Chapter 19 #2
My attention was spotty at best after that.
Being alone with him was a test of my willpower.
His laughter, his smell, and even the way his throat bobbed while he drank hypnotized me.
I loved that he was still the same Dawson, but also subtly different.
His scent was more masculine, his jaw shadowed with faint stubble, and his body was carved with new muscles.
I studied each little change in him I could find, seeing fragments of the boy I once knew in the man he was now.
“You’re staring.”
Dawson’s soft words snapped me out of my daze. I probably should have been embarrassed, but I had no shame when it came to appreciating him. I rested my elbow on the back of the couch, angling myself towards him.
“I was thinking about the day this movie released in theaters. You remember?”
Dawson’s face split into a grin and my heart seized in my chest. After hearing that the theater was doing an all day screening for the movie series, we’d convinced a bunch of our friends to skip with us to go see it.
We’d of course gotten caught and grounded for two weeks, but it had been totally worth it.
“Oh my god, I forgot about that. And we tried to shove like, fourteen people in two cars because only two of our friends were old enough to drive.”
“Right,” I chuckled. “And then I sat on your lap and you complained the whole way there.”
“Because your bony ass was digging into my thighs.”
I smacked Dawson square in the face with one of the throw pillows. I cracked up at the shock on his face, but gave him a clear opening to nail me right on the nose in payback. We grappled for the pillow, yanking it back and forth, but I only ended up pulling Dawson closer.
His eyes were bright with laughter and the air crackled between us. I relinquished my hold on the pillow and we slouched back, still huffing out breathless laughs. I felt the brush of Dawson’s pinky against my own.
“You know what I remember most about that day?” I murmured.
Instead of answering, Dawson stretched out a finger, drawing slow circles on the back of my hand.
My skin tingled from the contact and I soaked in the tiny, intimate gesture.
He used to do it all the time when we were younger to ground me when I was anxious or upset.
The fact he remembered made my throat tighten.
“I remember being so jealous I could barely breathe. McKenna had been flirting with you for weeks and when she sat next to you, I was so pissed. I watched you all day for any sign that you liked her back, terrified that you’d hold her hand or put your arm around her when the lights went out.
Especially when I would have given anything for you to hold my hand in that theater instead. ”
“You never told me that,” Dawson whispered roughly. I smiled weakly, stroking my little finger against his lightly.
“I’d been hiding how I felt about you for almost two years at that point. If I had let on that I was jealous, you would’ve figured it out. But then a couple months later we got together and it didn’t matter anymore.”
“I never liked her like that. I never liked anyone else before you.”
His voice was low and smooth, like honey poured in my ears. His eyes were molten, heating me from the inside out. My heartbeat thudded a heavy, uneven rhythm I could feel everywhere. Dawson’s pinky ensnared mine and I almost fell to pieces at his feet.
“It’s always been you.”
He’d barely gotten the words out before my lips were on him, devouring him in a slow, desperate kiss. His tongue tentatively slid against mine and a low growl vibrated in my chest. I cupped his jaw, deepening the kiss, chasing his sweet taste that I’d craved for years.
I worried he’d push me away, but Dawson’s fingers tangled in my shirt and he pulled me closer.
The kiss grew hungry, leaving me lightheaded as all my blood rushed south to my cock.
Dawson leaned back and tugged me down to cover him.
Our dicks rubbed together through our sweatpants and I groaned as pleasure shot down my spine.
Dawson moaned into my mouth and I swallowed it down greedily, wanting to coax every delicious sound from him I could.
“Fuck Mercury, I missed this…missed you,” I panted, our steady rocking driving me closer to the edge. He let out a pained whimper, rutting against me frantically. He clawed at my back as we chased our releases, trading gasping breaths between us.
“Oh god, Theo,” Dawson cried, his voice wrecked with lust. His head dropped back, eyes clenched shut as I quickened my thrusts.
“That’s it, baby…shit, I’m close.”
Dawson’s body tightened and his eyes shot open. Panic replaced pleasure as he scrambled to push me off him.
“No no, wait. Stop,” he begged.
Immediately I pulled back, even though my dick throbbed with my impending orgasm. My stomach cramped painfully at being denied release, but I ignored it, focusing on the shaken look on Dawson’s face.
“What’s wrong? Did I hurt you?” I asked in a rush.
Dawson scooted back into the corner, putting as much distance between us as he could manage. It hurt like hell after what we’d just done and I cursed myself for pushing him too far, too fast. He shook his head as he caught his breath, pushing his sweaty hair back with shaking hands.
“You didn’t hurt me,” he replied unsteadily. “I, um, I’m just not ready.”
“I’m so sorry, I thought you wanted it…”
“I did—do want it. What you said…nevermind.”
“No, wait. What did I say?”
Dawson looked uncomfortable, avoiding my gaze. He chewed the inside of his cheek as though debating whether to tell me or not.
