𝗠ason wasn't sure who the person looking back at him was supposed to be.
Eyelashes fanning the shadows of his damaged face, his eyes scoured the length of his sickly, pale skin. Thin slashes of red, newly scabbed over, littered the entirety of what he could see. Flexing his jaw, he winced at the undiluted aching rupturing from the stale bruises drawn over it—he floated in the pain he constantly received in return for denying any medication.
Plum-colored rings swooped under his eyes, rounding up and around his left. His orbital bone was smashed, leaving a shattered, protruding thickness to his flesh that could not be maimed. He blinked at his cursed reflection—at the injuries that proved what had happened to him had not been a nightmare to wake up from, but a reality he tried to run from.
He could not stand the sight of himself.
Blood suffocated the former whites of his eyes, dimming the baby blue irises he'd said hello to for the last twenty-one years. There was no window to his soul. There was just an unrequited dullness that stemmed from his lack of recognition and filled the innards of his heart.
The car accident was a translated text tattooed to his insides.
He was a monster even Victor Frankenstein envied.
"Are you sure you're ready for this?"
Mason pulled his eyes away from the mirror and glanced to his right, catching the gaze of his friend. The almost silent buzz of the clippers brought him back to the present and away from the past and future. Her hand gently curled in the strands of his hair—the last pieces of the pact he'd made to himself—the desire to not cut it since his father died.
His fingers, dismayed and devoid of their usual polish, automatically reached for the thin scar tracing from behind his ear to the back of his head. An operation that had given the doctors permission to shave the last thing keeping him attached to the kid he used to be.
It had been a slap in the face when he'd woken up yesterday. When the lucidity had come in screaming like a burning Phoenix, and the cold of his inner child's absence drifted lazily just below it.
He had become so bleak.
So incomplete.
Like the pieces of him he'd clung to were worth nothing more than an unconsummated death inside sterilized waste baskets. Like his dues and recreations had murdered him without the mercy of sending him down the spiraling void of black uncertainty.
"No," Mason cleared his throat, realizing it'd been minutes since she asked.
"You don't have to do this," she offered, "There's no problem leaving it as it is."
Mason allowed his eyes to rise to the mirror once again. He stared at the half of his head that was no more than a centimeter of a freshly mowed lawn and blinked at the other side of thoroughly overgrown weeds. For the last time in a long time, he nipped at the front ends with his pointer and thumb, closing his eyes and breathing easily.
The last year of his life had been a gloriously overwritten storyline of letting his past become a memory. Within the personal convictions of what his hair meant to him, it couldn't be an exception.
It and this hospital were the last things connecting him to his father.
"Cut it," he sat up straighter, dropping his hand, "Do it."
Blake's uneasiness radiated off of her until he was drowning in enough of her sentiment that he spared her a look. He swallowed the jealousy that flooded his throat at the way her red-brown hair swayed easily just underneath her chin. He tried his best to ignore the puddles of chocolate happiness that gazed at him like he was still the same lost puppy she'd saved three years ago.
"Are you sure you don't want another opinion?" she tried one more time, "I'm sure Kai—"
"No," he cut her off, "Either cut my hair or give me the clippers."
Mason flinched at the sound of his name.
He strained endlessly to get the three short letters of it out of his eardrums.
Because the only thing he'd been able to associate with that name was the same image that'd flashed over the backs of his eyelids in conscious and unconsciousness. He saw that desperate plea. That innocent recklessness that had him stepping forward in a dangerous place because of a situation that had nothing to do with him.
All he saw was the betrayal as the blood poured from his cheeks.
All he felt was the broken bonds of the vows he hadn't even gotten two weeks to adhere to.
Mason absentmindedly began to twist the rings positioned on his left hand, letting the blue gems graze his fingertips until his fingerprints felt like ash.
He couldn't forgive himself.
He couldn't accept forgiveness either.
"Please," he whispered to Blake, "Please, just get it over with."
"Alright," she agreed.
Without the furthering requirement of a conversation, Blake ran her palm through the long pieces, gathering a handful and pulling back. The bite of the clippers felt like atonement as Mason shut his eyes again and let his past fall over his shoulders like wispy, black feathers.
Everything about him felt like sandpaper.
Rough.
Unable to exist without being someone else's purpose.
But the feeling slowly began to ease the more Blake cut. He felt the breath hit his lungs a little smoother as pieces began to decorate his lap. The sickness he'd seen in his skin began to heal as his blood warmed under his skin, threading his pulse with anticipation as she reached the end.
