Chapter One Nix
Nix
Two minutes left. Checking the time as he watches the boiling pot, Nix is careful not to overcook the noodles. Dawson hates soggy noodles and has a very persuasive way of helping Nix remember it. He checks the table, careful that everything is exactly how it should be, slipping the ruler he used to measure the setup into the drawer. He takes a quick sip of water from the faucet to hold off his hunger because his boyfriend of five years demands his meal be ready the minute he’s home.
Acting on autopilot as he drains and finishes the pasta, forcing down his mounting anxiety, he wipes his hands on his worn t-shirt. Nix plates the side dishes and waits until he hears the door lock disengage before turning to fill Dawson’s plate with spaghetti . The hot food sloshes a bit over his hand because of his broken fingers (slammed in the bathroom door for a wet towel on the floor) and the shaking from what he knows must be low blood sugar.
He’d been denied food again after bringing home a poor-quality apple yesterday. It had a bruise, so Dawson had then thrown it at him. The bruise on his face would be a reminder to do better. Throwing the perfectly good apple out afterward in front of a hungry Nix had hurt almost as much as the bruise. Hopefully tonight, he’ll be allowed to eat some leftovers.
“Honey! I’m home!” Nix had never been more grateful that Dawson found himself funny because Nix hadn’t felt that way for quite some time. “Come, kiss me. I’ve had a great day.”
Nix leans in to accept Dawson’s sloppy kiss on his cheek. The nausea from his proximity and that faint rotten fruit smell makes it a struggle not to flinch, especially when Dawson takes pleasure in pressing down on the still-blooming bruise, licking it for good measure. He presses his nose deep into the bruise and sighs. “You smell so good, Austin. Now, my love, why isn’t dinner on the table?”
Austin. It’s the name on his birth certificate, but he’d never been called that until Dawson had decided it suited him better than his middle name, Phoenix. Nix hadn’t been asked which he preferred, but it hasn’t changed how he thinks of himself.
Dawson takes a minute to slide the tag pendant out of the neckline on Nix’s shirt and gives it a hard tug. “There we go. Just the way I like it.” The pendant had been a gift during their dating days, and Dawson insisted he never take it off. The only time he had was a night Nix had tried to block out entirely. It was stainless steel, and Dawson had told him the symbol on the reverse meant eternal love. In the coming years, Nix knew that tag was more about Dawson’s ownership than any love and tried to keep it hidden, even from himself.
A frisson of fear skates down his spine at his boyfriend’s manic mood, and as he takes his seat, Nix can see him mentally measuring the placement of the tableware, looking for a point of contention. When he can find none, Nix relaxes a bit and, in his relief, forgets his weakened, un-splinted broken fingers. With detached horror, he watches the food slide onto the pristine floor, with the sound of the shattering plate close behind.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry…” Nix hears his desperate apologies, futile though they are. Apologies never work, and begging only made Dawson draw out whatever punishment he had in mind. Nix wants to run and hide in his closet, but he knows that if Dawson has to chase him, it will be much worse. Another lesson he’d learned the hard way.
Time seems to slow as it always did in Nix’s moments of horror, but it isn’t long before Dawson has him by the hair, forcing him to his knees into the still-hot food and broken glass. “You stupid bitch! Day after day, I’m forced to take care of you, and all I ask is to have dinner on time. Clean this shit up.” He flings Nix back, and in doing so, Nix hits his head on the cabinet. His vision goes black around the edges, but he scrambles to his knees, forcing glass from the shattered bowl through his thin sweatpants.
“For fuck’s sake! Get up!” Dawson grabs Nix by the arm with such force he feels his shoulder give way. Dawson was so strong. He didn’t look like it, with an average build and a height shorter than Nix’s own, but he was vicious, always eager to use it to cause pain. Nix’s shriek seems to urge Dawson into a frenzy, like a dog with a squeaky toy.
“Stop that noise! You’ll annoy the neighbors, and if I get one more noise complaint about you, you’ll be even more sorry than you were the last time.” Dawson’s smile is darkly self-satisfied with his remembrance. The last time had involved Nix naked on the concrete floor of the balcony overnight. In October. After Dawson had used him and made him bleed. Remembering that silences him immediately.
Dawson dares to look disappointed.
