EVERFiC  _______  quality 'everwood' fanfiction archive

home * new * fanfiction * mine * quote me! * submit * links * contact

One Word Series
by bigboobedcanuck

Chapter Ten: Forget

Disclaimer: I own nothing, don't sue.
Feedback: I am most grateful for it. Thanks to everyone who has commented thus far, y'all really do make my day, week, month, etc.
Enjoy!

[ * ]

Ephram’s heart pounded and his throat was dry. He could feel the heat of the stares and the excited whispers were like the drone of a thousand bees. He’d been able to ignore the attention before, but Colin’s presence had instantly changed everything.

“Ephram, don’t worry, I’ll take care of this.” His father pushed his chair back.

“How? What? Dad, don’t do anything. It’s fine. Can we just go?” Ephram was suddenly desperate for fresh air, to be outside, to be away.

“Ephram, we’re not going to leave, we have every right to have dinner in this restaurant. We can’t be intimidated by these people, I won’t allow it.”

“Let’s be intimidated this one time, please? Let’s….” Ephram trailed off when he realized Mr. Hart was approaching their table. The buzz of excited chatter suddenly ceased.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve showing up here.”

Andy’s jaw clenched and Ephram groaned softly. His father was not about to back down.

“I’m not sure what you mean. There’s no reason my family and I shouldn’t enjoy a dinner out on a Friday night. As far as I know, this is still a free country. And my son can go anywhere he chooses.” Andy’s voice was clipped, his gaze steely.

At that moment, the only place Ephram wanted to be was far, far away. He stole a glance at Colin, still frozen by the door, his mother fussing over him.

“Your son,” Mr. Hart spat the words out. “…Is a disgusting example of the depravity that’s all too common in this country these days. He took advantage of my boy, who has been through enough without having to deal with this too!”

“He did NO such thing!” Andy was standing now. “And if you think you can just go around tossing out accusations, you’ve got another thing coming!”

“Dad, forget it, okay? Let’s just go!” Ephram’s chest had tightened painfully and the words were little more than a whisper. He looked at Delia, who watched their father with tears in her eyes.

“No, it’s not okay! My son would never hurt anyone else, certainly not Colin.”

“There was a witness!” Mr. Hart turned to the Abbott’s. “Amy, you saw what this little degenerate did, didn’t you?”

Amy looked to Colin, then back at Mr. Hart. Her eyes never met Ephram’s. She nodded jerkily.

Ephram looked at Colin again. He looked pale, unsteady. Ephram waited for him to speak up, to stand up for him.

“You see? We didn’t invent this story, Dr. Brown. Your son should be locked up! You’re obviously no kind of parent. Have you wondered why your patients are all returning to Dr. Abbott in droves?”

Ephram looked at his father. He hadn’t mentioned anything about trouble at work. “Dad, is that true?”

Andy looked at him. “Ephram, don’t worry about my work, it’s got nothing to do with you.” Ephram swallowed and turned away. He could spot his father’s lies easily.

“Dad, forget it.” Ephram’s head jerked up at the sound of Colin’s voice and all eyes turned to him where he stood. “Just leave it alone, okay? I’m fine.” Ephram held his breath and waited for him to go on, but Colin just blinked and looked down. His mother stroked his head worriedly.

Realization settled upon Ephram with leaden weight.

Colin was never going to tell the truth.

He could hear the fear in his voice and see it in his eyes. It was a mountain that Colin either couldn’t, or wouldn’t, climb. He’d said he’d give him time, but Ephram suddenly knew he couldn’t wait any longer.

His eyes filled with tears, and he looked down and tried to blink them away. His chest constricted and he felt like screaming out loud. The buzzing in his ears became unbearable and the walls closed in with suffocating intensity.

Ephram pushed his chair back and walked quickly from the restaurant. Colin was a blur as he passed and once on the street he broke into a run. He barely noticed the questioning looks from passerby and was soon navigating the quiet side streets of the town, never breaking stride.

He didn’t look back.

-----------------------------------------------------

The air grew increasingly colder as time passed. It had been hours since Ephram had bolted from the restaurant, and now he walked the deserted streets, his feet aching.

He wrapped his arms around himself, shivering. His long-sleeved t-shirt did little to warm him. The day had been balmy, and he still wasn’t used to the radical temperature swings in the mountains that occurred once night fell.

He thought of New York with a pang. Warm summer nights, sitting out on the balcony with his mother, talking for hours. He hadn’t been gay then, and everything had seemed so much easier.

