Liam gave him a look.
A look similar to Ezra’s—raised eyebrows, pursed mouth, almost pitying expression.
The look that said, “Aren’t you?”
Jesse saw red and curled his fists. Liam saw, and pulled another face. The face of a condescending, pretensions dick.
“Is that how you solve your problems?” he sneered.
“Shut the fuck up.”
“What happens when you argue with him, Jesse? Do you just shout until he shuts up, or do you hit him? You certainly leave fingerprints. Do you shake him as well?”
“I’ve never hit him in my life,” Jesse snarled.
“You do surprise me,” Liam snarled back. “You must outweigh him by a considerable amount, and it’s all muscle, I can see that. Never put it to use?”
“Not with violence,” Jesse snapped.
“But you do use it, then?”
Of course he used it. Ezra liked being manhandled, he’d said so himself. Right? “Never in any way he wouldn’t—”
“Of course, violence isn’t the only part of an abusive relationship. He said you were jealous, which is typical of the insecure type that instigates these things. Possessive, too, I can see that for myself. Do you check his phone and Facebook account as well? Like to know where he is all the time? Check up on him?”
“No, I fucking—” Jesse began, then the dark part at the back of his brain, the bit that likened him to his father, reminded him how he’d found out what Liam was saying about him, that Liam was even in touch with Ezra. On Ezra’s phone.
“So you do,” Liam said flatly. “And when that’s not enough? When he gets angry at you for doing it? Then what?”
“Listen, you fucking weasel, if you don’t shut your fucking trap, I’ll—” Jesse exploded.
“You’ll what?” Liam sneered.
“Oi!”
They both jumped.
“That’s not playing nice,” Ezra said, sliding back into his chair just in time to stop Liam getting a smack in the mouth. “I could hear the two of you arguing from the toilets.”
Jesse flexed his fingers. Ezra almost casually slid his hand across the wood and slipped it into the space. Jesse gripped back gratefully.
“What were you arguing about?” he asked.
“Nothing,” Jesse said, flagging down the waiter for another beer. A sorely needed beer. Because if this underwear-modelling wanker carried on, even Ezra’s serene influence might not be enough to stop Jesse rearranging those perfect teeth.
“Yes,” Liam said slowly, and smiled at Ezra. “So how do you work around Jesse’s…shifts at work?”
“Okay, no,” Ezra shook his head. “No, I’m not doing this. You’re not here to catch up, you’re here to wind Jesse up and make digs at my relationship. Stop it, Liam. I like you, you’re a great guy, but then you get like this and you turn into the massive prick that your firm hired. Jesse and I are leaving, and you’re going to think about the simple fact that no matter what you say or do, I am not getting back together with you, and if you want to actually try and be friends, without taking shots at my boyfriend all the time, I’ll listen. But for now, back off.”
“Ezzy, I—”
“No,” Ezra said sharply, then he was standing. “It would have been nice to see you, Liam, but you’ve changed,” he said, tugging Jesse by the hand. Jesse was more than happy to go and slid his arm around Ezra’s waist briefly as they approached the door.
He glanced over his shoulder. Liam was staring at that arm and looking unnervingly grim.
Chapter Nine
The walk home was silent.
Jesse felt—weird. Liam’s voice just kept ringing in his head, and his fingertips burned as if he was touching Ezra’s phone again, going through his texts, finding those messages again—and the card. He’d ripped up the card Liam had handed over with his phone number, slipped it out of Ezra’s jeans and torn it up in that hotel in Norwich—
Except he wasn’t. He wasn’t like that. Was he?
Ezra was giving him funny looks as Jesse chased his own thoughts, and the moment they were home, he dropped his keys on the side table and said, “Jess? What’s up?”
“D’you think I’m jealous?” Jesse blurted out.
Ezra raised his eyebrow. “Well, yes.”
He flinched. It wasn’t what he’d needed to hear. It wasn’t what he wanted to hear, because where was the line? If he went digging through Ezra’s phone and pockets, if he said he didn’t like him seeing Liam, then what? And he didn’t want him to see Liam anymore. He wanted to tell him not to, but—but—
“So why are you here?”
