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Drew traveled by himself for the funeral, which I understood. He’s not out to his family. They’ve never met me, he could only handle so much, and he wasn’t gone long. To be clear, I didn’t expect him to come back in good shape—fuck, at the time I was just praying he’d come back at all.
But he did, and he missed me, and he needed me, and I was there, the same way I’d been there for him the night he got the news. He said he wanted me. Needed me. And I think, in a way, he did—because fucking him so hard it hurt was the only way for him to get the rest of his hurt out.
Yet, with all that, slowly but surely, he disappears. Everyone—Elodie, Mallory, Jeremy—tell me to give him space, but my instincts are to crowd him. Stay in his face. Remind him to eat, to work out, to get out of the building from time to time. He does the things, goes through the motions. He kisses me back when I press, and every night begs me to go harder, like he’s trying to use me to exorcise all his demons.
He asks me one night if I can read his thoughts.
I say, “Sometimes.”
Because it’s not like he’s all that unpredictable.
But he doesn’t like that. His gaze, especially at night, grows suspicious. Angry. Wary. He pushes me away when I get too close. We stop having sex.
I chalk it up to grief. I give him the recommended space. It’s not like I have nothing going on. The wedding overtakes our lives—our info dumps on Mallory to help her finish the book become more frequent and last late into the night.
Drew starts taking long walks, and every time he leaves, I watch him walk out the door terrified I’ll never see him again. That this time will be the last time.
With the wedding less than a week away, Elodie and I are both in the living room with Mallory as her questions come rapid fire. She has a million blanks she needs to fill in—more commentary or details about certain events. What our thoughts are on some of the juicy tidbits she dug up in her research.
It’s three a.m. before I’m dragging my ass upstairs hoping to find a sleeping Drew and not a paranoid, wide-awake Drew.
But he isn’t in bed. The bathroom door is closed, and I hate that. We all know the kind of shit depressed people do when they’re in a bathroom by themselves.
I suck up my courage and knock on the door.
“Drew?”
No answer.
I press my hand against my pounding heart. My stomach flops in on itself. I try the latch, and the door opens.
The first thing I hear is his heavy breathing, and I know—no matter what—it’s going to be okay. He’s alive. I can work with anything as long as he’s alive, but in that moment, I promise myself I’ll never put myself through a moment like this again. He has to get help. He’s sick, and we all know it. I was a fool to think he’d get better on his own.
He’s sitting on the floor, his back against the vanity, staring up at me with that paranoid gleam in his eyes.
I remain in the doorway, not coming any closer.
He’s got his phone in his hand, and he’s sweating, breathing as though through a straw, in and out and in again.
“I love you,” I whisper to him across the distance I hate more than I can even describe.
He narrows his eyes.
“I love you so much, Drew. And I can’t read your mind, but I need you to let me help you.”
His breath stops suddenly. He’s silent for so long I wonder if he’s going to pass out. And then he gasps, hard, his phone falling from his hand and clattering to the floor.
“Olivier?”
“Yeah, I’m right here, babe.”
“You’re right here.”
“I’m right here, and I love you so fucking much.”
“I love you, too.”
“Will you let me help you? I promise I’ll never do anything to hurt you. Do you trust me?”
