Different Dimension

The weather hadn’t turned bad yet, so even a few days after Valentine’s Day, Zack and his friends were still able to sit outside on the grass banks. Valentine’s Day had turned out amazing, to be honest, from how horribly it had started. The film night had actually been so much fun, with Martin and Zack cuddled up close together the whole time, and had ended with Zack fucking Martin slowly into the mattress, face pressed into Zack’s pillows to muffle Martin’s moans. Waking up in Martin’s arms had been a welcome bonus.

Zack’s afternoon had started with him, Rian, Alex and Jack meeting up after their classes ended for the day, Tay and Sierra joining them later. Tay had brought a ginormous box of chocolates with her, that her mom had sent up to college, and because Tay didn’t want them all, she’d decided to share them with the group. Naturally they’d been delicious, so they went quickly, and when there was only one left, Zack eyed it hopefully. He rarely indulged himself with unhealthy food, but these chocolates were worth it.

And then Alex swooped in and took the last one.

“No!” Zack whined, Sierra and Jack whining too.

“You want it, you’ll have to take it from me,” Alex smirked.

Fine.

Zack lunged at Alex, earning laughter from their friends, even more so when Zack easily pinned Alex to the ground, straddling Alex’s waist with his hands holding Alex’s wrists to the grass.

“No fair!” Alex pouted.

“I win!” Zack said triumphantly.

He sat back onto Alex’s stomach, popping the chocolate in his mouth with a smug smile, everyone else cheering.

“Disgusting faggots,”

Oh God.

Zack immediately froze, breath hitching in his throat as he watched the grimacing students walk past. He thought he’d stopped having those words, those sorts of insults thrown his way, when he’d left high school. He thought college was meant to be better. Clearly he was wrong.

Shit, he needed to snap out of this.

He quickly rolled off of Alex, sending his friend a weak smile in apology.

“Are you okay?” Rian asked, frowning.

“Y-Yeah, I’m fine. Don’t worry about it,” Zack nodded.

“Hey, don’t listen to that asshole,” Alex said firmly.

“I wasn’t, I…”

Everyone frowned, clearly not believing his lie. Damn it.

“Fine. I just got bullied a lot in high school. That’s all. And that jerked back bad memories,” Zack said simply.

“But you’re, like, built,” Jack said, confused.

Zack laughed slightly. “I wasn’t until Junior year. Even if I had been built, my school wasn’t all that tolerant. I was really skinny actually in freshman year of high school, figured out I liked guys and it came out somehow, and didn’t go down too well. Just the one group of assholes, but it was enough,”

“Shit, Zack. You were bulled, for real?” Sierra said, shocked.

Zack smiled weakly. He didn’t know whether it was a good thing or a bad thing that he didn’t look like he’d never been bullied now.

“Yeah, pushed around, beaten, made fun of as well as more seriously verbally abused. I didn’t have all that great a time at all, to be honest, and I was in a really bad place mentally for a while,”

“How did you cope?” Rian asked.

“My guidance counsellor knew everything, considering I was getting beaten quite regularly and couldn’t be bothered to hide it, so she brought an older student along to one of my meetings. The guy was gay too and helped me realise it was all okay, that I didn’t have to be ashamed. He took me to GSA meetings as well as to the local gym, to take my mind off things, and I started building up from there, both mentally and physically,”

“Sounds like a nice guy,” Alex said, smiling.

“He was. He was also my ex,” Zack admitted.

“Woah,” Jack said, the word coming out in a whoosh of breath.

Zack smiled again. While there were so many bad memories throughout high school, there were also some really good ones. And all because of Matt.

“My ex, Matt, and I dated until he graduated, and I made a couple of friends in my last year of school when he wasn’t there. But he’s still my closest friend. My best friend,” Zack explained.

This was why he’d never turn his back on Matt. Matt had made his life bearable again, made it worth living, and he’d never be able to repay him for that.

“Does Martin know about this? About the bullying and about Matt?” Rian asked.

“Uh, he knows about Matt but not the bullying. We actually argued about Matt right after the winter break, about how close our friendship still is, but he doesn’t know we were brought together because I was bullied,”

“You should probably tell him,” Sierra pointed out.

“Probably,” Zack shrugged.

A few of his friends were frowning, including Rian, but he ignored them. What was the point in bringing it all up again? Zack didn’t want to argue like they had before. Nothing was worth that animosity they’d had, and Zack wasn’t going to risk it. Not when things were going so well again.

*

Zack had tried to forget about the incident over the rest of the day, but it wasn’t easy. Everything he’d left behind in Florida was still bubbling under his skin, and those hurtful words had brought all the self-loathing and doubt back to the surface again. He thought he was stronger than this, past all this, but now he wasn’t so sure.

He ended up going to bed a little early, Rian being out of the dorm for the night (on another date with the elusive Cass, and then back to hers, apparently). It had actually been quite calming and therapeutic to be able to get ready for bed by himself, to have a solitary set of motions that he could work himself through, just like he had in high school, and it worked enough to allow him to drift off into sleep.

He was in that pleasant state of dozing, sort of asleep but not really, when he heard the door open. What the hell? Had Rian’s date gone badly?

And then his duvet was pulled back, a body sliding in next to him. What the fuck?!

Zack rolled over quickly, eyes wide and searching in the dark of the room, until his racing heart calmed down. Martin. It was just Martin.

Wait, what the fuck?

“What are you doing here?” Zack yawned.

Martin slid his arms around Zack, burying his face in Zack’s neck for a little while, before pressing a gentle kiss to the bare skin and moving his head so it was just resting on Zack’s shoulder. But Zack frowned. As nice as this was, what the hell was going on?

“Paul let me in. But I’m also here because you should’ve told me that you met your ex because you were being bullied,” Martin said gruffly.

Zack groaned. He’d put money on Rian telling Paul and Paul telling Martin. Great.

“It was a long time ago. Sure, I’m still not comfortable with dealing with ignorant people being homophobic, but I’m a lot better than I was,” Zack said simply.

“I still should’ve known,” Martin muttered.

“Why?” Zack frowned.

Martin’s fingers traced patterns on Zack’s bare chest for a few moments before he looked up at him.

“So I can protect you like he did,” Martin said softly.

Ah, so that’s what this was about. Zack rolled his eyes but smiled.

“You are not competing with Matt,” Zack said firmly.

“I know that, I know, but I still feel like I’d fail as a boyfriend if I couldn’t protect you. I don’t want you feeling bad about yourself. Rian told Paul how you reacted at lunch and…I just don’t like the idea of you being like that. You are so beautiful, so kind, so wonderful, and far too good for me. So anything I can do, I want to do it,” Martin explained.

Zack just sighed, moving a leg to slot between Martin’s, so he was snuggling into his side a little more. He knew his boyfriend had good intentions.

“You’re such a caveman sometimes. But I love you anyway,” Zack murmured, pressing a kiss to Martin’s temple.

Then Zack inhaled sharply. He hadn’t said that out loud before, not properly like that. Fuck. Fuck. It was the truth though. He couldn’t deny that. He snuck a hesitant glance at his boyfriend, just to check he didn’t look completely horrified…and Martin was grinning. Full-on mega-watt grinning. Wow.

“I love you too,”

It was all Zack could do to grin back.