Bear, Otter, & the Kid 03 - The Art of Breathing (53 page)

“I know,” Dom says.

“This isn’t what I want to be.”

“I know. Tyson, you know it won’t go away just like that.”

“I’m scared.”

“Of?”

“This. What if this is forever?”

“Then we’ll deal with it as we’ve always dealt with things: one day at a time.”

“She ran from us.”

He kisses my neck. “I know.”

“I ran from you.”

“I know, baby.”

“I can’t forgive her. I can forget her, but I can’t forgive her. No matter how hard I try. She ran from us because that was all she could do. She couldn’t breathe and so she ran and ran, and I think she’s still running and I don’t think she’ll ever stop. She has Izzie, but she’ll never stop running.”

“Some people can’t, Ty.”

“You can’t forget me,” I plead, and I think of my sister. “You can be mad, but please don’t forget me. Because I can never forget you. I’ll never be able to. I don’t ever want to. I want to be inevitable for as long as I live, and I only want it to be with you. Please don’t forget me. Please. I promise I won’t run. I ran like she did, but I promise I won’t ever do it again. We’re not the same. We’re not. I’m sorry. Please just say you’ll never forget me.”

“As if I ever could,” he says, a catch in his voice. “I’ve told you, Ty. You and me?” He holds me tight. “It might take time. It might be hard. But I will stand by you and I will help you breathe, and if there are days when there are earthquakes, I promise you I’ll protect you from anything that falls. We’ve had a long road. But it doesn’t matter. Friends until we’re old and gray. Beginning to end. Day after day. Because we’re inevitable.”

We stay there in the bathtub. As my world shakes and rattles. As I catch my breath. He must be uncomfortable, given how big he is. The hotel bathtub isn’t that big. But I’m just a little guy and he has me gathered in his arms. Eventually, everything stops moving.

Eventually, I breathe in and out.

Eventually, I feel safe.

My heart hurts. It might always. It was broken, after all. But it’s held together now.

Eventually, he whispers promises of love and loyalty in my ear.

I’ll say it back. One day. I think he knows.

Eventually, I ask him to take me home.

“Bear?” he asks. “Otter?”

I shake my head and kiss him gently on the lips. “You.”

He knows what I mean.

Eventually, we leave it all behind.

I
SLEEP
on the ride back to Seafare.

Almost the whole way.

And I dream of my mother.

She laughs, and I laugh along with her.

We laugh because the kite is so high it might never come down.

She looks at me and I look back at her, and even though what I had once hoped will never be, this is still a dream in my secret heart. And in my secret heart, the kite flies high, and the sun shines down, and she looks over and tells me she loves me.

And I say good-bye.

I
T
’
S
DIFFERENT
.
Seafare. Maybe it’s just me. Things just look different.

The sun is rising as we drive into town. The tide is going out. It looks more like the home I left behind than when I first came back weeks ago. It’s just different because it’s again the same.

“Can you stop?” I ask him when we come near a familiar section of beach. “Just for a minute. There’s something I have to do.”

He nods, but doesn’t question it. Dom’s good like that.

He stops the SUV in the pullout. “You want me to go with you?” he asks. He stretches in his seat, and his shirt bunches up, and I have to tear my eyes away from the skin revealed. He catches me and chuckles. It’s almost time, but not quite yet.

“No,” I say. “Is that okay?”

He reaches over and pulls me toward him. He kisses me sweetly and I think of stars.

“I’ll be here,” he says as he leans back. “Just don’t take too long.” There’s a heat to his words I can’t ignore. For the first time in a very long time, I feel truly and completely awake.

There’s no wind as I open the door. I close it behind me and look down at the water. The air is cool as I take off my shoes. I wiggle my toes in the sand. The sea grass whispers secret things to me as I walk through it down the hill to the beach.

There’s the cross Anna made for her. I pass it. It’s not what I need right now.

The sun is warm on my face. The waves are low. Seagulls call out overhead.

I breathe in. Salt and ocean.

The ground does not move.

The sea does not threaten me.

I breathe out.

It’s a start.

