Safe and Sound

by Caitlin Ricci

  “Is it good?” I asked him. I was just trying to get Mason into having a conversation with me again. I knew the food was good. I’d been here plenty of times. Sometimes even once a week. The food was always great. But I wanted him to talk to me again.

  He nodded, then he looked over at me. “What’s it like? Dating multiple people at once?”

  I shrugged. “I’ve always been like that. I’ve never wanted to have a relationship with multiple people where we’re all together, but there are things that I like doing that Chester doesn’t want to or there’s things that he loves that I really don’t enjoy. I could go with him to those things, and I used to, but it’s a lot more fun for him to have someone that he can actually share those things with rather than me just tagging along because I’m trying to be nice. Like going to plays downtown. He loves them, so does Phillip. Or to drag shows. That’s very much not my scene.”

  Mason still looked a bit lost. “Then why not just have friends that he does that with? Why date them and not just be friends?”

  I smirked. “Because there are also sexual things that he likes that I don’t, and so forth. Why should he feel pressured to do something he doesn’t love just because I like it? And why should I miss out on something I really enjoy because I’m trying to be nice to him?”

  “Because isn’t that how relationships are supposed to be? Aren’t you supposed to compromise with everything?” Mason asked.

  That sounded horrible. “Maybe. I guess if you want to do that. But what’s something you love to do that no one you’ve ever dated has wanted to?”

  “I’ve never really dated,” he mumbled.

  “Your first kiss wasn’t with me, though, was it?”

  He shook his head.

  “So what did those guys not want to do?”

  “We never really got that far. But I like horseback riding. I wish I could do it more at the rescue, but Eli wants me to have a lot more experience first before he puts me on those horses that might be dangerous for me to ride. I’ve signed the waiver just like everyone else, but since he’s my best friend, he worries about me.”

  I could work with that. “So what if someone you really liked was allergic to horses or to hay or something. But you still liked them a lot and you liked everything else about them. Then you have this friend at the rescue and he likes you too, but maybe you’re really into comics and he doesn’t get them at all. So you have guy A to go to comic cons with and you have guy B to go riding with. And as long as you’re honest with both and you make time for both of them, no one has to get hurt or jealous. You use protection, and things don’t have to be complicated.”

  “You use protection with everyone?” He was staring at his food, pushing it around with his fork.

  I shook my head. “Yes and no. With everyone but Chester, I do. That’s our rule. I have specific days where I know he’s going to be out with Phillip. He’s only with Phillip, so I know he’s okay and everything is good there. Phillip is with a bunch of different guys, which would drive me nuts, but Chester doesn’t mind. He only cares about when Phillip is with him, and Chester uses protection with him. Phillip is off and on, and that worries me, but not enough that I’m willing to leave Chester over.”

  “I still don’t get it.”

  That was fine by me. “That’s not a big deal to me. If you have questions, I’d definitely answer them.” I wanted to get us to the part that I really cared about, though. “Can I still kiss you?”

  He shook his head as quickly as I’d asked the question. “You’re dating someone else. Is Chester the only guy you’re dating?”

  “He is, right now at least.”

  “I don’t want to kiss someone that is with someone else.” He didn’t seem happy about that either.

  “I understand.” I offered him my hand, and he looked down at it. Then, when I thought he was going to reject the idea of touching me completely, he slipped his fingers into mine. I gave his fingers a light squeeze. “Do you want to split some baklava?”

  He gave me a tiny smile. “Yeah. I think I would.”

  “So Chester just goes out with Phillip, and they do stuff, and you don’t care?” Mason asked me when we were halfway through our baklava a few minutes later.

  I nodded. “I really don’t. Sometimes we talk about the things they do together, like the plays that they see or a particularly gorgeous drag queen who performed the last time they were together. But he doesn’t tell me about the sex they had, and I don’t ask about it. We never see each other on the same days that he’s been on a date with Phillip, and before, back when I was dating other guys, I kept them separate as well. It’s part of respecting each other and what we have.”

  Mason pursed his lips, and I was sure that he would ask me more questions. I wasn’t against that at all. I didn’t mind answering his questions; I just wished that maybe he was open to being with me too. I wanted him to be in my life as more than just my occasional model.

  “What do you get from Chester? Besides sex.” He couldn’t even ask that question without blushing. I thought that was adorable.

  “We both love photography, that’s something. Phillip paints, but he likes what he interprets and then paints; I like capturing the little details in a moment with my camera. Chester does too. We go to exhibits together a lot, or we’ll go on hikes into the mountains in the fall to get some great shots of the leaves turning before they start down here in the city. I’m sure you have friends that you’re close to and you can only do things with them and no one else because no one else really gets you like that.”

  “Yeah, but I don’t have sex with him.”

  I shrugged. “The difference is that I decided to. There’s more to it than that, but that’s the big one. I find that it’s extremely easy and fulfilling to have this kind of relationship with someone as long as there’s a ton of communication going on. Without it an open relationship breaks down just as easily as any other one.” Dessert was done and we had the check. I paid and I was glad he didn’t say anything about it or try to argue with me at all. I didn’t want that. I just wanted him to relax and be more comfortable around me. He was always so tense and on edge, like he was waiting for something bad to happen to him. That couldn’t be his normal state, so I figured it had to be just how he was with me. “Do you want to come back to my place, or should I take you back to the rescue?”