Ezra’s eyebrows hiked higher. “I’m sorry?”
“Why are you here?” Jesse repeated, folding his arms and hunching his shoulders. “If I’m such a jealous, belligerent, possessive—”
“Hey, hey, I didn’t say—”
“You don’t need to,” Jesse snapped.
Ezra was frowning and shaking his head. “Jess, I’m really not following you here.”
“If I am such a jealous prick, why in the hell are you—”
“I never said you were a prick about it, I just said you were jealous, and don’t raise your voice to me,” Ezra said through gritted teeth.
Jesse ran his tongue around the inside of his teeth. He felt jittery, a hot anger burning low in his stomach at the condescending expression on Liam’s face, at the way he’d known—
“Liam thinks I fucking hit you, you know that?”
“Yes, I do know that,” Ezra said coolly. “He texted me a couple of days after we met him in Norwich, and he’s been banging on about it ever since. It’s driving me nuts. What’s that got to do with—?”
“He asked me to my fucking face if I shook you to get you to shut up!”
Ezra’s mouth tightened. “Jesse.”
“And he starts banging on about how it’s not just physical, it’s—”
“Jesse!” Ezra interrupted loudly. “Why in the hell do you care what Liam thinks?!”
“Because he’s right!” Jesse exploded.
Ezra stared at him. For a moment, the silence rang between them and for a moment, the truth yawned open, then Ezra shook his head and slammed the gap shut again.
“Come on,” he said.
He dragged Jesse into the living room by the wrist, pushing him to sit on the sofa. Kitsa lurked for a moment, then darted away under the television with an affronted yowl. Ezra sat on the coffee table, elbows braced on his knees, and frowned up at Jesse from an unusually slouched posture.
“Jess,” he prodded in a much gentler tone. “You know as well as I do you’ve never hit me.”
The anger and the—the hurt were thrumming in Jesse’s veins like a second pulse. This was it. The moment he’d feared, the moment he turned into that bastard who’d killed his mother, the moment that—
“Jess,” Ezra pushed again. “You’ve never hit me. You know that.”
“I will,” Jesse blurted out.
“What?”
“I will,” he said. “Liam’s right, Ez, I will, this is just—just the beginning, just how it all starts, isn’t it. I went through your pockets to get that card and destroy it, I went through your phone and found his messages, I—I don’t want you seeing him, I don’t, I was planning on telling you not to after tonight, and what kind of a fucking boyfriend does that, what kind of—”
“Someone,” Ezra said, pitching his voice very, very deliberately, “who feels threatened.”
Jesse clenched his jaw.
“You’re afraid, Jess,” Ezra said, squinting at him. “But I don’t understand why. You know this is bullshit. Not liking your boyfriend going to dinner with their ex, you know, whatever. That’s normal. I wouldn’t like it either.”
“You wouldn’t ban me from going.”
“Neither have you.”
“I would have.”
“But you haven’t.”
“That’s not fucking important!”
&nb
sp; “Yes, it is!” Ezra snapped. “Yes, it bloody well is, Jesse! What’s the point in getting caught up in hypothetical—”
“I fucking would have!” Jesse shouted, the anger rising like heat. His chest felt too tight. His heart felt swollen and confined. “I don’t like you fucking talking about him, I don’t like him, I don’t want you seeing him again or talking to him on Facebook, or—”
“What the hell is so threatening about him?!” Ezra yelled.
“He’s fucking perfect!”
“Perfect? He’s a fucking bellend!”
“He’s better than me!” Jesse bellowed.
Ezra jerked back, startled. Kitsa shot out from under the television and disappeared into the kitchen, and Jesse felt something crack in his chest. His face felt hot.
“What do you mean, he’s better than you?” Ezra asked slowly.
Jesse worked his jaw, his chest heaving.
“He is,” he said simply.
“Jess. What—?”
“Are you fucking blind?” he snarled, some of the anger finding an outlet in his voice.
“Don’t you fucking—” Ezra started, flaring up as Jesse had known he would, then the dam burst.
