I'm Okay

(Day 50: Sunday Night)

"King Ben. I wasn't expecting to see you tonight."

"Bridget," he partly smiles, "we've discussed this. Ben is just fine."

"Yes," she remembers. "I'm sorry."

Ben thinks for a moment, "Why weren't you expecting me?"

"Well, you have dinner with your parents on Sunday," she explains.

He scrunches his eyebrows in question, "How did you know that?"

"You told me."

"I told you?" Ben slightly shakes his head, "When was that?"

"About seven months ago. I made a joke about how often you come, asking if you were planning to come the next night too. You said you couldn't, because you have dinner with your parents every Sunday."

Ben grins, "You remembered that."

"Don't flatter yourself," she smiles back. "It's just good waitressing, but why aren't you at your parents, anyway?"

Ben looks down for a second, "I just couldn't deal with it tonight."

It takes a minute for her to respond, "What happened last time was really… Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Ben answers. "It was just an accident."

"He had a fork two inches from your eyes," Bridget reminds him. "Whatever that was, it wasn't an accident."

"He was just a little upset," Ben defends.

"A little upset?" she raises her eyebrows. "He smashed a pitcher against the wall and then threatened you with a fork."

"It wasn't like that," he quietly comments.

"Has anything like that happened before?" she worries.

Ben glances down, "He would never lay a hand on me."

"That doesn't answer my question."

Ben looks up at her, "He just doesn't feel well sometimes. Okay?"

"Doesn't feel well?" She shakes her head, "What's that even supposed to mean?"

"Just what I said." Ben gestures, "Sometimes he isn't well."

"As in sometimes he gets violent," she suspects. He shakes his head. "Has he ever hurt you before?"

"No. Of course, not," Ben quickly says, but then the couple images flash through his mind. "Not really."

"What about your mother?"

Ben's quiet for a moment, "She would have told me if anything important happened."

"Did you tell her about what happened the other night?" the waitress asks.

Ben lets out a long breath, "I'm getting to it."

"Right," she responds before writing something on her order sheets.

"What are you doing?"

She hands the paper to him, "It's my number. If you need to talk to someone, feel free to call or text."

"I have friends," Ben frowns.

"Sometimes it's easier to talk to a stranger," the waitress justifies.

He eyes her, "Well, that's going to be a problem, then. Because, you're not a stranger."

"No," Bridget acknowledges. "I'm an acquaintance, which is how you can know that I won't be recording any calls or posting any texts online."

Ben looks back down at the notepaper and shakes his head, "It's really not necessary."

She nods, "Okay." before she observes him intently. "If it's not necessary, then look into my eyes and tell me you're okay."

He looks into her light blue eyes, "I'm fine."

"No." She insists, "Not fine. Tell me you're okay."

Ben looks into her eyes again, "I'm—" but her worry is clear as day. "Okay." She hands the paper to him again, and he reluctantly takes it. "I won't be needing it."

"I hope not," she frowns. "Now." She hovers the pen over the order sheets again. "Will you be having the usual?"

"Uh, yeah," he answers.

"So, a large, extra rare steak with a basket of mozzarella sticks, barbeque chicken, and the Cola soda."

"Diet, if you have it."

She writes it down, "Anything else?"

"You know," Ben contemplates, "I've never really had dessert before. What's that like?"

"We have pie, cake, cookies, and ice cream."

"What about macadamia nut cookies?" he questions.

"We do have those," she informs.

He nods, "Yeah. I'll take some of those too."

"Three or five?" she questions.

"Five." Ben smiles, "I'll save a couple for later."

The waitress jots it down, "Okay, then. I will be back with your meal." but then she hears Ben's phone go off again. "That has to be the tenth call you've gotten."

"Yeah," Ben slowly answers, before uses a hand to explain, "This was really a last minute thing. I really should have been told to come back with a reservation, but this area was open and I'm king so…"

"Plus you pay well," she adds on, before she hears it ding and nods towards it. "You'd better get that. I expect silence when I return."

Ben laughs, "Don't worry. It will be silent." but as she leaves he frowns and merely turns the volume to silent. The next notification pops up, and Ben places a hand to his head as he goes to the text messages. Doug: Your mom is worried. Where are you? Doug: You should call her. Ben goes back and presses on his mom's texts. Mom: You're late. Where are you? Mom: Your father told me what happened. Can we talk? Mom: Please tell me where you are. I'm getting worried. Let me know you're okay.

