not your fault
They left the bathroom in silence. Logan helped him sit on the couch, then went to grab a blanket and draped it over his shoulders. Wade murmured a faint "thank you," avoiding his gaze. He felt ashamed. Ashamed of breaking down like this. Ashamed of not being able to eat a simple plate of pasta. Ashamed of everything he was still hiding.
Logan sat next to him, not saying a word. He didn’t want to push him, but he also didn’t want to ignore what was happening. Wade clutched the blanket around him like a shield against the outside world. His gaze was fixed on his knees, his body tense, as if expecting to be struck at any moment.
“It’s going to be okay, sunshine,” Logan said gently, his tone carrying all the tenderness of a man who knew that sometimes words weren’t enough.
Wade nodded slightly, but didn’t answer. Thoughts clashed in his head, waves that wouldn’t stop crashing, exploding in his chest. He felt Logan’s warmth beside him, but it wasn’t enough to calm the storm raging inside him.
“Have you ever felt like this, Logan…” he started, his voice trembling, “…the feeling of not being able to breathe, just... being swallowed?”
Logan turned his head to him, more serious, more attentive. “Yeah, I know what that feels like. Want to tell me more about it?”
Wade took a deep breath, closing his eyes in an attempt to calm the rising panic. “I think... I think I know what triggered all this.”
Logan waited, silently, ready to listen, but Wade couldn’t find the words. What he felt was a tangle of shame and pain, like a wound too old to heal but too alive to ignore.
He tightened the blanket around him, as if it could protect him from what he was about to say. He didn’t want to. It was too personal, too filthy. But he felt it, it had to come out. Not for him, but for Logan. Because he was here, still here, patient. And Wade couldn’t keep hiding it.
“I found… something, Logan. An old thing from my uncle. It… it reminded me of everything he did to me.”
The words were heavy, almost too heavy to say. But Wade let them out, and they now hung between them like a curse.
Logan straightened a bit, surprised by the revelation. “Your uncle?”
Wade nodded, his throat tight. “Yeah. A... gift he gave me when I was a kid. It was... something to make me ‘pretty for him.’ So he could… use me however he wanted.”
Logan furrowed his brow, not really understanding, but instinctively feeling that this gift was anything but good. “Wade... can you tell me exactly what he did to you? What... what did he say?”
Just saying those words was already torture, but Wade knew he wouldn’t move forward until he had let it all out. So, he took a deep breath and then started, almost reluctantly.
“He bought me stuff… clothes, outfits. He told me I had to be pretty for him. Because... because, you know, that’s how he always treated me. Like an object. Something he could mold however he wanted. He told me I had to please him. Not to be loved, just... so he could touch me.”
Logan swallowed, his heart tightening at what Wade had just said. It was unbearable. He couldn’t believe that Wade had gone through that, that he had to endure this as a child. But Wade wasn’t done.
“He told me I wasn’t pretty enough, not perfect enough. That if I wanted him to love me, I had to meet his expectations. He told me that if I was pretty, he could touch me, that he’d have the right to do it...”
Wade fell silent for a moment, his gaze evasive, then continued, quieter, almost in a whisper. “I... I did everything he asked. I just wanted him to stop. But it never stopped. And no one... no one saw, Logan. No one said anything when I talked about it.”
Logan leaned in a little closer, confusion in his eyes. “When you tried to talk about it… they believed you, right? It stopped?”
Wade bit his lip, closing his eyes for a moment. The memories came rushing back, painful, cruel. “No... No, they told me it was my fault. That I had provoked him. That it was my fault. He did it because I wanted it. I was just a dirty kid who didn’t know how to say no.”
Logan felt sick. Tears were rising again, but this time, Wade didn’t stop them. “They told me I was guilty. That it was my fault. And that I had to try harder to be… perfect.”
Logan turned away, rage boiling inside him. “They told you that? They said... you provoked him? That it was YOUR fault?” His voice trembled, but not in the same way as Wade’s. This was anger, disgust. The refusal to believe that the world could be so cruel. An uncontrollable rage towards those parents who didn’t believe their child, who let him destroy himself.
He wrapped Wade’s hand with his own, but he was too shaken to say more.
“You were never responsible for that, Wade. It’s not your fault.” Logan’s voice was firm, almost like an order. “No one had the right to touch you like that. It’s him we should hate. And them for doing nothing while they knew.”
Wade lowered his head, the shame still just as sharp, almost paralyzing. But this time, he allowed himself to speak more. “It’s because of that, the person I became, you know? Because of all that, what I felt, I... I’ve never been able to love myself. I’ve never been able to accept who I am. They destroyed me. You know, sometimes I talk so much to avoid facing my own demons. To avoid the voices in my head that want to destroy me.”
Logan didn’t know what to say anymore. He cursed himself for all the times he told Wade to shut up. He wished he could erase the past of the man he loved, fix everything. He wanted to keep Wade in his pocket and protect him from the rest of the world forever, but he knew that wasn’t possible. So he just took Wade’s hand in his, holding it gently.
“You don’t have to carry this alone. You don’t have to feel dirty anymore. I’m here, bub. Always.”
Wade turned his head towards him, his gaze still full of pain, but also a glimmer of recognition. Maybe, finally, he could begin to believe that Logan wouldn’t reject him. Not now. Not after all this.
Logan slowly leaned in to place a soft hand on Wade’s cheek, looking him in the eyes. “And if you want to talk about it... I’ll always be here to listen.”
Wade nodded, a small, sad smile on his lips. “I know. Thank you, peanut.”