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There’s many reasons why Robert is an idiot. He doesn’t have the time to list them all but the reasons are always floating about in his mind. He’s an idiot when it comes to farming, and making slash keeping friends and he’s also an idiot when it comes to trying to be a dad.
He’s not really an idiot when it comes to Aaron. He used to be terrible. He used to look right at Aaron, know how he felt and still decide to behave like he didn’t know what was really going on between them.
Now he knows Aaron. He knows Aaron so deeply that it’s scary. He knows what every look means, how a slight twitch at one given time translates to a whole sentence.
Robert remembers Aaron being so unclear, so muddled in his mind. He remembers their first few months in that pokey room in the pub. He remembers Aaron with eyes red rimmed and shoulders shaking telling him that he’s fine. Robert didn’t believe him, but he didn’t know how else to get through.
It’s sort of there again now. Robert has watched Aaron build it quietly, without any fuss at all. He’s far away and Robert knows he is but he also doesn’t know what he’s meant to do about it.
Chas is the one to be useful at the end of the day. She doesn’t even mean to.
Robert’s sitting in the pub, staring at a spreadsheet he put together when he should have been sleeping last night. It’s all about the farm, prices and contacts and building up some sort of network. He’s close to joining an online forum for farmers in the area. The Robert of ten years ago would have laughed in his face.
“Dinner and a show I think.” Liam is so perfectly normal and nice and happy all the time and Robert has to stare up at him to work out what all the fuss is.
He’s carrying a bouquet of flowers and smiling at Chas who looks a little bashful if that’s even possible for her.
“You didn’t need to do anything.” Chas says. “Well, maybe book a date properly this time. Unless you have any other wannabe stalkers I should know about.” Chas laughs and then has the audacity to pull a face at Robert. “No offence.”
Robert scowls and then looks back at his phone.
“I was going to say actually. Uh.” Chas approaches where Robert is sitting and then takes a seat.
She must be dying or something.
“What’s wrong?” Robert asks. Then something clicks. “Is it Aaron?” He gets to the point.
Chas pulls a face. “Well. Has he said something?”
Robert shrugs. “Like what?” He tenses slightly and feels like he’s on the edge, like he’s going to slip and fall flat on his face or something.
“Today.” Chas’ eyes flicker a little. “It might be a bit much.” She shrugs. “I told Liam to keep it low key but …”
Robert stares at the flowers. “Am I meant to know what you’re on about?”
Chas pulls another face, this time she looks alarmed. “Uh.” She stares back to the flowers Liam has bought her and clearly battles with what she should say next. “Well. It’s the day that — you know what if Aaron hasn’t mentioned it then —”
“Mentioned what?”
“He got engaged to John this time last year. As in today.”
Robert doesn’t know what to say. His brain sort of just short circuits a little because he really didn’t know that. Aaron hasn’t mentioned anything about his relationship with John other than the shitty basics. They met when John spawned into the village with that God awful van and Vic begged him to stay as a replacement brother.
Aaron’s said John and him were causal until they weren’t. He’s also said that John performed emergency surgery on him in one of the barns and it was all a big deal for a second.
He hasn’t mentioned who proposed. Robert’s always thought that it must have been John and now there’s this possibility that it wasn’t, there’s this real possibility that Aaron proposed to John.
Maybe he had a ring ready, maybe he got down on one knee and everything.
“Happened right there.” Chas points towards the corner of the bar. Nice and quiet. It doesn’t seem like a place Aaron would ever do that, but maybe Robert’s being way too self centred about Aaron’s life.
Robert has sat there with Aaron and enjoyed quiet pints and general conversation about how boring everyone in the village is. He remembers laughing, knees bumping and greasing fingers from Marlon’s chips and that’s where they got engaged.
“Hardly the peak of romance.” Robert thinks, and then says because he can’t exactly help himself.
Chas lifts an eyebrow, doesn’t disagree. “Didn’t even go down on one knee. Should have been a sign.” She folds her arms over and Robert waits a second for her to clarify who she means, only she doesn’t.
Robert feels sick rushing up his throat. It’s the only way he can describe the waiting that’s happening as the villagers in the pub go about their day.
“And he asked at my own engagement. Can you believe that?”
Robert closes his eyes, braces himself. “Aaron asked then?”
“What?” Chas tilts her head. “No. It was John. Thought that was obvious.”
Robert wants to kick himself because yes, obviously, of course it was.
Aaron still said yes.
Aaron still married him.
“Right.” Robert says and he’s trapped in his own head because he doesn’t hear what Chas says next and he has to ask her to repeat herself.
