Chapter 43 ALEX
ALEX
Anytime I’m not with Theo, I focus on myself.
I try to, anyway.
I make dinner plans with Anna and Jessica, I go to drinks with Bailey, I get lunch with Suzie, and I don’t talk about him at all.
I run, I paint, I watch movies, I wander through Astoria, and I don’t wish he was with me.
I lay in bed at night, not missing his arms around me and definitely not thinking about him when I’m masturbating.
The next time I see him, he still seems nervous. I try to get him to engage with me, and he tries, but he keeps giving me this look like he thinks I’ll disappear at any moment. He doesn’t relax at all throughout the movie, constantly keeping himself from touching me.
It’s jarring. I don’t know how I feel about stressed out, unsure Theo.
***
Alex, 11:25 AM:
hey
Theo, 11:53 AM:
What’s wrong?
Are you okay?
Why are you texting me?
i hope therapy goes well today :)
Thanks, Alex.
That means a lot.
see you tomorrow?
I can’t fucking wait.
***
On Wednesday, we go to the sports bar where I first met him, which makes him extremely uncomfortable, but I flirt with him until he finally relaxes a little.
I choose a secluded booth and let him order the drinks so he doesn’t have to watch me interact with the bartender, and I sit close to him and make him watch the Blazers game.
Neither of us cares about basketball, but it’s a neutral subject that we can make stupid jokes about, and the easy conversation seems to make him feel better.
By the end of the night, he’s almost the Theo I’m used to.
Almost.
***
Alex, 11:57 AM:
how was therapy?
Theo, 1:00 PM:
I will do anything to not answer that question right now.
anything?
Whatever you want.
oysters from the place on the pier?
Fuck yes.
Pick you up after work.
It feels normal. Not normal for us, but what normal dating is supposed to feel like.
***
On Saturday, we drive out to the beach and walk up the shore, not talking, but our silence is comfortable again.
We sit up on a dune and watch the waves come in, the wreck of the Iredale visible down the beach.
It’s cold and rainy, so I sit close and lean into Theo, and I can feel his arm jerk against mine as he keeps himself from wrapping it around me.
“How are you feeling?”
He snorts and shakes his head. “I have no idea. Not great.” I slip my hand into his, interlocking our fingers and squeezing his hand.
“How are you feeling about this?” He grips my hand tightly, not looking at me.
“I don’t know. I’m so grateful and excited, but I’m stressed and confused, and I feel so fucking guilty all the time.
Mostly I’m just terrified that I’m going to fuck it up or hurt you again.
I’m really worried that you don’t want to be here, or that it’s unhealthy for you to be with me, which is probably what Dr. Mills thinks.
” He runs his hand through his hair quickly and huffs out an angry breath.
I pull his face towards me, and I can tell he’s searching for any indication of how I’m feeling, so I smile softly at him, rubbing my thumb over his cheekbone.
“Well, I feel good about this so far,” I say as I lean in to kiss him. He makes a soft noise and kisses me back but doesn’t move, letting me set the pace of the kiss. I can tell he wants more, and I can feel him holding himself back, and I grin against his lips.
He’s trying so hard.
“I feel really good about it, honestly,” I say, kissing him again.
“I feel really good about you.” Theo’s smile is small and fragile, but it reaches his eyes, and I don’t think he can help how he melts into me, wrapping his other arm around my waist and pulling me closer.
He looks down at me, and I can tell he’s unsure, but I’m starting to see that means he’s thinking about me, and warmth spreads through me.
I like that I’m the one in control now, and I like making him feel good.
I like him, even like this.
***
Outside of our dates, we start running together again on Sundays, even though it’s usually pouring.
We always end our runs at the coffee shop by my work, which I find out Theo started frequenting when he was following me.
When I make a joke about him stalking me, he gets so upset that he leaves immediately, and I bring him his coffee and a pastry, and we end up sitting on his porch and talking for hours about everything that happened between us.
We’re both completely honest, and Theo has a panic attack when we talk about the first few times we had sex. He swears he’s never making coq a vin again, and I have to hide my disappointment, mostly because I want to reinforce him having boundaries, even if they’re boundaries I don’t like.
The more we talk, the more I get to see what his perspective was from inside the delusion.