The draft from the open window in the other room ran over the almost-baldness of his scalp, cleansing him from a burden he thought he'd dropped a long time ago.
How strange it was, to diagnose the beauty in his horrors.
How strange it was, the ease in giving up conventional attractiveness for happiness.
Mason peered at his reflection as the clippers shut off and silence blanketed him and Blake. His head robotically fell at an angle, allowing him the indulgence of the same colored glimmers he'd despised just a few minutes ago.
There was beauty in his death—even if it was metaphorical.
"Done," Blake placed her hands on his shoulders and squeezed, "Now how about we get you out into the world and back on your feet?"
"Wait, no—"
"Don't even start," she hummed, "You have no more excuses under the rug to convince me to let you wallow in this room. You need to get out and rejoin the world at some point, and I don't mind being the bad guy if it means I have to push you with my own two hands. Besides, there's someone who's been waiting to see you for two patient days."
"Stop, I don't—I," Mason stuttered.
Rasps and declarations.
Synopsis and poetry.
His tone and his ideals were bubblegum clumped in the middle of his esophagus, and each time he moved, breathed—lived—it began to heat. Like a conventional oven until he was soaking in the stickiness of his indecision, of his guilt—until he was reduced to a muzzled puddle of emasculation and disappointment.
"He wants to see you," she said gently, "You're his every topic."
"I can't, Blake," he replied.
Even if he wanted him, he couldn't.
Even if he felt the pathetic lies on the curve of his lips, he couldn't.
"The only person who blames you is yourself."
"Maybe that's the problem. Maybe people should acknowledge some accountability."
Blake rolled her eyes and grabbed the handlebars on the back of his wheelchair, spinning him out of the bathroom. Mason didn't speak as she pushed him halfway to his room door. He kept his eyes locked on the worn-down wood as Blake interlocked hands with Emiko and tapped the sleepy, red nose of their daughter, Andrei, as she slept in the baby sling strapped to Emiko's chest.
He remained quiet as Blake began to bark orders to the female bodyguards hidden in the shadowed corners of his personally fashioned prison cell. Her demands regarded the two children sleeping in the bed he'd called his own for the better half of a week. A fan of red hair. A deep, childish snore.
Tripp and Ruby held hands in their sleep as tightly as they held onto the toy cars they'd spent the majority of the afternoon racing on the four walls of this hospital room.
"Or maybe," Blake was suddenly at his side, in his ear, "You're too dependent on the cowardice you call a shield. No one is going to force you to get over it, but there's a big difference between feeling bad about something and letting your agony take over. Kai isn't going to leave you. You don't have to push yourself fifty feet away because you're scared of your fictional imagination."
Mason opened his mouth to respond but shut it immediately.
Blake was probably the only person to see through his walls as if he'd made them with transparent bricks. She knew when he was running and hiding, and when he was improperly stepping into a fight that disregarded him.
And yet, she was still doing this to him.
She understood, yet she was taking everyone else's side.
"Here," Emiko dangled a grey hat in his face.
Mason's frown deepened, "What is this for?"
"Is that attitude I'm hearing?" she scolded, moving away, "I guess you don't want it—"
"I want it!" he said roughly, snatching it.
Emiko snickered under her breath and turned toward her girlfriend as he struggled to pull the fabric over his buzz cut with his good hand. Ever since Kai had put the no males order on his room, the only people he'd seen had been the two of them, despite knowing that half of his friends were on the other side of the world, finishing a fight he should've been participating in.
That fact alone showed more and more each day—with the girls ganging up on him and tag-teaming him with teases and shrew comments he couldn't ignore. Their sassiness and objective correctness were things he wanted to avoid—things that didn't allow him to submit to his depression—and their accuracy taught him more about himself than he wished to uncover.
Mason didn't want to view the outside world because of his haircut.
He also knew it was just a partial excuse to get out of seeing his husband.
In the sixty seconds she'd left his side after his haircut, Blake must have mentioned his disinterest in having his sights set on his husband. In thirty of them, she'd managed to communicate how much he'd hated his new look—and how he would try to use it as an excuse to keep within this hole, no matter how liberated he felt.
They were good.
It was annoying.
