Page 61 of Psync
Was he judging Eli?
“And for the last few days I haven’t had access to them.” Eli blurted out. He gasped as a lance of pain shot through his chest. What the . . .?
Haruka’s eyes dulled. “That won’t happen again.”
Eli’s chest throbbed again. “What?”
“If you’d told me you needed something that badly, I would have left you alone.”
Eli rubbed his chest. “It’s okay. If I’d been smart, I would have asked Nate to get it for me. It’s my fault.” In hindsight, he probably hadn’t thought about it because he was sliding down a nice, deep depression well.
“It’s not your fault if I scared you away from something you needed.”
Ow, okay. The chest pains were really starting to get old.
“Is . . . is that you?”
Haruka’s eyes shuttered. “Is what me?”
Eli pointed to his own chest. “Are you hurting right here?”
Haruka looked away. “I’m fine.”
Eli didn’t know where the courage came from, but for some reason he found himself walking over to Haruka. Slowly, hesitantly, he reached out and touched Haruka, placing his hand right over the taller man’s heart.
The effect was instantaneous, all the tension building up in Haruka over the past few minutes melted away. His shoulders loosened, and his face relaxed.
“It’s not okay for you to be hurting quietly,” Eli whispered. “Just tell me. I won’t break over something like that.”
Haruka chuffed a rueful laugh. “You’re terrifyingly fragile.”
“I’m stronger than I look.” Eli shoved Haruka’s chest, and it was like pushing a stone wall.
“I can see that.” There was no trace of a joke on Haruka’s face. He meant it.
“See, now you’re just contradicting yourself.”
Haruka reached out and wrapped his arms around Eli slowly, giving him a chance to protest if he wanted to. He didn’t.
“Even if your body is fragile, it doesn’t mean your heart is,” Haruka said into Eli’s neck.
Warmth trickled down Eli’s cheeks. “I’m not fragile,” he said over the lump in his throat. “I’m just . . .”
He had no idea how to finish that sentence. Small? Different? He didn’t like any of them, but it didn’t make them less true.
So, he left it unfinished and burrowed into Haruka’s arms. Here was safety, here was where all the good things lived. His eyes began to drift shut and his body went boneless.
An arm went under his knees and Eli’s feet left the floor. His eyes flickered open to see that Haruka had begun to carry him to a bed.
“No, that’s Jace’s bed.”
A flicker of disgruntlement passed from Haruka to Eli, and he patted him sleepily.
“Over there.” He pointed to the neatly made bed with a Xxxholic butterfly embroidered on the duvet.
He set Eli on the bed and tucked him in. When his head hit the pillow, he began to drift off until Haruka moved away, pulling Eli back to the shores of wakefulness.
Such a terrible prospect made Eli whimper. “Nooo . . .”
