Like Breathing

by Tia Fielding

  “You have your first therapy session today, right?” Seth asked as he buttered his toast.

  “Yeah,” Leaf grunted. He still wasn’t sure about it.

  “Maybe Dev and I should come up with a reward for you for going?” Seth smirked, and Leaf had to laugh.

  “Sure, if you want to. It’s just….” He put his fork down for a moment to think about it. “I mean, it’s something I have to do for myself, you know? At least try. So getting rewarded for it would feel weird. Not that I don’t like the type of rewards you were thinking about.”

  Seth reached over the table and squeezed his fingers. “You’ll do fine. It won’t be easy, but you’re a strong man, Leaf.”

  “Thank you.”

  The toilet flushed upstairs, and they continued eating while waiting for Dev. Soon he came down the steps, adorably looking a little like Bambi with his shaky morning legs.

  “Sit down. I’ll get you breakfast,” Leaf said, getting up and kissing Dev’s cheek in passing.

  “Are you keeping an eye on the baby, Grace?” Dev asked when he noticed the orange ball of fluff resting against her neck again. Grace wagged her tail but didn’t move so she wouldn’t disrupt the kitten’s nap. “You’re such a good girl, yes you are,” Dev cooed.

  “Good morning to you too,” Seth said, aiming for a dry tone but landing somewhere near amused instead.

  Dev glanced at Seth, seemed to realize Seth hadn’t done anything to his hair yet, and affectionately mussed it before giving Seth a kiss. “Better?” Dev asked cheekily as he sat next to Seth and accepted the plate Leaf handed to him.

  Seth nodded. “Much.” He didn’t do a thing to his hair, though, and for the rest of their breakfast moment, their straightlaced professor sat there with his hair going every which way.

  ONCE SETH left for work, Leaf surrendered the kitten to Dev’s care for a while and went to shower and get ready for the day.

  He didn’t feel afraid because of the therapy that awaited him. After some soul-searching, he decided it was more like apprehension still. While he got dressed and made sure his beard didn’t make him look too homeless, he found himself humming some song he didn’t remember listening to consciously. It started to bother him, until he remembered where he’d heard it. Grinning, he combed back his hair and looked at the toiletry kit on the edge of the counter and the extra shampoo and shower gel inside the shower cubicle.

  Dev had invaded their lives in subtle ways, including his taste in music.

  “What are you smirking at?” Dev asked when Leaf went downstairs.

  Dev sat on the couch with the now wide-awake kitten toddling around on the cushion next to him. Grace had relocated with them and slept next to Dev’s feet on the floor.

  “I was just humming a song I didn’t recognize, and it started to bother me,” Leaf said and sat carefully on the other side of the tiny little beastie.

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, then I remember you dancing along with it while burping this little guy yesterday.” He stroked the cat’s fur with his fingers, smiling at him when he tried to wobble toward the edge of the cushion.

  Dev moved the baby and suddenly said, “Weasley.”

  “What?”

  “His name is Weasley, obviously.”

  For a moment Leaf didn’t make the connection, but then he remembered where he’d heard the name in a concept that made sense. “Harry Potter?”

  “Yes! There are so many of them and they’re all ginger, so there’s probably room for one more,” Dev explained, his eyes bright and gestures a bit wild like they were whenever he got passionate about something. He picked up the kitten and looked at it from every angle, then nodded solemnly. “You shall be called Weasley, and you will go do magical things!”

  Leaf was choked up as Dev, whom he’d come to love so quickly, showed just how amazing he could be by just being himself.

  “What?” Dev asked, turning his hand so Weasley also faced Leaf.

  “I’m so grateful that we met you. I love you.” Leaf gave Dev a wobbly smile.

  “Aww, babe,” Dev cooed and leaned in to give him a kiss, mindful of little Weasley.

  “I’m going to go walk the dogs, and then I’ll have to leave for the appointment,” Leaf said, sighing as they pulled apart again.

  “Yeah, I’d come with you for support, but….” Dev lifted the cat and Leaf nodded.

  “It’s the same with Grace. I’d take her, but she’d be distracted. She wants to stick by you two.”

