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The apartment was quiet when Benoit walked in, the only sound being the hum of the AC unit in the window.
Benoit closed the door behind himself, and leaned against.
His mind was still untangling the case, and all that he had encountered.
The case was over, wrapping up in a way that Benoit hadn’t seen coming.
And now he was home.
The sound of the kettle whistling from the kitchen cut through some of the fog in his brain.
He hung his hat on the rack next to the door and wandered into the kitchen where Phillip was standing over the stove making tea.
Phillip didn’t turn around right away. He never did when Benoit came home with heavy steps and careful breathing. “You’re back.”
“Yes,” Benoit answered, immediately noticing the thinness of his own voice. “I am.”
Phillip finally turned, and searched Benoit’s face with practiced ease. He could see everything that Benoit could never hide from him. “Here.” He grabbed two mugs and two tea bags, and set them on the counter. “Come sit.” He poured water from the kettle into the mugs, adding honey to Benoit’s.
Benoit crossed the kitchen and settled onto a stool.
Phillip slid his mug across the counter. “Tea fixes everything.”
Benoit smiled and wrapped his hands around the mug. “It was a...difficult one,” he said softly. “And not for the reasons that folks might expect.”
Phillip leaned against the counter, but didn’t push. He had learned over the years that Benoit spoke in spirals when something hurt - circling the truth until he could bear to land on it.
“A church,” Benoit continued. “Small parish. Big sins. Bigger lies dressed up as righteousness.” His mouth twitched, but there was no humor in his expression “The whole case was like walking into a memory I didn’t want to revisit.”
Phillip’s expression softened with understanding. “Your mother,” he said quietly.
Benoit nodded.
“She used to say the Lord loved the sinner but hated the sin,” he said. “And somehow I always seemed to be both.” He took a breath, and looked down at the mug. “She could quote scripture like it was air in her lungs. Sunday mornings, Wednesday nights, every grace said twice just to be safe.” He smiled faintly, then shook his head. “But when I told her who I was...who I loved...it was like I’d spoken a language she refused to hear.”
Phillip closed his eyes.
They’d talked about his mother before.
Countless times.
And each time was a knife to his heart.
He’d never met the woman.
Benoit had tried twice, before she died, but the woman had vehemently refused, condemning the relationship before even giving it a chance.
“The case...” Benoit took a deep breath, and took a drink of his tea. “It asked me to judge faith and fraud side by side. To decide what deserved exposure and what deserved mercy.” He set his cup down and massaged his face. “I chose silence, in the end. Or a version of it.”
“Do you regret it?” Phillip asked softly.
Benoit thought of the parishioners and their fragile hope. Of his mother, kneeling in pews that promised salvation but delivered conditions. And of the man he was now, the life he had built despite it all.
“No,” he said slowly. “But it reminded me how much damage can be done in God’s name. How many people learn to hate themselves because someone taught them it was...holy.”
Phillip sighed again, and closed his eyes. “Ben...”
Ben waved his hand. “It’s not important.”
“Ben-”
“I don’t believe in God,” Benoit continued over him “I believe in cause and effect. Rational. In human frailty. In the mathematics of motive.” He shook his head. “But this-this priest...he did.”
Phillip fell silent, and let the silence settle on them.
“He was good,” Benoit said softly. “One of the best. He made me think. Made me realize that not all priests were high and mighty. Judgemental. Not all priests were like the ones my mother used to drag me to.” He shook his head. “He was good. He told me that God never tried to hide or fix him. But that he loved him when he was guilty.”
“He does sound good,” Phillip said softly. “I know the kind.”
“I know. I know. You-”
“I believe in God.”
Benoit nodded. “Yes.”
“Not the way your mother did. Not the way that church does. But…I believe there’s something larger than us that bends toward love, even when people don’t.” He reached across the counter and placed his hands gently over Benoit’s. “I spent years trying to believe the right way. I tried different churches. Different versions of God. None of them fit.” He smiled wryly. “Turns out I’m allergic to being told who I am by people who claim divine authority.”
Benoit turned his hands upward so that he could encircle Philip’s fingers with his own. “You don’t speak much about your journey of faith.”
Phillip shrugged. “You don’t ask about it.”
He nodded. “That is on me.”
“The point is that I believe in God, but I don’t believe God needs defending by cruelty. And I don’t believe that love, ours included, requires forgiveness to exist. I believe in Grace.”
“Grace...” Benoit swallowed thickly, and looked down at their intertwined hands. “You know, the strangest thing about this case wasn’t the murder. Though believe me, it was very strange. It was standing in that place that so many called sanctuary, and realizing how much of my anger wasn’t aimed at the church… but at the boy I used to be. The one who kept waiting for faith to stop hurting. The one who felt trapped in a religion that had nothing to do with love and acceptance that God was supposed to offer.”
“Faith shouldn’t hurt,” Phillip said softly. “I’m sorry that your mother made it so that it did.”
“And yet,” Benoit said, voice low, “for many it does. It asks for obedience over compassion. Certainty before curiosity.” He glanced up at Phillip. “I live my life in questions. It’s how I breathe. And for a long time, that made me feel incompatible with faith itself.”
