Disclaimer: Obviously, not mine!

This chapter is dedicated to Cherry Owens for being the first person to ask me out to fight on the internet and Camisado006 for being the first person to ever propose marriage to my writing. For the record I have been a ringbearer before, at a lesbian wedding about two years ago.

MARK

I left because I knew it was right, not because I was moved to do it but because I recognized it as the right course and did it because I knew I should been inclined to-- though I wasn't. Outside was a rush of cold; briefly, as gooseflesh rose on my arms, the worlds merged, Mrs. Hobbs' quiet sobbing mixed with the disturbing quiet of the Jersey suburb.

Roger sat on the steps, his back to me. He was shivering at strange intervals and peeling the paint off the rail supports. I sat beside him. "Roger?" I asked, gently rubbing his shoulder. Did the contact bother him? Honestly his furious revelation had no shocked me as it should have, only left me slightly numb, as though the drama I had so recently seen played out was only that, only a drama, a scene.

But I touched him, and only then did I realize why his shivers were uneven: some were sobs. "Shh, shh." I had never before seen Roger cry for himself, only for pain and for others. When he cried for Angel, no one but me knows, he began to cry only after watching Collins for a moment and seeing what was happening to him. Roger cried over Mimi, though never for April, and once during withdrawal. Save these three instances, I had never seen him cry.

I had never seen him cry like this. He had been angry, fought, pushed me away. During withdrawal he shouted at me to get out, leave him alone, don't look at him like this, forced me to leave the room so he could cough up vomit without anyone seeing. Now he pressed against me and allowed me to hold him. "I wasn't ready," he mumbled.

"It's okay. Shh, it's okay. I'm right here, baby." He had grabbed fistfuls of my shirt. I stroked his hair and kissed him. "I'm here, I'm right here, baby."

"Mark… oh, G-d, Mark," he sobbed, struggling to control his breath. Roger cried very quietly, the only noise his huffing breath and the words he forced. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I didn't know…"

After a few moments of this, of letting him talk and silently stroking his hair, I realized that Roger was not apologizing for the drama. He was apologizing for whatever had happened in California. "Roger, that wasn't your fault, baby."

"Oh, G-d, Mark," he repeated, "I didn't know!"

He was begging my forgiveness. "Roger, shh, you did nothing wrong. It wasn't your fault, and no one is angry with you."

After he had calmed a little, not enough to release me but enough to have stopped crying, I petted him slowly and asked, "What do you want now? Do you want to go home? Or I can take you to Columbia." It was only, what, six-thirty, Collins probably wouldn't even be stoned.

He looked at me for the first time since leaving the house, peeling his face away from my tear-soaked shirt to say, "I want to talk. I want you to… to know whatever you want. Are you going to leave me now?"

How could Roger even think that? "No."

"I don't think… after tonight, I don't think I can live with it anymore. Not without… not with no one knowing," he told the dusky street.

I picked away strand of hair that had been plastered to his face with tears. "You can tell me, Roger."

It was not an over-generous offer. It was more than a little selfish, because I wanted to know, I wanted to understand. I also wanted Roger to show that he trusted me, that I was his first and only. I regretted the choice quickly.

"My mom has some issues. Whoever she's with, she's totally with. She takes his thoughts-- how she votes, what she eats, what she wears, it's all his opinion. But it's sick. She thinks it's her opinion. She makes it her opinion. It's not too bad when she's with someone like Reggie. He's not a bad guy. But…" Roger shook his head. He was so much calmer now. Tears stole down his cheeks, but they were irrelevant to his words. "It started in Los Angeles. We were going East, gonna go to New York." He laughed. "New York. Didn't make it," he added. "We made it to Taos."

"Taos?"

"Near Santa Fe, actually. Jesus, I'm sorry, I'm telling you my whole fuckin' life story--"

"It's okay. I wanna know."

"Sure?"

"Yeah."

"I started throwing up. Badly. She just drove, drove and drove and she would pull over when she was tired and sleep and tell me to, but… I couldn't. I was so hungry and so sad and I didn't understand… I was eight years old. She would sleep and I would watch the world outside, and then I started leaving the car… and I stole some money. I stole money from her wallet while she slept and bought myself a jar of peanut butter at them a.m./p.m. Then I ate it, the entire thing, off my fingers right there in the parking lot.

