“It doesn’t feel as oppressive out here.” Julie settled into the chair next to Leo.
“No, it doesn’t.” The traffic on the street out in front of the house was steady. He’d always appreciated the fact that his apartment was the rear one of the three that occupied the old house that had been divided up years ago into separate living quarters. Sure, he had to park on the side street, but it was quieter than the front two apartments were.
“So, what are we going to do for Felix?”
Leo shrugged. “I don’t know. Just be there for him. He’s scared out of his mind right now, in addition to being hurt. He doesn’t want physical shoulders to cry on, but he wants us there in case he needs us.”
“I gathered that much. I can’t imagine what kind of….” She paused and gestured that she was at a loss for words.
“Freak, monster, asshole, sociopath? There are lots of options,” Leo suggested.
“Yeah, I guess there are.” She folded her hands in her lap and shivered. “Why Felix? He wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“We’ll probably never get an answer to that question.” Leo slumped in his jacket. “I’ve been asking the same thing since he told me. Felix is one of the nicest guys I know.”
“It’s a shame you two never connected.”
Leo chuckled softly. “You know what? We actually did when we first met in college. We had a night of the worst sex two college boys could have. But we liked each other. It didn’t take us long to figure out that we were meant to be friends. I couldn’t ask for a better friend than Felix.”
She let out a long, slow breath. “That’s how I feel about both of you. You’re the best, most awesome friends a girl could ask for. You know, you’ve both spoiled me for other men. They’ll never live up to the examples you set.”
“And most of them won’t go do all the cool things with you that we do.” For the first time since he’d talked to Aud earlier, Leo smiled. “You might have to look pretty hard to find a nongay guy to go to the farmers’ market with you, or the game store.”
“I don’t know about the game store.” She pointed a finger with a well-chewed nail. “You’ve seen most of those geeks in the game store. A lot of those guys are straight.”
“Yeah, but many of them are so focused on things that have nothing to do with girls that you’d never get through to them.”
“You might have something there.”
Silence fell over them again; this time traffic and a barking dog broke it. Sofi’s purring had been more relaxing.
“We’re not going to be able to get him to go to the police with this, are we?” Julie asked.
“I don’t think so.” Leo picked at the peeling paint of his chair. “He’s fairly adamant about his feelings that they won’t do anything for him. I’m pretty sure he was surprised by the ER doctor’s response.”
Another long breath escaped Julie. “Yeah, but even there, if he’d been a woman, they would’ve called the cops whether he wanted them to or not. Since he’s a gay man, they don’t believe he can be raped.”
“With all the politicians going on about ‘true rape’ even in women, I don’t think a lot of people believe rape even exists.” Leo frowned, and in the distance a car alarm shattered the night with its blaring irritation. “After all the advancements we’ve made over the past fifty years, you’d think this war on women would be over by now. We should be past fighting about things like that, or human rights, but the bigots keep them alive, or struggling for life. It’s just sad.”
“And all it takes is something like this happening to make us realize how far we still have to go.” Julie tapped the arm of her chair. “At least the doctor seemed to be somewhat caring.”
“Yeah. He didn’t tell Felix he’d asked for it by meeting up with some random guy for sex. It could’ve been much worse.”
“Do you think we could get him to go to therapy? Would that help?”
Leo stared at her for a moment. “Do you think there’s a therapy group for men who have been raped?”
She shrugged. “Don’t know. I can do some research and find out. Maybe some of the women’s rape groups would help him.”
Leo shook his head. “Stop and think about that for a moment. If it was a group of women who’d been violated by men, do you really think they’d want a man in their group? It’s probably all women to make them feel safe.”
Julie swallowed. “But I want Felix to feel safe again too.” Her voice broke.
“I know. I would do anything to make it all right. At least I was able to talk him into staying here for a few nights. Axe doesn’t know where I live.”