Benji

“What’s your favourite colour?”

Benji and I had finished the majority of the food and were now leaning back against the cushions, watching the movie. We were only halfway through when Benji startled me with the random question.

I looked down at him, raising my eyebrows. “Are we playing Twenty Questions?”

Benji just shrugged, avoiding my gaze. “I just… I want to know everything about you.”

Chuckling, I threw my arm around his shoulders, grimacing when I realised that the hoodie Benji was wearing was still wet. “We have all the time in the world,” I told him. “But for now, let’s get this hoodie off you.”

I moved to help him out of it but he shied away from my touch.

“Um… It’s comfortable,” he blushed, “and it smells nice.”

I grinned at the adorable boy who was practically in my lap. His comment made my stomach flip and I couldn’t help but wrap my arms around his small frame. There was something so incredibly sweet about the way that he refused to take off my hoodie, and I felt my cheeks warm.

“My favourite colour is blue,” I murmured after a moment of silence.

Benji turned, peering up at me with his sapphire eyes. “What type of blue?” He enquired. “Like, light blue or dark blue or bright blue or pale blue or…”

“This blue,” I interrupted him, running my thumb across the skin under his eyes. “Benji blue.”

He looked down, biting his lip. His cheeks flushed a mad red before he spoke. “You’re so embarrassing sometimes,” he giggled.

“I know,” I laughed. “My turn to ask a question? Hmm… What’s the best thing about moving here?”

Benji thought for a moment, looking down at his hands clasped together between us. “Probably… Meeting you and Kyle.”

“Probably?” I questioned his choice of words jokingly.

“Definitely,” he nodded decisively. “I mean, I had friends back in Ohio, and… a previous boyfriend,” he admitted hesitantly, which immediately made me feel slightly jealous for some reason, “but I just, I feel really accepted here. Like, Kyle’s pretty much my best friend, and I’ve never really had a proper best friend before. And there’s heaps of people at school who are all super nice, and they always talk to me and stuff. And… I think you’re really amazing, and nice, and funny, and smart, and attractive.”

I gulped, my heart thumping wildly. “You really think all that?”

Refusing to look at me, Benji nodded his head against my chest. He tensed in my arms, as though he was scared of how I would react.

“Look at me,” I whispered, waiting until his blue eyes met mine. “Thank you, love. You’re too sweet.”

He quickly looked away, no doubt before I could see his blush, leaving me staring at his head in an almost-awkward silence.

“Who’s your best friend?” Benji asked, breaking the silence.

“I don’t have one…” I admitted. “I don’t really have any friends, apart from you and Priscilla.”

“What? Why? You’re like, amazing!” He exclaimed, to which I shook my head.

“No, I’m not… And I did have friends – I’m not a complete social outcast – but they all left town for university and stuff. I haven’t really been out to meet people in a while, but it’s whatever.”

My boyfriend (God, it felt amazing to be able to call him that) just looked at me for a few moments, his blue eyes examining my features. His lips formed a slight pout before he wrapped his arms around me and sort of nuzzled his head against my collarbone.

“You are amazing,” he mumbled into my shirt.

I just grinned, holding him tightly. This was quickly becoming my favourite feeling in the world; just holding Benji, his small frame leaning against me. I made a mental note to let him borrow my hoodies more often, because it made hugging him even better – he was just so damn adorable.

“Who’s your favourite singer or band?” I asked, continuing our flow of questions.

“I dunno, there’s heaps,” he said, moving so his mouth was no longer pressed against my shirt. “My CD’s are on the floor just there.”

He moved so I could sit up and crawl over, shuffling through the DVD’s to find his CD case. As I opened it, I remembered the last time I’d been flicking through it and had seen an out-of-place CD. Only it wasn’t there now.

“Hey, babe, can I ask you something?”

“You just did,” he giggled.

I rolled my eyes jokingly. “Seriously... When we first met, I was looking through this and there was a Metallica CD. It just, it caught my eye because it didn’t really fit and I was just wondering if there was a story behind that or…” I trailed off because Benji had looked down at his lap, his fingers fidgeting with his sleeves. I really hoped I hadn’t just crossed a line or made him sad.

