Page 147 of Maybe You

Yes, he’s turned into a mushy fucking asshole instead of the regular fucking asshole he’s always been.

Also, a depressed, miserable mess.

His apartment, the one place on this whole planet that has ever felt like home, because it’s all his and doesn’t have any horrible history lurking around the corners, is all wrong now.

It echoes with absence.

So he stays in his office instead.

Holes up in there.

Grits his teeth.

Pretends.

Otherwise, he’ll go back.

And everybody knows what happens when he goes back.

He’s seen it before.

He tries to shut off his thoughts. It’s no use.

You hit him-you hit him-you fucking hit him.

But I didn’t mean to!

What a thoroughly, inconceivably moronic excuse. It’s a small step from “I didn’t mean to” to “Why do you make me do this to you?”

He should know. He has a lifetime of experience when it comes to violence. He’s seen it all, felt it all, has had the images and the bottomless depths of human ugliness branded into his brain cells with a burning iron rod. He’s experienced the aftermath in all its different forms. He’s been dragged back into violence, kicking and screaming, time and time again.

And he swore to himself he would never let the pattern continue.

That he would not live that life.

That he would not turn into him.

At night, he lies awake on the uncomfortable, too short sofa pushed against the far wall of his office and tries not to see Wren in his mind’s eye.

It’s been an impossible task since the moment he first laid his eyes on him, standing by the side of the pool, with UNIMPRESSED written all over him in big, bold letters. The look in his deep blue eyes. Arms crossed over his chest. The serious line of his unsmiling lips.

He was a goner, and he didn’t even know it.

Only, of course he did.

He fucking did.

Just because he closed his eyes and covered his ears, doesn’t mean the reality somehow changed into something that fit his narrative. Into something more palatable.

Of course, he fucking knew.

Why else did he keep showing up night after night? Because he enjoyed the smell of chlorine so much?

Why else did he make up stories and lies just to get closer? To have one more look? Because of course each night he went back was going to be the last. He was going to get his head out of his ass just as soon as he got one more evening with him.

He’s a fucking liar.

And he fucking knew.