fic: that secret that you know, but don't know how to tell (part 2/3)
fic: that secret that you know, but don't know how to tell (part 2/3)
fandom: the social network
pairing: mark/eduardo, noncon mark/sean
warning: this piece contains triggers for noncon. please, please read with caution. thank you!
notes: written for the tsn_kinkmeme prompt (an excerpt) : "Come on, Sean's every expression just screamed rape!face, and I'm dying to see how Eduardo handles Mark after he's been broken like a wild foal."
title is from bon iver's "blood bank"
“I’m not going to talk to the police,” Mark says the next day, when his results come back negative. He’s slightly anemic, actually, but other than that- nothing.
Eduardo shakes his head. “Mark, we talked about this-”
“You’ve always hated him,” Mark interrupts, too loud, and points jerkily at Eduardo. “Since that first night.”
“Are you fucking kidding, Mark? First of all, that’s not true. But I sure as hell hate him now. Second, if you think I’m not going to, at least try- you have to understand the magnitude of what happened!”
“You think I don’t? You think I don’t get what happened?” Mark hisses. “I was there, okay? I get it. But, unlike you, I actually give a shit about what happens to Facebook. I’m fine. We don’t need to involve the police.”
Eduardo stares at him, and slowly, unwillingly, nods. “I still think you-”
“Yeah, Wardo, you’ve made your opinion clear.” He turns his back and goes into the kitchen.
Eduardo follows him, still talking.
“I want him out, Mark. He’s out, you understand me?” Eduardo starts pacing as Mark sits at the kitchen table. “I am still the CFO, and I’m saying it right now- he’s gone.”
Mark nods, face carefully blank, and Eduardo stares at him like he knows what Mark’s thinking.
“I am not going to let you do this to yourself, okay?” Eduardo says, crouching down in front of Mark. “I know how you are. You gotta trust me, yeah? You think he’s good for the company, but you’re the center of it, alright, and what’s most important is you.”
“And I’m fine,” Mark mutters, and Eduardo stands up, rubbing a tired hand over his face.
“I’ll draw up the papers.”
“What if he doesn’t-”
Eduardo cuts him off. “Oh, he’ll fucking sign.” Mark remembers blood on the floor, and Sean choking for air, and yeah, Sean’ll sign.
-----
Eduardo’s in New York when it happens, moving his stuff out of his apartment. He's coming back to Palo Alto for good, and it's just fucking hilarious that this is what makes him come out. Mark convinced him, one way or another.
Dustin gasps audibly at his computer, on a Tuesday morning, and Mark looks up from his laptop.
“Nothing, it’s uh, it’s nothing,” Dustin says hurriedly to Mark’s unspoken question. But when Mark looks back down, Dustin grabs his cell phone and leaves the room.
Three minutes later, his own cell rings.
“Yeah?” he says absentmindedly, typing with one hand.
“Mark?”
“Hi Wardo.”
“Mark, something’s happened.”
Mark straightens, and his hand stills on the keyboard.
“What?”
Eduardo sighs, and it comes across crackly.
“It’s- it’s Sean.” And it’s been two weeks, but his stomach still drops sickeningly.
“He- Mark, he’s been arrested.”
Mark just breathes, trying to process it. There’s no way it’s about him. Eduardo said he wouldn’t talk to the police, and Eduardo keeps his word, but why was he- cocaine? Drugs? Shit, he’s- and Facebook. Sean’s still connected to the company, because the papers are due to be signed next week, and it’ll be bad. And that’s why Mark hasn’t done or said anything, because of Facebook, and he should’ve known Sean would find some other way to fuck it up.
“It was a girl, at Stanford, and he’s been accused of- well- um, sexual- uh, rape.”
Mark pulls his knees up to his chest and closes his eyes.
“When?” he says hoarsely, mouth dry.
“It was two days ago. She filed the report immediately.” Unlike you, he doesn’t say.
“Fuck,” Mark says weakly.
“I’m coming, alright? I’ll be there in five hours. I know what you’re thinking, but it’s going to be okay. It’s going to be fine. Don’t say anything to anyone.”
Mark shakes his head angrily, but only says “Fine,” and hangs up.
----
It explodes, like he thought it would, and when Eduardo arrives, breathless out of a taxi, there’s already hundreds of messages, emails, calls, and Dustin is curled on the couch in fetal position. Mark’s trying desperately to type, but his hands keep shaking and when Eduardo comes up behind him he jumps.
“You okay?” he asks briefly, and Mark shrugs.
