Rivals 🌈 ✔

47 - Never Let Me Go

Juice barely recognized the man sitting next to him. His face was a rich color palette, swollen and there were cuts across his right eyebrow and along his jaw. Had his brothers done this to him? It looked like a reflection of how Juice had looked like after the Mayans had manhandled him. Something in his stomach contracted at the memory of how caring Raine had been and how Juice had muttered that he wanted to marry him. 

His eyes stung at the memory. 

Now however, he saw a hard shell that was starting to show cracks on all sides. There was a storm raging in Raine's eyes; self-hatred, despair, fear — emotions he'd never seen before. The past weeks Juice had felt awful; discarded and worthless, but right now he also saw the devastating effect of guilt. 

Feelings of guilt could only exist if Raine had really loved him; if he truly regretted what he had done and couldn't live with his mistakes. And to think that Raine hated himself so much for something he had never done... it broke Juice's heart. 

Esai hadn't only destroyed their relationship, he had also destroyed his friend. 

How could Juice keep the truth from him? Letting him wander in the darkness filled with self-loathing and pain? He wasn't sure he could — but now he had seen what Esai had done to his best friend, he didn't even want to imagine what he would do to Phantom when he found out he'd talked.

Raine hadn't moved after Juice's last words — his expressed longing to be held by him and to hear that Raine still loved him. Numbly he stared at Juice's hand which was holding his. His knuckles were bruised and swollen. He heard Raine's ragged breath; his fight against himself, a pathetic attempt to keep himself together. 

Juice stood up and pulled Raine on his feet. "Come," he said in a soft tone. "Mouse will take care of Sammy and Sasha." He nodded to his friend, who was talking to Raine's sister a few feet away from them. 

He understood the crowd was suffocating Raine; when he was close to a panic attack he also longed for seclusion. Holding Raine's hand, he led him away from the fairground, relieved the man didn't tear his arm away. There was a meadow bordering on the parking lot in front of the carnival. Under one of the trees that were scattered across the field, he sat down, his back towards the parking lot. The chaos of the carnival was still in the background, but he was sure they would be able to have a quiet conversation. 

Juice searched for words. Raine had never been the quiet one. Had he talked about his feelings at all over the past weeks? Or had he bottled everything up? Juice suspected the latter. He moved his free hand to Raine's face, carefully wiping away the tears. Raine held his breath; then, he turned his face away. 

"Stop." His voice sounded hoarse — tormented. 

Pain seeped into his heart. Not only because it hurt that Raine didn't want to be touched by him; also because there was a giant wall between them while they had always been so open in the past. 

"I love you," Juice said softly. "I still love you."

"I ripped out your heart."

Juice lifted Raine's hand and laid it across his heart. "And yet it still beats. For you."

Skittishly, his brown eyes looked up. Raine lifted his other hand and caressed his cheek; his fingers shaking. "I don't deserve you." His voice cracked. 

Juice shoved his hand across Raine's, moved it aside a little and kissed his fingertips. "You made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes." He hated himself for keeping the lie going by letting Raine believe that he had really cheated on him. To ease his conscience, he shared something that truly bothered him. "I just wish you'd tried harder to make it up to me, instead of giving up."