Chapter Thirteen

 

Rory

 

Well, shit!

In the grand scheme of things, it made no difference that Adrian was a virgin. None at all. Except it made a world of difference when my intention was to drag him into my bedroom and fuck him good and hard just to break the surface tension that had been growing between us for weeks. Only after the heat was moderately simmered did I plan on having the boyfriend talk with him. In my fucked-up mind, that order of operations was acceptable.

That could no longer happen.

“I’m sorry. Oh, God, I shouldn’t have said anything.”

Adrian squirmed from my hold and tried to make a run for it. I caught his arm and pulled him back, realizing too late my reaction had given him the wrong impression.

“Woah, stop.”

He struggled to break free, but I pinned him back against the door, holding his face in my hands.

“Do not be ashamed of that.”

“But you stopped. I’m such an idiot. Just… can I go? Please.”

“No. And you aren’t an idiot. Knock that shit off. You… you’re really a virgin?”

He dropped his gaze as the surface of his eyes glistened in the moonlight coming in from the balcony window. “Yeah, all right. Go ahead and make fun of me. I get it.”

“Shut up.”

I kissed away another protest before it spilled from his lips, doing all I could to show him I wasn’t turned off. It took less than a second for him to melt back against me and return to the heavenly place we’d left only a minute before. Adrian and all his innocence would be the death of me.

When we finally parted, I kept him close. “I stopped because you shocked me. That’s all. I’m not turned off in the least. Believe me. But…” I hesitated, hoping he wouldn’t take my next statement the wrong way. “My plans for the evening did change.”

His brow scrunched as he studied my face, his hands fisting my shirt tighter as though bracing himself for impending doom. “What do you mean?” he asked.

I unpeeled his hands from my shirt and guided him into the living room. We’d always sat on different pieces of furniture, him in my chair and me on the couch, but that time, I pulled him down beside me. He watched with enough weariness, guilt snuck in and kicked me in the balls. I wasn’t the kind of guy who made a proper impression in the bedroom—even though I wanted to with Adrian. It had nothing to do with performance. However, my focus was always on the task and never on the emotions, because if there were emotions, I was doing it wrong.

Krew understood. Adrian wouldn’t.

Nor did I want him to when I thought about it. I wanted to be all those things I’d never thought myself capable of.

There were already more emotions tumbling around inside me than I could explain when it came to him. My “fuck now, figure them out later” approach wasn’t going to work. I wouldn’t be that guy who made someone else’s first time less than memorable. Adrian wouldn’t be just another notch in my headboard who I wouldn’t remember by the following week. He was already on my mind twenty-four seven which was how we’d ended up there to begin with.

Adrian squirmed, and I realized I was lost in my head again, staring into space. I needed to do something before I lost him, and he flew out the door never to be seen again.

Leaning closer, I turned his face with a soft touch to his chin and claimed his mouth. Kissing I could do. Funny, because it was something I’d mostly rejected in bed partners in the past. But Adrian… He was incredibly responsive, and the tiny noises he made behind our connection made my heart flutter.

I needed to figure out how to go slow, be attentive, and build a relationship. It was new territory for me, and the last thing I wanted to do was fuck it up. Adrian wasn’t just anybody. He was innocent to a fault, and someone like me could ruin him too easily.

Adrian showed more confidence each time our mouths met. He took everything I offered and soon gave back with equal fervor. A little kissing and exploring wouldn’t hurt, so long as I didn’t allow things to go too far. That was what a respectable boyfriend did. Or, at least that was what I told myself.

It was easier said than done.

Adrian didn’t resist when I guided him down on the couch with me lying on top of him. Without thought, I ran a hand under his shirt, savoring his soft skin underneath my fingers. His body’s definition was hidden under his preppy clothes. I couldn’t get enough. The more I touched him, the more I wanted.

The halting moment came when Adrian became brave enough to reciprocate the action. His fingers danced for so long at my waist that when he dipped them inside my shirt and began moving his flattened palms up my back, I jerked away from the connection like he’d electrocuted me.

With my sudden reaction, he tore his hands out of my shirt and tried to pull away. If I hadn’t been pressing him into the couch, I had no doubt he’d have been across the room.

Fuck! How… What… I can’t… Not… Dammit!

My brain stuttered, and I didn’t know what to say or how to react.

“What did I do?”

“Nothing,” I snapped, hearing the harshness in my tone and wishing I’d kept my mouth shut.

I sat back and moved away from him, which directly contradicted my statement. He sat too, but his posture told me I’d hurt his feelings. Could I fuck this up more?

“Look, Adrian.” I shifted and forced myself to meet his eyes. “I had every intention of bringing you back here tonight and fucking you senseless.”

Krew’s berating words echoed in my mind telling me I was being an insensitive prick. I didn’t know how to be anything else. Blunt, harsh, and a little cruel was the only thing I was anymore.

