Chapter 37 ALEX
ALEX
I wake up on Christmas morning wrapped around Theo’s back, my arm tight around his waist. I press a series of soft, open-mouth kisses to his broad shoulders as I slip my arm out from under his pillow and prop myself on my elbow, looking down at him.
I take in his straight brows, the sweep of his eyelashes and the long lines of his cheekbones, the stubble on his jaw, his slightly aquiline nose, and his soft lips, affection and attraction welling up in my chest.
He’s so handsome, but he looks different right now.
He’s usually so intense and so frenetic, wound so tightly that he never fully relaxes, even when he’s asleep, but he seems so calm right now.
I like Theo normally, but I really like him calm and vulnerable like this, even though that’s a big fucking problem.
He’s only like this when he’s happy.
I’m so fucked, but I’m not thinking about that.
I’m choosing to be happy today. I reach my hand down to grip his half-hard cock, stroking him slowly.
He makes a slight noise and shifts in my arms, turning his hips slightly toward me, but he doesn’t wake up.
I stroke him a little harder, and his lips part, his brows twitching together.
I roll him gently to his back and slip him into my mouth, sucking him slowly until he’s fully hard, enjoying the deep, breathy sounds he makes.
I wonder if I can get him to come before he wakes up – he’s definitely gotten me to do it before.
I take him deeper into my mouth and he moans a little, his hips thrusting up slightly and his chest starting to flush.
I can tell he’s close, so I add in both hands, watching his face closely.
He starts to wake up, his hands coming to my head and his eyes snapping open and rolling back as he starts to come, his hips jerking up slightly as my mouth floods with his cum.
He swears softly and looks down at me with wide eyes, his face flushed and surprised.
I smile up at him, watching him process waking up in the middle of an orgasm.
“That’s your first present,” I say, and he stares at me for a long moment before he sits up, reaching for me and pulling me close.
“You’re the fucking gift,” he says before he pushes me to my back and takes a long time giving me my first several presents.
***
Theo makes us coffee while I stare at the tree, frowning.
I got him three gifts, and I told him he could choose three gifts out of the pile of bags he brought, but there are five gifts for me under the tree.
I look up at him as he brings us slices of panettone and coffee, his hair sticking up weirdly in the back, his face soft and relaxed.
Fuck it, if I get to be happy, he gets to be happy.
“Teddy?”
“Hmmmm?” He sets down the coffee and panettone in front of me.
“I’m accepting any and all gifts for today only.
” His face lights up, and he kisses me hard and fast before heading downstairs.
I sit on the couch and eat some of the panettone, warm nostalgia running through me at the taste.
I haven’t had one in years. Danny wouldn’t have cared, but it was a small way I kept things separate, a defined before and after.
It feels weird to have it now, here, in this situation, but I’m not thinking about that.
Theo comes back up and puts a pile of bags under the tree, and I squint at them.
“Why are there so many?”
He looks up sheepishly. “Uh, there are a bunch of gifts that I gave you that first weekend that you’ve never used, so I thought I’d give them to you again.”
I shake my head at him, sipping my coffee. He’s insane. Sweet and thoughtful, but kind of insane.
I open his gifts first, finally putting on the cashmere cardigan and perfume he got me months ago, some small part of me thrilled to have things I wanted but felt like I couldn’t have or shouldn’t accept.
I let myself react honestly, telling him how much I love everything, and he seems thrilled to have pleased me.
He’s especially happy about me wearing the perfume and tells me he loves how it smells on my skin.
The house is warm enough from the fire that I put on some of the lingerie he bought me, slipping the cardigan back on but leaving it open, and he’s delighted, constantly running his fingers over my skin.
I look at the few gifts I got him with increasing anxiety.
Me deciding to get him something was so last minute that the gifts aren’t perfect, maybe aren’t exactly what he wants or likes, but I think he’ll appreciate the thought more than anything.
I give him the sweater first, explaining it’s to replace the one I ruined when I threw a wineglass at him, which he seems to find funny.
Next is the large enamel-coated Dutch oven, which I tell him I’m sure he already has a better version of, but it was the nicest cooking thing I could find at the store.
He seems touched, and when I teasingly tell him I’d love it if he could make me coq a vin with it sometime, he tells me he’ll do whatever I want, although he seems less than enthused at the idea.
I turn over the last present in my hands for a moment, hesitant.
I know he’ll love this, but it feels like a point of no return.
I swallow the feeling. If I get to be happy, he gets to be happy.
He smiles when he opens the small Polaroid camera and film, but he seems a little confused until I take it out of his hands and load it.
I lean against him and angle the camera back at us, kissing his cheek and snapping a photo.
He looks at me in surprise, his bright eyes wide and focused intently on my face, and I feel a little embarrassed as I hand him the developing photo.
“Um, I thought you’d want a photo of us, and these ones can’t be seen online.
” He looks at the photo of us and back up at me with a tender, overwhelmed look on his face.
He kisses me gently, telling me over and over again that he loves it, kissing me harder and pushing me back on the couch, his hips fitting between my legs easily, like they’re meant to be there.
I’m glad I bought him more than one pack of film, because he’s a menace with the camera for the rest of the day.
He takes a photo of my face right after he kisses me, of me in lingerie with my legs on his shoulders as he fucks me, of me laid out on the couch, blissfully zoned out after, of me drinking coffee, of me putting panettone in my mouth, of me pulling out his laptop to put on a movie, of us curled up together.
I take the camera occasionally, snapping photos of Theo smiling and relaxed in a way he’s usually not.
There are small piles of polaroids on the coffee table and dining room table that I sort through as he starts to make lunch.
Many of the photos are washed out or out of focus, giving them a hazy, dreamlike quality, but there’s one of us that I can’t stop looking at.