Ben leans on the table as he taps the message box. I'm fine. I'm at Starlit Nights. I— He pauses for a minute, before he erases the 'I' and continues. Sorry I didn't let you know I wasn't coming. He shakes his head at the absurdity. He's never missed a family dinner before, not unless it was important or he was sick. He lets out a stressed breath, presses the back button, and then starts over. Sorry I couldn't come. I got busy. He shakes his head again. She's my mom. I'm not lying to her. He sits in thought, as he tries to figure out how he could respond to each message. He could easily just say he's fine, but he's not really. If he was, then he would have showed. He should at least tell her where he is. But then everyone would know I've been coming here alone. He stares at the second text. Your father told me what happened. Can we talk? He has no idea how to respond to that. How are they even supposed to talk about it? These things just happen. There's nothing to even talk about.

"Here you are." Ben looks back up and smiles at the sight of Bridget, turning his phone over and setting it back onto the corner of the table. "Here's your steak." She sets the two baskets on the other end of the table, "Your mozzarella sticks and chicken." before she places the soda in the middle. Ben watches her smile as she hands him the cookies, "Enjoy."

"I think I will," Ben replies before taking a bite of one of the cookies.

She slightly shakes her head in amusement, "I still don't know how you can eat so much and still stay so thin."

Ben frowns, "Fast metabolism." He shrugs. "Exercise."

"You're so lucky," she comments, but then Ben watches as she realizes what she had said. "I mean, just that I wish I could eat like you without any consequences. Obviously, no one's life is completely perfect. Not that what you're dealing with doesn't matter or anything. It's just that—"

"Thank you," Ben interrupts. "Really. For everything."

Bridget attempts to smile, "I should get to those other tables." Ben continues to tense his smile until she leaves, at which point he takes a relaxing breath, grabs a mozzarella stick as he fills his glass with soda, and then starts on his steak.

"There you are," Doug furrows his eyebrows, as Ben walks into the dorm. "I've been trying to reach you." Ben doesn't speak, just grabbing a Diet Coke from the mini fridge and then sitting down at the table. "Where've you been?"

"I went out to eat," Ben calmly comments as he sets the drink and cookie packages down, before he lifts one up for Doug. "You want it?"

"What I want," Doug sternly responds, "is an explanation." Ben starts on the cookie himself instead. "Your mom's had me on the phone half the night. She's scared."

Ben makes a noise as he shuts his eyes, "I didn't mean for that to happen."

"Of course, she's scared," Doug frustrates. "She's been texting you with no response, and when she called your friends none of them knew where you were."

Ben's frown deepens, "She brought my friends into this?" Now he has more people than just Doug to explain this to.

"What's up with you?" He yells, "It's like you don't even care."

"Good," Ben evenly responds. "I'm not allowed to care. If I do, my fever raises and I get sick."

There's silence before Doug questions, "Why do you only know how to make jokes out of serious subjects?"

"Coping mechanism," Ben smiles. "When there's a lot going on in someone's life, then sometimes they will relieve stress by making jokes."

Doug narrows his eyes at him, "Call your mom."

Ben lets out a long breath, but when he takes his phone out he laughs, "Can't. It's dead." He looks up at Doug. "Must be from everyone trying to contact me."

Doug glares at him, before he takes his own phone out and sets it in front of Ben, "Call her. Now."

Ben stares down at it for a moment, "I don't feel like talking to her right now."

"Too bad." Doug takes the phone, calls Ben's mom, and then hands it to him.

"What—" Ben cuts himself off when his mother picks up. "Hi, Mom."

"Ben?" she lets out in relief. "Are you okay? What's going on?"

"I'm fine," he manages. "I'm back at the school."

"Wha— Where have you been?"

Ben looks up at Doug for a second, willing him to leave, but he continues to watch the call. "I was at a restaurant. I was going to come to dinner. Really, but… I couldn't deal with it tonight. I got cold feet, I guess."

There's silence for a moment, "Honey. Does this have anything to do with what happened with your father at the restaurant?"

He's quiet for a minute, "I'm just tired of it, you know? I have my own life. I can't deal with him all of the time."

"It's not all the time," his mother comments.

"It feels like it," Ben gulps, as he can feel the tears intrude his eyes. "It's never enough for him. I'm never going to be able to please him."

