Page 11 of Mine

“You don’t decide things for him.”

“Oh the fuck I don’t,” I told him, pointing. “There’s the door.”

He looked at Landry, but Landry was staring at me. Chris didn’t get it, but there was no way he would have. Our relationship was a twisted, codependent mess, but it worked for us, and within the snarl that it was, we functioned pretty well.

My restrictions on Landry let him function. Perhaps there was a better way for him to live, a way that didn’t factor belonging to me into the equation, but no one could argue with my results. The man had been on a downward spiral. I had seen his light going out, but now he was healthy and secure and successful, and between the two of us, me loving him, him letting me, we had done that. He was different now, but still, sometimes, he looked to me if things got dicey, if his space got too big, if he strayed too far from sight, from home. If he started to come undone, untethered, too buoyant, I yanked him back like a dog on a choke chain. It sounded bad, hard and brutal, but the domination soothed him.

When I said no, when I gave orders—come home, sit down, let me make dinner, eat, have a glass of wine, get in bed, kiss me—when I made him, he became grounded. At times his life snowballed, and that was when he needed me to make it stop. The minute he could take a breath and get himself centered, when he could feel the edge of where he belonged and what was his, everything was suddenly right again. Sometimes just seeing me did it, and other times he had to touch me, hold my hand, kiss me, fuck me; whatever he needed from me to show him where he was and that he was fine, I gave to him.

Of course, it was a fine line, and the reverse was true as well. At times Landry had to be managed, handled. There were, on occasion, times when I had to back off, let him make his own choices and let the man come to me. For the sake of his pride, every instance was not time for me to take charge. But I had to be attentive, to see when he was too angry or too fixated or too wound up to even respond to me. It was a dance and I knew the steps.

I had tried unsuccessfully on many occasions to get him to a doctor, a psychiatrist, a psychologist, or any of the number of nice people listed in his medical coverage brochure when he signed himself and his employees, all eight of them, up for insurance. He had been confused about why I wanted him to see a shrink. What, precisely, did I think was wrong with him?

Hard to articulate the way he came apart when it happened so fast. By the time I was squeezing him tight, he was over it and asking me what I wanted for dinner. The first six months we were together, I had thought maybe I was the one who went a little crazy sometimes; maybe I was imagining Landry coming apart so he would need me. But the fact that I questioned myself at all told me I was actually okay. The old catch-22 premise came in handy when figuring out who was really nuts. Not that I thought the man I loved was crazy, but I knew that he needed more than love and affection. I worried about me dying, not because of what that would mean for me, but more for what that would mean for Landry. His mental health was pinned to me and not himself, and while I didn’t want it like that, it was a great big ego charge to know that he didn’t just want me, he needed me, too. It was twisted and I needed to fix it. I just wasn’t sure how.

“I guess I’ll go,” Chris said, looking at me warily as he stood up, returning my attention to him.

“Thanks,” I said.

“I’ll walk you to the door,” Landry offered.

“I’m jumping in the shower,” I told him.

I was surprised that he didn’t bring his coffee into the bathroom and talk to me. He normally did that in the morning, but I was in a hurry, so it was fine. I shaved, looked at my eyes in the mirror, and saw how red and raw they looked. There was no amount of Visine that could fix it; I needed to sleep, and that was it.

I called for Landry once I was out and changed, and when I was at the hall closet putting my camel hair coat and cashmere scarf on, he came walking out of the kitchen.

“I made you breakfast,” he told me as he crossed the room.

“Oh babe, I’m not awake enough to even eat yet. You have it, okay?” I smiled at him before checking in my shearling-lined denim jacket from the night before for my wallet.

I felt his hand on my shoulder. Turning, I was faced with the blue-green depths of his eyes. “What?”

“I’m worried about you.”

“Baby, I’m okay, just go to work.”

“You’re tired,” he said softly, his hand sliding around the side of my neck, stroking my nape. He leaned me forward so our foreheads touched, inhaling me.

“I’ll be okay,” I assured him, smiling as I drew back. “I just need my sunglasses.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t go, huh?”

“No, I have to go, and you need to go to work.”

“Okay.” His voice dropped low as he closed his eyes. “But please call me if you need anything, all right?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “You know I will.”

“You’ll come home for dinner.”

“I’ll try.”

“Trev.”

“I don’t know what Benji’s gonna need. I don’t know if I have to go collect for him or pay people. I have to find out, and that could take time. I won’t know anything until I get there.”

“I can make pot roast. It’s your favorite.”