Jeff examined his face in the mirror, going over the damage. There was a large red mark on his cheek in the shape of his father's hand, and it was already starting to bruise. He winced at the image. How was he supposed to cover this up? He had school in the morning, and the mark was only looking worse by the hour.

Maybe he would be forced to skip. Or come up with some other excuse. His father wasn't abusive, and he didn't want anyone to think he was, even if he was acting like an asshole right now. Plus, it wouldn't be too great for him to have child service people after him, trying to 'rescue' him from his violent household. His sisters would end up suffering from it, too, and they didn't need any of that. So he needed some sort of excuse.

But right now, he couldn't sleep. Like, at all. He wanted to cry, but he forced himself to keep it together. He wanted to talk to Nick more than anything. He wanted to get away from here.

Oh, hell. What does it matter? My parents don't care anyways. Jeff moved over to his window and pulled it open. He was on the second floor, but conveniently for him, there was a tree right by his window. He'd used it to sneak out a few times before, tying a knotted rope to it to make it possible to climb down the branch by his window. He'd never been caught before, and he doubted he would now. His parents were probably sick of looking at him.

He climbed down the rope with ease. When he touched the grassy floor, he paused to pull the hood of his hoodie over his head. Rain was drizzling lightly right now, and the coolness of it eased some of the stinging pain on his cheek, but he didn't want to show up on Nick's doorstep all wet. He'd look even more miserable than he already did now, and he didn't want to worry his boyfriend too much. He cut through his backyard and then Nick's backyard, moving around the house to the front door.

He was about to ring the doorbell, but stopped himself. It was kind of late…He wasn't sure about waking up everyone. He settled for just knocking on the massive door.

At the windows, the curtains fluttered briefly, and a moment later, the door was opened by Nick. His eyes were nothing but concern. "Jeff? What's wrong, what are you doing here?" He seemed to notice the slap mark on Jeff's face immediately, even though it was dark. He stepped closer to him and carefully pulled back the hood to his jacket, then stood back to examine the wound with worry. "What happened…?"

Jeff swallowed. "My dad," he barely managed to say aloud.

Nick looked shocked. "He hit you?" he gasped in disbelief.

Jeff nodded with a shaky sigh. "Mhmm. And he took away my cell phone…" His voice broke, so he paused to keep it under control.

Nick reached his hand up to touch Jeff's reddened cheek. Jeff flinched at first, but Nick's touch was very gentle, and maybe even a little soothing. He lightly brushed his fingers over the wound with a distinct frown on his lips. "They didn't kick you out, did they…?"

"No," Jeff answered. "I snuck out. I just couldn't stay there…I needed to get away."

Nick nodded understandingly. He took Jeff's hands and gently pulled him inside the house. "Come on. Let's talk to my mom," he said softly. He led Jeff through the entryway and to the living room.

"Um—I'm not sure I want her to see…what my dad did," Jeff protested weakly.

Nick paused, but couldn't say anything before his mother suddenly appeared from the hallway, dressed in a nightgown and robe. "Nick, who was at the door?" she asked with a tired yawn.

Nick quickly whispered to Jeff, "Put your hood up and keep your left side turned away from her." He then turned to his mom. "Umm…it was Jeff…"

Jeff pulled his hood over his head hastily and turned his head away slightly, per Nick's instructions. He could still look at Mrs. Romano, confident she couldn't see his slap mark.

She blinked in confusion. "Jeff?" she said. "It's like, midnight…what are you doing here?"

Jeff opened his mouth to respond, but Nick spoke up before him. "Jeff's having a little trouble at home," Nick explained vaguely, but also hintingly.

"Trouble?"

Nick nodded. "Can he stay the night here?"

"I…I don't think I can stay at home," Jeff spoke up. "Not tonight."

She seemed to notice how strained and distraught his voice sounded. She sighed. "Alright…you can stay here tonight," she agreed. "But—" she looked at Nick sternly. "in the guest room. Not with you, Nick."

"I know," Nick said. "Don't worry. I didn't even think about that."

She nodded. "Are you all right, Jeff?" she asked him softly.

He nodded. "Yeah…I'm fine. I just needed to get away from home for a little bit…"

Nick took one of Jeff's hands. "I'll take him to the guest room," he offered.

"Okay," she said. "I'll be up to check on you two in twenty minutes. I expect you to be in your own room at that point, Nick."

