Chapter Text
“And to be honest, you ain’t worth the hassle.”
As he walked around the square, the words from this morning still stung in Callum’s ears. He felt that he had a life that was used to rejection, used to the feeling of letting people down and leaving expectations unfulfilled. From Ben’s lips though, this really hit hard.
When Ben had turned around in the café that morning, a thousand different thoughts shuttled through his head. His face was mottled with scrapes and bruising that were clearly defined though obviously had healed for a few days. The main emotion brewing up in him was concern. Somehow this line of empathy had been connected between them; a thin, silver twine that kept them together, whole as one. Knowing what each other felt, recognising the emotions when masks told the world otherwise.
What Callum hadn’t expected was for Ben to blurt out that it was Stuart, his own brother, that had caused his wounds. Perhaps he was naïve, perhaps it should have occurred to him as soon as he saw Ben’s face. When he’d confronted Stuart, he made it sound like this was something Callum wanted. He’d bared his soul to his brother the other day, how could he possibly misconstrue his feelings like this?
That was his life though, wasn’t it? That had always been his life; people around him telling him how he should feel and what he should do. It started off with his Dad. Even back when he was young, he knew the expectation of what a man should be. What a son should be. You didn’t dare defy that, you were never allowed your own interests and your own thoughts. They had to be in tandem with dad’s own views. Keep smiling, keep agreeing and keep him happy. That was the unofficial Highway motto.
Then there was Stuart. He tried to hate his brother, he really did, but the echoes of his childhood and the beatings that were deflected on to his older sibling still rang in his mind. That being said, he was still just another person who told him what to do. He still moulded Callum into believing that he could never be good enough as who he was, so he might as well play the part of making someone else happy. He wasn’t decent enough, just not worth it, so play along and they might make it through the day.
When he joined the army there was a sense of freedom, a chance to be himself. However, the structure and routine just seemed to heighten his subservience rather than break through the shackles of it. Army life was just another way of telling him he wasn’t special; it was easy to stick to the rules, they were in full view; a code that wasn’t easily broken. Underneath though, something started to bubble; rebellion, defiance and individuality. It had always been there, he had always felt it, he had become a master of burying it down deep. The older he had gotten, the harder it had started to become until this feeling had started to claw its way out of the dirt.
Even in is role as a boyfriend and fiancé, it never became about him. He was Whitney’s fella, the dutiful partner who would do anything to make her happy. It was expected of him. All these people on the Square, they had no idea of who he really was and what he really wanted. They would make small talk in the pub or the shop, but it was no more than a glance. He wasn’t worth more than that.
Maybe he didn’t want an August wedding. Maybe he wanted to get married at somewhere they’d chosen, not just wherever was available. She’d never even asked him. His view wasn’t worth anything to her, all she needed him to do was turn up. At the moment, that was the last thing he wanted to do.
Ben had seen him, he’d listened to him and found out what he wanted. He’d given him what he wanted. Callum knew he wasn’t giving enough back. He felt himself spread so thin in making sure other people were happy, he was tying himself up in knots trying to do the right thing for everyone. He’d thanked Ben for not telling Whitney about where he got the cuts. It hadn’t come out quite right. It never did. He didn’t know how people did it. How people spoke their mind all the time and it came out clearly. Whenever he opened his mouth it seemed that he was disappointing someone.
Callum had started to think that Ben was the one person who thought he had something to offer. Now everything was ruined. Ben had seen the true him, like everyone else in his life had. Someone who just wasn’t worth the hassle.