I make a face and drop my hand. “First of all, that makes no sense. Second, did you just call me a dog?”

“If the shoe fits...”

I gasp in mock-outrage. “So mean,” I mouth. “Have you always been this mean?”

He rolls his eyes, lip ticking up into a bitter smile. “You’d know. You’ve seen the worst of me.”

I start to frown. “You’re not that bad, man.”

He chews on his lip as he looks at some point on my chin. “Don’t lie. It’s not becoming of a golden retriever.”

I pinch his side, and he yelps. “I’m not a golden retriever.”

We both chuckle before sobering once more.

I’m running my hand through his hair, watching the way my fingers disappear through the thick black waves, when he says, “I’m a fucking mess, Will.”

My movements still. I search his sad, weary gaze. “Way—”

“I’m a borderline alcoholic with a massive case of internalized homophobia. I also have PTSD—no, sorry, complex PTSD, because apparently regular PTSD wasn’t bougee enough for me,” he says sarcastically. “If that’s not a mess, I don’t know what is. And don’t even get me started on the ‘suicidal ideation’ stuff.” He scoffs and glances away.

None of this is news to me, even if he hasn’t come right out and said it until now. The signs were all there. It was only a matter of time before he was formally diagnosed with PTSD once he started therapy.

I smile thinly. “Yeah, well, we can’t all be as basic as me.”

He winces. “You know what I mean.”

“Yes. I do.” I duck my head to follow his gaze, so he knows I’m not mad.

What happened with Zayne is nothing compared to what he’s been through, but I don’t see it as a competition. I just see facts—or at least, I try to. Our cases are different, but it in no way takes anything away from anyone by acknowledging that.

It doesn’t change anything.

So I tell Waylon what my therapist told me back when I tried to deny the struggle I was facing. When I was so focused on how much worse other people had it—Zayne, in particular at the time; so much so that it killed him—that I couldn’t see how damaging that thought process was to my own healing journey.

“Acknowledging your trauma in no way invalidates mine. Okay?”

He starts to frown.

I cup his jaw. “Your story is yours and yours alone, as is mine.” I drag my gaze back and forth between his. “It’s not a contest of who had it worse. I don’t see it like that. And you shouldn’t either.”

Okay, so that second to last bit is kind of a lie, but if it helps him, so be it.