“The last thing you said…it was the same thing I overheard the night I found you and Corvin together.”
Guilt rushed to the surface and a chill swept through me. A queasy feeling settled low in my gut, but I knew it wasn’t a fraction as bad as Dawson must have felt. Even thinking of anyone else touching him made me physically ill, and he’d witnessed my shameful moment firsthand.
“I know nothing I say will make it any better or make you hurt less, but I can’t even begin to explain how fucking sorry I am for that night,” I rasped. “God, how can you not hate me for everything I did?”
“Would you hate me if the roles were reversed? If I’d been the one to sleep with someone else in those circumstances?”
“Never,” I answered instantly. I didn’t even have to think about it. It was an innate truth, as real as the blood in my veins.
“Then you understand how I feel. I don’t hate you, regardless of what I said when I was angry.”
“Do you want me to go?”
“No, no I don’t want that. I’m just struggling with the memories of it and…what it means for us, I guess.”
My stomach knotted harshly. “What do you want to know? I’ll tell you whatever you need.”
“I want to know why.” His voice cracked, cutting me with the broken sound.
“I get this might sound like an excuse, but you have to understand something. When I’m manic, I become…self-destructive, I guess. I get these impulses that are hard to ignore. And with the drugs I took, I was a walking disaster.”
“So you’re saying you just couldn’t help yourself? You got the impulse to screw someone and you couldn’t stop no matter what?”
I exhaled heavily, fighting not to let that sinister voice back in that whispered I would ruin everything. Dawson was giving me a chance to earn his trust back. I’d be damned if I messed that up.
“No, not exactly. When I have a manic episode and things get really bad, sometimes I feel…well, horny, but it’s more than that.
It can be intense and I don’t always think through the consequences of things like I normally would.
I don’t necessarily lose all control, but my inhibitions are way down, kind of like being drunk.
It doesn’t happen often and what you saw that night was a…
milder version of that. I had some awareness, but with the drugs… ”
“Then did you realize what you were doing or not? I’m not even sure what’s worse. That you had no control over your actions and it could happen again in the future, or you could have stopped it but you didn’t.”
Through his frustration, I could hear the fear about what this said about me. What he was worried I was capable of if we were together. I knew in my bones I would never cheat on Dawson, never even consider it, but I couldn’t lie to him about this. Not even to assuage his fear.
“The only times I couldn’t curb the impulse was when I was high or wasted,” I said warily.
“But at your party, I had started to come down a bit by that point. I honestly wasn’t aware of it at first, but…
eventually I realized what was happening and I chose to let it.
All because I thought you were with Aly, and I was jealous and miserable. ”
Dawson drew in a shuttering breath, wrapping his arms around himself.
He was quiet for so long that I wondered if I had finally managed to push him away, if he’d decided I wasn’t worth the risk.
I picked at my nails anxiously, weighing the pros and cons of getting on my knees and begging him not to give up on me yet.
“Were you unmedicated at my party?” He peered at me and I nodded solemnly. “What about the other times you couldn’t control it?”
“I hadn’t been taking my pills during any of those times. As much as I hate taking them, the meds definitely suppress any manic symptoms like that.”
Dawson’s head bobbed slowly, but he was still curled into himself and unwilling to look me in the eye. I carefully slid a few inches closer, giving him time to stop me if he wanted.
“Mercury, look at me,” I ordered gently. Glossy, sad eyes met mine, tearing my heart out. “I know you’re scared to trust me and that you think I won’t be able to control myself, but I promise you that I will never hurt you like that again. I would never cheat on you.”
“You can’t promise that,” he whispered brokenly.
“Yes I can. I don’t want Corvin, at all.
And I have no desire to get high or drunk, not when I have you.
I will take every medication, go to every therapy session, do anything I need to stay strong for us.
And if I ever feel like I’m slipping, I will tell you and you can help me stay grounded. We can do this together.”
“Do you really believe that?”
I reached for his hand, bringing it up to rest above my heart.
“There’s not much I trust about my mind, but I trust this. I’ve known you were meant to be mine since we were fifteen. I know I got lost along the way, but I found my way back to you. I am completely devoted to you, Dawson. This heart only beats for you.”
His hand curled into my shirt, dragging me towards him. Our lips met in a soft embrace, a quiet promise that we would find a way through this. Dawson was my anchor, my safe place, and I knew in the deepest parts of me that I could weather any storm with him at my side.
He restarted the movie and we settled into the cushions next to each other. I hated the few inches he left between us, but I wanted to give him what he needed. Space, time, patience, my whole goddamn heart carved from my chest. Anything he wanted of me, it was his.
Dawson reached for my hand, his fingers sliding between mine like a key finding its lock. Eventually, I fell asleep with a smile on my face and Dawson’s hand in mine in a dark theater.