“I said keep an eye on him.” Chas says slower this time like she’s taking the piss.
Robert thought he was. He thought that was his job. Then Moira ended up in prison and Joe had the farm and Vic left and —
“Yeah.” Robert says, because it’s easier than explaining just how much of an idiot he’s been. He thinks of Aaron this morning heading off to work pressing a kiss to Robert’s forehead before he left.
“I will.”
“Good.” Chas looks nervous, starts playing with her hands. “I was going to see if Eve wanted to come round, distract him you know?” Robert nods like he knows. “But he’s got you I suppose.”
Robert almost smiles. “Yeah. He’s got me.”
For what that’s worth anyway.
***
Aaron’s cooking something when Robert finally gets home. Robert can’t see his face to work out if he’s OK or not. He’s got his back to him, stirring something on the stove and then chopping something up on the side.
“Hey.” Aaron calls out. He sounds fine. Robert doesn’t know what he’s meant to say back for a second and that thought just sort of takes over until Aaron is turning around and looking right at him. “It’s a veggie pasta bake, best I could manage. Work was so long.”
Robert nods and then he sets his coat down on the back of the sofa. Then he picks it up again and hangs it up by the door the way he always tells Aaron to.
“Someone wanted to give us their car. So he gives me the keys and then …” Aaron stops. Robert realises he hasn’t been listening properly. “Robert.”
Robert looks up at Aaron and then holds in a breath before gulping hard. “Are you OK?”
Aaron lets out this breathy laugh. He actually looks happy and it twists something in Robert’s chest for just a second because he can’t work out if it’s genuine or not and that’s so much scarier than Aaron saying no, he’s not OK at all.
“Aaron, I’m being serious.” Robert takes a step towards Aaron and then another.
“Why wouldn’t I be?” Aaron’s still got a shy smile on his face like he’s finding this amusing. Then it falters a little. “What have you done?” He asks and Robert feels this ache in his chest suddenly.
“Nothing.” Robert says.
“So what’s wrong?”
Robert thinks for a second about the quietness of Aaron, the tossing and turning in his sleep, the way there’s still this ghost of John just floating about the place making everything heavy. He’s just there, waiting silently and Robert wants to kick at him until he’s gone.
“I know what today is.” Robert says. “You don’t have to pretend you don’t.”
Aaron freezes a little like he’s suddenly nervous and Robert realises he should start taking things back.
“It’s Wednesday last time I checked.” Aaron crosses his arms over. “Are you going to start telling me what this is about or are you going to keep talking in riddles?”
“Never mind.” Robert forces a smile on his face and then runs a hand over the back of his head. The small movement gets Aaron frowning because he knows him, and sometimes Robert wishes he didn’t. “Seriously.”
Aaron rolls his eyes. “Robert.” He snaps.
“Fine.” Robert decides that going down this route is better than an argument over not saying anything. John isn’t winning this fight. Robert leans back against the leather sofa and decides to look down at the floor. “You and John. Been a year since you two got engaged.”
Robert doesn't know what he expects but Aaron still manages to surprise him.
“Oh.” Aaron says, and it sounds genuine. “As in … today?”
Robert looks up, stares right at Aaron and then nods because for some strange reason he doesn’t trust himself to actually speak right now. Aaron gulps hard and Robert keeps staring.
“I didn’t remember.” Aaron says, and Robert believes him. He really does. It doesn’t stop the churning in his stomach. “I knew it was around this time but I – I’m not lying.”
“I don’t think you are.” Robert says gently, because he knows he needs to handle this with care now.
Aaron starts pacing the kitchen and Robert can practically hear the clogs turning in his head. “How do you even know?”
“Your mum.” Robert says and Aaron rolls his eyes again. “It’s her and Liam’s engagement anniversary too.” He points out and then he realises he didn’t even congratulate them or anything. Robert thinks of the fact that for a year they haven’t made any real plans that have gone anywhere. Robert thinks of Vegas suddenly.
Aaron stops walking. “Yeah. Of course it is.” He stares off into the distance, eyes fixed on somewhere and thinking about things Robert can’t be sure of.
Robert wants to scoop out the content of Aaron’s mind and spend years tracing over each thought. He wants there not to be six years worth of memories he’ll never be able to know about the way he needs to.
“Are you OK?” Robert asks, because he can’t chase Aaron’s thoughts.
Aaron finally looks at Robert. “Of course.” He says it so easily, Robert wants to shake him.
“It’s OK if you’re not.” Robert says, and he opens the door just slightly, the one Aaron’s been blocking since Robert was back in his arms properly and everything John related was far away.