Biting his lips to hold them closed, he reaches for the towel with his good arm. Dawson stands with his arms crossed and watches him struggle back down to his knees, trying not to jostle his arm. Blood from the glass is already seeping through his threadbare sweatpants. With obvious enjoyment, Dawson grabs a beer from the fridge as if he is settling in to watch a favorite game.
Nix startles and goes still like a prey animal when Dawson’s text tone sounds. Sighing at the distraction from his favorite sport, Dawson retrieves his phone. Reading the text, he belches.
“Well, Austin, I’m going out now. Who knows for how long? Better get this mess cleaned up before I get back. I’m getting tired of teaching you a lesson every time you fuck up.”
Leaning over, he pats Nix’s sore shoulder with a chuckle and lumbers out the door. Nix doesn’t move. He wouldn’t put it past him to jump out and scare him. He’d done it before. After he counts to two thousand, Nix slowly gets to his feet. Letting himself cry is not an option. When was the last time he’d allowed himself that show of emotion? Years.
But now, Nix has to take stock of the situation. The pain radiating from his arm is intense, and he’s afraid it may be dislocated, which means an emergency room. Shit . He’s been to every ER in a fifty-mile radius. Repeat visits were not allowed under Dawson’s rules because bleeding-heart nurses asked too many pointed questions about domestic abuse.
The last time he’d gone to the same ER, he’d had the misfortune of getting the same nurse as the previous visit. Dawson had taken him for some broken ribs, and when he’d left the curtained med-bay to take a call, she’d asked him if he needed help. So sincere. He’d wanted to say yes. Beg for her to hide him, shield him, and call the police. But he couldn’t.
Dawson had made a promise that Nix knew he would keep. A promise that Dawson would track down his MeeMaw and make sure she knew it was his fault before he did to her every single punishment he’d given Nix over the years. Nix had seen the list. A detailed spreadsheet of dates, times, and injuries. Sometimes, with photographs. Dawson knows all of Nix’s soft spots and relishes telling Nix in explicit detail how he’ll regret it if he ever thinks of leaving.
Finding his wallet tucked inside, with his TenCare health card, bus pass, and the only treasure he allowed himself to keep from his old life hidden in a tear in the fabric lining, Nix bites his lip to stifle a sound, sharp pain shooting through his arm like bolts of fire. Even putting aside the obvious motivation to avoid punishment, Nix genuinely likes his neighbors and hates to worry them any more than he already does. He always tries to meet their sympathetic faces with cheer, shaking off their concern for his bruises with claims of accident-prone impacts with door frames and clumsy falls when they cross paths in the hall.
Making sure the door to the apartment closes firmly, he makes his way to the elevator to see if he can get the bus to yet another new hospital and be ready to tell yet another new set of lies. He distracts himself by imagining what exciting new story he could weave for them and still make it believable. Was it a water-skiing incident? Zip lining? He wants to smile at the ludicrousness. He’d never been anywhere like that since coming to Nashville six years ago or before.
Despite living within thirty miles of the coastline in Jacksonville when he lived with his grandmother, they’d never even been to the beach. There hadn’t been the funds nor the time for any excursions, as Nix had tried to focus on his studies, hoping he could study on a scholarship at a university in Nashville.
But oh, how he missed the beach and Ja—
No . No good comes of that line of thought. Instinctively feeling for his wallet with his good arm, he sighs. Knowing the treasure he’s hidden inside has survived these almost nine years brings him a bit of solace. Not that he allows himself the comfort of looking at it anymore. He often wonders how something could hurt so much and still be the only thing in his twenty-four years to bring even a speck of joy.
Leaning gingerly back against the cracked, mirrored wall inside the elevator, he avoids meeting his own eyes and tries not to think about the people he’s lost or the happiest days of his life. He also tries not to imagine what Dawson will do if he gets home before Nix does. That thought causes an uptick in his heart rate and makes him freeze until he can force the fear back. Instead, he focuses on his shoulder’s deep, raw ache because it is better than the fear. Nights where Dawson is out fucking his newest conquest mean he might not be home until after midnight. But even getting his dick wet won’t save Nix if that mess is still on the floor.
Exiting the elevator, he admits to himself that he had stopped caring long ago about the other people Dawson had sex with. He is sure this one might be more serious, and he can’t help but be glad about it. It means Dawson is less likely to want to hurt Nix that way. Or at least not as often.
