Work Text:
It was one of the slower nights in the city, where everything took its sweet time settling down. One of the normal ones, where nothing eventful happened, the ones that made Ben feel comfortable in his skin for once. The only thing he could hear outside of his space was the faint hum of cars outside his window and the whistle of the late spring breeze flowing through. He held Ricky close to him, laying together on their sides, his head buried in Ben’s chest and cradled in his arms. It was like every other night for them, where everything fit into their own little routine
He was listening to the slowness of his breathing, the occasional indecipherable murmur from his sleep talking. He found everything Ricky did to be interesting, in an endearing sense. It was comforting to be able to stare at him in the night, to find himself at peace by the simpleness of his existence.
Ben let his hand run tenderly through Ricky’s soft hair, taking in the soothing moment. He kept staring at him, able to count every single eyelash if he wanted to, admiring what was his—and what would be his seemingly forever.
He felt his heart skip a beat as Ricky’s breathing changed. He had stirred in his sleep, but Ben was unable to tell whether he had woken up or not. Ben kept his voice to a low whisper, not close to Ricky’s ear but just loud enough that it would signal to him if he had been awakened. “Ricky? You awake?”
“Yeah,” he heard a slight mumble from Ricky, just barely audible from where he was tucked into Ben’s shirt. "Did you have a nightmare?” He knew that he didn’t get them as often anymore, but it wasn’t out of the question. Things like that usually kept him up.
“Nah, I’m just thinking about some stuff,” he said, voice heavy with sleep.
Ben wasn’t particularly surprised. Ricky tended to delve into his thoughts later at night, but he was still afraid that it could’ve been something he was worried about keeping him awake. “About what?” He asked. There was a short stretch of silence before Ricky answered him.
“Do you know where you wanna go to college?”
The question seemed a little out of the blue. Ben didn’t usually talk about his future often. A while ago, he assumed that he wouldn’t even have a chance at one. He always thought that his depression would win over him eventually, and he didn’t usually question it to be any other way. The letters that he kept away from any kinds of eyes proved that to him. Yet recently, things had been looking up. Ricky’s presence made things easier for him—for him to imagine living past seventeen, to think about what he would really want to do with himself.
“Yeah. It’s this art school in California. I’ve been looking at it for a while.” He let his hand drift lazily through Ricky’s hair as he spoke. “California?” He sounded somewhat surprised. “You don’t seem like the type.”
Ben understood where he was coming from. He had always despised the heat, but the opportunity to turn the one thing he was consistently good at into something he dreamed to become was too good to pass up.
”Yeah,” a small laugh came out with his words, “maybe I’ll get used to it.” There was a beat of silence before Ben raised another question, “are you going to college?” Ricky snorted a laugh, unexpectedly, “I don’t even know if I’m going to graduate .”
Ben moved downwards to meet Ricky’s eyes, bringing them face to face. He looked slightly confused as Ben reached out to cup the jawline of his soft skin carefully. “Don’t say that, shitbird.”
Ricky’s expression changed from humor to something indescribably blank. “I’m just kidding.” There was a shift in his tone once he realized that Ben actually cared. Ben knew he wasn’t only kidding around. He had heard Ricky speak that way about himself an unbearable amount of times for him to think it was true.
“What about after college?” Ricky’s voice came out clearer, like he was more intent on listening now and it wasn’t just a simple one-answer question.
Ben knew that he was trying to get off of the topic of his future, but he didn’t want to push it. Maybe if he opened up a little bit more, Ricky would be more keen on talking about himself. “See if it’s worth it to become an artist,” despite it always having been his dream, it wasn't exactly something he was sure he could depend on, “I’d probably stay in the city, too. I don’t know if I would enjoy the countryside or the suburbs. And I thought that we could-“
He caught himself before he finished his sentence.
We .
Ben’s hand suddenly stilled. He had hardly realized it before he had uttered the word. It had only been a slip of the tongue, but it felt so insanely real.