Aaron twitches. Robert’s heart pounds a little harder.
“I don’t know what you want me to say.” Aaron whispers.
Robert leans off the sofa and pulls Aaron towards him until Aaron’s head is against his. “It’s bound to bring up stuff. I get it."
“You don’t.” Aaron leans his head away and sighs. “I don’t want to remember that.”
“Was the proposal that bad?” Robert asks and Aaron pulls this awkward face like he’s really thinking back to it. Robert feels bad, lets it rush over him a little as he realises that he’s making Aaron relive it again and again.
Eventually, Aaron shrugs. “It was normal. Not romantic or anything.”
Robert frowns. “They’re supposed to be romantic I think.” He says, or at the very least amongst a wreckage of cars.
Aaron folds his arms over and looks at the floor like it’s easier that way. “Yeah well. This – wasn’t. He just asked me. And I said yeah.”
“Because you wanted him.” Aaron bristles. “I’m not trying to start anything.”
Aaron scowls, it takes over his whole face and Robert feels sick with it. “Well then what are you trying to do?”
“Get you to talk.”
Aaron scoffs. “About your dead brother? The one that nearly killed you and me about a million times.”
“Yeah. Him.” Robert gulps hard. “Because if you don’t, he’s won.”
Aaron looks horrified. “Don’t say that.”
Robert thinks about taking it back. Then John stands in the corner of the room and smiles right at him. He’s still there. He’s right there. “You won’t tell me how you feel about him, what he did to you.”
Aaron rolls his eyes. “Tried to kill me? You were there, you saw.”
Robert wakes up with a start sometimes, seeing Aaron’s terrified face as he goes over the gorge.
Robert looks right at Aaron and decides to be brave. “I meant before. In that cottage.”
Aaron doesn't say anything for a while. Instead, he looks out the window again and taps his foot against the floor like he’s trying to calm himself down or talk himself off a ledge the way Robert was literally avoiding.
“Aaron …” Robert isn’t sure where his sentence is going and he’s almost grateful for the way Aaron finally cuts him off.
“I don’t remember much.” Aaron says.
“What do you remember?” Robert whispers. Aaron looks away. “I’m sorry. I just – he was drugging you?”
Aaron nods and Robert thinks about talking again, telling Aaron he doesn’t need to say anything else if he really doesn’t want to but then Aaron opens his mouth again.
“I thought I was dying. He kept telling me it was OK, but the feeling just didn’t stop. It kept going. I didn’t know what – what day it was or where I was.” Aaron has this far away look on his face. “Then I’d be better.”
“When the drugs would have worn off.”
Aaron nods. “I was – was scared of him.” Aaron looks so angry.
Robert breathes in. “You had every right to be.”
“I hate that.” Aaron bites his lip hard. “The way he made me feel like – like I was a kid again, like I had no control over – like saying no, and – and saying I was sorry didn’t make a difference.”
Robert feels light headed all of a sudden and all he can do is reach out and hold at Aaron’s clammy hand. “Aaron.”
Aaron leans against the sofa, mirrors Robert a little and their knees touch. “I hate him. Still. For doing that.”
Robert struggles with what to say for a second and then decides to not think too much about it. “You’ve never told me any of this.”
Aaron sighs and Robert feels it deep down. “Yeah ‘cause it just makes you look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Devastated. Angry. Like you want to kill a dead man.”
Robert looks down. “I nearly lost you. I watched you die, they had to – shock you back to life. I – I watched that.” Robert knows it was the worst day of his whole life and there’s so many others that are right up there but he doesn’t think he’s ever going to get over the feeling of holding Aaron’s almost lifeless body in his arms like that and then watching people who have known him for years think he did that to him.
Aaron’s eyes are suddenly bigger. “I didn’t know that.” He says.
“Everyone thought I’d done that to you, that I’d hurt you.”
“I know.” Aaron gulps hard. “You’d never – the thought of them thinking you’re anything like him makes me feel sick Robert.”
Robert puts a hand on Aaron’s knee.
“The worst bit was – was when I was feeling OK at that cottage, and I thought of you.”
Robert looks up at Aaron’s sad eyes.
“I kept thinking that – that I'd never see you again, that I’d never get out, he’d never let me go and the last thing I did was lie to you.”
Robert’s chin wobbles. “I could see through it. You’re a really terrible liar.”
Aaron scoffs and then tilts his head on Robert’s shoulder.
“I don’t know why you want me to talk about him.”
Robert can’t see John standing in the corner of the room anymore but something still twists in his chest and he knows that talking about this all is better than pretending.