Pushing the building’s front doors open, he turns toward the bus stop, dreading the long journey to an “acceptable” emergency room and knowing it will be even more nerve-racking on the return. He stumbles a bit as his empty stomach gnaws relentlessly, but it is easy to ignore that this is his third day of just water when his shoulder aches so badly —small things to be grateful for, Nix, small things.
Dawson’s apartment (never home, never that) is deep in the heart of Nashville. Not close enough to the East Side to be fashionable. Dawson laments how his talents are wasted at Ripley Records, where he works in marketing and that’s why they have to live in squalor. Dawson finds great pleasure harping for hours on end about how he should have been a star, that his musical dreams were being lived by talentless hacks who fucked their way to the top or were given a free ride because of nepotism.
Those long tirades never end well for Nix, either. In the early days, he’d tried placating Dawson’s volatile temper and easing his frustrations with attention and encouragement. It wasn’t two months into their living together before Nix realized Dawson liked to work himself up so he could tear Nix down. Still, maybe Nix deserves it. He doesn’t contribute to the household finances, as Dawson likes to remind him, and he was a college dropout. No matter that Dawson had been the reason, Nix missed classes and eventually was expelled. Nix blamed himself for that and his current predicament.
There are so many people whose lives are harder than his own. Nix tried to appreciate that the building was well kept, that the custodian was kind, and that his neighbors were polite. He’s always grateful that the bus stop is right in front of his building because sometimes he can’t face the thought of a long walk.
Tonight, while Nix cowered on the floor, bleeding through his sweatpants, the moon had risen high in the sky. Shivering in his T-shirt in the early fall weather, he realizes how strange it is that he can see such a large, full moon in the city.
It’s so beautiful. The pain in his shoulder, knees, stomach, and fingers fades a bit as he stops to admire it . How beautiful you are! If you are listening, could you help me? I need a bit of luck tonight if I’m to find a different hospital and be home on time. Thank you.
Nix steps under the bus stop shelter, and the moon slips out of view just as a bus arrives. The blue door slides open, and the driver gives a surprised smile. The older gentleman raises his nose as if he is smelling the air like people do at restaurants or bakeries.
How weird. But Nix doesn’t mind “weird.” He likes people, and aside from the risk of making friends, Nix finds small moments of happiness in making people smile. The driver seems surprised that Nix intends to get on his bus as he struggles to get his pass out, but the driver shakes his head.
“Don’t worry about using that, son. It’s not what you need here. I’ll take you anyway, though. Find a seat.” He slides the doors shut and, looking back into the bus, Nix notices it’s empty. How odd. Public transport in Nashville is famously crowded. You have to be prepared for standing in crowded buses no matter the time of day and this one is empty at eight o’clock on a Friday night? Mind-blowing! Maybe someone heard his prayer after all.
Sliding into the seat nearest the driver, he clutches his arm. “I’m not certain of this route number, 0713. Does it go near a hospital?”
“Sure does. Nashville General? Ascension? Which do you prefer…this route goes by both.” The bus lurches a bit as it merges into nighttime traffic, and Nix wonders how the route could be taken by both major hospitals when they were at either end of the city.
“Neither, if possible. Do you know of another one? I’m in a bit of a hurry, and I need to get home before my–uh before it’s too late. I’m sorry to bother you. Just drop me at the connecting stop, and I can find my way after that.” Cheeks pink with the obvious lie, Nix tries to hide his embarrassment with a laugh. So much for suave stories about mythical zip-lining tonight; he really is an idiot. Nix wishes he could blame it on his low blood sugar.
“None of that, now. You found this bus, you found me, and we’re going to get you fixed up. I’ve got just the place. Hang on.” Nix relaxes, then. Trusting the driver to get him where he needs to go, Nix looks out the window, and he notices the bus passing by several full bus stops with red buses stopping to pick up passengers. Their six-digit route numbers are clear in marquee-style LED signs: six, not four. Red buses, not blue. Weird.
It isn’t more than fifteen minutes before Nix’s empty bus slides to a stop in front of a hospital emergency lane. “Here you are, Nix. They’ll get you what you need.” The older man moves as Nix gets off the bus, looking as if he might step down and guide him through the doors himself. In the end, he remains seated and waves. “Remember, son, you deserve good things.”
It isn’t until Nix is inside the vestibule of the emergency room, feeling the warm blow of heated air, that he realizes something: he’d never given the driver his name. And even if he had, he certainly wouldn’t have said Nix because he hasn’t heard that name said out loud in almost five years.