“That’s really cool.”
“Thanks. But to answer your original question, I’ve studied psychology a lot. I bet if you thought about it, you’d know why.”
Brek is quiet as he watches me. Eventually, he says, “Loren.”
I nod. “Yep. When I was maybe six, I remember overhearing Mom on the phone. Maybe with her sister or mother—I don’t know. But she was complaining about how fucked up Loren is. She literally used those words. To describe my three-year-old brother. He wasthree. I was so angry, and I told Myro all the things Mom was saying about him: Loren wasn’t a real person, he couldn’t feel anything, he was going to grow up to be a criminal. In later years, I remember hearing her say that he should be put down. As if he were a fucking dog.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah. I was eight when I began to understand how to do research. Sociopathy is the first subject I truly researched. I read everything I could get my hands on. But as you can imagine, to understand sociopathy, you also need to have a grasp of psychology.”
“Everything falls into place,” he notes.
I nod. “So, no degree. But more than a search engine degree.”
He grins.
“That was a long way to say that you’re allowed to figure yourself out all on your own if you choose, and there’s nothing wrongwith that. Especially with something like your sexuality and identity. We live in a world that programs us to fit into cookie-cutter roles, and anyone who deviates from that is mentally ill.”
“Or a terrorist,” he notes.
I snort. “Right? It’snoteasy figuring yourself out when everyone around you says that there’s something fundamentally wrong with you because you innately don’t fit into that role. Especially when you’ve had a lifetime of indoctrination to be one thing and when you finally break free, you may need another lifetime to unlearn that bullshit and figure out the truth about yourself.”
“I admit that I’m not good at asking for help,” Brek acknowledges. “I guess… My friends will accept me no matter what I tell them, but I kind of feel like I need to come to my truth on my own. Without any other voices in my ear suggesting that maybe I’m this or that.”
“Do they do that?”
“Not in a malicious way, but yeah. I think they do because they want to make sure I have all the facts. I have all the resources. I appreciate that, but…”
“You need to do it on your own.”
He sighs. “Yes.”
“Then do it on your own. I’m going to sleep.”
Brek grins.
I curl up into him in the chair we’re currently sharing and close my eyes. He laughs quietly. I never said I was going to my own room to sleep.
8
BREK
I’ve feltguilty for a few days now. In a way, I accepted help from Voss when I’m still pushing my friends off so they don’t try to help. Voss’ help is different, though. He handed me a website and then said nothing else unless I talked. And when our conversation continued, he didn’t talk about my asexuality.
For the past few days, we haven’t talked about it at all. We’ve hung out again after work. We kiss sometimes. We cuddled again last night.
Voss hasn’t so much as tried to make out. I haven’t had to feel like I need to make a decision on whether I’m in the mood with this man again, and… I appreciate it.
The stress that followed my orgasm with him was something I didn’t anticipate. It had nothing to do with him. Not his fault in the least. Not even the stress that came after. It was all me because I was thrown into a new reality about myself that didn’t make sense. I thought I knew myself. Suddenly, I wasn’t the man I thought I was an hour before.
There’s a quiet tap on my door that has me looking up. I’m sitting in the middle of my big bed with my tablet propped up, open to the website Voss provided me three nights ago. It’s the most thorough that I’ve found, though I have looked up specific terms in more detail anywhere I can.
It’s easier for me to relate to a label when I can find firsthand accounts of it. Sexuality labels are a lot like medical terms, where you’re given very clinical, matter-of-fact definitions. I need to know what it means in real-life terms. How it feels. What it means for a person’s day-to-day.
Firsthand accounts aren’t always easy to find, though. Either I’m not looking in the right place, or this isn’t an experience that people are forthcoming about sharing their experiences with.
Voss steps into my bedroom. He meets my eyes before shutting the door behind him. I stopped locking the door since he forced me to acknowledge my assholery.
