Surviving the Merge

by C P Harris

  I tried to turn away, but he held me in place by my chin.

  “Then I told him that if I ever see his lips on my property again, he’ll be the one that the neighbors hear screaming from their bedroom.”

  I knocked his hand away. “You have no right to―”

  “I have every fucking right,” he said in a type of calm fury. I wisely kept my peace. Arguing with him would only delay me in finding Max to apologize.

  Damon left me sitting there without another word. I hadn’t moved from my spot when, shortly after, he came down, hair wet and fully dressed. I flinched when the front door slammed behind him. I should’ve probably chased after him, but between my battered body, my bruised ego, and my blackened mood, I couldn’t move. My brain tried to send the signal to my limbs, but when I no longer heard the sound of his car engine in the distance, I knew it was too late. “Shit,” I said to myself, burying my face in my hands.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Damon never returned; he must’ve gone back to the city. I worked on the front of the house that day—grunting and wincing—but hadn’t done much else. Purely killing time until Max got home so I could clear up the misunderstanding. I took a couple more ibuprofen to get some of the swelling to my lips and face down, but there was only so much that modern medicine could do. It would go down on its own in a few days.

  I debated waiting until then to approach Max, but I wouldn’t leave him hanging simply to reduce my embarrassment. He won’t understand why I look like this, I thought.

  I’d just have to face the wrath of his judgment. It was the right thing to do.

  Nighttime approached, and I’d all but given up, deciding to head inside to throw myself a pity party. In the middle of making a drink, my ears picked up Pluto’s barks. I went to the window and watched Max enter his house via the rear door, Pluto at his heels. I exhaled, trying to garner the courage to make my way across the yard. I thought better of it and decided to walk around the block to ring his bell. Crossing his yard and knocking on the back door seemed like stepping over a boundary I was sure he had in place now. Plus, this bought me more time.

  I rang the bell, then stepped back to wait. I heard Pluto getting closer, the sounds of his dog tags jingling going from distant to near. The door opened, and I came face to face with a surprised Max. Pluto happily ran around my legs, and I bent down to rub his flank. Anything to not have to bear the look of anger and pity on Max’s face. I swallowed my grimace of pain that the action of bending caused to my overused body. “Hey, boy, did you miss me?”

  “Pluto, inside,” Max said. He didn’t want the dog to be my friend. Childish, but I couldn’t fault him for it. Pluto looked between the two of us a few times and then reluctantly went, releasing a whine from his throat.

  “Did he do that to you?” Max asked. At my confused expression, he pointed to my face and elaborated. “Your face. Did your husband do that to you?”

  “Oh.” I touched my cheekbone. “No. I bit my lip, and the swelling of my eyes and cheeks are due to... lack of sleep. It’ll be fine by morning.”

  Max didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t take it any further either. He crossed his arms over his chest and waited for me to state my business.

  “I wanted to apologize. First, for not mentioning that I was married. I knew you were interested. I should’ve told you right away that I wasn’t available.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me? What was your goal, Justin?”

  “A part of me thought that maybe I might be available,” I ended lamely.

  Max uncrossed his arms and put one hand on the door, about to shut it in my face. “Are you fucking kidding me right now?”

  I reached out a hand and held the door open, speaking quickly. “Look, I’m sorry. It was a shitty thing to do. You’re a great guy, and I’d still like to be friends if it’s at all possible. I’d still like to teach the kids down at the community center.” I held my breath, waiting for his reply.

  “I can’t pretend to understand your actions. You’re not really giving me much to consider here. And sometimes, Justin, ‘I’m sorry’ isn’t enough.” His voice lost some of its frost. “However, I would never let those kids suffer because my feelings were hurt. I’ll be in touch regarding the build-out, but no, we can’t be friends.” The door closed, and I hung my head, unsure of what to do next.

