“And if it hadn’t been you?” he asked softly, turning to look at me and let me see how deeply troubled he was. “You could fight me off. I guess I feel better about that. I know I ain’t gonna get the better of ya like I would someone else. But what if it had happened when I was tryin’ to sleep next to Clay? Or what if I’m sleepin’ back home and my mom comes in to wake me up and I try to hurt her? Clay’s big and can fight, but that’s?—”
“Not the same thing as someone trained in fighting for their life,” I finished for him with a wince. There was no need to address his hypothetical idea about his mother; she wouldn’t stand a chance. Worse yet, both would probably have tried to reason with Cade while he was in that state, not understanding the danger. I’d been through enough to know a threat when I saw it, and although I had known it wasn’t Cade choosing to attack me, I had realized it didn’t matter either. While he was in that state, he wouldn’t understand reality because his reality was something completely different, and while in that state, he was going to see people as threats when they weren’t. The only option would be to retreat or to fight back, and for your average person, fighting would not help them.
“Exactly,” he said, shutting his eyes tightly. “What if it had been them?”
“Okay, well, you should know that playing the ‘what if’ game is asking for trouble,” I reminded him gently.
“But…why is it happenin’ now? Why was it with you? I mean, I guess it was better that it was with you ’cause you could handle it, but,” he said, hanging his head and shaking it, “don’t make any sense. I ain’t never done this sorta thing before, so why now?”
I sighed. “I don’t know. There could be many reasons. Maybe on some level, some deeply unconscious level, you knew you were with someone who could handle themselves, and that meant you could let go of the brake a little. Maybe my being around has been more of a reminder of the team and the memories attached to them, and it’s pushing more to the surface. Or…I don’t know, Cade. I’m a failed soldier who turned into a failed, I don’t know…journalist? Blogger? Problem? I’m definitely no psychologist.”
“Maybe…maybe Isaac was right,” he said with a frown. “Maybe I should’ve been talkin’ to someone. Especially now.”
I was reluctant to agree, mostly because I had always avoided going to a professional. Not that I thought they were frauds, or as one person I’d talked to a handful of times had insisted, I didn’t believe they were collecting information to pass on to some shadow cabal waiting to take advantage of our vulnerabilities. I just didn’t see much point; there were things I had seen and done in my life that your run-of-the-mill shrink wasn’t equipped to help with. That was just as true for Cade, more so really, but it also wasn’t my place to dissuade him, not when he was struggling for some sense of normalcy and control.
“They have them here,” I said, remembering there were a few on staff.
He shifted uncomfortably. “I dunno if they’re the ones I wanna talk to. I see ’em, and kinda talk, but to like…talk to ’em? I don’t think I could do that.”
“What, like, you’ve become too comfortable with them? Like they’re too familiar?”
“Yeah.”
I thought about that for a second. “Well, there’s always a chance we could talk to one of the shrinks, or to Reggie, I suppose. They say that if there’s anything we need that they don’t have here already, we should contact them to arrange something. We could make Reggie put his money where his mouth is, I guess. Find someone you think you could talk to.”
He grimaced. “Ya think that’s a good idea?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I’ve never bothered with shrinks before; I just…never felt like they were going to do me much good. I’m not going to say it wouldn’t work for you. I mean, probably the only way for it to work is if you’re willing to try, which you sound like you are, so maybe that’s all that matters.”
“I guess,” he mumbled as he ran his fingers back and forth over my hand. “I’m really?—”
“Quit apologizing,” I said with a groan, reaching around him to grip him by the chest and yank him backward so we both ended up on our backs on the bed.
He glanced at me, blinking rapidly. “Seriously?”
“What? Am I supposed to act like you’re going to explode at any moment?” I asked with a chuckle. “Give yourself some credit.”
He rolled his eyes. “I don’t get why you’re okay with this. I could’ve hurt you.”
“That’s because you didn’t see my moves,” I said with a smirk.
He clearly wasn’t impressed by my supposed moves, but that was okay; I had handled things just fine on my own. Not that I enjoyed having to fight him, I could have hurt him as surely as he could have hurt me. The difference was that I was in a clear state of mind and could hold back from truly risking hurting him in my defense. Which I already knew put me at a disadvantage, because he had been willing to use whatever skills he still possessed to hurt me, clearly believing me to be an explicit threat. That could have gone in a worse direction, and perhaps there was some merit to him needing help that I couldn’t provide. Sometimes the best way to help someone else was to understand the limitations of your own abilities and let them do what they needed to do.
“This is serious,” he said in a pained voice that made me sigh as I inched closer, burying my face in his neck.
“Tell me how I can help,” I said. “If you want, I’ll message Reggie right now or call him. Or we can take a shower, or we can fuck, or we can talk, or we can?—”
“Walk?” he offered hopefully, as if I hadn’t just literally told him I was willing to do whatever it was he needed.
“Then we walk,” I said, getting off the bed and hunting for my clothes. “I kind of forgot that was always your thing back then.”
“Walkin’ lets me clear my head,” he said as he pulled on his clothing as well while we hunted down our shoes. “Clay was always wantin’ to work out when he was havin’ a bad day, but that’s always been a bad idea for me. He always overdid it, but I knew I’d be worse.”
“I can’t say shit, because Lord knows I’ve been guilty of overdoing it when I’m in a mood,” I said as I shoved my shoe on and grabbed a bottle of water each.
“Thanks,” he said as we stepped out into the hallway. “I used to do this a lot. Especially the first time I ever came here.”
“Walk around in the middle of the night?” I asked.