He had been imagining a future with Ricky . The thought that one day they would be separated had never crossed his mind once in the past two years. That one day he would wake up in his own apartment, without him, where Ricky could be across the country in some other city, living his own life, without Ben.
His heart dropped in the sudden silence. Ricky was still staring at him, listening intently as before, but now Ben found himself hardly being able to breathe. There was an unshakable lump left in his throat over a single word.
“Keep going,” Ricky urged, a dim twinkle in his eyes.
“I thought that we could… be together. I mean, I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep without you ever again.” Despite feeling like every word that slipped off his tongue burned him, his voice was heavy with sincerity, “something just for us. And I could have my own art studio, and you—you could publish your poems.”
Ben felt like he was making empty promises, only promises he would wish to be able to keep. But the ache in his chest told him how people would react to the idea. How Ricky would react to the idea. He didn’t even know if they were on the same page. He didn't know whether they could pull off at all. I’m such an idiot .
Ricky’s words grew softer in reassurance, “I’d like that a lot. Probably wouldn’t be much different than how we are now, except more private.”
Ben rarely felt thrilled by anything, but he swore that he felt something light up inside of his chest. A spark of hope that told him that he could actually find a way in his life, and bring Ricky along with him.
He didn’t assume that they would have similar ideas for their futures. He always thought that one day, Ricky would leave, and that he would be back to square one. Ben always held himself back from trying to care too much, out of fear that if he did end up leaving, it would be what would ruin him.
“Yeah, that’s what I want. A place just for us.” His hand shifted from where it laid on Ricky’s face, trailing down his skin to intertwine their hands together loosely.
There was a pause before Ricky asked another question. “Can we get a cat?” The question lightened the mood a little bit more, getting a giggle out of Ben. He wondered if Ricky had an ideal way for them to live, if he had been imagining it like Ben had. One that involved a cat—not that he minded. “Of course. What would you wanna name it?”
“Something stupid, probably,” he gave a small shrug, “like… Cigarette.”
Ben scoffed in joking irritation, “that’s a terrible name for a cat.”
“Exactly.”
“We can pick a better name together. I think you’ll be a little more mature by the time that happens.”
“Don’t get your hopes up.”
“What made you think about college in the first place?” Ben’s giddy smile remained before Ricky went unnervingly quiet in a second. Sudden tension sparked as his grin dropped, the silence loud with unspoken words between the two of them.
Ricky’s mouth parted, a slight shudder running up him that Ben could clearly feel from where his hand rested. “I was just thinking about what would happen if you and I… weren’t able to have a future together.”
Along with not realizing that Ricky thought the same way about their future—Ben also didn’t think about the fact that Ricky could’ve been worried about it. He hadn’t thought that he had wanted to have a future with him, the way that he wanted it.
In the quiet, a flood of thoughts came over Ben. Unrelenting thoughts of leaving Ricky behind, never seeing the same face who gave him kisses every morning when he woke up, the possibility of having someone who wasn’t Ricky in his shadow. Even if he thought about it differently at times, in the midst of his breakdowns in the bathroom that told him no one would stick around for him, he knew he would never have the heart to let him go. Not when he was everything he had ever wanted, and that he knew Ricky would never leave him either. “I’ll find a way. Promise.” He pressed a kiss to Ricky’s forehead, getting a happy hum from him in return as he snuggled closer.
Ben felt a tug on his heart, but not the uncomfortably familiar ones ridden with guilt. The one that reminded him of the boy in his arms whom he loved.
“We’re gonna be okay,” he whispered.
He got what he wanted, but not how he planned. A future with Ricky was everything he had dreamed of since then, but somehow, things were always ruined for him.
Ben remembered it all distinctly. He had woken up like any other day, gone about the routine he and Ricky had grown into after years of living together. It was all he had ever wanted and more. He had innocently checked his mail to find a letter addressed to Ricky—requesting his service for the U.S. Military in consequence to their actions in Vietnam.
