17. Gage
17
GAGE
I s it weird that I didn’t want to borrow a toothbrush because I didn’t want to scrub Alexei’s taste from my mouth? Yeah. Yeah, that’s probably weird. Nothing sexy about stale cum, but… everything about Alexei is sexy. Even the way he sleeps.
He made me cuddle him. I mean, I was going to anyway, but he practically forced me to. Then he changed his mind. My arms were wrapped around him from behind, my still-hard dick nestled against his ass without any compulsive urges. After a whole two and a half minutes, he said nope, made me turn over, and snuggled up to me from behind.
Guess I’m the little spoon. Kind of love it because his long body fits perfectly behind mine, and his blue-blond hair felt nice against my neck.
I slept alright, considering it was a new bed, a new house, and a new body next to mine, but as soon as the sun poked out from the horizon, I was wide awake and a bit jittery.
So now I’m slinking through the creaky mansion, wondering if I can make coffee or root through cabinets to see where Nathan keeps my meds. Or should I go home? Maybe I can have breakfast with Alexei if he wakes up before I need to leave for my therapy appointment with Natalie. It’s a video appointment this time, but I want to be alone and in my attic room for it.
“Here,” Nathan says, scaring the shit out of me. I’m just standing at the bottom of the stairs in sweats, a t-shirt, and bare feet, unsure which direction to turn or where to walk next. He hands me an empty coffee mug.
“What’s this?”
“It’s a rule that everyone gets their own mug here. Alex is specific about mugs.”
It’s a black mug with an alien face on it, the words ‘welcome intruder’ written beneath in spacy letters. I lift a brow at Nathan. “This your way of offering me a coffee and calling me an intruder at the same time?”
“Yes. I’ll get your pill.”
So, I sit at the island in the giant kitchen and dry-swallow my medication, and when my intruder cup is full of sweet and creamy coffee, I look at Nathan because he looks like he wants to say something.
“How’re you feeling?” he asks.
Proud. Exhausted about being proud. A little skeptical of myself for taking pride in not coming like it’s some sort of weird accomplishment.
“A little like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop,” I say instead. I sip coffee and try to own the feeling.
“How so?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Like I’ve mostly been doing okay, but I don’t want to get caught up thinking it’s going to be easy. I’ve barely faced my past. I’m just waiting for it to all come crashing down.”
Nathan nods, glancing at the stairs. “That’s normal. But don’t let it consume you. You’re still allowed to be happy with your progress. Recovery is… it’s hard. Don’t diminish how far you’ve come. One day at a time. Hell, one minute at a time.”
“But what am I going to do when things get tough? When I run into Brian again? When I get depressed and don’t know how to handle it? When I have a fight with Alexei and think my world is ending?”
“Call me,” he says plainly. “I don’t care what time it is or what I’m doing. That’s what I’m here for. Your sobriety is just as important to me as it is to you.”
Something eases inside my mind. It’s the same feeling I used to get knowing that rehab was an option. Nathan is my safe space, and I’m allowed to go to him when I don’t know if I can cope or keep myself alive. “Thank you.”
“And if you don’t think we’re a good match anymore because you’re, uh, dating my son?” he states it like a question and moves on, “Then I’ll help find you someone new. I’m on your side here, Gage.”
“Okay,” I say, sipping. “But… no thanks. I don’t want someone new. Not unless things get weird, and I’m hoping they don’t get weird. I like that it’s you. That you’re you… to me. I like weird.”
He doesn’t comment on that, but I think he gets what I’m saying. “I don’t want details, but… feeling okay after last night?” he asks.
I look at my steaming coffee and blush. Smiling. Remembering the way Alexei blurted random words to stave off his orgasm, the way he felt trembling under my touch, and the complete lack of control he had over his legs once his orgasm ebbed.
“Yeah, good. Proud of something stupid.”
“Do I wanna know?” he asks. “You can tell me anyway. Spare the details.”
“I did things for him…”
“Spare. The. Details.”