  By midweek, I’d managed to complete the front of the house, with no intentions of doing the back. I could look at myself in the mirror again―sort of. The evidence of my night with Damon had faded, but the humiliation from what I did to Max taunted me.

  I busied myself by going through some basic moves in the studio, trying to get a routine put together for the kids at the center. Only thing left to do was work on a playlist. Something not too intimidating. Not until I saw what they could do.

  Dancing always aided in relieving stress, but needing something more challenging for myself, I put on one of my favorite tracks: “Lonely Ballet.” It reflected my current mood, the title and the chords. I ran through my own sequence of leaps, extensions, and poses, with the somber soft notes of the piano as my backdrop. Lost in my own head, unsure of how long I’d been dancing, I was forced to halt mid-pirouette at the sound of an impatient bark. And then my arms were full of dog. I lost my balance, and we wound up on the floor. Smiling at how exuberantly he licked my face, I rubbed under both ears and raised my eyes to see Max filling the door frame.

  “Sorry about that. We may really need to get a proper fence put up.” He sounded put-out.

  “No, it’s fine, I don’t mind. It’s good to see that someone still likes me.” I pushed myself off the ground to Pluto’s disappointment. Max ignored my comment.

  “The construction should be done by Saturday. You can come by anytime to check it out and let me know if any adjustments need to be made. I’ll be at the center all day.”

  “All rig―”

  “You look better. Is everything okay with you and your husband?”

  The abrupt change of topic threw me for a second. “I wouldn’t know. He’s gone radio silent on me, which is not like him,” I confessed, tucking the loose tendril of hair that escaped my knot, behind my ear.

  “Can you blame him? I mean, don’t get me wrong, the guy’s an asshole, but I can see why he may have been a little upset,” he said, harshly.

  “Yeah, he can be an asshole, but he’s my asshole,” I said, not liking his tone. My behavior had been inexcusable. I owned that. But I wasn’t going to stand there and allow him to bash Damon for reacting to our kiss how any normal person would.

  “Too bad you didn’t remember that sooner, huh?” He didn't miss a beat.

  Ouch. “Touché,” I whispered. He was still in the doorway with Pluto at his feet, tail flapping back and forth. I took a step closer, “Look, Max―”

  “See you Saturday.” Turning on his heels and offering a sharp whistle to Pluto, he made his way to his side of the shrubs.

  No longer in the frame of mind to dance after Max left, I settled for brooding on the couch. I had my first shot of vodka and hoped to have the bottle emptied before the night was out. My decision to drink came on the heels of discovering I had five text messages from Blake. I sat there flipping the phone in my hand before finally giving in to curiosity.

  Are you ok? Don’t be upset with Damon. He did what he felt was right.

  Damon allowing Blake access to tend to me while I lay knocked unconscious didn’t qualify as “right” in my book.

  I understand why you did what you did. He won’t admit it, but so does Damon.

  I huffed. Blake obviously didn’t know Damon at all.

  Have you made much progress on the book? I can’t put it down.

  Julie says you haven’t returned any of her calls. She’s worried about you.

  I’m worried about you. I miss you. I love you. Find your way back to me.

  Anxiety stole the last of my strength, leaving me sick with worry. Blake was hurting more than I imagined, and s
uddenly, it wasn’t okay anymore. A wall had been erected between us, and I wasn’t sure where to begin tearing it down. What did one do when you loved someone so much but hated what they did to you in equal measure? Who did I turn to when Blake was the one I always turned to?

  Going into my call log, I dialed the only other person who’d proven they’d always be there for me. The phone barely rang before the call connected. In place of a greeting, I got, “It took you long enough, I haven’t heard from you in two days!” Taking her tone down a notch, she asked, “Are you okay?”

  Hit with a wave of crushing emotion, I closed my eyes and said on a shaky breath, “No.”

  “Let me carry some of it for you,” Sam whispered.

  The love those words contained became my undoing, and over the next several hours, I split my burden with her. And she carried it, like I knew she would.

