Forsaking Truth (29 page)

Pavement scraped his
cheek raw. “That ought to hold him,” someone said as Luke spit and blinked
through tears and blood.

They walked back over
to Tristan and picked him up. “Don’t,” Luke begged, b
ut
no one heard him.

One guy yanked
Tristan’s head back by his hair. His face was caked with blood. Dalton slapped
his cheek. “Wake up, faggot. Your girlfriend’s here.”

Luke breathed hard as
Tristan’s eyes slowly opened. When he focused on Luke’s broken bo
dy being held in place by two of the guys, he tensed and
struggled.
“Luke!”

Dalton punched Tristan
in the gut and he buckled. “See what we did to your lover boy over there. You
should have heard him crying for you like a little bitch.”

Tristan went
ballistic, but it only provoked their brutality. Luke struggled as well, but he
had bones broken in places he couldn’t feel and two of his teeth were now
knocked loose.

“Get me a knife,”
Dalton said and Luke shut his eyes and began to cry. Fo
rcing himself to be strong, he met the panic in Tristan’s broken gaze.
He’d do anything if they just left him alone. “Tristan! Tristan, look at me.
Don’t look at them.”

Tristan’s eyes bore
into him. He saw the fear. “I love you, Luke.”

No. No goodbyes. The
y were gonna get married. Be a family. “I love you too,
baby.”

He sucked in a sharp
breath as Dalton shoved the knife in Tristan’s side.

Luke fought against
the arms holding him down. “
Tristan! Tristan, keep your eyes on me!”

The amount of effort
it took f
or him to do as he said was evident. Luke
watched as his eyes clouded with tears. “I’m sorry,” Tristan mouthed.

“No!
No!
You listen to me! No
apologies any more. I told them. I told my parents. I love you…”

The knife glistened
crimson under the glare of t
he streetlights and Luke
winced, his stomach roiling again, as the sound of the blade sinking into
Tristan’s flesh met his ears. Dalton drew back when Tristan grunted and
punctured his side again. When Tristan didn’t lift his head again, Luke cried
and con
tinued to whisper, “I love you. I love you. I
love you…”

Pain exploded in the
back of his head and the world went black. It was an ugly place anyway.

Sunday

Monday

Tuesday

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

“…Blessed is the fruit
of thy womb, Jesus. Holy
Mary, Mother of God, pray
for us sinners…”

Who was praying?

Luke tried to open his
eyes, but could only manage to grunt.

The prayers stopped.

He heard movement and
then felt cool fingers touch his arm. “Luke. Luke, darling, are you awake?”

His throat was
dry and sore. He swallowed, the action painful. His voice
was scratchy and barely existent. “Tristan.”

Whoever was with him
started to cry. “Oh, thank the Lord. Luke, love, can you hear me? Someone get a
nurse!”

“Mum?”

Her cries became too
thick for him to make out her words. Other voices arrived and something
happened.
Tristan. Tristan. Tristan.

Everything went dark.

Saturday

Luke’s parched tongue
licked over his dry lips and he breathed. Hushed voices whispered in t
he distance. He cleared his throat and rasped, “Water.”

The whispers stopped
then voices got louder. A straw was placed between his lips and he sucked.
There had never been anything more quenching.

“Luke? Can you open
your eyes?”

That was his father’s
voi
ce.

Luke struggled to open
his eyes. Bright. It hurt. His lashes fluttered as a blurry image of his father
came into view. Someone was with him. He blinked. Finn.

“Hey,” Finn said with
a smile.

“Where am I?”

“Hospital,” his dad
said. “I’m so glad you’re
awake. The nurses said
you’d probably wake up sometime tonight since you woke up yesterday.” Luke
frowned. He had no recollection of waking. “I’m going to phone your mother.”

His dad left, but not
before Luke saw the tears slip past his eyes. Seeing his fa
ther cry was terrifying. He looked at Finn. He didn’t look
much better.

“You’re gonna be all
right,” his brother said, but Luke wasn’t sure who he was assuring.

“Where’s…Tristan?”

His brother’s
expression shuttered and he hesitated.

“Finn…please. Where is
he?”

“You… can’t see him
right now. You have to get better first.”

Fuck that. “I need…
Tristan
.”

“Luke, you’ve been in
a coma for a week. Give it a minute.”

Every word hurt, but
he needed to make him see. He swallowed and forced each word out syllable by sy
llable. “If it…were Mallory…would you…wait?”

His twin’s lips
thinned and he looked away, putting his fist to his lips. He pulled himself
together and turned. “No. No, I wouldn’t wait. They’d have to kill me to keep
me away.”

“I love him,” Luke
whispered.

“
I know you do. But right now… Oh, God, Luke…it’s bad.”

His lungs worked in
quick pants. Something was taped around his ribs. He couldn’t move his limbs.
Panic and a feeling of utter impotence grabbed hold of him. He was dead.
Tristan was fucking dead.

A lo
w pitched whimper filled the room and he realized it was
coming from him. He shut his eyes and twisted his head away so he could cry
privately. “They killed him?”

“What? No!”

He sucked in a breath
and faced Finn. “Then what? Why can’t I see him?”

