“How are you feeling, Noah?”

Farid’s hand was wrapped around mine, our fingers entwined. I snapped out of my reverie to look up at Farid, who sat in front of me.

Farid, with the patience of a predator and the observation skills of a hawk.

Farid, who had promised he would be stable, and that he would stay.

Farid, who was now my official boyfriend for about three months, though we had been dating for six months now.

The idea that I would never know if this was going to last didn’t terrify me. It was par for the course for any relationship, but I no longer thought about how the other shoe was going to drop. Farid had been a constant, steady presence through my life since the incident, and we’d spent nearly every day together since then.

Even Dan had to comment on it. “You’re both too sweet on one another!”

It was an exclamation that Theo shared, but he was happy whenever Farid and I had a date night, because Farid would purposely buy too much food so that there would be leftovers for Theo. It was just one of the few ways Farid was being considerate to the people in my life.

Farid was constantly reminding me of his feelings for me.

And I was growing to trust it more and more.

Farid and his family or their company had never been too involved in the workings of our start-up, but now Farid was spending every waking moment in our offices. Hell, he even had plans to rent his own office space in our building so that he could stay closer to me.

I told him it would make me happy, on a personal level, but never to do anything just for me.

“Bold of you to assume that this move would just be for you,” he replied when I spoke to him about it. “This city is a nice place to put down some roots, so that it’d be easier for people to contact me and make meetings, is all.”

I dropped it. Farid was a man who knew what he wanted and had the money to make it happen, anyway. I didn’t need to throw myself into his decision-making.

“Noah?”

I turned to look at Farid—my boyfriend—and I smiled. He looked handsome tonight, in one of his thousand-dollar suits and perfectly groomed beard. The watch he wore was some kind of expensive Swiss quartz. All in all, he looked just like the affluent investor he really was, complete with the posh accent that made everyone pay attention almost too quickly.

“Huh? Oh, I’m sorry,” I replied. “I’m good. I was just thinking about a couple of things.”

“Penny for your thoughts?” Farid asked.

I shook my head and smiled. “It’s nothing, really,” I started to say. “I was thinking about how lucky I am and how odd it is that I’m even in this position right now. A couple of months into a new relationship, but…I’m not scared. I’m not anxious. I actually feel secure.”

The funny thing was, every so often, I could still feel that same void that constantly poked its ugly head. I still heard some of the criticizing words and had the same feelings of inadequacy that hit me every so often. Whenever I saw someone stare at me, especially when I held Farid’s hand when we were together, I still felt highly self-conscious. I still felt like I wasn’t good enough for Farid. Maybe that wouldn’t really ever go away.

I put on my makeup like battle armor, but I also knew it had the effect of drawing attention to me. The eye makeup I put on, which gave me that flamboyant Captain Hook aesthetic I liked, was something that Farid quite liked. Sometimes, during sex, he would look at me and call me beautiful.

I told him to stop smudging my makeup. He thought that was funny, calling back to the first time that we kissed.

But still, the onslaught of emotions that overcame me weren’t always kind or positive. I learned to be more communicative to Farid when I was in a particularly low mood, and he learned how to deal with me during those off days. I began seeing a therapist regularly, and I learned to depend on Farid a little more.

Sometimes, I bring my previous boyfriend up from time to time. He knows it’s because in some small way, I still loved him—but to me, Farid was my future, and I talked about the past because it helped me make sense of the present. My therapist told me that I was going through something extraordinarily difficult. She said I was a survivor, and praised me for getting this far on my own, and that I wasn’t weak for seeking out help.

I didn’t quite believe her.

Something tells me it won’t be long before she prescribes some kind of medication for me, but the fact that I haven’t had an episode in a while, even without medication, has been a good thing.

And through it all, Farid was a constant, stabilizing presence. When I felt like I would spiral out of control, he could center me with a single sentence. I knew, always, to trust him—he would never spare a word for a lie. The fact that he spoke so little kind of helped that effect, too. He spoke the most with me, of course.

“I’m glad,” Farid said, nodding. “I’m your boyfriend. I should be making you feel more secure.”

“You’d be surprised how few people actually think that,” I replied to him, to which Farid shook his head.

“I’m not like other people.”

“I know,” I agreed. I believed it, too. If anything, that surprised me the most.

He smiled back at me.

A voice piped up from beside us. “Your order, sirs.”

The waiter placed our food in front of us. We were out of the apartment tonight, for the first time in a long time.

Honestly, I liked these nights out with him. Spending every night cuddled up against each other, sleeping while the television was on, was nice. Eating takeout or food prepared by a chef right at his ritzy apartment was nice, too. But now that I wasn’t so scared of the outside world anymore, and I wasn’t really doing dangerous things, I could just enjoy these nights dining out with Farid.

Sometimes, we would even go to a movie theatre and watch something new.

Other times, he’d take me on the cheesiest, most poetically romantic dates in the city. Things like going on carriage rides or going onto his yacht in the marina and having a date by the water, underneath the moonlight, were a not-uncommon occurrence.

But just because we were settling into something of a routine doesn’t mean it’s always been smooth sailing. Tonight was a good night, but I knew there would be tougher ones to come. There would be days when my doubt would get the better of me, and nights when I felt that void fill me again. But I knew I just needed to talk to Farid, and he would come up with a solution with me. Sometimes it would mean sating that void with physical contact—something that was happening fairly frequently, but that I enjoyed now because it meant Farid and I could have some rather rougher sex—and other times it would mean nights cuddled up together and streaming a movie or a television show.

Whatever came, however, I knew I could trust Farid.

Whenever a little part of me would break, he would be right there, helping me pick up the pieces.

And I would be right there with him, through thick or thin.

I loved him, after all.

But I didn’t want to tell him that just yet. Not today. Hell, maybe not tomorrow.

But definitely soon.