TABOO: THE COMPLETE SERIES(18)

“I can’t get over it,” he cried. “I try, everyday… fuck… all I want to do is forget but I can’t! I feel dead inside… so I thought why not match the outside to the inside!”

His hand was bleeding.

He was in tears.

In pain.

I didn’t know what to do, I’d never been so completely clueless.

Or so afraid.

“Let’s talk about it inside,” I said. “Just get up and come with me.”

“No!”

I squeezed my eyes shut, hoping it was a nightmare but it wasn’t. I opened my eyes and found him still there, on the stupid floor and ready to kill himself. The scary part was that for once I had no idea what to do.

I guess I was just going to wing it. I started walking up to him stepping on the shards with my boots. The glass crunched under my feet. Jake lifted the glass shard but before he could place it on his other wrist to cut himself, I grabbed a hold of him and pulled him up from the floor. My grip on his shirt was tight, and he stared at me with those eyes, looking more lost than ever. But the shard was still in his hand. “You can’t stop me.”

I pushed him back into the wall and grabbed his arm so he couldn’t lift it. Then, I used my other hand to pry his fingers from the shard buried in his palm.

“Fuck you!” Jake screamed, but he was weak and his resistance didn’t hold out longer than my strength. The minute the shard fell from his hand I kicked it away. He started lashing out at me, kicking and flailing his limbs and I had to restrain him. I pushed him against the wall and grabbed his arms behind his back so he would stay still.

“Go ahead!” he screamed. “Hurt me! Shove something else up me this time just make sure I don’t come back!”

I turned him around so that he would face me. I stayed calm. And I wasn’t known for my patience. To be honest it was tempting to hurt him again. To watch him in that state, all fucked up. Instead, I overcame my instinct for once and ran a hand over his head. I kissed his forehead. He wasn’t expecting that. “Don’t.”

But I didn’t stop.

I pushed him against that wall and I grabbed his shirt with two hands and I kissed him. Forcefully at first until he gave in. Fuck, it felt like what magic must feel like. The more I did it the more I wanted it. I couldn’t explain it but he unlocked a barrage of emotions that I thought I could never feel again.

I hated feeling that way because it made me feel vulnerable. And vulnerable was for others, people who I called victims. Because vulnerability was weakness. And weakness always came at a price. But at the same time, I couldn’t stop. When he finally broke away because he was short of breathing, I had to pull away.

We stood there, two stupid people, helpless. Fucked.

What the fuck had I gotten myself into?

This was supposed to be a game, so why wasn’t I playing it anymore? This was becoming stupider and crazier, and nothing good could come of it. My cock was so hard I could barely contain it in my pants. And that was the problem. Maybe he brought up something inside me that excited me in ways I couldn’t comprehend.

He was still breathless. “You’re hurt.”

It was the first time I noticed my bleeding hand. Must have happened when I was prying the glass from his hand. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s bleeding.”

“Let’s go back inside and figure this out,” I suggested. He didn’t leave right away. I could see the telltale bulge in the front of his pants so it couldn’t have been just me.

“There’s glass all over…”

“I’ll get someone to take care of it.”

He gingerly stepped ahead but I noticed his feet were bare. “Wait!” But before I could do anything he had already stepped on them and I thought he might have done it on purpose, but he was breathing really fast again, just like that other night. I could see the fear in his eyes even though I knew he was safe, I had a feeling it was all a bit much. All the drinking couldn’t have helped either. “Jake…” I was about to say something when he started to close his eyes and I thought maybe he was doing it to deal with the panic attack, but instead he went slack and his body landed on my shoulder. “Jake, hey!”

No response from his end.

I stood there for a long time just holding him.

I’m not the sort of person who cries, but if I did that would have been the day. Instead, I decided to be strong, the one thing I was good at. “It’s okay,” I said, as I gathered him into my arms and carried him to the bed. “I’ve got you.”





TREY


The silence was enough to give me rising panic.

“What’s wrong?” I asked but was afraid to hear the answer.

“I don’t know,” Weldon said. “But I have a feeling the entire bottle of vodka he finished off in the last two hours, might have something to do with it.”

I sat on the bed and proceeded to check his pulse. Slow but nothing alarming. That’s when I noticed the blood.

“He tried to kill himself,” Weldon said as though in response to all my unanswered questions.

“Not surprisingly,” I said. “After what he’s been through.”

“If you have something to say to me Trey, I suggest you come out and say it, instead of taking out your aggression passively.”