It’s us in front of the tree, the tree dark and barely visible in the background, and we’re smiling.
Our smiles are so different, but they seem like a matched set.
Theo’s is crooked and his dimples are showing, and mine is broad and toothy and reaches my eyes.
As I look at the photo, I realize both our smiles are completely real.
We look like we fit together, like we’re a real couple.
In the moment, we were.
For one second, it breaks the fantasy, and the feeling I’ve been pushing down hits me hard, and I choke down a sob.
Theo sticks his head out of the kitchen and asks if I want champagne, and he looks so genuinely calm and happy that I’m able to swallow the feeling again.
I put the photo down and join him, sipping champagne while he snaps the ends off green beans, taking a picture of him lovingly preparing his goddamn ham.
I bring the laptop into the kitchen and make him watch A Muppet Christmas Carol with me while he cooks.
He says he never watched it as a kid, and he doesn’t seem to like it, but eventually admits that it’s shockingly faithful to the book.
“You’re so pretentious,” I tease, and he laughs.
“You’re worse than I am!” he protests. “Look at the perspective in this painting. You can tell Monet was strongly inspired by his collection of ukiyo-e prints,” he parrots back at me in a high, snobbish voice with an exaggerated Boston accent. “If you’ll notice the color choices -”
“I do not sound like that,” I interrupt, shoving him gently.
“You do, a little.” He winks at me and kisses me quickly before refocusing on the green beans.
It feels normal to tease each other and have fun with him like this. I want to be happy like this all the time, but I’m not going to have any of this for much longer, so I just focus on being present in the moment.
I snap a photo of Theo pulling the ham out of the oven, laughing at his excitement.
We sit down to lunch and Theo eats a lot of ham, the look on his face pure bliss.
He explains, without prompting, that he got out of juvie and moved in with his grandparents right around Christmas, and that’s why he loves it so much, especially the food.
While we eat, we watch a storm roll in off the ocean, the wind whipping through the trees and the rain pattering against the large windows.
We curl up on the couch afterward and watch It’s A Wonderful Life, which is Theo’s favorite.
We fall asleep on the couch facing each other, our legs tangled together under the blanket, breathing each other’s breath as we drift to sleep.
It’s dark when we wake up, and we spend a long time holding each other, kissing lazily, enjoying just being together.
Theo opens another bottle of champagne, and we drink by the fire, completely comfortable with each other.
I’m fully immersed in the fantasy of a perfect Christmas with my perfect boyfriend in my new, perfect life, and I want it to be real so badly.
This is so far beyond fucking and playing house. We know each other now. I’ve told him things I’ve never told anyone else about, and I know he’s done the same.
I wish, not for the first time, that I was as delusional as he is.
I know how I feel about the situation, about him, but I don’t let myself think about it. I don’t let myself feel it because I don’t want my feelings, I want his feelings. If I can’t have those, I want the warm and hazy way he makes me feel after sex.
Adored. Cherished. Cared for.
I climb into his lap, and his hands span my back and grip my waist, pulling me into him.
He slips my cardigan down my arms, trailing kisses along my collarbones and up my neck.
We kiss slowly, feeling the warmth of the fire, feeling the warmth of each other as we take our time, being present in the moment together.
I let myself be happy in his arms, because I get to be happy sometimes.
I close my eyes, just trying to feel the pleasure and his adoration and ignore the feeling in my gut.
I’m not feeling that, I’m feeling him inside of me, his fingers moving against me, his lips on my chest. He’s doing what I need him to do – he’s making the feeling disappear.
I moan, my hands gripping his shoulders tighter as tension builds in my spine.
He exhales hard and grips my hips, thrusting up into me, and there’s no reality right now, just the fantasy of us.
“I want you so badly.” It slips out of my mouth, and my voice is so achingly affectionate that it hurts to hear myself. The feeling swells and starts creeping into my chest, tightening around my lungs.
“I’m yours,” Theo says, his voice tender and adoring. I tuck my face against his neck because I can’t look at him. I know what I’ll see on his face, but I can’t see it.
I can’t let him see how I feel, either.
I pull off him and lie down on the couch, pulling him on top of me and begging him to fuck me. He’ll fuck me hard, and it’ll just be sex, and then I’ll get that hazy, warm feeling he gives me, and I’ll have the fantasy back.
Theo starts to make love to me instead, cupping my face in his hand as he kisses me sweetly. I know I need to keep my eyes closed, otherwise I’m beyond fucked.
“Sweetheart, please look at me,” he begs, and I do because I’m stupid. He’s got that look on his face, the one he’s been giving me all weekend, for much longer, and I see how he feels, and I want to cry.
We’re telling ourselves two different versions of the same lie right now. Both of us want the fantasy, both of us want what we can’t have, but the only difference is that I don’t get to believe it’s real.
I try to focus on the sex, focus on separating my body from my feelings, but it’s not working. Instead, I’m feeling everything all at once, and I can’t get rid of the feeling, can’t ignore it anymore. It’s suffocating me.
The sex was supposed to make it better and let me sink deeper into the fantasy, but it only made the reality worse.
It’s been so good with Theo lately, especially today. It’s been a perfect day, the kind of day I want to build my life around. A wave of longing chokes me as the reality of the situation comes rushing in hard on its heels, overwhelming me.
For the first time in a long time, I’m loved, but I don’t get to have it or return it because I don’t have the option to. Theo ruined it, just like he’s ruined everything else. He’s taken everything away from me, leaving only him, and I can’t even have him now that I want him.
Something in his face changes, and he’s less and more and different and the same, entirely vulnerable with me for maybe the first time ever. Something raw and electric courses through me as I look at him, and I know what’s coming, and I know I can’t handle it.
I can’t handle any of this anymore.
I’d rather die.
“Alex?”