“I’m fine.” I edge past my uncle and take the stairs. “I just need to get out of these clothes.”
“Why of course you do, Beau,” he calls. “Because half of them aren’t yours.”
“Lawrence,” Dexter warns quietly.
I stop at the top of the stairs and breathe in.
“Where have you been?” Lawrence implores, ignoring his husband’s warning.
“Did you come home especially so you could grill me?” I ask tiredly. “I’m a thirty-year-old woman, Lawrence.”
“And when we spoke earlier, you asked me if I ever wanted to escape. You can’t say things like that and not expect me to worry.”
“You don’t need to worry.” I lock myself inside my bedroom, perching on the edge of the bed, my hands joined, my mind racing.
We’ll do it all again tomorrow.
I bite down on my lip. Once was an experience. Twice? I’d be closer to it becoming a habit, and everyone knows habits are hard to quit. “Oh, God, Beau,” I breathe, getting up and going to my bathroom. I run a hot bath, adding a few drops of the oil James gave me, and I strip. Climb in. Sink down beneath the hot, soothing water. Close my eyes.
There are no flashbacks of my past assaulting me. There’re only memories of today. There’s no lingering, familiar pain. There’s only the intense, unfamiliar ache of my body and sting of my wrists. There’s him. Every word he said, every move he made, every look he gave me. I need another habit. One to replace my terrible habit of suffering, but I know that habit shouldn’t be James.
I sink deeper into the water, falling into a slumber. It’s been a long time since dread hasn’t monopolized my dreams. Too long. I feel my mind shutting down. My body becoming heavy, a deep sleep upon me.
Peace.
Calm.
James.
I got what I asked for.
Have you, though, Beau?
I shoot up, startled, water splashing everywhere, my breathing shot. I’m freezing and feel incredibly stiff. Reaching across to the vanity unit, I grab my cell. Midnight. I glance around my bathroom as I drop it, bewildered, my eyes heavy with tiredness.
I need to get out.
Lying back, I plunge my head under the water, enduring the cold for a little longer to wash my hair. “Jesus,” I gasp, my teeth chattering, my skin riddled with goosebumps. I lift out of the water as soon as the suds are rinsed from my hair and grab a towel, wrapping it tightly around my chilly form.
As I’m wiping my eye makeup off with a cleansing cloth in the mirror, my cell rings and my hand lowers slowly from my face as I see the screen. It’s past midnight. I breath in deeply, taking his call. I don’t speak. But he does.
“Hi,” he says, low and gravelly. “It’s me.”
I look at myself in the mirror. I’m smiling. “It’s late.”
“And you’re awake. Why?”
I can’t tell him that I fell asleep in the tub and fantasized about him. It sounds as sappy as it is, and though I don’t know much about James, sappy he’s not. “I don’t sleep well,” I admit.
“Me neither.”
“Why?”
“Too much on my mind.”
“Like?”
“Many things,” he replies as I lower to the edge of the tub. “One of those things today is you.”
Today. Perhaps not tomorrow or the next day. Just today. “Why?” I ask.
“Because I never imagined I would meet someone as fucked up as me,” he says honestly. “And yet here I am, living the dream.”
It’s probably inappropriate, but I laugh to myself. He’s being straightforward, and I appreciate it. I’m glad he’s confirmed he’s fucked up, because I was silently beating myself up about reaching that conclusion. His kink shouldn’t make him fucked up. His scar shouldn’t either. But his broodiness and apparent lack of emotion certainly pointed to it. “Why are you fucked up, James?”
“Maybe you’ll find out in time. And perhaps in time you’ll feel comfortable enough to share your demons with me.”
My eyes dart across my bare knees. In time. How much time is that? “Maybe,” I murmur, quite certain that all the time in the world wouldn’t be enough for me to be comfortable.
“But in the meantime,” he continues, his voice rough, “let’s just carry on dodging our reality.”
“Isn’t it unhealthy to bury your head?”
“What’s the alternative?”
“I don’t know,” I admit. I’ve done therapy, seen shrink after shrink, taken medication, become a zombie because of it. Nothing worked. Nothing saved me from myself.
“Or maybe we just accept it,” he says.
“I accepted it long ago.”
“Me too.”
“Then why are we having this conversation?” I ask, a bit bemused.
“Because I wanted to hear your voice.”
I recoil, so much so, I nearly fall back into the bath. That just doesn’t sound like something James would say, and I’m thrown by it. His voice has been like ice—brittle, angry, cold. Arousing. He has elicited so many different responses from me. But I can’t deny, hearing his voice is settling. Because I wanted to hear your voice. Like I needed to hear his.