  He pulled out his phone, maybe to check the time, then looked back over at me. “Everyone should be gone by now. We could head back and get you some of those pictures with the horses that you wanted while there’s still some light.”

  “Sure, let’s do that.”

  He got up, and I followed him back out to my car.

  Chapter Seven

  Mason

  IT STARTED raining on our way back to the rescue, so I thought maybe Oliver wouldn’t want to take pictures of the horses, and me with them too, after all, but once we got there, he followed me into the nearest barn.

  “Which is your favorite right now?” he asked me as he ran his fingers through his wet hair. His camera and the stuff for it were in a big plastic case, which I assumed was waterproof since he didn’t look all that worried about it.

  We were in the intensive care barn, and I didn’t do much work with these horses at all, so I didn’t know them very well. “These are all the sick or injured horses, or the ones that just need a lot more weight put on them and can’t be out with the others yet,” I explained as I looked into each stall to check on the horses one by one. It was habit. “I don’t spend much time in here, only Eli really does. Him and the vet.”

  “Jesus,” Oliver hissed, and I turned to see what had caught his attention. I found him at the stall of a recently brought in neglect case, and looking at her made me both angry and sick to my stomach.

  “She was neglected,” I explained, as if he couldn’t already tell that just by looking at her. We used a scale to determine just how bad off a horse actually was, and it went from one to nine based on t
heir body condition. A yearling Arabian filly like her should have been about a four probably. She was severely in the one category with every bone in her emaciated body clearly visible.

  “What’s her name?”

  I shook my head. “She doesn’t have one. Not yet at least. We really only just got her in two days ago, so everything is happening kind of fast for her. She’ll probably never be rideable, just because the neglect has stunted her growth, but once she’s healthy, someone may want to adopt her as a friend for another of their horses. Or she may stay here. We’ve got a few permanent residents here, though they’re mostly older horses that are too lame to be ridden by anyone.”

  “What would you name her?” Oliver asked. He took out his camera and began taking photos. I was surprised that he was taking some of me too. I still had all my clothes on.

  “Star.” It was unoriginal in the extreme, but she did have a little white mark on her forehead to break up her bright red coat.

  Oliver smiled over at me. “You don’t want to pet her? She seems friendly.” She was currently chewing on the arm of his jacket.

  “She is. But looking at her makes me sad.”

  He stopped taking pictures of her to come over and hug me. I liked being in his arms, even though I knew I wasn’t the only one he held like that. And when he kissed my head, that felt really nice too. He kissed my cheek and slid his hands under my shirt. I liked that, but I hated it at the same time because somewhere out there in the world was a guy named Chester, and Oliver did this to him too. I shook my head, and as soon as I did that, Oliver stopped.

  “Too much?” Oliver asked.

  I nodded. “I can’t do that. Not with you.” I hated how much I wanted to, though. I’d kissed a few guys before, but it never felt like this. I felt comfortable around Oliver, even when I was scared. It was like I knew that he wouldn’t try anything with me, even when I’d been naked. I’d had to be buzzed to get that way, but I knew that he could have had sex with me right then and I probably would have let him. I would have hated it right after, I was sure, but I would have let him. And then he didn’t.

  “I get it.” He didn’t sound happy about it, though. And he didn’t let me go. I didn’t want him to either.

  “Chester is lucky,” I mumbled.

  He chuckled. “Maybe. Maybe not. Are you comfortable doing some photos tonight?”

  I wasn’t really feeling like it, but he had said that we might be able to work out the three hundred I needed, and I was worried he might not want to see me again after this. “What do I need to do in order to work off the three hundred I need?”

  He stepped back and scowled. “First of all, don’t say it like that. Just like I told you not to get drunk around just anybody, don’t say things like that around most people. They’ll take advantage of you.”

  “Like overworking me or something?” I really didn’t know what he was getting at.

  “You can’t be that naive. I meant like someone saying they’ll give you the money if you let them have sex with you.”

  My cheeks were hot again, and I considered what that would be like. Could I do that, if the person asking me was Oliver? Probably not. I needed the money, but I thought I might hate myself if I got it like that.

  “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be. Just don’t assume the world is nice and fair either. It’s not. There are a lot of shitty people out there, and you need to be smarter than that.”

  He didn’t have to tell me there were awful people around. I knew that already. I sniffled and hated that I was crying so easily lately. Thankfully my phone started ringing, breaking me out of the moment we were in. I looked at it, ignored the call, and quickly put it away again.

  “Eli checking up on you?” Oliver guessed.

  I shook my head. “My mom. She’s been calling me a lot lately. I… uh… left when she wasn’t home. I don’t know what her boyfriend told her about why I did it, but I doubt he said the truth.”

  “And that would have been what? That he was an ass and caused the fight between you?”

