"You're done already? Is this all you own?" I asked him.

"I don't have much," he replied.

That was the first time he'd ever spoken to me. His voice, which should've been cool and distant, came out soft and almost syrupy.

He kept his eyes lowered, walking behind me like a stray that had been abandoned too many times.

-

I brought Ben home with me.

The moment we stepped inside, I immediately pushed him into the bathroom.

"Take a good shower. Look at your hair."

I reached out and ruffled his hair. Thankfully, it wasn't too greasy. I kind of envied people who could go days without washing their hair and still not have it turn oily.

But Ben just stood there, helplessly staring at me.

His gaze was so pure and innocent that it made me feel like I was at fault no matter what happened between us.

I sighed and waved him on.

"Look at this switch. Turn it on, and the water will come out… Turn it to the left for hot water, and right for cold. You can tell the difference, right?"

Finally, I got him into the bathroom. As I sank into the couch, I could hear the sound of running water.

It felt like I had just bought myself a whole lot of trouble.

He showered quickly, probably because he'd already cleaned up earlier. There weren't any major issues, just that he flooded the bathroom with water. It was like a mini pool there.

When he opened the door, though...

His face was surprisingly handsome. If it weren't for his lack of intelligence, I bet girls would line up from my house to Selena's just to get his attention.

I admired him carefully—his jawline, collarbone, abs... and then I stopped myself.

"Where are your clothes?!"

I had caught sight of some things that were definitely too much for me to be looking at, so I quickly grabbed a pillow to hide my face.

I heard his cautious voice.

"They got wet."

"Even if they're wet, you need to put your clothes on first!"

-

Ben seemed to be terrified of the sound of the hairdryer.

When I tried drying his hair, he kept dodging me.

He even shook his head, splattering water all over me.

I gave him a light tap on the head.

Immediately, he lowered his eyes and obediently stayed still.

As I gently rubbed his damp black hair, I noticed a scar on the back of his neck. It looked like a pretty deep wound.

I couldn't help but wonder how he got it.

I was drying his hair, getting it halfway dry, when the doorbell rang.

I set the hairdryer down and went to open the door. Oh, of course, it was my dear sister—the one who had stolen my eleventh boyfriend.

"Jennifer, I heard you got your heart broken. You must be so upset. Oh, who's this?"

Before I could even invite her in, she darted inside, her eyes landing on Ben sitting on the couch.

"My new boyfriend."

I smiled thinly, even though my heart wasn't in it. The hairdryer was still buzzing.

By the time I turned to switch it off, Selena had already leaned down, getting way too close to Ben.

Probably not used to being so close to a stranger, Ben suddenly recoiled.

He furrowed his brows, his eyes wide with fear and uncertainty, and anyone could feel it.

Without thinking, I rushed forward and positioned myself between them, blocking Selena's view.

Selena laughed playfully.

"Wow, Jennifer, your taste has really changed. You're into handsome idiots now?"

For some reason, I didn't like hearing Ben being called an "idiot".

So, I gave her a push and urged her to leave.

"It's none of your business, is it? If you came to see me, you've seen enough. Now leave."

Selena, of course, was exactly how she'd always been. From childhood until now, no word described her better than "pick-me".

She was still smiling at me as she left.

"I didn't have much to say, but Dad wanted me to pass along a message. If you don't come home soon, don't bother coming back at all."

I fell silent.

My relationship with my father had always been on the verge of completely breaking down. It all boiled down to the mess of a blended family, which had been magnified to extreme proportions in our case.

Selena and I shared the same father, but we had different mothers. My stepmother was my father's first love. She was the type to be domineering, a classic spoiled rich heiress, which left no room for me in her life. And my father, guilty over the past, catered to her every whim.

My childhood memories were filled with me and my stepmother clashing, her running to my father in tears, and him punishing me for it. So, once I was old enough, I couldn't get away from that house fast enough. I hadn't gone back for years.

-

I stared at Ben, who was curled up on the couch, hugging his knees with those wet eyes of his locked on me.

I sighed.

Why had I gone ahead and spent 273 bucks to bring him back?

Financially, I was already struggling to make ends meet..

But, if I were to give him credit, Ben was actually pretty well-behaved.

Forget whether he did a good job, at least he cleaned the house. When I went to work, he would watch cartoons or draw.

His drawings... well, let's just say they were abstract.

I asked him what his art was supposed to represent, and he rubbed the edge of his paper with his pale fingers for a long while before finally pointing at the picture.

"This is you, Jen, and this is me."

He couldn't remember more complicated names, so he just called me Jen.

When he said that, his deep, cool voice echoed in my ears.

And that was when I realized: He really was a man now.

He could easily pull me into his arms, and without much effort, he could do things to me a man would.

Even though his expression was still goofy, his eyes pure and unclouded, as if he would never hurt me.

-

That night, the storm was the worst I had heard in months.

