AN: Thank you for the reviews people, you're awesome!

And thank you to Greg for beta-ing, he is also awesome.

LXVIII.

Tom didn't make it back to the tent until a little after eight. He shuffled around inside, barely glanced up when Ben entered. Jimmy hesitated a moment, before following. He couldn't hear anything over the sound of his own heart thundering in his head. He hovered at Ben' shoulder, kept Ben between himself and Tom, as though a shield of some kind.

"Boys, what are you up to?" Tom asked.

Ben gave Tom an incredulous look, and Tom back-peddled a bit, brought a hand up to lightly swipe across his forehead.

"Right, you wanted to talk, didn't you? Did you want to have that conversation now?" Tom said, glanced interestedly at Jimmy and noted, "I thought it was a private topic."

"It involves Jimmy," Ben said, a little too quickly. Jimmy's heart gave a jump, and he ducked his head, shuffled uncomfortably under Tom's scrutinizing eye.

"Ben, if this is about patrols," Tom groaned.

"It's not," Ben interjected, "It's about something else. Something that has nothing to do with the war, at all, actually."

Tom perked a brow at that, there was very little in the world left that had nothing to do with the war. He folded his arms over his chest and quirked a skeptical, "Really?"

Ben looked to Jimmy for a 'go ahead' or maybe a hand in explaining, but Jimmy had his face half buried in a palm, covering the very pretty shade of pink it had turned. He wasn't going to be much help it seemed, but at least he was being adorable doing that huge amount of nothing. Ben let the image flush through him, turned to his father, and puffed himself up a little.

"Dad, I wanted to tell you about something big that's happened in my life. Really big, and good. Very good. I figured you were going to find out sooner or later, but I thought you should find out from me," Ben started.

"Okay," Tom said, expression blank, somewhat bemused.

Ben took a deep breath, and declared, "We're dating."

"Dating who?" Tom asked.

The wind just about blew right out of Ben's sails. He glanced uncertainly at Jimmy, furrowed his brow in concern for his father, and tentatively reached out, and though Jimmy squirmed at first, unwilling to cooperate, Ben was finally able to snatch his hand. He turned back to his father, and answered, in a tone that suggested he worried his father might be stupid, "Each other."

Tom's eyes went wide momentarily, and then narrowed again to thin slits. He made a noise in the back of his throat, said nothing.

"Technically, we've only really been on one date. Half a date, actually. It was going really well but then the aliens attacked and killed half the camp and we were forced to all run for our lives," Jimmy said in a low ramble, he cleared his throat, dropped his eyes, "We haven't been on another one since, so dating is probably not the best word for it."

"And what would be the best word for it?" Tom carefully asked.

Jimmy shrugged, toyed with Ben's hand holding his as he continued quietly, "I don't know. We spend a lot of time in storage closets. I mean, so maybe, I guess…what's the word, bed buddies? Except no beds. There was one bed. But mostly just closets. The bus sometimes. Closet buddies, maybe? I'd go with fuck buddies, but I don't think you'd like that, Ben wouldn't like it. I suppose it's a little wrong too. Would friends with benefits apply? Probably not. You know, I never really got what that meant. I mean, either you're friends or you're screwing, you can't really have both."

Ben slapped a hand to his face. It probably would've been better if Jimmy had just stood there and looked pretty. He was very good at looking pretty; at least, as far as Ben was concerned, he was good at it. Explaining the delicate nature of their relationship, on the other hand, not so much.

Eventually, Jimmy meandered his way back into silence, standing rigidly and staring intensely at a spot on the tarp floor in the far corner of the tent, face now painted a stark white. Tom did a slow blink, shook his head.

"Jimmy, step outside, please. I need to speak to my son alone," he said.

Instinctively, Jimmy started for the tent flap, hesitated, darted a permissive glance to Ben, who still held his hand firmly.

"No, dad. Anything you have to say about Jimmy and our relationship, you can say in front of him," Ben decided.

"Ben, I really would prefer that Jimmy step outside," Tom repeated.

