13. Jason
CHAPTER 13
JASON
"Of course I remember." I’m doing my best to clean him up and cool him down while not letting the full blast of frigid water hit him. Although, after the initial shock, it feels kind of nice. If not for the obvious pain he's in, I might force him under the spray just to wake his ass up.
Janel called me earlier today and said she couldn't get in touch with him. I assured her he was alive and well, even though I hadn't actually laid eyes on him. I'd heard him throwing up in the early hours of the morning and assumed he'd had a lot more whiskey than I did. He didn't seem at all drunk last night, but I was distracted. Very, very distracted. It didn’t sit well with me that he might have been inebriated last night; I'd been considering knocking on his door to apologize when my phone rang.
"He's probably trying to sleep it off," she said, surprising me. Had he told her he'd gotten drunk? "If he's still in bed, I'd wager he has a migraine. With this crazy weather pressure and the stress he's been under, it would make sense. "
"Stress?" I asked.
The silence on the other side of the phone was a loud indication that I was the cause of said stress, but I don't know how to react to that. To my knowledge, she knows nothing about what happened all those years ago. She has no idea that he was the reason I packed up and moved across the world. But it doesn't take a genius to figure out that something happened.
"Yeah, well. With Jase graduating and moving off to college soon… they’re close, you know?" She sighs. "Anyway, toss him a bottle of water, okay? He won't get up to drink if it's bad. There are pain killers in the medicine cabinet, but if it's a really bad one, he'll need his prescription meds."
She gave me a quick rundown of what Mik might need and asked me to check in, but it took a few hours and multiple calls from her nagging the shit out of me before I finally checked on him. I really thought he was just hungover and deserved to suffer, and, well, I didn't exactly want to face him after last night. I'm still embarrassed over my behavior; disgusted with my lack of control.
Looking at him now, I regret not coming in first thing this morning. He looks exhausted despite having slept all day. Even the small smile playing across his pale face looks like it takes effort.
"That's when I knew," he says weakly. The way he turns his face away from me and leans his head back against the tile gives me the impression that he didn't mean to say that out loud. If I was a good person, I'd let it go and give him space. But we've well established that I'm the worst kind of asshole.
"Knew what?" I ask, running the cool washcloth down his exposed neck and tracing the invisible barrier where his tattoos start on his chest.
Mik sighs and shakes his head lightly, wincing at the motion. Swiping the cloth down the side of his face, I turn his face back towards mine. He opens his eyes briefly, and they're full of pain. Pain from his migraine, but maybe something more, too. His eyes close again before I can examine him too closely.
When it's clear he isn't going to say more, I step out of the shower for a moment to grab his toothbrush, guiding it to his mouth before he takes over. I let him use the washcloth to wipe his mouth, and then we're just standing there. I should help him get out and get his medicine, but I'm enjoying being this close to him too much. It's not even sexual, but it's more intimate than I've let myself be since the time the roles were reversed.
"I was so drunk," I say, chuckling at the memory.
I'd been dumped, again, and was feeling sorry for myself. Mik found me nursing a bottle of cheap whipped cream flavored vodka and wallowing in self-pity. After prying the nearly empty bottle from my clutches, he wrapped an arm around my shoulders and let me cry, tears and snot soaking into his favorite Red Hot Chili Peppers shirt. And then he rubbed my back while I hugged the toilet bowl. Once I'd purged most of the poison from my stomach, he stripped me down to my underwear and jostled me into a cool shower, soaking his own clothes in the process. He returned a few moments later with my toothbrush and a washcloth, wearing nothing but his boxer briefs. He cleaned me up—just like I'm doing for him now. It's so familiar it hurts.
I lead Mik out of the shower and help him dry off, so he doesn't have to bend down. Whenever he moves his head is when it seems to hurt the most, or he gets really dizzy. I find the prescription meds in the medicine cabinet and hand them to Mik with the bottle of water I brought with me. He sits on the edge of the bed, listening when I tell him not to lie down yet, because I'll just end up getting him up again and he'll have to change positions more. I find a pair of light cotton shorts and pull them up his naked thighs, not bothering with underwear or a shirt. It's too fucking hot, anyway .
"It's cooler downstairs," I tell him, and guide him down the two sets of stairs into the cool, dark basement.
