MAJOR TW: References to child abuse, parental neglect, drug use, alcohol use, homicidal intrusive thoughts (toward a pedo tho so I condone that personally), pedophilic behavior from parent, suicidal ideation, hurt, angst with a very happy ending. This chapter was so, so hard to write and I did my very best based on personal experience. Readers discretion is seriously advised, things work out in the end.
*

The first couple years it happened were foggy and not tangible by any means. He was little, and innocent. He didn't even know what was happening was wrong at all. Jacob was just happy his father was paying any attention to him in general.

At Kindergarten, Jacob was a social butterfly. He was silly and thought everything was hilarious. Trees would rustle in the wind and he'd show off his missing front teeth in a huge grin. He made friends easily, and though he was a bit disruptive in class, all of his teachers loved him. He was just a normal little boy. His hair was messy, he vibrated with energy, and he liked to sing. His family went to church on Sundays and there he learned about God and Jesus.

Supposedly they loved him, and had died for his sins. Jacob didn't know what sins he was committing, but he was happy God gave him freckles. His suburban neighborhood was like all the others around it. There wasn't much to see when everything was identical. Jacob was thankful God gave him a home too, he loved his home and the rainy days as much as the sunny warm ones. When there was rain he would splash in his wellies, not caring one bit if the water found its way to his feet. He loved water too, he loved everything.

On his sixth birthday he was pulled out of class for a doctors appointment by his father. Oliver Olfax was Baby Jacob's hero. He was big and strong and he was proud to look just like his dad. Their matching eyes and personalities made them inseparable. His dad was his best friend.

His mother was a different story. She was quiet, too quiet. The only time she'd raise her voice was to argue with his father, but it wasn't always like that. Jacob remembered a time when his mother would come home smelling like a bakery and scoop him into her arms to cover him in kisses. But she was always on her phone suddenly, and Jacob couldn't understand anything past the nervousness in his tummy when he got home.

Nighttime was the same as it always was, but something was stuck in his mind. The doctor that day had talked to him about private parts and his father had nodded earnestly with him, but now...

He always posed it as some kind of sick game. Jacob loved his father to pieces, so he rarely felt uncomfortable until he reached 8.

Something felt off. He felt afraid when his door opened that night. Faking sleep was hard as a kid. Things just happened, and he tried to imagine he would be okay. Sometimes he would even pray to God. He'd ask God to keep his father away, just so he could sleep one night.

God never listened.

The happy kid grew furious easily now. Teachers would touch his arm and he'd fly into a tantrum so violent that he was assigned a para to follow him around school. Now he was troubled. Now he wasn't like the other kids. He often complained of headaches and tummy aches, he had panic attacks when his male teachers got too close. His previous undying energy stayed tucked away, talkativeness just wasn't helpful if he had nothing to say. The playground was filled with normal children, and he knew he wasn't normal. Instead of playing he would watch quietly, shaking his head when they'd ask him to come and play. He was starting to feel sick, he hurt down there.

Something was wrong about it, but who could he ask?

"Jacob, you need to sit down." Mrs. Fletcher glared at him and glanced to his para, who nodded solemnly.

The entire class turned to look at him standing at the back. He felt dirty and he wanted to be anywhere else but there. "I can't."

His para tipped her head in concern. "Why not?"

He told her right then and there the only way he knew how. "I guess I was playing too hard last night."

She smiled and patted his shoulder. "We can go get you an ice pack if that would help you focus."

Jacob frowned deeply and shook his head. "No, I'm okay." He was miserable, he hurt, but he sat anyways and tried not to cry. Was this normal then? Maybe he was just being annoying. Sometimes his mother called him that when he was a bother. She was miffed by his presence easily, snarling, "Get lost, ya little tosser!"

That night when he'd told his father he hurt too much to play, he was completely ignored. Oliver stunk of booze and BO, it choked him until he couldn't think about anything else. He cried, he sobbed for him to please stop, and his father slapped him square across the face. Surely his mother had to have heard that, right?

Oliver raped him the entire night, growling at him to stay quiet. Jacob's trembling wasn't a concern to him, he just needed to get off because his bitch of a wife wasn't putting out. "That's what you're for now."

He never cried again, not with how his father had glared at him as he told him he was nothing but an object to use.

So, he focused on practicing being asleep. He'd still his body and go limp, trying to fall into himself as his body would go numb to the assault. The beach, that's where he liked to imagine himself being. Warm golden sand under his toes and broken pieces of seashells as far as the eye could see. Oliver used to take him there when he was a little kid, and he imagined how happy he was there.

His body... it started becoming confused. Sure he was young, but it was like his father had broken something inside of him. Ever past the fear, Jacob craved the attention enough to grow frustrated. The frustration would then turn back into confusion in an endless cycle.

