“You hungry, baby?” Loren asked, and Eliot shook his head.
“No,” he said flatly, and he collapsed back against the pillows, already feeling worn out even by this brief interaction.
The side of the futon dipped as Loren came to sit on the edge next to him.
“I can imagine you’re feeling like shit right now,” he whispered. “Will you try to eat a little something for me? Please?”
Eliot couldn’t resist the soft plea, and he gave a reluctant nod, sitting up against the pillows Loren plumped up for him and accepting the half bagel he brought to him on a napkin. There was no goopy cream cheese on it, which Eliot hated, but a light spread of butter, soaked into the warm toasted bread.
He took a bite and chewed with surprising pleasure, looking at Loren through narrowed eyes.
“You remembered how I like my bagel, even after all these years?”
“I remember everything about you, El. I’ve never forgotten.”
Loren sat on the edge of the bed again, his hand resting on Eliot’s thigh, stroking gently with his thumb.
“How come you don’t hate me, Loren?” Eliot asked, and he grimaced to himself at how pitiful he sounded. Jesus, he was a needy bastard.
“Why would I hate you?” Loren asked with what sounded to Eliot like real surprise in his tone. “You can’t help it.”
Loren rubbed his hand over Eliot’s leg with soothing motions. “But you
can
make things better for yourself, can’t you? Are you off your meds, Eliot? Drinking a lot?”
“Talking to Dr. Devlin again, I see,” Eliot said with bitterness, putting down the rest of his bagel, the surge of appetite gone.
“I did, El, because both she and I care about what happens to you. She and I are in this together.”
Eliot shoved Loren’s hand off of his thigh childishly. “She’s not
in this
at all,” he said with biting sarcasm. “Her solution to everything is just to throw money at the problem and think that will make it all better.”
“I think this is her only way of coping right now, El,” Loren murmured. “She’s alone, and she’s tired, and she doesn’t know what to do anymore.”
“So now you’re taking on the Eliot burden, huh? Lucky you.” Eliot could hear the sneer in his tone, and he waited for Loren to get pissed off and tell him to go fuck himself. But Loren just smiled.
“I’ve got broad shoulders, baby. I’ll take on whatever you got and then some. Come here.” Loren opened his arms, and Eliot sat up and went into them willingly, burying his face in the crook of Loren’s neck, feeling him rubbing his back.
“I’m here for you, El, but I don’t want to sit by and watch you self-destruct.”
“Don’t you know I’m crazy, Loren?” Eliot said, his voice muffled against Loren’s skin. “Batshit fucking crazy.”
“Yeah, I think you might be,” Loren replied, his voice gently teasing. “And you’ve got issues and struggles that I will never in a million years be able to understand and empathize with. I just know that I don’t want to lose you, Eliot, not when I’ve just found you again.”
There was a brief silence.
“Help me to understand why you don’t like taking your meds,” Loren whispered into Eliot’s hair, and Eliot pulled away with an exasperated grunt, collapsing against the pillows again. “If they can and do help, I don’t get why you’d stop.”
“Side effects can be a bitch,” Eliot replied bluntly. “Tremors, dry mouth, lethargy, other… things that are embarrassing and just fucking unpleasant. I hate it.”
Loren waved his hand at the smashed table. “And it looks to me like this is a classic case of what sucks less, El. Some crappy side effects against shit like this?”
Eliot blew out a breath, struggling to find the words to explain. “Also, I was feeling so much better, Loren, and I thought maybe I could manage it now myself.” Loren just looked at him, and Eliot said, with an undertone of defiance, “People like me better when I’m manic. And I like how I feel sometimes when I’m manic too. Like I can do anything I want,
be
anything I want. Anything instead of what I really am, a loser with a fucked-up crazy brain, without a high school education and any kind of real future.”
“Well, you can’t change your brain, but I know you can change all the rest of that, Eliot,” Loren said, laying his hand on Eliot’s chest. “I have all the faith in you.”
“I don’t even know how to try anymore, Loren. Sometimes—”
“What? I’m listening.”
“Sometimes it just feels fucking hopeless. For a long time I did everything I was supposed to, and I did everything right, and the crazy came back anyway. I tried—I tried so motherfucking hard, Loren, for so motherfucking long. And I still ended up in the hospital.”
