Fuck
. Nic had a bad feeling. But enough was enough. “Jus,” he said quietly.
If it was possible, Justice stiffened even more at the sound of his voice. He turned the rest of the way towards Nic, and the effect was striking. Not only because of the costume, but because of how absolutely wrecked he looked.
Those green eyes were almost black, and they were bloodshot. He had definitely been crying. Justice brought the clove back to his lips with shaking hands for another slow drag, while Nic waited patiently for…something.
Justice dropped the cigarette on the pavement, and ground out its sickly sweet smoke with his boot heel. He simply stared at Nic for a long moment before surging forward, grabbing Nic’s face and crushing their lips together. The kiss tasted of whiskey, tobacco, and desperation, and the combination made Nic’s stomach churn with worry.
Breaking the kiss, Justice rested their foreheads together, still clinging to Nic’s cheeks with his gauntleted hands. “I’m so fucking sorry.” His voice sounded so broken, Nic’s heart reached out to him, wanting to fix whatever had broken him. But Nic had a feeling it might have been him.
“What do you have to be sorry about, baby?” Nic asked, thinking he knew and probably didn’t want to hear it.
Justice sniffled and scrubbed at the tears that seemed to try and fall despite his will, further smearing his eye makeup. “I can’t go in there with you. Not now. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to.”
* * * *
Justice winced as he watched Nic’s reaction. Nic’s face hardened almost imperceptibly, his jaw tightening, and he slowly dropped his hands that had been grasping Justice’s shoulders.
“What?” he asked, in a flat voice with no discernible inflection.
Justice couldn’t believe he was doing this to the sweetest, hottest, most perfect man he’d ever met. He’d tried so hard to deal with the anxiety, because giving in always cost him so much.
He “baby-stepped” his way through getting ready, through standing up for Rory with all eyes on them. But he started to melt down as the happy couple had been captured for pictures, and the small wedding party trickled away to head to the reception hall. When he could no longer see Rory, feel his easy confidence in Justice, the panic started to trickle into his system.
Needing more time, but still trying to muscle through, Justice texted Nic to tell him to meet him at the reception. He had to get himself together. He had
really
tried. But his mind got away from him. He started imagining all of those heads turning when he walked in with a guy on his arm. He imagined the judgmental glances and the whispering behind hands.
Sure they were in Seattle, but half the guests were probably Catholic. They’d gotten married in a
church
, for fuck’s sake. Justice hadn’t even realized people were still doing that. Showed what little he knew about marriage —or about religion for that matter.
Then the epic clusterfuck of all meltdowns had ensued; full on dripping sweat, shivers, wringing hands, paranoia…he was even smoking. Justice didn’t smoke. Only when he was supremely, ridiculously stressed out did he smoke, and even then it was only cloves or cigars. The fact that he was on his fourth was an indication of just how much of a mindfuck he was in at the moment.
Justice tried to focus on the conversation with Nic, despite his dizziness and whirling thoughts. Nic was the last person he’d ever wanted to hurt.
When Justice said nothing, Nic kept talking. “You’re telling me this
now?
” He made a sweeping gesture indicating himself, and more importantly, his costume.
Justice hadn’t been paying attention, too wrapped up in his own shit. Nic was fucking gorgeous. He looked like some immortal archangel vampire prince, or some kind of shit. Beautiful in that devilish way that made you think naughty thoughts even while he slowly stole your life force.
The costume was spot on. Probably cost a small fortune. Justice felt even more like an asshole. He had to try and explain, but deep down, he knew that no amount of explaining could make someone truly understand his fucked up mind.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” Justice said. He’d opened his mouth to explain, but that was all that came out.
One side of Nic’s mouth quirked up in a poor excuse for a smile that Justice didn’t even deserve. “Yeah? Let’s go inside, then. You can show me off.”
Justice shivered and looked down at his steel-toed boots, another tear sliding down his cheek. “Can’t,” he said in a shaky voice. “I just physically cannot walk in there. It’s hard to explain.”
“Try.” Nic’s voice was hard, and brooked no argument. He crossed his arms over his broad chest and waited. Justice imagined him barely restraining himself from tapping his foot.
“I’m broken,” he said. “That’s the best way I know of to describe it. Things aren’t wired right in my head. When it comes to drawing attention to myself, making a spectacle…I’m just frozen in place. I can’t do it.”
Nic’s eyes softened, only from angry to sad. “I would have waited until you were ready. I just…jerking me around like this…kind of a dick move, ya know? A Colin move. I just thought you were different.”
“I was —I
am
. This disorder though, it doesn’t let me have what I want. No matter how much I want it. It’s a terrible burden for me to put on someone else, having to deal with my neuroses. I couldn’t ask you to compromise the things that you want or need, just to pander to my illness.”
What Nic said next was
not
what Justice had been expecting.
“Don’t be an idiot, Justice.”
“Huh?”
“Everyone has baggage, everyone has to adjust to one another when they get involved in a relationship. I live on a boat, for chrissake. How many boyfriends do you think that’s scared away?”
“Don’t wanna know,” Justice mumbled, tamping down an unfounded stab of jealousy.
“You have no idea what I would or wouldn’t have done. That wasn’t your decision to make! If I thought you’d stand by me the way I wanted to stand by you, I’d take on your neuroses, as you call them, in a heartbeat. Everyone deserves to be loved, despite, or because of, their idiosyncrasies.
“I’d have given you whatever you needed, had you asked, but I’m not going to help you hide from what you’re afraid off. Anxiety and fear are two entirely different animals, Justice. And I think you’re blaming the wrong one here.”
