He Loves Him Page 23

  “They kicked you out of their lives. You don’t owe them anything. If you go it needs to be for you, not for them,” I tried to explain to him. Deep down he knew all of that, but certainly in the moment he wasn’t thinking about any of that.

  “I don’t want to feel guilty.”

  “I’m not saying you shouldn’t go. Just that if you don’t want to you don’t have to. It doesn’t make you a bad person, or a bad son.” I placed my hand against his heart and felt it beat while he kept silent again. He was thinking again, I assumed. Ten, twenty, thirty, forty, fifty beats.

  “I don’t have anything to wear to a funeral,” he said suddenly.

  Maybe I couldn’t make a decision for him, but I could fix that problem. “It’s only an hour away from my place, right?”

  He nodded.

  “If you want we can go down and find something for you to wear. Stay at my place the night before, then go the next morning. I might even have something in my closet there you can borrow. If you don’t want to though we don’t have to. It’s up to you,” I offered.

  He went silent, and I was left focusing on his heartbeat again. Ten. Twenty.

  “Leave tomorrow after my shift?” he said after a while.

  “Sure.”

  “Okay. Let’s do that,” he said and for the first time ever his voice sounded small to me.

  “Okay,” I said gently.

  “What time is it?” He asked.

  “Eleven. Want to get some sleep?”

  “Yeah,” he said and leaned further into me until I had no choice but to lie down and bring him with me. I wrapped both my arms tighter around him and scooted further up the bed, pulling him with until my head reached the pillow. He nuzzled against my chest and slid one arm under my back while the other clutched at my shirt.

  “Don’t leave,” he whispered.

  “I won’t.” I slid my hand over his and linked my fingers with his.

  I watched as he closed his eyes and waited the ten minutes it took until his body relaxed and I knew he was asleep. Then I kept watching him for another two hours afterwards. I was worried about him. He didn’t cry, he didn’t react at all beyond sitting and staring at nothing. That wasn’t normal, it wasn’t healthy. I didn’t know much about losing someone, or multiple people, but I did know he should’ve had more of a reaction.

  Carefully, I reached down and pulled the covers up over us. I made sure both our alarms were turned on then placed our phones on the nightstand. I watched him for another half hour while I lightly played with his hair. The motion was relaxing, and he seemed to smile a little in his sleep when I started. A little while later I fell asleep with my hand still buried in his hair and the other holding his.

  When I woke up in the morning it was to my alarm and not his. I rolled and swiped at my phone until it turned off. I was confused. Kit’s alarm should have gone off first, but he and his phone were nowhere to be found. I looked back at my phone again and squinted at the screen. There was a text from Kit.

  K: Woke up and couldn’t fall back to sleep, went to the library. Don’t worry, I’m okay. :)

  R: Thanks for letting me know. We still leaving after your shift?

  K: Yeah. Pack for me?

  R: Sure :P

  I sighed and put the phone away again. I didn’t believe for a minute he was okay. He never answered his phone that fast while he was at the library for one, more importantly there was no way he was okay after finding out his parents died less than twenty-four hours before, even if they weren’t close. Also, he couldn’t sleep.

  The day went by pretty slowly from my point of view after that. I went to my one class for the day. I went back to the apartment and packed my bag for the weekend. I went into his room and packed then repacked his bag four times, not entirely sure what he would want or need this time around. Lunch was a sandwich and dinner was leftovers. I was standing in the kitchen putting dishes away when Kit finally came home.

  He walked into the kitchen and smiled at me. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” I said back, opening a cupboard to put the last bowl away, “You ready to go?”

  “Yeah. Are you?”

  “Yep, but, Kit are you sure you’re okay? I’m not trying to pester you about it or anything, I’m just worried.”

  “You’re fine,” Kit said. He stepped forward and kissed my cheek, “And I’m fine.”

  Well that was that then, I guess. I wasn’t going to push him about it again, at least not so soon. If he said he was fine, I’d believe him for now. We grabbed our bags and headed out then, just like it was any other trip we were taking and not like we were on our way to a funeral.

  Chapter 61- Kit

  April 28th, 2017

  We had fallen into bed exhausted as soon as we made it to his bedroom, but neither of us had fallen asleep right away. There was over an hour of us just cuddled up together talking and that was good enough of a reason for me to stay up. Riker was peacefully asleep now though, and I couldn’t bring myself to lie there hopelessly trying to sleep anymore.

  I eased myself away from him and out of the bed, making sure the blankets were still snuggly over him, and quietly snuck out of the room. I remembered a scrapbook of Riker growing up that his father had shown me the last time I had been here, and that sounded like something I could handle at the moment. Riker was so cute and adorable as a kid that I always smiled when I saw pictures of him from his childhood. I pulled it off the shelf and carried it over to the couch where I sat down and opened it up in my lap.

  Without fail, I smiled at the first picture of a wide eyed and mesmerized baby Riker reaching out with pudgy hands for the camera. Time seemed to slow as I took in every little detail of every picture, only turning the page when I thought I could perfectly recall the previous page. I knew by the time I finally fell asleep and woke up again, I wouldn’t remember more than a handful of these pictures and details, but right then it was keeping my mind busy and distracted.

