Final Call

“Please. Please Brendon. I’m begging you, okay? I’m on my knees.”

And he is, bare legs chafing on the carpet. He looks up at Brendon, wide-eyed, and chokes on a sob.

Brendon can’t even look at him.

“Please,” Ryan says desperately. There are tears staining his shirt, the floor. Brendon swallows, looks away.

“Oh god,” Ryan whispers finally. Brendon watches from the corner of his eye as he stands up slowly, one hand reaching for Brendon, pulling back again a second later. “I’ll do anything.”

Brendon sighs softly and whispers, “You’ve done enough,” before walking away.

--

Ryan refuses to leave the apartment.

Brendon remains composed, even as Ryan stops him when he tries to throw his things in a bag. Even as he pulls the clothes from Brendon’s hands, begging, screaming, fucking crying.

The crying gets to him the most. The crying almost undoes him.

Brendon manages to get their bedroom door locked in front of Ryan eventually, but he knocks and pleads restlessly until the sun starts to set. The steady thrum loses its rhythm just as Brendon is poised to throw his shoe at the door, his head throbbing in time with Ryan's knuckles.

Brendon has to give him that. He’s either unbelievably persistent, or unbelievably stupid.

Brendon sits on the bed and doesn’t cry, thinks about his heart instead, or maybe the pieces that are left. There’s an insistent ache in his chest, in his throat, catching on all the noises he can’t make, because some kid out there took a grainy picture with his camera phone of Ryan kissing some guy Brendon doesn’t even know.

For some ridiculous reason, it’s the worst part.

Ryan and Brendon have been together for almost three years and Ryan knows someone Brendon doesn’t.

--

Brendon opens the door to Ryan sleeping on the floor outside their bedroom, head pillowed on his arm.

He looks up when he hears Brendon, hair curtained over his eyes in the dopey way that makes Brendon hurt all the way to his bone marrow.

“Morning.”

Brendon looks down at him for a brief, stilted moment, not replying, before walking to the kitchen. Ryan follows, reaching for Brendon’s wrist in the doorway and circling it loosely.

“Do you want me to go?” he asks. His voice is a wreck and Brendon should feel satisfied but all he feels is sick.

He pries Ryan's hand off, but his body is resigned. He shrugs once.

Some things don't have to be screamed to be heard.

Ryan sighs heavily, chest rattling with unshed emotion. “I can leave—" He doesn't sound like he means it.

Brendon cuts him off with, “Go, stay, I don’t care.” He doesn't think he sounds like he means it, either.

Ryan takes a step back, looking towards the stairs and then back at Brendon. His hands are trembling.

“I should probably get my shit together, then?” he asks, voice masking something like hurt. Brendon can pretend not to hear the desperation in his tone, see it in his posture, the way his eyes have fallen.

“I don’t care, Ryan. Do whatever the fuck you want.” He moves to leave on shaky legs, but Ryan reaches out to stop him. He pulls back enough that Ryan has to take a step forward to touch him.

“Just stop! Stop giving me all this nonchalant bullshit and talk to me. Or let me talk. And then you can kick me out. Then I’ll leave.”

He's really fucking adamant. He's really fucking everything.

Brendon sits down at the kitchen table, rubbing the heel of his hands over his eyes. “I am not that person. The one that stays with their partner, even when they fuck up. Even when they cheat,” he says, but it's mostly to himself and to the ache in his chest and the feeling that his head is going to explode if Ryan so much as says another word.

Ryan sits across from him and grabs his hand again, not lacing their fingers, just holding. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I’m just so sorry and I love you and I don’t know how to fix it.”

Brendon thinks, irrationally, At least he’s not denying it.

He can’t decide if it would be worse.

They sit in heavy silence, neither of them moving. Brendon hardly breathes. It’s when Ryan squeezes his hand once, a barely-there pressure, that Brendon breaks (fucking shatters inside, but his composure it strong. His composure is everything).

“Was. Was he better?” Brendon chokes out, almost laughing at the stupid insignificance of the question.

He never thought he’d care, but he does. He does more than anything else. More than, Why did you do it? More than, Didn’t you love me enough?

Ryan snorts out loud, but it trails off into a wordless, miserable mumble. “Don’t do that. Don’t. No one could be,” he says quietly, forcefully. “No one.”

He sits with Brendon for a long, silent minute before he gets up and walks away with something that looks a lot like love on his face.

And with every part of him, Brendon wants to stop him, wants to believe him.

But no matter how weak he is, Brendon just can’t be that person.