It’s not quite midnight but it feels both much later and much earlier. I sit in the middle of Dom’s bed, dressed only in one of his t-shirts, and watch the small television that hangs on the opposing wall. The screen is a little off color-wise and it drives me crazy, but I don’t dare say anything. And I dare even less to buy him a new one. I’ll just wait for his birthday.

He comes in the room, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs. In each hand is a plate and on each plate is a sandwich. “Dinner is served.”

“You look pretty proud of that …” I take the plate. “Peanut butter and jelly.”

“It’s all we have. Ryder loves this shit.” He takes a big bite, a glob of grape jelly falling to the plate. “Not bad. The key to a great pb&j is the ratio of peanut butter to jelly. You gotta get it just right.”

“Is that so?” I giggle, biting into it. It’s so thick it sticks to the top of my mouth. “I think you’re a little heavy on the peanut butter.”

The words are practically indecipherable around the food in my mouth and we burst out laughing at the same time. He hands me a drink, flinching as he moves.

With a furrowed brow, I get the sandwich to go down and take a drink. “What’s wrong?”

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“You’re wincing again.”

“Just my ribs. Still sore as shit.”

“Come here.” I put my plate to the side and pat the blankets. He sits and I lift his shirt to see a purplish bruise marring his skin. “Dom, baby, that doesn’t look good.”

“It doesn’t feel good either,” he says, pressing on it with his hand. “It relieves some of the pressure when I do that.”

“You need a wrap. Do you have one?”

“Somewhere probably.”

“What kind of an answer is that?”

“An honest one?” He looks at me over his shoulder. “You’re really cute when you’re worried about me.”

“Then I must be cute all the damn time,” I say, getting off the bed. “Follow me.”

He does what I ask, his hand still on his side. “Where are we going?”

“To the bath.”

I expect an objection, but don’t get one and that pleasantly surprises me. I was ready for a fight.

We enter his bathroom and I try not to be heartbroken by the sorry state of the amenities. The flooring is a mess of ripped linoleum and shittier linoleum from God knows when. The sink sits on a wobbly cabinet with pressed-board doors and chrome-plated hinges. I lean into the tub, a shallow box that would never fit Dom’s body, and put the stopper in the hole. The water comes on, the pipes squealing in distress behind the paneling.

“Do you have bubble bath?” I ask.

He makes a face and disappears in the hall. He comes back with a bright pink bottle with a cartoon character on it. “This is Ryder’s. It’s all we’ve got.”

“Good enough,” I say, taking the bottle and lumping in a lot of the bubble-gum looking liquid. Immediately, I’m taken back to childhood and the garden tub in Mom’s bathroom that Sienna and I used to love to take baths in.

Testing the water, it’s perfect.

“You. In,” I say, nodding to the tub.

“I just got a shower.”

“And now you’re getting a bath.”

He nods, trying to act serious, but fails when the corners of his lips upturn. He drops his briefs and steps out of them and into the water. As he sits in the tub, his legs bent in a manner that can’t be comfortable, my heart hurts. Shaking it off, I squeeze myself in between the toilet and the tub.

Pooling water in my hands, I let it fall over his shoulders and down his back. Bits of the bubbles cling to his skin. Another splash ripples down his body, caressing the ridges of his muscles.

“Is that too hot?” I ask.

“No,” he breathes. “It feels really good.”

Gripping each shoulder with one of my hands, I knead them back and forth. He hisses as I work out the tension that’s caused his body to be so rigid. Eventually, I move both hands to one side and massage until it’s more pliable. Then I move to the other.

“That feels really good,” he says, halfway grimacing as I work a knot lodged near his neck. “That spot right there has hurt forever.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

He doesn’t answer, just bares more of his neck for my access.

“I want you to tell me things, Dom.”

“I’m not going to burden you with my shit.”

“It’s not a burden,” I sigh. “It’s a burden that you don’t tell me. It makes me feel …”

“What?”

I shrug, moving my hands down his spine. “It makes me feel like we’re never going to get there, you know?”

“I’m trying.”

“I know you are.” I press a kiss to the center of his back, resting my cheek against the warmth of his skin. “I’m trying too.”

We sit like that, the only sound coming from the droplets of water from the leaky faucet splashing into the tub. His heartbeat strums steadily, and I close my eyes and just feel the two of us.

“It should always feel like this,” I whisper. Pressing another kiss to the same spot, I pull back. “I like taking care of you. I want to take care of you.”

“I’m not a baby.”