  “Take Husky?” Dev suggested, looking at where the other dogs were lying on the floor.

  “Nah, I think I’ll handle this one alone. It shouldn’t be too heavy—it’s the introductory session. I’ll take Grace next time, though, if it seems like she doesn’t mind leaving Weasley behind.”

  “Okay,” Dev said, getting to his feet. “I’m going to go work for a while. I’ll go get the heating pad from the bedroom, though, since you’re going out.”

  “Or you could just slip him inside your sweater while we’re out and Grace will warm him once we’re back?”

  “That’ll work. Unless he gets very clawy, but at least his claws are baby-size.”

  “Yeah, I think it’ll be fine.” Leaf got up and went to pull on his sneakers. “Come on kids!”

  THEY WENT around their usual morning route, but Leaf didn’t stop to talk to the neighbors and other dog walkers they met like he usually might’ve. He told everyone he was in a bit of a rush, and the dogs followed him like always.

  When they got back home, he made sure the dogs were dry and clean, and checked the dog bed in the study for any sand or other nasties that might hurt the kitten.

  “It’s fine. I shook it out last night before bed,” Dev told him, smiling, at what Leaf was doing.

  “Oh, okay,” Leaf said, feeling bashful under Dev’s fond gaze.

  “Hey, I love you,” Dev said quietly just as Leaf was about to leave. “Drive carefully? And get lunch before the appointment, okay? You’ll feel better if you do.”

  “Experience speaking?” Leaf raised a brow at him.

  “Oh definitely. I could never eat after sessions, so I tried to do it before.”

  “Okay, good to know. Love you. I’ll be back in the afternoon.”

  “We’ll be here,” Dev said and got up to put Weasley next to Grace, who was pointedly staring at him by then. “Here you go. Your baby is just fine.”

  When Leaf turned away to go, Dev stopped him.

  “Hey, what was the song?”

  “Oh, it’s that one with Eden in it?” Leaf said.

  “Hozier’s ‘From Eden,’ then. It’s a good song. You should try to listen to the album during your drive maybe? Show me your phone.” Dev held out a hand, and Leaf handed his iPhone over.

  After a moment, he got it back.

  “Just press play. I queued it up in your Spotify.”

  “Okay, thank you, sweetheart.”

  “You’re welcome.” Dev gave him a quick kiss and retreated back behind the desk.

  Smiling, Leaf left the house. He hoped he clicked with the therapist and didn’t have to find a new one before he got started.

  LEAF DID listen to the album on his way to Denver, quite enjoying the sound. He found himself jamming along with the faster songs, and even tearing up a little on some slow ones. They got him right in the feels, as Dev would say.

  Leaf found the building where Dr. Lauren Reynolds’s office was and parked at a nearby diner’s lot. Then he went inside the diner and had some lunch, despite his stomach trying to disagree with him.

  He asked for coffee to go, which they were happy to provide, and walked to Dr. Reynolds’s practice. The receptionist smiled at him and told him the doctor was actually running early, so they might be able to begin sooner than the set time since Leaf was there.

  Leaf sat down to wait, and sure enough, fifteen minutes before his appointment, a blonde maybe ten years his junior peeked out from her room.

  “Mr. DeWitt, co
me on in.” She smiled at him in a regular-person way, not in a superperky-annoying way, which was already a good sign.

  Leaf went in and was told to take a seat wherever he wanted, so he picked a comfortable-looking armchair, and she sat at the end of a couch kitty-corner from him and pushed her black-rimmed glasses higher up her nose.

  “You should call me Leaf—nobody calls me Mr. DeWitt,” he said, and sipped at his coffee. “And I hope you don’t mind if I drink this?”

  “Oh, not at all, Leaf. I had my own dose of caffeine just before you got here, so I completely understand.” She took a pen from the holder that was on the nearest little end table and scribbled something on her notepad. She sat in a relaxed way, and her dark hair had been pinned back on the sides. Dressed in jeans and a pale blue button-down shirt, she looked casual chic and very approachable. “So, as you know, I’m Dr. Lauren Reynolds, and in the last decade or so, I’ve found myself with more and more patients who have very certain type of issues they want to talk about. In your case it would be the childhood you spent with what we know as the cult called Eternal Solace, and everything that ties to that, am I correct?”