He shook his head and laughed at himself. “You were a queer then too, Brown. Just too stupid to know it.” His voice was hoarse, and his throat was sore.

He needed to forget; he needed to stop feeling. Amy had told him once that he should move on. Ephram snorted with self-deprecating laughter. He didn’t even know where he was. “I guess the first part of moving on is getting lost.” He looked around at the darkened, unfamiliar houses. Everwood wasn’t that big, but the houses sprawled out far from the main street.

Ephram knew Amy’s words were as true now as they were then. He had needed to move on from her and now just needed to move on from Colin, to forget about him.

Memories flooded his mind – images and sounds and feelings. He thought of declarations of love and how Colin’s tongue felt caressing his. How he smelled, how his skin tasted.

Ephram gasped in a breath and once again he felt the urge to scream. His brain was replaying the memories on a constant loop that grated and hurt more each time it went around.

Then one of the memories crystallized and Ephram grasped onto it precariously, banishing all the others. He moved down the street, examining the quiet houses more carefully.

---------------------------------------------

The door swung open softly, giving no resistance. Colin was right, no one locked their doors, or at least, this family didn’t. Ephram left the door slightly ajar and tiptoed into the kitchen.

He’d come through the back door, figuring it was the best option. There had been no cars in the driveway and no signs of a dog. His heart pounded, but he focused on his task. If the world wouldn’t stop spinning, then he needed to stop feeling anything at all. Colin certainly seemed to be numbing himself successfully.

Ephram crept into the dining room and spotted a liquor cabinet on the far wall. The house was large, and he was sure the inhabitants could spare some of their collection. The cabinet door creaked and he winced at the sound.

Inside was a myriad of bottles. He went for the vodka, the easiest to choke down. The bottle was half-filled, but it would do. He closed the cabinet and turned back to the kitchen.

The fridge stood near the back door, and Ephram paused as one of the pictures stuck to it caught his eye. It was taken on a beach, and the children laughed with mouths wide as their mother buried them in sand. She looked not at the camera, but at them. The affection in her gaze was almost palpable.

Ephram ran his fingers lightly over her eyes, her smile, her brown hair.

He was a block away before he could control his breathing again and stop the flow of tears.

----------------------------------------------------

Early morning light was slowly brightening the sky when Ephram stumbled up to his front door. It opened before he had even raised his hand to the knob.

“Ephram!” His father crushed him to his chest. “Are you alright? Are you hurt?” Andy’s eyes roamed over his body, looking for any injuries. Ephram’s head was like lead and his father’s anxious words were nails on a chalkboard. His tongue felt like it was coated in cotton and he grunted.

Andy held him by the shoulders at arm’s length. “Where the HELL have you been all night? Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been? Do you?” He shook Ephram slightly.

Nausea roiled up inside him and Ephram lurched out of his father’s grasp. He barely made it to the bathroom in the hallway before puking up the contents of his stomach, which mainly consisted of vodka.

He moaned and curled up on the floor, beside the toilet.

Andy’s voice boomed down. “So you stayed out all damn night drinking? Are you kidding me? Since when is this acceptable behaviour, Ephram?”

Since when is being a fag acceptable behaviour? Ephram asked the question in his head, unable to form the words. He moaned again and pressed his cheek to the cool tile.

Then his father’s hands were lifting him up to his feet. Andy supported Ephram’s weight as they navigated the stairs. He lowered Ephram to his bed and stripped off his pants and shirt, which were dirty from the jungle gym where he’d eventually rested.

He curled on his side and was lost to the world.

------------------------------------------------

His head was much too heavy, Ephram decided.

He woke up by degrees. He felt like he was in his own bed, but he couldn’t be sure until he opened his eyes. But like his head, his eyelids seemed to have become impossibly weighed down.

A door opened and Ephram forced his eyes open. Luckily, his room greeted him. He rolled over onto his back and found his father by the side of the bed. Andy stood with his arms crossed.

“Sleeping beauty finally wakes. It’s only been about ten hours. Ephram, what the hell were you thinking?”

Ephram’s response was a low groan. He licked his lips and coughed slightly, and his father picked up a glass of water from the bedside table. He propped Ephram’s head up and helped him drink.

When Ephram had settled back down, Andy took a seat on the side of the bed. “Ephram, I know you’re going through a lot, but this isn’t the way to handle it.”

