Who: Ben and Liam What: Talking post party Where: Their apartment When: Directly after this. Warnings/Rating: It's deep man. Deep.
Liam looked up as Ben settled in the chair at his desk, a comfortable leather thing that someone wouldn't mind spending hours in, which was a good thing considering the time that Liam would spend writing. He didn't say anything for a moment, the question expected, but his thoughts so entirely scattered that it was difficult to put them in order. One hand came up to push at his hair, and eventually, Liam lay back, rolled over onto his side towards Ben, dark hair splayed out on the comforter. "Apparently, me living with another guy means we must be fucking. And I don't- I mean. I don't know what he is, Ben. Boyfriend? A good friend? He doesn't like labels and I'm not entirely sure I'm okay with that." His voice was quiet, strained, his gaze growing further away.
"And the party. That- that was a disaster." Liam let out a laugh that was hoarse and strained, hands coming up to simply cover his face as he shook his head. "It's bad enough that it was about secrets, right? Then whoever it was that I ended up with at that damned thing was ashamed of what had happened. Freaking out on me. And how the hell is that supposed to make me feel when I'm already having problems with what even occurred there?" It had brought back too much. Tristan, the Gardens, drawn blood and dreams that felt real. He drew in a shaking breath, harder and more uneven than he would have preferred, and almost unconsciously, a hand came up to scratch at his stomach, a creeping sensation coming up and over him.
To say that the other man was distressed would have been an understatement and Ben wasn't the type to just leave it. He might not be a therapist or a doctor, but he didn't like seeing anyone hurting in any sense. First things first though. "There's not much you can do about how he feels about it." It was out of Liam's control and out of Ben's -- and Ben didn't even know what had happened. It wasn't something he was going to pry into either, figuring that if Liam needed to talk about that part of it, he would. His thoughts turned back to this past party and the one that happened just before Halloween. Both times had shown him something he hadn't necessarily wanted to look at, but they were a part of him. A part that needed to be accepted. "Did it -- was it something you wanted?" Difficult questions to ask, but Ben wanted to make sure that Liam had at least consented (or that who he'd been at the party had) to whatever happened.
"I know I can't help how he feels, but for crying out loud, he could have been a little less blunt about it." Liam brought his hands down away from his stomach, clasping them together so he could at least make an attempt at staying still. "And yes. It was something I wanted. Something that was hard to even think of admitting to myself." They were feelings that had awoken in him, urges and needs he didn't completely understand, and it was a long way from who and what he had been a year ago. Last year, his thoughts had been on women, on the traditional definition of a relationship. And now he was thinking of men, of the sort of things that most people weren't interested in, the sort of things he was starting to have problems denying that he enjoyed. Couple that with the issues he was having with Seven, with the hot and cold, the give and take, everything else that was going on there, it was leaving him a wreck. Two steps forward and a dozen back. He just kept slipping.
Ben didn't know how to help with this one, or even where to start. But he'd been on the giving end of not wanting to know, of not wanting to discuss things, even if he wasn't the one that Liam hadn't been with that night. "It's hard on both of you. And you don't know, he might be in a committed relationship. The hotel doesn't seem to care about that." Leaning forward on the chair, he considered for a moment before his hand landed just above Liam's knee and he gave the other man a squeeze. "It's not necessarily something against you, even if it feels that way. Sometimes we see things we don't want to see there, about ourselves, about other people. I'm sorry though that he hurt you with it."
Liam started for a moment as Ben reached towards him, squeezing his knee for a brief time, eyes watching him carefully until he had pulled his fingers back, and then Liam let out a shuddering breath, closing his eyes as he turned in towards the comforter. "I just feel ashamed for what happened," Liam said quietly, boiling it all down into an easy sentence that summed it all up. "And I wish I could take it back."
The author was quiet for a while then, his breath steadying, evening and out, and after a few moments, he pushed himself up to sit, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed, facing Ben. "Anyways. Not much to be done about it now. So. Thai and go karts?" he asked, forcing a smile to his face that he didn't really feel. There was nothing to be done about it, nothing he could do to fix it, and laying in bed, as much as he wanted to, wasn't going to help. Getting his mind off of things, on the other hand, could help. Maybe he was bottling it up, and maybe that wasn't healthy, but it was the best he could do right then.
"But you weren't in control of it." Ben paused, searching for the words that might help him. "Sometimes the hotel shows us things that we don't necessarily want to see about ourselves, but they're a part of us nonetheless. It doesn't mean that they're the sum of who we are. If its something you don't like about yourself, then change it. We can't change what happened." Like him, he couldn't change the conversation he had with the man by the pool, but he could do his best to make sure he never felt that way again.
He knew what the sudden change was and considered Liam for another minute, then nodded. "Thai and Go Karts. If you're still feeling up to it, no reason we shouldn't go." No reason that they shouldn't create new memories to take away the sting of other ones that were both weighing heavily on them.
Liam knew that there was no changing what had happened, but that had been something hard for him to even think about, and the fact that it had been thrown back at him, like something to be ashamed of, it was likely the worst possible ending to what had been an enjoyable time. But he wasn't going to think on that now. Ben's words were wise, and Liam knew it, but he didn't have it in him right then to think any more deeply about it. There was too much hurt, too many raw endings of emotions to fuss with.
With the nod of Ben's head taken as agreement, Liam hauled himself off his bed, fingers raking back through hair that needed a cut with how long it was getting, tucking the longer bits back behind his ears as he surveyed the other man. "If I wasn't feeling up to it, I wouldn't have suggested it," he responded, and the grin was a little warmer, made more of an effort to reach his eyes. "Come on. Let's do this."