  I was so absorbed in the various pictures of him playing with toys, learning to crawl and then walk, him with his family, and much more that I didn’t realize Mrs. Shahayer was in the room until I heard her say from right behind me, “You’re up pretty late.”

  Riker had said when we got in for the night that she had been out at one of those parties rich people threw to show off their wealth and other rich people felt obligated to attend. I assumed she had come home at some point while we had been in his room, but apparently, I was wrong. Who knew those parties could go as long as a college party.

  “Sorry. I just… sorry,” I mumbled, not really sure what I was apologizing for, but feeling for some reason like I needed to.

  “You’re fine, Kit,” she said, smiling kindly. It was vastly different from my previous encounters with her. This time, despite the elegant, way too pricy, outfit she was wearing, she seemed to have a more down to Earth air about her.

  She walked over and sat down next to me. Feeling like I had been caught red-handed, I lowered the scrapbook some more so she could see it. It was still on the pictures of Riker in various Halloween costumes over the years. Her smile widened ever so slightly as she gently reached out and lightly tapped the picture of Riker dressed as a red fairy complete with lines of gold sparkles along it and gold and red glitter all over his hair and face. I was guessing he was about four.

  “His father had to get that specially made for him. The stores only had purple and pink and Riker desperately wanted to be a boy fairy, not a girl fairy.”

  I huffed fondly and stared at the picture. If I had ever told my parents I wanted to be a fairy, they probably would’ve given me a stern lecture then ushered me as fast as possible into a firefighters costume or something. Boys dressing up as fairies on Halloween just wasn’t done. Yet there was little four-year-old Riker not caring what was considered normal, and his parents loved him enough to let him be that way.

  Tears were threatening to spill from my eyes and I hastily wiped at them before they could fall onto one of
the pictures. Mrs. Shahayer laid a hand gently on my shoulder, “Are you okay?” she asked.

  I didn’t know how to say what I was thinking without sounding stupid, and I was thinking that I was extremely grateful Riker’s parents loved him and accepted him the way my parents never did with me. I was thinking how most parents wouldn’t let their son go out in that costume no matter how much they loved them. I wanted to thank her for being a good mother to him, but that would be weird, wouldn’t it? So, what actually came out of my mouth was, “Why didn’t my parents love me like this?” and I gestured toward the scrapbook.

  It was a question that had been floating around in my head for years, but that I had never felt the need to search for an answer to it before, so I had always pushed it to the back of my mind. I didn’t think I’d ever ask it out loud, let alone ask it in front of one of Riker’s parents, but apparently my brain decided that I needed the answer now.

  “I’m sure they loved you, Kit. You have happy memories with them, don’t you?”

  I thought of all the times my dad would lift me onto his shoulders and run me around the yard while I pretended I was an airplane. When Mom would take me into the kitchen with her and teach me how to cook.

  “Yeah, I do, but they kicked me out, disowned me, watched as I got beat up. That’s not love,” I said, not managing to stop the tears this time.

  “Oh honey, they did love you,” she said as she reached out with one hand to clasp one of mine. “I promise you that. They wouldn’t have spent so much time making sure you had good memories growing up if they didn’t love you. That kind of love doesn’t just disappear. Unfortunately, it gets buried under hate, and misunderstanding, but it was still there deep down.”

  I didn’t know if I believed that or not, but it made me feel better knowing that somebody else thought it was true. The scrapbook weighed heavily in my lap and I couldn’t help but look back down at it again.

  “You know staring at his baby pictures isn’t going to change your past.”

  “No, I know, that’s not it. It makes me feel better. Knowing he had a completely different childhood from me. I’d hate the world a lot more if he had to go through what I did. I’m insanely grateful he has a more loving family than me.” And that pretty much summed up my emotions.

  Ever since I had found out my parents were dead, I had been sad, but not because they were gone. No, I had accepted long ago that they were out of my life, and any emotional attachment I had to them was severed minus the hurt they had left behind. I was sad because of all the things I never had and would never have. No loving parents, no family, no memories of parents that would jump through hoops to let me dress as a fairy so that I didn’t feel left out or different. That was what I was sad about, that piece that had always been missing from my heart even though I didn’t know it was gone. But Riker had that piece, the innocence and the love, and that meant the world wasn’t as terrible as it could be.

  “You know, Kit,” she said, pulling me from my thoughts again, “you’re part of this family too now.”

  I looked up at her. I hadn’t known that. I knew the Shahayer family liked me enough to be okay with me dating their son and being a minor blip in their lives. I hadn’t realized that they had accepted me into the folds of the family. But hearing her say that, it made something in me settle into place.

  “Now I do,” I said quietly.

  She smiled kindly again and said, “You are loved, Kit, don’t ever forget that.”

  I nodded, unable to form words past the lump that had just developed in my throat.

  “It’s getting late. You are more than welcome to stay down here and look at these photos for as long as you want, or watch TV, or whatever, but you’re going to have a long weekend and I think you should at least try and get as much sleep as you can. Goodnight, Kit,” she said, then stood up and left.

