Rule #24: Wake up.
Hunter
My dreams are warped and restless. First, I’m feeling around the darkness for him, but my hands keep finding the wrong people. It’s all foreign flesh under my fingertips when all I want to find is the one my body knows by heart. Every time I think I’ve found him, he slips away.
Then, when I do get my hands on him in the pitch-black room, I feel the rope against his skin, but it’s wound around him too tight. It’s restricting his movement and his breathing, and I begin to panic as I struggle to find the end of the rope to untie him. He’s whispering my name, asking for me.
Hunter, is that you?
Hunter, get me out of this thing.
Hunter, help me.
But I can’t help him. No matter how much I try, I’m useless. The only thing holding me back is my own stupid pride and fear. Why didn’t I pay better attention during those workshops? Why was I always slipping away to do business? I should have been there.
Now Isabel is untying him and it’s not so dark anymore. She’s undoing his knots like it’s the simplest thing. Why couldn’t I do that? She’s staring at me with gentle impatience on her face—not anger because she understands it’s not my fault. But how long will she make this easy for me? How long will she allow me to fuck up before she’s had enough?
When she gets Drake untied, he goes to her. They cling to each other while I watch, but it’s not like before, when watching them got me excited. Now I just feel alone.
Someone jerks me away from them. It’s the asshole from the club in Austin and he’s pummeling his fist against my face. He just keeps punching me until he’s not that man anymore—now, he’s my father.
And I know why he’s punching me. He knows. He found out what Drake and I did in the dark room of that club and the sneer on his face is full of disgust and hatred. And I’m drowning in his disappointment. He never really liked me anyway, and maybe this is why. Maybe he’s always known.
His punches are accompanied by words like weapons—faggot, queer, pussy. I just let him hit me. I don’t fight or try to stop him. Just like the words, I let him berate me with the things that are supposed to hurt me, his fists and his insults.
But as he pummels me into the ground, until I’m nothing but a clump of broken flesh on the floor, I realize I don’t feel anything. The punches don’t hurt. And neither do the names.
They slide through me as if I’m being beaten by a ghost. Because he is a ghost. Even beyond the grave, this sad old man, who drank himself to death years ago, is trying to hurt me. But he can’t, not anymore.
And just like that, he’s gone. I’m lying on the floor of the ornate room in New Orleans where everything changed, and their faces come into my vision. They’re urging me to get up. They are naked and so am I, but I’m too paralyzed by the damage my father’s done to me that I can’t move. Even if there’s not a drop of blood on my face, I lie there as if I’m bleeding out.
Get up, baby. Come to bed with us.
Her voice sounds so real, my eyes pop open in surprise. Lifting my head from the pillow, I look around for her, but the room is empty. And so is my bed. Grabbing my phone off the nightstand, I check the time: 8:22 a.m.
Getting out of bed to find her, I discover the living room and kitchen empty. And when I realize where she is, I pause. What will I find if I go to his room and how will I feel about it?
I have no goddamn right to be mad if I find them naked, that’s for fucking sure. I’ve toyed with their emotions, forced them together for my own enjoyment, opened Pandora’s box. So I better be fucking ready for what comes out.
When I reach his door, I glance in hesitantly. My breath comes out in a quick exhale. They are sleeping in their underwear, their bodies entangled. Her head is on his arm and her leg is draped over him, the same way she sometimes sleeps with me. For a guy who almost never lets women sleep over, he looks pretty content with this one.
Seeing Drake is like being punched in the face again. I was an asshole to him last night. I’m fully aware of that. And I’m also aware that being an asshole in general sucks, but being an asshole to your best friend, who trusts you to not be an asshole, is an all-time low. I owe him the biggest of apologies and then I need to figure out what the actual fuck is wrong with me.
That blow job in the club was the best blow job of my life—sorry, Isabel. Although I’m sure she’d understand. Having his mouth on me and not a single thought in my head other than finally was euphoric. The dark room was exactly how I imagined it would be. Liberating, encouraging, sexy. For the first time in my life, I could have him in my hands and I didn’t have to think about what that meant or what would happen next.