“No, you’re not. You’re most definitely a man,” I tease, poking him in the side. “But that doesn’t mean you don’t need babied a little, and I can’t do that when you won’t let me. It makes me feel like I’m not a part of your whole life. Like there are pieces of you I can’t know. Does that sound dumb?”

“No.” He looks at me, his eyes wide. “I know what you mean. I feel like that with you.”

“But I tell you everything you ask. I let you see all the parts of me. The silly me, the smart me, the sassy me.”

“The sexy you.”

“Whatever,” I say, rolling my eyes. “You’re so great at helping me and talking me through things and doting on me. But you won’t let me take care of you like you do me. That’s not fair to either of us.”

There’s a shake in his next breath that ignites a spark inside him. I can see it cautiously ripple across his face. “I didn’t realize I was doing that, exactly.”

“You are,” I say, touching my lips to his. “Maybe I’m not super supportive of the fighting thing. It’s hard to be when I know things like this wallop of a bruise are going to show up.”

“Do you have something in your life that, when you do it, you could forget about everything else and just kind of zone out in that space?”

Instantly, I think of the designs Sienna has been showing me and the plans for Nate’s bar. I could play with those things for hours on end and never grow tired. I think, too, of certain charities that I love and could spend all day plotting for ways to help them.

“Maybe,” I say.

“That’s what fighting is for me. I go to the gym, pound the bag, concentrate on my footwork. You can’t fight and think about anything else. You have to focus on what you’re doing or you’ll get hurt.”

“I think you need to focus more,” I say, running water down his bruise.

He holds his breath. “Want me to tell you a story?”

“Yes,” I reply immediately. “I do. Bathtime Storytime with Dominic Hughes. Sign me up.”

He shakes his head, but I can see he’s already working on what he’s going to say. “Okay, when I was twelve, I skipped school,” he blows out a breath that has more emotion in the waves than I care to acknowledge. “I had a black eye from an impact with my dad’s right elbow in a futile effort to save my mother from his left fist. I didn’t want to make up a bullshit answer and I was just really fucking mad, to be honest. The other kids didn’t come banged up and I didn’t want to either. It was embarrassing.”

I fight back the tears wetting my eyes because I know if he sees them, he’ll stop talking. I focus on keeping his back showered with warm, sudsy water because that is something I can control.

“So I was just hanging out around town, just kind of walking around, messing around in some parks when this guy comes up and sits next to me on this bench. I remember the bench was red, down by the minor league baseball stadium, and faced the little tributary that runs down to the ocean. So he just sits next to me—no book, no magazine, no phone or anything. Nothing.”

“What did he want?” I ask.

“He sits there a while until I start to get up thinking this guy’s a creep, you know? Then he says his name is Jerry Percy. I tell him I’m Dominic and he asks why I’m not in school. I tell him I skipped, that he could call my parents or the school but neither of them would care so not to waste his time.”

I have to close my eyes to keep from crying at the thought of a little Dom sitting and feeling so alone. My throat squeezes so tight that I can’t answer or show I’m invested in the conversation. It’s impossible.

“He gets up,” Dom continues, “and I think he’s going to go call the cops or something, but he comes back with a bag. He sits again and pulls out a sandwich. It’s ham and tomatoes and lettuce and I don’t remember what else, I guess it doesn’t matter, and he handed it to me. Said his wife always packed him more than he could eat anyway.” He smiles sadly. “I ate the fuck out of that. Then he gave me a baggie of chips and a soda, and by this time, he could’ve kidnapped me and I would’ve gone willingly,” he chuckles. “So when he asked if I wanted to hang out at his gym for the rest of the afternoon, I said I did.”

“Percy’s,” I whisper. “That’s your gym now.”

“That’s my gym now.”

I have so many more questions, but I’m afraid to ask.

Before I can respond, we hear the front door opening and Ryder’s cries as Nate carries him past the bathroom and into their bedroom at the end of the hall.

We both exhale and then chuckle at our simultaneous reaction.

“Guess there goes your night cap, unless you can do it without screaming this time,” he winks.

“When is he moving out again?” I pout. “I should’ve made that a condition of my loan.”

“You’re a sucky loan shark.”

“I can’t be good at everything.” I stand, grabbing a towel off the makeshift rack and handing it to him.

He stands and dries himself off quickly before wrapping it around his waist. Before he steps out of the tub, he takes a deep breath. “Hey, you want to go stay the night at your house tonight?”

“You mean you’ll stay? With me? At my house?”

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, I think so,” I stammer. “I mean, yeah. Yes. Yes, I want you to come stay at my house tonight.”

He laughs at my reaction, stepping onto the linoleum. Bending so our noses are touching he whispers, “Then let’s get our shit and go before I make you start screaming right here.”