“Thank you,” I tell her. “For being my mom. I don’t know if I ever said that to you. Thank you.”

A breeze ruffles my hair. I close my eyes and lean into it. In my head, I hear bits of a bad poem from long ago.
She would have said family is all a person needs, and it doesn’t matter if they’re near or far. All that matters is the lesson we must heed; to know that this is us, this is who we are.

Then it’s gone.

I smile and wait for just a moment longer. It doesn’t come back.

That’s okay. It was enough. I know she heard.

It’s time to go home.

I turn and head back up the hill toward the inevitable.

I
T
STARTS
in the car.

Just a touch. He takes my hand. Caresses the palm. Scrapes the flesh with his nails.

He brings my hand up to his lips. His stubble is rough against my skin.

I’m shaking because it’s him and because I never thought we’d be.

I’m shaking because I’m scared.

I’m shaking because I can’t think straight. It’s all stars.

But I can breathe. Somehow, I can breathe.

It takes days, weeks, months, years to reach his house, even though it’s only a few miles away. He never once lets me go. He has to feel the way my skin vibrates. He has to hear my teeth chattering. He has to know I’m a mess. He has to know I probably always will be. He has to know there will come a day when my breath will stop in my chest and the earth will move beneath my feet again and I’ll panic. He has to know.

Still. He doesn’t let me go. It’s his promise without needing words.

The world goes by, the colors bright. I’m hyperaware of them all.

Eventually, finally, he pulls into the driveway. He turns off the SUV, and we’re surrounded by quiet. The engine ticks.

This is too much
, it says.
Too much. Not ready.

No
, I think back.
No.

“Ty?” Dom asks.

“Yeah?”

“We… don’t have to do this.” He sounds hesitant. Unsure. “I can take you home. You probably want to see Bear. And Otter. I know you need them.”

I turn my head, and he has a look of such earnestness on his face that it makes my chest hitch. It also causes my heart to race, and a strange, feral thing begins buzzing in my toes, working its way up, and I think
Now, now, now.

“I don’t want to go home,” I tell him.

“We don’t have—”

“Dom?”

“Yeah?”

“This is real? You want me?”

His pupils dilate. “Always,” he says hoarsely.

I’m in his lap then, launching myself over the console before I even know I’m moving. My mouth is on his, and it’s wet and warm. He puts his arms around me, his hands on either side of my head, and pulls me closer. There are tongues and teeth and our noses bump awkwardly, and I think of all the time lost, of the past four years, but then he grinds up against me the moment I press down and all rational thought is gone. This isn’t about the past. It’s not even about the future. It’s about the now.

“Ty,” he gasps.

“I need—”

“I know—”

“Please,” I beg and he groans.

“Not here,” he says. “Not here.”

Here is just fine with me. I lean forward again until our lips meet and I push down as hard as I can, but it’s not enough. I reach between us and fumble with the buttons to his jeans and my fingers hit the skin of his stomach and he grabs both my hands in with one of his, grips them tightly, and brings my arms up and over my head. My fingers scrape the roof of the car. I can’t move as he breathes heavily in my face.

“Inside,” he says, his voice a growl. “Not here.”

I nod. It’s the only thing I can do.

He opens the door and I move to slide off his lap (and run toward the house), but he only lets go of my hands, the rest of me still plastered to him. He moves one hand to my ass as he stands, lifting me up with him. I wrap my legs around his waist. There’s pressure building between us, and it hurts so wonderfully. He kicks the car door shut as he kisses me, and I tangle my hands in his hair. This is Dom. This is me and Dom.

I don’t know how he manages to open the door to the house with my tongue in his ear. I don’t know how we get inside with my dick pressing against his stomach. I don’t know how he navigates down the hall with his mouth on my neck, trailing his tongue down to the hollow of my throat. I don’t know how he does any of it. It doesn’t matter. I almost want to ask him if he sees the stars like I do, if they’re exploding for him like they are for me, but I can’t seem to find the words.

He lays me down onto his bed gently. He fills my world and he’s all I see. His eyes are so wide. His lips are wet and swollen. I still feel the burn of his stubble across my mouth. I’m shaking so hard I’m afraid I’ll break.