“He’s a fucking lawyer with a fucking second flat, he earns more in a year than I do in five, he’s got a university education and he’s taken cooking classes from a fucking Italian chef and he can probably fucking talk to cats, too!” Jesse exploded, throwing himself up off the sofa and beginning to pace furiously. “He’s a fucking perfect dick, he was probably the best you ever had in bed as well as out of it, so why the fresh fuck are you with me? What, the firefighter thing get to you? Getting your fill of some heroic, powerful piece of rough before you get bored and head back to—”
“Shut it!” Ezra roared. It was his teacher’s voice, his fire alarm voice, his this-time-I-mean-it voice, and Jesse had heard it once and only once before—but this time, unlike last time, he kept going.
“I won’t fucking shut it, Ez, it’s the fucking truth!” he bellowed back, the room ringing in the wake of all the uproar. “He’s fucking perfect and I’m a fucking mess and either you’re fucking lying to me, or you’re fucking stupid!”
“Oh, my God, you seriously have the most fucked-up self-esteem issues I have ever seen!” Ezra shouted.
“Yeah, that helps!”
“Shut your mouth and listen to me, for once in your bloody, blind little life!”
“I’ve tried fucking listening, but you’re obviously—”
“You obviously fucking haven’t if you haven’t got the message by now, you idiot! I bloody love you, even if I really don’t fucking like you right now!” Ezra hollered.
“Love’s a funny thing to call an exciting fuck!” Jesse roared back, beside himself with hurt fury and uncontrollable, spiralling anger that pinked the walls of the room—and, as the last syllable died away, thumped in his ears over Ezra’s suddenly quiet voice.
“Get out.”
Jesse stopped pacing.
“Get the fuck out of my house,” Ezra snarled.
Jesse unclenched his fists slowly. He had dug bloody crescents into his palms with his own nails.
What the hell had he just said?
“I said get out!” Ezra screamed, and the anger burst out again.
“What, you going to call Liam and tell him how he was fucking right the minute I’m out the door?” Jesse sneered.
“Get the fuck out before I call the fucking police and have you dragged out!” Ezra threatened, and when his hand strayed towards the heavy paperweight he kept on the coffee table to pin down his papers and protect them from stray paws, Jesse’s brain finally kicked in above the boiling rage, and he stormed his way out. Flopsy yowled from the bottom of the stairs as he stamped past.
“Oh, fuck off!” he roared at her, and slammed the front door behind him hard enough that the doorbell bounced off the wall and shattered on the step.
* * * *
By the time he got home, Jesse felt lousy.
For the first half of the walk, he’d still been spitting mad. He’d cut through the park, and had punched two trees just for being trees and kicked what had possibly been a stray cat when it shot across his path in the dark. Because fuck Liam, and fuck Ezra and fuck Jesse himself, too. And he’d reached the other side of the town centre, and his wrist had started throbbing from being asked to duel with a tree so soon after healing from its fracture, and with every pulsating twinge, his anger slowly bled away.
And left him feeling sick.
He knew he had a temper. He always had. That was why he feared becoming his father so much, because he carried that same hotheaded tendency to just—to just explode when things went wrong. It was why he’d never tried to join the police. The first time anyone spat at him, he’d blow up and smack them one, and that would be it. He wasn’t like Ezra. Ezra could take the verbal lashing all day at the school and just roll his eyes. Ezra could stare at someone while they called him all sorts of names, then ask if they were done and walk away. Even when it did get to him, he didn’t show it.
Shit, Ezra.
In the haze of anger, Jesse had barely heard himself, but the more he calmed down, the more of it came back. And the sicker he felt. The swearing, the calling him stupid, the aggressive stamping up and down, the terrified cats and the look on Ezra’s face—oh God, the expression—
Maybe he’d never hit him, but verbal abuse? Had he ever crossed the fucking line. How in the hell would Ezra ever give him a chance after that? How could Jesse give himself that chance?
“How could you?” he asked himself in a hoarse croak, throat sore from the shouting, as he turned into his own street, and the blocks of flats jutted up either side of him like looming, scowling faces. “You stupid fucking arsehole.”