"Cheer up," Emiko nudged his shoulder, walking at his side, "I hear they're serving red and blue jello in the cafeteria today, and chocolate pudding," the grin on her face as Blake opened the door did not fly by him—she was more excited for it than him.
"Lucky me," he mumbled anyway.
"We both know you're excited underneath all this self-deprecation."
"For pudding?" he scowled.
"Yup," she sighed dramatically, "Especially the blue one."
Mason's cheeks betrayed him, warming as Emiko shot a haughty wink in his direction. He chose not to answer her as Blake pushed him further down the medical wing. His ears perked toward the beeps and whooshes of the ill; he purposely focused on the physical implications of those he did not know instead of gathering his thoughts in consideration for the only man that mattered.
There was someone waiting for him—someone standing a few doors down a corridor—and for the first time, it felt like, it wasn't pernicious. It was someone who'd done nothing more than ask for his presence, his love, his fingers on his skin, and his heart inside his chest.
And all Mason had done was deny it.
Perhaps Blake and Emiko knew what they were talking about.
If he really didn't want to do this, he wouldn't be here. If he really wanted to spend the rest of his life locked in a room without a reprieve, only to hopelessly drown in an illness that not even medication could fix, he would still be stuck with his bodyguards.
Rather, he was a foot from his husband's room with two of the strongest women he'd ever met. Two women who have put their lives on the back burner to guide him through his darkest days. To help him rejoin society, even if it meant supervising each and every step he took.
"What if he doesn't want to see me anymore?" he blurted.
"He does," Emiko confirmed.
"That's a bridge you two will cross if it appears," Blake shrugged.
Mason tapped his fingers on his armrest impatiently, mulling over the strikingly opposite answers as they stopped in front of Kai's door. His eyebrows furrowed as the three of them leaned inside, only to see that the bed was undone, the bathroom door was open, and Kai was not there.
He felt his insides hit the pit in his stomach—dropping with such an intensity, that it felt as if he might hunch over and throw up in his seat. He shifted frantically, turning his head in pare with Emiko's as they both scoured the halls in search of his missing partner.
It'd been his decision to put space between them, but the longer his eyes were not graced by faded blue hair and stormy, dark eyes, the more he could feel this morning's forced breakfast clog his throat.
Mason gripped one of the wheels of his wheelchair, spinning haphazardly, trying to gauge a better understanding. Blake, still behind him, whined as he ran over her shoe, and grabbed the bars, helping him in his weakness.
"You look down the hall," Emiko rubbed Blake's arm, "I'll check with the nurse's station."
Mason coughed, choking on his fear as Blake agreed.
The feeling was one he'd known all too well.
It was the same one he'd had back when he'd forced Kai to choose Kaedyn over him—when he'd literally kicked him out and did not see him for almost a month after.
The chalky taste of ignorance.
The inability to swallow it.
This time, it was much worse.
Back then, they were in an unspoken relationship. They were two halves of the same whole who had been screaming, and clawing, and searching for each other for their entire lives, fingernails and skin torn, fighting for one another against all the blocks in the roads they'd built. Mason knew that even if he'd lost him then, this feeling wouldn't be catastrophically different.
But he also knew that it would be.
Because this time, he knew exactly what he wanted.
Mason saw Kai in his dreams, in his tears—in the breaths that clogged the air with frozen condensation in the winter. He saw him in his clothes, in the smell that surrounded him—in the food that he'd come to love simply because Kai had taken the time to cook it for him.
Kai wasn't just his past anymore. Kai wasn't just his present.
Kai was everything. Without him, there was nothing.
"Hey, stop!—Kai!"
Blake's shout snapped him out of his fear.
Mason looked ahead, catching a glimpse of his favorite, messy curls. His body warmed at the thought of being close to him again—at the thought of wrapping himself inside of him like a blanket, or around him like a sweater—at the thought of belonging so wholly to another person.
But Kai didn't turn around.
He grimaced as Blake began to pick up the pace, chasing him further and further away from the bustling hospital. The dull clacks of Kai's crutches and the skids of his wheels were the only sounds around them as they continued to race—until the rooms slowly became emptier.
"Kai!" Blake wailed, "Slow the hell down!"
"Speed up!" he demanded from below.
"Oh, shut it! You're freaking heavy, y'know!"
Mason rolled his eyes and let her comment slide over him, keeping his eyes trained on the small pieces of Kai they could see before he darted behind another corner. It wasn't until the halls grew slightly livelier, that he started to slow his pace. And it wasn't until a meaty hand smacked him right in the center of his chest, that he stopped completely.