“He mattered to you. Once.” Robert whispers, and that’s the fact that he hates most about all of this. Aaron saw a future in John. He loved John. John was his.
Aaron huffs. “That person wasn’t real.”
“I know that.” Robert points out. “But he was real to you. If things were different, if he wasn’t –”
“A maniac?”
“You could have still been married to him.” He could have been sitting here, toasting to a year since the shittest proposal ever.
Aaron shakes his head. “I’d have been yours again by September.” He says it so matter of fact. “We both know that.”
“Do we?” Robert almost says it to himself. He doesn’t want Aaron to hear that, he doesn’t want Aaron to know how pathetic he is most of the time when it comes to Aaron.
Aarond drags his head up from Robert’s shoulder. “I love you, you’re the love of my life.”
Robert feels something tug in his chest.
“I knew ten years ago, I knew it when John proposed and I married him and you turned up and tried ruining it. I’ve always known.”
“You’ve not always wanted to know.” Robert says, mainly because he can’t hear nice things when it comes to Aaron and just kindly accept them all.
“True.” Aaron says quietly. “And God knows how many times I’ve tried denying it.”
Robert pulls a face. “Don’t I know it.”
Aaron brings a hand up and strokes Robert’s face gently. “I love you.”
“I know.” Robert whispers. “I love you too which is why I don’t want you to hide anything about how you’re feeling.”
Aaron frowns. “I’m not telling you every time I think about John.”
“Fine.” Robert shrugs. “But just know I’m here to listen OK?”
“You shouldn’t have to, not about him.” Aaron turns his head. “You warned me, you – you told me so many times.”
“You warned me about Lee.” Robert says. “But you still let me cry into your shoulder after I did what I did. You let me talk to you.”
“It’s not the same.”
“I know.” Robert says. “But I’m here.”
Aaron nods. “I know you are.” He has a small smile on his face like he’s realising it all over again. “I just want him gone, wiped from my brain.”
“So do I.” Robert whispers. “It’s easier for me though, I only saw the bad bits.”
“His good bits weren't real.”
“You believed it. At the time.”
“Yeah 'cause I was an idiot, ‘cause without you or – or Liv, everything had a big ‘what do I have to lose’ sign printed above it in my head.”
“And because you loved him.”
Aaron looks like he wants to be sick. “Feels so stupid to say now but he made me feel safe, for a bit, before everything obviously. I felt really safe. I hadn’t felt like that since you.”
Robert runs a hand over Aaron’s arm.
“Then he drugged me and threw me off a cliff.”
“He abused you Aaron.”
Robert realises he’s gone too far when Aaron leans away from him and walks towards the kitchen. There’s this silence between them until Aaron turns the tap on and drinks a glass of water with his back turned to Robert.
“I’m sorry.” Robert blurts out to stop the silence and because he means it, because he knows that Aaron doesn’t need him making any of this worse.
“You don’t need to be sorry.” Aaron says, and he sounds so sad and angry and tired. Robert hasn’t taken in how tired he sounds because he’s been so wrapped up in everything with Vic and John and the bloody farm and Aaron’s just been there, he’s just been sitting with all of this.
“You’ve needed to talk about this but I’ve not – I’ve not been focused enough on you.” Robert breathes in and then out again and tries not to cry. “I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to be sorry about anything, Vic’s needed ya.” Aaron comes towards Robert and then wraps an arm around Robert. “Look at me, we’re both a mess.” He whispers.
“I’m here.” Robert says and he sounds so adamant. “I’m here, I’m sorry if I haven’t –”
“Come here.” Aaron says gently, like he’s talking to a child. It makes everything feel quieter in Robert’s head as leans against Aaron and shuts his eyes.
Later, Robert wakes up to the absence of Aaron and this pit in his stomach. He gets up on autopilot and finds Aaron by the sink, staring into space it seems and then wiping at his face. He’s crying, or has been, and Robert feels it, he genuinely feels it hit him as he watches.
“Aaron?”
Aaron turns slowly, face red and sad. “I’m just – sorry. I just couldn’t sleep and then I couldn't stop thinking about what you said earlier.”
Robert knows what it is already. John abused him. It’s just this fact that won’t ever go away.
“I – I didn–”
“Can I have a hug?”
Robert practically runs into Aaron’s arms. Aaron starts crying right into Robert’s chest and he just holds him, sways them side to side for a couple of seconds and then brings his hands up over Aaron’s head to hold him even tighter.
“We’re OK.” Robert says, and he means it, he means it so much that it manages to break through everything else.