“How do we handle this?” he responds, and Eduardo beckons for him to come into the bedroom. Mark can’t stop fidgeting.
“Hey. Hey. Look at me,” Eduardo says, putting his hands on Mark’s shoulders. “Are you okay?”
“That doesn’t really matter right now, Wardo,” Mark snaps. “This is a disaster. S-Sean is going to ruin the company if we don’t do damage control fast.” He keeps his voice level, but he can’t make eye contact, and he can’t stop thinking about the girl. Did she scream? Did he kiss her first? Was she drunk? Did it hurt less? More? Was she a virgin, like- and he stops that train of thought in its tracks.
“Mark-” Eduardo gives up and sighs. “Okay. Fine. Damage control. We need Chris, have you called him?”
“He’s called a couple times, but he’s in LA. He said he’s driving up in an hour.”
“We’ll put out an official statement when he gets here. For now, I say we ignore it. Chris really needs to okay whatever we do. Just- calm down, Mark. It’ll end up alright.”
Eduardo puts his arms around him, and Mark can’t relax, can’t calm down, he just stands stiff until Eduardo lets him go.
“I’m gonna go talk to Dustin, okay?”
Mark nods, and opens his laptop.
He finds the girl’s information and stares at the little piece of paper he’s written it down on for a good ten minutes.
Lindsay Jensen
650 249 5555
373 Oak Avenue
Heart in his throat, he dials 2 - 4 - 9 - 5 - 5 - and presses the End button. He’s breathing too fast. What would he say, even? Oh, hey, I got your information illegally off the Internet, and yeah, I’m the CEO of Facebook, and oh, Sean Parker, yeah, that whole thing he did to you? Me too.
She wouldn’t believe him.
But the next day when he goes to a VC meeting he ends up outside her house on the way back. It’s a nice house, close to campus. She probably shares it with a couple friends.
He waits across the street until a girl comes out, and he scrunches down in the car seat. The girl is blonde, pretty, petite, wearing shorts and a baseball cap, and Mark peers at her over the bottom of the window.
It’s her. He’s stared at her Facebook profile picture for enough time, her bright smile, arm slung over another girl’s shoulder.
When she drives off, he straightens, heart pounding, and goes home.
He does the same thing the next day, and the next, and Eduardo might be getting suspicious but he doesn’t care.
On the fourth day he makes it as far as her front step before he turns around jerkily and goes back to his car.
On the fifth day he’s only on the sidewalk when the door opens.
“Hi,” she says, and he can’t even look at her face. He nods in greeting.
“You’re outside like every day. We can see you. What do you want?”
Mark’s face goes hot.
“Um, just, uh-” and nothing comes to mind. He’s usually pretty good at making excuses, but there’s really no plausible reason why a skinny pale geek would be making regular trips to a house full of hot Stanford girls. Except, you know, stalking. Which suddenly seems extremely plausible, and his face gets even redder.
The girl rolls her eyes. “Just, spit it out or stop coming here, okay?”
Mark nods, and she’s turning around when he says, “Sean Parker.”
She faces him again, face carefully tight, but her eyes are scared. Mark recognizes the look well.
“Are you a reporter?” she says shakily, and Mark shakes his head.
“Did he- send you?”
“No. No. Can we- uh, talk? Inside?”
The girl crosses her arms. “No.”
“Um, okay.”
“And I have my cellphone here, in my hand. I can call my friends at any second. They’re inside. So don’t fucking try anything, okay?” Her tone is harsh, but Mark can sense the fear underneath.
“I won’t, uh, I just-” and how to explain it, really? He’s been thinking about it for a while, how he might eventually go about telling someone. But now it’s here, the moment, and he has no idea how. He suddenly, fervently wishes he had just sent her a Facebook message.
“I- I- I know about the lawsuit. I want to help.” The girl narrows her eyes, and Mark swallows and goes on. “Sean- the uh, he, I know him or whatever, and. He. Um, he did the same thing.” It’s a fucking pathetic finish, worse than he even imagined, and he says weakly, a moment after, “To me.”
The girl’s face is going twisted in that way that girls’ faces do when they’re about to cry.
“Are you joking? Is this some kind of joke?” she hisses, and swipes a hand over her eyes.
Mark shakes his head, and backs away. “I’m sorry,” he says, and he turns and runs to the car.
“Wait!” he hears her calling, but he fumbles for the key and drives away fast.
-----
Two days later, the house phone rings, and Mark waves a hand that means please get it Wardo can’t you see I’m wired in.
“Hello?”
Eduardo mm-hmms, and then hands the phone to Mark.