I had a decent understanding of what his delusion was from pushing to find the limits, but it was so real to him.
His justifications for his behavior are almost well-intentioned, and his understanding and interpretation of my behavior was so off base, but not entirely.
I feel so much softer towards him after hearing his side, knowing that he always genuinely cared about me in his own insane way.
Knowing that makes me less nervous about us making this work.
When we talk about his behavior, there are things Theo can accept and take accountability for, and things he can’t.
He feels terrible about scaring me, about triggering me, about making me feel like I’d lost control of my life, about anything that made me feel bad, and he takes accountability and apologizes profusely.
He knows he shouldn’t have stalked me or broken into my apartment, and he does apologize, but his apologies seem so pale in comparison to how he apologized for hurting me that I don’t think he feels bad about any of it.
He gets exceptionally cagey and evasive when I try to address his stalking impulses, and he won’t give me a straight answer on how many people he’s stalked besides Ashley and I, so I drop it.
He’ll have to tell me eventually, though.
The only thing he can’t seem to accept as part of the delusion is the connection he thinks we have. He tells me he logically recognizes it’s most likely delusional, but he explicitly avoids answering whether he thinks we’re connected. I drop that, too.
It’s delusional, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if it were true.
***
After that conversation, it gets easier to talk about things.
Both of us struggle to be open, but we work hard to answer questions honestly and to volunteer information, and being vulnerable with each other starts to feel good.
On top of that, we get back to just enjoying each other’s company, and things start to feel real between us.
We agree not to go out more than three times a week, besides running on Sundays, and the more comfortable we get together, the more Theo starts asking me about my days in minute detail. He acts casual when he asks, trying not to make it obvious how much he misses stalking me.
It’s very obvious.
I start to feel calmer, more in control of myself and my life as time goes on. Being in control is good for me, and I’m able to emotionally invest so much more because of it. It’s my choice to go slowly with him, to make sure he’s proving himself to me, but I miss what we had.
I miss spending days on end with him. I miss his constant, overwhelming amounts of affection.
I miss him showing up randomly when I’m not expecting him.
I miss the fridge full of homemade food and coming home to him when he shouldn’t be there.
I miss the weird, unexpected texts about what I’m doing in the moments we’re not together.
I’m horrified once I realize I kind of miss the stalking, too.
I don’t tell Theo.
Over the weeks, Theo’s mood seems to pick up and even out.
He seems less anxious and more sure of himself, and I see more and more flashes of the Theo I know.
He second-guesses himself more and seems unsure if things are what they are occasionally, but he starts to feel more secure in what’s happening between us.
I think the therapy is helping, even though I know he’s only trying because I’ve asked him to.
He really doesn't like his therapist.
He also doesn’t seem to like himself.
That makes one of us.
Because my biggest demand of him is honesty, and we’re talking so much, I’m getting to know Theo on a deeper level.
He’s not great at being vulnerable, but he tries hard to let me all the way in.
He’s got so many fucking issues, but he’s genuinely a sweet, caring person at his core.
The more I learn about him, the more sense he makes to me, and every time I look at him, I see a depth that I didn’t see before.
I let Theo get to know me, too. He made a lot of assumptions about my life based on stalking me and what information he could find online.
While he wasn’t entirely off base, he never really knew everything, either.
I get to tell him whole, messy truths about my life and let him see the parts of myself I tried to hide from him.
The more he gets to know me, the more it feels like he sees me as less of an idea and more as a person, and he loves me all the more for it.
For the first time in my life, I don’t feel like I have to do anything to earn the love I’m receiving. It gets harder for me to ignore and push down and manage my feelings about him, so I stop trying.
After that, it’s hard to go slowly.
***
Alex, 10:03 AM:
no gifts! no valentines day!
Theo, 10:05 AM:
Flowers aren’t technically gifts.
And they have nothing to do with Valentine’s Day.
i love them
thank you
I hope you have a good day, sweetheart.
After a lonely day and a lonelier night with a bottle of wine and my vibrator, I take a photo of myself for the first time, making sure not to get my face.
Theo, 11:50 PM:
When I get my fucking hands on you, you won’t walk for a week.
Alex, 11:51 PM: