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He’s going to do it. He is. He has to. It’s just he feels like he needs to talk to someone, and there’s literally nobody he can talk to about this. His parents are out of the question; his mother is the root of the whole issue, and he’d rather die than approach his dad to discuss his feelings about whoring himself out to a sleazebag ex to protect his mother’s dignity. Ew.
Alexis is off doing some kind of charitable activity for school. Plus, after her reaction to the whole situation this morning, he doesn’t trust her to understand - either why he needs to do it or why the whole thing is so emotionally distressing to him. Alexis would sleep with anyone given the right incentive and wouldn’t think twice about it. And she’s closer with their mother than ever before, but David still doesn’t think he can impress upon her just how much the publication of these photos would crush her.
David understands; he is his mother’s son. And though he’s never considered himself a good person, he thinks his limited capacity for empathy is still greater than his mother and sister’s combined. Alexis just isn’t like them; criticism and embarrassment slide right off her. David doesn’t have the time or the patience to make her understand what it feels like to care, against your will, what the world thinks of you.
He has to talk to someone, though. It hasn’t even happened yet, and he already feels dirty over the whole thing, just anticipating letting Sebastien put his hands on him again. He wonders about messaging Stevie, but… Stevie seemed upsettingly taken with Sebastien when he entered the motel office earlier. And although she’s like David, although she’d do the exact same thing in his situation, he’s not sure she’d feel as gross about it. Maybe she would, maybe she wouldn’t, but he’s not sure he’s emotionally up for an honest conversation with her about it.
And David realises he’s quickly exhausting his list of options. His ongoing choice not to socialise or make friends was always going to come back to haunt him eventually, he supposes. Really, the only option left is… Patrick. The newest, and the nicest, of his close acquaintance. The one he could never, ever tell about any of this.
And yet he’s the only one David can even imagine reaching out to at this moment. Patrick doesn’t need to know the details, David reasons with himself. But he needs contact with someone before he grits his teeth and endures… that. And what better preemptive antidote to a manipulative, pretentious egotist than David’s cute, buttoned-up business partner, who makes his stomach swoop every time he gives David that adorable upside-down smile?
Before he can talk himself out of it (because he really needs not to be alone with his thoughts for a minute; that much he knows for certain), he pulls out his phone and opens up his text chain with Patrick.
David cringes. There’s no way Patrick doesn’t see through this. Maybe David kind of wants him to, though? Luckily, a response comes through quickly, so he doesn't have too much time to think about it.
David ponders how to reply. Part of him wants to pretend he’s fine, just brush over this bit of the conversation so that they can spend some time talking about normal business-partner things, but Patrick has this uncanny ability to make David want to be honest. It’s very unsettling, and - at times like these - somewhat inconvenient. Then again, maybe that’s what made him want to talk to Patrick in the first place. He’s uncomplicated. There’s no pretence with him.
David whines aloud into the empty room. God, he’s so nice. They didn’t make people like that in David’s New York circles, that’s for sure.
He both does and doesn’t want to talk, so he settles for keeping it vague but honest.
For fuck’s sake. What on earth is Patrick supposed to make of that? David feels himself burning up in shame, and wonders if somebody’s invented a way of deleting both his own and Patrick’s record of his texts before Patrick has time to read them.
But then Patrick replies and makes sense of all the mess David’s just sent him.
And that’s… people have promised David anything before, a meaningless placation designed to tide them over until the first opportunity for David to ask for something, and no further. Yet David instinctively knows Patrick means it. He’s stunned once more at how easy it is with Patrick. Patrick asks how he can help and then he just… helps. Offers anything - manual labour that Alexis won’t do, grant money, a partnership that suits both of them - and then delivers on it.
It takes him a minute to figure out how to answer that one, and he wonders if Patrick’s reading into the pause.
And he likes to think it’s true. He’s steeling himself to do something that feels like a step back, but which will ultimately be a victory for his family and himself over somebody who used to hold all the power. He thinks he will feel pretty good about himself afterwards, all things considered. He just has to get there, first.
He’s being facetious, of course. It was the topic of much teasing that day - the kind of good-spirited, playful teasing they seem to do that leaves David blushing and pleased for reasons he’s not willing to examine too closely.
Only then, instead of taking the bait David offered him to poke fun, Patrick goes and responds with disarming sincerity.
Nobody is around to see David’s mouth fall open, or the way he recovers himself and shuts it again only to find himself unable to contain the happy little smile Patrick’s praise provokes. He is powerless to reply with anything but equal earnestness.
David has only a second to be stunned by that proclamation before the typing bubbles appear again. He feels the pause before Patrick’s next message as if they were standing face to face, holding eye contact through the momentary silence while having one of the painfully earnest conversations he can’t remember ever having had with anyone before he met Patrick. It’s intense - too intense - and he’s quickly learning he wouldn’t trade it for anything.