Justice’s head snapped back as if he’d been struck. Was that what he was doing? Was he confusing his disorder with his fear of coming out? Was there really a difference between the two?
Nic was right, he’d had every opportunity to back out of this gracefully, without hurting Nic. But he’d chosen to keep burying his head in the sand. He wanted to change, to be different, but he didn’t know how.
Nic sighed and wiped an errant tear off Justice’s cheek. Justice was helpless not to lean into the touch. “Ah, Justice. Don’t you know I was falling in love with you?”
Love? Wait…
was?
Justice’s head pounded and his vision wavered. “I wish I could give you what you need. I don’t even deserve to try. After what Colin did to you, I can’t ask you to hide with me…can’t ask you to wait. I wish I were free to be with you…but my disorder runs my life. I don’t know if I can ever be different.”
Nic pinched the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes briefly. “Shut
up
, Justice. Stop telling me what you don’t know or can’t do. What do you
want
to do?”
“I want to get my life together. I want to get better. I want to live my life without hiding, I just don’t know how.”
Nic nodded, gripped the back of Justice’s neck and looked deep in his eyes. “Then that’s what you’ve got to figure out. I’m not going to promise to wait for you,” he said with a sigh, “but I may not have a choice. I love you.”
“You’re serious.”
“As a heart attack. You get to a better place, and you feel like coming back to Seattle, look me up. I’ll want to see you.”
Justice couldn’t even fathom that kind of hope. He didn’t know what being able to truly count on someone looked like.
Nic seized him in a ferocious kiss, tangling their tongues and searing Justice from the inside out. Justice groaned and sank into him, allowing himself a moment to imagine the possibilities.
As soon as it had started, the kiss was over, and Nic was backing away from him, breathing hard.
“Goodbye, Justice. I won’t forget you.”
Chapter Twenty
Charleston, South Carolina
“How was your week, Justice?” Dr. Holloway asked. She was a plump, homely looking woman who appeared to be in her mid-to-late forties. She could have been any pleasant Midwestern housewife, but there was absolutely nothing that shocked that woman; Justice had tried.
Since she was his therapist, Justice had talked to her in explicit detail about all of his past relationships, and his current entanglement with Nic, sex and all. She’d never batted an eye at any of it, even with constant reminders of his “total gayness,” as he often called it.
Justice looked at the woman who was currently in the process of saving his life, meeting her direct stare with one of his own. “It was good,” he answered, one corner of his mouth quirking up in a half-smile.
“
Just
good?” She raised an eyebrow at him, familiar with the same tango they danced every time she had to coax Justice out of his shell.
“Yeah,
just
good,” he repeated, teasing. “I finished up all of my outstanding contracts for artwork, and I’ve held off from taking on any new ones. And the lease on my apartment is up in two weeks.”
“Mmhmm.”
He hated when she did her noncommittal humming thing. Why couldn’t she just save them both the time and give him all the answers? Of course, he knew why —because the answers were different for everyone —but that didn’t stop him getting frustrated when he had trouble arriving at the conclusion she was leading him to.
“I got invited to a Halloween party.”
“Really? Did you go?”
“Yeah,” Justice answered, smiling at the memory. “An acquaintance from work invited me —Shelby. I almost didn’t go, but I sucked it up.”
“This is the first social event you’ve tried to go to since we started your new medications. Did they seem to make a difference?”
After only their second session, Doc Holloway had switched Justice’s meds, claiming that the protocol he had been using wasn’t adequate for the types of symptoms he was experiencing, based on the latest research. She’d allowed him to keep his Xanax for panic attacks, but switched him to a new anxiolytic drug in combination with a beta blocker, which was used to combat the adrenaline that caused the physical symptoms of the panic attacks.
“I noticed a big difference.” This time, Justice allowed himself to smile fully. “I could tell when the anxiety started to ramp up, and I know what
would
have happened, but it was like the medication just…blocked my brain from going to that place. I didn’t even have to use the Xanax.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“You’re a genius, Doc.”
She rolled her eyes at him as she scribbled something in her notepad. “I’ve told you before, Justice, you can call me Jane.”
Justice shrugged. “Ugh, no. Feels weird. That’d be like calling my mom Millie.” His eyes widened and he clamped a hand over his mouth. As soon as the sentence had come out, Justice wanted to call it back. Maybe she wouldn’t notice.
Doc Holloway’s brows climbed toward her hairline. “You’ve never talked about your parents, not since your first session.”
Okay, she noticed. When he first came to her office, he had broken down and told her the whole sordid story of his coming out, the trip to Seattle and his subsequent relationship and breakup with Nic. He was basically losing it, and he’d needed to let it out before he exploded. He hadn’t wanted to talk about his parents again. Still didn’t.
“Yeah, well, they aren’t really a part of my life anymore,” he grumbled. He sounded like a petulant child, even to his own ears, but he couldn’t stop it. “I don’t even think about them anymore.”
“Justice, do you know what a Freudian slip is?”
“Oh, fuck me.”
“The subject right now is your parents, not your sex life,” she deadpanned.
“Doc!” Justice said with surprised laughter. He buried his face in his hands. “Holy Christ, what did I ever do to deserve this?”
“I’ll tell you. You grew up to be a decent, reasonably well-adjusted young man, in spite of your childhood and your disorder. You recognized you had a problem and you sought to better yourself so that you could get on with the business of life.
“I’m proud of you, Justice, and you should be proud of yourself. You don’t
need
your parents’ opinions or approval…but Justice?”
“Yeah?” he answered, scrubbing at his eyes that had gone watery all of a sudden.
“It’s time to talk about what you
want
.”
* * * *