Eliot could hear the anguish in his voice, and when Loren replied, it was obvious he was struggling to keep his own voice steady. “I can’t even imagine how much that sucks. For both you and your mom.”
At those words Eliot’s eyes filled with tears, but he dashed them away. “I hurt my mom a lot,” he whispered. “And I didn’t want to. I’m not stupid; I know she works so much because her work is about the only thing that hasn’t let her down. My dad dumped her. I’m a mess—”
“Hey,” Loren interrupted in firm tones. “You’re not some asshole who’s mean to his mom because it makes him feel like a big man or less of a loser or whatever. One thing I haven’t heard from you yet is you cutting yourself some slack for something you can’t help. You can’t help it, Eliot.”
He tugged Eliot back up and into his arms.
“Just a few minutes ago, you were trying your hardest to push me away. Don’t you think you’ve been doing the same thing to her, over and over, until she finally let you?”
Eliot sagged against him, exhausted all of a sudden from thinking and talking about all of this. Loren picked up on it, and he gave Eliot a gentle kiss.
“We’ll figure it out together, El,” Loren murmured. “I’m not gonna let you push me away, and I’m not going anywhere.”
Eliot didn’t believe it, but he wanted to, and he leaned against Loren again, soaking in his strength, his warmth, his steadiness, all the things he hadn’t had since—
Well, not since Loren.
“HEY, JABBER.”
“Smitty!” Jabber’s voice sounded on edge, with a sort of controlled excitement. “I almost forgot to call you, but we’re rolling on the human traffickers tonight. Word is there’s a cache of weapons too, so that’s why we’re in on it and not just the Feebs. Want a piece?”
“Hell yeah,” Loren burst out, and then he looked over at Eliot, slumped on the couch beside him. How could he leave him after what had happened last night? What was it that Rebecca had said, that a rage may happen again and it may not? Maybe Eliot would be fine, nothing would happen, and Loren would have missed his chance to be in on a federal bust.
“What time you rolling, boss?” he asked. “I might have a conflict.”
“The fuck, man,” Jabber exclaimed. “Don’t miss this! We’re staging at the sheriff’s office on Jefferson, 10:00 p.m., with midnight rollout.” With that the phone went dead.
Loren clenched his jaw, and he watched Eliot for a moment. He seemed more down than overly agitated, and Loren wanted to scream with the frustration of not knowing what to look for or expect. Maybe Eliot would just sleep all night, and Loren would make sure he was back in plenty of time to take Eliot to his appointment with Dr. Babcock.
He looked at his watch. It was 5:00 p.m., plenty of time to make a decision before 10:00 p.m. Loren put his arm around Eliot’s shoulders.
“How you feeling, baby?” he asked, and Eliot shrugged. Loren tightened his arm and persisted, “Do you feel like you did last night when you got so angry? Is it the same?”
Eliot pushed Loren’s arm off of his shoulder and said, his voice irritable, “I don’t fucking know, man. All I know is that I feel really tired and definitely not like answering questions.”
Loren dropped the subject, and Eliot grabbed up the TV remote, flipping through the satellite TV channels so fast it made Loren, a channel surfer himself, dizzy.
At nine fifteen Loren had to make a decision. Eliot seemed stable enough to him, and the chance to be in on this bust would keep his name and face fresh in some important minds. If he acquitted himself well tonight, it could have some positive impact on his professional future.
Loren went to the couch and knelt in front of Eliot, putting his hands on his knees.
“I need to go out for a couple of hours, El, okay?” he said. “I’ll be back by the time you wake up, and then we’ll go see Dr. Babcock together.”
Eliot gave a distant nod, jiggling his leg up and down under Loren’s hand. Loren noticed faint gouge marks in Eliot’s palm. Unease slithered through him, but he tamped it down. Other than those two things, Eliot didn’t seem on the verge of a major meltdown or manic outburst. It was just typical Eliot weirdness.
One more second of agonizing indecision, and then Loren determinedly pushed to his feet, grabbed his keys and wallet, and let himself out the door.
AFTER LOREN
left Eliot sprang up and started pacing the length of the apartment back and forth, muttering to himself. Why did Loren leave, and why would he have to be gone all fucking night long? Eliot would bet it was because he was sick of him, and he probably just stayed all day because Eliot freaked out like a loser, and Loren didn’t want to let on that he thought Eliot was a worthless piece of shit like everyone else did.