  The feel of arms encasing my waist startled me from sleep. Affectionately encasing me. My heart stuttered within my chest, and my lungs seized. Twisting away, I scrambled to the other end of the bed, holding my palms up to ward off further attempts at intimacy as my eyes adjusted to the darkness. “Who are you?”

  “Damon,” he said brusquely.

  “Then... then why are you touching me like that?”

  “Like what?” he asked, before understanding set in. He snagged my waist and dragged me back to the center of the bed. Roughly maneuvering me around until my back crushed against his bare chest.

  We were silent, laying there in the dark listening to one another breathe. Starved for attention and reassurance, it felt good to be held. He eventually began to tug at my nipples, and the sweet ache had me pushing my ass into his groin. Yes, this is what I need.

  Damon stopped. “Not tonight.”

  I whimpered before I could stop myself. “Why not?” I asked in frustration. My body had been conditioned to require sex, often. Even more so when my emotions were unstable. It served as an anchor, a distraction, a way to feel alive. A reminder that I was loved. At the root of it, the truth lay exposed—I’m an addict. Damon made me that way. After years and years of this, one would think I’d feel sated, glutted even. But with every sunrise, my body would forget about the day—or days before. I woke up with such hunger, an aching need to be fed, and Damon always welcomed my starvation.

  “Because you’re not ready yet. Not after the other night.”

  Flashbacks of the mess we both made of me assaulted my mind. “I’m fine, Damon.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  I attempted to circle around in his arms, but his hold tightened like a steel cage.

  “What are you going to do? Hold me all night?” I asked, sarcastically.

  “That’s exactly what I’m going to do. We’re going to cuddle,” he finished, awkwardly.

  “Blake? Are you... what the hell is happening here?” I struggled to break free.

  Damon rose to a sitting position, allowing me to face him. “Are you trying to say I’ve never held you before?” he asked, indignantly. And if I wasn’t coming down from my sudden terror, I might’ve appreciated his pinched but adorable expression.

  “Does held me down count as holding?” I rested back on my elbows, looking up into his unamused face. “Because if it does, then yeah, you’ve held me more times than I can count.”

  “Will you shut up and lay down?” he snarled.

  He didn’t give me a chance to answer, again, I found myself being handled, and within seconds, the iron cage was back in place. Like I said, held me down.

  “Your hair is too long now.” He groped the strands from root to tip.

  “Sam’s going to cut it this weekend.”

  “You will not allow her to cut it short,” he demanded.

  I shook my head in exasperation at his high-handedness but stopped instantly when I faintly heard him tack on “Please.” Said gruffly, but said.

  He resumed his ministrations of my nipples. “You can’t keep doing that if it’s going to go nowhere,” I said, a begging quality to my voice.

  His arm slackened a fraction, and before he could speak, I flipped around, threw my leg over his hip, and grabbed the curly hair at his nape to pull him to me. The kiss scorched instantly, never any warm-up between us. We were on our sides, grappling for control, I made an effort to roll him on his back with the intentions of straddling him, but a firm grip on my ass kept me in place. The pillows had all fallen to the floor, and one end of the fitted sheet snapped free from the top right edge of the mattress. I tasted blood; his or mine was anyone's guess. Reaching one of his hands slightly above my ass, Damon snagged the ends of my hair and pulled. “Nnnh…” I yelped as our mouths separated.

  “I know what you’re trying to do, and it’s not going to work,” Damon said. Heat tinged his eyes. We caught our breaths, then I was held again.

  Resigning myself to the fact that he wouldn’t give in, I moved on to something new. “When’s Ashton back in town?” I yawned, no longer hiding my exhaustion. “I haven’t seen him in forever, it seems.”

  “Saturday morning,” Damon said.

  “Mmmm. How’s work? Wait, who’s been working?” I asked, concerned and curious.

  “We both have.“

  “Really—”

  “Now get some rest.” Damon used his no-compromise voice.