Nick rolled his eyes and turned away, leading Jeff to the staircase. He brought Jeff to a plain room with nothing but a bed, a dresser, and a night stand. The typical guest room, he figured.

Nick closed the door. "It's not really ideal, but at least you've got a bed to sleep in instead of the sofa," he said.

Jeff shrugged. "Better here than at home," he mumbled.

"So…what happened, exactly?" Nick asked quietly.

Jeff wandered over to sit at the side of the bed. "Not much. My dad just yelled at me…He says he doesn't believe that we just got together recently—he thinks I've been hiding this whole thing behind their backs for years." He stared at his shoelaces sullenly.

"Why would he think that?"

"I don't know. I think he's just holding onto some gay stereotype or something. He doesn't think that our relationship is real," Jeff mumbled. "He either doesn't believe that I'm serious about my feelings, or that it's just simply a phase." His voice was starting to become uneven so he stopped there.

"Maybe he'll come around," Nick murmured as reassuringly as he could.

"I wish," Jeff mumbled. He touched the bruise on his face. "My dad has never hit me before. Tonight was the first time he's ever even laid a hand on me." His throat tightened and his vision blurred. He swallowed back the tears and forced himself to keep cool.

"I'm so sorry, Jeff," Nick said softly, moving over to sit next to him on the bed. He slipped his hand over Jeff's, intertwining their fingers and laying his head on Jeff's shoulder. "I wish I could do something more to help. I hate seeing you like this," he sighed.

Jeff smiled just barely and closed his eyes lightly. "Being close to you is all I need," he whispered. He frowned again. "Too bad you have to leave to your own room soon."

Nick smiled gently and lifted his head. "I'd stay here with you all night if I could," he said. "My mom would never let that fly, though."

"Unfortunately," Jeff sighed. He just wanted Nick's company, though. He felt so much better when he was with his boyfriend. But it looked like he'd be sleeping in this room alone.

Nick very lightly touched Jeff's bruised face. "You might want to put ice on that," he said softly. "It looks like you were slapped pretty hard. I think there's even a little swelling…"

"Yeah, it hurts," he admitted. "I'm wondering if he slapped me with an open hand or just plain clobbered me across the face."

"You don't know?"

"It happened really fast. I didn't even know he hit me at first," he told Nick.

Nick nodded slowly. "I'll see if I can slip out and get you an ice pack, okay?" he offered.

"And spend even less time with you?" Jeff protested.

"You're going to want to get the swelling down before school tomorrow, unless you want everyone to know what happened," Nick warned him.

Jeff sighed in defeat. "True," he mumbled.

"I'll be back in two minutes," Nick promised, standing up. He slipped out the door without another word.

Jeff sat in silence as he waited for Nick to return. The stinging in his face did beg for the cool relief of an ice pack, but he also didn't want to waste what little time he had with Nick right now. He'd have to get up early to sneak back home to pretend to wake up and get ready for school so no one would know he was gone. There was always tomorrow at school to be with Nick, but they wouldn't be alone there. And now that Jeff didn't have a cell phone, it would be even harder to talk to Nick.

Nick returned in about two minutes, as he promised, a blue ice pack clutched in his hands. He smiled at Jeff as he brought it over to him. "See? I was only gone for two minutes, tops."

Jeff perked up slightly. "And yet I still missed you," he said jokingly, although it came out a little strained. Nick took a seat at his left, carefully touching the icepack to Jeff's cheek. Almost instantly did the coldness take effect, and he sighed in relief as the pain subsided. It was only temporary, of course, while the cold lingered, though.

"Better?"

"Much," Jeff breathed. He closed his eyes for a long moment before reopening them to look at Nick. "You know…my dad also said he was going to pull me out of Dalton after this year's over," he mentioned randomly. Nick's hand suddenly slipped and he accidentally bumped the bruise under Jeff's eye. "Ow!" Jeff winced.

"S-sorry," Nick apologized. "Just…that's not fair! They can't do that based off of this!"

"That's what I said," Jeff told him. "But they said it's also because my grades haven't been near as appealing as Tyler's."

"They expect you to do as well as your older brother?"

Jeff shrugged. "I don't know." He heard Nick's mom calling from the first floor and sighed heavily. "And I think our twenty minutes is up."