“I’m okay with that,” Adrian murmured.

“What?”

“I said, I’m okay with that. Being fucked senseless. I’ve been waiting for a long time for this day, and I’m on board. Let’s do it.”

I gaped, hearing him but not understanding him.

“Well, I’m not.” He flinched, so I kept going. “I like you, Adrian.”

“Then what’s the problem? Because I’m a virgin? Who cares.”

“I care. I’m not going to let your first time be me throwing you on my bed and pounding your ass until you can’t walk just to temper the heat between us.”

He cringed, and I didn’t need Krew’s reprimanding voice that time. I mentally slapped myself for my choice of words. If that wasn’t evidence enough I was incapable of intimacy and sensitivity, I didn’t know what was.

“Your first time should be… I don’t know… with someone who will go slow and ensure it’s really good. You know… share the moment.” Fuck I sounded so stupid trying to express myself.

He pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head before glancing around the dark living room. I should have really turned a light on for him.

“And let me guess,” he said. “You’re not that guy.”

I wanted to be so fucking badly. For Adrian. But I didn’t think I could open myself up like that. It required tenderness and honesty, two things I couldn’t handle. For all my life, I’d worked to stay closed off. The one time I’d chanced putting my trust in people I called friends, they’d destroyed me. I just didn’t know how to let myself be vulnerable anymore. And for whatever reason, it seemed ten times harder to open up to Adrian than it ever had when it came to Krew. I needed to learn how to be a whole different person, and for Adrian, I’d certainly try, but I didn’t know where to start. Transparency about my past was probably the obvious first step, but it wasn’t easy.

I knew I’d mulled too long when Adrian stood and moved to the door.

“Where are you going?”

“Home.”

I sprung from the couch and went after him, even though him leaving was the best course of action. “Adrian, wait.”

“Why, Rory? You know, I consider myself to be a pretty smart guy, but you have my head in such a knot right now. I don’t get it. You quit therapy, you bring me here, you insinuate things are moving in that,” he motioned to the hallway leading to the bedroom, “direction, and then you grind to a halt when you find out I’m a virgin.” After his spiel, he looked into a distant place inside his head where his wheels turned. Then he snapped his attention back to the present. “You know what, never mind, I’m not confused at all. I get it.”

He spun to the door and yanked it open, fleeing without bothering to shut it. The dull light from the hallway made me squint. He’d gone in the direction of the elevators. All I could do was step into the gloomy hallway and call after him because, with my anxiety spiking, I knew I could never follow him inside.

“Adrian. It’s not you, it’s all me.”

He laughed as he spun and continued his retreat backward. “Lamest line ever, Rory. It’s a classic, and maybe I haven’t dated, but I’m not an idiot.”

He reached the elevator and pushed the button while a wild debate raced through my mind and body. Everything I held so tightly wrapped inside started to unravel. The dark memories that haunted me seeped out and took control as they always did when the truth threatened to surface. If he knew. If he understood.

“Adrian.”

My feet moved on their own free will, tugging me toward him.

He glanced over his shoulder as the elevator arrived. When the doors opened, the blinding light halted my steps, and I brought a hand up to shield my eyes. There were still over fifteen feet between us, but the tingling discomfort raced to cover my exposed skin. I scratched my arms, listening to the rising pulse of my heart, beating in my ears.

I wanted to curl up in a ball and get away from it. My advance on Adrian and reasoning for chasing him down the hall became secondary, and I took a step backward instead of forward. Other than my increasing discomfort escalating by the second, the only outside thing I registered was Adrian watching me, his hand holding the elevator door open.

I squeezed my eyes closed. “Adrian. Please.”

He didn’t know what I was begging him for, because I couldn’t express any more than that simple plea. Please come back and talk to me. Please understand how hard it is to make myself vulnerable. Please understand that I bear scars from the day I lost all trust in humanity. Please let me tell you. Just, please.

His voice broke through the rising chaos in my mind just as I reached my apartment door again.

“Look at yourself, Rory, and tell me again how you manage fine on your own. Call the center. Tell them you made a mistake.”

He released the door, and it closed, extinguishing the blinding light disabling my thought process. I needed to escape, so I backed into the darkness of my apartment and locked the door, sliding to the ground where I sat and gathered myself.

He was right. I’d made a mistake. But the mistake wasn’t canceling my sessions, it was withholding the truth from Adrian for so long. In the comfortable shadows of my apartment, I sat on the floor and battled the darkness in my mind—the one that had held me prisoner for six long years.

If I closed my eyes, the nightmares I’d been fighting showed themselves in perfect vividness. All the emotions returned. The pain. The humiliation. The fear. The hatred. The anger. I couldn’t let it go. They chained me like a prisoner to a world I despised. Unbreakable binds that stole my freedom.

