They don't really talk about it. Jacob tries asking Troye if he wants to get some professional help, or tell the police, or something. But Troye always closes up, starts sobbing and shaking, 'please Jake, I don't want to talk about it,' sob harder and then ask for strawberry milk. Jacob will sigh, fetch him a glass, and then wrap his arms around him and hold him as tight as he needs.
(The fighting:
"Troye, the 'forgive and forget' method is shit! You don't forgive people like that; you don't forgive unforgivable things!"
"Get out."
"Troye-"
"Just get out!"
Jacob would return the next day with an incoherent but genuine apology, lean against Troye's door and say it through the grain.
"Troye, Look. I'm really sorry for being that way yesterday. You're the one who went through it -well, you still are, I guess - I just- I don't want you thinking that what he did to you was okay, because it wasn't. Just - please let me in. I - I miss you.
The door would snick and Troye would be there with open arms and an apology that he would mumble into Jacob's neck.)
They grow closer, though. Troye isn't hiding anything else from Jacob. He told him he was sexually, physically, and emotionally abused, and Jacob never asked questions. He held in his quivering lip, and all the tears that threatened to fall from his cheeks, and was strong for Troye. Every little thing he closed off before, finally made sense. Jacob understood, even if he didn't understand.
Jacob spends most his days and nights with Troye. They don't share the same bed, but there is a sea of pillows and cushions and blankets on the floor, and they'll sleep there together.
Jacob will always use some of his extra money to buy Troye pretty things. Things he deserves to have. Troye deserves a lot. He mostly buys him candles, because when Troye gets in a really bad place, it calms him down to watch the flame flicker and the wax melt. Jacob's watched Troye sit in front of a brand new little candle until it was completely gone, and the scent of bubble-gum filled the air.
Some days they'll skip class, open the curtains to the sliding glass door of Troye's balcony, and crack the door just a bit. They'll sit with warm glasses of strawberry milk, watch the slush fall from the sky and wrap themselves with blankets. Jacob will paint Troye's nails warm colours to heat his body up, kiss his knuckles, and press his blush into Troye's palm.
Jacob's just so in love with Troye it hurts. He doesn't care about how obvious it comes off as. He wants Troye to know that he loves him, he wants him to know it and feel it, and realise there is good love.
The thing is, though, that's all Jacob can do. He can do small, subtle things to try and let Troye know, but he can't just say it, or initiate anything between the two of them. Troye's been through so much and Jacob can't hurt him, or scare him, or damage their close friendship in anyway. He has to make sure Troye is okay - that's before his own wants and needs, that comes first - and he hopes that one day something can happen between them, that one day Troye will be okay.
(And he knows Troye won't ever be okay again, not after what happened. loud noises will always surround him into a flinching mess, walls painted light brown and red marks across a city map. He isn't waiting for Troye to be okay, he's waiting for him to be stable enough. He's waiting for Troye to allow him closer.)
**
"Yeah, they literally fuck on everything," Jacob pauses, swallowing the bite he took of his sandwich as Troye sits across from him, giggling and twirling the straw in his milkshake, "and I'm just sitting there like, 'hey I got my fingers.'" Jacob rolls his eyes, watching Troye choke around the straw of his milkshake as he stifles a laugh.