  “Yeah, pretty much,” Leaf said, then thought about it. “I mean, that’s what makes me… me?”

  “I think Freud would say so at least,” she answered, grinning at him quickly. “Childhood experiences mold us, yes, but once we’re free to make our own decisions, I think we fix some things ourselves.”

  He thought about that and slowly nodded. “I suppose so. I mean, sure, I’ve repressed a hell of a lot of the memories I have”—she made a note of that in her pad, and Leaf smiled on the inside—“but I’ve consciously made sure both myself and my sister are fine. That we didn’t grow up to be like our parents.”

  Another note. “You said your sister, Rainbow, has had therapy before and suggested you might want to think of it too?”

  “Yeah. I mean, she’s been in therapy for a long time. Probably something like fifteen years, if not more. But recently I visited an old friend, acquaintance really, from the Solace days, and I talked with her and… I guess some of those repressed memories came back.”

  “I think we should look into that next time. Figure out how many of these memories you might have. Sometimes things in life can bring them to the front suddenly, even without having such conversations with someone.” She tilted her head as if to carefully choose her words. “Many people with history of being abused have triggers, whether they know it or not. I know patients who have had really bad experiences out of the blue when something completely mundane happened and some things popped back into their consciousness.”

  “I… ever since I started to really think about this, coming here, I’ve had some nightmares,” Leaf confessed.

  “Have you talked about this with your partner?” she asked, and he realized he’d only expressed that he was in a same-sex relationship and had been for a long time.

  “Uh, see, no. But it’s not that simple. I actually have two partners now,” he said, gauging for a reaction.

  She smiled, circled something in her notes, and then looked at him. “How about we just don’t get sidetracked yet and you tell me about yourself. What are your partners like, what do you do for a living, and so on. If you have any concerns, things you think you might want to talk about with me, tell me. Even if we don’t get to them today, I’ll make a note and we’ll go with it.”

  “All right, I can do that,” Leaf agreed. He took a deep breath and sort of huffed it out. “I’ve been in a monogamous relationship with my partner Seth for a decade now,” he started, and didn’t stop until his time was up for the day.

  On his way out, he remembered Dev’s suggestion. “Hey, Doc,” he said, turning back.

  “Yes?” She smiled at him, looking open and not at all like a stern authority figure Leaf had partially expected a therapist to seem like.

  “One of our dogs, the eldest, a pit bull, she’s a trained emotional support animal. Could I bring her with me next time? Or after that, depending on when I get to the heavy stuff?”

  Dr. Reynolds nodded. “Absolutely. Anything that helps you with your therapy like that is completely negotiable. I have other patients who have emotional support animals with them, so it’s fine. Just, as you arrive, you have to be careful with a bigger dog like that in case there are people in the waiting room.”

  “Yeah, of course. She’s a well-behaved old lady, but I get what you mean. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll see you on Thursday.”

  “Can’t wait to meet your dog. Service animals are so fascinating to me!” she called after him, making him laugh quietly.

  Yeah, he’d get along with this shrink just fine. It was the actual… shrinking that worried him still.

  THAT EVENING, after a dinner where he’d recapped the therapy session to Dev and Seth, they all gathered on the couch to watch Lucifer together. The show was so much fun, and Leaf enjoyed the play of emotions on Seth and Dev’s faces when something happened on the screen that surprised or amused them.

  They took a break to get drinks after one episode.

  “I’ll get those. I need to stretch my back,” Seth said, heading to the kitchen.

  Dev scratched his jaw and frowned. “I’ma go take a leak. Be right back.”

  Leaf stayed on the couch as Grace and Weasley cuddled on a dog bed nearby, with Missy on the floor next to them. They still needed to let the dogs out and feed the kitten before they could go to bed. Leaf had grown to love bedtime, cuddling up with Seth and Dev. They’d all been too tired for sex, other than leisurely hand jobs either in bed or in the shower in whichever configuration they happened to be at the moment. It didn’t bother him. There was more to sex than penetration, after all, and if he wanted more, all he had to do was ask.

