Chapter 30
chapter thirty
Present Day
Of course, he’d noticed. I didn’t actually think he hadn’t, but I’d been hoping he wouldn’t mention it. It was a stupid thing to hope for, but I’d still done it.
Callum turned off the lamp that sat on his nightstand, shrouding us in total darkness. His bed was big enough for us to have some room between us, just like our old bed in the apartment we used to live in. Like a line drawn in sand, no crossing allowed because I rarely ever allowed it.
Neither of us said anything as he shuffled on his side, getting comfortable. The past few nights, he’d slept on his side facing the windows, and I’d slept on mine, staring at his back until I’d fallen asleep. It was easier than facing him or facing away from him.
From where I could hear his breathing, it sounded like he was facing me, too. I tried blinking a few times, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Was he looking at me? Or were his eyes closed?
“Tobi,” he whispered.
My breath hitched at the tone of his voice. “Yeah?”
“Can I touch you? Your face. I want to hold you. Touch you in some way. If that’s okay.”
Slowly, I could start to see the outline of him. He was in front of me, our noses aligned just right. If I moved forward and crossed the invisible line we’d created, they’d touch. Would our lips touch, too? I nodded. “Yes. Please do.”
I listened to the contented sigh he let out as his hand banished the line, cradling my cheek. His thumb swiped against my cheekbone. “Why do you sneak in here, Tobes? Why not wake me?”
I pulled my lip between my teeth, biting on the loose skin there. “You…make it easier. The cravings. The sadness. The everything. They hit me late at night, and I try to fight them alone. I do. But I’m scared, Cally. I’m scared I’ll lose myself.”
“I keep you from losing yourself?”
“Yeah. You ground me. You’re the reminder of the life I’m trying to have.
You’re comforting. When I find it getting really hard, I just want you.
Need you. I need you so badly, it hurts in my chest. So, I come to you instead of going to the bar.
I come into your bed, and I don’t know.” I shook my head.
“I pretend like it’s the past, and we aren’t starting over, and everything is the same as it used to be.
I pretend like nothing has changed and that I’m allowed to want you the way I do. ”
He shuffled closer. Just by barely an inch.
I could see him now. See him clearly in the dark.
No matter how dark or how lost, I’d always be able to find him, just as he’d found me.
“I like my bed a lot better when you’re in it.
” He pushed a bit of my hair back away from my forehead, his hand traveling back down to cup my jaw.
“I think I was wrong. I don’t think we can start over. ”
I glanced between his eyes, my heart picking up pace behind my ribcage. “What do you mean?”
“The way I love you? That isn’t a crush. It isn’t the beginning of a relationship. It’s twelve fucking years of yearning and loving you with my whole entire heart.” He took one of my hands, slowly bringing it to his chest, right over his heart. “Can you feel that, baby?”
The way his heart was also pounding? How warm he was? How real and safe he felt, right beneath my palm? “Yes. I can.”
“That’s not just love for a man I barely know.
That’s a fire blazing and drums playing at a tempo far too fast. That’s love for a man I’ve known before, and I know now.
Love for you in every form. It’s a burning light in the sky as a new star is born, just as an old one dies because I have loved you and I will love you for eternity.
Even if it’s a different version of you. Of us.”
He didn’t have to move this time because I did. I caved to the pull between us, damning the line I’d drawn. I didn’t want the line. I wanted him. I needed him. I needed him in all the ways I’d deprived myself of for so fucking long.
My hand perfectly cradled his cheek, just as he’d done to me, holding him.
Feeling his skin in a way I’d never let myself before.
I wasn’t scared. I wasn’t anxious. I didn’t want him to stop touching me.
It was contradicting everything that used to be—but wasn’t that the point? He’d said every version of us.
Of me.
I pressed our noses together, whispering back to him. “Can I kiss you?”
“Not gonna tell me you love me, too?” His breath was warm against my skin as he matched my tone.
“I don’t think I can say it as good as you did. Let me show you that I do, instead of telling you.”
There was a short pause, a moment where I thought he was hesitating. “Kiss me, Tobias. Kiss me like you mean it. Like you love me. Kiss me like you’ve missed me all this time, so I can believe you won’t leave me again.”
I have. I have missed you. I won’t leave. I won’t leave again. I promise.
