❛ don’t try to fight it. i’m here for tonight. ❜
dodie clark originals | @feltstrange
eldon recalls, or it’s been the only thing he’s been thinking about for the past hour, with his head on ben’s shoulder, hand tucked into his, just how long the three-hour long train journey to new york is. the time difference is annoying sometimes; more than not, he’ll forget that while a text at one in the morning doesn’t sound so bad, it’ll be four that same morning when ben receives it. harmless jokes are shared that when eldondoes finish college, maybe he’ll move closer. he spends half of his time on the damn train & at ben’s apartment, anyway, so when sleep deprivation hits and they’re watching a movie ( and eldon is trying not to focus on the arm ben has subconsciously draped around his shoulders ) eldon might mention moving. california doesn’t feel like home anymore; no matter how hard he tries.
home; california, new york, ben. more specifically, ben in california, ben in new york, ben in general. there’s always that sinking, empty feeling of homesickness that settles when he and ben are apart– watching ben leave, saying goodbye to him, ending a phone call wanting to say more to keep the conversation going but knowing it’s been an hour already & he should give it up. they’re friends, which was so much easier to say when he was seventeen and the word ‘just’ fit so perfectly before their relationship status, and it’s been a year since eldon realised how he felt. before, it was ‘this is ben, my friend’. now, it seems like ‘this is ben, i don’t know what he is to me’ feels more accurate.
eldon tries not to let it hurt, which has always been better said than done. jealousy is too often a familiar feeling & despite a boyfriend ben has that barely even lasts a week ( regardless of the heavy sadness that settles, he never once wishes ben’s relationships don’t work; pining is hard but it doesn’t hurt quite as much as not seeing ben happy ) not once do things between them change. everything is comfortable, though eldon tries not to focus on the drifting distance that has managed to seep between them since they kissed. or, eldon was standing in the doorway of his college dorm and ben managed to single-handedly erase eldon’s belief that he could somehow forget his crush, & cause that much more confusion.
love is never a word that has fit right in his mouth. he loves his sister, he loved his mum, and when he was seventeen ( eighteen, almost nineteen ) and he didn’t feel this way about ben, he loved him too. but, only as a friend. a tall friend with an unusual accent & nice eyes, and a kindness that too often felt like a rarity to find. so, he replays the first moment he said goodbye to ben with an accidental ‘i love you’ and then how natural it felt to hear it back. too many times he is left standing alone, either watching ben leave or leaving himself, and wondering why they only ever say it on the phone but never in person. eldon would say goodbye with a hug and a smile, and when ben introduced a boyfriend to him, eldon would shake the stranger’s hand and pretend he wouldn’t spend the next five hours trying to figure out why that couldn’t be him ( why it never will be ).
ben’s arm is warm against his shoulders and it’s too early in the morning for ben to even consider going home despite eldon insisting more than once that he should. it was barely an argument; soft whispers over the noises coming from the movie ben had put on, something el hadn’t paid attention to the moment the gap between them closed because he couldn’t focus on much else but the steady, familiar sounds of ben breathing. that, and the closeness. ‘ tonight ‘ is full of promise but it only means this one occasion, and eldon doesn’t expect there to be more ‘ tonight’s ‘ but he hopes there is. hands shaking & unsure in his lap, voice just as unsteady–
“ ― you’ll stay? ” ( maybe he means ‘stay tonight’ or maybe he means ‘stay by my side for the rest of my life’. maybe, he really means both. )
