Utterly Forgettable | MM Romance | Complete

Twenty-Four: Not My Finest Moment (2/2)

It was Mark's turn to sigh. His voice had gone soft, pleading. "When this guy got under your skin I thought it was bad luck — that you'd go and fall that hard for someone who wasn't worth the time of day when you'd never even wobbled for anyone else before. But I've met him now. I've seen the two of you together. You can tell yourself you're not dating all you like, but the only thing you aren't doing is sex and kissing. He looks at you as if you hung the moon. What makes no sense to me is that you'd let it be without finding out why he acted the way he did. You mentioned a tragic backstory — ask him about it. Talk. Stop settling. Worst case scenario you're back where you started."

Josh's laugh held no humor at all. How could Mark suggest he offer himself up to Emery heart and soul again, when he'd seen what the man did with that sort of power already? The way he'd toyed with Josh's feelings, a game so masterfully played that even Emma had been convinced Emery loved him? How could he suggest Josh let Emery know he could still pull all of Josh's strings? "That's so far from the worst case scenario it's almost a joke." The peanut butter sat heavily on his stomach, making him feel queasy. "So that's how you see me? Someone who settles for things?"

"If you trusted people any less you'd be Mulder. You come here every week and you don't even realize how much everyone else likes you — you don't let yourself see. Any one of my friends would be your friend if you'd let them, but you lock people in acquaintance stage. You'll hear them out, you'll help if they need it, but you never give anything of yourself in return. You starve people out."

Mark bit his lip before continuing, as if he could add anything to what he'd already said that would worsen the devastation he was causing. "Brian loved you so much he stayed with you for four years before realizing you'd never let him in. If you think he'd have taken that job if he didn't know he didn't stand a chance, then you never really knew your boyfriend at all. That's the worst part of you — how easy it is to love you and how impossible you make it for anyone to get in. People keep hitting walls when they love you, unless they're at death's door."

Josh had never thought about things in those terms, not once. Mark was his friend because... Actually, because Mark hadn't taken no for an answer. They'd met during a first aid course Josh thought would be good to have, they'd clicked instantly and, as the course ended and Josh would have let the relationship fizzle and die, Mark continued to call and show up. He continued to be a part of Josh's life despite Josh himself, truth be told.

He'd been there for Josh when Josh's former roommate had wanted him to leave without cause, and Josh had been ready to throw in the towel and just move rather than deal with another bigot; said bigot had brought a number of women home but felt Josh wasn't well within his rights to have a man over. Mark had been the one to google endless legal statutes and feel so incensed on Josh's behalf that Josh had been left feeling half-ashamed he hadn't been more incensed himself.

In the end, he'd been left with a best friend who'd offered to fight by his side in the same breath that he'd offered to share an apartment with him, if Josh didn't feel like fighting. It was the kind of backup Josh had never had.

Josh had made it a point to repay that by being there for Mark when he'd needed it, but then Mark had continued to be there, conquering a permanent place in Josh's life with unparalleled perseverance, and Josh had tallied up every kindness to repay in turn until, one day, he'd stopped keeping score. Accepted that Mark would always be there for him, that the reverse was also true, and that they were both well beyond the need to keep things even. He'd never paused to consider he used the existence of his relationship with Mark as an excuse to keep other people at bay, that it was the exception that proved the rule.

Josh ran a hand through his hair. He wanted his words to come out as flippant, or light-hearted, but they sounded subdued at best. "So I'm fundamentally broken?"

"Not broken, just a little battered." Mark smiled. "It doesn't take a psychologist to tell it's because of the crap your parents pulled, but that was nearly thirty years ago. It's about time you let go of that. It'd be good for you to schedule an appointment with a therapist if you can't get rid of it on your own — I can give you a few names, when you're willing."

'Yes,' Mark might as well have said, 'I do think you're fundamentally broken, but the good news is you can still ask for help to glue all the pieces back together.' Which wasn't... It wasn't exactly bad, when seen like that — when someone who loved him said they thought there was hope for him yet — but it wasn't something he could process in real time, either.

"So to answer your question, yes," Mark broke his train of thought, "I see you as someone who settles. That you've managed to do that while making such a huge impact on people's lives is to your credit, but you've built your entire career on the need to keep yourself safe. And I never called you out on that because there was never anyone who I could see you taking a chance on. Now there is. A little risk wouldn't hurt, especially if the payoff is worth it. And you seem to think this guy is worth pretty much everything except your forgiveness, so why not that?"

Josh twisted his fingers, not knowing what to do with his hands, then picked up the spoon again to stop twisting. His mind was a jumbled knot. "Wow. Now I know how Emery felt."

"How he felt?"

"The morning we went to the hospital to meet you. I was trying to convince him to stay, and I said a lot of things, and he told me it was too early for psychoanalysis; asked if the entire conversation was going to be a recitation of his flaws. Here I thought he was being dramatic, but now I see how annoying I was."

Mark didn't let him have the easy way out. "You're overlooking the point and you know it, and I'm not having it tonight. Was anything I just said wrong? Did I paint you as a different person?"

Josh opened and closed his mouth a few times. He wanted to say that yes, Mark had been wrong. That Josh didn't settle, that not everyone needed to be in a relationship or have a huge roster of friends to be happy. The problem with that was that he now saw the first statement would be an outright lie, and the second one was true as an overall rule but not applied to him — he did want a relationship with Emery, or he would have, if things had turned out differently. The third one was still true — he didn't need a gaggle of friends, though he hadn't specifically set out to have just the one — but he hadn't ever stopped to consider that Mark's friends saw him as anything other than an outsider. "You have a nice way of sugarcoating things, don't you?"

"Like you sugarcoat my crap when you call me out on it?"

"Fair enough. That's... A lot to think about. It's a huge thing to dump on me at three in the morning when you've had years to ease me into it."

"I know. I'm feeling suitably ashamed that I didn't feed you bite-sized pieces over the years instead. But it doesn't make any of what I said less true." The spoon was yanked from Josh's hand without warning. "And give me that, before you get peanut butter all over my couch."

"Some friend you are," he grumbled, glad for the temporary change in topic, "More worried about your couch than about me."

"A man has to have priorities." Mark grinned without a hint of remorse. "What are yours going to be?"

Damn, they were back on topic. He let out a breath, fiddling with his hair. "I'll think about it. I might even set up that therapist's appointment when I'm ready. But not... Not Emery — I can't bring the subject up with him. I won't. I can't forgive him. The timing, the way he waited for me to admit — just... No. I can't." 'If I did that and he mocked me for it again I'd fall apart beyond anyone's ability to glue back together,' he didn't say aloud.

"Okay. I think that's enough of me beating you up for tonight. Come here. Can't let you go to sleep all bruised like that." Mark opened his arms and Josh fell easily into the familiar comforting hug. It was the least the idiot could do after upending Josh's self-image and tearing him to shreds, really, and Josh could do with a hug that wasn't emotionally and sexually charged, for once.