His confusion carried to his studies. He started failing everything except choir. Things didn't stick, he couldn't keep his attention on anything. The impending doom of going back home followed him around everywhere he went. Sometimes people would talk to him and he'd have no idea what they were even saying. He was exhausted from his lack of sleep.

"Jacob Olfax, please report to the headmasters office."

It took him a moment to register as he stood, trying to keep his eyes on the ground. He couldn't think of anything that he'd done wrong, but he was already ashamed.

He was always ashamed.

He didn't look up when he walked into the principals office, he stood behind the chair and tried to count the squares on the fabric. They blurred a bit in his tiredness, and the headmaster leaned forward to gain his gaze.

"Jacob, would you like to sit down?"

He swallowed and shook his head quickly. "No, Sir. I'm alright."

Concern clouded his expression. "Jacob, I called you in here because I'm concerned about your grades. Your teachers have been reporting that you've been awfully quiet. Is everything at home ace, son?"

That word, son, made his skin crawl. He wanted to vomit, but then he realized: this was his way out. Locking eyes with the headmaster he opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. Would his father get in trouble? His mom was barely around except physically. She never interacted with him for very long and only if he spoke to her first. As far as she was concerned, he didn't exist.

He couldn't lose both parents.

"Everything's fine. I've just not been getting good sleep. I apologize."

He was excused and later that night, Oliver got worse. So much worse. Pictures, videos, horrid things he couldn't even bring up in his memories anymore. His insides ached with the force of how sick he would become. Oliver would just... watch. He'd watch his misery like that was what got him off the hardest. Jacob couldn't even bear to call him dad anymore. He knew what this was now, he knew he was being used. But the words wouldn't come, and no one suspected a thing after he'd said everything was okay.

It wasn't all bad, though. Sometimes Oliver would come home sober and in a good mood and they'd wander down the rainy streets and talk about his school or his mother. If Jacob couldn't stop what was happening, he could try to ignore it and enjoy the times when they could be a semi normal family.

He was viciously jealous of the other kids' parents. They always dropped their kids off together, or they'd pick them up with huge smiles and promises of their favorites for dinner. They went to sporting events. Jacob couldn't even do sports. He was too scrawny from not eating much, and more often than not his father would have him throwing it up by the end of the night.

The first time he'd ever thought about killing himself, he was an angry 12 year old. The world was a wicked and cruel place. He didn't understand what he did to deserve any of this. But he had no conviction, at least not then. Every way he searched up on how to kill himself painlessly proved fruitless. He didn't need more pain, he needed the pain to stop. He was so sick of being sore he wanted to scream.

When Oliver entered his room, it wasn't to rape him. At least not at first. He hadn't in a few days, and for some reason Jacob found himself wildly frustrated. He was conditioned like a dog, mind fucked and then physically fucked and it disgusted him so much he destroyed his room until his hands were covered in blood. He banged his head against the wall with so much force sometimes he'd give himself a concussion. He was never brought to the doctor again after the "private parts" talk. It had scared Oliver greatly and he didn't want his son being educated on any of that.

"Dads are supposed to. It's how we teach them to be men."

What a joke.

His room was decimated daily. If there weren't things to break in there he'd find the kitchen in a rage and smash plates, cups, throw things and scream cry.

Tiff. That's what they called his mother. She would sit and stare usually, but one particular homicidal tantrum she murmured over a cup of tea, "Finally fed up with pop, ey?"

Jacob whirled on her, realization dawning on him. His eyes filled with pathetic tears. "You knew?"

Tiffs face stayed expressionless and she said nothing else. She didn't have to.

His face twisted up in anger and he flipped the table her tea was on. She didn't even flinch. He rampaged so often he was gaining muscle now, and it felt like he was out of control at all times. There were no ordinary interests in dating so much as it was fantasizing about being normal. His first kiss was with a guy, and then a girl, drunk off his ass and high as a kite. He liked both. But it didn't matter. Not when Oliver was attracted to how he'd grown into himself and it made Jacob's mind shut off.

"Mom, I'm bisexual." He hadn't expected her to respond truthfully, but she surprised him anyhow.

Barely.

"Makes sense, you little fag. God won't like that, and I can't love a son who sleeps with men."

So God wouldn't like a fag, but God was okay with him being raped the last decade? He stopped trying to force himself to believe in God right then and there. What was the point? From a young age he'd known God didn't answer prayers. God had better things to do was what the pastor had told him when he asked why God didn't answer prayers.

