cry. Shout at him. Hug him. I wanted to be home in our bed with our yellow sheets where nothing could hurt us. I wanted more than this. I wanted all of it.
“You need to work.” I was rather proud of myself because I was thinking, and thinking properly. Organising things in a rational manner. For once, I was in control, real control, and my neurons were shooting at full throttle. It almost made my head implode. It definitely made my smile even wider than before. “I’ll stay here and catch up because I have a load of reports to write and stuff to sort, and I’ve kind of been slacking today. Then I’ll go with Mark to this concert, and when you come back after work, I’ll make you a snack.”
“A snack,” he mused. “Hu, you need to rest too. Don’t burn yourself out. Today was a busy day.”
“Today was a shit day, Benjamin,” I said in my snarkiest voice, which made him grin. I laughed. I felt sooo bloody good.
“If you need me…” He squeezed my hands, kissed them again. “You know where I am.”
“I do, and thank you. For coming and…I really needed you here after…all that.” Fuck. No crying. I was better than this. Stronger than this.
“Would I ever let you do things like this on your own? Never. I’d have run all the way here if I’d had to. You’re not on your own in this.”
“That would probably have killed you. You’d have fallen over and got yourself run over or something.”
“I was once a rugby legend, thank you very much.”
He could snark too. And I loved that about him. But his words were hitting home. I wasn’t on my own. I didn’t know what to feel but…loved.