After setting him up with a pillow on the couch, I run back upstairs to strip the bed and text Janel and let her know he's alright. Or will be. I'm taking care of him.
The entire time I'm pulling the sweat-soaked sheets from the bed, and cleaning up the mess in the bathroom, I think about that night when Mik was so gentle with me. I was a sad drunk that night, but he took it all in stride. I never told him that I remembered every detail, and just let him think I'd been too drunk. For months, I'd thought I couldn't be remembering it right. Surely, my drunk, depressed self was reading into things that weren’t there.
Once everything is taken care of, I redress in a pair of shorts and a tank top. I grab a few bottles of water from the fridge, and make a tray of light snacks in case he wants to try eating once the meds kick in. I find a handful of battery-operated tea lights in the utility room and add those to the tray.
He's asleep when I sneak back down. I set the tray on the large ottoman, and scatter the tea lights so there's enough light to see. I put two in the bathroom and prop the door open in case he needs to get sick again. And then I sit on the opposite side of the couch, watching him and remembering.
"That's when I knew."
My eyes close and I think back to the night that ultimately led to breaking down all the walls between us. It was still months before we ever admitted our feelings to each other, but when I look back, it was so obvious.
"Pierce was a douche and a pillow princess that never reciprocated your affection," he'd told me. "You can do better."
"At least he was gay," I said sardonically, to which he’d snorted. I had a history of taking in closeted guys looking to experiment, which may or may not have been related to the running straight-best-friend-falls-for-me fantasy that I rarely let myself indulge in. Whatever my reasons for attracting men like that, I always walked away feeling used in the end.
"I don't know how to be enough," I rasped, my voice rough from crying and puking. It wasn't like me to feel so sorry for myself, but Mik wasn't going to judge me for my weakness. I sagged against the wall, leaning my head against the cool tile and closing my eyes to avoid crying again.
The water, which had been refreshing against my overheated skin when I first got in, grew cold. But I still didn't get out, choosing to focus on the bite of the cold water and prickling of gooseflesh across my chest and arms instead of how pathetic I felt. Suddenly there was heat near my chest, and when I opened my eyes, he was there in front of me. In the shower. Looking fucking edible, with water cascading down his lean abs. It honestly hurt to look at him sometimes. He was just that good looking. Still is.
Then he cupped my face and forced me to look up at him. "You are enough, Jason. You're everything."
I tried humor to diffuse the tension, but it came out sounding depressed rather than simply self-deprecating. "I'm a pushover that lets assholes take advantage of me."
"You're not a pushover. You do have shitty taste in guys, though." He laughed at my wry expression and put a little space between us, clearing his throat. "You'll meet the right guy. One that's going to notice every little thing you do and want to reciprocate because they want to make you feel as good as you make them feel."
There was a look in his eyes that I couldn't decipher, and my drunk imagination threatened to make things awkward. My very erect dick was making it awkward enough. He pretended not to notice and wrapped his arms around me, hugging me close. Bear hugs were my thing, considering my significantly bulkier frame and overall hairier body. But it was a good hug. It comforted me and distracted me enough that it didn't even register that he'd been just as hard as I was. The next morning, I remembered, and I spent days over-analyzing it before I gave it up as drunken wishful thinking.
"Do you think it would have been different if I'd come clean that night?"
Mik's groggy voice pulls me out of the memory, and my eyes focus. He's lying on his side, hugging the pillow under his head, watching me.
"How's your head?"
"Better," he answers softly, but he might be lying. He looks more comfortable, at least. "Thank you."
I nod. "I let Janel know you're okay."
He sighs. "I didn't mean to make anyone worry. I left my phone down here after… last night. And I wasn't feeling up to coming down to get it. I didn’t know what time it was."
"I thought you were just hungover."
"I didn't have that much to drink, unfortunately."
My mouth twists, but I try not to be offended. I'd wished I could blame my behavior on the alcohol, too. I wish I could blame it on anything but my own weakness.
"I think about it sometimes, you know," he says, his eyes closing again. He sounds woozy, but his features are a lot more relaxed. Maybe the medication is starting to do its job.
"Think about what?" I ask, but I'm being an asshole. Of course I know what. Because I think about it, too. Often.