Phillip was quiet for a moment. “Faith isn’t certainty. It is hope. Trust without evidence.” He smiled gently. “Which is probably why you and I can sit on the same couch and not feel like adversaries.”
Benoit chuckled softly. “We’re a walking paradox. A detective who relies on facts, and a believer who relies on faith.”
“We balance each other out. You look for truth by pulling things apart. And I look for meaning by holding things together. Same destination, just different routes.”
Benoit leaned his head back and looked up at the ceiling. “My mother used to tell me that doubt was a sin.” His voice cracked slightly. “That questioning meant weakness.”
“You know what I think? I think questioning is reverence. If God exists, I imagine He would prefer honest wrestling over blind obedience.”
Benoit looked back at Phillip and brushed his hand under his eyes. “You’ve never asked me to change,” he said. “Never pushed me to believe.”
“No. Because the man I love is the man who asks.” He brought Benoit’s hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to it. “You are a man who listens and refuses easy answers. If God has given me anything sacred, it has always been you. No change or belief necessary.”
“I believe in you,” Benoit said quietly. “In this. In the way you hold your faith without using it as a weapon. In the way you let me be who I am without needing me to kneel.”
“And I believe in the goodness of a man who chooses compassion and kindness even when truth would be easier.”
Silence settled on them for a moment.
“If my mother could see us now,” Benoit said softly. “She would have liked you, if she’d given you a chance.”
Phillip squeezed his hand, but didn’t say anything.
They were back into the realm of conversations they’d had before.
“You’re patient,” Benoit continued. “Thoughtful. You listen more than you speak. She would have loved the fact that you’re English. You’d have fixed the loose hinge on her back door without being asked. She prized manners, Phillip. Courtesy. You would have checked every box she pretended mattered most.”
Phillip smiled sadly. “Except for the one where I loved her son.”
“Yes,” Benoit nodded slowly. “That single one outweighed all the others.”
Phillip stroked the back of Benoit’s hand with his thumb. “You know, I used to imagine meeting her,” he admitted. “Never to convince her of anything. Just to show up. To let her see that I wasn’t a threat, or a phase, or…whatever she had decided I was.”
Benoit’s throat tightened, as fresh emotion crept in. “And that is exactly why she would have liked you,” he said. “She would’ve admired your restraint. She would have praised your kindness. Your belief. Your-your grace. She might even have trusted you.” He shook his head bitterly. “But she never forgave me for choosing you. For choosing men. For daring to exist outside of the mold she had created for my life.”
Phillip didn’t say anything.
Benoit wasn’t done.
This had been building up in him since his mother's funeral and the case had cracked it all open.
“She-she believed that love was something God distributed sparingly. That there were rules for who deserved it. A checklist to receive it. And I broke them simply by existing.” He sighed. “Every time she looked at me after I...came out to her, it was like she was waiting for me to apologize. Even up until she...”
Phillips closed his eyes and sighed heavily.
“I know you’ve wondered, but you haven’t asked about what happened when I went to see her before she passed.”
Phillip nodded. “I knew you would tell me when you were ready.”
Benoit leaned back in his chair, and stared at the far wall over Phillips shoulder. “She asked me to repent. To end my relationship with you, and to come back to God’s presence. That was what we talked about. That was all we talked about.” His breath hitched and he cleared his throat. “She knew that she was dying, and she...she couldn’t...” His shoulders dropped slightly, and he dropped his gaze to his cup. “I used to rehearse conversations in my head. What I’d say if she finally asked about you. About us and our life together.” He smiled weakly. “I imagined telling her how you make the best coffee I’ve ever had. How you bake some of the best souffle’s when your stressed. How you remember the names of everyone on our street. How you are good, kind and brilliant. The most brilliant man I’ve ever met.”
Tears burned Phillip’s eyes. “Ben...”
“But she never asked. And what I’ve realized hurts the most is that if I had simply brought you home as a friend, a-a colleague, she would have embraced you. Hell, she would have invited you to dinner and prayed for you by name.”
“But I was never just a friend,” Phillip said.
“Exactly. And because of that, I am left grieving this version of her that never existed. A version that would have loved me. Embraced me. Who would have put her relationship with me over her relationship and idea of God. I think I could have believed in God if that version of her existed. And I think I’ll always grieve what could have been.”
Phillip leaned forward and kissed Benoit. “Grief doesn’t mean you were wrong to walk away.”
“No,” Benoit murmured. “But it does mean cases like this reopen the wound. Religion always seems to find the tender spots.”
“Yeah.” Phillip kissed him again. “But it’s a good thing you have me here to tend to those spots.” He brushed his fingers through Benoit’s hair, before cupping his cheeks. “I have you, Ben. I always have and I always will.”
Benoit nodded, and smiled weakly. “I know that.”
Church bells rang from down the street.
Phillip kissed him one more time. “Shall we go for a walk?”
Benoit nodded. “I suppose.”
Philip kissed his brow. “Finish your tea, then we’ll go.”
Benoit nodded, and took a moment to stare into Phillip’s face. “I love you, Phillip Chester.”
“I love you, Benoit Blanc.”