Nick frowned. "Sounds like it," he mumbled. He placed the icepack in Jeff's hand. "Take care of the swelling. I hate to see your beautiful face so battered up."

Jeff smiled vaguely and leaned over, meeting his lips to Nick's in a deep kiss. His mouth was warm and sweet as usual, and Jeff closed his eyes to savor it in the short time that it lasted. When they broke apart, Jeff whispered, "Goodnight…and sweet dreams."

"I'll dream of you," Nick murmured as he stood up and made his way to the door. "I'll try to get you up early so you can head home before everyone wakes up. So try to get at least some sleep 'til then, honey."

"Same goes for you, sweetie." He tacked the pet name at the end a little teasingly. "Goodnight."

"Night." Nick then left the room, once again leaving Jeff all alone.

Jeff sighed out loud for the hundredth time, crawling under the covers to settle down. He might as well try to get some sleep, even if sleep seemed so unreachable right now. Besides, the bed was very soft—much softer than the one he had at home. He was comfortable here. He laid his cheek against the icepack, soothing the stinging pain that still seemed to linger there.

Now alone, he had too much time and space to think. His thoughts were instantly plagued with today's trauma and tomorrow's promised torture. What happened today wasn't over. His parents had yet to accept him and his feelings for Nick and until then, it would never be over. Would he really be forced to attend public school senior year? Regardless, his parents couldn't stop him from loving Nick. Did that mean they just planned to separate them as much as they could? Or… was there a chance that they could see this through Jeff's perspective? It didn't feel likely, but Jeff couldn't help praying.

Sleep was impossible to reach. His mind was racing too much. For a few hours, he just lied awake, torturing himself with worries and wonders, wishing that all of this could just disappear. Somehow, though, he must have fallen asleep eventually, because the next thing he knew he was being nudged awake by Nick.

"Jeff—wake up," he murmured. "Rise and shine. Um, the early bird catches the worm? I don't know, it's just time to wake up."

Jeff blinked open his eyes sleepily, suppressing a yawn. "What time is it…?"

"Like, 5:30 in the morning," Nick answered. "But I figured you should try to get back home at around 6 so you can get ready for school."

He rubbed his eyes to try to keep them open. He never really was a morning person and his body begged him to just roll over and go back to sleep. "Ah, yeah…that's probably a smart idea," he mumbled tiredly, his voice raspy.

Nick smiled softly. "By the way, I made breakfast, if you're hungry," he offered.

Jeff looked sideways at him, blinking. "How long have you been up?" he asked, somewhat surprised.

"Like an hour and a half. But I'm not sure if I even fell asleep last night," Nick admitted. "And if I did, it wasn't for very long."

Jeff sat up and smoothed down his ruffled blonde hair. "Yeah. I could hardly sleep, either," he said. "I feel like I might have slept for an hour at the most."

"We can meet up for coffee at the Lima Bean before school?" Nick suggested. "I have a feeling we'll need the caffeine."

"Sounds like a plan," Jeff mumbled.

Nick had made an Italian breakfast called Frittatas, which were kind of like Italian-style omelets. Jeff had to admit that they were pretty delicious, but what did he expect when Nick was the cook? He was the future Breadstix owner. It was practically a dream of his, and Jeff had no doubt that Nick would reach it.

Jeff got back home through his bedroom window just before 6. He had just enough time to change into a fresh uniform before either of his parents woke up. He left the house earlier than usual, calling through the house, "I'm going to school now!" just to make sure that they knew he'd been home. He headed to the Lima Bean with Nick first and got a triple-shot espresso to keep awake during the day. Nick had to be a little more careful when it came to caffeine thanks to his panic disorder and just got a plain medium drip with the usual amount of caffeine.

When it came to his face: the ice had really lessened any possible swelling, and there was just a little bit of a bruise visible on his pale white skin. He could come up with a believable excuse for this much easier, he figured. You couldn't even see the handprint anymore.

When people asked him, he quickly came up with the excuse: "My little sister threw a baseball at me." They didn't really have to know she was only five and probably didn't have a very strong arm. But hey—who knows, maybe Lilly could bruise his face with a baseball. They were pretty hard, after all…

All in all, Jeff did a pretty good job concealing his home problems from all of his friends at Dalton.

Hope you enjoyed this chapter! And I hope it wasn't too sappy...

Review, please! I'm starting to get writers block due to the lowering amounts of reviews I'm getting! ;)