“And not for myself,” I quickly add. “And it didn’t feel impossible to resist. Like I have some actual control over my… urges. Like I can handle them. And even when he asked if… yeah, sparing the details, I said no. And he listened. And it felt good. Almost better than actually… yeah.”
He breathes in through his nose, and when he exhales, steam from his coffee comes my way. “That’s definitely something to be proud of. And the rest? Any cravings?”
I’d kill for a fucking upper right now. I’m so tired and drained. “Uh, almost constantly. Like it’s there in the back of my mind, not demanding I take something, but reminding me that it feels good. I hope the whisper doesn’t start yelling at me.”
“Even if it does, you’re strong enough to ignore it. Keep quilting. Do something else that takes your mind off it.”
Yeah, the sewing isn’t really cutting it. It’s fine because I don’t hate it, and I like quilting nights at Marian’s house, but I need something a bit more consuming. A bit more stimulating. A bit more enjoyable.
“Have you tied things up in the city? With your old place? What happened there?”
I snort into my mug. “Well, I stole a frappé and snorted a baggy of coke, and then, since I’d already fucked up and called my sponsor, I went on a bit of a bender for the whole day. Got high off my ass to really give myself a reason to go to rehab for the eighth time, sold almost everything I owned in a drug haze that got finalized during my detox days later. But yeah, I just… left. I still own a place there, but I guess I should tie that up. Get my name off it. End that chapter.”
“Feel up to it?” Nathan asks, getting up for a refill.
“Soon,” I say, letting him pour me more coffee. “I’m gonna smoke. I’ll be right back… if I can stay?” My voice wobbles and Nathan notices, so he throws me one of his jackets and joins me on the front porch.
What is wrong with me? I had an awesome night, feel proud of myself for how I handled it, got to sleep in the same bed as my new slow-moving boyfriend, and now I’m broken about it or something. Like I got a taste of the good life and have no idea if I can keep it. I know my track record. I know myself. I’m that shadow that clouds sunshine and the toxin that spoils freshness. I’m a bad omen in a smiling package, and I don’t even know if my smile is real or if it’s forced.
I’m happy! My smile should be real. But emotions are overwhelming, whether they’re positive or negative, and I’m crumbling a little. Suffocating under the weight of everything that feels good and dying under the pressure to keep it good.
Nicotine fills my lungs and my hands shake. Nathan says nothing, but he sits next to me on the front step, watching the street wake up with the sun. A part of me wants to sprint home and hide in my attic like a vampire, sucking up loneliness instead of blood. I’m feeling guilty about my thoughts. I’m assuming the worst just because I’m living in the crash after the high of last night. I’m afraid to let too much happiness creep up on me… because what if I get used to it and then it disappears?
When I exhale smoke, my breath wavers and a choked sob sneaks out. I close my eyes, trying to lock it down, keep it inside, and not taint the sunrise with the eclipse of my feelings.
“The first time Alex invited me to spend time with him, I was so excited and overwhelmed about it that I said no,” Nathan says, and now I’m leaking from my eyes but not fully crying. “I’d been wanting it for so long. I spent so much time trying to earn his trust and make him believe in me, but he never took the bait. He was so skeptical of me. He kept me at arm’s length because he didn’t want to get hurt by me again.”
That’s probably how my family feels. I blink, and more tears drip, so I smoke harder.
“And when he finally trusted me enough, believed in me enough, to actually invite me to simply watch a movie with him, I suddenly didn’t trust myself. It was a Leonardo DiCaprio movie, that one about him walking through dreams, and Alex loves Leo. Loved him. He’s changed his mind now, but at the time, he was a big fan. And all I could think about was ruining a celebrity for him. What if I messed up, made a mistake, said the wrong thing, or was in a bad mood and ruined Leonardo for him? It was a damn movie, and the pressure of what it meant turned me into a pathetic coward. So, I said no. And guess what?”
I up-nod to ask what.
“He didn’t invite me to do anything with him again for a year after that. I let him down just by refusing something I’d wanted for so long.” Nathan looks at me. “You’re doing that now.”