"It doesn't matter if he goes outside, dad; I'm just going to tell him what you say later anyways. So just say what you want to say," Ben argued, tightening his hold on Jimmy. He wasn't letting Jimmy bolt this time, and besides, Tom would remain a lot more level-headed on the whole situation with Jimmy present.

Tom took a deep, calming breath.

"The other day on the bus," he stated, left it hanging there open-ended, closed his eyes, and shook his head, as if trying to dislodge a thought that didn't fit right.

"We didn't really want you to find out that way," Ben answered the unasked question.

"How long has this been going on?" Tom asked.

"Not long after you left we started patrolling together, then hanging out, and things just sort of happened from there," Ben explained. It was strange, more like a pleasant interview than anything else, as though they were chatting about their lives over brunch on a sunny afternoon at some high-class sidewalk cafe.

There was a pause, Tom looked to be attempting a puzzle in his head.

"I appreciate you're telling me," Tom said softly, took another deep breath, "I know that you're not too interested in my opinion lately, but I have to say it, Ben, this is a mistake."

Jimmy squirmed, and Ben gave his hand a squeeze, barely flinched.

"You're too young, you've been through far too much, and the current world situation isn't exactly right for making these kinds of choices in life," Tom continued, taking his time with his words, choosing each one deliberately, while avoiding looking at Jimmy altogether, as if knowing each thing he said was causing pain indescribable in that young boy and he couldn't keep speaking if he saw it, "I'm perfectly happy with you and Jimmy spending time together, Ben, but as friends. That kind of a relationship in these times is not a good idea. Emotions are running high; you're not thinking with a clear head, none of us are."

"My thoughts are clear, dad," Ben said.

"I understand wanting something to validate your emotions in this world," Tom started.

"This isn't about me needing someone, anyone, to get me through the hard times," Ben growled.

"How would you know if it was?" Tom demanded, "People don't make rational decisions during a crisis, especially not when it comes to forming bonds like this. Anything could happen, anything could go wrong. Things fall apart and you're not exactly in any position to get away from one another, not to mention, the added stress of war will only make it that much more difficult to cope with the many pitfalls that come from attempting a relationship."

"Don't project your fear of making a fucking move on the camp doctor onto this, dad, I'm not you," Ben seethed.

Tom faltered; the slow simmer that boiled often in Ben's expression, was hot in his own.

"Now Jimmy really needs to leave," he whispered, voice shaking with his rage.

Ben loosened his grip on Jimmy's hand, a signal that Jimmy was free to leave. Jimmy gave Ben a questioning look, and Ben met Jimmy's eyes briefly.

"I'll be right out," Ben reassured him.

Jimmy darted one look to Tom, an almost askance appeal of sorts, then swiftly ducked out of the tent. Ben set his father with a hard glare, folded his arms across his chest, and offered up challenge, eyes narrowed, brow furrowed, mouth pursed into a slender line. Tom, riled up by Ben's comment, wasn't in the mood to back down in the face of his surly son.

"It's true my relationship with Dr. Glass is friendlier than that with others around camp," Tom started, and Ben snorted derisively but said nothing, "We're friends, Ben, nothing more. This is not the same…"

"And I'm not the same stupid little kid from before, wondering why you're home in the middle of the day and buying your excuse that lecture got canceled," Ben growled, Tom flinched back into a startled silence, "I can hear everything, dad. I can hear your heart beat, your breath, as you draw it into your lungs, I can see everything, the heat rising in your body, the smallest movement of your eyes, of your lip. Maybe you want to believe that you're just friends with her, and happy about it even, but I know that you want more."

Tom shifted uncomfortably, mussed a few items scattered around the tent.

"Losing your mother was hard."

"You're getting over it fast."

"I don't know what you think was happening before, you certainly seem to believe you do," Tom whispered, looked wearily at his son, "But you don't even know half of the story. What happened then doesn't matter now. The only thing that matters is this family, you and your brothers, you are all the family I have left and we need to stay together. Dr. Glass has been there for me, and for you boys, and yes, I care about her, but she could never replace your mother and I would never hurt Dr. Glass, or the memory of your mother, for a small comfort."