“It’s a girl,” he whispers, and Mark shrugs and tucks the phone under his ear.
“Hello?”
“Hi. Mark? This is- um, this is Lindsay.”
He straightens up reflexively and the phone falls. He fumbles for it, and Eduardo’s eyes are boring a hole in the back of his head but he doesn’t dare look at him.
“How did you get this number?” he says quietly, shoving his laptop aside and stumbling into the next room, dropping down to sit against the wall.
“You’re Mark Zuckerberg.” She laughs rustily. “I’ve seen pictures of you with- with him. You’re his friend. You're the fucking CEO of Facebook. Why the fuck are you messing with me?”
Mark draws in a shuddery breath. He could go back now, he really could. Hang up on her, or explain yeah he asked me or just wanted to see what you would do but he thinks about Eduardo, outside, and he curls his knees up and breathes for a second.
“I’m not.”
She laughs again. “Okay, I don’t know how much of an idiot you think I am.”
“I don’t! I don’t think that. Sean isn’t part of the company anymore.”
“Because of me? Because of what happened?”
“Because of me.”
She doesn’t say anything for a second, and he can hear her breathing.
“Okay, I’m sorry I came over, and I already decided I wasn’t going to- but, I didn’t think he’d- fuck. Fuck.”
“Just relax, okay? Breathe, and formulate your response.” She sounds so much like Eduardo then that Mark laughs.
She laughs too. “I’m a psych major. Shut up.”
“Shouldn’t I be on a sofa or something?”
“You can lay down if you want.”
Mark smiles and it hurts, and he puts his face into his knees and says, a little muffled, and hesitant, but out loud- “Sean had sex with me and I didn’t want to.”
It feels like something should change.
But he just distantly hears Lindsay say, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry."
Mark doesn’t say anything for a while, just breathes harshly into the phone.
“Fuck,” he gets out finally, in lieu of anything coherent or meaningful, and she draws in a shaky breath.
“Yeah, fuck.” Her voice is thick.
“Can we meet?” she asks, and even as Mark shakes his head he knows he’s going to have to. It’s out loud, now, and maybe Eduardo agreed not to tell anyone but this girl he doesn’t even know won’t.
“Yeah. Yes. Your house. My -" and what is Eduardo, really? “My friend doesn’t- can’t know that I-”
“I understand.”
After he hangs up, he closes his eyes. Shit. This is happening.
----
That night, he can’t sleep for the first time since before Eduardo found out. He comes awake with a gasp after one particularly vivid dream, and the door creaks open.
“Hey.” It’s Eduardo, in a white shirt and sweatpants, hair sticking up in the back.
Mark sits up and doesn’t say anything, and Eduardo sits on the edge of his bed.
“You okay? I was on the couch, I heard you-”
“I’m fine.” He fiddles with a loose thread on the comforter.
“We haven’t talked about it, yet. The girl.”
Mark doesn’t say anything.
“I just wanted to make sure- Mark, if you ever want to talk-”
“Christ, Wardo, I told you I'm fine.”
Eduardo nods, and Mark immediately regrets it, because Eduardo’s the only thing right now, and yeah, he can be the most smothering irritating person ever, but he cares. He cares.
“Wait,” he says quietly, when Eduardo stands up to leave.
“Yeah?”
There’s a silence, because how is Mark supposed to say I can’t sleep and I think I’d sleep better if you were with me like we used to at Harvard, sometimes, when we were drunk or exhausted or lonely.
“You can stay. If you want,” he says instead, and Eduardo comes cautiously back towards the bed and lies down on his back. He’s carefully not touching Mark, but Mark can feel his heat, smell him, and before he can stop himself he rolls over and ends up half on top of Eduardo, cheek pressed into his chest.
Eduardo doesn’t say anything. Mark feels him swallow, and a hand comes up and rests on Mark’s back.
“Are you sure you’re-” and if Mark has to hear Eduardo ask if he’s okay one more time he’s going to kill someone, so he reaches up and presses their mouths together.
Eduardo doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, and Mark rights himself and does it again, kisses him hard, bruising, frustrated. Eduardo’s hand strokes the skin on the back of Mark’s neck for a second, but then he pulls away, breathing hard.
“Mark,” he says, low in his throat, quiet, “I can’t- wait, hey, hey, it’s okay-” he finishes, because Mark is chewing his lip viciously, and when he tries to sit up, away from Eduardo, Eduardo tightens the arm around his back.
“C’mon, hey,” he says, and Mark shakes his head frantically. He still can’t say anything, can’t form words, because it’s Eduardo. If he fucks up with things with Eduardo who does he have?