  Missy twitched in her sleep, and Leaf frowned. Her paws were too close to the others, mainly poor Weasley, so Leaf got up and went to quietly coax her to move away. He knew that if he’d called her, she would’ve jumped up and startled the other dogs and possibly Weasley as well, so he gently tapped her with his foot until she woke up.

  “Come on, little girl, go to your own bed, okay?” he told her, making her happy bull terrier face light up as she wiggled a little, even while horizontal. “Go on, to your bed.”

  Missy got up and stretched, nuzzled his palm, and went to sleep next to Husky in the row of dog beds on the other side of the living room.

  Dev and Seth reentered the room at the same time, and grinned at each other. Seth went to put the drinks on the coffee table, and Dev walked directly to Leaf, asking for a cuddle.

  Leaf embraced him, amused and pleased with the way Dev seemed to want a lot more hugs recently. It was like he’d gotten over the initial hesitance and couldn’t quite help himself with the bit of neediness they all experienced nowadays.

  Leaf pressed his face against Dev’s neck and inhaled deeply just as Dev wrapped his arms around Leaf in return.

  The next thing he registered was movement that almost threw him back as his body recoiled from Dev’s grasp. His brain in full fight-or-flight mode, things became a blur, and when Seth’s panicked voice penetrated the mess in his mind, he blinked and realized he was somehow in… the bedroom? Under the covers?

  “Leaf? Honey? It’s okay,” Seth said, repeating it over and over again. “Can I come closer?”

  Leaf took stock of himself, realizing how hot he was under the blankets fully dressed, and pushed them off. When he let go of the edge of the blanket, his hand was shaking. His heartbeat whooshed in his ears, almost drowning out Seth’s words.

  “I….”

  A sudden, worried whine came from somewhere, and then Grace was there, pressing against him, clinging like a barnacle.

  He didn’t know what had just happened, but the expression on Seth’s face was so forcedly calm, it freaked Leaf out even more.

  “I… I don’t know w-what….”

  “I think I might know,” a hesitant voice, so unlike how Dev usually sou
nded, came from the doorway. Dev stepped inside the room and stayed behind Seth, cradling Weasley to his chest. “I think something triggered you.”

  Leaf opened his mouth, then huffed when he realized that was exactly what had happened. This was what Dr. Reynolds had meant. He’d been thinking about the past on the way home, and now this. But why Dev?

  “What was different about the hug?” Seth asked, and Leaf grimaced when Dev seemed to deflate, withdraw from them somehow.

  “I might know that too.” Dev extracted one hand from the kitten and pointed to his jawline. “There’s an annoying pimple I have there, and I put some tea tree oil on it when I went to the bathroom.”

  Tea tree oil?

  “Can you s-show me?” Leaf asked, nodding toward the bathroom.

  Dev handed Weasley to Seth and went to get the oil. It was a small bottle, but when Dev came closer, it was obvious to Leaf this was exactly what had triggered him.

  “Oh… oh shit… no, can you…,” Leaf stuttered, and Dev quickly retreated to the bathroom.

  Leaf could hear the clunking sound when the trash can lid closed and knew Dev had tossed the bottle. Then the faucet came on, and Seth turned to look toward the bathroom at the telltale sound of scrubbing. Dev was washing his face.

  “Can we come closer?” Seth asked, gesturing with the kitten.

  “Y-yeah,” Leaf answered, hating how his voice wobbled.

  Seth handed Weasley to him and rounded the bed to get in behind him. He spooned Leaf but didn’t press as close as he normally would. Leaf wasn’t sure if he hated it or if it was a relief.

  Dev came out of the bathroom and glanced at them.

  “I’ll go take the dogs out and make sure everything’s ready for the night.”

  Before Leaf or Seth could say anything, Dev was gone, whistling for Grace to follow.

  She did, after looking at Leaf in what seemed a very pointed way.

  “I’m okay. Go pee.”

  Leaf put the kitten on his neck, where he seemed comfortable for the moment. Leaf could feel Seth stroke Weasley’s face and smiled tiredly. It was as if he’d been run over.