“That her deadname is Patrick? I dunno. I didn’t. Why would I? She’s Paige. I’ve always known her as Paige. As far as I know the name change is legal. It’s on her license.”
“That she’s a boy?”
“She’s not.” Ru paused, grabbing Tommy’s arm. “Tommy…”
Tommy blinked at him, the noise in his head loud. A lifetime of thoughts, chaos. He needed to sort through his toolbox, try to find something to work through the drama, put things in boxes.
“I knew that?” He thought back to their months together. And recalled vaguely the first meeting, Paige’s face bruised as they’d picked her up from the hospital. Dane blurting out that she was a boy. His memory came back at the strangest of times. “Not a boy…” Tommy muttered.
“She’s not,” Ru agreed. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know,” Tommy answered honestly. “I need a minute, then some time with my therapist. Are you going to leave?”
“Do you want me to?”
Tommy blinked at him, unsure how to answer. Too much noise. Did he have a panic attack coming?
He gave up the ghost, and collapsed on his bed. The weight of emotion too heavy. It was a mix of rage and fear, confusion, and hurt, all wrapped up in one. Too much to examine and redirect each. Better to let them out, and sort it out once they were free. What other options were there?
Ru hugged him, letting Tommy cry into his shoulder. Not tears of pain as much as frustration and confusion. “I don’t know what to feel?” Tommy said. “But I feel too much all at once.”
“About?” Ru asked. He tugged Tommy up and over to the couch to sit down, even pulling the weighted blanket off the bottom of the bed to wrap it around Tommy before curling up next to him. “Paige? Your dad?”
“All of it,” Tommy admitted.
“Maybe we can break it down? One thing at a time?” Ru offered. He attended one therapy session a week with Tommy now. But they’d only had a few sessions. “Your dad?”
“He makes me angry. Like, I did a lot for him. I don’t owe him anything. But, he’s my dad. And I look back and question everything now.” The first offered sip of beer, would he be here now without it?
“It’s okay to be angry,” Ru said. “He’s doing things to make you angry. But you can’t stew in that anger. What will you gain from holding onto it?”
Pain. “This was how you felt? When your dad abandoned you?” Tommy asked. Ru didn’t even flinch. That ship had passed years ago.
“He didn’t come back trying to medicate me and take my money. But you’re the reason for that. You’d already helped me get everything moved and diversified ‘cause some hot blonde chick advised you…”
“She was nice, even if we didn’t click,” Tommy reflected back to that meeting ages ago. They had never dated either, but she’d given him invaluable advice.
“The older woman…”
Tommy smiled, but it wasn’t the blonde girl he was thinking of, it was a redhead. Paige. “Liking Paige doesn’t make me gay?” Tommy said out loud the worst thought in his head.
“Because gay would be a bad thing?” Ru asked, brow quirked.
“Of course not. You know that’s not what I mean.”
“I’m gay. One hundred percent,” Ru added. “Paige is more girl than a lot of girls I know. I look at her and think, what a pretty girl, she does nothing for me. I look at Adam and think, hot damn I want that. Even before he was mine. What does your brain say when you look at her? ‘Cause if you’re too worried about what might be between her legs to actually see her, it might be better to break it off now.”
“I’m not trying to be an asshole,” Tommy said. He gripped his hair and tugged, the internal noise a bit much. Everything about Paige said girl to him, but that wasn’t even really the point. She was Paige. Who was always there for him, with a smile, a laugh, a snarky bit of art, and kisses that were still burned deeply into his memory. The negative voices from the world outside were still there, lingering, echoing, and getting louder, demanding to be heard. What had his therapist said? Negative self-talk were words others had said to him, burned into his psyche by trauma? He hated hearing them, layered one over another until it was too much chaos to sort out. Was any of it his thoughts? What did he think?
Ru pulled Tommy’s hands out of his hair. Pressing a stress ball into his grip instead. “I’ll tell her not to come for a few days.”
Tommy flinched.
“You can call her when you’re ready. Decide before you see her again. If you can’t see beyond some social preset label, then maybe it’s best to not move forward with her.”
The idea of not seeing Paige again really hurt. He struggled to breathe for a moment, but Ru was right. Paige didn’t need Tommy’s chaos. If he didn’t know what he felt, leading her on would be cruel. All he knew for sure was that, “I really like her.”
“Her? Or the idea of her?” Ru asked. “There will be other girls. Maybe another girl you like. But you have to know if you like her, or the idea of being with someone. We all need support. I hope you have enough of it now that you’re not holding on because you’re afraid of being alone.”
