remember the contra la montre challenge for couch?

[wellownedbkup]

He fidgeted for the fourteenth time in three minutes, the leather making him slide forward when he slouched.

“Do you want to sit in a normal chair, David? You look uncomfortable.” Dr. Alisha Holder stared at her patient as he wiggled higher in the chair.

He looked to it and shook his head. “No. I’m okay, Allie. That looks worse than this. I just need a pillow or something.” She handed him one from behind her. “Thanks.” He propped his head up and looked at the ceiling, as was his wont. He waited in silence for her to begin.

“Well?”

“His name is Nix. He’s gorgeous. Blonde hair, blue eyes… even that little padlock he has in his ear, right up here,” he gestured to the top of his left ear. She waited. “We were together for a few months and then we broke up. Or… I broke up with him. But I didn’t want to. I wanted to stay with him… wanted to love him… but I couldn’t.”

“Why?”

“He has more issues than me.” He sighed when she looked interested. “He’s masochistic. Bondage. Fetish. His past is full of beatings from men who paid him to rape him. And….”

“And?”

He stalled. “And we broke up. End of story.”

“No. It’s not. You wouldn’t have said anything unless it was otherwise.”

“I don’t think I want to talk about it.”

“Alright then.” She feigned indifference, but he couldn’t see what was really going through her mind.

“It’s just… I wasn’t raised like this. I wasn’t raised to like boys… well, men. Which explains why my parents sent me here. I wasn’t prepared to deal with his problems and still love him. I do love him, don’t get me wrong. I just couldn’t deal with it.”

“It?”

“His dream.”

“What happened?”

“He was friends with this guy named Jade. All Goth and glitter. He dreamt that Jade tied him to the bed… did all kinds of things to him and he liked it. He wanted it. I almost thought I could do that for him. Thought I could give him what he wanted and we’d be alright, right?”

“You were in love. All you want is to make the other person happy.”

“But, I’d been away for two months. I’d expected change, but this was the way he’d been for his whole life. He’d never told me. I was so angry.”

“Only natural. You felt betrayed.”

David nodded dismissively. “He went into the hospital for a week just as I got back. Heart problems. He finally told me everything, and I was trying to soak it all in. I went away for a week, tried to think it all over. I made the mistake of talking to my sister. She doesn’t believe in love like I had for Nix.” He sighed and turned to her. “Is it wrong for me to love him like I do?”

“No. But you need to tell him. He’s probably heartbroken.”

“Yeah. I lied to him about why.”

“You what?”

“I lied. I told him we were just a fling. That I wasn’t gay… just experimenting. And I left him to come back here, Detroit, and that I never wanted to see him again.” He began to shake with silent tears. “I don’t want to leave him. But I can’t go back.” His words resounded in his head, and he couldn’t go on.