To Share You (manxman)

Chapter 33

When I finally hear Raph approaching I know immediately something is off. His footsteps are too slow, not hasty enough, they're dragging as if for some reason he doesn't want to come home.

I'm confused and unsure of what to do. I want to run to him, but at the same time my brain won't come up with a valid excuse as to what is happening. And so I keep walking in crooked circles somewhere close to our home until finally, I see him appear from behind a tree.

'Raph!' I immediately call out. 'What happened?'

He doesn't look good. His face is too pale to be healthy and he is slightly swaying as if struggling with his balance. When I reach him, he only lets himself fall towards me, resting his forehead on my shoulder and breathing heavily. I'm not quite sure what to do with this. I always see Raph as the strong one in our relationship and without him saying anything and no clues to go off of, I feel helpless. The only thing that comes to mind is to check him over for injuries, but he seems fine. I can't see or smell any blood, no bruises either and the only thing that is really off is how he's acting.

'Talk to me, what's wrong?' Still, no reaction.

'Raph, I'm freaking out, what's happening?' When he still does nothing else other than to breath into my neck, my heart starts racing. I don't know what to do with this and it's scaring me.

Suddenly, Raph rips himself away from me as if I burnt him. I go to take a step towards him but he backs off at the same time.

'Don't!' is the first thing he says to me. 'Stay away, Donnie!'

I stop as if slapped. His words freeze me like nothing else could and it's all I can manage to not simply collapse like I want to. This is the first time I've experienced anything close to a rejection. I know in my heart that he doesn't mean it in the way my body understands it, but I can't help the numbing pain that is slowly spreading through me.

It's hard to believe that in the last two hours something so drastic happened that he doesn't even want to touch me anymore.

He seems to realise what he's doing when his eyes meet mine and the pain clearly spreads to him. He turns his head away but takes a small step towards me, silently telling me to calm down. It works marginally.

'Did... did Sam get back properly?' His voice is quiet and unsure and my heart aches to just hug him to me. I close my eyes and breath deeply before answering with a simple 'yes'. Sam is safe, but something is definitely wrong with Raph.

'Raph? I love you, you know that right?' I'm not sure why I say it, nor am I sure what I thought would come out of it, but telling him I loved him is never wrong.

Once he registers my words, his body goes rigid and the next thing I know his hands are painfully gripping my hair and his lips are bruising mine from the force he's kissing me with. I don't have time to even fully realise what's happening before he lets me go again and walks past me to our home.

It takes me a while to register that I am somewhat dumbly standing in the middle of the forest, still naked for that matter, but once I do I hurry to follow my mate.

I find him sitting somewhere in the corner, having thrown on a pair of sweats beforehand. I do the same before sitting down in front of him, silently looking at him. Part of me is trying to figure out what is wrong, while the other part is simply waiting for him to tell me. When neither of the two is happening and I come to the realisation that they won't be any time soon, I scoot over to sit next to my mate and just pull him into me without saying a word. Immediately his arms go around my torso and his head is resting next to mine; his whole body so close to me that I would have forgotten anything is wrong were it not for his nervous heart beat.