Chapter 118: We’re Never Beating the Allegations
•⋅⊰∙∘☾✶☽∘∙⊱⋅•✾•⋅⊰∙∘☾✶☽∘∙⊱⋅•
The joke I’d been about to make vanished. "...What about your parents?"
Something flickered in his expression, quick and carefully managed. "They were busy."
"Busy? But, they’re extraordinarily wealthy."
"They are."
"So I kind of assumed—" I stopped, realizing how that sounded.
He finished it gently, "That having money meant I had everything?"
I rubbed the back of my neck. "...Yeah."
Damien looked down into his tea, stirring it slowly.
"Money buys comfort." His tone was calm and matter-of-fact, like someone who had made peace with something rather than someone who was still wrestling with it. "It doesn’t always buy affection."
The silence that fell between us felt different, heavier, more careful, as if we both sensed something that had just been said and were allowing it room.
I’d spent months envying people like Damien. The fancy ass penthouses, the expensive clothes, the cars and drivers, and the effortless way they moved through every room.
The complete absence of that nagging financial anxiety I carried around everywhere. It had honestly never crossed my mind that someone could have all of that and still feel, in important ways, alone.
"I had it backwards," I admitted quietly, my heart panged. Although my dad and I barely had much, he never made it feel like I was ever alone...even when he was as drunk as a sailor.
He looked up at me. "Most people do."
Later that afternoon, the rain began pattering against the windows again in soft, unhurried rhythms. The apartment held that unique warmth of a day that decided to stay in, the gray light outside doing nothing to take away from the coziness of the space itself.
Damien stretched lazily from the couch before looking at me. "I’m tired."
I looked back at him. "Yeah, you’ve been awake for four hours."
"I need a nap."
"Then go take one. I’m not stopping you."
He tilted his head, like someone who had already made a decision and was now framing it as a question. "You should come too."
I stared at him. "...What?"
"I sleep better when you’re nearby, you’ve made sleeping next to you a habit." He said it like someone stating a preference for a certain type of coffee... straightforward, factual, and without hesitation. "It’s a documented pattern at this point."
I stared for another moment. "...Are you serious?"
"Very."
I should’ve said no. I had things to do, assignments, emails, the usual responsibilities of being a person. Any reasonable response would have been to stay put.
But for some reason I couldn’t quite explain, I followed him down the hall.
The bedroom was quiet except for the steady rhythm of rain against the glass, the sound filling the room with a specific drowsy peace only rain can create when you’re inside and warm.
Damien settled beneath the blankets and looked at me expectantly. "Well?"
"This is still weird," I said.
"You’ve literally seen me drool in my sleep for three days."
"Against my will and in a medical capacity."
He laughed. "Come here, Oliver."
Muttering under my breath about the specific flaws of manipulative, wealthy, irritatingly comfortable people, I climbed onto the bed. The mattress shifted under my weight, and a moment later Damien slipped an arm around my waist, careful and unhurried, like it was just the natural way to lie down.
I stiffened, despite myself, despite having done this like thirty times by now.
"Comfortable?" he asked, satisfied like someone who already knew the answer.
"No."
"Liar."
He smiled without opening his eyes, contentment spreading across his face. I rested my head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat, which was steady and reassuring, far easier to be close to than I was ready to admit.
It was peaceful. Unreasonably peaceful for a rainy afternoon in a room I hadn’t expected to feel this cozy in.
I started tracing small, absentminded circles on the fabric of his T-shirt without even realizing it.
"You spoil me," he said quietly.
"Whatever, man."
He laughed, and the sound vibrated through his chest and into mine in a way I felt more than heard. "You’re smiling."
"I’m not."
"You are."
"You can’t see my face."
"I don’t need to."
I huffed quietly and didn’t argue, because denying it would have taken more energy than I was willing to give.
A comfortable silence stretched between us, the rain keeping its steady rhythm outside.
His laughter rumbled under my cheek, warm, low, and incredibly comfortable, wrapping around me like something I’d been so used to that I’d forgotten it was something I could lose.
The silence that followed was the easy kind, one that didn’t need filling.
After a while, gentle fingers touched beneath my chin, tilting my face upward to meet his gaze. His expression had lost every trace of teasing, revealing only warmth, unhurried and certain... like he had already come to a conclusion and was done questioning it.
Before I could ask what he was thinking, he leaned in.
The kiss was soft, slow... nothing like the charged, sudden intensity of the kisses before. It wasn’t dramatic, nothing that made a big announcement, just his mouth against mine, patient and careful, the kind that lingers rather than demands. The kind that gives you time.
He was giving me every chance to pull away.
I didn’t.
My eyes closed as I kissed him back, my heartbeat rising steadily, and I was pretty sure he could feel it through my chest, while the rain continued outside, and the room was warm and quiet, small in the best way.
When we finally broke apart, the space between us felt different than before, not awkward, not charged, just changed. Like something that had been held at arm’s length had finally settled where it was meant to be.
My entire face burned. I was aware of it and couldn’t do anything about it.
Damien smiled. "That blush. I’ve missed seeing it."
"Oh, shut up."
"I mean it. It’s one of my favorite things."
"You’re never getting sick again. This has been awful for my dignity."
"I’ll do my best."
He rested his forehead against mine softly, his voice just above a whisper. "Stay a little longer."
I didn’t reply, I didn’t need to. We both knew I was staying.
I settled back against him, listening to the rain and the steady rhythm beneath my ear, not thinking about what any of this meant or what happened next, or where the line was between what we had been and whatever this was becoming.
Not long ago, I truly believed that people like Damien had it all... that wealth solved the loneliness I thought was specific to folks like me, people counting shifts and hospital bills and budgeting groceries.
Now I knew better. I realized that loneliness didn’t care about bank accounts, that affection couldn’t be bought, and that the penthouse and the driver and his calm demeanor never kept him company in the way that truly mattered.
And somewhere between sleepless nights, imperfect soup, and absentminded circles traced on a T-shirt, I stopped seeing him as my temporary roommate, the person I borrowed space from, the one I was supposed to keep my distance from.
I kept telling myself we were just friends.
But lying there in his arms, in the quiet of the afternoon, with the rain outside and his heartbeat beneath me and the warmth of a kiss still lingering — I was starting to realize I was already falling, probably had been for some time, and had no idea how to stop.
The scarier part was that I wasn’t sure I wanted to.
•
•
•
𝔞𝔲𝔱𝔥𝔬𝔯’𝔰 𝔯𝔞𝔪𝔟𝔩𝔦𝔫𝔤𝔰
hi💕, just popped in to say that Damien didn’t hear Oliver’s confession. Oliver was just being paranoid lol...ok bye!