Mark snorted. “I wish….”
“Well, apology accepted.” Then Makai’s whole being lit up and he began to laugh.
“What?”
“Emil is going to be intolerable. He called you being gay from that day.”
Mark groaned. “He and half of the fucking town. I don’t even know why I tried to stick to the closet.”
That made Makai turn serious again. “I know why. Fear. Internalized homophobia.”
“Yeah.” Mark looked away. “Anyway, thanks, man. I’ll see you around.”
“Okay.” Makai turned halfway as if to go back inside, then stopped. “If you need a friend… you know. I don’t have that many and….” He shrugged, then opened the door and went inside.
Chapter Twelve
Trauma was weird. Francis knew that from his experiences in the healthcare industry, of course. He just hadn’t quite understood how deeply something could affect him personally.
He’d called Evy after he’d moved to the Grahams’ house, just so he’d have someone who knew about the situation to use as a sounding board.
“Of course you can call me, Francis,” she said after he questioned it.
“It’s just… isn’t there a conflict of interest here?” Francis asked weakly as he sat on his bed at the upstairs guestroom.
“No, because I’m not your therapist, or Mark’s, and you’re both my friends, and I would still never break the confidentiality of my discussions with you two.” She must’ve been smiling, he could hear it in her voice when she asked, “So, what’s going on with you, then?”
Francis smiled. “I don’t know how much Mark told you, but I got triggered by him. Accidentally of course, but triggered nonetheless.”
“Uh-huh, he told me that.”
“I’ve had nightmares since. About the… the assault.”
“Do you want to tell me what happened?” Evy asked in her kind-therapist tone, which Francis could recognize without ever having heard it before.
“I was twenty-one, in college. Padraig, Marcus, and I had this friend who hung out with us. His sister was gay, so he was okay with us all being gay. Not that we were completely open about it. We were at this party one night and there was alcohol and weed, pretty normal stuff for a college party really. Anyway, Padraig and Marcus left before I did. Our friend and I… I guess it was sort of a dare, I can’t remember. We kissed and then… I don’t know.” Francis sighed and pulled a blanket over himself. He needed the comfort.
“It escalated from there?”
“Yeah. I went to use the bathroom, I was ready to go home. When I got out of the bathroom he was waiting for me and kissed me again. We ended up in a bedroom with the door locked and….” Francis realized his eyes were leaking. “At first it was fine, I thought he was experimenting, but you know, I was also young and horny.”
“And drunk and high, that lowers inhibitions like whoa,” she reminded him.
Francis smiled through his tears at her words. “’Like whoa’? Seriously?”
“Shut up.” She chuckled. “But please go on.”
“We were making out and then suddenly it wasn’t enough, I guess. He forced me. Called me slurs and covered my mouth and didn’t let me call for help. It was… I was hurt pretty badly, physically, I mean. It took me months to fully recover and more than few years to try bottoming again.”
“First of all, no. You didn’t ‘bottom,’ Francis, you were assaulted. So drop the ‘again’ from your brain right now. Secondly, did you see anyone? For the physical or mental injuries?”
“No. I guess I thought I could use what I’d learned at that point and just take care of it myself. Which I did, and eventually I healed. I didn’t even think about going to therapy then, it was such a different time,” Francis mused.
“Yeah, that’s something we still have to work on to this day. What happened to the guy who assaulted you? Did you ever tell Padraig and Marcus?”
“Oh no, I couldn’t tell them. The so-called friend began to hang out with other people after that. Padraig and Marcus wondered about it, but they didn’t ask me and I didn’t tell. It was… I don’t know, a relief to not have him there constantly anymore.” Francis frowned. “I guess I healed and buried it deep, and then Mark had his moment and….”
“He told me that you don’t blame him.”
