✔️The Greaser and the Skirtchaser [18+]

40. What Wasn't in Resthaven

"Blake? Blake, are you okay?" His voice was so soft. "Blake, say something."

His heart was about to burst from how hard it was pumping, and his fingers were shaking both from the pain and from the hands on his face. His face kept stinging, and he couldn't stop whimpering and gasping for breath from every pulse of fire. That rag kept gingerly dabbing at his cut, trying to get the antiseptic out. Blake didn't know if he could say something even if he wasn't burning in antiseptic.

Vance stood up. His voice was deathly quiet. "Get out, all of you."

They all cowed and slunk off to the back, and fuck, why were they leaving Blake with him?

"Blake? Talk to me. Are you okay?" He started untying his hands. "What did they do?"

"N-nothing." The next words he was going to say was sorry, but he didn't have the guts to say something like that.

"Bullshit they did nothing. There's—there's blood on your face and all over your shirt," he said in a pained whisper. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, Blake."

Hearing Vance apologize to him hurt a million times worse than his face.

Vance untied his last leg and winced at how tight Franco accidentally made it. "Jesus. They—they were torturing you. The dumped antiseptic on your face and blinded you!"

"It wasn't as bad as it seemed." Blake found he had no strength at all to get up, so he was stuck here. He was out of breath when he continued, "Really, their hearts were in the right place. I swear."

"That's ridiculous."

"Aren't I?" Blake said on reflex. Really? A joke now?

"You're still...." Vance laughed kind of miserably. He still had his hand on Blake's ankle. "The way you screamed—I thought they were killing someone in here."

"No. Just treating a cut. They're... don't be too hard on them." Blake pushed himself up, and he was still wobbly. He turned and began to walk out. "Okay. Well. Nice seeing you; I've gotta go. Sorr—um. I'm just gonna—you know."

"You're leaving?" he asked softly, and now Blake had to stop.

"Well—uh, yes. I'm... I've got other things... to do."

"After two years, you're leaving again." There was this heat in his voice.

It was impossible to respond to that because the answer was unarguably yes the hell he was. If Vance needed to yell all his unresolved anger at him for a minute, then Blake would have to come back another day when he was more mentally prepared for it and not straight after visiting his dad's grave.

"I'll be at my old man's house all day tomorrow, but I'll be leaving tomorrow night." Back to Resthaven, so this wouldn't happen again. "If you need me, I'll be there."

"Blake," he said, voice pinched in emotion.

And that was when Blake knew that he was so totally screwed. Blake was ready for mad. He was ready for pissed. He was ready for rage and resentment.

He was not ready for Vance to gently take his hand and say all choked-up, "You can't say you never felt anything at all. Please don't say that."

A dim truth was glaring down at him. Something that Blake couldn't bring himself to assume as true but something that sat in the back of his mind like a stone. It should've been impossible; the way Vance could still talk to and touch him like this. So, Blake closed his mind to it.

Blake was waiting for Vance to let go of his hand, but Vance gripped him tighter and walked around to come face-to-face with Blake. And there was no way to resist when he said, "Blake."