Ephram spoke quietly and tried to stay as still as possible, hoping the pain in his head would subside. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” Andy’s tone was incredulous. “Well you’d damn well better be! I looked all over for you and then when you didn’t come home I had no idea where you were. If you’d had an accident or if someone had hurt you. Those bullies at school already beat you up once, and next time it could be worse. I’ve never been so worried about you.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”

Andy went on as if Ephram hadn’t spoken. “And did you think for a minute about your sister? She was up most of the night looking out the window for you. I tried to get her to go to bed, but she wouldn’t until you came home. Finally, she cried herself to sleep.”

Shame coursed through him. “I’m sorry. I…I wasn’t thinking. I felt like I was going crazy or something, I just needed to…I don’t know what.”

“To drink yourself senseless? Where did you get the liquor? You know, I believed you when you said you didn’t give Colin anything to drink before. Was that a lie? Have you been drinking behind my back, Ephram?”

“No!” Ephram winced at the pain in his head. “I swear, I haven’t been drinking before last night. Honestly. I got it from this place where Colin used to get it.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. Ephram knew there was no way in hell he could tell his father he’d actually broken into someone’s house to steal it. More shame flushed him as he thought of what he’d done.

“And where the hell were you all night? You were filthy. Why didn’t you come home? Don’t you know you can always come home? Ephram, I don’t want you sleeping on the street.”

“I know. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again.”

Andy took this in. “Fine, Ephram. But you’d better believe that you are grounded and if I catch you so much as having a sip of cooking wine, you are going to be very, very sorry. I want to trust you, but you don’t make it very easy sometimes.”

“I know. But I promise I won’t drink again. I just…I just freaked out. I told you I wanted to go, why do you always have to be the big man and argue?” Ephram sniffed and his eyes were watery at the memory. “I couldn’t handle it, Dad.”

Andy looked down. “I’m sorry, Ephram. You’re right, I should have backed down and left when you said you wanted to. It’s just…you’re my son, Ephram. I was trying to protect you. But clearly, I screwed that one up. I’ll try harder next time, I promise.”

“Okay. And you can ground me as long as you want, my life is over anyway.”

“Ephram, that isn’t true! Your life has hardly begun, don’t let some small-minded people…”

He cut him off before he could get fully worked up to lecture mode. “Dad, stop. I know, okay? Seriously, I told you yesterday, I’m not going to kill myself or anything.”

“Right. You’ll just anaesthetize yourself with copious amounts of alcohol.”

“I won’t, I swear.” He tried to sit up, but slumped back on his pillow. “Believe me, I don’t look forward to ever feeling like this again.”

His father reached out and brushed his hair from his forehead. “Hangovers aren’t too much fun, huh? Let this be a lesson.”

“It was.” Ephram reached for the water and managed to drink it unassisted.

“Well, dinner’s in an hour. I thought we could order in.” The mention of food made Ephram groan and Andy smiled. “You can have some soup, don’t worry.” He was silent for a while and he stroked Ephram’s hair again. “I love you so much, you know that?”

Ephram squirmed and looked away. “I know,” he mumbled. He looked back at his father. “What happened after I left last night?”

Andy sighed and dropped his hand back into his lap. “We can talk about this later. You rest now.”

“No. I want to hear it. And what’s this about you losing patients? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because it’s got nothing to do with you.” Ephram snorted. “Alright, maybe these particular people have been influenced by gossip. I don’t want them as my patients, in that case. There are still plenty of people willing to take my free medicine, don’t worry, kiddo.”

“Okay. But what about last night? Did you and Mr. Hart start throwing punches?”

“No. After you left, we had a few more words and Dr. Abbott managed to calm him down. Delia and I left to go after you.”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it. Sorry to disappoint you, but I wasn’t involved in any brawls.” Andy laughed.

“So…Colin didn’t, like, say anything else?”

His father’s smile faded. “No. I’m sorry, Ephram. I think Colin is feeling an awful lot of pressure right now, from his parents and from Amy. Not to mention the town, after his accident, he really became a public figure, Everwood’s number one son. He doesn’t have your strength right now. But it doesn’t mean he never will.”

Ephram exhaled a shaky breath. “It’ll be too late. I’m never speaking to him again.”

“I understand how hurt you must feel, Ephram.”

“No, you don’t! You have no idea, okay?” He turned on his side, away from his father.

Andy’s tone was resigned. “Okay.” The bed creaked as he stood up. “Hey, what do you say we go to Denver tomorrow? You and Delia can take Monday off school; we’ll do some shopping, stay in a hotel. What do you say?”

“Fine, whatever.” Ephram didn’t care where they went, as long as it was out of Everwood.

-----------------------------------------------------

Denver was a welcome change of pace and Ephram was glad they weren’t there to visit the hospital, for once. It wasn’t New York, but at least it was a city. He could walk the streets without garnering any attention and he basked in the anonymity.