After a long time working to regulate my heart rate and stabilizing my head, I pulled my phone from my pocket and opened a message box to the only person who begrudgingly knew all of me.

I fucked up.

I dropped my cell beside me and drew my knees up, hugging them and burying my face. A furry body rubbed against my legs, and I reached out blindly to massage fingers through Samson’s thick fur the way I’d seen Adrian and Krew do on multiple occasions. His purr was like a blanket of comfort lately, although I’d never admit that to Krew.

My phone pinged, and I grabbed it, checking the message.

Need more, baby. What’s up?

I typed a single word and hit send.

Adrian.

His reply was immediate, and I could hear the implied tone behind every word.

Girl, do I need 2 write u a script? WTF did u do?

There was too much to explain, and the last thing I wanted to do was spill my guts through text.

Come over tonight?

Obv. B there at 3

The following few hours dragged. I worked some, smoked lots, and held off opening a beer until a quarter to three. When Krew came through my door without knocking, I was on my balcony, chain smoking and working on my second drink.

He helped himself to his own beer before joining me. Once he was comfortable with his feet kicked up in my lap, he pierced me with that look he gave when I tried to people and failed.

“Define fucked up.” He tilted his beer to his lips and drank.

“I closed my file at the counseling center. Ran into Adrian tonight. Told him. Brought him back here with the intent to fuck him, and then, found out he’s a virgin.”

Krew blinked, then blinked again. He placed his beer on the ground beside his chair and pinched the bridge of his nose as he fanned himself with his other hand in the overly dramatic way he did with everything.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I asked.

“Absorbing your stupidity, sugar. Shut up for a minute.”

It was those quirky actions that drove me nuts. Krew always had to perform with everything. I wished he would just fucking yell at me instead of absorbing.

When he finished his little calming exercise, he fluttered his eyes open and pursed his lips. “Okay, so first, tell me he didn’t declare himself a virgin, and you kicked him out.”

“I didn’t kick him out. But I did change my mind about fucking him.”

Krew flinched. “And why?”

“Because who am I fooling? I’m not exactly boyfriend material. I don’t do gentle and sweet.”

“And who says that’s what he wants?”

“Come on. He’s not you.”

Krew rolled his eyes so hard I didn’t know how he didn’t hurt himself. “Obviously. But don’t bullshit me, girl, I know there is way more behind this refusal then you’re letting on.”

Was I that fucking transparent?

“Stab in the dark, lovey. I’m going to guess how this went down. You were getting all hot and heavy with the guy, it was leading to sex, he announced his virgin status, and bam, you freaked out. Why? Because of a few reasons. One, you were involved in a heavy making-out session, which Rory Gallagher doesn’t do. Two, you wanted to make it special for him, but you haven’t told the guy your whole story yet, and during a sensual, sexual encounter isn’t how you wanted him to find out. Three, you don’t think you deserve him. Four—”

“Krew, fucking shut up.”

He listened but drank his beer with the smuggest of smiles. I hated when he was right, but more so, when he knew he was right.

I lit another smoke.

“I don’t know what I want,” I said after a few hefty pulls.

“Yeah, you do. You want to date him.”

“And how the fuck do you know that when I don’t,” I lied.

Krew set his beer down and slid to his knees.

“What are you doing?”

“Demonstrating.”

He shuffled between my legs, and I froze as his fingers worked loose the button on my jeans. I clamped a hand around his wrist, stilling him.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I asked between clenched teeth, my cigarette forgotten in my hand.

“I’m gonna suck your dick, you’re tense.”

“No.”

I shoved him away and did up my jeans with a look of disgust on my face. Krew didn’t protest or push the issue. He sat back in his lounger and retrieved his beer.

“That’s how I know. I knew the minute you turned me down a few weeks back. Not once since you’ve met Adrian have we fucked. Not. Once. And, sweetheart, I don’t give a shit, because I can get sex anywhere. But it told me then he was special to you.”

I didn’t respond. I focused on my cigarette and the clouds of smoke that disappeared into the air after each exhale.

“Rory, this is a good thing. Adrian isn’t going to hurt you.”

“I know,” I snapped a little too harshly. “Adrian… he lives in his own hell.”

“Then who better to be by his side than someone who gets it?”

I didn’t want to talk about it anymore. Every thought of Adrian opened a wound I didn’t know I had, and the rawness of the exposure hurt. I knew what I wanted, but I didn’t know if I could be that person.

“Oh, and PS, bitch, do you know how hard it was to find you help that fit within your vampire needs? What the fuck? How can you just quit?”

“I got enough shit to think about, can we drop it for now?”

Krew rolled his eyes and made a display of propping his feet on the railing as he finished his beer. “It was so much easier when we could just fuck that anxiety right out of you. You’re a bitch when you’re in love.”

I ignored that.