One of his crutches cluttered to the ground as Kai's surprise morphed over his face.
"Back up," a man dressed in a suit commanded, "This is a restricted area."
"I have to go through there—" Kai mouthed, unable to speak.
"If you don't leave, I'll be forced to remove you."
"But!" he dropped his arms emphatically, "But there was just a little boy—a little kid!—with black hair and big blue eyes and he was running and running, and I chased him here, and then I swear he disappeared into the doors behind you, so if you could just give me access so I can see him—"
Whatever Kai was trying to explain, no one could understand him.
Mason's head was cocked in confusion as he noted the fact that all Kai could manage for sound were small breaths of air. His eyes were wild with a story, but with the damage done to his larynx, the only thing that filled the corridor were mumbles and hums that made sense to no one other than the man who was speaking them.
His disability pissed off the man dressed in black.
"Do you think this is a joke?" he shoved Kai, "I said NO ACCESS."
Kai's attempt at pleading his case was lost as the man dressed in black hit him hard enough that he lost his balance. His back connected with the wall, his body weak with multiple surgeries, and crumpled into a pile on the floor.
"Oh my god, Kai!" Blake screamed.
She ran from his side and fell at his, grabbing onto his arm.
At the feeling of her hands, it was like whatever spell Kai was under, dissipated into the air.
Mason sucked in a sharp breath as his husband looked around the passage with confusion, double-taking and pausing when his vision latched onto his. His heart stalled in his chest as if it had been praying for a moment like this to leap out of his skin and join Kai's in a desolate place that didn't involve their bodies—just their souls.
As if years had passed, Mason's eyes watered, brimming at the rim thick enough that his sight was growing blurred. His beautiful, dark irises were as beautiful as the day he'd met them.
But as Blake got Kai to his feet, his feelings began to dissolve.
"I'm sorry about him," Blake said to the man dressed in black, "He's just woken up from throat surgery, and it seems like the anesthesia still hasn't worn off. We'll be leaving now."
As Emiko finally caught up with them, Mason's feelings began to harden.
The man dressed in black acknowledged Blake's apology by crossing his arms in front of his body and retaking his position next to his buddy in front of the eerie double doors.
Mason looked around as Blake tucked the crutch under Kai's arm.
He noticed the way Emiko bounced on the balls of her feet, cooing a slightly fussing Andi while Blake ran from his husband's side to make sure her daughter was alright. Mason, lowering his view to the linoleum tiles, wondered if Kai had noticed the women in the way he did—if he picked up on their micromovements and dissected them to distract himself, too.
It was a humorless guess that was anything but correct.
Kai's love for Mason was unbreakable, and whatever stood in between, or in his way, was a conjured-up faucet of his imagination. Kai adjusted his crutch, beginning to bridge the gap, and even though Mason had gazed away thirty seconds ago, he could hear the movements of his delayed walk. Counted the breaths he spewed from his lungs. Held his attention so close to his.
"Mase?" Kai hummed.
A magnetic nickname he could not discount—
Mason glanced up from under his eyebrows.
The thoughts and second-guesses that submerged his mind grew void at the sight of his proximity. Mason could lift a finger, and he'd graze his lover. He could lean in and feel the warmth beneath his thin hospital gown; he could inhale him; he could match the rhythm of his heartbeats with his inhales and exhales just to make sure that they were both alive at this moment.
But he did none of that.
His eyes lasered on the jagged scar starting halfway past his left cheek, running over the bridge of his nose over to his right ear. The mutilation that he'd done to the love of his life because he'd been delirious enough to not recognize his help, taunted him.
Burned a hole of acid straight through him.
Disgust marinated his soul as he thought about all the possibilities of repeats in the future. It coated him in a toxic sheath he didn't bother trying to escape from because at least, this way, Kai was safe. He was safe from the fact that Mason would never overcome his trauma. Safe from the fact that his sexuality would always be a threat to their marriage.
Mason put his good hand on his wheel and pushed back, widening the distance between them. He knew his husband was not fond of his need to blame himself for what happened, but that didn't mean there was no blame to be given. A person does not just become easily absolved of their crimes merely because of love. Or merely because one wants them to be.
He didn't miss the frown on Kai's face.
Or the hurt that flashed like lightning in his eyes.
"Can we leave?—" Mason started.