“Mark- Mark- I don’t think you know how long I’ve wanted that to happen,” Eduardo says, slowly, like he wishes he didn’t have to say any more than that. “I just don’t think now is the best time-”
“I’m not a fucking ruined woman!” Mark hisses hotly, and to his horror he goes red and has to swallow a sob. Eduardo exhales, his face still close to Mark’s.
“That’s not what I mean, I just- Mark-”
“When will it be the right time, then? When will it stop?”
And Mark knows, Jesus, it’s so painfully obvious he’s not just talking about kissing Eduardo. Eduardo knows it too, and he lets Mark hide his face in his shoulder, murmurs into his hair, and Mark focuses on keeping his breath slow and even, in, out, in, out, and in a minute he’s asleep.
He wakes up alone.
From the kitchen he hears the rattle of pans, and he stumbles to the shower.
When he comes out, dressed, and kicks on his flip-flops, Eduardo looks up from the stove.
“Hey, I made breakfast,” he says, and Mark grabs his phone off the table.
“I have a meeting,” he says shortly, and leaves.
He knocks on Lindsay’s door, and gets nearly past the threshold when he sees another woman, an older woman, sitting on her couch. He freezes, and nearly backs out of the door, but Lindsay puts a hand on his arm and pulls him forward.
“Mark, this is my lawyer, from the district attorney’s office, Anna Weinstein- Anna, Mark Zuckerberg,” and Anna holds out a hand but Mark doesn’t take it.
“You didn’t, uh, you didn’t say you would have a lawyer-” he stammers, and Lindsay steps close to him, whispers in his ear.
“I know, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but it’ll be easier if she’s here. You’ll have to tell it fewer times, and she’s really nice. Okay?” She looks at him with puppy eyes.
“Mr. Zuckerberg, I just want to ask you a couple questions,” the lawyer says, and Mark sits down stiffly, suddenly aware of how skinny and pale his knees are in cargo shorts, and he swallows nervously because what if they just don’t believe him? Who would believe him?
But Lindsay looks at him encouragingly, and he nods to Anna.
“When did you meet Sean Parker?”
Mark looks down. “In New York-” he coughs, voice cracking, “In, uh, March of this year. 2004.”
“What was the context of your relationship?”
“We were business partners. He - we lived together, starting in July and ending when- when, um, in August.”
“Mr. Zuckerberg, I’m going to ask some questions about the night of the incident. Would you like Lindsay to leave the room?”
He looks up, and Lindsay smiles at him, tightly but with affection, and he shrugs.
“I don’t- I mean, I’ll have to say it in front of a lot more people, won’t I?”
Anna just looks at him levelly. “Whatever you feel comfortable with.” And he’s not comfortable either way, how could he be comfortable, but what the fuck can he do?
“It’s okay.”
He explains it then, stumbling over the words, editing himself over and over until each sentence feels like a massive labor. Some parts just sound terrible- what is he supposed to say? Slang, like he fucked me or stuff like he entered me or we had intercourse and how in detail does he go? Should he mention how many drinks he’d had or hits he’d taken, or the way it felt when Sean put the first finger inside him, or how he’d woken up the next morning to Sean smirking at him over a panful of scrambled eggs? When he finishes, he goes red, and says, “That’s. That’s all. I guess.”
Anna nods, and he barely listens as she explains the approach of the lawsuit, how Mark is actually just a witness, how prosecutions take time and he should be patient, how Sean’ll probably plead not guilty but that this shouldn’t discourage him, and he just sneaks glances at Lindsay. She's staring down at her smooth brown knees.
“I’m sorry," Mark says as he's leaving.
“Why?” Lindsay looks genuinely curious, and Mark pushes up his hoodie sleeve with one hand, avoids her eyes.
“If I had said something. Right after it happened- if I had- he wouldn’t have-” he stops, blinking rapidly, and she looks at him wide-eyed and takes both of his hands in hers.
“Please don’t feel guilty, okay? I know it’s a natural reaction.”
“Fucking psych major,” he mutters, and she grins ruefully.
“Mark. What happened, happened. I don’t blame anyone except for the person who raped me.” She stumbles a little over the word and Mark bites his lip.
“The fact is, it happened, and now I’m dealing with it. There’s no point in placing blame on anyone else.”
“How very Zen of you,” Mark says dryly, and she laughs unexpectedly.
“I like you. You’re kind of an asshole, but in a good way.”
“There’s a good way to be an asshole?”
“Apparently,” she says, eyes scrunched up with amusement like Wardo's used to be, and kisses him gently on the cheek.