Saying it would’ve meant nothing. I had to show him how much I meant it. So, I tilted my head, pulling him in gently, and pressed my lips hard against his.
We took deep, satisfied breaths through our noses at the same time, sitting there, savoring the feeling. Our lips were never meant to be on their own or on someone else.
I made my way closer to him, pressing my body against his as it seemed to hit us all at once.
What this meant. What this had always meant.
I was never going to find a place with anyone else because my place had always been with Callum.
He was the one. He was the only one. He was who I was meant to live and die with.
He was the wind, as I was the feather.
He was the star, as I was space.
Callum made the sweetest, most beautiful whimpering noise as I instinctively pushed my hips against his. My hand was no longer on his cheek, and his wasn’t on mine, either. They were everywhere else, feeling skin on skin as we threw ourselves into the warmth of each other.
I panted against his lips, giving in to the way my body craved him. I hadn’t craved anyone like this in so long—I wasn’t sure if I ever had. I’d had moments when we were dating, but it was like my body was too scared. Too uncertain.
Now? God, I needed him.
“Cal, fuck. Is this okay?”
He pressed his forehead against mine, moving his hips in sync. “Yes,” he panted. “Yes, it’s so okay. Christ, baby.”
Hearing him whimper for me…It was a whole new experience. Something I never thought I’d get to feel with him. I thought I was broken. I thought I was tainted. I thought something was wrong with me.
But my entire body was aflame, each and every nerve sparking with each slide of his palms across my arms. Across my chest. Wrapping around my neck and over my shoulders. Every grind of my hard cock beneath my new pajama pants against his.
He took me in another kiss, this time deeper. We panted and groaned through our noses as his tongue met with mine, and each thrust and grind of my hips brought me dangerously close to coming undone. I loved him.
I loved him.
I loved him.
I had loved him from the moment we met. I had loved him on the day I left. I had loved him while I was surfing from house to house, taking hit by hit. I had loved him the day he’d found me in Driftwood. I had loved him when I ran from the hospital.
I loved him now. I loved him then. I loved him, and nothing else mattered.
I could feel it so deeply, so clearly, no longer numbed beneath the haze of drunk.
I could feel his body rocking against mine and the tightening in my gut, and I could hear his moans so clearly.
They weren’t filtered with an echo from a full bottle of vodka.
He tasted like a life I’d been running from. He tasted like forever. He tasted like love.
“I love you.” I panted against his lips. “Shit, I’m gonna come. I’m gonna come.”
Callum tangled his fingers in my hair, keeping me as close as possible. “Come then, baby doll. Come for me. Let go, and I’ll catch you.”
The wind to my feather.
My body curled toward him, my forehead resting against his shoulder as my hips stuttered and my muscles tensed and my breaths hitched until they stopped completely.
All my breath rushed in at once, coming out as a deep moan as I coated the inside of my boxers. My hips twitched forward, riding out the last few spasms. Callum was holding onto me, his fingers gripping tightly into my skin.
“Oh, god. Fuck.” He gasped just before whimpering over and over as he rutted against me.
Feeling and hearing him lose himself like that was all the confirmation I needed to know that it was the right thing to do. It was beautiful. He was beautiful.
After giving him all the ache in my heart, I knew we’d be okay. We weren’t starting over. Starting over had never been a real option for us.
I nuzzled my nose into the side of his neck, pressing a kiss to the salty skin there. “I love you, Callum.”
He was still breathing heavily, his pulse thrumming through the vein beneath my lips. “I love you too, Tobi. So, so much. Thank you for coming back to me.”
“I was always going to come back to you. I ain’t leavin’ again, though. I promise.”
He held me, and I let him. After changing our clothes, he just held me. The entire night. No line between us. No distance. No fear.
And no more cravings.
She held her hand out, shaking mine with a big smile on her face. “Hi, I’m Kathleen, and I’m an alcoholic.”
I blinked at her, not sure what to say to that. “Um, hi. I’m Tobi.”
Kathleen took a seat on the leather chair in front of me, letting me get situated on the long couch.
It was a pretty comfortable couch, honestly.
“It’s nice to meet you, Tobi. I like to introduce myself like that to kind of normalize it for the people who come in to see me.
I read through your online intake forms, but I was hoping you could tell me yourself why you’re seeking therapy with me. ”