Enemies with Benefits 2

Chapter 18: Not the face

Steven tried to concentrate to get the memory back. The details all washed into each other. It was hard to picture where he had been where it happened. It happened in his childhood bathroom, the walls were a light blue colour that he'd picked out when he was eight and his parents wouldn't let him change the colour after that. It'd always been a slight source of embarrassment even though there are much worse colours than light blue. He didn't remember seeing the walls on that day, though, he probably did. There wasn't really a way that he couldn't have. He did remember small other things. His childhood house had hard wooden floors and he somehow had the distinct memory that the darker lines within the wood almost looked like a cat. There was nothing else to look at when he was thrown onto it. Two spikes for ears, wobbly lines that could be eyes and a dot with two lines coming out for a mouth. He always thought it was funny that humans tried to find familiar shapes in anything.

"It was stupid," said Steven, "I had a free house for the weekend. My mom was staying with her sister and my dad was on a business trip. I invited Benny round. We would finally be able to stay the night with each other. He snuck round to my house after the sun had set and my neighbours were less likely to see him. I cooked dinner for him and we talked all evening. It really felt that there could be a future for us. Which was ridiculous, but for that night it didn't feel quite so ridiculous. He ended up staying the night."

"Who caught you?" Ezra asked.

He really should've seen this coming. Ezra had always been such a curious boy. Always grabbing whatever he could get his hands on and trying to put it in his mouth or somebody else's. What a shock he'd given Steven when he'd taken a nap in his office, only to wake up to Ezra placing a snail he'd found in the backyard on his lips. Afterwards when Steven was nearly sick at the idea of a snail touching his lips, crouched over the sink washing his face over and over, all Ezra kept asking him was: 'Do you hate snails, daddy? Why do you hate them? Would you hate me if I was a snail? Can I eat one? If Ezra was willing to put snails on his own dads lips, why wouldn't he be curious enough to ask about other things.

"Your grandpa caught us, but your grandma was lingering at the door." Did he see her? He couldn't remember precisely. What expression did she make? She was probably horrified or maybe she wasn't. Maybe she didn't care at all. Maybe she had been waiting for a reason to get rid of him. It was the small details he could record, details that meant nothing at all. Her nails had been painted red and she had grasped the door frame as she watched.

"What did he do?"

"I don't want to ruin your memory of-"

"I didn't like him!"

"Well, you should've. He's your grandpa."

"I don't have to like him just because he's family."

His coffee had turned cold. Consequence of talking too much about himself. Ezra or his dignity? Wasn't that the question. Such a modern invention to leave family. Steven hated most of his family and the feeling was mutual, but he still put up with him. Although... he supposed if he thought about it... he really didn't want Ezra to hate him the way Steven hated his own dad. "Your grandpa had a short fuse."

"I remember."

"I won't go into any unfortunate details, but if you can imagine your grandpa's temper and then multiply that by a thousand, maybe even more than that."

"Did he hit you?" Ezra leaned forward in his chair. His expression so torn between interest and a looming dread. Did Steven look like such a tragic figure?

"He may have." He did a lot more than that. Steven thought he could almost still feel the lingering sting on his face. He wondered whether Ezra had ever noticed that Steven's nose bridge was crooked.