PART THREE
fandom: the social network
pairing: mark/eduardo, noncon mark/sean
warning: this piece contains triggers for noncon. please, please read with caution. thank you!
notes: written for the tsn_kinkmeme prompt (an excerpt) : "Come on, Sean's every expression just screamed rape!face, and I'm dying to see how Eduardo handles Mark after he's been broken like a wild foal."
title is from bon iver's "blood bank"
“I’m not going to talk to the police,” Mark says the next day, when his results come back negative. He’s slightly anemic, actually, but other than that- nothing.
Eduardo shakes his head. “Mark, we talked about this-”
“You’ve always hated him,” Mark interrupts, too loud, and points jerkily at Eduardo. “Since that first night.”
“Are you fucking kidding, Mark? First of all, that’s not true. But I sure as hell hate him now. Second, if you think I’m not going to, at least try- you have to understand the magnitude of what happened!”
“You think I don’t? You think I don’t get what happened?” Mark hisses. “I was there, okay? I get it. But, unlike you, I actually give a shit about what happens to Facebook. I’m fine. We don’t need to involve the police.”
Eduardo stares at him, and slowly, unwillingly, nods. “I still think you-”
“Yeah, Wardo, you’ve made your opinion clear.” He turns his back and goes into the kitchen.
Eduardo follows him, still talking.
“I want him out, Mark. He’s out, you understand me?” Eduardo starts pacing as Mark sits at the kitchen table. “I am still the CFO, and I’m saying it right now- he’s gone.”
Mark nods, face carefully blank, and Eduardo stares at him like he knows what Mark’s thinking.
“I am not going to let you do this to yourself, okay?” Eduardo says, crouching down in front of Mark. “I know how you are. You gotta trust me, yeah? You think he’s good for the company, but you’re the center of it, alright, and what’s most important is you.”
“And I’m fine,” Mark mutters, and Eduardo stands up, rubbing a tired hand over his face.
“I’ll draw up the papers.”
“What if he doesn’t-”
Eduardo cuts him off. “Oh, he’ll fucking sign.” Mark remembers blood on the floor, and Sean choking for air, and yeah, Sean’ll sign.
-----
Eduardo’s in New York when it happens, moving his stuff out of his apartment. He's coming back to Palo Alto for good, and it's just fucking hilarious that this is what makes him come out. Mark convinced him, one way or another.
Dustin gasps audibly at his computer, on a Tuesday morning, and Mark looks up from his laptop.
“Nothing, it’s uh, it’s nothing,” Dustin says hurriedly to Mark’s unspoken question. But when Mark looks back down, Dustin grabs his cell phone and leaves the room.
Three minutes later, his own cell rings.
“Yeah?” he says absentmindedly, typing with one hand.
“Mark?”
“Hi Wardo.”
“Mark, something’s happened.”
Mark straightens, and his hand stills on the keyboard.
“What?”
Eduardo sighs, and it comes across crackly.
“It’s- it’s Sean.” And it’s been two weeks, but his stomach still drops sickeningly.
“He- Mark, he’s been arrested.”
Mark just breathes, trying to process it. There’s no way it’s about him. Eduardo said he wouldn’t talk to the police, and Eduardo keeps his word, but why was he- cocaine? Drugs? Shit, he’s- and Facebook. Sean’s still connected to the company, because the papers are due to be signed next week, and it’ll be bad. And that’s why Mark hasn’t done or said anything, because of Facebook, and he should’ve known Sean would find some other way to fuck it up.
“It was a girl, at Stanford, and he’s been accused of- well- um, sexual- uh, rape.”
Mark pulls his knees up to his chest and closes his eyes.
“When?” he says hoarsely, mouth dry.
“It was two days ago. She filed the report immediately.” Unlike you, he doesn’t say.
“Fuck,” Mark says weakly.
“I’m coming, alright? I’ll be there in five hours. I know what you’re thinking, but it’s going to be okay. It’s going to be fine. Don’t say anything to anyone.”
Mark shakes his head angrily, but only says “Fine,” and hangs up.
----
It explodes, like he thought it would, and when Eduardo arrives, breathless out of a taxi, there’s already hundreds of messages, emails, calls, and Dustin is curled on the couch in fetal position. Mark’s trying desperately to type, but his hands keep shaking and when Eduardo comes up behind him he jumps.
“You okay?” he asks briefly, and Mark shrugs.
“How do we handle this?” he responds, and Eduardo beckons for him to come into the bedroom. Mark can’t stop fidgeting.
