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The hope is how I know the meds are going to work. Well, that and the fact that I stop wondering whether everyone who looks at me too long is trying to read my mind. The doctor said it might take up to two weeks to start feeling any different, but by day three, all of a sudden—hope.
I’m not saying I’m cured and ready to take on the world after coming dangerously close to plotting out a quiet death, but the weight holding me down is slightly lighter, and the sun shines a little bit brighter. And I miss Olivier like a limb.
I’d really been hoping to keep my shit together through the wedding, but when I pissed myself on the way to the bathroom that last night because I hadn’t been able to bring myself to move off the bed until it was literally too late, I’d known I wasn’t going to make it. The panic set it, and when Olivier showed up in the doorway afraid to get close to me, something inside me—some lingering sliver of the real me—reached out.
He saved my life.
The heavy melancholy is the first thing to lift. The depression lingers, but it’s the kind I’ve gotten used to. So used to, in fact, it’s hard to believe it’s not just my personality at this point. I guess we’ll see.
On my fourth inpatient day, I’m writing in my journal like a good little mental patient when one of the staff knocks on the door of my private room. Well, it’s private except for the window in the door for them to spy on me. Makes jerking off a little awkward—not that I have. My sex drive’s MIA, but at least I’m making plans for the future again—like I might need to jerk off at some point, and the window is problematic for my future horny self.
“You have a visitor.”
Fucking finally. I’d known not seeing Olivier for three days would be tough, but I was so miserable when they broke that bit of news to me, I would have agreed to a brain transplant if it made the misery stop.
However, it turns out, I depend on The Heir like I depend on the sun to rise. Not seeing him is like living underground. Buried alive.
I close my journal with the pen inside and roll off the bed, nearly falling on my face in my rush to get my shoes on. The closer I get to the patio where visitors are seen, the stronger my fear that it won’t be him becomes.
By the time I’m out in the sunlight, my palms are sweating, but then I see him, and all the tension leaves me in a rush.
We hurl ourselves at each other, and one more weight comes off. “Fuck, I got scared it wasn’t you,” I confess.
“Of course it’s me. I’ve been waiting at the gate since dawn.”
“Bullshit.”
“Well, I did get here before it opened.”
I laugh softly, nuzzling my nose against his sweet, citrusy skin.
“There’s my laugh,” he whispers, and it makes me want to cry.
He pulls away and looks at me, running his hands over my chest, up my neck and then my cheeks, like he’s checking to make sure I’m still in one piece. “How are you?”
“A little better.”
“Really?”
“Really. How are you? How’s the honeymoon?”
“I like all the nature up here,” he says. “And this view is amazing. Can I kiss you?”
“You better.”
He wraps his arms around me again, and our mouths meet, lips already parted and ready for action. All the blood in my head rushes immediately to my dick.
I specifically requested a medication that wouldn’t mess with my erections—sex is like the one thing I still sort of enjoyed up until about two weeks ago, and while the doctor expressed some doubt about whether it would be enough to help my depression, I have hope. And apparently Olivier’s been the one holding my sex drive hostage. Figures. He’s selfish like that.
But so am I, because I can’t stop kissing him. Can’t let him go.
The days following my father’s funeral marked a serious low point in my life. I was glad I’d been able to be there for my family, and despite the circumstances that brought us all together, I’d felt welcomed and loved. I even had the chance to tell my mom finally that yes, I did in fact, have someone “special” in my life.
But once I got back to the city, my fucked-up brain chemistry wasn’t allowing me to process the loss, and frankly—Peggy. Her rage is the polar opposite of my apathy—we’re like two sides of the same misery coin, and the first thing my therapist here suggested I do was block her number.
I hesitated at first, and then later that evening, when I picked up my phone, I got an instant surge of anxiety. When I remembered there was zero chance of finding my sister’s name on my screen, I realized how traumatized I was.
And I get that they throw around words like trauma pretty loosely here, but whenever I’ve pushed back on the term on the grounds of how mine’s not that serious, they say something like, “Drew, there are many kinds of trauma, and they’re all valid.”