The wind was howling, and since I lived in a mid-rise, the gusts seemed to roar through the windows like a wild beast.

Ben usually slept on the fold-out couch in the living room, while I stayed in the bedroom.

Suddenly, a thunderclap cracked so loud it shook the walls, followed by the sound of something shattering in the living room.

I jumped up and ran to check, only to find that the vase on the coffee table had been smashed.

But Ben was nowhere in sight.

As I fumbled for the light switch, I found him huddled in the corner, shaking.

I pressed the switch, but the light wouldn't turn on.

There had been random power outages these past few days, and with the rainstorm, it was clear the power was down again.

I couldn't do anything but walk over to the trembling figure in the corner.

"What's wrong? Don't be scared. It's just thunder..."

I tried reaching out to pat him, but then I realized—he wasn't scared.

He was holding something back.

Another thunderous roar shook the room, and then a flash of lightning lit up the entire space.

I could only see the red of his eyes, but before I could blink, he lunged at me, knocking me to the floor.

No matter how I looked at it, I shouldn't have ignored it. Ben was a man.

A man with a bit of muscle, over six feet tall, still in his adolescence, full of restless desire.

I couldn't tell if he was kissing me or biting me.

Was he aroused, or was this just some kind of outburst?

I just wanted to reach the phone on the coffee table and dial 911.

But, in the end, I let go.

Instead, I gently rubbed his back.

Emotions could be a strange thing. People would connect and feel the same things sometimes.

I felt like he and I were the same—two strays, lost and forgotten.

So, with all my strength, I held him tight and kept calling his name.

The faint light scattered across the floor, flickering in and out, and it felt like an eternity before he finally calmed down. A quiet sob slipped from his throat.

He bit his lip, trying his best to control himself, his teeth nearly drawing blood. The sound of the rain eased, and the lights in the house flickered, casting a little bit of light into the room.

It wasn't until much later, when I thought back to this moment, that I realized something. Every time he looked at me with those eyes full of guilt, I could never bring myself to blame him for what happened.

-

"Your bite is something else, kid!"

The living room light was bright, and outside, the night was pitch black. Ben was sitting cross-legged obediently across from me as I used iodine to disinfect the cuts on my skin.

To be honest, his bite was well-placed, and it was clear he had a neat set of teeth. But even with that thought, the anger inside me still boiled over.

I reached out and pinched his jaw.

He let me do it, but his eyes were full of confusion and panic. His face was soft, and the feel of it was better than I expected.

I pinched his face and he opened his mouth slightly, as if uncomfortable with the situation. He reached up to touch my wrist but didn't dare to slap my hand away.

I let go.

"How'd you break the vase? Did your hands shake again, just like the last time when you handed me coffee? I saw you drawing, and your hands didn't shake..."

He pressed his lips together for a moment and inched closer to me. His eyes held countless little sparks of light, innocent, yet shining with a quiet glow.

"Jen, you're so pretty."

I froze.

Even if he called me pretty, that didn't mean I'd let him off the hook so easily!

-

Ben was actually quite afraid of the dark.

After he made strange noises several times in the living room and then looked at me with those pitiful eyes, I finally gave in.

We ended up sharing the same bed.

To be fair, his mentality was still like that of a four or five-year-old child.

He slept curled up in a little ball, sometimes even stealing my blanket.

And not only did he take the blanket, but his sleeping posture was a disaster.

In the first few days, I woke up to find myself tangled up with a man over six feet tall, like he was an octopus, nearly tossing him out of the bed.

Afterward, I resigned myself to waking up to his soft breathing, slipping out of his arm to start the day.

It turned out that getting used to something could be a terrifying thing.

Before I met him, my life was a complete mess, and everything was falling apart.

But after meeting him, I started having expectations.

Like on my way home from work, I'd pick up his favorite fruit cake.

When I passed by a store, I'd wonder if he had run out of painting supplies.

During that time, I actually began to feel happy.

When I smeared whipped cream on the tip of his nose, and he looked at me, helpless, I laughed so hard.

I laughed so much that I even surprised myself.

-

But such is life.

Smooth sailing was always a fleeting fantasy for me.

At some point, rumors started circulating at work that I was the daughter of a mistress.

At first, it was just a few coworkers whispering to each other behind closed doors.

But soon, even in the cafeteria, people would point at me.

It wasn't hard to figure out who was behind it—my "wonderful" stepmother.

She had already spread lies about me more than once.

Back in high school, right before my college entrance exams, she had even showed up at the school gate with a banner calling me the child of a mistress.

In fact, she was the mistress, and my father had married her less than a week after we buried my mother.

Yet she insisted on pinning that label on me.

I thought about defending myself, about clearing my name.

But when she and my father appeared, walking hand in hand, looking like a picture-perfect couple, everything I said seemed like an empty lie, and all I received were judgmental stares from others.