Finn’s
eyes were shot with red. He blinked rapidly. “They did a
number on him, Luke. He just woke up Tuesday, but he’s been in and out of
surgery. He’s on a lot of meds. They…mutilated him.”

He was gonna vomit.
His throat worked to hold it back. Breathing through
his teeth, his whole body tense, he asked, “How bad?”

“He lost two fingers
and was stabbed six times. His nose was broken and his arm.”

He couldn’t process.
So long as Tristan was alive—
oh, Tristan—
Luke’s pain didn’t even register. The
agony of his
battered body coming back to life was
second to Tristan’s condition. Tristan came first. He’d always come first. Luke
would have it no other way.

“We called his
parents, but…”

“No…don’t call them.
We’re his family.”

Finn nodded. “Yeah.
Bray and Colin are w
ith him now. He’s been asking for
you.”

“I need to see him.”

Finn sighed. “Let me
see what I can do.”

Finn was gone for a
long time. His father came back and soon his mother arrived. Finn finally
returned with Bray at his side. They came to his bed.

“Hey,
big guy,” Braydon said, looking on the verge of tears.
“Glad you’re back.”

Luke tried to smile,
but it hurt. “Hi. Didn’t know I was gone.”

“Gave us all a scare.
Here, someone wants to talk to you…” Bray held up his phone but not to his ear.
He realized th
ere was a live picture on the screen.
It took him a minute to realize he was looking at Tristan.

He sucked in a breath.
His hair was buzzed and there was a long line of stitches from his brow to his
battered eye.
Jesus
. “Hey, cowboy.”

Tristan turned his fa
ce away as his shoulders shook. When he looked back, he
choked, “Hi.” His lips were cracked, but he bit them anyway. “You look like
hell.”

“So do you.”

“I wish I could touch
you right now, know that you’re there.”

“I’m here,” Luke said.
“Not going anywhere
.”

Tristan nodded. “They
won’t let me out of bed yet.”

“Fuckers.”

Tristan laughed and
his chuckle turned into a sob. “I’m so sorry, baby.”

Luke gave up fighting
back his tears. “You’re alive. That’s all that matters.”

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

His fa
mily quietly stepped out of the room to give them privacy.
They talked until the battery on the phone died. Then they demanded someone
bring them some new phones or a cord to plug it in.

The conversation
continued through the night and his family appeared
every
so often to see if he needed anything. He didn’t. The only thing he needed was
right there. Tristan.

Apparently, someone
had called the cops that night. Dalton and the rest of those monsters were in
jail. Dalton was facing charges for attempted murde
r
and terroristic threats involving hate crimes. The local news had covered the
story, though they got no statement from the McCulloughs.

The day they finally
let Tristan out of bed he had a nurse wheel him right to Luke’s bedside, where
he stayed. They
eventually moved his belongings and
allowed him to occupy the other bed in the room.

Luke had four broken
ribs, a busted knee, a crushed collarbone, a ruptured eardrum, three broken
fingers, three loose teeth, and some other shit the doctors were working o
n. The thing of it was, none of it bothered him so long as
they were both alive and there.

Bruises would heal and
bones would mend. Surviving such a brutal attack did something to a person.
Luke realized he was fighting the wrong fight all along. So long
as he let other’s opinions shame him, the bad guys won.

The world was not what
it once was. Maybe it was better. Maybe it was uglier. The fact was, no man had
a right to take another’s freedom to find happiness. Tristan made him happy.
Their love was the
greatest thing he’d ever known and
he wouldn’t sacrifice it for anyone.

Dalton deserved to die
for what he did. There was too much hate. They only wanted the same rights as
everyone else in this world. Luke wanted the freedom to love his spouse, not in
fea
r, but in faith, that someday the good would
outnumber the bad and they could all live peacefully.

They didn’t let him
leave the hospital until June. It was hot and he was staring down a long road
of physical therapy and follow-up procedures before he’d be
able to walk again. But he would walk and when he did, the
first steps he planned to take were down an aisle into Tristan’s arms.

Sheilagh had come to
the hospital and Luke made his apologies. She apologized too. He no longer held
her youth against her. S
he had her own battles to
fight in this life and forgiveness was a liberating thing they both needed.

It took longest for
him to forgive himself. He still struggled from time to time with facing his
shortcomings, but his affection for Tristan was no longer
one of them.

The day they returned
home Tristan wheeled him into the barn. It looked different. The hole in the
wall had been patched and painted. There were pictures from his phone, printed
and hung in frames, pictures of him and Tristan.

The furniture h
ad been arranged to make room for his stupid wheelchair and
the fridge was stocked with tons of food—including a freezer full of his mum’s
chicken casserole—and there was plenty of beer.

Tristan helped him
into bed and lay next to him. Luke’s fingers found
his, his thumb rubbing over the bandaged part where his pinky had been and
slowly dragging to the next finger that wore his ring.

They each sighed and
Luke shut his eyes as Tristan began to whistle through his teeth. He missed
hearing that whistle.

Luke’s
lips pursed as he slowly whistled along to the tune of
Your
Song
by Elton John. When
they reached the chorus, they each whispered the line, echoing the sentiment
that life was wonderful so long as the other was in their world.