He brought back his goofy behavior at the beginning of high school, but now it was just a mask. The louder people laughed, the less he heard his father's voice or felt the ghost of his hands or body against him. Comedy came naturally to him. He wrote offensive shit, and then he said them. At lunch people would fight for tables near his so they could listen to his jokes and teases. People enjoyed his company, and the ladies loved him. If anyone had known about his home life they wouldn't have been surprised to know that he was better at pleasuring men than women, but he fined tuned his skills. He wasn't so much sexually aggressive as he was used to such attention and impulsive. The word fuckboi couldn't even be tossed around. As funny as he tried to be, he also tried to be nice to everyone. He'd walk away from a fight or take the hit and let them win for fucking their girlfriend. It was whatever, he barely even experienced pain anymore.

Sixteen came and went, and he sipped at his tea without tasting it. The telly blared about America and the wonders that awaited there. Curious and bored, he turned it up as his mother took her hourly dose of cocaine at the dinner table. This pizza was one he bought with his own money from doing odd jobs, but he'd heard it wasn't the same as American pizza. He laughed to himself when it said there was a degree and college for almost everything. "Wonder if there's a college for sex crazed clowns."

His mother breathed in deeply. "Nova Academy."

He ignored her. What was he supposed to say to her? Oliver had gone missing for days and she refused to eat anything. After being called a bastard slut who stole her husband, he'd ceased trying. The wretched bitch could starve for all he cared.

"Oy, kid."

Jacobs head snapped to the open window to stare out at Oliver. "And where've you been?"

Oliver ran a hand through his hair and Jacob recoiled. He looked terrible. "I been trying to get right. Let me in, yeah?"

He unlocked it and sat back down, He wasn't going to force himself to care for him. "Mums not eating. She's going to starve."

"Why don't we talk about it privately?"

Jacobs first stopped an inch from his father's face, his own scrunched up into a vicious scowl. "I won't be doing that. I'm done."

That was that. Jacob still lived with his parents, but he refused to speak with either. Not that they tried. He got a job at a station and tried to become a person instead of a shell. He worked every hour he wasn't at school or doing online classes. When he'd saved enough money to move, he'd told Oliver he was going to America after he graduated. The disgusting drunk lifted his glass bottle in cheers. "Least one of us is getting out of this hellhole."

"I need access to my college fund." Jacob stood in his way, letting out waves of anger. "Don't make me start acting a mess."

"Gram and gramps will let you in," Oliver mumbled, tense with anticipation. His son had threatened to kill him to his face many times by now. He was just waiting for it to happen. "You're going to college? That's ace."

Jacob never answered him. He focused all of his attention on school and his room, and with what little wasn't destroyed, was already packed the day he graduated.

Oliver stopped him at the door when Jacob started moving out the few boxes he had left. It was like a completely different person was standing in front of him now, he didn't recognize the bright eyed man. He'd been exchanged for his sunken eyed father at some point, and Jacob couldn't be bothered to ask or care why. "Son, I've been born again."

Jacob froze, the hand on his shoulder making his insides feel solid. "Remove your hand from my body or I'll remove it from yours."

"Jacob, isn't that exciting?" He removed his hand and opened his satchel to show a Bible. "I've found God again! He told me to apologize for all those years and I'm sorry son. I should've not done that, your life would've been better."

Jacob looked right through him. "Goodbye, Tiff."

She looked through him too.

In America, things weren't quite like the movies or commercials but that was okay. Anywhere where he didn't have to be near his father was okay with him.

Jacob wandered, he had a tiny little apartment in The Golden State and found peace in not knowing anything about where he was. He studied the way the people around him spoke, not knowing his accent was so thick. He learned to shove all of the bullshit to the very darkest parts of him and flat out ignored them. Oliver who? He'd never heard of such a man.

Applying for a visa was ridiculous, but he managed with what little smarts he felt he had to pass easily. Then it was just getting all of his new paperwork and identifying documents.

He sat at the dinner table one day, alone, thinking, drinking. A knife sat in its rightful place along with the others in their stand. An intrusive thought about ending it all was interrupted by his email chiming.

Tired and empty, he shoved away and stumbled to read off it.

'Congrats! You got in!

Now what?

Orientation is Friday, August 27th and school begins the following Monday, August 30th.'

For the first time in a long time, he was kind of excited for something. To be around people again was bringing back some of his old self. It wasn't like he didn't have friends, but they had families, most still lived with them. He couldn't bear to be around them, it stabbed at him. He'd rather not ache too hard where another human might see.

On his first day, a girl he was pretty sure was going to kill him smiled a tiny bit at him as she deadpanly told him the other students were going to beat his ass.

He fell in love right then and there.