It wasn’t nearly enough. He was worse than an arsehole. He had just proven everything. He wasn’t good enough. He’d never been good enough, and after that, after calling Ezra all those things and just—just—being like that, he’d be lucky if—
He’d be more than lucky if Ezra let him ever come back. Oh shit, they’d probably just—
“Oh God, it’s over,” Jesse whispered, and sank down onto the steps outside his building, head in his hands. There was a burning in his face again, but it wasn’t anger. It wasn’t even annoyance. “Fucking Jesus fucking Christ—”
It was over. It was over. He’d just destroyed the best relationship he’d ever had, the only real relationship he’d ever had, and destroyed it so thoroughly that there was no rebuilding it. There was no coming back from this. There was no way Ezra would take him back—because he wasn’t stupid, he was absolutely brilliant and totally ruthless and nobody’s fool, not even Liam’s, never mind Jesse’s, and—
“It’s over,” Jesse croaked, and the hot ache in his throat erupted. His voice cracked, and a tear launched itself towards the concrete.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, but he didn’t dare to look.
* * * *
The alarm clock went off, but Jesse had barely slept. He felt thick-headed and fuzzy, sore and aching. He didn’t want to go to work, but he was on the six-to-two shift, and Alan didn’t look kindly on people shirking because their personal lives had just imploded through every fault of their own.
But one look at his phone said it was too early to try to call Ezra. Not because it was five in the morning, but because of the text messages. The first, sent not ten minutes after he’d left, simply told him to stay away. The second was a string of inventive swearwords. The third—the third made his hand shake.
Ezra <3: On second thoughts, don’t come near the fucking house at all. I’m about this close to fucking boxing your stuff up and sending it second-class via Burkina Faso, so don’t let me catch fucking sight of you until I’ve calmed down, you son of a bitch.
Jesse swallowed, and scrolled through a few more.
Ezra <3: You’re a fucking idiot. Liam’s a bellend, but you’re a bloody fuckwit.
Ezra <3: How the fuck am I meant to help you when you don’t fucking talk to me??? Tell me about your father, great, thanks, but don’t think maybe you ought to mention THE HUGE EGO PROBLEM YOU HAVE!
Ezra <3: You’ve terrified my cats, frankly you’ve terrified me, and holy shit this is your idea of talking it out?!
Ezra <3: You broke my DOORBELL!
Jesse half-laughed, half-sobbed at the last one, pausing on it and fighting to get his raging emotions under control. He didn’t want to go on. He had fifteen texts and three missed calls, and though he could almost hear Ezra slowly calming down, he knew—he just knew—that there was a break-up text in there somewhere. How could Ezra not dump him after that?
Ezra <3: This is seriously the dumbest fucking fight I’ve ever had.
Jesse forced himself out of bed, abandoned the phone and headed for the shower.
He hadn’t meant to explode. He hadn’t meant to do anything. He’d meant to just go home, see Ezra to the door, make his excuses because of this early shift, and come back to the flat. He’d never meant to start the row. He’d never meant to say any of the things he’d said, and it was all because of Liam.
Well, no.
It wasn’t.
It was all because of Jesse.
Because he’d never stopped waiting for the other shoe to drop. Never stopped waiting for Ezra to get tired, or bored, or realise that dating an ignorant ex-shelf-stacker-in-a-cheap-supermarket wasn’t going to be long term for a brilliant chemistry graduate. Never stopped waiting for Ezra to wake up and smell the coffee. And Liam had smelled that coffee, had fucking drunk the damn coffee, and—
Jesse leaned his head against the cold tiles.
He hadn’t meant it.
He’d known, somewhere in his head, it would never last because he just wasn’t good enough for Ezra—and he was never going to be, really, not for Ezra—but he had hoped, all the same. He’d hoped. Hoped maybe he could become good enough, if he learned enough about Ezra and learned how to keep him happy all the time. Hoped maybe Ezra would choose to overlook the crappy bits about Jesse, because Jesse wasn’t totally useless, and he’d hoped maybe Ezra would decide he liked the good bits enough—
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