“With myself,” I admitted.
There was no use making something up; Logan was well aware of my…quirks.
“And…are you done now?” he said, playing along like I was a crazy person, which I was not.
Or was I?
“I think so. For the moment.” I shrugged as he blinked in bewilderment. An odd silence fell over us as the Boy’s voice still vibrated in my head.
“Do you want something to eat?” My brother swallowed hard, standing motionless. He knew that I wasn’t in my right mind and that one false move could trigger me in ways I wouldn’t be able to control.
“No,” I answered rapidly, ignoring my hunger. How long had it been since I’d last eaten?
Maybe that was why I felt lightheaded and so worn-out?
“You’re really pale and—” he began.
“And I need a good fuck,” I finished for him, and he gasped like I’d taken the lord’s name in vain.
Logan knew me very well and knew what I meant: I needed to relive my trauma to take possession of myself again.
I felt uneasy and profoundly troubled.
My eyes screamed my suffering at him.
“It’s not the solution, you know,” he murmured wretchedly.
I wasn’t having sex with the blonds as often as I’d used to. I’d been focusing on Selene lately, and now I was starting to lose the thread. I was really starting to feel the weight of everything pressing down on me: Player, his email to Selene, the webcam…
I couldn’t deal with all of that, let alone the Boy on top of it.
Whenever he showed up, he defeated me, and I sank back into the depths.
The only way to survive, the only way to reaffirm my value, was to seduce an ever-shifting roster of women and hurl myself into degrading sexual situations. I used my masculine appeal to overpower them and then observed, cold and detached, their erotic dependence on me, the same kind that I, as a child, had developed upon Kim.
Even though I knew better intellectually, I still couldn’t help the feeling sometimes that it was my fault.
I couldn’t stop telling myself that maybe I just wasn’t as good as the other kids, maybe I deserved what I got.
“Do you want me to go, then?” Logan didn’t take a step. He remained on alert, watching my every move. That was the emotion I inspired in my brother: fear.
“Yes,” I confirmed.No.I didn’t want him to go.
I didn’t want to be alone in my misery. I didn’t want to give in to the twisted compulsion to which I had been enslaved for so long.
When Logan finally shut the door behind him, I angrily stubbed out my cigarette in the ashtray and threw myself down on the bed. It was still cold in there, and I wouldn’t have minded getting a woman to warm me up. But that woman shouldn’t be Jennifer nor any of my other blonds.
It should be…Tinkerbell.
Fuck.
I wanted my Neverland and no one else. I wanted her silken skin, her clear eyes, and her coconut smell.
I’d left her all alone in Detroit, and I yearned to see her again, to make sure she was alright.
I wanted her. I was crazy, yes. Crazy for her.
I rubbed my forehead, which felt overstuffed with thoughts and fears. I needed to turn my brain off.