"I miss you," Kai signed, slapping his hands together.
"I don't—?"
"I," Kai pointed at his chest, "MISS," he tried to mumble, "You," he pointed at him.
The water in his eyes from earlier returned as he understood what he was saying. They threatened to spill down his cheeks as he watched the ragged way Kai's chest heaved—at the back of his hand—red with deliberation to get his words out.
Mason put his hand back to his wheel, about to move close again when an interruption nobody expected came soaring down the hallway. Mason drew his head back as Emiko slapped herself in the face, groaning at the two new bodies hogging this restricted corridor.
"Whoa, who the hell are they?" Blake quizzed.
"They're his—" Emiko began.
"His parents," Mason finished, eyes wide.
Valeria and Samuel Alveréz all but ignored the three of them as they dove into the broken arms of their son. Kai's face lit up in bewilderment and agony as he felt their hands hold him in ways they hadn't since the day he and Kaedyn had been born.
"I told them to wait by the nurse's station while I got you," Emiko glowered.
"Yeah, parents like those?" she thumbed in their direction, "No way they were listening."
"When did they get here?" Mason asked Emiko.
"Why are you here?" Kai signed to his parents.
The answers to all of their questions were met in the next few minutes.
Valeria backed up and held her son at an arm's distance, petting his shoulder and cupping his jaw in a way that made it seem like she was truly emotional. At the same time, Samuel stepped back and turned his attention to Mason, placing his hand on his shoulder. His upside-down smile offered him a million sympathies while his kind, brown eyes appeared human.
It was his first real interaction with his father-in-law, but all he wanted to do was grab a gun and shoot him in the fucking face for touching him without his permission. He had to know why Mason was here if he was here—had to know that someone he trusted had raped him—
Mason's thoughts were interrupted as Kai smacked his father's hand off of him.
Anger hurricaned his facial features as he said something in sign language.
Samuel instantly pocketed his hands, "I'm sorry, son."
"Oh, u-uhm," Mason stuttered, "It-it's okay?"
"What'd he say?" Blake tilted her head, asking Samuel.
"He said—"
"He said not to put his fucking hands on his husband," Emiko answered with curious eyes.
Mason shot a glance at Kai's, expecting him to smile for defending him—expecting him to showcase the praise he might deserve for telling someone to fuck off in his name, especially his father—but none of that came. Instead, he nodded his head and stepped back, taking his father by the arm and dragging him into a semi-circle with his mother.
Mason couldn't rid the shell-shock from his face.
He had no idea what to expect anymore.
"Wait, since when do you know sign language?" Blake interrogated her girlfriend.
"Since I was little," she shrugged, "My father's chef was deaf, so I learned for her."
"Why haven't you said anything?!"
"I thought offering to get Kai first was a key point enough," she laughed, "And besides, it's not something you just casually throw into a conversation."
Mason grinned at their banter while he watched the family of Alveréz's talk with their hands. The men dressed in black appeared pissed at the fact that this was all happening here, but they chose not to speak up. Mason wondered if it was because they were now outnumbered, or if they were serious enough to recognize two faces that belonged to England's Most Wanted list.
"What do you mean, why are we here?" his mother slapped Kai's arm, "What kind of son asks her mother that question? You're hurt! We should've been the first call!"
Kai glared at her, mouthing the vindictive words Mason couldn't understand.
"Of course, Kaedyn told us," his father shook his head, looking sad, "There's no need to be upset with your brother for telling us the truth. You know that he didn't have a choice. We forced him into telling us where you were because you went silent and your phone kept pinging in the middle of a wooded area. We were worried about you."
Kai rolled his eyes, making a noise that sounded like a scoff.
"You seriously don't think we care?" Valeria questioned.
Kai adjusted on his crutches, giving him full range of his hands. His mouth began to mutter whispers of the words he was choosing to speak while his fingers went on a rampage. Valeria looked stunned every time her son's eyebrows creased; his father seemed defeated each time his lip curled in disgust.
By the time he was finished, his proud mother's shoulders had fallen.
Samuel stepped to her, wrapping her in one arm, offering support.
Mason kept his eyes glued to them as he leaned back in his chair and beckoned for the girls to get closer. Hoping Emiko had been paying attention, he asked for a translation.