"He's not a small comfort," Ben said softly, "I love him."

"Love? You don't even know him," Tom returned sharp and obviously harsher than he intended, as he recoiled back and shook his head, pacing the tent, "You only just met him and you have no clue what that word even means. You are too young and too inexperienced in the world."

"I've had experiences," Ben cried, "I'm not as young as you want to believe."

"And you're not as old as you want to believe, either," Tom snapped, lowered his voice, "I would love for you to be able to explore yourself, explore the world, like a normal teenage boy should be able to, but the circumstances won't allow it. Now's not the time to be experimenting…"

"Goddamn it, why aren't you listening to me? He's not an experiment!" Ben curled his lip back, a vicious sneer, "Would we even be having this conversation if he wasn't a boy?"

"Yes, we would," Tom said without hesitation, and when Ben looked unconvinced, he sighed, and closed his eyes, confessed, "I've known for a while you were questioning yourself, Ben. Before the aliens you're mother found a letter you wrote your classmate. We didn't want to say anything. We wanted to wait until you were ready to come to us."

Ben gaped, felt as if his heart had stopped, "You went through my things."

"She found it doing laundry. You left it in your pocket," Tom quietly explained, gaze on the ground almost as though ashamed, though whether it was at himself or his son, Ben couldn't be certain, "She put it back in your room, tucked it in one of your notebooks so you wouldn't realize."

Ben swallowed hard; oddly, shivers raced his spine though he never felt the cold anymore.

"I'm not as disconnected from your life as you think," Tom continued, "I did pay attention to you, back then, and I'm trying to now, if you would only let me. I've been afraid of this, but I didn't think Jimmy…I almost hoped that…"

"Why are you being so difficult about this if you knew?" Ben demanded shakily, "Why are you questioning it so much?"

"He's the first friend you've made since the war started. You weren't certain of yourself before, and now, now you think you're certain because everything is dire and death is all around. You think you need to grab onto the nearest, most solid thing that seems real, so you're rushing into things," Tom said.

"That's not true," Ben stammered stubbornly, ducked his head to hide the frustrated tears beginning to form. He knew his feelings for Jimmy. He knew the future he wanted. He knew that his relationship with Jimmy came about because of all the right reasons.

"You're going to need that friendship later, Ben, but you don't need romance now," Tom stated plainly.

The tent flap fluttered open, and they both fell silent, turning to see Hal staggering inside. Hal halted a few steps in, looked between his father and brother, furrowed his brow.

"What? Do I have something on my face?" he asked.

"We're in the middle of a conversation right now, could you wait outside?" Tom said.

"Conversation? What conversation?" Hal wondered, blinking and glancing sidelong at Ben. Ben glared, perplexed, at the far corner of the tent and Hal's eyes widened in realization, "Oh, that conversation. How's it going? It's a little surprising, I know, I mean, sheesh, Jimmy, right? But you get used to it, and after a while, it's not so bad. Kind of cute, actually."

Tom gaped at Hal a moment and Ben made a noise in the back of his throat, took a deep breath.

"Falling in love isn't something you do because you need to," Ben said. Tom flickered his attention back to Ben, opened his mouth, closed it.

"No, Ben, no, you're not in love. You've only just met Jimmy, you barely know each other."

"I know more about him than you think. A lot happened while you were gone!"

"A lot did kind of happen," Hal agreed, shrugging at his father and crossing his arms over his chest.

"Not that much could've happened," Tom said, "You were barely speaking to each other before and now you're in love? You don't know him, hell, I know him better than you."

"You really don't…"

"He's a troubled kid; I could tell that much the day I met him, hell, he was troubled long before the war. You don't know where his head is at, and you can't really be sure of what he truly thinks or feels about any of this. It's likely this all might just be convenient for him, and in a few months that'll change. History is riddled with examples of relationships like this forming out of necessity and dissipating when one or the other member of the relationship doesn't need it anymore, and I don't want you getting hurt because of it," Tom ranted, "Not in this situation. Not in this world. Not after everything you have been through. Not by this boy."