  I wished it had been that simple. That would have made life so much easier. If it had just been a fight about cleaning my room or something, I could have let it go and I would have gone back home and apologized for being a jerk and then done what I’d been asked to do. But it wasn’t about that, and I couldn’t go back, but I couldn’t tell her what John had been doing either. She wouldn’t have understood, and I’d already let it go too long anyway.

  “It’s nothing.”

  Oliver pulled me into another hug, and then this time when he let me go, he kept his arm around my shoulders. “If you tell me what really happened, I’ll give you the money. No other work needed. Just the truth. Can you do that?”

  His offer surprised me. “Why does it matter to you so much?”

  “Because you look like you need to tell someone.”

  I needed the money, and I didn’t think Oliver would say anything to anyone. We didn’t know any of the same people after all. And it was an easy way to make the money I needed to get.

  “I wouldn’t owe you anything?”

  “Definitely not. Want to go somewhere to talk?”

  I’d been sleeping on a couch in the office. That would probably be the easiest place for us to go. “Sure. I’ll lead the way.” He put his camera away and locked everything back up, and then I led him to the office. We had a space set up in one of the unused stalls in another of the barns too, but the main office was a trailer by the front of the parking lot by the main gate. It was raining harder as we walked between the pastures and over to the trailer.

  When we got inside, I was soaking wet, and I took off my long-sleeve shirt since I had a T-shirt under it. Then I sat down on the couch and waited for him to get comfortable too.

  “Where do you want me to start?” I asked.

  “Let’s go from what made you leave home.”

  I looked down at my hands. I couldn’t meet his gaze while talking about this. “My mom’s boyfriend was mad that I’d been out drinking when I came home from seeing you last time, and we argued.” I licked my lips and knew that wasn’t quite right. I hadn’t left because John didn’t want me drinking. “He kept touching me.” I shivered. I wasn’t good at talking about this. Maybe if I’d had more practice, but there was no one that I really wanted to open up about this with.

  “Do you want him to go to jail?”

  I shook my head. I didn’t want to deal with him ever again. I didn’t want to go to the police. I didn’t want anything.

  “Then what do you want?”

  “Him gone and never near my mom again. I want him out of the house.” I took a deep breath and rubbed my hands together. “And I want her to believe me for once. I don’t want her to say that I don’t know what really happened or that I thought that it was different than it really was. I don’t like it, so there’s got to be something wrong with what he’s doing. Right?”

  I wiped at my eyes. I was crying again. When I looked up at him, Oliver was watching me closely. “I think there is. So you’d be happy if he was gone, but you don’t want him in jail, right? And you need a way for your mom to believe you without question so that he leaves.”

  I nodded. He had everything down.

  “So I think what you need to do is videotape him doing whatever it is to you that you hate, then you can tell him to leave or else you’ll show it to the cops, and you can show it to your mom, and then she’ll have to believe you. There’s really not enough to arrest him, unless there’s more going on than what you’ve told me, but maybe the threat of going to jail will be enough to get him to back off.”

  It was a good idea, and it would probably work, but I hated the idea of going back there and being around him again. “I’d have to see him again.”

  “You’d have to let him do whatever it is that you hate so that you could get a video of it.”

  That idea made my stomach clench. “I can’t. I won’t. He’s….” I shook my head. I was
too scared to do that. I definitely couldn’t make myself do what Oliver said I should, even if it meant ending this completely.

  “What if I was with you? Or if Eli was?”

  Eli would likely go off on John, and I didn’t want Eli in jail for doing his best to protect me. But Oliver seemed to be much more levelheaded than Eli was. I wasn’t as worried about Oliver trying to kill John on my behalf or anything like that.

  “It would be better with you. But if I brought you to the house, then he wouldn’t do anything. It only ever happens when we’re alone together.”

  Oliver went quiet for a few moments while he seemed to be thinking about the same problem as I was. Only, he seemed to be trying to come up with a solution and I was still trying to wrap my head around being alone with John again and not feeling sick about that.

  “What if you invited him here? You could do it tonight. I’d hide behind the desk or something. The second you needed me, I could jump out, but you’d have the proof you’d need, and he would leave.”

  “What if he doesn’t leave my mom? What if he stays there anyway?” It was a real possibility.

  “Would your mom let him stay after knowing what he was doing to you and how long it’s been going on?”

  I shook my head. She definitely wouldn’t have done that. The problem was that I’d never been able to convince her that something was happening before, so I didn’t even try now. She hadn’t believed me, and that had hurt a lot. I didn’t want to go through that again.

  “Just think about it. We’ve got as long as you need.”

  I was thinking about it. I was thinking so hard, in fact, that my head was spinning. “You’d stay here?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Why are you being so nice to me?” I pulled my legs under me. I was so confused right now.

  Oliver just shrugged as he smiled over at me. “Because I like you.”

  “I can’t date you.”

  He laughed a little. “Because of Chester. I know.”

  I nodded. That was exactly why. “I’m sorry.” I wasn’t even sure why I was apologizing to him, or what I was apologizing for.