He then met Adam, a quiet and mysterious one he happened to enjoy the company of greatly. Before he knew it, before he could even mildly process it, he was headed to a cabin out in the mountains surrounded by people who called him a friend and treasured him in ways that confused him. Didn't they know how dirty he was inside?

It bothered him so much it spilled out of him, at least the extremely abbreviated version did.

And they'd loved him all the same. But they hadn't quite known then.

Not like they did now.

Jacob took seven consecutive hits of his cart, continuing to refuse to be sober as he told his tale. "And that's about it, yeah." He forced himself to look at his friends in the face, to see what he was for certain would be disgust and hatred for him.

His ears turned back on and he realized a large majority of them were either frozen with tears streaming down their faces, or full on sobbing in sorrow for all he'd been through.

His wife, who'd known very little, wrapped her arms around him and sobbed into his chest. "It's not your fault! It was never your fault, I promise, Jacob!"

He opened his mouth to make a joke, but nothing came out. He was numb to it all. "I... have nothing else to say. I'm sorry."

Adam wiped at his face and sighed heavily. "Never apologize. You did what you had to do to survive."

"You're a hero." Steven rubbed at Connie's arm and shook his head slowly, still comprehending how someone he loved so much had gone through something so horrific for so long. "You're my hero."

The love simply took him out, and he fell asleep right then and there trying to get himself to feel anything at all.

*

When he woke up, he noticed a significant difference instantaneously.

The touchy, extremely handsy polycule were keeping their hands to themselves. Their feelings about his story were so strong, he could feel it and see it in their faces as they hugged their arms around themselves subconsciously, wishing they could hug him instead. But they were so hurt on his behalf they almost felt like they shouldn't touch. He was too precious, not fragile, but traumatized by touch and they had given it so frequently before without thinking. Had they ever triggered him with a less than friendly touch? It ate away at them.

He had to put his foot down one evening. "What the bloody hell are you guys doing?"

They all glanced at each other in confusion, and it made him start to shake. He couldn't take this much longer, he realized he was touch starved and it felt too familiar. This was triggering him.

Anna shuffled her foot shyly, hating confrontation but knowing someone had to speak. "What do you mean?"

The exhaustion from telling his story hit him then, it was so heavy his knees nearly buckled with the weight of it all. "Why won't you guys touch me anymore? Am..." Suddenly he was cold. He shivered and stared at the floor. "Am I too dirty?"

They rushed him. Hands, arms, lips and swears of relief that they finally got to hold him as his legs did in fact give out. Hazel held his weight easily, murmuring how wide and deep his love for him was. Jasmin pushed her lips to his, not caring that he was so limp he couldn't hardly kiss her back. They surrounded him and there was no part of him left untouched or unloved. Anna nuzzled into his chest and placed the world's sweetest kisses right over his heart, telling him she loved him. He melted into it, and a piece of the burden he was carrying was lifted. He felt it, the tension he held in his shoulders for sixteen years, starting from that day when he was eight, was lessening.

He was smothered with so much affection, so much passion and crystal clear love that it melded him back together.

Hazel and Adam and Steven held him in their arms that night, opting for a boys sleepover which the girls allowed for happily as long as they could have him the day after. Let him get some extra love, he needed it probably more than anyone. His head rested on Adams lap and he cried silently, only the sound of a shaky inhale or sniffle breaking through the quiet.

"We still love you," Adam told him seriously, dropping a kiss to his cheek and then his lips. "Nothing is going to change that."

Relief. His exhaustion turned to relief, just a little bit.

Steven had fallen asleep stroking at his back but he heard a whisper in his mind, inaudible but there. "And we don't just love any goofball we come across." Jacob felt him lie next to him, and Hazel and Adam sat up a bit straighter before a relaxation pulsed through all of them. "Don't listen to the lies telling you it's pity, they aren't true."

Hazel kissed him next, stroking at his cheek and watching his green eyes grow a bit brighter. "We'll never stop loving you, regardless of your battle scars. Steven was right. You're a hero, a warrior." He kissed him again. "I'm so proud to call you mine."

Jacob smiled as he felt the ghost of Stevens lips graze his and lift to settle back into his body. He opened his eyes and the pink flickered back into a gentle brown. "Ours. You'll have to fight me on that."

Adam snorted and pulled Jacob closer. "I fight dirty, just so you know."

A debate erupted at how they'd take each other out and it had Jacob laughing from his heart when Adam proclaimed he was the head of the house and owned the other boys too, so his pick was final.

Jacob gathered his courage and mumbled, "I'd fight to the ends of the Earth just to be held like this every day."

Hazel snapped his fingers. "Done, no need to fight anymore than you already have. Take off all that armor, soldier."

He could almost hear it clink against the ground as he did as told.