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“How long?” I whispered, focusing on his face to help with the overwhelming anxiety in my gut.
“About an hour and a half.”
I was sick to my stomach and afraid to concentrate on my memory. There were literally hundreds of new memories invading my mind and I knew the visions were of real events. Tears exploded from my eyes and I simply stared straight ahead and past Bo. I knew the truth. Everything. Like it was yesterday.
My sudden emotional response worried him. “Hey, baby. What is this about? Do you feel okay?” he pressed his palm against my face and held it there. “You’re flushed, baby.”
“Call me Hayes,” I whispered.
His eyes widened and he inhaled sharply. “What?”
I stared at him, numb from what I’d remembered. “My name is Hayes Crawford. I live in Charleston. My long-term partner’s name is Phillip Honeycutt.”
He studied my face carefully like he hadn’t understood my words. “Wait . . . what?” he asked. The realization of my words made their way across his face. He stood and hurried to the kitchen counter, leaning over the sink, his hand over his mouth as he attempted to stifle his pain.
I sat up, struggling to find my equilibrium so I could fully stand. With much effort I stumbled to a chair near the table for a moment before coming up behind him and wrapping my arms around his waist for support and resting my head against his back. He shook when he heaved with pain, stifled cries muffled in his hand.
“He cheated on me,” I stated, detachment in my voice as the reality of that and all of the other memories hitting me with a force I could barely stand flooded in. The recollections were coming in rapid succession updating my conscious mind fast and furiously. “I tried to leave the boat in the storm, Bo, because Phillip betrayed me.”
Bo bent over the sink and heaved into it, his stomach wracking in fits as he tried to clear an empty stomach. He was quiet but I felt the crying through his body. He slowly stood upright after rinsing his face with water.
“Look at me please,” I said, pulling on his shoulder.
He resisted.
“Bo, please turn around and look at me.”
He slowly turned around. His eyes were red and his lower lip trembled as he attempted to read my face. He grabbed the waistband of my boxers and leaned his head against me.
“I love you, Bo. Nothing has changed about my feelings. Zero. Do you understand me?”
He lifted his head and his eyes were reservoirs of tears. The dam was going to burst at any moment and he looked so incredibly lost. The tears finally lost their precarious hold and fell down the side of his nose in a river of pain. “Are you leaving now?” he asked.
I reached for his chin and squeezed it, maybe a bit too strong. “Of course not, baby. I’m not going anywhere. Nothing, and I mean nothing, is taking me away from you.”
“But . . . like, eventually?” he whispered, grabbing the hand at his chin and holding on for dear life.
“If and when that happens, I’d want you with me, Bo. There is no place on this earth I would ever want to be if you weren’t with me.”
He smiled through his tears. “You mean that?”
“I promise you that.”
We made our way to the sofa and sat side by side holding hands. I unloaded my life on him, catching him up on the early years and spending more time on the adult years. I told him of how Phillip and I had been together since high school, both of us sixteen at that time. He cautiously reminded me that ten years was a long time. I agreed and explained what the last four were like after college.
I was careful to accept equal responsibility for what had gone wrong with my relationship, being sure to state what it was I had wanted from the partnership, and how I began to understand that Phillip and I wanted different things.
“Phillip wanted to hide who and what we were to each other, Bo,” I began. “I couldn’t live the lie any longer. I want to be married and part of a loving partnership.”
I told him how we attended all social functions separately if we weren’t with people we knew were gay as well. Even family events were avoided as a couple in case someone Phillip knew might want to make connections that would help him climb the social ladder. With my father being connected to the upper echelons of business, there was no way Phillip would risk being exposed. I explained how Phillip had one dream and one goal only, and that was to rise to the top. If being in a loving gay relationship prevented that, he’d make the only decision that mattered to him and I would have lost.
“You must have felt alone a lot of the time,” Bo said, listening carefully and not passing judgment.
“I want you to know that I was on my way out the door when this accident happened,” I stated. “I had plans to speak with Phillip the following Tuesday when we got home, and I had already planned on leaving my father’s company, Bo.” I squeezed his hands and looked him directly in the eyes. “I was planning on starting over on Memorial Day and knew exactly what I wanted for my life.”
“And what do you think Phillip would have done when you told him?” he asked. “I know I’d fight for you.”
“How do you fight for someone that you hide from your own family, Bo?” I asked. “Phillip would have to go public with our relationship to have kept me, and in his heart we were not important enough for him to do that.”