Ben faltered, fell back a step, air escaping his lungs as though punched from his gut, "I can't believe you."

Tom quieted; eyes heavy on his son. He wore the look of one who'd said far more than intended. Ben glanced away, blinked a few times, trying to refocus. His head felt hot, and blood coursed a slow boil in his veins. He trembled.

"You know, he was afraid to tell you," Ben whispered.

Tom shifted uncomfortably; cleared his throat with a small swallowing motion.

Ben glared spiteful at his father and seethed, "Because of how much he respects your opinion."

"Ben," Tom sighed.

"I'll let you be the one to tell him you don't think he's good enough for me," Ben said evenly.

"That's not what I meant," Tom protested.

"That's kind of what it sounded like you meant," Hal mumbled, white with stun.

"Stay out of this, Hal," Tom muttered.

Ben shook his head, stepping backwards towards the door, "You're the one that needs to stay out of it, dad."

"All I'm asking is that you focus on friendship, and worry about finding romance later, you are young…"

"Oh, uh, no, dad, I tried that argument," Hal interjected.

"How the hell long have you known about this? You just let it happen? You should've been watching your brother?" Tom reeled on Hal.

"Let it happen," Hal scoffed, taken aback by the sudden accusation, "What exactly was I supposed to do? Tell them they weren't allowed to like each other and what? Poof, like magic, it would happen? Do you realize how ridiculous you sound right now?"

Ben bit back his anger and took advantage of the shift in his father's focus to slip out of the tent. He swallowed the cold night air in large gulps, tried to straighten out his head. He hated that Hal had been right, but more so, he hated that if Jimmy knew the things Tom said it would kill the boy. It seared through Ben, as if feeling Jimmy's heartache for Jimmy. Ben almost wanted to cry, or laugh, he couldn't decide. But he didn't do either. It was over, his father knew, and he felt more relieved than anything else.

Several yards away, Jimmy leaned against a tree smoking a cigarette. Ben approached slowly, turned his father's words over in his head at every step. They could move past this, they would find a way to sort it out. Even if Tom never approved, Ben would leave the family, move out of the tent, hide away with Jimmy, they could leave the 2nd Mass if it came to it, find their own way in the world, Ben didn't care.

Jimmy took a long drawl of the cigarette, watching Ben move towards him for a few seconds before stubbing out the cigarette and tossing it. He set back heavy on the tree trunk. Ben came to a stop in front of him. Jimmy tipped his head down, uncertainty etched in his features.

"What'd he say?" Jimmy quietly asked.

Ben shrugged, forced a smile, "Nothing really. He just lectured me about the Dr. Glass comment."

"It wasn't a smart thing to say," Jimmy murmured, scoured the darkened ground.

"No. Maybe not," Ben agreed, reaching forward to sweep the hair from Jimmy's face and lean a kiss to his forehead, "You okay?"

"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be?" Jimmy looked up at Ben, eyes shimmering strange, dark emotion, "It didn't go as bad as I thought it might."

"How bad were you expecting?" Ben wondered.

"I don't know. I sort of thought there'd be more swear words."

Ben smirked, and Jimmy kissed him, lingered their lips together a moment.

"I suppose I won't be moving into the tent after all," Jimmy joked when they parted.

"He just needs a little time to get used to the news. He'll be okay with it, he just needs time," Ben insisted.

"Right," Jimmy murmured, fell against the tree once more and tilted to his head back to gaze skyward. His expression was distant and unreadable and for a painful fleeting moment Ben wondered if Jimmy may have lingered outside of the tent and overheard any part of or even the whole conversation Ben had with his father.

"I know what I said but…" Ben faltered, frowned, and Jimmy peeked at him curiously.

"What's wrong now?"

"Nothing," Ben took a deep breath, "It would be nice, is all, to hear it. For you to say…I don't know, never mind."

Jimmy turned away and glared into the woods.

"I want a life with you," Ben said.