Even through it all, they knew they would have to stick together. They both knew that they wouldn’t be able to do it without one another’s presence. Despite Ricky’s protests that Ben shouldn’t go, that he wasn’t worth it, he wouldn’t be able to handle the fact that one day a group of soldiers could’ve shown up on his doorstep delivering news that would drive him into madness.
After his accident, Ben remembered the way he would slip in and out of consciousness in the infirmarys. The nights where Ben would be half asleep, listening to Ricky talk and not having the energy to get up or make a sound. It slightly reminded him of the nights they spent in his room together, simply listening to one another. But the familiar, comforting image shattered when Ben would remember the other injured soldiers laying beside him. The sounds of dying men, the people who Ben could be a part of if he weren’t nursed back to health sooner. It was easier, nicer, to pretend it was familiar. To pretend that the rough texture of the camp beds was indistinguishable from the one back home, that the sounds of the sick surrounding him were just randoms strolling throughout the city. He didn’t want to face the truth.
He didn’t want to think of the phantom that was his left arm. The bandage wrapped around the stub that was left of it. The gunshot that rang forever in his ears.
The only thing that wasn’t only a part of his fantasy was Ricky. Him running his hands through Ben’s hair when no one was watching. The occasional brush of Ricky’s hand against his just to reassure him that he was there. Muttering to himself about how he wished it was him instead.
Ben knew that he wouldn’t have had any idea what to do with himself if it were Ricky on the other side of that gun. He was the entire reason he was there , so that he could stay with him, or die protecting him. He was the only one Ben was able to hang onto. The only true reason for him to want to wake up.
The ride back home was quiet, with heavy tension on the backs of all soldiers returning home to their families, their loved ones, resting on their shoulders. Ben thought of the people who were waiting on those who would never come back. How lucky he was, even if he hadn’t gotten out of it unphased. He had flinched at practically every noise around him, like someone who had been trapped in a white room, senseless for ages and was just now being assimilated back into society.
Ricky stuck close to him the entire time, but neither of them spoke much. Their hands rested against each other in a silent attempt to comfort one another. Ben thought of the same thing that had been on his mind since he got on the bus for the first time— I want to go home.
He wanted nothing more than to feel normal again, though the fact that it was impossible clouded his brain.
The bus came to a halt, groups of people awaiting outside as the soldiers' attention collectively snapped to the fact that they had stopped. Ricky grabbed hold of Ben’s wrist almost immediately, holding him as if he was his anchor in the midst of the faces surrounding them.
The soldiers shuffled out in an orderly fashion, the air around them feeling like a bubble that kept all the tension trapped inside of it. People scattered as soon as they were allowed to leave, rushing as quickly as they were able to so they could reunite with their families after years of harrowing service. Ben was uncomfortably aware of his surroundings, his uniform clinging to him as if it had been molded onto his skin from wear.
In the hundreds of voices among the crowd, Ben heard the yell of his name ring through his ears, the shrill, familiar voice coming to him as soon as he turned to the source.
“ Ben!”
Ben’s heart dropped when he saw Donna running towards him, tears flying as she didn’t hesitate to hug him as soon as she was in close enough range. He went stiff for a second, the shock that she was there weighing down on him before he returned the touch, putting his arm around her. She didn’t seem to care about the state he was in, nor his injuries, only that she had her brother back. She waited for me.
She buried herself into the crook of his neck, the warmness of her touch like a burn against his skin that hadn’t felt that kind of warmth in too long. “Oh my god, oh my god—I missed you so much.”
He could hardly register it at first. She was the only familiar person he had seen in years that wasn’t Ricky. It made him feel real, too real, in fact. He held Donna as tight as he was able to in the shock, her tears soaking into his uniform.
Ricky kept a distance, more than a few inches away, but still had his eyes on them.
“Hey, Don,” his voice had a tinge of weariness but still held its constant laughter—Ricky always had that kind of effect—except it was more like relief than giddiness. Ben noticed Donna look up at him, tear stains running down her face, with a smile. She didn’t let go, but her expression was enough to reach him. “I’m so happy you two are okay.”
