Twenty-One
Rowan
Something is wrong with Hudson.
I noticed it at the group session on Tuesday night. Sitting so close to him in the observation room, it was impossible to miss.
He was quieter than usual. It wasn’t his normal, hyper-observant quiet, but a heavy silence that made the small room feel like an airless vault.
I even handed him a reason to tease me on a silver platter. During the second half of the session, I drew a remarkably detailed, wildly inappropriate sketch of a certain male body part. It had shading and an unnecessary but artistically impressive vein. I’d put effort into that penis.
When I nudged the pad toward him, he barely smiled.
Frankly, the lack of appreciation was insulting. It was one of my better penises.
“You okay, Shrink Wrap?” I’d asked when Dr. Webb dismissed the group.
He’d given me a flat, tight smile. “I’m fine.”
He used my favorite lie.
I didn’t push him. Hudson never forced me to hand over my secrets before I was ready, so I gave him the same courtesy. I packed up my sketchbook, squeezed his shoulder through the soft wool of his sweater, and left.
But damn it, I’m worried.
It’s Saturday afternoon, and I’ve been thinking about him every day since. Which explains why, through a combination of sheer impulse and complete insanity, I am standing outside his house.
My pulse kicks up as I stare at the front door.
This is insane.
I knock anyway.
Footsteps sound on the hardwood inside. A second later, the door swings open.
Hudson stands in the entryway in dark jeans and a plain black T-shirt, his hair rumpled like he’s been running his hands through it all morning. The second his blue eyes land on me, his entire face shifts from exhaustion to concern.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing is wrong,” I say quickly, holding up a hand before he can march me inside and take my vitals. “I’m physically intact.”
He blinks, apparently adjusting to the news that I’m not actively bleeding on his porch.
“Why are you here?”
“I need your help.”
“With what?”
“You’ll see.”
I pop my trunk with the key fob and head toward the car.
He exhales through his nose, but his footsteps follow me down the driveway.
Inside the trunk are several cans of house paint, two heavy canvas drop cloths, painter’s tape, a handful of clamps, and enough brushes to redecorate half the neighborhood.
Hudson stops beside me.
“Rowan,” he says slowly, pointing at a can of bright yellow. “What is this?”
“Paint.”
His eyes narrow. “I can see that it’s paint.”
“Good. Medical school continues to pay dividends.”
“Why is it in my driveway?”
“Grab some cans.”
“Rowan?”
“You’re a very pretty man, Hudson, but you’re a terrible assistant when you ask too many questions.”
He mutters something under his breath.
I’m almost certain he’s cursing the day he met me.
I haul a drop cloth over my shoulder and lead him around the side of the townhouse into his backyard.
Of course his yard is immaculate.
Green grass. Stone patio. Neatly clipped borders. A high wooden privacy fence running along the back.
I almost feel bad for what I’m about to do to it.
Almost.
Talking isn’t exactly my strong suit either, but paint is. I can help like this.
Hudson sets the cans down and watches as I spread one drop cloth over the ground, then clamp the other along the fence.
“What are we doing in my yard?” he tries again.
I turn around. “Art therapy.”
His expression goes flat. “This is not art therapy.”
“Not with that attitude.”
The shadow I saw on Tuesday is still there, sitting in the lines around his eyes and the tight set of his mouth. Whatever happened, he hasn’t put it down once all week.
Here goes nothing.
“I know something is going on with you,” I say, letting the teasing fall away. “And you don’t have to tell me about it.”
“Rowan, I’m—”
“If you say fine, I’m drawing more penises next week.”
His mouth snaps shut.
“That’s what I thought.”
He stares at me.
“You helped me your way when I needed it,” I say. “You let me sit in your room. You gave me space to talk. You brought me food. You didn’t push when I didn’t want to tell you things. Now let me help you my way.”
He searches my face for several seconds. “What do you want me to do?”
Poor bastard sounds terrified.
I march over to the cans, pry open three lids with the flathead screwdriver I brought, and point toward the hanging canvas.
“Throw paint.”
His eyebrows lift. “What?”
“You heard me. Pick up a brush, load it with paint, and throw it.”
“I’m not throwing paint at my fence.”
“The fence is covered, you neat freak.”
“This is ridiculous.”
“Throw the paint.”
“It’s an inefficient, messy, completely unscientific response to—”
“Talking doesn’t solve everything all the time!”
I grab a brush, soak it in yellow, and fling it at the canvas.
Paint explodes across the white surface.
“You spend your days protecting other people’s minds.” I turn to him. “Who protects yours?”
For one second, something raw flashes across his face.
Then his eyes narrow. “Have you been talking to my mother?”
My brush freezes halfway to the paint. “Huh?”
“Never mind.”
He rubs a hand over his face.
“Stop overthinking.” I dip another brush into bright pink and flick it toward the bottom of the canvas. “You’re doing it right now. Whatever is in your head, whatever you’ve been carrying all week, get it out.”
He gaze ping-pongs between me and the paint.
I see the moment the stoic, brilliant doctor gives up on being reasonable.
I expect him to pick up a brush.
He picks up the entire can.
“Hudson—”
WHOOSH. SPLAT.
An explosion of yellow hits the canvas, drenching the drop cloth and spraying across the grass.
My jaw drops. “Holy shit.”
“You told me to throw it!” he shouts.
There’s an energy in his voice I’ve never heard before.
“I meant with a brush!” I scream, already laughing. “You absolute lunatic!”
I’ve created a monster.
Worse, I’ve created a monster with excellent upper-body strength and access to twenty gallons of paint.
He grabs a wide brush, dunks it into the blue, and slashes it across the canvas.
I scoop white into a plastic cup and throw it over his yellow. “Get it out! Come on!”
Hudson doesn’t hold back. He dips, slashes, throws, and splatters, each movement bigger than the last. Blue cuts through yellow.
Pink lands across white. Paint hits his shirt, his arms, the grass.
Every strike against the canvas feels like a physical exorcism.
It’s grief and professional control being shredded to pieces right in front of me.
I’m laughing so hard my stomach hurts as I add another color.
At some point, Hudson reaches for another can and his shoe slides on the paint-slick drop cloth beneath us.
His arm shoots out.
Unfortunately, I’m what he grabs.
“Oh, shit—”
My feet go out from under me.
Hudson catches my arm and twists just before we hit, taking the ground on his back and pulling me against his chest.
We land in the grass in a tangle of limbs and wet paint.
For three seconds, neither of us moves.
Then I lift my head.
I’m a mess, but Hudson is so much worse.
His black T-shirt is ruined. Blue streaks one side of his arm. Bright yellow runs through his hair and down the side of his nose.
I stare at the yellow on his face. He stares at the pink smeared across my neck.
A sound rumbles out of him. At first, I think he’s groaning, but then it grows.
And Hudson is… laughing.
It’s the loudest, most unrestrained sound I’ve ever heard him make.
I start laughing too. Within seconds, my shoulders are shaking, and I roll off him onto the grass, staring up at the sky while we both lose whatever dignity we had left.
When the laughter eventually fades, Hudson turns his head toward me.
There’s no guardedness in his expression anymore, just tired blue eyes and yellow paint on his nose.
“Thank you,” he says quietly.
I smile and reach over to squeeze his wrist where it rests in the grass between us.
“You’re welcome.”