Chapter Text
“Is this what you want?”
Phayu’s calculating gaze pins him to his seat. Rain can feel his heartbeat pick up, and the palms of his hands clam up with sweat. This was the effect his husband had on him. One heated look from him would have Rain folding, bending over backward, ready to do everything for the man who held his heart.
And why wouldn’t he? He loved Phayu. And Phayu loved him. They had loved each other for a long, seven years.
Loved.
Belatedly, Rain wonders. When he started to regard the man across him with endearments connotated with past tense. He doesn’t think he can pinpoint when exactly it started to feel wrong to say love instead of loved. Or maybe he was being dramatic. Phayu had always said he was. It was something he loves– loved about him, he said.
“Rain?”
The mention of his name had him snapping back from his daze. Rain finally lifts his head from where it had dropped between his shoulders, and wills his eyes to look into his husband’s. His hand reaches out to touch the manila envelope on the low coffee table in front of him. His pointer finger reaches out from his fist and touches the dog-eared paper sticking out from the top of the envelope. Phayu had pulled it out just enough for him to see the words on top of the page before he had tossed it back on the table.
Inhaling through his nose roughly, Rain feels it as the air gets stuck in his throat. So, he nods.
“Words, baby. You know you need to use your words.”
He grits his teeth as the term of endearment slips past Phayu’s lips. When had been the last time he had called Rain baby? Why would he call him that now?
Shaking his head to himself, he thinks, why wouldn’t he? That’s what his husband was so good at. Sweet talk. Always sweet talking Rain. Rain loves– loved it. He loved how Phayu was able to coax him into calming down with mere words. A simple few alphabets strung together, and Rain would go lax in Phayu’s arms, ready to forget what had him keyed up in the first place.
Right now, though. Right now, at this very moment, Phayu’s words had Rain’s mind going haywire. The complete opposite of his husband, who looked so. So calm.
It irritated Rain. Why was Phayu always so composed? Even now, even now as Rain sat across from him, asking him something that was thought to be every couple’s nightmare. Rain was beside himself, and it showed. On his face, through his body language, by the fact that he couldn’t even speak. And here he was. His husband. Leaned back against the sofa across from him, on the other side of the coffee table. One leg tossed over the knee of the other, hands folded in his lap, elbow propped on the armrest. His head was tilted to the side, and if it wasn’t for the strain in his neck that only Rain could notice after years of studying his face– and memorizing its every detail– he wouldn’t be able to see any reaction on Phayu’s face.
But, he knew. Of course, Rain knew. The strain in his neck, that traveled across his jawline and the side of his right cheek, hollowed inwards slightly. Phayu was clenching his teeth, the same way he did whenever he thought his emotions were getting the best of him.
An evil thought wormed its way into Rain’s head. He wanted Phayu’s emotions to get the best of him, even though he knew his husband hated not being in control of himself. It wasn’t an issue with vulnerability, more so the fact that this was just Phayu’s nature. The evil little gremlin spits out that it wants to see Phayu lose that control. Wants to see Phayu fold, wants to see Phayu beg. Rain wants Phayu to need him like. Like he used to. Like he used to, back when Rain mattered to him.
Back when Phayu loved Rain.
Gulping down the knot of pain and anguish forming in the back of his mouth, Rain looked down at the words peeking out from the envelope again. He rubbed his palms against the rough fabric of his jeans and steeled his nerves.
“Yes,” he forced out, “This is what I want.”
There. It was out there. It sounded garbled, but it was out there. Rain had practiced delivering this speech for days and here he was, stuttering over a few words that were so vague, it sounded like he was confirming his lunch order for the day.
Phayu raised an eyebrow and shifted his weight slightly. Rain’s eyes zeroed in on his husband’s fingers twiddling around with the ring on his finger. The same ring that adorned Rain’s finger. He could see Phayu forming the sentences in his head, could see the way his husband’s eyes wavered, and his confident posture faltered. His beloved was easy to read, after seven years. At least. At least, he was easy to read to Rain.
And so Rain knew that Phayu was trying to form an argument in his head. Formulating a new question that would reduce Rain to a silent, blubbering mess. That would force Rain to feel like he was losing his mind, and needed to be wrapped up in Phayu’s arm in that very moment.
And he couldn’t have that. He needed to put this out there. So, he gulped down every word that his heart put in his throat. Every word that went against his brain. Every word that begged him to change his mind.
“Let's get divorced, P’Phayu.”