Ben knew that Ricky probably wouldn’t have had any family waiting for him when he arrived home. He knew that he had people that he would see later, once they left, but they had decided that it would be better to go home a bit after their reunions. To let themselves back into their routine, if it was even possible.
The apartment was stiff as he and Ricky stepped in for the first time in what might as well have been centuries. It was like he was stepping into somewhere frozen in time, where he couldn’t touch anything, or the place would all come crumbling down. It felt like he didn’t even own the place and was trespassing in somebody else’s life. Somebody who didn’t bear the same scars he did.
Ben left Ricky standing in the doorway as he wandered about aimlessly, his eyes drifting upon things that he brought here. That he used to use everyday. That were once a part of his daily life. He didn’t know whether or not it felt like home, it might as well have been just another place to him now.
The kitchen, where he remembered the feeling of finding Ricky making breakfast there every morning. His bedroom, the place where he would sleep under covers he had long forgotten the texture of, with warmth of his love beside him. Everything felt untouched, somehow. All he wanted was for nothing to change once he got settled, but he felt like a completely different human being at that point.
He drifted into the bathroom, feet light on the ground, yet every step he took felt like an echo off of the walls—every tile like a trapdoor into the void that could open up underneath him and swallow him whole. He didn’t bother shutting the door behind him, afraid that if he were to touch anything, he would slip away from reality entirely. Everything around him felt like an uncomfortably hopeful dream.
He didn’t know whether or not looking in the mirror would be a fate worse than death, but he had too. He had to prove that he could do it, that he could face what had become of him.
Ben could hardly recognize himself anymore when he turned to look at himself. Even if some details were smaller or easier to miss, he didn’t look anything like he used to. His eyes were heavier, like a tint of darkness had grown over them and refused to lift. There was a disgusting paleness to his skin, one he recognized, yet hadn’t seen in years.
And of course, a missing arm, empty space from right above where his elbow used to be.
He stepped closer, his hand resting on the counter top, gripping onto it as he kept his eyes trained on himself. It felt freezing against his palm, but he didn’t let go. He needed something to hang onto while he felt himself getting lost in his own reflection.
His body had never been his . He would never be able to escape people ripping away at parts of him, whether through their cruel words that forced him to put his own emotional walls or hands that grappled for him in the darkness as he could hardly scream from how numb it made him feel. All of it just for him to push people away when he wanted to let someone all over him for once in his life.
Ben had always thought he was distinguished from everyone else. The slightest slump in his step, a smile that people would cringe at the sight of even when they told him to smile more. Something that made him outcasted, like he was some disease that other people were afraid to catch.
He could see it. He could see how much of a freak he really was, no matter how hard he had tried running from the harsh truth his whole life. He thought that he had found acceptance for himself as he grew up, yet no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t tear his eyes away from his reflection. A ghost of someone who he thought was himself.
He felt hollow, like the only thing he was able to do was stare at himself. And he knew that he would stare until he felt sick. Until he would lose himself for good. Until—
He heard Ricky’s soft, careful steps outside the door. He didn’t bother looking over, but could sense that he was there. Ben had recently noticed that it felt like his senses were heightened, that he was on constant alert that something was there. Always something, waiting for him.
Ricky entered the bathroom slowly, approaching Ben like he was a stray animal who had appeared before him on the street who he was trying to coax to come to him.
He rested a hand upon Ben’s back—it wasn’t too firm, only a faint reminder that he was behind him. He flinched at the touch, but didn’t pull away. Ricky had his eyes directed at Ben’s, but he couldn’t take his own off of himself.
“Love…?” Ricky’s whisper trailed off, like he was trying to search for the words to tell him. He had always been able to tell when something was wrong with Ben’s expressions. But in all honesty, Ben didn’t think there could be any words. Words weren’t enough to stitch together something broken beyond repair, no matter how badly he wanted it. He needed to tell Ricky that he should step away, that he wouldn’t be able to fix him, that he would only get himself hurt if he kept putting Ben over himself.