“It was my dad’s,” he said softly, looking carefully up through his fringe at me.

“I’m sorry,” I said quickly, not wanting him to continue if he was uncomfortable. I didn’t really know anything about Benji’s dad, and I wasn’t even sure if he was still in the picture. “You don’t have to tell me anything.”

“No, no,” he protested, “I want to tell you. Um… I guess I should start at the beginning…?”

I shuffled back over to sit closer to him, resting my hand on his knee. “Whatever you’re comfortable with.”

Benji inhaled slowly and then began.

“My dad was always my best friend. When I was little he was always taking me to the park, buying me ice cream, pushing me on the swings,” he explained. “And then I got older and we still had fun together; I told him everything. And so a couple of months before I moved here, I’d had a really rough day at school, so to cheer me up, Dad drove us to the beach. Just me and him, blasting Metallica ‘cause it was his favourite band and we always listened to them together. It was a couple of hours drive but it was really fun. When we got there, he asked why I’d been so sad earlier and… So I told him. I told him I was gay and that my boyfriend had dumped me because I refused to… have sex with him.”

At this point, I reached over and took his hand in mine, lacing our fingers together. I’d never imagined that something so sad could happen to someone as innocent as Benji. And that ex-boyfriend of his, I wanted to murder him.

“He didn’t even say anything, not until we got home,” he continued with the story. “We drove in complete silence and it absolutely killed me. I couldn’t stop crying and he still wouldn’t say anything. When we got home, we just sat in the car. And he said… He said ‘my son is not a faggot’.” Benji’s face scrunched up as he repeated his father’s words and a single tear rolled down his cheek.

I squeezed his hand to let him know that I was here for him, and he looked up at me, smiling sadly.

“He pretty much ignored me after that. I didn’t know what to do. He was my dad! I thought he was supposed to love me no matter what, but he refused to talk to me. Mom said he would get over it, but… When he finally spoke to me it was to tell me it was all just a phase and that I would get over it, but I told him I’d been gay for a while, that I’d always been gay and it was just who I was.

“I’d thought he had finally accepted it then. He didn’t say anything for so long. But then he said that I couldn’t live under the same roof as him anymore. He suggested that I should come and stay here, with Carl, because Carl’s gay too, and Dad said it wasn’t appropriate for me to stay there anymore. He practically kicked me out!”

I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him into my lap. He wasn’t really crying, only sniffling slightly, but I felt like something in my chest was breaking.

“I’m sorry,” I mumbled into his hair. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” he sighed, his breath fluttering softly across the exposed patches of my skin. “And I’m happy here.”

“But you shouldn’t have to go through that!” I protested. “It’s not right. He’s your dad and he should accept you no matter what.”

Benji sat up to look at me properly. His eyes were rimmed with red, but other than that, he looked fine. “It’s okay, Reid. I’m okay, and I still love my dad and… he’ll get over it one day. But now I’m here, and I’m happy.”

I mirrored his smile, blinking back the wetness in my eyes. Now that he’d told me this, I had a newfound respect for him. So many other people, after being kicked out by their own parent, would have been depressed and morose, but here was Benji, this incredibly happy boy, who refused to let anything keep him down. I was just so incredibly proud of him.

I gently grabbed his chin, leading his face to mine so I could press our lips softly together. This was another thing that was fast becoming one of my new favourite feelings. Benji almost melted into me, leaning against me completely. His small hands gripped the fabric of my shirt, and I smirked when he tried to tug me closer. Our lips pressed eagerly together but I refused to even attempt to use my tongue, as I didn’t want to force Benji into anything too quickly.

We pulled apart and I sighed, running my fingers through my boyfriend’s hair. He made a small noise of contentment and rested his head against my shoulder, quickly making himself comfortable. I grinned and settled us back against the cushions so we could finish the forgotten movie.

I was happy, completely fucking ecstatic really, and Benji was happy, and I would do everything in my power to make sure he was always happy.