“Doing what?”
“Crumbling under the weight of wanting things without thinking you deserve them. You do, you know. Deserve them. You know that, right?”
I stamp my smoke and light another. “What have I ever done to deserve anything? Anything other than comeuppance?”
The front door is open, and I forgot that it’s silent now, but Alexei is standing there in all black with his pale blue hair messy. He’s glaring at us, poised but pissed.
“You went to rehab eight times. You got better. You earned sobriety chips and moved back home with your family. You care about your brothers and want to make life better for your mom. You sew and spend time with older ladies. You make my dad feel proud of you. You make me happy despite how hard that is. You’re a good person with a past that just so happens to have some substance abuse in it, but that’s not your whole fucking personality, Gage. If you won’t see yourself as a person, I will.” He levels me with a very stern and cute expression. “Hi, you’re Gage Rossum, former substance abuser and current slow- moving boyfriend. And you’re going to give yourself some damn credit. Yeah? What about comeuppance for all that?” He widens his eyes at me, and I’m awestruck and alive, and then… and then he slams the door on us and shouts, “That’s not the mug he was supposed to get!”
I’m still staring at the wooden door, my smoke burning down between my fingers and my coffee cooling while my mind rearranges itself to take in everything Alexei just said.
Then Nathan snorts. “What he said.”
Slowly, I look at him.
“Slow-moving boyfriend?” he asks.
“It’s a thing we’re trying.” I wave him off. “Am I more than an addict?”
“Fuckin’ right you are,” Nathan says. “I get that speech from him all the time. It’s like some default setting where we refer to ourselves as addicts and only addicts because we’re preparing everyone to be let down by us. Alex will never see you that way.”
“But he saw you that way.”
“He was a child. He saw me only as a junkie for seventeen years of his life. I was his dad biologically, but I wasn’t a dad. Alex only ever saw me as an addict he had to take care of and the man who brought danger to the house, and because of that, he was very skeptical of me. He’s never known you high. The situation is different, and he’s learned a lot because of what we put him through. Let him remind you that you’re a person. It’s okay to accept it.” He smiles at me. “I gotta get to work, but wanna hit a meeting tonight?”
“Yes, please.” I hand him my mug when he stands. “What mug was I supposed to get?”
Nathan just shakes his head and leaves me on the front porch to finish my cigarette.
“I don’t think it’s the best idea, Gage,” Natalie says during our video appointment.
“Why not?” I slump against my headboard and jostle my laptop around.
“Because that’s not the purpose of it.”
I told her that I was about to write in my arousal journal, recapping in great detail everything I felt and experienced with Alexei last night. While she’s very proud of me for how last night went, she’s now stern about the journal.
“It’s not meant to be a toy in a sex act. It isn’t there to build temptation and arousal. It’s perfectly acceptable for you to share it with him, but not as part of a game. It’s meant to be a tool. A coping method. A practice in mindfulness and self-awareness. Make sure you’re using it as such.”
Oh. Yeah. I guess that makes sense. “But you never said anything the first time we told you about it.”
“Because it was healthy at the time. It got you over the hurdle of wanting and into practicing , but now it needs to remain a tool for your awareness. Find other ways to entice one another from now on.” She smiles at me. “Now, tell me about last night and how you’re feeling today.”
I inhale hard. “Get ready. It’s the full spectrum of feelings.”
And by the time I’m done recapping the high of last night and the low of this morning, I’m drained. But Natalie makes me feel better about it because recovery is draining. Especially in the beginning. And it’s okay to be tired and confused and doubtful as long as there is still pride and hope there. And there is. I’m full of pride, and even though I’m sinking beneath my blankets to take a nap instead of working, I’m remembering Alexei from this morning.
If you won’t see yourself as a person, I will.
He’s right. Maybe it’s time I actually start seeing myself as a person instead of just an addict. Mom’s friends and the neighbour ladies know good stories about me. Alexei thinks I’m a person. My brothers see me as a brother. My mom sees me as a son.
I’m a person.