side job

9

Not talking to Minx was a lot more difficult than the couple would ever expect. Once Jonathan stopped responding to her tweets and withdrew his offer to let her stay with him during her trip, things with his other friends went downhill. 

This led to a disastrous fight between the friend group, and Jonathan was basically shunned until he got his shit together. And by that, his friends meant to dump Ezra so he could lead a normal life again.

And like everyone expected, Jonathan refused to leave Ezra. They didn't know Ezra like he did, so they couldn't appreciate him as a person even if they tried. No one saw how amazing Ezra is, and that bothered him a lot.

Keeping a relationship a secret for a long time and then randomly coming out to his best friends because he trusted them whole-heartedly only for them to shun him really broke Jonathan's heart.

And maybe that helped him realize that Ezra was right.

Ted and Charlie knew nothing about their relationship, yet they tried to say that Ezra was a bad person who was being too controlling and crazy. Jonathan was furious as he listened to his previous friends rant about how much they hated Ezra.

"If you hate Ezra, you hate me." Jonathan said, getting out of his chair and pulling his jacket on. "Ezra is an extension of myself and I refuse to allow you to act like he's a bad person, let alone a bad boyfriend."

Charlie stood up to, grabbing Jonathan's hand in a panic. "Schlatt, he made you do some pretty shitty stuff to Minx. That behavior isn't okay."

Jonathan slapped Charlie's hand away, stepping back and continuing to zip up his jacket. Ted stood up, pulling Charlie away from Jonathan.

"Schlatt, this is crazy. Just have a seat and calm down, and hear us out." Ted tried to reason.

Shaking his head, Jonathan tried to calm himself. "You guys don't know anything about my relationship. You only know that it exists, and that's pretty much the extent of it. Don't fucking tell me how I should handle my personal business when you don't have the first clue about how things are."

"I don't know anything? Like I don't know that you walked in on Ezra fucking his ex in your guys' living room? And how you came to my house completely fucking broken because of him?" Ted yelled.

Charlie was taken aback, his head flicking between looking at the taller men. He had no idea what to say, so he stood back and watched the men yell at each other.

"So I trusted you with that information and that it was hard and a bad time and you're going to throw it in my face like that? You don't get to dictate how I deal with problems in my own relationship, Ted!" Jonathan screamed. He was growing more agitated with each word that passed through Ted's lips.

"Jonathan, pretending nothing happened isn't dealing with problems! He manipulated you, and now he's trying to get rid of all your friends so he can still be in control!" At this point, Ted felt like he was losing his mind.

How did Jonathan not see the issue? Instead of fixing things, Ezra wanted to just forget about it and pretend nothing happened and Jonathan just accepted it.

Ezra had love-bombed Jonathan out of his negative feelings and gained this weird control over him. It was almost like Jonathan felt like nothing without Ezra, and that terrified Ted.

"Ezra isn't like that, Ted! He loves me and takes care of me. He helps me set boundaries when I have a hard time setting them myself." Jonathan snapped, crossing his arms.

"That's not setting boundaries, Schlatt. That's him telling you what to do for his own selfish reasons and you just letting him lead you on this path of self destruction!" Ted fully screamed.

His fists were balled tightly, hands squeezing so tight they were turning white. Charlie opened his mouth to speak, but was cut off when Jonathan stepped forward.

"What, you wanna fucking fight? Your solution to helping me is trying to fight me?" Schlatt laughed.

Ted stepped closer, testing the waters. He was spouting off insults and before Jonathan knew it, he had punched Ted right in the nose. His glasses fell off his face, along with a string of droplets of blood. Ted had fallen back onto his butt.

Charlie screamed, falling to his knees to help Ted regain his balance. "What the fuck, Schlatt?!"

Shaking his hand back and forth from the pain, Jonathan finally stepped out of the house and drove back home, only thinking about how angry he was and not the consequences of his actions.

He had arrived home, fuming still and icing his bruised knuckles. Ezra was in a panic, terrified of the incosolable man. Jonathan explained the situation, calming down as Ezra looked at him with pure love.

"You defended me." He whispered, a smile growing on his face. Jonathan felt his frown soften. "That means so much to me, J. I was scared Ted was going to turn you against me."

Jonathan let out a soft laugh, before pulling Ezra into his arms. He kissed the top of his head, before giving him a small squeeze.

"They couldn't convince me you were a bad person even if they tried. No one knows me like you do, babe." Jonathan sighed. He felt a bit pathetic saying that, but at least he had someone.

Ezra looked up at Jonathan with a grin. "Don't ever forget it, J. No one knows you like I do, and as a matter-of-fact, no one has or will ever love you like I do."

Jonathan pressed his lips onto Ezra's, pretending that those words didn't leave a little sting in his heart.