"I got back to the car… she was awake. And furious. She slammed me into the car and took off. I told her beforehand that I was gonna throw up. She said she didn't care. 'Just don't make a mess of my car.' Well, I did make a mess of it. 'Shit, baby, I thought you were being dramatic.'" Another wry laugh punctured his story. "His name was Max. She met him in the hospital. We lived with him for about a year.

"Then she started sleeping with this writer who was in town for vacation. Older. We went back home with him, moved in straight away even. Mama went back into business. And I really liked this guy. After a while I started calling him 'dad'." I sighed. Thank G-d, a positive male figure in Roger's life. Sounds like he was in sore need of one. I regretted it as Roger drew in a lungful of air and said, "And then I turned eleven and he started telling me that 'this is how fathers love their sons' and…" Roger shivered.

"He raped you?" I asked quietly, as though saying it loudly might make it worse, as though anything could make it worse.

"Not at first, no. He… touched me. Inappropriately. I didn't know that it was inappropriate, though, until…" He sighed and looked up at the stars. We saw precious few in New York, but here in Jersey more and more puckered out by the minute. "Mama went to a conference the week before my thirteenth birthday. I came home from practice, he… tried it. Nearly got there."

Roger swiped at his eyes. "Jesus. So he had me against that wall and he got inside me with his fingers but I bit him and kicked him and he let go. It was… he held me down and I was screaming and crying and telling him to stop, but he wouldn't let go."

"Shh. It's okay." I pulled Roger into a hug and he curled against me. I rocked him. It was awkward, but it was motion, and it helped. By that point I heartily regretting inviting Roger to tell me what was wrong, but I did not dare go back on it. I didn't want to hear, but I couldn't hurt him by requesting silence. "You don't have to talk about this."

"I want to," he said, half-whimpering. "Do you mind?"

"No. Of course not, baby."

So he told me. He told me how much it hurt. He told me he locked himself in the bathroom. "He was pounding on the door, first all threats-- 'I'll get you for this, I'm bleeding you little shit!' and then sweet, 'Roger, there's been a misunderstand, come out so we can talk.' And I just sat on the shower floor with the water running and I was holding onto this razor-- I was afraid he would get in. And… I pissed myself. I mean I'm sitting on the floor in the warm water and I'm too confused to cry and it just happens… and I wanted to castrate myself. I had the razor, and I just hated it." It took me a moment to realize that by 'it', Roger meant his penis. "I wanted it gone. I didn't, you know that, but I was ready."

And then he told me what happened when his mother returned: "'Roger, come out here right this minute and tell me what's going on!' And I did. I felt so good, I was safe, Mama was there… and I told, I told her tried to have sex in me. She hit me. First on the face, then she spanked me and sent me to my room. Told me I couldn't come out until I had decided to stop trying to make everything so difficult for her.

"A couple months later she walked into the room and there he was with his hand down my pants and the other hand clamped over my mouth, because now I knew to scream. And we left. Took off. Came to Jersey. Oh, G-d, Mark!"

Roger collapsed against me, trembling, unable to stop crying. I wish I could have done something more helpful, anything, even had a coat to protect him against the cold, but I didn't. I rubbed his back and stroked his hair and said what I hoped were soothing things: "Shh, it's okay baby, it's okay, just let it out, you're safe…"

After a while Roger had cried himself out. The door opened and slammed shut behind us just as Roger was pushing away the last of his tears. We turned.

Roger's own mother had not even come out to speak with him. It was Reggie.

"Hey, Roger. Your mom… told me some pretty weighty stuff in there," he said. Roger nodded, and I couldn't help but feel that Roger had told me some pretty weighty stuff out here. "I can't blame you at all if you don't want to come back inside, ever, but I would like it if you did."

"He doesn't have to do what you'd like," I spat.

Roger squeezed my hand. "It's okay," he croaked. Nearly an hour of crying had torn his throat up pretty badly. "It's okay." It was not Reggie I hated, but the man before him, the man who had done this to Roger, and myself. Suddenly I understood why, our first time, when I was purely excited, Roger paused and told me, Mark… please be gentle with me. Had I known then, I would not have laughed, kindly as I meant it, as I kissed his cheek and told him I would be.

"It would mean a lot to your mother, Roger, if you came in, even if it's just to say good-bye."

I was ready to tell him to forget her, she never gave a fuck about her son, but Roger nodded. "Okay," he said, and he stood.

TO BE CONTINUED!

Reviews would be excellent!

Oh, and for everyone who enjoyed the mild sex scene last chapter, check out Film and Junk's "The First Time". I'm part of that team and I write all the sex scenes.