He Acts Like We Never Have Met (I Don't Believe You) (THROAM!AU)

4

I wake up to a sudden, drunken yell. A flashing motel sign shines through a pair of curtains, and I don't know where I am. Silhouettes of drunken men move along, mumbling nonsense amongst themselves. Warm heat is pressed against my back. Even breaths against the shell of my ear. An arm wrapped around my chest, holding me close. Ryan.

I remember now.

Oh Father.

I slowly move onto my back, not wanting to wake him up. He presses into my side, his head on a pillow. His hair's in disarray, and he looks younger when he's asleep. Less troubled somehow. I stare at the ceiling and breathe in steadily. He wraps an arm around me tighter, his nose pressing into my neck. He lets out a content sound. I feel sore all over from his mouth, his stubble, his hands, his grip... My body feels used. My hole feels wet. Filled up.

I wasn't sure if he'd be here when I woke up, but he is. It's dusk outside, the light shining through the curtains a lot lighter than it was when we fell asleep.

The covers hang low on our waists, and I see teeth and nail marks on my chest and stomach. He said that he'd take me hard. He did warn me.

I can't fall back asleep, not again. It's all flooding in now, my mind no longer clouded by lust or desire. What he did to me. What we did.

My bladder's full, uncomfortably so, and I slowly inch Ryan's arm from around me. I look at his face, and he seems to frown in his sleep as I slip out of bed, but he doesn't wake up. His hand lands on where I was, fingers digging into the sheets.

Standing up was not a good idea. I flinch the second I do, a sharp pain, like needles, prickling my behind and radiating up my spine. I suck back a hiss and walk slowly to the bathroom door, limping as I go. Something runs down the back of my thigh. I know what it is without looking.

The bathroom light flickers on. The clothes that I wore last night are still in a pile on the floor. I close the door quietly, blinking against the sudden brightness. I push the toilet seat up and take a leak. My cock's in my hand, flaccid and sore. Flecks of dried come are splattered across my pubic hair. There's a bruise on my left hipbone: Ryan's teeth. I try hard to remember when he did that, but can't.

I flush the toilet. Stagger to the sink, twist the taps open. The light flickers above the mirror, and I make the mistake of looking at myself.

I look fucked. God, I look so fucked: my mouth's red from beard rash, my hair's a – Is that come in my hair? I swat at it quickly. And Ryan's marked me all over with his mouth and his nails. There's a lingering sensation inside me where I can feel his cock. When I move. When I walk. Knowing that he's been inside of me. His come is still rolling down my inner thigh.

I stare at myself blankly. Well, you did it now. You did it, and you loved it. You loved it, riding his cock, letting him do whatever he wanted. You know it's true. You would have let him do whatever he wanted to you. You didn't care. You got so into it, didn't you? What would your mother say? What would your father say?

"Shut up," I whisper. The mirror's fogged up from the running hot water. "Shut up, shut up." I close the taps and end up gripping the edges of the sink, leaning over it. About to hurl. Breathing hard. Saliva dripping from my mouth into the sink.

There's nothing wrong with it. There's nothing – It felt so good with him, so – How could that be wrong?

I'm not ashamed. I do not have to feel ashamed. I am not ashamed that after all the years of advice and love and then hate, this is what I'm doing. Getting screwed by anonymous men in roadside motels. Not mommy's little boy anymore. Not anybody's anything.

I sit down on the bathroom floor tiles, hugging my knees tight. The pain is obvious. I'm cold and sore and alone, and Ryan's in that bed, but he's not going to stay. I knew that the second I saw him, and I accepted it right from the start. I knew that he wouldn't be taking me home either. None of them will.

I'm not anybody's anything.

Could disappear and no one would even notice.

I draw in a shivery breath, and then another, and another, and I could disappear right here. Don't know where I'm heading. Norman said that Omaha's nice. Maybe I'll go there. Maybe I'll get lost on the way, and no one will ever know, anyway.

Have to keep going forward either way, because I can't go home anymore. They'd know. They'd take one look at me and know the things I've done tonight, and now I'll never see any of them again, will never see my mother. It's so much more final now.

My forehead presses against my knees, and I try out this disappearing act as my shoulders shake. I let it wash over me, not trying to hold it back. It's been a while. It's been months since the last time I gave myself the luxury to be weak, but every bad thing that's happened since, every day of struggling and lying and trying to go unnoticed like I don't matter, because I'm just an unnatural abomination, and we all know that, every tiny thing. They all wash over me, alongside Ryan fucking me, taking me so completely, and I let myself cry and cry because it's the only thing left to do.

I slip deep into it as the world around me slips out of focus, and it remains that way until something soft and solid engulfs me, a pair of arms and a warm body. I can't even make out what he's saying at first, but I try to push him off. He won't let me. His lips find my face, my cheeks, but I duck my head.

"Calm down, just calm down," he says, and even though I try to stop him, he manages to pull me into his arms. My forehead presses against his collarbone, and he's as naked as I am, the warmth of the sheets still on him. I breathe in hard, and his fingers card through my hair soothingly. "Baby, just calm down," he hushes me, words pressed to the shell of my ear and accompanied by a kiss.

But I can't calm down, and another sudden sob rattles through me. He holds me tighter. "You will get out of here," he whispers. "You will survive this and you'll make a life for yourself." A small, scared laugh breaks through from between the tears, because that'll be the day, sure, that's likely, when I'm drowning and tired and alone, and I can't anymore. His fingers caress the nape of my neck. "You will. I know you will. And you'll be stunning and you'll break hearts." He pauses before whispering, "You'll break my heart."

I lift my head enough to look into his eyes. He's broken, so clearly broken that I don't know how I missed it before. There's loss and love and hate and warmth in his touch. His nose brushes against mine as he leans in, his lips hovering over mine. "And I will love you."