“Hey. Hey. Look at me,” Eduardo says, putting his hands on Mark’s shoulders. “Are you okay?”
“That doesn’t really matter right now, Wardo,” Mark snaps. “This is a disaster. S-Sean is going to ruin the company if we don’t do damage control fast.” He keeps his voice level, but he can’t make eye contact, and he can’t stop thinking about the girl. Did she scream? Did he kiss her first? Was she drunk? Did it hurt less? More? Was she a virgin, like- and he stops that train of thought in its tracks.
“Mark-” Eduardo gives up and sighs. “Okay. Fine. Damage control. We need Chris, have you called him?”
“He’s called a couple times, but he’s in LA. He said he’s driving up in an hour.”
“We’ll put out an official statement when he gets here. For now, I say we ignore it. Chris really needs to okay whatever we do. Just- calm down, Mark. It’ll end up alright.”
Eduardo puts his arms around him, and Mark can’t relax, can’t calm down, he just stands stiff until Eduardo lets him go.
“I’m gonna go talk to Dustin, okay?”
Mark nods, and opens his laptop.
He finds the girl’s information and stares at the little piece of paper he’s written it down on for a good ten minutes.
Lindsay Jensen
650 249 5555
373 Oak Avenue
Heart in his throat, he dials 2 - 4 - 9 - 5 - 5 - and presses the End button. He’s breathing too fast. What would he say, even? Oh, hey, I got your information illegally off the Internet, and yeah, I’m the CEO of Facebook, and oh, Sean Parker, yeah, that whole thing he did to you? Me too.
She wouldn’t believe him.
But the next day when he goes to a VC meeting he ends up outside her house on the way back. It’s a nice house, close to campus. She probably shares it with a couple friends.
He waits across the street until a girl comes out, and he scrunches down in the car seat. The girl is blonde, pretty, petite, wearing shorts and a baseball cap, and Mark peers at her over the bottom of the window.
It’s her. He’s stared at her Facebook profile picture for enough time, her bright smile, arm slung over another girl’s shoulder.
When she drives off, he straightens, heart pounding, and goes home.
He does the same thing the next day, and the next, and Eduardo might be getting suspicious but he doesn’t care.
On the fourth day he makes it as far as her front step before he turns around jerkily and goes back to his car.
On the fifth day he’s only on the sidewalk when the door opens.
“Hi,” she says, and he can’t even look at her face. He nods in greeting.
“You’re outside like every day. We can see you. What do you want?”
Mark’s face goes hot.
“Um, just, uh-” and nothing comes to mind. He’s usually pretty good at making excuses, but there’s really no plausible reason why a skinny pale geek would be making regular trips to a house full of hot Stanford girls. Except, you know, stalking. Which suddenly seems extremely plausible, and his face gets even redder.
The girl rolls her eyes. “Just, spit it out or stop coming here, okay?”
Mark nods, and she’s turning around when he says, “Sean Parker.”
She faces him again, face carefully tight, but her eyes are scared. Mark recognizes the look well.
“Are you a reporter?” she says shakily, and Mark shakes his head.
“Did he- send you?”
“No. No. Can we- uh, talk? Inside?”
The girl crosses her arms. “No.”
“Um, okay.”
“And I have my cellphone here, in my hand. I can call my friends at any second. They’re inside. So don’t fucking try anything, okay?” Her tone is harsh, but Mark can sense the fear underneath.
“I won’t, uh, I just-” and how to explain it, really? He’s been thinking about it for a while, how he might eventually go about telling someone. But now it’s here, the moment, and he has no idea how. He suddenly, fervently wishes he had just sent her a Facebook message.
“I- I- I know about the lawsuit. I want to help.” The girl narrows her eyes, and Mark swallows and goes on. “Sean- the uh, he, I know him or whatever, and. He. Um, he did the same thing.” It’s a fucking pathetic finish, worse than he even imagined, and he says weakly, a moment after, “To me.”
The girl’s face is going twisted in that way that girls’ faces do when they’re about to cry.
“Are you joking? Is this some kind of joke?” she hisses, and swipes a hand over her eyes.
Mark shakes his head, and backs away. “I’m sorry,” he says, and he turns and runs to the car.
“Wait!” he hears her calling, but he fumbles for the key and drives away fast.
-----
Two days later, the house phone rings, and Mark waves a hand that means please get it Wardo can’t you see I’m wired in.
“Hello?”
Eduardo mm-hmms, and then hands the phone to Mark.
“It’s a girl,” he whispers, and Mark shrugs and tucks the phone under his ear.