Delia hadn’t tired of playing “I Spy” the entire drive down, but he didn’t mind. When he finally left his room the day before, she’d run up to him and whapped him on the arm before hugging him tightly. He watched her skipping down the sidewalk ahead of him and smiled.

“You’d think she hadn’t seen a toy store in years,” Andy said, genially.

“Well, it’s not every day you get an Equestrian Barbie for your very own.”

“I’m hoping she’ll be satisfied with this and forget about that horse I promised her.”

Ephram laughed. “Dream on, Dr. Brown. Besides, I was a witness, remember? There’s no way I’m letting her forget.”

“I should have known better, huh?” They laughed and headed into a music shop, Andy calling for Delia, who was eyeing an ice cream parlour further up the street. She was soon sitting in a corner, playing happily with her new doll while Andy and Ephram browsed the sheet music.

Ephram looked for something challenging, time-consuming. If he couldn’t drown his sorrows, at least he could try and play them away. He had always despised Liszt, but now he felt the hate fueled him.

He would conquer Liszt’s hardest piece, if it was the last thing he did.

-----------------------------------------------------

“Dad, I’m going for a swim, okay?”

Delia and Andy were lying on one of the beds in the large suite, watching a movie. “Isn’t it a bit late?” Andy looked at his watch.

Ephram had already changed into his bathing suit. “No, the concierge said it was open ‘til midnight. I just want to go for a few laps and sit in the hot tub or something. Might as well take advantage of everything this place has to offer, I’m sure it’s costing enough.”

Andy smirked. “Good point. Okay, just be careful. No diving!” Ephram saluted and then waved to Delia as he walked out the door, a t-shirt on and his towel slung over his shoulder.

He was pleasantly surprised to find the pool empty. It was fairly small, but big enough to do lengths in comfortably. After ten minutes, he moved to the hot tub in the corner of the room. He relaxed in the water and closed his eyes. They opened a few minutes later when another bather walked through the door.

Ephram’s breath caught in his throat.

The man was…well, he was beautiful. He was tall, with sandy-blonde hair, blue eyes and a lean, muscled body. Ephram guessed he was in his early twenties. He stared as he walked to the pool and slipped off his flip-flops. His bathing suit was surfer-style, similar to Ephram’s.

He tossed his towel onto a bench lining the wall before turning back to the pool. At the edge, he stopped and looked right at Ephram. He raised an eyebrow. “Hi.”

Ephram flushed, realizing that he’d been staring openly. “Hey,” he mumbled, looking away.

The man smiled. “Nice night for a swim.”

“Uh, yeah.” Ephram groaned inwardly. He was so pathetic.

The stranger laughed and hopped into the pool. After a few dozen laps, he got out and picked up his towel. “I think I’ll go take a steam.” He stretched his arms over his head and Ephram couldn’t help but admire his gleaming chest. “If you get bored in the hot tub, come on in and keep me company.”

Ephram gulped. Was he…no, it was impossible. Ridiculous! He wasn’t being…hit on, was he?

The man smiled and gave him a look that Ephram could only describe as “come hither.” Ephram was left staring at the door through which he had departed. Butterflies flapped their wings forcefully in his stomach.

He was probably imagining the whole thing; the guy was just being friendly. Right? Ephram’s mind spun. What if he wasn’t imagining it? He realized he was hard just thinking about it.

Unconsciously, his hand moved below the churning water and he stroked himself. Did this man, this gorgeous man, really want…him? Suddenly he was coming in the hot water and he looked around, guiltily.

He’d never really thought about any other guys except Colin. When he had in the past, he’d always clamped down on the feelings almost immediately. But here he was, jacking off in a public place at the mere thought of this stranger.

Ephram took a deep breath and got out of the hot tub. He didn’t owe Colin anything, and this would probably be nothing.

Definitely nothing.

He walked back into the change room area, where the steam room stood to his left. Ephram stopped in front of it. Maybe this guy was just being polite. They’d probably just sit there and struggle to make boring small talk.

His heart pounded in his chest and he stood with his hand on the handle.

He took a deep breath and pulled the door open, walking into the hazy room. The man lounged on the top bench, naked. He smiled beguilingly. “Well, hey there.” The door shut behind Ephram with a thud.

He had a feeling he wouldn’t have to worry about small talk.

Previous
Back
Next

(c) everfic.  cue edna's voice:  i don't own squat, private.
gorgeous banner made by the talented cj-same