"All the mistakes I made," he answers quietly. "If I'd been less of a coward, everything would have been different. "
I huff, not wanting to let him see just how much I feel his meaning. If I'd kissed him that night, or even the next morning when I’d woken up wrapped around him in my bed, maybe we would have started it sooner. By that point, he'd already told me he wanted to break up with my sister. I’d known he wanted to for a long time, but he didn't want me to be upset with him. Not her, me . And he'd put himself through misery, letting Janel string him along while she pretended not to understand that he was trying to break up with her.
She knew. She told me on the phone, after I'd moved away and she was getting close to her due date. She was emotional and crying that he didn't love her, that he'd only married her because of the baby. She was in her feelings, regretting pushing him, worried she'd be trapped in a loveless marriage forever. And I talked her down, reminding her that he chose to stay with her, to be with her and raise their baby, all while I was secretly getting relief from her pain.
Looking back at that conversation, it might be my fault that she'd started demanding more of him. I pointed out that she had all the power—she had his ring and his baby. If she wanted something from him, she just needed to be more direct. He'd always been a pushover when it came to her. I'd phrased that differently, and said he'd been soft when it came for her, and I said it knowing the real reason why he'd let her get away with so much.
I never thought she'd manage to turn Mik Sanders into a buttoned-up, ambitious working stiff. But here he is, mowing his lawn at an angle and discussing the Homeowner’s Organization over brunch with his wife's PTA friends, pretending to give a fuck about what color hedges the Joneses are allowed to have.
Gone is the guy who once told off an old woman in public for side-eying my rainbow t-shirt. The guy who hated social gatherings in any capacity but would go when I needed a wingman, who wasn't afraid to take a hit to help his team score, who just rolled with the punches and rarely got worked up about anything. Now he wears tucked in long-sleeved polo shirts, pretends to be something he's not, and has anxiety so bad it gives him crippling migraines. Yeah, I Googled every medication in his bathroom cabinet. Sue me.
My eyes trace over the ink on his exposed skin, his body stretched out on the couch. I suppose she didn't completely ruin him. Under all his professional clothes and fake smiles, there's still a little of that laid back, cynical, rebellious boy that I knew and loved.
"You did what you had to do," I finally answer, repeating his own words from the other day.
"I didn't have to keep how I felt a secret from you for so long. I didn't have to let her stay that night." His eyes open again. "I didn't have to let you go without at least making you talk to me," he almost whispers.
"What was there to talk about?" I say, throwing my hands up and then dragging them over my face with a deep breath. There's no point in getting upset over it. It is what it is. No amount of rehashing the past can change it. "It was done."
He flutters his eyelashes, the flickering light catching the glint of a tear before it soaks into his pillow. He notices me watching and sits up, pinching the bridge of his nose.
"Ignore me," he grumbles. "I get a little weird after I come down from a migraine. Sometimes I get the shits, sometimes I get emotional. Take your pick which is worse." He chuckles, trying to release some of the tension in the air, and reaches for his bottle of water and a few grapes.
"I think about it," I say, digging my fingers into my thighs. What the fuck, Jason?! Just keep your mouth shut, already! Let it go!
Mik blinks slowly in my direction, until the silence is too heavy.
"But I don't think you were a coward. I think you were too kind to my sister, and she sometimes took advantage of that kindness. And neither of us said anything, because neither of us wanted to risk our friendship."
"And yet, it happened anyway. If I had–"
"There's no point, Mik. We could spend our entire lives coming up with 'what if' scenarios, but not one of them will change the here and now." I take a breath. "Obviously, we have some unresolved issues between us. And maybe we can work through some of them, maybe not. But what we can't do is go back.”
“We can never go back," I add, though quieter, swallowing a rush of emotion that attempts to clog my throat.
I stand up, suddenly exhausted and overwhelmed by feelings that I'm not able to decipher or manage. It feels like my body is being slowly swallowed by it, starting with my legs and growing up my body. It's heavy and sticky and visceral. I need to find some space to breathe before I drown in it.
Before I walk up the stairs, I pause, looking over my shoulder but not able to look directly at him.
"For what it's worth, you made the right choice. I realize now that it wasn't an easy decision for you to make, but if you had come after me, I would have made it harder." My heart clenches in my chest, and the creeping heaviness tightens its hold on me. "I left because I knew you'd do the right thing, and I wasn't strong or brave enough to stand by and watch it. I would have begged you to run away with me instead. I was the coward."