“Hello?”
“Hi. Mark? This is- um, this is Lindsay.”
He straightens up reflexively and the phone falls. He fumbles for it, and Eduardo’s eyes are boring a hole in the back of his head but he doesn’t dare look at him.
“How did you get this number?” he says quietly, shoving his laptop aside and stumbling into the next room, dropping down to sit against the wall.
“You’re Mark Zuckerberg.” She laughs rustily. “I’ve seen pictures of you with- with him. You’re his friend. You're the fucking CEO of Facebook. Why the fuck are you messing with me?”
Mark draws in a shuddery breath. He could go back now, he really could. Hang up on her, or explain yeah he asked me or just wanted to see what you would do but he thinks about Eduardo, outside, and he curls his knees up and breathes for a second.
“I’m not.”
She laughs again. “Okay, I don’t know how much of an idiot you think I am.”
“I don’t! I don’t think that. Sean isn’t part of the company anymore.”
“Because of me? Because of what happened?”
“Because of me.”
She doesn’t say anything for a second, and he can hear her breathing.
“Okay, I’m sorry I came over, and I already decided I wasn’t going to- but, I didn’t think he’d- fuck. Fuck.”
“Just relax, okay? Breathe, and formulate your response.” She sounds so much like Eduardo then that Mark laughs.
She laughs too. “I’m a psych major. Shut up.”
“Shouldn’t I be on a sofa or something?”
“You can lay down if you want.”
Mark smiles and it hurts, and he puts his face into his knees and says, a little muffled, and hesitant, but out loud- “Sean had sex with me and I didn’t want to.”
It feels like something should change.
But he just distantly hears Lindsay say, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry."
Mark doesn’t say anything for a while, just breathes harshly into the phone.
“Fuck,” he gets out finally, in lieu of anything coherent or meaningful, and she draws in a shaky breath.
“Yeah, fuck.” Her voice is thick.
“Can we meet?” she asks, and even as Mark shakes his head he knows he’s going to have to. It’s out loud, now, and maybe Eduardo agreed not to tell anyone but this girl he doesn’t even know won’t.
“Yeah. Yes. Your house. My -" and what is Eduardo, really? “My friend doesn’t- can’t know that I-”
“I understand.”
After he hangs up, he closes his eyes. Shit. This is happening.
----
That night, he can’t sleep for the first time since before Eduardo found out. He comes awake with a gasp after one particularly vivid dream, and the door creaks open.
“Hey.” It’s Eduardo, in a white shirt and sweatpants, hair sticking up in the back.
Mark sits up and doesn’t say anything, and Eduardo sits on the edge of his bed.
“You okay? I was on the couch, I heard you-”
“I’m fine.” He fiddles with a loose thread on the comforter.
“We haven’t talked about it, yet. The girl.”
Mark doesn’t say anything.
“I just wanted to make sure- Mark, if you ever want to talk-”
“Christ, Wardo, I told you I'm fine.”
Eduardo nods, and Mark immediately regrets it, because Eduardo’s the only thing right now, and yeah, he can be the most smothering irritating person ever, but he cares. He cares.
“Wait,” he says quietly, when Eduardo stands up to leave.
“Yeah?”
There’s a silence, because how is Mark supposed to say I can’t sleep and I think I’d sleep better if you were with me like we used to at Harvard, sometimes, when we were drunk or exhausted or lonely.
“You can stay. If you want,” he says instead, and Eduardo comes cautiously back towards the bed and lies down on his back. He’s carefully not touching Mark, but Mark can feel his heat, smell him, and before he can stop himself he rolls over and ends up half on top of Eduardo, cheek pressed into his chest.
Eduardo doesn’t say anything. Mark feels him swallow, and a hand comes up and rests on Mark’s back.
“Are you sure you’re-” and if Mark has to hear Eduardo ask if he’s okay one more time he’s going to kill someone, so he reaches up and presses their mouths together.
Eduardo doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, and Mark rights himself and does it again, kisses him hard, bruising, frustrated. Eduardo’s hand strokes the skin on the back of Mark’s neck for a second, but then he pulls away, breathing hard.
“Mark,” he says, low in his throat, quiet, “I can’t- wait, hey, hey, it’s okay-” he finishes, because Mark is chewing his lip viciously, and when he tries to sit up, away from Eduardo, Eduardo tightens the arm around his back.
“C’mon, hey,” he says, and Mark shakes his head frantically. He still can’t say anything, can’t form words, because it’s Eduardo. If he fucks up with things with Eduardo who does he have?