  For a few minutes I stayed there collecting myself and soaking in what she had just said. When I felt stable enough, I took one last glance at the scrapbook then flipped it closed and replaced it on the shelf.

  Riker was sprawled out on the bed when I made it back to his room but had pulled his pillow to his chest and was clinging to it. I walked over and gently pried the pillow away from him. Then I climbed into the bed and slid under his arm, taking the place of the pillow. On some sort of sub-conscious instinct, he snuggled his way further into me until he was practically lying on top of me. I smiled at him and closed my eyes.

  Chapter 62 – Riker

  April 29th, 2017

  “Get out of bed, Riker,” Kit said and tugged at my blanket.

  “Five more minutes,” I said and tugged my blanket back.

  “It’s been five more minutes, every five minutes for the last half hour. Get out of bed,” he said this time with a little force behind it and tugged the blanket halfway down my body.

  I groaned and rolled over so that I could look up at him. He looked almost grim. “I know that face. What do you want to talk about?”

  He sat down on the edge of the bed and said quietly, “I don’t know if I want you to go with me to the funeral.”

  I bolted upright and looked at him.

  He sighed and said, “It’s not that I don’t want you there. It’s that I don’t want you around those people.”

  I shook my head and said, “Kit, I don’t get it. You know I don’t care what they think.”

  “Ri, other than my aunt, I don’t know who’s going to be there, but I assume my parents’ friends will be there and the last time I so much as showed my face they beat me up. Maybe they react the same way again. Maybe they don’t, but I’m scared that if I go there with you it won’t be me that it happens to, it’ll be you. I won’t put you in a position where that’s a risk.”

  “Kit, I don’t care, if you want me there, I’ll be there. I don’t care about the risk.”

  “But I do. I can’t, won’t, watch them hurt you or let them make you watch the same thing happen to me. I can handle my parents’ deaths, I can handle the funeral, and I can handle facing all these people again, but I can’t handle that happening. You already got beat once this year, please don’t put yourself through that again. Don’t put me through that again.”

  I studied him for a moment and saw the pure fear in his eyes. “Okay, if it will put you at ease to have me stay here then I’ll stay, but Kit if you think they could do that again then why should you have to put yourself at risk? Why do you have to risk going through that again?”

  “Because I have to face my demons.” A single tear escaped down his face and my heart ached for him. I reached out and swiped it away, then let my hand rest on his cheek.

  “You be ready to call the police, or me.”

  He leaned into my hand and the corners of his mouth twitched up just a little. “I will. I promise.”

  “Alright. Should we go find you something to wear then?”

  He chuckled and said, “Whenever you’re ready, sleepy.”

  Two hours later, he had finally dragged me out of the house. We had made it as far as my car before I stopped moving again.

  “You gonna drive, Ri?” he asked after we had buckled the seatbelts, but I made no move to turn the car on.

  I took a deep breath, let it out, and said, “Well, where we are going depends on whether or not you’re going to let me pay for this.”

  “Riker,” he started sternly, but I cut him off.

  “No, listen. I know you don’t like me spending big money on you, but I also know you work hard for the money you have, and you barely get any of it to spend on yourself. You shouldn’t have to spend that money on something you’re going to wear one time to a funeral for parents who didn’t give a damn about you.” My mouth snapped shut as soon as I said that. I shouldn’t have said that, and he was giving me a hard look. “I’m sorry,” I said quickly, but as sincerely as I knew how to. It didn’t matter how accurate a statement it was. His parents had just died, and on some level, he still loved them and I knew that. I
t was out of line to say what I did right then.

  His face softened and when he said, “It’s okay,” it was just as soft.

  I took a deep breath to calm myself before continuing, “It’s just, if I can’t be there with you, then I can at least give you something to take with, or I guess wear in this case. And I know I haven’t worked for the money, but it has a habit of going to outfits that only get worn once to events I don’t even want to be at, and I think it’s better spent on a onetime outfit for you so you can use your hard earned money on something that you actually want to be spending it on.”

  Kit angled his head a fraction and smiled at me. “Did that make sense?” he asked.

  I chuckled. “I don’t even know.”

  Kit leaned over and kissed my cheek. “You can pay, but I don’t need anything fancy. I don’t want to stand out and I don’t think anyone else there will be trying too hard.”

  “Okay.” I started up the car finally and pulled out of the garage.

  We were both quiet for a few minutes, and then, “I know they’re gone, and you never met them, so maybe it doesn’t really matter, but you can hate them if you want. It’s fine by me.”

  I sighed and said, “See, the thing is, it doesn’t matter how I feel towards them. It matters what you feel towards them. And it matters that I don’t start talking without a filter and piss you off.”

  “You didn’t piss me off. Kinda caught me off guard is all,” he said. “You see, Riker, when you said that, one it was true, and second it made me realize that you kind of have a reason to feel that strongly about it. If your parents had treated you the way mine did, I would hate them too. I just wasn’t expecting you to say it, especially as strongly as you did. You don’t usually get like that. That’s kind of my thing,” he explained.

  “I do hate them. Because I don’t get how anyone could treat their kid like that. But I don’t want to hate them Kit. I don’t know if that means anything, but I don’t.”