By the time Kerr started asking his next round of questions, Ben's brain had started firing and making connections. His asking 'what' had been almost like an audible delay, when processing was a split second later than verbalising. As soon as 'what' left his lips, he'd latched onto the last thing Kerr said, and worked his way backwards from there.
We can be apart for a little while + I'm just going to go away for a while + I decided to give you some space
It was a formula that added up to Kerr leaving him. Ben held his phone hard against his ear and listened for the ambient sounds behind Kerr. There shouldn't have been any if Kerr was in the penthouse, but he could hear some peculiar noises. Something whizzing, a repetitive clunking that was soft at first then got louder then softened again like it had come near Kerr and left him again, footsteps echoing. The space Kerr was in sounded big, like there were tiled or laminate floors, people around him.
Are you at an airport? he wanted to ask, but it felt like too big a question to pop out of his mouth, especially when his mind was still making connections.
I didn't realise how hard it was for you + that's only fair after what I've put you through
Was this payback for all the times Ben 1.0 had run away from his problems? Kerr didn't really believe that he was genuinely doing Ben any favours by abandoning him now, did he?
And then his mind made the final coup de grace.
it felt like you wanted to try exploring things properly + with Saraekiel
Ben closed his eyes, aware that Kerr's question about Cain had gone unanswered.
Had Kerr read it wrong? Fuck yes. Was getting rid of Cain the answer? Fuck no. Kerr had delivered a whole new set of problems with this betrayal. He was sitting at a fucking airport about to leave the fucking city because of a fucking argument that didn't even have anything to do with how Ben had fucked up Cain? And he was leaving to give Ben the chance to mess around with Saraekiel? It was absurd. The whole idea behind what was happening right now was absurd. Who ran away to a different country because their boyfriend thought someone else was hot? Call up all the tourist companies, they needed to change their advertising.
Ben had a very strong urge to ask if Kerr was going to New York. So much had happened in the decade after he'd returned to Kerr from there. He'd changed so much. But Kerr thought it was nothing. He'd said as much. That amount of time was nothing. He trusted nothing. Nothing mattered.
He must've taken too long to answer because Kerr spoke again.