“Mark- Mark- I don’t think you know how long I’ve wanted that to happen,” Eduardo says, slowly, like he wishes he didn’t have to say any more than that. “I just don’t think now is the best time-”
“I’m not a fucking ruined woman!” Mark hisses hotly, and to his horror he goes red and has to swallow a sob. Eduardo exhales, his face still close to Mark’s.
“That’s not what I mean, I just- Mark-”
“When will it be the right time, then? When will it stop?”
And Mark knows, Jesus, it’s so painfully obvious he’s not just talking about kissing Eduardo. Eduardo knows it too, and he lets Mark hide his face in his shoulder, murmurs into his hair, and Mark focuses on keeping his breath slow and even, in, out, in, out, and in a minute he’s asleep.
He wakes up alone.
From the kitchen he hears the rattle of pans, and he stumbles to the shower.
When he comes out, dressed, and kicks on his flip-flops, Eduardo looks up from the stove.
“Hey, I made breakfast,” he says, and Mark grabs his phone off the table.
“I have a meeting,” he says shortly, and leaves.
He knocks on Lindsay’s door, and gets nearly past the threshold when he sees another woman, an older woman, sitting on her couch. He freezes, and nearly backs out of the door, but Lindsay puts a hand on his arm and pulls him forward.
“Mark, this is my lawyer, from the district attorney’s office, Anna Weinstein- Anna, Mark Zuckerberg,” and Anna holds out a hand but Mark doesn’t take it.
“You didn’t, uh, you didn’t say you would have a lawyer-” he stammers, and Lindsay steps close to him, whispers in his ear.
“I know, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but it’ll be easier if she’s here. You’ll have to tell it fewer times, and she’s really nice. Okay?” She looks at him with puppy eyes.
“Mr. Zuckerberg, I just want to ask you a couple questions,” the lawyer says, and Mark sits down stiffly, suddenly aware of how skinny and pale his knees are in cargo shorts, and he swallows nervously because what if they just don’t believe him? Who would believe him?
But Lindsay looks at him encouragingly, and he nods to Anna.
“When did you meet Sean Parker?”
Mark looks down. “In New York-” he coughs, voice cracking, “In, uh, March of this year. 2004.”
“What was the context of your relationship?”
“We were business partners. He - we lived together, starting in July and ending when- when, um, in August.”
“Mr. Zuckerberg, I’m going to ask some questions about the night of the incident. Would you like Lindsay to leave the room?”
He looks up, and Lindsay smiles at him, tightly but with affection, and he shrugs.
“I don’t- I mean, I’ll have to say it in front of a lot more people, won’t I?”
Anna just looks at him levelly. “Whatever you feel comfortable with.” And he’s not comfortable either way, how could he be comfortable, but what the fuck can he do?
“It’s okay.”
He explains it then, stumbling over the words, editing himself over and over until each sentence feels like a massive labor. Some parts just sound terrible- what is he supposed to say? Slang, like he fucked me or stuff like he entered me or we had intercourse and how in detail does he go? Should he mention how many drinks he’d had or hits he’d taken, or the way it felt when Sean put the first finger inside him, or how he’d woken up the next morning to Sean smirking at him over a panful of scrambled eggs? When he finishes, he goes red, and says, “That’s. That’s all. I guess.”
Anna nods, and he barely listens as she explains the approach of the lawsuit, how Mark is actually just a witness, how prosecutions take time and he should be patient, how Sean’ll probably plead not guilty but that this shouldn’t discourage him, and he just sneaks glances at Lindsay. She's staring down at her smooth brown knees.
“I’m sorry," Mark says as he's leaving.
“Why?” Lindsay looks genuinely curious, and Mark pushes up his hoodie sleeve with one hand, avoids her eyes.
“If I had said something. Right after it happened- if I had- he wouldn’t have-” he stops, blinking rapidly, and she looks at him wide-eyed and takes both of his hands in hers.
“Please don’t feel guilty, okay? I know it’s a natural reaction.”
“Fucking psych major,” he mutters, and she grins ruefully.
“Mark. What happened, happened. I don’t blame anyone except for the person who raped me.” She stumbles a little over the word and Mark bites his lip.
“The fact is, it happened, and now I’m dealing with it. There’s no point in placing blame on anyone else.”
“How very Zen of you,” Mark says dryly, and she laughs unexpectedly.
“I like you. You’re kind of an asshole, but in a good way.”
“There’s a good way to be an asshole?”
“Apparently,” she says, eyes scrunched up with amusement like Wardo's used to be, and kisses him gently on the cheek.
PART THREE