Page 54 of Break the Rule
“What the fuck, Charlie?”
“Your rules,” Charlie whispers, hands lingering midair. He knows the rules. He won’t break them. “If not a date, what? One more night, like the one in my studio?”
“What, you’re just gonna let me fuck you and walk away? Just because it’s what you think I want?” Eden manages to makeit sound both like a statement and a question. “Because that’s fucking stupid. You’re a fucking idiot.”
“You’ve said that a few times now.”
“It’s how you’re saved in my phone.” The second the words are out Eden looks like he’s ready to bolt.
“You saved my phone number?”
“Just in case you were a stalker and tried to kill me or some shit,” Eden mumbles, looking anywhere but at Charlie. That’s alright, Charlie is looking at Eden, and he has no intention of looking away until he’s forced.
“Here I thought I proved myself as an anti-stalker.”
Eden makes a derisive noise, reaching for his left wrist. He fingers something beneath the bracelets—a tattoo, though of what Charlie can’t tell with the stack of bracelets covering it.
“If you’re uncomfortable, I can go,” Charlie offers.
“Fuck you,” Eden yells.
Taken aback Charlie does something he’s never done before—he shuts his mouth. He doesn’t say anything because he doesn’t have a clue what to say.
“How fucking dare you,” Eden yells, working himself up. He reaches for Charlie, fisting his hands in the front of Charlie’s neon jacket. “Twenty fucking years on this stupid fucking planet and I fucking hate everyone. Let me hate you.”
“Eden.”
“Why can’t I hate you?” Eden croaks, the declaration so small and broken.
A single gash through Charlie’s heart, another across the painting he knows he’s going to create tonight. Something dark, angry, and small like the man in front of him. His pain is a tangible thing that Charlie can feel, one that needs to bleed onto the canvas. Charlie doesn’t have a goddamn clue what’s hurt him, but he knows a broken boy when he sees one.
“Can I hug you?”
“Can you—fuck. Fuck. You,” Eden grits, hands fisting so tightly in Charlie’s jacket that Charlie stumbles forward. He’s not sure which of them does it, just knows Eden’s lips touch his in a demanding kiss, bruising in its intensity. Eden devours him, kissing him like he’s never kissed anyone before, like he might never kiss anyone again. Hot tears that aren’t Charlie’s coat his cheeks, salty and sharp against the sweetness of Eden’s bubblegum flavored chapstick. It’s the single most intense, confusing kiss of Charlie’s life, and when Eden pulls back with kiss swollen lips and mascara running down his cheeks all Charlie can think is what a beautiful disaster he is.
“Eden.”
Eden stumbles, the shock of panic on his face enough to have Charlie taking a step back. Not to get away but to protect, to afford Eden the smallest scrap of power he’s clearly scrambling to hold on to.
“Don’t,” Eden says, shaking his head. “Just don’t.”
“Okay,” Charlie whispers.
He’s never been good at listening, but he listens now, and it hurts. It hurts really fucking bad.
“I just…I—” but Eden doesn’t finish, turning to look behind him before he bolts and runs away into the darkness, taking a broken shard of Charlie with him.
Maybe Andrew was right. This sure as fuck feels like feelings.
11EDEN
Walking into his apartment,a sense of relief and dread hit him all at once. All the lights are off except for the microwave light above the stove, which they use as a nightlight, meaning Addy didn’t wait up. He can’t blame her. He promised to come home after work but after running away from Charlie, he’d simply kept running until he hit the edge of town, ending up sitting near the railroad tracks, listening to the waves crash and wondering if everyone might be better off if he left. Wondering how far he could go if he walked along those tracks and just disappeared.
Addy would miss him. Ella too. For the first time in his life, he had people who might cry if he was gone. As much as Eden wanted to run, there was a bigger part of him that wanted to stay. It didn’t make it easy though.
Eden lost track of how many hours he spent sitting on the tracks. With his phone dead, he couldn’t even text Addy to apologize. All he could do was wait until his brain stopped trying to get him to do something stupid and turn around, trudging across town. This late, the buses weren’t running, meaning it was well into the next day by the time Eden was opening his front door.
Coming home had never felt as good, or as scary. What if this time he’d fucked up too much? What if Addy is finally tired of his shit? He wouldn’t blame her. He fucked up, again. He promised her he’d be home and then he hadn’t been.