He could hardly put what he was feeling into words other than he felt ill just by looking at himself.
The more he stared, the more the image felt like it was morphing into a completely new man. He saw Ricky’s gaze shift to the mirror, like he was trying to decipher what Ben was looking at—but he wouldn't be able to know. Would he?
All he could think about was how everything he looked at was just a hazy hallucination.
He felt himself snap back to reality when Ricky’s hand shifted, letting out a light sigh as he moved his arm across Ben’s back to pull him to his chest, wrapping him in a tight hug with trembling arms. “It’s alright, sweetheart. It’s over now. We’re okay.” His words were soft spoken as Ben’s breath hitched as if he had just now gained consciousness.
We.
It was them, together. Ricky stayed with him, no matter how disgusting he felt about himself.
Ben had never been a loud crier. He had always forced his tears to stay back, to stay hidden away where he wouldn’t be considered weak. Ricky was the only one who he could ever truly take the mask off of, and even he rarely saw Ben cry. Sometimes he had convinced himself that he just wasn’t able to.
It was different this time.
It was like a dam had suddenly broken and everything had spilled out at once. He clutched at the back of Ricky’s shirt, feeling his heart hammering through his ribs as his body was wracked by sobs that he could only see as pathetic. I’m a grown man, I shouldn’t be doing this, his head screamed at him. But it wouldn’t stop. His sputtered tears wouldn’t end, the feeling of the heavy weight of his chest rising up and down as he hyperventilated overtaking him.
The only thing he could feel was the overwhelming feeling of existing too much. Everything was too real, all at once. He wished he could stay there forever. To stay in Ricky’s arms, to not have to look into the mirror anymore, just to melt into the one place he could find happiness in. But life moved on, somehow with the objective to make him suffer when he thought that he had everything he wanted.
He managed to speak, choked out words that would sound like gibberish to anyone else, but at least he tried.
“I’m so tired.” He buried himself in Ricky’s warmth, desperate for him to be the thing to bring him back to the living after feeling like a walking corpse for years. He could barely tell what he was or wasn’t anymore. A lover, a brother, a freak of nature, a murderer, a coward, an artist.
The truth hit him faster than the bullet did when it first struck. That he had lost his good arm.
“ I’m never going to be able to paint again .” The one thing he knew about himself, the thing he thought would never change no matter how depressed he was or how people tested him for it, ripped away from him as everything else was.
He heard Ricky give a sigh that carried a certain distress that he couldn’t place, holding him closer and leaning towards his ear. “Yes, you will, sweetheart,” he gave him a small kiss. It was gentle, the clear sense of softness just so he could remind Ben that he was there. “I’ll teach you how to use your right hand, if you want.” Ben let out a noise between another sob and a laugh, caught off guard by the comment. He felt like he was becoming hysterical—like Ricky being there was some kind of drug that he could live on forever and have it help him ignore all of the terrible things.
Ricky somehow always found a way to make him feel better, more like himself. Like he was the grounding part of him that would never be taken away. Even if where they stood could only feel like a house to him, Ricky was there, and that was enough to tell him that it was home .
“I love you, Ben. No matter how you look, or what you’ve done, or what you think you’ve done.” Ricky’s voice broke, hands trembling as he rubbed slow, comforting circles on Ben’s back. His breathing slowed gradually, his breakdown developing into a lesser flow of tears. He couldn’t speak, but he didn’t have to. He clung onto Ricky like he was the only thing holding him together. Even if the thoughts couldn’t leave his mind permanently, Ricky would be there for him. He knew that.
It was over—and maybe the universe would be kind enough to grant them some peace for the rest of their lives.
“We’re okay now, aren’t we?” He said, his voice weak from the sobs yet still eligible. Ricky pulled back slightly enough, his arms still tight around Ben, pressing their foreheads against each other. His bright blue eyes looked more like a sky that had been covered by a storm rather than their usual clearness. Yet Ben still looked into them as Ricky said, “yeah. We’re okay.”