He places a lingering kiss on my forehead as he hovers above me. A kiss between my eyes. The tip of my nose. A brush against my lips. Our foreheads touch. “You’re shaking,” he says.

“Scared,” I admit.

“Of me?”

“Never of you.”

“Then?”

“What if I’m not good?”

“You’ve… never…?”

I’m embarrassed and try to look away, but he doesn’t let me. I close my eyes instead.

“Ty,” he says.

“Kill me now,” I mumble.

“Tyson.”

“What?”

“Never with Corey.”

“No.”

“Anyone else?”

“No.”

He sighs. “Oh, Ty.”

“What?”

“I’m not going to hurt you.”

I’m crushed. “Then let me up,” I say. I need to leave. I need to run. I need to run so bad. I struggle, but it’s no use.

“No,” he says. “You didn’t hear me right. Open your eyes.”

I can’t.

“Ty,” he says. “For me.”

For him, I’d do anything. Even this.

I open my eyes.

He watches me with such wonder. Such hunger. Such… love? I think it might be. Whatever it is, it’s for me. It’s all for me. “You didn’t let me finish,” he says quietly. He kisses me again. “I’m not going to hurt you. We’re going to go slow. Take our time. Okay?”

I nod, not trusting myself to speak.

“Say it.”

My voice sounds like his when I say, “Okay.”

My shirt is gone and then his is gone and he lies against me, and the weight of him is crushing, but it holds me down, holds me in place, and his mouth is on mine, over mine. My chin. My neck. My shoulders. He kisses my chest, and I breathe and breathe.

He takes his time. He goes slow. When he takes me in his mouth, I feel like fire and I cry out, dig my fingers into his hair and scalp, and he does things that I didn’t think were possible. I say his name, and he says, “Oh, Ty,” and can it be this good? Can it be like this? How did I never know? How did I never know it could be like this?

It hurts, later. I never thought I’d experience such pain. I cry out as my eyes water and tears trickle down my cheeks. I press my hand against his chest and say
wait
. He does, from his perch above me, sweat dripping from his nose onto my chest. He leans down and kisses me again, and I lift my legs around his waist. I can’t believe how full I feel and it burns as I’m stretched to the point where I think I’m going to be torn apart. I’m about to tell him,
No, I can’t do this, not yet
, but something gives. Something gives and I nod, and he pushes
forward
and the
stars
, my God, the
stars
that come then explode and I chant his name, I scream his name. He snaps his hips again and again, and it still hurts, but I’m riding on waves above the pain, in the ocean, and there are earthquakes, but they’re so, so good, and when he sighs my name in my ear, I explode, and he explodes, and I breathe in and hold. I breathe out and hold. I breathe for him. I breathe for me. I breathe for the years we’ve lost, and the future we might have, uncertain though it might be.

But most of all, I just breathe.

S
OMETIME
LATER
,
he shifts above me, and I grimace. “I’m sticky,” I mutter.

He chuckles in my ear. “It’s a good look on you,” he says, kissing my chin. “Ready?”

I nod.

He rises above me, and I wince as he slides from me. Holy shit, I am going to be fucking sore tomorrow. And I’m also probably going to sound like wind blowing over a bottle when I walk. I was initially thrilled (and a bit awed) to find Dom completely size proportionate, but now I think the circus freak needs to keep that thing far away from me.

I watch him as he turns and heads for the bathroom, my gaze never leaving that broad expanse of back. Okay. I lied. I’m really watching his ass. You would, too, if you could see it like I can.

I close my eyes and drift momentarily, not thinking about much at all. I can’t remember the last time that actually happened. There’s always
something
with me (it’s sort of my curse), so to have this quiet, this lull between the storms is something that I cherish. Even more so because it feels like it’s been given as a gift from him to me.

There’s warmth on my chest now, and I crack open my eyes. He’s smiling down at me as he wipes my chest with a cloth. “You got some on your eyebrow,” he says, sounding amused.

“I was very pent up,” I explain as he dabs my face.

“That what you call it?”

“Well, I might also be a shooter.”

“Good to know. Anything else?”