***Hey y'all.
First off, thanks for clicking into this chapter. I hope you enjoy it. It was a difficult chapter for me to write, cause it was kinda sad, but I'm a fan of happy endings, so it will all be okay.
If you haven't read any other Ben Loves a Challenge chapters I suggest starting at the beginning. While there is sex in this chapter, this chapter is much more about the characters than the sex.
Again, please enjoy.
-Penny***
His mother squeezed the air from his chest. "Seriously, Benjamin! You don't visit home enough. Just look at you, I swear you're skinnier than last time. Are you eating enough?"
He wiggled his way out of his mother's arms. "Ma, I'm fine. You know, the road works both ways, right?"
His mother's face soured. "Well, still. You should visit your mother more often. Or at least call."
He shrugged, unzipping his jacket. Tenneille mewled piteously from her carrier. "Been busy."
His mother knelt down by the cage. "Oh, you poor baby, caged up for two whole hours. Come here, little kitty." She opened the cage, but this wasn't Tennille's first rodeo and she deftly dodged his mother's arms and ran out of the room. His mother snorted, standing back up. "Well then. Why don't you go ahead and get settled. I've got a roast chicken in the oven for tonight, and your sister and the kids should be by in the morning."
He kissed his mother on the cheek. "It's good to be home, ma," he said, then picked up his suitcase and headed back towards his old bedroom. The ranch house was comfortable, but once Molly and the kids showed up the house would seem tiny. He smiled, excited to see his niece and nephews again.
He came down and helped his mother make dinner, enjoying just being with her. His father had been gone well before he was old enough to remember him, but his mother never dwelled on it.
"So, no Laura?" his mother asked, her back to him as she stirred something on the stove.
He cringed. It wasn't that he hadn't been preparing ever since he'd sorta made up with Dean, but he still wasn't ready. "Ah, no. Ma, she's, ah, you know. It wasn't gonna work between us anyway."
His mother tisked as she checked the chicken in the oven. "She was good for you, kept you from galavanting."
He didn't know what to say to that point. "Well, she didn't think we were good together, and you know, it hurt a lot when she left. For a long time. But, I've finally moved on, and I see now that it was the right thing to do."
"How so?"
He sighed. "I was a bit selfish. Maybe I still am, but I think I'm a lot better now."
His mother turned to him, sliding the tray of roast chicken onto the range top of the stove. "Selfish I'll agree with. What makes you better? Cause she broke your heart?"
"I, ah... I mighta found someone new..." He felt heat cross his cheeks and he turned away, pretending to busy himself with the rice cooker.
"Someone new? When? Who? Why didn't you start with that?" She bumped him out of the way with her hip. "Go sit down. I'll bring it to the table."
"Ma," he whined. "Let me help." He picked up the inner part of the rice cooker and brought it to the table.
"A trivet! Don't put that right down on the table, Benjamin!"
"What the hell's a trivet?"
She pushed him out of the way again and picked up the rice, then slid a ceramic square under it. "This's a trivet. So you don't burn my table." She bustled around and brought the rest of the food to the table, then sat down across from him, sliding a vase of flowers to the side so she could see him.
"Nice flowers," he noted, dishing out some rice onto his plate.
"Thanks," she said, forking a tender piece of chicken. "So, someone new? You didn't bring her home, so still pretty fresh, relationship wise?"
He nodded, preparing a plate as he thought about how to tell his mother. They ate in silence for a few minutes, and he still hadn't thought of a good way to break the news to his mother. She interrupted his train of thought.
"That chain, it's from your new girlfriend?"
"Huh?" he asked, shoving his hand back into his lap. He'd been twisting it around his neck without realizing it. "Oh. Yeah, but, ah, not a girlfriend."
"You're not dating, and she gave you something so nice? You obviously like it. Why don't you ask the poor girl out?" His mother pinched her lips as she waited for his answer.
"Um... We are dating. I, ah... So, mom, ah..." He sighed, then picked up his water glass and gulped down half of it as he built up his courage. Who knew it'd be so hard to say something so simple to his mother? "Not a girl. I'm not dating a girl. I'm dating a guy."
His mother opened her mouth, then closed it. She repeated this three times, looking a bit like a fish drowning in air before she pursed her lips together again, then sucked her bottom lip in like she did when she wanted to say something but was holding back.
"I wasn't sure how to tell you..."
"A guy?" Her lips were thin, and her hands were shaking. She put down her water glass before the liquid could slosh over the sides. "Did I hear you correctly when you said you were dating a man?"
"Um, yeah," he said, then swallowed hard. Dean's warning about how this would go mocked him from the back of his mind. He shushed it. "I know this's a shock, but..." He trailed off as his mother stood up with enough force that her chair fell to the ground behind her. "Ma?"
She opened her mouth, then pursed her lips again, effectively sealing them. She turned abruptly and marched from the room. A moment later he heard the front door slam shut.
"Well, that went well." He sighed, then finished eating. When his mother didn't come back he covered her dish with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge, then cleaned up the kitchen and went back to his old room.
He wanted to call Dean, wanted to talk to him about his mother's reaction, but he couldn't. Dean would remind him that he'd told him what would happen, and he didn't need that right now. Still, he needed to talk to someone, but who?
D'metrius's number was ringing before he could lose his nerve. Who else could he talk to who would understand. It rang twice. "Oi, straight-bait, to what do I owe this pleasure?"
Ben nearly hung up, regretting this decision, all of his decisions today. "Um. I, ah. I wanted, um." Fuck it. "I came out to my mom today and it didn't go how I thought it would and I needed to talk to someone and Dean would have told me that he already told me how it would go and-"
"Slow down, Straight-bait," D'metrius cut in, effectively shutting down his speedy babble. "Now, start over, but this time with breathing between some of the words, okay?"
He sighed. "I told my mom about Dean, well not exactly about Dean. Just that I was dating a guy, we didn't actually get farther than that before she freaked out."