David blinks away the sudden stinging in his eyes with impatience. How can Patrick - who’s maybe the best and nicest person on the planet, because he’s certainly the nicest David has ever met - look at David and think he’s a good person? How has David deceived him so well? David who, unbeknownst to Patrick, is minutes away from knocking on the door of an asshole ex for a revenge fuck, exploiting his sexuality to get something from someone? The kind of thing that wouldn’t even occur to Patrick to do?
Not that Sebastien doesn’t deserve it. And David is mostly doing this for his mother. If she didn’t need him to destroy the photos, there wouldn’t be anything for David to take from Sebastien. When it came down to just the two of them, Sebastien always left with the upper hand. David left feeling used and unwanted; like he’d done something wrong.
No, he supposes this is his version of being a good person: doing the wrong thing for the right reasons (and okay, maybe some of the wrong reasons, too). Hurting someone cruel in order to protect someone who’s… well, if not perfectly virtuous, then at least undeserving of the pain Sebastien intends to inflict.
Still, David doesn’t expect this version of goodness to bear much resemblance to Patrick’s idea of it. Sweet, wholesome Patrick, with his open, honest eyes and excruciating Boy Scout earnestness. He comes from a different world to David.
David rereads the messages, his throat still a little tight, trying to figure out how to reply. It would be easier to deflect, maybe make a joke, but that doesn’t quite feel right. Patrick may be wrong about him, but he’s kind, and that counts for something. David won’t ruin the moment.
David stares at these texts for a moment. This is… is this flirting? Or is he just so startled at being thought well of that he’s reading it as something it’s not?
Instead of allowing himself to follow that train of thought, he thinks about what Patrick said. A good person. An absurd thing to accuse David Rose of being, but… easier to want now, in this reality that contains Patrick Brewer, where the Sebastien Raines of the world are just infrequent and unwelcome visitors. Still unattainable, probably, but easier to want.
And in the face of all that earnest intensity, David wants. To be more of the person Patrick thinks he is, even if he will never get there completely. He sends his next message before he can stop and think about it, desperate to know. Desperate for Patrick to see him, just a little, and to understand. To not hate him for it.
Patrick takes a long moment to reply. David tries to breathe deeply to slow his heart rate down. What must Patrick think of him? What is Patrick imagining? What if David’s scared him off, what if --
And there’s a story there, David realises suddenly. Why else would Patrick have sent the second part? But it’s not his place to ask.
And, despite everything he’s done and what he’s about to do, he thinks that he really does.
*
The next morning, David arrives at the store forty minutes after it opens, bearing tea for Patrick along with his coffee.
“Sorry I’m late,” he says, because he’s later than he usually is. “I had a couple things I had to deal with at the motel.”
Perhaps because of their texts last night, Patrick doesn’t rib him about it. He just says “no problem” like he means it, and thanks David for the tea, smiling one of his easy smiles. They sip their drinks, and David feels Patrick’s eyes on him before he asks about it. “You doing okay? After last night, I mean.”
David sucks in a breath and exhales slowly. “Yes, actually. Very okay - surprisingly so, you might say.” And now he’s babbling. Great. He clears his throat. “Um. Thank you, though, for the offer of moral support. And - and the other stuff. I think I needed that, in the moment.” He knows he did, actually, but that’s more than enough vulnerability as it is. He shakes himself mentally and ploughs on. “I’m really okay about it today.”
Patrick looks slightly taken aback, but there’s no trace of horror or disgust in his expression, which is something of a relief. “I guess you did tell me you’d be okay, after - after whatever it was went down. So I shouldn’t be surprised. I am glad, though,” he says, his face open and his gaze so direct it’s almost unbearable.
Patrick obviously doesn’t understand entirely - David has been careful not to let him - but he doesn’t appear to be judging him. Oh, he hopes Patrick isn’t judging him. He wishes he could explain - needs to explain, suddenly, in whatever roundabout way he can. Patrick seems to realise David is building up to something; he just stands and waits with a patience David has never pretended to possess.
“I hurt someone who was going to hurt my family,” says David, with finality. He did the right thing and he feels good about it now it’s over. Probably too good about it. (Well, he never did claim to be a good person, did he?) He doesn’t want Patrick to know just how good he feels about it.
But Patrick just raises his eyebrows, his expression benign. “Well, then. I’m not sure that qualifies as evidence that you’re a bad person.”
I felt good about it, David burns to confess. He hurt me, more than once, and I felt good about getting back at him. About hurting him. I enjoyed taking the power back.
He doesn’t, though. Patrick is looking at him like he’s sweet, like he’s… like he’s nice. The kind of nice that Patrick knows; a good man who would do anything for the ones he loved.
David should disavow him, but he can’t bring himself to do it.