"Jesus, Ben," Jimmy groaned.

"I'm serious. I know that you think I'm being stupid, that I can't possibly be a hundred percent about my feelings, that it's too soon or we're too young but I love you. I really do. And when I think about the future, maybe I don't know what's going to happen. Maybe I don't know if we'll win the war or spend the rest of our lives running. Hell, maybe we'll die tomorrow. All I know about the future is that when I think about it, I think about you being with me in it. I want to know the man that you are five years from now, ten, twenty," Ben said, "And I guess, I need to hear from you, that you want the same thing."

Jimmy slipped away from the tree, paced a few steps into the darkness, running a hand through his hair.

"You do want the same thing, right?" Ben persisted; a small pang in his chest.

The tree leaves rustled with a sudden chilly breeze. Jimmy shuddered, wrapped his arms around himself. Somewhere in the distance crickets sang and an owl called.

"It doesn't matter what I want," Jimmy mumbled, kicked a rock over and dug his boot toe into the indent in the dirt beneath it.

"It matters to me."

"Your dad knows about us. Now what?" Jimmy turned around to face Ben once more. Ben sighed, decided maybe it was better not to press it for that night. Too much had already happened, and they were both feeling emotionally strung out.

"Now," Ben smirked, closed the distance between them and leaned their foreheads together, "Now I think we should celebrate."

.

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AN: And there is the big confession chapter. I didn't like it. Greg said he did. I don't know. There's a line in here that'll confuse people, but it's actually a foreshadow for not the second part of this story, but the story after, so the fourth story in this series. If I ever get there. It's also a teeny-weeny hint of what's going on with Ben. Sort of.

I have midterms all next week and two papers to finish writing today. I need coffee, breakfast, and a giant bag of candy.

Please let me know what you thought!

Reviewers: LuckyDreamer91, no kidding Jimmy needs less stress in his life. As if the aliens haven't fucked up everything else for him, it might seem the one good thing the aliens did give him (ie. Ben) they're also going to fuck up. Poor Jimmy, he has the misfortune of being my fave character. Sigh. Yeah, I love Maggie being all sister/mother type figure to Jimmy. You know, they didn't really show many of the characters reacting to Jimmy's death, at least, not directly his death. Just Weaver and Ben. Anne was all upset it was her kid's birthday (which was the worst part of that entire episode, made me want to find a FS writer and punch 'em in the face), Tom was all upset that Ben was upset then he took advantage of vulnerable Anne for a kiss (second worst part of that entire episode), Hal was being an all around dick the whole episode (seriously, who gives their brother shit when his best friend is in the process of dying?), and no one else even bated a lash (Jimmy who?). Oh well, ranting again. Sorry about that. Hope this chapter didn't disappoint. Dee, I know right! What took you so long to write it? I was feeling all kinds of sad. You're looking forward to the angst now, hm? Well, brace yourself, because it might be worse than you thought. Yes, Jimmy's suddenly freaked out about the rash, because really he's freaked out about the confession later that night, and what better way to deal with those emotions than rush to the doctor and ask her if he's dying? He does want to protect Ben to the very last though, and he'd probably be hard pressed to confess to Ben what's going on even if it did turn out that Ben was causing it. Yes, Anne is in a deleterious position at the moment. If she tells the authorities in the camp she betrays Jimmy and risks his position in camp, if she doesn't, then she risks the health of the entire camp. And yes, mommy Maggie rears her protective head. In my outline of this chapter, that scene is described as "Maggie discusses with Ben his intentions towards Jimmy", so it was very much a parent-to-boyfriend dialogue. It also seemed to fit, Maggie's gentle statement that she's on Jimmy's side and her reminder that Ben might have less to lose if the whole relationship goes south. And you're right, that Maggie may be the only one Ben would listen to on the subject, not even Weaver could get it into Ben's head that he needs to tread careful for Jimmy's sake. Interesting thoughts on Maggie's upcoming heartache...very interesting...guess you will just have to read to find out!

Yay! See you guys next Sunday. Hopefully.