His mother breathes, "No, honey. You've made him very proud."

"Then why doesn't he show it?" Ben grits his teeth. "Why does he do these things?"

"He's just not very good with words," she excuses. "And as far as everything else goes…" She sighs, "He doesn't mean to do it. You know he doesn't." Ben stays silent, holding his breath to prevent himself from crying. "You just caught him on a bad night. That's all."

He can feel his face grow hot, "I'm just tired of it all."

"I know it's hard," she slowly responds, "but everything's going to be okay. Trust me." He takes short, calm breaths as he feels his forehead. "Ben?"

"I'm not feeling very well," he lets her know. "Can we go?"

"Yeah. Sure." He can hear the frown in her tone, before the forced smile escapes her lips, "Take care of yourself, and have a nice night."

"Night," Ben simply says, before he ends the call and hands the phone back to Doug.

He questions, "Your father is the reason behind this?"

Ben glances around, "Where's my water bottle?"

"I think you left it in the bathroom."

"Right," Ben breathes, before he carefully stands to his feet, walks to the bathroom, and finds his water bottle to fill it.

Doug follows him, "Are you okay?"

Ben walks back out, "I will be." before he kneels down by his bed, takes out the blue bin, and searches for the nighttime Alka-Seltzer.

"Your father," Doug begins. He expects Ben to interrupt him, but he doesn't. "What's going on between you two?"

Ben goes to sit back down at the table, dropping the tablets into the water bottle, "We just had this little argument the other night. Nothing that hasn't happened before. It only seems worse now, because I'm king and he doesn't trust me."

Doug sits back down as well, "If he doesn't trust you, then why did he pass the crown on to you?"

Ben's silent for a moment, as he breathes in the fizziness of the drink, "Stress isn't good for him. My mom thought if he had less of it, then he'd be better… I think it's just stressing him out even more, though, not to have that control."

It takes Doug a second to ask, "Is he sick like you're sick?"

"He has his own set of problems," Ben comments before downing the pills with the drink. "Whether it's beast related…" He shakes his head, "Mom thinks it's psychological."

"What do you think?" he questions.

Ben looks down for a moment, "I think that it doesn't matter whether he's stressed or not." before he frowns back up at Doug. "He's never been well, and he's never going to be." Doug nods in response. "How about a movie before bed to relax?"

He smiles, "Yeah. That would be great."

Ben hands him one of his cookies, "Tell me I'm a jerk again."

Doug takes it as he breathes, "So, you're not that jerk-like."

Ben smiles, "How about an animated comedy?" before he changes the news channel to the movie selection.

"Yeah." Doug agrees, "That sounds good."

- Just so everyone knows, I do plan on getting back to the other storylines. The reason why we're getting more into Ben's stuff right now is because I didn't feel like it would make a ton of sense for a couple of the other sub/plots to happen while Mal is awaiting trial (ex: I don't think Jay is going to be terribly focused on Carlos's situation right now)... I don't exactly know which plots and/or subplots you were referring to when you said to try to wrap those up before dealing with Ben's stuff, but I can say that at least the stuff with Audrey should conclude (at least as far as hybrid stuff is concerned) by the end of Mal's trial... Also, I wasn't intending to dive in deep with Ben's family in this first fic. I was only going to allude to it and then get into it for their following school year, but then we had this gap in the story (and as Mal's boyfriend her jail/trial time is going to affect him) so I figured we might as well do some stuff with Ben while we wait for the two weeks to conclude. Yeah. I know. If you were cinemasins, then you would totally hate me right now. Sorry. I don't like large gaps. I'm filling them in. However, I have been managing an average of only one chapter per story day, so compromise, I guess? I don't know. Sorry if you're hating this, but because I do hope to have a sequel for this I also can't guarantee that every aspect of each character's plot will be wrapped up in a nice bow. Just as life goes, it's probably not going to be perfect; however, because I do realize there's a ton of stuff going on in here, if you feel like I'm completely forgetting something you think hasn't been wrapped up yet, then you can feel free to remind me. Honestly, with a story this long I'm bound to forget a conversation or two. So, yeah, if you feel like I'm forgetting about something, you can remind me. I'll let you know if I really forget about it or if I do have plans for it already. In any case, I'd rather feel like an idiot rather than leave large holes in the story for me to be annoyed with when I finish and reread it all for the final edit.