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At a loss, I asked, “Do you want a hug?”
That was my default comforting move, but he flinched at the very mention. “No. Please, just…don’t touch me. Until I calm down.”
Whatever that asshole had done to Neil to make him like this, I wanted to track him down and squeeze the air out of his throat. I was killing mad. My usually unshakeable Neil was fractured and falling now. Because of Stephen, because of Neil’s memories of him, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I had to watch helplessly as the damage the asshole had inflicted continued to victimize the man I loved more than anyone else in the world.
“Can I do anything for you?” I asked.
“You can let me drink myself into a stupor,” he snapped. “Without judgment or lectures about my supposed problem.”
While one part of me thought it was totally reasonable for someone to have a drink in this situation, another part recoiled at his defensiveness. It meant he knew his behavior was self-destructive, he just didn’t care.
He took the bottle and left the glass, stalking from the kitchen in a huff. His anger was only directed at me, I knew, because if he were angry at Stephen, he would have to remember everything that had been done to him.
I followed him. “I know you want to be alone, right now. But I can’t let you.”
He stopped at the bottom of the stairs. “Don’t be histrionic, Sophie. I’m not going to harm myself. I’m angry, not suicidal.”
“You shouldn’t have to be angry by yourself,” I insisted, walking up behind him. “Neil, just let me help you.”
“You can’t help!” he shouted. “Can you change the past? Can you stop this book from releasing?”
I was glad Emma and Michael had gone to the airport to see Runólf and Geir off. They didn’t need to hear us having a shouting match on the stairs. Especially not about this.
“Obviously, I can’t.” I tried to keep my voice down, but it was hard. I wanted to scream, but I wanted to scream at Stephen, not Neil. It helped to remember that.
“Then, you can’t help, can you?” At the top of the stairs, he turned for his den. Once he was in that sanctuary, it would be impossible to get him out.
“Maybe not help, but I can be with you so that you don’t go through this alone,” I argued.
“I did go through it alone!” He threw the wine bottle against the pristine white wall, and the loud pop of shattering glass startled me less than the sudden violence of the act itself. I’d never seen Neil so out of control. He was breathing heavily, staring in shock at the red liquid trickling down the wall and soaking into the carpet. He hadn’t just frightened me. He’d frightened himself.
“At least you’re not drinking it, I guess,” I said, just to break up the horrified silence between us.
“I’m sorry,” he said after a long time. “That was completely unnecessary.”
“Did it make you feel better?” I asked quietly.
He nodded, but said, “No.”
I stepped closer to him, wary. Never once, even in our hardest play sessions, had I ever thought Neil would actually hurt me. I didn’t believe he would now. But he wasn’t prone to such destructive outbursts, and I didn’t know how to handle him like this. I didn’t want to make it worse for him, or make him feel guiltier. If someone had done to me what Stephen had put Neil through, I would want to throw more than a wine bottle. I would want to throw furniture.
When he turned to me, his eyes were full of tears. “I’m so sorry, Sophie. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I think you scared yourself more than you did me.” I tried to laugh. It neither worked, nor helped.
“I hope that’s true.” The shame in his expression crushed my heart.
“I’m not afraid of you,” I told him, and I held out my arms. He didn’t reject my offer the way he had in the kitchen. He wrapped his arms around me, and I squeezed him tight. I’d get someone to clean up the broken bottle later. Right now, I needed clean up the mess with Neil.
“I’m going to call Doctor Harris the moment we return,” he swore against the top of my head. “I’m so sorry for my behavior this week.”
I leaned back to look him in the eye. “Neil, your mother just died, and you’ve just found out that the man who hurt you is going to write a book as though he’s the leading expert on your personal experience. All of this is happening within the span of a few days. So, you had an outburst and fucked up our wall. At least, this time, you didn’t take a bunch of drugs or contemplate suicide.”
He didn’t argue with me, though I knew he wanted to.
“Do you want to talk about what happened?” I’d never asked him for the explicit details of what Stephen had done to him. All I knew was that Neil had been bound, and he’d panicked. He’d forgotten his safe word, and Stephen had claimed he didn’t know Neil wanted him to stop. Neil had hurt himself struggling. That was enough for me, but if Neil needed to unburden himself, I could be the one to listen. “I meant it when I said you don’t have to do this by yourself.”
Though he didn’t answer me, we moved with the same intention into the den. He shut the door, even though we were alone. I sat on the couch as he paced around the billiard table, tapping his fingers nervously on the rail. For a very long time, he didn’t say anything. It was utterly sil