Eliot’s agitation grew, and the black demon started whispering in his ear, telling him all sorts of horrible truths about his life, his sanity, his future. Eliot wanted to cry, but the energy was surging through him and he didn’t want to—couldn’t—sit still anymore. The blinking light on his answering machine caught his eye, and he played the message, thinking it sounded familiar, his mom inviting him to breakfast. Did he go? Did they ever have breakfast? Eliot couldn’t remember, and he figured he’d go over there now. Why the fuck not?
He banged out of his apartment and went to the nearest bus stop, pacing in front of the little enclosed bench thing. After a few minutes, the bus approached in a cloud of exhaust, and for one second Eliot considered throwing himself in front of it. Some fucking asshole was standing right where he’d need to be, though, if he was gonna get a good running start.
Fuck it. The bus doors opened with a hydraulic hiss, and Eliot stepped on board, wrinkling his nose at the sour smell of it. He usually kept his bus pass in his wallet and he didn’t feel like fishing it out, so he handed the whole thing over to the driver and told him to find it, ignoring the dirty look the fat fuck gave him and the muttering and pushing of the people behind him waiting to get on.
At last he got situated in a seat about the middle of the way down, and he jiggled his leg, digging his fingernails into his forearm and the palms of his hands to keep from screaming out his anger and anxiety. Where was he going again? He was so confused and he almost started crying, and then he remembered he was going to his mom’s house to eat.
The bus ride was long and excruciating, Eliot confined in a cramped seat next to smelly people who looked at him weird, and some of them even touched him as they went by, brushing against him and making his skin crawl. The black demon whispered it would be funny to hurt them, and bloody images swirled behind his eyes of fingernails digging into skin, gouging and ripping, ripping, ripping until there was nothing left but jagged bone.
He was sweaty and light-headed when he finally stumbled off the bus, and he made his way toward Dr. Devlin’s house, stopping in confusion when he noticed a strange car in the driveway. Had she gotten a new car? It was a sweet-looking ride, some expensive sports car thing, and Eliot ran his hand over the satiny finish, even bending down to rub his cheek against it. It felt so good against his skin. Arousal surged through him, and he decided after he saw his mom, he’d go find someone to fuck.
He walked up the front steps and banged on the door with his fist, again and again until it swung open and Dr. Devlin stood there in some silky-looking robe, looking stunned.
“Eliot?” she asked in a weak voice. “What are you doing here this time of night, honey?”
He pushed past her and went inside, heading for the kitchen and going straight to the freezer, where he yanked out a frosty bottle of rum, unscrewed the cap, and gulped several mouthfuls, reveling in the burn as it slid down his throat. His mother tried to take it from him and he shoved her away, enraged.
“Get the fuck off me,” he snarled, and she backed off, her hands held up in a nonthreatening gesture.
Eliot drank some more rum, wandering around the kitchen, not hungry but wondering why she would have invited him over for food if she didn’t fucking have any ready. Maybe he got it all wrong? He looked at her again through narrowed eyes, taking in the clingy robe and the high-heeled slippers. Ah. He got it.
“You want me to leave, Rebecca?” he asked in a silky tone, and the black demon laughed at her expression of hopeful relief.
She swallowed and said, “Eliot, you’re very sick, honey. Will you let me call Dr. Babcock? I can drive you to the hospital and—”
Eliot threw the bottle of rum at her and she ducked, the heavy glass smashing to the floor behind her. He was surprised she didn’t scream or sob, just straightened and looked at him steadily, although there was a glossy sheen of tears in her eyes.
“Remember when she told us about this, about what’s called a mixed state? Eliot, this is very dangerous. Please, baby, let me get you some help,” she whispered.
“I don’t need your fucking help, and I don’t need you,” he retorted viciously, taking a step in her direction. “You’re worthless, and it’s no wonder your husband left you. He never loved you, did he? I bet he was just around for the money and the free pussy.”
His mother’s face was bone-white. “I won’t discuss my marriage with you, Eliot. This isn’t about me and your father, it’s about you.”
“Bec?”
Eliot whirled around and saw a tall gray-haired man standing in the kitchen doorway, wearing a pair of silky pajama pants that matched Rebecca’s robe. He looked like an asshole, and Eliot sneered at him.