"I didn't catch the beginning, but he said something along the lines of: 'You didn't seem to care about me when it was Kaedyn in a bed and I was the one by his side. In fact, I distinctly remember you telling me that you wished it was me instead of him. On top of that, you tried to interrupt my wedding by insulting my husband in a room full of trained operatives, and then you came here and laid your hands on him after knowing what happened to him! You don't get to act like doting parents now. You don't have the right to be surprised at my feelings toward you. It's disgusting!'"
Mason narrowed his eyes at the back of his mother's head.
If he had been in the room when she'd said that—"
"If I could take it back, I would," Valeria whispered.
Kai signed while Emiko translated, "Well, you can't, and it's pointless to try to atone for your words and actions so many years later. I'm happy now. Why can't you just leave me alone?"
"Malakhi—"
Kai audibly growled at her.
"Don't you do that!" she pointed a finger in his face, "I named you. I raised you. No matter what has occurred between us, you're still my son and I'm still your mother!—"
"Your title only means something to you," Mason spit, stepping in.
Valeria whipped her head at him, "Stay out of this—"
"He's more my family than he ever was yours," he stated plainly.
"You little—"
"Valeria!" Samuel shouted, grabbing her by the arms.
Mason's mouth dropped in shock while Kai's widened and rounded. His father turned his mother away from Mason and forced her to look him in the face while he screamed at her. While he told her that this behavior was the exact reason why Kai didn't want to be around her.
"You can't even respect the fact that our boy wants to be called Kai!" he yelled, "You're so vindictive, you're pushing him further and further away! You can't even see it because you think you're too good compared to those around you. And yeah," he gazed at his son, "I've done my fair play by not getting involved, but no more. He's our son—I'm going to do everything in my power to be a part of his life, and I will do that with or without you, Valeria. With, or without you."
Samuel released her, stepping back a step.
Valeria's face was wet with regret.
"I feel like we shouldn't be here," Emiko whispered.
"I don't know. I kind of like being a fly on the wall," Blake said thoughtfully.
The girls began to playfully banter behind him, but all Mason could focus on was the conversation and actions going on in front of him. Maybe it was because he was on the outside looking in—maybe because he'd seen his husband go through hell and back to get where he was—to let his walls down enough to be vulnerable with someone—but the more he watched, the more it felt like he was ...
He was healing.
"Your father is right," Valeria cried, "There's so many things I've done and said to you that can't be taken back. There are craters in our relationship that can't be filled. I've allowed you to believe that I despised you for so long because I needed you to be stronger than I am."
"That doesn't make sense," Kai signed.
"Son, I know we're not perfect parents. Hell, I know we're not good parents," Samuel reached over and grabbed both his wife's and his son's hand, "I know that we don't deserve a conversation from you, and you deserve more than an overdue explanation, but I can't do the rest of my life—the rest of yours—not being the father I should've been. I can't lose you letting you think—letting you think," he hiccupped, beginning to cry himself.
"Letting you think that we don't love you," Valeria finished.
Mason watched as the steam of disappointment and failure began to leave Kai's wounded shoulders and permeate the air. It was almost as if he could count the rocks that fell from his ankles, and the number of locks on the shackles holding back his wrists.
Kai's lips parted. Closed. And parted again.
He could see the shake within them—could see the fear and grief in his eyes.
The acceptance.
"You love me?" he said strongly enough that all five of them heard it.
Valeria burst into tears, "Oh, I've failed you. I've failed you so much!"
"Of course, we love you!" Samuel wiped his eyes.
Mason lifted his hand to his face, suddenly feeling as if a pipe had burst and it was dripping on his skin. He rubbed it, avoiding the cuts, stunned to feel that the stream had started underneath his eyelids. He felt Emiko and Blake each grab one of his hands.
"A conversation," Valeria begged, "Just give a conversation."
"If at the end, your feelings still haven't changed, then we'll leave you be," Samuel concluded.
As if they were connected by a tiny red string, a single tear ran down Kai's face, falling to the ground. Mason fought against the jealousy that plagued his mind as his husband looked through his parent's heads directly at him. He did not need to reiterate it—the question desperately lingering in his eyes.
Yes or no?
It was the easiest choice he'd ever had to make.
Mason tipped his head up, nodding against his angst, knowing that if Kai did not hear out his parents right now, no matter how much he denied it, he'd forever have a gaping hole in his chest where they once resided—that their lives away from his would haunt him until they were six feet under.
Kai blinked away his pain.
Fought against a smile, and turned to his parents.
"Okay."