“Great.”
“Did you message me before or after that drink?”
“Does it matter?”
Aslan sighed, and I regretted my stubborn attitude.
“I can’t help you if you don’t want to help yourself, Diem.”
“I know.” Hadn’t Tallus said something similar about Darcy earlier? Christ, was I no different than a punk-ass nineteen-year-old? “When I’m stressed, it’s hard to remember why I want to be sober because all I want to be is numb. Making that phone call goes against the grain. I know you’re going to try to talk me out of it, but I don’t want anyone to change my mind at that point. I just want the drink. The escape.”
“I’ve been there. It’s a vicious cycle, and it’s lonely as fuck because the guilt and shame make you want to hide the truth from the people you love.”
I thought of Tallus and the pitying look in his eyes when I’d walked into the office. The way he already knew when I came clean.
“All my motivation goes out the window when I’m stressed, and I’m stressed all the time.”
That wasn’t true. I had been better lately. Stress ebbed and flowed, but it wasn’t a permanent state like it used to be.
Aslan leaned against his SUV and crossed his arms with a contemplative look on his face. “You go to the gym, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Daily?”
I shrugged. “About six times a week. It’s good for my mental health. Helps me not kill people, and I wish that was a joke, but it’s not.”
Aslan chuckled.
What I didn’t say was that without some form of release, I was bound to turn into my father, and if that happened, I would kill myself.
“What do you do on the days when you don’t want to go to the gym?”
“Never happens.”
Aslan laughed. “Bullshit. As a fellow strength trainer, I know there are days you just aren’t motivated to get your ass out of bed. What then?”
“I go anyway. Can’t wait for motivation to show up. If I don’t punch a bag or lift something heavy in the morning, my temper will surface with every stupid thing throughout the day. The energy I didn’t expend bench-pressing or squatting will build inside me. I get reactive. Easily angered. I have trouble thinking, working, and talking. Someone will get hurt.”
“Sounds like you’ve done some deep analysis on your sweat sessions.”
When you saw a therapist a few times a month, it was par for the course. They fucking analyzed the shit out of everything.
I didn’t say that and shrugged instead. “Punching a bag instead of some jackass’s face keeps me out of jail.”
“Fair enough, but what if you’re tired, or maybe your boyfriend is looking especially sexy and you’d rather spend your morning naked and fucking.”
I narrowed my eyes at the smug detective.
“Come on, Krause. You’ve been there. We all have.”
More than a million times. Had he looked at Tallus? Did he know how hard it was to leave his naked body every morning? It was hell choosing the gym over lazy morning sex, but I did it because I had to.
The prick’s smile grew. “What do you do? Sex or gym?”
“Both if I can swing it.”
“And if you can’t?”
