He was on the verge of tears. I could see it in his eyes, glistening and full of suffering. And he was right.
I couldn’t pick Selene; I couldn’t make that kind of mistake.
I couldn’t condemn her to a disastrous life alongside me.
My brain didn’t work like other brains. I was a different kind of man, and not in a good way.
“That won’t happen,” I answered, looking at the mattress. My pack of Winstons was lying there, and I really wanted to light one up and exhale all my tension with the smoke, but I was too weak. My body barely reacted to stimuli. My muscles were shot, and my head was spinning.
If I’d tried to stand up, I would have ended up right back on the floor.
“It can’t happen. You can’t forget about what Kim did to us.” These words were followed by an action I hadn’t expected at all: The Boy pinched the waistband of his shorts in his fingers and pulled them down his slim legs. I frowned in confusion. He just kept going, though, hooking his thumbs into his boxers and taking them down as well, exposing his naked body to me.
The differences between us were immediately obvious: His little body was undeveloped and skinny, while I had the body of a grown man who had been wounded too deeply inside.
“Look at me,” he ordered, pulling my attention back to him. “Remember how it hurt when I ran to the bathroom and scrubbed myself and the skin wouldn’t stop burning?” he asked. I stared at the reddened area around his genitals and felt like the air had been sucked out of my lungs.
I remembered it all too well.
That skin irritation was one of the first signs something was wrong. It was something my mother should have noticed. She should have helped me, taken me to a doctor right away, but instead, the only treatment I had available was washing myself. It soothed the pain that I felt inside and out.
“What about these? Remember these?” The Boy continued tormenting me, lifting up his jersey. He had red scratches across his abdomen, caused by an adult woman’s fingernails clawing at his skin and at his soul. I could still feel her long nails on me, and when my lovers also had them, it gave me the exact same soiled feeling.
By that point, I had lost all control over myself, and the Boy was proof of that.
He used our shared victimhood to keep us bound together, and in this way, he made it impossible to maintain a stable relationship. Because of him, I couldn’t give myself over to anything except sex.
The Boy wanted me all to himself.
He wanted me totally socially isolated so he could force me to give up on the idea of ever having a better life. He suppressed my emotions, making me cold and often apathetic. He erected a defensive barrier all around me, cutting me off from anyone who wasn’t him.
“You’re selfish,” I told him with a bitter smile. I was struggling to keep a lid on my anger.
I could feel the tension in my nerves, and that was never a good sign. My patience had limits, and beyond them, I knew no reason. I did realize, though, that it wouldn’t do me any good to go at the pool house like it was my heavy bag.
It wasn’t going to make the Boy leave.
“We both know what you need…” He slowly got dressed again, never taking his golden eyes off mine.
Sex.
I needed sex. Not for pleasure but to violate myself.
I got to my feet, still damp from my recent shower. The smell of shower gel enveloped me, but it offered me no relief. I still felt so dirty.
I began pacing around the room like a maniac, trying to decide if I should get in touch with Jennifer or one of the others.
My contacts were full of blonds ready to fall at my feet, if that was what I wanted.
The problem was that while I did feel some arousal at the thought, it was minimal.
If I thought of Selene, by contrast, a devouring, unmanageable passion burst to life inside me.
“You lost control a long time ago.” The Boy read my mind, tracking my every move with his eyes.
“You shut up and piss off,” I exploded, glaring at him. He just laughed insolently.
“I live in your head. Where can I go?” He shrugged and remained right where he was.