  Always so demanding.

  There were no traces of Damon when I got up the next morning, so I spent the first half of my day sprawled out in the studio reading All of Us.

  It blew my mind to read about some of the things that Phillip had gone through. And his wife stuck by his side through it all. If there was ever an exception to the “for better or worse” vow, what she suffered would be it.

  One of Phillip’s alters—Syn—was a sex-addicted lesbian. If Phillip’s wife refused Syn, that would lead to her disappearance, only to be tracked down and found hooking for sex and money, wearing next to nothing and heels.

  Sexual repression was Syn’s trigger. Phillip’s unvoiced proclivities that stemmed from being sexually abused as a child. Together, he and his wife redefined their sex life and the roles they both played in it.

  Learning about Phillip’s story made me feel a sort of distress of my own. As soon as Blake showed me that he was anything but perfect, I turned my back on him. I didn’t try to understand his side.

  No, that wasn’t true. I did see it from his perspective; it just wasn’t a good enough reason to excuse the pain that his actions caused me after the fact. Still, I knew I wouldn’t be walking away. I’d played ignorant to that truth the whole time. But between the debacle with Max, my phone conversation with Sam, and All of Us, it seemed wasteful to remain unenlightened. The question prevailed: how did we move forward?

  You can’t move forward without first moving, I reminded myself. Setting the book down on the floor next to me, I reached for my phone and then paused. Who am I even texting right now? Is it Blake? Damon? So much seemed to have changed since I left Kisla. I gathered that from little things Damon would say or wouldn’t say. Blake’s messages were also telling.

  Exactly how much progress had been made? What are they learning? What are they unlearning? Deciding it didn’t really matter who was on the other end, I extended my first olive-branch. Syn?? Unbelievable, right?

  I stood to pace the studio, biting down on my thumb nail, eyes never leaving the screen. Three dots appeared and then vanished several times. It was Blake, it had to be. Damon had no reason to hesitate. I imagined Blake sitting behind his desk, deciding on nonchalant or poor-your-heart-out. After a few minutes, he finally settled on a response.

  I couldn’t believe it either. I’m still not sure who of the twelve is my least favorite. Trevor and Malcolm hold the top spots at the moment, though.

  Trevor the abuser. I hadn’t met Malcolm, yet. I typed back, How far along are you?

  His response quicker this time. I’ve got four more chapters to go. One more alter to meet.

  Silence. Looked like neither
one of us wanted to touch the proverbial elephant. My phone eventually pinged.

  Take all the time you need. I’m not going anywhere.

  You don’t know that, Blake.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Now Friday afternoon, I found myself tumbling to the ground inside the front entryway after a wild animal crashed into me when I opened the door. Its brown mane blocked my vision, and its snarl wreaked havoc on my hearing.

  “Ow, what are you doing?” I could tell this was serious to her, but I couldn’t control my laughter. Sam was even cuter when angry.

  “I’ve got a bone to pick with you, Mister.”

  I loved it when she called me Mistah.

  “I can’t believe you told him things before me?”

  “Sam, you know more about me than he does.” We were speaking of Max. During our phone call, I’d filled Sam in on every square inch of my return to Chadwick.

  “Yeah, but he knew things that I didn’t. Important things!”

  “Like what?”

  “Like about your dad. And why you moved here. And... and more.” Her bottom lip poked out in the most adorable way. I fought back a smile, but she suspected one lurked and punched me in the shoulder before rolling off me and stomping to the kitchen. I got up to follow.

  “Sam, you’re my first friend—”

  “Your only friend—”

  “My first best friend—”

  “Your only best friend—”

  “Sam!”

  “Fine!” She whirled around to face me, jabbing her finger against my chest. “But he only gets to have you Monday through Friday. As your only best friend, I recognize that you need someone when I’m not there. As soon as the weekend rolls around, you’re mine, Buddy.”